THE WAY-SIDE MEETING.
A footpath intersected the highway some few rods below Mrs. Mason's
cottage, and ran off among the hills that lay behind Castle Rock. At
this point, Thrasher paused. He had only reached town that day, and his
first visit had been to the white cottage. Now, he thought of his
parents, who lived on a farm among those hills, and of another person
whose home he must pass in going there.
"I must see her, of course," he said, mentally; "but not at once. I have
no heart for another scene. But the old folks--that will be all joy--no
rebukes or entreaties ever came from that quarter. They will be hurt,
too, if I sleep at a tavern, and the homestead so near."
With these affectionate thoughts urging him forward, he turned up the
foot path and walked slowly on, wondering at the tender feelings that
rose and swelled in his heart as he drew near the family home.
You would not have believed that the man who walked so quietly along the
greensward with the moonlight on his face, could have been the same
person who stood on the deck of that brig and superintended the number
of lashes that should be dealt on the back of a human being. Once or
twice, as his glance fell on some familiar object, a sweet brier bush,
perhaps, or a cluster of tall mulleins that had grown by the footpath
since he was a child, his eyes would fill with tears. There was
something holy and homelike in the stillness that made a child of this
cruel man.
The footpath led Thrasher into the Bungy road. He had mounted one hill
and was descending into the valley which lay between it and another,
when he saw some dark object sitting on a pine stump, from which he had
gathered moss years before. His step was smothered on the sward, and the
night wind, which made a rustling sound among the leaves of a
neighboring wood, rendered his approach inaudible.
It was a woman shrouded in a cloak, but the light was so clear that he
could see the outlines of her person, though her face was bent down and
her limbs were drawn together as if she suffered from cold or sorrow.
Thrasher's heart told him at once who the woman was, and the knowledge
made a coward of him. He hesitated, turned to go back, but resumed his
course again, ashamed of so much weakness. The woman's face was bent
down, her hands were locked around her knees, and he could hear the
swell of her sobs as she rocked to and fro, as if the motion gave relief
to some great pain.
Thrasher stood close by the unhappy creature, but she was lost in grief
and did not look up.
"Katharine!"
She started to her feet with a cry that haunted his memory years after,
and stood before him, shaking in all her limbs. Why did she not fling
her arms about his neck as she had done at parting? Why did she shrink
and gather the cloak so timidly around her? Did the shadow of some great
wrong fall upon her with its sundering power?
"Katharine, you know me, but don't seem glad that I have come."
"Not glad--oh, my heart is dumb with joy! I thought--I feared that you
were dead, Nelson, and the idea was driving me crazy. I was trying to
pray when you came up."
She stole timidly toward him and held out her hand.
"Is it real--are you alive and here? Oh how good you are, coming to our
house the first moment to see me, for I know well enough you did want to
see me--while I was doubting if you would care about me after being away
so long, and wondering what I should do. You are not changed, Nelson;
you love me yet as well--better than ever."
There was something in the girl's manner that Thrasher did not
understand. She seemed frightened, and shrunk from approaching him. This
was so unlike the childlike affection with which she had hitherto met
him, that he stood looking upon her in surprise, mingled with a little
irritation.
"Why, Katharine, what is the matter? You are so changed--it may be the
moonlight, but your face seems thinner and less rosy."
She turned her eyes upon him with a wan smile, but did not answer at
once.
"You have changed, perhaps, and found some one you like better."
There was something in his tones that stung her; a hopeful questioning
as if he wished rather than dreaded this change. She looked at him
reproachfully, and her blue eyes floated in tears.
"Oh, Nelson!"
The words were uttered in a very low voice, but in their quietness lay
deep pathos. She moved close to his side and laid one hand on his
shoulder, waiting for him to return the caress. He placed his arm
lightly, and it seemed half reluctantly, about her waist. She felt the
chill at her heart.
"_You_ are changed!" she said, in a loud, clear voice, that sounded to
his ear like a challenge. "You come here not to meet, but to abandon
me."
Thrasher tightened his arm around her.
"Is this the way I abandon you?" he said.
She withdrew herself quietly from his arms, and fixing her eyes on his
face gave him a long, sorrowful look.
The moonlight lay full on his features. His dark eyes looked into hers;
a smile, half mocking, half pleasant, hung on his lip. He was a tall,
handsome man, and the moonlight refined his face into remarkable beauty.
"Are you trying me, Nelson?" she said, half returning the smile.
"Don't--don't--I have trouble enough without that."
"Trouble--was there ever a girl of your age without it, I wonder? Come,
take my arm, and as we walk along you shall tell me what great
misfortune sent you here crying and rocking yourself like an old woman
turned out of doors."
Katharine tried to laugh and took his arm, leaning on it with that half
caressing, half dependent grace which a woman who loves from her soul
assumes unconsciously. Formerly, when her arm touched his, he had, at a
time like this, taken the willing hands in his clasp, but the touch of
Ellen Mason's fingers thrilled his nerves even yet, and Katharine's hand
drooped helplessly over his arm.
"Now tell me what this great, great trouble is?" he said, walking
forward.
"Wait until we get into the shadow of the woods, and I will," she
replied, in a low choked voice.
They walked on in dead silence, entered the shadow of the wood, paused
in the darkest spot, and talked earnestly together. When they came in
the moonlight again, Thrasher looked pale and angry. He walked fast,
sometimes forcing her on beyond her strength, and cutting up the silk
weed and mulleins in his path with fierce dashes of his walking-stick.
Katharine made no resistance, for a cold, dead silence, which shut out
all joy, had fallen on her.
They came to a little brown house, under the shelter of a hill, and half
covered with morning-glories--a pretty, rustic place in which Katharine
lived alone with her mother. A board fence ran along the front yard,
hedging in some lilac bushes and a huge snowball bush. A flower bed ran
along each side of the walk, from the gate to the door. All this looked
pretty and cool, in its night dew, and Thrasher recognized the familiar
objects with something like a pang.
Katharine withdrew her arm from his at the gate; she tried to speak, and
ask him to go in, for a light shone through one of the windows, and the
old lady was evidently waiting for Katharine to come home before she
went to bed; her lips trembled, but refused to utter the invitation; he
read it in her eyes, however, and shook his head.
"Not to-night--another time we will talk this over."
They parted with these words, and Thrasher walked on at a more rapid
pace than he had yet used. Katharine watched him mournfully as he
disappeared, then, with a deep sigh, she entered the house.