North and South. Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell

For, the one thing clear and straight before her, was the necessity for leaving Helstone. Mr. Hale's successor in the living was appointed; and, at any rate, after her father's decision; there must be no lingering now, for his sake, as well as from every other consideration. For he came home every evening more and more depressed, after the necessary leave-taking which he had resolved to have with every individual parishioner. Margaret, inexperienced as she was in all the necessary matter-of-fact business to be got through, did not know to whom to apply for advice. The cook and Charlotte worked away with willing arms and stout hearts at all the moving and packing; and as far as that went, Margaret's admirable sense enabled her to see what was best, and to direct how it should be done. But where were they to go to? In a week they must be gone. Straight to Milton, or where? So many arrangements depended on this decision that Margaret resolved to ask her father one evening, in spite of his evident fatigue and low spirits. He answered:

      'My dear! I have really had too much to think about to settle this. What does your mother say? What does she wish? Poor Maria!'

      He met with an echo even louder than his sigh. Dixon had just come into the room for another cup of tea for Mrs. Hale, and catching Mr. Hale's last words, and protected by his presence from Margaret's upbraiding eyes, made bold to say, 'My poor mistress!'

      'You don't think her worse to-day,' said Mr. Hale, turning hastily.

      'I'm sure I can't say, sir. It's not for me to judge. The illness seems so much more on the mind than on the body.'

      Mr. Hale looked infinitely distressed.

      'You had better take mamma her tea while it is hot, Dixon,' said Margaret, in a tone of quiet authority.

      'Oh! I beg your pardon, miss! My thoughts was otherwise occupied in thinking of my poor—— of Mrs. Hale.'

      'Papa!' said Margaret, 'it is this suspense that is bad for you both. Of course, mamma must feel your change of opinions: we can't help that,' she continued, softly; 'but now the course is clear, at least to a certain point. And I think, papa, that I could get mamma to help me in planning, if you could tell me what to plan for. She has never expressed any wish in any way, and only thinks of what can't be helped. Are we to go straight to Milton? Have you taken a house there?'

      'No,' he replied. 'I suppose we must go into lodgings, and look about for a house.

      'And pack up the furniture so that it can be left at the railway station, till we have met with one?'

      'I suppose so. Do what you think best. Only remember, we shall have much less money to spend.'

      They had never had much superfluity, as Margaret knew. She felt that it was a great weight suddenly thrown upon her shoulders. Four months ago, all the decisions she needed to make were what dress she would wear for dinner, and to help Edith to draw out the lists of who should take down whom in the dinner parties at home. Nor was the household in which she lived one that called for much decision. Except in the one grand case of Captain Lennox's offer, everything went on with the regularity of clockwork. Once a year, there was a long discussion between her aunt and Edith as to whether they should go to the Isle of Wight, abroad, or to Scotland; but at such times Margaret herself was secure of drifting, without any exertion of her own, into the quiet harbour of home. Now, since that day when Mr. Lennox came, and startled her into a decision, every day brought some question, momentous to her, and to those whom she loved, to be settled.

      Her father went up after tea to sit with his wife. Margaret remained alone in the drawing-room. Suddenly she took a candle and went into her father's study for a great atlas, and lugging it back into the drawing-room, she began to pore over the map of England. She was ready to look up brightly when her father came down stairs.

      'I have hit upon such a beautiful plan. Look here—in Darkshire, hardly the breadth of my finger from Milton, is Heston, which I have often heard of from people living in the north as such a pleasant little bathing-place. Now, don't you think we could get mamma there with Dixon, while you and I go and look at houses, and get one all ready for her in Milton? She would get a breath of sea air to set her up for the winter, and be spared all the fatigue, and Dixon would enjoy taking care of her.'

      'Is Dixon to go with us?' asked Mr. Hale, in a kind of helpless dismay.

      'Oh, yes!' said Margaret. 'Dixon quite intends it, and I don't know what mamma would do without her.'

      'But we shall have to put up with a very different way of living, I am afraid. Everything is so much dearer in a town. I doubt if Dixon can make herself comfortable. To tell you the truth Margaret, I sometimes feel as if that woman gave herself airs.'

      'To be sure she does, papa,' replied Margaret; 'and if she has to put up with a different style of living, we shall have to put up with her airs, which will be worse. But she really loves us all, and would be miserable to leave us, I am sure—especially in this change; so, for mamma's sake, and for the sake of her faithfulness, I do think she must go.'

      'Very well, my dear. Go on. I am resigned. How far is Heston from Milton? The breadth of one of your fingers does not give me a very clear idea of distance.'

      'Well, then, I suppose it is thirty miles; that is not much!'

      'Not in distance, but in—. Never mind! If you really think it will do your mother good, let it be fixed so.'

      This was a great step. Now Margaret could work, and act, and plan in good earnest. And now Mrs. Hale could rouse herself from her languor, and forget her real suffering in thinking of the pleasure and the delight of going to the sea-side. Her only regret was that Mr. Hale could not be with her all the fortnight she was to be there, as he had been for a whole fortnight once, when they were engaged, and she was staying with Sir John and Lady Beresford at Torquay.

CHAPTER VI—FAREWELL

       Table of Contents

      'Unwatch'd the garden bough shall sway,

       The tender blossom flutter down,

       Unloved that beech will gather brown,

       The maple burn itself away;

      Unloved, the sun-flower, shining fair,

       Ray round with flames her disk of seed,

       And many a rose-carnation feed

       With summer spice the humming air;

      * * * * * *

      Till from the garden and the wild

       A fresh association blow,

       And year by year the landscape grow

       Familiar to the stranger's child;

      As year by year the labourer tills

       His wonted glebe, or lops the glades;

       And year by year our memory fades

       From all the circle of the hills.'

       TENNYSON.

      The last day came; the house was full of packing-cases, which were being carted off at the front door, to the nearest railway station. Even the pretty lawn at the side of the house was made unsightly and untidy by the straw that had been wafted upon it through the open door and windows. The rooms had a strange echoing sound in them—and the light came harshly and strongly in through the uncurtained windows—seeming already unfamiliar and strange. Mrs. Hale's dressing-room was left untouched to the last; and there she and Dixon were packing up clothes, and interrupting each other every now and then to exclaim at, and turn over with fond regard, some forgotten treasure, in the shape of some relic of the children while they were yet little. They did not make much progress with their work. Down-stairs, Margaret stood calm and collected, ready to counsel or advise the men who had been called in to help the cook and Charlotte. These two last, crying between whiles, wondered how the young lady could keep up so this last day, and settled it between them that she was not likely to care much for Helstone, having been so long in London. There she stood, very pale