Caradoc's voice became quite tremulous, either because of Miss Lloyd's obduracy, or that he felt, as many people do, rather pathetic at the thought of his own demise. He had already possessed himself of her whip-hand, when her horse began to rear, and in a minute more they were in the lime avenue; and this proved the last opportunity he had of reasoning with her on the subject that was nearest his heart. He now wished that he had never met Winifred Lloyd, or that, having met, and learned to love her--oddly enough, when his passion was not returned--he could be what her _ideal_ was. "In what," thought he, "am I wanting? Am I too rough, too soldierly, too blunt, unwinning, or what?" It was none of these; for Caradoc was a well-mannered, courteous, gentle, and pleasing young fellow, and by women unanimously deemed handsome and _distingué_. All that day he was unusually cast down and taciturn, though he strove to take an interest in the conversation around him.
"By Jove, Hardinge," said he, "I wish you had never brought me here, to renew the hopes I had begun to entertain in London."
"Don't lose heart yet, Phil," said I.
"But I have to leave for the seat of war--leave her to the chance of being loved by others, without even a promise--"
"To what troubles we are exposed in life!" said I, sententiously, and feeling perhaps selfishly secure in my own affair.
"Greater troubles perhaps in death," added Phil, gloomily, as he gnawed his moustache. "I sometimes wonder whether man was made for the world, or the world was made for man."
"In what respect," said I, surprised by the train of thought so unusual in him.
"Look at the newly-born infant, and you will find it difficult to determine. 'He begins his life,' as Pliny says, 'in punishment, and only for being born.'"
"Come Phil," said I, "don't get into the blues; and as for Pliny, I left him with Euclid, Straith's _Fortification_, and gunnery, at Sandhurst."
The morning mail brought letters from the depôt-adjutant to Phil and me. Their official aspect, as Owen Gwyllim laid them on the breakfast table, attracted the attention of all. The eyes of Winifred were on me, and mine turned instinctively and sadly to Lady Estelle, who grew ashy pale, but seemed intent on some letters of her own. The adjutant's epistles were brief. Caradoc was requested to join at once, his short leave being cancelled, as he had to go with a draft of eighty rank-and-file for the East. My leave was, extended for a fortnight, in consequence of a medical certificate received concerning the accident that had befallen me.
So that night saw poor good-hearted Phil depart; and the memory of his thick brown hair and handsome brown moustache, his clear hazel eyes and honest English face dwelt not in the thoughts of her with whom he had left his heart behind.
He had the regimental goat in his custody; and when Winifred caressed and kissed her pet, ere it was lifted into the vehicle that was to convey it to Chester, Phil eyed her wistfully; and I knew that he would have given the best of his heart's blood to have felt but one of those kisses on his nut-brown cheek!
CHAPTER XVIII.--GUILFOYLE.
My Lord Pottersleigh and the adventurer Hawkesby Guilfoyle--for an artful, presumptuous, and very singular adventurer he eventually proved to be--could not detect that there was a secret understanding, and still less that there was any engagement, between Lady Estelle and me; yet both were sharp enough to fancy that there was something wrong so far as they were concerned--something understood by us which to them was incomprehensible; and the latter now referred in vain to Baden, Berlin, Catzenelnbogen, and other places where they had met so pleasantly on the Continent. Engaged solemnly and tenderly to Estelle, I had yet the absurd annoyance of beholding Pottersleigh, who was assured of her mother's countenance and favour (though he would have been a more seemly suitor for herself), and whose years and position gave him perfect confidence, hovering or shambling perpetually about her, absorbing her time if not her attention, mumbling his overstrained compliments into her unwilling ear, touching her hand or tapered arm, and even patting her lovely white shoulders from time to time with his withered paws, and every way giving himself such fatherly and lover-like airs of proprietary oddly mingled that I could with pleasure have punched his aristocratic old head. We frequently laughed at all this even when he was present; for by a glance rather than a word, Estelle could convey to me all she thought and felt. There was something delightful in this secret understanding, this secret community of thought and interest, with one so young and beautiful--more than all, when blended with it was the charm of the most perfect success in a first affair of love; and I thought myself one of the happiest fellows in the world.
Superb as her toilettes were at all times, she seemed to make little Babette Pompon take extra pains with them now, and I felt delighted accordingly, for such infinite care seemed to express a desire to please me. Our next departure from the Court was Mr. Hawkesby Guilfoyle, whom Sir Madoc and all his visitors had begun to view with a coolness and disfavour of which the party in question found it convenient to seem quite oblivious; but it reached its culminating point through a very small matter. One day after luncheon we had gone so far as Penmaen Mawr. The four ladies were in the open carriage; I occupied the rumble; Sir Madoc, Lord Pottersleigh, and Guilfoyle were mounted, and we were all enjoying to the fullest extent that glorious combination of marine and mountain scenery peculiar to the Welsh coast; the air was full of ozone and the sky was full of sunshine. We were all happy, and even Winifred seemed in unusually high spirits; as for Dora, she was never otherwise. The well-hung carriage rolled pleasantly along, between the beautiful green hills, past quiet villages and ancient churches, vast yawning slate quarries, green mounds and gray stones that marked where battles had been, with occasional glimpses of the Irish Sea, that stretched away to the dim horizon like a sheet of glittering glass. Estelle, by arrangement, sat with her back to the horses, so that she and I could freely converse with our eyes, from time to time, under the shade of her skilfully-managed parasol.
Sir Madoc on this day was peculiarly enthusiastic, and having mounted what the girls called his "Welsh hobby," was disposed to give it full rein. We halted in a little sequestered glen, a lovely spot embosomed among trees, on the southern slope of the hill. The horses were unbitted; Owen Gwyllim had put the champagne' bottles to cool in a runnel, where their long gilded necks and swollen corks stood invitingly up amid the rich green grass that almost hid the murmuring water. We had come by Caerhun, through an old and little-frequented road, where Sir Madoc insisted on pointing out to us all the many erect old battle-stones by the wayside; for his mind was now full of quaint stories, and the memory of heroes with barbarous names. Thus when Owen uncorked the Cliquot, he drank more than one guttural Welsh toast, and told us how, often in his boyhood, the road had been obstructed for weeks by masses of rock that fell thundering from the mountain above; and in his love of the olden time or detestation of change, I believe he would have preferred such barriers to progress still, rather than have seen the lines of road and rail that now sweep between the mountain and the sea on the way to Holyhead.
"It was in this dell or _glyn_," said Sir Madoc, as he seated his sturdy figure on the grass, though the ladies did not leave the carriage, "that Llewellyn ap Jorwerth took prisoner the luckless William de Breas, whom he hanged at Aber, in the time of Henry III."
"Why did he hang him?" asked Guilfoyle, holding his glass for Owen to refill it.
"Because he was a handsome fellow, and found too much favour in the eyes of his princess, whom he dragged to the window that she might see his body hanging lifeless on the gibbet."
"Deuced hard lines," said Guilfoyle, laughing. "I thought he might have been hung because he hadn't a pedigree, or some other enormity in Welsh eyes." As Sir Madoc looked at the speaker his eyes sparkled, for the remark was a singularly gratuitous one.
"You English," said he, "laugh at what you are pleased to consider our little weakness in that respect; and yet the best names in the peerage are apt to be deduced from some corporal or sergeant of William's Norman rabble."
"Heavens, papa! when I change my name of Lloyd, I hope it won't be for that of Mrs. John Smith or Robinson?" said Dora, merrily, as she heard that Sir Madoc's tone was sharp.
"Well, but you must admit that these fortuitous circumstances are deemed of small account now; for as Dick Cypher sings,
"'A peer and a 'prentice now dress much the same, And you can't tell the difference excepting by name.'"
"I don't know who your friend Dick Cypher may be," replied Sir Madoc, quietly, though evidently greatly ruffled, "but Burke and Debrett record as ancient, names we deem but those of yesterday, and when compared with ours are as the stunted gorsebush to pine or oak--yes, sir! or as the donkey that crops thistles by the wayside when compared to the Arab horse!"