MRS. PRIME READS HER RECANTATION.
Above an hour had passed after the interruption mentioned at the end
of the last chapter before Mrs. Ray and Rachel crossed back from the
farm-house to the cottage, and when they went they went alone. During
that hour they had been sitting in Mrs. Sturt's parlour; and when at
last they got up to go they did not press Luke Rowan to go with them.
Mrs. Prime was at the cottage, and it was necessary that everything
should be explained to her before she was asked to give her hand to
her future brother-in-law. The farmer had come in and had joked his
joke, and Mrs. Sturt had clacked over them as though they were a
brood of chickens of her own hatching; and Mrs. Ray had smiled and
cried, and sobbed and laughed till she had become almost hysterical.
Then she had jumped up from her seat, saying, "Oh, dear, what will
Dorothea think has become of us?" After that Rachel insisted upon
going, and the mother and daughter returned across the green, leaving
Luke at the farm-house, ready to take his departure as soon as Mrs.
Ray and Rachel should have safely reached their home.
"I knew thee was minded stedfast to take her," said Mrs. Sturt,
"when it came out upon the newspaper how thou hadst told them all in
Baslehurst that thou wouldst wed none but a Baslehurst lass."
In answer to this Luke protested that he had not thought of Rachel
when he was making that speech, and tried to explain that all
that was "soft sawder" as he called it, for the election. But the
words were too apposite to the event, and the sentiment too much
in accordance with Mrs. Sturt's chivalric views to allow of her
admitting the truth of any such assurance as this.
"I know," she said; "I know. And when I read them words in the
newspaper I said to the gudeman there, we shall have bridecake from
the cottage now before Christmas."
"For the matter of that, so you shall," said Luke, shaking hands with
her as he went, "or the fault will not be mine."
Rachel, as she followed her mother out from the farmyard gate, had
not a word to say. Could it have been possible she would have wished
to remain silent for the remainder of the evening and for the night,
so that she might have time to think of this thing which she had
done, and to enjoy the full measure of her happiness. Hitherto she
had hardly had any joy in her love. The cup had been hardly given to
her to drink before it had been again snatched away, and since then
she had been left to think that the draught for which she longed
would never again be offered to her lips. The whole affair had now
been managed so suddenly, and the action had been so quick, that she
had hardly found a moment for thought. Could it be that things were
so fixed that there was no room for further disappointment? She had
been scalded so cruelly that she still feared the hot water. Her
heart was sore with the old hurt, as the head that has ached will be
still sore when the actual malady has passed away. She longed for
hours of absolute quiet, in which she might make herself sure that
her malady had also passed away, and that the soreness which remained
came only from the memory of former pain. But there was no such
perfect rest within her reach as yet.
"Will you tell her or shall I?" said Mrs. Ray, pausing for a moment
at the cottage gate.
"You had better tell her, mamma."
"I suppose she won't set herself against it; will she?"
"I hope not, mamma. I shall think her very ill-natured if she does.
But it can't make any real difference now, you know."
"No; it can't make any difference. Only it will be so uncomfortable."
Then with half-frightened, muffled steps they entered their own
house, and joined Mrs. Prime in the sitting-room.
Mrs. Prime was still reading the serious book; but I am bound to say
that her mind had not been wholly intent upon it during the long
absence of her mother and sister. She had struggled for a time to
ignore the slight fact that her companions were away gossiping with
the neighbouring farmer's wife; she had made a hard fight with her
book, pinning her eyes down upon the page over and over again, as
though in pinning down her eyes she could pin down her mind also.
But by degrees the delay became so long that she was tantalized
into surmises as to the subject of their conversation. If it were
not wicked, why should not she have been allowed to share it? She
did not imagine it to be wicked according to the world's ordinary
wickedness;--but she feared that it was wicked according to that
tone of morals to which she was desirous of tying her mother down as
a bond slave. They were away talking about love and pleasure, and
those heart-throbbings in which her sister had so unfortunately been
allowed to indulge. She felt all but sure that some tidings of Luke
Rowan had been brought in Mrs. Sturt's budget of news, and she had
never been able to think well of Luke Rowan since the evening on
which she had seen him standing with Rachel in the churchyard. She
knew nothing against him; but she had then made up her mind that he
was pernicious, and she could not bring herself to own that she had
been wrong in that opinion. She had been loud and defiant in her
denunciation when she had first suspected Rachel of having a lover.
Since that she had undergone some troubles of her own by which the
tone of her remonstrances had been necessarily moderated; but even
now she could not forgive her sister such a lover as Luke Rowan. She
would have been quite willing to see her sister married, but the
lover should have been dingy, black-coated, lugubrious, having about
him some true essence of the tears of the valley of tribulation.
Alas, her sister's taste was quite of another kind!
"I'm afraid you will have been thinking that we were never coming
back again," said Mrs. Ray, as she entered the room.
"No, mother, I didn't think that. But I thought you were staying late
with Mrs. Sturt."
"So we were,--and really I didn't think we had been so long. But,
Dorothea, there was some one else over there besides Mrs. Sturt, and
he kept us."
"He! What he?" said Mrs. Prime. She had not even suspected that the
lover had been over there in person.
"Mr. Rowan, my dear. He has been at the farm."
"What! the young man that was dismissed from Mr. Tappitt's?"
It was ill said of her,--very ill said, and so she was herself aware
as soon as the words were out of her mouth. But she could not help
it. She had taken a side against Luke Rowan, and could not restrain
herself from ill-natured words. Rachel was still standing in the
middle of the room when she heard her lover thus described; but she
would not condescend to plead in answer to such a charge. The colour
came to her cheeks, and she threw up her head with a gesture of angry
pride, but at the moment she said nothing. Mrs. Ray spoke.
"It seems to me, Dorothea," she said, "that you are mistaken there. I
think he has dismissed Mr. Tappitt."
"I don't know much about it," said Mrs. Prime; "I only know that
they've quarrelled."
"But it would be well that you should learn, because I'm sure you
will be glad to think as well of your brother-in-law as possible."
"Do you mean that he is engaged to marry Rachel?"
"Yes, Dorothea. I think we may say that it is all settled
now;--mayn't we, Rachel? And a very excellent young man he is,--and
as for being well off, a great deal better than what a child of mine
could have expected. And a fine comely fellow he is, as a woman's eye
would wish to rest on."
"Beauty is but skin deep," said Mrs. Prime, with no little
indignation in her tone, that a thing so vile as personal comeliness
should have been mentioned by her mother on such an occasion.
"When he came out here and drank tea with us that evening," continued
Mrs. Ray, "I took a liking to him most unaccountable, unless it was
that I had a foreshadowing that he was going to be so near and dear
to me."
"Mother, there can have been nothing of the kind. You should not say
such things. The Lord in his providence allows us no foreshadowing of
that kind."
"At any rate I liked him very much; didn't I, Rachel?--from the first
moment I set eyes on him. Only I don't think he'll ever do away with
cider in Devonshire, because of the apple trees. But if people are
to drink beer it stands to reason that good beer will be better than
bad."
All this time Rachel had not spoken a word, nor had her sister
uttered anything expressive of congratulation or good wishes. Now,
as Mrs. Ray ceased, there came a silence in the room, and it was
incumbent on the elder sister to break it.
"If this matter is settled, Rachel--"
"It is settled,--I think," said Rachel.
"If it is settled I hope that it may be for your lasting happiness
and eternal welfare."
"I hope it will," said Rachel.
"Marriage is a most important step."
"That's quite true, my dear," said Mrs. Ray.
"A most important step, and one that requires the most exact
circumspection,--especially on the part of the young woman. I hope
you may have known Mr. Rowan long enough to justify your confidence
in him."
It was still the voice of a raven! Mrs. Prime as she spoke thus
knew that she was croaking, and would have divested herself of her
croak and spoken joyously, had such mode of speech been possible
to her. But it was not possible. Though she would permit no such
foreshadowings as those at which her mother had hinted, she had
committed herself to forebodings against this young man, to such
extent that she could not wheel her thoughts round and suddenly think
well of him. She could not do so as yet, but she would make the
struggle.
"God bless you, Rachel!" she said, when they parted for the night.
"You have my best wishes for your happiness. I hope you do not doubt
my love because I think more of your welfare in another world than in
this." Then she kissed her sister and they parted for the night.
Rachel now shared her mother's room; and from her mother, when they
were alone together, she received abundance of that sympathy for
which her heart was craving.
"You mustn't mind Dorothea," the widow said.
"No, mamma; I do not."
"I mean that you mustn't mind her seeming to be so hard. She means
well through it all, and is as affectionate as any other woman."
"Why did she say that he had been dismissed when she knew that it
wasn't true?"
"Ah, my dear! can't you understand? When she first heard of Mr.
Rowan--"
"Call him Luke, mamma."
"When she first heard of him she was taught to believe that he was
giddy, and that he didn't mean anything."
"Why should she think evil of people? Who taught her?"
"Miss Pucker, and Mr. Prong, and that set."
"Yes; and they are the people who talk most of Christian charity!"
"But, my dear, they don't mean to be uncharitable. They try to do
good. If Dorothea really thought that this young man was a dangerous
acquaintance what could she do but say so? And you can't expect
her to turn round all in a minute. Think how she has been troubled
herself about this affair of Mr. Prong's."
"But that's no reason she should say that Luke is dangerous.
Dangerous! What makes me so angry is that she should think everybody
is a fool except herself. Why should anybody be more dangerous to me
than to anybody else?"
"Well, my dear, I think that perhaps she is not so wrong there. Of
course everything is all right with you now, and I'm sure I'm the
happiest woman in the world to feel that it is so. I don't know how
to be thankful enough when I think how things have turned out;--but
when I first heard of him I thought he was dangerous too."
"But you don't think he is dangerous now, mamma?"
"No, my dear; of course I don't. And I never did after he drank tea
here that night; only Mr. Comfort told me it wouldn't be safe not to
see how things went a little before you,--you understand, dearest?"
"Yes, I understand. I ain't a bit obliged to Mr. Comfort, though I
mean to forgive him because of Mrs. Cornbury. She has behaved best
through it all,--next to you, mamma."
I am afraid it was late before Mrs. Ray went to sleep that night, and
I almost doubt whether Rachel slept at all. It seemed to her that in
the present condition of her life sleep could hardly be necessary.
During the last month past she had envied those who slept while she
was kept awake by her sorrow. She had often struggled to sleep as she
sat in her chair, so that she might escape for a few moments from the
torture of her waking thoughts. But why need she sleep now that every
thought was a new pleasure? There was no moment that she had ever
passed with him that had not to be recalled. There was no word of his
that had not to be re-weighed. She remembered, or fancied that she
remembered, her idea of the man when her eye first fell upon his
outside form. She would have sworn that her first glance of him had
conveyed to her far more than had ever come to her from many a day's
casual looking at any other man. She could almost believe that he had
been specially made and destined for her behoof. She blushed even
while lying in bed as she remembered how the gait of the man, and the
tone of his voice, had taken possession of her eyes and ears from
the first day on which she had met him. When she had gone to Mrs.
Tappitt's party, so consciously alive to the fact that he was to be
there, she had told herself that she was sure she thought no more of
him than of any other man that she might meet; but she now declared
to herself that she had been a weak fool in thus attempting to
deceive herself; that she had loved him from the first,--or at any
rate from that evening when he had told her of the beauty of the
clouds; and that from that day to the present hour there had been no
other chance of happiness to her but that chance which had now been
so wondrously decided in her favour. When she came down to breakfast
on the next morning she was very quiet,--so quiet that her sister
almost thought she was frightened at her future prospects; but I
think that there was no such fear. She was so happy that she could
afford to be tranquil in her happiness.
On that day Rowan came out to the cottage in the evening and was
formally introduced to Mrs. Prime. Mrs. Ray, I fear, did not find the
little tea-party so agreeable on that evening as she had done on the
previous occasion. Mrs. Prime did make some effort at conversation;
she did endeavour to receive the young man as her future
brother-in-law; she was gracious to him with such graciousness as she
possessed;--but the duration of their meal was terribly long, and
even Mrs. Ray herself felt relieved when the two lovers went forth
together for their evening walk. I think there must have been some
triumph in Rachel's heart as she tied on her hat before she started.
I think she must have remembered the evening on which her sister had
been so urgent with her to go to the Dorcas meeting;--when she had so
obstinately refused that invitation, and had instead gone out to meet
the Tappitt girls, and had met with them the young man of whom her
sister had before been speaking with so much horror. Now he was there
on purpose to take her with him, and she went forth with him, leaning
lovingly on his arm, while yet close under her sister's eyes. I think
there must have been a gleam of triumph in her face as she put her
hand with such confidence well round her lover's arm.
Girls do triumph in their lovers,--in their acknowledged and
permitted lovers, as young men triumph in their loves which are not
acknowledged or perhaps permitted. A man's triumph is for the most
part over when he is once allowed to take his place at the family
table, as a right, next to his betrothed. He begins to feel himself
to be a sacrificial victim,--done up very prettily with blue
and white ribbons round his horns, but still an ox prepared for
sacrifice. But the girl feels herself to be exalted for those few
weeks as a conqueror, and to be carried along in an ovation of which
that bucolic victim, tied round with blue ribbons on to his horns,
is the chief grace and ornament. In this mood, no doubt, both Rachel
and Luke Rowan went forth, leaving the two widows together in the
cottage.
"It is pretty to see her so happy, isn't it now?" said Mrs. Ray.
The question for the moment made Mrs. Prime uncomfortable and almost
wretched, but it gave her the opportunity which in her heart she
desired of recanting her error in regard to Luke Rowan's character.
She wished to give in her adhesion to the marriage,--to be known to
have acknowledged its fitness so that she could, with some true word
of sisterly love, wish her sister well. In Rachel's presence she
could not have first made this recantation. Though Rachel spoke no
triumph, there was a triumph in her eye, which prevented almost the
possibility of such yielding on the part of Dorothea. But when the
thing should have been once done, when she should once have owned
that Rachel was not wrong, then gradually she could bring herself
round to the utterance of some kindly expression.
"Pretty," she said; "yes, it is pretty. I do not know that anybody
ever doubted its prettiness."
"And isn't it nice too? Dear girl! It does make me so happy to see
her light-hearted again. She has had a sad time of it, Dorothea,
since we made her write that letter to him; a very sad time of it."
"People here, mother, do mostly have what you call a sad time of it.
Are we not taught that it is better for us that it should be so? Have
not you and I, mother, had a sad time of it? It would be all sad
enough if this were to be the end of it."
"Yes, just so; of course we know that. But it can't be wrong that she
should be happy now, when things are so bright all around her. You
wouldn't have thought it better for her, or for him either, that they
should be kept apart, seeing that they really love each other?"
"No; I don't say that. If they love one another of course it is right
that they should marry. I only wish we had known him longer."
"I am not sure that these things always go much better because young
people have known each other all their lives. It seems to be certain
that he is an industrious, steady young man. Everybody seems to speak
well of him now."
"Well, mother, I have nothing to say against him,--not a word. And
if it will give Rachel any pleasure,--though I don't suppose it will,
the least in the world; but if it would, she may know that I think
she has done wisely to accept him."
"Indeed it will; the greatest pleasure."
"And I hope they will be happy together for very many years. I love
Rachel dearly, though I fear she does not think so, and anything I
have said, I have said in love, not in anger."
"I'm sure of that, Dorothea."
"Now that she is to be settled in life as a married woman, of course
she must not look for counsel either to you or to me. She must obey
him, and I hope that God may give him grace to direct her steps
aright."
"Amen!" said Mrs. Ray, solemnly. It was thus that Mrs. Prime read her
recantation, which was repeated on that evening to Rachel with some
little softening touches. "You won't be living together in the same
house after a bit," said Mrs. Ray, thinking, with some sadness, that
those little evening festivities of buttered toast and thick cream
were over for her now,--"but I do hope you will be friends."
"Of course we will, mamma. She has only to put out her hand the least
little bit in the world, and I will go the rest of the way. As for
her living, I don't know what will be best about that, because Luke
says that of course you'll come and live with us."
It was two or three days after this that Rachel saw the Tappitt girls
for the first time since the fact of her engagement had become known.
It was in the evening, and she had been again walking with Luke, when
she met them; but at that moment she was alone. Augusta would have
turned boldly away, though they had all come closely together before
either had been aware of the presence of the other. But to this both
Martha and Cherry objected.
"We have heard of your engagement," said Martha, "and we congratulate
you. You have heard, of course, that we are going to move to Torquay,
and we hope that you will be comfortable at the brewery."
"Yes," said Augusta, "the place isn't what it used to be, and so
we think it best to go. Mamma has already looked at a villa near
Torquay, which will suit us delightfully."
Then they passed on, but Cherry remained behind to say another word.
"I am so happy," said Cherry, "that you and he have hit it off. He's
a charming fellow, and I always said he was to fall in love with you.
After the ball of course there wasn't a doubt about it. Mind you send
us cake, dear; and by-and-by we'll come and see you at the old place,
and be better friends than ever we were."