The Author's Daughter/Chapter 15
CHAPTER XV.
MILLMOUNT.
In spite of all her husband's encouragement and her own natural fortitude Jessie Copeland's heart beat faster and more anxiously than was agreeable when on her arrival in England they took the train that was to land them at the nearest station to Millmount. They had telegraphed their safe arrival and their purposed journey before they started, so that old Mrs. Copeland was in a fever of impatience. To think of her eldest boy, her handsome George, returning to be a constant inmate in the house after twelve years' absence, was a delightful and bewildering anticipation; but would there not be a little risk in including the Australian wife?
At first the joy of seeing George swallowed up all her curiosity and anxiety with regard to the unknown daughter-in-law, and she held him in her arms for some minutes, without taking her eyes off his face, as she traced the likeness of the fair slight lad through the changes that had converted him into the strongly-made, handsome, embrowned, and bearded man.
"Oh! the eyes are the same, but there are lines about them that I was not used to see," she exclaimed; "and I can scarce recognise the smile with all that hair about your face; but it is George, my own George. My son was lost, and he is found."
"Yes, it is him really come home in the body, Sarah, in spite of all your forebodings of shipwrecks and unknown dangers. I knew he'd turn up without fail, after he had wrote that he was coming. Ah! George, my lad, you'll see great changes in us too, and in the parish as well," said Mr. Copeland.
"No more than I ought to be prepared for," said George. "Mother looks thin, but still she is just the same in every other respect, and you are a little heavier than you were, father, but as erect as ever. With a horse up to your weight I fancy you could ride to cover as well as any one in the county yet. But let us not be altogether taken up with ourselves. Mother, this is my dear good wife. Let Jessie be a daughter to you. He put their hands together. The mother looked for a few moments at the stranger, and met the expression of her kind truthful eyes. She felt that Jessie was to be loved and trusted; she took her new daughter into her arms and blessed her.
Few people look their best after a long sea voyage through hot latitudes, and Mr. Copeland thought his son might have picked up a prettier wife in England. The Scotch accent, too, grated a little on his unaccustomed ears, and Mrs. George had no style with her whatever. But the mother's instinct assured her that George was a happy and a fortunate man. During all the conversation, while her ears were listening for what George had to say and how his father took the news, her eyes were resting complacently on the quiet unpretending young woman who said so little, but that little always to the point. Jessie listened with interest to all the talk of the village and parish matters and farming affairs, appearing to know something of the people, or if she did not, trusting to gather some clue from the conversation, and not interrupting the current of talk with enquiries as to the who, the when, and the whereabout of each narration. If her opinion was required, or any question asked about Australia which she could answer, she spoke sensibly and properly, and she charmed both the old people by her intimate and practical knowledge of all sorts of rural matters.
She arranged the pillows on the old lady's sofa (for she was now somewhat of an invalid) not exactly to perfection, for it requires some practice or a peculiar instinct which Jessie had not, amongst her many good gifts, to do that; but with goodwill and readiness to take a hint. She made tea for the family in a little old-fashioned silver teapot set in a little stand—a great contrast to the capacious vessel in use at Branxholm—and listened to the history which Mrs Copeland gave of it as having belonged to her grandmother. There were many curious old handsome things in the house, showing that the Cepelands had been comfortable people for several generations, Whereas everything that was handsome at Branxholm was spick-andspan new. Jessie's mother had old stories of the greatness of the Lindsays and the Hepburns in times long past; but her own recollections of early life were of hard living, poor lodging, and little or no furniture in the wilds of Australia, and she fully appreciated the heirlooms and the anecdotes which her mother-in-law told. Mr. Copeland would rather have had the tea-service displayed that he had won in a sweepstakes with some neighbouring farmers by having the longest-wooled sheep amongst them; but the old lady had thought George would prefer the oldfashioned silver, without prejudice to showing off the new acquisition after tea, and to the relation of the whole story of the sweepstakes circumstantially by the old gentleman. He had never seen a woman in his life who seemed to know so much about sheep as his new daughter-in-law, or who handled his samples of wool in such a sensible and practical way.
On the following day, when Mr. Copeland took Jessie with her husband over the farmyard, the cattle-pens, and stable and poultry yard and piggeries, she expressed herself so intelligently about all these things that the old man's heart was completely won. Although George had gone a long way for his wife, and had as yet got nothing with her, he had certainly done better than if he had brought home a girl from any English town; and very few English farmers' daughters now-a-days were, as the old man said, so knowledgable about rural affairs as Mrs. George showed herself. The old gentleman was of opinion that the young women of the present generation were brought up altogether too fine for daily use. Even his own daughters had despised or disliked what their mother had been taught as indespenable parts of female education. No doubt servants had grown somewhat more skilful, so that the things were done; but with the skill had come an uppishness that the old-school farmer resented as an innovation, and the finer ways were more costly than the older and plainer manners of his youth.
He could not perhaps have put his ideas into words, but he felt that it was a pity that almost all domestic employments were dropping out of the hands of middle-class women in England, without much widening of employments of other kinds.
So that Jessie Lindsay's early training to do everything with her own hands made her the more agreeable to the Copelands, and gave her confidence that she might be useful to them. All Mr. Copeland said about Millmount, and the rent and tithes and income tax and other taxes, and the rotation of crops, and the payment of his labourers was exceedingly interesting to Jessie. She liked to hear a man not much older than her own father talk on subjects that had often been discussed at Branxholm in her hearing.
Whether she had been interested in Mr. Copeland's talk or not, she would have tried for George's sake to appear as if she was; but it cost her no effort; she liked it and she understood it; and this genuine tribute to his conversational powers was more charming than if it had cost her a sacrifice. Elderly people in civilized communities are generally treated with courtesy; but it was a rare pleasure to Mr. Copeland to be listened to with such genuine and unflagging interest and attention.
When the brothers and sisters came to see their returned brother and his Australian wife, they were by no means so prepossessed with Jessie as their parents. She sadly wanted style and polish, her accent was distressing, and her education was limited; but as the old people were delighted with her, they contented themselves with a few hints and a somewhat lofty manner to Mrs. George. She was humble in little things, and took their advice with regard to dress and such matters very good naturedly, so that by degrees they took her into greater favour, and congratulated themselves that so suitable a person had turned up to take care of the old people.
It was, as Mr. Copeland thought, a singular coincidence that on the day when George's first child, a boy, was born, old Mr. Derrick after a long and protracted illness should die. Jessie heard this news with some excitement. Young Mr. Derrick was now the Squire, and being released from his close attendance on his grandfather was likely to come to Stanmore to reside. But some time elapsed before this took place, and the estate was managed by an agent as before. No new arrangements were made with the tenants, and Mr. Copeland hoped to continue at Millmount for the remainder of his life.
But on one Sunday, Jessie was surprised by seeing the Squire's pew, so long empty, filled by a young gentleman and lady and a middle-aged lady. She looked eagerly for a likeness to Amy Staunton, but there was not the slightest resemblance in either of the young faces to her dear little friend. They might be strangers—she looked questionineg at George. "Mr. Anthony and Miss Edith, and their aunt, Miss Derrick," he whispered to her.
The Derricks were accustomed to be looked at when in church as the most important persons there, so they saw nothing remarkable in the repeated glances which George and Jessie Copeland directed towards them. Jessie 'could not ascertain whether she liked their appearance or not, there was a heavy look about the brows, and an expression round the mouth that suggested something of bad temper; but, to be sure, the faces were not animated by conversation, and the deep mourning worn by the ladies was severe upon their style of face. In going out of church the respectful salutation of the tenantry and of the villagers was acknowledged stiffly; there was little relaxation of the countenance accompanying the slight bend of the head. "I don't think I'll like them at all," she confided to her husband. On Sunday evening the young Squire and his family were the subjects of discussion, and Jessie led Mrs. Copeland on to tell all she knew of Lady Eveline Darlington. It was not much, for the Copelands had not gone to Stan.more till after Lady Eveline's second marriage, and they had only heard that it was a low hurried match, which had given great and just offence to the family. They believed that the young Squire's mother was dead many years ago, and that the children she had so cruelly deserted never heard her name mentioned by their grandfather or their aunt who had superintended their education.
Jessie kept her knowledge in the background; only with her husband did she consult as to what would be likely to occur if she brought Amy's relationship forward. George was as doubtful as herself on the subject. He saw a happy life before Amy as Allan's wife, and he was not strongly attracted towards the young squire, and still less so towards his sister. Amy's own last letters had been rather expressive of a greater shrinking from the disclosure than when she first confided in Jessie, and the husband and wife, after much doubt and consultation, resolved to trust to the chapter of accidents, and only to bring forward the subject if there was a very good opportunity.