The Tenant of Wildfell Hall (Penguin Classics)

by Brontë, Anne

  It was one rainy day last week: most of the company were killing time in the billiard-room, but Milicent and I were with little Arthur and Helen in the library, and between our books, our children, and each other, we expected to make out a very agreeable morning. We had not been thus secluded above two hours, however, when Mr Hattersley came in, attracted, I suppose, by the voice of his child as he was crossing the hall, for he is prodigiously fond of her, and she of him.

  He was redolent of the stables, where he had been regaling himself with the company of his fellow-creatures, the horses, ever since breakfast. But that was no matter to my little namesake: as soon as the colossal person of her father darkened the door, she uttered a shrill scream of delight, and, quitting her mother’s side, ran crowing towards him – balancing her course with out-stretched arms, – and, embracing his knee, threw back her head and laughed in his face. He might well look smilingly down upon those small, fair features radiant with innocent mirth, those clear, blue, shining eyes, and that soft flaxen hair cast back upon the little ivory neck and shoulders. Did he not think how unworthy he was of such a possession? I fear no such idea crossed his mind. He caught her up, and there followed some minutes of very rough play, during which it is difficult to say whether the father or the daughter laughed and shouted the loudest. At length, however, the boisterous pastime terminated – suddenly, as might be expected: the little one was hurt and began to cry; and its ungentle playfellow tossed it into its mother’s lap, bidding her ‘make all straight.’ As happy to return to that gentle comforter as it had been to leave her, the child nestled in her arms and hushed its cries in a moment; and, sinking its little weary head on her bosom, soon dropped asleep.

  Meantime, Mr Hattersley strode up to the fire, and, interposing his height and breadth between us and it, stood, with arms akimbo, expanding his chest, and gazing round him as if the house and all its appurtenances and contents were his own undisputed possessions.

  ‘Deuced bad weather this!’ he began. ‘There’ll be no shooting today, I guess.’ Then, suddenly lifting up his voice, he regaled us with a few bars of a rollicking song, which abruptly ceasing, he finished the tune with a whistle, and then continued, – ‘I say Mrs Huntingdon, what a fine stud your husband has! – not large but good. – I’ve been looking at them a bit this morning; and upon my word, Black Bess, and Grey Tom, and that young Nimrod are the finest animals I’ve seen for many a day!’ Then followed a particular discussion of their various merits, succeeded by a sketch of the great things he intended to do in the horse-jockey line3 when his old governor thought proper to quit the stage – ‘Not that I wish him to close his accounts,’ added he; ‘the old Trojan is welcome to keep his books open as long as he pleases for me.’

  ‘I hope so, indeed, Mr Hattersley!’

  ‘Oh yes! It’s only my way of talking. The event must come, sometime, and so I look to the bright side of it – that’s the right plan, isn’t it, Mrs H.? – What are you two doing here, by the by – where’s Lady Lowborough?’

  ‘In the billiard room.’

  ‘What a splendid creature she is!’ continued he, fixing his eyes on his wife, who changed colour, and looked more and more disconcerted as he proceeded. ‘What a noble figure she has! and what magnificent black eyes; and what a fine spirit of her own; – and what a tongue of her own, too, when she likes to use it – I perfectly adore her! – But never mind, Milicent: I wouldn’t have her for my wife – not if she’d a kingdom for her dowry! I’m better satisfied with the one I have. – Now then! what do you look so sulky for? don’t you believe me?’

  ‘Yes, I believe you,’ murmured she, in a tone of half sad, half sullen resignation, as she turned away to stroke the hair of her sleeping infant, that she had laid on the sofa beside her.

  ‘Well then, what makes you so cross? Come here Milly, and tell me why you can’t be satisfied with my assurance.’

  She went, and, putting her little hand within his arm, looked up in his face, and said softly, –

  ‘What does it amount to Ralph? Only to this, that though you admire Annabella so much, and for qualities that I don’t possess, you would still rather have me than her for your wife which merely proves that you don’t think it necessary to love your wife: you are satisfied if she can keep your house and take care of your child. But I’m not cross; I’m only sorry; for,’ added she in a low, tremulous accent, withdrawing her hand from his arm, and bending her looks on the rug, ‘if you don’t love me, you don’t, and it can’t be helped.’

  ‘Very true: but who told you I didn’t? Did I say I loved Annabella?’

  ‘You said you adored her.’

  ‘True, but adoration isn’t love. I adore Annabella, but I don’t love her, and I love thee Milicent, but I don’t adore thee.’ In proof of his affection, he clutched a handful of her light brown ringlets and appeared to twist them unmercifully.

  ‘Do you really, Ralph?’ murmured she with a faint smile beaming through her tears, just putting up her hand to his, in token that he pulled rather too hard.

  ‘To be sure I do,’ responded he: ‘only you bother me rather, sometimes.’

  ‘I bother you!’ cried she in very natural surprise.

  ‘Yes, you – but only by your exceeding goodness – when a boy has been cramming raisins and sugar-plums all day, he longs for a squeeze of sour orange by way of a change. And did you never, Milly, observe the sands on the sea-shore; how nice and smooth they look, and how soft and easy they feel to the foot? But if you plod along, for half an hour, over this soft, easy carpet – giving way at every step, yielding the more the harder you press, – you’ll find it rather wearisome work, and be glad enough to come to a bit of good, firm rock, that won’t budge an inch whether you stand, walk, or stamp upon it; and, though it be hard as the nether millstone, you’ll find it the easier footing after all.’

  ‘I know what you mean, Ralph,’ said she, nervously playing with her watch-guard and tracing the figure on the rug with the point of her tiny foot, ‘I know what you mean, but I thought you always liked to be yielded to; and I can’t alter now.’

  ‘I do like it,’ replied he, bringing her to him by another tug at her hair. ‘You mustn’t mind my talk Milly. A man must have something to grumble about; and if he can’t complain that his wife harries him to death with her perversity and ill-humour, he must complain that she wears him out with her kindness and gentleness.’

  ‘But why complain at all, unless, because you are tired and dissatisfied?’

  ‘To excuse my own failings, to be sure. Do you think I’ll bear all the burden of my sins on my own shoulders, as long as there’s another ready to help me, with none of her own to carry?’

  ‘There is no such one on earth,’ said she seriously; and then, taking his hand from her head, she kissed it with an air of genuine devotion, and tripped away to the door.

  ‘What now?’ said he. ‘Where are you going?’

  ‘To tidy my hair,’ she answered, smiling through her disordered locks: ‘you’ve made it all come down.’

  ‘Off with you then! – An excellent little woman,’ he remarked when she was gone, ‘but a thought too soft4 – she almost melts in one’s hands. I positively think I ill-use her sometimes, when I’ve taken too much – but I can’t help it, for she never complains, either at the time or after. I suppose she doesn’t mind it.’

  ‘I can enlighten you on that subject, Mr Hattersley,’ said I: ‘she does mind it; and some other things she minds still more, which, yet, you may never hear her complain of.’

  ‘How do you know? – does she complain to you?’ demanded he, with a sudden spark of fury ready to burst into a flame if I should answer ‘Yes.’

  ‘No,’ I replied; ‘but I have known her longer and studied her more closely than you have done. – And I can tell you, Mr Hattersley, that Milicent loves you more than you deserve, and that you have it in your power to make her very happy, instead of which you are her evil genius, and, I will venture to say, there i
s not a single day passes in which you do not inflict upon her some pang that you might spare her if you would.’

  ‘Well – it’s not my fault,’ said he, gazing carelessly up at the ceiling and plunging his hands into his pockets: ‘if my ongoings don’t suit her, she should tell me so.’

  ‘Is she not exactly the wife you wanted? Did you not tell Mr Huntingdon you must have one that would submit to anything without a murmur, and never blame you, whatever you did?’

  ‘True, but we shouldn’t always have what we want: it spoils the best of us, doesn’t it?5 How can I help playing the deuce when I see it’s all one to her whether I behave like a Christian or like a scoundrel such as nature made me? – and how can I help teasing her when she’s so invitingly meek and mim – when she lies down like a spaniel at my feet6 and never so much as squeaks to tell me that’s enough?’

  ‘If you are a tyrant by nature, the temptation is strong, I allow; but no generous mind delights to oppress the weak, but rather to cherish and protect.’

  ‘I don’t oppress her, but it’s so confounded flat to be always cherishing and protecting; – and then how can I tell that I am oppressing her when she “melts away and makes no sign?”7 I sometimes think she has no feeling at all; and then I go on till she cries – and that satisfies me.’

  ‘Then you do delight to oppress her.’

  ‘I don’t, I tell you! – only when I’m in a bad humour – or a particularly good one, and want to afflict for the pleasure of comforting; or when she looks flat and wants shaking up a bit. And sometimes, she provokes me by crying for nothing, and won’t tell me what it’s for; and then, I allow, it enrages me past bearing – especially, when I’m not my own man.’

  ‘As is no doubt generally the case on such occasions,’ said I. ‘But in future, Mr Hattersley, when you see her looking flat or crying for “nothing” (as you call it), ascribe it all to yourself: be assured it is something you have done amiss, or your general misconduct that distresses her.’

  ‘I don’t believe it. If it were, she should tell me so: I don’t like that way of moping and fretting in silence, and saying nothing – it’s not honest How can she expect me to mend my ways at that rate?’

  ‘Perhaps she gives you credit for having more sense than you possess, and deludes herself with the hope that you will one day see your own errors and repair them, if left to your own reflection.’

  ‘None of your sneers, Mrs Huntingdon! I have the sense to see that I’m not always quite correct – but sometimes I think that’s no great matter, as long as I injure nobody but myself–’

  ‘It is a great matter,’ interrupted I, ‘both to yourself (as you will hereafter find to your cost) and to all connected with you – most especially your wife – but indeed, it is nonsense to talk about injuring no one but yourself, it is impossible to injure yourself – especially by such acts as we allude to – without injuring hundreds, if not thousands, besides, in a greater or less degree, either by the evil you do or the good you leave undone.’

  ‘And as I was saying,’ continued he – ‘or would have said if you hadn’t taken me up so short – I sometimes think I should do better if I were joined to one that would always remind me when I was wrong, and give me a motive for doing good and eschewing evil by decidedly showing her approval of the one, and disapproval of the other.’

  ‘If you had no higher motive than the approval of your fellow mortal, it would do you little good.’

  ‘Well, but if I had a mate that would not always be yielding, and always equally kind, but that would have the spirit to stand at bay now and then, and honestly tell me her mind at all times – such a one as yourself for instance – Now if I went on with you as I do with her when I’m in London, you’d make the house too hot to hold me at times, I’ll be sworn.’

  ‘You mistake me: I’m no termagant’.

  ‘Well, all the better for that, for I can’t stand contradiction – in a general way – and I’m as fond of my own will as another: only I think too much of it doesn’t answer for any man.’

  ‘Well, I would never contradict you without a cause, but certainly I would always let you know what I thought of your conduct; and if you oppressed me, in body, mind, or estate, you should at least have no reason to suppose “I didn’t mind it.” ’

  ‘I know that my lady; and I think if my little wife were to follow the same plan it would be better for us both.’

  ‘I’ll tell her.’

  ‘No, no, let her be; there’s much to be said on both sides – and, now I think upon it, Huntingdon often regrets that you are not more like her – scoundrelly dog that he is – and you see, after all, you can’t reform him. he’s ten times worse than I – He’s afraid of you, to be sure – that is, he’s always on his best behaviour in your presence – but –’

  ‘I wonder what his worst behaviour is like, then?’ I could not forbear observing.

  ‘Why, to tell you the truth, it’s very bad indeed – isn’t it, Hargrave?’ said he, addressing that gentleman, who had entered the room unperceived by me, for I was now standing near the fire with my back to the door. ‘Isn’t Huntingdon,’ he continued, ‘as great a reprobate as ever was d—d?’

  ‘His lady will not hear him censured with impunity,’ replied Mr Hargrave, coming forward, ‘but I must say, I thank God I am not such another.’

  ‘Perhaps it would become you better,’ said I, ‘to look at what you are, and say, “God be merciful to me a sinner.” ’8

  ‘You are severe,’ returned he, bowing slightly and drawing himself up with a proud yet injured air. Hattersley laughed, and clapped him on the shoulder. Moving from under his hand with a gesture of insulted dignity, Mr Hargrave took himself away to the other end of the rug.

  ‘Isn’t it a shame, Mrs Huntingdon?’ cried his brother-in-law – ‘I struck Walter Hargrave when I was drunk, the second night after we came, and he’s turned a cold shoulder on me ever since; though I asked his pardon the very morning after it was done!’

  ‘Your manner of asking it,’ returned the other, ‘and the clearness with which you remembered the whole transaction, showed you were not too drunk to be fully conscious of what you were about, and quite responsible for the deed.’

  ‘You wanted to interfere between me and my wife,’ grumbled Hattersley, ‘and that is enough to provoke any man.’

  ‘You justify it then?’ said his opponent, darting upon him a most vindictive glance.

  ‘No, I tell you I wouldn’t have done it if I hadn’t been under excitement; and if you choose to bear malice for it, after all the handsome things I’ve said – do so and be damned!’

  ‘I would refrain from such language in a lady’s presence, at least,’ said Mr Hargrave, hiding his anger under a mask of disgust.

  ‘What have I said?’ returned Hattersley. ‘Nothing but Heaven’s truth – he will be damned, won’t he, Mrs Huntingdon, if he doesn’t forgive his brother’s trespasses?’

  ‘You ought to forgive him, Mr Hargrave, since he asks you,’ said I.

  ‘Do you say so? Then I will!’ And, smiling almost frankly, he stepped forward and offered his hand. It was immediately clasped in that of his relative, and the reconciliation was apparently cordial on both sides.

  ‘The affront,’ continued Hargrave, turning to me, ‘owed half its bitterness to the fact of its being offered in your presence; and since you bid me forgive it, I will – and forget it too.’

  ‘I guess the best return I can make, will be to take myself off,’ muttered Hattersley, with a broad grin. His companion smiled; and he left the room. This put me on my guard. Mr Hargrave turned seriously to me, and earnestly began –

  ‘Dear Mrs Huntingdon, how I have longed for, yet dreaded this hour! Do not be alarmed,’ he added, for my face was crimson with anger; ‘I am not about to offend you with any useless entreaties or complaints. I am not going to presume to trouble you with the mention of my own feelings or your perfections, but I have something to reveal to you which you o
ught to know, and which, yet, it pains me inexpressibly –’

  ‘Then don’t trouble yourself to reveal it!’

  ‘But it is of importance –’

  ‘If so, I shall hear it soon enough – especially if it is bad news, as you seem to consider it. At present, I am going to take the children to the nursery.’

  ‘But can’t you ring, and send them?’

  ‘No; I want the exercise of a run to the top of the house – Come Arthur.’

  ‘But you will return?’

  ‘Not yet; don’t wait.’

  ‘Then, when may I see you again?’

  ‘At lunch,’ said I, departing with little Helen in one arm, and leading Arthur by the hand.

  He turned away, muttering some sentence of impatient censure or complaint, in which ‘heartless’ was the only distinguishable word.

  ‘What nonsense is this Mr Hargrave?’ said I, pausing in the doorway. ‘What do you mean?’