I used to visit my mother's grave. Any one not knowing my Grandmother
might have thought she would be glad. But no--"Don't 'ee do it, my
dear. Once in a way 'tis right enough may be. But don't 'ee be getting
too fond of graveyards."
So I would gather flowers and put them on my mother's grave without
saying a word to any one.
One Saturday morning in April, about a year after my baptism, I had
picked primroses in the lanes, two great bunches, and was on my way
back to the cemetery, which lay in Bear Road on the outskirts of the
town, not very far above the Lawn. I was absorbed in my thoughts,
talking away as usual to myself. But when I saw a horse coming up the
road towards me I stepped aside almost into the ditch that ran along
under the hedgerow, and stared as one does at whatever inspires fear.
Horses came in my mind only second to cows as objects of prowling
terror. As the horse came nearer I looked up at its rider.
My heart beat violently. I inordinately wanted him to recognize me.
He glanced at me as he approached as any horseman might at a strange
child on the roadside; there was no recognition in the deep-set eyes.
He was sharper featured and less handsome than in my memory; but the
friendliness and aristocratic distinction of the face were as I had
retained them. Set on his horse, he looked something far above the
world I knew. Recognize me he must; I would make him.
"Sir! Sir!" I cried eagerly, shrilly, feebly, with an awkward appealing
gesture.
He put his hand in his pocket and threw me a shilling. So he thought
I was a beggar girl. I was filled with a burning shame of my lowly
appearance and shabby clothes, though truth to tell they were hardly as
bad as I thought them. I let the coin roll into the gutter. Now he was
passing me. My determination to make him know me became desperate: the
joy of being recognized must be mine. My heart was throbbing as I came
out into the middle of the road. I looked at him appealingly and cried
out:
"Westward Ho! Westward Ho!"
He stared.
"I'm not a beggar; I'm the little girl you gave the book to in
Torribridge. Don't you remember?"
He jumped from his horse.
"I do."
"Are you sure? Are you really sure?"
"Really! How is Aunt Jael?"
"Yes, yes, you do, you do!"
"And is it still so very silly to say that a certain little white town
looks glorious from the hills--?"
"Oh yes--"
"And did Uncle Simon--"
"Simeon," I corrected.
"--Let you read the book after all? Now do you believe I remember,
little Miss Doubting Thomas?"
I was radiant in the light of the kind quizzical smile.
"Of course I do. He burned it in the fire and said it was a wicked
swearing book just when I was at the best point where they attack the
Gold Train. That was when he began to treat me crueller, till at last I
ran away and came back to Grandmother and Aunt Jael."
"They live here--in Tawborough?"
"In Bear Lawn, do you know it? Number Eight."
"May I be inquisitive? What is your name, little girl?"
"Mary Lee. May I be inquisitive, please? What is _your_ name?"
"Ah, I don't think it would interest you if you heard it."
"That's not fair. Names are very important, they help you to know
what people are like. I'm Mary, you can see that to look at me, I
see that myself when I look in the glass. Any one like Aunt Jael
could only be called Aunt Jael, it belongs to her just as much as
her stick. I like names, especially fine names of people and places:
like Ur of the Chaldees. Say it over slowly, in a grand way like
this--Urr--of--the--Chal--dees! Penzance is another nice one, and
Marazion: I like all places with a 'z' in them, a 'z' looks so rare
and special. People's names are better still. The man we beat in
the Armada--do you remember it was you who told me about the Armada
first, and I thought it was an animal, but I know all about it now--the
Spanish commander was called the Duke of Medina Sidonia. Roll it over
on your tongue. If there is a Duke of Medina Sidonia alive now, I
should like to marry him. Fancy being called the Duchess of Medina
Sidonia!"
I half closed my eyes in rapture.
"Yes," he said twitching just a little at the corners of his mouth,
"you're the same little girl."
I liked this observation, as I was intended to. I could see he was
laughing at me, but liked me. I forgave the first for the second.
"You have not told me your name yet. I think it must be a good one."
"If it is _very_ good will you do the same for me as for the Duke of
Medina Sidonia?"
"What do you mean? Oh"--colouring--"I will see. Tell me your name
first."
"No, you must promise first."
"Very well then, if you won't! I can't promise to marry you. I shall
never marry at all." There was a quick vision of Robbie. "At least I
don't think so, and anyway it would be some one else. Good-bye, sir,
now." We were at the cemetery gates: "Unless you would wait? These
primroses are for my mother. I come here to put them on her grave."
"You wouldn't like me to come?"
"Yes, you may. I want you to."
"Why?"
"Because I like you. That's a proper reason; and _she_ wouldn't mind."
"Who? Your Grandmother you mean, or your aunt?"
"No, my mother. So come, will you please? What will you do with your
horse?"
The horse was not to be a stumbling block. "Here, hi!" he called to a
farmer's lad who was passing. "Hold the mare for a few minutes."
I led the way through the gate and across the familiar daisied turf. We
stopped at a simple grave, kerbless, grass-grown and unpretending. On
a plain upright slab of stone was inscribed
RACHEL TRAIES
_These are they which came out of great tribulation._
"Here we are."
"Which one?"
"This." I pointed.
"But, but--Traies? You told me your name was Lee."
"Yes, they call me Lee because my mother was called that before she was
married, and it's my Grandmother's name. Traies is my father's; people
don't use their father's name unless they live with him."
"I suppose not."
"What--why do you speak like that? You know him! You know my father!"
"No."
"You've heard of him I can see."
"Well, perhaps."
"How? When? What does he do? Where is he?" I waved the primroses.
"I don't know any of the things you ask me, and I don't know him.
Honour bright. But I think I've heard of him, though of course the Mr.
Traies I've heard of is quite likely a different person altogether, for
the name is not so rare in Devonshire."
"Is the one you've heard of a wicked man?"
"Not a very good man, perhaps."
"Oh, it's the same! Say wicked, it's what you mean. A vile wicked man.
He cruelly treated my mother and put her in this grave. There, I was
forgetting her. Mother dear, here are the primroses."
I knelt down and said a prayer, half aloud, more to my mother than
to her Maker and mine. Only for a moment, and then very slightly,
was I shy of the Stranger. Nor was there anything self-conscious
and melodramatic in me, no enjoyment in performing a striking and
sentimental act in front of another person, such as would have been
experienced by most people, and by myself too a few years later. (I had
less sense of pose and acting when some one else was watching me than
if alone, for I myself was the only person I performed in front of. On
the day when I hurled "Brawling woman in a wide house" at Aunt Jael,
it was somebody else inside me looking on and listening who exulted in
Mary's wit. Not for some years yet did I begin in the more usual manner
to make life a performance before other people.) I was silent for
perhaps three minutes. As I rose I wiped my eyes. So I think did the
Stranger.
He said: "Would you mind if I put some flowers there too--wipe your
knees, the grass is damp--Would you mind?"
"Why? No, it would be very kind. But you haven't got any."
"Some other time I shall bring them, when next I'm passing through
Tawborough."
"Why?"
"Because I like you. That's a proper reason; and--maybe--_she_ wouldn't
mind."
"Well, you may. We must go, it is dinner-time."
We reached the gate and he took his horse. Both of us knew we did not
accept this meeting as final, each of us was waiting for the other to
speak. I knew I could outwait him.
"Little girl, we shall see each other again? May I write and ask your
Grandmother or Aunt to let you come and see me?"
"Grandmother, not Aunt Jael. They might be angry though. What are
you--a Saint?"
"A what?"
"A Saint."
"No, a sinner. At least I think so. Not that I know quite what you
mean. Still I shall risk it."
"When?"
"One day. Don't worry; not far ahead. Now good-bye." His foot was in
the stirrup.
"Good-bye."
He was soon away up the hill. I stared him out of sight. He turned
round once.
I turned home, pleased and excited at the new life given to an old
player in the drama of Me. He was a kind and interesting looking
human-being, with this rare and all-important merit that he liked me. I
felt this keenly every time he looked at me. I turned over in my mind
whether I should tell Grandmother and decided not to. After all the
Stranger had said he would write to her: was it not better that she
should learn of it from him? For this letter I waited.
Another letter received by my Grandmother soon put all thought of the
Stranger at the back of my head.
One day at breakfast she read us a letter from no less a person than
the sixth Lord Tawborough, lord of Woolthy Hall. The writer stated that
his love for his old governess, reinforced by the wishes of his late
revered father, induced him (now that he had come back to Devonshire
to live) to hope to make the acquaintance of her mother; the more
especially as she had been wronged by one connected by kinship with the
family and whom she had first met in his father's house--his house.
Would Mrs. Lee be courteous enough to name a day on which it would be
convenient for him to call?
I was all attention. Now I should meet a person who had played a part
in my mother's life, the little boy who had been kind to her. There was
a debt to be paid here, as much as to any one who had been kind to my
own self. How I should pay back I could not yet decide. A lord! Mary
recompense a lord!
As I thus reflected Aunt Jael was weighing up whether she would accord
permission to His Lordship to enter _her_ house.
"Wull, let him come. Maybe he thinks he's honouring us. Let him know
a day on which he may call? The Lord's Day! He can come to Meeting
and learn that there's a bit of difference between his high position
before men and his wretched position before his Maker. Let him come. I
approve."
So did my Grandmother, whom natural instinct, religion, and the
sobering experience of seventy years' sisterhood had combined to teach
that it was not worth while pointing out that it was to her that
Lord Tawborough had written, or that the house too was equally hers,
inasmuch as one seventeen-pounds-ten-shillings is quite as good as
another.
"Very well, Lord's Day after next. I will ask him to come about ten
o'clock. If he wants to, he will make the time suit."
He made it suit, arriving at a bare four minutes past the hour on the
Lord's Day after next.
It was a big day to look forward to: except perhaps for my Grandmother,
with her curious indifference to persons and events worldly. Aunt
Jael pretended a scornful superiority which deceived nobody. That a
lord, and Lord Tawborough, one of the great ones of the earth (and
the county) was paying a visit to Miss Vickary--for so of course the
visit was announced--was soon all round the Meeting. On the Tuesday
preceding, the Misses Clinker discussed it all the afternoon.
"I don't 'old wi' these lords," said Miss Salvation, "the Lord God
A'mighty is good enough for me. They 'ave pride in their sinful 'earts,
and they imparts pride to them as receives 'em."
"_You_ jealous, ha, ha! Don't you know your place?" The old stick
thumped.
"I du; and well enough not to go inviting under my 'umble roof folks of
another station in life."
"In this life," corrected Glory.
Salvation agreed. "If you was to give 'im a plain talk about 'is sowl,
maybe the Lord would forgive the sinful pride in yer 'eart and render
the visit fruitful and a blessing to 'ee both. But you won't dare.
You'll remember 'e's a lord, and fearing to offend 'im ye'll offend
yer 'eavenly Lord instead--" She was ruder than she usually dared,
fortified by the knowledge that what she said was getting home.
"Silence, woman!" shouted Aunt Jael. "Every one of your foolish words
is false. The young man won't leave my house till he has confessed his
sin and been shown the plan of escape. I've asked 'im on a Lord's Day
so that he goes to Meeting with us, and hears the gospel. I've no doubt
for the first time in his life. He'll be there at 'Breaking of Bread.'"
"Aw, will 'ee?" Salvation reviewed rapidly what chance she would have
on that occasion of attracting his lordship's special notice.
"I beg your pardon, Sister Jael, I'm sure I do. Sorry I spoke in 'aste;
I was forgetting to jidge not so I be not jidged. Maybe you're asking a
few old friends up to meet him?"
"Maybe fiddlesticks."
Miss Salvation groaned aloud with envy and disappointment. If one
considers the disproportionate pleasure an invitation would have
given, Aunt Jael may be judged mean in her refusal. On the other hand,
poor Lord Tawborough!
My interest in the visitor was greater than Aunt Jael's, less snobbish
and more dramatic. He would be the first of my father's relatives I
had ever met: he figured in the sacred story of my mother. I pictured
a hundred times what he would be like; young, grand and impressive. He
would wear a coronet and carry a golden pole with ribbons floating from
the top.
At the last moment my chief attention shifted from the visitor to
myself: from considering what he would look like to what I should
look like to him. He was to arrive by carriage, he said. Aunt Jael
was to bow him into the famous front-room, swept and garnished for
the occasion, offer him a chair, a glass of sherry and a biscuit, and
hustle him off to Meeting. This was Aunt Jael's program. Mine was quite
as carefully worked out. I decided to stay upstairs in my bedroom
till he came, watching his arrival from my window, retiring so that
he could not catch a glimpse of me, and not descending till Aunt Jael
began to shout for me. Then I would go downstairs, ready dressed for
Meeting. The advantages were: first I looked best with my bonnet on,
as it concealed my scraggy and unalluring hair; second, I should have
seen him before he saw me, always a strategic advantage; third, he
would see me last, after he had had time to absorb the lesser charms of
Grandmother and Aunt Jael--even so does the leading lady fail to appear
till you have made the acquaintance of the lesser stars.
I made one eleventh-hour alteration. As I heard carriage-wheels coming
up the Lawn path, I decided, with impulsive generosity, not to peep
at him. It would be taking an unfair advantage: I would let him burst
on me at the same moment as I on him. To avoid temptation I ran away
from the window. I was specially excited. Now for some of Aunt Jael's
snobbery. A lord!
Grandmother was calling me, "Child, child!"
Begloved, bonnetted, Bibled, I went downstairs. As I approached the
half-open parlour door, I heard Aunt Jael expounding my "usual"
unpunctuality (a lie). My heart beat fast. I went in to greet our
visitor.
It was the stranger.
"Good morning, little girl. So you got home all right that day." He
rose, smiling. The advantage was his with a vengeance: poor reward for
my self-sacrifice in allowing him a simultaneous first-sight, when I
might have peeped from my window, discovered who he was and got through
my first excitement alone.
"You!" I gasped, "you're Lord Tawborough?" My amazement was shot
through with enjoyment of Aunt Jael's.
"Yes, that's the grand name I told you of. I'm not a duke, you see,
only a humble lord. I'm so sorry; Tawborough hasn't got quite the swing
of Medin-a Sidon-ia, I must admit. I'm sorry, Your Grace."
"You," I echoed, doubting if all this were not a dream. I clutched for
a moment to see if I could feel the side of my bed.
"Come now, child, explanations are due. What's this mean? There's been
concealment here."
"'Tis time to be off, Jael," whispered Grandmother, "twenty past."
"You must explain on the way; your lordship is ready too?" The first
sentence was spoken with usual harshness slightly modified for the
hearing of visitors, the second with an interesting mixture of
deference and command.
We sallied forth. Lord Tawborough on the outside, then Aunt Jael,
then Grandmother, then myself. On the way, he related briefly his
encounters with me, omitting with admirable reticence his purchase of
Westward Ho! and our visit to my mother's grave. Our entry into the
Room was stately, triumphant and restrained. In the Book of Judgment
there is a big black mark against Aunt Jael in that she did forget
she was entering the Lord's house, in her majestic obsession that she
was entering it with a lord. A biggish black mark against my name
too. Grandmother alone of the four of us has a clean white space.
For the Stranger too was proud--proud that he was not too proud to
mind entering a Brethren meeting-house with humble folk, the pride
of having no pride, the last pride of all--a huge mark his, black as
night. Marks against all the Saints' names too, even in that gathering
of devout souls I could see that there were none, excepting always my
Grandmother, who did not turn from holy thought for an odd moment now
and then to note their noble visitor: to feel a worldly interest in his
presence. More appropriately I could see them observing with regret
that he did not Break Bread (though of course he could not--it would
have been wicked if he had) and with pleasure that he was not allowed
to give to the box. Despite the glint of a gold guinea, Brother Brawn
snatched our four-mouthed monster proudly away from his outstretched
hand; we would not take gold from a sinner, albeit a peer.
In almost all the prayers that morning sorrowful reference was made to
his lordship: it was hoped that in His own good time the Lord might
turn him to Himself. After every such reference came "Ay-men! Ay-men!",
Salvation bellowing loudest.
I was too preoccupied pondering on the extraordinary fact that the
Stranger, my mother's little friend, and the sixth Lord Tawborough,
were one and the same person, to pay much heed to the service. One
feature, however, stands in my memory: an eloquent utterance by Brother
Briggs, who on this occasion outshone himself: shining face (remember
he was an oilman) and shining words alike. His voice roared through the
Room.
"There's zummat we've 'eard a powerful lot about jis' lately: Princes.
Princes dyin' an' marryin' and givin' in marridge.[3] Princes this an'
Princes that." (He took a deep breath, threw back his head, puffed out
his chest, slapped it heartily again and again, beamed supernally, and
shouted like a multitude.) "I'm a prince! You stares, brethrin, you
stares in wonderment, an' I repeats it to 'ee all; I'm a royull prince.
Why vor? Reflect a minute. What _is_ a prince?--Why, 'tis a King's son,
_an' I'm the son uv a King, I'm the son uv a King, I'm the son uv a
King_!" (He slapped his breast resoundingly three times.) "Ay, an' a
son uv the King of Kings; so I'm a Prince uv Princes! Turn wi' me to
the twenty-second chapter of the Gauspel accordin' to St. Luke, and
the twenty-ninth verse: 'I appoint unto you a kingdom.' _You_: that's
you and me, brethrin, that's our title and patent, or whatever 'tis
they caals un, to be princes royal uv the kingdom uv 'Eaven. Not as we
oughtn't ter respect the princes uv this earth: I knaws ma betters,
an' I ain't got no pashence wi' they as don't. 'Owsomever, they are
but mighty for 'a little space,' while us shan't never be anythin' but
lords an' princes, all thru the rollin' glorious years uv Eternity: vur
iver, an iver, an iver!
"An' _Who_ did it all? _'E_ did, _'E_, the same Chris' Jesus. 'E as
brought me up out uv a norribull pit, out uv the _moiry_ clay an' set
my feet upon a rock: the rock uv salvation. An' 'ere I am, a glorious
triumph an' trophy of 'eavenly Grace. An' so are all uv 'ee: triumphs
and trophies of Grace! It du my ol' eyesight good to look around this
blissid rume. My pore 'eart is nigh to bustin' this very minnit as I
speaks, wi' 'Is amazin' love fullin' ivry pore an' makin' me shout vur
joy. Praise ye the Lawr! Praise the Lawr, O My sowl! Praise 'Im in the
'eavens; praise 'Im in the 'eights! Praise 'Im on earth till us all
praises 'Im together in the sky! Bewtivul. Bewtivul. Bewtivul."
He clumped to his seat: a common dirty little man, faint with shouting
and radiant with God.
The moment the last prayer was over, Aunt Jael rose and stumped swiftly
for the door, our procession following: the Stranger, Grandmother,
Mary. This hint that she intended to escape without introducing "my
late niece's kinsman" to all and sundry was understood by sundry and by
all save one. Miss Salvation Clinker flew to the door and essayed to
bar our exit with ingratiating smile.
"Good mornin', good mornin' to 'ee, Sister Jael." Looked longingly
beyond to the Stranger.
Aunt Jael lifted her stick with threatening gesture, did not return the
greeting and gave no sign of recognition, thrusting past her through
the door.
Miss Salvation stifled a murderous and most unsaintly look, twisted her
enormous mouth into what she conceived to be a winsome smile--lips wide
apart, tiger-teeth gleaming--pulled out her black serge skirt with both
hands in the approved fashion of a courtesy, and ducked. The Stranger
slightly bowed--triumph after all!--and we escaped.
For dinner there was roast beef and sprouts followed by rhubarb pie.
Aunt Jael, republicanly, had decreed that there should be nothing
better than usual for dinner because a lord was coming. Nor, as far as
actual food went, was there. But there was a very special show of best
damask and our modest best silver, for no other reason (that I could
see) than that a lord was coming. Worse than this: Aunt Jael instructed
Mrs. Cheese to wait at table, as they do in grand houses. Instead of
my Great-Aunt just passing the plates along, Mrs. Cheese bore them,
laden with meat only, to our respective places, plumped them in front
of us, and then stood beside us in turn with the sprouts and potatoes.
Similarly for the pudding-course, with the cream and the sugar.
Unfortunately, when Mrs. Cheese waited at Lord Tawborough's side with
these, he was deep in converse and did not observe her. Mrs. Cheese
gave his lordship a hearty nudge. He flushed, and as flimsy covering
for his fault (in not observing her) said "No," to the sugar and cream,
thereby depriving himself, for the rhubarb was sour; and annoying Aunt
Jael, whose temper was sourer.
As soon as we were all served, Aunt Jael set upon our visitor. Her
fists tightened round her knife and fork, her brows were in battle trim.
"Wull, how did you like the service?" Staccato: opening shot.
He scented battle; realized that he was to be landed in a
heart-to-heart talk on the plain issues of religion: a thing he feared,
disliked and shirked. (He was a member of the Church of England.)
"Oh, very much, very much, thank you." A trifle evasively.
"Wull, what particular testimony helped you most? Whose utterance did
you find of most value?"
"Oh--er--they were all very sincere."
"But you found no special message? For instance, Brother Briggs?"
"Brother Briggs? Let me see, which was he?"
"The one over to the right who spoke last."
"Oh, that odd little man in the corner! His accent was a little
difficult in places: I've been away from Devonshire so long that I'm
afraid here and there I didn't quite follow what he said."
There was no intention of sarcasm; he realized the dangers too well.
But a certain "superiority" of manner--half-amused, half-irritated, and
altogether natural--enraged her.
There was a moment's dead silence. The storm broke tempestuously. She
was at the head of the table; the Stranger was sitting on her right.
She leaned across the intervening corner, banged the table with her
knife-encircling right fist, and howled into his face, with a withering
contempt it is impossible to convey, this one phrase: "_'E's got what
you ain't got!_"
He dropped his knife with a clatter on his plate in sheer fright,
starting back as far as he could as she leered into his face. It was
a moment before he could recover sufficiently to reply in a rather
quavery un-lord-like way, "Oh, er, what is it then?"
Thunderously: "_Eturrnal Life._"
The Stranger kept his temper, an irritating thing to do.
"How do you _know_, Miss Vickary, that I have no chance of eternal
life?"
On such mild opposition anger feeds. She raised her voice to a kind of
bass shriek, dropping her aitches generously.
"_'Ow_ do I know young man, 'ow do I know? If you 'ad eternal life,
if you _'ad_ accepted the Lord, you'd talk about 'Is grace and
goodness a little more bravely, and not look like a silly sheep when
'eavenly things are spoken of. Ugh, I know you shame-faced professin'
Christians, who blush when you 'ear the word Jesus, and never dare
to roll the 'oly word on your tongue, I know 'ee! _'Ow_ do I know?--
If you _'ad_ eternal life you'd not be mocking at a poor lowly
Brother who 'as a 'undredfold better chances of it than you, with
yer 'oh-er-ah-excellent little fellow in the corner with a difficult
accent doncherknow.' _Ow_ do I know? If you 'ad the Lord you'd be
a bit readier to talk about Him and testify to 'Is grace. Don't
tell me!"--she poked her head into his face for a final thunderous
shout,--"_By their fruits ye shall know them!_"
Grandmother looked troubled, seeking a chance to intervene. The
Stranger set his face like flint and determined to keep his temper,
though she should scalp him with the knife she was brandishing in his
face. He spoke very quietly.
"Miss Vickary, one moment please, what do _you_ know of my fruits?
After all we have met for the first time today."
His calm, his common-sense, were fuel to the fire. She thumped the
table with the butt end of her knife till it shook.
"Silence, youth, silence! Am I not seventy-two years of age, and ye but
twenty-one? In my young days youth respected age, rank or no rank. I
tell 'ee plainly: you're a miserable sinner. Learn to mind your manners
with those who're older than yourself; learn not to mock at them of
humbler station--"
"Miss Vickary, I--" he protested.
"Jael," pleaded my Grandmother.
"Oh, don't worry, Mrs. Lee. I don't mind, I don't really."
He looked across the table in a bee-line at my Grandmother, as though
Aunt Jael did not exist: the proper punishment for people who lose
their temper, the most pleasant revenge for those who keep theirs.
"No, no, don't worry; of course I don't mind. To be sure, I didn't
come here to discuss my own life in the next world but your little
granddaughter's in this. I can never forget her mother's kindness to
me, I want you to let me do something for her."
Aunt Jael recommenced eating, tired with shouting, beaten after all.
He had so swiftly but irrevocably changed the subject that she could
not easily go back to Brother Briggs and Eternal Life. My opinion of
the Stranger rose every moment. As a loyal Saint I had not liked his
slight note of superiority when he spoke of Brother Briggs, but the
moment Aunt Jael attacked him I was of course of his party through
thick and thin. And I realized the every-day worldly point of view just
enough to see that a peer of England is not accustomed to being railed
and shouted at by an old woman he hardly knows, least of all when he
is paying a courtesy visit to her in her own house, and decided that
the way he kept his temper was wonderful, as well as the shrewdest for
getting equal with Aunt Jael. With every reply, modelled on my own
method, my opinion of the Stranger rose. And now that he spoke with
reverence of my mother and of "doing things" for me my admiration knew
no bounds. He was perfect.
Grandmother was replying to him. "Thank you kindly; we need no help.
The child needs nothing but the love and mercy of the Lord."
"Quite so, but worldly advantages--"
"I need no worldly advantages for her, they could do nothing for her if
she had them. She is dedicated to the Lord's service in foreign parts,
and her whole life will be spent among the heathen."
Now or never I must strike for freedom.
"Oh, no, no, _NO_," I burst out.
There was an amazed silence. I was amazed myself. The words came from
my heart before I knew what I was saying.
My Grandmother's voice quavered; there was a bitter disappointment in
her face I had never seen there before. "Are you ill, child, are you?--"
"No, Grandmother, no, I will always love and serve the Lord. But not as
a missionary among the heathen, I cannot, I cannot, I have never dared
tell you about it before, but I will now. I often prayed about it, for
I wanted to please you and please Him, and months ago now soon after
my baptism He answered No. He told me He needed me in other ways, to
go about in England like an ordinary person and testify to Him there.
Grandmother dear, don't be sorrowful; 'tis true, it isn't because I
want to get out of going to the heathen, 'tis because I know the Lord
doesn't mean me to. Oh, if you knew how certain I was--"
She had no answer to this supreme plea. "Very well, my dear. If my
dream and your mother's is not to be fulfilled, if your dedication is
not to lead you to the fields of sacrifice I have prayed for, you can
still remain lowly and far above worldly graces and achievements. Thank
you, your lordship. Mary needs nothing."
"Mrs. Lee, I beg you. All I want to do is whatever a little money or
influence can, to give your grand-daughter certain advantages it might
not be easy for you--forgive me--to afford. I hardly know that I intend
anything special. The child is musical, I believe. Some good music
lessons, perhaps, with a first class master? Some tuition in French
or Italian, so that she might travel or take perhaps a really good
governess-post? I'm sure you will forgive me for thinking that her
mother would have wished it. It is in her name that I plead."
"And in the name of common-sense." To get a bit of her own back on
my Grandmother (for not having been rude to the Stranger) Aunt Jael
entered the new battle on my side. "If Lord Tawborough is good enough
to offer the child advantages we can't afford, we'd be fools not to
take them, and as for the child being a missionary, look at her! I
don't hold much with the governess idea, but she has to earn her living
somehow, and may as well take advantage of anything she can. Yes, Lord
Tawborough, _I_ accept."
My Grandmother offered some further resistance, but at last it was
decided that I was to have lessons in riding, music and French, each
with the best instructors in the town.
Riding! Music! French! Vistas spread before me. Imperial futures.
"Thank you, sir," I said rather primly, though I would have clasped his
hand if I had dared.
When we had finished dinner Aunt Jael settled down as usual for her
doze and Grandmother went upstairs to her bedroom to study the Word. At
our visitor's request I was excused Lord's Day's school and permitted
to go for a walk with him.
We went out of the town along by the river to the woods. I was
tongue-tied, waiting for him to speak. I was proud a little, confused a
little, shy a little, yet down in my heart quite at ease. Above every
other sentiment I was happy. Partly because of the new prospects he had
opened for me, partly because of the extraordinary coincidence by which
the Stranger and my mother's little boy were one and the same person,
chiefly because I liked him, and he liked me.
After a while he began to talk, and so did I. I was too naïvely
egotistical to see it then, but he made me talk, led me on all
unconscious to most garrulous self-expression. I grievously broke my
ancient rule of listening to other people, of absorbing things rather
than imparting them. I told him all about our life at Bear Lawn, about
Aunt Jael and Grandmother, about Uncle Simeon also and Torribridge,
with discreet omissions as to Christmas and New Year's Nights. Nor did
I tell him, for I could have told no one, a word about my own inner
life; it was too sacred, too ridiculous.
What was his inner life? I fell to wondering.
In my bedroom, on the evening of this wonderful Lord's Day a long and
tearful vigil. I had just got into my nightgown, when my Grandmother
came in. She closed the door more quietly, yet more decisively, than
usual. I knew what was going to happen. She came to me, took my arm,
and looked straight into my eyes.
"Child," she said, "you've taken away the brightest hope of my old age.
The light is gone out of my life."
With any one else there would have been a catch in the voice. In that
moment I understood and admired and pitied her more than in all the
years before. I felt the poignancy of her sorrow, and the measure of my
own shallowness and shame. I was her child, more than her child, her
daughter's gift to be given to the service of God; my dedication to
His Service was her supreme offering to Him Whom she loved with a love
beyond my understanding.
We knelt down together for the longest prayer that I remember.... Now
that I had forsworn my holy dedication and chosen the worldly path,
God grant that I might still walk as in His sight. I had confessed
in baptism that I had been raised with the Lord Jesus, and now I had
preferred a worldly future to the unsearchable riches of Christ. Might
the Lord in His mercy vouchsafe that my salvation might still be
secured and that she, the old pilgrim, whose call was very near--and
I, whose call might be nearer than I thought (ye know not the day
nor the hour)--and one other, called already, whom both of us loved
the best--might all three be united in tender love and everlasting
sisterhood around the throne of God....
I was sobbing.
She broke short, I remember, without finishing the prayer. "Forgive me,
my dear, 'tis I who am wrong. I admonish the Lord in vain. What He has
willed He has willed. 'Tis a great sorrow. _His will be done._"
FOOTNOTE:
[3] Albert, Prince Consort, died December 14th, 1861: Albert Edward,
Prince of Wales, married March 10th, 1863. The allusion must have been
to these events.