The days in the cottage were full of excitement and of occupation during
the blazing August weather, not so much indeed as is common in many
houses in which the expectant bridegroom is always coming and going;
though perhaps the place of that exhilarating commotion was more or less
filled by the ever-present diversity of opinion, the excitement of a
subdued but never-ended conflict in which one was always on the
defensive, and the other covertly or openly attacking, or at least
believed to be so doing, the distant and unseen object to which all
their thoughts turned. Mrs. Dennistoun, indeed, was not always
aggressive, her opposition was but in fits and starts. Often her
feelings of pain and alarm were quiescent in that unfeigned and
salutary interest in clothes and necessities of preparation which is
almost always a resource to a woman’s mind. It is wrong to undervalue
this possibility which compensates a woman in a small degree for some of
her special troubles. When the mother’s heart was very heavy, it was
often diverted a little by the discussion of a dinner dress, or made to
forget itself for the moment in a question about the cut of a sleeve, or
which would be most becoming to Elinor of two colours for a ball gown.
But though Mrs. Dennistoun forgot often, Elinor never forgot. The
dresses and “things” generally occupied her a great deal, but not in the
form of the anodyne which they supplied to her mother. Her mind was
always on the alert, looking out for those flying arrows of warfare
which your true fighter lets fly in the most innocent conversation at
the most unexpected moments. Elinor thus flung her shield in her
mother’s face a hundred times when that poor lady was thinking no evil,
when she was altogether occupied by the question of frills and laces, or
whether tucks or flounces were best, and she was startled many times by
that unnecessary rattle of Elinor’s arms. “I was not thinking of Mr.
Compton,” she would sometimes be driven to say; “he was not in my head
at all. I was thinking of nothing more important than that walking
dress, and what you had best wear in the afternoon when you are on those
grand visits.”
There was one thing which occasioned a little discussion between them,
and that was the necessary civility of asking the neighbours to inspect
these “things” when they were finally ready. It was only the argument
that these neighbours would be Mrs. Dennistoun’s sole resource when she
was left alone that made Elinor assent at last. Perhaps, however, as she
walked quickly along towards the moorland Rectory, a certain
satisfaction in showing them how little their hints had been taken,
mingled with the reluctance to admit those people who had breathed a
doubt upon the sacred name of Phil, to such a sign of intimacy.
“I have been watching you along the side of the combe, and wondering if
it was you such a threatening day,” said Alice Hudson, coming to the
door to meet her. “How nice of you to come, Elinor, when you must be so
busy, and you have not been here since--I don’t know how long ago!”
“No, I have not been here,” said Elinor with a gravity worthy the bride
of a maligned man. “But the time is so near when I shall not be able to
come at all that I thought it was best. Mamma wishes you to come over
to-morrow, if you will, to see my things.”
“Oh!” the three ladies said together; and Mrs. Hudson came forward and
gave Elinor a kiss. “My dear,” she said, “I take it very kind you coming
yourself to ask us. Many would not have done it after what we felt it
our duty---- But you always had a beautiful spirit, Elinor, bearing no
malice, and I hope with all my heart that it will have its reward.”
“Well, mother,” said Alice, “I don’t see how Elinor could do anything
less, seeing we have been such friends all our lives as girls, she and
I, and I am sure I have always been ready to give her patterns, or to
show her how a thing was done. I should have been very much disappointed
if she had not asked me to see her things.”
Mary Dale, who was Mrs. Hudson’s sister, said nothing at all, but
accepted the visit as in the course of nature. Mary was the one who
really knew something about Phil Compton: but she had been against the
remonstrance which Mrs. Hudson thought it her duty to make. What was the
good? Miss Dale had said; and she had refrained from telling two or
three stories about the Comptons which would have made the hair stand
upright on the heads of the Rector and the Rectoress. She did not even
now say that it was kind, but met Elinor in silence, as, in her position
as the not important member of the family, it was quite becoming for her
to do.
Then the Rector came in and took her by both hands, and gave her the
most friendly greeting. “I heard Elinor’s voice, and I stopped in the
middle of my sermon,” he said. “You will remark in church on Sunday a
jerky piece, which shows how I stopped to reflect whether it could be
you--and then went on for another sentence, and then decided that it
must be you. There is a big Elinor written across my sermon paper.” He
laughed, but he was a little moved, to see, after the “coolness,” the
little girl whom he had christened come back to her old friends again.
“She has come to ask us to go and see her things, papa,” said Mrs.
Hudson, twinkling an eye to get rid of a suspicion of a tear.
“Am I to come, too?” said the Rector; and thus the little incident of
the reconciliation was got over, to the great content of all.
Elinor reflected to herself that they were really kind people, as she
went out again into the grey afternoon where everything was getting up
for rain. She made up her mind she would just have time to run into the
Hills’, at the Hurst, and leave her message, and so get home before the
storm began. The clouds lay low like a dark grey hood over the fir-trees
and moorland shaggy tops of the downs all round. There was not a break
anywhere in the consistent grey, and the air, always so brisk, had
fallen still with that ominous lull that comes over everything before a
convulsion of nature. Some birds were still hurrying home into the
depths of the copses with a frightened straightness of flight, as if
they were afraid they would not get back in time, and all the insects
that are so gay with their humming and booming had disappeared under
leaves and stones and grasses. Elinor saw a bee burrowing deep in the
waxen trumpet of a foxglove, as if taking shelter, as she walked quickly
past. The Hills--there were two middle-aged sisters of them, with an old
mother, too old for such diversion as the inspection of
wedding-clothes, in the background--would scarcely let Elinor go out
again after they had accepted her invitation with rapture. “I was just
wondering where I should see the new fashions,” said Miss Hill, “for
though we are not going to be married we must begin to think about our
winter things----” “And this will be such an opportunity,” said Miss
Susan, “and so good of you to come yourself to ask us.”
“What has she come to ask you to,” said old Mrs. Hill; “the wedding? I
told you girls, I was sure you would not be left out. Why, I knew her
mother before she was married. I have known them all, man and boy, for
nearer sixty than fifty years--before her mother was born! To have left
you out would have been ridiculous. Yes, yes, Elinor, my dear; tell your
mother they will come--delighted! They have been thinking for the last
fortnight what bonnets they would wear----”
“Oh, mother!” and “Oh, Elinor!” said the “girls,” “you must not mind
what mother says. We know very well that you must have worlds of people
to ask. Don’t think, among all your new connections, of such little
country mice as us. We shall always just take the same interest in you,
dear child, whether you find you can ask us or not.”
“But of course you are asked,” said Elinor, in _gaieté de cœur_, not
reflecting that her mother had begun to be in despair about the number
of people who could be entertained in the cottage dining-room, “and you
must not talk about my new grand connections, for nobody will ever be
like my old friends.”
“Dear child!” they said, and “I always knew that dear Elinor’s heart was
in the right place.” But it was all that Elinor could do to get free of
their eager affection and alarm lest she should be caught in the rain.
Both of the ladies produced waterproofs, and one a large pair of
goloshes to fortify her, when it was found that she would go; and they
stood in the porch watching her as she went along into the darkening
afternoon, without any of their covers and shelters. The Miss Hills were
apt to cling together, after the manner of those pairs of sweet sisters
in the “Books of Beauty” which had been the delight of their youth; they
stood, with arms intertwined, in their porch, watching Elinor as she
hurried home, with her light half-flying step, like the belated birds.
“Did you hear what she said about old friends, poor little thing?” “I
wonder if she is finding out already that her new grand connections are
but vanity!” they said, shaking their heads. The middle-aged sisters
looked out of the sheltered home, which perhaps they had not chosen for
themselves, with a sort of wistful feeling, half pity, perhaps half
envy, upon the “poor little thing” who was running out so light-hearted
into the storm. They had long ago retired into waterproofs and goloshes,
and had much unwillingness to wet their feet--which things are a
parable. They went back and closed the door, only when the first flash
of lightning dazzled them, and they remembered that an open door is
dangerous during a thunderstorm.
Elinor quickened her pace as the storm began and got home breathless
with running, shaking off the first big drops of thunder-rain from her
dress. But she did not think of any danger, and sat out in the porch
watching how the darkness came down on the combe; how it was met with
the jagged gleam of the great white flash, and how the thunderous
explosion shook the earth. The combe, with its hill-tops on either side,
became like the scene of a battle, great armies, invisible in the sharp
torrents of rain, meeting each other with a fierce shock and recoil,
with now and then a trumpet-blast, and now the gleam that lit up tree
and copse, and anon the tremendous artillery. When the lightning came
she caught a glimpse of the winding line of the white road leading away
out of all this--leading into the world where she was going--and for a
moment escaped by it, even amid the roar of all the elements: then came
back, alighting again with a start in the familiar porch, amid all the
surroundings of the familiar life, to feel her mother’s hand upon her
shoulder, and her mother’s voice saying, “Have you got wet, my darling?
Did you get much of it? Come in, come in from the storm!”
“It is so glorious, mamma!” Mrs. Dennistoun stood for a few minutes
looking at it, then, with a shudder, withdrew into the drawing-room. “I
think I have seen too many storms to like it,” she said. But Elinor had
not seen too many storms. She sat and watched it, now rolling away
towards the south, and bursting again as though one army or the other
had got reinforcements; while the flash of the explosions and the roar
of the guns, and the white blast of the rain, falling like a sheet from
the leaden skies, wrapped everything in mystery. The only thing that was
to be identified from time to time was that bit of road leading out of
it--leading her thoughts away, as it should one day lead her eager feet,
from all the storm and turmoil out into the bright and shining world.
Elinor never asked herself, as she sat there, a spectator of this great
conflict of nature, whether that one human thing, by which her swift
thoughts traversed the storm, carried any other suggestion as of coming
back.
Perhaps it is betraying feminine counsels too much to the modest public
to narrate how Elinor’s things were all laid out for the inspection of
the ladies of the parish, the dresses in one room, the “under things” in
another, and in the dining-room the presents, which everybody was doubly
curious to see, to compare their own offerings with those of other
people, or else to note with anxious eye what was wanting, in order, if
their present had not yet been procured, to supply the gap. How to get
something that would look well among the others, and yet not be too
expensive, was a problem which the country neighbours had much and
painfully considered. The Hudsons had given Elinor a little tea-kettle
upon a stand, which they were painfully conscious was only plated, and
sadly afraid would not look well among all the gorgeous articles with
which no doubt her grand new connections had loaded her. The Rector came
himself, with his ladies to see how the kettle looked, with a great line
of anxiety between his brows; but when they saw that the revolving
dishes beside it, which were the gift of the wealthy Lady Mariamne, were
plated too, and not nearly such a pretty design, their hearts went up in
instant exhilaration, followed a moment after by such indignation as
they could scarcely restrain. “That rich sister, the woman who married
the Jew” (which was their very natural explanation of the lady’s
nickname), “a woman who is rolling in wealth, and who actually made up
the match!” This was crescendo, a height of scorn impossible to describe
upon a mere printed page. “One would have thought she would have given a
diamond necklace or something of consequence,” said Mrs. Hudson in her
husband’s ear. “Or, at least silver,” said the Rector. “These
fashionable people, though they give themselves every luxury, have
sometimes not very much money to spend; but silver, at least, she might
have been expected to give silver.” “It is simply disgraceful,” said the
Rector’s wife. “I am glad, at all events, my dear,” said he, “that our
little thing looks just as well as any.” “It is one of the prettiest
things she has got,” said Mrs. Hudson, with a proud heart. Lord St. Serf
sent an old-fashioned little ring in a much worn velvet case, and the
elder brother, Lord Lomond, an album for photographs. The Rector’s wife
indicated these gifts to her husband with little shrugs of her
shoulders. “If that’s all the family can do!” she said: “why Alice’s
cushion, which was worked with floss silks upon satin, was a more
creditable present than that.” The Miss Hills, who as yet had not had an
opportunity, as they said, of giving their present, roamed about,
curious, inspecting everything. “What is the child to do with a kettle,
a thing so difficult to pack, and requiring spirit for the lamp, and all
that--and only plated!” the Hills said to each other. “Now, that little
teapot of ours,” said Jane to Susan, “if mother would only consent to
it, is no use to us, and would look very handsome here.” “Real silver,
and old silver, which is so much the rage, and a thing she could use
every day when she has her visitors for afternoon tea,” said Susan to
Jane. “It is rather small,” said Miss Hill, doubtfully. “But quite
enough for two people,” said the other, forgetting that she had just
declared that the teapot would be serviceable when Elinor had visitors.
But that was a small matter. Elinor, however, had other things better
than these--a necklace, worth half a year’s income, from John Tatham,
which he had pinched himself to get for her that she might hold up her
head among those great friends; and almost all that her mother possessed
in the way of jewellery, which was enough to make a show among these
simple people. “Her own family at least have done Elinor justice,” said
the Rector, going again to have a look at the kettle, which was the
chief of the display to him. Thus the visitors made their remarks. The
Hills did nothing but stand apart and discuss their teapot and the means
by which “mother” could be got to assent.
The Rector took his cup of tea, always with a side glance at the kettle,
and cut his cake, and made his gentle jest. “If Alick and I come over in
the night and carry them all off you must not be surprised,” he said;
“such valuable things as these in a little poor parish are a dreadful
temptation, and I don’t suppose you have much in the way of bolts and
bars. Alick is as nimble as a cat, he can get in at any crevice, and
I’ll bring over the box for the collections to carry off the little
things.” This harmless wit pleased the good clergyman much, and he
repeated it to all the ladies. “I am coming over with Alick one of these
dark nights to make a sweep of everything,” he said. Mr. Hudson retired
in the gentle laughter that followed this, feeling that he had acquitted
himself as a man ought who is the only gentleman present, as well as the
Rector of the parish. “I am afraid I would not be a good judge of the
‘things,’” he said, “and for anything I know there may be mysteries not
intended for men’s eyes. I like to see your pretty dresses when you are
wearing them, but I can’t judge of their effect in the gross.” He was a
man who had a pleasant wit. The ladies all agreed that the Rector was
sure to make you laugh whatever was the occasion, and he walked home
very briskly, pleased with the effect of the kettle, and saying to
himself that from the moment he saw it in Mappin’s window he had felt
sure it was the very thing.
The other ladies were sufficiently impressed with the number and
splendour of Elinor’s gowns. Mrs. Dennistoun explained, with a humility
which was not, I fear, untinctured by pride, that both number and
variety were rendered necessary by the fact that Elinor was going upon a
series of visits among her future husband’s great relations, and would
have to be much in society and among fine people who dressed very much,
and would expect a great deal from a bride. “Of course, in ordinary
circumstances the half of them would have been enough: for I don’t
approve of too many dresses.”
“They get old-fashioned,” said Mrs. Hudson, gravely, “before they are
half worn out.”
“And to do them up again is quite as expensive as getting new ones, and
not so satisfactory,” said the Miss Hills.
The proud mother allowed both of these drawbacks. “But what could I do?”
she said. “I cannot have my child go away into such a different sphere
unprovided. It is a sacrifice, but we had to make it. I wish,” she said,
looking round to see that Elinor was out of hearing, “it was the only
sacrifice that had to be made.”
“Let us hope,” said the Rector’s wife, solemnly, “that it will all turn
out for the best.”
“It will do that however it turns out,” said Miss Dale, who was even
more serious than it was incumbent on a member of a clerical household
to be, “for we all know that troubles are sent for our advantage as
well as blessings, and poor dear Elinor may require much discipline----”
“Oh, goodness, don’t talk as if the poor child was going to be
executed,” said Susan Hill.
“I am not at all alarmed,” said Mrs. Dennistoun. It was unwise of her to
have left an opening for any such remark. “My Elinor has always been
surrounded by love wherever she has been. Her future husband’s family
are already very fond of her. I am not at all alarmed on Elinor’s
account.”
She laid the covering wrapper over the dresses with an air of pride and
confidence which was remembered long afterwards--as the pride that goeth
before a fall by some, but by others with more sympathy, who guessed the
secret workings of the mother’s heart.