Margaret Oliphant - Salem Chapel. Volume 2/2

MRS. VINCENT rose from the uneasy bed, where she had not slept, upon that dreadful Sunday morning, with feelings which it would be vain to attempt any description of. Snatches of momentary sleep more dreadful than wakefulness had fallen upon her during the awful night – moments of unconsciousness which plunged her into a deeper horror still, and from which she started thinking she heard Susan call. Had Susan called, had Susan come, in any dreadful plight of misery, her mother thought she could have borne it; but she could not, yet did, bear this, with the mingled passion and patience of a woman; one moment rising up against the intolerable, the next sitting down dumb and steadfast before that terrible necessity which could not be resisted. She got up in the dim wintry morning with all that restless anguish in her heart, and took out her best black silk dress, and a clean cap to go under her bonnet. She offered a sacrifice and burnt-offering as she dressed herself in her snow-white cuffs, and composed her trim little figure into its Sunday neatness; for the minister’s mother must go to chapel this dreadful day. No whisper of the torture she was enduring must breathe among the flock – nothing could excuse her from attending Salem, seeing her son’s people, and hearing Mr. Beecher preach, and holding up Arthur’s standard at this dangerous crisis of the battle. She felt she was pale when she came into the sitting-room, but comforted herself with thinking that nobody in Salem knew that by nature she had a little tender winter bloom upon her face, and was not usually so downcast and heavy-eyed. Instinctively, she rearranged the breakfast-table as she waited for the young minister from Homerton, who was not an early riser. Mr. Beecher thought it rather cheerful than otherwise when he came in somewhat late and hurried, and found her waiting by the white covered table, with the fire bright and the tea made. He was in high spirits, as was natural. He thought Vincent was in very comfortable quarters, and had uncommonly pleasant rooms.

“Don’t you think so? And one has just as great a chance of being uncomfortable as not in one’s first charge,” said the young preacher; “but we were all delighted to hear that Vincent had made an ’it. Liberal-minded people, I should say, if I may judge by Mr. Tozer, who was uncommonly friendly last night. These sort of people are the strength of our connection – not great people, you know, but the flower of the middle classes. I am surprised you did not bring Miss Vincent with you for a little cheerful society at this time of the year.”

“My daughter may perhaps come yet, before – before I leave,” said Mrs. Vincent, drawing herself up, with a little hauteur, as Mr. Beecher thought, though in reality it was only a physical expression of that sob of agony to which she dared not give vent in audible sound.

“Oh, I thought it might be more cheerful for her in the winter,” said the preacher, a little affronted that his interest in Vincent’s pretty sister should be received so coldly. He was interrupted by the arrival of the post, for Carlingford was a profane country town, and had its letters on Sunday morning. The widow set herself desperately down in an arm-chair to read Arthur’s letter. It made her heart beat loud with throbs so violent that a blindness came over her eyes, and her very life failed for an instant. It was very short, very assured and certain – he was going to Northumberland, where the fugitives had gone – he was going to bring Susan back. Mr. Beecher over his egg watched her reading this, and saw that she grew ashy, deathly pale. It was not possible for him to keep silent, or to refrain from wondering what it was.

“Dear me, I am afraid you are ill – can I get you anything?” he said, rising from the table.

Mrs. Vincent folded up her letter. “Thank you; my tea will refresh me,” she said, coming back to her seat. “I did not sleep very much last night, and my head aches: when people come to my time of life,” said the little woman, with a faint heroical smile, “they seldom sleep well the first few nights in a new place. I hope you rested comfortably, Mr. Beecher. Mr. Vincent, Arthur’s dear papa, used to say that he never preached well if he did not sleep well; and I have heard other ministers say it was a very true rule.”

“If that is all, I hope you will be pleased to-day,” said the preacher, with a little complaisance. “I always sleep well; nothing puts me much out in that respect. Perhaps it is about time to start now? I like to have a few minutes in the vestry before going into the pulpit. You know the way perhaps? or we can call at Mr. Tozer’s and get one of them to guide us.”

“I think I know the way,” said Mrs. Vincent, faintly. It was a slight comfort, in the midst of her martyrdom, to leave the room and have a moment to herself. She sank down by her bedside in an inarticulate agony of prayer, which doubtless God deciphered, though it never came to words, and rose up again to put on her bonnet, her neat shawl, her best pair of gloves. The smile that might have come on the face of a martyr at the stake dawned upon the little woman’s lips as she caught sight of her own pale face in the glass, when she was tying her bonnet-strings. She was not thrusting her hand into the scorching flames, she was only pulling out the bows of black ribbon, and giving the last touch to that perfection of gentle neatness in which Arthur’s mother, for his sake, must present herself to his people. She took Mr. Beecher’s arm afterwards, and walked with him, through the wintry sunshine and streams of churchgoers, to Salem. Perhaps she was just a little sententious in her talk to the young preacher, who would have stared had anybody told him what active and feverish wretchedness was in her heart. She quoted Arthur’s dear father more than usual; she felt a little irritated in spite of herself by the complaisance of the young man from ’Omerton. Notwithstanding the dreadful pressure of her trouble, she felt that his excitement in the prospect of preaching to Arthur’s people was quite ill-timed. What did it matter to him whether the Salem flock liked him or not? Were they not Arthur’s people, pre-engaged to their own pastor? The gentle widow did what she could to bring Mr. Beecher down as they walked through Grove Street. She remarked, gently, that where a minister was very popular, a stranger had but little chance of appreciation. “You must not be mortified if you see the congregation look disappointed when you come into the pulpit,” said Mrs. Vincent; “for my son, if he had not been called away so suddenly, was to commence a course of lectures to-day, and I believe a good deal of expectation was raised about them.” The new preacher was perhaps a shade less buoyant when he resigned his friend’s mother to Tozer at the door of the chapel, to be conducted to her pew. Salem was already about half filled; and the entering flock looked at Mrs. Vincent, as she stood with the deacon in the porch, asking, with the courtesy of a royal personage, humble yet affable, after his wife and daughter. Tozer was a little overawed by the politeness of the minister’s mother. He concluded that she was “quite the lady” in his private heart.

“If you tell me where the minister’s seat is, I need not trouble you to go in,” said Mrs. Vincent. “Mrs. Tufton’s uncommon punctual, and it’s close upon her time,” said Tozer; “being a single man, we’ve not set apart a seat for the minister – not till he’s got some one as can sit in it; it’s the old minister’s seat, as is the only one we’ve set aside; for we’ve been a-letting of the pews uncommon this past month, and it don’t answer to waste nothing in a chapel as is as expensive to keep up as Salem. It’s our pride to give our minister a good salary, as you know, ma’am, and we’ve all got to pay up according, so there ain’t no pew set apart for Mr. Vincent – not till he’s got a wife.”