"AND now that's settled, as far as we can settle it now," said Tozer, as
they left the magistrate's office, where John Brown, the famous
Carlingford solicitor, had accompanied them, "you'll go and see some of
the chapel folks, Mr. Vincent? It'll be took kind of you to lose no
time, especially if you'd say a word just as it's all over, and let them
know the news is true."
"I will go with you first," said Vincent, who contemplated the
butterman's shop at that moment through a little halo of gratitude and
kindness. He went into the back parlour with the gratified deacon, where
Mrs. Tozer sat reading over again the same 'Gazette' in which poor
Susan's history was summed up and ended. It seemed like a year to
Vincent since he had dined with his mother at this big table, amid the
distant odours of all the bacon and cheese. Mrs. Tozer put down the
paper, and took off her spectacles as her visitor came in. "It's Mr.
Vincent, Phoebe," she said, with a little exclamation. "Dear, dear, I
never thought as the pastor would be such a strange sight in my
house--not as I was meaning nothing unkind, Tozer, so there's no
occasion to look at me. I'm as glad as ever I can be to see the
minister; and what a blessing as it's all settled, and the poor dear
getting well, too. Phoebe, you needn't be a-hiding behind me, child,
as if the pastor was thinking of how you was dressed. She has on her
morning wrapper, Mr. Vincent, as she was helping her mother in, and we
didn't expect no visitors. Don't be standing there, as if it was any
matter to the minister how you was dressed."
"Oh, ma, as if I ever thought of such a thing!" said Phoebe, extending
a pink uncovered arm out of the loose sleeve of her morning dress to
Vincent, and averting her face; "but to see Mr. Vincent is so like old
times--and everything has seemed so different--and it is so pleasant to
feel as if it were all coming back again. Oh ma! to imagine that I ever
supposed Mr. Vincent could notice my dress, or think of poor me!" added
Phoebe, in a postscript under her breath. The minister heard the
latter words quite as well as the first. After he had shaken the pink,
plump hand, he sat down on the opposite side of the table, and saw
Phoebe, relieved against the light of the window, wiping a tender tear
from her eye. All at once out of the darker and heavier trials which had
abstracted him from common life, the young Nonconformist plunged back
into the characteristic troubles of his position. As usual, he made no
response to Phoebe, found nothing civil to say, but turned with
desperation to Mrs. Tozer, who was luckily about to speak.
"Don't pay no attention to her, Mr. Vincent; she's a deal too feelin'.
She oughtn't to be minded, and then she'll learn better," said Mrs.
Tozer. "I am sure it wasn't no wish of ours as you should ever stop
away. If we had been your own relations we couldn't have been more took
up; and where should a minister seek for sympathy if it isn't in his own
flock? There ain't nobody so safe to put your trust in, Mr. Vincent, as
Salem folks. There's a many fine friends a young man may have when he's
in a prosperous way, but it ain't to be supposed they would stand by him
in trouble; and it's then as you find the good of your real friends,"
continued Mrs. Tozer, looking with some significance at her husband.
Tozer, for his own part, rubbed his hands and stationed himself with his
back to the fire, as is the custom of Englishmen of all degrees. The
husband and wife contemplated Vincent with complacence. With the kindest
feelings in the world, they could not altogether restrain a little
triumph. It was impossible now that the minister could mistake who were
his true friends.
But just then, strangely enough, a vision of a tender smile, a glance up
in his face, the touch of a soft hand, came to Vincent's mind. His fine
friends! he had but one, and she had stood by him in his trouble. From
Tozer's complacence the minister's mind went off with a bound of relief
to that sweet, fruitless sympathy which was dearer than help. From her
soft perfumy presence to Mrs. Tozer's parlour, with that pervading
consciousness in it of the shop hard by and its store of provisions,
what a wonderful difference! It was not so easy to be grateful as he had
at first thought.
"Mr. Tozer has been my real friend indeed, and a most honest and
thorough one," said Vincent. "But I don't think I have any other in
Salem so sure and steady," added the minister, after a little pause,
half gratefully, half in bitterness. This sentiment was not, however,
resented by the assembled family. Phoebe leaned over her mother's
chair, and whispered, "Oh, ma, dear! didn't I always say he was full of
feeling?" somewhat to the discomfiture of the person commented on; while
Tozer himself beamed upon the minister from before the blazing fire.
"I said as we'd pull you through," said Tozer, "and I said as I'd stand
by you; and both I'll do, sir, you take my word, if you'll but stick to
your duty; and as for standing bail in a hundred pound or two,"
continued the butterman, magnanimously, "for a poor young creature as
couldn't be nothing but innocent, I don't mind that, nor a deal more
than that, to keep all things straight. It's nothing but my duty. When a
man is a responsible man, and well-known in a place, it's his business
to make use of his credit, Mr. Vincent, sir, and his character, for the
good of his friends."
"It may be your duty, but you know there ain't a many as would have done
it," said his straight-forward wife, "as Mr. Vincent sees himself, and
no need for nobody a-telling of him. There ain't a many as would have
stood up for the pastor, right and wrong, and finished off with the
likes of this, and the minister don't need us to say so. Dear, dear, Mr.
Vincent, you ain't a-going away already, and us hasn't so much as seen
you for I can't tell how long? I made sure you'd stop and take a bit of
dinner at least, not making no ceremony," said Mrs. Tozer, "for there's
always enough for a friend, and you can't take us wrong."
Vincent had risen hurriedly to his feet, under the strong stimulant of
the butterman's self-applause. Conscious as he was of all that Tozer had
really done, the minister found it hard to listen and echo, with due
humility and gratitude, the perfect satisfaction of the pair over their
own generosity. He had no thanks to say when thus forestalled. "Oh, ma,
how can you make so much of it?" cried Phoebe. "The minister will
think us so selfish; and, oh, please Mr. Vincent, when you go home, will
you speak to your mother, and ask her to let me come and help with her
nursing? I should do whatever she told me, and try to be a comfort to
her--oh, I should indeed!" said Phoebe, clasping those pink hands.
"Nobody could be more devoted than I should be." She cast down her eyes,
and stood the image of maidenly devotedness between Vincent and the
window. She struck him dumb, as she always did. He never was equal to
the emergency where Phoebe was concerned. He took up his hat in his
hands, and tried to explain lamely how he must go away--how he had
visits to make--duties to do--and would have stuck fast, and lost Mrs.
Tozer's favour finally and for ever, had not the butterman interposed.
"It's me as is to blame," said the worthy deacon. "If it hadn't have
been as the pastor wouldn't pass the door without coming in, I'd not
have had him here to-day; and if you women would think, you'd see.
We're stanch--and Mr. Vincent ain't no call to trouble himself about us;
but Pigeon and them, you see, as went off in a huff yesterday--that's
what the minister has got to do. You shan't be kep' no longer, sir, in
my house. Duty afore pleasure, that's my maxim. Good mornin', and I hope
as you won't meet with no unpleasantness; but if you should, Mr.
Vincent, don't be disheartened, sir--we'll pull you through."
With this encouraging sentiment, Vincent was released from Mrs. Tozer's
parlour. He drew a long breath when he got out to the fresh air in the
street, and faced the idea of the Pigeons and other recusants whom he
was now bound to visit. While he thought of them, all so many varieties
of Mrs. Tozer's parlour, without the kindness which met him there, the
heart of the young Nonconformist failed him. Nothing but gratitude to
Tozer could have sent him forth at all on this mission of conciliation;
but now on the threshold of it, smarting from even Tozer's
well-intentioned patronage, a yearning for a little personal comfort
seized upon Vincent's mind. It was his duty to go away towards Grove
Street, where the poulterer's residence was; but his longing eyes
strayed towards Grange Lane, where consolation dwelt. And, besides, was
it not his duty to watch over the real criminal, for whose mysterious
wickedness poor Susan had suffered? It was not difficult to foresee how
that argument would conclude. He wavered for a few minutes opposite
Masters's shop, gave a furtive glance back towards the butterman's, and
then, starting forward with sudden resolution, took his hasty way to
Lady Western's door; only for a moment; only to see that all was safe,
and his prisoner still in custody. Vincent sighed over the thought with
an involuntary quickening of his heart. To be detained in such custody,
the young man thought, would be sweeter than heaven; and the wild hope
which came and went like a meteor about his path, sprang up with sudden
intensity, and took the breath from his lips, and the colour from his
cheek, as he entered at that green garden door.
Lady Western was by herself in the drawing-room--that room divided in
half by the closed doors which Vincent remembered so well. She rose up
out of the low chair in which she reposed, like some lovely swan amid
billows of dark silken drapery, and held out her beautiful hand to
him--both her beautiful hands--with an effusion of kindness and
sympathy. The poor young Nonconformist took them into his own, and
forgot the very existence of Salem. The sweetness of the moment took all
the sting out of his fate. He looked at her without saying anything,
with his heart in his eyes. Consolation! It was all he had come for. He
could have gone away thereafter and met all the Pigeons in existence;
but more happiness still was in store for him--she pointed to a chair on
the other side of her work-table. There was nobody else near to break
the charm. The silken rustle of her dress, and that faint perfume which
she always had about her, pervaded the rosy atmosphere. Out of
purgatory, out of bitter life beset with trouble, the young man had
leaped for one moment into paradise; and who could wonder that he
resigned himself to the spell?
"I am so glad you have come," said Lady Western. "I am sure you must
have hated me, and everything that recalled my name; but it was
impossible for any one to be more grieved than I was, Mr. Vincent. Now,
will you tell me about Rachel? She sits by herself in her own room. When
I go in she gives me a look of fright which I cannot understand. Fright!
Can you imagine Rachel frightened, Mr. Vincent--and of me!"
"Ah, yes. I would not venture to come into the presence of the angels if
I had guilt on my hands," said Vincent, not very well knowing what he
said.
"Mr. Vincent! what can you mean? You alarm me very much," said the young
Dowager; "but perhaps it is about her little girl. I don't think she
knows where her daughter is. Indeed," said Lady Western, with a cloud on
her beautiful face, "you must not think I ever approved of my brother's
conduct; but when he was so anxious to have his child, I think she might
have given in to him a little--don't you think so? The child might have
done him good perhaps. She is very lovely, I hear. Did you see her? Oh,
Mr. Vincent, tell me about it. I cannot understand how you are connected
with it at all. She trusted in you so much, and now she is afraid of
you. Tell me how it is. Hush! she is ringing her bell. She has seen you
come into the house."
"But I don't want to see Mrs.--Mrs. Mildmay," said Vincent, rising up.
"I don't know why I came at all, if it were not to see the sun shining.
It is dark down below where I am," said the young man, with an
involuntary outburst of the passion which at that moment suddenly
appeared to him in all its unreasonableness. "Forgive me. It was only a
longing I had to see the light."
Lady Western looked up with her sweet eyes in the minister's face. She
was not ignorant of the condition of mind he was in, but she was sorry
for him to the bottom of her heart. To cheer him a little could not harm
any one. "Come back soon," she said, again holding out her hand with a
smile. "I am so sorry for your troubles; and if we can do anything to
comfort you, come back soon again, Mr. Vincent." When the poor
Nonconformist came to himself after these words, he was standing outside
the garden door, out of paradise, his heart throbbing, and his pulse
beating in a kind of sweet delirium. In that very moment of delight he
recognised, with a thrill of exaltation and anguish, the madness of his
dream. No matter. What if his heart broke after? Now, at least, he could
take the consolation. But if it was hard to face Mrs. Pigeon before, it
may well be supposed that it was not easy now, with all this world of
passionate fancies throbbing in his brain, to turn away from his
elevation, and encounter Salem and its irritated deacons. Vincent went
slowly up Grange Lane, trying to make up his mind to his inevitable
duty. When he was nearly opposite the house of Dr. Marjoribanks, he
paused to look back. The garden door was again open, and somebody else
was going into the enchanted house. Somebody else;--a tall slight
figure, in a loose light-coloured dress, which he recognised
instinctively with an agony of jealous rage. A minute before he had
allowed to himself, in an exquisite despair, that to hope was madness;
but the sight of his rival awoke other thoughts in the mind of the
minister. With quick eyes he identified the companion of his midnight
journey--he in whose name all Susan's wretchedness had been wrought--he
whom Lady Western could trust "with life--to death." Vincent went back
at the sight of him, and found the door now close shut, through which
his steps had passed. Close shut--enclosing the other--shutting him out
in the cold external gloom. He forgot all he had to do for himself and
his friends--he forgot his duty, his family, everything in the world but
hopeless love and passionate jealousy, as he turned again to Lady
Western's door.