The World Before Them Volume Iii Part 6

He laid his head upon the pillow beside his wife, and the tears streamed from his closed eyelids down his pale cheeks.

"Come, let us leave him," said Dorothy. "He will feel calmer soon. And here is dear Mr. Martin, who can better soothe him in his grief than we can. Oh, I am so glad you are come," she whispered to the good curate, as she followed the rest of the family from the room. "He is dreadfully afflicted. Poor old father, he loved her so much."

The four days that intervened between Mrs. Rushmere's death and the funeral were very trying to Dorothy. She had to receive so many visitors, and listen to so many unfeeling remarks and questions regarding her future position in the Rushmere family, put to her with the coa.r.s.e bluntness of uneducated people, who could not realize her grief for the loss of one who was not a blood relation. "Was she going," they asked, "to remain at the farm, or to take service elsewhere?" and they expressed great surprise that young Mrs. Rushmere had suffered her to remain there so long. Then, she was asked to give minute particulars regarding the terrible disease of which her foster-mother had died; of how she bore her sufferings, what doctor she employed, and what remedies had been applied? All this was trying enough to a sensitive mind; but they went further still, and utterly regardless of the wounds they were inflicting, demanded of the weeping girl, "If Mrs. Rushmere had left her anything, and who was to get her clothes?"

This important piece of information, was urged by no less a personage than Letty Barford, who in company with her mother-in-law and Miss Watling, called to look at the corpse.

"I think Mrs. Rushmere has done enough for her," said Miss Watling as they descended the stairs, "keeping her for so many years after all the trouble she has made in the family."

This was not said in Dorothy's hearing, but addressed to Mrs. Gilbert and her mother, to whom the party were offering their condolence.

"These interlopers are always a nuisance in families," said Mrs. Rowly.

"This Dorothy Chance is a good enough girl, but my daughter will be very glad to get rid of her. It does not do to have two mistresses in a house, and she has been used to have her own way in everything."

"It was but natural," suggested the elder Mrs. Barford. "She was more than a daughter to them, and it must have been trying to Dorothy to give up the place she had held for so many years, with such credit to herself, to strangers. I pity her with all my heart; when does she leave you Mrs. Gilbert?"

"As soon after the funeral as possible. It is only on the old man's account that I allowed her to remain here so long. She is the only creature in the house that can manage him, but it is high time that all this should be put a stop to."

"You are perfectly right, Mrs. Gilbert," cried Miss Watling. "I think you have shown great forbearance in tolerating the presence of such a dangerous person in the house so long. While she was kept in her place as servant of all work, it was all very well; but since the Earl has taken her under his especial patronage, there is no bounds to her a.s.sumption and insolence. Would you believe it, ladies, he is paying for her education, and is actually having her taught to play upon the piano."

"Strange, that we never heard a word of this before," cried both the ladies in a breath. "Is she his mistress?"

"That's the inference which most people have drawn from such strange conduct on his part," and Miss Watling shrugged her shoulders significantly.

"I don't believe a word of it," cried the elder Mrs. Barford. "I heard just now, that Dorothy was going to live with Mrs. Martin, and she is too good a woman to tolerate such doings in her house."

"It is an easy thing for a man of Lord Wilton's rank and wealth to bribe people to hold their tongues," sneered Miss Watling. "It is nothing to me what she is, I shall never give my countenance to a person of doubtful character, and one so every way my inferior. It is a good thing for you, Mrs. Gilbert, that it has pleased G.o.d to take the old woman, or this artful girl might make mischief between you and your husband."

"Oh ma'am, I have no fears on that head," replied Sophia tartly. "I am not afraid of such a mischance. I saw very little of Mrs. Rushmere, and considering the nature of her complaint, I think her death a happy release; and if the old man were to follow his wife, it would not break my heart--"

"Sophia, you should not speak your mind so freely," said her mother shaking her head. "But indeed, ladies, my daughter has been treated with so little respect by the whole family, that you must not wonder at her indifference at the death of a mother-in-law, who hardly said a civil thing to her since she came into the house. Of course it was the interest of this girl, Chance, to set the old folk against us, in the hope, which I have every reason to believe she entertained, that they would leave her all their personal property."

"Has the old woman left her a legacy?" demanded Letty, with breathless interest.

"Not a thing. Her sudden death prevented that. The old man wanted to give her all his wife's clothes and some of the fine linen, which he said belonged to Dorothy; but Sophia lifted up her voice against it, and the creature refused to accept the least thing, when she found that she could not get all."

"Just like such domestic sneaks," cried Miss Watling. "I am so glad she was disappointed. It will serve as a warning to others like her."

Shaking hands with Mrs. Gilbert in the most affectionate manner, and hoping that they would soon become excellent friends, Miss Watling and the two Barfords took their leave, all but the elder of the twain, delighted with Mrs. Rowly and her daughter, whom Miss Watling p.r.o.nounced, a very sweet, lady-like young person.

Until the morning appointed for the funeral, the poor old yeoman had confined himself entirely to his own room, beside the coffin which contained the mortal remains of his wife. On that morning, however, he rose early; washed his pale, haggard face, and shaved himself, and put on with unusual care, the mourning suit his son had provided for the melancholy occasion. Kissing with reverence the cold brow of his wife, he screwed down the lid of the coffin with his own hands, "that no one,"

he said, "should see her again, or rob him of that last look. It was now time for him to gird up his loins and act like a man."

Dorothy hearing him stirring, brought up his breakfast, for he had tasted nothing but bread and water for the last four days, and she knew that he must be weak and faint from his long fast. She found him standing behind the closed curtains of the window, looking mournfully into the court below. At the sound of the light well known footsteps, he turned to her and held out his hand. Dorothy threw her arms about his neck, and for some minutes they mingled their tears together. At length, rousing himself, Rushmere placed his large hand upon her bent head, and solemnly blessed her.

"Dolly," he said, "Dolly, my dear child, had I only known the woman that now fills the place in this house that you ought to have held, I would ha' seen my right hand struck from my body afore I would ha' refused my consent to your marriage with Gilbert. I ha' been punished, terribly punished for my folly and sin, ever since yon deceitful woman came into my house to lord it over me and mine. Night and day I hear Mary's voice, repeating to me over an' over again, the words she said to me on that sorrowful morn that Gilly first left his home, an' I turned you out friendless upon the pitiless world. You, who I ought to ha' protected to the last hour o' my life. 'Larry, as a man sows, so must he reap.'

Oh, my daughter, what sort o' a crop am I likely to reap with these women when you be gone?"

"They will be kinder to you, father, when I am away."

"Not a bit, not a bit. It is not in their natur, child. People cannot act agen natur. The only thing that reconciles me to my Mary's death, is, that she will not have to put up with their evil tempers, and that you, Dolly, will be removed from their malice."

"Dear father, don't vex your mind with antic.i.p.ating troubles; they always come soon enough without opening the door to call them in. Come with me into the next room and eat a bit of breakfast. You have been fasting too long, and look as weak as a child. I have cooked the steak with my own hands that you might have it nice."

"Ay, Dolly, you wor allers a first-rate hand at making good cheer. Yon Lunnon fine lady wu'd starve a body with her dirty ways."

"Don't think of her, father," said Dorothy, leading him by the hand like a child into the adjoining room, where she had a small table neatly spread, and his breakfast all ready. "You must do justice to my cooking.

It is the last meal your poor Dolly will ever cook for you in the old house."

"Oh, that it wor the last a' would ever want to eat," sighed Rushmere, wiping his eyes, and consenting to partake of the meal so temptingly spread before him.

After moving the dishes, Dorothy entreated him to go down stairs, and take a turn in the open air, to revive him after his confinement in the close atmosphere of the death-chamber. But this the old man could not be persuaded to do.

"I wu'd not ha' minded, Dorothy, had the day been wet." And he looked sadly toward the window, where the gay sunbeams were glancing through the closed white drapery, "but such a fine morn as this, wi' the birds singing gaily, as if they never knew sorrow or care, an' the blessed beams o' the young sun laughing in the glistening drops o' dew, an' all things o' G.o.d's making, but man, looking so bright and cheery, just maddens me wi' grief, to think that my Mary will never look upon this beautiful world again. It doth seem grievous to the wounded heart, that natur is allers happy; an' to-day I can't stand the smile on her gladsome face; it wu'd comfort me to see it covered up in storm and cloud. You know the old saying, Dolly, 'Happy is the corpse that the rain rains on.'"

If there was any truth in the old rhyme, Lawrence Rushmere's wish was gratified. The beautiful morning rapidly clouded over, and just as the funeral procession left the house, the storm burst over the melancholy train in awful thunder-claps, accompanied by floods of rain. Every one was drenched and looked uncomfortable, but the chief mourner. He held up his sad, pale face to the pitiless shower, as if its desolating progress was in unison with his own sad heart; nor did the tempest abate its fury until the sods were piled upon the narrow bed which separated him from the love of his youth.

CHAPTER V.

THE FALSE ACCUSATION.

Dorothy was not sorry to leave the old homestead. All the old a.s.sociations that had endeared it to her, and surrounded its gloomy walls with an atmosphere of love, were broken up or changed so completely, that she could no longer recognize them. Even the joyous bark of old Pincher, rushing forth to greet her, on her return from church or market, had been silenced, oh, how cruelly. She could not bear to recall the treachery that had robbed her of an humble, faithful friend.

"I cannot recognize the presence of G.o.d in this place, as I once did,"

she thought, "where every word spoken to me is a provocative to evil, to do as they do, not to do as I would be done by. I have daily prayed to be delivered from evil, and kept from temptation, and have too often yielded to the snares laid to entrap my soul. It is hard to dwell with the scorner, and escape free from contamination."

She was just cording her trunk, ready for its removal to the parsonage, when Mrs. Gilbert suddenly entered the attic.

"I wish to look into that trunk before you take it away."

"May I ask why, Mrs. Gilbert Rushmere?"

"To see that you have taken nothing but what belongs to you."

"Certainly, if you are mean enough to suspect me of such baseness," and the hot blood rushed into Dorothy's cheeks, and her dark eyes flashed with a bright light, that made the cold flaxen haired woman recoil before them. "But hold," she cried (as Mrs. Gilbert laid her hand on the trunk,) "I shall not give you the key, except in the presence of competent witnesses, lest the heart that conceived such an insult should belie me also."

Springing down stairs, and scarcely feeling them beneath her feet, she encountered Gilbert in the hall.

"Come with me upstairs, Mr. Gilbert."

"Dorothy, what ails you? Why are you so dreadfully excited? Have you seen anything?" He had heard of her encounter with the supernatural on the heath, and for a moment was possessed with the idea that she had seen the apparition of his mother.

"It is no risen angel," cried the excited girl, "but a human fiend! I want you to see. Follow me, Gilbert, if you ever loved me, and vindicate my honour."