DR. SHORT arrived, approved Dr. Phillips's treatment, and said the case
was severe but not hopeless, and he would call again. A bed was prepared
in the house for Mr. Hardie: but neither he nor any of the Dodds closed
an eye that sorrowful night.
About midnight, after a short slumber, the sufferer became uneasy, and
begged to be left with Julia. Julia was sent for, and found her a good
deal excited. She inquired more than once if they were quite alone, and
then asked for paper and a pencil. She wrote a few lines, and made
Julia put them in a cover and seal them. “Now, dear friend,” she said,
“promise me not to open this, nor even to let your mother; it is not for
your happiness that what I have written should be seen by her or you;
no, no, much better not. Come; dear friend, pledge me your honour.”
Julia pledged her honour.
Then Jane wrote on the cover, “From a dying sister.” Julia saw that; and
wept sore.
Jane comforted her. “Do not weep for me, love: I am content to go, or
stay. This is not my doing; so I know it must be for the best. He is
leading me by a way that I know not. Oh, my beloved friend, how sweet
it is to lie in His hands, and know no will but His. Ay, I thank Him for
crossing my will, and leading me to Himself by His own good way, and not
by poor blind, foolish mine.”
In this spirit of full resignation she abode constant, and consoled her
weeping friends from time to time, whenever she was quite herself.
About daybreak, being alone with her father, she shed a few tears at his
lonely condition. “I fear you will miss me,” said she. “Take my advice,
dear; be reconciled with Alfred at once, and let Julia be your daughter,
since I am leaving you. She is all humility and heart. Dying, I prize
her and her affection more highly; I seem to see characters clearer, all
things clearer, than I did before my summons came.”
The miserable father tried to be playful and scold her: “You must not
talk nor think of death,” he said. “Your bridal-day is to come first;
I know all; Edward Dodd has told me he loves you. He is a fine noble
fellow; you shall marry him: I wish it. Now, for his sake, summon all
your resolution, and make up your mind to live. Why, at your age,
it needs but to say, 'I will live, I will, I will;' and when all the
prospect is so smiling, when love awaits you at the altar, and on every
side! If you could leave your poor doting father, do not leave your
lover: and here he is with his mother crying for you. Let me comfort
him; let me tell him you will live for his sake and mine.”
Even this could not disturb the dying Christian. “Dear Edward,” she
said; “it is sweet to know he loves me. Ah, well, he is young; he must
live without me till I become but a tender memory of his youth. And oh,
I pray for him that he may cherish the words I have spoken to him for
his soul's good far longer than he can remember these features that are
hastening to decay.”
At ten in the morning Mr. Hardie's messenger returned without Alfred,
and with a note from Dr. Wycherley to this effect, that, the order for
Alfred's admission into his asylum being signed by Mr. Thomas Hardie,
he could not send him out even for a day except on Thomas Hardie's
authority; it would be a violation of the law. Under the circumstances,
however, he thought he might venture to receive that order by telegraph.
If, then, Mr. Hardie would telegraph Thomas Hardie in Yorkshire to
telegraph him (Wycherley), Alfred should be sent with two keepers
wherever Mr. T. Hardie should so direct.
Now Mr. Hardie had already repented of sending for Alfred at all.
So, instead of telegraphing Yorkshire, he remained passive, and said
sullenly to Mrs. Dodd, “Alfred can't come, it seems.”
Thus Routine kept the brother from his dying sister.
They told Jane, with aching hearts, there was reason to fear Alfred
could not arrive that day.
She only gave a meaning look at Julia, about the paper; and then she
said with a little sigh, “God's will be done.”
This was the last disappointment Heaven allowed Earth to inflict on her;
and the shield of Faith turned its edge.
One hour of pain, another of delirium, and now the clouds that darken
this mortal life seemed to part and pass, and Heaven to open full upon
her. She spoke of her coming change no longer with resignation; it was
with rapture. “Oh!” she cried, “to think that from this very day I
shall never sin again, shall never again offend Him by unholy temper, by
un-Christ-like behaviour!”
The strong and healthy wept and groaned aloud; but she they sorrowed for
was all celestial bliss. In her lifetime she had her ups and downs of
religious fervour; was not without feverish heats, and cold misgivings
and depression; but all these fled at that dread hour when the wicked
are a prey to dark misgivings, or escape into apathy. This timid girl
that would have screamed at a scratch, met the King of Terrors with
smiles and triumph. For her the grave was Jordan, and death was but the
iron gate of life everlasting. _Mors janua vitae._ Yet once or twice she
took herself to task: but only to show she knew what the All-Pure had
forgiven her. “I often was wanting in humility,” she said; “I almost
think that if I were to be sent back again into this world of sin and
sorrow I am leaving behind, I should grow a little in humility; for I
know the ripe Christian is like the ripe corn, holds his head lower than
when he was green; and the grave it seems to be ripening me. But what
does it matter? since He who died for me is content to take me as I am.
Come quickly, Lord Jesus, oh, come quickly! Relieve Thy servant from the
burden of the flesh, and of the sins and foibles that cling to it and
keep her these many years from Thee.”
This prayer was granted; the body failed more and more; she could not
swallow even a drop of wine; she could not even praise her Redeemer;
that is to say, she could not speak. Yet she lay and triumphed.
With hands put together in prayer, and eyes full of praise and joy
unspeakable, she climbed fast to God. While she so mounted in the
spirit, her breath came at intervals unusually long, and all were sent
for to see Death conquer the body and be conquered by the soul.
At last, after an unnaturally long interval, she drew a breath like a
sigh. They waited for another; waited, waited in vain.
She had calmly ceased to live.
The old doctor laid down her hand reverently, and said “She is with us
no more.” Then with many tears, “Oh, may we all meet where she is now,
and may I go to her the first.”
Richard Hardie was led from the room in a stupor.
Immediately after death all the disfiguring effect of pain retired, and
the happy soul seemed to have stamped its own celestial rapture on the
countenance at the moment of leaving it; a rapture so wonderful, so
divine, so more than mortal calm, irradiated the dead face. The good
Christians she left behind her looked on and feared to weep, lest they
should offend Him, who had taken her to Himself, and set a visible seal
upon the house of clay that had held her. “Oh, mamma,” cried Julia with
fervour, “look! look! Can we, dare we, wish that angel back to this
world of misery and sin?” And it was some hours before she cooled, and
began to hang on Edward's neck and weep his loss and hers, as weep we
mortals must, though the angels of Heaven are rejoicing.
Thus died in the flower of her youth, and by what we call a violent
death, the one child Richard Hardie loved; member of a religious party
whose diction now and then offends one to the soul: but the root of
the matter is in them; allowance made for those passions, foibles, and
infirmities of the flesh, even you and I are not entirely free from,
they live fearing God, and die loving Him.
There was an inquest next day, followed in due course by a public trial
of James Maxley. But these are matters which, though rather curious and
interesting, must be omitted, or touched hereafter and briefly.
The effect of Jane's death on Richard Hardie was deplorable. He saw
the hand of Heaven; but did not bow to it: so it filled him with rage,
rebellion, and despair. He got his daughter away and hid himself in the
room with her; scarce stirring out by night or day. He spoke to no one;
he shunned the Dodds: he hated them. He said it was through visiting
their house she had met her death, and at their door. He would not let
himself see it was he who had sent her there with his lie. He loathed
Alfred, calling him the cause of all.
He asked nobody to the funeral: and, when Edward begged permission to
come, he gave a snarl like a wild beast and went raging from him. But
Edward would go: and at the graveside pitying Heaven relieved the young
fellow's choking heart with tears. But no such dew came to that parched
old man, who stood on its other side like the withered Archangel, his
eyes gloomy and wild, his white cheek ploughed deep with care and
crime and anguish, his lofty figure bowed by his long warfare, his
soul burning and sickening by turns, with hatred and rebellion, with
desolation and despair.
He went home and made his will; for he felt life hang on him like lead,
and that any moment he might kill himself to be rid of it. Strange to
say, he left a sum of money to Edward Dodd. A moment before, he didn't
know he was going to do it: a moment after, he was half surprised he had
done it, and minded to undo it; but would not take the trouble. He went
up to London, and dashed into speculation as some in their despair take
to drink. For this man had but two passions; avarice, and his love for
his daughter. Bereaved of her, he must either die, or live for gain. He
sought the very cave of Mammon; he plunged into the Stock Exchange.
When Mr. Hardie said, “Alfred can't come, it seems,” Mrs. Dodd
misunderstood him, naturally enough. She thought the heartless young man
had sent some excuse: had chosen to let his sister die neglected rather
than face Julia: “As if she would leave her own room while _he_ was in
my house,” said Mrs. Dodd, with sovereign contempt. From this moment
she conceived a horror of the young man. Edward shared it fully, and the
pair always spoke of him under the title of “the Wretch:” this was when
Julia was not by. In her presence he was never mentioned. By this means
she would in time forget him, or else see him as they saw him.
And as, after all, they knew little to Mr. Hardie's disadvantage, except
what had come out of “the Wretch's” mouth, and as moreover their hearts
were softened towards the father by his bereavement, and their sight of
his misery, and also by his grateful words, they quite acquitted him of
having robbed them, and felt sure the fourteen thousand pounds was at
the bottom of the sea.
They were a little surprised that Mr. Hardie never spoke nor wrote to
them again; but being high-minded and sweet tempered, they set it down
to all-absorbing grief, and would not feel sore about it.
And now they must leave the little villa where they had been so happy
and so unhappy.
The scanty furniture went first; Mrs. Dodd followed, and arranged it
in their apartments. Julia would stay behind to comfort Edward,
inconsolable herself. The auction came off. Most of the things went for
cruelly little money compared to their value: and with the balance the
sad young pair came up to London, and were clasped in their mother's
arms. The tears were in her tender eyes. “It is a poor place to receive
my treasures,” she said: Edward looked round astonished: “It was a poor
place,” said he, “but you have made a little palace of it, somehow or
another.”
“My children's love can alone do that,” replied Mrs. Dodd, kissing them
both again.
Next day they consulted together how they were to live. Edward wished to
try and get his father into a public asylum; then his mother would have
a balance to live upon out of her income. But Mrs. Dodd rejected this
proposal with astonishment. In vain Edward cited the _'Tiser_ that
public asylums are patterns of comfort, and cure twice as many patients
as the private ones do. She was deaf alike to the _'Tiser_ and to
statistics. “Do not argue me out of my common sense,” said she. “My
husband, your father, in a public asylum, where anybody can go and stare
at my darling!”
She then informed them she had written to her Aunt Bazalgette and her
Uncle Fountain, and invited them to contribute something towards David's
maintenance.
Edward was almost angry at this. “Fancy asking favours of _them,_” said
he.
“Oh, I must not sacrifice my family to false pride,” said Mrs. Dodd;
“besides they are entitled to know.”
While waiting for their answers, a word about the parties and their
niece.
Our Mrs. Dodd, born Lucy Fountain, was left at nineteen to the care
of two guardians: 1, her Uncle Fountain, an old bachelor, who loved
comfort, pedigree, and his own way; 2, her Aunt Bazalgette, who loved
flirting, dressing, and her own way; both charming people, when they got
their own way; verjuice, when they didn't: and, to conclude, egotists
deep as ocean. From guardians they grew match-makers and rivals by
proxy: uncle schemed to graft Lucy on to a stick called Talboys, that
came in with the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes, known in pedigrees
as “the Norman Conquest.” Aunt, wife of a merchant of no Descent,
except from a high stool, devoted her to Richard Hardie. An unlooked-for
obstacle encountered both: Lucy was not amorous. She loved these two
egotists and their quadrupeds; but there she stopped dead short. They
persisted; and, while they pulled her to and fro and ruffled her
native calm, David Dodd, first mate of the Something or other East
Indiaman--brown cheek, honest speech, heart of gold--fell deep in love
and worshipped her at a distance. His timidity and social insignificance
made him harmless; so egotist Fountain had him in to dessert to spin
yarns; egotist Bazalgette invited him to her house to flirt with. At
this latter place he found Hardie and Talboys both courting Lucy; this
drove him mad, and in his fury he popped. Lucy declined him _secundum
artem:_ he went away blessing her, with a manly sob or two. Lucy cried
a little and took a feminine spite against his rivals, who remained to
pester her. Now Talboys, spurred by uncle, had often all but popped;
only some let, hindrance, or just impediment had still interposed: once
her pony kept prancing at each effort he made towards Hymen; they do say
the subtle virgin kept probing the brute with a hair pin, and made him
caracole and spill the treacle as fast as it came her way. However,
now Talboys elected to pop by sea. It was the element his ancestors had
invaded fair England by; and on its tranquil bosom a lover is safe from
prancing steeds, and the myriad anti-pops of _terra firma._ Miss Lucy
consented to the water excursion demurely, designing to bring her sickly
wooer to the point and so get rid of him for ever and ever. Plot and
counter-plot were baffled by the elements: there came an anti-pop out
of the south-west called a gale. Talboys boated so skilfully that he and
his intended would have been united without ceremony by Father Nep, at
the bottom of the British Channel, but for David Dodd, who was hovering
near in jealous anguish and a cutter. He saved them both, but in the
doing of it missed his ship, and professional ruin faced him. Then
good-hearted Lucy was miserable, and appealed to Mr. Bazalgette, and he
managed somehow to get David made captain of the _Rajah._ The poor girl
thought she had squared the account with David; but he refused the ship
unless she would go halves, and while her egotists bullied and vexed
her, he wrought so upon her pity, and teased her so, that to get rid
of his importunity she married him. In time she learned to love him ten
times better than if she had begun all flames. Uncle and aunt cut
her tolerably dead for some years. Uncle came round the first; some
antiquarian showed him that Dodd was a much more ancient family
than Talboys. “Why, sir, they were lords of sixteen manors under the
Heptarchy, and hold some of them to this day.” Mrs. Bazalgette, too, had
long corresponded with her periodically, and on friendly terms.
The answers came on the same day, curiously enough. Uncle Fountain,
ruined by railway speculation, was living on an allowance from
creditors; but his house was at their service, if they liked to live
with him--and board themselves.
Mrs. Bazalgette's was the letter of a smooth woman, who has hoarded
imperishable spite. She reminded her niece after all these years, that
her marriage with David was an act of disobedience and ingratitude. She
then enumerated her own heavy expenses, all but the L. 400 a year she
spent in bedizening her carcass, and finally, amidst a multitude of
petty insults, she offered to relieve Mrs. Dodd of--Julia. Now Poetry
has reconciled us to an asp in a basket of figs; but here was a scorpion
in a bundle of nettles. Poor Mrs. Dodd could not speak after reading
it. She handed it to Edward, and laid her white forehead wearily in her
hand. Edward put the letter in an envelope and sent it back with a line
in his own hand declining all further correspondence with the writer.
“Now then, ladies,” said he, “don't you be cast down. Let this be a
warning to us, never to ask favours of anybody. Let us look the thing in
the face; we must work or starve: and all the better for us. Hard work
suits heavy hearts. Come, have you any plan?”
“To be sure we have,” said Julia eagerly. “I mean to go for a governess,
and then I shall cost mamma nothing, and besides I can send her the
money the people give me.”
“A pretty plan!” said Edward sadly; “what! we three part company? Don't
you feel lonely enough without that? I do then. How can we bear our
burdens at all, if we are not to be all together to cheer one another
along the weary road? What! are we to break up? Is it not enough to be
bereaved?”
He could say no more for the emotion his own words caused him; thinking
of Jane, he broke down altogether, and ran out of the room.
However, he came back in an hour with his eyes red, but his heart
indomitable; determined to play a man's part for all their sakes. “You
ladies,” said he, with something of his old genial way, that sounded
so strange to one looking at his red eyes, and inspired a desire to hug
him, “are full of talent, but empty of invention. The moment you are
ruined or that sort of thing, it is, _go_ for a governess, _go_ for a
companion, _go_ here, _go_ there, in search of what? Independence? No;
dependence. Besides all this _going_ is bosh. Families are strong if
they stick together, and if they go to pieces they are weak. I learned
one bit of sense out of that mass of folly they call antiquity; and that
was the story of the old bloke with his twelve sons, and fagot to match.
'Break 'em apart,' he said, and each son broke his stick as easy as
shelling peas. 'Now break the twelve all tied together:' devil a bit
could the duffers break it then. Now we are not twelve, we are but
three: easy to break one or two of us apart, but not the lot together.
No; nothing but death shall break this fagot, for nothing less shall
part us three.”
He stood like a colossus, and held out his hand to them; they clung
round his neck in a moment, as if to illustrate his words; clung tight,
and blessed him for standing so firm and forbidding them to part.
Mrs. Dodd sighed, after the first burst of enthusiastic affection, and
said: “If he would only go a step further and tell us what to do in
company.”
“Ay, there it is,” said Julia. “Begin with me. What can I do?”
“Why, paint.”
“What, to sell? Oh dear, my daubs are not good enough for that.”
“Stuff! Nothing is too bad to _sell._”
“I really think you might,” said Mrs. Dodd, “and I will help you.”
“No, no, mamma, I want you for something better than the fine arts.
You must go in one of the great grooves: Female vanity: you must be a
dressmaker; you are a genius at it.”
“My mamma a dressmaker,” cried Julia; “oh Edward, how can you. How dare
you. Poor, poor mamma!”
“Do not be so impetuous, dear. I think he is right: yes, it is all I am
fit for. If ever there was a Heaven-born dressmaker, it's me.”
“As for myself,” said Edward, “I shall look out for some business in
which physical strength goes further than intellectual attainments.
Luckily there are plenty such. Breaking stones is one. But I shall try a
few others first.”
It is easy to settle on a business, hard to get a footing in one. Edward
convinced that the dressmaking was their best card, searched that mine
of various knowledge, the _'Tiser,_ for an opening: but none came. At
last one of those great miscellaneous houses in the City advertised
for a lady to cut cloaks. He proposed to his mother to go with him. She
shrank from encountering strangers. No, she would go to a fashionable
dressmaker she had employed some years, and ask her advice. Perhaps
Madame Blanch would find her something to do. “I have more faith in the
_'Tiser,_” said Edward, clinging to his idol.
Mrs. Dodd found Madame Blanch occupied in trying to suit one of those
heart-breaking idiots, to whom dress is the one great thing, and all
things else, sin included, the little ones. She had tried on a scarf
three times; and it discontented her when on, and spoilt all else when
off. Mrs. Dodd saw, and said obligingly, “Perhaps were I to put it on,
you could better judge.” Mrs. Dodd, you must know, had an admirable art
of putting on a shawl or scarf. With apparent _nonchalance_ she settled
the scarf on her shapely shoulders so happily that the fish bit, and the
scarf went into its carriage; forty guineas, or so. Madame cast a rapid
but ardent glance of gratitude Dodd-wards. The customer began to go, and
after fidgeting to the door and back for twenty minutes actually went
somehow. Then madame turned round, and said, “I'm sure, ma'am, I am much
obliged to you; you sold me the scarf: and it is a pity we couldn't put
her on your bust and shoulders, ma'am, then perhaps a scarf might please
her. What can I do for you, ma'am?”
Mrs. Dodd blushed, and with subdued agitation told Madame Blanch that
this time she was come not to purchase but to ask a favour. Misfortune
was heavy on her; and, though not penniless, she was so reduced by her
husband's illness and the loss of L. 14,000 by shipwreck, that she must
employ what little talents she had to support her family.
The woman explored her from head to foot to find the change of fortune
in some corner of her raiment: but her customer was as well, though
plainly dressed as ever, and still looked an easy-going duchess.
“Could Madame Blanch find her employment in her own line? What talent I
have,” said Mrs. Dodd humbly, “lies in that way. I could not cut as
well as yourself, of course; but I think I can as well as some of your
people.”
“That I'll be bound you can,” said Madame Blanch drily. “But dear, dear,
to think of your having come down so. Have a glass of wine to cheer you
a bit; do now, that is a good soul.”
“Oh no, madam. I thank you; but wine cannot cheer me: a little bit of
good news to take back to my anxious children, that would cheer me,
madam. _Will_ you be so good?”
The dressmaker coloured and hesitated; she felt the fascination of
Dignity donning Humility, and speaking Music: but she resisted. “It
won't do, at least here. I shouldn't be mistress in my own place. I
couldn't drive you like I am forced to do the rest; and, then, I should
be sure to favour you, being a real lady, which is my taste, and you
always will be, rich or poor; and then all my ladies would be on the
bile with jealousy.”
“Ah, madam,” sighed Mrs. Dodd, “you treat me like a child; you give me
sweetmeats, and refuse me food for my family.”
“No, no,” said the woman hastily, “I don't say I mightn't send you out
some work to do at home.”
“Oh, thank you, madam.” _N.B._ The dressmaker had dropped the Madam, so
the lady used it now at every word.
“Now stop a bit,” said Madame Blanch. “I know a firm that's in want.
Theirs is easy work by mine, and they cut up a piece of stuff every two
or three days.” She then wrote on one of her own cards, Messrs. Cross,
Fitchett, Copland, and Tylee, 11, 12, 13, and 14, Primrose Lane, City.
“Say, I recommend you. To tell the truth, an old hand of my own was to
come here this very morning about it, but she hasn't kept her time; so
this will learn her business doesn't stand still for lie-a-beds to catch
it.”
Mrs. Dodd put the card in her bosom and pressed the hand extended to her
by Madame Zaire Blanch; whose name was Sally White, spinster. She went
back to her children and showed them the card, and sank gracefully into
a chair, exhausted as much by the agitation of asking favours as by
the walk. “Cross, Fitchett, Copland? Why they were in the _'Tiser_
yesterday,” said Edward: “look at this; a day lost by being wiser than
the _'Tiser._”
“I'll waste no more then,” said Mrs. Dodd, rising quietly from the
chair. They begged her to rest herself first. No, she would not. “I saw
this lost by half an hour,” said she. “Succeed or fail, I will have no
remissness to reproach myself with.” And she glided off in her quiet
way, to encounter Cross, Fitchett, Copland and Tylee, in the lane where
a primrose was caught growing--six hundred years ago. She declined
Edward's company rather peremptorily. “Stay and comfort your sister,”
said she. But that was a blind; the truth was, she could not bear her
children to mingle in what she was doing. No, her ambition was to ply
the scissors and thimble vigorously, and so enable them to be ladies and
gentlemen at large. She being gone, Julia made a parcel of water-colour
drawings, and sallied forth all on fire to sell them. But, while she was
dressing, Edward started on a cruise in search of employment. He failed
entirely. They met in the evening, Mrs. Dodd resigned, Edward dogged,
Julia rather excited. “Now, let us tell our adventures,” she said. “As
for me, shop after shop declined my poor sketches. They all wanted
something about as good, only a little different: nobody complained
of the grand fault, and that is, their utter badness. At last, one old
gentleman examined them, and oh! he was so fat; there, round. And he
twisted his mouth so” (imitating him) “and squinted into them so. Then
I was full of hope; and said to myself; 'Dear mamma and Edward!' And
so, when he ended by saying, 'No,' like all the rest, I burst out crying
like a goose.
“My poor girl,” cried Mrs. Dodd, with tears in her own eyes, “why expose
yourself to these cruel rebuffs?”
“Oh, don't waste your pity, mamma; those great babyish tears were a
happy thought of mine. He bought two directly to pacify me; and there's
the money. Thirty shillings!” And she laid it proudly on the table.
“The old cheat,” said Edward; “they were worth two guineas apiece, I
know.”
“Not they; or why would not anybody else give twopence for them?”
“Because pictures are a drug.”
He added that even talent was not saleable unless it got into the Great
Grooves; and then looked at Mrs. Dodd, she replied that unfortunately
those Grooves were not always accessible. The City firm had received her
stiffly, and inquired for whom she had worked. “Children, my heart
fell at that question. I was obliged to own myself an amateur and beg a
trial. However, I gave Madame Blanch's card: but Mr.--I don't know which
partner it was--said he was not acquainted with her: then he looked a
little embarrassed, I thought, and said the Firm did not care to send
its stuff to ladies not in the business. I might cut it to waste, or--he
said no more; but I do really think he meant I might purloin it.”
“Why wasn't I there to look him into the earth? Oh, mamma, that you
should be subjected to all this!”
“Be quiet, child; I had only to put on my armour; and do you know what
my armour is? Thinking of my children. So I put on my armour, and said
quietly, we were not so poor but we could pay for a piece of cloth
should I be so unfortunate as to spoil it; and I offered in plain terms
to deposit the price as security. But he turned as stiff at that as his
yard measure; 'that was not Cross and Co.'s way of doing business,' he
said. But it is unreasonable to be dejected at a repulse or two; and I
am not out of spirits; not much:” with this her gentle mouth smiled; and
her patient eyes were moist.
The next day, just after breakfast, was announced a gentleman from
the City. He made his bow and produced a parcel, which proved to be a
pattern cloak. “Order, ladies,” said he briskly, “from Cross, Fitchett,
and Co., Primrose Lane. Porter outside with the piece. You can come in,
sir.” Porter entered with a bale. “Please sign this, ma'am.” Mrs. Dodd
signed a receipt for the stuff, with an undertaking to deliver it in
cloaks, at 11 Primrose Lane, in such a time. Porter retreated. The other
said, “Our Mr. Fitchett wishes you to observe this fall in the pattern.
It is new.”
“I will, sir. Am I to trouble you with any money--by way of deposit,
sir?”
“No orders about it, ma'am. Ladies, your most obedient. Good morning,
sir.”
And he was away.
All this seemed like a click or two of City clock-work: followed by
rural silence. Yet in that minute Commerce had walked in upon genteel
poverty, and left honest labour and modest income behind her.
Great was the thankfulness, strange and new the excitement. Edward was
employed to set up a very long deal table for his mother to work on,
Julia to go and buy tailors' scissors. Calculations were made how to cut
the stuff to advantage, and in due course the heavy scissors were heard
snick, snick, snicking all day long.
Julia painted zealously, and Edward, without saying a word to them,
walked twenty miles a day hunting for a guinea a week; and finding it
not. Not but what employment was often bobbed before his eyes: but there
was no grasping it. At last he heard of a place peculiarly suited to
him; a packing foreman's in a warehouse at Southwark; he went there, and
was referred to Mr. A.'s private house. Mr. A. was in the country for
a day. Try Mr. B. Mr. B. was dining with the Lord Mayor. Returning
belated, he fell in with a fire; and, sad to say, life was in jeopardy:
a little old man had run out at the first alarm, when there was no
danger, and, as soon as the fire was hot, had run in again for his
stockings, or some such treasure. Fire does put out some people's
reason; clean. While he was rummaging madly, the staircase caught,
and the smoke cut off his second exit, and drove him up to a little
staircase window at the side of the house. Here he stood, hose in hand,
scorching behind and screeching in front. A ladder had been brought: but
it was a yard short: and the poor old man danced on the window-ledge and
dare not come down to a gallant fireman who stood ready to receive him
at great personal peril. In the midst of shrieks and cries and shouts of
encouragement, Edward, a practised gymnast, saw a chance. He ran up the
ladder like a cat, begged the fireman to clasp it tight; then got on his
shoulders and managed to grasp the window-sill. He could always draw
his own weight up by his hands: so he soon had his knee on the sill,
and presently stood erect. He then put his left arm inside the window,
collared the old fellow with his right, and, half persuasion, half
force, actually lowered him to the ladder with one Herculean arm amidst
a roar that made the Borough ring. Such a strain could not long be
endured; but the fireman speedily relieved him by seizing the old
fellow's feet and directing them on to the ladder, and so, propping him
by the waist, went down before him, and landed him safe. Edward waited
till they were down: then begged them to hold the ladder tight below;
he hung from the ledge, got his eye well on the ladder below him, let
himself quietly drop, and caught hold of it with hands of iron, and
twisting round, came down the ladder on the inside hand over head
without using his feet, a favourite gymnastic exercise of his learnt
at the Modern Athens. He was warmly received by the crowd and by the
firemen. “You should be one of us, sir,” said a fine young fellow who
had cheered him and advised him all through. “I wish to Heaven I was,”
said Edward. The other thought he was joking, but laughed and said,
“Then you should talk to our head man after the business; there is a
vacancy, you know.”
Edward saw the fire out, and rode home on the engine. There he applied
to the head man for the vacancy.
“You are a stranger to me, sir,” said the head man. “And I am sure it is
no place for you; you are a gentleman.”
“Well; is there anything ungentlemanly in saving people's lives and
property?”
“Hear! hear!” said a comic fireman.
The compliment began to tell, though. Others put in their word. “Why,
Mr. Baldwin, if a gentleman ain't ashamed of us, why should we be
ashamed of him?”
“Where will ye get a better?” asked another; and added, “He is no
stranger; we've seen him work.”
“Stop a bit,” said the comic fireman: “what does the dog say? Just call
him, sir, if you please; his name is Charlie.”
Edward called the fire-dog kindly; he came and fawned on him; then
gravely snuffed him all round, and retired wagging his tail gently, as
much as to say, “I was rather taken by surprise at first, but, on the
whole, I see no reason to recall my judgment.”
“It is all right,” said the firemen in chorus; and one that had not
yet spoken to Edward now whispered him mysteriously, “Ye see that there
dog--he knows more than we do.”
After the dog, a biped oracle at head-quarters was communicated with,
and late that very night Edward was actually enrolled a fireman; and
went home warmer at heart than he had been for some time. They were all
in bed; and when he came down in the morning, Julia was reading out
of the _'Tiser_ a spirited and magniloquent description of a fire in
Southwark, and of the heroism displayed by a young gentleman unknown,
but whose name the writer hoped at so much the line would never be
allowed to pass into oblivion, and be forgotten. In short, the _'Tiser_
paid him in one column, for years of devotion. Now Edward, of
course, was going to relate his adventure; but the journal told it
so gloriously, he hesitated to say, “I did all that.” He just sat and
stared, and wondered, and blushed, and grinned like an imbecile.
Unfortunately looks seldom escaped the Doddesses. “What is that for?”
inquired Julia reproachfully. “Is that sheepish face the thing to wear
when a sister is reading out an heroic action? Ah, these are the things
that make one long to be a man, to do them. What are you thinking about,
dear?”
“Well, I am thinking the _'Tiser_ is pitching it rather strong.”
“My love, what an expression!”
“Well, then, to be honest, I agree with you that it is a jolly thing to
fight with fire and save men's lives; and I am glad you see it in that
light; for now you will approve the step I have taken. Ladies, I have
put myself in the way of doing this sort of thing every week of my life.
I'm a fireman.”
“You are jesting, I trust?” said Mrs. Dodd anxiously.
“No, mamma. I got the place late last night, and I'm to enter on my
duties and put on the livery next Monday. Hurrah!”
Instantly the admirers of fiery heroes at a distance overflowed with
grief and mortification at the prospect of one in their own family. They
could not speak at all at first: and, when they did, it was only “Cruel!
cruel!” from Julia; and “Our humiliation is now complete,” from Mrs.
Dodd.
They soon dashed Edward's spirits, and made him unhappy; but they
could not convince him he had done wrong. However, in the heat of
remonstrance, they let out at last that they had just begun to hope by
dint of scissors and paint-brush to send him back to Oxford. He also
detected, under a cloud of tender, loving, soothing, coaxing and
equivocating expressions, their idea of a Man: to wit, a tall, strong,
ornamental creature, whom the women were to cocker up, and pet, and
slave for; and be rewarded by basking, dead tired, in an imperial smile
or two let fall by their sovereign _protege_ from his arm-chair. And, in
fact, good women have often demoralised their idols down to the dirt by
this process; to be sure their idols were sorryish clay, to begin.
Edward was anything but flowery, so he paraded no manly sentiments in
reply; he just bluntly ridiculed the idea of his consenting to prey
on them; and he said humbly, “I know I can't contribute as much to
our living as you two can--the petticoats carry the brains in our
family--but, be a burden to you? Not if I know it.”
“Pride! pride! pride!” objected Julia, lifting her grand violet orbs
like a pensive Madonna.
“And such pride! The pride that falls into a fire-bucket,” suggested
prosaic mamma.
“That is cutting,” said Edward: “but, _soyons de notre siecle;_
flunkeyism is on the decline. I'll give you something to put in both
your pipes:
'Honour and rank from no condition rise.
Act well thy part; in that the honour lies.'”
“Yes, yes,” said Mrs. Dodd, “only first choose your part; and let your
choice be reasonable.”
“Mine was Hobson's, and he never chooses wrong. Come, come,” said
he, and appealed calmly to their reason, by which means he made
no impression at all. Then he happened to say, “Besides, I must do
something. I own to you I am more cast down than I choose to show.
Mother, I feel like lead ever since she died.” Now on this, their faces
filled with sympathy directly. So encouraged he went on to say: “But
when I got my hand on that old duffer's collar, and lowered him to the
ladder, and the fire shot roaring out of the window after him, too late
to eat him, and the crowd cheered the fireman and me, I did feel warm
about the waistcoat, and, for the first time this ever so long, life
seemed not quite ended. I felt there was a little bit of good left, that
even a poor dunce like me could do, and she could approve--if she can
look down and see me, as I hope she can.”
“There, there,” said Mrs. Dodd tearfully, “I am disarmed, But, my
darling, I do not know what you are talking about: Stay; why, Edward,
surely--I hope--you were not the young gentleman in the paper, the one
that risked his life so nobly, so foolishly--if it was you.
“Why, mother, didn't I tell you it was me?” said Edward, colouring.
“No, that you did not,” said Julia. “Was it? was it? oh do be quick and
tell one. There, it was.”
“Well, it was: ah, I remember now; that splendiferous account shut me
up. Oh, I say, didn't the _'Tiser_ pitch it strong?”
“Not at all,” cried Julia; “I believe every word, and ever so much more.
Mamma, we have got a hero, and here he is at breakfast with us, like
an ordinary mortal.” She rose suddenly with a burst of her old fire and
fell upon him and kissed him, and said earnestly how proud she was of
him; “And so is mamma. She may say what she likes.”
“Proud of him! ah, that I am; very proud, and very unhappy. _Heroes are
my horror._ How often, and how earnestly have I prayed that my son might
not be brave like his father, but stay quietly at home out of harm's
way.”
Here remonstrance ended; the members of this family, happy by nature,
though unhappy by accident, all knew when to yield to each other.
Unfortunately, in proportion as all these excitements great and small
died, and her life became quiet and uniform, the depth of Julia's wound
showed itself more and more. She never sang nor hummed, as she used to
do, going about the house. She never laughed. She did burst out with
fervid sentiments now and then, but very rarely; on the whole, a pensive
languor took the place of her lovely impetuosity. Tears rushed in a
moment to her eyes with no visible cause. She often stole to the window,
and looked all up and down the street; and when she was out of doors,
she looked down every side street she passed; and sometimes, when a
quick light step came behind them, or she saw a tall young gentleman at
a great distance, her hand twitched her mother's arm or trembled on it.
And, always, when they came home, she lingered a moment at the door-step
and looked all round before she went in.
At all these signs one half of Mrs. Dodd's heart used to boil with
indignation, and the other half melt with pity. For she saw her daughter
was looking for “the Wretch.” Indeed Mrs. Dodd began to fear she had
done unwisely in ignoring “the Wretch.” Julia's thoughts dwelt on
him none the less; indeed all the more as it seemed; so the topic
interdicted by tacit consent bade fair to become a barrier between her
and Mrs. Dodd, hitherto her bosom friend as well as her mother. This
was intolerable to poor Mrs. Dodd: and at last she said one day, “My
darling, do not be afraid of me; rob me of your happy thoughts if you
will, but oh, not of your sad ones.”
Julia began to cry directly. “Oh no, mamma,” she sobbed, “do not you
encourage me in my folly. I know I have thrown away my affections on one
who----I shall never see him again: shall I, mamma? Oh, to think I can
say those words, and yet go living on.”
Mrs. Dodd sighed. “And if you saw him, would that mend the chain he has
chosen to break?”
“I don't know; but if I could only see him to part friends! It is cruel
to hate him now he has lost his sister; and then I have got her message
to give him. And I want to ask him why he was afraid of me: why he could
not tell me he had altered his mind: did he think I wanted to have him
against his will? Oh, mamma,” said she imploringly, “he seemed to love
me; he seemed all truth. I am a poor unfortunate girl.”
Mrs. Dodd had only caresses to soothe her with. She could not hold out
any hopes.
One day Julia asked her timidly if she might be a district visitor: “My
dear friend was, and advised me to be one too; but I was wilful in those
days and chose to visit by fits and starts, and be independent. I am
humbled now a little: may I, mamma? Since she died every word of hers
seems a law to me.”
Mrs. Dodd assented cordially; as she would to anything else her wounded
one had proposed.
This project brought Julia into communication with the new curate; and
who should it prove to be but Mr. Hurd? At sight of him she turned white
and red, and the whole scene in the church came back to her. But Mr.
Hurd showed considerable tact for so young a man; he spoke to her in
accents of deep respect, but confined his remarks strictly to the
matter in hand. She told her mother when she got home; and expressed her
gratitude to Mr. Hurd, but said she wished they did not live in the
same parish with him. This feeling, however, wore off by degrees, as her
self-imposed duties brought her more and more into contact with him, and
showed her his good qualities.
As for Mr. Hurd, he saw and understood her vivid emotion at sight of
him; saw and pitied; not without wonder that so beautiful a creature
should have been jilted. And from the first he marked his sense of
Alfred's conduct by showing her a profound and chivalrous respect which
he did not bestow on other young ladies in his parish; on the contrary,
he rather received homage from them than bestowed it. By-and-bye he saw
Julia suppress if not hide her own sorrow, and go sore-hearted day by
day to comfort the poor and afflicted: he admired and almost venerated
her for this. He called often on Mrs. Dodd, and was welcome. She
concealed her address for the present from all her friends except Dr.
Sampson; but Mr. Hurd had discovered her, and ladies do not snub the
clergy. Moreover, Mr. Hurd was a gentleman, and inclined to High Church.
This she liked. He was very good-looking too, and quiet in his manners.
Above all, he seemed to be doing her daughter good; for Julia and Mr.
Hurd had one great sentiment in common. When the intimacy had continued
some time on these easy terms, Mrs. Dodd saw that Mr. Hurd was falling
in love with Julia; and that sort of love warm, but respectful, which
soon leads to marriage, especially when the lover is a clergyman. This
was more than Mrs. Dodd bargained for; she did not want to part with her
daughter, and under other circumstances would have drawn in her horns.
But Mr. Hurd's undisguised homage gratified her maternal heart, coming
so soon after that great insult to her daughter; and then she said to
herself: “At any rate, he will help me cure her of 'the Wretch.'” She
was not easy in her mind, though; could not tell what would come of it
all. So she watched her daughter's pensive face as only mothers watch;
and saw a little of the old peach bloom creeping back.
That was irresistible: she let things go their own way, and hoped for
the best.