Indeed, Madam, had I then dreamed that this man was to be my husband, I must I think have died; but our misfortunes come upon us by degrees, or else I suppose they could not be borne at all.
In three or four days he made his offer to my father, who accepted of him with eagerness as his son-in-law: the settlements were then agreed upon between them, and even the day was fixed without my being once consulted. My mother was ordered to tell me of it, and she bade me not say one word of opposition, or even one word that might demand delay. The fatal wedding was settled for that day se’nnight1 it was in vain I knelt to my mother – it was in vain that, on the ground, prostrate at his feet, I implored my father to have mercy upon me – nay, if they were determined to get rid of their poor Eleanor, to kill me, rather than to compel me to marry a man I could not help ting. They both treated me as a silly child, that did not know what was for her own good; and my father, suspecting that one of his shopmen had some regard for me, turned the poor young man away at-a moment’s notice; while my mother sent me to my eldest sister, who was as hard-hearted as herself, and had never loved me: there I was ordered to remain in an upper chamber, where I was teased all day during this sad week, by my sister and brother-in-law’s advice; and my mother in the mean time got my wedding-clothes made for me, and, the day before the dreadful one of my marriage, came to tell me that the next was fixed for my becoming the wife of Mr Grimshaw. She then shewed me the clothes she had prepared, in a way as if she thought such things would reconcile me to my lot, when she told me that Polly Such-a-one, and Betsy Such-a-one, had neither of them half as much, or half as good clothes on their wedding as mine were; and that they were only married to tradesfolks, whereas my intended husband was a gentleman of fortune, an Esquire, and had a fine seat in the country.
Never in my life had I been allowed the least will of my own; for though I was the youngest, I was not a favourite, and had been used to be ordered by my brother and sisters, and all the family, I had nobody to help me to resist this cruel tyranny. Mr Grimshaw, I thought, when I dared to look in his face, liked me the better for not liking him, and seemed to survey me, just as I can fancy a wild beast looks at the prey he is sure to have in his power. – Ah! Madam, the dreadful day came – I was carried to church more dead than alive; and though I never I believe moved my lips, for I was half insensible, yet I was congratulated on my marriage by my family, and put into a hired chariot and four, which Mr Grimshaw had provided, and, without any friend with me, brought to the manor house.
As I entered it, I felt sure that it would be my tomb: if it had been so directly, how many miseries should I have escaped from!
The first person I saw when I entered the house, was Mrs Hannah, who was dressed out to receive me, as if she had been the mistress of it, and I only an inferior visitor.
anneorvsto She surveyed me with scrutinizing eyes; but I saw a great deal of malice and ill nature mixed with her curiosity, as she from time to time spoke to her master in a sneering tone, and appeared hardly able to command herself from speaking the displeasure her looks expressed. Oh! Madam, when, in addition to such a reception, I considered myself at such a distance from my friends, and in the power of such a person as Mr Grimshaw, whom I had, during our journey, found to be the most ill-tempered and fierce man I had ever seen (for he had sworn and scolded the whole way like a lunatic), and in that dismal great house, it is impossible to describe how my heart sunk, and how earnestly I wished, that, young as I was, I might go to my death-bed rather than remain the wretch I was. But, bad as my condition then seemed to be, it was, even when I made the worst of it, far, far short of that I found it really to be afterwards.
Mrs Hannah, or, as I was desired to call her, Mrs Pegham, was our companion at table, and directed every thing in the house, where I was never consulted; for both she and the man whom it was my misery to call my husband, treated me like a child too insignificant to be noticed. I was very glad of that; for I did not desire to interfere in Mr Grimshaw’s family, and was obliged to them for letting me at any time escape from the necessity of hearing their voices, or staying in the room with them. Mrs Pegham took upon her to treat me with great insolence: she ordered even what clothes I should wear, and locked up the rest, saying to me, “that such a silly young thing was no judge of what was proper.” I did not complain, because I knew it would have been useless, or even worse than useless, because Mr Grimshaw would only have laughed at me if he had been in a good humour, or sworn at me if he had been in a bad temper, which much oftener happened; and besides, I did not care for my appearance, and wished, that, except being clean, I might never look well in his eyes again: so that, far from caring about the fineries that were taken from me, I had no satisfaction so great as being suffered to stay up in a closet at the end of the house, where I heard nothing of what was passing; and there I used to remain and cry for hours together.
My amusement, when I could take resolution to dry my eyes, was to write out of a bible, the only book I had for some time, such sentences as seemed to suit my sad condition; and this occupied more of my time than one would imagine, because I had not had much learning, and wrote very slow: but by degrees, and as I took a pleasure in it, I began to make out a little better, and the first want I found, was of materials for writing. I now and then took a sheet or two of paper out of an old leather case that lay about the parlour, when nobody saw me; for I dared not ask for any, Mr Grimshaw having told me once, when I expressed some wish to write to my mother, that he never suffered gossiping letters to be sent out of his house that my mother did not want to hear more of me than he told her, that I was very well, and he forbade my ever sending letters to any body. I said nothing at the time, but felt a strong desire to write from that moment; and I was now so much alone that I had plenty of time; for Mr Grimshaw, to my great satisfaction, was sometimes absent for a week, a fortnight, or even longer; and though when he came home he was generally in such a terrible humour that nobody but Mrs Pegham could endure the house, my comfort was, that he seemed to care less and less for this unfortunate person of mine which had occasioned all my misfortunes. Yet, when he had driven all his servants away by ill humour (for he used to abuse and beat the men so that he had actions brought against him continually), he would come up into the room where I was allowed to sit, and ask me what I did there? And whatever answer I gave, it was all the same; he either stood raving in the room till I fell senseless with terror, or dragged me down to the room where he and Mrs Pegham sat, and there he seemed to take an unaccountable pleasure in tormenting me; though, as I was so patient, and he had no one fault to accuse me of, it required some ingenuity to find topics of reproach and wrath. One of these however constantly was, that I was grown ugly. Far from that making me uneasy, I rejoiced at it, and wished to be the most odious and loathsome of human creatures, rather than ever appear in his eyes an object of what he called love. So passed the first wretched year of my marriage: at the beginning of that time I had been sometimes shewn to the few people whom he could not avoid seeing, as his wife, and had sat at the head of the table. I thought that once or twice some of the guests looked upon me with pity and concern: but as soon as the table-cloth was removed, I always had a hint from Mr Grimshaw to retire; and I never had an opportunity of speaking a word to any of these good people, who, if I had, could not perhaps have done me any service.
Autumn came on, and Mr Grimshaw, who affected to be very fond of field sports, went away into the North a-shooting. I knew the time he was to go, for I was lucky enough then to sleep in a room by myself; and I remember, that in a dark morning in October I softly opened the casement, from which, over an old wall, I could see into the stable yard; and when I heard him go out, swearing at his servants, my heart beat with apprehension, lest, as it was a bad morning, he should delay his journey; for he was very capricious, and often took it into his head to return after he had set out, or find some excuse for not going. He seemed always pursued by some tormenting thoughts, that never suffered him to res
t contented any where many days together.
However, this time he went, I heard him depart, followed by a servant with his gun; and as the noise of their horses feet, and of the man whistling to the dogs, became fainter and fainter, I felt quite relieved; so great was the horror of his presence, and, alas! such sort of negative comfort was all I could now ever hope to have.
Mrs Pegham, who perhaps hates him in her heart, was that day in a rather better humour than usual. She had some friends, she said, out of Yorkshire, who were to dine with her, and she desired I would dine in my own room, as I had often of late been suffered to do. I was very glad to do so now, and had not the least curiosity to see her friends, or wish to be a party in the merriment that seemed to go on in the best parlour, which I heard as I stepped across the landing-place of the great stairs, to go down as soon as I had dined to walk in what is called the lower garden. I had always chosen this place when I was allowed to go out, because it was hid from the windows of the house by the great garden walls. On one side of this second garden was a row of old fir trees, and a high cut holly hedge beyond them: the walk between led up to a sort of bower or arbour made of yew, cut also, and a wooden table in the middle of it; and shrubs, such as holly and laurustinus, grew about it, so that it was open no way but that which looked down a grass walk, between the holly hedge and the fir trees. There were table vegetables grew in the middle of the plot of ground, and on the other side was a long double row of filbert trees,1so old that they met at the top, and formed a sort of arbour all the length of the garden.
The evening I speak of was cold and gloomy, though there was but little wind. I walked to the end of the fir-tree walk, and sat down in the yew arbour. It was nearly dusk and every thing was quite silent about the garden. I fell into reflections on the different situation I was in now from that when I was in my father’s cheerful house in the midst of a great city, with the bustle of commerce always about me, and where every body seemed so busy, that none had time to think themselves unhappy. Now, in this cheerless solitude the cessation of the actual misery I suffered in Mr Grimshaw’s presence gave me but time to consider how dreadful my fate was.
As I thus gave myself up to melancholy thoughts, my eyes were insensibly fixed on the end of the long dark walk that was before me when a figure, not distinctly seen through the gloom, appeared there, and I could just discern that it seemed to be a woman, and was clad in some light colour. I felt no alarm, for I thought it was Mrs Pegham, or one of the maids; I looked steadily, and saw that she waved her hand as beckoning me towards her. My heart misgave me; I feared that Mr Grimshaw was returned, and that I was sent for in. I arose with this idea, and walked towards the person, who seemed to me to wait for me at the end of the walk; but as I approached, the form became more and more indistinct, till it seemed dissolved in air; and when I found myself close to the spot where I had imagined it to be, there was nothing. I looked round me in amaze,2 but still without terror – I listened. It was, I thought, surely my sight that deceived me, or some reflection of the trees in the declining light. I felt rather relieved than alarmed; for any thing was preferable in my opinion to what I had dreaded as the cause of this summons, the return of Mr Grimshaw. But the evening was become very cold, and it was growing dark. The leaves on the ground rustled mournfully as I passed under two lime trees from which they had fallen, meaning to pass through the filbert walk, to reach a door that led through an orchard the nearest way to the house. As I did so I looked down it, and fancied that about the middle I saw the same figure that I had perceived before standing quite still. The leaves were thin on the filbert trees, and many had fallen. I now fancied it the dairy-maid, a young country girl, whom I was ordered never to speak to, but whom I had sometimes talked to when I could do it unobserved: she had occasionally put me upon my guard against the ill-humour of Mr Grimshaw, when he returned in one of his frantic fits. She seemed to pity me. I felt myself grateful for such little acts of kindness as it was in her power to shew me. Persuading myself now that she waited there to give me some intelligence, I stepped down the walk. The figure appeared stationary till I was within twenty paces, and I discerned it to be a woman; but when I was almost near enough to discover the features, the vision again seemed to melt into air; and when I reached the spot where I thought it had stood, there was nothing!
A cold chill crept over me as I stood for a moment looking fearfully round. I listened in breathless terror. No sound but the faint rustling of the half-faded leaves broke the dead silence of the night, and it became almost entirely dark before, with trembling steps, I got back to my own room. I reached it, however, breathless, and sat down sighing loud and deep. My terror was not lessened when I heard the sigh repeated from a closet near the head of the bed, where I used to hang my clothes.
Starting up, I was going on the immediate impulse of fear to open the closet, but a low murmuring noise I heard in it deterred me. Faint dews hung upon my face: I became sick, and caught the post of the bed to save myself from falling. As I had nobody to listen to my terror, or by reasoning to remove it, I knew it would be useless to call for assistance, and I was a great way from the inhabited part of the house. I endeavoured, however, to argue with myself, and to enquire what I had to fear? Stories enough I had heard of ghosts and strange appearances; but it had also been impressed upon my mind, that these things never were seen but by the wicked. An internal consciousness of my own innocence, and at the same time a full sense of my own wretchedness, seemed somewhat to restore me. “What have I done,” said I, “that ought to make me fear the dead? – Which way can misery reach me from among the living? and how can I be more unhappy than I am?”
By these arguments I acquired strength enough to open the door of my room, meaning to have gone down a narrow back stairs at the end of a long passage, that there joined another narrow stairs which led down to the cellars; and it was a way by which Rebecca, a woman of the village, who was sometimes employed in the house, used to come into my room, sometimes brought what I wanted; and I meant to call for a candle, which I supposed Mrs Pegham’s having company for her to wait upon might have occasioned her to forget. I was slowly descending, when I thought I heard her coming up, and stopped: she soon appeared; but the moment she saw me she gave a loud shriek, let the candle fall, and I suppose, to save herself from falling, threw herself forward on the stairs. Hardly knowing what I said, I spoke to her, and, though we were in total darkness, tried to help her up. After a moment she was re-assured by the sound of my voice, and by being convinced it was I who spoke to her. I took her hand; and though my words trembled on my lips, I entreated her to let me know what had so alarmed her. – All the answer I could obtain was, “Oh! Madam, you don’t know! Such a fright! but it serves me as I ought to be served. – I was told last year how ’twould be.”
I found it vain to ask an explanation of all this, the woman still continuing to lament herself; I therefore desired she would try to rise and light the candle, for that I was extremely cold in my own room, and wished for a fire. At length I prevailed upon her to exert herself to go down, leaning on my arm; but as she went she continued to exclaim, “Cold! ah, well you may! Poor young thing! Who would be a great rich lady to live in this house? – Not I, I am sure.” Of this and similar speeches I entreated an explanation, but in vain. Taken up entirely with herself, all I could obtain from the woman was, that when she saw me upon the stairs she had taken me for the spirit that walked in and about the house, and which the dairy-maid had declared she had seen standing against the pales of the great granary. I shuddered, and earnestly enquired what was meant. “Ah! poor young lady, you will know soon enough.” was all the answer I could obtain from this person, who, as we approached the place where it was probable she might be heard by Mrs Pegham, lowered her voice, and seemed to subdue her fears by considering her interest. I could not prevail upon her to stay even while I waited for the dairy-maid: but she hastened away, and left me alone in the kitchen; for the servants now in the house, who were
only two maids, and a sort of farming man, were all employed, as I supposed, in attending on the friends of the housekeeper: the kitchen was entirely deserted.
It was, however, comparatively cheerful; for there was a good fire, supper seemed to be preparing, and several dogs lay round the hearth. I thought it would have been a consolation, and in some sort a protection, if I could have prevailed on one of these to follow me to my room. There was an old water spaniel that I had sometimes fondled and fed, and which had often followed me in my solitary walks. I now, fancying I heard Mrs Pegham’s voice, hastened to retire; for the terror of her insults was as great as almost any other, and I had been ordered by Mr Grimshaw never to be seen in the kitchen. I coaxed the spaniel to follow me, and taking up a candle, with which I intended to light my fire, I crept slowly back to my own room, dreading to look up the stairs, and somewhat re-assured by hearing the sound of my four-footed companion’s steps after me. Hardly, however, had I reached the door of my room before the dog began to howl in a strange manner, and ran away with such speed, that any attempts to stop or overtake it would have been to no purpose. I cannot describe the terror with which I entered the room; but perceiving nothing, and feeling half-dead with fear and cold, I lit the fire, and, when it burnt up, sat down and ate what had been sent me for my supper, which Rebecca had left upon the stairs. I found myself restored to a little more courage, but on the apprehensions of the evening I dared not think. As soon, therefore, as I could, I hastened to my bed, having bolted the door of my chamber, and that of the closet, into which I dared not look.
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