AN EMIGRATION SCHEME.
Several months passed away, bringing no visitor to Riversborough, except
Phebe, who came down two or three times to see Mr. Clifford, whose
favorite she was. But Phebe never spoke of the past to Jean Merle. Since
they had determined what to do, it seemed wiser to her not to look back
so as to embitter the present. Jean Merle was gradually gaining a
footing in the town as Mr. Clifford's representative, and was in many
ways filling a post very few could fill. Now and then, some of the elder
townsmen, who had been contemporary with Roland Sefton, remarked upon
the resemblance between Jean Merle and their old comrade; but this was
satisfactorily accounted for by his relationship to Madame Sefton: for
Roland, they said, had always had a good deal of the foreigner about
him, much more than this quiet, melancholy, self-effacing man, who never
pushed himself forward, or courted attention, yet was always ready with
a good sound shrewd opinion if he was asked for it. It had been a lucky
thing for old Clifford that such a man had been found to take care of
him and his affairs in his extreme old age.
Felix had gone back to his curacy, under Canon Pascal, in the parish
where he had spent his boyhood and where he was safe against any attack
upon his father's memory. But in spite of being able to see Alice every
day, and of enjoying Canon Pascal's constant companionship, he was ill
at ease, and Phebe was dissatisfied. This was exactly the life Felicita
had dreaded for him, an easy, half-occupied life in a small parish,
where there was little active employment for either mind or body. The
thought of it troubled and haunted Phebe. The magnificent physical
strength and active energy of Felix, and the strong bent to heroic
effort and Christian devotion given to him in his earliest years, were
thrown away in this tranquil English village, where there was clearly no
scope for heroism. How was it that Canon Pascal could not see it? His
curacy was a post to be occupied by some feebler man than Felix; a man
whose powers were only equal to the quiet work of carrying on the labors
begun by his rector. Besides, Felix would have recovered from the shock
of his mother's sudden death if his time and faculties had been more
fully occupied. She must give words to her discontent, and urge Canon
Pascal to banish him from a spot where he was leading too dull a life.
Canon Pascal had been in residence at Westminster for some weeks, and
was about to return to his rectory, when Phebe went down to the Abbey
one day, bent upon putting her decision into action. The bitterness of
the early spring had come again; and strong easterly gales were blowing
steadily day after day, bringing disease and death to those who were
feeble and ailing, yet not more surely than the fogs of the city had
done. It had been a long and gloomy winter, and in this second month of
the year the death rates were high. As Phebe passed through the Abbey on
her way to his home in the cloisters, she saw Canon Pascal standing
still, with his head thrown back and his eyes uplifted to the noble
arches supporting the roof. He did not notice her till her clear,
pleasant voice addressed him.
"Ah, Phebe!" he exclaimed, a swift smile transforming his grave, marked
face, "my dear, I was just asking myself how I could bear to say
farewell to all this."
He glanced round him with an expression of unutterable love and pride
and of keen regret. The Abbey had grown dearer to him than any spot on
earth; and as he paced down the long aisle he lingered as if every step
he took was full of pain.
"Bid farewell to it!" repeated Phebe; "but why?"
"For a series of whys," he answered; "first and foremost, because the
doctors tell me, and I believe it, that my dear wife's days are numbered
if she stays another year in this climate. All our days are numbered by
God, I know; but man can number them also, if he pleases, and make them
longer or shorter by his obedience or disobedience. Secondly, Phebe, our
sons have gone on before us as pioneers, and they send us piteous
accounts of the spiritual needs of the colonists and the native
populations out yonder. I preach often on the evils of over-population
and its danger to our country, and I prescribe emigration to most of the
young people I come across. Why should not I, even I, take up the
standard and cry 'Follow me'? We should leave England with sad hearts,
it is true, but for her good and for the good of unborn generations, who
shall create a second England under other skies. And last, but not
altogether least, the colonial bishopric is vacant, and has been offered
to me. If I accept it I shall save the life most precious to me, and
find another home in the midst of my children and grand-children."
"And Felix?" cried Phebe.
"What could be better for Felix than to come with us?" he asked; "there
he will meet with the work he was born for, the work he is fretting his
soul for. He will be at last a gallant soldier of the Cross, unhampered
by any dread of his father's sin rising up against him. And we could
never part with Alice--her mother and I. You would be the last to say No
to that, Phebe?"
"Oh, yes!" she answered, with tears standing in her eyes, "Felix must go
with you."
"And Hilda, too," he went on; "for what would become of Hilda alone
here, with her only brother settled at the antipodes? And here we shall
want Phebe Marlowe's influence with old Mr. Clifford, who might prevent
his ward from quitting England. I am counting also on Phebe herself, as
my pearl of deaconesses, with no vow to bind her, if the happiness and
fuller life of marriage opened before her. Still, to secure all these
benefits I must give up all this."
He paused for a minute or two, looking back up the narrow side aisle,
and then, as if he could not tear himself away, he retraced his steps
slowly and lingeringly; and Phebe caught the glistening of tears in his
eyes.
"Never to see it again," he murmured, "or if I see it, not to belong to
it! To have no more right here than any other stranger! It feels like a
home to me, dear Phebe. I have had solemn glimpses of God here, as if it
were indeed the gate of heaven. To the last hour of my life, wherever I
go, my soul will cleave to these walls. But I shall give it up."
"Yes," she said, sighing, "but there is no bitterness of repentance to
you in giving it up."
"How sadly you spoke that," he went on, "as if a woman like you could
know the bitterness of repentance! You have only looked at it through
other men's eyes. Yes, we shall go. Felix and Hilda and you are free to
leave Mr. Clifford, now he is so admirably cared for by this Jean Merle.
I like all that I hear of him, though I never saw him; surely it was a
blessing from God that Madame Sefton's poor kinsman was brought to the
old man. Could we not leave him safely in Merle's charge?"
"Quite safely," she answered.
"I have a scheme for a new settlement in my head," he continued, "a
settlement of our own, and we will invite emigrants to it. I can reckon
on a few who will joyfully follow our lead, and it will not seem a
strange land if we carry those whom we love with us. This hour even I
have made up my mind to accept this bishopric. Go on, dear Phebe, and
tell my wife. I must stay here alone a little longer."
But Phebe did not hasten with these tidings through the cloisters. She
walked to and fro, pondering them and finding in them a solution of many
difficulties. For Felix it would be well, and it was not to be expected
that Alice would leave her invalid mother to remain behind in England as
a curate's wife. Hilda, too, what could be better or happier for her
than to go with those who looked upon her as a daughter, who would take
Alice's place as soon as she was gone into a home of her own? There was
little to keep them in England. She could not refuse to let them go.
But herself? The strong strain of faithfulness in Phebe's nature knitted
her as closely with the past as with the present; and with some touch of
pathetic clinging to the past which the present cannot possess. She
could not separate herself from it. The little home where she was born,
and the sterile fields surrounding it, with the wide moors encircling
them, were as dear to her as the Abbey was to Canon Pascal. In no other
place did she feel herself so truly at home. If she cut herself adrift
from it and all the subtly woven web of memories belonging to it, she
fancied she might pine away of home-sickness in a foreign land. There
was Mr. Clifford too, who depended so utterly upon her promise to be
near him when he was dying, and to hold his hand in hers as he went
down into the deep chill waters of death. And Jean Merle, whose terrible
secret she shared, and would be the only one to share it when Mr.
Clifford was gone. How was it possible for her to separate herself from
these two? She loved Felix and Hilda with all the might of her unselfish
heart; but Felix had Alice, and by and by Hilda would give herself to
some one who would claim most of her affection. She was not necessary to
either of them. But if she went away she must leave a blank, too dreary
to be thought of, in the clouded lives of Mr. Clifford and poor Merle.
For their sakes she must refuse to leave England.