The Martyrdom of Madeline. Robert Williams Buchanan
had never been conscious of before.
In the course of her daily visits to the studio, where even the misanthropic Judas, as he had been profanely christened on account of his forbidding aspect, now gave her a welcome, she saw many things which awakened her wonder. Her previous ideas of Art had been chiefly connected with house-decoration and sign-painting, and she marvelled much at the creations on canvas of young Mr. Cheveley. For White she soon contracted a passionate affection, which deepened into idolatry when the good-natured Bohemian began, in his idle moments, to teach her to draw.
The quickness with which she learned the rudiments of this accomplishment reminded White that her general education was being neglected altogether.
‘My dear,’ he said to her one afternoon, 41 think I shall have to send you to school.’
She was standing at his side, looking over his shoulder, as he ‘touched up’ for her a picture of a house which reeled to one side like the leaning tower at Pisa, a tree or two like inverted mops, and a very shabby-looking bridge.
She looked at him right in the eyes, which was her custom.
‘I hate school,’ she said emphatically.
‘So did I at your age, and the child who doesn’t always comes to be hung. But I really think you’d pay for a little schooling. You write a shocking hand, to begin with.’
‘Uncle Luke said it was beautiful writing, and as clear as print.’
‘Humph! well, you see, he looked at it from a different point of view. I don’t question its legibility, which after all is the first thing to be aimed at, but it wants style. Then, your grammar is more shady than befits the protégée of a master-stylist, like myself.’
‘What’s grammar?’ asked Madeline, swinging her right foot irritably. ‘Nouns, verbs, “I am,” “thou art,” and all that? I hate ’em all.’
White laid down the drawing on which he had been busy, and took her by the two hands.
‘You hate a good many things,’ he said mildly. ‘Pray, what do you particularly like?’
‘I like drawing. I like to hear Mamzelle singing the pretty songs, and trying on her new dresses. I like dancing, too, and music, and all that. And I like to be here with you. I like you better than Mr. Cheveley. If I was big enough I’d marry you, and then you could take me to the theayter, where Mamzelle goes.’
‘Pronounce it theatre,’ said White, while his eyes opened in amused wonder. ‘So you are beginning to think of marrying already, are you? Precocious child! And you’d marry me, would you? Why, I’m old enough to be your father, and by the time you are a young woman I shall be quite on the shelf.’
Madeline surveyed him for some moments critically; then she threw her arms round his neck and kissed him impulsively.
‘When I marry you, Mr. White,’ she said, ‘I’ll buy you a nice wig, and then, you see, no one will know!’
‘A wig—the gods forbid!’
‘A beautiful black, like the Chevalier wears. I know it’s a wig, because he takes it off and puts on a nightcap when he goes to bed.’
White threw back his head and laughed heartily; then forcing a serious look into his face, he said—
‘Don’t let us wander from the subject; I began by saying that you must go to school.’
Madeline’s face darkened, and her lips pouted.
‘I shan’t,’ she said.
‘Come, come, Madeline! Don’t you care to learn?’
‘No.’
‘Nevertheless, learning is a physic which you will be compelled to take. You mustn’t grow up a little ignoramus. English grammar, geography, and—yes, by Jove—you shall learn French and music.’
‘French!’ she cried, with a sudden sparkle in her eyes. ‘Like Mamzelle talks sometimes to her pa?’
‘Exactly.’
‘And music! I love music! And then I shall understand every word they say, and play like Mamzelle on the piano. Oh, Mr. White, do let me go to school and learn French and music!’
All. opposition being thus speedily withdrawn, White determined that Madeline should go to school forthwith. In his customary fashion, therefore, he dismissed the subject from his mind; and it is a question how soon he would have practically carried out the scheme if Madeline herself had not worried him every day with the question, ‘Oh, Mr. White, when am I to go to school and learn French and music?’ But after a consultation with the Chevalier, a school was found in the neighbourhood—which he himself attended two or three times a week—and after a slight discussion over terms, which were specially reduced in her case, Madeline was sent there as a day scholar.
Once or twice since her translation to London, Madeline had heard from her foster-mother, who was then going from house to house as a monthly nurse. Mrs. Peartree could not write herself, but she sent by deputy many fond and loving messages, which Madeline answered with letters a thousand times more passionate. Since the day of their parting, however, she had heard nothing from Uncle Luke.
But some few weeks after she went to school there arrived a letter for her bearing the post-mark of a small town in Essex. Opening it eagerly, she read as follows:—
Mi dere Madlin—This comes from uncle Luke, hopping you are quite wel and a good gel which it leaves me at present. I be ni art-broke far away from you and mother working on the river down alonger mi cussin Joss don’t kry cos I brung you to London but be a good gel and give my umble respecs to Mister wite mi dere Madlin mi dere Madlin there be no bargis in thes parts and neer a brethren but aples be pourful big and I wish you see the aple-tree in cussin Joss his garding with luv & kisses & hopping you are a good gel & my humble respecks to mister wito good bi at present I am ever fecksonit uncle luke peartree.
P.S. Be a good gel & don’t kri cos I brung you.
Many and many a burning kiss did Madeline press on this simple epistle. She wetted it with her most tender tears, and placed it beneath her pillow at night, and carried it about all day in her bosom, to be kissed and kissed yet again. With a certain intuitive shame, she did not show it to any member of the De Berny family, whose fault was a snobbishness characteristic of shabby gentility, but she fearlessly confided in Mr. White and let him read it through. He was touched by its simple affection, penetrating through the rude orthography to the staunch and loving soul of the writer; and he encouraged the girl to talk to him of Uncle Luke and all her lowly friends.
‘Those who did not know him,’ he thought, as he listened to her eager words and watched her flushed face, ‘called poor Fred callous. It’s a lie! He had a noble heart, and so, thank God, has his little child!’
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