Chapter XXIX: The Return

Come home!—there is a sorrowing breath
In music since ye went,
And fragrant flower scents wander by
With mournful memories blent.
The tones of every household voice
Are grown more sad and deep—
And longing for thee wakes a wish
To turn aside and weep.

Oh, ye beloved! come home!—the hour
Of many a greeting tone,
The time of hearth-light and of song
Returns and ye are gone!
And darkly, heavily it falls
On the forsaken room,
Burdening the heart with tenderness
That deepens into gloom.—MRS. HEMANS.

Notwithstanding all her habitual calmness and cheerful patience, Mrs. Clifton began to grow uneasy at her son’s protracted stay. He had been absent a year and a month. And even now, instead of setting out on his return, he only wrote of coming home soon. At one time he was at Vienna, at another at Berlin, then at the Hague, progressing, indeed, but very, very slowly towards England and Liverpool, from which port he intended to embark. Every letter that came from him at this period, was opened and read with visible uneasiness by his mother. At length the glad tidings came, a letter from the mid-ocean, brought by a swift sailing packet-boat that had spoken the vessel in which he had embarked. He was hastening home, and might now be expected at any hour. The news contained in his letter excited the invalid so much upon the evening of its reception, that she passed a sleepless night, and rose the next morning weaker than she had ever been before; so weak, indeed, that she was obliged, in coming down stairs, to lean on the arms of Catherine and her maid for support. And when she reached the parlor, she was compelled to recline in an easy-chair, propped up by pillows, and with her feet supported by a foot-cushion. But her cheerfulness was undiminished. She gave many directions as to the adjustment and adornment of the room, and the preparation of certain dainties. Lastly she called Catherine to her side, and took her hand. Catherine did not appear to the best advantage, with her plain, dark gingham dress, and her chestnut hair divided simply above her forehead, rippling in tiny wavelets around her broad temples, and gathered into a twist behind. This plainness of style did not become her strongly marked features. And the lady saw it, for she gazed thoughtfully upon the girl awhile, and then lifting her hand, disengaged a portion of her tresses from the comb, and let them fall, turning into natural ringlets down her cheeks, saying—

“There, Catherine, when hair curls naturally and voluntarily, it is certain that the face it belongs to requires it so, and that it should be permitted to follow its nature, for nature does all things well. Why don’t you always wear your hair so? It is so much prettier.”

“Because, dear lady, I never thought it of any importance how my hair was fixed, so that it looked neat. But I will wear it this way, if it pleases you.”

“It does. Your face is not a classic one, dear Kate, and none but a classic face can bear that attic simplicity of style. Your countenance is a very noble one, Kate, but its very nobility is hard and stern, without the softening shadow of these ringlets nature has bestowed upon you. There now, look in the mirror, my little Oliver Cromwell, your face is much more womanly than before.”

Catherine found it so. The soft, bright, drooping curls shaded and rounded her large, square forehead into beautiful proportion to her other features, and softened the expression of the whole. No girl but is pleased to see herself improved in beauty, and it was with a bright blush, half of pleasure, half of modesty, that the maiden returned to the lady’s side.

“Now, dear Kate, you must leave off that dingy gingham, and wear white wrappers in the morning. It is early in the season, and you can wear white a month longer yet, and by the end of that time, I suppose, the world will expect you to wear black. You have no white wrappers though, my dear!”

“No, madam, I never had one.”

“Well, you have two white cambric dresses, without ornament, they will do for morning dresses. Do me the kindness to wear them. Nay, now, Catherine, my dear, no hesitation, I will have it so. Go at once and put on one of them.”

Kate complied, and in a short time returned to the parlor—by this change in the style of her toilet, almost transfigured, yet without the loss of her noble characteristics. One thought troubled the maiden, the question—What would Clifton think of this? How would he take it? Would he suspect that she had dressed for his eyes? If he did his suspicions would be well founded. And the consciousness of this truth, suffused with blushes the cheeks of the ingenuous girl, and heightened all her beauty.

There was no certainty of Major Clifton’s advent that day—he might come any day, but nevertheless they hoped for and expected his arrival. By a change in the hours, the stage now reached L—— at noon. And Mrs. Clifton had ordered dinner in the full expectation of having her son’s company at that meal. Nor were their hopes destined to disappointment. A little after one o’clock, the carriage that had been sent to L—— to meet the stage, returned and drove up to the door. And Archer Clifton alighted from it, and hastened joyfully into the house. Mrs. Clifton arose to meet him, but, overpowered by agitation and weakness, she sank back into her seat. Her son was before her in an instant, and had clasped her in his arms, and pressed her to his breast, and kissed her fondly many times, and sat her back in her chair to feast his eyes upon her beloved face and form, before he noticed how cadaverous, how death-like, she looked; then a startled expression of surprise and alarm sprung into his countenance, and he turned upon Kate, to whom he had not yet spoken, a glance of mingled inquiry, anger and reproach.

“You find me in poor health, Archer; but not worse, my son, than what might have been expected.”

“My dearest mother,” he began, but his voice choked, and to conceal the emotion he could not entirely suppress, he turned to Catherine and gave her a brother’s greeting in silence, but at the same time darting into her eyes a look of stern rebuke from his own, which seemed to say, “You, at least, should have written and informed me of this.” And the suspicions excited by Mrs. Georgia rose darkly in his mind, but were repressed again instantly.

“Dearest Archer, I am not usually so ill as I seem to-day. I have never been confined to my bed, or even my chair yet. Only to-day and yesterday, the joy of looking for you has prevented my taking the usual quantity of sleep. I shall be much better to-morrow. Sit down by me and rest, and when you are rested, your room is quite ready for you, if you wish to change your dress before dinner. Catherine, my love, will you go and direct them to serve dinner?”

Catherine left the room and gave the necessary commands. Then she ordered a boy to take Major Clifton’s baggage up into his chamber, and went up stairs to show him where to put it. In the meantime, Major Clifton, in looking upon his mother’s wasted form, had lost all self-command, and saying hastily that he thought he would change his traveling dress at once, hurried out of the room to give vent to a passionate sorrow, no longer to be restrained. He ran up stairs, but paused upon the first landing. Catherine, in leaving his room, found him leaning upon the balustrades, with his face buried in his hands, weeping convulsively. To women, there is something really appalling in a man’s tears—we look upon them with more than pity—with awe—with something like the feeling with which Mary and Martha must have witnessed the Saviour’s tears—with deep reverence be it said. Catherine would have crept by and slipped down stairs quietly, for she had a feeling of self-reproach for having even seen that strong outburst of sorrow; but he stood up and seized her hand, and drew her towards him, exclaiming—

“Stop, Catherine! You have seen my weakness! Now, tell me why you did not write to me of this? Cruel and selfish girl! were you so intent upon your own projects, that you could not find time to indite a line to let me know that my mother was dying?”

Another burst of weeping prevented his hearing Catherine’s gentle explanation, that Mrs. Clifton would not permit her to write. And Kate was not anxious to exculpate herself from an unjust charge; indeed, after once giving her little, meek explanation, she never thought of it again—she only thought of his agony of regret, and only wished to soothe it. He still held her wrist, unconsciously straining it in the strength of his emotion, until it pained her severely. But she did not care for that, she did not even feel it; she only cared to see him weep so convulsively, and losing all self-consciousness, and with it all reserve, she threw her arm around him, and dropping her head against him most tenderly, most lovingly, she said—

“Oh, do not grieve so! do not! see how calm and cheerful she is! Try to emulate her calmness!”

“I loved her, Kate! I loved her more than ever son loved mother before! She was the worth of life to me! I loved her more than ever I loved human being! More even than I ever loved you, Kate!”

This was Clifton’s first declaration to Catherine, and a strange time, place and circumstances, and a strange method of expressing his preference had fallen upon them. “I loved her more than I ever loved you, Kate!”

But it did not seem strange to Catherine. It seemed perfectly natural and in order. It did not startle her the least. It did not bring back her womanly self-consciousness, for she answered, meekly—

“I know it—I know you do. And, oh! don’t _you_ know that I would willingly give my life for hers, if I could restore her, in health, to your affections?”

“And yet you did not even write to let me know she was ill! Oh! girl! girl! you were much to blame for that! It was bitterly wrong.”

“I told you, but you did not hear me, that she would not permit me to write; she did not wish to give you pain, or to interfere with your arrangements for the year.”

“Catherine, that does not excuse you! Could not your own heart have told you how precious, how inestimable to me would have been every hour of her company when her days were numbered? Could you not have written to me secretly?”

“I never did anything secretly in my life. I should never have thought of doing so. Besides, I could not have had a secret from her, so open, so frank, so noble as she is. No, I proposed to write for you to come home, I entreated permission to do so, but she refused to grant it, and I deferred to her better judgment. I would not have deceived her for the world.”

“Then I have been unjust and unkind to you, Catherine, but you will pardon me when I tell you—when you see how thoroughly weakened and unmanned I am!”

The gust of sorrow was over, and Kate, with sudden self-recollection withdrew herself from him, deeply blushing, and hastened down stairs, and the thought of her transient self-forgetfulness rendered the girl even shyer than ever.

He went into his room and refreshed himself with a new toilet. And when he entered the parlor, an hour after, no one would have suspected from his handsome, animated face, the existence of the sorrow that lay subdued at the bottom of his heart.

They dined together, and after dinner Catherine thought it best to retire and leave the mother and son alone to enjoy more fully their re-union. When she had left the room—

“How pretty and lady-like Catherine is growing, madam,” said Major Clifton, looking after her, but addressing his mother.

“Yes,” replied Mrs. Clifton, “lady-like, but not very pretty; Kate will never be pretty; but if she be ‘blessed to her mind,’ she will be more, she will be handsome.”

After spending a long afternoon with his mother, Major Clifton took temporary leave, and went over to White Cliffs, to pay his respects to Mrs. Georgia. Most happily for all concerned, Georgia had just left home for a visit of some weeks at Richmond—ignorant, it is to be supposed, of Major Clifton’s arrival. He returned and spent the evening with the ladies at Hardbargain.

The next morning found Mrs. Clifton very much better—and in the evening she rode out, accompanied by Major Clifton and Catherine. Mrs. Clifton’s cheerfulness infected all the party—both upon this evening and afterwards. Her decline was so gradual, so painless, that she never took to her bed—but when weakest, sat in the easy-chair in the parlor, often with a little light knitting in her hands, that she would leisurely work upon, or drop into her lap, to be resumed at pleasure, while she conversed with Catherine and Major Clifton, or listened while one of them read, or both sang. There never were more pleasant, serene days, than these of the invalid’s gentle decay. It was genial, pensive autumn; the fall of the leaf without the house, and the fall of the leaf within.

Catherine was now the housekeeper. She had—through the increasing weakness of the lady—so gradually slidden into this office, that she scarcely knew at what time its whole burden had accumulated upon her. One morning, while Catherine was in the store-room giving out meal and bacon to the negroes, Mrs. Clifton and Major Clifton occupied the parlor alone. He had been reading to her from Jeremy Taylor, but seeing that she had dropped her knitting, and was sitting back with a look of weariness, he thought it time to desist and close the book.

“Dear mother, you are fatigued; will you have anything? What shall I bring you?”

“Nothing, my son. I am not wearied more than usual, and it will pass in a few minutes.”

The lady was silent for a little while, during which Major Clifton refrained from conversation. And then, after some little thought, she raised her eyes until they met his own and looking at him full in the face, she asked—

“When are you going to marry Catherine, Archer?”

Major Clifton started violently, and looked at the lady in silent astonishment.

“Nay, pray answer me—my question is an earnest one.”

“My dear madam, you have taken me by surprise!”

“Necessary bluntness, Archer.”

“Very Oliver Cromwellish, madam, my mother.”

“You must excuse it, dear Archer. You did not open the subject to me, therefore, feeling more anxious upon that affair than any other on earth, I am forced to broach it to you. But you have not answered my question yet.”

“Dear madam—what—exactly—was it?”

“When are you going to marry Catherine?”

“Upon my honor, my dear madam, I have no intention of marrying Catherine; nor have I ever given her reason to suppose so.”

“Ah! I had thought, or rather, I had hoped otherwise,” said the lady, relapsing into silence, while Major Clifton subsided into painful thought. Again the dark suspicions insinuated by Mrs. Georgia, arose in his mind, to be repressed again with loathing; and he said indignantly to himself—“It is not true! I can never believe her to be an intriguante. Georgia is mistaken—Georgia’s grateful and affectionate interest in my welfare, leads her to unjust suspicions of others. Kate is noble-hearted—Kate is true—is truth itself. It would be misery to believe otherwise.”

Mrs. Clifton gently interrupted his silent self-communion, by saying—

“Well, Archer, since you have no intention whatever of marrying Catherine yourself, you can have no reasonable ground of objection to her union with another?”

He looked up in surprise and anxiety, but soon the startled expression subsided into calmness, and he replied, coolly—

“_Catherine’s_ union with another! Oh! the supposition involves an impossibility.”

“I know you think so, Archer. I know you feel perfectly secure of this sweet girl, and just as easy about her as if she were secured to you by all the chains that church and state can forge, and that is the reason why you take things so coolly, and listen to your pride. But I tell you that it is not as you think. You are not forever secure of Catherine. Our moods of mind, and our views of things, change with time. And however the maiden may feel or think now, if you hesitate for years between your pride and love, she will naturally arrive at the conclusion that many a generous hearted woman has come to before her, and say to herself, ‘Well, I cannot be happy myself, but my life must not, therefore, be wasted—I can make some one else happy,’ and being scorned by one she loves, give herself away to one who loves her.”

Major Clifton started to his feet, with all the dark side of his character uppermost, exclaiming—

“Let her attempt it! I would stop such a marriage at the altar! Catherine is mine, or nobody’s. She could not repel my claim.”

“Dear Archer, sit down; do not excite yourself or me. Remember, I am in a dying state,” said the lady, as the best means of calming him.

“Dear madam, forgive me—forgive me—but why introduce this very embarrassing and highly exciting subject? I have had conflict enough in my own bosom about it. I love your favorite, I love her jealously, fiercely—I admit it—but there are objections and difficulties, which time, or a new set of circumstances, may remove; meanwhile, I could not bear to see her snatched from me. But there is time enough—even if I should decide upon such a step, there is time enough. Kate is very young yet.”

“But you are not very young, Archer.”

“I know it, dear madam. I have arrived at that age at which men do not make imprudent marriages for love.”

“But when they too often make unhappy marriages of convenience. Dear Archer, it is a false and sinful principle that keeps you and Catherine apart. Will you spoil two lives by your pride? Your hesitation between inclination and prejudice, weakens you and destroys her.”

“‘Prejudices,’ dear madam! Well, I suppose they are prejudices, but just think of the horror of having Carl Kavanagh, the farm laborer, for a brother-in-law, and being called ‘uncle’ by his ragged progeny!”

“Oh, Archer, your inhumanity shocks me—they are human creatures, after all—this Carl and his family.”

“And don’t you see besides, madam, that if I should marry Catherine, and introduce her into society, the first question would be, ‘Who is she?’ and the answer by some good-natured friend, ‘The sister of one of his farm-laborers,’ would expose us to contempt, if it did not rule us out of good company.”

“Archer! Archer! can it be that you weigh these falsities with the deep realities of life?”

“It is a deplorable thing, indeed, that a girl of such noble nature should come of such ignoble parentage.”

“No! it is a congratulatory thing!—or would be so, if it were not such a usual thing! Archer, you will find more moral worth, and it may be more mental worth, among the so-called lower classes, than among the higher; for instance, among the men, look at some of their brows, of Shaksperian height and breadth—think what they would be with cultivation! And I tell you, with all their disadvantages, the lower classes will give to our republic the greatest of her future great men.”[2]

Footnote 2:

The history of most prominent men of the day verifies the prediction.

Major Clifton remained in deep thought for awhile, and then taking the hand of the lady, said—

“My dear mother, the objections that I have advanced are those that have arisen in my mind, from time to time, giving me much pain. I wished to hold them up before myself, as I have just done, in order to see what they really consisted of, and looked like. I have seen the worst of them, and in their ugliest light, and they will not deter me from taking to my heart the girl I love. I have weighed them, and the whole mass is light in the balance with my need of Catherine. I will marry her. I will go and tell her so now. And the ceremony shall be performed whenever you think proper.”

“Whenever _Kate_ thinks proper, my dear Archer,” replied the lady, smiling.

At this moment a servant entered and delivered a note to Major Clifton. It was from Mrs. Georgia, announcing her return to White Cliffs, and begging the company of Major Clifton to tea that evening.