Take Courage (6 page)

This was not wise of Will, for though Francis cared little for scholarship, at any such hint his face was apt to cloud. Francis was in general free of all mean grudges, having only an honourable emulation towards those who surpassed him in sports, which indeed few did; but towards David he was never perfectly open and free. Nor was David
so to Francis. John and David on the other hand had a fast though silent friendship. At that time, though I knew this difference in the cousins, I did not rightly know its cause; later I understood it very well.

At that time, indeed, I was only a child in spite of my grave ways and lofty (as I believed) thinking; though I perceived clearly enough the difference in those around me, I did not trouble about it, but loved them all in their different ways, and was able to be happy with each in turn.

My life then was indeed a quietly happy one. Under Sarah's guidance I learned the management of our house; I took pains that everything in it should be clean and neat, our table well furnished with my brothers' favourite dishes—as for my father, he ate little and could not tell you what he had put in his mouth if you asked him—and our linen and apparel well repaired. In all matters of the house, I consulted Mrs. Thorpe if I were in some special difficulty; in matters of the needle, I went to Mrs. Ferrand, who, by example though not by precept, of which she was incapable, taught me her own delicate taste. In the day I laboured thus gladly for those I loved; in the evening I listened to Francis, or talked to John, or heard David his lesson, or—and this was still my dearest joy—sat reading to my father. Mr. Thorpe often said teasingly that my father would spend his last penny on a pamphlet. There were many such publications stirring, and often when Mr. Thorpe heard that my father had a new one, he came to our house to hear it read and explained. Others too came gladly to hear my father at these times; and I was happy to see him so well respected, his true worth recognised, and took pride in helping him by reading to him with understanding, carefully and well.

After a time i began to feel a strangeness in Mrs. Ferrand's manner to me.

I was ever a favourite with Mr. Ferrand, for he was a carnally minded man, setting great store on shows and appearances, and he was pleased to consider that I had some beauty. When I was a child, and he drew me to him and fondled me, as he often did, calling me his pretty little penny and such foolish but kindly names, Mrs. Ferrand was wont to pout and protest, saying pettishly: “Giles, you will spoil the child,” and the like; but once he had desisted from his caress, she seemed not to hold it against me. But now that I was growing from a child into a girl, her manner changed on such occasions; she made no protests, and simply sat in silence as if indifferent, her eyes not meeting mine; but I felt beneath her compliant air a secret hostility. While the men spoke of politics and affairs, she would draw me to one side and admire my gown—this was such a palpable untruth that it embarrassed me, for my dress was always dark and plain and ill-cut by comparison with hers. At other times, when we were alone, I having sought her advice about some needlework, she would talk to me of Francis, and then her speech was so strange, and so at variance with itself, that I was hard put to it to understand her. For she told in the same breath how devoted Francis was to her and how he swore he would never leave her to marry, and how his father was already about a marriage treaty for him with a young lady from Halifax; and how he was soon to go to Oxford and how he hated learning and would never attend a University; and how he had promised her he would never
be a soldier and how he was always begging his father to let him go to the Low Countries to fight; so that I was quite bewildered with so many contradictions, and found it difficult to make suitable replies.

The oft repeating of these conversations began to make me uneasy, for though I was uncertain of Mrs. Ferrand's meaning I was sure, from the tone in which she spoke, that it held some point disagreeable to me, and I began to puzzle over what she could intend, and be unable to dismiss the question from my mind. As a result, I became troubled over the lessons Francis took with Will. If Francis were not to go to the University, as his mother hinted, there was no more need of these lessons; and the more I thought about it, the more probable it seemed to me that Mrs. Ferrand was hitting at them, and that Francis continued them only out of generosity to Will. My cheek burned at the thought, for I was ever somewhat proud, and I began to think that my father and Will were unworldly simple people, too credulous of what men said to them to perceive hidden meanings, and that there would often be times when I, though so much younger, would see more clearly than they.

At last I could bear it no longer, I took a decision to open the matter with Francis. On the next evening when a lesson was due, therefore, I told Sarah I wished to speak with Francis alone for a moment before Will came in. She gave me a snort and a surly look, but nodded.

It was a lovely summer evening, and David being at church singing in the choir, as he did three times every week, my father and Will and I were sitting together in our little orchard, when Sarah came to the door and beckoned me. I ran in, and was a little disconcerted to meet Mr. Ferrand in the doorway; he had come, as he sometimes did, to pay Will his fee, it being the month's end. However, he passed on out into the garden after a hearty greeting, and I went in. Francis was lounging against the table, his fine feathered hat dangling in his hand; he sprang up as I entered and made me one of his teasing graceful bows.

“Francis,” I said all in a breath, fearing to lose my courage if I halted, “you do not really wish these lessons, you take them out of mere kindness to Will.”

For a moment he stood quite still, neither speaking nor moving, very tall and slender and erect, as always, his handsome head flung up and his grey eyes fixed on mine.

“What makes you think I do not wish them?” he said then.

His voice was not like his own, but deep and angry; I answered, troubled, that it was some words his mother had let fall.

Francis laughed in his new deep tone.

“And why did she tell you that, Pen? Don't you know? Don't you know?” he urged me in a fond teasing tone. He laughed again, and went on, for I was silent: “She thinks I am like to fall in love with you, Penninah Clarkson. And she is right.”

The blood rushed from my heart to my cheek; I stood still and silent before him, with my eyes downcast; I could not raise my head, or stir, or utter.

“Pen!” said Francis, very warm and low, and he took a step towards me.

Totally confused, I murmured: “Frank!” but yet put up my hands as a barrier against him. He took them in his own, and the next moment I was in his arms. Laughing, his grey eyes sparkling, he kissed me warmly.

It was a moment brimming with joy and sweetness. I yielded my lips to his in love, and stroked his warm golden head with joyful fingers; for indeed my heart was his and in some sense has ever stayed so.

Then a great laugh rang out, and there stood Mr. Ferrand and my father and Will in the doorway, entering from the orchard. I was so young and simple that, though I blushed as I turned to look at them, it never struck me to spring away from Francis, nor did he drop his arm from about my waist. At this Will cried out vehemently: “Penninah! What are you thinking of?” in warm reproach; but Mr Ferrand twirled his moustache and laughed, and said:
“Come, come! A little boy and girl sweethearting will do them no harm.” My father, smiling very kindly, put his hand on Francis's shoulder and said:

“Indeed I think it may not.”

“Thank you, sir!” cried Francis, laughing gaily up at him.

So after that Francis and I were always sweethearts.

The first time i understood that the things I read in the diurnals could concern ordinary people like ourselves was over the matter of Will's getting a place.

I had read about the course of affairs in the King's first Parliament, how the members granted the King the right to levy taxes for one year only, and then before promising him any more supplies began to make petitions about religion and bring accusations against the Duke of Buckingham, which angered the King so much that he dissolved that Parliament, so that it sat no more. My father shook his head over this and said it was a bad augury for a new reign, and I in my childish way agreed gravely, and was angry about the Duke and grieved that the young King should be so misled; but to me it was like an old historical tale or a piece out of the Bible, something that roused one's feelings strongly and gave one moral instruction, but was all over long ago and a long way off. I was glad when the King was obliged to call another Parliament because he needed money for wars abroad and the Court at home, and could not get what he needed without a Parliament's consent; but I had no notion that it would ever concern us in Bradford. But then, to put the members in a proper humour for granting subsidies, the King had sermons preached to both Houses of this new Parliament by a man whose name I heard for the first time, namely Bishop Laud. This Laud told the Parliament flatly that the King was God's lieutenant on earth, and the King's power was God's power—the blood came into my father's face when he heard this, and Will struck the table sharply, crying: “Divine Right! What did I tell you? Divine Right!” Will's temper
had been very uneven of late, so that David and I were quite uncomfortable with him; but I had no notion that this bad Bishop, with his Arminian views, as they were called, could have anything to do with Will's crossness. But not long after, this same Bishop had it proclaimed that nobody might discuss, either in writing or preaching, opinions contrary to the doctrine and discipline of the Church. It was our Vicar, Mr. Okell, who told us this one evening when he called to see my father on some churchwarden business. It was a cold night and we were all sitting round the fire.

“Discipline!” said my father, making a wry face. “I hate the word. True religion cannot be imposed by order, from above, as the Arminians seem to think.”

“Aye,” began Will, “and besides——”

Then suddenly he coloured up and his mouth shook, and with a strange cry he sprang from his chair and rushed away from us. Mr. Okell looked after him kindly, then turned towards my father with a question in his eyes. My father shook his head, and Mr. Okell shook his own white head in sympathy. I stole away after Will, and found him upstairs in the cold loom-chamber, his head buried in his hands, groaning. I asked if he were sick, but he told me “No,” and bade me leave him, somewhat roughly. I was perplexed, but since neither he nor my father, even when Mr. Okell had left us, offered to tell me what was wrong, I did not like to ask. Some while later David, who shared a bed with Will, confided to me that he thought Will was wretched because he wanted to be married and Mr. Thorpe would not let him. As the marriage treaty between Will and Eliza had long been signed, this puzzled me still further, and I thought David must be wrong, for I noticed that Will was always most put out after we had been reading the diurnals.

Indeed the news was not good, for Laud's sermon having provoked the Parliament, it did not hurry to grant any subsidies, but began to attack the Duke; whereupon the King hastily scolded and dissolved it, before it was six
months long. Parliaments, he said, were altogether in his power—an observation fit to madden any Englishman. What was worse, having no subsidies lawfully granted him, he now began to levy them illegally, without consent, and began also to demand loans from the gentry, and to tax merchants' goods entering the country from abroad; and many of the Arminian clergy began to preach sermons, exhorting their people to pay these loans and taxes. This all seemed to me very wicked, but still it did not strike me that it could happen nearer than London, for in Bradford we had no such sermons, Mr. Okell being a staunch Puritan and no lover of either the King or Laud. About this time Will began to spend more hours at the loom and fewer at his books, and his temper grew worse daily, but I was still quite in the dark as to why it should be so.

Then one day, when we were all dining at Holroyd Hall, it was made clear to me. The occasion was Francis's birthday; the Ferrands had many guests, and we were all at table. Mr. Ferrand was joking in a rather lewd way, as he loved to do, and he suddenly asked Will in a loud jovial tone when he was going to get a benefice and be able to marry. Poor Will coloured to his ears, and began stammeringly to explain that nowadays it was not easy for a young man of his views to find a Bishop or patron to appoint him. At once I saw the whole matter, for Mr. Thorpe, as his uncomfortable look now showed, would not wish Will and Eliza to marry till Will was in a fair way to gain his living.

“It is said that Bishop Laud gives the King lists of clergy marked O and P,” went on poor Will, more vehement as his anger gained on him: “O for Orthodox, who are to have promotion, and P for Puritan, who are not. Others with benefices in their gift take the cue, for fear they will be had up for heresy before the court of Starchamber.”

“And very properly,” roared Mr. Ferrand in his loud cheerful voice. “You cannot have a Church without a government; you cannot have these Puritans doing just as they choose. A set of dirty arrogant rascals, saving your presence, Tom and Robert, preaching all over the place
and behaving saucily to their betters. We must have decency and order.”

“You are an Arminian, sir!” cried my father sternly on a sudden.

Mr. Ferrand looked taken aback. “What do the Arminians hold?” he enquired doubtfully.

My father, his sudden warmth gone, smiled and replied: “They hold all the best bishoprics and deaneries in England.”

At this Mr. Thorpe laughed very heartily. “That's good! That's good, Robert!” he cried. “What do the Arminians hold? They hold all the best bishoprics—ha, ha, ha!”