Shirley, Charlotte Brontë [free children's ebooks online .txt] 📗

of twelve, whom you may help and caress forever without their evincing any quicker sense of the kindness done and meant than if they were made of wax and wood instead of flesh and nerves.⁠—She kept close to me, Miss Keeldar, the rest of the evening, walking with me over the grounds where the children were playing; she followed me into the vestry when all were summoned into church; she would, I believe, have mounted with me to the pulpit, had I not taken the previous precaution of conducting her to the rectory pew.”

“And he has been my friend ever since,” said Caroline.

“And always sat at her table, near her tray, and handed the cups⁠—that is the extent of my services. The next thing I do for her will be to marry her some day to some curate or mill-owner.⁠—But mind, Caroline, I shall inquire about the bridegroom’s character; and if he is not a gentleman likely to render happy the little girl who walked with me hand in hand over Nunnely Common, I will not officiate. So take care.”

“The caution is useless. I am not going to be married. I shall live single, like your sister Margaret, Mr. Hall.”

“Very well. You might do worse. Margaret is not unhappy. She has her books for a pleasure, and her brother for a care, and is content. If ever you want a home, if the day should come when Briarfield rectory is yours no longer, come to Nunnely vicarage. Should the old maid and bachelor be still living, they will make you tenderly welcome.”

“There are your flowers. Now,” said Caroline, who had kept the nosegay she had selected for him till this moment, “you don’t care for a bouquet, but you must give it to Margaret; only⁠—to be sentimental for once⁠—keep that little forget-me-not, which is a wild flower I gathered from the grass; and⁠—to be still more sentimental⁠—let me take two or three of the blue blossoms and put them in my souvenir.”

And she took out a small book with enamelled cover and silver clasp, wherein, having opened it, she inserted the flowers, writing round them in pencil, “To be kept for the sake of the Rev. Cyril Hall, my friend. May⁠—, 18⁠—.”

The Rev. Cyril Hall, on his part, also placed a sprig in safety between the leaves of a pocket Testament. He only wrote on the margin, “Caroline.”

“Now,” said he, smiling, “I trust we are romantic enough. Miss Keeldar,” he continued (the curates, by the by, during this conversation, were too much occupied with their own jokes to notice what passed at the other end of the table), “I hope you are laughing at this trait of ‘exaltation’ in the old gray-headed vicar; but the fact is, I am so used to comply with the requests of this young friend of yours, I don’t know how to refuse her when she tells me to do anything. You would say it is not much in my way to traffic with flowers and forget-me-nots; but, you see, when requested to be sentimental, I am obedient.”

“He is naturally rather sentimental,” remarked Caroline. “Margaret told me so, and I know what pleases him.”

“That you should be good and happy? Yes; that is one of my greatest pleasures. May God long preserve to you the blessings of peace and innocence! By which phrase I mean comparative innocence; for in His sight, I am well aware, none are pure. What to our human perceptions looks spotless as we fancy angels, is to Him but frailty, needing the blood of His Son to cleanse, and the strength of His Spirit to sustain. Let us each and all cherish humility⁠—I, as you, my young friends; and we may well do it when we look into our own hearts, and see there temptations, inconsistencies, propensities, even we blush to recognize. And it is not youth, nor good looks, nor grace, nor any gentle outside charm which makes either beauty or goodness in God’s eyes.⁠—Young ladies, when your mirror or men’s tongues flatter you, remember that, in the sight of her Maker, Mary Ann Ainley⁠—a woman whom neither glass nor lips have ever panegyrized⁠—is fairer and better than either of you. She is indeed,” he added, after a pause⁠—“she is indeed. You young things, wrapt up in yourselves and in earthly hopes, scarcely live as Christ lived. Perhaps you cannot do it yet, while existence is so sweet and earth so smiling to you; it would be too much to expect. She, with meek heart and due reverence, treads close in her Redeemer’s steps.”

Here the harsh voice of Donne broke in on the mild tones of Mr. Hall. “Ahem!” he began, clearing his throat evidently for a speech of some importance⁠—“ahem! Miss Keeldar, your attention an instant, if you please.”

“Well,” said Shirley nonchalantly, “what is it? I listen. All of me is ear that is not eye.”

“I hope part of you is hand also,” returned Donne, in his vulgarly presumptuous and familiar style, “and part purse. It is to the hand and purse I propose to appeal. I came here this morning with a view to beg of you⁠—”

“You should have gone to Mrs. Gill; she is my almoner.”

“To beg of you a subscription to a school. I and Dr. Boultby intend to erect one in the hamlet of Ecclefigg, which is under our vicarage of Whinbury. The Baptists have got possession of it. They have a chapel there, and we want to dispute the ground.”

“But I have nothing to do with Ecclefigg. I possess no property there.”

“What does that signify? You’re a churchwoman, ain’t you?”

“Admirable creature!” muttered Shirley, under her breath. “Exquisite address! Fine style! What raptures he excites in me!” Then aloud, “I am a churchwoman, certainly.”

“Then you can’t refuse to contribute in this case. The population of Ecclefigg are a parcel of brutes; we want to civilize them.”

“Who is to be the missionary?”

“Myself, probably.”

“You won’t fail through lack of sympathy with your flock.”

“I hope not⁠—I expect success; but we must have