The Complete Works (Illustrated Edition). Elizabeth Gaskell
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went up to her, and spoke below his breath.
“Maggie, we were children together — we two — brother and sister of one blood! Do you give me up to be put in prison — in the hulks — among the basest of criminals — I don’t know where — all for the sake of your own selfish happiness?”
She trembled very much; but did not speak or cry, or make any noise.
“You were always selfish. You always thought of yourself. But this time I did think you would have shown how different you could be. But it’s self — self — paramount above all.”
“Oh Maggie! how can you be so hard-hearted and selfish?” echoed Mrs. Browne, crying and sobbing.
“Mother!” said Maggie, “I know that I think too often and too much of myself. But this time I thought only of Frank. He loves me; it would break his heart if I wrote as Mr. Buxton wishes, cutting our lives asunder, and giving no reason for it.”
“He loves you so!” said Edward, tauntingly. “A man’s love break his heart! You’ve got some pretty notions! Who told you that he loved you so desperately? How do you know it?”
“Because I love him so,” said she, in a quiet, earnest voice. “I do not know of any other reason; but that is quite sufficient to me. I believe him when he says he loves me; and I have no right to cause him the infinite — the terrible pain, which my own heart tells me he would feel, if I did what Mr. Buxton wishes me.”
Her manner was so simple and utterly truthful, that it was as quiet and fearless as a child’s; her brother’s fierce looks of anger had no power over her; and his blustering died away before her into something of the frightened cowardliness he had shown in the morning. But Mrs. Browne came up to Maggie; and took her hand between both of hers, which were trembling. “Maggie, you can save Edward. I know I have not loved you as I should have done; but I will love and comfort you forever, if you will but write as Mr. Buxton says. Think! Perhaps Mr. Frank may not take you at your word, but may come over and see you, and all may be right, and yet Edward may be saved. It is only writing this letter; you need not stick to it.”
“No!” said Edward. “A signature, if you can prove compulsion, is not valid. We will all prove that you write this letter under compulsion; and if Frank loves you so desperately, he won’t give you up without a trial to make you change your mind.”
“No!” said Maggie, firmly. “If I write the letter I abide by it. I will not quibble with my conscience. Edward! I will not marry — I will go and live near you, and come to you whenever I may — and give up my life to you if you are sent to prison; my mother and I will go, if need be-I do not know yet what I can do, or cannot do, for you, but all I can I will; but this one thing I cannot.”
“Then I’m off!” said Edward. “On your deathbed may you remember this hour, and how you denied your only brother’s request. May you ask my forgiveness with your dying breath, and may I be there to deny it you.”
“Wait a minute!” said Maggie, springing up, rapidly. “Edward, don’t curse me with such terrible words till all is done. Mother, I implore you to keep him here. Hide him — do what you can to conceal him. I will have one more trial.” She snatched up her bonnet, and was gone, before they had time to think or speak to arrest her.
On she flew along the Combehurst road. As she went, the tears fell like rain down her face, and she talked to herself.
“He should not have said so. No! he should not have said so. We were the only two.” But still she pressed on, over the thick, wet, brown heather. She saw Mr. Buxton coming; and she went still quicker. The rain had cleared off, and a yellow watery gleam of sunshine was struggling out. She stopped or he would have passed her unheeded; little expecting to meet her there.
“I wanted to see you,” said she, all at once resuming her composure, and almost assuming a dignified manner. “You must not go down to our house; we have sorrow enough there. Come under these fir-trees, and let me speak to you.”
“I hope you have thought of what I said, and are willing to do what I asked you.”
“No!” said she. “I have thought and thought. I did not think in a selfish spirit, though they say I did. I prayed first. I could not do that earnestly, and be selfish, I think. I cannot give up Frank. I know the disgrace; and if he, knowing all, thinks fit to give me up, I shall never say a word, but bow my head, and try and live out my appointed days quietly and cheerfully. But he is the judge, not you; nor have I any right to do what you ask me.” She stopped, because the agitation took away her breath.
He began in a cold manner:—“I am very sorry. The law must take its course. I would have saved my son from the pain of all this knowledge, and that which he will of course feel in the necessity of giving up his engagement. I would have refused to appear against your brother, shamefully ungrateful as he has been. Now you cannot wonder that I act according to my agent’s advice, and prosecute your brother as if he were a stranger.”
He turned to go away. He was so cold and determined that for a moment Maggie was timid. But she then laid her hand on his arm.
“Mr. Buxton,” said she, “you will not do what you threaten. I know you better. Think! My father was your old friend. That claim is, perhaps, done away with by Edward’s conduct. But I do not believe you can forget it always. If you did fulfill the menace you uttered just now, there would come times as you grew older, and life grew fainter and fainter before you — quiet times of thought, when you remembered the days of your youth, and the friends you then had and knew; — you would recollect that one of them had left an only son, who had done wrong — who had sinned — sinned against you in his weakness — and you would think then — you could not help it — how you had forgotten mercy in justice — and, as justice required he should be treated as a felon, you threw him among felons — where every glimmering of goodness was darkened for ever. Edward is, after all, more weak than wicked; — but he will become wicked if you put him in prison, and have him transported. God is merciful — we cannot tell or think how merciful. Oh, sir, I am so sure you will be merciful, and give my brother — my poor sinning brother — a chance, that I will tell you all. I will throw myself upon your pity. Edward is even now at home — miserable and desperate; — my mother is too much stunned to understand all our wretchedness — for very wretched we are in our shame.”
As she spoke the wind arose and shivered in the wiry leaves of the fir-trees, and there was a moaning sound as of some Ariel imprisoned in the thick branches that, tangled overhead, made a shelter for them. Either the noise or Mr. Buxton’s fancy called up an echo to Maggie’s voice — a pleading with her pleading — a sad tone of regret, distinct yet blending with her speech, and a falling, dying sound, as her voice died away in miserable suspense.
It might be that, formed as she was by Mrs. Buxton’s care and love, her accents and words were such as that lady, now at rest from all sorrow, would have used; — somehow, at any rate, the thought flashed into Mr. Buxton’s mind, that as Maggie spoke, his dead wife’s voice was heard, imploring mercy in a clear, distinct tone, though faint, as if separated from him by an infinite distance of space. At least, this is the account Mr. Buxton would have given of the manner in which the idea of his wife became present to him, and what she would have wished him to do a powerful motive in his conduct. Words of hers, long ago spoken, and merciful, forgiving expressions made use of in former days to soften him in some angry mood, were clearly remembered while Maggie spoke; and their influence was perceptible in the change of his tone, and the wavering of his manner henceforward.
“And yet you will not save Frank from being involved in your disgrace,” said he; but more as if weighing and deliberating on the case than he had ever spoken before.
“If Frank wishes it, I will quietly withdraw myself out of his sight forever; — I give you my promise, before God, to do so. I shall not utter one word of entreaty or complaint. I will try not to wonder or feel surprise; — I will bless him in every action of his future life — but think how different would be the disgrace he would voluntarily incur to my poor mother’s shame, when she wakens up to know what her child