F. W. Robinson

“ Sidney Hinchford loved Harriet, and she could not understand a man loving on, and yet holding aloof from the idol he would fain worship still.
Sidney Hinchford, a few days afterwards, came to make his last inquiries concerning Mattie's health—had he waited another day he would have found empty rooms and a desolate hearth—and Mattie seized that opportunity to say a word. The grass never grew under the feet of Mattie Gray, and the dark look—new to his face in its intensity of sternness—did not deter her. ”

“ Harriet," she added more eagerly, "you do love him? It isn't a fancy, like—like the others?"
"Mattie, I love him with my whole heart—I never loved before—I feel that the past was all romantic folly. You don't know what a noble fellow he is—how kind and thoughtful!"
"Yes—I do."
"Ah! but you don't know him as I know him; the truth of his inner self, the nobleness of his character, the earnestness of his nature. Mattie, I feel that I have deceived him—that I should have told him all about Mr. Darcy, and trusted in his generosity, in his knowledge of me, to believe it. ”

“ CHAPTER X. MATTIE IN SEARCH.
How does the time contrive to steal away from us when we are sitting up, feverish with fear for him, or her, who returns not? The dial that we stare at so often, marks fresh hours, and still further alarms us; but the night is long and tedious, and there's a stab in every tick of that sepulchral clock on the landing. We disguise our alarm from the servants, even from ourselves, and sit down patiently for the coming one—nervous at the footfalls in the streets without, and feeling heart-sick as they pass our door, and die away in the distance. ”

“ Better to doubt me than—others?"
She corrected herself in time; she remembered her promise to Harriet. She saw how easy it was for a few errors, a few mistakes to make this strange man forget all the good efforts of a life—deceived in Mr. Wesden as she had been, she could not gauge in those excited moments the depths of his affection for his daughter.
In the avowal there would be danger to Harriet; so, for Harriet's sake, let her take the blame and go away. Harriet could only have cleared up the last mystery—the rest affected herself. ”

“ Oh! no, no—not so bad as that!"
"Then it will all come right in time," cried Mattie. "He has loved us all his life, and will not fling himself from us in his pride and anger, as—as other men would do, more selfish and unjust than he. I see the future brightening—we will wait patiently, and not be cast down by this slight trouble."
"Slight trouble!" exclaimed Harriet. "Oh! Mattie, if you only understood what love was like, you would guess my—my sense of desolation." ”

“ Mr. Darcy will not boast of his humiliation. The old people need not be harassed and perplexed by all that has happened this night."
"No, no—all an ugly dream, as you say, Mattie!" remarked Harriet; "perhaps it is best, and a woman's fame is hard to establish, on her own explanation of such a history as mine. Let it sink. I am verily ashamed of it. My blood will boil at every chance allusion that associates itself with last night. Oh! my poor, dear, truthful Sid, to think of turning away from you and believing in a heartless villain."
"Ah! Sidney!" exclaimed Mattie. ”

“ A land of things beyond the present, and yet which could never appertain to any future, map it as she might in the brain that went to work so busily. Figures flitted before her of Harriet and Mr. Darcy—of Sidney Hinchford in his desolation, so strange a contrast to the happiness which he had sought—of herself passing from one to the other and endeavouring to do good and make others happy, the one ambition of this generous little heart. ”

“ Mattie passed from evil to good swiftly, grateful to the hands that had been outstretched to save her; the untaught childhood became swiftly the days of grateful girlhood—and from girlhood to the gentle, honest womanhood, that thought of others' happiness, and strove hard for happiness in those she loved, was but another step, easily made and never repented of.
She did all for the best, and strove hard to make the best of everything—for others. We know no better heroine than this, and I am very doubtful if we care for one better educated or of higher origin. ”

“ I see it every morning there, and think of his coming disappointment."
"He'll soon get over it—men soon get over it," replied Harriet, "they have so much to do in the world, and so many things therein to distract them. It's not like us poor girls, who think of nothing else but whom it is best to love, and who will love us best."
"Speak for your own romantic self, Miss Harriet," said Mattie, laughing. ”

“ Mattie turned to the left at the end of Great Suffolk Street, and proceeded at a rapid pace towards the railway station; there were stragglers still in the Borough—a broad thoroughfare, that never rests, but is ever alive with sound. Life still at the great terminus; a train hissing and fuming from its long journey, a handful of passengers by the mail, a few cabmen still looking out for fares, guards full of bustle as usual, one Kent Street gamin out on business, and dodging the policeman behind a Patent Safety. ”

“ Mattie's slight form was soon lost in the surging stream of human life; Mr. Wesden, who had followed her to the door, noticed how soon she was submerged.
Five years ago he had taken her from the streets—a stray. Again in her womanhood, at his wish, he had cast her back to them a stray still—nothing more!
A stray whom no one would claim as child, sister, friend; who went away characterless in a world ever ready to believe the worst. She had spoken of her strength to do battle now alone, but she did not know with what enemies she had to fight, or what deadly weapons to encounter ”

“ And Ann proceeded to inspect mantel-pieces, open cupboards and drawers, to Mattie's dismay.
"Yes, I see just how it be," she said, after her search had resulted in nothing satisfactory. "You're working yourself to death, and starving yourself to death, without saying anything to anybody. And that's gratitude for all my love for you—you who want to leave me alone in the world, with not no one to love." ”

“ For an instant he was even tempted; there rose before him the one chance of his life, the happiness of his life with Harriet, forestalled by years—and then he put his hands out, as though to push all dangerous thoughts away.
"Thank you—thank you—" he said; "but when I speculate, it must be with my own money. I will not start in life burdened by a heavy debt. You're very kind—far too kind to me, sir."
"A Hinchford—I never forget that. You don't know how proud I am of my family, and all its belongings. And, joking apart, Sidney, we really are a fine family, every one of us! ”

“ Sidney's countenance changed a little—he became grave, and his cousin noticed the difference.
"Anything wrong?" was the quick question here.
Sidney was annoyed that he had betrayed himself—he who prided himself upon mastering all emotion when the occasion was necessary.
"Oh! no; everything right, Maurice!" he said with a forced lightness of demeanour; "the folly of an engagement that could end in nothing, discovered in good time, and two romantic beings sobered for their good!" ”

“ Wesden and I are an old couple, and mayn't keep you waiting so long as you fancy, Sidney. It isn't much money, but——"
"That will do, sir," said Sidney, hastily; "I must support my wife, not let my wife support me. Harriet," turning to the daughter, with an impetuosity almost akin to fierceness, "is it not time to return to Camberwell?"
"Oh! ho!—do you hear that, Wesden?" cried the father.
Mr. Hinchford had forgotten the downfall of his son's air-built castle, in the happiness which he believed would make amends for it to Sidney. And if Sidney were content—why, he was. ”

“ Mattie had not given much thought to Sidney Hinchford's appearance; the preacher's excitement, the return of a far-off thought to her, had rendered all that had followed vague and indistinct—the scene had been even too much for her, and she began to slowly close her eyes.
"I think she has been talked and worried to death too much," cried Ann running to her; "Miss Harriet, I'd go now, if I were you."
"Perhaps I have remained too long," said Harriet, rising.
"No," said Mattie, feebly, "I have been surprised by all that has just happened. You are not the cause." ”

“ Mattie was not looking pretty well; on the contrary, very pale and thin, as though anxiety, or hard work, or both, had been her portion since she had left Great Suffolk Street. She was dressed in black, very neatly dressed, and possibly the dark trappings had some effect in increasing the pallor of her countenance.
"We thought that we had lost you for good, Mattie."
"Was it likely, sir, that I was going to lose sight of all those who had been kind to me?"
"You're not looking very well," he said.
"Ah! we musn't judge by people's looks," said Mattie, cheerfully. "I'm well enough, thank God! ”

“ Still he judged Harriet Wesden by himself, and judged her rightly. If she loved him for himself, she would not care what money he brought her; and if his affection were selfish, knowing what an end to a love story his life must be, he had concealed nothing from her, and the truth had only drawn her closer to him. ”

“ Think of my sorrows, Mattie, and thank heaven that you have never been in love!"
"Dreadful sorrows yours are, Miss Harriet, I must say!"
"People never think much of other people's sorrows," remarked Harriet, sententiously.
Thus it came about that Harriet Wesden and Mattie were thrown into closer companionship for awhile, and that Mattie began to think that the constant presence of the girl she loved most in the world made ample amends for the suspicions which had placed her there, for the absence of Sidney Hinchford, and the mystery by which it had been characterized. ”

“ I fancied that I might do good by an effort—there is no doing good without one—and I made the attempt. When I was rewarded by my first convert, Mattie, that was my encouragement," he said, rising with the earnestness of his topic, sitting down again, and flinging his arms wildly about; "that was my incentive to go on, to save fresh souls from the danger, to struggle in the by-ways of life, for the light which the evil one would for ever shut from us. And I was rewarded for the effort; I have done good; I have spent the last sixteen years of my life in the good cause!" ”

“ It is a selfish globe on which we are spinning, and it is natural to think deeply—think altogether, perhaps—of our loves, our successes, our chances of fame, fortune, happiness, rather than of other people's. For the reason that it has been our lot to drop upon an exception to this rule—as near an exception as this rule sans exception will allow—do we hold Mattie a first place in our affections, and think her story—approaching its turbulent stage—worth the telling. ”

“ And you, sir?"
"Well, Mattie, thank God, too!"
"And Sidney, sir!"
"As brave as ever. I wish he had been at home—he has been anxious to see you, Mattie."
"He is very kind," she said, in a low voice, adding, "and what does he think?"
Mr. Hinchford was not quick in catching a subject upon which Mattie had brooded now for some months.
"Think of what?"
"Of me! Mr. Wesden has—hasn't turned him against me, sir?"
"Oh! no. He sticks up for you like a champion!"
"I thought he would. He never spoke ill of any one in his life, and he always took the part of those who were unfortunate. ”

“ And yet let it be recorded here, Harriet Wesden's main incentive to keep her secret close was for Sidney Hinchford's sake. It tortured her to think that she should have ever entertained one feeling of love or liking for the Mr. Darcy who had sought her humiliation; the shock to her pride had not only turned her utterly away from Mr. Darcy, but the very contrast he presented to young Hinchford, had aroused the old, or given birth to a new affection for the latter. ”

“ She had met obstacles in her path, which would have crushed the energy out of most women, but which she surmounted, not without wounds and loss of strength, and even health, and then went on again. She was matter-of-fact and honest, and those who had doubted her at first—for she had chosen her dwelling-place but a very little way from Great Suffolk Street, and the rumours of a lying tongue followed her, and set her neighbours and fellow-lodgers against her—soon understood her, for the poor are great observers and good judges of character. ”