The Case of General Ople and Lady Camper | Page 4

conversation, during which he
managed to express regrets at his aunt's turn for solitariness. As they
belonged to sister branches of the same Service, the General and Mr.
Reginald Roller had a theme in common, and a passion. Elizabeth told
her father that nothing afforded her so much pleasure as to hear him
talk with Mr. Roller on military matters. General Ople assured her that
it pleased him likewise. He began to spy about for Mr. Roller, and it
sometimes occurred that they conversed across the wall; it could hardly
be avoided. A hint or two, an undefinable flying allusion, gave the
General to understand that Lady Camper had not been happy in her
marriage. He was pained to think of her misfortune; but as she was not
over forty, the disaster was, perhaps, not irremediable; that is to say, if
she could be taught to extend her forgiveness to men, and abandon her
solitude. 'If,' he said to his daughter, 'Lady Camper should by any

chance be induced to contract a second alliance, she would, one might
expect, be humanized, and we should have highly agreeable
neighbours.' Elizabeth artlessly hoped for such an event to take place.
She rarely differed with her father, up to whom, taking example from
the world around him, she looked as the pattern of a man of wise
conduct.
And he was one; and though modest, he was in good humour with
himself, approved himself, and could say, that without boasting of
success, he was a satisfied man, until he met his touchstone in Lady
Camper.

CHAPTER II
This is the pathetic matter of my story, and it requires pointing out,
because he never could explain what it was that seemed to him so cruel
in it, for he was no brilliant son of fortune, he was no great pretender,
none of those who are logically displaced from the heights they have
been raised to, manifestly created to show the moral in Providence. He
was modest, retiring, humbly contented; a gentlemanly residence
appeased his ambition. Popular, he could own that he was, but not
meteorically; rather by reason of his willingness to receive light than
his desire to shed it. Why, then, was the terrible test brought to bear
upon him, of all men? He was one of us; no worse, and not strikingly or
perilously better; and he could not but feel, in the bitterness of his
reflections upon an inexplicable destiny, that the punishment befalling
him, unmerited as it was, looked like absence of Design in the scheme
of things, Above. It looked as if the blow had been dealt him by
reckless chance. And to believe that, was for the mind of General Ople
the having to return to his alphabet and recommence the ascent of the
laborious mountain of understanding.
To proceed, the General's introduction to Lady Camper was owing to a
message she sent him by her gardener, with a request that he would cut
down a branch of a wychelm, obscuring her view across his grounds

toward the river. The General consulted with his daughter, and came to
the conclusion, that as he could hardly despatch a written reply to a
verbal message, yet greatly wished to subscribe to the wishes of Lady
Camper, the best thing for him to do was to apply for an interview. He
sent word that he would wait on Lady Camper immediately, and betook
himself forthwith to his toilette. She was the niece of an earl.
Elizabeth commended his appearance, 'passed him,' as he would have
said; and well she might, for his hat, surtout, trousers and boots, were
worthy of an introduction to Royalty. A touch of scarlet silk round the
neck gave him bloom, and better than that, the blooming consciousness
of it.
'You are not to be nervous, papa,' Elizabeth said.
'Not at all,' replied the General. 'I say, not at all, my dear,' he repeated,
and so betrayed that he had fallen into the nervous mood. 'I was saying,
I have known worse mornings than this.' He turned to her and smiled
brightly, nodded, and set his face to meet the future.
He was absent an hour and a half.
He came back with his radiance a little subdued, by no means eclipsed;
as, when experience has afforded us matter for thought, we cease to
shine dazzlingly, yet are not clouded; the rays have merely grown
serener. The sum of his impressions was conveyed in the reflective
utterance--'It only shows, my dear, how different the reality is from our
anticipation of it!'
Lady Camper had been charming; full of condescension, neighbourly,
friendly, willing to be satisfied with the sacrifice of the smallest branch
of the wych-elm, and only requiring that much for complimentary
reasons.
Elizabeth wished to hear what