Chapter 53

BESSIE'S SUCCESSOR.

With the morrow the new housemaid came, but Miss McPherson was too anxious about her niece to observe more than that the girl was fresh, and bright, and clean, with a wonderful brogue and a clear, ringing voice. Miss Betsey had called the village doctor, who, after carefully examining his patient, said she was suffering either from nervous prostration or malaria, he could not tell which, until he had seen her again; then, prescribing quinine for the latter, and perfect rest for the former, he left just as the new girl appeared and with her volubility and energy seemed to fill the house. As quickly as possible Miss Betsey got her into the kitchen, and then went to her niece's room.

"I must have been asleep," Bessie said, "for I dreamed that I heard Jennie's voice, and I was so glad that it woke me, and I thought I heard it again. She was the Irish girl who was so kind to me on the ship. You remember I told you of her."

"Yes," Miss Betsey replied, "I think you liked her very much."

"Oh, yes, very, very much, and I would give a great deal to see her again, I believe I should get well at once, there is something so strong and hearty about her."

To this Miss McPherson made no reply, but all the rest of the morning she seemed very restless and excited, and was constantly hushing the new girl, whom she once bade the cook _gag_, if she could not quiet her in any other way.

"I have a sick niece up stairs, and you will disturb her," she said to the girl, who replied:

"An' sure thin, mum, I'll _whisper_."

But her whisper seemed to penetrate everywhere, and Miss McPherson was glad when at last the toast and tea and jelly intended for Bessie's dinner were ready upon the tray which she bade the girl take up stairs to the young lady whose room was at the end of the hall.

"An' indade I'd take off me shoes and go in me stockin' feet to be quiet: an' it's niver a word I'll spake," the girl said, as she started on her errand, while her mistress listened at the foot of the stairs.

Miss McPherson was prepared for a demonstration if some sort, but did not quite expect what followed, for the moment the girl stepped into the room, Bessie sprang up with the loud glad cry: "Oh, Jennie, Jennie, where did you come from? I am so glad!"

There was an answering cry of surprise and joy, and then the tray, with everything upon it, went crashing to the floor, while Jennie exclaimed:

"An', be jabers, the plather an' the tay is all one smash together, in me fright at seem' you here before me, when it's meself was goin' to ask her to take you. May the saints be praised, if it's not the happiest day since I left Ireland," and bending over Bessie the impulsive Irish girl kissed her again and again, talking, and laughing, and crying, until Bessie said to her:

"There, Jennie, please; I am very tired, and your sudden coming has taken my strength away."

She did look very white and faint, and Jennie saw it, and tried to be calm, though she kept whispering to herself as she gathered up the _debris_ on the floor, and with a most rueful expression took it down stairs, saying to her mistress:

"An' faith it's a bad beginnin' I've made, mum, but sure an' I'll pay you every farthing with me first wages, and now, if you plase, I'll do up my fut, for it's blistered, that it is, with the bilin' tay."

The foot was cared for, and another tray of toast and tea prepared. This, Miss Betsey took herself to Bessie, explaining that Jennie was the cousin who had come to take her former housemaid's place.

"But I had no idea," she said, "that she was such a behemoth. I am afraid she will not answer my purpose at all."

But Bessie pleaded for the girl, whose kindness of heart she knew, and who, she felt sure, could be molded and softened by careful and judicious training, and that afternoon, when Jennie came up to her she told her that her aunt did not like a noise, and that she must be very quiet and gentle if she wished to please.

Jennie listened to her, open-eyed, and when she was through responded:

"Is it quiet she wants? I told her I would whasper, an' faith I wull; for I'm bound to stay with you, and get me tin shillings a week."

The case seemed hopeless, and Jennie might have lost her place but for the serious illness which came upon Bessie, taking away all her vitality, and making her weak and helpless as a child. It was then that Jennie showed her real value, and by her watchful tenderness and untiring devotion, more than made amends for all her awkwardness.

Day after day, and night after night, she staid in the sick room, ministering to Bessie as no one else could have done, lifting her tenderly in her strong arms, and sometimes walking with her up and down the large chamber into which she had been carried when the physician said her sickness might be of weeks' duration, for she was suffering from all the fatigue and worry of the last two years, when the strain upon her nerves had been so great.

All through the remaining weeks of summer, and the September days which followed, Bessie lay in her bed, scarcely noticing any thing which was passing around her, and saying to her aunt when she bent over her, asking how she felt:

"Tired, so tired, and it is nice to rest."

And so the days went by, and everybody in Allington became interested in the young girl whom few had seen, but of whom a great deal was told by Mrs. Rossiter-Browne, whose carriage often stood at Miss McPherson's door, bringing sometimes the lady herself, and sometimes Augusta, who had returned from Saratoga, and was busy with the preparations for her wedding, which was to take place in October.

Lord Hardy, who had come from the West, and established himself at the Ridge House, called several times and left his card, which Miss McPherson promptly burned.

She did not like Lord Hardy. He was just a fortune-hunter, she said, and cared no more for Augusta Browne than he did for her, except that Augusta was the younger of the two, and she could not forget how he had looked, smirking and mincing by the side of Archie's wife at Aberystwyth; poor, weak Daisy, who, but for him, might not have gone so far astray as she did.

For Bessie's sake Miss McPherson was almost ready to forgive poor Daisy, as she always called her now when thinking of her. For Bessie's sake she felt that she could do a great deal that was contrary to her nature, but she could not feel kindly disposed toward Neil, for immediately after the receipt of her letter to his mother, containing two hundred and fifty pounds, and the announcement that she intended to take Bessie as her own child, Neil had written her a long, penitent letter, blaming himself as a coward, and telling of his remorse and regret for the past, and saying that, unless he was forbidden to do so, he should come to America in September, and renew his offer to Bessie.

This letter Miss McPherson read with sundry expressions of disgust, and then, taking from its peg her sun-hat, almost as large as a small umbrella, she started for the telegraph office, and several hours later Neil McPherson, in London, was reading the following laconic dispatch from Allington:

"Stay at home and mind your own business!

"Betsey McPherson"

"Perhaps I did wrong to send it, for maybe the girl likes him after all," the spinster thought, as she walked back to her house.

But it was too late now, and for the next two or three days she was too anxious to think of anything except Bessie, who was much worse, and seemed so weak and unconscious of everything, that the physician looked very grave, and the clergyman came at Miss McPherson's request, and said the prayers for the sick, but Bessie did not hear them, for she lay like one in a deep sleep, scarcely moving or seeming to breathe.

Before leaving the room the clergyman went softly to the bedside to look at the sick girl, wondering much at the likeness in her face to some one he had seen before, and wondering too why it should remind him of Hannah Jerrold, and the night when he went in the wintery storm to hear her father's confession.

"Poor Hannah!" he said to himself, as he left the house, and walking slowly across the common to the church-yard, sat down upon a bench near to a head-stone, which bore this inscription: "Sacred to the memory of Martha, beloved wife of the Rev. Charles Sanford, who died January 1st, 18--. Blessed are the dead who die in the Lord."

Since we last saw him, years ago, the Rev. Charles Sanford had grown an old man, though he was scarcely sixty-three, an age when many men are in their prime. There was a stoop in his shoulders as if the burden of life were heavy, and his hair was as white as snow, while upon his face was a look which only daily discipline, patiently borne, can ever write upon the human visage And patiently had he borne it, until he almost forgot that he was bearing it, and then one day it was removed and by the lightness and freedom he felt, he knew how heavy it had been.

"Poor Martha!" he said to himself, as he glanced at his shining coat-sleeves, and the spot on the knee of his pants, which was almost threadbare, and at his boots, which certainly had not been blacked that day. "Poor Martha! What would she say if she could see these clothes, which, though they may not look well, are very comfortable." Then, as his eye rested upon the word _beloved_, he continued: "Is that a lie, I wonder, which that marble is telling to the world? If so, it is Martha's fault, for she wrote her own epitaph, just as she ordered all the details of her funeral, and what preceded it. It was a strange fancy of hers to ask that Hannah should lay her out Poor Martha! _Devoted_ would have been better than _beloved_, though God knows I tried to do my best by her," and with a sigh, both for what had been and what might have been, the rector arose and started for his home, meeting at the gate of Grey's Park with Grey himself, who was in Allington for the first time since his return from Europe.

Lucy had come up a few days before, and had been at once to see Bessie, of whose illness she had written to Grey, and that had brought him as soon as he could leave his mother.

"Grey, my boy, how are you?" the rector said, offering his hand, which Grey took, saying as he did so:

"How is she this morning?"

Mr. Sanford did not know that Grey had ever seen or heard of Bessie McPherson, but something told him that he meant her, and he replied:

"Very weak and sick. Poor girl! she is too young to die."

"Mr. Sanford," and Grey spoke with great vehemence, "you do not think Bessie will die? She must not die!" and in his voice and manner there was something which betrayed his secret to the older man, who said to him:

"I hope not, Grey, God knows. Pray for her, my boy; pray earnestly. Prayer can move a mountain, or at least make a way through it. Pray for the girl you call Bessie."

To one accustomed as Grey was to take everything, however small, to God, prayer was an easy thing, and every thought was a prayer as he walked rapidly toward Miss McPherson's house.

"She is sleeping now," Miss Betsey said to him. "We trust she will be better when she wakens. It is rest she needs more than anything else. She has had a hard life so far. You have seen a great deal of her, I believe?"

"I cannot say I have seen a great deal of her, though I feel as though I had known her always. Yes, she has had a hard life. You do not think she will die?" was Grey's reply; and in his face and voice Miss Betsey detected what the rector had discovered.

"No," she said; "I do not believe she will die. Sit down and wait till she is awake."

So Grey sat down, and waited three hours, during which time the train, which would have taken him back to Boston, went rushing by, and Bessie still slept as quietly as an infant. It was Jennie who came at last and told him that she was awake and better, though too weak to see any one.

"Thank God!" Grey exclaimed, and slipping a bill into the girl's hand, he continued: "Take good care of her, Jennie, and when she is able tell her I came to see her."

"An' sure I'll tell her ivery blessed word, and that you left your love."

"I did not say that," Grey answered her, laughingly, as he bade her good-by and walked away.

For a week or more Bessie scarcely spoke or moved, it was such happiness to rest, with every wish anticipated either by her aunt or Jennie, whose voice was a _whasper_ most of the time, and who was learning to be more quiet and subdued. At last, however, Bessie began to talk, and said to Jennie one day:

"I believe I am getting better, and I am afraid I am not as glad as I ought to be--the world holds so little for me, and so few who care for me beside auntie and you."

"An', faith," Jennie began, "it's not for ye to be sayin' the likes of that. Nobody to care for you, indade, with the gentry comin' every day to inquire for you, the praste a readin' his prayers in this very room, and the foine gintleman who was on the ship a sittin' down stairs three mortal hours waitin' to know if you waked up dead or alive, and thankin' God when it was alive I told him you was."

"Who, Jennie? What gentleman?" Bessie asked.

"Mr. Grey, to be sure," Jennie replied; "and he left his compliments for ye, and thanked God when I told him you was better. Oh, but he's very fine, and Grey's Park is like them places in the old country where the grandees live."

Whether it was that Bessie was thoroughly rested, or that the fact that Grey had not forgotten her was in itself a restorative, her recovery was very rapid, though she still looked like some fragile flower which a breath might blow away, and Miss McPherson watched her with a tender solicitude, astonishing in one as cold and impassive as she had always seemed to be.