The Long Vacation | Page 8

and not Tom," said Gertrude.
"Both Brownlows. Tom knows them well, and wrote. One lives at the
East-end, and is sheet anchor to Whittingtonia. He began with Clement,
but made the case over to the cousin, the fashionable one, when we
made the great removal."
"So they consulted?"
"And fairly see the way out of the wood, though not by any means quit
of it, poor Tina; but there's a great deal to be thankful for," said Lance,
with a long breath.
"Indeed there is!" said the wife, with a squeeze of the hand. "But is
there any more to be feared?"
"Everything," Lance answered; "heart chiefly, but the lungs are not safe.
He has been whirling his unfortunate machine faster and faster, till no
wonder the mainspring has all but broken down. His ideal always was
working himself to death, and only Felix could withhold him, so now
he has fairly run himself down. No rest from that tremendous parish
work, with the bothers about curates, school boards and board schools,
and the threatened ritual prosecution, which came to nothing, but
worried him almost as much as if it had gone on, besides all the trouble
about poor Alda, and the loss of Fulbert took a great deal out of him.
When Somers got a living, there was no one to look after him, and he
never took warning. So when in that Stinksmeech Mission he breathed

pestiferous air and drank pestiferous water, he was finished up. They've
got typhus down there-—a very good thing too," he added vindictively.
"I put it further back than Mr. Somers' going," said Gertrude. "He never
was properly looked after since Cherry married. What is he to do
now?"
"Just nothing. If he wishes to live or have a chance of working again,
he must go to the seaside and vegetate, attempt nothing for the next six
months, nor even think about St. Matthew's for a year, and, as they told
me afterwards, be only able to go on cautiously even then."
"How did he take it?"
"He laid his head against Cherry, who was standing by his chair, put an
arm round her, and said, 'There!' and she gave him such a smile as I
would not have missed seeing on any account. 'Mine now,' she said.
'Best!' he said. He is too much tired and worn out to vex himself about
anything."
"Where are they to go? Not to Ewmouth, or all the family worries
would come upon them. Alda would give him no peace."
"Certainly not there. Brownlow advises Rockquay. His delicate brother
is a curate there, and it agrees with him better than any other place. So I
am to go and see for a house for them. It is the very best thing for
Cherry."
"Indeed it is. Was not she like herself last night? Anna says she has
never brightened up so much before! I do believe that if Clement goes
on mending, the dear person will have a good time yet; nay, all the
better now that she is free to be a thorough-going Underwood again."
"You Underwooder than Underwood!"
"Exactly! I never did like-—Yes, Lance, I am going to have it out. I do
think Clement would have done better to let her alone."
"He did let her alone. He told me so."
"Yes, but she let out to me the difference between that time and the one
of the first offer when dear Felix could not keep back his delight at
keeping her; whereas she could not help seeing that she was a burthen
on Clement's soul, between fear of neglecting her and that whirl of
parish work, and that St. Wulstan's Hall was wanted for the girls'
school. Besides, Wilmet persuaded her."
"She did. But it turned out well. The old man worshipped her, and she
was very fond of him."

"Oh! very well in a way, but you know better, Lance."
"Well, perhaps he did not begin young enough. He was a good,
religious man, but Pro Ecclesia Dei had not been his war-cry from his
youth, and he did not understand, and thought it clerical; good, but
outside his life. Still, she was happy."
"Petting, Society, Art, travels! I had rather have had our two first years
of tiffs than all that sort of happiness."
"Tiffs! I thought we might have gone in for the Dunmow flitch."
"You might! Do you mean that you forget how fractious and nasty and
abominable I was, and how many headaches I gave you?"
"Only what you had to put up with."
"You don't recollect that first visit of my father's, when I was so
frightfully cross because you said we must ask the Lambs and Bruces
to dinner? You came down in the morning white as