A Child of Hallow Een.

New Zealand Graphic, Volume XXIX, Issue XVII, 25 October 1902, Page 1080

A Child of Hallow Ee n .

The home of Sir Alfred Hamilton's ancestors was a joy to the antiquarian and to the reveller in folklore. But Sir Alfred himself and his wife, who was born to adorn a capital, and all her friends and relations (of whom he saw much, to the exclusion Of his own, and who were all as modern, and frivolous, and shallow, and devoid of heart and poetry as possible), thought the fmcieilt and timeworn mansion a gloomy and distasteful spot. They shivered in the lowroofed hall and declared that the dark narrow passages were damp; they pronounced the four-posters with their shadowy curtains “creepy,” and begged that “dear Alfred” would remove “thos»s- id armour men,” which stood in dark corners and seemed to look on at all their descendants’ vagaries with hollow, disapproving eyes, like mute reminders of time and eternity. It never occurred to them that the house lay under the shadow of the brave and rox mantie past. If one had come and said that it. was mourning for the dead days and the great deeds it had seen they would have laughed consumedly at him—unless he were the Poet Laureate, from whom such sayings might be expected, or the inmate of a lunatic asylum.

The house was originally a mere watch-tower, used by the Wardens of the Marches, but. when the stormy Middle Ages and the raids of the wild Scottish reivers were over, a later generation improved it. into a dwelling place, A building Hamilton, of Tudor times, added an Elizabethan wing, and this was the most modern part of the house, where were the drawing-room, the dining-room, and Lady Victoria’s seldom-used boudoir. The house stood high and looked north, fronting the Border as if ever on the look-out. It was the meeting place of the winds, and all night long they howled round it and rattled the old diamond window-jmnes and sang mournful dirges among the tossing branches'of the trees that stood sparsely about it. In the daytime they whistled down the bare bleak roads and drove the withered leaves before them in a Hying scud. Even in summer, when their frantic, voices were hushed, there still sounds of mourning and desolation round the lonely house, for the rooks cawed without ceasing in the treetops, and from the vale below came intermittently the plaintive cry of the peewit.

Thus it might be said that the lullaby of the infant, daughter of the house was sung in a minor key, and that her cradle was rocked to the slow cadences of a requiem. She was born on a dark October day, when the winds were howling in their most melancholy strain, and at her unexpected entrance into the world she found it a place where everyone was in weeds of woe, for the grandfather whom she never knew had died with a suddenness and awfulness that enhanced the sorrow and consternation at his departure. The very servants were all in black, the house was darkened, and there was a hush of great awe over all. Thus the baby was born in shadow, and she grew up under a twofold shadow, even as the house lay, the shadow of death and the shadow' of birth. Her earliest recollections were of a prevailing sombre tint; she never remembered any colour but black in her first, infancy. Vaguely she remembered a baby brother a pair of sunny blue eyes, and a slap given her when she tried to play with his cherished toys; and then he disappeared from her recollections, and the general black hue of her surroundings became deeper than before. As she grew older, it seemed to hear that all her troubles came from this baby brother dying, and she had a dim idea tnat if she had known then that he was going and all that it would mean to her, she would have implored him to stay. For years when she said her prayers she asked tor a brother, the same one back

again, or one to replace him, and when none eame she thought it must be in some way her own wickedness that was to blame. She used to hear the servants saying: “Ah, if little Master George had only lived!” or “The' house wants a young gentleman about it,” or "Ah, it’s a sad pity there is no heir!” and when she heard them the sense of her own inadequacy weighed on her as a heavy burden.

She was christened Ulrica Mary. But on his first introduction to her, her father, who wasya young man and thoughtless, 'Was so shocked at her skinny and gnome-like, appearance, that he exclaimed^”What a little scaramoutch!” and the nickname of Scaramoutch clung to her ever after. He had probably no idea himself what he meant, end most certainly no one else Knew, but the effect of his words remained the same as if they had been all that was wisest and most apt, and his innocent daughter suffered. So Ulrica came to have a strange sound in her ears, and she associated it with the times when she was naughty and wneu alone she heard it, and thought it denoted displeasure.

Hen nursery, and later tw her schoolroom and bedroom, were all in the old watch-tower, with walls many feet thick, and it was esteemed something of an expedition and an adventure if she occasionally penetrated to the rest .of the house, where the shutters were always closed and brown Holland swathed the chairs and sofas. These explorations usually took place when the housekeeper was fussing about at the head of her maids,' getting the rooms ready for Sir Alfred and Lady Victoria, while the courtyard resounded to the noise of the beating of carpets. The master and mistress of the house might be expected at least twice in the autumn, when they’ made their home “half-way house” on their road to and from Scotland; and also they sometimes came there in the early summer before the London season, for a week or so. Then Scaramoutch would be sent for in the evening to the 'drawing-room, a ceremony which she always regarded with as much awe as if it were a ritual. There she would see

“mamma,” who had about three remarks to make to her. aud then expect her to amuse herself; sometimes there was also “grandmamma,” who was a very alarming person and only to be approached wijh circumspection. Sometimes there were aunts, of whom new ones seemed to appear on every fresh occasion, to the great confusion of Scaramoutch’s mind in infancy. If “papa” were there he was always nice and kind, and would draw her pictures of a kind that would distract an artist, or teach her how to construct jerry-built houses of brieks with a newspaper foundation, at the same time demonstrating to her how exceedingly’ unsafe was her architecture under his tutelage by bringing the w’hole structure down with a crash when he twitched the newspaper; but this kind and instructive parent was usually absent, and the mints and other ladies from whom Soaramoutch’s infant brain failed to distinguish them, were not. always equally complaisant. Once Scaramoutch heard Aunt Alix, a very grand lady, who wore a wonderful trailing; garment and many' shining gold chains on her wrist, say’ in an audible voice: “What an uglv child!”

And Scaramoutch (who would have liked to make friends and play vvith the gold chains) turned and fled out of the room. When she was found, some time afterwards, hiding behind a sofa in the pitch dark boudoir. and carried by “papa” up to the nursery, very meek and with flushed cheeks stained with tears of mortification, she was told she was very’ naughty. A great confusion existed in her mind about what was “naughty” and what was “good”; a confusion to which, as she grew older, she gave

much thought, trying to find a clue. Apparently it was chiefly inconvenience to other people that was sin. Eq-al*. being quiet and keeping out of the ■’ way was virtue. When she heard *for the first time % of the Elevearth Comkxvandment, she argued in her own mind that it must run: “Thon ’shalt not make unnecessary

remarks.” Otherwise, though she searched the Bible and the “Imitation of Christ;” and such other books of devotion a«t she had access to, for' precepts which would confirm the standard held top to her by her nurse and governess, she could not discover the mortal necessity of their code. But she adopted the practical suggestion thereof; and kept the questions that surged in her miud behind cldsed lips. So fehe grew up very silent and revealed to her immediate surroundings nothing of that which lay behind her silence. Whefl she was seven years old, she was provided with a governess. This person eame like a bolt from the blue, Scaramoutch knew not whence, nor cared to inquire. She accepted her as she would accept the weather or the seasons, or any other arrangement of nature. The governess, byname Miss Grey, was a very estimable person, but far from exciting; her mental outlook was bounded by the four walls of r schoolroom; and if her thoughts ever strayed into wider fields than arithmetic and parsing, dictation and elementary history, it did not transpire to the world. Under her regular and monotonous tuition, Scaramoutch progressed from Little Arthur and Mrs Markham to Thirlwall and Gibbon, and amassed' knowledge in solid blocks and understanding in intermittent driblets.

It was a strange twist in the history of heredity; that Sir Alfred and Lady Victoria, being the sort of people they were (he with "no thought soaring beyond the destruction of game, big and small; she, who felt like a god-forsaken exile if she were a dozen miles from Bond-street) should have produced a child whose one passion was books. Their own reading consisted respectively’ of the “Badminton Library” and three-vol-ume novels, and the library in the watch-tower was left year after year to accumulate dust. There were obsolete books on every- subject under heaverf printed, many’ of them in eyedestroying type, bound in that shade of maroon which seems to have been so gratifying to a past generation of bookbftiders, and there Scaramoutch found the fresh fields and pastures new that were to her the sunny realm of VarAdise. It might not have seemed altogether advisable to allow her to rove therein with only her sweet will to guide her, but that the child was one of those that should see God, she was so utterly pure of heart. Therefore, though those round her knew this not, nor cared, but left her to take her chance, her wanderings among the old books did her .no harm.

It chanced one day that she lighted onia strange old volume that treated of witches and warlocks, phantoms, ■and Will-of-the-'W'isip, and other things marvellous and unhallowed, in the authoritative fashion of one whose ..occult’ knowledge exacts a boundless respect from the ignorant. Scaramoutch read it greedily, for the mystic had intense attractions for her. As she pored over the quaint type she believed every' word.

“But ye chitefest time when Workes of Darknesses doe abound is ye Eve of some Holie Daye, and ye most principal of these. Hallow Even, when ye unseen Things of ye Air doe take pastime abroad and delight in that which is wanton and evil.” The book went on to descant on the endless ■ observances of All Hallow E’en, when "Sath-anas and his angels, which be ye Powers of ye Air, see once more their long-lost Suzeraintie”; on the maidens who eat apples before' looking glasses and beheld the Dexfil in the form of their future husbands looking over their shoulder; on those that had the hardihood to sally’ forth in the dread silence of midnight and sow in a ploughed field seed which their fate reaped in their footsteps; on the mysttb assembly in the churchyard of those that should die in the coming year; on thhse inquirers after his Satanic Majesty who threw n cord out rtf their windows at the magical hour and were rewarded for their

unbecoming curiosity by feeling him pull at the other end. “What day is Hallow Even, Miss Grey?” enquired Scaramoutch that evening. “I suppose yo*u mean All Hallow E’en,” replied the governess, with snubbing precision. “It is the 31st ■ of October, the Vigil of All Saints.” “Why, then, it’s my birthday!.’’ ejaculated Scaramoutch. Aftsr a few minutes’ silence she resumed: “If one was born on All Hallow E’en could one see spirits?” “There are no such things. Don’t be silly,” exclaimed Miss Grey, severely. She was no prey to superstitious terrors, which she held incomparable to the alarm attendant on the appeardnee of a burglar dr a mouse. Though she had never had any means of ascertaining what her conduct would be in the first-named (contingency,shehadample experience of the last, for the terrifying marauders of whom her soul stood in dread were apt to hold nightly' revel in the very middle of hqr bedroom, regardless of thrown slippers and stifled screams under the bedclothes'. Scaramoutch only thought the more of being summarily shut up. She had come in the course of thirteen years’ sojourn among people who resented questions as a personal injury ’ anti .looked, upon a thirst for knowledge as a dangerous curiosity to refer all knotty points to the tribunal of her own mind; and being in herself judge,' prisoner ,and jury it is not. surprising that the conclusions to which she came were sometimes a little strange. Too much thinking is good for no one, and it breeds trouble with the people who " jdo not think, and consequently hate those who do. Also it sharpens senses that are best left to their natural dullness and dull others that should be kept bright. An inordinate thinker often loses the use of his tongue, and does not find. that the increased sharpness of his vision and hearing, the redoubled accuracy of his memory, and the development of his reasoning power are compensations. Scaramoutch was not old enough to know this truth, but she was on the fair road to finding it out; She was also within an ace of discovering the applicability of the wise man’s saying that of making- many books there is no end, and much study is a weariness of the flesh. She had an unwearing aptitude for study—especially of history—which she used to read purely for pleasure. She always had such a reigning passion for some one or other hero of the historic past as would have delighted the heart of Carlyle. Usually it. was Oliver Cromwell or William Wallace, or some such turbulent person, which clearly demonstrated the revolutionary tendency of the mind in early’ youth. So she dreamt and read her. time away-, and laid up for herself some pleasure and a great deal of trouble for the future, with the utmost cheerful unconsciousness. Soon after her fruitless attempt to extract information from Miss Grey, her parents came to the house on their way from Scotland. The first evening after their arrival, Scarumoutch, as usual, after her schoolroom being- over, traversed the winding stairs and short., unexpected passages to the drawing-room. She slid in at the door like a silent little shadow, and went to her favourite corner by the big palm tree behind the piano. But when she arrived there, she found the deep, low armchair that was her favourite seat already’ occupied. A lady was sitting there, deep in a book with the flaming circular label of the library on its ■hapless cover. She was a very tall and handsome lady, with dark hj-.r and eyes, and a pale oval face — rather a moon-faced sultana in lovks —and the short lace-edged sleeves of her crimson tea-gown showed beautiful white rounded arms, but the charm which rooted Scaramoutch to the spot was the extreme sweetness of her expression. The child would have stood there Nationless and fascinated for an indefinite time, bub after a few minutes, the lady looked up. A bright and most engaging smile flashed all over her face, lighting the soft, dark eyes, and lingering round the delicately cut m ntth; Scaramoutch’s conquest was complete. z “You are Ulrica, I think?’’ -nt)-'

Scaramoutch always spoke slowly and deliberately, and her voice was strangely deep for a ehild. She had never been taught that it is not polite to eye strangers in a too evident running over of their points as if they were prize bullocks. However, the lady was no doubt accustomed to being stared at, for she gave no sign of annoyance or embarrassment at Searamoutch's very direct gaze. "Won’t you sit down?” she asked, and her voice was soft and sweet and matched her face, thought Searamoutch. “You will be tired if you stand up all the time. There, that’s better." as her strange little eoni-

herself a low chair ami sat ii in it, still staring up into her face. “Are yon one of mamma's friends?" asked Scaramoilteli deli berate! x. after a moment's pause. “Yes, I am. I have known mamma since we were girls.” “I was .thinking you were different from most of them," said Scaramoutch, quite seriously. “I hope that means a compliment,” said the lady, laughing, “but what are you going to do? Wouldn’t you like to play a game?”

“I don’t know any,” replied Scaramoutch. rather suspicious of what seemed to her an unusual suggestion. Nobody had offered to play games with her since the days when “papa” was wont to erect the unsteady brick houses for her delectation. “I must teach you,” said her new friend, pleasantly; “1 see a little table over there, and if you look on the piano y< u will see some tiny packs of cards in a box. If vou bring them 1 w ill show *ou how to play Patience.” Scaramoutch dragged over the table noiselessly, and disappeared softfooted in search of the cards. Presently she re-appeared with a little

silver box, on which A and a coronet were engraved, and a moment later the two new friends were absorbed in the mysteries of the •’Demon.” By the time that irritating Patience had utterly baffled them they were quite intimate. Scaramoutch was never shy; she was too grave and self-contained to be self-conscious: but she was given to long' stretches of silence, with very small oases of conversation. Her new friend, however, seemed gifted with the instinct of how to draw her out. and elicit a greater degree of coin-

municat i veness than she was wont to bestow on anyone. Before the end of the evening. Scaramoutch had become quite graphic in her description of her pony and her Irish terrier, and the rats which the latter was so fond of slaughtering, while her new acquaintance watched her with a little smile on her fare. Scaramoutch was not a pretty child; her face was too square and solemn for beauty either <>t form or expression, and the one thing which redeemed her from positive ugliness was the quantity of silky dark brown ha’r on her shoulders, lier eyebrow’s were too straight and black, and her habit of drawing them

dow n over her eyes was not embellishing. Still, there was something about her face and figure that had in it elements both of oiiginalitv and of pathos. “She will not be pretty, but she will be piquant,” was the mental verdict of her new friend. And she knew that piquancy would carry such an heiress as Scaramoutch won hl be into realms whither the fairest, face in the world, that was the ow ner's sole fortune. w 7 ould never stray. Aloud she said: “1 have a little, girl just your age.

ami you must come and see her some da v.” “1 should like that,” said Scaramoutch. ”1 don't know any other g rls. Mamma, '* she added. “i> rather bored with children. I think.” “<>, really?” said the lady, halt amused, half surprised. ”Yes.” said Sea rainout ch. quite gravely, and as a matter of course; ’’she does not like me very much. I am not a boy. you see.’ Iler new friend hulked at her very kindly over the table, and said nothing but: “Shall we try another Pat ienee?” Scaramoutch had m ver applied the pr.nciple of hero-worship to anyone out-side a book till now. But this was changed, and the wonderful new acquaintance occupied the pedestal which hitherto had been sacred to Oliver Cromwell and others of his kidney. She used to watch her hero ine as a cat would a mouse at Inn eheon. at which meal she was suddenly adjudged “ohi enough” to appear, and not the least inflection of voice, not the slightest gesture escaped her. She would worship silently each word, each look, each movement, and think them all mar vellous and deeply interesting, even when most commonplace. The very way in which her heroine plied her knife and fork seemed admirable to Scaramoutch. Occasionally ishe was troubled with a vague, uneasy wish that she had something more than her mere silent adoration to lay at the shrine, and many were Ihe rose coloured castles that she built in her brain of all the lovely things she would pour at the adored feet if only they were hers to pour. Nothing seemed to her imagination too good for her heroine, ami when she heard that that much-admired lady was a duchess, she thought it no more than Ivcr deiserts. If a d'iadem brought happiness, as Scaramoutch. placing reliance on a most fallacious proverb, firmly believed, then her idol should have beenan Empress and a Celestial Majesty to boot. (To be continued.)