WINGFOLD AND HELEN.
When Helen lay down, she tried to sleep, but she could not even lie
still. For all her preference of George and his counsel, and her hope in
the view he took of Leopold’s case, the mere knowledge that in the next
room her cousin sat by her brother, made her anxious and restless.
At first it was the bare feeling that they were together--the thing she
had for so long taken such pains to prevent. Next came the fear
lest Leopold should succeed in persuading George that he was really
guilty--in which case, what would George, the righteous man, counsel?
And last and chief of all, what hope of peace to Leopold could he in any
of his counsel--except indeed he led him up to the door of death, and
urged him into the nothingness behind it? Then what if George should be
wrong, and there WAS something behind it? Whatever sort of a something
it might be, could the teaching of George be in the smallest measure a
preparation for it? Were it not better, so far as the POSSIBILITY which
remained untouched by any of George’s arguments was concerned, that
Leopold should die believing after Mr. Wingfold’s fashion, and not
disbelieving after George’s? If then there were nothing behind, he would
be nothing the worse; if there were, the curate might have in some sort
prepared him for it.
And now first she began to feel that she was a little afraid of her
cousin--that she had yielded to his influence, or rather allowed him
to assume upon the possession of influence, until she was aware of
something that somewhere galled. He was a very good fellow, but was he
one fit to rule her life? Would her nature consent to look up to his
always, if she were to marry him? But the thought only flitted like a
cloud across the surface of her mind, for all her care was Leopold, and
alas! with him she was now almost angry, and it grieved her sorely.
All these feelings together had combined to form her mood, when her maid
came to the door with the message that Mr. Wingfold was in the library.
She resolved at once to see him.
The curate’s heart trembled a little as he waited for her. He was not
quite sure that it was his business to tell her her duty--yet something
seemed to drive him to it: he could not bear the idea of her going on
in the path of crookedness. It is no easy matter for one man to tell
another his duty in the simplest relations of life; and here was a man,
naturally shy and self-distrustful, daring to rebuke and instruct a
woman, whose presence was mighty upon him, and whose influence was
tenfold heightened by the suffering that softened her beauty!
She entered, troubled yet stately, doubtful, yet with a kind of
half-trust in her demeanour, white, and blue-eyed, with pained mouth,
and a droop of weariness and suffering in eyelids and neck--a creature
to be worshipped if only for compassion of dignified distress.
Thomas Wingfold’s nature was one more than usually bent towards
helpfulness, but his early history, his lack of friends, of confidence,
of convictions, of stand or aim in life, had hitherto prevented the
outcome of that tendency. But now, like issuing water, which, having
found way, gathers force momently, the pent-up ministration of his soul
was asserting itself. Now that he understood more of the human heart,
and recognised in this and that human countenance the bars of a cage
through which peeped an imprisoned life, his own heart burned in him
with the love of the helpless; and if there was mingled therein anything
of the ambition of benefaction, anything of the love of power, anything
of self-recommendation, pride of influence, or desire to be a centre of
good, and rule in a small kingdom of the aided and aiding, these marshy
growths had the fairest chance of dying an obscure death; for the one
sun, potent on the wheat for life, and on the tares for death, is the
face of Christ Jesus, and in that presence Wingfold lived more and more
from day to day.
And now came Helen, who, more than anyone whose history he had yet
learned--more perhaps than even her brother, needed such help as he
confidently hoped he knew now where she might find! But when he saw her
stand before him wounded and tearful and proud, regarding his behaviour
in respect of her brother as cruel and heartless; when he felt in his
very soul that she was jealous of his influence, that she disliked and
even despised him; it was only with a strong effort he avoided assuming
a manner correspondent to the idea of himself he saw reflected in her
mind, and submitting himself, as it were, to be what she judged him.
When, however, by a pure effort of will, he rose above this weakness and
looked her full and clear in the face, a new jealousy of himself arose:
she stood there so lovely, so attractive, so tenfold womanly in her
misery, that he found he must keep a stern watch upon himself, lest
interest in her as a woman should trespass on the sphere of simple
humanity, wherein with favouring distinction is recognized neither Jew
nor Greek, prince nor peasant--not even man or woman, only the one human
heart that can love and suffer. It aided him in this respect however,
that his inherent modesty caused him to look up to Helen as to a
suffering goddess, noble, grand, lovely, only ignorant of the one
secret, of which he, haunting the steps of the Unbound Prometheus, had
learned a few syllables, broken yet potent, which he would fain, could
he find how, communicate in their potency to her. And besides, to
help her now looking upon him from the distant height of conscious
superiority, he must persuade her to what she regarded as an unendurable
degradation! The circumstances assuredly protected him from any danger
of offering her such expression of sympathy as might not have been
welcome to her.
It is true that the best help a woman can get is from a right
man--equally true with its converse; but let the man who ventures take
heed. Unless he is able to counsel a woman to the hardest thing that
bears the name of duty, let him not dare give advice even to her asking.
Helen however had not come to ask advice of Wingfold. She was in no such
mood. She was indeed weary of a losing strife, and only for a glimmer of
possible help from her cousin, saw ruin inevitable before her. But
this revival of hope in George had roused afresh her indignation at
the intrusion of Wingfold with what she chose to lay to his charge as
unsought counsel. At the same time, through all the indignation, terror,
and dismay, something within her murmured audibly enough that the curate
and not her cousin was the guide who could lead her brother where grew
the herb of what peace might yet be had. It was therefore with a sense
of bewilderment, discord, and uncertainty, that she now entered the
library.
Wingfold rose, made his obeisance, and advanced a step or two. He would
not offer a hand that might be unwelcome, and Helen did not offer hers.
She bent her neck graciously, and motioned him to be seated.
“I hope Mr. Lingard is not worse,” he said.
Helen started. Had anything happened while she had been away from him?
“No. Why should he be worse?” she answered. “Have they told you
anything?”
“I have heard nothing; only as I was not allowed to see him,--”
“I left him with Mr. Bascombe half an hour ago,” she said, willing to
escape the imputation of having refused him admittance.
Wingfold gave an involuntary sigh.
“You do not think that gentleman’s company desirable for my brother, I
presume,” she said with a smile so lustreless that it seemed bitter.
“He won’t do him any harm--at least I do not think you need fear it.”
“Why not? No one in your profession can think his opinions harmless, and
certainly he will not suppress them.”
“A man with such a weight on his soul as your brother carries, will not
be ready to fancy it lightened by having lumps of lead thrown upon it.
An easy mind may take a shroud on its shoulders for wings, but when
trouble comes and it wants to fly, then it knows the difference. Leopold
will not be misled by Mr. Bascombe.”
Helen grew paler. She would have him misled--so far as not to betray
himself.
“I am far more afraid of your influence than of his,” added the curate.
“What bad influence do you suppose me likely to exercise?” asked Helen,
with a cold smile.
“The bad influence of wishing him to act upon your conscience instead of
his own.”
“Is my conscience then a worse one than Leopold’s?” she asked, but as if
she felt no interest in the answer.
“It is not his, and that is enough. His own and no other can tell him
what he ought to do.”
“Why not leave him to it, then?” she said bitterly.
“That is what I want of you, Miss Lingard. I would have you fear to
touch the life of the poor youth.”
“Touch his life! I would give him mine to save it. YOU counsel him to
throw it away.”
“Alas, what different meanings we put on the word! You call the few
years he may have to live in this world his life; while I--”
“While you count it the millions of which you know nothing,--somewhere
whence no one has ever returned to bring any news!--a wretched life at
best if it be such as you represent it.”
“Pardon me, that is merely what you suppose I mean by the word. I do not
mean that; I mean something altogether different. When I spoke of his
life, I thought nothing about here or there, now or then. You will see
what I mean if you think how the light came back to his eye and the
colour to his cheek the moment he had made up his mind to do what had
long seemed his duty. When I saw him again that light was still in his
eyes, and a feeble hope looked out of every feature. Existence, from a
demon-haunted vapor, had begun to change to a morning of spring; life,
the life of conscious well-being, of law and order and peace, had begun
to dawn in obedience and self-renunciation; his resurrection was at
hand. But you then, and now you and Mr. Bascombe, would stop this
resurrection; you would seat yourselves upon his gravestone to keep him
down!--And why?--Lest he, lest you, lest your family should be disgraced
by letting him out of his grave to tell the truth.”
“Sir!” cried Helen, indignantly drawing herself to her full height and
something more.
Wingfold took one step nearer to her.
“My calling is to speak the truth,” he said: “and I am bound to warn
you that you will never be at peace in your own soul until you love your
brother aright.”
“Love my brother!” Helen almost screamed. “I would die for him.”
“Then at least let your pride die for him,” said Wingfold, not without
indignation.
Helen left the room, and Wingfold the house.
She had hardly shut the door, and fallen again upon the bed, when she
began to know in her heart that the curate was right. But the more
she knew it, the less would she confess it even to herself: it was
unendurable.