Chapter Eight.
“Good-Bye!”
So, upon the verge of sorrow
Stood we blindly hand in hand,
Whispering of a happy morrow
In the undiscovered land!
The world is not half so bad a place as some discontented people make out.
Our fellow-mortals are not always striving after their own interests, to the neglect of their duty towards their neighbour:—the mass of humanity not entirely selfish at heart—no, nor yet the larger portion of it, by a good way!
Of course, there are some ill-natured people. Blisters, are these; moral cataplasms imposed on us, probably, to produce that very feeling we admire, acting as they do by contrast—one of the most vivifying principles of mental action.
But, when we come to calculate their percentage, how very few they are in comparison with the better-disposed numbers of God’s creatures that live and breathe, and sicken and die in our midst, and whose kindly ministrations on behalf of their suffering brethren and sisters around them, remain generally unknown, until they are far beyond any praise that the world can give.
Yes, humanity is not so debased, but that its good points still excel its bad! Just as you see but one real miser in a fixed proportion of men; so, are there, I believe, quite as small a representative set of absolutely heartless persons. I am certain that the “good Samaritans” outvie the “Levites” in our daily existence—opposed, though my theory may be, to the ruling of the old doggerel, which cautions us that—
“’Tis a very good world to live in,
To spend and to lend, and to give in;
But,
To beg, or to borrow, and to get a man’s own,
’Tis the very worst world that ever was known!”
Look at my present case, for instance. Of course, personal instances are, as a general rule, wrong; but, one cannot very well argue without them—especially when telling a story, and when they come up so opportunely in front of one’s nose, so to speak.
No sooner was it generally known in Saint Canon’s that I was going away, than I met with offers of sympathy and assistance from many that I did not expect. I did not require their aid, yet, the proffer of it could not help being grateful to one’s feelings, all the same.
There was Horner now. You know that I was always in the habit of “chaffing” him, taking a malicious pleasure in so doing, from the reason that he could not “chaff” me back again in return. Well, you wouldn’t have supposed that he bore me any great love or friendship, or felt kindly disposed towards me? But, he did!
About a week after I left the Obstructor General’s Office, he came to me—I assure you, much to my astonishment—offering me his assistance.
“Bai-ey Je-ove! Lorton,” said he, “sawy to he-ah you have left us, you know—ah. Thawght you might be in a hole, you know—ah? And, Bai-ey Je-ove! I say, old fellah,”—he added, almost dropping his drawl in his earnestness,—“if I can help you in any way at all—ah, I should weally be vewy glad—ah!”
The “us,” whom I had “left—ah,” referred, of course, to officialdom; but, it was kind, wasn’t it?
There was old Shuffler, too.
“You ain’t a goin’ to Amerikey, sir, is you?” he asked me just before my departure, meeting me in the street.
“Yes, I am, Shuffler,” I replied, “and pretty soon, too!”
“Lor! Mister Lorton; but I’m right loth to ’ear it! I’ve got a brother myself over in Amerikey; s’pose now, sir, I was to give you a letter to ’im? It might, you know, some’ow or hother, be o’ service, hay?”
“America is a large place, Shuffler,” I answered.—“Whereabouts is he over there, eh?”
“Well, sir,” said he, “I don’t ’zackly knows were ’e his; but I dessay you’ll come across him, sir. I’ll give you the letter, at hany rate;”—and he did too, although I combated his resolution. I need hardly add that I never met the said “brother in Amerikey” of his; so, that it was of no use to me, as I told him—although, it was a considerate action on Shuffler’s part!
Lady Dasher, also, did not forget me.
Believing that the last of the Mohicans still lived, and that the continent of the setting sun resembled Hounslow Heath in the old highwaymen’s days, she presented to me—a blunderbuss!
It was one with which her “poor dear papa” had been in the habit of frightening obstreperous White Boys, who might assail the sacred premises of Ballybrogue Castle—the ancestral seat of the Earls of Planetree in sportive Tipperary, as I believe I’ve told you before. The weapon, she informed me, was a most efficient one, having once been known—when missing the advocate of “young Ireland” it was aimed at—to demolish a whole litter of those little gentlemen with curly tails who assist, in conjunction with the “praties,” in “paying the rint” of the trusting natives of the Emerald Isle; consequently, its destructive powers were beyond question, and it might really, she thought, be of the utmost utility to me on the western prairies, where, she believed, I was going to “camp out” for ever!
My lady gave me, in addition, a piece of advice, which she implored me always to bear in mind throughout my life—as she had invariably done—and that was, that, “Though I might unfortunately be poor, never to forget being proud”:—it was the pass-word to her morbid system.
And the vicar, and dear little Miss Pimpernell, and Monsieur Parole d’Honneur—how can I speak of all their kindness—evinced in many, many ways—ere I left the old parish and its whilom associations behind me?
Little Miss Pimpernell worked a supply of knitted socks, “comforters,” and muffetees, sufficient to last me for a three years’ cruise in the Polar circle in search of the north-west passage. The vicar gave me letters of introduction to some American friends of his, who received me afterwards most kindly in virtue of his credentials—he wanted to do much more for me, but I would not allow him; and as for Monsieur, he would not be denied, in spite of my telling him, over and over again, that I had no need of temporal assistance.
“Ah! but yes!” he said to me, in a parting visit he paid me the night before I started. “You cannote deceives me, my youngish friends! Lamartine was un republicain, hé?—Bien, he go un voyage en Orient; you, my dears Meestaire Lorton, are going to walk on a voyage en Ouest—dat is vraisemble. Ha! ha! Ze one visite the Arabes of ze old world, ze oders ze Arabes of ze nouvelle; and,—bote requires ze money, ze l’argent, ze cash. Ha! ha! Non, my youngish friends, you cannote deceives me!”
“But, I assure you, Monsieur Parole,” I replied. “I really have plenty—much more, indeed, than I absolutely require.”
“Ah! but yes! My dears, you moost take him to obliges me. I have gote here a leetle somme I doos note want. If you takes him note, I peetch him avays—peetch him avays, vraiment!”
And he handed me a little roll of banknotes, which I subsequently found to contain a hundred pounds.
It was, as I say, of no use my trying to get him to take them back; he would have no denial:—he absolutely got offended with me when I persisted in my refusal.
“Non!” he said. “When you come back a reech mans, you can pays me back; but, note till den! Non, Monsieur Lorton! I believes you considers me a friend. You offend me if you refuse! Take hims for ze memory de notre amitie!”
What could I do? I had to take the money after that.
The only great thing that grieved me at parting was the thought that I could not see Min, to have one parting word; but, even that favour was afforded me:—God was very good to me!
I had gone to the vicarage to say a last good-bye to the dear friends there. I was ushered into Miss Pimpernell’s parlour; but she was not there. Somebody else was, though; for, who should get up from the dear old lady’s seat in the fireside corner—where she always sat, winter and summer alike—but, my darling!
The surprise was almost too much for me, it was so unexpected. I thought it was her ghost at first.
“Min!” I exclaimed.
“Oh, Frank!”—she said, coming forwards eagerly—“and could you have the heart to go away without my seeing you again?”
I drew back.
“Min,”—said I,—“do not come near me! You do not know what has occurred; how I have sinned; how unworthy I am even to speak to you!”
She would not be denied, however. She came nearer me, and took my hand. “But, you have repented, Frank,”—she said—“have you not?”
“Oh, my darling!”—I said,—“I have repented; but that will not bring back the past. I can never hope to be forgiven, I know. I ought not to speak to you even!”
“Ah, Frank!”—she replied, looking up into my face with her dear grey eyes, which I had thought I would never look upon again.—“Don’t you remember that sermon the vicar preached last year, when we were in church together? and, don’t you remember the words of his text, how assuring they ought to be to us?—‘Though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool!’”
We were both silent.
Presently, as we sat side by side, Min spoke to me again.
“You will not forget me, Frank, will you?” she asked.
“That is very likely!” I said, laughing in my heart at the idea.
“And you will be good, Frank, will you not?”
“My darling,” I said, “with God’s grace I shall never from henceforth be unworthy of your trust in me, either in thought, in word, or, in deed.”
“But America is so far off!” she said again after a bit, with a tender little sigh.
“Not so very far,”—I replied,—“and, though my body may be a few miles distant from you—for it is only a few miles over the sea—you may know that my heart will always be with you. I shall be ever thinking of the time when I can come back and claim you as my own darling little wife!”
“But I can make no promise, you know, Frank!”—she said.
“Never mind that, darling!”—I replied.—“I am sanguine enough to believe you will not change towards me if I deserve you by my life; and I shall never marry anyone else, I know!”
“It is so hard, too, our not being able to write to each other! I will never be able to know what you are doing!” she said, again.
“Ah, yes, you will!” said I, to encourage her.
As she became despondent, I got sanguine; although, a tear in the soft grey eyes would have unmanned me at once.
“Miss Pimpernell is going to write to me, you know,”—I continued,—“and I to her; so you will be made acquainted with all I do and, even, think. I will write fully to the dear old lady, I promise you!”
She gave me a little Bible and Prayer-book, before we separated, in which she had written my name; and, told me that she would pray every night for me, that I might know that her prayers joined mine, and that both, together, would go up before the Master’s throne - notwithstanding that the Atlantic might roll between us.
She also gave me a likeness of herself, which was of more solace to me afterwards than I can tell.
A little, simple photograph it was, that has lain before my eyes a thousand times—in hope, in sadness, in sickness, in disappointment; and, that has always cheered me and encouraged me in some of the darkest moments of my life, ever bringing back to my mind the darling words of the giver.
And then, we parted.
One sobbing sigh, that expressed a world of emotion. One frenzied clasp of her to my heart, as if I could never let her go; and, our “Good-bye” was spoken, accomplished:—a good-bye whose recollection was to last! until I returned to claim her, receiving the welcome that her darling rosebud lips would gladly utter; and watching, the while, the unspoken delight that would then, I know, dance from the loving, soul-lit, truth-telling, grey eyes!