“Are you quite warm there, Agatha?”
“Yes, thank you, quite warm,” she said, turning round a little, and then
turning back. She sat working, or seeming to work, at a large bay window
that fronted the sea at Brighton. Already there had come over her the
slight but unmistakable change which indicates the wife--the girl no
longer. She had been married just one week.
Her husband sat at a table writing, as was his habit during the middle
of the day, in order that they might walk out in the evening. He had
often been thus busy during the week, even though it was the first week
of the honeymoon.
The honeymoon! How different the word now sounded to Agatha! Yet she had
nothing to complain of. Mr. Harper was very kind; watchful and tender
over her to a degree which she felt even more than she saw. In the
mornings he read to her, or talked, chiefly upon subjects higher and
withal pleasanter than Agatha had ever heard talked of before; in the
evenings they drove out or walked, till far into the starry summer
night. They were together constantly, there never passed between them a
quick or harsh word, and yet--
Agatha vainly tried to solve the dim, cloudy “yet” which had no tangible
form, and only arose now that the first bewilderment of her changed
existence was settling into reality, and she was beginning to recognise
herself as Agatha Harper, no longer a girl, but a married woman. The
sole conclusion she could come to was, that she must be now learning
what she supposed every one had to learn--that a honeymoon is not quite
the dream of bliss which young people believe in, and that few married
couples are quite happy during the first year of their union.
And Mrs. Harper (or Mrs. Locke Harper, as her husband had had printed on
the cards, omitting the name which she had once stigmatised as “ugly,”)
was probably not altogether wide of the truth, though in this case
she judged from mistaken because individual evidence. It is next to
impossible that two lives, unless assimilated by strong attachment and
rare outward circumstances, if suddenly thrown together, should at once
mingle and flow harmoniously on. It takes time, and the influence of
perfect love, to melt and fuse the two currents into one beautiful
whole. Perhaps, did all young lovers believe and prepare for this, there
would be fewer disappointed and unhappy marriages.
Though sitting at the open window, with the sharp sea-breeze blowing
in upon her--it happened to be a sunless and gloomy day--Agatha had
answered that she was “quite warm.” Nevertheless her heart felt cold.
Not positively sad, yet void. A great deal of passionate devotion is
necessary to make two active human beings content with one another's
sole company for eight entire days, having nothing to occupy them but
each other.
Wanting this--yet scarcely conscious of her need--the young wife sat, in
her secret soul all shivering and a-cold. At last, wearied with the long
grey sweep of undulating sea, she closed the window.
“I thought the breeze would be too keen for you,” said Mr. Harper, whom
her lightest movement always seemed to attract.
“Oh no; but I am tired of watching the waves. How melancholy it must be
to live here. I have a perfect terror of the sea.”
“Had I known that, I would not have proposed our coming to-day from
Leamington to Brighton. But we can leave to-morrow.”
“I did not mean that,” she answered quickly, dreading lest her husband
might have thought her speech ungracious or unkind. “We need not
go--unless you wish it.”
The bridegroom made no immediate reply: but there was a melancholy
tenderness in his eyes, as, without her knowing it, he sat watching his
young wife. At length he rose, and putting her arm in his, stood a long
time with her at the window.
“I think, dear Agatha, that you are right. The sea is always sad. How
dreary it looks now--like a wide-stretched monotonous life whose ending
we see not, yet it must be crossed. How shall we cross it?”
Agatha looked inquiringly.
“The sea I mean,” he continued, with a sudden change of tone. “Shall we
go over to France for a week or two?”
“Oh no”--and she shuddered. “It would kill me to cross the water.”
He looked surprised at her unaccountable repugnance, which she had
scarcely expressed than she seemed overpowered by confusion. Her husband
forbore to question her further; but the next day told her that he had
arranged for their quitting Brighton and making a tour through the west
of England, proceeding from thence to London.
“Where--as my brother, or rather my brother's solicitor, writes me
word--some business about your fortune will require our return in
another fortnight. Are you willing, Agatha?”
“Oh yes--quite willing,” she cried; for now that her changed life was
floating her far away from her old ties, she began to have a yearning
for them all.
So the honeymoon dwindled to three weeks, at the close of which Mr. and
Mrs. Locke Harper were again in London.
It seemed very strange to Agatha to come back to the known places, and
roll over the old familiar London stones, and see all things going on as
usual; while in herself had come so wide a gap of existence, as if those
one-and-twenty days of absence had been one-and-twenty years.
She had become a little more happy lately; a little more used to her new
life. And day by day something undefinable began to draw her towards
her husband. It was in fact the dawning spirit of love, which should
and might have come before marriage, instead of being, as now, an
after-growth. Beneath its influence Nathanael's very likeness altered;
his face grew more beautiful, his voice softer. Looking at him now, as
he sat by her side, Mr. Harper hardly appeared to her the same man who,
returning from the church as her bridegroom, had impressed her with such
shrinking awe.
He too was more cheerful. All the long railway journey he had tried to
amuse her; the humorous half of his disposition--for Nathanael had, like
most good men, a spice of humour about him--coming out as it had never
done before. However, as they neared London, he as well as his wife had
become rather grave. But when, abruptly turning round, he perceived
her earnestly, even tenderly regarding him (at which Agatha was foolish
enough to blush, as if it were a crime to be looking admiringly at one's
husband), he melted into a smile.
“Here we are in the old quarters, Agatha. The question is, Where shall
we go to, since we have no lodgings taken?”
“You should have let me write to Emma, as I wished.”
“No,” he said, shortly; “it was a pity to trouble her.”
“She would not have thought it so, poor dear Emma.”
“Were you very intimate with Mrs. Thornycroft? Did you tell her
everything in your heart, as women do?”
Agatha was amused by the jealous searching tone and look, so replied
carelessly: “Oh yes, all I had to tell, which was not much. I don't
deal in mysteries, nor like them. But the chief mystery now seems to be,
where are we to go? If Emma may not be troubled, surely Mrs. Ianson, or
your brother”--
“My brother is out of town.”
“Indeed!” And Agatha looked as she felt, neither glad nor sorry, but
purely indifferent. Her husband, observing it, became more cheerful.
“Nay, my dear Agatha, you shall not be inconvenienced. We will go first
to some quiet lodgings I know of, where Anne Valery always stays
when she is in London--though she has returned home now, I think. And
afterwards, if you find the evening very dull”--
“Ah!” exclaimed the young wife, smiling a beautiful negative.
“We will go and take a sentimental walk through those very squares we
strolled through that night--do you remember?”
“Yes!”
How strange seemed that recollection!--how little she had then thought
she was walking with her future husband!
Yet, when a few hours after she trod the well-known streets, with her
wifely feelings, sweet and grave, and thought that the arm on which she
now leaned was her own through life, Agatha Harper was not unhappy, nor
would she for one moment have wished to be again Agatha Bowen.
The next day, by the husband's express desire--the declaring of which
was a great act of self-denial on his part--word was sent to the
Thornycrofts of the arrival of Mr. and Mrs. Locke Harper.
Very trembling, shy, and bewitching the bride sat, waiting for the
meeting; and when Emma did really come, very tragico-comic, half
pleasure, half tears, was the hearty embrace between the two women. Mr.
Harper stood and looked on--he played the young husband as composedly
as he had done the lover and the bridegroom, except for a slight jealous
movement as he saw the clinging, the kisses, the tears, which, with
the warmth of a heart thrilled by new emotions and budding out into all
manner of new tendernesses, Agatha lavished on her friend.
Yet, whatever he felt, no one could observe but that Nathanael was
extremely polite and kind to Mrs. Thornycroft. She on her part admired
him extremely--in whispers.
“How well he looks! Really quite changed! No one would ever think of
calling him a 'boy' now. You must be quite proud of your husband, my
dear.”
Agatha smiled, and a light thrill at her heart betrayed its answer.
Very soon she ceased to be shy and shame-faced, and sat talking quite at
ease, as if she had been Mrs. Locke Harper for at least a year.
Emma Thornycroft was a person not likely to waste much time on
the sentimentalities of such a meeting; she soon dashed into the
common-sense question of what were their plans in London? and when they
would come and dine with herself and “James” “Quite friendly. We will
ask no one, except of course Major Harper.”
“He is out of town,” said Nathanael.
“What a pity--Yet, no wonder; London is so terribly hot now. Is he quite
well?”
“I believe so,” Agatha answered for her husband, who had moved off.
“Because James has met him frequently of late, rushing about the City as
pale as a ghost, and looking so miserable. We were afraid something was
wrong with him.”
“Oh, I hope not,” exclaimed Agatha, eagerly.
“My brother is quite well,” Mr. Harper again observed, from his outpost
by the window; and something in his tone unconsciously checked and
changed the conversation.
Whether by Agatha's real inclination, or by some unnoticed influence of
Nathanael's, who, gentle as his manners were, through a score of
other opposing wills seemed always silently to attain his own, Mrs.
Thornycroft's hospitable schemes were overruled. At least, the
_venue_ was changed from Regent's Park to the Harpers' own temporary
home--where, as if by magic, a multitude of small luxuries had already
gathered round the young wife. She took all quite naturally, never
pausing to think how they came.
It was with a trepidation which had yet its pleasure, that she arrayed
herself for this, the first time of her taking her place at the head of
her husband's table. She put on a high white gown, which Mr. Harper had
once said he liked--she was beginning to be anxious over her dress and
appearance now. Glancing into the mirror, there recurred to her mind
a speech she had once heard from some foolish matron--“Oh, it does not
signify what I wear, or how I look--I'm married!” Agatha thought what a
very wrong doctrine that was! and laughed at herself for never having
much cared to seem pleasing until she had some one to please. Nay, now
for the first time she grumbled at the Pawnee-face, wishing it had been
fairer!
But fair or not, when it came timidly and shone over Nathanael's
shoulder, he sitting leaning thoughtfully on his hand, the result was
such as materially to relieve any womanly doubts about her personal
appearance. He kissed her in unwonted smiling tenderness.
“I like that dress; and your curls--softly touching them--your curls
fall so prettily. How well you look, Agatha! Happy, too! Is it really
so? Are you getting more used to me and my faults, dear?” There was
something inexpressibly tender in the way he said “Dear,” the only
caressing word he ever used.
“Your faults?” re-echoed she in a merry incredulous tone. But before she
could say more, the guests most inopportunely arrived. And Agatha, very
naturally, darted from her husband to the other side of the room like a
flash of lightning.
If the Thornycrofts had expected to find a couple of turtle-doves cooing
in a cage, they were certainly disappointed. Mr. and Mrs. Locke Harper
had apparently settled down into an ordinary husband and wife, resuming
serenely their place in society, and behaving towards each other, and
the world in general, just like sensible old married people. Their
friends, taking the hint, treated them in like manner; and thus, now and
for ever, vanished Agatha's honeymoon.
After dinner, Emma, anxious about Agatha's proceedings, and still more
anxious to have a hand in the same, for she was never happy unless busy
about her own or other people's affairs, made inquiries as to the future
plans of the young couple.
Agatha could give no answer, for, to her great thankfulness, her husband
had hitherto avoided the subject. She looked at him for a reply.
“I think, Mrs. Thornycroft, it will probably be three months before
I”--he smilingly corrected himself, and said “_we_ return to Canada.”
“Then what do you intend to do meanwhile? Of course, Agatha dear, you
will remain in London?”
“Oh yes,” she replied, accustomed to decide for herself, and forgetting
at the moment that there was now another to whose decision she was bound
to defer. Blushing, she looked towards her husband, who was talking to
Mr. Thornycroft. He turned, as indeed he always did when he heard her
speaking; but he made no remark, and the “Yes” passed as their mutual
assent to Emma's question.
“I know a place that would just suit you,” pursued the latter; “that is,
if you take a furnished house.”
“I should like it much.”
“It is but a cottage--rather small, considering your means; by-the-by,
Agatha, how close our friend the Major kept all your affairs. No one
imagined you were so rich.”
“Neither did I, most certainly. But--the cottage.”
“The prettiest little place imaginable. Such a love of a drawing-room!
I went there to call on young Northen's sister when she married, last
year. Poor thing--sad affair that, my dear.”
“Indeed,” said Agatha, who now felt an interest in all stories of
marriages.
“It happened a fortnight ago, soon after your wedding. They
quarrelled--she got through a window, and ran away home to her father.
It seems she had never cared a straw for her husband, but had married
him out of spite, liking some one else better all the time. His own
brother, too, they say.”
“What a wicked--wicked thing!” cried Agatha warmly. So warmly, that she
did not see, close by her chair, her husband--watching her intently,
nay wildly. As she ceased, he rose from his stooping attitude. His
countenance became wonderfully beautiful, altogether glowing.
“Really you seem to have comprehended the matter at once,” said Mr.
Thornycroft, startled in the winding-up of a long harangue about the
Corn Laws by the exceedingly bright look which his hearer turned towards
him.
“Yes, I think I shall soon comprehend everything,” was the answer, as
Mr. Harper placed himself on the arm of his wife's chair in the gay
attitude of a very boy. She, moving a little, made room for him and
smiled. Nay, she even leant silently against his arm, which he had
thrown round the back of her chair.
“Come, Agatha, I want to hear about that wonderful house which your
friend is persuading you to take. You know, I happen to have a little
concern in the matter likewise. Have I not, Mr. Thornycroft?”
“Certainly; since you have turned out to be that no less wonderful
personage which my wife has been perpetually boring me about for the
last two years--Agatha's Husband,” said Mr. Thornycroft, patiently
resigning the Corn Laws to their inevitable doom--oblivion.
But Emma, plunging gladly into her native element, discussed the whole
house from attic to kitchen. Mr. Harper listened with a complaisant and
amused look. Beginning to discern the sterling good there was in the
little woman, he passed over her harmless small-mindedness; knowing well
that in the wide-built mansion of human nature there must be always a
certain order of beings honourable, useful, and excellent in themselves,
to form the basement-story.
The twilight darkened while Emma talked, the faster perhaps that her
“James,” whose respected presence always restrained her tongue, was
discovered to be undeniably asleep. But the young couple were excellent
listeners. Nathanael still sat balancing himself on the arm of his
wife's chair; his hand having dropped playfully among her curls. He
joined with gaiety in all the discussions. More than once, in talking of
the various arrangements of their new household, his voice faltered, and
the hearts of the husband and wife seemed trembling towards one another.
The conversation ended in Emma's receiving _carte-blanche_ to take the
house, if practicable, that the Harpers might settle there for three
months certain.
“Come, this is better than I expected,” cried the worthy little woman.
“We shall be neighbours, and I can teach Agatha house-keeping. She
will have a nice little _ménage_, and can give a proper 'At Home' and
charming wedding parties. Shall she not, Mr. Harper?”
“If she wishes.”
But Agatha's whispered “No,” and kind pressure of the hand, brought to
him a most blissful conviction that she did _not_ wish, and that she
would be, as she said, “happier living quietly at home.” _Home_! what a
word of promise that sounded in both their ears!
When the lights came, Mr. Thornycroft woke up; with many apologies, poor
man; only, as his wife said, “Everybody knew how hard James worked, and
how tired he was at night.” The two gentlemen fraternised once more.
They began one of those general arguments on the history of the times,
which when spoken, are intensely interesting, and being written as
intensely prosy. The ladies listened in a most wife-like and pleased
submission.
“How well my husband talks--doesn't he?” whispered Emma, with sparkling
eyes.
Agatha agreed, and indeed Mr. Thornycroft's strong sense and acute
judgment were patent to every one. But when Mr. Harper spoke, his
clear views on every point, his trenchant but pleasant wit, by which
he rounded off the angularities of argument, and above all his keen,
far-seeing intellect, which dived into wondrous depths of knowledge, and
invariably brought something precious to light--these things were to the
young wife a positive revelation.
She sat attentive, beginning to learn, what strange to say was no
pain--her own ignorance, and her husband's superior wisdom. She had
never before felt at once so humble and so proud.
When the Thornycrofts departed, and Mr. Harper returned up-stairs from
bidding them good-bye, he found his wife in a thoughtful mood.
“Well, dear, have you had a pleasant evening? Are you content with our
plans?”
“Yes--indeed, more so than I deserve. Oh, how good you are!” she
whispered; and her shortcomings towards him grew into a great burden of
regret.
“Hush!” he answered, smiling; “we will not begin discussing one
another's goodness, or you know the subject would be interminable. And
I would like us to hold a little serious consultation before to-morrow.
You are not sleepy?”
“No.”
“Stretch yourself out on the sofa, and let me sit beside you. There--are
you quite comfortable?”
“Ah, yes,” she said, and thought for the hundredth time how sweet it was
to have some one to take care of her.
“Now, my wife, listen! You seemed to long for that cottage very much,
and you shall have it. Nay, you ought, because at present you are the
rich lady; while I, so long as I remain in England, receive none of my
salary from Montreal, and am, comparatively speaking, poor. In fact,
nothing but that very secondary character, Agatha's Husband.'”
Though he laughed, there was a little jarring tone in this confession;
but Agatha was too simple to notice it. He continued quickly,
“Nevertheless, this question is only temporary; I shall be quite your
equal in Canada.”
“In Canada!” she echoed dolefully. “Oh, surely--surely we need not go?”
“Are you in earnest, Agatha?”
“I am indeed,” said she, gathering up courage to speak to him of what
ever since her marriage had been growing an inexpressible dread.
“Why so?”
“I--I am afraid to tell.”
“Shall I tell you? You cannot bear to leave your old friends? You fear
to go into a new country, entirely among strangers, with only your
husband?”
His suddenly suspicious tone stopped the frank denial that was bursting
to his wife's lips. She only said a little hurt, “If that were true, I
would have told you. I always speak exactly what I think.”
“Is it so? is it indeed so?” he cried, with a lightening of countenance
as sudden as its shade. “Oh, Agatha, forgive me,” and his heart
seemed melting before her. “I am not good to you--but you do not quite
understand me yet.”
“I feel that. Yet what can I do?”
“Nothing! Only wait I will try to cure myself without paining you. But,
for the sake of our whole life's happiness, henceforward always be open
with me, Agatha! Don't hide from me anything! Set your frank goodness
against my wicked suspiciousness, and make me ashamed of myself, as
now.”
He had not spoken so freely or with so much emotion since they were
married; and his wife was deeply touched. She made no answer, but half
raising herself, crept to his arms, almost as if she loved him. So she
truly did, in a measure, though not with the spontaneous, self-existent
love, which, once lit in a woman's breast, is like the central
fire hidden in the earth's bosom, enduring through all surface
variations--through summer and winter, earthquakes, floods, and
storms--utterly unchangeable and indestructible. And, however wildly
extravagant this simile may sound--however rare the fact it illustrates,
nevertheless such Love is a great truth, possible and probable, which
has existed and may exist--thank God for it!--to prove that He did not
found the poetry of all humanity upon a beautiful deceit.
Something of this mystery was beginning to stir in the wife's heart;
the girl-wife, married before her character was half formed--before
the perfecting of real love, which, taking, as all feelings must, the
impress of individual nature, was in her of slow development.
As Agatha lay, her head hidden on her husband's shoulder, guessing out
of her own heart something of what was passing in his, there came to her
the first longing after that oneness of spirit, without which marriage
is but a false or base union, legal and sanctified before men, but, oh!
how unholy in the sight of God!
The young wife felt as if now, and not until now, she could unfold
to her husband all the secrets of her heart, all its foolishness,
ignorance, and fears.
“If you will listen to me, and not despise me very much, I will tell you
something that I have never told to any one until now.”
She could not imagine why, but at this soft whisper he trembled;
however, he bade her go on.
“You wonder why it is I am so terrified at leaving England? It is not
for any of the reasons you said, but for one so foolish that I am half
ashamed to confess it. I dare not cross the sea.”
“Is that all?” Mr. Harper cried, and the unutterable dread which had
actually blanched his cheek disappeared instantaneously. He felt himself
another man.
“Wait, and I'll tell you why this is,” continued Agatha. “When I was
a little child, somewhere about four years old, I was at some seaport
town--I don't know where nor ever did, for there was no one with me but
my nurse, and she died soon after. One day, I remember being in a
little boat going to see a large ship. There were other people with us,
especially one lady. Somehow, playing with her, I fell overboard.” Here
Agatha shuddered involuntarily. “It may be very ridiculous, but even
now, when I am ill or restless in mind, I constantly dream over again
that horrible drowning.”
Her husband drew her closer to him, murmuring, “Poor child!”
“Ah, I was indeed a poor child! When, after being brought to life
again--for I fancy I must have been nearly dead--my nurse forbade me
ever to speak of what had happened, no one can tell into what a terror
it grew. I never shall overcome it, never! The very sight of the sea is
more than I can bear. To cross it---to be on it”--
“Hush, dear, quiet yourself,” said her husband, soothingly. “Now, tell
me all you can remember about this.”
“Scarcely anything more, except that when I came to myself I was lying
on the beach, with the stranger lady by me.”
“Who was she?”
“I have not the slightest idea. Being so young, I recollect little about
her--in fact, only one thing: that just as she was leaving me to go on
in the little boat, my nurse called out, 'The ship is gone!' and the
lady fell flat down--dead, as I thought then. They carried me away, and
I never saw or heard of her again.”
“How strange!”
“But,” continued Agatha, gathering courage as she found her husband did
not smile at this story, and beginning to speak with him more freely
than she had ever done with any person in her life, “but you have no
idea what a vivid impression the circumstance left on my mind. For years
I made of this lady--to whom I feel sure I owed in some way or other the
saving of my life--a sort of guardian angel I believe I even prayed to
her--such a queer, foolish child I was--oh, so foolish!”
“Very likely, dear; we all are,” said Mr. Harper, gaily. “And you are
quite sure you never saw your angel?”
“No, nor any one like her. The person most like, and yet very unlike,
too, in some things, was--don't laugh, please--was Miss Valery. That, I
fancy, was the reason why I liked her so from the first, and was ready
to do anything she bade me.”
“Then when you consented to be married it was not for love of me but
of Anne Valery?” And beneath Nathanael's smile lingered a little sad
earnest.
His wife did not answer--even yet she was too shy to say the words, “I
love you.” But she took his hand, and reverently kissed it, whispering,
“I am quite content. I would not have things otherwise than they are.
And all I mean by telling such a long foolish story is this--teach
me how to conquer myself and my fears, and I will go with you
anywhere--even across the sea.”
“My own dear wife!” His voice was quite broken; so sudden, so unexpected
was this declaration from her, and by the tremblings which shook her all
the while he saw how great her struggle had been.
For many minutes, holding her little head on his arm, the young husband
sat silent, buried in deep thought; Agatha never saw the changes,
bitter, fierce, sorrowful, that by turns swept over the face under which
her own lay so calmly, with sweet shut eyes. Strange difference between
the woman and the man!
“Agatha,” he said at last, “I have quite decided.”
“Decided what?”
“That I will give up my office at Montreal, and we will live in
England.”
She was so astonished that at first she could not speak; then she burst
into joyful tears, and hung about him, murmuring unutterable thanks. For
the moment he felt as if this reward made his sacrifice nothing, and yet
it had cost him almost everything that his manly pride held dear.
“Then you will not go? You will never cross the terrible Atlantic
again?”
“I do not promise that: for I must go, soon or late, if only to persuade
Uncle Brian to return with me to England.--Uncle Brian! what will he
say when he learns that I have given up my independence, and am living
pensioner on a rich wife?”
Agatha looked surprised.
“But,” continued he, trying to make a jest of the matter, “though I do
renounce my income in the New World, I am not going to live an idler on
your little ladyship's bounty. I intend to work hard at anything that I
can find to do. And it will be strange if, in this wide, busy England,
I cannot turn to some honourable profession. If not, I'd rather go into
the fields and chop wood with this right hand”--
And suddenly dashing it down on the table, he startled Agatha very much;
so much that she again clung to him, and innocently begged him not to be
angry with her.
Then, once more, Nathanael took his wife in his arms, and became calm in
calming her. Thus they sat, until the silence grew heavenly between
the two, and it seemed as if, in this new confidence, and in the joy of
mutual self-renunciation, were beginning that true marriage, which makes
of husband and wife not only “one flesh,” but one soul.