LUCY ROBARTS.
And now how was he to tell his wife? That was the consideration heavy
on Mark Robarts’ mind when last we left him; and he turned the matter
often in his thoughts before he could bring himself to a resolution.
At last he did do so, and one may say that it was not altogether a
bad one, if only he could carry it out.
He would ascertain in what bank that bill of his had been discounted.
He would ask Sowerby, and if he could not learn from him, he would go
to the three banks in Barchester. That it had been taken to one of
them he felt tolerably certain. He would explain to the manager his
conviction that he would have to make good the amount, his inability
to do so at the end of the three months, and the whole state of his
income; and then the banker would explain to him how the matter might
be arranged. He thought that he could pay £50 every three months with
interest. As soon as this should have been concerted with the banker,
he would let his wife know all about it. Were he to tell her at the
present moment, while the matter was all unsettled, the intelligence
would frighten her into illness.
But on the next morning there came to him tidings by the hands of
Robin postman, which for a long while upset all his plans. The letter
was from Exeter. His father had been taken ill, and had very quickly
been pronounced to be in danger. That evening—the evening on which
his sister wrote—the old man was much worse, and it was desirable
that Mark should go off to Exeter as quickly as possible. Of
course he went to Exeter—again leaving the Framley souls at the
mercy of the Welsh Low Churchman. Framley is only four miles from
Silverbridge, and at Silverbridge he was on the direct road to the
west. He was therefore at Exeter before nightfall on that day.
But nevertheless he arrived there too late to see his father again
alive. The old man’s illness had been sudden and rapid, and he
expired without again seeing his eldest son. Mark arrived at the
house of mourning just as they were learning to realize the full
change in their position.
The doctor’s career had been on the whole successful, but
nevertheless he did not leave behind him as much money as the world
had given him credit for possessing. Who ever does? Dr. Robarts had
educated a large family, had always lived with every comfort, and
had never possessed a shilling but what he had earned himself. A
physician’s fees come in, no doubt, with comfortable rapidity as soon
as rich old gentlemen and middle-aged ladies begin to put their faith
in him; but fees run out almost with equal rapidity when a wife and
seven children are treated to everything that the world considers
most desirable. Mark, we have seen, had been educated at Harrow and
Oxford, and it may be said, therefore, that he had received his
patrimony early in life. For Gerald Robarts, the second brother, a
commission had been bought in a crack regiment. He also had been
lucky, having lived and become a captain in the Crimea; and the
purchase-money was lodged for his majority. And John Robarts, the
youngest, was a clerk in the Petty Bag Office, and was already
assistant private secretary to the Lord Petty Bag himself—a place of
considerable trust, if not hitherto of large emolument; and on his
education money had been spent freely, for in these days a young man
cannot get into the Petty Bag Office without knowing at least three
modern languages; and he must be well up in trigonometry too, in
bible theology, or in one dead language—at his option.
And the doctor had four daughters. The two elder were married,
including that Blanche with whom Lord Lufton was to have fallen in
love at the vicar’s wedding. A Devonshire squire had done this in the
lord’s place; but on marrying her it was necessary that he should
have a few thousand pounds, two or three perhaps, and the old doctor
had managed that they should be forthcoming. The elder also had not
been sent away from the paternal mansion quite empty-handed. There
were, therefore, at the time of the doctor’s death two children left
at home, of whom one only, Lucy, the younger, will come much across
us in the course of our story.
Mark stayed for ten days at Exeter, he and the Devonshire squire
having been named as executors in the will. In this document it was
explained that the doctor trusted that provision had been made for
most of his children. As for his dear son Mark, he said, he was aware
that he need be under no uneasiness. On hearing this read Mark smiled
sweetly, and looked very gracious; but, nevertheless, his heart did
sink somewhat within him, for there had been a hope that a small
windfall, coming now so opportunely, might enable him to rid himself
at once of that dreadful Sowerby incubus. And then the will went on
to declare that Mary, and Gerald, and Blanche, had also, by God’s
providence, been placed beyond want. And here, looking into the
squire’s face, one might have thought that his heart fell a little
also; for he had not so full a command of his feelings as his
brother-in-law, who had been so much more before the world. To John,
the assistant private secretary, was left a legacy of a thousand
pounds; and to Jane and Lucy certain sums in certain four per cents.,
which were quite sufficient to add an efficient value to the hands
of those young ladies in the eyes of most prudent young would-be
Benedicts. Over and beyond this there was nothing but the furniture,
which he desired might be sold, and the proceeds divided among them
all. It might come to sixty or seventy pounds a piece, and pay the
expenses incidental on his death.
And then all men and women there and thereabouts said that old Dr.
Robarts had done well. His life had been good and prosperous, and
his will was just. And Mark, among others, so declared,—and was so
convinced in spite of his own little disappointment. And on the third
morning after the reading of the will Squire Crowdy, of Creamclotted
Hall, altogether got over his grief, and said that it was all right.
And then it was decided that Jane should go home with him,—for
there was a brother squire who, it was thought, might have an eye to
Jane;—and Lucy, the younger, should be taken to Framley Parsonage.
In a fortnight from the receipt of that letter Mark arrived at his
own house with his sister Lucy under his wing.
All this interfered greatly with Mark’s wise resolution as to
the Sowerby-bill incubus. In the first place he could not get to
Barchester as soon as he had intended, and then an idea came across
him that possibly it might be well that he should borrow the money of
his brother John, explaining the circumstances, of course, and paying
him due interest. But he had not liked to broach the subject when
they were there in Exeter, standing, as it were, over their father’s
grave, and so the matter was postponed. There was still ample time
for arrangement before the bill would come due, and he would not tell
Fanny till he had made up his mind what that arrangement would be. It
would kill her, he said to himself over and over again, were he to
tell her of it without being able to tell her also that the means of
liquidating the debt were to be forthcoming.
And now I must say a word about Lucy Robarts. If one might only go on
without those descriptions, how pleasant it would all be! But Lucy
Robarts has to play a forward part in this little drama, and those
who care for such matters must be made to understand something of her
form and likeness. When last we mentioned her as appearing, though
not in any prominent position, at her brother’s wedding, she was only
sixteen; but now, at the time of her father’s death, somewhat over
two years having since elapsed, she was nearly nineteen. Laying aside
for the sake of clearness that indefinite term of girl—for girls
are girls from the age of three up to forty-three, if not previously
married—dropping that generic word, we may say that then, at that
wedding of her brother, she was a child; and now, at the death of her
father, she was a woman.
Nothing, perhaps, adds so much to womanhood, turns the child so
quickly into a woman, as such death-bed scenes as these. Hitherto
but little had fallen to Lucy to do in the way of woman’s duties. Of
money transactions she had known nothing, beyond a jocose attempt
to make her annual allowance of twenty-five pounds cover all her
personal wants—an attempt which was made jocose by the loving bounty
of her father. Her sister, who was three years her elder—for John
came in between them—had managed the house; that is, she had made
the tea and talked to the housekeeper about the dinners. But Lucy had
sat at her father’s elbow, had read to him of evenings when he went
to sleep, had brought him his slippers and looked after the comforts
of his easy-chair. All this she had done as a child; but when she
stood at the coffin head, and knelt at the coffin side, then she was
a woman.
She was smaller in stature than either of her three sisters, to all
of whom had been acceded the praise of being fine women—a eulogy
which the people of Exeter, looking back at the elder sisters, and
the general remembrance of them which pervaded the city, were not
willing to extend to Lucy. “Dear—dear!” had been said of her; “poor
Lucy is not like a Robarts at all; is she, now, Mrs. Pole?”—for
as the daughters had become fine women, so had the sons grown into
stalwart men. And then Mrs. Pole had answered: “Not a bit; is she,
now? Only think what Blanche was at her age. But she has fine eyes,
for all that; and they do say she is the cleverest of them all.”
And that, too, is so true a description of her, that I do not know
that I can add much to it. She was not like Blanche; for Blanche had
a bright complexion, and a fine neck, and a noble bust, _et vera
incessu patuit Dea_—a true goddess, that is, as far as the eye
went. She had a grand idea, moreover, of an apple-pie, and had not
reigned eighteen months at Creamclotted Hall before she knew all the
mysteries of pigs and milk, and most of those appertaining to cider
and green geese.
Lucy had no neck at all worth speaking of,—no neck, I mean, that
ever produced eloquence; she was brown, too, and had addicted herself
in nowise, as she undoubtedly should have done, to larder utility. In
regard to the neck and colour, poor girl, she could not help herself;
but in that other respect she must be held as having wasted her
opportunities.
But then what eyes she had! Mrs. Pole was right there. They flashed
upon you—not always softly; indeed not often softly, if you were a
stranger to her; but whether softly or savagely, with a brilliancy
that dazzled you as you looked at them. And who shall say of what
colour they were? Green probably, for most eyes are green—green or
grey, if green be thought uncomely for an eye-colour. But it was not
their colour, but their fire, which struck one with such surprise.
Lucy Robarts was thoroughly a brunette. Sometimes the dark tint
of her cheek was exquisitely rich and lovely, and the fringes of
her eyes were long and soft, and her small teeth, which one so
seldom saw, were white as pearls, and her hair, though short, was
beautifully soft—by no means black, but yet of so dark a shade of
brown. Blanche, too, was noted for fine teeth. They were white and
regular and lofty as a new row of houses in a French city. But then
when she laughed she was all teeth; as she was all neck when she sat
at the piano. But Lucy’s teeth!—it was only now and again, when in
some sudden burst of wonder she would sit for a moment with her lips
apart, that the fine finished lines and dainty pearl-white colour of
that perfect set of ivory could be seen. Mrs. Pole would have said
a word of her teeth also, but that to her they had never been made
visible.
“But they do say that she is the cleverest of them all,” Mrs. Pole
had added, very properly. The people of Exeter had expressed such an
opinion, and had been quite just in doing so. I do not know how it
happens, but it always does happen, that everybody in every small
town knows which is the brightest-witted in every family. In this
respect Mrs. Pole had only expressed public opinion, and public
opinion was right. Lucy Robarts was blessed with an intelligence
keener than that of her brothers or sisters.
“To tell the truth, Mark, I admire Lucy more than I do Blanche.”
This had been said by Mrs. Robarts within a few hours of her having
assumed that name. “She’s not a beauty, I know, but yet I do.”
“My dearest Fanny!” Mark had answered in a tone of surprise.
“I do then; of course people won’t think so; but I never seem to care
about regular beauties. Perhaps I envy them too much.”
What Mark said next need not be repeated, but everybody may be
sure that it contained some gross flattery for his young bride. He
remembered this, however, and had always called Lucy his wife’s pet.
Neither of the sisters had since that been at Framley; and though
Fanny had spent a week at Exeter on the occasion of Blanche’s
marriage, it could hardly be said that she was very intimate with
them. Nevertheless, when it became expedient that one of them should
go to Framley, the remembrance of what his wife had said immediately
induced Mark to make the offer to Lucy; and Jane, who was of a
kindred soul with Blanche, was delighted to go to Creamclotted
Hall. The acres of Heavybed House, down in that fat Totnes country,
adjoined those of Creamclotted Hall, and Heavybed House still wanted
a mistress.
Fanny was delighted when the news reached her. It would of course
be proper that one of his sisters should live with Mark under their
present circumstances, and she was happy to think that that quiet
little bright-eyed creature was to come and nestle with her under the
same roof. The children should so love her—only not quite so much as
they loved mamma; and the snug little room that looks out over the
porch, in which the chimney never smokes, should be made ready for
her; and she should be allowed her share of driving the pony—which
was a great sacrifice of self on the part of Mrs. Robarts—and Lady
Lufton’s best good-will should be bespoken. In fact, Lucy was not
unfortunate in the destination that was laid out for her.
Lady Lufton had of course heard of the doctor’s death, and had sent
all manner of kind messages to Mark, advising him not to hurry home
by any means until everything was settled at Exeter. And then she was
told of the new-comer that was expected in the parish. When she heard
that it was Lucy, the younger, she also was satisfied; for Blanche’s
charms, though indisputable, had not been altogether to her taste. If
a second Blanche were to arrive there what danger might there not be
for young Lord Lufton!
“Quite right,” said her ladyship, “just what he ought to do. I
think I remember the young lady; rather small, is she not, and very
retiring?”
“Rather small and very retiring. What a description!” said Lord
Lufton.
“Never mind, Ludovic; some young ladies must be small, and some
at least ought to be retiring. We shall be delighted to make her
acquaintance.”
“I remember your other sister-in-law very well,” said Lord Lufton.
“She was a beautiful woman.”
“I don’t think you will consider Lucy a beauty,” said Mrs. Robarts.
“Small, retiring, and—” so far Lord Lufton had gone, when Mrs.
Robarts finished by the word, “plain.” She had liked Lucy’s face, but
she had thought that others probably did not do so.
“Upon my word,” said Lady Lufton, “you don’t deserve to have a
sister-in-law. I remember her very well, and can say that she is not
plain. I was very much taken with her manner at your wedding, my
dear; and thought more of her than I did of the beauty, I can tell
you.”
“I must confess I do not remember her at all,” said his lordship. And
so the conversation ended.
And then at the end of the fortnight Mark arrived with his sister.
They did not reach Framley till long after dark—somewhere between
six and seven—and by this time it was December. There was snow on
the ground, and frost in the air, and no moon, and cautious men when
they went on the roads had their horses’ shoes cocked. Such being the
state of the weather Mark’s gig had been nearly filled with cloaks
and shawls when it was sent over to Silverbridge. And a cart was sent
for Lucy’s luggage, and all manner of preparations had been made.
Three times had Fanny gone herself to see that the fire burned
brightly in the little room over the porch, and at the moment that
the sound of the wheels was heard she was engaged in opening her
son’s mind as to the nature of an aunt. Hitherto papa and mamma and
Lady Lufton were all that he had known, excepting, of course, the
satellites of the nursery.
And then in three minutes Lucy was standing by the fire. Those three
minutes had been taken up in embraces between the husband and the
wife. Let who would be brought as a visitor to the house, after a
fortnight’s absence, she would kiss him before she welcomed any one
else. But then she turned to Lucy, and began to assist her with her
cloaks.
“Oh, thank you,” said Lucy; “I’m not cold,—not very at least. Don’t
trouble yourself: I can do it.” But here she had made a false boast,
for her fingers had been so numbed that she could not do nor undo
anything.
They were all in black, of course; but the sombreness of Lucy’s
clothes struck Fanny much more than her own. They seemed to have
swallowed her up in their blackness, and to have made her almost
an emblem of death. She did not look up, but kept her face turned
towards the fire, and seemed almost afraid of her position.
“She may say what she likes, Fanny,” said Mark, “but she is very
cold. And so am I,—cold enough. You had better go up with her to her
room. We won’t do much in the dressing way to-night; eh, Lucy?”
In the bedroom Lucy thawed a little, and Fanny, as she kissed her,
said to herself that she had been wrong as to that word “plain.”
Lucy, at any rate, was not plain.
“You will be used to us soon,” said Fanny, “and then I hope we shall
make you comfortable.” And she took her sister-in-law’s hand and
pressed it.
Lucy looked up at her, and her eyes then were tender enough. “I am
sure I shall be happy here,” she said, “with you. But—but—dear
papa!” And then they got into each other’s arms, and had a great bout
of kissing and crying. “Plain,” said Fanny to herself, as at last
she got her guest’s hair smoothed and the tears washed from her
eyes—“plain! She has the loveliest countenance that I ever looked at
in my life!”
“Your sister is quite beautiful,” she said to Mark, as they talked
her over alone before they went to sleep that night.
“No, she’s not beautiful; but she’s a very good girl, and clever
enough too, in her sort of way.”
“I think her perfectly lovely. I never saw such eyes in my life
before.”
“I’ll leave her in your hands then; you shall get her a husband.”
“That mayn’t be so easy. I don’t think she’d marry anybody.”
“Well, I hope not. But she seems to me to be exactly cut out for an
old maid;—to be aunt Lucy for ever and ever to your bairns.”
“And so she shall, with all my heart. But I don’t think she will,
very long. I have no doubt she will be hard to please; but if I were
a man I should fall in love with her at once. Did you ever observe
her teeth, Mark?”
“I don’t think I ever did.”
“You wouldn’t know whether any one had a tooth in their head, I
believe.”
“No one except you, my dear; and I know all yours by heart.”
“You are a goose.”
“And a very sleepy one; so, if you please, I’ll go to roost.” And
thus there was nothing more said about Lucy’s beauty on that
occasion.
For the first two days Mrs. Robarts did not make much of her
sister-in-law. Lucy, indeed, was not demonstrative; and she was,
moreover, one of those few persons—for they are very few—who are
contented to go on with their existence without making themselves the
centre of any special outward circle. To the ordinary run of minds
it is impossible not to do this. A man’s own dinner is to himself
so important that he cannot bring himself to believe that it is a
matter utterly indifferent to every one else. A lady’s collection of
baby-clothes, in early years, and of house linen and curtain-fringes
in later life, is so very interesting to her own eyes, that she
cannot believe but what other people will rejoice to behold it. I
would not, however, be held as regarding this tendency as evil. It
leads to conversation of some sort among people, and perhaps to a
kind of sympathy. Mrs. Jones will look at Mrs. White’s linen-chest,
hoping that Mrs. White may be induced to look at hers. One can only
pour out of a jug that which is in it. For the most of us, if we do
not talk of ourselves, or at any rate of the individual circles of
which we are the centres, we can talk of nothing. I cannot hold with
those who wish to put down the insignificant chatter of the world.
As for myself, I am always happy to look at Mrs. Jones’s linen,
and never omit an opportunity of giving her the details of my own
dinners.
But Lucy Robarts had not this gift. She had come there as a stranger
into her sister-in-law’s house, and at first seemed as though she
would be contented in simply having her corner in the drawing-room
and her place at the parlour-table. She did not seem to need the
comforts of condolence and open-hearted talking. I do not mean to say
that she was moody, that she did not answer when she was spoken to,
or that she took no notice of the children; but she did not at once
throw herself and all her hopes and sorrows into Fanny’s heart, as
Fanny would have had her do.
Mrs. Robarts herself was what we call demonstrative. When she was
angry with Lady Lufton she showed it. And as since that time her love
and admiration for Lady Lufton had increased, she showed that also.
When she was in any way displeased with her husband, she could
not hide it, even though she tried to do so, and fancied herself
successful;—no more than she could hide her warm, constant,
overflowing woman’s love. She could not walk through a room hanging
on her husband’s arm without seeming to proclaim to every one there
that she thought him the best man in it. She was demonstrative, and
therefore she was the more disappointed in that Lucy did not rush at
once with all her cares into her open heart.
“She is so quiet,” Fanny said to her husband.
“That’s her nature,” said Mark. “She always was quiet as a child.
While we were smashing everything, she would never crack a teacup.”
“I wish she would break something now,” said Fanny, “and then perhaps
we should get to talk about it.” But she did not on this account
give over loving her sister-in-law. She probably valued her the more,
unconsciously, for not having those aptitudes with which she herself
was endowed.
And then after two days Lady Lufton called; of course it may be
supposed that Fanny had said a good deal to her new inmate about Lady
Lufton. A neighbour of that kind in the country exercises so large an
influence upon the whole tenor of one’s life, that to abstain from
such talk is out of the question. Mrs. Robarts had been brought up
almost under the dowager’s wing, and of course she regarded her as
being worthy of much talking. Do not let persons on this account
suppose that Mrs. Robarts was a tuft-hunter, or a toad-eater. If they
do not see the difference they have yet got to study the earliest
principles of human nature.
Lady Lufton called, and Lucy was struck dumb. Fanny was particularly
anxious that her ladyship’s first impression should be favourable,
and to effect this, she especially endeavoured to throw the two
together during that visit. But in this she was unwise. Lady Lufton,
however, had woman-craft enough not to be led into any egregious
error by Lucy’s silence.
“And what day will you come and dine with us?” said Lady Lufton,
turning expressly to her old friend Fanny.
“Oh, do you name the day. We never have many engagements, you know.”
“Will Thursday do, Miss Robarts? You will meet nobody you know, only
my son; so you need not regard it as going out. Fanny here will tell
you that stepping over to Framley Court is no more going out, than
when you go from one room to another in the parsonage. Is it, Fanny?”
Fanny laughed and said that that stepping over to Framley Court
certainly was done so often that perhaps they did not think so much
about it as they ought to do.
“We consider ourselves a sort of happy family here, Miss Robarts,
and are delighted to have the opportunity of including you in the
ménage.”
Lucy gave her ladyship one of her sweetest smiles, but what she said
at that moment was inaudible. It was plain, however, that she could
not bring herself even to go as far as Framley Court for her dinner
just at present. “It was very kind of Lady Lufton,” she said to
Fanny; “but it was so very soon, and—and—and if they would only
go without her, she would be so happy.” But as the object was to go
with her—expressly to take her there—the dinner was adjourned for a
short time—_sine die_.