He Knew He Was Right by Anthony Trollope (books you need to read .txt) 📕

Dorothy touched her arm, asking her whether she would not take some

broth which had been prepared for her. ‘Where’s Martha? Why does not

Martha come?’ said Miss Stanbury. This was a hard blow, and from that

moment Dorothy believed that it would be expedient that she should

return to Nuncombe Putney. The broth, however, was taken, while Dorothy

sat by in silence. Only one word further was said that evening by Miss

Stanbury about Brooke and his love-affair. ‘There must be nothing more

about this, Dorothy; remember that; nothing at all. I won’t have it.’

Dorothy made no reply. Brooke’s letter was in her pocket, and it should

be answered that night. On the following day she would let her aunt

know what she had said to Brooke. Her aunt should not see the letter,

but should be made acquainted with its purport in reference to Brooke’s

proposal of marriage.

‘I won’t have it!’ That had been her aunt’s command. What right had her

aunt to give any command upon the matter? Then crossed Dorothy’s mind,

as she thought of this, a glimmering of an idea that no one can be

entitled to issue commands who cannot enforce obedience. If Brooke and

she chose to become man and wife by mutual consent, how could her aunt

prohibit the marriage? Then there followed another idea, that commands

are enforced by the threatening and, if necessary, by the enforcement

of penalties. Her aunt had within her hand no penalty of which Dorothy

was afraid on her own behalf; but she had the power of inflicting a

terrible punishment on Brooke Burgess. Now Dorothy conceived that she

herself would be the meanest creature alive if she were actuated by

fears as to money in her acceptance or rejection of a man whom she

loved as she did Brooke Burgess. Brooke had an income of his own which

seemed to her to be ample for all purposes. But that which would have

been sordid in her, did not seem to her to have any stain of sordidness

for him. He was a man, and was bound to be rich if he could. And,

moreover, what had she to offer in herself, such a poor thing as was she,

to make compensation to him for the loss of fortune? Her aunt could

inflict this penalty, and therefore the power was hers, and the power

must be obeyed. She would write to Brooke in a manner that should

convey to him her firm decision.

But not the less on that account would she let her aunt know that she

thought herself to have been illused. It was an insult to her, a most

ill-natured insult that telling her that Brooke had been a fool for

loving her. And then that accusation against her of having been false,

of having given one reason for refusing Mr Gibson, while there was

another reason in her heart, of having been cunning and then untrue, was

not to be endured. What would her aunt think of her if she were to bear

such allegations without indignant protest? She would write her letter,

and speak her mind to her aunt as soon as her aunt should be well

enough to hear it.

As she had resolved, she wrote her letter that night before she went to

bed. She wrote it with floods of tears, and a bitterness of heart which

almost conquered her. She too had heard of love, and had been taught to

feel that the success or failure of a woman’s life depended upon that

whether she did, or whether she did not, by such gifts as God might

have given to her, attract to herself some man strong enough, and good

enough, and loving enough to make straight for her her paths, to bear

for her her burdens, to be the father of her children, the staff on

which she might lean, and the wall against which she might grow,

feeling the sunshine, and sheltered from the wind. She had ever

estimated her own value so lowly as to have told herself often that

such success could never come in her way. From her earliest years she

had regarded herself as outside the pale within which such joys are to

be found. She had so strictly taught herself to look forward to a blank

existence, that she had learned to do so without active misery. But not

the less did she know where happiness lay; and when the good thing came

almost within her reach, when it seemed that God had given her gifts

which might have sufficed, when a man had sought her hand whose nature

was such that she could have leaned on him with a true worship, could

have grown against him as against a wall with perfect confidence, could

have lain with her head upon his bosom, and have felt that of all spots

that in the world was the most fitting for her when this was all but

grasped, and must yet be abandoned, there came upon her spirit an agony

so bitter that she had not before known how great might be the depth of

human disappointment. But the letter was at last written, and when

finished was as follows:

‘The Close, Exeter, March 1, 186-.

DEAR BROOKE.’

There had been many doubts about this; but at last they were conquered,

and the name was written.

‘I have shewn your letter to my aunt, as I am sure you will think was

best. I should have answered it before, only that I thought that she

was not quite well enough to talk about it. She says, as I was sure she

would, that what you propose is quite out of the question. I am aware

that I am bound to obey her; and as I think that you also ought to do

so, I shall think no more of what you have said to me and have written.

It is quite impossible now, even if it might have been possible under

other circumstances. I shall always remember your great kindness to me.

Perhaps I ought to say that I am very grateful for the compliment you

have paid me. I shall think of you always till I die.

Believe me to be,

Your very sincere friend,

DOROTHY STANBURY.’

The next day Miss Stanbury again came out of her room, and on the third

day she was manifestly becoming stronger. Dorothy had as yet not spoken

of her letter, but was prepared to do so as soon as she thought that a

fitting opportunity had come. She had a word or two to say for herself;

but she must not again subject herself to being told that she was

taking her will of her aunt because her aunt was too ill to defend

herself. But on the third day Miss Stanbury herself asked the question.

‘Have you written anything to Brooke?’ she asked.

‘I have answered his letter, Aunt Stanbury.’

‘And what have you said to him?’

‘I have told him that you disapproved of it, and that nothing more must

be said about it.’

‘Yes of course you made me out to be an ogre.’

‘I don’t know what you mean by that, aunt. I am sure that I told him

the truth.’

‘May I see the letter?’

‘It has gone.’

‘But you have kept a copy,’ said Miss Stanbury.

‘Yes; I have got a copy,’ replied Dorothy; ‘but I would rather not shew

it. I told him just what I tell you.’

‘Dorothy, it is not at all becoming that you should have a

correspondence with any young man of such a nature that you should be

ashamed to shew it to your aunt.’

‘I am not ashamed of anything,’ said Dorothy sturdily.

‘I don’t know what young women in these days have come to,’ continued

Miss Stanbury. ‘There is no respect, no subjection, no obedience, and

too often no modesty.’

‘Does that mean me, Aunt Stanbury?’ asked Dorothy.

‘To tell you the truth, Dorothy, I don’t think you ought to have been

receiving love-letters from Brooke Burgess when I was lying ill in bed.

I didn’t expect it of you. I tell you fairly that I didn’t expect it of

you.’

Then Dorothy spoke out her mind. ‘As you think that, Aunt Stanbury, I

had better go away. And if you please I will when you are well enough

to spare me.’

‘Pray don’t think of me at all,’ said her aunt.

‘And as for love-letters, Mr Burgess has written to me once. I don’t

think that there can be anything immodest in opening a letter when it

comes by the post. And as soon as I had it I determined to shew it to

you. As for what happened before, when Mr Burgess spoke to me, which

was long, long after all that about Mr Gibson was over, I told him that

it couldn’t be so; and I thought there would be no more about it. You

were so ill that I could not tell you. Now you know it all.’

‘I have not seen your letter to him.’

‘I shall never shew it to anybody. But you have said things, Aunt

Stanbury, that are very cruel.’

‘Of course! Everything I say is wrong.’

‘You have told me that I was telling untruths, and you have called me

immodest. That is a terrible word.’

‘You shouldn’t deserve it then.’

‘I never have deserved it, and I won’t bear it. No; I won’t. If Hugh

heard me called that word, I believe he’d tear the house down.’

‘Hugh, indeed! He’s to be brought in between us is he?’

‘He’s my brother, and of course I’m obliged to think of him. And if you

please, I’ll go home as soon as you are well enough to spare me.’

Quickly after this there were many letters coming and going between the

house in the Close and the ladies at Nuncombe Putney, and Hugh

Stanbury, and Brooke Burgess. The correspondent of Brooke Burgess was

of course Miss Stanbury herself. The letters to Hugh and to Nuncombe

Putney were written by Dorothy. Of the former we need be told nothing

at the present moment; but the upshot of all poor Dolly’s letters was,

that on the tenth of March she was to return home to Nuncombe Putney,

share once more her sister’s bed and mother’s poverty, and abandon the

comforts of the Close. Before this became a definite arrangement Miss

Stanbury had given way in a certain small degree. She had acknowledged

that Dorothy had intended no harm. But this was not enough for Dorothy,

who was conscious of no harm either done or intended. She did not

specify her terms, or require specifically that her aunt should make

apology for that word, immodest, or at least withdraw it; but she

resolved that she would go unless it was most absolutely declared to

have been applied to her without the slightest reason. She felt,

moreover, that her aunt’s house ought to be open to Brooke Burgess, and

that it could not be open to them both. And so she went having resided

under her aunt’s roof between nine and ten months.

‘Goodbye, Aunt Stanbury,’ said Dorothy, kissing her aunt, with a tear

in her eye and a sob in her throat.

‘Goodbye, my dear, good-bye.’ And Miss Stanbury, as she pressed her

niece’s hand, left in it a bank-note.

‘I’m much obliged, aunt; I am indeed; but I’d rather not.’ And the

bank-note was left on the parlour table.