LOQUITUR HOPKINS.
The squire had been told that his niece Bell had accepted Dr. Crofts,
and he had signified a sort of acquiescence in the arrangement,
saying that if it were to be so, he had nothing to say against Dr.
Crofts. He spoke this in a melancholy tone of voice, wearing on his
face that look of subdued sorrow which was now almost habitual to
him. It was to Mrs. Dale that he spoke on the subject. "I could have
wished that it might have been otherwise," he said, "as you are well
aware. I had family reasons for wishing that it might be otherwise.
But I have nothing to say against it. Dr. Crofts, as her husband,
shall be welcome to my house." Mrs. Dale, who had expected much worse
than this, began to thank him for his kindness, and to say that she
also would have preferred to see her daughter married to her cousin.
"But in such a matter the decision should be left entirely to the
girl. Don't you think so?"
"I have not a word to say against her," he repeated. Then Mrs. Dale
left him, and told her daughter that her uncle's manner of receiving
the news had been, for him, very gracious. "You were his favourite,
but Lily will be so now," said Mrs. Dale.
"I don't care a bit about that;--or, rather, I do care, and think it
will be in every way better. But as I, who am the naughty one, will
go away, and as Lily, who is the good one, will remain with you,
doesn't it almost seem a pity that you should be leaving the house?"
Mrs. Dale thought it was almost a pity, but she could not say so now.
"You think Lily will remain," she said.
"Yes, mamma; I feel sure she will."
"She was always very fond of John Eames;--and he is doing so well."
"It will be of no use, mamma. She is fond of him,--very fond. In a
sort of a way she loves him--so well, that I feel sure she never
mentions his name without some inward reference to her old childish
thoughts and fancies. If he had come before Mr. Crosbie it would
have all been well with her. But she cannot do it now. Her pride
would prevent her, even if her heart permitted it. Oh! dear; it's
very wrong of me to say so, after all that I have said before; but
I almost wish you were not going. Uncle Christopher seems to be
less hard than he used to be; and as I was the sinner, and as I am
disposed of--"
"It is too late now, my dear."
"And we should neither of us have the courage to mention it to Lily,"
said Bell.
On the following morning the squire sent for his sister-in-law, as it
was his wont to do when necessity came for any discussion on matters
of business. This was perfectly understood between them, and such
sending was not taken as indicating any lack of courtesy on the part
of Mr. Dale. "Mary," he said, as soon as Mrs. Dale was seated, "I
shall do for Bell exactly what I have proposed to do for Lily. I had
intended more than that once, of course. But then it would all have
gone into Bernard's pocket; as it is, I shall make no difference
between them. They shall each have a hundred a year,--that is, when
they marry. You had better tell Crofts to speak to me."
"Mr. Dale, he doesn't expect it. He does not expect a penny."
"So much the better for him; and, indeed, so much the better for her.
He won't make her the less welcome to his home because she brings
some assistance to it."
"We have never thought of it,--any of us. The offer has come so
suddenly that I don't know what I ought to say."
"Say--nothing. If you choose to make me a return for it--; but I am
only doing what I conceive to be my duty, and have no right to ask
for a kindness in return."
"But what kindness can we show you, Mr. Dale?"
"Remain in that house." In saying these last words he spoke as though
he were again angry,--as though he were again laying down the law to
them,--as though he were telling her of a duty which was due to him
and incumbent on her. His voice was as stern and his face as acid as
ever. He said that he was asking for a kindness; but surely no man
ever asked for kindness in a voice so peremptory. "Remain in that
house." Then he turned himself in towards his table as though he had
no more to say.
But Mrs. Dale was beginning, now at last, to understand something of
his mind and real character. He could be affectionate and forbearing
in his giving; but when asking, he could not be otherwise than stern.
Indeed, he could not ask; he could only demand.
"We have done so much now," Mrs. Dale began to plead.
"Well, well, well. I did not mean to speak about that. Things are
unpacked easier than they are packed. But, however-- Never mind. Bell
is to go with me this afternoon to Guestwick Manor. Let her be up
here at two. Grimes can bring her box round, I suppose."
"Oh, yes: of course."
"And don't be talking to her about money before she starts. I had
rather you didn't;--you understand. But when you see Crofts, tell him
to come to me. Indeed, he'd better come at once, if this thing is to
go on quickly."
It may easily be understood that Mrs. Dale would disobey the
injunctions contained in the squire's last words. It was quite out
of the question that she should return to her daughters and not
tell them the result of her morning's interview with their uncle.
A hundred a year in the doctor's modest household would make all
the difference between plenty and want, between modest plenty and
endurable want. Of course she told them, giving Bell to understand
that she must dissemble so far as to pretend ignorance of the affair.
"I shall thank him at once," said Bell; "and tell him that I did not
at all expect it, but am not too proud to accept it."
"Pray don't, my dear; not just now. I am breaking a sort of promise
in telling you at all,--only I could not keep it to myself. And he
has so many things to worry him! Though he says nothing about it now,
he has half broken his heart about you and Bernard." Then, too, Mrs.
Dale told the girls what request the squire had just made, and the
manner in which he had made it. "The tone of his voice as he spoke
brought tears into my eyes. I almost wish we had not done anything."
"But, mamma," said Lily, "what difference can it make to him? You
know that our presence near him was always a trouble to him. He never
really wanted us. He liked to have Bell there when he thought that
Bell would marry his pet."
"Don't be unkind, Lily."
"I don't mean to be unkind. Why shouldn't Bernard be his pet? I
love Bernard dearly, and always thought it the best point in uncle
Christopher that he was so fond of him. I knew, you know, that it
was no use. Of course I knew it, as I understood all about--somebody
else. But Bernard is his pet."
"He's fond of you all, in his own way," said Mrs. Dale.
"But is he fond of you?--that's the question," said Lily. "We could
have forgiven him anything done to us, and have put up with any words
he might have spoken to us, because he regards us as children. His
giving a hundred a year to Bell won't make you comfortable in this
house if he still domineers over you. If a neighbour be neighbourly,
near neighbourhood is very nice. But uncle Christopher has not
been neighbourly. He has wanted to be more than an uncle to us, on
condition that he might be less than a brother to you. Bell and I
have always felt that his regard on such terms was not worth having."
"I almost feel that we have been wrong," said Mrs. Dale; "but in
truth I never thought that the matter would be to him one of so much
moment."
When Bell had gone, Mrs. Dale and Lily were not disposed to continue
with much energy the occupation on which they had all been employed
for some days past. There had been life and excitement in the work
when they had first commenced their packing, but now it was grown
wearisome, dull, and distasteful. Indeed so much of it was done that
but little was left to employ them, except those final strappings and
fastenings, and that last collection of odds and ends which could not
be accomplished till they were absolutely on the point of starting.
The squire had said that unpacking would be easier than packing, and
Mrs. Dale, as she wandered about among the hampers and cases, began
to consider whether the task of restoring all the things to their
old places would be very disagreeable. She said nothing of this to
Lily, and Lily herself, whatever might be her thoughts, made no such
suggestion to her mother.
"I think Hopkins will miss us more than any one else," she said.
"Hopkins will have no one to scold."
Just at that moment Hopkins appeared at the parlour window, and
signified his desire for a conference.
"You must come round," said Lily. "It's too cold for the window to
be opened. I always like to get him into the house, because he feels
himself a little abashed by the chairs and tables; or, perhaps, it is
the carpet that is too much for him. Out on the gravel-walks he is
such a terrible tyrant, and in the greenhouse he almost tramples upon
one!"
Hopkins, when he did appear at the parlour door, seemed by his manner
to justify Lily's discretion. He was not at all masterful in his
tone or bearing, and seemed to pay to the chairs and tables all the
deference which they could have expected.
"So you be going in earnest, ma'am," he said, looking down at Mrs.
Dale's feet.
As Mrs. Dale did not answer him at once, Lily spoke:--"Yes, Hopkins,
we are going in a very few days, now. We shall see you sometimes, I
hope, over at Guestwick."
"Humph!" said Hopkins. "So you be really going! I didn't think it'd
ever come to that, miss; I didn't indeed,--and no more it oughtn't;
but of course it isn't for me to speak."
"People must change their residence sometimes, you know," said Mrs.
Dale, using the same argument by which Eames had endeavoured to
excuse his departure to Mrs. Roper.
"Well, ma'am; it ain't for me to say anything. But this I will say,
I've lived here about t' squire's place, man and boy, jist all my
life, seeing I was born here, as you knows, Mrs. Dale; and of all
the bad things I ever see come about the place, this is a sight the
worst."
"Oh, Hopkins!"
"The worst of all, ma'am; the worst of all! It'll just kill t'
squire! There's ne'ery doubt in the world about that. It'll be the
very death of t' old man."
"That's nonsense, Hopkins," said Lily.
"Very well, miss. I don't say but what it is nonsense; only you'll
see. There's Mr. Bernard,--he's gone away; and by all accounts he
never did care very much for the place. They all say he's a-going
to the Hingies. And Miss Bell is going to be married,--which is all
proper, in course; why shouldn't she? And why shouldn't you, too,
Miss Lily?"
"Perhaps I shall, some day, Hopkins."
"There's no day like the present, Miss Lily. And I do say this, that
the man as pitched into him would be the man for my money." This,
which Hopkins spoke in the excitement of the moment, was perfectly
unintelligible to Lily, and Mrs. Dale, who shuddered as she heard
him, said not a word to call for any explanation. "But," continued
Hopkins, "that's all as it may be, Miss Lily, and you be in the hands
of Providence,--as is others."
"Exactly so, Hopkins."
"But why should your mamma be all for going away? She ain't going
to marry no one. Here's the house, and there's she, and there's t'
squire; and why should she be for going away? So much going away all
at once can't be for any good. It's just a breaking up of everything,
as though nothing wasn't good enough for nobody. I never went away,
and I can't abide it."
"Well, Hopkins; it's settled now," said Mrs. Dale, "and I'm afraid it
can't be unsettled."
"Settled;--well. Tell me this: do you expect, Mrs. Dale, that he's to
live there all alone by hisself without any one to say a cross word
to,--unless it be me or Dingles; for Jolliffe's worse than nobody,
he's so mortial cross hisself. Of course he can't stand it. If you
goes away, Mrs. Dale, Mister Bernard, he'll be squire in less than
twelve months. He'll come back from the Hingies, then, I suppose?"
"I don't think my brother-in-law will take it in that way, Hopkins."
"Ah, ma'am, you don't know him,--not as I knows him;--all the ins
and outs and crinks and crannies of him. I knows him as I does the
old apple-trees that I've been a-handling for forty year. There's a
deal of bad wood about them old cankered trees, and some folk say
they ain't worth the ground they stand on; but I know where the
sap runs, and when the fruit-blossom shows itself I know where the
fruit will be the sweetest. It don't take much to kill one of them
old trees,--but there's life in 'm yet if they be well handled."
"I'm sure I hope my brother's life may be long spared to him," said
Mrs. Dale.
"Then don't be taking yourself away, ma'am, into them gashly lodgings
at Guestwick. I says they are gashly for the likes of a Dale. It is
not for me to speak, ma'am, of course. And I only came up now just to
know what things you'd like with you out of the greenhouse."
"Oh, nothing, Hopkins, thank you," said Mrs. Dale.
"He told me to put up for you the best I could pick, and I means to
do it;" and Hopkins, as he spoke, indicated by a motion of his head
that he was making reference to the squire.
"We shan't have any place for them," said Lily.
"I must send a few, miss, just to cheer you up a bit. I fear you'll
be very dolesome there. And the doctor,--he ain't got what you can
call a regular garden, but there is a bit of a place behind."
"But we wouldn't rob the dear old place," said Lily.
"For the matter of that what does it signify? T' squire'll be that
wretched he'll turn sheep in here to destroy the place, or he'll have
the garden ploughed. You see if he don't. As for the place, the place
is clean done for, if you leave it. You don't suppose he'll go and
let the Small House to strangers. T' squire ain't one of that sort
any ways."
"Ah me!" exclaimed Mrs. Dale, as soon as Hopkins had taken himself
off.
"What is it, mamma? He's a dear old man, but surely what he says
cannot make you really unhappy."
"It is so hard to know what one ought to do. I did not mean to be
selfish, but it seems to me as though I were doing the most selfish
thing in the world."
"Nay, mamma; it has been anything but selfish. Besides, it is we that
have done it; not you."
"Do you know, Lily, that I also have that feeling as to breaking
up one's old mode of life of which Hopkins spoke. I thought that I
should be glad to escape from this place, but now that the time has
come I dread it."
"Do you mean that you repent?"
Mrs. Dale did not answer her daughter at once, fearing to commit
herself by words which could not be retracted. But at last she said,
"Yes, Lily; I think I do repent. I think that it has not been well
done."
"Then let it be undone," said Lily.
The dinner-party at Guestwick Manor on that day was not very bright,
and yet the earl had done all in his power to make his guests happy.
But gaiety did not come naturally to his house, which, as will have
been seen, was an abode very unlike in its nature to that of the
other earl at Courcy Castle. Lady De Courcy at any rate understood
how to receive and entertain a house full of people, though the
practice of doing so might give rise to difficult questions in the
privacy of her domestic relations. Lady Julia did not understand it;
but then Lady Julia was never called upon to answer for the expense
of extra servants, nor was she asked about twice a week who
the ---- was to pay the wine-merchant's bill? As regards Lord De
Guest and the Lady Julia themselves, I think they had the best of it;
but I am bound to admit, with reference to chance guests, that the
house was dull. The people who were now gathered at the earl's table
could hardly have been expected to be very sprightly when in company
with each other. The squire was not a man much given to general
society, and was unused to amuse a table full of people. On the
present occasion he sat next to Lady Julia, and from time to time
muttered a few words to her about the state of the country. Mrs.
Eames was terribly afraid of everybody there, and especially of the
earl, next to whom she sat, and whom she continually called "my
lord," showing by her voice as she did so that she was almost alarmed
by the sound of her own voice. Mr. and Mrs. Boyce were there, the
parson sitting on the other side of Lady Julia, and the parson's wife
on the other side of the earl. Mrs. Boyce was very studious to show
that she was quite at home, and talked perhaps more than any one
else; but in doing so she bored the earl most exquisitely, so that he
told John Eames the next morning that she was worse than the bull.
The parson ate his dinner, but said little or nothing between the two
graces. He was a heavy, sensible, slow man, who knew himself and his
own powers. "Uncommon good stewed beef," he said, as he went home;
"why can't we have our beef stewed like that?" "Because we don't pay
our cook sixty pounds a year," said Mrs. Boyce. "A woman with sixteen
pounds can stew beef as well as a woman with sixty," said he; "she
only wants looking after." The earl himself was possessed of a sort
of gaiety. There was about him a lightness of spirit which often made
him an agreeable companion to one single person. John Eames conceived
him to be the most sprightly old man of his day,--an old man with the
fun and frolic almost of a boy. But this spirit, though it would show
itself before John Eames, was not up to the entertainment of John
Eames's mother and sister, together with the squire, the parson, and
the parson's wife of Allington. So that the earl was overweighted and
did not shine on this occasion at his own dinner-table. Dr. Crofts,
who had also been invited, and who had secured the place which was
now peculiarly his own, next to Bell Dale, was no doubt happy enough;
as, let us hope, was the young lady also; but they added very little
to the general hilarity of the company. John Eames was seated between
his own sister and the parson, and did not at all enjoy his position.
He had a full view of the doctor's felicity, as the happy pair sat
opposite to him, and conceived himself to be hardly treated by Lily's
absence.
The party was certainly very dull, as were all such dinners at
Guestwick Manor. There are houses, which, in their every-day course,
are not conducted by any means in a sad or unsatisfactory manner,--in
which life, as a rule, runs along merrily enough; but which cannot
give a dinner-party; or, I might rather say, should never allow
themselves to be allured into the attempt. The owners of such houses
are generally themselves quite aware of the fact, and dread the
dinner which they resolved to give quite as much as it is dreaded
by their friends. They know that they prepare for their guests an
evening of misery, and for themselves certain long hours of purgatory
which are hardly to be endured. But they will do it. Why that long
table, and all those supernumerary glasses and knives and forks,
if they are never to be used? That argument produces all this
misery; that and others cognate to it. On the present occasion,
no doubt, there were excuses to be made. The squire and his niece
had been invited on special cause, and their presence would have
been well enough. The doctor added in would have done no harm. It
was good-natured, too, that invitation given to Mrs. Eames and her
daughter. The error lay in the parson and his wife. There was no
necessity for their being there, nor had they any ground on which to
stand, except the party-giving ground. Mr. and Mrs. Boyce made the
dinner-party, and destroyed the social circle. Lady Julia knew that
she had been wrong as soon as she had sent out the note.
Nothing was said on that evening which has any bearing on our story.
Nothing, indeed, was said which had any bearing on anything. The
earl's professed object had been to bring the squire and young Eames
together; but people are never brought together on such melancholy
occasions. Though they sip their port in close contiguity, they are
poles asunder in their minds and feelings. When the Guestwick fly
came for Mrs. Eames, and the parson's pony phaeton came for him and
Mrs. Boyce, a great relief was felt; but the misery of those who were
left had gone too far to allow of any reaction on that evening. The
squire yawned, and the earl yawned, and then there was an end of it
for that night.