This may have been true, but was not at all the proper way to express it. The only thing wrong on my part was, that a lively thrill of selfish hope ran down the veins of sympathy. She wept—she wept! Why should she weep, except at having left behind her some one whom she would most sadly miss? Could it be Miss Coldpepper? Happily that was most unlikely, from the lady’s character. Mrs. Marker? No, I think not—a very decent sort of woman, but not at all absorbing. Uncle Corny? Out of the question. A highly excellent and upright man; but a hero of nails, and shreds, and hammers, and green-baize aprons, and gooseberry knives. Ah, but Uncle Corny has a nephew—
“Kit, I am sorry for you, my boy;” he came up to me, as I was thinking thus, even before he went to his tobacco-jar; “you are hard hit, my lad; I can see it in your face; and you shall have no more chaff from me. Very few girls, such as they are now, deserve that any straight and honest young chap, like you, should be down in the mouth about them. But your mother did, Kit, your mother did. And I am not sure but that this Miss Fairthorn does; though you can’t judge a girl by her bonnet. But I am not going to be overcobbed like this. If you have set your heart upon the girl, and she on you—so be it, Amen! You shall be joined together.”
My Uncle came up, as he spoke, and looked with friendly intentions at me, and yet with a medical gaze and poise, which inclined me to be indignant. “It takes two parties to make an agreement,” I said, neither gratefully nor graciously.
“S’pose I don’t know that, after all the robberies taken out of me? But I know what I say, and I tell you, that if your mind is set upon this matter, you shall have it your own way. Only first of all, be sure that you know your mind. Few people do, in this ‘age of invention’—as they call it, without inventing much, except lies—if you are sure that you know your mind, speak out, and have done with it.”
I stood up and looked at him, without a word. All my gratitude for his good-will was lost in my wrath at his doubt of my steadfastness.
“Very well,” he said, “you need not stare, as if you were thunder and lightning. When you think about it, you will see that I was right; for this is no easy business, Kit, and not to be gone into, like a toss for sixpence. I have spoiled you, ever since you were a child; because you had no father, and no mother. You have had your own way wonderfully; and that makes it difficult for you to know your mind.”
If that were the only obstacle, I ought to have the finest knowledge of my mind; for the times had been very far asunder, when I had been allowed to follow my own way. But I knew that Uncle Corny took the other view, and he had this to bear him out, that he always managed that my way should be his way. It was not the time to argue out that question now; and one of my ways most sternly barred was that of going counter to him in opinion. So I only muttered that he had been very good to me.
“I have,” he continued; “and you are bound to feel it. Five shillings a week you have been receiving, ever since you could be trusted to lay in a tree; as well as your board and lodging, and your boots, and all except tailoring. Very well, if you set up a wife, you will look back with sorrow on these days of affluence. But to warn you is waste of words, in your present frame. Only I wish you to hear both sides. I have no time now; but if you like to come to me, when I have done up my books, I will tell you a little story.”
This I promised very readily; not only to keep him on my side, but because I saw that he knew much, not generally known in Sunbury, of the family matters which concerned my love, and therefore myself, even more than my own. And while he was busy with his books, which he kept in a fashion known only to himself, I strolled down the village in the feeble hope of picking up some tidings. It was pleasant to find, without saying much, that our neighbours felt a very keen and kind interest in our doings. There was scarcely a woman who was not ready to tell me a great deal more than she knew; and certainly not one who did not consider me badly treated. Miss Fairthorn, by her sweet appearance and gentle manner, had made friends in every shop she entered; and the story of her sudden and compulsory departure became so unsatisfactory, that deep discredit befell our two policemen. But the only new point I discovered, bearing at all upon my case, was gained from Widow Cutthumb. This good lady was now in bitter feud with the house of Coldpepper, although she made it clear that the loss of their custom had nothing to do with it, being rather a benefit than otherwise.
She told me, with much dramatic force, some anecdotes of Miss Monica, the younger daughter of Squire Nicholas, and a daughter by no means dutiful. She had married, against her father’s wish, the Honourable Tom Bulwrag, a gambler, and a drunkard, and, if reports were true, a forger. As this appears in my Uncle’s tale, it need not have been referred to, but to show that the lady’s early records were not fair among us. After impressing upon me the stern necessity of silence, as to these and other facts, Mrs. Cutthumb ended with a practical exhortation, dependent upon the question whether I had a spark of manhood in me. I replied that I hoped so, but as yet had few opportunities for testing it.
“Then, Mr. Kit,” she proceeded, with her head thrown back and one fat hand clenched, “there is only one thing for you to do—to run away with the young lady. Don’t stop me, if you please, Master Kit; you have no call to look as if I spoke treason. Better men than you has done it; and better young ladies has had to bear it. It is what the Lord has ordained, whenever He has made two innocent young people, and the wicked hold counsel together against them. You go home, and dwell upon it. Sure as I am talking to you now, you’ll be sorry till your dying day, if you don’t behave a little spirity. Do you think I would ever give such advice to a wild young man with no principles, to a fellow I mean like Sam Henderson? But I know what you are well enough; and every girl in Sunbury knows. ’Tis not for me to praise you to your face; but you are that solid and thick-built, that a woman might trust you with her only daughter. And that makes you slow to look into women. If I may be so bold to ask, how do you take the meaning of it for that sweet Miss Kitty to be fetched home so promiscuous?”
“Mrs. Cutthumb,” I answered, with a penetrating look, to show her that she underrated me, “I fear it must be that some mischief-maker has written up to say that I, that I—you know what I mean, Mrs. Cutthumb.”
“Yes, sir, and you means well so far, and everything straight-forrard; but you ain’t got near the heart of it, Master Kit; nor your Uncle neither, I’ll be bound. Wants a woman’s wits for that.”
“What on earth do you mean? It is bad enough. I don’t see how even a woman can make it any worse than it is. Speak out what you mean, since you have begun.”
“Well, sir, it is no more than this, and you mustn’t be put out by it. Suppose there is another young gent in the case—a young gent in London, they means her to marry.”
The goodnatured woman looked so knowing, that I thought she must have solid proof; and perhaps the deed was done already. I tried to laugh, but could only stare, and wonder what was coming next.
“Oh, Master Kit,” she went on with her apron to her eyes, or she was kind of heart, “you used to come, and play down here, when your head wasn’t up to the counter. And I had my Cutthumb then, and he gave you a penny, because you was so natural. Don’t you be struck of a heap like that, or I shall come to think that all women is wicked. It was only a bad thought of my own. I have nothing to go by, if I were to die this minute; and the same thought might come across any one. Don’t think no more about it, there’s a dear young man. Only keep your eyes open, and if you can manage to come across that stuck-up Jenny Marker, the least she can do, after saving her life, is to tell you all she knows, and to take your part. But don’t you believe more than half she says. I never would say a single word against her, there’s no call for that, being known as she is to every true woman in Sunbury; but if she’s not a double-faced gossiping hussy, as fancies that a gold chain makes a lady of her, and very likely no gold after all, why I should deserve to be taken up, and there’s no one has ever said that of me.”
Here Mrs. Cutthumb began to cry, at the thought of being taken to the station; and I saw that time alone could comfort her, yet ventured to say a few earnest words, about her position and high character. And presently she was