LITERATURE.

Globe, Volume III, Issue 284, 10 May 1875, Page 3

LITERATURE.

RUPERT’S CHOICE. Chapter I. ‘lt can’t be done, mother! ’ exclaimed Rupert Loraine, startling both his mother and myself by impatiently Hinging down on the breakfast table the new Bradshaw which the butler had brought in to him a few moments before. * Those brutes of directors have been squabbling again, and have carefully re-arranged the trains on both lines so that none of them fit each other, ’

‘Dinner can be as much later as you like,’ said Mrs Loraine, looking up from her letters.

‘ Not a bit of good, mother, if you dined at midnight!’ replied Rupert. *As it has stood all the summer, I could have done it beautifully. It was—Clevelands 5.50 Whitfield Junction 6.ls—Newbury 6,55 and an hour to drive home and dress for dinner at eight ; but now I can’t get home to-night unless I leave Clevelands at three o’clock—which is impossible—and wait two hours at Whitfield.’ * There must bo a later train! ’ I said.

‘ Yes! ’ answered Rupert. 1 There is one at 6.10 from Clevelands, reaching Whitfield at 6.45: precisely a quarter of an hour after the last train leaves Whitfield for Newbury!’

Mrs Loraine listened in evident consternation. ‘ But, Rupert, what can you do? Miss Herries comes this afternoon. ’

‘ I know she does, mother, or it wouldn’t matter a bit —but you must tell her I could not help it, and I will be here by breakfast time to morrow.’

‘ How dreadfully provoking! ’ said Mrs Loraine. ‘ There will be the whole evening without you!’ Rupert laughed. ‘ Well, mother, I’m not so conceited as to think that she can’t get through an evening without me! Anyhow it can’t be helped, and when I come back tomorrow morning I shall expect to find that you have been getting on like a house on fire! ’

* I will do my best, but it will be so different for her without you, ’ said Mrs Loraine.

* I’m half inclined to think it a piece of luck,’ exclaimed Rupert, who was always rather an optimist. ‘ You will be thrown more on each other at first and forced to break the ice and make a sudden plunge. Indeed, mother, Mona will suit you exactly, lam sure! She is good to read German poetry by the yard, and to play Beethoven by the hour, if you wish it; and she is great at schools and hymns and dirty children, and knows all about ferns—you like all the same things, I assure you! ’ ‘You included, I suppose!’ said his mother, smiling, as he ended his somewhat miscellaneous catalogue of Miss Herries’ accomplishments. ‘ Well, we must make the best of it it; but lam very sorry for her disappointment. ’ ‘ She’ll survive !’ laughed Rupert. ‘ Only don’t you go and be shy of her, mother, for she is awfully anxious about your liking her. However, there will be dear old Job here to act buffer and break the first shock, so I hope ’ ‘ The dog-cart is at the door, sir, and your things are all in, and I don’t think you’ve no time to lose,’ announced the butler.

‘ All right, Saunders ! I’m ready !’ And with a hasty ‘ Good-bye,’ Rupert dashed out of the dining-room and we heard him drive off. He had long been engaged to play on this day in a return match between the cricket clubs of his own county and the adjoining one ; but until this morning—too late to give up the engagement—he had no idea that he could not get back to dinner. ‘ Unfortunate, is it not?’ said Mrs Loraine, as we left the breakfast table.

‘I am inclined to agree with Rupert,’! replied. ‘ I think you will get on all the better for being thrown more completely upon each other at first.’ Mrs Loraine smiled and went off to the housekeeper’s room; while I turned into the library, which was the usual morning sitting-room. I was at this time on a visit to Helmsleigh, which is a beautiful place about seven miles from Newbury. I may, perhaps, as well state here that my name is Jane Osborne Barlow, and that ‘Job’ was a neckname given to me by Rupert in his childhood, when he chanced to make the discovery that that name was spelled by my initials.

I first made Mrs Loraine’s acquaintance abouttwo-and- twenty years ago, when I, then a girl of twentj, went to be Rupert’s governess. Mrs Loraine was the only child and heiress of old Mr Loraine, of Helmsleigh, and she had married a Colonel Eliot, who had taken her name. Their own house was in London, for he had an appointment at the Horse Guards, but they were a great deal at Helmsleigh. When J first went to them, Rupert was five years old, Alice three, and Bertha only fifteen months. I was kindly and affectionately treated ; I was an orphan without near relations, and the Loraines and Helmsleigh became to me as my own people and my home. Years passed on, and troubles came in quick succession. Colonel Eliot Loraine went to the Crimea, and fell at the battle of the Alma ; and the widow returned with her four children (for another boy had been born a few mouths after I went to them) to live with her old father at beautiful Helmsleigh, which would one day b( first hers and then Rupert’s. I remained with her, as her companion and the gov( mess of the little gills. Rupert, of course, left my care at ton years old to go to school, returning for the holidays to be the pride of our hearts and the plague of our lives ; bright, handsome, merry Rupert, always in mischief, but irresistibly lovable; devoted to his mother, affectionate to his sisters, and kindly courteous to me, though devising new schemes for our torment with each succeeding day !

1 helped Mrs Loraine to nurse her father through the long and tedious illness which preceded his death ; together we watched over dear little Oei’ald, who died of injuries received by a fall from his pony at eight years old ; and, sharper grief still, we saw our sweet, gentle Bertha slowly fade and droop, and die at sixteen, in spite of all that medical skill and the tenderest care could do. We left our darling at The following year, Alice, being eighteen, was presented and introduced into society, and I left Helmsleigh. They wished me to remain there, but I seemed to be needed elsewhere; for old Mr and Mrs Eliot, the father and mother of Colonel Eliot Loraine, required a companion and housekeeper now that all their daughters were married ; and they wei’e old and intirm, and unlit to bo alone together. They knew me And "were

willing to have me, and I felt that I could be of more use there than at Helmsleigh. For seven years now I have lived with them very happily, but I can rarely leave them. Occasionally, however, I am able to manage a visit to Helmsleigh ; and I was there for a month this summer.

Mrs Loraine was now very much alone there, for Alice had married at nineteen, and in every way to her mother’s satisfaction, but had died the following year at the birth of her first child, which only survived her for a few hours. Rupe't was now the only treasure left to his mother, and she idolised him. For his sake she struggled, even in early days, against her grief, and took care that Helmsleigh should continue to be a cheerful home for him, where his friends were always welcome. Rupert was very found of her and very considerate for her; but though he nominally lived with her he was a great deal away, either travelling or paying visits. Amusements of one kind or another tempted him in every direction, and he had no real duties at home ; for, though his father’s fortune made him quite independent, the property was his mother’s, and she had never abdicated her powers, though pleased to have his help in her rule.

Rupert’s marriage had naturally been always anticipated as likely and desirable, but when it came it was inevitably an anxiety and a shock. He had returned home quite lately from visiting some friends in Devonshire, to announct to his mother that he had engaged himself to a Miss Herries, a young lady of whose existence Mrs Loraine had never heard till that moment. She did not even know the Scott Parrys, the friends at whose house Rupert had met her. It was easily ascertained, however, that both Colonel and Mrs Herries were people of good birth and that there was nothing wrong about them, except poverty, which in this case could be of no consequence whatever.

Mrs Loraine did and said all that was kind and unselfish, and at once invited Miss Herries and her parents to come to pay a visit at Helmsleigh. But Colonel Herries was an invalid and could not visit, and his wife and daughter could not leave him at the same time; therefore Rosamond, otherwise “ Mona,” must come alone. It was rather a formidable visit for all parties, and she was to arrive in the afternoon of the day on which Rupert had gone over to Clevelands. I was very glad to be staying at Helmsleigh at this time, for I was deeply interested in all that concerned the happiness of both mother and son, All that we knew about Miss Herries was that she was the eldest of a large family, that she was two-and-twenty, and was tall, slight, and dark-haired. Rupert would sho >v no photograph of her. “ Horrid things—only fit for the fire—none of them do her justice!’ It was pleasant in these modern days to see that he was genuinely in love; the expression of it might be couched in queer phrases, and even in slang, but it was quite evident that his Mona had won his whole heart, and from that I augured well. For Mrs Lorame’s sake, even more than for Rupert’s, I was anxious to see Miss Herries. I longed to see the friend who had gone through such depths of trouble find in her son’s wife a loving daughter who would appreciate her, and delight in making her life bright and pleasant. Nothing would ever make Rupert otherwise than kind and affectionate to his mother, but a wife’s influence might greatly affect her happiness. To me, Mrs Loraine was an unusually interesting person ; but she was peculiar. Handsome, clever, and cultivated, and accustomed from childhood to be a person of importance, and both flattered and deferred to, she was yet curiously shy and diffident as to her own powers of winning affection, and the stiffness produced by this shyness was often mistaken for pride. She was eagerly enthusiastic, very sensitive and impulsive, and generous almost to folly; yet, with it all, she was too clever and sensible not to see through attempts to impose upon her, as soon as she allowed herself to think coolly. She was rashly lavish of assistance, of sympathy and affection, according as she fancied her friends to need them ; and then was quick to seeand feel, too late, that all her warm feeling and delicate generosity had been wasted. Knowing all this, I could not but be anxious to ascertain that Miss Herries was likely to understand her. I watched her all day, scarcely knowing whether tovbe touched or amused by her proceedings. She had selected for Miss Herries the prettiest room in the house, with a lovely view over the park, and she was in and out of it all day, adding to its attractions. She selected quite a library of such books as she herself valued, to place in the bookshelves; she gathered the prettiest flowers to make bouquets for the table ; she changed a commonplace engraving for a pretty water-colour sketch of Rupert as a child, with his dog and pony, which had always hung in her own room; and I only hoped that the girl who was on her way to Helmsleigh might be able to appreciate all the accumulated tokens of delicate welcome. Chapter 11. ‘We will drive over to Newbury this afternoon, I think, Jane, and meet Miss Herries,’ said Mrs Loraine after luncheon. * Saunders, tell Johnson to bring the carriage round in time for us to meet the 4.45 train. The cart must go for Miss Herries’ luggage.’ This was unquestionably the right thing to do, but, unfortunately, about ten minutes before we ought to have set off, the old Earl and Countess of I) came to call. They were the great people of the county, he being the Lord Lieutenant; they were also old friends, and they had driven many miles to congratulate Mrs Loraine on her son’s engagement, which had gradually become public news. There was no choice in the matter. Mrs Loraine desired Saunders to tell the coachman to be sure to be in time for the train, and the footman to say to Miss Herries' that she was sorry to be prevented from going to meet her; and then she passed on to the drawing-room to receive her guests and beg them to have their carriage put up for an hour or two. When they found that Miss Herries was expected on a first visit that very day, they ordered their carriage before the hour when she might be expected to arrive ; but there had been some little delay in the stables, and they were later than they intended to be, so that they drove from the house as the returning carriage drove up to it, and we heard no second sound of wheels. Our first intimation of the arrival was the door being thrown open by Saunders, who announced, in his most imposing manner Herries.”

To be continued.