Chambers's Journal of Popular Literature, Science, and Art, No. 684. Various
him for her sake. I tried to persuade myself that I was too hasty in my judgment – that his might be the type of manly beauty – the refined delicacy which in certain instances has accompanied a fine order of intellect. But no; Shelley had a different brow from that, and something very different looked out of Shelley's eyes.
While I was summing him up in this uncompromising way, I am bound to acknowledge that he was most courteously trying to make talk with me. Lilian had introduced us in her pretty graceful way, informing us that we were to become great friends; and he had taken the hint, making himself specially attentive and agreeable to me during dinner. He talked well, and appeared well read; and I must do him the justice also to say that his bearing towards Mrs Tipper was all that it should be, with no perceptible under-current of pride or satire. Above all, I must acknowledge that his love for Lilian was sincere; no woman could for a moment have doubted that; whatever its value in other respects, it was sincere. And yet I was perverse enough not to be satisfied with him. Why could I not take to him? I irritably asked myself, conscious that I had not sufficient grounds for my prejudice, and ashamed of feeling it. But there it was, and I could not overcome it.
Mr Farrar joined us in the drawing-room, which was lighted up as if for a large assembly, for an hour after dinner; and I, who had been accustomed to note certain signs and symptoms in an invalid, could see that the effort cost him a great deal. He was, however, not too weak to tell me the cost of building and furnishing Fairview; that he had paid two hundred and fifty pounds for the grand piano; a guinea a yard for the curtains; that the carpet had been made to his special order, &c.; whilst Mrs Tipper was smiling amiably in her after-dinner nap, her fat little jewelled hands folded at her capacious waist; and Lilian and her lover were sauntering amongst the flowers in the moonlight outside.
As soon as he was sufficiently recovered, Mr Farrar told me there were to be all sorts of entertainments given at Fairview; dinner-parties, garden-fêtes, and so forth. Then he named two or three City magnates as his friends, and went more fully into the Trafford pedigree for my edification, dwelling enjoyably upon the idea of being father-in-law to a Trafford. 'The Warwick Traffords, you understand, Miss Haddon; it is very essential that should be remembered.' Going on to point out the great things which might be expected from such an alliance. 'With money as well as birth, Arthur Trafford would enter parliament and make some mark in the world.' All of which proved that he too had faith in the young man's capabilities. I know now that it was Arthur Trafford's evidently sincere admiration for things great which misled so many who knew him. Were he capable of doing the deeds he could admire, he would have been what he had the credit for being. When I heard him dilate with glowing eyes and heightened colour upon some heroic deed, I could understand how he had obtained an influence over a young imaginative girl. He not only made her believe him to be endowed with the qualities of a hero, but honestly believed it himself; persuaded that he only lacked opportunity to prove that he was made of very different material from that of ordinary men.
I listened to Mr Farrar politely, as I was bound to do, and not a little pitifully too. All this was what he had set his heart upon; and he would not live to have his ambition gratified, even had Arthur Trafford been all he was imagined to be. Had no one warned him? Did not the sight of his own pinched and drawn face warn him that he was already on the threshold of the other life? Had I been speculatively inclined just then, I might perhaps have carried on the thought which suggested itself to me. I will only say that I felt more respect for the etherealised body at that moment than for the earth-bound soul. I think now that Mr Farrar would not be warned of what was approaching, and contrived to deceive his child and those about him as he deceived himself respecting his real state.
There certainly was at present no foreshadowing of the coming separation, in his daughter's face. She was altogether free from care; and I was presently very glad to find that my first estimate of her had been so far correct; she was not the kind of girl to be selfish in her happiness; in small things she shewed herself to be considerate for others. Mr Farrar was presently wheeled away in his invalid chair, bidding me good-night with the information that he was just at the period of convalescence when rest and seclusion are essential; and as soon as his daughter found that I was left companionless in the drawing-room, she came in, her lover's protests, which were carried on to the very threshold, notwithstanding.
But I begged to be allowed to make acquaintance with the garden; and went out into the moonlight, leaving the lovers at the piano together. It was the very best light in which to see the Fairview grounds where there were no trees higher than shrubs, and too much statuary, with vivid patches of colour, so fatiguing to the eye – masses of flowers without scent or leaves, arranged with mathematical precision, as though they had become strong-minded, and would only speak to you in problems. In fine, it was the newest fashion in gardening, which Mr Farrar prided himself upon keeping up at great expense. To my unaccustomed eye, it lacked the poetry of the old less formal styles. But it looked its best in the softening and subduing effect of moonlight; one got some hints of shadow, which was as lacking during most of the day as in the famous Elizabethan picture. In the light of day the silvan gods and goddesses looked specially uncomfortable, for want of a little foliage. One 'Startled Nymph,' placed at the corner of a gravel-walk, without so much as a shrub near her, appealed to one's sense of justice in the most pathetic way.
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