I think I was loath to leave the house. Can you believe it?—What could be the matter with me, I wonder?—I felt something so strange, and my heart was so lumpish!—I wonder what ailed me!—But this was so unexpected!—I believe that was all!—Yet I am very strange still. Surely, surely, I cannot be like the old murmuring Israelites, to long after the onions and garlick of Egypt, when they had suffered there such heavy bondage?—I’ll take thee, O lumpish, contradictory, ungovernable heart! to severe task, for this thy strange impulse, when I get to my dear father’s and mother’s; and if I find any thing in thee that should not be, depend upon it thou shalt be humbled, if strict abstinence, prayer, and mortification, will do it!
But yet, after all, this last goodness of his has touched me too sensibly. I wish I had not heard it, almost; and yet, methinks, I am glad I did; for I should rejoice to think the best of him, for his own sake.
Well, and so I went out to the chariot, the same that brought me down. So, Mr. Robert, said I, here I am again! a poor sporting-piece for the great! a mere tennis-ball of fortune! You have your orders, I hope. Yes, madam, said he. Pray, now, said I, don’t madam me, nor stand with your hat off to such a one as I. Had not my master, said he, ordered me not to be wanting in respect to you, I would have shewn you all I could. Well, said I, with my heart full, that’s very kind, Mr. Robert.
Mr. Colbrand, mounted on horseback, with pistols before him, came up to me, as soon as I got in, with his hat off too. What, monsieur! said I, are you to go with me?—Part of the way, he said, to see you safe. I hope that’s kind too, in you, Mr. Colbrand, said I.
I had nobody to wave my handkerchief to now, nor to take leave of; and so I resigned myself to my contemplations, with this strange wayward heart of mine, that I never found so ungovernable and awkward before.
So away drove the chariot!—And when I had got out of the elm-walk, and into the great road, I could hardly think but I was in a dream all the time. A few hours before, in my master’s arms almost, with twenty kind things said to me, and a generous concern for the misfortunes he had brought upon me; and only by one rash half-word exasperated against me, and turned out of doors, at an hour’s warning; and all his kindness changed to hate! And I now, from three o’clock to five, several miles off! But if I am going to you, all will be well again, I hope.
Lack-a-day, what strange creatures are men! gentlemen, I should say, rather! For, my dear deserving good mother, though poverty be both your lots, has had better hap, and you are, and have always been, blest in one another!—Yet this pleases me too; he was so good, he would not let Mrs. Jewkes speak ill of me, and scorned to take her odious unwomanly advice. O, what a black heart has this poor wretch! So I need not rail against men so much; for my master, bad as I have thought him, is not half so bad as this woman.—To be sure she must be an atheist!—Do you think she is not?
We could not reach further than this little poor place and sad alehouse, rather than inn; for it began to be dark, and Robin did not make so much haste as he might have done; and he was forced to make hard shift for his horses.
Mr. Colbrand, and Robert too, are very civil. I see he has got my portmanteau lashed behind the coach. I did not desire it; but I shall not come quite empty.
A thorough riddance of me, I see!—Bag and baggage! as Mrs. Jewkes says. Well, my story surely would furnish out a surprising kind of novel, if it was to be well told.