Burning Words
'No power at all; none whatever,' the banker said, when he was next
compelled to carry on the conversation. This was immediately upon his
return home from Cambridge, for his wife never allowed the subject to be
forgotten or set aside. Every afternoon and every evening it was being
discussed at all hours not devoted to prayers, and every morning it was
renewed at the breakfast-table.
'That comes from Robert.' Mr. Bolton was not able to deny the assertion.
'What does he mean by "no power"?'
'We can't make her do it. The magistrates can't interfere.'
'Magistrates! Has it been by the interference of magistrates that men
have succeeded in doing great things? Was it by order from the
magistrates that the lessons of Christ have been taught over all the
world? Is there no such thing as persuasion? Has truth no power? Is she
more deaf to argument and eloquence than another?'
'She is very deaf, I think,' said the father, doubting his own
eloquence.
'It is because no one has endeavoured to awaken her by burning words to
a true sense of her situation When she said this she must surely have
forgotten much that had occurred during those weary hours which had been
passed by her and her daughter outside there in the hall. 'No power!'
she repeated. 'It is the answer always made by those who are too sleepy
to do the Lord's work. It was because men said that they had no power
that the grain fell upon stony places, where they had not much earth. It
is that aversion to face difficulties which causes the broad path to be
crowded with victims. I, at any rate, will go. I may have no power, but
I will make the attempt.'
Soon after that she did make the attempt. Mr. Bolton, though he was
assured by Robert that such an attempt would produce no result, could
not interfere to prevent it. Had he been far stronger than he was in his
own house, he could hardly have forbidden the mother to visit the
daughter. Hester had sent word to say that she did not wish to see even
her mother. But this had been immediately after the verdict, when she
was crushed and almost annihilated by her misery. Some weeks had now
passed by, and it could not be that she would refuse to admit the
visitor, when such a visitor knocked at her door. They had loved each
other as mothers and daughters do love when there is no rival in the
affection,--when each has no one else to love. There never had been a
more obedient child, or a more loving parent. Much, no doubt, had
happened since to estrange the daughter from the mother. A husband had
been given to her who was more to her than any parent,--as a husband
should be. And then there had been that terrible opposition, that
struggle, that battle in the hall. But the mother's love had never waned
because of that. She was sure that her child would not refuse to see
her.
So the fly was ordered to take her out to Folking, and on the morning
fixed she dressed herself in her blackest black. She always wore brown
or black,--brown being the colour suitable for the sober and sad
domesticities of her week-days, which on ceremonies and Sabbath was
changed for a more solemn black. But in her wardrobe there were two such
gowns, one of which was apparently blacker than the other, nearer to a
guise of widowhood,--more fit, at any rate, for general funereal
obsequies. There are women who seem always to be burying someone; and
Mrs. Bolton, as she went forth to visit her daughter, was fit to bury
any one short of her husband.
It was a hot day in August, and the fly travelled along the dusty road
very slowly. She had intended to reach Folking at twelve, so that her
interview might be over and that she might return without the need of
eating. There is always some idea of festivity connected with food eaten
at a friend's table, and she did not wish to be festive. She was, too,
most unwilling to partake of John Caldigate's bread. But she did not
reach the house till one, and when she knocked at the door Hester's
modest lunch was about to be put upon the table.
There was considerable confusion when the servant saw Mrs. Bolton
standing in the doorway. It was quite understood by everyone at Folking
that for the present there was to be no intercourse between the Boltons
and the Caldigates. It was understood that there should be no visitors
of any kind at Folking, and it had been thought that Mr. Smirkie had
forced an entrance in an impertinent manner. But yet it was not possible
to send Mrs. Bolton from her own daughter's door with a mere 'not at
home.' Of course she was shown in,--and was taken to the parlour, in
which the lunch was prepared, while word was taken up to Hester
announcing that her mother was there.
Mr. Caldigate was in the house,--in his own book-room, as it used to be
called,--and Hester went to him first. 'Mamma is here,--in the
dining-room.'
'Your mother!'
'I long to see mamma.'
'Of course you do.'
'But she will want me to go away with her.'
'She cannot take you unless you choose to go.'
'But she will speak of nothing else. I know it. I wish she had not
come.'
'Surely, Hester, you can make her understand that your mind is made up.'
'Yes, I shall do that. I must do that. But, father, it will be very
painful. You do not know what things she can say. It nearly killed me
when I was at the Grange. You will not see her, I suppose?'
'If you wish it, I will. She will not care to see me; and as things are
at present, what room is there for friendship?'
'You will come if I send for you?'
'Certainly. If you send for me I will come at once.'
Then she crept slowly out of the room, and very slowly and very silently
made her way to the parlour-door. Though she was of a strong nature,
unusually strong of heart and fixed of purpose, now her heart misgave
her. That terrible struggle, with all its incidents of weariness and
agony, was present to her mind. Her mother could not turn the lock on
her now; but, as she had said, it would be very dreadful. Her mother
would say words to her which would go through her like swords. Then she
opened the door, and for a moment there was the sweetness of an embrace.
There was a prolonged tenderness in the kiss which, even to Mrs. Bolton,
had a charm for the moment to soften her spirit. 'Oh, mamma; my own
mamma!'
'My child!'
'Yes, mamma;--every day when I pray for you I tell myself that I am
still your child,--I do.'
'My only one! my only one!--all that I have!' Then again they were in
each other's arms. Yet, when they had last met, one had been the jailer,
and the other the prisoner; and they had fought it out between them with
a determined obstinacy which at moments had almost amounted to hatred.
But now the very memory of these sad hours increased their tenderness.
'Hester, through it all, do you not know that my heart yearns for you
day and night?--that in my prayers I am always remembering you? that my
dreams are happy because you are with me? that I am ever longing for
you as Ruth longed for Naomi? I am as Rachel weeping for her children,
who would not be comforted because they are not. Day and night my
heart-strings are torn asunder because my eyes behold you not.'
It was true,--and the daughter knew it to be true. But what could be
done? There had grown up something for her, holier, greater, more
absorbing even than a mother's love. Happily for most young wives,
though the new tie may surmount the old one, it does not crush it or
smother it. The mother retains a diminished hold, and knowing what
nature has intended is content. She, too, with some subsidiary worship,
kneels at the new altar, and all is well. But here, though there was
abundant love, there was no sympathy. The cause of discord was ever
present to them both. Unless John Caldigate was acknowledged to be a
fitting husband, not even the mother could be received with a full
welcome. And unless John Caldigate were repudiated, not even the
daughter could be accepted as altogether pure. Parental and filial
feelings sufficed for nothing between them beyond the ecstasy of a
caress.
As Hester was standing mute, still holding her mother's hand, the
servant came to the door, and asked whether she would have her lunch.
'You will stay and eat with me, mamma? But you will come up to my room
first?'
'I will go up to your room, Hester.'
'Then we will have our lunch,' Hester said, turning to the servant. So
the two went together to the upper chamber, and in a moment the mother
had fetched her baby, and placed it in her mother's arms.
'I wish he were at the Grange,' said Mrs. Bolton. Then Hester shook her
head; but feeling the security of her position, left the baby with its
grandmother. 'I wish he were at the Grange. It is the only fitting home
for him at present.'
'No, mamma; that cannot be.'
'It should be so, Hester. It should be so.'
'Pray do not speak of it, dear mamma.'
'Have I not come here on purpose that I might speak of it? Sweet as it
is to me to have you in my arms, do you not know that I have come for
that purpose,--for that only?'
'It cannot be so.'
'I will not take such an answer, Hester. I am not here to speak of
pleasure or delights,--not to speak of sweet companionship, or even of a
return to that more godly life which, I think, you would find in your
father's house. Had not this ruin come, unhappy though I might have
been, and distrustful, I should not have interfered. Those whom God has
joined together, let not man put asunder.'
'It is what I say to myself every hour. God has joined us, and no man,
no number of men, shall put us asunder.'
'But, my own darling,--God has not joined you! When he pretended to be
joined to you, he had a wife then living,--still living.'
'No.'
'Will you set up your own opinion against evidence which the jury has
believed, which the judge has believed, which all the world has
believed?'
'Yes, I will,' said Hester, the whole nature of whose face was now
altered, and who looked as she did when sitting in the hall-chair at
Puritan Grange,--'I will. Though I were almost to know that he had been
false, I should still believe him to be true.'
'I cannot understand that, Hester.'
'But I know him to be true,--quite true,' she said, wishing to erase the
feeling which her unguarded admission had made. 'Not to believe him to
have been true would be death to me; and for my boy's sake, I would wish
to live. But I have no doubt, and I will listen to no one,--not even to
you, when you tell me that God did not join us together.'
'You cannot go behind the law, Hester. As a citizen, you must obey the
law.'
'I will live here,--as a citizen,--till he has been restored to me.'
'But he will not then be your husband. People will not call you by his
name. He cannot have two wives. She will be his wife. Oh, Hester, have
you thought of it?'
'I have thought of it,' she said, raising her face, looking upwards
through the open window, out away towards the heavens, and pressing her
foot firmly upon the floor. 'I have thought of it,--very much; and I
have asked--the Lord--for counsel. And He has given it me. He has told
me what to believe, what to know, and how to live. I will never again
lie with my head upon his bosom unless all that be altered. But I will
serve him as his wife, and obey him; and if I can I will comfort him. I
will never desert him. And not all the laws that were ever made, nor all
the judges that ever sat in judgment shall make me call myself by
another name than his.'
The mother had come there to speak burning words, and she had in some
sort prepared them; but now she found herself almost silenced by the
energy of her daughter. And when her girl told her that she had applied
to her God for counsel, and that the Lord had answered her prayers--that
the Lord had directed her as to her future life,--then the mother hardly
knew how to mount to higher ground, so as to seem to speak from a more
exalted eminence. And yet she was not at all convinced. That the Lord
should give bad counsel she knew to be impossible. That the Lord would
certainly give good counsel to such a suppliant, if asked aright, she
was quite sure. But they who send others to the throne of heaven for
direct advice are apt to think that the asking will not be done aright
unless it be done with their spirit and their bias,--with the spirit and
bias which they feel when they recommend the operation. No one has ever
thought that direct advice from the Lord was sufficient authority for
the doing of that of which he himself disapproved. It was Mrs. Bolton's
daily custom to kneel herself and ask for such counsel, and to enjoin
such asking upon all those who were subject to her influence. But had
she been assured by some young lady to whom she had recommended the
practice that heavenly warrant had thus been secured for balls and
theatres, she would not have scrupled to declare that the Lord had
certainly not been asked aright. She was equally certain of some
defalcation now. She did not doubt that Hester had done as she had said.
That the prayer had been put up with energetic fervour, she was sure.
But energetic fervour in prayer was, she thought, of no use,--nay, was
likely to be most dangerous, when used in furtherance of human
prepossessions and desires. Had Hester said her prayers with a proper
feeling of self-negation,--in that religious spirit which teaches the
poor mortal here on earth to know that darkness and gloom are safer than
mirth and comfort,--then the Lord would have told her to leave Folking,
to go back to Puritan Grange, and to consent once more to be called
Hester Bolton. This other counsel had not come from the Lord,--had come
only from Hester's own polluted heart. But she was not at the moment
armed with words sufficiently strong to explain all this.
'Hester,' she said, 'does not all this mean that your own proud spirit
is to have a stronger dominion over you than the experience and wisdom
of all your friends?'
'Perhaps it does. But, at any rate, my proud spirit will retain its
pride.'
'You will be obstinate?'
'Certainly I will. Nothing on earth shall make me leave this house till
I am told by its owner to go.'
'Who is its owner? Old Mr. Caldigate is its owner.'
'I hardly know. Though John has explained it again and again, I am so
bad at such things that I am not sure. But I can do what I please with
it. I am the mistress here. As you say that the Grange is your house, I
can say that this is mine. It is the abode appointed for me, and here I
will abide.'
'Then, Hester, I can only tell you that you are sinning. It is a heavy,
grievous, and most obvious sin.'
'Dear mother,--dear mamma; I knew how it would be if you came. It is
useless for me to say more. Were I to go away, that to me would be the
sin. Why should we discuss it any more? There comes a time to all of us
when we must act on our own responsibility. My husband is in prison, and
cannot personally direct me. No doubt I could go, were I so pleased. His
father would not hinder me, though he is most unwilling that I should
go. I must judge a little for myself. But I have his judgment to fall
back upon. He told me to stay, and I shall stay.'
Then there was a pause, during which Mrs. Bolton was thinking of her
burning words,--was remembering the scorn with which she had treated her
husband when he told her that they had 'no power.' She had endeavoured
herself not to be sleepy in doing the Lord's work. But her seed, too,
had fallen upon stony places. She was powerless to do, or even to say,
anything further. 'Then I may go,' she muttered.
'You will come and eat with me, mamma?'
'No, my dear,--no.'
'You do not wish that there should be a quarrel?'
'There is very much, Hester, that I do not wish. I have long ceased to
trust much to any wishes. There is a great gulf between us, and I will
not attempt to bridge it by the hollow pretence of sitting at table with
you. I will still pray that you may be restored to me.' Then she went to
the door.
'Mamma, you will kiss me before you go?'
'I will cover you with kisses when you return to your own home.' But in
spite of this, Hester went down with her into the hall, holding by her
raiment; and as Mrs. Bolton got into the fly, she did succeed in kissing
her mother's hand.
'She has gone,' said Hester, going to her father-in-law's room. 'Though
I was so glad to see her, I wish she had not come. When people think so
very, very differently on a matter which is so very, very important, it
is better that they should not meet, let them love each other ever so.'
As far as Hester and Mr. Caldigate were concerned the visit had in truth
been made without much inconvenience. There had been no absolute
violence,--no repetition of such outward quarrelling as had made those
two days at the Grange so memorable. There was almost a feeling of
relief in Hester's bosom when her mother was driven away after that
successful grasp at the parting hand. Though they had differed much,
they had not hated each other during that last half-hour. Hester had
been charged with sin;--which, however, had been a matter of course. But
in Mrs. Bolton's heart there was a feeling which made her return home
very uncomfortable. Having twitted her husband with his lack of power,
she had been altogether powerless herself; and now she was driven to
confess to herself that no further step could be taken. 'She is
obstinate,' she said to her husband,--'stiff-necked in her sin, as are
all determined sinners. I can say no more to her. It may be that the
Lord will soften her heart when her sorrows have endured yet for a
time.' But she said no more of burning words, or of eloquence, or of the
slackness of the work of those who work as though they were not in
earnest.