AGNES ELOPES WITH HER AUNT BETSY.
"Is it possible!" cried Agnes, the moment that the door of the carriage
was closed upon them, "is it possible that I am really under your
protection, and going to your home, aunt Betsy?"
"To my temporary home, dear child, you are certainly going," said the
old lady, taking her hand; "but I hope soon to have one more comfortable
for you, my Agnes!"
"Where I shall find the bower and the bees? Is it not so, aunt?"
"Not exactly ... at least not at present.... But tell me, Agnes, don't
you think I was very gentle and civil to Mrs. Barnaby?"
"It was certainly very wise not to reproach her, poor woman, more
directly.... But, oh! dearest aunt Betsy, how well you know her!... If
you had studied for a twelvemonth to find out how you might best have
tormented her, you could have discovered no method so effectual as the
making her first believe that you had a great fortune, and then that her
own conduct had robbed her of your favour. Poor aunt Barnaby!... I
cannot help pitying her!"
"You are tender-hearted, my dear, ... and a flatterer too.... You give
me credit, I assure you, for a vast deal more cleverness than I possess:
excepting on the subject of the old clothes which she offered me when we
met in the cottage of dame Sims, I attempted no jestings with her....
But tell me, Agnes, have you not suffered dreadfully from the tyranny
and vulgar ignorance of this detestable woman? Has she not almost broken
your young heart?"
"I have not been very happy with her, aunt Betsy," replied Agnes
gently; ... "but she speaks only truth when she says I have lived at her
cost, and this ought to close my lips against speaking more against her
than may be necessary to clear my own conduct in your eyes."
Perhaps the old lady was a little disappointed at finding that she was
to have no good stories concerning the absurdities of the apothecary's
high-flying widow, as she called her; but, despite all the oddities of
Miss Compton, there was quite enough of the innate feeling of a
gentlewoman within her to make her value Agnes the more for her promised
forbearance. She threw her arm round her, and pressing her to her bosom,
said,--
"Let this feeling of Christian gentleness be extended to me also,
Agnes, ... for I have great need of it. This Martha Wisett the second,
poor soul, was the first-born of her mother, and seems to have taken as
her birth-right all the qualities, bodily and mental, of her vulgar and
illiterate dam.... But I have no such excuse, my child, for the
obstinate prejudice with which my heart has been filled, and my judgment
absolutely confounded. All you have suffered with this woman, Agnes,
ought, in truth, to be laid to my charge.... I knew what she was, and
yet I suffered you.... Let us try to forget it; and only remember, if
you can, that I turned away from you for no other reason upon earth than
because I feared you were not ... exactly what I now find you. But here
we are at home. How greatly must you want the healing feeling that home
should bring! Poor dear!... When have you ever felt it?"
"At Empton, aunt!" answered Agnes eagerly; and even though the carriage
door was open, and the step let down, she added, "The only home I ever
loved I owed to you."
Hastily as this word was said, it sunk with very healing effect into the
heart of the self-reproaching old lady ... it was answered by a cordial
"God bless you!" and hand in hand the very happy pair walked up the
staircase together. The accomplished William had preceded them, and
thrown open the door of aunt Betsy's handsome drawing-room; and no
apartment could offer an aspect of more comfort. The evening had all the
chilliness of September when its sun is gone; and the small bright fire,
with a sofa placed cosily near it, looked cheerily. Wax-lights on the
chimney and tea-table, gave light sufficient to shew a large,
exceedingly well-fitted up room; and a pretty young woman, neatly
dressed, came forward to offer her services in the removal of cloaks and
shawls.
Agnes looked round the room, and then turned to her aunt, as if tacitly
demanding an explanation of what she saw. Miss Compton smiled, and
answered the appeal by saying, "Did you expect, dearest, that I should
be able to bring my farm-house and my bees with me?"
"No, aunt Compton," replied Agnes, very gravely, "I did not expect
that; ... but...."
"Aunt BETSY--you must always call me aunt Betsy, Agnes. That was the
appellation that your dear voice uttered so joyously when I entered the
dark den in which I found you, and I shall never like any other as
well.... But don't be frightened because I have somewhat changed my mode
of living, my dear child. I will not invite you to ramble through the
streets of London, in order to visit me when I am in prison for debt. I
know what my means are, Agnes--few ladies better--and I will never
exceed them."
This was said very gravely, and the assurance was by no means
unimportant to the tranquillity of the young heiress. The scenes she had
recently passed through would have reconciled her to a farm-house, a
cottage, a hut; so that the air of heaven blew untainted round it, and
no livery-stable keepers, or bailiff's followers, could find entrance
there. But Miss Compton's words and manner set her heart at rest on that
score, though they could not remove her astonishment, the involuntary
expression of which, on her beautiful face, was by no means disagreeable
to the novel-read aunt Betsy. It was just as it should be ... beauty,
goodness, misery, ill-usage, and all; and she felt most happily
convinced that, if there were but a lover in the case, and such a one
as, despite all obstacles, she could approve, she should to her dying
day have the comfort of thinking that the moment which she had chosen
for ceasing to accumulate, and beginning to spend, was the very best
possible.
And this lover in the clouds.... Would Agnes open her heart to her on
such a subject?... Had she any right to hope it?... Not yet, certainly
not yet, thought Miss Compton as, the services of William over, and the
tea-things removed, they drew nearer the fire; and she fixed her eyes
anew on the beautiful face she so greatly loved to contemplate, partly
because it was so beautiful, and partly because she could not trace in
it the slightest resemblance to any member of the Wisett race.
But soft and peaceful as was now the expression of that face, there
might occasionally be seen by an accurate observer that indescribable
look of thoughtfulness in the eyes which never arises till the mind has
been awakened, upon some subject or other, to emotions of deep interest.
Miss Compton was a very accurate observer, and saw, as plainly as
Lavater himself could have done, that Agnes had learned to feel.
The romantic old lady would have given her right hand to possess her
confidence, but she was determined not to ask for it.
"Do you think we shall be happy together, Agnes?" said she, in a voice
which, when its cheerful tone was not exaggerated into the ironical
levity in which she sometimes indulged, was singularly pleasing. "Do
you think that you shall like to be my darling?"
"Yes, I do," replied Agnes, with the sudden bluntness of sincerity; "but
I think I shall plague you sometimes, aunt Betsy."
"You have made up your mind to that already, have you?" returned Miss
Compton, delighted at the playful tone in which she spoke; "then, in
that case, I must make up my mind too, and contrive to make a pleasure
of what you call a plague. How do you mean to begin, Agnes?... What will
you do first?... Will you cry for the moon?"
"Will you try to get it for me if I do, aunt Betsy?" said Agnes,
laughing.
"Yes, I will ... that is, if you will let me know what sort of moon it
is, and to what part of the heavens I must turn to find it. Jupiter, you
know, has...."
"Oh! my moon is the highest and brightest of them all!..." said Agnes,
with a sigh; and, after remaining silent for a moment, she added, ...
"Aunt Betsy, may I tell you everything that has happened to me?"
"If you love me well enough to do this, my child," said the delighted
old lady, while, nevertheless, a tear glistened in her clear black
eye,--"if you love me well enough, I shall feel that I have not given up
my bees and my flowers for nothing."
Agnes drew nearer, and, after a moment's hesitation, began.
"I believe that all young ladies' histories have something about a
gentleman in them, and so has mine...."
"A _young_ gentleman, I hope, Agnes?" interrupted the aunt, with a
smile.
Agnes coloured a little, but replied, "He is not so very young, aunt
Betsy, as to make his youth his most remarkable quality."
"Very well, that is all quite right; he ought to be older than you, my
dear.... Go on."
"When I was at Clifton, aunt Betsy, I was often in company with Colonel
Hubert...."
"A colonel?... That sounds very respectable; he was the father, I
suppose, of THE gentleman?"
"No, indeed," replied Agnes, with some vexation; "he is himself the only
gentleman that I have anything to say about, ... and his sister says
that he will be a general next month."
"Indeed!... A general?... General Hubert!... a very eligible
acquaintance, I have no doubt.... I should hardly have hoped you could
have had the good luck to meet with such among the friends of your aunt
Barnaby."
"An eligible acquaintance!... Oh! aunt, you don't understand me at
all!... But I will tell you everything. Colonel Hubert is ... I can't
describe him.... I hope you will see him, aunt Betsy, and then you will
not wonder, perhaps, that I should have thought him, from the very first
moment I saw him, the only person in the world...."
Agnes stopped short; but Miss Compton seemed to think she had finished
her phrase very properly.
"And what did he think of you, my dear?... this young colonel?"
"Colonel Hubert never said anything about it at Clifton," replied Agnes,
blushing; "but yet I thought--I hoped he liked me, though I knew it did
not signify whether he did or not, for he is one of a very
distinguished family, ... who could never, I imagined, think seriously
of any one living with ... with my aunt Barnaby. But at Cheltenham I
became acquainted with his aunt, Lady Elizabeth Norris, and his sister,
Lady Stephenson, and they were very, _very_ kind to me; and when I came
to London with my aunt Barnaby in this wild manner, they were very
anxious about me, and made me promise to write to them.... But before I
thought they could know anything about her being taken to prison ... the
very day indeed that she went there, in the evening, while I was sitting
in that dismal room, just as you found me to-night ... Colonel
Hubert.... Oh! aunt Betsy ... the sight of you did not surprise me
more.... Colonel Hubert walked in."
"That was hardly right, though, Agnes, if he knew you were alone."
"He brought a letter from his aunt and sister, most kindly asking me to
take shelter with them immediately; ... and I am quite sure that when he
came he had no intention of speaking of anything but that.... But I
believe I looked very miserable, and his generous heart could not bear
it, so he told me that he loved me, and asked me to be his wife."
"It _was_ generous of him at such a dreadful moment," said the spinster,
her eyes again twinkling through tears.... "And how did you answer him,
my love?"
"I told him," replied Agnes, trembling and turning pale as she spoke, "I
told him that I could never be his wife!"
"Why, my dear, I thought you said," ... cried the old lady, looking much
disappointed, ... "I thought you said you admired him of all things, and
I am sure he seems to have deserved it; but I suppose you thought he was
too old for you?"
"No! no! no!" replied Agnes vehemently.... "He is young enough for me to
love him, oh! so dearly!... It was because I could not hear that he
should marry so beneath himself ... it was because I thought his aunt
and sister would resent it...."
"Humph!... That was very generous on your part too; but I suppose he
knows best.... And what did he say then, Agnes?"
"Oh! aunt Betsy!... he said exactly as you did ... he said that he was
too old for me to love him; ..." and, remembering the agony of that
moment, she hid her face in her hands and wept.
Miss Compton looked at her with pitying eyes; and, after a moment, said,
"And so you parted, Agnes?"
"Yes!" she replied, removing her hands. "It was almost so, and yet not
quite.... I could not tell him, you know, how dearly, how very dearly I
loved him!... that was impossible!... but I said something about his
sister and his aunt; and then ... oh! I shall never forget him!...
something like hope ... pray, do not think me vain, aunt Betsy,--but it
_was_ hope that shot into his eye again, and changed the whole
expression of his face; ... yet he said no more about his love, and only
asked me to promise never to leave the shelter of that roof till I heard
from his aunt again.... And I did promise him.... But could I keep it,
aunt?... It would have been obeying him in words, and not in spirit....
And now I'm coming to my reason for telling you all this so very
soon.... What shall I say to them now? How shall I write to them?"
It seemed that Miss Compton did not find this a very easy question to
answer, for she took many minutes to consider of it. At length she
said, ... "As to setting right the love part of the affair, you need not
alarm yourself, my dear ... there will be no great difficulty in
that.... If you know your own mind, and really are in love with a
general, instead of an ensign, I don't see why you should be
contradicted, though it is a little out of the common way.... He is a
gentleman, and that is the only point upon which I could have been very
strict with you.... But there is another thing, Agnes, in which you must
please to let me have my own way.... Will you promise me?"
"How can there be any way but yours in what concerns me, dear aunt
Betsy?"
"Bless you, my dear!... I will not be a tyrant ... at least not a very
cruel tyrant; but my happiness will be injured for the rest of my life,
Agnes, if the next time you see this gentleman and his family, it is
not in such a manner as to make them perceive, without the necessity of
their listening to an old woman's long story about it, that you are not
an unworthy match for him in any way.... Let this be managed, and
everything will end well.... There will be no risk of your witnessing,
either in the words or looks of these noble ladies whom you call your
friends, any struggle between their partiality for you and their higher
hopes for him. HE will ever remember with pleasure that he waited not
for this to offer you his hand and heart; and trust me YOU will never
remember with sorrow that you did wait for it before you accepted him.
Do you agree with me?"
"Indeed I do!" fervently replied Agnes. "But could they see me at this
moment, would not your wish be answered? Could they doubt for a moment,
while seeing you, and seeing the style of all about you, that I am
something more than the poor hopeless dependant of Mrs. Barnaby?"
"That is not it.... That would not do at all, child," replied the old
lady, sharply. "It shall not be the poor dependant of anybody that this
noble-hearted Colonel Hubert shall come to woo. Love him as much as you
will, the world may say, and his family may think too, that his rank and
station led you to accept him. I will save you both from this danger.
Colonel Hubert shall not try his chance with you again till you are the
independent possessor of fifteen hundred pounds a-year. When I die,
Agnes, if you behave well in the interim, I will bequeath my bees to
you, and all the furniture of my two pretty rooms at Compton Basett, as
well as all the reserved rents in the shape of allowances, coals, wood,
attendance, and the like, which will be mine while I live. This, my
dear, shall come to you in the way of legacy, in case I continue to be
pleased with your behaviour; but there is no way for me to atone for the
injury I have done to the representative of my family by suffering her
to remain six months with Mrs. Barnaby, but making her at once the
independent possessor of the Compton property."
"My dear, dear aunt!" said Agnes, most unfeignedly distressed, "there
can be no occasion at this moment to talk of your doing what, in my
poor judgment, would be so very wrong.... Should I be so happy as to
make Colonel Hubert known to you, I would trust to him to discuss such
subjects.... Oh! what delight, aunt Betsy, for you to have such a man
for your friend!... and all owing to me!"
There was something so ingenuous, so young, so unquestionably sincere in
this burst of feeling, that the old lady was greatly touched by it. "You
are a sweet creature, Agnes," she replied, "and quite right in telling
me not to discuss any matters of business with you.... I shall touch on
no such subjects again, for I see they are totally beyond your
comprehension. Nevertheless, I must have my way about not introducing
myself to Colonel Hubert's family, or himself either, in lodgings. Write
to your kind friends, my dear; tell them that your old aunt Compton has
left her retirement to take care of you, and tell them also that she
feels as she ought to do.... But, no; you write your own feelings, and I
will write mine.... But this must be to-morrow, Agnes; ... it is past
twelve o'clock, love. See! that gay thing on the chimney-piece attests
it.... I must shew you to your room, my guest; hereafter I shall be
yours, perhaps."
Peggy being summoned, the two ladies were lighted to the rooms above....
These were in a style of great comfort, and even elegance; but one being
somewhat larger than the other, and furnished with a dressing-room, it
was in this that Agnes found her trunk and book-box; and it was here
that, after seeing that her fire burned brightly, and that Peggy was
standing ready to assist in undressing her, the happy Miss Compton
embraced, blessed, and left her to repose.
It was a long time, however, before Agnes would believe that anything
like sleep could visit her eyes that night. What a change, what an
almost incredible transition, had she passed through since her last
sleep! It was more like the operation of a magician's wand than the
consequence of human events. From being a reprobated outcast, banished
from the roof that sheltered her, she had become the sole object of
love and care to one who seemed to have it in her power to make life a
paradise to her. How many blissful visions floated through her brain
before all blended together in one general consciousness of happy
security, that at last lulled her to delicious sleep! She was hardly
less sensible than her somewhat proud aunt of the pleasure which a
reunion with her Cheltenham friends, under circumstances, so changed,
would bring; and her dreams were of receiving Lady Elizabeth Norris and
her niece in a beautiful palace on the shores of a lovely lake, while
Colonel Hubert stood smiling by to watch the meeting.