Part 26 (1/2)
Next morning very early, Stephen had a letter from Charlotte. He was sitting at breakfast with Ducie when the rector's boy brought it; and it came, as great events generally come, without any premonition or heralding circ.u.mstance. Ducie was pouring out coffee; and she went on with her employment, thinking, not of the letter Stephen was opening, but of the malt, and of the condition of the brewing-boiler. An angry exclamation from Stephen made her lift her eyes to his face. ”My word, Stephen, you are put out! What's to do?”
”Julius has turned Mrs. Sandal and Charlotte from house and home, yesterday afternoon. They are at the rectory. I am going, mother.”
”Stop a moment, Steve. This is now my affair.”
Stephen looked at his mother with amazement. Her countenance, her voice, her whole manner, had suddenly changed. An expression of angry purpose was in her wide-open eyes and firm mouth, as she asked, ”Can you or Jamie, or any of the men, drive me to Kendal?”
”To-day?”
”I want to leave within an hour.”
”The rain down-pours; and it is like to be worse yet, if the wind does not change.”
”If it were ten times worse, I must to Kendal. I am much to blame that I have let weather stop me so far and so long. While Dame Nature was busy about her affairs, I should have been minding mine. Deary me, deary me!”
”If you are for Kendal, then I will drive. The cart-road down the fell is too bad to trust you with any one but myself. Can we stop a moment at the rectory on our road?”
”We can stop a goodish bit. I have a deal to say to the parson. Have the tax-cart ready in half an hour; for there will be no betterness in the weather until the moon--G.o.d bless her!--is full round; and things are past waiting for now.”
In twenty minutes Ducie was ready. The large cloak and hood of the Daleswoman wrapped her close. She was almost indistinguishable in its folds. The rector met her with a little irritation. It was very early to be disturbed, and he thought her visit would refer, doubtless, to some trivial right between her son and Charlotte Sandal; besides which, he had made up his mind to discuss the Sandal affairs with no one.
But Ducie had spoken but a few moments before a remarkable change took place in his manner. He was bending eagerly forward, listening to her half-whispered words with the greatest interest and amazement. As she proceeded, he could scarcely control his emotion; and very soon all other expressions were lost in one of a satisfaction that was almost triumph.
”I will keep them here until you return,” he answered; ”but let me tell you, Ducie, you have been less quick to do right than I thought of you.”
”The fell has been a hard walk for an old woman, the cart-road nearly impa.s.sable until this rain washed away the drifts; but I did not neglect my duty altogether, neither, parson. Moser was written to six weeks since, and he has been at work. Maybe, after all, no time has been lost. I'll away now, if you will call Stephen. Don't let Mrs. Sandal 'take on' more than you can help;” and, as Stephen lifted the reins, ”You think it best to bring all here?”
”Far away best. G.o.d speed you!” He watched them out of sight,--his snowy hair and strong face and black garments making a vivid picture in the misty, drippy doorway,--and then, returning to his study, he began his daily walk up and down its carpeted length, with a singularly solemn elation. Ere long, the thoughtful stride was accompanied by low, musical mutterings, dropping from his lips in such majestic cadences that his steps involuntarily fell to their music in a march-like rhythm.
”Daughter of Justice, wronged Nemesis, Thou of the awful eyes, Whose silent sentence judgeth mortal life,-- Thou with the curb of steel, Which proudest jaws must feel, Stayest the snort and champ of human strife.
Under thy wheel unresting, trackless, all Our joys and griefs befall; In thy full sight our secret things go on; Step after step, thy wrath Follows the caitiff's path, And in his triumph breaks his vile neck bone.
To all alike, thou meetest out their due, Cubit for cubit, inch for inch,--stern, true.”
At the word ”true” he paused a moment, and touched with his finger an old black volume on one of the book-shelves. ”'Stern, true,' whether Euripides says 'cubit for cubit,' or Moses 'an eye for an eye,' or Solomon that 'he that troubleth his own house shall inherit the wind.'
Stern, true; for surely that which a man sows he shall also reap.”
After a while he went up-stairs and talked with Mrs. Sandal and Charlotte. They were much depressed and very anxious, and had what Charlotte defined ”a homeless feeling.” ”But you must be biddable, Charlotte,” said the rector; ”you must remain here until Stephen returns. Ducie had business that could not wait, and who but Stephen should drive her? When he comes back, we will all look to it. You shall not be very long out of your own home; and, in the mean time, how welcome you are here!”
”It seems such a weary time, sir; so many months that we have been in trouble.”
”It was all night long, once, with some tired, fearful ones 'toiling in rowing;' but in the fourth watch came Christ and help to them. It is nigh hand--the 'fourth watch'--with you; so be cheerful.”
Yet it was the evening of the sixth day before Ducie and Stephen returned. It was still raining heavily, and Ducie only waited a moment or two at the rectory gate. Charlotte was amazed to see the old clergyman hasten through the plas.h.i.+ng shower to speak to her. ”Surely Ducie's business must have a great deal of interest to the rector, mother: he has gone out to speak to her, and such weather too.”
”Ducie was always a favorite with him. I hope, now that her affairs have been attended to, ours may receive some care.”
Charlotte answered only by a look of sympathy. It had seemed to her a little hard that their urgent need must wait upon Ducie's business; that Stephen should altogether leave them in their extremity; that her anxious inquiries and suggestions, her plans and efforts about their new home, should have been so coldly received, and so positively put aside until Ducie and Stephen came back. And she had a pang of jealousy when she saw the rector, usually so careful of his health, hasten with slippered feet and uncovered head, through the wet, chilling atmosphere, to speak to them.
He came back with a radiant face, however, and Charlotte could hear him moving about his study; now rolling out a grand march of musical Greek syllables from Homer or Euripides, anon breaking into some familiar verse of Christian song. And, when tea was served, he went up-stairs for the ladies, and escorted them to the table with a manner so beaming and so happily predictive that Charlotte could not but catch some of its hopeful spirit.