ivy and other creeping plants. An iron ring, contrived so as when drawn up and down to rattle against the bar of notched iron through which it was suspended, served the purpose of a knocker; and to this he applied himself, though with the greatest precaution.
He received no answer for some time, and indeed it seemed as if the house was totally uninhabited; when, at length, his impatience getting the upper hand, he tried to open the door, and, as it was only upon the latch, very easily succeeded. He passed through a little low-arched hall, the upper end of which was occupied by a staircase, and turning to the left, opened the door of a summer parlour, wainscoted with black oak, and very simply furnished with chairs and tables of the same materials; the former cushioned with the leather. The apartment was gloomy – one of those stone-shafted windows which we have mentioned, with its small latticed panes, and thick garland of foliage, admitting but an imperfect light.
Over the chimneypiece (which was of the same massive materials with the panelling of the apartment) was the only ornament of the room; a painting, namely, representing an officer in the military dress of the Civil Wars. It was a green jerkin, then the national and peculiar wear of the Manxmen; his short band which hung down on the cuirass – the orange-coloured scarf, but, above all, the shortness of his close-cut hair, showing evidently to which of the great parties he had belonged. His right hand rested on the hilt of his sword; and in the left he held a small Bible, bearing the inscription, “In hoc signo.” The countenance was of a light complexion, with fair and almost effeminate blue eyes, and an oval form of face – one of those physiognomies, to which, though not otherwise unpleasing, we naturally attach the idea of melancholy and of misfortune.7 Apparently it was well known to Julian Peveril; for after having looked at it for a long time, he could not forbear muttering aloud, “What would I give that that man had never been born, or that he still lived!”
“How now – how is this?” said a female, who entered the room as he uttered this reflection. “You here, Master Peveril, in spite of all the warnings you have had! You here in the possession of folk’s house when they are abroad, and talking to yourself, as I shall warrant!”
“Yes, Mistress Deborah,” said Peveril, “I am here once more, as you see, against every prohibition, and in defiance of all danger. – Where is Alice?”
“Where you will never see her, Master Julian – you may satisfy yourself of that,” answered Mistress Deborah, for it was that respectable governante; and sinking down at the same time upon one of the large leathern chairs, she began to fan herself with her handkerchief, and complain of the heat in a most ladylike fashion.
In fact, Mistress Debbitch, while her exterior intimated a considerable change of condition for the better, and her countenance showed the less favourable effects of the twenty years which had passed over her head, was in mind and manners very much what she had been when she battled the opinions of Madam Ellesmere at Martindale Castle. In a word, she was self-willed, obstinate, and coquettish as ever, otherwise no ill-disposed person. Her present appearance was that of a woman of the better rank. From the sobriety of the fashion of her dress, and the uniformity of its colours, it was plain she belonged to some sect which condemned superfluous gaiety in attire; but no rules, not those of a nunnery or of a quaker’s society, can prevent a little coquetry in that particular, where a woman is desirous of being supposed to retain some claim to personal attention. All Mistress Deborah’s garments were so arranged as might best set off a good-looking woman, whose countenance indicated ease and good cheer – who called herself five-and-thirty, and was well entitled, if she had a mind, to call herself twelve or fifteen years older.
Julian was under the necessity of enduring all her tiresome and fantastic airs, and awaiting with patience till she had “prinked herself and pinned herself” – flung her hoods back, and drawn them forward – snuffed at a little bottle of essences – closed her eyes like a dying fowl – turned them up like duck in a thunderstorm; when at length, having exhausted her round of minauderies, she condescended to open the conversation.
“These walks will be the death of me,” she said, “and all on your account, Master Julian Peveril; for if Dame Christian should learn that you have chosen to make your visits to her niece, I promise you Mistress Alice would be soon obliged to find other quarters, and so should I.”
“Come now, Mistress Deborah, be good-humoured,” said Julian; “consider, was not all this intimacy of ours of your own making? Did you not make yourself known to me the very first time I strolled up this glen with my fishing-rod, and tell me that you were my former keeper, and that Alice had been my little playfellow? And what could there be more natural, than that I should come back and see two such agreeable persons as often as I could?”
“Yes,” said Dame Deborah; “but I did not bid you fall in love with us, though, or propose such a matter as marriage either to Alice or myself.”
“To do you justice, you never did, Deborah,” answered the youth; “but what of that? Such things will come out before one is aware. I am sure you must have heard such proposals fifty times when you least expected them.”
“Fie, fie, fie, Master Julian Peveril,” said the governante; “I would have you to know that I have always so behaved myself, that the best of the land would have thought twice of it, and have very well considered both what he was going to say, and how he was going to say it, before he came out with such proposals to me.”
“True, true, Mistress Deborah,” continued Julian; “but all the world hath not your discretion. Then Alice Bridgenorth is a child – a mere child; and one always asks a baby to be one’s little wife, you know. Come, I know you will forgive me. Thou wert ever the best-natured, kindest woman in the world; and you know you have said twenty times we were made for each other.”
“Oh no, Master Julian Peveril; no, no, no!” ejaculated Deborah. “I may indeed have said your estates were born to be united; and to be sure it is natural for me, that come of the old stock of the yeomanry of Peveril of the Peak’s estate, to wish that it was all within the ring fence again; which sure enough it might be, were you to marry Alice Bridgenorth. But then there is the knight your father, and my lady your mother; and there is her father, that is half crazy with his religion; and her aunt that wears eternal black grogram for that unlucky Colonel Christian; and there is the Countess of Derby, that would serve us all with the same sauce if we were thinking of anything that would displease her. And besides all that, you have broke your word with Mistress Alice, and everything is over between you; and I am of opinion it is quite right it should be all over. And perhaps it may be, Master Julian, that I should have thought so a long time ago, before a child like Alice put it into my head; but I am so good-natured.”
No flatterer like a lover, who wishes to carry his point.
“You are the best-natured, kindest creature in the world, Deborah. – But you have never seen the ring I bought for you at Paris. Nay, I will put it on your finger myself; – what! your foster-son, whom you loved so well, and took such care of?”
He easily succeeded in putting a pretty ring of gold, with a humorous affectation of gallantry, on the fat finger of Mistress Deborah Debbitch. Hers was a soul of a kind often to be met with, both among the lower and higher vulgar, who, without being, on a broad scale, accessible to bribes or corruption, are nevertheless much attached to perquisites, and considerably biassed in their line of duty, though perhaps insensibly, by the love of petty observances, petty presents, and trivial compliments. Mistress Debbitch turned the ring round, and round, and round, and at length said, in a whisper, “Well, Master Julian Peveril, it signifies nothing denying anything to such a young gentleman as you, for young gentlemen are always so obstinate! and so I may as well tell you, that Mistress Alice walked back from the Kirk-Truagh along with me, just now, and entered the house at the same time with myself.”
“Why did you not tell me so before?”
I am told that a portrait of the unfortunate William Christian is still preserved in the family of Waterson of Ballnabow of Kirk Church, Rushin. William Dhône is dressed in a green coat without collar or cape, after the fashion of those puritanic times, with the head in a close cropt wig, resembling the bishop’s peruke of the present day. The countenance is youthful and well-looking, very unlike the expression of foreboding melancholy. I have so far taken advantage of this criticism, as to bring my ideal portrait in the present edition, nearer to the complexion at least of the fair-haired William Dhône.
