A STORY OF THE SEEN AND THE UNSEEN.

At the period when the following incidents occurred I was living with

my father at The Grove, a large old house in the immediate neighborhood

of a little town. This had been his home for a number of years; and I

believe I was born in it. It was a kind of house which, notwithstanding

all the red and white architecture, known at present by the name of

Queen Anne, builders nowadays have forgotten how to build. It was

straggling and irregular, with wide passages, wide staircases, broad

landings; the rooms large but not very lofty; the arrangements leaving

much to be desired, with no economy of space; a house belonging to a

period when land was cheap, and, so far as that was concerned, there

was no occasion to economise. Though it was so near the town, the

clump of trees in which it was environed was a veritable grove. In

the grounds in spring the primroses grew as thickly as in the forest.

We had a few fields for the cows, and an excellent walled garden.

The place is being pulled down at this moment to make room for more

streets of mean little houses,—the kind of thing, and not a dull house

of faded gentry, which perhaps the neighborhood requires. The house

was dull, and so were we, its last inhabitants; and the furniture was

faded, even a little dingy,—nothing to brag of. I do not, however,

intend to convey a suggestion that we were faded gentry, for that was

not the case. My father, indeed, was rich, and had no need to spare any

expense in making his life and his house bright if he pleased; but he

did not please, and I had not been long enough at home to exercise any

special influence of my own. It was the only home I had ever known; but

except in my earliest childhood, and in my holidays as a schoolboy, I

had in reality known but little of it. My mother had died at my birth,

or shortly after, and I had grown up in the gravity and silence of a

house without women. In my infancy, I believe, a sister of my father's

had lived with us, and taken charge of the household and of me; but

she, too, had died long, long ago, my mourning for her being one of

the first things I could recollect. And she had no successor. There

was, indeed, a housekeeper and some maids,—the latter of whom I only

saw disappearing at the end of a passage, or whisking out of a room

when one of “the gentlemen” appeared. Mrs. Weir, indeed, I saw nearly

every day; but a curtsey, a smile, a pair of nice round arms which she

caressed while folding them across her ample waist, and a large white

apron, were all I knew of her. This was the only female influence in

the house. The drawing-room I was aware of only as a place of deadly

good order, into which nobody ever entered. It had three long windows

opening on the lawn, and communicated at the upper end, which was

rounded like a great bay, with the conservatory. Sometimes I gazed into

it as a child from without, wondering at the needlework on the chairs,

the screens, the looking-glasses which never reflected any living face.

My father did not like the room, which probably was not wonderful,

though it never occurred to me in those early days to inquire why.

I may say here, though it will probably be disappointing to those

who form a sentimental idea of the capabilities of children, that it

did not occur to me either, in these early days, to make any inquiry

about my mother. There was no room in life, as I knew it, for any such

person; nothing suggested to my mind either the fact that she must

have existed, or that there was need of her in the house. I accepted,

as I believe most children do, the facts of existence, on the basis

with which I had first made acquaintance with them, without question

or remark. As a matter of fact, I was aware that it was rather dull

at home; but neither by comparison with the books I read, nor by the

communications received from my school-fellows, did this seem to me

anything remarkable. And I was possibly somewhat dull too by nature,

for I did not mind. I was fond of reading, and for that there was

unbounded opportunity. I had a little ambition in respect to work,

and that too could be prosecuted undisturbed. When I went to the

university, my society lay almost entirely among men; but by that time

and afterwards, matters had of course greatly changed with me, and

though I recognised women as part of the economy of nature, and did not

indeed by any means dislike or avoid them, yet the idea of connecting

them at all with my own home never entered into my head. That continued

to be as it had always been, when at intervals I descended upon the

cool, grave, colorless place, in the midst of my traffic with the

world; always very still, well-ordered, serious—the cooking very good,

the comfort perfect—old Morphew, the butler, a little older (but very

little older, perhaps on the whole less old, since in my childhood I

had thought him a kind of Methuselah), and Mrs. Weir, less active,

covering up her arms in sleeves, but folding and caressing them just

as always. I remember looking in from the lawn through the windows

upon that deadly-orderly drawing-room, with a humorous recollection of

my childish admiration and wonder, and feeling that it must be kept

so forever and ever, and that to go into it would break some sort of

amusing mock mystery, some pleasantly ridiculous spell.

But it was only at rare intervals that I went home. In the long

vacation, as in my school holidays, my father often went abroad with

me, so that we had gone over a great deal of the Continent together

very pleasantly. He was old in proportion to the age of his son, being

a man of sixty when I was twenty, but that did not disturb the pleasure

of the relations between us. I don't know that they were ever very

confidential. On my side there was but little to communicate, for I

did not get into scrapes nor fall in love, the two predicaments which

demand sympathy and confidences. And as for my father himself, I was

never aware what there could be to communicate on his side. I knew

his life exactly—what he did almost at every hour of the day; under

what circumstances of the temperature he would ride and when walk;

how often and with what guests he would indulge in the occasional

break of a dinner-party, a serious pleasure—perhaps, indeed, less a

pleasure than a duty. All this I knew as well as he did, and also his

views on public matters, his political opinions, which naturally were

different from mine. What ground, then, remained for confidence? I did

not know any. We were both of us of a reserved nature, not apt to enter

into our religious feelings, for instance. There are many people who

think reticence on such subjects a sign of the most reverential way

of contemplating them. Of this I am far from being sure; but, at all

events, it was the practice most congenial to my own mind.

And then I was for a long time absent, making my own way in the world.

I did not make it very successfully. I accomplished the natural fate

of an Englishman, and went out to the Colonies; then to India in a

semi-diplomatic position; but returned home after seven or eight

years, invalided, in bad health and not much better spirits, tired

and disappointed with my first trial of life. I had, as people say,

“no occasion” to insist on making my way. My father was rich, and had

never given me the slightest reason to believe that he did not intend

me to be his heir. His allowance to me was not illiberal, and though he

did not oppose the carrying out of my own plans, he by no means urged

me to exertion. When I came home he received me very affectionately,

and expressed his satisfaction in my return. “Of course,” he said, “I

am not glad that you are disappointed, Philip, or that your health is

broken; but otherwise it is an ill wind, you know, that blows nobody

good—and I am very glad to have you at home. I am growing an old man—”

“I don't see any difference, sir,” said I; “everything here seems

exactly the same as when I went away—”

He smiled, and shook his head. “It is true enough,” he said, “after we

have reached a certain age we seem to go on for a long time on a plane,

and feel no great difference from year to year; but it is an inclined

plane—and the longer we go on, the more sudden will be the fall at the

end. But at all events it will be a great comfort to me to have you

here.”

“If I had known that,” I said, “and that you wanted me, I should have

come in any circumstances. As there are only two of us in the world—”

“Yes,” he said, “there are only two of us in the world; but still I

should not have sent for you, Phil, to interrupt your career.”

“It is as well, then, that it has interrupted itself,” I said, rather

bitterly; for disappointment is hard to hear.

He patted me on the shoulder and repeated, “It is an ill wind that

blows nobody good,” with a look of real pleasure which gave me a

certain gratification too; for, after all, he was an old man, and the

only one in all the world to whom I owed any duty. I had not been

without dreams of warmer affections, but they had come to nothing—not

tragically, but in the ordinary way. I might perhaps have had love

which I did not want, but not that which I did want,—which was not a

thing to make any unmanly moan about, but in the ordinary course of

events. Such disappointments happen every day; indeed, they are more

common than anything else, and sometimes it is apparent afterward that

it is better it was so.

However, here I was at thirty stranded—yet wanting for nothing, in a

position to call forth rather envy than pity from the greater part of

my contemporaries,—for I had an assured and comfortable existence, as

much money as I wanted, and the prospect of an excellent fortune for

the future. On the other hand, my health was still low, and I had no

occupation. The neighborhood of the town was a drawback rather than

an advantage. I felt myself tempted, instead of taking the long walk

into the country which my doctor recommended, to take a much shorter

one through the High Street, across the river, and back again, which

was not a walk but a lounge. The country was silent and full of

thoughts—thoughts not always very agreeable—whereas there were always

the humors of the little urban population to glance at, the news to be

heard, all those petty matters which so often make up life in a very

impoverished version for the idle man. I did not like it, but I felt

myself yielding to it, not having energy enough to make a stand. The

rector and the leading lawyer of the place asked me to dinner. I might

have glided into the society, such as it was, had I been disposed for

that—everything about me began to close over me as if I had been fifty,

and fully contented with my lot.

It was possibly my own want of occupation which made me observe with

surprise, after a while, how much occupied my father was. He had

expressed himself glad of my return; but now that I had returned, I saw

very little of him. Most of his time was spent in his library, as had

always been the case. But on the few visits I paid him there, I could

not but perceive that the aspect of the library was much changed. It

had acquired the look of a business-room, almost an office. There were

large business-like books on the table, which I could not associate

with anything he could naturally have to do; and his correspondence

was very large. I thought he closed one of those books hurriedly as I

came in, and pushed it away, as if he did not wish me to see it. This

surprised me at the moment, without arousing any other feeling; but

afterward I remembered it with a clearer sense of what it meant. He

was more absorbed altogether than I had been used to see him. He was

visited by men sometimes not of very prepossessing appearance. Surprise

grew in my mind without any very distinct idea of the reason of it;

and it was not till after a chance conversation with Morphew that my

vague uneasiness began to take definite shape. It was begun without

any special intention on my part. Morphew had informed me that master

was very busy, on some occasion when I wanted to see him. And I was a

little annoyed to be thus put off. “It appears to me that my father is

always busy,” I said, hastily. Morphew then began very oracularly to

nod his head in assent.

“A deal too busy, sir, if you take my opinion,” he said.

This startled me much, and I asked hurriedly, “What do you mean?”

without reflecting that to ask for private information from a servant

about my father's habits was as bad as investigating into a stranger's

affairs. It did not strike me in the same light.

“Mr. Philip,” said Morphew, “a thing 'as 'appened as 'appens more often

than it ought to. Master has got awful keen about money in his old age.”

“That's a new thing for him,” I said.

“No, sir, begging your pardon, it ain't a new thing. He was once broke

of it, and that wasn't easy done; but it's come back, if you'll excuse

me saying so. And I don't know as he'll ever be broke of it again at

his age.”

I felt more disposed to be angry than disturbed by this. “You must be

making some ridiculous mistake,” I said. “And if you were not so old a

friend as you are, Morphew, I should not have allowed my father to be

so spoken of to me.”

The old man gave me a half-astonished, half-contemptuous look. “He's

been my master a deal longer than he's been your father,” he said,

turning on his heel. The assumption was so comical that my anger could

not stand in face of it. I went out, having been on my way to the door

when this conversation occurred, and took my usual lounge about, which

was not a satisfactory sort of amusement. Its vanity and emptiness

appeared to be more evident than usual to-day. I met half a dozen

people I knew, and had as many pieces of news confided to me. I went up

and down the length of the High Street. I made a small purchase or two.

And then I turned homeward—despising myself, yet finding no alternative

within my reach. Would a long country walk have been more virtuous?—it

would at least have been more wholesome—but that was all that could

be said. My mind did not dwell on Morphew's communication. It seemed

without sense or meaning to me; and after the excellent joke about his

superior interest in his master to mine in my father, was dismissed

lightly enough from my mind. I tried to invent some way of telling

this to my father without letting him perceive that Morphew had been

finding faults in him, or I listening; for it seemed a pity to lose so

good a joke. However, as I returned home, something happened which put

the joke entirely out of my head. It is curious when a new subject of

trouble or anxiety has been suggested to the mind in an unexpected way,

how often a second advertisement follows immediately after the first,

and gives to that a potency which in itself it had not possessed.

I was approaching our own door, wondering whether my father had

gone, and whether, on my return, I should find him at leisure—for I

had several little things to say to him—when I noticed a poor woman

lingering about the closed gates. She had a baby sleeping in her

arms. It was a spring night, the stars shining in the twilight, and

everything soft and dim; and the woman's figure was like a shadow,

flitting about, now here, now there, on one side or another of the

gate. She stopped when she saw me approaching, and hesitated for a

moment, then seemed to take a sudden resolution. I watched her without

knowing, with a prevision that she was going to address me, though

with no sort of idea as to the subject of her address. She came up to

me doubtfully, it seemed, yet certainly, as I felt, and when she was

close to me, dropped a sort of hesitating curtsey, and said, “It's Mr.

Philip?” in a low voice.

“What do you want with me?” I said.

Then she poured forth suddenly, without warning or preparation, her

long speech—a flood of words which must have been all ready and waiting

at the doors of her lips for utterance. “Oh, sir, I want to speak to

you! I can't believe you'll be so hard, for you're young; and I can't

believe he'll be so hard if so be as his own son, as I've always heard

he had but one, 'll speak up for us. Oh, gentleman, it is easy for the

likes of you, that, if you ain't comfortable in one room, can just

walk into another; but if one room is all you have, and every bit of

furniture you have taken out of it, and nothing but the four walls

left—not so much as the cradle for the child, or a chair for your man

to sit down upon when he comes from his work, or a saucepan to cook him

his supper—”

“My good woman,” I said, “who can have taken all that from you? surely

nobody can be so cruel?”

“You say it's cruel!” she cried with a sort of triumph. “Oh, I knowed

you would, or any true gentleman that don't hold with screwing poor

folks. Just go and say that to him inside there, for the love of God.

Tell him to think what he's doing, driving poor creatures to despair.

Summer's coming, the Lord be praised, but yet it's bitter cold at night

with your counterpane gone; and when you've been working hard all day,

and nothing but four bare walls to come home to, and all your poor

little sticks of furniture that you've saved up for, and got together

one by one, all gone—and you no better than when you started, or rather

worse, for then you was young. Oh, sir!” the woman's voice rose into a

sort of passionate wail. And then she added, beseechingly, recovering

herself—“Oh, speak for us—he'll not refuse his own son—”

“To whom am I to speak? who is it that has done this to you?” I said.

The woman hesitated again, looking keenly in my face—then repeated with

a slight faltering, “It's Mr. Philip?” as if that made everything right.

“Yes; I am Philip Canning,” I said; “but what have I to do with this?

and to whom am I to speak?”

She began to whimper, crying and stopping herself. “Oh, please, sir!

it's Mr. Canning as owns all the house property about—it's him that our

court and the lane and everything belongs to. And he's taken the bed

from under us, and the baby's cradle, although it's said in the Bible

as you're not to take poor folks's bed.”

“My father!” I cried in spite of myself—“then it must be some agent,

some one else in his name. You may be sure he knows nothing of it. Of

course I shall speak to him at once.”

“Oh, God bless you, sir,” said the woman. But then she added, in a

lower tone—“It's no agent. It's one as never knows trouble. It's him

that lives in that grand house.” But this was said under her breath,

evidently not for me to hear.

Morphew's words flashed through my mind as she spoke. What was this?

Did it afford an explanation of the much occupied hours, the big

books, the strange visitors? I took the poor woman's name, and gave

her something to procure a few comforts for the night, and went

indoors disturbed and troubled. It was impossible to believe that my

father himself would have acted thus; but he was not a man to brook

interference, and I did not see how to introduce the subject, what to

say. I could but hope that, at the moment of broaching it, words would

be put into my mouth, which often happens in moments of necessity,

one knows not how, even when one's theme is not so all-important as

that for which such help has been promised. As usual, I did not see

my father till dinner. I have said that our dinners were very good,

luxurious in a simple way, everything excellent in its kind, well

cooked, well served, the perfection of comfort without show—which is

a combination very dear to the English heart. I said nothing till

Morphew, with his solemn attention to everything that was going, had

retired—and then it was with some strain of courage that I began.

“I was stopped outside the gate to-day by a curious sort of

petitioner—a poor woman, who seems to be one of your tenants, sir, but

whom your agent must have been rather too hard upon.”

“My agent? who is that?” said my father, quietly.

“I don't know his name, and I doubt his competence. The poor creature

seems to have had everything taken from her—her bed, her child's

cradle.”

“No doubt she was behind with her rent.”

“Very likely, sir. She seemed very poor,” said I.

“You take it coolly,” said my father, with an upward glance,

half-amused, not in the least shocked by my statement. “But when a man,

or a woman either, takes a house, I suppose you will allow that they

ought to pay rent for it.”

“Certainly, sir,” I replied, “when they have got anything to pay.”

“I don't allow the reservation,” he said. But he was not angry, which I

had feared he would be.

“I think,” I continued, “that your agent must be too severe. And this

emboldens me to say something which has been in my mind for some

time”—(these were the words, no doubt, which I had hoped would be put

into my mouth; they were the suggestion of the moment, and yet as I

said them it was with the most complete conviction of their truth)—“and

that is this: I am doing nothing; my time hangs heavy on my hands. Make

me your agent. I will see for myself, and save you from such mistakes;

and it will be an occupation—”

“Mistakes? What warrant have you for saying these are mistakes?” he

said testily; then after a moment: “This is a strange proposal from

you, Phil. Do you know what it is you are offering?—to be a collector

of rents, going about from door to door, from week to week; to look

after wretched little bits of repairs, drains, etc.; to get paid,

which, after all, is the chief thing, and not to be taken in by tales

of poverty.”

“Not to let you be taken in by men without pity,” I said.

He gave me a strange glance, which I did not very well understand, and

said, abruptly, a thing which, so far as I remember, he had never in my

life said before, “You've become a little like your mother, Phil—”

“My mother!” The reference was so unusual—nay, so unprecedented—that I

was greatly startled. It seemed to me like the sudden introduction of

a quite new element in the stagnant atmosphere, as well as a new party

to our conversation. My father looked across the table, as if with some

astonishment at my tone of surprise.

“Is that so very extraordinary?” he said.

“No; of course it is not extraordinary that I should resemble my

mother. Only—I have heard very little of her—almost nothing.”

“That is true.” He got up and placed himself before the fire, which

was very low, as the night was not cold—had not been cold heretofore

at least; but it seemed to me now that a little chill came into the

dim and faded room. Perhaps it looked more dull from the suggestion

of a something brighter, warmer, that might have been. “Talking of

mistakes,” he said, “perhaps that was one: to sever you entirely from

her side of the house. But I did not care for the connection. You

will understand how it is that I speak of it now when I tell you—”

He stopped here, however, said nothing more for a minute or so, and

then rang the bell. Morphew came, as he always did, very deliberately,

so that some time elapsed in silence, during which my surprise grew.

When the old man appeared at the door—“Have you put the lights in the

drawing-room, as I told you?” my father said.

“Yes, sir; and opened the box, sir; and it's a—it's a speaking

likeness—”

This the old man got out in a great hurry, as if afraid that his master

would stop him. My father did so with a wave of his hand.

“That's enough. I asked no information. You can go now.”

The door closed upon us, and there was again a pause. My subject had

floated away altogether like a mist, though I had been so concerned

about it. I tried to resume, but could not. Something seemed to

arrest my very breathing: and yet in this dull respectable house of

ours, where everything breathed good character and integrity, it was

certain that there could be no shameful mystery to reveal. It was some

time before my father spoke, not from any purpose that I could see,

but apparently because his mind was busy with probably unaccustomed

thoughts.

“You scarcely know the drawing-room, Phil,” he said at last.

“Very little. I have never seen it used. I have a little awe of it, to

tell the truth.”

“That should not be. There is no reason for that. But a man by himself,

as I have been for the greater part of my life, has no occasion for a

drawing-room. I always, as a matter of preference, sat among my books;

however, I ought to have thought of the impression on you.”

“Oh, it is not important,” I said; “the awe was childish. I have not

thought of it since I came home.”

“It never was anything very splendid at the best,” said he. He lifted

the lamp from the table with a sort of abstraction, not remarking even

my offer to take it from him, and led the way. He was on the verge

of seventy, and looked his age; but it was a vigorous age, with no

symptoms of giving way. The circle of light from the lamp lit up his

white hair, and keen blue eyes, and clear complexion; his forehead was

like old ivory, his cheek warmly colored: an old man, yet a man in

full strength. He was taller than I was, and still almost as strong.

As he stood for a moment with the lamp in his hand, he looked like a

tower in his great height and bulk. I reflected as I looked at him that

I knew him intimately, more intimately than any other creature in the

world,—I was familiar with every detail of his outward life; could it

be that in reality I did not know him at all?

* * * * *

The drawing-room was already lighted with a flickering array of

candles upon the mantelpiece and along the walls, producing the pretty

starry effect which candles give without very much light. As I had not

the smallest idea what I was about to see, for Morphew's “speaking

likeness” was very hurriedly said, and only half comprehensible in the

bewilderment of my faculties, my first glance was at this very unusual

illumination, for which I could assign no reason. The next showed me a

large full-length portrait, still in the box in which apparently it had

travelled, placed upright, supported against a table in the centre of

the room. My father walked straight up to it, motioned to me to place a

smaller table close to the picture on the left side, and put his lamp

upon that. Then he waved his hand towards it, and stood aside that I

might see.

It was a full-length portrait of a very young woman—I might say, a

girl, scarcely twenty—in a white dress, made in a very simple old

fashion, though I was too little accustomed to female costume to be

able to fix the date. It might have been a hundred years old, or

twenty, for aught I knew. The face had an expression of youth, candor,

and simplicity more than any face I had ever seen—or so, at least, in

my surprise, I thought. The eyes were a little wistful, with something

which was almost anxiety—which at least was not content—in them; a

faint, almost imperceptible, curve in the lids. The complexion was

of a dazzling fairness, the hair light, but the eyes dark, which

gave individuality to the face. It would have been as lovely had the

eyes been blue—probably more so—but their darkness gave a touch of

character, a slight discord, which made the harmony finer. It was

not, perhaps, beautiful in the highest sense of the word. The girl

must have been too young, too slight, too little developed for actual

beauty; but a face which so invited love and confidence I never saw.

One smiled at it with instinctive affection. “What a sweet face!” I

said. “What a lovely girl! Who is she? Is this one of the relations you

were speaking of on the other side?”

My father made me no reply. He stood aside, looking at it as if he knew

it too well to require to look,—as if the picture was already in his

eyes. “Yes,” he said, after an interval, with a long-drawn breath, “she

was a lovely girl, as you say.”

“Was?—then she is dead. What a pity!” I said; “what a pity! so young

and so sweet!”

We stood gazing at her thus, in her beautiful stillness and calm—two

men, the younger of us full grown and conscious of many experiences,

the other an old man—before this impersonation of tender youth. At

length he said, with a slight tremulousness in his voice, “Does nothing

suggest to you who she is, Phil?”

I turned round to look at him with profound astonishment, but he turned

away from my look. A sort of quiver passed over his face. “That is your

mother,” he said, and walked suddenly away, leaving me there.

My mother!

I stood for a moment in a kind of consternation before the white-robed

innocent creature, to me no more than a child; then a sudden laugh

broke from me, without any will of mine: something ludicrous, as well

as something awful, was in it. When the laugh was over, I found myself

with tears in my eyes, gazing, holding my breath. The soft features

seemed to melt, the lips to move, the anxiety in the eyes to become

a personal inquiry. Ah, no! nothing of the kind; only because of the

water in mine. My mother! oh, fair and gentle creature, scarcely

woman—how could any man's voice call her by that name! I had little

idea enough of what it meant,—had heard it laughed at, scoffed at,

reverenced, but never had learned to place it even among the ideal

powers of life. Yet, if it meant anything at all, what it meant was

worth thinking of. What did she ask, looking at me with those eyes?

what would she have said if “those lips had language”? If I had known

her only as Cowper did—with a child's recollection—there might have

been some thread, some faint but comprehensible link, between us; but

now all that I felt was the curious incongruity. Poor child! I said to

myself; so sweet a creature: poor little tender soul! as if she had

been a little sister, a child of mine—but my mother! I cannot tell how

long I stood looking at her, studying the candid, sweet face, which

surely had germs in it of everything that was good and beautiful; and

sorry, with a profound regret, that she had died and never carried

these promises to fulfilment. Poor girl! poor people who had loved

her! These were my thoughts: with a curious vertigo and giddiness of

my whole being in the sense of a mysterious relationship, which it was

beyond my power to understand.

Presently my father came back: possibly because I had been a long time

unconscious of the passage of the minutes, or perhaps because he was

himself restless in the strange disturbance of his habitual calm. He

came in and put his arm within mine, leaning his weight partially upon

me, with an affectionate suggestion which went deeper than words. I

pressed his arm to my side: it was more between us two grave Englishmen

than any embracing.

“I cannot understand it,” I said.

“No. I don't wonder at that; but if it is strange to you, Phil, think

how much more strange to me! That is the partner of my life. I have

never had another—or thought of another. That—girl! If we are to meet

again, as I have always hoped we should meet again, what am I to say to

her—I, an old man? Yes; I know what you mean. I am not an old man for

my years; but my years are threescore and ten, and the play is nearly

played out. How am I to meet that young creature? We used to say to

each other that it was forever, that we never could be but one, that it

was for life and death. But what—what am I to say to her, Phil, when I

meet her again, that—that angel? No, it is not her being an angel that

troubles me; but she is so young! She is like my—my granddaughter,” he

cried, with a burst of what was half sobs, half laughter; “and she is

my wife—and I am an old man—an old man! And so much has happened that

she could not understand.”

I was too much startled by this strange complaint to know what to say.

It was not my own trouble, and I answered it in the conventional way.

“They are not as we are, sir,” I said; “they look upon us with larger,

other eyes than ours.”

“Ah! you don't know what I mean,” he said quickly; and in the interval

he had subdued his emotion. “At first, after she died, it was my

consolation to think that I should meet her again—that we never

could be really parted. But, my God, how I have changed since then!

I am another man—I am a different being. I was not very young even

then—twenty years older than she was: but her youth renewed mine. I was

not an unfit partner; she asked no better: and knew as much more than I

did in some things—being so much nearer the source—as I did in others

that were of the world. But I have gone a long way since then, Phil—a

long way; and there she stands just where I left her.”

I pressed his arm again. “Father,” I said, which was a title I seldom

used, “we are not to suppose that in a higher life the mind stands

still.” I did not feel myself qualified to discuss such topics, but

something one must say.

“Worse, worse!” he replied; “then she too will be like me, a different

being, and we shall meet as what? as strangers, as people who have lost

sight of each other, with a long past between us—we who parted, my God!

with—with——”

His voice broke and ended for a moment: then while, surprised and

almost shocked by what he said, I cast about in my mind what to reply,

he withdrew his arm suddenly from mine, and said in his usual tone,

“Where shall we hang the picture, Phil? It must be here in this room.

What do you think will be the best light?”

This sudden alteration took me still more by surprise, and gave me

almost an additional shock; but it was evident that I must follow the

changes of his mood, or at least the sudden repression of sentiment

which he originated. We went into that simpler question with great

seriousness, consulting which would be the best light. “You know I can

scarcely advise,” I said; “I have never been familiar with this room. I

should like to put off, if you don't mind, till daylight.”

“I think,” he said, “that this would be the best place.” It was on the

other side of the fireplace, on the wall which faced the windows—not

the best light, I knew enough to be aware, for an oil-painting. When

I said so, however, he answered me with a little impatience,—“It does

not matter very much about, the best light. There will be nobody to

see it but you and me. I have my reasons——” There was a small table

standing against the wall at this spot, on which he had his hand as he

spoke. Upon it stood a little basket in very fine lace-like wickerwork.

His hand must have trembled, for the table shook, and the basket fell,

its contents turning out upon the carpet,—little bits of needlework,

colored silks, a small piece of knitting half done. He laughed as

they rolled out at his feet, and tried to stoop to collect them, then

tottered to a chair, and covered for a moment his face with his hands.

No need to ask what they were. No woman's work had been seen in the

house since I could recollect it. I gathered them up reverently and put

them back. I could see, ignorant as I was, that the bit of knitting was

something for an infant. What could I do less than put it to my lips?

It had. been left in the doing—for me.

“Yes, I think this is the best place,” my father said a minute after,

in his usual tone.

We placed it there that evening with our own hands. The picture was

large, and in a heavy frame, but my father would let no one help me

but himself. And then, with a superstition for which I never could

give any reason even to myself, having removed the packings, we closed

and locked the door, leaving the candles about the room, in their soft

strange illumination lighting the first night of her return to her old

place.

That night no more was said. My father went to his room early, which

was not his habit. He had never, however, accustomed me to sit late

with him in the library. I had a little study or smoking-room of my

own, in which all my special treasures were, the collections of my

travels and my favorite books—and where I always sat after prayers, a

ceremonial which was regularly kept up in the house. I retired as usual

this night to my room, and as usual read—but to-night somewhat vaguely,

often pausing to think. When it was quite late, I went out by the glass

door to the lawn, and walked round the house, with the intention of

looking in at the drawing-room windows, as I had done when a child.

But I had forgotten that these windows were all shuttered at night,

and nothing but a faint penetration of the light within through the

crevices bore witness to the instalment of the new dweller there.

In the morning my father was entirely himself again. He told me without

emotion of the manner in which he had obtained the picture. It had

belonged to my mother's family, and had fallen eventually into the

hands of a cousin of hers, resident abroad—“A man whom I did not like,

and who did not like me,” my father said; “there was, or had been,

some rivalry, he thought: a mistake, but he was never aware of that.

He refused all my requests to have a copy made. You may suppose, Phil,

that I wished this very much. Had I succeeded, you would have been

acquainted, at least, with your mother's appearance, and need not have

sustained this shock. But he would not consent. It gave him, I think, a

certain pleasure to think that he had the only picture. But now he is

dead—and out of remorse, or with some other intention, has left it to

me.”

“That looks like kindness,” said I.

“Yes; or something else. He might have thought that by so doing he was

establishing a claim upon me.” my father said: but he did not seem

disposed to add any more. On whose behalf he meant to establish a claim

I did not know, nor who the man was who had laid us under so great

an obligation on his deathbed. He _had_ established a claim on me at

least: though, as he was dead, I could not see on whose behalf it was.

And my father said nothing more. He seemed to dislike the subject.

When I attempted to return to it, he had recourse to his letters or

his newspapers. Evidently he had made up his mind to say no more.

Afterwards I went into the drawing-room to look at the picture once

more. It seemed to me that the anxiety in her eyes was not so evident

as I had thought it last night. The light possibly was more favorable.

She stood just above the place where, I make no doubt, she had sat in

life, where her little work-basket was—not very much above it. The

picture was full-length, and we had hung it low, so that she might

have been stepping into the room, and was little above my own level

as I stood and looked at her again. Once more I smiled at the strange

thought that this young creature, so young, almost childish, could be

my mother; and once more my eyes grew wet looking at her. He was a

benefactor, indeed, who had given her back to us. I said to myself,

that if I could ever do anything for him or his, I would certainly do,

for my—for this lovely young creature's sake.

And with this in my mind, and all the thoughts that came with it, I am

obliged to confess that the other matter, which I had been so full of

on the previous night, went entirely out of my head.

* * * * *

It is rarely, however, that such matters are allowed to slip out of

one's mind. When I went out in the afternoon for my usual stroll—or

rather when I returned from that stroll—I saw once more before me

the woman with her baby whose story had filled me with dismay on the

previous evening. She was waiting at the gate as before, and—“Oh,

gentleman, but haven't you got some news to give me?” she said.

“My good woman—I—have been greatly occupied. I have had—no time to do

anything.”

“Ah!” she said, with a little cry of disappointment, “my man said not

to make too sure, and that the ways of the gentlefolks is hard to know.”

“I cannot explain to you,” I said, as gently as I could, “what it is

that has made me forget you. It was an event that can only do you good

in the end. Go home now, and see the man that took your things from

you, and tell him to come to me. I promise you it shall be put right.”

The woman looked at me in astonishment, then burst forth, as it

seemed, involuntarily,—“What! without asking no questions?” After

this there came a storm of tears and blessings, from which I made

haste to escape, but not without carrying that curious commentary

on my rashness away with me—“Without asking no questions?” It might

be foolish, perhaps: but after all how slight a matter. To make the

poor creature comfortable at the cost of what—a box or two of cigars,

perhaps, or some other trifle. And if it should be her own fault, or

her husband's—what then? Had I been punished for all my faults, where

should I have been now. And if the advantage should be only temporary,

what then? To be relieved and comforted even for a day or two, was not

that something to count in life? Thus I quenched the fiery dart of

criticism which my _protégée_ herself had thrown into the transaction,

not without a certain sense of the humor of it. Its effect, however,

was to make me less anxious to see my father, to repeat my proposal

to him, and to call his attention to the cruelty performed in his

name. This one case I had taken out of the category of wrongs to be

righted, by assuming arbitrarily the position of Providence in my own

person—for, of course, I had bound myself to pay the poor creature's

rent as well as redeem her goods—and, whatever might happen to her

in the future, had taken the past into my own hands. The man came

presently to see me who, it seems, had acted as my father's agent in

the matter. “I don't know, sir, how Mr. Canning will take it,” he

said. “He don't want none of those irregular, bad-paying ones in his

property. He always says as to look over it and let the rent run on is

making things worse in the end. His rule is, 'Never more than a month,

Stevens:' that's what Mr. Canning says to me, sir. He says, 'More than

that they can't pay. It's no use trying.' And it's a good rule; it's a

very good rule. He won't hear none of their stories, sir. Bless you,

you'd never get a penny of rent from them small houses if you listened

to their tales. But if so be as you'll pay Mrs. Jordan's rent, it's

none of my business how it's paid, so long as it's paid, and I'll send

her back her things. But they'll just have to be took next time,” he

added, composedly. “Over and over: it's always the same story with them

sort of poor folks—they're too poor for anything, that's the truth,”

the man said.

Morphew came back to my room after my visitor was gone. “Mr. Philip,”

he said, “you'll excuse me, sir, but if you're going to pay all the

poor folk's rent as have distresses put in, you may just go into the

court at once, for it's without end—”

“I am going to be the agent myself, Morphew, and manage for my father:

and we'll soon put a stop to that,” I said, more cheerfully than I felt.

“Manage for—master,” he said, with a face of consternation. “You, Mr.

Philip!”

“You seem to have a great contempt for me, Morphew.”

He did not deny the fact. He said with excitement, “Master, sir—master

don't let himself be put a stop to by any man. Master's—not one to be

managed. Don't you quarrel with master, Mr. Philip, for the love of

God.” The old man was quite pale.

“Quarrel!” I said. “I have never quarreled with my father, and I don't

mean to begin now.”

Morphew dispelled his own excitement by making up the fire, which was

dying in the grate. It was a very mild spring evening, and he made up a

great blaze which would have suited December. This is one of many ways

in which an old servant will relieve his mind. He muttered all the time

as he threw on the coals and wood. “He'll not like it—we all know as

he'll not like it. Master won't stand no meddling, Mr. Philip,”—this

last he discharged at me like a flying arrow as he closed the door.

I soon found there was truth in what he said. My father was not angry;

he was even half amused. “I don't think that plan of yours will

hold water, Phil. I hear you have been paying rents and redeeming

furniture—that's an expensive game, and a very profitless one. Of

course, so long as you are a benevolent gentleman acting for your own

pleasure, it makes no difference to me. I am quite content if I get my

money, even out of your pockets—so long as it amuses you. But as my

collector, you know, which you are good enough to propose to be——”

“Of course I should act under your orders,” I said; but at least you

might be sure that I would not commit you to any—to any——” I paused for

a word.

“Act of oppression,” he said with a smile—“piece of cruelty,

exaction—there are half-a-dozen words——”

“Sir——” I cried.

“Stop, Phil, and let us understand each other. I hope I have always

been a just man. I do my duty on my side, and I expect it from others.

It is your benevolence that is cruel. I have calculated anxiously how

much credit it is safe to allow; but I will allow no man, or woman

either, to go beyond what he or she can make up. My law is fixed. Now

you understand. My agents, as you call them, originate nothing—they

execute only what I decide——”

“But then no circumstances are taken into account—no bad luck, no evil

chances, no loss unexpected.”

“There are no evil chances,” he said “there is no bad luck—they reap

as they sow. No, I don't go among them to be cheated by their stories

and spend quite unnecessary emotion in sympathising with them. You will

find it much better for you that I don't. I deal with them on a general

rule, made, I assure you, not without a great deal of thought.”

“And must it always be so?” I said. “Is there no way of ameliorating or

bringing in a better state of things?”

“It seems not,” he said; “we don't get 'no forrarder' in that direction

so far as I can see.” And then he turned the conversation to general

matters.

I retired to my room greatly discouraged that night. In former ages—or

so one is led to suppose—and in the lower primitive classes who still

linger near the primeval type, action of any kind was, and is, easier

than amid the complications of our higher civilisation. A bad man is

a distinct entity, against whom you know more or less what steps to

take. A tyrant, an oppressor, a bad landlord, a man who lets miserable

tenements at a rack-rent (to come down to particulars), and exposes his

wretched tenants to all those abominations of which we have heard so

much—well! he is more or less a satisfactory opponent. There he is, and

there is nothing to be said for him—down with him! and let there be an

end of his wickedness. But when, on the contrary, you have before you

a good man, a just man, who has considered deeply a question which you

allow to be full of difficulty; who regrets, but cannot, being human,

avert, the miseries which to some unhappy individuals follow from the

very wisdom of his rule,—what can you do—what is to be done? Individual

benevolence at haphazard may baulk him here and there, but what have

you to put in the place of his well-considered scheme? Charity which

makes paupers? or what else? I had not considered the question deeply,

but it seemed to me that I now came to a blank wall, which my vague

human sentiment of pity and scorn could find no way to breach. There

must be wrong somewhere—but where? There must be some change for the

better to be made—but how?

I was seated with a book before me on the table, with my head supported

on my hands. My eyes were on the printed page, but I was not reading—my

mind was full of these thoughts, my heart of great discouragement and

despondency, a sense that I could do nothing, yet that there surely

must and ought, if I but knew it, be something to do. The fire which

Morphew had built up before dinner was dying out, the shaded lamp on

my table left all the corners in a mysterious twilight. The house was

perfectly still, no one moving: my father in the library, where, after

the habit of many solitary years, he liked to be left alone, and I

here in my retreat, preparing for the formation of similar habits. I

thought all at once of the third member of the party, the newcomer,

alone too in the room that had been hers; and there suddenly occurred

to me a strong desire to take up my lamp and go to the drawing-room

and visit her, to see whether her soft angelic face would give any

inspiration. I restrained, however, this futile impulse—for what could

the picture say?—and instead wondered what might have been had she

lived, had she been there, warmly enthroned beside the warm domestic

centre, the hearth which would have been a common sanctuary, the true

home. In that case what might have been? Alas! the question was no more

simple to answer than the other: she might have been there alone too,

her husband's business, her son's thoughts, as far from her as now,

when her silent representative held her old place in the silence and

darkness. I had known it so, often enough. Love itself does not always

give comprehension and sympathy. It might be that she was more to us

there, in the sweet image of her undeveloped beauty, than she might

have been had she lived and grown to maturity and fading, like the rest.

I cannot be certain whether my mind was still lingering on this not

very cheerful reflection, or if it had been left behind, when the

strange occurrence came of which I have now to tell: can I call it an

occurrence? My eyes were on my book, when I thought I heard the sound

of a door opening and shutting, but so far away and faint that if real

at all it must have been in a far corner of the house. I did not move

except to lift my eyes from the book, as one does instinctively the

better to listen; when——But I cannot tell, nor have I ever been able

to describe exactly what it was. My heart made all at once a sudden

leap in my breast. I am aware that this language is figurative, and

that the heart cannot leap: but it is a figure so entirely justified by

sensation, that no one will have any difficulty in understanding what

I mean. My heart leapt up and began beating wildly in my throat, in my

ears, as if my whole being had received a sudden and intolerable shock.

The sound went through my head like the dizzy sound of some strange

mechanism, a thousand wheels and springs, circling, echoing, working

in my brain. I felt the blood bound in my veins, my mouth became dry,

my eyes hot, a sense of something insupportable took possession of

me. I sprang to my feet, and then I sat down again. I cast a quick

glance round me beyond the brief circle of the lamplight, but there

was nothing there to account in any way for this sudden extraordinary

rush of sensation—nor could I feel any meaning in it, any suggestion,

any moral impression. I thought I must be going to be ill, and got

out my watch and felt my pulse: it was beating furiously, about 125

throbs in a minute. I knew of no illness that could come on like this

with out warning, in a moment, and I tried to subdue myself, to say to

myself that it was nothing, some flutter of the nerves, some physical

disturbance. I laid myself down upon my sofa to try if rest would help

me, and keep still—as long as the thumping and throbbing of this wild

excited mechanism within, like a wild beast plunging and struggling,

would let me. I am quite aware of the confusion of the metaphor—the

reality was just so. It was like a mechanism deranged, going wildly

with ever-increasing precipitation, like those horrible wheels that

from time to time catch a helpless human being in them and tear him to

pieces: but at the same time it was like a maddened living creature

making the wildest efforts to get free.

When I could bear this no longer I got up and walked about my room;

then having still a certain command of myself, though I could not

master the commotion within me, I deliberately took down an exciting

book from the shelf, a book of breathless adventure which had always

interested me, and tried with that to break the spell. After a few

minutes, however, I flung the book aside; I was gradually losing all

power over myself. What I should be moved to do,—to shout aloud, to

struggle with I know not what; or if was I going mad altogether, and

next moment must be a raving lunatic,—I could not tell. I kept looking

round, expecting I don't know what: several times with the corner of

my eye I seemed to see a movement, as if some one was stealing out

of sight; but when I looked straight, there was never anything but

the plain outlines of the wall and carpet, the chairs standing in

good order. At last I snatched up the lamp in my hand and went out of

the room. To look at the picture? which had been faintly showing in

my imagination from time to time, the eyes, more anxious than ever,

looking at me from out the silent air. But no; I passed the door of

that room swiftly, moving, it seemed, without any volition of my own,

and before I knew where I was going, went into my father's library with

my lamp in my hand.

He was still sitting there at his writing-table; he looked up

astonished to see me hurrying in with my light. “Phil!” he said,

surprised. I remember that I shut the door behind me, and came up to

him, and set down the lamp on his table. My sudden appearance alarmed

him. “What is the matter?” he cried. “Philip, what have you been doing

with yourself?”

I sat down on the nearest chair and gasped, gazing at him. The wild

commotion ceased, the blood subsided into its natural channels, my

heart resumed its place, I use such words as mortal weakness can to

express the sensations I felt. I came to myself thus, gazing at him,

confounded, at once by the extraordinary passion which I had gone

through, and its sudden cessation. “The matter?” I cried; “I don't know

what is the matter.”

My father had pushed his spectacles up from his eyes. He appeared to

me as faces appear in a fever, all glorified with light which is not

in them—his eyes glowing, his white hair shining like silver; but his

look was severe. “You are not a boy, that I should reprove you; but you

ought to know better,” he said.

Then I explained to him, so far as I was able, what had happened. Had

happened? nothing had happened. He did not understand me—nor did I,

now that it was over, understand myself; but he saw enough to make him

aware that the disturbance in me was serious, and not caused by any

folly of my own. He was very kind as soon as he had assured himself of

this, and talked, taking pains to bring me back to unexciting subjects.

He had a letter in his hand with a very deep border of black when I

came in. I observed it, without taking any notice or associating it

with anything I knew. He had many correspondents, and although we

were excellent friends, we had never been on those confidential terms

which warrant one man in asking another from whom a special letter has

come. We were not so near to each other as this, though we were father

and son. After a while I went back to my own room, and finished the

evening in my usual way, without any return of the excitement which,

now that it was over, looked to me like some extraordinary dream. What

had it meant? had it meant anything? I said to myself that it must be

purely physical, something gone temporarily amiss, which had righted

itself. It was physical; the excitement did not affect my mind. I was

independent of it all the time, a spectator of my own agitation—a clear

proof that, whatever it was, it had affected my bodily organisation

alone.

Next day I returned to the problem which I had not been able to solve.

I found out my petitioner in the back street, and that she was happy

in the recovery of her possessions, which to my eyes indeed did not

seem very worthy either of lamentation or delight. Nor was her house

the tidy house which injured virtue should have when restored to its

humble rights. She was not injured virtue, it was clear. She made me a

great many curtseys, and poured forth a number of blessings. Her “man”

came in while I was there, and hoped in a gruff voice that God would

reward me and that the old gentleman 'd let 'em alone. I did not like

the looks of the man. It seemed to me that in the dark lane behind the

house of a winter's night he would not be a pleasant person to find in

one's way. Nor was this all: when I went out into the little street,

which it appeared was all, or almost all, my fathers property, a number

of groups formed in my way, and at least half-a-dozen applicants sidled

up. “I've more claims nor Mary Jordan any day,” said one; “I've lived

on Squire Canning's property one place and another, this twenty year.”

“And what do you say to me,” said another; “I've six children to her

two, bless you, sir, and ne'er a father to do for them.” I believed

in my father's rule before I got out of the street, and approved

his wisdom in keeping himself free from personal contact with his

tenants. Yet when I looked back upon the swarming thoroughfare, the

mean little houses, the women at their doors all so open-mouthed, and

eager to contend for my favor, my heart sank within me at the thought

that out of their misery some portion of our wealth came—I don't care

how small a portion: that I, young and strong, should be kept idle

and in luxury, in some part through the money screwed out of their

necessities, obtained sometimes by the sacrifice of everything they

prized! Of course I know all the ordinary commonplaces of life as well

as anyone—that if you build a house with your hands or your money, and

let it, the rent of it is your just due, and must be paid. But yet——

“Don't you think, sir,” I said, that evening at dinner, the subject

being reintroduced by my father himself, “that we have some duty

towards them when we draw so much from them?”

“Certainly,” he said; “I take as much trouble about their drains as I

do about my own.”

“That is always something, I suppose.”

“Something! it is a great deal—it is more than they get anywhere else.

I keep them clean, as far as that's possible. I give them at least the

means of keeping clean, and thus check disease, and prolong life—which

is more, I assure you, than they've any right to expect.”

I was not prepared with arguments as I ought to have been. That is all

in the Gospel according to Adam Smith, which my father had been brought

up in, but of which the tenets had begun to be less binding in my day.

I wanted something more, or else something else; but my views were not

so clear, nor my system so logical and well-built, as that upon which

my father rested his conscience, and drew his percentage with a light

heart.

Yet I thought there were signs in him of some perturbation. I met him

one morning coming out of the room in which the portrait hung, as if

he had gone to look at it stealthily. He was shaking his head, and

saying, “No, no,” to himself, not perceiving me, and I stepped aside

when I saw him so absorbed. For myself, I entered that room but little.

I went outside, as I had so often done when I was a child, and looked

through the windows into the still and now sacred place, which had

always impressed me with a certain awe. Looked at so, the slight figure

in its white dress seemed to be stepping down into the room from some

slight visionary altitude, looking with that which had seemed to me at

first anxiety, which I sometimes represented to myself now as a wistful

curiosity, as if she were looking for the life which might have been

hers. Where was the existence that had belonged to her, the sweet

household place, the infant she had left? She would no more recognize

the man who thus came to look at her as through a veil with mystic

reverence, than I could recognize her. I could never be her child to

her, any more than she could be a mother to me.

* * * * *

Thus time passed on for several quiet days. There was nothing to make

us give any special heed to the passage of time, life being very

uneventful and its habits unvaried. My mind was very much preoccupied

by my father's tenants. He had a great deal of property in the town

which was so near us,—streets of small houses, the best paying property

(I was assured) of any. I was very anxious to come to some settled

conclusion: on the one hand, not to let myself be carried away by

sentiment; on the other, not to allow my strongly roused feelings

to fall into the blank of routine, as his had done. I was seated

one evening in my own sitting-room busy with this matter,—busy with

calculations as to cost and profit, with an anxious desire to convince

him, either that his profits were greater than justice allowed, or that

they carried with them a more urgent duty than he had conceived.

It was night, but not late, not more than ten o'clock, the household

still astir. Everything was quiet—not the solemnity of midnight

silence, in which there is always something of mystery, but the

soft-breathing quiet of the evening, full of the faint habitual sounds

of a human dwelling, a consciousness of life about. And I was very busy

with my figures, interested, feeling no room in my mind for any other

thought. The singular experience which had startled me so much had

passed over very quickly, and there had been no return. I had ceased

to think of it: indeed I had never thought of it save for the moment,

setting it down after it was over to a physical cause without much

difficulty. At this time I was far too busy to have thoughts to spare

for anything, or room for imagination: and when suddenly in a moment

without any warning, the first symptom returned, I started with it into

determined resistance, resolute not to be fooled by any mock influence

which could resolve itself into the action of nerves or ganglions. The

first symptom, as before, was that my heart sprang up with a bound, as

if a cannon had been fired at my ear. My whole being responded with a

start. The pen fell out of my fingers, the figures went out of my head

as if all faculty had departed: and yet I was conscious for a time at

least of keeping my self-control. I was like the rider of a frightened

horse, rendered almost wild by something which in the mystery of its

voiceless being it has seen, something on the road which it will not

pass, but wildly plunging, resisting every persuasion, turns from,

with ever increasing passion. The rider himself after a time becomes

infected with this inexplainable desperation of terror, and I suppose

I must have done so: but for a time I kept the upper hand. I would

not allow myself to spring up as I wished, as my impulse was, but sat

there doggedly, clinging to my books, to my table, fixing myself on

I did not mind what, to resist the flood of sensation, of emotion,

which was sweeping through me, carrying me away. I tried to continue

my calculations. I tried to stir myself up with recollections of the

miserable sights I had seen, the poverty, the helplessness. I tried

to work myself into indignation; but all through these efforts I felt

the contagion growing upon me, my mind falling into sympathy with

all those straining faculties of the body, startled, excited, driven

wild by something I knew not what. It was not fear. I was like a ship

at sea straining and plunging against wind and tide, but I was not

afraid. I am obliged to use these metaphors, otherwise I could give no

explanation of my condition, seized upon against my will, and torn from

all those moorings of reason to which I clung with desperation—as long

as I had the strength.

When I got up from my chair at last, the battle was lost, so far as

my powers of self-control were concerned. I got up, or rather was

dragged up, from my seat, clutching at these material things round me

as with a last effort to hold my own. But that was no longer possible;

I was overcome. I stood for a moment looking round me feebly, feeling

myself begin to babble with stammering lips, which was the alternative

of shrieking, and which I seemed to choose as a lesser evil. What I

said was, “What am I to do?” and after a while, “What do you want me

to do?” although throughout I saw no one, heard no voice, and had in

reality not power enough in my dizzy and confused brain to know what I

myself meant. I stood thus for a moment looking blankly round me for

guidance, repeating the question, which seemed after a time to become

almost mechanical. What do you want me to do? though I neither knew to

whom I addressed it nor why I said it. Presently—whether in answer,

whether in mere yielding of nature, I cannot tell—I became aware of a

difference: not a lessening of the agitation, but a softening, as if my

powers of resistance being exhausted, a gentler force, a more benignant

influence, had room. I felt myself consent to whatever it was. My heart

melted in the midst of the tumult; I seemed to give myself up, and

move as if drawn by some one whose arm was in mine, as if softly swept

along, not forcibly, but with an utter consent of all my faculties to

do I knew not what, for love of I knew not whom. For love—that was

how it seemed—not by force, as when I went before. But my steps took

the same course: I went through the dim passages in an exaltation

indescribable, and opened the door of my father's room.

He was seated there at his table, as usual, the light of the lamp

falling on his white hair: he looked up with some surprise at the sound

of the opening door. “Phil,” he said, and, with a look of wondering

apprehension on his face, watched my approach. I went straight up to

him, and put my hand on his shoulder. “Phil, what is the matter? What

do you want with me? What is it?” he said.

“Father, I can't tell you. I come not of myself. There must be

something in it, though I don't know what it is. This is the second

time I have been brought to you here.”

“Are you going——?” he stopped himself. The exclamation had been begun

with an angry intention. He stopped, looked at me with a scared look,

as if perhaps it might be true.

“Do you mean mad? I don't think so. I have no delusions that I know of.

Father, think—do you know any reason why I am brought here? for some

cause there must be.”

I stood with my hand upon the back of his chair. His table was covered

with papers, among which were several letters with the broad black

border which I had before observed. I noticed this now in my excitement

without any distinct associations of thoughts, for that I was not

capable of; but the black border caught my eye. And I was conscious

that he, too, gave a hurried glance at them, and with one hand swept

them away.

“Philip,” he said, pushing back his chair, “you must be ill, my poor

boy. Evidently we have not been treating you rightly: you have been

more ill all through than I supposed. Let me persuade you to go to bed.”

“I am perfectly well,” I said. “Father, don't let us deceive one

another. I am neither a man to go mad nor to see ghosts. What it is

that has got the command over me I can't tell: but there is some cause

for it. You are doing something or planning something with which I have

a right to interfere.”

He turned round squarely in his chair with a spark in his blue eyes. He

was not a man to be meddled with. “I have yet to learn what can give

my son a right to interfere. I am in possession of all my faculties, I

hope.”

“Father,” I cried, “won't you listen to me? no one can say I have

been undutiful or disrespectful. I am a man, with a right to speak

my mind, and I have done so; but this is different. I am not here by

my own will. Something that is stronger than I has brought me. There

is something in your mind which disturbs—others. I don't know what I

am saying. This is not what I meant to say: but you know the meaning

better than I. Some one—who can speak to you only by me—speaks to you

by me; and I know that you understand.”

He gazed up at me, growing pale, and his under lip fell. I, for

my part, felt that my message was delivered. My heart sank into a

stillness so sudden that it made me faint. The light swam in my eyes:

everything went round with me. I kept upright only by my hold upon the

chair; and in the sense of utter weakness that followed I dropped on my

knees I think first, then on the nearest seat that presented itself,

and covering my face with my hands, had hard ado not to sob, in the

sudden removal of that strange influence, the relaxation of the strain.

There was silence between us for some time; then he said, but with a

voice slightly broken, “I don't understand you Phil. You must have

taken some fancy into your mind which my slower intelligence——Speak out

what you want to say. What do you find fault with? Is it all—all that

woman Jordan?”

He gave a short forced laugh as he broke off, and shook me almost

roughly by the shoulder, saying, “speak out! what—what do you want to

say?”

“It seems, sir, that I have said everything.” My voice trembled more

than his, but not in the same way. “I have told you that I did not come

by my own will—quite otherwise. I resisted as long as I could: now all

is said. It is for you to judge whether it was worth the trouble or

not.”

He got up from his seat in a hurried way. “You would have me as—mad as

yourself,” he said, then sat down again as quickly. “Come, Phil: if it

will please you, not to make a breach, the first breach, between us,

you shall have your way. I consent to your looking into that matter

about the poor tenants. Your mind shall not be upset about that even

though I don't enter into all your views.”

“Thank you,” I said; “but father, that is not what it is.”

“Then it is a piece of folly,” he said, angrily. “I suppose you

mean——but this is a matter in which I choose to judge for myself.”

“You know what I mean,” I said, as quietly as I could, “though I don't

myself know; that proves there is good reason for it. Will you do one

thing for me before I leave you? Come with me into the drawing-room——”

“What end,” he said, with again the tremble in his voice, “is to be

served by that?”

“I don't very well know; but to look at her, you and I together, will

always do something for us, sir. As for the breach, there can be no

breach when we stand there.”

He got up, trembling like an old man, which he was, but which he never

looked like, save at moments of emotion like this, and told me to take

the light; then stopped when he had got half-way across the room. “This

is a piece of theatrical sentimentality,” he said. “No, Phil, I will

not go. I will not bring her into any such——Put down the lamp, and if

you will take my advice, go to bed.”

“At least,” I said, “I will trouble you no more, father, to-night. So

long as you understand, there need be no more to say.”

He gave me a very curt “good-night,” and turned back to his papers—the

letters with the black edge, either by my imagination or in reality,

always keeping uppermost. I went to my own room for my lamp, and then

alone proceeded to the silent shrine in which the portrait hung. I at

least would look at her to-night. I don't know whether I asked myself,

in so many words, if it were she who—or if it was any one—I knew

nothing; but my heart was drawn with a softness—born, perhaps, of the

great weakness in which I was left after that visitation—to her, to

look at her, to see perhaps if there was any sympathy, any approval in

her face. I set down my lamp on the table where her little work-basket

still was: the light threw a gleam upward upon her,—she seemed more

than ever to be stepping into the room, coming down towards me, coming

back to her life. Ah no! her life was lost and vanished: all mine stood

between her and the days she knew. She looked at me with eyes that

did not change. The anxiety I had seen at first seemed now a wistful

subdued question; but that difference was not in her look but in mine.

* * * * *

I need not linger on the intervening time. The doctor who attended

us usually, came in next day “by accident,” and we had a long

conversation. On the following day a very impressive yet genial

gentleman from town lunched with us—a friend of my father's, Dr.

something; but the introduction was hurried, and I did not catch his

name. He, too, had a long talk with me afterwards—my father being

called away to speak to some one on business. Dr. —— drew me out on the

subject of the dwellings of the poor. He said he heard I took great

interest in this question, which had come so much to the front at the

present moment. He was interested in it too, and wanted to know the

view I took. I explained at considerable length that my view did not

concern the general subject, on which I had scarcely thought, so much

as the individual mode of management of my father's estate. He was a

most patient and intelligent listener, agreeing with me on some points,

differing in others; and his visit was very pleasant. I had no idea

until after of its special object: though a certain puzzled look and

slight shake of the head when my father returned, might have thrown

some light upon it. The report of the medical experts in my case,

however, had been quite satisfactory, for I heard nothing more of them.

It was, I think, a fortnight later when the next and last of these

strange experiences came.

This time it was morning, about noon,—a wet and rather dismal spring

day. The half-spread leaves seemed to tap at the window, with an appeal

to be taken in; the primroses, that showed golden upon the grass at

the roots of the trees, just beyond the smooth-shorn grass of the

lawn, were all drooped and sodden among their sheltering leaves. The

very growth seemed dreary—the sense of spring in the air making the

feeling of winter a grievance, instead of the natural effect which it

had conveyed a few months before. I had been writing letters and was

cheerful enough, going back among the associates of my old life, with,

perhaps, a little longing for its freedom and independence, but at the

same time a not ungrateful consciousness that for the moment my present

tranquillity might be best.

This was my condition—a not unpleasant one—when suddenly the now

well-known symptoms of the visitation to which I had become subject

suddenly seized upon me,—the leap of the heart; the sudden, causeless,

overwhelming physical excitement, which I could neither ignore nor

allay. I was terrified beyond description, beyond reason, when I became

conscious that this was about to begin over again: what purpose did it

answer, what good was in it? My father, indeed, understood the meaning

of it, though I did not understand: but it was little agreeable to

be thus made a helpless instrument without any will of mine, in an

operation of which I knew nothing; and to enact the part of the oracle

unwillingly, with suffering and such a strain as it took me days to

get over. I resisted, not as before, but yet desperately, trying with

better knowledge to keep down the growing passion. I hurried to my

room and swallowed a dose of a sedative which had been given me to

procure sleep on my first return from India. I saw Morphew in the hall,

and called him to talk to him, and cheat myself, if possible, by that

means. Morphew lingered, however, and, before he came, I was beyond

conversation. I heard him speak, his voice coming vaguely through the

turmoil which was already in my ears, but what he said I have never

known. I stood staring, trying to recover my power of attention,

with an aspect which ended by completely frightening the man. He

cried out at last that he was sure I was ill, that he must bring me

something; which words penetrated more or less into my maddened brain.

It became impressed upon me that he was going to get some one—one of

my father's doctors, perhaps—to prevent me from acting, to stop my

interference,—and that if I waited a moment longer I might be too

late. A vague idea seized me at the same time, of taking refuge with

the portrait—going to its feet, throwing myself there, perhaps, till

the paroxysm should be over. But it was not there that my footsteps

were directed. I can remember making an effort to open the door of the

drawing-room, and feeling myself swept past it, as if by a gale of

wind. It was not there that I had to go. I knew very well where I had

to go,—once more on my confused and voiceless mission to my father, who

understood, although I could not understand.

Yet as it was daylight, and all was clear, I could not help noting

one or two circumstances on my way. I saw some one sitting in the

hall as if waiting—a woman, a girl, a black-shrouded figure, with a

thick veil over her face: and asked myself who she was, and what she

wanted there? This question, which had nothing to do with my present

condition, somehow got into my mind, and was tossed up and down upon

the tumultuous tide like a stray log on the breast of a fiercely

rolling stream, now submerged, now coming uppermost, at the mercy of

the waters. It did not stop me for a moment, as I hurried towards my

father's room, but it got upon the current of my mind. I flung open my

father's door, and closed it again after me, without seeing who was

there or how he was engaged. The full clearness of the daylight did not

identify him as the lamp did at night. He looked up at the sound of the

door, with a glance of apprehension; and rising suddenly, interrupting

some one who was standing speaking to him with much earnestness and

even vehemence, came forward to meet me. “I cannot be disturbed at

present,” he said quickly; “I am busy.” Then seeing the look in my

face, which by this time he knew, he too changed color. “Phil,” he

said, in a low, imperative voice, “wretched boy, go away—go away; don't

let a stranger see you——”

“I can't go away,” I said. “It is impossible. You know why I have come.

I cannot, if I would. It is more powerful than I——”

“Go, sir,” he said; “go at once—no more of this folly. I will not have

you in this room. Go——go!”

I made no answer. I don't know that I could have done so. There had

never been any struggle between us before; but I had no power to do

one thing or another. The tumult within me was in full career. I

heard indeed what he said, and was able to reply; but his words, too,

were like straws tossed upon the tremendous stream. I saw now with my

feverish eyes who the other person present was. It was a woman, dressed

also in mourning similar to the one in the hall; but this a middle-aged

woman, like a respectable servant. She had been crying, and in the

pause caused by this encounter between my father and myself, dried her

eyes with a handkerchief, which she rolled like a ball in her hand,

evidently in strong emotion. She turned and looked at me as my father

spoke to me, for a moment with a gleam of hope, then falling back into

her former attitude.

My father returned to his seat. He was much agitated too, though doing

all that was possible to conceal it. My inopportune arrival was

evidently a great and unlooked-for vexation to him. He gave me the only

look of passionate displeasure I have ever had from him, as he sat down

again: but he said nothing more.

“You must understand,” he said, addressing the woman, “that I have said

my last words on this subject. I don't choose to enter into it again

in the presence of my son, who is not well enough to be made a party

to any discussion. I am sorry that you should have had so much trouble

in vain; but you were warned beforehand, and you have only yourself to

blame. I acknowledge no claim, and nothing you can say will change my

resolution. I must beg you to go away. All this is very painful and

quite useless. I acknowledge no claim.”

“Oh, sir,” she cried, her eyes beginning once more to flow, her speech

interrupted by little sobs. “Maybe I did wrong to speak of a claim.

I'm not educated to argue with a gentleman. Maybe we have no claim.

But if it's not by right, oh, Mr. Canning, won't you let your heart be

touched by pity? She don't know what I'm saying, poor dear. She's not

one to beg and pray for herself, as I'm doing for her. Oh, sir, she's

so young! She's so lone in this world—not a friend to stand by her, nor

a house to take her in! You are the nearest to her of any one that's

left in this world. She hasn't a relation—not one so near as you——oh!”

she cried, with a sudden thought, turning quickly round upon me, “this

gentleman's your son! Now I think of it, it's not your relation she is,

but his, through his mother! That's nearer, nearer! Oh, sir! you're

young; your heart should be more tender. Here is my young lady that

has no one in the world to look to her. Your own flesh and blood: your

mother's cousin—your mother's——”

My father called to her to stop, with a voice of thunder. “Philip,

leave us at once. It is not a matter to be discussed with you.”

And then in a moment it became clear to me what it was. It had been

with difficulty that I had kept myself still. My breast was laboring

with the fever of an impulse poured into me, more than I could contain.

And now for the first time I knew why. I hurried towards him, and took

his hand, though he resisted, into mine. Mine were burning, but his

like ice: their touch burnt me with its chill, like fire. “This is what

it is?” I cried. “I had no knowledge before. I don't know now what is

being asked of you. But, father—understand! You know, and I know now,

that some one sends me—some one—who has a right to interfere.”

He pushed me away with all his might. “You are mad,” he cried. “What

right have you to think——? Oh, you are mad—mad! I have seen it coming

on——”

The woman, the petitioner, had grown silent, watching this brief

conflict with the terror and interest with which women watch a struggle

between men. She started and fell back when she heard what he said,

but did not take her eyes off me, following every movement I made.

When I turned to go away, a cry of indescribable disappointment and

remonstrance burst from her, and even my father raised himself up and

stared at my withdrawal, astonished to find that he had overcome me so

soon and easily. I paused for a moment, and looked back on them, seeing

them large and vague through the mist of fever. “I am not going away,”

I said. “I am going for another messenger—one you can't gainsay.”

My father rose. He called out to me threateningly, “I will have nothing

touched that is hers. Nothing that is hers shall be profaned——”

I waited to hear no more: I knew what I had to do. By what means it was

conveyed to me I cannot tell; but the certainty of an influence which

no one thought of calmed me in the midst of my fever. I went out into

the hall, where I had seen the young stranger waiting. I went up to

her and touched her on the shoulder. She rose at once, with a little

movement of alarm, yet with docile and instant obedience, as if she

had expected the summons. I made her take off her veil and her bonnet,

scarcely looking at her, scarcely seeing her, knowing how it was: I

took her soft, small, cool, yet trembling hand into mine; it was so

soft and cool, not cold, it refreshed me with its tremulous touch. All

through I moved and spoke like a man in a dream, swiftly, noiselessly,

all the complications of waking life removed, without embarrassment,

without reflection, without the loss of a moment. My father was still

standing up, leaning a little forward as he had done when I withdrew,

threatening, yet terror-stricken, not knowing what I might be about to

do, when I returned with my companion. That was the one thing he had

not thought of. He was entirely undefended, unprepared. He gave her one

look, flung up his arms above his head, and uttered a distracted cry,

so wild that it seemed the last outcry of nature—“Agnes!” then fell

back like a sudden ruin, upon himself, into his chair.

I had no leisure to think how he was, or whether he could hear what I

said. I had my message to deliver. “Father,” I said, laboring with my

panting breath, “it is for this that heaven has opened, and one whom

I never saw, one whom I know not, has taken possession of me. Had we

been less earthly we should have seen her—herself, and not merely her

image. I have not even known what she meant. I have been as a fool

without understanding. This is the third time I have come to you with

her message, without knowing what to say. But now I have found it out.

This is her message. I have found it out at last.”

There was an awful pause—a pause in which no one moved or breathed.

Then there came a broken voice out of my father's chair. He had not

understood, though I think he heard what I said. He put out two feeble

hands. “Phil—I think I am dying—has she—has she come for me?” he said.

We had to carry him to his bed. What struggles he had gone through

before I cannot tell. He had stood fast, and had refused to be moved,

and now he fell—like an old tower, like an old tree. The necessity

there was for thinking of him saved me from the physical consequences

which had prostrated me on a former occasion. I had no leisure now for

any consciousness of how matters went with myself.

His delusion was not wonderful, but most natural. She was clothed in

black from head to foot, instead of the white dress of the portrait.

She had no knowledge of the conflict, of nothing but that she was

called for, that her fate might depend on the next few minutes. In

her eyes there was a pathetic question, a line of anxiety in the lids,

an innocent appeal in the looks. And the face the same: the same lips,

sensitive, ready to quiver; the same innocent, candid brow; the look

of a common race, which is more subtle than mere resemblance. How I

knew that it was so, I cannot tell, nor any man. It was the other—the

elder—ah no! not elder; the ever young, the Agnes to whom age can never

come—she who they say was the mother of a man who never saw her—it was

she who led her kinswoman, her representative, into our hearts.

* * * * *

My father recovered after a few days: he had taken cold, it was said,

the day before—and naturally, at seventy, a small matter is enough to

upset the balance even of a strong man. He got quite well; but he was

willing enough afterwards to leave the management of that ticklish kind

of property which involves human well-being in my hands, who could move

about more freely, and see with my own eyes how things were going on.

He liked home better, and had more pleasure in his personal existence

in the end of his life. Agnes is now my wife, as he had, of course,

foreseen. It was not merely the disinclination to receive her father's

daughter, or to take upon him a new responsibility, that had moved him,

to do him justice. But both these motives had told strongly. I have

never been told, and now will never be told, what his griefs against

my mother's family, and especially against that cousin, had been; but

that he had been very determined, deeply prejudiced, there can be no

doubt. It turned out after, that the first occasion on which I had

been mysteriously commissioned to him with a message which I did not

understand, and which for that time he did not understand, was the

evening of the day on which he had received the dead man's letter,

appealing to him—to him, a man whom he had wronged—on behalf of the

child who was about to be left friendless in the world. The second

time, further letters, from the nurse who was the only guardian of the

orphan, and the chaplain of the place where her father had died, taking

it for granted that my father's house was her natural refuge—had been

received. The third I have already described, and its results.

For a long time after, my mind was never without a lurking fear that

the influence which had once taken possession of me might return again.

Why should I have feared to be influenced—to be the messenger of a

blessed creature, whose wishes could be nothing but heavenly? Who can

say? Flesh and blood is not made for such encounters: they were more

than I could bear. But nothing of the kind has ever occurred again.

Agnes had her peaceful domestic throne established under the picture.

My father wished it to be so, and spent his evenings there in the

warmth and light, instead of in the old library, in the narrow circle

cleared by our lamp out of the darkness, as long as he lived. It is

supposed by strangers that the picture on the wall is that of my wife;

and I have always been glad that it should be so supposed. She who was

my mother, who came back to me and became as my soul for three strange

moments and no more, but with whom I can feel no credible relationship

as she stands there, has retired for me into the tender regions of

the unseen. She has passed once more into the secret company of those

shadows, who can only become real in an atmosphere fitted to modify and

harmonise all differences, and make all wonders possible—the light of

the perfect day.—_Blackwood's Magazine._