CHAPTER XIV.—CONTAINS MUCH DOCTOR’S STUFF, AND OTHER RUBBISH.
Ernest was true to his word—all that spring and summer he worked at his sermons and his parish, like an ecclesiastical galley-slave, till the volume was finished, and all the people had become so good, that if it had not been for christenings, weddings, and funerals, they would scarcely have required the services of a clergyman at all. Indeed, carrying out the doctrine of self-denial logically, and to its fullest extent, we doubt whether a rectory might not be regarded as a superfluous luxury, a kind of canonical pomp and vanity, and therefore a stumbling-block to be removed from the spiritual highway of that super-excellent community.
But writing sermons, and instilling pure and heavenly principles into the decidedly earthly minds of small shopkeepers and needy agricultural labourers, albeit a high and sacred calling, considered abstractedly and as a whole, is yet, taken in detail, a very trying vocation to a man possessing, in no common degree, a taste for intellectual pursuits, and a strong appreciation of refined society. Thus it came to pass that one fine morning (it was the 12th of August) Ernest, having written a report of a district meeting for the propagation of the Gospel in parts so very foreign that the propagators themselves would have been puzzled to find them on the map, leaned back in his chair and wondered how sundry college friends of his were getting on among the grouse, when a note in the Rosebud’s handwriting was brought to him. With sparkling eyes and a slight accession of colour to his pale cheeks, he read as follows:—
“Dear Mr. Carrington,—Mamma is very ill—how ill I do not know—and fear to learn. Mr. Pillanbill (do you consider him clever?) tells me not to be alarmed, which frightens me terribly. May I hope you will come to us—poor mamma is able and anxious to see you, and you will tell me whether anything else can or ought to be done. Yours sincerely,
“Emily Colville.”
Within ten minutes after the note had reached him Ernest was at the cottage. Emily received him with a blush and a smile. “How kind and good of you to come so quickly!” she said. Tears trembled in her eyes. Ernest had never seen her look so pretty.
“How good of you to send for me!” he replied: “I hope,” he continued—“I hope it proves that I am forgiven?”
Emily hung her head—“If you please, we will never refer to that again,” she said, entreatingly; “I was very proud and foolish, and behaved very ill; but you are wise enough to forgive, and kind enough to forget: is it not so?”
Ernest took her hand and pressed it warmly, nor was it immediately withdrawn.
Mrs. Colville was seriously ill; and having sat with her for some time, the rector obtained her permission to inquire whether Mr. Pillanbill would object to meet Dr. Twiggit, and learn if they agreed in their view of the case, just to satisfy Miss Colville’s natural anxiety.
Mr. Pillanbill graciously consented. Dr. Twiggit resided ten miles off, and had too good a practice near home to make it worth his while to poach upon his (P.‘s) manor for the sake of a single outlying patient with a limited purse. So Dr. Twiggit was summoned, and came; he was a little man, with a large hooked nose and an ornithological cast of countenance, as of a shrewd fowl. Having strutted and clapped his wings, and, so to speak, crowed over the apothecary and the Rosebud, and looked as if he would have liked uncommonly to fight Ernest for a handful of barley, he entered the sick-room, where first, with two little bright bead-like eyes, he looked clean through poor Mrs. Colville into the mattress and feather-bed; next, he stretched out a claw to feel her pulse; then he pecked at her to make her put out her tongue; then he shook his feathers and crowed over her; and then he chased Pillanbill round and out of the room for the consultation, which ran thus:—
Twiggit.—“Clear case!”
Pillanbill.—“No mistake.”
Twiggit.—“Hepatico-cerebreosistosis, first stage.”
Pillanbill.—“Quite so.”
Twiggit.—“What have you thrown in?”
Pillanbill hands prescription. Hydrarg:—mysterious cipher, looking like a 3 with two heads—Rhei: pulvo:—another cipher, worse than the first, &c., &c.
Twiggit reads—“Hum! yes, ha! good!” (returns prescription), “can’t be better—ar—I think that is all to-day, ar—needn’t send for me unless any symptoms of spiflicatio appear, and then it will be too late; keep the feet warm, head cool, nourishing slops, bland puddings—but you know—good morning.”
So saying, the talented M.D., who was in himself a modern instance of the mythical relation existing between Esculapius and the cock, strutted out to his carriage a richer man by five-guineas than he had been when he quitted that vehicle.
Mrs. Colville’s was a very severe illness, and at one time her state was most critical; but, thanks to a patient and resigned spirit, and an excellent constitution, after three weeks of intense anxiety to those who watched over her, she began to show symptoms of amendment. From the day on which Ernest had received the Rosebud’s summons, to the happy moment when Doctors Twiggit and Pillanbill took their leave, he had shown the unceasing affection of a son towards Mrs. Colville, and of a brother towards Emily. Hour after hour had he attended the sick woman’s bedside, reading to her or conversing with her on those all-important subjects that, at such seasons, become invested with a deep and solemn interest which in our happier moments they too often fail to excite in our weak and fallen natures. And as Emily sat by, and heard the words of the inspired volume, rendered yet more beautiful and impressive by the correct taste, true feeling, and rich mellow voice of the reader; or listened, as, with a wisdom beyond his years—a wisdom not of this world—Ernest explained away difficulties, and threw the clear light of a strong and vigorous understanding on the great truths of our Holy Religion, what wonder if some of the reverence and affection, which such teaching must excite in every pure and gentle bosom, grew to cling around the teacher? Or what wonder, either, that when Ernest saw the scornful, capricious, half-childlike little coquette, whose sparkling beauty had charmed his fancy, change, the instant sorrow laid its chastening touch upon her brow, into the thoughtful, tender devoted woman,—the ministering angel beside the couch of sickness, whose gentle, never-failing tact and quiet power of steadfast, patient endurance, man’s stronger, more energetic nature, may envy, but can never attain to;—what wonder if, where he had before admired, he now grew to love?
It is a good thing to love! So much mawkish sentimentality and bombastic nonsense, so many white-muslined tears and boarding-school sentimentalities, have been heaped around its counterfeit, that healthy minds not unnaturally scoff at the passion—until they feel it! and thus has one of the highest emotions of which our nature is capable, been brought into undeserved disrepute. A deep, true, earnest, unselfish affection, such as an honest man (“the noblest work of God”) is capable of feeling for a woman worthy to call it forth, raises, purifies, and spiritualises his whole being, enlarges his sympathies, and (by affording a new motive for exertion) stimulates his faculties, and thus causes him to do the work he may lay his hand to, better than he would have executed it without such an incentive. The Apostle tells us, “If a man say, I love God, and hateth his brother, he is a liar;” and a great truth is embodied in the text;—a nature capable of forming a deep, unselfish attachment to one of God’s creatures, raises its possessor in the scale of creation, and enables him to adore his Maker and love his fellows with a zealous earnestness and reality, of which a self-engrossed character is incapable—therefore, as we began by saying—it is a good thing to love!
As Mrs. Colville’s recovery progressed, it was Ernest Carrington who drew her about in her garden-chair, and as she grew yet stronger, it was on his arm she leaned when, with feeble steps, she began once again to resume her daily walks; and as, with grateful heart, Emily watched the colour slowly returning to her mother’s pale cheeks, she almost felt as if it was to Ernest that she owed her beloved parent’s restoration.
One morning, about a month after Mr. Pillanbill had finally taken leave, and when every vestige of his first syllable had been swallowed, and his last syllable (which was a very long one) had been paid, Ernest, whilst waiting until Mrs. Colville was ready for her accustomed walk, had a letter with a foreign postmark put into his hand. Emily, who watched him while he read it, saw him start and change colour.
“Is anything the matter?” she inquired, as he refolded the letter.
“Yes—no—that is, I think you cannot any longer be anxious about Mrs. Colville: her health, thank God, is perfectly restored.
“Oh yes, I trust so,” was the reply, “but why do you ask?’
“Because I must leave you for a time; and if you felt nervous or uncomfortable about your mother, we could arrange for Percy to return a week or two before the holidays—what do you say?—he might be a comfort to you?”
As Ernest spoke, he stooped to pick up the envelope of the letter, and thus failed to observe that Emily started and turned pale when he said he must leave her. The letter was from Sir Thomas Crawley’s valet; his master was very ill—dangerously ill, he was afraid; he had been unwell for some time, and had gone to Baden for change of air; but instead of recovering, he had grown worse every day, until finally, after a long interview with his medical advisers, he desired Hemmings to write to Mr. Selby and Mr. Carrington, begging them to come out to him without delay, and bring with them some clever English physician. When Mrs. Colville appeared and learned this intelligence, she fully agreed with Ernest that no time should be lost in setting off; and after a few minutes’ conversation on the subject, the rector rose to take his leave, saying that he should probably start the next morning.
“Mamma has persuaded me to go for an hour or two to the Selbys this evening; Caroline would take no refusal, and Miss Plainfille is coming to sit with mamma. Shall I see you there?” asked the Rosebud, quietly.
“Well then, farewell, dear Mrs. Colville,” exclaimed Ernest warmly, having answered Emily’s question in the affirmative; “I leave you in very good hands, and expect to find you stronger than ever when I return.”
The evening at the Selbys was a very pleasant one, both to Emily and to Ernest, only instead of two hours, it appeared to last about ten minutes.
“Mr. Carrington, I’m afraid I must be rude enough to ask you to step into my office and look at the arrangements I have made for our journey to-morrow,” observed Mr. Selby, late in the evening.
“Certainly, I will follow you in one moment,” was the reply.
There was a small apartment opening out of the drawingroom, fitted up as a boudoir for the benefit of Caroline Selby. In this snuggery the two young ladies had been looking over some water-colour sketches, but Caroline Selby had just been called away, and the Rosebud was left by herself. At that instant Ernest joined her.
“Emily,” he said, and his voice was low and tremulous—“Emily, I have come to bid you good-bye.”
“Must you go already?” was the rejoinder.
“Indeed, I fear so,” returned Ernest. There was a pause, and then he resumed, in a voice which trembled with emotion, “Emily, we have been very happy of late.”
“Oh, yes!” she murmured, almost unconsciously.
“And you,” he continued—“you have been very kind and gentle. Emily, you will not forget me—will not grow cold towards me again?”
She made no reply, but her silence was more eloquent than words. At that moment Mr. Selby’s footstep sounded on the stairs.
“I must go,” Ernest resumed: “Emily, dear Emily! goodbye;—God bless you!” He took her soft, warm little hand in his own; she allowed him to retain it unresistingly: he pressed it, and his heart beat quickly when he felt the pressure faintly but unmistakably returned. With a sudden impulse he raised the little hand, still imprisoned in his, to his lips, kissed it, and tore himself away. As he paused to close the door, a slight sound caught his ear: could it be a sob?
How long it might have been after his departure ere the noise of approaching voices roused Emily from the mental abstraction into which she had fallen, that young lady herself never knew—it might have been one minute, it might have been ten. When she did awake to a sense of outward things, the following speech from the lips of Mrs. Selby, a good-natured, vulgar woman, arrested her attention:—
“And so, ma’am, if Sir Thomas Crawley dies, which my husband fears is only too probable, Mr. Carrington is as likely to be his heir as anybody I can think of.”
“And then he’ll go and marry that pert stuck-up Emily Colville, I suppose” (the speaker was Mrs. Pillanbill, who owned three awful daughters, unattached); “that girl’s played her cards well, and no mistake. It was easy to see she set her cap at him from the first—probably calculated on his being Sir Thomas’s heir all along. Oh, she’s a deep one, trust her!”
And as the speakers passed on, their words became inaudible in the distance; but Emily had heard too much for her peace of mind. All night long she lay awake weeping—for she resolved, if Ernest should be Sir Thomas’s heir, and asked her to become his wife, she must and would refuse him, if the resolution broke her heart.
Oh, Rosebud! Rosebud! beware of pride—the sin that peopled hell!