John Halifax, Gentleman

by Dinah Maria Mulock Craik

  “Save me? From what—or whom?”

  “From Mr. Gerard Vermilye, who is now waiting down the road, and whom, if Lady Caroline Brithwood once flies to, or even sees, at this crisis, she loses her place among honourable English matrons for ever.”

  John said this, with no air of virtuous anger or contempt, but as the simple statement of a fact. The convicted woman dropped her face between her hands.

  Ursula, greatly shocked, was some time before she spoke.

  “Is it true, Caroline?”

  “What is true?”

  “That which my husband has heard of you?”

  “Yes,” she cried, springing up, and dashing back her beautiful hair—beautiful still, though she must have been five or six and thirty at least—“Yes, it is true—it shall be true. I will break my bonds and live the life I was made for. I would have done it long ago, but for—no matter. Why, Ursula, he adores me; young and handsome as he is, he adores me. He will give me my youth back again, ay, he will.”

  And she sang out a French chanson, something about “la liberte et ses plaisirs, la jeunesse, l’amour.”

  The mother grew sterner—any such wife and mother would. Then and there, compassion might have died out of even her good heart, had it not been for the sudden noise over-head of children’s feet—children’s chattering. Once more the pitiful thought came—“She has no children.”

  “Caroline,” she said, catching her gown as she passed, 318“when I was with you, you had a child which only breathed and died. It died spotless. When you die, how dare you meet that little baby?”

  The singing changed to sobbing. “I had forgotten. My little baby! Oh, mon Dieu, mon Dieu!”

  Mrs. Halifax, taking in earnest those meaningless French ejaculations, whispered something about Him who alone can comfort and help us all.

  “Him! I never knew Him, if indeed He be. No, no, there is no after-life.”

  Ursula turned away in horror. “John, what shall we do with her? No home!—no husband!—no God!”

  “He never leaves Himself without a witness. Look, love.”

  The wretched woman sat rocking to and fro—weeping and wringing her hands. “It was cruel—cruel! You should not have spoken about my baby. Now—”

  “Tell me—just one word—I will not believe anybody’s word except your own. Caroline, are you—still innocent?”

  Lady Caroline shrank from her touch. “Don’t hold me so. You may have one standard of virtue, I another.”

  “Still, tell me.”

  “And if I did, you, an ‘honourable English matron’—was not that your husband’s word?—would turn from me, most likely.”

  “She will not,” John said. “She has been happy, and you most miserable.”

  “Oh, most miserable.”

  That bitter groan went to both their hearts, Ursula leaned over her—herself almost in tears. “Cousin Caroline, John says true—I will not turn from you. I know you have been sinned against—cruelly—cruelly. Only tell me that you yourself have not sinned.”

  “I HAVE ‘sinned,’ as you call it.”

  Ursula started—drew closer to her husband. Neither spoke.

  319“Mrs. Halifax, why don’t you take away your hand?”

  “I?—let me think. This is terrible. Oh, John!”

  Again Lady Caroline said, in her sharp, bold tone, “Take away your hand.”

  “Husband, shall I?”

  “No.”

  For some minutes they stood together, both silent, with this poor woman. I call her “poor,” as did they, knowing, that if a sufferer needs pity, how tenfold more does a sinner!

  John spoke first. “Cousin Caroline.” She lifted up her head in amazement. “We are your cousins, and we wish to be your friends, my wife and I. Will you listen to us?”

  She sobbed still, but less violently.

  “Only, first—you must promise to renounce for ever guilt and disgrace.”

  “I feel it none. He is an honourable gentleman—he loves me, and I love him. That is the true marriage. No, I will make you no such promise. Let me go.”

  “Pardon me—not yet. I cannot suffer my wife’s kinswoman to elope from my own house, without trying to prevent it.”

  “Prevent!—sir!—Mr. Halifax! You forget who you are, and who I am—the daughter of the Earl of Luxmore.”

  “Were you the King’s daughter it would make no difference. I will save you in spite of yourself, if I can. I have already spoken to Mr. Vermilye, and he has gone away.”

  “Gone away! the only living soul that loves me. Gone away! I must follow him—quick—quick.”

  “You cannot. He is miles distant by this time. He is afraid lest this story should come out to-morrow at Kingswell; and to be an M.P. and safe from arrest is better to Mr. Vermilye than even yourself, Lady Caroline.”

  John’s wife, unaccustomed to hear him take that cool, worldly, half-sarcastic tone, turned to him somewhat reproachfully; but he judged best. For the moment, this tone had more 320weight with the woman of the world than any homilies. She began to be afraid of Mr. Halifax. Impulse, rather than resolution, guided her, and even these impulses were feeble and easily governed. She sat down again, muttering:

  “My will is free. You cannot control me.”

  “Only so far as my conscience justifies me in preventing a crime.”

  “A crime?”

  “It would be such. No sophistries of French philosophy on your part, no cruelty on your husband’s, can abrogate the one law, which if you disown it as God’s, is still man’s—being necessary for the peace, honour, and safety of society.”

  “What law?”

  “THOU SHALT NOT COMMIT ADULTERY.”

  People do not often utter this plain Bible word. It made Ursula start, even when spoken solemnly by her own husband. It tore from the self-convicted woman all the sentimental disguises with which the world then hid, and still hides, its corruptions. Her sin arose and stared her blackly in the face—AS SIN. She cowered before it.

  “Am I—THAT? And William will know it. Poor William!” She looked up at Ursula—for the first time with the guilty look; hitherto, it had been only one of pain or despair. “Nobody knows it, except you. Don’t tell William. I would have gone long ago, but for him. He is a good boy;—don’t let him guess his sister was—”

  She left the word unspoken. Shame seemed to crush her down to the earth; shame, the precursor of saving penitence—at least, John thought so. He quitted the room, leaving her to the ministry of his other self, his wife. As he sat down with me, and told me in a few words what indeed I had already more than half guessed, I could not but notice the expression of his own face. And I recognized how a man can be 321at once righteous to judge, tender to pity, and strong to save; a man the principle of whose life is, as John’s was—that it should be made “conformable to the image” of Him, who was Himself on earth the image of God.

  Ursula came out and called her husband. They talked some time together. I guessed, from what I heard, that she wished Lady Caroline to stay the night here, but that he with better judgment was urging the necessity of her returning to the protection of her husband’s home without an hour’s delay.

  “It is her only chance of saving her reputation. She must do it. Tell her so, Ursula.”

  After a few minutes, Mrs. Halifax came out again.

  “I have persuaded her at last. She says she will do whatever you think best. Only before she goes, she wants to look at the children. May she?”

  “Poor soul!—yes,” John murmured, turning away.

  Stepping out of sight, we saw the poor lady pass through the quiet, empty house into the children’s bed-room. We heard her smothered sob, at times, the whole way.

  Then I went down to the stream, and helped John to saddle his horse, with Mrs. Halifax’s old saddle—in her girlish days, Ursula used to be very fond of riding.

  “She can ride back again from the Mythe,” said John. “She wishes to go, and it is best she should; so
that nothing need be said, except that Lady Caroline spent a day at Longfield, and that my wife and I accompanied her safe home.”

  While he spoke, the two ladies came down the field-path. I fancied I heard, even now, a faint echo of that peculiarly sweet and careless laugh, indicating how light were all impressions on a temperament so plastic and weak—so easily remoulded by the very next influence that fate might throw across her perilous way.

  John Halifax assisted her on horseback, took the bridle 322under one arm and gave the other to his wife. Thus they passed up the path, and out at the White Gate.

  I delayed a little while, listening to the wind, and to the prattle of the stream, that went singing along in daylight or in darkness, by our happy home at Longfield. And I sighed to myself, “Poor Lady Caroline!”

  323CHAPTER XXIV

  Midnight though it was, I sat up until John and his wife came home. They said scarcely anything, but straightway retired. In the morning, all went on in the house as usual, and no one ever knew of this night’s episode, except us three.

  In the morning, Guy looked wistfully around him, asking for the “pretty lady;” and being told that she was gone, and that he would not be likely to see her again, seemed disappointed for a minute; but soon he went down to play at the stream, and forgot all.

  Once or twice I fancied the mother’s clear voice about the house was rarer than its wont; that her quick, active, cheerful presence— penetrating every nook, and visiting every creature, as with the freshness of an April wind—was this day softer and sadder; but she did not say anything to me, nor I to her.

  John had ridden off early—to the flour-mill, which he still kept on, together with the house at Norton Bury—he always disliked giving up any old associations. At dinner-time he came home, saying he was going out again immediately.

  Ursula looked uneasy. A few minutes after, she followed me under the walnut-tree, where I was sitting with Muriel, and asked me if I would go with John to Kingswell.

  “The election takes place to-day, and he thinks it right to 324be there. He will meet Mr. Brithwood and Lord Luxmore; and though there is not the slightest need—my husband can do all that he has to do alone— still, for my own satisfaction, I would like his brother to be near him.”

  They invariably called me their brother now; and it seemed as if the name had been mine by right of blood always.

  Of course, I went to Kingswell, riding John’s brown mare, he himself walking by my side. It was not often that we were thus alone together, and I enjoyed it much. All the old days seemed to come back again as we passed along the quiet roads and green lanes, just as when we were boys together, when I had none I cared for but David, and David cared only for me. The natural growth of things had made a difference in this, but our affection had changed its outward form only, not its essence. I often think that all loves and friendships need a certain three days’ burial before we can be quite sure of their truth and immortality. Mine—it happened just after John’s marriage, and I may confess it now—had likewise its entombment, bitter as brief. Many cruel hours sat I in darkness, weeping at the door of its sepulchre, thinking that I should never see it again; but, in the dawn of the morning, it rose, and I met it in the desolate garden, different, yet the very same. And after that, it walked with me continually, secure and imperishable evermore.

  I rode, and John sauntered beside me along the footpath, now and then plucking a leaf or branch off the hedge, and playing with it, as was his habit when a lad. Often I caught the old smile—not one of his three boys, not even handsome Guy, had their father’s smile.

  He was telling me about Enderley Mill, and all his plans there, in the which he seemed very happy. At last, his long life of duty was merging into the life he loved. He looked as proud and pleased as a boy, in talking of the new inventions he meant to apply in cloth-weaving; and how he and his wife had agreed together to live for some years to come at little Longfield, 325strictly within their settled income, that all the remainder of his capital might go to the improvement of Enderley Mills and mill-people.

  “I shall be master of nearly a hundred, men and women. Think what good we may do! She has half-a-dozen plans on foot already—bless her dear heart!”

  It was easy to guess whom he referred to—the one who went hand-in-hand with him in everything.

  “Was the dinner in the barn, next Monday, her plan, too?”

  “Partly. I thought we would begin a sort of yearly festival for the old tan-yard people, and those about the flour-mill, and the Kingswell tenants—ah, Phineas, wasn’t I right about those Kingswell folk?”

  These were about a dozen poor families, whom, when our mortgage fell in, he had lured out of Sally Watkins’s miserable alley to these old houses, where they had at least fresh country air, and space enough to live wholesomely and decently, instead of herding together like pigs in a sty.

  “You ought to be proud of your tenants, Phineas. I assure you, they form quite a contrast to their neighbours, who are Lord Luxmore’s.”

  “And his voters likewise, I suppose?—the ‘free and independent burgesses’ who are to send Mr. Vermilye to Parliament?”

  “If they can,” said John, biting his lip with that resolute half-combative air which I now saw in him at times, roused by things which continually met him in his dealings with the world—things repugnant alike to his feelings and his principles, but which he had still to endure, not having risen high enough to oppose, single-handed, the great mass of social corruption which at this crisis of English history kept gathering and gathering, until out of the very horror and loathsomeness of it an outcry for purification arose.

  “Do you know, Phineas, I might last week have sold your 326houses for double price? They are valuable, this election year, since your five tenants are the only voters in Kingswell who are not likewise tenants of Lord Luxmore. Don’t you see how the matter stands?”

  It was not difficult, for that sort of game was played all over England, connived at, or at least winked at, by those who had political influence to sell or obtain, until the Reform Bill opened up the election system in all its rottenness and enormity.

  “Of course I knew you would not sell your houses; and I shall use every possible influence I have to prevent your tenants selling their votes. Whatever may be the consequence, the sort of thing that this Kingswell election bids fair to be, is what any honest Englishman ought to set his face against, and prevent if he can.”

  “Can you?”

  “I do not feel sure, but I mean to try. First, for simple right and conscience; secondly, because if Mr. Vermilye is not saved from arrest by being placed in Parliament, he will be outlawed and driven safe out of the country. You see?”

  Ay, I did, only too well. Though I foresaw that whatever John was about to do, it must necessarily be something that would run directly counter to Lord Luxmore—and he had only just signed the lease of Enderley Mills. Still, if right to be done, he ought to do it at all risks, at all costs; and I knew his wife would say so.

  We came to the foot of Kingswell Hill, and saw the little hamlet—with its grey old houses, its small, ancient church, guarded by enormous yew-trees, and clothed with ivy that indicated centuries of growth.

  A carriage overtook us here; in it were two gentlemen, one of whom bowed in a friendly manner to John. He returned it.

  “This is well; I shall have one honest gentleman to deal with to-day.”

  “Who is he?”

  “Sir Ralph Oldtower, from whom I bought Longfield. An 327excellent man—I like him—even his fine old Norman face, like one of his knightly ancestors on the tomb in Kingswell church. There’s something pleasant about his stiff courtesy and his staunch Toryism; for he fully believes in it, and acts up to his belief. A true English gentleman, and I respect him.”

  “Yet, John, Norton Bury calls you a democrat.”

  “So I am, for I belong to the people. But I nevertheless up-hold a true aristocracy—the BEST MEN of the country,—do you reme
mber our Greeks of old? These ought to govern, and will govern, one day, whether their patent of nobility be births and titles, or only honesty and brains.”

  Thus he talked on, and I liked to hear him, for talking was rare in his busy life of constant action. I liked to observe how during these ten years his mind had brooded over many things; how it had grown, strengthened, and settled itself, enlarging both its vision and its aspirations; as a man does, who, his heart at rest in a happy home, has time and will to look out from thence into the troublous world outside, ready to do his work there likewise. That John was able to do it—ay, beyond most men—few would doubt who looked into his face; strong with the strength of an intellect which owed all its development to himself alone; calm with the wisdom which, if a man is ever to be wise, comes to him after he has crossed the line of thirty years. In that face, where day by day Time was writing its fit lessons—beautiful, because they were so fit—I ceased to miss the boyish grace, and rejoiced in the manhood present, in the old age that was to be.

  It seemed almost too short a journey, when, putting his hand on the mare’s bridle—the creature loved him, and turned to lick his arm the minute he came near—John stopped me to see the view from across Kingswell churchyard.

  “Look, what a broad valley, rich in woods, and meadow-land, and corn. How quiet and blue lie the Welsh hills far away. It does one good to look at them. Nay, it brings back a little bit of me 328which rarely comes uppermost now, as it used to come long ago, when we read your namesake, and Shakspeare, and that Anonymous Friend who has since made such a noise in the world. I delight in him still. Think of a man of business liking Coleridge.”

  “I don’t see why he should not.”

  “Nor I. Well, my poetic tastes may come out more at Enderley. Or perhaps when I am an old man, and have fought the good fight, and—holloa, there! Matthew Hales, have they made you drunk already?”

  The man—he was an old workman of ours—touched his hat, and tried to walk steadily past “the master,” who looked at once both stern and sad.