TWO LETTERS.
Northbury was so completely out of the world that it only had a postal
delivery twice a day. The early post was delivered at eight o'clock, so
that the good people of the place could discuss their little items of
outside news over their breakfast-tables. The postman went round with
his evening delivery at seven. He was not overwhelmed by the aristocracy
of Rosendale Manor, and, notwithstanding Mrs. Bertram's open annoyance,
insisted on calling there last. He said it suited him best to do so, and
what suited Sammy Benjafield he was just as determined to do, as Mrs.
Bertram was to carry out her own schemes.
Consequently, the evening letters never reached the Manor until between
eight and half-past. Mrs. Bertram and her daughters dined at seven. They
were the only people in Northbury who ate their dinner at that
aristocratic hour; tea between four and five, and hot, substantial and
unwholesome suppers were the order of the day with the Northbury folk.
_Very_ substantial these suppers were, and even the Rector was not
proof against the hot lobster and rich decoctions of crab with which his
flock favored him at these hours.
For the very reason, however, that heavy suppers were in vogue at
Northbury, Mrs. Bertram determined to adhere to the refinement of a
seven-o'clock dinner. Very refined and very simple this dinner generally
was. The fare often consisting of soup made out of vegetables from the
garden, with a very slight suspicion of what housekeepers call stock to
start it; fish, which meant as often as not three simple but fresh
herrings; a morsel of meat curried or hashed would generally follow; and
dessert and sweets would in the summer be blended into one;
strawberries, raspberries or gooseberries from the garden forming the
necessary materials. Cream did not accompany the strawberries, and the
rich wine in the beautiful and curiously-cut decanters was placed on the
table for show, not for use.
But then the dinners at the Manor were so exquisitely served. Such
napery, such china, such sparkling and elegant glass, and such
highly-polished plate. Poor little Clara, the serving-maid, who had not
yet acquired the knack of telling a lie with _sang froid_
absolutely trembled, as she spread out her snowy table-cloths, and laid
her delicate china and glass and silver on the board.
"It don't seem worth while," she often remarked to the cook. "For what's
an' erring? It seems wicked to eat an' erring off sech plates as them."
"It's a way the quality have," retorted Mrs. Masters, who had come from
London with the Bertrams and did not mean to stay. "They heats nothing,
and they lives on _sham_. Call _this_ soup! There, Clara, you'll be
a sham yourself before you has done with them."
Clara thought this highly probable, but she was still young and
romantic, and could do a great deal of living on make-beliefs, like many
other girls all the world over.
As the Bertrams were eating their strawberries off delicate Sevres
plates on the evening of the day when Mr. Ingram had disclosed the
parentage of poor Beatrice Meadowsweet, the postman was seen passing the
window.
Benjafield had a very slow and aggravating gait. The more impatient
people were for their letters, the more tedious was he in his delivery.
Benjafield had been a fisherman in his day, and had a very sharp,
withered old face. He had a blind eye, too, and walked by the aid of a
crutch but it was his boast that, notwithstanding his one eye and his
lameness, no one had ever yet got the better of him.
"There's Benjafield!" exclaimed Mabel. "Shall I run and fetch the
letters, mother?"
Mrs. Bertram rose slowly from her seat at the head of the board.
"The post is later than ever," she remarked; "it is past the half-hour.
I shall go myself and speak to Benjafield."
She walked slowly out through the open window. She wore an evening dress
of rusty black velvet with a long train. It gave her a very imposing
appearance, and the effect of her evening dress and her handsome face
and imperious manners were so overpowering that the old postman, as he
hobbled toward her, had to mutter under his breath:
"Don't forget your game leg, Benjafield, nor your wall eye, and don't
you be tooken down nor beholden to nobody."
"Why is the post so late?" inquired Mrs. Bertram. "It is more than
half-past eight."
"Eh!" exclaimed Benjafleld.
"I asked why the post was so late."
"Eh? I'm hard of hearing, your ladyship."
He came a little nearer, and leered up in the most familiar way into the
aristocratic face of Mrs. Bertram.
"Intolerable old man," she muttered, aloud: "Take the letters from him,
Catherine, and bring them here."
Then raising her voice to a thin scream, she continued:
"I shall write to the general post-office on this subject; it is quite
intolerable that in any part of England Her Majesty's Post should be
entrusted to incapable hands."
Old Benjafield, fumbling in his bag, produced two letters which he
presented to Catherine. He did so with a dubious, inquiring glance at
her mother, again informed the company generally that he was hard of
hearing, and hobbled away.
One of the letters, addressed in a manly and dashing hand, was for
Catherine. The other, also in manly but decidedly cramped writing, was
addressed to Mrs. Bertram.
She started when she saw the handwriting, instantly forgot old
Benjafield, and disappeared into the house.
When she was gone Mabel danced up to her sister's side, and looked over
her shoulder at the thick envelope addressed in the manly hand.
"Kate, it's from Loftie!" she exclaimed.
"Yes, it's from Loftie," responded Catherine. "Let us come and sit under
the elm-tree and read what he says, May."
The girls seated themselves together on a rustic bench, tore open the
thick letter, and acquainted themselves with its contents.
"Dearest,--I'm coming home to-morrow night. _Must_ see the mater.
Have got into a fresh scrape. Don't tell anyone but May--I mean about
the scrape.
"Your devoted brother,
"LOFTUS."
Catherine read this letter twice, once to herself, then aloud for
Mabel's benefit.
"Now, what's up?" exclaimed Mabel. "It must be very bad. He never calls
you 'dearest;' unless it's awfully bad. Does he, Kitty?"
"No," said Catherine. "Poor mother," she added then, and she gave a
profound and most ungirlish sigh.
"Why, Catherine, you have been grumbling at mother all day! You have
been feeling so cross about her."
"You never will understand, Mabel! I grumble at mother for her
frettiness, but I love her, I pity her for her sorrows."
Mabel looked full into her sister's face.
"I confess I don't understand you," she said. "I can't love one side of
a person, and hate the other side; I don't know that I love or hate
anybody very much. It's more comfortable not to do things very much,
isn't it, Kitty?"
"I suppose so," replied Catherine, "but I can't say. That isn't my
fashion. I do everything very much. I love, I hate, I joy or sorrow, all
in extremes. Perhaps it isn't a good way, but it's the only way I've
got. Now let us talk about Loftus. I wonder if he is going to stay long,
and if he will make himself pleasant."
"No fear of that," responded Mabel. "He'll be as selfish and exacting as
ever he can be. He'll keep mother in a state of fret, and you in a state
of excitement, and he'll insist on smoking a cigarette close to the new
cretonne curtains in the drawing-room, and he'll make me go out in the
hot part of the day to gather fresh strawberries for him. Oh, I do think
brothers are worries! I wish he wasn't coming. We are very peaceful and
snug here. And mother's face doesn't looked harassed as it often did
when we were in town. I do wish Loftus wasn't coming to upset
everything. It was he turned us away from our nice, sprightly, jolly
London, and now, surely he need not follow us into the country. Yes,
Catherine, what words of wisdom or reproof are going to drop from your
lips?"
"Not any," replied Catherine. "I can't make blind people see, and I
can't bring love when there is no love to bring. Of course, it is
different for me."
"How is it different for you?"
"I love Loftus. He gives me pain, but that can be borne, for I love
him."
At this moment Mrs. Bertram's tall figure was seen standing on the steps
of the house. It was getting dark; a heavy dew was falling, and the air
was slightly, pleasantly chill after the intense heat of the day. Mrs.
Bertram had wrapped a white fleecy cloud over her head. She descended
the steps, stood on the broad gravel sweep, and looked around her.
"We are here, mother," said May, jumping up. "Do you want us?"
"I want Catherine. Don't you come, Mabel. I want Catherine alone."
"Keep Loftus's letter," said Catherine, tossing it into her sister's
lap. "I know by mother's tone she is troubled. Don't let us show her the
letter to-night. Put it in your pocket, May."
Aloud she said,--
"Yes, mother, I'm coming. I'll be with you directly." She ran across the
grass, looking slim and pale in her white muslin dress, her face full of
intense feeling, her manner so hurried and eager that her mother felt
irritated by it.
"You need not dash at me as if you meant to knock me down, Kate," she
said.
"You said you wanted me, mother."
"So I did, Catherine. I do want you. Come into the house with me."
Mrs. Bertram turned and walked up the steps. She entered the wide hall
which was lit by a ghostly, and not too carefully-trimmed, paraffin
lamp. Catherine followed her. They went into the drawing-room. Here also
a paraffin lamp gave an uncertain light; very feeble, yellow, and
uncertain it was, but even by it Catherine could catch a glimpse of her
mother's face. It was drawn and white, it was not only changed from the
prosperous, handsome face which the girl had last looked at, but it had
lost its likeness to the haughty, the proud, the satisfied Mrs. Bertram
of Catherine's knowledge. Its expression now betokened a kind of inward
scare or fright.
"Mother, you have something to worry you," said Kate, "I see that by
your face. I am sorry. I am truly sorry. Sit down, mother. What can I do
for you?"
"Nothing, my dear, except to be an attentive daughter--attentive and
affectionate and obedient. Sometimes, Catherine, you are not that."
"Oh, never mind now, when you are in trouble, I'd do anything in the
world for you when you are in trouble. You know that."
Mrs. Bertram had seated herself. Catherine knelt now, and took one of
her mother's hands between her own. Insensibly the cold hand was
comforted by the warm steadfast clasp.
"You are a good child, Kate," said her mother in an unwonted and gentle
voice. "You are full of whims and fancies; but when you like you can be
a great support to one. Do you remember long ago when your father died
how only little Kitty's hand could cure mother's headaches?"
"I would cure your heartache now."
"You can't, child, you can't. And besides, who said anything about a
heartache? We have no time, Kate, to talk any more sentimentalities. I
have had a letter, my dear, and it obliges me to go to town to-night."
"To-night? Surely there is no train?"
"There is. One stops at Northbury to take up the mails at a quarter to
twelve. I shall go by it."
"Do you want me to go with you?"
"By no means. Of what use would you be?"
"I don't know. Perhaps not of any use, and yet long ago when you had
headaches, Kitty could cure them."
There was something so pathetic and so unwonted in Catherine's tone that
Mrs. Bertram was quite touched. She bent forward, placed her hand under
the young chin, raised the handsome face, and printed a kiss on the
brow.
"Kitty shall help her mother best by staying at home," she said.
"Seriously, my love. I must leave you in charge here. Not only in charge
of the house, of the servants, of Mabel--but--of my secret."
"What secret, mother?"
"I don't want any one here to know that I have gone to London."
Catherine thought a moment.
"I know you are not going to give me your reasons," she said, after a
pause. "But why do you tell me there is a secret?"
"Because you are trustworthy."
"Why do tell _me_ that you are going to London?"
"Because you must be prepared to act in an emergency."
"Mother, what do you mean?"
"I will tell you enough of my meaning to guide you, my love. I have had
some news that troubles me. I am going to London to try and put some
wrong things right. You need not look so horrified, Kate; I shall
certainly put them right. It might complicate matters in certain
quarters if it were known that I had gone to London, therefore I do it
secretly. It is necessary, however, that one person should know where to
write to me. I choose you to be that person, Catherine, but you are only
to send me a letter in case of need."
"If we are ill, or anything of that sort, mother?"
"Nothing of that sort. You and Mabel are in superb health. I am not
going to prepare for any such unlikely contingency as your sudden
illness. Catherine, these are the _only_ circumstances under which
you are to communicate with your mother. Listen, my dear daughter.
Listen attentively. A good deal depends on your discretion. A stranger
may call. The stranger may be either a man or a woman. He or she will
ask to see me. Finding I am away this person, whether man or woman, will
try to have an interview with either you or Mabel, and will endeavor by
every means to get my address. Mabel, knowing nothing, can reveal
nothing, and you, Kate, you are to put the stranger on the wrong scent,
to get rid of the stranger by some means, and immediately to telegraph
to me. My address is in this closed-up envelope. Lock the envelope in
your desk; open it if the contingency to which I have alluded occurs,
not otherwise. And now, my dear child, I must go upstairs and pack."
Catherine roused herself from her kneeling position with difficulty. She
felt cold and stiff, queer and old.
"Shall I help you, mother," she asked.
"No, my dear, I shall ring for Clara. I shall tell Clara that I am going
to Manchester. A train to Manchester can be taken from Fleet-hill
Junction, so it will all sound quite natural. Go out to Mabel, dear.
Tell her any story you like."
"I don't tell stories, mother. I shall have nothing to say to Mabel."
"Tell her nothing, then; only run away. What is the matter now?"
"One thing before you go, mother. I too had a letter to-night."
"Had you, my dear? I cannot be worried about your correspondence now."
"My letter was from Loftie."
"Loftus! What did he write about?"
"He is coming here to-morrow night."
Catherine glanced eagerly into her mother's face as she spoke. It did
not grow any whiter or any more careworn.
She stood still for a moment in the middle of the drawing-room,
evidently thinking deeply. When she spoke her brow had cleared and her
voice was cheerful.
"This may be for the best," she said.
Catherine stamped her foot impatiently.
"Mother," she said, "you quite frighten me with your innuendoes and your
half-confidences. I don't understand you. It is very difficult to act
when one only half understands."
"I cannot make things plainer for you, my dear. I am glad Loftie is
coming. You girls must entertain him as well as you can. This is
Wednesday evening. I hope to be back at the latest on Monday. It is
possible even that I may transact my business sooner. Keep Loftus in a
good temper, Kate. Don't let him quarrel with Mabel, and, above all
things, do not breathe to a soul that your mother has gone to London.
Now, kiss me, dear. It is a comfort to have a grown-up daughter to lean
on."