A Red Wallflower

There was a pause of some length.

'Who is left there now, of the family?' Esther asked.

'I have not heard.'

'Do they never write to you?'

'Never.'

'Nor you to them, papa?'

'No. Since I came away there has been no intercourse whatever between our families.'

'Oh, papa!'

'I am inclined to regret it now, for your sake.'

'I am not thinking of that. But, papa, it must be sixteen or seventeen years now; isn't it?'

'Something like so much.'

'Oh, papa, do write to them! do write to them, and make it up. Do not let the quarrel last any longer.'

'Write to them and make it up?' said the colonel, rubbing his head again. In all his life Esther had hardly ever seen him do it before. 'They have forgotten me long ago; and I suppose they are all grown out of my remembrance. But it might be better for you if we went home.'

'Never mind that, papa; that is not what I am thinking of. Why, who could be better off than I am? But write and make it all up, papa; do! It isn't good for families to live so in hostility. Do what you can to make it up.'

The colonel sat silent, rubbing the hair of his head in every possible direction, while Esther's fancy for a while busied itself with images of an unknown crowd of relations that seemed to flit before her. How strange it would be to have aunts and cousins; young and old family friends, such as other girls had; instead of being so entirely set apart by herself, as it were. It was fascinating, the mere idea. Not that Esther felt her loneliness now; she was busy and healthy and happy; yet this sudden vision made her realise that she was alone. How strange and how pleasant it would be to have a crowd of friends, of one's own blood and name! She mused a little while over this picture, and then came back to the practical present.

'Meanwhile, papa, what do you think of my plan? About getting a house in the city, and giving up Buonaparte and his oats? Don't you think it would be comfortable?'

The colonel considered the subject now in a quieter mood, discussed it a little further, and finally agreed to drive into town and see what he could find in the way of a house.

CHAPTER XXX

A HOUSE

Yet the colonel did not go. Days passed, and he did not go. Esther ventured some gentle reminders, which had no effect. And the winter was gone and the spring was come, before he made the first expedition to the city in search of a house. Once started on his quest, it is true the colonel carried it on vigorously, and made many journeys for it; but they were all in vain. Rents in the city were found to be so much higher than rents in the country as fully to neutralize the advantage hoped for in a smaller household and the dismissal of the horse. Not a dwelling could be found where this would not be true. The search was finally given up; and things in the little family went on as they had been going for some time past.

Esther at last, under stress of necessity, made fresh representations to her father, and besought leave to give lessons. They were running into debt, with no means of paying. It went sorely against the grain with the colonel to give his consent; pride and tenderness both rebelled; he hesitated long, but circumstances were too much for him. He yielded at last, not with a groan, but with many groans.

'I came here to take care of you,' he said; 'and this is the end of it!'

'Don't take it so, papa,' cried Esther. 'I like to do it. It is not a hardship.'

'It is a hardship,' he retorted; 'and you will find it so. I find it so now.'

'Even so, papa,' said the girl, with infinite sweetness; 'suppose it be a hardship, the Lord has given it to me; and so long as I am sure it is something He has given, I want no better. Indeed, papa, you know Icould have no better.'

'I know nothing of the kind. You are talking folly.'

'No, papa, if you please. Just remember, – look here, papa, – here are the words. Listen: "The Lord God is a sun and shield; the Lord will give grace and glory; no good thing will he withhold from them that walk uprightly."'

'Do you mean to tell me,' said the colonel angrily, 'that – well, that all the things that you have not just now, and ought to have, are not good things?'

'Not good for me, or at least not the best, or I should have them.'

This answer was with a smile so absolutely shadowless, that the colonel found nothing to answer but a groan, which was made up of pain and pride and pleasure in inscrutable proportions.

The next step was to speak to Miss Fairbairn. That wise woman showed no surprise, and did not distress Esther with any sympathy; she took it as the most natural thing in the world that her favourite pupil should wish to become a teacher; and promised her utmost help. In her own school there was now no longer any opening; that chance was gone; but she gave Esther a recommendation in person to the principal of another establishment, where in consequence Miss Gainsborough found ready acceptance.

And now indeed she felt herself a stranger, and found herself alone. This was a different thing from her first entering school as a pupil. And Esther began also presently to perceive that her father had not been entirely wrong in his estimate of a teacher's position and experiences. It is not a path of roses that such a one has to tread; and even the love she may bear to those she teaches, and even the genuine love of teaching them, do not avail to make it so. Woe to the teacher who has not those two alleviations and helps to fall back upon! Esther soon found both; and yet she gave her father credit for having known more about the matter than she did. She was truly alone now; the children loved her, but scattered away from her as soon as their tasks were done; her fellow-teachers she scarcely saw – they were busy and jaded; and with the world outside of school she had nothing to do. She had never had much to do with it; yet at Miss Fairbairn's she had sometimes a little taste of society that was of high order, and all in the house had been at least well known to her and she to them, even if no particular congeniality had drawn them together. She had lost all that now. And it sometimes came over Esther in those days the thought of her English aunts and cousins, as a vision of strange pleasantness. To have plenty of friends and relations, of one's own blood, and therefore inalienable; well-bred and refined and cultivated (whereby I am afraid Esther's fancy made them a multiplication of Pitt Dallas), – it looked very alluring! She went bravely about her work, and did it beautifully, and was very contented in it, and relieved to be earning money; yet these visions now and again would come over her mind, bringing a kind of distant sunshiny glow with them, different from the light that fell on that particular bit of life's pathway she was treading just then. They came and went; what came and did not go was Esther's consciousness that she was earning only a little money, and that with that little she could not clear off all the debts that had accrued and were constantly accruing. When she had paid the butcher, the grocer's bill presented itself, and when she had after some delay got rid of that, then came the need for a fresh supply of coal. Esther spent nothing on her own dress that she could help, but her father's was another matter, and tailors' charges she found were heavy. She went bravely on; she was young and full of spirit, and she was a Christian and full of confidence; nevertheless she did begin to feel the worry of these petty, gnawing, money cares, which have broken the heart of so many a woman before her. Moreover, another thing demanded consideration. It was necessary, now that she had no longer a home with Miss Fairbairn, that she should go into town and come back every day, and, furthermore, as she was giving lessons in a school, no circumstance of weather or anything else must hinder her being absolutely punctual. Yet Esther foresaw that as the winter came on again it would be very difficult sometimes to maintain this punctuality; and it became clear to her that it would be almost indispensable for them to move into town. If only a house could be found!

Meantime Christopher went and came about the house, cultivated the garden and took care of the horse and drove Esther to school, all just as usual; his whilome master never having as yet said one word to him on the subject of his marriage and consequent departure. Whether his wages were paid him, Esther was anxiously doubtful; but she dared not ask. I say 'whilome' master, for there is no doubt that Mr. Bounder in these days felt that nobody was his master but himself. He did all his duties faithfully, but then he took leave to cross the little field which lay between his old home and his new, and to disappear for whole spaces of time from the view of the colonel's family.

It was one evening in November. Mrs. Barker was just sitting down to her tea, and Christopher was preparing himself to leave her. I should remark that Mrs. Barker had called on the former Mrs. Blumenfeld, and established civil relations between the houses.

'Won't you stay, Christopher?' asked his sister.

'No, thank ye. I've got a little woman over there, who's expecting me.'

'Does she set as good a table for you as I used to do? in those days when I could?' the housekeeper added, with a sigh.

'Well, she ain't just up to some o' your arts,' said Christopher, with a contented face, in which his blue eye twinkled with a little slyness; 'but I'll tell you what, she can cook a dish o' pot-pie that you can't beat, nor nobody else; and her rye bread is just uncommon!'

'Rye bread!' said the housekeeper, with an utterance of disdain.

'I'll bring a loaf over,' said Christopher, nodding his head; 'and you can give some to Miss Esther if you like. Good-night!'

He made few steps of it through the dark cold evening to the house that had become his home. The room that received him might have pleased a more difficult man. It was as clean as hands could make it; bright with cleanliness, lighted and warmed with a glowing fire, and hopeful with a most savoury scent of supper. The mistress of the house was busy about her hearth, looking neat and comfortable enough to match her room. As Christopher came in she lit a candle that stood on the supper-table. Christopher hugged himself at this instance of his wife's thrift, and sat down.

'You've got something that smells uncommon good there!' said he approvingly.

'I allays du think a hot supper's comfortable at the end o' a cold day,' returned the new Mrs. Bounder. 'I don't care what I du as long's I'm busy with all the world all the day long; I kin take a piece and a bite and go on, but when it comes night, and I hev time to think I'm tired, then I like a good hot something or other.'

'What have you got there?' said Christopher, peering over at the dish on the hearth which Mrs. Bounder was filling from a pot before the fire. She laughed.

'You wouldn't be any wiser ef I told you. It's a little o' everything. Give me a good garden, and I kin live as well as I want to, and cost no one more'n a few shillin's, neither. 'Tain't difficult, ef you know how. Now see what you say to that.'

She dished up her supper, put a plate of green pickles on the table, filled up her tea-pot, and cut some slices from a beautiful brown loaf, which must have rivalled the rye, though it was not that colour. Christopher sat down, said grace reverently, and attacked the viands, while the mistress poured him out a cup of tea.

'Christopher,' she said, as she handed it to him, 'I'd jes' like to ask you something.'

'What is it?'

'I'd like to know jes' why you go through that performance?'

'Performance?' echoed Christopher. 'What are you talkin' about?'