A Canadian Heroine. Mrs. Harry Coghill
had spoken so wisely about a sensible marriage, he had been drawing lessons from his own experience. The late Countess had been a very charming woman, of good family, but, like her daughters, "sans dot;" and the infatuation which caused so imprudent a connection not having lasted beyond the first year of matrimony, the Earl had had plenty of time to repent and to calculate, over and over again, how different the fortunes of his house might have been, had he acted, himself, upon the principles he recommended to his son. It was with some displeasure that he heard Edward's intention of giving up, for a while, his pursuit of a desirable bride, and this displeasure was not lessened by hearing that the truant intended prolonging his expedition, for the purpose of visiting his mother's nephew, William Bellairs.
The journey, however, was made without any opposition on the Earl's part. Mr. Percy spent a few weeks in Quebec, then the seat of Government, and travelling slowly westward arrived finally at his cousin's house at Cacouna. Mr. Bellairs was a barrister in good practice; his pretty wife, a Frenchwoman by descent, had brought him a fortune of considerable amount for the colonies, and knew how to make his house sufficiently attractive. Both received their English relative with hearty hospitality, and thus it happened that the even current of Cacouna society was disturbed by the appearance of a visitor important enough to be a centre of attraction.
The morning after the picnic Mr. Bellairs proposed to his guest that they should drive along the river-bank to some rapids a few miles distant, which formed one of the objects to which visitors to Cacouna were in the habit of making pilgrimages. They went accordingly, in a light waggon, and having duly admired the rapids, and the surrounding scenery, started for home. Their way led past the Leighs' house and the end of the lane leading to Mrs. Costello's. Mr. Bellairs pointed them both out to his companion.
"Do you see that cottage close to the river? That is the nest of the prettiest bird in Cacouna; and in this long white house to the right lives my most hopeful pupil and my wife's right hand, Maurice Leigh."
"Miss Costello told me they were near neighbours," said Mr. Percy. "Has she no father or brother, that she seems to be so much the property of this pupil of yours?"
"No, indeed, poor girl! Her father died, I believe, when she was an infant. Mrs. Costello came here twelve years ago, a widow, with this one child."
"Is young Leigh any relation?"
Mr. Bellairs laughed. "Not at present certainly, though I have thought it would come to that by-and-by. It is only a case of devoted friendship. Alice Leigh, Maurice's sister, and Lucia used to be always together; but poor Alice died, and I suppose Maurice felt bound to make up to Lucia for the loss."
"Who or what are the Leighs then? It is a queer-looking place."
"Mr. Leigh is an Englishman; he came out here many years ago with a young wife; she is dead and so are all her children except Maurice. Father and son live there together alone."
"I don't of course pretend to know how you manage such things in Canada, but it appears to me that a beautiful girl, like Miss Costello, might expect a better match, at least if one is to judge of the Leighs by their house."
"I am not sure that we should call Maurice a bad match for any girl. With a fair amount of brains, and a great capacity for work, he would be sure to get on in a country like ours, even if he were less thoroughly a good fellow. He has but two faults; he is too scrupulous about trifles, and a little too Quixotic in his ideas about women. However, my wife will never let me say that."
The subject did not interest Mr. Percy; he began to ask questions about something else, and they soon after reached home. Later in the day Mrs. Bellairs met him coming in extremely bored from her husband's office.
"I am going to pay some visits," she said, "are you disposed to go with me?"
"Most thankfully," he answered. "I have been listening to half-a-dozen cases of trespass, not a single word of which I could understand. It will be doing me the greatest kindness to take me into civilized society."
"I thought," she said laughing, "that you came to the backwoods to escape civilized society."
"If I did," he replied, handing her into the pony-carriage, "it is quite clear that I made a happy mistake."
"I am going first," she said, as soon as Bob was fairly in motion, "to the Parsonage. Mr. and Mrs. Bayne were to have been with us yesterday, but one of the children was ill, and I must inquire after it."
Mr. Percy's politeness just enabled him to suppress a groan. He had seen Mrs. Bayne once, and not been delighted—and a sick child! However, duty before all. They stopped at the gate of the Parsonage. It was a tolerably large house, standing on a sloping lawn, overlooking the river on one side and the little town on the other; but the lawn was entered only by a wicket, so that Bob had to be fastened to the railing, while the visitors walked up to the house.
The moment they were seen approaching three or four children ran out of the hall, where they were playing, and fell upon Mrs. Bellairs.
"Don't eat me," she cried, kissing them all in turn. "Which is the invalid? Where is mamma?"
"It was Nina," shouted a chorus; "she fell into the river. Mamma's in the house."
By this time they had reached the door, and Mrs. Bayne appeared, having been attracted by their voices. She was a little woman, thin and worn, so worn indeed, by many children and many cares, that she looked fifty instead of thirty-five. She had on a faded dress, and her collar and cuffs had been soiled and crumpled by the attacks of her younger boys and girls, especially the fat baby she held in her arms; but she had long ago ceased to be embarrassed by the shabbiness of her toilette, or the inevitable disorder of her sitting-room. She found seats for her guests, and to do so pushed into the background the baby's cradle and an old easy-chair, in which the luckless Nina was sitting bundled up in shawls.
Mrs. Bellairs took the baby, which instantly became absorbed in trying to pull out the long feather of her hat, drew her chair close to the little invalid, and began to inquire into the accident. Mr. Percy, determined to make the best of his circumstances, endeavoured to make friends with the heir of the house, a sturdy boy of nine or ten, but as the young gentleman declined to do anything, except put his finger in his mouth and stare, he found himself without other occupation than that of listening to the conversation of the two ladies.
"It was the night before last," Mrs. Bayne was saying; "they were playing on the bank, and Miss Nina chose to climb into a tree that overhangs the river. Of course when she got up, the most natural thing in the world was that she should slip down again, but unluckily she did not fall on the grass, but into the water."
Mrs. Bellairs shuddered. "What an awful risk!"
"My dear, they are always running risks. I am sure among the seven there is always one in danger."
"Well?"
"Well, Charlie ran to the study to his papa, and when Mr. Bayne went out, there was Nina, who had been partly stunned by her fall, beginning to float away with the current. Fortunately she had fallen in so near the edge that the water was very shallow, and if she had been in possession of her senses, she might have dragged herself out I dare say; but, you know, the current is very strong, and her papa had to get into the river a little lower down and catch her as she was passing."
"And she was insensible?"
"Not quite when they brought her in, but then unluckily her wetting brought on ague again, and she was shivering all night."
"Poor Nina!" and Mrs. Bellairs turned to the miserable pale child, who looked as if another shivering fit were coming on. "You must make haste and get better, and come and stay with Flo for a while. We never have ague."
"You are fortunate," sighed Mrs. Bayne. "I wish that wretched swamp could be done something to."
"So do I, with all my heart. I must tease William into giving the people no rest until they do it."
"You will be doing us and our poor neighbours at the shanties no small service. Ague is dreadfully bad there just now."
A frantic pull at Mrs. Bellairs' hat from the baby interrupted