But she found there was no need to shrink from Mrs. May. When she confided to the landlady the plans that were in preparation, and the long separation which was impending, Mrs. May was full of encouraging hope. She could narrate cases in which the sea, despite its terrible side, had acted as a beneficent healer and life restorer. She could tell, too, of many who had suffered in the same way as Mr. Challoner, and were still alive—elderly people, with long useful years behind them. To Lucy Challoner this sort of cheer was the more acceptable because it came to her surrounded by an atmosphere, and supported by a foundation, in which neither life nor death were held to be the main things—but only “the will of the Lord,” which could make either death or life blessed both to those who were left and to those who were taken.
Very different was the tone of the notes which came from Lucy’s sister Florence. Mrs. Brand wrote a large hand, so that a very few words covered four sides of a sheet of note-paper; also she wrote, as it were, breathlessly, dropping pronouns and punctuation. She was very forcible in bewailing her sister’s departure to Deal—“So sudden—and such a place—and didn’t Charlie feel the journey—and it mightn’t be amiss if it turned him aside from the bigger scheme—couldn’t bear to think of it—poor dear Lucy all alone—well, the child, of course—and if for Charlie’s good, but it seemed a great risk—wasn’t beginning to look for a successor for Pollie yet; no good being in hurry—better not hire anyone till a day or two before wanted—and Lucy not coming back to London till the very night before Charlie sailed for the North—who was Captain Grant?—hoped he was a decent man—master mariners not always up to much; but if Charlie kept pretty well, perhaps he would not mind about trifles. Must get word as soon as they were sure of dates—must get last look of Charlie—and had good many evening engagements on. Poor dear Lucy, Florence really pitied—things had looked so different at Lucy’s marriage, but might turn out better, even yet.”
As Lucy read those notes, her pulse used to quicken with a sense of revolt. Charlie’s wife was no person to be pitied! Come what might, she was not to be pitied! Her anxieties, her possible sorrows, were not to be regarded as so much ill-luck, to be secretly contrasted by Florence with her own splendid fortune in stalwart, prosperous Jem, and her showy house, and large “visiting circle.”
After these rebellious sensations, Lucy always turned penitent—said to herself that she was silly and even wicked, and resolved to allow no such feelings to arise again. But Florence’s next note always stirred them anew. The east wind will ruffle us; we can but turn our backs to it, or veil our faces, and afterwards soothe the irritated skin with emollients. So there are natures which thus rush rudely on our souls. And we cannot change those natures, or their effect upon us; we can only avert the worst results by tact, hide our soreness in silence, and heal damages by patience and forbearance. Let us put our conscious misery to a good use by its keeping us humbly aware that any sweetness or amiability that we may seem to possess belongs, after all, almost as much to our environment as to ourselves!
The peaceful resting-time wore to an end. Charlie Challoner and his little boy had made friends with nearly all the Deal “hovellers,” lounging so easily on the shingly shore, watching the sea and the sky, as if there were nothing else to do in life, yet with the strength of scores of conquered storms wrought into their fine old faces. They had heard many stories grave and gay, and little Hugh had gathered up some queer treasures in the way of uncommon shells and stones, and even a little carved boat.
Lucy herself did not talk much to the old boatmen. Her happy relations with Mrs. May had not overcome all her shrinking from strangers, and she preferred to hear of them from Charlie, and to let him tell over their yarns to her. But when she went out with her husband they all gave her kindly greeting. It was Lucy’s delighted pride that whoever knew Charlie first seemed always ready to welcome and approve of her. She revelled in being regarded kindly for his sake. Yet it was as often something of her which had originally commended him. He or she who is wrapped round by a true and tender love carries its grace everywhere.
After Charlie had had his pleasant chats to some of those old men, the one of them had said to the other—
“Reckon that gentleman’s got a good woman belonging to him. Ye sort o’ feel it on him, like ye smell the spicy breezes before ye touch a port o’ the land where spices grow.”
“Course he has,” said the other; “haven’t ye seen her? A winsome lass—one of the little craft that can go through a great deal of rough weather—the sort that’s generally made for that purpose, to my thinking.”