"I am sure I ought,on behalf of my dear pupil,to offer you both my warmest thanks.Hers was a most trying position.She never told me of it till afterwards,poor child!I am thankful her trouble was softened to her by finding that STRANGERS"(was it only my fancy that detected a slight stress on the word?)"mere strangers could be at once so thoughtful and so kind.""No one could be otherwise to Miss March.Is she well?Has she recovered from her trial?""I hope so.Happily,few sorrows,few feelings of any kind,take lasting hold at eighteen.She is a noble girl.She did her duty,and it was no light one,to him who is gone;now her life begins anew.It is sure to be prosperous--I trust it may be very happy.--Now I must bid you both good-bye."
She stopped at the gates of the Mythe House;great iron gates,a barrier as proud and impassable as that which in these times the rich shut against the poor,the aristocrat against the plebeian.John,glancing once up at them,hurriedly moved on.
"Stay;you will come and see us,Mr.Halifax?Promise!""If you wish it."
"And promise,too,that under all circumstances you will tell me,as you did this morning,the 'plain truth'?Yes,I see you will.
Good-bye."
The iron gates closed upon her,and against us.We took our silent way up to the Mythe to our favourite stile.There we leaned--still in silence,for many minutes.
"The wind is keen,Phineas;you must be cold."Now I could speak to him--could ask him to tell me of his pain.
"It is so long since you have told me anything.It might do you good.""Nothing can do me good.Nothing but bearing it.My God!what have I not borne!Five whole months to be dying of thirst,and not a drop of water to cool my tongue."He bared his head and throat to the cutting wind--his chest heaved,his eyes seemed in a flame.
"God forgive me!--but I sometimes think I would give myself body and soul to the devil for one glimpse of her face,one touch of her little hand."I made no answer.What answer could be made to such words as these?
I waited--all I could do--till the paroxysm had gone by.Then Ihinted--as indeed seemed not unlikely--that he might see her soon.
"Yes,a great way off,like that cloud up there.But I want her near--close--in my home--at my heart;--Phineas,"he gasped,"talk to me--about something else--anything.Don't let me think,or I shall go clean mad."And indeed he looked so.I was terrified.So quiet as I had always seen him when we met,so steadily as he had pursued his daily duties;and with all this underneath--this torment,conflict,despair,of a young man's love.It must come out--better it should.
"And you have gone on working all this while?""I was obliged.Nothing but work kept me in my senses.Besides"--and he laughed hoarsely--"I was safest in the tan-yard.The thought of her could not come there.I was glad of it.I tried to be solely and altogether what I am--a 'prentice lad--a mere clown.""Nay,that was wrong."
"Was it?Well,at last it struck me so.I thought I would be a gentleman again--just for a pretence,you know--a dream--a bit of the old dream back again.So I went to London.""And met the Jessops there?"
"Yes;though I did not know she was Jane Cardigan.But I liked her--I liked my life with them.It was like breathing a higher air,the same air that--Oh,Phineas,it was horrible to come back to my life here--to that accursed tan-yard!"I said nothing.
"You see,now"--and that hard laugh smote me to the heart again--"you see,Phineas,how wicked I am growing.You will have to cut my acquaintance presently.""Tell me the rest--I mean,the rest of your life in London,"I said,after a pause."Did you ever hear of her?""Of course not;though I knew she was there.I saw it in the Court Circular.Fancy a lady,whose name was in the Court Circular,being inquired after by a tanner's lad!But I wanted to look at her--any beggar might do that,you know--so I watched in streets and parks,by theatre-doors at night,and by church-doors on Sunday mornings;yet Inever saw her once.Only think,not once for five whole months.""John,how could you tell me you were happy?""I don't know.Perhaps because of my pride;perhaps because--Ah,don't look so wretched!Why did you let me say all this?You are too good for such as I."Of course I took no heed of idle words like these.I let him stand there,leaning against the stile,now and then grasping it with his nervous,muscular hands,as if he would tear it down;then I said quietly:
"What do you intend to do?"
"Do?Nothing!What can I do?Though sometimes a score of wild plans rush into my mind,such as to run away to the Indies,like that young Warren Hastings we were talking of,come back twenty years hence a nabob,and--marry her.""Marry her,"I repeated,mournfully.
"Ay,I could.That is what maddens me.If now she and I were to meet and stand together,equal man and woman,I could make her love me;I feel I could.Instead of crawling after her thus I would go boldly in at those very gates--do you think she is there?"He trembled,actually trembled,at the mere thought of her being so near.
"Oh,it's hard,hard!I could despise myself.Why cannot I trust my manhood,my honest manhood that I was born with,go straight to her and tell her that I love her;that God meant her for me and me for her--true husband and true wife?Phineas,mark my words"--and,wild as his manner was,it had a certain force which sounded almost like prophecy--"if ever Ursula March marries she will be my wife--MYwife!"
I could only murmur--"Heaven grant it!"
"But we shall never marry,neither one nor the other of us;we shall go on apart and alone till the next world.Perhaps she will come to me then:I may have her in my heart there."John looked upward:there was in the west a broad,red frosty cloud,and just beyond it,nay,all but resting on it,the new moon--a little,wintry,soft new moon.A sight that might well have hushed the maddest storm of passion:it hushed his.He stood,still looking up,for many minutes,then his eyes closed,the lashes all wet.