I LOVE HER STILL

It was all over now, and as Lucius had said to his mother, there was nothing left for them but to go and hide themselves.  The verdict had reached him before his mother’s return, and on the moment of his hearing it he sat down and commenced the following letter to Mr. Furnival: ­

   Orley Farm, March ­, 18 .

   DEAR SIR,

I beg to thank you, in my mother’s name, for your great exertions in the late trial.  I must acknowledge that I have been wrong in thinking that you gave her bad advice, and am now convinced that you acted with the best judgment on her behalf.  May I beg that you will add to your great kindness by inducing the gentlemen who undertook the management of the case as my mother’s attorneys to let me know as soon as possible in what sum I am indebted to them?

I believe I need trouble you with no preamble as to my reasons when I tell you that I have resolved to abandon immediately any title that I may have to the possession of Orley Farm, and to make over the property at once, in any way that may be most efficacious, to my half-brother, Mr. Joseph Mason, of Groby Park.  I so strongly feel the necessity of doing this at once, without even a day’s delay, that I shall take my mother to lodgings in London to-morrow, and shall then decide on what steps it may be best that we shall take.  My mother will be in possession of about L200 a year, subject to such deduction as the cost of the trial may make from it.

I hope that you will not think that I intrude upon you too far when I ask you to communicate with my brother’s lawyers on the subject of this surrender.  I do not know how else to do it; and of course you will understand that I wish to screen my mother’s name as much as may be in my power with due regard to honesty.  I hope I need not insist on the fact, ­for it is a fact, ­that nothing will change my purpose as to this.  If I cannot have it done through you, I must myself go to Mr. Round.  I am, moreover, aware that in accordance with strict justice my brother should have upon me a claim for the proceeds of the estate since the date of our father’s death.  If he wishes it I will give him such claim, making myself his debtor by any form that may be legal.  He must, however, in such case be made to understand that his claim will be against a beggar; but, nevertheless, it may suit his views to have such a claim upon me.  I cannot think that, under the circumstances, I should be justified in calling on my mother to surrender her small income; but should you be of a different opinion, it shall be done.

   I write thus to you at once as I think that not a day
   should be lost.  I will trouble you with another line from
   London, to let you know what is our immediate address.

   Pray believe me to be
   Yours, faithfully and obliged,

   LUCIUS MASON.

   T. Furnival, Esq.,
   Old Square, Lincoln’s Inn Fields.

As soon as he had completed this letter, which was sufficiently good for its purpose, and clearly explained what was the writer’s will on the subject of it, he wrote another, which I do not think was equally efficacious.  The second was addressed to Miss Furnival, and being a love letter, was not so much within the scope of the writer’s peculiar powers.

   DEAREST SOPHIA,

I hardly know how to address you; or what I should tell you or what conceal.  Were we together, and was that promise renewed which you once gave me, I should tell you all; ­but this I cannot do by letter.  My mother’s trial is over, and she is acquitted; but that which I have learned during the trial has made me feel that I am bound to relinquish to my brother-in-law all my title to Orley Farm, and I have already taken the first steps towards doing so.  Yes, Sophia, I am now a beggar on the face of the world.  I have nothing belonging to me, save those powers of mind and body which God has given me; and I am, moreover, a man oppressed with a terribly heavy load of grief.  For some short time I must hide myself with my mother; and then, when I shall have been able to brace my mind to work, I shall go forth and labour in whatever field may be open to me.

But before I go, Sophia, I wish to say a word of farewell to you, that I may understand on what terms we part.  Of course I make no claim.  I am aware that that which I now tell you must be held as giving you a valid excuse for breaking any contract that there may have been between us.  But, nevertheless, I have hope.  That I love you very dearly I need hardly now say; and I still venture to think that the time may come when I shall again prove myself to be worthy of your hand.  If you have ever loved me you cannot cease to do so merely because I am unfortunate; and if you love me still, perhaps you will consent to wait.  If you will do so, ­if you will say that I am rich in that respect, ­I shall go to my banishment not altogether a downcast man.

   May I say that I am still your own

   LUCIUS MASON?

No; he decidedly might not say so.  But as the letter was not yet finished when his mother and Mrs. Orme returned, I will not anticipate matters by giving Miss Furnival’s reply.

Mrs. Orme came back that night to Orley Farm, but without the intention of remaining there.  Her task was over, and it would be well that she should return to The Cleeve.  Her task was over; and as the hour must come in which she would leave the mother in the hands of her son, the present hour would be as good as any.

They again went together to the room which they had shared for the last night or two, and there they parted.  They had not been there long when the sound of wheels was heard on the gravel, and Mrs. Orme got up from her seat.  “There is Peregrine with the carriage,” said she.

“And you are going?” said Lady Mason.

“If I could do you good, I would stay,” said Mrs. Orme.

“No, no; of course you must go.  Oh, my darling, oh, my friend,” and she threw herself into the other’s arms.

“Of course I will write to you,” said Mrs. Orme.  “I will do so regularly.”

“May God bless you for ever.  But it is needless to ask for blessings on such as you.  You are blessed.”

“And you too; ­if you will turn to Him you will be blessed.”

“Ah me.  Well, I can try now.  I feel that I can at any rate try.”

“And none who try ever fail.  And now, dear, good-bye.”

“Good-bye, my angel.  But, Mrs. Orme, I have one word I must first say; a message that I must send to him.  Tell him this, that never in my life have I loved any man as well as I have loved him and as I do love him.  That on my knees I beg his pardon for the wrong I have done him.”

“But he knows how great has been your goodness to him.”

“When the time came I was not quite a devil to drag him down with me to utter destruction!”

“He will always remember what was your conduct then.”

“But tell him, that though I loved him, and though I loved you with all my heart, ­with all my heart, I knew through it all, as I know now, that I was not a fitting friend for him or you.  No; do not interrupt me, I always knew it; and though it was so sweet to me to see your faces, I would have kept away; but that he would not have it.  I came to him to assist me because he was great and strong, and he took me to his bosom with his kindness, till I destroyed his strength; though his greatness nothing can destroy.”

“No, no; he does not think that you have injured him.”

“But tell him what I say; and tell him that a poor bruised, broken creature, who knows at least her own vileness, will pray for him night and morning.  And now good-bye.  Of my heart towards you I cannot speak.”

“Good-bye then, and, Lady Mason, never despair.  There is always room for hope; and where there is hope there need not be unhappiness.”

Then they parted, and Mrs. Orme went down to her son.

“Mother, the carriage is here,” he said.

“Yes, I heard it.  Where is Lucius?  Good-bye, Mr. Mason.”

“God bless you, Mrs. Orme.  Believe me I know how good you have been to us.”

As she gave him her hand, she spoke a few words to him.  “My last request to you, Mr. Mason, is to beg that you will be tender to your mother.”

“I will do my best, Mrs. Orme.”

“All her sufferings and your own, have come from her great love for you.”

“That I know and feel, but had her ambition for me been less it would have been better for both of us.”  And there he stood bare-headed at the door while Peregrine Orme handed his mother into the carriage.  Thus Mrs. Orme took her last leave of Orley Farm, and was parted from the woman she had loved with so much truth and befriended with so much loyalty.

Very few words were spoken in the carriage between Peregrine and his mother while they were being taken back through Hamworth to The Cleeve.  To Peregrine the whole matter was unintelligible.  He knew that the verdict had been in favour of Lady Mason, and yet there had been no signs of joy at Orley Farm, or even of contentment.  He had heard also from Lucius, while they had been together for a few minutes, that Orley Farm was to be given up.

“You’ll let it I suppose,” Peregrine had asked.

“It will not be mine to let.  It will belong to my brother,” Lucius had answered.  Then Peregrine had asked no further question; nor had Lucius offered any further information.

But his mother, as he knew, was worn out with the work she had done, and at the present moment he felt that the subject was one which would hardly bear questions.  So he sat by her side in silence; and before the carriage had reached The Cleeve his mind had turned away from the cares and sorrows of Lady Mason, and was once more at Noningsby.  After all, as he said to himself, who could be worse off than he was.  He had nothing to hope.

They found Sir Peregrine standing in the hall to receive them, and Mrs. Orme, though she had been absent only three days, could not but perceive the havoc which this trial had made upon him.  It was not that the sufferings of those three days had broken him down, but that now, after that short absence, she was able to perceive how great had been upon him the effect of his previous sufferings.  He had never held up his head since the day on which Lady Mason had made to him her first confession.  Up to that time he had stood erect, and though as he walked his steps had shown that he was no longer young, he had walked with a certain air of strength and manly bearing.  Till Lady Mason had come to The Cleeve no one would have said that Sir Peregrine looked as though his energy and life had passed away.  But now, as he put his arm round his daughter’s waist, and stooped down to kiss her cheek, he was a worn-out, tottering old man.

During these three days he had lived almost altogether alone, and had been ashamed to show to those around him the intense interest which he felt in the result of the trial.  His grandson had on each day breakfasted alone, and had left the house before his grandfather was out of his room; and on each evening he had returned late, ­as he now returned with his mother, ­and had dined alone.  Then he had sat with his grandfather for an hour or two, and had been constrained to talk over the events of the day without being allowed to ask Sir Peregrine’s opinion as to Lady Mason’s innocence or to express his own.  These three days had been dreadful to Sir Peregrine.  He had not left the house, but had crept about from room to room, ever and again taking up some book or paper and putting it down unread, as his mind reverted to the one subject which now for him bore any interest.  On the second of these three days a note had been brought to him from his old friend Lord Alston.  “Dear Orme,” the note had run, “I am not quite happy as I think of the manner in which we parted the other day.  If I offended in any degree, I send this as a peacemaker, and beg to shake your hand heartily.  Let me have a line from you to say that it is all right between us.  Neither you nor I can afford to lose an old friend at our time of life.  Yours always, Alston.”  But Sir Peregrine had not answered it.  Lord Alston’s servant had been dismissed with a promise that an answer should be sent, but at the end of the three days it had not yet been written.  His mind indeed was still sore towards Lord Alston.  The counsel which his old friend had given him was good and true, but it had been neglected, and its very truth and excellence now made the remembrance of it unpalatable.  He had, nevertheless, intended to write; but the idea of such exertion from hour to hour had become more distressing to him.

He had of course heard of Lady Mason’s acquittal; and indeed tidings of the decision to which the jury had come went through the country very quickly.  There is a telegraphic wire for such tidings which has been very long in use, and which, though always used, is as yet but very little understood.  How is it that information will spread itself quicker than men can travel, and make its way like water into all parts of the world?  It was known all through the country that night that Lady Mason was acquitted; and before the next night it was as well known that she had acknowledged her guilt by giving up the property.

Little could be said as to the trial while Peregrine remained in the room with his mother and his grandfather; but this he had the tact to perceive, and soon left them together.  “I shall see you, mother, up stairs before you go to bed,” he said as he sauntered out.

“But you must not keep her up,” said his grandfather.  “Remember all that she has gone through.”  With this injunction he went off, and as he sat alone in his mother’s room he tried to come to some resolution as to Noningsby.  He knew he had no ground for hope; ­no chance, as he would have called it.  And if so, would it not be better that he should take himself off?  Nevertheless he would go to Noningsby once more.  He would not be such a coward but that he would wish her good-bye before he went, and hear the end of it all from her own lips.

When he had left the room Lady Mason’s last message was given to Sir Peregrine.  “Poor soul, poor soul!” he said, as Mrs. Orme began her story.  “Her son knows it all then now.”

“I told him last night, ­with her consent; so that he should not go into the court to-day.  It would have been very bad, you know, if they had ­found her guilty.”

“Yes, yes; very bad ­very bad indeed.  Poor creature!  And so you told him.  How did he bear it?”

“On the whole, well.  At first he would not believe me.”

“As for me, I could not have done it.  I could not have told him.”

“Yes, sir, you would; ­you would, if it had been required of you.”

“I think it would have killed me.  But a woman can do things for which a man’s courage would never be sufficient.  And he bore it manfully.”

“He was very stern.”

“Yes; ­and he will be stern.  Poor soul! ­I pity her from my very heart.  But he will not desert her; he will do his duty by her.”

“I am sure he will.  In that respect he is a good young man.”

“Yes, my dear.  He is one of those who seem by nature created to bear adversity.  No trouble or sorrow would I think crush him.  But had prosperity come to him, it would have made him odious to all around him.  You were not present when they met?”

“No ­I thought it better to leave them.”

“Yes, yes.  And he will give up the place at once.”

“To-morrow he will do so.  In that at any rate he has true spirit.  To-morrow early they will go to London, and she I suppose will never see Orley Farm again.”  And then Mrs. Orme gave Sir Peregrine that last message. ­“I tell you everything as she told me,” Mrs. Orme said, seeing how deeply he was affected.  “Perhaps I am wrong.”

“No, no, no,” he said.

“Coming at such a moment, her words seemed to be almost sacred.”

“They are sacred.  They shall be sacred.  Poor soul, poor soul!”

“She did a great crime.”

“Yes, yes.”

“But if a crime can be forgiven, ­can be excused on account of its motives ­”

“It cannot, my dear.  Nothing can be forgiven on that ground.”

“No; we know that; we all feel sure of that.  But yet how can one help loving her?  For myself, I shall love her always.”

“And I also love her.”  And then the old man made his confession.  “I loved her well; ­better than I had ever thought to love any one again, but you and Perry.  I loved her very dearly, and felt that I should have been proud to have called her my wife.  How beautiful she was in her sorrow, when we thought that her life had been pure and good!”

“And it had been good, ­for many years past.”

“No; for the stolen property was still there.  But yet how graceful she was, and how well her sorrows sat upon her!  What might she not have done had the world used her more kindly, and not sent in her way that sore temptation!  She was a woman for a man to have loved to madness.”

“And yet how little can she have known of love!”

“I loved her.”  And as the old man said so he rose to his feet with some show of his old energy.  “I loved her, ­with all my heart!  It is foolish for an old man so to say; but I did love her; nay, I love her still.  But that I knew that it would be wrong, ­for your sake, and for Perry’s ­” And then he stopped himself, as though he would fain hear what she might say to him.

“Yes; it is all over now,” she said in the softest, sweetest, lowest voice.  She knew that she was breaking down a last hope, but she knew also that that hope was vain.  And then there was silence in the room for some ten minutes’ space.

“It is all over,” he then said, repeating her last words.

“But you have us still, ­Perry and me.  Can any one love you better than we do?” And she got up and went over to him and stood by him, and leaned upon him.

“Edith, my love, since you came to my house there has been an angel in it watching over me.  I shall know that always; and when I turn my face to the wall, as I soon shall, that shall be my last earthly thought.”  And so in tears they parted for that night.  But the sorrow that was bringing him to his grave came from the love of which he had spoken.  It is seldom that a young man may die from a broken heart; but if an old man have a heart still left to him, it is more fragile.