NEXT morning the household met at breakfast with that strange determination to look just as usual, and ignore all that had happened, which is so common in life. Kate, to be sure, did not know what had happened. She was aware of nothing but her own engagement which could have disturbed the family calm; and it filled her with wonder, and even irritation, to see how pale John looked, who ought to have been at the height of happiness, and how little exultation was in his voice. “He is thinking of what he is to say to papa,” was the thought that passed through her mind; and this thought fortunately checked her momentary displeasure. Mrs Mitford was paler still, and her eyes looked red, as if she had been crying; but instead of being subdued or cross, she was in unusually gay spirits, it seemed to Kate—talking a great deal more than usual, even laughing, and attempting little jokes which sat very strangely upon her. The only conclusion Kate could draw from the general aspect of affairs was that they were all extremely nervous about the meeting with Mr Crediton. And, on the whole, she was not very much surprised at this. She herself was nervous enough. His only child, for whom he might have hoped the most splendid of marriages—who was so much admired, and had so little excuse for throwing herself away—that she could engage herself thus, like any school-girl, to a clergyman’s son, with no prospects, nor money, nor position, nor anything! Kate looked at John across the table, and saw that he was very far from handsome, and owned to herself that it was next to incredible. Why had she done it? Looking at him critically, he was not even the least good-looking, nor distinguished, nor remarkable in any way. One might say he had a good expression, but that was all that could be said for him. And Kate felt that it would be incredible to her father. Dr Mitford was the only one of the party who was like himself; but then he was an old man, and naturally had not much feeling left.
“I want you to let me drive the phaeton over to the station to meet papa,” she said. “Please do, Dr Mitford. Oh, I am not in the least afraid of the pony. I have been making friends with him, and giving him lumps of sugar, and I do want to be the first to see papa.”
“My dear Miss Kate, I am so sorry the phaeton has only room for two,” said the Doctor. “If you were to go there would be no seat for your excellent father; but it is only half an hour’s drive—cannot you wait till he reaches here?”
“But, dear Dr Mitford, I always drive him from the station at home,” cried Kate.
“You are not at home now, my dear young lady,” said the Doctor, shaking his head. “We must give you back safe and sound into his hands. The groom will go. No, Miss Kate, no—we must not frighten your worthy father. You must consider what had so nearly happened a month ago. No, no; it requires a man’s hand——”
“But the pony is so gentle,” pleaded Kate.
“I know the pony better than you do,” Dr Mitford said, shaking his head, “and he wants a man’s hand. My dear, you must be content to wait your good father here.”
The Doctor was the only one who appeared unmoved. He had put on all his usual decorous solemnity along with his fresh stiff white tie, and highly-polished creaking boots. But even he made no allusion to the changed state of affairs. Sometimes Kate felt as if she must laugh, sometimes as if she must cry, sometimes disposed to be angry, sometimes wounded. She was glad to escape from the table to the garden, where John found her—glad, poor fellow, to escape too. And then, as they wandered among the rose-bushes arm-in-arm, she found out how it was.
“But they have no right to be so hard on you,” cried Kate, impetuously. “Suppose you had never seen me or thought of me—would it be right to be a clergyman, just like a trade, when you felt you could not in your heart——”
“My Kate!—you understand me at least; that is what I said.”
“And when you can do so much better for yourself,” said Kate, with emphasis. “Mrs Mitford and the Doctor should think of that. One way you never could have been anything but a clergyman; while the other way—why, you may be anything, John.”
He shook his head over her, half sadly, half pleased. He knew his capacities were far from being beyond limit, but still that she should think so was pleasant. And then there was the sense, which was sweet, that he and she, spending the summer morning among the flowers, were a little faction in arms against the world, with a mutual grievance, mutual difficulties, a cause to maintain against everybody. Solitude à deux is sweet, and selfishness à deux has a way of looking half sublime. It was the first time either of them had experienced this infinitely seductive sentiment. They talked over the hardness of the father and mother, with a kind of delight in thus feeling all the world to be against them. “They cannot blame me, for you were thinking of that before you ever saw me,” said Kate. “Blame you! it is one thing the more I have to love you for,” said John. “I should never have been awakened to free myself but for you, my darling. I should have gone stupidly on under the sway of custom.” And for the moment he believed what he said. Oh, what a difference it made! the wide world before him where to choose, and this creature, whom he loved more than all the world, leaning on him, putting her fate in his hands; instead of the dull routine of parish duties, and the dull home life, and the stagnation around, and all his uneasy restless thoughts.
It was about twelve o’clock when Kate went up-stairs to get her hat, with the intention of setting out on foot to waylay her father. It was absolutely indispensable, she felt, that she should be the first to see him; but up to that time the two lovers had wandered about together unmolested, not caring who saw them, arm-in-arm. This was the first advantage of the engagement. Dr Mitford saw them from his library, and Mrs Mitford looked down upon them with a beating heart from her chamber-window, but neither interfered. Twenty-four hours before Mrs Mitford would have gone out herself to take care of them, or would have called Kate to her; but now that they were engaged, such precautions were vain. And other people saw them besides the father and mother. Fred Huntley, for instance, who reined in his horse, and peered over the garden-wall as he passed, with a curiosity he found it difficult to account for, saw them standing by the lilies leaning on each other, and said “Oh!” to himself, and turned back and rode home again, without giving the message he had been charged with. He had come to ask the Fanshawe Regis people to a garden-party—“But what is the use?” Fred had said to himself; and had turned, not his own head, but his horse’s, and gone back again. Parsons, too, saw the pair from Kate’s window, where she was finishing her packing. “Master will soon put a stop to that,” was Parsons’ decision. But everybody perceived at once that a new relationship had been established between the two, and that everything was changed.
When Kate ran up-stairs to put on her hat, it was after two hours of this consultation and mutual confidence. It was true she had not taken much advice from him. She had closed his lips on that subject, telling him frankly that she knew her papa a great deal better than he did, and that she should take her own way; but she had given a great deal of counsel, on the other hand. He had found it impossible to do more than make a succession of little fond replies, so full had she been of advice and wisdom. “You must be, oh, so kind and gentle and nice to her,” Kate had said. “I will never forgive you if you are in the least cross or disagreeable to mamma. Yes; I like to say mamma. I never had any mother of my own, and she has been so good to me, and I love her so—not for your sake, sir, but for her own. You must never be vexed by anything she says; you must be as patient and gentle and sweet to her—but, remember, you must be firm! It will be kindest to all of us, John. If you were to appear to give in now, it would all have to be done over again; now the subject has been started, it will be much kinder to be firm.”
“You need not fear in that respect,” John replied. “I think nothing but the thought of you up-stairs, and the feeling that you understood me, would have given me courage to speak; but the moment one word had been said, all had been said. Nothing can bring things back to their old condition again.”
“I am so glad,” said Kate; “but, remember, you must be gentleness itself to her. If you were rude or undutiful or unkind, I should never, never look at you again.”
“My darling!” said John. It was so sweet of her thus to defend his mother. If Mrs Mitford had heard it, her soft heart would have been filled full of disgust and bitterness to think of this stranger taking it upon herself to plead for her, his mother, with her own son! But John only thought how sweet it was of his darling to be so anxious for his mother, and felt his heart melt over her. What was all his mother had done for him in comparison with Kate’s dominion, which was boundless, and of divine right? Thus they discussed their position, the very difficulties of which were delicious because they were mutual, and felt that the other persons connected with them, parents and suchlike, were railed off at an immense distance, and were henceforward to be struggled against and kept in subjection. It was with this resolution full in her mind, and thrilling with a new impulse of independence and activity, that Kate went up-stairs. Parsons had gone down to seek that sustenance of failing nature which the domestic mind finds necessary between its eight o’clock breakfast and its two o’clock dinner; but Lizzie, whom Kate had seen but little of lately, inspired on her side by a resolution scarcely less strong than the young lady’s, was at her bedroom door, waylaying her. Lizzie rushed in officiously to find the hat and the gloves and the parasol which Miss Crediton wanted, and then she added, humbly, “Please, miss!” and stood gaping, with her wholesome country roses growing crimson, and the creamy white of her round neck reddening all over, like sunrise upon snow.
“Well, Lizzie, what is it?—but make haste, for I am in a hurry,” said Kate. She was a young lady who was very good-natured to servants, and, as they said, not a bit proud.
“Oh, please, miss!—it’s as I can’t a-bear to see you going away.”
“Is that all? I am sure it is very kind of you, Lizzie—everybody has been so very kind to me at Fanshawe Regis that I can’t bear to go away,” said Kate; “but I daresay I shall come back again—probably very often; so you see it is not worth while to cry.”
“That’s not the reason, miss,” said Lizzie; “I’ve been thinking this long and long if I could better myself. Mother’s but poor, miss, and all them big lads to think of. And you as has so many servants, and could do such a deal—— It aint as I’m not happy with missis—but service is service, and I feel as I ought to better myself——.”
“Oh, you ungrateful thing!” cried Kate; “after Mrs Mitford has been so good to you. I would not be so ungrateful for all the world. Better yourself indeed! I can tell you, you are a great deal more likely to injure yourself. Oh, Lizzie, I should not have thought it of you! You ought to be so happy here.”
“It aint as I’m not happy,” cried Lizzie, melting into tears. “Oh, miss, don’t you go and be vexed. It’s all along of what Miss Parsons says. She says in the kitchen as how she’s going to be married, and all the dresses you gives her, and all the presents, and takes her about wherever you go. Oh, miss, when Miss Parsons is married, won’t you try me? I’ll serve you night and day—I will. I don’t mind sitting up nights—not till daylight—and I’d never ask for holidays, nor followers, nor nothing. You’d have a faithful servant, though I says it as shouldn’t,” said Lizzie, with her apron at her eyes; “and mother’s prayers, and a blessin’ from the Lord—oh, miss, if you’d try me!”
“Try you in place of Parsons!” cried Kate, in consternation. “Why, Lizzie, are you mad? Can you make dresses, you foolish girl, and dress hair, and do all sorts of things, like Parsons? You are only Mrs Mitford’s housemaid. Do you mean to tell me you can do all that too?”
“I could try, miss,” said Lizzie, somewhat frightened, drying her eyes.
“Try!—to make me a dress!” cried Kate, her eyes dancing with fun and comic horror. “But, Lizzie, I will try and find a place for you as housemaid, if you like.”
“I don’t care for that, miss,” said Lizzie, disconsolately; “what I want is to better myself. And I know I could, if I were to try. When I’ve tried hard at anything, I’ve allays done it. And, please, I don’t know what Miss Parsons is, as she should be thought that much of—I could do it if I was to try.”
“Then you had better try, I think,” said Kate, with severe politeness, “and let me know when you have succeeded; but in the mean time I will take my gloves, which you are spoiling. I have no more time to talk just now.”
Poor Lizzie found herself left behind, when she had hoped the argument was just beginning. Kate ran down with her gloves in her hand, half annoyed, half amused. The girl was so ready to transplant herself anywhere—to reach out her rash hands to new tools, and to take upon her a succession of unknown duties, that Kate was quite subdued by the thought. “How foolish!” she said to herself. “When she has been brought up to one thing, why should she want to try another? It is so silly. What stupids servants are! If I had been brought up a housemaid, I should have remained a housemaid. And to be willing to leave her good mistress and her home and all her past life—for what?” said Kate, moralising. Had she but known what a very similar strain of reasoning was going on in Mrs Mitford’s mind! “To give up his home, and all his associations, and his prospects in life, and the work God had provided for him—for what?” John’s mother was musing. The school, and the old women in the village, and all her parish work, had slid out of her thoughts. She had shut herself up in her own room, and was brooding over it—working the sword in her wound, and now and then crying out with the pain. And Dr Mitford in his study paused from time to time in the midst of his paper, and wished with a glum countenance that Mr Crediton’s visit was well over, and made up little speeches disowning all complicity in the business; and John had gone down to the river, to the foot of those cliffs where Kate’s horse was carrying her when he saved her, and, with his fishing-rod idle in his hand, tried also to prepare himself for that awful interview with Kate’s father, and for the final argument with his own which must follow. He was in the first day of his lover’s paradise, and had just tasted the sweetness of mutual consultation over those interests and prospects which were now hers as well as his. And he was very happy. But all the same he was wretched, feeling himself torn asunder from his life—feeling that he had lost all independent standing, and had alienated the hearts which loved him most in the world. All this followed upon the privilege of saving Miss Crediton’s life, and her month’s residence at Fanshawe Regis. Was it Kate’s fault? Nobody said so in words, not even Mrs Mitford; and Kate went to meet her father with such a sense of splendid virtue and disinterestedness as never before had swelled her bosom. She was full of the energy and exhilaration which attends the doing of a good action. “I have saved him,” she said to herself, “as he saved me. I have prevented him going and making a sacrifice of himself. He would never have had the courage to stand up for himself without me.” Moved by this glow of delightful complacency, she set out upon the road to the station; and it was not till she heard the jingle of the phaeton in the distance that a thrill of nervousness ran over Kate, and she felt the magnitude and importance of what she was about to do.
Mr Crediton probably was thinking of quite other things—at least, he did not recognise her, though she stood against the green hedgerow in her light summer dress, making signs with her parasol. It was only when the groom drew up that he observed the pretty figure by the roadside. “What, Kate!” he cried, with a flush of pleasure, and jumped out of the phaeton to greet her. “But there is no room for another,” he said, looking comically at the respectable vehicle, when he had kissed his child, and congratulated her on her improved looks—“what is to be done?”
“I wanted to have driven the pony to the station,” said Kate, “but Dr Mitford would not let me. Now you must walk home with me, papa—it is not a mile. James, you may drive on, and say we are coming. Dr Mitford thought the pony would be too much for me,” she added, demurely. “He is so funny, and so precise about everything.” Then Kate remembered suddenly that it was very contrary to her interest to depreciate any of the Mitford family, and changed her tone—“but so nice—you cannot think, papa, how kind, how good they have all been to me: they have made me like their own child.”
“So much the better, my dear,” said Mr Crediton. “I am very grateful to them. I am sure they are very good sort of people. But I hope, Kate, you are not sorry to be going home?”
“I am not sorry to see you, papa,” cried Kate, clasping his arm with both her hands. And then she leaned her head towards him in her caressing way. “Dear papa! I have so much to tell you,” she went on, faltering in spite of herself.
“If you have much to tell me, you must have used your time well,” said Mr Crediton, smiling upon her the smile of fond paternal indulgence. “And I daresay the items are not very important. But you have got back your roses and your bright eyes, my pet, and that is of more consequence than all the news in the world.”
“Papa,” said Kate, moved to a certain solemnity, “you would not say so if you knew what I am going to say. Do you remember what you said to me the morning you left? and I thought it was such nonsense;—but,” here she gave his arm a tender little squeeze between her two clinging hands, “I suppose it was you that knew best.”
“What did I say to you the morning I left?” said Mr Crediton, quite unsuspicious. He was pleased she should remember, pleased she should think he knew best. But he could scarcely realise his saucy Kate in this soft adoring creature, and he put his own hand caressingly upon the two little hands. “Mrs Mitford must have done you a great deal of good,” he added, with a soft laugh; “you did not use to be quite so retentive of what I said.”
“Oh, but papa, if you would only remember!” said Kate. “Papa,” she resumed, faltering, and drooping her head, “it came true—all your warning about—John.”
Mr Crediton gave a start, as if he had been shot. “About—John. What does this mean?” he cried, becoming alarmed. “What is it? I remember most things that concern you, but I don’t recollect anything particular I said.”
“Yes, papa; you warned me about—John. But it has not quite come true,” she added, lowering her voice, and leaning on him, with her head against his arm; “or rather, it has come more than true. Papa, don’t be angry. I came out on purpose to tell you. They are in a dreadful state about it. It is making poor Mrs Mitford quite ill. She thinks you will think they had some hand in it, but indeed they had not. Papa, dear, promise me you will not be angry. I—I am—engaged—to John.”
Mr Crediton was a very decorous, respectable man, not addicted to outbursts of passion, but at this wonderful announcement he swore a prodigious oath, and drew his arm away from her, giving her unawares a thrust aside which made her reel. Kate was so bewildered, so frightened, so dismayed by this personal touch that she blushed crimson the one moment, and the next began to cry. She stood gazing at him, with the big tears dropping, and the most piteous look in her eyes. “Oh, papa, don’t kill me!” she cried, in her consternation, sinking into the very hedge, in horror of his violence. Mr Crediton was so excited that he paid no attention to her cry of terror. “The d——d scoundrel!” he cried. “What! come in like this behind my back and rob me—take advantage of my sense of obligation—curse him! Curse them all! That’s your pious people!” And the man raved and blasphemed for five minutes at least, as if he had been his own groom, and not a respectable gentleman with grey hairs on his head, and the cares of half the county in his hands.
All this time Kate was too frightened to speak; but she was not the kind of girl to be long overwhelmed by such a fit of passion. She shrank back farther into the hedge, and grew as white as her dress, and trembled a good deal, and could not utter a word. But gradually her courage returned to her. Her heart began to thump less wildly against her breast, but rose and swelled instead with a force which was half self-will and half a generous sense of injustice. When Mr Crediton came to himself—which he did all at once with some very big words in his mouth, and his hand clenched in the air, and his face blazing with fury—he stopped short all at once, and cast an alarmed look at his daughter. Good heavens! he, a respectable man, to utter such exclamations, and in Kate’s presence! He came to himself all in a moment, and metaphorically fell prostrate before her with confusion and shame.
“Well,” he said, half fiercely, half humbly, “it is not much wonder if a man should forget himself. How do you dare to stand there and face me, and put such a thing into words?”
“Papa, I am very much surprised,” said Kate, her courage rising to the occasion. “I could not have believed it. It is best it should be me, and not a stranger, for what would any stranger have thought? But all the same, I am very sorry that it was me. I shall never be able to forget that I saw you look like that, and heard you say—— Ah!” said Kate, shutting her eyes. He thought she was going to faint, and got very much frightened; but nothing could be further from Kate’s mind than any intention of fainting. She sat down, however, on the grass, and leaned her elbows on her knees, and hid her face in her hands. And the unhappy father, conscious of having so horribly committed himself, stood silent, and did not know what to say.
Then, after a moment, she raised her head and looked him in the face. “Papa,” she said, “the people you have been abusing are waiting over there to welcome you to their house. They don’t like your coming, because they have a feeling what will happen; and they are very very vexed with their son for falling in love with me; and, poor fellow! I think he is vexed with himself, though he could not help it. What are you going to do? Are you going to swear at Dr Mitford, whose son saved your only child’s life, and whose wife saved it over again by her kindness, because they love me now as well? Are you going to drive me mad, and make me that I don’t care what I do? I am not so good as John is,” she said, with a half-sob; “if you cross me I will not be humble. I will go wrong, and make him go wrong too. You cannot change my mind by swearing at me, papa. What are you going to do?”
Yes, that was the question. It was very easy to storm and swear, with nobody present but his daughter. But Dr Mitford was as good a man as Mr Crediton, and as well known in the county, though he was not so rich. And John had saved Kate’s life at the risk of his own; and she had been taken in, and nursed, and brought back to perfect health; and there was no single house in the world to which Mr Crediton lay under such a weight of obligations. Was he to turn his back upon the house, and ignore all gratitude? Was he to go and insult them, or what was he to do? He was very angry, furious with Kate and her bold words, yet cowed by her in a way most wonderful to behold. “We had better walk back to the station; you are able enough for that, or at least you look so,” he said.
“That will show how highly you esteem my life,” said Kate, “though even that would be better than insulting them to their face.”
“By Jove!” said Mr Crediton, under his breath; and he took a few rapid turns up and down the road, with a perplexity which it would be impossible to describe. At last he came to a stop opposite Kate, who was watching him anxiously, without appearing to take any notice; and she felt that the fit was over. He came back to her very sternly, speaking with none of its usual softness in his voice.
“Kate,” he said, “you have spoken in a very unpardonable, very impertinent, way to me, but perhaps I have been wrong too. Of course I am not going to transgress the laws of civility. My opinion is not changed, but I hope I can be civil to my worst enemy. Get up, and let us go to the Rectory; it is the only thing we can do.”
Kate rose without a word, and put her hand upon her father’s arm, and the two stalked into Fanshawe Regis like two mutes following a funeral. They neither looked at each other, nor uttered a syllable to each other, but walked on side by side, feeling as if mutual hatred, and not love, was the bond between them. But yet in her inmost heart Kate felt that nothing was lost. The communication had been made, and the worst was over—perhaps even something had been gained.