But hark you, Kate,
Whither I go, thither shall you go too;
To-day will I set forth, to-morrow you.
HENRY IV.
“WHAT could _you_ do in Allenders? one never knows how to deal with
you capricious women. Stay at home, Agnes, and manage your own
department--it is impossible you could assist me, and you would only be
a hindrance to work. Stay at home, I say, till the place is ready for
you.”
Agnes laid down the child softly upon the sofa where she was sitting,
and answered nothing; but her face wore a look of resignation which
Harry thought ostentatious, and which irritated him greatly, as indeed
his little wife partly knew.
He started hastily from his seat with a contracted brow, and began
to walk about the room, muttering something to himself about the
impossibility of pleasing everybody. Poor little Agnes was desperately
exerting herself to swallow a sob; she did feel a little fretful and
peevish, it was very true, but at the same time she honestly struggled
to keep it down.
“Martha, say something,” whispered Rose. “Harry is angry--speak to him,
Martha.”
But Martha sat still and said nothing--for Harry’s magnificent
intentions troubled his sister with an uneasy sense of dependence. It
is oftentimes a greater exercise of generosity to receive than to
bestow. Labouring for Harry would have seemed to Martha a thing so
natural as never to disturb her every-day life for a moment; to be
supported by Harry, called for a stronger exertion. But Harry’s sister
was of a stouter spirit than Harry’s wife. She preferred, even at a
risk of great pain, to make trial quietly of this new life, rather than
to say how irksome to her was the prospect of burdening her brother,
and to undergo a scene of indignation, and grief, and reconcilement.
Nevertheless, Martha felt her influence abridged, and was silent--for
this fortune did not change her own position or that of her sisters.
Harry and his wife alone were rightful sharers of this unexpected
elevation, and Martha stepped down from the elder sister’s place, not
without a struggle, and endeavoured to turn her eyes, which had so long
expressed the distinct decisions of a separate will, towards the young
irresolute pair beside her as to the heads of the house.
“Why don’t you speak, Martha?” exclaimed Harry at last, noticing her
silence with a renewed burst of impatience. “Why don’t you say what you
think at once, instead of sitting glooming at us all?”
“I do not speak because I begin now to be your dependant, Harry,” said
Martha, with harsh emphasis; “and especially in a matter where I and
these bairns may restrict and hinder you, must now choose to listen to
your decision, and not try to influence it. That is why I do not speak.
But what I _think_ is, that Agnes, since she wishes it, should go with
you, and that we can remain to do all that is necessary here. Or I can
take them home to Ayr--anywhere--and Agnes will like to be with you in
your plannings and alterations, Harry. Why should she not go?”
“A dependant!” Harry looked very indignant and injured.
“Stay,” said Martha. “Nothing more of this. A woman needs to be so.
I am willing; but I prefer that nothing should be said of it, Harry,
especially now, when I am scarcely accustomed to the change.”
A long silence followed, and each individual heart there was busy with
its own proper thoughts. Martha, ever proud and harsh, repeated to
herself the many necessities which compelled her to remain an inmate
of Harry’s house, and to relinquish the work by which she had hitherto
supported herself--she, who, small as her opportunities were, had
always conferred, but never received, the benefits of ordinary life;
and there came vividly upon her memory those old dreams of youth, in
which she had imagined herself the support, the guardian, the protector
of the orphan children who were her charge in the world. Now she
was Harry’s dependant sister, curbing and burdening his hands, and
restraining the harmless indulgences he longed for. Martha was not
content, not willing, not ready, like a gentler woman, to take upon
herself this gracious yoke of love, and receive with sweet and becoming
humility the gifts which she could not refuse; but she bent her
stubborn neck to them, and reminded herself of her new position, with a
strong resolve to do all its duties--chiefest of all to cover over in
her own heart, so that no one could discern it, the bitterness she felt.
Harry, pleased to find himself not only the most important person in
the household, but the maintainer and the acknowledged head of all, and
only half angry that Martha should speak of herself as his dependant:
Agnes, thinking solely that now she had gained her point, and should
go with him to Allenders; Rose, full of new fears and new hopes,
unwilling to realize all that was in her mind; and little Lettie,
last of all, chivalrously determined to win, by some unknown means, a
fortune and fame for her sisters, far better than Harry’s, surrounded
this centre figure of the family group. In all minds there was a vague
dissatisfaction. This great inheritance, after all, like everything
else which deeply disturbs a life, brought new troubles, no less than
new pleasures, in its train.
But Harry made no further resistance to Agnes’s desire. An involuntary
consciousness that it would be ungracious and unkind to decide contrary
to Martha’s opinion, after she had acknowledged his authority, had
greater effect upon his impulsive mind than the reasonable wish of his
wife; for Harry came to do much of what was really right in his conduct
by side motives and impulses, and oftener made a start in his direct
course by an impetus from some diverging way, than kept steadily on,
because he knew that his path was the straight one. But Agnes did not
pause to consider the motive. It was enough to her that her point was
gained.