Page 22 of Through Darkened Clouds

“I’ll fetch the Missus, ma’am,” was the reply. She scurried back into the house.

“Didn’t your mother have a rose garden?” Mr. Bell mused aloud as he surveyed the property.

“Yes,” came the sad reply. “It is not at all as we left it.”

A plump woman, her straw-colored hair straying from its bindings under a lace cap, came rushing out to greet them. She carried a little one on her hip.

“Ah, Miss Hale!” the vicar’s wife greeted her, for she was curious to see the former inhabitants of her house. “This is your father, I presume…”

Margaret was forced to explain her father’s decease and to hear the well-intentioned pity stream from a stranger’s mouth.

She welcomed them in, introducing herself as Mrs. Hepworth. “You’ll see how we’ve had to extend the house to accommodate the children. How did you manage with so few rooms, Miss Hale?”

“We were only four,” was the quiet answer as Margaret looked about, unsmiling.

“Oh yes. Well, as the Bible says: ‘Children are a gift from the Lord.’ And we have been given seven such gifts! This here is Priscilla,” she said, giving the child in her arms a bounce.

She led them about, jabbering on about the ‘improvements’ made as Margaret forlornly observed how the wall of her father’s study had been taken out to expand the dining room, and mourned over how the quiet spaces she remembered with their bric-à-brac, rich-toned carpets, and delicate curtains now seemed to barren of all color, softness, and beauty—to have been traded for pure utility.

Mr. Bell glanced at Margaret, seeing at once her silent despair in her eyes.

Both visitors were glad when the tour was at an end, as Mrs. Hepworth pushed open the front door and they all stepped out where the laundry now flapped gently in the breeze.

They said their goodbyes hastily, eager to find some quiet. But they hadn’t gone far when they encountered a man in clerical clothes heading their way.

“Hello!” he said forcefully, intending to discover who the strangers in his hamlet were.

“Reverend Hepworth, I presume,” Mr. Bell replied, holding out his hand for a hearty shake.

“Indeed, indeed, welcome to our little hamlet. You are visiting relatives, perhaps?” he inquired.

“I used to live here,” Margaret answered. “My father was reverend here. I am Margaret Hale. And this is Mr. Bell.”

“Ah, Miss Hale! Welcome, welcome. Have you met my wife—”

“We have just come from there,” Mr. Bell hurried to say.

Rev. Hepworth’s eyes darted about, and he called out to a passerby on a path beyond them. “I expect I’ll see your husband at church this Sunday, Mrs. Corrigan.”

The woman smiled weakly, stammering an answer before hurrying away.

The Reverend returned his attention to the visitors. “I have a particular mission to drain the scourge of drunkenness in my parish. It is my duty to watch over my flock, to lead them,” he explained, a smile fixed upon his earnest face.

They conversed for a short while, Margaret explaining yet again her father’s fate, while Rev. Hepworth insisted upon telling them of the stricter measures and curriculum in his school.

When they could finally extricate themselves from the encounter, Mr. Bell headed back to the inn to take an afternoon nap while Margaret continued to walk the pathways of her youth.

Strolling beneath a bramble-covered stone arch, she entered the churchyard. Her vision grew bleary as she stilled to gaze at the ancient structure, with its spire reaching toward heaven. Hoping to find herself alone within, she entered the church. The heavy door shut behind her, and she was at once enveloped in the calm quiet of the darkened space.

Golden sunlight angled in from the west through the narrow windows and brightened portions of the long wooden pews. Nothing had changed here. Nothing ever would in her lifetime.

She glided slowly to where she and her mother would sit every Sunday and lowered herself into the seat. Looking up to where her father would always stand, she could no longer contain her grief. Tears spilled down her cheeks, and she bowed her head to sob.

The stars were luminous in the clear sky of the New Forest. Margaret sat at her window, staring up at them. Those unchanging stars were the same she had wondered upon here as a girl. But here, upon this spot on the earth, she had found sad changes amidst solid fixtures of stone, nature, and minds.

Perhaps it was a lesson her youth must struggle to accept. She felt she was beginning to understand how one must cherish the moments and people that surround you in the present—for time is unforgiving in its course, and nothing will remain the same forever.

A suffocating sorrow swept in to weigh upon her soul, to think of what would never return to her again: her mother and father, her life in Milton, and the love of an admirable man.