“Hush! you have never even insinuated that an explanation was necessary, which is the very height and climax of fine manners,” said Mrs. Hilyard; “and I speak who am, or used to be, an authority in such matters. I don’t mean to give you any explanation either. Now, you must turn back and go home. Good-night. One thing I may tell you, however,” she continued, with a little warmth; “don’t mistake me. There is no reason in this world why you might not introduce me to the ladies in Lonsdale, if any accident brought it about that we should meet. I say this to make your mind easy about your penitent; and now, my good young father in the faith, good-night.”
“Let me see you to your door first,” said the wondering young man.
“No—no farther. Good-night,” she said, hastily, shaking hands, and leaving him. The parting was so sudden that it took Vincent a minute to stop short, under way and walking quickly as he was. When she had made one or two rapid steps in advance, Mrs. Hilyard turned back, as if with a sudden impulse.
“Do you know I have an uneasiness about these ladies in Lonsdale?” she said; “I know nothing whatever about them—not so much as their names; but you are their natural protector; and it does not do for women to be as magnanimous and generous in the reception of strangers as you are. There! don’t be alarmed. I told you I knew nothing. They may be as safe, and as middle-aged, and as ugly as I am; instead of a guileless widow and a pretty little girl, they may be hardened old campaigners like myself; but they come into my mind, I cannot tell why. Have them here to live beside you, and they will do you good.”
“My sister is about to be married,” said Vincent, more and more surprised, and looking very sharply into her face in the lamplight, to see whether she really did not know anything more than she said.
A certain expression of relief came over her face.
“Then all is well,” she said, with strange cordiality, and again held out her hand to him. Then they parted, and pursued their several ways through the perfectly silent and dimly-lighted streets. Vincent walked home with the most singular agitation in his mind. Whether to give any weight to such vague but alarming suggestions—whether to act immediately upon the indefinite terror thus insinuated into his thoughts—or to write, and wait till he heard whether any real danger existed—or to cast it from him altogether as a fantastic trick of imagination, he could not tell. Eventful and exciting as the evening had been, he postponed the other matters to this. If any danger threatened Susan, his simple mother could suffer with her, but was ill qualified to protect her: but what danger could threaten Susan? He consoled himself with the thought that these were not the days of abductions or violent love-making. To think of an innocent English girl in her mother’s house as threatened with mysterious danger, such as might have surrounded a heroine of the last century, was impossible. If there are Squire Thornhills nowadays, their operations are of a different character. Walking rapidly home, with now and then a blast of chill rain in his face, and the lamplight gleaming in the wet streets, Vincent found less and less reason for attaching any importance to Mrs. Hilyard’s hints and alarms. It was the sentiment of the night, and her own thoughts, which had suggested such fears to her mind—a mind evidently experienced in paths more crooked than any which Vincent himself, much less simple Susan, had ever known. When he reached home, he found his little fire burning brightly, his room arranged with careful nicety, which was his landlady’s appropriate and sensible manner of showing her appreciation of the night’s lecture, and her devotion to the minister; and, lastly, on the table a letter from that little house in Lonsdale, round which such fanciful fears had gathered. Never was there a letter which breathed more of the peaceful security and tranquillity of home. Mrs. Vincent wrote to her Arthur in mingled rejoicing and admonition, curious and delighted to hear of his lectures, but not more anxious about his fame and success than about his flannels and precautions against wet feet; while Susan’s postscript—a half longer than the letter to which it was appended—furnished her affectionate brother with sundry details, totally incomprehensible to him, of her wedding preparations, and, more shyly, of her perfect girlish happiness. Vincent laughed aloud as he folded up that woman’s letter. No mysterious horror, no whispering doubtful gloom, surrounded that house from which the pure, full daylight atmosphere, untouched by any darkness, breathed fresh upon him out of these simple pages. Here, in this humble virtuous world, were no mysteries. It was a deliverance to a heart which had begun to falter. Wherever fate might be lingering in the wild darkness of that January night, it was not on the threshold of his mother’s house.
CHAPTER X.
ON the next evening after this there was a tea-meeting in Salem Chapel. In the back premises behind the chapel were all needful accommodations for the provision of that popular refreshment—boilers, tea-urns, unlimited crockery and pewter. In fact, it was one of Mr. Tozer’s boasts, that owing to the liberality of the “connection” in Carlingford, Salem was fully equipped in this respect, and did not need to borrow so much as a spoon or teapot, a very important matter under the circumstances. This, however, was the first tea-meeting which had taken place since that one at which Mr. Tufton’s purse had been presented to him, and the old pastor had taken leave of his flock. The young pastor, indeed, had set his face against tea-meetings. He was so far behind his age as to doubt their utility, and declared himself totally unqualified to preside over such assemblies; but, in the heat of his recent disappointment, when, stung by other people’s neglect, he had taken up Salem and all belonging to it into his bosom, a cruel use had been made of the young minister’s compliance. They had wrung a reluctant consent from him in that unguarded moment, and the walls of Carlingford had been for some days blazing with placards of the tea-meeting, at which the now famous (in Carlingford) lecturer on Church and State was to speak. Not Tozer, with all his eloquence, had been able to persuade the pastor to preside; but at least he was to appear, to take tea at that table elevated on the platform, where Phœbe Tozer, under the matronly care of Mrs. Brown (for it was necessary to divide these honours, and guard against jealousy), dispensed the fragrant lymph, and to address the meeting. There had been thoughts of a grand celebration in the Music Hall to do more honour to the occasion; but as that might have neutralised the advantages of having all the needful utensils within themselves, convenience and economy carried the day, and the scene of these festivities, as of all the previous festivities of Salem, was the large low room underneath the chapel, once intended for a school, but never used, except on Sundays, in that capacity. Thither for two or three days all the “young ladies” of the chapel had streamed to and fro, engaged in decorations. Some manufactured festoons of evergreens, some concocted pink and white roses in paper to embellish the same. The printed texts of the Sunday school were framed, and in some cases obliterated, in Christmas garlands. Christmas, indeed, was past, but there were still holly and red berries and green smooth laurel leaves. The Pigeon girls, Phœbe Tozer, Mrs. Brown’s niece from the country, and the other young people in Salem who were of sufficiently advanced position, enjoyed the preparations greatly—entering into them with even greater heartiness than Lucy Wodehouse exhibited in the adornment of St. Roque’s, and taking as much pleasure in the task as if they had been picturesque Italians adorning the shrine of their favourite saint. Catterina and Francesca with their flower-garlands are figures worthy of any picture, and so is Lucy Wodehouse under the chancel arch at St. Roque’s; but how shall we venture to ask anybody’s sympathy for Phœbe and Maria Pigeon as they put up their festoons round the four square walls of the low schoolroom in preparation for the Salem tea-party? Nevertheless it is a fact that the two last mentioned had very much the same intentions and sensations, and amid the coils of fresh ivy and laurel did not look amiss in their cheerful labour—a fact which, before the work was completed, had become perceptible to various individuals of the Carlingford public. But Mr. Vincent was, on this point, as on several others, unequal to the requirements of his position. When he did glance in for a moment of the afternoon of the eventful day, it was in company with Tozer and the Rev. Mr. Raffles of Shoebury, who was to take the chair. Mr. Raffles was very popular in Carlingford, as everywhere. To secure him for a tea-meeting was to secure its success. He examined into all the preparations, tasted the cake, pricked his fingers with the garlands to the immense delight of the young ladies, and complimented them on their skill with beaming cheerfulness; while the minister of Salem, on the contrary, stalked about by his side pale and preoccupied, with difficulty keeping himself from that contempt of the actual things around to which youth is so often tempted. His mind wandered off to the companion of his last night’s walk—to the stranger pacing up and down that damp garden with inscrutable unknown thoughts—to the beautiful creature within those lighted windows, so near and yet so overwhelmingly distant—as if somehow they had abstracted life and got it among themselves. Mr. Vincent had little patience for what he considered the mean details of existence nearer at hand. As soon as he could possibly manage it, he escaped, regarding with a certain hopeless disgust the appearance he had to make in the evening, and without finding a single civil thing to say to the fair decorators. “My young brother looks sadly low and out of spirits,” said jolly Mr. Raffles. “What do you mean by being so unkind to the minister, Miss Phœbe, eh?” Poor Phœbe blushed pinker than ever, while the rest laughed. It was pleasant to be supposed “unkind” to the minister; and Phœbe resolved to do what she could to cheer him when she sat by his elbow at the platform table making tea for the visitors of the evening.
The evening came, and there was not a ticket to be had anywhere in Carlingford: the schoolroom, with its blazing gas, its festoons, and its mottoes, its tables groaning with dark-complexioned plumcake and heavy buns, was crowded quite beyond its accommodation; and the edifying sight might be seen of Tozer and his brother deacons, and indeed all who were sufficiently interested in the success of Salem to sacrifice themselves on its behalf, making an erratic but not unsubstantial tea in corners, to make room for the crowd. And in the highest good-humour was the crowd which surrounded all the narrow tables. The urns were well filled, the cake abundant, the company in its best attire. The ladies had bonnets, it is true, but these bonnets were worthy the occasion. At the table on the platform sat Mr. Raffles, in the chair, beaming upon the assembled party, with cheerful little Mrs. Tufton and Mrs. Brown at one side of him, and Phœbe looking very pink and pretty, shaded from the too enthusiastic admiration of the crowd below by the tea-urn at which she officiated. Next to her, the minister cast abstracted looks upon the assembly. He was, oh, so interesting in his silence and pallor!—he spoke little; and when any one addressed him, he had to come back as if from a distance to hear. If anybody could imagine that Mr. Raffles contrasted dangerously with Mr. Vincent in that reserve and quietness, it would be a mistake unworthy a philosophic observer. On the contrary, the Salem people were all doubly proud of their pastor. It was not to be expected that such a man as he should unbend as the reverend chairman did. They preferred that he should continue on his stilts. It would have been a personal humiliation to the real partisans of the chapel, had he really woke up and come down from that elevation. The more commonplace the ordinary “connection” was, the more proud they felt of their student and scholar. So Mr. Vincent leaned his head upon his hands and gazed unmolested over the lively company, taking in all the particulars of the scene, the busy groups engaged in mere tea-making and tea-consuming—the flutter of enjoyment among humble girls and womankind who knew no pleasure more exciting—the whispers which pointed out himself to strangers among the party—the triumphant face of Tozer at the end of the room, jammed against the wall, drinking tea out of an empty sugar-basin. If the scene woke any movement of human sympathy in the bosom of the young Nonconformist, he was half ashamed of himself for it. What had the high mission of an evangelist—the lofty ambition of a man trained to enlighten his country—the warm assurance of talent which felt itself entitled to the highest sphere,—what had these great things to do in a Salem Chapel tea-meeting? So the lofty spirit held apart, gazing down from a mental elevation much higher than the platform; and all the people who had heard his lectures pointed him out to each other, and congratulated themselves on that studious and separated aspect which was so unlike other men. In fact, the fine superiority of Mr. Vincent was at the present moment the very thing that was wanted to rivet their chains. Even Mrs. Pigeon looked on with silent admiration. He was “high”—never before had Salem known a minister who did not condescend to be gracious at a tea-meeting—and the leader of the opposition honoured him in her heart.