'George,' said Meta. 'What would become of him without her? If he misses her for ten minutes he roams about lost, and he cannot enjoy anything without her. I cannot think how he can help seeing what hard work it is, and how he can be contented with those dreadful sham smiles; but as long as she can give him pleasure, poor Flora will toil for him.'
'It is very selfish,' Ethel caught herself saying.
'No, no, it is not,' cried Meta. 'It is not that he will not see, but that he cannot see. Good honest fellow, he really thinks it does her good and pleases her. I was so sorry one evening when I tried to take her place at that perpetual ecarte, and told him it teased her; he went so wistfully to her, and asked whether it did, and she exerted herself into such painful enjoyment to persuade him to the contrary; and afterwards she said to me, 'Let me alone, dearest--it is the only thing left me.''
'There is something in being husband and wife that one cannot understand,' slowly said Ethel, so much in her quaint way that Meta laughed.
Had it not been for Norman's absence, Ethel would, in the warm sympathy and accustomed manner of Meta Rivers, have forgotten all about the hopes and fears that, in brighter days, had centred on that small personage; until one day, as she came home from Cocksmoor, she found 'Sir Henry Walkinghame's' card on the drawing-room table. 'I should like to bite you! Coming here, are you?' was her amiable reflection.
Meta, in her riding-habit, peeped out of Margaret's room. 'Oh, Ethel, there you are! It is such a boon that you did not come home sooner, or we should have had to ride home with him! I heard him asking for the Miss Mays! And now I am in hopes that he will go home without falling in with Flora and George.'
'I did not know he was in these parts.'
'He came to Drydale last week, but the place is forlorn, and George gave him a general invitation to the Grange.'
'Do you like him?' said Ethel, while Margaret looked on, amazed at her audacity.
'I liked him very much in London,' said Meta; 'he is pleasant enough to talk to, but somehow, he is not congruous here--if you understand me. And I think his coming oppresses Flora--she turned quite pale when he was announced, and her voice was lower than ever when she spoke to him.'
'Does he come often?' said Ethel.
'I don't think he has anything else to do,' returned Meta, 'for our house cannot be as pleasant as it was; but he is very kind to George, and for that we must be grateful. One thing I am afraid of, that he will persuade us off to the yachting after all.'
'Oh!' was the general exclamation.
'Yes,' said Meta. 'George seemed to like the plan, and I very much fear that he is taking a dislike to the dear old Grange. I heard him say, 'Anything to get away.''
'Poor George, I know he is restless,' said Margaret.
'At least,' said Ethel, 'you can't go till after your birthday, Miss Heiress.'
'No, Uncle Cosham is coming,' said Meta. 'Margaret, you must have your stone laid before we go!'
'Dr. Spencer promises it before Hector's holidays are over,' said Margaret, blushing, as she always did, with pleasure, when they talked of the church.
Hector Ernescliffe had revived Margaret wonderfully. She was seldom downstairs before the evening, and Ethel thought his habit of making her apartment his sitting-room must be as inconvenient to her as it was to herself; but Hector could not be de trop for Margaret. She exerted herself to fulfil for him all the little sisterly offices that, with her brothers, had been transferred to Ethel and Mary; she threw herself into all his schemes, tried to make him endure Captain Gordon, and she even read his favourite book of Wild Sports, though her feelings were constantly lacerated by the miseries of the slaughtered animals. Her couch was to him as a home, and he had awakened her bright soft liveliness which had been only dimmed for a time.
The church was her other great interest, and Dr. Spencer humoured her by showing her all his drawings, consulting her on every ornament, and making many a perspective elevation, merely that she might see the effect.
Richard and Tom made it their recreation to construct a model of the church as a present for her, and Tom developed a genius for carving, which proved a beneficial interest to keep him from surliness. He had voluntarily propounded his intended profession to his father, who had been so much pleased by his choice, that he could not but be gratified; though now and then ambitious fancies, and discontent with Stoneborough, combined to bring on his ordinary moody fits, the more, because his habitual reserve prevented any one from knowing what was working in his mind.
Finally the Rivers' party announced their intention of going to the Isle of Wight as soon as Meta had come of age; and the council of Cocksmoor, meeting at tea at Dr. May's house, decided that the foundation stone of the church should be laid on the day after her birthday, when there would be a gathering of the whole family, as Margaret wished. Dr. Spencer had worked incredibly hard to bring it forward, and Margaret's sweet smiles, and liquid eyes, expressed how personally thankful she felt.
'What a blessing this church has been to that poor girl,' said Dr. Spencer, as he left the house with Mr. Wilmot. 'How it beguiles her out of her grief! I am glad she has the pleasure of the foundation; I doubt if she will see the consecration.'
'Indeed!' said Mr. Wilmot, shocked. 'Was that attack so serious?'
'That recumbent position and want of exercise were certain to produce organic disease, and suspense and sorrow have hastened it. The death of Mrs. Rivers's poor child was the blow that called it into activity, and, if it last more than a year, I shall be surprised.'
'For such as she is, one cannot presume to wish, but her father--is he aware of this?'
'He knows there is extensive damage; I think he does not open his eyes to the result, but he will bear it. Never was there a man to whom it came so naturally to live like the fowls of the air, or the lilies of the field, as it does to dear Dick May,' said Dr. Spencer, his voice faltering.
'There is a strength of faith and love in him that carries him through all,' said Mr. Wilmot. 'His childlike nature seems to have the trustfulness that is, in itself, consolation. You said how Cocksmoor had been blessed to Margaret--I think it is the same with them all--not only Ethel and Richard, who have been immediately concerned; but that one object has been a centre and aim to elevate the whole family, and give force and unity to their efforts. Even the good doctor, much as I always looked up to him--much good as he did me in my young days--I must confess that he was sometimes very provoking.'
'If you had tried to be his keeper at Cambridge, you might say so!' rejoined Dr. Spencer.
'He is so much less impetuous--more consistent--less desultory; I dare say you understand me,' said Mr. Wilmot. 'His good qualities do not entangle one another as they used to do.'
'Exactly so. He was far more than I looked for when I came home, though I might have guessed that such a disposition, backed by such principles and such--could not but shake off all the dross.'
'One thing was,' said Mr. Wilmot, smiling, 'that a man must take himself in hand at some time in his life, and Dr. May only began to think himself responsible for himself when he lost his wife, who was wise for both. She was an admirable person, but not easy to know well. I think you knew her at--'
'I say,' interrupted Dr. Spencer, 'it strikes me that we could not do better than get up our S. P. G. demonstration on the day of the stone--'
Hitherto the Stoneborough subscribers to the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel had been few and far between; but, under the new dynasty, there was a talk of forming an association, and having a meeting to bring the subject forward. Dr. Spencer's proposal, however, took the vicar by surprise.
'Never could there be a better time,' he argued. 'You have naturally a gathering of clergy--people ought to be liberal on such an occasion, and, as Cocksmoor is provided for, why not give the benefit to the missions, in their crying need!'
'True, but there is no time to send for any one to make a speech.'
'Husband your resources. What could you have better than young Harry and his islanders?'
'Harry would never make a speech.'
'Let him cram Norman. Young Lake tells me Norman made a great sensation at the Union at Oxford, and if his heart is in the work, he must not shrink from the face of his townsmen.'
'No doubt he had rather they were savages,' said the vicar. 'And yourself--you will tell them of the Indian missions.'
