"Be seated, mistress, if you please," said Mrs. Gaunt, with icy
civility, "and let me know to what I owe this extraordinary visit."
"I thank you, dame," said Mercy, "for indeed I am sore fatigued." She
sat quietly down. "Why I have come to you? It was to serve you, and to
keep my word with George Neville."
"Will you be kind enough to explain?" said Mrs. Gaunt, in a freezing
tone, and with a look of her calm gray eye to match.
Mercy felt chilled, and was too frank to disguise it. "Alas!" said she,
softly, "'t is hard to be received so, and me come all the way from
Lancashire, with a heart like lead, to do my duty, God willing."
The tears stood in her eyes, and her mellow voice was sweet and patient.
The gentle remonstrance was not quite without effect. Mrs. Gaunt colored
a little; she said, stiffly: "Excuse me if I seem discourteous, but you
and I ought not to be in one room a moment. You do not see this,
apparently. But at least I have a right to insist that such an interview
shall be very brief, and to the purpose. Oblige me, then, by telling me
in plain terms why you have come hither."
"Madam, to be your witness at the trial."
"_You_ to be _my_ witness?"
"Why not? If I can clear you? What, would you rather be condemned for
murder, than let me show them you are innocent? Alas! how you hate me!"
"Hate you, child? of course I hate you. We are both of us flesh and
blood, and hate one another. And one of us is honest enough, and uncivil
enough, to say so."
"Speak for yourself, dame," replied Mercy, quietly, "for I hate you not;
and I thank God for it. To hate is to be miserable. I'd liever be hated
than to hate."
Mrs. Gaunt looked at her. "Your words are goodly and wise," said she;
"your face is honest, and your eyes are like a very dove's. But, for all
that, you hate me quietly, with all your heart. Human nature is human
nature."
"'T is so. But grace is grace." She was silent a moment, then resumed:
"I'll not deny I did hate you for a time, when first I learned the man I
had married had a wife, and you were she. We that be women are too
unjust to each other, and too indulgent to a man. But I have worn out my
hate. I wrestled in prayer, and the God of Love, he did quench my most
unreasonable hate. For 'twas the man betrayed me; _you_ never wronged
me, nor I you. But you are right, madam; 't is true that nature without
grace is black as pitch. The Devil, he was busy at my ear, and whispered
me, 'If the fools in Cumberland hang her, what fault o' thine? Thou wilt
be his lawful wife, and thy poor, innocent child will be a child of
shame no more.' But, by God's grace, I did defy him. And I do defy him."
She rose swiftly from her chair, and her dove's eyes gleamed with
celestial light. "Get thee behind me, Satan. I tell thee the hangman
shall never have her innocent body, nor thou my soul."
The movement was so unexpected, the words and the look so simply noble,
that Mrs. Gaunt rose too, and gazed upon her visitor with astonishment
and respect; yet still with a dash of doubt.
She thought to herself, "If this creature is not sincere, what a
mistress of deceit she must be."
But Mercy Vint soon returned to her quiet self. She sat down, and said,
gravely, and for the first time a little coldly, as one who had deserved
well, and been received ill: "Mistress Gaunt, you are accused of
murdering your husband. 'T is false; for two days ago I saw him alive."
"What do you say?" cried Mrs. Gaunt, trembling all over.
"Be brave, madam. You have borne great trouble: do not give way under
joy. He who has wronged us both--he who wedded you under his own name of
Griffith Gaunt, and me under the false name of Thomas Leicester--is no
more dead than we are; I saw him two days ago, and spoke to him, and
persuaded him to come to Carlisle town, and do you justice."
Mrs. Gaunt fell on her knees. "He is alive; he is alive. Thank God! O,
thank God! He is alive; and God bless the tongue that tells me so. God
bless you eternally, Mercy Vint."
The tears of joy streamed down her face, and then Mercy's flowed too.
She uttered a little pathetic cry of joy. "Ah," she sobbed, "the bit of
comfort I needed so has come to my heavy heart. _She_ has blessed me."
But she said this very softly, and Mrs. Gaunt was in a rapture, and did
not hear her.
* * * * *
"Is it a dream? My husband alive? and you the one to come and tell me
so? How unjust I have been to you. Forgive me. Why does he not come
himself?"
Mercy colored at this question, and hesitated.
"Well, dame," said she, "for one thing, he has been on the fuddle for
the last two months."
"On the fuddle?"
"Ay; he owns he has never been sober a whole day. And that takes the
heart out of a man, as well as the brains. And then he has got it into
his head that you will never forgive him, and that he shall be cast in
prison if he shows his face in Cumberland."
"Why in Cumberland more than in Lancashire?" asked Mrs. Gaunt, biting
her lip.
Mercy blushed faintly. She replied with some delicacy, but did not
altogether mince the matter.
"He knows I shall never punish him for what he has done to me."
"Why not? I begin to think he has wronged you almost as much as he has
me."
"Worse, madam; worse. He has robbed me of my good name. You are still
his lawful wife, and none can point the finger at you. But look at me. I
was an honest girl, respected by all the parish. What has he made of me?
The man that lay a dying in my house, and I saved his life, and so my
heart did warm to him,--he blasphemed God's altar, to deceive and betray
me; and here I am, a poor forlorn creature, neither maid, wife, nor
widow; with a child on my arms that I do nothing but cry over. Ay, my
poor innocent, I left thee down below, because I was ashamed she should
see thee; ah me! ah me!" She lifted up her voice, and wept.
Mrs. Gaunt looked at her wistfully, and, like Mercy before her, had a
bitter struggle with human nature,--a struggle so sharp that, in the
midst of it, she burst out crying with great violence; but, with that
burst, her great soul conquered.
She darted out of the room, leaving Mercy astonished at her abrupt
departure.
Mercy was patiently drying her eyes, when the door opened, and judge her
surprise when she saw Mrs. Gaunt glide into the room with her little boy
asleep in her arms, and an expression upon her face more sublime than
anything Mercy Vint had ever yet seen on earth. She kissed the babe
softly, and, becoming infantine as well as angelic by this contact, sat
herself down in a moment on the floor with him, and held out her hand to
Mercy. "There," said she, "come, sit beside us, and see how I hate
him,--no more than you do; sweet innocent."
They looked him all over, discussed his every feature learnedly, kissed
his limbs and extremities after the manner of their sex, and,
comprehending at last that to have been both of them wronged by one man
was a bond of sympathy, not hate, the two wives of Griffith Gaunt laid
his child across their two laps, and wept over him together.
* * * * *
Mercy Vint took herself to task. "I am but a selfish woman," said she,
"to talk or think of anything but that I came here for." She then
proceeded to show Mrs. Gaunt by what means she proposed to secure her
acquittal, without getting Griffith Gaunt into trouble.
Mrs. Gaunt listened with keen and grateful attention, until she came to
that part; then she interrupted her eagerly. "Don't spare him for me. In
your place I'd trounce the villain finely."
"Ay," said Mercy, "and then forgive him; but I am different. I shall
never forgive him; but I am a poor hand at punishing and revenging. I
always was. My name is Mercy, you know. To tell the truth, I was to have
been called Prudence, after my good aunt; but she said, nay; she had
lived to hear Greed, and Selfishness, and a heap of faults, named
Prudence. 'Call the child something that means what it does mean, and
not after me,' quoth she. So with me hearing 'Mercy, Mercy,' called out
after me so many years, I do think the quality hath somehow got under my
skin; for I cannot abide to see folk smart, let alone to strike the
blow. What, shall I take the place of God, and punish the evil-doers,
because 't is me they wrong? Nay, dame, I will never punish him, though
he hath wronged me cruelly. All I shall do is to think very ill of him,
and shun him, and tear his memory out of my heart. You look at me: do
you think I cannot? You don't know me; I am very resolute when I see
clear. Of course I loved him,--loved him dearly. He was like a husband
to me, and a kind one. But the moment I knew how basely he had deceived
us both, my heart began to turn against the man, and now 't is ice to
him. Heaven knows what I am made of; for, believe me, I'd liever ten
times be beside you than beside him. My heart it lay like a lump of lead
till I heard your story, and found I could do you a good turn,--you that
he had wronged, as well as me. I read your beautiful eyes; but nay, fear
me not; I'm not the woman to pine for the fruit that is my neighbor's.
All I ask for on earth is a few kind words and looks from you. You are
gentle, and I am simple; but we are both one flesh and blood, and your
lovely wet eyes do prove it this moment. Dame Gaunt--Kate--I ne'er was
ten miles from home afore, and I am come all this weary way to serve
thee. O, give me the one thing that can do me good in this world,--the
one thing I pine for,--a little of _your_ love."
The words were scarce out of her lips, when Mrs. Gaunt caught her
impetuously round the neck with both hands, and laid her on that erring
but noble heart of hers, and kissed her eagerly.
They kissed one another again and again, and wept over one another.
And now Mrs. Gaunt, who did nothing by halves, could not make enough of
Mercy Vint. She ordered supper, and ate with her, to make her eat. Mrs.
Menteith offered Mercy a bed; but Mrs. Gaunt said she must lie with her,
she and her child.
"What," said she, "think you I'll let you out of my sight? Alas! who
knows when you and I shall ever be together again?"
"I know," said Mercy, thoughtfully. "In this world, never."
They slept in one bed, and held each other by the hand all night, and
talked to one another, and in the morning knew each the other's story,
and each the other's mind and character, better than their oldest
acquaintances knew either the one or the other.