The Perpetual Curate · Chapter 27 (2/2)

Lucy rose from where she had been sitting at the bedside. She had grown paler than before, and looked almost stern in her youthful gravity. “I will not permit my father to be disturbed,” she said. “I don’t know what you mean, or what you are talking of; but he is not to be disturbed. Do you think I will let him be vexed in his last hours about money or anybody’s interest?” she said, turning upon the Curate a momentary glance of scorn. Then she sat down again, with a pang of disappointment added to her grief. She could not keep her heart so much apart from him, as not to expect a little comfort from his presence. And there had been comfort in his prayers and his looks; but to hear him speak of wills and worldly affairs by her father’s deathbed, as any man might have done, went to Lucy’s heart. She sat down again, putting her hand softly upon the edge of the pillow, to guard the peace of those last moments which were ebbing away so rapidly. What if all the comfort of the world hung upon it? Could she let her kind father be troubled in his end for anything so miserable? Lucy turned her indignant eyes upon the others with silent resolution. It was she who was his protector now.

“But it must be done,” said Mr. Wentworth. “You will understand me hereafter. Miss Wodehouse, you must send for Mr. Waters, and in the meantime I will do what I can to rouse him. It is no such cruelty as you think,” said the Curate, with humility; “it is not for money or interest only⁠—it concerns all the comfort of your life.”

This he said to Lucy, who sat defending her father. She, for her part, looked up at him with eyes that broke his heart. At that moment of all others, the unfortunate Curate perceived, by a sudden flash of insight, that nothing less than love could look at him with such force of disappointment and reproach and wounded feeling. He replied to the look by a gesture of mingled entreaty and despair.

“What can I do?” he cried⁠—“you have no one else to care for you. I cannot even explain to you all that is at stake. I must act as I ought, even though you hate me for it. Let us send for Mr. Waters;⁠—if there is a will⁠—”

Mr. Wentworth had raised his voice a little in the excitement of the moment, and the word caught the dull ear of the dying man. The Curate saw instantly that there was comprehension in the flicker of the eyelash and the tremulous movement of the hand upon the bed. It was a new and unaccustomed part which he had now to play; he went hurriedly to the other side and leaned over the pillow to make out the stammering words which began to be audible. Lucy had risen up also and stood looking at her father still with her look of defence. As the feeble lips babbled forth unintelligible words, Lucy’s face grew sterner and sterner. As for Miss Wodehouse, she stood behind, crying and trembling. “Oh, Mr. Wentworth, do you think it is returning life⁠—do you think he is better?” she cried, looking wistfully at the Curate; and between the two young people, who were leaning with looks and feelings so different over his bed, the patient lay struggling with those terrible bonds of weakness, labouring to find expression for something which wrought him into a fever of excitement. While Mr. Wentworth bent his ear closer and closer, trying to make some sense of the inarticulate torrent of sound, Lucy, inspired by grief and horror and indignation, leaned over her father on the other side, doing everything possible to calm him. “Oh, papa, don’t say any more⁠—don’t say any more; we understand you,” she cried, and put her soft hands upon his flushed forehead, and her cheek to his. “No more, no more!” cried the girl in the dulled ear which could not hear. “We will do everything you wish⁠—we understand all,” said Lucy. Mr. Wentworth withdrew vanquished in that strange struggle⁠—he stood looking on while she caressed and calmed and subdued into silence the dying passion which he would have given anything in the world to stimulate into clearer utterance. She had baffled his efforts, made him helpless to serve her, perhaps injured herself cruelly; but all the more the Curate loved her for it, as she expanded over her dying father, with the white sleeves hanging loose about her arms like the white wings of an angel, as he thought. Gradually the agony of utterance got subdued, and then Lucy resumed her position by the bed. “He shall not be disturbed,” she said again, through lips that were parched with emotion; and so sat watchful over him, a guardian immovable, ready to defy all the world in defence of his peace.

Mr. Wentworth turned away with his heart full. He would have liked to go and kiss her hand or her sleeve or anything belonging to her; and yet he was impatient beyond expression, and felt that she had baffled and vanquished him. Miss Wodehouse stood behind, still looking on with a half perception of what had happened; but the mind of the elder sister was occupied with vain hopes and fears, such as inexperienced people are subject to in the presence of death.

“He heard what you said,” said Miss Wodehouse; “don’t you think that was a good sign? Oh, Mr. Wentworth, sometimes I think he looks a little better,” said the poor lady, looking wistfully into the Curate’s face. Mr. Wentworth could only shake his head as he hurried away.

“I must go and consult Mr. Waters,” he said, as he passed her. “I shall come back presently;” and then Miss Wodehouse followed him to the door, to beg him not to speak to Mr. Waters of anything particular⁠—“For papa has no confidence in him,” she said, anxiously. The Curate was nearly driven to his wits’ end as he hastened out. He forgot the clouds that surrounded him in his anxiety about this sad household; for it seemed but too evident that Mr. Wodehouse had made no special provision for his daughters; and to think of Lucy under the power of her unknown brother, made Mr. Wentworth’s blood boil.

The shutters were all put up that afternoon in the prettiest house in Grange Lane. The event took Carlingford altogether by surprise; but other events just then were moving the town into the wildest excitement; for nothing could be heard, far or near, of poor little Rosa Elsworthy, and everybody was aware that the last time she was seen in Carlingford she was standing by herself in the dark, at Mr. Wentworth’s garden-door.