The Young Duke

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'Danced, my dear fellow! Do not speak to me.'

'What is the matter?'

'The most diabolical matter that you ever heard of.'

'Well, well?'

'I have not even been introduced.'

'Well! come on at once.'

'I cannot.'

'Are you mad?'

'Worse than mad. Where is her father?'

'Who cares?'

'I do. In a word, my dear Lucy, her father is that guardian whom I have
perhaps mentioned to you, and to whom I have behaved so delicately.'

'Why! I thought your guardian was an old curmudgeon.'

'What does that signify, with such a daughter!'

'Oh! here is some mistake. This is the only child of Dacre of Castle
Dacre, a most delightful fellow; one of the first fellows in the county;
I was introduced to him to-day on the course. I thought you knew them.
You were admiring his outriders to-day, the green and silver.'

'Why, Bag told me they were old Lord Sunderland's.'

'Bag! How can you believe a word that booby says? He always has an
answer. To-day, when Afy drove in, I asked Bag who she was, and he said
it was his aunt, Lady de Courcy. I begged to be introduced, and took
over the blushing Bag and presented him.'

'But the father; the father, Lucy! How shall I get out of this scrape?'

'Oh! put on a bold face. Here! give him this ring, and swear you
procured it for him at Genoa, and then say that, now you are here, you
will try his pheasants.'

'My dear fellow, you always joke. I am in agony. Seriously, what shall I
do?'

'Why, seriously, be introduced to him, and do what you can.'

'Which is he?'

'At the extreme end, next to the very pretty woman, who, by-the-bye, I
recommend to your notice: Mrs. Dallington Vere. She is amusing. I know
her well. She is some sort of relation to your Dacres. I will present
you to both at once.'

'Why! I will think of it.'

'Well, then! I must away. The two stewards knocking their heads together
is rather out of character. Do you know it is raining hard? I am
cursedly nervous about to-morrow.'

'Pooh! pooh! If I could get through to-night, I should not care for
to-morrow.'

CHAPTER III.

_The Duke Apologises_

AS SIR LUCIUS hurried off his colleague advanced towards the upper end
of the room, and, taking up a position, made his observations, through
the shooting figures of the dancers, on the dreaded Mr. Dacre. The late
guardian of the Duke of St. James was in the perfection of manhood;
perhaps five-and-forty by age; but his youth had lingered long. He
was tall, thin, and elegant, with a mild and benevolent expression of
countenance, not unmixed, however, with a little reserve, the ghost of
youthly pride. Listening with polished and courtly bearing to the pretty
Mrs. Dallington Vere, assenting occasionally to her piquant observations
by a slight bow, or expressing his dissent by a still slighter smile,
seldom himself speaking, yet always with that unembarrassed manner which
makes a saying listened to, Mr. Dacre was altogether, in appearance, one
of the most distinguished personages in this distinguished assembly. The
young Duke fell into an attitude worthy of Hamlet: 'This, then, is _old_
Dacre! O deceitful Fitz-pompey! O silly St. James! Could I ever forget
that tall, mild man, who now is perfectly fresh in my memory? Ah! that
memory of mine; it has been greatly developed to-night. Would that I had
cultivated that faculty with a little more zeal! But what am I to do?
The case is urgent. What must the Dacres think of me? What must May
Dacre think? On the course the whole day, and I the steward, and not
conscious of the presence of the first family in the Riding! Fool, fool!
Why, why did I accept an office for which I was totally unfitted? Why,
why must I flirt away a whole morning with that silly Sophy Wrekin? An
agreeable predicament, truly, this! What would I give now once more to
be in St. James's Street! Confound my Yorkshire estates! How they
must dislike, how they must despise me! And now, truly, I am to be
_introduced_ to him! The Duke of St. James, Mr. Dacre! Mr. Dacre,
the Duke of St. James! What an insult to all parties! How supremely
ludicrous! What a mode of offering my gratitude to the man to whom I
am under solemn and inconceivable obligations! A choice way, truly, to
salute the bosom-friend of my sire, the guardian of my interests, the
creator of my property, the fosterer of my orphan infancy! It is
useless to conceal it; I am placed in the most disagreeable, the most
inextricable situation. 'Inextricable! Am I, then, the Duke of St.
James? Am I that being who, two hours ago, thought that the world was
formed alone for my enjoyment, and I quiver and shrink here like a
common hind? Out, out on such craven cowardice! I am no Hauteville! I
am bastard! Never! I will not be crushed. I will struggle with this
emergency; I will conquer it. Now aid me, ye heroes of my house! On
the sands of Palestine, on the plains of France, ye were not in a more
difficult situation than is your descendant in a ball-room in his own
county. My mind elevates itself to the occasion, my courage expands with
the enterprise; I will right myself with these Dacres with honour, and
without humiliation.'

The dancing ceased, the dancers disappeared. There was a blank between
the Duke of St. James on one side of the broad room, and Mr. Dacre and
those with whom he was conversing on the other. Many eyes were on his
Grace, and he seized the opportunity to execute his purpose. He advanced
across the chamber with the air of a young monarch greeting a victorious
general. It seemed that, for a moment, his Majesty wished to destroy
all difference of rank between himself and the man that he honoured. So
studied and so inexpressibly graceful were his movements that the
gaze of all around involuntarily fixed upon him. Mrs. Dallington Vere
unconsciously refrained from speaking as he approached; and one or two,
without actually knowing his purpose, made way. They seemed awed by his
dignity, and shuffled behind Mr. Dacre, as if he were the only person
who was the Duke's match.

'Mr. Dacre,' said his Grace, in the softest but still audible tones, and
he extended, at the same time, his hand; 'Mr. Dacre, our first meeting
should have been neither here nor thus; but you, who have excused so
much, will pardon also this!'

Mr. Dacre, though a calm personage, was surprised by this sudden
address. He could not doubt who was the speaker. He had left his ward
a mere child. He saw before him the exact and breathing image of the
heart-friend of his ancient days. He forgot all but the memory of a
cherished friendship.

He was greatly affected; he pressed the offered hand; he advanced; he
moved aside. The young Duke followed up his advantage, and, with an air
of the greatest affection, placed Mr. Dacre's arm in his own, and then
bore off his prize in triumph.

Right skilfully did our hero avail himself of his advantage. He spoke,
and he spoke with emotion. There is something inexpressibly captivating
in the contrition of a youthful and a generous mind. Mr. Dacre and his
late ward soon understood each other; for it was one of those meetings
which sentiment makes sweet.

'And now,' said his Grace, 'I have one more favour to ask, and that is
the greatest: I wish to be recalled to the recollection of my oldest
friend.'

Mr. Dacre led the Duke to his daughter; and the Earl of St. Jerome, who
was still laughing at her side, rose.

'The Duke of St. James, May, wishes to renew his acquaintance with you.'

She bowed in silence. Lord St. Jerome, who was the great oracle of the
Yorkshire School, and who had betted desperately against the favourite,
took Mr. Dacre aside to consult him about the rain, and the Duke of
St. James dropped into his chair. That tongue, however, which had never
failed him, for once was wanting. There was a momentary silence, which
the lady would not break; and at last her companion broke it, and not
felicitously.

'I think there is nothing more delightful than meeting with old
friends.'

'Yes! that is the usual sentiment; but I half suspect that it is
a commonplace, invented to cover our embarrassment under such
circumstances; for, after all, "an old friend" so situated is a person
whom we have not seen for many years, and most probably not cared to
see.'

[Illustration: frontis-p79]

'You are indeed severe.'

'Oh! no. I think there is nothing more painful than parting with old
friends; but when we have parted with them, I am half afraid they are
lost.'

'Absence, then, with you is fatal?'

'Really, I never did part with any one I greatly loved; but I suppose it
is with me as with most persons.'

'Yet you have resided abroad, and for many years?'

'Yes; but I was too young then to have many friends; and, in fact, I
accompanied perhaps all that I possessed.'

'How I regret that it was not in my power to accept your kind invitation
to Dacre in the Spring!'

'Oh! My father would have been very glad to see you; but we really are
dull kind of people, not at all in your way, and I really do not think
that you lost much amusement.'

'What better amusement, what more interesting occupation, could I have
had than to visit the place where I passed my earliest and my happiest
hours? 'Tis nearly fifteen years since I was at Dacre.'

'Except when you visited us at Easter. We regretted our loss.'

'Ah! yes! except that,' exclaimed the Duke, remembering his jaeger's
call; 'but that goes for nothing. I of course saw very little.'

'Yet, I assure you, you made a great impression. So eminent a personage,
of course, observes less than he himself is observed. We had a graphical
description of you on our return, and a very accurate one, too; for I
recognised your Grace to-night merely from the report of your visit.'

The Duke shot a shrewd glance at his companion's face, but it betrayed
no indication of badinage, and so, rather puzzled, he thought it best to
put up with the parallel between himself and his servant. But Miss Dacre
did not quit this agreeable subject with all that promptitude which he
fondly anticipated.

'Poor Lord St. Jerome,' said she, 'who is really the most unaffected
person I know, has been complaining most bitterly of his deficiency in
the _air noble_. He is mistaken for a groom perpetually; and once, he
says, had a _douceur_ presented to him in his character of an ostler.
Your Grace must be proud of your advantage over him. You would have been
gratified by the universal panegyric of our household. They, of course,
you know, are proud of their young Duke, a real Yorkshire Duke, and they
love to dwell upon your truly imposing appearance. As for myself, who
am true Yorkshire also, I take the most honest pride in hearing them
describe your elegant attitude, leaning back in your britzska, with your
feet on the opposite cushions, your hat arranged aside with that air of
undefinable grace characteristic of the Grand Seigneur, and, which is
the last remnant of the feudal system, your reiterated orders to drive
over an old woman. You did not even condescend to speak English, which
made them quite enthusiastic--'

'Oh, Miss Dacre, spare me!'

'Spare you! I have heard of your Grace's modesty; but this excessive
sensibility, under well-earned praise, surprises me!'

'But, Miss Dacre, you cannot indeed really believe that this vulgar
ruffian, this grim scarecrow, this Guy Faux, was--was--myself.'

'Not yourself! Really, I am a simple personage. I believe in my eyes and
trust to my ears. I am at a loss for your meaning.'

'I mean, then,' said the Duke, who had gained time to rally, 'that this
monster was some impostor, who must have stolen my carriage, picked my
pocket, and robbed me of my card, which, next to his reputation, is a
man's most delicate possession.'

'Then you never called upon us?'

'I blush to confess it, never; but I will call, in future, every day.'

'Your ingenuousness really rivals your modesty.'

'Now, after these confessions and compliments, may I suggest a waltz?'

'No one is waltzing now.'

'When the quadrille, then, is finished?'

'Then I am engaged.'

'After your engagement?'

'That is indeed making a business of pleasure. I have just refused
a similar request of your fellow-steward. We damsels shall soon be
obliged to carry a book to enrol our engagements as well as our bets, if
this system of reversionary dancing be any longer encouraged.'

'But you must dance with me!' said the Duke, imploringly.

'Oh! you will stumble upon me in the course of the evening, and I shall
probably be more fortunate.

I suppose you feel nervous about to-morrow?'

'Not at all.'

'Ah! I forgot. Your Grace's horse is the favourite. Favourites always
win.'

'Have I a horse?'

'Why, Lord St. Jerome says he doubts whether it be one.'

'Lord St. Jerome seems a vastly amusing personage; and, as he is so
often taken for an ostler, I have no doubt is an exceedingly good judge
of horse-flesh.'

Miss Dacre smiled. It was that wild, but rather wicked, gleam which
sometimes accompanies the indulgence of innocent malice. It seemed to
insinuate, 'I know you are piqued, and I enjoy it' But here her hand was
claimed for the waltz.

The young Duke remained musing.

'There she swims away! By heavens! unrivalled! And there is Lady Afy
and Burlington; grand, too. Yet there is something in this little Dacre
which touches my fancy more. What is it? I think it is her impudence.
That confounded scrape of Carlstein! I will cashier him to-morrow.
Confound his airs! I think I got out of it pretty well. To-night, on
the whole, has been a night of triumph; but if I do not waltz with the
little Dacre I will only vote myself an ovation. But see, here comes Sir
Lucius. Well! how fares my brother consul?'

'I do not like this rain. I have been hedging with Hounslow, having
previously set Bag at his worthy sire with a little information. We
shall have a perfect swamp, and then it will be strength against speed;
the old story. Damn the St. Leger. I am sick of it.'

'Pooh! pooh! think of the little Dacre!'

'Think of her, my dear fellow! I think of her too much. I should
absolutely have diddled Hounslow, if it had not been for her confounded
pretty face flitting about my stupid brain. I saw you speaking to
Guardy. You managed that business well.'

'Why, as I do all things, I flatter myself, Lucy. Do you know Lord St.
Jerome?'

'Verbally. We have exchanged monosyllables; but he is of the other set.'

'He is cursedly familiar with the little Dacre. As the friend of her
father, I think I shall interfere. Is there anything in it, think you?'

'Oh! no; she is engaged to another.'

'Engaged!' said the Duke, absolutely turning pale.

'Do you remember a Dacre at Eton?'

'A Dacre at Eton!' mused the Duke. At another time it would not have
been in his power to have recalled the stranger to his memory; but this
evening the train of association had been laid, and after struggling a
moment with his mind he had the man. 'To be sure I do: Arundel Dacre, an
odd sort of a fellow; but he was my senior.'

'Well, that is the man; a nephew of Guardy, and cousin, of course, to La
Bellissima. He inherits, you know, all the property. She will not have
a sou; but old Dacre, as you call him, has managed pretty well, and
Monsieur Arundel is to compensate for the entail by presenting him with
a grandson.'

'The deuce!'

'The deuce, indeed! Often have I broken his head. Would that I had to a
little more purpose!'

'Let us do it now!'

'He is not here, otherwise----One dislikes a spooney to be successful.'

'Where are our friends?'

'Annesley with the Duchess, and Squib with the Duke at ecarte.'

'Success attend them both!'

'Amen!'

CHAPTER IV.

_Innocence and Experience_

TO FEEL that the possessions of an illustrious ancestry are about to
slide from out your line for ever; that the numerous tenantry, who look
up to you with the confiding eye that the most liberal parvenu cannot
attract, will not count you among their lords; that the proud park,
filled with the ancient and toppling trees that your fathers planted,
will yield neither its glory nor its treasures to your seed, and that
the old gallery, whose walls are hung with pictures more cherished than
the collections of kings, will not breathe with your long posterity; all
these are feelings sad and trying, and are among those daily pangs which
moralists have forgotten in their catalogue of miseries, but which
do not the less wear out those heart-strings at which they are so
constantly tugging.

This was the situation of Mr. Dacre. The whole of his large property was
entailed, and descended to his nephew, who was a Protestant; and yet,
when he looked upon the blooming face of his enchanting daughter, he
blessed the Providence which, after all his visitations, had doomed him
to be the sire of a thing so lovely. An exile from her country at an
early age, the education of May Dacre had been completed in a foreign
land; yet the mingling bloods of Dacre and of Howard would not in a
moment have permitted her to forget The inviolate island of the sage and
free! even if the unceasing and ever-watchful exertions of her father
had been wanting to make her worthy of so illustrious an ancestry.

But this, happily, was not the case; and to aid the development of the
infant mind of his young child, to pour forth to her, as she grew
in years and in reason, all the fruits of his own richly-cultivated
intellect, was the solitary consolation of one over whose conscious head
was impending the most awful of visitations. May Dacre was gifted with
a mind which, even if her tutor had not been her father, would have
rendered tuition a delight. Her lively imagination, which early unfolded
itself; her dangerous yet interesting vivacity; the keen delight, the
swift enthusiasm, with which she drank in knowledge, and then panted for
more; her shrewd acuteness, and her innate passion for the excellent and
the beautiful, filled her father with rapture which he repressed, and
made him feel conscious how much there was to check, to guide, and to
form, as well as to cherish, to admire, and to applaud.

As she grew up the bright parts of her character shone with increased
lustre; but, in spite of the exertions of her instructor, some less
admirable qualities had not yet disappeared. She was still too often
the dupe of her imagination, and though perfectly inexperienced, her
confidence in her theoretical knowledge of human nature was unbounded.
She had an idea that she could penetrate the characters of individuals
at a first meeting; and the consequence of this fatal axiom was, that
she was always the slave of first impressions, and constantly the victim
of prejudice. She was ever thinking individuals better or worse than
they really were, and she believed it to be out of the power of anyone
to deceive her. Constant attendance during many years on a dying and
beloved mother, and her deeply religious feelings, had first broken, and
then controlled, a spirit which nature had intended to be arrogant and
haughty. Her father she adored; and she seemed to devote to him all
that consideration which, with more common characters, is generally
distributed among their acquaintance. We hint at her faults. How
shall we describe her virtues? Her unbounded generosity, her dignified
simplicity, her graceful frankness, her true nobility of thought and
feeling, her firmness, her courage and her truth, her kindness to
her inferiors, her constant charity, her devotion to her parents, her
sympathy with sorrow, her detestation of oppression, her pure unsullied
thoughts, her delicate taste, her deep religion. All these combined
would have formed a delightful character, even if unaccompanied with
such brilliant talents and such brilliant beauty. Accustomed from an
early age to the converse of courts and the forms of the most polished
circles, her manner became her blood, her beauty, and her mind. Yet
she rather acted in unison with the spirit of society than obeyed its
minutest decree. She violated etiquette with a wilful grace which made
the outrage a precedent, and she mingled with princes without feeling
her inferiority. Nature, and art, and fortune were the graces which had
combined to form this girl. She was a jewel set in gold, and worn by a
king.

Her creed had made her, in ancient Christendom, feel less an alien; but
when she returned to that native country which she had never forgotten,
she found that creed her degradation. Her indignant spirit clung with
renewed ardour to the crushed altars of her faith; and not before those
proud shrines where cardinals officiate, and a thousand acolytes fling
their censers, had she bowed with half the abandonment of spirit with
which she invoked the Virgin in her oratory at Dacre.

The recent death of her mother rendered Mr. Dacre and herself little
inclined to enter society; and as they were both desirous of residing on
that estate from which they had been so long and so unwillingly absent,
they had not yet visited London. The greater part of their time had been
passed chiefly in communication with those great Catholic families with
whom the Dacres were allied, and to which they belonged. The modern race
of the Howards and the Cliffords, the Talbots, the Arundels, and the
Jerninghams, were not unworthy of their proud progenitors. Miss Dacre
observed with respect, and assuredly with sympathy, the mild
dignity, the noble patience, the proud humility, the calm hope, the
uncompromising courage, with which her father and his friends sustained
their oppression and lived as proscribed in the realm which they had
created. Yet her lively fancy and gay spirit found less to admire in the
feelings which influenced these families in their intercourse with the
world, which induced them to foster but slight intimacies out of the
pale of the proscribed, and which tinged their domestic life with
that formal and gloomy colouring which ever accompanies a monotonous
existence. Her disposition told her that all this affected
non-interference with the business of society might be politic, but
assuredly was not pleasant; her quick sense whispered to her it was
unwise, and that it retarded, not advanced, the great result in which
her sanguine temper dared often to indulge. Under any circumstances,
it did not appear to her to be wisdom to second the efforts of their
oppressors for their degradation or their misery, and to seek no
consolation in the amiable feelings of their fellow-creatures for the
stern rigour of their unsocial government. But, independently of all
general principles, Miss Dacre could not but believe that it was
the duty of the Catholic gentry to mix more with that world which so
misconceived their spirit. Proud in her conscious knowledge of
their exalted virtues, she felt that they had only to be known to be
recognised as the worthy leaders of that nation which they had so often
saved and never betrayed.

She did not conceal her opinions from the circle in which they had grown
up. All the young members were her disciples, and were decidedly of
opinion that if the House of Lords would but listen to May Dacre,
emancipation would be a settled thing. Her logic would have destroyed
Lord Liverpool's arguments; her wit extinguished Lord Eldon's jokes.
But the elder members only shed a solemn smile, and blessed May Dacre's
shining eyes and sanguine spirit.

Her greatest supporter was Mrs. Dallington Vere. This lady was a distant
relation of Mr. Dacre. At seventeen she, herself a Catholic, had married
Mr. Dallington Vere, of Dallington House, a Catholic gentleman of
considerable fortune, whose age resembled his wealth. No sooner had this
incident taken place than did Mrs. Dallington Vere hurry to London, and
soon evinced a most laudable determination to console herself for her
husband's political disabilities. Mrs. Dallington Vere went to Court;
and Mrs. Dallington Vere gave suppers after the opera, and concerts
which, in number and brilliancy, were only equalled by her balls. The
dandies patronised her, and selected her for their Muse. The Duke of
Shropshire betted on her always at ecarte; and, to crown the whole
affair, she made Mr. Dallington Vere lay claim to a dormant peerage. The
women were all pique, the men all patronage. A Protestant minister
was alarmed; and Lord Squib supposed that Mrs. Dallington must be the
Scarlet Lady of whom they had heard so often.

Season after season she kept up the ball; and although, of course, she
no longer made an equal sensation, she was not less brilliant, nor
her position less eminent. She had got into the best set, and was more
quiet, like a patriot in place. Never was there a gayer lady than Mrs.
Dallington Vere, but never a more prudent one. Her virtue was only
equalled by her discretion; but, as the odds were equal, Lord Squib
betted on the last. People sometimes indeed did say--they always
will--but what is talk? Mere breath. And reputation is marble, and iron,
and sometimes brass; and so, you see, talk has no chance. They did say
that Sir Lucius Grafton was about to enter into the Romish communion;
but then it turned out that it was only to get a divorce from his wife,
on the plea that she was a heretic.

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