Maria Young's lodging at the farrier's had one advantage over many
better dwellings;--it was pleasanter in Winter than in Summer. There
was little to find fault with in the tiny sitting-room after candles
were lighted. The fire burned clear in the grate; and when the screen
was up, there were no draughts. This screen was quite a modern
improvement. When Fanny and Mary Grey had experienced the pleasure of
surprising Sophia with a token of sisterly affection, in the shape of a
piece of India-rubber, and their mother with a token of filial
affection, in the form of a cotton-box, they were unwilling to stop, and
looked round to see whether they could not present somebody with a token
of some other sort of affection. Sophia was taken into their counsels;
and she, being aware of how Miss Young's candle flared when the wind was
high, devised this screen. The carpenter made the frame; Sydney covered
it with canvas and black paper for a ground; and the little girls pasted
on it all the drawings and prints they could muster. Here was the
Dargle, an everlasting waterfall, that looked always the same in the
sunny-coloured print. There was Morland's Woodcutter, with his tall
figure, his pipe, his dog, and his faggot, with the snow lying all
around him. Two or three cathedrals were interspersed; and, in the
midst of them, and larger than any of them, a silhouette of Mr Grey,
with the eyelash wonderfully like, and the wart upon his nose not to be
mistaken. Then there was Charles the First taking leave of his family;
and, on either side of this, an evening primrose in water-colours, by
Mary, and a head of Terror, with a square mouth and starting eyes, in
crayon, by Fanny. Mrs Grey produced some gay border which the
paper-hanger had left over when the attics were last furnished; and
Sydney cut out in white paper a huntsman with his whip in the air, a
fox, a gate, and two hounds. Mr Grey pleaded, that, having contributed
his face, he had done all that could be expected of him: nevertheless,
he brought home one day, on his return from market, a beautiful Stream
of Time, which made the children dance round their screen. It was
settled at first that this would nobly ornament the whole of one side;
but it popped into Sydney's head, just as he was falling asleep one
night, how pretty it would be to stick it round with the planets. So
the planets were cut out in white, and shaded with Indian ink. There
was no mistaking Saturn with his ring, or Jupiter with his moons. At
length, all was done, and the cook was glad to hear that no more paste
would be wanted, and the little girls might soon leave off giggling when
Miss Young asked them, in the schoolroom, why they were jogging one
another's elbows. Mr Grey spared one of his men to deposit the
precious piece of handiwork at Miss Young's lodging; and there, when she
went home one cold afternoon, she found the screen standing between the
fire and the door, and, pinned on it, a piece of paper, inscribed, "A
Token of friendly Affection."
This was not, however, the only, nor the first, gift with which Maria's
parlour was enriched. Amidst all the bustle of furnishing the Hopes'
house, Margaret had found time to plan and execute a window-curtain for
her friend's benefit; and another person--no other than Philip Enderby--
had sent in a chaise-longue, just the right size to stand between the
fire and the table. It had gone hard with Maria to accept this last
gift; but his nephew and nieces were Philip's plea of excuse for the
act; and this plea cut her off from refusing: though in her heart she
believed that neither the children nor ancient regard were in his
thoughts when he did it, but rather Margaret's affection for her. For
some time, this chaise-longue was a couch of thorns; but now affairs had
put on a newer aspect still, and Maria forgot her own perplexities and
troubles in sympathy with her friend.
There was nothing to quarrel with in the look of the chaise-longue, when
Margaret entered Maria's room in the twilight, in the afternoon of the
appointed Thursday.
"Reading by fire-light?" said Margaret.
"I suppose I am: but it had not occurred to me--the daylight went away
so softly. Six o'clock, I declare! The days _are_ lengthening, as we
say every year. But we will have something better than firelight, if
you will be so kind as to set those candles on the table."
The time was long put when Maria thought of apologising for asking her
friend to do what her lameness rendered painful to herself. Margaret
laid aside her bonnet and cloak behind the screen, lighted the candles,
put more coals on the fire, and took her seat--not beside Maria, but in
a goodly armchair, which she drew forward from its recess.
"Now," said she, "we only want a cat to be purring on the rug to make us
a complete winter picture. The kettle will be coming soon to sing on
the hob: and that will do nearly as well. But, Maria, I wonder _you_
have no cat. We have set up a cat. I think I will send you a kitten,
some day, as a token of neighbourly affection."
"Thank you. Do you know, I was positively assured lately that I had a
cat? I said all I could in proof that I had none; but Mrs Tucker
persisted in her inquiries after its health, notwithstanding."
"What did she mean?"
"She said she saw a kitten run into the passage, and that it never came
out again: so that it followed of course that it must be here still.
One day, when I was in school, she came over to satisfy herself; and
true enough, there had been a kitten. The poor thing jumped from the
passage window into the yard, and went to see what they were about at
the forge. A hot horse-shoe fell upon its back, and it mewed so
dolefully that the people drowned it. So there you have the story of my
cat, as it was told to me."
"Thank you, it is a good thing to know. But what does Mrs Grey say to
your setting up a cat?"
"When she heard Mrs Tucker's first inquiries, she took them for an
imputation, and was vexed accordingly. `Miss Young!' said she, `You
must be mistaken, Mrs Tucker. Miss Young cannot afford to keep a
kitten!'"
"Oh, for shame!" said Margaret, laughing. "But what is the annual
expense of a kitten--can you tell us? I am afraid we never considered
that."
"Why, there is the breast of a fowl, once a year or so, when your cook
forgets to shut the larder-door behind her. Cats never take the
drumsticks when there is a breast, you are aware. You know best how Mr
Hope looks, when the drumsticks and side bones come to table, with an
empty space in the middle of the dish where the breast ought to have
been."
"I will tell you, the first time it happens." And Margaret sank into an
absent fit, brought on by the bare suggestion of discontent at home.
Hester had made her uncomfortable, the last thing before she left the
house, by speaking sharply of Maria, without any fresh provocation.
Undisciplined still by what had happened so lately, she had wished Maria
Young a hundred miles off. Margaret meditated and sighed. It was some
time before Maria spoke. When she did, she said:
"Margaret, do not you think people had better not persuade themselves
and their very intimate friends that they are happy when they are not?"
"They had better not think, even in their own innermost minds, whether
they are happy or not, if they can help it."
"True: but there are times when that is impossible--when it is far
better to avoid the effort. Come--I suspect we may relieve each other
just now, by allowing the truth. I will own, if you will, that I am
very unhappy to-night. Never mind what it is about."
"I will, if you will," replied Margaret, faintly smiling.
"There now, that's right! We shall be all the better for it. We have
quite enough of seeming happy, God knows, beyond these doors. We can
talk there about kittens and cold fowl. Here we will not talk at all,
unless we like; and we will each groan as much as we please."
"I am sorry to hear you speak so," said Margaret, tenderly. "Not that I
do not agree with you. I think it is a terrible mistake to fancy that
it is religious to charm away grief, which, after all, is rejecting it
before it has done its work; and, as for concealing it, there must be
very good reasons indeed for that, to save it from being hypocrisy. But
the more I agree with you, the more sorry I am to hear you say just what
I was thinking. I am afraid you must be very unhappy, Maria."
"I'm in great pain to-night; and I do not find that pain becomes less of
an evil by one's being used to it. Indeed, I think the reverse happens;
for the future comes into the consideration."
"Do you expect to go on to suffer this same pain? Can nothing cure it?
Is there no help?"
"None, but in patience. There are intermissions, happily, and pretty
long ones. I get through the summer very well; but the end of the
winter--this same month of February--is a sad aching time; and so it
must be for as many winters as I may have to live. But I am better off
than I was. Last February I did not know you. Oh, Margaret, if they
had not brought you up from under the ice, the other day, how different
would all have been to-night!"
"How strange it seems to think of the difference that hung on that one
act!" said Margaret, shivering again at the remembrance of her icy
prison. "What, and where, should I have been now? And what would have
been the change in this little world of ours? You would have missed me,
I know; and on that account I am glad it ended as it did."
"And on no other?" asked Maria, looking earnestly at her friend.
"My sister would have grieved sadly at first--you do not know what care
she takes of me--how often she is thinking of my comfort. And Edward is
fond of me too: I know he is; but they live for each other, and could
spare every one else. You and Morris would have been my mourners, and
you two are enough to live for."
"To say nothing of others who may arise."
"I hope nothing more will arise in my life, Maria. I want no change. I
have had enough of it."
"You think so now. I understand your feeling very well. But yet I can
fancy that when you are twice as old as you are--when a few grey hairs
peep out among all that brown--when this plump little hand grows thin,
and that girlish figure of yours looks dignified and middle-aged, and
people say that nobody thought when you were young that you would turn
out a handsome woman--I can fancy that when all this has happened, you
may be more disposed to look forward, and less disinclined to change,
than you feel at this moment. But there is no use in saying so now.
You shake your head, and I nod mine. You say, `No,' and I say, `Yes,'
and there is an end of it."
"Where will you be then, I wonder?"
"I do not wish to know, nor even to inquire of my own judgment. My
health is very bad--worse than you are aware of. I cannot expect to be
able to work always; some of my present pupils are growing very tall;
and no strangers will take me if I do not get much better; which is, I
believe, impossible. The future, therefore, is all a mystery; and so
let it remain. I am not anxious about that."
"But I am."
"Here comes tea. Now you will be doing a finer thing in making us a
good cup of tea, than in settling my future ever so satisfactorily--
seeing that you cannot touch it with so much as your little finger. The
tea is wholly in your power."
"You look forward to other people's grey hair and sedateness of face,
though you will not to your own."
"Mere grey hair is as certain as futurity itself; and I will allow you
to prophesy that much for me or for anybody."
"Why should we not prophesy about your pupils too? They seem to be
improving very much."
"They certainly are; and I am glad you have lighted upon the pleasantest
subject I ever think about. Oh, Margaret, you do not know what
encouragement I have about some of those children! Their lot is and
will be a hard one, in many respects. It will be difficult for them to
grow kindly, and liberal, and truthful, with such examples as they have
before their eyes. They advance like the snail on the wall, creeping
three inches on in the day, and falling back two at night. They get out
of a pretty mood of mind in the morning, and expand and grow interested
in things out of Deerbrook; and then, in the evening, the greater part
of this is undone, and they go to bed with their heads full of small,
vile notions about their neighbours."
"And when they grow too wise to have their heads so filled, their hearts
will be heavy for those who are not rising like themselves."
"That is unavoidable, and they must bear the sorrow. We must hope that
they will disperse from Deerbrook, and find their way into a more genial
society than they can ever know here. I must keep the confidence of my
children sacred even from you, Margaret: but you may believe me when I
tell you, that if you knew all that we have to say to one another, you
would find some of these children animated with really noble thoughts,
and capable of really generous acts."
"`Some of them.' Mary, in particular, I venture to conjecture to be in
your thoughts."
"Yes: Mary in particular; but she had always a more gentle and generous
temper than her sisters. Fanny, however, is improving remarkably."
"I am delighted to hear it, and I had begun to suspect it. Fanny, I
observe, lays fewer informations than she did; and there is more of
thought, and less of a prying expression, in her face. She is really
growing more like Mary in countenance. The little Rowlands--the younger
ones--seem simple enough; but Matilda, what a disagreeable child she
is!"
"The most that can be done with her is to leave her only a poor
creature--to strip her of the conceit and malice with which her mother
would overlay her feeble intellect. This sounds deplorably enough; but,
as parents will not speak the plain truth to themselves about their
charge, governesses must. There is, perhaps, little better material in
Fanny: but I trust we may one day see her more lowly than she can at
present relish the idea of being, and with energy enough to improve
under the discipline of life, when she can no longer have that of
school. She and Mary have been acknowledging to-day a fine piece of
experience. Mr Grey is pleased with their great Improvement in Latin.
He finds they can read, with ease and pleasure, some favourite classical
scraps which he used to talk about without exciting any interest in
them. They honestly denied having devoted any more time to Latin than
before, or having taken any more pains; and no new methods have been
tried. Here was a mystery. To-day they have solved it. They find that
all is owing to their getting up earlier in the morning to teach those
little orphans, the Woods, to read and sew."
"Not a very circuitous process," said Margaret; "love and kind interest,
energy and improvement--whether in Latin or anything else. But what did
you mean just now about truth? What should make the Greys otherwise
than truthful?"
"Oh, not the Greys! I was thinking of the other family when I said
that. But that is a large subject: let us leave it till after tea.
Will you give me another cup?"
"Now; shall we begin upon our large subject?" said she, as the door
closed behind the tea-tray and kettle, and Margaret handed her her
work-bag.
"I am aware that I asked for it," replied Margaret; "but it is a
disagreeable topic, and perhaps we had better avoid it."
"You will take me for a Deerbrook person, if I say we will go into it,
will not you?"
"Oh, no: you have a reason, I see. So, why should not the little
Rowlands be truthful?"
"Because they have so perpetual an example of falsehood before them at
home. I have made some painful discoveries there lately."
"Is it possible you did not know that woman long ago?"
"I knew her obvious qualities, which there is no need to specify: but
the depth of her untruth is a new fact to me."
"Are you sure of it, now?"
"Quite sure of it in some particulars, and strongly suspecting it in
others. Do not tell your sister anything of what I am going to say,
unless you find it necessary for the direction of her conduct. Let your
disclosures be rather to Mr Hope. That is settled, is it? Well, Mrs
Rowland's ruling passion just now is hatred to your household."
"I suspected as much. But--the untruth."
"Wait a little. She dislikes you, all and severally."
"What, my brother?"
"Oh, yes; for marrying into the Grey connection so decidedly. Did you
ever hear that before?"