CHAPTER XLI.

LORD BEAUDEVERE’S STORY TOLD BY A CHRISTMAS FIRESIDE.

Right well our Christian sires of old Loved when the year its course had rolled, And brought blithe Christmas back again With all his hospitable train. Domestic and religious rite Gave honor to the holy night. On Christmas eve the bells were rung; On Christmas eve the hymns were sung; All hailed with uncontrolled delight And general voice the happy night That to the cottage as the crown Brought tidings of salvation down. SIR WALTER SCOTT.

It was Christmas Eve.

In the great hall of Cloudland a huge wood fire was burning. From the lofty oak ceiling, dark and polished by time and not by art, the ancient iron cresset swung and lighted a scene that might have belonged to the ninth rather than to the nineteenth century.

This hall was the most ancient part of the building. Klodd, the Saxon, with his rude boors, had feasted there long before it passed into the hands of his conqueror, John or Jean Beaue, the groom of Norman William and the ancestor of the Barons Beaudevere.

Through all the restorations, enlargements and modern improvements of the castle, the barons had never allowed this hall to be touched, except in one particular:—in the reign of one of the earlier Henries the great chimney at the farther end opposite the door had been built. And ever since that time, at Christmas-tide, the yule log had been yearly drawn in and laid on the back of the immense cavernous fireplace, and the baron’s family had there gathered around the Christmas fire.

It was a weird, ghostly, yet interesting and fascinating scene.

The heavy stone walls were decorated with stags’ antlers, and other trophies of the chase, and hung with ancient armor and weapons, and looked as if they were haunted by the forms of old knights—

“Whose swords were rust, Whose bones were dust; Whose souls were with The Lord, we trust.”

It was furnished with heavy oaken tables, chairs and settles, before which were laid, in lieu of rugs, well-tanned skins of leopards, bears and buffaloes.

Never in all the centuries had lain so huge a yule log or blazed so splendid a fire as this that burned in the ancient chimney-place and lighted the old hall.

A historical oak, a marvel of age and size, had stood in the Cloudland forest from time immemorial. It had long ceased to show a leaf in summer, and every winter its dry twigs rattled and fell with every blast.

In the preceding summer a thunderbolt had blasted the patriarch of centuries. Then the baron’s steward had ordered the riven giant limbs to be cut and sawed and given away by cords of wood to the poor on the estate, and the huge hole to be trimmed and carted to the castle for the yule log.

Now it was blazing in the broad fireplace of the castle hall, and around it were gathered a group consisting of Lord Beaudevere, Lady Arielle Montjoie, Miss Desparde, and Mr. Valdimir Desparde.

The order to serve dinner was given, and in a few moments it was announced.

Lord Beaudevere gave his arm to Lady Arielle, and Valdimir to his sister, and so they went into the dining-room and enjoyed a very good meal.

After dinner they adjourned to the hall, gathered around the great fire, seated themselves on the old oaken chairs, and, with their feet upon the lion’s skin that did duty for a rug, began to talk of Christmas times, ancient as well as modern—a theme suggested by the surroundings as well as by the season.

It was noticeable that this talk was chiefly among the three young people, and that Lord Beaudevere gave brief and often eccentric answers to questions and remarks addressed to him. He seemed troubled and abstracted.

Presently, in the lull of the conversation, he said:

“I think, my young friends, that the hour has come when I must tell you that passage in my early history which, from morbid sensitiveness, I have hitherto kept from you.”

Lady Arielle, feeling that this address was made to Valdimir and Vivienne, and that the story to be told concerned them, arose quietly to steal away from the hall.

But Lord Beaudevere stopped her with a word:

“Stay! Resume your seat, Lady Arielle. This interests you as well as ourselves. Are you not one of us?”

The young lady sat down again gladly, for, in truth, she was as curious as any one to hear the story of Lord Beaudevere’s early life, as it affected her betrothed husband and his sister.

Lord Beaudevere passed his hand once and again over his thoughtful and troubled brow, then smiled on the expectant circle, and began:

BEAUE’S LITTLE ROMANCE.

“My father, the late baron, had but one son and no daughter. He lost my mother when I was but a few months old, and he never gave her a successor. It followed that my earliest idea of my mother was of an angel in heaven.

“I had, therefore, neither brother nor sister, but in place of both—in place of all childish companions—I had my little cousin, my father’s orphan niece, whom he had adopted for the sake of his dear lost sister.

“We were of the same age, and as much attached to each other as any twin pair that ever lived. The nurses used to call us the ‘love birds.’

“We shared the same nursery until we were five years old, when we were separated. That was the first sorrow of my life, and you will laugh, my lad and lasses, when I tell you it was one of my sharpest.

“But think of it! I had never, within my memory, gone to sleep except with my arms around Vivi’s neck, or hers around mine. So I cried all night in my lonesome crib, and so had she in hers, as I learned when I met her at the nursery breakfast the next morning—met her with as much joy as if we had been parted for years instead of for hours!

“We still shared the same day nursery, and the same lessons under our young nursery governess, until we were seven years old, when a more accomplished teacher took charge of us, a lady, who conducted our education for the next three years.

“Then came another trial, and we were separated by day as well as by night. A tutor was engaged for me and I took my lessons in a room off my father’s library instead of in the school-room, which was given up now to Vivi and her governess.

“But still we met at meal times, where we also enjoyed the society and surveillance of the tutor and governess. And so two more years passed away, and I had to go to Eton. I pass over that parting. I do not suppose that any school-boy in existence ever behaved so badly as I did on leaving home; it was all because I was leaving Vivi.

“But if any boy ever carries anything sentimental or mawkish to Eton College it is bound to be knocked and cuffed out of him, mind you. To say nothing of my studies, which really did engage and interest my mind, I had fights enough on my hands to employ all my leisure time and keep me from pining after Vivi.

“But when the holidays drew near all my slumbering love was re-awakened, and I thought of nothing but of going home and meeting Vivi.

“And every time I went home and saw her she seemed more beautiful than ever, and I loved her more.

“I spent four years at Eton, and then came home for a visit previous to entering the university at Oxford.

“I was then a mere stripling of sixteen, _not_ tall for my age—quite the reverse—for I was of slow growth, and no taller nor stouter than many a boy of thirteen.

“I came home and found Vivi, at sixteen years of age, shot up into a beautiful and blooming young woman, a head taller than myself. This was mortifying to me, especially as she assumed the airs of a woman and treated me as a child.

“I was in despair until certain news reached us from India. The letters and documents came just a few days before I was to have left home for Oxford to enter Trinity College—where, by the way, all my forefathers and uncles have been educated since the college was founded.

“The news was that our uncle—my father’s and Vivi’s mother’s brother—a wealthy merchant of Calcutta, had died unmarried, and left the whole of his immense wealth to his sole nephew, John Beaue, and sole niece, Vivienne Leville—share and share alike—upon one condition—that they should marry each other. But if either one should refuse to marry the other, the party so refusing should forfeit all share in the estate, which should then go undivided to the party refused, with the further condition that the last inheritor should have no power to alienate any part of the property in favor of the defaulting and disinherited one, and in case of attempting to do so, should forfeit the whole, which should then go to found a Lunatic Asylum.

“Such was the purport of our uncle’s will. My father told me he hoped I would not be such an idiot as to forfeit such a splendid fortune by refusing to marry Vivienne Leville.

“I told him, with truth, that, on the contrary, so far was I from any thoughts of refusing to marry my cousin, and so dear was she to my soul, that if my uncle and my father had both threatened to disinherit me _for_ marrying her, I should have tried to win her all the same.

“My father wanted the betrothal to take place then; so did I, you may depend. This was accomplished without any love-making on my part. We three—my father, my cousin and myself—being together in the drawing-room, after dinner, my father broached the subject to Vivi, by speaking of our uncle’s death and reading the will.

“‘If you accept the conditions of the will and marry John, my girl, you will be the future Baroness Beaudevere, with an income from your united fortunes of fifty thousand pounds a year. Come, what do you say?’

“‘Jack has not asked me yet,’ laughed my cousin.

“‘Has not he? Well, he told me just now that he had meant to marry you, if he could get you, even if the consequences had been his disinheritance instead of his enrichment!’

“‘Did you say that, Jack?’ she asked.

“‘Yes, and I meant it, Vivi,’ I stammered, for I was an awkward boy, then at the most awkward age of boyhood.

“‘Very well, then. It is settled,’ said my father; and he took our hands and joined them.

“‘Is it settled, Vivi?’ I asked.

“‘Yes,’ she laughed.

“‘And you _will_ be my wife, truly?’ I asked breathlessly.

“‘Of course,’ she answered.’ Do you suppose I am going to forfeit fifty thousand pounds per annum for _you_? Go along, boy!’

“Though I was not quite satisfied with the way in which she answered me and could have wished she had been more earnest, I went away to Oxford next morning as happy as a king! I was _sure_ of her now, or at least I _thought_ so! I sent her a betrothal ring from London set with a solitaire diamond worth a farm.

“No day was yet fixed for our marriage. We were yet but young. It was understood, however, that we were betrothed to each other, and neither of us in the matrimonial market. The baron, my father, was so well satisfied with our engagement that he took very good care to let it be known generally.

“At the end of every college term I came home here to visit my cousin, my betrothed. And every time found her more lovely and attractive. She did not keep on growing taller. She had stopped growing, for which circumstance I was very thankful; for _I_ had not stopped growing. I was quickly overtaking her in height. When we were both eighteen I was as tall as she was. When we were twenty-one I was half a head taller.

“Then I graduated from old Trinity with some honor, and we all came up to London to our town house for the season.

“My father, from excessive caution, had not brought my young cousin up for a season in town before this, lest there should be some possible chance of some other aspirant for her hand that might make trouble; but now that I had left the university never to return, and our marriage day was fixed and near at hand, we all came up to town for the season and occupied our house in South Audley street. We got the dowager Lady Leville, a distant relation of my mother’s, to come and stay with us to chaperone Vivi.

“Vivi was first of all presented at court and then entered society—_threw_ herself into it rather—wildly, madly, as only a country girl secluded from the world until she was twenty-one and then brought out in London at the height of the fashionable season, under such auspices as hers, could do.

“I went with her everywhere, followed her, watched her, closely, jealously. Among the many admirers her beauty and reputed wealth drew around her was one whom I cannot even now recall without a pang—Thadeus Valdimir Desparde, a captain in the horse guards. He was called by women the handsomest and most fascinating man in London. He was called by the men the best, freest, most generous fellow alive.

“I cannot dwell upon this part of the story, my friends—I suffered the tortures of souls in purgatory when I saw how interested in this man my cousin had become. No, I cannot go into details. Even my father saw the danger at last, and he expostulated with his niece, and—only offended her!

“Our marriage day drew near. Our wedding was to have taken place in London. But my father, seeing the danger, suddenly resolved to leave town and have our marriage celebrated at Cloudland. Vivienne made no opposition to the plan, and my hopes of happiness were revived,—only for a few hours, however, for the day before we were to have left London Vivienne Leville disappeared.”

Here the baron paused in his story and put his hand to his head—a gesture common to him when disturbed.

Miss Desparde, whose eyes had been fixed on him with the deepest sympathy throughout his narration, now left her seat and drew a hassock to his side, sat down by him and took his hand and kissed it.

The baron drew his hand away from her and laid it on her head with a gesture of benediction. Then he resumed his story with more cheerfulness:

“When we next heard of my cousin she was the wife of Captain Desparde. She wrote a letter to my father and myself, pleading forgiveness, saying that she loved me as a dear brother, but _could_ not think of me in any other light; that she loved Captain Desparde with all the strength of her being, and was willing to forfeit for his sake the coronet of Beaudevere and the wealth of the Indies, and to go with him to Jamaica, where the regiment into which he had exchanged was ordered.

“That was the last we heard of Vivienne for seven years. I had a brain fever, but got over it without any lasting injury to my constitution. A year passed away, and my father urged upon me my duty, as an only son and the sole heir to the old barony, to marry. But I could not bring my mind to it. Four more years passed away, and then my father left me. He had been a childless widower and long passed middle age when he married my mother, and so he was quite aged when he passed away, and I, at the age of twenty-six, became the last Baron of Beaudevere.

“I traveled on the Continent for two years, and then returned to Cloudland, a disappointed, solitary, but, thank Heaven! not a soured or embittered man.

“Then I one day received a letter that gave me an electric shock!—a letter from my cousin Vivienne, asking me to come to her for the Lord’s sake, for that she was widowed and dying in destitution and dishonor—”

“DISHONOR!” exclaimed Valdimir and Vivienne, in one voice of agony.

“Stay! She thought so. It was _her_ mistake then, as it was _yours_ afterwards, my lad. And from the same cause. You were in error. No dishonor ever attached to your name, my young cousins. And now let me go on.

“I read the letter in my eagerness, on recognizing her handwriting, before I even looked at the date. When I did, I saw that it was written from Kingston on the Island of Jamaica. You will despise me, my young people, but I arose up from reading that letter, ‘all on fire with joy,’ determined to go at once—to start that very day for London and sail in the first ship or craft, whatever it might be, that should leave the West India Docks. And I knew that one or more left every day; for I had resolved to marry my cousin yet if she would have me—to marry her widowed and destitute and dying as she was, and dishonored as she might be, if such a thing could be possible.

“I went down to London without a servant; I found a sailing ship outward bound with the tide and engaged my passage on her. In due time I reached the Island of Jamaica and the town of Kingston. I found my kinswoman, with two children, in poor lodgings, and in a dying condition—much further gone than I had expected to find her; to have spoken of marriage to her would have been the bitterest mockery.

“I found her suffering not only from bodily but from mental distress. She gave me a history of her short married life. It had been a happy marriage, because it had been a love match, although her husband had been wild very wild, and had got into debt, and finally been obliged to sell out his commission under penalty of being dismissed from her majesty’s service—only for debt, for nothing worse at that time, she said.

“But then she hesitated, wept, wrung her hands, and—could not tell me, but showed me a paper. My dears, you know the fallacy of newspaper reports? A garbled account of that execution in New Orleans had been published in the _West Indian Signal_, by which it was made to appear that Captain Valdimir Desparde was the felon who had suffered the extreme penalty of the law on that occasion.

“I was shocked beyond all measure, but I was also very incredulous. I knew there must have been some mistake. But my first care was to remove my dying cousin and her two children to more comfortable apartments, and to provide her with all that her condition required, the best medical attendance among the rest.

“Then—as I could not talk with _her_ upon a subject so extremely distressing and exciting—I set about, through other channels, to find out the truth in regard to Captain Desparde. And I soon learned it, as _she_ might have learned if she had known how to inquire.

“I discovered that Captain Desparde had left Kingston to go on some business to New Orleans, had remained there but a short time and embarked on a steamboat to return to his wife and children, whom, it appears, he had fondly loved through all his wild career, when the steamer was wrecked and many of the crew and passengers were lost.

“His name, by some mistake, never appeared in the list of the lost, nor was it known to his wife that he had embarked on that ill-fated ship. But I ascertained the fact beyond all doubt.

“It was much easier to assure myself of the identity of the felon who was executed in New Orleans under the _alias_ of Valdimir Desparde.

“When I found myself in possession of the whole unquestionable truth I made it known to my cousin, and soothed her last hours with the good news that her husband had died a blameless man, and notwithstanding all his wildness, had left an unstained name to their children.

“And I promised to adopt those children, and bring them up as my own. A week after that my cousin fell asleep in my arms to wake no more in this lower world. We left her mortal remains in St. John’s Cemetery at Kingston, and I brought her children home with me.

“My lad and lasses, my story is told, and now you know why I have lived a bachelor all my past life, and why I must expect to be solitary all my future,” concluded the baron, with a sigh and a smile.

Vivienne, who was still sitting on a low hassock at his feet, holding his hand, and gazing up into his face with her dark eyes full of tenderest sympathy and deepest reverence, now spoke in low, impassioned tones:

“Not solitary while I live, dearest Beaue. She treated you badly, Beaue; but she could not help it, you know, if she loved somebody else. She would have treated you worse if she had been false to herself and married you under such circumstances. And, dearest Beaue, she left you _me_—my mother left you _me_—and I will never leave you—never, never leave you!”

The baron laid his hand upon her beautiful young head and smiled as he might have smiled on a child, as he said:

“But some one may be taking you away from me, dear. I could not be so selfish as to wish to prevent that.”

“I know what you mean, Beaue,” said Vivienne. “You mean that I may be asked in marriage. Well, I have often been asked. I could not help it, with all my coldness and discouragement of such offers; but I shall never, never, never leave you, Beaue, and, of course, never marry—unless—” Her voice failed.

“Unless what, my dear?” inquired the baron, kindly stroking her head.

She did not answer, nor did he understand her.

Would he _ever_ understand her?

Hardly; for Beaue was rather self-depreciating in all respects; and besides that, he was one of those who could not be made to believe a truth—sometimes made manifest—that a young woman could love an old man.

He turned to Valdimir and said:

“You will now perhaps understand the morbid sensitiveness that kept me silent on the subject of your early life, Desparde.”

The young man bowed gravely. He was thinking how much Lord Beaudevere must have vailed under the convenient term of “wildness” that was at least reprehensible in the career of the late Captain Desparde. The selling of his commission to pay his debts; the subsequent bringing of his family to destitution—and leaving them so in a foreign city, while he himself went off somewhere else—all these circumstances in themselves hinted at a story, that might yet be told, not pleasant for the son to hear.

But he had heard enough.

And now the clock struck twelve, and the Christmas bells rang out in joyous peals of welcome as to a newborn babe.

The circle around the fire arose and smilingly exchanged their mutual good wishes, and retired to rest.

Lady Arielle Montjoie, as we have continued to call her, because of her extreme youth and our own habit, although since the death of the late earl she had been Countess of Altofaire—remained at Cloudland until after Twelfth day, and then returned to Castle Montjoie, accompanied by Vivienne.

Early in the new year came news of Brandon Coyle. The officers that had been sent out in pursuit of him returned without him and with intelligence that under any other circumstances must have been received with grief, but under the existing ones was hailed by his relatives with a sense of infinite relief.

Brandon Coyle had never reached the shores of the New World.

One stormy winter day, when the ship was in extreme peril off the coast of Newfoundland, and he persisted in staying on deck against the advice of the officers, he was blown overboard and drowned. Rescue had been impossible. Even his body was irrecoverably lost.

The captain of the ship took charge of his effects and held them subject to the order of his heirs.

The detective officers on their arrival at New York learned these facts, took possession of the property of the deceased, and returned with it to England. After making their report to the Chief of Police, they came down to Caveland and delivered up their trust to old Mr. Coyle.

Four thousand nine hundred pounds of the five thousand drawn upon the forged check were recovered and returned to the bank.

And old Mr. Coyle and his niece breathed freely. This ending was so much better than that which they had had every reason to fear for Brandon Coyle.

The old squire, “with the sigh of a great deliverance,” took his niece to Italy for the winter.

While they were sojourning in Rome they made the acquaintance of a young Roman gentleman of incredible nobility and poverty, who, attracted by the beauty and wealth of the heiress, laid his title and his destitution at her feet.

Aspirita, in desperation, accepted them and became the Marchesa Maniola.

Old Mr. Coyle returned to his native land with a double sense of satisfaction and security. Brandon could never now be hung for murder; Aspirita would never now run away with a footman.

He settled down to his own quiet, kindly, comfortable life at Caveland, beloved and honored by his servants and tenantry, and esteemed and respected by his neighbors.

And so we leave the old squire.

MARRIAGE IN MAY WEATHER.

In the prime of the spring a happy party was gathered at Castle Montjoie to witness the marriage of John Beaue, Baron Beaudevere, of Cloudland, to Vivienne, only daughter of the late Captain Desparde, of her majesty’s army; and also that of Mr. Valdimir Desparde with Arielle Montjoie, Countess of Altofaire.

Yes, Beaue was happy at last—as happy as it was in the nature of man to be—in the assurance of his young bride’s pure and devoted love, which had grown for him from her childhood up, and had been founded on an admiration for his character which almost amounted to adoration.

By Arielle’s instance, the marriage of the baron and his chosen bride took precedence, but was immediately followed by that of Mr. Desparde and the young countess.

The ceremonies were performed in the chapel by the Rev. Mr. Lucas, assisted by the Rev. Mr. Matthew, and were conducted in a very unostentatious manner.

The brides were dressed alike in white silk, with white Brussels lace vails, orange flower wreaths, and pearl ornaments. There were no bride-maids nor groomsmen.

In the first marriage Valdimir Desparde gave his sister away. In the second marriage the baron performed the same office for the young countess.

The witnesses were very few—old Mr. Coyle, Dr. Bennet, Mr. and Mrs. Adrian Fleming, and the family solicitor, who had come down for the marriage settlements, and the upper servants, who were gathered in the rear.

The old housekeeper and butler were aghast at this simplicity, and declared that it was enough to make all the old earls and countesses rise up out of their coffins and come in procession to remonstrate against their last descendant being married in this plain manner.

And they told each other traditions that had been handed down to them about the grand weddings of former times at Castle Montjoie.

After the last ceremony the company adjourned to the dining-room, where the wedding breakfast was laid.

Old Squire Coyle was invited to take the head of the table. All honor was done this old gentleman by the neighbors that loved him.

The breakfast went on merrily.

Mr. Adrian Fleming arose in his place and made a little speech in proposing the health of the two brides.

Beaudevere arose and responded on the part of the ladies.

Then other healths were drank, and the merry meal came to an end.

The brides withdrew to change their wedding-dresses for traveling suits of lavender poplin, with sacks, hats and gloves to match, and half an hour later drove off in an open carriage with their husbands, followed by a shower of good wishes and old slippers.

They drove together to the Miston Station and took the London train _en route_ for Paris.

They passed the conventional four weeks very pleasantly in the French capital, and then returned to their country homes in Cumberland.

Mr. Desparde and the young countess took up their abode at Castle Montjoie, and Lord and Lady Beaudevere settled down at Cloudland.

They visited each other often.

* * * * *

Only a few years have passed since then, but children have been born to both households, and girls and boys are growing up in the old homes.

Valdimir Desparde is no longer the heir presumptive of the Barony of Beaudevere, for an heir-apparent has seen the light; but Valdimir is compensated in another way. By the terms of the marriage settlements, it will be remembered, he had agreed to assume the name and arms of Montjoie. For that reason and others, within three years after his marriage with the last heiress of the house, he was granted the reversion of the old title and became the Earl of Altofaire.

THE END.

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THE CHAUTAUQUANS.

BY

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_Author of “Helen’s Babies,” etc._

_WITH ILLUSTRATIONS BY WARREN B. DAVIS._

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RETURN OF THE O’MAHONY.

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TRANSCRIBER’S NOTES

● Typos fixed; non-standard spelling and dialect retained. ● Enclosed italics font in _underscores_.