Hopes and Fears or, scenes from the life of a spinster

‘Oh, I could not do that,’ cried Honor, with a sudden revulsion.  Love them as she might, Owen Sandbrook’s children must not step into Humfrey Charlecote’s place.  ‘And, besides,’ she added, ‘I want my little Owen to be a clergyman; I think he can be what his father missed.’

‘Well, you can do exactly as you think fit.  Only what I wanted to tell you is, that there may be another branch, elder than our own.  Not that this need make the least difference, for the Holt is legally ours.  It seems that our great grandfather had an elder son—a wild sort of fellow—the old people used to tell stories of him.  He went on, in short, till he was disinherited, and went off to America.  What became of him afterwards I never could make out; but I have sometimes questioned how I should receive any of his heirs if they should turn up some day.  Mind you, you need not have the slightest scruple in holding your own.  It was made over to my grandfather by will, as I have made it sure for you; but I do think that when you come to think how to dispose of it, the possibility of the existence of these Charlecotes might be taken into consideration.’

‘Yankee Charlecotes!’ she said.

‘Never mind; most likely nothing of the kind will ever come in your way, and they have not the slightest claim on you.  I only threw it out, because I thought it right just to speak of it.’

After this commencement, Humfrey, on this and the ensuing days, made it his business to make his cousin acquainted with the details of the management of the estate.  He took such pleasure in doing so, and was so anxious she should comprehend, that she was forced to give her whole attention; and, putting all else aside, was tranquilly happy in thus gratifying him.  Those orderly ranges of conscientious accounts were no small testimony to the steady, earnest manner in which Humfrey had set himself to his duty from his early youth, and to a degree they were his honest pride too—he liked to show how good years had made up for bad years, and there was a tenderness in the way he patted their red leather backs to make them even on their shelves, as if they had been good friends to him.  No, they must not run into confusion.

The farms and the cottages—the friendly terms of his intercourse, and his large-handed but well-judging almsgiving—all revealed to her more of his solid worth; and the simplicity that regarded all as the merest duty touched her more than all.  Many a time did she think of the royal Norwegian brothers, one of whom went to tie a knot in the willows on the banks of the Jordan, while the other remained at home to be the blessing of his people, and from her broken idol wanderer she turned to worship her steadfast worker at home, as far as his humility and homeliness made it possible, and valued each hour with him as if each moment were of diamond price.  And he was so calmly happy, that there was no grieving in his presence.  It had been a serene life of simple fulfilment of duty, going ever higher, and branching wider, as a good man’s standard gradually rises the longer he lives; the one great disappointment had been borne without sourness or repining, and the affections, deprived of the home channel, had spread in a beneficent flood, and blessed all around.  So, though, like every sinful son of man, sensible of many an error, many an infirmity, still the open loving spirit was childlike enough for that blessed sense; for that feeling which St. John expresses as ‘if our heart condemn us not, then have we confidence towards God;’ confidence in the infinite Merits that atone for the errors of weakness, and occasional wanderings of will; confidence that made the hope a sure and steadfast one, and these sentenced weeks a land of Beulah, where Honora’s tardy response to his constant love could be greeted and valued as the precious fulfilment of long-cherished wishes, not dashed aside as giving bitterness to his departure.

The parting was broken by a promise that Honora should again meet the Savilles at the Holt in the autumn.  She assured herself that there was no danger before that time, and Humfrey spoke cheerfully of looking forward to it, and seemed to have so much to do, and to be so well equal to doing it, that he would not let them be concerned at leaving him alone.

To worship Humfrey was an easier thing at a distance than when beside him.  Honora came back to Sandbeach thoroughly restless and wretched, reproaching herself with having wasted such constant, priceless affection, haunted by the constant dread of each morning’s post, and longing fervently to be on the spot.  She had self-command enough not to visit her dejection on the children, but they missed both her spirits and her vigilance, and were more left to their nurse; and her chief solace was in long solitary walks, or in evening talks with Miss Wells.  Kind Miss Wells perhaps guessed how matters stood between the two last Charlecotes, but she hinted not her suspicions, and was the unwearied recipient of all Honora’s histories, of his symptoms, of his cheerfulness, and his solicitude for her.  Those talks did her good, they set the real Humfrey before her, and braced her to strive against weakness and despondence.

And then the thought grew on her, why, since they were so thoroughly each other’s, why should they not marry, and be together to the last?  Why should he be left to his solitude for this final year? why should their meetings be so prudentially chaperoned?  Suppose the disease should be lingering, how hard it was that she should be absent, and he left to servants!  She could well imagine why he had not proposed it; he was too unselfish to think of exposing her to the shock, or making her a widow, but how came she never to have thought of it?  She stood beyond all ordinary rules—she had nothing worldly to gain nor to lose by being his wife for these few remaining months—it surely was her part, after the way she had treated him, to meet him more than half way—she alone could make the proposal—she would—she must.  And oh! if the doctors should be mistaken!  So spoke the midnight dream—oh! how many times.  But what said cool morning?  Propriety had risen up, grave decorum objecting to what would shock Humfrey, ay, and was making Honor’s cheeks tingle.  Yes, and there came the question whether he would not be more distressed than gratified—he who wished to detach himself from all earthly ties—whether he might not be pained and displeased at her thus clinging to him—nay, were he even gratified, might not emotion and agitation be fatal?

Many, many times was all this tossed over in Honor’s mind.  Often the desperate resolution was definitely taken, and she had seen herself quietly meeting him at dear old Hiltonbury Church, with his grave sweet eyes resting satisfied upon her as his darling.  As often had the fear of offending him, and the instinct of woman’s dignity turned her away when her heart was beating high.  That autumn visit—then she would decide.  One look as if he wished to retain her, the least air of feebleness or depression, and she would be determined, even if she had to waive all feminine reserves, and set the matter in hand herself.  She thought Mr. Saville would highly approve and assist; and having settled into this period for her project, she set herself in some degree at rest, and moved and spoke with so much more of her natural ease, that Miss Wells was consoled about her, and knew not how entirely heart and soul were at Hiltonbury, with such devotion as had never even gone to the backwoods.

To meet the Savilles at Hiltonbury in the autumn!  Yes—Honor met Mr. Saville, but not as she had intended.  By that time the stroke had fallen, just as she had become habituated to the expectation, just as her promised visit had assumed a degree of proximity, and her heart was beating at the prospect of the results.

Humfrey had been scarcely ailing all the summer, he had gone about his occupations with his usual cheerfulness, and had taken part in all the village festivals as genially as ever.  Only close observers could have noticed a slackness towards new undertakings, a gradual putting off of old ones, a training of those, dependent on his counsel, to go alone, a preference for being alone in the evening, a greater habit of stillness and contemplation.

September had come, and he had merrily sent off two happy boy-sportsmen with the keeper, seeing them over the first field himself, and leaning against the gate, as he sent them away in convulsions of laughing at his droll auguries.  The second was a Sunday, a lovely day of clear deep blue sky, and rich sunshine laughing upon the full wealth of harvest fields—part fallen before the hand of the reaper, part waving in their ripe glowing beauty, to which he loved to liken Honora’s hair—part in noble redundant shocks of corn in full season.  Brooks used afterwards to tell how he overtook the squire slowly strolling to church on that beauteous autumnal morning, and how he paused to remark on the glory of the harvest, and to add, ‘Keep the big barn clear, Brooks—let us have all the women and children in for the supper this time—and I say—send the spotted heifer down to-morrow to old Boycotts, instead of his cow that died.  With such a crop as this, one can stand something.  And,’ said Brooks, ‘Thank God for it! was as plain written on his face as ever I saw!’

It was the first Sunday in the month, and there was full service.  Hiltonbury Church had one of those old-fashioned altar-rails which form three sides of a square, and where it was the custom that at the words ‘Draw near with faith,’ the earliest communicants should advance to the rail and remain till their place was wanted by others, and that the last should not return to their seats till the service was concluded.  Mr. Charlecote had for many years been always the first parishioner to walk slowly up the matted aisle, and kneel beside the wall, under the cumbrous old tables of Commandments.  There, on this day, he knelt as usual, and harvest labours tending to thin the number of communicants, the same who came up first remained to the end, joined their voices in the Eucharistic Lord’s Prayer and Angelic Hymn, and bowed their heads at the blessing of the peace that passeth all understanding.

It was not till the rest were moving away, that the vicar and his clerk remarked that the squire had not risen.  Another look, and it was plain that he had sunk somewhat forward on his folded arms, and was only supported by the rail and the wall.  The vicar hastily summoned the village doctor, who had not yet left the church.  They lifted him, and laid him along on the cushioned step where he had been kneeling, but motion and breath were gone, the strong arms were helpless, and the colour had left the open face.  Taken at once from the heavenly Feast on earth to the glory above, could this be called sudden death?

There he lay on the altar step, with hands crossed on his breast, and perfectly blessed repose on his manly countenance, sweetened and ennobled in its stillness, and in every lineament bearing the impress of that Holy Spirit of love who had made it a meet temple.

What an unpremeditated lying in state was that! as by ones and twos, beneath the clergyman’s eye, the villagers stole in with slowly, heavily falling tread to gaze in silent awe on their best friend, some sobbing and weeping beyond control, others with grave, almost stolid tranquillity, or the murmured ‘He was a gentleman,’ which, in a poor man’s mouth, means ‘he was a just man and patient, the friend of the weak and poor.’  His farmers and his own labourers put their shoulders to bear him once more to his own house, through his half-gathered crops—

The hand of the reaper
Takes the ears that are hoary,
But the voice of the weeper
Wails manhood in glory.

No, bewail him not.  It was glory, indeed, but the glory of early autumn, the garnering of the shock of corn in full season.  It was well done of the vicar that a few long, full-grained ears of wheat were all that was laid upon his breast in his coffin.

There Honora saw them.  The vicar, Mr. Henderson, had written to her at once, as Humfrey had long ago charged him to do, enclosing a letter that he had left with him for the purpose, a tender, soothing farewell, and an avowal such as he could never have spoken of the blessing that his attachment to her had been, in drawing his mind from the narrowness to which he might have been liable, and in elevating the tone of his views and opinions.

She knew what he meant—it was what he had caught from her youthful enthusiasm, second-hand from Owen Sandbrook.  Oh! what vivid, vigorous truth not to have been weakened in the transit through two such natures, but to have done its work in the strong, practical mind able and candid enough to adopt it even thus filtered!

There were a few words of affectionate commendation of his people and his land into her keeping, and a parting blessing, and, lastly, written as a postscript—with a blot as if it had been written with hesitation—‘Little children, keep yourselves from idols!’

It was not bitter weeping.  It was rather the sense of utter vacancy and hopelessness, with but one fixed purpose—that she would see his face again, and be the nearest to him when he was laid in the grave.  She hastily wrote to the housekeeper and to the clergyman that she was coming, and Miss Wells’s kind opposition only gave her just wilfulness and determination enough to keep her spirit from sinking.

So she travelled alone, and came to Hiltonbury in the sunset, as the ‘last long wains’ were slowly bearing their loads of wheat into the farmyard, the waggoners walking dejectedly beside them.  Mr. Saville had come before her, and was at the door to receive her.  She could not very well bear the presence of any one, nor the talk of cold-blooded arrangements.  It seemed to keep away the dreamy living with Humfrey, and was far more dreary than the feeling of desolateness, and when they treated her as mistress of the house that was too intolerable.  And yet it was worth something, too, to be the one to authorize that harvest supper in the big barn, in the confidence that it would be anything but revelry.  Every one felt that the day was indeed a Harvest Home.

The funeral, according to his expressed wishes, was like those of the farmers of the parish; the coffin borne by his own labourers in their white round frocks; and the labourers were the expected guests for whom provision was made; but far and wide from all the country round, though harvest was at the height, came farmers and squires, poor men and rich, from the peer and county member down to the poor travelling hawker—all had met the sunny sympathy of that smile, all had been aided and befriended, all felt as if a prop, a castle of strength were gone.

Charlecotes innumerable rested in the chancel, and the last heir of the line was laid beneath the same flag where he had been placed on that last Sunday, the spot where Honor might kneel for many more, meeting him in spirit at the feast, and looking to the time when the cry should be, ‘Put ye in the sickle, for the harvest is come.’

But ere she could look in thorough hope for that time, another page of Honor’s life must be turned, and an alloy, as yet unknown to herself, must be purged from her heart.  The last gleam of her youthful sunshine had faded with Humfrey; but youth is but a fraction of human existence, and there were further phases to be gone through and lessons to be learnt; although she was feeling as if all were over with her in this world, and neither hope, love, nor protection were left her, nor any interest save cherishing Humfrey Charlecote’s memory, as she sat designing the brass tablet which was to record his name and age in old English illuminated letters, surrounded by a border of ears of corn and grapes.

CHAPTER IV

The glittering grass, with dewstars bright,
Is all astir with twinkling light;
What pity that such fair array
In one brief hour should melt away.

    —Rev. T. Whytehead

‘This is a stroke of good luck!’ said Mr. Charteris.  ‘We must not, on any account, remove the Sandbrook children from Miss Charlecote; she has no relations, and will certainly make the boy her heir.’

‘She will marry!’ said his wife.  ‘Some fashionable preacher will swallow her red hair.  She is just at the age for it!’

‘Less likely when she has the children to occupy her.’

‘Well, you’ll have them thrown on your hands yet!’

‘The chance is worth trying for, though!  I would not interfere with her on any account.’

‘Oh, no, nor I! but I pity the children.’

* * * * *

‘There, Master Owen, be a good boy, and don’t worry.  Don’t you see, I’m putting up your things to go home.’

‘Home!’ the light glittered in Lucilla’s eyes.  ‘Is it Wrapworth, nursey?’

‘Dear me, miss, not Wrapworth.  That’s given away, you know; but it’s to Hiltonbury you are going—such a grand place, which if Master Owen is only a dear good boy, will all belong to him one of these days.’

‘Will there be a pony to ride on?’ asked Owen.

‘Oh, yes—if you’ll only let those stockings alone—there’ll be ponies, and carriages, and horses, and everything a gentleman can have, and all for my own dear little Master Owen!’

‘I don’t want to go to Hiltonbury,’ said Lucilla; ‘I want to go home to the river and the boat, and see Mr. Prendergast and the black cow.’

‘I’ll give you a black cow, Cilly,’ said Owen, strutting about.  ‘Is Hiltonbury bigger than the castle?’

‘Oh, ever so big, Master Owen; such acres of wood, Mr. Jones says, and all your dear cousin’s, and sure to be your own in time.  What a great gentleman you will be, to be sure, dining thirty gentlefolks twice a week, as they say poor Mr. Charlecote did, and driving four fine horses to your carriage like a gentleman.  And then you won’t forget poor old nursey-pursey.’

‘Oh, no, nurse; I’ll give you a ride in my carriage!’

Honora in her listless state had let Mr. Saville think for her, and passively obeyed him when he sent her back to Sandbeach to wind up her affairs there, while he finished off the valuations and other painful business at the Holt, in which she could be of little use, since all she desired was to keep everything as it was.  She was anxious to return as soon as possible, so as to take up the reins before there had been time for the relaxation to be felt, the only chance she felt of her being able to fulfil his charge.  The removal, the bustle, the talking things over with Miss Wells, and the sight of the children did much to restore her, and her old friend rejoiced to see that necessary occupation was tending to make her time pass more cheerfully than she perhaps knew.