the day of hillyard’s visit was full of trial and excitement to mary. to live in a household where everything is talked of freely, with the consciousness of having various matters of the deepest interest entirely to yourself, is not an agreeable position in any case; and to feel yourself thrilling through every vein with the concussion of a recent shock, while yet you are compelled to put on the most commonplace composure, is more trying still. mary, however, had been used to it for some time back, if that was any alleviation. she only had known, or rather suspected, the ancient connexion between ben renton and the beautiful millicent. she alone had had the excitement of watching their meeting after so long an interval. she only had understood the passage of arms between the two; and she had witnessed their parting, which to her was of ten-fold more interest than even the great interest which the family had in common. and now, her spectatorship in ben’s romance being over, here had suddenly{305} sprung up a romance of her own, so completely beyond all expectation that even now she could scarcely believe it had been real. mary could not have betrayed ben’s secret to any one; but had her mother been at hand, or even had her godmother been less pre-occupied, i doubt whether she could have kept poor hillyard’s to herself. for it was her own, and in the excitement of the moment she might not have remembered that it was the man’s also, and a humiliation to him. but, as it was, poor mary had not the opportunity of relieving her mind. mrs. westbury was away, and alice took her share in nursing mrs. renton, entering into it with a certain enjoyment of the task. there were even moments when she thought mary unsympathetic, and was sorry for ‘poor grandmamma,’ bringing with her a fresh interest in the ailments and the alleviations, such as was scarcely possible to the nurse who had been going through it all for seven years. mary consequently at this extraordinary moment of her existence had lost all her habitual quiet, and all those possibilities of communication which had ever been open to her. she herself and her personal being was floated away, as it were, on the current of ‘the frank rentons.’ they had come into the house like an inundation, and left no room for anything but their own cheerful beginning of life,—their arrangements, their new house, their children, what they were going to do. the two{306} women who had lived there so long in the silence were carried away by the vigorous young tide; and mary, hiding her individual concerns in her own mind, lived for the rest of that evening a strange, abstracted, feverish sort of existence, like a creature in a dream, hearing the cheerful voices round her, and the lights shining, and figures flitting about, but only awaking to take any part in it when she was called upon energetically to come out of her abstraction. the position altogether was so strange that she kept asking herself which scene was real and which was a dream;—either this was the reality,—this evening picture, with frank talking to his mother on the sofa, and alice working in the golden circle of the lamplight, and the urn bubbling, and gleams of reflexion shining from the tea-table in the corner; or else the other scene, with hillyard standing sunburnt, and bearded, and impassioned, telling her he had loved before he even saw her,—saying, if some time, any time she should want a man’s love and support—— one thing was certain, they could not both be real; she had been dreaming them,—or else she was dreaming now.
nor yet was mary’s excitement over for the night. when the evening post came in, a letter was brought to her, which at the first glance she saw was in ben’s handwriting. well! there was nothing surprising in that. of course ben would write, though she had not expected it so soon. but{307} the contents of the note were such as to raise to a climax her sense of being in some feverish dream. this is what ben said:—
‘dear mary,—i want to speak half-a-dozen words to you before i go. i have heard something to-day which has taken me very much by surprise, and i cannot leave england without seeing you. but i don’t want to disturb my mother with a hurried visit and another parting. if you will be at the beech-tree on the river-walk to-morrow morning at eight, i will come down by the first train and meet you there. don’t refuse me. it is of great importance. in haste,
‘yours, b. r.’
mary’s head went round and round as she sat,—hearing frank’s voice talking all the while, and alice pouring out the tea,—and read this note. the question changed now, and seemed to be,—they or ben; which was the phantom? but the paper and the writing were very real,—so real that she could see it had been written in excitement, and was blurred, and betokened a scratching and uncomfortable pen, which is a thing that no imagination would be likely to invent. when she had put the extraordinary note away in her pocket,—fortunately she had not said out loud, ‘here is a letter from ben,’ as on any other day she would have done,{308}—mary’s mind went hopelessly into abstraction. she gave up the tea-making to alice gratefully and without an effort, though in general she did not like her prerogatives invaded. she never uttered a word to help on the conversation. she had to be recalled as from a distance, when anybody spoke to her. things had come to such a pitch that she seemed to lose her individual consciousness altogether. to have violent love made her one day by a man whom she scarcely knew, and to meet her cousin ben clandestinely the next morning by the great beech, to talk over something of importance, which concerned only her and him, and nobody else in the family,—the earth seemed to be going off its pivot altogether to mary. she felt that now nothing would surprise her. if mrs. renton had suddenly proposed to her to walk to town, or frank that she should swim across the river, it would have seemed to her perfectly natural. but to meet ben by stealth at the great beech at eight o’clock! could she have mistaken the words? for one moment a sort of gleam of eldritch fear came across her, and a reminiscence of the amazing manner in which the familiar forms of the nursery arranged themselves in the mind of little alice in wonderland in the story. could it be that ben was to start on his long journey to-morrow by the first train, and could the great beech be the name of the ship? mary was so completely thrown off her balance, that this idea actually{309} occurred to her. and then she felt that they must all have remarked that she had got a letter, and had thrust it stealthily into her pocket. altogether, the evening swam over her somehow, she could not tell how. and then there was the stir of davison’s entrance, and mrs. renton’s going to bed. and then frank disappeared to smoke his cigar, and alice, finding her companion uncommunicative, sat down at the piano, and began to play softly to herself, as she had been wont in the old days at home; and silence, broken only by sounds which helped to increase all the mists, and made her feel a safety and comfort in the retirement of her thoughts, fell upon the quiet house.
next morning mary was awake and up before any one was stirring. she did not herself think that she had slept all the night; but she was still young enough to consider an hour or two’s wakefulness a great matter. and she was as much afraid of ben’s visit being found out, as if he had been the most illegitimate of visitors. she was out soon after six, while the grass was still quite wet with dew, and went wandering up and down the river-walk like a ghost, under the cloistered shade of those great trees which, as yet, let no sunshine through. there was something in the air at that early hour which told that summer was waning, and mary was chilly with nervousness, which had all the effect of cold. she went all the way down to the river-side, and{310} basked in the sunshine which lay full on the open bit of green bank, by way of overcoming the shivering which had seized her. the world was so still, the birds so noisy,—which rather heightens than impairs the stillness,—the paths so utterly vacant and suggestive, that fancy continually caught glimpses of something disappearing behind the trees. now it would seem a gliding dream-figure, now the last sweep of a robe just getting out of sight. the ghostliness of the early morning is different, but not less profound, than that of the night; and at six o’clock the renton woods were as mysterious, as dim under the great shadows of the trees, as any enchanted wood. the sunshine went all round them, drying up the dew on the open bank, and chasing the mists and chills of night; but the river-walk was all brown and grey, and full of clear, mystical distances and windings, broken by upright shafts of trees. any one might have appeared suddenly at such an hour in such a place. people out of books, people out of one’s own straining fancy, people from the other world. and though it was ben, and no other, for whom mary westbury was waiting, yet her imagination, over-excited, was ready to see anything. and she was alarmed by every waving leaf or bough that swayed in the morning air. if anybody should discover this tryst! if it should be known that ben had come in this sweet inconceivable sort of way to see her! had he been{311} a tabooed lover, whose discovery would have involved all sorts of perils, mary could not have been more afraid.
it was half-past seven before he came,—as indeed she might have known,—since that was the earliest moment at which any one could come by the first train. she could see him coming for a long way, making his way among the trees. he had not come in by any gate, but through some illegitimate byway known to the renton boys and the poachers, so lawless were all the accessories of this extraordinary stealthy meeting. he came along rapidly, making himself audible by, now and then, the sound of the gravel sent flying by his foot, or the crackle of a fallen branch on the path. and then he came in sight, walking very quickly, with a look of abstraction, wrapped in his own thoughts. he was close upon the bank before he caught sight of mary, whose grey gown was easily lost sight of among the branches,—then he quickened his pace, and came forward eagerly.
‘you here,’ he said, ‘mary? i thought i should be too early for you,’ and held out both his hands for her.
‘i was so much surprised,—so anxious to know what it was. i have been out for nearly an hour, i think,’ said mary. ‘i could not sleep.’
‘did i startle you?’ said ben. ‘not half so much, i am sure, as i was startled myself. but if{312} i have made you uneasy i will never forgive myself,’ he went on, looking closely into her face.
what could have made that difference in his look? he had always been kind,—certainly he had always been kind,—but he had never looked at her before in that wistful, anxious way. he had been protecting, superior, affectionate; but such was not his expression now.
‘oh, it does not matter!’ said mary; ‘but, of course, since it is something important enough to bring you from town like this,—and at this hour—— tell me, please, and put me out of pain.’
what he did was to draw her arm closely through his own. ‘come this way,’ he said, ‘i don’t want to be seen or interrupted. there is a corner down here where we shall be quite safe. it was very good of you, mary, to come.’
‘oh, ben,’ she cried, ‘don’t talk so, you frighten me! you never were so gentle, so soft to me before. tell me what it is. it must be something terrible to make you look like this. what is wrong?’
‘i don’t know if there is anything wrong,’ he said. ‘it depends upon your feelings altogether, mary; only i never had thought of,—anything of the kind,—never! it came upon me like a thunder-clap. to be sure. i might have known. you could not but be as sweet and as pleasant in the eyes of others as you were in mine——’
‘ben, don’t talk riddles, i entreat of you,’ said{313} mary. ‘i cannot make this out to-day. a shadow would frighten me to-day. i have had too much to bear,—too much,—‘
‘sit down here,’ he said, tenderly; ‘you must not be frightened. there is nothing to hurt you. it is only me that it can hurt. mary, hillyard came to me yesterday, and said,—i suppose by this time you must know what he said?’
‘yes,’ she answered, first with a violent blush, and then growing suddenly hot.
‘of course, i ought to have known it,’ said ben. ‘i used to read him your letters, like an ass, never thinking. i was furious yesterday; i thought it presumption and insolence. but, of course, that was nonsense. the man is as good as i am. the fact is, i suppose i thought that no other man but myself had any right to think of you.’
‘ben!’ mary cried, trembling with a sudden passion, ‘you never thought of me! how can you say so? or what is it you would have me understand? i feel as if you were mocking me,—and yet you would not come all this way, surely, to mock me!’
‘then, i did not think at all,’ he went on, without any direct answer. ‘i felt that no man had any right,—and i was a fool for thinking so. mary, the fact is, it ought to be you and i.’
‘what ought to be you and i?’ she faltered, lost in confusion and amazement.{314}
he was standing before her, not lover-like, but absorbed, pressing his subject, and paying no special regard to her. ‘it ought to be you and i to build up the old house. no. i cannot think any man has a right to come in and interfere. but only just there is this one thing to be said. whatever is for your happiness, mary, i will carry out with all my might. if you should set your heart on one thing or another, it shall be done; but still that does not affect the question,—it ought to be you and me.’
‘for what?’ she asked again.
‘for what? oh, for more than i can tell,’ said ben; ‘to build up this old house, as i told you,—to get through life. i must always have felt it, though i did not know. and here is this fellow come in with his wild backwoods way, and thinks he can win you off-hand. i don’t say a word if it is for your happiness; but i know it should be you and me.’
and then there was a pause, and ben walked up and down the little vacant space in front of the seat he had placed her in, with his eyes bent on the ground, and his face moody and full of trouble. as for mary, she sat and gazed at him, half-conscious only, worn out by excitement and wonder, and the succession of shocks of one kind and another which she had been receiving, but with a soft sense of infinite ease and consolation stealing over her confused heart. it was that relief from pain which feels to the sufferer like positive blindness. she had not even{315} known how deep the pain in her was until she felt it stealing in upon her,—this ineffable ease and freedom from it, which is more sweet than actual joy.
‘ben,’ she said at last, when she could get breath. ‘it is very difficult for me to follow you, and you confuse me so that i don’t know. but, about mr. hillyard you are all wrong. i never saw him till monday. i never thought about him at all. i was very sorry. but it is not as if i could blame myself. i was not to blame.’
‘to blame! how could you be to blame?’ said ben, and he came and stood before her again, gazing at her with that strange look which mary did not recognise in him, and could not meet.
‘i should never have mentioned it to any one,’ she said. ‘i would not now, though you question me so. but only it is best you should not have anything on your mind. is,—that,—all?’
it was not coquetry which suggested the question; it was her reason that began utterly to fail her. she did not seem to know what it was he had said besides,—though he had said something.
‘ah!’ he cried vehemently, and then paused and subdued himself, ‘all except my answer, mary,’ he said, softly stooping over her.
‘your answer? you have not asked me anything. oh, ben,’ she cried, suddenly getting up from her seat, with her cheeks burning and her eyes wet, ‘let there be no more of this. it was all the feeling{316} of the moment. you thought something had happened which never, never could happen, and you felt a momentary grudge. don’t tell me it was anything else. do you think i forget what you told me once up at the beech about her?’ mary cried, waving her hand towards the willows. ‘you did not mean to tell me; but i knew. and the other day—— when you say this sort of thing to me it is unkind of you; it is disrespectful to me. i have my pride like other women. let us speak no more of it, but say good-bye, and i shall go home.’
‘then you do not even think me worthy of an answer?’ said ben; and the two stood confronting each other in that supreme duel and conflict of the two existences about to become one, which never loses its interest; she flushed, excited, suspicious; he steadily keeping to his point, refusing to be led away from it. and why mary should have resisted, standing thus wildly at bay,—and why, when she could stand no longer, she should have sunk down on the seat from which she had risen, in a passion of tears, is more than i can tell. but that finally ben did get his answer, and that it was, as anybody must have foreseen, eminently satisfactory to him at last, is a matter about which there can be no doubt. i do not know even whether he offered any explanations, or justified himself in the matter of millicent. i am inclined to think, indeed, that at that moment he took no notice of it whatever; but only insisted on that reply, which, when nature{317} was worn out and could stand against it no longer, came. but the victor did go into certain particulars, as with mary’s arm drawn closely through his he led her again up that bank which, in so much excitement and uncertainty, half-an-hour before he had led her down.
‘i can’t tell you the fright i was in yesterday,’ he said. ‘it suddenly flashed upon me in a moment how mad i had been. to leave you here so long, open to any assault, and to be such an ass as to bring a man down who had eyes in his head, and was not an idiot?’
‘i wish you would not swear,’ said mary. ‘the strange thing is that you should like me, and yet think me of so small account that any man,—a man i had only known for three days——’
‘hush!’ he said, drawing her to him. ‘when a man’s eyes are opened first to the thought that another man has gone off express to rob him of his jewel, do you think he pauses to be reasonable?’ and then they looked at each other and were silent, there being more expression in that than in speech.
‘but the jewel was no jewel till yesterday,’ said mary, making the kind of objection which women love to make, ‘and who knows but it may be paste to-morrow?’
‘my dear,’ said ben, ‘my only woman in the world! might not a man have been beguiled to follow a will-o’-the-wisp till he cursed and hated such{318} lights, and chose darkness instead,—and then all at once wake up to see that his moon had risen, and that the night was safe and sweet as day?’
i suppose it was the only bit of poetry which ben renton was ever guilty of in his life; and it was perfectly successful. and they went on and continued their walk to the beech-tree. mary’s eyes were blind with sweet tears; but then, what did it matter? was not he there to be eyes to her, through the winding of the tender morning path? and as they reached the trees, the sunshine burst into the wood all at once with something like a shout of triumph. if it was not a shout, it came to precisely the same thing, and caught a branch here and a twig there, and made it into burnished gold, and lit up the far distance and cloistered shade into all the joyous animation and moving stir of life.
‘must you go now?’ mary said, clinging to him a little closer, ‘must it still be secret? is no one to see you now?’
‘i must still go away,’ he said, ‘no help for that, mary; but in the meantime i am going home with you to tell them all about it. i shall still catch my ship if i go by the next train.’
he was received with subdued consternation by the household, which jumped instantly to the conclusion that something had happened; but there is an instinct in the domestic mind which is almost infallible in such matters; and before mrs. renton had even{319} been told of the unexpected arrival of her son, davison had said to the housekeeper, ‘he’s come down at the last to settle it all with miss mary. now didn’t i tell you?’ and willis had recorded his opinion that, on the whole, there wasn’t nothing to say again it. ‘a little bit of money never comes amiss,’ he said; ‘but she was used bad in the will, never to have no compensation. and, on the whole, i agrees with ben.’
such was the decision of the house, conveyed in language, kind, if familiar, just five minutes after the entry by the window into the dining-room, where the breakfast-table was prepared for the family, of the betrothed pair. mary’s gown was wet with the dew, and she ran up-stairs to change it, leaving ben alone to receive the greetings of his brothers, who appeared at the same moment. ‘i thought you couldn’t resist coming down again, old fellow, before you left for good,’ frank said in her hearing, as she rushed to the covert and sanctuary of her own room. he was not so discriminating as the intelligent community below stairs.
and then, in that strange golden forenoon, which seemed at the same time one hasty moment and a long day, full of events, mrs. renton, amazed, found her son again stooping over her, and received the astonishing news. it was some time before she could take it in. ‘what,’ she said, ‘mary? i will never believe it is mary. you are making fun of me, ben.{320}’
‘it is a great deal better than fun, mother,’ he said. ‘i could not go till it was settled; and now there is only ten minutes or so to kiss us and bless us, and thank me for giving you such a daughter. she has been a daughter to you already for so long.’
‘of course she has,’ said the bewildered woman. ‘mary! it’s like your sister. i can’t think it’s quite right, do you know, ben. i should as soon have thought of you marrying alice, or——’
‘frank might object to that, my dear mother,’ said ben.
‘but, mary—you are sure you are not making one of your jokes? and after all, i can’t think what you see in her, ben,’ mrs. renton said, with a little eagerness. ‘she was never very pretty,—not like that beautiful mrs. rich, you know, or those sort of women,—and not even very young. she must be seven-and-twenty, if she is a day. let me see, frank was born in july, and she in the december after. she will be seven-and-twenty on her next birthday. and nothing to make up for it—— ’
‘except that there is nobody else in the world,’ said ben, smiling at mary, who had just come into the room.
‘nobody else in the world! i don’t know what you mean. not to say a word against mary, but you might have done a great deal better, ben.’
‘and so he might, godmamma,’ said mary, with the gravity of happiness, though ben had her hand in his.{321}
‘yes, my dear,’ said mrs. renton, in perfect good faith, ‘a great deal better. you always have the sense to see things. if i were you, i would reflect a little longer before i announced it, or did anything more in the matter, ben.’
the answer ben made to this proposal was to draw his betrothed close to his mother’s bedside within his own supporting arms. ‘give her a kiss, mamma, and say god bless you,’ he said, bending down his own face close to mary’s. and the mother, quite confused and bewildered, did as she was told, crying a little, and not knowing what to think. and before any one knew, ben was gone again, off by express to join the steamer which sailed from liverpool that night. he had just time; everything belonging to him having gone on before with poor hillyard, who knew nothing about this morning’s expedition. and before noon the episode was all over, and the frank rentons once more in the foreground, and mary reading the newspaper as if such a wild inroad of romance into the midst of reality had never been.
‘my dear, it is not that i am not as fond of you,—fonder of you than of anybody,’ mrs. renton said, when poor mary, for one moment, owing to a paragraph about a shipwreck, fairly broke down; ‘but it does not seem somehow as if it were quite proper. and we can’t shut our eyes to it that he might have done better. it feels as if there was{322} never to be any satisfaction in the boys’ marriages. i had a fortune of my own, and so had your grandmother; but everything now is going to sixes and sevens——’
‘don’t say anything more about it, godmamma,’ said mary, with an outburst of pent-up agitation, and the nervous panic that seizes a weakened mind. ‘oh, how can we tell what may happen in the meantime? let us say nothing more till he comes home.’
‘well, to be sure, he might change his mind,’ said mrs. renton, as davison came in with her arrowroot. and for half-an-hour or so that satisfactory conclusion, and the adding of another teaspoonful of port, on account of the excitement she had been going through, put a stop to the conversation, and gave mary time to draw breath in peace.
but if the reader of this history hopes to be humoured by a shipwreck at this late period of the narrative, it is a vain expectation. the winds blew, and the sea rose, but ben renton got safely out to canada, and came safely home. i am sorry to have to say that his last great piece of work did not pay nearly so well as he had expected it to do; and the business, which he made over to hillyard, was, owing to the state of the colony at that moment, of less value than had been anticipated; but at the same time patience alone was wanted to realise all possible hopes. i have been obliged to ask the{323} reader to take ben’s success for granted all along, as it would have been simply impossible to introduce details of engineering enterprise into a work of this description; and, indeed, to tell the truth, i fear i should not have sufficiently understood them to set them forth with any distinctness. but whether hillyard will have patience, and keep up the energy which ben put into the business, is a very doubtful matter; and it is just as likely as not that he may turn up again at the old club, which is the only luxury he keeps up, as rough, as insouciant, as careless what becomes of him, as on the first day ben met him, after the weird of the rentons had begun. mary might have made another man of him perhaps; but who knows? temperament is stronger than circumstance,—stronger than fortune,—stronger even than love.
ben renton came home, as i have said, as safely as most men come home from canada. and everything occurred as it ought to have occurred. i would add that they lived happy ever after, if there had been time to make such a record. but the fact is, that it is too early yet to be historical on that point; and for anything anybody can tell, the rentons may yet come to be very wretched, and give occasion for other chapters of history; though, in common with all their friends, i sincerely hope not. benedict renton of renton stood for the county of berks, in the late election, with politics perhaps{324} slightly tinged by his life in the other world, but failed by a few votes, notwithstanding the interest attaching to him,—berks, like many other counties, being of the opinion that a good, steady, reliable bumpkin, who will do whatever he is told, is a more satisfactory legislator than a man who has spent his youth in objectionable exercises, such as writing, and thinking, and moving about the world. frank renton, true soldier and constitutional tory, is one of those who hold this opinion. but i do not despair of seeing ben in parliament yet.
and thus the story ends; being like all stories, no history of life, but only of a bit out of life,—the most amiable bit, the section of existence which the world has accepted as its conventional type of life, leaving all the profounder glooms and the higher lights apart. as in heaven there can be no story-telling of the present, for happiness has no story,—there, perhaps, for the first time, the mouth of the minstrel may be opened to say or sing what is untellable by the frankest voice on earth. but till then we must be content to break off after the fairy chapter of life’s beginning, the history of youth.