The History of Henry Esmond, Esq., a Colonel in the Service of Her Majesty Queen Anne by - (top 100 books to read .txt) 📕
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“There is no use, my lord,” she said; “Frank was on his knee as he was making pictures, and was running constantly from Henry to me. The evil is done, if any.”
“Not with me, damme,” cried my lord. “I've been smoking,”—and he lighted his pipe again with a coal—“and it keeps off infection; and as the disease is in the village—plague take it—I would have you leave it. We'll go to-morrow to Walcote, my lady.”
“I have no fear,” said my lady; “I may have had it as an infant: it broke out in our house then; and when four of my sisters had it at home, two years before our marriage, I escaped it, and two of my dear sisters died.”
“I won't run the risk,” said my lord; “I'm as bold as any man, but I'll not bear that.”
“Take Beatrix with you and go,” said my lady. “For us the mischief is done; and Tucker can wait upon us, who has had the disease.”
“You take care to choose 'em ugly enough,” said my lord, at which her ladyship hung down her head and looked foolish: and my lord, calling away Tusher, bade him come to the oak parlor and have a pipe. The Doctor made a low bow to her ladyship (of which salaams he was profuse), and walked off on his creaking square-toes after his patron.
When the lady and the young man were alone, there was a silence of some moments, during which he stood at the fire, looking rather vacantly at the dying embers, whilst her ladyship busied herself with the tambour-frame and needles.
“I am sorry,” she said, after a pause, in a hard, dry voice,—“I REPEAT I am sorry that I showed myself so ungrateful for the safety of my son. It was not at all my wish that you should leave us, I am sure, unless you found pleasure elsewhere. But you must perceive, Mr. Esmond, that at your age, and with your tastes, it is impossible that you can continue to stay upon the intimate footing in which you have been in this family. You have wished to go to the University, and I think 'tis quite as well that you should be sent thither. I did not press this matter, thinking you a child, as you are, indeed, in years—quite a child; and I should never have thought of treating you otherwise until—until these CIRCUMSTANCES came to light. And I shall beg my lord to despatch you as quick as possible: and will go on with Frank's learning as well as I can, (I owe my father thanks for a little grounding, and you, I'm sure, for much that you have taught me,)—and—and I wish you a good-night, Mr. Esmond.”
And with this she dropped a stately curtsy, and, taking her candle, went away through the tapestry door, which led to her apartments. Esmond stood by the fireplace, blankly staring after her. Indeed, he scarce seemed to see until she was gone; and then her image was impressed upon him, and remained for ever fixed upon his memory. He saw her retreating, the taper lighting up her marble face, her scarlet lip quivering, and her shining golden hair. He went to his own room, and to bed, where he tried to read, as his custom was; but he never knew what he was reading until afterwards he remembered the appearance of the letters of the book (it was in Montaigne's Essays), and the events of the day passed before him—that is, of the last hour of the day; for as for the morning, and the poor milkmaid yonder, he never so much as once thought. And he could not get to sleep until daylight, and woke with a violent headache, and quite unrefreshed.
He had brought the contagion with him from the “Three Castles” sure enough, and was presently laid up with the smallpox, which spared the hall no more than it did the cottage.
CHAPTER IX. I HAVE THE SMALL-POX, AND PREPARE TO LEAVE CASTLEWOOD.
When Harry Esmond passed through the crisis of that malady, and returned to health again, he found that little Frank Esmond had also suffered and rallied after the disease, and the lady his mother was down with it, with a couple more of the household. “It was a Providence, for which we all ought to be thankful,” Doctor Tusher said, “that my lady and her son were spared, while Death carried off the poor domestics of the house;” and rebuked Harry for asking, in his simple way, For which we ought to be thankful—that the servants were killed, or the gentlefolks were saved? Nor could young Esmond agree in the Doctor's vehement protestations to my lady, when he visited her during her convalescence, that the malady had not in the least impaired her charms, and had not been churl enough to injure the fair features of the Viscountess of Castlewood; whereas, in spite of these fine speeches, Harry thought that her ladyship's beauty was very much injured by the small-pox. When the marks of the disease cleared away, they did not, it is true, leave furrows or scars on her face (except one, perhaps, on her forehead over her left eyebrow); but the delicacy of her rosy color and complexion was gone: her eyes had lost their brilliancy, her hair fell, and her face looked older. It was as if a coarse hand had rubbed off the delicate tints of that sweet picture, and brought it, as one has seen unskilful painting-cleaners do, to the dead color. Also, it must be owned, that for a year or two after the malady, her ladyship's nose was swollen and redder.
There would be no need to mention these trivialities, but that they actually influenced many lives, as trifles will in the world, where a gnat often plays a greater part than an elephant, and a mole-hill, as we know in King William's case, can upset an empire. When Tusher in his courtly way (at which Harry Esmond always chafed and spoke scornfully) vowed and protested that my lady's face was none the worse—the lad broke out and said, “It IS worse and my mistress is not near so handsome as she was;” on which poor Lady Castlewood gave a rueful smile, and a look into a little Venice glass she had, which showed her, I suppose, that what the stupid boy said was only too true, for she turned away from the glass, and her eyes filled with tears.
The sight of these in Esmond's heart always created a sort of rage of pity, and seeing them on the face of the lady whom he loved best, the young blunderer sank down on his knees, and besought her to pardon him, saying that he was a fool and an idiot, that he was a brute to make such a speech, he who had caused her malady; and Doctor Tusher told him that a bear he was indeed, and a bear he would remain, at which speech poor young Esmond was so dumbstricken that he did not even growl.
“He is MY bear, and I will not have him baited, Doctor,” my lady said, patting her hand kindly on the boy's head, as he was still kneeling at her feet. “How your hair has come off! And mine, too,” she added with another sigh.
“It is not for myself that I cared,” my lady said to Harry, when the parson had taken his leave; “but AM I very much changed? Alas! I fear 'tis too true.”
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