Miss Oliver already honoured me with frequent visits to my cottage.I had learnt her whole character,which was without mystery or disguise:she was coquettish but not heartless; exacting,but not worthlessly selfish.She had been indulged from her birth,but was not absolutely spoilt. She was hasty,but good-humoured; vain (she could not help it,when every glance in the glass showed her such a flush of loveliness),but not affected; liberal-handed;innocent of the pride of wealth; ingenuous;sufficiently intelligent; gay, lively, and unthinking:she was very charming, in short,even to a cool observer of her own sex like me;but she was not profoundly interesting or thoroughly impressive.A very different sort of mind was hers from that,for instance, of the sisters of St. John. Still,I liked her almost as I liked my pupil Adèle;except that, for a child whom we have watched over and taught,a closer affection is engendered than we can give an equally attractive adult acquaintance.
She had taken an amiable caprice to me.She said I was like Mr. Rivers, only, certainly,she allowed, “not one-tenth so handsome,though I was a nice neat little soul enough,but he was an angel.” I was, however, good, clever,composed, and firm, like him. I was a _lusus naturæ_,she affirmed, as a village schoolmistress:she was sure my previous history, if known,would make a delightful romance.
One evening, while, with her usual child-like activity,and thoughtless yet not offensive inquisitiveness,she was rummaging the cupboard and the table-drawer of my little kitchen,she discovered first two French books,a volume of Schiller, a German grammar and dictionary,and then my drawing-materials and some sketches,including a pencil-head of a pretty little cherub-like girl,one of my scholars, and sundry views from nature,taken in the Vale of Morton and on the surrounding moors.She was first transfixed with surprise,and then electrified with delight.
“Had I done these pictures?Did I know French and German?What a love—what a miracle I was!I drew better than her master in the first school in S——. Would I sketch a portrait of her, to show to papa?”
“With pleasure,” I replied;and I felt a thrill of artist-delight at the idea of copying from so perfect and radiant a model. She had then on a dark-blue silk dress; her arms and her neck were bare; her only ornament was her chestnut tresses, which waved over her shoulders with all the wild grace of natural curls. I took a sheet of fine card-board, and drew a careful outline. I promised myself the pleasure of colouring it; and, as it was getting late then, I told her she must come and sit another day.
She made such a report of me to her father, that Mr.Oliver himself accompanied her next evening—a tall,massive-featured, middle-aged, and grey-headed man,at whose side his lovely daughter looked like a bright flower near a hoary turret. He appeared a taciturn, and perhaps a proud personage; but he was very kind to me. The sketch of Rosamond’s portrait pleased him highly: he said I must make a finished picture of it. He insisted, too, on my coming the next day to spend the evening at Vale Hall.
I went. I found it a large, handsome residence,showing abundant evidences of wealth in the proprietor.Rosamond was full of glee and pleasure all the time I stayed.Her father was affable;and when he entered into conversation with me after tea,he expressed in strong terms his approbation of what I had done in Morton school, and said he only feared, from what he saw and heard, I was too good for the place, and would soon quit it for one more suitable.
“Indeed,” cried Rosamond,“she is clever enough to be a governess in a high family, papa.”
I thought I would far rather be where I am than in any high family in the land.Mr. Oliver spoke of Mr.Rivers—of the Rivers family—with great respect.He said it was a very old name in that neighbourhood;that the ancestors of the house were wealthy;that all Morton had once belonged to them;that even now he considered the representative of that house might,if he liked, make an alliance with the best.He accounted it a pity that so fine and talented a young man should have formed the design of going out as a missionary; it was quite throwing a valuable life away. It appeared, then, that her father would throw no obstacle in the way of Rosamond’s union with St. John. Mr. Oliver evidently regarded the young clergyman’s good birth, old name, and sacred profession as sufficient compensation for the want of fortune.
It was the 5th of November, and a holiday.My little servant, after helping me to clean my house,was gone, well satisfied with the fee of a penny for her aid.All about me was spotless and bright—scoured floor,polished grate, and well-rubbed chairs.I had also made myself neat,and had now the afternoon before me to spend as I would.
The translation of a few pages of German occupied an hour;then I got my palette and pencils,and fell to the more soothing,because easier occupation,of completing Rosamond Oliver’s miniature.The head was finished already:there was but the background to tint and the drapery to shade off;a touch of carmine, too,to add to the ripe lips—a soft curl here and there to the tresses—a deeper tinge to the shadow of the lash under the azured eyelid. I was absorbed in the execution of these nice details, when, after one rapid tap, my door unclosed, admitting St. John Rivers.
“I am come to see how you are spending your holiday,” he said. “Not, I hope, in thought?No, that is well: while you draw you will not feel lonely.You see, I mistrust you still,though you have borne up wonderfully so far.I have brought you a book for evening solace,” and he laid on the table a new publication—a poem:one of those genuine productions so often vouchsafed to the fortunate public of those days—the golden age of modern literature. Alas!the readers of our era are less favoured. But courage!I will not pause either to accuse or repine.I know poetry is not dead, nor genius lost;nor has Mammon gained power over either,to bind or slay: they will both assert their existence,their presence, their liberty and strength again one day.Powerful angels, safe in heaven!they smile when sordid souls triumph,and feeble ones weep over their destruction. Poetry destroyed?Genius banished?No!Mediocrity, no: do not let envy prompt you to the thought.No; they not only live, but reign and redeem:and without their divine influence spread everywhere,you would be in hell—the hell of your own meanness.
While I was eagerly glancing at the bright pages of “Marmion” (for “Marmion” it was), St. John stooped to examine my drawing. His tall figure sprang erect again with a start: he said nothing. I looked up at him: he shunned my eye. I knew his thoughts well, and could read his heart plainly; at the moment I felt calmer and cooler than he: I had then temporarily the advantage of him, and I conceived an inclination to do him some good, if I could.
“With all his firmness and self-control,” thought I,“he tasks himself too far:locks every feeling and pang within—expresses,confesses, imparts nothing.I am sure it would benefit him to talk a little about this sweet Rosamond,whom he thinks he ought not to marry:I will make him talk.”
I said first, “Take a chair, Mr. Rivers.” But he answered, as he always did,that he could not stay. “Very well,” I responded,mentally, “stand if you like;but you shall not go just yet, I am determined:solitude is at least as bad for you as it is for me.I’ll try if I cannot discover the secret spring of your confidence,and find an aperture in that marble breast through which I can shed one drop of the balm of sympathy.”
“Is this portrait like?” I asked bluntly.
“Like!Like whom?I did not observe it closely.”
“You did, Mr. Rivers.”