But hark you, Kate,
Whither I go, thither shall you go too;
To-day will I set forth, to-morrow you.
HENRY IV.
“What could you do in Allenders? one never knows how to deal with you capricious women. Stay at home, Agnes, and manage your own department—it is impossible you could assist me, and you would only be a hindrance to work. Stay at home, I say, till the place is ready for you.”
Agnes laid down the child softly upon the sofa where she was sitting, and answered nothing; but her face wore a look of resignation which Harry thought ostentatious, and which irritated him greatly, as indeed his little wife partly knew.
He started hastily from his seat with a contracted brow, and began to walk about the room, muttering something to himself about the impossibility of pleasing everybody. Poor little Agnes was desperately exerting herself to swallow a sob; she did feel a little fretful and peevish, it was very true, but at the same time she honestly struggled to keep it down.
“Martha, say something,” whispered Rose. “Harry is angry—speak to him, Martha.”
But Martha sat still and said nothing—for Harry’s magnificent intentions troubled his sister with an uneasy sense of dependence. It is oftentimes a greater exercise of generosity to receive than to bestow. Labouring for Harry would have seemed to Martha a thing so natural as never to disturb her every-day life for a moment; to be supported by Harry, called for a stronger exertion. But Harry’s sister was of a stouter spirit than Harry’s wife. She preferred, even at a risk of great pain, to make trial quietly of this new life, rather than to say how irksome to her was the prospect of burdening her brother, and to undergo a scene of indignation, and grief, and reconcilement. Nevertheless, Martha felt her influence abridged, and was silent—for this fortune did not change her own position or that of her sisters. Harry and his wife alone were rightful sharers of this unexpected elevation, and Martha stepped down from the elder sister’s place, not without a struggle, and endeavoured to turn her eyes, which had so long expressed the distinct decisions of a separate will, towards the young irresolute pair beside her as to the heads of the house.
“Why don’t you speak, Martha?” exclaimed Harry at last, noticing her silence with a renewed burst of impatience. “Why don’t you say what you think at once, instead of sitting glooming at us all?”