Whiteladies. Oliphant Margaret
while Martha, aggrieved but conscientious, fumbled with the doors of the wardrobe, in which she had just hung up her mistress’s gown; perhaps it was the tired way in which Miss Susan leaned back in her easy chair, and the half sigh which breathed into her good-night. But from all these signs together Martha knew, what nothing could have taught Augustine. But what could the maid do to show sympathy? At first, I am sorry to say, she did not feel much, but was rather glad that the mistress, who had kept her half an hour longer than usual out of bed, should herself have some part of the penalty to pay; but compunctions grew upon Martha before she left the room, and I think that her lingering, which annoyed Miss Susan, was partly meant to show that she felt for her mistress. If so, it met the usual recompense of unappreciated kindness, and at last earned a peremptory dismissal for the lingerer. When Miss Susan was alone, she raised herself a little from her chair and screwed up the flame of the small silver lamp on her little table, and put the double eyeglass which she used, being slightly short-sighted, on her nose. She was going to think; and she had an idea, not uncommon to short-sighted people, that to see distinctly helped her faculties in everything.
She felt instinctively for her eyeglass when any noise woke her in the middle of the night; she could hear better as well as think better with that aid. The two white streaks of moonlight, with the broad bar of shadow between, and all the markings of the diamond panes, indicated on the gray oaken board and fringe of Turkey carpet, moved slowly along the floor, coming further into the room as the moon moved westward to its setting. In the distant corner the night-light burned dim but steady. Miss Susan sat by the side of her bed, which was hung at the head with blue-gray curtains of beautiful old damask. On her little table was a Bible and Prayer Book, a long-stalked glass with a rose in it, another book less sacred, which she had been reading in the morning, her handkerchief, her eau-de-cologne, her large old watch in an old stand, and those other trifles which every lady’s-maid who respects herself keeps ready and in order by her mistress’s bedside. Martha, too sleepy to be long about her own preparations, was in bed and asleep almost as soon as Miss Susan put on her glasses. All was perfectly still, the world out-of-doors held under the spell of the moonlight, the world inside rapt in sleep and rest. Miss Susan wrapped her dressing-gown about her, and sat up in her chair to think. It was a very cosey, very comfortable chair, not hard and angular like Austine’s, and everything in the room was pleasant and soft, not ascetical and self-denying. Susan Austin was not young, but she had kept something of that curious freshness of soul which some unmarried women carry down to old age. She was not aware in her innermost heart that she was old. In everything external she owned her years fully, and felt them; but in her heart she, who had never passed out of the first stage of life, retained so many of its early illusions as to confuse herself and bewilder her consciousness. When she sat like this thinking by herself, with nothing to remind her of the actual aspect of circumstances, she never could be quite sure whether she was young or old. There was always a momentary glimmer and doubtfulness about her before she settled down to the consideration of her problem, whatever it was – as to which problem it was, those which had come before her in her youth, which she had settled, or left to float in abeyance for the settling of circumstances – or the actual and practical matter-of-fact of to-day. For a moment she caught her own mind lingering upon that old story between Augustine and their cousin Farrel, as if it were one of the phases of that which demanded her attention; and then she roused herself sharply to her immediate difficulty, and to consider what she was to do.
It is forlorn in such an emergency to be compelled to deliberate alone, without any sharer of one’s anxieties or confidante of one’s thoughts. But Miss Susan was used to this, and was willing to recognize the advantage it gave her in the way of independence and prompt conclusion. She was free from the temptation of talking too much, of attacking her opponents with those winged words which live often after the feeling that dictated them has passed. She could not be drawn into any self-committal, for nobody thought or cared what was in her mind. Perhaps, however, it is more easy to exercise that casuistry which self-interest produces even in the most candid mind, when it is not necessary to put one’s thoughts into words. I cannot tell on what ground it was that this amiable, and, on the whole, good woman concluded her opposition to Farrel-Austin, and his undoubted right of inheritance, to be righteous, and even holy. She resisted his claim – because it was absolutely intolerable to her to think of giving up her home to him, because she hated and despised him – motives very comprehensible, but not especially generous, or elevated in the abstract. She felt, however, and believed – when she sat down in her chair and put on her glasses to reflect how she could baffle and overthrow him – that it was something for the good of the family and the world that she was planning, not anything selfish for her own benefit. If Augustine in one room planned alms and charities for the expiation of the guilt of the family, which had made itself rich by church lands, with the deepest sense that her undertaking was of the most pious character – Susan in another, set herself to ponder how to retain possession of these lands, with a corresponding sense that her undertaking, her determination, were, if not absolutely pious, at least of a noble and elevated character. She did not say to herself that she was intent upon resisting the enemy by every means in her power. She said to herself that she was determined to have justice, and to resist to the last the doing of wrong, and the victory of the unworthy. This was her way of putting it to herself – and herself did not contradict her, as perhaps another listener might have done. A certain enthusiasm even grew in her as she pondered. She felt no doubt whatever that Farrel-Austin had gained his point by false representations, and had played upon the ignorance of the unknown Austin who had transferred his rights to him, as he said. And how could she tell if this was the true heir? Even documents were not to be trusted to in such a case, nor the sharpest of lawyers – and old Mr. Lincoln, the family solicitor, was anything but sharp. Besides, if this man in Bruges were the right man, he had probably no idea of what he was relinquishing. How could a Flemish tradesman know what were the beauties and attractions of “a place” in the home counties, amid all the wealth and fulness of English lands, and with all the historical associations of Whiteladies? He could not possibly know, or he would not give them up. And if he had a wife, she could not know, or she would never permit such a sacrifice.
Miss Susan sat and thought till the moonlight disappeared from the window, and the Summer night felt the momentary chill which precedes dawn. She thought of it till her heart burned. No, she could not submit to this. In her own person she must ascertain if the story was true, and if the strangers really knew what they were doing. It took some time to move her to this resolution; but at last it took possession of her. To go and undo what Farrel-Austin had done, to wake in the mind of the heir, if this was the heir, that desire to possess which is dominant in most minds, and ever ready to answer to any appeal; she rose almost with a spring of youthful animation from her seat when her thoughts settled upon this conclusion. She put out her lamp and went to the window, where a faint blueness was growing – that dim beginning of illumination which is not night but day, and which a very early bird in the green covert underneath was beginning to greet with the first faint twitter of returning existence. Miss Susan felt herself inspired; it was not to defeat Farrel-Austin, but to prevent wrong, to do justice, a noble impulse which fires the heart and lights the eye.
Thus she made up her mind to an undertaking which afterward had more effect upon her personal fate than anything else that had happened in her long life. She did it, not only intending no evil, but with a sense of what she believed to be generous feeling expanding her soul. Her own personal motives were so thrust out of sight that she herself did not perceive them – and indeed, had it been suggested to her that she had personal motives, she would have denied it strenuously. What interest could she have in substituting one heir for another? But yet Miss Susan’s blue eyes shot forth a gleam which was not heavenly as she lay down and tried to sleep. She could not sleep, her mind being excited and full of a thousand thoughts – the last distinct sensation in it before the uneasy doze which came over her senses in the morning being a thrill of pleasure that Farrel-Austin might yet be foiled. But what of that? Was it not her business to protect the old stock of the family, and keep the line of succession intact? The more she thought of it, the more did this appear a sacred duty, worthy of any labor and any sacrifice.
CHAPTER VI
The breakfast-table was spread in the smaller dining-room, a room furnished with quaint old furniture like the hall, which looked out upon nothing but the grass and trees