Chapter VIII Pleasures and pains
A few days after the conversation recorded in our last chapter took place, Flora, full of youthful hope and joy, sprang into the carriage which was to convey her to the station, and waved again and again a fond farewell to the beloved parent who watched her departure from the gate.
It was with mixed emotions that the gentle widow beheld disappearing down the winding lane the carriage which held her dearest earthly treasure, separated from her for the first time. Mrs. Vernon took pleasure in her daughter’s pleasure, and had, perhaps, secret pride in the thought that her beauty, talents, and virtues, would now be more widely known and appreciated. But there was pain also in parting; pain with which the meek parent reproached herself—that Flora could be so happy in parting! There was a secret fear, which Mrs. Vernon thought want of faith, lest the different scenes into which she was entering should, were it even in the slightest degree, change one who, in her partial love, she thought could scarcely change for the better. Mrs. Vernon also suffered from the cares and anxieties of life, which she now must bear alone; for she was not one to complain, even to her most intimate friends, of the secret trials of her home. The peevishness, the selfishness, the heartlessness of Emma, the wayward passions of her ill-taught children, the loss of the quiet repose of a well-ordered dwelling, were a cross to Mrs. Vernon as well as to her daughter; if to the latter it formed the most painful burden, it was because she murmured, struggled, and chafed under its weight, while the widow bent meekly under it, remembering the divine hand that had laid it upon her.
So, quietly and unostentatiously, never dreaming either of merit or reward, the widow went through her round of daily duties, ordering her household, teaching the children, caring for her guest, nursing the infant, and never forgetting the poor. Emma’s total indifference on the subject of religion often grieved Mrs. Vernon; but trusting in God, and not in herself, the simple Christian would not despair even of a heart which seemed like the beaten highway, on which the good seed fell only at once to be carried away. There was no use in lending religious works to Emma; the volumes lay unopened beside her. She never considered herself equal to the fatigue of attending service in the house of God. Mr. Ward and his wife paid her more than one visit. The good man spoke, as was his wont, out of the abundance of his heart; while Mrs. Vernon listened meekly with her clasped hands resting on her knee. But even he was chilled by the affected nod and meaningless smile with which the daughter-in-law received his words of holy consolation; while his wife felt uncomfortable under the dark eye which seemed scrutinizing every article of her simple apparel.
Not every one bore as patiently as Mrs. Ward this scrutinizing survey of dress from the fashionable and extravagantly-attired young widow. Miss Butterfield, who had a character and a temper of her own, was irritated by the close attention paid to her large poke-bonnet and rusty shawl. She made some observations, more true than polite, about heads like band-boxes in a milliner’s shop, intended to hold nothing more weighty than quilings and puffings; which brought an angry tinge to Emma’s sallow cheek, and made her bitterly comment, when the guest had departed, upon the insufferable vulgarity of Mrs. Vernon’s country acquaintance.
“How can I win Emma’s attention to anything serious?” such was Mrs. Vernon’s frequent thought, till one day the happy idea struck her mind of reading to her Flora’s manuscript hymns. “If any human writings can interest her, these will,” thought the simple-hearted mother. “She will listen to them first for the sake of the authoress, and then their own beauty must touch her heart;—I am sure that it always does mine!”
Emma could not, of course, refuse her assent to the proposal to read aloud the verses of her sister. She declared that she would be charmed to hear them, secretly hoping that the infliction might not be long, and that her mother-in-law would not think it necessary to go through the volume from beginning to end. Mrs. Vernon read with great impressiveness and feeling; every touching sentiment, every graceful idea, gained added beauty from her earnest expression. She was pleased and gratified by the profound silence of her listener, and read on, and on, warming with her subject, till in one favourite hymn, which described the blessedness of living for eternity, her eyes filled, and her heart overflowed, and she turned, as she wiped away a thankful tear, to see if Emma shared her emotions. The widow lay fast asleep on the sofa!
The only things to which Emma listened with real interest were portions of Flora’s letters from London. These, written to amuse her mother in her seclusion, and full of lively descriptions given with freshness and vigour by one to whom everything which she beheld was new, were, even to a stranger, extremely entertaining. By Mrs. Vernon the arrival of the post was looked forward to as bringing the one great treat of the day, and never once was she disappointed of it. She feasted on the letters of her daughter with unmingled delight; for she saw in them proofs of the conscientious regard which Flora paid to her wishes, and of the tender affection with which, in the midst of her amusements, her heart clung to the parent whom she had left.
All the little circle of friends in the quiet village of Wingsdale shared in Mrs. Vernon’s enjoyment. They listened to accounts of the first wondrous Crystal Palace, glittering like some fairy structure on the trodden sward of Hyde Park; the “sermons in stones” preached from the spoils of old Nineveh; descriptions of the treasures of art, all the things beautiful, curious, and rare, upon which the eye of Flora had rested delighted. They heard also personal descriptions of men with whose names they were already familiar—how Shaftesbury had spoken, and Guthrie had preached; whilst not least interesting to the hearts of her rural subjects was a graphic account of our gracious Queen from the enthusiastic pen of Flora.
But never had the young correspondent expressed herself in such glowing terms of admiration and pleasure as in her description of Sir Amery Legrange, whom she spoke of as one of the leading writers of the day. She had been actually introduced to “the lion,” had listened to the wondrous flow of eloquence which made his conversation an intellectual treat beyond any which she had ever known before. With his expansive brow, eagle eye, most poetical cast of countenance, his were exactly the face and form which a painter would wish to immortalize on canvas, as representing the beau ideal of a genius; and Flora could not but imagine that Sir Amery must have drawn himself in the hero of his famous chef-d’oeuvre, “The Master-Mind.”
“‘The Master-Mind!’” lisped Emma from the sofa; “Oh! I have read that—all the world has read it—it is a most charming work! I have it somewhere in my boxes, I think.”
Mrs. Vernon was content to be classed with those not of the world, for she had never read, nor even heard of the book. She was pleased, however, that her child should have met one of the literary celebrities of London, and had thus added another to the pleasant recollections which she would carry with her from the metropolis.
The next morning’s post brought a description of a fête at the Botanical Gardens; and this sentence occurred in Flora’s letter: “We met our brilliant author just as we were entering the gardens, and he remained the whole time with our party. He has certainly wonderful powers of conversation; just such as might be expected from a writer whose pen seems dipped in the colours of the rainbow, and brightens whatever it touches. When he speaks, we can do nothing but listen.”
“I think, Emma,” said Mrs. Vernon, “that you mentioned that you had a copy of ‘The Master-Mind’ beside you. I should be obliged, if you would allow me to read it.”
“Oh, certainly, when I can lay hands upon it; but all my luggage is still one mass of confusion, and whatever I want is certain to be at the very bottom of the very last box into which I should think of looking for it. But you really wish to see ‘The Master-Mind?’ Well,” added the lady, with an affected laugh, “I should as soon have dreamed of Mr. Ward’s dancing a polka, as of your sitting quietly down to a novel!”
Emma’s promise to look for the work was speedily forgotten by herself, nor did more than one reminder induce her to take this slight trouble for one to whom she owed the comfort of a home.
Flora’s subsequent letters contained scarcely any mention of Sir Amery. She occasionally quoted his opinion, or mentioned a brilliant remark made by him on some subject of general interest; but it was merely from such passing allusions that her mother gathered that Flora was not unfrequently in the society of the literary “lion.”
Mrs. Vernon had much to occupy her thoughts—much to engage her anxious attention. She was now patiently listening to the frivolous complaints of the hypochondriac widow; then quitting her to stand by the death-bed of a young school-girl—hear her last faint breathings of devotion—receive her last message of affection to Flora. The next hour would find Mrs. Vernon seated amongst the children, enduring their rough play and noisy glee, and ministering to their amusement as patiently as she had done to the wants of the suffering and the dying. But the wear upon her spirits and the strain upon her energies were too much for the strength of Mrs. Vernon. There was no one to watch her faded cheek, her weary step, her languid eye; no one, at least in her own home, to think for her, care for her—attend to the comforts of one who ever attended to the comforts of others. She might have been ill, she might have been dying, and Emma, absorbed in her own selfish cares, would never have observed that anything ailed her. Mrs. Vernon missed Flora each day more and more—longed more and more to hear her light step on the stair, her sweet song from the garden—to look again into those soft and loving eyes which were wont to rest on her so tenderly, so fondly. But Mrs. Vernon would not abridge a visit which afforded so much enjoyment to her daughter; she would not, even by the slightest allusion to her own failing health and spirits, throw a shadow over that enjoyment. She was content if Flora was happy; and if she herself needed comfort and strength, was not the source of all comfort and strength ever open to the Christian!