Charlotte Yonge - The Young Step-Mother; Or, A Chronicle of Mistakes

‘I never heard anything so absurd or unjust!’ cried Albinia, too much irritated to remember anything but the sympathy of her auditor. ‘If I am to be treated in this manner, I have done striving to please them. Due respect shall be shown, but as to intimacy and confidence—’

‘I’m glad you see it so at last!’ cried Gilbert. ‘Aunt Maria has been the plague of my life, and I’m glad I told her a bit of my mind!’

What was Albinia’s consternation! Her moment’s petulance had undone her morning’s work.

‘Gilbert,’ she said, ‘we are both speaking very wrongly. I especially, who ought to have helped you.’

Spite of all succeeding humility the outburst had been fatal, and argue and plead as she might, she could not restore the boy to anything like the half satisfactory state of penitence in which she had led him from home. The giving way to her worse nature had awakened his, and though he still allowed that she should prepare the way for his confession to his father, all real sense of his outrageous conduct towards his aunt was gone.

Disheartened and worn out, Albinia did not feel equal even to going to take off her walking things, but sat down in the drawing-room on the sofa, and tried to silence the girls’ questions and chatter, by desiring Lucy to read aloud.

By-and-by Mr. Kendal was heard returning, and she rose to arrest him in the hall. Her looks began the story, for he exclaimed, ‘My dear Albinia, what is the matter?’

‘Oh, Edmund, I have such things to tell you! I have been doing so wrong.’

She was almost sobbing, and he spoke fondly. ‘No, Albinia, I can hardly believe that. Something has vexed you, and you must take time to compose yourself.’

He led her up to her own room, tried to soothe her, and would not listen to a word till she should be calm. After lying still for a little while, she thought she had recovered, but the very word ‘Gilbert’ brought such an expression of anxiety and sternness over his brow as overcame her again, and she could not speak without so much emotion that he silenced her; and finding that she could neither leave the subject, nor mention it without violent agitation, he said he would leave her for a little while, and perhaps she might sleep, and then be better able to speak to him. Still she held him, and begged that he would say nothing to Gilbert till he had heard her, and to pacify her he yielded, passed his promise, and quitted her with a kiss.

There was a messenger at Fairmead Parsonage by sunrise the next morning, and by twelve o’clock Mr. and Mrs. Ferrars were at Willow Lawn.

Mr. Kendal’s grave brow and depressed manner did not reassure Winifred as he met her in the hall, although his words were, ‘I hope she is doing well.’

He said no more, for the drawing-room door was moving to and fro, as if uneasy on the hinges, and as he made a step towards it, it disclosed a lady with black eyes and pinched features, whom he presented as ‘Miss Meadows.’

‘Well, now—I think—since more efficient—since I leave Mrs. Kendal to better—only pray tell her—my love and my mother’s—if I could have been of any use—or shall I remain?—could I be of any service, Edmund?—I would not intrude when—but in the house—if I could be of any further use.’

‘Of none, thank you,’ said Mr. Kendal, ‘unless you would be kind enough to take home the girls.’

‘Oh, papa!’ cried Lucy, I’ve got the keys. You wont be able to get on at all without me. Sophy may go, but I could not be spared.’

‘Let it be as you will,’ said Mr. Kendal; ‘I only desire quiet, and that you should not inconvenience Mrs. Ferrars.’

‘You will help me, will you not!’ said Winifred, smiling, though she did not augur well from this opening scene. ‘May I go soon to Albinia?’

‘Presently, I hope,’ said Mr. Kendal, with an uneasy glance towards Miss Meadows, ‘she has seen no one as yet, and she is so determined that you cannot come till after Christmas, that she does not expect you.’

Miss Meadows began one of her tangled skeins of words, the most tangible of which was excitement; and Mr. Kendal, knowing by long experience that the only chance of a conclusion was to let her run herself down, held his tongue, and she finally departed.

Then he breathed more freely, and said he would go and prepare Albinia to see her sister, desiring Lucy to show Mrs. Ferrars to her room, and to take care not to talk upon the stairs.

This, Lucy, who was in high glory, obeyed by walking upon creaking tip-toe, apparently borrowed from her aunt, and whispering at a wonderful rate about her eagerness to see dear, dear mamma, and the darling little brother.

The spare room did not look expectant of guests, and felt still less so. It struck Winifred as very like the mouth of a well, and the paper showed patches of ancient damp. One maid was hastily laying the fire, the other shaking out the curtains, in the endeavour to render it habitable, and Lucy began saying, ‘I must apologize. If papa had only given us notice that we were to have the pleasure of seeing you,’ and then she dashed at the maid in all the pleasure of authority. ‘Eweretta, go and bring up Mrs. Ferrars’s trunks directly, and some water, and some towels.’

Winifred thought the greatest mercy to the hunted maid would be to withdraw as soon as she had hastily thrown off bonnet and cloak, and Lucy followed her into the passage, repeating that papa was so absent and forgetful, that it was very inconvenient in making arrangements. Whatever was ordinarily repressed in her, was repaying itself with interest in the pleasure of acting as mistress of the house.

Mrs. Ferrars beheld Gilbert sitting listlessly on the deep window-seat at the end of the passage, resting his head on his hand.

‘Well!’ exclaimed Lucy, ‘if he is not there still! He has hardly stirred since breakfast! Come and speak to Mrs. Ferrars, Gilbert. Or,’ and she simpered, ‘shall it be Aunt Winifred?’

‘As you please,’ said Mrs. Ferrars, advancing towards her old acquaintance, whom she would hardly have recognised, so different was the pale, downcast, slouching figure, from the bright, handsome lad she remembered.

‘How cold your hand is!’ she exclaimed; ‘you should not sit in this cold passage.’

‘As I have been telling him all this morning,’ said Lucy.

‘How is she?’ whispered the boy, rousing himself to look imploringly in Winifred’s face.

‘Your father seems satisfied about her.’

At that moment a door at some distance was opened, and Gilbert seemed to thrill all over as for the moment ere it closed a baby’s cry was heard. He turned his face away, and rested it on the window. ‘My brother! my brother!’ he murmured, but at that moment his father turned the corner of the passage, saying that Albinia had heard their arrival, and was very eager to see her sister.

Still Winifred could not leave the boy without saying, ‘You can make Gilbert happy about her, can you not? He is waiting here, watching anxiously for news of her.’

‘Gilbert himself best knows whether he has a right to be made happy,’ said Mr. Kendal, gravely. ‘I promised to ask no questions till she is able to explain, but I much fear that he has been causing her great grief and distress.’

He fixed his eyes on his son, and Winifred, in the belief that she was better out of their way, hurried to Albinia’s room, and was seen very little all the rest of the day.

She was spared, however, to walk to church the next morning with her husband, Lucy showing them the way, and being quiet and agreeable when repressed by Mr. Ferrars’s presence. After church, Mr. Dusautoy overtook them to inquire after Mrs. Kendal, and to make a kind proposal of exchanging Sunday duty. He undertook to drive the ponies home on the morrow, begged for credentials for the clerk, and messages for Willie and Mary, and seemed highly pleased with the prospect of the holiday, as he called it, only entreating that Mrs. Ferrars would be so kind as to look in on ‘Fanny,’ if Mrs. Kendal could spare her.