CALEB RUNCIMAN.
"Why what a pettish, petty thing I grow,
A mere, mere woman, a mere flaccid nerve,
A kerchief left all night in the rain,
Turned soft so--over-tasked and over-strained
And over-lived in this close London life!
And yet I should be stronger."--_Aurora Leigh._
One wet evening, towards the end of November, Caleb Runciman stood at
the window of his little parlor, straining his eyes wistfully into
the darkness.
"A wild night," he muttered to himself more than once; "it is raining
whole buckets-full, and blowing hard. She will never venture out
with the child, and so careful as she is too, bless her dear little
motherly heart. I may as well tell Molly to make the tea. Dear,
dear, how contrary-wise things will happen sometimes," with which
oracular remark the old man rubbed his hands ruefully together, and
turned to the fire.
It was a wild night certainly. A cold, gusty rain swept the streets
of Carlisle; the flickering lamplight shone on glittering pools and
dripping water-spouts; the few pedestrians hurried past Caleb's
window, casting furtive glances at the warm, inviting gleam from
within.
Caleb's fire blazed cheerily; a faggot spluttered and hissed half up
the little chimney; the blue china pixies on the old-fashioned tiles
fairly danced in the light, as did the Dresden shepherdesses, and the
two simpering figures in umbrella courtship on the high wooden
mantel-piece.
These tiles were Emmie's delight. She would sit on the stool at
Caleb's feet for hours, following the innocent, baby-faced pixy
through a hundred fanciful adventures. The little gentleman in the
pink china waistcoat and the lady in the blue scarf were veritable
works of art to her. The plaster group of the Holy Family, slightly
defaced by smoke and time, excited in her the same profound reverence
that a Titian or a Raphael excites in an older mind. She never could
be made to understand that the black-framed battle of Trafalgar,
painted in flaming reds and yellows, was not a master-piece; there
was nothing incongruous to her in the spectacle of Nelson's dying
agonies portrayed amid the stage effects of a third rate pantomime;
to her the ludicrous was merged in the sublime. It is not in early
youth that the one trends so often on the other.
The candlesticks on the little round table were still unlighted, but
there was plenty of light to show signs of unwonted preparations.
Caleb had robbed the plot of ground he called his garden ruthlessly
before he filled the large, wide-mouthed jug with violet and white
china asters. The display of preserves in all colors too, not to
mention an astounding plum-cake with frosted edges, showed some
unusual festivity.
Caleb's round rosy face elongated considerably as he sat in his
wooden rocking-chair, warming his hands over the blaze.
"Dear, dear, she'll cry her eyes out, poor lamb, and no wonder; and
such a beautiful cake too as Molly has made," he continued,
disconsolately. "I wonder if the old cat would open the parcel if I
sent it wrapt up in brown paper, with Caleb Runciman's kind regards
to Miss Emmie. I'll lay a wager the poor little angel would never
eat a crumb of it. Hark! surely that was not a knock; I dare say it
is only the paper-boy."
Caleb's cogitations soon came to an abrupt end. There was an
exclamation of surprised dismay in Molly's loud, cheerful voice, then
quick footsteps, and the entrance of two dripping figures.
"My dear Miss Queenie and the precious lamb, who ever would have
thought it!" cried Caleb, in a voice quite trembling with joy, but
shaking his head all the time. "It will be the death of both of you.
Molly! Where is that woman? Molly, it will be the death of these
dear creatures if you don't make tea quick, and get off their wet
things. Miss Queenie, I am surprised at you. Dear, dear, such a
night. I must say I am surprised," continued Caleb, trying to speak
severely, but with his blue eyes twinkling with animation.
"Emmie fretted so that I was obliged to bring her," returned Queenie,
apologetically. "It was wrong, I know; I have been blaming myself
all the way; but what could I do?"
"Now, Caleb, don't be cross, and on my birthday too," interrupted
Emmie, throwing her arms round the old man's neck. "I thought of
your disappointment, and the cake, and the dear old parlor, and I
could not help crying; and then Queenie put on her determined face,
and said I should go if she carried me. Cathy was so angry with us
both, and no wonder."
"No, indeed; I must say I was extremely surprised," reiterated Caleb,
who never liked to lose a leading idea, and was fond of repeating his
own words. "Mark my words, Miss Queenie, it will be the death of
Emmie."
"Nonsense, Caleb," interrupted the child; "I won't have you scold
Queenie; she carried me nearly all the way, she did indeed; she said
I was quite light. And she is so tired, and she made me wear her
cloak, because it was long, and would cover me, and I am so warm and
dry; but I know her poor feet are wet, because her boots are so thin
and old, terribly old."
"Oh, hush, Em; how can you?" returned her sister, blushing hotly;
"you will make Caleb so unhappy."
"You both of you go near to break my heart," replied the old man
huskily, as he knelt down, and took the old shabby boot in his hand.
"Miss Queenie, dear, this is not right; you will lay yourself up, and
then what will Emmie do? Where is the money I gave you last time you
were here, when I begged and prayed you to get a new pair?"
"She bought ever so many things for me," broke in Emmie again. "No,
I won't hush, Queenie," as her sister vainly strove to silence her.
"I said I would tell Caleb, and I will. I have warm flannels, and
gloves, and mittens, and Queenie has nothing; and she is so cold that
she never gets warm all day; and Cathy says it is a shame."
"Oh, Miss Queenie, Miss Queenie," was all Caleb's answer, as the old
fingers fumbled and bungled over their work. Perhaps it was an
unusually large pinch of snuff that dimmed his eyes for a moment, and
that obliged him to have recourse to the red spotted silk
handkerchief.
Queenie was used to be waited upon by her kind old friend. She
allowed her cold feet to be encased in a pair of list slippers that
Molly had made for Caleb. A pleasant feeling of warmth and comfort
began to steal over her, a luxurious sense of being cared for. Emmie
had already installed herself at the tea-tray, and was holding the
tea-pot carefully with both hands; her work was cut out for her for
the evening. She had to make tea for Caleb and Queenie, and then
fill Caleb's pipe, and sit at his knee and chatter to him of all they
had been doing; then she had to visit Molly in her nice clean
kitchen, and play with Sukey and her kittens. How she longed for a
kitten in the old garret in Granite Lodge, only Queenie shook her
head at the bare idea.
To-night Molly was ironing her master's shirts, and Emmie's visit was
paid earlier than usual, that she might help her by washing up the
tea-things, a piece of play-work that was charming to the little girl.
As soon as she had left them, Caleb put down his pipe, and drew his
chair closer to Queenie, and laid his wrinkled hand on hers.
"Well, my dear, well! and how has the world been treating you
lately?" for the quiet, thoughtful face he had been watching all the
evening seemed to him to have grown sadder since he last saw it.
"You must not ask me, my dear old friend," returned the girl,
sorrowfully; "I have been losing heart lately."
"Nay, nay, that's bad hearing."
"One must speak the truth. I have lost not only heart, but courage.
If it were not for Emmie I could battle on; I am strong and tough
enough for anything, but she makes me weak."
"Nay, surely."
"Do not misunderstand me,"--as the kind old hand stroked hers
gently,--"I could not bear you to do that. I am weak, I do not
complain, I am young and healthy, and a little hardness will not hurt
me; but it is for Emmie I fear. Caleb," in an almost inaudible
voice, "what they make me suffer through her!"
"I know it, I know it," rubbing up his grey hair restlessly.
"She is getting thinner every day, and losing appetite, and there is
a nervous look in her eyes that I do not like. Miss Titheridge will
not see it; I think sometimes she dislikes Emmie; she and Fraulein
are harder on her than ever."
"There now, there now, poor lambs, poor orphaned lambs," broke in the
compassionate Caleb.
"They are driving me to the verge of distraction, and they know it,"
continued Queenie, in the same strange, suppressed voice; "things
cannot go on like this much longer. Caleb, I shall frighten you, but
I have made up my mind to do something desperate, and to do it at
once: I mean to go to Mr. Calcott."
Caleb's hands dropped on his knees, and his eyes grew round and
fixed. "Miss Queenie!" he gasped at length.
"I shall go to him," repeated the young girl quietly, "and tell him
about Emmie."
"But--but he will never see you, my dear young lady; you must be mad
or dreaming. See Mr. Calcott! it is a preposterous
idea--preposterous--pre--."
"Hush! when have you ever known me fail in anything I have
undertaken? It is a waste of words to try and dissuade me. All last
night I lay thinking it out, till my brain reeled. I may do no good;
heaven knows what manner of man I have to deal with, but all the same
I will speak to him, face to face, and tell him what is in my heart."
"Heaven preserve the young creature, for she is certainly daft!"
groaned Caleb; and here he positively wrung his hands. "The lamb in
the lion's den, that is what it will be. Miss Queenie, dear," he
said, coaxingly, "I am thirty or forty years older than you; be
guided by an old friend, and put this thought out of your head."
Queenie shook her head.
"It will do no good to Emmie, and only anger him against you both.
He is an old man now, and ailing; and some say he suffers a good deal
at times, and then he gets almost beside himself. You do not know to
what you expose yourself."
"Besides," finding the girl still remained silent, "you may even turn
him more against you. Sometimes I have seen him start and bite his
lip when the school has passed our office window; he never fails to
recognise it, and he seems disturbed and put out for minutes
afterward. You see his sin lies heavy on him--the sin of those
wicked words, Miss Queenie."
"Yes, yes, I know," she interrupted hastily, "and most likely he
repents. Caleb, it is useless; nothing you can say will shake my
resolution. Things have come to this pass, that I would rather beg
my bread than be indebted any longer to Miss Titheridge. If we stay
there Emmie will die, and then what good will my life be to me."
The old man shook his head reproachfully. "Miss Queenie, you know
what you have refused?"
"Yes," she returned, looking at him with a smile that made her face
absolutely beautiful, "yes, dear old friend; but it was right. You
were too old to work for us, too old to be burthened with two such
helpless creatures; and then how were we to know whether Mr.
Calcott's anger might not have been turned on you. Were we to bring
trouble on our only friend?"
"I said," continued Caleb in a broken voice, "that as long as I had a
crust of bread and a cup of water, and a roof, however humble, I
would share them with you and Emmie."
"And my answer," continued the girl softly, as she lifted the
wrinkled hand to her lips, "my answer was that Emmie and I loved you
too well to bring sorrow and ruin on you. Caleb, Emmie is dearer to
me than anything in the world; but I would rather lose her than do
such a thing."
"Ah, you were always so proud and self-willed," ejaculated Caleb,
sorrowfully.
"Then I am proud of my pride; I rejoice in a self-will that prevents
me from harming so deeply one whom I love. You have given us more
than crusts, you have shared with us a nobler shelter than your roof,
for you have warmed us through and through with a kindness that has
known no stint or limit; and Emmie and I will bless you for it all
our lives."
"Don't, don't, Miss Queenie; I cannot bear you to say such things."
"But I will say them, I must say them, when you call me proud and
self-willed; I must defend myself, and get the last word; I am only a
woman, you know."
"God bless such women, I say."
"You have the spirit of a little child, Caleb; so doubtless you will
be heard. Blessings are long in coming to us I think, and I am
growing hard and discontented in consequence; but you and Cathy have
often saved me from hopeless infidelity."
"Good heavens! what do you mean?"
"Yes, from infidelity--that utter and hopeless disbelief in one's
fellow-creatures. When I find myself growing cynical, I just say,
'There are Caleb and Cathy, the world cannot be wholly bad with two
such good creatures in it,' and that thought rests me."
"Aye, aye, it is too old a head on young shoulders; people don't
often think and say such things. You are rarely clever for your age,
Miss Queenie."
"One can think without being clever," returned the girl, with a
slight smile. "Cathy and I have strange talks sometimes; we often
bewilder and lose ourselves. I have no one as Cathy has to set me
right. It must be very nice to have a brother."
"Aye, I had a brother once," returned Caleb, dreamily; "he was
deformed, poor fellow, a hunch-back; but every one liked Joe. I was
only a little chap when he died, but I have never forgotten him yet;
some of his sharp sayings come into my mind when I sit here smoking
my pipe."
"A strong, wise, elder brother,--some one to trust,--and who would
care for me," continued Queenie, reflectively. "I think Cathy must
be a happy girl. Hark! that is nine striking; I must go and find
Emmie."
"I have ironed lots of handkerchiefs, all the beautiful blue and
white spotted ones," cried Emmie, rushing in, red and glowing, "and
Molly has been telling me such lovely stories. I think Molly quite
the handsomest woman I have ever seen after Queenie, she is so nice
and rosy."
"Come, Em, come," replied the elder sister, quietly; "it is raining
so fast, dear, and the wind will blow you away unless you keep close
to me. Bid Caleb good-night, and let us go."
"How dark and wet it is," cried poor Emmie, as the door of her
child's paradise closed behind her, and the grey frowning portico of
Granite Lodge loomed on her distant vision. "Oh, Queenie, why must
we not go and live with Caleb, and leave this horrid, hateful prison
of ours?"
"Hush, pet; shall I tell you a story? but perhaps you cannot hear my
voice in the wind. What! tired, darling, already? Suppose I carry
you again just for fun! It is dark, and no one will see us."
"Yes, just for fun," returned the child wearily; "if you are not
tired, Queenie. Mind you put me down when you are tired."
"Of course; you are so dreadfully heavy;" but the little joke died
away into something like a sob as she lifted the thin, weak figure in
her strong young arms, and struggled bravely through the storm.