North and South - Elizabeth Gaskell (popular books to read .TXT) 📗

‘Milton-Northern! The manufacturing town in Darkshire?’

‘Yes,’ said he, in the same despondent, indifferent way.

‘Why there, papa?’ asked she.

‘Because there I can earn bread for my family. Because I know no one there, and no one knows Helstone, or can ever talk to me about it.’

‘Bread for your family! I thought you and mamma had’—and then she stopped, checking her natural interest regarding their future life, as she saw the gathering gloom on her father’s brow. But he, with his quick intuitive sympathy, read in her face, as in a mirror, the reflections of his own moody depression, and turned it off with an effort.

‘You shall be told all, Margaret. Only help me to tell your mother. I think I could do anything but that: the idea of her distress turns me sick with dread. If I tell you all, perhaps you could break it to her to-morrow. I am going out for the day, to bid Farmer Dobson and the poor people on Bracy Common goodbye. Would you dislike breaking it to her very much, Margaret?’

Margaret did dislike it, did shrink from it more than from anything she had ever had to do in her life before. She could not speak, all at once. Her father said, ‘You dislike it very much, don’t you, Margaret?’ Then she conquered herself, and said, with a bright strong look on her face:

‘It is a painful thing, but it must be done, and I will do it as well as ever I can. You must have many painful things to do.’

Mr. Hale shook his head despondingly: he pressed her hand in token of gratitude. Margaret was nearly upset again into a burst of crying. To turn her thoughts, she said: ‘Now tell me, papa, what our plans are. You and mamma have some money, independent of the income from the living, have not you? Aunt Shaw has, I know.’

‘Yes. I suppose we have about a hundred and seventy pounds a year of our own. Seventy of that has always gone to Frederick, since he has been abroad. I don’t know if he wants it all,’ he continued in a hesitating manner. ‘He must have some pay for serving with the Spanish army.’

‘Frederick must not suffer,’ said Margaret, decidedly; ‘in a foreign country; so unjustly treated by his own. A hundred is left Could not you, and I, and mamma live on a hundred a year in some very cheap—very quiet part of England? Oh! I think we could.’

‘No!’ said Mr. Hale. ‘That would not answer. I must do something. I must make myself busy, to keep off morbid thoughts. Besides, in a country parish I should be so painfully reminded of Helstone, and my duties here. I could not bear it, Margaret. And a hundred a year would go a very little way, after the necessary wants of housekeeping are met, towards providing your mother with all the comforts she has been accustomed to, and ought to have. No: we must go to Milton. That is settled. I can always decide better by myself, and not influenced by those whom I love,’ said he, as a half apology for having arranged so much before he had told any one of his family of his intentions. ‘I cannot stand objections. They make me so undecided.’

Margaret resolved to keep silence. After all, what did it signify where they went, compared to the one terrible change?

Mr. Hale continued: ‘A few months ago, when my misery of doubt became more than I could bear without speaking, I wrote to Mr. Bell—you remember Mr. Bell, Margaret?’

‘No; I never saw him, I think. But I know who he is. Frederick’s godfather—your old tutor at Oxford, don’t you mean?’

‘Yes. He is a Fellow of Plymouth College there. He is a native of Milton-Northern, I believe. At any rate, he has property there, which has very much increased in value since Milton has become such a large manufacturing town. Well, I had reason to suspect—to imagine—I had better say nothing about it, however. But I felt sure of sympathy from Mr. Bell. I don’t know that he gave me much strength. He has lived an easy life in his college all his days. But he has been as kind as can be. And it is owing to him we are going to Milton.’

‘How?’ said Margaret.

‘Why he has tenants, and houses, and mills there; so, though he dislikes the place—too bustling for one of his habits—he is obliged to keep up some sort of connection; and he tells me that he hears there is a good opening for a private tutor there.’

‘A private tutor!’ said Margaret, looking scornful: ‘What in the world do manufacturers want with the classics, or literature, or the accomplishments of a gentleman?’

‘Oh,’ said her father, ‘some of them really seem to be fine fellows, conscious of their own deficiencies, which is more than many a man at Oxford is. Some want resolutely to learn, though they have come to man’s estate. Some want their children to be better instructed than they themselves have been. At any rate, there is an opening, as I have said, for a private tutor. Mr. Bell has recommended me to a Mr. Thornton, a tenant of his, and a very intelligent man, as far as I can judge from his letters. And in Milton, Margaret, I shall find a busy life, if not a happy one, and people and scenes so different that I shall never be reminded of Helstone.’

There was the secret motive, as Margaret knew from her own feelings. It would be different. Discordant as it was—with almost a detestation for all she had ever heard of the North of England, the manufacturers, the people, the wild and bleak country—there was this one recommendation—it would be different from Helstone, and could never remind them of that beloved place.

‘When do we go?’ asked Margaret, after a short silence.

‘I do not know exactly. I wanted to talk it over with you. You see, your mother knows nothing about it yet: but I think, in a fortnight;—after my deed of resignation is sent in, I shall have no right to remain.

Margaret was almost stunned.

‘In a fortnight!’

‘No—no, not exactly to a day. Nothing is fixed,’ said her father, with anxious hesitation, as he noticed the filmy sorrow that came over her eyes, and the sudden change in her complexion. But she recovered herself immediately.

‘Yes, papa, it had better be fixed soon and decidedly, as you say. Only mamma to know nothing about it! It is that that is the great perplexity.’

‘Poor Maria!’ replied Mr. Hale, tenderly. ‘Poor, poor Maria! Oh, if I were not married—if I were but myself in the world, how easy it would be! As it is—Margaret, I dare not tell her!’

‘No,’ said Margaret, sadly, ‘I will do it. Give me till to-morrow evening to choose my time Oh, papa,’ cried she, with sudden passionate entreaty, ‘say—tell me it is a night-mare—a horrid dream—not the real waking truth! You cannot mean that you are really going to leave the Church—to give up Helstone—to be for ever separate from me, from mamma—led away by some delusion—some temptation! You do not really mean it!’

Mr. Hale sat in rigid stillness while she spoke.

Then he looked her in the face, and said in a slow, hoarse, measured way—‘I do mean it, Margaret. You must not deceive yourself into doubting the reality of my words—my fixed intention and resolve.’ He looked at her in the same steady, stony manner, for some moments after he had done speaking. She, too, gazed back with pleading eyes before she would believe that it was irrevocable. Then she arose and went, without another word or look, towards the door. As her fingers were on the handle he called her back. He was standing by the fireplace, shrunk and stooping; but as she came near he drew himself up to his full height, and, placing his hands on her head, he said, solemnly:

‘The blessing of God be upon thee, my child!’

‘And may He restore you to His Church,’ responded she, out of the fulness of her heart. The next moment she feared lest this answer to his blessing might be irreverent, wrong—might hurt him as coming from his daughter, and she threw her arms round his neck. He held her to him for a minute or two. She heard him murmur to himself, ‘The martyrs and confessors had even more pain to bear—I will not shrink.’

They were startled by hearing Mrs. Hale inquiring for her daughter. They started asunder in the full consciousness of all that was before them. Mr. Hale hurriedly said—‘Go, Margaret, go. I shall be out all to-morrow. Before night you will have told your mother.’

‘Yes,’ she replied, and she returned to the drawing-room in a stunned and dizzy state.