John Halifax [10]
returned; he threw his battered cap high up in the air, and shouted out, "Hurrah!"--a thorough boy.
And I, in my poor, quavering voice, shouted too.
CHAPTER III
When I was young, and long after then, at intervals, I had the very useless, sometimes harmful, and invariably foolish habit of keeping a diary. To me, at least, it has been less foolish and harmful than to most; and out of it, together with much drawn out of the stores of a memory, made preternaturally vivid by a long introverted life, which, colourless itself, had nothing to do but to reflect and retain clear images of the lives around it--out of these two sources I have compiled the present history.
Therein, necessarily, many blank epochs occur. These I shall not try to fill up, but merely resume the thread of narration as recollection serves.
Thus, after this first day, many days came and went before I again saw John Halifax--almost before I again thought of him. For it was one of my seasons of excessive pain; when I found it difficult to think of anything beyond those four grey-painted walls; where morning, noon, and night slipped wearily away, marked by no changes, save from daylight to candle-light, from candle-light to dawn.
Afterwards, as my pain abated, I began to be haunted by occasional memories of something pleasant that had crossed my dreary life; visions of a brave, bright young face, ready alike to battle with and enjoy the world. I could hear the voice that, speaking to me, was always tender with pity--yet not pity enough to wound: I could see the peculiar smile just creeping round his grave mouth--that irrepressible smile, indicating the atmosphere of thorough heart-cheerfulness, which ripens all the fruits of a noble nature, and without which the very noblest has about it something unwholesome, blank, and cold.
I wondered if John had ever asked for me. At length I put the question.
Jael "thought he had--but wasn't sure. Didn't bother her head about such folk."
"If he asked again, might he come up-stairs?"
"No."
I was too weak to combat, and Jael was too strong an adversary; so I lay for days and days in my sick room, often thinking, but never speaking, about the lad. Never once asking for him to come to me; not though it would have been life to me to see his merry face--I longed after him so.
At last I broke the bonds of sickness--which Jael always riveted as long and as tightly as she could--and plunged into the outer world again.
It was one market-day--Jael being absent--that I came down-stairs. A soft, bright, autumn morning, mild as spring, coaxing a wandering robin to come and sing to me, loud as a quire of birds, out of the thinned trees of the Abbey yard. I opened the window to hear him, though all the while in mortal fear of Jael. I listened, but caught no tone of her sharp voice, which usually came painfully from the back regions of the house; it would ill have harmonised with the sweet autumn day and the robin's song. I sat, idly thinking so, and wondering whether it were a necessary and universal fact that human beings, unlike the year, should become harsh and unlovely as they grow old.
My robin had done singing, and I amused myself with watching a spot of scarlet winding down the rural road, our house being on the verge where Norton Bury melted into "the country." It turned out to be the cloak of a well-to-do young farmer's wife riding to market in her cart beside her jolly-looking spouse. Very spruce and self-satisfied she appeared, and the market-people turned to stare after her, for her costume was a novelty then. Doubtless, many thought as I did, how much prettier was scarlet than duffle grey.
Behind the farmer's cart came another, which at first I scarcely noticed, being engrossed by the ruddy face under the red cloak. The farmer himself nodded good-humouredly, but Mrs. Scarlet-cloak turned up her nose. "Oh, pride, pride!" I thought, amused, and watched the two carts, the second of which was with difficulty passing the farmer's, on the opposite side of the narrow
And I, in my poor, quavering voice, shouted too.
CHAPTER III
When I was young, and long after then, at intervals, I had the very useless, sometimes harmful, and invariably foolish habit of keeping a diary. To me, at least, it has been less foolish and harmful than to most; and out of it, together with much drawn out of the stores of a memory, made preternaturally vivid by a long introverted life, which, colourless itself, had nothing to do but to reflect and retain clear images of the lives around it--out of these two sources I have compiled the present history.
Therein, necessarily, many blank epochs occur. These I shall not try to fill up, but merely resume the thread of narration as recollection serves.
Thus, after this first day, many days came and went before I again saw John Halifax--almost before I again thought of him. For it was one of my seasons of excessive pain; when I found it difficult to think of anything beyond those four grey-painted walls; where morning, noon, and night slipped wearily away, marked by no changes, save from daylight to candle-light, from candle-light to dawn.
Afterwards, as my pain abated, I began to be haunted by occasional memories of something pleasant that had crossed my dreary life; visions of a brave, bright young face, ready alike to battle with and enjoy the world. I could hear the voice that, speaking to me, was always tender with pity--yet not pity enough to wound: I could see the peculiar smile just creeping round his grave mouth--that irrepressible smile, indicating the atmosphere of thorough heart-cheerfulness, which ripens all the fruits of a noble nature, and without which the very noblest has about it something unwholesome, blank, and cold.
I wondered if John had ever asked for me. At length I put the question.
Jael "thought he had--but wasn't sure. Didn't bother her head about such folk."
"If he asked again, might he come up-stairs?"
"No."
I was too weak to combat, and Jael was too strong an adversary; so I lay for days and days in my sick room, often thinking, but never speaking, about the lad. Never once asking for him to come to me; not though it would have been life to me to see his merry face--I longed after him so.
At last I broke the bonds of sickness--which Jael always riveted as long and as tightly as she could--and plunged into the outer world again.
It was one market-day--Jael being absent--that I came down-stairs. A soft, bright, autumn morning, mild as spring, coaxing a wandering robin to come and sing to me, loud as a quire of birds, out of the thinned trees of the Abbey yard. I opened the window to hear him, though all the while in mortal fear of Jael. I listened, but caught no tone of her sharp voice, which usually came painfully from the back regions of the house; it would ill have harmonised with the sweet autumn day and the robin's song. I sat, idly thinking so, and wondering whether it were a necessary and universal fact that human beings, unlike the year, should become harsh and unlovely as they grow old.
My robin had done singing, and I amused myself with watching a spot of scarlet winding down the rural road, our house being on the verge where Norton Bury melted into "the country." It turned out to be the cloak of a well-to-do young farmer's wife riding to market in her cart beside her jolly-looking spouse. Very spruce and self-satisfied she appeared, and the market-people turned to stare after her, for her costume was a novelty then. Doubtless, many thought as I did, how much prettier was scarlet than duffle grey.
Behind the farmer's cart came another, which at first I scarcely noticed, being engrossed by the ruddy face under the red cloak. The farmer himself nodded good-humouredly, but Mrs. Scarlet-cloak turned up her nose. "Oh, pride, pride!" I thought, amused, and watched the two carts, the second of which was with difficulty passing the farmer's, on the opposite side of the narrow