Helen was seized with profound and anxious sadness. Leonard had been
three or four times to see her, and each time she saw a change in
him that excited all her fears. He seemed, it is true, more shrewd,
more worldly-wise, more fitted, it might be, for coarse daily life;
but, on the other hand, the freshness and glory of his youth
were waning slowly. His aspirings drooped earthward. He had not
mastered the Practical, and moulded its uses with the strong hand
of the Spiritual Architect, of the Ideal Builder: the Practical was
overpowering himself. She grew pale when he talked of Burley, and
shuddered, poor little Helen! when she found he was daily and almost
nightly in a companionship which, with her native honest prudence,
she saw so unsuited to strengthen him in his struggles, and aid him
against temptation. She almost groaned when, pressing him as to his
pecuniary means, she found his old terror of debt seemed fading
away, and the solid healthful principles he had taken from his
village were loosening fast. Under all, it is true, there was what a
wiser and older person than Helen would have hailed as the redeeming
promise. But that something was _grief_--a sublime grief in his
own sense of falling--in his own impotence against the Fate he had
provoked and coveted. The sublimity of that grief Helen could not
detect: she saw only that it _was_ grief, and she grieved with it,
letting it excuse every fault--making her more anxious to comfort,
in order that she might save. Even from the first, when Leonard had
exclaimed, "Ah, Helen, why did you ever leave me?" she had revolved
the idea of return to him; and when in the boy's last visit he told
her that Burley, persecuted by duns, was about to fly from his
present lodgings, and take his abode with Leonard in the room she
had left vacant, all doubt was over. She resolved to sacrifice the
safety and shelter of the home assured her. She resolved to come
back and share Leonard's penury and struggles, and save the old
room, wherein she had prayed for him, from the tempter's dangerous
presence. Should she burden him? No; she had assisted her father by
many little female arts in needle and fancy work. She had improved
herself in these during her sojourn with Miss Starke. She could
bring her share to the common stock. Possessed with this idea, she
determined to realise it before the day on which Leonard had told
her Burley was to move his quarters. Accordingly she rose very
early one morning; she wrote a pretty and grateful note to Miss
Starke, who was fast asleep, left it on the table, and, before
any one was astir, stole from the house, her little bundle on her
arm. She lingered an instant at the garden-gate, with a remorseful
sentiment--a feeling that she had ill-repaid the cold and prim
protection that Miss Starke had shown her. But sisterly love carried
all before it. She closed the gate with a sigh, and went on.
She arrived at the lodging-house before Leonard was up, took
possession of her old chamber, and, presenting herself to Leonard as
he was about to go forth, said, (story-teller that she was,)--"I am
sent away, brother, and I have, come to you to take care of me. Do
not let us part again. But you must be very cheerful and very happy,
or I shall think that I am sadly in your way."
Leonard at first did look cheerful, and even happy; but then he
thought of Burley, and then of his own means of supporting her, and
was embarrassed, and began questioning Helen as to the possibility
of reconciliation with Miss Starke. And Helen said gravely,
"Impossible--do not ask it, and do not go near her."
Then Leonard thought she had been humbled and insulted, and
remembered that she was a gentleman's child, and felt for her
wounded pride--he was so proud himself. Yet still he was embarrassed.
"Shall I keep the purse again, Leonard?" said Helen coaxingly.
"Alas!" replied Leonard, "the purse is empty."
"That is very naughty in the purse," said Helen, "since you put so
much into it."
"I?"
"Did not you say that you made, at least, a guinea a-week?"
"Yes; but Burley takes the money; and then, poor fellow! as I owe
all to him, I have not the heart to prevent his spending it as he
likes."
"Please, I wish you could settle the month's rent," said the
landlady, suddenly showing herself. She said it civilly, but with
firmness.
Leonard coloured. "It shall be paid to-day."
Then he pressed his hat on his head, and, putting Helen gently
aside, went forth.
"Speak to _me_ in future, kind Mrs Smedley," said Helen with the air
of a housewife. "_He_ is always in study, and must not be disturbed."
The landlady--a good woman, though she liked her rent--smiled
benignly. She was fond of Helen, whom she had known of old.
"I am so glad you are come back; and perhaps now the young man will
not keep such late hours. I meant to give him warning, but--"
"But he will be a great man one of these days, and you must bear
with him now." And Helen kissed Mrs Smedley, and sent her away half
inclined to cry.
Then Helen busied herself in the rooms. She found her father's box,
which had been duly forwarded. She re-examined its contents, and
wept as she touched each humble and pious relic. But her father's
memory itself thus seemed to give this home a sanction which the
former had not; and she rose quietly and began mechanically to put
things in order, sighing as she, saw all so neglected, till she
came to the rose-tree, and that alone showed heed and care. "Dear
Leonard!" she murmured, and the smile resettled on her lips.