Erema - My Father's Sin, Richard Doddridge Blackmore [read me a book TXT] 📗

And having no home in England, or, indeed, I might say, any where, I was to live with the Major and his wife, supposing that they could arrange it so, until I should discover relatives.

We had a long and stormy voyage, although we set sail so fairly; and I thought that we never should round Cape Horn in the teeth of the furious northeast winds; and after that we lay becalmed, I have no idea in what latitude, though the passengers now talked quite like seamen, at least till the sea got up again. However, at last we made the English Channel, in the dreary days of November, and after more peril there than any where else, we were safely docked at Southampton. Here the Major was met by two dutiful daughters, bringing their husbands and children, and I saw more of family life (at a distance) than had fallen to my lot to observe before; and although there were many little jars and brawls and cuts at one another, I was sadly inclined to wish sometimes for some brothers and sisters to quarrel with.

But having none to quarrel with, and none to love, except good Mrs. Hockin, who went away by train immediately, I spent such a wretched time in that town that I longed to be back in the Bridal Veil in the very worst of weather. The ooze of the shore and the reek of the water, and the dreary flatness of the land around (after the glorious heaven-clad heights, which made me ashamed of littleness), also the rough, stupid stare of the men, when I went about as an American lady may freely do in America, and the sharpness of every body's voice (instead of the genial tones which those who can not produce them call "nasal," but which from a higher view are cordial)--taken one after other, or all together, these things made me think, in the first flush of thought, that England was not a nice country. After a little while I found that I had been a great deal too quick, as foreigners are with things which require quiet comprehension. For instance, I was annoyed at having a stupid woman put over me, as if I could not mind myself--a cook, or a nurse, or housekeeper, or something very useful in the Hockin family, but to me a mere incumbrance, and (as I thought in my wrath sometimes) a spy. What was I likely to do, or what was any one likely to do to me, in a thoroughly civilized country, that I could not even stay in private lodgings, where I had a great deal to think of, without this dull creature being forced upon me? But the Major so ordered it, and I gave in.

There I must have staid for the slowest three mouths ever passed without slow starvation finishing my growth, but not knowing how to "form my mind," as I was told to do. Major Hockin came down once or twice to see me, and though I did not like him, yet it was almost enough to make me do so to see a little liveliness. But I could not and would not put up with a frightful German baron of music, with a polished card like a toast-rack, whom the Major tried to impress on me. As if I could stop to take music lessons!

"Miss Wood," said Major Hockin, in his strongest manner, the last time he came to see me, "I stand to you in loco parentis. That means, with the duties, relationships, responsibilities, and what not, of the unfortunate--I should say rather of the beloved--parent deceased. I wish to be more careful of you than of a daughter of my own--a great deal more careful, ten times, Miss Wood; I may say a thousand times more careful, because you have not had the discipline which a daughter of mine would have enjoyed. And you are so impulsive when you take an idea! You judge every body by your likings. That leads to error, error, error."

"My name is not Miss Wood," I answered; "my name is 'Erema Castlewood.' Whatever need may have been on board ship for nobody knowing who I am, surely I may have my own name now."

When any body says "surely," at once up springs a question; nothing being sure, and the word itself at heart quite interrogative. The Major knew all those little things which manage women so manfully. So he took me by the hand and led me to the light and looked at me.

I had not one atom of Russian twist or dyed China grass in my hair, nor even the ubiquitous aid of horse and cow; neither in my face or figure was I conscious of false presentment. The Major was welcome to lead me to the light and to throw up all his spectacles and gaze with all his eyes. My only vexation was with myself, because I could not keep the weakness--which a stranger should not see--out of my eyes, upon sudden remembrance who it was that used to have the right to do such things to me. This it was, and nothing else, that made me drop my eyes, perhaps.

"There, there, my dear!" said Major Hockin, in a softer voice than usual. "Pretty fit you are to combat with the world, and defy the world, and brave the world, and abolish the world--or at least the world's opinion! 'Bo to a goose,' you can say, my dear; but no 'bo' to a gander. No, no; do quietly what I advise--by-the-bye, you have never asked my advice."

I can not have been hypocritical, for of all things I detest that most; but in good faith I said, being conquered by the Major's relaxation of his eyes,

"Oh, why have you never offered it to me? You knew that I never could ask for it."

For the moment he looked surprised, as if our ideas had gone crosswise; and then he remembered many little symptoms of my faith in his opinions; which was now growing inevitable, with his wife and daughters, and many grandchildren--all certain that he was a Solomon.

"Erema," he said, "you are a dear good girl, though sadly, sadly romantic. I had no idea that you had so much sense. I will talk with you, Erema, when we both have leisure."

"I am quite at leisure, Major Hockin," I replied, "and only too happy to listen to you."

"Yes, yes, I dare say. You are in lodgings. You can do exactly as you please. But I have a basin of ox-tail soup, a cutlet, and a woodcock waiting for me at the Cosmopolitan Hotel. Bless me! I am five minutes late already. I will come and have a talk with you afterward."

"Thank you," I said; "we had better leave it. It seems of no importance, compared--compared with--"

"My dinner!" said the Major; but he was offended, and so was I a little, though neither of us meant to vex the other.


CHAPTER XX


BRUNTSEA

It would be unfair to Major Hockin to take him for an extravagant man or a self-indulgent one because of the good dinner he had ordered, and his eagerness to sit down to it. Through all the best years of his life he had been most frugal, abstemious, and self-denying, grudging every penny of his own expense, but sparing none for his family. And now, when he found himself so much better off, with more income and less outlay, he could not be blamed for enjoying good things with the wholesome zest of abstinence.

For, coming to the point, and going well into the matter, the Major had discovered that the "little property" left to him, and which he was come to see to, really was quite a fine estate for any one who knew how to manage it, and would not spare courage and diligence. And of these two qualities he had such abundance that, without any outlet, they might have turned him sour.

The property lately devised to him by his cousin, Sir Rufus Hockin, had long been far more plague than profit to that idle baronet. Sir Rufus hated all exertion, yet could not comfortably put up with the only alternative--extortion. Having no knowledge of his cousin Nick (except that he was indefatigable), and knowing his own son to be lazier even than himself had been, longing also to inflict even posthumous justice upon the land agent, with the glad consent of his heir he left this distant, fretful, and naked spur of land to his beloved cousin Major Nicholas Hockin.

The Major first heard of this unexpected increase of his belongings while he was hovering, in the land of gold, between his desire to speculate and his dread of speculation. At once he consulted our Colonel Gundry, who met him by appointment at Sacramento; and Uncle Sam having a vast idea of the value of land in England, which the Major naturally made the most of, now being an English land-owner, they spent a most pleasant evening, and agreed upon the line marked out by Providence.

Thus it was that he came home, bringing (by kind arrangement) me, who was much more trouble than comfort to him, and at first disposed to be cold and curt. And thus it was that I was left so long in that wretched Southampton, under the care of a very kind person who never could understand me. And all this while (as I ought to have known, without any one to tell me) Major Hockin was testing the value and beating the bounds of his new estate, and prolonging his dinner from one to two courses, or three if he had been travelling. His property was large enough to afford him many dinners, and rich enough (when rightly treated) to insure their quality.

Bruntsea is a quiet little village on the southeast coast of England, in Kent or in Sussex, I am not sure which, for it has a constitution of its own, and says that it belongs to neither. It used to be a place of size and valor, furnishing ships, and finding money for patriotic purposes. And great people both embarked and landed, one doing this and the other that, though nobody seems to have ever done both, if history is to be relied upon. The glory of the place is still preserved in a seal and an immemorial stick, each of which is blessed with marks as incomprehensible as could be wished, though both are to be seen for sixpence. The name of the place is written in more than forty different ways, they say; and the oldest inhabitant is less positive than the youngest how to spell it.

This village lies in the mouth, or rather at the eastern end of the mouth, of a long and wide depression among the hills, through which a sluggish river wins its muddy consummation. This river once went far along the sea-brink, without entering (like a child who is afraid to bathe), as the Adur does at Shoreham, and as many other rivers do. And in those days the mouth and harbor were under the cliff at Bruntsea, whence its seal and corporation, stick, and other blessings. But three or four centuries ago the river was drawn by a violent storm, like a badger from his barrel, and forced to come straight out and face the sea, without any three miles of dalliance. The time-serving water made the best of this, forsook its ancient bed (as classic nymphs and fountains used to do), and left poor Bruntsea with a dry bank, and no haven for a cockle-shell. A new port, such as it is,