"No--except a little. There is one thing----"
"What is it, my pet? If it"s to the half of my kingdom, it shall be done."
"Phil, we are going to be very good when we are together? don"t laugh--to help each other?"
He did laugh low, not to be heard, but long. "I shall have no temptation," he said, "to be anything but good, you little goose of a Nell," taking it for a warning of possible jealousy to come.
"Oh, but I mean both of us--to help each other."
"Why, Nell, I know you"ll never go wrong----"
She gave him a little impatient shake. "You will not understand me, Phil. We will try to be better than we"ve ever been. To be good--don"t you know what that means?--in every way, before G.o.d."
Her voice dropped very low, and he was for a moment overawed. "You mean going to church, Nell?"
"I mean--yes, that for one thing; and many other things."
"That"s dropping rather strong upon a fellow," he said, "just at this moment, don"t you think, when I must say yes to everything you say."
"Oh, I don"t mean it in that way; and I was not thinking of church particularly; but to be good, very good, true and kind, in our hearts."
"You are all that already, Nell."
"Oh, no, not what I mean. When there are two of us instead of one we can do so much more."
"Well, my pet, it"s for you to make out the much more. I"m quite content with you as you are; it"s me that you want to improve, and heaven knows there"s plenty of room for that."
"No, Phil, not you more than me," she said.
"We"ll choose a place where the sermon"s short, and we"ll see about it.
You mean little minx, to bind a man down to go to church, the night before his wedding day!"
And then there was a sound of movement indoors, and after a little while the bride appeared among the guests with a little more colour than usual, and an anxiously explanatory description of something she had been obliged to do; and the confused hour flew on with much sound of talking and very little understanding of what was said. And then all the visitors streamed away group after group into the moonlight, disappearing like ghosts under the shadow of the trees. Finally, the Rectory party went too, the three mild ladies surrounded by an exciting circle of cigars; for Alick, of course, had broken all bonds, and even the Rector accepted that rare indulgence. Alice Hudson half deplored, half exulted for years after in the scent that would cling round one particular evening dress. Five gentlemen, all with cigars, and papa as bad as any of them! There had never been such an extraordinary experience in her life.
And then the Tathams, too, withdrew, and the mother and daughter stood alone on their own hearth. Oh, so much, so much as there was to say! but how were they to say it?--the last moment, which was so precious and so intolerable--the moment that would never come again.
"You were a long time with Philip, Elinor, in the garden. I think all your old friends ---- the last night."
"I wanted to say something to him, mamma, that I had never had the courage to say."
Mrs. Dennistoun had been looking dully into the dim mirror over the mantelpiece. She turned half round to her daughter with an inquiring look.
"Oh, mamma, I wanted to say to him that we must be good! We"re so happy.
G.o.d is so kind to us; and you--if you suppose I don"t think of you! It was to say to him--building our house upon all this, G.o.d"s mercy and your loss, and all--that we are doubly, doubly bound to serve--and to love--and to be good people before G.o.d; and like you, mother, like you!"
"My darling!" Mrs. Dennistoun said. And that was all. She asked no questions as to how it was to be done, or what he replied. Elinor had broken down hysterically, and sobbed out the words one at a time, as they would come through the choking in her throat. Needless to say that she ended in her mother"s arms, her head upon the bosom which had nursed her, her slight weight dependent upon the supporter and protector of all her life.
That was the last evening. There remained the last morning to come; and after that--what? The great sea of an unknown life, a new pilot, and a ship untried.
CHAPTER XVI.
And now the last morning had come.
The morning of a wedding-day is a flying and precarious moment which seems at once as if it never would end, and as if it were a hurried preliminary interval in which the necessary preparations never could be done. Elinor was not allowed to come down-stairs to help, as she felt it would be natural to do. It was Mary Tatham who arranged the flowers on the table, and helped Dennistoun to superintend everything. All the women in the house, though they were so busy, were devoted at every spare moment to the service of Elinor. They brought her simple breakfast up-stairs, one maid carrying the tray and another the teapot, that each might have their share. The cook, though she was overwhelmed with work, had made some cakes for breakfast, such us Elinor liked. "Most like as we"ll never have her no more--to mind," she said. The gardener sent up an untidy bundle of white flowers. And Mrs. Dennistoun came herself to pour out the tea. "As if I had been ill, or had turned into a baby again," Elinor said. But there was not much said. Mary Tatham was there for one thing, and for another and the most important they had said all they had to say; the rest which remained could not be said. The wedding was to be at a quarter to twelve, in order to give Lady Mariamne time to come from town. It was not the fashion then to delay marriages to the afternoon, which no doubt would have been much more convenient for her ladyship; but the best that could be done was done. Mr. Tatham"s carriage, which he had brought with him to grace the ceremony, was despatched to the station to meet Lady Mariamne, while he, good man, had to get to church as he could in one of the flys. And then came the important moment, when the dressing of the bride had to be begun. The wedding-breakfast was not yet all set out in perfect order, and there were many things to do. Yet every woman in the house had a little share in the dressing of the bride. They all came to see how it fitted when the wedding-dress was put on. It fitted like a glove! The long glossy folds of the satin were a wonder to see. Cook stood just within the door in a white ap.r.o.n, and wept, and could not say a word to Miss Elinor; but the younger maids sent forth a murmur of admiration. And the Missis they thought was almost as beautiful as the bride, though her satin was grey.
Mrs. Dennistoun herself threw the veil over her child"s head, and put in the diamond star, the old-fashioned ornament, which had been her husband"s present to herself. And then again she had meant to say something to Elinor--a last word--but the word would not come. They were both of them glad that somebody should be there all the time, that they should not be left alone. And after that the strange, hurried, everlasting morning was over, and the carriage was at the door.
Then again it was a relief that old Mr. Tatham had missed his proper place in the fly, and had to go on the front seat with the bride and her mother. It was far better so. If they had been left even for ten minutes alone, who could have answered that one or the other would not have cried, and discomposed the bouquet and the veil? It seemed a great danger and responsibility over when they arrived at last safely at the church door. Lady Mariamne was just then arriving from the station. She drew up before them in poor Mr. Tatham"s carriage, keeping them back.
Harry Compton and Mr. Bolsover sprang to the carriage window to talk to her, and there was a loud explosion of mirth and laughter in the midst of the village people, and the children with their baskets of flowers who were already gathered. Lady Mariamne"s voice burst out so shrill that it overmastered the church bells. "Here I am," she cried, "out in the wilderness. And Algy has come with me to take care of me. And how are you, dear boys; and how is poor Phil?" "Phil is all ready to be turned off, with the halter round his neck," said d.i.c.k Bolsover; and Harry Compton said, "Hurry up, hurry up, Jew, the bride is behind you, waiting to get out." "She must wait, then," said Lady Mariamne, and there came leisurely out of the carriage, first, her ladyship"s companion, by name, Algy, a tall person with an eye-gla.s.s, then a little pug, which was carefully handed into his arms, and then lightly jumping down to the ground, a little figure in black--in black of all things in the world! a sight that curdled the blood of the village people, and of Mrs. Hudson, who had walked across from the Rectory in a gown of pigeon"s-breast silk which scattered prismatic reflections as she walked. In black! Mrs. Hudson bethought herself that she had a white China c.r.a.pe shawl in her cupboard, and wondered if she could offer it to conceal this ill omened gown. But if Lady Mariamne"s dress was dark, she herself was fair enough, with an endless fluff of light hair under her little black lace bonnet. Her gloves were off, and her hands were white and glistening with rings. "Give me my puggy darling," she said in her loud, shrill tone. "I can go nowhere, can I, pet, without my little pug!"
"A Jew and a pug, both in church. It is enough," said her brother, "to get the poor parson into trouble with his bishop."
"Oh, the bishop"s a great friend of mine," said the lady; "he will say nothing to me, not if I put Pug in a surplice and make him lead the choir." At this speech there was a great laugh of the a.s.sembled party, which stood in the centre of the path, while Mr. Tatham"s carriage edged away, and the others made efforts to get forward. The noise of their talk disturbed the curious abstraction in which Elinor had been going through the morning hours. Mariamne"s jarring voice seemed louder than the bells. Was this the first voice sent out to greet her by the new life which was about to begin? She glanced at her mother, and then at old Uncle Tatham, who sat immovable, prevented by decorum from apostrophising the coachman who was not his own, but fuming inwardly at the interruption. Mrs. Dennistoun did not move at all, but her daughter knew very well what was meant by that look straight before her, in which her mother seemed to ignore all obstacles in the way.
"I got here very well," Lady Mariamne went on; "we started in the middle of the night, of course, before the lamps were out. Wasn"t it good of Algy to get himself out of bed at such an unearthly hour! But he snapped at Puggy as we came down, which was a sign he felt it. Why aren"t you with the poor victim at the altar, you boys?"
"Phil will be in blue funk," said Harry; "go in and stand by your man, d.i.c.k: the Jew has enough with two fellows to see her into her place."
The bride"s carriage by this time pushed forward, making Lady Mariamne start in confusion. "Oh! look here; they have splashed my pretty toilette, and upset my nerves," she cried, springing back into her supporter"s arms.
That gentleman regarded the stain of the damp gravel on the lady"s skirt through his eye-gla.s.s with deep but helpless anxiety. "It"s a pity for the pretty frock!" he said with much seriousness. And the group gathered round and gazed in dismay, as if they expected it to disappear of itself--until Mrs. Hudson bustled up. "It will rub off; it will not make any mark. If one of you gentlemen will lend me a handkerchief," she said. And Algy and Harry and d.i.c.k Bolsover, not to speak of Lady Mariamne herself, watched with great gravity while the gravel was swept off. "I make no doubt," said the Rector"s wife, "that I have the pleasure of speaking to Lady Mariamne: and I don"t doubt that black is the fashion and your dress is beautiful: but if you would just throw on a white shawl for the sake of the wedding--it"s so unlucky to come in black----"
"A white shawl!" said Lady Mariamne in dismay.
"The Jew in a white shawl!" echoed the others with a burst of laughter which rang into the church itself and made Phil before the altar, alone and very anxious, ask himself what was up.
"It"s China c.r.a.pe, I a.s.sure you, and very nice," Mrs. Hudson said.
Lady Mariamne gave the good Samaritan a stony stare, and took Algy"s arm and sailed into the church before the Rector"s wife, without a word said; while all the women from the village looked at each other and said, "Well, I never!" under their breath.
"Let me give you my arm, Mrs. Hudson," said Harry Compton, "and please pardon me that I did not introduce my sister to you. She is dreadfully shy, don"t you know, and never does speak to anyone when she has not been introduced."
"My observation was a very simple one," said Mrs. Hudson, very angry, yet pleased to lean upon an Honourable arm.
"My dear lady!" cried the good-natured Harry, "the Jew never wore a shawl in her life----"
And all this time the organ had been pealing, the white vision pa.s.sing up the aisle, the simple villagers chanting forth their song about the breath that breathed o"er Eden. Alas! Eden had not much to do with it, except perhaps in the trembling heart of the white maiden roused out of her virginal dream by the jarring voices of the new life. The laughter outside was a dreadful offence to all the people, great and small, who had collected to see Elinor married.
"What could you expect? It"s that woman whom they call the Jew,"
whispered Lady Huntingtower to her next neighbour.
"She should be put into the stocks," said Sir John, scarcely under his breath, which, to be sure, was also an interruption to the decorum of the place.
And then there ensued a pause broken by the voice, a little lugubrious in tone, of the Rector within the altar rails, and the tremulous answers of the pair outside. The audience held its breath to hear Elinor make her responses, and faltered off into suppressed weeping as the low tones ceased. Sir John Huntingtower, who was very tall and big, and stood out like a pillar among the ladies round, kept nodding his head all the time she spoke, nodding as you might do in forced a.s.sent to any dreadful vow.
Poor little thing, poor little thing, he was saying in his heart. His face was more like the face of a man at a funeral than a man at a wedding. "Blessed are the dead that die in the Lord"--he might have been nodding a.s.sent to that instead of to Elinor"s low-spoken vow. Phil Compton"s voice, to tell the truth, was even more tremulous than Elinor"s. To investigate the thoughts of a bridegroom would be too much curiosity at such a moment. But I think if the secrets of the hearts could be revealed, Phil for a moment was sorry for poor little Elinor too.