Toilers of Babylon: A Novel

CHAPTER XV

How sweet are the Surrey lanes and woods, especially round about Godalming! Innumerable are the pictures which artists have found there and fixed upon canvas to delight and instruct. In spring and summer peeps of fairyland reveal themselves almost at every turn. Small forests of straight and stately trees are there, full of solemn visions, lifting one's thoughts heavenward, and attuning the soul to more than earthly glory. The earth is carpeted with wonders, and the air is fragrant with subtle perfumes. The gentle declivities are clothed in beauty, and the wondrous variety of greens and browns are a marvel to behold.

It was a balmy night, and the skies were full of stars. A clear pool reflected them, and Nansie and Kingsley stood upon the rustic bridge and looked down in silence and love and worship.

"In the method of my education, my dear Nansie," said Kingsley, as they walked from the bridge into the stillness of the woods, "I recognize now one end."

"What end, Kingsley?" asked Nansie, looking up at him in hope.

"Nothing particular," said Kingsley. He spoke with his customary lightness, but there was a dash of seriousness in his voice, not as though he was troubled by the reflections which were passing through his mind, but with a dim consciousness that something better than he was able to accomplish might have been evolved. "That seems to me to have been the method of it-nothing particular. Shall I try to explain myself?"

"Please, dear. But kiss me first."

"Even in this kiss, my own dear wife," said Kingsley, "which, in what it means to me, all the gold in the world could not purchase- Ah, Nansie, dear, how truly I love you!"

"And I you, Kingsley, with all the strength of my heart and soul."

"That is the beauty of it, and it is that which makes it unpurchasable. It is my love for you, and yours for me; it is my faith in you and yours in me, springing out of my heart and soul as it springs out of yours, that makes me feel how inexpressibly dear you are to me, and to know that my spiritual life would not have been complete without you. But I am flying off at a tangent again."

"You were speaking of the method of your education, my darling."

"Yes, ending in nothing particular. God knows whether the fault is in it or me, but so it strikes me just now. I have a smattering of Greek and Latin, but nothing really tangible, I am afraid; nothing which would warrant me in calling myself a scholar. Say that I were one, a scholar and a man, I do not see (because, perhaps, after all, the fault or the deficiency is in my nature) how I could make a fortune out of it. For you, Nansie."

"I know, my dear," said Nansie, "that you are thinking of me."

"I confess that, if I allowed it to take possession of me, I should be more than perplexed; I should be seriously troubled. But, to go on. I seem not to be able, except in words, to express myself or do myself justice. For instance, I look into the stream, and see a wave of stars. There is a poem there, and I feel it, but I could not write it. Pitiful to reflect, isn't it? because, in our circumstances, it might be sold for-twopence; but even that we might find useful."

"A great deal more, dear, if you could write it."

"If I could! There's the rub. Here, as I look around me, and at every step I have taken, I see pictures; but I could not paint them. Now, how is that?"

"Perhaps, my dear," said Nansie, timidly, "it is because life has never been so serious to you as it is now with me by your side."

"Serious and sweet," said Kingsley; "remember that. We must not have one without the other. The fact is, I dare say, that I never thought of what I was to be, because I did not see the necessity of troubling myself about it. My father was a rich man; everybody spoke of him as a millionaire, and spoke the truth for once; and all my college chums envied me my luck. But for that it may be that I should have applied myself, and ripened into a poet or a painter, or something that would come in useful now. Nothing very superior, perhaps, in any line, because, my dear, you will be surprised when I confess to you that I do not regard myself as an out-of-the-way brilliant fellow. But there's no telling, is there, what may come out of a fellow if he puts his shoulder to the wheel?"

"Something good would be sure to come out of such a head as yours, Kingsley," said Nansie.

"You will flatter me, my dear; but, after all, you may be right. There are no end of clever men who were dull boys at school, and thought to have nothing in them; though, now I think of it, I was not at all a dull boy-rather bright, indeed, really, Nansie-and the fact that dullards often prove themselves geniuses is rather against me. Do you know what I've been told? That there is a lot of stuff in me, but that I lack application; that is, the power of sticking long to one thing. That is true, perhaps, and it is that quality, or failing, or what you like, that makes me fly off at a tangent in the way I am in the habit of doing. I've stuck pretty close to this conversation, haven't I?"

"Yes, dear."

"Notwithstanding that there are a thousand things to distract my attention. For instance, thoughts. Such as this: that it would be a happy lot if you and I could wander forever side by side through such lovely scenes as this, and in a night so sweet and beautiful."

"But that could not be, Kingsley, dear, and I am not sure whether it would be a happy lot."

"You surprise me, Nansie. Not a happy lot! Our being always together, and always without worry or trouble!"

"In course of time," said Nansie, a slight contraction of her eyelids denoting that she was thinking of what she was saying, "we should grow so used to each other that we should become in each other's eyes little better than animated statues. The monotony of its being always summer, of everything around us being always beautiful, would so weigh upon us that we should lose all sense of the beautiful, and should not be grateful for the sweet air, as we are now, Kingsley. We grow indifferent to things to which we are regularly accustomed. Change produces beauty. You are making me think, you see, and I am almost pretending to be wise."

"Go on, Nansie. I want you to finish, and when you have done I have something to say on an observation you have made, change produces beauty. Now that is a theme profound."

"There is not a season in the year that is not full of sweetness, and that we do not enjoy. If it were always spring the charm of spring would be gone. If it were always summer we should lie down and sleep the days away, and should gradually grow indifferent to the beautiful shapes and colors with which nature adorns the world in the holiday time of the year. Is not autumn charming, with its moons and sunsets and changing colors? And what can be prettier and more suggestive of fairy fancies than winter, in its garb of snow and icicle? There are plenty of bad days in all the seasons, even in the brightest, and it is those which make us enjoy the good all the more. In the last weeks of my dear father's life I learned a great deal from him; it was almost, Kingsley, as if he created a new life within me; and he had the power, in a few words, of unfolding wonders and making you understand them."

"Your dear father," said Kingsley, "was a wise and good man-a poet, too, and could have been almost anything in the artistic world he cared to aspire to. I have no doubt of that, Nansie, dear. And yet he was always poor, and died so."

"It is true, Kingsley. I think it was because he lacked-"

But Nansie paused in sudden alarm, and the word she was about to utter hung upon her tongue. It distressed her, also, that, in what was in her mind as to the reason of her father's worldly failure, the very words which Kingsley used towards himself should have suggested themselves to her.

"Because he lacked" – prompted Kingsley. "Finish the sentence, Nansie."

"The desire to produce, to achieve," said Nansie, in a stumbling fashion.

"No, Nansie, that was not the way you intended to finish the sentence. I want it in the original, without correction or afterthought. Because he lacked-"

"Application," said Nansie, desperately.

"Exactly. My own failing." Kingsley spoke gently, and as though he was not in the least dismayed by the example of an aimless life which presented itself in the career of Nansie's father. "Your father had great powers, Nansie, and could have accomplished great things if he had been industrious. But he was a happy as well as a good man. I cannot recall, in any person I ever knew, one who was so thoroughly happy as your father. He did harm to no man. His life was a good life."

"Yes, Kingsley." And yet Nansie was not satisfied with herself for being the cause of the conversation drifting into this channel.

"You see, my love," said Kingsley, in his brightest manner, and Nansie's heart beat gratefully at his cheerful tone, "when a truth comes home to a man he can, at all events, learn something from it, unless he be a worthless fellow. When he sees an example before him he can profit by it, if his mind be set upon it. He lays it before him, he dissects it, he studies it, and he says, 'Ah, I see how it is.' That is what I shall do. Your father and I, in this matter of application and industry, somewhat resemble each other. A kind of innate indolence in both of us. Well, what I've got to do is to tackle it. Within me is an enemy, a bad influence, which I must take in hand. 'Come,' I say to this insidious spirit, 'let us see who will get the best of it.' Thereupon we fall to. The right thing to do, Nansie?"

"Yes," she replied, "but you must not reproach yourself, my dear."

"Oh, I am not doing so," he said, quickly, before she could proceed. "I am applying to the discovery I have made the touchstone of philosophy. There is no doubt of the result, not the slightest. But I don't think it is anything to lament that I seem to find a resemblance in your father's character and mine."

"It is something to be deeply grateful for, my dear."

"And the discovery is made in time. After all, I am a young man, and, as I told you, I intend to commence with a new slate. Really, I intend to try my very best."

"And you will succeed, Kingsley," said Nansie, earnestly. "You are sure to succeed."

"Now that's comforting. It gives a fellow strength. With you always by my side, it will be very hard if I fail. But," and here he took off his hat and passed his fingers through his hair with the characteristic of vagueness in him which sometimes took a humorous and sometimes a pitiful turn, but always perplexed-"succeed or fail in what? That is the all-important question. There is no quarry in sight; it will never do to follow a Will-o'-the-wisp. So much valuable time lost. The very best thing, I take it, for a fellow in my position to do, is to find out his groove and fall into it. Do you consider that a practical idea?"

"Quite practical, my love."

"Yes, to find out the groove and fall into it. Could anything be done with tools?"

His voice was wholly humorous now, and for the life of her Nansie could not help smiling. "And what tools?" He looked at his hands, and stretched out his arms. "Well, all that is in the future. I was going to remark on an observation you made a little while ago. Oh, I remember what it is. 'Change produces beauty.' Now that struck me as serious. How about love?"

"I did not mean that, Kingsley, dear. Love stands apart from everything else. The sweetness and beauty of love is to be found only in perfection when it is constant and unchangeful. To me it is the same as my faith in immortality. My love for you will abide in me forever. Ah, Kingsley, do not misunderstand me, or misinterpret what I said!"

"I do not," he said, folding her in his arms and embracing her; "I could never have loved any other woman than you, I can never love another. So you see, my dear, you are not quite logical. There is one thing in which we should find no beauty in change."

They strolled through the woods, exchanging fond endearments, pausing often in silence to drink in the sweetness and the beauty of the time and scene. They listened to the notes of the nightingale, and recalled the remembrances of the night when Kingsley came to Nansie in the caravan.

"I have the daisies you threw up to my little window," said Nansie. "We listened to the nightingale then."

Some few minutes afterwards Nansie spoke to Kingsley of his mother.

"When your affairs are settled," she said, "do you not think that she would help you to make a start in life? You seldom speak of your mother, Kingsley."

"I think a great deal of her and of my father," said Kingsley, "and I have hidden something from you which I will tell you of presently. It is wrong to have a secret from you, but I really did it because I felt it would distress you. Between my mother and me, my dear, there was never any very close tie. We had not those home ties which I think must be necessary to bind parents and children together. Since I was a young child, I have always been away for ten months or so every year at school or college, and frequently in vacation I had no house in London or elsewhere in which to spend my holidays. My father, engrossed in his business, would be absent from England sometimes for many months, and my mother would often accompany him. Then you must understand that my parents are as one. What my father says is law, and my mother obeys his instructions implicitly. She is entirely and completely under his control, and has the blindest worship of him. She cannot believe that he could do anything that was not just and right, and if he says a thing is so, it is so, without question or contradiction from her. That tells fatally against me in this difference between my father and me. In her judgment-although she does not exercise it, but submits unmurmuringly to his-he is absolutely right in the course he has taken, and I am absolutely wrong. During the last week I spent at home my mother said many times to me, 'Kingsley, be guided by your father. For your own sake and ours do not thwart him.' I tried to reason, to argue with her, but she shook her head and would not listen, saying continually, 'I know all; your father has told me everything.' I half believe if she had only listened to me, and consented to see you, as I begged of her, that there would be some hope; but she would not. Well, my dear, since your dear father's funeral I have written to my mother."

"Yes, Kingsley," said Nansie, looking anxiously at him.

"No answer. I wrote to my father, too."

"Did he not reply, Kingsley?"

"He replied in a very effective manner. You know I received a letter yesterday, which I led you to believe was from a lawyer?"

"Yes, my dear."

"It was not, my dear. It was the letter I wrote to my father, returned to me unopened."

"Oh, Kingsley!"

"It was a blow, though I should have been prepared for it. My father is a man of iron will, Nansie; there is no moving him, once he has resolved upon a course. I dare say this inflexibility has helped him to grow rich, but it is a hard thing for us. And now, my dear, let us talk no more of this at present; it troubles me."

They diverged into other subjects, and Kingsley soon regained his lightness of spirits. They passed into an open glade with trees all around.

"A beautiful spot," said Kingsley; "and so suitable!"

"For what, dear?"

"For the caravan; one could be happy here for a long time. But that castle is in the air, is it not, my love?"

CHAPTER XVI

When Mr. Loveday, the bookseller in Church Alley, heard of his brother's death in a letter which Nansie wrote to him, he fell to reproaching himself for the small grief he experienced at the news. The intelligence did not, indeed, create within him any profound impression. He and his brother had been separated for a great many years, and the bond of love which had united them in their childhood had become weaker and weaker till it scarcely held together. It is true that death strengthened it somewhat, but it could never again be what it once was. The humanly selfish cares of life are so engrossing that love which is not in evidence dies gradually away. That "absence makes the heart grow fonder" is as false as are nine out of ten of other sentimental proverbs.

"Timothy," said Mr. Loveday to his new assistant, who was proving himself a perfect treasure, "when little Teddy died you were very sorry."

"I was more than sorry, sir," said Timothy, becoming instantly grave; "I was almost heart-broken."

"Have you got over it?" asked Mr. Loveday.

"I shall never get over it," replied Timothy.

"Do you think that will be true all your life long?"

"I am certain it will be, sir."

"And yet you were not related to him."

"No, sir; but I could not have loved a brother more."

Mr. Loveday winced.

"You regard that as a very strong tie, Timothy."

"A brother's love, sir?"

"Yes."

"I can hardly imagine a stronger. If I had a brother I should so love him that I think I should be ready to die for him."

"Ah!" mused Mr. Loveday, "perhaps if my brother had died when we were boys together, I should not be reproaching myself now for not feeling his death more keenly."

As a penance, he inflicted a punishment upon himself. Since he had taken Timothy into his service his life had been easier and more agreeable than it had been for a considerable time past. He was no longer tormented by small worries, which, after a long recurrence of them, become, in certain stages of mental irritation, veritable mountains of evil. Timothy had more than one rare gift, and not one more precious and beneficial in its effect upon others than the gift of thoughtfulness. This, extending to the most trivial matter where his own interests were not involved, was invariably displayed by Timothy when opportunity offered, and it was natural, therefore, that in his new and important position in Mr. Loveday's business and household, it should come into play with greater force. The result was that not a day passed without Mr. Loveday being made aware that he had enlisted in his service a lad who seemed bent upon making everything go on smoothly around him. Heaven only knows where Timothy picked up all he knew; it was likely the outcome of a willing, cheerful, practical spirit, and of one who knew how to profit by observation; but Timothy, who had never learned how to cook, could cook a chop and a steak and a potato to perfection, and before long could prepare more ambitious dishes in a manner to satisfy his master's not very fastidious taste; and Timothy, who had never passed an apprenticeship in domestic service, could and did apply himself with skilful efficiency to the thousand and one drudgeries of domestic affairs. Moreover, he did his work neatly and unobtrusively. There were no sudden noises now in Mr. Loveday's establishment; no unreasonable breakages of crockery; and, what Mr. Loveday thoroughly appreciated, no waste. It could not be but that Mr. Loveday noted with gratefulness this improvement in his surroundings, and therefore, being at ease and in rare peace of mind, the punishment he inflicted upon himself for not taking the news of his brother's death more closely to heart was really no light one. It was to write to Nansie and remind her, if she needed reminding, that he had promised her father to give her the shelter of his home.

"My dear niece," he wrote, "the intelligence you have conveyed to me of your dear father's death has deeply affected me-"