Chapter V

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After St John had left I could not help but feel that I had been rather foolish in asking him to read 'The Sigh'; we met often in the mornings at Morton school and on the Monday following his visit to us he was blunter and more reticent than before—I believe he may have been angry with me. At the end of the week, however, he was more his usual self—yet still far from being warm or hospitable. Sometimes I found him terribly frustrating, indeed, I told him more than once of my vexation at his stubborn coldness. Daily I hoped for his disposition to improve and daily I was disappointed. Nevertheless, I looked forward to my visits at Morton school and became quite fond of Miss Elliott; she was rather more sedate than I would have desired in a companion, and meditative beyond her years, but she was good natured and I enjoyed our meetings. I often came to visit at her cottage, in the evenings or when the school was closed.

Miss Elliott's past was still a mystery to me; when I asked about her previous life her replies were always very vague and I concluded that it must have been terribly dramatic and exciting!

"I am sure it would make a delightful romance!" I declared one evening.

"You may conclude what you wish," replied she, and went on looking over one of the student's books with a slight smile on her face. I believe she found my theories amusing and I liked to amuse her.

"To do with some dashing officer, perhaps, or a poor, gallant foot soldier," I continued, running away with many fantastical images of Miss Elliott's past,"or a dark and mysterious gentleman!"

Miss Elliott glanced up at me, her expression suddenly somber and serious.

I laughed to throw off the solemn atmosphere, but decided to drop the subject nonetheless.

"I am glad you are pleased with Alice," I said, "She is a sweet little thing isn't she?"

"She has proved very helpful," Miss Elliott replied.

"And she is doing well at the school?"

"Very well, she works hard at her studies."

"She is from the workhouse, you know. A poor little orphan."

"Yes, Mr Rivers told me. He told me that it was you who removed her from the workhouse and undertook to pay for her education and clothing."

"It was," I smiled. St John seemed to take some pride in my charitable deeds and I was pleased to hear that he had relayed them to others, it seemed, perhaps irrationally, a compliment from he to I, or at least an indication that I was in his thoughts. "Does Mr Rivers speak of me often?" I asked.

"Not often," Miss Elliott answered honestly, "but that is no measure of disregard for he does not speak often of anything but his plans for India. I believe they consume him almost entirely."

I had spoken of Mr Rivers on so many occasions to Miss Elliott that I suspected my esteem for St John must have been apparent to her, and took this opportunity to ask her opinion.

"He is so unfriendly toward me of late," I said, flinging myself down on a chair, "He has always been somewhat removed, I suppose, yet he was not wont to be so very cold—but a year ago I was sure of his liking for me, but now he is so changeable. Perhaps it is his father's death and his sisters having gone away that effects him so?"

"Mr Rivers is capable of strong natural affection; his sisters, I think, are very dear to him; but I never saw anybody so capable of leading a solitary life. The company of others is not to him what it is to you or I. It is far more likely that it is his ambitions, his desire to become a missionary, that are the cause of his taciturnity. I believe he would attempt to subdue anything he regarded as a hinderance to his plans."

I understood her meaning. It was disheartening to hear it from Miss Elliott despite having suspected it myself, there was something shrewdly perceptive about her and she seemed to understand St John well, when she came to the conclusion it appeared to possess an undoubtable veracity. I would rather have heard it was his father's death that had been the origin of his aloofness for that I knew would have faded with time and I liked to think that my affection could would have quite banished it from his mind, but his ambition being the cause, as I suppose I had known all along, was far more difficult to solve. He thought me, no doubt, unsuitable for a missionary's wife—alas! No doubt he would be correct! I had no wish to travel far away from home, from my Papa, and everything I knew, to exhaust myself in some distant tropical climb! No wish to toil under an Indian sun! I am no saint, and yet even if I were, I can see that I might do as much good at home, happy and comfortable, as I could teaching with St John in a remote foreign village somewhere in the jungle, where, too, it is likely that I would catch a horrid disease before I had time to do any good at all! Why Mr Rivers did not see this also I cannot comprehend! I rode home slowly, feeling troubled; St John would be harder to win than I had hitherto allowed myself to believe, perhaps he was unreachable altogether.

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