Chapter 3. The Story

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_ CHAPTER III. THE STORY

The children were at last in bed, the drawing-room lodger had finished her dinner, the welcome time of lull in the day's occupations had come, and Mrs. Home sat by the dining-room fire. A large basket, filled with little garments ready for mending, lay on the floor at her feet, and her working materials were close by; but, for a wonder, the busy fingers were idle. In vain Daisy's frock pleaded for that great rent made yesterday, and Harold's socks showed themselves most disreputably out at heels. Charlotte Home neither put on her thimble nor threaded her needle; she sat gazing into the fire, lost in reverie. It was not a very happy or peaceful reverie, to judge from the many changes on her expressive face. The words, "Shall I, or shall I not?" came often to her lips. Many things seemed to tear her judgment in divers ways; most of all the look in her little son's eyes when he asked that eager, impatient question, "mother, why aren't we rich?" but other and older voices than little Harold's said to her, and they spoke pleadingly enough, "Leave this thing alone; God knows what is best for you. As you have gone on all these years, so continue, not troubling about what you cannot understand, but trusting to him."

"I cannot; I am so tired sometimes," sighed the poor young wife.

She was still undetermined when her husband returned. There was a great contrast in their faces--a greater almost in their voices, in the tone of her dispirited, "Well, Angus," and his almost triumphant answer,----

"Well, Lottie, that hard fight has ended bravely. Thank God!"

"Ah! then the poor soul has gone," said the wife, moving her husband's chair into the warmest corner.

"She has truly gone; I saw her breathe her last. But there is no need to apply the word 'poor' to her; she has done with all that. You know what a weakly, troubled creature she always was, how temptation and doubt seemed to wrap her round like a mist, and prevent her seeing any of the shining of the blue sky. Well, it all passed away at the last, and there was nothing but a steadfast looking into the very face of her Lord. He came for her, and she just stretched out her arms and went to Him. Thank God for being privileged to witness such a death; it makes life far more easy."

A little weariness had crept perceptibly into the brave voice of the minister as he said these last words. His wife laid her hand sympathizingly on his. They sat silent for a few moments, then he spoke on a different subject,----

"How is baby to-night, Lottie?"

"Better, I think; his tooth is through at last. He will have rest now for a bit, poor little darling."

"We must be careful to keep him from catching another cold. And how is Anne getting on?"

"As well as we can expect from such an ignorant little mite. And oh! Angus, the nursery is such a cold, draughty room, and I do--I do wish we were rich."

The last words were tumbled out with a great irrepressible burst of tears.

"Why, my Lottie, what has come to you?" said her husband, touched and alarmed by this rare show of feeling "What is it, dear? You wish we were rich, so do not I; I am quite content. I go among so very much poorer people than myself, Lottie, that it always seems to me I have far more than my fair share of life's good things; but, at any rate my Lottie, crying won't make us rich, so don't waste your strength over it."

"I can't help it sometimes, Angus; it goes to my heart to see you shivering in such a great-coat as you have just taken off, and then I know you want better food, and wine; you are so tired this moment you can scarcely speak. What a lot of good some port wine would do you!"

"And what a lot of good, wishing for it will do me! Come Lottie, be sensible; we must not begin to repine for what we have not got, and cannot get. Let us think of our mercies."

"You make me ashamed of myself, Angus. But these thoughts don't come to me for nothing; the fact is--yes, I will tell you at last, I have long been making up my mind. The truth is, Angus, I can't look at the children--I can't look at you and see you all suffering, and hold my peace any longer. We are poor, very--very--dreadfully poor, but we ought to be rich."

"Lottie!"

Such a speech, so uttered, would have called for reproof from Angus Home, had it passed the lips of another. But he knew the woman he had married too well not to believe there was reason in her words.

"I am sorry you have kept a secret from me," he said. "What is this mystery, Lottie?"

"It was my mother, Angus. She begged of me to keep it to myself, and she only told me when she was dying. But may I just tell you all from the very beginning?"

"Yes, dear. If it is a romance, it will just soothe me, for though I am, I own, tired, I could not sleep for a long time to come."

"First, Angus, I must confess to a little bit of deceit I practised on you."

"Ah, Lottie!" said her husband playfully, "no wonder you cried, with such a heavy burden on your soul; but confess your sins, wife."

"You know how it has always fretted me, our being poor," said Charlotte. "Your income is only just sufficient to put bread into our mouths, and, indeed, we sometimes want even that. I have often lain awake at night wondering how I could make a little money, and this winter, when it set in so very severe, set my thoughts harder to work on this great problem than ever. The children did want so much, Angus--new boots, and little warm dresses--and so--and so--one day about a month ago, Mrs. Lisle, who reads and writes so much, called, and I was very low, and she was kind and sympathizing; somehow, at last out it all came, I did so wish to earn money. She asked me if I could write a good clear hand, a hand easily read. I showed her what I could do, and she was good enough to call it excellent. She said no more then, but the next day she came early. She brought me a MS. written by a friend of hers; very illegible it was. She would not tell me the name of her friend, but she said she was a lady very desirous of seeing herself in print. If I would copy this illegible writing in my own good clear hand, the lady would give me five pounds. I thought of the children's boots and their winter dresses, and I toiled over it. I confess now that it was weary work, and tired me more than I cared to own. I finished it to-day; this evening, just before you came home, that task was done; but this morning I did something else. You know Miss Mitchell is always kind enough to let me see the _Times_. This morning Anne brought it down as usual, and, as I ran my eyes over it I was struck by an advertisement, 'A young lady living at Kensington wished for the services of an amanuensis, for so many hours daily. Remuneration good.' I could not help it, Angus, my heart seemed to leap into my mouth. Then and there I put on my bonnet, and with a specimen of my handwriting in my pocket, went off to answer the advertisement in person. The house was in Prince's Gate, Kensington: the name of the young lady who had advertised for my services was Harman."

"Harman! how strange, wife! your own name before you married."

"Yes, dear; but such a different person from me, so rich, while I am so poor; so very, very beautiful, and graceful, and gracious: she may have been a year or so younger than I, she was not much. She had a thoughtful face, a noble face. I could have drawn tears from her eyes had I described the little children, but I did not. It was delightful to look upon her calm. Not for worlds would I disturb it; and, Angus, I found out another thing--her name was not only Harman, but Charlotte Harman."

There was no doubt at all that the other Charlotte was excited now, the color had come into her cheeks, her eyes sparkled. Her husband watched her with undisguised surprise.

"I made a good thing of it Angus," she continued. "I am to go to Prince's Gate every morning, I am to be there at ten, and give my services till one o'clock. I am then to have lunch with the young lady, and for all this, and the enjoyment of a good dinner into the bargain, I am to receive thirty shillings a week. Does not it sound too good to be true?"

"And that is how we are to be rich, Lottie. Well, go on and prosper. I know what an active little woman you are and how impossible it is for you to let the grass grow under your feet. I do not object to your trying this thing, if it is not too much for your strength, and if you can safely leave the children."

"I have thought of the children, Angus; this is so much for their real interest, that it would be a pity to throw it away. But, as you say, they must not be neglected. I shall ask that little Alice Martin to come in to look after them until I am back every day; she will be glad to earn half-a-crown a week."

"As much in proportion, as your thirty shillings is to you--eh, Lottie? See how rich we are in reality."

Mrs. Home sighed, and the bright look left her face. Her husband perceived the change.

"That is not all you have got to tell me," he said.

"No, it is only leading up to what I want to tell you. It is what has set me thinking so hard all day that I can keep it to myself no longer. Angus, prepare for a surprise; that beautiful young lady, who bears the same name I bore before I was married--is--is--she is my near relation."

"Your near relation, Charlotte? But I never knew you had any near relations."

"No, dear, I never told you; my mother thought it best that you should not know. She only spoke to me of them when she was dying. She was sorry afterwards that she had even done that; she begged of me, unless great necessity arose, not to say anything to you. It is only because it seems to me the necessity has really come that I speak of what gave my mother such pain to mention."

"Yes, dear, you have wealthy relations. I don't know that it matters very greatly. But go on."

"There is more than that, Angus, but I will try to tell you all. You know how poor I was when you found me, and gave me your love and yourself."

"We were both poor, Lottie; so much so that we thought two hundred a year, which was what we had to begin housekeeping on, quite riches."

"Yes, Angus; well, I had been poor all my life, I could never do what rich girls did, I was so accustomed to wearing shabby dresses, and eating plain food, and doing without the amusements which seem to come naturally into the lives of most young girls, that I had ceased to miss them. I was sent to a rather good school, and had lessons in music and painting, and I sometimes wondered how my mother had money even to give me these. Then I met you, and we were married. It was just after our little Harold was born that my mother died."

"Yes, you went down into Hertfordshire; you were away for six weeks."

"I took Harold with me; mother was so proud of him. Whenever she had an easy moment, she used to like to have him placed on her knee. She told me then that she had a little son older than I, who died, and that our Harold reminded her of him. One night, I remember so well, I was sitting up with her. She had been going through great pain, but towards the morning she was easier. She was more inclined, however, to talk than to sleep. She began again speaking about the likeness between our Harold and my little brother who died.

"'I shall give you little Edgar's christening robe for Harold,' she said. 'I never could bear to part with it before but I don't mind his having it. Open my wardrobe, Charlotte, and you will find it folded away in a blue paper, in the small wooden box.'

"I did so, and took out a costly thing, yellow, it is true, with age, but half covered with most valuable lace.

"'Why, mother,' I exclaimed, 'how did you ever get such a valuable dress as this? Why, this lace would be cheap at a guinea a yard!'

"'It cost a great deal more than that,' replied mother, stroking down the soft lace and muslin with her thin fingers; 'but we were rich then, Lottie.'

"'Rich!' I said, 'rich! I never, never thought that you and I had anything to say to money, mother.'

"'You don't remember your father, child?'

"'No, mother,' I said; 'how could I? I was only two years old when he died.'

"Mother was silent after that, and I think she went into a doze, but my curiosity and wonder were excited, and I could not help seeking to know more.

"'I never knew that we were rich,' I said again the next day. 'Why did you never tell me before? The next best thing to enjoying riches would be to hear about them.'

"'I did not want to make you discontented, Lottie. I thought what you had never known or thought of you would never miss. I feared, my dear, to make you discontented.'

"'But I have thought of money,' I owned, 'I have thought of it lately a great deal. When I look at Angus I long to get him every luxury, and I want my little Harold to grow up surrounded by those things which help to develop a fine and refined character.

"'But they don't, Lottie; they don't indeed,' answered my dear dying mother. 'Riches bring a snare--they debase the character, they don't ennoble it.'

"'Mother,' I said, 'I see plainly that you are well acquainted with this subject. You will tell me, mother, what you know?'

"'Yes,' replied my mother; 'it won't do you the least good; but as I have said so much to you I may as well tell the rest.'

"Then, Angus, my mother told me the following story; it is not very long.

"She was an orphan and a governess when my father found her and married her--she was my father's second wife. She was much younger than he--he had grown-up sons--two grown-up sons at the time of his marriage; and they were very deeply offended at his thinking of a second marriage. So indignant were they that my father and they came to quite an open quarrel, and mother said that during the five years that my father lived she never saw either of her stepsons until just at the close. She was very happy as my father's wife; he loved her dearly, and as he had plenty of money she wanted for nothing. My father was an old man, as I have said, and he was tired of fuss, and also of much society; so though they were so rich mother lived rather a lonely life--in a large and beautiful place in Hertfordshire. She said the place was called the Hermitage, and was one of the largest and best in the neighborhood. At last my father fell ill, very ill, and the doctors said he must die. Then for the first time there came hastening back to the Hermitage the two elder sons--their names were John and Jasper--the eldest John, my mother said, was very handsome, and very kind and courteous to her. He was a married man, and he told mother that he had a little daughter much about my age, who was also called Charlotte. My father and his two sons seemed quite reconciled in these last days, and they spent most of their time with him. On the evening, however, before he died, he had mother and me with him alone. I sat on the bed, a little baby child of two, and my father held mother's hand. He told mother how much he loved her, and he spoke a very little about money matters.

"'John will make it all right for you, Daisy,' he said. 'John knows all about my wishes with regard to you and little Charlotte. I should like this little Charlotte and his to be friends; they are both called after my own mother, the best woman I ever met. You will bring up little Charlotte with every comfort and refinement, dear wife.'

"The next day my father died, and John and Jasper went to London. They did not even wait for the funeral, though Jasper came back for it. John, he told mother, was kept by the sudden dangerous illness of his wife. Jasper said that John felt our father's death most dreadfully. Mother had liked John, who was always very civil to her, but she could not bear Jasper: she said he seemed a cleverer man than his brother, but she never could get over a feeling of distrust towards him. The will was never read to my mother, but Jasper came back again from London to tell her of its contents, and then judge of her surprise--her name was not even mentioned, neither her name nor mine. She had been married without settlements, and every farthing of all my father's great wealth was left to his two sons, John and Jasper. Jasper expressed great surprise; he even said it was a monstrously unfair thing of his father to do, and that certainly he and his brother would try to rectify it in a measure. He then went back to London, and mother was left alone in the great empty house. She said she felt quite stunned, and was just then in such grief for my father that she scarcely heeded the fact that she was left penniless. Two days afterwards a lawyer from London came down to see her. He came with a message from her two stepsons. They were much concerned for her, and they were willing to help her. They would allow her, between them, as long as she lived the interest on three thousand pounds--on one condition. The condition was this: she was never to claim the very least relationship with them; she was to bring up her daughter as a stranger to them. They had never approved of their father's marrying her; they would allow her the money on condition that all connection between them be completely dropped. The day it was renewed by either mother or daughter, on that day the interest on the three thousand pounds would cease to be paid. My mother was too young, too completely inexperienced, and too bowed down with grief, to make the least objection. Only one faint protest did she make. 'My husband said,' she faltered, 'on the very last day of his life, he said that he wished my little Charlotte and that other Charlotte in London to be friends.' But the lawyer only shook his head. On this point his clients were firm. 'All communication between the families must cease.'

"That is the story, Angus," continued Charlotte Home, suddenly changing her voice, and allowing her eyes, which had been lowered during her brief recital, to rise to her husband's face. "My dear mother died a day or two afterwards. She died regretting having to own even what she did, and begging me not to think unkindly of my father, and not to unsettle your mind by telling you what could do no good whatever.

"'I do not think unkindly of my father, mother,' I answered, 'and I will not trouble my husband's mind, at least, not yet, never, perhaps, unless fitting opportunity arises. But I know what I think, mother--what, indeed, I know. That was not my father's real will; my brothers John and Jasper have cheated you. Of this I am very sure.'

"Mother, though she was so weak and dying, got quite a color into her cheeks when I said this. 'No, no,' she said, 'don't harbor such a thought in your heart--my darling, my darling. Indeed it is utterly impossible. It was a real, real will. I heard it read, and your brothers, they were gentlemen. Don't let so base a thought of them dwell in your heart. It is, I know it is, impossible.'

"I said no more to trouble my dear mother and shortly afterwards she died. That is six years ago." _

Read next: Chapter 4. Two Ways Of Looking At It

Read previous: Chapter 2. The Poor Charlotte

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