"I am much interested to know that you have a mother and sister," said the poor needlewoman before him, looking up with calm, fine-lady impertinence in his face. "But you did not hear me speak of Lonsdale; it was her ladyship who mentioned it. As for me, I interest myself in what is going on close by, Mr. Vincent. I am quite absorbed in the chapel; I want to know how you get on, and all about it. I took that you said on Sunday about levity deeply to heart. I entertain a fond hope that you will see me improve under your ministrations, even though I may never come up to the b.u.t.terman's standard. Some people have too high an ideal.

If you are as much of an optimist as your respected deacon, I fear it will be ages before I can manage to make you approve of me."

Vincent's wandering thoughts were recalled a little by this attack. "I hope," he said, rousing himself, "that you don't think me so inexperienced as not to know that you are laughing at me? But indeed I should be glad to believe that the services at the chapel might sometimes perhaps be some _comfort_ to you," added the young pastor, a.s.suming the dignity of his office. He met his penitent's eyes at the moment, and faltered, moon-struck as he was, wondering if she saw through and through him, and knew that he was neither thinking of consolation nor of clerical duties, but only of those lingering echoes which, to any ears but his own, were out of hearing. There was little reason to doubt the acute perceptions of that half-amused, half-malicious glance.

"_Comfort!_" she cried; "what a very strange suggestion to make! Why, all the old churches in all the old ages have offered comfort. I thought you new people had something better to give us; enlightenment," she said, with a gleam of secret mockery, throwing the word like a stone--"religious freedom, private judgment. Depend upon it, that is the _role_ expected from you by the b.u.t.terman. Comfort! one has that in Rome."

"You never can have that but in conjunction with truth, and truth is not to be found in Rome," said Vincent, p.r.i.c.king up his ears at so familiar a challenge.

"We'll not argue, though you do commit yourself by an a.s.sertion," said Mrs. Hilyard; "but oh, you innocent young man, where is the comfort to come from? Comfort will not let your seats and fill your chapel, even granting that you knew how to communicate it. I prefer to be instructed, for my part. You are just at the age, and in the circ.u.mstances, to do that."

"I fear you still speak in jest," said the minister, with some doubt, yet a little gratification; "but I shall be only too happy to have been the means of throwing any light to you upon the doctrines of our faith."

For a moment the dark eyes gleamed with something like laughter. But there was nothing ill-natured in the amus.e.m.e.nt with which his strange new friend contemplated the young pastor in the depressions and confidences of his youth. She answered with a mock gravity which, at that moment, he was by no means clear-sighted enough to see through.

"Yes," she said, demurely, "be sure you take advantage of your opportunities, and instruct us as long as you have any faith in instruction. Leave consolation to another time: but you don't attend to me, Mr. Vincent; come another day: come on Monday, when I shall be able to criticise your sermons, and we shall have no Lady Western to put us out. These beauties are confusing, don't you think? Only, I entreat you, whatever you do, don't fall in love with her; and now, since I know you wish it, you may go away."

Vincent stammered a faint protest as he accepted his dismissal, but rose promptly, glad to be released. Another thought, however, seemed to strike Mrs. Hilyard as she shook hands with him.

"Do your mother and sister in Lonsdale keep a school?" she said. "Nay, pray don't look affronted. Clergymen's widows and daughters very often do in the Church. I meant no impertinence in this case. They don't?

well, that is all I wanted to know. I daresay they are not likely to be in the way of dangerous strangers. Good-bye; and you must come again on Monday, when I shall be alone."

"But--dangerous strangers--may I ask you to explain?" said Vincent, with a little alarm, instinctively recurring to his threatened brother-in-law, and the news which had disturbed his composure that morning before he came out.

"I can't explain; and you would not be any the wiser," said Mrs.

Hilyard, peremptorily. "Now, good morning. I am glad they don't keep a school; because, you know," she added, looking full into his eyes, as if defying him to make any meaning out of her words, "it is very tiresome, tedious work, and wears poor ladies out. There!--good-bye; next day you come I shall be very glad to see you, and we'll have no fine ladies to put us out."

Vincent had no resource but to let himself out of the shabby little room which this strange woman inhabited as if it had been a palace. The momentary alarm roused by her last words, and the state of half offence, half interest, into which, notwithstanding his pre-occupation, she had managed to rouse him, died away, however, as he re-entered the poor little street, which was now a road in Fairyland instead of a lane in Carlingford, to his rapt eyes. Golden traces of those celestial wheels surely lingered still upon the way, they still went rolling and echoing over the poor young minister's heart, which he voluntarily threw down before that heavenly car of Juggernaut. Every other impression faded out of his mind, and the infatuated young man made no effort of resistance, but hugged the enchanted chain. He had seen Her--spoken with Her--henceforward was of her acquaintance. He cast reason to the winds, and probability, and every convention of life. Did anybody suppose that all the world leagued against him could prevent him from seeing her again? He went home with an unspeakable elation, longing, and excitement, and at the same time with a vain floating idea in his mind that, thus inspired, no height of eloquence was impossible to him, and that triumph of every kind was inevitable. He went home, and got his writing-desk, and plunged into his lecture, nothing doubting that he could transfer to his work that glorious tumult of his thoughts; and, with his paper before him, wrote three words, and sat three hours staring into the roseate air, and dreaming dreams as wild as any Arabian tale. Such was the first effort of that chance encounter, in which the personages were not Lady Western and the poor Dissenting minister, but Beauty and Love, perennial hero and heroine of the romance that never ends.

CHAPTER VI.

It was only two days after this eventful meeting that Vincent, idling and meditative as was natural in such a condition of mind, strayed into Masters's shop to buy some books. It would have been difficult for him to have explained why he went there, except, perhaps, because it was the last place in the world which his masters at the chapel would have advised him to enter. For there was another bookseller in the town, an evangelical man, patronised by Mr. Bury, the whilom rector, where all the Tract Society's publications were to be had, not to speak of a general range of literature quite wide enough for the minister of Salem.

Masters's was a branch of the London Masters, and, as might be supposed, was equally amazed and indignant at the intrusion of a Dissenter among its consecrated book-shelves. He was allowed to turn over all the varieties of the 'Christian Year' on a side-table before any of the attendants condescended to notice his presence; and it proved so difficult to find the books he wanted, and so much more difficult to find anybody who would take the trouble of looking for them, that the young Nonconformist, who was sufficiently ready to take offence, began to get hot and impatient, and had all but strode out of the shop, with a new mortification to record to the disadvantage of Carlingford. But just as he began to get very angry, the door swung softly open, and a voice became audible, lingering, talking to somebody before entering.

Vincent stopped speaking, and stared in the shopman's astonished face when these tones came to his ear. He fell back instantly upon the side-table and the 'Christian Year,' forgetting his own business, and what he had been saying--forgetting everything except that She was there, and that in another moment they would stand again within the same walls. He bent over the much-multiplied volume with a beating heart, poising in one hand a tiny miniature copy just made to slip within the pocket of an Anglican waistcoat, and in the other the big red-leaved and morocco-bound edition, as if weighing their respective merits--put beside himself, in fact, if the truth must be told, oblivious of his errand, his position--of everything but the fact that She was at the door. She came in with a sweet flutter and rustle of sound, a perfumed air entering with her, as the unsuspected enthusiast thought, and began to lavish smiles, for which he would have given half his life, upon the people of the place, who flew to serve her. She had her tablets in her hand, with a list of what she wanted, and held up a dainty forefinger as she stood reading the items. As one thing after another was mentioned, Masters and his men darted off in search of it. There were fortunately enough to give each of them a separate errand, and the princ.i.p.al ranged his shining wares upon the counter before her, and bathed in her smiles, while all his satellites kept close at hand, listening with all their ears for another commission. Blessed Masters! happy shopmen! that one who looked so blank when Vincent stopped short at the sound of her voice and stared at him, had forgotten all about Vincent. _She_ was there; and if a little impromptu litany would have pleased her ladyship, it is probable that it could have been got up on the spot after the best models, and that even the Nonconformist would have waived his objections to liturgical worship and led the responses. But Masters's establishment offered practical homage--only the poor Dissenting minister, divided between eagerness and fear, stood silent, flushed with excitement, turning wistful looks upon her, waiting till perhaps she might turn round and see him, and letting fall out of his trembling fingers those unregarded editions of the Anglican lyre.

"And two copies of the 'Christian Year,'" said Lady Western, suddenly.

"Oh, thank you _so_ much! but I know they are all on the side-table, and I shall go and look at them. Not the very smallest copy, Mr. Masters, and not that solemn one with the red edges; something pretty, with a little ornament and gilding: they are for two little _protegees_ of mine. Oh, here is exactly what I want! another one like this, please.

How very obliging all your people are," said her ladyship, benignly, as the nearest man dashed off headlong to bring what she wanted--"but I think it is universal in Carlingford; and indeed the manners of our country people in general have improved very much of late. Don't you think so? oh, there can't be a question about it!"

"I beg your ladyship's pardon, I am sure; but perhaps, my lady, it is not safe to judge the general question from your ladyship's point of view," said the polite bookseller, with a bow.

"Oh, pray don't say so; I should be wretched if I thought you took more trouble for me than for other people," said the young Dowager, with a sweetness which filled Vincent's heart with jealous pangs. She was close by his side--so close that those sacred robes rustled in his very ear, and her shawl brushed his sleeve. The poor young man took off his hat in a kind of ecstasy. If she did not notice him, what did it matter?--silent adoration, speechless homage, could not affront a queen.

And it was happily very far from affronting Lady Western. She turned round with a little curiosity, and looked up in his face. "Oh, Mr.--Mr.

Vincent," cried the beautiful creature, brightening in recognition. "How do you do? I suppose you are a resident in Carlingford now, are not you?

Pardon me, that I did not see you when I came in. How very, very good it is of you to go and see my--my friend! Did you ever see anything so dreadful as the place where she lives? and isn't she an extraordinary creature? Thank you, Mr. Masters; that's exactly what I want. I do believe she might have been Lord Chancellor, or something, if she had not been a woman," said the enchantress, once more lifting her lovely eyes with an expression of awe to Vincent's face.

"She seems a very remarkable person," said Vincent. "To see her where she is, makes one feel how insignificant are the circ.u.mstances of life."

"Really! now, how do you make out that?" said Lady Western; "for, to tell the truth, I think, when I see her, oh, how important they are! and that I'd a great deal rather die than live so. But you clever people take such strange views of things. Now tell me how you make that out?"

"Nay," said Vincent, lowering his voice with a delicious sense of having a subject to be confidential upon, "you know what conditions of existence all her surroundings imply; yet the most ignorant could not doubt for a moment her perfect superiority to them--a superiority so perfect," he added, with a sudden insight which puzzled even himself, "that it is not necessary to a.s.sert it."

"Oh, to be sure," said Lady Western, colouring a little, and with a momentary hauteur, "of course a Russell---- I mean a gentlewoman--must always look the same to a certain extent; but, alas! I am only a very commonplace little woman," continued the beauty, brightening into those smiles which perhaps might be distributed too liberally, but which intoxicated for the moment every man on whom they fell. "I think those circ.u.mstances which you speak of so disrespectfully are everything! I have not a great soul to triumph over them. I should break down, or they would overcome me--oh, you need not shake your head! I know I am right so far as I myself am concerned."

"Indeed I cannot think so," said the intoxicated young man; "you would make any circ.u.mstances--"

"What?"

But the bewildered youth made no direct reply. He only gazed at her, grew very red, and said, suddenly, "I beg your pardon," stepping back in confusion, like the guilty man he was. The lady blushed, too, as her inquiring eyes met that unexpected response. Used as she was to adoration, she felt the silent force of the compliment withheld--it was a thousand times sweeter in its delicate suggestiveness and reserve of incense than any effusion of words. They were both a little confused for the moment, poor Vincent's momentary betrayal of himself having somehow suddenly dissipated the array of circ.u.mstances which surrounded and separated two persons so far apart from each other in every conventional aspect. The first to regain her place and composure was of course Lady Western, who made him a pretty playful curtsy, and broke into a low, sweet ring of laughter.

"Now I shall never know whether you meant to be complimentary or contemptuous," cried the young Dowager, "which is hard upon a creature with such a love of approbation as our friend says I have. However, I forgive you, if you meant to be very cutting, for her sake. It is so very kind of you to go to see her, and I am sure she enjoys your visits.

Thank you, Mr. Masters, that is all. Have you got the two copies of the 'Christian Year'? Put them into the carriage, please. Mr. Vincent, I am going to have the last of my summer-parties next Thursday--twelve o'clock; will you come?--only a cup of coffee, you know, or tea if you prefer it, and talk _au discretion_. I shall be happy to see you, and I have some nice friends, and one or two good pictures; so there you have an account of all the attractions my house can boast of. Do come: it will be my last party this season, and I rather want it to be a great success," said the syren, looking up with her sweet eyes.

Vincent could not tell what answer he made in his rapture; but the next thing he was properly conscious of was the light touch of her hand upon his arm as he led her to her carriage, some sudden courageous impulse having prompted him to secure for himself that momentary blessedness. He walked forth in a dream, conducting that heavenly vision: and there, outside, stood the celestial chariot with those pawing horses, and the children standing round with open mouth to watch the lovely lady's progress. It was he who put her in with such pride and humbleness as perhaps only a generous but inexperienced young man, suddenly surprised into pa.s.sion, could be capable of--ready to kiss the hem of her garment, or do any other preposterous act of homage--and just as apt to blaze up into violent self-a.s.sertion should any man attempt to humble him who had been thus honoured. While he stood watching the carriage out of sight, Masters himself came out to tell the young Nonconformist, whose presence that dignified tradesman had been loftily unconscious of a few minutes before, that they had found the book he wanted; and Vincent, thrilling in every pulse with the unlooked-for blessedness which had befallen him, was not sorry, when he dropped out of the clouds at the bookseller's accost, to re-enter that place where this enchantment still hovered, by way of calming himself down ere he returned to those prose regions which were his own lawful habitation. He saw vaguely the books that were placed on the counter before him--heard vaguely the polite purling of Masters's voice, all-solicitous to make up for the momentary incivility with which he had treated a friend of Lady Western's--and was conscious of taking out his purse and paying something for the volume, which he carried away with him. But the book might have been Sanscrit for anything Mr. Vincent cared--and he would have paid any fabulous price for it with the meekest resignation. His attempt to appear moderately interested, and to conduct this common transaction as if he had all his wits about him, was sufficient occupation just at this moment. His head was turned. There should have been roses blossoming all along the bare pavement of George Street to account for the sweet gleams of light which warmed the entire atmosphere as he traversed that commonplace way. Not only the interview just pa.s.sed, but the meeting to come, bewildered him with an intoxicating delight. Here, then, was the society he had dreamed of, opening its perfumed doors to receive him.

From Mrs. Tozer's supper-table to the bowery gates of Grange Lane was a jump which, ten days ago, would of itself have made the young minister giddy with satisfaction and pleasure. Now these calm emotions had ceased to move him; for not society, but a sweeter syren, had thrown chains of gold round the unsuspecting Nonconformist. With Her, Back Grove Street was Paradise. Where her habitation was, or what he should see there, was indifferent to Vincent. He was again to meet Herself.

CHAPTER VII.

The days which intervened between this meeting and Lady Western's party were spent in a way which the managers of Salem would have been far from approving of. Mr. Vincent, indeed, was rapt out of himself, out of his work, out of all the ordinary regions of life and thought. When he sat down to his sermons, his pen hung idly in his hand, and his mind, wilfully cheating itself by that semblance of study, went off into long delicious reveries, indescribable, intangible--a secret sweet intoxication which forbade labour, yet nourished thought. Though he sometimes did not write a word in an hour, so deep was the aspect of studiousness displayed by the young pastor at his writing-desk, and so entire the silence he maintained in his room, shut up in that world of dreams which n.o.body knew anything of, that his landlady, who was one of his hearers, communicated the fact to Tozer, and expatiated everywhere upon the extreme devotion to study displayed by the new minister. Old Mr. Tufton, who had been in the habit of putting together the disjointed palaver which he called a sermon on the Sat.u.r.day morning, shook his head over the information, and doubted that his young brother was resorting more to carnal than to spiritual means of filling his chapel; but the members of Salem generally heard the rumour with pride, and felt a certain distinction accrue to themselves from the possibility that their pastor might ruin his health by over-study. It was a new sensation in Salem; and the news, as it was whispered about, certainly came to the ears of a few of those young men and thinkers, princ.i.p.ally poor lawyers'

clerks and drapers' a.s.sistants, whom Tozer was so anxious to reach, and drew two or three doubtful, genteel hearers to the chapel, where Mr.

Vincent's sermon, though no better than usual, and in reality dashed off at the last moment in sheer desperation, when necessity momentarily thrust the dreams away, was listened to with a certain awe and devout attention, solely due to the toil it was reported to have cost. The young minister himself came out of the pulpit remorseful and ashamed, feeling that he had neglected his duty, and thoroughly disgusted with the superficial production, just lighted up with a few fiery sentences of that eloquence which belongs to excitement and pa.s.sion, which he had just delivered. But Tozer and all the deacons buzzed approbation. They were penetrated with the conviction that he had worked hard at his sermon, and given them his best, and were not to be undeceived by the quality of the work itself, which was a secondary matter. More deeply disgusted and contemptuous than ever was the young pastor at the end of that Sunday--disgusted with himself to have done his work so poorly--contemptuous of those who were pleased with it--his heart swelling with mortified pride to think that what he thought so unworthy of him was more appreciated than his best efforts. For he did not know the report that had gone abroad; he did not know that, while brooding over his own rising pa.s.sion, and absorbed in dreams with which Salem had nothing to do, the little world around him was complacently giving him credit for a purpose of wearing himself out in its behalf. The sermons so hastily written, thrust into a corner by the overpowering enchantment of those reveries, were not the only sin he had to charge against himself. He could not bring himself to bear the irksome society that surrounded him, in the state of elevation and excitement he was in.

Tozer was unendurable, and Phoebe to be avoided at all costs. He did not even pay his promised visit to Mrs. Hilyard, nor go to Siloam Cottage as usual. In short, he spent the days in a kind of dream, avoiding all his duties, paying no visits, doing no pastoral work, neglecting the very sermon over which his landlady saw him hanging so many silent hours, without knowing that all the vacant atmosphere between him and that blank sheet of paper, in which she saw nothing, was peopled with fairy visitants and unreal scenes to the dreamy eyes of her lodger. Such were the first effects of Circe's cup upon the young minister. He indulged himself consciously, with apologetic self-remonstrances, as Thursday approached. After that day, life was to go on as usual. No--not as usual--with a loftier aim and a higher inspiration; but the season of dreams was to be over when he had real admittance into that Eden garden, where the woman of all women wandered among her flowers. He thought what he was to say to her on that eventful day--how he should charm her into interest in his difficulties, and beautify his office, and the barren spot in which he exercised it, with her sympathy. He imagined himself possessed of her ear, certain of a place by her side, a special guest of her own election. He was not vain, nor deeply persuaded of his own importance; yet all this seemed only natural to his excited imagination. He saw himself by her side in that garden of beat.i.tudes, disclosing to her all that was in his heart; instinctively he recalled all that the poets have said of woman the consoler--woman the inspirer. When he had gained that priceless sympathy, what glorious amends he should make for the few days'

indolence to which he now gave way! Thus in his inexperience he went on, preparing for himself, as any one a little wiser could have seen at a glance, one of the bitterest disappointments of early life.

Thursday came, a day of days--such a day as people reckon by, months after; a soft and bright autumnal morning, breathing like spring. As Vincent issued from his own door and took his way along George Street to Grange Lane, he saw the curate of St. Roque's walking before him in the same direction; but Mr. Wentworth himself was not more orthodoxly clerical in every detail of his costume than was the young Nonconformist, who was going, not to Lady Western's breakfast-party, but into the Bower of Bliss, the fool's paradise of his youth. Mr.

Wentworth, it is true, was to see Lucy Wodehouse there, and was a true lover; but he walked without excitement to the green gate which concealed from him no enchanted world of delights, but only a familiar garden, with every turn of which he was perfectly acquainted, and which, even when Lucy was by his side, contained nothing ineffable or ecstatic.

It was, to tell the truth, an autumnal garden, bright enough still with scarlet gleams of geranium and verbena, with a lawn of velvet smoothness, and no great diminution as yet in the shade of the acacias and lime-trees, and everything in the most perfect order in the trim shrubberies, through the skilful mazes of which some bright groups were already wandering, when Vincent pa.s.sed through to the sunny open door.

At the open windows within he could see other figures in a pleasant flutter of gay colour and light drapery, as he advanced breathless to take his own place in that unknown world. He heard his own name announced, and went in, with a chill of momentary doubt upon his high expectations, into the airy sunshiny room, with its gay, brilliant, rustling crowd, the ladies all bright and fresh in their pretty morning-dresses, and the din of talk and laughter confusing his unaccustomed ears. For a moment the stranger stood embarra.s.sed, looking round him, eagerly investigating the crowd for that one face, which was not only the sole face of woman in the world so far as he was concerned, but in reality the only face he knew in the gay party, where everybody except himself knew everybody else. Then he saw her, and his doubts were over. When she perceived him, she made a few steps forward to meet him and held out her hand.

"I am so glad to see you--how kind of you to come!" said Lady Western; "and such a beautiful day--just what I wanted for my last fete. Have you seen my friend again since I saw you, Mr. Vincent--quite well, I hope?

Now, do have some coffee.--How do you do, Mr. Wentworth? You have been here full five minutes, and you have never paid your respects to me.

Even under the circ.u.mstances, you know, one cannot overlook such neglect."

"I am too deeply flattered that your ladyship should have observed my entrance to be able to make any defence," said the curate of St.

Roque's, who could speak to her as to any ordinary woman; "but as for circ.u.mstances----"

"Oh dear, yes, we all know," cried Lady Western, with her sweet laugh.

"Was it you, Mr. Vincent, who were saying that circ.u.mstances were everything in life?--oh, no, I beg your pardon, quite the reverse. I remember it struck me as odd and clever. Now, I daresay, you two could quite settle that question. I am such an ignoramus. So kind of you to come!"

Vincent was about to protest his delight in coming, and to deprecate the imputation of kindness, but ere he had spoken three words, he suddenly came to a stop, perceiving that not only Lady Western's attention but her ear was lost, and that already another candidate for her favour had possession of the field. He stepped back into the gay a.s.sembly, disturbing one group, the members of which all turned to look at him with well-bred curiosity. He stood quite alone and silent for some time, waiting if, perhaps, he could catch the eye of Lady Western. But she was surrounded, swept away, carried off even from his neighbourhood, while he stood gazing. And here was he left, out of the sunshine of her presence in the midst of Carlingford society, knowing n.o.body, while every face smiled and every tongue was busy but his own: talk _au discretion!_ such there certainly was--but Vincent had never in his life felt so preposterously alone, so dismally silent, so shut up in himself.