Under the Mendips: A Tale. Marshall Emma
had better wait here," was the answer. "The service is nearly over. Come this way into the cloisters. Don't be aggressive, Falconer, and make a row."
"I hate rows as much as you do," was the answer; "but I am not inclined to knock under, to this pair of drivelling old idiots."
I cannot say how this unseemly wrangle might have ended had not the verger in charge of the Dean heard the blowing of the organ pipes, which was a warning that he was to hasten to perform his office, and conduct the Dean back to the Deanery.
Almost immediately the organ sounded, and those who had taken part in the service came out. Joyce and Charlotte were amongst the last of the very scanty congregation.
Melville, for reasons of his own, did not care to introduce his friend at that moment, and Mr. Arundel was quite unconscious that the fair face of which he caught sight, from under the shadow of the large bonnet, was that of Melville's sister.
"What a sweet face!" he thought; and then, as Joyce turned suddenly towards the spot by the font where the two gentlemen were standing, a bright blush and smile, made her look irresistibly lovely.
"Who is that young lady, Melville? She knows you." For Joyce had made a step forward, and then apparently changed her mind and went towards the north door with Charlotte.
Melville fingered his cravat, and settled his chin in its place above it. "That little girl dressed as if she came out of Noah's ark is my sister! Come, you will have another opportunity of cultivating her acquaintance, and you want to call at the Palace, don't you?"
"My mother charged me to do so; but there is no haste."
"Oh, you had better not lose time, or you may not find your legs under the Bishop's mahogany. We live some miles out, you know."
Mr. Arundel turned his head round twice to take a last look at the retreating figures, and then allowed Melville to tuck his arm in his, and walk down the cloisters with him to the Palace.
Melville was in fact very anxious to show off his intimacy with Mr. Arundel to the bishop, for he could not hide from himself the fact that the ecclesiastical élite of Wells had not paid him the attention he hoped to receive. The truth was that rumours of Melville's gay and careless life, and the anxiety he had given his father, had reached the ears of some in authority. Heads of colleges reported his behaviour at Oxford, and Melville had been sent down, not for what may be called serious offences; but still the character hung about him of a man who cared for nothing earnestly; reading or rowing, it was all alike. Nothing that Melville did was done with singleness of purpose, except, as his father sometimes said, with a sigh, "dress himself like a mountebank and copy London fashions."
CHAPTER III.
THE PALACE
The old baronial Palace of Wells, surrounded by its moat and reached by a drawbridge – not raised now as in olden times, – is in perfect harmony with the city in which it stands. In it, but not of it; for when once the gateway is passed, the near neighbourhood of the market-place is forgotten, such traffic as this little city knows is left behind; and the gardens of the Palace might well be supposed to be far from all human habitations, so complete is the repose which broods over it. Encircled by battlemented walls, and standing in a wide demesne, a stranger is at once struck with the unusual beauty of its surroundings.
Mr. Arundel's admiration rather disconcerted his friend.
"Come on, Arundel. Don't stare about like that; some of the family may be at the windows."
But Mr. Arundel did not heed his friend's entreaty.
"Come on; it is so like a country clodhopper to stand looking at a big house, as if you had never seen one before."
"I never have seen one before, in the least like this big house," was the reply; "and what are those ruins? It is odd, Falconer, that you never prepared me for the beautiful things I was to find in Somersetshire."
"It's a mighty damp place," Melville said. "Rheumatism and low fever haunt the servants' quarters, which are on a level with the moat; but, my dear fellow, do come on."
"Can't we cross over to that old wall? It is like a glimpse of Paradise through there."
"No, no, we must go up to the front like well-mannered folk. Come, don't be so obstinate, Arundel."
Whether Melville would have succeeded in his attempts to draw his friend towards the entrance-porch, which stood in the centre of a long line of windows of the lower story of this side of the Palace, I do not know, had not a clerical figure in knee-breeches and shovel hat, been seen advancing over the emerald turf, and approaching the two young men.
Melville began to show signs of nervousness, and the grand air which he maintained to his inferiors gave place to a rather servile and cringing manner, as he carefully removed his high narrow hat from his curled head and, bowing low, said:
"My lord, my friend Mr. Arundel is anxious to pay his respects to you."
The bishop looked with keen grey eyes at Melville, and said stiffly:
"Mr. Falconer's son, I think?"
"Yes, my lord; your lordship's humble servant," again bowing till the tails of his short-waisted coat stood up like those of a robin-redbreast.
"Arundel, Arundel," the bishop repeated; "Arundel: the name is familiar to me."
"My mother, my lord, had the honour of your lordship's acquaintance some years ago. She was Annabella Thorndeane."
The bishop's somewhat stiff manner changed at once. He extended his hand, and said:
"To have known your mother is to bear her always in affectionate remembrance. Where is she living?"
"Since my father's death, my lord, my mother has had no settled home. She has lived within reach of me, first at Winchester, and then at Oxford. Now she will settle where I do."
"And what profession are you taking, may I inquire?"
"The law I believe; things are not yet decided, my lord; but there is some notion of a partnership in Bristol, when I have passed the needful examinations."
"Well, well, we must have lawyers, and can no more do without them than doctors, eh?" All this time Melville had fidgeted, and felt annoyed at the bishop's coldness to him. "I am alone just now in the Palace; health, or rather the search for health, has taken the ladies to the east coast, a very distant spot – Cromer in Norfolk. But bracing was recommended, and our Western sea cannot come under that head. But will you walk round; I shall be pleased to show you over the grounds, and the gallery, where the portraits of my predecessors hang. One has the mark of a bullet in his cheek, caught in the battle of Sedgemoor. All our surroundings speak of warlike times, and there are moments now when I feel as if I would gladly pull up my drawbridge and have done with the world without. There is strife in the streets, and storms even in our little tea-cup, I can assure you."
The bishop now led the way round to the gardens at which Arundel had looked with longing eyes through the ruins. Suddenly the bishop turned sharply on Melville, looking him down from head to foot with anything but an approving glance.
"And what profession, sir, do you mean to take up? – law, like your friend – or what?"
"I am going to travel for a year, my lord."
"Travel! humph! Your good father has several sons, I think?"
"Four younger sons, my lord; so much the worse for me."
"I hope you set them a good example," said the bishop, drily. "I should venture to suggest that your father might want help with his estate."
"He has a steward, my lord, an old servant."
"Stewards mean money, don't they? and a gentleman with a small landed property cannot be overburdened with that article nowadays, more especially if he has five sons."
Melville's brow clouded, and he would fain, if he had dared, given vent to some rather uncomplimentary adjectives, of which "old meddler" was one.
"Here," said the bishop, "are the ruins of the old Hall, where, report says, the last abbot of Glastonbury was hanged. He was tried here