“Nothing: why nothing, mother,” said Hester, opening the door, “only you startled me, that’s all, mother.”
“Startled you indeed! Why, you are shaking all over, child. What could you be doing? I came just to darn that hole in your window curtain while you were out, for I thought you were gone to the Martins an hour ago. What could you be doing, my dear?”
“I was looking out some change. I want some change. Can you lend me half a crown? No: five shillings I want. No, no, four will do. Can you lend me four shillings?”
“Indeed I cannot,” replied her mother, laughing. “With all your stock of money, you can get change from every shop in the town, and I like the appearance of your sending for it. Nanny shall step to the baker’s in a minute. Give me a note, and I will send her.”
Hester went into the kitchen, apparently to save her mother the trouble; but it was to borrow four shillings of Nanny, instead of sending her to the baker’s for twenty.
Enoch was jocose upon her paying him in silver lest she should make the same mistake again, though the chances were a thousand to one against another bad note falling in her way while the small note circulation lasted.
It was a beautiful day, as fresh as mild, and the country was in the perfection of its summer beauty. In order to avoid going home, Hester proceeded to the Martins, and staid till the latest moment she could without keeping her mother waiting for dinner. The summer wind blew away half her cares before she reached the farm; and by the time she left it, she pronounced herself the silliest person in the world for having taken up such a wild fancy as had terrified her this morning.
Rhoda had not yet left her father’s house, nor was likely to do so at present. Her lover had employment, but had not yet nearly repaired the losses which Cavendish’s villany had caused him, and Martin was not now so well able as formerly to enter into engagements to assist his daughter. His rent pressed heavily, now that prices had fallen so much; and the young people must wait. This sentence fell irritatingly upon Rhoda’s ear, month after month;—every Saturday night, when the farmer and his wife ascertained how much or how little was ready to go into the rent-purse, and every Sunday when Chapman brought her home from a long ramble in the lanes, whose turns and windings had lost the charms they possessed for her when she began to follow them in his company, four years ago. She should not have minded, she told Hester, if she had known from the beginning that they must wait five years: it was the disappointment, the suspense, that was so cruel; and she sometimes wished that they had married on Cavendish’s coming. They could but have been ruined by the failure, like many other people; her little legacy would have been safe in the shape of furniture; and they could not well have been more anxious than they were now. Hester sagely took up Mr. Berkeley’s argument on these occasions, and tried very perseveringly to persuade Rhoda that she and Chapman were comfortably free from care, and that they ought to be very glad that they were not married yet Rhoda was equally sure that Hester could have no cares; how should she, with a husband so fond of her that he could not part with her oftener than once in four years, and in possession of a good salaried office, and with no children to provide for, and all so comfortable about her,—to judge from her dress, and the money she had spent at Haleham?
Thus these two school companions went forth this morning, arm in arm, to look after some farm-house pet that had strayed out upon the heath. Each was old in cares though young in years, and each fully persuaded that the other must be easy and gay at heart, in comparison with herself.—Mrs. Martin looked after them from the door of the dairy, as they took their way from the shady nook in which she stood through the orchard, and out upon the heath behind. She shook her head as she watched them, and thought to herself that theirs was not the step with which she went about her work and her pleasures at their age. There was little of girlhood remaining in the heavy gait and absent air with which they walked. There was something wrong in the state of things which took from life the ease and graces of its prime. It was a pity that Mrs. Martin was not within sight of the young women half an hour afterwards, when the summer wind had refreshed their spirits, and made old merry thoughts chase one another over their minds like the wrinkles on the surface of the blue pond which lay open to the breeze. If she had seen them running round the brink to drive the waddling ducks into the water, or watching the sand-martins to their holes, or cherishing the rich brown hairy caterpillar that Hester had nearly trodden upon, or forgetting what they came for in counting how many little orange butterflies were perched at once upon the same gorse bush, she would have been satisfied that to be turned loose upon the heath in a west wind is a certain cure for the cares of the heart. Rhoda had the impression of being still a school-girl all the while; and Hester forgot her suspicion for as much as ten minutes at a time; and when she remembered it again, thought it too absurd to be dwelt upon any more. As if nobody had ever chanced to take a bad note before! As if it was not very likely that in so large a parcel as Edgar had given her, there might be one bad among many good! and at the cheering idea, she gave a new bound upon the turf, and began another race with the butterflies. The two mothers were pleased with the aspect of their respective daughters on their return; Rhoda with her hair blown about her glowing face, and Hester with an arm full of wild flowers, gathered partly from the heath, and partly from the hedges and ditches she had skirted on her way home.
Mrs. Parndon smilingly held up a letter: but Hester did not snatch it as usual. She received it with an absent look, and carried it into her chamber without first breaking the seal. In a moment she was heard saying,