Chapter XX: Part 20

"I will do whatever you think proper," said John Brown, who was rather scared, and very much impressed by Miss Marjoribanks's candour. Dr Rider had been the first love of Mr Brown's own wife, and the lawyer had a curious kind of satisfaction in thinking that this silly young fellow had thus lost two admirable women, and that probably the little Australian was equally inferior to Miss Marjoribanks and Mrs Brown. He ought to have been grateful that Dr Rider had left the latter lady to his own superior discrimination--and so he was; and yet it gave him a certain odd satisfaction to think that the Doctor was not so happy as he might have been. He went away fully warranted to receive Dr Rider's proposition, and even, to a certain extent, to decide upon it--and Lucilla threw herself back in her chair in the silent drawing-room, from which Aunt Jemima had discreetly withdrawn, and began to think over the reality of her position as she now saw it for the first time.

The sense of bewildering revolution and change was over; for, strangely enough, the greater a change is the more easily the mind, after the first shock, accepts and gets accustomed to it. It was over, and the world felt steady once more under Lucilla's feet, and she sat down, not precisely amid the ruins of her happiness, but still in the presence of many an imagination overthrown, to look at her real position. It was not, after all, utter poverty, misery, and destitution, as at the first glance she had believed. According to what John Brown had said, and a rapid calculation which Lucilla had herself made in passing, something approaching two hundred a year would be left to her--just a small single woman's revenue, as she thought to herself. Two hundred a year! All at once there came into Miss Marjoribanks's mind a sudden vision of the two Miss Ravenswoods, who had lived in that pretty set of rooms over Elsworthy's shop, facing into Grange Lane, and who had kept a lady's maid, and asked the best people in the place to tea, upon a very similar income, and how their achievements had been held up to everybody as a model of what genteel economy could do. She thought of them, and her heart sank within her; for it was not in Lucilla's nature to live without a sphere, nor to disjoin herself from her fellow-creatures, nor to give up entirely the sovereign position she had held for so many years. Whatever she might ultimately do, it was clear that, in the meantime, she could not make up her mind to any such giving up of the battle as that. And then there was the house. She might let it to the Riders, and add probably another hundred a year to her income; for though it was an excellent house, and worth more than a hundred a year, still there was no competition for houses in Grange Lane, and the new Doctor was the only probable tenant. And, to tell the truth, though Lucilla was very reasonable, it went to her heart at the present moment to think of letting the house to the new Doctor, and having the patients come as usual, and the lamp lighted as of old, and nothing changed except the central figure of all. She ought to have been above such sentimental ideas when a whole hundred pounds a year was in question; but she was not, which of itself was a strange phenomenon. If she could have made up her mind to that, there were a great many things that she might have done. She might still have gone abroad, and to some extent taken a limited share in what was going on in some section of English society on the Continent. Or she might have gone to one of the mild centres of a similar kind of life in England. But such a prospect did not offer many attractions to Miss Marjoribanks. If she had been rich, it would have been different. Thus there gradually dawned upon her the germ of the plan she ultimately adopted, and which was the only one that commended itself to her feelings. Going away was expensive and troublesome at the best; and even at Elsworthy's, if she could have made up her mind to such an expedient, she would have been charged a pound a week for the rooms alone, not to speak of all kinds of extras, and never having the satisfaction of feeling yourself in your own place. Under all the circumstances, it was impressed upon Lucilla's mind that her natural course was to stay still where she was, and make no change. Why should she make any change? The house was her own, and did not cost anything, and if Nancy would but stand by her and one good maid----It was a venture; but still Lucilla felt as if she might be equal to it. Though she was no mathematician, Miss Marjoribanks was very clever at mental arithmetic in a practical sort of way. She put down lines upon lines of figures in her head while she sat musing in her chair, and worked them out with wonderful skill and speed and accuracy. And the more she thought of it, the more it seemed to her that this was the thing to do. Why should she retreat and leave her native soil and the neighbourhood of all her friends because she was poor and in trouble? Lucilla was not ashamed of being poor--nor even frightened by it, now that she understood what it was--any more than she would have been frightened, after the first shock, had her poverty even been much more absolute. She was standing alone at this moment as upon a little island of as yet undisturbed seclusion and calm, and she knew very well that outside a perfect sea of good advice would surge round her as soon as she was visible. In these circumstances Lucilla took by instinct the only wise course: she made up her mind there and then with a perfect unanimity which is seldom to be gained when counsellors are admitted. And what she decided upon, as was to be expected from her character, was not to fly from her misfortune and the scene of it, but to confront fate and take up her lawful burden and stay still in her own house. It was the wisest and the easiest, and at the same time the most heroic course to adopt, and she knew beforehand that it was one which would be approved of by nobody. All this Lucilla steadily faced and considered and made up her mind to while she sat alone; although silence and solitude and desolation seemed to have suddenly come in and taken possession all around her of the once gay and brilliant room.

She had just made her final decision when she was rejoined by her aunt, who, everybody said, was at this trying moment like a mother to Lucilla. Yet Aunt Jemima, too, had changed a little since her brother-in-law's death. She was very fond of Miss Marjoribanks, and meant every word she had said about giving her a home, and still meant it. But she did not feel so certain now as she had done about Tom's love for his cousin, nor at all anxious to have him come home just at this moment; and for another thing, she had got a way of prowling about the house and looking at the furniture in a speculative, auctioneering sort of way. "It must be all sold, of course," Aunt Jemima had said to herself, "and I may as well look what things would suit me; there is a little chiffonier that I have always wanted for my drawing-room, and Lucilla would like to see a few of the old things about her, poor dear." With this idea Mrs John gave herself a great deal of unnecessary fatigue, and gave much offence to the servants by making pilgrimages all over the house, turning up at the most unlikely places and poking about in the least frequented rooms. It was a perfectly virtuous and even amiable thing to do, for it was better, as she reasoned, that they should go to her than to a stranger, and it would be nice for Lucilla to feel that she had some of the old things about her; but then such delicate motives are seldom appreciated by the homely critics downstairs.

It was with something of this same air that she came into the drawing-room, where Lucilla was. She could not help laying her hand in a suggestive sort of way on a small table which she had to pass, as if she were saying to herself (as indeed she was saying), "The veneer has been broken off at that side, and the foot is mended; it will bring very little; and yet it looks well when you don't look too close." Such were the ideas with which Aunt Jemima's mind was filled. But yet she came forward with a great deal of sympathy and curiosity, and forgot about the furniture in presence of her afflicted niece.

"Did he tell you anything, Lucilla?" said Mrs John; "of course he must have told you something--but anything satisfactory, I mean."

"I don't know if you can call it satisfactory," said Lucilla, with a sudden rush of softer thoughts; "but it was a comfort to hear it. He told me something about dear papa, Aunt Jemima. After he had heard of _that_, you know--all that he said was, Poor Lucilla! And don't you remember how he put his hand on my shoulder that last night? I am so--so--glad he did it," sobbed Miss Marjoribanks. It may be supposed it was an abrupt transition from her calculations; but after all it was only a different branch of the same subject; and Lucilla in all her life had never before shed such poignant and tender tears.

"He might well say, Poor Lucilla!" said Mrs John--"brought up as you have been, my dear; and did not you hear anything more important?--I mean, more important in a worldly point of view," Aunt Jemima added, correcting herself, "of course, it must be the greatest comfort to hear something about your poor papa."

And then Lucilla unfolded John Brown's further particulars to her surprised hearer. Mrs John lived upon a smallish income herself, and she was not so contemptuous of the two hundred a year. "And the house," she said--"the house would bring you in another hundred, Lucilla. The Riders, I am sure, would take it directly, and perhaps a great part of the furniture too. Three hundred would not be so bad for a single woman. Did you say anything about the furniture, my dear?" Aunt Jemima added, half regretfully, for she did feel that she would be sorry to lose that chiffonier.

"I think I shall stay in the house," said Lucilla; "you may think it silly, Aunt Jemima, but I was born in it, and----"

"Stay in the house!" Mrs John said, with a gasp. She did not think it silly, but simple madness, and so she told her niece. If Lucilla could not make up her mind to Elsworthy's, there was Brighton and Bath and Cheltenham, and a hundred other places where a single woman might be very comfortable on three hundred a year. And to lose a third part of her income for a piece of sentiment was so utterly unlike any conception Aunt Jemima had ever formed of her niece. It _was_ unlike Miss Marjoribanks; but there are times of life when even the most reasonable people are inconsistent. Lucilla, though she felt it was open to grave criticism, felt only more confirmed in her resolution by her aunt's remarks. She heard a voice Aunt Jemima could not hear, and that voice said, Stay!

_Chapter XLV_

It must be allowed that Lucilla's decision caused very general surprise in Carlingford, where people had been disposed to think that she would be rather glad, now that things were so changed, to get away. To be sure it was not known for some time; but everybody's idea was that, being thus left alone in the world, and in circumstances so reduced, Miss Marjoribanks naturally would go to live with somebody. Perhaps with her aunt, who had something, though she was not rich; perhaps, after a little, to visit about among her friends, of whom she had so many. Nobody doubted that Lucilla would abdicate at once, and a certain uneasy, yet delicious, sense of freedom had already stolen into the hearts of some of the ladies in Grange Lane. They lamented, it is true, the state of chaos into which everything would fall, and the dreadful loss Miss Marjoribanks would be to society; but still, freedom is a noble thing, and Lucilla's subjects contemplated their emancipation with a certain guilty delight. It was, at the same time, a most fertile subject of discussion in Carlingford, and gave rise to all those lively speculations and consultations, and oft-renewed comparing of notes, which take the place of bets in the feminine community. The Carlingford ladies as good as betted upon Lucilla, whether she would go with her aunt, or pay Mrs Beverley a visit at the Deanery, or retire to Mount Pleasant for a little, where those good old Miss Blounts were so fond of her. Each of these opinions had its backers, if it is not profane to say so; and the discussion which of them Miss Marjoribanks would choose waxed very warm. It almost put the election out of people's heads; and indeed the election had been sadly damaged in interest and social importance by the sad and most unexpected event which had just happened in Grange Lane.

But when the fact was really known, it would be difficult to describe the sense of guilt and horror which filled many innocent bosoms. The bound of freedom had been premature--liberty and equality had not come yet, notwithstanding that too early unwise _élan_ of republican satisfaction. It was true that she was in deep mourning, and that for a year, at least, society must be left to its own devices; and it was true, also, that she was poor--which might naturally be supposed a damper upon her energies--but, at the same time, Carlingford knew its Lucilla. As long as she remained in Grange Lane, even though retired and in crape, the constitutional monarch was still present among her subjects; and nobody could usurp her place or show that utter indifference to her regulations which some revolutionaries had dreamed of. Such an idea would have gone direct in the face of the British Constitution, and the sense of the community would have been dead against it. But everybody who had speculated upon her proceedings disapproved of Lucilla in her most unlooked-for resolution. Some could not think how she could bear it, staying on there when everything was so changed; and some said it was a weakness they could never have believed to exist in her; and some--for there are spiteful people everywhere--breathed the names of Cavendish and Ashburton, the rival candidates, and hinted that Miss Marjoribanks had something in her mind to justify her lingering. If Lucilla had not been supported by a conscious sense of rectitude, she must have broken down before this universal disapprobation. Not a soul in the world except one supported her in her resolution, and that was perhaps, of all others, the one least likely to be able to judge.

And it was not for want of opportunity to go elsewhere. Aunt Jemima, as has been seen, did not lose an instant in offering the shelter of her house to her niece; and Mrs Beverley wrote the longest, kindest, most incoherent letter begging her dear Lucilla to come to her immediately for a long visit, and adding, that though she had to go out a good deal into society, she needn't mind, for that everything she could think of would be done to make her comfortable; to which Dr Beverley himself, who was now a dean, added an equally kind postscript, begging Miss Marjoribanks to make her home at the Deanery "until she saw how things were to be." "He would have found me a place, perhaps," Lucilla said, when she folded up the letter--and this was a terrible mode of expression to the genteel ears of Mrs John.

"I wish you would not use such words, my dear," said Aunt Jemima; "even if you had been as poor as you thought, my house would always have been a home for you. Thank Heaven I have enough for both; you never needed to have thought, under any circumstances, of taking a--a situation. It is a thing I could never have consented to,"--which was a very handsome thing of Aunt Jemima to say.

"Thank you, aunt," said Lucilla, but she sighed; for, though it was very kind, what was Miss Marjoribanks to have done with herself in such a dowager establishment? And then Colonel Chiley came in, who had also his proposal to make.

"_She_ sent me," the Colonel said; "it's been a sad business for us all, Lucilla; I don't know when I have felt anything more; and as for her, you know, she has never held up her head since----"

"Dear Mrs Chiley!" Miss Marjoribanks said, unable to resist the old affection; "and yet I heard she had sent for Dr Rider directly," Lucilla added. She knew it was quite natural, and perhaps quite necessary, but then it did seem hard that his own friends should be the first to replace her dear papa.

"It was I did that," said the Colonel. "What was a man to do? I was horribly cut up, but I could not stand and see her making herself worse; and I said you had too much sense to mind----"

"So I ought," said Lucilla, with penitence, "but when I remembered where he was last, the very last place----"

It was hard upon the Colonel to stand by and see a woman cry. It was a thing he could never stand, as he had always said to his wife. He took the poker, which was his favourite resource, and made one of his tremendous dashes at the fire, to give Lucilla time to recover herself, and then he turned to Aunt Jemima, who sat pensively by:

"_She_ sent me," said the Colonel, who did not think his wife needed any other name--"not that I would not have come of my own accord; we want Lucilla to go to us, you see. I don't know what plans she may have been making, but we're both very fond of her--she knows that. I think, if you have not settled upon anything, the best that Lucilla can do is to come to us. She'll be the same as at home, and always somebody to look after her----"

The old Colonel was standing before the fire, wavering a little on his long unsteady old legs, and looking wonderfully well preserved, and old and feeble; and Lucilla, though she was in mourning, was so full of life and force in her way. It was a curious sort of protection to offer her, and yet it was real protection, and love and succour, though, Heaven knows! it might not perhaps last out the year.

"I am sure, Colonel Chiley, it is a very kind offer," said Aunt Jemima, "and I would have been thankful if she could have made up her mind to go with me. But I must say she has taken a very queer notion into her head--a thing I should never have expected from Lucilla--she says she will stay here."

"Here?--ah--eh--what does she mean by here?" said the Colonel.

"_Here_, Colonel Chiley, in this great big melancholy house. I have been thinking about it, and talking about it till my head goes round and round. Unless she were to take Inmates," said Aunt Jemima, in a resigned and doleful voice. As for the Colonel, he was petrified, and for a long time had not a word to say.

"_Here!_--By Jove, I think she must have lost her senses," said the old soldier. "Why, Lucilla, I--I thought--wasn't there something about the money being lost? You couldn't keep up this house under a--fifteen hundred a year at least; the Doctor spent a mint of money;--you must be going out of your senses. And to have all the sick people coming, and the bell ringing of nights. Bless my soul! it would kill anybody," said Colonel Chiley. "Put on your bonnet, and come out with me; shutting her up here, and letting her cry, and so forth--I don't say it ain't natural--I'm terribly cut up myself whenever I think of it; but it's been too much for her head," said the Colonel, with anxiety and consternation mingling in his face.

"Unless she were to take Inmates, you know," said Aunt Jemima, in a sepulchral voice. There was something in the word that seemed to carry out to a point of reality much beyond anything he had dreamt of, the suggestion Colonel Chiley had just made.

"Inmates! Lord bless my soul! what do you mean, ma'am?" said the old soldier. "Lucilla, put on your bonnet directly, and come and have a little fresh air. She'll soon be an inmate herself if we leave her here," the Colonel said. They were all very sad and grave, and yet it was a droll scene; and then the old hero offered Lucilla his arm, and led her to the door. "You'll find me in the hall as soon as you are ready," he said, in tones half gruff, half tender, and was glad to go downstairs, though it was cold, and put on his greatcoat with the aid of Thomas, and stand warming the tips of his boots at the hall fire. As for Lucilla, she obeyed him without a word; and it was with his unsteady but kind old arm to lean upon that she first saw how the familiar world looked through the mist of this strange change that had come over it, and through the blackness of her crape veil.

But though she succeeded in satisfying her friends that she had made up her mind, she did not secure their approval. There were so many objections to her plan. "If you had been rich even, I don't think I should have approved of it, Lucilla," Mrs Chiley said, with tears; "and I think we could have made you happy here." So the good old lady spoke, looking round her pretty room, which was so warm and cheery and bright, and where the Colonel, neat and precise as if he had come out of a box, was standing poking the fire. It looked all very solid and substantial, and yet it was as unstable as any gossamer that the careless passenger might brush away. The two good people were so old that they had forgotten to remember they were old. But neither did Lucilla think of that. This was really what she thought and partly said:

"I am in my own house, that wants no expense nor changing, and Nancy is getting old, and does not mind standing by me. And it is not so much trouble after all keeping everything nice when there is no gentleman coming in, and nothing else to do. And, besides, I don't mean to be Lucilla Marjoribanks for ever and ever." This was the general scope, without going into all the details, of what Lucilla said.

But, at the same time, though she was so happy as not to be disturbed in her decision, or made uncomfortable, either by lamentation or remonstrance, and had no doubt in her mind that she was doing right, it was disagreeable to Miss Marjoribanks to go thus in the face of all her friends. She went home by herself, and the house did look dreary from the outside. It was just as it had always been, for none of the servants were dismissed as yet, nor any external change made; but still a look as if it had fallen asleep--a look as if it too had died somehow, and only pretended to be a house and home--was apparent, in the aspect of the place; and when the servants were gone, and nobody remained except Lucilla and her faithful Nancy, and a young maid--which must be the furthest limit of Miss Marjoribanks's household, and difficult enough to maintain upon two hundred a year--what would it look like? This thought was more discouraging than any remonstrances; and it was with a heavy heart that Lucilla re-entered her solitary house. She told Thomas to follow her upstairs; and when she sank, tired, into a chair, and put up her veil before commencing to speak to him, it was all she could do to keep from crying. The depressing influences of this sad week had told so much on her, that she was quite fatigued by her walk to see Mrs Chiley; and Thomas, too, knew why he had been called, and stood in a formal manner before her, with his hands crossed, against the closed door. When she put back her thick black veil, the last climax of painful change came upon Miss Marjoribanks. She did not feel as if she were Lucilla; so discouraged and depressed and pale, and tired with her walk as she was, with all sorts of projects and plans so quenched out of her; almost if she had been charged with being somebody else, the imputation was one which she could not have denied.

"Thomas," she said faintly, "I think I ought to speak to you myself about all that has happened--we are such old friends, and you have been such a good kind servant. You know I shan't be able to keep up----"

"And sorry we all was, Miss, to hear it," said Thomas, when Lucilla's utterance failed. "I am sure there never was a better master, though particular; and for a comfortabler house----"

"If I had been as poor papa expected to leave me," said Miss Marjoribanks, after a little pause, "everything would have gone on as usual: but after your long service here, and so many people as know you, Thomas, you will have no difficulty in getting as good a place: and you know that anything I can say----"

"Thank you, Miss," said Thomas; and then he made a pause. "It was not exactly that as I was thinking of; I've set my heart, this many a day, on a little business. If you would be so kind as to speak a word for me to the gentlemen as has the licensing. There ain't nobody as knows better how----"

"What kind of a business, Thomas?" said Lucilla, who cheered up a little in ready interest, and would have been very glad if she could have taken a little business too.

"Well, Miss, a kind of a quiet--public-house, if I don't make too bold to name it," said Thomas, with a deprecating air--"not one of them drinking-places, Miss, as, I know, ladies can't abide; but many a man, as is a very decent man, wants his pint o' beer now and again, and their little sort of clubs of a night as well as the gentlefolks; and it's my opinion, Miss, as it's a man's dooty to see as that sort of thing don't go too far, and yet as his fellow-creatures has their bit of pleasure," said Thomas, who naturally took the defensive side.

"I am sure you are quite right," said Lucilla, cheering up more and more, and instinctively, with her old statesmanlike breadth of view, throwing a rapid glance upon the subject to see what capabilities there might be in it; "and I hope you will try always to exercise a good influence--What is all that noise and shouting out of doors?"

"It's one of the candidates, Miss," said Thomas, "as is addressing of the bargemen at the top o' Prickett's Lane."

"Ah!" said Lucilla; and a deep sigh escaped from her bosom. "But you cannot do anything of that kind, you know, Thomas, without a wife."

"Yes, Miss," said Thomas, with great confusion and embarrassment; "that was just what I was going to say. Me and Betsy----"

"Betsy!" said Lucilla, with dismay; for it had been Betsy she had specially fixed upon as the handy, willing, cheerful maid who, when there was no gentleman coming in, and little else to do, might keep even this big house in order. She sighed; but it was not in her power, even if she had desired it, to put any restriction upon Betsy's wishes. And it was not without a momentary envy that she received the intelligence. It was life the housemaid was about to enter on--active life of her own, with an object and meaning--clogged by Thomas, no doubt, who did not appear to Lucilla as the bright spot in the picture--but still independent life; whereas her mistress knew of nothing particularly interesting in her own uncertain future. She was roused from her momentary meditation by the distant shouts which came from the top of Prickett's Lane, and sighed again, without knowing it, as she spoke.

"It's a pity you had not got your--little inn," said Lucilla, for the sake of euphony, "six months or a year ago, for then you might have voted for Mr Ashburton, Thomas. I had forgotten about the election until now."

"Not as that needn't stand in the way, Miss," said Thomas eagerly; "there's Betsy's brother as has it now, and he ain't made up his mind about his vote; and if he knowed as it would be any comfort to you----"

"Of course it will be a comfort to me!" said Miss Marjoribanks; and she got up from her chair with a sense that she was still not altogether useless in the world. "Go and speak to him directly, Thomas; and here's one of Mr Ashburton's colours that I made up myself; and tell him that there can be no doubt _he_ is the man for Carlingford; and send up Nancy to me. And I hope Betsy and you will be very happy," said Lucilla. She had been dreadfully down, but the rebound was all the more grateful. "I am not done with yet, and, thank Heaven! there must always be something to do," she said to herself when she was alone. And she threw off her shawl, and began to make the drawing-room look like itself; not that it was not perfectly in order, and as neat as a room could be; but still the neatness savoured of Betsy, and not of Lucilla. Miss Marjoribanks, in five minutes, made it look like that cosy empire of hospitality and kindness and talk and wit, and everything pleasant, that it used to be; and then, when she had finished, she sat down and had a good cry, which did not do her any harm.

Then Nancy appeared, disturbed in her preparations for dinner, and with her arms wrapped in her apron, looking glum and defiant. Hers was not the resigned and resourceful preparation for her fate which had appeared in Thomas. She came in, and put the door ajar, and leant her back against the sharp edge. She might be sent off like the rest, if that was Miss Lucilla's meaning--her that had been in the house off and on for more than thirty years; but if it was so, at least she would not give up without unfolding a bit of her mind.

"Come in," said Lucilla, drying her eyes--"come in and shut the door; you had better come and sit down here, Nancy, for I have a great deal to say, and I want to speak to you as a friend."

Nancy shut the door, but she thought to herself that she knew what all this meant, and made but a very little movement into the room, looking more forbidding than ever. "Thank you all the same, Miss Lucilla, but I ain't too old to stand," she said; and stood firm to meet the shock, with her arms folded under her apron, thinking in her heart that it was about one of the almshouses, her horror and hope, that her young mistress was going to speak.

"Nancy," said Lucilla, "I want to tell you what I am going to do. I have to make up my mind for myself now. They all go against me, and one says I should do this and another says I should do that; but I don't think anybody knows me so well as you do. Don't stand at the door. I want to consult you as a friend. I want to ask you a question, and you must answer as if you were before a judge--I have such confidence in _you_."

Nancy's distrust and defiance gave way a little before this appeal. She came a step nearer, and let the apron drop from her folded arms. "What is it, Miss Lucilla?--though I ain't pretending to be one to advise," she said, building a kind of intrenchment round her with the nearest chairs.

"You know how things are changed," said Lucilla, "and that I can't stay here as I used to do. People think I should go and live with somebody; but _I_ think, you know--if I was one of those ladies that have a faithful old servant to stand by them, and never to grumble nor make a fuss, nor go back on the past, nor go in for expensive dishes--one that wouldn't mind cooking a chop or making a cup of tea, if that was all we could afford--why, I think, Nancy----"

But Nancy could not hear any more. She made a little rush forward, with a kind of convulsive chuckling that was half sobbing and half laughter. "And me here!" cried Dr Marjoribanks's famous cook, who had spent a fortune on her gravy-beef alone, and was one of the most expensive people in Carlingford--"me as has done for you all your days! me as would--if it was but a roast potato!" cried the devoted woman. She was in such a state of hysterical flutter and excitement that Lucilla had to take her almost into her arms and put the old woman into a chair and bring her to, which was an occupation quite in Miss Marjoribanks's way.

"But I shall only have two hundred a year," said Lucilla. "Now don't be rash; there will have to be a maid to keep things tidy, and that is every farthing I shall have. You used to spend as much in gravy-beef," said Miss Marjoribanks, with a sigh.

"Oh, Miss Lucilla, let bygones be bygones," said Nancy, with tears. "If I did, it wasn't without many a little something for them as was too poor to buy it for themselves--for I never was one as boiled the senses out of a bit of meat; and when a gentleman is well-to-do, and hasn't got no occasion to count every penny----The Doctor, I will say for him, was never one as asked too many questions. Give him a good dinner on his own table, and he wasn't the gentleman as grudged a bit of broken meat for the poor folks. He did a deal of good as you nor no one never know'd of, Miss Lucilla," said Nancy, with a sob.

And then his daughter and his faithful old servant cried a little in company over Dr Marjoribanks's vacant place. What could a man have more? Nobody was made altogether desolate by his death, nor was any heart broken, but they wept for him honestly, though the old woman felt happy in her sorrow. And Lucilla, on her knees before the fire, told Nancy of that exclamation the Doctor had made in John Brown's office, and how he had put his hand on her shoulder that last night. "All he said was, Poor Lucilla!" sobbed Miss Marjoribanks; "he never thought of himself nor all his money that he had worked so hard for;" and once more that touch of something more exquisite than was usual to her went sharply down into Lucilla's heart and brought up tenderer and deeper tears.

She felt all the better for it after, and was even a little cheerful in the evening, and like herself; and thus it will be seen that one person in Carlingford--not, it is true, a popular oracle, but of powerful influence and first-rate importance in a practical point of view--gave the heartiest approbation to Miss Marjoribanks's scheme for her new life.

_Chapter XLVI_

Lucilla's calculations were fully justified by the result. Twenty times in a day she recognised the wisdom of her own early decision, which was made while she was still by herself, and before anybody had come in to advise her. If she had left it over until the time when, though much shaken, she was understood to be able to see her friends, it is just possible that the whirlwind of popular opinion which raged about her might have exercised a distracting influence even upon Miss Marjoribanks's clear head and steady judgment. For even now, though they saw her in her own house, in her mourning, people would not believe that it was true, and that Lucilla actually intended to make "no change"; and all that tide of good advice which had been flowing through Carlingford ever since the Doctor's death in the form of opinion, now rushed in upon her, notwithstanding that all the world knew that she had made up her mind. "Everybody says you are going to stay on, but we do hope it is not true, Lucilla," her friends said, in many voices. "It is dreadful for us to lose you, but you never _could_ bear it, dear." And this was repeated so often that if Miss Marjoribanks had been weak-minded, she must have ended by believing not only that it was more than she was equal to, but more than she ought to be equal to--which was a more touching argument still.

"You are excited now," Miss Brown said, who had a great deal of experience in family troubles; "one always is at such a time; but when things have settled down in their ordinary way, then you will find it is more than you can bear. I think it is always best to make a change. If you were to travel a little, you know----"

"But, my dear, I am poor," said Lucilla.

"It doesn't require so much money when you know how to set about it," said her adviser; "and there are so many people who would be glad to have you, Lucilla! And then you might settle a little at Caen or Tours, or some of those nice places, where there is such capital English society, and everything so cheap; or, if you thought your health required it, at Pau or Nice, you know. You are looking quite pale, and I don't think you were ever very strong in the chest, Lucilla; and everything is _so_ different on the Continent--one feels it the moment one crosses the Channel; there is something different in the very air."

"It smells different, I know," said Lucilla meekly; and then the conversation was interrupted by that afternoon cup of tea, which Nancy could not be got to think was an extravagance, and around which, to tell the truth, the Grange Lane ladies began to resume their habit of gathering--though Miss Marjoribanks, of course, was still quite unequal to society--as in the old times.

"And unless it is for a very short time, Lucilla," Mrs Centum said, who had joined them, "you never can keep it up, you know. _I_ could not pretend to afford Nancy, for my part; and when a cook is extravagant she may promise as faithfully as you please, and make good resolutions, and all that; but when it is in her, Lucilla--I am sure one or two receipts she has given me have been quite ridiculous. You don't like to give in, I know, but you'll be driven to give in; and if she does not get you into debt as well, you will be very lucky. I know what it is. With my family, you know, a week of Nancy would make an end of me."

"And the worst of all is," said Lady Richmond, who had driven in expressly to add her mite to the treasure of precious counsel, of which Miss Marjoribanks was making so little use, "that I am sure Lucilla is overestimating her strength. She will find after that she is not equal to it, you know; all the associations--and the people coming at night to ask for the Doctor--and--and all that. I know it would kill _me_."

"Dear Lady Richmond," said Lucilla, making a desperate stand, and setting, as it were, her back against a rock, "don't you think I can bear it best here where you are all so kind to me; and where everybody was so fond of--of _him_? You can't think what a comfort it is to me," said Lucilla, with a sob, "to see all the hatbands upon the gentlemen's hats."

And then there was a pause, for this was an argument against which nobody could find anything to say.

"For my part, I think the only thing she can do is to take Inmates," said Aunt Jemima. "If I were obliged to leave she would be so very lonely. I have known ladies do it who were in a very good position, and it made no difference; people visited them all the same. She could say, 'In consequence of changes in the family,' or 'A lady who has a larger house than she requires'; which I am sure is quite true. It goes to one's heart to think of all these bedrooms, and only one lady to sleep in them all--when so many people are so hampered for want of room. Or she might say, 'For the sake of society'; for, I am sure, if I should have to go away----"

"But I hope you are not going away. It would be so sad for Lucilla to be left alone," said Lady Richmond, who took a serious view of everything, "at such a time."

"Oh, no!" Aunt Jemima said, faltering a little; and then a pink blush, which seemed strangely uncalled for in such a mild little tea-party, came over her mature countenance; "but then one can never tell what may happen. I might have other duties--my son might make a call upon my time. Not that I know of anything at present," she added hurriedly, "but I never can bind myself on account of Tom----"

And then she caught Lucilla's eye, and grew more confused than ever. What could she have to be confused about? If Tom did make a call upon her time, whatever that might mean, there was nothing in it to call a blush upon his mother's face. And the fact was, that a letter had come from Tom a day or two before, of which, contrary to all her usual habits, Aunt Jemima had taken no notice to Lucilla. These were things which would have roused Miss Marjoribanks's curiosity if she had been able to think about anything, as she said. But her visitors were taking their cup of tea all the time, in a melancholy, half-sympathetic, half-disapproving way, and they could not be expected to see anything particularly interesting in Aunt Jemima's blush.

And then Rose Lake came in from Grove Street, who was rather an unusual visitor, and whose appearance, though they were all very kind and gracious to her, rather put the others to flight; for nobody had ever quite forgotten or forgiven Barbara's brief entrance into society and flirtation with Mr Cavendish, which might be said to have been the beginning of all that happened to him in Grange Lane. As for Mrs Centum, she took her leave directly, and pressed Lucilla's hand, and could not help saying in her ear that she hoped _the other_ was not coming back to Carlingford to throw herself in poor Mr Cavendish's way. "It would do him so much harm," Mrs Centum said anxiously; "but oh! I forgot, Lucilla, you are on the other side."

"I am on no side _now_," said Miss Marjoribanks, with plaintive meaning; "and Barbara was as old as I am, you know, and she must have gone off."

"I have no doubt she has gone off," said Mrs Centum, with righteous indignation. "As old as you, Lucilla! She must be ten years older at least; and such a shocking style of looks--if men were not so infatuated! And you have not gone off at all, my poor dear," she added, with all the warmth of friendship! And then they were joined at the door by the county lady, who was the next to go away.

"My dear, I hope you will be guided for the best," Lady Richmond said as she went away; but she gave a deep sigh as she kissed Lucilla, and looked as if she had very little faith in the efficacy of her own wish. Maria Brown had withdrawn to another part of the drawing-room with Aunt Jemima, so that Lucilla was, so to speak, left alone with Rose. And Rose, too, had come with the intention of giving advice.

"I hear you are going to stay, Lucilla," she said, "and I did not think I would be doing my duty if I did not tell you what was in my mind. _I_ can't do any good to anybody, you know; but you who are so clever, and have so much in your power----"

"I am poor now," said Miss Marjoribanks; "and as for being clever, I don't know about that. I never was clever about drawing or Art, like you."

"Oh, like me!" said poor little Rose, whose Career had been sacrificed ten years ago, and who was a little misanthropical now, and did not believe even in Schools of Design; "I am not so sure about the moral influence of Art as I used to be--except High Art, to be sure; but we never have any High Art down here. And oh, Lucilla! the poor people _do_ want something done for them. If I was as clever as you, and with a great house all to myself like this, and well off, and with plenty of influence, and no ties----" said Rose, with energetic emphasis. She made a pause there, and she was so much in earnest that the tears came into her eyes. "I would make it a House of Mercy, Lucilla! I would show all these poor creatures how to live and how to manage, if I was as clever as you; and teach them and their children, and look after them, and be a mother to them!" said Rose; and here she stopped short, altogether overcome by her own magnificent conception of what her friend could or might do.

Aunt Jemima and Miss Brown, who had drawn near out of curiosity, stared at Rose as if they thought she had gone mad; but Lucilla, who was of a larger mind and more enlightened ideas, neither laughed nor looked horrified. She did not make a very distinct answer, it is true, but she was very kind to her new adviser, and made her a fresh cup of tea, and even consented, though in an ambiguous way, to the principle she had just enunciated, "If you won't be affronted, my dear," Lucilla said, "I do not think that Art could do very much in Carlingford; and I am sure any little thing that I may be of use for----" But she did not commit herself any further, and Rose too found the result of her visit unsatisfactory, and went home disappointed in Lucilla. This was how the afternoon passed; and at the end of such a day, it may well be imagined how Miss Marjoribanks congratulated herself on having made up her mind before the public, so to speak, were admitted. For Rose was followed by the Rector, who, though he did not propose in so many words a House of Mercy, made no secret of his conviction that parish-work was the only thing that could be of any service to Lucilla; and that, in short, such was the inevitable and providential destination of a woman who had "no ties." Indeed, to hear Mr Bury, a stranger would have been disposed to believe that Dr Marjoribanks had been, as he said, "removed," and his fortune swept away, all in order to indicate to Lucilla the proper sphere for her energies. In the face of all this it will be seen how entirely Miss Marjoribanks's wisdom in making her decision by herself before her advisers broke in upon her, was justified. She could now set her back against her rock, and face her assailants, as Fitz-James did.

Come one, come all, this rock shall fly
From its firm base as soon as I,

might have been her utterance; but she was not in a defiant mood. She kissed all her counsellors that day (except, of course, the Rector), and heard them out with the sweetest patience; and then she thought to herself how much better it was that she had made up her mind to take her own way.

Notwithstanding, all this commotion of public opinion about her made a certain impression upon Miss Marjoribanks's mind. It was not unpleasant to feel that, for this moment at least, she was the centre of the thoughts of the community, and that almost everybody in Carlingford had taken the trouble to frame an ideal existence for her, according as he or she regarded life. It is so seldom that any one has it in his power, consciously and evidently, to regulate his life for himself, and make it whatever he wants it to be. And then, at the same time, the best that she could make of it would, after all, be something very limited and unsatisfactory. In her musings on this subject, Lucilla could not but go back a great many times to that last conversation she had with her father, when she walked up Grange Lane with him that night over the thawed and muddy snow. The Doctor had said she was not cut out for a single woman; and Lucilla, with candour, yet a certain philosophical speculativeness, had allowed that she was not--unless, indeed, she could be very rich. If she had been very rich, the prospect would no doubt have been, to a certain extent, different. And then, oddly enough, it was Rose Lake's suggestion which came after this to Lucilla's mind. She did not smile at it as some people might expect she would. One thing was quite sure, that she had no intention of sinking into a nobody, and giving up all power of acting upon her fellow-creatures; and she could not help being conscious of the fact that she was able to be of much use to her fellow-creatures. If it had been Maria Brown, for instance, who had been concerned, the whole question would have been one of utter unimportance, except to the heroine itself; but it was different in Miss Marjoribanks's case. The House of Mercy was not a thing to be taken into any serious consideration; but still there was something in the idea which Lucilla could not dismiss carelessly as her friends could. She had no vocation, such as the foundress of such an establishment ought to have, nor did she see her way to the abandonment of all projects for herself, and that utter devotion to the cause of humanity which would be involved in it; but yet, when a woman happens to be full of energy and spirit, and determined that whatever she may be she shall certainly not be a nonentity, her position is one that demands thought. She was very capable of serving her fellow-creatures, and very willing and well disposed to serve them; and yet she was not inclined to give herself up entirely to them, nor to relinquish her personal prospects--vague though these might be. It was a tough problem, and one which might have caused a most unusual disturbance in Lucilla's well-regulated mind, had not she remembered all at once what deep mourning she was in, and that at present no sort of action, either of one kind or another, could be expected of her. There was no need for making a final decision, either about the parish-work, or about taking Inmates, as Aunt Jemima proposed, or about any other single suggestion which had been offered to her; no more than there was any necessity for asking what her cousin Tom's last letter had been about, or why his mother looked so guilty and embarrassed when she spoke of him. Grief has its privileges and exemptions, like other great principles of life; and the recollection that she could not at present be expected to be able to think about anything, filled Lucilla's mind with the most soothing sense of consolation and refreshing calm.