Christian's Mistake by Dinah Maria Mulock Craik

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And so it was all over--safely over--this great change, which, however
longed for, had not been contemplated as a possibility one hour before.
It had arranged itself out of the most trivial elements, as great events
often do. There could be no question that every body felt it to be the
best thing, and every body was thankful; and yet Christian watched her
husband with a little uncertainty until she heard him heave a sigh of
relief.

"Yes, I am sure it was right to be done, and I am glad it is done. Are
not you, Christian?"

"Oh, so glad! I hope it is not wicked in me, but I am so glad!"

"Why--to have me all to yourself?" said he, smiling at her energy.

A strange, unwonted thrill ran through Christian's heart as she
recognized, beyond possibility of doubt, that this was the secret source
of her delight--of the feeling as if a new existence were opening before
her--as if the heavy weight which had oppressed her were taken off,
and she could move through those old gloomy rooms, which had once
struck a chill through her whole being, with a sense as if she were as
light as air, and as merry as a bird in the spring.

To have the Lodge made into a real home--a home altogether her own--
and emptied of all but those who were really her own, with a glad
welcome for any visitors, but still only as visitors, coming and going,
and never permanently interfering with the sweet, narrow circle of the
family fireside; to be really mistress in her own house; to have her time
to herself; to spend long mornings with the children; long evenings
alone with her husband, even if he sat for hours poring over his big
books and did not speak a word--oh, how delicious it would be!

"Yes, all to myself--I'll have you all to myself," she murmured, as she
put her arms round his neck, and looked right up into his eyes. For the
first time she was sure--quite sure that she loved him. And as she stood
embraced, encircled and protected by his love, and thought of her
peaceful life now and to come, full of duties, blessings, and delights,
ay, though it had also no lack of cares. Christian felt sorry--oh, so
infinitely sorry for poor Aunt Henrietta.

Chapter 12.

_"Weave, weave, weave,
The tiniest thread will do;
The filmiest thread from a spider's bed
Is stout enough for you._

_"Twist, twist, twist,
With fingers dainty and small;
Let the wily net be quietly set,
That the innocent may fall."_

Arthur never got his thrashing. The serious results, of which he had
been the primary cause, for a while put his naughtiness out of every
body's head; and when, after an hour or more, Christian went up stairs,
and found the poor little fellow waiting patiently and obediently in
mother's bedroom, it seemed rather hard to punish him.

She went down again into the study, and had a long talk with her
husband, in which she spoke her mind very freely--more freely than she
had ever done before, and told him things which had come to her
knowledge concerning the children of which he, poor man! had hitherto
been kept in total ignorance.

Thus taking counsel together, the father and mother decided that,
except in very rare instances, corporal punishment should be entirely
abolished, and never, under any circumstances, should be administered
by Phillis. That Phillis's sway was to be narrowed as much as possible,
without any absolute laws being made that would wound her feelings,
or show indifference to her long fidelity.

"For," said Dr. Grey, "we must not forget, Christian, that she loved the
children when they had not quite so much love as they have now."

No, Arthur was not thrashed--was promised faithfully that Phillis
should never be allowed to thrash him any more; but his step-mother
made him write the meekest, humblest letter of apology to his Aunt
Henrietta, which that lady returned unanswered. This, however, as
Christian took some pains to explain to him, was a matter of secondary
consequence. Whatever she did, he had done only what was his duty.
And he was enjoined, when they did meet, to address her politely and
respectfully, as a nephew and a gentleman should--as his father always
addressed her, even in answer to those sharp speeches which, though in
his children's presence, Miss Gascoigne continually let fall.

Nevertheless, Dr. Grey bore them, and so did his wife, which was
harder. She did not mind rudeness to herself, but to hear her husband
thus spoken to and spoken of was a sufficient trial to make her long for
the time of release. And yet through it all came the deep sense of pity
that any woman who could show herself in so pleasant a light abroad--
for many of the morning visitors quite condoled with Mrs. Grey on the
impending change at the Lodge, and of the great loss she would have in
her sister-in-law--should be so obnoxious at home that her nearest
relatives counted the days until her shadow should cease to darken their
doors.

And so, gradually and often painfully, but still with a firm conviction
on every body's mind that the plan so suddenly decided on had been the
best for all parties, came round the time of the aunts' departure.

Christian had spent all the previous day at Avonside, which she found a
very pretty cottage, all woodbine and roses, with nothing at all
poverty-stricken about it, either within or without. She had gone over it
from garret to basement, making every thing as comfortable as
possible, as she had carte blanche from her husband to do, and gladly
did; for on her tender conscience rankled every bitter word of Miss
Gascoigne's as though it were real truth; and sometimes, in spite of
herself, she could not suppress an uneasy feeling as if the aunts were
being "turned out." The last day of their stay at the Lodge was so
exceedingly painful, that, having done all she could, she at length
rushed out of the house with Arthur for a breath of fresh air and a quiet
half hour before dinner, if such were possible.

She did not go far, only just crossing the bridge to the cottage grounds
opposite where, in sight of the Lodge windows, she could walk up and
down the beautiful avenue, which still bears the name of the old
philosopher who loved it. If his wise, gentle ghost still haunted the
place, it might well have watched with pleasure this fair, grave, sweet-
looking young woman sauntering up and down with the boy in her
hand, listening vaguely to his chatter, and now and then putting in a
smiling answer. She had a smiling, peaceful face, and her thoughts
were peaceful too. She was thinking to herself how pretty Avonsbridge
was in its June dress of freshest green, how quietly and innocently life
passed under shadow of these college walls, and how could any one
have the heart to make it otherwise?

She would not after today. She would cease to vex herself, or let her
husband vex himself about Miss Gascoigne. With a mile and a half
between them, the Lodge would certainly feel safe from her. And oh!
what a wonderful peace would come into the house when she left it!
How good the children would be! How happy their father!--yes, he
could be made happy, Christian knew that, and it was she who could
make him so. The consciousness of power in this sweet sense, and the
delight of exercising it was becoming the most exquisite happiness
Christian had ever known. She sat dreaming over it almost like a girl in
her first love-dream--only this dream was deeper and calmer, with all
the strength of daily duty added to the joy of loving and being loved.
Not that she reasoned much--she was not given to much analyzing of
herself--she only knew that she was content, and found content in every
thing--in the ripple of the river at her feet, the flutter of the leaves
over her head, the soft blue sky above the colleges, and the green grass
gemmed with daisies, where an old man was mowing on the one side,
and a large thrush, grown silent with summer, was hopping about on
the other. Every thing seemed beautiful, for the beauty began in her
own heart.

"Good-morning, Mrs. Grey."

People talk about "looking as if they had seen a ghost"--and perhaps
that look was not unlike Christian's as she started at this salutation
behind her. He must have come stealthily across the grass, for she had
heard nothing, did not even know that any body was near, till she
looked up and saw Sir Edwin Uniacke.

The surprise was so great that it brought (oh, what shame to feel it, and
feel sure that he saw it!) the blood up to her face--to her very forehead.
She half rose, and then sat down again, with a blind instinct that any
thing was better than either to be or to appear afraid.

Without waiting for either a reply or a recognition--which indeed came
not, nothing but that miserable blush--the young man seated himself on
the bench and began to make acquaintance with Arthur.

"I believe I have seen you before, my little friend. You are Dr. Grey's
son, and I once offered to carry you, but was refused. Are you quite
well now, Master Albert? Isn't that your name?"

"No; Arthur," said the boy, rather flattered at being noticed. "Are you
one of the men at our college? You haven't your gown on."

"Not now," with a queer look, half amusement, half irritation. "I don't
belong to Avonsbridge. I have a house of my own in the country--such
a pretty place, with a park, and deer, and a lake, and a boat to row on it.
Wouldn't you like to see it?"

"Yes." said Arthur, all eyes and ears.

"I live there, but I am always coming over to Avonsbridge. Do what I
will, I can not keep away."

The tone, the glance across the child, were unmistakable. Christian
rose, her momentary stupefaction gone.

"Come, Arthur, papa will be waiting dinner. We never keep papa
waiting, you know."

Simple as the words were, they expressed volumes.

For an instant her composed matronly grace--her perfect indifference,
silenced, nay, almost awed the young man, and then irritated him into
resistance. He caught hold of Arthur in passing.

"You need not go yet. It is only just five, and your papa does not dine
till six."

"How do you know?" asked the child.

"Oh. I know every thing. I watch you in and out of the Lodge, and am
aware of all you do. But about the boat I promised you. It is at my
place, Lake Hall, near--"

"Arthur. we must go."

Arthur jumped up at once. Gentle as it was, he had learned that that
voice must never be disobeyed.

"I can't stay, sir; mother calls me. But I'll tell papa we met you, and ask
him to let me come and see you, if you will tell me your name."

Sir Edwin hesitated.

"There is no necessity," said Mrs. Grey. "Arthur, I know this
gentleman. I myself shall tell your papa that we have met him here.
Good-morning, Sir Edwin Uniacke."

She bowed with that perfect, repellant courtesy against which there is
no appeal, and passed on; had she seen--she did not, for she looked
straight on and saw nothing--but had she seen the look of mingled hate
and love which darkened over Sir Edwin's face, it might have terrified
her. But no, she was too courageous a woman to fear anything save
doing wrong.

After a minute's angry beating of his boot with his stick, the young man
rose and followed them down the avenue, contriving, by dint of
occasional conversation with Arthur, to keep along side of them the
whole way as far as the bridge which connected the college grounds
with the college buildings, and which was overlooked by the whole
frontage of the Lodge.

With a vague sense of relief and protection, Christian glanced to the
windows of her home, and there, at the open nursery casement, she saw
a group, Phillis, Oliver, Letitia, and behind Letitia another person--Miss
Susan Bennett, who had come with a message from old Mrs. Ferguson,
and whom, in her kindness, Mrs. Grey had sent to have a cup of tea in
the nursery before returning to the village, where the girl said she was
"quite comfortable." There she stood, she and Phillis, watching, as they
doubtless had watched the whole interview, from the time Sir Edwin
sat down, on the bench till his parting shake of the hand to Arthur, and
farewell bow to herself, which bow was rather easy and familiar than
distantly ceremonious.

Had he done it on purpose? Had he too seen the group at the window,
and, moved by a contemptible vanity, or worse, behaved so that these
others ought notice his manner to Mrs. Grey, and put upon it any
construction they pleased?

Yet what possible construction could be put upon it, even by the most
ill-natured and malicious witnesses? The college grounds were free to
all; this meeting was evidently accidental and all that had passed thereat
was a few words with the boy, which Arthur would be sure to repent at
once; nor did Christian desire to prevent him.

It was a hard position. She had done no wrong--not the shadow of
wrong--and yet here was she, Christian Grey, discovered meeting and
walking with a man whom her husband had distinctly forbidden the
house--discovered both by her servant, who, having an old servant's
love of prying into family affairs, no doubt knew of this prohibition,
and by Miss Bennett, to whom she herself had said that Sir Edwin was
a man unfit for any respectable woman's acquaintance.

"What would they both think? And, moreover, when she heard of it--as
assuredly she would--what would Miss Gascoigne think and say?"

That overpowering dread, "What will people say?" for the first time in
her life began to creep over Christian's fearless heart. Such an innocent
heart it was, and oh, such a contented one only half an hour ago.

"How dare he?" she said, fiercely, as she found herself alone in her own
room, with but just time enough to dress and take her place as the fair,
stately, high-thoughted, pure-hearted mistress of her husband's table.
"How dare he?" and, standing at the glass, she looked almost with
disgust into the beautiful face that burnt, hotly still only at the
remembrance of the last ten minutes. "But he must see--he must surely
understand how utterly I despise him. He will not presume again. Oh,
if I had only told my husband! It was a terrible mistake?"

What was--her secret or her marriage? or both?

Christian did not stop to think. Whatever it was, she knew that, like
most of the mistakes and miseries of this world, it was made to be
remedied--made possible of remedy. At all events, the pain must be
endured, fought through, struggled with, any thing but succumbed to.

In the five minutes that, after all, she found she had to wait in the
drawing-room before the aunts or her husband appeared. Christian
took herself seriously to task for this overwhelming, cowardly fear.
What had she really to dread? What harm could he do her--the bad
man of whom she had so ignorantly made a girl's ideal? The only
testimony thereof was her letters, if he still had them in his possession--
her poor, innocent, girlish letters--very few--just two or three. Foolish
they might have been, sentimental and ridiculous, but she could not
remember any thing wrong in them--any thing that a girl in her teens
need blush to have written, either to friend or lover, save for the one
fact that, a girl is wiser to have no friend at all among men--except her
lover. And, whatever they were, most likely he had destroyed them
long ago.

"No, no," she thought, "he can not do me any harm; he dare not!"

It was difficult to say what Sir Edwin Uniacke would not dare; for,
going back to her room for some trifle forgotten, she discovered that he
was still lounging, cigar in mouth, up and down the river-side avenue
opposite, where he could plainly see and be seen from almost every
window in the Lodge.

And there, hurrying to meet him, she saw Susan Bennett. But the
meeting appeared not satisfactory, and after a few minutes the girl had
left him and he was again seen walking up and down alone.

A vain woman might have been flattered, perhaps allured, by this
persistence. In Christian it produced only repulsion, actual hatred, if so
gentle a spirit could hate. An honest love from the very humblest man
alive, she would have been tender over; but this, which to her, a wife,
was necessarily utter insult and wickedness, awoke in her nothing but
abhorrence--the same sort of righteous abhorrence that she would have
felt--she knew she would--toward any woman who had tried to win her
husband from herself. Win her husband? The fancy almost made her
smile, and then filled her with a brimming sense of joy that he was--
what he was, a man to whom the bare idea of loving any woman but his
own wife was so impossible that it became actually ludicrous.

She smiled, she even laughed, with an ever-growing sense of all he was
to her and she to him, when she heard him open his study-door and call
"Christian."

She went quickly, to explain in a word or two, before they went down
to dinner, her rencontre with Sir Edwin Uniacke. Afterward, in their
long, quiet evenings, to which she so looked forward, she would tell her
husband the whole story, and give herself the comfort of feeling that
now at last he was fully acquainted with her whole outer life and
inmost soul, as a husband ought to be.

But there stood the two aunts, one stately and grim, the other silent and
tearful; and it took all Dr. Grey's winning ways to smooth matters so as
to make their last meal together before the separation any thing like a
peaceful one.

He seemed so anxious for this--nervously anxious--that his wife forgot
every thing in helping him to put a cheerful face on every thing. And
when she watched him, finding a pleasant word for every one, and
patient even with Miss Gascoigne, who today seemed in her sharpest
mood, gray-haired, quaint, and bookish-looking as he was, it appeared
to Christian that not a young man living could bear a moment's
comparison with Dr. Arnold Grey.

He tried his best, and she tried her best but it was rather a dull dinner,
and she found no opportunity to say, as at last she had decided to say
publicly, just as a piece of news, no more, that she had today met Sir
Edwin Uniacke. And so it befell that the first who told the fact was
Arthur, blurting out between his strawberries, "Oh, papa I want you to
let me go to a place called Lake Hall."

"Lake Hall?"

"Yes; the owner of it invited me there; he did, indeed. He is the
kindest, pleasantest gentleman I ever met. A 'Sir,' too. His name is Sir
Edwin Uniacke."

"My boy, where did you meet Sir Edwin Uniacke?"

So the whole story came out. Dr. Grey listened in grave silence--even a
little displeasure, or something less like displeasure than pain. At
length, he said,

"I think you must have made some mistake, Arthur. Your mother could
never have allowed--"

"She did not say she would allow me to go. She looked rather vexed; I
don't think she liked Sir Edwin Uniacke. And if she is very much
against my going--well, I won't go," said Arthur, heroically.

"You are a good boy; but I think this gentleman ought to have hesitated
a little before he thus intruded himself upon my wife and my son."

"I think so, too," said Christian, the first words she had spoken.

Dr. Grey glanced at her sharply, but the most suspicious husband could
have read nothing in her face beyond what she said.

"And I think," burst in Miss Gascoigne, who had listened to it all, her
large eyes growing every minute larger and larger, "that it must be
somehow a lady's own fault when a gentleman is intrusive, I never
believed--I never could have believed--after all Dr. Grey has said about
Sir Edwin, that the three figures--a lady, and gentleman, and a child,
whom I saw this afternoon sitting so comfortably together on the
bench--as comfortably, I vow and declare, as if they had been sitting
there an hour, which perhaps they had--"

"Not more than two minutes," interrupted Christian, speaking very
quietly, but conscious of a wild desire to fly at Miss Gascoigne and
shake her as she stood, putting forward, in her customary way, those
mangled fragments of truth which are more irritating than absolute lies.
"Indeed, it was only two minutes. I did not choose, even if I had no
other reason, that a man of whom Dr. Grey did not approve should hold
any communication with Arthur?"

"Thank you, that was right," said Dr. Greg.

"Yet you let him walk with you--I know you did, up to the very Lodge
door."

"To the bridge, Miss Gascoigne."

"Well, it's all the same. And I must confess it is most extraordinary
conduct. To refuse a gentleman's visits--his open visits here--on the
pretext that he is not good enough for your society, and then to meet
him, sit with him, walk with him in the college grounds. What will
people say."

Christian turned like a hunted creature at bay, "I do not care--not a jot,
what people say."

"I thought not. People like you never do care. They fly in the face of
society; they--"

"Husband!" with a sort of wild appeal, the first she had ever made for
protection--for at least justice.

Dr. Grey looked up, started out of a long fit of thoughtfulness--sadness
it might be, during which he had let the conversation pass him by.

"The only thing I care for is what my husband thinks. If he blames
me--"

"For what, my dear?"

"Because, when I was walking in the college grounds, as any lady may
walk, that man, Sir Edwin Uniacke, whose acquaintance I desire as
little as you do, came up and spoke to me, or rather to Arthur. I could
not help it, could I?"

"No, my child," with a slight emphasis on the words "my child," that
went to Christian's heart. Yes, surely, if she had only had courage to
tell him, in his large tenderness he could have understood that childish
folly, the dream of a day, and the long misery it had brought her. She
would tell him all the very first opportunity; however much it pained
and humiliated her, she would tell her good husband all.

"And, papa, have I been naughty too?" said Arthur? "I am sure I did
not see any thing so very dreadful in Sir Edwin. He came up and spoke
to mother as if he knew her quite well, and then he talked ever so much
to me, and said if I would visit him he would give me a boat to row,
and a horse to ride. And I'm sure he seemed the very kindest,
pleasantest gentleman."

"So he is; and nothing shall ever make me believe he isn't." cried Miss
Gascoigne, always delighted to pull against the tide. "And I must say,
Dr. Grey, the way you and your wife set up your opinion against that of
really good society is perfect nonsense. For my part, when I have a
house of my own once more, and can invite whomsoever I please--"

"I would nevertheless advise, so far as a brother may," interrupted Dr.
Grey, very seriously, "that you do not invite Sir Edwin Uniacke. And
now, aunts both," with that sun-shiny smile which could disperse
almost any domestic cloud, "as this conversation is not particularly
interesting to the children, suppose we end it. When do you intend to
have us all to tea at Avonside?"

Chapter 13.

_"Forgive us each his daily sins,
If few or many, great or small;
And those that sin against us, Lord,
Good Lord! Forgive them all._

_"Judge us not as we others judge;
Condemn us not as we condemn;
They who are merciless to us,
Be merciful to them._

_"And if the cruel storm should pass,
And let Thy heaven of peace appear,
Make not our right the right--or might,
But make the right shine clear."_

"Well, the least I can say of it is that it is very extraordinary!"

"What is extraordinary?" asked Miss Grey, looking up placidly from
her knitting, which did not get on very fast now. For Aunt Maria was
exceedingly busy and exceedingly happy. If ever her brother or his
wife had the least qualms of conscience about her removal from the
Lodge to Avonside, they would have been dispelled by the sight of the
dear little fat woman trotting about, the picture of content, full of
housekeeping plans, and schemes for her poultry-yard, her pigeon-
house, and her green-house. As for her garden, it was a source of
perpetual pride, wonder, and delight. The three years which she had
spent at the Lodge--which, in her secret heart, she owned were rather
dull and trying years--were ended.

She herself, and, indeed, the whole establishment, resumed again
exactly the place they had filled in the lifetime of the first Mrs. Grey.
Avonside became once more a regular aunts' house--devoted to
children, who now, at the distance of a mile and a half, thought nothing
so delightful as to spend long days there, and be petted by Aunt Maria.

The sudden revolution had succeeded--as honest revolutions usually do.
when any one has the courage to attempt them--to break through a false
domestic position, and supply it with a true one. Even Miss Gascoigne
was the happier for it; less worried in her mind, having no feeling of
domestic responsibility, and being no longer haunted by the children.
The poor little souls! she could get on well enough with them for an
hour or two at Avonside, but they had been a sore affliction to her at
the Lodge. Any woman who can not wholly set aside self is sure to be
tormented by, and be a still worse torment to, children.

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