Читать книгу A Bride Of Honor - Ruth Axtell Morren - Страница 10

L indsay sighed in relief at the sight of Reverend Hathaway leaning against the wrought-iron fence that surrounded Portman Square. Until that moment, she hadn’t realized how worried she’d been that he wouldn’t be waiting for her when she left her music lesson.

He saw her immediately and straightened. But he didn’t approach her, discreetly waiting across the street. She bade her teacher goodbye and tucked her drawing pad under her arm. “My maid will return the key in a little bit when I’ve finished my sketch.” It had been the only pretext she’d been able to think of to borrow the key to the square.

As she turned from the house, she said to her maid, “Clara, please wait for me in the carriage.”

The girl bobbed a curtsy. “Yes, miss.”

Lindsay waited until the girl had climbed into the coach and the door was shut behind her. Then she quickly crossed the street.

“Hello, Reverend Hathaway,” she said breathlessly. “Thank you for coming.”

He lifted his hat in greeting and smiled. “How was your lesson?”

She was reassured by the warmth of his tone. Suddenly, the day truly felt like spring—she began to hear the birdsong and feel the fresh breeze upon her cheeks. “My lesson? Oh, it was fine.” She shook her head. “I must practice more. That’s what I’m always told.” And suddenly, she laughed out loud for the sheer pleasure she felt. The weight of the past few weeks fell from her shoulders. Reverend Hathaway would know what she should do.

She gestured toward the large square. “Would you care to take a stroll in the park?”

“That would be very pleasant.” He took the large iron key from her, unlocked the gate and held it open.

They began to walk along the hard-packed dirt path under the elm trees in the neatly laid-out square. The reason for her being there returned and her spirits fell. She said nothing for a few minutes, unsure how to begin. She had never done such a thing in all her life. But she was so confused….

She swung around to him, bringing him to abrupt stop. “I would like to ask you something. It’s only a theoretical question, mind you.”

He nodded, his blue eyes regarding her steadily. Why did they look even bluer out-of-doors? “Ask away. Clergymen are always having theoretical questions pitched at them.”

She felt her face grow warm. Was she that transparent?

As if sensing her chagrin, his expression sobered. “What is it, Miss Phillips? What is troubling you so?”

She bit her lower lip. “If one is required to do something, to obey, but one finds the choice…distasteful, but one wants so very much to obey…”

He nodded. “Obedience can be very difficult at times.”

“Oh, yes!” He did understand. “Have you ever felt like that? As if the Lord were asking something impossible of you, and it would cost you everything to obey?”

He was looking at her keenly now, all traces of humor erased from his features. “I think we all come to that place in our walk with Him, where He requires us to surrender all to Him.”

Her spirits sank. It couldn’t be. How could she bear it? “But if the choice is so…so disagreeable?”

“His grace is sufficient for thee,” he answered gently.

Her shoulders slumped and she turned back to the path, resuming their walk. “I never thought my coming out would be filled with that kind of decision, as if having my own will would cause others so much displeasure, but obedience will cause me—” She wrung her hands together, unable to express her horror. “I do so want to be obedient. These last few weeks at your Bible study, I’ve learned so much about the Lord’s word. There’s so much I feel I need to learn. I don’t want to be a self-willed person. You speak of the cross and dying to the old nature. But what if that old nature refuses to die?”

He walked alongside her, his hands clasped behind his back. His wooden leg didn’t seem to impede him. She discerned no limp, although the wood made a different sound than that of their shoes upon the ground.

“I’ve found, in the years I’ve been counseling the flock the Lord has brought me, that many times a person’s spiritual growth is impeded by one thing alone—a thorn in the flesh, as it were, and not by a host of earthly pleasures.”

“Oh, yes, that’s it exactly. One thing alone!”

He glanced at her. “At least in your case, you are honest enough to admit it. Most people hide from the knowledge, and the Lord has to work on them for years before they are willing to put the item on the altar.” He sighed. “In the meantime, however, they don’t realize how many years have gone by, years in which they could have been growing in the knowledge of the Lord and reaching new heights.”

Her spirits sank further. She didn’t want that to happen to her. But the alternative! Jerome Stokes’s face rose in her mind. To be betrothed to him. She shuddered.

“Come, Miss Phillips, can it be so very bad? You are a young lady born with every privilege, your whole life before you.”

She turned to him, stricken. If only he knew what Papa was asking of her. “Yes,” was all she could whisper. She could never speak anything ill of Papa.

They were both silent some moments, and she focused on the soft sound of their footsteps on the ground. The bark of a dog on the other side of the square and the chirp of birds barely registered with her.

She drew a deep breath. “Have you never faced that kind of dilemma? In which…if you say no, you would be holding back from God?”

He was quiet a moment, and when she feared she had overstepped the bounds of propriety, he said, “I gave my heart and soul to the Lord as a young lad, before I was faced with many worldly temptations.”

He hastened to add, “Not because I was some kind of saint, but simply out of my desperate need.” He gestured with his chin downward. “After my accident, my need for God was great.”

She followed his gaze, realizing he was referring to the loss of his limb. “H-how did it happen?” she finally dared ask.

“I ran out in the road after a duck.” He glanced sidelong at her, his expression unreadable to her. “I was eight years old and responsible for a flock of ducks.”

She held her breath. “What happened?”

He shrugged. “I didn’t look before running out. A heavy wagon ran over my leg.”

“Oh, my—” Her hand covered her mouth. She couldn’t imagine the pain and anguish for an adult let alone a child.

“It was a miracle I survived. The wheel could just have easily run over my body. There, now, Miss Phillips, please don’t be upset. It happened so long ago. Eighteen years,” he murmured, as if amazed himself. “The pain and terror have long since faded.”

“How…could you bear it?” she asked, her voice still faint.

“I believe I wouldn’t have if not for my parents’ faith.” His finely shaped mouth turned up at one corner. “And Florence’s. Hers was more the bullying kind. Once I was fully healed and fitted with a wooden leg, I had to face perhaps what was harder than the physical pain I’d endured before. I had to take up my life, face the children at school, pretend I was as normal as they.

“Florence was my champion. If a boy so much as snickered behind my back or dared even breathe a nickname, she was over him, giving him the thrashing of his life.”

She couldn’t help laughing at the image of the spare woman fighting a big bully. “How wonderful it must have been to have a big sister,” she said wistfully.

He looked at her as if he understood more than she was saying. “You have no brothers or sisters?”

She shook her head. “I always envied my friends at school who had several brothers and sisters. Tell me more of what you meant. You said your accident made you turn to God for help.”

“Yes. Having Florence defend me and my parents shower their love on me wasn’t enough. To be able to face every day with my head held high, I needed to know the Father’s unconditional love. I needed the Lord’s grace to make it through each day, knowing I was no longer a whole boy, but a—” his Adam’s apple moved as he swallowed “—cripple.”

“Oh, no! You’re not a cripple. You are many things. A fine curate for one.” Yes, that was true. His disadvantage seemed so very small in light of the whole man before her.

He smiled, but it didn’t hide the bleakness in his expression. “But that’s what I was in the eyes of others. In order to overcome my limitations, I had to rely on God’s strength. I came to understand in a very personal way, the verse, ‘My strength is made perfect in weakness.’ God proved it to me time and again.”

They had walked the whole perimeter of the square. Lindsay, unwilling to have their walk end so soon, said abruptly, “You were so brave to take in a…fugitive.”

He blinked at the sudden change in topic. “Quinn?”

She nodded.

He shrugged. “At the time the choice seemed easy. A man came to our door on a rainy winter’s night, cold, feverish, hungry. In truth, it was my sister who brought him in. I only seconded her decision.”

She shivered, picturing it. “I don’t know if I would have dared do such a thing.”

He studied her steadily. “It sounds as if you have your own decision to make which requires bravery.”

Her eyelids fluttered downward and she kicked at the dirt in her path. “I don’t know if I am able to be as brave as you.”

“God doesn’t give us more than we are able to bear.”

How she wanted to believe that!

After a few minutes, the reverend said quietly, “It would seem to me that you have already decided which is the proper course to follow.”

She drew in her breath. Those were not the words she wanted to hear. Before she could respond, he continued. “I shall pray for you, that the Lord make His perfect will clearly known to you and give you perfect peace in your decision.”

A masculine voice hailed them from behind. “Good day, Damien.”

They both looked in surprise at the gentleman walking toward them. Lindsay immediately recognized her own pastor.

Reverend Hathaway halted and waited for the older gentleman to reach them. “Reverend Doyle.”

Lindsay bit her lip, wondering what the rector would think of seeing her alone with the curate. Doyle eyed them both without smiling. He nodded to Reverend Hathaway and then to her. “Miss Phillips. How lovely to see you. What are you doing all the way in Marylebone alone?”

“Good afternoon, Reverend Doyle. I was just leaving my music lesson.” She raised her chin, annoyed at how nervous she sounded, as if she had been doing something wrong.

“I wasn’t aware that you were acquainted with my curate.” His glance strayed to the reverend.

Her companion replied in an easy tone before Lindsay could think what to say. “Miss Phillips and her cousin came one Sunday to the chapel and I had the privilege of meeting them, thanks to your recommendation.”

Instead of smiling, the rector merely nodded. “I had spoken highly of you at one time, that is true.” There was unmistakable censure in his tone.

“I’ve been attending the reverend’s Bible studies at the parsonage with my cousin Beatrice,” she added, hoping to dispel the tension she felt in the air.

The rector raised an eyebrow. “I see.”

A silence fell between them. Then he asked, “I trust your father and cousin are in health?”

“Yes, they are both quite well,” she answered, hoping news would not travel back to her father about this encounter.

“I am relieved. You may tell them I shall be over soon for a visit.”

“Yes.” Her worry grew. What would her father say? Would he forbid further Bible studies under Reverend Hathaway’s tutelage?

The rector turned his attention back to the reverend. “I shall call upon you in the coming days. There is much we need to discuss.”

“I am at your service,” Reverend Hathaway said quietly.

“Very well.” With a final glance between the two of them, the rector bowed his head and bade them farewell.

“I didn’t expect to see Reverend Doyle here,” she said when he had exited the square.

“He lives nearby on Cavendish Square.”

“I see. He seemed displeased about something,” she ventured.

“Yes, I fear so.” He sighed. “For many years, he was almost like a father—a spiritual father—to me. He advised me on my studies and procured this living for me at St. George’s.” He turned to her. “I am not a gentleman’s son, you see, but the son of a clockmaker.”

Her eyes widened. “But…but you are…” She laughed nervously. “You seem to be a gentleman.” Far more a gentleman than Jerome Stokes with all his privileges and assets, she added silently.

“If so, it is thanks to the rector. He is the one who made it possible for me to receive a gentleman’s education. He recommended me to Lord Marlborough of Portman Square who paid for my studies at Oxford.”

These new facts only served to increase her admiration for the man before her. “You must have been worthy of their belief in you.”

His gaze traveled over her face, almost in wonder, she would hazard. “You are remarkable, Miss Phillips.”

She smiled tentatively. “Why do you say that, Reverend Hathaway?”

He shook his head slightly. “Most young ladies would not see it in that light.”

“How would they see it?”

“They would see me rather as a fraud. A man dressed up like a gentleman, pretending to be something he is not.”

“Oh, no!” Such an accusation angered her. “You are a man of God, whose life reflects what he preaches from the pulpit.”

His cheeks deepened in color, and she hoped her words had brought pleasure and not embarrassment to him. She meant them with all her heart. A thin line appeared between his eyebrows. “Have you asked advice from the rector? He is, after all, your spiritual advisor.”

She shook her head, looking down. “I don’t feel I know him well enough. You see, I’ve been away at school some years, so I really have not seen him much.” She fell silent. There was no rational way to explain that in the short time she’d known him, Reverend Hathaway was the only person whose counsel she trusted in this matter.

“Reverend Doyle is a man of great wisdom. I would advise you to talk to him.”

“He must be very proud of you for helping Mr. Quinn when he was in so much trouble.”

A shadow crossed his eyes, and he hesitated. “He did not approve of what my sister and I did.” He hastened to add, “He was right to object. We were aiding and abetting a fugitive. We broke the law in doing so.”

She felt a tremor at the gravity of his tone. “Is that why he is displeased with you?”

The reverend nodded. “I don’t regret having taken Mr. Quinn into our keeping. However, I would not counsel anyone lightly to do what we did. One must be very sure what one is doing is absolutely right in God’s eyes before taking such a step.”

Did he think she was on the brink of making a wrong decision? Was he warning her?

She lifted her chin. “In that case, I think it was all the more brave of you to help Mr. Quinn.”

The reverend’s blue eyes seemed to lighten. “Thank you, Miss Phillips. Your good opinion means a lot to me.”

Before she had a chance to feel the pleasure his words gave her, he continued. “Sometimes it is not easy to make the right decision. Sometimes what seems the right choice—that determined by the rules laid out—is, in fact, not the right way.”

Did his words spell hope or doom for her? Was there a way to disobey her father without losing his love and esteem? “How does one know in such a case?” she asked in a whisper, her eyes intent on his.

“By much prayer. In the end, the answer must come from here.” He tapped his chest. “A person must follow his—or her—conscience, whatever the risks involved.”

She nodded slowly, her gaze lifting from his slim hand back up to his face.

When the time came, would she have the courage to follow the dictates of her conscience?

Damien held up the slate toward the group of boys sitting on the floor at his feet in the cell given them to use for the lesson. “Let us review what we learned yesterday. Who can tell me what this says?”

Several arms shot up like arrows.

Damien smiled at one eager face, pale skin shining through the smudges. “Yes, Sam?”

“The Lord is my sh-shepherd!” He finished with a triumphant smile.

“Very good. Let us try another sentence.” He wiped off the slate with his rag and wrote again.

As he held it up, his glance went to a dim corner of the prison cell. A group of older boys was whispering and sniggering among themselves. In a second, Jonah squatted beside them. “You’d rather end up on the gallows or the transport ship than learn yer letters, is that it?”

“Tell us about the gallows,” a black-haired youth with a chipped tooth replied.

With a quick wink Damien’s way, Jonah sat down cross-legged among them. Damien continued with his lesson. He knew it was impossible to reach them all, so he appreciated Jonah’s help in keeping the unruly ones occupied while he taught those who wanted to learn.

He turned back to the young pupil. “Sam?”

The underfed lad screwed up his face in preparation to read. “Th-the t-t-time of—”

Damien prompted him gently until he managed the whole sentence. When they finished the lesson, he and Jonah parceled out the food and provisions they had brought with them. Before they left, he told them a Bible story.

On their way out of Newgate, Jonah shuddered as they passed through the arched entrance. “Always glad to leave that hole.”

Damien glanced at him. “I do appreciate your accompanying me. I know it’s not easy to go back each time.”

“It’s truly a dark pit in there.”

“All the more reason we must bring the light.”

Jonah nodded as they made their way past the Old Bailey. “I’ll never forget the day I was sentenced to be hanged.” He shook his head. “To think Florence was sitting there, praying for me even then.” At the corner, he asked, “You want me to hail a cab?”

“No. Let’s walk.”

“You certain? Florence wanted me to get her some things at Covent Garden Market.”

“That’s fine.” Damien shook off the slight irritation he felt whenever Jonah seemed overly protective of him. He knew it was only thoughtfulness on the man’s part. But by now, he’d hoped Jonah would realize Damien was capable of walking the distance of any normal man.

They sauntered down Ludgate Hill and headed west on Fleet Street, jostled by the thick throng of pedestrians. It only worsened as they approached the Strand, where they veered off at Drury Lane toward the market.

“How’s the pretty Miss Phillips?”

Damien glanced sharply at Jonah. He’d told no one of his meeting with Miss Phillips the day before. “You should know as well as I, since you see her at the house as often as I do.”

Jonah shrugged. “She’s a fair young lady, who seems to admire you quite a bit.”

Damien made his way around a large woman who stood shouting to a hansom cab driver from the curb. “If she seems to admire me, it is only because I am a clergyman.”

“Is that all you think it is?”

Damien gave him a sharp look at the sly tone. The street noises grew louder as they approached the stalls and sheds occupying Covent Garden. Damien followed Jonah to a vendor’s table filled with a colorful display of fruits and vegetables. Jonah poked at a pile of green cabbages. “What do you want for these sorry-looking things?”

The woman behind the table glared at him, her hefty arms akimbo. “Those be as crispy as anything you could grow yourself. A shillin’ for the pound.”

He grabbed up one from the top of the pyramid. “Here, weigh that one for me, be a good lass.”

When he’d paid for the cabbage, they walked on.

“Oranges from Valencia!” the rough voice of a hawker called out.

“I’ll take a half-dozen o’ those.”

“Here, let me carry them,” Damien offered as they started on again.

“That’s all right, I’ve got ’em.”

Damien clamped his lips down and said no more.

“So, you’re not interested in Miss Phillips as a young lady of marriageable age?”

Damien refused to be drawn. “I repeat, Miss Phillips only sees me as a clergyman.”

Jonah stopped before a fish vendor’s cart, and Damien stood silent while Jonah haggled over a piece of cod. As they waited for it to be cleaned and cut, he turned back to Damien, a twinkle in his dark green eyes. “Is that so?”

“She has seemed…troubled to me of late. If she can receive any counsel from the scriptures, then it is my duty to aid her in that way and no more. I am not even her proper pastor—that is Reverend Doyle’s purview. I must respect his office.”

Jonah mulled on that a moment, then dug in his pocket for some coins. “I beg your pardon, then. I didn’t quite see it in that light. I just see you as a good-looking young gent. Don’t you ever fancy yourself in need of a wife o’ your own?”

Damien was momentarily saved from replying when the vendor handed Jonah his change and packet of fish. But as they resumed walking, Jonah quirked an eyebrow at him. “Well?”

Damien jabbed his walking stick into the cobbled stones. “I realized long ago my calling was to serve God, and it is a full-time occupation as you have come to observe in the time you’ve been residing with us.” He tried not to sound as testy as he was now feeling.

Jonah remained silent, seeming to examine the other stalls they passed. Damien felt compelled to add, “The Apostle Paul put it very well. When a person is married, he becomes concerned with the needs of his spouse to the detriment of the business of the Lord.”

Jonah grunted. “How is it then that most vicars and curates I see are married? Their wives seem to be their helpmates in the parish. Didn’t the good book also say something about it not being good for a man to be alone?”

Damien pretended to study the display of flowers at one stall. For the first time, he regretted having taught Jonah any scripture.

Jonah fished out a coin and indicated a posy of primroses. “These blooms have nothing over the bloom in your cheeks,” he told the vendor.

The pretty girl’s cheeks dimpled. “Thankee, sir.”

“Can you wrap them in a bit o’ paper for me?” As the girl complied, Jonah murmured, “That’s a good lass.” He took them from her and handed her the money.

“And who’s the lucky lady these are for?”

He inspected the colorful bouquet, turning it around in his large hand. “They’re for a very special lady, the one who’s promised to marry me.”

“Ooh!”

When the girl tried to hand him the change, he said, “Keep it and buy yourself your own posy.”

The girl flashed him a wide smile. “Thankee kindly, sir!”

Damien swallowed, watching the careful way Jonah placed the small bouquet atop his other purchases in his satchel. The incongruous sight of his blunt fingers handling the fragile blooms sent a curious pang through Damien. How would it feel to buy a woman flowers? He’d never know the pleasure.

Jonah’s keen eyes met his at that moment. “Don’t you ever fancy having a lady of your own to come home to?”

“I am content with my single state.” At Jonah’s raised eyebrow, he added, “You’ve seen my life. I’m at the beck and call of those in need anytime of the day or night.”

Jonah shrugged. “That’s why the Lord gives a man a helpmate.”

They inched their way forward through the crowded aisle between the stalls.

“I must say I’m always amazed at the ease you have in talking to women,” Damien couldn’t help commenting when Jonah paused in front of a stall selling herbs and spices. The pungent aromas of cumin and cinnamon filled the air. Dried pods and seeds were heaped in large burlap sacks on the ground at their feet.

Jonah straightened from where he’d bent to examine a sack of nutmegs. “What’s that you say?”

Damien wished he had kept his mouth shut.

Too late, the words seemed to register with Jonah and his lips cracked open in a grin. “Talking to lasses is the easiest thing in the world.”

Damien shook his head, unable to keep from smiling back. “I doubt you’d find many men to agree with you.”

Jonah draped a brawny arm across his shoulders. “All you do is look at ’em a certain way and tell ’em they’re the loveliest thing you’ve ever laid eyes on. Works about three-quarters o’ the time.”

Damien chuckled. “And the other quarter of the time?”

“Why, you just spend some blunt on ’em, and they’re yours.” He waved his arm. “Look around you at all the young women. I’d lay odds that any number o’ them would give their spinster eyeteeth to catch a fine parson like you.”

The crowded market was filled with far more women than men. Women of all ages, plump and slim, well-dressed and shabby. Damien shook his head, wondering how he’d gotten into this ridiculous conversation with his future brother-in-law.

Jonah frowned a moment, removing his arm from Damien’s shoulders and adjusting the satchel he carried. “Of course, you realize, with your sister, it was different. There was nothing I could ’a done or said to win her, if the Lord hadn’t o’ had mercy on me.”

Damien chuckled. “I think she saw what lay beneath the surface.”

Jonah shook his head. “That was pretty rotten, too. No, it took God’s grace to bless me the way He has with your sister’s love.”

Before Damien could say anything more, Jonah gestured quickly with his hand. “See the ladies standing by the fruit vendor?”

Damien’s gaze traveled to two women inspecting the fruit. One of them looked older, perhaps thirty, the other probably not more than nineteen or twenty. In their plain dark pelisses, they could have been servants out to make purchases, or young matrons doing their household shopping. “What of them?”

“What of ’em?” Jonah mimicked in mock scorn. “They’re a pair of pretty lasses who’d probably lap you up like a plum pudding if you so much as looked their way.”

When Damien became aware of what Jonah intended, his steps slowed, but Jonah hauled him forward by the elbow. The next thing he knew, Jonah was smiling and tipping his hat to the ladies in question. “Good day to ye, madam, miss. Have you ever seen such plump-looking grapes in all your life?”

He snatched up one of the fat black grapes and popped it into his mouth. “Sweet as honey.” He addressed the older woman, but included both in his smile. “Of course, hothouse grapes don’t come near to the taste of those grown outside in the warm sun and refreshing rain. When I lived in the country, I used to grow my own. Muscats, Rieslings, Gamays. You’ve never tasted a sweeter grape than those I harvested.”

“Oh, where did you cultivate grapes?” the older one asked with a simpering smile.

“I tilled the soil on a place in Surrey.”

Damien couldn’t help admiring how quickly Jonah had them entranced. He looked a well-set-up gentleman in his bottle-green cutaway coat and black pantaloons, nothing like the farm laborer he used to be. Although he didn’t lie, his words made the women assume he had been a landowner on some prosperous farm.

“Oh, yes, I grew apples and pears, too. I was only just telling my young friend, the parson here, that I haven’t seen a fruit nor a vegetable in London yet that beats anything I grew myself.”

The two women turned to notice Damien, who’d been standing slightly behind Jonah.

“Of course, he’s city bred, so he doesn’t know what it means to pick your own apple and feel the juice on your tongue at that first, crisp bite.”

Damien thought that was a bit much, considering the orchard in his backyard, but he kept silent, allowing Jonah to have his fun.

“Would you ladies like me to hail you a cab? You’ve an awful lot of parcels to carry,” Jonah asked.

“Oh, that would be most helpful,” the older said. “We live in Cheapside. It’s always hard to get a cab around here.”

“Come along then, here, let me help you with those. The preacher can take yours,” he said, turning to the younger lady.

As they began to move apart, the young girl suddenly looked down at Damien’s legs and her eyes grew round. Without a word, she handed Damien her basket, but when they began walking, she took her place beside her companion, on the farthest side away from Damien and Jonah.

Damien slowed his steps until he was walking just behind the group. Jonah continued chatting amiably with the older woman as if nothing had happened. Damien hoped he hadn’t noticed anything.

They reached the curb and in a few moments Jonah had procured them a hack from those waiting at a stand.

As the lumbering vehicle inched away down the crowded street, Jonah muttered under his breath, “Couple o’ low-class wenches. Weren’t worth your time, my boy.” He nudged Damien on the elbow and they crossed the street. “That girl was as sallow as whey. Plenty more where she came from!”

A block farther, Jonah hailed them a cab. The two climbed in and rode silently back toward the parsonage. Damien kept his eyes fixed out the window. Perhaps now his well-meaning friend would drop the subject of a wife for him.