Transcriber’s Note: Italicized text is surrounded by underscores:
_italics_.
JOSHUA HAGGARD’S DAUGHTER
LONDON:
ROBSON AND SONS, PRINTERS, PANCRAS ROAD, N.W.
JOSHUA HAGGARD’S DAUGHTER
A Novel
BY THE AUTHOR OF
‘LADY AUDLEY’S SECRET’
ETC. ETC. ETC.
IN THREE VOLUMES
VOL. III.
[Illustration: (Colophon)]
LONDON
JOHN MAXWELL AND CO.
4 SHOE LANE, FLEET STREET
1876
[_All rights reserved_]
CONTENTS OF VOL. III.
CHAP. PAGE
I. FULL OF SCORPIONS 1
II. ‘FAREWELL, CONTENT’ 21
III. ‘WE TWO STOOD THERE WITH NEVER A THIRD’ 30
IV. ‘IT IS A BASILISK UNTO MINE EYE’ 40
V. ‘AND YET I FEEL I FEAR’ 56
VI. THE WANDERER’S RETURN 76
VII. ‘WHERE IS THY BROTHER?’ 90
VIII. THE FACE IN OSWALD’S SKETCH-BOOK 109
IX. REPUDIATED 127
X. WHAT THE COWBOY COULD TELL 156
XI. AT HIS DOOR 175
XII. AN OPEN VERDICT 193
XIII. JOSHUA STOPS HIS WATCH 211
XIV. JOSHUA’S CONFESSION 236
XV. CARRYING PEACE AND PARDON 254
XVI. THE ODOUR OF ROSEMARY 261
XVII. ‘BETWEEN TWO WORLDS’ 275
EPILOGUE 295
JOSHUA HAGGARD’S DAUGHTER
CHAPTER I.
FULL OF SCORPIONS.
‘Will he come, will he come to see me?’
This was the question which Naomi asked herself when she arose
next morning, to see another peerless summer day smiling at her,
but to feel none of the joy of harvest; only a heart as dull and
desolate as if she had awakened to find herself amidst some dwindled
hope-forsaken band hemmed round by Arctic seas. What was summer to
her, or harvest, or all the common joys of life--joys that gladden
hearts which are _not_ broken?
All through the feverish wakeful night the same doubt had agitated
Naomi’s mind. Might not her lover have repented and returned to her?
So blessed a thing was just possible. He had loved her dearly once;
surely that old love could not die. He had often told her that love
was deathless. Fancy had gone astray, perhaps, and love had been true
all the time. Absence had taught him that she was still dear. O, how
tenderly she would have welcomed the returning prodigal, could she
but be sure of his repentance, sure that her love could even yet make
him happy! Thus argued hope; but despair took the other side. He had
come back in secret for some evil purpose. He had come back to see
Cynthia.
This day would show if he meant well or ill. If well, he would not
fear to show himself at Mr. Haggard’s house. He would come and make
peace with his betrothed. O, long hours of waiting, between morning
prayer and noontide--hours in which the simple household tasks were
performed, while the girl’s heart was given to alternate hope and
despair! Would he come? Would he prove true and good, despite of all
that had gone before!
Noon came, and dinner, and afternoon, and he did not appear. Hope
died in Naomi’s breast. She went about the house listlessly, yet
was too restless to sit long at her work. It happened to be a busy
afternoon in the drapery department, and aunt Judith was too well
employed behind the counter to observe her niece’s idle moving to
and fro, or else there would have been the small bitterness of that
maiden lady’s lectures superadded to the great bitterness of Naomi’s
despair.
Cynthia and Jim were in the garden. Those two were very friendly just
now. The poor little stepmother clung to the honest outspoken lad in
this time of cloud and brooding storm. Naomi’s coldness cut her to
the heart. She felt that there was a great gulf between her and her
husband. Of Judith’s dislike and distrust she was inwardly assured.
But Jim seemed fond of her, and he was of her husband’s flesh and
blood. The poor little timid soul went out to him in its loneliness.
‘Do you really like me, James?’ she asked to-day, as they were tying
up the carnations in the long garden border, Cynthia’s small face
shaded by a dimity sun-bonnet.
‘Liking isn’t the word, Cynthia,’ answered the boy. ‘I’m uncommonly
fond of you; and if you’d only show a little more spirit and make
aunt Judith give up the housekeeping, I should have a still better
opinion of you. Why should she stint us to one or two puddens a week,
and those as hard as brickbats; and a fruit pasty once in a blue
moon, when the garden’s running over with gooseberries and may-dukes?
It isn’t her place to order the puddens. It’s yours. It was all very
well to be trodden under her foot when we were orphans; but you’re
our mother now, and you ought to stand by us. Why don’t we have bacon
and fried potatoes for breakfast, like Christians? She’d let a whole
side go rusty before she’d give us the benefit of it. And my father
sits at the table and starves himself, and quotes William Law to show
that starvation is a Christian duty. I’ve no patience! I’m sure I
wonder I’ve grown up the fine young man I am upon such short commons.’
Jim came into the house half an hour later, and found Naomi in the
parlour. She was standing by the window idle, her work in her hands,
staring absently at the bend in the road yonder, by which Oswald
used to come on Herne the Hunter. Poor old faithful Herne! the tears
came into her eyes when she thought of him. He had been turned out to
grass, and she had seen him looking over gaps in the hedge, a haggard
unkempt beast. She had called him and coaxed him, and held out her
hand to invite his approach; and he had come with a shy sidelong gait
close up to her, and even sniffed at her in a friendly way, and then
shot off like a sky-rocket before she could caress his honest gray
nose.
Jim burst into the parlour like a whirlwind.
‘I thought you was fond of those crinkly harts-tongues I got for
you?’ he exclaimed, breathless with indignation.
‘So I am, Jim; very fond of them.’
‘Then you’d better get a bit of black stuff out of the shop and make
yourself a mourning-gown!’
‘Are they dead?’
‘They’re as near it as anything in the fern line can be--as yellow as
the inside of a poached egg, and half eaten by snails. How long is it
since you’ve been in the wilderness?’
‘I don’t know: a few days--a week, perhaps.’
‘You’re a nice young woman for an industrious brother to toil for!
The place is as dry as an ash-pit. What’s the use of my getting
you fine specimens, if this is the way you treat ’em? There’s the
parsley-fern crinkled up like a bit of whity-brown paper. Cynthia
and I have been giving the things a good dowsing; but they’ve been
shamefully neglected. I should have thought you could have found time
to look after them. _You’re_ not in the business,’ concluded Jim,
with a superior air.
‘Don’t be cross, Jim,’ faltered Naomi gently. ‘It was wrong of me to
neglect the ferns that you’ve taken such trouble to set for me; but
I have not done any gardening lately; I have not been feeling well
enough--’
And here Naomi burst into tears--Naomi, with whom tears were so rare.
Jim had his arms round her in a moment, and was hugging her like an
affectionate bruin.
‘There, there, there!’ he cried; ‘don’t fret. I oughtn’t to have been
so cross. You’ve had your troubles lately--father going and breaking
off your marriage without rhyme or reason. Nobody ever heard of
such tyranny. I’ll be sworn William Law, the father of Methodism, is
at the bottom of it. Suffering is good for us. It’s blessed to deny
ourselves. And my poor little sister mustn’t marry the man she loves!
Cheer up, Naomi; it will all come right in the end, I daresay, though
things are going crooked now. Don’t worry about the wilderness.
Cynthia and I are making things tidy--weeding and watering, and
training the creepers over the rockwork. You can come down and look
at us, if you like; it will cheer you up a bit.’
‘I’ll come presently, Jim dear,’ answered Naomi, drying her tears.
‘Be sure you do,’ said Jim; and then he hurried back to his work.
Naomi sat in the parlour for a quarter of an hour or so. She shed no
more tears, but sat with dry eyes looking straight before her.
Why had he come back? Not for her--O, not for her!
The day was nearly done. She could hear the rattling of teacups in
the pantry. Sally was getting her tray ready. That meant half-past
four o’clock. Naomi rose with a long heavy sigh, and went out into
the garden. It was to please her brother she went. There was no
pleasure or interest for her in earth or sky.
She walked slowly down the long straight garden path, where the
clove carnations and double stocks were in their glory, and through
the little orchard to the wilderness. Jim was hard at work--the
perspiration running down his forehead, his coat off, and his
shirt-sleeves rolled up to the elbow--dividing great tufts of
primroses and overgrown hartstongue. Cynthia was on her knees
weeding, a pretty picture of youth and fairness in the yellow
sunlight.
Naomi stood and looked at her. What was the charm in her that had
lured her false lover? Could the eye of another woman see the bait
that had won weak and fickle man; the enchantment which had wrought
alike upon the strong man in his meridian of knowledge and wisdom and
the youth in his folly?
Yes, the charm revealed itself even to the cold eye of a resentful
rival. It was not so much absolute beauty which allured in this
nameless waif as a soft and gracious innocence, a flower-like
loveliness, that stole upon mind and heart unawares.
She charmed the senses, as roses and lilies do in the early morning
while the dew is still on them. She appealed to the eye and held it,
like some picture which, in a long gallery, stands out from all other
images, and transfixes the spectator. She stole upon the soul like
music heard afar off on a river, in the still summer night.
Nor was it this outward charm of perfect fairness and grace
only which attracted. The soft lovableness of her disposition
accorded with the tender grace of her beauty. She had the clinging
affectionateness of a soft and yielding nature; a humility of spirit
which made her ready to reverence the strong; a tenderness of heart
which inclined her to pity the weak. In one word she was lovable--a
woman created to be loved.
Naomi stood and looked at her, full of bitter thoughts. For the first
time in her life she envied the gifts of another. She felt all the
good things that Providence had given her of no account when weighed
against the bewitchment of fair looks and winning ways.
‘How wicked I am growing!’ she thought, shocked at her own bitterness.
‘There!’ exclaimed Jim, pulling down his shirt-sleeves; ‘I think I
have done a tidy afternoon’s work. You’ll have oceans of primroses
next year, sis.’
‘If they don’t all die,’ said Naomi, not hopefully. ‘Do you think
it’s quite the right time for moving them?’
‘Primroses!’ cried Jim. ‘As if you could hurt a primrose! I know what
I am about, sister. They wouldn’t take any harm by my moving if they
were the delicatest flowers in a hot-house.’
He pulled on his coat, put away trowel and rake, and came out of the
wild garden into the orchard. Cynthia rose too, with an absent-minded
sigh, and followed him.
‘Now look here, little stepmother,’ he said, in his patronising way;
‘you’d better go in and make yourself tidy for tea, while I show
Naomi what I have done to her primroses.’
Cynthia obeyed without a word, and left them. Jim tucked his
sister’s arm under his own, and began to perambulate the orchard.
‘What’s the matter, Jim?’
‘Cheer up, old woman; I’ve got some good news for you. I won’t see
you trampled upon, not if I can help it. I won’t have your early
affections blighted, and young Pentreath sent to the right-about, if
I can prevent it. Don’t be afraid, sis; I’ll stand by you.’
‘Jim, what do you mean?’ cried Naomi piteously.
‘I’ve got a letter for you.’
Naomi’s heart leapt with sudden overwhelming joy. Oswald had written.
Thank God, thank God! She was not utterly forgotten.
‘A letter, Jim?’ clasping his arm rapturously. ‘How did it come?’
‘How should it come? He brought it himself, of course.’
‘And gave it to you? You saw him? Dear, dear Jim, tell me all about
it. How is he looking, ill or well?’
‘White and fagged; as if he’d been going to the--well, you know--all
the time he’s been in London. I only just caught a glimpse of him
above the wall.’
‘And he gave you the letter--’
‘No, that’s the fun of it. He didn’t see me. It was just as I came
back to the wilderness after I left you in the parlour. Cynthia was
sitting reading on the bench yonder. Just as I came to the gate, I
saw a pale face look over the wall; and then a white hand went up
and threw something over. It fell among the ferns, not a yard from
stepmother. But she never saw it; that was the lark. Her nose was in
her book, poetry or some such trash. I gave a whistle, and off went
my gentleman like a shot--scared away.’
‘And what became of the letter?’
‘Why, I picked it up unbeknown to Cynthia, when her back was turned.
It’s wrapped round a stone. There’s no address on it--too artful for
that--but I knew the party it was meant for.’
‘Are you sure it’s for me?’ asked Naomi, trembling a little. That
exceeding great joy fainted in her heart. A letter unaddressed, and
thrown at Cynthia’s feet!
‘Of course it’s for you. Stepmother sat with her back to the wall,
and her head and shoulders smothered in that great sun-bonnet of
hers. He might easy take her for you.’
‘Give me the letter, dear,’ said Naomi, with suppressed eagerness.
He handed her a little parcel--a goodish-sized pebble packed neatly
in a sheet of letter-paper, and carefully sealed with the well-known
coat-of-arms which had hung a year ago from the Squire’s fob.
‘Ain’t you going to read it?’ demanded Jim, as his sister stood
looking at the packet.
‘Not just yet, dear. I had rather read it when I am quite alone.’
‘O my!’ ejaculated Jim. ‘For fear some of the love should run over,
like clouted cream that hasn’t set properly. What it is to be in
love! Well, sis, I’ll leave you to the enjoyment of your love-letter,
while I go and clean myself.’
He ran off, leaving Naomi alone in the orchard. Fear held her hand
for a moment, though hope whispered that this little packet was full
of comfort and sweetness. It had fallen at Cynthia’s feet, said
fear. Was it not possible that it had been meant for Cynthia?
She broke the seal and carefully unfolded the sheet of Bath post--the
fair wide paper which our forefathers used when letters were worth
having.
It was a letter of three pages, written by a hand which betrayed
its owner’s emotion. Naomi’s eyes shone with an angry light as they
hurried over the lines. There was a name written here and there--a
hateful name, that told her the letter was not for her--‘My Cynthia;’
‘My Cynthia--mine by that mutual love which is our mutual sorrow!’
‘Villain and traitor!’ cried Naomi, with a burst of passion which
transformed her.
Had he stood before her in that moment, and she armed, she could
have stabbed him. This Naomi, who could have laid down her life to
accomplish some good and great thing, was, for this one instant,
capable of murder.
Such cruel perfidy, such heartless treachery, such shameless
iniquity, outraged her sense of justice. It seemed to her as if
Heaven had created a monster.
She had not yet read the letter, but Cynthia’s name stood out from
the tremulous lines as if it had been written in fire. Slowly, with
her hand pressed against her burning forehead, in the effort to keep
brain and understanding clear, she addressed herself to the hateful
task.
She would know the lowest deep of man’s infamy: a lover who could
forsake his sworn love; a man, calling himself a gentleman, who could
try to seduce a good man’s wife.
The letter was incoherent, passionate--despair’s foolish appeal
against Fate:
‘I must see you once again--yes, dearest, at whatever hazard to
you or me, at whatever cost. I have made up my mind to live and
die far away from the dear place that holds you. The wide, bleak,
barren sea shall roll between me and my beloved. I am going to
America; that is far enough, surely! Death could part us no wider
than the Atlantic. I shall look at that great sea, and think how
the green waves roll up the golden sands of home and kiss your
feet; how the white spray blows into your hair and caresses
you like a cloud--and I am no Jove, to be in that cloud, love.
I shall be severed from you for ever. But before I sail for the
other side of the sea I must see you once more; yes, Cynthia, my
Cynthia--mine by that mutual love which is our mutual sorrow--I
must see you once more, clasp your hand and say farewell; bless
you, and be blessed by you. Trust me, trust me, my beloved, with
but one meeting. There shall no evil word be spoken; you shall
not even hear me complain against Fate. I will only take your
hand in mine and say good-bye. Vain blessing, you will say;
but, dearest love, the memory of that moment will comfort me in
weary days and nights to come. I would but know that you pity
and forgive and pray for me; and that, if Fate had willed it so,
you might have loved me. It will be like a parting between two
friends when one is doomed to die. I shall think the executioner
is waiting at the door, and the death-bell ready to toll. O dear
love, by thy tender and pitying heart, I adjure thee, grant me
this last prayer! Thy Werther, despairing unto death, pleads to
thee!
‘I have come back to Devonshire for this only--to see you once
more. I have taken my passage for New York. All is settled;
nothing can alter my decision. I am not weak enough, or guilty
enough, to remain within reach of you. I thought that in London
I might forget; but your image followed me everywhere I went;
in crowds or in solitudes, you were always near; nothing but a
lifelong exile can cure my wound or expiate my guilt.
‘Let me see you, beloved one. I shall contrive to convey this
letter to you by some means in the course of to-day. Meet me
to-morrow afternoon; and to-morrow night, by the coach which
starts from the First and Last at eight o’clock, I will leave
Combhaven for ever. Your afternoons are always free; I shall wait
for you, from two to four o’clock, on the common beyond Matcherly
Wood, near the old shaft. It is rather far for you to come, but I
think it is the safest place for our meeting. No one ever comes
there but a stray cowboy in quest of his cattle.
‘Come, dearest; it is the only boon you can bestow upon one whose
heart you have broken unawares.--Yours till death,
‘OSWALD.’
This was the letter. Naomi read it slowly to the end, and then put it
in her pocket.
A shrill shriek from the house-door roused her from abstraction.
‘Naomi, are you coming?’ at the top of aunt Judith’s high-pitched
voice.
‘We never do have our teas like Christians nowadays!’ complained Miss
Haggard, as Naomi came into the parlour breathless. ‘Have you seen
another ghost, girl?’ she asked, staring at her niece. ‘You look as
white as a yard of calico. Here’s your father not home to his tea
again; that makes the third time this week.’
‘He is attending to his duty, no doubt, aunt.’
‘Who says he isn’t? But I wish he could contrive to combine duty with
punctuality at meals. I hate a disorderly table.’
Joshua came in just as they had finished their meal. His large cup of
tea had been put on one side for him, covered with a saucer. He sat
down in his arm-chair and drank his tea in silence. He was looking
exhausted and weary.
‘I am afraid you have had a hard afternoon’s work, Joshua,’ Cynthia
said, sitting down beside him timidly.
‘I have been in the house of death, my dear; that is always trying to
weak humanity. And I have walked a long way in the sun.’
Naomi sat by the window darning Jim’s stockings. Aunt Judith retired
to the drapery department. Joshua leant back in his chair, with
closed eyes. Cynthia took up a book; it was Milton’s _Paradise
Lost_, one of the few imaginative works of which Mr. Haggard did not
disapprove.
They sat thus for some time, in a silence only broken by the lowing
of distant cattle and the gentle lapping of summer waves upon the
pebbly beach. Then Jim looked in at the door and called Cynthia. She
rose quickly and went out to him, and Naomi was alone with her father.
This was the opportunity she had been waiting for. After reading
Oswald’s letter she had come to a desperate resolve. These lofty
natures have a touch of hardness in their composition sometimes. A
sense of immunity from sin and weakness makes them stony-hearted
judges of erring humanity. Oswald’s wrongdoing had awakened that
latent element of hardness in Naomi’s nature. She thought she was
only doing her duty in taking desperate measures. Or was it jealousy
which put on a mask and called itself justice? She took the letter
out of her pocket, and looked at her father. He was not asleep, only
resting with closed eyes.
‘Father,’ said Naomi, in a low voice, ‘here is a letter which has
come to me by accident, and which I think you ought to see. It is
from Oswald to your wife.’
She put the letter into his hand and left him. She dared not await
the issue of her act.