“You left us there and find us here. We have been watching you, and shall watch you still. You must be questioned one day, but not now. At present all you have to do is to say good night, and then pass.”
Moore glanced from one to the other without unbending his aspect. “Days of fête have their privileges, and so have days of hazard,” observed he gravely.
“Come, don’t moralize. Say good night, and pass,” urged Shirley.
“Must I say good night to you, Miss Keeldar?”
“Yes, and to Caroline likewise. It is nothing new, I hope. You have bid us both good night before.”
He took her hand, held it in one of his, and covered it with the other. He looked down at her gravely, kindly, yet commandingly. The heiress could not make this man her subject. In his gaze on her bright face there was no servility, hardly homage; but there were interest and affection, heightened by another feeling. Something in his tone when he spoke, as well as in his words, marked that last sentiment to be gratitude.
“Your debtor bids you good night! May you rest safely and serenely till morning.”
“And you, Mr. Moore – what are you going to do? What have you been saying to Mr. Helstone, with whom I saw you shake hands? Why did all those gentlemen gather round you? Put away reserve for once. Be frank with me.”
“Who can resist you? I will be frank. Tomorrow, if there is anything to relate, you shall hear it.”
“Just now,” pleaded Shirley; “don’t procrastinate.”
“But I could only tell half a tale. And my time is limited; I have not a moment to spare. Hereafter I will make amends for delay by candour.”
“But are you going home?”
“Yes.”
“Not to leave it any more tonight?”
“Certainly not. At present, farewell to both of you.”
He would have taken Caroline’s hand and joined it in the same clasp in which he held Shirley’s, but somehow it was not ready for him. She had withdrawn a few steps apart. Her answer to Moore’s adieu was only a slight bend of the head and a gentle, serious smile. He sought no more cordial token. Again he said “Farewell,” and quitted them both.
“There! it is over,” said Shirley when he was gone. “We have made him bid us good night, and yet not lost ground in his esteem, I think, Cary.”
“I hope not,” was the brief reply.
“I consider you very timid and undemonstrative,” remarked Miss Keeldar. “Why did you not give Moore your hand when he offered you his? He is your cousin; you like him. Are you ashamed to let him perceive your affection?”
“He perceives all of it that interests him. No need to make a display of feeling.”
“You are laconic; you would be stoical if you could. Is love, in your eyes, a crime, Caroline?”
“Love a crime! No, Shirley; love is a divine virtue. But why drag that word into the conversation? It is singularly irrelevant.”
“Good!” pronounced Shirley.
The two girls paced the green lane in silence. Caroline first resumed.
“Obtrusiveness is a crime, forwardness is a crime, and both disgust; but love! no purest angel need blush to love. And when I see or hear either man or woman couple shame with love, I know their minds are coarse, their associations debased. Many who think themselves refined ladies and gentlemen, and on whose lips the word ‘vulgarity’ is forever hovering, cannot mention ‘love’ without betraying their own innate and imbecile degradation. It is a low feeling in their estimation, connected only with low ideas for them.”
“You describe three-fourths of the world, Caroline.”
“They are cold – they are cowardly – they are stupid on the subject, Shirley! They never loved – they never were loved!”
“Thou art right, Lina. And in their dense ignorance they blaspheme living fire, seraph-brought from a divine altar.”
“They confound it with sparks mounting from Tophet.”
The sudden and joyous clash of bells here stopped the dialogue by summoning all to the church.
Chapter XVIII Which the Genteel Reader Is Recommended to Skip, Low Persons Being Here Introduced
The evening was still and warm; close and sultry it even promised to become. Round the descending sun the clouds glowed purple; summer tints, rather Indian than English, suffused the horizon, and cast rosy reflections on hillside, house front, tree bole, on winding road and undulating pasture ground. The two girls came down from the fields slowly. By the time they reached the churchyard the bells were hushed; the multitudes were gathered into the church. The whole scene was solitary.
“How pleasant and calm it is!” said Caroline.
“And how hot it will be in the church!” responded Shirley. “And what a dreary long speech Dr. Boultby will make! And how the curates will hammer over their prepared orations! For my part, I would rather not enter.”
“But my uncle will be angry if he observes our absence.”
“I will bear the brunt of his wrath; he will not devour me. I shall be sorry to miss his pungent speech. I know it will be all sense for the church, and all causticity for schism. He’ll not forget the battle of Royd Lane. I shall be sorry also to deprive you of Mr. Hall’s sincere friendly homily, with all its racy Yorkshireisms; but here I must stay. The gray church and grayer tombs look divine with this crimson gleam on them. Nature is now at her evening prayers; she is kneeling before those red hills. I see her prostrate on the great steps of her altar, praying for a fair night for mariners at sea, for travellers in deserts, for lambs on moors, and unfledged birds in woods. Caroline, I see her, and I will tell you what she is like. She is like what Eve was when she and Adam stood alone on earth.”
“And that is not Milton’s Eve, Shirley.”
“Milton’s Eve! Milton’s Eve! I repeat. No, by the pure Mother of God, she is not! Cary, we are alone; we may speak what we think. Milton was great; but was he good? His brain was right; how was his heart? He saw heaven; he looked down on hell. He saw Satan, and Sin his daughter, and Death their horrible offspring. Angels serried before him their battalions; the long lines of adamantine shields flashed back on his blind eyeballs the unutterable splendour of heaven. Devils gathered their legions in his sight; their dim, discrowned, and tarnished armies passed rank and file before him. Milton tried to see the first woman; but, Cary, he saw her not.”
“You are bold to say so, Shirley.”
“Not more bold than faithful. It was his cook that he saw; or it was Mrs. Gill, as I have seen her, making custards, in the heat of summer, in the cool dairy, with rose-trees and nasturtiums about the latticed window, preparing a cold collation for the rectors – preserves and ‘dulcet creams;’ puzzled ‘what choice to choose for delicacy best; what order so contrived as not to mix tastes, not well-joined, inelegant, but bring taste after taste, upheld with kindliest change.’”
“All very well too, Shirley.”
“I would beg to remind him that the first men of the earth were Titans, and that Eve was their mother; from her sprang Saturn, Hyperion, Oceanus; she bore Prometheus”.
“Pagan that you are! what does that signify?”
“I say, there were giants on the earth in those days – giants that strove to scale heaven. The first woman’s breast that heaved with life on this world yielded the daring which could contend with Omnipotence, the strength which could bear a thousand years of bondage, the vitality which could feed that vulture death through uncounted ages, the unexhausted life and uncorrupted excellence, sisters to immortality, which, after millenniums of crimes, struggles, and woes, could conceive and bring forth a Messiah. The first woman was heaven-born. Vast was the heart whence gushed the well-spring of the blood of nations, and grand the undegenerate head where rested the consort-crown of creation.”
“She coveted an apple, and was cheated by a snake; but you have got such a hash of Scripture and mythology into your head that there is no making any sense of you. You have not yet told me what you saw kneeling on those hills.”