EXCELLENT ADVICE.
When once in the garden, Mrs. Mason grew very serious, and stood some
time in silence watching Ruth, who, bending low, was sweeping the
green leaves from a host of plump berries, clustering red ripe in the
sunshine. At last she spoke, with an effort, and her voice was abrupt
if not severe.
"Ruth," she said, "I have a thing to say which troubles me."
Ruth looked up wistfully.
"Why is it that you try to keep secrets from your sick father?"
"Secrets!" faltered the girl.
"If you mean to wed this young man, why not say so at any rate to your
own father? It is the best way out of this difficulty."
"Difficulty!"
"There, there! I can see no use in all this blushing, as red as the
strawberries one minute, and denying it the next. Ruth, Ruth!
deception and craft should not belong to your mother's child. I don't
pretend to like this young man over much, but, under the
circumstances, I have nothing to say. If your father is against it, a
little persuasion from Sir Noel will set all that right."
"What--what do you mean, grandmother?" questioned Ruth, hoarse with
dread.
"I mean to stop people's mouths by an honest marriage with a man, who,
after all, is a good match enough. If you have ever been uplifted to
thoughts of a better, it has come from too much notice from gentle
people at 'The Rest,' and from too much reading of poetry books. But
for that, there would never have been these meetings in the park, and
moonlight flittings about the lake, to scandalize people. Think better
of it, Ruth, or worse mischief than the scandal that is in everybody's
mouth may come out of it. Nothing but an honest marriage can put an
end to it."
"Scandal!" whispered the girl, rising slowly, and turning her white
face on the housekeeper. "What scandal?"
"Such as any girl may expect, Ruthy, who meets young men in the park,
and, worst of all, by the lake."
"The lake! The park!" repeated the poor girl, aghast with
apprehension; for every walk or chance meeting she had shared with
young Hurst rushed back upon her, with accusing vividness. "Who has
said--who has dared?"
Here the frightened young creature burst into a passion of tears. The
walks, the chance meetings, each a romance and an adventure, to dream
of and hoard up in her thoughts, like a poem got by heart. Who could
have torn them from their privacy, and bruited them abroad to her
discredit? In what way would she deny or explain them? More and more
pale her face grew, and her slender figure drooped with humiliation.
"There, there, little one, do not look so miserable. I did not mean to
hurt your feelings. Of course, I remember you have no mother to say
what is right or wrong. Only this, never meet the young man again. It
breeds scandal."
Ruth looked up in amazement.
"I know, I know your father is ill, but that should keep you
in-doors."
"Godmother, I do not understand. How is it possible?"
"It is not possible for you to meet him in out-of-the-way places
without casting your good name in the teeth of every gossip in the
village. Nay, I have my doubts if the young man has not helped it on,
else, how did that brazen-faced maid at the inn know about it, and
taunt him with it before a half-score of drinkers?"
The eyes of Ruth Jessup grew large with wonder.
"Among drinkers! He at the public inn! Godmother, of whom are you
speaking?"
"Who should I speak of, but the young man himself, Richard Storms?"
As a cloud sometimes sweeps suddenly from the blue sky, the shame and
the fear left that young girl's face.
"Oh, godmother, were you only speaking of him?"
"Who else should I be speaking of, Ruth? As if his name and yours were
not in every one's mouth, from the highest to the lowest."
A faint, hysterical laugh broke through the sobs that had almost
choked the girl, and alarmed the good woman.
"There, there," she said, "only be careful for the time to come; an
honest marriage will set everything right. I only wish the young man
were of a better sort, and went less to the public; but he will mend,
I dare say. That is right, you have had a good cry, and feel better."
Ruth had wiped the tears from her face, and, after drawing a deep
breath, was stooping down to the strawberry-bed again, and dashing the
thick leaves aside with her hands, was gathering the fruit in eager
haste. So great was her sense of relief, that she could feel neither
resentment nor annoyance regarding the scandal that had so troubled
the good housekeeper. Though she still trembled with the shock which
had passed, this lesser annoyance was nothing to her. In and out,
through the clustering leaves, her little hand flew, until the great
china-bowl, into which the gathered fruit was dropped, brimmed over
with its mellow redness. Meantime the housekeeper pattered on,
bestowing a world of advice and matronly cautions of which Ruth never
heard a syllable until the name of her lover-husband was mentioned.
Then her hand moved cautiously, that it might not rustle the leaves as
she listened.
"He took Mr. Webb up, scornfully, as you did me, when he mentioned the
gossip, and would not hear of it, calling young Storms a hind and a
braggart, of whom the neighborhood should be rid, if he were master.
So Webb said nothing more, though his news had come from some of the
gamekeepers who had seen you once and again in company with the young
man."
The blood began to burn hotly in Ruth's cheeks.
"I wonder only that you should have believed such things of me,
godmother, and almost scorn myself for caring to contradict them," she
said, placing the bowl of strawberries in a shady place, while she
began to cut flowers for a bouquet.
By this time, Mrs. Mason had unburdened her mind of so many wise
sayings, and such hoards of good advice, that her goddaughter's
indiscretions seemed to be quite carried away. She was weary of
standing, too, and seating herself in a rustic garden-chair, over
which an old cherry-tree loomed, waited complacently, while Ruth
flitted to and fro among the rose-bushes, singing softly as a dove
coos, while she plundered the flower-beds, and grouped buds and leaves
into a sweet love-language, which her own heart supplied, and which he
had studied with her, when their passion was like a poem, and flowers
were its natural expression.
"He will read these," she thought, clustering some forget-me-nots
around a white rose-bud, which became the heart of her sweet epistle.
"Let him only know that they come from me, and every bud will tell him
how my very soul craves to see him. Ah, me, it seems so long--so long,
since that day."
As she twined each flower in its place, a light kiss, of which she was
half-ashamed, was breathed into it as foolishly fond women will let
their hearts go out, and still be wise, and good. Indeed, the fact of
doing it, proves such women far superior to the common herds, who have
no rare fancies, and scorn them, because of profound ignorance, that
such gentle follies can spring out of the deepest feeling.
When all was ready, and that bouquet, redolent of kisses, innocent as
the perfume with which they were blended, was laid, a glowing web of
colors, on the strawberries, Mrs. Mason prepared to depart. With the
china bowl held between her rotund waist and the curve of her arm,
she entered into the shaded path, promising Ruth to deliver both fruit
and flowers to the young master with her own hands, and tell him how
well things were going on at the cottage.
"You will do everything that is kind, godmother, that I know well
enough; only never mention that dreadful man's name to me, let people
think what they will. I can bear anything but that."
"First promise me never to see him again till he comes like an honest
man and asks you of your father."
"That I promise; nor then, if I can help it. Oh, godmother, how can
you think it of me?"
The good lady shook her head, kissed the sweet mouth uplifted to hers,
and went away muttering, "I suppose all girls are alike, and think it
no harm to keep back their love-secrets. I haven't forgot how it was
with me and Mason. How many times I met him on the sly, and hot
tongues wouldn't have forced me to own it. So, thinking of that, I
needn't be overhard on our Ruthy, who has no mother to set her right,
poor thing."