The Vicar of Wrexhill Part 4

"Surely, Charles, it was no symptom of friendship to me, to say that your dear father had made an accursed will!"

"Good heavens!... what a strange misrepresentation, mother!... and all hanging, as it should seem, upon one little syllable!... Our friend, as you well know, is what Rosalind calls a manish man; he denies the supremacy of woman, and might, and I verily believe did say, that a will which vested power in her must be a cursed will. But we know too well his long-licensed coa.r.s.eness of expression to greatly marvel at that; but for the solemn and most awful word ac-cursed, believe me, mother, he never said it."

"It matters little, my dear son, what particular words of abuse Sir Gilbert uttered against me, provided that your heart did not echo them."

"Mother! dearest mother!" cried Helen, rising and going towards her brother, who seemed petrified at the words he heard, "how for a single moment could you believe that Charles's heart could echo any word that spoke not honour and love towards you!"

"He might have been mistaken, Helen," replied her mother with a heavy sigh: "Charles could not indeed suspect that the mother his dear father so fully trusted should prove unworthy of the trust.--But let us quit this painful theme; and believe me, my children, that the first wish of my heart is to prove myself worthy of his trust and your love."

"Such words are just what we might expect to hear from you, mother,"

said Mowbray, "were any profession from you to us necessary; but I would gladly forget that you have ever thought such an a.s.surance called for."

He bent down and kissed her fervently; and then making a sign to Helen, who seemed about to follow him, that she should remain where she was, he walked out for a couple of hours among the darkest thickets he could find, with more of melancholy feeling than had ever before rested on his spirits.

CHAPTER V.

THE ARISTOCRACY OF WREXHILL.

There was no longer any thing to prevent Charles Mowbray's return to Oxford, and the following day the time of his departure was canva.s.sed, and at length fixed for the early part of the following week. During the few days that intervened, Mrs. Mowbray seemed quite to have forgotten their painful conversation respecting the will; she resumed all her former confiding tenderness of manner, and told him before they parted, that henceforward his liberal allowance would be doubled.

The day preceding his departure was Sunday, and for the first time since their heavy loss the whole family appeared at church. They had all dreaded the moment of reappearing before the eyes of the little village world, and of thus giving public notice, as it were, that they no longer required to be left to mourn in secret: but this painful ceremony came, and was endured, like those that had preceded it; and poor Helen, as she laid her head upon her pillow, exclaimed, "What is there that we could not bear, and live."

The sad parting of the next morning having also pa.s.sed over them, they at once, and by necessity, fell into the mode of life which they were hereafter to pursue. But dreary and heavy was the change that had fallen on them, and it was long ere the mere act of a.s.sembling for their daily meals ceased to be a source of suffering--for fearful was the blank left by the absence of the kind, the gentle, the beloved, the venerated being, whose voice was used to speak a blessing and a welcome over every repast. But our natures seize with avidity the healing balm which time and occupation offer: much variety of disposition was, however, manifested in the manner in which each one of the family sought the consolation they needed.

Mrs. Mowbray became evidently, though perhaps unconsciously, better both in health and spirits from the time that her neighbours, according to their different ranks, resumed their visits of friendship, civility, and respect. She had testified outwardly, excepting to such an eye as Rosalind's, more intense suffering than any other member of the family.

Nor was this in the smallest degree the result of affectation: she felt all, and more than all, that she had ever expressed, and would gladly, for the sake of her poor children, have concealed a part of it, had the fibre of her character permitted her doing so. But she was demonstrative by nature: with great softness and sweetness of temper, was joined that species of weakness which is often said to be the most attractive feature in the female character;--a weakness that induced her to seize gladly and gratefully any hand extended to lead her, and which, while it made her distrust herself, gave most sovereign sway and masterdom to any one ready and willing to supply the strength and decision of purpose which she wanted.

Many female philippics have been penned, I believe, against that manly pa.s.sion for superiority which leads our masters to covet in a companion chosen for life the temper of mind here described; but I am tempted to think that this longing to possess a being that wants protection, far from demonstrating a disposition p.r.o.ne to tyranny, shows a nature disposed to love and to cherish, in a manner perfectly accordant to the most perfect _beau ideal_ of married life. But, on the other hand, there may perhaps be more of fondness than judgment in those who make such mallability of mind their first requisite in a choice so awfully important.

Mrs. Mowbray, however, had a thousand good qualities to justify the devoted affection of her husband. Generous, unsuspicious, and confiding, she was almost as incapable of doubting the goodness of others, as of deserving such doubts herself. Though heiress to immense property, no feeling in the slightest degree approaching to pride had even for a single instant swelled her heart; and though good, beautiful, and accomplished, her estimate of herself was lower than that formed of her by any other human being. Her heart was now more than ever opened to every expression of sympathy and kindness, and she experienced the most salutary effects from admitting those who uttered such, yet she was still a mourner in her very heart and soul; and there were moments in which she felt so bitterly that all her youthful affections were buried, and every hope of earthly happiness past, that the fair young faces of the three affectionate girls who were ready to devote themselves to her seemed too bright and beautiful to be kept within the influence of her melancholy, and she often sent them from her to their music-room, their flower-gardens, or the Park, with a sort of feverish anxiety, lest their youth and health should be sacrificed to their affection for her.

Helen had all the tenderness with none of the weakness of her mother's character. She soon ceased to speak of her father, except occasionally, when walking or sitting quite alone with Rosalind, when sheltering boughs or thickening twilight might conceal the working features of her face even from her. At such a moment, if some kind caress from her young companion touched unawares the feelings over which she unceasingly kept guard, as if they were a secret treasure too precious to be exposed to vulgar eyes, she would from time to time give way to the sacred pleasure of discoursing on the character of the father she had lost.

But she had resumed all her former occupations, and added to them the far from unpleasing task of imparting to Rosalind much that had either been ill taught or altogether neglected in her early education. This, as well as their daily-increasing affection for each other, kept them much together, without any blameable desertion either of Mrs. Mowbray or f.a.n.n.y: for the former was really wretched if she thought they confined themselves too much to her drawing-room and herself; and the latter was hourly becoming more devoted to solitary study, and to speculations too poetical and sublime to be shared by any one less romantic and imaginative than herself.

The neighbourhood was not a large one: Mowbray Park, and the estate attached to it, stretched itself so far in all directions, that Oakley, the residence of Sir Gilbert Harrington, the nearest landed proprietor, was at the distance of more than a mile. The little village of Wrexhill, however, had one or two pretty houses in it, inhabited by ladies and gentlemen of moderate but independent fortune, with whom the family at the Park a.s.sociated on terms of intimacy.

Among these, the late Vicar and his family had been the decided favourites of the whole race of Mowbrays,--and most deservedly so; for the father was a man of piety, learning, and most amiable deportment; his wife, a being whose temper, to say nothing of sundry other good qualities, had made her the idol of the whole parish; and his two sons and two daughters, just such sons and daughters as such parents deserved to have. But, as Gregory Dobbs, the old parish clerk, observed, after officiating at the funeral of Mr. Mowbray, "Death seemed to have taken a spite against the village of Wrexhill, for within one short month he had mowed down and swept away the two best and _most powerful_ men in the parish, and 'twas no easy matter to say how long the inhabitants might be likely to wear mourning."

The dispersion and departure of the good Vicar's family was an additional misfortune that his parishioners had not looked for. The living, more valuable for its pleasant house and pretty glebe than for its revenue, was in the gift of one who through life had been, not in appearance or profession only, but in most true sincerity, the attached friend of the late inc.u.mbent; and Edward Wallace, his eldest son, was bred to the church with the express understanding that the next presentation should be his. With this persuasion, the young man's first act on the death of his father was to tell his mother and sisters that they should continue to inhabit the home they had so long loved. But this arrangement was speedily overthrown; for in reply to the letter which announced the death of his father to Sir J. C. Blackhouse, the patron of the living, he received the following answer:

"My dear Fellow,

"As the devil would have it, I am now a cabinet minister, and I no more dare give the living to your Tory father's son, than I dare blow up Westminster Hall, or pull the Lord Chancellor's nose in public. I do a.s.sure you I am very sorry for this, for I believe you are likely to be as good a man as your excellent father, who, when he was my tutor, had certainly no notion that I should turn out such a first-rate Radical. However, there is no resisting destiny; and so here I am, just going to give my pretty little living to some Reverend Mr. Somebody that I don't care a straw about, because my Lord M---- says, that though a bit of a saint, he is a _capital clerical Whig_. I wish, Edward, you'd try to forget all the fusty old nonsense about Church and State,--upon my life I do. By-gones are by-gones, my dear fellow; and if you could get up a clever pamphlet on the t.i.the Laws, or on the Protestant affinities to the Church of Rome, or anything else with a good rich vein of whiggery running through it, I really think I might still be able to do something for you. Do think of this, and believe me,

"My dear fellow,

"Very affectionately,

"Your friend,

"J. C. BLACKHOUSE."

This most unlooked-for disappointment of course banished the Wallace family from Wrexhill; and the regret their departure left was so general, that it would be hardly saying too much to declare that no interference of the Whig government, however personal or tyrannical, ever produced a stronger sensation of disgust in the circle to which its influence extended than this.

It was greatly owing to the influence of Mr. Mowbray, that Mr.

Cartwright, his son and daughter, were visited by the neighbourhood on their arrival; but the obvious injustice and impropriety of treating with indignity and disrespect the clergyman who was placed among them, solely because they would have preferred one of their own choosing, had led the benevolent owner of "the great house" to banish the painful feelings to which this unpopular appointment had given rise, and before he died, he had the satisfaction of knowing that those who looked up to him as authority had followed his example, and that the new Vicar had been called upon by all the visiting families of Wrexhill.

The handsomest house in the village was inhabited by a widow lady still young enough to be called handsome, and living with sufficient show to be supposed rich. She played a little, sang a little, sketched a little, and talked and dressed a great deal. Some people declared that when she was young, her complexion must have been as beautiful as that of Miss f.a.n.n.y Mowbray: but these were only the young farmers, who did not know rouge when they saw it. This lady, whose name was Simpson, had one little girl, a pretty little creature of eight years old, who was sometimes petted and played with till she was completely spoiled, and sometimes left in the nursery for days together, while her mamma was absorbed in the perusal of a new novel or the fabrication of a new dress.

At the next turn of the village street was the entrance to a little place of much less pretension, but infinitely prettier, and in better taste: this also was tenanted by a fair widow, who, had she not been surrounded by three daughters, all taller than herself, might have pa.s.sed for being as young and as handsome as Mrs. Simpson. She was, however, as little like her as possible in every other respect, being subject to no caprice, remarkably simple in her dress, and her hair and her cheeks always remaining of the colour that pleased G.o.d. This lady had been early left a widow by the gallant and unfortunate Colonel Richards, who lost a life in a skirmish with the native troops of India which might have done honour to his country in a n.o.bler field. What his young widow endured in returning from a remote part of the country to Madras, with her three infants and very little means, had doubtless contributed, with the good gifts born with her, to make her what she was; for there was a firmness and strength of mind enveloped in her miniature frame, which seemed as if her brave husband had bequeathed to her the legacy of his dauntless spirit to sustain her under all the privations and misery his early death left her to encounter alone.

The character of her three girls will be easily understood hereafter.

Mrs. Richards's cottage was the only residence in Wrexhill except the Vicar's that did not open upon the village street, so that she had no immediate neighbour; but close to the corner of the pretty field that fronted her dwelling and fed her cow, lived a bachelor half-pay officer, who among many other excellent qualities possessed one which made him pre-eminently interesting in her eyes:--he had known Colonel Richards well, and less than half the reverence he felt for his memory has often sufficed to enrich the church of Rome with a saint. It was not Major Dalrymple's fault if the widow of his umqwhile commanding officer had not long ago exchanged her comparative poverty for his very comfortable independence; and considering that he was five years younger than the lady, was the presumptive heir to a n.o.ble Scotch cousin who was thought consumptive, played the flute exquisitely, and was moreover a tall and gentlemanly figure, with no other fault imputed to him than a somewhat obstinate pertinacity of attachment to herself, many people both in and out of Wrexhill wondered at her obduracy, especially as she had never been heard to say, even by her most intimate friends, "that her heart was buried in the grave of her dear Richards."

The remaining aristocracy of Wrexhill need hardly be enumerated, as they will not make any very considerable figure in the following pages. But there was an attorney, an apothecary, and a schoolmaster. The latter, indeed, was an excellent person, of whom we may hear more in the sequel; but a _catalogue raisonne_ of names makes but a dull chapter.

CHAPTER VI.

THE PRINc.i.p.aL PERSON IN THE VILLAGE.--THE VICAR'S FAMILY.

Two days after the Mowbray family appeared at church, the village gentry began to offer their visits of condolence, which, happily however for the tranquillity of the persons chiefly concerned, were performed in the improved manner of modern times; that is to say, every allusion to the recent event being by all but their intimate friends most cautiously avoided by all parties.

The first person who entered the drawing-room was Mrs. Simpson. On all occasions, indeed, this lady exerted herself to sustain the position of "the princ.i.p.al person in the village." She seldom gave an order for "the fly," which, weak as were its own springs, was, in truth, the main-spring of all the rural visitings; she seldom ordered this indispensable commodity without adding to her instructions, "Pray be punctual, Mr. Sims,--I say this for your sake as well as my own; for if the princ.i.p.al person in the village is made to wait, you may depend upon it an opposition will be started immediately, and in that case, you know, I should be obliged to give it my patronage." In like manner, the butcher and baker in the village, the ruddy-faced milkman out of it, the shoemaker, the dressmaker, the carpenter, the glazier, the dealer in small wares and all wares, were severally and collectively given to understand that Mrs. Simpson, as the princ.i.p.al person in the village, had a right to expect the first-fruits of their civility, attention, industry, and general stock-in-trade.

Her entrance into the presence of Mrs. Mowbray was as pregnant with sentiment and sympathy as the degree of intimacy to which she was admitted would permit. The hand-shaking was performed with a little pressure and a little sigh; every pause in the conversation was made to speak volumes by the sad tone in which the next sentence was spoken: in short, if the minds of Mrs. Mowbray, her eldest daughter, and her ward, who kindly volunteered to sustain this ordeal with her, had not been fully occupied by the recent event, almost every word, look, and gesture of the princ.i.p.al person of Wrexhill were calculated to recall it.

Mrs. Simpson was accompanied by her pretty little girl, flowered and furbelowed into as near a resemblance to a bantam chicken as it was possible for a pretty little girl to take.

The distance from the village to the Park was almost too great for so young a child to walk, and the poor little thing looked heated, cross, and weary; but her mamma declared that a ramble through those delicious fields was the greatest treat in the world. "I trust in Heaven," she continued, using her near-sighted eye-gla.s.s to look at a drawing which lay on the table, "that Mimima" (her abbreviation of Jemima) "will have my taste for sketching--I like to take her out with me, dear pet, she enjoys it so! but at this lovely season it is the most difficult thing in the world not to sketch as one goes. Indeed, when the mind is pre-occupied"--(a sigh)--"every object, however"--(a pause)--"I beg your pardon, but it is so difficult--"

"Come to me, Jemima," said Helen, holding out her hand, "and let me take your bonnet off."

The child put up her shoulder, and pressed with distressing closeness upon the delicate lilac of her mother's new silk dress.

"It is such a shy puss!" said Mrs. Simpson; "I often think what would become of her"--(a sigh). "I beg your pardon--but sad thoughts will press--"

"Little girl, do you love eau de Cologne?" said Rosalind, taking a bottle from the table and holding it towards her.

Either the look, the accent, or the action of Rosalind had attraction sufficient to draw the child towards her; when she good-humouredly relieved the glowing cheeks from the stifling enc.u.mbrance of a very close pink bonnet and thick green veil, and then copiously bedewed the pretty head with the fragrant and refreshing water.