CHAPTER XV.

There little love or canty cheer can come Frae duddy doublets and a pantry toom.

Allan Ramsay.

As De Molton expected, the quarters of his regiment were changed; and soon after Blanche's confinement, he left her to superintend the removal of their goods and chattels, and the arrangement of them in some other temporary domicile.

Unfortunately, the regiment was sent to a small town, built principally of red brick, situated in one of the midland counties,--ugly, bare, and bleak. There were no pretty cottages with nice gardens in the neighbourhood; not even a retired farm house, with a few rooms to be let; for the rustic inconveniences and rural inelegancies of a rambling farm house are infinitely preferable to the pert vulgarity of a red house in a street.

To this last alternative De Molton was most unwillingly reduced, and all he could accomplish was the acquisition of one of the few tenements to which was affixed a bright light-green balcony, which formed a brilliant contrast to the vermilion of the walls; at least, the untarnished freshness of the colouring gave promise of new furniture and cleanliness within.

He returned to London for his wife and child, and his delight at seeing them was somewhat alloyed by finding that, during his absence, Blanche and her father had ascertained that Turton was very little out of the way to Temple Loseley, and that, consequently, he and her mother would pass a night or two with Blanche on their way into the country.

If his heart had sunk within him at the thoughts of introducing his wife to the vulgar abode which he had been obliged to provide for her, how much more did it sink at the thoughts of exhibiting to her parents their graceful, their beautiful, their high-born daughter, as mistress of this same abode. Moreover, the house was not calculated to receive an influx of company.

Still every one ought to be proud and happy to receive their father and mother-in-law under their roof; and he was determined to be so. He reminded himself that, though he was poor, he had never pretended to be otherwise, he never would pretend to be otherwise: there was no disgrace in poverty; he had presented himself under no false colours; he knew his own situation, and he would not throw a ridicule over it by seeming ashamed of it.

Blanche had pictured to herself another cottage, of the same stamp as that in Devonshire: and as the country was now in full beauty, and as there was no occasion to put the chimneys to the test, she anticipated with pleasure showing her mother how happy and how pretty an humble home might be; how dignified De Molton could look, though employed in working in his garden; and how little she deserved the pity that had been lavished upon her.

She was extremely vexed when her dear Frank broke to her the nature of the country, the situation of the town, the sort of house he had been compelled to hire.

"Is there nothing else to be procured for love or money?"

"For money, yes; for love, not!" he replied.

"But if something else is to be got, for Heaven's sake make any sacrifice!"

"There is one house much larger than we require, which has been fitted up with every luxury by a retired brewer, who now wishes to travel, and would gladly let it."

"Oh, that will be just the thing!"

"My dear! the rent is far, far beyond our means."

"Oh! but for one year, dearest Frank!"

"With a limited income, one year's extravagance unavoidably entails many, many years of real distress. I will not run the risk of being unable to answer the just demands of my tradesmen. I never sent a creditor away without his money, and I never will."

De Molton spoke with seriousness, and something approaching harshness; for he suffered under the mortification of his wife, and the tone was meant to confirm his own determination, not to be unkind to her. She thought him stern.

"We had much better put off papa and mamma, and say at once we cannot receive them."

Her tone was a little pettish. De Molton's task was no longer so difficult; he dreaded seeing her unhappy, but the moment he perceived there was temper mixed with her sorrow, his fortitude returned, and he replied, "By no means: such as it is, our home is ever open to our parents; and we have only to regret that it is not in our power to make them more comfortable."

"I had a thousand times rather mamma did not come at all, than that she should see me in such a hole as you describe."

Her voice was half choked with rising emotion: she had led her mother to expect something so very different! The Devonshire cottage had grown under her glowing descriptions into a miniature terrestrial paradise.

"Blanche, this is not kind by your parents; you should wish to see them for their own sakes." Certainly De Molton did not wish to see them, but he would not have pleaded guilty to such a weakness for the world.

"I do not know how I can wish to be exposed to mamma's taunting expressions and contemptuous looks;" and partly from vexation, and partly from bodily weakness, she burst into tears.

"Blanche, this is childish! You chose to marry a poor man, and you must abide by it."

"You should not be the person to speak so coldly and unkindly. You know the thing I mind most of all is, that mamma always seems to despise you; and I had hoped to show her that, though we were poor, we did not deserve pity." Her sobs here interrupted her words. In addition to her other mortifications, she felt injured by the husband whose dignity she was so anxious to uphold.

De Molton was quite overcome by finding it was for him her feelings were so strongly excited. "Blanche, dearest Blanche!" he exclaimed, "you do not think me ungrateful for all you have given up for my sake! Oh no! you cannot think that!" And he soothed her by every attention and kindness in his power.

The effervescence of her mortification and vexation had exhausted itself, and she was sorry to have wounded him; he was also annoyed at having allowed an unkind word to escape his lips; and they were still sufficiently lovers for their little quarrel to be almost a renewal of love: almost,--but not quite. Blanche could not forget that he had said, "You have married a poor man, and you must abide by it;" and De Molton remembered that she had said, "She should be ashamed to be seen in such a hole" as the only home he could take her to.

These words recurred to his mind more and more frequently as they drew near the small town of Turton. He felt quite angry with the Horse-guards for having built any barracks in so frightful a country as that which they were approaching. It was all arable: but there were no enclosures, no hedges, no hill, no dale, no woods, no copses; merely a succession of fields; in the highest state of cultivation it is true, but that circumstance did not add to their beauty in Blanche's eyes. She would gladly have seen the wheat enlivened by some brilliant scarlet poppies, some beautiful old-fashioned blue corn-flowers, now almost exploded by the improvements in agriculture; she would gladly have been greeted with the fragrance of a distant field of charlock.

They had a good view of Turton long before they reached it; for it was placed in the midst of a large basin of land, divided into squares by the various crops, though by no other visible mark. From the last hill, as they looked down into the broad vale below, De Molton felt responsible for its ugliness, and tried to carry off a sensation something resembling shame, by remarking that, though such scenery was not to our English eyes picturesque, it was very like "la belle France." The day was grey and colourless: there were no gleams of sunshine, no passing shadows, which will invest any extensive view with a certain degree of beauty. The wheat was all green, the barley was green, the oats were green, the tares were green, the clover was green; there was no variety of hue, except where, here and there, a field lay fallow, or had been newly ploughed up.

De Molton looked cheerlessly upon Blanche's spiritless face, and fairly wished the first evening in their new domicile come and gone. Blanche wished, upon her arrival, to be able to say she found it better than she expected, but the words died away upon her lips. She walked to the window, and looked up and down the straight street. There was the lawyer's house opposite, with a brass knocker well polished; then came the Sun Inn, all new, and red, and staring; then a paltry shop; and then the apothecary's door, surmounted by a gilt pestle and mortar. The road was dusty, and the cut lime-trees before the houses on the other side of the lawyer's were rather whitish-brown, than green. The street ran north, and south; a gust of wind drove down it from the north, which gave the poor leaves a fresh coating before her eyes.

It was as cold as days sometimes are in June: she turned from the window, and proposed a fire; they both dreaded the attempt, but it succeeded, and there was no smoke.

Blanche wished the days had not been so long, that they might sooner have let down the green Venetian blinds (there were no shutters), drawn the short and scanty white curtains, and shut out the dismal prospect. She tried to place the furniture in such positions as to give the room an inhabited appearance, but she only succeeded in making it look untidy. The little dimity covered _chaise-longue_ was wheeled out from the wall, and placed between the fire and the window, till they found that so sharp a draught cut across from the ill-closed sashes, that it was quickly wheeled back to its original situation. A card-table was set open, and made to enact the part of a stand for _petits objets_. Blanche collected all her baskets and boxes, in hopes of making the apartment look comfortable, but her efforts were not as yet crowned with success.

The next day she bought a square of dark red cloth, and she bound it with gold-coloured binding, and with it concealed a great portion of the card-table, and set off to better advantage the _chef-d'œuvres_ of art and the _souvenirs_ of sentiment. The arm-chair, the dear arm-chair, was unpacked; and the buhl clock, it was hoped by both of them, would be a redeeming object.

Alas! there was no part of the room in which the buhl clock could be safely and advantageously placed! The little chimney-piece was infinitely too narrow; the card-table was already filled; and the one other table which was not in constant requisition was by far too rickety to be entrusted with so precious an article.

At length the small _souvenirs_ were removed to the rickety table, and the clock was established upon the card-table; and De Molton, when he looked upon his wife with her child upon her knee, saw no fault in the arrangement of the room.

There was, however, one misfortune to which even De Molton could not close his eyes or bar his senses,--a misfortune, too, which was utterly irremediable.

A kind of fixture,--half cupboard, half bookcase,--the lower part of which opened like a cupboard while the top finished in shelves, adorned each side of the fire place. Now, in the lower part of one of these nondescript things there was every reason to believe the predecessors of the De Moltons had been in the habit of keeping apples. When the room was closed, this dire smell of apples assailed their noses, and at length it was traced home to the guilty spot.

Chloruret of lime, eau de Cologne, every sort of fumigation was tried, but the indomitable smell was only quelled for the time: it returned with fresh vigour! Blanche was in utter despair, for Lady Falkingham was expected in a day or two, and she was renowned for the extreme acuteness of her olfactory nerves! Blanche had repressed any expression of her feelings, till this last blow quite over-came her fortitude.

"Can nothing be done about this smell, Frank? It will distract mamma!"

"Upon my word I do not know what more to recommend. Let us wash it again with chloruret of lime just before your mother comes."

"I would not mind all the rest if we could but get rid of this smell of apples!"

That expression--"all the rest," spoke volumes. De Molton was fully aware how much it implied of discomfort.

Love in a cottage is a thing very frequently met with in books, and not unfrequently in actual life; but love in a red-brick house in the street of a country town can never exist in poetry, and seldom in reality.

"There is one other thing I would fain alter, Frank, and I think it might be accomplished without much expense."

Blanche spoke timidly, for she had learned to be afraid of proposing anything which he might deem extravagant. "Could we not get rid of the knocker on the door? It looks dreadful; but the horrid vulgar sound is worse than the appearance. It is impossible to forget where one is, when one hears that rap-a-tap!"

De Molton sighed to think she should so wish to forget that she was in her home, with her husband and her child; and Blanche, two years before, would not have believed she could ever have been otherwise than contented, when certain of De Moltan's constancy, of his undivided affection, and when united to him by the holiest ties.

The day arrived on which the almost dreaded parental visit was to be paid. De Molton proposed driving to a nursery-garden at no great distance, and buying some flowers, which would make the room look rather more gay and countryfied. To this Blanche gladly assented; and she took great pains to fill all the little ugly vases upon the chimney-piece, and all the finger-glasses which were not wanted after dinner, with such flowers as could be procured. They had arranged everything for the accommodation of Lord and Lady Falkingham as well as the capabilities of the house permitted. Blanche's maid was turned out of her room, and into the nursery, for Lady Falkingham's maid; an arrangement which by no means met with her approbation, and which had not been accomplished without considerable difficulty.

De Molton relinquished his dressing-room to his father-in-law, and, unknown to any one, as he hoped, performed his toilet very early in the morning in the dining-room; the little back-parlour having been consecrated to the ladies'-maids, and anything being more practicable than to interfere with their morning repast.

Both Blanche and De Molton had looked repeatedly into each room, and had ascertained that everything was as comfortable as they could make it, and they sat waiting in some agitation for the arrival of their guests.

Generally speaking, if there is a moment of unmixed happiness, it is that in which parents pay their first visit to a married child, and in which children receive the first visit from their parents.

The pretty, half-childish, half-matronly pride with which the young wife does the honours of her domestic arrangements; the tearful joy of the mother as she inspects and admires; the honest happiness of the father; and the modest exultation of the bridegroom who has installed the creature he loves in all the comforts with which she is surrounded,--render the moment one of pleasing interest to the most careless bystander.

But such were not the feelings which animated any of the present party.