The Paper Cap. A Story of Love and Labor

“I thought from your kind manner with Faith and your admiring words both to her and about her that you would have congratulated me on my success in winning her love.”

“I doan’t know as thou deserves much congratulation on that score. I think it is mebbe, to me mysen, and to thy mother thou art mainly indebted for what success there is in winning Miss Foster’s favor. We gave thee thy handsome face and fine form, thy bright smile and that coaxing way thou hes – a way that would win any lass thou choose to favor – it is just the awful way young men hev, of choosing the wrong time to marry even if they happen to choose the right woman.”

“Was that your way, father?”

“Ay, was it! I chose the right time, but the girl was wrong enough in some ways.”

“My mother wrong! Oh, no, father!”

“My father thought she was not rich enough for me. He was a good bit disappointed by my choice but I knew what I was doing.”

“Father, I also know what I am doing. I suppose you object to Faith’s want of fortune.”

“Mebbe I do, and I wouldn’t be to blame if I did, but as it happens I think a man is better without his wife’s money. A wife’s money is a quarrelsome bit of either land or gold.”

“I consider Faith’s goodness a fortune far beyond any amount of either gold or land.”

“Doan’t thee say anything against either land or gold. When thou hes lived as long as I hev thou wilt know better than do that.”

“Wisdom is better than riches. I have heard you say that often.”

“It was in Solomon’s time. I doan’t know that it is in Victoria’s. The wise men of this day would be a deal wiser if they hed a bit of gold to carry out all the machines and railroads and canals they are planning; and what would the final outcome be, if they hed it? Money, money, and still more money. This last year, Dick, I hev got some new light both on poverty and riches and I have seen one thing plainly, it is that money is a varry good, respectable thing, and a thing that goes well with lovemaking; but poverty is the least romantic of all misfortunes. A man may hide, or cure, or forget any other kind of trouble, but, my lad, there is no Sanctuary for Poverty.”

“All you say is right, father, but if Faith’s want of fortune is no great objection, is there any other reason why I should not marry her? We might as well speak plainly now, as afterwards.”

“That is my way. I hate any backstair work, especially about marrying. Well, then, one thing is that Faith’s people are all Chapel folk. The Squire of Annis is a landed gentleman of England, and the men who own England’s land hev an obligation to worship in England’s Church.”

“You know, father, that wives have a duty laid on them to make their husbands’ church their church. Faith will worship where I worship and that is in Annis Parish Church.”

“What does tha know of Faith’s father and mother?”

“Her grandfather was a joiner and carpenter and a first class workman. He died of a fever just before the birth of Faith’s mother. Her grandmother was a fine lace maker, and supported herself and her child by making lace for eight years. Then she died and the girl, having no kindred and no friends willing to care for her, was taken to the Poor House.”

“Oh, Dick! Dick! that is bad – very bad indeed!”

“Listen, father. At the Poor House Sunday school she learned to read, and later was taught how to spin, and weave, and to sew and knit. She was a silent child, but had fine health and a wonderfully ambitious nature. At eleven years of age she took her living into her own hands. She went into a woolen mill and made enough to pay her way in the family of Samuel Broadbent, whose sons now own the great Broadbent mill with its six hundred power-looms. When she was fifteen she could manage two looms, and was earning more than a pound a week. Every shilling nearly of this money went for books. She bought, she borrowed, she read every volume she could reach; and in the meantime attended the Bradford Night School of the Methodist Church. At seventeen years of age she was a very good scholar and had such a remarkable knowledge of current literature and authors that she was made the second clerk in the Public Library. Soon after, she joined the Methodist Church, and her abilities were quickly recognized by the Preacher, and she finally went to live with his family, teaching his boys and girls, and being taught and protected by their mother. One day Mr. Foster came as the second preacher in that circuit and he fell in love with her and they married. Faith is their child, and she has inherited not only her mother’s beauty and intellect, but her father’s fervent piety and humanity. Since her mother’s death she has been her father’s companion and helped in all his good works, as you know.”

“Yes, I know – hes her mother been long dead?

“About six years. She left to the young girls who have to work for their living several valuable text-books to assist them in educating themselves, a very highly prized volume of religious experiences and a still more popular book of exquisite poems. Is there anything in this record to be called objectionable or not honorable?”

“Ask thy mother that question, Dick.”

“Nay, father, I want your help and sympathy. I expect nothing favorable from mother. You must stand by me in this strait. If you accept Faith my mother will accept her. Show her the way. Do, father! Always you have been right-hearted with me. You have been through this hard trial yourself, father. You know what it is.”

“To be sure I do; and I managed it in a way that thou must not think of, or I will niver forgive thee. I knew my father and mother would neither be to coax nor to reason with, and just got quietly wedded and went off to France with my bride. I didn’t want any browbeating from my father and I niver could hev borne my mother’s scorn and silence, so I thought it best to come to some sort of terms with a few hundred miles between us – but mind what I say, Dick! I was niver again happy with them. They felt that I hed not trusted their love and they niver more trusted my love. There was a gulf between us that no love could bridge. Father died with a hurt feeling in his heart. Mother left my house and went back to her awn home as soon as he was buried. All that thy mother could do niver won her more than mere tolerance. Now, Dick, my dear lad, I hev raked up this old grief of mine for thy sake. If tha can win thy mother’s promise to accept Faith as a daughter, and the future mistress of Annis Hall, I’ll put no stone in thy way. Hes tha said anything on this subject to Mr. Foster? If so, what answer did he give thee?”

“He said the marriage would be a great pleasure to him if you and mother were equally pleased; but not otherwise.”

“That was right, it was just what I expected from him.”

“But, father, until our engagement was fully recognized by you and mother, he forbid us to meet, or even to write to each other. I can’t bear that. I really can not.”

“Well, I doan’t believe Faith will help thee to break such a command. Not her! She will keep ivery letter of it.”

“Then I shall die. I could not endure such cruelty! I will – I will – ”

“Whativer thou shall, could, or will, do try and not make a fool of thysen. Drat it, man! Let me see thee in this thy first trial right-side-out. Furthermore, I’ll not hev thee going about Annis village with that look on thy face as if ivery thing was on the perish. There isn’t a man there, who wouldn’t know the meaning of it and they would wink at one another and say ‘poor beggar! it’s the Methody preacher’s little lass!’ There it is! and thou knows it, as well as I do.”

“Let them mock if they want to. I’ll thrash every man that names her.”

“Be quiet! I’ll hev none of thy tempers, so just bid thy Yorkshire devil to get behind thee. I hev made thee a promise and I’ll keep it, if tha does thy part fairly.”

“What is my part?”

“It is to win over thy mother.”

“You, sir, have far more influence over mother than I have. If I cannot win mother, will you try, sir?”

“No, I will not. Now, Dick, doan’t let me see thee wilt in thy first fight. Pluck up courage and win or fail with a high heart. And if tha should fail, just take the knockdown with a smile, and say,

“If she is not fair for me,What care I how fair she be!

That was the young men’s song in my youth. Now we will drop the subject and what dost tha say to a ride in the Park?”

“All right, sir.”

The ride was not much to speak of. One man was too happy, and the other was too unhappy and eventually the squire put a stop to it. “Dick,” he said, “tha hed better go to thy room at The Yorkshire Club and sleep thysen into a more respectable temper.” And Dick answered, “Thank you, sir. I will take your advice” – and so raising his hand to his hat he rapidly disappeared.

“Poor lad!” muttered his father; “he hes some hard days before him but it would niver do to give him what he wants and there is no ither way to put things right” – and with this reflection the squire’s good spirits fell even below his son’s melancholy. Then he resolved to go back to the Clarendon. “Annie may come back there to dress before her dinner and opera,” he reflected – “but if she does I’ll not tell her a word of Dick’s trouble. No, indeed! Dick must carry his awn bad news. I hev often told her unpleasant things and usually I got the brunt o’ them mysen. So if Annie comes home to dress – and she does do so varry often lately – I’ll not mention Dick’s affair to her. I hev noticed that she dresses hersen varry smart now and, by George, it suits her well! In her way she looks as handsome as either of her daughters. I did not quite refuse to dine at Jane’s, I think she will come to the Clarendon to dress and to beg me to go with her and I might as well go – here she comes! I know her step, bless her!”

When Dick left his father he went to his sister’s residence. He knew that Jane and his mother were at the lecture but he did not think that Katherine would be with them and he felt sure of Katherine’s sympathy. He was told that she had just gone to Madam Temple’s and he at once followed her there and found her writing a letter and quite alone.

“Kitty! Kitty!” he cried in a lachrymose tone. “I am in great trouble.”

“Whatever is wrong, Dick? Are you wanting money?”

“I am not thinking or caring anything about money. I want Faith and her father will not let me see her or write to her unless father and mother are ready to welcome her as a daughter. They ought to do so and father is not very unwilling; but I know mother will make a stir about it and father will not move in the matter for me.”

“Move?”

“Yes, I want him to go to mother and make her do the kind and the right thing and he will not do it for me, though he knows that mother always gives in to what he thinks best.”

“She keeps her own side, Dick, and goes as far as she can, but it is seldom she gets far enough without father’s consent. Father always keeps the decisive word for himself.”

“That is what I say. Then father could – if he would – say the decisive word and so make mother agree to my marriage with Faith.”

“Well you see, Dick, mother is father’s love affair and why should he have a dispute with his wife to make you and your intended wife comfortable and happy? Mother has always been in favor of Harry Bradley and she does not prevent us seeing or writing each other, when it is possible, but she will not hear of our engagement being made public, because it would hurt father’s feelings and she is half-right anyway. A wife ought to regard her husband’s feelings. You would expect that, if you were married.”

“Oh, Kitty, I am so miserable. Will you sound mother’s feelings about Faith for me? Then I would have a better idea how to approach her on the subject.”

“Certainly, I will.”

“How soon?”

“To-morrow, if possible.”

“Thank you, dearie! I love Faith so truly that I have forgotten all the other women I ever knew. Their very names tire me now. I wonder at myself for ever thinking them at all pretty. I could hardly be civil to any of them if we met. I shall never care for any woman again, if I miss Faith.”

“You know, Dick, that you must marry someone. The family must be kept up. Is the trouble Faith’s lack of money?”

“No. It is her father and mother.”

“Her father is a scholar and fine preacher.”

“Yes, but her mother was a working girl, really a mill hand,” and then Dick told the story of Faith’s mother with enthusiasm. Kitty listened with interest, but answered, “I do not see what you are going to do, Dick. Not only mother, but Jane will storm at the degradation you intend to inflict upon the house of Annis.”

“There are two things I can do. I will marry Faith, and be happier than words can tell; or I will leave England forever.”

“Dick, you never can do that. Everything good forbids it – and there. Jane’s carriage is coming.”

“Then good-by. When can I see you tomorrow?”

“In the afternoon, perhaps. I may speak to mother before three o’clock.”

Then Dick went away and a servant entered with a letter. It was from Lady Jane, bidding Katherine return home immediately or she would not be dressed in time for dinner. On her way home she passed Dick walking slowly with his head cast down and carrying himself in a very dejected manner. Katherine stopped the carriage and offered to give him a lift as far as his club.

“No, thank you, Kitty,” he answered. “You may interview mother for me if you like. I was coming to a resolution to take the bull by the horns, or at least in some manner find a way that is satisfactory in the meantime.”

“That is right. There is nothing like patient watching and waiting. Every ball finally comes to the hand held out for it.”

Then with a nod and a half-smile, Dick lifted his hat and went forward. While he was in the act of speaking to Katherine an illuminating thought had flashed through his consciousness and he walked with a purposeful stride towards his club. Immediately he sat down and began to write a letter, and the rapid scratching of the goose quill on the fine glazed paper indicated there was no lack of feeling in what he was writing. The firm, strong, small letters, the wide open long letters, the rapid fluency and haste of the tell-tale quill, all indicated great emotion, and it was without hesitation or consideration he boldly signed his name to the following letter: —

To the Rev. John Foster.

Dear Sir:

You have made me the most wretched of men. You have made Faith the most unhappy of women. Faith never wronged you in all her life. Do you imagine she would do for me what she has never before done? I never wronged you by one thought. Can you not trust my word and my honor? I throw myself and Faith on your mercy. You are punishing us before we have done anything worthy of punishment. Is that procedure just and right? If so, it is very unlike you. Let me write to Faith once every week and permit her to answer my letter. I have given you my word; my word is my honor. I cannot break it without your permission, and until you grant my prayer, I am bound by a cruel obligation to lead a life, that being beyond Love and Hope, is a living death. And the terrible aching torture of this ordeal is that Faith must suffer it with me. Sir, I pray your mercy for both of us.

Your sincere suppliant,

Richard Haveling Annis.

Dick posted this letter as soon as it was written and the following day it was in the hands of the preacher. He received it as he was going home to his tea, about half past five, and he read it, and then turned towards the open country, and read it again and again. He had been in the house of mourning all day. His heart was tender, his thoughts sadly tuned to the sorrows and broken affections of life, and at the top of the Brow he sat down on a large granite boulder and let his heart lead him.

“Richard Annis is right,” he said. “I have acted as if I could not trust. Oh, how could I so wrong my good, sweet daughter I I have almost insulted her, to her lover. Why did I do this evil thing? Self! Self! Only for Self! I was determined to serve myself first. I did not consider others as I ought to have done – and Pride! Yes, Pride! John Foster! You have been far out of the way of the Master whom you serve. Go quickly, and put the wrong right.” And he rose at the spiritual order and walked quickly home. As he passed through the Green he saw Faith come to the door and look up and down the street. “She is uneasy about my delay,” he thought, “how careful and loving she is about me! How anxious, if I am a little late! The dear one! How I wronged her!”

“I have been detained, Faith,” he said, as she met him at the door. “There are four deaths from cholera this afternoon, and they talk of forbidding me to visit the sick, till this strange sickness disappears.” During the meal, Foster said nothing of the letter he had received, but as Faith rose, he also rose, and laying his hand upon her shoulder said: “Faith, here is a letter that I received this afternoon from Richard Annis.”

“Oh, father, I am so sorry! I thought Richard would keep his word. He promised me – ” and her voice sunk almost to a whisper.

“Richard has not broken a letter of his promise. The letter was sent to me. It is my letter. I want you to read it, and to answer it for me, and you might write to him once a week, without infringing on the time necessary for your duties here. I wish to tell you also, that I think Annis is right. I have put both of you under restraints not needful, not supposable, even from my knowledge of both of you. Answer the letter according to your loyal, loving heart. Annis will understand by my utterly revoking the charge I gave you both, that I see my fault, and am sorry for it.”

Then Faith’s head was on her father’s shoulder, and she was clasped to his heart, and he kissed the silent happy tears from off her cheeks and went to the chapel with a heart at peace.

Two days afterward the squire went to call upon his son and he found him in his usual buoyant temper. “Mother was anxious about thee, Dick. She says she has not seen thee for four or five days.”

“I have been under the weather for a week, but I am all right now. Tell her I will come and dine with her to-night. What are you going to do with yourself to-day?”

“Well, I’ll tell thee – Russell and Grey hev asked me to go to Hyde Park Gate and talk to the people, and keep them quiet, till parliament can fashion to get back to its place.”

“Are not the Easter holidays over yet?”

“The taking of holidays at this time was both a sin and a shame. The streets are full of men who are only wanting a leader and they would give king and lords and commons a long, long holiday. Earl Russell says I am the best man to manage them, and he hes asked by proclamation Yorkshire and Lancashire men to meet me, and talk over our program with me.”

“Can I go with you?”

“If tha wants to.”

“There may be quarreling and danger. I will not let you go alone. I must be at your side.”

“Nay, then, there is no ‘must be.’ I can manage Yorkshire lads without anybody’s help.”

“What time do you speak?”

“About seven o’clock.”

“All right. Tell mother I’ll have my dinner with her and you at the Clarendon, and then we will go to interview the mob afterward.”

“They are not a mob. Doan’t thee call them names. They are ivery one Englishmen, holding themsens with sinews of steel, from becoming mobs; but if they should, by any evil chance, become a mob, then, bless thee, lad, it would be well for thee and me to keep out of their way!”

“The trouble lies here,” the squire continued, – “these gatherings of men waiting to see The Bill passed that shall give them their rights, have been well taught by Earl Grey, Lord Russell, and Lord Brougham, but only fitfully, at times and seasons; but by day and night ivery day and Sunday, there hev been and there are chartists and socialist lecturers among them, putting bitter thoughts against their awn country into their hearts. And they’re a soft lot. They believe all they are told, if t’ speaker but claim to be educated. Such precious nonsense!”

“Well, then, father, a good many really educated people go to lectures about what they call science and they, too, believe all that they are told.”

“I’ll warrant them, Dick. Yet our Rector, when he paid us a visit last summer, told me emphatically, that science was a new kind of sin – a new kind of sin, that, and nothing more, or better! And I’ll be bound thy mother will varry soon find it out and I’m glad she hed the sense to keep Kitty away from such teachers. Just look at Brougham. He is making a perfect fool of himsen about tunneling under the Thames River and lighting cities with the gas we see sputtering out of our coal fires and carrying men in comfortable coaches thirty, ay, even forty, miles an hour by steam. Why Bingley told me, that he heard Brougham say he hoped to live to see men heving their homes in Norfolk or Suffolk villages, running up or down to London ivery day to do their business. Did tha iver hear such nonsense, Dick? And when men who publish books and sit on the government benches talk it, what can you expect from men who don’t know their alphabet?”

“You have an easier fight than I have, sir. Love and one woman, can be harder to win, than a thousand men for freedom.”

“Tha knows nothing about it, if that is thy opinion,” and the squire straightened himself, and stood up, and with a great deal of passion recited three fine lines from Byron, the favorite men’s poet of that day: —

“For Freedom’s battle once begun,Bequeathed by bleeding sire to son,Though baffled oft, is always won!”

“Those lines sound grandly in your mouth, dad,” said Dick, as he looked with admiring love into his father’s face.

“Ay, I think they do. I hev been reciting them a good deal lately. They allays bring what t’ Methodists call ‘the Amen’ from the audience. I don’t care whether it is made up of rich men, or poor men, they fetch a ringing Amen from every heart.”

“I should think that climax would carry any meeting.

“No, it won’t. The men I am going to address to-night doan’t read; but they do think, and when a man hes drawn his conclusions from what he hes seen, and what he hes felt or experienced, they hev a bulldog grip on him. I will tell thee now, and keep mind of what I say – when tha hes to talk to fools, tha needs ivery bit of all the senses tha happens to hev.”

“Well, father, can I be of any use to you to-night?”

“Tha can not. Not a bit, not a word. Dick, thou belongs to the coming generation and they would see it and make thee feel it. Thy up-to-date dress would offend them. I shall go to t’ meeting in my leather breeches, and laced-up Blucher shoes, my hunting coat and waistcoat with dog head buttons, and my Madras red neckerchief. They will understand that dress. It will explain my connection with the land that we all of us belong to. Now be off with thee and I am glad to see thou hes got over thy last sweet-hearting so soon, and so easy. I thought thou wert surely in for a head-over-ears attack.”

“Good-by, dad I and do not forget the three lines of poetry.”

“I’m not likely to forget them. No one loves a bit of poetry better than a Yorkshire weaver. Tha sees they were mostly brought up on Wesley’s Hymn Book,” and he was just going to recite the three lines again, but he saw Dick had turned towards the door and he let him go. “Ah, well!” he muttered, “it is easy to make Youth see, but you can’t make it believe.”

CHAPTER IX – LOVERS QUARREL AND THE SQUIRE MAKES A SPEECH

“There are no little events with the Heart.”“The more we judge, the less we Love.”“Kindred is kindred, and Love is Love.”“The look that leaves no doubt, that the lastGlimmer of the light of Love has gone out.”

WHEN Dick left his father he hardly knew what to do with himself. He was not prepared to speak to his mother, nor did he think it quite honorable to do so, until he had informed his father of Mr. Foster’s change of heart, with regard to Faith and himself. His father had been his first confidant, and in this first confidence, there had been an implied promise, that his engagement to Faith was not yet to be made public.

“Dick!” the squire had said: “Thou must for a little while do as most men hev to do; that is, keep thy happiness to thysen till there comes a wiser hour to talk about it. People scarcely sleep, or eat, the whole country is full of trouble and fearfulness; and mother and Jane are worried about Katherine and her sweethearts. She hes a new one, a varry likely man, indeed, the nephew of an earl and a member of a very rich banking firm. And Kitty is awkward and disobedient, and won’t notice him.”