A FIRST MEETING.
Catherine Vernon had come to see with her own eyes that her guests or
tenants had arrived, and that they were comfortable. They were
relations, which justified the want of ceremony; but, perhaps, if they
had not been poor, and she had not been their benefactor, she would
scarcely, in so very easy a way, with a shawl over her cap, and at an
hour not adapted for visits, have made the first call upon them. She
would have been more indignant than any one at such a suggestion; but
human motives are very subtle, and, no doubt, though she was not in the
least aware of it, this was true. To be sure, there were circumstances
in which such a visit would have seemed, of all things, the most kind,
but not, perhaps, with persons so little in sympathy as Catherine Vernon
and Mrs. John. She knew she had been substantially kind. It is so much
easier to be substantially kind than to show that tender regard for
other people's feelings which is the only thing which ever calls forth
true gratitude; and perhaps Catherine had not altogether escaped the
deteriorating influences of too much prosperity. In her solitude she had
become a great observer of men--and women: and was disposed to find much
amusement in this observation. Miss Vernon was half aware that other
motives than those of pure benevolence affected her mind as she went
that evening to the Vernonry. Curiosity was in it. She could not but
wonder how Mrs. John was feeling, what she thought of all these changes.
She was glad that her cousin's widow had come home where she could be
looked after, and where it would be seen that nothing happened to her;
but she had wondered above measure when her offer of shelter and a home
had been accepted, not knowing, of course, anything about that very
active factor in Mrs. John's affairs, who was known to the people in
Redborough only as "the little girl." Catherine Vernon thought that she
herself, in Mrs. John's position, would have starved or worked her
fingers to the bone rather than have come back in such a humiliated
condition to the neighbourhood where she had held so different a place.
She was rather glad to feel herself justified in her contempt of her
cousin's wife by this failure in her of all "proper pride"; and she
allowed curiosity and a sense of superiority and her low estimate of
Mrs. John's capacity of feeling, to carry the day over her natural sense
of courtesy. What so natural, she said to herself, as that she should
run out and see whether they had arrived, and if they were comfortable,
and establish friendly, easy relations at once, without waiting for
formalities? _Qui s'excuse s'accuse._ Miss Vernon certainly knew, at the
bottom of her heart, that sorrow and downfall merited a more respectful
accost; but then Mrs. John had none of those delicacies of feeling, or
it was not in nature that she would have come at all. And nothing could
be more substantially kind than Catherine knew she had been. She had
engaged an excellent servant for them--a woman who had been in her own
house, and who was a capital cook, and capable of taking a kind of
charge as housekeeper if Mrs. John still remained incapable as of old;
and, no doubt, Miss Vernon thought, there would be a foreign _bonne_ of
some sort or other to take care of "the little girl." Her own maid
accompanied her to the gate, then went round to the humbler entrance
while Miss Vernon walked through the garden to the pretty verandah newly
put up (but in excellent taste and keeping, everybody said), which was
intended to form a sort of conservatory in a sunny corner, and give the
inhabitants a little more elegance and modern prettiness than the other
houses afforded. She had done this on purpose for Mrs. John, who had got
used, no doubt, to foreign ways, sitting out of doors, and indulgences
of that kind. Could anything have been more kind? And yet, at the bottom
of her heart, Miss Vernon was aware that if she had resisted her impulse
to come and spy upon the poor traveller this first night, and
investigate her feelings, and how she was supporting the change, and all
the recollections to be called forth by her return, she would have been
far more really kind. She felt this, yet she came. What is there in the
human bosom more strong than the desire to see how the gladiators die?
Poor Mrs. John was no gladiator, but she was upon the point of that
sword of suffering which some writhe and struggle upon, and some allow
themselves to be wounded by, in silence. Miss Vernon was very anxious to
know how she was bearing it. The daylight, which had come to an end
altogether in the dark wainscoted rooms inside, was still lingering
without. Behind the trees there was a golden clearness upon the horizon,
against which every branch stood out. The stars were only half visible
in the faint blue. The walk had been delightful. It was the time she
preferred to be abroad, her mind undisturbed by those cares which pursue
less peaceful people, yielding itself up entirely to the spell of
universal tranquillity and repose.
But when Miss Vernon, opening the glass door of the verandah, suddenly
came in sight of a figure which was quite unexpected, which she could
not identify or recognise, she was, for the moment, too much startled to
speak. A tall girl of fourteen, in that large development which so many
girls attain at that early age, to be "fined down" into slim grace and
delicacy afterwards--with rather high shoulders, increased by the simple
form of her dress; hair of a chestnut colour, cut short, and clustering
in natural rings and twists--not curled in the ordinary sense of the
word; a complexion in which white predominated, the creamy whiteness of
a sanguine temperament, with but little of the rose; and two large,
eager brown eyes, full of curiosity, full of life, evidently
interrogating everything, coming out, even upon the twilight and the
tears of departing day, with her lighted candle and all-questioning
eyes. There was so much warmth of life and movement about Hester, that
it was difficult not to feel a certain interest in her; and there was
something wonderfully characteristic in her attitude, arrested, as she
stepped out, like an explorer, with her candle in her hand.
"I don't know you," said Catherine Vernon, who, from her general
popularity and the worship administered to her all round, had, perhaps
without knowing it, acquired the familiar ease of expression which
belonged to kind and well-intentioned despots. The tone of her voice,
Hester thought, who was accustomed to that distinction, was as if she
said "_tu_." And it depends a great deal upon circumstances whether it
is affection or insult to _tutoyer_ a stranger. "I don't know you," she
said, coming in without any invitation, and closing the glass door
behind her. "I suppose you must have come with Mrs. John Vernon. It is
not possible," she cried a moment after, "that you are the little girl?"
"I am all the girl there is. I am Hester: but I don't know you either,"
the girl said, determined not to show any poltroonery or to veil her
pretensions for any one. "Are you Cousin Catherine?" she added after a
moment, with a quick drawn breath.
"Yes, I am Cousin Catherine. I came to see how you have got through your
journey, and how your mother is. I suppose she is your mother? It is
quite astonishing to me to see you look almost like a grown up young
woman, you whom I have always thought of as the little girl."
"I am fourteen," said Hester. "I never was very little since I can
remember;" and then they stood and looked at each other under the glass
roof, which still let in some light among the flowers, their two faces
lit up by the flame of the candle. Hester stood in front of the door
which led into the house, and, indeed, had something the aspect of a
guardian of the house preventing the visitor from going in. There was a
sort of resemblance to each other in their faces and somewhat largely
developed figures; but this, which ought to have been a comfortable and
soothing thought, did not occur to either. And it cannot be denied that
the first encounter was hostile on both sides.
"I should like to see your mother: to--welcome her--home."
"She has gone to bed. She was--tired," Hester said; and then, with an
effort--"I do not suppose it is quite happy for her, just the first
night, coming back to the place she used to live in. I made her go to
bed."
"You take good care of her," said Miss Vernon; "that is right. She
always wanted taking care of." Then, with a smile, she added, "Am I not
to go in? I came to see if you were comfortable and had everything you
want."
"Mother will be much obliged," said Hester, stiffly. She did not know
any better. She was not accustomed to visitors, and was altogether at a
loss what to do--not to speak of the instinct of opposition which sprang
up in her mind to this first new actor in the new life which lay vaguely
existing and unknown before her feet. It seemed to her, she could
scarcely tell how, that here was an enemy, some one to be held at arm's
length. As for Catherine Vernon, she was more completely taken aback by
this encounter than by anything which had happened for years. Few people
opposed her or met her with suspicion, much less hostility; and the
aspect of this girl standing in the doorway, defending it, as it were,
preventing her from entering, was half comic, half exasperating. Keeping
her out of her own house! It was one of the drawbacks of her easy
beneficence, the _defauts de ses qualités_, that she felt a little too
distinctly that it was her own house, which, seeing she had given it to
Mrs. John, was an ungenerosity in the midst of her generosity. But she
was human, like the rest of us. She began to laugh, bewildered, half
angry, yet highly tickled with the position, while Hester stood in front
of her, regarding her curiously with those big eyes. "I must rest here,
if I am not to go in," she said. "I hope you don't object to that; for
it is as much as I can do to walk from the Grange here."
Hester felt as if her lips were sealed. She could not say anything;
indeed she did not know what she ought to say. A vague sense that she
was behaving badly made her uncomfortable; but she was not going to
submit, to yield to the first comer, to let anybody enter who chose. Was
she not the guardian of her mother, and of her quiet and repose? She
shifted her position a little as Miss Vernon sat down on one of the
creaking basket chairs, but did not even put her candle out of her hand,
or relax in her defensive attitude. When her visitor laughed again,
Hester felt a flush of hot anger, like a flame, going over her. To be
ludicrous is the last thing a girl can bear: but even for that she would
not give in.
"You are a capital guardian," Catherine said, "but I assure you I am not
an enemy. I shall have to call my maid Jennings, who has gone to the
kitchen to see Betsey, before I go home, for I am not fond of walking
alone. You must try and learn that we are all friends here. I suppose
your mother has told you a great deal about the Vernons--and me?"
"I don't know about any Vernons--except ourselves," Hester said.
"My dear," said Miss Vernon, hastily, "you must not get it into your
little head that you are by any means at the head of the house, or near
it. Your grandfather was only the second son, and you are only a
girl--if you had been a boy it might have been different; and even my
great-grandfather, John Vernon, who is the head of our branch, was
nothing more than a cadet of the principal family. So don't give
yourself any airs on that score. All your neighbours here are better
Vernons than you----"
"I never give myself any airs--I don't know what you mean," said Hester,
feeling a wish to cry, but mastering herself with all the strength of
passion.
"Don't you, my poor child? I think you do. You are behaving in a silly
way, you know, meeting me like this. Your mother should have taught you
better manners. I have no desire but to be kind to you. But never mind,
I will not say anything about it, for I dare say you are all put the
wrong way with fatigue and excitement; otherwise I should think you were
excessively uncivil, do you know," Miss Vernon said.
And Hester stood, fiery-red, and listened. If she had spoken she must
have cried--there was no alternative. The candle flickered between the
two antagonists. They were antagonists already, as much as if they had
been on terms of equality. When Miss Vernon had rested as long as she
thought necessary, she got up and bade her young enemy good-night. "Tell
your mother that I have done my duty in the way of calling, and that it
is she now who must come to me," she said.
Hester stood at the door of the verandah, with her candle flaring into
the night, while Catherine went round to the other door to call
Jennings, her maid, and then watched the two walking away together with
a mixture of confused feeling which filled her childish soul to
overflowing. She wanted to cry, to stamp with her feet, and clench her
fists, and grind her teeth. She was like a child in the unreasoning
force of her passion, which was bitter shame as well. She had behaved
like a savage, like a fool, she knew, like a little silly, ill-tempered
child. She ought to be whipped for her rudeness, and--oh, far
worse!--she would be laughed at. Does not every one remember the
overwhelming, intolerable shame and mortification which envelope a young
creature like a sudden flame when she perceives that her conduct has
been ludicrous as well as wrong, and that she has laid herself open to
derision and laughter? Oh, if she could but wipe that hour out of her
life! But Hester felt that never, never could it be wiped out of her
life. She would remember it if she lived to be a hundred, Miss Vernon
would remember it, and tell everybody what a senseless, rude, ignorant
being she was. Oh, if the earth would open and swallow her up! She did
not wish to live any longer with the consciousness of this mistake. The
first time, the first time she had been tried--and she had made herself
ridiculous! The tears came pouring from her eyes like hail-drops, hot
and stinging. Oh, how she stamped upon the floor! Never more could she
hold up her head in this new place. She had covered herself with shame
the very first hour. All the self-restraint she could exercise was to
keep herself from flying up stairs and waking her mother in order to
tell her all that had happened. She was not what people call
unselfish--the one quality which is supposed to be appropriate to
feminine natures. She was kind and warm-hearted and affectionate, but
she was not without thought of herself. Her own little affairs naturally
bulked more largely to her than everything else in the world. She could
scarcely endure to keep all this to herself till to-morrow. She had
indeed flown up stairs with a cry of "Mother, mother!" open-mouthed: and
then it had occurred to her that to wake her mother would be cruel. She
was very tired, and she had been more "upset" than Hester had ever seen
her. Probably she would be still upset in the morning if she were
disturbed now in her slumber. Hester's fortitude was not sufficient to
make her go to bed quietly. She was almost noisy in her undressing,
letting her hair-brush fall, and pushing the furniture about, hoping
every moment that her mother would wake. But Mrs. John was very tired,
and she was a good sleeper. She lay perfectly still notwithstanding this
commotion; and Hester, with her heart swelling, had to put herself to
bed at last, where she soon fell asleep too, worn out with passion and
pain--things which weary the spirit more than even a day on the railway
or crossing the Channel when there are storms at sea.
Miss Vernon went home half amused, but more than half angry. Edward
Vernon had not very long before taken up his abode at the Grange, and he
was very attentive to Aunt Catherine, as many of the family called her.
He came out to meet her when she appeared, and blamed her tenderly for
not calling him when she went out.
"I do not think you would have been the worse for my arm," he said. He
was a slim young man with a black beard, though he was still quite
young, and a gentle expression in his eyes. He was one of those of whom
it is said he never gave his parents an anxious hour; but there was
something in his face which made one wonder whether this was from
genuine goodness, or because he had never yet come under temptation.
This doubt had passed through Catherine Vernon's mind when she heard all
that his enthusiastic family had to say of him; but it had worn away in
beholding the sweetness of his disposition, and his gentle, regular
life. To see him so dutiful and gentle was a relief and comfort to her
after the encounter she had just had.
"It would have given you a sensation," she said, "I promise you, if you
had come with me, Edward. I have just had a meeting with a little
spitfire, a little tiger-cat."
"Who is that, Aunt Catherine?"
Miss Vernon threw her shawl off her cap, and sat down on the sofa to
take breath. She had walked home faster than usual in the excitement of
the moment.
"If you will believe me," she said, "I don't even know her name--except
of course that it is Vernon, John Vernon's daughter. I suppose she must
have been warned against me, and instructed to keep me at arm's length."
"To keep _you_ at arm's length? That is not possible."
"Well, it does not look likely, does it?" she said, somewhat mollified.
"People are not generally afraid of Catherine Vernon: but it is singular
sometimes how you will find your own family steeled against you, when
everybody else likes you well enough. They see you too near at hand,
where there is no illusion possible, I suppose; but that could not be
the case with this little thing, who never set eyes on me before. She
let me know that her mother was not to be disturbed, and even refused me
admission--what do you think?--to my own house."
"Are you quite sure there is no mistake?" said Edward; "it seems
incomprehensible to me."
"Oh, I do not find it incomprehensible. She is Mrs. John's daughter, and
there never was any love lost between us. I always felt her to be a
vacant, foolish creature; and no one can tell what a venturesome,
ridiculous hoyden she thought me."
Here Catherine Vernon felt herself grow hot all over, as Hester had
done, bethinking herself of an encounter not altogether unlike the
present, in which she had enacted Hester's part, and exposed herself to
the ridicule of Mrs. John. Though this was nearly half a century ago, it
had still power to move her with that overwhelming sense of
mortification. There are things which no one ever forgets.
"When I heard of that woman coming home, I knew mischief would come of
it," Miss Vernon said.
"But forgive me, Aunt Catherine, was it not you that asked her to come?"
Catherine Vernon laughed.
"You have me there," she said. "I see you are quick, and I see you are
honest, Edward. Most people hearing me say that would have been
bewildered, and thought it not possible. No, I did not bring her. I only
said to her, if you are coming, there is a house here which you are
welcome to if you please. What else could I do?"
"She is not penniless, I suppose. You might have let her settle where
she pleased."
"She is not penniless, but she is heedless and heartless," said Miss
Vernon with a sigh; "and as for settling where she pleased, of course
anyhow she would have come here. And then, I never expected she would
take it."
"You thought she would come here, and yet you never expected she would
take it; and you knew she would make mischief, yet you invited her to
come. That is a jumble. I don't make head or tail of it."
"Nor I," cried Miss Vernon, with another laugh. "You shall carry the
problem a little further, if you please. I feared that her coming would
disturb us all, and yet I am half pleased in my heart, being such a bad
woman, that she is going to make a disturbance to prove me right. You
see I don't spare myself."
"It amuses you to make out your own motives as well as other people's:
and to show how they contradict each other," Edward said, shaking his
head.
This little bit of metaphysics refreshed Miss Vernon. She became quite
herself again, as she told him her story.
"The little firebrand!" she said, "the little spitfire! facing me on my
own ground, defying me, Catherine Vernon, in the very Vernonry, my own
creation!"
"I wonder what the child could mean by it; it must have been ignorance."
"Very likely it was ignorance: but it was more; it was opposition, firm,
healthy, instinctive opposition, without any cause for it; that is a
sort of thing which it refreshes one to see. It must have been born in
her, don't you see? for she didn't know me, never set eyes on me. The
little wild cat! She felt in every nerve of her that we were in
opposition, she and I."
"Don't you think you give too much importance to the nonsense of a girl?
I know," said Edward, with a very serious nod of his head, "what girls
are. I have six sisters. They are strange beings. They will go all off
at a tangent in a moment. Pull a wrong string, touch a wrong stop, and
they are all off--in a moment."
"You forget that I was once a girl myself."
"It is a long time ago, Aunt Catherine," said the ruthless young man. "I
dare say you have forgotten: whereas I, you know, have studied the
subject up to its very last development."
Miss Vernon shook her head at him with a playful menace, and then the
tea was brought in, and lights. As he went on talking, she could not
refrain from a little self-congratulation. What a wise choice she had
made! Many young men hurried out in the evenings, made acquaintances
that were not desirable, involved themselves in indifferent society.
Edward seemed to wish for nothing better than this soft home atmosphere,
her own company, his books and occupations. What a lucky choice! and at
the same time a choice that reflected much credit on herself. She might
just as well have chosen his brother, who was not so irreproachable. As
she sat on the sofa and took her tea, her eyes sought the figure of the
young man, pacing quietly up and down in the dim space, filling the
house and the room and her mind with a sensation of family completeness.
She was better off with Edward than many a mother with her son. It was
scarcely possible for Miss Vernon to divest herself of a certain feeling
of complacency. Even the little adventure with the stranger at the
Heronry enhanced this. Mrs. John, to whom she had been so magnanimous,
to whom she had offered shelter, had always been against her; she had
foreseen it, and if not content with this incident, was so with herself.