|After that first round of visitation Mrs. Haldane and the vicar met
very frequently.
She found that she could be of use to a great number of poor people,
and the occupation afforded her by her self-imposed duties was novel
and interesting. It is pleasant to take the place of Providence, and
mete out help and gladness to afflicted humanity. She was actuated by
no petty spirit of vanity or ostentation; and though she soon learned
that the poorer and more necessitous people are, the more thankless
they are as a rule, these disagreeable experiences did not disillusion
her. Very often she would leave her carriage at the village inn and
accompany Mr. Santley on foot across the fields and down the deep
green lanes to the different houses at which he was to call. Their
conversations on these occasions were very interesting to her;
and more than once as she drove back home in the evening she fell
a-thinking of that distant schoolgirl past which Jiad so nearly faded
away from her memory, and began to wonder whether, if her family had
not so promptly extinguished that little romance of hers, she would
now have been the wife of the vicar of Omberley. No word had yet
passed between them of that old time, and occasionally she felt just
the least curiosity to know how he regarded it. She knew he had not
forgotten it, and she smiled to herself as she called to mind the way
in which he had addressed her as “Ellen” that first Sunday. She
had ever since been only Mrs. Haldane to him. There was a singular
fascination about him which she was unable to explain to herself.
She remembered his words, his looks his gestures with a curious
distinctness. She was conscious that, notwithstanding his reticence,
he still entertained a warm attachment to her. She could see it in his
eyes, could hear it in the tones of his voice, could feel it in the
pressure of his hand. There is no incentive to affection so powerful
and subtle as the knowledge that one is beloved. Without any analysis
of her feelings or any misgiving whatever, Mrs. Haldane knew that the
vicar’s friendship was very dear to her, that his sympathy and counsel
were rapidly growing indispensable. Many things troubled her in
connection with her husband--his indifference to any form of
religion, his stern acceptance of the conclusions of science, however
destructive they might be of all that the world had clung to as
essential to goodness and happiness, his utter disbelief of the truths
of revelation, his rejection of the only God in whom she could place
trust and confidence. Diffidently at first, and with pain and doubt,
she spoke to Mr. Santley of these troubles, and of the waverings of
her own convictions. Her husband was so good, so upright and noble a
man, that she could not despair of his some day returning to the faith
and the Church of his boyhood. Could the vicar not aid her in winning
him back to God? Then, too, at times her husband’s words appealed to
her reason so irresistibly that she began to question whether after
all she had not spent her life in the worship of a delusion. That did
not happen often, but it terrified her that it should be possible
for her at any time or in any circumstance to call in question the
fatherhood of God or the divinity of Christ.
It was only natural that these matters-should draw the vicar and
his fair parishioner very close to each other; and that intimate
relationship of soul with soul by subtle degrees widened and widened
till each became deeply interested in everything that could in any
way affect the other. In spite of his strongest resolve to be true to
Edith, Mr. Santley felt himself irresistibly drawn to her beautiful
rival. He struggled with the enchantment till further resistance
seemed useless, and then he sought refuge in self-deception. His
nature, he fancied, was wide enough to include the love of both.
To Edith he could give the affection of a husband, to Ellen the
anticipative passion of a disfranchised spirit. One was a temporal,
the other an eternal sentiment.
One afternoon, as they were returning from a visit, being on the
edge of the moss about a couple of miles from the village, they were
overtaken by a storm. There was a clump of trees hard by, and they
entered it for shelter. Mrs. Haldane had her waterproof with her; but
the rain drove in such drenching showers, that the vicar insisted on
her standing under his umbrella and sheltering her person with her
own. Side by side, with the large trunk of a beech-tree behind them
and its tossing branches overhead, they stood there for nearly half an
hour. He held his umbrella over her so that his arm almost touched her
further shoulder. They were very close together, and while she watched
the flying volleys of rain he was gazing on the beautiful complexion
of her face and neck, on the rich dark masses of her hair, her sweet
arched eyebrows and long curving eyelashes. For years he had not been
able to regard her so closely. She did not notice his scrutiny at
first, but, when she did, little sunny flushes of colour made her
loveliness still more electrical. They were talking of the storm at
first, but now there was an interval of silence. She felt his eyes
upon her face--they seemed to touch her, and the contract made her
cheeks glow. At last she turned and looked straight at him.
“I was thinking of long ago,” he said in answer to her look; “do you
remember how once we were caught by a thunderstorm at Seacombe, and we
stood together under a tree just as we are now?”
“What an excellent memory you have!” she said with a smile, while her
colour again rose.
“I never forget anything,” rejoined Mr. Santley with emphasis. “But
surely you too recollect that?”
“Oh yes; I have not forgotten it,” she said lightly. “We were very
foolish people in those days.”
“We were very happy people, were we not?
“Yes, I think we were; it was a childish happiness.”
“Manhood, then, has brought me no greater. Ah, Ellen, you seem to have
easily let the past slip away from you. With me it is as vivid to-day
as if it were only yesterday that you and I walked on the cliffs
together. Do you remember we went to the gipsy’s camp in the
sand-hills, and had our fortunes told?”
Mrs. Haldane blushed and laughed.
“We were foolish enough to do anything, I think, at that time.”
“That pretty gipsy girl with the dark almond eyes and red-and-amber
headdress was sadly out in her reading of our destinies.”
Mrs. Haldane made no reply. These reminiscences, and especially the
tone in which the vicar dwelt on them, disquieted her.
“I think the worst of the shower is over now,” she said, stepping from
under his umbrella. As she spoke, however, a fresh gust of wind and
rain contradicted her, and she stepped further into the shelter of the
tree. Mr. Santley clearly understood the significance of her words and
action.
“It is raining far too heavily to go yet,” he said gently. “Let me
hold my umbrella over you.”
She consented a little uneasily, but he laid his hand upon her arm and
said--
“I have displeased you by referring to the past, have I not? Come,
be frank with me. Surely we are good enough friends by this to speak
candidly to each other.”
She raised her great dark eyes to his face and replied gravely,
“I do not like you to speak of the past in that way. I do not think
it is right. I hope we _are_ good enough friends to speak candidly. I
have trusted you as a friend, as a very dear and true friend. I wish
to keep you always my friend; but when you spoke just now of
our childish liking for each other, I do not think you spoke as
a--friend.”
The vicar was silent, and his eyes were cast on the ground.
“Have I done you an injustice?” she asked in a low tone, after a
little pause. “Then, pray, do forgive me.”
The vicar regarded her with a look of sadness, and took the little
gloved hand she held out to him.
“You do me injustice in thinking that I have forgotten your position.”
Mrs. Haldane coloured deeply.
“No,” continued the vicar, “I have not forgotten that. I _cannot_
forget it. And if I still love you with the old love of those vanished
years, if I love you with a love which will colour my whole life, do
not imagine that it is with any hope of a response in this world. I
do your husband no injustice; I do you no dishonour. I loved you long
before he knew you; I shall love you still in that after life in which
he has deliberately abandoned all claim to you in the very existence
of which he places no belief. Between this and then let me be your
friend--your brother; let me be as one in whom you will ever find
sympathy and devotedness; one who can share and understand all your
doubts and distress, all your temptations and trials. I do not ask you
to love me; I only ask you to let me love you.” This gust of passion
was so sudden, so unexpected, so overwhelming, that almost before she
was aware, he had spoken and she had listened. And now as she thought
of what he said a strangely mixed sensation of doubt and pleasure
awoke within her. All that he wished to be he was indeed already
in her eyes--her adviser, sympathiser, friend. Only this secret
unexpectant love which lived on the past and the future agitated her.
And yet surely it was a pure spiritual love which asked for no return
on this side of the grave. These thoughts occurred to her before she
took the sober common-sense view of what he had said.
“You are taking too visionary, too feverish a view of life when you
speak in that way,” she said gently. “We cannot live on dreams. Our
duties, our work, our disappointments and cares are too real for us to
be satisfied with any love less real. You will some day meet some one
worthy of your affection, capable of sympathising with you and aiding
you in your life-work--some one who will be a fitting helpmeet to you.
For my part, I think that whenever we have missed what we are apt to
consider a great happiness it is a sure sign that God intends some
better thing for us.”
The vicar shook his head silently.
“Oh, you must have more faith!” she continued brightly. “And it ought
to be very easy for you to have faith in this matter. You have all the
advantages on your side. And, if I may be frank with you, I will say
that I think you would be happier if you _were_ married. You need some
responsive heart, and nowhere could one more need close companionship
than in such a place as Omberley.”
The rain had ceased, and as she spoke the last words she glanced up at
the clouds breaking away from the sunny blue of the sky.
“I think we may safely start now. How bright and sweet everything
looks after the rain; and what a fragrance the fields have!”
Mr. Santley did not attempt to renew the conversation. Clearly she was
not in the mood, and he believed that what he had said had fallen
as seed in a generous soil, and would germinate in the warmth of her
fervid temperament. It was enough that she knew he still loved her.
Such a knowledge is ever dangerous to an imaginative woman. For
several days after that incident Mrs. Haldane never thought of
the vicar, never heard his name mentioned without at the same time
unconsciously recalling--or rather without having flashed upon her a
mental picture not only of that little wood near the moss, but of the
romantic shore at Seacombe. She felt a strange tender interest in the
man who had loved her so long, and still loved her so hopelessly, so
unselfishly. Hitherto in their relationship she had only thought of
herself, of her own needs and her own happiness. She had looked up to
him. But that avowal had changed their position towards one another
in a singular way. He to whom every one felt entitled to appeal to
for advice, assistance, consolation, was evidently himself in need of
human affection. She had hitherto regarded the priest rather than the
man, but now the man chiefly engaged her attention, and attracted her
sympathy while he excited and perplexed her imagination. What could
she do to be of service to him? She set her woman’s wit to work in a
woman’s way, and speedily arrived at one means of serving him.
“George,” she said to her husband one morning at breakfast, “I have
been thinking of asking an old schoolfellow of mine, Hettie Taylor, to
come and spend a few weeks with us. She lives in London, and she will
be delighted with the change to the country, I know. What do you say?”
“Beginning to feel lonely already?” he asked, glancing up at her.
“Oh no, not at all. Only I have been thinking of her, and should like
to have her with me again for a little while. I am sure you will
like her. She is very pretty--such beautiful brown hair and eyes--and
decidedly intellectual.”
“Ask her by all means, then.”
“Thanks. I will write to her to-day. No, not to-day--I shall be busy
seeing after the children’s picnic. Will you not come, dear? You know
you love children.”
“To a picnic, my dear girl!” cried Mr. Haldane aghast.
“Yes, in Barton Wood. The children are all going in a couple of
waggons. And there will be some of the old people there if the weather
is fine. Do come.”
“A picnic, my dear Nell, is pure atavism--it is one of those lapses
into savagery which betray the aboriginal arboreal blood,” said
Mr. Haldane, laughing. “No, no; I have too much respect for the
civilization of the century and for my personal comfort to willingly
retrograde to the Drift Period.”