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Susan and Anna Warner - Wych Hazel

S >> Susan and Anna Warner >> Wych Hazel




'I was afraid you were going to say the mill stream,' said
Wych Hazel, who was getting so nervous she didn't know what to
do with herself; 'but the mills seem a safe place.'

'I don't know but he's better done that of the two,' said
Prudentia. 'A safe place? Why, my dear, just think! he has
bought all of Mr. Morton's right and title there; with Mr.
Morton's three mills. Of course, it _must_ have taken very
nearly his whole fortune; it _must_.'

'I fancy there's a trifle left over,' said Mr. Falkirk. 'But I
can't conceive what possessed him. What does Rollo know of the
mill business?'

'Nothing at all, of course,' said Prudentia. 'Nor of any other
business. And he has shewed his ignorance--did Arthur tell you,
sir, how he has shewed it?'

'In buying three mills to begin with,' said Mr. Falkirk. 'A
modest man would have begun with one.'

'But my dear sir, _that_ isn't all. What _do_ you suppose, Miss
Kennedy, was his first move?'

'One is prepared for almost anything.'

'He will learn the business, before long,' said Dr. Arthur,
'if close attention can do it.'

'What should he learn the business for?' said his sister. 'He
has already all that the mill business could give him, without
any trouble. _I_ think he's troubled in his wits; I do indeed.
He was always a wild boy, and now he's a wilder man.'

'Troubled in his wits!' said Dr. Arthur, with such supreme
derision, that Wych Hazel laughed. To her own great relief, be
it said.

'But what is this that he has done?' Mr. Falkirk inquired, his
brows looking very much disgusted.

'My dear sir! Fancy it. Fancy it, Miss Kennedy. The first
thing he did was to _raise the wages of his hands!_'

Just one person caught the gleam from under Hazel's down-cast
eyes,--perhaps something made his own quick-sighted. Dr. Arthur
answered for her.

'They were not half paid before, Mr. Falkirk. That explains
it.'

'Weren't they paid as other mill hands are paid, Dr. Arthur?'

'The more need for a change, then,' said the young man, who
was a trifle Quixotic himself.

'But if the change is made by one man alone, he effects
nothing but his own ruin.'

'That is what Dane is about, I am firmly persuaded,' said Mrs.
Coles.

'No man ever yet went to ruin by doing right,' said Dr.
Maryland.

'Many a one!' said Mr. Falkirk,--'by doing what he _thought_
right; from John Brown up to John Huss, and from John Huss
back to the time when history is lost in a fog bank.'

'They'll get their reward, I suppose, in the other world,'
said Prudentia comfortably.

'How will his ruin affect the poor mill people?' said Wych
Hazel, so seriously, that perhaps only Mr. Falkirk--knowing
her-- knew what she was about.

'Why, my dear, it ruins them too in the end; that's it. When
he fails, of course his improvements fail, and everything goes
back where it was before. Only worse.'

'Precisely,' said Mr. Falkirk. 'You cannot lift the world out
of the grooves it runs in, by mere force; and he who tries,
will put his shoulder out of joint.'

'Then my picture of "the loss of all things," is the portrait
of a ruined man!' said Wych Hazel, with an expressive glance
at Dr. Maryland. He smiled.

'It partly depends, you know, Miss Kennedy, upon where the
race is supposed to end. But our friend is running well at
present, for both worlds.'

'Arthur, he is not!' said his sister emphatically. 'Paul and
John Charteris, the other mill-owners, hate him as hard as
they can hate him; and if they can ruin him, they will; that
you may depend upon.'

'And his own people love him as hard as they can,--so that,
even if you allow one rich mill-owner to be worth a hundred
poor employes, Dane can still strike a fair balance.'--Rather
more than that, Dr. Arthur thought, as his quick eye took
notice of the little screening hand that came suddenly up
about Wych Hazel's mouth and chin.

'That's all nonsense, Arthur; business is business, and not
sentiment. I never heard of a cotton mill yet that was run
upon sentiment; nor did you. And I tell you, it won't pay. I
am speaking of business _as_ business. Paul and John Charteris
will ruin Dane, if they can.'

'They probably can,' said Mr. Falkirk. 'They will make a
combination with other mill-owners and undersell him; and
paying less wages they can afford to do it, for a time. And a
certain time will settle Rollo's business.'

'I think he has lost his wits,' Prudentia repeated, for the
third or fourth utterance. 'Then another thing he has done--But
really, Arthur, my dear, we must go.'

'O tell us some more!' said Miss Kennedy. 'We have not heard
of any wits lost in this way, all winter; and it is quite
exciting. What next, Mrs. Coles?'

Prudentia laughed.

'How comes it he don't tell you himself? I thought you used to
be such friends--riding about everywhere. But indeed _we_ don't
see much of Dane now; he lives at his old nurse's ever so much
of the time; and comes scouring over the country on that bay
horse of his, to consult papa about something;--but _I_ never see
him, except through the window. Sometimes he rides your brown
horse, I think, Miss Kennedy. I suppose he is keeping it in
order for you.'

'Well, that certainly does sound erratic!' said Miss Kennedy,
drawing a long breath. 'I hope he will confine all new-fangled
notions to the bay.'

'He has taught that creature to stand still,' said Mrs. Coles,
looking at her.

'That must afford him immense satisfaction! Rather hard upon
the bay, though.'

'He stands as still as a mountain,' Prudentia went on,
carrying on meanwhile privately a mental speculation about
Wych Hazel;--'he stands like a glossy statue, without being
held, too; and comes when Dane snaps his fingers to him.'

'It only shews what unexpected docility exists in some
natures,' said Miss Kennedy with an unreadable face.

'Come, Prudens--tell your story and have done!' said Dr.
Arthur, speaking now. 'I have an appointment.'

'I am quite ready,' said Mrs. Coles starting up. 'Dear me! we
have stayed an unconscionable time, but Miss Kennedy will
forgive us, being country people and going back to the country
to-morrow. Prim says Dane is coming down before long.'

'Tell your story!'

'Miss Kennedy won't care for it, and it will ruin Dane with
Mr. Falkirk. He has introduced something like English penny
readings at Morton Hollow,' said Prudentia, putting on her
bonnet and turning towards Wych Hazel's guardian.

'What are penny readings?' said Mr. Falkirk.

'They had their origin in England, I believe; somebody set
them on foot for the benefice of the poorer classes, or work
people; and Dane has imported them. He receives the employes
of the mills,' said Prudentia, chuckling,--'whoever will come
and pay a penny; his own workmen and the others. The levee is
held on Saturday nights; and Dane lays himself out to amuse
them with reading to them and singing. Fancy it! Fancy Dane
reading all sorts of things to those audiences! and the
evenings are so interesting, I am told, that they do not
disperse till eleven o'clock. I believe he has it in
contemplation to add the more material refreshment of
sandwiches and coffee as soon as he gets his arrangements
perfected. And he is going to build, as soon as the spring
opens, O, I don't know what!'

'Fools build houses, and other people live in them,' said Mr.
Falkirk.

'O, it's not houses to live in--though I have a notion he is
going to do that too. He lives with old Gyda pretty much of
the time.'

'Well,' said Dr. Arthur, looking at Mr. Falkirk but speaking
to Wych Hazel, 'I need only add, that my father thoroughly
approves of all Rollo's work.'

'Work?--does he call it "work"?' said Wych Hazel, looking up.

'It is not exactly play, Miss Kennedy!'--

But the soft laugh that answered that, no one could define.

'He won't find it play by the by,' said Mr. Falkirk.


CHAPTER XLI.

A LESSON.


This visit and talk gave Hazel a great deal to ponder. The
work, and--the doer of it; and--did he ever think of her, she
questioned, in the doing? And did he expect to make _her_
'stand, as he had the bay'? and come, if he but 'snapped his
fingers'? On the whole, Miss Wych did not feel as if _she_ were
developing any hidden stores of docility at present!--not at
present; and one or two new questions, or old ones in a new
shape, began to fill her mind; inserting themselves between
the leaves of her Schiller, peeping cunningly out from behind
'reason' and 'instinct' and 'the wings of birds'; dancing and
glimmering and hiding in the firelight. Mr. Falkirk might have
noticed, about this time, that Miss Wych was never ready to
have the gas lit.

The gas was lit, however, and the tea-tray just brought in,
when one evening a few nights after the visit last recorded,
Rollo himself was announced. Notwithstanding all Mrs. Coles
had prognosticated, he seemed very much like himself both in
face and manner; he came in and talked and took his place at
the table, just as he had been used to do at Chickaree. Not
even more grave than he had often been there.

It was not the first time Wych Hazel had confessed to herself
that tea trays are a great institution; nor the first time she
had found shelter behind her occupation. Very demurely she
poured out the tea, and listened sedately to the talk between
the gentlemen; but it was with extra gravity that she at last
put her fingers in. She never could guess afterwards how she
had dared.

'Do you think he looks _much_ like a ruined man, Mr. Falkirk?'
she said, in one of the pauses of their talk.

A flash of lightning quickness and brightness came to her from
Rollo's eyes. Mr. Falkirk lifted his dumbly, not knowing how
to take the girl. He had not, so far in the talk, touched the
subject of Mrs. Coles' communications, though no doubt they
had not been out of his mind for one instant. But somehow, Mr.
Falkirk had lacked inclination to call his younger coadjutor
to account, and probably was hopeless of effecting any
supposable good by so doing. Now he stared wonderingly up at
Wych Hazel. She was looking straight at him, awaiting an
answer; but fully alive to the situation, and a little bit
frightened thereat, and with the fun and the confusion both
getting into her face in an irresistible way. Mr. Falkirk's
face went down again with a grunt, or a growl; it was rather
dubious in intent. Rollo's eyes did not waver from their
inquisition of Wych Hazel's face. It was getting to be hot
work!--Hazel touched her hand bell, and turned away to give
orders, and came back to her business; sending Mr. Falkirk a
cup of tea that was simply scalding. Her bravery was done for
that time.

'What have you been doing this winter?' Mr. Falkirk finally
concluded to ask.

'Investing in new stock,' Rollo answered carelessly.

'Don't pay, does it?'

'I think it will. Money is worth what you can get out of it,
you know.'

'Pray, if I may ask, what do you expect to get out of it in
this way?'

'Large returns'--said Rollo very calmly.

'I don't see it,' said Mr. Falkirk. 'I hope you do; but I
can't.'

'You have not the elements to make a perfect calculation.'

Rollo, it was plain, understood himself, and was in no
confusion on the subject. Mr. Falkirk, either in uncertainty
or in disgust, declined to pursue it. He finished his tea, and
then, perhaps, feeling that he had no right to keep watch over
his brother guardian, much to Wych Hazel's discomfiture, he
took up his book and marched away.

Rollo left the table and came round then to a seat by her
side.

'What have _you_ been doing this winter?' he asked, putting the
question with his eyes as well as with his words.

'Making old stock pay,'--said the girl, looking down at her
folded hands; she was not of the calm sisterhood who hide
themselves in crochet.

'Perhaps you will be so good as to enlarge upon that.'

Hazel sent back the first answer that came to her tongue, and
the next: it was no part of her plan to have herself in the
foreground.

'This is a fair average specimen of our tea-drinkings,' she
said. 'And the mornings are hardly more eventful. Just lately,
Mr. Falkirk has been a good deal disturbed about you. Or else
he was easy about you, and disturbed about your doings,--he has
such a confused way of putting things. But we heard you had
copied my "hurricane track," ' said Miss Wych, folding her
hands in a new position.

'And were you disturbed about my doings?'

'I? O no. I am never disturbed with what you do to anybody but
me.'

Rollo did not choose to pursue that subject. He plunged into
another.

'I should like to explain to you some of my doings; and I must
go a roundabout way to do it. Miss Hazel, do you read the
Bible much?'

'Much?' she said with a sudden look up. 'What do you call
"much?" '

He smiled at her. 'Are you in the habit of studying it?'

'As I study other things I do not know?--Not often. Sometimes,'
said Wych Hazel, thinking how often she had gone over that
same ninety-first Psalm.

'What is your notion of religion?--as to what it means?'

She glanced up at him again, almost wondering for a moment if
his wits were 'touched.' Then seeing his eyes were undoubtedly
sane and grave, set her own wits to work.

'It means,' she answered slowly after a pause, 'to me,
different things in different people. All sorts of
contradictions, I believe!--In mamma, as they tell of her, it
meant everything beautiful, and loving, and loveable, and
tender. And it puts Dr. Maryland away off--up in the sky, I
think. And it just blinds Prim, so that she cannot comprehend
common mortals. And it seems to open Gyda's eyes, so that she
_does_ understand--like mamma. And--I do not know what it means in
you, Mr. Rollo!'

'You never saw it in me.'

'No.'

'Let me give you a lesson to study,' said he. 'Something I
have been studying lately a good deal. I must take this minute
before we are interrupted. Have you got a Bible here?'

She sprang up and brought her own from the next room, with a
certain quick way as if she were excited; Rollo took it and
turned over the leaves, then placed it before her open.

'I have heard you read the Bible once. Read now those two
verses.'


"For the love of Christ constraineth us; because we thus
judge, that if one died for all, then were all dead: and that
he died for all, that they which live should not henceforth
live unto themselves, but unto him which died for them, and
rose again."--2 Cor. v. 14, 15.


Wych Hazel read the words slowly, softly,--then look[ed] up at
him again.

'Is _that_ what it means in you?' she said.

'What do the words imply, for anybody?' he said, with his eyes
going down into hers as they did sometimes, like as if they
would get at the yet unspoken thoughts. But hers fell again to
the book.

'I suppose, they should mean--what they say,' she answered in
the same slow fashion. 'But what that is,--or at least would
be,--I do not very well know.'

'If One died for me,--if it is because of his love and death
for me that I live at all,--to whom do I properly belong?
myself, or him?'

'Well, and then?' she said, passing the question as answered.

'_Then_ a good many things,' he said, smiling again. 'Suppose
that he, to whom I belong, has work that he wants done,--
suppose there are people he wants taken care of and helped,--if
I love him and if I belong to him, what shall I like to do?'

'What you are doing, I suppose,' said Hazel, with a little
undefined twinge that came much nearer jealousy than she
guessed.

'That is very plain, and perfectly simple, isn't it?'

'It sounds so.'--And glancing furtively at the bright, clear
face, she added to herself Dr. Maryland's old words: 'Love
likes her bonds!'--That was plain too.

'Then another question. If I belong to this One whom I love,
does not all that I have belong to him too?'

'But it was not _I_ who said you were ruining yourself,' said
the girl in her quick way. 'I liked it.'

'Did you?' said he, with one of his flashes of eye. 'But I am
giving you a lesson to study. I am not justifying myself.
Answer my question. Does not all I have belong to that One,
who loves me and whom I love?'

She bowed her head in assent. Somehow the words hurt her.

'So that, whatever I do, I cannot be said to _give_ him
anything? It is all his already. I am asking you a business
question. I want you to answer just as it appears to you.'

'How can it appear but in one way?' said Hazel. 'That must be
true, of course.'

'Very well. That is clear. Now suppose further that my Lord
has left me special directions about what he wants done to
these people I spoke of--am I not to take the directions
exactly as they stand, without clipping?'

'Yes.'

He put his hand upon the book which lay before her, and turned
back the leaves to the third chapter of Luke; there indicated
a verse and bade her read again.

' "He that hath two coats, let him impart to him that hath
none." '

'What does that mean?' asked Rollo.

'What it says--if it means anything, I suppose.'

Again Rollo put his hand upon the leaves, turning further back
still till he reached the book of Isaiah. And then he gave
Wych Hazel these words to read:

'Is not this the fast that I have chosen? to loose the bands
of wickedness, to undo the heavy burdens, and to let the
oppressed go free, and that ye break every joke? Is it not to
deal thy bread to the hungry, and that thou bring the poor
that are cast out to thine house? when thou seest the naked,
that thou cover him; and that thou hide not thyself from thine
own flesh?'

'How are the commands to be met?' Rollo asked gravely when she
had done.

'Why, you have found out!' said Hazel. 'I knew you would go
off on a crusade after that October sky, Mr. Rollo.'

He seemed half to forget his subject, or to merge it, in a
deep, thoughtful gaze at her for a few moments, over which a
smile gradually broke.

'To come back to our lesson,' he said,--'are not these commands
to be taken _au pied de la lettre?_'

'They can hardly be the one exception among commands, I should
think,'--with a little arch of her eyebrows.

'Then I am bound, am I not, to undo every heavy burden that I
can reach? to loose every bond of wickedness, and to break
every yoke, and to remove oppression, in so far as it lies
with me to do it? Do you not think so?'

'Why, yes!' said Wych Hazel. 'Does anybody _like_ oppression?'

'Does anybody practise it?'

'I do not know, Mr. Rollo. O yes, of course, in some parts of
the world. But I mean here. Yes,--those people used to look as
if something kept them down,--and I used to think Mr. Morton
might help it, I remember.'

'You are not to suppose that oppression is liked for its own
sake. That is rarely the case, even in this world. It is for
the sake of what it will bring, like other wrong things. But a
question more. Can I do _all_ I can, without giving and using
all I have for it?'

'That is self-evident.'

'Then it only remains, how to use what I have to the best
advantage.'

'Well, even Mr. Falkirk admits you are a good business man,'
said Hazel, laughing a little.

'How are you for a business woman?'

'Nobody has ever found out. Of course I consider myself
capable of anything. But then business never does come into my
hands, you know.'

'This business does.'

'Does it? the business of caring for other people?--Last summer
Dr. Maryland read a terrible text about the "tears of the
oppressed, and they had no comforter." It haunted me for a
while. But I could do nothing. No,--one must have more right of
way than I have--yet.'

'I do not mean the business simply of caring for other people.
I mean the whole course of action, beginning from those first
words you read.'

'You know,' she said quietly, 'I have never tried.'

'Will you study the lesson I have set you?'

'The one you have been learning?'

'Yes. The one contained in these verses you have read. Shall I
do harm if I mark this book?'

'No.'--The word came quick, under breath.

He turned to the different places where she had been reading,
and carefully marked the passages; then sought out and
likewise marked several others. 'Will you study the lesson
out?' he asked as he was busy with the last marking.

'I will try--I think,' she answered slowly. 'As well as I know
how.'

'Do not fancy,' he said, smiling as he shut the book, 'that
the care of the needy, in any shape, is religion; nor think
that He who loves us will take _anything_ as a substitute for
our whole-hearted love to him. If we give him that, he will
let us know in what way we may shew it.'

She made no answer except by another swift look. This was
Chaldee to her! He let the silence last a little while.

'Now I have asked you so many questions,' he said, 'I should
like it if you would ask me a few.'

'What about?'

'All subjects are open to you!'

'How did you contrive to make the bay "stand"?'

The flash of Rollo's eye came first.

'How do you know I did?' he said laughing. 'But that is no
answer. Let me see. I believe, first I made him know that he
must mind me; and secondly, I persuaded him into loving me.
All that remained, was to let him understand that I wanted him
to be immovable when I was not on his back.'

'O, but!--' said Hazel hastily,--the sentence ending in crimson
cheeks, and the shyest veil of reserve dropped over her face.

'I might question here,' said Rollo in an amused tone, and
eyeing her inquisitively; 'but I have done it so often,--I
leave the ground to you. What next?'

'What next' seemed to have flown away.

'Does Collingwood engross all the thoughts that go back to
Chickaree?'

A sidelong glance of the brown eyes was all that Mr. Rollo got
by that venture.

How is Truedchen?' she asked gravely.

'Flourishing. Asks after you whenever she gets a chance.'

'Mrs. Boerresen of course is well, as she has had you to look
after?'

'Gyda is happy. It is a comfort to her to have to make
fladbrod for two.'

'It must be a comfort to you to eat it!--How is poor Mr.
Morton? I felt for him when I heard you had turned his world
upside down.'

'What did you feel for him?' said Rollo quite innocently.

'You have asked all your questions. I think it would be proper
now,' said Wych Hazel, folding her hands and controlling the
curling lips, 'that you should go on and tell me all there is
to be told, and save me the trouble of asking any more.'

'I do not wish to save you the trouble.'

'It is good practice occasionally to do what you do not wish.
Instructive. And full of suggestion.'

'Suggestion of what?'

'Try, and you will know. I doubt if you ever did try,' said
Wych Hazel.

'I tried it last night and yesterday morning, when I was
turned away from your door with the announcement that you were
out.'

'But you did not leave your name!' said Hazel, looking up.

'I found it "suggestive" too,' Rollo went on. 'I do not know
whether you would like me to tell you all the things which it
suggested.'

'How is everybody else at home?' said Hazel, changing her
ground. 'I heard Miss May had been sick.'

The answer tarried, for Mr. Falkirk came in, and perhaps Rollo
forgot it, or knew that Wych Hazel had; for it was never
given. He entered into talk with Mr. Falkirk; and did his part
well through the rest of the evening. Then, Mr. Falkirk
expressing the surmise, it was hardly put in the form of a
hope, that they would see him to breakfast or dinner, Rollo
averred that he was going immediately home. He had done his
work in town, and could not tarry. No remark from the lady of
the house met that. Indeed she had been sitting in the
silentest of moods, letting the gentlemen talk; having enough
to think of and observe. For absence does change, even an
intimate friend, and both lifts and drops a veil. Old
characteristics stand out with new clearness; old graces of
mind or manner strike one afresh; but the old familiarity
which once in a sort took possession of all this, is now
withdrawn a little,--we stand off and look. And so, secretly,
modestly, shyly, Wych Hazel studied her young guardian that
night. But when he had risen to go, the faintest little touch
from one of her finger tips drew him a step aside.

'I said I would study that,' she began. 'But it seems to me
you explained it all as you went along. What is there left to
study?'

The grave penetrating eyes she met and had to meet once, gave
all the needed force to his answer.--'_Your part_, Miss Hazel.'
He stood looking at her a minute; and then he went away.

If when Rollo had entered he room where she was, that evening,
the instant feeling had been that he must come often: perhaps
the after feeling was that he could not stand much of this
doubtful and neutral intercourse. For he did as he had
promised; left her, practically, to Mr. Falkirk, and came not
to town again during all the rest of that winter.


CHAPTER XLII.

STUDY.


It seemed to Hazel, that in these days there was no end to the
thinking she had to do; and if Mr. Rollo had only known, she
remarked to herself, he need not have been at the trouble to
point out new lines of study. The mere sight of him for two
hours had put her head in a tangle that it would take her a
month to clear away. Some of the questions indeed had started
up under the conversation of Mrs. Coles; but with them now
came others, all wrapped round and twisted in; and instead of
dreamily watching the fire in her twilight musings, she began
now to spend them with her cheek on her book, or her head
dropped on her hands, an impatient little sigh now and then
bearing witness to the depth of the difficulties in which she
was plunged. What was foremost among the subjects of her
musings?--perhaps this strange new talk of Mr. Rollo's, with
the whole new world of work and interest and consecration
which had opened before him. It made her sober,--it brought
back the old lonely feelings which of late (since she knew
herself to belong to somebody 'in idea') had somewhat passed
out of sight. He was beginning a new, glad life; growing wiser
and better than she; making himself a blessing, whereas she
was only a care. What could she do for him any more?--would he
even want her any more? given up now to these new ways of
which she knew nothing, and in which somebody else might suit
him better--say Primrose? But at that, Miss Wych started up and
stirred the fire energetically, and then came back to her
musings.

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