Rachel Ray

And he had been right. She said so to herself now again, though the words which he had spoken and the things which he had done had brought upon her all this sorrow. He had been right. If he loved her it was only manly and proper in him to tell his love. And for herself, – seeing that she had loved, had it not been proper and womanly in her to declare her love? What had she done; when, at what point, had she gone astray, that she should be brought to such a pass as this? At the beginning, when he had held her hand on the spot where she was now sitting, and again when he had kept her prisoner in Mr. Tappitt's hall, she had been half conscious of some sin, half ashamed of her own conduct; but that undecided fear of sin and shame had been washed out, and everything had been made white as snow, as pure as running water, as bright as sunlight, by the permission to love this man which had been accorded to her. What had she since done that she should be brought to such a pass as that in which she now found herself?

As she thought of this she was bitter against all the world except him; – almost bitter against her own mother. She had said that she would obey in this matter of the letter, and she knew well that she would in truth do as her mother bade her. But, sitting there, on the churchyard stile, she hatched within her mind plans of disobedience, – dreadful plans! She would not submit to this usage. She would go away from Baslehurst without knowledge of any one, and would seek him out in his London home. It would be unmaidenly; – but what cared she now for that; – unless, indeed, he should care? All her virgin modesty and young maiden fears, – was it not for him that she would guard them, for his delight and his pride? And if she were to see him no more, if she were to be forced to bid him go from her, of what avail would it be now to her to cherish and maintain the unsullied brightness of her woman's armour? If he were lost to her, everything was lost. She would go to him, and throwing herself at his feet would swear to him that life without his love was no longer possible for her. If he would then take her as his wife she would strive to bless him with all that the tenderness of a wife could give. If he should refuse her, – then she would go away and die. In such case what to her would be the judgment of any man or any woman? What to her would be her sister's scorn and the malignant virtue of such as Miss Pucker and Mr. Prong? What the upturned hands and amazement of Mr. Comfort? It would have been they who had driven her to this.

But how about her mother when she should have thus thrown herself overboard from the ship and cast herself away from the pilotage which had hitherto been the guide of her conduct? Why – why – why had her mother deserted her in her need? As she thought of her mother she knew that her plan of rebellion was nothing; but why – why had her mother deserted her?

As for him, and these new tidings which had come to the cottage respecting him, she would have cared for them not a jot. Mrs. Cornbury had cautioned her not to believe all that she heard; but she had already declined, – had altogether declined to believe any of it. It was to her, whether believed or disbelieved, matter altogether irrelevant. A wife does not cease to love her husband because he gets into trouble. She does not turn against him because others have quarrelled with him. She does not separate her lot from his because he is in debt! Those are the times when a wife, a true wife, sticks closest to her husband, and strives the hardest to lighten the weight of his cares by the tenderness of her love! And had she not been permitted to place herself in that position with regard to him when she had been permitted to love him? In all her thoughts she recognized the right of her mother to have debarred her from the privilege of loving this man, if such embargo had been placed on her before her love had been declared. She had never, even within her own bosom, assumed to herself the right of such privilege without authority expressed. But her very soul revolted against this withdrawal of the sanction that had been given to her. The spirit within her rebelled, though she knew that she would not carry on that rebellion by word or deed. But she had been injured; – injured almost to death; injured even to death itself as regarded all that life could give her worth her taking! As she thought of this injury that fierce look of which I have spoken came across her brow! She would obey her pastors and masters. Yes; she would obey them. But she could never again be soft and pliable within their hands. Obedience in this matter was a necessity to her. In spite of that wild thought of throwing off her maiden bonds and allowing her female armour to be splashed and sullied in the gutter, she knew that there was that which would hinder her from the execution of such scheme. She was bound by her woman's lot to maintain her womanly purity. Let her suffer as she might there was nothing for her but obedience. She could not go forth as though she were a man, and claim her right to stand or fall by her love. She had been injured in being brought to such plight as this, but she would bear her injury as best might be within her power.

She was still thinking of all this, and still sitting with her eyes turned towards the tower of the church, when she was touched on the back by a light hand. She turned round quickly, startled by the touch, – for she had heard no footstep, – and saw Martha Tappitt and Cherry. It was Cherry who had come close upon her, and it was Cherry's voice that she first heard. "A penny for your thoughts," said Cherry.

"Oh, you have so startled me!" said Rachel.

"Then I suppose your thoughts were worth more than a penny. Perhaps you were thinking of an absent knight." And then Cherry began to sing – "Away, away, away. He loves and he rides away."

Poor Rachel blushed and was unable to speak. "Don't be so foolish," said Martha to her sister. "It's ever so long since we've seen you, Rachel. Why don't you come and walk with us?"

"Yes, indeed, – why don't you?" said Cherry, whose good-nature was quite as conspicuous as her bad taste. She knew now that she had vexed Rachel, and was thoroughly sorry that she had done so. If any other girl had quizzed her about her lover it would not have annoyed her, and she had not understood at first that Rachel Ray might be different from herself. "I declare we have hardly seen you since the night of the party, and we think it very ill-natured in you not to come to us. Do come and walk to-morrow."

"Oh, thank you; – not to-morrow, because my sister is coming out from Baslehurst, to spend the evening with us."

"Well; – on Saturday, then," said Cherry, persistingly.

But Rachel would make no promise to walk with them on any day. She felt that she must henceforth be divided from the Tappitts. Had not he quarrelled with Mr. Tappitt; and could it be fitting that she should keep up any friendship with the family that was hostile to him? She was also aware that Mrs. Tappitt was among those who were desirous of robbing her of her lover. Mrs. Tappitt was her enemy as Mr. Tappitt was his. She asked herself no question as to that duty of forgiving them the injuries they had done her, but she felt that she was divided from them, – from Mr. and Mrs. Tappitt, and also from the girls. And, moreover, in her present strait she wanted no friend. She could not talk to any friend about her lover, and she could not bring herself even to think on any other subject.

"It's late," she said, "and I must go home, as mamma will be expecting me."

Cherry had almost replied that she had not been in so great a hurry once before, when she had stood in the churchyard with another companion; but she thought of Rachel's reproachful face when her last little joke had been uttered, and she refrained.

"She's over head and ears in love," said Cherry to her sister, when Rachel was gone.

"I'm afraid she has been very foolish," said Martha, seriously.

"I don't see that she has been foolish at all. He's a very nice fellow, and as far as I can see he's just as fond of her as she is of him."

"But we know what that means with young men," said Martha, who was sufficiently serious in her way of thinking to hold by that doctrine as to wolves in sheep's clothing in which Mrs. Ray had been educated.

"But young men do marry, – sometimes," said Cherry.

"But not merely for the sake of a pretty face or a good figure. I believe mamma is right in that, and I don't think he'll come back again."

"If he were my lover I'd have him back," said Cherry, stoutly; – and so they went away to the brewery.

Rachel on her way home determined that she would write her letter that night. Her mother was to read it when it was written; that was understood to be the agreement between them; but there would be no reason why she should not be alone when she wrote it. She could word it very differently, she thought, if she sat alone over it in her own bedroom, than she could do immediately under her mother's eye. She could not pause and think and perhaps weep over it, sitting at the parlour table, with her mother in her arm-chair, close by, watching her. It needed that she should write it with tears, with many struggles, with many baffled attempts to find the words that would be wanted, – with her very heart's blood. It must not be tender. No; she was prepared to omit all tenderness. And it must probably be short; – but if so its very shortness would be another difficulty. As she walked along she could not tell herself with what words she would write it; but she thought that the words would perhaps come to her if she waited long enough for them in the solitude of her own chamber.

She reached home by nine o'clock and sat with her mother for an hour, reading out loud some book on which they were then engaged.

"I think I'll go to bed now, mamma," she said.

"You always want to go to bed so soon," said Mrs. Ray. "I think you are getting tired of reading out loud. That will be very sad for me with my eyes."

"No, I'm not, mamma, and I'll go on again for half an hour, if you please; but I thought you liked going to bed at ten."

The watch was consulted, and as it was not quite ten Rachel did go on for another half-hour, and then she went up to her bedroom.

She sat herself down at her open window and looked out for a while upon the heavens. The summer moon was at its full, so that the green before the cottage was as clear before her as in the day, and she could see over into the gloom of Mr. Sturt's farmyard across it. She had once watched Rowan as he came over the turf towards the cottage swinging his stick in his hand, and now she gazed on the spot where the Baslehurst road came in as though she expected that his figure might again appear. She looked and looked, thinking of this, till she would hardly have been surprised had that figure really come forth upon the road. But no figure was to be seen, and after awhile she withdrew from the window and sat herself down at the little table. It was very late when she undressed herself and went to her bed, and later still when her eyes, red with many tears, were closed in sleep; – but the letter had been written and was ready for her mother's inspection. This was the letter as it stood after many struggles in the writing of it, —

Bragg's End,Thursday, 186 —

My dear Mr. Rowan,

I am much obliged to you for having written the letter which I received from you the other day, and I should have answered it sooner, only mamma thought it best to see Mr. Comfort first, as he is our clergyman here, and to ask his advice. I hope you will not be annoyed because I showed your letter to mamma, but I could not receive any letter from you without doing so, and I may as well tell you that she will read this before it goes.

And now that I have begun I hardly know how to write what I have to say. Mr. Comfort and mamma have determined that there must be nothing fixed as an engagement between us, and that for the present, at least, I may not correspond with you. This will be my first and last letter. As that will be so, of course I shall not expect you to write any more, and I know that you will be very angry. But if you understood all my feelings I think that perhaps you would not be very, very angry. I know it is true that when you asked me that question, I nodded my head as you say in your letter. If I had sworn the twenty oaths of which you speak they would not, as you say, have bound me tighter. But neither could bind me to anything against mamma's will. I thought that you were very generous to come to me as you did; – oh, so generous! I don't know why you should have looked to such a one as me to be your wife. But I would have done my best to make you happy, had I been able to do as I suppose you then wished me. But you well know that a man is very different from a girl, and of course I must do as mamma wishes.

They say that as the business here about the brewery is so very unsettled they think it probable that you will not have to come back to Baslehurst any more; and that as our acquaintance has been so very short, it is not reasonable to suppose that you will care much about me after a little while. Perhaps it is not reasonable, and after this I shall have no right to be angry with you if you forget me. I don't think you will quite forget me; but I shall never expect or even hope to see you again.

Twice in writing her letter Rachel cut out this latter assertion, but at last, sobbing in despair, she restored the words. What right would she have to hope that he would come to her, after she had taken upon herself to break that promise which had been conveyed to him, when she bent her head over his arm?

I shall not forget you, and I will always be your friend, as you said I should be. Being friends is very different to anything else, and nobody can say that I may not do that.

I will always remember what you showed me in the clouds; and, indeed, I went there this very evening to see if I could see another arm. But there was nothing there, and I have taken that as an omen that you will not come back to Baslehurst. —

"To me," had been the words as she had first written them; but there was tenderness in those words, and she found it necessary to alter them.

I will now say good-bye to you, for I have told you all that I have to tell. Mamma desires that I will remember her to you kindly.

May God bless you and protect you always!

Believe me to beYour sincere friend,Rachel Ray.

In the morning she took down the letter in her hand and gave it to her mother. Mrs. Ray read it very slowly and demurred over it at sundry places. She especially demurred at that word about the omen, and even declared that it ought to be expunged. But Rachel was very stern and held her ground. She had put into the letter, she said, all that she had been bidden to say. Such a word from herself to one who had been so dear to her must be allowed to her.

The letter was not altered and was taken away by the postman that evening.

CHAPTER VI.

MRS. RAY GOES TO EXETER, AND MEETS A FRIEND

Six weeks passed over them at Bragg's End, and nothing was heard of Luke Rowan. Rachel's letter, a copy of which was given in our last chapter, was duly sent away by the postman, but no answer to it came to Bragg's End. It must, however, be acknowledged that it not only required no answer, but that it even refused to be answered. Rachel had told her lover that he was not to correspond with her, and that she certainly would not write to him again. Having so said, she had no right to expect an answer; and she protested over and over again that she did expect none. But still she would watch, as she thought unseen, for the postman's coming; and her heart would sink within her as the man would pass the gate without calling. "He has taken me at my word," she said to herself very bitterly. "I deserve nothing else from him; but – but – but – " In those days she was ever silent and stern. She did all that her mother bade her, but she did little or nothing from love. There were no more banquets, with clotted cream brought over from Mrs. Sturt's. She would speak a word or two now and then to Mrs. Sturt, who understood the whole case perfectly; but such words were spoken on chance occasions, for Rachel now never went over to the farm. Farmer Sturt's assistance had been offered to her; but what could the farmer do for her in such trouble as hers?

During the whole of these six weeks she did her household duties; but gradually she became slower in them and still more slow, and her mother knew that her disappointment was becoming the source of permanent misery. Rachel never said that she was ill; nor, indeed, of any special malady did she show signs: but gradually she became thin and wan, her cheeks assumed a haggard look, and that aspect of the brow which her mother feared had become habitual to her. Mrs. Ray observed her closely in all that she did. She knew well of those watchings for the postman. She was always thinking of her child, and, after a while, longing that Luke Rowan might come back to them, with a heart almost as sore with longing as was that of Rachel herself. But what could she do? She could not bring him back. In all that she had done, – in giving her sanction to this lover, and again in withdrawing it, she had been guided by the advice of her clergyman. Should she go again to him and beg him to restore that young man to them? Ah! no; great as was her trust in her clergyman she knew that even he could not do that for her.

During all these weeks hardly a word was spoken openly between the mother and daughter about the matter that chiefly occupied the thoughts of them both. Luke Rowan's name was hardly mentioned between them. Once or twice some allusion was made to the subject of the brewery, for it was becoming generally known that the lawyers were already at work on behalf of Rowan's claim; but even on such occasions as these Mrs. Ray found that her speech was stopped by the expression of Rachel's eyes, and by those two lines which on such occasions would mark her forehead. In those days Mrs. Ray became afraid of her younger daughter, – almost more so than she had ever been afraid of the elder one. Rachel, indeed, never spoke as Mrs. Prime would sometimes speak. No word of scolding ever passed her mouth; and in all that she did she was gentle and observant. But there was ever on her countenance that look of reproach which by degrees was becoming almost unendurable. And then her words during the day were so few! She was so anxious to sit alone in her own room! She would still read to her mother for some hours in the evening; but this reading was to her so manifestly a task, difficult and distasteful!

It may be remembered that Mrs. Prime, with her lover, Mr. Prong, and her friend Miss Pucker, had promised to call at Bragg's End on the evening after Rachel's walk into Baslehurst. They did come as they had promised, about half an hour after Rachel's letter to Luke had been carried away by the postman. They had come, and had remained at Bragg's End for an hour, eating cake and drinking currant wine, but not having, on the whole, what our American friends call a good time of it. That visit had been terrible to Mrs. Ray. Rachel had sat there cold, hard, and speechless. Not only had she not asked Miss Pucker to take off her bonnet, but she had absolutely declined to speak to that lady. It was wonderful to her mother that she should thus, in so short a time, have become wilful, masterful, and resolved in following out her own purposes. Not one word on that occasion did she speak to Miss Pucker; and Mrs. Prime, observing this, had grown black and still blacker, till the horror of the visit had become terrible to Mrs. Ray. Miss Pucker had grinned and smiled, and striven gallantly, poor woman, to make the best of it. She had declared how glad she had been to see Miss Rachel on the previous evening, and how well Miss Rachel had looked, and had expressed quite voluminous hopes that Miss Rachel would come to their Dorcas meetings. But to all this Rachel answered not a syllable. Now and then she addressed a word or two to her sister. Now and then she spoke to her mother. When Mr. Prong specially turned himself to her, asking her some question, she would answer him with one or two monosyllables, always calling him Sir; but to Miss Pucker she never once opened her mouth. Mrs. Prime became very angry, – very black and very angry; and the time of the visit was a terrible time to Mrs. Ray.

But this visit is to be noticed in our story chiefly on account of a few words which Mr. Prong found an opportunity of saying to Mrs. Ray respecting his proposed marriage. Mrs. Ray knew that there were difficulties about the money, and was disposed to believe, and perhaps to hope, that the match would be broken off. But on this occasion Mr. Prong was very marked in his way of speaking to Mrs. Ray, as though everything were settled. Mrs. Ray was thoroughly convinced by this that it was so, and her former beliefs and possible hopes were all dispersed. But then Mrs. Ray was easily convinced by any assertion. In thus speaking to his future mother-in-law he had contrived to turn his back round upon the other three ladies, so as to throw them together for the time, and thus make their position the more painful. It must be acknowledged that Rachel was capable of something great, after her determined resistance to Miss Pucker's blandishments under such circumstances as these.

"Mrs. Ray," Mr. Prong had said, – and as he spoke his voice was soft with mingled love and sanctity, – "I cannot let this moment pass without expressing one word of what I feel at the prospect of connecting myself with your amiable family."

"I'm sure I'm much obliged," Mrs. Ray had answered.

"Of course I am aware that Dorothea has mentioned the matter to you."

"Oh yes; she has mentioned it, certainly."

"And therefore I should be remiss, both as regards duty and manners, if I did not take this opportunity of assuring you how much gratification I feel in becoming thus bound up in family affection with you and Miss Rachel. Family ties are sweet bonds of sanctified love; and as I have none of my own, – nearer, that is, than Geelong, the colony of Victoria, where my mother and brother and sisters have located themselves, – I shall feel the more pleasure in taking you and Miss Rachel to my heart."

This was complimentary to Mrs. Ray; but with her peculiar feelings as to the expediency of people having their own belongings, she almost thought that it would have been better for all parties if Mr. Prong had gone to Geelong with the rest of the Prong family: this opinion, however, she did not express. As to taking Mr. Prong to her heart, she felt some doubts of her own capacity for such a performance. It would be natural for her to love a son-in-law. She had loved Mr. Prime very dearly, and trusted him thoroughly. She would have been prepared to love Luke Rowan, had fate been propitious in that quarter. But she could not feel secure as to loving Mr. Prong. Such love, moreover, should come naturally, of its own growth, and not be demanded categorically as a right. It certainly was a pity that Mr. Prong had not made himself happy, with that happiness for which he sighed, in the bosom of his family at Geelong. "I'm sure you're very kind," Mrs. Ray had said.

"And when we are thus united in the bonds of this world," continued Mr. Prong, "I do hope that other bonds, more holy in their nature even than those of family, more needful even than them, may join us together. Dorothea has for some months past been a constant attendant at my church – "

"Oh, I couldn't leave Mr. Comfort; indeed I couldn't," said Mrs. Ray in alarm. "I couldn't go away from my own parish church was it ever so."

"No, no; not altogether, perhaps. I am not sure that it would be desirable. But will it not be sweet, Mrs. Ray, when we are bound together as one family, to pour forth our prayers in holy communion together?"

"I think so much of my own parish church, Mr. Prong," Mrs. Ray replied. After that Mr. Prong did not, on that occasion, press the matter further, and soon turned round his chair so as to relieve the three ladies behind him.

"I think we had better be going, Mr. Prong," said Mrs. Prime, rising from her seat with a display of anger in the very motion of her limbs. "Good-evening, mother: good-evening to you, Rachel. I'm afraid our visit has put you out. Had I guessed as much, we would not have come."