Chapter 4. Changes

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_ CHAPTER IV. CHANGES

Sing on! we sing in the glorious weather
Till one steps over the tiny strand,
So narrow in sooth, that still together
On either brink we go hand in hand.

The beck grows wider, the hands must sever,
On either margin our songs all done;
We move apart, while she singeth ever,
Taking the course of the stooping sun.

--JEAN INGELOW.

About a week after Hilda Merton's engagement, just when her friends were full of the event, and congratulations began to pour in on all sides, there came a very unexpected blow to the inmates of the peaceful and pretty Rectory.

The parish of Little Staunton was large and scattered; it stretched away at one side down to the sea, at another it communicated with great open moors and tracts of the outlying lands of the New Forest. It was but sparsely peopled, and those parishioners who lived in small cottages by the sea, and who earned their living as fishermen, were most of them very poor. Mr. Merton, however, was one of the ideal sort of rectors, who helped his flock with temporal as well as spiritual benefits. The stipend which he received from the church was not a large one, and every penny of it was devoted to the necessities of his poor parishioners.

There came an awful morning, therefore, when a short announcement in the local paper, and a long letter from Mr. Merton's lawyer, acquainted him with the fact that the Downshire County Bank had stopped payment. In plain language, Mr. Merton, from being a wealthy man, became suddenly a very poor one.

Aunt Marjorie cried when she heard the news; Hilda's face turned very pale, and Judy and Babs, who were both in the room at the time, felt that sort of wonder and perplexity which children do experience when they know something is dreadfully wrong, but cannot in the least understand what it is.

In the course of the morning Hilda went to her father in his study.

Her face was very white as she opened the door, some of the young soft lines of her early youth seemed to have left it; her beautiful brown eyes looked in a heavy sort of fashion out at the world from their dark surroundings. She came up to her father, and put her hand on his shoulder. He was bending over his desk, busily writing.

"What is the matter, Hilda?" he asked, glancing up at her with a quick start, and an endeavor to make his voice sound as usual.

"I--I have come, father, to say that if you like, I--I will give up my engagement to Jasper Quentyns."

Mr. Merton rose from his seat and put his arm round her neck.

"My dear child," he said, "it is my comfort to-day to know that you, at least, are provided for. Quentyns is fairly well off. If he will take you without any fortune, there is certainly no reason why you should not go to him."

"Money can't make any difference to Jasper," said Hilda, just a little proudly, although her lips trembled; "but I--it seems wrong that I should be so happy when the rest of you are so miserable."

"Tut, tut!" said the Rector. "I shall get over this in time. I own that just now the blow is so severe that I can scarcely quite realize it. When I opened my eyes this morning, I was pleasantly conscious that I was the possessor of a private income of quite two thousand a year; I felt this fact in the comforts that surrounded me, and the ease which filled my life. Except that small stipend which is represented by my living, and which I have always hitherto devoted to the poor of the flock, I am now reduced to nothing a year. My poor must divide my money with me in future, that is all; I don't intend to be miserable when I get accustomed to the change, Hilda. I must dismiss most of the servants, and give up the carriage and horses, and live as a poor man instead of a rich one; but I owe no man anything, my dear, and I have not the least doubt there is a certain zest in poverty which will make the new order of things agreeable enough when once I get used to it."

The tears gathered slowly in Hilda's eyes.

"I don't feel as if I could quite bear it," she said, with a sob.

The Rector, who was always rather absent-minded, and had a dreamy way of looking far ahead even when he was most roused, scarcely noticed Hilda's tears. He talked on in a monotonous sort of voice:

"I have not the least doubt that poverty has its alleviations. I have heard it more than once remarked that the hand-to-mouth existence is the most stimulating in the world. I should not be surprised, Hilda, if my sermons took a turn for the better after this visitation. I have preached to my flock, year in, year out, that the mysterious ways of Providence are undoubtedly the best--I have got to act up to my preaching now, that is all."

The Rector sat down again and continued to write a very unbusiness-like letter to his lawyer; Hilda stood and looked at him with a frown between her brows, and then went slowly out of the room.

Aunt Marjorie, who had cried herself nearly sick, and whose eyes between their swollen lids were scarcely visible, came to meet her as she walked across the hall.

"Oh, my darling," she said, with a fresh sob, "how can I bear to look at you when I think of all your young life blighted in a moment! Oh, those wicked Bank Directors. They deserve hanging! yes, I should hang them one and all. And so you have been with my poor brother? I would not venture near him. How is he taking it, Hilda? Is he quite off his head, poor, dear man?"

"How do you think my father would take a blow of this kind?" said Hilda. "Come into the drawing room, Auntie. Oh, Auntie dear, do try to stop crying. You don't know what father is. Of course I can't pretend to understand him, but he is quite noble--he is splendid; he makes me believe in religion. A man must be very, very good to talk as father has just done."

"Poor Samuel!" said Aunt Marjorie. "I knew that he would take this blow either as a saint or as an idiot--I don't know which is the most trying. You see, Hilda, my love, your father has never had anything to do with the petty details of housekeeping. This parish brings in exactly three hundred and fifty pounds a year; how are we to pay the wages of nine servants, and how are the gardeners to be paid, and the little girls' governess, and--and how is this beautiful house to be kept up on a pittance of that sort? Oh, dear; oh, dear! Your father will just say to me, 'I know, Marjorie, that you will do your best,' and then he'll forget that there is such a thing as money; but I shall never be able to forget it, Hilda. Oh, dear; oh, dear! I do think saintly men are awful trials."

"But you said just now you thought he would be off his head. You ought to be very thankful, Aunt Maggie, that he is taking things as he is. Of course the servants must go away, and the establishment must be put on an altogether new footing. You'll have to walk instead of ride in future, but I don't suppose Judy and Babs will much care, and I----"

"Oh, yes," said Aunt Marjorie, "you will be in your new house in London, new-fangled with your position, and highly pleased and proud to put Mrs. before your name, and you'll forget all about us. Of course I am pleased for you, but you're just as bad as your father when you talk in that cool fashion about dismissing the servants, and when you expect an old lady like me to tramp all over the place on my feet."

"I told father that if he wished I would break off my engagement."

Aunt Marjorie dried her eyes when her niece made this speech, and looked at her fixedly.

"I do think," she said, "that you're a greater fool even than poor Samuel. Is not your engagement to a nice, gentlemanly, clever man like Jasper Quentyns the one ray of brightness in this desolate day? You, child, at least are provided for."

"I wonder if you think that I care about being provided for at this juncture?" answered Hilda, knitting her brows once again in angry perplexity.

She went away to her own room, and sitting before her desk, wrote a long letter to her lover.

Quentyns had been called to the Bar, and was already beginning to receive "briefs."

His income was by no means large, however, and although he undoubtedly loved Hilda for her own sake, he might not have proposed an immediate marriage had he not believed that his pretty bride would not come to him penniless.

Hilda sat with her pen in her hand, looking down at the blank sheet of paper.

By the same post which had brought the lawyer's dreadful letter there had come two closely-written sheets from Jasper. He wanted Hilda to marry him in the autumn, and he had already begun house-hunting.

"We might find it best to take a small flat for a year," he had written, "but if you would rather have a house, darling, say so. Some people don't approve of flats. They say they are not so wholesome. One misses the air of the staircase, and there is a certain monotony in living altogether on one floor which may not be quite conducive to health. On the other hand flats are compact, and one knows almost at a glance what one's expenses are likely to be. I have been consulting Rivers--you know how often I have talked to you of my friend Archie Rivers--and he thinks on the whole that a flat would be advisable; we avoid rates and taxes and all those sort of worries, and if we like to shut up house for a week, and run down to the Rectory, why there we are, you know; for the house-porter sees to our rooms, and we run no risk from burglars. But what do you say yourself, darling, for that is the main point?"

Hilda had read this letter with a beating heart and a certain pleasant sense of exhilaration at breakfast that morning, but then this was before the blow came--before Aunt Marjorie's shriek had sounded through the room, and before Hilda had caught a glimpse of her father's face with the gray tint spreading all over it, before she had heard his tremulous words:

"Yes, Marjorie! God help us! We are ruined."

Hilda read the letter now with very different feelings; somehow or other all the rose light had gone out of it. She was a very inexperienced girl as far as money matters were concerned. Until to-day money seemed to have little part or lot in her life; it had never stirred her nature to its depths, it had kindly supplied her with necessities and luxuries; it had gilded everything, but she had never known where the gilt came from. When she engaged herself to Jasper, he told her that, for the present at least, he was a comparatively poor man; he had three hundred a year of his own. This he assured her was a mere bagatelle, but as he was almost certain to earn as much more in his profession, and as Hilda had money, he thought they might marry if she did not mind living very prudently. Of course Hilda did not mind--she knew nothing at all of the money part. The whole thing meant love and poetry to her, and she disliked the word money coming into it.

To-day, however, things looked different. For the first time she got a glimpse of Tragedy. How mean of it, how horrible of it to come in this guise! She pressed her hand to her forehead, and wondered what her lover could mean when he talked of rates and taxes, and asked her to decide between a flat and a house.

"I don't know what to say," she murmured to herself. "Perhaps we shall not be married at all at present. Perhaps Jasper will say we can't afford it. Perhaps I ought to answer his question about the flat--but I don't know what to say. I thought we might have had a cottage somewhere in one of the suburbs--with a little garden, and that I might have kept fowls, and have had heaps and heaps of flowers. Surely fowls would be economical, but I am sure I can't say. I really don't know anything whatever about the matter."

"Why are you talking in that funny way half-aloud to yourself, Hilda?" asked a little voice with a sad inflection in it.

Hilda slightly turned her head and saw that Judy had softly opened the door of her bedroom, and was standing in the entrance.

Judy had an uncertain manner about her which was rather new to her character, and her face had a somewhat haggard look, unnatural and not pleasant to see in so young a child.

"Oh, pet, is that you?" said Hilda. "Come and give me a kiss--I am just longing for you--you're the person of all others to consult. Come along and sit down by me. Now, now--you don't want to strangle me, do you?"

For Judy had rushed upon her sister like a little whirlwind, her strong childish arms were flung with almost ferocious tightness round Hilda's neck, the skirt of her short frock had swept Jasper's letter to the floor, and even upset an ink-pot in its voluminous sweep.

"Oh, oh!" said Hilda, "I must wipe up this mess. There, Judy, keep back for a moment; it will get upon the carpet, and spoil it if we are not as quick as possible. Hand me that sheet of blotting-paper, dear. There now, that is better--I have stopped the stream from descending too far. Why, Judith, my dear, you have tears in your eyes. You don't suppose I care about the ink being spilt when I get a hug like that from you."

"I wasn't crying about the ink," said Judy; "what's ink! The tears came because I am so joyful."

"You joyful? and to-day?" said Hilda. "You know what has happened, don't you, Judy?"

"We are poor instead of rich," said Judy; "what's that? Oh, I am so happy--I am so awfully happy that I scarcely know what to do."

"What a queer little soul you are! Now, now, am I to be swept up in another embrace?"

"Oh, yes, let me, let me--I haven't kissed you like this since you, you--you got _engaged_."

"In what a spiteful way you say that last word, Judy; now I come to think of it, we _have_ scarcely kissed each other since. But whose fault was that? Not mine, I am sure. I was quite hungry for one of your kisses, jewel, and now that I have got it I feel ever so much better. Sit down by me, and let us talk. Judy, you are a very wise little darling, aren't you?"

"I don't know. If you think so, you darling, I suppose I am."

"I do think so. I have had a letter from Jasper. I want to talk over something he says in it with you. Judy dear, he is such a noble fellow."

Judy shut up her firm lips until they looked like a straight line across her face.

"He's such a noble fellow," repeated Hilda. "I can't tell you how glad you ought to be to have the prospect of calling a man like Jasper your brother; he'll be a great help to you, Judy, by and by."

"No, he won't--I don't want him to be," said Judy viciously.

"Why, I declare, I do believe the dear is jealous; but now to go on. Jasper has written to me on a most important subject. Now, if I consult you about it you won't ever, ever tell, will you?"

"No, of course I won't. Was it about that you were muttering to yourself when I came into the room?"

"You funny puss; yes, I was talking the matter over to myself. Jasper is looking out for a house for us."

"He isn't. It's awfully cheeky of him."

"My dear Judy, it would be much more cheeky to ask me to go and live in the street with him. We must have some residence after we are married--mustn't we? Well, darling, now you must listen very attentively; he has asked me whether it would be best for us to live in a little house of our own----"

"Why a little house? he ought to take you to a palace."

"Don't interrupt; we shall be poor people, quite a poor couple, Jasper and I. Now, Judy, just try and get as wise as a Solon. He wants to know whether I would rather live in a little house or a flat."

"What's a flat, Hilda?"

"I don't quite know myself; but I believe a flat consists of several rooms on one floor shut away from the rest of the house by a separate hall door. Jasper rather approves of a flat, because he says there won't be any rates and taxes. It's very silly, but though I am a grown-up girl, I don't exactly know what rates and taxes are--do you?"

"No, but I can ask Miss Mills."

"I don't expect she'd know anything about them; it seems so stupid to have to write back and tell Jasper that I don't understand what he means."

"Aunt Marjorie would know," said Judy.

"I shouldn't like to consult her, pet. I think I'd better leave it to Jasper to decide."

Judy looked very wise and interested now.

"Why don't you say you'd rather go into a little house?" she said; "it sounds much more interesting. A flat is an ugly name, and I am quite sure it must be an ugly place."

"That is true," said Hilda, pausing and looking straight before her with her pretty brows knit. "Oh, dear, oh, dear! I wonder what is right. And a little house might have a garden too, mightn't it, Judy?"

"Of course, and a fowl-house and a cote for your pigeons."

"To be sure; and when you come to see me, you should have a strip of garden to dig in all for yourself."

"Oh, should I really come to see you, Hilda? Miss Mills said that you wouldn't want me--that you wouldn't be bothered with me."

"That I wouldn't be bothered with you? Why, I shall wish to have you with me quite half the time. Now, now, am I to be strangled again? Please, Judy, abstain from embracing, and tell me whether we are to have a flat or a cottage."

"Of course you are to have a cottage, with the garden and the fowl-house."

"I declare I think I'll take your advice, you little dear. I'll write and tell Jasper that I'd much rather have a cottage. Now, who is that knocking at the door? Run, Judy, and see what's wanted."

Judy returned in a moment with a telegram.

Hilda tore it open with fingers that slightly trembled.

"Oh, how joyful, how joyful!" she exclaimed.

"What is it?" asked Judy.

"Jasper is coming--my dear, dear Jasper. See what he says--'Have heard the bad news--my deepest sympathy--expect me this evening.' Then I needn't write after all. Judy, Judy, I agree with you; I feel quite happy, even though it is the dreadful day when the blow has been struck."

Judy did not say anything, she rose languidly to her feet.

"Where are you going?" asked Hilda.

"For a walk."

"Why so?"

"Miss Mills said that even though we were poor I was to take the fresh air," replied the child in a prim little voice, out of which all the spirit had gone.

She kissed Hilda, but no longer in a rapturous, tempestuous fashion, and walked soberly out of the room. _

Read next: Chapter 5. In A Garden

Read previous: Chapter 3. A Question And An Answer

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