When all our luggage had been got into the hall, and we had dismissed the post-boy with what I’m sure was a very handsome gratuity for himself, my mamma at once broke to us the terrible news which was to welcome us home.
About three that afternoon, the good, kind soul had given herself the trouble of coming over to see that all was nice and comfortable against our arrival. She had knocked for at least a quarter of an hour, and fancying the maid might be out on an errand, she had gone a little further. But on coming back, she had found the same impossibility of making any one in the house hear. She grew extremely alarmed, though naturally far from a nervous woman, like the rest of our family. She thought the house perhaps had been stripped, and the horrid ideas that passed through her mind she told us no one could imagine. At last she determined on forcing an entrance for herself; so she borrowed a pair of steps from next door; and with extreme difficulty, (for mamma is inclined to be stout,) and almost at the peril of some of the bones in her body, got in at the parlour window.
Down in the kitchen, she found the maid lying on her back on the rug, before the fire, in a state of complete insensibility, while our best linen sheets—which mamma had given out to her the day before, in order that they might be properly aired against our return—were hanging on the horse, burnt to perfect rags, so that they could not even be cut up into glass-cloths; and it was a mercy, she said, for which we ought to go down on our bended knees, that we did not come home and find our cottage orné a mass of black, smouldering, heart-rending ruins.
The state into which this dreadful news threw both Edward and myself may be more easily imagined than described. Mamma’s lively picture of the good-for-nothing woman’s sufferings filled our hearts at the time with pity for the disreputable creature. We all thought it was a fit, and that the slut was afflicted with epilepsy; but alas! it was much worse than that; and she was, therefore, totally undeserving of all sympathy. Though we were then so wrapt up in the woman, (if I might be allowed the expression,) that we were unable to see through the minx; which fully convinces me of the truth of the popular saying—“that we are all blind mortals.”
And a nice state we found the place in, indeed—everything topsy turvy throughout the establishment—indeed, any one, to have seen it, would have said that the whole house had been turned out of windows—not even so much as a spark of fire in the parlour grate—no cloth laid, nor things on the table for tea. Indeed, had we been dying of hunger ever so, there was nothing in the house for us but discomfort and misery—nor was there a thing to welcome us but some hot water—and even that we should not have had, if my dear mamma herself had not prepared it for our reception. So that—to use a figure of speech—the place really seemed as if it did not belong to us, and that we were nothing better than intruders in our own house.
I was even forced to stoop to light the fire myself; and my fair readers may well imagine my feelings when I tell them that there was scarcely even a bundle of wood in the establishment. As soon as it was fairly alight, I gave the bellows to poor Edward, who not being, as he said, “used to that sort of thing,” was consequently in a great passion; so I left him alone to blow up the fire, while I went to see that deceitful bit of goods, with the epilepsy, as I thought, up in the front attic—for my mother had put her to bed during her fit—(pretty fit, indeed!—but more of this hereafter.)
When I got there, I found my dear mamma standing by the bed-side with a brandy-bottle, giving her some of the liquor in a dessert-spoon, with the view of bringing her back to her senses. Asking mamma how the poor thing (a deceitful baggage!) was, she told me that she had given her some spirits before, and it seemed to do her a world of good, for she had gone off to sleep afterwards. Presently, the girl opened her eyes, and from the dull, leaden expression they had, I was quite shocked; for at the time she appeared to me to be literally standing at death’s door. I shook her gently, (though if I had known then half as much as I do now, I really think I should have forgotten myself, and shaken the cat to bits,) and asked her how she felt herself now. Upon which she made an effort to speak; but the woman was no longer herself, for she had entirely lost the use of her tongue, and there was no getting anything out of her. My mamma, however, thought she would be able to understand, even if she could not speak; and told Mary that it was very wrong and wicked of her not to have said that she was subject to fits before she entered our service, and tried to learn whether they were periodical or not, but all to no purpose. So we both left her; and I remarked to mamma, as we came down stairs, that, though I should have felt myself bound to have mentioned the circumstance of her fits in her character, still the omission was very excusable in her late mistress; for it really would have been like taking the bread out of the poor creature’s mouth, which no true lady could be expected to do.
When we returned to the parlour, we found Edward with (thanks to goodness!) a nice fire, but he was so surly, (and well he might be,) at the place being so uncomfortable, that he kept banging the things about, though I did not expect he would have done as much so soon after our marriage; and I recollect at the time it struck me as being highly indecent. We described to him the state of the girl, and were much hurt (though we thought it best not to show it) at the strong want of feeling he displayed upon hearing an account of her affliction; for he was too ready to put a bad construction on her illness; and didn’t hesitate to say that he’d forfeit his head if the fits didn’t turn out to be fits of drunkenness after all, calling the girl, to our great horror, “a gin-drinking toad.” This so kindled my mamma’s wrath, that she declared she wondered how he could ever stand there and say such things; and that she should be very much astonished if his words did not rise up in judgment against him some fine day or other; for that she was never more convinced of anything in her life than that we should eventually find Mary, as she had before said, and would say again, and she did not care who heard her—a perfect treasure. Though she could not help allowing that the fits were a slight drawback, and went somewhat against the girl; still, as she could not reasonably be expected to have more than one every six weeks, and would be sure to have warning when they were coming on, why really my mamma said she could not see that there was so much for a body to put up with, after all.
Edward observed, that, considering all things, he was afraid he should have a good deal to put up with, from a certain quarter that was not a hundred miles off. On which my mamma said something that has escaped me; and Edward replied, I can’t exactly at present call to mind what. So that I felt that a storm was gathering round about my head, and that the house (if I may be permitted to use so strong an expression) would shortly be too hot to hold me. Accordingly, with my usual sagacity in such matters, I went up and kissed dear mamma, and got her to go down stairs and look after the tea, for I was anxious to separate them, as I saw they had every disposition to get together by the ears, which I was sure would give rise to a great deal of pain on both sides.
At tea, little was said by either party—and, indeed, it was a sorry meal. For my poor mamma had been thrown into such a flurry by Edward’s cruel, ungrateful treatment, that she could not for the life of her lay her hands upon the lump-sugar, and we were obliged to put up with moist, to which Edward has a horrid dislike—and Mary had forgotten to take in the milk while she was in her fit—and mamma had had the misfortune to cut the bread and butter with an oniony knife, which gave my husband’s stomach quite a turn; so that everything went crooked with us that evening, and we were not sorry when the time came for mamma to leave. As she was putting on her bonnet, she told me that Edward had behaved so rude to her, that he really had quite upset her, (to use a figure of speech,) and she didn’t know how she was ever to manage to get home, for she positively couldn’t say whether she was walking on her head or her heels.