Mrs. Humphry Ward

“ His contempt for Hubert was of many years' standing. Laura lifted her eyebrows.
"That was sharp, for the last word. I don't think you should stick pins when you're dying—dying!"—she repeated the word with a passionate energy—"going quite away—for ever." Then, with a sudden change of tone—"Can I have the cart to-morrow, Daffady?"
Daffady, who had been piling the fire with fresh peat, paused and looked down upon her. His long, lank face, his weather-stained clothes, his great, twisted hand were all of the same colour—the colour of wintry grass and lichened rock. ”

“ We must believe for ourselves the Church is the only way. But God is so merciful! But you—it is offered to you, Laura. And Alan's love with it. Just so little on your part—the Church is so tender, so indulgent! She does not expect a perfect faith all at once. One must just make the step blindly—obey—throw oneself into her arms. Father Leadham said so to me one day—-not minding what one thinks and believes—not looking at oneself—just obeying—and it will all come!"
But Laura could not speak. Little Augustina, full of a pleading, an apostolic strength, looked at her tenderly. ”

“ Half an hour later Laura was in the oriel window of the drawing-room, looking out through the open casement at the rising of a golden moon above the fell. Her mind was full of confusion.
"Is he never to be free to say what he thinks and feels in his own house?" she asked herself passionately. "Or am I to sit by and see him sink to the level of these bigots?"
Augustina was upstairs, and Laura, absorbed in her own thoughts and the night loveliness of the garden, did not hear Helbeck and Mr. Williams enter the room, which was as usual but dimly lighted. ”

“ Helbeck looked at her without answering for a long moment. Her agitation, his painful silence, bore pitiful testimony to the strange, insurmountable reality of those facts of the spirit that stood like rocks in the stream of their love.
At last he held out his hands to her with that half-reproachful gesture he had often used towards her. "I fear nothing!—I hope everything. You never forbade me that. Will you leave my love no mysteries, Laura—no reserve? Nothing for you to discover and explore as time goes on?"
She trembled under the mingled remonstrance and passion of his tone. ”

“ When was Laura to be married, and what was she to wear?
"The plainest thing I can find," said Laura indifferently. "Unless Augustina teases me into something I don't want." Polly inquired if it would be in church. "In a Catholic church," said Laura with a shrug. "No flowers—no music. They just let you be married—that's all."
Polly's-eyes jumped with amazement. "Why, I thowt they had everything so grand!"
"Not if you will go and marry a heretic like me," said Laura. "Then they make you know your place."
"But—but Laura! yo're to be a Romanist too—for sure?" cried Polly in bewilderment. ”

“ As it was, Laura was pitched against the railing of the dog-cart, and as she instinctively grasped it to save herself, her wrist was painfully twisted.
"You are hurt!" said Helbeck, pulling up the pony.
The first cry of pain had been beyond her control. But she would have died rather than permit another.
"It is nothing," she said, "really nothing! What was the matter?"
"A mare and her foal, as far as I can see," said Helbeck, looking behind him. "How careless of the farm people!" he added angrily.
"Oh! they must have strayed," said Laura faintly. ”

“ Once, when she had been chatting in the friendliest way with the Reverend Mother, she paused for a moment in the passage outside Augustina's room, amazed at herself.
It was liberty, no doubt—this strange and desolate liberty in which she stood, that made the contrast. By some obscure association she fell on the words that Helbeck had once quoted to her—how differently! "My soul is escaped like a bird out of the snare of the fowler; the snare is broken, and we are delivered." ”

“ Laura dropped her head upon the window-sill, and the tears rushed into her eyes.
"I know—we all know—what you have done and sacrificed for the faith," said the younger man with emotion.
"You will not venture to make a merit of it," said Helbeck gravely. "For we serve the same ends—only you perceive them more clearly—and follow them more persistently than I."
"I have stronger aids—and shall have to answer for more!" said Williams, in a low voice. "And I owe it all to you—my friend and rescuer."
"You use a great deal too strong language," said Helbeck, smiling. ”

“ History, in fact, is the great rationalist; and the Catholic conscience is scandalised by her. And so we have these pitiful little books—" he laid his hand on the volume beside him—"which simply expunge history, or make it afresh. And we have a piece of Jesuit apologia, like this paper of Leadham's—so charming, in a sense, so scholarly! And yet one feels through it a cry of the soul—the Catholic arraignment of history, that she is what she is!" ”

“ Helbeck then?" asked Polly. Her loud surprise conveyed the image of Helbeck as it lay graven in the minds of the Browhead circle,—a sort of triple-crowned, black-browed tyrant, with all the wiles and torments of Rome in his pocket. A wife resist—defy? The Church knows how to deal with naughtiness of that kind.
Laura laughed.
"We can but try. But now then,"—she bent forward and put her hands impulsively on Polly's shoulders,—"tell me about everybody and everything. How's Daffady? how's the cow that was ill? how're the calves? how's Hubert?" ”

“ But the strange look of power—almost of triumph—on Helbeck's face remained unaltered. She shrank before it.
"Laura, you don't know yourself! But no matter! Only, will you forgive me if you feel a change in me? Till now I have shrunk from fighting you. It seemed to me that an ugly habit of words might easily grow up that would poison all our future. But now I feel in it something more than words. If you challenge, Laura, I shall meet it! If you strike, I shall return it." ”

“ Then he said, "He came—as I told you—to think that it was right and best for him to do so. An artist, darling, has to think of the Four Last Things, like anybody else!"
"The Four Last Things!" said Laura, startled. "What do you mean?"
"Death—Judgment—Heaven—and Hell."
The words fell slowly from the half-whispering voice into the quiet darkness of the chapel. Laura looked up—Helbeck's eyes, fixed upon the crucifix over the altar, seemed to receive thence a stem and secret message to which the whole man responded. ”

“ Day by day, indeed, amid all jars and misgivings, the once solitary master of Bannisdale was becoming better acquainted with that mere pleasantness of a woman's company which is not passion, but its best friend. In the case of those women whom nature marks for love, it is a company full of incident, full of surprise. Certainly Helbeck found it so.
A week or more had now passed since the quarrel over the picture. Not a word upon the subject had passed between them since. As for Laura, she took pains not to look at the picture—to forget its existence. ”

“ Had the differences between her and Helbeck been differences of opinion, they would have melted like morning dew. But they went far deeper. Helbeck, indeed, was in his full maturity. He had been trained by Jesuit teachers; he had lived and thought; his mind had a framework. Had he ever felt a difficulty, he would have been ready, no doubt, with the answer of the schools. But he was governed by heart and imagination no less than Laura. A serviceable intelligence had been used simply to strengthen the claims of feeling and faith. ”

“ Williams disappeared. A light scaffolding had been placed in the chapel. Work was to begin.
Laura put on her hat, took a basket, and went into the garden to gather fresh flowers for the house. Along the edges of the bowling-green stood rows of sunflowers, a golden show against the deep bronze of the thick beech hedges that enclosed the ground. Laura was trying, without much success, to reach some of the top blossoms of a tall plant when Helbeck came upon her.
"Be as independent as you please," he said laughing, "but you will never be able to gather sunflowers without me!" ”

“ When you take him, he will be able to do what you tell him, perhaps. But—for this world—it will be like a dead man.' And Father Leadham did not deny it. He knows it is true."
And thus, so long as her poor strength lasted, Augustina lay and whispered—reporting all the piteous history of those winter months—things that Laura had never heard and never dreamed—a tale of grief so profound and touching that, by the time it ended, every landmark was uprooted in the girl's soul, and she was drifting on a vast tide of pity and passion, whither she knew not. ”

“ It was so strange, after all the pains—all the clinging to Him—and entreating. It might have been a sign, and there!—she never gave a thought to us. It seemed like an intrusion, a disturbance even to touch her. How horrible it is that death is so lonely! Then something was said that reminded me of my father. I had forgotten him for so long. But when they left me with her, I seemed to be holding not her hand, but his. I was back in the old life—I heard him speaking quite distinctly. 'Laura, you cannot do it—you cannot do it!' And he looked at me in sorrow and displeasure. ”

“ There was deep silence. Helbeck knelt on the grass beside Laura and took her hands afresh.
"Laura, since that night I have been my Lord's. It seemed to me that He had come Himself—come from His cross—to raise two souls from the depths of Hell. Marie went into a convent, and died in peace and blessedness; I came home here, to do my duty if I could—and save my soul. That seems to you a mere selfish bargain with God—an 'egotism'—that you hate. But look at the root of it. Is the world under sin—and has a God died for it? ”

“ Helbeck soon perceived that she was jarred. When she called to Bruno he checked his flow of anecdote, and said to her in a lower voice:
"You think us uncharitable?"
She looked up—but rather at the Jesuit than at Helbeck.
"No—only it is not amusing! If Augustina or I could speak for the other side—that would be more fun!"
"Laura!" cried Augustina, scandalised.
"Oh, I know you wouldn't, if you could," said the girl gayly. "And I can't. So there it is. One can't stop you, I suppose!" ”

“ And to such aids and helps must a human heart come in dying!
She had not been quick enough to master herself. Oh! that was wrong—very wrong. But had it deserved a stroke so cruel—so unjust?
Oh! miserable, miserable religion! Her wild nature rose against it—accused—denounced it.
That night Augustina was marvellously well. She lay with the relic case beside her in a constant happiness.
"Oh, Laura! Laura, dear!—even you must see what it has done for me!"
So she whispered, when Sister Rosa had withdrawn into the next room and she and Laura were left together. ”

“ Was she to be wept over by Sister Angela—to confess her sins to Father Bowles—still worse, to Father Leadham? As she asked herself the question, she shrank in sudden passion from the whole world of ideas concerned—from all those stifling notions of sin, penance, absolution, direction, as they were conventionalised in Catholic practice and chattered about by stupid and mindless people. In defiance of them, her whole nature stood like a charged weapon, ready to strike. ”

“ You see, Jane, if it's true—'ne croit qui veut'—it's still more true, 'ne doute qui veut!' To doubt—doubt wholesomely, cheerfully, fruitfully—why, my dear, there's no harder task in the world! And a woman, who thinks with her heart—who can't stand on her own feet as a man can—you remove her from all her normal shelters and supports—you expect her to fling a 'No!' in the face of half her natural friends—and then you are too indolent or too fastidious to train the poor child for her work!—Fountain took Laura out of her generation, and gave her nothing in return. ”

“ Augustina fell into a maze of rather miserable cogitation. She recalled her brother's manner and words after his return from the station on the night of the expedition—and then next day, the news!—and Laura's abrupt admission: "I met him in the garden, Augustina, and—well! we soon understood each other. It had to come, I suppose—it might as well come then. But I don't wonder it's all very surprising to you——" And then such a wild burst of tears—such a sudden gathering of the stepmother in the girl's young arms—such a wrestle with feelings to which the bewildered Augustina had no clue. ”

“ Oh! the tyranny of those perpetual grumblings and parsimonies, of those sour unfriendly looks! Economy—yes! But it should be a seemly, a smiling economy in future—one still compatible with a little elegance, a little dignity.
Laura liked to think of her own three hundred a year; liked to feel it of importance in the narrow lot of this impoverished estate. To a rich bridegroom it would have been a trifle for contempt. To Helbeck and herself—though she scarcely believed that he had realised as yet that she possessed a farthing!—it would mean just escape from penury ”

“ To be the managing wife of an obedient husband was the last thing that her imagination coveted. So that when any change in the garden, any repair in the house, was in progress, she would hover round Helbeck, half cold, half eager, now only showing a fraction of her mind, and now flashing out into a word or look that for Helbeck turned the whole business into pure joy. ”

“ At the same time, the sadness of his Catholic friends should find no other pretext. Upon his fidelity now and here, not only his own eternal fate, but Laura's, might depend. Devotion to the crucified Lord and His Mother, obedience to His Church, imitation of His saints, charity to His poor—these are the means by which the Catholic draws down the grace, the condescension that he seeks. He felt his own life offered for hers. So that the more he loved her, the more set, the more rigid became all the habits and purposes of religion. ”