Chapter Four.
Through thorny paths.
“I do repent me now too late of each impatient thought,
That would not let me tarry out God’s leisure as I ought.”
Caroline Bowles.
“Is it long since Madam woke, Baxter?” cried Rhoda in a breathless whisper, as she came in at the side door.
“But this minute, Mrs Rhoda,” answered he.
“That’s good!” said Rhoda aside to Phoebe, and slipping off her shoes, she ran lightly and silently upstairs, beckoning her cousin to follow.
Phoebe, having no idea of the course of Rhoda’s thoughts, obeyed, and followed her example in doffing her hood and smoothing her hair.
“Be quick!” said Rhoda, her own rapid movements over, and putting on her shoes again.
They found Madam looking barely awake, and staring hard at her book, as if wishful to persuade herself that she had been reading.
“I hope, child, you were not out all this time,” said she to Rhoda.
“Oh no, Madam!” glibly answered that trustworthy young lady. “We only had a dish of tea with Mrs Dolly, and I made my compliments to the other gentlewomen.”
“And where were you since, child?”
“We have been upstairs, Madam,” said Rhoda, unblushingly.
“Not diverting yourselves, I hope?” was Madam’s next question.
“Oh no, not at all, Madam. We were not doing anything particular.”
“Talking, I suppose, as maids will,” responded Madam. “Phoebe, to-morrow after breakfast bring all your clothes to my chamber. I must have you new apparelled.”
“Oh, Madam, give me leave to come also!” exclaimed Rhoda, with as much eagerness as she ever dared to show in her grandmother’s presence. “I would so dearly like to hear what Phoebe is to have! Only, please, not a musk-coloured damask—you promised me that.”
“My dear,” answered Madam, “you forget yourself. I cannot talk of such things to-day. You may come if you like.”
Supper was finished in silence. After supper, a pale-faced, tired-looking young man, who had been previously invisible, came into the parlour, and made a low reverence to Madam, which she returned with a queenly bend of her head. His black cassock and scarf showed him to be in holy orders. Madam rang the hand-bell, the servants filed in, and evening prayers were read by the young chaplain, in a thin, monotonous voice, with a manner which indicated that he was not interested himself, and did not expect interest in any one else. Then the servants filed out again; the chaplain kissed Madam’s hand, and wished her good-night, bowed distantly to Rhoda, half bowed to Phoebe, instantly drew himself up as if he thought he was making a mistake, and finally disappeared.
“’Tis time you were abed, maids,” said Madam.
Rhoda somewhat slowly rose, knelt before her grandmother, and kissed her hand.
“Good-night, my dear. God bless thee, and make thee a good maid!” was Madam’s response.
Phoebe had risen, and stood, rather hesitatingly, behind her cousin. She was doubtful whether Madam would be pleased or displeased if she followed Rhoda’s example. In her new life it seemed probable that she would not be short of opportunities for the exercise of meekness, forbearance, and humility. Madam’s quick eyes detected Phoebe’s difficulty in an instant.
“Good-night, Phoebe,” she said, rising.
“Good-night, Madam,” replied Phoebe in a low voice, as she followed Rhoda. It was evident that no relationship was to be recognised.
“Here, you carry the candle,” said Rhoda, nodding towards the hall table on which the candlesticks stood. “That’s what you are here for, I suppose,—to save me trouble. Dear, I forgot my cloak,—see where it is! Bring it with you, Phoebe.”
Demurely enough Rhoda preceded Phoebe upstairs. But no sooner was the bedroom door closed behind them, than Rhoda threw herself into the large invalid chair, and laughed with hearty amusement.
“Oh, didn’t I take her in? Wasn’t it neatly done, now? Didn’t you admire me, Phoebe?”
“You told her a lie!” retorted Phoebe, indignantly.
“’Sh!—that’s not a pretty word,” said Rhoda, pursing her lips. “Say a fib, next time.—Nonsense! Not a bit of it, Phoebe. We had been upstairs since we came in.”
“Only a minute,” answered Phoebe. “You made her think what was not true. Father called that a lie,—I don’t know what you call it.”
“Now, Phoebe,” said Rhoda severely, “don’t you be a little Puritan. If you set up for a saint at White-Ladies, I can just tell you, you’ll pull your own nest about your ears. You are mightily mistaken if you think Madam has any turn for saints. She reckons them designing persons—every soul of ’em. You’ll just get into a scrape if you don’t have a care.”
Phoebe made no reply. She was standing by the window, looking up into the darkened sky. There were no blinds at White-Ladies.
It was well for Rhoda—or was it well?—that she could not just then see into Phoebe’s heart. The cry that “shivered to the tingling stars” was unheard by her. “O Father, Father,” said the cry. “Why did you die and leave your poor little Phoebe, whom nobody loves, whose love nobody wants, with whom nobody here has one feeling in common?” And then all at once came as it were a vision before her eyes, of a scene whereof she had heard very frequently from her father,—a midnight meeting of the Desert Church, in a hollow of the Cevennes mountains, guarded by sentinels posted on the summit,—a meeting which to attend was to brave the gallows or the galleys,—and Phoebe fancied she could hear the words of the opening hymn, as the familiar tune floated past her:—
“Mon sort n’est pas à plaindre,
Il est à désirer;
Je n’ai plus rien à craindre,
Car Dieu est mon Berger.”
It was a quiet, peaceful face which was turned back to Rhoda.
“Did you hear?” rather sharply demanded that young lady.
“Yes, I heard what you said,” calmly replied Phoebe. “But I have been a good way since.”
“A good way!—where?” rejoined her cousin.
“To France and back,” said Phoebe, with a smile.
“What are you talking about?” stared Rhoda. “I said nothing about France; I was telling you not to be a prig and a saint, and make Madam angry.”
“I won’t vex her if I can help it,” answered Phoebe.
“Well, but you will, if you set up to be better than your neighbours,—that’s pos.! Take the pins out of my commode.”
“Why should not I be better than my neighbours?” asked Phoebe, as she pulled out the pins.
“Because they’ll all hate you—that’s why. I must have clean ruffles—they are in that top drawer.”
“Aren’t you better than your neighbours?” innocently suggested Phoebe, coming back with the clean ruffles.
Rhoda paused to consider how she should deal with the subject. The question was not an easy one to answer. She believed herself very much better, in every respect: to say No, therefore, would belie her wishes and convictions; yet to say Yes, would spoil the effect of her lecture. There was moreover, a dim impression on her mind that Phoebe was incapable of perceiving the delicate distinction between them, which made it inevitable that Rhoda should be better than Phoebe, and highly indecorous that Phoebe should attempt to be better than Rhoda. On the whole, it seemed desirable to turn the conversation.
“Oh, not these ruffles, Phoebe! These are some of my best. Bring a pair of common ones—those with the box plaits.—What were you thinking about France?”
“Oh, nothing particular. I was only—”
“Never mind, if you don’t want to tell,” said Rhoda, graciously, now that her object was attained. “I wonder what new clothes Madam will give you. A camlet for best, I dare say, and duffel for every day. Don’t you want to know?”
“No, not very much.”
“I should, if I were you. I like to go fine. Not that she’ll give you fine things, you know—not likely. There! put my shoes out to clean, and tuck me up nicely, and then if you like you can go to bed. I shan’t want anything more.”
Phoebe did as she was requested, and then knelt down.
“I vow!” exclaimed her cousin, when she rose. “Do you say your prayers on Sunday nights? I never do. Why, we’ve only just been at it downstairs. And what a time you are! I’m never more than five minutes with mine!”
“I couldn’t say all I want in five minutes,” replied Phoebe.
“Want! why, what do you want?” said Rhoda. “I want nothing. I’ve got to do it—that’s all.”
“Well, I dare say five minutes is enough for that,” was the quiet reply from Phoebe. “But when people get into trouble, then they do want things.”
“Trouble! Oh, you don’t know!” said Rhoda, loftily. “I’ve had heaps of trouble.”
“Have you?” innocently demanded Phoebe, in an interested tone.
“Well, I should think so! More than ever you had.”
“What were they?” said Phoebe, in the same manner.
“Why, first, my mother died when I was only a week old,” explained Rhoda. “I suppose, you call that a trouble?”
“Not when you were a week old,” said Phoebe; “it would be afterwards—with some people. But I should not think it was, much, with you. You have had Madam.”
“Well, then my father went off to London, and spent all his estate, that I should have had, and there was nothing left for me. That was a trouble, I suppose?”
“If you had plenty beside, I should not think it was.”
“‘Plenty beside!’ Phoebe, you are the silliest creature! Why, don’t you see that I should have been a great fortune, if I had had Peveril as well as White-Ladies? I should have set my cap at a lord, I can tell you. Only think, Phoebe, I should have had sixty thousand pounds. What do you say to that? Sixty thousand pounds!”
“I should think it is more than you could ever spend.”
“Oh, I don’t know about that,” said Rhoda. “When White-Ladies is mine, I shall have a riding-horse and a glass coach; and I will have a splendid set of diamonds, and pearls too. They cost something, I can tell you. Oh, ’tis easy spending money. You’ll see, when it comes to me.”
“Are you sure it will come to you?”
“Why, of course it will!” exclaimed Rhoda, sitting up, and leaning on her elbow. “To whom else would Madam leave it, I should like to know! Why, you never expect her to give it to you, poor little white-faced thing? I vow, but that is a good jest!”
Rhoda’s laugh had more bitterness than mirth in it. Phoebe’s smile was one of more unmixed amusement.
“Pray make yourself easy,” said Phoebe. “I never expect anything, and then I am not disappointed.”
“Well, I’ll just tell you what!” rejoined her cousin. “If I catch you making up to Madam, trying to please all her whims, and chime in with her vapours, and that—fancying she’ll leave you White-Ladies—I tell you, Phoebe Latrobe, I’ll never forgive you as long as I live! There!”
Rhoda was very nearly, if not quite, in a passion. Phoebe turned and looked at her.
“Cousin,” she said, gently, “you will see me try to please Madam, since ’tis my duty: but if you suppose ’tis with any further object, such as what she might give me, you very ill know Phoebe Latrobe.”
“Well, mind your business!” said Rhoda, rather fiercely.
A few minutes later she was asleep. But sleep did not visit Phoebe’s eyes that night.
When the morning came, Rhoda seemed quite to have forgotten her vexation. She chattered away while she was dressing, on various topics, but chiefly respecting the new clothes which Madam had promised to Phoebe. If words might be considered a criterion, Rhoda appeared to take far more interest in these than Phoebe herself.
Breakfast was a solemn and silent ceremony. When it was over, Madam desired Phoebe to attend her in her own chamber, and to bring her wardrobe with her. Rhoda followed, unasked, and sat down on the form at the foot of the bed to await her cousin. Phoebe came in with her arms full of dresses and cloaks. She was haunted by a secret apprehension which she would not on any account have put into words—that she might no longer be allowed to wear mourning for her dead father. But Phoebe’s fears were superfluous. Madam thought far too much of the proprieties of life to commit such an indecorum. However little she had liked or respected the Rev. Charles Latrobe, she would never have thought of requiring his child to lay aside her mourning until the conventional two years had elapsed from the period of his decease.
Phoebe’s common attire was very quickly discarded, as past further wear; and she was desired to wear her best clothes every day, until new ones were ready for her. This decided, Rhoda was ordered to ring for Betty, Madam’s own maid, and Betty was in her turn required to fetch those stuffs which she had been bidden to lay aside till needed. Betty accordingly brought a piece of black camlet, another of black bombazine, and a third of black satin, with various trimmings. The two girls alike watched in silence, while Betty measured lengths and cut off pieces of camlet and bombazine, from which it appeared that Phoebe was to have two new dresses, and a mantua and hood of the camlet: but when Rhoda heard Betty desired to cut off satin for another mantua, her hitherto concealed chagrin broke forth.
“Why, Madam!—she’ll be as fine as me!”
“My dear, she will be as I choose,” answered Madam, in a tone which would have silenced any one but Rhoda. “And now, satin for a hood, Betty—”
“’Tis a shame!” said Rhoda, under her breath, which was as much as she dared venture; but Madam took no notice.
“You will line the hoods and mantuas warm, Betty,” pursued Madam, in her most amiable tone. “Guard the satin with fur, and the camlet with that strong gimp. And a muff she must have, Betty.”
“A muff!” came in a vexed whisper from Rhoda.
“And when the time comes, one of the broidered India scarves that were had of Staveley, for summer wear; but that anon. Then—”
“But, Madam!” put in Rhoda, in a troubled voice, “you have never given me one of those scarves yet! I asked you for one a year ago.” To judge from her tone, Rhoda was very near tears.
“My dear!” replied Madam, “’tis becoming in maids to wait till they are spoken to. Had you listened with proper respect, you would have heard me bid Betty lay out one also for you. You cannot use them at this season.”
Rhoda subsided, somewhat discontentedly.
“Two pairs of black Spanish gloves, Betty; and a black fan, and black velvet stays. (When the year is out she must have a silver lace.) And bid Dobbins send up shoes to fit on, with black buckles—two pairs; and lay out black stockings—two pairs of silk, and two of worsted; and plain cambric aprons—they may be laced when the year is out. I think that is all. Oh!—a fur tippet, Betty.”
And with this last order Madam marched away.
“Oh, shocking!” cried Rhoda, the instant she thought her grandmother out of hearing. “I vow, but she’s going to have you as fine as me. Every bit of it. Betty, isn’t it a shame?”
“Well, no, Mrs Rhoda, I don’t see as how ’tis,” returned Betty, bluntly. “Mrs Phoebe, she’s just the same to Madam as you are.”
“But she isn’t!” exclaimed Rhoda, blazing up. “I’m her eldest daughter’s child, and she’s only the youngest. And she hasn’t done it before, neither. Last night she didn’t let her kiss her hand. I say, Betty, ’tis a crying shame!”
“Maybe Madam thought better of it this morning,” suggested Betty, speaking with a pin in her mouth.
“Well, ’tis a burning shame!” growled Rhoda.
“Perhaps, Mrs Betty,” said Phoebe’s low voice, “you could leave the satin things for a little while?”
“Mrs Phoebe, I durstn’t, my dear!” rejoined Betty; “nay, not if ’twas ever so! Madam, she’s used to have folk do as she bids ’em; and she’ll make ’em, too! Never you lay Mrs Rhoda’s black looks to heart, my dear, she’ll have forgot all about it by this time to-morrow.”
Rhoda had walked away.
“But I shall not!” answered Phoebe, softly.
“Deary me, child!” said Betty, turning to look at her, “don’t you go for to fret over that. Why, if a bit of a thing like that’ll trouble you, you’ll have plenty to fret about at White-Ladies. Mrs Rhoda, she’s on and off with you twenty times a day; and you’d best take no notice. She don’t mean anything ill, my dear; ’tis only her phantasies.”
“Oh, Mrs Betty! I wish—”
“Phoebe!” came up from below. “Fetch my cloak and hood, and bring your own—quick, now! We are about to drive out with Madam.”
“Come, dry your eyes, child, and I’ll fetch the things,” said Betty, soothingly. “You’ll be the better of a drive.”
Rhoda’s annoyance seemed to have vanished from her mind as well as from her countenance; and Madam took no notice of Phoebe’s disturbed looks. The Maidens’ Lodge, was first visited, and a messenger sent in to ask Lady Betty if she were inclined to take the air. Lady Betty accepted the offer, and was so considerate as not to keep Madam wailing more than ten minutes. No further invitation was offered, and the coach rumbled away in the direction of Gloucester.
For a time Phoebe heard little of the conversation between the elder ladies, and Rhoda, as usual in her grandmother’s presence, was almost silent. At length she woke up to a remark made by Lady Betty.
“Then you think, Madam, to send for Gatty and Molly?”
“That is my design, my Lady Betty. ’Twill be a diversion for Rhoda; and Sir Richard was so good as to say they should come if I would.”
“Indeed, I think he would be easy to have them from home, Madam, till they may see if Betty’s disorder be the small-pox or no.”
“When did Betty return home, my Lady?”
“But last Tuesday. ’Tis not possible that her sisters have taken aught of her, for she had been ailing some days ere she set forth, and they have bidden at home all the time. You will be quite safe, Madam.”
“So I think, my Lady Betty,” replied Madam. “Rhoda, have you been listening?”
“No, Madam,” answered Rhoda, demurely.
“Then ’tis time you should, my dear,” said Madam, graciously. “I will acquaint you of the affair. I think to write to Lady Delawarr, and ask the favour of Mrs Gatty and Mrs Molly to visit me. Their sister Mrs Betty, as I hear, is come home from the Bath, extreme distempered; and ’tis therefore wise to send away Mrs Gatty and little Mrs Molly until Mrs Betty be recovered of her disorder. I would have you be very nice toward them, that they shall find their visit agreeable.”
“How long will they stay, Madam?” inquired Rhoda.
“Why, child, that must hang somewhat on Mrs Betty’s recovering. I take it, it shall be about a month; but should her distemper be tardy of disappearing, it shall then be something longer.”
“Jolly!” was the sound which seemed to Phoebe to issue in an undertone from the lips of Rhoda. But the answer which reached her grandmother’s ears was merely a sedate “Yes, Madam.”
“I take it, my Lady Betty,” observed Madam, turning to her companion, “that the sooner the young gentlewomen are away, the better shall it be.”
“Oh, surely, Madam!” answered Lady Betty. “’Tis truly very good of you to ask it; but you are always a general undertaker for your friends.”
“We were sent into this world to do good, my Lady Betty,” returned Madam, sententiously.
Unless Phoebe’s ears were deceived, a whisper very like “Fudge!” came from Rhoda.
The somewhat solemn drive was finished at last; Lady Betty was set down at the Maidens’ Lodge; inquiries were made as to the health of Mrs Marcella, who returned a reply intimating that she was a suffering martyr; and Rhoda and Phoebe at last found themselves free from superveillance, and safe in their bedroom.
“Now that’s just jolly!” was Rhoda’s first remark, with nothing in particular to precede it. “Molly Delawarr’s a darling! I don’t much care for Gatty, and Betty I just hate. She’s a prig and a fid-fad both. But Molly—oh, Phoebe, she’s as smart as can be. Such parts she has! You know, she’s really—not quite you understand—but really she’s almost as clever as I am!”
Phoebe did not seem overwhelmed by this information; she only said, “Is she?”
“Well, nearly,” said Rhoda. “She knows fourteen Latin words, Molly does; and she always brings them in.”
“Into what?” asked Phoebe, with the little amused laugh which was very rare with her.
“Into her discourse, to be sure, child!” said Rhoda, loftily, “You don’t know fourteen Latin words; how should you?”
“How should I, indeed,” rejoined Phoebe, meekly, “if father had not taught me?”
“Taught you—taught you Latin?” gasped Rhoda.
“Just a little Latin and Greek; there wasn’t time for much,” humbly responded Phoebe.
“Greek!” shrieked Rhoda.
“Very little, please,” deprecated Phoebe.
“Phoebe, you dear sweet darling love of a Phoebe!” cried Rhoda, kissing her cousin, to the intense astonishment of the latter; “now won’t you, like a dear as you are, just tell me one or two Greek words? I would give anything to outshine Molly and make her look foolish, I would! She doesn’t know one word of Greek—only Latin. Do, for pity’s sake, tell me, if ’tis only one Greek word! and I won’t say another syllable, not if Madam gives you a diamond necklace!”
Phoebe was laughing more than she had yet ever done at White-Ladies. She was far too innocent and amiable to think of playing Rhoda the trick of which Melanie’s father was guilty, in Contes à ma Fille, when, under the impression that she was saying in Latin, “Knowledge gives the right to laugh at everything,” he cruelly caused her to remark in public, “I am a very ridiculous donkey.” Phoebe bore no malice. She only said, still smiling, “I don’t know what words to tell you.”
“Oh, any!” answered Rhoda, accommodatingly. “What’s the Greek for ugly?”
“I don’t know,” said Phoebe, dubiously. “Kakos means bad.”
“And what is good and pretty?”
“Agathos is good,” replied Phoebe, laughing; “and beautiful is kallios.”
“That’ll do!” said Rhoda, triumphantly. “’Tis plenty,—I couldn’t remember more. Let me see,—kaks, and agathos, and kallius—is that right?”
Phoebe laughingly offered the necessary corrections. “All right!” said Rhoda. “I’ve no more to wish for. I’ll take the shine out of Molly!”
At supper that evening, Madam announced that she had sent her note to Lady Delawarr by a mounted messenger, and had received an answer, according to which Gatty and Molly might be expected to arrive at White-Ladies on Wednesday evening. Madam appeared to be in one of her most gracious moods, for she even condescended to inform Phoebe that Mrs Gatty was two months older than Rhoda, and Mrs Molly four years her junior,—“two years younger than you, my dear,” said Madam, very affably.
“Now, Phoebe, I’ll tell you what we’ll do,” asserted Rhoda, as she sat down before the glass that night to have her hair undressed by her cousin. “I’m not going to have Molly teasing about the old gentlewomen down yonder. I’ll soon shut her mouth if she begins; and if Gatty wants to go down there, well, she can go by herself. So I’ll tell you what: you and I will drink a dish of tea with Mrs Dolly to-morrow, and we’ll make her finish her story. I only do wish the dear old tiresome thing wouldn’t preach! Then I’ll take you in to see Mrs Marcella, and we’ll get that done. Then in the morning, you must just set out all my gowns on the bed, and I’ll have both you and Betty to sew awhile I must have some lace on that blue. I’ll make Madam give me a pair of new silver buckles, too. I can’t do unless I cut out those creatures somehow. And the only way to cut out Gatty is by dress, because she hasn’t anything in her,—’tis all on her. I cut out Molly in brains. But my Lady Delawarr likes to dress Gatty up, because she fancies the awkward thing’s pretty. She isn’t, you know,—not a speck; but she thinks so.”
Whether the last pronoun referred to Lady Delawarr or to Gatty, Rhoda was not sufficiently perspicuous to indicate. Phoebe went on disentangling her hair in silence, and Rhoda likewise fell into a brown study.
Of the nature of her thoughts that young lady gave but two intimations: the first, as she tied up her hair in the loose bag which then served for a night-cap,—
“I cannot abide that Betty!”
The second came a long while afterwards, just as Phoebe was dropping to sleep.
“I say, Phoebe!”
“Yes?”
“Did you say ‘kakios?’”
Phoebe had to collect her thoughts. “Kakos,” she said.
“Oh, all right; they won’t know. But won’t I take the shine out of that Molly!”
Phoebe’s arrested sleep came back to her as she was reflecting on the curious idea which her cousin seemed to have of friendship.
“Come along, Phoebe! This is the shortest way.”
“Oh, couldn’t we go by the road?” asked Phoebe, drawing back apprehensively, as Rhoda sprang lightly from the top of the stile which led into the meadow.
“Of course we could, but ’tis ever so much further round, and not half so pleasant. Why?”
“There are—cows!” said Phoebe, under her breath.
Rhoda laughed more decidedly than civilly.
“Cows! Did you never see cows before? I say, Phoebe, come along! Don’t be so silly!”
Phoebe obeyed, but in evident trepidation, and casting many nervous glances at the dreaded cows, until the girls had passed the next stile.
“Cows don’t bite, silly Phoebe!” said Rhoda, rather patronisingly, from the height of her two years’ superiority in age.
“But they toss sometimes, don’t they?” tremblingly demanded Phoebe.
“What nonsense!” said Rhoda, as they rounded the Maidens’ Lodge.
Little Mrs Dorothy sat sewing at her window, and she nodded cheerily to her young guests as they came in.
“What do you think, Mrs Dolly?—good evening!” said Rhoda, parenthetically. “If this foolish Phoebe isn’t frighted of a cow!”
“Sure, my dear, that is no wonder, for one bred in in the town,” gently deprecated Mrs Dorothy.
“So stupid and nonsensical!” said Rhoda. “I say, Mrs Dolly, are you afraid of anything?”
“Yes, my dear,” was the quiet answer.
“Oh!” said Rhoda. “Cows?”
“No, not cows,” returned Mrs Dorothy, smiling.
“Frogs? Beetles?” suggested Rhoda.
“I do not think I am afraid of any animal, at least in this country, without it be vipers,” said Mrs Dorothy. “But—well, I dare say I am but a foolish old woman in many regards. I oft fear things which I note others not to fear at all.”
“But what sort of things, Mrs Dolly?” inquired Rhoda, who had made herself extremely comfortable with a large chair and sundry cushions.
“I will tell you of three things, my dear, of which I have always felt afraid, at the least since I came to years of discretion. And most folks are not afraid of any of them. I am afraid of getting rich. I am afraid of being married. And I am afraid of judging my neighbours.”
“Oh!” cried Rhoda, in genuine amazement. “Why, Mrs Dolly, what do you mean? As to judging one’s neighbours,—well, I suppose the Bible says something against that; but we all do it, you know.”
“We do, my dear; more’s the pity.”
“But getting rich, and being married! Oh, Mrs Dolly! Everybody wants those.”
“No, my dear, asking your pardon,” replied the old lady, in a tone of decision unusual with her. “I trust every Christian does not want to be rich, when the Lord hath given him so many warnings against it. And every man does not want to marry, nor every woman neither.”
“Well, not every man, perhaps,” admitted Rhoda; “but every woman does, Mrs Dolly.”
“My dear, I am sorry to hear a woman say it,” answered Mrs Dorothy, with as much warmth as was consonant with her nature. “I hoped that was a man’s delusion.”
“Why, Mrs Dolly! I do,” said Rhoda, with great candour.
“Then I wish you more wisdom, child.”
“Well, upon my word!” exclaimed Rhoda. “Didn’t you, when you were young, Mrs Dolly?”
“No, I thank God, nor when I was old neither,” replied Mrs Dorothy, in the same tone.
“But, Mrs Dolly! A maid has no station in society!” said Rhoda, using a phrase which she had picked up from one of her grandfather’s books.
“My dear, your station is where God puts you. A maid has just as good a station as a wife; and a much pleasanter, to my thinking.”
“Pleasanter!” exclaimed Rhoda. “Why, Mrs Dolly, nobody thinks anything of an old maid, except to pity her.”
“They may keep their pity to themselves,” said Mrs Dorothy, with a little laugh. “We old maids can pity them back again, and with more reason.”
“Mrs Dolly, would you have all the world hermits?”
“No, my dear; nor do I at all see why people should always leap to the conclusion that an old maid must be an ill-tempered, lonely, disappointed creature. Sure, there are other relatives in this world beside husbands and children; and if she choose her own lot, what cause hath she for disappointment? ’Tis but a few day since Mr Leighton said, in my hearing, ‘Of course we know, when a gentlewoman is unwed, ’tis her misfortune rather than her fault’—and I do believe the poor man thought he paid us women a compliment in so speaking. For me, I felt it an insult.”
“Why so, Mrs Dolly?”
“Why, think what it meant, my dear. ‘Of course, a woman cannot be so insensible to the virtues and attractions of men that she should wish to remain unwed; therefore, if this calamity overtake her, it shows that she hath no virtues nor attractions herself.’”
“You don’t think Mr Leighton meant that, Mrs Dolly?” asked Rhoda, laughing.
“No, my dear; I think he did not see the meaning of his own words. But tell me, if it is not a piece of great vanity on the part of men, that while they never think to condole with a man who is unmarried, but take it undoubted that he prefers that life, they take it as equally undoubted that a woman doth not prefer it, and lament over her being left at ease and liberty as though she had suffered some great misfortune?”
“I never did see such queer notions as you have, Mrs Dolly! I can’t think where you get them,” said Rhoda. “However, you may say what you will; I mean to marry, and I am going to be rich too. And I expect I shall like both of them.”
“My dear!” and Mrs Dorothy laid down her work, and looked earnestly at Rhoda. “How do you know you are going to be rich?”
“Why, I shall have White-Ladies,” answered Rhoda. “And of course Aunt Harriet will leave me everything.”
“Have Madam and Mrs Harriet told you so, my dear?”
“No,” said Rhoda, rather impatiently. “But who else should they leave it to?”
Mrs Dorothy let that part of the matter drop quietly.
“‘They that will be rich fall into temptation and a snare,’” she said, taking up her work again.
“What snare?” said Rhoda, bluntly.
“They get their hearts choked up,” said the old lady.
“With what, Mrs Dolly?”
“‘Cares, and riches, and pleasures of this life.’ O my dear, may the Lord make your heart soft! Yet I am afraid—I am very sore afraid, that the only way of making some hearts soft is—to break them.”
“Well, I don’t want my heart breaking, thank you,” laughed Rhoda; “and I don’t think anything would break it, unless I lost all my money, and was left an old maid. O Mrs Dolly, I can’t think how you bear it! To come down, now, and live in one of these little houses, and have people looking down on you, instead of looking up to you—if anything of the sort would kill me, I think that would.”
“Well, it hasn’t killed me, child,” said Mrs Dorothy, calmly; “but then, you see, I chose it. That makes a difference.”
“But you didn’t choose to be poor, Mrs Dolly?”
“Well, yes, in one sense, I did,” answered the old lady, a little tinge of colour rising in her pale cheek.
“How so?” demanded Rhoda, who was not deterred from gaining information by any delicacy in asking questions.
“There was a time once, my dear, that I might have married a gentleman of title, with a rent-roll of six thousand a year.”
“Mrs Dolly! you don’t mean that?” cried Rhoda. “And why on earth didn’t you?”
“Well, my dear, I had two reasons,” answered Mrs Dorothy. “One was”—with a little laugh—“that as you see, I preferred to be one of these same ill-conditioned, lonely, disappointed old maids. And the other was”—and Mrs Dorothy’s voice sank to a softer and graver tone—“I could not have taken my Master with me into that house. I saw no track of His footsteps along that road. And His sheep follow Him.”
“But God means us to be happy, Mrs Dolly?”
“Surely, my dear. But He knows better than we how empty and fleeting is all happiness other than is found in Him. ’Tis only because the Lord is our Shepherd that we shall not want.”
“Mrs Dolly, that is what good people say; but it always sounds so gloomy and melancholy.”
“What sounds melancholy, my dear?” inquired Mrs Dorothy, with slight surprise in her tone.
“Why, that one must find all one’s happiness in reading sermons, and chanting Psalms, and thinking how soon one is going to die,” said Rhoda, with an uncomfortable shrug.
“My dear!” exclaimed Mrs Dorothy, “when did you ever hear me say anything of the kind?”
“Why, that was what you meant, wasn’t it,” answered Rhoda, “when you talked about finding happiness in piety?”
“And when did I do that?”
“Just now, this minute back,” said Rhoda in surprise.
“My dear child, you strangely misapprehend me. I never spoke a word of finding happiness in piety; I spoke of finding it in God. And God is not sermons, nor chanting, nor death. He is life, and light, and love. I never think how soon I shall die. I often think how soon the Lord may come; but there is a vast difference between looking for the coming of a thing that you dread, and looking for the coming of a person whom you long to see.”
“But you will die, Mrs Dolly?”
“Perhaps, my dear. The Lord may come first; I hope so.”
“Oh dear!” said Rhoda. “But that means the world may come to an end.”
“Yes. The sooner the better,” replied the old lady.
“But you don’t want the world to end, Mrs Dolly?”
“I do, my clear. I want the new heavens and the new earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness.”
“Oh dear!” cried Rhoda again. “Why, Mrs Dolly, I can’t bear to think of it. It would be an end of everything I care about.”
“My dear,” said the old lady, gravely and yet tenderly, “if the Lord’s coming will put an end to everything you care about, that must be because you don’t care much for Him.”
“I don’t know anything about Him, except what we hear in church,” answered Rhoda uneasily.
“And don’t care for that?” softly responded her old friend.
Rhoda fidgeted for a moment, and then let the truth out.
“Well, no, Mrs Dolly, I don’t. I know it sounds very wicked and shocking; but how can I, when ’tis all so far off? It doesn’t feel real, as you do, and Madam, and all the other people I know. I can’t tell how you make it real.”
“He makes it real, my child. ’Tis faith which sees God. How can you see Him without it? But I am not shocked, my dear. You have only told me what I knew before.”
“I don’t see how you knew,” said Rhoda uncomfortably; “and I don’t know how people get faith.”
“By asking the Lord for it,” said Mrs Dolly. “Phoebe, my child, is it a sorrowful thing to thee to think on Christ and His coming again?”
“Oh no!” was Phoebe’s warm answer. “You see, Madam, I haven’t anything else.”
“Dear child, thank God for it!” replied Mrs Dorothy softly. “‘Ton sort n’est pas à plaindre.’”
“I declare, if ’tis not four o’clock!” cried Rhoda, springing up, and perhaps not sorry for the diversion. “There, now! I meant you to finish your story, and we haven’t time left. Come along, Phoebe! We are going to look in a minute on Mrs Marcella, and then we must hurry home.”