AN UNAVAILING EFFORT.
The dry, matter-of-fact world, with its face to business and its back to
romance, is still interested in love-matters, and passingly agitated by
the sudden disruption of any love-engagement. It shows an interest in
the latest news, and turns from its account-books for awhile to know how
it came about that Damon and Phyllis could not agree upon "proprieties,"
and thought that it was better to part, for good and aye, than to settle
down for good as man and wife. Having learned the news, remarked upon
the pity that it was, or the best thing that could happen for _her_ or
for _him_, the world goes upon its course again, and the story is as old
as the hills before the leading characters have got over their first
heart-pangs.
It was not a large world that was interested in the disruption of Sidney
Hinchford's love engagement; two old men at Camberwell, and a
needlewoman, might almost constitute it in this instance. We say almost,
for a reason that will appear presently; a cautious writer should always
speak with a reserve.
The two old men were interested in the news, but not profoundly
affected; such is the selfishness of humanity, when matters do not
seriously affect its own comfort.
Harriet Wesden told the news on the following day to her father, and he,
after a stare over her head in the old fashion, thought, perhaps, that
it was all for the best. Harriet told him the whole story of the past
that had led to the parting, and he took stock of the principal
features, and thought it was an odd affair, and that he might have been
told of this Mr. Darcy a little earlier. After awhile he fancied that it
was more comfortable to know that Harriet was to be always with him, to
attend to his small ailments, and study his eccentricities. Of late he
had harassed himself somewhat with the idea that there would be an early
marriage, and that he should be left entirely alone in the world;--with
that house and new furniture, that wash-house where the chimney always
smoked, and that back-garden where groundsel grew vigorously in the
garden paths. The news of the quarrel came with something like a relief
to him. Harriet always at home; no one calling to distract attention
away from him--well, it _was_ for the best, though in his unselfish
moments, and he had many of them, Harriet alone in the world after he
was gone, was a picture that affected him.
There was something else to trouble him now; Harriet's story had cleared
up the mystery of Mattie's actions, that last mystery which had led to
an act of injustice on his part. That he had been unjust, and cast
Mattie back to the streets, troubled him far more than the broken
love-pledge between Harriet and Sidney; for the first time in his life
he had done a wrong, a palpable and cruel one, which might have
submerged a soul, and he was sorry, very sorry, for all that had led to
it. It did not matter that Mattie had been rescued from utter loneliness
by the appearance of her father upon the scene; his hasty judgment had
only brought about the wrong, and he had tried to walk uprightly all his
life, and do his best according to his powers.
Harriet, his daughter, kept her troubles to herself; she had met with
the first shock that falls to the share of many a young life, and she
had not made up her mind as to the best method of bearing up against it.
Two years ago this would not have been a great trouble to her; but two
years had wondrously sobered her, and her eyes had only been opened to
the true estimate of Sidney's character at the time when he spoke of the
necessity of ending all engagement between them. He had not blamed her,
or she might have defended herself; he had spoken of his own
consciousness of having done wrong to bind her by a promise made in an
impulsive moment, he had intimated that it was a relief to him to give
her up, and in the face of the cold, unpitying world, she was powerless
to act. Still she was hopeful amidst it all; it was no serious quarrel;
he had spoken of his wish to remain her friend, and by one of the many
chances of life, it would not be difficult for him to discover that it
_was_ love which drew her to him, and not the pity which is akin to it.
It might all be explained when the right moment came round; but as the
days passed, and no Sidney appeared, her heart sank more, and she read
the future in store for her through a medium less highly coloured by her
fancy.
A week after the explanation between Sidney and her, she went in search
of Mattie. Always in trouble thinking of Mattie--seeking from her that
consolation which her own thoughts denied her. Mattie was still in
Tenchester Street, although Ann Packet had gone back to the Hinchford
service. Mattie was strong enough to shift for herself again--to set
about packing her scanty wardrobe for removal to her fathers home; she
was alone and busy with her preparations for departure, when Harriet
Wesden came into the room.
After the first salutations had been exchanged--and flying remarks upon
Mattie's better health and brighter looks had been made--our heroine
looked steadily at Harriet, and asked what was the matter.
"Am I so altered that you should think anything had happened, Mattie?"
"There is not the look I like to see _there_," said Mattie, pointing to
Harriet Wesden's face.
"It's not a happy look, is it?" she asked, with a little sigh.
"Not very."
"Sit down here beside me, and let me tell you why the happy looks have
gone for ever."
"For ever! Oh! I'll not believe that."
"You'll never guess what I am going to tell you?"
"Sidney and you have quarrelled."
"Yes--no--not exactly quarrelled--what a girl you are to guess things!
Sidney and I, by mutual consent, have cancelled our engagement."
"I am sorry," said Mattie, after a moment's silence; "sorry, not that
the engagement has been broken for awhile, for it will be renewed
again--"
"Never!--never!"
"But that any difference should have arisen between you two. As for not
making it up again," said Mattie, cheerfully, "oh! we can't believe
that, we two who understand Sidney Hinchford so well."
"There will never be an engagement between him and me again," said
Harriet; "over for once and all, Mattie."
"I say there will be," said Mattie, in an equally decisive manner. "Have
I lived so long to see it all ended thus? I say it shall be!" cried
Mattie, in an excited manner, that surprised even Harriet, who knew
Mattie's character so well; "and we shall see, in good time, which is
the true prophetess."
"Mattie, you don't know Sidney, after all."
"Tell me the story--I am very anxious."
And with a woman's keen interest in love matters--her own, or anybody
else's, as the case might be--Mattie clasped her hands together, and
bent forward, all eagerness for Harriet's narrative.
"It's all through your father--that father of yours, who comes upon the
scene, and brings misery with him at once!" said Harriet, a little
petulantly.
"Hush, Harriet!--remember that he is my father, now!" said Mattie, who
had found one more to defend in life, and to live for, "and I am
learning to love him, and to understand him better every day."
"Yes--yes--you will forgive me--I am always offending some one with my
hasty words. This is how the quarrel came about."
Harriet launched into her story at once; in a torrent of hurried
explanations the details were poured forth, and Mattie, in a short
while, knew as much as Harriet Wesden, which was not all however, as we,
who are behind the scenes of this little drama, are aware.
"Perhaps it serves _us_ right," said Mattie, pluralizing the case after
her old fashion; "we kept something back, and Sidney is straightforward
in everything, and hates deceit, even innocent deceit like ours,
practised for your good name's sake. Did you tell him that?"
"I don't know what I told him," answered Harriet, sadly. "I said
nothing--I was found guilty, and there was no answer left me."
"We shall live this down, I think," said Mattie, confidently. "After
all, there's nothing very serious about it--if he don't suspect us of
behaving wrongly on that night."
"Sidney suspect that of me! Oh! no, no--not so bad as that!"
"Then it will all come right in time," cried Mattie. "He has loved us
all his life, and will not fling himself from us in his pride and anger,
as--as other men would do, more selfish and unjust than he. I see the
future brightening--we will wait patiently, and not be cast down by this
slight trouble."
"Slight trouble!" exclaimed Harriet. "Oh! Mattie, if you only understood
what love was like, you would guess my--my sense of desolation."
Harriet flung herself on the bosom of the old faithful friend, whose
face, over her shoulder, became suddenly, and for an instant only, very
white and lined.
"I will try and guess," she said, in a low voice. "It must be desolate;
I--I may know better some day!"
Then Mattie set herself the task of comforting this child--a child
still, she thought, in her impulsiveness, and in that weakness which
gave way like a child at the first trouble, and sought help and comfort
from others, rather than from her own heart. And Mattie, who had the
gift--that rare rich gift above all price--of comforting those who are
afflicted, succeeded in putting the facts of the case in their best and
less distorted light, and was rewarded before the interview was
over--and when Harriet remembered it--by the new fact of how one
revelation had brought about another, and cleared up the mystery of
Mattie's absence from home to the man who had suspected her.
"I broke the promise--there was nothing to keep back, when I had my own
story to relate."
"He knows all this," said Mattie, "and he----"
"He is very sorry for all that harshness which drove you from us--I am
sure of it."
"Why, it is brightening all round," said Mattie; "we shall have no
secret in the midst of us, and all will be well now!"
Both had forgotten the letter, wherein absence of all true affection was
asserted; Harriet believed it destroyed, and Mattie did not think to
remind her of the danger--in her heart believed it even far removed from
her.
They parted hopefully; Mattie made the best of the position, and was
really trustful in a good result. Sidney Hinchford loved Harriet, and
she could not understand a man loving on, and yet holding aloof from the
idol he would fain worship still.
Sidney Hinchford, a few days afterwards, came to make his last inquiries
concerning Mattie's health--had he waited another day he would have
found empty rooms and a desolate hearth--and Mattie seized that
opportunity to say a word. The grass never grew under the feet of Mattie
Gray, and the dark look--new to his face in its intensity of
sternness--did not deter her.
"I am sorry to hear the last news, Mr. Hinchford."
"It was to be expected," he replied shortly. He would have hastened away
from a subject that distressed him, but Mattie was not deterred by his
harsh voice.
"Not to be expected, you mean, Mr. Sidney," she said; "for she and you,
who have been together all your lives, should----"
"Pardon me, Mattie," he interrupted, decisively; "I cannot bear a third
person's interference in this matter. It lies between her and me, and
both she and I have thought it better to part, without reproach or
ill-will. She has made up her mind----"
"But----"
"And had she not," he said, catching at Mattie's wrist and holding it
firmly with his hand, as though to stay her defence by that means, "I
have made up mine, and there is nothing on earth, or in heaven, to alter
it, I swear!"
"Oh! sir," cried Mattie, dismayed at this assertion, "you will think of
this again--of her you have known from a little child, and should be
able to trust. There's not a truer, kinder heart, in all the world!"
"She is true and kind--she would even have sacrificed her happiness for
my sake--but she never loved me. I have her written evidence to that."
"The letter!--oh! the letter!"
"You knew it?--_you_ helped to deceive me, too!"
"Not deceit--all was done for your own good, Mr. Sidney--she did not
know her own mind when that letter was written; she----"
"She will never know it--she is a weak woman--God help her! She was
never fit for me!"
"Yes," was the quick denial.
"No, I say. A thousand times no!"
He stamped his foot upon the floor, and then turned away, sterner and
darker in his looks than ever. Mattie's heart sank then--for she read in
his face a resolve that love could not soften, or time ameliorate. She
lost hope herself from that day.
"I must make up for him as well as I can," said Mattie, after he had
gone; "she must not break down, because he turns away. She is young and
will get over it--let me see, now, how shall I teach my darling to
forget all this?"