The Widow Barnaby Volume Iii Part 10

"My dear, dear aunt!" said Agnes, most unfeignedly distressed, "there can be no occasion at this moment to talk of your doing what, in my poor judgment, would be so very wrong.... Should I be so happy as to make Colonel Hubert known to you, I would trust to him to discuss such subjects.... Oh! what delight, aunt Betsy, for you to have such a man for your friend!... and all owing to me!"

There was something so ingenuous, so young, so unquestionably sincere in this burst of feeling, that the old lady was greatly touched by it. "You are a sweet creature, Agnes," she replied, "and quite right in telling me not to discuss any matters of business with you.... I shall touch on no such subjects again, for I see they are totally beyond your comprehension. Nevertheless, I must have my way about not introducing myself to Colonel Hubert's family, or himself either, in lodgings. Write to your kind friends, my dear; tell them that your old aunt Compton has left her retirement to take care of you, and tell them also that she feels as she ought to do.... But, no; you write your own feelings, and I will write mine.... But this must be to-morrow, Agnes; ... it is past twelve o'clock, love. See! that gay thing on the chimney-piece attests it.... I must shew you to your room, my guest; hereafter I shall be yours, perhaps."

Peggy being summoned, the two ladies were lighted to the rooms above....

These were in a style of great comfort, and even elegance; but one being somewhat larger than the other, and furnished with a dressing-room, it was in this that Agnes found her trunk and book-box; and it was here that, after seeing that her fire burned brightly, and that Peggy was standing ready to a.s.sist in undressing her, the happy Miss Compton embraced, blessed, and left her to repose.

It was a long time, however, before Agnes would believe that anything like sleep could visit her eyes that night. What a change, what an almost incredible transition, had she pa.s.sed through since her last sleep! It was more like the operation of a magician's wand than the consequence of human events. From being a reprobated outcast, banished from the roof that sheltered her, she had become the sole object of love and care to one who seemed to have it in her power to make life a paradise to her. How many blissful visions floated through her brain before all blended together in one general consciousness of happy security, that at last lulled her to delicious sleep! She was hardly less sensible than her somewhat proud aunt of the pleasure which a reunion with her Cheltenham friends, under circ.u.mstances, so changed, would bring; and her dreams were of receiving Lady Elizabeth Norris and her niece in a beautiful palace on the sh.o.r.es of a lovely lake, while Colonel Hubert stood smiling by to watch the meeting.

CHAPTER VIII.

AGNES APPEARS LIKELY TO PROFIT BY THE CHANGE OF AUNTS.

The first waking under the consciousness of new, and not yet familiar happiness, is perhaps one of the most delightful sensations of which we are susceptible. Agnes had closed her eyes late, and it was late when she opened them, for Peggy had already drawn her window curtains; and the gay hangings and large looking-gla.s.ses of the apartment met her eyes at the first glance with such brilliant effect, that she fancied for an instant she must still be dreaming. But by degrees all the delightful truth returned upon her mind. Where was the blank, cold isolation of the heart, with which her days were used to rise and set? Where were the terrors amidst which she lived, lest her protectress should expose herself by some monstrous, new absurdity? Where was the hopeless future, before which she had so often wept and trembled? Was it possible that she was the same Agnes Willoughby who had awoke with such an aching heart, but four-and-twenty hours ago?... All these questions were asked, and gaily answered, before she had resolution to spring from her bed, and change her delightful speculations for a more delightful reality.

Notwithstanding the various fatigues of the preceding day, Miss Compton was not only in the drawing-room, but her letter to Lady Elizabeth Norris was already written on the third side of a sheet of letter paper, thus giving Agnes an opportunity of explaining everything before her own lines should meet her ladyship's eye.

The meal which has been slandered as "lazy, lounging, and most unsocial," was far otherwise on the present occasion. The aunt and niece sat down together, each regaling the eyes of the other with a countenance speaking the most heart-felt happiness; and while the old lady indulged herself with sketching plans for the future, the young one listened as if her voice were that of fate, declaring that she should never taste of sorrow more.

"The carriage will be here at twelve, Agnes," said Miss Compton, to "take us into what our books tell us is called THE CITY, as if it were the city of cities, and about which I suppose you and I are equally ignorant, seeing that you never did take that pleasant little walk the dowager Mrs. Barnaby so considerately sketched out for you. So now we shall look at it together. But don't fancy, my dear, that any such idle project as looking at its wonders is what takes me there now.... I have got a broker, Agnes, as well as the widow, and it is quite as necessary to my proceedings as to hers that I should see him. But we must not go till our partnership letter is ready for the post. Here is my share of it Agnes ... read it to me, and if it meets your approbation, sit down and let your own precede it."

The lines written by Miss Compton were as follow:--

"MADAM,

"Permit a stranger, closely connected by the ties of blood to Agnes Willoughby, to return her grateful thanks for kindness extended to her at a moment when she greatly needed it. That she should so have needed it, will ever be a cause of self-reproach to me; nor will it avail me much either in my own opinion, or in that of others, that the same qualities in our common kinswoman, Mrs. Barnaby, which produced the distress of Agnes, produced in me the aversion which kept me too distant to perceive their effects on her respectability and happiness.

"I am, Madam,

"Your grateful and obedient servant,

"ELIZABETH COMPTON."

Agnes wrote:--

"MY KIND AND GENEROUS FRIENDS!

"Lady Elizabeth!... Lady Stephenson! I write to you, as I never dared hope to do, from under the eye and the protection of my dear aunt Compton. It is to her I owe all the education I ever received, and, I might add, all the happiness too, ... for I have never known any happy home but that which her liberal kindness procured for me during five years spent in the family of my beloved instructress Mrs. Wilmot. For the seven months that have elapsed since I quitted Mrs. Wilmot, my situation, as you, my kind friends, know but too well, has been one of very doubtful respectability, but very certain misery. My aunt Compton blames herself for this, but you, if I should ever be so happy as to make you know my aunt Compton, will blame me.

Her former kindness ought to have given me courage to address her before, even though circ.u.mstances had placed me so entirely in the hands of Mrs. Barnaby as to make the separation between us fearfully wide. But, thank G.o.d! all this unhappiness is now over. I _did_ apply to her at last, and the result has been the converting me from a very hopeless, friendless, and miserable girl (as I was when you first saw me) into one of the very happiest persons in the whole world. I have pa.s.sed through some scenes, from the remembrance of which I shall always shrink with pain; but there have been others ... there have been points in my little history, which have left an impression a thousand times deeper, and dearer too, than could ever have been produced on any heart unsoftened by calamity. And must it not ever be accounted among my best sources of happiness, that the regard which can never cease to be the most precious, as well as the proudest boast of my life, was expressed under circ.u.mstances which to most persons would have appeared so strongly against me?

"My generous friends!... May I hope that the affection shewn to me in sorrow will not be withdrawn now that sorrow is past?...

May I hope that we shall meet again, and that I may have the great happiness of making my dear aunt known to you? She is all kindness, and would take me to Cheltenham, that I might thank you in person for the aid so generously offered in my hour of need, but I fear poor Mrs. Barnaby's adventures will for some time be too freshly remembered there for me to wish to revisit it...."

When Agnes had written thus far, she stopped. "Where shall I tell them, aunt Betsy, that we are going to remain?" she said.... "If ... if Colonel Hubert" ... and she stopped again.

"If Colonel Hubert ... and what then, Agnes?"

"Why, if Colonel Hubert _were_ to pay us a visit, aunt Betsy, I cannot help thinking that he would understand me better now, than when I was so dreadfully overpowered by the feeling of my desolate condition.... Don't you think so?"

"I think it very probable he might, my dear; ... and as to your sensible question, Agnes, of where we are going to be, I think you must decide it yourself. We have both declared against Cheltenham, and for reasons good.... Where then should you best like to go?"

"To Clifton, aunt Betsy!... It was there I saw him first, and there, too, I was most kindly treated by friends who, I believe, pitied me because ... because I did not seem happy, I suppose.... Oh! I would rather go to Clifton than any place in the world ... excepting Empton."

"And to Empton we cannot go just at present, Agnes ... it would be too much like running out of the world again, which I have no wish at all to do. To Clifton, therefore, we will go, dear child, and so you may tell your good friends."

Agnes gave no other answer than walking round the table and imprinting a kiss upon the forehead of her happy aunt.... Then resuming her writing, she thus concluded her letter:--

"My aunt Compton, as soon as she has concluded some business which she has to settle in London, will go to Clifton, where, I believe, we shall stay for some months; and should any of your family happen again to be there, I may perhaps be happy enough to see them. With grat.i.tude to all, I remain ever your attached and devoted

"AGNES WILLOUGHBY."

Poor Agnes!... She was terribly dissatisfied with her letter when she had written it. Not all her generalizations could suffice to tell him, THE him, the only mortal him she remembered in the world,--not all her innocent little devices to make it understood that _he_ was included in all her grat.i.tude and love, as well as in her invitation to Clifton,--made it at all clear that she wanted Colonel Hubert to come and offer to her again.

Yet what could she say more?... She sat with her eye fixed on the paper, and a face full of meaning, though what that meaning was, it might not be very easy to decide.

"What is my girl thinking of?" said Miss Compton.

"I am thinking," replied Agnes, and she shook her head, "I am thinking that Colonel Hubert will never understand from this letter, aunt Betsy, how very much I want to see him again."

"That is very true, my dear."

"Is there anything else I could say to make him know how greatly he mistook me when he fancied I said NO from my want of love?"

"Oh yes! my dear, certainly."

"Tell me then, my dear, dear, aunt!... I feel as if I had no power to find a word.... Tell me what I shall say to him."

"You may say many things ... for instance, ... you may say, Tell my beloved Colonel Hubert...."

"Oh! aunt Betsy!... aunt Betsy! you are laughing at me," cried Agnes, looking at her very gravely, and with an air of melancholy reproach.

"So I am, my dear: an old spinster of three score is but a poor confidant in matters of this sort.... But if you seriously ask for my advice, I will give it, such as it is. Let our letter go just as it is, without any addition or alteration whatever. If Colonel Hubert sees this letter, as you seem to expect, and if he loves you as you deserve to be loved, he will find food enough for hope therein to carry him further than from one end of Gloucestershire to the other.... If he does _not_ see it, put what you will in it, he would learn nothing thereby.... But if, seeing it, he determines to sit quietly down under your refusal ...

then let him; I, for one, should feel no wish to become better acquainted with the gentleman."

Agnes said no more, but folded the letter, and directed it to Lady Elizabeth Norris, Cheltenham.

"Now, aunt, I have folded up Colonel Hubert, and put him out of sight till he shall choose to bring himself forward again.... I will tease you no more about him.... Shall I put my bonnet on?... The carriage has been waiting for some time."

"My darling Agnes!..." said the old lady, looking fondly at her, "how little I deserve to find you so exactly what I wished you should be!...

You are right; we will talk no more of this Colonel Hubert till he has himself declared what part he means to play in the drama before us. We shall be at no loss for subjects.... Remember how much we have to settle between us!... our establishment, our equipage, our wardrobes, all to be decided upon, modelled, and provided. Get ready, dearest; the sooner we get through our business, the earlier we shall be at Clifton; ... and who knows which part of our _dramatis personae_ may arrive there first?"

A happy smile dimpled the cheek of Agnes as she ran out of the room to equip herself, and in a few minutes the two ladies were _en route_ towards the city.

"What makes you wear such very deep mourning, my dear?" said Miss Compton, fixing her eyes on the perennial black c.r.a.pe bonnet of her companion. "Is it all for the worthy apothecary of Silverton?... But that can't be either, for now I think of it, his charming widow had half the colours of the rainbow about her.... What does it mean, Agnes?"

Agnes looked out of the window to conceal a smile, but recovering her composure answered,... "I have never been out of mourning, aunt, since Mr. Barnaby died.... There was a great deal of black not worn out, ...