The Squire of Sandal-Side A Pastoral Romance

CHAPTER IX.

ESAU.

“To be weak is mis­er­able, Do­ing or suf­fer­ing.”

“Now con­science wakes de­spair That slum­berd; wakes the bit­ter mem­ory Of what he was, what is, and what must be.”

It was the mid­dle of Febru­ary be­fore Har­ry could leave San­dal-​Side. He had re­mained there, how­ev­er, on­ly out of that def­er­ence to pub­lic opin­ion which no one likes to of­fend; and it had been a most melan­choly and anx­ious de­lay. He was not al­lowed to en­ter the squire's room, and in­deed he shrank from the or­deal. His moth­er and Char­lotte treat­ed him with a re­serve he felt to be al­most dis­like. He had been so ac­cus­tomed to con­sid­er moth­er-​love suf­fi­cient to cov­er all faults, that he for­got there was a stronger tie; for­got that to the ten­der wife the hus­band of her youth--her lover, friend, com­pan­ion--is far near­er and dear­er than the tie that binds her to sons and daugh­ters.

Al­so, he did not care to give any con­sid­er­ation to the fact, that both his moth­er and Char­lotte re­sent­ed the kind of daugh­ter and sis­ter he had forced up­on them. So there was lit­tle sym­pa­thy with him at Seat-​San­dal, and he fan­cied that all the gen­tle­men of the neigh­bor­hood treat­ed him with a per­cep­ti­ble cool­ness of man­ner. Per­haps they did. There are so­cial in­tu­itions, mys­te­ri­ous in their ori­gin, and yet hit­ting sin­gu­lar­ly near the truth. Be­fore cir­cum­stances per­mit­ted him to leave San­dal-​Side, he had be­gun to hate the Seat and the neigh­bor­hood, and ev­ery thing per­tain­ing to it, with all his heart.

The on­ly place of refuge he had found had been Up-​Hill. The day af­ter the catas­tro­phe he fought his way there, and with pas­sion­ate tears and com­plaints told Ducie the ter­ri­ble sto­ry. Ducie had some mem­ories of her own wil­ful mar­riage, which made her tol­er­ant with Har­ry. She had al­so been ac­cused of caus­ing her moth­er's death; and though she knew her­self to be in­no­cent, she had suf­fered by the ac­cu­sa­tion. She un­der­stood Har­ry's trou­ble as few oth­ers could have done; and though a good deal of his ev­ident mis­ery was on ac­count of his sep­ara­tion from Beat­rice, Ducie did not sus­pect this, and re­al­ly be­lieved the young man to be break­ing his heart over the re­sults of his rash com­mu­ni­ca­tion.

He was agree­ably sur­prised, al­so, to find that Stephen treat­ed him with a con­sid­er­ation he had nev­er done when he was a dash­ing of­fi­cer, with all his own small world at his feet. For when any man was in trou­ble, Steve La­trigg was sure to take that man's part. He did not ask too par­tic­ular­ly in­to the trou­ble. He had a way of say­ing to Ducie, “There will be faults on both sides. If two stones knock against each oth­er un­til they strike fire, you may be sure both of them have been hard, moth­er. Any way, Har­ry is in trou­ble, and there is none but us to stand up for him.”

But in spite of Steve's con­stant friend­ship, and Ducie's nev­er-​fail­ing sym­pa­thy, Har­ry had a bad six weeks. There were days dur­ing them when he stood in the shad­ow of death, with al­most the hor­ror of a par­ri­cide in his heart. Long, lone­ly days, emp­ty of ev­ery thing but anx­iety and weari­ness. Long, stormy days, when he had not even the re­lief of a walk to Up-​Hill. Days in which strangers slight­ed him. Days in which his moth­er and Char­lotte could not even bear to see him. Days in which he fan­cied the ser­vants dis­liked and ne­glect­ed him. He was al­most hap­py one af­ter­noon when Stephen met him on the hill­side, and said, “The squire is much bet­ter. The doc­tors think he is in no im­me­di­ate dan­ger. You might go to your wife, Har­ry, I should say.”

“I am glad, in­deed, to hear the squire is out of dan­ger. And I long to go to my sick wife. I get lit­tle cred­it for stay­ing here. I re­al­ly be­lieve, Steve, that peo­ple ac­cuse me of wait­ing to step in­to fa­ther's shoes. And yet if I go away they will say things just as cru­el and un­true.”

But he went away be­fore day-​dawn next morn­ing. Char­lotte came down-​stairs, and served his cof­fee; but Mrs. San­dal was watch­ing the squire, who had fall­en in­to a deep sleep. Char­lotte wept much, and said lit­tle; and Har­ry felt at that hour as if he were be­ing very bad­ly treat­ed. He could scarce­ly swal­low; and the in­tense si­lence of the house made ev­ery slight noise, ev­ery low word, so dis­tinct and re­mark­able, that he felt the con­straint to be re­al­ly painful.

“Well,” he said, ris­ing in haste, “I may as well go with­out a kind word. I am not to have one, ap­par­ent­ly.”

“Who is here to speak it? Can fa­ther? or moth­er? or I? But you have that wom­an.”

“Good-​by, Charley.”

She bit her lips, and wrung her hands; and moan­ing like some wound­ed crea­ture lift­ed her face, and kissed him.

“Good-​by. Fare you well, poor Har­ry.”

A lit­tle purse was in his hand when she took her hand away; a net­ted silk one that he had watched the mak­ing of, and there was the glim­mer of gold pieces through it. With a blush he put it in his pock­et, for he was sore­ly pressed for mon­ey; and the small gift was a great one to him. And it al­most broke his heart. He felt that it was all she could give him,--a lit­tle gold for all the sweet love that had once been his.

His horse was stand­ing ready sad­dled. 'Ost­tler Bill opened the yard-​gate, and lift­ed the lantern above his head, and watched him ride slow­ly away down the lane. When he had gone far enough to drown the clat­ter of the hoofs he put the crea­ture to his met­tle, and Bill waved the lantern as a farewell. Then, as it was still dark, he went back to the sta­ble and lay down to sleep un­til the day broke, and the ser­vants be­gan to open up the house.

When Har­ry reached Am­ble­side it was quite light, and he went to the Salu­ta­tion Inn, and or­dered his break­fast. He had been a fa­vorite with the land­la­dy all his life long, and she at­tend­ed to his com­fort with many kind­ly in­quiries and many good wish­es. “And what do you think now, Capt. San­dal? Here has been a man from Up-​Hill with a let­ter for you.”

“Is he gone?”

“That he is. He would not wait, even for a bite of good vict­uals. He was dry­ish, though, and I gave him a glass of beer. Then him and his lit­tle Gal­loway took them­selves off, with­out more words about it. Here it is, and Mr. La­trigg's writ­ing on it or I wasn't chris­tened Han­nah Stave­ly.”

Har­ry opened it a lit­tle anx­ious­ly; but his heart light­ened as he read,--

DEAR HAR­RY,--If you show the en­closed slip of pa­per to your old friend Han­nah Stave­ly, she will give you a hun­dred pounds for it. That is but a lit­tle bit of the kind­ness in moth­er's heart and mine for you. At Seat-​San­dal I will speak up for you al­ways, and I will send you a true word as to how all gets on there. God bless the squire, and bring you and him to­geth­er again!

Your friend and broth­er,

STEPHEN LA­TRIGG.

And so Har­ry went on his way with a lighter heart. In­deed, he was not in­clined at any time to share sor­row out of which he had es­caped. Ev­ery mile which he put be­tween him­self and San­dal-​Side gave back to him some­thing of his old gay man­ner. He be­gan first to ex­cuse him­self, then to blame oth­ers; and in a few hours he was in very com­fort­able re­la­tions with his own con­science; and this, not be­cause he was de­lib­er­ate­ly cru­el or wicked, but be­cause he was weak, and loved plea­sure, and con­sid­ered that there was no use in be­ing sor­ry when sor­row was nei­ther a cred­it to him­self, nor a com­pli­ment to oth­ers. And so to Italy and to love he sped as fast as mon­ey and steam could car­ry him. And on the jour­ney he did his very best to put out of his mem­ory the large, lone­ly, gray “Seat,” with its solemn, mys­te­ri­ous cham­ber of suf­fer­ing, and its wraiths and mem­ories and fear­ful fight­ing away of death.

But on the whole, the hope which Stephen had giv­en him of the squire's fi­nal re­cov­ery was a too flat­ter­ing one. There was, per­haps, no im­me­di­ate dan­ger of death, but there was still less prospect of en­tire re­cov­ery. He had be­gun to re­mem­ber a lit­tle, to speak a word or two, to use his hands in the weak, un­cer­tain way of a young child; but in the main he lay like a gi­ant, bound by in­vis­ible and in­vin­ci­ble bonds; speech­less, mo­tion­less, seek­ing through his large, pa­thet­ic eyes the help and com­fort of those who bent over him. He had quite lost the fine, firm con­tour of his face, his rud­dy col­or was all gone; in­deed, the coun­try ex­pres­sion of “face of clay,” best of all words de­scribed the col­or­less, still coun­te­nance amid the white pil­lows in the dark­ened room.

As the spring came on he gained strength and in­tel­li­gence, and one love­ly day his men lift­ed him to a couch by the win­dow. The lat­tices were flung wide open, that he might see the trees toss­ing about their young leaves, and the grass like grass in par­adise, and hear the bees hum­ming among the ap­ple-​blooms, and the sheep bleat­ing on the fells. The earth was full of the beau­ty and the tran­quil­li­ty of God. The squire looked long at the fa­mil­iar sights; looked till his lips trem­bled, and the tears rolled heav­ily down his gray face. And then he re­al­ized all that he had suf­fered, he re­mem­bered the hand that had dealt him the blow. And while Mrs. San­dal was kiss­ing away his tears, and speak­ing words of hope and love, a let­ter came from Sophia.

It was dat­ed Cal­cut­ta. Julius had tak­en her there in the win­ter, and the news of her fa­ther's ill­ness did not reach her for some weeks. But, as it hap­pened, when Char­lotte's let­ter de­tail­ing the sad event ar­rived, Julius was par­tic­ular­ly in need of some­thing to won­der over and to spec­ulate about; and of all sub­jects, Seat-​San­dal in­ter­est­ed him most. To be mas­ter of the fine old place was his supreme am­bi­tion. He felt that he pos­sessed all the qual­ities nec­es­sary to make him a lead­er among the Dales gen­tle­men. He fore­saw, through them, so­cial in­flu­ence and po­lit­ical pow­er; and he had an am­bi­tion to make his reign in the house of San­dal the era of a new and far more splen­did dy­nasty.

He had been ly­ing in the shade, drink­ing iced cof­fee, and smok­ing. But as Sophia read, he sat up­right, and a look of spec­ula­tion came in­to his eyes. “There is no use weep­ing, my love,” he said lan­guid­ly, “you will on­ly dim your beau­ty, and that will do nei­ther your fa­ther nor me any good. Let us go to San­dal. Char­lotte and moth­er must be worn out, and we can be use­ful at such a time. I think, in­deed, our prop­er place is there. The af­fairs of the 'walks' and the farms must be at­tend­ed to, and what will they do on quar­ter-​day? Of course Har­ry will not re­main there. It would be un­kind, wrong, and in ex­ceed­ing­ly bad taste.”

“Poor, dear fa­ther! And oh, Julius, what a dis­grace to the fam­ily! A singer! How could Har­ry be­have so shame­ful­ly to us all?”

“Har­ry nev­er cared for any mor­tal but him­self. How dis­grace­ful­ly he be­haved about our mar­riage; for this same wom­an's sake, I have no doubt. You must re­mem­ber that I dis­ap­proved of Har­ry from the very first. The idea of ter­mi­nat­ing a _li­ai­son_ of that kind with a mar­riage! Har­ry ought to be put out of de­cent so­ci­ety. You and I ought to be at Seat-​San­dal now. Char­lotte will be push­ing that Stephen La­trigg in­to the San­dal af­fairs, and you know what I think of Stephen La­trigg. He is to be feared, too, for he has ca­pa­bil­ities, and Char­lotte to back him; and Char­lotte was al­ways un­der­hand, Sophia. You would not see it, but she was. Or­der your trunks to be packed at once,--don't for­get the ru­bies my moth­er promised you,--and I will have a con­ver­sa­tion with the judge.”

Judge Thomas San­dal was by no means a bad fel­low. He had left San­dal-​Side un­der a sense of great in­jus­tice, but he had done well to him­self; and those who had done him wrong, had dis­ap­peared in­to the cloud of death. He had for­got­ten all his grievances, he had even for­got­ten the in­flicters of them. He had now a kind­ly feel­ing to­wards San­dal, and was a lit­tle proud of hav­ing sprung from such a grand old race. There­fore, when Julius told him what had hap­pened, and frankly said he thought he could buy from Har­ry San­dal all his rights of suc­ces­sion to the es­tate, Judge Thomas San­dal saw noth­ing un­just in the af­fair.

The law of pri­mo­gen­iture had al­ways ap­peared to him a most un­just and fool­ish law. In his own youth it had been a source of burn­ing anger and dis­pute. He had al­ways de­clared it was a shame to give Launcelot ev­ery thing, and William and him­self scarce a crumb off the fam­ily loaf. To his el­dest broth­er, as his el­dest broth­er, he had de­clined to give “hon­or and obe­di­ence.” “William is a far fin­er fel­low,” he said one day to his moth­er; “far more wor­thy to fol­low fa­ther than Laun­cie is. If there is any par­tic­ular mer­it in keep­ing up the old seat and name, for good­ness' sake let fa­ther choose the best of us to do it!” For such rev­olu­tion­ary and dis­re­spect­ful sen­ti­ments he had been fre­quent­ly in dis­grace; and the end of the dis­put­ing had been his own ex­pa­tri­ation, and the found­ing of a fam­ily of East-​In­di­an San­dals.

He heard Julius with ap­proval. “I think you have a very good plan,” he said. “Har­ry San­dal, with his play-​singing wife, would have a very bad time of it among the Dales­men. He knows it. He will have no de­sire to test the feel­ing. I am sure he will be glad to have a sum of ready mon­ey in lieu of such an un­com­fort­able right. As for the La­trig­gs, my moth­er al­ways de­test­ed them. Sophia and you are both San­dals; cer­tain­ly, your claim would be be­fore that of a Char­lotte La­trigg.”

“Har­ry, too, is one of those men who are al­ways poor, al­ways want­ing mon­ey. I dare say I can buy his suc­ces­sion for a song.”

“No, no. Give him a fair price. I nev­er thought much of Ja­cob buy­ing poor Esau out for a mess of pot­tage. It was a mean trick. I will put ten thou­sand pounds at Bun­der's in Thread­nee­dle Street, Lon­don, for you. Draw it all if you find it just and nec­es­sary. The rental ought to de­ter­mine the val­ue. I want you to have Seat-​San­dal, but I do not want you to steal it. How­ev­er, my broth­er William may not die for many a year yet; those Dale squires are a cen­tu­ry-​liv­ing race.”

In ac­cor­dance with these plans and in­ten­tions, Sophia wrote. Her let­ter was, there­fore, one of great and gen­er­al sym­pa­thy; in fact, a very clever let­ter in­deed. It com­plete­ly de­ceived ev­ery one. The squire was told that Sophia and Julius were com­ing, and his face bright­ened a lit­tle. Mrs. San­dal and Char­lotte for­got all but their need of some help and com­fort which was fam­ily help and com­fort, free of cer­emo­ny, and spring­ing from the same love, hopes, and in­ter­ests.

Stephen, how­ev­er, fore­saw trou­ble. “Julius will get the squire un­der his fin­ger,” he said to Char­lotte. “He will make him­self in­dis­pens­able about the es­tate. As for Sophia, she could al­ways work moth­er to her own pur­pos­es. Moth­er obeyed her will, even while she re­sent­ed and dis­ap­proved her au­thor­ity. So, Char­lotte, I shall be­gin at once to build La­trigg Hall. I know it will be need­ed. The plan is drawn, the site is cho­sen; and next Mon­day ground shall be bro­ken for the foun­da­tion.”

“There is no harm in build­ing your house, Steve. If fa­ther should die, moth­er and I would be here up­on Har­ry's suf­fer­ance. He might leave the place in our care, he might bring his wife to it any day.”

“And how could you live with her?”

“It would be im­pos­si­ble. I should feel as if I were liv­ing with my fa­ther's--with the one who re­al­ly gave fa­ther the death-​blow.”

So when Julius and Sophia ar­rived at Seat-​San­dal, the walls of La­trigg Hall were ris­ing above the green sod. A most beau­ti­ful site had been cho­sen for it,--the low­est spur on the west­ern side of the fell; a charm­ing plateau fac­ing the sea, shad­ed with great oaks, and slop­ing down in­to a lit­tle dale of love­ly beau­ty. The plan showed a fine cen­tral build­ing, with low­er wings on each side. The wide porch­es, deep win­dows, and small stone bal­conies gave a pic­turesque ir­reg­ular­ity to the gen­er­al ef­fect. This home had been the dream of Stephen's man­hood, and Ducie al­so had urged him to its speedy re­al­iza­tion; for she knew that it was the first step to­wards se­cur­ing for him­self that recog­ni­tion among the coun­ty gen­try which his wealth and his old fam­ily en­ti­tled him to. Not that there was any in­ten­tion of aban­don­ing Up-​Hill. Both would have thought such a move­ment a vol­un­tary in­sult to the fam­ily wraiths,--one sure to bring up­on them dis­as­ter of ev­ery kind. Up-​Hill was to be Ducie's res­idence as long as she lived; it was to be al­ways the home of the fam­ily in the hot months, and thus re­tain its right as an in­te­gral part and por­tion of the La­trig­gs' hearth.

“I have seen the plan of La­trigg Hall,” said Julius one day to Sophia. “An ab­surd­ly fine build­ing for a man of Stephen's birth. What will he do with it? It will re­quire as large an in­come as Seat-​San­dal to sup­port it.”

“Stephen is rich. His grand­fa­ther left him a great deal of mon­ey. Ducie will add con­sid­er­ably to the sum, and Stephen seems to have the fac­ul­ty of get­ting it. My moth­er says he is man­ag­ing three 'walks,' and all of them are do­ing well.”

“Nev­er­the­less, I do not like him. 'In-​law' kins­men and kinswom­en are gen­er­al­ly de­testable. Look at my broth­ers-​in-​law, Mr. Har­ry San­dal and Mr. Stephen La­trigg; and my sis­ters-​in-​law, Mrs. Har­ry San­dal and Miss Char­lotte San­dal; a pret­ty un­de­sir­able quar­tette I think.”

“And look at mine. For sis­ters-​in-​law, Ma­hal and Ju­dith San­dal; for broth­ers-​in-​law, William and Tom San­dal; a pret­ty un­de­sir­able quar­tette I think.”

Julius did not rel­ish the re­tort; for he replied stiffly, “If so, they are at least at the oth­er end of the world, and not like­ly to trou­ble you. That is sure­ly some­thing in their fa­vor.”

The first move­ment of the Julius San­dals in Seat-​San­dal had been a clever one. “I want you to let us have the east rooms, dear moth­er,” said Sophia, on their ar­rival; “Julius does feel the need of the morn­ing sun so much.” And though oth­er rooms had been pre­pared, the re­quest was read­ily grant­ed, and with­out any sus­pi­cion of the mo­tive which had dic­tat­ed it. And yet they had made a very pru­dent cal­cu­la­tion. Oc­cu­py­ing the east rooms gave them a cer­tain promi­nence and stand­ing in the house, for on­ly guests of im­por­tance were as­signed to them; and the ser­vants, who are peo­ple of wise per­cep­tions gen­er­al­ly, took their tone from the cir­cum­stance.

It seemed as if a spir­it of dis­sat­is­fac­tion and quar­relling came with them. The maids all found out that their work was too heavy, and that they were worn out with it. Sophia had been pity­ing them. “Mrs. San­dal does not mean to be hard, but she is so wrapped up in the squire she sees noth­ing; and Miss Char­lotte is so strong her­self, she re­al­ly ex­pects too much from oth­ers. She does not in­tend to be ex­act­ing, but then she is; she can't help it.”

And sit­ting over “a bit of hot sup­per” the cham­ber­maid re­peat­ed the re­mark; and the house­maid said she on­ly knew that she was traipsed off her feet, and hadn't been near hand her own folks for a fort­night; and the cook thought Mis­sis had got quite nat­try. She had been near falling out with her more than once; and all the ill-​na­ture was be­cause she was fagged out, all day long and ev­ery day mak­ing some kind of lit­tle knick-​shaw or oth­er that was nev­er eat­en.

Not one re­mem­bered that the Julius San­dals had them­selves con­sid­er­ably in­creased the work of the house; and that Mrs. Julius alone could find quite suf­fi­cient em­ploy­ment for one maid. Since her ad­vent, Char­lotte's room had been some­what ne­glect­ed for the fine guest-​cham­bers; but it was up­on Char­lotte all the blame of over-​work and weari­ness was laid. In­sen­si­bly the thought had its ef­fect. She be­gan to feel that for some rea­son or oth­er she was out of fa­vor; that her few wants were care­less­ly at­tend­ed to, and that Mrs. Julius in­flu­enced the house as com­plete­ly as she had done when she was Miss San­dal.

She soon dis­cov­ered, al­so, that re­pin­ing was use­less. Her moth­er begged for peace at any cost. “Put up with it,” she said, “for a lit­tle while, Char­lotte. I can­not bear quar­relling. And you know how Sophia will in­sist up­on ex­plain­ing. She will call up the ser­vants, and 'fend and prove,' and make com­plaints and re­grets, and in the long end have all on her own side. And I can tell you that Ann has been queer late­ly, and Eliz­abeth talks of leav­ing at Mar­tin­mas. O Char­lotte! put up with things, my dear. There is on­ly you to help me.”

Char­lotte could not re­sist such ap­peals. She knew she was re­al­ly the hand to which all oth­er hands in the house looked, the heart on which her fa­ther and moth­er leaned their weary hearts; still, she could not but re­sent many an un­kind po­si­tion, which Sophia's clever tac­tics com­pelled her to take. For in­stance, as she was leav­ing the room one morn­ing, Sophia said in her blan­dest voice, “Dear Char­lotte, will you tell Ann to make one of those queen pud­dings for Julius. He does en­joy them so much.”

Ann did not re­ceive the or­der pleas­ant­ly. “They are a sight of trou­ble, Miss Char­lotte. I'll be hard set with the squire's fan­cies to-​day. And there is as good as three din­ners to make now, and I must say a queen's pud­ding is a bit thought­less of you.” And Char­lotte felt the in­jus­tice she was too proud to ex­plain to a ser­vant. But even to Sophia, com­plaint availed noth­ing. “You must give ex­tra or­ders your­self to Ann in the fu­ture,” she said. “Ann ac­cus­es me of be­ing thought­less in con­se­quence of them.”

“As if I should think of in­ter­fer­ing in your du­ties, Char­lotte. I hope I know bet­ter than that. You would be the first to com­plain of my 'tak­ing on' if I did, and I should not blame you. I am on­ly a guest here now. But I am sure a lit­tle queen pud­ding is not too much to ask, in one's own fa­ther's house too. Julius has not many fan­cies I am sure, but such a lit­tle thing.”

“Julius can have all the fan­cies he de­sires, on­ly do please or­der them from Ann your­self.”

“Well, I nev­er! I am sure fa­ther and moth­er would nev­er op­pose a lit­tle pud­ding that Julius fan­cies.”

Does any one imag­ine that such tri­als as these are small and in­signif­icant? They are the very ones that make the heart burn, and the teeth close on the lips, and the eyes fill with an­gry tears. They take hope out of dai­ly work, and sun­shine out of dai­ly life, and slay love as noth­ing else can slay it. There was an evil spir­it in the house,--a small, self­ish, en­vi­ous, ma­li­cious spir­it; peo­ple were cross, and they knew not why; felt in­jured, and they knew not why; the days were hard­er than those dread­ful ones when fire and can­dle were nev­er out, and ev­ery one was a watch­er in the shad­ow of death.

As the sea­son ad­vanced, Julius took pre­cise­ly the po­si­tion which Stephen had fore­told he would take. At first he de­ferred en­tire­ly to the squire; he re­ceived his or­ders, and then saw them car­ried out. Very soon he for­got to name the squire in the mat­ter. He held con­sul­ta­tions with the head man, and talked with him about the mow­ing and har­vest­ing, and the sale of lambs and fleeces. The mas­ter's room was opened, and Julius sat at the ta­ble to re­ceive ten­ants and la­bor­ers. In the squire's chair it was easy to feel that he was him­self squire of San­dal-​Side and Torv­er.

It was a most un­hap­py sum­mer. Evils, like weeds, grow apace. There was scarce­ly any in­ter­val be­tween some long-​hon­ored cus­tom and its dis­ap­pear­ance. To-​day it was ob­served as it had been for a life­time; the next week it had passed away, and ap­peared to be for­got­ten. “Such times I nev­er saw,” said Ann. “I have been at San­dal twen­ty-​two years come Mar­tin­mas, but I'm go­ing to Bev­er­ley next feast.”

“You'll not do it, Ann. It's but talk.”

“Nay, but I'm set on it. I have tak­en the 'fas­ten­ing pen­ny,' and I'm bound to make that good. Things are that try­ing here now, that I can't abide them longer.”

All sum­mer ser­vants were go­ing and com­ing at Seat-​San­dal; the very foun­da­tions of its do­mes­tic life were bro­ken up, and Char­lotte's bright face had a con­stant wrin­kle of wor­ry and an­noy­ance. Sophia was care­ful to point out the fact. “She has no house­keep­ing abil­ity. Ev­ery thing is in a mess. If I on­ly durst take hold of things. But Char­lotte is such a spit­fire, one does not like to of­fer help. I would be on­ly too glad to put things right, but I should give of­fence,” etc. “The poi­son of asps un­der the tongue,” and a very lit­tle of it, can par­alyze and ir­ri­tate a whole house­hold.

Mow­ing-​time and shear­ing-​time and reap­ing-​time came and went, but the gay pas­toral fes­ti­vals brought none of their old-​time plea­sure. The men in the fields did not like Julius in the squire's place, and they took no pains to hide the fact. Then he came home with com­plaints. “They were idle. They were dis­re­spect­ful. The crops had fall­en short.” He could not un­der­stand it; and when he had ex­pressed some dis­sat­is­fac­tion on the mat­ter, the head man had told him, to take his grum­bling to God Almighty. “An in­so­lent race, these states­men and Dale shep­herds,” he added; “if one of them owns ten acres, he thinks him­self as good as if he owns a thou­sand.”

“All well-​born men, Julius, all of them; are they not, Char­lotte? Eh? What?”

“So well born,” an­swered Char­lotte warm­ly, “that King James the First set up a claim to all these small es­tates, on the plea that their own­ers had nev­er served a feu­dal lord, and were, there­fore, ten­ants of the crown. But the large states­men went with the small ones. They led them in a body to a heath be­tween Kendal and Stave­ly, and there over two thou­sand men swore, 'that as they had their lands by the sword, they would keep them by the same.' So you see, Julius, they were gen­tle­men be­fore the feu­dal sys­tem ex­ist­ed; they nev­er put a fin­ger un­der its au­thor­ity, and they have long sur­vived its fall.”

“Well, for all that, they make poor ser­vants.”

“There's men that want In­di­an ry­ots or ne­gro slaves to do their turn. I want free men at San­dal-​Side as long as I am squire of that name.”

“They missed you sore­ly in the fields, fa­ther. It was not shear­ing-​time, nor hay-​time, nor har­vest-​time to any one in San­dal this year. But you will stand in your mead­ows again--God grant it!--next sum­mer. And then how the men will work! And what shout­ing there will be at the sight of you! And what a har­vest-​home we shall have!”

And he caught her en­thu­si­asm, and stood up to try his feet, and felt sure that he walked stronger, and would soon be down-​stairs once more. And Julius, whose eyes love did not blind, felt a lit­tle scorn for those who could not see such ev­ident de­cay and dis­so­lu­tion. “It is re­al­ly crim­inal,” he said to Sophia, “to en­cour­age hopes so pal­pa­bly false.” For Julius, like all self­ish per­sons, could per­ceive on­ly one side of a ques­tion, the side that touched his own side. It nev­er en­tered his mind that the squire was try­ing to cheer and en­cour­age his wife and daugh­ter, and was pri­vate­ly quite aware of his own con­di­tion. San­dal had not told him that he had re­ceived “the to­ken,” the se­cret mes­sage which ev­ery soul re­ceives when the King de­sires his pres­ence. He had nev­er heard those solemn con­ver­sa­tions which fol­lowed the read­ing of “The Evening Ser­vice,” when the rec­tor knelt by the side of his old friend, and they two talked with Death as with a com­pan­ion. So, though Julius med­dled much with San­dal af­fairs, there was a life there in­to which he nev­er en­tered.

One evening in Oc­to­ber, Char­lotte was walk­ing with Stephen. They had been to look at the new build­ing, for ev­ery inch of progress was a mat­ter of in­ter­est to them. As they came through the vil­lage, they per­ceived that Farmer Huet was hold­ing his ap­ple feast; for he was car­ry­ing from his house in­to his or­chard a great bowl of spiced ale, and was fol­lowed by a mer­ry com­pa­ny, singing was­sail as they poured a lit­tle at the root of ev­ery tree:--

“Here's to thee, good ap­ple-​tree! Whence thou may'st bud, and whence thou may'st blow, Whence thou may'st bear ap­ples enou'; Hats full, caps full, Bushels full, sacks full. Hur­rah, then! Hur­rah, then! Here's to thee, good ap­ple-​tree!”

They wait­ed a lit­tle to watch the pro­ces­sion round the or­chard; and as they stood, Julius ad­vanced from an op­po­site di­rec­tion. He took a let­ter from his pock­et, which he had ev­ident­ly been to the mail to se­cure, for Char­lotte watched him break the seal as he ap­proached; and when he sud­den­ly raised his head, and saw her look of amaze­ment, he made a lit­tle brava­do of the af­fair, and said, with an air of frank­ness, “It is a let­ter from Har­ry. I thought it was best for his let­ters not to come to the house. The mail-​bag might be tak­en to the squire's room, and who knows what would hap­pen if he should see one of these,” and he tapped the let­ter sig­nif­icant­ly with his long point­ed fore-​fin­ger.

“You should not have made such an ar­range­ment as that, Julius, with­out speak­ing to moth­er. It was cru­el to Har­ry. Why should the vil­lagers think that the sight of a let­ter from him would be so dread­ful to his own peo­ple?”

“I did it for the best, Char­lotte. Of course, you will mis­judge me.”

“Ah! I know now why Pol­ly Es­th­waite called you, 'such a nice, kind, thought­ful gen­tle­man as nev­er was.' Is the let­ter for you?”

“Mr. La­trigg can ex­am­ine the ad­dress if you wish.”

“Mr. La­trigg dis­tinct­ly re­fus­es to look at the let­ter. Come, Char­lotte, the air is cold and raw;” and with very scant cour­tesy they part­ed.

“What can it mean, Steve, Julius and Har­ry in cor­re­spon­dence? I don't know what to think of such a thing. Har­ry has on­ly writ­ten once to me since he went away. There is some­thing wrong in all this se­cre­cy, you may de­pend up­on it.”

“I would not be sus­pi­cious, Char­lotte. Har­ry is af­fec­tion­ate and trust­ing. Julius has writ­ten him let­ters full of sym­pa­thy and friend­ship; and the poor fel­low, cut off from home and kin­dred, has been on­ly too glad to an­swer. Per­haps we should have writ­ten al­so.”

“But why did Julius take that trou­ble? Julius al­ways has a mo­tive for what he does. I mean a self­ish mo­tive. Has Har­ry writ­ten to you?”

“On­ly a few lines the very day he left. I have heard noth­ing since.”

The cir­cum­stance trou­bled Char­lotte far be­yond its ap­par­ent im­por­tance. She could con­ceive of no pos­si­ble rea­son for Julius in­ter­fer­ing in Har­ry's life, and she had the feel­ing of a per­son fac­ing a dan­ger in the dark. Julius was al­so an­noyed at her dis­cov­ery. “It pre­cip­itates mat­ters,” he said to Sophia, “and is ap­par­ent­ly an un­lucky chance. But chance is des­tiny, and this last let­ter of Har­ry's in­di­cates that all things are very near­ly ready for me. As for your sis­ter, Char­lotte San­dal, I think she is the most in­ter­fer­ing per­son I ev­er knew.”

The air of the sup­per-​ta­ble was one of re­serve and of­fence. On­ly Sophia twit­tered and ob­served and won­dered about all kinds of triv­ial things. “Moth­er has so many headaches now. Does she take prop­er care of her­self, Char­lotte? She ought to take ex­er­cise. Julius and I nev­er ne­glect tak­ing ex­er­cise. We think it a du­ty. No time do you say? Moth­er ought to take time. Poor, dear fa­ther was nev­er un­rea­son­able; he would wish moth­er to take time. What taste­less cus­tards, Char­lotte! I don't think Ann cares how she cooks now. When I was at home, and the el­dest daugh­ter, she al­ways liked to have things nice. Julius, my dear one, can you find any thing fit to eat?” And so on, and so on, un­til Char­lotte felt as if she must scream, or throw a plate down, or fly be­yond the sight and sound of all things hu­man.

The next evening Julius an­nounced his in­ten­tion of go­ing abroad at once. “But I shall leave Sophia to be a lit­tle so­ci­ety for moth­er, and I shall not de­lay an hour be­yond the time nec­es­sary for trav­el and busi­ness.” He spoke with an air of con­scious self-​de­nial; and as Char­lotte did not ex­press any grat­itude he con­tin­ued, “Not that I ex­pect any thanks, Sophia and I, but for­tu­nate­ly we find du­ty is its own re­ward.”

“Are you go­ing to see Har­ry?”

“I may do such a thing.”

“Is he sick?”

“No.”

“I hope he will not get sick while you are there.” And then some pas­sion­ate im­pulse took pos­ses­sion of her; her face glowed like a flame, and her eyes scin­til­lat­ed like sparks. “If any thing hap­pens Har­ry while you are with him, I swear, by each sep­arate San­dal that ev­er lived, that you shall ac­count for it!”

“Oh, you know, Sophia dear, this is too much! Leave the ta­ble, my love. Your sis­ter must be”--and he tapped his fore­head; while Sophia, with a look of an­ni­hi­lat­ing scorn, drew her drap­ery tight around her, and with­drew.

“What did I say? What do I think? What ter­ror is in my heart? Oh, Har­ry, Har­ry, Har­ry!”

She buried her face in her hands, and sat lost in woe­ful thought,--sat so long that Phoebe the ta­ble-​maid felt her de­lay to be un­kind and ag­gra­vat­ing; es­pe­cial­ly when one of the cham­ber-​maids came down for her sup­per, and in­formed the rulers of the ser­vants' hall that “Mrs. Julius was cry­ing up-​stairs about Miss Char­lotte falling out with her hus­band.”

“Mer­cy on us! What do­ings we have to bide with!” and Ann shook her check apron, and sat down with an air of near­ly ex­haust­ed pa­tience.

“You can't think what a tak­ing Mr. Julius is in. He's go­ing away to-​mor­row.”

“For good and all?”

“Not he. He'll be back again. He has had a falling-​out with Miss Char­lotte.”

“Poor lass! Say what you will, she has been hard set late­ly. I nev­er knew nor heard tell of her be­ing flighty and fratchy be­fore the squire's trou­ble.”

“Good hearts are plen­ty in good times, Ann Skel­ton. Miss Char­lotte's tem­per is past all the last few weeks, she is that off-​and-​on and change­able like and spir­ity. Mrs. Julius says she does beat all.”

“I don't pin my faith on what Mrs. Julius says. Not I.”

In the east rooms the crit­icism was still more se­vere. Julius railed for an hour ere he fi­nal­ly de­cid­ed that he nev­er saw a more sus­pi­cious, un­la­dy­like, un­char­ita­ble, unchris­tian­like girl than Char­lotte San­dal! “I am glad to get away from her a lit­tle while,” he cried; “how can she be your sis­ter, Sophia?”

So glad was he to get away, that he left be­fore Char­lotte came down in the morn­ing. Ann made him a cup of cof­fee, and re­ceived a shilling and some suave words, and was quite sure af­ter them that “Mr. Julius was the finest gen­tle­man that ev­er trod in shoe-​leather.” And Julius was not above be­ing grat­ified with the ap­pro­ba­tion and good wish­es of ser­vants; and it gave him plea­sure to leave in the lit­tle hur­rah of their bows and cour­te­sies, their smiles and their good wish­es.

He went with­out de­lay straight to the small Ital­ian vil­lage in which Har­ry had made his home. Har­ry's let­ters had pre­pared him for trou­ble and pover­ty, but he had lit­tle idea of the re­al con­di­tion of the heir of San­dal-​Side. A few bare rooms in some di­lap­idat­ed palace, grim with fad­ed mag­nif­icence, com­fort­less and dull, was the kind of place he ex­pect­ed. He found him in a small cot­tage sur­round­ed by a bar­ren, sandy patch of ground over­grown with ne­glect­ed vines and vagabond weeds. The in­te­ri­or was hot and un­tidy. On a couch a wom­an in the firm grip of con­sump­tion was ly­ing; an ema­ci­at­ed, fever­ish wom­an, fret­ful with acute suf­fer­ing. A lit­tle child, wan and waxy-​look­ing, and ap­par­ent­ly as ill as its moth­er, wailed in a cot by her side. Sig­nor Lan­za was smok­ing un­der a fig-​tree in the ne­glect­ed acre, which had been a vine­yard or a gar­den. Har­ry had gone in­to the vil­lage for some ne­ces­si­ty; and when he re­turned Julius felt a shock and a pang of re­gret for the dash­ing young sol­dier squire that he had known as Har­ry San­dal.

He kissed his wife with pas­sion­ate love and sor­row, and then turned to Julius with that mute look of in­quiry which few find them­selves able to re­sist.

“He is alive yet,--much bet­ter, he says; and Char­lotte thinks he may be in the fields again next sea­son.”

“Thank God! My poor Beat­rice and her ba­by! You see what is com­ing to them?”

“Yes.”

“And I am so poor I can­not get her the change of air, the lux­uries, the medicines, which would at least pro­long life, and make death easy.”

“Go back with me to San­dal-​Side, and see the squire: he may lis­ten to you now.”

“Nev­er more! It was cru­el of fa­ther to take my mar­riage in such a way. He turned my life's joy in­to a crime, cursed ev­ery hour that was left me.”

“Peo­ple used to be so in­tense--'a few strong feel­ings,' as Mr. Wordsworth says--too strong for or­di­nary life. We re­al­ly can't af­ford to love and hate and suf­fer in such a tee­to­tal way now; but the squire came from the Mid­dle Ages. This is a dread­ful­ly hot place, Har­ry.”

“Yes, it is. We were very much de­ceived in it. I bought it; and we dreamed of vine­yards and milk and wine, and a long, hap­py, sim­ple life to­geth­er. Noth­ing has pros­pered with us. We were swin­dled in the house and land. The sig­nor knows noth­ing about vines. He was born here, and want­ed to come back and be a great man.” And as he spoke he laughed hys­ter­ical­ly, and took Julius in­to an in­ner room. “I don't want Beat­rice to hear that I am out of mon­ey. She does not know I am des­ti­tute. That sor­row, at least, I have kept from her.”

“Har­ry, I am go­ing to make you a pro­pos­al. I want to be kind and just to you. I want to put you be­yond the need of any one's help. An­swer me one ques­tion tru­ly. If your fa­ther dies, what will you do?”

“You said he was get­ting bet­ter. For God's sake, do not speak of his death.”

“I am sup­pos­ing a case. You would then be squire of San­dal-​Side. Would you re­turn there with Beat­rice?”

“Ah, no! I know what those Dales­men are. My fa­ther's feel­ings were on­ly their feel­ings in­ten­si­fied by his re­la­tion to me. They would look up­on me as my fa­ther's mur­der­er, and Beat­rice as an ac­ces­so­ry to the deed.”

“Still you would be squire of San­dal-​Side.”

“Moth­er would have to take my place, or Char­lotte. I have thought of that. I could not bear to sit in fa­ther's chair, and go up and down the house. I should see him al­ways. I should hear con­tin­ual­ly that aw­ful cry with which he fell. It fills, even here, all the spaces of my mem­ory and my dreams. I can­not go back to San­dal-​Side. Noth­ing could take me back, not even my moth­er.”

“Then lis­ten, I am the heir fail­ing you.”

“No, no: there is my son Michael.”

Julius was stunned for a mo­ment. “Oh, yes! The child is a boy, then?”

“It is a boy. What were you go­ing to say?”

“I was go­ing to ask you to sell your rights to me for ten thou­sand pounds. It would be bet­ter for you to have a sum like that in your hand at once, than to trust to drib­bling re­mit­tances sent now and then by wom­en in charge. You could in­vest that sum to no­ble pur­pose in Amer­ica, be­come a cit­izen of the coun­try, and found an Amer­ican line, as my fa­ther has found­ed an In­di­an one.”

“The poor lit­tle chap makes no dif­fer­ence. He is on­ly born to die. And I think your of­fer is a good one. I am so worn out, and things are re­al­ly des­per­ate with me. I nev­er can go back to Eng­land. I am sick to death of Flo­rence. There are places where Beat­rice might even yet re­cov­er. Yes, for her sake, I will sell you my in­her­itance. Can I have the mon­ey soon?”

“This hour. I had the prop­er pa­per drawn up be­fore I came here. Read it over care­ful­ly. See if you think it fair and hon­or­able. If you do, sign your name; and I will give you a check you can cash here in Flo­rence. Then it will be your own fault if Beat­rice wants change of air, lux­uries, and medicine.”

He laid the pa­per on the ta­ble, and Har­ry sat down and pre­tend­ed to read it. But he did not un­der­stand any thing of the jar­gon. The words danced up and down. He could on­ly see “Beat­rice,” “free­dom from care,” “pow­er to get away from Flo­rence,” and the fi­nal thought, the one which re­moved his last scru­ple, “Lan­za can have the cot­tage, and I shall be clear of him for­ev­er.”

With­out a word he went for a pen and ink, and wrote his name bold­ly to the deed of re­lin­quish­ment. Then Julius hand­ed him a check for ten thou­sand pounds, and went with him to the bank in or­der to fa­cil­itate the trans­fer of the sum to Har­ry's cred­it. On the street, in the hot sun­shine, they stood a few min­utes.

“You are quite sat­is­fied, Har­ry?”

“You have saved me from de­spair. Per­haps you have saved Beat­rice. I am grate­ful to you.”

“Have I done just­ly and hon­or­ably by you?”

“I be­lieve you have.”

“Then good-​by. I must has­ten home. Sophia will be anx­ious, and one nev­er knows what may hap­pen.”

“Julius, one mo­ment. Tell my moth­er to pray for me. And the same word to Char­lotte. Poor Charley! Sophia”--

“Sophia pities you very much, Har­ry. Sophia feels as I do. We don't ex­pect peo­ple to cut their lives on a fif­teenth-​cen­tu­ry pat­tern.”

Then Har­ry lift­ed his hat, and walked away, with a shad­ow still of his old mil­itary, up-​head man­ner. And Julius looked af­ter him with con­tempt, and thought, “What a poor fel­low he is! Not a word for him­self, or a plea for that wretched lit­tle heir in his cra­dle. There are some mis­er­able kinds of men in this world. I thank God I am not one of them!”

And the wretched Esau, with the ten thou­sand pounds in his pock­et? Ah, God on­ly knew his agony, his shame, his long­ing, and de­spair! He felt like an out­cast. Yes, even when he clasped Beat­rice in his arms, with promis­es of un­stint­ed com­forts; when she kissed him, with ten­der words and tears of joy,--he felt like an out­cast.