Lady Bell, Volume 1 by Sarah Tytler

According to the fashion of the time, though it was only two or three / days' journey to Trevor Court, Squire Trevor and his young wife made it / a progress from one friend's house to another, where the Squire in / person announced his marriage, presented his bride, was roasted and / toasted, and regaled with the first instalment of his wedding rejoicings / by the good-will of his neighbours.

The practice was so far lucky in Lady Bell's case, it gave her no time / to reflect on what had happened in all its importance, so that the / reaction which had already set in after the overstrained resignation and / meekness of her last moments at St. Bevis's, was only a silent / rebellion.

Lady Bell, even at fifteen, had too much spirit and sense to feel / inclined to exhibit to strangers her wrongs and misery, and the extent / of the sacrifice which she had just celebrated. She did not dissolve in / floods of tears-she controlled herself, and was only thought very pale / (but she was a pale, dark-eyed beauty at any time), proud, and shy,-a / grand, but not very attractive, young madam for old Squire Trevor.

Nevertheless, it was in a state of chronic rebellion that Lady Bell / reached Trevor Court. What good was the rebellion to do then? She never / asked herself. Fifteen does not often ask such questions when it but / writhes under a sense of betrayal and wretchedness.

Trevor Court was not like St. Bevis's. It was a fine, well-preserved old / place, with noble stacks of warm red-brick chimneys, seen first from / amidst coeval dark green yews on a broad green terrace.

It had a stone-seated porch and an oaklined chimney corner, with great / delf platters hanging by strings on each side of the richly-carved wood / chimney-piece.

It had a best parlour answering to a drawing-room, where the / spindle-legged chairs were made of cane, the hangings and chair-covers / were lemon colour, and there were Indian ornaments and egg-shell / china-altogether so cold, fantastic, and fragile in its details, that / nobody would have dreamt of occupying it, except for the reception of / company.

There were blue, red, and green bedrooms, each with its enormous bed / like a coloured hearse, its square of Persian carpet in the middle of / the floor, and its ebony escritoire. Everything was in keeping and in / order, and was, next to his sovereign self, the pride of Squire Trevor's / heart and the delight of his eyes.

"Look up, and look out, here is my place, my lady; " so Squire Trevor / introduced Trevor Court, its venerable beauties fresh with the perennial / freshness of early summer, to Lady Bell.

"Is this Trevor Court? " sighed Lady Bell, scarcely stirring herself in / her corner of the chariot.

It was with intense mortification, almost exceeding that with which he / had heard her first address him as a man who might be her father, and / afterwards repel with disgust his clumsy blandishments, that Mr. Trevor / discovered Trevor Court was lost on Lady Bell.

She saw in it only a better sort of prisonhouse. She was not grateful / for the change from the wreck at St. Bevis's. At St. Bevis's there had / still been something like freedom and hope. Trevor Court signified / slavery and despair.

Lady Bell was not nearly old enough, or mercenary enough, to weigh with / appreciation the substantial evidences of respectability and comfort. / Her burdened heart and soul were not free to admit a sense of beauty.

Lady Bell looked round her with lacklustre eyes. No comment of / satisfaction or word of praise dropped from her tightly-locked lips.

"Welcome, your honour! Welcome, madam, and long life and prosperity! / Many happy returns of the day! Hoorah! hoorah! " broke the stiff, / oppressive silence. The greeting burst in set form, and simultaneously, / from the pliant dependants and consequential old servants in quilted / gowns like Mrs. Kitty's, in worsted stockings, and worsted lace setting / off their livery, in gardeners' green aprons and countrymen's round / hats, which were at that moment waved lustily in the air.

The worst was to come; for resentment and anguish at fifteen are very / liable to merge into petulance, alternating with heaviness. Lady Bell / received the demonstration haughtily and cavalierly. She was the / mistress of these folks, in spite of herself, and against her will. / Their making merry provoked her when she did not desire their service.

It had been right that she should put the best face upon matters while / she was in other people's houses; but since she had come home, if home / meant anything, and as Squire Trevor's marriage had been too / unpremeditated to admit of the assistance of strangers in the / "home-coming," she need make no farther pretence.

She declined to drink her own health, not to say Squire Trevor's, in the / ale which had been broached, and the claret which had been drawn. She / was forced to pledge her household in return; but she only touched the / flagon with her lips. She was compelled, too, to take the Squire's arm, / and walk, accommodating her steps to his pursy gait; but she walked like / a naughty child, with as few smiles and curtseys as she could bestow / between the rows of retainers. She clutched her skirt and riding-gloves, / to prevent any willing hand freeing her from the encumbrances.

There was something pathetic as well as ludicrous in the forlornness of / the unmagnanimous behaviour that showed both singleness of heart and / extreme youthful folly in the friendless girl; but it incensed Squire / Trevor beyond measure.

Without the indiscretion, he might have felt inclined, as he had carried / his point and gained his end, to be in good humour with his bride and / the rest of the world.