FALSE MOTHER.
SUCH is the balance of human events—if the phrase be held
admissible—that the moment any member of our race is likely to strike
the stars with his head sublime, he receives a hard thump upon that
protuberance, and comes down with a crown—but a cracked one. As
for myself—an unpretentious fellow, and of very simple intellect,
though not quite such a fool as the world considered me in my later
troubles,—desiring always to tell the truth, I will not deny that I
walked on air, when I found myself gifted with my Kitty’s love, and her
large-hearted father’s assent to it. It had been arranged that I must
wait, and keep my bliss inside my waistcoat, until such time as slower
prudence and clearer foresight might prescribe. But all I thought of
were the glorious facts that Kitty loved me as I loved her, and that
her father, who alone could enter sound denial, would not deny. “What
do I care for that old stepmother?” I said to myself, as I buttoned my
coat.
That coat was henceforth sacred to me. There may have been smarter and
grander coats, coats with more tone of high art about them, and of
sleeker and richer substance. But this coat was enriched for ever with
at least three tears from Kitty’s eyes, Kitty’s lovely hair had fallen
like a vernal shower upon it, and her true heart had quivered to it,
when she owned whose heart it was. I knew that it might be my duty now
to start a new coat of loftier order, to keep me abreast of my rise in
the world, as the son of a celebrated man; nevertheless this would be
the coat to look back upon and look up to, as it hung upon a holy peg,
with the pockets full of lavender.
I had said farewell to my dear love, and was just beginning to think
how I would come it over Uncle Corny, telling him a bit, and then
another bit, and leading him on to laugh at me, until I should come out
with news which would make him snap his favourite pipe—when suddenly,
near the Captain’s gate, I felt a sharp tug from behind. The dusk was
gathering, and I meant to put my best foot foremost, and walk all the
way to Sunbury, scarcely feeling the road beneath my feet.
“What do you want, little chap?” I asked, for it was not in my power
then to speak rudely to any living creature, although I was vexed at
losing time.
“If you please, young man, my lady says that you are to come back and
speak to her. You are to come with me to the door over there. And you
must be careful how you scrape your boots.”
I looked at the boy, and felt inclined to laugh. He was dressed in
green from head to foot, and two or three dozen gilt buttons shone
in a double row down the front of him. For a moment I doubted about
obeying, until it occurred to me that if I refused, my sin might be
visited upon another. So I turned and followed the page, who seemed
to think disobedience impossible. He led me to a door at the west end
of the house, and then up a little staircase to a fine broad passage,
with statues and pictures looking very grand indeed. Before I could
take half of it into my mind, he opened a door with carved work upon
it, and showed me into the grandest room I had ever entered, except in
show places, such as Hampton Court, or Windsor Castle. All this part of
the house was so different from the other end that I was amazed, when I
came to think of it.
But I could not think now of floors and ceilings, or even chairs and
tables, as I walked with my best hat in my hand, towards a tall lady
very richly dressed, who stood by the mantelpiece, almost like a figure
carved upon it. Her thick and strong hair seemed as black as a coal,
until one came to look into it; and then it showed an undercast of red,
such as I never saw in any other person. Her form was large and robust
and full, and as powerful as that of any ordinary man; but the chief
thing to notice was her face and eyes. Her face was like those we see
cut in shell, to represent some ancient goddess, such as I read of at
Hampton School—Juno, or Pallas, or it may have been Proserpine, my
memory is not clear upon those little points—but although I remember a
god with two faces, and a dog with three heads, I cannot call to mind
any goddess among them endowed with three chins. “My lady,” as the boy
in green had called her, certainly did own three fine chins, as well as
a mouth which was too large for the shells, and contemptuous nostrils
that seemed to sift the air, and bright eyes with very thick lids for
their sheath—and they wanted a sheath, I can tell you—and a forehead
which looked as if it could roll, instead of only wrinkling, when the
storm of passion swept it.
As yet I was too young to understand that justice and kindness are the
only qualities entitling our poor fellow-mortals to respect. I had
passed through no tribulation yet, and coped with none of the sorrows,
which enlarge, when they do not embitter, the heart. Therefore I was
much impressed by this lady’s grandeur and fine presence, and made her
a clumsy bow, as if I had scarcely a right to exist before her. She saw
it, and scorned me, and took the wrong course, as we mostly do when we
despise another.
“Do I know your name, young man?” she asked, as if it were very
doubtful whether I possessed any name at all. “I seem to have heard of
you, but cannot say where.”
“In that case,” I said, with my spirit returning at the insolent
disdain of her eyes and voice, “the boy who came to fetch me has made
some mistake. No doubt you wished to see some other person. I beg you
to make no apologies.”
With another low bow, I began my retreat, and was very near securing
it; for she became too furious to condescend to speak. But two young
ladies, whom I had scarcely noticed, jumped up from their chairs, and
intercepted me.
“Mamma forgets names so,” said one of them, a little plain thing with a
mass of curly hair; “but you are Mr. Orchardson, I think, of Sunbury.
If so, it is you that mamma wants to speak to.”
“I am not Mr. Orchardson of Sunbury,” I answered; “my Uncle Cornelius
is the gentleman so known. I am Christopher Orchardson, who only helps
him in his business.”
“Then, Christopher Orchardson,” resumed their mother, as I came back
and looked at her quietly, “you seem to have very little knowledge of
good manners. Allow me to ask you what you are doing in this house?”
“I understood that I was sent for, ma’am; and I am waiting to know what
your pleasure is.” I saw the girls giggle, and glance at one another,
as I delivered this statement.
“None of your trifling with me, young man. What I insist upon knowing
is this. What right had you to enter my house, some hours ago, without
my knowledge, and to remain in it, without my permission? Don’t fence
with the question, but answer it.”
“That is easy enough,” I replied with my eyes full on hers, which
vainly strove to look down mine; “I came to this house, without asking
whose it was, to see Captain Fairthorn, with a little sketch of
something in which he had taken interest. The servant, or housekeeper,
told me to wait, while she went to look for her mistress. Then I met
Miss Fairthorn, whom I have had the pleasure of meeting several times
before; and she most kindly showed me to her father’s room. And I was
very glad to find him in good health. After a very pleasant time with
him, I was leaving the garden on my way home, when I was told that you
wished to see me. I was not rude enough to refuse, and that is why I am
in this house again.”
“You have made a fine tale of it, but not told the truth. Did you come
to my house to see the Professor? Or did you come rather to see his
daughter?”
“I came to this house to see Captain Fairthorn. But I hoped that I
might perhaps have the pleasure of seeing Miss Fairthorn also.”
“And what was your motive in wishing to see her? I have a right to
ask, as she is in my charge. I stand in the place of a mother to her,
whether she is grateful, or whether she is otherwise. What did you wish
to see her for?”
I was greatly at a loss to answer this. Not from any shame at the
affection, which was the honour and glory of my being, but from dread
of the consequences to my precious darling. She saw my hesitation, and
burst forth,—
“Do you think that I do not know all about it? You have had the gross
insolence to lift your eyes to a young lady far above you in every way.
You fancy that because she has no mother, and her father is a man of no
worldly wisdom, and of extravagant sentiments, a kind of philosopher
in short, you will be permitted to reduce her to your inferior rank in
life. What are you?—a small market-gardener, or something of that kind,
I believe.”
“You were kind enough to say just now,” I answered, “that you did not
know anything about me. Even my name was strange to you. I am not
ashamed of my business; and I lay no traps for any one.”
“Have you the insolence to refer to me?” Her guilty conscience caught
her here, and under its sting she grew so wild that I thought she would
have flown at me, though no thought of her had been in my words. “But
you are below my contempt, and I wonder that I even deign to speak to
you. And I will make short work of it. Go back to your spade, or your
heap of manure, or whatever it is you live in, and never dare to think
again of Miss Kitty Fairthorn. She is engaged to a gentleman of family,
and title, and large property; and I mean to have her married to him
very shortly. Go back to your manure-heap; I have done with you.”
“Not quite so easily as you think.” To her great amazement I approached
her, not only without terror, but with calm contempt. “You have a foul
scheme in hand, as is widely known, for selling a poor girl, whom you
have vilely misused, and starved for some years, and made her life a
misery; and you think you will be allowed to sell her to a reprobate
old man, who has not even gold enough to cover the blackness of his
character. As a girl she has borne your blows, as a woman she would
have to bear those of a cowardly and godless scoundrel. You like plain
speaking, and there it is for you. Do you think that God will allow
such crimes? I tell you, poor tyrant, that the right will conquer. Miss
Fairthorn shall have a happy home, with the affection and kindness of
which you have robbed her; and you—you shall suffer the misery you have
inflicted.”
Now I had not meant to say a single word of this, and was thoroughly
astonished at my own strong language. Bitterly angry with myself as
well, for what I felt to be unmanly conduct (even under fiercest
provocation), when I saw the effect upon this haughty lady. It must
have been many years now, since any one had dared to show her thus
what she was like; for her strong will had swept black and white into
one—the one she chose to make of them. Weak indolence, and cowardice,
a thousandfold more common than the resolute will, had got out of her
way, until her way turned to a resistless rush.
She looked at me now, as if utterly unable to believe that her ears
could be true to her. Then glancing at one of her daughters, she said,
“Geraldine, this young man does not mean it. He has no idea what he is
talking about. Take him away, my dear; I feel unwell. I shall be able
to think of things, by-and-by. Euphrasia, run for the sal volatile, or
the Cognac in the square decanter. And then he may come back, and tell
me what he means.”
This strange turn of mind puzzled me, as much as my straightforward
speech had puzzled her. Dr. Sippets—our great man at Sunbury—said, when
I spoke of it many years afterwards, that he quite understood, and
could easily explain it. To wit, that with people of choleric habit,
the vessels of the brain become so charged up to a certain tension,
that if anything more—but I had better not try to put his hundred-tun
words into my pint pot. He is a choleric man himself; and his vessels
might become so charged as to vent themselves in a heavy charge to me.
It is enough to say, that when the lady sank, with a face as white as
death, upon the sofa, proper feeling told me to depart.
This I was doing, in a sad haze of mind; doubting whether duty did not
require that I should halt on the premises, until I had learned how
the sufferer passed through her trial. But now another strange thing
happened to me, and perhaps the very last I should have dreamed of. I
was lingering uneasily near the door, with many pricks of self-reproach
and even shame, when a slim figure glided out and came to me. Although
the night had quite fallen now, I could see that it was not my Kitty
who came out, but some one much shorter, and smaller altogether. With
great anxiety I went to meet her, fearing almost to hear fatal tidings;
for who can tell in such a case what may be the end of it?
“You need not be alarmed, Mr. Orchardson,” said a voice which I
recognized as that of Miss Jerry; “my mother is all right again, and
quite ready to have another turn at you, if you are anxious to come
back.”
“The Lord forbid!” I replied devoutly. “I would run into the hottest of
the brick-kilns yonder, rather than meet the good lady again. But I am
delighted that it is no worse. It was very kind of you to come and tell
me. My best thanks to you, Miss Geraldine.”
“It was not that at all,” she said with some hesitation; “I did not
come to set your mind at ease, though I thought that possibly you
might be waiting here; which is very good of you. But I came to say
how grateful I am for your behaviour. You have done a lot of good; I
cannot tell you half of it. Nobody ever dares to contradict mamma; that
is what makes her so much what she is. She is very kind and pleasant
at the bottom, I am sure. But she has such a very strong will of her
own; as a clever man said, when he tried to comfort my dear father many
years ago, such a ‘very powerful identity,’ that every one has always
given way before her, until she—until she thinks all the world is
bound to do it. You spoke very harshly to her, I know. Perhaps a real
gentleman would not have done it; and for the moment I hated you. But
she is so delightful to us ever since! We shall have a sweet time of
it, for at least a week. But won’t Miss Kitty catch it?”
Those last words gave me a bitter pang. This odd girl, who seemed to
have some good in her, spoke them, as I thought, with exultation, or at
any rate without any sign of sorrow. Her justice, like her mother’s,
stopped at home.
“If I have done you any good,” I said, with faint hopes of getting some
little myself, “do promise me one thing; I am sure you will. Try to be
kind to Miss Fairthorn, and lighten some little of the burden she has
to bear.”
“Oh, you don’t know her,” she answered, with a laugh. “You think she is
wonderful, I dare say. I can tell you Miss Kitty has a temper of her
own. She is awfully provoking, and she won’t be pitied. I believe she
hates Frizzy and me, just because we are our mother’s daughters. If you
ever marry her, you had better look out. However, I will bear with her,
as far as human nature can. And now I will say ‘Good-night.’”
She gave me her hand, which I did not expect; and I saw that she was
rather a pretty girl which I had not noticed in the room. She had fine
dark eyes, and her voice was much softer than that of her sister; and,
it seemed to me that she might come to good, if she got among good
people, and away from her terrible mother.