Lights danced before me; bells rang in my ears; the pressure on my lungs
grew more intolerable with each moment; but still I fought with that
lid. Seven devils were within me and helped me; and all the while I
knew that I was dying, that unless the box were opened in a moment or
two it would be too late.
The sweat ran off my eyebrows and dripped on the box. My breath came
and went in sobs. I could not die. I could not, must not die. And so
I tugged and strained and tugged again.
Then, as I felt the black anguish of the Blue Room descending a second
time upon me, I seemed to put all my strength into my hands. From the
lid or from my own throat--I could not distinguish--there came a creak
and a long groan. I tore back the board and fell on the heath with one
shuddering breath of relief.
And drawing it, I raised my head and looked over the coffin's edge.
Still drawing it, I tumbled back.
White, cold, with the last struggle fixed on its features and open eyes,
it was my own dead face that stared up at me!
IV.
WHAT I HAVE SINCE LEARNT.
They found me, next morning, lying on the brink of the tarn, and carried
me back to the inn. There I lay for weeks in a brain fever and talked--
as they assure me--the wildest nonsense. The landlord had first guessed
that something was amiss on finding the front door open when he came
down at five o'clock. I must have turned to the left on leaving the
house, travelled up the road for a hundred yards, and then struck almost
at right angles across the moor. One of my shoes was found a furlong
from the highway, and this had guided them. Of course they found no
coffin beside me, and I was prudent enough to hold my tongue when I
became convalescent. But the effect of that night was to shatter my
health for a year and more, and force me to throw up my post of School
Inspector. To this day I have never examined the school at Pitt's
Scawens. But somebody else has; and last winter I received a letter,
which I will give in full:--
21, Chesterham Road, KENSINGTON, W.
December 3rd, 1891.
Dear Wraxall,--
It is a long time since we have corresponded, but I have just
returned from Cornwall, and while visiting Pitt's Scawens
professionally, was reminded of you. I put up at the inn where
you had your long illness. The people there were delighted to
find that I knew you, and desired me to send "their duty" when
next I wrote. By the way, I suppose you were introduced to their
state apartment--the Blue Room--and its wonderful chimney carving.
I made a bid to the landlord for it, panels, mirror, and all, but
he referred me to Squire Parkyn, the landlord. I think I may get
it, as the Squire loves hard coin. When I have it up over my
mantel-piece here you must run over and give me your opinion on it.
By the way, clay has been discovered on the Tremenhuel Estate, just
at the back of the "Indian Queens": at least, I hear that Squire
Parkyn is running a Company, and is sanguine. You remember the
tarn behind the inn? They made an odd discovery there when
draining it for the new works. In the mud at the bottom was
imbedded the perfect skeleton of a man. The bones were quite clean
and white. Close beside the body they afterwards turned up a
silver snuff-box, with the word "Fui" on the lid. "Fui" was the
motto of the Cardinnocks, who held Tremenhuel before it passed to
the Parkyns. There seems to be no doubt that these are the bones
of the last Squire, who disappeared mysteriously more than a
hundred years ago, in consequence of a love affair, I'm told.
It looks like foul play; but, if so, the account has long since
passed out of the hands of man.
Yours ever, David E. Mainwaring.
P.S.--I reopen this to say that Squire Parkyn has accepted my offer
for the chimney-piece. Let me hear soon that you'll come and look
at it and give me your opinion.
THE TWO HOUSEHOLDERS.
_Extract from the Memoirs of Gabriel Foot, Highwayman._
I will say this--speaking as accurately as a man may, so long
afterwards--that when first I spied the house it put no desire in me but
just to give thanks.
For conceive my case. It was near mid-night, and ever since dusk I had
been tramping the naked moors, in the teeth of as vicious a nor'-wester
as ever drenched a man to the skin, and then blew the cold home to his
marrow. My clothes were sodden; my coat-tails flapped with a noise like
pistol-shots; my boots squeaked as I went. Overhead, the October moon
was in her last quarter, and might have been a slice of finger-nail for
all the light she afforded. Two-thirds of the time the wrack blotted
her out altogether; and I, with my stick clipped tight under my armpit,
eyes puckered up, and head bent aslant, had to keep my wits alive to
distinguish the road from the black heath to right and left. For three
hours I had met neither man nor man's dwelling, and (for all I knew) was
desperately lost. Indeed, at the cross-roads, two miles back, there had
been nothing for me but to choose the way that kept the wind on my face,
and it gnawed me like a dog.
Mainly to allay the stinging of my eyes, I pulled up at last, turned
right-about-face, leant back against the blast with a hand on my hat,
and surveyed the blackness behind. It was at this instant that, far
away to the left, a point of light caught my notice, faint but steady;
and at once I felt sure it burnt in the window of a house. "The house,"
thought I, "is a good mile off, beside the other road, and the light
must have been an inch over my hat-brim for the last half-hour."
This reflection--that on so wide a moor I had come near missing the
information I wanted (and perhaps a supper) by one inch--sent a strong
thrill down my back.
I cut straight across the heather towards the light, risking quags and
pitfalls. Nay, so heartening was the chance to hear a fellow creature's
voice, that I broke into a run, skipping over the stunted gorse that
cropped up here and there, and dreading every moment to see the light
quenched. "Suppose it burns in an upper window, and the family is going
to bed, as would be likely at this hour--" The apprehension kept my
eyes fixed on the bright spot, to the frequent scandal of my legs, that
within five minutes were stuck full of gorse prickles.
But the light did not go out, and soon a flicker of moonlight gave me a
glimpse of the house's outline. It proved to be a deal more imposing
than I looked for--the outline, in fact, of a tall, square barrack, with
a cluster of chimneys at either end, like ears, and a high wall, topped
by the roofs of some outbuildings, concealing the lower windows. There
was no gate in this wall, and presently I guessed the reason. I was
approaching the place from behind, and the light came from a back window
on the first floor.
The faintness of the light also was explained by this time. It shone
behind a drab-coloured blind, and in shape resembled the stem of a
wine-glass, broadening out at the foot; an effect produced by the
half-drawn curtains within. I came to a halt, waiting for the next ray
of moonlight. At the same moment a rush of wind swept over the
chimney-stacks, and on the wind there seemed to ride a human sigh.
On this last point I may err. The gust had passed some seconds before I
caught myself detecting this peculiar note, and trying to disengage it
from the natural chords of the storm. From the next gust it was absent;
and then, to my dismay, the light faded from the window.
I was half-minded to call out when it appeared again, this time in two
windows--those next on the right to that where it had shone before.
Almost at once it increased in brilliance, as if the person who carried
it from the smaller room to the larger were lighting more candles; and
now the illumination was strong enough to make fine gold threads of the
rain that fell within its radiance, and fling two shafts of warm yellow
over the coping of the back wall. During the minute or more that I
stood watching, no shadow fell on either blind.
Between me and the wall ran a ditch, into which the ground at my feet
broke sharply away. Setting my back to the storm again, I followed the
lip of this ditch around the wall's angle. Here it shallowed, and here,
too, was shelter; but not wishing to mistake a bed of nettles or any
such pitfall for solid earth, I kept pretty wide as I went on.
The house was dark on this side, and the wall, as before, had no
opening. Close beside the next angle there grew a mass of thick gorse
bushes, and pushing through these I found myself suddenly on a sound
high-road, with the wind tearing at me as furiously as ever.
But here was the front; and I now perceived that the surrounding wall
advanced some way before the house, so as to form a narrow courtlage.
So much of it, too, as faced the road had been whitewashed, which made
it an easy matter to find the gate. But as I laid hand on its latch I
had a surprise.
A line of paving-stones led from the gate to a heavy porch; and along
the wet surface of these there fell a streak of light from the front
door, which stood ajar.
That a door should remain six inches open on such a night was
astonishing enough, until I entered the court and found it as still as a
room, owing to the high wall. But looking up and assuring myself that
all the rest of the facade was black as ink, I wondered at the
carelessness of the inmates.
It was here that my professional instinct received the first jog.
Abating the sound of my feet on the paving-stones, I went up to the door
and pushed it softly. It opened without noise.
I stepped into a fair-sized hall of modern build, paved with red tiles
and lit with a small hanging-lamp. To right and left were doors leading
to the ground-floor rooms. Along the wall by my shoulder ran a line of
pegs, on which hung half-a-dozen hats and great-coats, every one of
clerical shape; and full in front of me a broad staircase ran up, with a
staring Brussels carpet, the colours and pattern of which I can recall
as well as I can to-day's breakfast. Under this staircase was set a
stand full of walking-sticks, and a table littered with gloves, brushes,
a hand-bell, a riding-crop, one or two dog-whistles, and a bedroom
candle, with tinder-box beside it. This, with one notable exception,
was all the furniture.
The exception--which turned me cold--was the form of a yellow mastiff
dog, curled on a mat beneath the table. The arch of his back was
towards me, and one forepaw lay over his nose in a natural posture of
sleep. I leant back on the wainscotting with my eyes tightly fixed on
him, and my thoughts sneaking back, with something of regret, to the
storm I had come through.
But a man's habits are not easily denied. At the end of three minutes
the dog had not moved, and I was down on the door-mat unlacing my soaked
boots. Slipping them off, and taking them in my left hand, I stood up,
and tried a step towards the stairs, with eyes alert for any movement of
the mastiff; but he never stirred. I was glad enough, however, on
reaching the stairs, to find them newly built, and the carpet thick. Up
I went, with a glance at every step for the table which now hid the
brute's form from me, and never a creak did I wake out of that staircase
till I was almost at the first landing, when my toe caught a loose
stair-rod, and rattled it in a way that stopped my heart for a moment,
and then set it going in double-quick time.
I stood still with a hand on the rail. My eyes were now on a level with
the floor of the landing, out of which branched two passages--one
turning sharply to my right, the other straight in front, so that I was
gazing down the length of it. Almost at the end, a parallelogram of
light fell across it from an open door.
A man who has once felt it knows there is only one kind of silence that
can fitly be called "dead." This is only to be found in a great house
at midnight. I declare that for a few seconds after I rattled the
stair-rod you might have cut the silence with a knife. If the house
held a clock, it ticked inaudibly.
Upon this silence, at the end of a minute, broke a light sound--the
_tink-tink_ of a decanter on the rim of a wine-glass. It came from the
room where the light was.
Now perhaps it was that the very thought of liquor put warmth into my
cold bones. It is certain that all of a sudden I straightened my back,
took the remaining stairs at two strides, and walked down the passage as
bold as brass, without caring a jot for the noise I made.
In the doorway I halted. The room was long, lined for the most part
with books bound in what they call "divinity calf," and littered with
papers like a barrister's table on assize day. A leathern elbow-chair
faced the fireplace, where a few coals burned sulkily, and beside it, on
the corner of a writing table, were set an unlit candle and a pile of
manuscripts. At the opposite end of the room a curtained door led (as I
guessed) to the chamber that I had first seen illuminated. All this I
took in with the tail of my eye, while staring straight in front, where,
in the middle of a great square of carpet, between me and the windows,
stood a table with a red cloth upon it. On this cloth were a couple of
wax candles lit, in silver stands, a tray, and a decanter three-parts
full of brandy. And between me and the table stood a man.
He stood sideways, leaning a little back, as if to keep his shadow off
the threshold, and looked at me over his left shoulder--a bald, grave
man, slightly under the common height, with a long clerical coat of
preposterous fit hanging loosely from his shoulders, a white cravat,
black breeches, and black stockings. His feet were loosely thrust into
carpet slippers. I judged his age at fifty, or thereabouts; but his
face rested in the shadow, and I could only note a pair of eyes, very
small and alert, twinkling above a large expanse of cheek.
He was lifting a wine-glass from the table at the moment when I
appeared, and it trembled now in his right hand. I heard a spilt drop
or two fall on the carpet. This was all the evidence he showed of
discomposure.
Setting the glass back, he felt in his breast-pocket for a handkerchief,
failed to find one, and rubbed his hands together to get the liquor off
his fingers.
"You startled me," he said, in a matter-of-fact tone, turning his eyes
upon me, as he lifted his glass again, and emptied it. "How did you
find your way in?"
"By the front door," said I, wondering at his unconcern.
He nodded his head slowly.
"Ah! yes; I forgot to lock it. You came to steal, I suppose?"
"I came because I'd lost my way. I've been travelling this
God-forsaken moor since dusk--"
"With your boots in your hand," he put in quietly.
"I took them off out of respect to the yellow dog you keep."
"He lies in a very natural attitude--eh?"
"You don't tell me he was _stuffed?_"
The old man's eyes beamed a contemptuous pity.
"You are indifferent sharp, my dear sir, for a housebreaker. Come in.
Set down those convicting boots, and don't drip pools of water in the
doorway. If I must entertain a burglar, I prefer him tidy."
He walked to the fire, picked up a poker, and knocked the coals into a
blaze. This done, he turned round on me with the poker still in his
hand. The serenest gravity sat on his large, pale features.
"Why have I done this?" he asked.
"I suppose to get possession of the poker."
"Quite right. May I inquire your next move?"
"Why?" said I, feeling in my tail-pocket, "I carry a pistol."
"Which I suppose to be damp?"
"By no means. I carry it, as you see, in an oil-cloth case."
He stooped, and laid the poker carefully in the fender.
"That is a stronger card than I possess. I might urge that by pulling
the trigger you would certainly alarm the house and the neighbourhood,
and put a halter round your neck. But it strikes me as safer to assume
you capable of using a pistol with effect at three paces. With what
might happen subsequently I will not pretend to be concerned. The fate
of your neck"--he waved a hand,--"well, I have known you for just five
minutes, and feel but a moderate interest in your neck. As for the
inmates of this house, it will refresh you to hear that there are none.
I have lived here two years with a butler and female cook, both of whom
I dismissed yesterday at a minute's notice, for conduct which I will not
shock your ears by explicitly naming. Suffice it to say, I carried them
off yesterday to my parish church, two miles away, married them and
dismissed them in the vestry without characters. I wish you had known
that butler--but excuse me; with the information I have supplied, you
ought to find no difficulty in fixing the price you will take to clear
out of my house instanter."
"Sir," I answered, "I have held a pistol at one or two heads in my time,
but never at one stuffed with nobler indiscretion. Your chivalry does
not, indeed, disarm me, but prompts me to desire more of your
acquaintance. I have found a gentleman, and must sup with him before I
make terms."
This address seemed to please him. He shuffled across the room to a
sideboard, and produced a plate of biscuits, another of dried figs, a
glass, and two decanters.
"Sherry and Madeira," he said. "There is also a cold pie in the larder,
if you care for it."
"A biscuit will serve," I replied. "To tell the truth, I'm more for the
bucket than the manger, as the grooms say: and the brandy you were
tasting just now is more to my mind than wine."
"There is no water handy."
"I have soaked in enough to-night to last me with this bottle."
I pulled over a chair, laid my pistol on the table, and held out the
glass for him to fill. Having done so, he helped himself to a glass and
a chair, and sat down facing me.
"I was speaking, just now, of my late butler," he began, with a sip at
his brandy. "Does it strike you that, when confronted with moral
delinquency, I am apt to let my indignation get the better of me?"
"Not at all," I answered heartily, refilling my glass.
It appeared that another reply would have pleased him better.
"H'm. I was hoping that, perhaps, I had visited his offence too
strongly. As a clergyman, you see, I was bound to be severe; but upon
my word, sir, since Parkinson left I have felt like a man who has lost a
limb."
He drummed with his fingers on the cloth for a few moments, and went
on--
"One has a natural disposition to forgive butlers--Pharaoh, for
instance, felt it. There hovers around butlers an atmosphere in which
common ethics lose their pertinence. But mine was a rare bird--a black
swan among butlers! He was more than a butler: he was a quick and
brightly gifted man. Of the accuracy of his taste, and the unusual
scope of his endeavour, you will be able to form some opinion when I
assure you he modelled himself upon _me_."
I bowed, over my brandy.
"I am a scholar: yet I employed him to read aloud to me, and derived
pleasure from his intonation. I talk with refinement: yet he learned to
answer me in language as precise as my own. My cast-off garments fitted
him not more irreproachably than did my amenities of manner. Divest him
of his tray, and you would find his mode of entering a room hardly
distinguishable from my own--the same urbanity, the same alertness of
carriage, the same superfine deference towards the weaker sex. All--all
my idiosyncrasies I saw reflected in him; and can you doubt that I was
gratified? He was my _alter ego_--which, by the way, makes it harder
for me to pardon his behaviour with the cook."
"Look here," I broke in; "you want a new butler?"
"Oh, you really grasp that fact, do you?" he retorted.
"Why, then," said I, "let me cease to be your burglar and let me
continue here as your butler."
He leant back, spreading out the fingers of each hand on the table's
edge.
"Believe me," I went on, "you might do worse. I have been in my time a
demy of Magdalen College, Oxford, and retain some Greek and Latin.
I'll undertake to read the Fathers with an accent that shall not offend
you. My taste in wine is none the worse for having been formed in other
men's cellars. Moreover, you shall engage the ugliest cook in
Christendom, so long as I'm your butler. I've taken a liking to you--
that's flat--and I apply for the post."
"I give forty pounds a year," said he.
"And I'm cheap at that price."
He filled up his glass, looking up at me while he did so with the air of
one digesting a problem. From first to last his face was grave as a
judge's.
"We are too impulsive, I think," was his answer, after a minute's
silence; "and your speech smacks of the amateur. You say, 'Let me cease
to be your burglar and let me be your butler.' The aspiration is
respectable; but a man might as well say, 'Let me cease to write
sermons, let me paint pictures.' And truly, sir, you impress me as no
expert even in your present trade."
"On the other hand," I argued, "consider the moderation of my demands;
that alone should convince you of my desire to turn over a new leaf.
I ask for a month's trial; if at the end of that time I don't suit, you
shall say so, and I'll march from your door with nothing in my pocket
but my month's wages. Be hanged, sir! but when I reflect on the amount
you'll have to pay to get me to face to-night's storm again, you seem to
be getting off dirt cheap!" cried I, slapping my palm on the table.
"Ah, if you had only known Parkinson!" he exclaimed.
Now the third glass of clean spirit has always a deplorable effect on
me. It turns me from bright to black, from levity to extreme sulkiness.
I have done more wickedness over this third tumbler than in all the
other states of comparative inebriety within my experience. So now I
glowered at my companion and cursed.
"Look here, I don't want to hear any more of Parkinson, and I've a
pretty clear notion of the game you're playing. You want to make me
drink, and you're ready to sit prattling there plying me till I drop
under the table."
"Do me the favour to remember that you came, and are staying, on your
own motion. As for the brandy, I would remind you that I suggested a
milder drink. Try some Madeira."
He handed me the decanter, as he spoke, and I poured out a glass.
"Madeira!" said I, taking a gulp, "Ugh! it's the commonest Marsala!"
I had no sooner said the words than he rose up, and stretched a hand
gravely across to me.
"I hope you will shake it," he said; "though, as a man who after three
glasses of neat spirit can distinguish between Madeira and Marsala, you
have every right to refuse me. Two minutes ago you offered to become my
butler, and I demurred. I now beg you to repeat that offer. Say the
word, and I employ you gladly; you shall even have the second decanter
(which contains genuine Madeira) to take to bed with you."
We shook hands on our bargain, and catching up a candlestick, he led the
way from the room.
Picking up my boots, I followed him along the passage and down the
silent staircase. In the hall he paused to stand on tip-toe, and turn
up the lamp, which was burning low. As he did so, I found time to fling
a glance at my old enemy, the mastiff. He lay as I had first seen him--
a stuffed dog, if ever there was one. "Decidedly," thought I, "my wits
are to seek to-night;" and with the same, a sudden suspicion made me
turn to my conductor, who had advanced to the left-hand door, and was
waiting for me, with a hand on the knob.
"One moment!" I said: "This is all very pretty, but how am I to know
you're not sending me to bed while you fetch in all the countryside to
lay me by the heels?"
"I'm afraid," was his answer, "you must be content with my word, as a
gentleman, that never, to-night or hereafter, will I breathe a syllable
about the circumstances of your visit. However, if you choose, we will
return up-stairs."
"No; I'll trust you," said I; and he opened the door.
It led into a broad passage paved with slate, upon which three or four
rooms opened. He paused by the second and ushered me into a
sleeping-chamber, which, though narrow, was comfortable enough--a vast
improvement, at any rate, on the mumpers' lodgings I had been used to
for many months past.
"You can undress here," he said. "The sheets are aired, and if you'll
wait a moment, I'll fetch a nightshirt--one of my own."
"Sir, you heap coals of fire on me."
"Believe me that for ninety-nine of your qualities I do not care a
tinker's curse; but for your palate you are to be taken care of."
He shuffled away, but came back in a couple of minutes with the
nightshirt.
"Good-night," he called to me, flinging it in at the door; and without
giving me time to return the wish, went his way up-stairs.
Now it might be supposed I was only too glad to toss off my clothes and
climb into the bed I had so unexpectedly acquired a right to. But, as a
matter of fact, I did nothing of the kind. Instead, I drew on my boots
and sat on the bed's edge, blinking at my candle till it died down in
its socket, and afterwards at the purple square of window as it slowly
changed to grey with the coming of dawn. I was cold to the heart, and
my teeth chattered with an ague. Certainly I never suspected my host's
word; but was even occupied in framing good resolutions and shaping out
a reputable future, when I heard the front door gently pulled to, and a
man's footsteps moving quietly to the gate.
The treachery knocked me in a heap for the moment. Then, leaping up and
flinging my door wide, I stumbled through the uncertain light of the
passage into the front hall. There was a fan-shaped light over the
door, and the place was very still and grey. A quick thought, or,
rather, a sudden, prophetic guess at the truth, made me turn to the
figure of the mastiff curled under the hall table.
I laid my hand on the scruff of his neck. He was quite limp, and my
fingers sank into the flesh on either side of the vertebrae.
Digging them deeper, I dragged him out into the middle of the hall and
pulled the front door open to see the better.
His throat was gashed from ear to ear.
How many seconds passed after I dropped the senseless lump on the floor,
and before I made another movement, it would puzzle me to say. Twice I
stirred a foot as if to run out at the door. Then, changing my mind, I
stepped over the mastiff, and ran up the staircase.
The passage at the top was now dark; but groping down it, I found the
study door open, as before, and passed in. A sick light stole through
the blinds--enough for me to distinguish the glasses and decanters on
the table, and find my way to the curtain that hung before the inner
room.
I pushed the curtain aside, paused for a moment, and listened to the
violent beat of my heart; then felt for the door-handle and turned
it.
All I could see at first was that the chamber was small; next, that the
light patch in a line with the window was the white coverlet of a bed;
and next that somebody, or something, lay on the bed.
I listened again. There was no sound in the room; no heart beating but
my own. I reached out a hand to pull up the blind, and drew it back
again. I dared not.
The daylight grew minute by minute on the dull oblong of the blind, and
minute by minute that horrible thing on the bed took something of
distinctness.
The strain beat me at last. I fetched a loud yell to give myself
courage, and, reaching for the cord, pulled up the blind as fast as it
would go.
The face on the pillow was that of an old man--a face waxen and
peaceful, with quiet lines about the mouth and eyes, and long lines of
grey hair falling back from the temples. The body was turned a little
on one side, and one hand lay outside the bedclothes in a very natural
manner. But there were two big dark stains on the pillow and coverlet.
Then I knew I was face to face with the real householder, and it flashed
on me that I had been indiscreet in taking service as his butler, and
that I knew the face his ex-butler wore.
And, being by this time awake to the responsibilities of the post, I
quitted it three steps at a time, not once looking behind me.
Outside the house the storm had died down, and white daylight was
gleaming over the sodden moors. But my bones were cold, and I ran
faster and faster.
THE DISENCHANTMENT OF 'LIZABETH.
"So you reckon I've got to die?"
The room was mean, but not without distinction. The meanness lay in
lime-washed walls, scant fittings, and uncovered boards; the distinction
came of ample proportions and something of durability in the furniture.
Rooms, like human faces, reflect their histories; and that generation
after generation of the same family had here struggled to birth or death
was written in this chamber unmistakably. The candle-light, twinkling
on the face of a dark wardrobe near the door, lit up its rough
inscription, "S.T. and M.T., MDCLXVII"; the straight-backed oaken chairs
might well claim an equal age; and the bed in the corner was a spacious
four-poster, pillared in smooth mahogany and curtained in faded green
damask.
In the shadow of this bed lay the man who had spoken. A single candle
stood on a tall chest at his left hand, and its ray, filtering through
the thin green curtain, emphasised the hue of death on his face.
The features were pinched, and very old. His tone held neither
complaint nor passion: it was matter-of-fact even, as of one whose talk
is merely a concession to good manners. There was the faintest
interrogation in it; no more.
After a minute or so, getting no reply, he added more querulously--
"I reckon you might answer, 'Lizabeth. Do 'ee think I've got to die?"
'Lizabeth, who stood by the uncurtained window, staring into the
blackness without, barely turned her head to answer--
"Certain."
"Doctor said so, did he?"
'Lizabeth, still with her back towards him, nodded. For a minute or two
there was silence.
"I don't feel like dyin'; but doctor ought to know. Seemed to me 'twas
harder, an'--an' more important. This sort o' dyin' don't seem o' much
account."
"No?"
"That's it. I reckon, though, 'twould be other if I had a family round
the bed. But there ain't none o' the boys left to stand by me now.
It's hard."
"What's hard?"
"Why, that two out o' the three should be called afore me. And hard is
the manner of it. It's hard that, after Samuel died o' fever, Jim shud
be blown up at Herodsfoot powder-mill. He made a lovely corpse, did
Samuel; but Jim, you see, he hadn't a chance. An' as for William, he's
never come home nor wrote a line since he joined the Thirty-Second; an'
it's little he cares for his home or his father. I reckoned, back
along, 'Lizabeth, as you an' he might come to an understandin'."
"William's naught to me."
"Look here!" cried the old man sharply; "he treated you bad, did
William."
"Who says so?"
"Why, all the folks. Lord bless the girl! do 'ee think folks use their
eyes without usin' their tongues? An' I wish it had come about, for
you'd ha' kept en straight. But he treated you bad, and he treated me
bad, tho' he won't find no profit o' that. You'm my sister's child,
'Lizabeth," he rambled on; "an' what house-room you've had you've fairly
earned--not but what you was welcome: an' if I thought as there was harm
done, I'd curse him 'pon my deathbed, I would."
"You be quiet!"
She turned from the window and cowed him with angry grey eyes.
Her figure was tall and meagre; her face that of a woman well over
thirty--once comely, but worn over-much, and prematurely hardened.
The voice had hardened with it, perhaps. The old man, who had risen on
his elbow in an access of passion, was taken with a fit of coughing, and
sank back upon the pillows.
"There's no call to be niffy," he apologised at last. "I was on'y
thinkin' of how you'd manage when I'm dead an' gone."
"I reckon I'll shift."
She drew a chair towards the bed and sat beside him. He seemed drowsy,
and after a while stretched out an arm over the coverlet and fell
asleep. 'Lizabeth took his hand, and sat there listlessly regarding the
still shadows on the wall. The sick man never moved; only muttered
once--some words that 'Lizabeth did not catch. At the end of an hour,
alarmed perhaps by some sound within the bed's shadow, or the feel of
the hand in hers, she suddenly pushed the curtain back, and, catching up
the candle, stooped over the sick man.
His lids were closed, as if he slept still; but he was quite dead.
'Lizabeth stood for a while bending over him, smoothed the bedclothes
straight, and quietly left the room. It was a law of the house to doff
boots and shoes at the foot of the stairs, and her stocking'd feet
scarcely raised a creak from the solid timbers. The staircase led
straight down into the kitchen. Here a fire was blazing cheerfully, and
as she descended she felt its comfort after the dismal room above.
Nevertheless, the sense of being alone in the house with a dead man, and
more than a mile from any living soul, was disquieting. In truth, there
was room for uneasiness. 'Lizabeth knew that some part of the old man's
hoard lay up-stairs in the room with him. Of late she had, under his
eye, taken from a silver tankard in the tall chest by the bed such
moneys as from week to week were wanted to pay the farm hands; and she
had seen papers there, too--title-deeds, maybe. The house itself lay in
a cup of the hill-side, backed with steep woods--so steep that, in
places, anyone who had reasons (good or bad) for doing so, might well
see in at any window he chose. And to Hooper's Farm, down the valley,
was a far cry for help. Meditating on this, 'Lizabeth stepped to the
kitchen window and closed the shutter; then, reaching down an old
horse-pistol from the rack above the mantelshelf, she fetched out powder
and bullet and fell to loading quietly, as one who knew the trick of it.
And yet the sense of danger was not so near as that of loneliness--of a
pervading silence without precedent in her experience, as if its
master's soul in flitting had, whatever Scripture may say, taken
something out of the house with it. 'Lizabeth had known this kitchen
for a score of years now; nevertheless, to-night it was unfamiliar, with
emptier corners and wider intervals of bare floor. She laid down the
loaded pistol, raked the logs together, and set the kettle on the flame.
She would take comfort in a dish of tea.
There was company in the singing of the kettle, the hiss of its overflow
on the embers, and the rattle with which she set out cup, saucer, and
teapot. She was bending over the hearth to lift the kettle, when a
sound at the door caused her to start up and listen.
The latch had been rattled: not by the wind, for the December night
without was misty and still. There was somebody on the other side of
the door; and, as she turned, she saw the latch lowered back into its
place.
With her eyes fastened on this latch, she set down the kettle softly and
reached out for her pistol. For a moment or two there was silence.
Then someone tapped gently.
The tapping went on for half a minute; then followed silence again.
'Lizabeth stole across the kitchen, pistol in hand, laid her ear
against the board, and listened.
Yes, assuredly there was someone outside. She could catch the sound of
breathing, and the shuffling of a heavy boot on the door-slate. And now
a pair of knuckles repeated the tapping, more imperiously.
"Who's there?"
A man's voice, thick and husky, made some indistinct reply.
'Lizabeth fixed the cap more securely on her pistol, and called again--
"Who's there?"
"What the devil--" began the voice.
'Lizabeth shot back the bolt and lifted the latch.
"If you'd said at once 'twas William come back, you'd ha' been let in
sooner," she said quietly.
A thin puff of rain floated against her face as the door opened, and a
tall soldier stepped out of the darkness into the glow of the warm
kitchen.
"Well, this here's a queer home-coming. Why, hullo, 'Lizabeth--with a
pistol in your hand, too! Do you shoot the fatted calf in these parts
now? What's the meaning of it?"
The overcoat of cinder grey that covered his scarlet tunic was powdered
with beads of moisture; his black moustaches were beaded also; his face
was damp, and smeared with the dye that trickled from his sodden cap.
As he stood there and shook himself, the rain ran down and formed small
pools upon the slates around his muddy boots.
He was a handsome fellow, in a florid, animal fashion; well-set, with
black curls, dark eyes that yet contrived to be exceedingly shallow, and
as sanguine a pair of cheeks as one could wish to see. It seemed to
'Lizabeth that the red of his complexion had deepened since she saw him
last, while the white had taken a tinge of yellow, reminding her of the
prize beef at the Christmas market last week. Somehow she could find
nothing to say.
"The old man's in bed, I reckon. I saw the light in his window."
"You've had a wet tramp of it," was all she found to reply, though aware
that the speech was inconsequent and trivial.
"Damnably. Left the coach at Fiddler's Cross, and trudged down across
the fields. We were soaked enough on the coach, though, and couldn't
get much worse."
"We?"
"Why, you don't suppose I was the only passenger by the coach, eh?" he
put in quickly.
"No, I forgot."
There was an awkward silence, and William's eyes travelled round the
kitchen till they lit on the kettle standing by the hearthstone.
"Got any rum in the cupboard?" While she was getting it out, he took
off his cap and great-coat, hung them up behind the door, and, pulling
the small table close to the fire, sat beside it, toasting his knees.
'Lizabeth set bottle and glass before him, and stood watching as he
mixed the stuff.
"So you're only a private."
William set down the kettle with some violence.
"You still keep a cursedly rough tongue, I notice."
"An' you've been a soldier five year. I reckoned you'd be a sergeant at
least," she pursued simply, with her eyes on his undecorated sleeve.
William took a gulp.
"How do you know I've not been a sergeant?"
"Then you've been degraded. I'm main sorry for that."
"Look here, you hush up! Damn it! there's girls enough have fancied
this coat, though it ain't but a private's; and that's enough for you, I
take it."
"It's handsome."
"There, that'll do. I do believe you're spiteful because I didn't offer
to kiss you when I came in. Here, Cousin 'Lizabeth," he exclaimed,
starting up, "I'll be sworn for all your tongue you're the prettiest
maid I've seen this five year. Give me a kiss."
"Don't, William!"
Such passionate entreaty vibrated in her voice that William, who was
advancing, stopped for a second to stare. Then, with a laugh, he had
caught and kissed her loudly.
Her cheeks were flaming when she broke free.
William turned, emptied his glass at a gulp, and began to mix a second.
"There, there; you never look so well as when you're angered,
'Lizabeth."
"'Twas a coward's trick," she panted.
"Christmas-time, you spitfire. So you ain't married yet? Lord!
I don't wonder they fight shy of you; you'd be a handful, my vixen, for
any man to tame. How's the old man?"
"He'll never be better."
"Like enough at his age. Is he hard set against me?"
"We've never spoke of you for years now, till to-night."
"To-night? That's queer. I've a mind to tip up a stave to let him know
I'm about. I will, too. Let me see--"
"When Johnny comes marching home again,
Hooray! Hoo--"
"Don't, don't! Oh, why did you come back to-night, of all nights?"
"And why the devil not to-night so well as any other? You're a
comfortable lot, I must say! Maybe you'd like common metre better:--
"Within my fathers house
The blessed sit at meat.
Whilst I my belly stay
With husks the swine did eat."
--"Why shouldn't I wake the old man? I've done naught that I'm ashamed
of."
"It don't seem you're improved by soldiering."
"Improved? I've seen life." William drained his glass.
"An' got degraded."
"Burn your tongue! I'm going to see him." He rose and made towards the
door. 'Lizabeth stepped before him.
"Hush! You mustn't."
"'Mustn't?' That's a bold word."
"Well, then--'can't.' Sit down, I tell you."
"Hullo! Ain't you coming the mistress pretty free in this house?
Stand aside. I've got something to tell him--something that won't wait.
Stand aside, you she-cat!"
He pushed by her roughly, but she held on to his sleeve.
"It _must_ wait. Listen to me."
"I won't."
"You shall. He's dead."
"_Dead!_" He reeled back to the table and poured out another glassful
with a shaking hand. 'Lizabeth noticed that this time he added no
water.
"He died to-night," she explained; "but he's been ailin' for a year
past, an' took to his bed back in October."
William's face was still pallid; but he merely stammered--
"Things happen queerly. I'll go up and see him; I'm master here now.
You can't say aught to that. By the Lord! but I can buy myself out--I'm
sick of soldiering--and we'll settle down here and be comfortable."
"We?"
His foot was on the stair by this time. He turned and nodded.
"Yes, _we_. It ain't a bad game being mistress o' this house.
Eh, Cousin 'Lizabeth?"
She turned her hot face to the flame, without reply; and he went on his
way up the stairs.
'Lizabeth sat for a while staring into the wood embers with shaded eyes.
Whatever the path by which her reflections travelled, it led in the end
to the kettle. She remembered that the tea was still to make, and, on
stooping to set the kettle back upon the logs, found it emptied by
William's potations. Donning her stout shoes and pattens, and slipping
a shawl over her head, she reached down the lantern from its peg, lit
it, and went out to fill the kettle at the spring.
It was pitch-dark; the rain was still falling, and as she crossed the
yard the sodden straw squeaked beneath her tread. The yard had been
fashioned generations since, by levelling back from the house to the
natural rock of the hill-side, and connecting the two on the right by
cow-house and stable, with an upper storey for barn and granary, on the
left by a low wall, where, through a rough gate, the cart-track from the
valley found its entrance. Against the further end of this wall leant
an open cart-shed; and within three paces of it a perpetual spring of
water gushing down the rock was caught and arrested for a while in a
stone trough before it hurried out by a side gutter, and so down to join
the trout-stream in the valley below. The spring first came to light
half-way down the rock's face. Overhead its point of emergence was
curtained by a network of roots pushed out by the trees above and
sprawling over the lip in helpless search for soil.
'Lizabeth's lantern threw a flare of yellow on these and on the bubbling
water as she filled her kettle. She was turning to go when a sound
arrested her.
It was the sound of a suppressed sob, and seemed to issue from the
cart-shed. 'Lizabeth turned quickly and held up her lantern. Under the
shed, and barely four paces from her, sat a woman.
The woman was perched against the shaft of a hay-waggon, with her feet
resting on a mud-soiled carpet-bag. She made but a poor appealing
figure, tricked out in odds and ends of incongruous finery, with a
bonnet, once smart, hanging limply forward over a pair of
light-coloured eyes and a very lachrymose face. The ambition of the
stranger's toilet, which ran riot in cheap jewellery, formed so odd a
contrast with her sorry posture that 'Lizabeth, for all her wonder, felt
inclined to smile.
"What's your business here?"
"Oh, tell me," whimpered the woman, "what's he doing all this time?
Won't his father see me? He don't intend to leave me here all night,
surely, in this bitter cold, with nothing to eat, and my gown ruined!"
"He?" 'Lizabeth's attitude stiffened with suspicion of the truth.
"William, I mean; an' a sorry day it was I agreed to come."
"William?"
"My husband. I'm Mrs. William Transom."
"Come along to the house." 'Lizabeth turned abruptly and led the way.
Mrs. William Transom gathered up her carpet-bag and bedraggled skirts
and followed, sobbing still, but in _diminuendo_. Inside the kitchen
'Lizabeth faced round on her again.
"So you'm William's wife."
"I am; an' small comfort to say so, seein' this is how I'm served.
Reely, now, I'm not fit to be seen."
"Bless the woman, who cares here what you look like? Take off those
fal-lals, an' sit in your petticoat by the fire, here; you ain't wet
through--on'y your feet; and here's a dry pair o' stockings, if you've
none i' the bag. You must be possessed, to come trampin' over High
Compton in them gingerbread things." She pointed scornfully at the
stranger's boots.
Mrs. William Transom, finding her notions of gentility thus ridiculed,
acquiesced.
"An' now," resumed 'Lizabeth, when her visitor was seated by the fire
pulling off her damp stockings, "there's rum an' there's tea.
Which will you take to warm yoursel'?"
Mrs. William elected to take rum; and 'Lizabeth noted that she helped
herself with freedom. She made no comment, however, but set about
making tea for herself; and, then, drawing up her chair to the table,
leant her chin on her hand and intently regarded her visitor.
"Where's William?" inquired Mrs. Transom.
"Up-stairs."
"Askin' his father's pardon?"
"Well," 'Lizabeth grimly admitted, "that's like enough; but you needn't
fret about them."
Mrs. William showed no disposition to fret. On the contrary, under the
influence of the rum she became weakly jovial and a trifle garrulous--
confiding to 'Lizabeth that, though married to William for four years,
she had hitherto been blessed with no children; that they lived in
barracks, which she disliked, but put up with because she doted on a red
coat; that William had always been meaning to tell his father, but
feared to anger him, "because, my dear," she frankly explained,
"I was once connected with the stage"--a form of speech behind which
'Lizabeth did not pry; that, a fortnight before Christmas, William had
made up his mind at last, "'for,' as he said to me, 'the old man must be
nearin' his end, and then the farm'll be mine by rights;'" that he had
obtained his furlough two days back, and come by coach all the way to
this doleful spot--for doleful she must call it, though she _would_ have
to live there some day--with no shops nor theayters, of which last it
appeared Mrs. Transom was inordinately fond. Her chatter was
interrupted at length with some abruptness.
"I suppose," said 'Lizabeth meditatively, "you was pretty, once."
Mrs. Transom, with her hand on the bottle, stared, and then tittered.
"Lud! my dear, you ain't over-complimentary. Yes, pretty I was, though
I say it."
"We ain't neither of us pretty now--you especially."
"I'd a knack o' dressin'," pursued the egregious Mrs. Transom, "an' nice
eyes an' hair. 'Why, Maria, darlin',' said William one day, when him
an' me was keepin' company, 'I believe you could sit on that hair o'
yours, I do reely.' 'Go along, you silly!' I said, 'to be sure I can.'"
"He called you darling?"
"Why, in course. H'ain't you never had a young man?"
'Lizabeth brushed aside the question by another.
"Do you love him? I mean so that--that you could lie down and let him
tramp the life out o' you?"
"Good Lord, girl, what questions you do ask! Why, so-so, o' course,
like other married women. He's wild at times, but I shut my eyes; an'
he hav'n struck me this year past. I wonder what he can be doin' all
this time."
"Come and see."
'Lizabeth rose. Her contempt of this foolish, faded creature recoiled
upon herself, until she could bear to sit still no longer.
With William's wife at her heels, she mounted the stair, their shoeless
feet making no sound. The door of the old man's bed-room stood ajar,
and a faint ray of light stole out upon the landing. 'Lizabeth looked
into the room, and then, with a quick impulse, darted in front of her
companion.
It was too late. Mrs. Transom was already at her shoulder, and the eyes
of the two women rested on the sorry spectacle before them.
Candle in hand, the prodigal was kneeling by the dead man's bed. He was
not praying, however; but had his head well buried in the oaken chest,
among the papers of which he was cautiously prying.
The faint squeal that broke from his wife's lips sufficed to startle
him. He dropped the lid with a crash, turned sharply round, and
scrambled to his feet. His look embraced the two women in one brief
flicker, and then rested on the blazing eyes of 'Lizabeth.
"You mean hound!" said she, very slowly.
He winced uneasily, and began to bluster:
"Curse you! What do you mean by sneaking upon a man like this?"
"A man!" echoed 'Lizabeth. "Man, then, if you will--couldn't you wait
till your father was cold, but must needs be groping under his pillow
for the key of that chest? You woman, there--you wife of this man--I'm
main grieved you should ha' seen this. Lord knows I had the will to
hide it!"
The wife, who had sunk into the nearest chair, and lay there huddled
like a half-empty bag, answered with a whimper.
"Stop that whining!" roared William, turning upon her, "or I'll break
every bone in your skin."
"Fie on you, man! Why, she tells me you haven't struck her for a whole
year," put in 'Lizabeth, immeasurably scornful.
"So, cousin, you've found out what I meant by 'we.' Lord! you fancied
_you_ was the one as was goin' to settle down wi' me an' be comfortable,
eh? You're jilted, my girl, an' this is how you vent your jealousy.
You played your hand well; you've turned us out. It's a pity--eh?--you
didn't score this last trick."
"What do you mean?" The innuendo at the end diverted her wrath at the
man's hateful coarseness.
"Mean? Oh, o' course, you're innocent as a lamb! Mean? Why, look
here."
He opened the chest again, and, drawing out a scrap of folded foolscap,
began to read :--
"_I, Ebenezer Transom, of Compton Burrows, in the parish of
Compton, yeoman, being of sound wit and health, and willing, though
a sinner, to give my account to God, do hereby make my last will and
testament_."
"_My house, lands, and farm of Compton Burrows, together with every
stick that I own, I hereby (for her good care of me) give and
bequeath to Elizabeth Rundle, my dead sister's child_"
--"Let be, I tell you!"
But 'Lizabeth had snatched the paper from him. For a moment the devil in
his eye seemed to meditate violence. But he thought better of it; and
when she asked for the candle held it beside her as she read on slowly.
"_ . . . to Elizabeth Rundle, my dead sister's child, desiring
that she may marry and bequeath the same to the heirs of her body;
less the sum of one shilling sterling, which I command to be sent
to my only surviving son William--_"
"You needn't go on," growled William.
"_ . . . because he's a bad lot, and he may so well know I think
so. And to this I set my hand, this 17th day of September, 1856._"
"_Signed_"
"_Ebenezer Transom._"
"_Witnessed by_"
"_John Hooper._"
"_Peter Tregaskis._"
The document was in the old man's handwriting, and clearly of his
composition. But it was plain enough, and the signatures genuine.
'Lizabeth's hand dropped.
"I never knew a word o' this, William," she said humbly.
Mrs. Transom broke into an incredulous titter.
"Ugh! get along, you designer!"
"William," appealed 'Lizabeth, "I've never had no thought o' robbin'
you."
'Lizabeth had definite notions of right and wrong, and this
disinheritance of William struck her conservative mind as a violation of
Nature's laws.
William's silence was his wife's opportunity.
"Robbery's the word, you baggage! You thought to buy him wi' your
ill-got gains. Ugh! go along wi' you!"
'Lizabeth threw a desperate look towards the cause of this trouble--the
pale mask lying on the pillows. Finding no help, she turned to William
again--
"You believe I meant to rob you?"
Meeting her eyes, William bent his own on the floor, and lied.
"I reckon you meant to buy me, Cousin 'Lizabeth."
His wife tittered spitefully.
"Woman!" cried the girl, lapping up her timid merriment in a flame of
wrath. "Woman, listen to me. Time was I loved that man o' your'n; time
was he swore I was all to him. He was a liar from his birth. It's your
natur' to think I'm jealous; a better woman would know I'm _sick_--sick
wi' shame an' scorn o' mysel'. That man, there, has kissed me, oft'n
an' oft'n--kissed me 'pon the mouth. Bein' what you are, you can't
understand how those kisses taste now, when I look at _you_."
"Well, I'm sure!"
"Hold your blasted tongue!" roared William. Mrs. Transom collapsed.
"Give me the candle," 'Lizabeth commanded. "Look here--"
She held the corner of the will to the flame, and watched it run up at
the edge and wrap the whole in fire. The paper dropped from her hand to
the bare boards, and with a dying flicker was consumed. The charred
flakes drifted idly across the floor, stopped, and drifted again.
In dead silence she looked up.
Mrs. Transom's watery eyes were open to their fullest. 'Lizabeth turned
to William and found him regarding her with a curious frown.
"Do you know what you've done?" he asked hoarsely.
'Lizabeth laughed a trifle wildly.
"I reckon I've made reparation."
"There was no call--" began William.
"You fool--'twas to _myself!_ An' now," she added quietly, "I'll pick
up my things and tramp down to Hooper's Farm; they'll give me a place, I
know, an' be glad o' the chance. They'll be sittin' up to-night, bein'
Christmas time. Good-night, William!"
She moved to go; but, recollecting herself, turned at the door, and,
stepping up to the bed, bent and kissed the dead man's forehead.
Then she was gone.
It was the woman who broke the silence that followed with a base speech.
"Well! To think she'd lose her head like that when she found you wasn't
to be had!"
"Shut up!" said William savagely; "an' listen to this: If you was to
die to-night I'd marry 'Lizabeth next week."
Time passed. The old man was buried, and Mr. and Mrs. Transom took
possession at Compton Burrows and reigned in his stead. 'Lizabeth dwelt
a mile or so down the valley with the Hoopers, who, as she had said,
were thankful enough to get her services, for Mrs. Hooper was well up in
years, and gladly resigned the dairy work to a girl who, as she told her
husband, was of good haveage, and worth her keep a dozen times over.
So 'Lizabeth had settled down in her new home, and closed her heart and
shut its clasps tight.
She never met William to speak to. Now and then she caught sight of him
as he rode past on horseback, on his way to market or to the "Compton
Arms," where he spent more time and money than was good for him. He had
bought himself out of the army, of course; but he retained his barrack
tales and his air of having seen life. These, backed up with a baritone
voice and a largehandedness in standing treat, made him popular in the
bar parlour. Meanwhile, Mrs. Transom, up at Compton Burrows--perhaps
because she missed her "theayters"--sickened and began to pine; and one
January afternoon, little more than a year after the home-coming,
'Lizabeth, standing in the dairy by her cream-pans, heard that she was
dead.
"Poor soul," she said; "but she looked a sickly one." That was all.
She herself wondered that the news should affect her so little.
"I reckon," said Mrs. Hooper with meaning, "William will soon be lookin'
round for another wife."
'Lizabeth went quietly on with her skimming.
It was just five months after this, on a warm June morning, that William
rode down the valley, and, dismounting by Farmer Hooper's, hitched his
bridle over the garden gate, and entered. 'Lizabeth was in the garden;
he could see her print sun-bonnet moving between the rows of peas.
She turned as he approached, dropped a pod into her basket, and held out
her hand.
"Good day, William." Her voice was quite friendly.
William had something to say, and 'Lizabeth quickly guessed what it was.
"I thought I'd drop in an' see how you was gettin' on; for it's main
lonely up at Compton Burrows since the missus was took."
"I daresay."
"An' I'd a matter on my mind to tell you," he pursued, encouraged to
find she harboured no malice. "It's troubled me, since, that way you
burnt the will, an' us turnin' you out; for in a way the place belonged
to you. The old man meant it, anyhow."
"Well," said 'Lizabeth, setting down her basket, and looking him full in
the eyes.
"Well, I reckon we might set matters square, you an' me, 'Lizabeth, by
marryin' an' settlin' down comfortable. I've no children to pester you,
an' you're young yet to be givin' up thoughts o' marriage. What do 'ee
say, cousin?"
'Lizabeth picked a full pod from the bush beside her, and began shelling
the peas, one by one, into her hand. Her face was cool and
contemplative.
"'Tis eight years ago, William, since last you asked me. Ain't that
so?" she asked absently.
"Come, Cousin, let bygones be, and tell me; shall it be, my dear?"
"No, William," she answered; "'tis too late an hour to ask me now. I
thank you, but it can't be." She passed the peas slowly to and fro in
her fingers.
"But why, 'Lizabeth?" he urged; "you was fond o' me once. Come, girl,
don't stand in your own light through a hit o' pique."
"It's not that," she explained; "it's that I've found myself out--an'
you. You've humbled my pride too sorely."
"You're thinking o' Maria."
"Partly, maybe; but it don't become us to talk o' one that's dead.
You've got my answer, William, and don't ask me again. I loved you
once, but now I'm only weary when I think o't. You wouldn't understand
me if I tried to tell you."
She held out her hand. William took it.
"You're a great fool, 'Lizabeth."
"Good-bye, William."
She took up her basket and walked slowly back to the house; William
watched her for a moment or two, swore, and returned to his horse.
He did not ride home wards, but down the valley, where he spent the day
at the "Compton Arms." When he returned home, which was not before
midnight, he was boisterously drunk.
Now it so happened that when William dismounted at the gate Mrs. Hooper
had spied him from her bedroom window, and, guessing his errand, had
stolen down on the other side of the garden wall parallel with which the
peas were planted. Thus sheltered, she contrived to hear every word of
the foregoing conversation, and repeated it to her good man that very
night.
"An' I reckon William said true," she wound up. "If 'Lizabeth don't
know which side her bread's buttered she's no better nor a fool--an'
William's another."
"I dunno," said the farmer; "it's a queer business, an' I don't fairly
see my way about in it. I'm main puzzled what can ha' become o' that
will I witnessed for th' old man."
"She's a fool, I say."
"Well, well; if she didn't want the man I reckon she knows best. He put
it fairly to her."
"That's just it, you ninny!" interrupted his wiser wife; "I gave William
credit for more sense. Put it fairly, indeed! If he'd said nothin',
but just caught her in his arms, an' clipped an' kissed her, she
couldn't ha' stood out. But he's lost his chance, an' now she'll never
marry."
And it was as she said.
THE END.