|Finished to-morrow.” What a life-time seems to have elapsed since I
wrote that line!
A month and four days ago, I sat here, waiting for papa and Penelope
to come home from their dinner party. Trying to be cheerful--wondering
why I was not so: yet with my heart as heavy as lead all the time.
I think it will never be quite so heavy any more. Never weighed down
by imaginary wrongs and ideal woes. It has known real anguish and been
taught wisdom.
We have been very near losing our beloved father. Humanly speaking, we
should have lost him but for Doctor Urquhart, to whose great skill and
unremitting care, Doctor Black himself confessed yesterday, papa has,
under God, owed his life.
It is impossible for me to write down here the particulars of dear
papa's accident, and the illness which followed, every day of which
seems at once so vivid and so unreal. I shall never forget it while I
live, and yet, even now, am afraid to recall it. Though at the time I
seemed afraid of nothing--strong enough for everything. I felt--or it
now appears as though I must have done so--as I did on one sunshiny
afternoon, at a pic-nic, about a dozen years ago--when I, following
Colin Granton, walked round the top of a circular rock, on a ledge two
feet wide, a sloping ledge of short slippery grass, where, if we had
slipped, it was about ninety perpendicular feet to fall.
I shudder to think of that feat, even now; and telling it to Doctor
Urquhart in illustration of what I am here mentioning, namely,
the quiet unconsciousness with which one sometimes passes through
exceeding great danger, he too shuddered, turned deadly white. I never
saw a strong man lose colour so suddenly and completely as he does, at
times.
Can he be really strong? Those nights of watching must have told
upon his health; which is so valuable. Doubly valuable to one in his
profession. We must try to make him take care of himself, and allow
us--Rockmount generally--to take care of him. Though, since his
night-watchings ceased, he has not given us much opportunity, having
only paid his due medical visit once a-day, and scarcely stayed ten
minutes afterwards,--until to-day, when by papa's express desire,
Augustus drove over and fetched him to dinner.
It is pleasant to be able to write down here, how very much better I
like my brother-in-law. His thorough goodness of nature, his kindly
cheering ways, and his unaffected, if rather obstreperous love for
his wife, which is reflected, as it should be, upon every creature
belonging to her, make it impossible not to like him. I am heartily
glad he has sold out, so that even if war breaks out again, there will
be no chance of his being ordered off on foreign service. Though
in that case, he declares he should feel himself in honour bound to
volunteer. But Lisabel only laughs; she knows better.
Still, I trust there may be no occasion. War, viewed in the abstract,
is sufficiently terrible; but when it comes home, when one's self, and
one's own, are bound up in the chances of it, the case is altogether
changed. Some misfortunes contemplated as personal possibilities, seem
more than human nature could bear. How the mothers, sisters, wives,
have borne them all through this war is--
My head turned dizzy here, and I was obliged to leave off writing,
and lie down. I have not felt very strong lately--that is, not bodily
strong. In my heart I have--thoroughly calm, happy, and thankful--as
God knows we have all need to be, since he has spared our dear father,
never loved so dearly as now. But physically, I am rather tired and
weak, as if I would fain rest my head somewhere and be taken care
of. If there were anybody to do it, which there is not. Since I can
remember, nobody ever took care of me.
While writing this last line, old Mrs. Cartwright came up to bring me
some arrowroot with wine in it, for my supper, entreating me to to
go to bed “like a good child.” She said “the Doctor” told her to look
after me; but she should have done it herself, anyhow. She is a
good old body--I wish we could find out anything about her poor lost
daughter.
What was I writing about? Oh, the history of to-day: where I take up
the thread of my journal, leaving the whole interval between, a blank.
I could not write about it if I would.
I did not go to church with them this morning, feeling sure I could
not walk so far, and some one ought to stay with papa. So the girls
went, and Doctor Urquhart also, at which papa seemed just a little
disappointed, he having counted on a long morning's chat.
I never knew papa attach himself to any man before, or take such
exceeding delight in any one's company. He said the other day, when
Augustus annoyed him about some trifle or other, that “he wished he
might have chosen his own son-in-law--Lisabel had far better have
married Doctor Urquhart.”
Our Lisabel and Doctor Urquhart! I could not help laughing. Day and
night--fire and water, would have best described their union.
Penelope now, though she has abused him so much--but that was
Francis's fault,--would have suited him a deal better. They are more
friendly than they used to be--indeed he is on good terms with all
Rockmount. We feel, every one of us, I trust, that our obligations
to him are of a kind of which we never can acquit ourselves while we
live.
This great grief has been in many ways, like most afflictions, “a
blessing in disguise.” It has drawn us altogether, as nothing but
trouble ever does, as I did not think anything ever would, so queer a
family are we. But we are improving. We do not now shut ourselves
up in our rooms, hiding each in her hole like a selfish bear until
feeding time--we assemble in the parlor--we sit and talk round papa's
study-chair. There, this morning after church, we held a convocation
and confabulation before papa came down.
And, strange to say--almost the first time such a thing ever happened
in ours, though a clergyman's family--we talked about church and the
sermon.
It was preached by the young man whom papa has been obliged to take
as curate, and who, Penelope said, she feared would never suit, if he
took such eccentric texts, and preached such out-of-the-way sermons
as the one this morning. I asked what it was about, and was answered,
“the cities of refuge.”
I fear I do not know my Bible--the historic portion of it--so well as
I might; for I scandalized Penelope exceedingly by inquiring what were
“the cities of refuge.” She declared any child in her school would
have been better acquainted with the Old Testament, and I had it at
my tongue's end to say that a good many of her children seemed far too
glibly and irreverently acquainted with the Old Testament, for I once
overheard a knot of them doing the little drama of Elijah, the mocking
children, and the bears in the wood, to the confusion of our poor
bald-headed organist, and their own uproarious delight, especially
the two boys who enacted the bears. But 'tis wicked to teaze our good
Penelope--at least I think it wicked now.
So I said nothing; but after the sermon had been well talked over
as “extraordinary,” “unheard of in our church,” “such a mixing of
politics and religion, and bringing up everyday subjects into the
pulpit,”--for it seems he had alluded to some question of capital
punishment, which now fills the newspapers--I took an opportunity of
asking Doctor Urquhart what the sermon really had been about. I can
often speak to him of things which I never should dream of discussing
with my sisters, or even papa. For, whatever the subject is, he will
always listen, answer, explain; either laughing away my follies, or
talking to me seriously and kindly.
This time, though, he was not so patient; asked me abruptly, “Why I
wanted to know?”
“About the sermon? From harmless curiosity. Or rather,”--for I would
not wish him to think that in any religious matter I was guided by no
higher motive than curiosity, “because I doubt Penelope's judgment of
the curate. She is rather harsh sometimes.”
“Is she?”
“Will you find for me,”--and I took out of my pocket my little Bible,
which I had been reading in the garden,--“about the cities of refuge?
That is, unless you dislike to talk on the subject.”
“Who--I--what made you suppose so?”
I replied candidly, his own manner, while they were arguing it.
“You must not mind my manner--it is not kind--it is not friendly.” And
then he begged my pardon, saying he knew he often spoke more rudely to
me than to anyone else.
If he does it harms me not. He must have so many causes of anxiety and
irritation, which escape by expression. I wish he would express them
a little more, indeed. One could bear to be really scolded, if it
did him any good. But, of course, I should have let the theological
question slip by, had he not, some minutes after, referred to it
himself. We were standing outside the window; there was no one within
hearing; indeed, he rarely talks very seriously unless he and I happen
to be alone.
“Did you think as they do--your sisters, I mean--that the Mosaic law
is still our law--an eye for an eye--a tooth for a tooth--a life for a
life--and so on?”
I said I did not quite understand him.
“It was the subject of the sermon. Whether he who takes life forfeits
his own. The law of Moses enacted this. Even the chance murderer, the
man guilty of manslaughter, as we should term it now, was not safe
out of the bounds of the three cities of refuge. The avenger of blood
finding him, might slay him.”
I asked, what he thought was meant by “the avenger of blood.” Was it
divine or human retribution?
“I cannot tell. How should I know? Why do you question me?”
I might have said, because I liked to talk to him, and hear him talk;
because, in many a perplexed subject over which I had been wearying
myself, his opinion had guided me and set me right. I did hint
something of the kind, but he seemed not to hear or heed it, and
continued:--
“Do you think, with the minister of this morning, that, except in very
rare cases, we--we Christians, have no right to exact a life for a
life? Or do you believe, on religious as well as rational grounds,
that every man-slayer, should inevitably be hanged?”
I have often puzzled over that question, which Doctor Urquhart
evidently felt as much as I did. Truly, many a time have I turned
sick at the hangings which I have had to read to papa in the
newspapers--have wakened at seven in the morning, and counted, minute
by minute some wretched convict's last hour--till the whole scene grew
so vivid that the execution seemed more of a murder than the original
crime of which it was the expiation. But still, to say that there
ought to be no capital punishments? I could not tell. I only repeated
softly, words that came into my mind at that instant.
“_For we know that no murderer hath eternal life in him?_
“But if he were _not_ a wilful murderer?--if life were taken--let us
suppose such a case--in violent passion, or under circumstances which
made the man not himself?--if his crime were repented of and atoned
for in every possible way--the lost life re-purchased by his own--not
by dying, but by the long torment of living?”
“Yes,” I said, “I could well imagine a convict's existence, or that
of one convicted in his own conscience--a duellist, for instance--far
more terrible than death upon the scaffold.”
“You are right; I have seen such cases.”
No doubt he has, since, as an officer once told me, the army still
holds duelling to be the necessary defence of a gentleman's “honor.”
The recollections aroused were apparently very sore; so much so that
I suggested our changing the subject, which seemed both painful and
unprofitable.
“Not quite. Besides, would you quit a truth because it happened to be
painful? That is not like you.”
“I hope not.”
After a few minutes' silence, he continued:--“This is a question I
have thought over deeply. I have my own opinion concerning it, and
I know that of most men; but I should like to hear a woman's--a
Christian woman's. Tell me, do you believe the avenger of blood walks
through the Christian world, as through the land of Israel, requiring
retribution; that for blood-shedding as for all other crimes, there
is, in this world, whatever there may be in another, expiation, but no
pardon. Think well, answer slowly, for it is a momentous question.”
“I know that--the one question of our times.”
Doctor Urquhart bent his head without replying. He hardly could speak;
I never saw him so terribly in earnest. His agitation roused me from
the natural shyness I have in lifting up my own voice and setting
forth my own girlish opinion on topics of which every one has a right
to think, but very few to speak.
“I believe that in the Almighty's gradual teaching of His creatures,
a Diviner than Moses brought to us a higher law--in which the sole
expiation required is penitence, with obedience: “_Repent ye? “Go
and sin no more?_ It appears to me, so far as I can judge and read
here”--my Bible was still in my hand--“that throughout the New, and in
many parts of the Old Testament, runs one clear doctrine, namely, that
any sin, however great, being repented of and forsaken, is by God, and
ought to be by man, altogether pardoned, blotted out and done away.”
“God bless you!”
For the second time he said to me those words--said them twice over,
and left me.
Rather abruptly; but he is sometimes abrupt when thinking deeply of
anything.
Thus ended our little talk: yet it left a pleasant impression. True,
the subject was strange enough; my sisters might have been shocked
at it; and at my freedom in asking and giving opinions. But oh! the
blessing it is to have a friend to whom one can speak fearlessly on
any subject; with whom one's deepest as well as one's most
foolish thoughts come out simply and safely. Oh, the comfort--the
inexpressible comfort of feeling _safe_ with a person--having neither
to weigh thoughts nor measure words, but pouring them all right out,
just as they are, chaff and grain together; certain that a faithful
hand will take and sift them, keep what is worth keeping, and then
with the breath of kindness blow the rest away.
Somebody must have done a good deal of the winnowing business this
afternoon; for in the course of it I gave him as much nonsense as
any reasonable man could stand--even such an ultra-reasonable man
as Doctor Urquhart. Papa said once, that she was “taking too great
liberty of speech with our good friend, the Doctor”--that foolish
little Dora but foolish little Dora knows well enough what she is
about--when to be silly and when to be wise. She believes in her heart
that there are some people to whom it does great good to be dragged
down from their heights of wisdom, and forced to talk and smile, until
the clouds wears off, and the smile becomes permanent--grows into a
sunshine that warms every one else all through. Oh, if he had had
a happy life--if Dallas had lived--this Dallas, whom I often think
about, and seem to know quite well--what a cheerful blithe nature his
would have been!
Just before tea, when papa was taking his sleep, Doctor Urquhart
proposed that we should all go for a walk. Penelope excused herself;
besides, she thinks it wrong to walk out on a Sunday; but Lisabel and
Augustus were very glad to go. So was I, having never been beyond the
garden since papa's illness.
If I try to remember all the trivial incidents of to-day, at full
length, it is because it has been such an exceedingly happy day: to
preserve which from the chances of this mortal life, “the sundry and
manifold changes of this world,” as the prayer says, I here write them
down.
How vague, how incompatible with the humdrum tenor of our quiet days
at Rockmount that collect used to sound!
“_That amidst the sundry and manifold changes of this world, our
hearts may surely there be fixed, where true joys are to le found,
through Jesus Christ our Lord, Amen_.” Now, as if newly understanding
it, I also repeat, “Amen.”
We started, Lisabel, Augustus, Doctor Urquhart, and I. We went
through the village, down the moorland-road, to the ponds, which
Augustus wanted to examine, with a view to wild-duck shooting, next,
or, rather, I might say, this winter, for Christmas is coming close
upon us, though the weather is still so mild.
Lisa and her husband walked on first, and quickly left us far behind;
for, not having been out for so long, except the daily stroll round
the garden, which Doctor Urquhart had insisted upon, the fresh air
seemed to turn me dizzy. I managed to stumble on through the village,
keeping up talk, too, for Doctor Urquhart hardly said anything, until
we came out upon the open moor, bright, breezy, sunshiny. Then I felt
a choking--a longing to cry out or sob--my head swam round and round.
“Are you wearied?--you look as if you were.”
“Will you like to take my arm?”
“Sit down--sit down on this stone--my child!”
I heard these sentences distinctly, one after the other, but could not
answer. I felt my bonnet-strings untied, and the wind blowing on my
face--then all grew light again, and I looked round.
“Do not be frightened; you will be well in a minute or two. I only
wonder that you have kept up so bravely, and are so strong.”
This I heard too--in a cheerful kind voice--and soon after I became
quite myself, but ready to cry with vexation, or something, I don't
know what.
“You will not tell anybody?” I entreated.
“No, not anybody,” said he, smiling, “if turning faint was such a
crime. Now, you can walk? Only not alone, just at present, if you
please.”
I do not marvel at the almost unlimited power which, Augustus says,
Doctor Urquhart has over his patients. A true physician--not only of
bodies, but souls.
We walked on, I holding his arm. For a moment, I was half afraid of
Lisabel's laugh, and the silly etiquette of our neighbourhood; which
holds that if a lady and gentleman walk arm-in-arm they must be going
to be married. Then _I_ forgot both, and only thought what a comfort
it was in one's weakness to have an arm to lean on, and one that you
knew, you felt, was not unwilling to have you resting there.
I have never said, but I will say it here, that I know Doctor Urquhart
likes me--better than any other of my family; better, perhaps,
than any friend he has, for he has not many. He is a man of great
kindliness of nature, but few personal attachments. I have heard him
say “that though he liked a great many people, only one or two were
absolutely necessary to him.” Dallas might have been, had he lived.
He told me, one day, there was a certain look in me which occasionally
reminded him of Dallas. It is by these little things that I guess he
likes me--at least, enough to make me feel, when with him, that rest
and content that I never feel with those who do not care for me.
I made him laugh, and he made me laugh, several times, about trifles
that, now I call them to mind, were not funny at all. Yet “it takes a
wise man to make a fool, and none but a fool is always wise.”
With which sapient saying we consoled ourselves, standing at the
edge of the larger pool, watching the other couple strolling along,
doubtless very busy over the wild-duck affair.
“Your sister and Treherne seem to suit one another remarkably well. I
doubted once if they would.”
“So did I. It ought to be a warning to us against hasty judgments.
Especially here.” Mischief prompted the latter suggestion, for Doctor
Urquhart must have recollected, as well as I did, the last and only
time he and I had walked across this moorland-road, when we had such a
serious quarrel, and I was more passionate and rude to him than I ever
was to anybody--out of my own family. I hope he has forgiven me. Yet
he was a little wrong too.
“Yes, especially here,” he repeated, smiling--so I have no doubt he
did remember.
Just then, Lisabel's laugh, and her husband's with it, rang distantly
across the pool.
“They seem very happy, those two.”
I said, I felt sure they were, and that it was a blessed thing to
find, the older one grew, how very much of happiness there is in life.
“Do you think so?”
“Do _you_ not think so?”
“I do; but not in your sense exactly. Remember, Miss Theodora, people
see life in a different aspect at twenty-five and at--”
“Forty. I know that.”
“That I am forty? Which I am not quite, by the bye. No doubt it seems
to you a most awful age.”
I said, it was perhaps for a woman, but for a man no more than the
prime of life, with many years before him in which both to work and
enjoy.
“Yes, for work is enjoyment, the only enjoyment that ever satisfies.”
He stood gazing across the moorland, _my_ moorland, which put on its
best smile for us to-day. Ay, though the heather was brown, and the
furze-bushes had lost their gold. But so long as there is free air,
sunshine, and sky, the beauty never can vanish from my beloved moor.
I wondered how anyone could look at it and not enjoy it; could stand
here as we stood and not be satisfied.
Perhaps in some slight way I hinted this, at least, so far as
concerned myself, to whom everything seemed so delicious, after this
month of sorrow.
“Ah, yes, I understand,” said Doctor Urquhart, “and so it should be
with me also. So it is, I trust. This is a lovely day, lovely to its
very close, you see.”
For the sun was sinking westward, and the clouds robing themselves for
one of those infinitely varied late autumn sunsets, of the glory of
which no human eye can ever tire.
“You never saw a tropical sunset? I have, many. I wonder if I shall
ever see another.” After a little hesitation, I asked if he thought it
likely? Did he wish to go abroad again?
“For some reasons, yes!” Then speaking forcibly:--“Do not think
me morbid; of all things, morbid, cowardly sentimentality is my
abhorrence--but I am not naturally a cheerful-minded man. That is, I
believe I was, but circumstances have been stronger than nature; and
it now costs me an effort to attain what I think every man ought to
have, if he is not absolutely a wicked man.”
“You mean an even, happy temper, that tries to make the best of all
things, which I am sure you do.”
“An idle life,” he went on, unheeding, “is of all things the very
worst for me. Unless I have as much work as ever I can do, I am never
happy.”
This was comprehensible in degree. Though one thing surprised and
pained me, that even Doctor Urquhart was not “happy.” Is anybody
“happy?”
“Do not misunderstand me.” (I had not spoken, but he often guesses
my thoughts in a way that makes me thankful I have nothing to hide).
“There are as many degrees of happiness as of goodness, and the
perfection of either is impossible. But I have my share. Yes, truly, I
have my share.”
“Of both?”
“Don't--don't!”
Nor ought I to have jested when he was in such heavy earnest.
And then for some time we were so still, that I remember hearing a
large bee, deluded by the mild weather, come swinging and singing over
the moor, and stop at the last, the very last, blue-bell--I dared
not call it a hare-bell with Doctor Urquhart by--of the year, for
his honey-supper. While he was eating it, I picked one of the
flower-stalks, and stroked it softly over his great brown back and
wings.
“What a child you are still!”
(But for once Doctor Urquhart was mistaken.)
“How quiet everything is here!” he added.
“Yes, that wavy purple line always reminded me of the hills in the
'Happy Valley' of Prince Kasselas. Beyond them lies the world.”
“If you knew what 'the world' is, as you must one day. But I hope you
will only see the best half of it. I hope you will have a happy life.”
I was silent.
“This picture; the moorland, hills, and lake,--your pond is as wide
and bright as a lake--will always put me in mind of Rasselas, but
one cannot live for ever in our 'Happy Valley,' nor in our lazy camp
either. I often wish I had more work to do.”
“How--and where?”
As soon as I had put it I blushed at the intrusiveness of this
question. In all he tells me of his affairs I listen, but never dare
to enquire, aware that I have no right to ask of him more than he
chooses to reveal.
Right or not, he was not offended; he replied to me fully and long;
talking more as if I had been a man and his confidential friend, than
only a simple girl, who has in this at least some sense, that she
feels she can understand him.
It appears, that in peace-time, the duties of a regimental surgeon are
almost nothing, except in circumstances where they become as hopeless
as they are heavy; such as the cases of unhealthy barracks, and other
avoidable causes of mortality, which Doctor Urquhart and Augustus
discussed, and which he has since occasionally referred to, when
talking to papa and me. He told me with what anxiety he had tried
to set on foot reforms in these matters; how all his plans had been
frustrated, by the tardiness of Government; and how he was hopeless
of ever attaining his end. Indeed he showed me an official letter,
received that morning, finally dismissing the question.
“You see, Miss Theodora,=
````'To mend the world's a vast design.'=
too vast for my poor powers.”
“Are you discouraged?”
“No. But I suspect I began at the wrong end; that I attempted too
much, and gave myself credit for more influence than I possessed. It
does not do to depend upon other people; much safer is that amount of
work which a man can do with his own two hands and head. I should be
far freer, and therefore more useful, if I left the army altogether,
and set up practice on my own account.
“That is, if you settled somewhere as a consulting physician, like
Doctor Black?”
“No,” he smiled--“not exactly like Doctor Black. Mine would be a much
humbler position. You know, I have no income except my pay.”
I confessed that I had never given a thought to his income, and again
smiling, he answered--“No, he was sure of that.”
He then went on to explain that he believed moral and physical evil to
be so bound up together, that it was idle to attack one without trying
to cure the other. He thought, better than all building of gaols
and reformatories, or even of churches--since the Word can be spread
abroad without need of bricks and mortar--would be the establishing
of sanitary improvements in our great towns, and trying to teach
the poor, not how to be taken care of in workhouses, prisons, and
hospitals, but how to take care of themselves, in their own homes.
And then, in answer to my questions, he told me many things about
the life, say rather existence, of the working-classes in most large
towns, which made me turn sick at heart; marvelling how, with all this
going on around me, I could ever sit dreamily gazing over my moorland,
and play childish tricks with bees!
Yes, something ought to be done. I was glad, I was proud, that it
had come into his mind to do it. Better far to labour thus in his own
country than to follow an idle regiment into foreign parts, or even
a fighting regiment into the terrible campaign. I said so. “Ah--you
'hate soldiers' still.”
I did not answer, but met his eyes. I know mine were full--I know my
lips were quivering. Horribly painful it was to be jested with just
then.
Doctor Urquhart said gravely; “I was not in earnest; I beg your
pardon.”
We then returned to the discussion of his plans and intentions. I
asked him how he meant to begin his labors?
“From a very simple starting-point. 'The doctor' has, of all persons,
the greatest influence among the poor--if only he cares to use it. As
a commencement, and also because I must earn salt to my porridge, you
know, my best course would be to obtain the situation of surgeon to
some dispensary, workhouse, hospital, or even gaol. Thence, I could
widen my field of work at pleasure, so far as time and money were
forthcoming.”
“If some one could only give you a fortune now!”
“I do not believe in fortunes. A man's best wealth consists of his
personal labors, personal life. 'Silver and gold have I none'--but
wherever I am, I can give myself, my labors, and my life.”
I said something about that being a great gift--many men would call it
a great sacrifice.
“Less to me than to most men--since, as you know, I have no relatives;
nor is it likely I shall ever marry.”
I believed so. Not constantly; but at intervals. Something in his
manner and mode of thought fixed the conviction in my mind, from our
earliest acquaintance.
Of course, I merely made some silent assent to this confidence. What
was there to say? Perhaps he expected something--for as we turned to
walk home, the sun having set, he remained a long time silent. But I
could not speak. In truth, nothing came into my head to say.
At last I lifted my eyes from the ground, and saw the mist beginning
to rise over my moorland--my grey, soft, dreamy moorland. Ay, dreamy,
it was, and belonging only to dreams. But the world beyond--the
struggling suffering, sinning world of which he had told me--that was
a reality.
I said to my friend who walked beside me, feeling keenly that he was
my friend, and that I had a right to look up into his good noble face,
wherein all his life was written as clearly as on a book--thinking too
what a comfort and privilege it was to have more than any one else had
the reading of that book--I said to Doctor Urquhart--my old hesitation
having somehow altogether vanished--that I wished to know all he could
possibly tell me of his plans and projects: that I liked to listen to
them, and would fain do more than listen--help.
He thanked me. “Listening is helping. I hope you will not refuse
sometimes to help me in that way--it is a great comfort to me. But the
labor I hope for is exclusively a man's--if any woman could give aid
you could, for you are the bravest woman I ever knew.”
“And do you think I never can help you?”
“No.”
So our walk ended.
I say “ended,” because, though there was a great deal of laughing with
Augustus and Lisabel--who had pushed one another ancle-deep into the
pond, and behaved exactly like a couple of school-children out on
a holiday, and though, they, hurrying home, Doctor Urquhart and I
afterwards followed leisurely, walking together slowly, along the
moor-land road--we did not renew our conversation. We scarcely
exchanged more than a few words;--but walking thus arm-in-arm we did
not feel--that is, I did not feel, either apart, or unfriendly, or
sad.
There is more in life than mere happiness--even as there are more
things in the world than mere marrying and giving in marriage. If,
from circumstances, he has taken that resolution, he is perfectly
justified in having done so, and in keeping to it. I would do exactly
the same. The character of a man who marries himself to a cause, or
a duty--has always been an ideal of mine--like my Max--Max and
Thekla.--But they were lovers, betrothed lovers; free to _say_ “I love
you” with eyes and lips--just once, for a day or two--a little hour or
two.--Would this have made parting less bitter or more? I cannot tell;
I do not know. I shall never know aught about these things. So I will
not think of them.
When we came home--Doctor Urquhart and myself--I left him at the door,
and went up into my own room.
In the parlour I found Colin Granton come to tea--he had missed me at
church, he said, and was afraid I had made myself ill; so walked over
to Rockmount to see. It was very kind--though, while acknowledging, it
he seemed half ashamed of the kindness.
He and Augustus, now on the best of terms, kept us alive all the
evening with their talking and laughing. They planned all sorts of
excursions--hunting, shooting, and what not--to take place during the
grand Christmas gathering which is to be at Treherne Court. Doctor
Urquhart--one of the invited guests, listened to all, with a look of
amused content.
Yes--he is content. More than once, as I caught his eye following
me about the room, we exchanged a smile--friendly, even
affectionate.--Ay, he does like me. If I were a little younger--if I
were a little girl in curls, I should say he is “fond” of me.--“Fond
of”--what an idle phrase!--such as one would use towards a dog, or
cat, or bird. What a difference between that and the holy words, “I
love”--not as silly young folks say, I am “in love”--but “_I love_;”
with all my reason, will, and strength; with all the tenderness of my
heart, all the reverence of my soul.
Be quiet, heart--be silent, soul! I have, as I said before--nought to
do with these things.
The evening passed pleasantly and calmly enough, all parties seeming
to enjoy themselves: even poor Colin coming out his brilliantest and
best; and making himself quite at home with us. Though he got into a
little disgrace before going away, by saying something which irritated
papa; and which made me glad that the little conversation this morning
between Doctor Urquhart and myself had been not in family conclave,
but private.
Colin was speaking of the sermon, and how “shocked” his mother had
been at its pleading against capital punishment.
“Against capital punishment, did you say?”--cried papa. “Did my
curate bring this disgraceful subject into my pulpit in order to speak
against the law of the land--the law of God?--Girls, why did you not
tell me. Dora, remind me I must see the young man to-morrow.”
I was mortally afraid this would end in the poor young man's summary
dismissal; for papa never allows any “new-fangled notions” in his
curates; they must think and preach as he does--or quit. I pleaded a
little for this one, who has a brother and sister dependent on him,
lodging in the village; and, as far as I dared and could, I pleaded
for his sermon. Colin tried to aid me, honest fellow, backing my
words, every one, with the most eager asseverations--well-meant,
though they did not exactly help the argument.
“Dora,” cried papa, in utmost astonishment, “what do you mean?”
“Miss Dora's quite right: she always is,”--said Colin, stoutly. “I
don't think anybody ever ought to be hanged; least of all a poor
fellow who, like--” he mentioned the name, but I forget it--it was the
case that has been so much in the newspapers--“killed another fellow
out of jealousy--or in a passion--or being drunk--which was it? I say,
Urquhart--Treherne--won't you bear me out?”
“In what?” asked Augustus, laughing. “That many a man has sometimes
felt inclined to commit murder?--I have myself--ha! ha!--and many a
poor devil is kicked out of the world dancing upon nothing, who isn't
a bit worse, may be better, than a great many young scoundrels who die
unhung. That's truth, Mr. Johnston, though I say it.”
“Sir,” said papa, turning white with anger, “you are at perfect
liberty to say exactly what you please--provided it is not in my
presence. No one, before me, shall so insult my cloth, and blaspheme
my Maker, as to deny His law set down here,” dropping his hand over
our great Family Bible, which he allows no one but himself to touch,
because, as we know, there is the fly-leaf pasted down, not to be read
by any one, nor written on again during poor papa's life-time. “God's
law is blood for blood. '_Whoso sheddeth man's blood, by man shall
his blood be shed!_ That law, sir, my church believes never has
been--never will be--annulled. And though your maudlin, loose charity
may sympathize with hanged murderers, uphold duellists, and exalt
into heroes cowardly man-slayers, I say that I will no more have in my
house the defenders of such, than I would, under any pretext, grasp in
mine the hand of a man who had taken the life of another.”
To see papa so excited, alarmed us all. Colin, greatly distressed,
begged his pardon and retracted everything--but the mischief was done.
Though we anticipate no serious results, indeed he has been now for
some hours calmly asleep in his bed, still he was made much worse by
this unfortunate dispute.
Doctor Urquhart stayed, at our earnest wish, till midnight, though he
did not go into papa's room. When I asked him what was to be done in
case of papa's head suffering for this excitement--if we should send
to the camp for him--he said, “No, he would rather we sent for Doctor
Black.”
Yet he was anxious, I know; for after Colin left, he sat by himself
in the study, saying he had a letter to write and post, but would
come upstairs to papa if we sent for him. And when, satisfied that the
danger was past and papa asleep, he prepared to leave--I never, in all
the time of our acquaintance, saw him looking so exceedingly pale and
weary.
I wanted him to take something--wine or food; or at least to have one
of our ponies saddled that he might ride instead of walking home. But
he would not.
We were standing at the hall--only he and I--the others having gone to
bed. He took both my hands, and looked long and steadily in my face as
he said good-bye.
“Keep up heart. I do not think any harm will come to your father.”
“I hope not. Dear, dear papa--it would indeed be terrible.”
“It would. Nothing must be allowed to grieve him in any way--as long
as he lives.”
“No.”
Doctor Urquhart was not more explicit than this; but I am sure he
wished me to understand that in any of those points discussed today,
wherein he and I agreed, and both differed from my father--it was
our duty henceforth, as much as possible, to preserve a respectful
silence. And I thanked him in my heart--and with my eyes too, I
know--for this, and for his forbearance in not having contradicted
papa, even when most violent and unjust.
“When shall you be coming again, Doctor Urquhart?”
“Some day--some day.”
“Do not let it be very long first. Good-bye.”
“Good-bye.”
And here befell a thing so strange--so unexpected, that if I think
of it, it seems as if I must have been dreaming; as if, while all the
rest of the events of to-day, which I have so quietly written down,
were perfectly natural, real, and probable--this alone were something
unreal, and impossible to tell--hardly right to tell.
And yet--oh me! it is not wrong--though it makes my cheek burn and my
hand tremble--this poor little hand.
I thought he had gone--and was standing on the door-step, preparing to
lock up--when Doctor Urquhart came back again along the walk. It was
he--though in manner and voice so unlike himself--that even now I can
hardly believe the whole is not a delusion.
“For God's sake--for pity's sake--do not utterly forget me, Theodora.”
And then--then--
He said once, that every man ought to hold every woman sacred; that,
if not of her own kindred, he had no right, except as the merest
salutation, even to press her hand. Unless--unless he loved her.
Then, why--
No: I ought not to write it, and I will not. It is--if it is
anything--something sacred between him and me--something in which no
one else has any part--which may not be told to anyone--except in my
prayers.
My heart is so full. I will close this and say my prayers.