The Trial; Or, More Links of the Daisy Chain

'Where's the coffee-mill?' said Minna, presently, looking round in blank despair.

'Oh dear!' said Ella, 'I remember now; that dirty little Polly Mason came to borrow it this morning. I said we wanted it every day: but she guessed we could do without it, for they had got a tea-party, and her little brother had put in a stone and spoilt Cora Muller's; and she snatched it up and carried it off.'

'He will serve ours the same, I suppose,' said Minna. 'It is too far off to go for it; let us make some tea.'

'There's no tea,' said Ella; 'a week ago or more that great Irene Brown walked in and reckoned we could lend her 'ma some tea and sugar, 'cause we had plenty. And we have used up our own since; and if we did ask her to return the loan, hers is such nasty stuff that nobody could drink it. What shall we do, Minna?' and she began to cry.

'We must take some coffee up to the hotel,' said Minna, after a moment's reflection; 'Black Joe is very good-natured, and he'll grind it.'

'But I don't like to go ail by myself,' said Ella; 'into the kitchen too, and hear them say things about Britishers.'

'I'll go, dear,' said Minna, gently, 'if you will just keep the fire up, and boil the eggs, and make the toast, and listen if Ave calls.'

Poor Minna, her sensitive little heart trembled within her at the rough contemptuous words that the exclusive, refined tone of the family always provoked, and bodily languor and weariness made the walk trying; but she was thinking of Ave's need, and resolutely took down her cloak and hat. But at that moment the latch was raised, and the bright graceful figure of Cora stood among them, her feathered hat and delicate muslin looking as fresh as at New York.

'What, all alone!' she said; 'I know it is poor Ave's sick day. Is she better?'

'Yes, going to get up and come down; but—' and all the troubles were poured out.

'True enough, the little wretch did spoil our mill, but Rufus mended it; and as I thought Polly had been marauding on you, I brought some down.'

'Ah! I thought I smelt it most deliciously as you came in, but I was afraid I only fancied it because I was thinking about it. Dear Cora, how good you are!'

'And have you anything for her to eat?'

'I was going to make some toast.'

'Of that dry stuff! Come, we'll manage something better:' and off came the dainty embroidered cambric sleeves, up went the coloured ones, a white apron came out of a pocket, and the pretty hands were busy among the flour; the children assisting, learning, laughing a childlike laugh.

'Ah!' cried Cora, turning round, and making a comic threatening gesture with her floury fingers; 'you ought not to have come till we were fixed. Go and sit in your chair by the fire.'

'Dear Cora!'

But Cora ran at her, and the wan trembling creature put on a smile, and was very glad to comply; being totally unequal to resist or even to stand long enough to own her dread of Henry's finding all desolate and nothing to eat.

Presently Cora tripped in, all besleeved and smartened, to set cushions behind the tired back and head, and caress the long thin fingers. 'I've left Minna, like King Alfred, to watch the cakes,' she said; 'and Ella is getting the cups. So your fifth girl is gone.'

'The fifth in five months! And we let her sit at table, and poor dear Minna has almost worn out her life in trying to hinder her from getting affronted.'

'I've thought what to do for you, Ave. There's the Irish woman, Katty Blake—her husband has been killed. She is rough enough, but tender in her way; and she must do something for herself and her child.'

'Her husband killed!'

'Yes, at Summerville. I thought you had heard it. Mordaunt wrote to me to tell her; and I shall never forget her wailing at his dying away from his country. It was not lamentation for herself, but that he should have died far away from his own people.'

'She is not long from the old country; I should like to have her if—if we can afford it. For if the dividends don't come soon from that building company, Cora, I don't know where to turn—'

'Oh, they must come. Father has been writing to Rufus about the arrangements. Besides, those Irish expect less, and understand old country manners better, if you can put up with their breakages.'

'I could put up with anything to please Henry, and save Minna's little hard-worked bones.'

'I will send her to-morrow. Is it not Minna's day of ague?'

'Yes, poor dear. That is always the day we get into trouble.'

'I never saw a child with such an instinct for preventing variance, or so full of tact and pretty ways; yet I have seen her tremble under her coaxing smile, that even Mis' Shillabeer can't resist.'

'See, see!' cried Ella, hurrying in, 'surely our contingent is not coming home!'

'No,' said Cora, hastening to the door, 'these must be a reinforcement marching to take the train at Winiamac.'

'Marching?' said Ella, looking up archly at her. 'We didn't let our volunteers march in that way.'

They were sturdy bearded backwoodsmen, rifle on shoulder, and with grave earnest faces; but walking rather than marching, irregularly keeping together, or straggling, as they chose.

'Your volunteers!' cried Cora, her eyes flashing; 'theirs was toy work! These are bound for real patriotic war!' and she clasped her hands together, then waved her handkerchief.

'It is sad,' said Averil, who had moved to the window, 'to see so many elderly faces—men who must be the prop of their families.'

'It is because ours is a fight of men, not of children; not one of your European wars of paltry ambition, but a war of principle!' cried Cora, with that intensity of enthusiasm that has shed so much blood in the break-up of the Great Republic.

'They do look as Cromwell's Ironsides may have done,' said Averil; 'as full of stern purpose.'

And verily Averil noted the difference. Had a number of European soldiers been passing so near in an equally undisciplined manner, young women could not have stood forth as Cora was doing, unprotected, yet perfectly safe from rudeness or remark; making ready answer to the inquiry for the nearest inn—nay, only wishing she were in her own house, to evince her patriotism by setting refreshment before the defenders of her cause. Her ardour had dragged Averil up with her a little way, so as to feel personally every vicissitude that befell the North, and to be utterly unaware of any argument in favour of the Confederates; but still Averil was, in Cora's words, 'too English;' she could not, for the life of her, feel as she did when equipping her brother against possible French invasions, and when Mordaunt Muller had been enrolled in the Federal army, she had almost offended the exultant sister by condolence instead of congratulation.

Five months had elapsed since the arrival of Averil in Massissauga—months of anxiety and disappointment, which had sickened Henry of plans of farming, and lessened his hopes of practice. The same causes that affected him at New York told in Indiana; and even if he had been employed, the fees would have been too small to support the expense of horses. As to farming, labour was scarce, and could only be obtained at the cost of a considerable outlay, and, moreover, of enduring rude self-assertions that were more intolerable to Henry than even to his sisters. The chief hope of the family lay in the speculation in which Averil's means had been embarked, which gave them a right to their present domicile, and to a part of the uncleared waste around them; and would, when Massissauga should begin to flourish, place them in affluence. The interest of the portions of the two younger girls was all that was secure, since these were fortunately still invested at home. Inhabitants did not come, lots of land were not taken; and the Mullers evidently profited more by the magnificent harvest produced by their land than by the adventure of city founding. Still, plenty and comfort reigned in their house, and Cora had imported a good deal of refinement and elegance, which she could make respected where Averil's attempts were only sneered down. Nor had sickness tried her household. Owing partly to situation—considerably above the level of River Street—partly to the freer, more cleared and cultivated surroundings—partly likewise to experience, and Cousin Deborah's motherly watchfulness—the summer had passed without a visitation of ague, though it seemed to be regarded as an adjunct of spring, as inevitable as winter frost. Averil trembled at the thought, but there was no escape; there were absolutely no means of leaving the spot, or of finding maintenance elsewhere. Indeed, Cora's constant kindness and sympathy were too precious to be parted with, even had it been possible to move. After the boarding-house, Massissauga was a kind of home; and the more spirits and energy failed, the more she clung to it.

Mr. Muller had lately left home to arrange for the sale of his corn, and had announced that he might perhaps pay a visit to his son Mordaunt in the camp at Lexington. Cora was expecting a letter from him, and the hope that 'Dr. Warden' might bring one from the post-office at Winiamac had been one cause of her visit on this afternoon; for the mammoth privileges of Massissauga did not include a post-office, nor the sight of letters more than once a week.

The table had just been covered with preparations for a meal, and the glow of the fire was beginning to brighten the twilight, when the sound of a horse's feet came near, and Henry rode past the window, but did not appear for a considerable space, having of late been reduced to become his own groom. But even in the noise of the hoofs, even in the wave of the hand, the girls had detected gratified excitement.

'Charleston has surrendered! The rebels have submitted!' cried Cora.

And Averil's heart throbbed with its one desperate hope. No! That would have brought him in at once.

After all, both were in a state to feel it a little flat when he came in presenting a letter to Miss Muller, and announcing, 'I have had a proposal, ladies; what would you say to seeing me a surgeon to the Federal forces?—Do you bid me go, Miss Muller?'

'I bid every one go who can be useful to my country,' said Cora.

'Don't look alarmed, Averil,' said Henry, affectionately, as he met her startled eyes; 'there is no danger. A surgeon need never expose himself.'

'But how—what has made you think of it?' asked Averil, faintly.

'A letter from Mr. Muller—a very kind letter. He tells me that medical men are much wanted, and that an examination by a Board is all that is required, the remuneration is good, and it will be an introduction that will avail me after the termination of the war, which will end with the winter at latest.'

'And father has accepted an office in the commissariat department!' exclaimed Cora, from her letter.

'Yes,' answered Henry; 'he tells me that, pending more progression here, it is wiser for us both to launch into the current of public events, and be floated upwards by the stream.'

'Does he want you to come to him, Cora?' was all that Averil contrived to say.

'Oh no, he will be in constant locomotion,' said Cora. 'I shall stay to keep house for Rufus. And here are some directions for him that I must carry home. Don't come, Dr. Warden; I shall never cure you of thinking we cannot stir without an escort. You will want to put a little public spirit into this dear Ave. That's her one defect; and when you are one of us, she will be forced to give us her heart.'

And away ran the bright girl, giving her caresses to each sister as she went.

The little ones broke out, 'O, Henry, Henry, you must not go away to the wars!' and Averil's pleading eyes spoke the same.

Then Henry sat down and betook himself to argument. It would be folly to lose the first opening to employment that had presented itself. He grieved indeed to leave his sisters in this desolate, unhealthy place; but they were as essentially safe as at Stoneborough; their living alone for a few weeks, or at most months, would be far less remarkable here than there; and he would be likely to be able to improve or to alter their present situation, whereas they were now sinking deeper and more hopelessly into poverty every day. Then, too, he read aloud piteous accounts of the want of medical attendance, showing that it was absolutely a cruelty to detain such assistance from the sick and wounded. This argument was the one most appreciated by Averil and Minna. The rest were but questions of prudence; this touched their hearts. Men lying in close tents, or in crowded holds of ships, with festering wounds and fevered lips, without a hand to help them—some, too, whom they had seen at New York, and whose exulting departure they had witnessed—sufferers among whom their own Cora's favourite brother might at any moment be numbered—the thought brought a glow of indignation against themselves for having wished to withhold him.

'Yes, go, Henry; it is right, and you shall hear not another word of objection,' said Averil.

'You can write or telegraph the instant you want me. And it will be for a short time,' said Henry, half repenting when the opposition had given way.

'Oh, we shall get on very well,' said Minna, cheerfully; 'better, perhaps for you know we don't mind Far West manners; and I'll have learnt to do all sorts of things as well as Cora when you come home!'

And Henry, after a year's famine of practice, was in better spirits than since that fatal summer morning. Averil felt how different a man is in his vocation, and deprived of it.

'Oh yes,' she said to herself, 'if I had let ourselves be a drag on him when he is so much needed, I could never have had the face to write to our dear sufferer at home in his noble patience. It is better that we should be desolate than that he should be a wreck, or than that mass of sickness should be left untended! And the more desolate, the more sure of One Protector.'

There was true heroism in the spirit in which this young girl braced herself to uncomplaining acceptance of desertion in this unwholesome swamp, with her two little ailing sisters, beside the sluggish stream, amid the skeleton trees—heroism the greater because there was no enthusiastic patriotism to uphold her—it was only the land of her captivity, whence she looked towards home like Judah to Jerusalem.

CHAPTER XXIII

Prisoner of hope thou art; look up and sing,In hope of promised spring.Christian Year

In the summer of 1862, Tom May was to go up for his examination at the College of Physicians, but only a day or two before it he made his appearance at home, in as much excitement as it was in him to betray. Hazlitt, the banker's clerk at Whitford, had written to him tidings of the presentation of the missing cheque for £25, which Bilson had paid to old Axworthy shortly before the murder, and which Leonard had mentioned as in the pocket-book containing his receipt for the sum that had been found upon him. Tom had made a halt at Whitford, and seen the cheque, which had been backed by the word Axworthy, with an initial that, like all such signatures of the nephew, might stand either for S. or F., and the stiff office hand of both the elder and younger Axworthy was so much alike, that no one could feel certain whose writing it was. The long concealment, after the prisoner's pointed reference to it, was, however, so remarkable, that the home conclave regarded the cause as won; and the father and son hastened triumphantly to the attorneys' office.

Messrs. Bramshaw and Anderson were greatly struck, and owned that their own minds were satisfied as to the truth of their client's assertion; but they demurred as to the possibility of further steps. An action for forgery, Tom's first hope, he saw to be clearly impossible; Samuel Axworthy appeared to have signed the cheque in his own name, and he had every right to it as his uncle's heir; and though the long withholding of it, as well as his own departure, were both suspicious circumstances, they were not evidence. Where was there any certainty that the cheque had ever been in the pocket-book or even if it had, how did it prove the existence of young Ward's acknowledgment? Might it not have been in some receptacle of papers hitherto not opened? There was no sufficient case to carry to the police, after a conviction like Leonard's, to set them on tracing the cheque either to an unknown robber, or to Sam Axworthy, its rightful owner.

Mr. Bramshaw likewise dissuaded Dr. May from laying the case before the Secretary of State, as importunity without due grounds would only tell against him if any really important discovery should be made: and the Doctor walked away, with blood boiling at people's coolness to other folk's tribulations, and greatly annoyed with Tom for having acceded to the representations of the men of law, and declining all co-operation in drawing up a representation for the Home Office, on the plea that he had no time to lose in preparing for his own examination, and must return to town by the next train, which he did without a syllable of real converse with any one at home.

The Doctor set to work with his home helpers, assisted by Dr. Spencer; but the work of composition seemed to make the ground give way under their feet, and a few adroit remarks from Dr. Spencer finally showed him and Ethel that they had not yet attained the prop for the lever that was to move the world. He gave it up, but still he did not quite forgive Tom for having been so easily convinced, and ready to be dismissed to his own affairs.

However, Dr. May was gratified by the great credit with which his son passed his examination, and took his degree; and Sir Matthew Fleet himself wrote in high terms of his talent, diligence, and steadiness, volunteering hopes of being able to put him forward in town in his own line, for which Tom had always had a preference; and adding, that it was in concurrence with his own recommendation that the young man wished to pursue his studies at Paris—he had given him introductions that would enable him to do so to the greatest advantage, and he hoped his father would consent. The letter was followed up by one from Tom himself, as usual too reasonable and authoritative to be gainsaid, with the same representation of advantages to be derived from a course of the Parisian hospitals.

'Ah, well! he is after old Fleet's own heart,' said Dr. May, between pride and mortification. 'I should not grudge poor Fleet some one to take interest in his old age, and I did not look to see him so warm about anything. He has not forgotten Calton Hill! But the boy must have done very well! I say, shall we see him Sir Thomas some of these days, Ethel, and laugh at ourselves for having wanted, to make him go round in a mill after our old fashion?'

'You were contented to run round in your mill,' said Ethel, fondly, 'and maybe he will too.'

'No, no, Ethel, I'll not have him persuaded. Easy-going folk, too lazy for ambition, have no right to prescribe for others. Ambition turned sour is a very dangerous dose! Much better let it fly off! I mean to look out of my mill yet, and see Sir Thomas win the stakes. Only I wish he would come and see us; tell him he shall not hear a word to bother him about the old practice. People have lived and died at Stoneborough without a May to help them, and so they will again, I suppose.'

Ethel was very glad to see how her father had made up his mind to what was perhaps the most real disappointment of his life, but she was grieved that Tom did not respond to the invitation, and next wrote from Paris. It was one of his hurried notes, great contrasts to such elaborate performances as his recent letter. 'Thanks, many thanks to my father,' he said; 'I knew you would make him see reason, and he always yields generously. I was too much hurried to come home; could not afford to miss the trail. I had not time to say before that the Bank that sent the cheque to Whitford had it from a lodging-house in town. Landlord had a writ served on S. A.; as he was embarking at Folkestone, he took out the draft and paid. He knew its import, if Bramshaw did not. I hope my father was not vexed at my not staying. There are things I cannot stand, namely, discussions and Gertrude.'

Gertrude was one of the chief cares upon Ethel's mind. She spent many thoughts upon the child, and even talked her over with Flora.

'What is it, Flora? is it my bad management? She is a good girl, and a dear girl; but there is such a want of softness about her.'

'There is a want of softness about all the young ladies of the day,' returned Flora.

'I have heard you say so, but—'

'We have made girls sensible and clear-headed, till they have grown hard. They have been taught to despise little fears and illusions, and it is certainly not becoming.'

'We had not fears, we were taught to be sensible.'

'Yes, but it is in the influence of the time! It all tends to make girls independent.'

'That's very well for the fine folks you meet in your visits, but it does not account for my Daisy—always at home, under papa's eye—having turned nineteenth century—What is it, Flora? She is reverent in great things, but not respectful except to papa, and that would not have been respect in one of us—only he likes her sauciness.'

'That is it, partly.'

'No, I won't have that said,' exclaimed Ethel. 'Papa is the only softening influence in the house—the only one that is tender. You see it is unlucky that Gertrude has so few that she really does love, with anything either reverend or softening about them. She is always at war with Charles Cheviot, and he has not fun enough, is too lumbering altogether, to understand her, or set her down in the right way; and she domineers over Hector like the rest of us. I did hope the babies might have found out her heart, but, unluckily, she does not take to them. She is only bored by the fuss that Mary and Blanche make about them.

'You know we are all jealous of both Charles Cheviots, elder and younger.'

'I often question whether I should not have taken her down and made her ashamed of all the quizzing and teasing at the time of Mary's marriage. But one cannot be always spoiling bright merry mischief, and I am only elder sister after all. It is a wonder she is as good to me as she is.'

'She never remembered our mother, poor dear.'

'Ah! that is the real mischief,' said Ethel. 'Mamma would have given the atmosphere of gentleness and discretion, and so would Margaret. How often I have been made, by the merest pained look, to know when what I said was saucy or in bad taste, and I—I can only look forbidding, or else blurt out a reproof that will not come softly.'

'The youngest must be spoilt,' said Flora, 'that's an ordinance of nature. It ends when a boy goes to school, and when a girl—'

'When?'

'When she marries—or when she finds out what trouble is,' said Flora.

'Is that all you can hold out to my poor Daisy?'

'Well, it is the way of the world. There is just now a reaction from sentiment, and it is the less feminine variety. The softness will come when there is a call for it. Never mind when the foundation is safe.'

'If I could only see that child heartily admiring and looking up! I don't mean love—there used to be a higher, nobler reverence!'

'Such as you and Norman used to bestow on Shakespeare and Scott, and—the vision of Cocksmoor.'

'Not only used,' said Ethel.

'Yes, it is your soft side,' said Flora; 'it is what answers the purpose of sentiment in people like you. It is what I should have thought living with you would have put into any girl; but Gertrude has a satirical side, and she follows the age.'

'I wish you would tell her so—it is what she especially wants not to do! But the spirit of opposition is not the thing to cause tenderness.'

'No, you must wait for something to bring it out. She is very kind to my poor little Margaret, and I won't ask how she talks of her.'

'Tenderly; oh yes, that she always would do.'

'There, then, Ethel, if she can talk tenderly of Margaret, there can't be much amiss at the root.'

'No; and you don't overwhelm the naughty girl with baby talk.'

'Like our happy, proud young mothers,' sighed Flora; and then letting herself out—'but indeed, Ethel, Margaret is very much improved. She has really begun to wish to be good. I think she is struggling with herself.'

'Something to love tenderly, something to reverence highly.' So meditated Ethel, as she watched her sunny-haired, open-faced Daisy, so unconquerably gay and joyous that she gave the impression of sunshine without shade. There are stages of youth that are in themselves unpleasing, and yet that are nobody's fault, nay, which may have within them seeds of strength. Tom's satire had fostered Daisy's too congenial spirit, and he reaped the consequence in the want of repose and sympathy that were driving him from home, and shutting him up within himself. Would he ever forgive that flippant saying, which Ethel had recollected with shame ever since—shame more for herself than for the child, who probably had forgotten, long ago, her 'shaft at random sent'?