Master Rowland stared, but made no objection to this invasion; Mrs. Betty, after much private rumination and great persuasion, consented to the arrangement. Young madam was obliged to be ruefully acquiescent, though secretly irate at so preposterous a scheme; the Vicar, good man, to do him justice, was always ponderously anxious to abet his mother, and had, besides, a sneaking kindness for Mistress Betty; the girls were privately charmed, and saw no end to the new element of breadth, brightness, and zest, in their little occupations and amusements.
When again, of a sudden, after the day was fixed for Master Rowland's departure, and the whole family were assembled in the vicarage parlour—old madam fell a-crying and complaining that they were taking her son away from her—robbing her of him: she would never live to set eyes on him again—a poor old body of her years and trials would not survive another flitting. She had been fain to gratify some of his wishes; but see if they would not destroy them both, mother and son, by their stupid narrow-mindedness and obstinacy.
Such a thing had never happened before. Who had ever seen Granny unreasonable and foolish? The Vicar slipped his hand to her wrist, in expectation that he would detect signs of hay-fever, though it was a full month too late for the complaint—there had been cases in the village—and was shaken off with sufficient energy for his pains.
"Mother," exclaimed Master Rowland, haughtily, "I understand you; but I had a plain answer to a plain question months ago, and I will have no reversal to please you. Pity craved by an old woman's weakness! favours granted in answer to tears drawn from dim eyes! I am not such a slave!"
The others were all clamouring round Granny, kissing her hand, kneeling on her footstool, imploring her to tell them what she wanted, what she would like best, what they could go and do for her; only the squire spoke in indignant displeasure, and nobody attended to him but Mistress Betty.
It did appear that the squire had been too fast in repelling advances which did not follow his mother's appeal. Mistress Betty gave no token—she stood pulling the strings of her cap, and growing first very red, and then ominously white, like any girl.
Perhaps the squire suspected that he had been too hasty, that he had not been grateful to his old mother, or generous to the woman who, however fine, and courted, and caressed, was susceptible of a simple woman's anguish at scorn or slight. Perhaps there flashed on his recollection a certain paper in the 'Spectator,' wherein a young lady's secret inclination towards a young gentleman is conclusively revealed, not by her advances to save his pride, but by her silence, her blushes, her disposition to swoon with distress when an opportunity is afforded her of putting herself forward to attract his notice—nay, when she is even urged to go so far as to solicit his regard.
Master Rowland's brow lightened as if a cloud lowering there had suddenly cleared away—Master Rowland began to look as if it were a much more agreeable experience to contemplate Mistress Betty nervous and glum, than Lady Betty armed at a hundred points, and all but invulnerable—Master Rowland walked as alertly to her side as if there were no such things as sprains in this world. "Madam, forgive me if I have attributed to you a weak complacency to which you would never condescend. Madam, if you have changed your mind, and can now tolerate my suit, and accord it the slightest return, I am at your feet."
Assuredly, the tall, vigorous, accomplished squire would have been there, not figuratively but in his imposing person. Family explanations were admissible a century and a half ago; public declarations were sometimes a point of honour; bodily prostration was by no means exploded; matter-of-fact squires knelt like romantic knights; Sir Charles Grandison and Sir Roger de Coverley bent as low for their own purposes as fantastic gauze and tinsel troubadours.
But Mistress Betty prevented him. "I am not worth it, Master Rowland," cried Mistress Betty, sobbing and covering her face with her hands; and, as she could not have seen the obeisance, the gentleman intermitted it, pulled down the hands, kissed Madam Betty oftener than the one fair salute, and handed her across the room to receive Granny's blessing. Granny sat up and composed herself, wished them joy (though she had the grace to look a little ashamed of herself), very much as if she had obtained her end.