“STILL no Mr. Earnshaw,” said Lady Mary. “This business of his and yours is a long affair then, Tom. I wanted to send down to those cousins of his to ask them to dinner, or something. I suppose I must write a little civil note, and tell Mrs. Smith why I delay doing so. It is best to wait till he comes back.”
“I’ll take your note, Aunt Mary,” said Harry, with alacrity. “Oh, no, it will not inconvenience me in the least. I shall be passing that way.”
“I suppose you want to see the beauty again?” said Lady Mary, smiling. “She is very pretty. But I don’t care much for the looks of the brother. He has an uncertain way, which would be most uncomfortable in illness. If he were to stand on one foot, and hesitate, and look at you like that, to see what you were thinking of him, when some one was ill! A most uncomfortable doctor. I wish we may not have been premature about poor old Dr. Franks.”
“Anyhow it was not your doing,” said Mr. Tottenham.
Lady Mary blushed slightly. She answered with some confusion: “No, I don’t suppose it was.” But at the same time she felt upon her conscience the weight of many remarks, as to country practitioners, and doctors of the old school, and men who did not advance with the progress of science even in their own profession, which she had made at various times, and which, no doubt, had gone forth with a certain influence. She had not had it in her power to influence Dr. Franks as to the person who should succeed him; but she had perhaps been a little instrumental in dethroning the old country doctor of the old school, whose want of modern science she had perceived so clearly. These remarks were made the second day after the lecture, and Edgar had not yet returned. Nobody at Tottenham’s knew where he was, or what had become of him; nobody except the master of the house, who kept his own counsel. Harry had made another unavailing promenade in front of Mrs. Smith’s lodgings on the day before, and had caught a glimpse of Margaret in a cab, driving with her brother to some patient, following the old lofty gig which was Dr. Franks’ only vehicle. He had taken off his hat, and stood at the gate of Tottenham’s, worshipping while she passed, and she had given him a smile and a look which went to his heart. This look and smile seemed the sole incidents that had happened to Harry; he could not remember anything else; and when Lady Mary spoke of the note his heart leaped into his mouth. She had, as usual, a hundred things to do that morning while he waited, interviews with the housekeeper, with the gardener, with the nurse, a hundred irrelevant matters. And then she had her letters to write, a host of letters, at which he looked on with an impatience almost beyond concealment—letters enclosing circulars, letters asking for information, letters about her lectures, about other “schemes” of popular enlightenment, letters to her friends, letters to her family. Harry counted fifteen while he waited. Good lord! did any clerk in an office work harder? “And most of them about nothing, I suppose,” Harry said cynically to himself. Luncheon interrupted her in the middle of her labours, and Harry had to wait till that meal was over before he could obtain the small envelope, with its smaller enclosure, which justified his visit. He hurried off as soon as he could leave the table, but not without a final arrangement of his locks and tie. The long avenue seemed to flee beneath his feet as he walked down, the long line of trees flew past him. His heart went quicker than his steps, and so did his pulse, both of them beating so that he grew dizzy and breathless. Why this commotion? he said to himself. He was going to visit a lady whom he had only seen once before; the loveliest woman he had ever seen in his life, to be sure; but it was only walking so quickly, he supposed, which made him so panting and excited. He lost time by his haste, for he had to pause and get command of himself, and calm down, before he could venture to go and knock at the shabby little green door.
Margaret was seated on the end of the little sofa, which was placed beside the fire. This, he said to himself, no doubt was the reason why he had not seen her at the window. She had her work-basket on the table, and was sewing, with her little girl seated on a stool at her feet. The little girl was about seven, very like her mother, seated in the same attitude, and bending her baby brows over a stocking which she was knitting. Margaret was very plainly, alas! she herself felt, much too plainly-dressed, in a dark gown of no particular colour, with nothing whatever to relieve it except a little white collar; her dark hair, which she also lamented over as quite unlike and incapable of being coaxed into, the fashionable colour of hair, was done up simply enough, piled high up upon her head. She had not even a ribbon to lend her a little colour. And she was not wise enough to know that chance had befriended her, and that her beautiful pale face looked better in this dusky colourless setting, in which there was no gleam or reflection to catch the eye, than it would have done in the most splendid attire. She raised her eyes when the door opened and rose up, her tall figure, with a slight wavering stoop, looking more and more like a flexile branch or tall drooping flower. She put out her hand quite simply, as if he had been an old friend, and looked no surprise, nor seemed to require any explanation of his visit, but seated herself again and resumed her work. So did the child, who had lifted its violet eyes also to look at him, and now bent them again on her knitting. Harry thought he had never seen anything so lovely as this group, the child a softened repetition of the mother—in the subdued greenish atmosphere with winter outside, and the still warmth within.
“I came from my aunt with this note,” said Harry, embarrassed. She looked up again as he spoke, and this way she had of looking at him only now and then gave a curious particularity to her glance. He thought, poor fellow, that his very tone must be suspicious, that her eyes went through and through him, and that she had found him out. “I mean,” he added, somewhat tremulously, “that I was very glad of—of the chance of bringing Lady Mary’s note; and asking you how you liked the place.”
“You are very kind to come,” said Margaret in her soft voice, taking the note. “It’s a little lonely, knowing nobody—and a visit is very pleasant.”
The way in which she lingered upon the “very,” seemed sweetness itself to Harry Thornleigh. Had a prejudiced Englishman written down the word, probably he would, after Margaret’s pronunciation, have spelt it “varry;” but that would be because he knew no better, and would not really represent the sound, which had a caressing, lingering superlativeness in it to the listener. She smiled as she spoke, then opened her letter, and read it over slowly. Then she raised her eyes to his again with still more brightness in them.
“Lady Mary is very kind, too,” she said, with a brightening of pleasure all over her face.
“She’s waiting for your cousin to come back—I suppose she says so—before asking you to the house; and I hope it will not be long first, for I am only a visitor here,” said Harry impulsively. Margaret gave him another soft smile, as if she understood exactly what he meant.
“You are not staying very long, perhaps?” she said.
“Oh, for some weeks, I hope; I hope long enough to improve my acquaintance with—with Dr. Murray and yourself.”
“I hope so too,” said Margaret, with another smile. “Charlie is troubled with an anxious mind. To see you so friendly will be very good for him, very good.”
“Oh, I hope you will let me be friendly!” cried Harry, with a glow of delight. “When does he go out? I suppose he is busy with the old doctor, visiting the sick people. You were with him yesterday—”
“He thinks it is good for my health to go with him; and then he thinks I am dull when he’s away,” said Margaret. “He is a real good brother; there are not many like him. Yes, he is going about with Dr. Franks nearly all the day.”
“And you are quite alone, and dull? I am so sorry. I wish you would let me show you the neighbourhood; or if you would come and walk in the park or the wood—my aunt, I am sure, would be too glad.”
“Oh, I’m not dull,” said Margaret. “I have my little girl. She is all I have in the world, except Charles; and we are great companions, are we no, Sibby?”
This was said with a change in the voice, which Harry thought, made it still more like a wood-pigeon’s note.
“Ay are we,” said the little thing, putting down her knitting, and laying back her little head, like a kitten, rubbing against her mother’s knee. Nothing could be prettier as a picture, more natural, more simple; and though the child’s jargon was scarcely comprehensible to Harry, his heart answered to this renewed appeal upon it.
“But sometimes,” he said, “you must want other companionship than that of a child.”
“Do I?” said Margaret, pressing the little head against her. “I am not sure. After all, I think I’m happiest with her, thinking of nothing else; but you, a young man, will scarcely understand that.”
“Though I am a young man, I think I can understand it,” said Harry. He seemed to himself to be learning a hundred lessons, with an ease and facility he was never conscious of before. “But if I were to come and take you both out for a walk, into the woods, or through the park, to show you the country, that would be good both for her and you.”
“Very good,” said Margaret, raising her eyes, “and very kind of you; but I think I know why you’re so very good. You know my cousin, Edgar Earnshaw, too?”
“Yes; I know him very well,” said Harry.
“He must be very good, since everybody is so kind that knows him; and fancy, I don’t know him!” said Margaret. “Charles and he are friends, but Sibby and I have only seen him once. We have scarcely a right to all the kind things that are done for his sake.”
“Oh, it isn’t for his sake,” cried Harry. “I like him very much; but there are other fellows as good as he is. I wouldn’t have you make a hero of Edgar; he is odd sometimes, as well as other folks.”
“Tell me something about him; I don’t know him, except what he did for Granny,” said Margaret. “It’s strange that, though I am his relative, you should know him so much better. Will you tell me? I would like to know.”
“Oh, there’s nothing very wonderful to tell,” said Harry, somewhat disgusted; “he’s well enough, and nice enough, but he has his faults. You must not think that I came for his sake. I came because I thought you would feel a little lonely, and might be pleased to have some one to talk to. Forgive me if I was presumptuous.”
“Presumptuous! no,” said Margaret, with a smile. “You were quite right. Would you like a cup of tea? it is just about the time. Sibby, go ben and tell Mrs. Sims we will have some tea.”
“She is very like you,” said Harry, taking this subject, which he felt would be agreeable, as a new way of reaching the young mother’s heart.
“So they tell me,” said Margaret. “She is like what I can mind of myself, but gentler, and far more good. For, you see, there were always two of us, Charlie and me.”
“You have always been inseparable?”
“We were separated, so long as I was married; but that was but two years,” said Margaret, with a sigh; and here the conversation came to a pause.
Harry was so touched by her sigh and her pause, that he did not know how to show his sympathy. He would have liked to say on the spot, “Let me make it all up to you now;” but he did not feel that this premature declaration would be prudent. And then he asked himself, what did she mean? that the time of her separation from her brother was sad? or that she was sad that it came to an end so soon? With natural instinct, he hoped it might be the former. He was looking at her intently, with interest and sympathy in every line of his face, when she looked up suddenly, as her manner was, and caught him—with so much more in his looks than he ventured to say.
Margaret was half amused, half touched, half flattered; but she did not let the amusement show. She said, gratefully, “You are very kind to take so much interest in a stranger like me.”
“I do not feel as if you were a stranger,” cried Harry eagerly; and then not knowing how to explain this warmth of expression, he added in haste, “you know I have known—we have all known your cousin for years.”
Margaret accepted the explanation with a smile, “You all? You are one of a family too—you have brothers and sisters like Charles and me?”
“Not like you. I have lots of brothers and sisters, too many to think of them in the same way. There is one of my sisters whom I am sure you would like,” said Harry, who had always the fear before his eyes that the talk would flag, and his companion get tired of him—a fear which made him catch wildly at any subject which presented itself.
“Yes?” said Margaret, “tell me her name, and why you think I would like her best.”
From this it will be seen that she too was not displeased to keep up the conversation, nor quite unskilled in the art.
“The tea’s coming,” said little Sibby, running in and taking her seat on her footstool. Perhaps Harry thought he had gone far enough in the revelation of his family, or perhaps only that this was a better subject. He held out his hand and made overtures of friendship to the little girl.
“Come and tell me your name,” he said, “shouldn’t you like to come up with me to the house, and play with my little cousins in the nursery? There are three or four of them, little things. Shouldn’t you like to come with me?”
“No without mamma,” said little Sibby, putting one hand out timidly, and with the other clinging to her mother’s dress.
“Oh, no,” said Harry, “not without mamma, she must come too; but you have not told me your name. She is shy, I suppose.”
“A silly thing,” said Margaret, stroking her child’s dark hair. “Her name is Sybilla, Sybil is prettier; but in Scotland we call it Sibby, and sometimes Bell for short. Now, dear, you must not hold me, for the gentleman will not eat you, and here is the tea.”
Harry felt himself elected into one of the family, when Mrs. Sims came in, pushing the door open before her, with the tray in her arms; upon which there was much bread and butter of which he partook, finding it delightful, with a weakness common to young men in the amiable company of the objects of their affection. He drew his chair to the table opposite to Margaret, and set Sibby up on an elevated seat at the other side, and felt a bewildering sensation come over him as if they belonged to him. It was not a very high ideal of existence to sit round a red and blue table in a cottage parlour of a winter’s afternoon, and eat bread and butter; but yet Harry felt as if nothing so delightful and so elevating had ever happened to him before in all his life.
It was a sad interruption to his pleasure, when Dr. Murray came in shortly afterwards, pushing the door open as Mrs. Sims had done, and entering with the air of a man to whom, and not to Harry, the place belonged. He had his usual doubtful air, looking, as Lady Mary said, to see what you thought of him, and not sure that his sister was not showing an injudicious confidence in thus revealing to Harry the existence of such a homely meal as tea. But he had no desire to send the visitor away, especially when Margaret, who knew her brother’s humour, propitiated him by thrusting into his hand Lady Mary’s note.
“I am sure her Ladyship is very kind,” he said, his face lighting up, “Margaret, I hope you have written a proper reply.”
“When we have had our tea, Charles—will you not have some tea?” his sister said; she always took things so easily, so much more easily than he could ever do.
“Oh, you are having tea with the child, five o’clock tea,” said the poor doctor, who was so anxious to make sure that everybody knew him to have been “brought up a gentleman;” and he smiled a bland uneasy smile, and sat down by Sibby. He would not take any bread and butter, though he was hungry after a long walk; he preferred Harry to think that he was about to dine presently, which was far from being the case. But Harry neither thought of the matter nor cared; he had no time nor attention to spare, though he was very civil to her brother, and engaged him at once in conversation, making himself agreeable with all his might.
“I suppose you are making acquaintance with quantities of people, and I hope you think you will like the place,” he said.
“Yes, a great many people,” said Dr. Charles, “and it was full time that somebody should come who knew what he was doing. Dr. Franks, I am afraid, is no better than an old wife.”
“Oh, Charlie, how rashly you speak! he always says out what he thinks,” said Margaret with an appealing look at Harry, “and it is often very far from a wise thing to do.”
“Bravo, Aunt Mary will be delighted,” cried Harry, “it is what she always said.”
“I knew Lady Mary Tottenham was very talented,” said Dr. Murray with some pomp, “and that she would see the state of affairs. I can’t tell you what a pleasure and support it is to have a discriminating person in the neighbourhood. He is just an old wife. You need not shake your head at me, Margaret, I know Mr. Thornhill is a gentleman, and that he will not repeat what is said.”
“Surely not,” said Harry, somewhat surprised to find himself thus put on his honour; “but my name is Thornleigh; never mind, it was a very simple mistake.”
The doctor blushed with annoyance, and confounded himself in excuses. Harry took his leave before these apologies were half over. He was rather glad to get away at the last, feeling that a shadow had come over his happiness; but before he had left the Green, this momentary shade disappeared, and all the bliss of recollection came back upon him. What an hour he had spent, of happiness pure and unalloyed, with so many smiles, so many looks to lay up as treasures! how lovely she was, how simple, how superior to everything he had ever seen before! Talk of fashion, Harry said to himself hotly, talk of rank and society and high birth, and high breeding! here was one who had no need of such accessories, here was a perfect creature, made in some matchless mould that the world had never seen before; and how kindly she had looked at him, how sweetly talked to him! What had he done, that he should have suddenly fallen upon such happiness?