A SURNAME AT LAST.
When Simon Verstage learned that Mehetabel was to be married to
the Broom-Squire, he was not lightly troubled. He loved the girl
more dearly than he was himself aware. He was accustomed to see
her about the house, to hear her cheerful voice, and to be welcomed
with a pleasant smile when he returned from the fields. There was
constitutional ungraciousness in his wife. She considered it
lowering to her dignity, or unnecessary, to put on an amiable face,
and testify to him pleasure at his presence. Little courtesies are
dear to the hearts of the most rugged men; Simon received them
from Mehetabel, and valued them all the more because withheld
from him by his wife. The girl had known how to soothe him when
ruffled, she had forestalled many of his little requirements, and
had exercised a moderating influence in the house. Mrs. Verstage,
in her rough, imperious fashion, had not humored him, and many a
domestic storm was allayed by the tact of Mehetabel.
Simon had never been demonstrative in his affection, and it was
only now, when he was about to lose her, that he became aware how
dear she was to his old heart. But what could he do, now that she
had given herself to Jonas Kink? Of the manner in which this had
been brought about he knew nothing. Had he been told he would
have stormed, and insisted on the engagement coming to an end. But
would this have mended matters? Would it not have made Mehetabel's
position in the house only more insupportable?
He remained silent and depressed for a week, and when the girl
was in the room followed her with his eyes, with a kindly,
regretful light in them. When she passed near him, he held out
his hand, took hers, squeezed it, and said, "Matabel, we shall
miss you:--wun'erful--wun'erful!"
"Dear father!" she would answer, and return the pressure of his
hand, whilst her eyes filled.
"I hope you'll be happy," he would say; then add, "I suppose you
will. Mother says so, and wimen knows about them sort o' things
better nor we."
To his wife Simon said, "Spare nothing. Give her a good outfit,
just as if she was our own daughter. She has been a faithful
child, and has saved us the expense and worrit of a servant,
and I will not have it said--but hang it! what odds to me what
is said? I will not have her feel that we begrudge her aught.
She has no father and mother other than we, and we must be to
her all that we can."
"Leave that to me," said the wife.
Mainly through the instrumentality of Mrs. Verstage the marriage
was hastened on; it was to be as soon as the banns had been called
thrice.
"Wot's the good o' waitin'?" asked Mrs. Verstage, "where all is
pleasant all round, and all agreed?"
Mehetabel was indifferent, even disposed to have the wedding
speedily, there was no advantage in postponing the inevitable. If
she were not wanted in the Ship, her presence was desired in the
Punch-Bowl, if not by all the squatters there, at all events by
the one most concerned.
She felt oppression in the house in which she had been at home
from infancy, and was even conscious that her adopted mother was
impatient to be rid of her. Mehetabel was proud, too proud to
withdraw from her engagement, to acknowledge that she had rushed
into it without consideration, and had accepted a man whom she
did not love. Too proud, in fine, to continue one day longer
than need be, eating the bread of charity.
Seamstresses were summoned, and every preparation made that
Mehetabel should have abundance of clothing when she left the Ship.
"Look here, Susanna," said Simon, "you'll have made a pocket in
them gownds, you mind."
"Yes, Simon, of course."
"Becos I means to put a little purse in for Matabel when she
goes from us--somethin' to be her own. I won't have the little
wench think we han't provided for her."
"How much?" asked Mrs. Verstage, jealously.
"That I'm just about considerin'," answered the old man cautiously.
"Don't you do nothin' reckless and unraysonable, Simon. What will
she want wi' money? Hasn't she got the Broom-Squire to pay for
all and everything?"
During the three weeks that intervened between the precipitate
and ill-considered engagement and the marriage, Mehetabel hardly
came to her senses. Sometimes when occupied with her work in the
house a qualm of horror came over her and curdled the blood in her
heart; then with a cold sweat suffusing her brow, and with pale
lips, she sank on a stool, held her head between her palms, and
fought with the thoughts that rose like spectres, and with the
despair that rolled in on her soul like a dark and icy tide. The
words spoken by the hostess had made it impossible for her to
retrace her steps. She could not understand what had come over
Mrs. Verstage to induce her to address her as she had. The after
conduct of the hostess was such as showed her that although wishing
her well she wished her away, and that though having a kindly
feeling towards her, she would not admit a renewal of former
relations. They might continue friends, but only on condition of
being friends at a distance. Mehetabel racked her brain to find in
what manner she had given offence to the old woman, and could find
none. She was thrust from the only bosom to which she had clung
from infancy, without a reason that she could discover. Meanwhile
she drew no nearer to Bideabout. He was delighted at his success,
and laid aside for a while his bitterness of speech. But she did
not admit him to nearer intimacy. His attempts at familiarity met
with a chilling reception; the girl had to exercise self-restraint
to prevent the repugnance with which she received his addresses
from becoming obvious to him and others.
Happily for her peace of mind, he was a good deal away, engaged in
getting his house into order. It needed clearing out, cleansing
and repairing. No money had been expended on dilapidations, very
little soap and water on purification, since his mother's death.
His sister, Mrs. Rocliffe, some years older than himself, living
but a few yards distant, had done for him what was absolutely
necessary, and what he had been unable to do for himself; but
her interest had naturally been in her own house, not in his.
Now that he announced to her that he was about to marry, Sarah
Rocliffe was angry. She had made up her mind that Jonas would
continue a "hudger," and that his house and land would fall to
her son, after his demise. This was perhaps an unreasonable
expectation, especially as her own conduct had precipitated the
engagement; but it was natural. She partook of the surly disposition
of her brother. She could not exist without somebody or something
to fall out with, to scold, to find fault with. Her incessant
recrimination had at length aroused in Jonas the resolve to cast
her wholly from his dwelling, to have a wife of his own, and to
be independent of her service.
Sarah Rocliffe ascertained that she had overstepped the mark in
quarrelling with her brother, but instead of blaming herself she
turned the fault on the head of the inoffensive girl who was to
supplant her. She resolved not to welcome her sister-in-law with
even a semblance of cordiality.
Nor were the other colonists of the Bowl favorably disposed. It
was a tradition among them that they should inter-marry. This
rule had once been broken through with disastrous results. The
story shall be told presently.
The squatter families of the Punch-Bowl hung together, and when
Sarah Rocliffe took it in dudgeon that her brother was going to
marry, then the entire colony of Rocliffes, Boxalls, Nashes, and
Snellings adopted her view of the case, and resented the engagement
as though it were a slight cast on them.
As if the Bowl could not have provided him with a mate meet for
him! Were there no good wenches to be found there, that he must
go over the lips to look for a wife? The girls within the Bowl,
thanks be, had all surnames and kindred. Matabel had neither.
It was not long before Bideabout saw that his engagement to
Mehetabel was viewed with disfavor by him immediate neighbors,
but he was not the man to concern himself about their opinions.
He threw about his jibes, which did not tend to make things
better. The boys in the Bowl had concocted a jingle which they
sang under his window, or cast at him from behind a hedge, and
then ran away lest he should fall on them with a stick. This was
their rhyme:--
"A harnet lived in an 'ollow tree,
A proper spiteful twoad were he.
And he said as married and 'appy he'd be;
But all folks jeered and laughed he-he!"
Mehetabel's cheeks were pale, and her brows were contracted and
her lips set as she went to Thursley Church on the wedding-day,
accompanied by Mrs. Verstage and some village friends.
Gladly would she have elected to have her marriage performed as
quietly as possible, and at an hour and on a day to which none
were privy save those most immediately concerned. But this
did not suit the pride of the hostess, who was resolved on making
a demonstration, of getting to herself the credit of having acted
a generous and even lavish part towards the adopted child.
Mehetabel held up her head, not with pride, but with resolution
not to give way. Her brain was stunned. Thought would no more
flow in it than veins of water through a frozen soil. All the
shapes of human beings that passed and circled around her were
as phantasms. In church she hardly gathered her senses to know
when and what to respond.
She could scarcely see the register through the mist that had
formed over her eyes when she was required to sign her Christian
name, or collect her thoughts to understand the perplexity of the
parson, as to how to enter her, when she was without a surname.
When congratulated with effusion by Mrs. Verstage, with courtesy
by the Vicar, and boisterously by the boys and girls who were
present, she tried to force a smile, but ineffectually, as her
features were set inflexibly.
The bridegroom kissed her cheek. She drew back as if she had been
stung, as a sensitive plant shrinks from the hand that grasps it.
The previous day had been one of rain, so also had been the night,
with a patter of raindrops on the roof above Mehetabel's attic
chamber, and a flow of tears beneath.
During the morning, on the way to church, though there had been
no rain, yet the clouds had hung low, and were threatening.
They separated and were brushed aside as the wedding party issued
from the porch, and then a flood of scorching sunlight fell over
the bride and bridegroom. For the first time Mehetabel raised her
head and looked up. The impulse was unconscious--it was to let
light shine into her eyes and down into the dark, despairing
chambers of her soul filled only with tears.
The villagers in the churchyard murmured admiration; as she issued
from the gates they cheered.
Bideabout was elate; he was proud to know that the handsomest girl
in the neighborhood was now his. It was rare for a sarcastic curl
to leave his lips and the furrow to be smoothed on his brow. Such
a rare occasion was the present. And the Broom-Squire had indeed
secured one in whom his pride was justifiable.
No one could say of Mehetabel that she had been frivolous and
forward. Reserved, even in a tavern: always able to maintain her
dignity; respecting herself, she had enforced respect from others.
That she was hard-working, shrewd, thrifty, none who visited the
Ship could fail to know.
Many a lad had attempted to win her favor, and all had been
repulsed. She could keep forward suitors at a distance without
wounding their self-esteem, without making them bear her a grudge.
She was tall, well-built and firmly knit. There was in her evidence
of physical as well as of moral strength.
Though young, Mehetabel seemed older than her years, so fully
developed was her frame, so swelling her bosom, so set were her
features.
Usually the girl wore a high color, but of late this had faded
out of her face, which had been left of an ashen hue. Her pallor,
however, only gave greater effect to the lustre and profusion of
her dark hair and to the size and to the velvet depth and softness
of her hazel eyes.
The girl had finely-moulded eyebrows, which, when she frowned
through anger, or contracted them through care, met in one band,
and gave a lowering expression to her massive brow.
An urchin in the rear nudged a ploughboy, and said in a low tone,
"Jim! The old harnet out o' the 'ollow tree be in luck to-day.
Wot'll he do with her, now he's ketched a butterfly?"
"Wot be he like to do?" retorted the bumpkin. "A proper spiteful
twoad such as he--why, he'll rumple all the color and booty out
o' her wings, and sting her till her blood runs pison."
Then from the tower pealed the bells.
Jonas pressed the arm of Mehetabel, and leering into her face,
said: "Come, say a word o' thanks. Better late than never. At the
last, through me, you've gotten a surname."