Chapter VII: The Red House

WOODLEIGH was a very scattered village, numbering about one thousand inhabitants all told, yet containing only one double row of straggling houses, which might by courtesy be termed a street.

Woodleigh Hall stood well apart from this little central cluster, in its own grounds, on something of an eminence, from which views could be had of pretty and undulating country around.

George Rutherford’s father had inherited the place from a distant relative. Left at twenty-one, by his father’s death, in possession of the property, George had steered marvellously clear of the perils sure to assail a young man in such a position, owing much of his safety, under a higher Power, to the companionship of a wise and loving mother. Not until her death, in his thirty-third year, did George Rutherford begin to think seriously of finding a wife.

After considerable hesitation he had found one in Dulcibel Lloyd; not at all the kind of wife that any one would have expected him to choose, the very last person that anybody else would have chosen for him. But this was almost a matter of course. Men usually go contrary to expectations in such matters.[?]

And whether or no Dulcibel was able to give him all that he required, either in the way of heart or of intellect, he and she had been very happy together. The last seventeen years had gone by with smooth rapidity.

George Rutherford was a busy man; he always had been so, ever since he emerged from boyhood. Property brings responsibility with it, and George felt those responsibilities with all seriousness. Alike generous and tender-hearted, no case of need came within his ken to be passed over or put aside. Investigation was followed invariably by such assistance as seemed wise.

In these matters Dulcibel was a very meet help to her husband. She dearly loved to have half-a-dozen interesting “cases” on hand, and to be running hither and thither after them.

Joan’s inclinations lay in a different line. Books were her prime interest, and parish work was distasteful. With “father” she would go anywhere, but in a cottage she always became shy and curt, and left all the talking to him. George tried in vain to awaken wider sympathies. All the outflow of Joan’s affections seemed to be at present towards him, and him alone. Still she was very kind to Nessie, and Nessie was very fond of Joan, in a gentle, colorless style.

A stranger would have been oddly struck with the contrast between the two, as they walked side by side that afternoon, along a high road, according to Joan’s prediction. Nessie could not endure wet grass or stiles; but she liked walking, and could manage a very considerable distance at a good pace. Naturally her tendency would have been to lounge languidly onward, but Joan never would permit this.

“I do love autumn,” Joan broke out, when they had plodded steadily for half an hour in silence—“next best to spring.”

“I don’t, because winter is coming,” said Nessie.

“Well—and spring comes after winter. One may enjoy each in turn. Nessie, suppose we turn down this lane, and go around by that queer old red house, with any amount of chimneys.”

“Mrs. St. John’s house.”

“I don’t know who lives there. We should just have time to do the round before dark, if we are quick. It is not too far for you?”

“Oh, no!” and Nessie turned obediently. “I thought you called there once with father.”

“No; he went in, and I didn’t. I hate calls. I can’t bear being introduced to people as Miss Brooke, and having remarks made on my name.”

“Well, you seem like one of us,” said Nessie placidly. “Is that why you never will call on anybody, if you can help it?”

“That’s principally why,” said Joan.

“Mother doesn’t much care for Mrs. St. John,” said Nessie. “She thinks her proud and cold. But sometimes people are called so when they are shy.”

“At all events we don’t mean to call on Mrs. St. John now,” said Joan, with a slight shrug of her shoulders, and a rapid movement of her eyebrows. “I’d rather be excused, and so I dare say would you. Come, we shall have to step out well, Nessie. It is a good way round—seven or eight miles altogether. What a pity father didn’t come with us?”

“Why didn’t he?”

“Mother wanted him for something. Those clouds look rather suspicious for by-and-by; but it won’t rain yet. I’d have brought my umbrella if I had noticed them.”

The red house of which Joan had spoken was well shaded with tall trees. A rather small drawing-room stood on one side of the front door, and in this drawing-room sat two ladies, working or making believe to work, and talking without any make-believe. Both were well advanced in years: the elder, Mrs. St. John, about seventy-five, the other only some ten or twelve years her junior. And while Mrs. St. John, a slender, upright little body, with white hair, and sharp eyes, and mittened hands, expressed her thoughts with a clear and resolute utterance, the other lady seemed too listless and depressed for ought but deliberation, and even slowness. She was very sweet-faced, this second occupant of the room, but there was a look of premature age about her stooping figure and faded complexion. A careless observer might almost have mistaken her for the senior of the two.

“The fact is my dear Amelia,” Mrs. St. John was saying—“the fact is, you always were given to rather distorted views of your duty. And this is a case in point.”

She spoke with the freedom of a sister, yet the ladies were not sisters, or even relatives, but only old school-friends.

“I do not feel any doubt as to what my duty would be, if it were not for my husband’s wishes,” the other answered in her spiritless manner. “But, feeling as he does—”

“Knowing him to feel as he does, your course of action is quite clear,” said Mrs. St. John decisively.

“I am not sure. If I could persuade him—”

“My dear Amelia, have you ever once, in all your married life, succeeded in persuading your good husband that you were a better judge than himself on any single question?”

A flickering smile crossed the other’s face.

“Hubert is very decided, certainly,” she said—“very decided, when once he has made up his mind.”

Then the smile was quenched in sudden tears.

“No, that is it—never, never! If I ever could have touched him, it would have been for our boy—my boy!”

“Then you see the uselessness now. But I did not mean to distress you, Amelia. Take some eau-de-cologne—or, stay, an early cup of tea will do you good.”

“No, thanks.”

“Well, you must not be in such low spirits—positively you must not. I begin to think we have made a mistake in letting you come here; but you seemed to wish it. And after about twenty years—”

“Over twenty,” breathed the other.

“About twenty, I said. After twenty years, I do think, my dear Amelia, that for one professing to be so religious as yourself there is a singular want of resignation to Providence, in fretting still, year after year. You ought by this time to have learnt a spirit of submission. Other people have their sorrows too. I have lost my dear husband, I hope I know how to bear my loss with fortitude.”

“It is very wrong of me—very wrong, I am afraid,” the other lady said, with a meek tremulousness. “I do hope it is not want of submission to God’s will. He knows what is best—I know—I am sure. But still, people do suffer so differently; and some troubles seem to cut away the very ground from under one’s feet. If I could have seen my boy again before he died, or if I might have watched his child growing up—have held the little thing in my arms.”

“Quite impossible, Amelia. Your husband would never have consented. And if the child is alive now, she is a woman. Perhaps you would have wished to welcome her mother also to your home and heart?”

“As Hubert’s wife—yes.”

“But as the milkman’s daughter—no!”

“He was—quite a respectable farmer,” faltered the lady; “and she I believe, was well educated.”

Mrs. St. John made an indescribable gesture.

“Perhaps, my dear Amelia, you would like to call upon Cairns the next time my butter and milk bill has to be paid. You might take a message from me that his butter has been very poor lately, at the same time that you announce yourself as his daughter’s mother-in-law!”

“I don’t think you need talk like this to me. It is not quite kind,” remonstrated her friend.

Mrs. St. John rose and walked to the window.

“Dear me, what a change in the weather! It is coming on to rain—quite a pelt. I hope your husband is not out-of-doors.”

There was no answer to this. The other lady seemed struggling to control her emotion; and, failing to do so, she left the room. Mrs. St. John stood looking towards the door, tapping a small table with the long pointed fingers of one mittened hand.

“Poor dear Amelia! She is sadly weak still—the same good creature as always, but with such a want of mental stamina. I must do my best to brace her up while she is here. This perpetual fretting has gone on long enough. It is just a habit of mind now—hardly genuine. Quite out of the question that she should hold any communication with the Cairns family; and if there is a child of Hubert’s still living, the less Amelia knows of her the better. Dear me, what a drench! I hope nobody is out in it.”

Her face showed satisfaction as a comely, courtly old gentleman, with flowing white locks; entered the room.

“Mr. Brooke! I am delighted to see you indoors. What tremendous rain.”

“Coming down in bucketsful!” said Mr. Brooke. “Very sudden change; but the glass showed a tendency to fall this morning. Can you tell me where Amelia is?”

“She will be back, I think, directly. We happened to touch upon the old subject, and she was overcome.”

“As usual,” said Mr. Brooke, his features taking a grim set.

“Yes; but I hope it will not last. Dear Amelia is evidently in rather a low state just now; and associations in this neighborhood are trying.”

“Amelia has never been here before.”

“No,” said Mrs. St. John slowly—“no, certainly; but somebody was here. And if Amelia does not know many particulars, imagination supplies material to fill up gaps.”

“No doubt,” said Mr. Brooke. “Ha, two young ladies out in the rain!”

“Where?”

Mrs. St. John gazed through the panes, speedily descrying a couple of girlish figures. They seemed to be taking shelter under a small elm, just outside the garden gate; but the shelter was evidently very partial.

“Foolish young things. No umbrella, of course,” said Mr. Brooke.

Mrs. St. John was putting up her eye-glass.

“I know who they are,” she said. “One of them is a daughter of Mr. Rutherford, and the other, no doubt, is her sister. The youngest came to call on me once with her mother—a washed-out, uninteresting little thing—not two ideas in her head.”

“She is likely to be washed-out now, in good earnest. Ha, ha!” laughed Mr. Brooke, pleased with his own joke. “Who is this Mr. Rutherford?”

“He has property at Woodleigh. A very philanthropic sort of individual, I believe;” and a sneer was apparent. “He came in once on business, about a needy person whom he wished to help. His wife has taken the trouble to call on me twice during the three years and a half that I have lived here. I do not think it incumbent on me, at my age, to pay return calls, beyond leaving my card; and people ought to understand this; but probably Mrs. Rutherford does not. She certainly has not given herself much trouble about me. As it happens, her calling or non-calling makes little difference to me; for she did not at all take my fancy.”

“Nevertheless, it might be a charity to offer her daughters a shelter in the storm,” suggested Mr. Brooke, getting rather tired of Mrs. St. John’s utterances. “There is lightning—pretty near too. One of those girls is frightened; and standing under a tree is not particularly safe.”

“Perhaps they would come in if we beckoned,” suggested Mrs. St. John.

Mr. Brooke threw up the window, and signs of invitation were freely made, not at once to be responded to. The girls seemed very slow to hear or heed, Joan being extremely reluctant to enter the house. But Nessie was timid in a storm, and her fears overruled Joan’s unwillingness. They crossed the open space at a run, and stood under the porch.

Mr. Brooke himself opened the door.

“Come in, pray,” he said. “Mrs. St. John thought you might be glad of shelter.”

“I don’t mind it, but Nessie does. Thank you,” Joan said, not very graciously, as she preceded Nessie into the drawing-room.

Mrs. St. John’s hand was extended to Nessie first. “How do you do?” she said, rather distantly. “You and I have met before, I believe. Is this your sister?”

“It is—Joan,” Nessie answered, with a slight break, recalling Joan’s words as to introductions.

“My friend, Mr. Brooke. The two Misses Rutherford,” Mrs. St. John said, by way of introduction. “Pray come to the fire, and dry yourselves.”

Joan’s black eyes had given one startled flash at the sound of the gentleman’s name. A Brooke was not necessarily a connection of her own, but she never liked to hear the word. She said nothing, however, placing herself in front of the fire. Nessie followed tamely, being much given when with Joan to act as Joan’s shadow.