"I have had a letter from your Aunt Dorothea lately," my Aunt Kezia went
on, "in which she asks for Cary to pay her a visit next June. But now
we are only in March. So, as Cary must be somewhere between times, and
I think she would be better out of the way, she will go to Abbotscliff
with Flora--unless, my dear," she added, turning to me, "you would
rather be at Bracewell Hall? You may, if you like."
"I would rather be at Abbotscliff, very much, Aunt Kezia," said I; and I
think Aunt Kezia was pleased.
"Aunt Kezia, don't send me away!" pleaded Sophy. "Do let me stay and
help you to settle at Fir Vale. I should hate to stay at Bracewell, and
I should just like bustling about and helping you in that way. Won't
you let me?"
"Well, my dear, we will see," said my Aunt Kezia; and I think she was
pleased with Sophy too. Hatty declared that Bracewell would just suit
her, and she would not stay at any price, if she had leave to choose.
So it seems to be settled in that way. Fanny will be married on the
30th,--that is three weeks hence; and the week after, Hatty goes with
the Bracewells, and I with Flora, to their own homes; and my Aunt Kezia
and Sophy will remain here, and only leave the house on the evening
before the marriage.
It seems very odd that Father should have wished not to have us at his
wedding. Was it Cecilia who did not wish it? But I am not to call her
Cecilia any more.
When my cousins came in for tea, they were told too. Charlotte cried,
"Well, I never!" for which piece of vulgarity she was sharply pulled up
by my Aunt Kezia. Amelia fanned herself--she always does, whatever time
of year it may be--and languidly remarked, "Dear!" Angus said, "Castor
and Pollux!" for which he also got rebuked. And after a sort of "Oh!"
Flora said nothing, but looked very sorrowfully at us. Cec--I mean Miss
Osborne--did not appear at all until tea was nearly over, and then she
came in from the garden, and Mr Parmenter with her, that everlasting
eyeglass stuck in his eye. I do so dislike the man.
Father never comes to tea. He says it is only women's rubbish, and
laughs at Ephraim Hebblethwaite because he says he likes it. I fancy
few men drink tea. My Uncle Charles never does, I know; but my Aunt
Dorothea says she could not exist a day without tea and cards.
I wonder if it will be pleasant to stay with my Aunt Dorothea. I
believe she and my Uncle Charles are living in London now. I should
like dearly to see London, and the fine shops, and the lions in the
Tower, and Ranelagh, and all the grand people. And yet, somehow, I feel
just a little bit uneasy about it, as if I were going into some place
where I did not know what I should find, and it might be something that
would hurt me. I do not feel that about Abbotscliff. I expect it will
be pleasant there, only perhaps rather dull. And I want to see my Uncle
Drummond, and Flora's friend, Annas Keith. I wonder if she is like her
brother. And I never saw a Presbyterian minister, nor indeed a minister
of any sort. I do hope my Uncle Drummond will not be like Mr Bagnall,
and I hope all the gentlemen in the South are not like that odious Mr
Parmenter.
Flora seems very much pleased about my going back with her. I do not
know why, but I fancied Angus did not quite like it. Can he be afraid
of my telling his father the story of the hunt-supper? He knows nothing
of what I heard up on the Scar.
I do hope Ephraim Hebblethwaite is not very unhappy about Fanny. I
should think it must be dreadful, when you love any one very much, to
see her go and give herself quite away to somebody else. And Ambrose
thinks of going to live in Cheshire, where his uncle has a large farm,
and he has no children, so the farm will come to Ambrose some day; and
his uncle, Mr Minshull, would like him to come and live there now. Of
course, if that be settled so, we shall lose Fanny altogether.
Must there always be changes and break-ups in this world? I do not mean
the change of death: that, we know, must come. But why must there be
all these other changes? Why could we not go on quietly as we were? It
seems now as if we should never be the same any more.
If that uncle of Cecilia's would only have tied her to the leg of a
table, or locked her up in her bed-chamber, or done something to keep
her down there in the South, so that she had never come to torment us!
I suppose I ought not to wish that, if she makes Father happier. Ay,
but will she make him happy? That is just what I am uncomfortable
about! I don't believe she cares a pin for him, though I dare say she
likes well enough to be the Squire's lady, and queen it at Brocklebank.
Somehow, I cannot trust those tawny eyes, with their sidelong glances.
Am I very wicked, or is she?
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Will things never give over happening?
This morning, just after I came down--there were only my Aunt Kezia, Mr
Keith, Flora, and me in the dining-parlour--we suddenly heard the great
bell of Brocklebank Church begin to toll. My Aunt Kezia set down the
chocolate-pot.
"It must be somebody who has died suddenly, poor soul!" cried she.
"Maybe, Ellen Armathwaite's baby: it looked very bad when I saw it last,
on Thursday. Hark!"
The bell stopped tolling, and we listened for the sound which would tell
us the sex and age of the departed.
"One!" Then silence.
That meant a man. Ellen Armathwaite's baby girl it could not be. Then
the bell began again, and we counted. It tolled on up to twenty--
thirty--forty: we could not think who it could be.
"Surely not Farmer Catterall!" said my Aunt Kezia, "I have often felt
afraid of an apoplexy for him."
But the bell went on past sixty, and we knew it was not Farmer
Catterall.
"Is it never going to stop?" said Flora, when it had passed eighty.
My Aunt Kezia went to the door, and calling Sam, bade him go out and
inquire. Still the bell tolled on. It stopped just as Sam came in, at
ninety-six.
"Who is it, Sam?--one of the old bedesmen?"
"Nay, Mrs Kezia; puir soul, 'tis just the auld Vicar!"
"Mr Digby!" we all cried together.
"Ay; my mither found him deid i' his bed early this morrow. She's come
up to tell ye, an' to ask gin' ye can spare me to go and gi'e a haun',
for that puir witless body, Mr Anthony Parmenter, seems all but daft."
Miss Osborne and Amelia came in together, and I saw Cecilia turn very
white. (Oh dear! how shall I give over calling her Cecilia?) My Aunt
Kezia told them what had happened, and I thought she looked relieved.
"What ails Mr Parmenter?" asked my Aunt Kezia.
"'Deed, and what ails a fule onie day?" said Sam, always more honest
than soft-spoken. "He's just as ill as a bit lassie--fair frichtened o'
his auld uncle, now he is deid, that ne'er did him a bawbee's worth o'
harm while he was alive. My mither says she's vara sure he'll be here
the morn, begging and praying ye to tak' him in and keep him safe frae
his puir auld uncle's ghaist. Hech, sirs! I'll ghaist him, gin' he
comes my way."
"Now, Sam, keep a civil tongue in your head," quoth my Aunt Kezia, "and
don't let me hear of your playing tricks on Mr Parmenter or any one
else. You should be old enough to have some sense by this time. I will
come out and speak to your mother in a moment. Yes, I suppose we must
let you go. What cuckoos there are in this world, to be sure!"
But Mr Parmenter did not wait till to-morrow--he came up this
afternoon, just as Sam said he would. Father was not at home, and to my
surprise my Aunt Kezia would not take him in, but sent him on to Farmer
Catterall's. I do not think the tawny eyes liked it, for though they
were mostly bent on the ground, I saw them give one sidelong flash at my
Aunt Kezia which did not look to me like loving-kindness.
I feel to-night what I think Angus means when he says that he is flat.
Everything feels flat. Fanny is gone--she was married on Saturday.
Amelia, Charlotte, and Hatty set forth on Tuesday, and they are gone. I
thought that Ce--Miss Osborne would have gone with them, and have
returned by-and-by; but she stays on, and will do so, I hear, almost
till my Aunt Kezia goes, when Mrs Hebblethwaite has asked her to stay
at the Fells Farm for the last few days before the wedding. It is
settled now that my Aunt Kezia and Sophy stay here till the day before
it. It does seem so queer for Sophy to be here till then, and not be at
the wedding! I don't believe it is Father's doing. It is not like him.
Flora, Angus, Mr Keith, and I are to start to-morrow; but Mr Keith
only goes with us as far as Carlisle--that is, the first day's journey;
then he leaves us for Newcastle, where he has some sort of business
(that horrid word!), and I go on with my cousins to Abbotscliff. We
shall be met at Carlisle by a Scots gentleman who is travelling thence
to Selkirk, and is a friend of my Uncle Drummond. He goes in his own
chaise, with two mounted servants, and both he and they are armed, so I
hope we shall get clear of freebooters on the Border. He has nobody
with him, and says he shall have plenty of room in the chaise. It is
very lucky that this Mr Cameron should just be going at the same time
as we are. I don't think Angus would be much protection, though I
should not wish him to know I said so.
If Ephraim Hebblethwaite have broken his heart, he behaves very funnily.
He was not only at Fanny's wedding, but was best man; and he looks
quite well and happy. I begin to think that we must have been mistaken
in guessing that he cared for Fanny. Perhaps it only amused him to talk
to her.
Fanny's wedding was very smart and gay, and everybody came to it. The
bridesmaids were we three, Esther Langridge, and two cousins of
Ambrose's, whose names are Annabel Catterall and Priscilla Minshull. I
rather liked Annabel, but Priscilla was horrid. (Sophy says I say
"horrid" too often, and about all sorts of things. But if people and
things are horrid, how am I to help saying it?) I am sure Priscilla
Minshull was horrid. She reminded me of Angus's saying about turning up
one's eyes like a duck in thunder. I never watched a duck in thunder,
and I don't know whether it turns up its eyes or it does not: only
Priscilla did. She seemed to think us all (my Aunt Kezia said) no
better than the dirt she walked on. And I am sure she need not be so
stuck-up, for Mr James Minshull, her father, is only a parson, and not
only that, but a chaplain too: so Priscilla is not anybody of any
consequence. I said so to Flora, and she replied that Priscilla would
be much less likely to be proud if she were.
I was dreadfully tired on Sunday. We had been so hard at work all the
fortnight before, first making the wedding dress, and then dressing the
wedding-dinner; and when I went to bed on Saturday night, I thought I
never wanted to see another. Another wedding, of course, I mean.
However, everything went off very well; and Fanny looked charming in her
pink silk brocaded with flowers, with white stripes down it here and
there, and a pink quilted slip beneath. She had pink rosettes, too, in
her shoes, and a white hood lined with pink and trimmed with pink bows.
Her hoop came from Carlisle, and was the biggest I have seen yet. The
mantua-maker from Carlisle, who was five days in the house, said that
hoops were getting very much larger this year, and she thought they
would soon be as big as they were in Queen Anne's time. We had much
smaller hoops--of course it would not have been seemly to have the
bridesmaids as smart as the bride--and we were dressed alike, in white
French cambric, with light green trimmings. Of course we all wore white
ribbons. I think Father would have stormed at us if we had put on any
other colour. I should not like to be the one to wear a red ribbon when
he was by! [Note 1.] We wore straw milk-maid hats, with green ribbon
mixed with the white; and just a sprinkle of grey powder in our hair.
Cecilia would not be a bridesmaid, though she was asked. I don't think
she liked the dress chosen; and indeed it would not have suited her.
But wasn't she dressed up! She wore--I really must set it down--a
purple lutestring, [Note 2.] over such a hoop that she had to lift it on
one side when she went in at the church door; this was guarded with gold
lace and yellow feathers. She had a white laced apron, purple velvet
slippers with red heels, and her lace ruffles were something to look at!
And wasn't she patched! and hadn't she powdered her hair, and made it
as stiff with pomatum as if it had been starched! Then on the top of
this head went a lace cap--it was not a hood--just a little, light,
fly-away cap, with purple ribbons and gold embroidery, and in the middle
of the front a big gold pompoon.
What a contrast there was between her and my Aunt Kezia! She wore a
silk dress too, only it was a dark stone-colour, as quiet as a
Quakeress, just trimmed with two rows of braid, the same colour, round
the bottom, and a white silk scarf, with a dark blue hood, and just a
little rosette of white lace at the top of it. Aunt Kezia's hood was a
hood, too, and was tied under her chin as if she meant it to be some
good. And her elbow-ruffles were plain nett, with long dark doe-skin
gloves drawn up to meet them. Cecilia wore white silk mittens. I hate
mittens; they are horrid things. If you want to make your hands look as
ugly as you can, you have only to put on a pair of mittens.
The wedding-dinner, which was at noon, was a very grand one. It should
have been, for didn't my arms ache with beating eggs and keeping pans
stirred! Hatty said we were martyrs in a good cause. But I do think
Fanny might have taken a little more trouble herself, seeing it was her
wedding. Now, let us see, what had we? There was a turkey pie, and a
boar's head, chickens in different ways, and a great baron of roast
beef; cream beaten to snow (Sophy did that, I am glad to say), candied
fruits, and ices, and several sorts of pudding, for dessert. Then for
drink, there were wine, and mead, purl, and Burton ale.
Well! it is all over now, and Fanny is gone. There will never be four
of us any more. There seems to me something very sad about it. Poor
dear Fanny, I hope she will be happy!
"I dare guess she will, in her way," says my Aunt Kezia. "She does not
keep a large cup for her happiness. 'Tis all the easier to fill when
you don't; but a deal more will go in when you do. There are advantages
and disadvantages on each side of most things in this world."
"Is there any advantage, Aunt Kezia, in my having just pricked my finger
shockingly?"
"Yes, Cary. Learn to be more careful in future."
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Note 1. The white ribbon, like the white cockade, distinguished a
Jacobite; the red ribbon and the black cockade were Hanoverian.
Note 2. A variety of silk then fashionable.