Page:Once a Week June to Dec 1863.pdf/274

264 speculations as to decide on a fitting wedding-dress for her daughter in the event of a match being the result, and Tom little knew how she had blessed him for the golden opportunity he was unconsciously throwing in Jane’s way. He exerted himself to the utmost in his character of host. He fetched in the elderly and the ordinary among his female visitors, and they somehow felt younger and more attractive in his society; it seemed as if with him there need be no apology for their age or their ugliness: his kind-heartedness overlooked it all. Out into the sunshine again, where the village band has begun to play a country dance, in which young and old, rich and poor, are to join; when Mrs. Wortleby dances with the best bowler, and Miss Letitia with the conquering plough-boy, and Mr. Thorpe, contrary to all etiquette on such occasions, with Jane. It lasts an hour; for every awkward partner has to be put right; the shy ones have to be encouraged; the noisy ones to be kept in order; every big brown hand has to be seized; every tiny hot one to be raised aloft; but it comes to an end at last, and the members of the band retreat to the last cask. While the shadows are lengthening on the grass, it is wonderful to hear “God save the Queen” sung slowly, majestically, and greatly out of tune. The Beauchamp people give three cheers for their rector. He stands bareheaded in the purple light, and thanks them for their good will, and asks them all to come again: and the day is done.

No letter. The suspense of another night would have been intolerable. Tom walked over to Chanleigh, where he arrived just as the Rose and Crown was closing, and found that a person answering George Nugent’s description had left for London early in the evening. The clock of Beauchamp church struck twelve as he crossed the common on his way home. Then came the hour again, like an echo from the church tower at Chanleigh: more faintly still, little chimes broke into the clear air from the next village. Tom was somewhat weary both in body and mind; but a vague sense of relief came over him as he looked back on the events of the day. He was thankful for it, and in natures such as his, thankfulness is one form of happiness.

Two days afterwards, Mr. Wortleby drove over from Chanleigh with a sense of importance hid under a more distant manner than usual, calling at the Squire’s, the rectory, the medical man’s, and even at the Golden Lion, telling everywhere the same story in precisely the same words. He stated that Mr. George Nugent had returned from Australia, and in the handsomest and most honourable manner had intimated his intention of paying his father’s debts in addition to his own. For himself, he must be allowed to say that he had received a magnificent silver tea-service in acknowledgment of some slight assistance he had once had the satisfaction of rendering Mr. Nugent. He did not add that in the silver tea-pot he had found a hundred pound note in an envelope, on which was written, “Debt, £37, and interest,” or that George Nugent, in taking that sum from his cash-box for his passage to Australia, had committed a felony. The whole village was full of the wonderful event, and of Reuben Bates’s good fortune, Mr. Wortleby having been charged with the arrangements for his emigration. Tom longed to know how Miss Letitia had received the tidings. Had he been treacherous to her cause, he could not have been more careful to avoid her since the school-feast. Sunday came, and he went down to the church for the morning service, for the first time, with a divided heart. He knew that Miss Letitia sat where he could see her face, and he felt as if he must stop short in the psalm which he was reading, if he did not satisfy himself as to the effect the news had had upon her. Tom looked at her but once; and he carried away with him an impression that her eyes were glittering, that her cheeks were carnation-coloured, and that she wore a red bonnet. Poor Miss Letitia! It was a pardonable piece of female vanity to wear a pink ribbon on this day above all others, when the whole of the inhabitants of the parish were expecting George Nugent amongst them again. Sunday passed, and the week wore on, and still he did not come. By dint of bounding over hedges and otherwise ignominiously making his escape when Miss Letitia came in sight, Tom had avoided meeting her in his daily walks; but he grew at last so much to dread an interview, that he could scarcely bring himself to leave the house. He had a foreboding that sooner or later he must meet her face to face, and own that he had utterly failed in what he had undertaken to do; and he tried to be prepared to answer her questions without touching on the subject of George Nugent’s visit: but the meeting should be of her own seeking; he resolved to evade it while he could. The crisis came at last. Tom had a note from Miss Letitia, asking to speak to him, and he went at the appointed hour with a heavy heart. She was sitting at the open window, with restless eyes, which looked as if they had watched and watched again till they had grown weary in the task. How long had she been without sleep, Tom wondered, as he glanced at her face, and noted how many painful feelings, shame, disappointment, and yet some lingering thread of hope, had been striving for the mastery since he had seen her last.

“I would not have asked you to come, Mr. Morland,” she said, “if I had any relation, any other friend to give me advice. You may have heard that Mr. Nugent has returned from Australia?”

Tom said in a low tone that he knew it.

“He has acted nobly,” she said, and a flush of enthusiasm spread on her cheeks. “He has paid his father’s debts; he has made provision for his old servants; he intends to send out to the colonies anyone who cannot honestly get on here; but is it because the place is so full of unhappy associations to him, that he does not come himself? Is it because—” she waited for a moment, and then broke out in sobs—“Is it because he has forgotten me?”

What could Tom say? He sat looking at a flower-pot on the window-sill, growing more and more wretched every moment.

“I must try and tell you what I want you to do,” she said, checking her tears. “I hear that