Chapter XVII: The Fairy's Wand

There are but few of us, I fear, who can say: "Though I should die suddenly, and at the most unlooked-for time, there will be nothing left behind me which I would have destroyed, even though I had had the opportunity." Of course there are none who can boast that they are at peace with all mankind; that they leave nothing unrepented of or unatoned for; that their human affairs and social relations are exactly where they would have wished them to be. But independent of these matters, neglected by the very best of us, how eagerly must many a man desire, between the warning and swift stroke of death, that he had had but a little time--a little strength to set, not, indeed, his house in order, but his desk and his note-book. What a cruel shock have many a family received, after they have lost the Head whom they have worshipped so many years, by discovering, where they looked for no such thing, _after his death_, that he had all along (as will be thought) been even such a one--_not_ as themselves, but worse--as they whom they had been taught by his own self to look upon with contempt, or at least with pity; as they who, by contrast with himself, were persons base and vile. Is there no letter, reader, ragged and time-worn, perhaps, but still legible, lying among that heap of correspondence you intend to winnow some day--which it will be better to burn _now_? Is there no half-forgotten gift, meant for your own eyes alone, when they were brighter than at present, which it would be well to make an end of this very day? Can you say: "Even though I do not return home to night, or ever again, but am smashed by a railway locomotive, or driven over by a 'bus, or poisoned in a cab, yet there will be nothing of mine, nothing when my friends take stock of my personal effects, of which I need be ashamed." If so, thou art a good man indeed--or one of exceeding prudence. Above all things, my friends, be good, for that is best; but if not, at least be prudent. Let your memories be sullied with no stain, at all events in the thoughts of those you leave at home. The actions of the unjust blossom in their dust into flowers compared with which the deadly nightshade is as the violet or the rose. The satirist tells us that in a week, a month, a year at most, the memory of a dead man dies even from the hearts of those he held most dear. This is not true; but the satirist would have been severer yet, and have spoken truth as well, had he said that the memory of a dead man, so far as his vice and wickedness are concerned, dies not at all among his kin. It is spoken of in whispers by the purest, and renders them less pure; it is made light of by the vicious, but only to excuse their wrongful acts by a worse example. "Wild as I may be, I am not so wild as the governor was in his day," is a terrible legacy of comfort to leave behind one to one's son.

It is possible that even Sir Massingberd Heath may at some far-back time have deemed it necessary to lay to his soul some flattering unction of this kind. There were Sir Wentworth and Sir Nicholas, and many a Heath to extenuate his acts, if bad example might do it. But the time came to him, and very early in life, when he had no longer this slender justification, since he had outdone his worse progenitor in vice and folly. Mr. Clint had known, Mr. Long had guessed--we all of us had suspected more or less that the lost baronet's life had been evil beyond that of an ordinary man; but the dumb revelations which were made concerning it in the necessary examination of his papers, were simply shocking. After destroying these, the next approach to cleansing Fairburn Hall was to discharge all the indoor domestics. Mr. Richard Gilmore resented this conduct towards a faithful servant of the family, as he styled himself, very bitterly; but he departed with the rest, laden, there is little doubt with a very considerable plunder. Presently the upholsterers came down from town with a great following of workpeople, and a caravan of waggons, bearing costly furniture; then a host of servants, selected with as much care as was possible, replaced the exiles; and when all was ready within and without--the waste places of the grounds being reclaimed, and put upon the same footing with those which hitherto had alone been "kept up"--Sir Marmaduke Heath and his wife themselves took possession of Fairburn Hall.

Art had already done much to change that sombre house into a comfortable as well as splendid mansion; but the presence of its new mistress did more than all to rescue it from the long tyranny of decay and gloom. Beneath her smile, the shadows of the past could take no shape, but vanished, thin and pale. She would allow them nowhere resting-place. Where they had been wont to gather thickest to her husband's eyes, she quelled them by her radiant presence, day and night. The Oak Parlour and its adjoining bedroom; she formed into a double boudoir for her own sweet self; and straightway all bat-winged, harpy-headed memories, the brood of evil deeds, flew from it as the skirts of Night before the dawn, and in their place an angel-throng came fluttering in, and made it their abode. No stage-fairy, wand in hand, ever effected transformation-scene more charming and complete. One fear, and one alone, now agitated Marmaduke's heart, for the safety of his priceless wife in her approaching trial. He would have gladly cancelled nature's gracious promise, and lived childless all his days, rather than any risk should befall Lucy. His friends, his servants, and the villagers, brimful of hope that there should be an heir to Fairburn, flowed over in earnest congratulations; but for his part, he felt apprehensive only. His heart experienced no yearning for the child who might endanger the mother.

In accordance with her plan of ignoring all that had gone before of shame and sorrow, and regenerating evil places with a baptism of joy, Lady Heath had chosen the state chamber itself as her sleeping apartment, and there in due time she safely brought forth a son. Upon his knees, Marmaduke thanked Heaven for the blessing which was thus vouchsafed to him, but above all, in that it had brought with it no curse. Verily had the house of mourning become the house of feasting, and the chamber of sorrow the chamber of mirth.

The unconscious father had been sitting by the library fire, endeavouring vainly to distract his mind from what was occurring upstairs, and turning his eyes restlessly ever and anon towards the door, when the voice of Dr. Sitwell suddenly broke the silence.

"Sir Marmaduke, I congratulate you; you have a son and heir."

"And my wife?" cried the husband impatiently.

"She is as well as can possibly be expected, I do assure you."

"You are very welcome," exclaimed the young baronet; "and would have been so, although you had chosen to burst your way in with a torpedo. But I confess you startled me a good deal."

"I am afraid I did," returned the doctor, in a voice like a stream of milk and honey, "although it was not my intention to do so. But the fact is, I did not come in by the door at all. Her ladyship desired that I should bring you the good news by way of Jacob's Ladder; and I may add, that you may come back with me that way and see her yourself for just one quarter of a minute."

So even Jacob's Ladder was made a pleasant thoroughfare to Marmaduke, and dearer from that hour than all staircases of wood or stone.