fasten hopes on what might have no meaning, and could rely on nothing, till she had seen her father, who never kept back his genuine pinion, and would least of all from her. She found her spirits too much agitated to talk to her sisters, and quietly begged them to let her be quite alone till the consultation was over, and she lay trying to prepare herself to submit thankfully, whether she might be bidden to resign herself to helplessness, or to let her mind open once more to visions of joyous usefulness. Every step she hoped would prove to be her father's approach, and the longest hour of her life was that before he entered her room. His face said that the tidings were good, and yet she could not ask.
'Well, Margaret, I am glad we had him down. He thinks you may get about again, though it may be a long time first.'
'Does he?--oh, papa!' and the colour spread over her face, as she squeezed his hand very fast.
'He has known the use of the limbs return almost suddenly after even a year or two,' and Dr. May gave her the grounds of the opinion, and an account of other like cases, which he said had convinced him, 'though, my poor child,' he said, 'I feared the harm I had done you was irremediable, but thanks--' He turned away his face, and the clasp of their hands spoke the rest.
Presently he told Margaret that she was no longer to be kept prostrate, but she was to do exactly as was most comfortable to her, avoiding nothing but fatigue. She might be lifted to the sofa the next day, and if that agreed with her, she might be carried downstairs.
This, in itself, after she had been confined to her bed for three months, was a release from captivity, and all the brothers and sisters rejoiced as if she was actually on her feet again. Richard betook himself to constructing a reading-frame for the sofa; Harry tormented Miss Winter by insisting on a holiday for the others, and gained the day by an appeal to his father; then declared he should go and tell Mr. Wilmot the good news; and Norman, quite enlivened, took up his hat, and said he would come too.
In all his joy, however, Dr. May could not cease bewailing the alteration in his old friend, and spent half the evening in telling Margaret how different he had once been, in terms little less measured than Ethel's: 'I never saw such a change. Mat Fleet was one of the most warm, open-hearted fellows in the world, up to anything. I can hardly believe he is the same--turned into a mere machine, with a moving spring of self-interest! I don't believe he cares a rush for any living thing! Except for your sake, Margaret, I wish I had never seen him again, and only remembered him as he was at Edinburgh, as I remembered dear old Spencer. It is a grievous thing! Ruined entirely! No doubt that London life must be trying--the constant change and bewilderment of patients preventing much individual care and interest. It must be very hardening. No family ties either, nothing to look to but pushing his way. Yes! there's great excuse for poor Mat. I never knew fully till now the blessing it was that your dear mother was willing to take me so early, and that this place was open to me with all its home connections and interests. I am glad I never had anything to do with London!'
And when he was alone with Norman, he could not help saying, 'Norman, my boy, I'm more glad than ever you yielded to me about your Greek these holidays, and for the reason you did. Take care the love of rising and pushing never gets hold of you; there's nothing that faster changes a man from his better self.'
Meanwhile, Sir Matthew Fleet had met another old college friend in London, and was answering his inquiries for the Dick May of ancient times.
'Poor May! I never saw a man so thrown away. With his talent and acuteness, he might be the most eminent man of his day, if he had only known how to use them. But he was always the same careless, soft-hearted fellow, never knowing how to do himself any good, and he is the same still, not a day older nor wiser. It was a fatal thing for him that there was that country practice ready for him to step into, and even of that he does not make as good a thing as he might. Of course, he married early, and there he is, left a widower with a house full of children-- screaming babies, and great tall sons growing up, and he without a notion what he shall do with them, as heedless as ever--saving nothing, of course. I always knew it was what he would come to, if he would persist in burying himself in that wretched little country town, but I hardly thought, after all he has gone through, to find him such a mere boy still. And yet he is one of the cleverest men I ever met--with such talent, and such thorough knowledge of his profession, that it does one good to hear him talk. Poor May! I am sorry for him, he might have been anything, but that early marriage and country practice were the ruin of him.'
CHAPTER XIV.
To thee, dear maid, each kindly wile Was known, that elder sisters know, To check the unseasonable smile, With warning hand and serious brow. From dream to dream with her to rove, Like fairy nurse with hermit child; Teach her to think, to pray, to love, Make grief less bitter, joy less wild. LINES ON A MONUMENT AT LICHFIELD.
Sir Matthew Fleet's visit seemed like a turning-point with the May family, rousing and giving them revived hopes. Norman began to shake off his extreme languor and depression, the doctor was relieved from much of the wearing suffering from his hurt, and his despondency as to Margaret's ultimate recovery had been driven away. The experiment of taking her up succeeded so well, that on Sunday she was fully attired, 'fit to receive company.' As she lay on the sofa there seemed an advance toward recovery. Much sweet coquetry was expended in trying to look her best for her father; and her best was very well, for though the brilliant bloom of health was gone, her cheeks had not lost their pretty rounded contour, and still had some rosiness, while her large bright blue eyes smiled and sparkled. A screen shut out the rest of the room, making a sort of little parlour round the fire, where sundry of the family were visiting her after coming home from church in the afternoon. Ethel was in a vehement state of indignation at what had that day happened at school. 'Did you ever hear anything like it! When the point was, to teach the poor things to be Christians, to turn them back, because their hair was not regulation length!'
'What's that! Who did?' said Dr. May, coming in from his own room, where he had heard a few words.
'Mrs. Ledwich. She sent back three of the Cocksmoor children this morning. It seems she warned them last Sunday without saying a word to us.'
'Sent them back from church!' said the doctor.
'Not exactly from church,' said Margaret.
'It is the same in effect,' said Ethel, 'to turn them from school; for if they did try to go alone, the pew-openers would drive them out.'
'It is a wretched state of things!' said Dr. May, who never wanted much provocation to begin storming about parish affairs. 'When I am churchwarden again, I'll see what can be done about the seats; but it's no sort of use, while Ramsden goes on as he does.'
'Now my poor children are done for!' said Ethel. 'They will never come again. And it's horrid, papa; there are lots of town children who wear immense long plaits of hair, and Mrs. Ledwich never interferes with them. It is entirely to drive the poor Cocksmoor ones away--for nothing else, and all out of Fanny Anderson's chatter.'
'Ethel, my dear,' said Margaret pleadingly.
'Didn't I tell you, Margaret, how, as soon as Flora knew what Mrs. Ledwich was going to do, she went and told her this was the children's only chance, and if we affronted them for a trifle, there would be no hope of getting them back. She said she was sorry, if we were interested for them, but rules must not be broken; and when Flora spoke of all who do wear long hair unmolested, she shuffled and said, for the sake of the teachers, as well as the other children, rags and dirt could not be allowed; and then she brought up the old story of Miss Boulder's pencil, though she has found it again, and ended by saying Fanny Anderson told her it was a serious annoyance to the teachers, and she was sure we should agree with her, that something was due to voluntary assistants and subscribers.'
'I am afraid there has been a regular set at them,' said Margaret, 'and perhaps they are troublesome, poor things.'
'As if school-keeping were for luxury!' said Dr. May. 'It is the worst thing I have heard of Mrs. Ledwich yet! One's blood boils to think of those poor children being cast off because our fine young ladies are too grand to teach them! The clergyman leaving his work to a set of conceited women, and they turning their backs on ignorance, when it comes to their door! Voluntary subscribers, indeed! I've a great mind I'll be one no longer.'
'Oh, papa, that would not be fair--'began Ethel; but Margaret knew he would not act on this, squeezed her hand, and silenced her.
'One thing I've said, and I'll hold to it,' continued Dr. May; 'if they outvote Wilmot again in your Ladies' Committee, I'll have no more to do with them, as sure as my name's Dick May. It is a scandal the way things are done here!'
