Mr. and Mrs. ThompsonAt Home Tuesday, May 2nd,To meet Lord Dunderhead who will give a Bible Reading.8 to 10.30 Evening Dress.
And had sent it off to his college friend, Carmichael of Drumtochty, with a running commentary of a very piquant character.
“Thank you, but I fear that my work will prevent me being with you on Tuesday; it is no light thing for a man to come straight from college to St Bede's without even a holiday.”
“So sorry, but by-and-bye you will come to one of our little meetings. Mrs. Thompson greatly enjoyed your sermon to young men this afternoon; perhaps just a little too much of works and too little of faith. Excuse the hint—you know the danger of the day—all life, life; but that's a misleading test By the way, we are all hoping that you may get settled in a home as well as in your church,” continued Mr. Thompson, with pious waggery, and then chilling at the want of sympathy on the minister's face; “but that is a serious matter, and we trust you may be wisely guided. A suitable helpmeet is a precious gift.”
“Perhaps you may not have heard, Mr. Thompson, that I am engaged”—and Rutherford eyed the elder keenly,—“and to a girl of whom any man and any congregation may be proud. I am going north next week to see her and to settle our marriage day.”
“I am so pleased to hear you say so, and so will all the elders be, for I must tell you that a rumour came to our ears that gave us great concern; but I said we must not give heed to gossip, for what Christian has not suffered in this way at the hand of the world?”
“What was the gossip?” demanded Rutherford, and there was that in his tone that brooked no trifling.
“You must not take this to heart, dear Mr. Rutherford; it only shows how we ought to set a watch upon our lips. Well that you were to marry a young woman in Glen—Glen——”
“Alder. Go on,” said Rutherford. “Yes, in Glenalder, where we all rejoice to know you did so good a work.”
“I taught a dozen children in the summer months to eke out my living. But about the young woman—what did they say of her?”
“Nothing at all, except that she was, perhaps, hardly in that position of society that a clergyman's wife ought to be, especially one in the west end of Glasgow. But do not let us say anything more of the matter; it just shows how the great enemy is ever trying to create dissension and injure the work.”
“What you have heard is perfectly true, except that absurd reference to Glasgow, and I have the honour to inform you, as I intend to inform the elders on my return next week, that I hope to be married in a month or two to Magdalen Macdonald, who was brought up by her grandfather, Alister Macdonald of the Black Watch, and who herself has a little croft in Glenalder”—and Rutherford challenged Mr. Thompson, expounder of Scripture and speculator in iron, to come on and do his worst “Will you allow me, my dear young friend, to say that there is no necessity for this... heat, and to speak with you as one who has your... best Interests at heart, and those of St. Bede's. I feel it to be a special providence that I should have called this evening.”
“Well?” insisted Rutherford.
“What I feel, and I have no doubt you will agree with me, is that Christians must not set themselves against the arrangements of Providence, and you see we are set in classes for a wise purpose. We are all equal before God, neither 'bond nor free,' as it runs, but it is expedient that the minister of St Bede's should marry in his own position. There are many sacrifices we must make for our work's sake; and, oh, Mr. Rutherford, what care we have to take lest we cast a stumbling-block in the way of others! It was only last week that a valued fellow-worker begged me to invite a young lady to my little drawing-room meeting who was concerned about spiritual things. 'Nothing would give me greater pleasure,' I said, 'if it would help her; but it is quite impossible, and you would not have asked me had you known her history. Her father was a shopkeeper, and in the present divided state of society I dare not introduce her among the others, all wholesale without exception.' You will not misunderstand me, Mr. Rutherford?”
“You have stated the case admirably, Mr. Thompson, and from your standpoint in religion, I think, conclusively. Perhaps the Sermon on the Mount might...; but we won't go into that Before deciding, however, what is my duty, always with your aid, you might like to see the face of my betrothed. There, in that light.”
“Really quite beautiful, and I can easily understand; we were all young once and... impressionable. As good-looking as any woman in St Bede's? Excuse me, that is hardly a question to discuss. Grace does not go with looks. We all know that beauty is deceitful. Knows the poets better than you do, I dare say. There is a nurse of my sister's, a cabman's daughter—I beg your pardon for dropping the photograph; you startled me. But you will excuse me saying that it is not this kind of knowledge... well, culture, which fits a woman to be a minister's wife. Addressing a mothers' meeting is far more important than reading poetry. Highland manners more graceful than Glasgow? That is a very extraordinary comparison, and... can do no good. Really no one can sympathise with you more than I do, but I am quite clear as to your duty as a minister of the Gospel.”
“You mean”—and Rutherford spoke with much calmness—“that I ought to break our troth. It is not a light thing to do, sir, and has exposed both men and women to severe... criticism.”
“Certainly, if the matter be mismanaged, but I think, although it's not for me to boast, that it could be arranged. Now, there was Dr. Drummer—this is quite between ourselves—he involved himself with a teacher of quite humble rank during his student days, and it was pointed out to him very faithfully by his elders that such a union would injure his prospects. He made it a matter of prayer, and he wrote a beautiful letter to her, and she saw the matter in the right light, and you know what a ministry his has been. His present wife has been a real helpmeet; her means are large and are all consecrated.”
“Do you happen to know what became of the teacher? I only ask for curiosity, for I know what has become of Dr. Drummer.”
“She went to England and caught some fever, or maybe it was consumption, but at any rate she died just before the Doctor married. It was all ordered for the best, so that there were no complications.”
“Exactly; that is evident, and my way seems now much clearer.. There is just one question more I should like to ask. If you can answer it I shall have no hesitation about my course. Suppose a woman loved a man and believed in him, and encouraged him through his hard college days, and they both were looking forward with one heart to their wedding day, and then he—did not marry her—what would honourable men think of him, and what effect would this deed of—prudence have on his ministry of the Gospel?”
“My dear friend, if it were known that he had taken this step simply and solely for the good of the cause he had at heart and after prayerful consideration, there is no earnest man—and we need not care for the world—who would not appreciate his sacrifice.”
“I do not believe one word you say.” Mr. Thompson smiled feebly, and began to retire to the door at the look in Rutherford's eye. “But whether you be right or wrong about the world in which you move, I do not know. In my judgment, the man who acted as you describe would have only one rival in history, and that would be Judas Iscariot.”
Southern travellers wandering over Scotland in their simplicity have a dim perception that the Scot and the Celt are not of one kind, and, as all racial characteristics go back to the land, they might be helped by considering the unlikeness between a holding in Fife and a croft in a western glen. The lowland farm stands amid its neighbours along the highway, with square fields, trim fences, slated houses, cultivated after the most scientific method, and to the last inch a very type of a shrewd, thrifty, utilitarian people. The Highland farm is half a dozen patches of as many shapes scattered along the hillside, wherever there are fewest stones and deepest soil and no bog, and those the crofter tills as best he can—sometimes getting a harvest and sometimes seeing the first snow cover his oats in the sheaf, sometimes building a rude dyke to keep off the big, brown, hairy cattle that come down to have a taste of the sweet green corn, but often finding it best to let his barefooted children be a fence by day, and at certain seasons to sit up all night himself to guard his scanty harvest from the forays of the red deer. Somewhere among the patches he builds his low-roofed house, and thatches it over with straw, on which, by-and-bye, grass with heather and wild flowers begins to grow, till it is not easy to tell his home from the hill. His farm is but a group of tiny islands amid a sea of heather that is ever threatening to overwhelm them with purple spray. Any one can understand that this man will be unpractical, dreamy, enthusiastic, the child of the past, the hero of hopeless causes, the seer of visions.
Magdalen had milked her cows at midday and sent them forth to pasture, and now was sitting before her cottage among wallflower and spring lilies, reading for the third time the conclusion of Rutherford's last letter:—
“Here I was interrupted by the coming of an elder, a mighty man in the religious world, and very powerful in St Bede's. He tells me that something has been heard of our engagement, and I have taken counsel with him with the result that it seems best we should be married without delay. After loving for four years and there being nothing to hinder, why should you be lonely on your croft in Glenalder and I in my rooms at Glasgow? Answer me that, 'calf of my heart' (I do not attempt the Gaelic). But you cannot. You will only kiss the letter, since I am not at your side, and next week I shall come north, and you will fix the day.
“My head is full of plans, and I do not think that joy will let me sleep to-night for thinking of you and all that we shall do together. We'll be married early in the morning in the old kirk of Glenalder, as soon as the sun has filled the Glen and Nature has just awaked from sleep. Mona Macdonald will be your bridesmaid, I know, and she will wear white roses that shall not be whiter than her teeth. Yes, I have learned to notice all beautiful things since I knew you, Magdalen. My best man will be Carmichael of Drumtochy, who is of Highland blood himself and a goodly man to look upon, and he has his own love-story. All the Glen will come to our wedding, and will grudge that a Lowland Scot has spoiled the Glen of the Flower of Dalnabreck—yes, I know what they call you. And we shall have our breakfast in the manse, for the minister has pledged us to that, and it is he and John Carmichael that will be making the wonderful speeches! (You see how I've learned the style.) But you and I will leave them and catch the steamer, and then all the long June day we shall sit on the deck together and see distant Skye, and the little isles, and pass Mull and Ardnamurchan, and sail through Oban Bay and down Loch Fyne, and thread our way by Tighnabruaich, and come into the Firth of Clyde when the sun is going down away behind Ben Alder. Won't it be a glorious marriage day, among lochs and hills and islands the like of which travellers say cannot be found in all the world?
“Then I want to take you to Germany, and to show you the old University town where I lived one summer, and we will have one good day there, too, my bride and I. Early in the morning we shall stand in the market-place, where the women are washing clothes at the fountain and the peasants are selling butter and fruit, and the high-gabled houses rise on three sides, and the old Rathhaus, on whose roof the storks build their nests, makes the fourth. We'll go to my rooms near the Kirche, where I used to write a letter to you every day, and here is what old Frau Hepzacker will say, 'Mein Gott, der Schottlander und ein wunderschones madchen* (you will English and Gaelic this for yourself), and we will drink a glass of (fearfully sour) wine with her, and go out with her blessing echoing down the street Then we will watch the rafts coming down the Neckar from the Black Forest, and walk among the trees in the Vorstadt, where I lay and dreamed of you far away in Glenalder. And we will go to the University where you sent me... but that is never to be mentioned again; and the students in their wonderful dress will come and go—red hats and blue, besides the white, black and gold I used to wear. And in the evening we will drive through the vines and fruit-trees to Bebenhausen, the king's hunting-seat. And those will only be two days out of our honeymoon, Magdalen. It seems too good to be my lot that I should be minister of Christ's evangel—of which surely I am not worthy—and that you should be my bride, of which I am as unworthy. Next Monday I shall leave this smoky town and meet you at the Cairn of Remembrance on Tuesday morning.
“Meanwhile and ever I am your faithful lover,
“Henry Rutherford.”
Magdalen kissed the name passionately and thrust the letter into her bosom. Then she went to the edge of the heather and looked along the Glen, where she had been born and lived her twenty-two years in peace, from which she was so soon to go out on the most adventurous journey of life. When a pure-bred Highland woman loves, it is once and for ever, and earth has no more faithful wife, or mother, or daughter. And Magdalen loved Rutherford with all her heart. But it is not given unto her blood to taste unmixed joy, and now she was haunted with a sense of calamity. The past flung its shadow over her, and the people that were gone came back to their deserted homes. She heard the far-off bleating of the sheep and the wild cry of the curlew; she crooned to herself a Gaelic song, and was so carried away that she did not see the stranger come along the track through the heather till he spoke.
“Good evening; may I ask whether this is eh... Dalnabreck? and have I the pleasure of addressing Miss Macdonald?”
“Yes, I am Magdalen Macdonald”—and as she faced him in her beauty the visitor was much abashed. “Would you be wanting to see me, sir?”
“My name is Thompson, and I have the privilege of being an elder in St Bede's, Glasgow, and as I happened to be passing through Glenalder—just a few days' rest after the winter's work—how the soul wears the body!—I thought that it would be... a pleasure to... pay my respects to one of whom I have... heard from our dear pastor. Perhaps, however,”—this with some anxiety—“Mr. Rutherford may have mentioned my humble name.”
“There are so many good people in St Bede's, and they are all so kind to him, that... Henry”—the flush at her lover's name lent the last attraction to her face and almost overcame the astute iron merchant—“will not be able to tell me all their names. But I will be knowing them all for myself soon, and then I will be going to thank every person for all that has been done to... him. It is very gracious of you to be visiting a poor Highland girl, and the road to Dalnabreck is very steep; you will come in and rest in my house, and I will bring you milk to drink. You must be taking care of the door, for it is low, and the windows are small because of the winter storms; but there is room inside and a heart welcome for our friends in our little homes. When I am bringing the milk maybe you will be looking at the medals on the wall. They are my grandfather's, who was a brave man and fought well in his day, and two will be my father's, who was killed very young and had not time to get more honour.”
The elder made a hurried survey of the room, with its bits of black oak and the arms on the wall, and the deer-skins on the floor, and bookshelves hanging on the wall, and wild flowers everywhere; and, being an operator so keen that he was said to know a market by scent, he changed his plan.
“I took a hundred pounds with me,” he explained afterward to a friend of like spirit, “for a promising ministry was not to be hindered for a few pounds! I intended to begin with fifty and expected to bring back twenty-five, but I saw that it would have been inexpedient to offer money to the young woman. There was no flavour of spirituality at all about her, and she was filled with pride about war and such-like vanities. Her manner might be called taking in worldly circles, but it was not exactly... gentle, and she might have... been rude, quite unpleasant, if I had tried to buy her... I mean arrange on a pecuniary basis. Ah, Juitler, how much we need the wisdom of the serpent in this life!”
“What a position you are to occupy, my dear friend,” began the simple man, seated before the most perfect of meals—rich milk of cows, fed on meadow grass, yellow butter and white oat cakes set among flowers. “I doubt not that you are often weighed down by a sense of responsibility, and are almost afraid of the work before you. After some slight experience in such matters I am convinced that the position of a minister's wife is the most... I may say critical in Christian service.”
“You will be meaning that she must be taking great care of her man, and making a beautiful home for him, and keeping away foolish people, and standing by him when his back will be at the wall. Oh, yes, it is a minister that needs to be loved very much, or else he will become stupid and say bitter words, and no one will be wanting to hear him”—and Magdalen looked across the table with joyful confidence.
“Far more than that, I'm afraid”—and Mr. Thompson's face was full of pity. “I was thinking of the public work that falls to a minister's wife in such a church as St Bede's, which is trying and needs much grace. The receiving of ladies alone—Providence has been very good to our people, twelve carriages some days at the church door—requires much experience and wisdom.
“Mrs. Drummer, who has been much used among the better classes, has often told me that she considered tact in society one of her most precious talents, and I know that it was largely owing to her social gifts, sanctified, of course, that the Doctor became such a power. Ah, yes”—and Mr. Thompson fell into a soliloquy—“it is the wife that makes or mars the minister.”
“Glasgow then will not be like Glenalder”—and Magdalen's face was much troubled—“for if any woman here will tell the truth and speak good words of people, and help when the little children are sick, and have an open door for the stranger, then we will all be loving her, and she will not hurt her man in anything.”
“Be thankful that you do not live in a city, Miss Macdonald, for the world has much more power there; they that come to work are in the thick of the battle and need great experience, but you will learn in time and maybe you could live... quietly for a year or two... you will excuse me speaking like this... you see it is for our beloved minister I am anxious.”
Magdalen's face had grown white, and she once or twice took a long, sad breath.
“As regards the public work expected of a minister's wife—but I am wearying you, I fear, and it is time to return to the inn. I cannot tell you how much I have enjoyed this delicious milk..
“Will you tell me about the... the other things... I want to know all.”
“Oh, it was the meetings I was thinking of, for of course, as I am sure you know, our minister's wife is the head of the mothers' meeting. Mrs. Drummer's addresses there were excellent, and her liberality in giving treats—gospel treats, I mean, with tea—was eh, in fact, queenly. And then she had a Bible-class for young ladies that was mentioned in the religious papers.”
Magdalen had now risen and was visibly trembling.
“There is a question I would like to ask, Mister...”
“Thompson—Jabez Thompson.”
“Mister Thompson—and you will be doing a great kindness to a girl that has never been outside Glenalder, and... is not wanting to be a sorrow to the man she loves, if you will answer it Do you know any minister like... your minister who married a country girl and... what happened?”
“Really, my dear friend, I... well, if you insist, our neighbour in St Thomas's—a very fine young fellow—did, and he was a little hindered at first; but I am sure, in course of time, if he had waited—yes, he left, and I hear is in the Colonies, and doing an excellent work among the squatters, or was it the Chinese?... No, no, this is not good-bye. I only hope I have not discouraged you.... What a lovely glen! How can we ever make up to you for this heather?”
For three days no one saw Magdalen, but a shepherd attending to his lambs noticed that a lamp burned every night in the cottage at Dalnabreck. When Rutherford arrived at the cairn on Tuesday he looked in vain for Magdalen. Old Elspeth, Magdalen's foster-mother, was waiting for him and placed a letter in his hands, which he read in that very place where he had parted from his betrothed.
“Dearest of my Heart,—
“It is with the tears of my soul that I am writing this letter, and it is with cruel sorrow you will be reading it, for I must tell you that our troth is broken and that Magdalen cannot be your wife. Do not be thinking this day or any day that she is not loving you, for never have you been so dear to me or been in my eyes so strong and brave and wise and good, and do not be thinking that I do not trust you, for it is this girl knows that you would be true to me although all the world turned against me.
“Believe me, my beloved, it is because I love you so much that I am setting you free that you may not be put to shame because you have married a Highland girl, who has nothing but two cows, and who does not know the ways of cities, and who cannot speak in public places, and who can do nothing except love.
“If it had been possible I would have been waiting for you at the Cairn of Remembrance, and it is my eyes that ache to see you once more, but then I would be weak and could not leave you, as is best for you.
“You will not be seeking after me, for I am going far away, and nobody can tell you where, and this is also best for you and me. But I will be hearing about you, and will be knowing all you do, and there will be none so proud of you as your first love.
“And, Henry, if you meet a good woman and she loves you, then you must not think that I will be angry when you marry her, for this would be selfish and not right I am going away for your sake, and I will be praying that the sun be ever shining on you and that you become a great man in the land. One thing only I ask—that in those days you sometimes give a thought to Glenalder and your faithful friend,
“Magdalen Macdonald.”
“It was a first-rate match, and we were fairly beaten; it was their forward turned the scale. I had two hacks from him myself”—the captain of the Glasgow Football Club nursed the tender spots. “It's a mercy to-morrow's Sunday and one can lie in bed.”
“Olive oil is not bad for rubbing. You deserve the rest, old man. It was a stiff fight. By-the-way I saw Rutherford of St Bede's there. He cheered like a good'un when you got that goal. He's the best parson going in Glasgow.”
“Can't bear the tribe nor their ways, Charlie, they're such hypocrites, always preaching against the world and that kind of thing and feathering their own nests at every turn. Do you know I calculated that six of them in Glasgow alone have netted a hundred and twenty thousand pounds by successful marriages. That's what sickens a fellow at religion.”
“Well, you can't say that against Rutherford, Jack, for he's not married, and works like a coal-heaver. He's the straightest man I've come across either in the pulpit or out of it, besides being a ripping preacher. Suppose you look me up to-morrow about six, and we'll hear what he's got to say.”
His friends said that Rutherford was only thirty-four years of age, but he looked as if he were near fifty, for his hair had begun to turn gray, and he carried the traces of twenty years' work upon his face. No one would have asked whether he was handsome, for he had about him an air of sincerity and humanity that at once won your confidence. His subject that evening was the “Sanctifying power of love,” and, as his passion gradually increased to white heat, he had the men before him at his mercy. Women of the world complained that he was hard and unsympathetic; some elderly men considered his statements unguarded and even unsound; but men below thirty heard him gladly. This evening he was stirred for some reason to the depths of his being, and was irresistible. When he enlarged on the love of a mother, and charged every son present to repay it by his life and loyalty, a hundred men glared fiercely at the roof, and half of them resolved to write home that very night. As he thundered against lust, the foul counterfeit of love, men's faces whitened, and twice there was a distinct murmur of applause. His great passage, however, came at the close, and concerned the love of a man for a maid: “If it be given to any man in his fresh youth to love a noble woman with all his heart, then in that devotion he shall find an unfailing inspiration of holy thoughts and high endeavours, a strong protection against impure and selfish temptations, a secret comfort amid the contradictions and adversities of life. Let him give this passion full play in his life and it will make a man of him and a good soldier in the great battle. And if it so be that this woman pass from his sight or be beyond his reach, yet in this love itself shall he find his exceeding reward.” As he spoke in a low, sweet, intense voice, those in the gallery saw the preacher's left hand tighten on the side of the pulpit till the bones and sinews could be counted, but with his right hand he seemed to hold something that lay on his breast “Look here, Charlie”—as the two men stood in a transept till the crowd passed down the main aisle—“if you don't mind I would like... to shake hands with the preacher. When a man takes his coat off and does a big thing like that he ought to know that he has... helped a fellow.”
“I'll go in too, Jack, for he's straightened me, and not for the first time. You know how I used to live... well, that is over, and it was Rutherford saved me.”
“He looks as if he had been badly hit some time. Do you know his record?”
“There's some story about his being in love with a poor girl and being determined to marry her, but 'Iron Warrants' got round her and persuaded her that it would be Rutherford's ruin; so she disappeared, and they say Rutherford is waiting for her to this day. But I don't give it as a fact.”
“You may be sure every word of it is true, old man; it's like one of Thompson's tricks, for I was in his office once, and it's just what that man in the pulpit would do; poor chap, he's served his time... I say, though, suppose that girl turns up some day.”
They were near the vestry door and arranging their order of entrance when a woman came swiftly down the empty aisle as from some distant corner of the church and stood behind them for an instant.
“Is this Mr. Rutherford's room, gentlemen”—with a delicate flavour of Highland in the perfect English accent—“and would it be possible for me to see him... alone?”
They received a shock of delight on the very sight of her and did instant homage. It was not on account of her magnificent beauty—a woman in the height of her glory—nor the indescribable manner of good society, nor the perfection of her dressing, nor a singular dignity of carriage. They bowed before her for the look in her eyes, the pride of love, and, although both are becoming each day her more devoted slaves, yet they agree that she could only look once as she did that night.
It was Charlie that showed her in, playing beadle for the occasion that this princess might not have to wait one minute, and his honour obliged him to withdraw instantly, but before the door could be closed he heard Rutherford cry—“At last, Magdalen, my love!”
“Do you think, Charlie...?”
“Rutherford has got his reward, Jack, and twenty years would not have been too long to wait.”
We must have Trixy Marsden on the Thursday”—for Mrs. Leslie was arranging two dinner parties. “She will be in her element that evening; but what are we to do with Mr. Marsden?”
“Isn't it rather the custom to invite a husband with his wife? he might even expect to be included,” said John Leslie. “Do you know I'm glad we came to Putney; spring is lovely in the garden.”
“Never mind spring just now,” as Leslie threatened an exit to the lawn; “you might have some consideration for an afflicted hostess, and give your mind to the Marsden problem.”
“It was Marsden brought spring into my mind,” and Leslie sat down with that expression of resignation on his face peculiar to husbands consulted on domestic affairs; “he was telling me this morning in the train that he had just finished a table of trees in the order of their budding, a sort of spring priority list; his love for statistics is amazing.
“He is getting to be known on the 9 train; the men keep their eye on him and bolt into thirds to escape; he gave a morning on the influenza death-rate lately, and that kind of thing spreads.
“But he's not a bad fellow for all that,” concluded Leslie; “he's perfectly straight in business, and that is saying something; I rather enjoy half an hour with him.”
“Very likely you do,” said his wife with impatience, “because your mind has a squint, and you get amusement out of odd people; but every one has not your taste for the tiresome. He is enough to devastate a dinner table; do you remember that escapade of his last year?”
“You mean when he corrected you about the length of the American passage, and gave the sailings of the Atlantic liners since '80,” and Leslie lay back to enjoy the past: “it seemed to me most instructive, and every one gave up conversation to listen.”
“Because no one could do anything else with that voice booming through the room. I can still hear him: 'theColumbasix days, four hours, five minutes.' Then I rose and delivered the table.”
“It was only human to be a little nettled by his accuracy; but you ought not to have retreated so soon, for he gave the express trains of England a little later, and hinted at the American lines. One might almost call such a memory genius.”
“Which is often another name for idiocy, John. Some one was telling me yesterday that quiet, steady men rush out of the room at the sound of his voice, and their wives have to tell all sorts of falsehoods about their absence.
“Trixy is one of my oldest and dearest friends, and it would be a shame to pass her over; but I will not have her husband on any account.”
“Perhaps you are right as a hostess; it is a little hard for a frivolous circle to live up to Marsden, and I hear that he has got up the temperatures of the health resorts; it's a large subject, and lends itself to detail.”
“It will not be given in this house. What Trixy must endure with that man! he's simply possessed by a didactic devil, and ought never to have married. Statistics don't amount to cruelty, I suppose, as a ground of divorce?”
“Hardly as yet; by-and-bye incompatibility in politics or fiction will be admitted; but how do you know, Florence, that Mrs. Marsden does not appreciate her husband? You never can tell what a woman sees in a man. Perhaps this woman hungers for statistics as a make-weight She is very amusing, but a trifle shallow, don't you think?”
“She used to be the brightest and most charming girl in our set, and I have always believed that she was married to Mr. Marsden by her people. Trixy has six hundred a year settled on her, and they were afraid of fortune-hunters. Mothers are apt to feel that a girl is safe with a man of the Marsden type, and that nothing more can be desired.”
“Perhaps they are not far wrong. Marsden is not a romantic figure, and he is scarcely what you would call a brilliantraconteur; but he serves his wife like a slave, and he will never give her a sore heart.”
“Do you think it nothing, John, that a woman with ideals should be tied to a bore all her days? What a contrast between her brother and her husband, for instance. Godfrey is decidedly one of the most charming men I ever met.”
“He has a nice tenor voice, I grant, and his drawing-room comedies are very amusing. Of course, no one believes a word he says, and I think that he has never got a discharge from his last bankruptcy; but you can't expect perfection. Character seems to oscillate between dulness and dishonesty.”
“Don't talk nonsense for the sake of alliteration, John. Trixy's brother was never intended for business; he ought to have been a writer, and I know he was asked to join the staff of theBoomeller. Happy thought! I'll ask him to come with his sister instead of Mr. Marsden.”
And this was the note:
“My dear Trixy,—
“We are making up a dinner party for the evening of June 2nd, at eight o'clock, and we simply cannot go on without you and Mr. Mars-den. Writeinstantlyto say you accept; it is an age since I've seen you, and my husband is absolutely devoted to Mr. Marsden. He was telling me only a minute ago that one reason why he goes by the 9 train is to get the benefit of your husband's conversation. With much love,
“Yours affectionately,
“Florence Leslie.
“P.S.—It does seem a shame that Mr. Marsden should have to waste an evening on a set of stupid people, and if he can't tear himself from his books, then you will take home a scolding to him from me.
“P.S.—If Mr. Marsdenwill notcondescend, bring Godfrey to take care of you, and tell him that we shall expect some music.”
“Come to this corner, Trixy, and let us have a quiet talk before the men arrive from the dining-room. I hope your husband is duly grateful to me for allowing him off this social ordeal. Except perhaps John, I don't think there is a person here fit to discuss things with him.”
“Oh, Mr. Marsden does not care one straw whether they know his subjects or not so long as people will listen to him, and I'm sure he was quite eager to come, but I wanted Godfrey to have a little pleasure.
“I'm so sorry for poor Godfrey,” and Mrs. Marsden settled herself down to confidences. “You know he lost all his money two years ago through no fault of his own. It was simply the stupidity of his partner, who was quite a common man, and could not carry out Godfrey's plans. My husband might have helped the firm through their difficulty but he was quite obstinate, and very unkind also. He spoke as if Godfrey had been careless and lazy, when the poor fellow really injured his health and had to go to Brighton for two months to recruit.”
“Yes, I remember,” put in Mrs. Leslie; “we happened to be at the Metropole one week end, and Godfrey looked utterly jaded.”
“You have no idea how much he suffered, Florrie, and how beautifully he bore the trial. Why, had it not been for me, he would not have had money to pay his hotel bill, and that was a dreadful change for a man like him. He has always been very proud, and much petted by people. The poor fellow has never been able to find a suitable post since, although he spends days in the city among his old friends, and I can see how it is telling on him. And—Florrie, I wouldn't mention it to any one except an old friend—Mr. Marsden has not made our house pleasant to poor Godfrey.”
“You don't mean that he... reflects on his misfortunes.”
“Doesn't he? It's simply disgusting what he will say at times. Only yesterday morning—this is absolutely between you and me, one must have some confidant—Godfrey made some remark in fun about the cut of Tom's coat; he will not go, you know, do what I like, to a proper tailor.”
“Godfrey is certainly much better dressed,” said Mrs. Leslie, “than either of our husbands.”
“Perhaps it was that made Tom angry, but at any rate he said quite shortly, 'I can't afford to dress better,' and of course Godfrey knew what he meant. It was cruel in the circumstances, for many men spend far more on their clothes than Godfrey. He simply gives his mind to the matter and takes care of his things; he will spend any time selecting a colour or getting a coat fitted.”
“Is your brother quite... dependent on... his friends, Trixy?”
“Yes, in the meantime, and that is the reason why we ought to be the more considerate. I wished to settle half my income on him, but it is only a third of what it used to be—something to do with investments has reduced it—and Mr. Marsden would not hear of such a thing; he allows Godfrey one hundred a year, but that hardly keeps him in clothes and pocket money.”
“Still, don't you think it's all Godfrey could expect?” and Mrs. Leslie was inclined for once to defend this abused man. “Few husbands would do as much for a brother-in-law.”
“Oh, of course he does it for my sake, and he means to be kind. But, Florrie, Mr. Marsden is so careful and saving, always speaking as if we were poor and had to lay up for the future, while I know he has a large income and a sure business.
“Why, he would not leave that horrid street in Highbury, say what I could; and I owe it to Godfrey that we have come to Putney. When Tom went out to Alexandria, my brother simply took our present house and had it furnished in Mr. Marsden's name, and so when he came home from Alexandria we were established in The Cottage.”
“John is the best of husbands, but I dare not have changed our house in his absence,” and Mrs. Leslie began to get new views on the situation. “Was not Mr. Marsden rather startled?”
“He was inclined to be angry with Godfrey, but I sent the boy off to Scarborough for a month; and he is never hasty to me, only tiresome—you can't imagine how tiresome.”
“Is it the statistics?”
“Worse than that. He has begun the Reformation now, and insists on reading from some stuffy old book every evening,Dumas' History, I think, till I wish there never had been such a thing, and we were all Roman Catholics.”
“Very likely he would have read about the Popes, then, or the saints. My dear girl, you don't wish to have your mind improved. You ought to be proud of your husband; most men sleep after dinner with an evening paper in their hands, and are quite cross if they're wakened. But there they come, and we must have Godfrey's last song.”
“Nurse will rise at four and bring you a nice cup of tea. Are you sure you will not weary, being alone for two hours?” and Mrs. Marsden, in charming outdoor dress, blew eau-de-Cologne about the room. “Don't you love scent?”
“Where are you going?” asked Marsden, following her with fond eyes. “You told me yesterday, but I forget; this illness has made me stupider than ever, I think. Wasn't it some charity?”
“It's the new society every one is so interested in, 'The Working Wives' Culture Union.' What is wanted is happy homes for the working men,” quoting freely from an eloquent woman orator, “and the women must be elevated; so the East End is to be divided into districts, and two young women will be allotted to each. Are you listening?”
“Yes, dear; but it rests me to lie with my eyes closed. Tell me all about your society. What are the young ladies to do?”
“Oh, they're to visit the wives in the afternoon and read books to them: solid books, you know, about wages and... all kinds of things working men like. Then in the evening the wives will be able to talk with their husbands on equal terms, and the men will not want to go to the public-houses. Isn't it a capital idea?”
A sad little smile touched Marsden's lips for an instant “And where do you meet to-day? It's a long way for you to go to Whitechapel.”
“Didn't I tell you? The Marchioness of Gloucester Is giving a Drawing Room at her town house, and Lady Helen wrote an urgent note, Insisting that I should come, even though it were only for an hour, as her mother depended on my advice so much.
“Of course I know that's just a way of putting it; but I have taken lots of trouble about founding the Union, so I think it would hardly do for me to be absent You're feeling much better, too, to-day, aren't you, Thomas?”
“Yes, much better; the pain has almost ceased; perhaps it will be quite gone when you return. Can you spare just ten minutes to sit beside me? There is something I have been wanting to say, and perhaps this is my only chance. When I am well again I may... be afraid.”
Mrs. Marsden sat down wondering, and her husband waited a minute.
“One understands many things that puzzled him before, when he lies in quietness for weeks and takes an after look. I suspected it at times before, but I was a coward and put the thought away. It seemed curious that no one came to spend an hour with me, as men do with friends; and I noticed that they appeared to avoid me. I thought it was fancy, and that I had grown self-conscious.
“Everything is quite plain now, and I... am not hurt, dear, and I don't blame any person; that would be very wrong. People might have been far more impatient with me, and might have made my life miserable.
“God gave me a dull mind and a slow tongue; it took me a long time to grasp anything, and no one cared about the subjects that interested me. Beatrice... I wish now you had told me how I bored our friends; it would have been a kindness; but never mind that now; you did not like to give me pain.
“What troubles me most is that all these years you should have been tied to a very tiresome fellow,” and Marsden made some poor attempt at a smile. “Had I thought of what was before you, I would never have asked you to marry me.
“Don't cry, dear; I did not wish to hurt you. I wanted to ask your pardon for... all that martyrdom, and... to thank you for... being my wife; and there's something else.
“You see when I get well and am not lying in bed here, maybe I could not tell you, so let me explain everything now, and then we need not speak about such things again.
“Perhaps you thought me too economical, but I was saving for a purpose. Your portion has not brought quite so much as it did, and I wished to make it up to you, and now you can have your six hundred a year as before; if this illness had gone against me, you would have been quite comfortable—in money, I mean, dear.
“No, I insist on your going to Lady Gloucester's; the change will do you good, and I'll lie here digesting the Reformation, you know,” and he smiled, better this time, quite creditably, in fact “Will you give me a kiss, just to keep till we meet again?”
When the nurse came down at four to take charge, she was horrified to find her patient alone, and in the death agony, but conscious and able to speak.
“Don't ring... nor send for my wife... I sent... her away knowing the end was near... made her go, in fact... against her will.”
The nurse gave him brandy, and he became stronger for a minute.
“She has had a great deal to bear with me, and I... did not wish her to see death. My manner has been always so wearisome... I hoped that... nobody would be here. You are very kind, nurse; no more, if you please.
“Would it trouble you... to hold my hand, nurse? It's a little lonely... I am not afraid... a wayfaring man though a fool... not err therein...”
He was not nearly so tedious with his dying as he had been with his living; very shortly afterwards Thomas Marsden had done with statistics for ever.
Three days later Leslie came home from the city with tidings on his face, and he told them to his wife when they were alone that night “Marsden's lawyer made an appointment after the funeral, and I had an hour with him. He has asked me to be a trustee with himself in Mrs. Marsden's settlement.”
“I'm so glad; you must accept, for it will be such a comfort to poor Beatrice; but I thought Godfrey was her sole trustee.”
“So he was,” said Leslie grimly, “more's the pity, and he embezzled every penny of the funds—gambled them away in card-playing and... other ways.”
“Godfrey Harrison, Beatrice's brother?”
“Yes, her much-admired, accomplished, ill-used brother, the victim of her husband's stinginess.”
“If that be true, then Godfrey is simply a...”
“You mean an unmitigated scoundrel. Quite so, Florence, and a number of other words we won't go over. I tell you,” and Leslie sprang to his feet, “there is some use in swearing; if it had not been for one or two expressions that came to my memory suddenly to-day, I should have been ill. Curious to say, the lawyer seemed to enjoy them as much as myself, so it must be a bad case.”
“But I don't understand—if Godfrey spent Trixy's money, how is there anything to manage? Did he pay it back?”
“No, he did not, and could not; he has not enough brains to earn eighteen pence except by cheating, and if by any chance he came into a fortune, would grudge his sister a pound.”
“Then...?”
“Don't you begin to catch a glimpse of the facts? Why, Marsden toiled and scraped, and in the end, so the doctors say, killed himself to replace the money, and he had just succeeded before his death.”
“How good of him! but I don't see the necessity of all this secrecy on his part, and all those stories about low interest that he told Trixy.”
“There was no necessity; if it had been some of us, we would have let Mrs. Marsden know what kind of brother she had, and ordered him out of the country on threat of jail.
“It was Marsden's foolishness, let us call it, to spare his wife the disgrace of her idol and the loss of his company. So her husband was despised beside this precious rascal every day.”
“Trixy will get a terrible shock when she is told; it would almost have been kinder to let her know the truth before he died.”
“Mrs. Marsden is never to know,” said Leslie; “that was his wish; she's just to be informed that new trustees have been appointed, and we are to take care that she does not waste her income on the fellow.
“People will send letters of condolence to Mrs. Marsden, but they will say at afternoon teas that it must be a great relief to her, and that it's quite beautiful to see her sorrow. In two years she will marry some well-dressed fool, and they will live on Marsden's money,” and Leslie's voice had an unusual bitterness.
“Did you ever hear of another case like this, John?”
“Never; when old Parchment described Marsden giving him the instructions, he stopped suddenly.
“'Marsden,' he said, 'was the biggest fool I ever came across in the course of forty-two years' practice,' and he went over to the window.”
“And you?”
“I went to the fireplace; we were both so disgusted with the man that we couldn't speak for five minutes.”
After a short while Mrs. Leslie said, “It appears to me that this slow, uninteresting man, whom every one counted a bore, was in his own way... almost a hero.”
“Or altogether,” replied John Leslie.