CHAPTER, XXIII.
A pretty trifle in its way, no doubt, is the love between youth and
youth,--gay varieties of the bauble spread the counter of the great
toy-shop; but thou, courteous dame Nature, raise thine arm to yon
shelf, somewhat out of every-day reach, and bring me down that
obsolete, neglected, unconsidered thing, the love between age and
childhood.
The next day Sophy was better; the day after, improvement was more
visible; and on the third day Waife paid his bill, and conducted her to
the rural abode to which, credulous at last of his promises to share it
with her for a time, he enticed her fated steps. It was little more than
a mile beyond the suburbs of the town; and, though the walk tired her,
she concealed fatigue, and would not suffer him to carry her. The
cottage now smiled out before them,--thatched gable roof, with fancy
barge board; half Swiss, half what is called Elizabethan; all the fences
and sheds round it, as only your rich traders, condescending to turn
farmers, construct and maintain,--sheds and fences, trim and neat, as if
models in waxwork. The breezy air came fresh from the new haystacks;
from the woodbine round the porch; from the breath of the lazy kine, as
they stood knee-deep in the pool, that, belted with weeds and broad-
leaved water-lilies, lay calm and gleaming amidst level pastures.
Involuntarily they arrested their steps, to gaze on the cheerful
landscape and inhale the balmy air. Meanwhile the Mayor came out from
the cottage porch, his wife leaning on his arm, and two of his younger
children bounding on before, with joyous faces, giving chase to a gaudy
butterfly which they had started from the woodbine.
Mrs. Hartopp had conceived a lively curiosity to see and judge for
herself of the objects of her liege lord's benevolent interest. She
shared, of course, the anxiety which formed the standing excitement of
all those who lived but for one godlike purpose, that of preserving
Josiah Hartopp from being taken in. But whenever the Mayor specially
wished to secure his wife's countenance to any pet project of his own,
and convince her either that he was not taken in, or that to be
discreetly taken in is in this world a very popular and sure mode of
getting up, he never failed to attain his end. That man was the
cunningest creature! As full of wiles and stratagems in order to get his
own way--in benevolent objects--as men who set up to be clever are for
selfish ones. Mrs. Hartopp was certainly a good woman, but a made good
woman. Married to another man, I suspect that she would have been a
shrew. Petruchio would never have tamed her, I'll swear. But she, poor
lady, had been gradually, but completely, subdued, subjugated, absolutely
cowed beneath the weight of her spouse's despotic mildness; for in
Hartopp there was a weight of soft quietude, of placid oppression, wholly
irresistible. It would have buried a Titaness under a Pelion of moral
feather-beds. Mass upon mass of downy influence descended upon you,
seemingly yielding as it fell, enveloping, overbearing, stifling you; not
presenting a single hard point of contact; giving in as you pushed
against it; supplying itself seductively round you, softer and softer,
heavier and heavier,--till, I assure you, ma'am, no matter how high your
natural wifely spirit, you would have had it smothered out of you, your
last rebellious murmur dying languidly away under the descending fleeces.
"So kind in you to come with me, Mary," said Hartopp. "I could not have
been happy without your approval: look at the child; something about her
like Mary Anne, and Mary Anne is the picture of you!"
Waife advanced, uncovering; the two children, having lost trace of the
butterfly, had run up towards Sophy. But her shy look made themselves
shy,--shyness is so contagious, and they stood a little aloof, gazing at
her. Sir Isaac stalked direct to the Mayor, sniffed at him, and wagged
his tail.
Mrs. Hartopp now bent over Sophy, and acknowledging that the face was
singularly pretty, glanced graciously towards the husband, and said, "I
see the likeness!" then to Sophy, "I fear you are tired, my dear: you
must not overfatigue yourself; and you must take milk fresh from the cow
every morning." And now the bailiff's wife came briskly out, a tidy,
fresh-coloured, kind-faced woman, fond of children; the more so because
she had none of her own.
So they entered the farm-yard, Mrs. Hartopp being the chief talker; and
she, having pointed out to Sophy the cows and the turkeys, the hen-coops,
and the great China gander, led her by the one hand--while Sophy's other
hand clung firmly to Waife's'--across the little garden, with its patent
bee-hives, into the house, took off her bonnet, and kissed her. "Very
like Mary Anne!--Mary Anne, dear." One of the two children owning that
name approached,--snub-nosed, black-eyed, with cheeks like peonies.
"This little girl, my Mary Anne, was as pale as you,--over-study; and
now, my dear child, you must try and steal a little of her colour. Don't
you think my Mary Anne is like her papa, Mr. Chapman?"
"Like me!" exclaimed the Mayor, whispering Waife, "image of her mother!
the same intellectual look!"
Said the artful actor, "Indeed, ma'am, the young lady has her father's
mouth and eyebrows, but that acute, sensible expression is yours,--quite
yours. Sir Isaac, make a bow to the young lady, and then, sir, go
through the sword exercise!"
The dog, put upon his tricks, delighted the children; and the poor actor,
though his heart lay in his breast like lead, did his best to repay
benevolence by mirth. Finally, much pleased, Mrs. Hartopp took her
husband's arm to depart. The children, on being separated from Sir
Isaac, began to cry. The Mayor interrupted his wife,--who, if left to
herself, would have scolded them into worse crying,--told Mary Anne that
he relied on her strong intellect to console her brother Tom; observed to
Tom that it was not like his manly nature to set an example of weeping to
his sister; and contrived thus to flatter their tears away in a trice,
and sent them forward in a race to the turnstile.
Waife and Sophy were alone in the cottage parlour, Mrs. Gooch, the
bailiff's wife, walking part of the way back with the good couple, in
order to show the Mayor a heifer who had lost appetite and taken to
moping. "Let us steal out into the back garden, my darling," said Waife.
"I see an arbour there, where I will compose myself with a pipe,--a
liberty I should not like to take indoors." They stepped across the
threshold, and gained the arbour, which stood at the extreme end of the
small kitchen-garden, and commanded a pleasant view of pastures and
cornfields, backed by the blue outline of distant hills. Afar were
faintly heard the laugh of the Mayor's happy children, now and then a
tinkling sheep-bell, or the tap of the woodpecker, unrepressed by the
hush of the. Midmost summer, which stills the more tuneful choristers
amidst their coverts. Waife lighted his pipe, and smoked silently;
Sophy, resting her head on his bosom, silent also. She was exquisitely
sensitive to nature: the quiet beauty of all round her was soothing a
spirit lately troubled, and health came stealing gently back through
frame and through heart. At length she said softly, "We could be so
happy here, Grandfather! It cannot last, can it?"
"It is no use in this life, my dear," returned Waife, philosophizing, "no
use at all disturbing present happiness by asking, 'Can it last?' To-day
is man's, to-morrow his Maker's. But tell me frankly, do you really
dislike so much the idea of exhibiting? I don't mean as we did in Mr.
Rugge's show. I know you hate that; but in a genteel private way, as the
other night. You sigh! Out with it."
"I like what you like, Grandy."
"That's not true. I like to smoke; you don't. Come, you do dislike
acting? Why? you do it so well,--wonderfully. Generally speaking,
people like what they do well."
"It is not the acting itself, Grandy dear, that I don't like. When I am
in some part, I am carried away; I am not myself. I am some one else!"
"And the applause?"
"I don't feel it. I dare say I should miss it if it did not come; but it
does not seem to me as if I were applauded. If I felt that, I should
stop short, and get frightened. It is as if that somebody else into whom
I was changed was making friends with the audience; and all my feeling is
for that somebody,--just as, Grandy dear, when it is over, and we two are
alone together, all my feeling is for you,--at least (hanging her head)
it used to be; but lately, somehow, I am ashamed to think how I have been
feeling for myself more than for you. Is it--is it that I am growing
selfish? as Mr. Mayor said. Oh, no! Now we are here,--not in those
noisy towns,--not in the inns and on the highways; now here, here, I do
feel again for you,--all for you!"
"You are my little angel, you are," said Waife, tremulously. "Selfish!
you! a good joke that! Now you see, I am not what is called
Demonstrative,--a long word, Sophy, which means, that I don't show to you
always how fond I am of you; and, indeed," he added ingenuously, "I am
not al ways aware of it myself. I like acting,--I like the applause, and
the lights, and the excitement, and the illusion,--the make-belief of the
whole thing: it takes me out of memory and thought; it is a world that
has neither past, present, nor future, an interlude in time,-an escape
from space. I suppose it is the same with poets when they are making
verses. Yes, I like all this; and, when I think of it, I forget you too
much. And I never observed, Heaven forgive me! that you were pale and
drooping till it was pointed out to me. Well, take away your arms. Let
us consult! As soon as you get quite, quite well, how shall we live?
what shall we do? You are as wise as a little woman, and such a careful,
prudent housekeeper; and I'm such a harumscarum old fellow, without a
sound idea in my head. What shall we do if we give up acting
altogether?"
"Give up acting altogether, when you like it so! No, no. I will like it
too, Grandy. But--but--" she stopped short, afraid to imply blame or to
give pain.
"But what? let us make clean breasts, one to the other; tell truth, and
shame the Father of Lies."
"Tell truth," said Sophy, lifting up to him her pure eyes with such
heavenly, loving kindness that, if the words did imply reproof, the eyes
stole it away. "Could we but manage to tell truth off the stage, I
should not dislike acting! Oh, Grandfather, when that kind gentleman and
his lady and those merry children come up and speak to us, don't you feel
ready to creep into the earth?--I do. Are we telling truth? are we
living truth? one name to-day, another name to morrow? I should not
mind acting on a stage or in a room, for the time, but always acting,
always,--we ourselves 'make beliefs!' Grandfather, must that be? They
don't do it; I mean by they, all who are good and looked up to and
respected, as--as--oh, Grandy! Grandy! what am I saying? I have pained
you."
Waife indeed was striving hard to keep down emotion; but his lips were
set firmly and the blood had left them, and his hands were trembling.
"We must, hide ourselves," he said in a very low voice; "we must take
false names; I--because--because of reasons I can't tell even to you; and
you, because I failed to get you a proper home, where you ought to be;
and there is one who, if he pleases, and he may please it any day, could
take you away from me, if he found you out; and so--and so--" He paused
abruptly, looked at her fearful wondering soft face, and, rising, drew
himself up with one of those rare outbreaks of dignity which elevated the
whole character of his person. "But as for me," said he, "if I have lost
all name; if, while I live, I must be this wandering, skulking outcast,--
look above, Sophy,--look up above: there all secrets will be known, all
hearts read; and there my best hope to find a place in which I may wait
your coming is in what has lost me all birthright here. Not to exalt
myself do I say this,--no; but that you may have comfort, darling, if
ever hereafter you are pained by what men say to you of me."
As he spoke, the expression of his face, at first solemn and lofty,
relaxed into melancholy submission. Then passing his arm into hers, and
leaning on it as if sunk once more into the broken cripple needing her
frail support, he drew her forth from the arbour, and paced the little
garden slowly, painfully. At length he seemed to recover himself, and
said in his ordinary cheerful tone, "But to the point in question,
suppose we have done with acting and roaming, and keep to one name and
settle somewhere like plain folks, again I ask, How shall we live?"
"I have been thinking of that," answered Sophy. "You remember that those
good Miss Burtons taught me all kinds of needlework, and I know people
can make money by needlework. And then, Grandy dear, what can't you do?
Do you forget Mrs. Saunders's books that you bound, and her cups and
saucers that you mended? So we would both work, and have a little
cottage and a garden, that we could take care of, and sell the herbs and
vegetables. Oh, I have thought over it all, the last fortnight, a
hundred hundred times, only I did not dare to speak first."
Waife listened very attentively. "I can make very good baskets," said
he, rubbing his chin, "famous baskets (if one could hire a bit of osier
ground), and, as you say, there might be other fancy articles I could
turn out prettily enough, and you could work samplers, and urn-rugs, and
doileys, and pincushions, and so forth; and what with a rood or two of
garden ground, and poultry (the Mayor says poultry is healthy for
children), upon my word, if we could find a safe place, and people would
not trouble us with their gossip, and we could save a little money for
you when I am--"
"Bees too,--honey?" interrupted Sophy, growing more and more interested
and excited.
"Yes, bees,--certainly. A cottage of that kind in a village would not be
above L6 a year, and L20 spent on materials for fancy-works would set us
up. Ah but furniture, beds and tables,--monstrous dear!"
"Oh, no! very little would do at first."
"Let us count the money we have left," said Waife, throwing himself down
on a piece of sward that encircled a shady mulberry-tree. Old man and
child counted the money, bit by bit, gayly yet anxiously,--babbling,
interrupting each other,--scheme upon scheme: they forgot past and
present as much as in acting plays; they were absorbed in the future,--
innocent simple future,--innocent as the future planned by two infants
fresh from "Robinson Crusoe" or fairy tales.
"I remember, I remember, just the place for us," cried Waife, suddenly.
"It is many, many, many years since I was there; I was courting my Lizzy
at the time,--alas! alas. But no sad thoughts now!--just the place, near
a large town, but in a pretty village quite retired from it. 'T was
there I learned to make baskets. I had broken my leg; fall from a horse;
nothing to do. I lodged with an old basketmaker; he had a capital trade.
Rivulet at the back of his house; reeds, osiers, plentiful. I see them
now, as I saw them from my little casement while my leg was setting. And
Lizzy used to write to me such dear letters; my baskets were all for her.
We had baskets enough to have furnished a house with bask'ts; could have
dined in baskets, sat in baskets, slept in baskets. With a few lessons I
could soon recover the knack of the work. I should like to see the place
again; it would be shaking hands with my youth once more. None who could
possibly recognize me could be now living. Saw no one but the surgeon,
the basketmaker, and his wife; all so old they must be long since
gathered to their fathers. Perhaps no one carries on the basket trade
now. I may revive it and have it all to myself; perhaps the cottage
itself may be easily hired." Thus, ever disposed to be sanguine, the
vagabond chattered on, Sophy listening fondly, and smiling up in his
face. "And a fine large park close by: the owners, great lords, deserted
it then; perhaps it is deserted still. You might wander over it as if it
were your own, Sophy. Such wonderful trees,--such green solitudes; and
pretty shy hares running across the vistas,--stately deer too! We will
make friends with the lodge-keepers, and we will call the park yours,
Sophy; and I shall be a genius who weaves magical baskets, and you shall
be the enchanted princess concealed from all evil eyes, knitting doileys
of pearl under leaves of emerald, and catching no sound from the world of
perishable life, except as the boughs whisper and the birds sing."
"Dear me, here you are; we thought you were lost," said the bailiff's
wife; "tea is waiting for you, and there's husband, sir, coming up from
his work; he'll be proud and glad to know you, sir, and you too, my dear;
we have no children of our own."
It is past eleven. Sophy, worn out, but with emotions far more
pleasurable than she has long known, is fast asleep. Waife kneels by her
side, looking at her. He touches her hand, so cool and soft; all fever
gone: he rises on tiptoe; he bends over her forehead,--a kiss there, and
a tear; he steals away, down, down the stairs. At the porch is the
bailiff holding Sir Isaac.
"We'll take all care of her," said Mr. Gooch. "You'll not know her again
when you come back."
Waife pressed the hand of his grandchild's host, but did not speak.
"You are sure you will find your way,--no, that's the wrong turn,--
straight onto the town. They'll be sitting up for you at the Saracen's
Head, I suppose, of course, sir? It seems not hospitable like, your
going away at the dead of night thus. But I understand you don't like
crying, sir, we men don't; and your sweet little girl I dare say would
sob ready to break her heart if she knew. Fine moonlight night, sir,--
straight on. And I say, don't fret about her: wife loves children
dearly,--so do I. Good-night."
On went Waife,--lamely, slowly,--Sir Isaac's white coat gleaming in the
moon, ghostlike. On he went, his bundle strapped across his shoulder,
leaning on his staff, along by the folded sheep and the sleeping cattle.
But when he got into the high road, Gatesboro' full before him, with all
its roofs and spires, he turned his back on the town, and tramped once
more along the desert thoroughfare,--more slowly and more, more lamely
and more, till several milestones were passed; and then he crept through
the gap of a hedgerow to the sheltering eaves of a haystack; and under
that roof-tree he and Sir Isaac lay down to rest.
