Shirley
look forward to a possibility that has its terrors."
The sleeve was readjusted, the bracelet replaced.
"Do you know that you try me?" he said, smiling. "I am a patient sort of
man, but my pulse is quickening."
"Whatever happens, you will befriend me, Mr. Moore? You will give me the
benefit of your self-possession, and not leave me at the mercy of
agitated cowards?"
"I make no promise now. Tell me the tale, and then exact what pledge you
will."
"It is a very short tale. I took a walk with Isabella and Gertrude one
day, about three weeks ago. They reached home before me; I stayed behind
to speak to John. After leaving him, I pleased myself with lingering in
the lane, where all was very still and shady. I was tired of chattering
to the girls, and in no hurry to rejoin them. As I stood leaning against
the gate-pillar, thinking some very happy thoughts about my future
life--for that morning I imagined that events were beginning to turn as
I had long wished them to turn----"
"Ah! Nunnely had been with her the evening before!" thought Moore
parenthetically.
"I heard a panting sound; a dog came running up the lane. I know most of
the dogs in this neighbourhood. It was Phœbe, one of Mr. Sam Wynne's
pointers. The poor creature ran with her head down, her tongue hanging
out; she looked as if bruised and beaten all over. I called her. I meant
to coax her into the house and give her some water and dinner. I felt
sure she had been ill-used. Mr. Sam often flogs his pointers cruelly.
She was too flurried to know me; and when I attempted to pat her head,
she turned and snatched at my arm. She bit it so as to draw blood, then
ran panting on. Directly after, Mr. Wynne's keeper came up, carrying a
gun. He asked if I had seen a dog. I told him I had seen Phœbe.
"'You had better chain up Tartar, ma'am,' he said, 'and tell your people
to keep within the house. I am after Phœbe to shoot her, and the groom
is gone another way. She is raging mad.'"
Mr. Moore leaned back in his chair and folded his arms across his chest.
Miss Keeldar resumed her square of silk canvas, and continued the
creation of a wreath of Parmese violets.
"And you told no one, sought no help, no cure? You would not come to
me?"
"I got as far as the schoolroom door; there my courage failed. I
preferred to cushion the matter."
"Why? What can I demand better in this world than to be of use to you?"
"I had no claim."
"Monstrous! And you did nothing?"
"Yes. I walked straight into the laundry, where they are ironing most of
the week, now that I have so many guests in the house. While the maid
was busy crimping or starching, I took an Italian iron from the fire,
and applied the light scarlet glowing tip to my arm. I bored it well
in. It cauterized the little wound. Then I went upstairs."
"I dare say you never once groaned?"
"I am sure I don't know. I was very miserable--not firm or tranquil at
all, I think. There was no calm in my mind."
"There was calm in your person. I remember listening the whole time we
sat at luncheon, to hear if you moved in the room above. All was quiet."
"I was sitting at the foot of the bed, wishing Phœbe had not bitten
me."
"And alone. You like solitude."
"Pardon me."
"You disdain sympathy."
"Do I, Mr. Moore?"
"With your powerful mind you must feel independent of help, of advice,
of society."
"So be it, since it pleases you."
She smiled. She pursued her embroidery carefully and quickly, but her
eyelash twinkled, and then it glittered, and then a drop fell.
Mr. Moore leaned forward on his desk, moved his chair, altered his
attitude.
"If it is not so," he asked, with a peculiar, mellow change in his
voice, "how is it, then?"
"I don't know."
"You do know, but you won't speak. All must be locked up in yourself."
"Because it is not worth sharing."
"Because nobody can give the high price you require for your confidence.
Nobody is rich enough to purchase it. Nobody has the honour, the
intellect, the power you demand in your adviser. There is not a shoulder
in England on which you would rest your hand for support, far less a
bosom which you would permit to pillow your head. Of course you must
live alone."
"I _can_ live alone, if need be. But the question is not how to live,
but how to die alone. That strikes me in a more grisly light."
"You apprehend the effects of the virus? You anticipate an indefinitely
threatening, dreadful doom?"
She bowed.
"You are very nervous and womanish."
"You complimented me two minutes since on my powerful mind."
"You are very womanish. If the whole affair were coolly examined and
discussed, I feel assured it would turn out that there is no danger of
your dying at all."
"Amen! I am very willing to live, if it please God. I have felt life
sweet."
"How can it be otherwise than sweet with your endowments and nature? Do
you truly expect that you will be seized with hydrophobia, and die
raving mad?"
"I _expect_ it, and have _feared_ it. Just now I fear nothing."
"Nor do I, on your account. I doubt whether the smallest particle of
virus mingled with your blood; and if it did, let me assure you that,
young, healthy, faultlessly sound as you are, no harm will ensue. For
the rest, I shall inquire whether the dog was really mad. I hold she was
not mad."
"Tell nobody that she bit me."
"Why should I, when I believe the bite innocuous as a cut of this
penknife? Make yourself easy. _I_ am easy, though I value your life as
much as I do my own chance of happiness in eternity. Look up."
"Why, Mr. Moore?"
"I wish to see if you are cheered. Put your work down; raise your head."
"There----"
"Look at me. Thank you. And is the cloud broken?"
"I fear nothing."
"Is your mind restored to its own natural sunny clime?"
"I am very content; but I want your promise."
"Dictate."
"You know, in case the worst I _have_ feared should happen, they will
smother me. You need not smile. They will; they always do. My uncle will
be full of horror, weakness, precipitation; and that is the only
expedient which will suggest itself to him. Nobody in the house will be
self-possessed but you. Now promise to befriend me--to keep Mr. Sympson
away from me, not to let Henry come near, lest I should hurt him.
Mind--_mind_ that you take care of yourself too. But I shall not injure
you; I know I shall not. Lock the chamber door against the surgeons;
turn them out if they get in. Let neither the young nor the old MacTurk
lay a finger on me; nor Mr. Greaves, their colleague; and lastly, if I
give trouble, with your own hand administer to me a strong
narcotic--such a sure dose of laudanum as shall leave no mistake.
_Promise to do this._"
Moore left his desk, and permitted himself the recreation of one or two
turns through the room. Stopping behind Shirley's chair, he bent over
her, and said, in a low, emphatic voice, "I promise all you ask--without
comment, without reservation."
"If female help is needed, call in my housekeeper, Mrs. Gill. Let her
lay me out if I die. She is attached to me. She wronged me again and
again, and again and again I forgave her. She now loves me, and would
not defraud me of a pin. Confidence has made her honest; forbearance has
made her kind-hearted. At this day I can trust both her integrity, her
courage, and her affection. Call her; but keep my good aunt and my timid
cousins away. Once more, promise."
"I promise."
"That is good in you," she said, looking up at him as he bent over her,
and smiling.
"Is it good? Does it comfort?"
"Very much."
"I will be with you--I and Mrs. Gill only--in any, in every extremity
where calm and fidelity are needed. No rash or coward hand shall
meddle."
"Yet you think me childish?"
"I do."
"Ah! you despise me."
"Do we despise children?"
"In fact, I am neither so strong, nor have I such pride in my strength,
as people think, Mr. Moore; nor am I so regardless of sympathy. But when
I have any grief, I fear to impart it to those I love, lest it should
pain them; and to those whom I view with indifference I cannot
condescend to complain. After all, you should not taunt me with being
childish, for if you were as unhappy as I have been for the last three
weeks, you too would want some friend."
"We all want a friend, do we not?"
"All of us that have anything good in our natures."
"Well, you have Caroline Helstone."
"Yes. And you have Mr. Hall."
"Yes. Mrs. Pryor is a wise, good woman. She can counsel you when you
need counsel."
"For your part, you have your brother Robert."
"For any right-hand defections, there is the Rev. Matthewson Helstone,
M.A., to lean upon; for any left-hand fallings-off there is Hiram Yorke,
Esq. Both elders pay you homage."
"I never saw Mrs. Yorke so motherly to any young man as she is to you. I
don't know how you have won her heart, but she is more tender to you
than she is to her own sons. You have, besides, your sister Hortense."
"It appears we are both well provided."
"It appears so."
"How thankful we ought to be!"
"Yes."
"How contented!"
"Yes."
"For my part, I am almost contented just now, and very thankful.
Gratitude is a divine emotion. It fills the heart, but not to bursting;
it warms it, but not to fever. I like to taste leisurely of bliss.
Devoured in haste, I do not know its flavour."
Still leaning on the back of Miss Keeldar's chair, Moore watched the
rapid motion of her fingers, as the green and purple garland grew
beneath them. After a prolonged pause, he again asked, "Is the shadow
_quite_ gone?"
"Wholly. As I _was_ two hours since, and as I _am_ now, are two
different states of existence. I believe, Mr. Moore, griefs and fears
nursed in silence grow like Titan infants."
"You will cherish such feelings no more in silence?"
"Not if I dare speak."
"In using the word '_dare_,' to whom do you allude?"
"To you."
"How is it applicable to me?"
"On account of your austerity and shyness."
"Why am I austere and shy?"
"Because you are proud."
"Why am I proud?"
"I should like to know. Will you be good enough to tell me?"
"Perhaps, because I am poor, for one reason. Poverty and pride often go
together."
"That is such a nice reason. I should be charmed to discover another
that would pair with it. Mate that turtle, Mr. Moore."
"Immediately. What do you think of marrying to sober Poverty many-tinted
Caprice?"
"Are you capricious?"
"_You_ are."
"A libel. I am steady as a rock, fixed as the polar star."
"I look out at some early hour of the day, and see a fine, perfect
rainbow, bright with promise, gloriously spanning the beclouded welkin
of life. An hour afterwards I look again: half the arch is gone, and the
rest is faded. Still later, the stern sky denies that it ever wore so
benign a symbol of hope."
"Well, Mr. Moore, you should contend against these changeful humours.
They are your besetting sin. One never knows where to have you."
"Miss Keeldar, I had once, for two years, a pupil who grew very dear to
me. Henry is dear, but she was dearer. Henry never gives me trouble;
she--well, she did. I think she vexed me twenty-three hours out of the
twenty-four----"
"She was never with you above three hours, or at the most six at a
time."
"She sometimes spilled the draught from my cup, and stole the food from
my plate; and when she had kept me unfed for a day (and that did not
suit me, for I am a man accustomed to take my meals with reasonable
relish, and to ascribe due importance to the rational enjoyment of
creature comforts)----"
"I know you do. I can tell what sort of dinners you like best--perfectly
well. I know precisely the dishes you prefer----"
"She robbed these dishes of flavour, and made a fool of me besides. I