XLI

Mab went home from her visit to Mrs. Brown a very different girl from

that little person who had run off from the group of her friends to ask

the co-operation of the schoolmistress--which had seemed to her a very

amusing mission. She had wondered much how it would be taken--with

satire or with pleasure. Mrs. Brown’s tongue was one which could sting,

Mab knew; but a tongue is all the more amusing for that, when its sting

is not for one’s self. Mab rather liked to hear her sending her arrows

from right to left. She had thought that probably it was misfortune that

caused this, and the sense which people who have seen better days are

apt to entertain that it is somehow a wrong to themselves that other

people should be prosperous. We are all, unfortunately, too apt to feel

so. Blatant prosperity, smiling and smooth, how hard it is for the rest

of us not to hate its superior well-being, even if we do not think that

it is something taken from ourselves. But that was a very different

thing from the dreadful confidences which Mab had received, and which

made of her, even herself, who had certainly nothing to do with Mrs.

Brown’s sin, a heavy-laden and burdened spirit. Little Mab, who had run

down to the schoolhouse as light as a feather--though she was not, as

the reader is aware, one of your thread-paper girls--came back from it

as if she had carried that pack upon her back which Christian had in the

_Pilgrim’s Progress_. The pack belonged to Christian himself, and he had

a right to bear it; but, I repeat, Mab had nothing to do with Mrs.

Brown’s sins. And I am not at all sure what Mab conceived these sins to

be; she knew nothing about them: they were something vaguely terrible,

vaguely yet frightfully guilty to her childish sense of purity and

rectitude. And yet Mrs. Brown was the schoolmistress, the woman who had

all the Watcham girls in her hands; and Mab alone, of all the parish,

knew that she was not fit to be trusted with that charge. She walked

home with the tread and the air of a woman of fifty, her soft brow lined

with prodigious scores of thought, her spiritual back bent under this

burden. Mab knew, while all the parish lay in darkness. And Mab, the

Rector’s niece, and a district visitor, and Lady Bountiful from her

cradle, had a duty to the parish which a person less bound with ties of

duty might not have thought of. There was her duty to the parish, and,

on the other hand, there was her duty to her penitent; for, though she

had not asked to have that high office, still Mab felt that she had been

adopted as the confessor of the sinner. Sinner was a better name for her

than penitent, for she was not penitent; but yet she had trusted Mab.

And what was the person so trusted to do?--betray it to the parish, or

to any one in the parish? Oh, no, no! And yet was not that to betray the

parish and its trust and confidence in herself? If you can imagine any

subject more likely to score with wrinkles a brow of seventeen, such a

divination is beyond my powers. Mab thought and thought, turning the

question over and over in her mind with more curiosity than if she had

been a philosopher in search of a new theory. What it is right to do

between two conflicting duties is a question for a moralist more than a

philosopher, if there is, indeed, any difference between the two. It was

a tremendous question. She did not see her friend, the General, though

he took off his hat and waved it in cordial greeting as she passed his

garden hedge; nor Miss Grey, who had run after her, but finally gave up

the chase, unable to make Mab hear her call. Lady William was waiting,

though not impatiently, for the mid-day meal, which was the chief repast

in the cottage, when Mab reached home: her mother called out to her to

make haste, for Anne in the kitchen was apt to lose her temper when her

ladies were unpunctual. But Mab was too much confused to make haste. She

did not come down for a quarter of an hour, until Anne was half-wild,

and Patty in the highest agitation. The dinner had already been sent in,

which should have pacified Anne, but she was something of an artiste, in

feeling at least, and could not bear her dishes to be spoiled. Mab heard

her voice from the depths of the kitchen intoning comminations, and saw

that Patty had tears in her eyes, though they sent out pretty sparks of

satisfaction at sight of the laggard.

‘Oh, Miss Mab, the soup’s cold,’ she ventured to say, even Patty thus

raising a protest.

But Lady William was not very severe. ‘You little sluggish thing,’ she

said. ‘What have you been doing? Patty and I have been suffering much

from Anne. And I fear the soup will be quite cold.’

‘Oh, that’s all the better,’ said Mab, trying to pluck up a spirit, ‘for

it’s a very warm day.’

‘I am glad you find it so,’ said Lady William, with a shiver. ‘May is

seldom so hot in England as to make cold soup desirable. And how did the

practice go off, and where have you been? for I saw Emmy and Florry go

home a long time ago.’

‘I have been to Mrs. Brown. They wanted her to act something. She is a

very funny woman. She was at her lunch, or dinner, or whatever she calls

it. She gave me an apple, which she called _Pomme au sucre_, and I never

tasted anything so nice.’

‘Oh, she is like that, is she?’ said Lady William; ‘the woman who has

seen better days.’

‘Yes, mother, she is like that,’ said Mab; even to say so much as this

relieved her mind a little, though she had no idea what was meant by the

question or reply.

‘And is she going to--act? To act, did you say?--that will be an odd

thing for the schoolmistress to do.’

‘They thought--she might do Lady Macbeth--or something.’

‘Or something!’ said Lady William, just as Mrs. Brown had done: ‘that

will be still more odd,’ she added, with a laugh. ‘And is she going to

do it, Mab? I shall see this woman, then, at last.’

‘No, she is not going to do it, mother. She laughed at the idea. She

said, “Lady Macbeth--or something,” just as you did. She is a very

strange woman, but I don’t think that you would like her.’

‘Probably not,’ said Lady William. ‘It is, perhaps, unkind to say it,

but I am not very fond of the decayed gentlewoman in general. It would

serve me right,’ she said, with half a smile and half a sigh, ‘to end

like that myself.’

‘But how could that be?’ said Mab. It was one of those questions to

which there is no answer possible. Nor did she expect an answer. But it

brought a little cloud over Lady William’s brow. Indeed, it was all Lady

William could do to keep her face tolerably unclouded, and her

conversation as cheerful as usual for Mab’s sake. And this struggle on

her mother’s part kept Mab’s unusually serious face from being noticed

as it otherwise must have been. After that there were no further

questions asked about Mrs. Brown, and Mab went out to her gardening and

the many other occupations which filled up her time. But whatever she

was doing this heavy question hung upon her mind, and she carried with

her the burden that was like Christian’s, yet which she had not, like

him, any right to bear. Her duty to the parish was to denounce the woman

who ought not, with her mysterious guiltiness, to have the training of

the girls of Watcham. And her duty to her penitent was to keep

everything jealously within her own breast which had been confided to

her, so to speak, under the seal of confession. Mab had, as was natural,

a tremendous sense of her responsibility to both, but how she was to

reconcile the two was more than she could think of. She determined at

last upon a compromise, which was not indeed half sufficient to meet the

case, but which was the only thing she could think of. She herself, she

concluded, would for the future go constantly to the school, and thus

neutralise any evil that might be produced by Mrs. Brown. She would go

and watch over the girls, and see that their morals were all right, and

that nothing was said or done to lead them astray. By dint of thinking

it over the whole afternoon, shutting herself up alone to wrestle with

it, refraining even from tea in order that her deliberations might be

unbroken--this was the middle course to which Mab attained. She could

not betray Mrs. Brown. That was out of the question: and it was also

dreadful to think of betraying the parish, which, alas! if it knew what

Mab knew, would not continue Mrs. Brown in her place for a single day;

but if Mab took it upon herself--her little innocent self--to watch over

the girls, to be there early and late, guarding them from every

allusion, from every lesson that could hurt them--would not that make up

for the silence? She would watch the children as nobody else could

watch. She would have eyes like the lynx and ears like those who heard

the grass growing. This was what Mab determined upon in the anxiety of

her soul.

She had persuaded her mother to go to the entertainment, though it was a

dissipation to which Lady William was noways inclined. But Mab,

notwithstanding the sad check that had been put upon her by the

forenoon’s proceedings, was very anxious about the delights of the

evening, which were of a kind unusual in Watcham, where there was so

very little going on. A concert was of the rarest occurrence. A little

comedy had once been known to be played in the large room of the ‘Blue

Boar’ by a strolling company, and, as we are aware, there had been a

dance at General FitzStephen’s. But the occasions that occurred in

Watcham of putting on a best cap or a flower in your hair and sallying

forth in the evening without your bonnet, to meet other persons under

the same beatific conditions, were so very rare that nobody wished to

miss the curate’s entertainment. There had been very grave and serious

questions among the ladies as to the point of costume, some being of

opinion that as the entertainment was primarily for the working people,

it would be ‘better taste’ on the part of the ladies and gentlemen not

to go in evening dress, or at all events to shroud their glories in

bonnets on one side, and great-coats on the other. This, however, had

been boldly combated by Mrs. Plowden, who maintained that it would be

much better for ‘the poor things’ to have the exhilarating spectacle for

once in a way of ladies in their evening toilettes, and gentlemen with

shirt-fronts that could be seen half a mile off. It would do them good,

the Rector’s wife said, to see that the best people were ready to mingle

with them thus on a sort of equal terms, coming to enjoy themselves just

as the boatmen did. And it was absolutely necessary that the young

ladies who were to perform should be arrayed and made to look their

best; it would have been very hard upon them to step down from the

platform amongst a mass of bonnets, and thus be made conspicuous in the

assembly even when they had finished their exertions in its behalf. I

don’t think that Mrs. Plowden had the least difficulty in bringing the

others to her opinion, and accordingly the front seats in the schoolroom

where the performance was to take place, were peopled by a small, and

select, but distinguished audience, which rather over-shadowed, it must

be allowed, and put out the homely ranks behind, and made the curate

gnash his teeth when he saw immediately in front of his presiding chair

all the shining shirt-fronts and frizzed or smooth locks, or

lace-covered heads of the familiar little society of Watcham. Poor

higher classes! They wanted a little amusement to the full as much, or

perhaps more, than the boatmen and their wives from Riverside. And,

perhaps, had they been at the back and the others in front, Mr. Osborne

would not have minded. As it was, perhaps in this as in greater matters

all was for the best--for General FitzStephen’s high head prevented the

curate from seeing how old George from the landing yawned over the

quartette of the violinists from Winwick. Breeding is everything in such

cases, for the General was quite as much bored as old George; yet he

applauded when it was over (partly in thankfulness for that fact) as if

he had never heard anything so beautiful before.

As for Mab, she was able to forget for the moment her interview with

Mrs. Brown. Not only was it pleasant to be out in the evening--though

only in a white frock high up to the neck, which was in reality a

morning dress, but quite enough in Lady William’s opinion for such an

entertainment; but the excitement of feeling that she had really a part

in the performance through the songs of Emmy and Florence, and the

recitation of Jim, enlivened her spirits and raised her courage. The

Rectory girls sang two duets, far better in Mab’s opinion than all the

other performers, and she felt sure that if Florence, whose voice was so

much the strongest, had but had the courage to sing alone--! But this

was a suggestion that Florence had crushed at once. It was bad enough to

stand up there in face of all these people with Emmy to support her: but

alone!

‘Don’t you think it was rather silly of Florry to be so particular,’

whispered Mab, ‘when they have all known her--almost since she was

born?’

‘No. I don’t think it was silly,’ said Miss Grey decisively.

‘Oh! but you never think any one silly,’ said Mab.

‘Don’t I!’ said Miss Grey, with a truculence which left all the swearing

roughs of Riverside far behind. ‘I know who I think silly,’ said that

enraged dove.

Mab’s eyes ranged over all the people on the platform in astonishment,

to see who could be the object of this outburst.

‘Not poor Jim?’ she said, faltering.

‘Jim is worth a dozen of him,’ said Miss Grey.

There was only one face that was not friendly and bright. And that was,

Mab supposed, because Mr. Osborne was so anxious that everything should

go off well. Florence, the duet just over, was standing within three

steps of him, with a little group about her congratulating her on her

success, and the sound of the applause behind was still riotous in the

room. Old George was very audibly exclaiming at the top of his gruff

voice: ‘That’s your sort now! that’s somethin’ as a man can understand;’

while some of the Riverside lads, the people Mr. Osborne had been so

anxious about, kept on clapping their big rough hands persistently, when

everybody else had stopped, not daring to cry encore to the young

ladies, but signifying their wishes very clearly in that way. The two

girls hesitated and lingered, kept by their friends from retiring while

this noisy but timid call went on, which presently was joined in by all

the front benches, under the leadership of the General, who was not at

all shy, and cried ‘encore’ lustily. Mr. Osborne grew more gloomy than

ever, and called imperiously for the next performers. ‘We must stick to

the programme,’ he cried; ‘we shall never get done at this rate,’ and

the Winwick amateurs came up again with their fiddles, while Emmy and

Florry stole away, escaping abashed from their friends, who were

discomfited too. It was then that Miss Grey said between her closed

teeth, ‘I know who I think is silly;’ as if she would have liked to

crush that person in her little hand which (in a very ill-fitting glove)

she clenched as she spoke. If he had been a butterfly he would have had

no chance in that clenched fist of Miss Grey.

And then Jim came up smiling and delivered his ‘Ride,’ and was applauded

till the roof rang, chiefly, however, because he was Jim, and there was

something about racing horses in what he had read. ‘That’s your sort,’

old George said again, but more doubtfully; ‘though I’d like to have

known a little more about them horses,’ he added; and shortly after the

entertainment came to an end. There was no doubt it had been a great

success. While the common people streamed out, not sorry to be able to

stretch their limbs and let loose their opinion, and indemnify

themselves for having been silent so long, the audience in the front

benches lingered to pay their respects and congratulations, and to

assure the curate that everything had gone off beautifully. ‘I hope the

Riverside people enjoyed it. I am sure _I_ did,’ said General

FitzStephen. Mr. Osborne looked at that gallant officer as if he would

have liked to knock him down. He could not have shown a more angry and

clouded face had the entertainment been a failure. ‘Oh yes. I suppose it

has done well enough,’ he said. Mab, who did not know what all this

meant, but who was able to perceive that something was wrong, was fixing

her wits upon this mystery, and very anxious to know what it meant, when

she suddenly heard a little cry from her mother, whose eyes were fixed

upon the last stragglers of the crowd going out, and who suddenly broke

off in the midst of a conversation, and with every appearance of

excitement suddenly rushed out after some one--Mab could not tell whom.

Mab rushed after her mother full of astonishment and eager curiosity,

but only to find Lady William standing outside looking vaguely round her

with an anxious, bewildered look upon her face. ‘What is it, mother? Who

is it?’ Mab cried. ‘Do you want to speak to somebody?’ ‘I am certain,’

cried Lady William, ‘I saw her in the crowd. She turned round for a

moment and I saw her face.’ ‘Who is it, mother? Who is it, mother?’

cried Mab. But Lady William did not make any reply to her. She turned

round to another who had rushed after her (‘_That_ Leo Swinford, of

course,’ Mab said to herself) and put out her hand to him, as if he,

and not her child, could help her. ‘I have seen her, I am sure I have

seen her!’ she cried--and she repeated in a tone of rising excitement

what she had said before--‘with a black veil over her head. She turned

round as she went out of the door; and there was Artémise. Oh, find her

for me; find her, Leo!’ Lady William cried.