DOROTHY MAKES A "CONFIDANT" OF MR. FITZMORRIS.
Dorothy was undecided in what manner to break the news of Gilbert's marriage to his mother, to whom she well knew the intelligence would be everything but welcome. Fortunately she was spared what she foolishly considered a humiliating task.
The walking post from the village beyond Hadstone in the shape of a very spare wrinkled old woman, whom all the boys in the neighbourhood considered a witch, left a letter at the door on her way to Storby, for Mrs. Rushmere.
"This is from Gilbert," said Dorothy, as she examined the seal and superscription. "But no, the hand is not his. Some one must have written it for him, (and she remembered the lost arm), his wife perhaps." The writing was that of a woman, and the letter was neatly folded and sealed. Gilbert's letters were short and ill-shaped, and closed with a great blotch of discoloured wax pressed down with a regimental button. The epistle was evidently none of his.
She had left Mrs. Rushmere in the easy chair, talking with her husband about Gilbert's misfortune. They were still pursuing the same theme, when she reentered the room.
"A letter for you, dear mother, with the London post-mark. One shilling postage. The old woman is waiting for it at the door."
Mrs. Rushmere gave her the money, bidding her quickly return, and read the letter. It was, as Dorothy suspected, from Gilbert's wife.
"Dear Madam,
"I write at the desire of my husband, your son, Lieutenant Rushmere."
"Hold!" cried the farmer. "Gilbert married. I'll not believe a word on't. He'd never get married without telling us about it, or giving us a jollification at the wedding. Tut, tut, girl, 'tis all a hoax."
"Go on with the letter, Dorothy, and let us hear what the woman says for hersel'," said Mrs. Rushmere. "It may be true after all."
"I think you will find it so," returned Dorothy, who had been glancing over the first page.
"You will be sorry to hear that he lost his right arm in the battle of Vittoria, but is now in a fair way of recovery, and as well in health as could be expected. He is very anxious to visit his home and his parents again, and if nothing happens to prevent our journey, we shall be with you the day after to-morrow by the London mail. Mr. Rushmere need not trouble himself to send a conveyance to meet us at the coach. My mother will accompany us. I bring my own servant, and the luggage consequently will be heavy. Lieutenant Rushmere proposes to hire a post-chaise to carry us on to Hadstone. Hoping, dear madam, to meet you and Mr. Rushmere in good health,
"I remain, yours truly,
"Sophia Rushmere."
Dorothy folded the letter, and the three exchanged glances. "His wife, and mother, and servant. Where are they all to be stowed?" asked Dorothy, who did not like the formal tone of the letter, and the cool manner in which the lady had included her mother and servant in the visit. "Well, Dolly, dear, we must contrive to make them comfortable," cried the good mother, rubbing her hands, and rejoicing in the near prospect of beholding her son. "Gilbert has taken us by surprise, both in regard to his marriage and this visit; but the mother and daughter may turn out very agreeable people, and be willing to submit to a little inconvenience."
"I hope it may be so, dear mother, for your sake; I will do my best to accommodate the party, but I want to know how it is to be done. There are only three sleeping rooms, and the attic, in the old house."
"The servant gals can sleep together," said Rushmere, "in the attic. Gilbert and his wife can occupy his own room; and the old missus may share your bed."
"The good lady may not approve of sleeping with a stranger."
"Oh, dang the old mother! she might ha' waited till she was invited. What the dickens did they want to bring her for?"
"I can stay with Mrs. Martin during their visit," suggested Dorothy. "As they bring their own servant, and our Polly is a very willing creature, my service will no longer be required."
"It is natural, Dorothy, that you should object to meet Gilbert's wife," said Mrs. Rushmere, thoughtfully; "and if we could possibly do without you, I would advise it strongly."
"And who's to wait upon you, Mary," asked Rushmere, angrily. "Gilbert's naught to Dorothy now. I don't see the necessity of her running away just when she be most wanted."
"I could sleep and take my meals at Mrs Martin's, and attend to dear mother's requirements as well as I do now. But, indeed, indeed, I should feel much happier away. At least," she added, in a broken voice, "for the first few days."
"Let it be so," said Mrs. Rushmere, kindly pressing her hands.
"Thank you, dearest mother, for the permission; I will go, but not until I have arranged everything for their comfort. And one thing I must request of you, father, that you never treat me as a servant before Gilbert's wife."
"Oh, if you mean to take yourself off, Dolly, you may as well go altogether. Gilbert's wife's a lady; she won't put up with airs from the like o' you."
"Ah, there it is, father, you are kind enough when we are alone, but the moment any one comes into the house you treat me as an object of charity, especially if you think them rich and well-born. But I tell you candidly that I have too much self-respect to bear it any longer. If you cannot value my love and faithful services, I have friends who stand as high in the world's estimation, who do. You may find Gilbert's wife a woman more to your taste, but she will never be a better daughter to you than I have been."
"Nobody found fault with you, girl, that you should go off in a tantrum about naught. It's only just your envy of Gilly's rich wife, that makes you saucy to me. In course, as my son's wife, she must be a person of more consequence in the house than ever you can be. It's neither kind nor grateful o' you to be talking of leaving your mother when she be unable to help herself."
Mrs. Rushmere cast a pleading look at Dorothy, to take no notice of this ungracious speech. He had an ugly habit, she often said, of undervaluing his best friends before strangers which sprang out of an overweening sense of his own importance, and a wish to exalt himself at the expense of others.
Dorothy took Mrs. Rushmere's hint, and left the room to prepare for the arrival of the bridal party. She was vexed with herself for resenting Mr. Rushmere's coarse speeches, and pressed Lord Wilton's letter which she had in her bosom, more closely against her heart. While she possessed the esteem of such men as the Earl, Henry Martin, and Gerard Fitzmorris, why need she mind the ungenerous sarcasm of an illiterate man.
Calling Polly, the parish apprentice, to her aid, she set diligently to work, and before the dinner hour arrived, their united efforts had made the two chambers fit for the reception of their expected inmates.
Dorothy did not mean to share her bed with Gilbert's mother-in-law, and though she felt much regret in leaving the dear little room she had occupied for so many years, she greatly preferred sleeping alone in the attic. Thither she removed her little store of books, her pots of geraniums and fuchsias, the small trunk that held her clothes, and a few keepsakes she had been given by the kind Martins. What to do with the check she had received from Lord Wilton, she did not know. She was astonished that such a small slip of paper could stand for such a large sum of money. She felt dreadfully afraid of losing it, and determined to show it to Mr. Fitzmorris, and ask him to keep it for her, together with the mysterious sealed packet, which she had a great longing to read. "And I am afraid I shall do it, if it remains in my own possession," she said, "though I know it would be very wicked."
When the rooms were put in order, and everything looked as clean and bright as new pins, as Polly said, Dorothy led Mrs. Rushmere upstairs to inspect them, and see if they were entirely to her satisfaction.
"They look like yourself, my darling Dorothy," said Mrs. Rushmere, falling on her neck and kissing her. "Neat and beautiful. Oh! my beloved child, you don't know how I feel for you. How much I dread the coming of these strange women. It do seem to me so odd that he should marry all on a suddent, an' never tell us a word about it. An' he so weak an' ill, from the loss o' his arm."
"Oh, but he was married before he left England the last time, which accounts for his sending no message to me in his letter."
"Why, Dolly, did the wife write that? I never heard you read a word on't in her letter?"
Dorothy was dumb-foundered, she had quite forgotten that Lord Wilton was her informant, and to get out of the scrape into which she had fallen, for she abhorred all concealment, she thought it best to show Mrs. Rushmere the Earl's letter.
Sending Polly downstairs to prepare the dinner, she made her mother take a seat on a lounge by the window, while she read the important document, and shewed her the mysterious sealed packet, and the draft for the money.
Mrs. Rushmere made her read it twice over. It was a long time before she spoke. She sat lost in a profound reverie.
"Mother," said Dorothy, "you will not mention what I have read to any one. Neither to father nor Gilbert."
"Poor Gilly," sighed the mother, "how blind he has been to reject the gold and take up with the dross, and exchange a real lady for a cunning impostor. He ha' given himself away for a brass farthing. Well, Dorothy, you have had your revenge, and bitterly will father and son repent o' their obstinate folly."
"We will talk no more of that, mother. It was a painful experience, but it is past and gone. The Lord did not intend me to be Gilbert's wife. 'The lot is cast into the lap, but the choosing of it is from Him.' I feel this day happy and grateful that it is so."
"You may well do that, Dorothy. Your fortunes, will, indeed, lie far apart. Oh! my child, when I think of all that he has lost, of all that might have been his, it is enough to break my heart."
"Mother, I don't understand you."
"No, nor is it fit you should. But I see, I know it all. Time will bring to light the hidden things of darkness, and when I am in the dust, Dorothy, and you are a great lady, remember how dearly I loved you. Loved you while poor and friendless, and gathered you into my heart as my own."
Mrs. Rushmere's head was now resting upon Dorothy's bosom, and she was weeping bitterly.
"Mother, I am so sorry I showed you that letter, it has grieved you so much; but I have never kept anything from you. I did not like to conceal my correspondence with the Earl. Do you think it would be improper in me to answer his letter, and accept that money?"
"You must do both, Dorothy. You owe him both love and obedience. You have given me your confidence, I will give you mine. I feel certain that you be his daughter."
"Mother!"
"Whether by marriage or imprudent love, remains yet to be told. But time will prove that I be right."
"Ah, how could that poor starved creature be an Earl's wife?" and Dorothy shuddered, as if an arrow had suddenly pierced her heart.
"How, indeed?" continued Mrs. Rushmere.
"There was a wild story afloat some years agone, of his having seduced a beautiful girl adopted by his mother. She went home to her grandmother in consequence, and the cruel old woman turned her into the streets, an' she was never heard of again—folks did say that she walked into the sea when the tide was coming in, an' destroyed hersel'. No one but God knows."
"But I could not love Lord Wilton if I were that miserable lost creature's daughter," cried Dorothy, wringing her hands. "Oh mother! mother! it would be worse than being called the beggar's brat that farmer Rushmere picked up on the heath. If I thought that I were his child through that infamous connection, I would spurn him and his gift from me as accursed things!"
She took the packet from her bosom, and was about to put her threat into execution. Mrs. Rushmere stayed her hand.
"Dorothy, what be you about? Supposing your mother to have been his wife, you may be destroying the proofs of your legitimacy. As Lawrence would say, 'cutting your own throat.'"
"True," said Dorothy, frightened at her own rashness. "How wrong it is of any one to act without thinking. This wedding-ring, after all, may be a true witness that my poor mother was an honest woman."
"At any rate, Dorothy, it is useless for you to try and puzzle out the truth; even if so be that you hit upon it, without farther evidence you could not satisfy yoursel' that it was so. But be sartin sure o' this, that mystery and concealment are generally used to cover crime. If Lord Wilton had acted rightly, he would not have been afraid of owning his wife to the world. Selfishness and sin must lie at some one's door, and women—the poor creatures—when they love, generally fling their all into the scale, regardless of consequences.
"But there's the dinner-bell, my pet, father will be rampaging if he comes in and finds us talking here."
After Dorothy had given Mrs. Rushmere her tea that evening, and got her comfortably to bed, she tripped across the dreary heath by the light of the July moon to see Mrs. Martin, and tell her all that had transpired.
She found no one at home but Mr. Fitzmorris, who was walking up and down the lawn, with a closed book in his hand, in which he could no longer see to read. He looked up, as the little gate swung to, and came forward to meet her. "Oh, Mr. Fitzmorris, you are the very person I wanted to see. I am so glad to find you alone."
He looked into the sweet face with an inquiring glance, but seemed suddenly struck with its unusual pallor.
"Dorothy, something has happened to annoy you. I can read that face of yours like an open book. You could not deceive any one."
"I hope I may never be tempted to try. But oh, Mr. Fitzmorris, I was sorely tempted last night to do a very dishonourable thing."
"And did the tempter succeed, Dorothy?"
"No, though I had not the courage to say 'get thee behind me Satan.' But if you will sit down under this tree, I will tell you all about it, and the many anxious thoughts that are passing through my mind."
"I am hardly old enough, Dorothy, to be a father confessor."
"But I have as much confidence in you, Mr. Fitzmorris, as though you were as old as Methuselah."
Gerard laughed heartily.
"As you have inducted me into this office, Dorothy, make a clean breast of it."
"But it is no laughing matter," quoth Dorothy, "I found it sad and serious enough."
She then informed him of the contents of Lord Wilton's letter, and showed him the check for the fifty pounds, and the mysterious sealed packet. He listened very attentively.
"It is too dark under the trees, Dorothy, to examine these important papers. Come with me into my study. There we shall be free from interruption."
When once in the sanctum sanctorum, into which no one ever intruded but Mrs. Martin, and that only once-a-week, to dust the furniture and arrange his books and papers, the vicar lighted his candles, and bidding Dorothy take a seat in the big leather arm-chair, he went to the table and read Lord Wilton's letter.
To Dorothy's great surprise, he made no comment on its contents.
"You wish me to take charge of this packet?" he asked.
"If you will be troubled with it. But what do you think of the letter, Mr. Fitzmorris?"
"A great deal, Dorothy, but the contents are too sacred to be lightly talked about. Have you any idea of the relation in which this man stands to you, my young friend?"
"I scarcely dare guess," and Dorothy, bowed her head on her hands and burst into tears.
"That he is your father there can be no doubt."
"Oh, sir, how can I love him as a father, if I be the child of sin and dishonour?"
"Still, Dorothy, he is your father," said Gerard, solemnly taking the hand that trembled in his own, "the author of your being; as such, however erring, he has a right to claim from you the love and duty of a child. That he truly loves you, and is anxious to repair, as far as now lies in his power, the injury he has inflicted upon you and your poor mother, is touchingly evident. My dear little cousin, (what a thrill of joy shot through Dorothy's heart as he called her so,) it is not for us, who are all sinners in the sight of a holy God, lightly to condemn another. No one knows how they would themselves act when placed in situations of strong temptation. The best of us are so much the creatures of circumstances, that we ought to pity rather than pronounce harsh judgment against the fallen.
"Take this unhappy father to your heart, Dorothy, and cherish him there. You may be an instrument in the hands of God for the salvation of his soul."
"I do love him," sobbed Dorothy, "but I want to respect, to venerate him, to look upon him as the dearest living tie next to God in my soul. The first time I ever saw him, when he was so kind to me, a poor, uneducated country girl, I felt drawn towards him by a strong, mysterious instinct—if I may so call it—and whenever I have met him since, my love for him, and the deep interest I felt in his sorrow, although perfectly unconscious of the cause, acquired new strength."
"The voice of nature asserting her solemn claims upon your heart. To drown this voice, Dorothy, would be to close your ears to the commandment which tells us to honour our father and mother."
"What shall I do? Oh, tell me, how to act towards him;" and the supplicating black eyes were raised to his, gleaming through tears.
"Write to him, Dorothy, freely, fully, confidentially. Let there be no secrets between you. He claims your sympathy; give it to him with your whole heart. Think how much he needs it, watching day by day the sick bed of his only son. Hoping, fearing, still praying for his recovery, yet inwardly conscious that the feeble flame of life flickers to its close. Remember, that in a few weeks at the farthest, you will be all that remains to him in the world."
"Oh, I feel ashamed of having felt any bitterness against him," said Dorothy. "It was cruel, it was sinful. How I wish I could console him for the loss of that dear son. The brother," he says, "that is so like me, whom now, I shall never see."
"Oh, yes, Dorothy, you will see him. His life is but one act in the vast drama of Eternity. But we will turn from this sad subject, and speak of Lord Wilton's kindness and forethought for your comfort, in providing a home for you with Mrs. Martin, in case you should find the company of these strange women, who are coming to the farm to-morrow, disagreeable."
"It was very good."
Both remained silent some minutes. Mr. Fitzmorris took Dorothy's hand, and said with deep earnestness:—
"Dare I ask my young friend how she bore the news of Gilbert's marriage?"
"You will think me very unfeeling, Mr. Fitzmorris; I felt glad—felt that I could meet him with perfect composure. That it was God's will that it should be so, and I was satisfied. But the thought of meeting his wife was really painful. This you will consider foolish pride on my part. But to me such a meeting is humiliating."
"If she be the woman that the Earl represents, you need not feel humbled by her bad, or exalted by her good opinion. Treat her with Christian benevolence, and avoid all discussions that may lead to angry words. I think it would be hard for any one to quarrel with you, Dorothy."
"But you don't know me, Mr. Fitzmorris. All black-eyed people are naturally fierce. I was on the eve of quarrelling this very morning with father."
"A very hard matter, I should think, to keep from quarrelling with him," said Mr. Fitzmorris, laughing. "But, Dorothy, if you can live in peace with these people, until Lord Wilton's return, I see no actual necessity for your leaving the farm, while your doing so might give rise to unpleasant scandal. Besides, what would that sweet woman, your dear mother, do without you? Keep at the post of duty, little cousin, as long as you can."
"Then you think I had better return."
"Decidedly, I shall call and see Mrs. Rushmere, whenever I can command a spare moment, and you can let me know from time to time, how you get on. Now, put on your bonnet, and I will see you home."