Wives and Daughters Part 66

"If I'm not to be father in this matter, thou sha'n't be son. Go against me in what I've set my heart on, and you'll find there's the devil to pay, that's all. But don't let us get angry, it's Sunday afternoon for one thing, and it's a sin; and besides that, I've not finished my story."

For Osborne had taken up his book again, and under pretence of reading, was fuming to himself. He hardly put it away even at his father's request.

"As I was saying, Gibson said, when first we spoke about it, that there was nothing on foot between any of you four, and that if there was, he would let me know; so by-and-by he comes and tells me of this."

"Of what--I don't understand how far it has gone?"

There was a tone in Osborne's voice the Squire did not quite like; and he began answering rather angrily.

"Of this, to be sure--of what I'm telling you--of Roger going and making love to this girl, that day he left, after he had gone away from here, and was waiting for the 'Umpire' in Hollingford. One would think you quite stupid at times, Osborne."

"I can only say that these details are quite new to me; you never mentioned them before, I a.s.sure you."

"Well; never mind whether I did or not. I'm sure I said Roger was attached to Miss Kirkpatrick, and be hanged to her; and you might have understood all the rest as a matter of course."

"Possibly," said Osborne, politely. "May I ask if Miss Kirkpatrick, who appeared to me to be a very nice girl, responds to Roger's affection?"

"Fast enough, I'll be bound," said the Squire, sulkily. "A Hamley of Hamley isn't to be had every day. Now, I'll tell you what, Osborne, you're the only marriageable one left in the market, and I want to hoist the old family up again. Don't go against me in this; it really will break my heart if you do."

"Father, don't talk so," said Osborne. "I'll do anything I can to oblige you, except--"

"Except the only thing I've set my heart on your doing."

"Well, well, let it alone for the present. There's no question of my marrying just at this moment. I'm out of health, and I'm not up to going into society, and meeting young ladies and all that sort of thing, even if I had an opening into fitting society."

"You should have an opening fast enough. There'll be more money coming in, in a year or two, please G.o.d. And as for your health, why, what's to make you well, if you cower over the fire all day, and shudder away from a good honest tankard as if it were poison?"

"So it is to me," said Osborne, languidly, playing with his book as if he wanted to end the conversation and take it up again. The Squire saw the movements, and understood them.

"Well," said he, "I'll go and have a talk with Will about poor old Black Bess. It's Sunday work enough, asking after a dumb animal's aches and pains."

But after his father had left the room Osborne did not take up his book again. He laid it down on the table by him, leant back in his chair, and covered his eyes with his hand. He was in a state of health which made him despondent about many things, though, least of all, about what was most in danger. The long concealment of his marriage from his father made the disclosure of it far, far more difficult than it would have been at first. Unsupported by Roger, how could he explain it all to one so pa.s.sionate as the Squire? how tell of the temptation, the stolen marriage, the consequent happiness, and alas! the consequent suffering?--for Osborne had suffered, and did suffer, greatly in the untoward circ.u.mstances in which he had placed himself. He saw no way out of it all, excepting by the one strong stroke of which he felt himself incapable. So with a heavy heart he addressed himself to his book again. Everything seemed to come in his way, and he was not strong enough in character to overcome obstacles.

The only overt step he took in consequence of what he had heard from his father, was to ride over to Hollingford the first fine day after he had received the news, and go to see Cynthia and the Gibsons. He had not been there for a long time; bad weather and languor combined had prevented him. He found them full of preparations and discussions about Cynthia's visit to London; and she herself not at all in the sentimental mood proper to respond to his delicate intimations of how glad he was in his brother's joy. Indeed, it was so long after the time, that Cynthia scarcely perceived that to him the intelligence was recent, and that the first bloom of his emotions had not yet pa.s.sed away. With her head a little on one side, she was contemplating the effect of a knot of ribbons, when he began, in a low whisper, and leaning forward towards her as he spoke,--"Cynthia--I may call you Cynthia now, mayn't I?--I'm so glad of this news; I've only just heard of it, but I'm so glad!"

"What news do you mean?" She had her suspicions; but she was annoyed to think that from one person her secret was pa.s.sing to another and another, till, in fact, it was becoming no secret at all. Still, Cynthia could always conceal her annoyance when she chose. "Why are you to begin calling me Cynthia now?" she went on, smiling. "The terrible word has slipped out from between your lips before, do you know?"

This light way of taking his tender congratulation did not quite please Osborne, who was in a sentimental mood, and for a minute or so he remained silent. Then, having finished making her bow of ribbon, she turned to him, and continued in a quick low voice, anxious to take advantage of a conversation between her mother and Molly,--

"I think I can guess why you made that pretty little speech just now. But do you know you ought not to have been told? And, moreover, things are not quite arrived at the solemnity of--of--well--an engagement. He would not have it so. Now, I sha'n't say any more; and you must not. Pray remember you ought not to have known; it is my own secret, and I particularly wished it not to be spoken about; and I don't like its being so talked about. Oh, the leaking of water through one small hole!"

And then she plunged into the talk of the other two, making the conversation general. Osborne was rather discomfited at the non-success of his congratulations; he had pictured to himself the unbosoming of a love-sick girl, full of rapture, and glad of a sympathizing confidant. He little knew Cynthia's nature. The more she suspected that she was called upon for a display of emotion, the less would she show; and her emotions were generally under the control of her will. He had made an effort to come and see her; and now he leant back in his chair, weary and a little dispirited.

"You poor dear young man," said Mrs. Gibson, coming up to him with her soft, soothing manner; "how tired you look! Do take some of that eau-de-Cologne and bathe your forehead. This spring weather overcomes me too. 'Primavera' I think the Italians call it. But it is very trying for delicate const.i.tutions, as much from its a.s.sociations as from its variableness of temperature. It makes me sigh perpetually; but then I am so sensitive. Dear Lady c.u.mnor always used to say I was like a thermometer. You've heard how ill she has been?"

"No," said Osborne, not very much caring either.

"Oh, yes, she is better now; but the anxiety about her has tried me so: detained here by what are, of course, my duties, but far away from all intelligence, and not knowing what the next post might bring."

"Where was she then?" asked Osborne, becoming a little more sympathetic.

"At Spa. Such a distance off! Three days' post! Can't you conceive the trial? Living with her as I did for years; bound up in the family as I was."

"But Lady Harriet said, in her last letter, that they hoped she would be stronger than she had been for years," said Molly, innocently.

"Yes--Lady Harriet--of course--every one who knows Lady Harriet knows that she is of too sanguine a temperament for her statements to be perfectly relied on. Altogether--strangers are often deluded by Lady Harriet--she has an off-hand manner which takes them in; but she does not mean half she says."

"We will hope she does in this instance," said Cynthia, shortly.

"They're in London now, and Lady c.u.mnor hasn't suffered from the journey."

"They say so," said Mrs. Gibson, shaking her head, and laying an emphasis on the word "say." "I am perhaps over-anxious, but I wish--I wish I could see and judge for myself. It would be the only way of calming my anxiety. I almost think I shall go up with you, Cynthia, for a day or two, just to see her with my own eyes. I don't quite like your travelling alone either. We will think about it, and you shall write to Mr. Kirkpatrick, and propose it, if we determine upon it. You can tell him of my anxiety; and it will be only sharing your bed for a couple of nights."

CHAPTER XL.

MOLLY GIBSON BREATHES FREELY.

That was the way in which Mrs. Gibson first broached her intention of accompanying Cynthia up to London for a few days' visit. She had a trick of producing the first sketch of any new plan before an outsider to the family circle; so that the first emotions of others, if they disapproved of her projects, had to be repressed, until the idea had become familiar to them. To Molly it seemed too charming a proposal ever to come to pa.s.s. She had never allowed herself to recognize the restraint she was under in her stepmother's presence; but all at once she found it out when her heart danced at the idea of three whole days--for that it would be at the least--of perfect freedom of intercourse with her father; of old times come back again; of meals without perpetual fidgetiness after details of ceremony and correctness of attendance.

"We'll have bread-and-cheese for dinner, and eat it on our knees; we'll make up for having had to eat sloppy puddings with a fork instead of a spoon all this time, by putting our knives in our mouths till we cut ourselves. Papa shall pour his tea into his saucer if he's in a hurry; and if I'm thirsty, I'll take the slop-basin. And oh, if I could but get, buy, borrow, or steal any kind of an old horse; my grey skirt isn't new, but it will do;--that would be too delightful! After all, I think I can be happy again; for months and months it has seemed as if I had got too old ever to feel pleasure, much less happiness again."

So thought Molly. Yet she blushed, as if with guilt, when Cynthia, reading her thoughts, said to her one day,--

"Molly, you're very glad to get rid of us, are not you?"

"Not of you, Cynthia; at least, I don't think I am. Only, if you but knew how I love papa, and how I used to see a great deal more of him than I ever do now--"

"Ah! I often think what interlopers we must seem, and are in fact--"

"I don't feel you as such. You, at any rate, have been a new delight to me--a sister; and I never knew how charming such a relationship could be."

"But mamma?" said Cynthia, half-suspiciously, half-sorrowfully.

"She is papa's wife," said Molly, quietly. "I don't mean to say I'm not often very sorry to feel I'm no longer first with him; but it was"--the violent colour flushed into her face till even her eyes burnt, and she suddenly found herself on the point of crying; the weeping ash-tree, the misery, the slow dropping comfort, and the comforter came all so vividly before her--"it was Roger!"--she went on looking up at Cynthia, as she overcame her slight hesitation at mentioning his name--"Roger, who told me how I ought to take papa's marriage, when I was first startled and grieved at the news. Oh, Cynthia, what a great thing it is to be loved by him!"

Cynthia blushed, and looked fluttered and pleased.

"Yes, I suppose it is. At the same time, Molly, I'm afraid he'll expect me to be always as good as he fancies me now, and I shall have to walk on tiptoe all the rest of my life."

"But you are good, Cynthia," put in Molly.

"No, I'm not. You're just as much mistaken as he is; and some day I shall go down in your opinions with a run, just like the hall clock the other day when the spring broke."

"I think he'll love you just as much," said Molly.

"Could you? Would you be my friend if--if it turned out ever that I had done very wrong things? Would you remember how very difficult it has sometimes been to me to act rightly?" (she took hold of Molly's hand as she spoke). "We won't speak of mamma, for your sake as much as mine or hers; but you must see she isn't one to help a girl with much good advice, or good-- Oh, Molly, you don't know how I was neglected just at a time when I wanted friends most. Mamma does not know it; it is not in her to know what I might have been if I had only fallen into wise, good hands. But I know it; and what's more,"

continued she, suddenly ashamed of her unusual exhibition of feeling, "I try not to care, which I daresay is really the worst of all; but I could worry myself to death if I once took to serious thinking."