MY UNCLE COMES HOME.
Time went on, and it was now the depth of a cold, miserable winter. I
remember the day to which I have now come so well! It was a black day.
There was such a thickness of snow in the air, that what light got
through had a lost look. It was almost more like a London fog than an
honest darkness of the atmosphere, bred in its own bounds. But while the
light lasted, the snow did not fall. I went about the house doing what I
could find to do, and wondering John did not come.
His horse had again fallen lame--this time through an accident which made
it necessary for him to stay with the poor animal long after his usual
time of starting to come to me. When he did start, it was on foot, with
the short winter afternoon closing in. But he knew the moor by this time
nearly as well as I did.
It was quite dark when he drew near the house, which he generally entered
through the wilderness and the garden. The snow had begun at last, and
was coming down in deliberate earnest. It would lie feet deep over the
moor before the morning! He was thinking what a dreary tramp home it
would be by the road--for the wind was threatening to wake, and in a
snow-wind the moor was a place to be avoided--when he struck his foot
against something soft, in the path his own feet had worn to the
wilderness, and fell over it. A groan followed, and John rose with the
miserable feeling of having hurt some creature. Dropping on his knees to
discover what it was, he found a man almost covered with snow, and nearly
insensible. He swept the snow off him, contrived to get him on his back,
and brought him round to the door, for the fence would have been awkward
to cross with him. Just as I began to be really uneasy at his prolonged
absence, there he was, with a man on his back apparently lifeless!
I did not stop to stare or question, but made haste to help him. His
burden was slipping sideways, so we lowered it on a chair, and then
carried it between us into the kitchen, I holding the legs. The moment a
ray of light fell upon the face, I saw it was my uncle.
I just saved myself from a scream. My heart stopped, then bumped as if it
would break through. I turned sick and cold. We laid him on the sofa, but
I still held on to the legs; I was half unconscious. Martha set me on a
chair, and in a moment or two I came to myself, and was able to help her.
She said never a word, but was quite collected, looking every now and
then in the face of her cousin with a doglike devotion, but never
stopping an instant to gaze. We got him some brandy first, then some hot
milk, and then some soup. He took a little of everything we offered him.
We did not ask him a single question, but, the moment he revived, carried
him up the stair, and laid him in bed. Once he cast his eyes about, and
gave a sigh as of relief to find himself in his own room, then went off
into a light doze, which, broken with starts and half-wakings, lasted
until next day about noon. Either John or Martha or I was by his bedside
all the time, so that he should not wake without seeing one of us near
him.
But the sad thing was, that, when he did wake, he did not seem to come to
himself. He never spoke, but just lay and looked out of his eyes, if
indeed it was more than his eyes that looked, if indeed _he_ looked out
of them at all!
“He has overdone his strength!” we said to each other. “He has not been
taking care of himself!--And then to have lain perhaps hours in the snow!
It's a wonder he's alive!”
“He's nothing but skin and bone!” said Martha. “It will take weeks to get
him up again!--And just look at his clothes! How ever did he come nigh
such! They're fit only for a beggar! They must have knocked him down and
stripped him!--Look at his poor boots!” she said pitifully, taking up one
of them, and stroking it with her hand. “He'll never recover it!”
“He will,” I said. “Here are three of us to give him of our life! He'll
soon be himself again, now that we have him!”
But my heart was like to break at the sad sight. I cannot put in words
what I felt.
“He would get well much quicker,” said John, “if only we could tell him
we were married!”
“It will do just as well to invite him to the wedding,” I answered.
“I do hope he will give you away,” said Martha.
“He will never give me away,” I returned; “but he will give me to John.
And I will not have the wedding until he is able to do that.”
“You are right,” said John. “And we mustn't ask him anything, or even
refer to anything, till he wants to hear.”
Days went and came, and still he did not seem to know quite where he was;
if he did know, he seemed so content with knowing it, that he did not
want to know anything more in heaven or earth. We grew very anxious about
him. He did not heed a word that Dr. Southwell said. His mind seemed as
exhausted as his body. The doctor justified John's resolve, saying he
must not be troubled with questions, or the least attempt to rouse his
memory.
John was now almost constantly with us. One day I asked him whether his
mother took any notice of his being now so seldom home at night. He
answered she did not; and, but for being up to her ways, he would imagine
she knew nothing at all about his doings.
“What does she do herself all day long?” I asked.
“Goes over her books, I imagine,” he answered. “She knows the hour is at
hand when she must render account of her stewardship, and I suppose she
is getting ready to meet it;--how, I would rather not conjecture. She
gives me no trouble now, and I have no wish to trouble her.”
“Have you no hope of ever being on filial terms with her again?” I said.
“There can be few things more unlikely,” he replied.
I was a little troubled, notwithstanding my knowledge of her and my
feeling toward her, that he should regard a complete alienation from his
mother with such indifference. I could not, however, balance the account
between them! If she had a strong claim in the sole fact that she was his
mother, how much had she not injured him simply by not being lovable!
Love unpaid is the worst possible debt; and to make it impossible to pay
it, is the worst of wrongs.
But, oh, what a heart-oppression it was, that my uncle had returned so
different! We were glad to have him, but how gladly would we not have let
him go again to restore him to himself, even were it never more to rest
our eyes upon him in this world! Dearly as I loved John, it seemed as if
nothing could make me happy while my uncle remained as he was. It was a
kind of cold despair to know him such impassable miles from me. I could
not get near him! I went about all day with a sense--not merely of loss,
but of a loss that gnawed at me with a sickening pain. He never spoke. He
never said _little one_ to me now! he never looked in my eyes as if he
loved me! He was very gentle, never complained, never even frowned, but
lay there with a dead question in his eyes. We feared his mind was
utterly gone.
By degrees his health returned, but apparently neither his memory, nor
his interest in life. Yet he had a far-away look in his eyes, as if he
remembered something, and started and turned at every opening of the
door, as if he expected something. He took to wandering about the yard
and the stable and the cow-house; would gaze for an hour at some animal
in its stall; would watch the men threshing the corn, or twisting
straw-ropes. When Dr. Southwell sent back his horse, it was in great hope
that the sight of Death would wake him up; that he would recognize his
old companion, jump on his back, and be well again; but my uncle only
looked at him with a faint admiration, went round him and examined him as
if he were a horse he thought of buying, then turned away and left him.
Death was troubled at his treatment of him. He on his part showed him all
the old attention, using every equine blandishment he knew; but having
met with no response, he too turned slowly away, and walked to his
stable, Dr. Southwell would gladly have bought him, but neither John nor
I would hear of parting with him: he was almost a portion of his master!
My uncle might come to himself any moment: how could we look him in the
face if Death was gone from us! Besides, we loved the horse for his own
sake as well as my uncle's, and John would be but too glad to ride him!
My uncle would wander over the house, up and down, but seemed to prefer
the little drawing-room: I made it my special business to keep a good
fire there. He never went to the study; never opened the door in the
chimney-corner. He very seldom spoke, and seldomer to me than to any
other. It _was_ a dreary time! Our very souls had longed for him back,
and thus he came to us!
Sorely I wept over the change that had passed upon the good man. He must
have received some terrible shock! It was just as if his mother, John
said, had got hold of him, and put a knife in his heart! It was well,
however, that he was not wandering about the heath, exposed to the
elements! and there was yet time for many a good thing to come! Where one
_must_ wait, one _can_ wait.
John had to learn this, for, say what he would, the idea of marrying
while my uncle remained in such plight, was to me unendurable.