 Chapter 28. The Ordeal It was the afternoon of an April day in that same year, and the sky was blue above, with little sailing white clouds catching the pleasant sunlight. The earth in that northern country had scarcely yet put on her robe of green. The few trees grew near brooks running down from the moors and the higher ground. The air was full of pleasant sounds prophesying of the coming summer. The rush and murmur and tinkle of the hidden watercourses, the song of the lark poised up high in the sunny air, the bleed of the lands calling to their mothers. Everything inanimate was full of hope and gladness. For the first time for a mournful month the front door of Hader's Bank Farm was open. The warm spring air might enter and displace the sad dark gloom if it could. There was a newly lighted fire in the unused grate and Kester was in the kitchen with his clogs off his feet so as not to dirty the spotless floor, stirring here and there and trying in his awkward way to make things look home-like and cheerful. He had brought in some wild daffodils which he had been to seek in the dawn and he placed them in a jug on the dresser. Dolly Reed, the woman who had come to help Sylvia during her mother's illness a year ago, was attending to something in the back kitchen, making a noise among the milk cans and singing a ballad to herself as she worked. Yet every now and then she checked herself in her singing as if a sudden recollection came upon her that this was neither the time nor the place for songs. Once or twice she took up the funeral song which is sung by the bearers of the body in that country. But it was of no use. The pleasant April weather out of doors and perhaps the natural spring in the body disposed her nature to cheerfulness and insensibly she returned to her old ditty. Kester was turning over many things in his rude honest mind as he stood there, giving his finishing touches every now and then to the aspect of the house place in preparation for the return of the widow and daughter of his old master. It was a month and more since they had left home. More than a fortnight since Kester, with three half-pence in his pocket, had set out after his day's work to go to York to walk all night long and to wish Daniel Robson his last farewell. Daniel had tried to keep up and had brought out one or two familiar thread-bear, well-worn jokes, such as he had made Kester chuckle over many a time and oft, when the two had been together afield or in the shippen at the home, which he should never more see. But no old grouse in the gun room could make Kester smile or do anything except groan in but a heartbroken sort of fashion. And presently the talk had become more suitable to the occasion. Daniel being up to the last, the more composed of the two. For Kester, when turned out of the condemned cell, fairly broke down into the heavy sobbing he had never thought to sob again on earth. He had left Bell and Sylvia in their lodging at York under Philip's care. He dared not go see them. He could not trust himself. He had sent them his duty, and bade Philip tell Sylvia that the game hen had brought out fifteen chickens at a hatch. Yet although Kester sent this message through Philip, although he saw and recognized all that Philip was doing on their behalf, in the behalf of Daniel Robson, the condemned felon, his honoured master, he liked Hepburn not a whit better than he had done before all this sorrow had come upon them. Philip had perhaps shown a want of tact in his conduct to Kester. Acute with passionate keenness in one direction, he had a sort of dull straightforwardness in all others. For instance, he had returned Kester the money which the latter had so gladly advanced towards the expenses incurred in defending Daniel. Now the money which Philip gave him back was a part of an advance which foster brothers had made on Philip's own account. Philip had thought that it was hard on Kester to lose his savings in a hopeless cause, and had made a point of repaying the old man. But Kester would far rather have felt that the earnings of the sweat of his brow had gone in the attempt to save his master's life than have had twice ten times as many gold guineas. Moreover, it seemed to take his action in lending his hoard out of the sphere of love, and make it but a leaden common loan, when it was Philip who brought him the sum, not Sylvia, into whose hands he had given it. With these feelings Kester felt his heart shut up, as he saw the long watched for to coming down the little path with a third person with Philip holding up the failing steps of poor Belle Robson as loaded with her heavy mourning and feeble from the illness which had detained her in York ever since the day of her husband's execution. She came faltering back to her desolate home. Sylvia was also occupied in attending to her mother. Once or twice when they paused a little, she and Philip spoke in the familiar way in which there is no coin as no reserve. Kester caught up his clogs and went quickly out through the back kitchen into the farmyard, not staying to greet them, as he had meant to do. And yet it was dull-sided of him not to have perceived that whatever might be the relations between Philip and Sylvia he was sure to have accompanied them home, for alas, he was the only male protector of their blood remaining in the world. Poor Kester, who would feign have taken that office upon himself, chose to esteem himself cast off, and went heavily about the farmyard, knowing that he ought to go in and bid such poor welcome as he had to offer, yet feeling too much to like to show himself before Philip. It was long too before anyone had leisure to come and seek him. Belle's mind had flashed up for a time, till the fatal day, only to be reduced by her subsequent illness into complete and hopeless childishness. It was all Philip and Sylvia could do to manage her in the first excitement of returning home. Her restless inquiry for him who would never more be present in the familiar scene, her feverish weariness and uneasiness, all required tender soothing and most patient endurance of her refusals to be satisfied with what they said or did. At length she took some food, and refreshed by it and warmed by the fire, she sank asleep in her chair. Then Philip would feign had spoken with Sylvia before the hour came at which he must return to Monkshaven. But she eluded him and went in search of Kester, whose presence she had missed. She had guessed some of the causes which kept him from greeting them on their first return. But it was not as if she had shaped these causes into the definite form of words. It is astonishing to look back and find how differently constituted were the minds of most people 50 or 60 years ago. They felt they understood without going through reasoning or analytic processes. And if this was the case among the more educated people, of course it was still more so in a class to which Sylvia belonged. She knew by some sort of intuition that if Philip accompanied them home, as indeed under the circumstances was so natural as to be almost unavoidable, the old servant and friend of the family would have sent himself. And so she slipped away at the first possible moment to go in search of him. There he was in the farm yard, leaning over the gate that opened into the home field, apparently watching the poultry that scratched and pecked at the new spring and grass with the utmost relish. A little farther off were the ewes with their new dropped lambs. Beyond that the great old thorn tree with its round fresh clusters of buds. Again beyond that there was a glimpse of the vast sunny rippling sea. But Sylvia knew well that Kester was looking at none of these things. She went up to him and touched his arm. He started from his reverie and turned round upon her with his dim eyes full of unshed tears. When he saw her black dress her deep mourning, he had hard work to keep from breaking out. But by dint of a good brush of his eyes with the back of his hand and a moment's pause, he could look at her again with tolerable calmness. Why Kester? Why did never come speak to us? said Sylvia, finding it necessary to be cheerful if she could. I don't know, never asked me. I say they indicted Simpson, whose evidence had been all material against poor Daniel Robson at the trial. Ah, to rotten eggs and foul things they could as Saturday they did, continued he in a tone of satisfaction. I and they never stopped to see whether tags were rotten or fresh when their blood was up. Nor were their stones was hard or soft, he added, in a lower tone and chuckling a little. Sylvia was silent. He looked at her now, chuckling still. Her face was white, her lips tightened, her eyes aflame. She drew a long breath. I wish I'd been there. I wish I could do him an ill turn, sighed she with some kind of expression on her face that made Kester coil a little. Nay, lass, who get to fray others, never fret thyself about such rubbish, I am done ill to speak on him. No thou hasn't. Them as was friends of fathers, a love for ever and ever. Them as helped for to hang him, she shuddered from head to foot a sharp irrepressible shudder. I'll never forgive, never. Nivers are long words, said Kester musingly. I could horse whip them, or cast stones at him, or duck him myself. But, lass, nivers are long word. Well, never heed if it is, it's me as has said it, and unturned savage late days, come in, Kester, and see poor mother. Ah, cannot, said he, turning his wrinkled puckered face away, that she might not see the twitchings of emotion on it. There's kind to be fetched up and what not, and he's there, isn't he, Sylvie? Facing round upon her with inquisitiveness, under his peering eyes she reddened a little. Yes, if it's Philip thou means, he's been all we've had to look to soon. Again the shudder. Well, now he'll be seen after his shot by Reckon. Sylvie was calling to the old mare nibbling tufts of early spring and grass here and there, and half unconsciously coaxing the creature to come up to the gate to be stroked. But she heard Kester's words well enough, and so he saw, although she made this excuse not to reply. But Kester was not to be put off. Folks is talking about thee and him, thou hath a mindless thee and him gets your names coupled together. It's right down cruel on folks then, said she, crimsoning from some emotion, as if any man, as was a man, wouldn't do all he could for too long women at such a time, and he a cousin too. Tell me who said so, continued she, firing round at Kester, and I'll never forgive him, that's all. Hoad said Kester a little conscious that he himself was the principal representative of that name of multitude folk. Here's a pretty lass, she's got I'll never forgive at her tongue's end we avengeance. Sylvia was a little confused. Oh Kester man, said she, my heart is sore again every one for father's sake. And at length the natural relief of plentiful tears came, and Kester, with instinctive wisdom, let her weep undisturbed. Indeed he cried not a little himself. They were interrupted by Philip's voice from the back door. Sylvia, your mother's awake and wants you. Come Kester come, and taking hold of him, she drew him with her into the house. Bell rose as they came in, holding by the arms of the chair. At first she received Kester as though he had been a stranger. I'm glad to see you sir, to master's out, but he'll be in a far long. It'll be about to lamb's your come maybe. Mother said Sylvia, do not you see it's Kester, Kester with his Sunday clothes on. Kester, I sure it is, my eyes have gotten so sore and dim of late. Just as if I've been greeting I'm sure lad, I'm glad to see thee. It's a long time I've been away, but it were not pleasure seeking as took me, it were business as some make. Tell him Sylvia, what it were, from my head's clean gone. I only know I wouldn't have left home if I could have helped it, or I think I should have kept my health better if I'd bided at home with my master. I wonder as he's not come din for to bid me welcome. Is he far afield, think he Kester? Kester looked at Sylvia, mutely imploring her to help him out in the dilemma of answering, but she was doing all she could to help crying. Philip came to the rescue, and he said, the clock has stopped. Can you tell me where to find Tiki and I'll wind it up. Tiki, said she hurriedly, Tiki, it's behind a big bible on Yon's shelf, but I'd rather that wouldn't touch it lad, it's to master's work, and he distrusts both meddling with it. Day after day there was this constant reference to her dead husband. In one sense it was a blessing. All the circumstances attendant on his sad and untimely end were swept out of her mind along with the recollection of the fact itself. She referred to him as absent, and had always some plausible way of accounting for it, which satisfied her own mind, and accordingly, they fell into the habit of humoring her, and speaking of him as gone to Munch's Haven, or a field, or wearied out, and taking a nap upstairs, as her fancy led her to believe for the moment. But this forgetfulness, though happy for herself, was terrible for her child. It was a constant renewing of Sylvia's grief, while her mother could give her no sympathy, no help, or strength in any circumstances that arose out of this grief. She was driven more and more upon Philip. His advice and his affection became daily more necessary to her. Kester saw what would be the end of all this more clearly than did Sylvia herself, and impotent to hinder what he feared and disliked, he grew more and more surly every day. Yet he tried to labor hard and well for the interests of the family, as if they were bound up in his good management of the cattle and land. He was out and about by the earliest dawn, working all day long with might and main. He bought himself a pair of new spectacles, which might, he fancied, enable him to read the farmer's complete guide, his dead master's vade makum. But he had never learned more than his capital letters, and had forgotten many of them. So the spectacles did him but little good. Then he would take the book to Sylvia, and ask her to read to him the instructions he needed, instructions, be it noted, that he would formally have despised as mere book learning, but his present sense of responsibility had made him humble. Sylvia would find the place with all deliberation, and putting her finger under the line to keep the exact place of the word she was reading, she would strive in good earnest to read out the directions given. But when every fourth word had to be spelt, it was rather hopeless work, especially as all these words were unintelligible to the open-mouthed listener, however intent he might be. He had generally to fall back on his own experience, and guided by that, things were not doing badly in his estimation, when one day Sylvia said to him, as they were in the hayfield, heeping up the hay into cocks with Dolly Reid's assistants, Kester, I didn't tell thee, there were a letter from Mr. Hall, Lord Malton steward, that came last night and that Philip read me. She stopped for a moment. I, lass, Philip read thee, and whaton might it say? Only that he had an offer for Hatersbank Farm, and would set mother free to go as soon as to crops was off to ground. She sighed a little as she said this. Only saystah, what in business is he for to go and offer to let to farm, for ever he were told as you wish to leave it, observed Kester in high Degin. Oh, replied Sylvia, throwing down her rake as if weary of life. What could we do with to farm and land, if it were all dairy I might have done, but it was so much on its arable, and if tis arable, is not Ayala's to tifor. Oh man, do not find fault with me, I'm just feigned to lie down and die, if it were not for mother. Ay, thy mother will be sore unsettled if thou'st for quitting Hatersbank, said merciless Kester. I cannot help it, I cannot help it, what can I do? It would take two para-mens hands to keep to land up as Maester Hall likes it, and beside, beside what, said Kester, looking up at her with his sudden odd look, one eye shut, the other open, there she stood, her two hands clasped, tight together, her eyes filling with tears, her face pale and sad. Beside what, he asked again sharply. Tancers sent to Maester Hall, Philip wrote it last night, so there's no use planning and fretting, it were done for to best and one be done. She stooped and picked up her rake, and began tossing the hay with energy, the tears streaming down her cheeks unheeded. It was Kester's turn to throw down his rake, she took no notice, he did not feel sure she had observed his action. He began to walk towards the field gate, this movement did catch her eye, for in a minute her hand was on his arm, and she was stooping forward to look into his face. It was working and twitching with emotion. Kester, oh man, speak out, but do not leave me at this ends. What could I have done? Mother has gone date-less with sorrow, and I am but a young lass, the years I mean, firm old enough with weeping. I, to put up for to farm myself sooner than had they turned out, said Kester in a low voice, then working himself up into a passion, as a new suspicion crossed his mind, he added, and what for didn't you tell me unto the letter? You're in a mighty hurry to settle the da, and get rid of the old place. Maester Hall had said to notice to quit on mid-summer day, but Philip had answered it himself. Thou knows I'm not good at reading, writing, special when the letter's full of long words, and Philip had taken it in hand to answer. Without asking thee, Sylvia went on without minding the interruption, and Maester Hall makes a good offer, for to man as is going to come in will take this stock and all to implements, and if mother, if we, if I, like the furniture and all. Furniture, said Kester in grim surprise, what's to come at a missus and thee, that you'll not need a bed to lie on, or a pot to boil your vitil in? Sylvia readened but kept silence. Cannot you speak? O Kester, I didn't think Thou'd turn again me, and me so friendless. It's as if I'd been doing something wrong, and I've so striven to act as his best, there's mother as well as me to be thought on. Cannot you answer a question, said Kester once more, whatens up that to missus and you'll not need bed and table pots and pans? I think I'm going to marry Philip, said Sylvia, in so low a tone that if Kester had not suspected what her answer was to be, he could not have understood it. After a moment's pause, he recommends his walk towards the field gate, but she went after him and held him tight by the arm speaking rapidly. Kester, what could I do? What can I do? He's my cousin, and mother knows him and likes him, and he's been so good to us in all this time a trouble and heavy grief, and he'll keep mother in comfort all the rest of her days. I, and thee in comfort, there's a deal in a well-filled purse in a winch's eye, or one would have thought it weren't so easy for getting the unlad as loved he has to apple on his eye. Kester, Kester, she cried, I've never forgotten Charlie. I think on him, I see him every night lying drowned at the bottom of the sea, forgetting him, man, it's easy talking. She was like a wild creature that sees its young, but is unable to reach it without a deadly spring, and yet is preparing to take that fatal leap. Kester himself was almost startled, and yet it was as if he must go on torturing her. And who tell thee so sure and certain as he were drowned? He might have been carried off by depressing, as well as other men. Oh, if I were but dead, that I might know all, cried she, flinging herself down on the hay. Kester kept silence, then she sprang up again, and looking with eager wistfulness into his face, she said, tell me the chances, tell me quick. Philip's very good and kind, and he says he shall die if I will not marry him, and there's no home for mother in me, no home for her, for as for me, I do not care what comes on me, but if Charlie's alive, I cannot marry Philip. No, not if he dies for one to me, and as for mother, poor mother, Kester, it's an awful straight. Only first tell me if there's a chance, just one in a thousand, only one in a hundred thousand, as Charlie were tamed by to gain. She was breathless by this time. What with her hurried words, and what with the beating of her heart? Kester took time to answer. He had spoken before too hastily. This time he weighed his words. King Raid went away from this here place to join his ship, and he never joined it no more, and to captain and all his friends at New Castle as ever were, made search for him on board to King's ships. That's more than a fifteen month ago, and not as ever been heard on him by any man. That's what's to be said on one side it's a matter. Then on another there's this as is known. His hat were cast up by to see a ribbon on it, as there's reason to think as he'd not have parted with so quick if he'd had his own will. But you said as he might have been carried off by to gain. You did, Kester, though now you're off at other's side. My lass, I'd fain have him alive, and I did not fancy fill up for thy husband, but it's the serious judgment as thou's put me on, and I'm trying it fair. There's always one chance in a thousand that he's alive, for no man ever saw him dead. But to gain were known about Munch's Haven then, there were never a tender unto coast nearer than shields, and those there were searched. He did not say any more, but turned back into the field, and took up his hay-making again. Sylvia stood quite still, thinking and wistfully longing for some kind of certainty. Kester came up to her, Sylvie. Thou knows Philip paid me back my money, and it were eight pound fifteen and three pence, and to hay and stock'll sell for some it above to rent, and I've a sister as he's a decent widow woman, though but badly off, livin' at Dayland, and if thee and thy mother'll go live with her, I'll give thee well on to all I can earn, and it'll be a matter of five shilling a week. But to not go and marry a man as thou's known taken with, and another as most like for to be dead, but who, maybe, is alive, havin' a pull on thy heart. Sylvia began to cry as if her heart was broken. She had promised herself more fully to Philip the night before than she had told Kester, and with some pains and much patience, her cousin, her lover alas, her future husband, had made the fact clear to the bewildered mind of her poor mother, who had all day long shown that her mind and heart were full of the subject, and that the contemplation of it was giving her as much peace as she could ever know. And now Kester's words came to call up echoes in the poor girl's heart, just as she was in this miserable state, wishing that the grave lay open before her, and that she could lie down and be covered up by the soft green turf from all the bitter sorrows and carking cares and weary bewilderments of this life, wishing that her father was alive, that Charlie was once more here, that she had not repeated the solemn words by which she had promised herself to Philip only the very evening before. She heard a soft, low whistle, and looking round unconsciously, there was her lover, an affianced husband, leaning on the gate, and gazing into the field with passionate eyes, devouring the fair face and figure of her, his future wife. Oh, Kester, said she once more, what man I do? I'm pledged to him as strong as words can make it, and mother blessed us both with more sense than she's had for weeks. Kester, man, speak. Shall I go and break it all off? Say. Nay, it's no one for me to say. Mappan thou's gone too far. Them above only knows what is best. Again that long, cooing whistle. Sylvie. He's been very kind to us all, said Sylvie, laying down her rake with low care. And I'll try to make him happy. End of Chapter 28. Chapter 29 Of Sylvie's Lovers This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Xu Shan. Sylvie's Lovers by Elizabeth Gaskell. Chapter 29 Wedding Raymond Philip and Sylvie were engaged. It was not so happy a state of things as Philip had imagined. He had already found that out, although it was not twenty-four hours since Sylvie had promised to be his. He could not have defined why he was so dissatisfied if he had been compelled to account for his feeling. He would probably have alleged as a reason that Sylvie's manner was so unchanged by her new position towards him. She was quiet and gentle, but no shyer, no brighter, no coir, no happier than she had been for months before. When she joined him at the field gate, his heart was beating fast, his eyes were beaming out love at her approach. She neither blushed nor smiled, but seemed absorbed in thought of some kind. But she resisted his silent effort to draw her away from the path leading to the house, and turned her face steadily homewards. He murmured soft words, which she scarcely heard. Right in their way was the stone trough for the fresh bubbling water, that issuing from a roadside spring served for all the household purposes of Hater's Bank Farm. By it were the milk-cans, glittering and clean. Sylvie knew she should have to stop for these, and carry them back home in readiness for the evening's milking. And at this time during this action, she resolved to say what was on her mind. They were there, Sylvie spoke. Philip, Kester has been saying as how it might have been. Well, said Philip, Sylvie sat down on the edge of the trough, and dipped her hot little hand in the water. Then she went on quickly and lifting her beautiful eyes to Philip's face with the look of inquiry. He thinks his Charlie Kinrad may have been took by to Press King. It was the first time she had named the name of her former lover to her present one since the day, long ago now, when they had quarreled about him. And the rosy colour flushed her all over, but her sweet, trustful eyes never flinched from their steady, unconscious gaze. Philip's heart stopped beating, literally, as if he had come to a sudden precipice, while he had thought himself securely walking on sunny Greensward. He went purple all over from dismay. He dared not take his eyes away from that sad, earnest look of hers, but he was thankful that a mist came before them and drew a veil before his brain. He heard his own voice saying words he did not seem to have framed in his own mind. Kester's a damned fool, he growled. He says there's maybe but one chance in a hundred, said Sylvie, pleading as it were for Kester. But, oh Philip, think you there's just that one chance. I there's a chance sure enough, said Philip, in a kind of fierce despair that made him reckless what he said or did. There's a chance, I suppose, for everything in life as we have not seen with our own eyes as it may not have happened. Kester may say next as there's a chance as your father is not dead, because we none on us saw him— Hung, he was going to have said, but a touch of humanity came back into his stony heart. Sylvie sent up a little sharp cry at his words. He longed at the sound to take her in his arms and hush her up, as a mother hushes her weeping child. But the very longing, having to be repressed, only made him more beside himself with guilt, anxiety, and rage. They were quite still now. Sylvie looking sadly down into the bubbling merry flowing water, Philip glaring at her, wishing that the next word were spoken, though it might stab him to the heart. But she did not speak. At length, unable to bear it any longer, he said, Thou sets a deal astore on that man, Sylvie. If that man had been there at the moment, Philip would have grappled with him, and not let go his whole till one or the other were dead. Sylvie caught some of the passionate meaning of the gloomy, miserable tone of Philip's voice, as he said these words. She looked up at him. I thought, you know, that I cared a deal for him. There was something so pleading and innocent in her pale, troubled face, so pathetic in her tone that Philip's anger, which had been excited against her as well as against all the rest of the world, melted away into love. And once more he felt that have her for his own he must, at any cost. He sat down by her, and spoke to her in quite a different manner to that which she had used before, with a ready tact and art which some strange instinct or tempter close at his ear supplied. Yes, darlin', I know you cared for him. I'll not say ill of him that is dead. I did and drowned, whatever Kester may say, before now. But if I chose, I could tell tales. No, tell no tales, I'll not hear them, said she, wrenching herself out of Philip's clasping arm. They may miscar him for ever, and I'll not believe them. I'll never miscall one who is dead, said Philip. Each new unconscious sign of the strength of Sylvia's love for her former lover, only making him the more anxious to convince her that he was dead, only rendering him more keen at deceiving his own conscience, by repeating it to it the lie that long ere this, Kinrad, was in all probability dead, killed by either the chances of war or tempestuous sea, that even if not, he was as good as dead to her, so that the word dead might be used in all honest certainty, as in one of its meanings Kinrad was dead for sure. Think ye that if ye were not dead he wouldn't have written ere this to some one of his kin, if not to thee, yet none of his kin who cast away but believe him dead. So Kester says, sighed Sylvia. Philip took heart. He put his arms softly round her again, and murmured, My lassie, try not to think on them as is gone as is dead, but to think a bit more on him as loves you with heart and soul and might, and hast on ever since he first set eyes on you. O Sylvia, my love for thee is just terrible. At this moment Dolly Reid was seen at the back door of the farmhouse, and catching sight of Sylvia, she called out, Sylvia, thy mother is asking for thee, and I cannot make her mind easy. In a moment Sylvia had sprung up from her seat, and was running into soothe and comfort her mother's troubled fancies. Philip sat on by the well side, his face buried in his two hands. Presently he lifted himself up, drank some water eagerly out of his hollowed palm, sighed, and shook himself, and followed his cousin into the house. Sometimes he came unexpectedly to the limits of his influence over her. In general she obeyed his expressed wishes with gentle indifference, as if she had no preferences of her own. Once or twice he found that she was doing what he desired out of the spirit of obedience, which is her mother's daughter she believed to be her duty towards her affianced husband. And this last motive for action depressed her lover more than anything. He wanted the old Sylvia back again—captious, capricious, willful, hotty, merry, charming. Alas! that Sylvia was gone for ever! But once especially his power, arising from whatever cause, was stopped entirely short, was utterly of no avail. It was on the occasion of Dick Simpson's mortal illness. Sylvia and her mother kept aloof from every one. They had never been intimate with any family but the Cornies, and even this friendship had considerably cooled since Molly's marriage, and most especially since Kinrad supposed death, when Bessie Cornie and Sylvia had been, as it were, rival mourners. But many people, both in Monkshaven, and the country roundabout, held the Robson family in great respect, although Mrs. Robson herself was accounted high and distant, and poor little Sylvia, in her heyday of beautiful youth and high spirits, had been spoken of as a bit flighty and a set-up lassie. Still, when their great sorrow fell upon them, there were plenty of friends to sympathize deeply with them. And as Daniel had suffered in a popular cause, there were even more who, scarcely knowing them personally, were ready to give them all the marks of respect and friendly feeling in their power. But neither Belle nor Sylvia were aware of this. The former had lost all perception of what was not immediately before her, the latter shrink from all encounters of any kind with the sore heart, and sensitive avoidance of everything that could make her a subject of remark. So the poor afflicted people at Hatersbank knew little of Monkshaven news. What little did come to their ears came through Dolly Reed when she returned from selling the farm produce of the week, and often indeed even then she found Sylvia too much absorbed in other cares or thoughts to listen to her gossip. So no one had ever named that Simpson was supposed to be dying till Philip began on the subject one evening. Sylvia's face suddenly flashed into glow in life. He's dying, is he? To earth is well rid on such a fellow. Hey, Sylvia, that's a hard speech of thine, said Philip. It gives me but poor heart to ask a favour of thee. If it's ought about Simpson, replied she, and then she interrupted herself. But say on, it were ill-mannered in me for to interrupt you. Thou would be sorry to see him, I think, Sylvia. He cannot get over the way to folk met him and pelted him when he came back for York, and he's weak and faint, and beside himself at times, and he'll lie a dreamin' and a fancy and they're all at him again, hootin' and yellin' and peltin' him. I'm glad on't, said Sylvia. It's the best news I've heard for many a day. He to turn again fathere who gave him money for to get a lodge in that night, when he had no place to go to. It were his evidences hung, fathere, and he's rightly punished for it now. For all that, and he's done a vasterong beside, he's dying now, Sylvia. Well, let him die. It's the best thing he could do. But his lion is such dreary poverty, and neither a friend to go near him, neither a person to speak a kind word to him. It seems as you've been speaking with him at any rate, said Sylvia, turning round on Philip. Aye, he sent for me my little manning, the old beggar woman who sometimes goes in and makes his bed for him, poor etch. His lion in taroons at the cowhouse of the mariners' arms, Sylvia. Well, said she in the same hard-tried tone. And I went and fetched the parish doctor, for I thought he'd all died before my face. He was so one, and ash and gray, so thin too. His eyes seemed pushed out of his bony face. That less time, fathere's eyes were starting wild like, as if he couldn't meet ours, or bear the sight on our weeping. It was a bad look-out for Philip's purpose, but after a pause he went bravely on. He's a poor dying creature, anyhow. The doctor said so, and told him he hadn't many hours, let alone days, to live. And he'd shrink for dying where he sins on his head, said Sylvia, almost exultingly. Philip shook his head. He said this world had been too strong for him, and meant too hard upon him. He could never do any good here, and he thought he should maybe find folks in the next place more merciful. He'll meet fathere there, said Sylvia, still hard and bitter. He's a poor ignorant creature, and doesn't seem to know rightly who he's like to meet. Only he seems glad to get away from monk-saving folks. He were really hurt, I'm afraid, that night, Sylvia. And he speaks as if he'd had hard times of it ever since he were a child. And he talks as if he were really grieved for it apart to lawyers made him take at the trial. They made him speak against his will, he says. Couldn't he have beaten his tongue out, asked Sylvia. It's fine talking a sorrow when the thing is done. Well, anyhow, he's sorry now, and he's not long for to live. And Sylvia, he'd been me ask thee if for the sake of all that is dear to thee both here and in the world to come, thou'd go weep me, and just say to him that thou forgives him his part that day. He sent thee on that errand, did he? And thou could come and ask me? I've a mind to break it off for ever with thee, Philip. She kept gasping as if she could not say any more. Philip watched and waited till her breath came, his own half choked. Thee and me was never meant to go together. It's not in me to forgive. I sometimes think it's not in me to forget. I wonder, Philip, if thy father had done a kind deed, and a right deed, and a merciful deed, and someone as he'd been good to, even at a midst of his just anger, had gone and let on about him to the judge, as was trying to hang him, and had getting him hanged. Hanged did, so that his wife were a widow, and his child fatherless were ever more. I wonder if thy veins would run milk and water so that thou could go and make friends, and speak so with him as had caused thy father's death. It's said into Bible, Sylvie, that we're to forgive. Eh, there's some things as I know I never forgive, and there's others as I can't, and I want, either. But, Sylvie, you'll pray to be forgiven, your trespasses, as you forgive them as trespassed against you. Well, if I'm to be taken at my word, I'll not in pray at all, that's all. It's well enough for them as has but little to forgive to use them words, and I don't reckon it's kind, or pretty behaved in you, Philip, to bring up scripture against me. Thou may go about thy business. Thou art fext with me, Sylvie, and I'm not meanin' but that it would go hard with thee to forgive him. But I think it would be right, and Christian like in thee, and that they would find thy comfort in thinkin' on it after. If thou'd only go, and see his wistful eyes, I think they'd plead with thee more than his words, or mine, either. I tell thee my flesh and blood wasn't made for forgiving and forgetting. Once for all, thou must take my word. When I love, I love, and when I hate, I hate, and him as has done hard to me, or to mine, I may keep for striking or murdering, but I'll never forgive. I should be just a monster fit to be shown at a fair if I could forgive him as got feather hanged. Philip was silent, thinkin' what more he could urge. You ought to be better off, said Sylvie, in a minute or two. You and me has got wrong, and it'll take a night's sleep to set us right. You've said all you can for him, and perhaps it's not you as is to blame but your nature. But I'm put out with thee, and want thee out of my sight for a while. One or two more speeches of this kind convinced him that it would be wise in him to take her at her word. He went back to Simpson, and found him, though still alive, past the understanding of any words of human forgiveness. Philip had almost wished he had not troubled or irritated Sylvie by urging the dying man's request. The performance of this duty seemed now to have been such a useless office. After all, the performance of a duty is never a useless office, though we may not see the consequences or they may be quite different to what we expected or calculated on. In the pause of active work when daylight was done, and the evening shades came on, Sylvie had time to think, and her heart grew sad and soft, in comparison to what it had been when Philip's urgency had called out all her angry opposition. She thought of her father, his sharp passions, his frequent forgiveness, or rather his forgetfulness that he had even been injured. All Sylvie's persistent or enduring qualities were derived from her mother, her impulses from her father. It was her dead father whose example filled her mind this evening in the soft and tender twilight. She did not say to herself that she would go and tell Simpson that she forgave him, but she thought that if Philip asked her again that she should do so. But when she saw Philip again he told her that Simpson was dead, and passed on from what he had reason to think would be an unpleasant subject to her. Thus he never learnt how her conduct might have been more gentle and relanting than her words, words which came up into his memory at a future time with full measure of miserable significance. In general Sylvie was gentle and good enough, but Philip wanted her to be shy and tender with him, and this she was not. She spoke to him, her pretty eyes looking straight and composately at him. She consulted him like the family friend that he was. She met him quietly in all the arrangements for the time of their marriage, which she looked upon more as a change of home, as the leaving of Hader's bank as it would affect her mother than in any more directly personal way. Philip was beginning to feel, though not as yet to acknowledge that the fruit he had so inordinately longed for was but of the nature of an apple of Sodom. Long ago, lodging in Whittle Rose's garret, he had been in the habit of watching some pigeons that were kept by a neighbour. The flock disborded themselves on the steep tiled roofs, just opposite to the attic window, and insensibly Philip grew to know their ways, and one pretty soft little dove was somehow perpetually associated in his mind with his idea of his cousin Sylvia. The pigeon would sit in one particular place, sunning herself, and puffing out her feathered breast with all the blue and rose-coloured lights gleaming in the morning rays, cooing softly to herself as she dressed her plumage. Philip fancied that he saw those same colours in a certain piece of shot silk, now in the shop, and none other seemed to him so suitable for his darling's wedding dress. He carried enough to make a gown and gave it to her one evening as she sat on the grass, just outside the house, half attending to her mother, half engaged in knitting stockings for her scanty marriage outfit. He was glad that the sun was not gone down, thus allowing him to display the changing colours in fuller light. Sylvia admired it duly, even Mrs. Robson was pleased and attracted by the soft yet brilliant hues. Philip whispered to Sylvia. He took delight in whispers. She, on the contrary, always spoke to him in her usual tone of voice. Thou'd look so pretty in its sweet heart, on Thursday fortnight. Thursday fortnight. On the fourth you're thinking on, but I cannot wear it then. I shall be in black. Not on that day, sure, said Philip. Why not? There's not to happen on that day for to make me forget father. I couldn't put off my black Philip. No, not to save my life. Yon silk is just lovely, far too good for the likes of me, and I'm sure I much beholden to ye. And I'll have it made at first of any gown after last April come two years. But O Philip, I cannot put off my mourning. Not for a wedding day, said Philip sadly. No lad, I really cannot. I'm just sorry about it, for I see Thou'd set upon it, and Thou'd so kind and good. I sometimes think I can never be thankful enough to thee, when I think on what would have become of mother in me if we hadn't had thee for a friend in need. I'm not grateful, Philip, though I sometimes fancy Thou'd thinking I am. I don't want Thou'd to be grateful, Sylvie, said poor Philip, dissatisfied, yet unable to explain what he did want, only knowing that there was something he lacked, yet fame would have had. As the marriage day drew near, all Sylvia's care seemed to be for her mother. All her anxiety was regarding the appurtenances of the home she was leaving. In vain Philip tried to interest her in details of his improvements or contrivances in the new home to which she was going to take her. She did not tell him, but the idea of the house behind the shop was associated in her mind with two times of discomfort and misery. The first time she had gone into the parlor about which Philip spoke so much was at the time of the press-king riot, when she had fainted from terror and excitement. The second was on that night of misery, when she and her mother had gone into Monkshaven to bid her father farewell before he was taken to York. In that room on that night she had first learnt something of the fatal peril in which he stood. She could not show the bright, shy curiosity about her future dwelling that is common enough with girls who are going to be married. All she could do was to restrain herself from sighing, and listen patiently when he talked on the subject. In time he saw that she shrank from it, so he held his peace and planned and worked for her in silence, smiling to himself as he looked on each completed arrangement for her pleasure or comfort, and knowing well that her happiness was involved in what fragments of peace and material comfort might remain to her mother. The wedding day drew near a pace. It was Philip's plan that after they had been married in Kirk Moorside Church, he and his Sylvia, his cousin, his love, his wife, should go for the day to Robin Hood's Bay, returning in the evening to the house behind the shop in the marketplace. There they were to find Belle Robson, installed in her future home, for Hater's Bank farm was to be given up to the new tenant on the very day of the wedding. Sylvia would not be married any sooner. She said that she must stay there till the very last, and had said it was such determination that Philip had desisted from all urgency at once. He had told her that all should be settled for her mother's comfort during their few hours absence, otherwise Sylvia would not have gone at all. He told her he should ask Hester, who was always so good and kind, who never yet had set him nay, to go to church with them as bridesmaid, for Sylvia would give no thought or care to anything but her mother, and that they would leave her at Hater's Bank as they returned from church. She would manage Mrs. Robson's removal. She would do this, do that, do everything. Such friendly confidence had Philip in Hester's willingness and tender skill. Sylvia acquiesced at length, and Philip took upon himself to speak to Hester on the subject. Hester said he one day, when he was preparing to go home, after the shop was closed. Would your mind stop in a bit? I should like to show you the place now it's done up, and I have a favour to ask on Yabba's side. He was so happy he did not see her shiver all over. She hesitated just a moment before she answered. I'll stay if thou wishes it, Philip, but I'm no judge of fashions and such like. Thou were to judge a comfort, and that's what I've been aiming at. I were never so comfortable in my life. As when I were a lodger at thy house, said he, with brotherly tenderness in his tone, if my mind had been at ease I could have said I never were happier in all my days than under thy roof, and I know what were thy doing for the most part. So come along, Hester, and tell me if there's ought more I can put in for Sylvia. It might not have been a very appropriate text, but such as it was, the words, from him that would ask of thee, turn not thou away, seemed the only source of strength that could have enabled her to go patiently through the next half-hour. As it was, she unselfishly brought all her mind to bear upon the subject, admired this thought and decided upon that, as one by one Philip showed her all his alterations and improvements. Never was such a quiet little bit of unconscious and unrecognized heroism. She really ended by such a conquest of self that she could absolutely sympathize with the proud, expectant lover, and had quenched all envy of the beloved, in sympathy with the delight she imagined Sylvia must experience when she discovered all these proofs of Philip's fond consideration and care. But it was a grey strain on the heart, that source of life, and when Hester returned into the parlor after her deliberate survey of the house, she felt as weary and depressed and bodily strength as if she had gone through an illness of many days. She sat down on the nearest chair and felt as though she never could rise again. Philip, joyous and content, stood near her talking, and Hester, said he, Sylvia's given me a message for thee. She says thou must be her bridesmaid, she'll have none other. I cannot! said Hester with sudden sharpness. Oh yes, but you must! It wouldn't be like my wedding if thou wasn't there, why I've looked upon thee as a sister ever since I came to lodge with thy mother. Hester shook her head. Did her duty require her not to turn away from this asking, too? Philip saw her reluctance, and by intuition rather than reason he knew that what she would not do for gaiety or pleasure she would consent to, if by so doing she could render any service to another. So he went on, besides, Sylvia and me has planned to go for our wedding jaunt to Robin Hood's Bay. I have been to engage a chandry this very morn, before to shop was opened, and there's no one to leave with my aunt. The poor old body is sore-crashed with sorrow, and is as one may say childish at times. She's to come down here that we may find her when we come back at night, and there's never a one she'll come with so willing and so happy as with thee, Hester. Sylvia and me has both said so. Hester looked up in his face with her grave, honest eyes. I cannot go to church with thee, Philip, and thou must not ask me any further, but I'll go be times to hate her spank of harm, and I'll do my best to make the old lady happy, and to follow out thy directions in bringing her here before nightfall. Philip was on the point of urging her afresh to go with them to church, but something in her eyes brought a thought across his mind, as transitory as a breath passes over a looking-glass, and he desisted from his entreaty, and put away his thought as a piece of vain cox-cumry insulting to Hester. He passed rapidly on to all the careful directions rendered necessary, by her compliance with the latter part of his request, coupling Sylvia's name with his perpetually, so that Hester looked upon her as a happy girl, as eager in planning all the details of her marriage as though no heavy, shameful sorrow had passed over her head not many months ago. Hester did not see Sylvia's white, dreamy, resolute face, to answer the psalm questions of the marriage service in a voice that did not seem her own. Hester was not with them to notice the heavy abstraction that made the bride as if unconscious of her husband's loving words, and then start and smile and reply with a sad gentleness of tone. No! Hester's duty lay in conveying the poor widow and mother down from Hatersbank to the new home in Monkshaven. And for all Hester's assistance and thoughtfulness, it was a dreary, painful piece of work. The poor old woman crying like a child, with bewilderment at the confused bustle which, in spite of all Sylvia's careful forethought, could not be avoided on this final day, when her mother had to be carried away from the homestead, over which she had so long presided. But all this was as nothing to the distress which overwhelmed poor Belle Robson when she entered Philip's house—the parlor—the whole place so associated with the keen agony she had undergone there, that the stab of memory penetrated through her dead incenses and brought her back to misery. In vain Hester tried to console her by telling her the fact of Sylvia's marriage with Philip in every form of words that occurred to her. Belle only remembered her husband's fate, which filled up her poor wandering mind and coloured everything. In so much that Sylvia not being at hand to reply to her mother's cry for her, the latter imagined that her child as well as her husband was in danger of trial and death and refused to be comforted by any endeavour of the patient sympathising Hester. In a pause of Mrs. Robson's sobs, Hester heard the welcome sound of the wheels of the returning chandry, bearing the bride and bridegroom home. It stopped at the door. An instant in Sylvia whiteness a sheet at the sound of her mother's wailings which she had caught while yet at a distance, with the quick ears of love, came running in. Her mother feebly rose and tottered towards her and fell into her arm saying, Oh Sylvia, Sylvia, take me home and away from this cruel place. Hester could not but be touched with the young girl's manner to her mother, as tender, as protecting as if their relation to each other had been reversed, and she was lolling and tenderly soothing a wayward frightened child. She had neither eyes nor ears for anyone till her mother was sitting in trembling peace, holding her daughter's hand tight in both of hers, as if afraid of losing sight of her. Then Sylvia turned to Hester, and with the sweet grace which is a natural gift to some happy people, thanked her. In common words enough she thanked her, but in that nameless manner and with that strange, rare charm which made Hester feel as if she had never been thanked in all her life before. And from that time forth she understood, if she did not always yield to, the unconscious fascination which Sylvia could exercise over others at times. Did it enter into Philip's heart to perceive that he had wedded his long-sought bride in mourning raiment, and that the first sounds which greeted them as they approached their home were those of weeping and wailing. And now Philip seemed as prosperous as his heart could desire. The business flourished, and money beyond his moderate wants came in. As for himself, he required very little. He had always looked forward to placing his idol in a befitting shrine, and means for this were now furnished to him. The dress, the comforts, the position he had desired for Sylvia were all hers. She did not need to do a stroke of household work if she preferred to sit in her parlor and sew up a scene. Indeed Phoebe resented any interference in the domestic labor which she had performed so long that she looked upon the kitchen as a private empire of her own. Mrs. Hepburn, as Sylvia was now termed, had a good dark silk gown piece in her drawers, as well as the poor dove-colored, against the day when she chose to leave off mourning, and stuff for either gray or scarlet cloaks was hers at her bidding. What she cared for far more were the comforts with which it was in her power to surround her mother. In this Philip vied with her, for besides his old love and new pity for his aunt Bell, he never forgot how she had welcomed him to Hader's bank, and favored his love to Sylvia, in the yearning days when he little hoped he should ever win his cousin to be his wife. But even if he had not had these grateful and affectionate feelings toward the poor woman, he would have done much for her if only to gain the sweet, rare smiles which his wife never bestowed upon him so freely as when she saw him attending to mother, for so both of them now called Bell. For her creature comforts, her silk gowns, and her humble luxury Sylvia did not care. Philip was almost annoyed at the indifference she often manifested to all his efforts to surround her with such things. It was even a hardship to her to leave off her country dress, her uncovered hair, her Lindsay petticoat, and loose bed gown into Donna's stiff and stately gown for her morning dress. Sitting in the dark parlor at the back of the shop and doing white work was much more wearying to her than running out into the fields to bring up the cows or spinning wool or making up butter. She sometimes thought to herself that it was a strange kind of life where there were no outdoor animals to look after. The ox and the ass had hitherto come into all her ideas of humanity, and her care and gentleness had made the dumb creatures round her father's home into mute friends with loving eyes, looking at her as if wistful to speak in words the grateful regard that she could read without the poor expression of language. She missed the free open air, the great dome of sky above the fields. She rebelled against the necessity of dressing, as she called it, to go out, although she acknowledged that it was necessary where the first step beyond the threshold must be into a populist street. It is possible that Philip was right at one time, when he had thought to win her by material advantages, but the old vanities had been burnt out of her by the hot iron of acute suffering, a great deal of passionate feeling still existed, concealed and latent. But at this period it appeared as though she were indifferent to most things, and had lost the power of either hoping or fearing much. She was stunned into a sort of temporary numbness on most points, those on which she was sensitive, being such as referred to the injustice and oppression of her father's death, or anything that concerned her mother. She was quiet even to passiveness in all her dealings with Philip. He would have given not a little for some of the old bursts of impatience, the old pettishness, which, naughty as they were, had gone to form his idea of the former Sylvia. Once or twice he was almost vexed with her for her docility. He wanted her so much to have a will of her own, if only that he might know how to rouse her to pleasure by gratifying it. Indeed he seldom fell asleep at nights without his last thoughts being devoted to some little plan for the morrow, that he fancied she would like, and when he wakened in the early dawn he looked to see if she were indeed sleeping by his side, or whether it was not all a dream that he called Sylvia wife. He was aware that her affection for him was not to be spoken of in the same way as his for her, but he found much happiness in only being allowed to love and cherish her, and with the patient perseverance that was one remarkable feature in his character, he went on striving to deepen and increase her love when most other men would have given up the endeavor, made themselves content with half a heart, and turned to some other object of attainment. All this time Philip was troubled by a dream that recurred whenever he was over fatigued or otherwise not in perfect health. Over and over again in this first year of married life he dreamt this dream, perhaps as many as eight or nine times, and it never varied. It was always of Kinraid's return. Kinraid was full of life in Philip's dream, though in his waking hours he could and did convince himself by all the laws of probability that his rival was dead. He never remembered the exact sequence of events in that terrible dream after he had roused himself with a fight and a struggle from his feverish slumbers. He was generally sitting up in bed when he found himself conscious, his heart beating wildly with a conviction of Kinraid's living presence somewhere near him in the darkness. Occasionally Sylvia was disturbed by his agitation and would question him about his dreams, having, like most of her class at that time, great faith in their prophetic interpretation. But Philip never gave her any truth in his reply. After all, and though he did not acknowledge it even to himself, the long desired happiness was not so delicious and perfect as he had anticipated. Many have felt the same in their first year of married life, but the faithful patient nature that still works on, striving to gain love, and capable itself of steady love all the while, is a gift not given to all. For many weeks after their wedding Kester never came near them. A chance word or two from Sylvia showed Philip that she had noticed this and regretted it, and accordingly he made it his business, at the next leisure opportunity, to go to Hader's bank, never saying a word to his wife of his purpose, and seek out Kester. All the whole place was altered. It was new whitewashed, new thatched, the patches of color in the surrounding ground were changed with altered tillage, the great geraniums were gone from the window, and instead was a smart knitted blind. Children played before the house door, a dog lying on the step flew at Philip. All was so strange, that it was even the strangest thing of all for Kester to appear where everything else was so altered. Philip had to put up with a good deal of crabbed behavior on the part of the ladder, before he could induce Kester to promise to come down into the town and see Sylvia in her new home. Somehow the visit when paid was but a failure. At least it seemed so at the time, though probably it broke the eyes of restraint which was forming over the familiar intercourse between Kester and Sylvia. The old servant was daunted by seeing Sylvia in a strange place, and stood, sleaking his hair down and furtively looking about him, instead of seating himself on the chair Sylvia had so eagerly brought forward for him. Then his sense of the estrangement caused by their new positions infected her, and she began to cry pitifully saying, Oh, Kester, Kester, tell me about Hater's Bank. Is it just as it used to be in Fathers' days? Well, I cannot say as it is, said Kester, thankful to have a subject started. They implode up toad pasture field, and are setting it for Taters. They're not much for cattle, isn't Higgins'. They'll be for corn into next year, I reckon. And they'll just have their pains for their payment. But they're always so pig-headed as folks for a distance. So they went on discoursing on Hater's Bank in the old days, till Bell Robson, having finished her afternoon nap, came slowly downstairs to join them. And after that the conversation became so broken up, from the desire of the other two to attend and reply as best they could to her fragmentarian disjointed talk, that Kester took his leave before long, falling, as he did so, into the formal and unnaturally respectful manner which he had adopted on first coming in. But Sylvia ran after him and brought him back from the door. To think of thy going away, Kester, without either bit or drink, nay, come back with thee, and taste wine and cake. Kester stood at the door, half shy, half pleased, while Sylvia, in all the glow and hurry of a young housekeeper's hospitality, sought for the decanter of wine, and a wine-glass in the corner covered, and hastily cut an immense wedge of cake, which she crammed into his hand in spite of his remonstrances. And then she poured him out an overflowing glass of wine, which Kester would far rather have gone without, as he knew manners too well to suppose that he might taste it without having gone through the preliminary ceremony of wishing the donor health and happiness. He stood red and half-smiling with his cake in one hand, his wine in the other, and then began. Long may you live, happy may you be, and blessed with enumerous progeny. There, that's poetry for you, as I learned in my youth. But there's a deal to be said, as cannot be put into poetry, and yet I cannot say it somehow. It attacks a person to say, ah, as I've gotten in my mind. It's like a heap of wood just after shearing time. It's worth a deal, but it takes a vast acumen and carden and spinning afore it can be made use on. If I were up to to use the words, I could say a mighty deal. But somehow I'm tongue-teed when I come to want my words most. So I'll only just make bold to say, as I think you've done pretty well for yourself, getting a house full of furniture, looking around him, as he said this, and vitil and clothing for taxing, be like, and a home for to miss us in our time and need, and maybe not such a bad husband, as I once thought Yon-Man had make. I'm not above sayin' as he's, maybe, better nor I took him for. So here's to ye both, and wishin' ye health and happiness, I, and money to buy you another, as country folks say. Having ended his oration, much to his own satisfaction, Kester tossed off his glass of wine, smacked his lips, wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, pocketed his cake, and made off. That night Sylvia spoke of his visit to her husband. Philip never said how he himself had wrought it to pass, nor did he name the fact that he had heard the old man come in just as he himself had intended going into the parlour for tea, but had kept away, as he thought Sylvia and Kester would most enjoy their interview undisturbed. And Sylvia felt as if her husband's silence was unsympathising, and shut up the feelings that were just beginning to expand towards him. She sank again into the listless state of indifference, from which nothing but some reference to former days, or present consideration for her mother, could rouse her. Hester was almost surprised at Sylvia's evident liking for her. By slow degrees, Hester was learning to love the woman, whose position as Philip's wife she would have envied so keenly, had she not been so truly good and pious. But Sylvia seemed as though she had given Hester her whole affection all at once. Hester could not understand this, while she was touched and melted by the trust it implied. For one thing Sylvia remembered and regretted, her harsh treatment of Hester the rainy stormy night, on which the latter had come to Hader's bank, to seek her and her mother, and bring them into Monkshaven to see the imprisoned father and husband. Sylvia had been struck with Hester's patient endurance of her rudeness, a rudeness which she was conscious that she herself should have immediately and vehemently resented. Sylvia did not understand how a totally different character from hers might immediately forgive the anger she could not forget. And because Hester had been so meek at the time, Sylvia, who knew how passing and transitory was her own anger, thought that all was forgotten, while Hester believed that the words which she herself could not have uttered except under deep provocation meant much more than they did, and admired and wondered at Sylvia for having so entirely conquered her anger against her. Again the two different women were divergently affected by the extreme fondness which Bell had shown towards Hester ever since Sylvia's wedding day. Sylvia, who had always received more love from others than she knew what to do with, had the most entire faith in her own supremacy in her mother's heart, though at times Hester would do certain things more to the poor old woman's satisfaction. Hester, who had craved for the affection which had been withheld from her, and had from that one circumstance become distrustful of her own power of inspiring regard while she exaggerated the delight of being beloved, feared less Sylvia should become jealous of her mother's open display of great attachment and occasional preference for Hester. But such a thought never entered Sylvia's mind. She was more thankful than she knew how to express towards anyone who made her mother happy, as has already been said, the contributing to Bell Robson's pleasures earned Philip more of his wife's smiles than anything else, and Sylvia threw her whole heart into the words and caresses she lavished on Hester whenever poor Mrs. Robson spoke of the goodness and kindness of the latter. Hester attributed more virtue to these sweet words and deeds of gratitude than they deserved. They did not imply in Sylvia any victory over evil temptation as they would have done in Hester. It seemed to be Sylvia's fate to captivate more people than she cared to like back again. She turned the heads of John and Jeremiah Foster, who could hardly congratulate Philip enough on his choice of a wife. They had been prepared to be critical on one who had interfered with their favorite project of a marriage between Philip and Hester, and though full of compassion for the cruelty of Daniel Robson's fate, they were two completely men of business, not to have some apprehension that the connection of Philip Hepburn with the daughter of a man who was hanged might injure the shop over which both his and their name appeared. But all the possible proprieties demanded that they should pay attention to the bride of their former shopman and present successor, and the very first visitors whom Sylvia had received after her marriage had been John and Jeremiah Foster in their Sabbath day clothes. They found her in the parlor so familiar to both of them, clear-starching her mother's caps, which had to be got up in some particular fashion that Sylvia was afraid of dictating to Phoebe. She was a little disturbed at her visitors discovering her at this employment, but she was on her own ground and that gave herself possession, and she welcomed the two old men so sweetly and modestly and looked so pretty and feminine, and besides so notable in her handiwork that she conquered all their prejudices at one blow, and their first thought on leaving the shop was how to do her honor by inviting her to a supper-party at Jeremiah Foster's house. Sylvia was dismayed when she was bidden to this wedding-feast, and Philip had to use all his authority, though tenderly, to make her consent to go at all. She had been to marry country parties like the Cornies, and to bright hay-making roms in the open air, but never to a set stately party at a friend's house. She would feign have made attendance on her mother an excuse. But Philip knew he must not listen to any such plea, and applied to Hester in the dilemma, asking her to remain with Mrs. Robson while he and Sylvia went out visiting, and Hester had willingly, nay, eagerly consented. It was much more to her taste than going out. So Philip and Sylvia set out, arm in arm, down Bridge Street, across the bridge, and then clambered up the hill. On the way he gave her the direction she asked for about her behavior as bride and most honored guest, and altogether succeeded, against his intention and will, in frightening her so completely, as to the grandeur and importance of the occasion, and the necessity of remembering certain set rules and making certain set speeches, and attending to them when the right time came, that, if anyone so naturally graceful could have been awkward, Sylvia would have been so that night. As it was, she sate, pale and weary-looking on the very edge of her chair, she uttered the formal words which Philip had told her were appropriate to the occasion, and she heartily wished herself safe at home and in bed. Yet she left but one unanimous impression on the company when she went away. Namely, that she was the prettiest and best-behaved woman they had ever seen, and that Philip Hepburn had done well in choosing her, Felon's daughter, though she might be. Both the hosts had followed her into the lobby to help Philip in cloaking her, and putting on her patterns. They were full of old-fashioned compliments and good wishes. One speech of theirs came up to her memory in future years. Now Sylvia Hepburn, said Jeremiah, I've known thy husband long, and I don't say but what thou has done well in choosing him. But if he ever neglects or ill-uses thee, come to me, and I'll give him a sound lecture on his conduct. Mind, I'm thy friend from this day forids, and ready to take thy part against him." Philip smiled as if the day would never come when he should neglect or ill-use his darling. Sylvia smiled a little, without much attending to or caring for the words that were detaining her, tired as she was. John and Jeremiah chuckled over the joke, but the words came up again in after-days, as words idly spoken sometimes do. Before the end of that first year, Philip had learned to be jealous of his wife's new love for Hester. To the latter, Sylvia gave the free confidence on many things which Philip fancied she withheld from him. A suspicion crossed his mind from time to time that Sylvia might speak of her former lover to Hester. It would not be unnatural, he thought, if she did so, believing him to be dead. But the idea irritated him. He was entirely mistaken, however. Sylvia, with all her apparent frankness, kept her deep sorrows to herself. She never mentioned her father's name, though he was continually present to her mind. Nor did she speak of human beings, though, for his sake, her voice softened when, by chance, she spoke to a passing sailor. And for his sake, her eyes lingered on such men longer than on others, trying to discover in them something of the old familiar gait. And partly for his dead sake, and partly because of the freedom of the outlook and the freshness of the air, she was glad occasionally to escape from the comfortable imprisonment of her parlor, and the close streets around the marketplace, and to mount the cliffs and sit on the turf, gazing abroad over the wide still expanse of the open sea. For at that height, even breaking waves looked only like broken lines of white foam on the blue watery plain. She did not want any companions on these rambles, which had somewhat of the delight of stolen pleasures, for all the other respectable matrons and town dwellers whom she knew were content to have always a business object for their walk, or else to stop at home in their own households, and Sylvia was rather ashamed of her own yearnings for solitude and open air, and the sight and sound of the motherlike sea. She used to take off her hat, and sit there, her hands clasping her knees, the salt air lifting her bright curls, gazing at the distant horizon over the sea, in a sad dreaminess of thought. If she had been asked on what she meditated, she could not have told you. But by and by the time came when she was a prisoner in the house, a prisoner in her room, lying in bed with a little baby by her side, her child, Philip's child. His pride, his delight knew no bounds. This was a new fast tie between them. This would reconcile her to the kind of life that, with all its respectability and comfort, was so different from what she had lived before, and which Philip had often perceived that she felt to be dull and restraining. He already began to trace in a little girl only a few days old the lovely curves that he knew so well by heart in the mother's face. Sylvia, too, pale, still, and weak, was very happy, yes, really happy, for the first time since her irrevocable marriage. For its irrevocableness had weighed much upon her with a sense of dull hopelessness. She felt all Philip's kindness. She was grateful to him for his tender regard towards her mother. She was learning to love him as well as to like and respect him. She did not know what else she could have done but marry so true a friend, and she and her mother so friendless. But at the same time it was like lead in her morning spirits when she awoke and remembered that the decision was made. The deed was done. The choice taken which comes to most people but once in their lives. Now the little baby came in upon this state of mind like a ray of sunlight into a gloomy room. Even her mother was rejoiced and proud. Even with her crazed brain and broken heart, the sight of sweet peaceful infancy brought light to her. All the old ways of holding a baby, of hushing it to sleep, of tenderly guarding its little limbs from injury came back like the habits of her youth to bell, and she was never so happy or so easy in her mind or so sensible and connected in her ideas as when she had Sylvia's baby in her arms. It was a pretty sight to see, however familiar to all of us such things may be. The pale worn old woman in her quaint old fashioned country dress, holding the little infant on her knees, looking at its open unspeculative eyes and talking the little language to it as though it could understand. The father on his knees, kept prisoner by a small, small finger curled round his strong and sinewy one, and gazing at the tiny creature with wondering idolatry. The young mother, fair and pale and smiling, propped up on pillows in order that she too might see the wonderful babe. It was astonishing how the doctor could come and go without being drawn into the admiring vortex and look at this baby just as if babies came into the world every day. Philip said Sylvia one night, as he said as still as a mouse in her room, imagining her to be asleep, he was by her bedside in a moment. I've been thinking what she's to be called, Isabella after mother, and what will your mother's name? Margaret, said he. Margaret, Isabella, Isabella, Margaret. Mother's called Belle, she might be called Bella. I could have wished her to be called after thee. She made a little impatient movement. Nay, Sylvia's not a lucky name. Best be called after thy mother and mine, and I want for to ask Hester to be godmother. Anything thou like, sweetheart? Shall we call her Rose after Hester Rose? No, no, said Sylvia. She might be called after my mother or thine or both. I should like her to be called Bella after mother because she's so fond of baby. Anything to please thee, darling? Don't say that, as if it didn't signify. There's a deal in having a pretty name, said Sylvia, a little annoyed. I have always hated being called Sylvia. It were after father's mother, Sylvia Steele. I never thought any name in all the words so sweet and pretty as Sylvia, said Philip fondly, but she was too much absorbed in her own thoughts to notice either his manner or his words. There, you'll not mind if it is Bella, because you'll see my mother is alive to be pleased by its being named after her, and Hester may be godmother, and I'll have to dove-colored silk as you gave me before we were married, made up into a cloak for it to go to church here. I got it for thee, said Philip, a little disappointed. It'll be too good for the baby. Eh, but I'm so careless. I should be spilling something on it. But if thou got it for me, I cannot find it in my heart for to wear it on baby, and I'll have it made into a christening gown for myself. But I'll never feel it my ease in it, for fear of spoiling it. Well, and if thou dost spoil it, love, I'll get thee another. I make account of riches only for thee, that I may be able to get thee whatever thou is a fancy for, for either thy cell or thy mother. She lifted her pale face from her pillow, and put up her lips to kiss him for these words. Perhaps on that day Philip reached the zenith of his life's happiness. CHAPTER XXXI The first step in Philip's declension happened in this way. Sylvia had made rapid progress in her recovery, but now she seemed at a stationary point of weakness, wakeful nights succeeding till languid days. Occasionally she caught a little sleep in the afternoons, but she usually awoke startled and feverish. One afternoon Philip had stolen upstairs to look at her and his child. But the efforts he made at careful noiselessness made the door creak on its hinges as he opened it. The woman employed to nurse her had taken the baby into another room that no sound might rouse her from her slumber. And Philip would probably have been worn against entering the chamber where his wife lay sleeping had he been perceived by the nurse. As it was, he opened the door, made a noise, and Sylvia started up, her face all one flush, her eyes wild and uncertain. She looked about her as if she did not know where she was, pushed the hair off her hot forehead, all which actions Philip saw dismayed and regretful. But he kept still, hoping that she would lie down and compose herself. Instead she stretched out her arms imploringly and said, in a voice full of yearning and tears, Oh Charlie, come to me, come to me. And then as she more fully became aware of the place where she was, her actual situation, she sank back and feebly began to cry. Philip's heart boiled within him, any man's wood under the circumstances. But he had the sense of guilty concealment to aggravate the intensity of his feelings. Her weak cry after another man, too, irritated him, partly through his anxious love which made him wise to know how much physical harm she was doing herself. At this moment he stirred, or unintentionally made some sound. She started a profession called out, Oh, who's there? Do for God's sake, tell me who you are. It's me, said Philip, coming forwards, striving to keep down the miserable complication of love and jealousy and remorse and anger that made his heart beat so wildly and almost took him out of himself. Indeed, he must have been quite beside himself at the time, or he could never have gone on to utter the unwise, cruel words he did. But she spoke first, in a distressed and plaintive tone of voice. Oh Philip, I've been asleep, and yeah, I think I was awake. I saw Charlie Kinradis, as plain as ever, I see thee now, and he wasn't drowned at all. I'm sure he's alive somewhere. He was so clear in life, like, oh, what shall I do? What shall I do? She wrung her hands in feverish distress, urged by passionate feelings of various kinds, and also by his desire to quench the agitation which was doing her harm. Philip spoke, hardly knowing what he said. Kinrades dead, I'll tell you, Sylvie. What kind of a woman are you to go dreaming of a man in this way, and taking on so about him, when you're a wedded wife, with a child as you're born to another man? In a moment he could have bitten out his tongue. She looked at him with a mute reproach, which some of us see, God help us, in the eyes of the dead, as they come before our sad memories in the night season. Looked at him with such a solemn, searching look, never saying a word of reply or defence. Then she lay down, motionless and silent. He had been instantly stung with remorse for his speech. The words were not beyond his lips when an agony had entered his heart. But her steady, dilated eyes had kept him dumb and motionless, as if by a spell. Now he rushed to the bed on which she lay, and half knelt, half threw himself upon it, imploring her to forgive him. Regardless for the time of any evil consequences to her, it seemed as if he must have her pardon, her relenting at any price, even if they both died in the act of reconciliation. But she lay speechless, and, as far as she could be, motionless, the bed trembling under her with the quivering she could not steal. Philip's wild tones caught the nurse's ears, and she entered full of the dignified indignation of wisdom. Are you for killing your wife, master? she asked. She's not as strong as she can bear, frightened and scolding. Nor will she be for many a week to come. Go down with her, and leave her at peace if your manners can be called a man. Her anger was rising as she caught sight of Sylvia's averted face. It was fleshed crimson, her eyes full of intense emotion of some kind, her lips compressed, but an involuntary twitching over mastering her resolute stillness from time to time. Philip, who did not see the averted face, nor understand the real danger in which he was placing his wife, felt as though he must have one word, one responsive touch of the hand which lay passive in his, which was not even drawn away from the kisses with which he covered it any more than if it had been an impassive stone. The nurse had fell into taken by the shoulders and turned him out of the room. In half an hour the doctor had to be summoned. Of course, the nurse gave him her version of the events of the afternoon, with much animus against Philip, and the doctor thought at his duty to have some very serious conversation with him. I do assure you, Mr. Hepburn, that in the state your wife has been in for some days, it was little less than madness on your part to speak to her about anything that could give rise to strong emotion. It was madness, sir, replied Philip in a low, miserable tone of voice. The doctor's heart was touched in spite of the nurse's accusations against the scolding husband, yet the danger was now too serious for him to mince matters. I must tell you that I cannot answer for her life, unless the greatest precautions are taken on your part, and unless the measures I shall use have the effect I wish for in the next twenty-four hours. She is on the verge of a brain fever. Any allusion to the subject, which has been the final cause of the state in which she now is, must be most cautiously avoided, even to a chance word which may bring it to her memory. And so on, but Philip seemed to hear only this. Then he might not express contrition or sue for pardon. He must go on and forgiven through all this stress of anxiety, and even if she recovered, the doctor warned him of the undesirableness of recurring to what had passed. Heavy, miserable times of endurance and waiting have to be passed through by all during the course of their lives, and Philip had had his share of such seasons, when the heart and the will and the speech and the limbs must be bound down with strong resolution to patience. For many days, nay, for weeks, he was forbidden to see Sylvia, as the very sound of his footstep brought on a recurrence of the fever and convulsive movement. Yet she seemed, from questions she feebly asked the nurse, to have forgotten all that had happened on the day of her attack from the time when she dropped off to sleep. But how much she remembered of after occurrences no one could ascertain. She was quite enough when, at length, Philip was allowed to see her. But he was half jealous of his child, when he watched how she could smile at it, while she never changed a muscle of her face at all he could do or say. And of a peace with this extreme quietitude and reserve, was her behaviour to him when at length she had fully recovered, and was able to go about the house again. Philip thought many a time of the words she had used long before, before their marriage. Ominous words they were. It's not in me to forgive. Sometimes think it's not in me to forget. Philip was tender, even to humility, in his conduct towards her. But nothing stirred her from her fortress of reserve. Then he knew she was so different. He knew how loving they passionate was her nature. Veerment, demonstrative. Oh, how could he stir her once more into expression, even if the first show or speech she made was of anger? Then he tried being angry with her himself. He was sometimes unjust to her consciously and of a purpose, in order to provoke her into defending herself and appealing against his unkindness. He only seemed to drive her love away, still more. If any one had known all that was passing in that household, while yet the story of it was not ended, nor indeed come to its crisis, their hearts would have been sorry for the man who lingered long at the door of the room in which his wife said cooing and talking to her baby, and sometimes laughing back to it, or who was soothing the quarrelousness of failing age with every possible patience of love. Sorry for the poor listener who was hungering for the profusion of tenderness that scattered on the senseless air, yet only by stealth caught the echoes of what ought to have been his. It was so difficult to complain to. Impossible, in fact. Everything that a wife could do from duty, she did, but the love seemed to have fled. And in such cases no reproaches or complaints can avail to bring it back, so reasoned outsiders, and are convinced of the result before the experiment is made. But Philip could not reason, or could not yield to a reason, and so he complained and reproached. She did not much answer him, but he thought that her eyes expressed the old words. He's not in me to forgive, I sometimes think it's not in me to forget. However, it is an old story, an ascertained fact that, even in the most tender and stable masculine natures, at the supremist season of their lives, there is room for other thoughts and passions than such as are connected with love. Even with the most domestic and affectionate men, their emotions seem to be kept in a cell, distinct and away from their actual lives. Philip had other thoughts and other occupations than those connected with his wife during all this time. An uncle of his mother's, a Cumberland statesman, of whose existence he was barely conscious, died about this time, leaving to his unknown great-nephew four or five hundred pounds, which put him at once in a different position with regard to his business. Henceforward his ambition was roused, such humble ambition as befitted a shopkeeper in a country town sixty or seventy years ago, to be respected by the men around him had always been an object with him, and was perhaps becoming more so than ever now, as a sort of refuge from his deep, sorrowful mortification in other directions. He was greatly pleased at being made a sidesman, and in preparation for the further honour of being church warden, he went regularly twice a day to church on Sundays. There was enough religious feeling in him to make him disguise the worldly reason for such conduct for himself. He believed that he went because he thought it right to attend public worship in the parish church whenever it was offered up, but it may be questioned of him, as of many others, how far he would have been as regular in attendance in a place where he was not known. With this, however, we have nothing to do. The fact was that he went regularly to church, and he wished his wife to accompany him to the pew, newly painted with his name on the door, where he sat in full sight of the clergyman and congregation. Sylvia had never been in the habit of such regular church going, and she felt it as a hardship, and slipped out of the duty as often as ever she could. In her unmarried days, she and her parents had gone annually to the Mother Church of the parish in which Hater's Bank was situated. On the Monday succeeding the Sunday next, after the Romish Saint's Day, to whom the church was dedicated, there was a great feast or wake held, and on the Sunday, all the parishioners came to church from far and near. Frequently, too, in the course of the year, Sylvia would accompany one or other of her parents to Scarby Moorside afternoon service, when the hay was got in and the corn not ready for cutting, or the cows were dry and there was no afternoon milking. Many clergymen were languid in those days, and did not too curiously inquire into the reasons which gave them such small congregations in country parishes. Now she was married, this weekly church going which Philip seemed to expect from her became a tie, and a small hardship which connected itself with a life of respectability and prosperity. A crust of bread and liberty was much more according to Sylvia's nature than plenty of creature comforts and many restraints. Another wish of Philip's, against which she said no word, but constantly rebelled in thought and deed, was his desire that the servant he'd engaged during the time of her illness to take charge of the baby, should always carry it whenever it was taken out for a walk. Sylvia often felt, now she was strong, as if she would far rather have been without the responsibility of having this nursemaid of whom she was, in reality, rather afraid. The good side of it was that it set her in liberty to attend to her mother at times when she would have been otherwise occupied with her baby. But Belle required very little from anyone. She was easily pleased and exacting the methodical even in her dotage, preserving the quiet and demonstrative habits of her earlier life, now that the faculty of reason which had been at the basis of the formation of such habits was gone. She took great delight in watching the baby and was pleased to have it in her care for a short time. But she doted so much that it prevented her having any strong wish on the subject. So Sylvia contrived to get her baby as much as possible to herself in spite of the nursemaid, and above all she would carry it out, softly cradled in her arms, warm pillowed on her breast, and bear it to the freedom and solitude of the seashore on the west side of the town where the cliffs were not so high and there was a good space of sand and shingle at all low tides. Once here, she was as happy as she ever expected to be in this world. The fresh sea breeze restored something of the colour of former days to her cheeks, the old buoyancy to her spirits. Here she might talk her heart full of living nonsense to her baby. Here it was all her own. No father to share in it, no nursemaid to dispute the wisdom of anything she did with it. She sang to it, she tossed it, it growled and it laughed back again till both were weary, and then she would sit down on a broken piece of rock and fall to gazing on the advancing waves catching the sunlight on their crests, advancing, receding, forever and forever as they had done all her life long, as they did when she had walked with them that once by the side of Kinraid, those cruel waves that, forgetful of their happy lovers' talk by the side of their waters, had carried one away and drowned him deep till he was dead. Every time she sat down to look at the sea, this process of thought was gone through up to this point. The next step would, she knew, bring her to the question she dead not must not ask. He was dead, he must be dead, for was she not Philip's wife? Then came up the recollection of Philip's speech, never forgotten, only buried out of sight. What kind of a woman are you to go on dreaming of another man and your wedded wife? She used to shudder as if cold steel had been plunged into her warm living body as she remembered these words, cruel words, harmlessly provoked. They were too much associated with physical pains to be dwelt upon. Only their memory was always there. She paid for these happy ramble with her baby by the depression which awaited her on her re-entrance into the dark, confined house that was her home. Its very fullness of comfort was an oppression. Then, when her husband saw her pale and fatigued, he was annoyed, and sometimes upbraided her for doing what was so unnecessary as to load herself with her child. She knew full well it was not that that caused her weariness. By and by, when he inquired and discovered that all these walks were taken in one direction, out towards the sea, he grew jealous of her love for the inanimate ocean. Was it connected in her mind with the thought of Kinraid? Why did she so perseveringly in wind or cold go out to the seashore, the western side too, where, if she went but far enough, she would come upon the mouth of the hater's bank gully, the point at which she had lost seen Kinraid. Such fancies haunted Philip's mind for hours after she had acknowledged the direction of her walks. But he never said a word that could distinctly tell her that he disliked her going to the sea, otherwise she would have obeyed him in this, as in everything else. For absolute obedience to her husband seemed to be her rule of life at this period. The obedience to him who would so gladly ever obeyed her smallish risk had she but expressed it. She never knew that Philip had any painful association with a particular point on the seashore that she instinctively avoided, both from a consciousness of wifely duty, and also because the sight of it brought up so much sharp pain. Philip used to wonder if the dream that preceded her illness was the suggestive cause that drew her so often to the shore. Her illness consequence upon that dream had filled his mind, so that for many months he himself had had no haunting vision of Kinraid to disturb his slumbers. But now the old dream of Kinraid's actual presence by Philip's bedside began to return with fearful vividness. Night after night it recurred, each time with some new touch of reality and close approach, till it was as if the fate that overtakes all men were then, even then, knocking at his door. In his business Philip prospered. Men praised him because he did well to himself. He had the perseverance, the capability for head work and calculation, the steadiness and general forethought which might have made him a great merchant if he had lived in a large city. Without any effort of his own almost too, without Coulson's being aware of it, Philip was now in the position of superior partner, but one to suggest and arrange while Coulson only carried out the plans that emanated from Philip. The whole work of life was suited to the man. He did not aspire to any different position, only to the full development of the capabilities of that which he already held. He had originated several fresh schemes with regard to the traffic of the shop, and his old masters, with all their love of tried ways and distrust of everything new, had been candid enough to confess that their success as plans had resulted in success, their successes. Philip was content with having the power when the exercise of it was required and never named his own important share in the new improvements. Possibly if he had, Coulson's vanity might have taken the alarm and he might not have been so acquiescent for the future. As it was, he forgot his own subordinate share and always used the imperial we. We thought it struck us, etc. End of Chapter 31