The Hallam Succession, Amelia Edith Huddleston Barr [desktop ebook reader .txt] 📗

flushed and lifted, her eyes misty with unshed tears, her tall erect form quivering with emotion. And as the rector looked and listened a swift change came over his face. He laid his hand upon hers. When she ceased, he answered, promptly:

"Miss Hallam, from this moment I believe in you with all my heart. I believe in the wisdom and purity of all you have done. Whatever you may do in the future I shall trust in you. Late as it is, take my sincere, my warm sympathy. If you choose to make me the sharer of your cares and sorrows, you will find me a true friend; if you think it right and best still to preserve silence, I am equally satisfied of your integrity."

Then he put her arm within his, and talked to her so wisely and gently that Elizabeth found herself weeping soft, gracious, healing tears. She brought him once more into the squire's familiar sitting-room. She spread for him every delicacy she knew he liked. She took him all over the house and grounds, and made him see that every thing was kept in its old order. He asked no questions, and she volunteered no information. But he did not expect it at that time. It would not have been like Elizabeth Hallam to spill over either her joys or her sorrows at the first offer of sympathy. Her nature was too self-contained for such effusiveness. But none the less the rector felt that the cloud had vanished. And he wondered that he had ever thought her capable of folly or wrong--that he had ever doubted her.

After this he was every-where her champion. He was seen going to the hall with his old regularity. He took a great liking for the child, and had him frequently at the rectory. Very soon people began to say that "Miss Hallam must hev done about t' right thing, or t' rector wouldn't iver uphold her;" and no one doubted but that all had been fully explained to him.

Yet it was not until the close of the year that the subject was again named between them. The day before Christmas, a cold, snowy day, he was amazed to see Elizabeth coming through the rectory garden, fighting her way, with bent head, against the wind and snow. At first he feared Harry was ill, and he went to open the door himself in his anxiety; but one glance into her bright face dispelled his fear.

"Why, Elizabeth, whatever has brought you through such a storm as this?"

"Something pleasant. I meant to have come yesterday, but did not get what I wanted to bring to you until this morning. My dear, dear, old friend! Rejoice with me! I am a free woman again. I have paid a great debt and a just debt; one that, unpaid, would have stained forever the name we both love and honor. O thank God with me! the Lord God of my fathers, who has strengthened my heart and my hands for the battle!"

And though she said not another word, he understood, and he touched her brow reverently, and knelt down with her, and the thin, tremulous, aged voice, and the young, joyful one recited together the glad _benedictus_:

"Blessed be the Lord God of Israel; for he hath visited and
redeemed his people,
"And hath raised up a horn of salvation for us in the house of
his servant David;
"As he spake by the mouth of his holy prophets, which have been
since the world began:
"That we should be saved from our enemies, and from the hand
of all that hate us;
"To perform the mercy promised to our fathers, and to remember
his holy covenant;
"The oath which he sware to our father Abraham,
"That be would grant unto us, that we, being delivered out of the
hand of our enemies, might serve him without fear,
"In holiness and righteousness before him, all the days of our
life.
"And thou, child, shall be called the prophet of the Highest: for
thou shalt go before the face of the Lord to prepare his ways;
"To give knowledge of salvation unto his people by the remission
of their sins,
"Through the tender mercy of our God; whereby the Dayspring
from on high hath visited us,
"To give light to them that sit in darkness and in the shadow of
death, to guide our feet into the way of peace."

And Elizabeth rose up with a face radiant and peaceful; she laid upon the table L100, and said, "It is for the poor. It is my thank-offering. I sold the bracelet my brother gave me at his marriage for it. I give it gladly with my whole heart. I have much to do yet, but in the rest of my work I can ask you for advice and sympathy. It will be a great help and comfort. Will you come to the hall after Christmas and speak with me, or shall I come here and see you?"

"I will come to the hall; for I have a book for Harry, and I wish to give it to him myself."

The result of this interview was that the rector called upon the firm of Whaley Brothers, and that the elder Whaley called upon Elizabeth. He attempted some apology at first, but she graciously put it aside: "There has been a mistake, Mr. Whaley. Let it pass. I wish you to communicate with all the creditors of the late firm of Antony Hallam. Every shilling is to be paid and the income of the estate will be devoted to it, with the exception of the home farm, the rental of which I will reserve for my own necessities, and for keeping Hallam in order."

And to Martha Elizabeth said: "We are going to live a little more like the hall now, Martha. You shall have two girls to help you, and Peter Crag shall bring a pony for Harry, and we'll be as happy as never was again! We have had a bit of dark, hard road to go over, but the end of it has come. Thank God!"

"It's varry few as find any road through life an easy one; t' road to heaven is by Weeping Cross, Miss Hallam."

"I don't know why that should be, Martha. If any have reason to sing, as they go through life, they should be the children of the King."

"It's t' sons o' t' King that hev t' battles to fight and t' prayers to offer, and t' sacrifices to mak' for a' t' rest o' t' world, I think. What made John Wesley, and the men like him, be up early and late, be stoned by mobs, and perish'd wi' cold and hunger? Not as they needed to do it for their own profit, but just because they were the sons o' t' King, they couldn't help it. Christians mustn't complain of any kind o' a road that tak's 'em home."

"But sometimes, Martha, it seems as if the other road was so smooth and pleasant."

"Two roads are a bit different--t' road to Babylon and t' road to Jerusalem aren't t' same. You may go dancin' along t' first; the last is often varry narrow and steep."

"But one can't help wondering why."

"If it wasn't narrow, and varry narrow, too, Miss Hallam, fenced in, and watchmen set all along it, we'd be strayin' far and near, and ivery one o' us going our own way. There isn't a church I knows of--not even t' people called Methodists--as mak's it narrow enough to prevent lost sheep. But it isn't all t' Hill o' Difficulty, Miss Hallam. It isn't fair to say that. There's many an arbor on t' hill-side, and many a House Beautiful, and whiles we may bide a bit wi' t' shepherds on t' Delectable Mountains. And no soul need walk alone on it. That's t' glory and t' comfort! And many a time we're strengthened, and many a time we're carried a bit by unseen hands."

"Well, Martha, those are pleasant thoughts to sleep on, and to-morrow-- to-morrow will be another day."

"And a good one, Miss Hallam; anyhow, them as bodes good are t' likeliest to get it. I do think that."

So Elizabeth went to sleep full of pleasant hopes and aims. It had always been her intention to pay every penny that Antony Hallam owed; and she felt a strange sense of delight and freedom in the knowledge that the duty had begun. Fortunately, she had in this sense of performed duty all the reward she asked or expected, for if it had not satisfied her, she would have surely been grieved and disappointed with the way the information was generally received. No one is ever surprised at a bad action, but a good one makes human nature at once look for a bad motive for it.

"She's found out that it wont pay her to hold on to other folks' money. Why-a! nobody notices her, and nivver a sweetheart comes her way."

"I thought we'd bring her to terms, if we nobbut made it hot enough for her. Bless you, Josiah! women folks can't live without their cronying and companying."

"It's nobbut right she should pay ivery penny, and I tell'd her so last time I met her on Hallam Common."

"Did ta? Why, thou hed gumption! Whativer did she say to thee?"

"She reddened up like t' old squire used to, and her eyes snapped like two pistols; and says she, 'Marmaduke Halcroft, you'll get every farthing o' your money when I get ready to pay it.'"

"Thank you, miss," says I, "all the same, I'll be bold to mention that I've waited going on five years for it."

"'And you may wait five years longer, for there are others besides you,' says she, as peacocky as any thing, 'but you'll get it;' and wi' that, she laid her whip across her mare in a way as made me feel it were across my face, and went away so quick I couldn't get another word in. But women will hev t' last word, if they die for 't."

"If she'll pay t' brass, she can hev as many words as she wants; I'm none flayed for any woman's tongue--not I, indeed."

And these sentiments, expressed in forms more or less polite, were the prevailing ones regarding Miss Hallam's tardy acknowledgment of the debt of Hallam to the neighborhood. Many were the discussions in fashionable drawing-rooms as to the propriety of rewarding the justice of Elizabeth's action, by bows, or smiles, or calls. But privately few people were really inclined, as yet, to renew civilities with her. They argued, in their own hearts, that during the many years of retrenchment she could not afford to return hospitalities on a scale of equivalent splendor; and, in fact, poverty is offensive to wealth, and they had already treated Miss Hallam badly, and, therefore, disliked her. It was an irritation to have the disagreeable subject forced upon their attention at all. If she had assumed her brother's debts at the time of his failure, they were quite sure they would have honored her, however poor she had left herself. But humanity has its statutes of limitation even for good deeds; every one decided that Elizabeth had become honorable and honest too late.

And for once