Henry Esmond; The English Humourists; The Four Georges. William Makepeace Thackeray
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it was, “Lord, Mr. Henry!” and “How do you do, Nancy?” many and many a time in the week. 'Tis surprising the [pg 080] magnetic attraction which draws people together from ever so far. I blush as I think of poor Nancy now, in a red bodice and buxom purple cheeks and a canvas petticoat; and that I devised schemes, and set traps, and made speeches in my heart, which I seldom had courage to say when in presence of that humble enchantress, who knew nothing beyond milking a cow, and opened her black eyes with wonder when I made one of my fine speeches out of Waller or Ovid. Poor Nancy! from the mist of far-off years thine honest country face beams out; and I remember thy kind voice as if I had heard it yesterday.
When Doctor Tusher brought the news that the small-pox was at the “Three Castles”, whither a tramper, it was said, had brought the malady, Henry Esmond's first thought was of alarm for poor Nancy, and then of shame and disquiet for the Castlewood family, lest he might have brought this infection; for the truth is that Mr. Harry had been sitting in a back room for an hour that day, where Nancy Sievewright was with a little brother who complained of headache, and was lying stupefied and crying, either in a chair by the corner of the fire, or in Nancy's lap, or on mine.
Little Lady Beatrix screamed out at Dr. Tusher's news; and my lord cried out, “God bless me!” He was a brave man, and not afraid of death in any shape but this. He was very proud of his pink complexion and fair hair—but the idea of death by small-pox scared him beyond all other ends. “We will take the children and ride away to-morrow to Walcote:” this was my lord's small house, inherited from his mother, near to Winchester.
“That is the best refuge in case the disease spreads,” said Dr. Tusher. “'Tis awful to think of it beginning at the alehouse. Half the people of the village have visited that to-day, or the blacksmith's, which is the same thing. My clerk Simons lodges with them—I can never go into my reading-desk and have that fellow so near me. I won't have that man near me.”
“If a parishioner dying in the small-pox sent to you, would you not go?” asked my lady, looking up from her frame of work, with her calm blue eyes.
“By the Lord, I wouldn't,” said my lord.
“We are not in a Popish country: and a sick man doth not absolutely need absolution and confession,” said the [pg 081] doctor. “'Tis true they are a comfort and a help to him when attainable, and to be administered with hope of good. But in a case where the life of a parish priest in the midst of his flock is highly valuable to them, he is not called upon to risk it (and therewith the lives, future prospects, and temporal, even spiritual welfare of his own family) for the sake of a single person, who is not very likely in a condition even to understand the religious message whereof the priest is the bringer—being uneducated, and likewise stupefied or delirious by disease. If your ladyship or his lordship, my excellent good friend and patron, were to take it——”
“God forbid!” cried my lord.
“Amen,” continued Dr. Tusher. “Amen to that prayer, my very good lord! for your sake I would lay my life down”—and, to judge from the alarmed look of the doctor's purple face, you would have thought that that sacrifice was about to be called for instantly.
To love children, and be gentle with them, was an instinct, rather than a merit, in Henry Esmond, so much so, that he thought almost with a sort of shame of his liking for them, and of the softness into which it betrayed him; and on this day the poor fellow had not only had his young friend, the milkmaid's brother, on his knee, but had been drawing pictures, and telling stories to the little Frank Esmond, who had occupied the same place for an hour after dinner, and was never tired of Henry's tales, and his pictures of soldiers and horses. As luck would have it, Beatrix had not on that evening taken her usual place, which generally she was glad enough to have, upon her tutor's lap. For Beatrix, from the earliest time, was jealous of every caress which was given to her little brother Frank. She would fling away even from the maternal arms, if she saw Frank had been there before her; insomuch that Lady Castlewood was obliged not to show her love for her son in the presence of the little girl, and embrace one or the other alone. She would turn pale and red with rage if she caught signs of intelligence or affection between Frank and his mother; would sit apart, and not speak for a whole night, if she thought the boy had a better fruit or a larger cake than hers; would fling away a ribbon if he had one; and from the earliest age, sitting up in her little chair by the great fireplace opposite to the corner where Lady Castlewood [pg 082] commonly sat at her embroidery, would utter infantine sarcasms about the favour shown to her brother. These, if spoken in the presence of Lord Castlewood, tickled and amused his humour; he would pretend to love Frank best, and dandle and kiss him, and roar with laughter at Beatrix's jealousy. But the truth is, my lord did not often witness these scenes, nor very much trouble the quiet fireside at which his lady passed many long evenings. My lord was hunting all day when the season admitted; he frequented all the cockfights and fairs in the country, and would ride twenty miles to see a main fought, or two clowns break their heads at a cudgelling match; and he liked better to sit in his parlour drinking ale and punch with Jack and Tom, than in his wife's drawing-room: whither, if he came, he brought only too often bloodshot eyes, a hiccuping voice, and a reeling gait. The management of the house and the property, the care of the few tenants and the village poor, and the accounts of the estate, were in the hands of his lady and her young secretary, Harry Esmond. My lord took charge of the stables, the kennel, and the cellar—and he filled this and emptied it too.
So it chanced that upon this very day, when poor Harry Esmond had had the blacksmith's son, and the peer's son, alike upon his knee, little Beatrix, who would come to her tutor willingly enough with her book and her writing, had refused him, seeing the place occupied by her brother, and, luckily for her, had sat at the further end of the room, away from him, playing with a spaniel dog which she had (and for which, by fits and starts, she would take a great affection), and talking at Harry Esmond over her shoulder, as she pretended to caress the dog, saying, that Fido would love her, and she would love Fido, and nothing but Fido, all her life.
When, then, the news was brought that the little boy at the “Three Castles” was ill with the small-pox, poor Harry Esmond felt a shock of alarm, not so much for himself as for his mistress's son, whom he might have brought into peril. Beatrix, who had pouted sufficiently (and who whenever a stranger appeared began, from infancy almost, to play off little graces to catch his attention), her brother being now gone to bed, was for taking her place upon Esmond's knee: for, though the doctor was very obsequious to her, she did not like him, because he had thick boots and dirty hands [pg 083] (the pert young miss said), and because she hated learning the catechism.
But as she advanced towards Esmond from the corner where she had been sulking, he started back and placed the great chair on which he was sitting between him and her—saying in the French language to Lady Castlewood, with whom the young lad had read much, and whom he had perfected in this tongue—“Madam, the child must not approach me; I must tell you that I was at the blacksmith's to-day, and had his little boy upon my lap.”
“Where you took my son afterwards,” Lady Castlewood said, very angry, and turning red. “I thank you, sir, for giving him such company. Beatrix,” she said in English, “I forbid you to touch Mr. Esmond. Come away, child—come to your room. Come to your room—I wish your reverence good night—and you, sir, had you not better go back to your friends at the alehouse?” Her eyes, ordinarily so kind, darted flashes of anger as she spoke; and she tossed up her head (which hung down commonly) with the mien of a princess.
“Hey-day!” says my lord, who was standing by the fireplace—indeed he was in the position to which he generally came by that hour of the evening—“Hey-day! Rachel, what are you in a passion about? Ladies ought never to be in a passion. Ought they, Doctor Tusher? though it does good to see Rachel in a passion—Damme, Lady Castlewood, you look dev'lish handsome in a passion.”
“It is, my lord, because Mr. Henry Esmond, having nothing to do with his time here, and not having a taste for our company, has been to the alehouse, where he has some friends.”
My lord burst out with a laugh and an oath—“You young sly-boots, you've been at Nancy Sievewright. D—— the young hypocrite, who'd have thought it in him? I say, Tusher, he's