That moment of naturalness was the crystallizing feather-touch: itshook flirtation into love. Remember that the ambitious man who waslooking at those Forget-me-nots under the water was very warm-heartedand rash. He did not know where the chain went; an idea had thrilledthrough the recesses within him which had a miraculous effect in raisingthe power of passionate love lying buried there in no sealed sepulchre,but under the lightest, easily pierced mould. His words were quite abruptand awkward; but the tone made them sound like an ardent, appealingavowal.
"What is the matter? you are distressed. Tell me, pray."
Rosamond had never been spoken to in such tones before. I am notsure that she knew what the words were: but she looked at Lydgate andthe tears fell over her cheeks. There could have been no more completeanswer than that silence, and Lydgate, forgetting everything else,completely mastered by the outrush of tenderness at the sudden beliefthat this sweet young creature depended on him for her joy, actually puthis arms round her, folding her gently and protectingly—he was used tobeing gentle with the weak and suffering—and kissed each of the twolarge tears. This was a strange way of arriving at an understanding, butit was a short way. Rosamond was not angry, but she moved backward alittle in timid happiness, and Lydgate could now sit near her and speakless incompletely. Rosamond had to make her little confession, and hepoured out words of gratitude and tenderness with impulsive lavishment.In half an hour he left the house an engaged man, whose soul was nothis own, but the woman's to whom he had bound himself.
He came again in the evening to speak with Mr. Vincy, who, justreturned from Stone Court, was feeling sure that it would not be longbefore he heard of Mr. Featherstone's demise. The felicitous word"demise," which had seasonably occurred to him, had raised his spiritseven above their usual evening pitch. The right word is always a power,and communicates its definiteness to our action. Considered as a demise,old Featherstone's death assumed a merely legal aspect, so that Mr.Vincy could tap his snuff-box over it and be jovial, without even anintermittent affectation of solemnity; and Mr. Vincy hated bothsolemnity and affectation. Who was ever awe struck about a testator, orsang a hymn on the title to real property? Mr. Vincy was inclined to takea jovial view of all things that evening: he even observed to Lydgate thatFred had got the family constitution after all, and would soon be as finea fellow as ever again; and when his approbation of Rosamond'sengagement was asked for, he gave it with astonishing facility, passing atonce to general remarks on the desirableness of matrimony for youngmen and maidens, and apparently deducing from the whole theappropriateness of a little more punch.
CHAPTER XXXII.
"They'll take suggestion as a cat laps milk."
—SHAKESPEARE: Tempest.
The triumphant confidence of the Mayor founded on Mr.Featherstone's insistent demand that Fred and his mother should notleave him, was a feeble emotion compared with all that was agitating thebreasts of the old man's blood-relations, who naturally manifested moretheir sense of the family tie and were more visibly numerous now that hehad become bedridden. Naturally: for when "poor Peter" had occupiedhis arm-chair in the wainscoted parlor, no assiduous beetles for whomthe cook prepares boiling water could have been less welcome on ahearth which they had reasons for preferring, than those persons whoseFeatherstone blood was ill-nourished, not from penuriousness on theirpart, but from poverty. Brother Solomon and Sister Jane were rich, andthe family candor and total abstinence from false politeness with whichthey were always received seemed to them no argument that theirbrother in the solemn act of making his will would overlook the superiorclaims of wealth. Themselves at least he had never been unnaturalenough to banish from his house, and it seemed hardly eccentric that heshould have kept away Brother Jonah, Sister Martha, and the rest, whohad no shadow of such claims. They knew Peter's maxim, that moneywas a good egg, and should be laid in a warm nest.
But Brother Jonah, Sister Martha, and all the needy exiles, held adifferent point of view. Probabilities are as various as the faces to beseen at will in fretwork or paper-hangings: every form is there, fromJupiter to Judy, if you only look with creative inclination. To the poorerand least favored it seemed likely that since Peter had done nothing forthem in his life, he would remember them at the last. Jonah argued thatmen liked to make a surprise of their wills, while Martha said thatnobody need be surprised if he left the best part of his money to thosewho least expected it. Also it was not to be thought but that an ownbrother "lying there" with dropsy in his legs must come to feel that bloodwas thicker than water, and if he didn't alter his will, he might havemoney by him. At any rate some blood-relations should be on thepremises and on the watch against those who were hardly relations atall. Such things had been known as forged wills and disputed wills,which seemed to have the golden-hazy advantage of somehow enablingnon-legatees to live out of them. Again, those who were no blood-relations might be caught making away with things—and poor Peter"lying there" helpless! Somebody should be on the watch. But in thisconclusion they were at one with Solomon and Jane; also, some nephews,nieces, and cousins, arguing with still greater subtilty as to what mightbe done by a man able to "will away" his property and give himself largetreats of oddity, felt in a handsome sort of way that there was a familyinterest to be attended to, and thought of Stone Court as a place which itwould be nothing but right for them to visit. Sister Martha, otherwiseMrs. Cranch, living with some wheeziness in the Chalky Flats, could notundertake the journey; but her son, as being poor Peter's own nephew,could represent her advantageously, and watch lest his uncle Jonahshould make an unfair use of the improbable things which seemed likelyto happen. In fact there was a general sense running in the Featherstoneblood that everybody must watch everybody else, and that it would bewell for everybody else to reflect that the Almighty was watching him.
Thus Stone Court continually saw one or other blood-relationalighting or departing, and Mary Garth had the unpleasant task ofcarrying their messages to Mr. Featherstone, who would see none ofthem, and sent her down with the still more unpleasant task of tellingthem so. As manager of the household she felt bound to ask them ingood provincial fashion to stay and eat; but she chose to consult Mrs.Vincy on the point of extra down-stairs consumption now that Mr.Featherstone was laid up.
"Oh, my dear, you must do things handsomely where there's lastillness and a property. God knows, I don't grudge them every ham in thehouse—only, save the best for the funeral. Have some stuffed vealalways, and a fine cheese in cut. You must expect to keep open house inthese last illnesses," said liberal Mrs. Vincy, once more of cheerful noteand bright plumage.
But some of the visitors alighted and did not depart after thehandsome treating to veal and ham. Brother Jonah, for example (thereare such unpleasant people in most families; perhaps even in the highestaristocracy there are Brobdingnag specimens, gigantically in debt andbloated at greater expense)—Brother Jonah, I say, having come down inthe world, was mainly supported by a calling which he was modestenough not to boast of, though it was much better than swindling eitheron exchange or turf, but which did not require his presence at Brassingso long as he had a good corner to sit in and a supply of food. He chosethe kitchen-corner, partly because he liked it best, and partly because hedid not want to sit with Solomon, concerning whom he had a strongbrotherly opinion. Seated in a famous arm-chair and in his best suit,constantly within sight of good cheer, he had a comfortableconsciousness of being on the premises, mingled with fleetingsuggestions of Sunday and the bar at the Green Man; and he informedMary Garth that he should not go out of reach of his brother Peter whilethat poor fellow was above ground. The troublesome ones in a family areusually either the wits or the idiots. Jonah was the wit among theFeatherstones, and joked with the maid-servants when they came aboutthe hearth, but seemed to consider Miss Garth a suspicious character,and followed her with cold eyes.
Mary would have borne this one pair of eyes with comparative ease,but unfortunately there was young Cranch, who, having come all the wayfrom the Chalky Flats to represent his mother and watch his uncle Jonah,also felt it his duty to stay and to sit chiefly in the kitchen to give hisuncle company. Young Cranch was not exactly the balancing pointbetween the wit and the idiot,—verging slightly towards the latter type,and squinting so as to leave everything in doubt about his sentimentsexcept that they were not of a forcible character. When Mary Garthentered the kitchen and Mr. Jonah Featherstone began to follow her withhis cold detective eyes, young Cranch turning his head in the samedirection seemed to insist on it that she should remark how he wassquinting, as if he did it with design, like the gypsies when Borrow readthe New Testament to them. This was rather too much for poor Mary;sometimes it made her bilious, sometimes it upset her gravity. One daythat she had an opportunity she could not resist describing the kitchenscene to Fred, who would not be hindered from immediately going to seeit, affecting simply to pass through. But no sooner did he face the foureyes than he had to rush through the nearest door which happened tolead to the dairy, and there under the high roof and among the pans hegave way to laughter which made a hollow resonance perfectly audible inthe kitchen. He fled by another doorway, but Mr. Jonah, who had notbefore seen Fred's white complexion, long legs, and pinched delicacy offace, prepared many sarcasms in which these points of appearance werewittily combined with the lowest moral attributes.
"Why, Tom, you don't wear such gentlemanly trousers—you haven'tgot half such fine long legs," said Jonah to his nephew, winking at thesame time, to imply that there was something more in these statementsthan their undeniableness. Tom looked at his legs, but left it uncertainwhether he preferred his moral advantages to a more vicious length oflimb and reprehensible gentility of trouser.
In the large wainscoted parlor too there were constantly pairs of eyeson the watch, and own relatives eager to be "sitters-up." Many came,lunched, and departed, but Brother Solomon and the lady who had beenJane Featherstone for twenty-five years before she was Mrs. Waule foundit good to be there every day for hours, without other calculableoccupation than that of observing the cunning Mary Garth (who was sodeep that she could be found out in nothing) and giving occasional drywrinkly indications of crying—as if capable of torrents in a wetterseason—at the thought that they were not allowed to go into Mr.Featherstone's room. For the old man's dislike of his own family seemedto get stronger as he got less able to amuse himself by saying bitingthings to them. Too languid to sting, he had the more venom refluent inhis blood.
Not fully believing the message sent through Mary Garth, they hadpresented themselves together within the door of the bedroom, both inblack—Mrs. Waule having a white handkerchief partially unfolded in herhand—and both with faces in a sort of half-mourning purple; while Mrs.Vincy with her pink cheeks and pink ribbons flying was actuallyadministering a cordial to their own brother, and the light-complexionedFred, his short hair curling as might be expected in a gambler's, waslolling at his ease in a large chair.
Old Featherstone no sooner caught sight of these funereal figuresappearing in spite of his orders than rage came to strengthen him moresuccessfully than the cordial. He was propped up on a bed-rest, andalways had his gold-headed stick lying by him. He seized it now andswept it backwards and forwards in as large an area as he could,apparently to ban these ugly spectres, crying in a hoarse sort ofscreech—
"Back, back, Mrs. Waule! Back, Solomon!"
"Oh, Brother. Peter," Mrs. Waule began—but Solomon put his handbefore her repressingly. He was a large-cheeked man, nearly seventy,with small furtive eyes, and was not only of much blander temper butthought himself much deeper than his brother Peter; indeed not likely tobe deceived in any of his fellow-men, inasmuch as they could not well bemore greedy and deceitful than he suspected them of being. Even theinvisible powers, he thought, were likely to be soothed by a blandparenthesis here and there—coming from a man of property, who mighthave been as impious as others.
"Brother Peter," he said, in a wheedling yet gravely official tone, "It'snothing but right I should speak to you about the Three Crofts and theManganese. The Almighty knows what I've got on my mind—"
"Then he knows more than I want to know," said Peter, laying downhis stick with a show of truce which had a threat in it too, for hereversed the stick so as to make the gold handle a club in case of closerfighting, and looked hard at Solomon's bald head.
"There's things you might repent of, Brother, for want of speaking tome," said Solomon, not advancing, however. "I could sit up with you to-night, and Jane with me, willingly, and you might take your own time tospeak, or let me speak."
"Yes, I shall take my own time—you needn't offer me yours," saidPeter.
"But you can't take your own time to die in, Brother," began Mrs.Waule, with her usual woolly tone. "And when you lie speechless youmay be tired of having strangers about you, and you may think of meand my children"—but here her voice broke under the touching thoughtwhich she was attributing to her speechless brother; the mention ofourselves being naturally affecting.
"No, I shan't," said old Featherstone, contradictiously. "I shan't thinkof any of you. I've made my will, I tell you, I've made my will." Here heturned his head towards Mrs. Vincy, and swallowed some more of hiscordial.
"Some people would be ashamed to fill up a place belonging by rightsto others," said Mrs. Waule, turning her narrow eyes in the samedirection.
"Oh, sister," said Solomon, with ironical softness, "you and me arenot fine, and handsome, and clever enough: we must be humble and letsmart people push themselves before us."
