A BREEZE ABOUT A BONNET.
It was on a Sunday morning, about a fortnight after the return of the
travellers, that Honor had the first serious warning of coming
“difficulty” with her mother-in-law. I have often heard it remarked, and
I fear with some degree of truth, that the Seventh is very apt to be the
one, of all days in the year, when domestic differences do most
frequently arise. Why this should be is not, I think, very difficult of
comprehension. To such women as Mrs. Beacham--to the habitually
“busy”--the enforced idleness of Sunday hangs terribly heavy on the
folded hands. When an active-minded and energetic female has nothing to
do, there is a terrible temptation to be cantankerous. With John’s
restless, vigorous-bodied parent the Sabbath was anything but a
favourite time. She paid all outward respect to the hours between
sunrise and bedtime on the “Lord’s day.” Her best gown was donned, and
her roast beef eaten; the knitting-needles were put away, and Cowper’s
Sermons or Law’s _Serious Call_ brought forward in their stead. Mrs.
Beacham might even go so far as to _call_ the “Sabbath a delight, the
holy of the Lord, honourable;” but she was, nevertheless, very thankful
(under the rose) when the irksome hours drew to a close; and if there
did happen to be a day when, to use Letty’s favourite expression,
“missus got out the wrong side of her bed,” that day was pretty certain
to be the Seventh.
It would seem that John was not altogether unaware of this trifling
peculiarity, for during breakfast-time he was seen to _wink_ more than
once with an air of comic warning to Honor, as much as to say, “Take no
notice; this is but a passing shower, the looming of a summer cloud; the
slightest possible crumpling of the tender roses with which our bed is
strewn.” He was quite in the dark--Honor understood that well--as to the
real state of things between her and his mother. He had yet to discover
that, during his long daily absences, although no overt act, no _words_
even of which she could actually complain, had made her life
uncomfortable, still there was an undercurrent of “nagging,” a perpetual
though not always a very perceptible “talking at,” on the old lady’s
part, which was far harder to endure patiently than the open harshness
of language which Honor felt certain that John’s mother was often
longing to attack her with.
The first Sunday at the Paddocks having been a hopelessly rainy day,
there had been no walking along the lanes to attend Divine Service: the
Seventh day had, however, now come round again, and the shy
consciousness of early wifehood having a little worn off, Honor, as was
only natural, had allowed her thoughts to wander to a no less important
subject than the dress in which, at Switcham Church, she was to make her
first appearance as a wife. The result of these meditations, and
also--if the truth must be told--of a little stitching and altering, was
as pretty a specimen of Sabbath-day adornment as ever entered the walls
of a village church. And yet there was nothing (bright as a spring
butterfly though she looked) the least over-dressed, or unbecoming her
situation in life, in Honor Beacham’s attire. There were no
incongruities, no single article of dress outshone or put shame upon the
other, there had been no “trimming of robe of frieze with copper-lace;”
but all was neat, effective, and, so far as Honor and the Leigh
dressmaker together could achieve the desired object, according to the
make and fashion of the day.
“Now then, Honey, let’s have a good look at you,” exclaimed John, as,
five minutes before the moment appointed for setting forth, his wife,
with a blush of gratified vanity on her cheek (for the glass had told
her she was worth the looking at), tripped confidently up to him for
approval. Before he could speak, however, Mrs. Beacham’s harsh voice
broke the charm, and John’s complimentary words were frozen on his lips.
“My good gracious me!” she cried; “why you’re never surely going to
church in that thing!” and she pointed with a thick finger, clothed in
the stoutest of useful bottle-green gloves, at Honor’s airy bonnet; a
small senseless thing enough, but very becoming all the same, with its
trimming of blue forget-me-nots, showing off to perfection the soft
beauty of the brown braided hair, and matching the azure eyes, John
thought, so prettily. “To church of all places!” continued the old lady,
whose headgear, being of very ancient fashion and materials, had struck
Honor as far more remarkable than her own. “Why, you’ll have everyone
looking at you!”
“And like enough too,” said John with a laugh, and hoping by this
_judicious_ manœuvre to divert the rising storm, “let her put on what
she may. But I say, mother, what’s wrong with Honor’s bonnet? I don’t
pretend to know much about women’s dress, about their crinoline and
hairbags, for instance. You don’t wear one of them I’m glad to see,
Honey,” he went on, twisting a shining curl that strayed upon her white
throat round his big finger as he spoke. “I’m all for nature, I am; but
as for the child’s bonnet, mother--”
“Now, John,” put in Mrs. Beacham irritably, “don’t you be foolish. I
_must_ know better than you can do what’s proper for a young woman to
wear; and I say that such a thing as _that_ isn’t fit to be seen within
a church door.”
Honor could not help smiling--for she did not foresee to what extent her
stepmother’s temper would carry her--at the old woman’s abuse of her
unoffending costume. She felt certain too of John’s support, and
therefore replied cheerfully:
“I am very sorry; I thought it such a pretty bonnet. However, I daresay
nobody will look at it; and my best hat got so spoilt at Ryde--”
“Spoilt indeed! Ryde seems to have played the mischief with all your
smart new clothes. And as if you could venture into church in one of
those flighty pork-pies, that I hate the very sight of!”
“Well then,” interposed John, “as that matter’s settled, suppose we cut
along. Got your Prayer-book, eh, Honey? That’s all right;” and he was
half out of the door, when, instead of following on his footsteps, Mrs.
Beacham plumped her ample figure down on her own especial arm-chair, and
planted her two hands defiantly on her knees.
“You may go to church, John, if _you_ like; but as for me, if you’ve no
objection, I prefer to remain at home.”
“Nonsense, mother! Come! The idea of going on so about a bonnet! I’m
sure Honor doesn’t care, do you, Pet? She doesn’t mind what she wears,
mother, not she! She’s pretty enough not to, any way,” he added in a
lower tone; not so low, however, but that his mother heard the words,
and grew thereupon more than ever determined to conquer and humble the
object of John’s foolish admiration and absurdly weak and blamable
indulgence.
“If she doesn’t care then, let her change it,” she said stolidly,--“let
her change it. She’s got another in her box--one that a decent woman
needn’t be ashamed to be seen in, and--”
“O, John, it’s _such_ an old-fashioned one!” Honor broke in. “I’ve had
it these two years, and it’s only fit for rainy days. I’d rather not go,
indeed I would;” and the tears, I am sorry to say, were already very
near her bright blue eyes.
John scratched his head in very positive perplexity. To yield to his
mother had, from long habit, become almost second nature to the
good-tempered man; but then, nature--and nature too with a very powerful
voice--pleaded within him strongly for Honor. He could not bear to see
her vexed; and she would be vexed, that he knew right well, if they
both--his mother and himself--went off to church and left her all alone.
But then, if she so disliked the idea of wearing the two-year-old
bonnet, and if--which he knew well enough would be the case--his mother
would not yield, why what was to be done? It was the beginning of
domestic troubles--a foreshadowing of the cloud that was to darken all
John’s future life--the first faint warnings of the fell disease that,
like the cankerworm, eats into the vital parts, and poisons the whole
sap of life, and this truth (though John was far enough from shaping to
himself any, even the most indistinct, of the evils that were
threatening his peace) probably lay at the root of the strange
discouragement which, while he turned his eyes alternately from his wife
to his mother, gave a look of bewilderment to his usually placid face.
It was that look which decided Honor, showing her the way her duty lay,
and awakening her pity for the man halting so helplessly between two
opinions.
“After all,” she said to herself, calling up as much philosophy to her
aid as a weak vessel of her sex and age could hope to summon,--“after
all, what does it signify? It _is_ absurd to make so much fuss about a
bonnet;” and then aloud, “I don’t care--indeed I don’t, John; and rather
than vex you, I’ll change it in half a moment;” and she ran upstairs
with an alacrity which confirmed John in the impression that she was an
angel.
And so at the moment--or at least very like one--Honor felt that she had
earned the right to be considered; for she was--absurd as it may seem to
those among my readers who have either outlived, or have never been
subject to, the weakness of personal vanity--about to make what was to
her a great, ay even a heroic, sacrifice. She had so looked forward to
appearing her very best that day. Religion, I grieve to confess, had
little enough to do (when, alas I has it ever much?) with the fitting on
of the best gown, and the extra smoothing of the shining hair. In nine
cases out of ten, the remembering of the Sabbath-day does not mean the
keeping of it holy. Jill, it is to be feared, goes to church to show
herself; while Jack, in his best coat and Sunday hat, goes through the
same ceremony that he may join his sweetheart. Can we wonder that too
often these respective parties come to grief, and, like the Jack and
Jill in the story-book, wounds and bruises (metaphorically speaking) are
the well-deserved consequences of their levity and _supercherie_?
Seeing then that the female mind is, both from nature and habit, loth to
believe in the “glaring impotence” of “dress,” we may excuse this poor
Honor for her petulance, and for the little angry jerk with which she
threw open the old mahogany wardrobe, and drew from it the contemned and
faded specimen of bygone finery. With a flushed face, and hands that
trembled a little with the passing irritation of the moment, she tied
the tumbled strings under her dainty chin, and then, without stopping to
look at her “shabby” self in the glass, she hastened down the stairs.
John and his mother had already left the house when Honor, feeling very
proud of her holocaust, and not a little eager to judge of its effect
upon those she had endeavoured to please, rushed into the hall. She knew
it was late, and moreover Mrs. Beacham was, she felt, precisely the kind
of old woman who would not enter a Church after the service had begun
for the world; but in spite of these and other excuses that might be
made for the disappearance of her companions, Honor did feel it a little
hard that they had not waited for her--a trifle provoking that John
should have cared so little whether she looked well or ill in that “guy
of a thing” that she had put upon her head. She betrayed no outward
signs of the foolish, perhaps too it may be called _puerile_, inward
struggle--the battle against what I fear might almost be called a “bit
of temper” that was rife within her. Overtaking John and his mother
walking quietly arm-in-arm, “as if nothing had happened,” it was only
natural, I think, that this silly girl should have entertained a vague
impression that she, the bride of four weeks old, had been “thrown
over”--and that, too, after she had shown herself so willing to
“oblige”--for the sake of the “cross,” “fussy” old woman, behind whose
broad uncompromising back Honor (and it must be confessed that at the
moment she did not greatly love the sight) was trudging across the
meadows, with her fair face--that bonnet was so very old-fashioned and
ugly!--slightly overshadowed by a passing cloud.
It _was_ only a trifle, you will say, that produced this inauspicious
result; but need I repeat that trifles make up the sum of human life?
Were we all to look back upon some of the most important incidents of
our lives, I think--could we all be strictly honest with ourselves--we
should be willing to allow that what seemed a mere “nothing” at the time
was not without its influence, not only on our conduct, but on that
which goes by the name (for want of a better) of our destinies. Honor
would have been as incredulous as her neighbours had it been suggested
to her that in her present petulance there lay the germ of future peril,
and that the apparently insignificant family feud with which that
peaceful-seeming Sabbath had been marked was _le commencement de la fin_
of her life’s history; and yet that so it was the events hereafter to be
disclosed will greatly tend to prove.
Many and curious were the eyes turned towards “Farmer Beacham’s” pew
that holiday in early June, when the sun shone out and nature’s garb was
fresh, and when it would almost seem that, out of compliment to the
bride, each daughter of Eve there present had bedecked herself in her
Sunday’s best. With her head bent down and half hidden by the high oaken
walls of the old-fashioned pew, Honor endeavoured, and not wholly
without success, to remember that the “place in which she stood was holy
ground.” She never once raised her blue eyes from the bran-new
red-morocco Prayer-book--gilt-edged, and which was one of John’s
earliest offerings to his betrothed--which she held in her hand. A shy
consciousness that she was the observed of all observers in that crowded
village church, together with the mortifying reflection which, _malgré
elle_, would intrude itself, that she was not “fit to be seen,” brought
pretty waves of colour to the lowered girlish face.
From his place in the gallery, the most conspicuous one in the big,
well-cushioned, luxurious family pew, there was one who throughout the
service continued furtively to gaze upon the features which to his eyes
were so surpassing fair. Though, for his age, he had seen a good deal of
the world, Arthur Vavasour was still in every way too young to set the
opinion of that world at absolute defiance; so he chose the opportunity
when he and the rest of the congregation were on their knees, repeating
with wearisome monotony that they were all “miserable sinners,” to gaze
his fill at the farmer’s lovely bride. In the house of God, under the
shelter of his folded arms, in the humble posture of a penitent, he was
already breaking in his heart the one of the commandments on which most
strenuously depends “our neighbour’s” peace, his honour and well-being!
Truly it was well for Cecil Vavasour that his sleep was sound in the
churchyard vault that day, and that to him it was not given to look
within the erring heart of his eldest born! That son, who in his
beautiful childhood had been so very near his father’s heart, stood
terribly in need that Sabbath-day, proud and handsome and prosperous
though he seemed, of the “effectual fervent prayer” which in the sight
of Heaven “availeth much.”