This, however, was about the end of their conference, for they had reached old Betty’s cottage by this time, who came out, ungrateful old woman as she was, to courtesy as humbly to Mr. Brownlow as if he had been twenty old squires, and to ask after his health. And Sara had occasion to speak to her friend Pamela on the other side of the way. It was not consistent with the father’s dignity, of course, to go with her to visit those humble neighbors, but he stood at the gate with old Betty behind in a whirl of courtesies, watching while Sara’s tall, straight, graceful figure went across the road, and Pamela with her little, fresh, bright, dewy face, like an April morning, came running out to meet her. “Poor little thing!” Mr. Brownlow said to himself—though he could not have explained why he was sorry for Pamela; and then he turned back slowly and went home, crossing the long shadows of the trees. He was not satisfied with himself or with his day’s work. He was like a doctor accustomed to regard with a cool and impartial eye the diseases of others, but much at a loss when he had his own personal pains in hand. He was uneasy and ashamed when he was alone, and reminded himself that he had managed very badly. What was he to do? Was he to act as a doctor would, and put his domestic malady into the hands of a brother practitioner? But this was a suggestion at which he shuddered. Was he to take Jack into his counsel and get the aid of his judgment?—but Jack was worse, a thousand times worse, than a stranger. He had all his life been considered a very clever lawyer, and he knew it; he had got scores of people out of scrapes, and, one way or other, half the county was beholden to him; and he could do nothing but get himself deeper and deeper into his own miserable scrape. Faint thoughts of making it into “a case” and taking opinions on it—taking Wrinkell’s opinion, for instance, quietly, his old friend who had a clear head and a great deal of experience—came into his mind. He had made a muddle of it himself. And then the Rector’s question recurred to him with still greater force—could it be softening of the brain? Perhaps it would be best to speak to the doctor first of all.
Meanwhile Sara had gone into Mrs. Swayne’s little dark parlor, out of the sunshine, and had seated herself at Pamela’s post in the window, very dreamy and full of thought. She did not even speak for a long time, but let her little friend prattle to her. “I saw you and Mr. Brownlow coming down the avenue,” said Pamela; “what a long time you were, and how strange it looked! Sometimes you had a great deal to say, and then for a long time you would walk on and on, and never look at each other. Was he scolding you? Sometimes I thought he was.”
Sara made no answer to this question; she only uttered a long, somewhat demonstrative sigh, and then went off upon a way of her own. “I wonder how it would have felt to have had a mother?” she said, and sighed again, to her companion’s great dismay.
“How it would have felt!” said Pamela; “that is just the one thing that makes me feel I don’t envy you. You have quantities and quantities of fine things, but I have mamma.”
“And I have papa,” said Sara, quickly, not disposed to be set at a disadvantage; “that was not what I meant. Sometimes, though you may think it very wicked, I feel as if I was rather glad; for, of course, if mamma had been living it would have been very different for me; and then sometimes I think I would give a great deal—Look here. I don’t like talking of such things; but did you ever think what you would do if you were married? Fanny Hardcastle likes talking of it. How do you think you should feel? to the gentleman, you know?”
“Think,” said Pamela; “does one need to think about it? love him, to be sure.” And this she said with a rising color, and with two rays of new light waking up in her eyes.
“Ah, love him,” said Sara; “it is very easy to talk; but how are you to love him? that does not come of itself just when it is told, you know; at least I suppose it doesn’t—I am sure I never tried.”
“But if you did not love him, of course you would not marry him,” said Pamela, getting confused.
“Yes—that is just one of the things it is so easy to say,” said Sara; “and I suppose at your age you don’t know any better. Don’t you know that people have to marry, whether they like it or not? and when they never, never would have thought of it themselves? I suppose,” said Sara, in the strength of her superior knowledge, “that most of us are married like that. Because it suits our people, or because— I don’t know what—any thing but one’s own will.” And this little speech the young martyr again rounded with a sigh.
“Are you going to be married?” said Pamela, drawing a footstool close to her friend’s feet, and looking up with awe into her face. “I wish you would tell me. Mamma has gone to Dewsbury, and she will not be back for an hour. Oh, do tell me—I will never repeat it to any body. And, dear Miss Brownlow, if you don’t love him—”