Her voice fell into its lowest and tenderest key as she spoke these last words, and the tears stood in her eyes, as if the thought of Christ's life, so long familiar, had started into a new meaning for her. The opportunity for copying Him more literally than she had ever done before was granted to her, and her spirit sprang forward eagerly to seize it. Mr. Chantrey sat silent, yet with a lighter heart than he had had for months. He felt that if Ann Holland went out with them half his load would be gone. There was a brighter hope for Sophy, and there would be a sure friend for his boy, whatever his own fate might be. Yet he shrank from accepting such a sacrifice, and could only see the selfishness of doing so at the first moment.
"You must take another week to think of it," he said.
But when the week was ended Ann Holland was more confirmed in her wish than before. The news that she was going out with Mr. Chantrey's family caused as great a stir in the town as that of the rector's resignation. The Hollands had always been saddlers in Upton, and all the true old Upton people had faithfully adhered to them, never being tempted away by interlopers from London or other places, who professed to do better work at lower prices. To be sure the last male Holland was gone, but every one knew that his only share in the business for many years had been the spending of the money it brought in. That Ann Holland should give up her good trade and go out as servant to the Chantreys—for so it was represented by the news-bearers—was an unheard-of, incredible thing. Many were the remonstrances she had to listen to, and to answer as best she could.
It was a bitter day for Ann Holland when she saw her treasured household furniture sold by auction and scattered to the four winds. Many of her old neighbors bought for themselves some mementoes of the place they knew so well, but the bulk of the larger articles were sold without sentiment or feeling. It was a pang to part with each one of them, as they were carried off to some strange or hostile house to be put to common uses. The bare walls and empty rooms that were left, which she had never seen bare and empty before, seemed terribly new, yet familiar to her. She wandered through them for a few minutes, loitering in each one as she thought of all that had happened to her during her monotonous life; and then, with a sorrowful yet brave heart, she walked along the street to the rectory, which was already dismantled and bare like the home she had just left.
[CHAPTER XIV.]
FAREWELLS
During these busy weeks Mrs. Bolton had looked on in almost sullen silence, except when now and then she had broken out into a passionate invective of her nephew's madness. He had never been indifferent to the luxuries and refinements that give a charm to life, and her nature could not comprehend how all these were poisoned at their source for him. He was eager to exchange them for a chance of a true home, however lowly that home might be. He would willingly have gone to the wilds of Siberia, if by so doing he could secure his wife's reformation An almost feverish haste possessed him. To carry her away from Upton, from England, and to enter upon a quite new career in a strange place, and to accomplish this plan quickly, absorbed him nearly to the exclusion of any other thought. Mrs. Bolton felt herself very much neglected and greatly aggrieved. Her plans were frustrated and her comforts threatened, yet her nephew hardly seemed to think of her—he for whom she had done so much, who would not have been even rector of Upton but for the late archdeacon.
Yet she relented a little from her displeasure as the day for parting came. She was as fond of him and his boy as her nature would allow. Sophy had never been otherwise than an object of her jealousy, and now she positively detested her. But when Mr. Chantrey came on the last evening to sit an hour or two with her, and she saw, as with newly-opened eyes, his care-worn face and wearied, feeble frame, her heart quite melted toward him.
"Remember," she said, eagerly, "you can come back again whenever yon choose, as soon as you grow sure how useless this mad scheme is. I wish I could have persuaded you to keep on your living, but yon are too wilful. You are welcome to draw upon me for funds to return at any time, and I shall supply them gladly, and give you a home here. If yon find your expectations fail, promise me to come back."