would make up to her if anything could. And now to find all the time that it was Francis Ochterlony, and not her own friends, that she was going to! Winnie sat quite still, with her fine profile cut out sternly against the dark green wall, looking immovable and unfeeling, as only a profile can under such circumstances. This was what came of Mary’s placid morning, and the dear union of family support and love into which she thought she had come. It was harder upon Mrs. Ochterlony than if Aunt Agatha had not come to meet her. She had to sit blank and silent like a criminal, and see the old lady cry and the young lady lift up the stern delicacy of that profile against her. They were disappointed in Mary; and not only were they disappointed, but mortified – wounded in their best feelings and embarrassed in secondary matters as well; for naturally Aunt Agatha had told everybody that she was going to bring her niece, Mrs. Ochterlony, and the poor dear children home.
Thus it will be seen that the first breakfast in England was a very unsatisfactory meal for Mary. She took refuge with her children when it was over, and shut up, as she had been forced to do in other days, another door in her heart; and Aunt Agatha and Winnie, on the other hand, withdrew to their apartment and talked it over, and kindled each other’s indignation. “If you knew the kind of man he was, Winnie!” Aunt Agatha said, with a severity which was not entirely on Mary’s account; “not the sort of man I would trust those poor dear children with. I don’t believe he has any religious principles. Dear, dear, to think how Mary should have changed! I never could have thought she would have preferred Francis Ochterlony, and turned against her own friends.”
“I don’t know anything about Francis Ochterlony,” said Winnie, “but I know what a lot of bother we have had at home making all those changes; and your parlour that you had given up, Aunt Agatha – I must say when I think of that – ”
“That is nothing, my love,” said Aunt Agatha; “I was not thinking of what I have done, I hope – as if the sacrifice was anything.” But nevertheless the tears came into her eyes at the thought. It is hard when one has made a sacrifice with a liberal heart, to have it thrown back, and to feel that it is useless. This is hard, and Aunt Agatha was only human. If she had been alone, probably after the first moment of annoyance she would have gone to Mary, and the two would have cried together, and after little Hugh’s prospects had been discussed, Miss Seton would have consented that it was best for her niece to go to Earlston; but then Winnie was there to talk it over and keep up Aunt Agatha’s indignation. And Mary was wounded, and had retired and shut herself up among her children. And it was thus that the most trifling and uncalled-for of cares came, with little pricks of vexation and disappointment, to disturb at its very outset the new chapter of life which Mrs. Ochterlony had imagined herself to be entering upon in such a calm of tranquillising grief.
They were to go to London that day, and to continue their journey to the North by the night train: but it was no longer a journey in which any of the party could take any pleasure. As for Mary, in the great revulsion of her disappointment, it seemed to her as if there was no comfort for her anywhere. She had to go to Earlston to accept a home from Francis Ochterlony, whom she had never “taken to,” even in her young days. And it had occurred to her that her aunt and sister would understand why, and would be sorry for her, and console her under this painful effort. When, on the contrary, they proved to be affronted and indignant, Mary’s heart shut close, and retreated within itself. She could take her children into her arms, and press them against her heart, as if that would do it some good; but she could not talk to the little things, nor consult them, nor share anything with them except such smiles as were practicable. To a woman who has been used to talk all her concerns over with some one, it is terrible to feel her yearnings for counsel and sympathy turned back upon her own soul, and to be struck dumb, and feel that no ear is open to her, and that in all the world there is no one living to whom her affairs are more than the affairs of a stranger. Some poor women there are who must have fellowship somehow, and who will be content with pity if sympathy is not to be had. But Mary was not of this kind of women. She shut her doors. She went in, into herself in the silence and solitude, and felt her instinctive yearning to be helped and understood come pouring back upon her like a bitter flood. And then she looked at her little boys in their play, who had need of all from her, and could give her back but their childish fondness, and no help, or stay, or counsel. It is hard upon a woman, but yet it is a thing which every woman must confront and make up her mind to, whom God places in such circumstances. I do not know if it is easier work for a man in the same position. Mary had felt the prop of expected sympathy and encouragement and affection rudely driven from under her, and when she came in among her innocent helpless children she faced her lot, and did not deceive herself any more. To judge for herself, and do the best that in her lay, and take all the responsibilities upon her own head, whatever might follow; to know that nobody now in all the world was for her, or stood by her, except in a very secondary way, after his or her concerns and intentions and feelings had been carefully provided for in the first place. This was how her position appeared to her. And, indeed, such was her position, without any exaggeration. It was very kind of Francis Ochterlony to be willing to take her in, and very kind of Aunt Agatha to have made preparations for her; and kindness is sweet, and yet it is bitter, and hard, and cold, and killing to meet with. It made Mary sick to her heart, and filled her with a longing to take up her babes and rush away into some solitary corner, where nobody would ever see her again or hear of her. I do not say that she was right, or that it was a proper state of mind to be in. And Mary was too right-minded a woman to indulge in it long; but that was the feeling that momentarily took possession of her as she put the doors to in her heart, and realized that she really was alone there, and that her concerns were hers alone, and belonged to nobody else in the world.
And, on the other hand, it was very natural for Aunt Agatha and Winnie. They knew the exertions they had made, and the flutter of generous excitement in which they had been, and their readiness to give up their best for the solace of the widow. And naturally the feeling that all their sacrifices were unnecessary and their preparations made in vain, turned the honey into gall for the moment. It was not their part to take Mary’s duty into consideration, in the first place; and they did not know beforehand of Francis Ochterlony’s letter, nor the poor Major’s confidence that his brother would be a friend to his widow. And then Aunt Agatha’s parlour, which was all metamorphosed, and the changes that had been made through the whole house! The result was, that Aunt Agatha, offended, did not so much as offer to her niece the little breathing-time Mary had hoped for. When they got to London, she re-opened the subject, but it was in an unanswerable way.
“I suppose your brother-in-law expects you?” she said. “I think it will be better to wait till to-morrow before you start, that he may send the carriage to the station for you. I don’t ask you to come to me for the night, for it would be a pity to derange the children for so short a time.”
“Very well, aunt,” said Mary, sadly. And she wrote to Mr. Ochterlony, and slept that night in town – her strength almost failing her at the thought that, in her feebleness and excitement, she had to throw herself immediately on Francis Ochterlony’s tender mercies. She even paused for a moment to think, might she not really do as her heart suggested – find out some corner of refuge for herself with which nobody could intermeddle, and keep apart from them all? But Mary had come “home to her friends,” as everybody said at the station; and she had a woman’s prejudices, and it seemed unnatural to her to begin, without any interposition of the people belonging to her, that strange and solitary life of independence or self-dependence which was what she must decide upon some time. And then there was always Mr. Ochterlony’s letter, which was so kind. Thus it was fixed by a few words, and could not be changed. Aunt Agatha had a terrible compunction afterwards, and could not get Mary’s look out of her head, as she owned to Winnie, and would have got up out of her bed in the middle of the night, and gone to Mary and begged her to come to the cottage first, if it had not been that Winnie might have woke up, and that she would have to cross a passage to Mary’s room; and in an hotel where “gentlemen” were continually about, and who could tell whom she might meet? So they all slept, or pretended to sleep, and said nothing about it; and the next day set off with no further explanations, on their way “home.”
CHAPTER
