The Three Clerks Part 58

But this was a bore. Alaric thought it most probable that Norman would marry one of the younger sisters, and he knew that family quarrels are uncomfortable and injudicious. When therefore he became a Civil Service Commissioner, and was thus removed from business intercourse with Norman, he conceived that it would be wise to arrange a reconciliation. He discussed the matter with Gertrude, and she, fully agreeing with him, undertook the task of making the proposal through her mother. This she did with all the kindness and delicacy of a woman. She desired her mother to tell Harry how much she had valued his friendship, how greatly she regretted the loss of it, how anxious her husband was to renew, if possible, their former terms of affection. Mrs. Woodward, by no means sanguine, undertook the commission. She undertook it, and utterly failed; and when Gertrude, in her disappointment, spoke bitterly of Norman's bitterness, both mother and sister, both Mrs. Woodward and Linda, took Norman's part.

'I wish it could be otherwise,' said Mrs. Woodward, 'I wish it for all our sakes; but he is a man not easily to be turned, and I cannot blame him. He has suffered very much.'

Gertrude became very red. Her mother's words contained a reproach against herself, tacit and unintended indeed, but not the less keenly felt.

'I am not aware that Mr. Norman has any cause of just complaint,'

she said, 'against any one, unless it be himself. For the sake of charity and old a.s.sociations we have wished that all ideas of injury should be forgiven and forgotten. If he chooses still to indulge his rancour, he must do so. I had taken him to be a better Christian.'

More words had sprung from these. Mrs. Woodward, who, in truth, loved Norman the better for the continuance of his sorrow, would not give up his part; and so the mother and child parted, and the two sisters parted, not quarrelling indeed, not absolutely with angry words, but in a tone of mind towards each other widely differing from that of former years. Mrs. Woodward had lost none of the love of the parent; but Gertrude had forgotten somewhat of the reverence of the child.

All this had added much to the grief created by Katie's illness.

And then of a sudden Katie became silent, as well as sad and ill --silent and sad, but so soft, so loving in her manner. Her gentle little caresses, the tender love ever lying in her eye, the constant pressure of her thin small hand, would all but break her mother's heart. Katie would sit beside her on the sofa in the drawing-room for hours; a book, taken up as an excuse, would be in her lap, and she would sit there gazing listlessly into the vacant daylight till the evening would come; and then, when the room was shaded and sombre, when the light of the fire merely served to make the objects indistinct, she would lean gently and by degrees upon her mother's bosom, would coax her mother's arm round her neck, and would thus creep as it were into her mother's heart of hearts. And then slow tears would trickle down her cheeks, very slow, one by one, till they would fall as telltales on her mother's hand.

'Katie, my darling Katie,' the mother would say.

'I'm only tired, mamma,' would be her answer. 'Don't move, mamma; pray don't move. I am so comfortable.'

And then at night she would put herself to rest close circled in Linda's arms. She would twist up her little feet, and lie so quiet there, that Linda would remain motionless that she might not disturb her Katie's sleep; but soon warm tears would be running on her bosom, and she would know that Katie was still thinking of her love.

Linda, among all her virtues, had not that of reticence, and her mother had soon learnt from her what had been said that night in their bedroom about Charley. But this violation of confidence, if it was a violation, was hardly necessary to make Mrs. Woodward aware of what was pa.s.sing in her daughter's bosom. When Katie ceased to ask that Charley might be sent for, when she ceased to plead for his pardon and to praise his virtues, Mrs. Woodward knew well the cause of her silence. It was not that others suspected her love, but that she had learned to suspect it herself. It was not that she was ashamed of loving Charley, but that she felt at once that such love would distress her mother's heart.

As she sat there that night fingering her silken hair, she had asked herself whether in truth this man was master of her heart; she had probed her young bosom, which now, by a sudden growth, became quick with a woman's impulse, and she had owned to herself that she did love him. He was dearer to her, she found, than all in the world beside. Fondly as she loved her sister, sweet to her as were her mother's caresses, their love was not as precious to her as his might be. And then she remembered what he was, what was the manner of his life, what his character; how different he was from Alaric or Harry Norman; she remembered this, and knew that her love was an unhappy pa.s.sion. Herself she would have sacrificed: prisoner as he had been, debtor as he was, drunkard, penniless, and a spendthrift, she would not have hesitated to take him for her guide through life, and have done what a woman might to guide him in return. But she would not sacrifice her mother. She saw now why Charley was not asked, and silently acquiesced in his banishment.

She was not yet quite seventeen. Not yet seventeen! the reader will say. She was still such a child, and yet arguing to herself about spendthrift debtors and self-sacrifice! All this bombast at sixteen and a half. No, my ungentle reader, not all this bombast at sixteen and a half. The bombast is mine. It is my fault if I cannot put into fitting language the thoughts which G.o.d put into her young heart. In her mind's soliloquy, Charley's vices were probably all summed up in the one word, unsteady. Why is he so unsteady? Why does he like these wicked things?' And then as regarded Mrs. Woodward, she did but make a resolve that not even for her love would she add to the unhappiness of that loving, tenderest mother. There was no bombast in Katie, either expressed or unexpressed.

After much consideration on the matter, Mrs. Woodward determined that she should ask Charley down to the Cottage. In the first place, she felt bitterly her apparent ingrat.i.tude to him. When last they had been together, the day after Katie's escape at the bridge, when his tale had just been read, she had told him, with the warmth of somewhat more than friendly affection, that henceforth they must be more than common friends. She had promised him her love, she had almost promised him the affection and care of a mother; and now how was she keeping her promise? He had fallen into misfortune, and she had immediately deserted him.

Over and over again she said to herself that her first duty was to her own child; but even with this reflection, she could hardly reconcile herself to her neglect of him.

And then, moreover, she felt that it was impossible that all their friendship, all their mutual regard, should die away suddenly without any explanation. An attempt to bring about this would not cure Katie's love. If this were done, would not Katie always think of Charley's wrong?

And, lastly, it was quite clear that Katie had put a check on her own heart. A meeting now might be the reverse of dangerous. It would be well that Katie should use herself to be with him now again; well, at any rate, that she should see him once before their proposed journey to Torquay; for, alas, the journey to Torquay was now insisted on by the London physician--insisted on, although he opined with a nod, somewhat less authoritative than his former nod, that the young lady was touched by no organic disease.

'And then,' said Mrs. Woodward to herself, 'his heart is good, and I will speak openly to him.' And so Charley was again invited to the cottage. After some demurring between him and Norman, he accepted the invitation.

Mrs. Val's dance had taken place in June, and it was now late in October. Four months had intervened, and during that period Charley had seen none of the Woodwards. He had over and over again tried to convince himself that this was his own fault, and that he had no right to accuse Mrs. Woodward of ingrat.i.tude. But he was hardly successful. He did feel, in spite of himself, that he had been dropped because of the disgrace attaching to his arrest; that Mrs. Woodward had put him aside as being too bad to a.s.sociate with her and her daughters; and that it was intended that henceforth they should be strangers.

He still had Katie's purse, and he made a sort of resolve that as long as he kept that in his possession, as long as he had that near his heart, he would not go near Norah Geraghty. This resolution he had kept; but though he did not go to the 'Cat and Whistle,' he frequented other places which were as discreditable, or more so. He paid many very fruitless visits to Mr. M'Ruen; contrived to run up a score with the proprietor of the dancing saloon in Holborn; and was as negligent as ever in the matter of the lock entries.

'It is no use now,' he would say to himself, when some aspirations for higher things came across his heart; 'it is too late now to go back. Those who once cared for me have thrown me over.' And then he would again think of Waterloo Bridge, and the Monument, and of what might be done for threepence or fourpence in a pistol gallery.

And then at last came the invitation to Hampton. He was once more to talk to Mrs. Woodward, and a.s.sociate with Linda--to see Katie once more. When he had last left the house he had almost been as much at home as any one of the family; and now he was to return to it as a perfect stranger. As he travelled down with Norman by the railway, he could not help feeling that the journey was pa.s.sing over too quickly. He was like a prisoner going to his doom. As he crossed the bridge, and remembered how Katie had looked when she lay struggling in the water, how he had been feted and caressed after pulling her out, he made a bitter contrast between his present position and that which he then enjoyed. Were it not for very shame, he would have found it in his heart to return to London.

And then in a moment they were at the Cottage door. The road had never been so short. Norman, who had not fathomed Charley's feelings, was happy and light-hearted--more so than was usual with him, for he was unaffectedly glad to witness Charley's return to Hampton. He rang sharply at the door, and when it was opened, walked with happy confidence into the drawing-room.

Charley was bound to follow him, and there he found himself again in the presence of Mrs. Woodward and her daughters. Katie would fain have absented herself, but Mrs. Woodward knew that the first meeting could take place in no more favourable manner.

Mrs. Woodward bade him welcome with a collected voice, and a.s.sured, if not easy manner. She shook hands with him cordially, and said a few words as to her pleasure of seeing him again. Then he next took Linda's hand, and she too made a little speech, more awkwardly than her mother, saying something mal a propos about the very long time he had been away; and then she laughed with a little t.i.tter, trying to recover herself. And at last he came to Katie. There was no getting over it. She also stretched out her now thin hand, and Charley, as he touched it, perceived how altered she was. Katie looked up into his face, and tried to speak, but she could not articulate a word. She looked into his face, and then at Mrs. Woodward, as though imploring her mother's aid to tell her how to act or what to say; and then finding her power of utterance impeded by rising sobs, she dropped back again on her seat, and hid her face upon the arm of the sofa.

'Our Katie is not so well as when you last saw her--is she, Charley?' said Mrs. Woodward. 'She is very weak just now; but thank G.o.d she has, we believe, no dangerous symptoms about her.

You have heard, perhaps, that we are going to Torquay for the winter?'

And so they went on talking. The ice was broken and the worst was over. They did not talk, it is true, as in former days; there was no confidence between them now, and each of them felt that there was none; but they nevertheless fell into a way of unembarra.s.sed conversation, and were all tolerably at their ease.

And then they went to dinner, and Charley was called on to discuss Admiralty matters with Uncle Bat; and then he and Norman sat after dinner a little longer than usual; and then they had a short walk, during which Katie remained at home; but short as it was, it was quite long enough, for it was very dull; and then there was tea; and then more constrained conversation, in which Katie took no part whatever; and then Mrs. Woodward and the girls took their candles, and Charley went over to the inn on the other side of the road. Oh! how different was this from the former evenings at Surbiton Cottage.

Charley had made no plan for any special interview with Katie; had, indeed, not specially thought about it at all; but he could not but feel an intense desire to say one word to her in private, and learn whether all her solicitude for him was over. 'Dear Charley, you will be steady; won't you?' Those had been her last words to him. Nothing could have been sweeter; although they brought before his mind the remembrance of his own unworthy career, they had been inexpressibly sweet, as testifying the interest she felt in him. And was that all over now? Had it all been talked away by Mrs. Woodward's cautious wisdom, because he had lain for one night in a sponging-house?

But the next day came, and as it pa.s.sed, it appeared to him that no opportunity of speaking one word to her was to be allowed to him.

She did not, however, shun him. She was not up at breakfast, but she sat next to him at lunch, and answered him when he spoke to her.

In the evening they again went out to walk, and then Charley found that Linda and Norman went one way, and that he was alone with Mrs. Woodward. It was manifest to him that this arrangement had been made on purpose, and he felt that he was to undergo some private conversation, the nature of which he dreaded. He dreaded it very much; when he heard it, it made him very wretched; but it was not the less full of womanly affection and regard for him.

'I cannot let you go from us, Charley,' began Mrs. Woodward, 'without telling you how deep a sorrow it has been to me to be so long without seeing you. I know you have thought me very ungrateful.'

'Ungrateful, Mrs. Woodward! 'O no! I have done nothing to make grat.i.tude necessary.'

'Yes, Charley, you have--you have done much, too much. You have saved my child's life.'

'O no, I did not,' said he; 'besides, I hate grat.i.tude. I don't want any one to be grateful to me. Grat.i.tude is almost as offensive as pity. Of course I pulled Kate out of the water when she fell in; and I would have done as much for your favourite cat.' He said this with something of bitterness in his tone; it was not much, for though he felt bitterly he did not intend to show it; but Mrs. Woodward's ear did not fail to catch it.

'Don't be angry with us, Charley; don't make us more unhappy than we already are.'

'Unhappy!' said he, as though he thought that all the unhappiness in the world was at the present moment reserved for his own shoulders.

'Yes, we are not so happy now as we were when you were last with us. Poor Katie is very ill.'

'But you don't think there is any danger, Mrs. Woodward?'

There are many tones in which such a question may be asked--and is asked from day to day--all differing widely from each other, and giving evidence of various shades of feeling in the speaker.

Charley involuntarily put his whole heart into it. Mrs. Woodward could not but love him for feeling for her child, though she would have given so much that the two might have been indifferent to each other.

'I do not know,' she said. 'We hope not. But I should not be sent with her to Torquay if she were not very ill. She is very ill, and it is absolutely essential that nothing should be allowed to excite her painfully. I tell you this, Charley, to excuse our apparent unkindness in not having you here sooner.'

Charley walked by her in silence. Why should his coming excite her more than Norman's? What could there be painful to her in seeing him? Did the fact of his having been arrested attach to his visit any peculiar probability of excitement?

'Do not suppose that we have not thought of you,' continued Mrs.

Woodward.' We have all done so daily. Nay, I have done so myself all but hourly. Ah, Charley, you will never know how truly I love you.'

Charley's heart was as soft as it was inflammable. He was utterly unable to resist such tenderness as Mrs. Woodward showed to him.

He had made a little resolution to be stiff and stern, to ask for no favour and to receive none, not to palliate his own conduct, or to allow Mrs. Woodward to condemn it. He had felt that as the Woodwards had given him up, they had no longer any right to criticize him. To them at least, one and all, to Mrs. Woodward and her daughters, his conduct had been _sans reproche_. They had no cause to upbraid him on their own account; and they had now abandoned the right to do so on his own. With such a.s.sumed sternness he began his walk; but now it had all melted before the warmth of one tender word from a woman's mouth.

'I know I am not worth thinking about,' said he.

'Do not say so; pray do not say so. Do not think that we say so to ourselves. I grieve for your faults. Charley; I know they are grievous and wicked; but I know how much there is of good in you.

I know how clever you are, how excellent your heart is, how sweet your disposition. I trust, I trust in G.o.d, you may reform, and be the pride of your friends. I trust that I yet may be proud of knowing you----'

'No one will ever be proud of me,' said Charley.