And after this neither Sir Edward nor his young friend appeared for two
whole days. Any girl of Winifred Seton's impetuous character, who has
ever been left in such a position on the very eve of the telling of that
love-tale, which had been all but told for several weeks past, but now
seemed suddenly and artificially arrested just at the moment of
utterance--will be able to form some idea of Winnie's feelings during
this dreadful interval. She heard the latch of the gate lifted a hundred
times in the day, when, alas, there was no one near to lift the latch.
She was afraid to go out for an instant, lest in that instant "they"
should come; her brain was ringing with supposed sounds of footsteps and
echoes of voices, and yet the road lay horribly calm and silent behind
the garden hedge, with no passengers upon it. And these two evenings the
light came early into Sir Edward's window, and glared cruelly over the
trees. And to be turned inward upon the sweet old life from which the
charm had fled, and to have to content one's self with flowers and
embroidery, and the canary singing, and the piano, and Aunt Agatha! Many
another girl has passed through the same interval of torture, and felt
the suspense to be killing, and the crisis tragic--but yet to older
eyes perhaps even such a dread suspension of all the laws of being has
also its comic side. Winnie, however, took care to keep anybody from
laughing at it in the cottage. It was life and death to her, or at least
so she thought. And her suppressed frenzy of anxiety, and doubt, and
fear, were deep earnest to Aunt Agatha, who seemed now to be living her
own early disappointments over again, and more bitterly than in the
first version of them. She tried hard to remember the doubt thrown upon
Captain Percival by Mary, and to persuade herself that this
interposition was providential, and meant to save her child from an
unhappy marriage. But when Miss Seton saw Winnie's tragic countenance,
her belief in Providence was shaken. She could not see the good of
anything that made her darling suffer. Mary might be wrong, she might be
prejudiced, or have heard a false account, and it might be simply
herself who was to blame for shutting her doors, or seeming to shut her
doors, against her nearest and oldest neighbours. Could it be supposed
that Sir Edward would bring any one to her house who was not a fit
associate or a fit suitor, if things should take such a turn, for
Winnie? Under the painful light thrown upon the subject by Winnie's
looks, Aunt Agatha came altogether to ignore that providential view
which had comforted her at first, and was so far driven in the other
direction at last as to write Sir Edward a little note, and take the
responsibility upon her own shoulders. What Miss Seton wrote was, that
though, in consequence of their late affliction, the family were not
equal to seeing visitors in a general way, yet that it would be strange
indeed if they were to consider Sir Edward a stranger, and that she
hoped he would not stay away, as she was sure his company would be more
a comfort to Mary than anything else. And she also hoped Captain
Percival would not leave the Hall without coming to see them. It was
such a note as a maiden lady was fully justified in writing to an old
friend--an invitation, but yet given with a full consideration of all
the proprieties, and that tender regard for Mary's feelings which Aunt
Agatha had shown throughout. It was written and despatched when Winnie
had gone out, as she did on the third day, in proud defiance and
desperation, so that if Sir Edward's sense of propriety and respect for
Mary's cap should happen to be stronger than Aunt Agatha's, no further
vexation might come to the young sufferer from this attempt to set all
right.
And Winnie went out without knowing of this effort for her consolation.
She went down by the Kirtell, winding down the wooded banks, in the
sweet light and shade of the August morning, seeing nothing of the
brightness, wrapped up and absorbed in her own sensations. She felt now
that the moment of fate had passed,--that moment that made or marred two
lives;--and had in her heart, in an embryo unexpressed condition,
several of Mr. Browning's minor poems, which were not then written; and
felt a general bitterness against the world for the lost climax, the
_dénouement_ which had not come. She thought to herself even, that if
the tale had been told, the explanation made, and something, however
tragical, had happened _after_, it would not have been so hard to bear.
But now it was clear to Winnie that her existence must run on soured and
contracted in the shade, and that young Percival must stiffen into a
worldly and miserable old bachelor, and that their joint life, the only
life worth living, had been stolen from them, and blighted in the bud.
And what was it all for?--because Mary, who had had all the good things
of this life, who had loved and been married in the most romantic way,
and had been adored by her husband, and reigned over him, had come, so
far, to an end of her career. Mary was over thirty, an age at which
Winnie could not but think it must be comparatively indifferent to a
woman what happened--at which the snows of age must have begun to benumb
her feelings, under any circumstances, and the loss of a husband or so
did not much matter; but at eighteen, and to lose the first love that
had ever touched your heart! to lose it without any reason--without the
satisfaction of some dreadful obstacle in the way, or misunderstanding
still more dreadful; without ever having heard the magical words and
tasted that first rapture!--Ah, it was hard, very hard; and no wonder
that Winnie was in a turmoil of rage, and bitterness, and despair.
The fact was, that she was so absorbed in her thoughts as not to see him
there where he was waiting for her. He had seen her long ago, as she
came down the winding road, betraying herself at the turnings by the
flutter of her light dress--for Winnie's mourning was slight--and he had
waited, as glad as she could be of the opportunity, and the chance of
seeing her undisturbed, and free from all critical eyes. There is a kind
of popular idea that it is only a good man, or one with a certain
"nobility" in his character, who is capable of being in love; but the
idea is not so justifiable as it would seem to be. Captain Percival was
not a good young man, nor would it be safe for any conscientious
historian to claim for him generous or noble qualities to any marked
degree; but at the same time I am not disposed to qualify the state of
his sentiments by saying, as is generally said of unsatisfactory
characters, that he loved Winnie as much as he could love anything. He
was in love with her, heart and soul, as much as if he had been a
paladin. He would not have stayed at any obstacle, nor regarded either
his own comfort or hers, or any other earthly bar between them. When
Winnie thought him distant from her, and contemplating his departure, he
had been haunting all the old walks which he knew Miss Seton and her
niece were in the habit of taking. He was afraid of Mary--that was one
thing indisputable--and he thought she would harm him, and bring up his
old character against him; and felt instinctively that the harm which he
thought he knew of her, could not be used against her here. And it was
for this reason that he had not ventured again to present himself at the
cottage; but he had been everywhere about, wherever he thought there was
any chance of meeting the lady of his thoughts. And if Winnie had not
been so anxious not to miss that possible visitor; if she had been
coming and going, and doing all she usually did, their meeting must have
taken place two days ago, and all the agony and trouble been spared. He
watched her now, and held his breath, and traced her at all the turnings
of the road, now by a puff of her black and white muslin dress, and then
by a long streaming ribbon catching among the branches--for Winnie was
fond of long ribbons wherever she could introduce them. And she was so
absorbed with her own settled anguish, that she had stepped out upon him
from among the trees before she was aware.
"Captain Percival!" said Winnie, with an involuntary cry; and she felt
the blood so rush to her cheeks with sudden delight and surprise, that
she was in an instant put on her guard, and driven to account for
it.--"I did not see there was any one here--what a fright you have given
me. And we, who thought you had gone away," added Winnie, looking
suddenly at him with blazing defiant eyes.
If he had not been in love, probably he would have known what it all
meant--the start, the blush, the cry, and that triumphant, indignant,
reproachful, exulting look. But he had enough to do with his own
sensations, which makes a wonderful difference in such a case.
"Gone away!" he said, on the spur of the moment--"as if I could go
away--as if you did not know better than that."
"I was not aware that there was anything to detain you," said Winnie;
and all at once from being so tragical, her natural love of mischief
came back, and she felt perfectly disposed to play with her mouse. "Tell
me about it. Is it Sir Edward? or perhaps you, too, have had an
affliction in your family. I think that is the worst of all," she said,
shaking her pretty head mournfully--and thus the two came nearer to each
other and laughed together, which was as good a means of _rapprochement_
as anything else.
But the young soldier had waited too long for this moment to let it all
go off in laughter. "If you only knew how I have been trying to see
you," he said. "I have been at the school and at the mill, and in the
woods--in all your pet places. Are you condemned to stay at home because
of this affliction? I could not come to the cottage because, though Miss
Seton is so kind, I am sure your sister would do me an ill turn if she
could."
Winnie was startled, and even a little annoyed by this speech--for it is
a fact always to be borne in mind by social critics, that one member of
a family may be capable of saying everything that is unpleasant about
another, without at the same time being disposed to hear even an echo of
his or her own opinion from stranger lips. Winnie was of this way of
thinking. She had not taken to her sister, and was quite ready herself
to criticise her very severely; but when somebody else did it, the
result was very different. "Why should my sister do you an ill turn?"
she said.
"Oh!" said young Percival; "it is because you know she knows that I know
all about it----"
"All about it!" said Winnie. She was tall already, but she grew two
inches taller as she stood and expanded and looked her frightened lover
into nothing. "There can be nothing about Mary, Captain Percival, which
you and all the world may not know."
And then the young man saw he had made a wrong move. "I have not been
haunting the road for hours to talk about Mrs. Ochterlony," he said.
"She does not like me, and I am frightened for her. Oh, Winnie, you know
very well why. You know I would tremble before anybody who might make
_you_ think ill of me. It is cruel to pretend you don't understand."
And then he took her hand and told her everything--all that she looked
for, and perhaps more than all--for there are touches of real eloquence
about what a man says when he is really in love (even if he should be no
great things in his own person) which transcend as much as they fall
short of, the suggestions of a woman's curious fancy. She had said it
for him two or three times in her own mind, and had done it far more
elegantly and neatly. But still there was something about the genuine
article which had not been in Winnie's imagination. There were fewer
words, but there was a great deal more excitement, though it was much
less cleverly expressed. And then, before they knew how, the crisis was
over, the _dénouement_ accomplished, and the two sitting side by side as
in another world. They were sitting on the trunk of an old beech-tree,
with the leaves rustling and the birds twittering over them, and Kirtell
running, soft and sweet, hushed in its scanty summer whisper at their
feet; all objects familiar, and well-known to them--and yet it was
another world. As for Mr. Browning's poems about the unlived life, and
the hearts all shrivelled up for want of a word at the right moment,
Winnie most probably would have laughed with youthful disdain had they
been suggested to her now. This little world, in which the fallen
beech-tree was the throne, and the fairest hopes and imaginations
possible to man, crowded about the youthful sovereigns, and paid them
obsequious court, was so different from the old world, where Sir Edward
at the Hall, and Aunt Agatha in the Cottage, were expecting the young
people, that these two, as was not unnatural, forgot all about it, and
lingered together, no one interfering with them, or even knowing they
were there, for long enough to fill Miss Seton's tender bosom with wild
anxieties and terrors. Winnie had not reached home at the early
dinner-hour--a thing which was to Aunt Agatha as if the sun had declined
to rise, or the earth (to speak more correctly) refused to perform her
proper revolutions. She became so restless, and anxious, and unhappy,
that Mary, too, was roused into uneasiness. "It must be only that she is
detained somewhere," said Mrs. Ochterlony. "She never would allow
herself to be detained," cried Aunt Agatha, "and oh, Mary, my darling is
unhappy. How can I tell what may have happened?" Thus some people made
themselves very wretched about her, while Winnie sat in perfect
blessedness, uttering and listening to all manner of heavenly nonsense
on the trunk of the fallen tree.
Aunt Agatha's wretchedness, however, dispersed into thin air the moment
she saw Winnie come in at the garden-gate, with Captain Percival in
close attendance. Then Miss Seton, with natural penetration, saw in an
instant what had happened; felt that it was all natural, and wondered
why she had not foreseen this inevitable occurrence. "I might have
known," she said to Mary, who was the only member of the party upon whom
this wonderful event had no enlivening effect; and then Aunt Agatha
recollected herself, and put on her sad face, and faltered an apology.
"Oh, my dear love, I know it must be hard upon you to see it," she
said, apologizing as it were to the widow for the presence of joy.
"I would be a poor soul indeed, if it was hard upon me to see it," said
Mary. "No, Aunt Agatha, I hope I am not so shabby as that. I have had my
day. If I look grave, it is for other reasons. I was not thinking of
myself."
"My love! you were always so unselfish," said Miss Seton. "Are you
really anxious about _him_? See how happy he looks--he cannot be so fond
of her as that, and so happy, and yet a deceiver. It is not possible,
Mary."
This was in the afternoon, when they had come out to the lawn with their
work, and the two lovers were still together--not staying in one place,
as their elders did, but flitting across the line of vision now and
then, and, as it were, pervading the atmosphere with a certain flavour
of romance and happiness.
"I did not say he was a deceiver--he dared not be a deceiver to Winnie,"
said Mrs. Ochterlony; "there may be other sins than that."
"Oh, Mary, don't speak as if you thought it would turn out badly," cried
Aunt Agatha, clasping her hands; and she looked into Mrs. Ochterlony's
face as if somehow she had the power by retracting her opinion to
prevent things from turning out badly. Mary was not a stoic, nor above
the sway of all the influences around her. She could not resist the soft
pleading eyes that looked into her face, nor the fascination of her
young sister's happiness. She held her peace, and even did her best to
smile upon the spectacle, and to hope in her heart that true love might
work magically upon the man who had now, beyond redemption, Winnie's
future in his hands. For her own part, she shrank from him with a vague
sense of alarm and danger; and had it been possible to do any good by
it, would have felt herself capable of any exertion to cast the intruder
out. But it was evident that under present circumstances there was no
good to be done. She kept her boys out of his way with an instinctive
dread which she could not explain to herself, and shuddered when poor
Aunt Agatha, hoping to conciliate all parties, set little Wilfrid for a
moment on their visitor's knee, and with a wistful wile reminded him of
the new family relationships Winnie would bring him. Mary took her child
away with a shivering sense of peril which was utterly unreasonable. Why
had it been Wilfrid of all others who was brought thus into the
foreground? Why should it be he who was selected as a symbol of the
links of the future? Wilfrid was but an infant, and derived no further
impression from his momentary perch upon Captain Percival's knee, than
that of special curiosity touching the beard which was a new kind of
ornament to the fatherless baby, and tempting for closer investigation;
but his mother took him away, and carried him indoors, and disposed of
him carefully in the room which Miss Seton had made into a nursery, with
an anxious tremor which was utterly absurd and out of all reason. But
though instinct acted upon her to this extent, she made no further
attempt to warn Winnie or hinder the course of events which had gone too
fast for her. Winnie would not have accepted any warning--she would have
scorned the most trustworthy advice, and repulsed even the most just and
right interference--and so would Mary have done in Hugh Ochterlony's
case, when she was Winnie's age. Thus her mouth was shut, and she could
say nothing. She watched the two with a pathetic sense of impotence as
they went and came, thinking, oh, if she could but make him what Hugh
Ochterlony was; and yet the Major had been far, very far from perfect,
as the readers of this history are aware. When Captain Percival went
away, the ladies were still in the garden; for it was necessary that the
young man should go home to the Hall to join Sir Edward at dinner, and
tell his story. Winnie, a changed creature, stood at the garden-gate,
leaning upon the low wall, and watched him till he was out of sight; and
her aunt and her sister looked at her, each with a certain pathos in her
face. They were both women of experience in their different ways, and
there could not but be something pathetic to them in the sight of the
young creature at the height of her happiness, all-confident and fearing
no evil. It came as natural to them to think of the shadows that _must_,
even under the happiest conditions, come over that first incredible
brightness, as it was to her to feel that every harm and fear was over,
and that now nothing could touch or injure her more. Winnie turned sharp
round when her lover disappeared, and caught Mary's eye, and its wistful
expression, and blazed up at once into momentary indignation, which,
however, was softened by the contempt of youth for all judgment other
than its own, and by the kindly influence of her great happiness. She
turned round upon her sister, sudden and sharp as some winged creature,
and set her all at once on her defence.
"You do not like him," she said, "but you need not say anything, Mary.
It does not matter what you say. You had your day, and would not put up
with any interference--and I know him a hundred--a thousand times better
than you can do; and it is my day now."
"Yes," said Mary. "I did not mean to say anything. I do not like him,
and I think I have reason; but Winnie, dear, I would give anything in
the world to believe that you know best now."
"Oh, yes, I know best," said Winnie, with a soft laugh; "and you will
soon find out what mistakes people make who pretend to know--for I am
sure he thinks there could be something said, on the other side, about
you."
"About me," said Mary--and though she did not show it, but stood before
her sister like a stately tower firm on its foundation, she was aware of
a thrill of nervous trembling that ran through her limbs, and took the
strength out of them. "What did he say about me?"
"He seemed to think there was something that might be said," said
Winnie, lightly. "He was afraid of you. He said you knew that he knew
all about you; see what foolish ideas people take up! and I said,"
Winnie went on, drawing herself up tall and straight by her stately
sister's side, with that superb assumption of dignity which is fair to
see at her age, "that there never could be anything about you that he
and all the world might not know!"
Mary put out her hand, looking stately and firm as she did so--but in
truth it was done half groping, out of a sudden mist that had come up
about her. "Thank you, Winnie," she said, with a smile that had anguish
in it; and Winnie with a sudden tender impulse out of her own happiness,
feeling for the first time the contrast, looked at Mary's black dress
beside her own light one, and at Mary's hair as bright as her own, which
was put away beneath that cap which she had so often mocked at, and
threw her arms round her sister with a sudden thrill of compassion and
tenderness unlike anything she had ever felt before.
"Oh, Mary, dear!" she cried, "does it seem heartless to be so happy and
yet to know that you----"
"No," said Mary, steadily--taking the girl, who was as passionate in her
repentance as in her rebellion, to her own bosom. "No, Winnie; no, my
darling--I am not such a poor soul as that. I have had my day."
And it was thus that the cloud rolled off, or seemed to roll off, and
that even in the midst of that sharp reminder of the pain which life
might still have in store for her, the touch of nature came to heal and
help. The enemy who knew all about it might have come in bringing with
him sickening suggestions of horrible harm and mischief; but anything he
could do would be in vain here, where everybody knew more about her
still; and to have gained as she thought her little sister's heart, was
a wonderful solace and consolation. Thus Mary's faith was revived again
at the moment when it was most sorely shaken, and she began to feel,
with a grateful sense of peace and security, the comfort of being, as
Aunt Agatha said, among her own friends.