A PAINFUL RECOGNITION.
Immediate steps were now taken by the Earl to establish Dorothy's
claims, and while the suit was pending, he yielded to her earnest
request to remain at Heath Farm with her old protector, Lawrence
Rushmere, who was still ignorant of the great future anticipated for his
adopted daughter.
The old yeoman had grown so fond of her since the desertion of his son,
that he could hardly bear her out of his sight. The responsibilities of
a lofty station weighed heavily on her mind, and there were moments
when she sincerely wished her lot might be cast midway between poverty
and riches, and she might avoid the humiliation of the one, and great
temptations incidental to the other.
There never was a period in her life when pride exerted so little
influence over her, or she thought more humbly of herself. She became
pensive and silent, and, being now entirely exempt from domestic
drudgery, passed much of her time in reading and serious reflection.
Gerard remarked the change that had passed over Dorothy, but attributed
it to the extreme conscientiousness of her character, which made her
consider herself unfitted by previous habits and education to fill a
lofty station. Once, when she had opened her mind to him on the subject,
and not without tears, lamented her ignorance of the usages of
fashionable society, and wished that she could have remained with him
always in the country, the happy and useful wife of a village pastor. He
gently chid her for her want of faith.
"You possess qualities, Dorothy, that are truly noble, that would do
honour to any station. Human nature is the same in every class, and
those who have prized you when only a country girl, working in the
fields, will not hold you in less estimation when transported to a
higher sphere. Only retain the same natural unaffected manners, that
charmed my heart in simple Dorothy Chance, and I know enough of the
society you so much dread, to assure you that you need not feel the
least alarm for the result."
But Dorothy still doubted and feared, and shrunk from the public
expressions of interest and curiosity, which could not fail to be
exerted in her case.
When Lord Wilton determined to do what was right, he became happy and
contented, and never let a day pass without paying her a visit to inform
her how the suit was progressing. Lawrence Rushmere marvelled at the
Earl's condescension, and was so won over by his kindness, that he no
longer regarded him as his hereditary enemy. One day the portrait of the
soldier of the Covenant caught the Earl's eye. He started up to examine
it, then turned to Rushmere, and spoke with animation.
"I have often heard of that picture, and feel as proud of my descent
from that glorious old fellow as you do, who are his lineal
representative, and bear his name."
"How do you make that out, my lord?" said the yeoman. "It is the first
time I ever heard that the blood of a Rushmere ran in the veins of a
Fitzmorris."
"You don't seem greatly honoured by the relationship," returned the
Earl, laughing. "But whether or no, what I say is strictly true. My
grandfather, Sir Lawrence Fitzmorris, was grandson to that famous
roundhead, by his eldest daughter Alena, and bore his Christian name.
You and I, my worthy old friend, are cousins in the third degree; will
you acknowledge me as a kinsman?"
"Aye, that a' wull wi' my heart in my hand," cried Rushmere, grasping
the nobleman's outstretched hand, who could have dispensed with at least
one half of the energetic pressure that compressed his thin white
fingers within the strong grip of the honest tiller of the soil.
"Dear, dear!" he continued, "if a' had only known that afore, I should
ha' thought a deal more o' your Lordship."
"I have something to tell you which will surprise you much more,
Lawrence. This little girl, Dorothy, whom you adopted as your own, is
descended from him too."
"Now, my lord, you be surely making fun o' me; for nobody in the world
knows who Dolly's mother was, still less her father. I ha' been puzzling
my brain about that secret for the last sixteen years, without finding
it out. It was the want of knowing who she was, that has ruined both me
and my son."
"She is my daughter, Lawrence. The poor woman that you found dead on
Hadstone Heath, was Alice Knight, a beautiful girl, whom you may
remember was adopted by my mother, Lady Dorothy. She was my wife, and
the mother of our Dorothy."
"The Lord a' mercy!" cried Rushmere, starting to his feet. "An' you let
the poor lass die for want, an' her child work for her bread, in the
house of a stranger. You may call yourself noble, an' all that, Lord
Wilton, but I should feel prouder of the relationship of a poor, honest
man."
"I do not blame you, Rushmere. My conduct, from the view you take of it,
must appear atrocious indeed. But I was as ignorant of the facts as you
were."
"But how could your lawful wife come to such a state o' destitution? Did
a' play you false?"
"I will tell you how it all happened," returned Lord Wilton, "and you
will be more ready to forgive me, as the unfortunate worship of the
golden calf, which I find is an hereditary sin, brought about this
unhappy affair."
Drawing his seat beside the old yeoman, he told him the story the reader
has just learned from the preceding chapter, patiently submitting to
his blunt cross-questioning on many points, that could not fail to be
very distressing to his feelings.
"Well, my lord," he said, when he had listened with intense interest to
the said history, "I am sartain sure I should ha' done exactly as you
did. Such a fortin as that very few men could ha' resisted. It was a
sore temptation, there's no doubt. I allers thought that yon poor
creature had been summat above her condition. She had bonny hair, an'
the smallest foot an' hand in the world. People that work hard, allers
show it most in the extremities. Labour calls out the muscles and
sinews, makes the limbs large, an' gives breadth more than height to the
figure, tans the complexion, an' makes it ruddy an' coarse. To such as I
this be real beauty, but you lords of the creation prefer a white
skinned, die away, half dead an' alive sort o' a cretur, to a well
grown healthy buxom lass like our Dorothy, who ha' grown up just as God
made her, whom all the delicate women folk envy, an' all the young men
are mad arter. She be just what I call a beauty."
Dorothy laughed at her foster-father's ideas of real beauty, and told
him that she was not at all flattered by his description, as she was
very much afraid the gentle folks would consider it "_barn-yard
beauty_."
"Don't you mind what they call it, my Lady Dorothy. I 'spose I must call
you so now. You need not be ashamed to show your face anywhere; all I be
afeared on is this, that when you go home to live in the grand old Hall,
that belonged to him," pointing up to the picture, "you'll forget the
cross old man who was father to you, when you had none. An' you might
ha' been my own darter too," he added, with a sigh, "but for my greed.
An' your children an' Gilbert's might have inherited the home of my
ancestors. I was nigh cursing Gilbert 'tother day, but Gilly has more
cause to curse me. Alack, alack, what poor miserable blind creatures we
be! It is well for us, that God's providence is at work behind it all."
"Father, you need never fear my forgetting you," said Dorothy; "I have
known this change in my fortunes a long time; and have you found any
alteration in my regard?"
"An' did a' wait upon the old man for the last three months, an' knew a'
was a titled lady all the time?"
"I'm not a titled lady to you, dear father, but always your own little
Dorothy. Where I am--you must go too, and when I leave Heath Farm, you
will have to go to Heath Hall, for I cannot live without you; and kind
Mrs. Brand has prepared a nice room for you; and we will try and make
you forget all the past troubles," and she put her arm round his neck
and kissed him.
"Rushmere, I shall grow jealous of you," said Lord Wilton, "if my
daughter bestows on you more kisses than she gives me. What Dorothy says
is perfectly true; she considers you too old to trouble about the farm,
that it is high time you should rest from labour. You must allow her to
have her own way in this matter. I have no doubt that she will contrive
to make you happy."
A week later, and Dorothy's claims were established on a legal basis,
and all the country rang with the romantic tale.
Mrs. Lane put on her best bonnet and hurried up to Nancy Watling, with
the newspaper in her hand. She had run every step of the way, a good
half mile, for fear Miss Watling should hear the news from any one else,
and when she burst into the parlour, she was too much out of breath to
speak.
Miss Watling ran upstairs for her smelling bottle, thinking that the
good woman was going to faint. By the time, however, that she reached
the parlour, the vendor of small wares had recovered the use of her
tongue.
"Well, Miss Watling," she cried, still panting, "the mystery's all out
at last. Dorothy Chance is Lord Wilton's _own_ daughter! and that poor
beggar woman, as you was used to call her, was no other than Alice
Knight, rich old Mrs. Knight's daughter, whom the Earl's good mother
adopted, and he married unbeknown to her."
"I'll not believe a word of it!" said Nancy, resolutely.
"Why, woman, it's all here in the paper," and Mrs. Lane tapped the
important document significantly, "and as true as gospel. Do you suppose
the Earl would allow the newspapers to meddle with his private affairs?
Don't you hear the bells ringing; and if you come down to the village
with me, you'll see all the flags a flying, and them who has no flags,
puts out o' their windows quilts and hankerchers. Oh, it's true, true,
and I be right glad on it. I allers did think Dorothy Chance a fine
girl."
"I wonder how her ladyship bears her new dignity?" said Miss Watling,
waspishly.
"As meek as a lamb," returned Mrs. Lane.
"How the old man will fret and fume that Gilbert did not marry her. It
serves him right, at any rate."
"How money do make people turn about," continued Mrs. Lane. "It was
only this time last year that I heard you praise old Rushmere for
turning Dorothy out o' doors. Before another week is over, you will be
boasting of her acquaintance.
"Good morning, Nancy, I can't stay longer. The butcher has promised to
give me a cast in his cart, as far as Barfords. I know Jane Barford will
be glad of any good that happens to Dorothy."
And off went the little bustling woman to spread the glad tidings in
every house she passed.
Miss Watling's envy of Dorothy was greatly diminished by her exaltation
to rank and fortune. She was now too far above her to provoke
competition, and she began to praise what she could not pull down.
Mrs. Lane was right, when she anticipated the hearty congratulations
of Mrs. Barford; even Letty stopped her churn, and, clapping her hands,
said:
"Who wud ha' thought that we shud ever have a titled lady for a dairy
maid, or that a countess wud nurse my boy, Tommy. It do seem jist like a
fairy tale."
"Yes," returned old Mrs. Barford, "and Dorothy may be considered as the
queen of the fairies. If Gilbert's in England, I wonder what he will say
to all this? As to Dorothy, she had a good miss of him. They do say that
he made that other woman a wretched husband."
"I'm thinking," said Letty, sententiously, "that it wor the wretch o' a
woman that made him a bad wife. What he could see in that dirty,
impudent wench, Martha Wood, to run off wi' un, 'stonishes I more than's
marrying yon stuck up Gallimaufry from Lunnon."
"Nothing need astonish you, Letty, that is done by a drunken man. But in
this matter of Dorothy Chance, Lawrence Rushmere was more to blame than
his son, and a fine mess he has made of it. Howsomever, I don't believe
that people can marry just whom they like. God mates them, and not man,
or we should not see such strange folk come together."
"If that be true, mother," cried Letty, with unusual vivacity, "how can
yer go on from day to day, fretting an' nagging, an' blaming Joe for
marrying I? If I had to be his wife, he wor forced to take I, whether or
no."
This was rather a poser to Mrs. Barford's favourite theory, on which
much might be said for and against, and which still remains an unsolved
enigma. The old lady was wont to excuse her own imprudent marriage on
the score of its being _her fate_. She took up her knitting and began
rattling her pins vigorously, as if perfectly unconscious of her
daughter-in-law's sensible remark.
There was one, however, to whom the change in Dorothy's social position
brought no joy, producing the most bitter disappointment, and giving
rise to vindictive and resentful feelings. This was Gilbert Rushmere.
Before leaving Heath Farm with Martha Wood, he had secured a tolerably
large sum of money by the sale of the farm horses, which had been
accomplished without the knowledge of his father. With this sum, it was
his intention of taking his passage to America; but meeting in London
some of his gambling associates, they had prevailed upon him to stay,
until fleeced in his turn of all his ill-gotten store, he was reduced to
the necessity of acting as a decoy duck, in a low tavern, which was the
common resort of men even yet more fallen and degraded than himself.
He was sitting maudling over a strong potation of gin and water, after a
night of riot and debauchery, in an underground kitchen in this den of
infamy, striving to drown the recollection of former respectability in
the maddening glass. His red bloated face, unshaven chin and matted
hair, contrasted painfully with the faded uniform that seemed to claim
for its wearer the title of a gentleman.
It is not the murderer alone who bears upon his brow the stamp of Cain.
Vice marks all her degraded victims with an unerring sign, which reveals
to the spectator the depths of their debasement. This sign is so
distinctly traceable in the countenance of a wicked man, that a little
child--nay even a dog--alike unconscious of the cause of this physical
degradation, sees that something is wrong, and shrinks instinctively
from his companionship. If a good man feels it difficult to maintain the
straight onward path of prescribed duty, the downward career of the
wicked man has no stumbling blocks in the way. Every step accelerates
his speed, till he gains, by a final plunge in deeper guilt, the
dreadful goal.
That miserable man, in his half conscious state, with his unwashed face
and soiled garments, and brutalized expression, is a sad illustration of
such a frightful career.
Scarcely a year has expired, when, a brave, honest soldier, he was
respected by his comrades, the pride of his parents, and the beloved of
a virtuous woman, and held an honourable and independent position. He
then gave a fair promise of becoming a useful member of society. Look at
him now leaning on that dirty table, drivelling over the accursed
liquor, for which he has bartered body and soul, and to obtain which he
has to herd with ruffians yet more fallen and degraded than himself.
His shameless companion deserted him when he was no longer able to
gratify her vanity, by the purchase of fine clothes and bogus jewellery.
Of his wife and her mother he neither knows nor cares, and never names
them without a curse, as the author of his misery.
His glass is out, and he is just going to fling himself upon the dirty
floor, to sleep off the headache due to last night's shameless orgies.
"Hullo! Rush! You're not going to sleep?" cries one of the gang,
entering in his shirt sleeves, with a newspaper in his hand. "In less
than an hour you'll have plenty of work to do. If you are in your senses
rouse up and read this, to keep your eyes open till the governor wants
you."
Rubbing his eyes with a dreadful oath, and wishing his companion in the
place to which he is himself fast hastening, Gilbert staggered up, and
sat down once more by the greasy table.
"It's hard that you won't leave me alone, Boxer. This life's killing me.
My head aches confoundedly. I want to go sleep, 'to forget my misery,'
as that jolly old dog, Solomon, has it, 'and remember my poverty no
more.'"
"This paper will wake you up. It's the history of your old sweetheart,
Dolly, that you are always boring me about. Not that I believe a word of
all that now. Not a very likely tale that such a girl as that would have
anything to say to such a chap as you. A nice fellow, an't you, for a
lady of rank to break her heart about."
"Don't bother me!" yawned Gilbert. "If there's anything worth hearing,
can't you tell me without my having the trouble to read it."
"There--see for yourself," cries the other, flinging the paper at his
head. "My eyes! but you lost a fine chance, if ever it was in your power
to win it."
Gilbert mechanically picked up the paper, and went to a dresser under
the only window in the room to find out what his companion meant.
The columns were filled with the termination of the famous suit that had
pronounced Dorothy Chance the legitimate daughter of Lord Wilton, and
secured to her the accumulated wealth left by her grandmother, Mrs.
Knight.
Whether it was the liquor that had maddened him, the sense of his own
degradation, or the full consciousness of all that he had lost, by his
cruel desertion of Dorothy, the news contained in that paper rendered
him furious. He raved and swore--cursing his own folly and his father's
avarice, that had hindered him from being the fortunate possessor of
all this wealth. For Dorothy herself he no longer cared. He had sunk too
low in the mire of iniquity to love a pure and virtuous woman; but the
idea of another possessing her, filled him with rage and envy, and he
swore with a terrible oath that Dorothy Chance should never be the wife
of Gerard Fitzmorris; that he would have his revenge or die in the
attempt.
His vicious comrades laughed at him, and made fun of his awful
imprecations, but the gloomy determination in his eyes proved that he at
least was not in joke.
What a mercy it is that people are generally unconscious of the evils
plotting against them, that the sorrows of the coming hour are hid
beneath the folded wings of the future.
While her quondam lover was plotting all sorts of mischief against her,
to disturb her peace, Dorothy had taken her first journey to London, in
company with her father. Her presence was necessary to sign important
papers, and to prepare a suitable outfit for her marriage, which was to
take place the first of May.
A noble suite of apartments had been prepared at Heath Hall for the
reception of the bride and bridegroom on their return to Hadstone, after
their bridal tour, which, owing to Gerard's strict notions of the sacred
obligations of his profession, and the little time that a faithful
pastor can afford to devote to his own gratification, was to be of short
duration,--embracing a brief visit to the Highlands of Scotland, and a
glance at the English lakes on their homeward route.
To a young girl brought up in the seclusion of a very retired country
life, who can catch but a faint echo from the great world to which she
is an entire stranger, the metropolis, seen at a distance, through the
dazzling medium of the imagination, is believed to be a wonderful place;
a city full of enchantments, where beauty and wealth meet you at every
turn, and cares and sorrows are forgotten in an endless round of
dissipation and pleasure. The reality of those diversions and enjoyments
soon makes them distasteful to a sensitive and reflective mind, who can
discern the sharp thorns thickly studding the stem of the rose, and who
will not sacrifice peace of mind and integrity to secure the fleeting
flowers of popular applause.
Dorothy, whose tastes were all simple and natural, felt lonely and
disappointed in the crowded streets of the great city. Their amusements
and pursuits were so different to those to which she had been
accustomed, that it required time and reflection to reconcile her to the
change.
She cared very little for expensive jewels and magnificent attire, and
did not feel at home in the splendid halls and saloons of the wealthy
and high-born. When arrayed for the first time in a costume befitting
her rank, to attend a great ball given by the beautiful Duchess of----,
and led before the mirror to admire the charming image it reflected, the
simple girl shocked her lady's maid--a very great lady indeed in her own
estimation--by turning from the glass and bursting into tears.
Her romantic story had excited the greatest interest in the public mind.
Crowds collected round the Earl's town residence to catch a glimpse of
his beautiful daughter when she took a drive in the carriage, and men
and women vied with each other in extolling the charms of her person and
the unaffected grace of her deportment. Songs were made and sung in her
praise, and wherever she appeared she was forced to submit to the
flatteries and adulations of a crowd of admirers.
This was all very painful to Dorothy; it oppressed her, restrained her
natural freedom, and rendered her a silent passive observer in the
society in which she might have shone. She was not insensible to the
admiration of the new friends, who had so graciously received her into
their charmed circle, but she longed to get out of it, and find herself
once more in the country.
She wrote daily to her lover an account of all she heard and saw, which
helped to beguile the tedium of a separation. In answer to a paragraph
in one of his letters, she said:--
"You are afraid, dear Gerard, that I may be induced to forget you,
surrounded by so many admirers; that all this gaiety and ball-going may
give me a taste for frivolous amusements, and spoil my heart. It cannot
damage what it never touches--I hardly know I have a heart; it lies so
still under this weight of jewels and brocade. It is only in the silence
of my own chamber, when my thoughts flow back to you, that it awakes to
life and happiness.
"Everything strikes me as hollow and false, in the life I am at present
compelled to lead. People live for the world and its opinions, and not
for each other, still less for God. They dare not be simple and natural,
and love the truth for its own sake--the blessed truth that would set
them free from all these conventional forms and ceremonies, that shackle
the soul and deaden all its heavenward aspirations. You will laugh at
me, Gerard, when I declare to you that I have experienced more real
enjoyment in working among the new-mown hay, and inhaling its delicious
perfume, when the skylark was warbling in the blue heaven above me,
than I have ever known in these crowded palaces, following the dull
routine of what my noble young friends term pleasure. You need not fear
such gorgeous insipidities will ever wean me from the love of nature, or
make me indifferent to the quiet happiness of a country life, the higher
enjoyment of being useful and striving to benefit others."
On several occasions, when riding out with her father, Dorothy had been
startled by observing a face in the crowd that bore a strong resemblance
to Gilbert Rushmere, but haggard and degraded, regarding her with a
fixed scowling stare of recognition, from which she shrunk with feelings
of terror and disgust. Why did this person follow her whenever she
appeared in public, glaring upon her with those wild bloodshot eyes,
with unequivocal glances of hatred and ferocity.
It was impossible that it could be Gilbert, and yet the fear that the
presence of this person never failed to inspire, convinced her, much as
she repressed the ungenerous idea, that it was he, and no other. Once,
when dismounting at her milliner's in Bond Street, she was so near to
him, that they were almost face to face. He put his sole remaining hand
hastily into the breast pocket of his coat, as if to deliver something
to her, but was pushed back, and told to get out of the lady's way by
the footman, and, with a glare of rage and disappointment, had shrunk
back among the crowd.
This frightful apparition haunted her for several days, and disturbed
her mind so much that she kept close in doors, pleading indisposition to
avoid her usual drive.