MR. KIRKPATRICK, Q.C.
Cynthia was always the same with Molly: kind, sweet-tempered, ready
to help, professing a great deal of love for her, and probably
feeling as much as she did for any one in the world. But Molly had
reached to this superficial depth of affection and intimacy in the
first few weeks of Cynthia's residence in her father's house; and if
she had been of a nature prone to analyse the character of one whom
she loved dearly, she might have perceived that, with all Cynthia's
apparent frankness, there were certain limits beyond which her
confidence did not go; where her reserve began, and her real self was
shrouded in mystery. For instance, her relations with Mr. Preston
were often very puzzling to Molly. She was sure that there had been a
much greater intimacy between them formerly at Ashcombe, and that the
remembrance of this was often very galling and irritating to Cynthia,
who was as evidently desirous of forgetting it as he was anxious
to make her remember it. But why this intimacy had ceased, why
Cynthia disliked him so extremely now, and many other unexplained
circumstances connected with these two facts, were Cynthia's secrets;
and she effectually baffled all Molly's innocent attempts during
the first glow of her friendship for Cynthia, to learn the girlish
antecedents of her companion's life. Every now and then Molly came
to a dead wall, beyond which she could not pass--at least with the
delicate instruments which were all she chose to use. Perhaps Cynthia
might have told all there was to tell to a more forcible curiosity,
which knew how to improve every slip of the tongue and every fit of
temper to its own gratification. But Molly's was the interest of
affection, not the coarser desire of knowing everything for a little
excitement; and as soon as she saw that Cynthia did not wish to tell
her anything about that period of her life, Molly left off referring
to it. But if Cynthia had preserved a sweet tranquillity of manner
and an unvarying kindness for Molly during the winter of which there
is question, at present she was the only person to whom the beauty's
ways were unchanged. Mr. Gibson's influence had been good for her as
long as she saw that he liked her; she had tried to keep as high a
place in his good opinion as she could, and had curbed many a little
sarcasm against her mother, and many a twisting of the absolute
truth when he was by. Now there was a constant uneasiness about her
which made her more cowardly than before; and even her partisan,
Molly, could not help being aware of the distinct equivocations she
occasionally used when anything in Mr. Gibson's words or behaviour
pressed her too hard. Her repartees to her mother were less frequent
than they had been, but there was often the unusual phenomenon
of pettishness in her behaviour to her. These changes in humour
and disposition, here described all at once, were in themselves a
series of delicate alterations of relative conduct spread over many
months--many winter months of long evenings and bad weather, which
bring out discords of character, as a dash of cold water brings out
the fading colours of an old fresco.
During much of this time Mr. Preston had been at Ashcombe; for Lord
Cumnor had not been able to find an agent whom he liked to replace
Mr. Preston; and while the inferior situation remained vacant Mr.
Preston had undertaken to do the duties of both. Mrs. Goodenough had
had a serious illness; and the little society at Hollingford did not
care to meet while one of their habitual set was scarcely out of
danger. So there had been very little visiting; and though Miss
Browning said that the absence of the temptations of society was very
agreeable to cultivated minds, after the dissipations of the previous
autumn, when there were parties every week to welcome Mr. Preston,
yet Miss Phoebe let out in confidence that she and her sister had
fallen into the habit of going to bed at nine o'clock, for they found
cribbage night after night, from five o'clock till ten, rather too
much of a good thing. To tell the truth, that winter, if peaceful,
was monotonous in Hollingford; and the whole circle of gentility
there was delighted to be stirred up in March by the intelligence
that Mr. Kirkpatrick, the newly-made Q.C., was coming on a visit for
a couple of days to his sister-in-law, Mrs. Gibson. Mrs. Goodenough's
room was the very centre of gossip; gossip had been her daily bread
through her life, gossip was meat and wine to her now.
"Dear-ah-me!" said the old lady, rousing herself so as to sit upright
in her easy-chair, and propping herself with her hands on the arms;
"who would ha' thought she'd such grand relations! Why, Mr. Ashton
told me once that a Queen's counsel was as like to be a judge as a
kitten is like to be a cat. And to think of her being as good as
a sister to a judge! I saw one oncst; and I know I thought as I
shouldn't wish for a better winter-cloak than his old robes would
make me, if I could only find out where I could get 'em second-hand.
And I know she'd her silk gowns turned and dyed and cleaned, and, for
aught I know, turned again, while she lived at Ashcombe. Keeping a
school, too, and so near akin to this Queen's counsel all the time!
Well, to be sure, it wasn't much of a school--only ten young ladies
at the best o' times; so perhaps he never heard of it."
"I've been wondering what they'll give him to dinner," said Miss
Browning. "It is an unlucky time for visitors; no game to be had,
and lamb so late this year, and chicken hardly to be had for love or
money."
"He'll have to put up with calf's head, that he will," said Mrs.
Goodenough, solemnly. "If I'd ha' got my usual health I'd copy out
a receipt of my grandmother's for a rolled calf's head, and send it
to Mrs. Gibson--the doctor has been very kind to me all through this
illness--I wish my daughter in Combermere would send me some autumn
chickens--I'd pass 'em on to the doctor, that I would; but she's been
a-killing of 'em all, and a-sending of them to me, and the last she
sent she wrote me word was the last."
"I wonder if they'll give a party for him!" suggested Miss Phoebe.
"I should like to see a Queen's counsel for once in my life. I have
seen javelin-men, but that's the greatest thing in the legal line I
ever came across."
"They'll ask Mr. Ashton, of course," said Miss Browning. "The three
black graces, Law, Physic, and Divinity, as the song calls them.
Whenever there's a second course, there's always the clergyman of the
parish invited in any family of gentility."
"I wonder if he's married!" said Mrs. Goodenough. Miss Phoebe had
been feeling the same wonder, but had not thought it maidenly to
express it, even to her sister, who was the source of knowledge,
having met Mrs. Gibson in the street on her way to Mrs. Goodenough's.
"Yes, he's married, and must have several children, for Mrs. Gibson
said that Cynthia Kirkpatrick had paid them a visit in London, to
have lessons with her cousins. And she said that his wife was a most
accomplished woman, and of good family, though she brought him no
fortune."
"It's a very creditable connection, I'm sure; it's only a wonder
to me as how we've heard so little talk of it before," said Mrs.
Goodenough. "At the first look of the thing, I shouldn't ha' thought
Mrs. Gibson was one to hide away her fine relations under a bushel;
indeed, for that matter, we're all of us fond o' turning the best
breadth o' the gown to the front. I remember, speaking o' breadths,
how I've undone my skirts many a time and oft to put a stain or a
grease-spot next to poor Mr. Goodenough. He'd a soft kind of heart
when first we was married, and he said, says he, 'Patty, link thy
right arm into my left one, then thou'lt be nearer to my heart;' and
so we kept up the habit, when, poor man, he'd a deal more to think on
than romancing on which side his heart lay; so, as I said, I always
put my damaged breadths on the right hand, and when we walked arm in
arm, as we always did, no one was never the wiser."
"I should not be surprised if he invited Cynthia to pay him another
visit in London," said Miss Browning. "If he did it when he was poor,
he's twenty times more likely to do it now he's a Queen's counsel."
"Ay, work it by the rule o' three, and she stands a good chance. I
only hope it won't turn her head; going up visiting in London at her
age. Why, I was fifty before ever I went!"
"But she has been in France; she's quite a travelled young lady,"
said Miss Phoebe.
Mrs. Goodenough shook her head for a whole minute before she gave
vent to her opinion.
"It's a risk," said she, "a great risk. I don't like saying so to
the doctor, but I shouldn't like having my daughter, if I was him,
so cheek-by-jowl with a girl as was brought up in the country where
Robespierre and Bonyparte was born."
"But Buonaparte was a Corsican," said Miss Browning, who was much
farther advanced both in knowledge and in liberality of opinions than
Mrs. Goodenough. "And there's a great opportunity for cultivation of
the mind afforded by intercourse with foreign countries. I always
admire Cynthia's grace of manner, never too shy to speak, yet never
putting herself forwards; she's quite a help to a party; and if she
has a few airs and graces, why they're natural at her age! Now as for
dear Molly, there's a kind of awkwardness about her--she broke one of
our best china cups last time she was at a party at our house, and
spilt the coffee on the new carpet; and then she got so confused that
she hardly did anything but sit in a corner and hold her tongue all
the rest of the evening."
"She was so sorry for what she'd done, sister," said Miss Phoebe,
in a gentle tone of reproach; she was always faithful to Molly.
"Well, and did I say she wasn't? but was there any need for her to be
stupid all the evening after?"
"But you were rather sharp,--rather displeased--"
"And I think it my duty to be sharp, ay, and cross too, when I see
young folks careless. And when I see my duty clear, I do it; I'm not
one to shrink from it, and they ought to be grateful to me. It's
not every one that will take the trouble of reproving them, as Mrs.
Goodenough knows. I'm very fond of Molly Gibson, very, for her own
sake and for her mother's too; I'm not sure if I don't think she's
worth half-a-dozen Cynthias, but for all that she shouldn't break my
best china teacup, and then sit doing nothing for her livelihood all
the rest of the evening."
By this time Mrs. Goodenough gave evident signs of being tired;
Molly's misdemeanors and Miss Browning's broken teacup were not as
exciting subjects of conversation as Mrs. Gibson's newly-discovered
good luck in having a successful London lawyer for a relation.
Mr. Kirkpatrick had been, like many other men, struggling on in his
profession, and encumbered with a large family of his own; he was
ready to do a good turn for his connections, if it occasioned him no
loss of time, and if (which was, perhaps, a primary condition) he
remembered their existence. Cynthia's visit to Doughty Street nine
or ten years ago had not made much impression upon him after he had
once suggested its feasibility to his good-natured wife. He was even
rather startled every now and then by the appearance of a pretty
little girl amongst his own children, as they trooped in to dessert,
and had to remind himself who she was. But as it was his custom
to leave the table almost immediately and to retreat into a small
back-room called his study, to immerse himself in papers for the rest
of the evening, the child had not made much impression upon him; and
probably the next time he remembered her existence was when Mrs.
Kirkpatrick wrote to him to beg him to receive Cynthia for a night on
her way to school at Boulogne. The same request was repeated on her
return; but it so happened that he had not seen her either time; and
only dimly remembered some remarks which his wife had made on one of
these occasions, that it seemed to her rather hazardous to send so
young a girl so long a journey without making more provision for her
safety than Mrs. Kirkpatrick had done. He knew that his wife would
fill up all deficiencies in this respect as if Cynthia had been her
own daughter; and thought no more about her until he received an
invitation to attend Mrs. Kirkpatrick's wedding with Mr. Gibson, the
highly-esteemed surgeon of Hollingford, &c. &c.--an attention which
irritated instead of pleasing him. "Does the woman think I have
nothing to do but run about the country in search of brides and
bridegrooms, when this great case of Houghton _v._ Houghton is coming
on, and I haven't a moment to spare?" he asked of his wife.
"Perhaps she never heard of it," suggested Mrs. Kirkpatrick.
"Nonsense! the case has been in the papers for days."
"But she mayn't know you are engaged in it."
"She mayn't," said he, meditatively--such ignorance was possible.
But now the great case of Houghton _v._ Houghton was a thing of the
past; the hard struggle was over, the comparative table-land of Q.
C.-dom gained, and Mr. Kirkpatrick had leisure for family feeling and
recollection. One day in the Easter vacation he found himself near
Hollingford; he had a Sunday to spare, and he wrote to offer himself
as a visitor to the Gibsons from Friday till Monday, expressing
strongly (what he really felt, in a less degree,) his wish to make
Mr. Gibson's acquaintance. Mr. Gibson, though often overwhelmed with
professional business, was always hospitable; and moreover, it was
always a pleasure to him to get out of the somewhat confined mental
atmosphere which he had breathed over and over again, and have a
whiff of fresh air: a glimpse of what was passing in the great world
beyond his daily limits of thought and action. So he was ready to
give a cordial welcome to his unknown relation. Mrs. Gibson was
in a flutter of sentimental delight, which she fancied was family
affection, but which might not have been quite so effervescent if Mr.
Kirkpatrick had remained in his former position of struggling lawyer,
with seven children, living in Doughty Street.
When the two gentlemen met they were attracted towards each other
by a similarity of character, with just enough difference in their
opinions to make the experience of each, on which such opinions
were based, valuable to the other. To Mrs. Gibson, although the
bond between them counted for very little in their intercourse, Mr.
Kirkpatrick paid very polite attention; and was, in fact, very glad
that she had done so well for herself as to marry a sensible and
agreeable man, who was able to keep her in comfort, and to behave
to her daughter in so liberal a manner. Molly struck him as a
delicate-looking girl, who might be very pretty if she had a greater
look of health and animation: indeed, looking at her critically,
there were beautiful points about her face--long soft grey eyes,
black curling eyelashes, rarely-showing dimples, perfect teeth;
but there was a languor over all, a slow depression of manner,
which contrasted unfavourably with the brightly-coloured Cynthia,
sparkling, quick, graceful, and witty. As Mr. Kirkpatrick expressed
it afterwards to his wife, he was quite in love with that girl;
and Cynthia, as ready to captivate strangers as any little girl
of three or four, rose to the occasion, forgot all her cares and
despondencies, remembered no longer her regret at having lost
something of Mr. Gibson's good opinion, and listened eagerly and made
soft replies, intermixed with nave sallies of droll humour, till
Mr. Kirkpatrick was quite captivated. He left Hollingford, almost
surprised to have performed a duty, and found it a pleasure. For Mrs.
Gibson and Molly he had a general friendly feeling; but he did not
care if he never saw them again. But for Mr. Gibson he had a warm
respect, a strong personal liking, which he should be glad to have
ripen into a friendship, if there was time for it in this bustling
world. And he fully resolved to see more of Cynthia; his wife must
know her; they must have her up to stay with them in London, and show
her something of the world. But, on returning home, Mr. Kirkpatrick
found so much work awaiting him that he had to lock up embryo
friendships and kindly plans in some safe closet of his mind,
and give himself up, body and soul, to the immediate work of his
profession. But, in May, he found time to take his wife to the
Academy Exhibition, and some portrait there striking him as being
like Cynthia, he told his wife more about her and his visit to
Hollingford than he had ever had leisure to do before; and the
result was that on the next day a letter was sent off to Mrs. Gibson,
inviting Cynthia to pay a visit to her cousins in London, and
reminding her of many little circumstances that had occurred when she
was with them as a child, so as to carry on the clue of friendship
from that time to the present.
On its receipt, this letter was greeted in various ways by the four
people who sate round the breakfast-table. Mrs. Gibson read it to
herself first. Then, without telling what its contents were, so that
her auditors were quite in the dark as to what her remarks applied,
she said,--
"I think they might have remembered that I am a generation nearer to
them than she is, but nobody thinks of family affection now-a days;
and I liked him so much, and bought a new cookery-book, all to make
it pleasant and agreeable and what he was used to." She said all this
in a plaintive, aggrieved tone of voice; but as no one knew to what
she was referring, it was difficult to offer her consolation. Her
husband was the first to speak.
"If you want us to sympathize with you, tell us what is the nature of
your woe."
"Why, I daresay it's what he means as a very kind attention, only I
think I ought to have been asked before Cynthia," said she, reading
the letter over again.
"Who's _he_? and what's meant for a 'kind attention'?"
"Mr. Kirkpatrick, to be sure. This letter is from him; and he wants
Cynthia to go and pay them a visit, and never says anything about you
or me, my dear. And I'm sure we did our best to make it pleasant; and
he should have asked us first, I think."
"As I couldn't possibly have gone, it makes very little difference to
me."
"But I could have gone; and, at any rate, he should have paid us
the compliment: it's only a proper mark of respect, you know. So
ungrateful, too, when I gave up my dressing-room on purpose for him!"
"And I dressed for dinner every day he was here, if we are each to
recapitulate all our sacrifices on his behalf. But, for all that, I
didn't expect to be invited to his house. I shall be only too glad if
he will come again to mine."
"I've a great mind not to let Cynthia go," said Mrs. Gibson
reflectively.
"I can't go, mamma," said Cynthia, colouring. "My gowns are all so
shabby, and my old bonnet must do for the summer."
"Well, but you can buy a new one; and I'm sure it is high time you
should get yourself another silk gown. You must have been saving up a
great deal, for I don't know when you've had any new clothes."
Cynthia began to say something, but stopped short. She went on
buttering her toast, but she held it in her hand without eating it;
without looking up either, as, after a minute or two of silence, she
spoke again:--
"I cannot go. I should like it very much; but I really cannot go.
Please, mamma, write at once, and refuse it."
"Nonsense, child! When a man in Mr. Kirkpatrick's position comes
forward to offer a favour, it does not do to decline it without
giving a sufficient reason. So kind of him as it is, too!"
"Suppose you offer to go instead of me?" proposed Cynthia.
"No, no! that won't do," said Mr. Gibson, decidedly. "You can't
transfer invitations in that way. But, really, this excuse about your
clothes does appear to be very trivial, Cynthia, if you have no other
reason to give."
"It is a real, true reason to me," said Cynthia, looking up at him
as she spoke. "You must let me judge for myself. It would not do
to go there in a state of shabbiness, for even in Doughty Street,
I remember, my aunt was very particular about dress; and now that
Margaret and Helen are grown up, and they visit so much,--pray don't
say anything more about it, for I know it would not do."
"What have you done with all your money, I wonder?" said Mrs. Gibson.
"You've twenty pounds a year, thanks to Mr. Gibson and me; and I'm
sure you haven't spent more than ten."
"I hadn't many things when I came back from France," said Cynthia, in
a low voice, and evidently troubled by all this questioning. "Pray
let it be decided at once; I can't go, and there's an end of it." She
got up, and left the room rather suddenly.
"I don't understand it at all," said Mrs. Gibson. "Do you, Molly?"
"No. I know she doesn't like spending money on her dress, and is very
careful." Molly said this much, and then was afraid she had made
mischief.
"But then she must have got the money somewhere. It always has struck
me that if you have not extravagant habits, and do not live up to
your income, you must have a certain sum to lay by at the end of the
year. Have I not often said so, Mr. Gibson?"
"Probably."
"Well, then, apply the same reasoning to Cynthia's case; and then, I
ask, what has become of the money?"
"I cannot tell," said Molly, seeing that she was appealed to. "She
may have given it away to some one who wants it."
Mr. Gibson put down his newspaper.
"It's very clear that she has neither got the dress nor the money
necessary for this London visit, and that she doesn't want any more
inquiries to be made on the subject. She likes mysteries, in fact,
and I detest them. Still, I think it's a desirable thing for her to
keep up the acquaintance, or friendship, or whatever it is to be
called, with her father's family; and I shall gladly give her ten
pounds; and if that's not enough, why, either you must help her out,
or she must do without some superfluous article of dress or another."
"I'm sure there never was such a kind, dear, generous man as you are,
Mr. Gibson," said his wife. "To think of your being a stepfather!
and so good to my poor fatherless girl! But, Molly my dear, I
think you'll acknowledge that you too are very fortunate in your
stepmother. Are not you, love? And what happy _tte--ttes_ we shall
have together when Cynthia goes to London! I'm not sure if I don't
get on better with you even than with her, though she is my own
child; for, as dear papa says so truly, there is a love of mystery
about her; and if I hate anything, it is the slightest concealment
or reserve. Ten pounds! Why, it will quite set her up, buy her a
couple of gowns and a new bonnet, and I don't know what all! Dear Mr.
Gibson, how generous you are!"
Something very like "Pshaw!" was growled out from behind the
newspaper.
"May I go and tell her?" said Molly, rising up.
"Yes, do, love. Tell her it would be so ungrateful to refuse; and
tell her that your father wishes her to go; and tell her, too, that
it would be quite wrong not to avail herself of an opening which may
by-and-by be extended to the rest of the family. I am sure if they
ask me--which certainly they ought to do--I won't say before they
asked Cynthia, because I never think of myself, and am really the
most forgiving person in the world, in forgiving slights;--but when
they do ask me, which they are sure to do, I shall never be content
till, by putting in a little hint here and a little hint there, I've
induced them to send you an invitation. A month or two in London
would do you so much good, Molly."
Molly had left the room before this speech was ended, and Mr. Gibson
was occupied with his newspaper; but Mrs. Gibson finished it to
herself very much to her own satisfaction; for, after all, it was
better to have some one of the family going on the visit, though she
might not be the right person, than to refuse it altogether, and
never to have the opportunity of saying anything about it. As Mr.
Gibson was so kind to Cynthia, she too would be kind to Molly, and
dress her becomingly, and invite young men to the house; do all
the things, in fact, which Molly and her father did not want to
have done, and throw the old stumbling-blocks in the way of their
unrestrained intercourse, which was the one thing they desired to
have, free and open, and without the constant dread of her jealousy.