The Old Helmet. Volume I

Comfort was not near, however. Jane waked up in a violent fit of coughing; and when that was subdued or died away, as difficult a fit of restlessness was left behind. She was nervous and uneasy; Eleanor had only too much sympathy with both moods, nevertheless she acted the part of a kind and delicate nurse; soothed Jane and ministered to her, even spoke cheerful words; until the poor girl's exhausted mind and body sank away again into slumber, and Eleanor was free to sit down on the hearth and fold her hands.

Then she began to think. Not till then. Indeed what she did then at first was not to think, but to recall in musing all the scenes and as far as possible all the words of that evening; with a consciousness behind this all the while that there was hard thinking coming. Eleanor went dreamily over the last few hours, looking in turn at each image so stamped upon her memory; felt over again the sermon, the hymns, the prayers; then suddenly broke from her musings to face this consciousness that was menacing her. Set herself to think in earnest.

What was it all about? Eleanor might well have shunned it, might well grasp it in desperation with a sudden inability to put it off any longer. Down in her heart, as strong as the keep of an old castle, and as obstinate-looking, was the feeling – "I do not want to marry Mr. Carlisle." Eleanor did not immediately discern its full outline and proportions, in the dim confusion which filled her heart; but a little steady looking revealed it, revealed it firm and clear and established there. "I do not want to marry him – I will not marry him" – she found the words surging up from this stronghold. Pride and ambition cowering somewhere said, "Not ever? Do you mean, not at all? not ever?" – "Not ever!" – was the uncompromising answer; and Eleanor's head dropped in agony. "Why?" was the next question. And the answer was clear and strong and ready. "I am bent upon another sort of life than his life – I am going another way – I must live for aims and objects which he will hate and thwart and maybe hinder – I will not walk with him in his way – I cannot walk with him in mine – I cannot, oh, I do not wish, to walk with him at all!" Eleanor sat face to face with this blank consciousness, staring at it, and feeling as if the life was gradually ebbing out of her. What was she to do? The different life and temper and character, and even the face, of Mr. Rhys, came up to her as so much nobler, so much better, so much more what a man should be, so much more worthy of being liked. But Eleanor strove to put that image away, as having very truly, she said to herself, nothing to do with the present question. However, she thought she could not marry Mr. Carlisle; and intrenched herself a little while in that position, until the next subject came up for consideration; how she could escape from it? What reason could be assigned? Only this religious one could be given – and it might be, it might well be, that Mr. Carlisle would not on his part consider that reason enough. He would certainly hope to overcome the foundation on which it stood; and if he could not, Eleanor was obliged to confess to herself that she believed he loved her to that degree that he would rather have her a religious wife than not his wife at all. What should Eleanor do? Was she not bound? had she not herself given him claims over her which she had no right to disallow? had he not a right to all her fulfilment of them? Eleanor did not love him as he loved her; she saw that with singular and sudden distinctness; but there again, when she thought of that as a reason for not fulfilling her contract, she was obliged to own that it would be no reason to Mr. Carlisle. He never had had ground to suppose that Eleanor gave him more than she had expressed; but he was entirely content with what he had and his own confidence that he could cultivate it into what he pleased. There was no shaking loose from him in that way. As Eleanor sat on the hearth and looked at the ashes, in reality looking at Mr. Carlisle, her own face grew wan at what she saw there. She could give him no reason for changing their relations to each other, that would make him hold her a bit the less closely, no, nor the less fondly. What could Eleanor do? To go on and be Mr. Carlisle's wife, if necessary; give him all the observance and regard that she could, that she owed him, for having put herself in a false position where she could not give him more; – Eleanor saw nothing else before her. But one thing beside she would do. She would make Mr. Carlisle clearly and fully understand what sort of a woman he must expect in her. She would explain thoroughly what sort of a life she meant to lead. Justly stated, what would that be?

Eleanor thought; and found herself determined, heart and soul, to follow the path of life laid before her that evening. Whether "peace" could visit her, in the course that seemed to lie through her future prospects, Eleanor much doubted; but at any rate she would have the rest of a satisfied conscience. She would take the Bible for her rule. Mr. Rhys's God should be her God, and with all she had of power and ability she would serve him. Dim as religious things still were to her vision, one thing was not dim, but shiningly clear; the duty of every creature to live the devoted servant of that Lord to whom he belongs by creation and redemption both. Here Eleanor's heart fixed, if it had a fixed point that tumultuous night; but long before it settled anywhere her thoughts were bathed in bitter tears; in floods of weeping that seemed fit to wash her very heart away. It occurred to Eleanor, if they could, how much trouble would be saved! She saw plenty before her. But there was the gripe of a fear and a wish upon her heart, that overmastered all others. The people had sung a hymn that evening, after the first one; a hymn of Christian gladness and strength, to an air as spirited as the words. Both words and air rang in her mind, through all the multifarious thoughts she was thinking; they floated through and sounded behind them like a strain of the blessed. Eleanor had taken one glance at Mr. Rhys while it was singing; and the remembrance of his face stung her as the sight of an angel might have done. The counter recollection of her own misery in the summer at the time she was ill; the longing want of that security and hope and consequent rest of mind, was vividly with her too. Pushed by fear and desire, Eleanor's resolution was taken. She saw not the way clear, she did not know yet the "wicket-gate" towards which Bunyan's Pilgrim was directed; like him however she resolved to "keep the light in her eye, and run."

The fire had died all out; the grey ashes were cold; she was very cold herself, but did not know it. The night had waned away, and a light had sprung in at the window which Eleanor thought must be the dawn. It was not; it was the old moon just risen, and struggling through the fog. But the moon was the herald of dawn; and Eleanor got up from the hearth, feeling old and stiff; as if she had suddenly put on twenty years of age more than she came to the village with. The room was quite too cold for Jane, she remembered; and softly she went up and down for kindling and lighted up the fire again. Till she had done that, she felt grey and stern, like the November morning; but when the fire crackled and sparkled before her, and gave its cheery look and comforting warmth to her chilled senses, some curious sympathy with times that were gone and that she dared not hope to see again, smote Eleanor with a softer sorrow; and she wept a very rain of new tears. These did her good; they washed some of the bitterness out of her; and after that she sat thinking how she should manage; when Mr. Rhys's parting words suddenly recurred to her. A blanker ignorance how they should be followed, can scarcely be imagined, in a person of general sense and knowledge. Nevertheless, she bowed herself on the hearth, surely not more in form than in feeling, and besought of that One whose aid she knew not how to ask, that he would yet give it to her and fulfil all her desires. Eleanor was exhausted then. She sat in a stupor of resting, till the faint illumination of the moon was really replaced by a growing and broadening light of day. The night was gone.

CHAPTER IX.

IN PERPLEXITIES

"Look, a horse at the door,And little King Charles is snarling;Go back, my lord, across the moor,You are not her darling."

Eleanor set out early to go home. She would not wait to be sent for. The walk might set her pulses in motion again perhaps. The fog was breaking away under the sun's rays, but it had left everything wet; the morning was excessively chill. There was no grass in her way however, and Eleanor's thick shoes did not fear the road, nor her feet the three miles of way. The walk was good. It could not be said to be pleasant; yet action of any kind was grateful and helpful. She saw not a creature till she got home.

Home struck her with new sorrow, in the sense of the disappointment she was going to bring to so many there. She made her own room without having to speak to anybody; bathed and dressed for breakfast. How grave her face was, this morning! She could not help that. And she felt that it grew graver, when entering the breakfast room she found Mr. Carlisle there.

"What have you done to yourself?" said he after they were seated at the breakfast table.

"Taken a walk this morning."

"Judicious! in this air, which is like a suspended shower-bath! Where did you go?"

"On the Wiglands road."

"If I had come in time, I should have taken you up before me, and cut short such a proceeding. Mrs. Powle, you do not make use of your authority."

"Seems hardly worth while, when it is on the point of expiring," said Mrs. Powle blandly, with a smiling face.

"Why Eleanor had to come home," said Julia; "she spent the night in the village. She could not help walking – unless mamma had sent the carriage or something for her."

"Spent the night in the village!" said Mr. Carlisle.

"Eleanor took it into her head that she must go to take care of a sick girl there – the daughter of her nurse. It is great foolishness, I think, but Eleanor will do it."

"It don't agree with her very well," said Julia. "How you do look, Eleanor, this morning!"

"She looks very well," said the Squire – "for all I see. Walking won't hurt her."

What Mr. Carlisle thought he did not say. When breakfast was over he drew Eleanor off into the library.

"How do you do this morning?" said he stopping to look at her.

"Not very well."

"I came early, to give you a great gallop to the other end of the moor – where you wished to go the other day. You are not fit for it now?"

"Hardly."

"Did you sit up with that girl last night?

"I sat up. She did not want much done for her. My being there was a great comfort to her."

"Far too great a comfort. You are a naughty child. Do you fancy, Eleanor, your husband will allow you to do such things?"

"I must try to do what is right, Macintosh."

"Do you not think it will be right that you should pleasure me in what I ask of you?" he said very gently and with a caressing action which took away the edge of the words.

"Yes – in things that are right," said Eleanor, who felt that she owed him all gentleness because of the wrong she had done.

"I shall not ask you anything that is not right; but if I should, – the responsibility of your doing wrong will rest on me. Now do you feel inclined to practise obedience a little to day?"

"No, not at all," said Eleanor honestly, her blood rousing.

"It will be all the better practice. You must go and lie down and rest carefully, and get ready to ride with me this afternoon, if the weather will do. Eh, Eleanor?"

"I do not think I shall want to ride to-day."

"Kiss me, and say you will do as I bid you."

Eleanor obeyed, and went to her room feeling wretched. She must find some way quickly to alter this state of things – if she could alter them. In the mean time she had promised to rest. It was a comfort to lock the door and feel that for hours at any rate she was alone from all the world. But Eleanor's heart fainted. She lay down, and for a long time remained in motionless passive dismay; then nature asserted her rights and she slept.

If sleep did not quite "knit up the ravelled sleeve of care" for her, Eleanor yet felt much less ragged when she came out of her slumber. There was some physical force now to meet the mental demand. The first thing demanded was a letter to Mr. Carlisle. It was in vain to think to tell him in spoken words what she wanted him to know; he would cut them short or turn them aside as soon as he perceived their drift, before she could at all possess him with the facts of the case. Eleanor sat down before dressing, to write her letter, so that no call might break her off until it was done.

It was a weary, anxious, sorrowful writing; done with some tears and some mute prayers for help; with images constantly starting into her mind that she had to put aside together with the hot drops they called forth. The letter was finished, when Eleanor was informed that Mr. Carlisle waited for her.

"To ride, I suppose," she thought. "I will not go." She put on a house dress and went down to the library, where her mother and Mr. Carlisle were together; looking both of them so well pleased!

"You are not dressed for riding!" he said, taking her into his arms.

"As you see," returned Eleanor.

"I have brought a new horse for you. Will you change your dress?"

"I think not. I am not equal to anything new."

"Have you slept?"

"Yes, but I have not eaten; and it takes both to make muscle. I cannot even talk to you till after tea."

"Have you had no luncheon?"

"I was asleep."

"Mrs. Powle," said the gentleman, "you do not take care of my interests here. May I request you to have this want supplied – I am going to take Eleanor a great gallop presently; she must have something first." He put Eleanor in an easy chair as he spoke, and stood looking at her. Probably he saw some unusual lines of thought or care about the face, but it was by no means less fine for that. Mr. Carlisle liked what he saw. Refreshments came; and he poured out chocolate for her and served her with an affectionate supervision that watched every item. But when after a very moderate meal Eleanor's hand was stretched out for another piece of bread, he stopped her.

"No," he said; "no more now. Now go and put on your habit."

"But I am very hungry," said Eleanor.

"No matter – you will forget it in five minutes. Go and put on your habit."

Eleanor hesitated; thought that perhaps after all the ride would be the easiest way of passing the afternoon; and went.

"Well you do understand the art of command," said Mrs. Powle admiringly. "She would never have done that for me."

Mr. Carlisle did not look surprised, nor gratified, nor in fact shew anything whatever in his looks. Unless it were, that the difference of effects produced by himself and his future mother-in-law, was very much a matter of course. He stood before the fire, with no change at all in his clear hazel eyes, until Eleanor appeared. Then they sparkled. Eleanor was for some reason or other particularly lovely in his eyes to-day.

The horse he had brought for her was a superb Arabian, shewing nerve and fire in every line of his form and starting muscle, from the tips of the ears down to the long fetlock and beautiful hoof. Shewing fire in the bright eye too. A brown creature, with luxuriant flowing mane and tail.

"He is not quite so quiet as Black Maggie," Mr. Carlisle said as he put Eleanor upon his back; "and you must not curb him, Eleanor, or he will run."

They went to the moor; and by degrees getting wonted to her fiery charger and letting him display his fine paces and increase his speed, Eleanor found the sensation very inspiriting. Even Black Maggie was not an animal like this; every motion was instinct with life and power, and not a little indication of headstrongness and irritability gave a great additional interest and excitement to the pleasure of managing him. Mr. Carlisle watched her carefully, Eleanor knew; he praised her handling. He himself was mounted on a quiet, powerful creature that did not make much shew.

"If this fellow – what is his name?"

"Tippoo Sultan."

"If he were by any chance to run – would that horse you are riding keep up with him?"

"I hope you will not try."

"I don't mean it – but I am curious. There, Mr. Carlisle, there is the place where I was thrown."

"A villainous looking place. I wish it was mine. How do you like Tippoo?"

"Oh, he is delightful!"

Mr. Carlisle looked satisfied, as he might; for Eleanor's colour had become brilliant, and her face had changed greatly since setting out. Strength and courage and hope seemed to come to her on Tippoo's back, facing the wind on the moor and gallopping over the wild, free way. They took in part the route Eleanor had followed that day alone, coming back through the village by a still wider circuit. As they rode more moderately along the little street, if it could be called so – the houses were all on one side – Eleanor saw Mr. Rhys standing at Mrs. Lewis's door; he saw her. Involuntarily her bow in return to his salutation was very low. At the same instant Tippoo started, on a run to which all his former gallopping had been a gentle amble. This was not ungentle; the motion had nothing rough; only Eleanor was going in a straight line over the ground at a rate that took away her breath. She had presence of mind not to draw the curb rein, but she felt that she could hardly endure long the sort of progress she was making through the air. It did not seem to be on the ground. Her curiosity was gratified on one point; for after the first instant she found Mr. Carlisle's powerful grey straining close beside her. Nevertheless Tippoo was so entirely in earnest that it was some little time – it seemed a very long one – before the grey could get so close to the brown and so far up with him that Mr. Carlisle could lay his hand upon the thick brown mane of Tippoo and stoop forward to speak to him. As soon as that was done once or twice, Tippoo's speed gradually relaxed; and a perseverance in his master's appeals to his reason and sense of duty, brought the wild creature back to a moderate pace and the air of a civilized horse. Mr. Carlisle transferred his grasp from the mane to Eleanor's hand.

"Eleanor, what did you do that for?"

"Do what? I did nothing."

"You curbed him. You drew the rein, and he considered himself insulted.

I told you he would not bear it."

"He has had nothing to bear from me. I have not drawn the curb at all, Robert."

"I must contradict you. I saw you do it. That started him."

Eleanor remained silent and a little pale. Was Mr. Carlisle right? The ride had until then done her a great deal of good; roused up her energies and restored in some degree her spirit; the involuntary race together with the sudden sight of Mr. Rhys, had the effect to bring back all the soberness which for the moment the delight and stir of the exercise had dissipated. She went on pondering various things. Eleanor's letter to Mr. Carlisle was in the pocket of her habit, ready for use; she determined to give it him when he left her that evening; that was one of her subjects of thought. Accordingly he found her very abstracted and cold the rest of the way; grave and uninterested. He fancied she might have been startled by her run on Tippoo's back, though it was not very like her; but he did not know what to fancy. And true it is, that a remembrance of fear had come up to Eleanor after that gallop. Afraid she was not, at the time; but she felt that she had been in a condition of some peril from which her own forces could not have extricated her; that brought up other considerations, and sadly in Eleanor's mind some words of the hymn they had sung last night in the barn floated over among her thoughts:

"When I can read my title clear, To mansions in the skies, I'll bid farewell to every fear, And wipe my weeping eyes."

Very simple words; words that to some ears have become trite with repetition; but thoughts that went down into the depths of Eleanor's heart and garrisoned themselves there, beyond the power of any attacks to dislodge. Her gravity and indifference piqued Mr. Carlisle, curiosity and affection both. He spent the evening in trying to overcome them; with very partial success. When he was leaving her, Eleanor drew the letter from her pocket.

"What is this?" said he taking it.

"Only a letter for you."

"From you! The consideration of that must not be postponed." He broke the seal. "Come, sit down again. I will read it here."

"Not now! Take it home, Macintosh, and read it there. Let it wait so long."

"Why?"

"Never mind why. Do! Because I ask you."

"I don't believe I can understand it without you beside me," said he smiling, and drawing the letter from its envelope while he looked at her.

"But there is everybody here," said Eleanor glancing at another part of the room where the rest of the family were congregated. "I would rather you took it home with you."

"It is something that requires serious treatment?"

"Yes."

"You are a wise little thing," said he, "and I will take your advice." He put the letter in his pocket; then took Eleanor's hand upon his arm and walked her off to the library. Nobody was there; lamplight and firelight were warm and bright. Mr. Carlisle placed his charge in an easy chair by the library table, much to her disappointment; drew another close beside it, and sat down with his arm over the back of hers to read the letter. Thus it ran:

"It is right you should know a change which has taken place in me since the time when I first became known to you. I have changed very much, though it is a change perhaps which you will not believe in; yet I feel that it makes me very different from my old self, and alters entirely my views of almost everything. Life and life's affairs – and aims – do not look to me as they looked a few months ago; if indeed I could be said to have taken any view at all of them then. They were little more than names to me, I believe. They are great realities now.

"I do not know how to tell you in what this change in me consists, for I doubt you will neither like it nor believe in it. Yet you mustbelieve in it; for I am not the woman I was a little while ago; not the woman you think me now. If I suffered you to go on as you are, in ignorance of it, I should be deceiving you. I have opened my eyes to the fact that this life is not the end of life. I see another beyond, – much more lasting, unknown, strange, perhaps not very distant. The thought of it presses upon me like a cloud. I want to be ready for it – I feel I am not ready – and that before I can be ready, not only my views but my character must be changed. I am determined it shall. For, Mr. Carlisle, there is a Ruler whose government extends over this life and that, whose requisitions I have never met, whose commands I have never obeyed, whom consequently I fear; and until this fear is changed for another feeling I cannot be happy. I will not live the life I have been leading; careless and thoughtless; I will be the servant of this Ruler whom hitherto I have disregarded. Whatever his commands are, those I will follow; at all costs, at any sacrifice; whatever I have or possess shall be used for his service. One thing I desire; to be a true servant of God, and not fear his face in displeasure. To secure that, I will let everything else in the world go.

"I wish you to understand this thoroughly. It will draw on consequences that you would not like. It will make me such a woman as you would not, I feel, wish your wife to be. I shall follow a course of life and action that in many things, I know, would be extremely distasteful to you. Yet I must follow them – I can do no other – I dare do no other. I cannot live as I have lived. No, not for any reward or consideration that could be offered me. Nor to avoid any human anger.

"I think you would probably choose never to see me at the Priory, rather than to see me there such a woman as I shall be. In that case I shall be very sorry for all the disagreeable consequences which would to you attend the annulling of the contract formed between us. My own part of them I am ready to bear.

"ELEANOR POWLE."