Heart and Cross

With which, shaking off a little heat of exasperation which had gathered about her, Miss Polly resumed her usual work and placidity. I confess it was not without a smile I read Lady Greenfield’s letter. I fortunately was under no temptations of the kind myself. If I had been, I daresay, I should have turned out exactly like my neighbors; but the spectators of a domestic squabble or successful piece of neighborly oppression and tyranny always see the ludicrous side of it, and I could understand my lady’s mild malice and certainty of not being to blame, so well. It appeared that the poor little Emmy, completely overpowered by Lady Greenfield’s neighborly attentions, had in her turn worried her curate, and that the result of their united efforts was the withdrawal of the young clergyman, who did not feel himself able to cope with my lady at the Hall and his own exasperated little wife in the cottage, which unlooked-for result Lady Greenfield took the earliest opportunity of communicating to her dear Polly, with condolences over Emmy’s want of spirit and weak propensity, poor child!—to see neglect and slight where nothing of the kind was meant. I was so long getting over this, that, having heard from him recently myself, I did not make the haste I might have done to read what Lady Greenfield had to say about Bertie. I was reminded of this by seeing suddenly over the top of the letter a slight, quick movement made by Alice. It was only the most common change of position—nothing could be more natural; but there was a certain indescribable something of impatience and suspense in it which I comprehended by a sudden instinct. I stumbled immediately down to the paragraph about Bertie:

“Pray tell Clare Crofton,” wrote Lady Greenfield, “in case she should not have heard from Bertie lately—which is very likely, for young men I know don’t always keep up their correspondences as they ought, especially with elderly female relations, like dear Clare and myself—that I had a letter from my nephew by the last mail. He has not done yet lamenting that he could not get home and go to the Crimea, but says his old brigadier is suspicious of the Native army, and prophesies that there will be some commotion among them, which Bertie thinks will be great fun, and that a thorough cutting down would do these pampered fellows all the good in the world: so he says, you know, as boys will talk—but the Company’s officers laugh at the idea. If all keeps quiet, Bertie says he is rather sick of India—he thinks he will come back and see his friends: he thinks perhaps his dear cousin Clare has somebody in her pocket whom she means him to marry. To be sure, after giving him Estcourt, it would be only right that she should have a vote in the choice of his wife. Such a great matter, you know, for a boy like Bertie, his father’s fourth son, to come into a pretty little property like Estcourt—and so good of dear Clare!—pray tell her, with my love.”

Not having taken the precaution to glance over this, as I ought to have done from my previous acquaintance with “dear” Elinor, I had stumbled into the middle of that statement about the somebody whom cousin Clare had in her pocket before I was aware; and after an awkward pause, felt constrained to proceed. I thought the malice of the epistle altogether would defeat itself, and went on accordingly to the end of the sentence. Then I folded up the letter and gave it to Miss Polly.

“I wonder does Lady Greenfield mean to make me so thoroughly uncomfortable when Bertie comes home that I shall not let him come here at all,” said I; “or to terrify me out of the possibility of introducing him to anybody, lest I should be said to be influencing his choice? But indeed she need not take the trouble. I know Bertie, and Bertie knows me much too well for the success of any such attempt. I will not have my liberty infringed upon, I assure you, Miss Polly, not by half a dozen Lady Greenfields.”

“My dear, you don’t suppose me an accessory?” said Miss Polly, with a little spirit. “Did any one ever see such a wanton mischief-maker? I think she takes quite a delight in setting people by the ears. If Bertie ever did say such a thing, Clare,” said Miss Polly, with a little vehemence, “about somebody in your pocket, you know, I could swear it was Elinor, and nobody else, who put it into his head.”

By the merest inadvertence I am sure, certainly not by any evil intention, Miss Polly, as she delivered these words, allowed her mild old glances to stray towards Alice. I at the same moment chanced to give a furtive look in the same direction. Of course, just at the instant of danger, Alice, who had been immovable hitherto, suddenly looked up and detected us both. I do not know what meanings of which they were innocent her sensitive pride discovered in our eyes, but she sprang up with an impatience and mortification quite irrestrainable, her very neck growing crimson as she turned her head out of my sight. I understood well enough that burning blush of shame, and indignation, and wounded pride; it was not the blush of a love-sick girl, and my heart quaked when it occurred to me that Lady Greenfield might possibly have done a more subtle act of mischief by her letter than even she intended. Whom was I so likely to have in my pocket as Alice Harley? Indeed, was not she aware by intuition of some such secret desire in my mind? And suppose Bertie were coming home with tender thoughts towards the friend of his boyhood, and perhaps a little tender pleasant wonder, full of suggestions, why Alice Harley, and she alone, out of her immediate companions, should remain unmarried—what good would that laudable, and much-to-be-desired frame of mind do to the poor boy now? If he came to Hilfont this very night, the most passionate lover, did not I know that Alice would reject him much more vehemently than she had rejected the Rector—scornfully, because conscious of the secret inclination towards him, which, alas! lay treacherous at the bottom of her heart? Oh, Lady Greenfield! Oh, dearest of “dear” Elinors! if you had anywhere two most sincere well-wishers, they were surely Miss Polly and myself!

CHAPTER X

“Why will not you come with us to London, Alice?” said I. “Mr. Crofton wishes it almost as much as I do. Such a change would do you good, and I do not need to tell you how pleasant it would be to me. Mrs. Harley and the young people at home can spare you. Kate, you know, is quite old enough to help your mother. Why are you so obstinate? You have not been in town in the season since the year after Clara’s marriage.”

“I went up to see the pictures last year,” said Alice demurely.

“Oh pray, Alice, don’t be so dreadfully proper!” cried Clara; “that’s what she’s coming to, Mrs. Crofton. The second week in May—to see all the exhibitions and hear an Oratorio in Exeter Hall—and make ‘mems.’ in her diary when she has got through them, like those frightful people who have their lives written! Oh dear, dear! to think our Alice should have stiffened into such a shocking old maid!”

“Well, Clara, dear, I am very glad you find your own lot so pleasant that you would like to see everybody the same as yourself,” said Alice, sententiously, and with no small amount of mild superiority; “for my part I think the rôle of old maid is quite satisfactory, especially when one has so many nephews and nieces—and why should I go to London, Mrs. Crofton? It is all very well for Clara—Clara is in circumstances, of course, that make it convenient and natural—but as for me, who have nothing at all to do with your grand life, why should I go and vex myself with my own? Perhaps I might not have strength of mind to return comfortably to the cottage, and look after the butcher’s bills, and see that there were no cobwebs in the corners—and though I am of very little importance elsewhere,” said Alice, coloring a little, and with some unnecessary fervor, “I am of consequence at home.”

“But then, you see,” said I, “Mrs. Harley has four daughters—and I have not one.”

“Ah! by-and-by,” said Alice, with a smile and a sigh, “Mrs. Harley will only have one daughter. Kate and little Mary will marry just as Clara has done. I shall be left alone with mamma and Johnnie; that is why I don’t want to do anything which shall disgust me with my quiet life—at least that is one reason,” added Alice, with a slight blush. “No, no—what would become of the world if we were all exactly alike—what a hum-drum, dull prospect it would be if everybody were just as happy, and as gay, and as much in the sun as everybody else. You don’t think, Clara, how much the gray tints of our household that is to be—mamma old, Johnnie, poor fellow, so often in trouble, and myself a stout housekeeper, will add to the picturesqueness of the landscape—much more than if our house were as gay as your own.”

“Why, Alice, you are quite a painter!” cried I, in a little surprise.

“No, indeed—I wish I were,” said Alice. “I wonder why it is that some people can do things, and some people, with all the will in the world, can only admire them when they’re done, and think—surely it’s my own fault—surely if I had tried I could have done as well! I suppose it’s one of the common troubles of women. I am sure I have looked at a picture, or read a book many a time, with the feeling that all that was in my heart if I could only have got it out. You smile, Mrs. Crofton—perhaps it’s very absurd—I daresay a woman ought to be very thankful when she can understand books, and has enough to live on without needing to work,” added this feminine misanthrope with a certain pang of natural spite and malice in her voice.

Spite and malice! I venture to use such ugly words, because it was my dear Alice, the purest, tenderest, and most lovable of women, who spoke.

“There are a great many people in this world who think it a great happiness to have enough to live on,” said I, besides women. “I don’t know if Maurice has your ambition, Alice—but, at least he’s a man, and has no special disadvantages; yet, begging your pardons, young ladies, I think Alice is good for something more than he is, as the world stands.”

“Ah, but then Maurice, you know, Mrs. Crofton—Maurice has doubts,” said Clara, with a slight pique at my boldness. “Poor Maurice! he says he must follow out his inquiries wherever they lead him, and however sad the issue may be. It is very dreadful—he may not be able to believe in anything before he is done—but then, he must not trifle with his conscience. And with such very serious things to trouble him, it is too bad he should be misunderstood.”

“Don’t, Clara! hush!” whispered Alice, looking a little ashamed of this argument.

“But why should I hush? Hugh says just the same as Mrs. Crofton—it’s very provoking—but these active people do not take into consideration the troubles of a thoughtful mind, Maurice says.”

“That is very likely,” said I, with a little complacency—“but remember this is all a digression—Alice, will you come to London or will you not?”

Alice got up and made me a very pretty curtsey. “No, please, Mrs. Crofton, I will not,” said that very unmanageable young lady. She looked so provokingly pretty, piquant, and attractive at the moment that I longed to punish her. And Bertie was coming home! and her mind was irretrievably prejudiced against him; it was almost too much for human patience—but to be sure, when a woman is seven-and-twenty, she has some sort of right to know her own mind.

At that moment little Clary Sedgwick, all in a flutter of pink ribbons, came rustling into the room, her very brief little skirt inflated with crinoline, and rustling half as much as her mamma’s—a miniature fine lady, with perfect little gloves, a miraculous little hat, and ineffable embroideries all over her; but with a child’s face so sweet, and a little princess’s air so enchanting, that one could no more find fault with her splendor than one could find fault with the still more exquisite decorations of a bird or a flower. Clary came to tell her mamma that the carriage was at the door, and little Mrs. Sedgwick swept off immediately, followed by Alice, to get ready for her drive. They were going to call upon somebody near. Clary remained with me till they came back, and Derwie was not long of finding out his playfellow. Derwie (my boy was a vulgar-minded boy, with a strong preference for things over thoughts, as I have before said) stood speechless, lost in admiration of Clary’s grandeur. Then he cast a certain glance of half-comical comparison upon his own coat, worn into unspeakable shabbiness by three weeks of holidays, and upon his brown little hands, garnished with cuts and scratches, and I am grieved to say not even so clean as they might have been. When he had a little recovered his first amazement, Derwie turned her round and round with the tips of his fingers. Clary was by no means unwilling; she exhibited her Easter splendor with all the grace of a little belle.

“Mamma, isn’t she grand?” said Derwie—“isn’t she pretty? I never saw her look so pretty before.”

“Oh, Derwie, for shame!” said Clary, holding down her head with a pretty little affectation of confusion wonderful to behold.

“For shame?—Why?—For you know you are pretty,” said my straightforward son, “whether you are dressed grand or not. Mamma, did you ever see her like this before?—I never did. I should just like to have a great big glass case and put you in, Clary, so that you might always look just as you look now.”

“Oh, Derwie!” cried Clary, again, but this time with unaffected horror, “I’d starve if you put me in there!”

“No, because I’d bring you something every day,” said Derwie—“all my own pudding, and every cake I got, and the poor women in the village would be so pleased to come and look at you, Clary. Tell me what’s the name of this thing; I’ll tell Susan Stubbs, the dressmaker, all about you. They like to see ladies in grand dresses, all the cottage people; so do I; but I like to see you best of all. Here, Clary, Clary! don’t go away! Look at her pink little gloves, mamma!—and I say, Clary, haven’t you got a parasol?”

“You silly boy! what do you suppose I want with a parasol when I’m going to drive with mamma?” cried Clary, with that indescribable little toss of her head.

At that interesting moment the mamma, of whom this delightful little beauty was a reproduction, made her appearance, buttoning pink gloves like Clary’s, and rustling in her rosy, shining, silken draperies, like a perfect rose, all dewy and fragrant, not even quite full-blown yet, in spite of the bud by her side. Alice came after her, a little demure, in her brown silk gown, very affectionate, and just a little patronizing to the pretty mother and daughter—on the whole rather superior to these lovely fooleries of theirs, on her eminence of unmarried woman. My pretty Alice! Her gravity, notwithstanding she was quite as much a child as either of them, was wonderfully amusing, though she did not know it. They went down-stairs with their pleasant feminine rustle, charming the echoes with their pleasant voices. My boy Derwie, entirely captivated by Mrs. Sedgwick’s sudden appearance on the scene—an enlarged edition of Clary—followed them to the door, vainly attempting to lay up some memoranda in his boyish mind for the benefit of Susan Stubbs. Pleased with them all, I turned to the window to see them drive away, when, lo! there suddenly emerged out of the curtains the dark and agitated face of Johnnie Harley. Had we said anything in our late conversation to wound the sensitive mind of the cripple? He had been there all the time.

CHAPTER XI

“Johnnie, is there anything the matter. Why have you been sitting there?” cried I.

“Oh, no, there’s nothing the matter,” said Johnnie, in such a tone as a wild beast making a snap at one might have used if it had possessed the faculty of words. “I was there because I happened to be there before you came into the room, Mrs. Crofton; I beg your pardon! I don’t mean to be rude.”

“I think it is quite necessary you should say as much,” said I. “Your sisters and I have been talking here for some time, quite unaware of your presence. That is not becoming. No one ought to do such things, especially a young man of right feeling like yourself.”

“Oh, you think I have right feelings,” cried Johnnie, bitterly, “you think I am man enough to know what honor means? That is something, at least. I have been well brought up, haven’t I? Mrs. Crofton,” continued the unfortunate youth, “you were rather hard upon Maurice just now—I heard you, and he deserves it. If I were like Maurice, I should be ashamed to be as useless as he is. I’m not so useless now, in spite of everything; but you’ll be frank with me—why does Alice speak of keeping house with my mother and Johnnie? Why, when Kate, and even little Mary, are supposed to have homes of their own, and Maurice, of course, to be provided for—why is there to be a special establishment, all neutral colored and in the shade, for my mother, and Alice, and me?”

I sat gazing at the poor youth in the most profound confusion and amazement. What could I say to him? How, if he did not perceive it himself, could I explain the naturalness of poor Alice’s anticipations? I had not a word to say; his question took me entirely by surprise, and struck me dumb—it was unanswerable.

“You do not say anything,” said Johnnie, vehemently. “Why does Alice suppose she will have to take care of me all my life through? Why should I go to contribute that alternative of shade which makes the landscape picturesque?—picturesque!” exclaimed poor Johnnie, breathing out the words upon a long breath of wrath and indignation; “is that all I am good for? Do you suppose God has made me in a man’s form, with a man’s heart, only to add a subtle charm to another man’s happiness by the contrast of my misery? I believe in no such thing, Mrs. Crofton. Is that what Alice means?”

“I believe in no such thing either,” said I, relieved to be able to say something; “and you forget, Johnnie, that the same life which Alice assigned to you she chose for herself. She thought, I suppose, because your health is not strong, that you would choose to live at home—she thought”–

“Mrs. Crofton,” said Johnnie, “why don’t you say it out? she thought—but why say thought—she knew I was a cripple, and debarred from the joyous life of man; she thought that to such as me no heavenly help could come; it did not occur to her that perhaps there might be an angel in the spheres who would love me, succor me, give me a place among the happy—yes, even me! You think I speak like a fool,” continued the young man, the flush of his excitement brightening all his face, and the natural superlatives of youth, all the warmer and stronger for the physical infirmities which seemed to shut him out from their legitimate use, pouring to his lips, “and so I should have been, but for the divine chance that brought me here. Ah, Mrs. Crofton, you did not know what an Easter of the soul you were asking me to! I came only a boy, scarcely aware of the dreary colors in which life lay before me. Now I can look at these dreary colors only by way of Alice’s contrast—to make the reality more glorious—for I too shall have the home and the life of a man!”

He stopped, not because his words were exhausted, but because breath failed him—he stood before me, raising himself erect out of his habitual stoop of weakness, strengthened by the inspiring force of the great delusion, which gave color to his face and nerve to his hand. Looking at him so, his words did not seem such sad, bitter, heart-breaking folly as they were. Poor boy! poor Johnnie! how would he fall prostrate upon the cold, unconsolatory earth, when this spell was broken! I could have cried over him, as he stood there defying me; he had drunk that cup of Circe—but he did not know in his momentary intoxication that it was poison to him.

“My dear Johnnie,” said I, “I am very glad of anything that makes you happy—but there is surely no occasion to speak so strongly. Alice, I must remind you again, chose exactly the same life for herself that she supposed for you”–

“Alice has had her youth and her choice,” said Johnnie, with a calmer tone, and sinking, his first excitement over, into a chair; “but she does not think Maurice is likely to share that gray life of hers—Maurice, who, as you say yourself, is of no use in the world—nor Harry, whom they have all forgotten now he is in Australia, nor the children at home; only mamma when she is old, and Johnnie—well, it is of no use speaking. A man’s business is not to speak, but to work.”

“That is very true, certainly,” said I: “but tell me, will you—if it is not wrong to ask—what has made this great change in your ideas, all at once?”

“Ah, Mrs. Crofton, don’t you know?” cried Johnnie, blushing, a soft overpowering youthful blush, which would have done no discredit to Clara herself; and the poor, foolish boy looked at me with an appealing triumphant look, as if he at once entreated me to say, and defied me to deny that she was altogether an angel, and he the very happiest of boys or men.

“My dear boy,” said I, “don’t be angry with me. I’ve known you all your life, Johnnie. I don’t mean to say a word against Miss Reredos—but tell me, has there been any explanation between her and you?”

He hesitated a moment, blushing still.

“No,” he said, after a pause; “no—I have not been able to arrange my thoughts at all yet. I have thought of nothing but—but herself—and this unimaginable hope of happiness—and I am a man of honor, Mrs. Crofton. I will not speak to her till I know whether I have anything but love to offer—not because I am so base as to suppose that money could recommend a man to her, or so foolish as to think that I will ever have anything beyond income; but when I do speak, you understand, Mrs. Crofton, it is not for vague love-making, but to ask her to be my wife.”

He looked at me with his sudden air of manhood and independence, again somewhat defiant. Heaven help the poor boy! I heard myself groaning aloud in the extremity of my bewilderment and confusion; poor Johnnie, with his superb self-assumption!—he, a fortnight ago, the cheerfulest of boy invalids, the kindest of widow’s sons!—and she, five years older than he, at the lowest reckoning, an experienced young lady, with dreams of settlements and trousseaux occupying her mature mind! Alack, alack! what was to come of it? I sat silent, almost gaping with wonderment at the boy. At last I caught at the idea of asking him what his prospects or intentions were—though without an idea that he had any prospects, or knew in the least what he was talking about.

“You spoke of income, Johnnie—may I ask what you were thinking of?”

Johnnie blushed once more, though after a different fashion; he grew confidential and eager—like himself.