I have no intention of following Lieutenant Ford to the seat of war. The
exploits of his campaign are recorded in the public journals of the
day, where the curious may still peruse them. My own taste has always
been for unwritten history, and my present business is with the reverse
of the picture.
After Jack went off, the two ladies resumed their old homely life. But
the homeliest life had now ceased to be repulsive to Elizabeth. Her
common duties were no longer wearisome: for the first time, she
experienced the delicious companionship of thought. Her chief task was
still to sit by the window knitting soldiers' socks; but even Mrs. Ford
could not help owning that she worked with a much greater diligence,
yawned, rubbed her eyes, gazed up and down the road less, and indeed
produced a much more comely article. Ah, me! if half the lovesome
fancies that flitted through Lizzie's spirit in those busy hours could
have found their way into the texture of the dingy yarn, as it was
slowly wrought into shape, the eventual wearer of the socks would have
been as light-footed as Mercury. I am afraid I should make the reader
sneer, were I to rehearse some of this little fool's diversions. She
passed several hours daily in Jack's old chamber: it was in this
sanctuary, indeed, at the sunny south window, overlooking the long road,
the wood-crowned heights, the gleaming river, that she worked with most
pleasure and profit. Here she was removed from the untiring glance of
the elder lady, from her jarring questions and commonplaces; here she
was alone with her love,--that greatest commonplace in life. Lizzie felt
in Jack's room a certain impress of his personality. The idle fancies of
her mood were bodied forth in a dozen sacred relics. Some of these
articles Elizabeth carefully cherished. It was rather late in the day
for her to assert a literary taste,--her reading having begun and ended
(naturally enough) with the ancient fiction of the "Scottish Chiefs." So
she could hardly help smiling, herself, sometimes, at her interest in
Jack's old college tomes. She carried several of them to her own
apartment, and placed them at the foot of her little bed, on a
book-shelf adorned, besides, with a pot of spring violets, a portrait of
General McClellan, and a likeness of Lieutenant Ford. She had a vague
belief that a loving study of their well-thumbed verses would remedy, in
some degree, her sad intellectual deficiencies. She was sorry she knew
so little: as sorry, that is, as she might be, for we know that she was
shallow. Jack's omniscience was one of his most awful attributes. And
yet she comforted herself with the thought, that, as he had forgiven her
ignorance, she herself might surely forget it. Happy Lizzie, I envy you
this easy path to knowledge! The volume she most frequently consulted
was an old German "Faust," over which she used to fumble with a battered
lexicon. The secret of this preference was in certain marginal notes in
pencil, signed "J.". I hope they were really of Jack's making.
Lizzie was always a small walker. Until she knew Jack, this had been
quite an unsuspected pleasure. She was afraid, too, of the cows, geese,
and sheep,--all the agricultural _spectra_ of the feminine imagination.
But now her terrors were over. Might she not play the soldier, too, in
her own humble way? Often with a beating heart, I fear, but still with
resolute, elastic steps, she revisited Jack's old haunts; she tried to
love Nature as he had seemed to love it; she gazed at his old sunsets;
she fathomed his old pools with bright plummet glances, as if seeking
some lingering trace of his features in their brown depths, stamped
there as on a fond human heart; she sought out his dear name, scratched
on the rocks and trees,--and when night came on, she studied, in her
simple way, the great starlit canopy, under which, perhaps, her warrior
lay sleeping; she wandered through the green glades, singing snatches of
his old ballads in a clear voice, made tuneful with love,--and as she
sang, there mingled with the everlasting murmur of the trees the faint
sound of a muffled bass, borne upon the south wind like a distant
drum-beat, responsive to a bugle. So she led for some months a very
pleasant idyllic life, face to face with a strong, vivid memory, which
gave everything and asked nothing. These were doubtless to be (and she
half knew it) the happiest days of her life. Has life any bliss so great
as this pensive ecstasy? To know that the golden sands are dropping one
by one makes servitude freedom, and poverty riches.
In spite of a certain sense of loss, Lizzie passed a very blissful
summer. She enjoyed the deep repose which, it is to be hoped, sanctifies
all honest betrothals. Possible calamity weighed lightly upon her. We
know that when the columns of battle-smoke leave the field, they journey
through the heavy air to a thousand quiet homes, and play about the
crackling blaze of as many firesides. But Lizzie's vision was never
clouded. Mrs. Ford might gaze into the thickening summer dusk and wipe
her spectacles; but her companion hummed her old ballad-ends with an
unbroken voice. She no more ceased to smile under evil tidings than the
brooklet ceases to ripple beneath the projected shadow of the roadside
willow. The self-given promises of that tearful night of parting were
forgotten. Vigilance had no place in Lizzie's scheme of heavenly
idleness. The idea of moralizing in Elysium!
It must not be supposed that Mrs. Ford was indifferent to Lizzie's mood.
She studied it watchfully, and kept note of all its variations. And
among the things she learned was, that her companion knew of her
scrutiny, and was, on the whole, indifferent to it. Of the full extent
of Mrs. Ford's observation, however, I think Lizzie was hardly aware.
She was like a reveller in a brilliantly lighted room, with a
curtainless window, conscious, and yet heedless, of passers-by. And Mrs.
Ford may not inaptly be compared to the chilly spectator on the dark
side of the pane. Very few words passed on the topic of their common
thoughts. From the first, as we have seen, Lizzie guessed at her
guardian's probable view of her engagement: an abasement incurred by
John. Lizzie lacked what is called a sense of duty; and, unlike the
majority of such temperaments, which contrive to be buoyant on the
glistening bubble of Dignity, she had likewise a modest estimate of her
dues. Alack, my poor heroine had no pride! Mrs. Ford's silent censure
awakened no resentment. It sounded in her ears like a dull, soporific
hum. Lizzie was deeply enamored of what a French book terms her _aises
intellectuelles_. Her mental comfort lay in the ignoring of problems.
She possessed a certain native insight which revealed many of the
horrent inequalities of her pathway; but she found it so cruel and
disenchanting a faculty, that blindness was infinitely preferable. She
preferred repose to order, and mercy to justice. She was speculative,
without being critical. She was continually wondering, but she never
inquired. This world was the riddle; the next alone would be the answer.
So she never felt any desire to have an "understanding" with Mrs. Ford.
Did the old lady misconceive her? it was her own business. Mrs. Ford
apparently felt no desire to set herself right. You see, Lizzie was
ignorant of her friend's promise. There were moments when Mrs. Ford's
tongue itched to speak. There were others, it is true, when she dreaded
any explanation which would compel her to forfeit her displeasure.
Lizzie's happy self-sufficiency was most irritating. She grudged the
young girl the dignity of her secret; her own actual knowledge of it
rather increased her jealousy, by showing her the importance of the
scheme from which she was excluded. Lizzie, being in perfect good-humor
with the world and with herself, abated no jot of her personal deference
to Mrs. Ford. Of Jack, as a good friend and her guardian's son, she
spoke very freely. But Mrs. Ford was mistrustful of this
semi-confidence. She would not, she often said to herself, be wheedled
against her principles. Her principles! Oh for some shining blade of
purpose to hew down such stubborn stakes! Lizzie had no thought of
flattering her companion. She never deceived any one but herself. She
could not bring herself to value Mrs. Ford's good-will. She knew that
Jack often suffered from his mother's obstinacy. So her unbroken
humility shielded no unavowed purpose. She was patient and kindly from
nature, from habit. Yet I think, that, if Mrs. Ford could have measured
her benignity, she would have preferred, on the whole, the most open
defiance. "Of all things," she would sometimes mutter, "to be patronized
by that little piece!" It was very disagreeable, for instance, to have
to listen to _portions_ of her own son's letters.
These letters came week by week, flying out of the South like
white-winged carrier-doves. Many and many a time, for very pride, Lizzie
would have liked a larger audience. Portions of them certainly deserved
publicity. They were far too good for her. Were they not better than
that stupid war-correspondence in the "Times," which she so often tried
in vain to read? They contained long details of movements, plans of
campaigns, military opinions and conjectures, expressed with the
emphasis habitual to young sub-lieutenants. I doubt whether General
Halleck's despatches laid down the law more absolutely than Lieutenant
Ford's. Lizzie answered in her own fashion. It must be owned that hers
was a dull pen. She told her dearest, dearest Jack how much she loved
and honored him, and how much she missed him, and how delightful his
last letter was, (with those beautifully drawn diagrams,) and the
village gossip, and how stout and strong his mother continued to
be,--and again, how she loved, etc., etc., and that she remained his
loving L. Jack read these effusions as became one so beloved. I should
not wonder if he thought them very brilliant.
The summer waned to its close, and through myriad silent stages began to
darken into autumn. Who can tell the story of those red months? I have
to chronicle another silent transition. But as I can find no words
delicate and fine enough to describe the multifold changes of Nature,
so, too, I must be content to give you the spiritual facts in gross.
John Ford became a veteran down by the Potomac. And, to tell the truth,
Lizzie became a veteran at home. That is, her love and hope grew to be
an old story. She gave way, as the strongest must, as the wisest will,
to time. The passion which, in her simple, shallow way, she had confided
to the woods and waters reflected their outward variations; she thought
of her lover less, and with less positive pleasure. The golden sands had
run out. Perfect rest was over. Mrs. Ford's tacit protest began to be
annoying. In a rather resentful spirit, Lizzie forbore to read any more
letters aloud. These were as regular as ever. One of them contained a
rough camp-photograph of Jack's newly bearded visage. Lizzie declared it
was "too ugly for anything," and thrust it out of sight. She found
herself skipping his military dissertations, which were still as long
and written in as handsome a hand as ever. The "too good," which used to
be uttered rather proudly, was now rather a wearisome truth. When Lizzie
in certain critical moods tried to qualify Jack's temperament, she said
to herself that he was too literal. Once he gave her a little scolding
for not writing oftener. "Jack can make no allowances," murmured Lizzie.
"He can understand no feelings but his own. I remember he used to say
that moods were diseases. His mind is too healthy for such things; his
heart is too stout for ache or pain. The night before he went off he
told me that Reason, as he calls it, was the rule of life. I suppose he
thinks it the rule of love, too. But his heart is younger than
mine,--younger and better. He has lived through awful scenes of danger
and bloodshed and cruelty, yet his heart is purer." Lizzie had a
horrible feeling of being _blasée_ of this one affection. "Oh, God bless
him!" she cried. She felt much better for the tears in which this
soliloquy ended. I fear she had begun to doubt her ability to cry about
Jack.