MR. MOUBRAY was in his study, in the gray of the winter’s afternoon. It is never a very cheerful moment. The fire was burning brightly, the room was warm and pleasant, with plenty of books, and many associations; but it was a pensive moment, too dark for reading, when there is nothing to do but to think. And though a man who has begun to grow old, and who is solitary, may be very happy thinking, yet it is a pensive pleasure. He was sitting very quietly, looking out at the shaft of red gold in the west where the sun had disappeared, and watching the light as it stole away, each moment a little less, a little less brilliant, till it sank altogether in the gray.
To eyes “that have kept watch o’er man’s mortality” there is always an interest in that sight: one going out is so like another: the slow lessening, the final disappearance have an interest that never fails. And the minister can scarcely be said to have been thinking. He was watching, as he had watched at many a death-bed, the slow extinction, the going away. Whether it is a sun or a life that is setting, that last ineffable moment of disappearance cannot but convey a thrill to the heart.
This was how he was seated, meditating in the profoundest tranquillity when, all at once, the door flew open, and a young figure full of agitation, in all the force of life and passion, a creature all alive to the very finger points, to the hem of her skirts, to the crown of her wind-blown hair, burst in breathless, an emblem of disturbance, of conflict, in short, of existence in contrast with the calm of contemplation.
She stood for a moment before him, but only as if under protest, pausing perforce for breath, “Uncle John,” she cried, panting, “come, come with me! I want to tell you, I want to ask you—you must help me—to stop something. But, oh, I can’t wait to explain; come with me, come with me! and I’ll tell you on the way——”
“What is it, Effie?” He got up hastily; but though her influence was strong, it was not strong enough to prevent him from asking an explanation before he obeyed it.
She caught at his arm in her impatience, “Oh, Uncle John, come—come away! I’ll tell you on the road—oh, come away—there is not a moment, not a moment! to lose——”
“Is anybody ill?” he said. She continued to hold his arm, not as a means of support, but by way of pushing him on, which she did, scarcely leaving him a moment to get his hat. Her impetuosity reminded him so much of many a childish raid made into his house that, notwithstanding his alarm, he smiled.
“Oh, no, there is nobody ill, it is much, much worse than that, Uncle John. Oh, don’t smile as if you thought I was joking! It’s just desperation. There is a letter that Mrs. Ogilvie has written, and I must, I must—get it back from the post, or I will die. Oh, come! come! before it is too late.”
“Get a letter back from the post!——”
He turned in spite of Effie’s urgency at the manse door. It stood high, and the cheerful lights were beginning to shine in the village windows below, among which the shop and post-office was conspicuous with its two bright paraffin lamps.
“But that is impossible,” he said.
“Oh, no,” said the girl. “Oh, Uncle John, come quick, come quick! and you will see that we must have it. Mrs. Moffatt will give it when she sees you. Not for me, perhaps, but for you. You will say that something has been forgotten, that another word has to be put in, that—oh, Uncle John when we are there it will come into our heads what to say——”
“Take no thought beforehand what you shall speak, Effie,” said the minister, half smiling, half admonishing; “is it so serious as that?”
He suffered her to lead him down the slope of the manse garden, out upon the road, her light figure foremost, clinging to his arm, yet moving him along; he, heavier, with so much of passive resistance as his large frame, and only half responsive will, gave.
“Oh yes,” she cried, “it is as serious as that. Uncle John, was not that what our Lord said when His men that He sent out were to stand for Him and not to forsake Him? And to desert your friends when they are in trouble, to turn your back upon them when they need you, to give them up because they are poor, because they are unfortunate, because they have lost everything but you——”
She was holding his arm so closely, urging him on, that he felt the heaving of her heart against his side, the tremor of earnestness in her whole frame as she spoke.
“Effie, my little girl! what strait are you in, that you are driven to use words like these?”
Her voice sounded like a sob in her throat, which was parched with excitement.
“I am in this strait, Uncle John, that he has lost everything, and they have written to say I take back my word. No, no, no,” cried Effie, forcing on with feverish haste the larger shadow by her side. “I will never do it—it shall not be. They made me take him when he was rich, and now that he is poor I will stand by him till I die.”
“My little Effie!” was all the minister said. She still hurried him along, but yet he half carried her with an arm round her slender figure. What with agitation and the unaccustomed conflict in her mind, Effie’s slight physical frame was failing her. It was her heart and soul that were pushing on. Her brain swam, the village lights fluttered in her eyes, her voice had gone altogether, lost in the climbing sob which was at once breath and utterance. She was unconscious of everything save her one object, to be in time, to recover the letter, to avert that cowardly blow.
But when Effie came to herself in the little shop with its close atmosphere, the smell of the paraffin, the dazzling glare of the light, under the astonished gaze of Mrs. Moffatt the postmistress, who stood at her counter stamping the letters spread out before her, and who stopped short, bewildered by the sudden entrance of so much passion, of something entirely out of the ordinary, which she felt, but could not understand—the girl could bring forth nothing from that slender, convulsed throat but a gasp. It was Mr. Moubray who spoke.
“My niece wishes you to give her back a letter—a letter in which something must be altered, something added: a letter with the Gilston stamp.”
“Eh, Mr. Moubray! but I canna do that,” the postmistress cried.
“Why can’t you do it? I am here to keep you free of blame. There is no harm in it. Give her back her letter, and she will add what she wishes to add.”
“Is it Miss Effie’s own letter? I’m no sure it’s just right even in that point of view. Folk should ken their own minds,” said Mrs. Moffatt, shuffling the letters about with her hands, “before they put pen to paper. If I did it for ane, I would have to do it for a’ that ask. And where would I be then? I would just never be done——”
“Let us hope there are but few that are so important: and my niece is not just any one,” said the minister, with a little natural self-assertion. “I will clear you of the blame if there is any blame.”
“I am not saying but what Miss Effie—— Still the post-office is just like the grave, Mr. Moubray, what’s put in canna be taken out. Na, I do not think I can do it, if it was for the Queen hersel’.”
Effie had not stood still while this conversation was going on; she had taken the matter into her own hands, and was turning over the letters with her trembling fingers without waiting for any permission.
“Na, Miss Effie; na, Miss Effie,” said the postmistress, trying to withdraw them from her. But Effie paid no attention. Her extreme and passionate agitation was such that even official zeal, though strengthened by ignorance, could not stand before it. Notwithstanding all Mrs. Moffatt’s efforts, the girl examined everything with a swift desperation and keenness which contrasted strangely with her incapacity to see or know anything besides. It was not till she had turned over every one that she flung up her hands with a cry of dismay, and fell back upon the shoulder of the minister, who had held her all the time with his arm.
“Oh, Uncle John! oh, Uncle John!” she cried with a voice of despair.
“Perhaps it has not been sent, Effie. It was only a threat perhaps. It might be said to see how you felt. Rest a little, and then we will think what to do——”
“I will have to go,” she said, struggling from him, getting out to the door of the shop. “Oh, I cannot breathe! Uncle John, when does the train go?”
“My dear child!”
“Uncle John, what time does the train go? No, I will not listen,” said the girl. The fresh air revived her, and she hurried along a little way: but soon her limbs failed her, and she dropped down trembling upon the stone seat in front of one of the cottages. There she sat for a few minutes, taking off her hat, putting back her hair from her forehead instinctively, as if that would relieve the pressure on her heart.
She was still for a moment, and then burst forth again: “I must go. Oh, you are not to say a word. Do you know what it is to love some one, Uncle John? Yes, you know. It is only a few who can tell what that is. Well,” she said, the sob in her throat interrupting her, making her voice sound like the voice of a child; “that is how he thinks of me; you will think it strange. He is not like a serious man, you will say, to feel so; but he does. Not me! oh, not me!” said Effie, contending with the sob; “I am not like that. But he does. I am not so stupid, nor so insensible, but I know it when I see it, Uncle John.”
“Yes, Effie, I never doubted it; he loves you dearly, poor fellow. My dear little girl, there is time enough to set all right——”
“To set it right! If he hears just at the moment of his trouble that I—that I—— What is the word when a woman is a traitor? Is there such a thing as that a girl should be a traitor to one that puts his trust in her? I never pretended to be like that, Uncle John. He knew that it was different with me. But true—Oh, I can be true. More, more! I can’t be false. Do you hear me? You brought me up, how could I? I can’t be false; it will kill me. I would rather die——”
“Effie! Effie! No one would have you to be false. Compose yourself, my dear. Come home with me and I will speak to them, and everything will come right. There cannot be any harm done yet. Effie, my poor little girl, come home.”
Effie did not move, except to put back as before her hair from her forehead.
“I know,” she said, “that there is no hurry, that the train does not go till night. I will tell you everything as if you were my mother, Uncle John. You are the nearest to her. I was silly—I never thought:—but I was proud too. Girls are made like that: and just to be praised and made much of pleases us; and to have somebody that thinks there is no one in the world like you—for that,” she said, with a little pause, and a voice full of awe, “is what he thinks of me. It is very strange, but it is true. And if I were to let him think for a moment—oh, for one moment!—that the girl he thought so much of would cast him off, because he was poor!——”
Effie sprang up from her seat in the excitement of this thought. She turned upon her uncle, with her face shining, her head held high.
“Do you think I could let him think that for an hour? for a day? Oh, no! no! Yes, I will go home to get my cloak and a bonnet, for you cannot go to London just in a little hat like mine; but don’t say to me, Uncle John, that I must not do it, for I WILL.”
She took his arm again in the force of this resolution. Then she added, in the tone of one who is conceding a great favour: “But you may come with me if you like.”
Between the real feeling which her words had roused in him and the humour of this permission, Mr. Moubray scarcely knew how to reply. He said: “I would not advise you to go, Effie. It will be better for me to go in your place if anyone must go; but is that necessary? Let us go quietly home in the meantime. You owe something to your father, my dear; you must not take a step like this without his knowledge at least.”
“If you are going to betray me to Mrs. Ogilvie, Uncle John——”
“My little Effie, there is no question of betrayal. There is no need for running away, for acting as if you were oppressed at home. You have never been oppressed at home, my dear. If Mrs. Ogilvie has written to Mr. Dirom, at least she was honest and told you. And you must be honest. It must all be spoken of on the true ground, which is that you can do only what is right, Effie.”
“Uncle John,” cried Effie, “if to give up Fred is right, then I will not do it—whatever you say, I will not do it. He may never want me in my life again, but he wants me now. Abandon him because he is in need of me! Oh, could you believe it of Effie? And if you say it is wrong, I do not care, I will do it. I will not desert him when he is poor, not for all the—not for anybody in the world——”
“Is that Effie that is speaking so loud? is that you, John?”
This was the voice of Mr. Ogilvie himself, which suddenly rose out of the dim evening air close by. They had gone along in their excitement scarce knowing where they went, or how near they were to the house, and now, close to the dark shrubberies, encountered suddenly Effie’s father, who, somewhat against his own will, had come out to look for her.
His wife had been anxious, which he thought absurd, and he had been driven out rather by impatience of her continual inquiries: “I wonder where that girl has gone. I wonder what she is doing. Dear me, Robert, if you will not go out and look after her, I will just have to do it myself,”—than from any other motive. Effie’s declaration had been made accordingly to other ears than those she intended; and her father’s slow but hot temper was roused.
“I would like to know,” he said, “for what reason it is that you are out so late as this, and going hectoring about the roads like a play-acting woman? John, you might have more sense than to encourage her in such behaviour. Go home to your mother this moment, Effie, and let me hear no such language out of your head. I will not ask what it’s about. I have nothing to say to women’s quarrels. Go home, I tell you, to your mother.”
Effie had caught with both her hands her uncle’s arm.
“Oh, I wish that I could—Oh, if I only could,” she cried, “that would make all clear.”
“Ogilvie, she is in a state of great excitement—I hope you will set her mind at rest. I tell her she shall be forced to nothing. You are not the man, though you may be a little careless, to permit any tyranny over your child.”
“Me, careless! You are civil,” said the father. “Just you recollect, John Moubray, that I will have no interference—if you were the minister ten times over, and her uncle to the boot. I am well able to look after my own family and concerns. Effie, go home.”
Effie said nothing; but she stood still clinging to her uncle’s arm. She would not advance though he tried to draw her towards the gate, nor would she make any reply: she wound her arms about his, and held him fast. She had carried him along with the force of her young passion; but he could not move her. Her brain was whirling, her whole being in the wildest commotion. Her intelligence had partially given way, but her power of resistance was strong.
“Effie,” he said softly, “come home. My dear, you must let your father see what is in your mind. How is he to learn if you will not tell him? Effie! for my part, I will do whatever you please,” he said in a low tone in her ear. “I promise to go to him if you wish it—only obey your father and come home.”
“Go home this moment to your mother,” Mr. Ogilvie repeated. “Is this a time to be wandering about the world? She may just keep her mind to herself, John Moubray. I’ll have nothing to say to women’s quarrels, and if you are a wise man you will do the same. Effie, go home.”
Effie paused a moment between the two, one of whom repulsed her, while the other did no more than soothe and still her excitement as best he could. She was not capable of being soothed. The fire and passion in her veins required an outlet. She was so young, unaccustomed to emotion. She would not yield to do nothing, that hard part which women in so many circumstances have to play.
Suddenly she loosed her arms from that of the minister, and without a word, in an instant, before anything could be said, darted away from them into the gathering night.