Ruth - Elizabeth Gaskell (romantic books to read txt) 📗

discovery which had been to her so great a shock; standing, she had learnt to take heed lest she fell; and, when she had once been aroused to a perception of the violence of the hatred which she had indulged against Ruth, she was more reticent and measured in the expression of all her opinions. It showed how much her character had been purified from pride, that now she felt aware that what in her was again attracting Mr. Farquhar was her faithful advocacy of her rival, wherever such advocacy was wise or practicable. He was quite unaware that Jemima had been conscious of his great admiration for Ruth; he did not know that she had ever cared enough for him to be jealous. But the unacknowledged bond between them now was their grief, and sympathy, and pity for Ruth; only in Jemima these feelings were ardent, and would fain have become active; while in Mr. Farquhar they were strongly mingled with thankfulness that he had escaped a disagreeable position, and a painful notoriety. His natural caution induced him to make a resolution never to think of any woman as a wife until he had ascertained all her antecedents, from her birth upwards; and the same spirit of caution, directed inwardly, made him afraid of giving too much pity to Ruth, for fear of the conclusions to which such a feeling might lead him. But still his old regard for her, for Leonard, and his esteem and respect for the Bensons, induced him to lend a willing ear to Jemima’s earnest entreaty that he would go and call on Mr. Benson, in order that she might learn something about the family in general, and Ruth in particular. It was thus that he came to sit by Mr. Benson’s study fire, and to talk, in an absent way, to that gentleman. How they got on the subject he did not know, more than one-half of his attention being distracted; but they were speaking about politics, when Mr. Farquhar learned that Mr. Benson took in no newspaper.

“Will you allow me to send you over my Times? I have generally done with it before twelve o’clock, and after that it is really waste-paper in my house. You will oblige me by making use of it.”

“I am sure I am very much obliged to you for thinking of it. But do not trouble yourself to send it; Leonard can fetch it.”

“How is Leonard now?” asked Mr. Farquhar, and he tried to speak indifferently; but a grave look of intelligence clouded his eyes as he looked for Mr. Benson’s answer. “I have not met him lately.”

“No!” said Mr. Benson, with an expression of pain in his countenance, though he, too, strove to speak in his usual tone.

“Leonard is not strong, and we find it difficult to induce him to go much out-of-doors.”

There was a little silence for a minute or two, during which Mr. Farquhar had to check an unbidden sigh. But, suddenly rousing himself into a determination to change the subject, he said—

“You will find rather a lengthened account of the exposure of Sir Thomas Campbell’s conduct at Baden. He seems to be a complete blackleg, in spite of his baronetcy. I fancy the papers are glad to get hold of anything just now.”

“Who is Sir Thomas Campbell?” asked Mr. Benson.

“Oh, I thought you might have heard the report—a true one, I believe—of Mr. Donne’s engagement to his daughter. He must be glad she jilted him now, I fancy, after this public exposure of her father’s conduct.” (That was an awkward speech, as Mr. Farquhar felt; and he hastened to cover it, by going on without much connection.)

“Dick Bradshaw is my informant about all these projected marriages in high life—they are not much in my way; but, since he has come down from London to take his share in the business, I think I have heard more of the news and the scandal of what, I suppose, would be considered high life, than ever I did before; and Mr. Donne’s proceedings seem to be an especial object of interest to him.”

“And Mr. Donne is engaged to a Miss Campbell, is he?”

“Was engaged; if I understood right, she broke off the engagement to marry some Russian prince or other—a better match, Dick Bradshaw told me. I assure you,” continued Mr. Farquhar, smiling, “I am a very passive recipient of all such intelligence, and might very probably have forgotten all about it, if the Times of this morning had not been so full of the disgrace of the young lady’s father.”

“Richard Bradshaw has quite left London, has he?” asked Mr. Benson, who felt far more interest in his old patron’s family than in all the Campbells that ever were or ever would be.

“Yes. He has come to settle down here. I hope he may do well, and not disappoint his father, who has formed very high expectations from him; I am not sure if they are not too high for any young man to realise.” Mr. Farquhar could have said more; but Dick Bradshaw was Jemima’s brother, and an object of anxiety to her.

“I am sure, I trust such a mortification—such a grief as any disappointment in Richard, may not befall his father,” replied Mr. Benson.

“Jemima—Miss Bradshaw,” said Mr. Farquhar, hesitating, “was most anxious to hear of you all. I hope I may tell her you are all well” (with an emphasis on all); “that–-”

“Thank you. Thank her for us. We are all well; all except Leonard, who is not strong, as I said before. But we must be patient. Time, and such devoted, tender love as he has from his mother, must do much.”

Mr. Farquhar was silent.

“Send him to my house for the papers. It will be a little necessity for him to have some regular exercise, and to face the world. He must do it, sooner or later.”

The two gentlemen shook hands with each other warmly on parting; but no further allusion was made to either Ruth or Leonard.

So Leonard went for the papers. Stealing along by back streets—running with his head bent down—his little heart panting with dread of being pointed out as his mother’s child—so he used to come back, and run trembling to Sally, who would hush him up to her breast with many a rough-spoken word of pity and sympathy. Mr. Farquhar tried to catch him to speak to him, and tame him, as it were; and, by-and-by, he contrived to interest him sufficiently to induce the boy to stay a little while in the house or stables, or garden. But the race through the streets was always to be dreaded as the end of ever so pleasant a visit. Mr. Farquhar kept up the intercourse with the Bensons which he had thus begun. He persevered in paying calls—quiet visits, where not much was said, political or local news talked about, and the same inquiries always made and answered as to the welfare of the two families, who were estranged from each other. Mr. Farquhar’s reports were so little varied that Jemima grew anxious to know more particulars.

“Oh, Mr. Farquhar!” said she; “do you think they tell you the truth? I wonder what Ruth can be doing to support herself and Leonard? Nothing that you can hear of, you say; and, of course, one must not ask the downright question. And yet I am sure they must be pinched in some way. Do you think Leonard is stronger?”

“I am not sure. He is growing fast; and such a blow as he has had will be certain to make him more thoughtful and full of care than most boys of his age; both these circumstances may make him thin and pale, which he certainly is.”

“Oh! how I wish I might go and see them all! I could tell in a twinkling the real state of things.” She spoke with a tinge of her old impatience.

“I will go again, and pay particular attention to anything you wish me to observe. You see, of course, I feel a delicacy about asking any direct questions, or even alluding in any way to these late occurrences.”

“And you never see Ruth by any chance?”

“Never!”

They did not look at each other while this last question was asked and answered.

“I will take the paper to-morrow myself; it will be an excuse for calling again, and I will try to be very penetrating; but I have not much hope of success.

“Oh, thank you. It is giving you a great deal of trouble; but you are very kind.”

“Kind, Jemima!” he repeated, in a tone which made her go very red and hot; “must I tell you how you can reward me?—Will you call me Walter?—say, thank you, Walter—just for once.”

Jemima felt herself yielding to the voice and tone in which this was spoken; but her very consciousness of the depth of her love made her afraid of giving way, and anxious to be wooed, that she might be reinstated in her self-esteem.

“No!” said she, “I don’t think I can call you so. You are too old. It would not be respectful.” She meant it half in joke, and had no idea he would take the allusion to his age so seriously as he did. He rose up, and coldly, as a matter of form, in a changed voice, wished her “Good-bye.” Her heart sank; yet the old pride was there. But as he was at the very door, some sudden impulse made her speak—

“I have not vexed you, have I, Walter?”

He turned round, glowing with a thrill of delight. She was as red as any rose; her looks dropped down to the ground.

They were not raised, when, half-an-hour afterwards, she said, “You won’t forbid my going to see Ruth, will you? because if you do, I give you notice I shall disobey you.” The arm around her waist clasped her yet more fondly at the idea, suggested by this speech, of the control which he should have a right to exercise over her actions at some future day.

“Tell me,” said he, “how much of your goodness to me, this last happy hour, has been owing to the desire of having more freedom as a wife than as a daughter?” She was almost glad that he should think she needed any additional motive to her love for him before she could have accepted him. She was afraid that she had betrayed the deep, passionate regard with which she had long looked upon him. She was lost in delight at her own happiness. She was silent for a time. At length she said—

“I don’t think you know how faithful I have been to you ever since the days when you first brought me pistachio-candy from London—when I was quite a little girl.”

“Not more faithful than I have been to you,” for in truth, the recollection of his love for Ruth had utterly faded away, and he thought himself a model of constancy; “and you have tried me pretty well. What a vixen you have been!” Jemima sighed; smitten with the consciousness of how little she had deserved her present happiness; humble with the recollection of the evil thoughts that had raged in her heart during the time (which she remembered well, though he may have forgotten it) when Ruth had had the affection which her jealous rival coveted.

“I may speak to your father; may not I, Jemima?”

No! for some reason or fancy which she could not define, and could not be persuaded out of, she wished to keep their mutual understanding a secret. She had a natural desire to avoid the congratulations she expected from her family. She dreaded her father’s consideration of the whole affair as a satisfactory disposal of