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Olive: A Novel, a novel by Dinah M. Mulock Craik |
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Chapter 49 |
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_ CHAPTER XLIX Late autumn, that season so beautiful in Scotland, was shining into the house at Morningside. She, its mistress, who had there lived from middle life to far-extended years, and then passed from the weakness of age to the renewed youth of immortality, was seen no more within its walls. But her spirit seemed to abide there still; in the flowers which at early spring she had planted, for other hands to gather; in the fountain she had placed, which sang its song of murmuring freshness to soothe many an ear and heart, when _she_, walking by the streams of living waters, needed those of earth no more. Mrs. Flora Rothesay was dead; but she had lived one of those holy lives whose influence remains for generations. So, though now her name had gradually ceased from familiar lips, and from her house and garden walks, her image faded slowly in the thoughts of those who best loved her; still she lived, even on earth, in the good deeds she had left behind--in the happiness she had created wherever her own sore-wounded footsteps trod. In the dwelling from which she had departed there seemed little change. Everything looked as it had done more than a year before, when Olive had come thither, and found rest and peace. There were fewer flowers in the autumnal garden, and the Hermitage woods beyond were all brown and gold; but there was the same clear line of the Braid Hills, their purple slopes lying in the early morning sun. No one looked at them, though, for the breakfast-room was empty. But very soon there stole into it, with the soft footstep of old, with the same quiet smile,--Olive Rothesay. No, reader! Neither you nor any one else will ever see Olive _Rothesay_ more. She wears on her finger a golden ring, she bears a new name--the well-beloved name.--She is Harold Gwynne's wife now. To their fortunes Heaven allowed, as Heaven sometimes does, the sweetness of a brave resolve, the joy of finding that it is not needed. Scarcely had Olive and her betrothed prepared to meet their future and go on, faithfully loving, though perhaps unwedded for years, when a change came. They learned that Mrs. Flora Rothesay, by a will made a little before her death, had devised her whole fortune to Harold, on condition that he should take the name of his ancestors on the mother's side, and be henceforth Harold Gordon Gwynne. She made no reservations, save that she wished her house and personal property at Morningside to go to her grand-niece Olive, adding in the will the following sentence: "I leave her this and _no more_, that she may understand how deeply I reverenced her true woman's nature, and how dearly I loved herself." And Olive did understand all; but she hid the knowledge in her rejoicing heart, both then and always. It was the only secret she ever kept from her husband. She had been married some weeks only; yet she felt as if the old life had been years gone by, so faint and dreamlike did it seem. Hers was a very quiet marriage--a quiet honeymoon; fit crowning of a love which had been so solemn, almost sad, from its beginning to its end. Its _end_?--say, rather, its new dawn;--its fulfilment in a deeper, holier bond than is ever dreamed of by girlish sentiment or boyish passion--the still, sacred love of marriage. And, however your modern infidels may doubt, and your free-thinking heart-desecrators scoff, _that_ is the true love--the tie which God created from the beginning, making man and woman to be one flesh, and pronouncing it "good." It is good! None can question it who sees the look of peace and full contentment--a look whose like one never beholds in the wide world save then, as it sits smiling on the face of a bride who has married for true love. Very rare it is, indeed--rare as such marriages ever are; but one sees it sometimes;--we saw it, reader, a while since, on a young wife's face, and it made us think of little Olive in her happy home at Morningside. She stood by the window for a minute or two, her artist-soul drinking in all that was beautiful in the scene; then she went about her little household duties, already grown so sweet. She took care that Mrs. Gwynne's easy-chair was placed in its proper angle by the fire, and that Harold had beside his plate the great ugly scientific book which he always liked to read at breakfast. Indeed, it was a saying of Marion M'Gillivray's--from whose bonnie face the cloud had altogether passed, leaving only a thoughtful gravity meet for a girl who would shortly leave her maiden home for one far dearer--Marion often said that Mr. Gwynne was trying to make his wife as learned as himself, and that his influence was robbing their Scottish Academy of no one knew how many grand pictures. Perhaps it might be--it was a natural and a womanly thing that in her husband's fame Olive should almost forget her own. When she had seen all things ready, Olive went away upstairs, and stood by a child's bed--little Ailie's. Not the least sweet of all her new ties was it, that Harold's daughter was now her own. And tender, like a mother's, was the kiss with which she wakened the child. There was in her hand a book--a birthday gift; for Ailie was nine years old that day. "Oh, how good you are to me, my sweet, dear, new mamma!" cried the happy little one, clinging round Olive's neck. "What a pretty, pretty book! And you have written in it my name--'Ailie.' But," she added, after a shy pause, "I wish, if you do not mind, that you would put there my whole long name, which I am just learning to write." "That I will, my pet. Come, tell me what shall I say--word for word, 'Alison'"------ "Yes, that is it--my beautiful long name--which I like so much, though no one ever calls me by it--_Alison Sara Gwynne._" "Sara! did they call you Sara?" said Olive, letting her pen fall. She took the little girl in her arms, and looked long and wistfully into the large oriental eyes--so like those which death had long sealed. And her tears rose, remembering the days of her youth. How strange--how very strange, had been her whole life's current, even until now! She thought of her who was no more--whose place she filled, whose slighted happiness was to herself the summit of all joy. But Heaven had so willed it, and to that end had made all things tend. It was best for all. One moment her heart melted, thinking of the garden at Oldchurch, the thorn-tree at the river-side, and afterwards of the long-closed grave at Harbury, over which the grass waved in forgotten silence. Then, pressing Ailie to her bosom, she resolved that while her own life lasted she would be a faithful and most loving mother unto poor Sara's child. A _Mother!_--The word brought back--as it often did when Harold's daughter called her by that name--another memory, never forgotten, though sealed among the holy records of the past. Even on her marriage-day the thought had come--"O thou, to whom in life I gave all love, all duty,--now needed by thee no more, both pass unto _him_. If souls can behold and rejoice in the happiness of those beloved on earth, mother, look down from heaven and bless my husband!" Nor did it wrong the dead, if this marriage-bond involved another, which awakened in Olive feelings that seemed almost a renewal of the love once buried in Mrs. Rothesay's grave. And Harold's wife inly vowed, that while she lived, his mother should never want the devotion and affection of a daughter. In the past fading memories of Olive's former life was one more, which now grew into a duty, over whose fulfilment, even amidst her bridal happiness, she pondered continually; and talked thereof to her husband, to whom it was scarcely less absorbing. Since they came home to Morningside, they had constantly sought at St. Margaret's for news of Christal Manners. Many times Olive had written to her, but no answer came. The silence of the convent walls seemed to fold itself over all revelations of the tortured spirit which had found refuge there. However, Christal had taken no vows. Mrs. Flora and Harold had both been rigid on that point, and the good nuns reverenced their order too much to admit any one who might have sought it from the impulse of despair, rather than from any pious "vocation." Olive's heart yearned over her sister. On this day she resolved to make one more effort to break the silence between them. So, in the afternoon, she went to the convent quite alone, walking through the pleasant lanes where she had formerly walked with Marion M'Gillivray. Strange contrast between the present and the past! When she stood in the little convent parlour, and remembered how she had stood there with a bursting heart, that longed for any rest--any oblivion, to deaden its cruel pain,--Olive trembled with her happiness now. And she felt how solemn is the portion of those whose cup God has thus crowned, in order that they may pour it out before Him continually, in offerings of thanksgiving and of fruitful deeds. Sister Ignatia entered--the same bright-eyed, benevolent, simple soul. "Ah, you are come again this week, too, my dear Mrs. Harold Gwynne--(I can hardly remember your new name even yet)--but I fear your coming is vain; though, day after day, I beseech your sister to see you." "She will not, then?" said Olive, sighing. "No. Yet she says she has no bitterness against you. How could she? However, I ask no questions, for the past is all forgotten here. And I love the poor young creature. Oh, if you knew her fasts, her vigils, and her prayers! God and the Holy Mother pity her, poor broken-hearted thing!" said the compassionate nun. "Speak to her once more. Do not tell her I am here: only speak of me to her," said Olive. And she waited anxiously until Sister Ignatia came back. "She says she is glad you are happy, and married to that good friend of hers, to whom she owes so much; but that she is dead to the world, and wishes to hear of no one any more. Still, when I told her you lived at Morningside, she began to tremble. I think--I hope, if she were to see you suddenly, before she had time to reflect--only not now--you look so agitated yourself." "No, no; I can always be calm at will--I have long learned that. Your plan is kind: let it be to-day. It may end in good, please God. Where is my dear sister?" "She is sitting in the dormitory of the convent-school. She stays a great deal with our little girls, and takes much care of them, especially of some orphans that we have." Olive sighed. Well she read unhappy Christal's reason. But it showed some softening of the stony heart. Almost hopeful she followed Sister Ignatia to the dormitory. It was a long, narrow room, lined with tiny white beds. Over its pure neatness good fairies might have continually presided. Through it swept the fresh air coming from the open window which overlooked the garden. And there, darkening it with her tall black shadow, stood the only present occupant of the room, Christal Manners. She wore a garb half-secular, half-religious. Her black serge dress betrayed no attention to fashion, scarcely even to neatness; her beautiful hair was all put back under a white linen veil, and her whole appearance showed that last bitter change in a woman's nature, when she ceases to have a woman's instinctive personal pride. Olive saw not her face, except the cheek's outline, worn to the straightness of age. Nor did Christal observe Olive until she had approached quite close. Then she gave a wild start, the old angry flush mounted to her temples, and sank. "Why did you come here?" she said hoarsely; "I sent you word I wished to see no one--that I was utterly dead to the world." "But not to me--oh, not to me, my sister!" "Sister!" she repeated, with flashing eyes, and then crossed herself humbly, muttering, "The evil spirit must not rise again. Help me, Blessed Mother--good saints, help me!" She told her rosary over once, twice, and then turned to Olive, subdued. "Now say what you have to say to me. I told you I had no anger in my heart--I even asked your forgiveness. I only desire to be left alone--to spend the rest of my bitter life in penance and prayer." "But I cannot leave you, my sister." "I wish you would not call me so, nor take my hand, nor look at me as you do now--as you did the first night I saw you, and again on that awful, awful day!" And Christal sank back on one of the little beds--the thornless pillow where some happy child slept--and there sobbed bitterly. More than once she motioned Olive away, but Olive would not go. "Do not send me away! If you knew how I suffer daily from the thought of you!" "You suffer! happy as they tell me you are--you, with your home and your husband!" "Ah, Christal, even my husband grieves--my husband, who would do anything in the whole world for your peace. You have forgotten Harold." A softness came over Christal's face. "No, I have not forgotten him. Day and night I pray for him who saved more than my life--my soul. For that deed may God bless him!--and God pardon me." She said this, shuddering, too, as at some awful memory. After a while, she spoke to Olive in a gentler tone, for the first time lifting her eyes to her sister's face. "You seem well in health, and you have a peaceful look. I am glad of it--I am glad you are happy, and married to Harold Gwynne. He told me of his love for you." "But he could not tell you all. If I am happy, I have suffered too. We must all suffer, some time; but suffering ends in time." "Not with me--not with me. But I desire not to talk of myself." "Shall I talk then about your friend Harold--your _brother_? He told me to say he would ever be so to you," said Olive, striving to awaken Christal's sympathies. And she partly succeeded; for her sister listened quietly, and with some show of interest, while she spoke of Harold and of their dear home. "It is so near you, too; we can hear the convent bells when we walk in our pretty garden. You must come and see it, Christal." "No, no; I have rest here; I will never go beyond these walls. As soon as I am twenty-one I shall become a nun, and then I, with all my sorrows, will be buried out of sight for evermore." So said she; and Olive did not contradict her at the time. But she thought that if there was any strength in faithful affection and earnest prayers, the peace of a useful life, spent, not in barren solitude, but in the fruitful garden of God's world, should be Christal's portion yet. One only doubt troubled her. After considering for a long time she ventured to say: "I have told you now nearly all that has happened among us this year. You have spoken of all your friends, save one." She hesitated, and at last uttered the name of Lyle. "Hush!" said Christal. But her cheek's paleness changed not; her heavy eye neither kindled nor drooped. "Hush! I do not wish to hear that name. It has passed out of my world for ever--blotted out by the horrors that followed." "Then you have forgotten"---- "Forgotten all. It was but a dream of my old vain life--it troubles me no more." "Thank God!" murmured Olive, though in her heart she marvelled to think how many false reflections there were of the one true love--the only love that can endure--such as had been hers. She bade an affectionate farewell to her sister, who went with her to the outer court of the convent. Christal did not ask her to come again, but she kissed her when they parted, and once looked back ere she again passed into the quiet silent home which she had chosen as her spirit's grave. Olive walked on quickly, for the afternoon was closing. Very soon she heard overtaking her a footstep, whose sound quickened her pulse even now. "How good and thoughtful of him, my dear Harold--my husband!" _My husband!_ Never did she say or think the words but her heart swelled with inexpressible emotion, remembering the old time, the long silent struggle, the wasting pain. Yet she would have borne it all a thousand times--ay, even had the end come never in her life on earth,--rather than not have known the sweetness of loving--the glory of loving one like him. Harold met her with a smile. "I have been waiting long--I could not let my little Olive walk home alone." She, who had walked through the world alone for so many weary years! But she would never do so any more. She clung to her husband's arm, clasping over it both her little hands in a sweet caressing way: and so they went on together. Olive told him all the good news she had to tell, and he rejoiced with her for Christal's sake. He agreed that there was hope and comfort for their sister still; for he could not believe there was in the whole world a heart so hard and cold, that it could not be melted by Olive's gentle influence, and warmed by the shining of Olive's spirit of love. They were going home, when she saw that her husband looked tired and dull--he had been poring over his books all day. For though now independent of the world, as regarded fortune, he could not relinquish his scientific pursuits; but was every day adding to his acquirements, and to the fame which had been his when only a poor clergyman at Harbury. So, without saying anything, Olive led him down the winding road that leads from Edinburgh towards the Braid Hills, laughing and talking with him the while, "to send the cobwebs out of his brain," as she often told him. Though at the time she never let him see how skilfully she did this, lest his man's dignity should revolt at being so lovingly beguiled. For he was still as ever the very quintessence of pride. Well for him his wife had not that quality--yet perhaps she loved him all the better for possessing it. At the gate of the Hermitage Harold paused. Neither of them had seen the place since they last stood there. At the remembrance he seemed greatly moved. His wife looked lovingly up to him. "Harold, are you content? You would not send me from you?--you would not wish to live your whole life without me now?" "No--no!" he cried, pressing her hand close to his heart. The mute gesture said enough--Olive desired no more. They walked on a long way, even climbing to the summit of the Braid Hills. The night was coming on fast,--the stormy night of early winter--for the wind had risen, and swept howling over the heathery ridge. "But I have my plaid here, and you will not mind the cold, my lassie--Scottish born," said Harold to his wife. And in his own cheek, now brown with health, rose the fresh mountain-blood, while the bold mountain-spirit shone in his fearless eyes. No marvel that Olive looked with pride at her husband, and thought that not in the whole world was there such another man! "I glory in the wind," cried Harold, tossing back his head, and shaking his wavy hair, something lion-like. "It makes me strong and bold. I love to meet it, to wrestle with it; to feel myself in spirit and in frame, stern to resist, daring to achieve, as a man should feel!" And on her part, Olive with her clinging sweetness, her upward gaze, was a type of true woman. "I think," Harold continued, "that there is a full rich life before me yet. I will go forth and rejoice therein; and if misfortune come, I will meet it--thus!" He planted his foot firmly on the ground, lifted his proud head, and looked out fearlessly with his majestic eyes. "And I," said Olive, "thus." She stole her two little cold hands under his plaid, laid her head upon them, close to his heart, and, smiling, nestled there. And the loud fierce wind swept by, but it harmed not them, thus warm and safe in love. So they stood, true man and woman, husband and wife, ready to go through the world without fear, trusting in each other, and looking up to Heaven to guide their way. [THE END] _ |
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