by Ellen Wood
When Helen went home from London, carrying with her the mortification that came of her interrupted marriage and Captain Foliott’s delinquency, she began to do what she had never done in her life before, busy herself a little in the parish: perhaps as a safety-valve to carry off her superfluous anger. The curate was a middle-aged man with a middle-aged wife and two babies, and Helen had no scruple in going about with him, here, there, and everywhere. To the schools, to the church, to practise the boys, to visit the poor, went she. But when in a few months that curate’s heart was made glad by a living — two hundred a-year and a five-roomed Vicarage — and Mr. Leafchild came in his place, it was a little different. She did not run about with the new curate as she had with the old, but she did see a good deal of him, and he of her. The result was they fell in love with one another. For the first time in her life the uncertain god, Cupid, had pierced the somewhat invulnerable heart of Helen Whitney.
But now, could anything be so inappropriate, or look more hopeless? Charles Leafchild, B.A., curate of Buttermead, positively only yet reading for his full title, scantily paid, no prospect of anything better, lacking patronage; and Miss Helen Whitney, daughter of Sir John Whitney, baronet! Looking at it from a practical point of view, it seemed that he might just as well have expected to woo and wed one of the stars in the sky.
On the bleak February morning that followed Helen’s expedition to Timberdale, Mr. Leafchild came down from his chamber and entered his sitting-room. The fire, a small one, for Mrs. Bean had received a general caution to be sparing of his coal, burnt brightly in the grate. He stood over it for a minute or two, rubbing his slender hands at the blaze: since he left the West Indies he had felt the cold more keenly than formerly. Then he turned to the breakfast-table, and saw upon it, a small portion of cold neck of mutton, an uncut loaf, and a pat of butter. His tea stood there, already made.
“If I leave the meat, it will do for dinner,” he thought: and proceeded to make his meal of bread-and-butter. Letty Bean, who chiefly waited on him, came in.
“A letter for you, sir,” she said, handing him a note.
He took it, looked at the handwriting, which was thick and sprawly and not familiar to him, and laid it beside his plate.
“Sir John Whitney’s footman brought it, sir,” continued Letty, volunteering the information: and a hot colour flushed the curate’s face as he heard it. He opened it then. Short and peremptory, it merely requested the Reverend Charles Leafchild to call upon Sir John Whitney that morning at Whitney Hall.
“Is the man waiting for an answer, Letty?”
“No, sir. He went away as soon as he gave it me.”
Mr. Leafchild half suspected what had occurred — that Sir John must, in some way, have become acquainted with the state of affairs. He judged so by the cold, haughty tone of the note: hitherto Sir John had always shown himself friendly. Far from being put out, Mr. Leafchild hoped it was so, and went on with his breakfast.
Another interruption. Mrs. Bean this time. She wore a mob cap and had lost her teeth.
“Here’s that tipsy Jones come to the door, sir. He says you told him to come.”
“Ah yes, I did; let him come in,” said the curate. “Is he tipsy this morning?”
“No, sir, only shaky. And what shall I order you for dinner, sir, to-day? I may as well ask, as I am here.”
“That will do,” he answered, pointing to the cold meat. “And please mash the potatoes.”
Jones came in. The man was not an incorrigibly bad doer, but weak and irresolute. If he worked two days, he idled and drank three, and his wife and children suffered. Mr. Leafchild, who felt more sorrow for him than anger, invited him to a seat by the fire, and talked to him long and persuasively, almost as one brother might talk to another, and gave him a hot cup of tea. Jones went away great in promises and penitence: and about eleven o’clock the curate betook himself to the Hall.
Of all men living, the Squire perhaps excepted, Sir John was about the worst to carry out any troublesome negotiation. He was good-hearted, irresolute, and quick-tempered.
When Mr. Leafchild was shown in, Sir John utterly forgot certain speeches he had conned over in his mind, broke down, went into a passion, and told the curate he was a designing, impudent villain.
Though his love for Helen, and that was intense, caused him to feel somewhat agitated in the presence of Helen’s father, Mr. Leafchild’s manner was quiet and calm, a very contrast to that of Sir John. After a little while, when the baronet had talked himself cool, Mr. Leafchild entered into a history of the affair: telling how he and Miss Whitney had met without any intention of any kind, except of that which might be connected with the parish interests, and how with as little intention, a mutual liking — nay, a love — had sprung up.
“Yes, that’s all very fine,” said Sir John, shuffling about his steel spectacles that were perched on his old red nose. “You knew she was my daughter; you knew well what you were about.”
The young man reddened at the reproach.
“Sir, indeed you misjudge me. I never thought of such a thing as falling in love with Miss Whitney until the love had come. Had she been the most obscure of young women, it would have been all the same.”
“Then you are an idiot for your pains,” retorted Sir John. “Why, goodness gracious me! have you not one single atom of common sense? Can’t you see how unfitting it is?”
“My family is a very good one; in point of fact, as good as yours, Sir John — if you will pardon me for saying so thus pointedly,” urged the curate in his gentle voice. “And though — —”
“Oh, bother!” interrupted Sir John, having no counter argument particularly at hand. “That goes for nothing. What are your prospects?”
“They are not great. Perhaps I ought to say that I have no prospects as yet. But, sir — —”
“Now come! that’s honest. No prospects! And yet you must go making love to my daughter.”
“I have not done that, sir, in one sense— ‘made love.’ Hardly a word, I think, has passed between myself and Miss Whitney that you might not have heard. But we have, notwithstanding, been fully aware of the state of each other’s heart — —”
“The state of each other’s fiddlestick,” spluttered Sir John. “A nice pair of you, I must say! And pray, what did you think it would come to?”
“What Miss Whitney may have thought I have not presumed to ask. For myself, I confess I am cherishing hopes for the future. It is some little time now since I have been wishing to speak to you, Sir John: and I intended, if you were so kind as not to entirely reject me, to write to my father, Dr. Leafchild, and lay the whole case before him. I think he can help me later if he will; and I certainly believe he will be only too glad to do it.”
“Help you to what?”
“To a living.”
“And, bless my heart and mind, how long do you suppose you might have to wait? A dozen years. Twenty years, for all you know. The curate who was here before you, poor Bell, had been waiting more than twenty years for one. It came to him last year, and he was forty-seven years old.”
Mr. Leafchild could say nothing to this.
“And a fine living it is, now he has it!” went on Sir John. “No, no, sir: Helen Whitney cannot be dragged into that kind of fate.”
“I should be the last to drag her, or wish to drag her into it. Believe that, Sir John. But, if I had a good living given to me, then I should like her to share it. And I think that my father would perhaps allow me some private means also, for Helen’s sake. He has money, and could do it.”
“But all those fancies and notions are just so many vapours, clouds up in the sky, and no better, don’t you see! You young men are sanguine and foolish; you lose sight of facts in fallacies. We must look at what is, not at what might be. Why, you are not yet even a priest!”
“No. I shall be ordained to that in a few months’ time.”
“And then, I suppose, you will either remain here, or get a curacy elsewhere. And you
r income will be that of a curate — a hundred pounds a-year, all told. Some curates get but fifty.”
“True. We are poorly paid.”
“And that may go on till you are forty or fifty years of age! And yet, in the face of it, you ask me to let you have my daughter. Now, Mr. Leafchild, you are either a simpleton yourself, or you must think I am one,” added Sir John, rising to end the interview, which had been to him one of thorough discomfort. “And I’m sure I hope you’ll pick up a little common sense, young man, and I shall order Miss Helen to pick some up too. There, that’s all.”
“I trust you are not angry with me, sir,” said the curate mildly, for Sir John was holding out his hand to be shaken.
“Well, yes, I am. Anything like this causes one such worry, you know. I’m sure I and my wife have had no sleep all night. You must not think any more of Helen. And now good-morning.”
As Mr. Leafchild walked back to his lodgings at Dame Bean’s, his hopes seemed to be about as dull as the wintry sky on which his nice brown eyes were fixed. His whole happiness, socially speaking, lay in Helen; hers lay with him; but only separation seemed to be looming in the air. Suddenly, when he was close to Marigold Cottage, a little rift broke in the leaden clouds, and a bit of pale blue sky shone forth.
“I will take that as an omen for good; pray God it may be so!” spoke the curate gladly and reverently, as he lifted his hat. “And — come what may, in storm and in tempest, God is over all.”
Helen went home in the dumps and to sundry edifying lectures. An embargo was laid on her parish work, and she only saw the curate at church. One month, two months passed over thus, and she grew pale and thin. Sir John was cross, Lady Whitney uncomfortable; they were both simple-minded people, caring more for their children’s happiness than for their grandeur. The former told the Squire in confidence that if the young fellow could get a decent living, he was not sure but he’d give in, and that he liked him ten thousand times better than he had ever liked that Foliott.
They met one day by accident. Helen was out moping in the long broad walk: which was beginning to be shady now, for May was all but in, and the trees were putting on their foliage. At the end of it she came to a standstill, leaning on the gate. The waters of the lake, out yonder, were blue as the unruffled sky. With a faint cry, she started aside, for Charles Leafchild stood before her.
Being a parson, and tacitly on honour to Sir John, he might have been expected to pass on his way without stopping; but Helen’s hand was already stretched out over the gate. He could but shake it.
“You are not looking well,” he said after a moment’s silence. “I am sorry to see it.”
What with his unexpected presence, and what with her mind’s general discomfort, Helen burst into tears. Mr. Leafchild kept her hand in his.
“I have a bad headache to-day,” said Helen, by way of excuse for her tears. “It has been gloomy weather lately.”
“Gloomy within and without,” he assented, giving a meaning to her words that she had not meant to imply. “But in every cloud, you know, however dark it may be, there is always a silver lining.”
“We can’t always see it,” returned Helen, drying her tears.
“No; we very often cannot. But we may trust that it is there — and be patient.”
“I think it sometimes happens that we never see it — that all is gloomy to the end, the end of life. What then?”
“Then we may be sure that it is best for us it should be so. God directs all things.”
Helen sighed: she had not learnt the love and faith and submission that made up the sum of Mr. Leafchild’s life, bringing into it so strange a peace.
“Is it true that you are going to leave?” she asked. “We heard it mentioned.”
“Yes: when I shall be fully ordained. Mr. Singleton has to take his nephew. It was an old promise — that he should come to him for his first year, just as I have. I think I shall go to Worcester.”
“To Worcester?”
“I have been offered a curacy there by one of the minor canons whose living is in the town, and I feel inclined to take it. The parish is large and has a good many of the very poor in it.”
Helen made a face. “But would you like that? You might be frightfully overworked.”
“It is what I should like. As to the work — it is done for our Master.”
He shook hands with her again, and left, the cheery smile still on his face, the thoughtful light in his steadfast eyes. And never a word of love, you see, had passed.
It was, I take it, about a fortnight after this, that there went walking one afternoon to Whitney Hall, a tall, portly, defiant-looking gentleman in gold-rimmed spectacles and a laced-up clerical hat. By the way he turned his head here and there, and threw his shoulders about as he strode along, you might have taken him for a bishop at least, instead of a canon — but canons in those days were a great deal more self-important than bishops are in these. It was the Reverend Dr. Leafchild. A real canon was he, a great man in his own cathedral, and growing rich on his share of its substantial revenues: your honorary canons with their empty title and non-stipends had not sprung into fashion then. In his pompous manner, and he had been born pompous, Dr. Leafchild asked to see Sir John Whitney.
After Mr. Leafchild’s interview with Sir John in February, he had written to his father and told him all about it, asking him whether he thought he could not help him later to a living, so that he might have a chance of winning Helen. But for Helen’s being a baronet’s daughter and the connection one that even the canon might be proud of, he would have turned a deaf ear: as it was, he listened. But Dr. Leafchild never did things in a hurry; and after some correspondence with his son (and a great deal of grumbling, meant for his good), he had now come into Worcestershire for the purpose of talking over the affair with Sir John.
The upshot was, that Sir John gave in, and sanctioned the engagement. There was an excellent living somewhere down in the North — eight hundred pounds a-year, a handsome house, and some land — the next presentation to which the canon could command. He had intended it for his eldest son; but he, by some lucky chance, had just obtained a better preferment, and the doctor could promise it to Charles. The present incumbent was old and ailing; therefore, in all probability, it would very speedily fall in. The canon added that he might settle on the young people a small sum at their marriage, say a hundred a-year, or so; and he also hinted that Charles might stand a chance of better preferment later — say a snug canonry. So Sir John shook hands heartily upon the bargain, invited the canon to stay dinner, and sent for Charles.
For the next six weeks who so happy as the curate and Helen? They came over to us at Dyke Manor (for we had gone back there) for a day or two, and we learnt to like him with our whole hearts. What a good, earnest, warm-natured man he was; and oh, how unselfish!
I remember one evening in particular when they were out together, pacing the field-path. Helen had his arm, and he was talking to her in what seemed an uncommonly solemn manner: for his hand was lifted now and then in earnestness, and both were gazing upwards. It was a beautiful sky: the sun had set in splendour, leaving crimson and gold clouds behind it, the evening star twinkled in the deepening canopy. Mrs. Todhetley sent me to them. A poor woman had come up for broth for her sick son, one of our labourers. She was in great distress: a change had taken place in him for the worse, he was calling for the clergyman to come to him before he died: but Mr. Holland was out that evening — gone to Evesham.
“Johnny, I — I think Mr. Leafchild would go,” said the mater. “Do you mind asking him?”
Hardly any need to ask. At the first word he was hastening to the woman and walking away with her. Helen’s eyes, gazing at the sky still, were wet with tears.
“Is it not beautiful, Johnny?”
“Very.” It was a glorious sunset.
“But I never saw it as I see it now. He is teaching me many things. I cannot hope to be ever as he is, Johnny, not half as good; but I think in t
ime he will make me a little like him.”
“You have a happy life before you.”
“Yes — I hope so,” she said hesitatingly. “But sometimes a feeling makes itself heard within me — that one who is so entirely fitted for the next world may not long be left in this.”
II.
It was autumn weather — October. A lot of us were steaming over to Worcester in the train. Miss Whitney from Cheltenham, and a friend of hers — a maiden lady as ancient as herself, one Miss Conaway, of Devonshire — were staying at the Hall. Miss Conaway did not know Worcester, and was now being taken to see it — especially the cathedral. Lady Whitney, Helen, Anna, and I made up the party, and we filled the carriage. My being with them arose from chance: I had come over accidentally that morning to Whitney Hall. Of course Helen hoped to see something besides the cathedral her curate. For in June Mr. Leafchild, then in priest’s orders, entered on his new curacy at Worcester, there to stay until the expected living should fall in.
“How is he?” I asked Helen, bending over the arm of the seat that divided us.
“Working himself to death,” she whispered back to me, her tone a cross one.
“He said he was glad there would be plenty of work, you know. And it is a large parish.”
“But he need not let it put everything else out of his head.”
“Meaning you?”
“I have not heard from him for more than a week. Papa had a letter from Dr. Leafchild this morning. He said in it that Charles, when he last wrote, complained of being poorly.”
“A great many curates do get very overtaxed.”
“Oh, and what do you think?” went on Helen. “He is actually beginning to have scruples about taking that living, on the score that there’ll be hardly any work to do.”