The Story of a Governess. Mrs. Oliphant
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humiliation, and, if not ready to take offence, at least quite aware that nobody is likely to take her feelings into consideration, or think that she is made of young flesh and blood like the others. There are many excuses for this frame of mind, and in many cases the worst prognostics are carried out. But I am very glad to say that this was not at all the idea with which the subject of this story prepared to go forth upon the world.
Her position up to this time had not been like that of the young and gentle governess of romance, an exceptionally sheltered and happy one. She had not been the only daughter of a doting father or mother, whose want of means to provide for her was only discovered upon their sudden death. On the contrary, Janet’s experience was entirely that of a dependent. It is true the dependence was more or less a natural one. She was a relation of her patroness, and she had grown up from childhood in Miss Philipson’s house, without any consciousness that it was not her home, and with much of the feelings of a child, always subject, always liable to be ordered about and reproved, and little considered, but only in a way common to children. She had been very well educated on the whole, very well cared for, nicely dressed, since that was quite according to the fitness of things, and not allowed in anything to fall behind the neighboring girls of her age in any pleasure or accomplishment. It would have been contrary to Miss Philipson’s credit, and it would have impaired her comfort, if Janet had not been on a level with the rest, or if she had not been cheerful and happy in her life. She was always kind to the girl, not being naturally unkind to anyone. She liked to have everything pleasant about her, and she had a conscience besides—both which things were very good for her little cousin. She did not provide for Janet, but that was all—and indeed, having done so much for her, and given her on the whole such a happy life up to her twentieth year, there was no failure of duty in this; and though some of Janet’s friends were inclined to blame Miss Philipson, Janet herself was much more just, and neither felt nor expressed any blame.
“Aunt Mary was always good to me,” the girl said. “I had no right to that, but she gave it me freely, and we were very happy together, and certainly I had no right to expect any more.”
“My dear, I would not for the world impair your gratitude or your affection for your poor aunt,” said the vicar’s wife; “in many things she deserved it fully, but——”
“There is no ‘but,’” said Janet. She was not perhaps quite so much overcome by grief as her friends would have liked to see her. There is a very simple standard in this respect which people like to see followed. They like to see a grief which is overwhelming for the moment, tears without measure, a sorrow which can take no comfort, all the better if it makes the mourner ill, and perhaps confines her to bed for a few days in a shrouded room, without any occupation but that of brooding and weeping over her loss. And then they expect her to cheer up—not too quickly, but with a little visible advance every day, an advance which they can feel to be owing more or less to their own sympathetic kindness and good offices. Janet had to a certain extent followed this unspoken rule. She had cried a great deal, though her health had not at all suffered; but after the funeral she had perhaps too quickly regained her cheerfulness. When the doctor proposed to her, which was a thing that happened very soon after, it had been all she could do not to laugh at the droll idea that anyone should think it possible she would marry a middle-aged country doctor, she—Janet! She did laugh in the safety of her own room where nobody could hear her, recalling his look, and all the peculiarities of his unattractive person and his rough riding dress. He wanted to save her from the life of a governess by binding her to him, and his shabby house, and his busy, dry, joyless existence. How extraordinary, how ludicrous it was that anybody should think it was better to vegetate than to go out into the world and seek your fortune! Janet had lived at Clover all her life, and she liked the little place. The scenes were all so familiar, the people were all friends; but then she never for a moment supposed that she could be bound to such a seclusion. It had always been her expectation that one time or another she was to fling herself forth upon the world.
At the vicarage they were exceedingly tender of the girl who was going forth upon fate like this. Mrs. Bland made a survey of all her clothes, and mended some and condemned others with a pathetic tenderness.
“You must have all your linen in order,” she said, “for there is nothing a girl is so apt to forget. I was in rags myself when my first wedding outfit wore out before I ever thought of getting a new set of things. A girl can see when she wants a new frock, but as for her under-things she always leaves that to her mother.”
“But you forget, Mrs. Bland, I have never had a mother,” said Janet.
“Ah, my poor child! but you were very kindly thought of, Janet, very kindly.”
“Do you think I meant any reproach to poor Aunt Mary? Oh, no, no! She liked me to have everything. She liked me to be the best dressed child in the parish. But as I grew up I saw to it myself. She thought it was best for me. But I shall always take the most care of the buttons you have sewed on. Fancy sewing on buttons and seeing after tapes for me!”
“It is the most natural thing in the world,” said the vicaress. “I only wish I could always take the charge of you, Janet; but we are old people, and we have little to leave, and it would only be putting off a little what would have to be faced at last.”
“Dear Mrs. Bland!” cried Janet, looking at her with something like tears in her eyes: they were real tears—and yet even while they sprang by instinct of nature, the little thing could not help the rising of a revolt against the thought of settling again at Clover after she had once been unseated from her corner. At Clover! when what she was thinking of was the world.
“But you must promise me, my dear,” said the old lady, with a tremor in her voice, “that as long as we live you will always look on the vicarage as your home. If this Mrs. Harwood should not turn out all you expect, you must not think it necessary to stay on, you know, and fret yourself to death trying to make it do. You must always remember you have a home to come back to, Janet.”
“But the vicar thought Mrs. Harwood was very nice.”
“So he did, but in such cases a man’s opinion does not go for very much. If a woman looks nice and talks nicely, and has an agreeable smile, it is all the vicar thinks of: and most people are nice to him.”
“How could they help it, he is so delightful himself?”
“Well, I tell you, he is no judge; and in the best of places, Janet, there is a great deal to put up with. Every family has its own ways, and you will be a stranger, and it will be hard for you to be left out and to feel yourself always an outsider. There is a young lady, and she will go out to her parties and balls and you will be left behind. I don’t mean that you will feel it now, when your spirit is broken, but by and by, when in the course of nature——”
“It would be just the same at Clover,” said Janet; “there are neither balls nor parties.”
“Ah, but everything there is you are asked to. That makes such a difference: and it will not be the case there. My dear, I am frightened about you, for you are too bold. You don’t realize the difference. It will be a great difference,” said Mrs. Bland, shaking her head.
Janet could have laughed, but did not. She was very bold. The new life and the strange family had no terrors for her. Novelty was dear, an exhilaration not a terror, to this little girl. Her heart was beating high with expectation while all these prophecies were poured into her ear. But it would not have been in good taste (Janet felt) to exhibit the real state of her feelings, so she answered, demurely, that she hoped she was not too bold.
“But, dear Mrs. Bland, when one has to do it, don’t you think one had better try to do it cheerily and think the best? Don’t you remember the old song in the play that the vicar likes so much—
“‘A merry heart goes all the way
A sad one tires in a mile, a’!”’
“That’s true enough,” said Mrs. Bland, still shaking her head, “but men don’t know half that women have to put up with. Anyhow, Janet, my poor dear, you must always recollect this, that if it should ever become