RETURNS TO AVONWORTH VALLEY, AND GLANCES
AT MRS. SOMERTON’S SECRET.
The trees were covered with a hundred shades of brown and red and
yellow. A pleasant September breeze wandered about, carrying with it
here and there the report of the sportsman’s gun. Flocks of sheep
cropped the sweet herbage, and crowds of happy-looking gleaners
gathered the stray ears of wheat which Mr. Somerton had left in the
corn-fields.
There had been an abundant harvest, and the corn was well and
successfully garnered. The big yellow stacks peered out amongst the
trees round about the Hall farm, and Luke Somerton sat cozily smoking
his after-dinner pipe.
Peace and plenty was the prevailing characteristic of the place, and
Luke Somerton was on particularly good terms, at the moment, with
himself and all the world.
“I wonder how Paul is getting on,” he said, musingly, just as his wife
had folded up the table-cloth and instructed her servant to “get those
dinner-things washed up at once.”
“Oh, he’ll get on well enough,” said Mrs. Somerton, “if his sister
doesn’t spoil him with her pack of silly letters. One would think they
had nothing in the world to do but to write letters to each other.”
“Well, there’s no harm in their writing to each other; it may keep Paul
out of mischief.”
“He is getting very little money for his age; he ought to have enough
to keep him without assistance from us by this time. It’s little we
save.”
“You think too much about saving money, Sarah. There are lots of things
in life better than money.”
“You may say what you please, Luke, the great object of life should
be to make money and get position. If one cannot gain it oneself, we
should try to get it through our children,” said Mrs. Somerton, taking
up her knitting and sitting by the window.
A stranger wandering about the quiet, peaceful, happy-looking country
of which we speak in the opening of this chapter, would assuredly not
have looked for the expression of such worldly views by the mistress of
that comfortable-looking house amongst the trees. The thought passed
over the farmer’s mind, but so lightly that he did not attempt to give
expression to it, though his reply bordered slightly upon it.
“And what do you call position, Sarah? Has it anything to do with
happiness?” asked Luke.
“Position! Why, to be above other people. To be looked up to instead
of being looked down upon. To have servants of one’s own, and not be
servants ourselves.”
“That is, your husband should be something more than a farm-bailiff,
or a farmer even on his own account. The old story; it’s no use, Sarah,
we can’t alter our lot. It seems to me that a clear conscience, and
owing nobody a penny, is about the best position in the world, after
all, whatever your station in life.”
“I know that is your opinion, Luke, and there’s something in it, for
those who like to jog through the world and be nothing to nobody. We
have money now, and why can’t we have a farm of our own, at least?”
“Oh, we’ve had enough of farming on our own account, Sarah. These are
not the days for farmers with small incomes. It doesn’t suit me to be
peddling about in the old style of farming. I have gone in for the
science of the thing, and I must have the best machinery to work with;
and you want a big holding for that and lots of capital besides. We are
much better off as it is. Mr. Tallant is rich, and, although he gets
now a fair return for his money, he’s sunk a lot in this estate.”
“And what for? That young Tallant will soon get through it all.”
“Stop until he inherits.”
“Ah, there will be changes here whenever the old man goes. Whatever
will become of Phœbe? I shall take it upon myself to speak to him about
that young lady.”
“I should think you’ll do nothing of the sort.”
“Why not? I say it is a burning shame to keep her mewed up here. She
would pick up a duke, at least, in London; and, as sure as fate, that
little painter fellow will get her if she stays at Barton much longer.”
“You seem to be quite insane upon this subject, Sarah.”
“Oh yes, of course. Everything that _you_ can’t see through is absurd;
it always was so, Luke. When you have got as far as the end of your
nose there is an end to your prospect, unless you are thinking about
what crop should follow wheat or barley.”
“Now, then; get into a passion. You said you would talk quietly if I
would stay.”
“I am not in a passion--nothing of the kind,” said Mrs. S., knitting at
double-quick speed.
“Very well, then, mind you don’t get into a passion,” said Luke,
smiling.
“Phœbe Tallant was made to shine in society, and to marry well; and it
is horrible to see wealth and power going out of a young girl’s grasp
just because nobody puts her anywhere near the prize.”
“Happiness never seems to form part of your philosophy, Sarah.”
“Wealth and power, Luke--isn’t that happiness? To wear real diamonds,
and heaps of them; to drive in the parks; to be presented at court; to
make other women envy you. Happiness! Talk of clear consciences and all
that stuff, to set a room full of women hating you for your wealth and
beauty is bliss--joy above everything!”
Luke took his pipe from his mouth and gazed in astonishment at his
wife, who had ceased knitting, and was looking out beyond where he
sat,--but not at the quiet rural picture spread out before her. She was
simply looking at her own thoughts.
“Women, Luke, are devils. To men they are bad enough, but they
treat each other like fiends: they are mean to an extent beyond all
imagination; they hate each other mortally; and a pretty woman is a
mark for all their spite and slander. But she takes it out; she has her
revenge; she stings them like an adder.”
“You are a strange woman, Sarah; but you say a great deal more than you
believe,” said Luke.
“Do I? I believe women capable of anything. But men deserve to be
deceived by them, because the first of the race was a sneak and a
coward. ‘The woman tempted me, and I did eat.’”
Mrs. Somerton gave a contemptuous toss of her head, and went on with
her knitting.
“What a pity you didn’t marry some great gun who could have given you
your full swing of power and wealth. You were a fine showy woman when
I married you, Sarah; and hang me if you wouldn’t eclipse some of the
young ones now. What a blessing it would be if you hadn’t such a bitter
tongue.”
Luke seemed to be turning this over in his mind, and contemplating it.
He spoke half admiringly, half in regret.
“Ah, Luke, I dare say you think I am a fiend like the rest of my sex,
and I feel like one at times; but if my time had to come over again, I
should not alter my choice. There are some things that I’ve done which
I would undo if I could, but not that, not that, Luke.”
“Come, Sarah, that does me good,” said Luke, going up to her, and
putting his hand on her shoulders. “I have often thought we were an
ill-assorted couple, and you’ve said many an unkind thing; but you have
been a good wife to me after all, always done your duty--ay, and more;
and I am sure your heart’s in the right place.”
Mrs. Somerton looked up at her husband with a disturbed expression of
face. Her heart was in the right place; but her life was blighted by
one act of wicked deceit, and she had struggled ever since to justify
it to her conscience.
“There, you may go now, Luke. You don’t believe I am so bad as I seem?”
“You’re a good soul; try and drop all that nonsense about position, and
we shall be a regular Darby and Joan in our old age.”
Luke kissed her on the forehead and went out; and the wife continued
her knitting.
There were some things that she would undo if she could! The years
of secret hopes and fears, and doubts and misery, revealed in this
expression, were not even dreamed of by Luke Somerton. She had schemed,
and plotted, and built castles in the future, and carried about with
her a big, burning secret, and it had lately begun to dawn upon her
that her designs would be frustrated.
There may be far-seeing readers of this book who have already plucked
out the heart of Mrs. Somerton’s mystery. We have made no great effort
to conceal it from this piercing foresight. It is no new thing that
we have invented. Our story will not be injured by your knowing Mrs.
Somerton’s secret from the beginning, neither will it be particularly
enhanced by delaying the disclosure of the great plot of her married
life.
But there are other things crowding upon my attention, and we must
leave Mrs. Somerton at present without further explanation, to chafe
against the bars of her own self-made prison-house.