Rachel, as soon as she had made her mother the promise that she would write the letter, left the parlour and went up to her own room. She had many thoughts to adjust in her mind which could not be adjusted satisfactorily otherwise than in solitude, and it was clearly necessary that they should be adjusted before she could write her letter. It must be remembered, not only that she had never before written a letter to a lover, but that she had never before written a letter of importance to anyone. She had threatened at one moment that she would leave the writing of it to her mother; but there came upon her a feeling, of which she was hardly conscious, that she herself might probably compose the letter in a strain of higher dignity than her mother would be likely to adopt. That her lover would be gone from her for ever she felt almost assured; but still it would be much to her that, on going, he should so leave her that his respect might remain, though his love would be a thing of the past. In her estimation he was a noble being, to have been loved by whom even for a few days was more honour than she had ever hoped to win. For a few days she had been allowed to think that her great fortune intended him to be her husband. But Fate had interposed, and now she feared that all her joy was at an end. But her joy should be so relinquished that she herself should not be disgraced in the giving of it up. She sat there alone for an hour, and was stronger, when that hour was over, than she had been when she left her mother. Her pride had supported her, and had been sufficient for her support in that first hour of her sorrow. It is ever so with us in our misery. In the first flush of our wretchedness, let the outward signs of our grief be what they may, we promise to ourselves the support of some inner strength which shall suffice to us at any rate as against the eyes of the outer world. But anon, and that inner staff fails us; our pride yields to our tears; our dignity is crushed beneath the load with which we have burdened it, and then with loud wailings we own ourselves to be the wretches which we are. But now Rachel was in the hour of her pride, and as she came down from her room she resolved that her sorrow should be buried in her own bosom. She had known what it was to love — had known it, perhaps, for one whole week — and now that knowledge was never to avail her again. Among them all she had been robbed of her sweetheart. She had been bidden to give her heart to this man — her heart and hand; and now, when she had given all her heart, she was bidden to refuse her hand. She had not ventured to love till her love had been sanctioned. It had been sanctioned, and she had loved; and now that sanction was withdrawn! She knew that she was injured — deeply, cruelly injured, but she would bear it, showing nothing, and saying nothing. With this resolve she came down from her room, and began to employ herself on her household work.
Mrs Ray watched her carefully, and Rachel knew that she was watched; but she took no outward notice of it, going on with her work, and saying a soft, gentle word now and again, sometimes to her mother and sometimes to the little maiden who attended them. “Will you come to dinner, mamma?” she said with a smile, taking her mother by the hand.
“I shouldn’t mind if I never sat down to dinner again,” said Mrs Ray.
“Oh, mamma! don’t say that; just when you are going to thank God for the good things he gives you.”
Then Mrs Ray, in a low voice, as though rebuked, said the grace, and they sat down together to their meal.
The afternoon went with them very slowly and almost in silence. Neither of them would now speak about Luke Rowan; and to neither of them was it as yet possible to speak about aught else. One word on the subject was said during those hours. “You won’t have time for your letter after tea,” Mrs Ray said.
“I shall not write it till tomorrow,” Rachel answered; “another day will do no harm now.”
At tea Mrs Ray asked her whether she did not think that a walk would do her good, and offered to accompany her; but Rachel, acceding to the proposition of a walk, declared that she would go alone. “It’s very bad of me to say so, isn’t it, when you’re so good as to offer to go with me?” But Mrs Ray kissed her; saying, with many words, that she was satisfied that it should be so. “You want to think of things, I know,” said the mother. Rachel acknowledged, by a slight motion of her head, that she did want to think of things, and soon after that she started.
“I believe I’ll call on Dolly,” she said. “It would be bad to quarrel with her; and perhaps now she’ll come back here to live with us — only I forgot about Mr Prong.” It was agreed, however, that she should call on her sister, and ask her to dine at the cottage on the following day.
She walked along the road straight into Baslehurst, and went at once to her sister’s lodgings. She had another place to visit before she returned home but it was a place for which a later hour in the evening would suit her better. Mrs Prime was at home; and Rachel, on being shown up into the sitting-room — a room in which every piece of furniture had become known to her during those Dorcas meetings — found not only her sister sitting there, but also Miss Pucker and Mr Prong. Rachel had not seen that gentleman since she had learned that he was to become her brother-in-law, and hardly knew in what way to greet him; but it soon became apparent to her that no outward show of regard was expected from her at that moment.
“I think you know my sister, Mr Prong,” said Dorothea. Whereupon Mr Prong rose from his chair, took Rachel’s hand, pressing it between his own, and then sat down again. Rachel, judging from his countenance, thought that some cloud had passed also across the sunlight of his love. She made her little speech, giving her mother’s love, and adding her own assurance that she hoped her sister would come out and dine at the cottage.
“I really don’t know,” said Mrs Prime. “Such goings about do cut up one’s time so much, I shouldn’t be here again till —”
“Of course you’d stay for tea with us,” said Rachel.
“And lose the whole afternoon,” said Mrs Prime.
“Oh do!” said Miss Pucker. “You have been working so hard; hasn’t she now, Mr Prong? At this time of the year a sniff of fresh air among the flowers do a body so much good” And Miss Pucker looked and spoke as though she also would like the sniff of fresh air.
“I’m very well in health, and am thankful for it. I can’t say that it’s needed in that way,” said Mrs Prime,
“But mamma will be so glad to see you,” said Rachel.
“I think you ought to go, Dorothea,” said Mr Prong; and even Rachel could perceive that there was some slight touch of authority in his voice. It was the slightest possible intonation of a command; but, nevertheless, it struck Rachel’s ears.
Mrs Prime merely shook her head and sniffed. It was not for a supply of air that she used her nostrils on this occasion, but that she might indicate some grain of contempt for the authority which Mr Prong had attempted to exercise. “I think I’d rather not, Rachel, thank you — not to dinner, that is. Perhaps I’ll walk out in the evening after tea, when the work of the day is over. If I come then, perhaps my friend, Miss Pucker, may come with me.”
“And if your esteemed mamma will allow me to pay my respects,” said Mr Prong, “I shall be most happy to accompany the ladies.”
It will be acknowledged that Rachel had no alternative left to her. She said that her mother would be happy to see Mr Prong, and happy to see Miss Pucker also. As to herself, she made no such assertion, being in her present mood too full of her own thoughts to care much for the ordinary courtesies of life.
“I’m very sorry you won’t come to dinner, Dolly,” she said; but she abstained from any word of asking the others to tea.
“If it had only been Mr Prong,” she said to her mother afterwards, “I should have asked him; for I suppose he’ll have to come to the house sooner or later. But I wouldn’t tell that horrid, squinting woman that you wanted to see her, for I’m sure you don’t.”
“But we must give them some cake and a glass of sweet wine,” said Mrs Ray.
“She won’t have to take her bonnet off for that as she would for tea, and it isn’t so much like making herself at home here. I couldn’t bear to have to ask her up to my room.”
On leaving the house in the High Street, which she did about eight o’clock, she took her way towards the churchyard — not passing down Brewery Lane, by Mr Tappitt’s house, but taking the main street which led from the High Street to the church. But at the corner, just as she was about to leave the High Street, she was arrested by a voice that was familiar to her, and, turning round, she saw Mrs Cornbury seated in a low carriage, and driving a pair of ponies. “How are you, Rachel?” said Mrs Cornbury, shaking hands with her friend, for Rachel had gone out into the street up to the side of the carriage, when she found that Mrs Cornbury had stopped. “I’m going by the cottage — to papa’s. I see you are turning the other way; but if you’ve not much delay, I’ll stay for you and take you home.”
But Rachel had before her that other visit to make, and she was not minded to omit it or postpone it. “I should like it so much,” said Rachel, “but —”
“Ah! well; I see. You’ve got other fish to fry. But, Rachel, look here, dear —” and Mrs Cornbury almost whispered into her ear across the side of the pony carriage —“don’t you believe quite all you hear, I’ll find out the truth, and you shall know. Goodbye.”
“Goodbye, Mrs Cornbury,” said Rachel, pressing her friend’s hand as she parted from her. This allusion to her lover had called a blush up over her whole face, so that Mrs Cornbury well knew that she had been understood. “I’ll see to it,” she said, driving away her ponies.
See to it! How could she see to it when that letter should have been written? And Rachel was well aware that another day must not pass without the writing of it.
She went down across the churchyard, leaving the path to the brewery on her left, and that leading out under the elm trees to her right, and went on straight to the stile at which she had stood with Luke Rowan, watching the reflection of the setting sun among the clouds. This was the spot which she had determined to visit; and she had come hither hoping that she might again see some form in the heavens which might remind her of that which he had shown her. The stile, at any rate, was the same, and there were the trees beneath which they had stood, There were the rich fields, lying beneath her, over which they two had gazed together at the fading lights of the evening. There was no arm in the clouds now, and the perverse sun was retiring to his rest without any of that royal pageantry and illumination with which the heavens are wont to deck themselves when their king goes to his couch. But Rachel, though she had come thither to look for these things and had not found them, hardly marked their absence. Her mind became so full of him and of his words, that she required no outward signs to refresh her memory, she thought so much of his look on that evening, of the tones of his voice, and of every motion of his body, that she soon forgot to watch the clouds, she sat herself down upon the stile with her face turned away from the fields, telling herself that she would listen for the footsteps of strangers, so that she might move away if any came near her; but she soon forgot also to listen, and sat there thinking of him alone. The words that had been spoken between them on that occasion had been but trifling — very few and of small moment; but now they seemed to her to have contained all her destiny. It was there that love for him had first come upon her — had come over her with broad outspread wings like an angel; but whether as an angel of darkness or of light, her heart had then been unable to perceive. How well she remembered it all; how he had taken her by the hand, claiming the right of doing so as an ordinary farewell greeting; and how he had held her, looking into her face, till she had been forced to speak some word of rebuke to him! “I did not think you would behave like that,” she had said. But yet at that very moment her heart was going from her. The warm friendliness of his touch, the firm, clear brightness of his eye, and the eager tone of his voice, were even then subduing her coy unwillingness to part with her maiden love. She had declared to herself then that she was angry with him; but, since that, she had declared to herself that nothing could have been better, finer, sweeter than all that he had said and done on that evening. It had been his right to hold her, if he intended afterwards to claim her as his own. “I like you so very much,” he had said; “why should we not be friends?” She had gone away from him then, fleeing along the path, bewildered, ignorant as to her own feelings, conscious almost of a sin in having listened to him; but still filled with a wondrous delight that anyone so good, so beautiful, so powerful as he, should have cared to ask for her friendship in such pressing words. During all her walk home she had been full of fear and wonder and mysterious delight. Then had come the ball, which in itself had hardly been so pleasant to her, because the eyes of many had watched her there. But she thought of the moment when he had first come to her in Mrs Tappitt’s drawing-room, just as she was resolving that he did not intend to notice her further, she thought of those repeated dances which had been so dear to her, but which, in their repetition, had frightened her so grievously. She thought of the supper, during which he had insisted on sitting by her; and of that meeting in the hall, during which he had, as it were, forced her to remain and listen to him — forced her to stay with him till, in her agony of fear, she had escaped away to her friend and begged that she might be taken home! As she sat by Mrs Cornbury in the carriage, and afterwards as she had thought of it all while lying in her bed, she had declared to herself that he had been very wrong — but since that, during those few days of her permitted love, she had sworn to herself as often that he had been very right.
And he had been right. She said so to herself now again, though the words which he had spoken and the things which he had done had brought upon her all this sorrow. He had been right. If he loved her it was only manly and proper in him to tell his love. And for herself — seeing that she had loved, had it not been proper and womanly in her to declare her love? What had she d............