The Days of My Life: An Autobiography

And so we set out upon our dreary journey – once more I looked from the carriage windows, and wondered if this day was but a common day to the common people round. Once we met a marriage party – a gayer party than ours had been, five weeks ago, with young bright faces, and smiles and jests, and all the natural tokens of a time of joy. I looked at them with the strangest interest. I wondered which was the bride and what was appointed to come to her. Should she be so miserable as I, or was mine a solitary instance? You would fancy a mourner had little room for such thoughts – but I had room for every kind of thought – no wild fancy or speculation in that slow dreadful journey came amiss to me.

Everything looked different from what it had been when I came by this same road to my father’s death-bed; now the people were at work in the fields; there were cries in the air – passengers on the road, everywhere, life and motion, sunshine and hope. I saw the rustic people pause at their labors to look at our solemn procession; I could fancy how they asked each other who it was that came this way to his last rest. My thoughts went back to that night seven years ago, when my father and I drove this way together, leaving our ancestral home. We had never been on the road again, so far as I knew, never till now, and now we were taking him to a home of which no man should ever dispossess him, to rest with his forefathers for ever.

A very low rude wall, one of those fences of the country, was round the church-yard, the church itself was small and poor – a humble little chapel, where only a few scattered worshippers ever came. I do not know why it had been permitted to fall so much into neglect, for the family tomb was in a little chapel closely adjoining and opening from it. This little shelter of our race was paved with old tombstones, every one bearing the name of a Southcote, and the walls were covered with tablets to the memory of the dead of our house. There were two raised tombs besides, with recumbent figures, memorials of some more distinguished or more ostentatious than the rest; and this house of the dead was lighted by a small Gothic window, filled with scraps of ancient glass; here, under the shelter of this groined roof, within these inscribed and monumental walls, and not where the free air of heaven should visit his grave, we were to lay my father. It was well – better for him than the green grass, the flowers, the sunshine, and the outer human world, was the little family chapel where, withdrawn from the common dust, his race and kindred waited till the end.

In silence and solitude I stood at the head while it was being laid in its place. I did not weep, nor cry, nor faint. I never faltered for an instant from my firmness. In my cold, cold composure I stood and looked on. The words of the service never woke me, yet I heard every one of them. I noticed the very tone of the clergyman’s voice, and the habitual cadence of the words. I knew it was because he said them so often that they rang to that measure. I observed everything; not the smallest incident escaped my eye. By and bye all was silent again – it was over, and we had to go away.

Only then did I linger for a moment – I looked round upon this well frequented place, where so many had been brought and had been left before. I glanced over all the names, how full it was. This place was home. The house we were all born to inhabit – the permanent, lasting dwelling-place. The new comer was not alone here; he was gathered to his fathers; he was entered upon his last and sweet inheritance. I came away with a steady step – I think almost with a smile upon my face. My father had many friends around and beside him – only I was alone.

And then we set out to return to our life, and left the dead behind. Oh! life inexorable – cruel! how it sweeps upon the traces of the last slow journey, and beats out the mourner’s footprints with its race and tumult! It was not hard to leave him, for he was well; but it was hard to note our quickened pace, to know that we were going back to every-day. No one spoke – I was thankful for that – even Mr. Osborne did not break upon the silence. Once more the people in the fields looked up to see us going back again, and the light came from the west, and the labors were almost over, and we had left our new inhabitant in the grave; that was all the world knew of us as we went home.

When we entered, I saw the table was spread, and it occurred to me, that at my father’s table we ought to be represented, not by Edgar Southcote, nor by Mr. Osborne; and when I had taken off my mantle, I returned and took my place. I saw Mr. Osborne look at me with extreme and uncomprehending wonder. He could not understand my motive, nor what he called the rule of my conduct. He did everything very properly himself, and conformed to all the usual decorums, and he did not know how to judge me. I was aware of his wondering, and almost disapproving glance. I was aware that I ought not to have been able, on this day, to take my place here as I did; but I was not moved by knowing it; I only felt an indignant determination that neither of them two should rule at my father’s board – this was his house still, and I was his heir.

When the meal was over, I returned to my room; but I could no longer rest there – there was a visible void in the house – a dull ache and vacancy in my heart. I wandered about from room to room, to his bed-chamber where he died, and where he had been lying like a king in state and rest; from thence I went to the library where his chair stood by the table, where his desk and his books seemed almost to have been used to-day.

There I sat down in my dull, vacant misery; the door was closed, the house was still – save for the branches waving in the evening wind across the window, there was neither sound nor motion near. I was quite alone. I sat looking at the diamond ring upon my finger, his last gift. I wondered what he meant by saying it was a misfortune. A misfortune – I had no need, yet no fear of such in my withered life. One great calamity, as I thought, had put me beyond the reach of fate. “No, no!” I repeated to myself unconsciously aloud, “fate has done its worst – I can suffer no more. I can lose no more – there is no misfortune left possible to me.”

As I spoke I heard some motion in the room, and starting saw Mr. Osborne rise from behind the curtain where he had been reading. In proportion to my former confidence in him, was my resentment against him now, and I became very angry when I perceived he had been watching me.

“Then you have made up your mind to be miserable,” he said, somewhat sharply, as he came up to me. “This is very foolish, Hester! it is worse than foolish – it is criminal, and it is weak – you forget your natural grief to nurse your wrath, and confirm yourself in a sense of injury. Where is your poor mother’s miniature which I gave you for a charm to keep those evil thoughts away? It might have soothed your father’s last hour, if you had not thus embittered your heart. Child! child! it is easier to make misery than to heal it – do not throw your life away.”

“I have no life to throw away,” said I, sullenly, “it has been taken from me and all its hopes. I do not care if I should die to-morrow.”

“Do you think that those who make such speeches are in the best mind for dying?” said Mr. Osborne. “Dying is a solemn matter, Hester! and can only be done once. But at present, living is more in your way. Do you know that this revengeful passion of yours will estrange all sympathy from you? Men and women who have lived long in the world have generally known some real calamities, Hester! it is only boys and girls who can afford to indulge in despair, and say fate has done its worst. You do not know what you say – instead of fate and its curse, Providence has blessed you more greatly than you are able to perceive.”

“Not Providence – Providence never works by falsehood,” cried I.

Mr. Osborne’s face flushed with displeasure. “You are very bitter, Hester, very harsh in your judgment,” he said, “and I could not bear with this passion of yours so long if you had not been a dear child to me for many a year – for your father’s and your mother’s sake I overlook your resentment against myself, though I have not deserved it; but, Hester, beware – it is all very well now to be heroically miserable; but you are young – you have a long life before you; and, however long you may dwell upon your injury, some time or other you will begin to want and long for the happiness which now you despise. Hester! come, I will confess you have had a hard initiation into the cares of life; be a woman and a brave one, let us see no more of the girl’s whims and humors. I can promise you all tenderness for your honest sorrow, Hester, but not for your wilful wretchedness.”

“I ask no tenderness, no sympathy. I will not accept it,” I cried, starting from my seat. “You know I have not a true friend in the world – who should sympathize with me? every one of you has deceived me!”

“If that is your conclusion, so be it,” said Mr. Osborne, walking to his seat. “I can only hope that your true friends will not be lost, even before you have real need for them, and that when you come back to look for it, Hester, and find your right senses, your happiness will not be entirely out of your reach.”

I did not wait to hear any more, but left the room, unable to speak with anger and indignation – the stupor of my misery was broken, I was roused almost to madness. It was not yet a week since I had fallen from my happy confidence into this dark abyss of falsehood and betrayal, and already they blamed me– already they called me resentful, revengeful, obdurate. I, the victim of their successful plots, I who stood alone and no one with me! I saw at once how I would be judged on all sides, how every one would condemn me – how light his offence would be in the eyes of the world – how unpardonable mine! If I had been like to yield before, I could not have yielded after that. I set myself fairly to meet it all. He should have justice! justice! and neither deceit nor pity from me.

In this tumult, my heart awoke. Its dead and sullen inaction gave way to a vivid feeling of reality – and as if I had known it now for the first time, there burst upon me the full sense of my father’s death. Yes! for the first time I felt to my heart, how desolate I was, and with a bitter satisfaction I remembered that I had nothing to wean me from my grief, nothing to distract the mourning of my orphanhood – no wooing tender happiness to lead me away from the grave where I would build all my thoughts. Yet now, also, for the first time I remembered what he had said upon his death-bed – strange words for him, “one event should not poison a life.” I thought I heard the echoing round me of his failing voice – the voice I should hear no more; and I threw myself down before the bed, kneeling and covering my face in passionate and bitter weeping. My father! my father! where was he? where?

When I rose from my knees, it was quite dark. I do not think any one can be in great or real grief without trying to pray. I prayed little in the stupor of my misery, but now broken wandering disconnected petitions came to my lips among my tears. When I appealed to God, though ever so feebly, and, alas! so little as I knew of him! it calmed me in some degree. I rose and bathed my face to put away the tears – I was subdued and melted – my eyes filled in spite of myself. I did not weep over the death-bed or the grave. I felt now as if I could weep continuously, and that it was impossible to stay my tears.

Then I heard a timid step without; I knew it was Alice, and by-and-bye she came softly knocking at the door – under the door crept in the light from her candle. I remembered with a bitter pang the last time she came to me in the darkness – the night of my betrothal. When I thought of that, I rose firmly and admitted her. How I was changed! Alice came in with a hesitating step, looking wistfully at me to see how far she might venture. Alice was greatly shaken with the events of these last few days. The bright look on her face was overclouded, she was humble and deprecating and uneasy. I had been her child, loving, confiding, almost depending upon her – and there was such a dreary difference in everything now.

She set the light upon the table, and lingered looking at me. I fancy she saw some encouragement in the glance of my wet eyes and the softening of my face. She came behind me under the pretence of doing something, and then she said timidly, “Miss Hester, may I speak?”

I could not say no. I did not answer at all, and she took this for permission.

“You think every one’s deceived you, dear,” said Alice humbly, “and in your great trouble you stand by yourself, and will let nobody help you. I don’t deny, Miss Hester, every one’s done wrong; but, darling, it was all for love of you.”

“Do not say so, Alice,” I exclaimed, eagerly, “you insult me when you speak thus.”

“Oh! Miss Hester, think upon my meaning,” cried Alice. “I thought I knew his look, his step, his voice, from the first time he came under this roof. I pondered and pondered in my mind if it could be him; but he never told me that I should know. You were as like to know as I was, dear – you had seen him all the same; and it was not my part to speak, or I thought so, Miss Hester. Then the night he spoke to you first, he brought the roses here, and said to me, ‘Do you think she would like them, Alice?’ and in my heart I knew where they came from; but never a word was spoken of them by either him or me. On your wedding-day I got more again, by a servant’s hand. I never doubted they came from Cottiswoode, nor that he sent them: but, dear, he never told me, and I had no right to know. You were willing to marry him, Miss Hester, you were bound up in one another; was I to presume that I knew more than you did, darling! and what was it I knew? nothing at all, dear, but the thought in my heart – oh! Miss Hester, you’re all I have in the world – don’t turn away from Alice – don’t think I’ve deceived you, I’m desolate without you.”

“I am quite desolate, I have no one in the world to trust to,” said I.

“Oh! don’t say it – don’t say it!” cried Alice, “he’s been led into a snare once, Miss Hester, but truth is in his heart!”

“It is I who have been led into a snare,” said I, bitterly, “he has wrecked all my expectations – he has plunged me out of happiness into misery; but that is not all, he has placed me so that I must either yield and be satisfied like a weak fool, or if I resist be known as a passionate ill-tempered woman, who makes him miserable. I see all that is before me. I am doomed like my father. My own life is robbed of every comfort, and the blame of making him unhappy will be added to me – oh, I see it all! I will be called a termagant, a household plague, a scorn to women. It is not enough that my life is wretched – my good name must go from me too.”

“Oh! Miss Hester, not by his will,” cried Alice.

As she spoke, a change came upon me. The pride of a wife came to my mind. I could blame him myself – but I could hear no one else blame him – I could not admit a third person to our domestic discord. My quarrel with Alice was for her own fault, and not for his. My bitterness against Mr. Osborne was because he had deceived me, and not because Edgar Southcote had. No one but himself had any right to speak of his error to me.

“I am not speaking of my husband,” I said coldly; “what is between us can only be settled by ourselves; no one can interfere between him and me. I speak only of circumstances of my unfortunate and unhappy position; that is all I refer to.”

Alice paused, chilled and overcast once more; it was difficult for her, a humble, simple woman, who rarely was offended, and who, when she was, forgave like a Christian, and never suffered the sun to go down upon her wrath, to understand or to deal with me; she stole round behind my chair, and bent down on the ground by my feet.

“Miss Hester, will you forgive me? you are used to me – you would not take to another for a long time, dear. I was your nurse, and I have been your maid, Miss Hester, all your life – don’t cast off Alice. May be, I don’t deserve that you ever should trust me more; but let me be beside you, darling; let me serve you, and wait on you, and comfort you if I can. Oh! Miss Hester, my dear sweet young lady trusted in me – and even your papa trusted in me – don’t cast me off, for you are my own child.”

I cried long and bitterly. I could not help it. The pleading of Alice recalled again to me how desolate and solitary I was. I had not a friend in the world, old or young, to whom I could confide my trouble; not one whom I could lean upon if I was ill or suffering; alas, not a woman in existence, except herself, whom I should have wished even to see again! and disappointed as I was in those hopes of perfect sympathy and union with my husband, which every one forms at some time or other; my heart yearned for the natural solace – the comfort of mother or of sister which providence had denied to me. I let my hand fall upon her shoulder – I leaned upon her. “Oh, Alice, Alice, why did you deceive me?” I cried with a great burst of tears.

She did not answer anything, she drew me close to her bosom, and caressed me, and soothed me. My heart beat calmer. I was subdued – I scarcely knew how, as I leant upon Alice. I seemed to have found some rest and comfort for which I had been seeking vainly. When she began to weep over me, my own tears stayed; my heart was eased because I had forgiven her, and then I raised myself up, and we sat together speaking of my father. I had never heard about his last days.

“He never was well after you went away, Miss Hester,” said Alice; “all that day after Mr. Osborne left, he wandered up and down talking to himself. The most that he said, that I could hear, was, ‘she will be well – she will be well;’ for, dear, his heart was wrapped up in you, though he said little; and then sometimes he would take a turn, as if he was doubtful, and once I heard him say, like trying to persuade himself, ‘She is not like me – she will not resent it as I would have done.’ I was not spying on him to hear this, Miss Hester; but he wandered about so, wherever I was, or whatever we were doing, and never seemed to notice us, and Mary, if she had minded, might have heard as well as me. A week before you came home he took to his bed, and when I was staying in his room waiting on him, he sometimes spoke to me. God was good to him, dear, and gave him time to think, and he was not near so high, as he drew near his latter end; but, Miss Hester, you might not care to hear what your papa said to me.”

“Oh! tell me everything – every word, Alice,” I cried.

“Sometimes he would not say a word for hours – and then all at once would speak as if he thought I had been following all that was in his mind,” said Alice. “In this way, all at once, he said to me, ‘When she comes home, you will stay by her, Alice – let nothing persuade you to go away from her – she has no mother, no friend,’ and then he did not say another word that night. Then it was again, ‘She may have disappointment in her life – few are free of it – the simplest comfort is the best. Alice, you are a simple woman, you live in every day – do you bring fresh heart to comfort my child.’ It looks presuming, Miss Hester, I know it does, dear. I never could have thought such things of myself; but that was what he said.”

“Go on – go on, Alice,” said I, as well as I was able, through my tears.

“Dear, there was not a great deal more; sometimes he said only your name, and ‘My only child, my only child;’ and then he would turn and say, ‘Be sure you never leave her, Alice, she will have need of you.’ I cannot think on much more; but when I went and told him you were come (it was in the night we got the news, and I was sitting up with him), he said I was to send away that moment to call you to him – and you came – and oh, darling! what a comfort all your life, that you were in time to see his latter end!”

I was weeping now without restraint, leaning upon Alice. My solitude was less desolate, less miserable, when she was beside me; and I who had always prized so much my father’s few tokens of tenderness, it went to my heart to hear how he had remembered me when I was away. “Do you think he knew, Alice?” I whispered; it was an unnecessary question, for I was sure he did.

“He never said a word, dear; but it was not like he would tell me,” said Alice. “Yes, Miss Hester, he had found it out – I knew it by his eye that very day.”

And now, that I had the clue, so did I; but I no longer felt anger against my father, though all of them had suffered me to sink passively into this gulf and grave of all my hopes.

When I went to rest that night, it was Alice’s kind hand that smoothed away my hair, and said good-night at my pillow. I wept myself to sleep, but my sleep was not haunted by the miserable visions of those nights which were past.

THE FIFTH DAY

OCTOBER was over now, and sullen and dark winter weather had oppressed the skies, and settled down upon the country. I was still in Cambridge, living alone in my father’s house. My husband came and went constantly, yet left me unmolested; I almost think he was afraid at once to enter upon the question of my return, and he respected the grief which would not be sympathized with. I believe, indeed, that to have an excuse for delaying any explanation or arrangements between us – to put off fixing that future which we both dreaded, there was a mutual pretence of business which claimed my attention after my father’s death; but there was, indeed, no such thing. He had left one or two legacies, and desired that, except the books he bequeathed to Mr. Osborne, his library should be left intact, and even the house preserved, and a housekeeper placed in it when I returned to my own home – but he had neither debts nor debtors – there were no arrangements to make. I lived a dreary life in the drawing-room, when I was too sick at heart to go near the window, and never left my chair when I could help it. I read earnestly, yet eagerly, whatever books came to my hand – novels when I could get them – I was glad of anything to cheat me from my own brooding unhappy thoughts; yet I never thought of going away. Where could I go to? All the world was alike solitary – alike desolate to me. The heavy listlessness of grief came upon me – I cared for nothing, I scarcely desired anything. I had never had any visitors, and though one or two came to see me now because I was mistress of Cottiswoode, to offer their condolences and sympathy for my loss, I denied them admittance when I could, and when I could not, suffered their coming and their going so indifferently that they seldom came to trouble me again. Mr. Osborne came now and then, but his visits were only of duty, and there was little pleasure in them for either him or me. By degrees I was left entirely alone with Alice, and with my husband, when he came. People had begun already to speak of me with astonishment. I made Alice confess this was the case; and no one knew me or could take my part; but in my heart I was rather glad than otherwise, to have my first condemnation over so soon.

It was now a month since we had returned home, and save on the first evening and morning after our arrival at Cottiswoode, we had spoken to each other only on indifferent subjects. I knew this could not last. I had always in my mind a certain deadened and dull expectation of our next interview. I feared it, and would have put it off from day to day, yet it seemed the one thread of life in my languid existence. My heart beat when I heard his footsteps come along the close – that springy light rapid step; I knew its faintest echo, and equally well I knew it when duller and fainter it went away. The misery of our position was, that we were not, and could not be, indifferent to each other; when he came, this subdued restrained expectation animated me into temporary vigor; when he went away, I was aware of an aching disappointment, which mingled with a sense of relief. Involuntarily I watched and waited for him – if our meetings had all been joy, they scarcely could have been so breathlessly anticipated, for then we should have known each other’s plans, and intentions, and wishes, and now we knew each other in perfect ignorance of what the other meant to do.

I myself was still worse than that – I did not know my own intentions; I had no plan for the future. I knew we must by-and-by decide upon something; but my mind seemed incapable of any action, save brooding over my own thoughts or speculating on his. Alice had brightened, I could not tell why, since our interview. I suspected she nourished vain hopes that I was weak, and would yield to him; none of them understood me, or if any one did, it was he.

Things were in this position to-day, when Alice came and told me that he had arrived, and wanted to see me. I told her to show Mr. Southcote upstairs. I was able to compose myself before he entered the room. I am sure he could see no sign of agitation. It was very different with him; his face had an excited, unsteady look, he was very pale, yet sometimes his cheek flushed with a deep faint color. I could not see that he either had any plan. I read in his whole manner that he had come to try once more what entreaty, and persuasion, and penitence would do. This hardened and strengthened me; I was ready to hear him with coolness and self-possession when I saw that he brought neither to his conference with me.