: Miss Esperance and Mr Wycherly by Harker L Allen Lizzie Allen - Orphans Fiction; Guardian and ward Fiction; Villages Fiction; Scotland Fiction

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CHAPTER

And the kingdom of heaven is of the child-like, of those who are easy to please, who love and who give pleasure.--R.L.S.

Just as a Royal Princess is known only by her Christian name, so "Miss Esperance" was known to her many friends by hers. It would have seemed an impertinence to add anything more: there was only one Miss Esperance, and even quite commonplace people, deficient in imagination and generally prosaic in their estimate of their acquaintance, acknowledged, perhaps unconsciously, that in Miss Esperance was to be found in marked degree "that hardy and high serenity," distinguishing quality of the truly great.

A little, old lady, her abundant white hair demurely parted under the species of white muslin cap known in the North country as a "mutch," with beautiful, kind eyes, and a fresh pink-and-white complexion, having a slim, long-waisted figure, always attired in garments something of a cross between those of a Quakeress and a Sister-of-Mercy; a little, old lady, who walked delicately and talked deliberately the English of Mr. Addison; who lived in a small, square house set in a big, homely garden, on an incredibly small income; and out of that income helped innumerable people poorer than herself, to say nothing of much greater responsibilities undertaken at an age when most of us look for rest and a quiet life.

Long before there was a village of Burnhead at all, that small stone house had stood four-square to all the winds of heaven, and winds are boisterous in that cold North. So lonely had it been--that little house--that far back, beyond the memory of even hearsay it had been called "Remote." Now the village had crept up round it, but still it stood just a little aloof, alone in its green garden at the end of the straggling village street. And it seemed a singularly suitable setting for Miss Esperance who, also, by reason of her breeding and her dignified, dainty ways, moved wholly unconsciously and gracefully on a somewhat different plane from that of the homely folk amongst whom she spent her simple days.

Such was Miss Esperance; regarded by the inhabitants of her own village, and those of the big town on whose outskirts it lay, with something of the possessive pride with which they looked upon their famous Castle.

And then there was Mr. Wycherly.

For some years he had lived with Miss Esperance, occupying two rooms on the first floor. A very learned man was he, absorbed in the many books which lined his little sitting-room. Something of a collector, too, with a discriminating affection for first editions and a knowledge concerning them excelling that of Mr. Donaldson himself, the great second-hand dealer.

The attitude of Miss Esperance toward Mr. Wycherly somewhat resembled that of Miss Betsy Trotwood to Mr. Dick, with this difference--that Mr. Wycherly's lapses from a condition of erudite repose were only occasional. He had what Miss Esperance tenderly called "one foible." On occasion, particularly at such times as he left the safe shelter of the village on a book-hunting expedition in the neighbouring town, "he exceeded"--again to quote Miss Esperance--the temperate tumbler of toddy and single glass of port which she accorded him; and would return in a state of boisterous hilarity, which caused Elsa, the serving-woman, to shake her head and mutter something about "haverals" on his first wavering appearance at the far end of the garden path which led to the front door.

Then would she march upstairs and sternly "turn down" his bed; descending hastily again and, in spite of his protests, trundle him up the staircase, divest him of his boots, nor leave him till he was safe between the sheets. There he continued to sing lustily till he fell asleep.

He was never otherwise than courteous in his cups; but at such times his usually austere manner would unbend, and he would compare Elsa--who was older than Miss Esperance and extremely hard-favoured--to sundry heathen goddesses, eulogising her eyes and her complexion, and interspersing his compliments with sonorous Latin quotations; for, like Mr. Addison, "his knowledge of the Latin poets, from Lucretius and Catullus down to Claudian and Prudentius, was singularly exact and profound."

Even when most mirthful he sang only two songs, "Here's a Health Unto His Majesty" and "Down Among the Dead Men." In his more sober moments he professed entire ignorance of music.

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