Wives and Daughters

by Elizabeth Gaskell

  ‘Thank you, my own love. How good you are! So many men would think only of their own wishes and interests! I’m sure the parents of my dear pupils will admire you—will be quite surprised at your consideration for their interests.’

  ‘Don’t tell them, then. I hate being admired. Why shouldn’t you say it is your wish to keep on your school till they’ve had time to look out for another?’

  ‘Because it isn’t,’ said she, daring all. ‘I long to be making you happy; I want to make your home a place of rest and comfort to you; and I do so wish to cherish your sweet Molly, as I hope to do, when I come to be her mother. I can’t take virtue to myself which doesn’t belong to me. If I have to speak for myself, I shall say, “Good people, find a school for your daughters by Michaelmas,—for after that time I must go and make the happiness of others.” I can’t bear to think of your long rides in November—coming home wet at night, with no one to take care of you. Oh! if you leave it to me, I shall advise the parents to take their daughters away from the care of one whose heart will be absent. Though I couldn’t consent to any time before Michaelmas—that wouldn’t be fair or right, and I’m sure you wouldn’t urge me—you are too good.’

  ‘Well, if you think that they will consider we have acted uprightly by them, let it be Michaelmas with all my heart. What does Lady Cumnor say?’

  ‘Oh! I told her I was afraid you wouldn’t like waiting, because of your difficulties with your servants, and because of Molly—it would be so desirable to enter on the new relationship with her as soon as possible.’

  ‘To be sure; so it would. Poor child! I’m afraid the intelligence of my engagement has rather startled her.’

  ‘Cynthia will feel it deeply, too,’ said Mrs. Kirkpatrick, unwilling to let her daughter be behind Mr. Gibson’s in sensibility and affection.

  ‘We will have her over to the wedding! She and Molly shall be bridesmaids,’ said Mr. Gibson, in the unguarded warmth of his heart.

  This plan did not quite suit Mrs. Kirkpatrick: but she thought it best not to oppose it until she had a presentable excuse to give, and perhaps also some reason would naturally arise out of future circumstances; so at this time she only smiled, and softly pressed the hand she held in hers.

  It is a question whether Mrs. Kirkpatrick or Molly wished the most for the day to be over which they were to spend together at the Towers. Mrs. Kirkpatrick was rather weary of girls as a class. All the trials of her life were connected with girls in some way. She was very young when she first became a governess, and had been worsted in her struggles with her pupils in the first place she ever went to. Her elegance of appearance and manner, and her accomplishments, more than her character and acquirements, had rendered it easier for her than for most to obtain good ‘situations’; and she had been absolutely petted in some; but still she was constantly encountering naughty or stubborn, or over-conscientious, or severe-judging, or curious and observant girls. And again, before Cynthia was born she had longed for a boy, thinking it possible that if some three or four intervening relations died, he might come to be a baronet; and instead of a son, lo and behold it was a daughter! Nevertheless, with all her dislike to girls in the abstract as ‘the plagues of her life’ (and her aversion was not diminished by the fact of her having kept a school for ‘young ladies’ at Ashcombe), she really meant to be as kind as she could be to her new step-daughter, whom she remembered principally as a black-haired, sleepy child, in whose eyes she had read admiration of herself. Mrs. Kirkpatrick accepted Mr. Gibson principally because she was tired of the struggle of earning her own livelihood; but she liked him personally—nay, she even loved him in her torpid way, and she intended to be good to his daughter, though she felt as if it would have been easier for her to have been good to his son.

  Molly was bracing herself up in her way too. ‘I will be like Harriet. I will think of others. I won’t think of myself,’ she kept repeating all the way to the Towers. But there was no selfishness in wishing that the day was come to an end, and that she did very heartily. Mrs. Hamley sent her thither in the carriage, which was to wait and bring her back at night. Mrs. Hamley wanted Molly to make a favourable impression, and she sent for her to come and show herself before she set out.

  ‘Don’t put on your silk gown—your white muslin will look the nicest, my dear.’

  ‘Not my silk? It is quite new! I had it to come here.’

  ‘Still, I think your white muslin suits you the best.’ ‘Anything but that horrid plaid silk,’ was the thought in Mrs. Hamley’s mind; and, thanks to her, Molly set off for the Towers, looking a little quaint, it is true, but thoroughly ladylike, if she was old-fashioned. Her father was to meet her there; but he had been detained, and she had to face Mrs. Kirkpatrick by herself, the recollection of her last day of misery at the Towers fresh in her mind as if it had been yesterday Mrs. Kirkpatrick was as caressing as could be. She held Molly’s hand in hers, as they sat together in the library, after the first salutations were over. She kept stroking it from time to time, and purring out inarticulate sounds of loving satisfaction, as she gazed in the blushing face.

  ‘What eyes! so like your dear father’s! How we shall love each other—shan’t we, darling? For his sake!’

  ‘I’ll try,’ said Molly, bravely; and then she could not finish her sentence.

  ‘And you’ve just got the same beautiful black curling hair!’ said Mrs. Kirkpatrick, softly lifting one of Molly’s curls from off her white temple.

  ‘Papa’s hair is growing grey,’ said Molly.

  ‘Is it? I never see it. I never shall see it. He will always be to me the handsomest of men.’

  Mr. Gibson was really a very handsome man, and Molly was pleased with the compliment; but she could not help saying—

  ‘Still, he will grow old, and his hair will grow grey. I think he will be just as handsome, but it won’t be as a young man.’

  ‘Ah! that’s just it. He’ll always be handsome; some people always are. And he is so fond of you, dear.’ Molly’s colour flushed into her face. She did not want an assurance of her own father’s love from this strange woman. She could not help being angry; all she could do was to keep silent. ‘You don’t know how he speaks of you; “his little treasure,” as he calls you. I’m almost jealous sometimes.’

  Molly took her hand away, and her heart began to harden; these speeches were so discordant to her. But she set her teeth together, and ‘tried to be good.’

  ‘We must make him so happy. I’m afraid he has had a great deal to annoy him at home; but we will do away with all that now. You must tell me,’ seeing the cloud in Molly’s eyes, ‘what he likes and dislikes, for of course you will know.’

  Molly’s face cleared a little; of course she did know. She had not watched and loved him so long without believing that she understood him better than any one else: though how he had come to like Mrs. Kirkpatrick enough to wish to marry her was an unsolved problem that she unconsciously put aside as inexplicable. Mrs. Kirkpatrick went on—‘All men have their fancies and antipathies, even the wisest. I have known some gentlemen annoyed beyond measure by the merest trifles; leaving a door open, or spilling tea in their saucers, or a shawl crookedly put on. Why,’ continued she, lowering her voice, ‘I know of a house to which Lord Hollingford will never be asked again because he didn’t wipe his shoes on both the mats in the hall! Now you must tell me what your dear father dislikes most in these fanciful ways, and I shall take care to avoid it. You must be my little friend and helper in pleasing him. It will be such a pleasure to me to attend to his slightest fancies. About my dress, too—what colours does he like best? I want to do everything in my power with a view to his approval.’

  Molly was gratified by all this, and began to think that really, after all, perhaps her father had done well for himself; and that, if she could help towards his new happiness, she ought to do it. So she tried very conscientiously to think over Mr. Gibson’s wishes and ways; to ponder over what annoyed him the most in his household.r />
  ‘I think,’ said she, ‘papa isn’t particular about many things; but I think our not having the dinner quite punctual—quite ready for him when he comes in—fidgets him more than anything. You see, he has often had a long ride, and there is another long ride to come, and he has only half an hour—sometimes only a quarter—to eat his dinner in.’

  ‘Thank you, my own love. Punctuality! Yes; it’s a great thing in a household. It’s what I’ve had to enforce with my young ladies in Ashcombe. No wonder poor dear Mr. Gibson has been displeased at his dinner not being ready, and he so hard worked!’

  ‘Papa doesn’t care what he has, if it’s only ready. He would take bread and cheese, if cook would only send it in instead of dinner.’

  ‘Bread and cheese! Does Mr. Gibson eat cheese?’

  ‘Yes; he’s very fond of it,’ said Molly innocently. ‘I’ve known him eat toasted cheese when he has been too tired to fancy anything else.’

  ‘Oh! but, my dear, we must change all that. I shouldn’t like to think of your father eating cheese; it’s such a strong-smelling coarse kind of thing. We must get him a cook who can toss him up an omelette, or something elegant. Cheese is only fit for the kitchen.’

  ‘Papa is very fond of it,’ persevered Molly.

  ‘Oh! but we will cure him of that. I couldn’t bear the smell of cheese; and I’m sure he would be sorry to annoy me.’

  Molly was silent; it did not do, she found, to be too minute in telling about her father’s likes and dislikes. She had better leave them for Mrs. Kirkpatrick to find out for herself. It was an awkward pause; each was trying to find something agreeable to say. Molly spoke at length. ‘Please! I should so like to know something about Cynthia—your daughter.’

  ‘Yes, call her Cynthia. It’s a pretty name, isn’t it? Cynthia Kirkpatrick. Not so pretty, though, as my old name, Hyacinth Clare. People used to say it suited me so well. I must show you an acrostic a gentleman—he was a lieutenant in the 53rd—made upon it. Oh! we shall have a great deal to say to each other, I foresee!’

  ‘But about Cynthia?’

  ‘Oh, yes! about dear Cynthia. What do you want to know, my dear?’

  ‘Papa said she was to live with us! When will she come?’

  ‘Oh, was it not sweet of your kind father? I thought of nothing else but Cynthia’s going out as a governess when she had completed her education; she has been brought up for it, and has had great advantages. But good dear Mr. Gibson wouldn’t hear of it. He said yesterday that she must come and live with us when she left school.’

  ‘When will she leave school?’

  ‘She went for two years. I don’t think I must let her leave before next summer. She teaches English as well as learning French. Next summer she shall come home, and then shan’t we be a happy little quartette?’

  ‘I hope so,’ said Molly. ‘But she is to come to the wedding, isn’t she?’ she went on timidly, not knowing how far Mrs. Kirkpatrick would like the allusion to her marriage.

  ‘Your father has begged for her to come; but we must think about it a little more before quite fixing it. The journey is a great expense!’

  ‘Is she like you? I do so want to see her.’

  ‘She is very handsome, people say In the bright-coloured style—perhaps something like what I was. But I like the dark-haired foreign kind of beauty best—just now,’ touching Molly’s hair, and looking at her with an expression of sentimental remembrance.

  ‘Does Cynthia—is she very clever and accomplished?’ asked Molly, a little afraid lest the answer should remove Miss Kirkpatrick at too great a distance from her.

  ‘She ought to be; I’ve paid ever so much money to have her taught by the best masters. But you will see her before long, and I’m afraid we must go now to Lady Cumnor. It has been very charming having you all to myself, but I know Lady Cumnor will be expecting us now, and she was very curious to see you—my future daughter, as she calls you.’

  Molly followed Mrs. Kirkpatrick into the morning-room, where Lady Cumnor was sitting—a little annoyed because, having completed her toilette earlier than usual, Clare had not been aware by instinct of the fact, and so had not brought Molly Gibson for inspection a quarter of an hour before. Every small occurrence is an event in the day of a convalescent invalid, and a little while ago Molly would have met with patronizing appreciation, where now she had to encounter criticism. Of Lady Cumnor’s character as an individual she knew nothing; she only knew she was going to see and be seen by a live countess; nay, more, by ‘the countess’ of Hollingford.

  Mrs. Kirkpatrick led her into Lady Cumnor’s presence by the hand, and, in presenting her, said—‘My dear little daughter, Lady Cumnor!’

  ‘Now, Clare, don’t let me have nonsense. She is not your daughter yet, and may never be—I believe that one-third of the engagements I have heard of have never come to marriages. Miss Gibson, I am very glad to see you, for your father’s sake; when I know you better, I hope it will be for your own.’

  Molly very heartily hoped that she might never be known any better by the stern-looking lady who sat so uprightly in the easy-chair, prepared for lounging, and which therefore gave all the more effect to the stiff attitude. Lady Cumnor luckily took Molly’s silence for acquiescent humility, and went on speaking after a further little pause of inspection.

  ‘Yes, yes, I like her looks, Clare. You may make something of her. It will be a great advantage to you, my dear, to have a lady who has trained up several young people of quality always about you just at the time when you are growing up. I’ll tell you what, Clare!’—a sudden thought striking her—‘you and she must become better acquainted—you know nothing of each other at present; you are not to be married till Christmas, and what could be better than that she should go back with you to Ashcombe! She would be with you constantly, and have the advantage of the companionship of your young people, which would be a good thing for an only child! It’s a capital plan; I’m very glad I thought of it!’

  Now it would be difficult to say which of Lady Cumnor’s two hearers was the most dismayed at the idea which had taken possession of her. Mrs. Kirkpatrick had no fancy for being encumbered with a stepdaughter before her time. If Molly came to be an inmate of her house, farewell to many little background economies, and a still more serious farewell to many little indulgences, that were innocent enough in themselves, but which Mrs. Kirkpatrick’s former life had caused her to look upon as sins to be concealed: the dirty dog’s-eared delightful novel from the Ashcombe circulating library, the leaves of which she turned over with a pair of scissors; the lounging-chair which she had for use at her own home, straight and upright as she sat now in Lady Cumnor’s presence; the dainty morsel, savoury and small, to which she treated herself for her own solitary supper—all these and many other similarly pleasant things would have to be forgone if Molly came to be her pupil, parlour-boarder, or visitor, as Lady Cumnor was planning. One—two things Clare was instinctively resolved upon: to be married at Michaelmas, and not to have Molly at Ashcombe. But she smiled as sweetly as if the plan proposed was the most charming project in the world, while all the time her poor brains were beating about in every bush for the reasons or excuses of which she could make use at some future time. Molly, however, saved her all this trouble. It was a question which of the three was the most surprised by the words which burst out of her lips. She did not mean to speak, but her heart was very full, and almost before she was aware of her thought she heard herself saying—

  ‘I don’t think it would be nice at all. I mean, my lady, that I should dislike it very much; it would be taking me away from papa just these very few last months. I will like you,’ she went on, her eyes full of tears; and, turning to Mrs. Kirkpatrick, she put her hand into her future stepmother’s with the prettiest and most trustful action. ‘I will try hard to love you, and to do all I can to make you happy; but you must not take me away from papa just this very last bit of time that I shall have him.’

  Mrs. Kirkpatrick fondled the
hand thus placed in hers, and was grateful to the girl for her outspoken opposition to Lady Cumnor’s plan. Clare was, however, exceedingly unwilling to back up Molly by any words of her own until Lady Cumnor had spoken and given the cue. But there was something in Molly’s little speech, or in her straightforward manner, that amused instead of irritating Lady Cumnor in her present mood. Perhaps she was tired of the silkiness with which she had been shut up for so many days.

  She put up her glasses, and looked at them both before speaking. Then she said—‘Upon my word, young lady! Why, Clare, you’ve got your work before you! Not but what there is a good deal of truth in what she says. It must be very disagreeable to a girl of her age to have a stepmother coming in between her father and herself, whatever may be the advantages to her in the long run.’

  Molly almost felt as if she could make a friend of the stiff old countess, for her clearness of sight as to the plan proposed being a trial; but she was afraid, in her new-born desire of thinking for others, of Mrs. Kirkpatrick being hurt. She need not have feared, as far as outward signs went, for the smile was still on that lady’s pretty rosy lips, and the soft fondling of her hand never stopped. Lady Cumnor was more interested in Molly the more she looked at her; and her gaze was pretty steady through her gold-rimmed eye-glasses. She began a sort of catechism: a string of very straightforward questions, such as any lady under the rank of countess might have scrupled to ask, but which were not unkindly meant.

  ‘You are sixteen, are you not?’

  ‘No; I am seventeen. My birthday was three weeks ago.’

  ‘Very much the same thing, I should think. Have you ever been to school?’

  ‘No, never! Miss Eyre has taught me everything I know.’

  ‘Umph! Miss Eyre was your governess, I suppose? I should not have thought your father could have afforded to keep a governess. But of course he must know his own affairs best.’

  ‘Certainly, my lady,’ replied Molly, a little touchy as to any reflections on her father’s wisdom.