by Ellen Wood
Last, but not least, Mrs. Peckaby had not gone. No: for Brother Jarrum had stolen a march upon her. What his motive in doing this might be was best known to himself. Of all the converts, none had been so eager for the emigration, so fondly anticipative of the promised delights, as Susan Peckaby; and she had made her own private arrangements to steal off secretly, leaving her unbelieving husband to his solitary fate. As it turned out, however, she was herself left; the happy company stole off, and abandoned her.
Brother Jarrum so contrived it, that the night fixed for the exodus was kept secret from Mrs. Peckaby. She did not know that he had even gone out of the house, until she got up in the morning and found him absent. Brother Jarrum’s personal luggage was not of an extensive character. It was contained in a blue bag; and this bag was likewise missing. Not, even then, did a shadow of the cruel treachery played her darken the spirit of Mrs. Peckaby. Her faith in Brother Jarrum was of unlimited extent; she would as soon have thought of deceiving her own self, as that he could deceive. The rumour that the migration had taken place, the company off, awoke her from her happy security to a state of raving torture. Peckaby dodged out of her way, afraid. There is no knowing but Peckaby himself may have been the stumbling-block in the mind of Brother Jarrum. A man so dead against the Latter Day Saints as Peckaby had shown himself, would be a difficult customer to deal with. He might be capable of following them and upsetting the minds of all the Deerham converts, did his wife start with them for New Jerusalem.
All this information was gathered by Jan. Jan had heard nothing for many a day that so tickled his fancy. He bent his steps to Peckaby’s, and went in. Jan, you know, was troubled neither with pride nor ceremony; nobody less so in all Deerham. Where inclination took him, there went Jan.
Peckaby, all black, with a bar of iron in his hand, a leather apron on, and a broad grin upon his countenance, was coming out of the door as Jan entered. The affair seemed to tickle Peckaby’s fancy as much as it tickled Jan’s. He touched his hair. “Please, sir, couldn’t you give her a dose of jalap, or something comforting o’ that sort, to bring her to?” asked he, pointing with his thumb indoors, as he stamped across the road to the forge.
Mrs. Peckaby had calmed down from the rampant state to one of prostration. She sat in her kitchen behind the shop, nursing her knees, and moaning. Mrs. Duff, who, by Jan’s help, had survived the threatened death fro “cholic,” and was herself again, stood near the sufferer, in company with one or two more cronies. All the particulars, Susan Peckaby’s contemplated journey, with the deceitful trick played her, had got wind; and the Deerham ladies were in consequence flocking in.
“You didn’t mean going, did you?” began Jan.
“Not mean going!” sobbed Susan Peckaby, rocking herself to and fro. “I did mean going, sir, and I’m not ashamed to own to it. If folks is in the luck to be offered a chance of paradise, I dun know many as ud say they wouldn’t catch at it.”
“Paradise, was it?” said Jan. “What was it chiefly to consist of?”
“Of everything,” moaned Susan Peckaby. “There isn’t a thing you could wish for under the sun, but what’s to be had in plenty at New Jerusalem. Dinners and teas, and your own cows, and big houses and parlours, and gardens loaded with fruit, and garden stuff as decays for want o’ cutting, and veils when you go out, and evening dances, like the grand folks here has, and new caps perpetual! And I have lost it! They be gone and have left me! — oh, o-o-o-h!”
“And husbands, besides; one for everybody!” spoke up a girl. “You forget that, Mrs. Peckaby.”
“Husbands besides,” acquiesced Susan Peckaby, aroused from her moaning. “Every woman’s sure to be chose by a saint as soon as she gets out. There’s not such a thing as a old maid there, and there needn’t be no widders.”
Mrs. Duff turned up bar nose, and turned it wrathfully on the girl who had spoken.
“If they call husbands their paradise, keep me away from ‘em, say I. You girls be like young bears — all your troubles have got to come. You just try a husband, Bess Dawson; whether he’s a saint, or whether he’s a sinner, let him be of a cranky temper, thwarting you at every trick and turn, and you’ll see what sort of a paradise marriage is! Don’t you think I’m right, sir?”
Jan’s mouth was extended from ear to ear, laughing.
“I never tried it,” said he. “Were you to have been espoused by Brother Jarrum?” he asked, of Susan Peckaby.
“No, sir, I was not,” she answered, in much anger. “I did not favour Brother Jarrum. I’d prefer to pick and choose when I got there. But I had a great amount of respect for Brother Jarrum, sir, which I’m proud to speak to. And I don’t believe that he has served me this shameful trick of his own knowledge,” she added, with emphasis. “I believe there has been some unfortinate mistake, and that when he finds I’m not among the company, he’ll come back for me. I’d go after them, only that Peckaby’s on the watch. I never see such a altered man as Peckaby; it had used to be as I could just turn him round my little finger, but he won’t be turned now.”
She finished up with a storm of sobs. Jan, in an Ecstasy of mirth yet, offered to send her some cordials from the surgery, by way of consolation; not, however, the precise one suggested by Peckaby. But cordials had no charm in that unhappy moment for Mrs. Peckaby’s ear.
Jan departed. In quitting the door he encountered a stranger, who inquired if that was Peckaby’s shop. Jan fancied the man looked something the cut of Brother Jarrum, and sent him in. His coat and boots were white with dust. Looking round on the assembled women when he reached the kitchen, the stranger asked which was Mrs. Peckaby. Mrs. Peckaby looked up, and signified that she was.
“I have a message from the saint and elder, Brother Jarrum,” he mysteriously whispered in her ear. “It must be give to you in private.”
Mrs. Peckaby, in a tremble of delight, led the stranger to a small shed in the yard, which she used for washing purposes, and called the back ‘us. It was the most private place she could think of, in her fluster. The stranger, propping himself against a broken tub, proceeded, with some circumlocution and not remarkable perspicuity of speech, to deliver the message with which he was charged. It was to the effect that a vision had revealed to Brother Jarrum the startling fact, that Susan Peckaby was not to go out with the crowd at present on the wing. A higher destiny awaited her. She would be sent for in a different manner — in a more important form; sent for special, on a quadruped. That is to say, on a white donkey.[A]
[A] A fact.
“On a white donkey?” echoed the trembling and joyful woman.
“On a white donkey,” gravely repeated the brother — for that he was another brother of the community, there could be little doubt. “What the special honour intended for you may be, me and Brother Jarrum don’t pertend to guess at. It’s above us. May be you are fated to be chose by our great prophet hisself. Any how, it’s something at the top of the tree.”
“When shall I be sent for, sir?” eagerly asked Mrs. Peckaby.
“That ain’t revealed neither. It may be next week — it mayn’t be for a year; you must always be on the look-out. One of these days or nights, you’ll see a white donkey a-standing at your door. It’ll be the messenger for you from New Jerusalem. You mount him without a minute’s loss of time, and come off.”
But that Mrs. Peckaby’s senses were exalted at that moment far above the level of ordinary mortals’, it might have occurred to her to inquire whether the donkey would be endowed with the miraculous power of bearing her over the sea. No such common question presented itself. She asked another.
“Why couldn’t Brother Jarrum have told me this hisself, sir? I have been a’most mad this morning, ever since I found as they had gone.”
The brother — this brother — turned up the whites of his eyes. “When unknown things is revealed to us, and mysterious orders give, they never come to us a minute afore the time,” he replied. “Not till Brother Jarrum was fixing the night of departure, did th
e vision come to him. It was commanded him that it should be kept from you till the rest were off, and then he were to send back a messenger to tell you — and many a mile I’ve come! Brother Jarrum and me has no doubt that it is meant as a trial of your faith.”
Nothing could be more satisfactory to the mind of Mrs. Peckaby than this explanation. Had any mysterious vision appeared to herself, showing her that it was false, commanding her to disbelieve it, it could not have shaken her faith. If the white donkey arrived at her door that very night, she would be sure to mount him.
“Do you think it’ll be very long, sir, that I shall have to wait?” she resumed, feverishly listening for the answer.
“My impression is that it’ll be very short,” was the reply. “And it’s Brother Jarrum’s also. Any way, you be on the look-out — always prepared. Have a best robe at hand continual, ready to clap on the instant the quadruped appears, and come right away to New Jerusalem.”
In the openness of her heart, Mrs. Peckaby offered refreshment to the brother. The best her house afforded: which was not much. Peckaby should be condemned to go foodless for a week, rather than that he should depart fasting. The brother, however, declined: he appeared to be in a hurry to leave Deerham behind him.
“I’d not disclose this to anybody if I was you,” was his parting salutation. “Leastways, not for a day or two. Let the ruck of ’em embark first at Liverpool. If it gets wind, some of them may be for turning crusty, because they are not favoured with special animals, too.”
Had the brother recommended Susan Peckaby to fill the tub with water, and stand head downwards in it for a day or two, she was in the mood to obey him. Accordingly, when questioned by Mrs. Duff, and the other curious ones, what had been the business of the stranger, she made a great mystery over it, and declined to answer.
“It’s good news, by the signs of your face,” remarked Mrs. Duff.
“Good news!” rapturously repeated Susan Peckaby, “it’s heaven. I say, Mother Duff, I want a new gownd: something of the very best. I’ll pay for it by degrees. There ain’t no time to be lost, neither; so I’ll come down at once and choose it.”
“What has happened?” was the wondering rejoinder of Mother Duff.
“Never you mind, just yet. I’ll tell you about it afore the week’s out.”
And, accordingly, before the week was out, all Deerham was regaled with the news; full particulars. And Susan Peckaby, a robe of purple, of the stuff called lustre, laid up in state, to be donned when the occasion came, passed her time, night and day, at her door and windows, looking out for the white donkey that was to bear her in triumph to New Jerusalem.
CHAPTER XLII.
A SURPRISE FOR MRS. TYNN.
In the commodious dressing-room at Verner’s Pride, appropriated to its new mistress, Mrs. Verner, stood the housekeeper, Tynn, lifting her hands and her eyes. You once saw the chamber of John Massingbird, in this same house, in a tolerable litter: but that was as nothing compared with the litter in this dressing-room, piles and piles of it, one heap by the side of another. Mary Tynn stood screwed against the wainscoting of the wall: she had got in, but to get out was another matter: there was not a free place where she could put her foot. Strictly speaking, perhaps, it could not be called litter, and Mrs. Verner and her French maid would have been alike indignant at hearing it so classed. Robes of rich and rare texture; silks standing on end with magnificence; dinner attire, than which nothing could be more exquisite; ball dresses in all sorts of gossamer fabrics; under-skirts, glistening with their soft lustre; morning costumes, pure and costly; shawls of Cashmere and other recherché stuffs, enough to stock a shop; mantles of every known make; bonnets that would send an English milliner crazy; veils charming to look upon; laces that might rival Lady Verner’s embroideries, their price fabulous; handkerchiefs that surely never were made for use; dozens of delicately-tinted gloves, cased in ornamental boxes, costing as much as they did; every description of expensive chaussure; and trinkets, the drawn cheques for which must have caused Lionel Verner’s sober bankers to stare. Tynn might well heave her hands and eyes in dismay. On the chairs, on the tables, on the drawers, on the floor, on every conceivable place and space they lay; a goodly mass of vanity, just unpacked from their cases.
Flitting about amidst them was a damsel of coquettish appearance, with a fair skin, light hair, and her nose a turn-up. Her gray gown was flounced to the waist, her small cap of lace, its pink strings flying, was lodged on the back of her head. It was Mademoiselle Benoite, Mrs. Verner’s French maid, one she had picked up in Paris. Whatever other qualities the damsel might lack, she had enough of confidence. Not many hours yet in the house, and she was assuming more authority in it than her mistress did.
Mr. and Mrs. Verner had returned the night before, Mademoiselle Benoite and her packages making part of their train. A whole fourgon could not have been sufficient to convey these packages from the French capital to the frontier. Ph[oe]by, the simple country maid whom Sibylla had taken to Paris with her, found her place a sinecure since the engagement of Mademoiselle Benoite. She stood now on the opposite side of the room to Tynn, humbly waiting Mademoiselle Benoite’s imperious commands.
“Where on earth will you stow ’em away?” cried Tynn, in her wonder. “You’ll want a length of rooms to do it in.”
“Where I stow ’em away!” retorted Mademoiselle Benoite, in her fluent speech, but broken English. “I stow ’em where I please. Note you that, Madame Teen. Par example! The château is grand enough.”
“What has its grandeur got to do with it?” was Mary Tynn’s answer. She knew but little of French phrases.
“Now, then, what for you stand there, with your eyes staring and your hands idle?” demanded Mademoiselle Benoite sharply, turning her attack on Ph[oe]by.
“If you’ll tell me what to do, I’ll do it,” replied the girl. “I could help to put the things up, if you’d show me where to begin.”
“I like to see you dare to put a finger on one of these things!” returned Mademoiselle Benoite. “You can confine your services to sewing, and to waiting upon me; but not you dare to interfere with my lady’s toilette. Tiens, I am capable, I hope! I’d give up the best service to-morrow where I had not sole power! Go you down to the office, and order me a cup of chocolate, and wait you and bring it up to me. That maudite drogue, that coffee, this morning, has made me as thirsty as a panthère.”
Ph[oe]by, glancing across at Mrs. Tynn, turned somewhat hesitatingly to pick her way out of the room. The housekeeper, though not half understanding, contrived to make out that the morning coffee was not approved of. The French mademoiselle had breakfasted with her, and, in Mrs. Tynn’s opinion, the coffee had been perfect, fit for the table of her betters.
“Is it the coffee that you are abusing?” asked she. “What was the matter with it?”
“Ciel! You ask what the matter with it!” returned Mademoiselle Benoite, in her rapid tongue. “It was everything the matter with it. It was all bad. It was drogue, I say; medicine. There!”
“Well, I’m sure!” resentfully returned the housekeeper. “Now, I happened to make that coffee myself this morning — Tynn, he’s particular in his coffee, he is — and I put in—”
“I not care if you put in the whole canastre,” vehemently interrupted Mademoiselle Benoite. “You English know not to make coffee. All the two years I lived in London with Madame la Duchesse, I never got one cup of coffee that was not enough to choke me. And they used pounds of it in the house, where they might have used ounces. Bah! You can make tea, I not say no; but you cannot make coffee. Now, then! I want a great number sheets of silk-paper.”
“Silk-paper?” repeated Tynn, whom the item puzzled. “What’s that?”
“You know not what silk-paper is!” angrily returned Mademoiselle Benoite. “Quelle ignorance!” she apostrophised, not caring whether she was understood or not. “Ellé ne connait pas ce que c’est, papier-de-soie! I must have it, and a great deal of it, do you hear? It is
as common as anything — silk-paper.”
“Things common in France mayn’t be common with us,” retorted Mrs. Tynn. “What is it for?”
“It is for some of these articles. If I put them by without the paper-silk round them in the cartons, they’ll not keep their colour.”
“Perhaps you mean silver-paper,” said Mary Tynn. “Tissue-paper, I have heard my Lady Verner call it. There’s none in the house, Madmisel Bennot.”
“Madmisel Bennot” stamped her foot. “A house without silk-paper in it! When you knew my lady was coming home!”
“I didn’t know she’d bring — a host of things with her that she has brought,” was the answering shaft lanced by Mrs. Tynn.
“Don’t you see that I am waiting? Will you send out for some?”
“It’s not to be had in Deerham,” said Mrs. Tynn. “If it must be had, one of the men must go to Heartburg Why won’t the paper do that was over ’em before?”
“There not enough of that. And I choose to have fresh, I do.”
“Well, you had better give your own orders about it,” said Mary Tynn. “And then, if there’s any mistake, it’ll be nobody’s fault, you know.”
Mademoiselle Benoite did not on the instant reply. She had her hands full just then. In reaching over for a particular bonnet, she managed to turn a dozen or two on to the floor. Tynn watched the picking up process, and listened to the various ejaculations that accompanied it, in much grimness.