Not always do those who dare such divine conflict prevail. Night after night the sweat of agony may burst dark on the forehead; the supplicant may cry for mercy with that soundless voice the soul utters when its appeal is to the Invisible. "Spare my beloved," it may implore. "Heal my life's life. Rend not from me what long affection entwines with my whole nature. God of heaven, bend, hear, be clement!" And after this cry and strife the sun may rise and see him worsted. That opening morn, which used to salute him with the whisper of zephyrs, the carol of skylarks, may breathe, as its first accents, from the dear lips which colour and heat have quitted, "Oh! I have had a suffering night. This morning I am worse. I have tried to rise. I cannot. Dreams I am unused to have troubled me."
Then the watcher approaches the patient's pillow, and sees a new and strange moulding of the familiar features, feels at once that the insufferable moment draws nigh, knows that it is God's will his idol shall be broken, and bends his head, and subdues his soul to the sentence he cannot avert and scarce can bear.
Happy Mrs. Pryor! She was still praying, unconscious that the summer sun hung above the hills, when her child softly woke in her arms. No piteous, unconscious moaning--sound which so wastes our strength that, even if we have sworn to be firm, a rush of unconquerable tears sweeps away the oath--preceded her waking. No space of deaf apathy followed. The first words spoken were not those of one becoming estranged from this world, and already permitted to stray at times into realms foreign to the living. Caroline evidently remembered with clearness what had happened.
"Mamma, I have slept _so_ well. I only dreamed and woke twice."
Mrs. Pryor rose with a start, that her daughter might not see the joyful tears called into her eyes by that affectionate word "mamma," and the welcome assurance that followed it.
For many days the mother dared rejoice only with trembling. That first revival seemed like the flicker of a dying lamp. If the flame streamed up bright one moment, the next it sank dim in the socket. Exhaustion followed close on excitement.
There was always a touching endeavour to _appear_ better, but too often ability refused to second will; too often the attempt to bear up failed. The effort to eat, to talk, to look cheerful, was unsuccessful. Many an hour passed during which Mrs. Pryor feared that the chords of life could never more be strengthened, though the time of their breaking might be deferred.
During this space the mother and daughter seemed left almost alone in the neighbourhood. It was the close of August; the weather was fine--that is to say, it was very dry and very dusty, for an arid wind had been blowing from the east this month past; very cloudless, too, though a pale haze, stationary in the atmosphere, seemed to rob of all depth of tone the blue of heaven, of all freshness the verdure of earth, and of all glow the light of day. Almost every family in Briarfield was absent on an excursion. Miss Keeldar and her friends were at the seaside; so were Mrs. Yorke's household. Mr. Hall and Louis Moore, between whom a spontaneous intimacy seemed to have arisen--the result, probably, of harmony of views and temperament--were gone "up north" on a pedestrian excursion to the Lakes. Even Hortense, who would fain have stayed at home and aided Mrs. Pryor in nursing Caroline, had been so earnestly entreated by Miss Mann to accompany her once more to Wormwood Wells, in the hope of alleviating sufferings greatly aggravated by the insalubrious weather, that she felt obliged to comply; indeed, it was not in her nature to refuse a request that at once appealed to her goodness of heart, and, by a confession of dependency, flattered her _amour propre_. As for Robert, from Birmingham he had gone on to London, where he still sojourned.
So long as the breath of Asiatic deserts parched Caroline's lips and fevered her veins, her physical convalescence could not keep pace with her returning mental tranquillity; but there came a day when the wind ceased to sob at the eastern gable of the rectory, and at the oriel window of the church. A little cloud like a man's hand arose in the west; gusts from the same quarter drove it on and spread it wide; wet and tempest prevailed a while. When that was over the sun broke out genially, heaven regained its azure, and earth its green; the livid cholera-tint had vanished from the face of nature; the hills rose clear round the horizon, absolved from that pale malaria-haze.
Caroline's youth could now be of some avail to her, and so could her mother's nurture. Both, crowned by God's blessing, sent in the pure west wind blowing soft as fresh through the ever-open chamber lattice, rekindled her long-languishing energies. At last Mrs. Pryor saw that it was permitted to hope: a genuine, material convalescence had commenced. It was not merely Caroline's smile which was brighter, or her spirits which were cheered, but a certain look had passed from her face and eye--a look dread and indescribable, but which will easily be recalled by those who have watched the couch of dangerous disease. Long before the emaciated outlines of her aspect began to fill, or its departed colour to return, a more subtle change took place; all grew softer and warmer. Instead of a marble mask and glassy eye, Mrs. Pryor saw laid on the pillow a face pale and wasted enough, perhaps more haggard than the other appearance, but less awful; for it was a sick, living girl, not a mere white mould or rigid piece of statuary.
Now, too, she was not always petitioning to drink. The words, "I am _so_ thirsty," ceased to be her plaint. Sometimes, when she had swallowed a morsel, she would say it had revived her. All descriptions of food were no longer equally distasteful; she could be induced, sometimes, to indicate a preference. With what trembling pleasure and anxious care did not her nurse prepare what was selected! How she watched her as she partook of it!
Nourishment brought strength. She could sit up. Then she longed to breathe the fresh air, to revisit her flowers, to see how the fruit had ripened. Her uncle, always liberal, had bought a garden-chair for her express use. He carried her down in his own arms, and placed her in it himself, and William Farren was there to wheel her round the walks, to show her what he had done amongst her plants, to take her directions for further work.
William and she found plenty to talk about. They had a dozen topics in common--interesting to them, unimportant to the rest of the world. They took a similar interest in animals, birds, insects, and plants; they held similar doctrines about humanity to the lower creation, and had a similar turn for minute observation on points of natural history. The nest and proceedings of some ground-bees, which had burrowed in the turf under an old cherry-tree, was one subject of interest; the haunts of certain hedge-sparrows, and the welfare of certain pearly eggs and callow fledglings, another.
Had _Chambers's Journal_ existed in those days, it would certainly have formed Miss Helstone's and Farren's favourite periodical. She would have subscribed for it, and to him each number would duly have been lent; both would have put implicit faith and found great savour in its marvellous anecdotes of animal sagacity.
This is a digression, but it suffices to explain why Caroline would have no other hand than William's to guide her chair, and why his society and conversation sufficed to give interest to her garden-airings.
Mrs. Pryor, walking near, wondered how her daughter could be so much at ease with a "man of the people." _She_ found it impossible to speak to him otherwise than stiffly. She felt as if a great gulf lay between her caste and his, and that to cross it or meet him half-way would be to degrade herself. She gently asked Caroline, "Are you not afraid, my dear, to converse with that person so unreservedly? He may presume, and become troublesomely garrulous."
"William presume, mamma? You don't know him. He never presumes. He is altogether too proud and sensitive to do so. William has very fine feelings."
And Mrs. Pryor smiled sceptically at the nave notion of that rough-handed, rough-headed, fustian-clad clown having "fine feelings."
Farren, for his part, showed Mrs. Pryor only a very sulky brow. He knew when he was misjudged, and was apt to turn unmanageable with such as failed to give him his due.
The evening restored Caroline entirely to her mother, and Mrs. Pryor liked the evening; for then, alone with her daughter, no human shadow came between her and what she loved. During the day she would have her stiff demeanour and cool moments, as was her wont. Between her and Mr. Helstone a very respectful but most rigidly ceremonious intercourse was kept up. Anything like familiarity would have bred contempt at once in one or both these personages; but by dint of strict civility and well-maintained distance they got on very smoothly.
Towards the servants Mrs. Pryor's bearing was not uncourteous, but shy, freezing, ungenial. Perhaps it was diffidence rather than pride which made her appear so haughty; but, as was to be expected, Fanny and Eliza failed to make the distinction, and she was unpopular with them accordingly. She felt the effect produced; it rendered her at times dissatisfied with herself for faults she could not help, and with all else dejected, chill, and taciturn.
This mood changed to Caroline's influence, and to that influence alone. The dependent fondness of her nursling, the natural affection of her child, came over her suavely. Her frost fell away, her rigidity unbent; she grew smiling and pliant. Not that Caroline made any wordy profession of love--that would ill have suited Mrs. Pryor; she would have read therein the proof of insincerity--but she hung on her with easy dependence; she confided in her with fearless reliance. These things contented the mother's heart.
She liked to hear her daughter say, "Mamma, do this;" "Please, mamma, fetch me that;" "Mamma, read to me;" "Sing a little, mamma."
Nobody else--not one living thing--had ever so claimed her services, so looked for help at her hand. Other people were always more or less reserved and stiff with her, as she was reserved and stiff with them; other people betrayed consciousness of and annoyance at her weak points. Caroline no more showed such wounding sagacity or reproachful sensitiveness now than she had done when a suckling of three months old.
Yet Caroline could find fault. Blind to the constitutional defects that were incurable, she had her eyes wide open to the acquired habits that were susceptible of remedy. On certain points she would quite artlessly lecture her parent; and that parent, instead of being hurt, felt a sensation of pleasure in discovering that the girl _dared_ lecture her, that she was so much at home with her.
"Mamma, I am determined you shall not wear that old gown any more. Its fashion is not becoming; it is too strait in the skirt. You shall put on your black silk every afternoon. In that you look nice; it suits you. And you shall have a black satin dress for Sundays--a real satin, not a satinet or any of the shams. And, mamma, when you get the new one, mind you must wear it."
"My dear, I thought of the black silk serving me as a best dress for many years yet, and I wished to buy you several things."
"Nonsense, mamma. My uncle gives me cash to get what I want. You know he is generous enough; and I have set my heart on seeing you in a black satin. Get it soon, and let it be made by a dressmaker of my recommending. Let me choose the pattern. You always want to disguise yourself like a grandmother. You would persuade one that you are old and ugly. Not at all! On the contrary, when well dressed and cheerful you are very comely indeed; your smile is so pleasant, your teeth are so white, your hair is still such a pretty light colour. And then you speak like a young lady, with such a clear, fine tone, and you sing better than any young lady I ever heard. Why do you wear such dresses and bonnets, mamma, such as nobody else ever wears?"
"Does it annoy you, Caroline?"
"Very much; it vexes me even. People say you are miserly; and yet you are not, for you give liberally to the poor and to religious societies--though your gifts are conveyed so secretly and quietly that they are known to few except the receivers. But I will be your lady's-maid myself. When I get a little stronger I will set to work, and you must be good, mamma, and do as I bid you."
And Caroline, sitting near her mother, rearranged her muslin handkerchief and resmoothed her hair.
"My own mamma," then she went on, as if pleasing herself with the thought of their relationship, "who belongs to me, and to whom I belong! I am a rich girl now. I have something I can love well, and not be afraid of loving. Mamma, who gave you this little brooch? Let me unpin it and look at it."
Mrs. Pryor, who usually shrank from meddling fingers and near approach, allowed the license complacently.
"Did papa give you this, mamma?"
"My sister gave it me--my only sister, Cary. Would that your Aunt Caroline had lived to see her niece!"
"Have you nothing of papa's--no trinket, no gift of his?"
"I have one thing."
"That you prize?"
"That I prize."
"Valuable and pretty?"
"Invaluable and sweet to me."
"Show it, mamma. Is it here or at Fieldhead?"
"It is talking to me now, leaning on me. Its arms are round me."
"Ah, mamma, you mean your teasing daughter, who will never let you alone; who, when you go into your room, cannot help running to seek for you; who follows you upstairs and down, like a dog."
"Whose features still give me such a strange thrill sometimes. I half fear your fair looks yet, child."
"You don't; you can't. Mamma, I am sorry papa was not good. I do so wish he had been. Wickedness spoils and poisons all pleasant things. It kills love. If you and I thought each other wicked, we could not love each other, could we?"
"And if we could not trust each other, Cary?"
"How miserable we should be! Mother, before I knew you I had an apprehension that you were not good--that I could not esteem you. That dread damped my wish to see you. And now my heart is elate because I find you perfect--almost; kind, clever, nice. Your sole fault is that you are old-fashioned, and of that I shall cure you. Mamma, put your work down; read to me. I like your southern accent; it is so pure, so soft. It has no rugged burr, no nasal twang, such as almost every one's voice here in the north has. My uncle and Mr. Hall say that you are a fine reader, mamma. Mr. Hall said he never heard any lady read with such propriety of expression or purity of accent."
"I wish I could reciprocate the compliment, Cary; but, really, the first time I heard your truly excellent friend read and preach I could not understand his broad northern tongue."
"Could you understand me, mamma? Did I seem to speak roughly?"
"No. I almost wished you had, as I wished you had looked unpolished. Your father, Caroline, naturally spoke well, quite otherwise than your worthy uncle--correctly, gently, smoothly. You inherit the gift."
"Poor papa! When he was so agreeable, why was he not good?"
"Why he was _as_ he was--and happily of that you, child, can form no conception--I cannot tell. It is a deep mystery. The key is in the hands of his Maker. There I leave it."
"Mamma, you will keep stitching, stitching away. Put down the sewing; I am an enemy to it. It cumbers your lap, and I want it for my head; it engages your eyes, and I want them for a book. Here is your favourite--Cowper."
These importunities were the mother's pleasure. If ever she delayed compliance, it was only to hear them repeated, and to enjoy her child's soft, half-playful, half-petulant urgency. And then, when she yielded, Caroline would say archly, "You will spoil me, mamma. I always thought I should like to be spoiled, and I find it very sweet." So did Mrs. Pryor.

Not always do those who dare such divine conflict prevail. Night after night the supplicant may cry in agonised, soundless voice: "Spare my beloved. Heal my life's life. God of heaven, be merciful!" And after this cry and strife the sun may rise and see him worsted. At morn the dear, pale lips may murmur of a night of yet worse suffering.
Then the watcher approaches the patient's pillow, and sees a new and strange moulding of the familiar features, feels that the unbearable moment draws nigh, that it is God's will his idol shall be broken. He bends his head, and subdues his soul to the sentence he cannot avert and scarce can bear.
Happy Mrs. Pryor! She was still praying when her child softly woke in her arms. There was no piteous moaning, no deaf apathy. Caroline's first words showed no fever or delirium.
"Mamma, I have slept so well. I only dreamed and woke twice."
Mrs. Pryor rose with a start, joyful tears called into her eyes by that affectionate word "mamma."
For many days the mother dared rejoice only with trembling. That first revival seemed like the flicker of a dying lamp. If the flame streamed up bright one moment, the next it sank dim. Exhaustion followed close on excitement.
Caroline made a touching endeavour to appear better, but too often failed. The effort to eat, to talk, to look cheerful, was unsuccessful. Many an hour passed when Mrs. Pryor feared that she would never grow stronger.
During this time the mother and daughter seemed left almost alone in the neighbourhood. It was the close of August; the weather was very dry and dusty, very cloudless, too, though a pale haze seemed to rob the heaven of blue, and the earth of freshness. Almost every family in Briarfield was away. Miss Keeldar and her friends were at the seaside; so were the Yorkes. Mr. Hall and Louis Moore, between whom a friendship had arisen, had gone to walk in the Lakes. Even Hortense, who would fain have stayed at home, had been so earnestly entreated by Miss Mann to accompany her again to Wormwood Wells that she felt obliged to comply. As for Robert, from Birmingham he had gone to London, where he still stayed.
However, there came a day when the dry east wind dropped. A cloud arose in the west, and spread wide: rain and tempest followed. When that was over the sun broke out, heaven regained its azure, and earth its green; the hills rose clear, freed from that pale sickly haze.
Her mother's care and the pure, fresh wind, blowing soft through the window, rekindled Caroline's energies. At last Mrs. Pryor began to hope. It was not merely Caroline's smile which was brighter, but a certain look had passed from her face - a dread, glassy look, familiar to those who have watched by sickbeds. Mrs. Pryor saw laid on the pillow a face pale and wasted, but not white and rigid.
Now, too, Caroline was not always saying she was thirsty; food was not so distasteful to her. With what anxious care her nurse prepared what she preferred! How she watched her as she ate!
Nourishment brought strength. Caroline could sit up. Then she longed to breathe the fresh air, to revisit her flowers, to see how the fruit had ripened. Her uncle had bought a garden-chair for her use. He carried her down in his arms, and placed her in it, and William Farren wheeled her round the walks, to show her what he had done amongst her plants.
William and she found plenty to talk about. They had a common interest in animals, birds and plants; they held similar views about humane treatment of the lower creation, and had a similar turn for observing natural history. The nest of some ground-bees, which had burrowed in the turf under a cherry-tree, was one subject of interest; the haunts of hedge-sparrows, and the welfare of certain fledglings, was another.
Mrs. Pryor wondered how her daughter could be so at ease with a workman. She found it impossible to speak to him otherwise than stiffly. She felt as if a great gulf lay between her caste and his, and that to cross it or meet him half-way would be to degrade herself. She gently asked Caroline, "Are you not afraid, my dear, to converse with that person so unreservedly? He may presume, and become troublesomely garrulous."
"You don't know William, mamma. He never presumes. He is too proud and sensitive to do so. William has very fine feelings."
Mrs. Pryor smiled sceptically at the nave notion of that rough-handed clown having "fine feelings." Farren, for his part, was sulky towards Mrs. Pryor. He knew when he was misjudged.
Mrs. Pryor liked the evening; for then she was alone with her daughter. During the day she would have her cool moments, as was her wont. Relations between her and Mr. Helstone were very respectful but rigidly ceremonious. By dint of strict civility and well-maintained distance they got on smoothly.
Towards the servants Mrs. Pryor was shy; but her diffidence made her appear haughty to Fanny and Eliza, and she was unpopular with them. She knew it, and felt dissatisfied with herself.
This dejected mood changed under Caroline's influence. The affection of her child thawed her frost; she grew smiling and pliant. Caroline hung on her with easy dependence; she confided in her, and contented the mother's heart.
She liked to hear her daughter say, "Mamma, do this;" "Please, mamma, fetch me that;" "Mamma, read to me;" "Sing a little, mamma." Nobody else had ever so looked for help at her hand. Other people were always reserved with her, as she was reserved and stiff with them. Caroline showed no such reproachful sensitivity.
Yet Caroline could find fault. She had her eyes wide open to habits that could be remedied. On certain points she would artlessly lecture her parent; and that parent, instead of being hurt, felt pleasure in discovering that the girl was so much at home with her.
"Mamma, I am determined you shall not wear that old gown any more. Its fashion is not becoming. You shall put on your black silk every afternoon. In that you look nice; it suits you. And you shall have a black satin dress for Sundays. My uncle gives me cash to get what I want. You know he is generous; and I have set my heart on seeing you in black satin. Let me choose the pattern. You always want to disguise yourself like a grandmother. You would persuade one that you are old and ugly. Not at all! On the contrary, when well dressed and cheerful you are very comely indeed. And then you speak like a young lady, with such a clear, fine tone, and you sing better than any young lady I ever heard. Why do you wear such dresses and bonnets, mamma, such as nobody else ever wears?"
"Does it annoy you, Caroline?"
"Very much. People say you are miserly; and you are not, for you give liberally to the poor, though in secret. But I will be your lady's-maid myself. When I get a little stronger I will set to work, and you must be good, mamma, and do as I bid you. My own mamma," she went on, "who belongs to me, and to whom I belong! I am a rich girl now. I have something I can love, and not be afraid of loving. Mamma, who gave you this little brooch? Was it papa?"
"My only sister gave it me, Cary. Would that your Aunt Caroline had lived to see her niece!"
"Have you nothing of papa's - no gift of his?"
"I have one thing that I prize, invaluable and sweet to me."
"Show it, mamma. Is it here or at Fieldhead?"
"It is talking to me now. Its arms are round me."
"Ah, mamma, you mean your teasing daughter, who never lets you alone; who follows you upstairs and down, like a dog."
"Whose features still give me such a strange thrill sometimes. I half fear your fair looks yet, child."
"I am sorry papa was not good. I do so wish he had been. Wickedness kills love. If you and I thought each other wicked, how miserable we should be! Mother, before I knew you, I had a fear that you were not good. And now I am delighted to find you perfect - almost; kind, clever, nice. Your sole fault is that you are old-fashioned, and of that I shall cure you. Mamma, put your work down; read to me. I like your southern accent; it is so pure. When you first met me, mamma, did I seem to speak roughly?"
"No. I almost wished you had. Your father spoke well, and you inherit the gift."
"Poor papa! When he was so agreeable, why was he not good?"
"Why he was as he was, I cannot tell. It is a deep mystery. The key is in the hands of his Maker. There I leave it."
"Mamma, put down your sewing; here is a book - your favourite - Cowper."
These commands were the mother's pleasure. If ever she delayed compliance, it was only to hear them repeated, and to enjoy her child's soft, half-playful urgency. And then, when she yielded, Caroline would say archly, "You will spoil me, mamma. I always thought I should like to be spoiled, and I find it very sweet." So did Mrs. Pryor.


MR. YORKE (_continued_)
A Yorkshire gentleman he was, _par excellence_, in every point; about fifty-five years old, but looking at first sight still older, for his hair was silver white. His forehead was broad, not high; his face fresh and hale; the harshness of the north was seen in his features, as it was heard in his voice; every trait was thoroughly English--not a Norman line anywhere; it was an inelegant, unclassic, unaristocratic mould of visage. Fine people would perhaps have called it vulgar; sensible people would have termed it characteristic; shrewd people would have delighted in it for the pith, sagacity, intelligence, the rude yet real originality marked in every lineament, latent in every furrow. But it was an indocile, a scornful, and a sarcastic face--the face of a man difficult to lead, and impossible to drive. His stature was rather tall, and he was well made and wiry, and had a stately integrity of port; there was not a suspicion of the clown about him anywhere.
I did not find it easy to sketch Mr. Yorke's person, but it is more difficult to indicate his mind. If you expect to be treated to a Perfection, reader, or even to a benevolent, philanthropic old gentleman in him, you are mistaken. He has spoken with some sense and with some good feeling to Mr. Moore, but you are not thence to conclude that he always spoke and thought justly and kindly.
Mr. Yorke, in the first place, was without the organ of veneration--a great want, and which throws a man wrong on every point where veneration is required. Secondly, he was without the organ of comparison--a deficiency which strips a man of sympathy; and thirdly, he had too little of the organs of benevolence and ideality, which took the glory and softness from his nature, and for him diminished those divine qualities throughout the universe.
The want of veneration made him intolerant to those above him--kings and nobles and priests, dynasties and parliaments and establishments, with all their doings, most of their enactments, their forms, their rights, their claims, were to him an abomination, all rubbish; he found no use or pleasure in them, and believed it would be clear gain, and no damage to the world, if its high places were razed, and their occupants crushed in the fall. The want of veneration, too, made him dead at heart to the electric delight of admiring what is admirable; it dried up a thousand pure sources of enjoyment; it withered a thousand vivid pleasures. He was not irreligious, though a member of no sect; but his religion could not be that of one who knows how to venerate. He believed in God and heaven; but his God and heaven were those of a man in whom awe, imagination, and tenderness lack.
The weakness of his powers of comparison made him inconsistent; while he professed some excellent general doctrines of mutual toleration and forbearance, he cherished towards certain classes a bigoted antipathy. He spoke of "parsons" and all who belonged to parsons, of "lords" and the appendages of lords, with a harshness, sometimes an insolence, as unjust as it was insufferable. He could not place himself in the position of those he vituperated; he could not compare their errors with their temptations, their defects with their disadvantages; he could not realize the effect of such and such circumstances on himself similarly situated, and he would often express the most ferocious and tyrannical wishes regarding those who had acted, as he thought, ferociously and tyrannically. To judge by his threats, he would have employed arbitrary, even cruel, means to advance the cause of freedom and equality. Equality! yes, Mr. Yorke talked about equality, but at heart he was a proud man--very friendly to his workpeople, very good to all who were beneath him, and submitted quietly to be beneath him, but haughty as Beelzebub to whomsoever the world deemed (for he deemed no man) his superior. Revolt was in his blood: he could not bear control; his father, his grandfather before him, could not bear it, and his children after him never could.
The want of general benevolence made him very impatient of imbecility, and of all faults which grated on his strong, shrewd nature; it left no check to his cutting sarcasm. As he was not merciful, he would sometimes wound and wound again, without noticing how much he hurt, or caring how deep he thrust.
As to the paucity of ideality in his mind, that can scarcely be called a fault: a fine ear for music, a correct eye for colour and form, left him the quality of taste; and who cares for imagination? Who does not think it a rather dangerous, senseless attribute, akin to weakness, perhaps partaking of frenzy--a disease rather than a gift of the mind?
Probably all think it so but those who possess, or fancy they possess, it. To hear them speak, you would believe that their hearts would be cold if that elixir did not flow about them, that their eyes would be dim if that flame did not refine their vision, that they would be lonely if this strange companion abandoned them. You would suppose that it imparted some glad hope to spring, some fine charm to summer, some tranquil joy to autumn, some consolation to winter, which you do not feel. An illusion, of course; but the fanatics cling to their dream, and would not give it for gold.
As Mr. Yorke did not possess poetic imagination himself, he considered it a most superfluous quality in others. Painters and musicians he could tolerate, and even encourage, because he could relish the results of their art; he could see the charm of a fine picture, and feel the pleasure of good music; but a quiet poet--whatever force struggled, whatever fire glowed, in his breast--if he could not have played the man in the counting-house, of the tradesman in the Piece Hall, might have lived despised, and died scorned, under the eyes of Hiram Yorke.
And as there are many Hiram Yorkes in the world, it is well that the true poet, quiet externally though he may be, has often a truculent spirit under his placidity, and is full of shrewdness in his meekness, and can measure the whole stature of those who look down on him, and correctly ascertain the weight and value of the pursuits they disdain him for not having followed. It is happy that he can have his own bliss, his own society with his great friend and goddess Nature, quite independent of those who find little pleasure in him, and in whom he finds no pleasure at all. It is just that while the world and circumstances often turn a dark, cold side to him--and properly, too, because he first turns a dark, cold, careless side to them--he should be able to maintain a festal brightness and cherishing glow in his bosom, which makes all bright and genial for him; while strangers, perhaps, deem his existence a Polar winter never gladdened by a sun. The true poet is not one whit to be pitied, and he is apt to laugh in his sleeve when any misguided sympathizer whines over his wrongs. Even when utilitarians sit in judgment on him, and pronounce him and his art useless, he hears the sentence with such a hard derision, such a broad, deep, comprehensive, and merciless contempt of the unhappy Pharisees who pronounce it, that he is rather to be chidden than condoled with. These, however, are not Mr. Yorke's reflections, and it is with Mr. Yorke we have at present to do.
I have told you some of his faults, reader: as to his good points, he was one of the most honourable and capable men in Yorkshire; even those who disliked him were forced to respect him. He was much beloved by the poor, because he was thoroughly kind and very fatherly to them. To his workmen he was considerate and cordial. When he dismissed them from an occupation, he would try to set them on to something else, or, if that was impossible, help them to remove with their families to a district where work might possibly be had. It must also be remarked that if, as sometimes chanced, any individual amongst his "hands" showed signs of insubordination, Yorke--who, like many who abhor being controlled, knew how to control with vigour--had the secret of crushing rebellion in the germ, of eradicating it like a bad weed, so that it never spread or developed within the sphere of his authority. Such being the happy state of his own affairs, he felt himself at liberty to speak with the utmost severity of those who were differently situated, to ascribe whatever was unpleasant in their position entirely to their own fault, to sever himself from the masters, and advocate freely the cause of the operatives.
Mr. Yorke's family was the first and oldest in the district; and he, though not the wealthiest, was one of the most influential men. His education had been good. In his youth, before the French Revolution, he had travelled on the Continent. He was an adept in the French and Italian languages. During a two years' sojourn in Italy he had collected many good paintings and tasteful rarities, with which his residence was now adorned. His manners, when he liked, were those of a finished gentleman of the old school; his conversation, when he was disposed to please, was singularly interesting and original; and if he usually expressed himself in the Yorkshire dialect, it was because he chose to do so, preferring his native Doric to a more refined vocabulary, "A Yorkshire burr," he affirmed, "was as much better than a cockney's lisp as a bull's bellow than a raton's squeak."
Mr. Yorke knew every one, and was known by every one, for miles round; yet his intimate acquaintances were very few. Himself thoroughly original, he had no taste for what was ordinary: a racy, rough character, high or low, ever found acceptance with him; a refined, insipid personage, however exalted in station, was his aversion. He would spend an hour any time in talking freely with a shrewd workman of his own, or with some queer, sagacious old woman amongst his cottagers, when he would have grudged a moment to a commonplace fine gentleman or to the most fashionable and elegant, if frivolous, lady. His preferences on these points he carried to an extreme, forgetting that there may be amiable and even admirable characters amongst those who cannot be original. Yet he made exceptions to his own rule. There was a certain order of mind, plain, ingenuous, neglecting refinement, almost devoid of intellectuality, and quite incapable of appreciating what was intellectual in him, but which, at the same time, never felt disgust at his rudeness, was not easily wounded by his sarcasm, did not closely analyze his sayings, doings, or opinions, with which he was peculiarly at ease, and, consequently, which he peculiarly preferred. He was lord amongst such characters. They, while submitting implicitly to his influence, never acknowledged, because they never reflected on, his superiority; they were quite tractable, therefore, without running the smallest danger of being servile; and their unthinking, easy, artless insensibility was as acceptable, because as convenient, to Mr. Yorke as that of the chair he sat on, or of the floor he trod.
It will have been observed that he was not quite uncordial with Mr. Moore. He had two or three reasons for entertaining a faint partiality to that gentleman. It may sound odd, but the first of these was that Moore spoke English with a foreign, and French with a perfectly pure, accent; and that his dark, thin face, with its fine though rather wasted lines, had a most anti-British and anti-Yorkshire look. These points seem frivolous, unlikely to influence a character like Yorke's; but the fact is they recalled old, perhaps pleasurable, associations--they brought back his travelling, his youthful days. He had seen, amidst Italian cities and scenes, faces like Moore's; he had heard, in Parisian cafs and theatres, voices like his. He was young then, and when he looked at and listened to the alien, he seemed young again.
Secondly, he had known Moore's father, and had had dealings with him. That was a more substantial, though by no means a more agreeable tie; for as his firm had been connected with Moore's in business, it had also, in some measure, been implicated in its losses.
Thirdly, he had found Robert himself a sharp man of business. He saw reason to anticipate that he would, in the end, by one means or another, make money; and he respected both his resolution and acuteness--perhaps, also, his hardness. A fourth circumstance which drew them together was that of Mr. Yorke being one of the guardians of the minor on whose estate Hollow's Mill was situated; consequently Moore, in the course of his alterations and improvements, had frequent occasion to consult him.
As to the other guest now present in Mr. Yorke's parlour, Mr. Helstone, between him and his host there existed a double antipathy--the antipathy of nature and that of circumstances. The free-thinker hated the formalist; the lover of liberty detested the disciplinarian. Besides, it was said that in former years they had been rival suitors of the same lady.
Mr. Yorke, as a general rule, was, when young, noted for his preference of sprightly and dashing women: a showy shape and air, a lively wit, a ready tongue, chiefly seemed to attract him. He never, however, proposed to any of these brilliant belles whose society he sought; and all at once he seriously fell in love with and eagerly wooed a girl who presented a complete contrast to those he had hitherto noticed--a girl with the face of a Madonna; a girl of living marble--stillness personified. No matter that, when he spoke to her, she only answered him in monosyllables; no matter that his sighs seemed unheard, that his glances were unreturned, that she never responded to his opinions, rarely smiled at his jests, paid him no respect and no attention; no matter that she seemed the opposite of everything feminine he had ever in his whole life been known to admire. For him Mary Cave was perfect, because somehow, for some reason--no doubt he had a reason--he loved her.
Mr. Helstone, at that time curate of Briarfield, loved Mary too--or, at any rate, he fancied her. Several others admired her, for she was beautiful as a monumental angel; but the clergyman was preferred for his office's sake--that office probably investing him with some of the illusion necessary to allure to the commission of matrimony, and which Miss Cave did not find in any of the young wool-staplers, her other adorers. Mr. Helstone neither had, nor professed to have, Mr. Yorke's absorbing passion for her. He had none of the humble reverence which seemed to subdue most of her suitors; he saw her more as she really was than the rest did. He was, consequently, more master of her and himself. She accepted him at the first offer, and they were married.
Nature never intended Mr. Helstone to make a very good husband, especially to a quiet wife. He thought so long as a woman was silent nothing ailed her, and she wanted nothing. If she did not complain of solitude, solitude, however continued, could not be irksome to her. If she did not talk and put herself forward, express a partiality for this, an aversion to that, she had no partialities or aversions, and it was useless to consult her tastes. He made no pretence of comprehending women, or comparing them with men. They were a different, probably a very inferior, order of existence. A wife could not be her husband's companion, much less his confidante, much less his stay. _His_ wife, after a year or two, was of no great importance to him in any shape; and when she one day, as he thought, suddenly--for he had scarcely noticed her decline--but, as others thought, gradually, took her leave of him and of life, and there was only a still, beautiful-featured mould of clay left, cold and white, in the conjugal couch, he felt his bereavement--who shall say how little? Yet, perhaps, more than he seemed to feel it; for he was not a man from whom grief easily wrung tears.
His dry-eyed and sober mourning scandalized an old housekeeper, and likewise a female attendant, who had waited upon Mrs. Helstone in her sickness, and who, perhaps, had had opportunities of learning more of the deceased lady's nature, of her capacity for feeling and loving, than her husband knew. They gossiped together over the corpse, related anecdotes, with embellishments of her lingering decline, and its real or supposed cause. In short, they worked each other up to some indignation against the austere little man, who sat examining papers in an adjoining room, unconscious of what opprobrium he was the object.
Mrs. Helstone was hardly under the sod when rumours began to be rife in the neighbourhood that she had died of a broken heart. These magnified quickly into reports of hard usage, and, finally, details of harsh treatment on the part of her husband--reports grossly untrue, but not the less eagerly received on that account. Mr. Yorke heard them, partly believed them. Already, of course, he had no friendly feeling to his successful rival. Though himself a married man now, and united to a woman who seemed a complete contrast to Mary Cave in all respects, he could not forget the great disappointment of his life; and when he heard that what would have been so precious to him had been neglected, perhaps abused, by another, he conceived for that other a rooted and bitter animosity.
Of the nature and strength of this animosity Mr. Helstone was but half aware. He neither knew how much Yorke had loved Mary Cave, what he had felt on losing her, nor was he conscious of the calumnies concerning his treatment of her, familiar to every ear in the neighbourhood but his own. He believed political and religious differences alone separated him and Mr. Yorke. Had he known how the case really stood, he would hardly have been induced by any persuasion to cross his former rival's threshold.
* * * * *
Mr. Yorke did not resume his lecture of Robert Moore. The conversation ere long recommenced in a more general form, though still in a somewhat disputative tone. The unquiet state of the country, the various depredations lately committed on mill-property in the district, supplied abundant matter for disagreement, especially as each of the three gentlemen present differed more or less in his views on these subjects. Mr. Helstone thought the masters aggrieved, the workpeople unreasonable; he condemned sweepingly the widespread spirit of disaffection against constituted authorities, the growing indisposition to bear with patience evils he regarded as inevitable. The cures he prescribed were vigorous government interference, strict magisterial vigilance; when necessary, prompt military coercion.
Mr. Yorke wished to know whether this interference, vigilance, and coercion would feed those who were hungry, give work to those who wanted work, and whom no man would hire. He scouted the idea of inevitable evils. He said public patience was a camel, on whose back the last atom that could be borne had already been laid, and that resistance was now a duty; the widespread spirit of disaffection against constituted authorities he regarded as the most promising sign of the times; the masters, he allowed, were truly aggrieved, but their main grievances had been heaped on them by a "corrupt, base, and bloody" government (these were Mr. Yorke's epithets). Madmen like Pitt, demons like Castlereagh, mischievous idiots like Perceval, were the tyrants, the curses of the country, the destroyers of her trade. It was their infatuated perseverance in an unjustifiable, a hopeless, a ruinous war, which had brought the nation to its present pass. It was their monstrously oppressive taxation, it was the infamous "Orders in Council"--the originators of which deserved impeachment and the scaffold, if ever public men did--that hung a millstone about England's neck.
"But where was the use of talking?" he demanded. "What chance was there of reason being heard in a land that was king-ridden, priest-ridden, peer-ridden; where a lunatic was the nominal monarch, an unprincipled debauchee the real ruler; where such an insult to common sense as hereditary legislators was tolerated; where such a humbug as a bench of bishops, such an arrogant abuse as a pampered, persecuting established church was endured and venerated; where a standing army was maintained, and a host of lazy parsons and their pauper families were kept on the fat of the land?"
Mr. Helstone, rising up and putting on his shovel-hat, observed in reply, "that in the course of his life he had met with two or three instances where sentiments of this sort had been very bravely maintained so long as health, strength, and worldly prosperity had been the allies of him who professed them; but there came a time," he said, "to all men, 'when the keepers of the house should tremble; when they should be afraid of that which is high, and fear should be in the way;' and that time was the test of the advocate of anarchy and rebellion, the enemy of religion and order. Ere now," he affirmed, "he had been called upon to read those prayers our church has provided for the sick by the miserable dying-bed of one of her most rancorous foes; he had seen such a one stricken with remorse, solicitous to discover a place for repentance, and unable to find any, though he sought it carefully with tears. He must forewarn Mr. Yorke that blasphemy against God and the king was a deadly sin, and that there was such a thing as 'judgment to come.'"
Mr. Yorke "believed fully that there was such a thing as judgment to come. If it were otherwise, it would be difficult to imagine how all the scoundrels who seemed triumphant in this world, who broke innocent hearts with impunity, abused unmerited privileges, were a scandal to honourable callings, took the bread out of the mouths of the poor, browbeat the humble, and truckled meanly to the rich and proud, were to be properly paid off in such coin as they had earned. But," he added, "whenever he got low-spirited about such-like goings-on, and their seeming success in this mucky lump of a planet, he just reached down t' owd book" (pointing to a great Bible in the bookcase), "opened it like at a chance, and he was sure to light of a verse blazing wi' a blue brimstone low that set all straight. He knew," he said, "where some folk war bound for, just as weel as if an angel wi' great white wings had come in ower t' door-stone and told him."
"Sir," said Mr. Helstone, collecting all his dignity--"sir, the great knowledge of man is to know himself, and the bourne whither his own steps tend."
"Ay, ay. You'll recollect, Mr. Helstone, that Ignorance was carried away from the very gates of heaven, borne through the air, and thrust in at a door in the side of the hill which led down to hell."
"Nor have I forgotten, Mr. Yorke, that Vain-Confidence, not seeing the way before him, fell into a deep pit, which was on purpose there made by the prince of the grounds, to catch vainglorious fools withal, and was dashed to pieces with his fall."
"Now," interposed Mr. Moore, who had hitherto sat a silent but amused spectator of this worldly combat, and whose indifference to the party politics of the day, as well as to the gossip of the neighbourhood, made him an impartial, if apathetic, judge of the merits of such an encounter, "you have both sufficiently blackballed each other, and proved how cordially you detest each other, and how wicked you think each other. For my part, my hate is still running in such a strong current against the fellows who have broken my frames that I have none to spare for my private acquaintance, and still less for such a vague thing as a sect or a government. But really, gentlemen, you both seem very bad by your own showing--worse than ever I suspected you to be.--I dare not stay all night with a rebel and blasphemer like you, Yorke; and I hardly dare ride home with a cruel and tyrannical ecclesiastic like Mr. Helstone."
"I am going, however, Mr. Moore," said the rector sternly. "Come with me or not, as you please."
"Nay, he shall not have the choice; he _shall_ go with you," responded Yorke. "It's midnight, and past; and I'll have nob'dy staying up i' my house any longer. Ye mun all go."
He rang the bell.
"Deb," said he to the servant who answered it, "clear them folk out o' t' kitchen, and lock t' doors, and be off to bed.--Here is your way, gentlemen," he continued to his guests; and, lighting them through the passage, he fairly put them out at his front door.
They met their party hurrying out pell-mell by the back way. Their horses stood at the gate; they mounted, and rode off, Moore laughing at their abrupt dismissal, Helstone deeply indignant thereat.

A Yorkshire gentleman he was in every point; about fifty-five years old, but looking older, for his hair was silver white. His forehead was broad; his face fresh and hale; the harshness of the north was seen in his features, and heard in his voice; every trait was thoroughly English - an inelegant, unaristocratic face. It held pith, intelligence and originality in every furrow; but it was scornful and sarcastic - the face of a man difficult to lead, and impossible to drive.
If you expect Mr. Yorke to be a benevolent, philanthropic old gentleman, reader, you are mistaken. He has spoken with some sense and good feeling to Mr. Moore, but you are not therefore to conclude that he always spoke and thought justly and kindly.
Mr. Yorke lacked the ability to venerate; and he lacked the ability to compare - and hence to feel sympathy. He had too little benevolence and softness in his nature, and he did not value those divine qualities.
He was intolerant to those above him. Kings and priests, dynasties and parliaments, were to him an abomination. He found no use or pleasure in them. His lack of veneration, too, dried up a thousand pure sources of enjoyment. He was not irreligious - he believed in God and heaven; but his God and heaven were those of a man without awe, imagination, or tenderness.
While he claimed to be tolerant, he was bigoted. He spoke of "parsons" and "lords" with unjust harshness and insolence. He could not place himself in the position of those he reviled; he could not allow for their temptations or disadvantages; he could not imagine how he would behave in a similar situation, and he would often express the most ferocious wishes regarding those who he thought had acted ferociously. Mr. Yorke talked about equality, but at heart he was a proud man - very friendly to his workpeople, good to those beneath him, but haughty as Beelzebub to anyone the world judged his superior. Revolt was in his blood: he could not bear control; his father and grandfather before him could not bear it, nor his children after him.
His lack of benevolence made him very impatient of others' faults; it left no check to his cutting sarcasm. He would sometimes wound and wound again, without noticing how much he hurt, or caring how deep he thrust.
He had no imagination; but his fine ear for music, and correct eye for colour and form, left him the quality of taste; and who cares for imagination? Who does not think it a rather dangerous, senseless attribute - a disease of the mind rather than a gift?
Probably all think it so but those who possess imagination, or fancy they possess it. To hear them speak, you would believe that their hearts would be cold and their eyes dim without that flame, that they would be lonely if this strange companion abandoned them. You would suppose that it gave some glad hope to spring, some fine charm to summer, some tranquil joy to autumn, some consolation to winter, which you do not feel. An illusion, of course; but the fanatics cling to their dream.
As Mr. Yorke did not possess poetic imagination himself, he considered it superfluous in others. Painters and musicians he could tolerate, because he could see the charm of a fine picture, and feel the pleasure of good music; but he would have despised a poet.
I have told you some of his faults, reader: yet he was one of the most honourable and capable men in Yorkshire. He was much beloved by the poor, because he was kind and fatherly to them. To his workmen he was considerate and cordial. When he dismissed them from an occupation, he would try to find them other work, or help them to move to a district where work might be found. It must also be remarked that if any of his workmen showed signs of insubordination, Yorke knew how to crush rebellion at the outset, so that it never spread. He spoke severely of those who did not do the same, saying that any difficulties they had were entirely their own fault, and sometimes taking the workmen's side.
Mr. Yorke's family was the oldest and most respected in the district; and he was one of the most influential men. His education had been good. In his youth, he had travelled on the Continent, and spoke French and Italian; he had collected many good paintings and tasteful rarities. His manners, when he liked, were those of an old-fashioned gentleman; his conversation, when he wished to please, was singularly interesting; and if he usually expressed himself in the Yorkshire dialect, it was because he chose to do so.
Mr. Yorke knew every one for miles round; yet his close friends were very few. He preferred racy, original characters to refined, insipid ones, no matter how exalted they might be. He would spend an hour talking with a shrewd workman, or with some wise old woman amongst his cottagers, yet would not spend a moment on a commonplace fine gentleman or fashionable lady. He forgot that there may be amiable and admirable characters amongst those who cannot be original.
He was cordial with Mr. Moore for several reasons. Firstly, Moore spoke French with a pure accent; and his un-British looks had pleasant associations for Mr. Yorke - they brought back his youthful travelling days in Italy and Paris.
Secondly, he had known Moore's father, and had had business dealings with him. That tie was more substantial, though by no means more agreeable; for his firm had also been implicated in Moore's losses.
Thirdly, he had found Robert himself a sharp man of business. He respected his resolution and acuteness - perhaps also his hardness. A fourth circumstance which drew them together was that Mr. Yorke was one of the guardians of the landowner, not yet twenty-one, on whose estate Hollow's Mill was situated; so Moore frequently had to consult him.
As to Mr. Helstone - between him and Mr. Yorke there was antipathy. Their natures were opposite, and it was said that they had once been rival suitors of the same lady.
Mr. Yorke, when young, preferred sprightly and dashing women. A showy air, a lively wit, a ready tongue attracted him. He never, however, proposed to any of these brilliant belles; instead he fell seriously in love with a girl who presented a complete contrast to them - a girl with the face of a Madonna; a girl of living marble - stillness personified. No matter that she never responded to his opinions, rarely smiled at his jests, and paid him no attention. No matter that she seemed the opposite of every woman he had previously admired. For him Mary Cave was perfect.
Mr. Helstone, at that time curate of Briarfield, loved Mary too - or at any rate, he fancied her. He did not pretend to have Mr. Yorke's absorbing passion for her, nor the humble reverence of her other suitors. He saw her as she really was. He was, consequently, more master of her and himself. She accepted him at the first offer, and they were married.
Nature never intended Mr. Helstone to make a very good husband, especially to a quiet wife. He thought so long as a woman was silent, nothing could be wrong. If she did not express likes and dislikes, then she had none. He made no pretence of comprehending women. They were a different, probably a very inferior, order of existence to men. A wife could not be her husband's companion, much less his confidante. His wife, after a year or two, was of no great importance to him; and when she one day, as he thought, suddenly - for he had scarcely noticed her decline - took her leave of him and of life, he felt his bereavement - who shall say how little? Yet, perhaps, more than he seemed to feel it; for he was not a man from whom grief easily wrung tears.
His dry-eyed mourning scandalized the old housekeeper and Mrs. Helstone's nurse, who, perhaps, knew more of the deceased lady's capacity for feeling and loving than her husband did. They gossiped together over the corpse, and worked each other up to some indignation against the austere little man who sat in the next room going through papers.
Mrs. Helstone was hardly buried when rumours began to be rife in the neighbourhood that she had died of a broken heart. These magnified quickly into reports of harsh treatment by her husband - reports grossly untrue, but eagerly heard despite that. Mr. Yorke heard them, and partly believed them. Though himself a married man now, united to a woman who seemed a complete contrast to Mary Cave, still he could not forget his great disappointment; and when he heard that Mary had been neglected, perhaps abused, he felt a bitter hatred for Mr. Helstone.
Mr. Helstone was only half aware of this. He neither knew how much Yorke had loved Mary Cave, nor what was rumoured about his own treatment of her. He believed political and religious differences alone separated him and Mr. Yorke. Had he known how the case really stood, he would not have crossed his former rival's threshold.
Mr. Yorke did not resume his lecture of Robert Moore. Instead they began to talk about the unquiet state of the country, and the recent attacks on mills, although each of the three gentlemen had different views on these subjects. Mr. Helstone thought the workpeople were unreasonable and impatient; he thought the government should interfere, and even use military force.
Mr. Yorke wished to know whether this interference would feed the hungry, and give work to those who needed work. He said the public had borne enough, and resistance was now a duty. The mill masters, he believed, had been let down by a "corrupt, base, and bloody" government (these were his words). It was their perseverance in a hopeless, ruinous war which had brought the nation to its knees. It was their monstrously oppressive taxation and the infamous "Orders in Council" that hung a millstone about England's neck.
"But where was the use of talking?" he demanded. "What chance was there of reason being heard in a land whose king was a lunatic, and whose regent was a debauchee? Where such humbugs as the peerage and a bench of bishops were venerated; and a host of lazy parsons and their families were kept on the fat of the land?"
Mr. Helstone, rising up and putting on his shovel-hat, replied "that he had met with two or three men who held these opinions so long as they were healthy and wealthy; but there came a time," he said, "to all men when they should tremble, and their views be tested. He had been called to the miserable death-bed of one of the church's most rancorous foes; he had seen him stricken with remorse, and desperate to repent. He must warn Mr. Yorke that blasphemy against God and the king was a deadly sin, and that there was such a thing as 'judgment to come.'"
Mr. Yorke "believed fully in the judgment to come. Otherwise, it would be difficult to imagine how the scoundrels who broke innocent hearts, took the bread out of the mouths of the poor, browbeat the humble, and truckled meanly to the rich, were to be properly paid off. But," he added, "he knew that some folk were bound for Hell, just as well as if an angel had told him."
"Sir," said Mr. Helstone with dignity, "Man must know himself, and the place whither his own steps tend."
"Now," interposed Mr. Moore, who had sat silent till now, "you have both proved how cordially you detest each other. For my part, I still hate the fellows who have broken my frames, and have no hate to spare for my acquaintances, and still less for such a vague thing as a government. But really, gentlemen, you both seem very bad. I dare not stay with a rebel and blasphemer like you, Yorke; and I hardly dare ride home with a tyrannical churchman like Mr. Helstone."
"I am going, however, Mr. Moore," said the rector sternly. "Come with me or not, as you please."
"Nay, he shall go with you," responded Yorke. "It's past midnight, and ye must all go." Leading his guests through the passage, he fairly pushed them out of his front door.
They met their companions hurrying out by the back way. Their horses stood at the gate; they mounted and rode off, Moore laughing, and Helstone deeply indignant.


It was necessary to the arrangement of Martin's plan that he should stay at home that day. Accordingly, he found no appetite for breakfast, and just about school-time took a severe pain about his heart, which rendered it advisable that, instead of setting out to the grammar school with Mark, he should succeed to his father's arm-chair by the fireside, and also to his morning paper. This point being satisfactorily settled, and Mark being gone to Mr. Summer's class, and Matthew and Mr. Yorke withdrawn to the counting-house, three other exploits--nay, four--remained to be achieved.
The first of these was to realize the breakfast he had not yet tasted, and with which his appetite of fifteen could ill afford to dispense; the second, third, fourth, to get his mother, Miss Moore, and Mrs. Horsfall successfully out of the way before four o'clock that afternoon.
The first was, for the present, the most pressing, since the work before him demanded an amount of energy which the present empty condition of his youthful stomach did not seem likely to supply.
Martin knew the way to the larder, and knowing this way he took it. The servants were in the kitchen, breakfasting solemnly with closed doors; his mother and Miss Moore were airing themselves on the lawn, and discussing the closed doors aforesaid. Martin, safe in the larder, made fastidious selection from its stores. His breakfast had been delayed; he was determined it should be _recherch_. It appeared to him that a variety on his usual somewhat insipid fare of bread and milk was both desirable and advisable; the savoury and the salutary he thought might be combined. There was store of rosy apples laid in straw upon a shelf; he picked out three. There was pastry upon a dish; he selected an apricot puff and a damson tart. On the plain household bread his eye did not dwell; but he surveyed with favour some currant tea-cakes, and condescended to make choice of one. Thanks to his clasp-knife, he was able to appropriate a wing of fowl and a slice of ham; a cantlet of cold custard-pudding he thought would harmonize with these articles; and having made this final addition to his booty, he at length sallied forth into the hall.
He was already half-way across--three steps more would have anchored him in the harbour of the back parlour--when the front door opened, and there stood Matthew. Better far had it been the Old Gentleman, in full equipage of horns, hoofs, and tail.
Matthew, sceptic and scoffer, had already failed to subscribe a prompt belief in that pain about the heart. He had muttered some words, amongst which the phrase "shamming Abraham" had been very distinctly audible, and the succession to the armchair and newspaper had appeared to affect him with mental spasms. The spectacle now before him--the apples, the tarts, the tea-cakes, the fowl, ham, and pudding--offered evidence but too well calculated to inflate his opinion of his own sagacity.
Martin paused _interdit_ one minute, one instant; the next he knew his ground, and pronounced all well. With the true perspicacity _des mes lites_, he at once saw how this at first sight untoward event might be turned to excellent account. He saw how it might be so handled as to secure the accomplishment of his second task--namely, the disposal of his mother. He knew that a collision between him and Matthew always suggested to Mrs. Yorke the propriety of a fit of hysterics. He further knew that, on the principle of calm succeeding to storm, after a morning of hysterics his mother was sure to indulge in an afternoon of bed. This would accommodate him perfectly.
The collision duly took place in the hall. A dry laugh, an insulting sneer, a contemptuous taunt, met by a nonchalant but most cutting reply, were the signals. They rushed at it. Martin, who usually made little noise on these occasions, made a great deal now. In flew the servants, Mrs. Yorke, Miss Moore. No female hand could separate them. Mr. Yorke was summoned.
"Sons," said he, "one of you must leave my roof if this occurs again. I will have no Cain and Abel strife here."
Martin now allowed himself to be taken off. He had been hurt; he was the youngest and slightest. He was quite cool, in no passion; he even smiled, content that the most difficult part of the labour he had set himself was over.
Once he seemed to flag in the course of the morning.
"It is not worth while to bother myself for that Caroline," he remarked. But a quarter of an hour afterwards he was again in the dining-room, looking at the head with dishevelled tresses, and eyes turbid with despair.
"Yes," he said, "I made her sob, shudder, almost faint. I'll see her smile before I've done with her; besides, I want to outwit all these womenites."
Directly after dinner Mrs. Yorke fulfilled her son's calculation by withdrawing to her chamber. Now for Hortense.
That lady was just comfortably settled to stocking-mending in the back parlour, when Martin--laying down a book which, stretched on the sofa (he was still indisposed, according to his own account), he had been perusing in all the voluptuous ease of a yet callow pacha--lazily introduced some discourse about Sarah, the maid at the Hollow. In the course of much verbal meandering he insinuated information that this damsel was said to have three suitors--Frederic Murgatroyd, Jeremiah Pighills, and John-of-Mally's-of-Hannah's-of-Deb's; and that Miss Mann had affirmed she knew for a fact that, now the girl was left in sole charge of the cottage, she often had her swains to meals, and entertained them with the best the house afforded.
It needed no more. Hortense could not have lived another hour without betaking herself to the scene of these nefarious transactions, and inspecting the state of matters in person. Mrs. Horsfall remained.
Martin, master of the field now, extracted from his mother's work-basket a bunch of keys; with these he opened the sideboard cupboard, produced thence a black bottle and a small glass, placed them on the table, nimbly mounted the stairs, made for Mr. Moore's door, tapped; the nurse opened.
"If you please, ma'am, you are invited to step into the back parlour and take some refreshment. You will not be disturbed; the family are out."
He watched her down; he watched her in; himself shut the door. He knew she was safe.
The hard work was done; now for the pleasure. He snatched his cap, and away for the wood.
It was yet but half-past three. It had been a fine morning, but the sky looked dark now. It was beginning to snow; the wind blew cold; the wood looked dismal, the old tree grim. Yet Martin approved the shadow on his path. He found a charm in the spectral aspect of the doddered oak.
He had to wait. To and fro he walked, while the flakes fell faster; and the wind, which at first had but moaned, pitifully howled.
"She is long in coming," he muttered, as he glanced along the narrow track. "I wonder," he subjoined, "what I wish to see her so much for? She is not coming for me. But I have power over her, and I want her to come that I may use that power."
He continued his walk.
"Now," he resumed, when a further period had elapsed, "if she fails to come, I shall hate and scorn her."
It struck four. He heard the church clock far away. A step so quick, so light, that, but for the rustling of leaves, it would scarcely have sounded on the wood-walk, checked his impatience. The wind blew fiercely now, and the thickening white storm waxed bewildering; but on she came, and not dismayed.
"Well, Martin," she said eagerly, "how is he?"
"It is queer how she thinks of _him_," reflected Martin. "The blinding snow and bitter cold are nothing to her, I believe; yet she is but a 'chitty-faced creature,' as my mother would say. I could find in my heart to wish I had a cloak to wrap her in."
Thus meditating to himself, he neglected to answer Miss Helstone.
"You have seen him?"
"No."
"Oh! you promised you would."
"I mean to do better by you than that. Didn't I say _I_ don't care to see him?"
"But now it will be so long before I get to know any thing certain about him, and I am sick of waiting. Martin, _do_ see him, and give him Caroline Helstone's regards, and say she wished to know how he was, and if anything could be done for his comfort."
"I won't."
"You are changed. You were so friendly last night."
"Come, we must not stand in this wood; it is too cold."
"But before I go promise me to come again to-morrow with news."
"No such thing. I am much too delicate to make and keep such appointments in the winter season. If you knew what a pain I had in my chest this morning, and how I went without breakfast, and was knocked down besides, you'd feel the impropriety of bringing me here in the snow. Come, I say."
"Are you really delicate, Martin?"
"Don't I look so?"
"You have rosy cheeks."
"That's hectic. Will you come--or you won't?"
"Where?"
"With me. I was a fool not to bring a cloak. I would have made you cosy."
"You are going home; my nearest road lies in the opposite direction."
"Put your arm through mine; I'll take care of you."
"But the wall--the hedge--it is such hard work climbing, and you are too slender and young to help me without hurting yourself."
"You shall go through the gate."
"But----"
"But, but--will you trust me or not?"
She looked into his face.
"I think I will. Anything rather than return as anxious as I came."
"I can't answer for that. This, however, I promise you: be ruled by me, and you shall see Moore yourself."
"See him myself?"
"Yourself."
"But, dear Martin, does he know?"
"Ah! I'm dear now. No, he doesn't know."
"And your mother and the others?"
"All is right."
Caroline fell into a long, silent fit of musing, but still she walked on with her guide. They came in sight of Briarmains.
"Have you made up your mind?" he asked.
She was silent.
"Decide; we are just on the spot. I _won't_ see him--that I tell you--except to announce your arrival."
"Martin, you are a strange boy, and this is a strange step; but all I feel _is_ and _has_ been, for a long time, strange. I will see him."
"Having said that, you will neither hesitate nor retract?"
"No."
"Here we are, then. Do not be afraid of passing the parlour window; no one will see you. My father and Matthew are at the mill, Mark is at school, the servants are in the back kitchen, Miss Moore is at the cottage, my mother in her bed, and Mrs. Horsfall in paradise. Observe--I need not ring. I open the door; the hall is empty, the staircase quiet; so is the gallery. The whole house and all its inhabitants are under a spell, which I will not break till you are gone."
"Martin, I trust you."
"You never said a better word. Let me take your shawl. I will shake off the snow and dry it for you. You are cold and wet. Never mind; there is a fire upstairs. Are you ready?"
"Yes."
"Follow me."
He left his shoes on the mat, mounted the stair unshod. Caroline stole after, with noiseless step. There was a gallery, and there was a passage; at the end of that passage Martin paused before a door and tapped. He had to tap twice--thrice. A voice, known to one listener, at last said, "Come in."
The boy entered briskly.
"Mr. Moore, a lady called to inquire after you. None of the women were about. It is washing-day, and the maids are over the crown of the head in soap-suds in the back kitchen, so I asked her to step up."
"Up here, sir?"
"Up here, sir; but if you object, she shall go down again."
"Is this a place or am I a person to bring a lady to, you absurd lad?"
"No; so I'll take her off."
"Martin, you will stay here. Who is she?"
"Your grandmother from that chteau on the Scheldt Miss Moore talks about."
"Martin," said the softest whisper at the door, "don't be foolish."
"Is she there?" inquired Moore hastily. He had caught an imperfect sound.
"She is there, fit to faint. She is standing on the mat, shocked at your want of filial affection."
"Martin, you are an evil cross between an imp and a page. What is she like?"
"More like me than you; for she is young and beautiful."
"You are to show her forward. Do you hear?"
"Come, Miss Caroline."
"Miss Caroline!" repeated Moore.
And when Miss Caroline entered she was encountered in the middle of the chamber by a tall, thin, wasted figure, who took both her hands.
"I give you a quarter of an hour," said Martin, as he withdrew, "no more. Say what you have to say in that time. Till it is past I will wait in the gallery; nothing shall approach; I'll see you safe away. Should you persist in staying longer, I leave you to your fate."
He shut the door. In the gallery he was as elate as a king. He had never been engaged in an adventure he liked so well, for no adventure had ever invested him with so much importance or inspired him with so much interest.
"You are come at last," said the meagre man, gazing on his visitress with hollow eyes.
"Did you expect me before?"
"For a month, near two months, we have been very near; and I have been in sad pain, and danger, and misery, Cary."
"I could not come."
"Couldn't you? But the rectory and Briarmains are very near--not two miles apart."
There was pain and there was pleasure in the girl's face as she listened to these implied reproaches. It was sweet, it was bitter to defend herself.
"When I say I could not come, I mean I could not see you; for I came with mamma the very day we heard what had happened. Mr. MacTurk then told us it was impossible to admit any stranger."
"But afterwards--every fine afternoon these many weeks past I have waited and listened. Something here, Cary"--laying his hand on his breast--"told me it was impossible but that you should think of me. Not that I merit thought; but we are old acquaintance--we are cousins."
"I came again, Robert; mamma and I came again."
"Did you? Come, that is worth hearing. Since you came again, we will sit down and talk about it."
They sat down. Caroline drew her chair up to his. The air was now dark with snow; an Iceland blast was driving it wildly. This pair neither heard the long "wuthering" rush, nor saw the white burden it drifted. Each seemed conscious but of one thing--the presence of the other.
"So mamma and you came again?"
"And Mrs. Yorke did treat us strangely. We asked to see you. 'No,' said she, 'not in my house. I am at present responsible for his life; it shall not be forfeited for half an hour's idle gossip.' But I must not tell you all she said; it was very disagreeable. However, we came yet again--mamma, Miss Keeldar, and I. This time we thought we should conquer, as we were three against one, and Shirley was on our side. But Mrs. Yorke opened such a battery."
Moore smiled. "What did she say?"
"Things that astonished us. Shirley laughed at last; I cried; mamma was seriously annoyed. We were all three driven from the field. Since that time I have only walked once a day past the house, just for the satisfaction of looking up at your window, which I could distinguish by the drawn curtains. I really dared not come in."
"I _have_ wished for you, Caroline."
"I did not know that; I never dreamt one instant that you thought of me. If I had but most distantly imagined such a possibility----"
"Mrs. Yorke would still have beaten you."
"She would not. Stratagem should have been tried, if persuasion failed. I would have come to the kitchen door; the servants should have let me in, and I would have walked straight upstairs. In fact, it was far more the fear of intrusion--the fear of yourself--that baffled me than the fear of Mrs. Yorke."
"Only last night I despaired of ever seeing you again. Weakness has wrought terrible depression in me--terrible depression."
"And you sit alone?"
"Worse than alone."
"But you must be getting better, since you can leave your bed?"
"I doubt whether I shall live. I see nothing for it, after such exhaustion, but decline."
"You--you shall go home to the Hollow."
"Dreariness would accompany, nothing cheerful come near me."
"I _will_ alter this. This _shall_ be altered, were there ten Mrs. Yorkes to do battle with."
"Cary, you make me smile."
"Do smile; smile again. Shall I tell you what I should like?"
"Tell me anything--only keep talking. I am Saul; but for music I should perish."
"I should like you to be brought to the rectory, and given to me and mamma."
"A precious gift! I have not laughed since they shot me till now."
"Do you suffer pain, Robert?"
"Not so much pain now; but I am hopelessly weak, and the state of my mind is inexpressible--dark, barren, impotent. Do you not read it all in my face? I look a mere ghost."
"Altered; yet I should have known you anywhere. But I understand your feelings; I experienced something like it. Since we met, I too have been very ill."
"_Very_ ill?"
"I thought I should die. The tale of my life seemed told. Every night, just at midnight, I used to wake from awful dreams; and the book lay open before me at the last page, where was written 'Finis.' I had strange feelings."
"You speak my experience."
"I believed I should never see you again; and I grew so thin--as thin as you are now. I could do nothing for myself--neither rise nor lie down; and I could not eat. Yet you see I am better."
"Comforter--sad as sweet. I am too feeble to say what I feel; but while you speak I _do_ feel."
"Here I am at your side, where I thought never more to be. Here I speak to you. I see you listen to me willingly--look at me kindly. Did I count on that? I despaired."
Moore sighed--a sigh so deep it was nearly a groan. He covered his eyes with his hand.
"May I be spared to make some atonement."
Such was his prayer.
"And for what?"
"We will not touch on it now, Cary; unmanned as I am, I have not the power to cope with such a topic. Was Mrs. Pryor with you during your illness?"
"Yes"--Caroline smiled brightly--"you know she is mamma?"
"I have heard--Hortense told me; but that tale too I will receive from yourself. Does she add to your happiness?"
"What! mamma? She is _dear_ to me; _how_ dear I cannot say. I was altogether weary, and she held me up."
"I deserve to hear that in a moment when I can scarce lift my hand to my head. I deserve it."
"It is no reproach against you."
"It is a coal of fire heaped on my head; and so is every word you address to me, and every look that lights your sweet face. Come still nearer, Lina; and give me your hand--if my thin fingers do not scare you."
She took those thin fingers between her two little hands; she bent her head _et les effleura de ses lvres_. (I put that in French because the word _effleurer_ is an exquisite word.) Moore was much moved. A large tear or two coursed down his hollow cheek.
"I'll keep these things in my heart, Cary; that kiss I will put by, and you shall hear of it again one day."
"Come out!" cried Martin, opening the door--"come away; you have had twenty minutes instead of a quarter of an hour."
"She will not stir yet, you hempseed."
"I dare not stay longer, Robert."
"Can you promise to return?"
"No, she can't," responded Martin. "The thing mustn't become customary. I can't be troubled. It's very well for once; I'll not have it repeated."
"_You_'ll not have it repeated."
"Hush! don't vex him; we could not have met to-day but for him. But I will come again, if it is your wish that I should come."
"It _is_ my wish--my _one_ wish--almost the only wish I can feel."
"Come this minute. My mother has coughed, got up, set her feet on the floor. Let her only catch you on the stairs, Miss Caroline. You're not to bid him good-bye"--stepping between her and Moore--"you are to march."
"My shawl, Martin."
"I have it. I'll put it on for you when you are in the hall."
He made them part. He would suffer no farewell but what could be expressed in looks. He half carried Caroline down the stairs. In the hall he wrapped her shawl round her, and, but that his mother's tread then creaked in the gallery, and but that a sentiment of diffidence--the proper, natural, therefore the noble impulse of his boy's heart--held him back, he would have claimed his reward; he would have said, "Now, Miss Caroline, for all this give me one kiss." But ere the words had passed his lips she was across the snowy road, rather skimming than wading the drifts.
"She is my debtor, and I _will_ be paid."
He flattered himself that it was opportunity, not audacity, which had failed him. He misjudged the quality of his own nature, and held it for something lower than it was.

It was necessary to Martin's plan that he should stay at home that day. Accordingly, he found no appetite for breakfast, and at school-time took a severe pain about his heart, which made it advisable that, instead of setting out to the grammar school with Mark, he should stay in his father's arm-chair by the fireside. With Mark gone to school, and Matthew and Mr. Yorke withdrawn to the counting-house, four other things remained to be done.
The first of these was to obtain some breakfast, which he could not do without; the second, third and fourth were to get his mother, Miss Hortense, and Mrs. Horsfall successfully out of the way before four o'clock that afternoon.
Martin set off to the larder. The servants were in the kitchen, breakfasting behind closed doors; his mother and Miss Moore were airing themselves on the lawn, and discussing the servants. Martin made a fastidious selection of food. There were apples laid upon a shelf; he picked out three. There was pastry on a dish; he selected an apricot puff and a damson tart. On the plain household bread his eye did not dwell; but he surveyed with favour some currant tea-cakes, and chose one. With his clasp-knife, he cut a wing of fowl and a slice of ham; he thought a cold custard-pudding would go with these; and with his booty, he sallied forth into the hall.
He was half-way across when the front door opened, and there stood Matthew. Better far had it been the Devil, horns, hoofs, and all.
Matthew, sceptic and scoffer, had already expressed disbelief in Martin's pain about the heart, and had muttered something about "shamming." The sight now before him - the apples, the tarts, the tea-cakes, and the rest - gave him proof of his own sagacity.
Martin paused one instant; then he saw how this untoward event might be turned to excellent account. It might be handled so as to accomplish his second task - the disposal of his mother. He knew that a collision between him and Matthew always gave Mrs. Yorke a fit of hysterics; after which his mother was sure to indulge in an afternoon in bed. This would suit him perfectly.
The collision duly took place in the hall. A dry laugh, an insulting sneer, met by a cutting reply, were the signals. They rushed at it. Martin made a great deal of noise. In flew the servants, Mrs. Yorke, and Miss Moore; Mr. Yorke was summoned.
"Sons," said he, "one of you must leave my roof if this occurs again."
Martin now allowed himself to be taken off. He had been hurt; he was the younger and slighter; but he was quite cool. He even smiled.
Once during that morning, he seemed to flag. "It is not worth while to bother myself for that Caroline," he remarked. But a quarter of an hour afterwards he was again in the dining-room, looking at the portrait of despair.
"Yes," he said, "I made her sob and shudder. I'll see her smile before I've done with her; besides, I want to outwit all these womenites."
After dinner Mrs. Yorke duly withdrew to her chamber. Now for Hortense.
That lady was just comfortably settled to stocking-mending in the back parlour, when Martin, stretched on the sofa, lazily began to chat about Sarah, the maid at the Hollow. In the course of much verbal meandering he hinted that this damsel was said to have three suitors; and that Miss Mann had said she knew for a fact that now the girl was left in sole charge of the cottage, she often had them to meals, and fed them with the best food in the house.
It needed no more. Hortense could not have lived another hour without going to the Hollow and inspecting the state of matters in person. Only Mrs. Horsfall remained.
Martin, master of the field now, extracted from his mother's work-basket a bunch of keys; with these he opened the sideboard cupboard, produced a black bottle and a small glass, placed them on the table, nimbly mounted the stairs and tapped on Mr. Moore's door. The nurse opened it.
"If you please, ma'am, you are invited to step into the back parlour and take some refreshment. You will not be disturbed; the family are out."
He watched her down; he shut the door. He knew she was safe.
The hard work was done; now for the pleasure. He snatched his cap, and set off for the wood.
It was half-past three. It had been a fine morning, but the sky looked dark now. It was beginning to snow; the wind blew cold; the wood looked dismal, the old tree grim. Martin had to wait, walking to and fro, while the flakes fell faster, and the wind howled pitifully.
"She is long in coming," he muttered. "I wonder why I wish so much to see her? She is not coming for me. But I have power over her, and I want to use that power."
He continued his walk.
"Now," he resumed after a while, "if she fails to come, I shall hate and scorn her."
The church clock struck four. He heard a step so quick, so light, that it scarcely sounded on the wood-walk. The wind blew fiercely now, and the snow-storm increased; but on she came.
"Well, Martin," she said eagerly, "how is he?"
"It is queer how much she thinks of him," reflected Martin. "The blinding snow and bitter cold are nothing to her, I believe; I almost wish I had a cloak to wrap her in."
"You have seen him?" she asked.
"No."
"Oh! you promised you would. Now it will be so long before I know anything certain about him, and I am sick of waiting. Martin, do see him, and give him Caroline Helstone's regards, and say she wished to know how he was, and if anything could be done for his comfort."
"I won't."
"You are changed. You were so friendly last night."
"Come, we must not stand in this wood; it is too cold. I am delicate: if you knew what a pain I had in my chest this morning, and how I went without breakfast, you wouldn't bring me here in the snow. Come, I say."
"Are you really delicate, Martin? You have rosy cheeks."
"That's hectic. Will you come, or not?"
"Where?"
"Home with me. I was a fool not to bring a cloak. Put your arm through mine; I'll take care of you. Will you trust me?"
She looked into his face. "I think I will. Anything rather than return as anxious as I came."
"I can't answer for that. However, I promise you shall see Moore yourself."
"Dear Martin, does he know?"
"Ah! I'm dear now. No, he doesn't know."
"And your mother and the others?"
"All is right."
Caroline mused silently, but she walked on with her guide to Briarmains.
"Will you see him? I won't, except to announce your arrival."
"Martin, you are a strange boy, and this is a strange step; but all is strange now. I will see him."
"Here we are, then. Don't worry; my father and Matthew are at the mill, Mark is at school, the servants are in the back kitchen, Miss Moore is at the cottage, my mother in her bed, and Mrs. Horsfall in paradise. Observe - the hall is empty, the staircase quiet. The whole house and all its inhabitants are under a spell, which I will not break till you are gone."
"Martin, I trust you."
"You never said a better word. Let me take your shawl. I will dry it for you. You are cold and wet. Never mind; there is a fire upstairs. Follow me."
He left his shoes on the mat, and mounted the stair unshod. Caroline stole after, with noiseless step. At the end of a passage Martin paused before a door and tapped twice - thrice. At last a voice said, "Come in."
He entered briskly.
"Mr. Moore, a lady called to inquire after you. None of the women were about. It is washing-day, and the maids are up to their ears in soap-suds, so I brought her up here."
"Is this a place to bring a lady to, you absurd lad?"
"No; so I'll take her off."
"Martin, stay here. Who is she?"
"Your grandmother."
"Martin," said the softest whisper at the door, "don't be foolish."
"Is she there?" inquired Moore hastily.
"She is there, fit to faint. She is standing on the mat."
"Martin, you are an imp. Show her in."
"Come, Miss Caroline."
"Miss Caroline!" repeated Moore.
And when Miss Caroline entered she was met by a standing, thin, wasted figure, who took both her hands.
"I give you a quarter of an hour," said Martin, as he withdrew. "I will wait in the gallery; nothing shall approach. But if you stay longer, I leave you to your fate."
He shut the door. In the gallery he was as elated as a king. No adventure had ever made him feel so important or so interested.
"You are come at last," said Moore, gazing on his visitress with hollow eyes.
"Did you expect me before?"
"For a month, near two months, I have been in sad pain, and danger, and misery, Cary."
"I could not come."
"Couldn't you? But the rectory and Briarmains are not two miles apart."
There was pain and there was pleasure in the girl's face as she defended herself.
"I came with mamma the very day we heard what had happened. Mr. MacTurk then told us it was impossible to admit any stranger."
"But afterwards - for many weeks past I have waited and listened. My heart told me you must think of me, Cary. Not that I deserve thought; but we are old friends - we are cousins."
"I came again, Robert; mamma and I came again. And Mrs. Yorke turned us away, saying, 'I am responsible for his life; it shall not be forfeited for half an hour's idle gossip.' But I must not tell you all she said; it was very disagreeable. However, we came yet again - mamma, Miss Keeldar, and I. This time we thought we should conquer, as we were three against one. But Mrs. Yorke opened such a battery."
Moore smiled. "What did she say?"
"Things that astonished us. Shirley laughed; I cried; mamma was seriously annoyed. We were all three driven away. Since then I have walked past the house every day, just for the satisfaction of looking up at your window."
"I have wished for you, Caroline."
"I did not know that; I never dreamt one instant that you thought of me. If I had imagined-"
"Mrs. Yorke would still have beaten you."
"She would not. I would have come to the kitchen door; the servants should have let me in, and I would have walked straight upstairs. In fact, it was far more the fear of intruding on you that baffled me than the fear of Mrs. Yorke."
"Only last night I despaired of ever seeing you again. Weakness has wrought terrible depression in me."
"And you sit alone?"
"Worse than alone."
"But you must be getting better, since you can leave your bed?"
"I doubt whether I shall live, after such exhaustion."
"You shall go home to the Hollow. I will alter this. This shall be altered, were there ten Mrs. Yorkes to do battle with."
"Cary, you make me smile."
"Do smile; smile again. Shall I tell you what I should like? I should like you to be brought to the rectory, and given to me and mamma."
"A precious gift! I have not laughed since they shot me till now."
"Do you suffer pain, Robert?"
"Not so much now; but I am hopelessly weak, and my mind is inexpressibly dark."
"I understand your feelings," she said; "I experienced something like it. Since we met, I too have been very ill."
"Very ill?"
"I thought I should die. The tale of my life seemed told. Every night, just at midnight, I used to wake from awful dreams; and I felt I was close to the end."
"You speak my experience," said Moore.
"I believed I should never see you again; and I grew so thin. I could do nothing, and I could not eat. Yet you see I am better."
"I am too feeble to say what I feel; but while you speak I do feel."
"Here I am at your side, where I thought never more to be. You look at me kindly. I despaired of that."
Moore sighed - a sigh so deep it was nearly a groan. "May I be spared to make atonement."
"For what?"
"We will not touch on it now, Cary. Was Mrs. Pryor with you during your illness?"
"Yes." Caroline smiled brightly. "You know she is my mamma?"
"I have heard - Hortense told me. Does she make you happy?"
"What! mamma? She is dear to me; how dear I cannot say. I was altogether weary, and she held me up."
"That is a coal of fire heaped on my head; and so is every word you address to me. Come nearer, Lina; give me your hand - if my thin fingers do not scare you."
She took those thin fingers; she bent her head and touched them to her lips. Moore was much moved. A tear coursed down his hollow cheek.
"I'll keep these things in my heart, Cary; that kiss I will put by, and you shall hear of it again one day."
"Come out!" cried Martin, opening the door - "come away; you have had twenty minutes."
"She will not stir yet, you hempseed."
"I dare not stay longer, Robert."
"Can you promise to return?"
"No, she can't," responded Martin. "The thing mustn't become customary; I'll not have it repeated."
"You'll not have it repeated?"
"Hush! don't vex him," urged Caroline; "we could not have met today but for him. But I will come again, if you wish."
"It is my one wish."
"Come away this minute. My mother has coughed, and got up. Let her only catch you on the stairs, Miss Caroline! You're not to bid him good-bye, you are to march."
Martin made them part. He half carried Caroline down the stairs, and wrapped her shawl round her, and if his mother's tread had not then creaked in the gallery, and diffidence held him back, he would have claimed his reward. He would have said, "Now, Miss Caroline, for all this give me one kiss." But she was already across the snowy road.
"She is my debtor, and I will be paid." He flattered himself that it was opportunity, not boldness, which had failed him. He misjudged the quality of his own nature, and held it for something lower than it was.