Whiteladies. Oliphant Margaret
believe Everard felt what was the connecting link of thought, or rather feeling, and for the first moment was half angry, feeling himself more or less blamed; but he was too gentle a soul not to be overwhelmed by the other picture suggested, after the first moment. “Is he so very bad, then?” he asked, after an interval, in a low and reverential tone.
“Not worse than he has been for weeks,” said Miss Susan, “but that is as bad as possible; and any day – any day may bring – God help us! in this lovely weather, Everard, with everything blooming, everything gay – him dying, her watching him. Oh! how could I forget them for a moment – how could I think of anything else?”
He made no answer at first, then he said faltering, “We can do them no good by thinking, and it is too cruel, too terrible. Is she alone?”
“No; God forgive me,” said Miss Susan. “I ought to think of the mother who is with her. They say a mother feels most. I don’t know. She has other ties and other children, though I have nothing to say against her. But Reine has no one.”
Was it a kind of unconscious appeal to his sympathy? Miss Susan felt in a moment as if she had compromised the absent girl for whom she herself had formed visions with which Reine had nothing to do.
“Not that Reine is worse off than hundreds of others,” she said, hastily, “and she will never want friends; but the tie between them is very strong. I do wrong to dwell upon it – and to you!”
“Why to me?” said Everard. He had been annoyed to have Reine’s sorrow thrust upon his notice, as if he had been neglecting her; but he was angry now to be thus thrust away from it, as if he had nothing to do with her; the two irritations were antagonistic, yet the same. “You don’t like painful subjects,” said Miss Susan, with a consciousness of punishing him, and vindictive pleasure, good soul as she was, in his punishment. “Let us talk of something else. Austine is at her almshouses, as usual, and she has left me with scarcely a servant in the house. Should any one call, or should tea be wanted, I don’t know what I should do.”
“I don’t suppose I could make the tea,” said Everard. He felt that he was punished, and yet he was glad of the change of subject. He was light-hearted, and did not know anything personally of suffering, and he could not bear to think of grief or misfortune which, as he was fond of saying, he could do no good by thinking of. He felt quite sure of himself that he would have been able to overcome his repugnance to things painful had it been “any good,” but as it was, why make himself unhappy? He dismissed the pain as much as he could, as long as he could, and felt that he could welcome visitors gladly, even at the risk of making the tea, to turn the conversation from the gloomy aspect it had taken. The thought of Herbert and Reine seemed to cloud over the sunshine, and take the sweetness out of the air. It gave his heart a pang as if it had been suddenly compressed; and this pain, this darkening of the world, could do them no good. Therefore, though he was fond of them both, and would have gone to the end of the world to restore health to his sick cousin, or even to do him a temporary pleasure, yet, being helpless toward them, he was glad to get the thoughts of them out of his mind. It spoilt his comfort, and did them no manner of good. Why should he break his own heart by indulging in such unprofitable thoughts?
Miss Susan knew Everard well; but though she had herself abruptly changed the subject in deference to his wishes, she was vexed with him for accepting the change, and felt her heart fill full of bitterness on Reine’s account and poor Herbert’s, whom this light-hearted boy endeavored to forget. She could not speak to him immediately, her heart being sore and angry. He felt this, and had an inkling of the cause, and was half compunctious and half disposed to take the offensive, and ask, “What have I done?” and defend himself, but could not, being guilty in heart. So he stood leaning against the open doorway, with a great rosebranch, which had got loose from its fastenings, blowing in his face, and giving him a careless prick with its thorns, as the wind blew it about. Somehow the long waving bough, with its many roses, which struck him lightly, playfully, across the face as he stood there, with dainty mirth and mischief, made him think of Reine more than Miss Susan’s reminder had done. The prick of the branch woke in his heart that same, sudden, vivid, poignant realization of the gay girl in contrast with her present circumstances, which just a few minutes before had taken Miss Susan, too, by surprise; and thus the two remained, together, yet apart, silent, in a half quarrel, but both thinking of the same subject, and almost with the same thoughts. Just then the rolling of carriage wheels and prance of horses became audible turning the corner of the green shady road into which the gate, at this side of the town, opened – for the manor-house was not secluded in a park, but opened directly from a shady, sylvan road, which had once served as avenue to the old priory. The greater part of the trees that formed the avenue had perished long ago, but some great stumps and roots, and an interrupted line of chance-sown trees, showed where it had been. The two people in the porch were roused by this sound, Miss Susan to a troubled recollection of her servant-less condition, and Everard to mingled annoyance and pleasure as he guessed who the visitors were. He would have been thankful to any one who had come in with a new interest to relieve him from the gloomy thoughts that had taken possession of him against his will, and the new comers, he felt sure, were people whom he liked to meet.
“Here is some one coming to call,” cried Miss Susan in dismay, “and there is no one to open the door!”
“The door is open, and you can receive them here, or take them in, which you please; you don’t require any servant,” said Everard; and then he added, in a low tone, “Aunt Susan, it is the Farrel-Austins; I know their carriage.”
“Ah!” cried Miss Susan, drawing herself up. She did not say any more to him – for was not he a friend and supporter of that objectionable family? – but awaited the unwelcome visitors with dignified rigidity. Their visits to her were very rare, but she had always made a point of enduring and returning these visits with that intense politeness of hostility which transcends every other kind of politeness. She would not consent to look up, nor to watch the alighting of the brightly-clad figures on the other side of the lawn. The old front of the house, the old doorway and porch in which Miss Susan sat, was not now the formal entrance, and consequently there was no carriage road to it; so that the visitors came across the lawn with light Summer dresses and gay ribbons, flowery creatures against the background of green. They were two handsome girls, prettily dressed and smiling, with their father, a dark, insignificant, small man, coming along like a shadow in their train.
“Oh, how cool and sweet it is here!” said Kate, the eldest. “We are so glad to find you at home, Miss Austin. I think we met your sister about an hour ago going through the village. Is it safe for her to walk in the sun without her bonnet? I should think she would get a sunstroke on such a day.”
“She is the best judge,” said Miss Susan, growing suddenly red; then subduing herself as suddenly, “for my part,” she said, “I prefer the porch. It is too warm to go out.”
“Oh, we have been so much about; we have been abroad,” said Sophy, the youngest. “We think nothing of the heat here. English skies and English climate are dreadful after the climate abroad.”
“Ah, are they? I don’t know much of any other,” said Miss Susan. “Good morning, Mr. Farrel. May I show you the way to the drawing-room, as I happen to be here?”
“Oh, mayn’t we go to the hall, please, instead? We are all so fond of the hall,” said Sophy. She was the silly one, the one who said things which the others did not like to say. “Please let us go there; isn’t this the turn to take? Oh, what a dear old house it is, with such funny passages and turnings and windings! If it were ours, I should never sit anywhere but in the hall.”
“Sophy!” said the father, in a warning tone.
“Well, papa! I am not saying anything that is wrong. I do love the old hall. Some people say it is such a tumble-down, ramshackle old house; but that is because they have no taste. If it were mine, I should always sit in the hall.”
Miss Susan led the way to it without a word. Many people thought that Sophy Farrel-Austin had reason in her madness, and said, with a show of silliness, things that were too disagreeable for the others; but that was a mere guess on the part of the public. The hall was one of the most perfectly preserved rooms of