The World Before Them Volume I Part 22

"My poor girl, I will make inquiries respecting him, and let you know. I am just writing to my son. G.o.d knows if he be still alive. I can only hope and trust in his mercy. My mind, Dorothy, is just now overwhelmed by the same horrible anxiety which you find so hard to bear. This cruel suspense, this hope, which keeps alive despair, is the most painful of human maladies."

He walked several times through the s.p.a.cious apartment in deep thought, then suddenly returning to the side of the weeping girl, he took her hand and pressed it warmly between his own.

"Dry your tears, Dorothy; you have deeply interested me in your sad history. You shall never want a friend while I live. If Gilbert Rushmere returns, and money be the only obstacle that separates you, tell Mr.

Rushmere that I will give you a wedding portion that shall more than satisfy him."

"My lord, I would rather you would not," said Dorothy, in a tone of alarm, withdrawing her hand, and looking as proud as the lady whose portrait she so strongly resembled. "If I am not worthy to be his daughter, penniless as I am, money could never purchase the love and respect I crave, and which could alone make me happy."

"Bravo! my little heroine," cried Lord Wilton, the kindling cheeks and flashing eyes of Dorothy filling him with surprise and admiration. "Your n.o.bility exceeds mine; I am only n.o.ble by birth, but your lofty spirit springs from a greatness of mind inherent in your nature."

"My lord!" said Dorothy, "you speak too highly of that which I only consider my duty. I feel most grateful to you for your kindness, for your generous sympathy in my sorrow, but I cannot accept your bounty.

And now I will leave you, and carry your gracious promise about Gilbert, to his parents, which will dry their tears and make them very glad."

With a low reverence, the country girl glided from the room.

Lord Wilton remained standing by the table where she left him; his arms folded, his eyes bent upon the ground, lost in profound thought. An expression of intense mental suffering pa.s.sed over his face; he clasped his hands tightly together and spoke unconsciously aloud.

"At last the long search is over. The hope deferred--the agony of doubt and fear has culminated in the grave. Death--and such a death! Oh, my G.o.d! I see--I feel it all. Dest.i.tute--forsaken--alone. Her sole attendants, starvation and despair--perhaps crime. Who can tell the straits to which misery may have reduced its unfortunate victim. To die amidst storm and darkness with a helpless little one clasped to the fond heart growing cold and unconscious, in the chill embrace of the destroyer. Alice, my beloved, my lost darling, such then was your fate. * * *

"Were your last thoughts with me in that desolate hour? Did you forgive me, for the sorrow and suffering which my selfish love had drawn down upon that innocent head. If you can read my heart, pity me, oh pity me, for I am desolate and in misery! Never, never can we meet again. Never can I now make atonement for the wrongs I inflicted. Never hope for peace or happiness again. The past irrevocable--the future a blank.

Remorse may punish--it cannot restore. The vain regrets--the unsatisfied cravings of the tortured heart, have made earth a h.e.l.l for the last twenty years, and vengeance is now complete. Oh, my G.o.d, have mercy upon me! I cry to Thee in the stilly night. I stretch my hands out to Thee in the darkness, but no answer of peace comes to my agonized prayers."

He bowed his head upon his trembling hands. The storm of conscience swept on--all its waves went surging over his soul, and broke forth in stifled moans, wrung from the depths of the bruised and tortured heart.

At length he grew calmer, and began to reason on the facts of the case.

"I may be mistaken. What proof have I that the nameless vagrant was my lost love? A lock of sunny hair--a ring--the likeness of her child to me and mine. The cold unfeeling men of the world would laugh such evidence to scorn."

He glanced up at his mother's picture, and his thoughts took a new turn.

"Yes, that lovely girl is her child. Did not my heart burn within me, while she was talking with me? Did I not long to clasp her in my arms and claim her as my own--the all that is left me of my beloved?

"I will restrain my feelings. I will not take her from her happy obscurity--separate her from the man she loves. The secret which her mother kept so bravely for my sake, which she carried down with her to the grave, shall rest there. I will keep down my swelling heart--will chain my lips in eternal silence, and prove my love for her by self-abnegation."

A low rap at the door was several times repeated before it was noticed by Lord Wilton.

"My lord," said Mrs. Brand, presenting herself before him, with her usual deep reverence, "Mrs. Martin is below, and wishes to speak with you." Struck with the unusual paleness of her master's face, and its melancholy expression, she said, with maternal anxiety.

"My lord, you are ill. You must not give way about Lord Fitzmorris. His wounds may not be so dangerous as they are represented. Newspapers do not always tell the truth."

"Mrs. Brand, he is my only son," returned the n.o.bleman, not sorry to find his grief attributed to a legitimate cause. "The uncertainty respecting him depresses me greatly. If I knew the worst, I could bear it like a man. Show Mrs. Martin up. I can speak to her now."

Mrs. Martin was a thin delicate looking woman, very pale, and very care-worn, with an expression of patient endurance in her face, painful to behold. She was no worshipper of rank or wealth, though a perfect lady in her appearance and manners. Experience had taught her that money was an imperative want, by no means to be despised; that without an adequate supply the necessaries of life could not be procured. That love in a cottage was a pleasant dream. The waking reality by no means so agreeable.

"My lord," she said, addressing him with great candour and firmness, "I have given your proposal the most careful consideration, and willing as I am to oblige you, and to discharge a Christian duty, I find that I cannot conscientiously undertake the management of your school. I have six children. The eldest a boy of nine years old, the youngest a baby of only three months."

Her pale cheeks flushed.

"We are too poor, my lord, to keep a servant. I take care of my own children, and do the work of the house. Henry is too young to be entrusted with the charge of so many little ones during my absence at school, and my mind would be so full of anxiety about them, that I could not attend to my scholars as I could wish. I hope you will take these unfortunate circ.u.mstances as a sufficient apology for my declining the situation."

"We are all called upon to make sacrifices for the good of our fellow-creatures, Mrs. Martin, but we must not do so at the expense of more sacred duties. I should be sorry to lay upon you, my dear madam, a burthen greater than the one you have already to bear. Now listen to what I have to propose, and I think we can arrange the matter to our mutual satisfaction. Mr. Conyers, the vicar, allows your husband eighty pounds a year for his ministerial services. A small remuneration for a well-educated man, and a good preacher, who has to support a large family and pay rent for the cottage in which he resides.

"The vicar draws from the parish an income of fifteen hundred per annum, and could afford to give more. I now propose to allow you one hundred a year for taking charge of my school. Will you accept my terms, and by so doing confer upon me a great obligation?"

Mrs. Martin burst into tears. "Oh, my lord, it would make our desert blossom as the rose, and give the poor children bread and meat, where they now only get a scanty supply of bread and milk. In our daily prayers, we shall not forget to ask our Heavenly Father to bless you for your munificence."

"I am not quite so disinterested and benevolent as you think me,"

returned the lord of the manor, deeply moved by her tears, for Mrs.

Martin was the last person in the world from whom he would have expected such a display of feeling.

"This school is a pet scheme of mine. I do not like to be disappointed.

The miserable ignorance of the peasantry is a disgrace to the landed gentry, and loudly calls for reform. I want to lend a hand in washing out this foul national blot, and the co-operation of the clergy and their wives must be obtained, to do this in a proper Christian spirit.

Their example will provoke to emulation the wives and daughters of the wealthy yeomanry; and after a few weeks you will find that we shall have plenty of pupils and teachers to a.s.sist in the good work."

Lord Wilton spoke with enthusiasm, for the subject was very near his heart. Mrs. Martin who knew the poorer cla.s.ses better than he did, and their decided aversion to book learning, looked rather incredulous. This was not the only difficulty to be overcome. The prejudice that existed in the minds of the agricultural employers to their servants being taught, was yet stronger than the indifference and apathy manifested by the poor people themselves.

"My lord, you have a harder battle to fight than you imagine. The farmers prefer human machines to work for them, to rational thinking men and women. They tell me it is none of your business to instruct the poor. G.o.d made them so, and it is better for you to leave them as you find them. They don't want their servants to know as much as they do themselves."

"They prefer slaves to freemen," suggested Lord Wilton. "It is strange how deeply that accursed system is implanted in the human heart. We need not go to the West Indies, or to the slave states of America, to see how it degrades the mind, and reduces man to the level of the brute. I hope the day is not far distant when both countries will abolish for ever this disgraceful traffic."

"It will not be in our day," said Mrs. Martin, who, in spite of her many cares, possessed a considerable degree of humour, "without we should attain to the age of Methuselah."

"G.o.d forbid. I do not covet length of days," returned Lord Wilton, "but I do hope to see that accomplished in my day, and during this generation. But I am rambling from the school altogether. It may be necessary for you to have an a.s.sistant to help you, and take charge of the younger cla.s.ses. There was a nice amiable young girl here a few minutes ago, to inquire of me if I could tell whether young Rushmere had been killed in the battle of Corunna. Could you not press her into the service? She called herself Dorothy Chance. Do you know her?"

"Everybody in the parish knows Dorothy Chance, my lord. She is rather a remarkable person. Did you ever hear how she got her odd name?"

"Yes, yes," cried his lordship impatiently, dreading a repet.i.tion of what had occasioned him such intense pain. "It is not of that sad story, but of the girl's capabilities as a teacher, I want to speak. Can she read and write?"

"Indifferently."

"My dear Mrs. Martin," he now spoke with great earnestness, "will you increase my obligations to you, by giving this young girl, this Dorothy Chance, an hour's instruction daily in the usual branches of English education. She is very intelligent, and will make an excellent a.s.sistant, if properly trained for the work."

"I respect Dorothy, and will do so with the greatest pleasure. When shall her schooling commence?"

"Directly you can make the necessary arrangements. You shall not be the loser, Mrs. Martin, by the attention you may pay to this poor orphan girl. I cannot think of her strange history without emotion."

"Lord Wilton is an angel of goodness," thought Mrs. Martin, "the most benevolent of men. It is seldom we meet with such in this hard world.

Dorothy Chance has lived in the parish from a baby, but who among her neighbours ever thought of doing her a real service, uninfluenced by interested motives?"

Lord Wilton had made two people supremely happy that morning. Dorothy had left his presence grateful for the kind sympathy he had expressed in her welfare, and confident that he would perform his promise in reference to Gilbert Rushmere; and Mrs. Martin felt the heavy load of poverty, that was crushing her to the earth, suddenly removed. Visions of peace and plenty, of warm clothing and sufficient food for her family, cheered and elevated her heart. When once alone in the park, she returned thanks to the Almighty for his goodness.

"It is not in man," she cried, "to do acts of kindness and generosity like this. It is of G.o.d, from whom all goodness, directly, or indirectly, flows, who has influenced the mind of this n.o.ble gentleman to help us in our present distress."

The school project that had filled her with such dismay, now appeared in the light of a blessing. She was glad that Dorothy had been selected for her a.s.sistant. She knew the kindly disposition of the girl, who had often left a roll of nice fresh b.u.t.ter, or a cream cheese, at her humble dwelling, as a small token of her respect; and she had often wished she had the power to show her some small favour in return, for her offerings of love.

At the park gates she overtook Dorothy, who had sauntered leisurely homewards, recalling to memory every word that had pa.s.sed between her and Lord Wilton. Marvelling at the grandeur of the Hall, and still more at the gracious reception he had given her--

"Mrs. Martin," she said, when that lady joined her, "is not Lord Wilton a kind good man? I feel as if I could love him with my whole heart. I felt so afraid of him before I saw him--and he treated me as politely as if I had been a lady. How can people call him proud and cold? I shall never think of him without coupling his name with a blessing."

"He deserves it, Dorothy. He has made me very happy. He has promised to give me a hundred a year for superintending his school. A hundred a year--think of that. It appears quite a fabulous sum to me. It will double our income. And do you know, Dorothy, he wants you to be my a.s.sistant?"