JOY WELL-NIGH INCREDIBLE
The midday letters were a riddle to the ladies at Malvern.
'Out all day,' said Mary, 'that is well. He will get strong out
boating.'
'I hope Herbert has come home to take him out,' said Constance.
'Or he may be yachting. I wonder he does not say who is taking him out.
I am glad that he can feel that sense of enjoyment.'
Yet that rejoicing seemed to be almost an effort to the poor mother who
craved for a longer letter, and perhaps almost felt as if her Frank were
getting out of sympathy with her grief--and what could be the good news?
'Herbert must have passed!' said Constance.
'I hope he has, but the expression is rather strong for that,' said Lady
Adela.
'Perhaps Ida is engaged to that Mr. Deyncourt? Was that his name?' said
Lady Northmoor languidly.
'Oh! that would be delicious,' cried Constance, 'and Ida has grown much
more thoughtful lately, so perhaps she would do for a clergyman's wife.'
'Is Ida better?' asked her aunt, who had been much drawn towards the girl
by hearing that her health had suffered from grief for Michael.
'Mamma does not mention her in her last letter, but poor Ida is really
much more delicate than one would think, though she looks so strong.
This would be delightful!'
'Yet, joy well-nigh incredible!' said her aunt, meditatively. 'Were not
those the words? It would not be like your uncle to put them in that way
unless it were something--even more wonderful, and besides, why should he
not write it to me?'
'Oh--h!' cried Constance, with a leap, rather than a start. 'It can be
only one thing.'
'Don't, don't, don't!' cried poor Mary; 'you must not, Constance, it
would kill me to have the thought put into my head only to be lost.'
Constance looked wistfully at Lady Adela; but the idea she had suggested
had created a restlessness, and her aunt presently left the room. Then
Constance said--
'Lady Adela, may I tell you something? You know that poor dear little
Mite was never found?'
'Oh! a boat must have picked him up,' cried Amice; 'and he is coming
back.'
'Gently, Amy; hush,' said the mother, 'Constance has more to tell.'
'Yes,' said Constance. 'My friend, Rose Rollstone, who lives just by our
house at Westhaven, and was going back to London the night that Mite was
lost, wrote to me that she was sure she had seen his face just then. She
thought, and I thought it was one of those strange things one hears of
sights at the moment of death. So I never told of it, but now I cannot
help fancying--'
'Oh! I am sure,' cried Amice.
Lady Adela thought the only safe way would be to turn the two young
creatures out to pour out their rapturous surmises to one another on the
winding paths of the Malvern hills, and very glad was she to have done
so, when by and by that other telegram was put into her hands.
Then, when Mary, unable to sit still, though with trembling limbs, came
back to the sitting-room, with a flush on her pale cheek, excited by the
sound at the door, Lady Adela pointed to the yellow paper, which she had
laid within the Gospel, open at the place.
Mary sank into a chair.
'It can't be a false hope,' she gasped.
'He would never have sent this, if it were not a certainty,' said Adela,
kneeling down by her, and holding her hands, while repeating what
Constance had said.
A few words were spent on wonder and censure on the girl's silence, more
unjust than they knew, but hardly wasted, since they relieved the
tension. Mary slid down on her knees beside her friend, and then came a
silence of intense heart-swelling, choking, and unformed, but none the
less true thanksgiving, and ending in a mutual embrace and an outcry of
Mary's--
'Oh, Adela! how good you are, you with no such hope'--and that great
blessed shower of tears that relieved her was ostensibly the burst of
sympathy for the bereaved mother with no such restoration in view. Then
came soothing words, and then the endeavour with dazed eyes and throbbing
hearts to look out the trains from Liverpool, whence, to their amazement,
they saw the telegram had started, undoubtedly from Lord Northmoor.
There was not too large a choice, and finally Lady Adela made the hope
seem real by proposing preparations for the child's supper and
bed--things of which Mary seemed no more to have dared to think than if
she had been expecting a little spirit; but which gave her hope
substance, and inspired her with fresh energy and a new strength, as she
ran up and downstairs, directing her maid, who cried for joy at the news,
and then going out to purchase those needments which had become such
tokens of exquisite hope and joy. After this had once begun, she seemed
really incapable of sitting still, for every moment she thought of
something her boy would want or would like, or hurried to see if all was
right.
Constance begged again and again to run on the messages, but she would
not allow it, and when the girl looked grieved, and said she was tiring
herself to death, Lady Adela said--
'My dear, sitting still would be worse for her. However it may turn out,
fatigue will be best for her.'
'Surely it can't mean anything else!' cried Constance.
'I don't see how it can. Your uncle weighs his words too much to raise
false hopes.'
So, dark as it was by the time the train was expected, Adela promoted the
ordering a carriage, and went herself with the trembling Mary to the
station, not without restoratives in her bag, in case of, she knew not
what. Not a word was spoken, but hands were clasped and hearts were
uplifted in an agony of supplication, as the two sat in the dark on the
drive to the station. Of course they were too soon, but the driver
manoeuvred so as to give them a full view of the exit--and then came that
minute of indescribable suspense when the sounds of arrival were heard,
and figures began to issue from the platform.
It was not long--thanks to freedom from luggage--before there came into
full light a well-known form, with a little half-awake boy holding his
hand.
Then Adela quietly let herself out of the brougham, and in another moment
her clasping hand and swimming eyes had marked her greeting. She pointed
to the open door and the white face in it, and in one moment more a pair
of arms had closed upon Michael, and with a dreamy murmur, 'Mam-mam,
mam-ma,' the curly head was on her bosom, the precious weight on her lap,
her husband by her side, the door had closed on them, they were driving
away.
'Oh! is it real? Is he well?'
'Perfectly well! Only sleepy. Strong, grown, well cared for.'
'My boy, my boy,' and she felt him all over, gazed at the rosy face
whenever a tantalising flash of lamplight permitted, then kissed and
kissed, till the boy awoke more fully, with another 'Mamma! Mamma,'
putting his hand to feel for her chain, as if to identify her. Then with
a coo of content, 'Mite has papa and mamma,' and he seemed under the
necessity of feeling them both.
Only at their own door did those happy people even recollect Lady Adela,
with shame and dismay, which did not last long, for she came on them,
laughing with pleasure, and saying it was just what she had intended,
while Mite was recognising his Amy and his Conny, and being nearly
devoured by them.
He still was rather confused by the strange house. 'It's not home,' he
said, staring round, and blinking at the lights; 'and where's my big
horse?'
'You shall soon go home to the big horse--and Nurse Eden, poor nurse
shall come to you, my own.'
To which Michael responded, holding out a plump leg and foot for
admiration. 'I can do mine own socks and bootses now, and wash mine own
hands and face.'
Nevertheless, he was quite sleepy enough to be very happy and content to
be carried off to his mother's bedroom, where he sat enthroned on her
lap, Constance feeding him with bread and milk, while Amice held the
bowl, and the maid, almost equally blissful, hovered round, and there
again he sat with the two admiring girls one at each foot, disrobing him,
as best they might.
Nearly asleep at last, he knelt at his mother's knee with the murmured
prayer, but woke just enough to say, 'Mite needn't say "make papa
better," nor "bring Mite home."'
'No, indeed, my boy. Say Thank God for all His mercy.'
He repeated it and added of himself, 'Bless nursey, and let Tommy and Fan
have papas and mammas again. Amen.'
He was nodding again by that time, but he held his mother's hand fast
with 'Don't go, Mam!' Nor did she. She had asked no questions. To be
alone with her boy and Him, whom she thanked with her whole soul, was
enough for her at present.