Chapter Thirteen.
Stepping Northwards.
“It were to be wished the flaws were fewer
In the earthen vessels holding treasure
Which lies as safe in a golden ewer:
But the main thing is, does it hold good measure?”
Browning.
I turned back to the table, and dropping the letter on it, I laid my head down upon my arms and wept bitterly. He who wrote it had done with the world and the world’s things for ever. Words such as these were not of earth. They had come from the other side of the world-storm and the life’s fever. And he was nearly there.
I wondered how much Flora understood. Did she guess anything of that unwhispered secret which he promised to tell her in the courts of Heaven? Had she ever given to Duncan Keith what he had given her?
I rose at last, and returned the letter to Annas.
“Thank you,” I said. “You will be glad some day to have had that letter.”
“I am glad now,” said Annas, quietly, as she restored it to its place. “And ere long we shall be glad together. The tears help the journey, not hinder it.”
“How calm you are, Annas!” I said, wondering at her.
“The time for Miss Keith to be otherwise has not come yet,” said Mr Raymond’s voice behind me. “I think, Miss Courtenay, you have not seen much sorrow.”
“I have not, Sir,” said I, turning to him. “I think I have seen—and felt—more in the last six months than ever before.”
“And I dare say you have grown more in that period,” he made answer, “than in all the years before. You know in what sort of stature I mean.”
He left us, and went up-stairs, and Ephraim came in soon after. I had no words with Flora alone, and only a moment with Annas. She came with us to the door.
“Does Flora understand?” I whispered, as I kissed Annas for good-bye.
“I think not, Cary. I hope not. It would be far better.”
“You do?” said I.
“I knew it long ago,” she answered. “It is no new thing.”
We went back to Bloomsbury Square, where I found in the drawing-room a whole parcel of visitors—Mrs Newton and her daughters, and a lot of the Pages (there are twelve of them), Sir Anthony Parmenter, and a young gentleman and gentlewoman who were strangers to me. Grandmamma called me up at once.
“Here, child,” said she, “come and speak to your cousins. These are my brother’s grandchildren—your second cousins, my dear.” And she introduced them—Mr Roland and Miss Hilary Carlingford.
What contrasts there are in this world, to be sure! As my Cousin Hilary sat by me, and asked me if I went often to the play, and if I had seen Mrs Bellamy, (A noted actress of that day) and whether I loved music, and all those endless questions that people seem as if they must ask you when they first make acquaintance with you,—all at once there came up before me the white, calm face of Annas Keith, and the inner vision of Colonel Keith in his prison, waiting so patiently and heroically for death. And oh, how small did the one seem, and how grand the other! Could there be a doubt which was nearer God?
A lump came up in my throat, which I had to swallow before I could tell Hilary that I loved old ballads and such things better than what they call classical music, much of which seems to me like running up and down without any aim or tune to it—and she was giving me a tap with her fan, and saying,—
“Oh, fie, Cousin Caroline! Don’t tell the world your taste is so bad as that!”
Suddenly a sound broke across it all, that sent everything vanishing away, present and future, good and ill, and carried me off to the old winter parlour at Brocklebank.
“Bless me, man! don’t you know how to carry a basket?” said a voice, which I felt as ready and as glad to welcome as if it had been that of an angel. “Well, you Londoners have not much pith. We Cumberland folks don’t carry our baskets with the tips of our fingers—can’t, very often; they are a good heft.”
“Madam,” said Dobson at the door, looking more uncomfortable than I had ever seen him, “here is a—a person—who—”
“Woman, man! I’m a woman, and not ashamed of it! Mrs Desborough, Madam, I hope you are well.”
What Grandmamma was going to do or say, I cannot tell. She sat looking at her visitor from head to foot, as if she were some kind of curiosity. I am afraid I spoilt the effect completely, for with a cry of “Aunt Kezia!” I rushed to her and threw my arms round her neck, and got a warmer hug than I expected my Aunt Kezia to have given me. Oh dear, what a comfort it was to see her! She was what nobody else was in Bloomsbury Square—something to lean on and cling to. And I did cling to her: and if I went down in the esteem of all the big people round me, I felt as if I did not care a straw about it, now that I had got my own dear Aunt Kezia again.
“Here’s one glad to see me, at any rate!” said my Aunt Kezia; and I fancy her eyes were not quite dry.
“Here are two, Aunt Kezia,” said Hatty, coming up.
“Mrs Kezia Courtenay, is it not?” said Grandmamma, so extra graciously that I felt sure she was vexed. “I am extreme glad to see you, Madam. Have you come from the North to-day? Hester, my dear, you will like to take your aunt to your chamber. Caroline, you may go also, if you desire it.”
Thus benignantly dismissed, we carried off my Aunt Kezia as if she had been a casket of jewels. And as to what the fine folks said behind our backs, either of her or of us, I do not believe either Hatty or I cared a bit. I can answer for one of us, anyhow.
“Now sit down and rest yourself, Aunt Kezia,” said I, when we reached our chamber. “Oh, how delightful it is to have you! Is Father well? Are we to go home?”
And then it flashed upon me—to go home, leaving Colonel Keith in prison, and Annas and Flora in such a position! Must we do that? I listened somewhat anxiously for my Aunt Kezia’s answer.
“It is pleasant to see you, girls, I can tell you. And it is double pleasant to have such a hearty welcome to anybody. Your Father and Sophy are quite well, and everybody else. You are to go home?—ay: but when, we’ll see by-and-by. But now I want my questions answered, if you please. I shall be glad to know what has come to you both? I sent off two throddy, rosy-cheeked maids to London, that did a bit of credit to Cumberland air and country milk, and here are two poor, thin, limp, white creatures, that look as if they had lost all the sunshine out of them. What have you been doing to yourselves?—or what has somebody else been doing to you? Which is it?”
“Cary must speak for herself,” said Hatty, “Hatty must speak for herself,” said I.
Hatty laughed.
“It is somebody else, with Hatty,” I went on, “and I don’t quite know how it is with me, Aunt Kezia. I have been feeling for some weeks past as if I had the world on my shoulders.”
“Your shoulders are not strong enough for that, child,” replied my Aunt Kezia. “There is but one shoulder which can carry the world. ‘The government shall be upon His shoulder.’ You may well look poor if you have been at that work. Where are Flora and Miss Keith?—and what has become of their brothers, both?”
“Annas and Flora have just come back to London,” said Hatty. “But Angus is in dreadful trouble, Aunt; and I do not know where Colonel Keith is—with the Prince, I suppose.”
“No, Hatty,” said I. “Aunt Kezia, Angus is safe, but an exile in France; and Colonel Keith lies in Newgate Prison, waiting for death.”
“What do you know about it?” asked Hatty, in an astonished tone.
My Aunt Kezia looked from one of us to the other.
“You cannot both be right,” said she. “I hope you are mistaken, Cary.”
“I have no chance to be so,” I answered; and I heard my voice tremble. “Colonel Keith bought Angus’s freedom with his own life. At least, there is every reason to fear that result, and none to hope.”
“Then that man who escaped was Angus?” asked Hatty.
I bowed my head. I felt inclined to burst out crying if I spoke.
“But who told you? and how come you to be so sure it is true?”
“I was the girl who carried the basket into the prison.” I just managed to say so much without breaking down, though that tiresome lump in my throat kept teasing me.
“You!” cried Hatty, in more tones than the word has letters. “Cary, you must be dreaming! When could you have done it?”
“In the evening, on one of Grandmamma’s Tuesdays, and I was back before any one missed me, except you.”
“Who went with you?—who was in the plot? Do tell us, Cary!”
“Yes, I suppose you may know now,” I said, for I could now speak more calmly. “Ephraim took me to the place where I put on the disguise, and forward to the prison. Then Colonel Keith and I carried in the basket, and Angus brought it out. Ephraim came to us after we left the prison, and brought me back here.”
“Ephraim Hebblethwaite helped you to do that?”
I did not understand Hatty’s tone. She was astonished, undoubtedly so, but she was something else too, and what that was I could not tell.
My Aunt Kezia listened silently.
“Why, Cary, you are a heroine! I could not have believed that a timid little thing like you—” Hatty stopped.
“There was nobody else,” said I. “You were not well enough, you know. I had to do it; but I can assure you, Hatty, I felt like anything but a hero.”
“They are the heroes,” said my Aunt Kezia, softly, “who feel unlike heroes, but have to do it, and go and do it therefore. Colonel Keith and Cary seem to be of that sort. And there is only one other kind of heroes—those who stand by and see their best beloved do such things, and, knowing it to be God’s will, bid them God-speed with cheerful countenance, and cry their own hearts out afterwards, when no one sees them but Himself.”
“That is Annas’ sort,” said I.
“Yes, and one other,” replied my Aunt Kezia.
“But Hatty did not know till afterwards,” said I.
“Child, I did not mean Hatty. Do Flora and Miss Keith look as white as you poor thin things?”
“Much worse, I think,” said I. “Annas keeps up, and does not shed a tear, and Flora cries her eyes out. But they are both white and sadly worn.”
“Poor souls!” said my Aunt Kezia. “Maybe they would like to go home with us. Do you know when they wish to go?”
“Annas has been promised a hearing of Princess Caroline, to intercede for her brother,” I made answer. “I think she will be ready to go as soon as that is over. There would be no good in waiting.” And my voice choked a little as I remembered for what our poor Annas would otherwise wait.
“Cary Courtenay, do you know you have got ten years on your head in six months?”
“I feel as if I were a good deal older,” I said, smiling.
“You are the elder of the two now,” said my Aunt Kezia, drily. “Not but what Hatty has been through the kiln too; but it has softened her, and hardened you.”
“Then Hatty is gold, and I am only clay,” I said, and I could not help laughing a little, though I have not laughed much lately.
“There is some porcelain sells for its weight in gold,” said my Aunt Kezia.
“Thank you for the compliment, Aunt Kezia.”
“Nay, lass, I’m a poor hand at compliments; but I know gold when I see it—and brass, too. You’ll be home in good time for Sophy’s wedding.”
“Aunt Kezia, who does Sophy marry?”
“Mr Liversedge, the Rector.”
“Is not he rather rough?”
“Rough? Not a bit of it. He is a rough diamond, if he be.”
“I fancied from what Sam said when he came back to Carlisle—”
“Oh, we had seen nought of him then. He has done more good at Brocklebank than Mr Digby did all the years he was there. You’ll see fast enough when you get back. ’Tis the nature of the sun to shine.”
“What do you mean by that, Aunt Kezia?”
“Keep your eyes open—that’s what I mean. Girls, your father bade me please myself about tarrying a bit before I turned homeward. I doubt I’m not just as welcome to your grandmother as to you; but I think we shall do best to bide till we see if the others can come with us. Maybe Ephraim may be ready to go home by then, too. ’Tis a bad thing for a young man to get into idle habits.”
“O Aunt Kezia, Ephraim is not idle!” I cried.
“Pray, who asked you to stand up for him, Miss?” replied my Aunt Kezia. “‘A still tongue makes a wise head,’ lass. I’ll tell you what, I rather fancy Mrs Desborough thinks me rough above a bit. If I’m to be stroked alongside of these fine folks here, I shall feel rough, I’ve no doubt. That smart, plush fellow, with his silver clocks to his silk stockings, took up my basket as if he expected it to bite his fingers. We don’t take hold of baskets that road in our parts. I haven’t seen a pair of decent clogs since I passed Derby. They are all slim French finnicking pattens down here. How many of those fine lords-in-waiting have you in the house?”
“Three, and a black boy, Aunt.”
“And how many maids?”
“I must count. Lucette and Perkins, and the cook-maid, and the kitchen girl, four; and two chambermaids, six, and a seamstress, seven.”
“What, have you a mantua-maker all to yourselves?”
“Oh, she does not make gowns; she only does plain sewing.”
“And two cook-maids, and two chambermaids, and two beside! Why, whatever in all the world can they find to do?”
“Lucette is Grandmamma’s woman, and Perkins is my Aunt Dorothea’s,” said I.
“But what have they got to do? That’s what I want to know,” said my Aunt Kezia.
“Well, Lucette gets up Grandmamma’s laces and fine things,” said I, “and quills the nett for her ruffles, and dresses her hair, and alters her gowns—”
“What’s that for?” said my Aunt Kezia.
“When a gown has been worn two or three times,” said Hatty, “they turn it upside down, Aunt, and put some fresh trimming on it, so that it looks like a new one.”
“But what for?” repeated my Aunt Kezia.
“Why, then, you see, people don’t remember that you had it on last week.”
“I’ll be bound I should!”
“We have very short memories in London,” said Hatty, laughing.
“Seems so! But why should not folks remember? I am fairly dumfoozled with it all. How any mortal woman can get along with four men and seven maids to look after, passes me. I find Maria and Bessy and Sam enough, I can tell you: too many sometimes. Mrs Desborough must be up early and down late; or does Mrs Charles see to things?”
I began to laugh. The idea of Grandmamma “seeing to” anything, except fancy work and whist, was so extreme diverting.
“Why, Aunt Kezia, nobody ever sees to anything here,” said Hatty.
“And do things get done?” asked my Aunt Kezia with uplifted eyebrows.
“Sometimes,” said Hatty, again laughing. “They don’t do much dusting, I fancy. I could write my name on the dust on the tables, now and then, and generally on the windows.”
My Aunt Kezia glanced at the window, and set her lips grimly.
“If I were mistress in this house for a week,” said she, “I reckon those four men and seven maids would scarce send up a round robin begging me to stop another!”
“Lucette does her work thoroughly,” said I, “and so does Cicely, the under chambermaid; and Caesar, the black boy, is an honest lad. I am afraid I cannot say much for the rest. But really, Aunt, it seemed to me when I came that people hadn’t a notion what work was in the South.”
“I guess it’ll seem so to me, coming and going too,” said my Aunt Kezia, in the same tone as before. “No wonder. I couldn’t work in silk stockings with silver clocks, and sleeves with lace ruffles, and ever so many yards of silk bundled up of a heap behind me. I like gowns I can live in. I’ve had this on a bit over three times, Hatty.”
“I should think so, Aunt!” said Hatty, laughing something like her old self. “Why, I remember your making it the winter before last. Did not I run the seams?”
“I dare say you did, child. When you see me bedecked in the pomps and vanities of this wicked world, you may expect to catch larks by the sky falling. At least, I hope so.”
“Mademoiselle!” said Lucette’s voice at the door, “Madame bids me say the company comes from going, and if Madame and Mesdemoiselles will descend, she will be well at ease.”
“That’s French lingo is it?” said my Aunt Kezia. “Poor lass!”
So down we went to the drawing-room, where we found Grandmamma, my Aunt Dorothea, and my Uncle Charles, who came forward and led my Aunt Kezia to a chair. (Miss Newton told me that ceremony was growing out of date, and was only practised now by nice old-fashioned people; but Grandmamma likes it, and I fancy my Uncle Charles will keep it up while she lives.)
“Madam,” said Grandmamma, “I trust Mr Courtenay is well, and that you had a prosperous journey.”
“He is better than ever he was, I thank you, Madam,” answered my Aunt Kezia. “As for my journey, I did not much enjoy it, but here I am, and that is well.”
“Your other niece, Miss Drummond, is in Town, as I hear,” said Grandmamma. “Dorothea, my dear, it would doubtless be agreeable to Mrs Kezia if that young gentlewoman came here. Write a line and ask her to tarry with us while Mrs Kezia stays.”
“I thank you, Madam,” said my Aunt Kezia.
“If Miss Keith be with her, she may as well be asked too,” observed Grandmamma, after she had refreshed her faculties with a pinch of snuff.
My Aunt Dorothea sat down and writ the note, and then, bidding me ring the bell, sent Caesar with it. He returned with a few lines from Flora, accepting the invitation for herself, but declining it for Annas. I was less surprised than sorry. Certainly, were I Annas, I should not care to come back to Bloomsbury Square.
“Poor white thing!” said my Aunt Kezia, when she saw Flora in the evening. “Why, you are worse to look at than these girls, and they are ill enough.”
Flora brings news that Annas is to see the Princess next Thursday, but she has made up her mind to tarry longer in London, and will not go back with us. I asked where she was going to be, and Flora said at Mr Raymond’s.
“What, all alone?” said Hatty.
“Oh, no!” answered Flora; “Mr Raymond’s mother is there.”
I did not know that Mr Raymond had a mother.
Annas had a letter this morning from Lady Monksburn: the loveliest letter, says Flora, that ever woman penned. Mr Raymond said, when he had read it (which she let him do) that it was worthy of a martyr’s mother.
“Is Mr Raymond coming round?” said I.
“What, in politics?” replied Flora, with a smile. “I don’t quite know, Cary. I doubt if he will turn as quickly as you did.”
“As I did? What can you mean, Flora?”
“Did you not know you had become of a very cool politician a very warm one?” she said. “I remember, when you first went with me to Abbotscliff, Angus used to tease you about being a Whig: and you once told me you knew little about such matters, and cared less.”
I looked back at myself, as it were, and I think Flora must be right. I certainly thought much less of such things six months ago. I suppose hearing them always talked of has made a change in me.
There is another thing that I have been thinking about to-night. What is it in my Aunt Kezia that makes her feel so strong and safe to lean upon—so different from other people? I should never dream of feeling in that way to Grandmamma: and even Father,—though it is pleasant to rely on his strength and kindness, when one wants something done beyond one’s own strength,—yet he is not restful to lean on in the same way that she is. Is she so safe to hold by, because she holds by God?
This is Grandmamma’s last Tuesday, as Lent begins to-morrow, and I believe she would as soon steal a diamond necklace as have an assembly in Lent. I had been walking a great deal, as I have carried my Aunt Kezia these last few days to see all manner of sights, and I was very tired; so I crept into a little corner, and there Ephraim found me.
By the way, it is most diverting to carry my Aunt Kezia to see things. My Uncle Charles has gone with us sometimes, and Ephraim some other times: but it is so curious to watch her. She is the sight, to me. In the first place, she does not care a bit about going to see a thing just because everybody goes to see it. Then she has very determined ideas of her own about everything she does see. I believe she quite horrified my Uncle Charles, one day, when he carried us to see a collection of beautiful paintings. We stopped before one, which my Uncle Charles told us was thought a great deal of, and had cost a mint of money.
“What’s it all about?” said my Aunt Kezia.
“’Tis a picture of the Holy Family,” he answered, “by the great painter Rubens.”
“Now, stop a bit: who’s what?” said my Aunt Kezia, and set herself to study it. “Who is that old man that hasn’t shaved himself?”
“That, Madam, is Saint Joseph.”
“Never heard of him before. Oh, do you mean Joseph the carpenter? I see. Well, and who is that woman with the child on her knee? Why ever does not she put him some more clothes on? He’ll get his death of cold.”
“My dear Madam, that is the Blessed Virgin!”
“I hope it isn’t,” said my Aunt Kezia, bluntly. “I’ll go bail she kept her linen better washed than that. But what’s that queer thing sprawling all over the sky?”
“The Angel Gabriel, Madam.”
“I hope he hasn’t flown in here and seen this,” said my Aunt Kezia. “I should say, if he have, he didn’t feel flattered by his portrait.”
My Aunt Kezia did not seem to care for fine things—smart clothes, jewels, and splendid coaches, or anything like that. She was interested in the lions at the Tower, and she liked to see any famous person of whom my Uncle Charles could tell her; but for Ranelagh she said she did not care twopence. There were men and women plenty wherever you went, and as to silks and laces, she could see them any day over a mercer’s counter. Vauxhall was still worse, and Spring Gardens did not please her any better.
But when, in going through the Tower, we came to the axe which beheaded my Lady Jane Grey, she showed no lack of interest in that. And the next day, when my Uncle Charles said he would show us some of the fine things in the City, and we were driving in Grandmamma’s coach towards Newgate, my Aunt Kezia wanted to know what the open space was; and my Uncle Charles told her,—“Smithfield.”
“Smithfield!” cried she. “Pray you, Mr Desborough, bid your coachman stop. I would liever see this than a Lord Mayor’s Show.”
“My dear Madam, there is nothing to see,” answered my Uncle Charles, who seemed rather perplexed. “This is not a market-day.”
“There’ll be plenty I can see!” was my Aunt Kezia’s reply; and, my Uncle Charles pulling the check-string, we alighted. My Aunt Kezia stood a moment, looking round.
“You see, there is nothing to see,” he observed.
“Nothing to see!” she made answer. “There are the fires to see, and the martyrs, and the angels around, and the devils, and the men well-nigh as ill as devils. There is the land to see that they saved, and the Church that their blood watered, and the greatness of England that they preserved. Ay, and there is the Day of Judgment, when martyrs and persecutors will have their reward—and you and I, Mr Desborough, shall meet with ours. My word, but there is enough to see for them that have eyes to see it!”
“Oh!—ah!” said my Uncle Charles.
My Aunt Kezia said no more, except a few words which I heard her whisper softly to herself,—“‘They shall reign for ever and ever.’ ‘The noble army of martyrs praise Thee.’” Then, as she turned back to the coach, she added, “I thank you, Sir. It was worth coming to London to look at that. It makes one feel as if one got nearer to them.”
And I thought, but did not say, that I should never be nearer to them than I had been that winter night, when Colonel Keith helped me to carry the basket into the gates of that grim, black pile beyond. He was there yet. If I had been a bird, to have flown in and sung to him!—or, better, a giant, to tear away locks and bars, and let him out! And I could do nothing.
But here I am running ever so far from Grandmamma’s Tuesday, and the news Ephraim brought.
Annas has seen the Princess Caroline. She liked her, and thought her very gentle and good. But she held out no hope at all, and did not seem to think that anything which she could say would influence her father. She would lay the matter before him, but she could promise no more. However, she appointed another day, about a month hence, when Annas may go to her again, and hear the final answer. So Annas must wait for that.
Ephraim and Annas seem to be great friends. Is it not shockingly selfish of me to wish it otherwise? I do not quite know why I wish it. But sometimes I wonder—no, I won’t wonder. It will be all right, of course, however it be arranged. Why should I always want people to care for me, and think of me, and put me first? Cary Courtenay, you are growing horribly vain and selfish! I wonder at you!
It is settled now that we go home the week after Easter Day. We, means my Aunt Kezia, and Flora, and Hatty, and me. I do not know how four women are to travel without a gentleman, or even a serving-man: but I suppose we shall find out when the time comes. I said to my Aunt Kezia that perhaps Grandmamma would lend us Dobson.
“Him!” cried she. “Dear heart, but I’d a vast deal liever be without him! He would want all the coach-pockets for his silk stockings, and would take more waiting on than Prince Charlie himself. I make no account of your grand gentlemen in plush, that pick up baskets with the tips of their fingers! (My Aunt Kezia cannot get over that.) Give me a man, or a woman either, with some brains in his head, and some use in his hands. These southern folks seem to have forgotten how to use theirs. I watched that girl Martha dusting the other day, and if I did not long to snatch the duster out of her hands and whip her with it! She just drew it lazily across the top of the table,—never troubled herself about the sides,—and gave it one whisk across the legs, and then she had done. I’d rather do my work myself, every bit of it, than have such a pack of idle folks about me—ay, ten times over, I would! They don’t seem to have a bit of gumption. They say lawyers go to Heaven an inch every Good Friday; but if those lazy creatures get there or anywhere else in double the time, I wonder! And just look at the way they dress! A good linsey petticoat and a quilted linen bed-gown was good enough for a woman that had her work to do, when I was young; but now, dear me! my ladies must have their gowns, and their muslin aprons of an afternoon, and knots of ribbon in their hair. I do believe they will take to wearing white stockings, next thing! and gloves when they go to church! Eh dear, girls! I tell you what, this world is coming to something!”
Later in the evening, Miss Newton came up to me, with her fan held before her laughing face.
“My dear Miss Courtenay, what curious things your worthy Aunt does say! She asked me just now why I came into the world. I told her I did not know, and the idea had never before occurred to me: and she said, ‘Well, then, it is high time it did, and some to spare!’ Do all the people in Cumberland ask you such droll questions?”
I said I thought not, but my Aunt Kezia did, often enough.
“Well, she is a real curiosity!” said Miss Newton, and went away laughing.
Brocklebank Fells, April the 10th, 1746.
At least I begin on the 10th, but when I shall finish is more than I can tell. Things went on happening so fast after the last page I writ, that I neither had time to set them down, nor heart for doing it. Prince William of Hanover (whom the Whigs call Duke of Cumberland) left Edinburgh with a great army, not long after I writ; but no news has yet reached us of any hostile meeting betwixt him and the Prince. Mr Raymond saith Colonel Keith’s chances may depend somewhat upon the results of the battle, which is daily expected. Nevertheless, he adds, there is no chance, for the Lord orders all things.
My Aunt Kezia and Mr Raymond have taken wonderfully to one another. Hatty said to her that she could not think how they got on when they chanced on politics.
“Bless you, child, we never do!” said my Aunt Kezia. “We have got something better to talk about. And why should two brothers quarrel because one likes red heels to his shoes and the other admires black ones?”
“Ah, if that were all, Aunt!” said I. “But how can you leave it there? It seems to me not a matter for opinion, but a question of right. We have to take sides; and we may choose the wrong one.”
“I don’t see that a woman need take any side unless she likes,” quoth my Aunt Kezia. “I can bake as tasty a pie, and put on as neat a patch, whether I talk of Prince Charles or the Young Pretender. And patches and pies are my business: the Prince isn’t. I reckon the Lord will manage to see that every one gets his rights, without Kezia Courtenay running up to help Him.”
“But somebody has it to do, Aunt.”
“Let them do it, then. I’m glad I’m not somebody.”
“But, Aunt Kezia, don’t you want people to have their rights?”
“Depends on what their rights are, child. Some of us would be very sadly off if we got them. I should not like my rights, I know.”
“Ah, you mean your deserts, Aunt,” said Hatty. “But rights are not just the same thing, are they?”
“Let us look it in the face, girls, if you wish,” saith my Aunt Kezia. “I hate seeing folks by side-face. If you want to see anybody, or understand anything, look right in its face. What are rights? They are not always deserts,—you are right there, Hatty,—for none of us hath any rights as regards God. Rights concern ourselves and our fellow-men. I take it, every man hath a right to what he earns, and to what is given him,—whether God or man gave it to him,—so long as he that gave had the right over what he gave. Now, as to this question, it seems to me all lies in a nut-shell. If King James be truly the son of the old King (which I cannot doubt), then God gave him the crown of England, of which no man can possibly have any right to deprive him. Only God can do that. Then comes the next question, Has God done that? Time must answer. Without a revelation from Heaven, we cannot find it out any other way.”
“But until we do find it out, where are we to stand?”
“Keep to your last orders till you get fresh ones. A servant will make sad blunders who goes contrary to orders, just because he fancies that his master may have changed his mind.”
I see that for all practical purposes my Aunt Kezia agrees with Annas. And indeed what they say sounds but reasonable.
It was the second of April when we left London. It had been arranged that we should travel by the flying machine (Note. Stage-coaches originally bore this hyperbolical name.) which runs from London to Gloucester, setting forth from the Saracen’s Head on Snow Hill. The last evening before we set out, my Aunt Kezia, Hatty, and I, spent at Mr Raymond’s with Annas. His mother is a very pleasant old silver-haired gentlewoman, with a soft, low voice and gentle manner that reminded me of Lady Monksburn.
I felt it very hard work to say farewell to Annas. What might not have happened before we met again? Ephraim was there for the last hour or so, and was very attentive to her. I do think— And I am rather afraid the Laird, her father, will not like it. But Ephraim is good enough for anybody. And I hope, when he marry Annas, which I think is coming, that he will not quite give over being my friend. He has been more like our brother than anybody else. I should not like to lose him. I have always wished we had a brother.
“No, not good-bye just yet, Cary,” said Ephraim, in answer to my farewell. “You will see me again in the morning.”
“Oh, are you coming to see us off?”
He nodded; and we only said good-night.
Grandmamma was very kind when we took leave of her. She gave each of us a keepsake—a beautiful garnet necklace to Hatty, and a handsome pearl pin to me.
“And, my dear,” said she to Hatty, “I do hope you will try to keep as genteel as you are now. Don’t, for mercy’s sake, go and get those blowzed red cheeks again. They are so unbecoming a gentlewoman. And garnets, though they are the finest things in the world for a pale, clear complexion, look horrid worn with great red cheeks. Cary, your manners had rather gone back when you came, from what they used to be; but you have improved again now. Mind you keep it up. Don’t get warm and enthusiastic over things,—that is your danger, my dear,—especially things of no consequence, and which don’t concern you. A young gentlewoman should not be a politician; and to be warm over anything which has to do with religion, as I have many times told you, is exceeding bad taste. You should leave those matters to public men and the clergy. It is their business—not yours. My dears,” and out came Grandmamma’s snuff-box, “I wish you to understand, once for all, that if one of you ever joins those insufferable creatures, the Methodists, I will cut her off with a shilling! I shall wash my hands of her completely. I would not even call her my grand-daughter again! But I am sure, my dears, you have too much sense. I shall not insult you by supposing such a thing. Make my compliments to your father, and tell him I think you both much improved by your winter in Town. Good-bye, my dears. Mrs Kezia, I wish you a safe and pleasant journey.”
“I thank you, Madam, and wish you every blessing,” said my Aunt Kezia, with a warm clasp of Grandmamma’s hand, which I am sure she would think sadly countrified. “But might I ask you, Madam, to explain something which puzzled me above a bit in what you have just said?”
“Certainly, Mrs Kezia,” said Grandmamma, in her most gracious manner.
“Then, Madam, as I suppose the clergy are going to Heaven (and I am sure you would be as sorry to think otherwise as I should), if the way to get there is their business and not yours, where are you going, if you please?”
Grandmamma looked at my Aunt Kezia as if she thought that she must have taken leave of her wits.
“Madam! I—I do not understand—”
My Aunt Kezia did not flinch in the least. She stood quietly looking into Grandmamma’s face, with an air of perfect simplicity, and waited for the answer.
“Of course, we—we are all going to Heaven,” said Grandmamma, in a hesitating way. “But it is the business of the clergy to see that we do. Excuse me, Madam; I am not accustomed to—to talk about such subjects.”
And Grandmamma took two pinches, one after the other.
“Well, you see, I am,” coolly said my Aunt Kezia. “Seems to me, Madam, that going to Heaven is every bit as much my business as going to Gloucester; and I have not left that for the clergy to see to, nor do I see why I should the other. Folks don’t always remember what you trust them with, and sometimes they can’t manage the affair. And I take the liberty to think they’ll find that matter rather hard to do, without I see to it as well, and without the Lord sees to it beside. Farewell, Madam; I shall be glad to meet you up there, and I do hope you’ll make sure you’ve got on the right road, for it would be uncommon awkward to find out at last that it was the wrong one. Good-morrow, and God bless you!”
Not a word came in answer, but I just glanced back through the crack of the door, and saw Grandmamma sitting with the reddest face I ever did see to her, and two big wrinkles in her forehead, taking pinch after pinch in the most reckless manner.
My Aunt Dorothea, who stood in the door, said acidly,—“I think, Madam, it would have been as well to keep such remarks till you were alone with my mother. I do not know how it may be in Cumberland, but they are not thought becoming to a gentlewoman here. Believe me, I am indeed sorry to be forced to the discourtesy of saying so; but you were the first offender.”
“Ay,” said my Aunt Kezia. “Folks that tell the naked truth generally meet with more kicks than halfpence. But I would have spoken out of these girls’ hearing, only I got never a chance. And you see I shall have to give in my account some day, and I want it to be as free from blots as I can.”
“I suppose you thought you were doing a good work for your own soul!” said my Aunt Dorothea, sneeringly.
“Eh, no, poor soul!” was my Aunt Kezia’s sorrowful reply. “My soul’s beyond my saving, but Christ has it safe. And knowing that, Madam, makes one very pitiful to unsaved souls.”
“Upon my word, Madam!” cried my Aunt Dorothea. “You take enough upon you! ‘Unsaved souls,’ indeed! Well, I am thankful I never had the presumption to say that my soul was safe. I have a little more humility than that.”
“It would indeed be presumption in some cases,” said my Aunt Kezia, solemnly. “But, Madam, if you ask a princess whose daughter she is, it is scarce presuming that she should answer you, ‘The King’s.’ What else can she answer? ‘We know that we have eternal life.’”
“An apostle writ that, I suppose,” said my Aunt Dorothea, in a hard tone.
“They were not apostles he writ to,” said my Aunt Kezia. “And he says he writ on purpose that they might know it.”
“Now, ladies, ’tis high time to set forth,” called my Uncle Charles’s voice from the hall; and I was glad to hear it. I and Hatty ran off at once, but I could not but catch my Aunt Kezia’s parting words,—
“God bless you, Madam, and I thank you for all your kindness. And when I next see you, I hope you will know it.”
We drove to Snow Hill in Grandmamma’s coach, and took our seats (bespoken some days back) in the flying machine, where our company was two countrywomen with baskets, a youth that looked very pale and cadaverous, and wore his hair uncommon long, a lady in very smart clothes, and a clergyman in his cassock. My Uncle Charles bade us farewell very kindly, and wished us a safe journey. Mr Raymond was there also, and he bade God bless us. Somehow, in all the bustle, I had not a right chance to take leave of Ephraim. The coach set forth rather sooner than I expected, while Flora and I were charging Mr Raymond with messages to Annas; and he had only time to step back with a bow and a smile. I looked for Ephraim, but could not even see him. I was so sorry, and I thought of little else until we got to Uxbridge.
At Uxbridge we got out, and went into the inn to dine at the ordinary, which is always spread ready for the coming of the flying machine on a Wednesday. As I sat down beside my Aunt Kezia, a man came and took the chair on the other side of me.
“Tired, Cary?” he said, to my amazement.
“Ephraim!” I cried. “Wherever have you come from?”
“Did you think I had taken up my abode in London?” said he, looking diverted.
“But I thought you went after some business,” I said, feeling very much puzzled that he should be going home just now, and leaving poor Annas in all her trouble.
“I did,” he answered. “Business gets done some time. It would be a sad thing if it did not. Will you have some of this rabbit pie?”
I accepted the pie, for I did not care what I had.
“Then your business is done?” I said, in some surprise.
His business could hardly have any connection with Annas, in that case. It must be real business—something that concerned his father.
“Yes, Cary; my business was finished last night, so I was just in time to come with you.” And the look of fun came into his eyes again.
“Oh, I am glad!” said I. “I wondered how my Aunt Kezia would manage all by herself.”
“Had you three made up your minds to be particularly naughty?” asked he, laughing.
“Now, Ephraim!” said I.
“Sounded like it,” he replied. “Well, Cary, are you glad to go home?”
“Well, yes—I think—I am,” answered I.
“Then certainly I think you are not.”
“Well. I am glad for some reasons.”
“And not for others. Yes, I understand that. And I guess one of the reasons—you are sorry to leave Miss Keith.”
I wondered if he guessed that because he was sorry.
“Yes, I am very sorry to leave her in this trouble. Do you think it likely that Colonel Keith can escape?”
Ephraim shook his head.
“Is it possible?”
“‘Possible’ is a Divine word, not fit for the lips of men. What God wills is possible. And it is not often that He lets us see long beforehand what He means to do.”
“Then you think all lies with God?” I said—I am afraid, in a rather hopeless tone.
“Does not everything, at all times, lie with God? That means hope, Cary, not despair. ‘Whatsoever the Lord pleased, that did He.’”
“Oh dear! that sounds as if—Ephraim, I don’t mean to say anything wicked—as if He did not care.”
“He cares for our sanctification: that is, in the long run, for our happiness. Would you rather that He cared just to rid you of the pain of the moment, and not for your eternal happiness?”
“Oh no! But could I not have both?”
“No, Cary, I don’t suppose you could.”
“But if God can do everything, why can He not do that? Do you never want to know the answers to such questions? Or do they not trouble you? They are always coming up with me.”
“Far too often. Satan takes care of that.”
“You think it is wicked to want the answers?”
“It is rebellion, Cary. The King is the best judge of what concerns His subjects’ welfare.”
I felt in a corner, so I ate my pie and was silent.
We slept at Reading, and the next day we dined at Wallingford, and slept at the Angel at Oxford. Next morning, which was Saturday, we were up before the sun, to see as much as we could of the city before the machine should set forth. I cannot say that I got a very clear idea of the place, for when I try to remember it, my head seems a confused jumble of towers and gateways, colleges and churches, stained windows and comical gargoyles—at least that is what Ephraim called the funny faces which stuck out from some of the walls. I don’t know where he got the word.
This day’s stage was the longest. We dined at Lechlade; and it had long been dark when we rattled into the courtyard of the Bell Inn at Gloucester, where we were to pass the Sunday. Oh, how tired I was! almost too tired to sleep.
On Sunday, we went to church at the Cathedral, where we had a very dull sermon from a Minor Canon. In the afternoon, as we sat in the host’s parlour, Ephraim said to me,—
“Cary, did you ever hear of George Whitefield?”
“Oh yes, Ephraim!” I cried, and I felt the blood rush to my cheeks, and my eyes light up. “I heard him preach in Scotland, when I was there with Flora. Have you heard him?”
“Yes, many times, and Mr Wesley also.”
I was pleased to hear that. “And what were you going to say about him?”
“That if you knew his name, it would interest you to hear that he was born in this inn. His parents kept it.”
“And he chose to be a field-preacher!” cried I. “Why, that was coming down in the world, was it not?” (Note 1.)
“It was coming down, in this world,” said he. “But there is another world, Cary, and I fancy it was going up in that. You must remember, however, that he did not choose to be a field-preacher nor a Dissenter: he was turned out of the Church.”
“But why should he have been turned out?”
“I expect, because he would not hold his tongue.”
“But why did anybody want him to hold his tongue?”
“Well, you see, he let it run to awkward subjects. Ladies and gentlemen did not like him because he set his face against fashionable diversions, and told them that they were miserable sinners, and that there was only one way into Heaven, which they would have to take as well as the poor in the almshouses. The neighbouring clergy did not like him because he was better than themselves. And the bishops did not like him because he said they ought to do their duty better, and look after their dioceses, instead of setting bad examples to their clergy by hunting and card-playing and so forth; or, at the best, sitting quiet in their closets to write learned books, which was not the duty they promised when they were ordained. But, as was the case with another Preacher, ‘the common people heard him gladly.’”
“And he was really turned out?”
“Seven years ago.”
“I wonder if it were a wise thing,” said I, thinking.
“Mr Raymond says it was the most unwise thing they could have done. And he says so of the turning forth under the Act of Uniformity, eighty years ago. He thinks the men who were the very salt of the Church left her then: and that now she is a saltless, soulless thing, that will die unless God’s mercy put more salt in her.”
“But suppose it do, and the bishops get them turned out again?”
“Then, says Raymond, let the bishops look to themselves. There is such a thing as judicial blindness: and there is such a thing as salt that has lost its savour, and is trodden under foot of men. If the Church cast out the children of God, God may cast out the Church of England. There are precedents for it in the Books of Heaven. And in all those cases, God let them go on for a while: over and over again they grieved His Spirit and persecuted His servants; but at last there always came one time which was the last time, and after that the Spirit withdrew, and that Church, or that nation, was left to the lot which it had chosen.”
“Oh, Ephraim, that sounds dreadful.”
“It will be dreadful,” he answered, “if we provoke it at the Lord’s hand.”
“One feels as if one would like to save such men,” I said.
“Do you? I feel as if I should like to save such Churches. It is like a son’s feeling who sees his own mother going down to the pit of destruction, and is utterly powerless to hold out a hand to save her. She will not be saved. And I wonder, sometimes, whether any much sorer anguish can be on this side Heaven!”
I was silent.
“It makes it all the harder,” he said, in a troubled voice, “when the Father’s other sons, whose mother she is not, jeer at the poor falling creature, and at her own children for their very anguish in seeing it. I do not think the Father can like them to do that. It is hard enough for the children without it. And surely He loves her yet, and would fain save her and bring her home.”
And I felt he spoke in parables.
Note 1. At this date, an innkeeper stood higher in the estimation of society than at present, and a clergyman considerably lower, unless the latter were a dignitary, or a man whose birth and fortune were regarded as entitling him to respect apart from his profession.