The Mill on the Floss (76 page)

"Don't you speak so, Miss," said Bob, grasping the skin of
Mumps's neck; "if there's anything I can do for you, I should look
upon it as a day's earnings."

"I want you to go to Dr. Kenn's, and ask to speak to him, and
tell him that I am here, and should be very grateful if he would
come to me while my mother is away. She will not come back till
evening."

"Eh, Miss, I'd do it in a minute,–it is but a step,–but Dr.
Kenn's wife lies dead; she's to be buried to-morrow; died the day I
come from Mudport. It's all the more pity she should ha' died just
now, if you want him. I hardly like to go a-nigh him yet."

"Oh no, Bob," said Maggie, "we must let it be,–till after a few
days, perhaps, when you hear that he is going about again. But
perhaps he may be going out of town–to a distance," she added, with
a new sense of despondency at this idea.

"Not he, Miss," said Bob. "
He'll
none go away. He isn't
one o' them gentlefolks as go to cry at waterin'-places when their
wives die; he's got summat else to do. He looks fine and sharp
after the parish, he does. He christened the little un; an' he was
at
me to know what I did of a Sunday, as I didn't come to
church. But I told him I was upo' the travel three parts o' the
Sundays,–an' then I'm so used to bein' on my legs, I can't sit so
long on end,–'an' lors, sir,' says I, 'a packman can do wi' a small
'lowance o' church; it tastes strong,' says I; 'there's no call to
lay it on thick.' Eh, Miss, how good the little un is wi' you! It's
like as if it knowed you; it partly does, I'll be bound,–like the
birds know the mornin'."

Bob's tongue was now evidently loosed from its unwonted bondage,
and might even be in danger of doing more work than was required of
it. But the subjects on which he longed to be informed were so
steep and difficult of approach, that his tongue was likely to run
on along the level rather than to carry him on that unbeaten road.
He felt this, and was silent again for a little while, ruminating
much on the possible forms in which he might put a question. At
last he said, in a more timid voice than usual,–

"Will you give me leave to ask you only one thing, Miss?"

Maggie was rather startled, but she answered, "Yes, Bob, if it
is about myself–not about any one else."

"Well, Miss, it's this.
Do
you owe anybody a
grudge?"

"No, not any one," said Maggie, looking up at him inquiringly.
"Why?"

"Oh, lors, Miss," said Bob, pinching Mumps's neck harder than
ever. "I wish you did, an' tell me; I'd leather him till I couldn't
see–I would–an' the Justice might do what he liked to me
arter."

"Oh, Bob," said Maggie, smiling faintly, "you're a very good
friend to me. But I shouldn't like to punish any one, even if
they'd done me wrong; I've done wrong myself too often."

This view of things was puzzling to Bob, and threw more
obscurity than ever over what could possibly have happened between
Stephen and Maggie. But further questions would have been too
intrusive, even if he could have framed them suitably, and he was
obliged to carry baby away again to an expectant mother.

"Happen you'd like Mumps for company, Miss," he said when he had
taken the baby again. "He's rare company, Mumps is; he knows
iverything, an' makes no bother about it. If I tell him, he'll lie
before you an' watch you, as still,–just as he watches my pack.
You'd better let me leave him a bit; he'll get fond on you. Lors,
it's a fine thing to hev a dumb brute fond on you; it'll stick to
you, an' make no jaw."

"Yes, do leave him, please," said Maggie. "I think I should like
to have Mumps for a friend."

"Mumps, lie down there," said Bob, pointing to a place in front
of Maggie, "and niver do you stir till you're spoke to."

Mumps lay down at once, and made no sign of restlessness when
his master left the room.

Chapter II
St. Ogg's Passes Judgment

It was soon known throughout St. Ogg's that Miss Tulliver was
come back; she had not, then, eloped in order to be married to Mr.
Stephen Guest,–at all events, Mr. Stephen Guest had not married
her; which came to the same thing, so far as her culpability was
concerned. We judge others according to results; how else?–not
knowing the process by which results are arrived at. If Miss
Tulliver, after a few months of well-chosen travel, had returned as
Mrs. Stephen Guest, with a post-marital
trousseau
, and all
the advantages possessed even by the most unwelcome wife of an only
son, public opinion, which at St. Ogg's, as else where, always knew
what to think, would have judged in strict consistency with those
results. Public opinion, in these cases, is always of the feminine
gender,–not the world, but the world's wife; and she would have
seen that two handsome young people–the gentleman of quite the
first family in St. Ogg's–having found themselves in a false
position, had been led into a course which, to say the least of it,
was highly injudicious, and productive of sad pain and
disappointment, especially to that sweet young thing, Miss Deane.
Mr. Stephen Guest had certainly not behaved well; but then, young
men were liable to those sudden infatuated attachments; and bad as
it might seem in Mrs. Stephen Guest to admit the faintest advances
from her cousin's lover (indeed it
had
been said that she
was actually engaged to young Wakem,–old Wakem himself had
mentioned it), still, she was very young,–"and a deformed young
man, you know!–and young Guest so very fascinating; and, they say,
he positively worships her (to be sure, that can't last!), and he
ran away with her in the boat quite against her will, and what
could she do? She couldn't come back then; no one would have spoken
to her; and how very well that maize-colored satinette becomes her
complexion! It seems as if the folds in front were quite come in;
several of her dresses are made so,–they say he thinks nothing too
handsome to buy for her. Poor Miss Deane! She is very pitiable; but
then there was no positive engagement; and the air at the coast
will do her good. After all, if young Guest felt no more for her
than
that
it was better for her not to marry him. What a
wonderful marriage for a girl like Miss Tulliver,–quite romantic?
Why, young Guest will put up for the borough at the next election.
Nothing like commerce nowadays! That young Wakem nearly went out of
his mind; he always
was
rather queer; but he's gone abroad
again to be out of the way,–quite the best thing for a deformed
young man. Miss Unit declares she will never visit Mr. and Mrs.
Stephen Guest,–such nonsense! pretending to be better than other
people. Society couldn't be carried on if we inquired into private
conduct in that way,–and Christianity tells us to think no
evil,–and my belief is, that Miss Unit had no cards sent her."

But the results, we know, were not of a kind to warrant this
extenuation of the past. Maggie had returned without a
trousseau
, without a husband,–in that degraded and outcast
condition to which error is well known to lead; and the world's
wife, with that fine instinct which is given her for the
preservation of Society, saw at once that Miss Tulliver's conduct
had been of the most aggravated kind. Could anything be more
detestable? A girl so much indebted to her friends–whose mother as
well as herself had received so much kindness from the Deanes–to
lay the design of winning a young man's affections away from her
own cousin, who had behaved like a sister to her! Winning his
affections? That was not the phrase for such a girl as Miss
Tulliver; it would have been more correct to say that she had been
actuated by mere unwomanly boldness and unbridled passion. There
was always something questionable about her. That connection with
young Wakem, which, they said, had been carried on for years,
looked very ill,–disgusting, in fact! But with a girl of that
disposition! To the world's wife there had always been something in
Miss Tulliver's very
physique
that a refined instinct felt
to be prophetic of harm. As for poor Mr. Stephen Guest, he was
rather pitiable than otherwise; a young man of five-and-twenty is
not to be too severely judged in these cases,–he is really very
much at the mercy of a designing, bold girl. And it was clear that
he had given way in spite of himself: he had shaken her off as soon
as he could; indeed, their having parted so soon looked very black
indeed–
for her
. To be sure, he had written a letter,
laying all the blame on himself, and telling the story in a
romantic fashion so as to try and make her appear quite innocent;
of course he would do that! But the refined instinct of the world's
wife was not to be deceived; providentially!–else what would become
of Society? Why, her own brother had turned her from his door; he
had seen enough, you might be sure, before he would do that. A
truly respectable young man, Mr. Tom Tulliver; quite likely to rise
in the world! His sister's disgrace was naturally a heavy blow to
him. It was to be hoped that she would go out of the
neighborhood,–to America, or anywhere,–so as to purify the air of
St. Ogg's from the stain of her presence, extremely dangerous to
daughters there! No good could happen to her; it was only to be
hoped she would repent, and that God would have mercy on her: He
had not the care of society on His hands, as the world's wife
had.

It required nearly a fortnight for fine instinct to assure
itself of these inspirations; indeed, it was a whole week before
Stephen's letter came, telling his father the facts, and adding
that he was gone across to Holland,–had drawn upon the agent at
Mudport for money,–was incapable of any resolution at present.

Maggie, all this while, was too entirely filled with a more
agonizing anxiety to spend any thought on the view that was being
taken of her conduct by the world of St. Ogg's; anxiety about
Stephen, Lucy, Philip, beat on her poor heart in a hard, driving,
ceaseless storm of mingled love, remorse, and pity. If she had
thought of rejection and injustice at all, it would have seemed to
her that they had done their worst; that she could hardly feel any
stroke from them intolerable since the words she had heard from her
brother's lips. Across all her anxiety for the loved and the
injured, those words shot again and again, like a horrible pang
that would have brought misery and dread even into a heaven of
delights. The idea of ever recovering happiness never glimmered in
her mind for a moment; it seemed as if every sensitive fibre in her
were too entirely preoccupied by pain ever to vibrate again to
another influence. Life stretched before her as one act of
penitence; and all she craved, as she dwelt on her future lot, was
something to guarantee her from more falling; her own weakness
haunted her like a vision of hideous possibilities, that made no
peace conceivable except such as lay in the sense of a sure
refuge.

But she was not without practical intentions; the love of
independence was too strong an inheritance and a habit for her not
to remember that she must get her bread; and when other projects
looked vague, she fell back on that of returning to her plain
sewing, and so getting enough to pay for her lodging at Bob's. She
meant to persuade her mother to return to the Mill by and by, and
live with Tom again; and somehow or other she would maintain
herself at St. Ogg's. Dr. Kenn would perhaps help her and advise
her. She remembered his parting words at the bazaar. She remembered
the momentary feeling of reliance that had sprung in her when he
was talking with her, and she waited with yearning expectation for
the opportunity of confiding everything to him. Her mother called
every day at Mr. Deane's to learn how Lucy was; the report was
always sad,–nothing had yet roused her from the feeble passivity
which had come on with the first shock. But of Philip, Mrs.
Tulliver had learned nothing; naturally, no one whom she met would
speak to her about what related to her daughter. But at last she
summoned courage to go and see sister Glegg, who of course would
know everything, and had been even to see Tom at the Mill in Mrs.
Tulliver's absence, though he had said nothing of what had passed
on the occasion.

As soon as her mother was gone, Maggie put on her bonnet. She
had resolved on walking to the Rectory and asking to see Dr. Kenn;
he was in deep grief, but the grief of another does not jar upon us
in such circumstances. It was the first time she had been beyond
the door since her return; nevertheless her mind was so bent on the
purpose of her walk, that the unpleasantness of meeting people on
the way, and being stared at, did not occur to her. But she had no
sooner passed beyond the narrower streets which she had to thread
from Bob's dwelling, than she became aware of unusual glances cast
at her; and this consciousness made her hurry along nervously,
afraid to look to right or left. Presently, however, she came full
on Mrs. and Miss Turnbull, old acquaintances of her family; they
both looked at her strangely, and turned a little aside without
speaking. All hard looks were pain to Maggie, but her self-reproach
was too strong for resentment. No wonder they will not speak to me,
she thought; they are very fond of Lucy. But now she knew that she
was about to pass a group of gentlemen, who were standing at the
door of the billiard-rooms, and she could not help seeing young
Torry step out a little with his glass at his eye, and bow to her
with that air of
nonchalance
which he might have bestowed
on a friendly barmaid.

Maggie's pride was too intense for her not to feel that sting,
even in the midst of her sorrow; and for the first time the thought
took strong hold of her that she would have other obloquy cast on
her besides that which was felt to be due to her breach of faith
toward Lucy. But she was at the Rectory now; there, perhaps, she
would find something else than retribution. Retribution may come
from any voice; the hardest, cruelest, most imbruted urchin at the
street-corner can inflict it; surely help and pity are rarer
things, more needful for the righteous to bestow.