Shirley, Charlotte Brontë [uplifting books for women .txt] 📗

the beginning as a master ought to behave, they never would have entertained their present feelings towards him."

"Easy for you to talk," exclaimed Miss Keeldar, who was beginning to wax warm in her tenant's cause—"you, whose family have lived at Briarmains for six generations, to whose person the people have been accustomed for fifty years, who know all their ways, prejudices, and preferences—easy, indeed, for you to act so as to avoid offending them. But Mr. Moore came a stranger into the district; he came here poor and friendless, with nothing but his own energies to back him, nothing but his honour, his talent, and his industry to make his way for him. A monstrous crime indeed that, under such circumstances, he could not popularize his naturally grave, quiet manners all at once; could not be jocular, and free, and cordial with a strange peasantry, as you are with your fellow-townsmen! An unpardonable transgression that when he introduced improvements he did not go about the business in quite the most politic way, did not graduate his changes as delicately as a rich capitalist might have done! For errors of this sort is he to be the victim of mob outrage? Is he to be denied even the privilege of defending himself? Are those who have the hearts of men in their breasts (and Mr. Helstone, say what you will of him, has such a heart) to be reviled like malefactors because they stand by him, because they venture to espouse the cause of one against two hundred?"

"Come, come now, be cool," said Mr. Yorke, smiling at the earnestness with which Shirley multiplied her rapid questions.

"Cool! Must I listen coolly to downright nonsense—to dangerous nonsense? No. I like you very well, Mr. Yorke, as you know, but I thoroughly dislike some of your principles. All that cant—excuse me, but I repeat the word—all that cant about soldiers and parsons is most offensive in my ears. All ridiculous, irrational crying up of one class, whether the same be aristocrat or democrat—all howling down of another class, whether clerical or military—all exacting injustice to individuals, whether monarch or mendicant—is really sickening to me; all arraying of ranks against ranks, all party hatreds, all[Pg 323] tyrannies disguised as liberties, I reject and wash my hands of. You think you are a philanthropist; you think you are an advocate of liberty; but I will tell you this—Mr. Hall, the parson of Nunnely, is a better friend both of man and freedom than Hiram Yorke, the reformer of Briarfield."

From a man Mr. Yorke would not have borne this language very patiently, nor would he have endured it from some women; but he accounted Shirley both honest and pretty, and her plain-spoken ire amused him. Besides, he took a secret pleasure in hearing her defend her tenant, for we have already intimated he had Robert Moore's interest very much at heart. Moreover, if he wished to avenge himself for her severity, he knew the means lay in his power: a word, he believed, would suffice to tame and silence her, to cover her frank forehead with the rosy shadow of shame, and veil the glow of her eye under down-drooped lid and lash.

"What more hast thou to say?" he inquired, as she paused, rather, it appeared, to take breath than because her subject or her zeal was exhausted.

"Say, Mr. Yorke!" was the answer, the speaker meantime walking fast from wall to wall of the oak parlour—"say? I have a great deal to say, if I could get it out in lucid order, which I never can do. I have to say that your views, and those of most extreme politicians, are such as none but men in an irresponsible position can advocate; that they are purely opposition views, meant only to be talked about, and never intended to be acted on. Make you Prime Minister of England to-morrow, and you would have to abandon them. You abuse Moore for defending his mill. Had you been in Moore's place you could not with honour or sense have acted otherwise than he acted. You abuse Mr. Helstone for everything he does. Mr. Helstone has his faults; he sometimes does wrong, but oftener right. Were you ordained vicar of Briarfield, you would find it no easy task to sustain all the active schemes for the benefit of the parish planned and persevered in by your predecessor. I wonder people cannot judge more fairly of each other and themselves. When I hear Messrs. Malone and Donne chatter about the authority of the church, the dignity and claims of the priesthood, the deference due to them as clergymen; when I hear the outbreaks of their small spite against Dissenters; when I witness their[Pg 324] silly, narrow jealousies and assumptions; when their palaver about forms, and traditions, and superstitions is sounding in my ear; when I behold their insolent carriage to the poor, their often base servility to the rich—I think the Establishment is indeed in a poor way, and both she and her sons appear in the utmost need of reformation. Turning away distressed from minster tower and village spire—ay, as distressed as a churchwarden who feels the exigence of white-wash and has not wherewithal to purchase lime—I recall your senseless sarcasms on the 'fat bishops,' the 'pampered parsons,' 'old mother church,' etc. I remember your strictures on all who differ from you, your sweeping condemnation of classes and individuals, without the slightest allowance made for circumstances or temptations; and then, Mr. Yorke, doubt clutches my inmost heart as to whether men exist clement, reasonable, and just enough to be entrusted with the task of reform. I don't believe you are of the number."

"You have an ill opinion of me, Miss Shirley. You never told me so much of your mind before."

"I never had an opening. But I have sat on Jessy's stool by your chair in the back-parlour at Briarmains, for evenings together, listening excitedly to your talk, half admiring what you said, and half rebelling against it. I think you a fine old Yorkshireman, sir. I am proud to have been born in the same county and parish as yourself. Truthful, upright, independent you are, as a rock based below seas; but also you are harsh, rude, narrow, and merciless."

"Not to the poor, lass, nor to the meek of the earth; only to the proud and high-minded."

"And what right have you, sir, to make such distinctions? A prouder, a higher-minded man than yourself does not exist. You find it easy to speak comfortably to your inferiors; you are too haughty, too ambitious, too jealous to be civil to those above you. But you are all alike. Helstone also is proud and prejudiced. Moore, though juster and more considerate than either you or the rector, is still haughty, stern, and, in a public sense, selfish. It is well there are such men as Mr. Hall to be found occasionally—men of large and kind hearts, who can love their whole race, who can forgive others for being richer, more prosperous, or more powerful than they are. Such men may have less originality, less force of character than you, but they are better friends to mankind."

[Pg 325]"And when is it to be?" said Mr. Yorke, now rising.

"When is what to be?"

"The wedding."

"Whose wedding?"

"Only that of Robert Gérard Moore, Esq., of Hollow's Cottage, with Miss Keeldar, daughter and heiress of the late Charles Cave Keeldar of Fieldhead Hall."

Shirley gazed at the questioner with rising colour. But the light in her eye was not faltering; it shone steadily—yes, it burned deeply.

"That is your revenge," she said slowly; then added, "Would it be a bad match, unworthy of the late Charles Cave Keeldar's representative?"

"My lass, Moore is a gentleman; his blood is pure and ancient as mine or thine."

"And we two set store by ancient blood? We have family pride, though one of us at least is a republican?"

Yorke bowed as he stood before her. His lips were mute, but his eye confessed the impeachment. Yes, he had family pride; you saw it in his whole bearing.

"Moore is a gentleman," echoed Shirley, lifting her head with glad grace. She checked herself. Words seemed crowding to her tongue. She would not give them utterance; but her look spoke much at the moment. What, Yorke tried to read, but could not. The language was there, visible, but untranslatable—a poem, a fervid lyric, in an unknown tongue. It was not a plain story, however, no simple gush of feeling, no ordinary love-confession—that was obvious. It was something other, deeper, more intricate than he guessed at. He felt his revenge had not struck home. He felt that Shirley triumphed. She held him at fault, baffled, puzzled. She enjoyed the moment, not he.

"And if Moore is a gentleman, you can be only a lady; therefore——"

"Therefore there would be no inequality in our union."

"None."

"Thank you for your approbation. Will you give me away when I relinquish the name of Keeldar for that of Moore?"

Mr. Yorke, instead of replying, gazed at her much puzzled. He could not divine what her look signified—whether she spoke in earnest or in jest. There were purpose and feeling, banter and scoff, playing, mingled, on her mobile lineaments.

[Pg 326]"I don't understand thee," he said, turning away.

She laughed. "Take courage, sir; you are not singular in your ignorance. But I suppose if Moore understands me that will do, will it not?"

"Moore may settle his own matters henceforward for me; I'll neither meddle nor make with them further."

A new thought crossed her. Her countenance changed magically. With a sudden darkening of the eye and austere fixing of the features she demanded, "Have you been asked to interfere? Are you questioning me as another's proxy?"

"The Lord save us! Whoever weds thee must look about him! Keep all your questions for Robert; I'll answer no more on 'em. Good-day, lassie!"

The day being fine, or at least fair—for soft clouds curtained the sun, and a dim but not chill or waterish haze slept blue on the hills—Caroline, while Shirley was engaged with her callers, had persuaded Mrs. Pryor to assume her bonnet and summer shawl, and to take a walk with her up towards the narrow end of the Hollow.

Here the opposing sides of the glen, approaching each other and becoming clothed with brushwood and stunted oaks, formed a wooded ravine, at the bottom of which ran the mill-stream, in broken, unquiet course, struggling with many stones, chafing against rugged banks, fretting with gnarled tree-roots, foaming, gurgling, battling as it went. Here, when you had wandered half a mile from the mill, you found a sense of deep solitude—found it in the shade of unmolested trees, received it in the singing of many birds, for which that shade made a home. This was no trodden way. The freshness of the wood flowers attested that foot of man seldom pressed them; the abounding wild roses looked as if they budded, bloomed, and faded under the watch of solitude, as if in a sultan's harem. Here you saw the sweet azure of blue-bells, and recognized in pearl-white blossoms, spangling the grass, a humble type of some starlit spot in space.

Mrs. Pryor liked a quiet walk. She ever shunned high-roads, and sought byways and lonely lanes. One companion she preferred to total solitude, for in solitude she was nervous; a vague fear of annoying encounters broke the enjoyment of quite lonely rambles. But she feared nothing with Caroline. When once she got away from human[Pg 327] habitations, and entered the still demesne of nature accompanied by this one youthful friend, a propitious change seemed to steal over her mind and beam in her countenance. When with Caroline—and Caroline only—her heart, you would have said, shook off a burden, her brow put aside a veil, her spirits too escaped from a restraint. With her she was cheerful; with her, at times, she was tender; to her she would impart her knowledge, reveal glimpses of her experience, give her opportunities for guessing what life she had lived, what cultivation her mind had received, of what calibre was her intelligence, how and where her feelings were vulnerable.

To-day, for instance, as they walked along, Mrs. Pryor talked to her companion about the various birds singing in the trees, discriminated their species, and said something about their habits and peculiarities. English natural history seemed familiar to her. All the wild flowers round their path were recognized by her; tiny plants springing near stones and peeping out of chinks in old walls—plants such as Caroline had scarcely noticed before—received a name and an intimation of their properties. It appeared that she had minutely studied the botany of English fields and woods. Having reached the head of the ravine, they sat down together on a ledge of gray and mossy rock jutting from the base of a steep green hill which towered above them. She looked round her, and spoke of the neighbourhood as she had once before seen it long ago. She alluded to its changes, and compared its aspect with that of other