Having delivered himself of which remark with infinite contempt, old Gruff & Tackleton withdrew.
Bertha remained where he had left her, lost in meditation. The gaiety had vanished from her downcast face, and it was very sad. Three or four times she shook her head, as if bewailing some remembrance or some loss; but her sorrowful reflections found no vent in words.
"Father, I am lonely in the dark. I want my eyes; my patient, willing eyes."
"Here they are," said Caleb. "Always ready. They are more yours than mine, Bertha, any hour in the four-and-twenty. What shall your eyes do for you, dear?"
"Look round the room, father."
"All right," said Caleb. "No sooner said than done, Bertha."
"Tell me about it."
"It"s much the same as usual," said Caleb. "Homely, but very snug. The gay colors on the walls; the bright flowers on the plates and dishes; the shining wood, where there are beams or panels; the general cheerfulness and neatness of the building, make it very pretty."
Cheerful and neat it was, wherever Bertha"s hands could busy themselves.
But nowhere else were cheerfulness and neatness possible, in the crazy shed which Caleb"s fancy so transformed.
"You have your working dress on, and are not so gay as when you wear the handsome coat?" said Bertha, touching him.
"Not quite so gay," answered Caleb. "Pretty brisk though."
"Father," said the blind girl, drawing close to his side and stealing one arm round his neck, "tell me something about May. She is very fair."
"She is, indeed," said Caleb. And she was indeed. It was quite a rare thing to Caleb not to have to draw on his invention.
"Her hair is dark," said Bertha, pensively, "darker than mine. Her voice is sweet and musical I know. I have often loved to hear it. Her shape--"
"There"s not a doll"s in all the room to equal it," said Caleb. "And her eyes--"
He stopped; for Bertha had drawn closer round his neck; and, from the arm that clung about him, came a warning pressure which he understood too well.
He coughed a moment, hammered for a moment, and then fell back upon the song about the sparkling bowl; the song which helped him through all such difficulties.
"Our friend, father; the one who has helped us so many times, Mr.
Tackleton. I am never tired you know, of hearing about him. Now was I, ever?" she said, hastily.
"Of course not," answered Caleb. "And with reason."
"Ah! with how much reason?" cried the blind girl, with such fervency that Caleb, though his motives were pure, could not endure to meet her face, but dropped his eyes, as if she could have read in them his innocent deceit.
"Then tell me again about him, dear father," said Bertha. "Many times again! His face is good, kind, and tender. Honest and true, I am sure it is. The manly heart that tries to cloak all favors with a show of roughness and unwillingness beats in its every look and glance."
"And makes it n.o.ble," added Caleb in his quiet desperation.
"And makes it n.o.ble!" cried the blind girl. "He is older than May, father?"
"Ye-es," said Caleb, reluctantly. "He"s a little older than May, but that don"t signify."
"Bertha," said Caleb softly, "what has happened? How changed you are, my darling, in a few hours--since this morning. _You_ silent and dull all day! What is it? Tell me!"
"Oh father, father!" cried the blind girl, bursting into tears. "Oh, my hard, hard fate!"
Caleb drew his hand across his eyes before he answered her.
"But think how cheerful and how happy you have been, Bertha! How good, and how much loved, by many people."
"That strikes me to the heart, dear father! Always so mindful of me!
Always so kind to me!"
Caleb was very much perplexed to understand her.
"To be--to be blind, Bertha, my poor dear," he faltered, "is a great affliction; but----"
"I have never felt it!" cried the blind girl. "I have never felt it in its fullness. Never! I have sometimes wished that I could see you, or could see him; only once, dear father; only for one little minute. But, father! Oh, my good, gentle father, bear with me, if I am wicked!" said the blind girl. "This is not the sorrow that so weighs me down!"
"Bertha, my dear!" said Caleb, "I have something on my mind I want to tell you, while we are alone. Hear me kindly! I have a confession to make to you, my darling."
"A confession, father?"
"I have wandered from the truth and lost myself, my child," said Caleb, with a pitiable look on his bewildered face. "I have wandered from the truth, intending to be kind to you; and have been cruel."
She turned her wonder-stricken face towards him, and repeated, "Cruel!
He cruel to me!" cried Bertha, with a smile of incredulity.
"Not meaning it, my child," said Caleb. "But I have been; though I never suspected it till yesterday. My dear blind daughter, hear me and forgive me! The world you live in, heart of mine, doesn"t exist as I have represented it. The eyes you have trusted in have been false to you."
She turned her wonder-stricken face towards him still.
"Your road in life was rough, my poor one," said Caleb, "and I meant to smooth it for you. I have altered objects, invented many things that never have been, to make you happier. I have had concealments from you, put deceptions on you, G.o.d forgive me! and surrounded you with fancies."
"But living people are not fancies?" she said hurriedly, and turning very pale, and still retiring from him. "You can"t change them."
"I have done so, Bertha," pleaded Caleb. "There is one person that you know, my Dove--"
"Oh, father! why do you say I know?" she answered in a tone of keen reproach. "What and whom do I know! I, who have no leader! I, so miserably blind!"
In the anguish of her heart she stretched out her hands, as if she were groping her way; then spread them, in a manner most forlorn and sad, upon her face.
"The marriage that takes place to-day," said Caleb, "is with a stern, sordid, grinding man. A hard master to you and me, my dear, for many years. Ugly in his looks and in his nature. Cold and callous always.
Unlike what I have painted him to you in everything, my child. In everything."
"Oh, why," cried the blind girl, tortured, as it seemed, almost beyond endurance, "why did you ever do this? Why did you ever fill my heart so full, and then come in, like death, and tear away the objects of my love? Oh, heaven, how blind I am! How helpless and alone!"
Her afflicted father hung his head, and offered no reply but in his grief.
"Tell me what my home is. What it truly is."
"It is a poor place, Bertha; very poor and bare indeed. The house will scarcely keep out wind and rain another winter. It is as roughly shielded from the weather, Bertha, as your poor father in his sackcloth coat."