Mrs. Mackenzie

“ Whereupon Mrs Mackenzie, without further speech to her cousin on the subject, went out and purchased a muslin covered all over with the prettiest little frecks of black, and sent a milliner to Margaret, and provided a bonnet of much the same pattern, the gayest, lightest, jauntiest, falsest, most make-belief-mourning bonnet that ever sprang from the art of a designer in bonnets—and thus nearly broke poor Margaret's heart.
"People should never have things given them, who can't buy for themselves," she said, with tears in her eyes, "because of course they know what it means." ”

“ Then Mr Maguire got up, saying that he should probably do himself the pleasure of calling on Miss Mackenzie at the Cedars, and went his way.
"I wonder what he's after," said Mrs Mackenzie, as soon as the door was shut.
"Perhaps he came to tell her to bear it all with Christian resignation," said Miss Colza; "they always do come when anything's in the wind like that; they like to know everything before anybody else."
"It's my belief he's after her money," said Mrs Mackenzie.
"With such a squint as that!" said Mary Jane; "I wouldn't have him though he was made of money, and I hadn't a farthing." ”

“ Mrs Mackenzie saw what was passing in his mind; but she was not a woman to be driven easily from her purpose.
"You see," she said, "there is so much to think of. What is Margaret to do, if we leave her in London when we go down? And it would really be better for her to be married from her cousin's house; it would, indeed. Lady Ball would like it better—I'm sure she would—than if she were to be living alone in the town in lodgings. There is always a way of doing things; isn't there? And Walter's sisters, her own cousins, could be her bridesmaids, you know." ”

“ The same view of the matter was perhaps taken by Mr Rubb, junior, when he was told that Miss Mackenzie was to pass through London on her way to the Cedars, though he did not express his fears openly, as Mrs Mackenzie had done.
"Why don't you ask your sister to stay in Gower Street?" he said to his partner.
"She wouldn't come."
"You might at any rate ask her."
"What good would it do?"
"Well; I don't know that it would do any good; but it wouldn't do any harm. Of course it's natural that she should wish to have friends about her; and it will only be natural too that she should marry some one." ”

“ On the next morning Mrs Mackenzie and Margaret were together, and then Mrs Mackenzie began:
"Margaret, my dear," said she, "that bonnet I gave you has been worth its weight in gold."
"It cost nearly as much," said Margaret, "for it was very expensive and very light."
"Or in bank-notes either, because it has shown him and me and everybody else that you needn't be a dowdy unless you please. No man wishes to marry a dowdy, you know." ”

“ On the day appointed Mrs Mackenzie again came, and Margaret was carried off to Cavendish Square. Here she found herself suddenly brought into a mode of life altogether different from anything she had as yet experienced. The Mackenzies were people who went much into society, and received company frequently at their own house. The first of these evils for a time Margaret succeeded in escaping, but from the latter she had no means of withdrawing herself. ”

“ Mackenzie should continue to live with them--"She has a right to live in the house," he said, "it is I who have no right in it. I am a poor old pensioner, don't you see, subsisting on Rosey's bounty. We live on the hundred a year secured to her at her marriage, and Mrs. Mackenzie has her forty pounds of pension which she adds to the common stock. They put their little means together, and they keep us--me and Clive. What can we do for a living? ”

“ If a single life will suit her best, she shall have half of all that she ever thought to be her own."
"And do you wish it to be so?"
"I have not said that, Mrs Mackenzie. But it may be that I should wish her to have the choice fairly in her own power."
"Then I can tell you at once which she would choose. Your offer is very generous. It is more than generous. But, Sir John, a single life will not suit her; and my belief is, that were you to offer her the money without your hand, she would not take a farthing of it." ”

“ Then the widow asked him to take a chair, and he took a chair.
"My sister-in-law is not with us at present," said Mrs Mackenzie.
"She is staying for a visit with her aunt, Lady Ball, at the Cedars, Twickenham," said Mary Jane, who had contrived to drop her sheet, and hustle it under the table with her feet, as soon as she learned that the visitor was a clergyman.
"Lady Ball is the lady of Sir John Ball, Baronet," said Miss Colza, whose good nature made her desirous of standing up for the honour of the family with which she was, for the time, domesticated. ”

“ Mrs. Mackenzie and her four children were in the bateau, with their clothing and a limited amount of supplies. Chandonnais and a friendly Indian were at the oars. Black Partridge had appeared at the trading station before daylight, to ask Mackenzie and his family to go in the boat. The trader refused, saying he would march with [Pg 360] the soldiers; and Robert also declined the opportunity. Both Mackenzie and his wife insisted that Beatrice should take the safer course, but it was useless.
"What?" she asked, "and leave Queen? Not I! We're going with the soldiers!" ”

“ Every one of you might make progress if you tried. But there is only one of you all who works. That is Miss Mackenzie."
But, all too soon, Rosalind's ten pounds melted away, until they had all gone. And, as there was no more where they had come from, Rosalind's lessons must also come to an end!
"Oh! Mother, can't you do anything to help Rosie?" Nannie cried in piteously beseeching accents the night before Rosalind was to go to the studio for the last time.
"Nannie," answered Mrs. Mackenzie reproachfully, "don't you think I would if I could?"
"Daddy, can you do nothing?" Nannie implored. ”

“ Then they parted, and Margaret was left alone to congratulate herself over her success.
"Sir John," said Mrs Mackenzie, calling him into the drawing-room; "you must hear my congratulations; you must, indeed."
"Thank you," said he, looking foolish; "you are very good."
"And so is she. She is what you may really call good. She is as good as gold. I know a woman when I see her; and I know that for one like her there are fifty not fit to hold a candle to her. She has nothing mean or little about her—nothing. They may call her a lamb, but she can be a lioness too when there is an occasion." ”

“ Perhaps the only person in the world that she cordially disliked was her sister-in-law. She certainly knew no other woman whose society would be so unpalatable to her. But if things were so as Mr Rubb now described them, there could be no doubt about her duty. It was very well indeed that her answer to Mr Maguire had been postponed to that Monday.
She found her sister-in-law in the dining-room, and Mrs Mackenzie, of course, received her with a shower of tears. "I did think you would have come, Margaret, by the first train." ”

“ People can't break any bones by their talking."
"Wouldn't you think it very unpleasant, Mrs Mackenzie, to have your name brought up in the newspapers?"
"Upon my word I don't think I should care about it as long as my husband stood by me. What is it after all? People say that you and Margaret are the Lion and the Lamb. What's the harm of being called a lamb or a lion either? As long as people are not made to believe that you have behaved badly, that you have been false or cruel, I can't see that it comes to much. One does not, of course, wish to have newspaper articles written about one." ”

“ Then they sat leaning against the gate, she idly plucking sun-faded primroses, he brooding upon the nearness of her hand. In such universal placidity it could not be wrong to hold that hand wasting itself amid small energies. Without looking into her eyes, without turning his gaze from the great tranquil water before him, Michael took her hand in his so lightly that save for the pulsing of his heart he scarcely knew he held it. So he sat breathless, enduring pins and needles, tolerating the uncertain pilgrimage of ants rather than move an inch and break the yielding spell which made her his. ”

“ With a light tread she went up stairs: she would not have her mother know that she had overheard the remark made to her father—her mother could not know all, only herself and Don Mackenzie knew her cruel secret; he would never tell, not even Roger, and she could sooner die than let the words pass her lips to any human creature. Girls had gone through terrible things before; but no girl ever had gone through this; no girl could, unless she were like herself, and no girl was like herself, so impetuous, so headlong, so frank that frankness became a sin. ”

“ Margaret told the lady that she did not know her, and at that moment was altogether at a loss to guess who the lady might be. The lady might be forty years of age, but was still handsome, and carried with her that easy, self-assured, well balanced manner, which, if it be not overdone, goes so far to make up for beauty, if beauty itself be wanting.
"I am your cousin, Mrs Mackenzie,—Clara Mackenzie. My husband is Walter Mackenzie, and his father is Sir Walter Mackenzie, of Incharrow. ”

“ Jenny, when she looked at him full, was aware less of his eyes than of her own, which seemed to her to be kindling in the dry sparks that were radiated by his; and even as she felt scorched by the brain which was thus expressed, her own eyes would melt, as it were, to meet appropriately the liquid softness that succeeded. His lips were never remarkably red, and as the evening advanced they adopted the exact shade of his complexion, which from paleness took on the lifeless monotone of color that is seen in the rain-soaked petal of a pink rose. ”

“ Every house took on a look of the most unutterable completeness; the horses galloped like Arabian barbs; policemen expanded like beneficent genii; errand boys whistled like nightingales; all familiarity was enchanted, and seven-leagued boots took him forward as easily as if he travelled a world subdued to the effortless transitions of sleep. Carlington Road stretched before him bright, kindly, beckoning to his ingress. Against the lighted entrance-hall of Number 64 Michael saw the red and amber sparrows like humming-birds, ruby-throated, topaz-winged. ”

“ Of love I am supposed to know nothing, save in that third person whose company is unwelcome and superfluous. Perhaps my devotion to the Odes has led me to see too many Lalages, too many Lyces. Perhaps I regard women too much as roses that bloom, scatter their sweets and die. In a word, perhaps I am unsympathetick."
"I don't think you are at all, sir," cried Phyllida, surprized by her own boldness.
"Thank you," said the Beau, with the merest hint of a tremour in his equable voice.
"But," he went on, "if I regard women as roses, I never seek to pluck them: most men do. ”

“ One night after a hard day's portage Mackenzie was inspired by a brilliant idea. "They got no children," he said, in a hoarse, exceptionally audible whisper. "It worries them. Them as is Catholics goes pilgrimages, but these ain't Catholics. See?"
"I can't stand that," said Marjorie. "It touches my pride. I've stood a good deal. Mr. Mackenzie!... Mr.... Mackenzie."
The voice at the men's fire stopped and a black head turned around. "What is it, Mrs. Trafford?" asked Mackenzie. ”

“ There was no landscape that Lily did not make more inevitably composed. There was no place of which she did not become tutelary, whether she lay among the primroses that starred the steep brown banks of woodland or whether she fronted the great sunshine of the open country; but most of all when she sat in cowslips, looking over arched knees at the wind.
Michael fell into the way of talking to her as if he were playing upon Dorian pipes the tale of his love:
“I must buy you a ring, Lily. What ring shall I buy for you? Rings are all so dull. ”

“ A woman born in California, herself a citizen of the United States with the right to vote, automatically relinquishes her citizenship and that right the moment she becomes the wife of a foreigner, whether the foreigner is a resident or not.
Mrs. Mackenzie, who brought the test case, is the wife of Gordon Mackenzie, known on the concert platform as Mackenzie Gordon, the Scotch tenor. Her husband, who is a nephew of the late Sir Morell Mackenzie, a famous English surgeon, has been a resident of San Francisco for the last twelve years. He has lived in this country for more than twenty years. ”

“ Michael said. “But somehow one never thinks of anything like this in connection with one’s own mother.”
“Or sister,” murmured Stella, looking up at a spot on the ceiling.
“I wish I could kick myself for not having said good-bye to him,” Michael declared. “That comes of talking too much. I talked much too much then. Talking destroys action. What a beast I was. Lily and I look rather small now, don’t we?” he went on. “When you think of the amount that mother must have suffered all these years, it just makes Lily and me look like illustrations in a book. ”

“ The Incharrow Mackenzies were great people who saw much company, and it was, she thought, quite out of the question that she should go to their house. At no time of her career would she have been, as she conceived, fit to live with such grand persons; but at the present moment, when she grudged herself even a new pair of gloves out of the money remaining to her, while she was still looking forward to a future life passed as a nurse in a hospital, she felt that there would be an absolute unfitness in such a visit. ”