A haunted life

THE MEET OF THE COACHING CLUB.

'Be patient, Trevor Chute; they are sure to be here to-day, old fellow, for Ida told me so.'

'Ida?'

'Yes, Mrs. Beverley; does that surprise you?' asked the other, with a singular smile--one that was rather sardonic.

'No, Jerry, I have long ceased to be surprised at anything. As I have told you, my special mission in town is a visit to her; but--so you and she are good friends still?'

'Yes, though she has been six months a widow, we are on the same strange terms in which you left us last--friends pure and simple.'

'And nothing more?'

'As yet,' replied Jerry Vane, lowering his voice, with something of despondency perceptible in his tone, and to a close observer it might have been apparent that he, though by nature frank, jovial, and good-humoured, had, by force of habit, or by circumstances, a somewhat cynical mode of expression and gravity of manner.

The time was the noon of a bright and lovely day in May, when the newly-opened London season is at its height; and it was the first meet of the Coaching Club in Hyde Park, where the expectant crowd, filling all the seats under the pleasant trees, or in occupation of handsome carriages, snug barouches, dashing phaetons and victorias--in everything save hackney cabs--covered all the wide plateau which stretches from the Marble Arch to the somewhat prosaic powder magazine beside the Serpentine, and waited with the characteristic patience and good-humour of Londoners for the assembling of the coaches, though some were seeking to while away the time with a morning paper or the last periodical.

The speakers, though young men, were old friends, who had known each other since boyhood in the playing-fields of Rugby.

Jervoise, or, as he was familiarly called, Jerry Vane, was a curly-pated, good-looking young fellow of the genuine Saxon type, with expressive, but rather thoughtful eyes of bluish grey, long fair whiskers, and somewhat the bearing of a 'man about town;' while the other, perhaps in aspect the manlier of the two, Trevor Chute, in figure compact and well set-up, was dark-haired, hazel-eyed, and had a smart moustache, imparting much decision of expression to a handsome and regular face, which had been scorched and embrowned by a tropical sun; and where the white flap of the puggaree had failed to protect his neck and ears, they had deepened to a blister hue.

He had but the day before come to town, on leave from his regiment (which had just returned from India), on a special errand, to be detailed in its place.

In front was the great bend of the blue Serpentine rippling and sparkling in the sunshine, with its tiny fleet of toy-ships; beyond it was the leafy background of trees, and the far stretch of emerald lawn, chequered with clumps of rhododendron in full flower, and almost covered with sight-seers, some of whom gave an occasional cheer as a stately drag passed to the meeting-place, especially if its driver was recognized as a personage of note or a public favourite.

'I don't know what you may have seen in India, Trevor,' said Jerry Vane, 'but I am assured that the gayest meetings on the continent of Europe can present nothing like this. I have been in the Prater at Vienna on the brightest mornings of summer, and on gala days at the Bois de Boulogne, and seen there all the élite of Paris wending its way in equipages, on horse or on foot, but no scene in either place equals this of to-day by the Serpentine!'

To this his friend, who had so recently returned from military exile, in the East, warmly assented, adding:

'The day is as hot as my last Christmas was in the Punjaub.'

'Christmas in the Paunjaub, by Jove!' exclaimed Jerry Vane, with a laugh. 'Eating ices and fanning oneself under a punkah, with the thermometer at 90 in the shade, eh?'

Captain Chute laughed in turn at this idea; but as he stood at that time by the inner railings in Hyde Park, waiting anxiously to see the fair occupants of a certain drag, he could foresee, as little as his friend, where they were to spend their coming Christmas, or on its eve to hear, through the stillness thereof, the sweet evensong coming over a waste of snow from an old chapel, amid a group of crystal-shrouded trees, where many soft voices, with hers among them, told again of the angels' message, given more than eighteen hundred years ago to the shepherds of Chaldea, as they watched their fleecy flock by night.

'It seems but yesterday that I last stood here, Jerry,' said Trevor Chute, thoughtfully, almost sadly; 'and how much has come and gone to us both since then!'

'Yes; and here, as of old, Trevor, are the last new beauties who have come out, and the overblown belles of seasons that are past, and, of course, all those great folks whom everybody knows, and others of whom no one knows anything, save that they have swell equipages, and are "like magnificent red and purple orchids, which grow out of nothing, yet do so much credit to their origin."'

'You grow cynical, Jerry.'

'Perhaps; but there was a time when I was not wont to be so. And you, Trevor, are not without good reason for being so too. Why, man alive! when in the Guards, how popular you were with all the mammas of unmarried daughters; a seat in the carriage, a box at the opera, a balcony at the boat-race, whenever you felt disposed. By Jove! there was no man in town I envied more than you in those days.'

'And what has it all come to now, Jerry? I feel quite like a fogey,' exclaimed Trevor Chute.

'Yet this was but four years ago.'

'Only four years, old fellow, and she is not married yet! But here come the party, and on Desmond's drag; he has the "lead," it seems.'

It was now the hour of one; the procession had started, and the eyes of all the onlookers were eagerly engaged in critically examining the various drags, so magnificently horsed and brilliantly appointed, as they passed in succession, with all their silver harness shining in the sun.

About thirty drove from the well-known rendezvous of the Coaching Club along the pretty drive which skirts the Serpentine and ends with the bridge that divides the Park from Kensington Gardens; and though some of the drivers adhered to the Club uniform--blue, with gilt buttons--many appeared in the perfection of morning costume; and as team after team went by, chestnut, white, or grey, with satin-like skins, murmurs of applause, rising at times to a cheer, greeted the proprietors.

The costumes of the ladies who occupied the lofty seats were as perfect as, in many instances, was their beauty; and no other capital in Europe could have presented such a spectacle as Trevor Chute saw then, when the summer sun was at its height in the heavens, gilding the trees with brilliant light, and showing Hyde Park in all its glory.

The leading drag was the one which fascinated him, and all the other twenty-nine went clattering past like same phantasmagoria, or a spectacle one might seem to behold in a dream.

Several ladies were on the drag, including the owner's somewhat passé sister, the Hon. Evelyn Desmond; but Chute saw only two--Clare and Violet Collingwood--or one, rather, the elder, who riveted all his attention.

Both girls were remarkable for their beauty even then, when every second female face seemed fair to look upon; but the contrast was strong in the opposite styles of their loveliness, for Clare was a brilliant brunette, while Violet was even more brilliant as a blonde; and as the drag swept past, Trevor Chute had only time to remark the perfect taste of Clare's costume or habit, that her back hair was a marvel of curious plaiting, and that she was laughingly and hastily thrusting into her silver-mounted Marguerite pouch a note that Desmond had handed to her, almost surreptitiously it seemed; and then, amid the crowd and haze, she passed away from his sight, as completely as she had done four years before, when, by the force of circumstances--a fate over which he had no control--they had been rent asunder, when their engagement was declared null, and they were informed that thenceforward their paths in life must be far apart.

'Clare Collingwood is the same girl as ever, Trevor,' said Jerry Vane, breaking a silence of some minutes. 'You saw with what imperial indifference she was receiving the admiration of all who passed, and the attention of those who were about her.'

'Is she much changed, Jerry, since--since I left England?' Trevor asked.

'Oh, no,' replied the other, cynically; 'she and her sisters--Violet, at least--have gone, and are still going, over the difficult ways of life pleasantly, gracefully, and easily, as all in their "set" usually do. In her fresh widow's weeds Ida Beverley could not be here to-day, of course.'

'I have an express and most melancholy mission to her on the morrow,' said Captain Chute. 'But why is Collingwood père not with his daughters on this occasion?'

'Though girls that any man might be proud of escorting in any capacity, the old beau, with his dyed hair and curled whispers, is never seen with them, nor has been since their mother's death. Though sixty, if he is a day, he prefers to act the rôle of a young fellow on his preferment, and doesn't like to have these young women--one of them a widow, too--calling him "papa." He knows instinctively--nay, he has overheard--that he is called "old Collingwood," and he doesn't like the title a bit,' added Vane, laughing genuinely, for the first time that forenoon, as they made their way towards the nearest gate of the Park, which the glittering drags were all leaving by the Marble Arch, and setting forth, viâ Portman Square, for luncheon at Muswell Hill or elsewhere.

'And has Clare had no offers since my time?' asked Trevor Chute, almost timidly.

'Two; good ones, also.'

'And she refused them?'

'So Ida told me.'