Miss Marjoribanks

been expected. When he did mention that eventful day at all, he said that he had happened accidentally to be calling on Miss Marjoribanks the day her cousin came home, and saw at once the state of affairs; and he sent her a very nice present when she was married. After all, it was not her fault. If Providence had ordained that it was to be Tom, how could Lucilla fly in the face of such an ordinance? and, at the same time, there was to both parties the consoling reflection, that whatever might happen to them as individuals, the best man had been chosen for Carlingford, which was an abiding benefit to all concerned.

Under all the circumstances, it was to be looked for that Miss Marjoribanks’s spirits should improve even in her mourning, and that the tenacity with which she clung to her father’s house should yield to the changed state of affairs. This was so much the case, that Lucilla took heart to show Mrs. Rider all over it, and to point out all the conveniences to her, and even, with a sigh, to call her attention to the bell which hung over the Doctor’s bedroom door. “It breaks my heart to hear it,” Miss Marjoribanks said; “but still Dr. Rider will find it a great convenience.” It was a very nice house; and so the new Doctor’s wife, who had not been used to anything so spacious, was very willing to say; and instead of feeling any grudge against the man who was thus in every respect to take her father’s place, so sweet are the softening influences of time and personal well-being, that Lucilla, who was always so good-natured, made many little arrangements for their comfort, and even left the carpets, which was a thing nobody could have expected of her, and which Aunt Jemima did not scruple to condemn. “They are all fitted,” Lucilla said, “and if they were taken up they would be spoiled; and besides, we could have no use for them at Marchbank.” It was a very kind thing to do, and simplified matters very much for the Riders, who were not rich. But Aunt Jemima, in the background, could not but pull Lucilla’s sleeve, and mutter indistinct remarks about a valuation, which nobody paid any particular attention to at the moment, as there were so many things much more important to think of and to do.

And the presents that came pouring in from every quarter were enough to have made up for twenty carpets. Lucilla got testimonials, so to speak, from every side, and all Carlingford interested itself, as has been said, in all the details of the marriage, as if it had been a daughter of its own. “And yet it is odd to think that, after all, I shall never be anything but Lucilla Marjoribanks!” she said, in the midst of all her triumphs, with a certain pensiveness. If there could be any name that would have suited her better, or is surrounded by more touching associations, we leave it to her other friends to find out; for at the moment of taking leave of her, there is something consoling to our own mind in the thought that Lucilla can now suffer no change of name. As she was in the first freshness of her youthful daring, when she rose like the sun upon the chaos of society in Carlingford, so is she now as she goes forth into the County to carry light and progress there. And in this reflection there is surely comfort for the few remaining malcontents, whom not even his own excellent qualities, and Lucilla’s happiness, can reconcile to the fact that after all it was Tom.

Endnotes

1. It may be mentioned here that this was an engagement that none of the friends approved of, and that it was the greatest possible comfort to Miss Marjoribanks’s mind that she had nothing to do with it⁠—either one way or another, as she said. ↩

2. It is only justice to Miss Marjoribanks to say that she was not addicted to fine writing; but then she was a person who liked to have everything in keeping, and naturally an emergency such as the present does not come every day, and requires to be treated accordingly. ↩

Colophon

Miss Marjoribanks
was published in 1866 by
Margaret Oliphant.

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