The History of Henry Esmond, Esq., a Colonel in the Service of Her Majesty Queen AnneThackeray, William Makepeace
History
The History of Henry Esmond, Esq., a Colonel in the Service of Her Majesty Queen Anne
Thackeray, William Makepeace
Great Britain -- History -- Anne, 1702-1714 -- Fiction; Historical fiction
Harry Esmond was witness of the departure. It was very different to my
lord's coming, for which great preparation had been made (the old house
putting on its best appearance to welcome its guest), and there was
a sadness and constraint about all persons that day, which filled Mr.
Esmond with gloomy forebodings, and sad indefinite apprehensions. Lord
Castlewood stood at the door watching his guest and his people as they
went out under the arch of the outer gate. When he was there, Lord Mohun
turned once more, my Lord Viscount slowly raised his beaver and bowed.
His face wore a peculiar livid look, Harry thought. He cursed and kicked
away his dogs, which came jumping about him--then he walked up to the
fountain in the centre of the court, and leaned against a pillar and
looked into the basin. As Esmond crossed over to his own room, late the
chaplain's, on the other side of the court, and turned to enter in at
the low door, he saw Lady Castlewood looking through the curtains of
the great window of the drawing-room overhead, at my lord as he stood
regarding the fountain. There was in the court a peculiar silence
somehow; and the scene remained long in Esmond's memory:--the sky bright
overhead; the buttresses of the building and the sun-dial casting shadow
over the gilt memento mori inscribed underneath; the two dogs, a black
greyhound and a spaniel nearly white, the one with his face up to the
sun, and the other snuffing amongst the grass and stones, and my lord
leaning over the fountain, which was bubbling audibly. 'Tis strange how
that scene, and the sound of that fountain, remain fixed on the memory
of a man who has beheld a hundred sights of splendor, and danger too, of
which he has kept no account.
It was Lady Castlewood--she had been laughing all the morning, and
especially gay and lively before her husband and his guest--who as soon
as the two gentlemen went together from her room, ran to Harry, the
expression of her countenance quite changed now, and with a face and
eyes full of care, and said, “Follow them, Harry, I am sure something
has gone wrong.” And so it was that Esmond was made an eavesdropper at
this lady's orders and retired to his own chamber, to give himself time
in truth to try and compose a story which would soothe his mistress, for
he could not but have his own apprehension that some serious quarrel was
pending between the two gentlemen.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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