 CHAPTER XI by the King, and then by the State, and thirdly by that which is thrice as great, as these and a thousandfold stronger and higher shall Baxendale Hall be made fuel of fire. It fell upon a day, so the ancient chronicles tell us, before men had discovered that Merciar was a land whose stones were of iron and were foundations of coal, that guide the eldest son of Sir Stephen de Baxendale without hunting in the merry greenwood which lay between Baxendale Hall and Silver Hampton Town. And because Guy was too young to take such heat of his own steps and the steps of his steed as an older and wiser huntsman would have done, the horse put his foot into a rabbit-hole, thereby bringing himself and his rider to the ground. In much fear and trembling the retainers picked up the unconscious form of their young master and bore him to Gortzee Hayes, a forester's lodge in the heart of the wood, which is still standing to this day. Here he was nursed back to consciousness by Vivian of the Glade, the forester's fair daughter, much famed in those parts for her scale and discovering healing herbs and distilling soothing potions from the same. It was many a long day before Guy of Baxendale was sufficiently recovered to be taken home to the Hall, for his leg was broken and his whole body badly bruised, and when at last he did go back he left his heart behind him in the safekeeping of Vivian of the Glade. For even in those far off times love flew where he listed and no man ordered his goings, just as he does unto this day, and will do so long as this round world of ours shall run its course in the light of the sun. When there was war in the house of Baxendale, Guy had made of his mind to wed the fair daughter of the forester, while Sir Stephen and Dame Alice, his wife, had made of their minds with equal firmness that no son of their noble name should mate with the daughter of the people. Long before William the Norman planted his indomitable foot upon English soil, the Baxendales had taken up their abode in the heart of the Merciar forests, and there had builded themselves a stronghold against their enemies. It was rumored that one of them had fought on the side of Ethel Fleda, Queen of Mercia, in the great battle between the Danes and the Saxons, and that the Queen had delighted to honour him for his bravery on that day of blood. Be that as it may, the family had long ruled over their own fair lands in the centre of the Merciar forests, and had accounted themselves as being made of different flesh and blood from the common people, which men are sadly prone to do when they have handed down their lands from father to son for many generations, until God sees fit to teach them himself that he is no respecter of persons. Before it was a bitter thing to Sir Stephen and Dame Alice, his wife, when their first born son set his heart upon Vivian, the forester's daughter, but Guy claved to the woman and refused to let her go. For the witch should all succeeding Baxendales honour him, as a man who is not ready to leave his father and mother in order to cleave to his wife is not the clay out of which the best husbands and fathers are fashioned by the hands of the great potter. While the battle was raging fierce and strong, Guy swearing that he should wed the girl whether or no, and his parents swearing that he should not, a rumour got wind in the neighbourhood. Started men said, in the first place by Dame Alice herself, that the healing skill of Vivian of the Glade had its origin in the sin of witchcraft. Then Alas, and Alas for Guy of Baxendale, and his ill-fated love, the rumour grew apace until women refused so much as to look at Vivian's fair face, and even brave men crossed themselves if they had to ride by gortsy haze after nightfall, and at last it came to pass that the girl was seized by soldiers and carried to Baxendale Hall, where she was condemned by several worthy justices of the peace, to be burnt alive at Silverhampton Marketplace, as a punishment for her evil deeds, and a warning to any like-minded persons who might be tempted to follow in her unholy footsteps. So in Silverhampton Marketplace she was burnt alive, close to the strange old druidical pillar, whereof no man knows the history, even unto this day. And just as the faggots were beginning to crackle, she broke through the rope that bound her right arm, and pointed with her forefinger to the thickly wooded hill on the other side of the valley, where Baxendale Hall nestled among the trees, the home of the great family, who had done her to death for the sole crime of being lowly born, and as she pointed to their house she raised her voice and cursed them as they had cursed her. First by the king, and then by the state, and thirdly by that which is thrice as great, as these and a thousandfold stronger and higher shall Baxendale Hall be made fuel of fire. Then the tongues of flame leaped up and fawned upon her like dogs of war let loose by fiendish hands, higher and higher they leaped until the voice of cursing faded into a shriek of agony, and then died away into the silence of the eternities. And the people stood round, engaged upon the awful sight, thanking God in their blindness and ignorance that they were not as this woman was, while the old church of St. Peter uplifted its ancient tower above their heads, an unheeded witness to him who would fain have gathered them all under his wings, as a hen gathered her chickens. But they would not, and who would fain have taught them, in this his temple made with hands the things that belong to their peace, but which as yet were hid from their eyes. Thus perished Vivian of the Glade, because she had succeeded in winning the love of Guy of Baxendale, but her curse lived on and was fulfilled to the letter. As for Guy, he forgot his sorrow in the fierce joy of fighting in the wars of the roses, the love of war being stronger in some men than even the love of woman. Then late in life when he was alike too old to fight or to love any more, he took to wife a well-born damsel, some thirty years younger than himself, who bore him a large family of sons and daughters. In a ripe but cheerless old age he was gathered to his fathers, and Hugh his son reigned in his stead. But until the day of his death Guy of Baxendale never again entered Silverhampton town. He turned on his heel and tripped the dust of the place off his feet on the day when the woman he loved was martyred underneath the old stone pillar, in the very shadow of the church which brought to those who had ears to hear it, the message of peace upon earth and good will towards men, and he never set foot therein again. But his children and his grandchildren married in their own class and lived happily ever after, at least until they were removed to that strange world where rank and wealth count for less than nothing, and love and duty for so much. If they found it impossible to live happily in a world where it was accounted better to be a saint than a Baxendale, no one knows. But it is somewhat difficult for even a chronicler to imagine. Nevertheless, because human nature is stronger than pride of birth or social ambition is stronger in fact than anything else on earth except the grace of God, and sometimes for a while apparently even stronger than that. It came to pass when Henry the Eighth was king that again a Baxendale lost his heart to a daughter of the people. Once more, as of old, his parents interfered between him and the soul that God had given him for the sake of the glory of their ancient house. And because Richard Baxendale, like his ancestor Guy, swore that he would marry the girl he loved, though she was only Agnes Tyler, daughter of a wool merchant in Silverhampton, Agnes was sent to the convent of Grey Ladies, and they're compelled by her father to take the veil. For how could a plain mercy and wool merchant defy the wishes of the great Sir Wilfred Baxendale? So Agnes possessed her sweet soul in patience, within the thick stone walls of Grey Ladies, and passed her time in praying for Richard Baxendale, that he might do honor to his knighthood on earth, and finally obtain the heavenly crown, which is promised to him that overcomeeth. There year after year she watched the daffodils cover the earth, and she thought upon those golden streets, through which Richard and she should one day walk together. And she saw the wild hyacinths carpet the woodlands, and thought upon the pavement of sapphire, before which Richard and she should one day kneel. She prayed also for his wife and his children, for her love was not of the earth earthy. And there was no thought of self to be found therein. As for the wool merchant, her father, he commended himself in that he had killed two birds with one stone, so to speak, in pleasing God and Sir Wilfred equally, by taking his daughter from the one in order to give her to the other. And he felt that he had thereby conferred an obligation upon both of these powers, which neither of them could likely discharge. It is always so satisfactory to a man when he can serve God and mammon at the same time. There was no doubt that the wool merchant of Silverhampton was an excellent man of business. And there was also no doubt that the two of the parties involved, namely himself and Sir Wilfred, were completely satisfied with the arrangement. Whether the third power concerned in the transaction concurred in the approval manifested by the other two is a more doubtful matter, and one whereof the chronicler knows nothing. But Wil Tyler himself knows all about it by this time, and probably realizes at last the disadvantages of a divided service. When Agnes was safely out of his reach, Richard took to wife the lady Anne, daughter of the Earl of Merciar, and by her had three fine sons and four fair daughters. But his heart was always in the convent of grey ladies, some five miles from Baxendale Hall. It was when Sir Richard's hair was thinning and his beard was turning grey that the Reformation altered the whole political aspect of England, and Henry VIII appropriated to himself the religious house of grey ladies, and all the properties appertaining thereto. The convent was sacked, and the nuns fled to Baxendale, taking with them as much treasure as they could carry. For Sir Richard being but a simple English gentleman could not understand how even kings should rise superior to the VIII commandment and yet go unpunished. The king's soldiers in the king's name commanded Sir Richard to give up the treasures of the convent or else they would burn Baxendale Hall to the ground. But he laughed in their faces and swore that the nuns who had fled to him for safety should find it there until his death. Then the king's soldiers in the king's name set fire to the hall. The lady Anne and her children escaped. But Sir Richard stayed with the nuns whom he was defending, like the brave knight he was, and perished with them in the final crash. Tradition says that just at the end, when all hope or chance of life was over and death was awaiting for them both, Sir Richard threw back the veil which for so long had divided him from Agnes, and kissed her once more full upon the lips, as he had been one to kiss her long ago in the merry Greenwood between Baxendale Hall and Silverhampton. If this were so, no one saw it, save the god who made them man and woman before they were knight and nun, and therefore would not go back upon his own handiwork, and their souls are in his keeping until this day. Thus perished Sir Richard and the woman he had loved, and thus was fulfilled the first part of the curse of Vivian of the Glade. A third time he came to pass since history has a habit of repeating itself that Baxendale sought a low-born bride. The hall had been rebuilt for close upon a century when Walter Baxendale, one of the most loyal subjects of King Charles the Martyr, set his heart upon charity Fremantle, a pretty Puritan maid. But now it was the lady's father who objected and not the Swains, for Walter had lost both his parents while he was yet a boy. Joshua Fremantle swore great oath that none of his household should touch the accursed thing, whereby he meant that none of his pretty daughters should be joined in wedlock with a supporter of the royalist cause. Again as of yore there were sweet-stolen meetings in the woodlands lying west of Silverhampton town, meetings which turned the mossy paths into veritable highways of paradise, and the sun dappled glades into fairyland itself. When the shouting of the captains was drowned for a while in the hush and the hum of the summer, and the sound of war could no longer be heard because of the murmur of lovers' vows and lovers' kisses. Then came the battle of Worcester, and the triumph of the parliamentary army, when Charles fled for safety to Bosquebell, and there was hid in an oak tree from his would-be murderers. Cromwell's men suspected that the fugitive monarch was in hiding at Baxendale Hall, and they commanded the master thereof to deliver into their hands the king to whom he had sworn allegiance. A thing which Walter Baxendale would not have done, if he could, since he was a loyal knight and true, and could not if he would, as the king was not at Baxendale at all, but had ridden on to Bosquebell. But in the midst of the search for King Charles, Joshua Fremantle, one of Cromwell's most fanatical followers, came upon his daughter, Charity, in Baxendale Wood, folded in the arms of her devoted cavalier who had just come back to her alive and unhurt from the field of Worcester. In a moment of frenzy, Fremantle fired at the man he hated, as men never hate, save in the throes of civil warfare, but Charity seeing what was coming flung herself between her father and her lover, and so was slain in her lover's stead. Then Sir Walter and Fremantle engaged in a hand-to-hand struggle, the one being inspired by the love of woman and the other by the love of religion. Two of the strongest forces that ever impelled men to shed blood like water. For many minutes the deadly combat lasted, first the one seeming to get the upper hand, and then the other. But Baxendale's heart was broken, and it is hard work fighting with a broken heart. So it came to pass that the fanatic proved too strong for the knight and finally overthrew him, running him straight through the body with his sword. So Walter and his love lay dead together in the woodland, where they had so often plighted their vows. And who shall dare to say that those vows were not fulfilled in that paradise, where of the forest of Baxendale had been but a foretaste and a type? Joshua Fremantle then rode on to the hall, followed by a small company of round heads, and filled with the passion of war and the frenzy of religious zeal. With the soldier's help he burned the house to the ground, thinking, poor misguided soul, that he was thereby doing God's service. Just as he thought he had saved his daughter's soul alive by slaying her in Baxendale Woods, rather than let her mate with the son of Baliel, as he considered all who were not supporters of Cromwell. He also had much to learn, when at last he went to his own place, and found how terribly he had misrepresented the God whom he had sincerely, though ignorantly, worshipped. It was not until after Richard Cromwell's death, and the restoration to the throne of King Charles II, that the property was given back to Hubert Baxendale, Sir Walter's younger brother. In the meanwhile it lay a desolate and neglected ruin, silent save for the calling of the rooks by day and the screeching of the owls by night. But then Hubert claimed it as his brother's heir at law, and the king at once recognized his claims and restored the largest state of Baxendale to its rightful owner. For some years Hubert Baxendale saved up his revenues in order to rebuild the hall, and by the time that James II was sitting upon his brother's throne, a fine red brick house had grown up on the old site of Baxendale Hall, a house which was destined to be enlivened by the laughter of several generations of Baxendales, before the third part of the ancient prophecy came true. Thus perished Sir Walter Baxendale, and the woman of his choice, and thus was fulfilled the second part of the curse of Vivian of the Glade. For more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org. A merry heart goes all the way as Shakespeare once was pleased to say. It strikes me Nancy, remarked Anthony Burton, looking critically at his cousin, that Lawrence Baxendale is inclined to be sweet upon you. I wonder at the fact I confess, but my eagle eye cannot help perceiving it. I doubt if he has the sense, replied Nancy, but it would do him all the good in the world. Anthony tilted his straw hat still further over his eyes. Your lack of humility, my dear child, is only equal by your lack of justification to be anything else but humble. What there is in you to induce any man, not bound to you by the ties of relationship, to think about you twice, I fail to imagine. But the fact remains that our friend Baxendale does think about you twice, and facts have to be reckoned with. Twice, and the rest, said Nancy leconically. Now if he thought twice about Nora, I should find more excuse for him, continued Anthony, turning his attentions to his younger cousin. Nora, though far from being all that I could wish, has certain claims to good looks. Thank you, responded Nora. Nancy's good humor remained unruffled. Yes, there is no doubt that Nora is much better looking than I am. I've discovered that it is a universal law of nature that of two sisters, the second is always the better looking, and the taller, on the days of Leah and Rachel downwards. If there are any brains going about, the elder sister generally fixes upon them, but as there are no brains going about in our family, this doesn't affect us. Speak for yourself, my dear, demerred Anthony, Nora and I are simply bursting with brain power, but we do not despise you for your inferiority in this respect, we merely pity. But Nancy was not attending. I'm very glad you've noticed that Mr. Baxendale is rather taken with me, for I'd got an idea that way myself, and it is a comfort to find it confirmed, even by such an idiot as you, Tony. Allow me to tender you a hearty vote of thanks for the kind, the two kind terms in which you are pleased to refer to my intellectual endowments, murmured Anthony. But he tries dreadfully hard not to admire me. That's the best of the joke. It entertains me most enormously to see him struggling to defend himself against my charms. I know exactly what you mean, Nan, cried Nora. When you say anything funny, he tries all he knows how not to laugh, but to be properly shocked. Yes, doesn't he? And that makes me try to be all the funnier, and it is a pity it takes him like that, for he really has got a very nice sense of humor if he'd give it its head and not curb it with proprieties. Still, I don't see why he shouldn't admire you if he wants to. Anthony continued, as I remarked before, I should never want to admire you myself, but if I did feel any inclination in that extraordinary direction, I should have no conscientious scruples against indulging it to the fall. I once knew a man, said Nancy, who divided the girls he made love to into those he made love to on Sundays and those he made love to on weekdays, and he said nothing would induce him to make love to me on a Sunday. His mother wouldn't like it, though he'd devote the six other days entirely to the pursuit with pleasure. Then I shouldn't have let him, interrupted Nora, I'd have been made love to by him on Sundays or not at all. I wouldn't let a man pick and choose his times and seasons in that rude way. I didn't, and the result was he didn't do it at all. I expect that is generally the result when you are concerned, side Tony. Nancy laughed, is it? That's all you know about it. But why doesn't Baxendale want to admire you? That's what I can't see. I suppose he couldn't afford to marry, replied Nora wisely, unless he married a much richer girl than one of us. Oh, I don't think it's that, argued Nancy. Mr. Baxendale is just the sort of man to marry the most unsuitable woman he could find. You see, he is high principled and honorable and conscientious, and honorable conscientious people always have scruples against knowing the right men and marrying the right women. Then what is his objection to you, persisted Tony, if you aren't rich enough, aren't you poor enough? I don't believe it is money at all. Money would never enter into the councils of such a man as Lawrence Baxendale. He thinks I am common, that's where the shoe pinches. Confound his cheek, where does the commonness come in? I should like to know. Oh, he thinks it is awfully low not to have strolled into England with William the Conqueror and sat still here ever since. He is the sort of man who expects you to be always taking your ancestors about with you. And getting them to give you letters of introduction, don't you know? He never moves without taking a lot of ancestors about with him, just as some people never move without taking a lot of servants. I know the sort. I thought he'd have had a fit the other day when I said that somehow we'd mislead our great-great-grandfather, and though we'd searched for him diligently in the rag bag and the waste paper basket we couldn't lay our hands on him anywhere, he didn't in the least see that it was funny. Nor shook her pretty head how tiresome of him. I can't bear people who don't see when things are funny. Well, he generally does see when things are funny, that is one of his principal charms in my eyes, but he regards family and birth and blood and all that sort of thing is far too sacred to be trifled with or lightly spoken of. I'm thankful that I belong to a new family that has no curse, but gas and water laid on. There is good reason for your Tay Dayum, agreed Anthony. You see, Mr. Baxendale has a curse and everything else that is correct and uncomfortable and aristocratic, and he thinks it dreadfully plebeian of us to be making iron. In fact, he is one of the people who thinks it is dreadfully vulgar to make anything but mistakes. And of those, they make plenty. I've never quite grasped, said Anthony, why he and his mother have suddenly come down to live under the shadow of their uninhabited ancestral home. Oh, I've got it all out of faith fair facts, answered Nor. You know that Baxendale's are frightfully poor, and when old Mr. Baxendale died, Lady Alicia went to live with her brother, Lord Portcullis. Lawrence was tremendously clever and went to Oxford with a sort of scholarship, which they called a post office order of merton, or something like that. I knew he was clever, said Nancy, or else he wouldn't admire me. When he left Oxford, he became tutor to Lord Drawbridge, Lord Portcullis' eldest son, and this went on till Drawbridge went to school and Lord Portcullis married again. Till both their lurches went to school, in short, concluded Anthony, if they can't afford actually to live at Baxendale Hall, they like to be near it, I suppose, Nor said. Not the rose, but near the rose, though what's the fun of living near the rose? If you can't possess it, I don't know, said Tony. Neither do I, agreed Nor. If I can't buy a thing for my own, I hate seeing it in the shop windows. I believe that Faith Fairfax is in love with Mr. Baxendale, Nancy said slowly. The other two looked up with interest. What makes you think that? asked Nor. Because she always knows where he is, and always pretends that she doesn't. Now Faith would be a suitable match for our friend, Tony remarked, she'd have property enough to set Baxendale Hall on its legs again, and propriety enough not to knock Lawrence off his. Nancy nodded. I know that, and that would be just the reason why he would never fall in love with her. Trust him for invariably going against his own interests when he has the chance. I think it would be rather dull to be in love with Mr. Baxendale, said Nor. It would be like going to an oratorio every day of one's life or lodging in a cathedral. What rubbish! Nancy exclaimed. Besides oratorios and cathedrals are very nice in their way. Of course they are, Nancy dear. I only said it would be rather dull to be married to one. Well, I don't agree with you. Mr. Baxendale is an ideal sort of person, with high aims and sound principles, and everything else all sweet. And though it would be horrid to have ideal people for one's relations, I think they are the most satisfactory sort to fall in love with. Nor looked doubtful. But why? Well, you see, exclaimed Nancy, falling in love is an ideal sort of thing. And if you fall in love with a person and then found he was sorted in commonplace, it would be like seeing an angel and then finding the angelic robes were made of cheap calico. Now Mr. Baxendale is tiresome in trying in absurdly festivities, but he would always be more or less ideal. I don't mean he is ideal in the sense of being faultless or anything but. He is ideal in the sense of always seeing the right course and as far as in him lies of following yet. Faith is ideal too, said Nora, softly. Faith is an angel, Nancy agreed emphatically. And not an angel in cheap calico either added her cousin. No, faith is just perfect. Nancy continued, but all the same. It would do Mr. Baxendale far more good to fall in love with me than with her. I should have thought ideal people ought to fall in love with ideal people, suggested Tony on the approved principle of a hair of the dog that bit you. And in that case, Baxendale and Ms. Fairfax seem made to order for each other. It would be a match, not only striking on the box, but striking from every possible point of view. Nancy shrugged her shoulders, a hair of the dog that bit you is supposed to be curative you silly. And love is the one disease that is the worst for being cured. I think that Lawrence and Faith would cure each other of perfection by their own perfectness. And then where would they be, stupid? Goodness or badness only knows. Now it is an education for anyone to fall in love with one of us burdens. Nancy went on, I've noticed it often. So have I, her cousin agreed, and that has led me to make the educational process as easy and pleasant as possible to such young ladies as appear to me worthy of the training and likely to do it justice. You see, we are so healthy-minded that we cure any tendency to morbidness at once, and we are so natural that affectation cannot exist within our borders. Then we are funny, and as a rule, the curse of love is seriousness. Love as a tragedy is a bore, but love as a comedy is a delight to the actors and is worth ten and six a stall to the audience. Now no one could regard a love affair with one of us in the light of a tragedy, could they? They certainly could not, replied Anthony, unless, of course, we accepted them. Still, I'm not sure that this is altogether a virtue, nor remarked, sadly. I believe people enjoy a love affair more if they can cry over it, and we never can. That's the worst of us, said Nancy with the sigh. We spoil half the fun of life by laughing at it. If we could only cry over things and not see that they are funny, we should enjoy them a million times more. I'm sure we should. It spoils a love affair to see the funny side of it, and yet I always do. Mr. Baxxendale wouldn't see the funny side of a love affair, said Norm. Oh, yes he would. That's just the sort of thing. He would see the joke of. It is only solemn things, such as truth and honor in the church and the Baxxendales, that he takes so seriously. As a matter of fact, I believe he is, too, superior, a person, to fall in love at all. He would think it infra-dig, for a Baxxendale to love an ordinary woman, and that is why it would do him such a world of good to fall in love with me. It is extremely good for people to be obliged to do what they consider infra-dig. It knocks the nonsense out of them. It seems to me, remarked Anthony, that there is a good deal of nonsense to be knocked out of Mr. Lawrence Baxxendale, and that our beloved Nancy would enjoy the job. I really believe I should, agreed Nancy. The worst of Mr. Baxxendale is that he is so frightening, said Norm. He says such sarcastic things. Oh, I'm not frightened of him, replied her sister eerily, but she was. I always feel he is despising us and making fun of us. Norm went on. He has such a dreadfully sneering way with him. I don't care whether he sneers or not, Nancy persisted. But I thought you were under the impression that he admired you, suggested her cousin. So he does, but he doesn't approve of me. That's all the difference, silly. I wonder if he ever lapsed his mother, remarked Norm. She is so deliciously vague that it must indeed be a privation to be prevented by the Fifth Commandment from thoroughly enjoying her. Nancy shook her head. No, I feel sure he doesn't. Mr. Baxxendale is the sort of man that the Commandments would have great weight with. And by the way, here he comes in the flesh round the corner of the terrace, so I can begin the knocking out process at once. And the three young burdens hoisted themselves up out of the garden chairs in which they were lounging and went to meet a slight, fair, aristocratic-looking man who was being piloted by a footman across the lawn. It was a summer's afternoon, and Anthony and his cousins were sitting in the garden of Wayside, the Burton's house, about three miles from the manufacturing town of Silverhampton. Mr. Burton, the girl's father, was an iron master as his father had been before him. And he and Anthony drove every day to the works which lay in the dark valley on the other side of the ridge, which divides, as by a straight line, the great black country of the Midlands, from the woods and hills and meadowlands of West Mercer. Mr. Burton had married a Miss Farringdon, a distant cousin of the Farringdons of Sedgill, and they were blessed with two sons and two daughters, Nancy, who had wit, and Nora, who had beauty, respectively aged twenty-two and eighteen. And two small boys, Arthur and Ambrose, who were enjoying life and neglecting their education at a preparatory school. Anthony, the only child of Mr. Burton's late brother, had inherited his father's share in the works and was now his uncle's sole partner. His mother died when he was born, and since the death of his father, when Anthony was only ten years old, the latter had made Wayside his home and had been treated by Mr. and Mrs. Burton exactly as if he were a son of their own. To Nancy and Nora, he had always been as the kindest of brothers, and although he teased them in brotherly fashion, he was also in brotherly fashion, ready to fight their battles to the death, and to knock down any other man who should venture to tease them, as he did. The Burton's were a lighthearted race who had never known either great riches or uncomfortable poverty, and so were innocent alike of the responsibilities of the one and the anxieties of the other. They had never been rich enough to be economical, nor poor enough to be extravagant, so they took life easily and extracted pleasure from the most unpromising sources, and, as is the custom in this too sorrowful world, were popular in proportion to their chillfulness. Mankind, as at present constituted, dearly loves the people who make it laugh. Wayside the local habitation of the Burton's was a red-brick house on the high road leading from Silverhampton to Selopshire, and thence to the Western Sea. It was approached from the road by a long, solemn drive bordered by specimen shrubs, which Nancy said had a depressing appearance because evergreens always gave her the blues, but the house itself was cheerful and comfortable enough, and the garden at the back faded away into fields, which in their turn ended in some of the prettiest lanes in England. As a child, Nancy thought that these lanes led straight into Fairyland. As a woman, she knew that they did, but this fuller knowledge only came after she had troddened those green and mysterious ways in company with the man of her choice and sundry others. There was nothing narrow or exclusive about Nancy. Her power of making friends was only equaled by her capacity of turning these friends into lovers on the slightest provocation, and if the friends declined to be thus transformed, no bitterness was excited in Nancy's breast, as it might have been in the breast of a more sentimental and serious-minded young woman. Everything was fished that came to her net, and if it was not fished, it was foul or good red herring, which did quite as well as far as she was concerned, if men fell in love with her, she enjoyed their love. If they were only friends with her, she enjoyed their friendship, and she regarded either as the best joke in the world for the town being. Nora, to a great extent, molded herself upon Nancy, for if Nora was the beauty, Nancy had the stronger personality. Nora Burton really was extremely pretty, with dark brown hair, large blue eyes, and a bright pink color. She was tall and slender, and carried herself like a queen. Nancy always described herself, and with much truth, as a colonial addition of Nora. She was shorter and paler, with darker hair, and her eyes were smaller than her sisters, though quite as blue. The boys were more like Nora, a merry, good-looking little couple. All the burdens were endowed with a very saving faith in themselves, and a very sincere admiration for each other, and which is the secret of all true family and conjugal happiness. They appreciated and applauded one another's jokes to the full. Even the love which beareth and believeth all things staggers now and then when its attempts at wit are greeted with the stony stare of the unamused, but the burdens knew better than to put their family affection to so severe a test. As Nancy crossed the lawn to greet Lawrence, Baxamdale, she found time en route for an aside to the footman bidding him fetch his mistress and tea. Then she devoted herself to charming her guests to the utmost extent of her powers, as was her invariable habit, whether the guest happened to be male or female. Come and sit down, she said. I have told Frederick to bring out tea and mother at once, as I feel sure you must be dying for one or the other. Baxamdale bowed. Thank you, Miss Burton. Naturally, both will be welcome, but it would be invidious, wouldn't it, to point out which will be the more so. We have just been talking about you, Nancy, observed, as the four young people seated themselves. Lawrence winced. He was one of the few people who hate to be talked about, but this, of course, was inexplicable to Nancy, who would rather have been abused than not mentioned at all. Indeed, what have you found to say about me, he asked. We have agreed that you are rather like a cathedral or an oratorio and that we are decidedly frightened of you. I should not have thought that you would be frightened of me, replied Lawrence, who was frightened out of his wits at Miss Burton, and the terrible doubt as to what she might say, I'm a most harmless creature. Oh, yes, you're harmless enough, but you are so dreadfully truthful and upright, and that is what makes you so cathedrally. I never feel like a cathedral, Lawrence protested, and you don't look like one. Elephants always look like walking cathedrals, don't you think? When you see them strolling about at the zoo, just as if they were built of gray stone, which had been exposed to the elements for centuries, I can't say Miss Burton, I don't know that I have ever seen a walking cathedral, but you've seen a circulating library, and that's something of the same sort, but as I was saying, you don't look like a cathedral. You only shed a gentle and cathedrally sort of influence, and that is because you are so truthful and upright. It is generally supposed to be the best policy, isn't it? So at least I've always been told, then you've been brought up on proverbs, said Knorr, joining in the conversation, and they are invariably misleading. Of course they are at a Nancy. If you let yourself be guided by proverbs, you will believe that the better you behave, the better looking you will become, which, as Euclid wisely remarked, is absurd. Then aren't you truthful and upright? Ask Lawrence, endeavoring to divert the conversation from himself and his moral excellencies. Nancy laughed. Not we, we never tell the truth, unless we are convinced that it is funnier than fiction, and we always take what doesn't belong to us if we happen to fancy it. From hearts down to postage stamps, added Anthony under his breath. But none of us has ever stolen on a large scale, except Mother. Nancy went on. Did you ever hear the tale of Mother in the boot shot Mr. Baxentale? No, please tell it me. Well, one day at the seaside, I went with Mother to buy a new pair of boots. She tried on several pairs in the Orthodox fashion and finally settled upon a pair that was faintly less uncomfortable than the others. Whereupon we left the shop. All the way home, we saw people looking at us and giggling. And though we feel we are worthy of all notice, we see nothing in our appearance to excite mirth. Therefore we wondered. Naturally, said Lawrence. At last one woman braver than the rest stopped us and said to Mother, between paroxysms of laughter. Are you aware, Madam, that you have a bunch of babies' shoes hanging behind you? It turned out, would you believe it, that when Mother sat down to be tried on, a bunch of children's shoes had caught on the fringe of her mantle. And she had walked with them dangling behind her all up the street. You know the sort, ankle, straps, and every conceivable shade of leather. Of course, we nearly died of laughing. And that is the only time any one of us has ever been actually convicted of shoplifting. But here is the thief herself. Tee and Mrs. Burton arrived simultaneously, and the former was dispensed by Nancy, with much enlivening conversation, wherein the others joined, which backs in Dale in spite of his efforts to the contrary, enjoyed to the full. And when a man has to make an effort not to enjoy the conversation of one particular woman, things are pretty bad with him. At last he rose. I wonder what a clock it is. I seem to be staying an unconscionable time, like Charles II, but to me it has appeared short, as I dare say it did to him. Nancy looked at her watch bracelet. I'm not a very good guide as to time, because my watch is always either 10 minutes too slow, or three quarters of an hour too fast, and you never can be quite sure which. There must be something wrong with its internal arrangement, said Mrs. Burton, with her pleasant laugh, which perhaps accounts for your being late for everything, Nancy dear. Maybe, anyway, I must admit that punctuality is the one virtue which I don't happen to possess. Can I do anything towards the watch's recovery, asked Lawrence, holding out his hand for the pretty toy. No, thank you. When it is worse than usual, I just give it a stirrup inside with a hairpin. Lawrence smiled. That is a bit drastic, isn't it? But it always does it good for at least a week after the hairpin treatment. It never loses more than five minutes in the day, or gains more than 30, but after that it drops back into its old evil ways again, just as we all do the next week, but one after a really stirring sermon. I'm afraid sermons never stir me up at all. Whatever hairpins might do, said Lawrence. Oh, but they stir up Nancy, cried Nora. Sermons, I mean, of course, not hairpins. Nancy nodded. I should just think they do. They give me thrills all down my spine, just as the national anthem, and falling in love do, and make me really an exquisite character for about four days. Once, for a week after Mr. Arbuthnath had preached about unselfishness, I went for a walk with Nora every day. And another time after he'd preached against vanity and love of dress, I let Tony go for a whole afternoon with his tie wriggling up over the back of his collar and never told him of it. And I was not behind you in virtuous behavior, added Anthony. That very same sermon led me to leave a smut, which had settled upon our dear Nancy's ineffective nose, unwept, unhonored, and unsung for at least four good hours by Shrewsbury Clock, and it was on a day when she was particularly fancying herself, too. Nancy tossed her head, What a goose you are, Tony! All the same, I wondered how you could resist the pleasure of finding fault with me when there was any just ground for such fault finding. I admit it was difficult, my dear young cousin, unless self-denying man could not have withstood the temptation. There are some things which are absolutely necessary to a man's well-being and peace of mind, and one of them is pointing out the faults of his female relations. Another is pointing out in a photograph of any place which he has visited the hotel where he happened to stay, said Nancy. No normal human being, either man or woman, can help doing that. And if we can put across opposite our own particular bedroom window, Delight reaches the point of ecstasy, added Lawrence. Anthony gazed at Nancy in mock admiration. My dear young friend, you are too clever by half. If you get much sharper, you'll cut yourself. Well, I haven't yet, anyhow, though I've often been tempted to cut you There you are, added again, sighed Anthony, when shall I persuade you to be good, sweet maid, and let who will be clever? It would be such a pleasant change, if you would, and besides, you will never get a husband if you go on scintillating like this, and then don't want to blaze a fireworks on their own hearthstones. They'll want me right enough, whether I hearthstone or whether I firework, retorted Nancy, who never could resist squabbling with Tony, when she had the chance. In that case, replied her cousin, they'll soon find out their mistake, at least the fortunate, or rather the unfortunate, one whom you select will. The beauteous firework, so fiercely sought, will become an intolerable nuisance by being confined to the domestic hearthstone. I'm sure I pity the poor fellow, whoever he may be, when I meet him, I shall hug my single blessedness, feeling how far my high failure overlaps the bounds of his low success. Mr. Baxendale turned to Nancy, do you know I think your cousin is rather wasting his sympathy? No, I'm not, Anthony contradicted him. You don't know her as well as I do, which is my misfortune rather than my fault. That may be, but it is a most fortunate misfortune for you. She'll make a strict wife, won't she, Nora? Not, she replied the younger Miss Burton. Of course, you'll expect the man to do things her way instead of his own, but that will only be good for him. And though I shall expect the man to do things my way instead of his own, I shall never expect him to say, or even to think, that it is a better way than his own. That's where lots of women make such a mistake. Wise Nancy, exclaimed Mrs. Burton, well all the same I return to my point, said Anthony, and that is that Nancy is becoming too clever to get her husband at all. Nancy merely made a face at him without taking the trouble to reply. You silly children, said Mrs. Burton, rising from her chair and shaking Lawrence's outstretched hand. Well, if you must go, goodbye, Mr. Baxendale. I'm afraid you will imagine that I have a most frivolous family. I shan't thank any of the worst of them. On that score, Lawrence politely expostulated, but he did, in those days before Nancy had taught him how wise it is to be silly sometimes, and how dull it is, when once one has been silly, to become wise again. End of Chapter 1 Chapter 2 Of Fuel of Fire This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Fuel of Fire by Ellen Thorny-Crawf Fowler Chapter 2 Baxendale Hall Upon a hill, the old house stood, commanding stream and field and wood. Baxendale Hall, which was built for the third time, having been twice destroyed by fire, in the reign of James II, was a fine square house of red brick with stone facings and the coat of arms of the Baxendales, also in stone, carved over the front door. It stood in the center of a beautiful park on the borders of Mercer and Slopcher, and the house was situated upon such an eminence that its cellars were on a line with the top of the tower of Silverhampton Church. Thus Silverhampton and Baxendale Hall looked at each other from their respective hills across a fruitful and well-populated valley, a pleasant land of meadows and orchards and comfortable houses, made happy by the money that was coined in the murky coalfields on the other side of Silverhampton Town. The Baxendales were one of the oldest families in Mercer, and they had lived at Baxendale Hall ever since Doomsday Book was edited, and probably before that. But of late years their prosperity had dwindled, as is the way nowadays of all prosperity, which has its being solely inland. And when the late Mr. Baxendale died of a broken heart, owing to the pecuniary difficulties which beset him, it was found that the rents of the estate were so reduced, and the mortgages upon it so heavy, that his son came into an income of only some very few hundreds a year. And those few hundreds were made still fewer by the enormous fire insurance which all the owners of Baxendale were bound to pay, in consideration of the family curse, which foretold that Baxendale Hall should once more for the third time be made fuel of fire. The late Mr. Baxendale had married for love and not for money, a peculiarity of his race, Lady Alicia Mote, a daughter of the Earl of Portcullis, and by her had one child, a son Lawrence. Her ladyship possessed as little wit, as money, but she had beauty in excess, and for her beauty, all when Baxendale loved, wooed, and married her, and lived beyond his income, and finally died brokenhearted because that income was insufficient to supply her somewhat exorbitant daily needs. Thus matters came to a crisis, Baxendale Hall was shut up, and only an old man and his wife left in it as caretakers, and Alicia went to rule the house of her brother, Lord Portcullis, while Lawrence Baxendale officiated as tutor to his lordship's eldest son. When, however, Lord Portcullis took unto himself a second wife, Lady Alicia was compelled to seek a home elsewhere, so she and her son repaired to an untenanted farmhouse near the Ways, a hamlet on the Baxendale estate, and about a mile and a half from the Hall. The Ways was probably so-called because five Ways met there, one went eastward past the Burton's House, and through the pretty village of Tedley, straight to Silverhampton, another took the opposite direction and led the traveller by the hills of Salipshire and Wales to the coast of the Western Sea. A third went northward down a shady lane past Ways Hall, the home of the Fairfax family to Codswell, a picturesque village whose cobble-paved street climbed bravely up a church-ground hill, which stood as high as Baxendale or Silverhampton, a fourth lay through the well-witted glades of Baxendale Park, and finally, by slow-ass scents, reached the Hall itself, and the fifth went due south into a green maze of lanes, which wandered on and on until they finally lost themselves in Fairyland, as English lanes have a knack of doing if only they are taken in the right way. There are few things more beautiful than a mercure lane, it is beautiful in the winter when the elm trees that overshadow it are transformed into coral reefs by the magic touch of the horror frost, it is beautiful in the spring when its hedges are white with mayblossom and its stitches fringe with that lace-like hemlock, and it is beautiful in the autumn when the climbing brambles adorn it on either side with crimson and cold, but it is most beautiful of all on a summer's evening when the low-lying shafts of light touch the vents and the feathery grasses and turn the pathway into a golden pavement encircled by a veritable rainbow of emerald until the traveller feels that he is treading a ladder worthy of the feet of angels leading him as the beauty of nature will always lead those who have eyes to see it straight from earth to heaven. The spot where these five ways met was marked by a group of fine old elm trees growing upon a grassy mount and round about it were clustered a farm or two in sundry cottages a picturesque post office in black smith's forge it was a pretty hamlet in the typical english style and its quaint little inn by name the crown slumbered in a cozy bed of blossom with a coverlet of climbing roses way's hall was a long low white house clothed with virginia creeper which made it as a green bower in summer while in autumn it appeared as a house which was enveloped by crimson flames and yet was not consumed it was set in the center of velvet lawns which like the famous lawns of oxford had been rolled for five hundred years and which sloped down to a large sheet of water inhabited and defended to the best availability by a family of swans the banks of this lake were covered every spring with daffodils and periwinkles which looked at their reflection in the water and dance with pleasure at the site at least the daffodils did the periwinkles only knotted and said to themselves what nice blue eyes we have the fairfaxes of the ways were a good old family but now had dwindled down to two namely mrs fairfax and our daughter faith mrs fairfax was a stately dame of the old school would never in her life sat in an easy chair or set a silly thing and faith was the raw material out of which saints and angels are manufactured she had soft fair hair and a Madonna like face and in her eyes was that look which dwells in the eyes of all those chosen ones who see beyond this present world unselfish was an adjective not applicable to faith fairfax selfless was the only description available for her had she lived in earlier times faith would inevitably have taken the veil for she was one of the women who have a special vocation for religion and seem made for the cloister rather than the heart as it was she devoted herself to her mother and the poor and the human side of her as far as anything about faith fairfax was purely human fell in love with Lawrence Baxendale and loved him in the ideal worshiping way in which only such none like women can love the high-minded inflexible part of his character which stirred up opposition in Nancy Burton fitted exactly into faith's more saintly nature and while Nancy was slightly defined and greatly afraid faith was humbly adoring as a boy whenever anything went wrong Lawrence Baxendale turned to faith to set it right again as a man he pursued very much the same course she was a year or two older than he and filled in his life the place which his mother had left empty for motherliness was the last attribute which could be laid to the charge of pretty foolish lady Alicia it is strange how in the give and take of life men take from the angelic and give to the purely human women with whom they are brought into contact they make demands excessive demands upon the patients and forbearance and unselfishness of the women who love them but it is the women who make excessive demands upon them that they love the best women who behave well rather than wisely take credit to themselves for carrying their own cloaks and climbing over their own styles and generally saving trouble for the men who are treading life's paths by their side foolish creatures the men want to carry their cloaks and help them over the styles if only they will let them which shows that the proverbial selfishness of man is as a feat and worn out a bogey as the dodo or the sea serpent or religious disability the most interesting feature of backs and dale hall was a large library filled with all manner of rare old books and fine pictures containing many priceless manuscripts and valuable prints it occupied the whole length of the front of the house upon the first floor and was exactly over the great entrance hall behind it and over the dining and the drawing rooms was the suit of rooms always occupied by the master and mistress of the house and next to these the nurseries and school room where generations of little backs and dales had played their games and learned their lessons the guest chambers were in one wing of the house over the justice room and the muniment room and the rooms where the men smoked played billiards and managed the estate the opposite wing was devoted to the kitchens and offices and over then the servants apartments the front of the hall looked east to where the old churches of silverhampton and sedge hill were landmarks to all the surrounding country and the gardens at the back borrowed much of their glory from the sun which sat behind the distant welsh hills i wish mother if it wouldn't bother you that you would see rather more of the burton girls laurence backs and dale said to lady alicia the day after he had been to tea at wayside i know they aren't exactly your star but i should be awfully glad if you would be kind to them as they are always very kind to me and i enjoy going there immensely certainly dear laurence certainly i've called on mrs barton and she has returned the call but there is no real friendship and conventionality such as that and real friendship is so beautiful between neighbors i think so very beautiful it makes everyday life such a touching and exquisite thing yes it is a good thing to be on friendly terms with the people about you as you say dear laurence they are not exactly my style or in our set their father makes iron and i think it is beautiful to make iron it must teach men to be so great and strong and then it is so sweet and christian i always think to show kindness to persons not quite in one's own rank of society because i dare say one can do one's duty in an ironworks as well as on a landed property in fact one can do one's duty in almost any rank of life that i think is such a comforting thought because it is always so nice for everybody to do their duty if they can there's something very soothing in doing one's duty don't you think soothing isn't exactly the word i should have used said laurence driley and then the Burton girls are so charming too such sweet simple unsophisticated creatures lady alicia had an amiable habit of praising all the people with whom she was brought into contact but she slightly took the edge off her own commendation by invariably praising them for the qualities which they did not happen to possess the next afternoon she walked up to wayside and found the girls and their mother at home i'm so glad you're in dear mrs burton she began in her usual gushing manner it always seems so insincere and hollow to call upon people when they are not at home and in sincerity and hollowness are such terrible things don't you think such very terrible things they are certainly not lovable qualities agreed mrs burton and nancy winked at nor behind lady alicia's elegant back i want to see more of you and your dear girls i was only saying to my son yesterday how beautiful it is to be neighborly with the people who live near one so sweet and christian even if they don't happen to be the sort of people one would choose it is very kind of you to say so lady alicia replied mrs burton manfully repressing her natural desire to smile and what are your dear girls christian names i'm always so interested in people's christian names and the months in which their birthdays are i think one can learn so much from these don't you they are so interesting and suggestive and often such a key to character do you mean to the characters of the people themselves or of their godfathers and godmothers ask nancy with ominous demurriness oh dear child of the people themselves of course how could it be the key to the character of their godfathers and godmothers and we never know who their godfathers and godmothers are they are not given in the period you know though i'm not at all sure that they ought not to be it would be rather nice and orthodox if they were don't you think it would be rather interesting said nancy as showing whom they expected to leave them a fortune and there is so much in names i always think it was such a mistake of dear shakesburg to say that arose would smell the sweet if you called it something else it couldn't you know and what are your girls names mrs. Burton nancy and norah oh how sweet a very sweet for them both to begin with the same letter i always think there is so much sympathy between people whose names begin with the same letter it was such a comfort to me that my dear husband's name began with a like mine do you know i don't think i could ever have loved a man whose christian name began with b he would have seemed so far off almost as if he were living in another planet i remember once meeting a man and his wife who were called francis and francis i thought it's so very touching and beautiful it would be rather abhor if nancy and i have to marry men whose names begin with n said norah because there are so few nice men's names beginning with n and it would be horrid to marry men who weren't nice added nancy lady alicia took it all in solemn earnest oh dear children there is nathaniel not exactly a pretty name you know but so biblical and suggested i think it must be lovely to have a bible name especially on sundays it must make one feel in such perfect harmony with the day but we can't both marry men who are called nathaniel persisted nancy would be so very confusing and we should get them all mixed up so you would my dear but i feel sure there are other nice names beginning within if only one could recall them but you didn't call your son by a name beginning with a suggested nor oh no dear laurence was called after an ancestor of his who did something very heroic and touching i forget exactly what it was and i think it is so ennobling to call one's children by names which remind one of heroic deeds don't you it seems to elevate the tone of everyday life by beautiful memories and there's nothing more refining i find than beautiful memories oh what a priceless gift memory is what should we do without it i wonder the girls thought that lady alicia ought to know but they did not say so her ladyship ambled on as usual without giving anyone else a chance to speak i do hope dear mrs burton that your girls are cultured i think it is so sweet for young people to be cultured and to read nice poetry i remember when i was a girl i used to read all the poetry i could lay my hands on except lord baron's donkey hote dear papa never would allow that oh we've not been allowed to read it either remark nancy haven't you how very interesting i think it is so very beautiful when parents overlook their children's reading it seems to bring the fifth commandment into everyday life and it is so sweet and christian to keep the commandments when one can don't you think i think one should always try to do so for the sake of setting the servants a good example if not for one's own i think it is nice for parents to take an interest in everything that their children do said mrs burton it is indeed dear mrs burton and i do hope your young people are fond of culture i'm devoted to reading myself but unfortunately the minute i begin to read my thoughts begin to wander so unfortunately i'm unable to indulge my literary taste as i should wish it is a great deprivation but you have the pleasure of your own thoughts suggest a nor and that is far greater i'd much rather think my own thoughts than read other peoples lady alicia said ah my dear that is because you are not literary if you had my temperament you would live upon books i remember once starting our shakespeare reading society when i was living with my dear brother lord portcullis for all the girls in the neighborhood i thought it would train their minds and it is so nice for the minds of the young to be trained very nice that mrs burton and she had not time to say more before lady alicia went on of course there are things in shakespeare not all together suitable for the young to read so i asked the clergyman's wife to mark all the passages which you felt could be read without detriment to the fresh and untrained minds i was endeavoring to cultivate i think clergyman's wives are just the people to do that sort of thing don't you dear mrs burton it seems exactly the kind of duty they would enjoy i feel sure they would and did this particular one justified the confidence you had placed in her mrs burton asked well it was very unfortunate but there was a mistake instead of marking all the passages to be read as i had asked her she marked all the passages to be left out and most naturally the class read those and left the others out but how could i help it i assumed that she had done what i had asked her the two girls coughed violently in order to stifle their laughter and their mother managed to inquire with a fairly sober front but didn't it occur to you at the time what had happened well it did occur to me that the remarks were a little disjointed but remarks are often disjointed in plays to allow for changing the scenery or the actors clothes i suppose so i took it as a matter of course but it was annoying all the same it made people laugh though what there was to laugh at i cannot imagine but that is a growing evil of the present day don't you think people treat everything as a joke and speak likely of quite serious things it is the virtue of the present day i think argued nancy to laugh instead of crying whenever it is possible my heart is like Beatrice's keeps poor fool on the windy side of care and i'm thankful for it lady alicia side or dainty little sigh ah my poor dear husband was like that and so is laurence they both of them have always laughed at things that seem to me quite pathetic but then i am extremely sensitive and my poor husband was not nor is laurence they could not of course help being so unlike me nor do i in any way blame them for it but it has been to me a matter of regret what sort of things does mr backsendale laugh at ask nancy who was a thirst for any form of knowledge concerning laurence just the things his poor dear father used to laugh at things that you would have expected them to be quite sorry about instead our poverty for instance and the way we have come down in the world and his own shyness and unpopularity and the fact that he can't afford to marry and lots of really quite sad things like that i see and nancy's voice was very low i often say to him what a pity it is that he can't afford to marry because the charming wife is such a nice thing for a man to have don't you think in fact i should quite pity him poor boy if only he would let me but whenever i mention the subject he just turns it off into a joke it never seems to take it seriously at all so my sympathy is wasted and i'm such a sympathetic creature you know that laurence's callousness pains me i don't think it needs to mrs burton gently ah but i am so sensitive i shrivel up like a sensitive plant when my feelings are hurt and laurence is always hurting them i'm sure he does not mean to do so but he is so thick-skinned that he does not understand a sensitive nature like mine his poor father was just the same what sort of things did he laugh at ask nancy with unslaked curiosity or used to laugh at our poverty too and at what a wretched match he had turned out for me of course i ought to have done much better and i used to say so but he just treated it as a joke and it really was no joke at all for me who had so many really good offers when i was young nancy's lip curl was scorn and she judged lady alicia with the merciless judgment of those who have neither married nor been disappointed in marriage people used to say her ladieship continued that all one died of a broken heart when he found that he would be obliged to turn out of backs and deal but that was quite a mistake he merely shows how people ought not to talk about things which they do not understand i think that is another of the faults of the rising generation dear mrs burton people are so prone so sadly prone to talk about matters which are quite beyond their comprehension and not only of the rising generation said mrs burton dryly i know it was a fault of my poor dear alwin he never in the least understood my finer perceptions and yet he was always talking about them in a slightly sarcastic way and he had none of his own poor dear ah nancy remark and that's for dying because he could not afford to live at backs and deal lady alicia continued it was all nonsense he never really felt it at all but made jokes about bringing me to the workhouse till the hour of his death now i did feel it who had been brought up in such luxury and always expected to make such a brilliant match i have no doubt you did say mrs burton kindly endeavoring as was accustomed to make the best of everybody both you and mr backs and deal must have thought leaving such a beautiful home but he didn't feel it that was the remarkable thing he just laughed at it as he did it everything else a sad habit as i remarked a few minutes ago and one which i agreed to say dear laurence inherits almost the last thing he said to me about an hour before his death was to make a half laughing apology for having given me only a heart full of love instead of a purse full of money but adding that he was about to make the only reparation in his power poor mr backs and deal and mrs burton's eyes were full of tears oh do you think so for my part it quite shocked me to hear him speak sarcastically at such a time i cannot think that a deathbed is the place for sarcasm it seems to me so sweet to read the bible and speak lovingly to all your friends at a time like that so as to leave a nice impression behind you nancy toaster hit it is a pity that a trifling incident such as death should divert the minds of some people from the importance of making an effective exit she was very impertinent there was no doubt of that but perhaps there was some excuse for her her impertinence however was lost upon lady alicia that lady would have soon have expected a girl of nancy's rank to be pert to her as she would have expected a polyanthus to jump up and bite her so she innocently continued in death as in life my poor dear husband never cared about what sort of impression he was making upon anybody he was far too thick skin for that and laurence is just like him which is really very hard upon me as i always think it would have been so nice to live with people who really understood one and sympathize with one and who were alive to the higher traits of a really refined nature but i suppose such crosses are intentional and so must be born uncomplainingly as patients under misconception is such a beautiful thing and lady alicia again sighed her dainty sigh as she rose to take her leave having effectively succeeded as was her want in preventing those with whom she was conversing from putting their oars in even sideways. End of chapter two. Chapter three of fuel of fire. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org. Fuel of fire by ellen thorny crawt fowler. Chapter three laurence bachsen dale. The pride that goes before a fall had ruled the master of the hall. Somewhere in the middle of the maze of lanes which lay between the ways and deadly wood stood an old red farmhouse sent an old by a row of poplar trees. From its front windows one could see the stretch of green fields that lay between it and the wood and beyond them the distant mountains which hid from the casual observer the wonderful doings of the setting sun and from its back windows one could see bachsen dale hall standing on the top of a green hill and supported by regiments of trees on either side. It was at this old red house called poplar farm that laurence and his mother took up their abode when the second marriage of lord portcullis made that nobleman's castle too full and some people said too warm to hold them. It belonged to them being situated on the bachsen dale property and though small was quite as large and abode as their very limited means permitted to them. Poplar farm was about five minutes walk from wayside and propinkwiti did all that even the late arthur hugh cloth himself could reasonably have expected of it for laurence bachsen dale and nancy burton. It so happened that they had never become friends until the bachsen dales took up their abode at the farm in the old days when the bachsen dales lived at the hall. Nancy had been a small girl whom laurence may have known by sight but to whom so far as he remembered he had never spoken. In those far off days they seemed far off to him though in fact it was but a short time ago laurence had been a quiet boy reserved and sensitive to a degree with few acquaintances among boys of his own age and no friends. Even then he gave evidence of a pride which seemed to have been his by birth, pride in the long line of bachsen dale stretching back until it was lost, in the dim mist of bygone centuries, pride in the ancestral hall whose red bricks and square windows he so much loved, pride even in the family curse which filled him when a child with a most delightful dread a most fearful joy. As he grew older and found that despite this terrible curse no one grew the penny the worse he would look back with a smile at the time when he feared to go to bed at night fully expecting to be burnt alive before morning. Yet for all that he hugged the ancestral implication to his breast as a most cherished possession but as a boy he chiefly showed his pride to the outside world in what seemed a studied reserve. Part of this was no doubt shyness but in addition he intentionally held aloof from companions of his own age. The bachsen dales even then were not able to mix much in society so that except when he paid a rare visit to drawbridge castle he did not come across boys who by birth were his equals. Yet in spite of his pride and reserve in spite of his unsociable reticence he was a refined well-bred boy with great capacities for good. For his father he had a passionate love and devotion and it was his father who chiefly influenced his early years. Lady Alicia was fond of her child proud of his good looks and distinguished air but she paid far more attention to his clothes than to his character. She was only one of those women who look on the outward appearance of their darlings but who never win or even care to win their children's confidence. From his father Lawrence had inherited two excellent gifts a quick feeling for the humorous and a strong sense of humor. He seemed instinctively to shrink from anything mean and underhand a hater of cruelty and naturally disposed to be lenient in his judgments in any matter touching honor. He was pitiless in condemnation and never would allow mercy to temper justice. Having no companions of his own age he would have found time hang heavily on his hands but for his love of books hour after hour did he spend in the magnificent library of the hall. He would probably have turned into a desultory bookworm as his father could not afford to send him to a public school had not the then vicar of Tetley happened to be an admirable scholar. When Lawrence grew to advance for his father he was sent for three or four hours every day to the vicarage to be instructed in Latin and Greek and other excellent things. He was a clever boy and the vicar took the greatest delight in his instruction. His tutor not only laid the foundation of accurate scholarship but also instilled in him a love for the English classics cultivating his naturally good taste until it became almost fastidious and not only taught him the knack of producing passable Latin and Greek verses but also the art of writing excellent English prose. Nevertheless Lawrence did not grow up a milk sup. He had a great love of fresh air and wrote his pony daily and took long walks in Baxendale Park and the maze of adjacent lanes. Moreover he had boxing and fencing lessons from the retired sergeant who was engaged at the grammar school of the neighboring town of Silverhampton. Wherefore those slight he was strong healthy and active. He had his faults no doubt as so many of us have his pride in his race bred in him a certain tolerant scorn for those of humble birth. His pride in his intellect was accompanied by something like contempt for his less gifted brethren. His finished culture shrank from contact with people whose manners were less perfect than his own. Again his delicate sensitiveness in all matters affecting honor gradually developed into an excessive scrupulousness. In his anxiety to avoid anything to which the most exacting moralist could take exception he invented scruples where none could be fairly said to exist. He was an adept in finding a lion in the path in all matters affecting his own pleasure or advantage and he elevated conscience to a position of such eminence that it became almost a bogey. With all this he was not a prig he was saved from that by the quickness with which he saw the ridiculous side of things and it is only fair to acknowledge that he was as ready to laugh at himself as that another. From the humorous to the pathetic it is only a step and Lawrence had a vein of tenderness and sympathy which he strove manfully and not unsuccessfully to conceal but which was evident enough to the few who knew him well. He loved dumb animals especially horses and dogs but he was never much at home with children and only child himself and avoiding through both pride and shyness the companionship of others he had lived a more or less solitary boyhood and knew little and understood less of children which perhaps accounts for the fact that he quite ignored the short frock Nancy and her sister when he met them taking their walks abroad under the protecting wing and vigilant oversight of their governess and was quite unconscious that their eyes were not only blue but uncommonly bright and pretty. He had a quick eye for the flight of a bird or a cricket ball but in things which really mattered he was in those days as blind as a bat. In due course Lawrence went to Oxford having won a post-master ship at Merton thanks to the admirable coaching of the vicar. His father was only able to make him a scanty allowance so that even with his scholarship he had to lead a very quiet life and to indulge in few luxuries yet he enjoyed his college days better perhaps than if he had been able to gratify expensive tastes and frequent frivolous if not rowdy society. He read hard and rode hard and had plenty of friends of a quiet sort he had not much difficulty in securing a first in both moderations and grades moreover he won the gaze for prize for Greek verse a feat which greatly delighted his quantum tutor the vicar. During his last year at Oxford Lawrence made his first real acquaintance with sorrow. His father whose finances have been straightened for some years owing to agricultural depression and the extravagance of Lady Alicia found that he could no longer maintain his position at Baxendale Hall. He decided to move to a small house but this decision was never carried into effect grief at leaving his ancestral home broke his heart and his last days were rendered more wretched by the selfishness of his foolish wife who was continually bemoaning her heart fate in having to resign the position in the county which was her due. Thus a narrower home than even the one he had contemplated claimed the brokenhearted man a home of quietness and peace where he found rest for his soul. Mr. Baxendale's death was a terrible blow to Lawrence he'd always been devoted to his father who had made himself a companion and friend to his son that a time would ever come when that companion and friend should be no more had never occurred to Lawrence and when the blow fell it crushed him. He could not believe at first that it could be true it seemed to him as though his father had gone on a journey and would soon come back then as he began to realize that it really was true that never again on this earth would he see his father smile or clasp his father's hand his faith was staggered. It could not be true that God was a loving father if he could thus deal with his children how could he so Lawrence cried in his anguish permit his creatures to be thus tormented why should he have thus cruelly deprived him of his father in the plenitude of that father's powers with so much good left undone which he alone it seemed could accomplish so much duty neglected which he alone could fulfill if God were indeed pitiful and compassionate why did he permit such misery and unhappiness to innocent men and women where was the justice where was the love of the creator for a time the mystery of pain and of human sorrow and grief overwhelmed Lawrence's soul but he faced his doubts and came through the darkness into light at last it was the remembrance of the father he had lost that was his sheet anchor in this time of storm tossed doubt until he eventually realized the profound truth that the full influence of a man is never felt until his bodily presence has been removed that great though the grief may be yet it is in truest love and divine as knowledge that God sometimes decides that it is expedient for us that our dear one should go away shortly after his father's death Lawrence took his degree meanwhile his mother had gone to her brother Lord Portcullis whose wife had just died and had taken charge of his household as a tutor was required to teach the rising drawbridge how to shoot it occurred to the heads of the family that Baxendale might undertake the post he was not especially attracted by the prospect but his pockets were so empty that there was room in them for his inclinations as well as his salary so he was compelled to pocket both on the same principle that 50 persons drink inferior tea because they therewith receive a book as a bonus meanwhile the Baxendale estates were managed by an agent but when the agent had been paid his salary and the heavy fire insurance which the owner was bound to maintain had been discharged there was not very much left from the diminished rent roll the residue such as it was was given to Lady Elisha by her son for her apparel which was by no means that of a meek and quiet spirit but was after a much more expensive if more effective style so time rolled on until drawbridge was ready for eaten and as a consequence his cousin's services were no longer required it so happened at about this time it occurred to drawbridge's father that Lady Sarah Sashinak had a pretty face in a charming manner on pursuing the train of thought thus suggested he began to speculate how the same face would look at the head of his table on the whole he came to the conclusion that he should prefer it to his sisters in his case for once the course of true love ran smooth as a consequence Lady Elisha as well as her son found her occupation gone it would have been well for Baxendale if he had withstood the allurements of the immediate income he secured by becoming his cousin's tutor and instead of devoting such money as he possessed to the decoration of his mother's person he had spent it on the preparation of himself for the learned profession of the law this at the time had to his scrupulous conscience savored too much of selfishness whereas if he had only used common sense he would have seen that in the long run his mother would have benefited by a temporary restriction in the number and expansiveness of her gowns but it is so difficult to use a sense that one does not happen to possess and few of us care to borrow another person's for the occasion to which minority Lawrence did not happen to belong as things were now he had lost precious years moreover he had to find a home for his mother whose exodus from drawbridge castle was necessitated by the advent of the new countess his opportunity was therefore lost and as the idea of another tutorship was distasteful to him he determined to dispense with the services of an agent and manage his estate himself so he betook himself and his mother to popular farm which happened to be vacant at the time and having learned much while he was at drawbridge from his uncle's agent found himself quite competent to manage his own property with the salary saved in the rent of the house occupied by former agents added to his assets his income was brought up to a few hundreds a year sufficient for the needs of himself and his mother but quite inadequate to the introduction of a Mrs. Lawrence Baxendale he tried of course to let the hall but it was a large rambling building too old-fashioned for the modern merchant prince moreover its proximity to the town of silver Hampton was against its being let as it is a notorious theory which no amount of that can contravert that the surrounding country is as dark as arabus although anyone who has so adjourned in south mercer knows for well that the much maligned country is like a certain distinguished personage not nearly so black as it is painted the management of an estate is a helpful occupation as was evidenced by the bloom upon Baxendale's face and the easy carriage of his slight but athletic frame yet it did not occupy his time to the full the above mentioned personage is credited and there are apparently some grounds for the persuasion with the lack of finding occupation for idle hands this potentate has many local agents some paid and some honorary whom he engages to carry out his designs on this occasion the vacant post belt to miss Nancy Burton Nancy herself was nothing loath to fulfill this useful office she had an appetite which would have done credit to alexander himself for new worlds which should finally be conquered by her bow and spear there was nothing of the little englander about miss Burton in her policy there was no continent too vast to be annexed no tribe too unmanageable to be added to her dependencies therefore she hailed laurence baxendale as one of those unknown yet conquerable spheres for which her great prototype side in vain she was very adaptable and had no difficulty in charming all with whom she came into contact and in persuading them that they and their concerns were objects of absorbing interest to her there was no insincerity in this as long as she was in the company of any person however dull her desire to put that particular person at ease and to find topics of conversation agreeable to him or her led to this result baxendale was an exceedingly clever man but unfortunately he had the knack of hiding his light under the bushel of shyness now Nancy did not know what it was to be shy more than that she defied anyone to be shy when in no company therefore as the two met not infrequently she quickly discovered laurence's abilities and found to her delight that he was very different from the average man of her acquaintance whose superabundance of health was more than balanced by a plentiful lack of wit not to say brains like other men laurence found it impossible to be shy in her presence though he still maintained a reserve which nancy thought as extraordinary as it was unnecessary yet they became close friends in spite of scruples and of struggles on the man's part nancy did not exactly set her cap at the impecunious owner of baxendale hall but she dearly loved power and finding she was exceedingly quick and discerning feelings the man resisting her influence she determined that she will conquer his indifference she had no intention of breaking his heart still less her own but she decided that he should be made to care for her sufficiently to satisfy the point of honor and then he might depart with slightly scorched fingers but otherwise unhurt as for laurence he began by thinking he disliked nancy her very frankness he critically put down to forwardness her wit he regarded as pertness her good humor as casual indifference but he soon found himself convinced to folly he began to recognize the charm of this brilliant young woman to see that her frankness was the result of absence of self-consciousness her easy tolerance the perfection of good manners from this he rapidly progressed to a recognition of the brightness of her wit and the fascination of her strong personality a day seemed lost if he did not see her a day appeared well spent if he had but five minutes of her charming society yet strange to say the more he was attracted the more reserved he himself became this puzzled nancy who was perfectly aware of his being attracted and equally conscious of his studied reserve laurence himself knew but he was unable to gratify the girl's natural curiosity in short he had fallen in love with nancy and his sensitive conscience would not allow him to mention the fact to her if he had done so nobody would have been more surprised than she no one knew what a struggle he had with himself day by day as he saw her he fell deeper into the coils he knew what he was doing yet he made no effort to escape he knew that so far as he was concerned nancy was the only woman in the world and he accepted this elementary truth without a murmur yet his conscience told him that he could never marry her she was a girl accustomed to walk delicately along the luxurious ways of life he with his ancient birth and pride of race had nothing to offer her but a rambling mansion with a superb library which the terms of his grandfather's will had made it impossible for him to sell a large estate that brought him in a scanty income made scantier by the fact that this same will stipulated that both lorns and his father could only succeed to the property on condition that they paid a heavy-fire insurance to protect the hall from the consequences of the old curse moreover he had a mother with by no means inexpensive taste to support so it came to pass that in his relations with nancy he was a man of many moods sometimes he would yield to the seductive charm of her bright talk at such moments he would unbend and become his own natural silk he would allow his pleasant vein of humor and natural kindliness of heart full play then would nancy regard him as the most delightful of men and then all at once he would freeze up and become stiff and affected to nancy's great astonishment she would ask and ask with reason what she had done or said to justify such a change but to this lorns would only reply with stately reserve that she had done and said nothing and would even deny a reserve which no one felt more strongly than himself when he was in this mood nancy thought with some justice that lorns was the most disagreeable of men and determined that she would drop his acquaintance she would perhaps have passed a gentler judgment on the unhappy prisoner at the bar if she had only known that these sudden fits of chilling reserve were simply signs of a devotion and a love which lorns felt were getting beyond his powers of self-control if nancy at such times was irritated almost beyond measure it is equally true that the man whom she regarded as absolutely devoid of human feelings was suffering the tortures of a self-made inquisition which would have put to shame most of the inventions of media evil spain end of chapter three