Christian's Mistake

by Dinah Maria Mulock Craik

As she was to Oliver, who, wakening at the storm in the nursery, took to sleepy crying, and was immediately lulled in her arms with the fondest soothing; the fiercest threatenings between whiles being directed to Letitia and Arthur, until they both slunk off to bed, sullen and silent—at war with one another, with Phillis, and with the whole world.

But children's woes are transient. By-and-by Titia's fretful face settled into sleepy peace; the angry flush melted from Arthur's hot cheeks; Oliver had already been transferred to his crib; and Phillis settled herself to her sewing, queen regnant of the silent nursery.

Meanwhile, at the other end of the ghostly gallery, sat, over the dining-room fire, the two other rulers, guardians, and guides of these three children—"the aunts"—Miss Gascoigne and Miss Grey; for these ladies still remained at the Lodge. Dr. Grey had asked Christian if she wished them to leave, for they had a house of their own near Avonsbridge, and she had answered indifferently, "Oh no; let them do as they like." As she liked did not seem to enter into her thoughts. Alas! that sacred dual solitude, which most young wives naturally and rightfully desire, was no vital necessity to Christian Grey.

So the two ladies, who had come to the Lodge when their sister died, had declared their intention of remaining there, at least for the present, "for the sake of those poor, dear children." And, dressed in at their best, they sat solemnly waiting the arrival of the children's father and step-mother—"that young woman," as they always spoke of her in Avonsbridge.

What Dr. Grey had gone through in domestic opposition before he married, he alone knew, and he never told. But he had said, as every man under similar circumstances has a right to say, "I will marry," and had done it. Besides, he was a just man; he was fully aware that to his sisters Christian was not—could not be as yet, any more than the organist's daughter and the silversmith's governess, while they were University ladies. But he knew them, and he knew her; he was not afraid.

They were a strong contrast, these two, the ladies at the Lodge. Miss Grey, the elder, was a little roly-poly woman, with a meek, round, fair-complexioned face, and pulpy soft-hands—one of those people who irresistibly remind one of a white mouse. She was neither clever nor wise, but she was very sweet-tempered. She had loved Dr. Grey all her life. From the time that she, a big girl, had dandled him, a baby, in her lap; throughout her brief youth, when she was engaged to young Mr. Gascoigne, who died; up to her somewhat silly and helpless middle-age, there never was anybody, to Miss Grey, like "my brother Arnold." Faithfulness is a rare virtue; let us criticise her no more, but pass her over, faults and all.

Miss Gascoigne was a lady who could not be passed over on any account. Nothing would have so seriously offended her. From her high nose to her high voice and her particularly high temper, every thing about her was decidedly prononcé. There was no extinguishing her or putting her into a corner. Rather than be unnoticed—if such a thing she could ever believe possible—she would make herself noticeable in any way, even in an ill way. She was a good-looking woman, and a clever woman too, only not quite clever enough to find out one slight fact—that there might be any body in the world superior to herself.

"Set down your value at your own huge rate,
The world will pay it"

—for a time. And so the world had paid it pretty well to Miss
Gascoigne, but was beginning a little to weary of her; except fond
Miss Grey, who still thought that, as there never was a man like "dear
Arnold," so there was not a woman any where to compare with "dear
Henrietta."

There is always something pathetic in this sort of alliance between two single women unconnected by blood. It implies a substitution for better things—marriage or kindred ties; and has in some cases a narrowing tendency. No two people, not even married people, can live alone together for a number of years without sinking into a sort of double selfishness, ministering to one another's fancies, humors, and even faults in a way that is not possible, or probable, in the wider or wholesomer life of a family. And if, as is almost invariably the case—indeed otherwise such a tie between women could not long exist—the stronger governs the weaker, one domineers and the other obeys, the result is bad for both. It might be seen in the fidgety restlessness of Miss Gascoigne, whose eyes, still full of passionate fire, lent a painful youthfulness to her faded face, and in the lazy supineness of Miss Grey, who seemed never to have an opinion or a thought of her own. This was the dark side of the picture; the bright side being that it is perfectly impossible for two women, especially single women, to live together, in friendship and harmony, for nearly twenty years, without a firm basis of moral worth existing in their characters, producing a fidelity of regard which is not only touching, but honorable to both.