Chippinge Borough

"Why did she not remain in Bath?" Mary asked.

"I cannot tell you," Miss Sibson answered. "She has whims. If you ask me, I should say that she thought Sir Robert would not find her here, and so could not take you from her."

"But the servants?" Mary said in dismay. "They will tell my father. And indeed-"

"Indeed what, my dear?"

"I do not wish to hide from him."

"Quite right!" Miss Sibson said. "Quite right, my dear. But I fancy that that was her ladyship's reason. Perhaps she thought also that when she-that afterwards I should be at hand to take care of you. As a fact," Miss Sibson continued, rubbing her cheek with the handle of a teaspoon, a sure sign that she was troubled, "I wish that your mother had chosen another place. You don't ask, my dear, where the children are."

Mary looked at her hostess. "Oh, Miss Sibson!" she exclaimed, conscience-stricken. "You cannot have sent them away for my sake?"

"No, my dear," Miss Sibson answered, noting with satisfaction that Mary was making a meal. "No, their parents have removed them. The Recorder is coming to-morrow, and he is so unpopular on account of this nasty Bill-which is setting everyone on horseback whether they can ride or not-and there is so much talk of trouble when he enters, that all the foolish people have taken fright and removed their children for the week. It's pure nonsense, my dear," Miss Sibson continued comfortably. "I've seen the windows of the Mansion House broken a score of times at elections, and not another house in the Square a penny the worse! Just an old custom. And so it will be to-morrow. But the noise may disturb her ladyship, and that's why I wish her elsewhere."

Mary did not answer, and the schoolmistress, noting her spiritless attitude and the dark shadows under her eyes, was confirmed in her notion that here was something beyond grief for the mother whom the girl had scarcely known. And Miss Sibson felt a tug at her own heartstrings. She was well-to-do and well considered in Bristol, and she was not conscious that her life was monotonous. But the gay scrap of romance which Mary's coming had wrought into the dull patchwork of days, long toned to the note of Mrs. Chapone, was welcome to her. Her little relaxations, her cosy whist-parties, her hot suppers to follow, these she had: but here was something brighter and higher. It stirred a long-forgotten youth, old memories, the ashes of romance. She loved Mary for it.

To rouse the girl, she rose from her chair. "Now, my dear," she said, "you can go to your room, if you will. And in ten minutes we will step next door."

Mary looked at her with grateful eyes. "I am glad now," she said, "I am glad that she came here."

"Ah!" the schoolmistress answered, pursing up her lips. And she looked at the girl uncertainly. "It's odd," she said, "I sometimes think that you are just-Mary Smith."

"I am!" the other answered warmly. "Always Mary Smith to you!" And the old woman took the young one to her arms.

A quarter of an hour later Mary came down, and she was Mary Smith in truth. For she had put on the grey Quaker-like dress in which she had followed her trunk from the coach-office six months before. "I thought," she said, "that I could nurse her better in this than in my new clothes!" But she blushed deeply as she spoke: for if she had this thought she had others also in her mind. She might not often wear that dress, but she would never part with it. Arthur Vaughan's eyes had worshipped it; his hands had touched it. And in the days to come it would lie, until she died, in some locked coffer, perfumed with lavender, and sweet with the dried rose-leaves of her dead romance. And on one day in the year she would visit it, and bury her face in its soft faded folds, and dream the old dreams.

It was but a step to the door of the neighbouring house. But the distance, though short, steadied the girl's mind and enabled her to taste that infinity of the night, that immensity of nature, which, like a fathomless ocean, islands the littleness of our lighted homes. The groaning of strained cordage, the creaking of timbers, the far-off rattle of a boom came off the dark water that lipped the wharves which still fringe three sides of the Square. Here and there a rare gas-lamp, lately set up, disclosed the half-bare arms of trees, or some vague opening leading to the Welsh Back. But for all the two could see, as they glided from the one door to the other, the busy city about them, seething with so many passions, pregnant with so much danger, hiding in its entrails the love, the fear, the secrets of a myriad lives, might have been in another planet.

Mary owned the calming influence of the night and the stars, and before the door opened to Miss Sibson's knock, the blush had faded from her cheek. It was with solemn thoughts that she went up the wide oaken staircase, still handsome, though dusty and fallen from its high estate. The task before her, the scene on the threshold of which she trod, brought the purest instincts of her nature into play. But her guide knocked, someone within the room bade them enter, and Mary advanced. She saw lights and a bed-a four-poster, heavily curtained. And half blinded by her tears, she glided towards the bed-or was gliding, when a querulous voice arrested her midway.

"So you are come!" it said. And Lady Sybil, who, robed in a silken dressing-gown, was lying on a small couch in a different part of the room, tossed a book, not too gently, to the floor. "What stuff! What stuff!" she ejaculated wearily. "A schoolgirl might write as good! Well, you are come," she continued. "There," as Mary, flung back on herself, bent timidly and kissed her, "that will do! That will do! I can't bear anyone near me! Don't come too near me! Sit on that chair, where I can see you!"

Mary beat back her tears and obeyed with a quivering lip. "I hope you are better," she said.

"Better!" her mother retorted in the same peevish tone. "No, and shall not be!" Then, with a shrill scream, "Heavens, child, what have you got on?" she continued. "What have you done to yourself? You look like a sœur de Charité!"

"I thought that I could nurse you better in this," Mary faltered.

"Nurse me!"

"Yes, I-"

"Rubbish!" Lady Sybil exclaimed with petulant impatience. "You nurse? Don't be silly! Who wants you to nurse me? I want you to amuse me. And you won't do that by dressing yourself like a dingy death's-head moth! There, for Heaven's sake," with a catch in her voice which went to Mary's heart, "don't cry! I'm not strong enough to bear it. Tell me something! Tell me anything to make me laugh. How did you trick Sir Robert, child? How did you escape? That will amuse me," with a mirthless laugh. "I wish I could see his solemn face when he hears that you are gone!"

Mary explained that the summons had found her in London; that her father was not there, but that still she had had to beat down Lady Worcester's resistance before she could have her way and leave.

"I don't know her," Lady Sybil said shortly.

"She was very kind to me," Mary answered.

"I dare say," in the same tone.

"But she would not let me go until I gave her my address."

Lady Sybil sat up sharply. "And you did that?" she shrieked. "You gave it her?"

"I was obliged to give it," Mary stammered, "or I could not have left London."

"Obliged? Obliged?" Lady Sybil retorted, in the same passionate tone. "Why, you fool, you might have given her fifty addresses! Any address! Any address but this! There!" Lady Sybil continued sullenly, as she sank back and pressed her handkerchief to her lips. "You've done it now. You've excited me. Give me those drops! There! Are you blind? Those! Those! And-and sit farther from me! I can't breathe with you close to me!"

After which, when Mary, almost heartbroken, had given her the medicine, and seated herself in the appointed place, she turned her face to the wall and lay silent and morose, uttering no sound but an occasional sigh of pain.

Meantime, to eyes that could read, the room told her story, and told it eloquently. The table beside the couch was strewn with rose-bound Annuals and Keepsakes, and a dozen volumes bearing the labels of more than one library; books opened only to be cast aside. Costly toys and embroidered nothings, vinaigrettes and scent-bottles, lay scattered everywhere; and on other tables, on the mantelpiece, on the floor, a litter of similar trifles elbowed and jostled the gloomy tokens of illness. Near the invalid's hand lay a miniature in a jewelled frame, while a packet of letters tied with a fragment of gold lace, and a buhl desk half-closed upon a broken fan told the same tale of ennui, and of a vanity which survived the charms on which it had rested. The lesson was not lost on the daughter's heart. It moved her to purest pity; and presently, wrung by a sigh more painful than usual, she crept to the couch, sank on her knees, and pressed her cool lips to the wasted hand which hung from it. Even then for a time her mother did not move or take notice. But slowly the weary sighs grew more frequent, grew to sobs-how much less poignant! – and her weak arm drew Mary's head to her bosom.

And by-and-by the arm tightened its hold and gripped her convulsively, the sobs grew deeper and shook the worn form at each respiration; and presently, "Ah, God, what will become of me?" burst from the depths of the poor quaking heart, too proud hitherto to make its fear known. "What will become of me?"

That cry pierced Mary like a knife, but its confession of weakness made mother and daughter one. Her feeble arms could not avert the approach of the dark shadow, whose coming terrified though it could not change. But what human love could do, what patient self-forgetfulness might teach, she vowed that she would do and teach; and what clinging hands might compass to delay the end, her hands should compass. When Miss Sibson's message, informing her that it was time to return, was brought to her, she shook her head, smiling, and locked the door. "I shall be your nurse, after all!" she said. "I shall not leave you." And before midnight, with a brave contentment, for which Lady Sybil's following eyes were warrant, she had taken possession of the room and all its contents; she had tidied as much as it was good to tidy, she had knelt to heat the milk or brush the hearth, she had smoothed the pillow, and sworn a score of times that nothing, no Sir Robert, no father, no force should tear her from this her duty, this her joy-until the end.

No memory of her dull childhood, or of the days of labour and servitude which she owed to the dying woman, no thought of the joys of wealth and youth which she had lost through her, rose to mar the sincerity of her love. Much less did such reflections trouble her on whose flighty mind they should have rested so heavily. So far indeed was this from being the case, that when Mary stooped to some office which the mother's fastidiousness deemed beneath her, "How can you do that?" Lady Sybil cried peevishly. "I'll not have you do it! Do you hear me, girl? Let some servant see to it! What else are they for!"

"But I used to do it every day at Clapham," Mary answered cheerfully. She had not spoken before, aware of the reproach which her words conveyed, she could have bitten her tongue.

But Lady Sybil did not wince. "Then why did you do it?" she retorted, "Why did you do it? Why were you so foolish as to stoop to such things? I'm sure you didn't get your poor spirit from me! And Vermuyden was as stiff as a poker! But there! I remember the prince saying once that ladies went out of fashion with hoops, and gentlemen with snuffboxes. You make me think he was right. Oh, clumsy!" she continued, raising her voice, "now you are turning the light on my face! Do you wish to see me hideous?"

Mary moved it. "Is that better, mother?" she asked.

Lady Sybil cast a resentful glance at her. "There, there, let it be!" she said. "You can't help it. You're like your father. He could never do anything right! I suppose I am doomed to have none but helpless people about me."

And so on, and so on. Like many invalids, she was most lively at night, and she continued to complain through long restless hours, with the candles burning lower and lower, and the snuffers coming into more frequent request. Until with the chill before the dawn she fell at last into a fitful sleep; and Mary, creeping to the close-curtained windows to cool her weary eyes, peeped out and saw the grey of the morning. Outside, the Square was beginning to discover its half-bare trees and long straight rows of houses. Through openings, here and there, the water glimmered mistily; and on the height facing her, the tall tower of St. Mary Redcliffe rose above the roofs and pointed skywards. Little did Mary think what the day would bring forth in that grey deserted place on which she looked; or in what changed conditions, under what stress of mind and heart, she would, before the sun set twice, view that Square.

XXX

THE MAYOR'S RECEPTION IN QUEEN'S SQUARE

The day, of which Mary watched the cloudy opening from her mother's window, was drawing to a close; and from a house in the same Square-but on the north side, whereas Miss Sibson's was on the west-another pair of eyes looked out, while a heart, which a few hours before had been as sore as hers, rose a little at the prospect. Arthur Vaughan, ignorant of her proximity-to love's shame be it said-sat in a window on the first floor of the Mansion House, and, undismayed by the occasional crash of glass, watched the movements of the swaying, shouting, mocking crowd; a crowd, numbering some thousands, which occupied the middle space of the Square, as well as the roadways, clustered upon the Immortal Memory, overflowed into the side streets, and now joined in one mighty roar of "Reform! Reform!" now groaned thunderously at the name of Wetherell. Behind Vaughan in the same room, the drawing-room of the official residence, some twenty or thirty persons argued and gesticulated; at one time approaching a window to settle a debated point, at another scattering with exclamations of anger as a stone fell or some other missile alighted among them.

"Boo! Boo!" yelled the mob below. "Throw him out! Reform! Reform!"

Vaughan looked down on the welter of moving faces. He saw that the stone-throwers were few, and the daredevils, who at times adventured to pull up the railings which guarded the forecourt, were fewer. But he saw also that the mass sympathised with them, egged them on, and applauded their exploits. And he wondered what would happen when night fell, and wondered again why the peaceable citizens who wrangled behind him made light of the position. The glass was flying, here and there an iron bar had vanished from the railings, night was approaching. For him it was very well. He had accompanied Brereton to Bristol to see what would happen, and for his part, if the adventure proved to be of the first class, so much the better. But the good pursy citizens behind him, who, when they were not deafening the little Mayor with their counsels, were making a jest of the turmoil, had wives and daughters, goods and houses within reach. And in their place he felt that he would have been far from easy.

By and by it appeared that some of them shared his feelings. For presently, in a momentary lull of the babel outside, a voice he knew rose above those in the room.

"Nothing? You call it nothing?" Mr. Cooke-for his was the voice-cried. "Nothing, that his Majesty's Judge has been hooted and pelted from Totterdown to the Guildhall? Nothing, that the Recorder of Bristol has been hunted like a criminal from the Guildhall to this place! You call it nothing, sir, that his Majesty's Commission has been flouted for six hours past by all the riffraff of the Docks? And with half of decent Bristol looking on and applauding!"

"Oh, no, no!" the little Mayor remonstrated. "Not applauding, Mr. Cooke!"

"Yes, sir, applauding!" Cooke retorted with vigour.