The Small House at Allington
"Isn't mamma down yet?" said Bell.
"Bell," said Lily, "something has happened. Mamma has got a letter."
"Happened! What has happened? Is anybody ill? Who is the letter
from?" And Bell was going to return through the door in search of her
mother.
"Stop, Bell," said Lily. "Do not go to her yet. I think it's
from--Adolphus."
"Oh, Lily, what do you mean?"
"I don't know, dear. We'll wait a little longer. Don't look like
that, Bell." And Lily strove to appear calm, and strove almost
successfully.
"You have frightened me so," said Bell.
"I am frightened myself. He only sent me one line yesterday, and now
he has sent nothing. If some misfortune should have happened to him!
Mrs. Crump brought down the letter herself to mamma, and that is so
odd, you know."
"Are you sure it was from him?"
"No; I have not spoken to her. I will go up to her now. Don't you
come, Bell. Oh! Bell, do not look so unhappy." She then went over and
kissed her sister, and after that, with very gentle steps, made her
way up to her mother's room. "Mamma, may I come in?" she said.
"Oh! my child!"
"I know it is from him, mamma. Tell me all at once."
Mrs. Dale had read the letter. With quick, glancing eyes, she had
made herself mistress of its whole contents, and was already aware
of the nature and extent of the sorrow which had come upon them. It
was a sorrow that admitted of no hope. The man who had written that
letter could never return again; nor if he should return could he be
welcomed back to them. The blow had fallen, and it was to be borne.
Inside the letter to herself had been a very small note addressed to
Lily. "Give her the enclosed," Crosbie had said in his letter, "if
you do not now think it wrong to do so. I have left it open, that you
may read it." Mrs. Dale, however, had not yet read it, and she now
concealed it beneath her handkerchief.
I will not repeat at length Crosbie's letter to Mrs. Dale. It covered
four sides of letter-paper, and was such a letter that any man who
wrote it must have felt himself to be a rascal. We saw that he had
difficulty in writing it, but the miracle was, that any man could
have found it possible to write it. "I know you will curse me," said
he; "and I deserve to be cursed. I know that I shall be punished
for this, and I must bear my punishment. My worst punishment will
be this,--that I never more shall hold up my head again." And then,
again, he said:--"My only excuse is my conviction that I should
never make her happy. She has been brought up as an angel, with pure
thoughts, with holy hopes, with a belief in all that is good, and
high, and noble. I have been surrounded through my whole life by
things low, and mean, and ignoble. How could I live with her, or she
with me? I know now that this is so; but my fault has been that I
did not know it when I was there with her. I choose to tell you all,"
he continued, towards the end of the letter, "and therefore I let you
know that I have engaged myself to marry another woman. Ah! I can
foresee how bitter will be your feelings when you read this: but they
will not be so bitter as mine while I write it. Yes; I am already
engaged to one who will suit me, and whom I may suit. You will not
expect me to speak ill of her who is to be near and dear to me. But
she is one with whom I may mate myself without an inward conviction
that I shall destroy all her happiness by doing so. Lilian," he said,
"shall always have my prayers; and I trust that she may soon forget,
in the love of an honest man, that she ever knew one so dishonest
as--Adolphus Crosbie."
Of what like must have been his countenance as he sat writing such
words of himself under the ghastly light of his own small, solitary
lamp? Had he written his letter at his office, in the day-time, with
men coming in and out of his room, he could hardly have written of
himself so plainly. He would have bethought himself that the written
words might remain, and be read hereafter by other eyes than those
for which they were intended. But, as he sat alone, during the small
hours of the night, almost repenting of his sin with true repentance,
he declared to himself that he did not care who might read them. They
should, at any rate, be true. Now they had been read by her to whom
they had been addressed, and the daughter was standing before the
mother to hear her doom.
"Tell me all at once," Lily had said; but in what words was her
mother to tell her?
"Lily," she said, rising from her seat, and leaving the two letters
on the couch; that addressed to the daughter was hidden beneath a
handkerchief, but that which she had read she left open and in sight.
She took both the girl's hands in hers as she looked into her face,
and spoke to her. "Lily, my child!" Then she burst into sobs, and was
unable to tell her tale.
"Is it from him, mamma? May I read it? He cannot be--"
"It is from Mr. Crosbie."
"Is he ill, mamma? Tell me at once. If he is ill I will go to him."
"No, my darling, he is not ill. Not yet;--do not read it yet. Oh,
Lily! It brings bad news; very bad news."
"Mamma, if he is not in danger, I can read it. Is it bad to him, or
only bad to me?"
At this moment the servant knocked, and not waiting for an answer
half opened the door.
"If you please, ma'am, Mr. Bernard is below, and wants to speak to
you."
"Mr. Bernard! ask Miss Bell to see him."
"Miss Bell is with him, ma'am, but he says that he specially wants to
speak to you."
Mrs. Dale felt that she could not leave Lily alone. She could not
take the letter away, nor could she leave her child with the letter
open.
"I cannot see him," said Mrs. Dale. "Ask him what it is. Tell him
I cannot come down just at present." And then the servant went, and
Bernard left his message with Bell.
"Bernard," she had said, "do you know of anything? Is there anything
wrong about Mr. Crosbie?" Then, in a few words, he told her all, and
understanding why his aunt had not come down to him, he went back
to the Great House. Bell, almost stupefied by the tidings, seated
herself at the table unconsciously, leaning upon her elbows.
"It will kill her," she said to herself. "My Lily, my darling Lily!
It will surely kill her!"
But the mother was still with the daughter, and the story was still
untold.
"Mamma," said Lily, "whatever it is, I must, of course, be made to
know it. I begin to guess the truth. It will pain you to say it.
Shall I read the letter?"
Mrs. Dale was astonished at her calmness. It could not be that
she had guessed the truth, or she would not stand like that, with
tearless eyes and unquelled courage before her.
"You shall read it, but I ought to tell you first. Oh, my child, my
own one!" Lily was now leaning against the bed, and her mother was
standing over her, caressing her.
"Then tell me," said she. "But I know what it is. He has thought it
all over while away from me, and he finds that it must not be as we
have supposed. Before he went I offered to release him, and now he
knows that he had better accept my offer. Is it so, mamma?" In answer
to this Mrs. Dale did not speak, but Lily understood from her signs
that it was so.
"He might have written it to me, myself," said Lily, very proudly.
"Mamma, we will go down to breakfast. He has sent nothing to me,
then?"
"There is a note. He bids me read it, but I have not opened it. It is
here."
"Give it me," said Lily, almost sternly. "Let me have his last words
to me;" and she took the note from her mother's hands.
"Lily," said the note, "your mother will have told you all. Before
you read these few words you will know that you have trusted one who
was quite untrustworthy. I know that you will hate me.--I cannot
even ask you to forgive me. You will let me pray that you may yet be
happy.--A. C."
She read these few words, still leaning against the bed. Then she
got up, and walking to a chair, seated herself with her back to her
mother. Mrs. Dale moving silently after her stood over the back of
the chair, not daring to speak to her. So she sat for some five
minutes, with her eyes fixed upon the open window, and with Crosbie's
note in her hand.
"I will not hate him, and I do forgive him," she said at last,
struggling to command her voice, and hardly showing that she could
not altogether succeed in her attempt. "I may not write to him
again, but you shall write and tell him so. Now we will go down to
breakfast." And so saying, she got up from her chair.
Mrs. Dale almost feared to speak to her, her composure was so
complete, and her manner so stern and fixed. She hardly knew how to
offer pity and sympathy, seeing that pity seemed to be so little
necessary, and that even sympathy was not demanded. And she could not
understand all that Lily had said. What had she meant by the offer to
release him? Had there, then, been some quarrel between them before
he went? Crosbie had made no such allusion in his letter. But Mrs.
Dale did not dare to ask any questions.
"You frighten me, Lily," she said. "Your very calmness frightens me."
"Dear mamma!" and the poor girl absolutely smiled as she embraced her
mother. "You need not be frightened by my calmness. I know the truth
well. I have been very unfortunate;--very. The brightest hopes of
my life are all gone;--and I shall never again see him whom I love
beyond all the world!" Then at last she broke down, and wept in her
mother's arms.
There was not a word of anger spoken then against him who had done
all this. Mrs. Dale felt that she did not dare to speak in anger
against him, and words of anger were not likely to come from poor
Lily. She, indeed, hitherto did not know the whole of his offence,
for she had not read his letter.
"Give it me, mamma," she said at last. "It has to be done sooner or
later."
"Not now, Lily. I have told you all,--all that you need know at
present."
"Yes; now, mamma," and again that sweet silvery voice became stern.
"I will read it now, and there shall be an end." Whereupon Mrs. Dale
gave her the letter and she read it in silence. Her mother, though
standing somewhat behind her, watched her narrowly as she did so. She
was now lying over upon the bed, and the letter was on the pillow, as
she propped herself upon her arm. Her tears were running, and ever
and again she would stop to dry her eyes. Her sobs, too, were very
audible, but she went on steadily with her reading till she came to
the line on which Crosbie told that he had already engaged himself
to another woman. Then her mother could see that she paused suddenly,
and that a shudder slightly convulsed all her limbs.
"He has been very quick," she said, almost in a whisper; and then she
finished the letter. "Tell him, mamma," she said, "that I do forgive
him, and I will not hate him. You will tell him that,--from me; will
you not?" And then she raised herself from the bed.
Mrs. Dale would give her no such assurance. In her present mood her
feelings against Crosbie were of a nature which she herself hardly
could understand or analyze. She felt that if he were present she
could almost fly at him as would a tigress. She had never hated
before as she now hated this man. He was to her a murderer, and worse
than a murderer. He had made his way like a wolf into her little
fold, and torn her ewe-lamb and left her maimed and mutilated for
life. How could a mother forgive such an offence as that, or consent
to be the medium through which forgiveness should be expressed?
"You must, mamma; or, if you do not, I shall do so. Remember that I
love him. You know what it is to have loved one single man. He has
made me very unhappy; I hardly know yet how unhappy. But I have loved
him, and do love him. I believe, in my heart, that he still loves me.
Where this has been there must not be hatred and unforgiveness."