Part 11 (2/2)

Perhaps this was one reason of the growing frequency of his visits to Frostham. There he was made much of, deferred to, and all his little fancies flattered and obeyed. Will knew he was the most important person in the world to Alice Frostham; and he knew, also, that he only shared Aspatria's heart with Ulfar Fenwick. Men like the whole heart, and nothing less than the whole heart; hence Alice's influence grew steadily all through the summer days, full to the brim of happy labour and reasonable love. As early as the haymaking Will told Aspatria that Alice was coming to Seat-Ambar as its mistress; and when the harvest was gathered in, the wedding took place. It was as noisily jocund an affair as Aspatria's had been silent and sorrowful; and Alice Frostham, encircled by Will's protecting arm, was led across the threshold of her own new home, to the sound of music and rejoicing.

The home was quickly divided, though without unkind intent. Will and Alice had their own talk, their own hopes and plans, and Aspatria and Brune generally felt that their entrance interfered with some discussion. So Aspatria and Brune began to sit a great deal in Aspatria's room, and by and by to discuss, in a confidential way, what they were to do with their future. Brune had no definite idea.

Aspatria's intents were clear and certain. But she knew that she must wait until the spring brought her majority and her freedom.

One frosty day, near Christmas, as Brune was returning from Dalton, he heard himself called in a loud, cheerful voice. He was pa.s.sing Seat-Ketel, and he soon saw Harry Ketel coming quickly toward him.

Harry wore a splendid scarlet uniform; and the white snow beneath his feet, and the dark green pines between which he walked, made it all the more splendid by their contrast. Brune had not seen Harry for five years; but they had been companions through their boyhood, and their memories were stored with the pleasant hours they had spent together.

Brune pa.s.sed that night, and many subsequent ones, with his old friend; and when Harry went back to his regiment he took with him a certainty that Brune would soon follow. In fact, Harry had found his old companion in that mood which is ready to accept the first opening as the gift of fate. Brune found there was a commission to be bought in the Household Foot-Guards, and he was well able to pay for it.

Indeed, Brune was by no means a poor man; his father had left him seven thousand pounds, and his share of the farm's proceeds had been constantly added to it.

Aspatria was delighted. She might now go to London in Brune's care.

They discussed the matter constantly, and began to make the preparations necessary for the change. But affairs were not then arranged by steam and electricity, and the letters relating to the purchase and transfer of Brune's commission occupied some months in their transit to and fro; although Brune did not rely upon the postman's idea of the practicability of the roads.

Aspatria's correspondence was also uncertain and unsatisfactory for some time. She had at first no guide to a school but the advertis.e.m.e.nts in the London papers which Harry sent to his friend.

But one night Brune, without any special intention, named the matter to Mrs. Ketel; and that lady was able to direct Aspatria to an excellent school in Richmond, near London. And as she was much more favourably situated for a quick settlement of the affair, she undertook the necessary correspondence.

Will was not ignorant of these movements, but Alice induced him to be pa.s.sive in them. ”No one can then blame us, Will, whatever happens.”

And as Will and Alice were extremely sensitive to public opinion, this was a good consideration. Besides Alice, not unnaturally, wished to have the Seat to herself; so that Aspatria's and Brune's wishes fitted admirably into her own desires, and it gave her a kind of selfish pleasure to forward them.

The ninth of March was Aspatria's twenty-first birthday; and it was to her a very important anniversary, for she received as its gift her freedom and her fortune. There was no hitch or trouble in its transfer from Will to herself. Honour and integrity were in the life-blood of William Anneys, honesty and justice the very breath of his nostrils.

Aspatria's fortune had been guarded with a super-sensitive care; and when years gave her its management, Will surrendered it cheerfully to her control.

Fortunately, the school selected by Mrs. Ketel satisfied Will thoroughly; and Brune's commission in the Foot-Guards was in honourable accord with the highest traditions and spirit of the dales.

For the gigantic and physically handsome men of these mountain valleys have been for centuries considered the finest material for those regiments whose duty it is to guard the persons and the homes of royalty. Brune had only followed in the steps of a great number of his ancestors.

In the beginning of April, Aspatria left Seat-Ambar for London,--left forever all the pettiness of her house life, chairs and tables, sewing and meals, and the useless daily labour that has to be continually done over again. And at the last Will was very tender with her, and even Alice did her best to make the parting days full of hope and kindness. As for the journey, there was no anxiety; Brune was to travel with his sister, and see her safely within her new home.

Yet neither of them left the old home without some tears. Would they ever see again those great, steadfast hills, that purify those who walk upon them; ever dwell again within the dear old house, that had not been builded, but had grown with the family it had sheltered, through a thousand years? They hardly spoke to each other, as they drove through the sweet valleys, where the suns.h.i.+ne laid a gold on the green, and the warm south-wind gently rocked the daisies, and the lark's song was like a silvery water-fall up in the sky.

But they were young; and, oh, the rich significance of the word ”young” when the heart is young as well as the body, when the thoughts are not doubts, and when the eyes look not backward, but only forward, into a bright future!

CHAPTER VI.

”LOVE SHALL BE LORD OF SANDY-SIDE.”

During thirty years of the first half of this century Mrs. St. Alban's finis.h.i.+ng school for young gentlewomen was a famous inst.i.tution of its kind. For she had been born to the manner of courts and of people of high degree; and when evil fortune met her, she very wisely turned her inherited social advantages into a means of honest livelihood.

Aspatria was much impressed by her n.o.ble bearing and fine manners, and by the elaborate state in which the twelve pupils, of whom she was one, lived.

Each had her own suite of apartments; each was expected to keep a maid, and to dress with the utmost care and propriety. There were fine horses in the stables for their equestrian exercise, there were grooms to attend them during it, and there were regular reception-days, which afforded tyros in social accomplishments practical opportunities for cultivating the graceful and gracious urbanity which evidences really fine breeding.

Many of Aspatria's companions were of high rank,--Lady Julias and Lady Augustas, who were destined to wear ducal coronets and to stand around the throne of their young queen. But they were always charmingly pleasant and polite, and Aspatria soon acquired their outward form of calm deliberation and their mode of low, soft speech. For the rest, she decided, with singular prudence, to cultivate only those talents which nature had obviously granted her.

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