Healey. A romance

Front matter

HEALEY: A ROMANCE AT ALL THE LIBRARIES. Love Me, or Love Me Not. By MRS. FRANCIS G. FAITHFULL. Three Vols. Crown &vo. 'The book is full of poetry and deep earnest pathos. . . . Winifred Chace ... is a woman to be both loved and respected, and ... in all fiction wre scarcely remember a man so grand and noble in his self-forgetfulness as Mark Cameron.' — Standard. HENRY S. KING & CO. HEALEY A R O MA N CE BY JESSIE FOTHERGILL ' Hope nothing, is I thus may speak To thee, a woman, and thence weak. Hope nothing, I repeat Farewell all wishes, all debate, All prayer for this cause, or for that I Weep, if that aid thee, but depend Upon no help of outward friend ; Espouse thy doom at once, and cleave To fortitude without reprieve.' — Wordsworth IN THREE VOLUMES VOL. II. HENRY S. KING & CO., LONDON All Rights Reserved HEALEY: A ROMANCE.

Chapter I

Harken, oh harken ! let your souls behind you Turn, gently moved. Our voices seek along the Dread to find you, O lost, beloved ! ' — A Drama of Exile. EARNS HAW sat alone II §p_f O one evening in the early Septem «^ftm™»al ber. He was wondering what Katharine would do if Wilfrid remained away much longer without sign. The strike at the mill was over ; the Cornish girls had with drawn, and then the Lancashire hands re turned to work. That Avas all right, and if only the master were at home, an arrangement might soon be made with the colliers also. VOL. II. A Healey : a Romance. 2 He then turned towards the table, and, still thinking of business, opened a bundle of papers which he was to look over. They had been put into his hands by Katharine, with the words, ' I don't know whether they are all there, for they were tumbled into a drawer in my davenport, but they are all dated.

You must tell me to-morrow if any are missing. I want to know the prices from May to Sep tember in .' She named several successive years. He turned to his task, and presently opened a paper similar to all the others in appearance. He spread it open, but it had neither dates nor figures. It was a large sheet of blue paper, covered on two sides with a compact and legible handwriting. Naturally he glanced at it ; the words arrested his attention ; they astonished him, and he read on. ' " The old days," said she, " seem to be here again, do not they ?" ' For an instant I was cheated, and said, Healey : a Romance. 3 " Yes, indeed ; " but after I had spoken, some thing seemed to whisper to my heart, " No, they never will return again ; " and aloud I said, " What was it I said just now ? The old days ? oh, never, never more !

" ' My friend sighed. " Alas ! I fear not ! " she acquiesced. " We are older now, and sadder ; and when part of what made the old days is gone, how can we live them over again ? " ' " True," I replied ; " we will not strive after them. They are dead and buried. Let us do the best we can with these new ones. If we fill them with earnest, steady, holy work, they will not seem so like a hollow echo of what we rejoiced in then." ' Then, with all the sun veiled from our eyes, and all the light gone from our faces, we walked on, arm in arm as before ; nature, the irrevocable, around us ; the water plashing in our ears, and the sky blue and bright above us. All was as it had been, but we knew that Healey : a Romance. 4 when we reached a certain house, our destina tion, there would meet us merely a great void, which refused to be filled up ; and despite our calm words and resolute promises, we felt the truth, and could not meet each others' eyes.

We approached the house ; as we drew nigh our courage sailed ; we could not enter. ' " The sun is still high," we said ; " we will not go in yet; let us stroll over the hill and upon the moors, and return when dark comes on." ' We turned aside from the gates without demur, and went our way up the winding road, and presently came to a farm placed high upon a hill. That we passed. It was the end of June ; the haymakers in the sloping field were merrily singing and calling one to another, and tossing up the fragrant grass. Evening scents began to steal in the air ; evening sounds to pervade space. The sun was lower than we had supposed. He was already yellowing, and each figure stood out soft, yet clear, and " dark against day's golden Healey : a Romance. 5 death." But as for us, we passed on in silence.

We stole by without saluting the haymakers, for their merriment jarred upon our sadness. We passed down the hill, and came to a narrow lane ; a stream ran through it, and disappeared under an arched tunnel. High banks rose around it. The sun was hidden by one of them, and the air was chill. ' " This is like the Valley of the Shadow of Death," said my companion. ' " Perhaps, to some," I answered, " and those steep toilsome steps, up which we must climb to reach the higher road, are the hard entrance into eternity which such must dree. But" (and here we emerged upon a mountain road) "cross the road, 'and look down that gentle descent into a shaded but most beautiful valley. That, since I have known it, has always symbolized the Valley of the Shadow of Death to me." ' The sun was in view again, and we pursued our way up the road.

The moors lay around us, vast and broad. From the Healey : a Romance. sky a star or two began to twinkle. As we ascended the air became clearer — the hills more majestic — the silence more solemn and imposing. ' The stars shone out brighter ; and finally, as we reached the highest ridge, where the road ceased to ascend, and began to slope to the other side, we looked around, and below us we saw night already falling in either valley. We were high : we were elevated above the villages and farm-houses. We looked down upon reservoirs and moor land tarns. Earth's lights were quenched or dim in the dusk and mist of descending night, while we could look in awed and wondering worship at the calm blue heavens, and at the mystic silver crescent and steadfast points of light, whose radiance was shed upon us.

And yet we mourned. We could not speak to each other, but stood apart in silence. ' A breeze rose, and like a wailing whisper slipped over our heads. It was the spirit of Healey : a Roma7ice. 7 those past days which we should never know any more. A sadness as of death possessed us. Then floated through my mind words which I had read " long since, and lost awhile;" but now they overcame me — ' We are but orphan spirits left in Eden A time ago ; God gave us golden cups, and we were bidden To feed you so ; But now our right hand hath no cup remaining, No work to do — The mystic hydromel is spilt, and staining The whole world through. ' Harken ! oh, harken ! ye shall harken surely For years and years, The noise beside you dripping — coldly, purely — Of spirit's tears ! ' ' Then we sighed, and shivered, and said, " Let us now descend and go home." ' We took our way back again, and as we went clouds gathered, and the wind rose high, while we hurried along to be out of the storm. ' When we went into the house, our friends were there, save only him.

His voice was Healey : a Romance. 8 silent ; his form was wanting — ah ! where was he ? 'Perhaps he would come later? No. To morrow, or the next day? Not so. In a month, a year, say in several years ? Ah, no! Then when? Never. He is gone, and we shall see him no more — we who loved him — he who loved us. Is he happy, away from us, or is his heart possessed by just such a void as ours ? We do not know. We cannot tell if he be at all. We may question, we may pray, we may torment our souls day and night, but no one will reply. This is what makes us so sad. — " K. H." ' Those initials suddenly taught Ughtred what he had been doing. He had been reading a paper of Miss Healey's, never meant for his eye, acquainting himself with revelations and memories intended for the writer's sight alone. For a few moments he hardly knew what to do.

There was pain, there was pleasure Healey : a Romance. 9 in the knowledge he had just proved. He felt as if he had noiselessly entered a crypt ; he also felt a curiosity of the most purely mundane description. ' Who is he — he ? Whom will she never see again ? Whom does she mourn so sadly ? I wish I had never seen the paper ! To-morrow I shall have to tell her I have read it How am I to do that ? But of course she must know. Can it be true that the most strong-minded of women are devoid of a proper attention to the sorting of their papers — are ungifted with the spirit of pigeon holes, and let business papers and senti mental reveries repose side by side, sublimely careless of what irreverent eyes may light upon them ? Not, I am sure, that I have read it irreverently, but how is she to know that ?

I wish Hang it ! I do wish I had never seen the thing ! ' Katharine Healey, too, sat lonely that Healey : a Romance. 10 evening, smiling now and then an ungenial smile at her own ungenial reflections. Wil frid had been away rather more than a month, and she had heard not the faintest tidings of him. Now and then something seemed to whisper to her, ' Louis Kay knows where he is.' Once again she had asked him ; once again he had tranquilly denied any knowledge of Wilfrid's whereabouts, seeming amused that she should ask him so often about a thing of which he had once denied all knowledge. ' If I were to marry Louis,' she was thinking to-night, 'would he still hide things away from me ; still have secrets that he did not confide ? ' Oh, if I only knew any one who was perfectly honest, any one who would rather I knew all about him, however evil, than keep me in ignorance !

Some one who liked me to know him as he was He, I am say ing, but there is no such man in the world. Healey : a Romance. 11 They are all half-hearted. Those who are perfectly candid are only those who have nothing to conceal but folly, which will out whether they choose or no. ' All these years I have never reproached him, never disobeyed him, never thwarted him. It is not fair — it is not indeed! His workmen can lay down their tools and stand aside while they bargain for better terms, and he has to give in to them at last. Why should not I do the same ? Fool, to ask such a question! I'm lonely enough now, but then — what should I be then ? He would never cast a second thought after me unless something went wrong that I was in the habit of smoothing over for him. It is very hard— ' The hall bell rang.

Katharine waited, but her sitting-room was distant, and she heard nothing. No one came to her ; and her heart, which had fluttered eagerly for a few moments, soon beat regularly again. Healey : a Romance. 12 She passed the rest of the evening in a con tinuation of her former reflections ; and before going to bed paid her usual visit to Wilfrid's domain, the smoking - room, just to glance round at the unfamiliar order and neatness of the ' Empty room, And idle door that missed the master's step. A light was burning there, which quenched that of the candle she held. Seated in his own peculiar chair, tranquilly smoking a cigar, was Wilfrid, looking as if he had never been absent from his place. ' Wilfrid!' she cried, in profound and morti fied astonishment, 'when did you come ?' ' Hours ago. You don't seem very glad to see me.' ' You might at least have sent to tell me you were here, if you would not be at the trouble of coming to see me yourself,' said she, coldly, but with a most aching heart. ' What !

Mayn't I come into my own house Healey : a Romance. 13 in any manner I choose, without a scolding ? My dear girl, drop that ; I won't have it.' ' It cannot matter to you whether I am pleased or not to see you,' said she, turning away to leave the room ; but though she stepped proudly her eyes were almost blinded with tears. Had he uttered but one soft word, he had been welcomed as prodigals usually are ; but since he did not care, she would go. There was the whole long night before her — plenty of time in which to prove the bitter ness of her grief and humiliation. She had moved but slowly in her pain ; and when he put his arm round her waist, her pride was not strong enough to make her remove it and pass on ; besides, she had a candlestick in her right hand. ' A precious welcome home I get !' he said. ' Give me that candle, and don't try on Lady Macbeth airs, Kate.

I assure you, you would never make your fortune on the stage ' A pause. Healey : a Romance. 14 ' If I wait long enough, Kate, will you give me a kiss' (kissing her as he spoke), 'and tell me what you have been doing while I 've been away ? I rather expect to hear that I am bankrupt. Relieve my anxiety, please.' ' Oh, Wilfrid,' said she, between laughing and crying, ' can you humbug other people as easily as you can me, I wonder ?' The result of the concession was, that Miss Healey, instead of retiring to rest in dudgeon, sat with her brother until past midnight, tell ing him of many things — of cotton, coals, and strikes ; of her own and Ughtred's combined measures ; of Mrs. Kay, and of Mr. Gamaliel, whom she described for his benefit in her dry, sardonic way. ' Who ? What ? Gamaliel ?' exclaimed Wil frid, with a startled look. ' Gamaliel ! ' he repeated to himself, passing his hand over his eyes, and he became suddenly silent.

Chapter II

' A fault confessed is half redressed.' HE day after Wilfrid's return he went to Healey, saw Earnshaw, WBSeSmm wag pleased to commend the mea sures he had taken, and was, upon the whole, gracious and complacent, if a little blustering. The next morning Katharine rode up, and almost her first question was for the list she had desired Ughtred to make. ' It is here,' said he, giving her the list ; and, withholding that other paper, he added, after a pause, ' This, I think, had got slipped Healey : a Romance. 16 in with the others.' He felt himself redden under her gaze, but went on, ' I had read several words before I knew what I was doing, and then — it was quite unpardon able ' 'You finished it, I suppose?' said Katharine coolly. ' Yes,' he replied, looking straight at her. ' I can but apologize, and that I do most humbly, though I daresay you will hardly pardon me ; indeed, I cannot expect that you should.' ' Suppose I look at this unlucky document,' said she, in a composed but rather constrained voice, as she took it, opened it, and glanced at it.

For a moment she too blushed painfully, and then said, with a contemptuous though rather unsteady laugh — ' You are too conscientious, Mr. Earnshaw. I could not imagine what you had got hold of. I am sorry if your mind has been dis- Healey : a Romance. 17 turbed about this trash, and still more sur prised that I have not destroyed it long ago. It refers to a young brother of mine who died some six years ago, when I was seven teen — an age at which both boys and girls imagine that there are griefs past the healing. Perhaps you will be good enough to tear it up, and toss it into the waste-paper basket.' And she threw it indifferently upon the desk. Then you pardon my impertinence ? ' Impertinence is much too imposing a word to use in relation to such nonsense. I hope it afforded you any amusement, I am sure.

Were any of the other papers missing ?' 'No.' 'You will have seen Mr. Healey?' ' I did, yesterday.' ' I am going away from home myself. My brother says I need a change.' (Poor Katharine ! she spoke with as much pride as if he had been the most considerate brother in the world.) ' And as Mrs. and Mr. Kay VOL. II. B Healey : a Romance. are going away from home, I am going with them. Now, I want you to write to me every week, Mr. Earnshaw. Mr. Healey never writes, except upon business matters, and after what has happened I cannot be easy to be away without hearing anything. You have been so kind hitherto — will you think this too much trouble ? ' ' It will be no trouble, but a pleasure.' ' I am so much obliged. Good-bye, then. We leave to-morrow. By the by ' added Katharine, as if remembering something — ' Crier used to be attached to Sara Holden, your landlady's daughter.

Does he ever come there now, and do you think she returns his devotion ? ' ' He never comes there. She has been away for more than a month, " seeing the world," her mother says. I believe she absolutely dislikes him now, but I don't think she always did, and I consider it a pity for both of them that they could not have been married.' Healey : a Romance. 19 ' Ah ! I don't agree with you in the least. She is a sweet, modest, beautiful girl, a thou sand times too good for him. Good-bye again.' How unconsciously she spoke, not knowing that the day would come on which she would wish, with tears and sighs, that Sara and Crier had been married long ago. They shook hands and parted. The sheet of blue paper never reached the waste-paper basket. It returned home with Ughtred Earn shaw, and found a place amongst his treasures.

Chapter III

* If you look closely at the matter, it will be seen that whatever appears most vagrant and utterly purposeless, turns out in the end to have been impelled the most surely on a preordained and unswerving track.' — Transformation. HE words which head this chapter are very true ones. How was Katharine Healey to know that a certain elfish-looking little girl, with a large expressive mouth, weird brown eyes, and two little pig-tails of brown hair tied with pink ribbons — a little girl who had all that summer run on the sands and danced along by the waves that washed the quiet beach of Pen fynlas in Wales — how, I ask, was she to know that this little being was in any way connected with her fate ? Yet it was so. Healey : a Romance. 21 Little Phœbe Meredith ran down every day from her father's house, which overlooked the sea, and passed her time in contented dreams and elfish gambols, as lonely and as happy as any one in the world, till September came, and the very few visitors who had penetrated to that quiet spot took their de parture.

Penfynlas was empty. ' No one else will come, Thorgerd,' said Phœbe, clasping her step-sister's hand, and trying to make the staider steps of her elder keep pace with her own dancing gait. ' Very likely,' assented the sister, standing still and shading her eyes with her hand, to gaze over the expanse of waters, and be dazzled by the sunshine that lay upon them. The little girl and the tall maiden were alike wrong. Fresh visitors did come to Pen fynlas : no others than Katharine Healey, Mrs. Kay, and her son Louis. The reasons for their coming to so quiet and secluded a spot were various. Two Healey : a Romance. 22 impulses urged Louis to it : he was in love, and asked nothing better than to be near Katharine in the quietest place in the world, and he had a friend living near Penfynlas who offered him some shooting.

Katharine was utterly indifferent as to where she went, and Mrs. Kay, wrapped up in her son and rather fond of Katharine, was ready to go wherever the others wished. On the morning after their arrival Katharine betook herself to the beach alone. Louis had gone to see his friend, and Mrs. Kay was not disposed to go out. Katharine looked up and down the solitary shore, and saw only the one little figure, Phœbe Meredith, who walked at a sedater pace than usual by the sea, as near as possible to the retreating waves. It did not require much resolution on Phœbe's part to address the newcomer ; she considered an aimless stranger to be her natural property, and entered into a conversation with Katharine Healey : a Romance. 23 with little ceremony. She volunteered her society and companionship in the walk that Katharine proposed to take ; and finding that she was not rebuffed, but that a hand was extended to her, and that a faint smile lighted a sad face at her prattle, she became very communicative, and soon put Katharine into possession of the chief facts of her life ; that she was the daughter of the vicar of Penfynlas ; that Thorgerd was her sister, but not her ' own very sister ; ' that mamma did not like Thorgerd, and Thorgerd did not like mamma ; and that she, Phœbe, liked Thorgerd rather better than mamma.

These things, with other details concerning village acquaintances and daily doings, did the garrulous little tongue pour into Katharine's amused ears. She was touched and pleased to find that anything so bright, so joyous, and so elfin-like, should seem rather attracted to her than otherwise ; and she rambled about the pleasant beach all morning with Healey : a Romance. 24 her little companion, returning about one o'clock to the place whence they had started. Thorgerd was walking about the beach with a book ; she looked uneasily hither and thither, and her face brightened perceptibly when she saw Phœbe. ' Where have you been, child ? ' she asked, but not chidingly. ' I have been looking for you for half an hour.' Phœbe ran forward, and gave a detailed account of her morning's adventure. ' I hope I have not done wrong in taking her,' said Katharine, pleased with the sweet and rather sad face of the elder sister. ' She seemed not unwilling to go, and I , was glad to have her for a companion.' ' It is kind of you.

I hope she has not been troublesome,' said Thorgerd. They conversed for some little time, and each moment Katharine liked better the open, charming face of this brown-haired, soft-voiced maiden. She was not beautiful, — sometimes Healey : a Romance. 25 she was hardly even pretty, — but there was a harmony and fitness in her traits, and an untaught, unconstrained grace in her manner, which Katharine was conscious of lacking her self, and which was to her as refreshing as the breezes from the sea by which the girl dwelt.

Chapter IV

' My heart is sair, I dauma tell ; My heart is sair.' lATHARINE'S acquaintance with the Merediths progressed. Their father and mother had called upon Mrs. Kay, who professed herself delighted with them ; but Katharine found the society of the sisters sufficient for her. A child is a wonderful revolutionist. The small being called Phœbe Meredith soon broke down the barriers of stiffness and formality. She spoke to the Kays or to Katharine whenever she saw them ; it would have been sinful to resist her gay 'How do you do ? ' She had a confiding way Healey : a Romance. 27 of slipping her hand into Katharine's that the latter could not resist ; and many were the strolls and drives taken together by the grave, somewhat saturnine woman, and the odd, unearthly-looking little girl. In knowing Phœbe, she grew also to know better, and to like even more, Phœbe's sister.

Louis, perhaps, was not so well pleased at finding Katharine so constantly in the society of the two Merediths. He had calculated upon being almost always with her when not out shooting, and he felt almost jealous of her new companions. She was one morning sitting on the beach with Thorgerd : Phœbe was lying on the stones not far from them, turning over the leaves of a book, and Mrs. Kay was pacing about at some little distance, in conversation with the sharp-faced Mrs. Meredith, the stepmother, whom Katharine had quickly guessed to be the trouble of Thorgerd's life. ' Katharine,' said Louis, coming up to them. Healey : a Romance. ' Here is a letter for you. The post has just come in, at the timely hour of noon.' Katharine looked eagerly to see if it were from Wilfrid, but no: it had the Hamerton post-mark, but the writing was Ughtred Earn shaw's. Her fingers trembled and her face flushed as she opened it.

She assured herself silently that all was well ; Earnshaw would have tele graphed if anything had gone wrong ; but she had grown a coward of late, and could not altogether master her foolish fears. She did not know that both Louis and Thorgerd were watching her ; he with distrust and vexation ; she with a little wonder at the palpable tremor and disturbance of Katharine's manner. The letter, however, was very short, and assured her that all was well, and that Crier was just then away from Hamerton on a pro fessional tour, combining preaching with sedi tion. Mr. Healey had been to the office. ( Earnshaw did not mention that he had Healey : a Romance. 29 grumbled bitterly at Katharine's absence, and sworn roundly at things in general upon the occasion.) He would write again next week, and he remained her ' Obedient servant, Ugh tred Earnshaw.' ' Just what I wanted to know,' reflected Katharine, looking down at the short concise note, with its even lines and round, clear handwriting. ' Who would think,' she went on to herself, ' that this is from a man who knows my worst trouble, and who has helped me as I never thought I should need help ing ?

When I was seventeen, I did not pro phetically see myself receiving such letters as this. I hope Wilfred will not quarrel with Mr. Earnshaw. I can imagine, nay, I am sure, that though patient, gentle, and reason able, yet that there are things that would rouse him in a minute, and if he were angry she half smiled as she thought, ' I should not like to face him. I should be so sure that he was in the right to be angry. Healey : a Romance. 30 ' You have an interesting letter, Katharine ? ' said Louis inquiringly. She started, and looked up, to find his eyes bent upon her in an interested, question ing kind of way that she resented. Her letters were no concern of his — yet. She answered, rather coldly, ' I never have interesting letters as some people have. They are business, all business, and very dry.' ' I hope all is right at Healey.' ' Thank you, yes ; quite right.' With which she put the letter in her pocket, wishing she could put away the whole subject in the same expeditious manner.

Then she and Thorgerd rose and walked towards Mrs. Kay and Mrs. Meredith, and Louis stood still, looking after them, till Phœbe's voice arrested his attention, and he looked at her. She was sitting on the shingle, looking up at him, and she observed, with the utmost composure — 'You are vexed that Miss Healey has got that letter.' Healey : a Romance. 31 Indeed! Why?' ' And you wish you could read it,' pursued Phœbe. He shook his head, and smiled ; but Phœbe nodded decisively two or three times without speaking. Katharine wrote to Ughtred in a day or two, thanking him for his letter ; giving him her address, and asking him to write again. ' Excuse me,' she concluded, ' if I remind you that you promised to give me your help in that matter as my friend, not my " obedient servant." I am sure I need not say more.' She had paused to consider before writing this, and had finally decided to do it.