DOROTHY AT HOME.
Dorothy was received at home with so much affection and such
expressions of esteem as to afford her much consolation in her
misery. Both her mother and her sister approved of her conduct.
Mrs. Stanbury's approval was indeed accompanied by many expressions
of regret as to the good things lost. She was fully alive to the
fact that life in the Close at Exeter was better for her daughter
than life in their little cottage at Nuncombe Putney. The outward
appearance which Dorothy bore on her return home was proof of this.
Her clothes, the set of her hair, her very gestures and motions had
framed themselves on town ideas. The faded, wildered, washed-out
look, the uncertain, purposeless bearing which had come from her
secluded life and subjection to her sister had vanished from her.
She had lived among people, and had learned something of their gait
and carriage. Money we know will do almost everything, and no doubt
money had had much to do with this. It is very pretty to talk of the
alluring simplicity of a clean calico gown; but poverty will shew
itself to be meagre, dowdy, and draggled in a woman's dress, let
the woman be ever so simple, ever so neat, ever so independent, and
ever so high-hearted. Mrs. Stanbury was quite alive to all that her
younger daughter was losing. Had she not received two offers of
marriage while she was at Exeter? There was no possibility that
offers of marriage should be made in the cottage at Nuncombe Putney.
A man within the walls of the cottage would have been considered as
much out of place as a wild bull. It had been matter of deep regret
to Mrs. Stanbury that her daughter should not have found herself able
to marry Mr. Gibson. She knew that there was no matter for reproach
in this, but it was a misfortune,--a great misfortune. And in the
mother's breast there had been a sad, unrepressed feeling of regret
that young people should so often lose their chances in the world
through over-fancifulness, and ignorance as to their own good. Now
when she heard the story of Brooke Burgess, she could not but think
that had Dorothy remained at Exeter, enduring patiently such hard
words as her aunt might speak, the love affair might have been
brought at some future time to a happy conclusion. She did not say
all this; but there came on her a silent melancholy, made expressive
by constant little shakings of the head and a continued reproachful
sadness of demeanour, which was quite as intelligible to Priscilla
as would have been any spoken words. But Priscilla's approval of her
sister's conduct was clear, outspoken, and satisfactory. She had been
quite sure that her sister had been right about Mr. Gibson; and was
equally sure that she was now right about Brooke Burgess. Priscilla
had in her mind an idea that if B. B., as they called him, was half
as good as her sister represented him to be,--for indeed Dorothy
endowed him with every virtue consistent with humanity,--he would
not be deterred from his pursuit either by Dolly's letter or by Aunt
Stanbury's commands. But of this she thought it wise to say nothing.
She paid Dolly the warm and hitherto unaccustomed compliment of
equality, assuming to regard her sister's judgment and persistent
independence to be equally strong with her own; and, as she knew
well, she could not have gone further than this. "I never shall agree
with you about Aunt Stanbury," she said. "To me she seems to be so
imperious, so exacting, and also so unjust, as to be unbearable."
"But she is affectionate," said Dolly.
"So is the dog that bites you, and, for aught I know, the horse that
kicks you. But it is ill living with biting dogs and kicking horses.
But all that matters little as you are still your own mistress. How
strange these nine months have been, with you in Exeter, while we
have been at the Clock House. And here we are, together again in the
old way, just as though nothing had happened." But Dorothy knew well
that a great deal had happened, and that her life could never be as
it had been heretofore. The very tone in which her sister spoke to
her was proof of this. She had an infinitely greater possession in
herself than had belonged to her before her residence at Exeter; but
that possession was so heavily mortgaged and so burthened as to make
her believe that the change was to be regretted.
At the end of the first week there came a letter from Aunt Stanbury
to Dorothy. It began by saying that Dolly had left behind her certain
small properties which had now been made up in a parcel and sent by
the railway, carriage paid. "But they weren't mine at all," said
Dolly, alluding to certain books in which she had taken delight. "She
means to give them to you," said Priscilla, "and I think you must
take them." "And the shawl is no more mine than it is yours, though
I wore it two or three times in the winter." Priscilla was of opinion
that the shawl must be taken also. Then the letter spoke of the
writer's health, and at last fell into such a strain of confidential
gossip that Mrs. Stanbury, when she read it, could not understand
that there had been a quarrel. "Martha says that she saw Camilla
French in the street to-day, such a guy in her new finery as never
was seen before except on May-day." Then in the postscript Dorothy
was enjoined to answer this letter quickly. "None of your short
scraps, my dear," said Aunt Stanbury.
"She must mean you to go back to her," said Mrs. Stanbury.
"No doubt she does," said Priscilla; "but Dolly need not go because
my aunt means it. We are not her creatures."
But Dorothy answered her aunt's letter in the spirit in which it had
been written. She asked after her aunt's health, thanked her aunt for
the gift of the books,--in each of which her name had been clearly
written,--protested about the shawl, sent her love to Martha and her
kind regards to Jane, and expressed a hope that C. F. enjoyed her new
clothes. She described the cottage, and was funny about the cabbage
stumps in the garden, and at last succeeded in concocting a long
epistle. "I suppose there will be a regular correspondence," said
Priscilla.
Two days afterwards, however, the correspondence took altogether
another form. The cottage in which they now lived was supposed to be
beyond the beat of the wooden-legged postman, and therefore it was
necessary that they should call at the post-office for their letters.
On the morning in question Priscilla obtained a thick letter from
Exeter for her mother, and knew that it had come from her aunt.
Her aunt could hardly have found it necessary to correspond with
Dorothy's mother so soon after that letter to Dorothy had been
written had there not arisen some very peculiar cause. Priscilla,
after much meditation, thought it better that the letter should be
opened in Dorothy's absence, and in Dorothy's absence the following
letter was read both by Priscilla and her mother:--
The Close, March 19, 186--.
DEAR SISTER STANBURY,
After much consideration, I think it best to send under
cover to you the enclosed letter from Mr. Brooke Burgess,
intended for your daughter Dorothy. You will see that I
have opened it and read it,--as I was clearly entitled to
do, the letter having been addressed to my niece while she
was supposed to be under my care. I do not like to destroy
the letter, though, perhaps, that would be best; but I
would advise you to do so, if it be possible, without
shewing it to Dorothy. I have told Mr. Brooke Burgess what
I have done.
I have also told him that I cannot sanction a marriage
between him and your daughter. There are many reasons of
old date,--not to speak of present reasons also,--which
would make such a marriage highly inexpedient. Mr. Brooke
Burgess is, of course, his own master, but your daughter
understands completely how the matter stands.
Yours truly,
JEMIMA STANBURY.
"What a wicked old woman!" said Priscilla. Then there arose a
question whether they should read Brooke's letter, or whether they
should give it unread to Dorothy. Priscilla denounced her aunt in
the strongest language she could use for having broken the seal.
"'Clearly entitled,'--because Dorothy had been living with her!"
exclaimed Priscilla. "She can have no proper conception of honour
or of honesty. She had no more right to open Dorothy's letter than
she had to take her money." Mrs. Stanbury was very anxious to read
Brooke's letter, alleging that they would then be able to judge
whether it should be handed over to Dorothy. But Priscilla's sense of
right would not admit of this. Dorothy must receive the letter from
her lover with no further stain from unauthorised eyes than that to
which it had been already subjected. She was called in, therefore,
from the kitchen, and the whole packet was given to her. "Your aunt
has read the enclosure, Dolly; but we have not opened it."
Dorothy took the packet without a word and sat herself down. She
first read her aunt's letter very slowly. "I understand perfectly,"
she said, folding it up, almost listlessly, while Brooke's letter lay
still unopened on her lap. Then she took it up, and held it awhile in
both hands, while her mother and Priscilla watched her. "Priscilla,"
she said, "do you read it first."
Priscilla was immediately at her side, kissing her. "No, my darling;
no," she said; "it is for you to read it." Then Dorothy took the
precious contents from the envelope, and opened the folds of the
paper. When she had read a dozen words, her eyes were so suffused
with tears, that she could hardly make herself mistress of the
contents of the letter; but she knew that it contained renewed
assurances of her lover's love, and assurance on his part that he
would take no refusal from her based on any other ground than that of
her own indifference to him. He had written to Miss Stanbury to the
same effect; but he had not thought it necessary to explain this to
Dorothy; nor did Miss Stanbury in her letter tell them that she had
received any communication from him. "Shall I read it now?" said
Priscilla, as soon as Dorothy again allowed the letter to fall into
her lap.
Both Priscilla and Mrs. Stanbury read it, and for awhile they sat
with the two letters among them without much speech about them.
Mrs. Stanbury was endeavouring to make herself believe that her
sister-in-law's opposition might be overcome, and that then Dorothy
might be married. Priscilla was inquiring of herself whether it would
be well that Dorothy should defy her aunt,--so much, at any rate,
would be well,--and marry the man, even to his deprivation of the
old woman's fortune. Priscilla had her doubts about this, being very
strong in her ideas of self-denial. That her sister should put up
with the bitterest disappointment rather than injure the man she
loved was right;--but then it would also be so extremely right to
defy Aunt Stanbury to her teeth! But Dorothy, in whose character was
mixed with her mother's softness much of the old Stanbury strength,
had no doubt in her mind. It was very sweet to be so loved. What
gratitude did she not owe to a man who was so true to her! What was
she that she should stand in his way? To lay herself down that she
might be crushed in his path was no more than she owed to him. Mrs.
Stanbury was the first to speak.
"I suppose he is a very good young man," she said.
"I am sure he is;--a noble, true-hearted man," said Priscilla.
"And why shouldn't he marry whom he pleases, as long as she is
respectable?" said Mrs. Stanbury.
"In some people's eyes poverty is more disreputable than vice," said
Priscilla.
"Your aunt has been so fond of Dorothy," pleaded Mrs. Stanbury.
"Just as she is of her servants," said Priscilla.
But Dorothy said nothing. Her heart was too full to enable her to
defend her aunt; nor at the present moment was she strong enough to
make her mother understand that no hope was to be entertained. In the
course of the day she walked out with her sister on the road towards
Ridleigh, and there, standing among the rocks and ferns, looking down
upon the river, with the buzz of the little mill within her ears,
she explained the feelings of her heart and her many thoughts with a
flow of words stronger, as Priscilla thought, than she had ever used
before.
"It is not what he would suffer now, Pris, or what he would feel, but
what he would feel ten, twenty years hence, when he would know that
his children would have been all provided for, had he not lost his
fortune by marrying me."
"He must be the only judge whether he prefers you to the old woman's
money," said Priscilla.
"No, dear; not the only judge. And it isn't that, Pris,--not which
he likes best now, but which it is best for him that he should have.
What could I do for him?"
"You can love him."
"Yes;--I can do that." And Dorothy paused a moment, to think how
exceedingly well she could do that one thing. "But what is that? As
you said the other day, a dog can do that. I am not clever. I can't
play, or talk French, or do things that men like their wives to do.
And I have lived here all my life; and what am I, that for me he
should lose a great fortune?"
"That is his look out."
"No, dearest;--it is mine, and I will look out. I shall be able, at
any rate, to remember always that I have loved him, and have not
injured him. He may be angry with me now,"--and there was a feeling
of pride at her heart, as she thought that he would be angry with
her, because she did not go to him,--"but he will know at last that I
have been as good to him as I knew how to be."
Then Priscilla wound her arms round Dorothy, and kissed her.
"My sister," she said; "my own sister!" They walked on further,
discussing the matter in all its bearings, talking of the act of
self-denial which Dorothy was called on to perform, as though it were
some abstract thing, the performance of which was, or perhaps was
not, imperatively demanded by the laws which should govern humanity;
but with no idea on the mind of either of them that there was any
longer a doubt as to this special matter in hand. They were away
from home over three hours; and, when they returned, Dorothy at once
wrote her two letters. They were very simple, and very short. She
told Brooke, whom she now addressed as "Dear Mr. Burgess," that
it could not be as he would have it; and she told her aunt,--with
some terse independence of expression, which Miss Stanbury quite
understood,--that she had considered the matter, and had thought it
right to refuse Mr. Burgess's offer.
"Don't you think she is very much changed?" said Mrs. Stanbury to her
eldest daughter.
"Not changed in the least, mother; but the sun has opened the bud,
and now we see the fruit."