Mrs. Oliphant

“ Darling, I’m sure you don’t know what to say for joy.”
“Oh, Alice, it is all beyond saying,” said I; “I don’t know why this should have come to me, when even you yourself—you who are always kindest, did not dare to ask a blessing for me; and after you said that, Alice, I never dared to ask one for myself.”
“I never meant that, Miss Hester,” said Alice, humbly; “I did crave for the blessing night and day, and here it is, bless his dear little heart; the sight of him brings back my pleasant days to me, dear. A woman never has such a joy as a baby. Do you shake your head at that, Miss Hester? ”

“ I said; “I will seek out the poor, and work for them. I will teach the children. I will take care of the old people. There is a great deal of misery everywhere—I can understand it now, and I will find plenty to do.”
“Yes, dear, there’s plenty of trouble,” said Alice, with a heavy sigh: “plenty of God’s own sending, and plenty of our own making, Miss Hester—and old folks like me, that have seen grief, it goes to our heart to see the young and the great that have happiness at their feet, and will not stoop down to lift it—and that’s the truth.” ”

“ If you are the heir of Cottiswoode do you think anything you could do, would make my father keep what is not his? No, you can do nothing except justice. My father is not a man to be pitied.”
“Nor do I mean to pity him,” said the boy, gently, “I respect my father’s brother, though my father’s brother doubts me. Will you throw me off then? you judge of me, perhaps, by my companion. Ah! that would be just; I do not care for justice, cousin Hester; I want that which you reject so bitterly—pity, compassion, love!” ”

“ With a woman’s sympathetic instinct, I knew she was gone away with her burden, to try if she could lighten it by tears.
“Harry,” I said gravely, when we went away, “she is not young nor pretty, nor clever, nor interesting—people don’t love her even when they only see her as I used to do. What has such a woman to reward her for the neglects and slights that are her portion now?”
“Patience and hope here, nothing more, Hester,” said Harry, “not even William loves her as she loves him—nothing but hope and patience—poor Martha!—and in the world to come, life everlasting. That is enough for her.” ”

“ My heart melted to my own mother when I looked at my new friend. I began to understand how hard it would be for such a creature to live at all under the shadow of a silent, passionate, uncommunicative man like my father, even if he had not distrusted her.
“I am afraid I was crying,” said Flora, wiping something from her cheek, “for Alice was speaking of your mamma; and, cousin, Alice too thinks I am like her. I am so very glad to be like her; but papa said you were a little too, cousin Hester.”
“No, I do not think it,” said I. “I am not like her, I am like the gloomy Southcotes, Flora. ”

“ Poor Alice was taken by surprise: she had not expected such a flush of sudden displeasure—she paused in her work, and looked at my crimsoned face with a glance of real apprehension. Alice was old-fashioned and held by many primitive notions—she did not understand what I could mean.
“Miss Hester, if it’s the nuns you’re thinking of, I’ll break my heart,” said Alice.
“I’m not thinking of the nuns,” cried I, indignantly, “why should a lady be married any more than Mr. Osborne? do you mean I could not be as well by myself as he is? ”

“ I thought you one of those whose very presence makes a home—your high spirit, your rapid mind, only gave a noble charm to your generous loving heart—I thought so, Hester—I delighted in believing it. I thought the key of my joy in this world was given to me when they put your hand in mine. Look at me now—I am bankrupt, shipwrecked—from the first hour I brought you home, happiness was ended for me. This house is wretched—the very sunshine and daylight that God has made are no longer blessings to me. My life is a burden. ”

“ I did not answer, but looked at her with earnestness as great as her own.
“First of all, before even the safety, and the blessing, and the joy, oh, Miss Hester,” cried Alice, with strange emotion, “that you may be made to see which is good and which is evil, and to choose the right way. I dare not ask the blessing first, darling, I dare not! I’d lay down my life for an hour’s comfort to you, Miss Hester; you know it’s not boasting, you know it’s true; but you’re following a wrong way, and sorrow is the right thing to come to that rather than joy. ”

“ I am sure he heard me sob as I ran up stairs; but he did not know how I was almost overpowered—how a new love and tenderness, almost too much for me, was swelling like a sea in my heart. I fled to my own room, and shut myself in, and sank down upon the floor and cried. Alice had been speaking to him: I read it in his eye—but I—I could say nothing. I could not go, as his wife should have gone, to share with him the delight, and awe, and wonder, of this approaching future. I lay down upon the floor prostrate, with my face buried in my hands. ”

“ I yield to you in the more important particulars; you must yield to me in this.”
“Papa! I cannot leave you. Do not bid me,” I cried, eagerly, encouraged by his tone; “to go away now would kill me. Father, father! have you no pity upon me? you cannot have the heart to send me away!”
“I have the heart to do all I think right, Hester!” said my father, sternly. “I am the last man in the world to speak to of pity. Pity has ruined me; and I will do what is right, and not a false kindness to my only child. This lover of yours is your own choice—remember at all times he is your own choice. ”

“ It was very good of you to come and tell me, Flora.”
“No, he is not a hero,” said Flora, and then she paused and looked up in my face, and made a breathless appeal to me, clasping baby’s little soft hand within both her own; “Oh, cousin Hester, will you come home? it must be so dreadful to be parted; I can understand it now,” said Flora, with her sweet blush. “Please, cousin Hester, dear cousin, what matter is it if Mr. Southcote was wrong, he is so fond of you, he thinks there is no one like you; oh, will you come home?” ”

“ Alice turned round to me eagerly with a tear shining in her eye.
“Don’t you think I’d rather have been without them, Miss Hester; don’t you think it now! it’s hard to lose, but it’s blessed to have; that’s true—that’s true! I would not have been without one, though they’re all gone: I have read in books many a time, good books, books that were written on purpose to comfort the sorrowful,” said Alice, sinking to her usual quietness of tone, “that God did but lend our treasures to us, to take them back at His pleasure. ”

“ I have heard often how foolish was all this display and bustle about a marriage. I do not think it. It is the one day in a woman’s life when everything and every one should do her honor. As I stood with Alice in my bright room, half blinded with the intense light upon the white ribbons, I was pleased with all the things about me. I had license to like everything, and to be interested with all the additions to my wardrobe. Only once in one’s life can one be a bride. ”

“ I wondered once more where Alice had got them—for my own part I was not now excited; I had fallen into a lull of composure, and was watching everybody. I remember the little speech Mr. Osborne made—full of real kindness; but with a little mock formality in it, as if a large party had been present, when he drank our healths; and I remember the glow upon Harry’s face, and the gleam in his eyes, when he without any mockery stretched out his hand to him, and thanked him. Miss Osborne sat by me in her rustle and flutter of finery, whispering jokes and kind words into my ear ”

“ I heard one suppressed sob behind me, and knew it was Alice; and I knew, too, instinctively that though I did not see him, there was another in the room. But I never moved nor turned my head; not a tear came to my dry eye, my lips were parched and hot; but neither sobbing nor weeping were possible to me. I sat still by that bedside, in full possession of my mind and faculties. I never observed more keenly, more closely, more minutely in all my life—I felt no grief, I knew no emotion, I only watched and watched with intense attention and consciousness to see my father pass away. ”

“ But after a little while he spoke in his measured low melodious tones. “You think it better to risk your all upon a chance, do you, Hester? Such a chance—happiness never comes of it. It is always an unequal barter—but you prefer to risk that rather than to trust to me.”
“I want to risk nothing—I need nothing!” cried I, “while I have my father, I want no other, and do not bid me think of such misery—do not, papa! You will live longer than I shall—oh! I hope, I pray you will. Papa, do not urge me, I cannot anticipate such a calamity!” ”

“ Osborne was engaged. He held out his hand when I came up to him, and looked at me with a glance of pleased satisfaction, almost as if he were proud of me, which warmed my heart in spite of myself. I told my message, but he made no haste to obey it. He only nodded his head, with a smile, in answer to Mrs. Boulder’s urgent beckoning.
“Should you like to see him, Hester?” said Mr. Osborne, “there he is, that young dandy there, among all the young ladies—he prefers worshippers to critics, like a sensible man. Should you like to hear the great lion roar, Hester?” ”

“ I looked up with a startled, indignant glance at Alice, who was bending over me anxiously. “Bring him to me, Alice,” I cried eagerly; “or, if I must not have my baby, do you keep him at least. She is a stranger; she does not care for him. Look, look, she has fallen asleep!” I saw the woman start and open her eyes with a guilty look as I spoke, and Alice said, “Yes, darling, yes,” as she bent over me and continued bathing my forehead. I put away her hand impatiently. “Take him yourself, Alice, or bring him to me,” I cried again. ”

“ Osborne is your agent, I understand? You leave these matters in his hands? Now, I must know the hour you will leave me—how you are to travel, and where you will go first; and if I may depend certainly on the time of your return?”
“We will fix it for any time you choose,” said Harry, quickly and with an air of relief. “I will be only too proud to bring Hester home, and to see her in her own settled house; but you must give us our moon; we have a right to that—I have a right to that. You will not grudge us our charmed holiday. I shall be content to have no other all my life.” ”

“ I had to restrain whatever I felt; my eyes were blinded with tears; but Miss Osborne was rustling forward to support me and give me her arm upstairs, and I would not call forth her common-place coldness, should I not even have ten minutes with Alice, all by ourselves.
But Alice contrived this, and, as I changed my dress, Alice wept over me. “The house will be desolate—desolate, darling,” said Alice, “but I see nothing but happiness for you. It makes my heart light to think on what’s before you. He’s a noble young gentleman, Miss Hester; I never saw one was equal to him. ”

“ I admired her as only women can admire each other. I was not shy of looking at her as a man might have been. I had a pure pleasure in the sweet bloom of her cheek, the pretty turn and rounding of its outline. I had a great love of beauty by nature, but I had seen few beautiful people. Many a time the sweet complexion of Alice, and her comely bright face, had charmed me unawares, and I was a great deal more delighted with Flora now.
Mrs. Ennerdale took me aside, after a few minutes, to talk to me after a matronly and confidential fashion, for I was not well, and did not look well. ”

“ I fancy she saw some encouragement in the glance of my wet eyes and the softening of my face. She came behind me under the pretence of doing something, and then she said timidly, “Miss Hester, may I speak?”
I could not say no. I did not answer at all, and she took this for permission.
“You think every one’s deceived you, dear,” said Alice humbly, “and in your great trouble you stand by yourself, and will let nobody help you. I don’t deny, Miss Hester, every one’s done wrong; but, darling, it was all for love of you.” ”

“ The tears were shining in his kind eyes I could see—he looked as he used to look in the brief charmed days before our marriage;—no, better than that—for through sorrow, and bitterness, and estrangement—strange lessons!—I knew him now, as then I had no chance to know him. “Do not fear, Hester,” he said; “I am not afraid of your generosity. I told you long ago I could bear to be pitied—the only thing I could not bear was justice;—and so long as what you give me is not barely my ‘rights,’ I will permit you to be as generous as even your nature can be. ”

“ I was fully dressed. Can a bride forget her ornaments? I thought they were very dazzling as I saw them in my mirror. I could not help pausing to look at myself, at the lustre of my dress, and the glow of Harry’s bracelet on my arm; and I was about to go away so, to see my father—but Alice stopped me to wrap a large light shawl over my splendor—“Dear, he’ll feel it,” said Alice. I was struck with the delicacy which both Alice and Mr. Osborne, though they condemned him, showed to my father and his feelings. I wrapped the shawl closer over my arms, and with a subdued step left my own room. ”

“ Ennerdale; “Flora told me you were quite pale and thin when she saw you—ah, there’s nothing like native air, my dear—you’ve got quite a bloom—you look better than ever I saw you look, though that is quite natural—where is baby?—not asleep or out of doors, I hope. Do you know you ought not to let me see him, for I shall begin to envy you immediately—I envy every woman I see with a baby in her arms. Ah, my dear, it’s the very happiest time of your life.” ”

“ Sorrow has been in our house—sickness—once death,—but strife has never entered at the peaceful doors of Cottiswoode; and I should smile now, with the smile of perfect confidence and security, did any one whisper to me that discord could come between Harry and his brave brother Brian, our little knight-errant—our St. George—our eager champion of the distressed. The children are God’s children—I do not tremble for them; and life comes to have a very different aspect, with all its unknown haps and chances, when one can say Providence, heartily, instead of Fate. ”

“ I threw off my mantle upon the kind arm of Alice, and danced away to make tea for my father. In proportion to the depth of my sadness at leaving Cottiswoode, was the height of my exhilaration now to find another home. We had expected this to be a very dreary evening—instead of that I had seldom been so happy, so vivacious, so daring, in my girl’s talk; and there sat my father, his face brightening in the firelight, smiling at my boldness, my enthusiasms, my denunciations, my girlish superlative emotion. ”

“ If I was wrong—criminal—think of what the circumstances were, Hester. Can your heart find no excuse for me? and see what my punishment is already. Instead of the natural joy which a man looks for, when he carries his bride home, I have anticipated this day with terror—and my fears are more than realized. Have I become a different person from him to whom you said this very night, ‘I am your wife?’ Am not I the same man you promised your heart and love to? the same with whom you left your father’s house? Hester! ”

“ It! a spark of sudden anger woke in me when some one said it—that was correct enough half an hour ago—but this was he, an individual being, my baby, my own, mine! I cannot tell to any one the rapture in which I lay watching Alice as she put upon him his first little robes. I was in a woman’s paradise—a moment which can come but once in a lifetime. What mother does not remember, after all her dread, her awe, her suffering, the heavenly rest in which she lay looking at her firstborn? ”

“ If you can give in to him, Miss Hester, dear, if it’s not against your heart—if you’re fancy-free, and think no more of one than of another—oh! darling, yield to him anything you can. He’s a suffering man, and is your father, and pride is the sin of the house; every one has it, less or more; and there are only two of you in the world, and you are his only child!”
Alice ran breathlessly through this string of arguments, while I listened with a disturbed and a rebellious heart. ”

“ Hester, beware! your husband’s happiness depends as much on you as yours does on him. He is himself a noble young man, worthy the regard of any woman; and I have had a higher opinion of yourself ever since I saw that you valued him. When you leave your father’s house, take this sweet counsellor with you. Remember the cause that broke her young heart, and left you without a mother in the world. Let the glance of the sweet frank eyes teach you a woman’s wisdom, my dear child. Forgive what is wrong—foster what is right. Hester! ”

“ Alice satisfied me by a great many assurances. “Babies are not always pretty, darling,” said the impartial Alice; “I have seen the oddest little things, though their mothers were always pleased; but Master Harry is a noble boy! Look how big he is; why he’s quite a weight to lift already, and such a head of hair,” she continued, gently pushing back his cap to show the silky down beneath; “and look here, Miss Hester, what arms, he might be a month old, bless him, instead of half a day. Do I really think it? My darling, I never, all my days, was called a flatterer before.” ”