The Tenant of Wildfell Hall

“y dear Gilbert, I wish you would try to be a little more amiable,”
said my mother one morning after some display of unjustifiable
ill-humour on my part. “You say there is nothing the matter with you,
and nothing has happened to grieve you, and yet I never saw anyone so
altered as you within these last few days. You haven’t a good word for
anybody—friends and strangers, equals and inferiors—it’s all the same.
I do wish you’d try to check it.”

“Check what?”

“Why, your strange temper. You don’t know how it spoils you. I’m sure
a finer disposition than yours by nature could not be, if you’d let it
have fair play: so you’ve no excuse that way.”

While she thus remonstrated, I took up a book, and laying it open on
the table before me, pretended to be deeply absorbed in its perusal,
for I was equally unable to justify myself and unwilling to acknowledge
my errors; and I wished to have nothing to say on the matter. But my
excellent parent went on lecturing, and then came to coaxing, and began
to stroke my hair; and I was getting to feel quite a good boy, but my
mischievous brother, who was idling about the room, revived my
corruption by suddenly calling out,—

“Don’t touch him, mother! he’ll bite! He’s a very tiger in human form.
I’ve given him up for my part—fairly disowned him—cast him off, root
and branch. It’s as much as my life is worth to come within six yards
of him. The other day he nearly fractured my skull for singing a
pretty, inoffensive love-song, on purpose to amuse him.”

“Oh, Gilbert! how could you?” exclaimed my mother.

“I told you to hold your noise first, you know, Fergus,” said I.

“Yes, but when I assured you it was no trouble and went on with the
next verse, thinking you might like it better, you clutched me by the
shoulder and dashed me away, right against the wall there, with such
force that I thought I had bitten my tongue in two, and expected to see
the place plastered with my brains; and when I put my hand to my head,
and found my skull not broken, I thought it was a miracle, and no
mistake. But, poor fellow!” added he, with a sentimental sigh—“his
heart’s broken—that’s the truth of it—and his head’s—”

“Will you be silent NOW?” cried I, starting up, and eyeing the fellow
so fiercely that my mother, thinking I meant to inflict some grievous
bodily injury, laid her hand on my arm, and besought me to let him
alone, and he walked leisurely out, with his hands in his pockets,
singing provokingly—“Shall I, because a woman’s fair,” &c.

“I’m not going to defile my fingers with him,” said I, in answer to the
maternal intercession. “I wouldn’t touch him with the tongs.”

I now recollected that I had business with Robert Wilson, concerning
the purchase of a certain field adjoining my farm—a business I had been
putting off from day to day; for I had no interest in anything now; and
besides, I was misanthropically inclined, and, moreover, had a
particular objection to meeting Jane Wilson or her mother; for though I
had too good reason, now, to credit their reports concerning Mrs.
Graham, I did not like them a bit the better for it—or Eliza Millward
either—and the thought of meeting them was the more repugnant to me
that I could not, now, defy their seeming calumnies and triumph in my
own convictions as before. But to-day I determined to make an effort to
return to my duty. Though I found no pleasure in it, it would be less
irksome than idleness—at all events it would be more profitable. If
life promised no enjoyment within my vocation, at least it offered no
allurements out of it; and henceforth I would put my shoulder to the
wheel and toil away, like any poor drudge of a cart-horse that was
fairly broken in to its labour, and plod through life, not wholly
useless if not agreeable, and uncomplaining if not contented with my
lot.

Thus resolving, with a kind of sullen resignation, if such a term may
be allowed, I wended my way to Ryecote Farm, scarcely expecting to find
its owner within at this time of day, but hoping to learn in what part
of the premises he was most likely to be found.

Absent he was, but expected home in a few minutes; and I was desired to
step into the parlour and wait. Mrs. Wilson was busy in the kitchen,
but the room was not empty; and I scarcely checked an involuntary
recoil as I entered it; for there sat Miss Wilson chattering with Eliza
Millward. However, I determined to be cool and civil. Eliza seemed to
have made the same resolution on her part. We had not met since the
evening of the tea-party; but there was no visible emotion either of
pleasure or pain, no attempt at pathos, no display of injured pride:
she was cool in temper, civil in demeanour. There was even an ease and
cheerfulness about her air and manner that I made no pretension to; but
there was a depth of malice in her too expressive eye that plainly told
me I was not forgiven; for, though she no longer hoped to win me to
herself, she still hated her rival, and evidently delighted to wreak
her spite on me. On the other hand, Miss Wilson was as affable and
courteous as heart could wish, and though I was in no very conversable
humour myself, the two ladies between them managed to keep up a pretty
continuous fire of small talk. But Eliza took advantage of the first
convenient pause to ask if I had lately seen Mrs. Graham, in a tone of
merely casual inquiry, but with a sidelong glance—intended to be
playfully mischievous—really, brimful and running over with malice.

“Not lately,” I replied, in a careless tone, but sternly repelling her
odious glances with my eyes; for I was vexed to feel the colour
mounting to my forehead, despite my strenuous efforts to appear
unmoved.

“What! are you beginning to tire already? I thought so noble a creature
would have power to attach you for a year at least!”

“I would rather not speak of her now.”

“Ah! then you are convinced, at last, of your mistake—you have at
length discovered that your divinity is not quite the immaculate—”

“I desired you not to speak of her, Miss Eliza.”

“Oh, I beg your pardon! I perceive Cupid’s arrows have been too sharp
for you: the wounds, being more than skin-deep, are not yet healed, and
bleed afresh at every mention of the loved one’s name.”

“Say, rather,” interposed Miss Wilson, “that Mr. Markham feels that
name is unworthy to be mentioned in the presence of right-minded
females. I wonder, Eliza, you should think of referring to that
unfortunate person—you might know the mention of her would be anything
but agreeable to any one here present.”

How could this be borne? I rose and was about to clap my hat upon my
head and burst away, in wrathful indignation from the house; but
recollecting—just in time to save my dignity—the folly of such a
proceeding, and how it would only give my fair tormentors a merry laugh
at my expense, for the sake of one I acknowledged in my own heart to be
unworthy of the slightest sacrifice—though the ghost of my former
reverence and love so hung about me still, that I could not bear to
hear her name aspersed by others—I merely walked to the window, and
having spent a few seconds in vengibly biting my lips and sternly
repressing the passionate heavings of my chest, I observed to Miss
Wilson, that I could see nothing of her brother, and added that, as my
time was precious, it would perhaps be better to call again to-morrow,
at some time when I should be sure to find him at home.

“Oh, no!” said she; “if you wait a minute, he will be sure to come; for
he has business at L——” (that was our market-town), “and will require a
little refreshment before he goes.”

I submitted accordingly, with the best grace I could; and, happily, I
had not long to wait. Mr. Wilson soon arrived, and, indisposed for
business as I was at that moment, and little as I cared for the field
or its owner, I forced my attention to the matter in hand, with very
creditable determination, and quickly concluded the bargain—perhaps
more to the thrifty farmer’s satisfaction than he cared to acknowledge.
Then, leaving him to the discussion of his substantial “refreshment,” I
gladly quitted the house, and went to look after my reapers.

Leaving them busy at work on the side of the valley, I ascended the
hill, intending to visit a corn-field in the more elevated regions, and
see when it would be ripe for the sickle. But I did not visit it that
day; for, as I approached, I beheld, at no great distance, Mrs. Graham
and her son coming down in the opposite direction. They saw me; and
Arthur already was running to meet me; but I immediately turned back
and walked steadily homeward; for I had fully determined never to
encounter his mother again; and regardless of the shrill voice in my
ear, calling upon me to “wait a moment,” I pursued the even tenor of my
way; and he soon relinquished the pursuit as hopeless, or was called
away by his mother. At all events, when I looked back, five minutes
after, not a trace of either was to be seen.

This incident agitated and disturbed me most unaccountably—unless you
would account for it by saying that Cupid’s arrows not only had been
too sharp for me, but they were barbed and deeply rooted, and I had not
yet been able to wrench them from my heart. However that be, I was
rendered doubly miserable for the remainder of the day.