North and South
“I had forgotten what I said for the time,” continued Margaret quietly.
“I should have thought of it again when I was less busy. May I go with
you now?”
Bessy gave a quick glance at Margaret’s face, to see if the wish
expressed was really felt. The sharpness in her eye turned to a wistful
longing as she met Margaret’s soft and friendly gaze.
“I ha’ none so many to care for me; if yo’ care yo’ may come.”
So they walked on together in silence. As they turned up into a small
court, out of a squalid street, Bessy said,
“Yo’ll not be daunted if father’s at home, and speaks a bit gruffish at
first. He took a mind to ye, yo’ see, and he thought a deal o’ your
coming to see us; and just because he liked yo’ he was vexed and put
about.”
“Don’t fear, Bessy.”
But Nicholas was not at home when they entered. A great slatternly girl,
not so old as Bessy, but taller and stronger, was busy at the wash-tub,
knocking about the furniture in a rough capable way, but altogether
making so much noise that Margaret shrunk, out of sympathy with poor
Bessy, who had sat down on the first chair, as if completely tired out
with her walk. Margaret asked the sister for a cup of water, and while
she ran to fetch it (knocking down the fire-irons, and tumbling over a
chair in her way), she unloosed Bessy’s bonnet strings, to relieve her
catching breath.
“Do you think such life as this is worth caring for?” gasped Bessy, at
last. Margaret did not speak, but held the water to her lips. Bessy took
a long and feverish draught, and then fell back and shut her eyes.
Margaret heard her murmur to herself: “They shall hunger no more,
neither thirst any more: neither shall the sun light on them, nor any
heat.”
Margaret bent over and said, “Bessy don’t be impatient with your life,
whatever it is—or may have been. Remember who gave it you, and made it
what it is!”
She was startled by hearing Nicholas speak behind her; he had come in
without her noticing him.
“Now, I’ll not have my wench preached to. She’s bad enough, as it is,
with her dreams and her methodee fancies, and her visions of cities with
goulden gates and precious stones. But if it amuses her I let it abe,
but I’m none going to have more stuff poured into her.”
“But surely,” said Margaret, facing round, “you believe in what I said,
that God gave her life, and ordered what kind of life it was to be?”
“I believe what I see, and no more. That’s what I believe, young woman.
I don’t believe all I hear—no! not by a big deal. I did hear a young
lass make an ado about knowing where we lived, and coming to see us. And
my wench here thought a deal about it, and flushed up many a time, when
hoo little knew as I was looking at her, at the sound of a strange step.
But hoo’s come at last,—and hoo’s welcome, as long as hoo’ll keep from
preaching on what hoo knows nought about.”
Bessy had been watching Margaret’s face; she half sate up to speak now,
laying her hand on Margaret’s arm with a gesture of entreaty. “Don’t be
vexed wi’ him—there’s many a one thinks like him: many and many a one
here. If yo’ could hear them speak, yo’d not be shocked at him; he’s a
rare good man, is father—but oh!” said she, falling back in despair,
“what he says at times makes me long to die more than ever, for I want
to know so many things, and am so tossed about wi’ wonder.”
“Poor wench—poor old wench—I’m loth to vex thee, I am; but a man mun
speak out for the truth, and when I see the world going all wrong at
this time o’ day, bothering itself wi’ things it knows nought about, and
leaving undone all the things that lie in disorder close at its
hand—why, I say, leave a’ this talk about religion alone, and set to
work on what yo’ see and know. That’s my creed. It’s simple, and not far
to fetch, nor hard to work.”
But the girl only pleaded the more with Margaret.
“Don’t think hardly on him—he’s a good man, he is. I sometimes think I
shall be moped wi’ sorrow even in the City of God, if father is not
there.” The feverish colour came into her cheek, and the feverish flame
into her eye. “But you will be there, father! you shall! Oh! my heart!”
She put her hand to it, and became ghastly pale.
Margaret held her in her arms, and put the weary head to rest upon her
bosom. She lifted the thin soft hair from off the temples, and bathed
them with water. Nicholas understood all her signs for different
articles with the quickness of love, and even the round-eyed sister
moved with laborious gentleness at Margaret’s “hush!” Presently the
spasm that foreshadowed death had passed away, and Bessy roused herself
and said,—
“I’ll go to bed,—it’s best place; but,” catching at Margaret’s gown,
“yo’ll come again,—I know yo’ will—but just say it!”
“I will come again to-morrow,” said Margaret.
Bessy leant back against her father, who prepared to carry her upstairs;
but as Margaret rose to go, he struggled to say something; “I could wish
there were a God, if it were only to ask Him to bless thee.”
Margaret went away very sad and thoughtful.
She was late for tea at home. At Helstone unpunctuality at meal-times
was a great fault in her mother’s eyes; but now this, as well as many
other little irregularities, seemed to have lost their power of
irritation, and Margaret almost longed for the old complainings.
“Have you met with a servant, dear?”
“No, mamma; that Anne Buckley would never have done.”
“Suppose I try,” said Mr. Hale. “Everybody else has had their turn at
this great difficulty. Now let me try. I may be the Cinderella to put on
the slipper after all.”
Margaret could hardly smile at this little joke, so oppressed was she by
her visit to the Higginses.
“What would you do, papa? How would you set about it?”
“Why, I should apply to some good house-mother to recommend me one known
to herself or her servants.”
“Very good. But we must first catch our house-mother.”
“You have caught her. Or rather she is coming into the snare, and you
will catch her to-morrow, if you’re skilful.”
“What do you mean, Mr. Hale?” asked his wife, her curiosity aroused.
“Why, my paragon pupil (as Margaret calls him) has told me that his
mother intends to call on Mrs. and Miss Hale to-morrow.”
“Mrs. Thornton!” exclaimed Mrs. Hale.
“The mother of whom he spoke to us?” said Margaret.
“Mrs. Thornton; the only mother he has, I believe,” said Mr. Hale,
quietly.
“I shall like to see her. She must be an uncommon person,” her mother
added. “Perhaps she may have a relation who might suit us, and be glad
of our place. She sounded to be such a careful economical person, that I
should like any one out of the same family.”
“My dear,” said Mr. Hale alarmed. “Pray don’t go off on that idea. I
fancy Mrs. Thornton is as haughty and proud in her way as our little
Margaret here is in hers, and that she completely ignores that old time
of trial, and poverty, and economy, of which he speaks so openly. I am
sure, at any rate, she would not like strangers to know anything about
it.”
“Take notice that is not my kind of haughtiness, papa, if I have any at
all; which I don’t agree to, though you’re always accusing me of it.”
“I don’t know positively that it is hers either; but from little things
I have gathered from him, I fancy so.”
They cared too little to ask in what manner her son had spoken about
her. Margaret only wanted to know if she must stay in to receive this
call, as it would prevent her going to see how Bessy was, until late in
the day, since the early morning was always occupied in household
affairs; and then she recollected that her mother must not be left to
have the whole weight of entertaining her visitor.
CHAPTER XII.
MORNING CALLS.
“Well—I suppose we must.”
FRIENDS IN COUNCIL.
Mr. Thornton had had some difficulty in working up his mother to the
desired point of civility. She did not often make calls; and when she
did, it was in heavy state that she went through her duties. Her son had
given her a carriage; but she refused to let him keep horses for it;
they were hired for the solemn occasions, when she paid morning or
evening visits. She had had horses for three days, not a fortnight
before, and had comfortably “killed off” all her acquaintances, who
might now put themselves to trouble and expense in their turn. Yet
Crampton was too far off for her to walk; and she had repeatedly
questioned her son as to whether his wish that she should call on the
Hales was strong enough to bear the expense of cab-hire. She would have
been thankful if it had not; for, as she said, “she saw no use in making
up friendships and intimacies with all the teachers and masters in
Milton; why, he would be wanting her to call on Fanny’s dancing-master’s
wife, the next thing!”
“And so I would, mother, if Mr. Mason and his wife were friendless in a
strange place, like the Hales.”
“Oh! you need not speak so hastily. I am going to-morrow. I only wanted
you exactly to understand about it.”
“If you are going to-morrow, I shall order horses.”
“Nonsense, John. One would think you were made of money.”
“Not quite, yet. But about the horses I’m determined. The last time you
were out in a cab, you came home with a headache from the jolting.”
“I never complained of it, I’m sure.”
“No! my mother is not given to complaints,” said he, a little proudly.
“But so much the more I have to watch over you. Now, as for Fanny there,
a little hardship would do her good.”
“She is not made of the same stuff as you are, John. She could not bear
it.”
Mrs. Thornton was silent after this; for her last words bore relation to
a subject which mortified her. She had an unconscious contempt for a
weak character; and Fanny was weak in the very points in which her
mother and brother were strong. Mrs. Thornton was not a woman much
given to reasoning; her quick judgment and firm resolution served her in
good stead of any long arguments and discussions with herself; she felt
instinctively that nothing could strengthen Fanny to endure hardships
patiently, or face difficulties bravely; and though she winced as she
made this acknowledgment to herself about her daughter, it only gave her
a kind of pitying tenderness of manner towards her; much of the same
description of demeanour with which mothers are wont to treat their weak
and sickly children. A stranger, a careless observer might have
considered that Mrs. Thornton’s manner to her children betokened far
more love to Fanny than to John. But such a one would have been deeply
mistaken. The very daringness with which mother and son spoke out
unpalatable truths, the one to the other, showed a reliance on the firm
centre of each other’s souls, which the uneasy tenderness of Mrs.
Thornton’s manner to her daughter, the shame with which she thought to
hide the poverty of her child in all the grand qualities which she
herself possessed unconsciously, and which she set so high a value upon
in others—this shame, I say, betrayed the want of a secure
resting-place for her affection. She never called her son by any name
but John; “love,” and “dear,” and such like terms, were reserved for
Fanny. But her heart gave thanks for him day and night; and she walked
proudly among women for his sake.
“Fanny dear! I shall have horses to the carriage to-day, to go and call
on these Hales. Should not you go and see nurse? It’s in the same
direction, and she’s always so glad to see you. You could go on there
while I am at Mrs. Hale’s.”
“Oh! mamma, it’s such a long way, and I am so tired.”
“With what?” asked Mrs. Thornton, her brow slightly contracting.
“I don’t know—the weather, I think. It is so relaxing. Couldn’t you
bring nurse here, mamma? The carriage could fetch her, and she could
spend the rest of the day here, which I know she would like.”