‘Mamma, you will kiss me before you go?’
‘I will cover you with kisses when you return
to your own home.’ But in spite of this,
Hester went down with her into the hall, holding by
her raiment; and as Mrs. Bolton got into the fly,
she did succeed in kissing her mother’s hand.
‘She has gone,’ said Hester, going to
her father-in-law’s room. ’Though
I was so glad to see her, I wish she had not come.
When people think so very, very differently on a matter
which is so very, very important, it is better that
they should not meet, let them love each other ever
so.’
As far as Hester and Mr. Caldigate were concerned
the visit had in truth been made without much inconvenience.
There had been no absolute violence,—no
repetition of such outward quarrelling as had made
those two days at the Grange so memorable. There
was almost a feeling of relief in Hester’s bosom
when her mother was driven away after that successful
grasp at the parting hand. Though they had differed
much, they had not hated each other during that last
half-hour. Hester had been charged with sin;—which,
however, had been a matter of course. But in
Mrs. Bolton’s heart there was a feeling which
made her return home very uncomfortable. Having
twitted her husband with his lack of power, she had
been altogether powerless herself; and now she was
driven to confess to herself that no further step
could be taken. ’She is obstinate,’
she said to her husband,—’stiff-necked
in her sin, as are all determined sinners. I
can say no more to her. It may be that the Lord
will soften her heart when her sorrows have endured
yet for a time.’ But she said no more of
burning words, or of eloquence, or of the slackness
of the work of those who work as though they were not
in earnest.
Curlydown and Bagwax
There had been a sort of pledge given at the trial
by Sir John Joram that the matter of the envelope
should be further investigated. He had complained
in his defence that the trial had been hurried on,—that
time had not been allowed for full inquiries, seeing
that the character of the deed by which his client
had been put in jeopardy depended upon what had been
done on the other side of the globe. ‘This
crime,’ he had said, ’if it be a crime,
was no doubt committed in the parish church of Utterden
in the early part of last year; but all the evidence
which has been used or which could be used to prove
it to have been a crime, has reference to things done
long ago, and far away. Time has not been allowed
us for rebutting this evidence by counter-evidence.’
And yet much time had been allowed. The trial
had been postponed from the spring to the summer assizes;
and then the offence was one which, from its very
nature, required speedy notice. The Boltons, who
became the instigators of the prosecution, demanded
that the ill-used woman should be relieved as quickly
as possible from her degradation. There had been
a general feeling that the trial should not be thrown
over to another year; and, as we are aware, it had
been brought to judgment and the convicted criminal
was in jail. But Sir John still persevered, and
to this perseverance he had been instigated very much
by a certain clerk in the post-office.
