The Squire of Sandal-Side A Pastoral Romance

CHAPTER VIII.

THE EN­EMY IN THE HOUSE­HOLD.

“There is a method in man's wicked­ness, It grows up by de­grees.”

“How sharp­er than a ser­pent's tooth it is To have a thank­less child!”

Af­ter the wed­ding, there were some weeks of that peace­ful monotony which is the hap­pi­est ve­hi­cle for dai­ly life,--weeks so uni­form that Char­lotte re­mem­bered their events as lit­tle as she did their par­tic­ular weath­er. The on­ly cir­cum­stance that cast any shad­ow over them re­lat­ed to Har­ry. His be­hav­ior had been some­what re­mark­able, and the hope that time would ex­plain it had not been re­al­ized at the end of Au­gust.

About three weeks be­fore Sophia's mar­riage, Har­ry sud­den­ly wrote to say that he had ob­tained a three months' fur­lough, in or­der to go to Italy with a sick friend. This let­ter, so ut­ter­ly un­ex­pect­ed, caused some heart-​burn­ing and dis­ap­point­ment. Sophia had cal­cu­lat­ed up­on Har­ry's fine ap­pear­ance and splen­did uni­form as a dis­tinct ad­di­tion to her wed­ding spec­ta­cle. She al­so felt that the whole neigh­bor­hood would be spec­ulat­ing up­on the cause of his ab­sence, and very like­ly in­fer from it that he dis­ap­proved of Julius; and the bare sus­pi­cion of such a slight made her in­dig­nant.

Julius con­sid­ered this to be the true state of the case, though he promised him­self “to find out all about Mr. Har­ry's af­fairs” as soon as he had the leisure and op­por­tu­ni­ty.

“The idea of Har­ry go­ing as sick-​nurse with any friend or com­rade is ab­surd, Sophia. How­ev­er, we can eas­ily take Flo­rence in­to our wed­ding-​trip, on­ly we must not let Char­lotte know of our in­ten­tion. Char­lotte is against us, Sophia; and you may de­pend up­on it, Har­ry meant to in­sult us by his ab­sence.”

In­sult or not to the bride and bride­groom, it was a great dis­ap­point­ment to Mrs. San­dal. To see, to speak to Har­ry was al­ways a sure de­light to her. The squire loved and yet feared his vis­its. Har­ry al­ways need­ed mon­ey; and late­ly his fa­ther had be­gun to un­der­stand, and for the first time in his life, what a many-​sid­ed need it was. To go to his sec­re­tary, and to find no gold pieces in its cash-​draw­er; and to his bank-​book, and find no sur­plus cred­it there, gave the squire a feel­ing of blank amaze­ment and heart-​sick per­plex­ity. He felt that such a change as that might pre­fig­ure oth­er changes still more painful and fright­some.

Char­lotte in­clined to the same opin­ion as Julius, re­gard­ing her broth­er's sud­den flight to Flo­rence. She con­clud­ed that he had felt it im­pos­si­ble to con­grat­ulate his sis­ter, or to sim­ulate any fra­ter­nal re­gard for Julius; and her knowl­edge of facts made her read for “sick friend” “fair friend.” It was, in­deed, very like­ly that the beau­ti­ful girl, whose like­ness Har­ry car­ried so near his heart, had gone to Flo­rence; and that he had moved heav­en and earth to fol­low her there. And when his own love-​af­fairs were press­ing and im­por­tant, how was it like­ly that he could care for those of Julius and Sophia?

So, at in­ter­vals, they won­dered a lit­tle about Har­ry's pe­cu­liar move­ment, and tried hard to find some­thing def­inite be­low the sur­face words of his short let­ters. Oth­er­wise, a great peace had set­tled over Seat-​San­dal. Its hall-​doors stood open all day long, and the Au­gust sun­shine and the gar­den scents drift­ed in with the lights and shad­ows. Life had set­tled down in­to such sim­ple ways, that it seemed to be al­ways at rest. The hours went and came, and brought with them their lit­tle mea­sure of du­ty and plea­sure, both so usu­al and easy, that they took noth­ing from the feel­ings or the strength, and gave an in­fi­nite sense of peace and con­tent­ment.

One Au­gust evening they were in the gar­den; there had been sev­er­al hot, clear days, and the har­vesters were mak­ing the most of ev­ery hour. The squire had been in the field un­til near sun­set, and now he was watch­ing anx­ious­ly for the last wain. “We have the ear­li­est shear­ing in San­dal-​Side,” he said. “The sick­le has not been in the up­per mead­ows yet, and if they fin­ish to-​night it will be a good thing. It's a fine moon for work. _A fine moon, God bless her!_ Hark! There is the song I have been wait­ing for, and all's well, Char­lotte.” And they stood still to lis­ten to the rum­ble of the wag­on, and the rude, hearty chant that at in­ter­vals ac­com­pa­nied it:--

“Blest be the day that Christ was born! The last sheaf of San­dal corn Is well bound, and bet­ter shorn. Hip, hip, hur­rah!”

“Good-​evening, squire.” The speak­er had come quick­ly around one of the gar­den hedges, and his voice seemed to fall out of mid-​air. Char­lotte turned, with eyes full of light, and a flush of col­or that made her ex­ceed­ing­ly hand­some.

“Well-​a-​mer­cy! Good-​evening, Stephen. When did you get home? No­body had heard tell. Eh? What?”

“I came this af­ter­noon, squire; and as there is a fa­vor you can do us, I thought I would ask it at once.”

“Sure­ly, Stephen. What can I do? Eh? What?”

“I hear your har­vest is home. Can you spare us a cou­ple of men? The wheat in Low Bar­ra fields is ready for the sick­le.”

“Three men, four, if you want them. You can­not have too many sick­les. Cut wheat while the sun shines. Eh? What? How is the la­dy at Up-​Hill?”

“Moth­er is mid­dling well, I'm obliged to you. I think she has failed though, since grand­fa­ther died.”

“It is like­ly. She has been too much by her­self. You should stay at home, Stephen La­trigg. A man's du­ty is more of­ten there than any­where else. Eh?”

“I think you are right now, squire.” And then he blun­dered in­to the very state­ment that he ought to have let alone. “And I am not go­ing to build the mill, squire,--not yet, at least. I would not do any thing to an­noy you for the world.”

The in­for­ma­tion was pleas­ant to San­dal; but he had al­ready heard it, in its least of­fen­sive way, through Ducie and Char­lotte. Steve's broad re­lin­quish­ment de­mand­ed some ac­knowl­edg­ment, and ap­peared to put him un­der an obli­ga­tion which he did not feel he had any right to ac­knowl­edge. He con­sid­ered the build­ing of a mill so near his own prop­er­ty a great so­cial wrong, and why should he thank Stephen La­trigg for not com­mit­ting it?

So he an­swered cold­ly, “You must take your own way, Stephen. I am an old man. I have had my say in my gen­er­ation, maybe I haven't any right to med­dle with yours. New men, new times.” Then be­ing con­scious that he was a lit­tle un­gen­er­ous he walked off to Mrs. San­dal, and left the lovers to­geth­er. Steve would have for­giv­en the squire a great deal more for such an op­por­tu­ni­ty, es­pe­cial­ly as a still kinder af­ter-​thought fol­lowed it. For he had not gone far be­fore he turned, and called back, “Bring Steve in­to the house, Char­lotte. He will stay, and have a bit of sup­per with us, no doubt.” Per­haps the lovers made the way in­to the house a lit­tle round­about. But San­dal was not an un­just man; and hav­ing giv­en them the op­por­tu­ni­ty, he did not blame them for tak­ing it. Be­sides he could trust Char­lotte. Though the heav­ens fell, he could trust Char­lotte.

Dur­ing sup­per the con­ver­sa­tion turned again to Stephen's fu­ture plans. Whether the squire liked to ad­mit the fact or not, he was deeply in­ter­est­ed in them; and he lis­tened care­ful­ly to what the young man said.

“If I am go­ing to trust to sheep, squire, then I may as well have plen­ty to trust to. I think of buy­ing the Penghyll 'walk,' and putting a thou­sand on it.”

“My song, Stephen!”

“I can man­age them quite well. I shall get more shep­herds, and there are new ways of do­ing things that light­en la­bor very much. I have been find­ing out all about them. I think of tak­ing three thou­sand fleeces, at the very least, to Brad­ford next sum­mer.”

“Two hun­dred years ago some­body thought of har­ness­ing a flock of wild geese for a trip to the moon. They nev­er could do it. Eh? What?”

Stephen laughed a lit­tle un­com­fort­ably. “That was non­sense, squire.”

“It was 'almighty youth,' Stephen. The young think they can do ev­ery thing. In a few years they do what they can and what they may. It is a blessed truth that the mind can­not stay long in a _bree_. It gets tired of bal­loon­ing, and comes down to hands and feet again. Eh? What?”

“I think you mean kind­ly, squire.”

The con­fi­dence touched him. “I do, Steve. Don't be in a hur­ry, my lad. There are some things in life that are worth a deal more than mon­ey,--things that mon­ey can­not buy. Let mon­ey take a back­ward place.” Then he vol­un­tar­ily asked about the pro­cess­es of spin­ning and weav­ing wool, and in spite of his prej­udices was a lit­tle ex­cit­ed over Stephen's startling state­ments and statis­tics.

In­deed, the young man was so in­ter­est­ing, that San­dal went with him to the hall-​door, and stood there with him, lis­ten­ing to his graph­ic de­scrip­tions of the wool-​rooms at the top of the great York­shire mills. “I'd like well to take you through one, squire. Fleeces? You would be won­der-​struck. There are long sta­ple and short sta­ple; silky wool and wool­ly wool; black fleeces from the Pun­jaub, and curly white ones from Bom­bay; long warps from Rus­sia, short ones from Buenos Ayres; lit­tle Span­ish fleeces, and our own West­more­land and Cum­ber­land skins, that beat ev­ery thing in the world for size. And then to see them turned in­to cloth as fast as steam can do it! My word, squire, there nev­er was mag­ic or witchcraft like the steam and met­al witchcraft of a York­shire mill.”

“Well, well, Steve. I don't fret my­self be­cause I am set in stiller ways, and I don't blame those who like the hur­ry­ment of steam and met­al. Each of us has God's will to do, and our own race to run; and may we pros­per.”

Af­ter this, Steve, some­times gain­ing and some­times los­ing, grad­ual­ly won his way back to the squire's lik­ing. Septem­ber proved to be an un­usu­al­ly fair month; and to the lovers it was full of hap­pi­ness, for ear­ly in it their re­la­tion to each oth­er was ful­ly rec­og­nized; and Stephen had gone in and out of the pleas­ant “Seat,” dayshine and dark, as the ac­knowl­edged lover of Char­lotte San­dal. The squire, up­on the whole, sub­mit­ted grace­ful­ly: he on­ly stip­ulat­ed that for some time, in­def­inite­ly post­poned, the sub­ject of mar­riage was not to be tak­en in­to con­sid­er­ation. “I could not bear it any road. I could not bear it yet, Stephen. Wait your full time, and be glad to wait. So few young men will un­der­stand that to pluck the blos­som is to de­stroy the fruit.”

To­wards the end of Septem­ber, there was a let­ter from Sophia dat­ed Flo­rence. Some let­ters are like some in­di­vid­uals, they car­ry with them a cer­tain un­pleas­ant at­mo­sphere. None of Sophia's epis­tles had been very sat­is­fac­to­ry; for they were so short, and yet so def­inite­ly pinned to Julius, that they were but com­men­taries on that in­di­vid­ual. At Paris she had sim­ply asked Julius, “What do _you_ think of Paris?” And the opin­ion of Julius was then giv­en to Seat-​San­dal con­fi­dent­ly as the on­ly cor­rect es­ti­mate that the world was like­ly to get. At Venice, Rome, Naples, her plan was iden­ti­cal; and any vari­ation of de­tail sim­ply re­ferred to the liv­ing at dif­fer­ent places, and how Julius liked it, and how it had agreed with him.

So when the Flo­rence let­ter came, there was no par­tic­ular en­thu­si­asm about it. The ad­dress as­signed it to the squire, and he left it ly­ing on the ta­ble while he fin­ished the broiled trout and cof­fee be­fore him. But it trou­bled Char­lotte, and she wait­ed anx­ious­ly for the un­pleas­ant words she felt sure were in­side of it. Yet there was no change on the squire's face, and no sign of an­noy­ance, as he read it. “It is about the usu­al thing, Al­ice. Julius likes Flo­rence. It is called 'the beau­ti­ful.' Julius thinks that it de­serves the ti­tle. The wine in Rome did not suit Julius, but he finds the Flo­rence vin­tage much bet­ter. The cli­mate is very de­light­ful, Julius is sure he will de­rive ben­efit from it; and so on, and so on, and so on.” Then there was a short pause, and a rapid turn of the sheet to glance at the oth­er side. “Oh, Julius met Har­ry yes­ter­day! He--Julius--does not think Har­ry is do­ing right. 'Har­ry al­ways was self­ish and ex­trav­agant, and though he did af­front us on our wed­ding-​day, Julius thought it prop­er to call up­on him. He--I mean Har­ry--was with a most beau­ti­ful young girl. Julius thinks fa­ther ought to write to him, and tell him to go back to his du­ty.'”

These were the words, doubt­ful and sug­ges­tive, which made ev­ery heart in Seat-​San­dal thor­ough­ly un­com­fort­able. And yet Char­lotte stout­ly said, “I would not mind Sophia's in­sin­ua­tions, fa­ther and moth­er. She is an­gry at Har­ry. Har­ry has as much right in Flo­rence as Sophia has. He told us he was go­ing there. He has writ­ten to us fre­quent­ly. Sup­pose he was with a beau­ti­ful girl: is Julius the on­ly young man en­ti­tled to such a priv­ilege? Sophia is hap­py in her own way, and we do not en­vy nor in­ter­fere with her hap­pi­ness; but why should we per­mit her to make us un­hap­py? Throw the let­ter out of your mem­ories, dear fa­ther and moth­er. It is on­ly a piece of ill-​na­ture. Per­haps Julius had been cross with her; and if Sophia has a grievance, she nev­er rests un­til she pass­es it on to some one.”

Wom­en still hold the di­vin­ing-​cup, and Char­lotte was not far wrong in her sup­po­si­tion. In spite of their twin­ship of soul, and in spite of that habit of lov­ing which was in­volved in their be­lief “that they had been hus­band and wife in many a pre­vi­ous ex­is­tence,” Mr. and Mrs. Julius San­dal dis­agreed as con­ven­tion­al­ly as the or­di­nary hus­band and wife of one ex­is­tence. The day on which the Flo­rence let­ter was writ­ten had been a very un­hap­py one for Sophia. Julius had quar­relled with her about some very triv­ial af­fair, and had gone out in a tem­per dis­grace­ful­ly at vari­ance with the oc­ca­sion for it; and Sophia had sat all day nurs­ing her wrath in her dark­ened room. She did not dress for the evening drive, for she had de­ter­mined to “keep up” her anger un­til Julius made her some atone­ment.

But when he came home, she could not re­sist his air of con­fi­dence and sat­is­fac­tion. He had quite for­got­ten the af­fair at the break­fast-​ta­ble, and was on­ly ea­ger for her help and sym­pa­thy. “I have seen Har­ry,” he said.

“Very well. You came here to find him. I sup­pose I can see him al­so. I am sure I need to see some one. I have been ne­glect­ed all day; suf­fer­ing, lone­ly,”--

“Sophia, you and I are here to look af­ter our own af­fairs a lit­tle. If you are will­ing to help me, I shall be glad; if not”--

“You know I will help you in any thing I can, Julius.”

Then he kissed her, and she cried a lit­tle, and he kissed her again; and she dressed her­self, and they went for a drive, and dur­ing it met Har­ry, and brought him back to dine with them. Julius was par­tic­ular­ly pleas­ant to the un­sus­pi­cious sol­dier. He soon per­ceived that he was thor­ough­ly dis­gust­ed with the rig­or and rou­tine of mil­itary life, and long­ing to free him­self from its thral­dom; and he en­cour­aged him in the idea.

“I won­der how you stand it, Har­ry,” he said sym­pa­thet­ical­ly.

“You see, Julius, when I went in­to the army, I was so weary of San­dal-​Side; and I liked the uni­form, and the stir of an of­fi­cer's life, and the ad­mi­ra­tion of the girls, and the whole _eclat_ of the thing. But when a man's time comes, and he falls so deeply in love that he cares for noth­ing on earth but one wom­an, then he hates what­ev­er comes be­tween him­self and that wom­an.”

“Nat­ural­ly so. I sup­pose it is the young la­dy I saw you walk­ing with this morn­ing.”

And Har­ry blushed like a girl as he grave­ly nod­ded his head.

“Does she live here?”

“She will for the fu­ture.”

“And you must go back to your reg­iment?”

“Al­most im­me­di­ate­ly.”

“Too bad! Too bad! Why not leave the army?”

“I--I have thought of that; but un­less I re­turned to San­dal-​Side, my fa­ther would be an­gry be­yond ev­ery thing.”

“Fa­thers can­not be au­to­crats--quite. You might sell out.”

“Julius, you ought not to sug­gest such a thing. The temp­ta­tion has been lurk­ing in my own heart. I am sor­ry you have giv­en it a voice. It would be a shame­ful thing to do un­less fa­ther were will­ing.”

“I have a friend anx­ious for a com­mis­sion. I should think a thou­sand pounds would make an ex­change.”

“Do not speak on the sub­ject, Julius.”

“Very well. I was on­ly sup­pos­ing; a fel­low-​feel­ing, you know. I have mar­ried the girl I de­sired; and I am sor­ry for a young man who is obliged to leave a hand­some mis­tress, and to feel that oth­ers may see her and talk to her while he can­not. It was on­ly a sup­po­si­tion. Do not mind it.”

But the germ of ev­ery wrong deed is the re­flec­tion whether it be pos­si­ble. And af­ter Har­ry had gone away with the thought in his heart, Julius sat mus­ing over his own plans, and Sophia wrote the let­ter which so un­nec­es­sar­ily and un­kind­ly shad­owed the pleas­ant life at Seat-​San­dal. For though the squire pooh-​poohed it, and Char­lotte pro­fessed in­dif­fer­ence about it, and Mrs. San­dal kept as­sur­ing her­self and oth­ers that “Har­ry nev­er, nev­er would do any thing wrong or un­kind, es­pe­cial­ly about a wom­an,” ev­ery one was ap­pre­hen­sive and watch­ful. But at last, even sus­pi­cion tires of watch­ing for events that nev­er hap­pen; and Sophia sent oth­er let­ters, and made no men­tion of Har­ry; and the fear that had crouched at each home-​heart slunk away in­to for­get­ful­ness.

In­to to­tal for­get­ful­ness. When Har­ry vol­un­tar­ily came home for Christ­mas, no one cou­pled his vis­it with the re­marks made by Sophia four months pre­vi­ous­ly. They had not ex­pect­ed to see him, and the news of his ad­vent bare­ly reached the house be­fore he fol­lowed it; for there was a heavy snow-​storm, and the mail was sent for­ward with dif­fi­cul­ty. So Mrs. San­dal was read­ing the let­ter an­nounc­ing his vis­it when she heard his voice in the hall, and the joy­ful cry of Char­lotte as she ran to meet him. And that night ev­ery one was too hap­py, too full of in­quiry and in­for­ma­tion, to no­tice that Har­ry was un­der an un­usu­al re­straint. It did not even strike Char­lotte un­til she awoke the next morn­ing with all her fac­ul­ties fresh and clear; then she felt, rather than un­der­stood, that there was some­thing not quite right about Har­ry.

It was still snow­ing, and ev­ery thing was white; but the at­mo­sphere of a qui­et, hap­py Christ­mas was in the house. There were smil­ing faces and good wish­es at the break­fast-​ta­ble, and the shift­ing lus­tres of blaz­ing fires up­on the dark walls and ev­er­greens and wax-​white mistle­toe. And the wind brought a Christ­mas greet­ing from the bells of Fur­ness and Torv­er, and San­dal-​Side peal sent it on to Earl­stow­er and Con­is­ton. Af­ter break­fast they all went to church; and Har­ry saw, as in a dream, the sa­cred ta­ble spread with spot­less cloth and sil­ver cups and flagons, and the dim place decked with hol­ly, and the smil­ing glance of wel­come from his old ac­quain­tances in the vil­lage. And he fell in­to a rever­ie which was not a Christ­mas rever­ie, and had it sud­den­ly bro­ken by his sis­ter singing high and clear the car­ol the an­gels sung on the hills of Beth­le­hem,--“Glo­ry be to God on high!” And the tears sprang in­to his eyes, and he looked stealthi­ly at his fa­ther and moth­er, who were rev­er­ent­ly lis­ten­ing; and said soft­ly to him­self, “I wish that I had nev­er been born.”

For he had come to tell his fa­ther news which he knew would shake the foun­da­tions of love and life; and he felt like a cow­ard and a thief in de­lay­ing the ex­pla­na­tion. “What right have I to this one day's more love?” he asked him­self; and yet he could not en­dure to mar the holy, un­selfish fes­ti­val with the rev­ela­tion of his own self­ish­ness. As the day wore on, a sense of weari­ness and even gloom came with it. Rich food and wine are by no means con­ducive to cheer­ful­ness. The squire sloomed and slept in his chair; and fi­nal­ly, af­ter a cup of tea, went to bed. The ser­vants had a par­ty in their own hall, and Mrs. San­dal and Char­lotte were oc­cu­pied an hour or two in its or­der­ing. Then the moth­er was thor­ough­ly weary; and be­fore it was quite nine o'clock, Har­ry and Char­lotte were left alone by the par­lor fire. Char­lotte was a lit­tle dull al­so; for Steve had found it im­pos­si­ble to get down the moun­tain dur­ing the storm, and she missed him, and was con­stant­ly in­clined to fall in­to short si­lences.

Af­ter one of them, she raised her eyes to Har­ry's face, and was shocked by its ex­pres­sion. “Har­ry,” she said, lean­ing for­ward to take his hand, “I am sure you are in trou­ble. What is it?”

“If I durst tell you, Char­lotte!”

“What­ev­er you have dared to do, you may dare to tell me, Har­ry, I think.”

“I have got mar­ried.”

“Well, where is the harm? Is it to the la­dy whose pic­ture you showed me?”

“Yes. I told you she was poor.”

“It is a great pity she is poor. I am afraid we are get­ting poor too. Fa­ther was say­ing last week that he had been talk­ing with Squire Bev­er­ley. Emi­ly is to have fif­teen thou­sand pounds. Fa­ther is fever­ish­ly anx­ious about you and Emi­ly. Her for­tune would be a great thing at San­dal, and fa­ther likes her.”

“What is the use of talk­ing about Emi­ly? I have been mar­ried to Beat­rice Lan­za since last Septem­ber.”

“Such a strange name! Is it a Scotch name?”

“She is an Ital­ian.”

“Har­ry San­dal! What a shame!”

“Don't you think God made Ital­ians as well as En­glish­men?”

“That is not the ques­tion. God made In­di­ans and ne­groes and all sorts of peo­ple. But he set the world in races, as he set races in fam­ilies. He told the Jews to keep to them­selves. He was an­gry when they in­ter­mar­ried with oth­ers. It al­ways brought harm. What kind of a per­son is an Ital­ian? They are pa­pists, I know. The Pope of Rome is an Ital­ian. O Har­ry, Har­ry, Har­ry! It will kill fa­ther and moth­er. But per­haps, as you met her in Ed­in­burgh, she is a Protes­tant. The Scotch are all Protes­tants.”

“Beat­rice is a Ro­man Catholic, a very strict Ro­man Catholic. I had to mar­ry her in a Romish church.” He said the words rather de­fi­ant­ly, for Char­lotte's at­ti­tude of­fend­ed him; and he had reached that point when it was a reck­less plea­sure to put things at their worst.

“Then I am ashamed of you. The dear old rec­tor! He mar­ried fa­ther and moth­er; he chris­tened and con­firmed you; you might be sure, that if you could not ask him to mar­ry you, you had no busi­ness to mar­ry at all.”

“You said her face was like an an­gel's, and that you would love her, Char­lotte.”

“Oh, in­deed! But I did not think the an­gel was an Ital­ian an­gel and a Ro­man-​Catholic an­gel. Cir­cum­stances al­ter cas­es. You, who have been brought up a good Church-​of-​Eng­land gen­tle­man, to go over to the Pope of Rome!”

“I have not gone over to the Pope of Rome.”

“All the same, Har­ry; all the same. And you know how fa­ther feels about that. Fa­ther would fight for the Church quick­er than he would fight for his own house and land. Why! the San­dals got all of their Mil­lom Es­tate for be­ing good Protes­tants; for stand­ing by the Hanove­ri­an line in­stead of those popish Stu­arts. Fa­ther will think you have com­mit­ted an act of trea­son against both church and state, and he will be ashamed to show his face among the Dale squires. It is too bad! too bad for any thing!” and she cov­ered her face, and cried bit­ter­ly.

“She is so love­ly, so good”--

“Non­sense! Were there no love­ly En­glish girls? no good En­glish girls? Emi­ly is ten times love­li­er.”

“You know what you said.”

“I said it to please you.”

“Char­lotte!”

“Yes, I did,--at least, in a great mea­sure. It is easy enough to call a pret­ty girl an an­gel; and as for my promise to love your wife, of course I ex­pect­ed you would choose a wife suit­able to your re­li­gion and your birth. Sup­pose you se­lect­ed some out­landish dress,--an Ital­ian brig­and's, for in­stance,--what would the neigh­bor­ing gen­tle­men think of you? It would be an in­sult to their na­tion­al cos­tume, and they would do right to re­sent it. Well, be­ing who and what you are, you have no right to bring an Ital­ian wom­an in­to Seat-​San­dal. It is an in­sult to ev­ery wom­an in the coun­ty, and they will make you feel it.”

“I shall not give them the op­por­tu­ni­ty. Beat­rice can­not live in this beast­ly cli­mate.”

“The cli­mate is wrong al­so? Nat­ural­ly. It would fol­low the re­li­gion and the wom­an. Har­ry San­dal, I wish I had died, ere my ears had heard such a shame and sor­row for my fa­ther and moth­er! Where are you go­ing to live, then?”

“In Flo­rence. It is the birth­place of Beat­rice the city as­so­ci­at­ed with all her tri­umphs.”

“God have mer­cy, Har­ry! Her tri­umphs! Is she, then, an ac­tress?”

“She is a singer,--a won­der­ful singer; one to whom the world has lis­tened with breath­less de­light.”

“A singing wom­an! And you have mar­ried her? It is an out­rage on your an­ces­tors, and on your par­ents and sis­ters.”

“I will not hear you speak in that way, Char­lotte. Of course I mar­ried her. Did you wish me to ru­in and de­base her? _That_, I sup­pose, you could have for­giv­en. My sin against the San­dals and so­ci­ety is, that I mar­ried her.”

“No, sir; you know bet­ter. Your sin is in hav­ing any thing what­ev­er to do with her. There is not a soul in San­dal that would have hes­itat­ed be­tween ru­in and mar­riage. If it had to be one or the oth­er, then fa­ther and moth­er both, then I, then all your friends, would have said with­out hes­ita­tion, 'Mar­ry the wom­an.'”

“I ex­pect­ed and hoped this would be your view of the sit­ua­tion. I could not give up Beat­rice, and I could not be a scoundrel to her.”

“You might have thought of an­oth­er wom­an be­sides Beat­rice. Is a sin against a moth­er a less sin than one against a strange wom­an? A moth­er is some­thing sa­cred. To wound her heart is to throw a stone at her. You have com­mit­ted a sort of sac­ri­lege. And you are mar­ried. No en­treaties can pre­vent, and no re­pen­tance can avail. Oh, what a sor­row to dark­en all the rest of fa­ther's and moth­er's days! What right have you to spoil their lives, in or­der to give your­self a lit­tle plea­sure? O Har­ry! I nev­er knew that you were self­ish be­fore.”

“I de­serve all you say, Charley, but I loved Beat­rice so much.”

“Are you sure, even of that ex­cuse? I heard you vow that you loved Eliza Pier­son 'so much,' and Fan­ny Ul­loch 'so much,' and Emi­ly Bev­er­ley 'so much.' Why did you not come home, and speak to me be­fore it was too late? Why come at all now?”

“Be­cause I want to talk to you about mon­ey. I have sold out.”

“Sold out? Is there any more bad news? Do you know what fa­ther paid for your com­mis­sion? Do you know how it ham­pered him to do it? that, in fact, he has nev­er been quite easy about ready mon­ey since?”

“I had to sell out. Did I not tell you that Beat­rice could not live in this cli­mate? She was very ill when she re­turned to Italy. Sig­nor Lan­za was in great trou­ble about her.”

“Sig­nor Lan­za? Her broth­er, I sup­pose.”

“You sup­pose wrong. He is her fa­ther.”

“For her, then, you have giv­en up your faith, your coun­try, your home, your pro­fes­sion, ev­ery thing that oth­er men hold dear and sa­cred. Do you ex­pect fa­ther to sup­port you? Or is your wife to sing in Italy?”

“I think you are try­ing how dis­agree­able you can be, Char­lotte.”

“I am ask­ing you hon­est ques­tions in hon­est words.”

“I have the mon­ey from the sale of my com­mis­sion.”

“It does not then strike you as dis­hon­or­able to keep it?”

“No, fa­ther gave me it.”

“It ap­pears to me, that if mon­ey was tak­en from the es­tate, let us say to stock a sheep-​walk, and it was de­cid­ed af­ter three years' tri­al to give up the en­ter­prise, and sell the sheep, that the mon­ey would nat­ural­ly go back to the es­tate. When you came of age, fa­ther made you a very gen­er­ous al­lowance. Af­ter a time you pre­ferred that he should in­vest a large sum in a mil­itary com­mis­sion for you; and you pro­posed to live up­on your pay,--a thing you nev­er have even tried to do. Sud­den­ly, you find that the com­mis­sion will not suit your more re­cent plans, and you sell it. Ought not the mon­ey to go back to the es­tate, and you to make a fresh ar­range­ment with fa­ther about your al­lowance? That is my idea.”

“Fool­ish­ness! And pray what al­lowance would my fa­ther make me, af­ter the mar­riage I have con­tract­ed?”

“Now, you show your se­cret heart, Har­ry. You know you have no right to ex­pect one, and so you keep what is not yours. This sin al­so for the wom­an whom you have put be­fore ev­ery sen­ti­ment of love and hon­or.”

“You were stub­born enough about Steve La­trigg.”

“I was hon­or­able; I was con­sid­er­ate for fa­ther, and did not put Stephen be­fore him. Do you think I would ev­er mar­ry Stephen against fa­ther's wish, or to the in­jury or suf­fer­ing of any one whom I love? Cer­tain­ly I would mar­ry no one else, but I gave fa­ther my word that I would wait for his sanc­tion. When peo­ple do right, things come right for them. But if fa­ther had stood out twen­ty years, Steve and I would have wait­ed. Ducie gave us the same ad­vice. 'Wait, chil­dren,' she said: 'I have seen many a wil­ful match, and many a run-​away match, but nev­er one, nev­er one that pros­pered.'”

“Charley, I ex­pect­ed you to stand by me. I ex­pect­ed you to help me.”

“O Har­ry, Har­ry! How can I help? What can I do? There is noth­ing left but to suf­fer.”

“There is this: plead for me when I am away. My wife is sick in Flo­rence. I must go to her at once. The mon­ey I have from my com­mis­sion is all I have. I am go­ing to in­vest it in a lit­tle house and vine­yard. I have found out that my re­al tastes are for a pas­toral life.”

“Ah, if you could on­ly have found that out for fa­ther!”

“Cir­cum­stances may change.”

“That is, your fa­ther may die. I sup­pose you and your wife have talked over that prob­abil­ity. Beat­rice will be able to en­dure the cli­mate then.”

“If I did not see that you were un­der very strong ex­cite­ment, Char­lotte, I should be much of­fend­ed by what you say. But you don't mean to hurt me. Do you imag­ine that I feel no sor­row in leav­ing fa­ther and my moth­er and you and the old home? My heart is very sad to-​night, Charley. I feel that I shall come here no more.”

“Then why go away? Why, why?”

“Be­cause a man leaves fa­ther and moth­er and ev­ery thing for the wom­an he loves. Charley, help me.”

She shook her head sad­ly.

“Help me to break the trou­ble to fa­ther.”

“There is no 'break­ing' it. It will break him. It will kill him. Alas, it is the un­grate­ful child that has the pow­er to in­flict a slow and tor­tur­ing death! Poor fa­ther! Poor moth­er! And it is I that must wit­ness it. I, that would die to save them from such un­de­served sor­row.”

Then Har­ry rose up an­gri­ly, pushed his chair im­pa­tient­ly away, and with­out a word went to his own room.

In the morn­ing the squire came down to break­fast in ex­ceed­ing­ly high spir­its. A Scotch­man would have called him “_fey_,” and been cer­tain that mis­for­tune was at his heels. And Char­lotte looked at him in won­der­ing pity, for Har­ry's face was the face of a man de­ter­mined to car­ry out his own will re­gard­less of con­se­quences.

“Come, come, Har­ry,” said the squire in a loud, cheer­ful voice, “you are mop­ing, and eat­ing no break­fast. Char­lotte will have to fill three times be­fore it is 'cup down' with me. I think we will take Dob­bin, and go over to Win­der­mere in the tax-​cart. The roads will be a bit slop­pery, but Dob­bin isn't too old to splash through them at a rat­tling pace. He is a fa­mous good old-​has-​been is Dob­bin. Give me a Suf­folk Punch for a road­ster. I set much by them. Eh? What?”

“I must leave San­dal this morn­ing, sir.”

“Sir me no sir, Har­ry. 'Fa­ther' will stand be­tween you and me, I think. You must make a put-​off for one day. I was at Bow­ness last week, and they say such a win­ter for char-​fish­ing was nev­er seen. While I was on the lake­side, Kit No­ble's boat came in. He had all of twen­ty dozen in the bot­tom of it. Mr. Wordsworth was there too, and he made a piece of po­et­ry about 'The sil­very lights play­ing over them;' and he took me to see a pic­ture that a Lon­don gen­tle­man paint­ed of Kit and his boat. You nev­er saw fish out of the wa­ter look so fresh; their olive-​green backs and ver­mil­lion bel­lies and dark-​red fins were as nat­ural as life. Come Har­ry, we will go and fetch over a few dozen. If you car­ry your colonel some, he will take the gift as an ex­cuse for the day. Eh? What?”

“I think Har­ry had bet­ter not go with you, fa­ther.”

“Eh? What is the mat­ter with you, Char­lotte? You are as nat­tert and cross as nev­er was. Where is your moth­er? I like my morn­ing cup filled with a smile. It helps the day through.”

“Moth­er isn't feel­ing well. She had a bad dream about Har­ry and you, and she is mak­ing her­self sick over it. She is all in a trem­ble. I didn't think moth­er was so fool­ish.”

“Dreams are from some­where be­yond us, Char­lotte. There's them that vis­it us a-​dream­ing. I am not so wise as to be fool­ish. I be­lieve in some things that are out­side of my short wits. Maybe we had bet­ter not go to Win­der­mere. We might be tempt­ed in­to a boat, and dry land is a mid­dling bit safer. Eh? What?”

Char­lotte felt as if she could en­dure her fa­ther's un­sus­pi­cious hap­pi­ness no longer. It was like watch­ing a lit­tle child smil­ing and prat­tling on the road to its moth­er's fu­ner­al. She put Mrs. San­dal's break­fast on a small tray, and with this in her hand went up-​stairs, leav­ing Har­ry and the squire still at the ta­ble.

“Char­lotte is a bit hur­rysome this morn­ing,” he said; and Har­ry mak­ing no an­swer, he seemed sud­den­ly to be struck with his at­ti­tude. He looked cu­ri­ous­ly at him a mo­ment, and then lapsed in­to si­lence. “Har­ry wants mon­ey.” That was his first thought, and he be­gan to cal­cu­late how far he was able to meet the want. Even then, his on­ly bit­ter re­flec­tion was, that Har­ry should sup­pose it nec­es­sary to be glum about it. “A cheer­ful asker is the next thing to a cheer­ful giv­er;” and to such mus­ings he filled his pipe, and with a shad­ow of of­fence on his large rud­dy face went in­to “the mas­ter's room” to smoke.

When kind­ly good-​na­ture is snubbed, it feels it keen­ly; and there was a mist of tears in the squire's blue eyes when Har­ry fol­lowed, and he turned them on him. And it was part of his pun­ish­ment, that, even in the first flush of the plea­sure of his sin, he felt all the pangs of re­morse.

“Fa­ther?”

“Well, well, Har­ry! I see you are want­ing mon­ey again.”

“It will be the last time. I am mar­ried, and am go­ing to Italy to live.”

“Eh? What?” The squire flushed hot­ly. His hand shook, his long clay pipe fell to the hearth­stone, and was shat­tered to pieces.

Then a reck­less de­sire to have the whole wrong out urged the un­hap­py son to a most cru­el dis­tinct­ness of de­tail. With­out wast­ing a word in ex­pla­na­tion or ex­cuse, he stat­ed broad­ly that he had fall­en in love with the fa­mous singer, Beat­rice Lan­za, and had mar­ried her. He spared him­self or his fa­ther noth­ing; he ap­peared to gath­er a hard courage as he spoke of her fail­ing health, her ha­tred of Eng­land, her de­vo­tion to her own faith, and the ne­ces­si­ty of his re­tire­ment to Italy with her. He seemed de­ter­mined to put it out of the pow­er of any one to say worse of him than he had al­ready said of him­self. In con­clu­sion he added, “I have sold my com­mis­sion, and paid what I owed, and have very lit­tle mon­ey left. Life, how­ev­er, is not an ex­pen­sive af­fair in the vil­lage to which I am go­ing. If you will al­low me two hun­dred pounds a year I shall be very grate­ful.”

“I will not give you one pen­ny, sir.”

The words came thick and heavy, and with great dif­fi­cul­ty; though the wretched fa­ther had risen, and was stand­ing by the ta­ble, lean­ing hard with both hands up­on it.

He would not look at his son, though the young man went on speak­ing. He heard noth­ing that he said. In his ears there was the roar­ing of mighty wa­ters. All the waves and the bil­lows were go­ing over him. For a few mo­ments he strug­gled des­per­ate­ly with the black, ad­vanc­ing tide. His sight failed, it was grow­ing dark. Then he threw the last forces of life in­to one ter­ri­ble cry, and fell, as a great tree falls, heav­ily to the ground.

The cry rang through the house. The moth­er, trem­bling in her bed; Char­lotte, crouch­ing up­on the stairs, fear­ing and lis­ten­ing; the ser­vants, chat­ter­ing in the kitchen and the cham­bers,--all heard it, and were for a mo­ment hor­ri­fied by the agony and de­spair it ex­pressed. But ere the aw­ful echo had quite sub­sid­ed, Char­lotte was at her fa­ther's side; in a mo­ment af­ter­wards, Mrs. San­dal, sob­bing at ev­ery fly­ing step, and still in her night-​cloth­ing, fol­lowed; and then ser­vants from ev­ery quar­ter came rush­ing to the mas­ter's room.

There was no time for in­quiry or lamen­ta­tion. Har­ry and two of the men mount­ed swift hors­es in search of med­ical help. Oth­ers lift­ed the in­sen­si­ble man, and car­ried him ten­der­ly to his bed. In a mo­ment the at­mo­sphere of the house had changed. The mas­ter's room, which had held for gen­er­ations noth­ing but mem­ories of pas­toral busi­ness and syl­van plea­sures, had sud­den­ly be­come a place of sor­row. The shat­tered pipe up­on the hearth­stone made Char­lotte ut­ter a low, hope­less cry of pain. She closed the shut­ters, and put the burn­ing logs up­on the hearth safe­ly to­geth­er, and then locked the door. Alas! alas! they had car­ried the mas­ter out, and in Char­lotte's heart there was a con­vic­tion that he would nev­er more cross its thresh­old.

Af­ter Har­ry's first feel­ings of an­guish and hor­ror had sub­sid­ed, he was dis­tinct­ly re­sent­ful. He felt his fa­ther's suf­fer­ing to be a wrong to him. He be­gan to re­flect that the day for such in­tense emo­tions had passed away. But he for­got that the squire be­longed to a gen­er­ation whose life was filled and ruled by a few strong, de­cid­ed feel­ings and opin­ions that struck their roots deep in­to the very foun­da­tions of ex­is­tence; a gen­er­ation, al­so, which was bear­ing the brunt of the tran­si­tion be­tween the strong, sim­ple life of the past, and the rapid, com­plex life of the present. Thus the squire op­posed to the in­dif­fer­ence of the time a rigid­ity of habits, which, to even small events, gave that ex­cep­tion­al char­ac­ter which rar­ity once im­part­ed. He felt ev­ery thing deeply, be­cause ev­ery thing re­tained its im­por­tance to him. He had great rev­er­ence. He loved, and he hat­ed. All his con­vic­tions and prej­udices were for life.

Har­ry's mar­riage had been a blow at the roots of all his con­scious ex­is­tence. The San­dals had al­ways mar­ried in their own coun­ty, Cum­ber­land ladies of hon­or­able pedi­gree, good daugh­ters of the Church of Eng­land, good house­wives, gen­tle and mod­est wom­en, with more or less land and gold as their dowry. Emi­ly Bev­er­ley would have been pre­cise­ly such a wife. And in a mo­ment, even while Har­ry was speak­ing, the squire had con­trast­ed this Beat­rice Lan­za with her;--a for­eign­er,--an Ital­ian, of all for­eign­ers most ob­jec­tion­able; a sub­ject of the Pa­pal States; a mem­ber of the Romish Church; a wom­an of ob­scure birth, poor and por­tion­less, and in ill-​health; worse than all, a pub­lic wom­an, who had sung for mon­ey, and yet who had made Har­ry desert his home and coun­try and pro­fes­sion for her. And with this train of thought an­oth­er ran par­al­lel,--the shame and the wrong of it all. The dis­grace to his wife and daugh­ters, the hu­mil­ia­tion to him­self. Each bit­ter thought beat on his heart like the ham­mer on the anvil. They fought and blend­ed with each oth­er. He could not mas­ter one. He felt him­self be­ing beat­en to the ground. He made ag­oniz­ing ef­forts to re­tain con­trol over the surg­ing wave of an­guish, ris­ing, ris­ing, ris­ing from his breast to his brain. And fail­ing to do so, he fell with the mighty cry of one who, even in the death agony, protests against the vic­tor.

The news spread as if all the birds in the air car­ried it. There were a dozen physi­cians in Seat-​San­dal be­fore noon. There was a crowd of shep­herds around it, wait­ing in silent groups for their ver­dict. All the af­ter­noon the gen­tle­men of the Dales were com­ing and go­ing with of­fers of help and sym­pa­thy; and in the lone­ly par­lor the rec­tor was soft­ly pac­ing up and down, mut­ter­ing, as he walked, pas­sages from the “Or­der for the Vis­ita­tion of the Sick”:--

"O Saviour of the world, who by thy cross and pre­cious blood hast re­deemed us, save us, and help us, we humbly be­seech thee, O Lord.

"Spare us good Lord. Spare thy peo­ple whom thou hast re­deemed with thy most pre­cious blood.

"Shut not up thy ten­der mer­cies in dis­plea­sure; but make him to hear of joy and glad­ness.

“De­liv­er him from the fear of the en­emy. Lift up the light of thy coun­te­nance up­on him. Amen.”