THROUGH A STORM.
THE SAME.
August 1. Saturday Evening.
YESTERDAY afternoon, when I had written those two words, "I cannot—"
Nona darted into the room, and seized my dress, with a scared whisper—
"Come! quick! quick! A telegram for you! We are so frightened."
I could see that she was. She looked quite pale and out of breath.
I found later that they had met on the road the messenger from the
telegraph-office, had guessed his errand, questioned him, and raced
back in a body, at full speed, to find out what I should have to tell
them.
Elfie showed no signs of waking. In my anxiety to relieve the poor
girls' suspense, I rose at once, just closing my journal volume upon a
sheet of blotting-paper, but not fastening the spring-lock according
to my invariable habit hitherto. Indeed it was not only for the girls'
sake that I made all possible haste. A terrible fear crept over me that
my dear and loving friend might be no more.
Miss Millington stood in the passage outside. I think I said something
to her in passing, but I do not know what; and I remarked with a vague
surprise that she did not follow us. Then I forgot her existence.
Maggie, Thyrza, and Denham, with the little ones, were on the
gravel-path outside the front porch, waiting for us. Nona hurried me
thither,—not faster than I would have gone without her hurrying. I
noticed that Popsie and Pet were half crying; that Thyrza was rigid
and sad; that Maggie seemed bewildered, yet kept her usual colour.
Denham held out the envelope, saying, "We thought you wouldn't like
Elfie startled." Afterwards I learnt that they would all have dashed in
together, but for Thyrza's remonstrances.
I tore open the thin paper, and read aloud—
"Mother no worse, doctors give hope!"
Dead silence followed, lasting several seconds. Then, to my
astonishment, Maggie remarked in a cheerful tone—
"Oh, well, it isn't so bad! She is getting better!"
"Maggie!!" half-smothered, came from behind, and I turned to see Thyrza
on the verge of tears, fighting to control herself.
"'No worse,' Maggie—Hardly 'better' yet," I said gravely.
"I can't think why Nellie didn't send the telegram to me," said Maggie.
"She wished, of course, to avoid startling you," I said.
The children were asking—"Is mother nearly well?" And as Maggie chose
to give a particularly hopeful response, I did not interfere.
"I would rather have nothing said to Elfie," I observed, when a few
remarks had passed.
"Don't you mean to tell her what we have heard?" demanded Nona.
"I am not sure," I said. "Perhaps, by-and-by; but it must depend on how
Elfie is."
"Mother never likes Elfie to be coddled," asserted Maggie with
promptitude. She has that notion at her fingers' ends.
"I have not the least intention of coddling Elfie," I answered. "There
is such a thing as necessary caution; and neither you nor I wish
to have Elfie ill. I must request you all to say nothing about the
telegram to her without my leave."
Maggie turned and walked a few paces, remarking, "Well, I suppose we
may as well go on now. Where's Millie?"
Did she really not care—or not understand? Or was this only assumed
indifference?
"She went indoors," Nona said.
"I will find Miss Millington, and ask her to join you out here," I
said. "Elfie is asleep, and I would rather not have her roused."
"Millie can catch us up. Come along, girls," Denham said, with an air
of forced cheerfulness. I could not but be glad to see how forced his
cheerfulness was,—also how pale and serious Nona and the little ones
looked. Thyrza held back and when asked to accompany them, she said,
"No!" then vanished round the side of the house. Maggie alone showed no
signs of being deeply stirred. And when I remember how that poor mother
clings to Maggie—But if she were here, she would believe in Maggie
still!
I returned then to the drawing-room. As I opened the door and entered,
Miss Millington came hurrying across the room. I was struck with her
flushed face and flurried manner. She did not look at me, and would
have gone straight past, but I whispered—
"They are expecting you in the garden." She made no answer, and
disappeared.
A glance revealed to me Elfie sleeping soundly still. I was thankful
for that,—poor child. She had stirred and changed her position, but the
coming and going had not roused her.
I sat down again at the side-table; and in one moment I knew that my
papers had been meddled with. The consciousness came over me like a
clap of thunder.
It is my habit to be very orderly in arrangements when writing.
Hurriedly as I had been called away, I could have told exactly how
each sheet and envelope lay,—placed in readiness for letter-writing,
after journalising. The order of them was changed now. Note-sheets,
envelopes and post-cards, had been thrust into a heap. That might mean
nothing,—merely a hasty movement of somebody's hand, in going to the
drawer. But that was not all. I opened my journal, and I knew at once
that it had been opened in my absence. The piece of blotting-paper,
which I had left between the leaves, had fallen half out; and the
leaves themselves were rumpled, as if by too hurried turning over and
too hasty closure.
If further proof were needed, I had it. For straight before my
eyes, close to the name of "Arthur Lenox," lay one small yellowish
rose-petal, pink-edged. I was well aware from what rose that petal
came. Only half-an-hour earlier I had seen Maggie fasten it in Miss
Millington's dress, with an apology for its too full-grown condition.
The petal must have fluttered down, unseen, at the last moment, as she
shut the book, startled by my quick return.
My first feeling was as if I had been stunned by a blow. I could not
understand what had happened,—could not let myself face it. How long
I sat, gazing in stupefaction at the last unfinished sentence of my
journal, I do not know. It must have been quite mechanically that I
at last added a few words, found further writing impossible, shut and
locked the book, and glanced at Elfie.
Asleep still! I could not see her face in the new position she had
assumed,—a crumpled-up attitude peculiar to herself; but her extreme
stillness convinced me that there was no fear of an awakening at
present. She might be left for a short time.
I took the journal, and went upstairs to my own room.
There the storm broke,—not outwardly, much of it. But all at once I
realised what this deed was which Miss Millington had done to me. She
had covertly possessed herself of my heart's secret,—had stolen from
me my most guarded possession. The agony of having the thing known at
all—worst of all known by her!—came upon me fiercely; and then the
contemptibleness of her conduct! The miserable paltry curiosity! The
shameless lack of honour!—Then again my own helplessness! I could do
nothing. How much or how little she had read or understood, I might
never know.
I could not even prove that she had really looked: and if I could, what
use? Nothing could undo that which she had done. I would never stoop
to accuse her of it,—would never put myself further in her power, by
letting her know that I had discovered her act. I would only despise
and hate her thenceforward, as a creature utterly base and low, beneath
contempt, outside the pale of common respect. Forgive her! Love her!
Never!
I have always known that I "had a temper," as the saying is,—a temper
capable of being roused on occasions, though not susceptible to very
small daily worries. But never till yesterday have I felt myself
powerless in its grasp, carried away like a leaf in the gale.
The half-hour that I spent alone in my room might have been hours,
judged by what I went through in the course of it.
I was unable to sit still, unable to kneel, unable to pray. The
overmastering anguish of hate and scorn gradually subdued all other
sensations. Pain itself went down for the time before that storm of
withering contempt. For I have always had such a horror of anything not
strictly and perfectly honourable! I have always been so scrupulous
in dealing with others! To look at a thing secretly, not meant for
one's eyes, has seemed to me, not merely so wrong, but so absolutely
impossible! And now—to be subjected to this!
Half an hour and no more I gave myself. At its close, the battle was
not fought out,—was scarcely indeed begun. I had not fought at all. I
had only been swept along by a tornado of passion. And I think that the
one thing which kept me from losing my balance, which restrained me
from resolving on some wild or rash step of reprisal or escape, in that
half-hour of fearful resentment, was the consciousness of my Father's
pity,—the knowledge that He was looking down all the while tenderly on
His poor racked child, and that He would help me, so soon as I could
and would glance up to Him for help.
I thought He would not help me—yet! I thought I could not glance
towards Him—yet! But I do think now that my very sense of His loving
pity was even then a wordless prayer,—and that even then His Hand was
holding me back.
For somehow at the half-hour's end, I could be outwardly calm. I washed
my face, smoothed my hair, and noted curiously in the glass my unusual
degree of pallor, and the strange expression in my eyes. I wondered if
others would remark the latter; for I felt that I could not control it.
Then I went downstairs to the drawing-room.
Elfie was awake. She showed no surprise at my absence, but seemed
poorly and fretful, and would not talk. I saw signs of tears, and when
I tried to comfort her, she turned fractiously away, hiding her face in
the cushion. So I left her quiet, and sat down with work, resolving to
make no mention at present of the telegram.
The walking-party returned earlier than I expected. I was determined
that Miss Millington should see no change in my manner. Pride demanded
this of me. But whether I was successful, I do not know. When she first
came into the room, I had a sensation of being turned to ice. She may
not have noted any difference, since, to my knowledge, she never looked
at me once during the hour that we were all together. The resolute
manner in which her eyes shunned mine was remarkable; for generally
they seem to be everywhere. The walking-party had much to say about
their ramble,—not to me, but one to another. I would not be left out of
the conversation, and talked as much as anybody; but by the time tea
was over, the strain had become almost more than I knew how to endure.
Thyrza, who had been very silent, found an opportunity to say to me,
unheard by the rest—
"Are you tired, Miss Con?"
"Rather," I answered. "Would you mind sitting with Elfie for an hour,
while I have a walk?"
"No, of course I will. I meant to ask if you wouldn't like some fresh
air. But you will not go alone?"
"Quite alone," I said. The words sounded hard, and I tried to smile.
"Couldn't Millie or somebody else take care of Elfie? I should so like
to be with you."
"Not this evening," I answered. She looked at me with such puzzled
eyes, that I became conscious of something peculiar in my manner,
and to soften the words, I added, "Better not ask it. They talked of
another ramble before supper."
We have given up late dinner for the present, while Mr. Romilly is away.
"Isn't Elfie so well? Are you worried about her?"
"I don't think she is actually ill," I said. "She needs care."
"And you have told her about the telegram?"
"No. Why?"
"Oh, I thought—I didn't know, of course,—only, she was crying so, just
before tea."
"I have said nothing. I hope the children have not let it out," I said.
"They wouldn't dare! If Maggie—" Thyrza paused. "But Elfie always
frets, when she is poorly, and her faceache is so bad to-day. I dare
say it is only that. I'll go to her now. Do get a walk. I am sure you
have been too long indoors."
Thyrza's solicitude was my one touch of outside comfort. I could see
that she thought me distressed about her mother, as indeed I was and
am. But that pain grows small beside the other.
A few minutes later I was off. The sun had gone in, and it was a grey
yet clear evening, some blue sky visible towards Beckbergh, and heavy
masses of dark cloud brooding over the upper extremity of the Dale,
while mountain-outlines near at hand stood out distinctly against a
pale background, dun-tinted. On quitting the garden, I turned to the
right, aware that other walkers from our house would turn to the left.
I did not yet allow myself to think. I wanted first to work off by
rapid exercise some small part of the stony misery.
The road slanted downward, gradually nearing the river. By-and-by I
gained glimpses of a broad bridge crossing it, far ahead. One pathway
leading up the hillside, on my right hand, attracted me; but I resolved
first to have a look at the bridge, then to return and try this path.
As the main road descended, it grew more and more muddy,—not surprising
after such heavy rain. I had to choose my steps with some care. There
were cows loitering along, a few at a time in charge of a man and a
dog, on their way back from afternoon milking. I exchanged a kind
"Good-evening" with the man. Old-fashioned greetings from strangers
seem the fashion here, why not elsewhere? I pondered this question
mechanically, patting the rough side of a cow as I went by. And
then I noted one or two distant whitewashed farms: and the pretty
silken-coated sheep on the hillsides, so different from our southern
sheep, took my fancy. But still I kept at bay the lowering black cloud
within.
The bridge was reached at last, by a road which turned down to it
from the main road. I leant upon the stone-parapet, and gazed, as
in a dream, upon the curdling stream, chocolate-brown in hue, swift
and steadfast in its rush. It was hard to believe that the brawling
mountain-torrent of a few miles higher up could have already grown to
this powerful river.
Somehow I was unable to remain on the bridge. The spot did not satisfy
my need. There was a cottage near, and I wanted to be away from
anything human. Soon I retraced my steps for some distance along the
main road, and struck up by the side-path which I had before noticed.
This path, like the road beneath, led towards the lower Dale-extremity:
but it wandered up the steep hillside, instead of keeping near the
bottom of the valley, serving evidently as a shorter cut to Beckbergh,
over a rocky ridge. It is probably a good deal frequented; yet no one
overtook or passed me yesterday. The complete solitude was what I had
craved for. I went on, till a distant glimpse of the town, Beckbergh,
beyond and beneath, became visible.
I did not wish to get there,—though I might have had time, the
evenings now are so long. I only wanted to find a spot, secure from
interruption, where I might dare to indulge thought.
I had reached the highest point of the pathway, after which it begins
to descend towards Beckbergh. It crosses there a wild green common-like
slope, broken by out-standing rocks and big boulders.
So I left the path, and went upwards, regardless of the wet grass, and
presently I found a seat upon one flat rock, another rising a little
below in just such a position as to hide me effectually from anybody
who should pass along the path.
Then at last I knew that I might allow myself to think,—and I meant to
begin, and have the matter out. But before I could set to work, my eyes
fell on a beautiful plant of real Parsley fern, growing a few paces
off, under the shelter of an overhanging boulder.
How delighted Thyrza would be! I would get it for her, of course. She
is an ardent fern-collector, and I knew she was hoping to find many
specimens while here. Maggie follows suit, as a matter of course, and
collects fitfully, under "Millie's" superintendence, neither knowing
much about the matter. There had been talk at tea-time about the
abundant supplies of Polypody and Adiantum Nigrum, already noted.
Maggie had expressed hopes of "Oak" and "Beech," and Thyrza had
added—"Perhaps even Parsley!"—almost her sole remark. And here the
Parsley was!
My trouble had to wait a while longer. Digging a Parsley fern out of
a rocky bed, not having even the help of a knife, is no easy matter.
I pulled off my gloves, and knelt down, setting to work with care and
determination. The business took some time, but I did it thoroughly,
keeping the roots almost intact. My "find" at length was freed, and I
went back to the seat I had chosen.
And then I sat silently, looking around, willing to face my grief, yet
somehow composed. The storm of rage and contempt did not return. I had
felt so sure that it must; and I was mistaken.
I had a good view of the Dale, with its high hill-ranges on either
side. "The Fell" lay opposite, extending far up the valley: a great
mountainous mass, with curved clear outlines, hummocked and dimpled
sides; the frowning Scaur in the distance contrasting with soft green
surroundings; masses of bracken varying the grass-tints; slender
winding rivulets streaking its sides like silver snakes; and the lights
and shades of evening lending a wonderful beauty to the whole. I could
see the river below, and near the Dale-Head loftier mountains reared
their summits into the grey clouds which clustered there; but my eyes
returned persistently to the changeful loveliness of The Fell. For that
enchained me.
I almost think that at first there was a sense of disappointment at
my own quietness. I hardly wished to be quiet yet. For I had been so
grievously wronged. My wrath had been a righteous wrath,—so I told
myself, not seeing how far it had passed the righteous boundary. I
suppose no anger that has the mastery over one can ever be a purely
just anger. The contempt too, I told myself, had been no more than Miss
Millington deserved. I despised still, and I must despise. There could
be no excuse for her. And a voice seemed to whisper—"No! None! And
yet—!"
I hardly know how to tell what followed. I do not wish to lose the
recollection, so I must try. But it was not words. It was only—the help
I needed.
I must have looked up to Him unknowingly. I did believe that He would
help me, sooner or later. And it was sooner, instead of later. Perhaps
He sometimes—often—comes, unasked, to the rescue of His own, in peril.
Though passionate anger was lulled, pain was not. It grew keener,
deeper, as I sat there. The consciousness of what she had done came
over me afresh, and with it a fresh agony at having my secret known.
Would she make use of her discovery?—Tell it to others? Surely not! And
yet I could believe her capable of even this. I had no fear that she or
any one would dare to speak a word to me on the subject. But to know
that others know!—This I felt to be enough, more than enough, more than
I might endure!
The pain was none the less for being a calm pain. Passion had helped me
earlier. Now the very calmness rendered me better able to feel, better
fitted to measure the cause which existed for pain. And in a little
while, I could not face the sweet scene around—I could only drop my
head on my knees, shivering in the cold grasp of a bitter distress, a
dull longing to be out of it all and away from everybody—for ever.
My own helplessness was terrible, helplessness to undo the evil,
helplessness to meet it, helplessness to guard myself, helplessness to
forgive. I seemed to be hedged round on every side.
"Forgive her! Oh never!" I found myself murmuring.
And suddenly I seemed to see that sad Denial-Scene, when one whom the
Master loved turned against Him, in cowardly wise abjuring His Name.
And I saw in response, no anger, no bitterness, no contempt; only one
gentle Look from those wonderful loving Eyes, so grave and sweet,
pleading and true, reproachful yet pitying, humanly sorrowful, Royally
calm.
What has she done to me, compared with that which the craven disciple
did to Him that day? More!—In what has she wronged me, compared with
all the wronging of my coldness, heartlessness, ingratitude, towards
Him—my Master and King? For I have not loved her,—I have not trusted
her,—I have not given up aught for her sake! And what has not He done
and endured for me?
The debt of one hundred pence indeed, beside the debt of ten thousand
pounds! If He resented my ill-doings as I have resented hers, where
should I be?
I think the look which softened St. Peter came to me too, in that hour
on the lonely hillside. Perhaps there was the touch as well,—His Hand
removing the bitterness, the wrath, the angry contempt; not taking
away the pain, but rather laying it upon me anew, as something to be
patiently endured for Him; and with it giving His peace.
Had I not only that morning pleaded to have His will worked in me,
avowing myself submissive? And if this were His will?
It was not—is not—for me to choose. Just because this trouble so
fiercely racks my pride, it may be the very burden I most need.
And, after all, I might have misjudged her. This thought came next.
She might not have meant to look,—might have gone to the drawer for
something, have moved my papers accidentally, have even thrown the book
open by some awkward movement and have shut the page, unread.
If she did read,—then, dishonourable, base, contemptible, are not terms
too strong for the deed. But yet I have not to judge her. To her own
Master she standeth or falleth. Have I always acted towards my loving
Lord with perfect honour, perfect courtesy, perfect thoughtfulness,
perfect delicacy? And has He not forgiven me? Oh, times without number!
Besides, she may have been ill-trained. She may have by nature a blunt
sense of honour, a defective understanding. There can be no excuse; but
there may be considerations inducing pity.
"Be not overcome of evil, but overcome evil with good."
That command followed. I knew from Whom it came: and I could only feel
that I was willing,—if my God would make me able.
* * * * * * *
It was later than I had intended, when I reached home. Thyrza came to
meet me at the garden-gate. She gave one long look, kissed me gravely,
and said, "The walk has done you good. I am so glad."
I showed her the Parsley fern, and said, "I meant this for you. But
what do you think? Shall I give it to Maggie?"
She flushed up and exclaimed at the sight of what I had brought, with
genuine enthusiasm. Then I saw a moment's struggle.
"Yes,—please do," she said. "Maggie says you always put me first."
"Maggie would have no reason for saying so in this instance," I
answered. "You are our chief fern-collector: so I count that you have
the prime right."
"But Maggie has the fancy just now. Poor little fern! She will only let
you die," sighed Thyrza. Yet there came again a decisive—"Yes, give it
to her."
I did so: and Maggie received my gift awkwardly, glancing between her
thanks at "Millie," to discover whether she were being betrayed into
over-warmth.