In ordinary cases, I have no doubt Mr. Buchanan would have made a little quiet fun of his visitor, whose knock and step he had begun to know, as if she had been a visitor expected and desired. But what took all the fun out of it and prevented even a smile, was the fact that he was horribly afraid of her all the time, and never saw her come in without a tremor at his heart. It seemed to him on each repeated visit that she must in the interval since the last have discovered something: though he knew that there was nothing to discover, and that the proofs of his own culpability were all locked up in his own heart, where they lay and corroded, burning the place, and never permitting him to forget what he had done, although he had done nothing. How often had he said to himself that he had done nothing! But it did him no good, and when Mrs. Mowbray came in with her grievances, he felt as if each time she must denounce him, and on the spot demand that he should pay what he owed. Oh, if that only could be, if she had denounced him, and had the power to compel payment, what a relief it would have been! It would have taken the responsibility off his shoulders, it would have brought him out of hell. There would then have been no possibility of reasoning with himself, or asking how it was to be done, or shrinking from the shame of revealing even to his wife, what had been his burden all these years. He had in his imagination put the very words into her mouth, over and over again. He had made her say: “Mr. Buchanan, you were owing old Mr. Anderson three hundred pounds.” And to this he had replied: “Yes, Mrs. Mowbray,” and the stone had rolled away from his heart. This imaginary conversation had been repeated over and over again in his mind. He never attempted to deny it, never thought now of taking his bill and writing fourscore. Not an excuse did he offer, nor any attempt at denial. “Yes, Mrs. Mowbray:” that was what he heard himself saying: and he almost wished it might come true.
The condition of strange suspense and expectation into which this possibility threw him, is very difficult to describe or understand. His wife perceived something, and perhaps it crossed her mind for a moment that he liked those visits, and that there was reason of offence to herself in them: but she was a sensible woman and soon perceived the folly of such an explanation. But the mere fact that an explanation seemed necessary, disturbed her, and gave her an uncomfortable sensation in respect to him, who never had so far as she knew in all their lives kept any secret from her. What was it? The most likely thing was, that the secret was Mrs. Mowbray’s which she had revealed to him, and which was a burden on his mind because of her, not of himself. That woman—for this was the way in which Mrs. Buchanan began to describe the other lady in her heart—was just the sort of woman to have a history, and what if she had burdened the minister’s conscience with it to relieve her own? “I wonder,” she said to Elsie one day, abruptly, a remark connected with nothing in particular, “what kind of mind the Catholic priests have, that have to hear so many confessions of ill folks’ vices and crimes. It must be as if they had done it all themselves, and not daring to say a word.”
“What makes you think of that, mother?” said Elsie.
“It is no matter what makes me think of it,” said Mrs. Buchanan, a little sharply. “Suppose you were told of something very bad, and had to see the person coming and going, and never knowing when vengeance might overtake them by night or by day.”
“Do you mean, mother, that you would like to tell, and that they should be punished?” Elsie said.
“It would not be my part to punish her,” said the mother, unconsciously betraying herself. “No, no, that would never be in my mind: but you would always be on the outlook for everything that happened if you knew—and specially if she knew that you knew. Whenever a stranger came near, you would think it was the avenger that was coming, or, at the least, it was something that would expose her, that would be like a clap of thunder. Bless me, Elsie, I cannot tell how they can live and thole it, these Catholic priests.”
“They will hear so many things, they will not think much about them,” Elsie said, with philosophy.
“No think about them! when perhaps it is life or death to some poor creature, and her maybe coming from time to time looking at you very wistful as if she were saying: ‘Do you think they will find me out? Do you think it was such a very bad thing? do you think they’ll kill me for it?’ I think I would just go and say it was me that did it, and would they give me what was my due and be done with it, for ever and ever. I think if it was me, that is what I would do.”
“But it would not be true, mother.”
“Oh, lassie,” said Mrs. Buchanan, “dinna fash me with your trues and your no trues! I am saying what I would be worked up to, if my conscience was bowed down with another person’s sin.”