Part 2, Chapter XII.
Harebells in Snow.
Fifty thousand pounds! For a penniless girl to find herself suddenly possessed of such a golden dower is a very wonderful experience. This was the fate which, towards the end of November, descended upon little Jeanie Palmer, and, as she truly said, “It was quite upsetting.” It came in a natural, though unexpected manner. An uncle died, possessed of a much larger fortune than had been supposed, and divided it by will, between Jeanie and another niece. That “something” might come to her from this quarter, her mother had always hoped; but nothing so splendid had ever been anticipated. It meant, in the first place, frocks of an altogether different quality to any Jeanie had previously possessed; and, in the second, an entire change of plans for herself and her mother.
It had been a great advantage last summer to come to Ingleby, and live in so comfortable and dignified a fashion; but now Jeanie would have her own house, and needed her mother to arrange it for her.
Besides, Godfrey would be coming back, and if he chose to seek out Jeanie again, he should see her in a new light. No one would ever feel her to be anybody at Ingleby; but, among the Palmers, she would be now a person of consequence, and her mother told Guy that she was sorry to break up their comfortable arrangements, but Jeanie had business to attend to, and must go to old Mr Matthew Palmer’s, near Rilston, he being her trustee.
“I am very sorry you must go, Cousin Susan,” said Guy, with perfect truth.
And yet it did not seem to the two ladies that their presence in the house could have made much difference to him. Every hour that his strength held out he spent on his work, and when he was driven to what he called resting, he often shut himself up in the study, and what he did there, they knew not. He had what Mrs Palmer called, “uncomfortable ways.” They felt him to be an uncomfortable person. His colourless face and preoccupied eyes—eyes that seemed always watchful, but that watched for something out of other people’s ken, like a wild creature’s, who scents or hears some far-off foe—were too odd to be pleasant.
In the mill, however, he proved himself born to rule. In spite of his youth and his bad health, he made himself felt in every corner of it, and won allegiance, if not affection. It was not his way to be irritable, but he was always grave; often stern and sarcastic, determined and dictatorial as ever old Margaret had been in the hey-day of her strength. When he stood leaning against the doorway of the long rooms, breathless with climbing the stairs, there was not a worker who did not wish to avoid his criticism; while the old managers gave in to his daring new departures, and never doubted that he could sail the ship.