The Clever Woman of the Family

by Шарлотта Мэри Йондж

  "Their blossoms if you please," laughed Ermine. "We have not seen their fruits yet."

  "And I shall take care the fruits are not nipped with the blight of suspicion," said Rachel, good-humouredly.

  However, after driving Ermine home, and seeing her lifted out and carried into the house by her sister, Rachel did send the carriage back by the groom and betake herself to Villars's shop, where she asked for a sight of the "Clergy List." The name of Mauleverer caught her eye, but only one instance of it appeared, and he was a cathedral canon, his presentation dated in 1832, the time at which, judging from appearances, the object of her search might have been born; besides, he rejoiced in the simple name of Thomas. But Rachel's search was brought to an abrupt conclusion by the issue of Mr. Mauleverer himself from the reading-room within the shop. He bowed and passed by, but Rachel for the life of her could not hinder a burning colour from spreading to the very tips of her ears; so certain did she feel that she was insulting him by her researches, and that he perceived them. She felt absolutely ashamed to see him the next day, and even in her dreams was revolving speeches that might prove that though cautious and clear-sighted, she was neither suspicious nor narrow-minded.

  He came when some morning visitors were at the Homestead, prosy neighbours whose calls were always a penance to Rachel, and the butler, either from the manner of the inquiry or not regarding him as drawing-room company, put him into the dining-room and announced, "Mr. Mauleverer to see Miss Rachel." Up jumped Miss Rachel, with "You'll excuse me, it is on business;" and went off highly satisfied that "the mother" was hindered by politeness from making any attempt at chaperonage either personally or through Grace, so unnecessary at her age, for since Colonel Keith's departure, Rachel's age had begun to grow on her again. She held out her hand as if to atone for her search, hut she found at once that it had been remarked.

  "You were doing me the honour to look for my name in the 'Clergy List,' Miss Curtis," he said.

  "Yes, one is apt--," faltered Rachel, decidedly out of countenance.

  "I quite appreciate the motive. It is exactly in accord with Miss Curtis's prudence and good sense. I should wish to be fully explicit before any arrangements are made. I am unhappily not in orders, Miss Curtis. I know your liberality will regard the cause with leniency."

  "Indeed," said Rachel, sufficiently restored to recall one of her premeditated reassurances. "I can fully appreciate any reluctance to become stringently bound to dogmatic enunciations, before the full powers of the intellect have examined into them."

  "You have expressed it exactly, Miss Curtis. Without denying an iota of them, I may be allowed to regret that our formularies are too technical for a thoughtful mind in the present age."

  "Many have found it so," returned Rachel, thoughtfully, "who only needed patience to permit their convictions to ripen. Then I understand you, it was a rejection on negative not positive grounds?"

  "Precisely; I do not murmur, but it has been the blight of my life."

  "And yet," said Rachel, consolingly, "it may enable you to work with more freedom."

  "Since you encourage me to believe so, Miss Curtis, I will hope it, but I have met with much suspicion."

  "I can well believe it," said Rachel; even some of the most superior persons refuse to lay their hands to any task unless they are certified of the religious opinions of their coadjutors, which seems to me like a mason's refusing to work at a wall with a man who liked Greek architecture when he preferred Gothic!"

  If Rachel had been talking to Ermine she might have been asked whether the dissimilarity might not be in the foundations, or in the tempering of the mortar, but Mr. Mauleverer only commended her liberal spirit, and she thought it high time to turn from this subject to the immediate one in hand. He had wished to discuss the plan with her, he said, before drawing it up, and in effect she had cogitated so much upon it that her ideas came forth with more than her usual fluency and sententiousness. The scheme was that an asylum should be opened under the superintendence of Mr. Mauleverer himself, in which young girls might be placed to learn handicrafts that might secure their livelihood, in especial, perhaps, wood engraving and printing. It might even be possible, in time, to render the whole self-supporting, suppose by the publication of a little illustrated periodical, the materials for which might be supplied by those interested in the institution.

  If anything could add to Rachel's delight it was this last proposition. In all truth and candour, the relief to the victims to lace-making was her primary object, far before all besides, and the longing desire of her heart for years seemed about to be fulfilled; but a domestic magazine, an outlet to all the essays on Curatocult, on Helplessness, on Female Folly, and Female Rights, was a development of the plan beyond her wildest hopes! No dull editor to hamper, reject or curtail! She should be as happy, and as well able to expand as the Invalid herself.

  Mr. Mauleverer had brought a large packet of letters with him, in all manner of hands. There were some testimonials from a German university, and letters from German professors in a compromise between English and German hand, looking impossible to read, also the neat writing and thin wavy water-marked paper of American professors and philanthropists in high commendation of his ability and his scheme, and a few others that he said were of too private a nature to do more than show Miss Curtis in confidence, but on which she recognised some distinguished names of persons interested in Social Science. She would not wound his feelings by too close an inquiry, but she felt armed at all points against cavillers. Really, she began to think, it was a great pity Colonel Keith should cross her path again, she had so much on her hands that it would be a public misfortune if any one man's private domestic love should monopolize her; and yet, such was this foolish world, the Honourable Mrs. Colin Keith would be a more esteemed lady patroness than Miss Rachel Curtis, though the Curtises had been lords of the soil for many generations, and Colonel Keith was a mere soldier of fortune.

  One disappointment Rachel had, namely, that Mr. Mauleverer announced that he was about to return to St. Herbert's, the very large and fashionable watering-place in the next indentation of the coast. He had duties there, he said, and he had only come to Avonmouth for a brief holiday, a holiday that was to result in such happy effects. He lived in an exceedingly retired way, he said, being desirous of saving his small private means for his great object, and he gave Rachel his address at the chief printseller's of the place, where his letters were left for him, while he made excursions from time to time to study the picturesque, and to give lectures on behalf of philanthropical subjects. He offered such a lecture at Avonmouth, but Mr. Touchett would not lend either school-room, and space was nowhere else available. In the meantime a prospectus was drawn up, which Rachel undertook to get printed at Villars's, and to send about to all her friends, since a subscription in hand was the first desideratum.

  Never since she had grown up to be a thinking woman had Rachel been so happy as with this outlet to her activity and powers of managing, "the good time coming at last." Eagerly she claimed sympathy, names and subscriptions. Her own immediate circle was always easily under her influence, and Lady Temple, and Mrs. Curtis supplied the dignity of lady patronesses; Bessie Keith was immensely diverted at the development of "that landscape painter," and took every opportunity of impressing on Rachel that all was the result of her summons to the rescue. Ermine wished Rachel had found out who was the bishop's chaplain who rejected him, but allowed that it would have been an awkward question to ask, and also she wondered if he were a university man; but Mr. Touchett had been at a Hall, and never knew anybody, besides being so firmly convinced that Mr. Mauleverer was a pestiferous heretic, that no one, except Lady Temple, could have obtained a patient answer from him on that head--and even with her he went the length of a regret that she had given the sanction of her name to an undertaking by a person of whose history and principles nothing satisfactory was known. "Oh!" said Fanny, with her sweet look of asking pardon, "I am so sorry you think so; R
achel wished it so much, and it seems such a nice thing for the poor children."

  "Indeed," said Mr. Touchett, well nigh disarmed by the look, "I am quite sensible of the kindness of all you do, I only ventured to wish there had been a little more delay, that we were more certain about this person."

  "When Colonel Keith comes back he will find out all about him, I am sure," said Fanny, and Mr. Touchett, to whom seemed to have been transferred Rachel's dislike to the constant quoting of Colonel Keith, said no more.

  The immediate neighbourhood did not very readily respond to the appeal to it in behalf of the lace-makers. People who did not look into the circumstances of their neighbours thought lace furnished a good trade, and by no means wished to enhance its price; people who did care for the poor had charities of their own, nor was Rachel Curtis popular enough to obtain support for her own sake; a few five- pound notes, and a scanty supply of guineas and half-guineas from people who were ready at any cost to buy off her vehement eyes and voice was all she could obtain, and with a subscription of twenty pounds each from her mother, Lady Temple, and Grace, and all that she could scrape together of her own, hardly seemed sufficient to meet the first expenses, and how would the future be provided for? She calculated how much she could spare out of her yearly income, and actually, to the great horror of her mother and the coachman, sold her horse.

  Bessie Keith was the purchaser. It was an expense that she could quite afford, for she and her brother had been left very well off by their father--a prudent man, who, having been a widower during his Indian service, had been able to live inexpensively, besides having had a large amount of prize money. She had always had her own horse at Littleworthy, and now when Rachel was one day lamenting to her the difficulty of raising money for the Industrial Asylum, and declaring that she would part with her horse if she was sure of its falling into good hands, Bessie volunteered to buy it, it was exactly what would suit her, and she should delight in it as a reminder of dear Avonmouth. It was a pang, Rachel loved the pretty spirited creature, and thought of her rides with the Colonel; but how weigh the pleasure of riding against the welfare of one of those hard-worked, half- stifled little girls, and besides, it might be best to have done with Colonel Keith now that her mission had come to find her. So the coachman set a purposely unreasonable value upon poor Meg, and Rachel reduced the sum to what had been given for it three years before; but Bessie begged her brother to look at the animal and give his opinion.

  "Is that what you are after?" he exclaimed.

  "Indeed, Alick, I thought it was the greatest kindness I could do her; she is so very eager about this plan, and so anxious to find poor Meg a good home."

  "Purely to oblige her?"

  "Of course, Alick, it was much more convenient to her than if she had had to send about to horse-dealers or to advertise. I doubt if she could have done it at all; and it is for her asylum, you know."

  "Then give the coachman's sixty guineas at once."

  "Ah, Alick, that's your infatuation!" and she put on a droll gesture of pity. "But excuse me, where would be the fine edge of delicacy in giving a manifestly fancy price? Come and look at her."

  "I never meddle with horse-dealing."

  "Stuff, as if you weren't the best-mounted man in the regiment. I shall send a note to Captain Sykes if you won't; he knows how to drive a bargain."

  "And give a fancy price the other way. Well, Bessie, on one condition I'll go, and that is, that Meg goes to Bishopsworthy the day she is yours. I won't have her eating Lady Temple's corn, and giving her servants trouble."

  "As if I should think of such a thing."

  Captain Keith's estimate of the value of the steed precisely agreed with Rachel's demand of the original price. Bessie laughed, and said there was collusion.

  "Now seriously, Alick, do you think her worth so much? Isn't it a pity, when you know what a humbug poor Rachel is going to give it to?" and she looked half comical, half saucy.

  "If she were going to throw it into the sea, I don't see what difference that would make."

  "Ah! you are far too much interested. Nothing belonging to her can bear a vulgar price."

  "Nothing belonging to me is to gain profit by her self-denial," said Alick, gravely. "You cannot do less than give her what she gave for it, if you enter on the transaction at all."

  "You mean that it would look shabby. You see we womankind never quite know the code of the world on such matters," she said, candidly.

  "There is something that makes codes unnecessary, Bessie," he said.

  "Ah! I can make allowances. It is a cruel stroke. I don't wonder you can't bear to see any one else on her palfrey; above all as a sacrifice to the landscape painter."

  "Then spare my feelings, and send the mare to Bishopsworthy," said Alick, as usual too careless of the imputation to take the trouble to rebut it or to be disconcerted.

  Bessie was much tickled at his acceptance, and laughed heartily.

  "To be sure," she said, "it is past concealment now. You must have been very far gone, indeed, to have been taken in to suppose me to be making capital of her 'charitable purposes.'"

  "Your acting is too like life," he said, not yet induced to laugh, and she rattled on with her droll, sham sentimental air. "Is it the long words, Alick, or is it 'the great eyes, my dear;' or is it--oh, yes, I know what is the great attraction--that the Homestead doesn't possess a single spot where one could play at croquet!"

  "Quite irresistible!" replied Alick, and Bessie retreated from the colloquy still not laughing at but with him; that is, if the odd, quaint, inward mirth which only visibly lengthened his sleepy eyes, could be called a laugh.

  Next time Captain Keith rode to Avonmouth he met the riding party on the road, Bessie upon Rachel's mare, and it appeared that Lady Temple had considered it so dreadful that Meg should not share her hospitality, that it had been quite impossible to send her away. "So, Alick, your feelings must endure the dreadful spectacle."

  Meanwhile Rachel was hard at work with the subscribers to the "Christian Knowledge Society." Beginning with the A's, and working down a page a day, she sent every member a statement of the wrongs of the lacemakers, and the plans of the industrial establishment, at a vast expense of stamps; but then, as she calculated, one pound thus gained paid for two hundred and forty fruitless letters.

  "And pray," said Alick, who had ridden on to call at the Homestead, "how do you reconcile yourself to the temptation to the postmen?"

  "They don't see what my letters are about?"

  "They must be dull postmen if they don't remark on the shower of envelopes that pass through their hands--ominous money-letters, all with the same address, and no detection remember. You don't know who will answer and who will not."

  "I never thought of that," said Rachel; "but risks must be run when any great purpose is in hand."

  "The corruption of one postman versus the rescue of--how many children make a postman?" asked Captain Keith, with his grave, considering look.

  "The postman would be corrupt already," said Grace, as Rachel thought the last speech too mocking to be worthy of reply, and went on picking up her letters.

  "There is another objection," added Captain Keith, as he watched her busy fingers. "Have you considered how you are frightening people out of the society? It is enough to make one only subscribe as Michael Miserly or as Simon Skinflint, or something equally uninviting to applications."

  "I shall ask you to subscribe by both names!" said Rachel, readily. "How much for Simon Skinflint?"

  "Ten pounds. Stop--when Mr. Mauleverer gives him a reference."

  "That's ungenerous. Will Michael Miserly make up for it?"

  "Yes, when the first year's accounts have been audited."

  "Ah! those who have no faith to make a venture can never effect any good."

  "You evidently build on a great amount of faith from the public. How do you induce them to believe--do you write in your own name?"

  "No, it makes mamma unhappy. I was
going to put R. C., but Grace said people would think it meant Roman Catholic. Your sister thought I had better put the initials of Female Union for Lacemaker's Employment."

  "You don't mean that Bessie persuaded you to put that?" exclaimed Alick Keith, more nearly starting up than Rachel had ever seen him.

  "Yes. There is no objection, is there?"

  "Oh, Rachel, Rachel, how could we have helped thinking of it?" cried Grace, nearly in a state of suffocation.

  Rachel held up her printed appeal, where subscriptions were invited to the address of F. U. L. E., the Homestead, Avonmouth.

  "Miss Curtis, though you are not Scottish, you ought to be well read in Walter Scott."

  "I have thought it waste of time to read incorrect pictures of pseudo-chivalry since I have been grown up," said Rachel. "But that has nothing to do with it."

  "Ah, Rachel, if we had been more up in our Scotch, we should have known what F. U. L. E. spells," sighed Grace.

  A light broke in upon Rachel. "I am sure Bessie never could have recollected it," was her first exclamation. "But there," she continued, too earnest to see or stumble at straws, "never mind. It cannot be helped, and I dare say not one person in ten will be struck by it."

  "Stay," said Grace, "let it be Englishwoman's Employment. See, I can very easily alter the L into an E."

  Rachel would hardly have consented, but was forced to yield to her mother's entreaties. However, the diligent transformation at L's did not last long, for three days after a parcel was left at the Homestead containing five thousand printed copies of the appeal, with the E rightly inserted. Bessie laughed, and did not disavow the half reluctant thanks for this compensation for her inadvertence or mischief, whichever it might be, laughing the more at Rachel's somewhat ungrateful confession that she had rather the cost had gone into a subscription for the F. U. E. E. As Bessie said to herself, it was much better and more agreeable for all parties that it should so stand, and she would consider herself in debt to Alick for the amount. Indeed, she fully expected him to send her in the bill, but in the meantime not one word was uttered between the brother and sister on the subject. They understood one another too well to spend useless words.