CHAPTER XXXVIII.
_RICHARD AND ARTHUR_.
She went to find him, told him what had happened to the young man, and,
feeling her way, proposed that he should go to his grandfather's for a
few days. Arthur started. Send him where he and Barbara would be
constantly meeting! Must he for ever imagine them walking up and down
that field, among the dandelions and daisies! He had discovered, he
believed, all that was between them, but was not therewith satisfied: she
had found out, he said to himself, that the fellow was an infidel, did
not believe in God, or a resurrection--was so low that he did not care to
live for ever, and she was trying to convert him. Arthur would rather he
remained unconverted than that _she_ should be the means of converting
him. Nor indeed would he be much injured by having the growth of such a
faith as Arthur's prevented in him: Arthur prided himself in showing due
respect to _the Deity_ by allowing that he existed. But the fellow was
too clever by half, he said, and would be much too much for her. Any
theory wild enough would be attractive to her, who never cared a pin-head
what the rest of the world believed! She had indeed a strong tendency to
pantheism, for she expected the animals to rise again--a most unpleasant
notion! Doubtless it was she that sought his company; a fellow like that
_could_ not presume to seek hers! He was only laughing at her all the
time! What could an animal like him care about the animals: he had not
even a dog to love! He would _not_ have him go to his grandfather's! he
would a thousand times rather give up the library! There should be no
more bookbinding at Mortgrange! He would send the books to London to him!
It would be degrading to allow personal feeling to affect his behaviour
to such a fellow; he should have the work all the same, but not at
Mortgrange!
So he answered his mother that he was rather tired of him, and thought
they had had enough of him; the work seemed likely to be spun out _ad
infinitum_, and this was a good opportunity for getting rid of him. He
was sorry, for it was the best way for the books, but he could send them
to him in London, and have them done there! The man, he understood, had
been making himself disagreeable too, and he did not want to quarrel with
him! He was a radical, and thought himself as good as anybody: it was
much best to let him go. He had at first liked him, and had perhaps shown
it more than was good for the fellow, so that he had come to presume upon
it, setting it down to some merit in himself. Happily he had retained the
right of putting an end to the engagement when he pleased!
This was far better than lady Ann had expected. Arthur went at once to
Richard, and speaking, as he thought, unconcernedly, told him they found
it inconvenient to have the library used as a workshop any longer, and
must make a change.
Richard was glad to hear it, thinking he meant to give him another room,
and said he could work just as well anywhere else: he wanted only a dry
room with a fire-place! Arthur told him he had arranged for what would be
more agreeable to both parties, namely, that he should do the work at
home. It would cost more, but he was prepared for that. He might go as
soon as he pleased, and they would arrange by letter how the books should
be sent--so many at a time!
Richard spied something more under his dismissal than the affair with
Miss Vixen; but he was too proud to ask for an explanation: Mr. Lestrange
was in the right of their compact. He felt aggrieved notwithstanding, and
was sorry to go away from the library. He would never again have the
chance of restoring such a library! He did not once think of it from the
point of gain: he could always make his living! It was to him a genuine
pleasure to cause any worthy volume look as it ought to look; and to make
a whole straggling library of books wasted and worn, put on the
complexion, uniform, and discipline of a well-conditioned company of the
host of heaven, was at least an honourable task! For what are books, I
venture to say, but an army-corps of the lord of hosts, at whose command
are troops of all natures, after the various regions of his indwelling!
Even the letter is something, for the dry bones of books are every hour
coming alive to the reader in whose spirit is blowing the better spirit.
Richard himself was one of such, though he did not yet know there was a
better spirit. Then again, there were not a few of the books with which
individually he was sorry to part. He had also had fine opportunity for
study, of which he was making good use, and the loss of it troubled him.
He had read some books he would hardly otherwise have been able to read,
and had largely extended his acquaintance with titles.
He was sorry too not to see more of Mr. Wingfold. He was a clergyman, it
was true, but not the least like any other clergyman he had seen! Richard
had indeed known nothing of any other clergyman out of the pulpit; and I
fear most clergymen are less human, therefore less divine, in the pulpit
than out of it! Many who out of the pulpit appear men, are in it little
better than hawkers of old garments, the worse for their new patches. Of
the forces in action for the renovation of the world, the sale of such
old clothes is one of the least potent. They do, however, serve a little,
I think, even as the rags of a Neapolitan for the olives of Italy, as a
sort of manure for the young olives of the garden of God.
But his far worst sorrow was leaving Miss Wylder. That was a pain, a keen
pain in his heart. For, that a woman is miles above him, as a star is
above a marsh-light, is no reason why a man should not love her. Nay, is
it not the best of reasons for loving her? The higher in soul, and the
lowlier in position he is, the more imperative and unavoidable is it that
he should love her; and the absence of any thought in the direction of
marriage leaves but the wider room for the love infinite. In a man
capable of loving in such fashion, there are no bounds to the
possibilities, no limit to the growth of love. Richard thought his soul
was full, but a live soul can never be full; it is always growing larger,
and is always being filled.
"Like one that hath been stunned," he went about his preparations for
departure.
"You will go by the first train in the morning," said Arthur, happening
to meet him in the stable-yard, whither Richard had gone to look if Miss
Brown was in her usual stall. "I have told Robert to take you and your
tools to the station in the spring-cart."
"Thank you, sir," returned Richard; "I shall not require the cart. I
leave the house to-night, and shall send for my things to-morrow morning.
I have them almost ready now."
"You cannot go to London to-night!"
"I am aware of that, sir."
"Then where are you going? I wish to know."
"That is my business, sir."
"You have no cause to show temper," said Arthur coldly.
"I should not have shown it, sir, had you not presumed to give me orders
after dismissing me," answered Richard.
"I have not dismissed you; I mean to employ you still, only in London
instead of here," said Arthur.
"That is a matter for fresh arrangement with my father," rejoined
Richard, and left him.
Arthur felt a shadow cross him--almost like fear: he had but driven
Richard to his grandfather's, and had made an enemy of him! Nor could he
feel satisfied with himself; he could not get rid of the thought that
what he had done was not quite the thing for a gentleman to do. His
trouble was not that he had wronged Richard, but that he had wronged
himself, had not acted like his ideal of himself. He did not think of
what was right, but of what befitted a gentleman. Such a man is in danger
of doing many things unbefitting a gentleman. For the measure of a
gentleman is not a man's ideal of himself.
His uneasiness grew as day after day went by, and Barbara did not appear
at Mortgrange. He was not aware that Richard saw no more of her than
himself. He knew that he was at his grandfather's; he had himself seen
him at work at the anvil; but he did not know that the hope in which he
lingered there was vain.
Richard waited a week, but no Barbara came to the smithy. He could not
endure the thought of going away without seeing her once more. He must
once thank her for what she had done for him! He must let her know why he
had left Mortgrange.
He would go and say good-bye to the clergyman: from him he might hear
something of her!
Wingfold caught sight of him approaching the house, and himself opened
the door to him. Taking him to his study, he made him sit down, and
offered him a pipe.
"Thank you, sir; I don't smoke," said Richard.
"Then don't learn. You are better without it," answered Wingfold, and put
down his own pipe.
"I came," said Richard, "to thank you for your kindness to me, and to ask
about Miss Wylder. Not having seen her for a long time, I was afraid she
might be ill. I am going away."
There was a tremor in Richard's voice, of which he was not himself aware.
Wingfold noted it, pitied the youth because of the fuel he had stored for
suffering, and admired him for his straightforwardness.
"I am sorry to say you are not likely to see Miss Wylder," he answered.
"Her mother is ill."
"I hardly thought to see her, sir. Is her mother very ill?"
"Yes, very ill," answered Wingfold.
"With anything infectious?"
"No. Her complaint is as little infectious as complaint could be; it is
just exhaustion--absolute prostration, mental and nervous. She is too
weak to think, and can't even feed herself. I fear her daughter will be
worn out waiting on her. She devotes herself to her mother with a spirit
and energy I never but once knew equalled. She never seems tired, never
out of spirits. I heard a lady say she couldn't have much feeling to look
cheerful when her mother was in such a state; but the lady was stupid.
She would wait on her own mother almost as devotedly as Miss Wylder, but
with such a lugubrious countenance that her patient might well seek
refuge from it in the grave. But it is no wonder she should be in good
spirits: it is the first time in her life, she says, that she has been
allowed to be of any use to her mother! Then she is not suffering pain,
and that makes a great difference. But more than all, her mother has
grown so tender to her, and so grateful, following her constantly about
the room with her eyes, that the girl says she feels in a paradise of
which her mother is the tutelar divinity, raying out bliss as she lies in
bed! Also her father is kinder to her mother. Little signs of tenderness
pass between them--a thing she has never known before! How could she be
other than happy!--But what is this you tell me about going away? The
library cannot be finished!"
Wingfold had dilated on the worth of Miss Wylder, and let Richard know of
her happiness, out of genuine sympathy. He knew that, next to the worship
of God, the true _worship_ of a fellow-creature, in the old meaning of
the word, is the most potent thing for deliverance.
"No, sir," answered Richard; "the library is left in mid ocean of decay.
I don't know why they have dismissed me. The only thing clear is, that
they want to be rid of me. What I have done I can't think. There is a
little girl of the family--"
Here he told how Vixen had from the first behaved to him, and what things
had happened in consequence, the last more particularly.
"But," he concluded, "I do not think it can be that. I _should_ like to
know what it is."
"Then wait," said Wingfold. "If we only wait long enough, every reason
will come out. You know I believe we are not going to stop, but are meant
to go on and on for ever; and I believe the business of eternity is to
bring grand hidden things out into the light; and with them will come of
necessity many other things as well, even some, I daresay, that we count
trifles.--But I am sorry you're going."
"I don't see why you should be, sir!" answered Richard, his look taking
from the words their seeming rudeness.
"Because I like you, and feel sure we should understand each other if
only we had time," replied the parson. "It's a grand thing to come upon
one who knows what you mean. It's so much of heaven before you get
there.--If you think I'm talking shop, I can't help it--and I don't care,
so long as you believe I mean it. I would not have you think it the
Reverend Thomas and not Thomas himself that was saying it."
"I should never say you talked shop, sir; and I don't think you would say
I was talking shop if I expatiated on the beauties of a Grolier binding!
You would see I was not talking from love of gain, but love of beauty!"
"Thank you. You are a fair man, and that is even more than an honest man!
I don't speak from love of religion; I don't know that I do love
religion."
"I don't understand you now, sir."
"Look here: I am very fond of a well-bound book; I should like all my new
books bound in levant morocco; but I don't _care_ about it; I could do
well enough without any binding at all."
"Of course you could, sir! and so could I, or any man that cared for the
books themselves."
"Very well! I don't care about religion much, but I could not live
without my Father in heaven. I don't believe anybody can live without
him."
"I see," said Richard.
He thought he saw, but he did not see, and could not help smiling in his
heart as he said to himself, "_I_ have lived a good many years without
him!"
Wingfold saw the shadow of the smile, and blamed himself for having
spoken too soon.
"When do you go?" he asked.
"I think I shall go to-morrow. I am at my grandfather's."
"If I can be of use to you, let me know."
"I will, sir; and I thank you heartily. There's nothing a man is so
grateful for as friendliness."
"The obligation is mutual," said Wingfold.
