Читать книгу Janet's Love and Service - Margaret M. Robertson - Страница 4

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“It’s a’ ye ken! Gotten ower it, indeed!” and Janet turned her back on her visitor, and went muttering about her gloomy kitchen: “The minister no’ being one to speak his sorrow to the newsmongering folk that frequent your house, they say he has gotten ower it, do they? It’s a’ they ken!”

“Janet, woman,” said her visitor, “I canna but think you are unreasonable in your anger. I said nothing derogatory to the minister; far be it from me! But we can a’ see that the house needs a head, and the bairns need a mother. The minister’s growing gey cheerful like, and the year is mair than out; and—”

“Whisht, woman. Dinna say it. Speak sense if ye maun speak,” said Janet, with a gesture of disgust and anger.

“Wherefore should I no’ say it?” demanded her visitor. “And as to speaking sense—. But I’ll no’ trouble you. It seems you have friends in such plenty that you can afford to scorn and scoff at them at your pleasure. Good-day to you,” and she rose to go.

But Janet had already repented her hot words.

“Bide still, woman! Friends dinna fall out for a single ill word. And what with ae thing and anither I dinna weel ken what I’m saying or doing whiles. Sit down: it’s you that’s unreasonable now.”

This was Mistress Elspat Smith, the wife of a farmer—“no’ that ill aff,” as he cautiously expressed it—a far more important person in the parish than Janet, the minister’s maid-of-all-work. It was a condescension on her part to come into Janet’s kitchen, under any circumstances, she thought; and to be taken up sharply for a friendly word was not to be borne. But they had been friends all their lives; and Janet “kenned hersel’ as gude a woman as Elspat Smith, weel aff or no’ weel aff;” so with gentle violence she pushed her back into her chair, saying:

“Hoot, woman! What would folk say to see you and me striving at this late day? And I want to consult you.”

“But you should speak sense yourself, Janet,” said her friend.

“Folk maun speak as it’s given them to speak,” said Janet; “and we’ll say nae mair about it. No’ but that the bairns might be the better to have some one to be over them. She wouldna hae her sorrow to seek, I can tell you. No that they’re ill bairns—”

“We’ll say no more about it, since that is your will,” said Mrs. Smith, with dignity; and then, relenting, she added—

“You have a full handfu’ with the eight of them, I’m sure.”

“Seven only,” said Janet, under her breath. “She got one of them safe home with her, thank God. No’ that there’s one ower many,” added she quickly; “and they’re no’ ill bairns.”

“You have your ain troubles among them, I dare say, and are muckle to be pitied—”

“Me to be pitied!” said Janet scornfully, “there’s no fear o’ me. But what can the like o’ me do? For ye ken, woman, though the minister is a powerful preacher, and grand on points o’ doctrine, he’s a verra bairn about some things. She aye keepit the siller, and far did she make it gang—having something to lay by at the year’s end as well. Now, if we make the twa ends meet, it’s mair than I expect.”

“But Miss Graeme ought to have some sense about these things. Surely she takes heed to the bairns?”

“Miss Graeme’s but a bairn herself, with little thought and less experience; and its no’ to be supposed that the rest will take heed to her. The little anes are no’ so ill to do with; but these twa laddies are just spirits o’ mischief, for as quiet as Norman looks; and they come home from the school with torn clothes, till Miss Graeme is just dazed with mending at them. And Miss Marian is near as ill as the laddies; and poor, wee Rosie, growing langer and thinner every day, till you would think the wind would blow her awa. Master Arthur is awa at his eddication: the best thing for a’ concerned. I wish they were a’ safe unto man’s estate,” and Janet sighed.

“And is Miss Graeme good at her seam?” asked Mistress Elspat.

“Oh ay; she’s no’ that ill. She’s better at her sampler and at the flowering than at mending torn jackets, however. But there’s no fear but she would get skill at that, and at other things, if she would but hae patience with herself. Miss Graeme is none of the common kind.”

“And has there been no word from her friends since? They say her brother has no bairns of his own. He might well do something for hers.”

Janet shook her head.

“The minister doesna think that I ken; but when Mr. Ross was here at the burial, he offered to take two of the bairns, Norman or Harry, and wee Marian. She’s likest her mamma. But such a thing wasna to be thought of; and he went awa’ no’ weel pleased. Whether he’ll do onything for them in ony ither way is more than I ken. He might keep Master Arthur at the college and no’ miss it. How the minister is ever to school the rest o’ them is no’ easy to be seen, unless he should go to America after all.”

Mistress Smith lifted her hands.

“He’ll never surely think o’ taking these motherless bairns to yon savage place! What could ail him at Mr. Ross’s offer? My patience! but folk whiles stand in their ain light.”

“Mr. Ross is not a God-fearing man,” replied Janet, solemnly. “It’s no’ what their mother would have wished to have her bairns brought up by him. The minister kenned her wishes well on that point, you may be sure. And besides, he could never cross the sea and leave any of them behind.”

“But what need to cross the sea?” cried Mrs. Smith; “It’s a pity but folk should ken when they’re weel aff. What could the like o’ him do in a country he kens nothing about, and with so many bairns?”

“It’s for the bairns’ sake he’s thinking of it. They say there’s fine land there for the working, and no such a thing as payin’ rent, but every man farming his own land, with none to say him nay. And there’s room for all, and meat and clothes, and to spare. I’m no’ sure but it’s just the best thing the minister can do. They had near made up their minds afore, ye ken.”

“Hoot, woman, speak sense,” entreated her friend. “Is the minister to sell rusty knives and glass beads to the Indians? That’s what they do in yon country, as I’ve read in a book myself. Whatna like way is that to bring up a family?”

“Losh, woman, there’s other folk there beside red Indians; folk that dinna scruple to even themselves with the best in Britain, no’ less. You should read the newspapers, woman. There’s one John Caldwell there, a friend o’ the minister’s, that’s something in a college, and he’s aye writing him to come. He says it’s a wonderful country for progress; and they hae things there they ca’ institutions, that he seems to think muckle o’, though what they may be I couldna weel make out. The minister read a bit out o’ a letter the ither night to Miss Graeme and me.”

“Janet,” said her friend, “say the truth at once. The minister is bent on this fule’s errand, and you’re encouraging in it.”

“Na, na! He needs na encouragement from the like o’ me. I would gie muckle, that hasna muckle to spare, gin he were content to bide where he is, though it’s easy seen he’ll hae ill enough bringing up a family here, and these laddies needing more ilka year that goes o’er their heads. And they say yon’s a grand country, and fine eddication to be got in it for next to nothing. I’m no sure but the best thing he can do is to take them there. I ken the mistress was weel pleased with the thought,” and Janet tried with all her might, to look hopeful; but her truth-telling countenance betrayed her. Her friend shook her head gravely.

“It might have done, with her to guide them; but it’s very different now, as you ken yourself, far better than I can tell you. It would be little else than a temptin’ o’ Providence to expose these helpless bairns, first to the perils o’ the sea, and then to those o’ a strange country. He’ll never do it. He’s restless now; and unsettled; but when time, that cures most troubles, goes by, he’ll think better of it, and bide where he is.”

Janet made no reply, but in her heart she took no such comfort. She knew it was no feeling of restlessness, no longing to be away from the scene of his sorrow that had decided the minister to emigrate, and that he had decided she very well knew. These might have hastened his plans, she thought, but he went for the sake of his children. They might make their own way in the world, and he thought he could better do this in the New World than in the Old. The decision of one whom she had always reverenced for his goodness and wisdom must be right, she thought; yet she had misgivings, many and sad, as to the future of the children she had come to love so well. It was to have her faint hope confirmed, and her strong fears chased away, that she had spoken that afternoon to her friend; and it was with a feeling of utter disconsolateness that, she turned to her work again, when, at last, she was left alone.

For Janet had a deeper cause for care than she had told, a vague feeling that the worldly wisdom of her friend could not help her here, keeping her silent about it to her. That very morning, her heart had leaped to her lips, when her master in his grave, brief way, had asked—

“Janet, will you go with us, and help me to take care of her bairns?”

And she had vowed to God, and to him, that she would never leave them while they needed the help that a faithful servant could give. But the after thought had come. She had other ties, and cares, and duties, apart from these that clustered so closely round the minister and his motherless children.

A mile or two down the glen stood the little cottage that had for a long time been the home of her widowed mother, and her son. More than half required for their maintenance Janet provided. Could she forsake them? Could any duty she owed to her master and his children make it right for her to forsake those whose blood flowed in her veins? True, her mother was by no means an aged woman yet, and her son was a well-doing helpful lad, who would soon be able to take care of himself. Her mother had another daughter too, but Janet knew that her sister could never supply her place to her mother. Though kind and well-intentioned, she was easy minded, not to say thriftless, and the mother of many bairns besides, and there could neither be room nor comfort for her mother at her fireside, should its shelter come to be needed.

Day after day Janet wearied herself going over the matter in her mind. “If it were not so far,” she thought, or “if her mother could go with her.” But this she knew, for many reasons, could never be, even if her mother could be brought to consent to such a plan. And Janet asked herself, “What would my mother do if Sandy were to die? And what would Sandy do if my mother were to die? And what would both do if sickness were to overtake them, and me far-away?” till she quite hated herself for ever thinking of putting the wide sea, between them and her.

There had been few pleasures scattered over Janet’s rough path to womanhood. Not more than two or three mornings since she could remember had she risen to other than a life of labour. Even during the bright brief years of her married-life, she had known little respite from toil, for her husband had been a poor man, and he had died suddenly, before her son was born. With few words spoken, and few tears shed, save what fell in secret, she had given her infant to her mother’s care, and gone back again to a servant’s place in the minister’s household. There she had been for ten years the stay and right hand of her beloved friend and mistress, “working the work of two,” as they told her, who would have made her discontented in her lot, with no thought from year’s end to year’s end, but how she might best do her duty in the situation in which God had placed her.

But far-away into the future—it might be years and years hence—she looked to the time when in a house of her own, she might devote herself entirely to the comfort of her mother and her son. In this hope she was content to strive and toil through the best years of her life, living poorly and saving every penny, to all appearance equally indifferent to the good word of those who honoured her for her faithfulness and patient labour, and to the bad word of those who did not scruple to call her most striking characteristics by less honourable names. She had never, during all these years, spoken, even to her mother, of her plans, but their fulfilment was none the less settled in her own mind, and none the less dear to her because of that. Could she give this up? Could she go away from her home, her friends, the land of her birth, and be content to see no respite from her labour till the end? Yes, she could. The love that had all these years been growing for the children she had tended with almost a mother’s care, would make the sacrifice possible—even easy to her. But her mother? How could she find courage to tell her that she must leave her alone in her old age? The thought of parting from her son, her “bonny Sandy,” loved with all the deeper fervour that the love was seldom spoken—even this gave her no such pang as did the thought of turning her back upon her mother. He was young, and had his life before him, and in the many changes time might bring, she could at least hope to see him again. But her mother, already verging on the three-score, she could never hope to see more, when once the broad Atlantic rolled between them.

And so, no wonder if in the misery of her indecision, Janet’s words grew fewer and sharper as the days wore on. With strange inconsistency she blamed the minister for his determination to go away, but suffered no one else to blame him, or indeed to hint that he could do otherwise than what was wisest and best for all. It was a sore subject, this anticipated departure of the minister, to many a one in Clayton besides her, and much was it discussed by all. But it was a subject on which Janet would not be approached. She gave short answers to those who offered their services in the way of advice. She preserved a scornful silence in the presence of those who seemed to think she could forsake her master and his children in their time of need, nor was she better pleased with those who thought her mother might be left for their sakes. And so she thought, and wished, and planned, and doubted, till she dazed herself with her vain efforts to get light, and could think and plan no more.

“I’ll leave it to my mother herself to decide,” she said, at last; “though, poor body, what can she say, but that I maun do what I think is my duty, and please myself. The Lord above kens I hae little thought o’ pleasin’ myself in this matter.” And in her perplexity Janet was ready to think her case an exception to the general rule, and that contrary to all experience and observation, duty pointed two ways at once.