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NORTH AND SOUTH
eration, Frederick had determined upon remaining in London
a day or two longer. He had thought of coming down to Milton
again; the temptation had been very strong; but the idea of Mr.
Bell domesticated in his father’s house, and the alarm he had
received at the last moment at the railway station, had made
him resolve to stay in London. Margaret might be assured he
would take every precaution against being tracked by Leonards. Margaret was thankful that she received this letter while
her father was absent in her mother’s room. If he had been
present, he would have expected her to read it aloud to him,
and it would have raised in him a state of nervous alarm which
she would have found it impossible to soothe away. There was
not merely the fact, which disturbed her excess- ively, of Frederick’s detention in London, but there were allu- sions to the
recognition at the last moment at Milton, and the possibility
of a pursuit, which made her blood run cold; and how then
would it have affected her father? Many a time did Margaret
repent of having suggested and urged on the plan of consulting Mr. Lennox. At the moment, it had seemed as if it would
occasion so little delay – add so little to the apparently small
chances of detection; and yet everything that had since occurred had tended to make it so undesirable. Margaret battled hard against this regret of hers for what could not now
be helped; this self-reproach for having said what had at the
time appeared to be wise, but which after events were proving
to have been so foolish. But her father was in too depressed
a state of mind and body to struggle healthily; he would succumb to all these causes for morbid regret over what could not
be re- called. Margaret summoned up all her forces to her aid.
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ELIZABETH CLEGHORN GASKELL
Her father seemed to have forgotten that they had any reason to expect a letter from Frederick that morning. He was absorbed in one idea – that the last visible token of the presence
of his wife was to be carried away from him, and hidden from
his sight. He trembled pitifully as the undertaker’s man was
arran- ging his crape draperies around him. He looked wistfully at Margaret; and, when released, he tottered towards her,
mur- muring, ‘Pray for me, Margaret. I have no strength left in
me. I cannot pray. I give her up because I must. I try to bear it:
in- deed I do. I know it is God’s will. But I cannot see why she
died. Pray for me, Margaret, that I may have faith to pray. It is
a great strait, my child.’
Margaret sat by him in the coach, almost supporting him
in her arms; and repeating all the noble verses of holy comfort, or texts expressive of faithful resignation, that she could
remem- ber. Her voice never faltered; and she herself gained
strength by doing this. Her father’s lips moved after her, repeating the well-known texts as her words suggested them; it
was terrible to see the patient struggling effort to obtain the
resignation which he had not strength to take into his heart as
a part of himself.
Margaret’s fortitude nearly gave way as Dixon, with a slight
motion of her hand, directed her notice to Nicholas Higgins
and his daughter, standing a little aloof, but deeply attentive
to the ceremonial. Nicholas wore his usual fustian clothes, but
had a bit of black stuff sewn round his hat – a mark of mourning which he had never shown to his daughter Bessy’s memory. But Mr. Hale saw nothing. He went on repeating to himself,
mechanically as it were, all the funeral service as it was read by
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NORTH AND SOUTH
the officiating clergyman; he sighed twice or thrice when all
was ended; and then, putting his hand on Margaret’s arm, he
mutely entreated to be led away, as if he were blind, and she
his faithful guide.
Dixon sobbed aloud; she covered her face with her handker- chief, and was so absorbed in her own grief, that she did
not perceive that the crowd, attracted on such occasions, was
dis- persing, till she was spoken to by some one close at hand.
It was Mr. Thornton. He had been present all the time, standing, with bent head, behind a group of people, so that, in fact,
no one had recognised him.
‘I beg your pardon, – but, can you tell me how Mr. Hale is?
And Miss Hale, too? I should like to know how they both are.’
‘Of course, sir. They are much as is to be expected. Master
is terribly broke down. Miss Hale bears up better than likely.’
Mr. Thornton would rather have heard that she was suffering the natural sorrow. In the first place, there was selfishness enough in him to have taken pleasure in the idea that his
great love might come in to comfort and console her; much
the same kind of strange passionate pleasure which comes
stinging through a mother’s heart, when her drooping infant
nestles close to her, and is dependent upon her for everything.
But this delicious vision of what might have been – in which,
in spite of all Margaret’s repulse, he would have indulged only
a few days ago – was miserably disturbed by the recollection
of what he had seen near the Outwood station. ‘Miserably
disturbed!’ that is not strong enough. He was haunted by the
remembrance of the handsome young man, with whom she
stood in an attitude of such familiar confidence; and the re-
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ELIZABETH CLEGHORN GASKELL
membrance shot through him like an agony, till it made him
clench his hands tight in order to subdue the pain. At that late
hour, so far from home! It took a great moral effort to galvanise his trust – ere- while so perfect – in Margaret’s pure and
exquisite maidenli- ness, into life; as soon as the effort ceased,
his trust dropped down dead and powerless: and all sorts of
wild fancies chased each other like dreams through his mind.
Here was a little piece of miserable, gnawing confirmation.
‘She bore up better than likely’ under this grief. She had then
some hope to look to, so bright that even in her affectionate
nature it could come in to lighten the dark hours of a daughter
newly made mother- less. Yes! he knew how she would love.
He had not loved her without gaining that instinctive knowledge of what capabilities were in her. Her soul would walk
in glorious sunlight if any man was worthy, by his power of
loving, to win back her love. Even in her mourning she would
rest with a peaceful faith upon his sympathy. His sympathy!
Whose? That other man’s. And that it was another was enough
to make Mr. Thornton’s pale grave face grow doubly wan and
stern at Dixon’s answer.
‘I suppose I may call,’ said he coldly. ‘On Mr. Hale, I mean.
He will perhaps admit me after to-morrow or so.’
He spoke as if the answer were a matter of indifference to
him. But it was not so. For all his pain, he longed to see the
au- thor of it. Although he hated Margaret at times, when he
thought of that gentle familiar attitude and all the attendant
circumstances, he had a restless desire to renew her picture in
his mind – a longing for the very atmosphere she breathed.
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NORTH AND SOUTH
He was in the Charybdis of passion, and must perforce circle
and circle ever nearer round the fatal centre.
‘I dare say, sir, master will see you. He was very sorry to
have to deny you the other day; but circumstances was not
agreeable just then.’
For some reason or other, Dixon never named this interview that she had had with Mr. Thornton to Margaret. It might
have been mere chance, but so it was that Margaret never
heard that he had attended her poor mother’s funeral.
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CHAPTER 34
FALSE AND TRUE
‘Truth will fail thee never, never!
Though thy bark be tempest-driven,
Though each plank be rent and riven,
Truth will bear thee on for ever!’
ANON.
The ‘bearing up better than likely’ was a terrible strain
upon Margaret. Sometimes she thought she must give way,
and cry out with pain, as the sudden sharp thought came
across her, even during her apparently cheerful conversations with her father, that she had no longer a mother. About
Frederick, too, there was great uneasiness. The Sunday post
intervened, and interfered with their London letters; and on
Tuesday Margaret was surprised and disheartened to find
that there was still no letter. She was quite in the dark as to
his plans, and her father was miserable at all this uncertainty. It broke in upon his lately acquired habit of sitting still
in one easy chair for half a day to- gether. He kept pacing up
and down the room; then out of it; and she heard him upon
the landing opening and shutting the bed-room doors, without any apparent object. She tried to tran- quillise him by
reading aloud; but it was evident he could not listen for long
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NORTH AND SOUTH
together. How thankful she was then, that she had kept to
herself the additional cause for anxiety produced by their encounter with Leonards. She was thankful to hear Mr. Thornton announced. His visit would force her father’s thoughts
into another channel.
He came up straight to her father, whose hands he took
and wrung without a word – holding them in his for a minute
or two, during which time his face, his eyes, his look, told of
more sympathy than could be put into words. Then he turned
to Margaret. Not ‘better than likely’ did she look. Her stately
beauty was dimmed with much watching and with many tears.
The expression on her countenance was of gentle patient sadness – nay of positive present suffering. He had not meant to
greet her otherwise than with his late studied coldness of demeanour; but he could not help going up to her, as she stood
a little aside, rendered timid by the uncertainty of his manner of late, and saying the few necessary common-place words
in so tender a voice, that her eyes filled with tears, and she
turned away to hide her emotion. She took her work and sate
down very quiet and silent. Mr. Thornton’s heart beat quick
and strong, and for the time he utterly forgot the Outwood
lane. He tried to talk to Mr. Hale: and – his presence always a
certain kind of pleasure to Mr. Hale, as his power and decision
made him, and his opinions, a safe, sure port – was unusually
agree- able to her father, as Margaret saw.
Presently Dixon came to the door and said, ‘Miss Hale, you
are wanted.’
Dixon’s manner was so flurried that Margaret turned sick
at heart. Something had happened to Fred. She had no doubt
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ELIZABETH CLEGHORN GASKELL
of that. It was well that her father and Mr. Thornton were so
much occupied by their conversation.
‘What is it, Dixon?’ asked Margaret, the moment she had
shut the drawing-room door.
‘Come this way, miss,’ said Dixon, opening the door of what
had been Mrs. Hale’s bed-chamber, now Margaret’s, for her
father refused to sleep there again after his wife’s death. ‘It’s
nothing, miss,’ said Dixon, choking a little. ‘Only a police-inspector. He wants to see you, miss. But I dare say, it’s about
nothing at all.’
‘Did he name – ’ asked Margaret, almost inaudibly.
‘No, miss; he named nothing. He only asked if you lived
here, and if he could speak to you. Martha went to the door,
and let him in; she has shown him into master’s study. I went
to him myself, to try if that would do; but no – it’s you, miss,
he wants.’ Margaret did not speak again till her hand was on
the lock of the study door. Here she turned round and said,
‘Take care
papa does not come down. Mr. Thornton is with him now.’
The inspector was almost daunted by the haughtiness of
her manner as she entered. There was something of indignation expressed in her countenance, but so kept down and controlled, that it gave her a superb air of disdain. There was no
surprise, no curiosity. She stood awaiting the opening of his
business there. Not a question did she ask.
‘I beg your pardon, ma’am, but my duty obliges me to ask
you a few plain questions. A man has died at the Infirmary, in
con- sequence of a fall, received at Outwood station, between
the hours of five and six on Thursday evening, the twenty-
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NORTH AND SOUTH
sixth in- stant. At the time, this fall did not seem of much
consequence; but it was rendered fatal, the doctors say, by the
presence of some internal complaint, and the man’s own habit
of drinking.’
The large dark eyes, gazing straight into the inspector’s
face, dilated a little. Otherwise there was no motion perceptible to his experienced observation. Her lips swelled out into
a richer curve than ordinary, owing to the enforced tension
of the muscles, but he did not know what was their usual appearance, so as to recognise the unwonted sullen defiance of
the firm sweeping lines. She never blenched or trembled. She
fixed him with her eye. Now – as he paused before going on,
she said, al- most as if she would encourage him in telling his
tale – ’Well – go on!’
‘It is supposed that an inquest will have to be held; there is
some slight evidence to prove that the blow, or push, or scuffle
that caused the fall, was provoked by this poor fellow’s halftipsy impertinence to a young lady, walking with the man
who pushed the deceased over the edge of the platform. This
much was observed by some one on the platform, who, however, thought no more about the matter, as the blow seemed of
slight consequence. There is also some reason to identify the
lady with yourself; in which case – ’
‘I was not there,’ said Margaret, still keeping her expression- less eyes fixed on his face, with the unconscious look of
a sleep-walker.
The inspector bowed but did not speak. The lady standing be- fore him showed no emotion, no fluttering fear, no
anxiety, no desire to end the interview. The information he
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ELIZABETH CLEGHORN GASKELL
had received was very vague; one of the porters, rushing out
to be in readi- ness for the train, had seen a scuffle, at the
other end of the platform, between Leonards and a gentleman accompanied by a lady, but heard no noise; and before
the train had got to its full speed after starting, he had been
almost knocked down by the headlong run of the enraged
half intoxicated Leonards, swearing and cursing awfully. He
had not thought any more about it, till his evidence was routed out by the inspector, who, on making some farther inquiry at the railroad station, had heard from the station-master
that a young lady and gentleman had been there about that
hour – the lady remarkably hand- some – and said, by some
grocer’s assistant present at the time, to be a Miss Hale, living at Crampton, whose family dealt at his shop. There was
no certainty that the one lady and gentleman were identical
with the other pair, but there was great probab- ility. Leonards himself had gone, half-mad with rage and pain, to the
nearest gin-palace for comfort; and his tipsy words had not
been attended to by the busy waiters there; they, however, remembered his starting up and cursing himself for not having
sooner thought of the electric telegraph, for some purpose
un- known; and they believed that he left with the idea of
going there. On his way, overcome by pain or drink, he had
lain down in the road, where the police had found him and
taken him to the Infirmary: there he had never recovered
sufficient con- sciousness to give any distinct account of his
fall, although once or twice he had had glimmerings of sense
sufficient to make the authorities send for the nearest magistrate, in hopes that he might be able to take down the dying
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