"The saddest birds a season find to sing."
SOUTHWELL.
"Never to fold the robe o"er secret pain,Never, weighed down by memory"s clouds again,To bow thy head! Thou art gone home!"
MRS. HEMANS.
Mrs. Thornton came to see Mrs. Hale the next morning. She was muchworse. One of those sudden changes--those great visible strides towardsdeath, had been taken in the night, and her own family were startled bythe gray sunken look her features had assumed in that one twelve hoursof suffering. Mrs. Thornton--who had not seen her for weeks--wassoftened all at once. She had come because her son asked it from her asa personal favour, but with all the proud bitter feelings of her nature inarms against that family of which Margaret formed one. She doubtedthe reality of Mrs. Hale"s illness; she doubted any want beyond amomentary fancy on that lady"s part, which should take her out of herpreviously settled course of employment for the day. She told her sonthat she wished they had never come near the place; that he had nevergot acquainted with them; that there had been no such useless languagesas Latin and Greek ever invented. He bore all this pretty silently; butwhen she had ended her invective against the dead languages, he quietlyreturned to the short, curt, decided expression of his wish that sheshould go and see Mrs. Hale at the time appointed, as most likely to beconvenient to the invalid. Mrs. Thornton submitted with as bad a graceas she could to her son"s desire, all the time liking him the better forhaving it; and exaggerating in her own mind the same notion that hehad of extraordinary goodness on his part in so perseveringly keepingup with the Hales.
His goodness verging on weakness (as all the softer virtues did in hermind), and her own contempt for Mr. and Mrs. Hale, and positivedislike to Margaret, were the ideas which occupied Mrs. Thornton, tillshe was struck into nothingness before the dark shadow of the wings ofthe angel of death. There lay Mrs. Hale--a mother like herself--a muchyounger woman than she was,--on the bed from which there was nosign of hope that she might ever rise again No more variety of light andshade for her in that darkened room; no power of action, scarcelychange of movement; faint alternations of whispered sound andstudious silence; and yet that monotonous life seemed almost too much!
When Mrs. Thornton, strong and prosperous with life, came in, Mrs.
Hale lay still, although from the look on her face she was evidentlyconscious of who it was. But she did not even open her eyes for aminute or two. The heavy moisture of tears stood on the eye-lashesbefore she looked up, then with her hand groping feebly over the bedclothes,for the touch of Mrs. Thornton"s large firm fingers, she said,scarcely above her breath--Mrs. Thornton had to stoop from hererectness to listen,-"
Margaret--you have a daughter--my sister is in Italy. My child will bewithout a mother;--in a strange place,--if I die--will you"---Andher filmy wandering eyes fixed themselves with an intensity ofwistfulness on Mrs. Thornton"s face For a minute, there was no changein its rigidness; it was stern and unmoved;--nay, but that the eyes of thesick woman were growing dim with the slow-gathering tears, she mighthave seen a dark cloud cross the cold features. And it was no thought ofher son, or of her living daughter Fanny, that stirred her heart at last; buta sudden remembrance, suggested by something in the arrangement ofthe room,--of a little daughter--dead in infancy--long years ago--that,like a sudden sunbeam, melted the icy crust, behind which there was areal tender woman.
"You wish me to be a friend to Miss Hale," said Mrs. Thornton, in hermeasured voice, that would not soften with her heart, but came outdistinct and clear.
Mrs. Hale, her eyes still fixed on Mrs. Thornton"s face, pressed the handthat lay below hers on the coverlet. She could not speak. Mrs. Thorntonsighed, "I will. be a true friend, if circumstances require it Not a tenderfriend. That I cannot be,"--("to her," she was on the point of adding, butshe relented at the sight of that poor, anxious face.)--"It is not my natureto show affection even where I feel it, nor do I volunteer advice ingeneral. Still, at your request,--if it will be any comfort to you, I willpromise you." Then came a pause. Mrs. Thornton was too conscientiousto promise what she did not mean to perform; and to perform any-thingin the way of kindness on behalf of Margaret, more disliked at thismoment than ever, was difficult; almost impossible.
"I promise," said she, with grave severity; which, after all, inspired thedying woman with faith as in something more stable than life itself,-flickering,flitting, wavering life! "I promise that in any difficulty inwhich Miss Hale"---"
Call her Margaret!" gasped Mrs. Hale.
"In which she comes to me for help, I will help her with every power Ihave, as if she were my own daughter. I also promise that if ever I seeher doing what I think is wrong"---"
But Margaret never does wrong--not wilfully wrong," pleaded Mrs.
Hale. Mrs. Thornton went on as before; as if she had not heard:
"If ever I see her doing what I believe to be wrong--such wrong nottouching me or mine, in which case I might be supposed to have aninterested motive--I will tell her of it, faithfully and plainly, as I shouldwish my own daughter to be told."
There was a long pause. Mrs. Hale felt that this promise did not includeall; and yet it was much. It had reservations in it which she did notunderstand; but then she was weak, dizzy, and tired. Mrs. Thornton wasreviewing all the probable cases in which she had pledged herself to act.
She had a fierce pleasure in the idea of telling Margaret unwelcometruths, in the shape of performance of duty. Mrs. Hale began to speak:
"I thank you. I pray God to bless you. I shall never see you again in thisworld. But my last words are, I thank you for your promise of kindnessto my child."
"Not kindness!" testified Mrs. Thornton, ungraciously truthful to the last.
But having eased her conscience by saying these words, she was notsorry that they were not heard. She pressed Mrs. Hale"s soft languidhand; and rose up and went her way out of the house without seeing acreature.
During the time that Mrs. Thornton was having this interview with Mrs.