The Wanderer; or, Female Difficulties (Volume 1 of 5)

Harleigh was already out of sight.

'Pour soul!' said Selina, 'I am sure, for one, I'll help her.'

'Let us make a subscription,' said Elinor, producing half a guinea, and looking round to Mrs Maple.

Selina joined the same sum, full of glee to give, for the first time, as much as her sister.

Mrs Maple clamorously ordered them to shut the parlour door.

With shame, yet joy, the stranger accepted the two half guineas, intimated her hopes that she should soon repay them, repeated her thanks, and took leave.

The sisters would still have detained her, but Mrs Maple peremptorily insisted upon breakfasting without further delay.

The Incognita was proceeding to the housekeeper's room, for a packet of the gifts of Elinor, but she was stopt in the hall by Ireton, who was loitering about, playing with his purse, and jerking and catching it from hand to hand.

'Here, my dear,' he cried, 'look at this, and take what you will from it.'

She coldly thanked him, and, saying that the young ladies had amply supplied her, would have moved on: but he prevented her, repeating his offer, and adding, while with uncontrolled freedom he stared at her, 'How the deuce, with such a pretty face as that, could you ever think of making yourself look such a fright?'

She told him that she was in haste.

'But what was the whim of it?'

She desired him to make way, every moment of day-light being precious to her.

'Hang day-light!' cried he, 'I never liked it; and if you will but wait a few minutes – '

Selina, here, running to call him to breakfast, he finished in a whisper, 'I'll convey you in my own chaise wherever you like to go;' and then, forced to put up his purse, he gallantly handed his fair bride-elect back to the parlour.

The stranger, entering the housekeeper's room, met Harleigh, who seriously remonstrated against her walking project, offering his servant to procure her a post-chaise. The sigh of her negative expressed its melancholy economy, though she owned a wish that she could find some meaner vehicle that would be safe.

Harleigh then disappeared; but, a few minutes afterwards, when she was setting out from the garden-gate, she again met him, and he told her that he was going to order a parcel from a stationer's at Brighthelmstone; and that a sort of chaise-cart, belonging to a farmer just by, would be sent for it, almost immediately. 'I do not recommend,' added he, smiling, 'such a machine for its elegance; and, if you would permit me to offer you one more eligible – '

A grave motion of the head repressed him from finishing his phrase, and he acquainted her that he had just been to the farm, to bespeak a sober driver, with whom he had already settled for his morning's work.

This implied assurance, that he had no plan of following the machine, induced her to agree to the proposition; and, when the little carriage was in sight, he expressed his good wishes that she might find the letter, or the friend, that she desired, and returned to the breakfast parlour.

The length of the way, joined to the dirt of the roads, made her truly sensible of his consideration, in affording her this safe conveyance.

When she arrived at the Post-office, the words, 'Oh, you are come at last!' struck her ear, from the street; but not conceiving herself to be addressed, they failed to catch her attention, till she saw, waiting to give her his hand, while exclaiming, 'What the deuce can have made you so long in coming?' young Ireton.

Far less pleased than surprised, she disengaged herself from him with quickness, and enquired for the post-master.

He was not within.

She was extremely disturbed, and at a loss where to wait, or what to do.

'Why did not you stay for my chaise?' said Ireton. 'When I found that you were gone, I mounted my steed, and came over by a short cut, to see what was become of you; and here you have kept me cooling my heels all this devil of a time. That booby of a driver must have had a taste for being out-crawled by a snail.'

Without answering him, she asked whether there were any clerk at hand, to whom she could apply?

Oh, yes! and she was immediately shewn into an office, and followed, without any ceremony, by Ireton, though she replied not a word to any thing that he said.

A young man here received her, of whom, in a fearful voice, she demanded whether he had any letter directed for L.S., to be left till called for.

'You must make her tell you her name, Sir!' cried Ireton, with an air of importance. 'I give you notice not to let her have her letter, without a receipt, signed by her own hand. She came over with Mrs Maple of Lewes, and a party of us, and won't say who she is. 'T has a very ugly look, Sir!'

The eye of the stranger accused him, but vainly, of cruelty.

The clerk, who listened with great curiosity, soon produced a foreign letter, with the address demanded.

While eagerly advancing to receive it, she anxiously enquired, whether there were no inland letter with the same direction?

None, she was answered.

Ireton then, clapping his hand upon the shoulder of the clerk, positively declared, that he would lodge an information against him, if he delivered any letter, under such circumstances, without a signed receipt.

An almost fainting distress was now visible in the face of the Incognita, as the clerk, surprised and perplexed, said, 'Have you any objection, Ma'am, to giving me your name?'

She stammered, hesitated, and grew paler, while Ireton smiled triumphantly, when the party was suddenly joined by Harleigh.

Ireton ceased his clamour, and hung back, ashamed.

Harleigh, approaching the stranger, with an apology for his intrusion, was struck with her disordered look, and enquired whether she were ill?

'Ah, Sir!' she cried, reviving with hope at his sight, and walking towards the window, whither, wondering, he followed, 'assist me in mercy! – you know, already, that some powerful motive deters me from naming myself – '

'Have I been making any indiscreet enquiry?' cried he, gently, yet in a tone of surprise.

'You? O no! You have been all generosity and consideration!'

Harleigh, much gratified, besought her to explain herself with openness.

'They insist upon my telling my name – or they detain my letter!'

'Is that all?' said he, and, going to the clerk, he demanded the letter, for which he gave his own address and receipt, with his word of honour that he was authorised to require it by the person to whom it was written.

He then delivered it into her hand.

The joy of its possession, joined to the relief from such persecution, filled her with a delight which, though beaming from all her features, she had not yet found words to express, when Ireton, whom Harleigh had not remarked, burst into a significant, though affected laugh.

'Why, Harleigh! why, what the deuce can have brought you hither?' cried he. Harleigh wished to retort the question; but would not hazard a raillery that might embarrass the stranger, who now, with modest grace, courtsied to him; while she passed Ireton without notice, and left the room.

Each wished to follow her, but each was restrained by the other. Ireton, who continued laughing maliciously, owned that his journey to Brighthelmstone had been solely to prevail with the clerk to demand the name of the stranger, before he gave up the letter; but Harleigh protested that he had merely ridden over to offer his mediation for her return to Lewes, if she should miss the friend, or letter, of which she came in search.

Ireton laughed still more; and hoped that, from such abundant charity, he would attribute his own ride, also, to motives of as pure benevolence. He then begged he might not interfere with the following up of so charitable a purpose: but Harleigh assured him that he had neither right, pretension, nor design to proceed any farther.

'If that's the case,' cried Ireton, 'since charity is the order of the day, I'll see what is become of her myself.'

He ran out of the room.

Harleigh, following, soon joined him, and they saw the Incognita enter a milliner's shop. They then separated; Harleigh pleading business for not returning immediately to Lewes; while Ireton, mounting his horse, with an accusing shake of the head, rode off.

Harleigh strolled to the milliner's, and, enquiring for some gloves, perceived, through the glass-door of a small parlour, the stranger reading her letter.

He begged that the milliner would be so good as to tell the lady in the inner room, that Mr Harleigh requested to speak to her.

A message thus open could neither startle nor embarrass her, and he was instantly admitted.

He found her pale and agitated. Her letter, which was in her hand, she hastily folded, but looked at nothing else, while she waited an explanation of his visit.

'I could not,' he said, 'go back to Lewes without knowing whether your expectations are answered in coming hither; or whether you will permit me to tell the Miss Joddrels that they may still have the pleasure to be of some use to you.'

She appeared to be unable to speak.

'I fear to seem importunate,' he continued, 'yet I have no intention, believe me, to ask any officious questions. I respect what you have said of the nature of your situation, too much to desire any information beyond what may tend to alleviate its uneasiness.'

She held her hands before her eyes, to hide her fresh gushing tears, but they trickled fast through her fingers, as she answered, 'My situation is now deplorable indeed! – I have no letter, no direction from the person whom I had hoped to meet; and whose abode, whose address, I know not how to discover! I must not apply to any of my original friends: unknown, and in circumstances the most strange, if not suspicious, can I hope to make myself any new ones? – Can I even subsist, when, though thus involved in mystery, I am as indigent as I am friendless, yet dare not say who, nor what I am, – and hardly even know it myself!'

Touched with compassion, he drew nearer to her, meaning, from an almost unconscious impulse of kindness, to take her hand; but feeling, with equal quickness, the impropriety of allowing his pity such a manifestation, he retreated to his first place, and, in accents of gentle, but respectful commiseration, expressed his concern for her distress.

Somewhat soothed, yet heavily sighing, 'To fail finding,' she said, 'either the friend, or her direction, that I expected, overwhelms me with difficulty and perplexity. And even this letter from abroad, though most welcome, has grievously disappointed me! I am promised, however, another, which may bring me, perhaps, happier tidings. I must wait for it patiently; but the person from whom it comes little imagines my destitute state! The unfortunate loss of my purse makes it, by this delay of all succour, almost desperate!'

The hand of Harleigh was involuntarily in his pocket, but before he could either draw out his purse, or speak, she tremulously added, colouring, and holding back, 'I am ashamed to have mentioned a circumstance, which seems to call for a species of assistance, that it is impossible I should accept.'

Harleigh bowed, acquiescent.

Her eyes thanked him for sparing her any contest, and she then gratefully acceded to his proposal, of soliciting for her the renewed aid and countenance of the Miss Joddrels, from whom some little notice might be highly advantageous, in securing her decent treatment, during the few days, – perhaps more, – that she might be kept waiting at Brighthelmstone for another letter.

He gently exhorted her to re-animate her courage, and hoped to convince her, by the next morning, that he had not intruded upon her retirement from motives of idle and useless curiosity.

As soon as he was gone, she treated with Miss Matson, the milliner, to whom Harleigh had considerately named her as a young person known to Mrs Maple, for a small room in her house during a few days; and then, somewhat revived, she endeavoured, by recollecting the evils which she had escaped, to look forward, with better hopes of alleviation, to those which might yet remain to be encountered.

CHAPTER VIII

The next morning, the Wanderer had the happy surprise of seeing Elinor burst into her chamber. 'We are all on fire,' she cried, 'at our house, so I am come hither to cool myself. Aunt Maple and I have fought a noble battle; but I have won the day.'

She then related, that Harleigh had brought them an account of her disappointments, her letter, her design to wait for another, and her being at the milliner's. 'Aunt Maple,' she continued, 'treated the whole as imposition; but I make it a rule never to let her pitiful system prevail in the house. And so, to cut the matter short, for I hate a long story, I gave her to understand, that, if she would not let you return to Lewes, and stay with us till your letter arrives, I should go to Brighthelmstone myself, and stay with you. This properly frightened her; for she knew I would keep my word.'

'And would you, Madam?' said the stranger, smiling.

'Why not? Do you think I would not do a thing only because no one else would do it? I am never so happy as in ranging without a guide. However, we came to a compromise this morning; and she consents to permit your return, provided I don't let you enter her chaise, and engage for keeping you out of every body's way.'

The stranger, evidently hurt and offended, declined admission upon such terms. Her obligations, she said, were already sufficiently heavy, and she would struggle to avoid adding to their weight, and to supply her own few wants herself, till some new resource might open to her assistance.

Elinor, surprised, hastily demanded whether she meant to live alone, that she might only be aided, and only be visited by Mr Harleigh.

The stranger looked all astonishment.

'Nay, that will certainly be the most pleasant method; so I don't affect to wonder at it; nevertheless – '

She hesitated, but her face was tinted with a glow of disturbance, and her voice announced strong rising emotion, as she presently added, 'If you think of forming any attachment with that man – ' She stopt abruptly.

The heightened amazement of the stranger kept her for a few instants speechless; but the troubled brow of Elinor soon made her with firmness and spirit answer, 'Attachment? I protest to you, Madam, except at those periods when his benevolence or urbanity have excited my gratitude, my own difficulties have absorbed my every thought!'

'I heartily congratulate your apathy!' said Elinor, her features instantly dilating into a smile; 'for he is so completely a non-descript, that he would else incontestably set you upon hunting out for some new Rosamund's Pond. That is all I mean.'

She then, but with gaiety and good humour, enquired whether or not the stranger would return to Lewes.

Nothing, to the stranger, could be less attractive at this moment; yet the fear of such another misinterpretation and rebuff, and the unspeakable dread of losing, in her helpless situation, all female countenance, conquered her repugnance.

Elinor then said that she would hurry home, and send off the same elegant machine from the farm, which, she found, had been made use of in her service the preceding day.

Far from exhilarated was the young person whom she left, who, thus treated, could scarcely brook the permission to return, which before she would have solicited. Small are the circumstances which reverse all our wishes! and one hour still less resembles another in our feelings, than in our actions.

Upon arriving again at the house of Mrs Maple, she was met by Selina, who expressed the greatest pleasure at her return, and conducted her to the little room which she had before occupied; eagerly announcing that she had already learnt half her part, which she glibly repeated, crying, 'How lucky it is that you are come back; for now I have got somebody to say it to!'

Mrs Maple, she added, had refused her consent to the whole scheme, till Elinor threatened to carry it into execution in Farmer Gooch's barn, and to invite all the county.

She then entered into sundry details of family secrets, the principal of which was, that she often thought that she should be married before her sister Elinor, though Sister Elinor was twenty-two years old, and she herself was only fourteen: but Sister Elinor had had a violent quarrel with Mr Dennis Harleigh, whom she had been engaged to marry before she went abroad, about the French Revolution, which Sister Elinor said was the finest thing in the world, but which Mr Dennis said was the very worst. But, for all that, he loved her so, that he had made his brother fetch her home, and wanted the marriage to take place directly: and Aunt Maple wished it too, of all things, because Sister Elinor was so hard to manage; for, now she was of age, she did everything that she liked; and she protested that she would not give her consent, unless Mr Dennis promised to change his opinion upon the French Revolution; so they quarrelled again the day before they left town; and Aunt Maple, quite frightened, invited Mr Harleigh, the elder brother, to come and spend a week or two at Lewes, to try to bring matters round again.

These anecdotes were interrupted by the appearance of Elinor, of whom the Incognita entreated, and obtained, permission to reside, as in town, wholly in her own room.

'I wish you could hear,' said Elinor, 'how we all settle your history in the parlour. No two of us have the same idea of whom or what you are.' She then entered upon the subject of the play, which was to be the Provoked Husband, in compliment to Miss Arbe, a young lady of celebrated talents, who, having frequently played the part of Lady Townly, with amazing applause, at private theatres, had offered her services for that character, but would study no other. This, Elinor complained, was singularly provoking, as Harleigh, who alone of the whole set was worth acting with, must necessarily be Lord Townly. However, since she could not try her own theatrical skill, by the magnetizing powers of reciprocated exertions, she determined, in relinquishing what was brilliant, to adopt at least what was diverting; for which reason she had taken the part of Lady Wronghead. Selina was to be Miss Jenny; Ireton, 'Squire Richard; and she had pitched upon Mr Scope and Miss Bydel, two famous, formal quizzes, residing in Lewes, to compliment them with the fogrum parts of Manly and Lady Grace; characters which always put the audience to sleep; but that, as they were both good sort of souls, who were never awake themselves, they would not find out. The other parts she had chiefly arranged for the pleasure of giving a lesson of democracy to Aunt Maple; for she had appointed Sir Francis Wronghead to Mr Stubbs, an old steward belonging to Lord Rockton; Count Basset to young Gooch, a farmer's son; Myrtylla to Golding, her own maid, and John Moody to Tomlinson, the footman.

The air of attention with which the stranger listened, whether she answered or not, renewed again in Elinor the pleasure which she had first found in talking to her; and thus, between the two sisters, she had almost constantly a companion till near midnight.

To be left, then, alone was not to be left to unbroken slumbers. She had no dependence, nor hope, but in an expected second letter, yet had devised no means to secure its immediate reception, even if its quick arrival corresponded with her wishes. As soon, therefore, as she heard the family stirring the next morning, she descended, with an intention of going to the housekeeper's room, to make some arrangement for that purpose.

Ireton, who caught a glimpse of her upon the stairs, met and stopt her. 'My dear,' he cried, 'don't think me such a prig as to do you any mischief; but take a hint! Don't see quite so much of a certain young lady, whom I don't wish should know the world quite so soon! You understand me, my dear?'

Inexpressibly offended, she was contemptuously shrinking from him, when they were joined by Harleigh, who asked, with an air of respect that was evidently meant to give a lesson to Ireton, whether she would permit him to call at the post-office, to order that her letters should be forwarded to Lewes.

This offer was irresistible, and, with looks of the brightest gratitude, she was uttering her acknowledgements, when the voice of Elinor, from a distance, sounding tremulous and agitated, checked her, and she hastily retreated.

But her room-door was only shut to be almost instantly thrown open by Elinor herself, who, entering with a large parcel in her hands, while her face shewed pain and disorder, said, 'See how I have been labouring to assist and to serve you, at the very moment of your insidious duplicity!'

Thunderstruck by the harshness of an attack nearly as incomprehensible as it was vehement, the stranger fixed her eyes upon her accuser with a look that said, Are you mad?

The silent, yet speaking expression was caught by Elinor, who, struck with sudden shame, frankly begged her pardon; and, after a little reflexion, coolly added, 'You must never mind what I say, nor what I do; for I sport all sort of things, and in all sort of manners. But it is merely to keep off stagnation: I dread nothing like a lethargy. But pray what were you all about just now?'

The Incognita related her intended purpose; its interruption; the offer of Mr Harleigh; and its acceptance.

Elinor looked perturbed again, and said, 'You seem mighty fond, methinks, of employing Mr Harleigh for your Mercury!'

'He is so good as to employ himself. I could never think of taking such a liberty.'

Elinor put up her lip; but told her to make what use she could of the parcel, and, with an abrupt 'Good morning,' went down to breakfast.

The stranger, amazed and confounded, remained for some time absorbed by conjectures upon this scene.

The parcel contained cast-off clothes of almost every description; but, much as she required such aid, the manner in which it was offered determined her upon its rejection.

In a few hours, the maid who brought her meals, was desired by Mr Harleigh to inform her, that he had executed her commission at the post-office.

This assurance revived her, and enabled her to pass the day in tolerable tranquillity, though perfectly alone, and without any species of employment to diversify her ruminations, or help to wear away the tediousness of expectation.

When the next day, however, and the next, passed without her seeing any of the family, she felt disconcerted and disturbed. To be abandoned by Elinor, and even by Selina, made her situation appear worse than forlorn; and her offended spirit deemed the succour thus afforded her, inadequate to compensate for the endurance of universal disesteem and avoidance. She determined, therefore, to quit the inhospitable mansion, persuaded that no efforts could be too difficult, no means too laborious, that might rescue her from an abode which she could no longer inhabit, without seeming to herself to be degraded.

But the idea of this project had a facility of which its execution did not partake. She had no money, save what she had received from the two sisters; even that, by a night and day spent at the milliner's, was much diminished. She could not quit the neighbourhood of Brighthelmstone, while still in expectation of a letter; and if, while awaiting it in any other house, the compassion, or the philanthropy of Harleigh should urge him to see her, might not Elinor conclude that she had only retreated to receive his visits alone?

Apprehensions such as these frightened her into forbearance: but in teaching her prudence, they did not endow her with contentment. Her hours lingered in depression and uncertainty; her time was not employed but consumed; her faculties were not enjoyed, but wasted.

Yet, upon more mature reflexion, she enquired by what right she expected kinder treatment. Unknown, unnamed, without any sort of recommendation, she applied for succour, and it was granted her: if she met with the humanity of being listened to, and the charity of being assisted, must she quarrel with her benefactors, because they gave not implicit credit to the word of a lonely Wanderer for her own character? or think herself ill used that their donations and their aid were not delicate as well as useful?

This sober style of reasoning soon chased away resentment, and, with quieter nerves, she awaited some termination to her suspence and solitude.