CHAPTER XII.

MORNING CALLS.

“Well—I suppose we must.”

FRIENDS IN COUNCIL.

Mr. Thornton had had some difficulty in working up his mother to the

desired point of civility. She did not often make calls; and when she

did, it was in heavy state that she went through her duties. Her son had

given her a carriage; but she refused to let him keep horses for it;

they were hired for the solemn occasions, when she paid morning or

evening visits. She had had horses for three days, not a fortnight

before, and had comfortably “killed off” all her acquaintances, who

might now put themselves to trouble and expense in their turn. Yet

Crampton was too far off for her to walk; and she had repeatedly

questioned her son as to whether his wish that she should call on the

Hales was strong enough to bear the expense of cab-hire. She would have

been thankful if it had not; for, as she said, “she saw no use in making

up friendships and intimacies with all the teachers and masters in

Milton; why, he would be wanting her to call on Fanny’s dancing-master’s

wife, the next thing!”

“And so I would, mother, if Mr. Mason and his wife were friendless in a

strange place, like the Hales.”

“Oh! you need not speak so hastily. I am going to-morrow. I only wanted

you exactly to understand about it.”

“If you are going to-morrow, I shall order horses.”

“Nonsense, John. One would think you were made of money.”

“Not quite, yet. But about the horses I’m determined. The last time you

were out in a cab, you came home with a headache from the jolting.”

“I never complained of it, I’m sure.”

“No! my mother is not given to complaints,” said he, a little proudly.

“But so much the more I have to watch over you. Now, as for Fanny there,

a little hardship would do her good.”

“She is not made of the same stuff as you are, John. She could not bear

it.”

Mrs. Thornton was silent after this; for her last words bore relation to

a subject which mortified her. She had an unconscious contempt for a

weak character; and Fanny was weak in the very points in which her

mother and brother were strong. Mrs. Thornton was not a woman much

given to reasoning; her quick judgment and firm resolution served her in

good stead of any long arguments and discussions with herself; she felt

instinctively that nothing could strengthen Fanny to endure hardships

patiently, or face difficulties bravely; and though she winced as she

made this acknowledgment to herself about her daughter, it only gave her

a kind of pitying tenderness of manner towards her; much of the same

description of demeanour with which mothers are wont to treat their weak

and sickly children. A stranger, a careless observer might have

considered that Mrs. Thornton’s manner to her children betokened far

more love to Fanny than to John. But such a one would have been deeply

mistaken. The very daringness with which mother and son spoke out

unpalatable truths, the one to the other, showed a reliance on the firm

centre of each other’s souls, which the uneasy tenderness of Mrs.

Thornton’s manner to her daughter, the shame with which she thought to

hide the poverty of her child in all the grand qualities which she

herself possessed unconsciously, and which she set so high a value upon

in others—this shame, I say, betrayed the want of a secure

resting-place for her affection. She never called her son by any name

but John; “love,” and “dear,” and such like terms, were reserved for

Fanny. But her heart gave thanks for him day and night; and she walked

proudly among women for his sake.

“Fanny dear! I shall have horses to the carriage to-day, to go and call

on these Hales. Should not you go and see nurse? It’s in the same

direction, and she’s always so glad to see you. You could go on there

while I am at Mrs. Hale’s.”

“Oh! mamma, it’s such a long way, and I am so tired.”

“With what?” asked Mrs. Thornton, her brow slightly contracting.

“I don’t know—the weather, I think. It is so relaxing. Couldn’t you

bring nurse here, mamma? The carriage could fetch her, and she could

spend the rest of the day here, which I know she would like.”

Mrs. Thornton did not speak; but she laid her work on the table, and

seemed to think.

“It will be a long way for her to walk back at night!” she remarked, at

last.

“Oh, but I will send her home in a cab. I never thought of her walking.”

At this point, Mr. Thornton came in, just before going to the mill.

“Mother! I need hardly say, that if there is any little thing that could

serve Mrs. Hale as an invalid, you will offer it, I’m sure.”

“If I can find it out, I will. But I have never been ill myself, so I am

not much up to invalids’ fancies.”

“Well! here is Fanny then, who is seldom without an ailment. She will be

able to suggest something, perhaps—won’t you, Fan?”

“I have not always an ailment,” said Fanny, pettishly; “and I am not

going with mamma. I have a headache to-day, and I shan’t go out.”

Mr. Thornton looked annoyed. His mother’s eyes were bent on her work, at

which she was now stitching away busily.

“Fanny! I wish you to go,” said he, authoritatively. “It will do you

good, instead of harm. You will oblige me by going, without my saying

anything more about it.”

He went abruptly out of the room after saying this.

If he had stayed a minute longer, Fanny would have cried at his tone of

command, even when he used the words, “You will oblige me.” As it was,

she grumbled.

“John always speaks as if I fancied I was ill, and I am sure I never do

fancy any such thing. Who are these Hales that he makes such a fuss

about?”

“Fanny, don’t speak so of your brother. He has good reasons of some kind

or other, or he would not wish us to go. Make haste and put your things

on.”

But the little altercation between her son and her daughter did not

incline Mrs. Thornton more favourably towards “these Hales.” Her jealous

heart repeated her daughter’s question, “Who are they, that he is so

anxious we should pay them all this attention?” It came up like a burden

to a song, long after Fanny had forgotten all about it in the pleasant

excitement of seeing the effect of a new bonnet in the looking-glass.

Mrs. Thornton was shy. It was only of late years that she had had

leisure enough in her life to go into society; and as society she did

not enjoy it. As dinner-giving, and as criticising other people’s

dinners, she took satisfaction in it. But this going to make

acquaintance with strangers was a very different thing. She was ill at

ease, and looked more than usually stern and forbidding as she entered

the Hales’ little drawing-room.

Margaret was busy embroidering a small piece of cambric for some little

article of dress for Edith’s expected baby—“Flimsy, useless work,” as

Mrs. Thornton observed to herself. She liked Mrs. Hale’s double knitting

far better; that was sensible of its kind. The room altogether was full

of knick-knacks, which must take a long time to dust; and time to people

of limited income was money.

She made all these reflections as she was talking in her stately way to

Mrs. Hale, and uttering all the stereotyped commonplaces that most

people can find to say with their senses blindfolded. Mrs. Hale was

making rather more exertion in her answers, captivated by some real old

lace which Mrs. Thornton wore; “lace,” as she afterwards observed to

Dixon, “of that old English point which has not been made for this

seventy years, and which cannot be bought. It must have been an

heir-loom, and shows that she had ancestors.” So the owner of the

ancestral lace became worthy of something more than the languid exertion

to be agreeable to a visitor, by which Mrs. Hale’s efforts at

conversation would have been otherwise bounded. And presently, Margaret,

racking her brain to talk to Fanny, heard her mother and Mrs. Thornton

plunge into the interminable subject of servants.

“I suppose you are not musical,” said Fanny, “as I see no piano.”

“I am fond of hearing good music; I cannot play well myself; and papa

and mamma don’t care much about it; so we sold our old piano when we

came here.”

“I wonder how you can exist without one. It almost seems to me a

necessary of life.”

“Fifteen shillings a week, and three saved out of them!” thought

Margaret to herself. “But she must have been very young. She probably

has forgotten her own personal experience. But she must know of those

days.” Margaret’s manner had an extra tinge of coldness in it when she

next spoke.

“You have good concerts here, I believe.”

“Oh, yes! Delicious! Too crowded, that is the worst. The directors admit

so indiscriminately. But one is sure to hear the newest music there. I

always have a large order to give to Johnson’s, the day after a

concert.”

“Do you like new music simply for its newness, then?”

“Oh; one knows it is the fashion in London, or else the singers would

not bring it down here. You have been in London, of course.”

“Yes,” said Margaret, “I have lived there for several years.”

“Oh! London and the Alhambra are the two places I long to see!”

“London and the Alhambra!”

“Yes! ever since I read the Tales of the Alhambra. Don’t you know them?”

“I don’t think I do. But surely, it is a very easy journey to London.”

“Yes; but somehow,” said Fanny, lowering her voice, “mamma has never

been to London herself, and can’t understand my longing. She is very

proud of Milton; dirty, smoky place as I feel it to be. I believe she

admires it the more for those very qualities.”

“If it has been Mrs. Thornton’s home for some years, I can well

understand her loving it,” said Margaret, in her clear, bell-like voice.

“What are you saying about me, Miss Hale? May I inquire?”

Margaret had not the words ready for an answer to this question, which

took her a little by surprise, so Miss Thornton replied:

“Oh, mamma! we are only trying to account for your being so fond of

Milton.”

“Thank you,” said Mrs. Thornton. “I do not feel that my very natural

liking for the place where I was born and brought up,—and which has

since been my residence for some years, requires any accounting for.”

Margaret was vexed. As Fanny had put it, it did seem as if they had been

impertinently discussing Mrs. Thornton’s feelings; but she also rose up

against that lady’s manner of showing that she was offended.

Mrs. Thornton went on after a moment’s pause:

“Do you know anything of Milton, Miss Hale? Have you seen any of our

factories? our magnificent warehouses?”

“No!” said Margaret. “I have not seen anything of that description as

yet.”

Then she felt that, by concealing her utter indifference to all such

places, she was hardly speaking with truth; so she went on:

“I dare say, papa would have taken me before now if I had cared. But I

really do not find much pleasure in going over manufactories.”

“They are very curious places,” said Mrs. Hale, “but there is so much

noise and dirt always. I remember once going in a lilac silk to see

candles made, and my gown was utterly ruined.”

“Very probably,” said Mrs. Thornton, in a short displeased manner. “I

merely thought, that as strangers newly come to reside in a town which

has risen to eminence in the country, from the character and progress of

its peculiar business, you might have cared to visit some of the places

where it is carried on; places unique in the kingdom, I am informed. If

Miss Hale changes her mind and condescends to be curious as to the

manufactures of Milton, I can only say I shall be glad to procure her

admission to print-works, or reed-making, or the more simple operations

of spinning carried on in my son’s mill. Every improvement of machinery

is, I believe, to be seen there, in its highest perfection.”

“I am so glad you don’t like mills and manufactories, and all those kind

of things,” said Fanny, in a half-whisper, as she rose to accompany her

mother, who was taking leave of Mrs. Hale with rustling dignity.

“I think I should like to know all about them, if I were you,” replied

Margaret quietly.

“Fanny!” said her mother, as they drove away, “we will be civil to these

Hales: but don’t form one of your hasty friendships with the daughter.

She will do you no good, I see. The mother looks very ill, and seems a

nice, quiet kind of person.”

“I don’t want to form any friendship with Miss Hale, mamma,” said Fanny,

pouting. “I thought I was doing my duty by talking to her, and trying to

amuse her.”

“Well! at any rate John must be satisfied now.”