That Stick
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Charlotte M. Yonge >> That Stick
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'No,' said Bertha; 'of course, one never thinks of such things with
grown-up people, especially one whom one has always thought of as a
stick, and to whom perhaps ascribed some of its toughness,' she added,
smiling; 'but he did come home looking very white and worn-out, and
complained of horrible smells. No, dear man, he was far too punctilious
to use the word, he only said that he should like to send the Sanitary
Commission down the alley. I ought to have dosed him with brandy on the
spot, for of course he was too polite to ask for it, so I only gave him a
cup of _tea_,' said Bertha, with an infinite tone of scorn in the name of
the beverage.
'Will it be any comfort to tell you that most likely it would have been
too late even if he would have accepted it? Come, Bertha, how often are
we told that we are not to think so much of consequences as of actions,
and there was nothing blameworthy in the whole business.'
'Except that I was such a donkey as not to have begun by asking for the
man's proofs, but I was so much afraid that he would pounce on the child
that I only thought of buying him off from time to time. I did not know
I was so weak. Well, at any rate, with little Mite to the fore, the
place will be left in good hands. I like Herbert on the whole, but to
have that woman reigning as Madame Mere would be awful.'
'Nay, I trust we are not coming to that! Trotman says it is a thoroughly
severe attack, but not abnormally malignant, as he calls it. It is a
matter of nursing, he tells me, and that he has of the best--a matter of
nursing and of prayer, and that,' added Adela, her eyes filling with
tears, 'I am sure he has.'
'And yet--and yet,' Bertha broke off.
'Ah, you are thinking how we prayed before! And yet, Birdie, after these
six years of seeing his rule and recognising what mine would have been, I
see it was for the best that my own little Michael was taken to his happy
home.'
'You'll call it for the best now,' said Bertha grimly.
'If it be so, it will prove itself; but I really do not see any special
cause for extra fear.'
Lady Adela and Bertha both thought themselves as far safe as any one can
be with scarlet fever, and would gladly have taken a share in the
nursing. Bertha, however, had far too much of the whirlwind in her to be
desirable in a sick house, and on the principle that needless risk was
wrong, was never admitted within the house doors, but Lady Adela insisted
on seeing Mary every day, and was assured that she should be a welcome
assistant in case of need; but at present there was no necessity of
calling in other help, the form of fever being lethargic with much
torpidity, but no violence of delirium, and requiring no more watching
than the wife and nurse could give.
Frank never failed to know his Mary, and to respond when she addressed
him; but she was told never to attempt more than rousing him when it was
needful to make him take food. He had long ago, with the precaution of
his legal training, made every needful arrangement for her and for his
son; and even on the first day, he had not seemed to trouble himself on
these points, being too heavy and oppressed for the power of looking
forward. So the days rolled on in one continual watch on Mary's part,
during which she seemed only to live in the present, and, secure that her
boy was safe, would not risk direct communication with him or with his
nurse.
Lady Adela had undertaken to keep Constance, the person who really loved
her uncle best, daily informed, and she also wrote at intervals to Mrs.
Morton, by special desire of Lady Northmoor, and likewise to her own old
servant, Eden, the nurse. She wrote cheerfully, but Eden had other
correspondents in the servants' hall, who dwelt sensationally on the
danger, as towards Whitsun week the fever began to run higher towards the
crisis, the strength was reduced, the torpor became heavier; and anxiety
increased as to whether there would be power of rally in a man who,
though healthy, had never been strong.
The anxiety manifested by the entire neighbourhood was a notable proof of
the estimation in which the patient was held, and was very far from
springing only from pity or humanity. Half the people who came to Lady
Adela for further information had some cause going on in which 'That
Stick' was one of the most efficient of props.
CHAPTER XXXI
MITE
Little Michael Morton was in the meantime installed in his aunt's house.
For him to be anywhere else was not to be thought of, and Mrs. Morton was
soft-hearted enough to be very fond of such a bright little boy, so much
in her own hands, and very amusing with the old-fashioned formal ways
derived from chiefly consorting with older people.
Besides, the pretty little fellow was an object of great interest to all
her acquaintances, especially as it was understood at Westhaven that it
was only too possible that he might any day become Lord Northmoor; and
never had Mrs. Morton's drawing-room been so much resorted to by visitors
anxious for bulletins, or perhaps more truly for excitement. Mite was a
young gentleman of some dignity. He sat elevated on a hassock upon a
chair to dine at luncheon-time, comporting himself most correctly; but
his aunt was sorely chafed at Eden's standing behind his chair, like
Sancho's physician, to regulate his diet, and placing her veto upon
lobsters, cucumbers, pastry, and glasses of wine with lumps of sugar in
them.
It amounted to a trial of strength between aunt and nurse. Michael
submitted once or twice, when told that his mamma would not approve, but
the lobster struck him with extreme amazement and admiration, and he
could not believe but that the red, long-whiskered monster was not as
good as he was beautiful.
'He has got a glove like what Peter wears to cut the holly hedge,'
exclaimed the boy, to the general amusement. 'Where's his hand?'
'My Mite shall have a bit of his funny hand,' said Mrs. Morton, and Ida
was dealing with the claw, when Eden interposed and said she did not
think her ladyship would wish Master Michael to have any.
'Just a taste, nurse, with some of the cream,' said Mrs. Morton. 'Here,
Mitey dear.'
'No, Master Michael, mamma would say no,' said Eden.
'Really, Eden, you might let Mrs. Morton judge in her own house,' said
Ida.
'Master Morton is under my charge, ma'am, and I am responsible for him,'
said Eden, respectfully but firmly. But Ida held out the claw, and
Michael made a dart at it.
Eden again said 'No,' but he looked up at her with an exulting roguish
grin, and clasped it, whereupon she laid hold of him by the waist, and
bore him off, kicking and roaring, amid the pitiful and indignant
exclamations of his aunt and cousin.
It may be that the faithful Eden was somewhat wanting in tact, by her
determined attention to the routine that chafed her hosts; but she had
been forced to come away without directions, and could only hold fast to
the discipline of her well-ordered nursery under all obstacles.
Master Michael was to have his cup of milk and run on the beach with the
nursery-maid long before the usual awakening of the easy-going household,
which regarded late hours as belonging to gentility; then, after the
general breakfast, his small lessons, over which there often was a
battle, first, because he felt injured by not doing them with his mother,
and next, because his hostesses regarded them as a hardship, and taught
him to cry over 'Reading without tears,' besides detaining him as late as
they could over the breakfast, or proposing to take him out at once,
without waiting for that quarter of an hour's work. Or when
out-of-doors, they would not bring him home for the siesta, on which his
nurse insisted, though it was often only lying down in the dark; nor had
Mrs. Morton any scruple in breaking it, if she wanted to exhibit him to
her friends, though if it were interrupted or omitted, the child's temper
was the worse all the afternoon.
'That nurse is a thorough tyrant over the poor little darling, and a very
impertinent woman besides,' said Mrs. Morton.
'A regular little spoiled brat,' Ida declared him.
While certainly the worse his father was said to be, the more his aunt
tried to spoil and indulge him, as a relief to her pity and grief.
He had missed his home and parents a good deal at first, had cried at his
lessons, and cried more at not having father to carry him to the nursery,
nor mother to hear him say his prayers and kiss him at night; but time
wore off the association, and he was full of delight at the sea, the
ships, the little crabs, and all the other charms of the shore.
Above all, he was excited about the little boys. His own kind had never
come in his way before, his chief playfellow being Amice, who was so much
older as to play with him condescendingly and always give way to him.
There was a large family in a neighbouring lodging containing what he
respectfully called 'big knicker-bocker boys,' who excited his intense
admiration, and drew him like a magnet.
For once Mrs. Morton and Eden were agreed as to the propriety of the
companionship, since Rollstone had pronounced them of 'high family,' and
the governess who was in charge of them was quite ready to be interested
in the solitary little stranger, even if he had not been the Honourable
Michael. So was the elder girl of the party, but, unluckily, Michael was
just of the age to be a great nuisance to children who played combined
and imaginative games which he could not yet understand.
When they were making elaborate approaches to a sand fortification,
erected with great care and pains, he would dash on it with a _coup de
main_, break it down at once with his spade, and stand proudly laughing
and mixing up the ruins together, heedless of the howls of anger of the
besiegers, and believing that he had done the right thing.
And once, when a wrathful boy of eight had shaken the troublesome urchin
as he would have done his own junior, had this last presumed to stir up
his clear pool of curiosities, most of the female portion of the family
had taken the part of the intruder, and cried shame on any one who could
hurt or molest a poor dear little boy away from a father who was so ill!
Thus the Lincoln family, for the sake of peace and self-defence, used
sedulously to flee at the approach of Mite, and seek for secluded coves
to which he was not likely to penetrate.
Mr. Rollstone was Eden's great solace. They discovered that they had
once been staying in the same country-house, and had a great number of
common acquaintances in the upper-servant world, and they entirely agreed
in their estimate of Mrs. Morton and Ida, whom Mr. Rollstone pronounced
to be neither fish, flesh, nor fowl, though as for Miss Constance, she
was a lady all over, and always had been, and there might have been hopes
for Mr. Herbert, if only he could have got into the army.
To sit with Mr. Rollstone, whom the last winter's rheumatics had left
very infirm, was Eden's chief afternoon employment, as she could not
follow her charge's wanderings on the beach, but had to leave him to the
nursery-maid, Ellen. The old butler wanted much to show 'Miss Eden' his
daughter, who took advantage of Whit-Sunday and the Bank-holiday to run
down and see her parents, though at the next quarter she was coming home
for good, extremely sorry to leave her advantages in London, and the
friends she had made there, but feeling that her parents needed her so
much that she must pursue her employment at home.
They were all very anxious on that Whit-Sunday, and Rose carried with her
something of Constance's feeling, as with tears in her eyes she looked at
the little fellow at the children's service, standing by his nurse, with
wide open, inquiring eyes, chiefly fixed upon Willie Lincoln in
satisfaction whenever an answer proceeded from that object of his
unrequited attachment. With the young maiden's love of revelling in
supposed grief, Rose already pitied the fair-faced, unconscious child as
fatherless, and weighted with heavy responsibilities.
Another pair of eyes looked at the boy, not with pity, but indignant
impatience.
Perhaps even already that little pretender was the only obstacle between
Herbert and the coronet that was his by right, between Ida herself and--
Ida had walked from the school to the church with Mr. Deyncourt, and he
had talked so gently and pitifully of the family distress, and assumed so
much grief on her part, that his sympathy made her heart throb; above
all, when he told her that his two sisters were coming to stay with him,
Mrs. Rollstone had contrived to make room for them, and they would show
her, better than he could, some of the plans he wished to have carried
out with the little children.
So he wished to introduce her to his sisters! What did that mean? If
the Deyncourts were ever so high they could not sneer at Lord Northmoor's
sisters.
Then she thought of many a novel, and in real life, of what she believed
respecting that lost lover of Miss Morton's. And later in the day Tom
Brady lounged up to Northmoor Cottage, and leaning with one elbow on the
window-sill, while the other arm held away the pipe he had just taken
from his lips, he asked if they would give him a cup of tea, the whole
harbour was so full of such beastly, staring cads that there was no peace
there. One ought to give such places a wide berth at Whitsuntide.
'I wonder you did not,' said Ida, as she hastened to compound the tea.
'Forgot it,' he lazily droned, 'forgot it. Attractions, you know,' and,
as she brought the cup to the window, with a lump of sugar in the tongs,
'when sugar fingers are--' and the speech ended in a demonstration at the
fingers that made Ida laugh, blush, and say, 'Oh, for shame, Mr. Brady!'
'You had better come in, Mr. Brady,' called Mrs. Morton. 'You can't
drink it comfortably there, and you'll be upsetting it. We are down in
the dining-room to-day, because--'
The cause, necessary to her gentility, was lost, as Ida proceeded to let
him in at the front door, and he presently deposited himself on the sofa,
grumbling complacently at the bore of holidays, especially bank holidays.
His crew would have been ready to strike, he declared, if he had taken
them out of harbour, or he would have asked the ladies to come on a
cruise out of the way of it all.
'Why, thank you very much, Mr. Brady, but, really in my poor brother,
Lord Northmoor's state, I don't know that it would be etiquette.'
'Ah, yes. By the bye, how's the governor?'
'Very sad, strength failing. I hardly expect to hear he is alive
to-morrow,' and Mrs. Morton's handkerchief was raised.
'Oh ay, sad enough, you know! I say, will it make any difference to
you?'
'My poor, dear brother! Well, it ought, you know. Indeed it would if it
had not been for that dear little boy. My poor Herbert!'
'It must have been an awful sell for him.'
'Yes,' said Ida, 'and some people think there was something very odd
about it all--the child being born out in the Dolomites, with nobody
there!'
'Don't, Ida, I can't have you talk so,' protested her mother.
'Supposititious, by all that's lucky! I should strangle him!' and Mr.
Brady put back his head and laughed a loud and hearty laugh, by no means
elegant, but without much sound of truculent intentions.
CHAPTER XXXII
A SHOCK
It was on the Thursday of Whitsun-week when Lady Adela and Bertha came
down from their visit of inquiry, a little more hopeful than on the
previous day, though they could not yet say that recovery was setting in.
But a great shock awaited them. The parlour-maid met them at the door,
pale and tearful. 'Oh, my lady, Mrs. Eden's come, and--'
Poor Eden herself was in the hall, and nothing was to be heard but 'Oh,
my lady!' and another tempest of sobs.
'Come in, Eden,' scolded Bertha, in her impatience. 'Don't keep us in
this way. What has happened to the child? Let us have it at once! The
worst, or you wouldn't be here.'
For all answer, Eden held up a little wooden spade, a sailor hat, and a
shoe showing traces of sand and sea-water.
'It is so then,' said Lady Adela. 'Oh, his mother! But,' after that one
wail, she thought of the poor woman before her, 'I am sure you are not to
blame, Eden.'
'Oh, my lady, if I could but feel that! But that I should have trusted
the darling out of my sight for a moment!'
Presently they brought her to a state in which she could tell her
lamentable history.
She had been spending the afternoon at Mr. Rollstone's, leaving Master
Michael as usual in the care of the underling, Ellen, and after that she
knew no more till neither child nor maid came home at his supper-time,
and Mrs. Morton was slowly roused to take alarm, while Eden, half
distracted, wandered about, seeking her charge, and found Ellen, calling
and shouting in vain for him. Ellen confessed that she had seen him
running after the Lincoln children, and supposing him with them, had
given herself up to the study of a penny dreadful in company with another
young nursemaid. When they had awakened to real life, the first idea had
been that he must be with these children; but they were gone, and Ellen,
fancying that he might have gone home with them, asked at their lodging,
but no, he was not there.
The tide was by this time covering the beach, and driving away the
miserable maids, with the aunt, cousin and others who had been on the
fruitless quest. No more could be done then, and they went home with
desolation in their hearts. Miss Ida, as Eden declared, stayed out long
after everybody else when it was clearly of no use, and came back so
tired and upset that she went up straight to bed. There was still a hope
that some one might have met the little boy and taken him home, unable
clearly to make out to whom he belonged, more especially as the Lincolns
in terror and compunction had confessed that they had seen him and his
nurse from a distance, and had rushed headlong round a projecting rock
into a cove, hoping that he had not seen them, because he was so tiresome
and spoilt all their games. And when that morning the spade, hat, and
shoe were discovered upon the shore, not far from the very rock, the poor
children had to draw plenty of morals on the consequences of selfishness.
No doubt that poor little Michael had pursued them barefooted and gone
too near the waves!
There was nothing more but the forlorn hope that the waves would restore
the little body they had carried off, and Mrs. Morton was watching for
that last sad satisfaction. In case of that contingency, Ellen, as the
last person known to have seen the boy, had been left at Westhaven, in
agonies of despair, vowing that she would never speak to any one, nor
look at a story-book again in her life. She had attempted the excuse
that she thought she saw Miss Ida going in that direction, but the young
lady had declared that she had never been on the beach at all that
afternoon till after the alarm had been given; and had been extremely
angry with Ellen for making false excuses and trying to shift off the
blame, and the girl had been much terrified, and owned that she was not
at all sure.
'And oh, my lady,' entreated Eden, 'don't send me up to the House! Don't
make me face her ladyship! I should die of it!'
'We must think what is to be done about that,' said Lady Adela. 'Can you
tell whether any one from the House has seen you?'
Eden thought not, and after she had been consigned to her friend, Lady
Adela's maid, to be rested, fed, and comforted as far as might be
possible, the sisters-in-law held sad counsel, and agreed that it was not
safe to keep back the terrible news from the poor mother who expected
daily tidings of her child, and might hear some report, in spite of her
shut-up state.
'Poor Adela, I pity you almost as much as her,' said Bertha.
'Oh, I know now how much I have to be thankful for! No uncertainty--and
my little one's grave.'
'Besides Amice. Let me drive you up, Addie. Your heart is beating
enough to knock you down.'
'Well, I believe it is. But not up to the front door. I will go in by
the garden. Oh, may he be spared to her at least!'
Very pale then Lady Adela crept in, meeting a weeping maid who was much
relieved to see her, but was hardly restrained from noisy sobs. Mr.
Trotman, she said, had come just before the garden boy had inevitably
dashed up with the tidings, and the household had been waiting till he
came out, to secure that he should be near when Lady Northmoor was told.
Adela felt that this might be the safest opportunity, and sent a message
to the door to beg that her ladyship would come and speak to her for a
few minutes in the study.
Mary's soft step was soon there, and her lips were framing the words, 'No
ground lost,' when at sight of Adela's face the light went out of her
eyes, and setting herself firmly on her feet, she said, 'You have bad
news. My boy!'
Adela came near and would have taken her hand, saying--'My poor
Mary'--but she clasped them both as if to hold herself together, and
said, 'The fever!'
'No, no--sadder still! Drowned!'
'Ah, then there was not all that suffering, and without me!
Thankworthy-- Oh no, no, please'--as Lady Adela, with eyes brimming
over, would have pressed her to her bosom--'don't--don't upset me, or I
could not attend to Frank. It all turns on this one day, they say, and I
must--I must be as usual. There will be time enough to know all about
it--if'--with a long oppressed gasp--'he is saved from the hearing it.'
'I think you are right, dear,' said Adela, 'if you keep him--' but she
could not go on.
'Well, any way,' said Mary, 'either he will be given back, or he will be
saved this. Let me go back to him, please.' Then at the door, putting
her hand to her head--'Who is here?'
'Poor Eden.'
'Ah, let her and Emma know that I am sure it is not their fault. Come
again to-morrow, please; I think he will be better.'
She went away in that same gliding manner, perfectly tearless. Adela
waited to see the doctor, who assured her that the patient had rather
gained than lost during the last twenty-four hours, and that if he could
be spared from any shock or agitation he would probably recover. Lady
Northmoor seemed so entirely absorbed by his critical state, that she was
not likely to betray the sad knowledge she had put aside in the secret
chamber of her heart, more especially as her husband was still too much
weighed down, and too slumberous to be observant, or to speak much, and
knowing the child to be out of the house, he did not inquire for him.
Nevertheless, Mr. Trotman gladly approved of Lady Adela's intention of
sleeping in the house in case of any sudden collapse; and the servants,
who were not to let Lady Northmoor know, evidently felt this a great
relief.
'Yes, it is a comfort to think some one will be within that poor thing's
reach,' said Bertha, as they went back together, 'and, if you can bear
it, you are the right person.'
'She will not let herself dwell on it. She never even looked at Mrs.
Morton's letter.'
'And I really hope they won't find the poor little dear, to have all the
fuss and heart-rending.'
'Oh, Birdie!'
'There's only one thing that would make me wish it. I'm quite sure that
that Miss Ida knows more about it than she owns. No, you need not say,
"Oh, Birdie" again; I don't suspect her of the deed, but I do believe she
saw the boy and kept out of his way, and now wants that poor Ellen to
have all the blame!'
'You will believe nothing against a girl out of an orphanage!'
'I had rather any day believe Ellen Mole than Ida Morton. There's
something about that girl which has always revolted me. I would never
trust her farther than I could see her!'
'Prejudice, Birdie; because she is in bad style.'
'You to talk of prejudice, Addie, who hardly knew how to go on living
here under the poor stick!'
'Don't, Birdie. He has earned esteem by sheer goodness. Poor man, I
don't know what to wish for him when I think of the pang that awaits
him.'
'You know what to wish for yourself and Northmoor! Not but that Herbert
may come to good if he doesn't come into possession for many a long
year.'
'And now I must write to that poor child, Constance. But oh, Bertha,
don't condemn hastily! Haven't I had enough of that?'
CHAPTER XXXIII
DARKNESS
Full a week later, Frank looked up from his pillow, and said, 'I wonder
when it will be safe to have Mite back. Mary, sweet, what is it? I have
been sure something was burthening you. Come and tell me. If he has the
fever, you must go to him. No!' as she clasped his hand and laid her
face down on the pillow.
'Ah, Frank, he does not want us any more!'
'My Mary, my poor Mary, have you been bearing such knowledge about with
you? For how long?'
'Since that worst day, yesterday week. Oh, but to see you getting better
was the help!'
'Can you tell me?'
She told him, in that low, steady voice, all she knew. It was very
little, for she had avoided whatever might break the composure that
seemed so needful to his recovery; and he could listen quietly, partly
from the lulling effect of weakness, partly from his anxiety for her, and
the habit of self-restraint, in which all the earlier part of their lives
had been passed, made utterance come slowly to them.
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