The young folk scattered themselves about the room.Guy and Walter at the unshuttered window--we had a habit of never hiding our home-light--were looking at the moon,and laying bets,sotto voce,upon how many minutes she would be in climbing over the oak on the top of One-tree Hill.Edwin sat,reading hard--his shoulders up to his ears,and his fingers stuck through his hair,developing the whole of his broad,knobbed,knotted forehead,where,Maud declared,the wrinkles had already begun to show.For Mistress Maud herself,she flitted about in all directions,interrupting everything,and doing nothing.
"Maud,"said her father,at last,"I am afraid you give a great deal of trouble to Uncle Phineas."Uncle Phineas tried to soften the fact,but the little lady was certainly the most trying of his pupils.Her mother she had long escaped from,for the advantage of both.For,to tell the truth,while in the invisible atmosphere of moral training the mother's influence was invaluable,in the minor branch of lesson-learning there might have been found many a better teacher than Ursula Halifax.So the children's education was chiefly left to me;other tutors succeeding as was necessary;and it had just begun to be considered whether a lady governess ought not to "finish"the education of Miss Halifax.But always at home.Not for all the knowledge and all the accomplishments in the world would these parents have suffered either son or daughter--living souls intrusted them by the Divine Father--to be brought up anywhere out of their own sight,out of the shelter and safeguard of their own natural home.
"Love,when I was waiting to-day in Jessop's bank--"(Ah!that was another change,to which we were even yet not familiar,the passing away of our good doctor and his wife,and his brother and heir turning the old dining-room into a "County Bank--open from ten till four.")"While waiting there I heard of a lady who struck me as likely to be an excellent governess for Maud.""Indeed!"said Mrs.Halifax,not over-enthusiastically.Maud became eager to know "what the lady was like?"I at the same time inquiring "who she was?""Who?I really did not ask,"John answered,smiling."But of what she is,Jessop gave me first-rate evidence--a good daughter,who teaches in Norton Bury anybody's children for any sort of pay,in order to maintain an ailing mother.Ursula,you would let her teach our Maud,I know?""Is she an Englishwoman?"--For Mrs.Halifax,prejudiced by a certain French lady who had for a few months completely upset the peace of the manor-house,and even slightly tainted her own favourite,pretty Grace Oldtower,had received coldly this governess plan from the beginning."Would she have to live with us?""I think so,decidedly."
"Then it can't be.The house will not accommodate her.It will hardly hold even ourselves.No,we cannot take in anybody else at Longfield.""But--we may have to leave Longfield."
The boys here turned to listen;for this question had already been mooted,as all family questions were.In our house we had no secrets:the young folk,being trusted,were ever trustworthy;and the parents,clean-handed and pure-hearted,had nothing that they were afraid to tell their children.
"Leave Longfield!"repeated Mrs.Halifax;"surely--surely--"But glancing at her husband,her tone of impatience ceased.
He sat gazing into the fire with an anxious air.
"Don't let us discuss that question--at least,not to-night.It troubles you,John.Put it off till to-morrow."No,that was never his habit.He was one of the very few who,a thing being to be done,will not trust it to uncertain "to-morrows."His wife saw that he wanted to talk to her,and listened.
"Yes,the question does trouble me a good deal.Whether,now that our children are growing up,and our income is doubling and trebling year by year,we ought to widen our circle of usefulness,or close it up permanently within the quiet bound of little Longfield.Love,which say you?""The latter,the latter--because it is far the happiest.""I am afraid,NOT the latter,because it IS the happiest."He spoke gently,laying his hand on his wife's shoulder,and looking down on her with that peculiar look which he always had when telling her things that he knew were sore to hear.I never saw that look on any living face save John's;but I have seen it once in a picture--of two Huguenot lovers.The woman is trying to fasten round the man's neck the white badge that will save him from the massacre (of St.
Bartholomew)--he,clasping her the while,gently puts it aside--not stern,but smiling.That quiet,tender smile,firmer than any frown,will,you feel sure,soon control the woman's anguish,so that she will sob out--any faithful woman would--"Go,die!Dearer to me than even thyself are thy honour and thy duty!"When I saw this noble picture,it touched to the core this old heart of mine--for the painter,in that rare expression,might have caught John's.Just as in a few crises of his life I have seen it,and especially in this one,when he first told to his wife that determination which he had slowly come to--that it was both right and expedient for us to quit Longfield,our happy home for so many years,of which the mother loved every flower in the garden,every nook and stone in the walls.
"Leave Longfield!"she repeated again,with a bitter sigh.
"Leave Longfield!"echoed the children,first the youngest,then the eldest,but rather in curiosity than regret.Edwin's keen,bright eyes were just lifted from his book,and fell again;he was not a lad of much speech,or much demonstration of any kind.