“Mrs. Harper--Missus--there's a carriage at the door.”
“Say I am not at home.”
She had given the same sullen answer to every visitor for four weeks,
shutting herself up in stern seclusion, determined that, whatever cruel
comments they made, the neighbourhood should have no power of spying
into the mystery of “that poor Mrs. Locke Harper who did not live happy
with her husband.” For so she felt sure had been the result of that
fatal betrayal to her brother-in-law. Since, as Harrie had once said,
“Duke never could keep a secret in his life!” But even his own wife
could not thoroughly fathom the good heart of Marmaduke Dugdale.
“Not at home?” repeated Dorcas, who had been very faithful to her young
mistress. “Not when it's Miss Valery, who has been so ill? Oh, Missus,
do'ee see Miss Valery.”
Mrs. Harper hesitated, and during that time her visitor entered
uninvited.
“So, Agatha, as you did not come to see me, I have come at last to see
you.”
“I am sorry”--
“What, to see me?” said Anne, smiling. But the voice was weak, and the
smile had a sickly beauty. Agatha was struck by a change, slight, yet
perceptible, which had come over Miss Valery.
“I hear you have been ill--will you take the arm-chair? Are you better
to day?”
“Oh yes,” returned Anne, briefly; she was never much in the habit of
talking about herself. “But you, my dear, how have you been this long
time? Come and let me look at you.”
“It is not worth while. Never mind me. Talk of something else.”
“Of your husband, then. When did you hear from him?”
“Last week.”
“And is he quite well? Will you give a message to him from me when you
write again?”
“I never write.”
Miss Valery looked surprised, pained. Evidently to her sick-room had
reached the vaguest possible hints of what had happened. Or else Anne
must have refused to hear or credit what she was persuaded was an
impossible falsehood. In all good hearts scandal unrepeated, unbelieved,
dies a natural death.
To Mrs. Harper's brief, sharp sentence there was no reply; her guest
turned to other topics.
“Harriet Dugdale comes home to-morrow. It is not often she takes it into
her head to pay a three weeks' visit from home. You must have missed her
a good deal.”
“No, I did not. I have never been outside the garden.”
“Was that quite right, my dear? And your sisters-in-law complain
bitterly that you will not go to Kingcombe Holm.”
“They should have taken more trouble in coming to ask me.
“Nay, in this world we should not judge too harshly. We cannot see into
any one's motives. There may have been reasons. I know the Squire has
not been at all well; and Mary has spent her whole time in watching him,
and in coming to Thornhurst to nurse me.”
“Have you been so very ill, then? I wish--I wish--”
“That you also had come to see me? Well, you will come now. Not to-day;
for I am going to use this lovely autumn morning in taking a journey.”
“Whither?”
“To Weymouth, opposite the Isle of Portland.”
After this answer both were silent. Agatha was thinking of the night
when her husband rode to Weymouth. Anne was thinking--of what?
At length she put her thoughts aside, and turned to watch the young
wife, who had fallen into a sullen, absent mood.
“Does your house please you, Agatha? It is very pretty, I think.”
“Yes, very. I do not complain. Would you like to look over it? Or shall
I give you some cake and wine? That is the fashion, I believe, when a
visitor first comes to see a bride in her new home.”
The bitterness, the sarcasm of her manner were pitiful to see. Anne
Valery watched her, sadly, yet not hopelessly. There was in the calm of
that pale face a clearness of vision which pierced through many human
darknesses to the light behind.
She only said, “Thank you, I will take some wine; I like to keep up
good old customs,”--and waited while Mrs. Harper, with a quick excited
manner, and a countenance that changed momentarily, did the first
honours of her household. So sad it was to see her doing it all alone!
More widow-like than bride-like.
As she came up with the wine-glass, Miss Valery caught her hand, holding
it firmly in defiance of Agatha's slight effort to get free.
“Wait a minute for my good wishes to the bride. May God bless you! Not
with fortune, which is oftentimes only a curse”--
“That is true,” muttered Agatha, bitterly.
“Not with perfect freedom from care, for that is impossible, or, if
possible, would not be good for you. Every one of us must bear our own
burden; and we can bear it, if we love one another.”
Agatha's lips were set together.
“If,” continued Anne, firmly--“If we love any one with sincerity and
faithfulness, we are sure to reap our reward some time. If any love us,
and we believe it and trust them, they are sure to come out clear from
all clouds, our own beloved, true to the end. Therefore, Agatha, above
all blessings, may God bless you with _love_! May you be happy in your
husband, and make him happy! May you live to see your home merry
and full--not silent!--may you die among your children and your own
people--not alone!”
The sudden solemnity of this blessing, enhanced by the feebleness of
the voice that uttered it, awoke strange emotions in Agatha. She threw
herself on her knees by the armchair, where Anne lay back--now faint and
pale.
“Oh, if you had been near me--if I had known you always, and you had
brought me up, and made a good woman of me.”
“Perhaps I ought,” murmured Anne, thoughtfully. “But, just then, it
would have been so hard--so hard!”
“What are you saying? Say it again. All your words are good words. Tell
me.”
“Nothing, dear. Except”--here Miss Valery raised herself with a sudden
effort mental and bodily--“Agatha, will you go with me to Weymouth?”
“If you like. Anywhere to be with you. I am sick of myself.”
“We all are at times, especially when we are young, and do not quite
understand ourselves or others. The feeling passes away. But as to
Weymouth--do you still dislike to go near the sea?”
“Yes--no! I will try to bear it; I think I could, by your side. And you
shall not go alone on any account.”
“Thank you,” said Anne, taking her hand. So they went.
An innocent line of railway darted past Kingcombe, in the vain hope of
waking that somnolent town. It was a pleasant whirl across the usual
breezy flats of moorland, by some meadows where a network of serpentine
streams flashed in the sun. Agatha felt more like her own self; with
her, the spirit of Nature was always an exorciser of internal demons;
and Anne's conversation aided the beneficent work.
At Dorchester they took a carriage, and drove across the country to
Weymouth.
“Are you not getting weary? you looked so but lately,” said Agatha to
Miss Valery.
“Not at all, I feel strong now.” Her eyes and cheeks were indeed very
bright; she leaned forward and gazed eagerly around.
“This Weymouth seems familiar to you, Miss Valery?”
“Yes; we used to come here every summer--Mr. and Mrs. Harper and the
children and I, until she died. She was as good as a mother, or an elder
sister”--here Anne hesitated, but repeated the words--“like an elder
sister--to me. We were all very happy in those times. It is a great
blessing, Agatha, to have had a happy childhood. Where did you spend
yours?”
Agatha looked uneasy. “Chiefly in London--I told you.”
“But before then, when you were a very little girl?”
“I do not know. Don't let us talk about that.”
“Not if you do not wish it.” Anne's eyes, which had watched her closely,
turned away, and after a few minutes were riveted on a line of blue sea
sweeping round a distant headland, and curving off to the horizon. As
she looked she became very pale, and shivered. Agatha hardly noticed
her, being so busy examining the new regions into which they now
entered--the ordinary High Street of an ordinary country town. The sea
view had vanished.
Suddenly the carriage turned a corner, and they burst upon the shore of
Weymouth Bay. A great, blue, glittering bay, with two white headlands
shutting it in; the tide running high, the waves dashing themselves
furiously against the sea-wall of the esplanade, breaking into showers
of spray, and curling back into the foaming whirl below.
Agatha started, and put her hands before her eyes. “I know that sight--I
remember that sound. Oh! where is this place? why did you bring me
here?”
At this cry Miss Valery, roused from her momentary fit of abstraction,
took hold of Agatha's hand. The girl was trembling violently.
“My dear, I did not expect this, or you should not have come here. This
is Weymouth. Now do you remember?”
“How should I? Was I ever here before?” She peered from under her hand at
the sparkling sea. “No, it is not like that sea; it is too bright. Yet I
hear the same roll against the same wall. It is very foolish, but I wish
we could get away.”
“Presently,” said Anne's soothing voice. “We must drive along this
shore, and then we will get out at an inn I know, and rest.”
Her manner, her expression, as she fixed her eyes full upon her, struck
Agatha with an indescribable feeling. She looked eagerly at Miss Valery,
trying to read in that worn face some likeness to the one which had
impressed her childish memory with almost angelic beauty.
“Tell me--you say you have been often here--did you ever one stormy day
follow a ship that was outward bound? You were in a little boat, and the
ship was standing out to sea, round that point--and”--
She stopped, for Anne's face was livid to the very lips. Agatha forgot
her own question and its purport.
“Stop the carriage. Let me hold you. Dear--dear Miss Valery, you are
worn out--you are fainting.”
“No--I never faint--I am only tired. Don't speak to me for a minute or
two, and I shall be well.”
With a long sigh she forcibly brought life back to her cheeks--a feeble
life at best. Agatha, watching her, was smitten by a dread which
now entered her mind for the first time, driving thence all personal
feelings, and making her gaze with sorrowful anxiety on the friend
beside her who had been all day so cheerful and kind. And she thought
with a remorse amounting to positive horror, that she herself during
that day had more than once spoken sharply even to Anne Valery.
A great awe came upon her, reflecting how often we unconsciously walk
hand-in-hand, and talk of our own petty earthly trials, with those whose
souls' wings are already growing, already stirring with the air that
comes to bear them to the unseen land.
It was a relief indescribable, when leisurely strolling along the
pavement, she saw among many strange faces one that seemed familiar. The
hands knotted loosely at his back, the light hair straggling out from
under the hat, that was pushed far up from the forehead--no, she could
not be mistaken. She uttered a cry of pleasure.
“Look, look! there he is; I am certain it is he.”
Anne started violently.
“Mr. Dugdale, Mr. Dugdale!” Agatha called out.
He came up to the carriage with the most lengthened “E--h!” that she had
ever heard him utter. “What brought you two here? This bleak day too.
Very wrong of Anne!”
“But she would come. She said she wanted a breath of sea-air, and I
think, besides, she has business.”
“No,” interrupted Anne, “no business, except bringing Agatha to see
Weymouth. Now shall we rest, and have some tea at the inn. You'll come
with us, Mr. Dugdale?”
“Yes, I want to speak to you, Anne. I've got news about--that little
affair you know of. That was why I came to Weymouth to-day. Eh,
now--just look there!”
With a countenance brimful of pleasure he came to Miss Valery's side,
and pointed to a steamer that lay in the offing.
“It's the _Anna Mary_. She made the passage from New York in no time.
I've been aboard her already. I fancied I might find him there. Now,
what do you think, Anne?”
“Is he come?” said Anne, in a steady voice. She had quite recovered
herself now.
“No--not this time. But he will sail, for certain, by the next New York
packet to Havre.”
“Thank God!” It was a very low answer--just a sigh, and nothing more.
“And we have satisfactorily ended all that business which you first put
into my head,” continued Duke, rubbing his hands with great glee. “It
was a risk certainly, but then it was for him. My children will never be
a bit the poorer.”
“No,” murmured Anne Valery to herself.
“And think what an election we shall have! With him to make speeches for
Trenchard, and argue in this wonderful way about Free-trade, and tell
the farmers all about Canadian wheat! Glorious!”
“What are you both talking about?” cried Agatha, who had been
considerably puzzled. “Do let me hear, if it is not a secret.”
“No secret,” said Anne, turning round, speaking clearly and composedly,
and not at all like a sick person. “Mr. Brian Harper is coming home.”
Agatha clapped her hands for joy.
When they dismounted from the carriage, and had ordered tea at the
inn, Anne still seemed quite strong. She said it was the sea-breeze that
brought life to her, and stood at the open window gazing over the bay.
Agatha thought she had never seen Miss Valery's face so near looking
beautiful as now; it was the faint reflex of girlhood's brightness, like
the zodiacal light which the sun casts on the sky long after he has gone
down.
After tea,--at which meal Mr. Dugdale did not appear, a fact that nobody
wondered at, since he was left to wander about Weymouth at his own sweet
will, without Harrie to catch him and remind him that there was such
a thing as time, likewise such sublunary necessities as eating and
drinking--after tea Miss Valery and Mrs. Harper sat at the window
together.
It was only an inn-window, the panes scribbled over with many names, and
it lighted an ordinary inn-parlour, looking on the esplanade. Yet it
was a pleasant seat; quiet, too, for the town was almost deserted as
winter-time came on. The bay, smoothed by the ebbing tide, lay like
crystal under a sky where sunset and moonlight mixed. Agatha ventured to
look at the sea now. She beheld with a curious interest a sight till now
so unfamiliar, taking a childish pleasure in watching the great white
arm of moon-rays stretch further and further across the water, changing
the ripples into molten silver, and making ethereal and ghostlike every
little boat that glided through them.
By-and-by came a group of wandering musicians, playing very respectably,
as German street-musicians always do. They converted the dark esplanade
and the shabby inn-parlour into a fairy picture of visible and audible
romance.
“It is quite like a scene in a play,” said Agatha, laughing and
trying to make Miss Valery laugh. She could not see her clearly in the
moonlight, but she did not like her sitting so quiet and silent.
“Yes, very like a play, with '_Herz, mein Herz,_' for a serenade. What a
sweet old tune it is!”
“I used to sing it once.” And Agatha began following the instruments
with her voice. “No, I can't sing. I could sooner cry.”
“Why? Are you sorrowful?”
“No--happy. Yet all feels strange, very strange.” She crept to Miss
Valery, wrapped her arms round her waist, and laid her head timidly on
her shoulder. Anne drew her nearer, with a more caressing manner than
she ever used to any one. Agatha Harper seemed that night of all nights
to lie very near her heart.
“_Herz, mein Herz,_” died faintly away down the esplanade; there was
nothing but the glitter of the bay, and the moon climbing higher and
higher above the Isle of Portland.
Anne spoke at last, amidst the half-playful, half-tender caresses that
were so dear to Agatha, who had never known what it was to be calmly and
safely in a mother's arms. Lying thus seemed most like it.
“Do you think I care for you, Agatha, my child?”
“I cannot tell. Perhaps not, for I am not good enough to deserve it.”
“Do you know what first made me care for you?”
“No--unless it was for the sake of my husband.”
Anne gave no reply, and her husband's name plunged Agatha into such a
maze of painful thought, that she was for a long time altogether silent.
“Shall I tell you a story, Agatha?”
“Anything--anything, to keep me from thinking.”
“If I do, it is one you must not tell again, unless to Nathanael, for I
would put no secrets between husband and wife.”
“Ah, that is right--that is kind. Would that _he_ had thought the same!”
“What did you say, dear?”
“Nothing! Nothing of any consequence. Don't mind me. Go on.”
“It is a history which I think it right and best to tell you. You will
both need to keep it sacred for a little while--not for very long.”
As she spoke, a shudder passed through Anne's frame. Was it the
involuntary shrinking of mortality in sight of immortality?
Shortly afterwards she began to talk in her usual sweet tone--perhaps a
shade more serious.
“'There were once two _friends_--three I should say, but the third far
less intimate than the other two. Something happened--it is now too long
ago to signify what--which made the elder of the first two angry with
his dearest friend and the other. He went away suddenly, writing word to
his friend--his own--that he should sail next day, leaving England for
ever.”
“That was wrong!” cried Agatha. “People ought never to be passionate and
unjust in friendship. It was very wrong.”
“Hush! you do not know all the circumstances; you cannot judge,” Anne
answered hastily. “His friend, who greatly honoured him, and knew what
pain his loss would bring to many, wished to prevent his going. She”--
“It was a woman, then?”
“Yes.”
“And were they _only_ friends?”
“They were friends,” repeated Miss Valery, in a tone which, doubtful as
the answer was, made Agatha feel she had no right to inquire further.
“She never knew how much he cared for her until that last letter he
wrote, just after he had gone away. On receiving it, she followed
him--which she had a right to do--to the place he mentioned, a seaport
from which he was to sail. When she reached it, the vessel had already
heaved anchor and was standing out to sea. She saw it--the very ship he
was on board--in the middle of the bay.”
“The bay! Was it then”--
“Hush, dear, just for a little,--I cannot speak long. It was a stormy
day, and few boats would go out. However, there was on the beach a woman
who was also very eager to catch the vessel. Together they managed to
get a boat, and embarked--this lady I speak of--the woman and a little
girl.”
Agatha listened with painful avidity.
“It was not the woman's own child, or she could not have been so
careless of it It was tossed into the bottom of the boat, and lay there
crying. The lady felt sorry for it, and took it in her arms. They had
gone but a little way from the shore when it was playing about her,
quite happy again. While playing--she looking at the ship, and not
watching the little thing as she ought to have done--the child fell
overboard.”
A loud sob burst from Agatha.
“Hush, still hush, my darling! The child was saved. The ship sailed
away, but the child--you _know_ that she was saved. I am thankful to God
it was so!”
Anne wrapped her arms tightly round the sobbing girl, and after a few
moments she also wept.
“I remember it all now,” cried Agatha, as soon as she found words--“the
shore, the headlands, the bay. I was that little child, and it was you
who saved me!”
Anne made no answer but by pressing her closer.
“I felt it the first moment I ever saw you. I never forgot you--never!
But how did you know me?”
“Was I likely ever to lose sight of that little child? And also, years
before, I had once or twice met your father--though this would have
been nothing. But from that day I felt that you belonged to me. And now,
since you are become a Harper, you do.”
Agatha embraced her, and then suddenly looked mournful.--“But yourself?
Tell me, did you ever again meet your--your friend?”
No answer. A slight movement of the lips sufficed to explain the whole.
“And it was all through me,” cried Agatha, to whom that soft smile was
agony. “And what have I done in requital? I have lived a useless, erring
life; I have suffered--oh, how I have suffered! Far better I had been
left lying at the bottom of that quiet bay. Why did God let you save
me?”
“That you might grow up a good and noble woman, fulfilling worthily the
life He spared, and giving it back into His hands, in His time, as a
true and faithful servant. Dare not to murmur at His will--dare not to
ask why He saved you, Agatha Harper.”
Saying this, as sternly as Anne Valery could speak--she tried to put
Agatha from her breast, but the girl held her too fast.
“Oh, do not cast me away. I have nobody in the world but you. Forgive
me! Guide my life which I owe you, and make it worth your saving. Love
me--teach my husband to love me. If you knew how miserable I am, and may
be always.”
“No one is miserable always,” returned Anne faintly, as she leaned back,
her hands dropping down cold and listless. “We grow content in time. We
shall all be--very happy--some day.”
She spoke with hesitation and difficulty. The next minute, in spite
of her declaration that she never fainted, Miss Valery had become
insensible.