“Yes, yes, to be sure,” said Vincent, impatiently; “he can have my room, tell your mistress—that will do—we don’t want anything more.”
“Mr. Vincent is going to leave town again this afternoon,” said his mother. “Tell your mistress that I shall be glad to have a little conversation with her after my son goes away—and you had better bring the sauce—but it would have saved you trouble and been more sensible, if you had put it on the tray in the first place. Oh, Arthur,” cried his mother again, when she had seen the little maid fairly out—“do be a little prudent, my dear! When a minister lodges with one of his flock, he must think of appearances—and if it were only for my dear child’s sake, Arthur! Susan must not be spoken of through our anxiety; oh, my child!—Where can she be?—Where can she be?”
“Mother dear, you must keep up, or everything is lost!” cried Vincent, for the first time moved to the depths of his heart by that outcry of despair. He came to her and held her trembling hands, and laid his face upon them without any kiss or caress, that close clinging touch of itself expressing best the fellowship of their wretchedness. But Mrs. Vincent put her son away from her, when the door again bounced open. “My dear boy, here is the sauce, and you must eat your chop,” she said, getting up and drawing forward a chair for him; her hands, which trembled so, grew steady as she put everything in order, cut the bread, and set his plate before him. “Oh, eat something, Arthur dear—you must, or you cannot go through it,” said the widow, with her piteous smile. Then she sat down at the table by him in her defensive armour. The watchful eyes of “the flock” were all around spying upon the dreadful calamity which had overwhelmed them; at any moment the college companion whom Vincent had sent for might come in upon them in all the gaiety of his holiday. What they said had to be said with this consciousness—and the mother, in the depth of her suspense and terror, sat like a queen inspected on all sides, and with possible traitors round her, but resolute and self-commanding in her extremity, determined at least to be true to herself.
“Arthur, can you think where to go?” she said, after a little interval, almost under her breath.
“To London first,” said Vincent—“to inquire after—him, curse him! don’t say anything, mother—I am only a man after all. Then, according to the information I get.—God help us!—if I don’t get back before another Sunday——”
Mrs. Vincent gave a convulsive start, which shook the table against which she was leaning, and fell to shivering as if in a fit of ague. “Oh, Arthur, Arthur, what are you saying? Another Sunday!” she exclaimed, with a cry of despair. To live another day seemed impossible in that horror. But self-restraint was natural to the woman who had been, as she said, a minister’s wife for thirty years. She clasped her hands tight, and took up her burden again. “I will see Mr. Beecher when he comes, dear, and—and speak to him,” she said, with a sigh, “and I will see the Tozers and—and your people, Arthur; and if it should be God’s will to keep us so long in suspense, if—if—I can keep alive, dear, I may be of some use. Oh, Arthur, Arthur, the Lord have pity upon us! if my darling comes back, will she come here or will she go home? Don’t you think she will come here? If I go back to Lonsdale, I will not be able to rest for thinking she is at Carlingford; and if I stay—oh, Arthur, where do you think Susan will go to? She might be afraid to see you, and think you would be angry, but she never could distrust her poor mother, who was the first to put her in danger; and to think of my dear child going either there or here, and not finding me, Arthur! My dear, you are not eating anything. You can never go through it all without some support. For my sake, try to eat a little, my own boy; and oh, Arthur, what must I do?”
“These Tozers and people will worry you to death if you stay here,” said the minister, with an impatient sigh, as he thought of his own difficulties; “but I must not lose time by going back with you to Lonsdale, and you must not travel by yourself, and this is more in the way, whatever happens. Send word to Lonsdale that you are to have a message by telegraph immediately—without a moment’s loss of time—if she comes back.”
“You might say when, Arthur, not if,” said his mother, with a little flash of tender resentment—then she gave way for the moment, and leaned her head against his arm and held him fast with that pressure and close clasp which spoke more than any words. When she raised her pale face again, it was to entreat him once more to eat. “Try to take something, if it were only a mouthful, for Susan’s sake,” pleaded the widow. Her son made a dismal attempt as she told him. Happy are the houses that have not seen such dreadful pretences of meals where tears were the only possible food! When she saw him fairly engaged in this desperate effort to take “some support,” the poor mother went away and wrote a crafty female letter, which she brought to him to read. He would have smiled at it had the occasion been less tragic. It was addressed to the minister of “the connection” at Lonsdale, and set forth how she was detained at Carlingford by some family affairs—how Susan was visiting friends and travelling, and her mother was not sure where to address her—and how it would be the greatest favour if he would see Williams at the cottage, and have a message despatched to Mrs. Vincent the moment her daughter returned. “Do you not think it would be better to confide in him a little, and tell him what anxiety we are in?” said Vincent, when he read this letter. His mother took it out of his hands with a little cry. “Oh, Arthur, though you are her brother, you are only a man, and don’t understand,” cried Mrs. Vincent. “Nobody must have anything to say about my child. If she comes to-night, she will come here,” continued the poor mother, pausing instinctively once more to listen; “she might have been detained somewhere; she may come at any moment—at any moment, Arthur dear! Though these telegraphs frighten me, and look as if they must bring bad news, I will send you word directly when my darling girl comes; but oh, my dear, though it is dreadful to send you away, and to think of your travelling to-morrow and breaking the Sunday, and very likely your people hearing it—oh, Arthur, God knows better, and will not blame you: and if you will not take anything more to eat, you should not lose time, my dearest boy! Don’t look at me, Arthur—don’t say good-bye. Perhaps you may meet her before you leave—perhaps you may not need to go away. Oh, Arthur dear, don’t lose any more time!”
“It is scarcely time for the train yet,” said the minister, getting up slowly; “the world does not care, though our hearts are breaking; it keeps its own time. Mother, good-bye. God knows what may have happened before I see you again.”
“Oh, Arthur, say nothing—say nothing! What can happen but my child to come home?” cried his mother, as he clasped her hands and drew her closer to him. She leaned against her son’s breast, which heaved convulsively, for one moment, and no more. She did not look at him as he went slowly out of the room, leaving her to the unspeakable silence and solitude in which every kind of terror started up and crept about. But before Vincent had left the house his mother’s anxiety and hope were once more excited to passion. Some one knocked and entered; there was a sound of voices and steps on the stair audibly approaching this room in which she sat with her fears. But it was not Susan; it was a young man of Arthur’s own age, with his travelling-bag in his hand, and his sermons in his pocket. He had no suspicion that the sight of him brought the chill of despair to her heart as he went up to shake hands with his friend’s mother. “Vincent would not come back to introduce me,” said Mr. Beecher, “but he said I should find you here. I have known him many years, and it is a great pleasure to make your acquaintance. Sometimes he used to show me your letters years ago. Is Miss Vincent with you? It is pleasant to get out of town for a little, even though one has to preach; and they will all be interested in ’Omerton to hear how Vincent is getting on. Made quite a commotion in the world, they say, with these lectures of his. I always knew he would make an ’it if he had fair-play.”