"But now," she said, "that is all over. When you and I come to the end of our conversation, let the days which preceded the dark and terrible one of his death"--she paused for a moment to command her voice,-"let them be consigned to oblivion. There are no faults in the grave; all is so trifling, so small, so contemptible in the presence of that great mystery. I think it is a happy thing, Cuthbert, that the death of a person who has ever been beloved blots out not only anger, but dulls remembrance. I know this is the truth, that many and many a day I sat brooding over small offences, little slights, trifling but significant departures from the courtesies and the graces of love; and oh how miserable such brooding made me! Well, I forget them all now; every trace of bitterness has disappeared,--I remember only all the good there was in my poor Charley, Yes, Cuthbert, he is mine again now; he had ceased to be hers before he was slain; now he is mine again, and I am not going to dwell on his faults."
Cuthbert Farleigh was privately of opinion that Lady Mitford proposed to herself an exceedingly limited sphere of contemplation in respect to her late estimable lord; but he admired, he reverenced, as every man with the heart of a gentleman must, the simple, beautiful, unreasoning instinct of womanly tenderness.
"So now," she went on, "there can be no harm in Helen's coming to me. I am a widow so much sadder and more pitiable than other widows, that I cannot talk of him whom I have lost with that free outspoken pride which is so instinctive in other women, and which must be so sweet and so bitter too, so precious and so terrible. I am truly widowed; for life robbed me of my husband before death came to hide him from my eyes. The world will cease to talk about him soon, and it will forget me when it does not see me. There will be nothing objectionable in the quiet life which I shall ask Helen to share with me until you ask her to leave my home for yours."
Helen Manningtree obeyed Lady Mitford's summons; and from the first hours of their mutual association Sir Laurence Alsager's hopes and expectations were fulfilled. They "suited each other" exactly, and their companionship was beneficial to both.
Helen Manningtree and Mrs. Chisholm corresponded with great regularity with Sir Laurence, now travelling somewhere in the East, and furnishing the most inscrutable addresses for their letters, the attempt to decipher which they ordinarily gave up in despair and pasted them bodily on the envelopes. Their letters were written from London and from Knockholt respectively, and furnished the recipient with the fullest particulars respecting their writers, and the most accurate details of the few events which marked the first year of Lady Mitford's widowhood.
Thus from Helen Sir Laurence learned that the young Sir Edward and his mother had come to town on Lady Mitford's invitation, and that Georgie and the quiet little lady from the country soon became great friends; that the young baronet was a promising boy enough, but given to idleness, the avoidance of soap-and-water, and the pursuit of useless amusements, such as cricket and fishing, as contra-distinguished from classical and useful learning; that his mother and Lady Mitford having duly consulted the family advisers, and received from them the simple counsel that they had better manage the boy as they thought proper, had considered that the very best way of managing him would be to establish him comfortably under the charge of a private tutor of unusually desirable attainments.
When Ellen next wrote she informed Sir Laurence that the private tutor of unusually desirable attainments had been found in the person of Cuthbert Farleigh, who had, moreover, been provided with a very comfortable living not very far distant from Knockholt, by virtue of a mysterious arrangement whereby somebody gave up this piece of preferment at the present, in consideration of some other "good thing" of a similar kind which would be at the young baronet's disposal in the future. Helen did not understand the arrangement very clearly, but she had a perfect appreciation of its results; and though her account of the transaction, as written "out" to Sir Laurence (who, though he wrote vaguely of coming soon, was still beyond the reach of civilization and spelling), was remarkably confused, two facts appeared with unmistakable clearness. The one was that the family lawyers were satisfied with the arrangements ("There's no simony in it, then, or bedevilment of that kind," thought Sir Laurence, relieved when he ascertained this first fact); the second was that Helen's marriage could not take place so early as she and Cuthbert had hoped, because since Cuthbert had ceased to be a curate, the cares of property and position had fallen upon him, involving the repairing and altering of his parsonage-house, new furnishing, &c., &c. "So now, as it is so far off, dear Laurence," wrote Helen, "you really must come home in time for my wedding. I think we should have put the event off, at all events, in order to admit of Lady Mitford's being present; and now, as her year's deep mourning will have more than expired, she has promised to come. Indeed, I rather think our marriage will take place here. You would be much surprised, if you could see her, at her cheerfulness. I am sure it must arise from her perfect forgetfulness of self. She lives entirely for others, and her serenity and sweetness tell that peace is the result. Sir Edward is greatly attached to her; he and Cuthbert also get on very well together. As usual, Lady Mitford sends her kindest regards."
From Mrs. Chisholm Sir Laurence received good tidings of affairs at Knockholt Park. That excellent lady prided herself upon her letter-writing, fondly flattering herself, at times, that she turned her sentences in something of the same manner in which her gifted Augustine had rounded those flowing periods which had been so effective when the departed curate occupied the pulpit at St. Parable's. She liked writing letters, and especially to Sir Laurence; and though she furnished him with plentiful details concerning individuals of whose identity he had the most vague and confused ideas; and though she was very pathetic indeed on the theme of Cuthbert's removal "to a sphere of, I trust, greatly extended usefulness, but that usefulness to others to be purchased at the price of a relapse into spiritual destitution here very sad to contemplate,"--Sir Laurence liked receiving her letters.
The truth was, his heart yearned towards England And home. He had imposed upon himself a fixed term of absence, and nothing would have induced him to abridge that period; but all his resolution did not check his imagination, did not arrest his fancy, did not quell his longing for its expiration. The smallest details which reached him from the distant households in which he was held in such affectionate remembrance had ineffable charm for him. He found himself, under the most unpropitious circumstances and in the most unheard-of places, writing lengthy epistles to Mrs. Chisholm--letters full of almost feminine inquisitiveness, and enjoining the immediate despatch of voluminous replies. He rejoiced the good lady's heart by the sympathy which he expressed in all the local matters which she detailed; and he soothed her sorrows concerning the departure of Cuthbert by so dexterous an argument in favour of the almost inevitable eligibility of the curate destined to succeed him, that Mrs. Chisholm actually prepared to receive him with a gracious and hopeful welcome. Sir Laurence was right; only a young man of exemplary piety and conscientious intentions in the direction of parish-work would be at all likely to accept so poor a provision as the curacy at Laneham,--no doubt all would be well; and she hoped dear Cuthbert would not be led away by his preferment. It was, however, melancholy to observe how great a contrast sometimes existed between the lowly and hard-working curate and the proud, lazy, and worldly-minded rector. She trusted such a contrast might never exist in the case of dear Cuthbert.
The simple-minded lady was thinking, as she thus expressed her guileless hopes and fears, of one curate to whom preferment never came, and whom it never could have spoiled. She had a strong conviction that if there should prove to be any celestial institution at all resembling a bench of bishops in a future state, she should find her Augustine occupying a very prominent place among its occupants.