Shirley
"dotard;" you have taunted him with his age and the loss of his physical
vigour. What fine heroes you are yourselves! Men like you have a right
to trample on what is mortal in a demigod. Scoff at your ease; your
scorn can never break his grand old heart.
But come, friends, whether Quakers or cotton-printers, let us hold a
peace-congress, and let out our venom quietly. We have been talking with
unseemly zeal about bloody battles and butchering generals; we arrive
now at a triumph in your line. On the 18th of June 1812 the Orders in
Council were repealed, and the blockaded ports thrown open. You know
very well--such of you as are old enough to remember--you made Yorkshire
and Lancashire shake with your shout on that occasion. The ringers
cracked a bell in Briarfield belfry; it is dissonant to this day. The
Association of Merchants and Manufacturers dined together at Stilbro',
and one and all went home in such a plight as their wives would never
wish to witness more. Liverpool started and snorted like a river-horse
roused amongst his reeds by thunder. Some of the American merchants felt
threatenings of apoplexy, and had themselves bled--all, like wise men,
at this first moment of prosperity, prepared to rush into the bowels of
speculation, and to delve new difficulties, in whose depths they might
lose themselves at some future day. Stocks which had been accumulating
for years now went off in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye.
Warehouses were lightened, ships were laden; work abounded, wages rose;
the good time seemed come. These prospects might be delusive, but they
were brilliant--to some they were even true. At that epoch, in that
single month of June, many a solid fortune was realized.
* * * * *
When a whole province rejoices, the humblest of its inhabitants tastes a
festal feeling; the sound of public bells rouses the most secluded
abode, as if with a call to be gay. And so Caroline Helstone thought,
when she dressed herself more carefully than usual on the day of this
trading triumph, and went, attired in her neatest muslin, to spend the
afternoon at Fieldhead, there to superintend certain millinery
preparations for a great event, the last appeal in these matters being
reserved for her unimpeachable taste. She decided on the wreath, the
veil, the dress to be worn at the altar. She chose various robes and
fashions for more ordinary occasions, without much reference to the
bride's opinion--that lady, indeed, being in a somewhat impracticable
mood.
Louis had presaged difficulties, and he had found them--in fact, his
mistress had shown herself exquisitely provoking, putting off her
marriage day by day, week by week, month by month, at first coaxing him
with soft pretences of procrastination, and in the end rousing his whole
deliberate but determined nature to revolt against her tyranny, at once
so sweet and so intolerable.
It had needed a sort of tempest-shock to bring her to the point; but
there she was at last, fettered to a fixed day. There she lay, conquered
by love, and bound with a vow.
Thus vanquished and restricted, she pined, like any other chained
denizen of deserts. Her captor alone could cheer her; his society only
could make amends for the lost privilege of liberty. In his absence she
sat or wandered alone, spoke little, and ate less.
She furthered no preparations for her nuptials; Louis was himself
obliged to direct all arrangements. He was virtually master of Fieldhead
weeks before he became so nominally--the least presumptuous, the kindest
master that ever was, but with his lady absolute. She abdicated without
a word or a struggle. "Go to Mr. Moore, ask Mr. Moore," was her answer
when applied to for orders. Never was wooer of wealthy bride so
thoroughly absolved from the subaltern part, so inevitably compelled to
assume a paramount character.
In all this Miss Keeldar partly yielded to her disposition; but a remark
she made a year afterwards proved that she partly also acted on system.
"Louis," she said, "would never have learned to rule if she had not
ceased to govern. The incapacity of the sovereign had developed the
powers of the premier."
It had been intended that Miss Helstone should act as bridesmaid at the
approaching nuptials, but Fortune had destined her another part.
She came home in time to water her plants. She had performed this little
task. The last flower attended to was a rose-tree, which bloomed in a
quiet green nook at the back of the house. This plant had received the
refreshing shower; she was now resting a minute. Near the wall stood a
fragment of sculptured stone--a monkish relic--once, perhaps, the base
of a cross. She mounted it, that she might better command the view. She
had still the watering pot in one hand; with the other her pretty dress
was held lightly aside, to avoid trickling drops. She gazed over the
wall, along some lonely fields; beyond three dusk trees, rising side by
side against the sky; beyond a solitary thorn at the head of a solitary
lane far off. She surveyed the dusk moors, where bonfires were kindling.
The summer evening was warm; the bell-music was joyous; the blue smoke
of the fires looked soft, their red flame bright. Above them, in the sky
whence the sun had vanished, twinkled a silver point--the star of love.
Caroline was not unhappy that evening--far otherwise; but as she gazed
she sighed, and as she sighed a hand circled her, and rested quietly on
her waist. Caroline thought she knew who had drawn near; she received
the touch unstartled.
"I am looking at Venus, mamma. See, she is beautiful. How white her
lustre is, compared with the deep red of the bonfires!"
The answer was a closer caress; and Caroline turned, and looked, not
into Mrs. Pryor's matron face, but up at a dark manly visage. She
dropped her watering-pot and stepped down from the pedestal.
"I have been sitting with 'mamma' an hour," said the intruder. "I have
had a long conversation with her. Where, meantime, have you been?"
"To Fieldhead. Shirley is as naughty as ever, Robert. She will neither
say Yes nor No to any question put. She sits alone. I cannot tell
whether she is melancholy or nonchalant. If you rouse her or scold her,
she gives you a look, half wistful, half reckless, which sends you away
as queer and crazed as herself. What Louis will make of her, I cannot
tell. For my part, if I were a gentleman, I think I would not dare
undertake her."
"Never mind them. They were cut out for each other. Louis, strange to
say, likes her all the better for these freaks. He will manage her, if
any one can. She tries him, however. He has had a stormy courtship for
such a calm character; but you see it all ends in victory for him.
Caroline, I have sought you to ask an audience. Why are those bells
ringing?"
"For the repeal of your terrible law--the Orders you hate so much. You
are pleased, are you not?"
"Yesterday evening at this time I was packing some books for a
sea-voyage. They were the only possessions, except some clothes, seeds,
roots, and tools, which I felt free to take with me to Canada. I was
going to leave you."
"To leave me? To leave _me_?"
Her little fingers fastened on his arm; she spoke and looked affrighted.
"Not now--not now. Examine my face--yes, look at me well. Is the despair
of parting legible thereon?"
She looked into an illuminated countenance, whose characters were all
beaming, though the page itself was dusk. This face, potent in the
majesty of its traits, shed down on her hope, fondness, delight.
"Will the repeal do you good--_much_ good, _immediate_ good?" she
inquired.
"The repeal of the Orders in Council saves me. Now I shall not turn
bankrupt; now I shall not give up business; now I shall not leave
England; now I shall be no longer poor; now I can pay my debts; now all
the cloth I have in my warehouses will be taken off my hands, and
commissions given me for much more. This day lays for my fortunes a
broad, firm foundation, on which, for the first time in my life, I can
securely build."
Caroline devoured his words; she held his hand in hers; she drew a long
breath.
"You are saved? Your heavy difficulties are lifted?"
"They are lifted. I breathe. I can act."
"At last! Oh, Providence is kind! Thank Him, Robert."
"I do thank Providence."
"And I also, for your sake!" She looked up devoutly.
"Now I can take more workmen, give better wages, lay wiser and more
liberal plans, do some good, be less selfish. _Now_, Caroline, I can
have a house--a home which I can truly call mine--and _now_----"
He paused, for his deep voice was checked.
"And _now_," he resumed--"now I can think of marriage, _now_ I can seek
a wife."
This was no moment for her to speak. She did not speak.
"Will Caroline, who meekly hopes to be forgiven as she forgives--will
she pardon all I have made her suffer, all that long pain I have
wickedly caused her, all that sickness of body and mind she owed to me?
Will she forget what she knows of my poor ambition, my sordid schemes?
Will she let me expiate these things? Will she suffer me to prove that,
as I once deserted cruelly, trifled wantonly, injured basely, I can now
love faithfully, cherish fondly, treasure tenderly?"
His hand was in Caroline's still; a gentle pressure answered him.
"Is Caroline mine?"
"Caroline is yours."
"I will prize her. The sense of her value is here, in my heart; the
necessity for her society is blended with my life. Not more jealous
shall I be of the blood whose flow moves my pulses than of her happiness
and well-being."
"I love you, too, Robert, and will take faithful care of you."
"Will you take faithful care of me? Faithful care! As if that rose
should promise to shelter from tempest this hard gray stone! But she
_will_ care for me, in her way. These hands will be the gentle
ministrants of every comfort I can taste. I know the being I seek to
entwine with my own will bring me a solace, a charity, a purity, to
which, of myself, I am a stranger."
Suddenly Caroline was troubled; her lip quivered.
"What flutters my dove?" asked Moore, as she nestled to and then
uneasily shrank from him.
"Poor mamma! I am all mamma has. Must I leave her?"
"Do you know, I thought of that difficulty. I and 'mamma' have discussed
it."
"Tell me what you wish, what you would like, and I will consider if it
is possible to consent. But I cannot desert her, even for you. I cannot
break her heart, even for your sake."
"She was faithful when I was false--was she not? I never came near your
sick-bed, and she watched it ceaselessly."
"What must I do? Anything but leave her."
"At my wish you never shall leave her."
"She may live very near us?"
"With us--only she will have her own rooms and servant. For this she
stipulates herself."
"You know she has an income, that, with her habits, makes her quite
independent?"
"She told me that, with a gentle pride that reminded me of somebody
else."
"She is not at all interfering, and incapable of gossip."
"I know her, Cary. But if, instead of being the personification of
reserve and discretion, she were something quite opposite, I should not
fear her."
"Yet she will be your mother-in-law?" The speaker gave an arch little
nod. Moore smiled.
"Louis and I are not of the order of men who fear their mothers-in-law,
Cary. Our foes never have been, nor will be, those of our own household.
I doubt not my mother-in-law will make much of me."
"That she will--in her quiet way, you know. She is not demonstrative;
and when you see her silent, or even cool, you must not fancy her
displeased; it is only a manner she has. Be sure to let me interpret for
her whenever she puzzles you; always believe my account of the matter,
Robert."