Cilla was leaning on the window-ledge when she heard her father’s
footstep in the porch. The house-place was unlit and dim, save for the
flickering of a fire that was dying hard in the wide grate; but at the
window here there was a soft and tranquil light, half from the gloaming
and half from the clouded moon. The geraniums, lined all along the
ledge, showed a more chastened red than in the sunlight. Outside, among
the lilacs and the hawthorns and the late-leafing copper beeches, the
birds were twittering restlessly, and now and then were giving a last,
clear challenge to the night.
Priscilla of the Good Intent had been crying quietly. She was stunned
no longer, and had gone through a fire of anguish in amongst her usual
household business; and now the tears had come, as dew falls on the
parched, tired fields. She was glad, when she heard her father’s step,
that it was dark indoors.
“Why, Cilla, ye’re all in darkness here!” cried Hirst, seeing her
outlined by the half-light that filtered through the window-space.
“I was idling, father. The day’s so sorry to go down the hills, and I
was sorry, too, to watch it go.”
From a brave stock came Cilla, and her voice was clear and even.
“Ay, but I’ve brought company, lile lass. I’ve promised him neither
bite nor sup, but at the least he must have a candle lit here and there
about the house-place.”
The girl raised her head quickly, and stood back a step or two. It was
hard enough to meet her father, but she was not prepared to welcome
“company” of any sort. She tried, in the dusk of the room, to see who
it was that came, but the guest was hidden by Hirst’s bulk.
Not once did she guess that it could be Reuben Gaunt. Had Billy the
Fool not led her to the thorn-bush this morning, such a visit would
have been natural and looked-for; but Cilla, single-hearted and
understanding little of concealment, could not realize that Gaunt,
trusting in her ignorance of all concerning Peggy Mathewson, might
still come asking Yeoman Hirst for his daughter.
“Will you light the candles, father?” she said hurriedly. “I--I am all
in my workaday frock, and I must tidy myself if you bring company.”
Hirst would have had the matter settled at once; but, before he could
protest, the girl had run lightly up the stair, and her footfall
sounded crisply overhead. So he lit the candles, standing in their
handsome sticks of Sheffield ware; and he took his place in front of
the dying fire, and stood very straight, thrusting his hands under the
lapels at his coat.
“Stand where ye like, Mr. Gaunt,” he said. “Will not ask ye to sit, for
some matters are best settled standing up.”
Gaunt moved restlessly about the room, and the silence--broken by the
little noise of Cilla’s movements overhead--did not help him to a more
even frame of mind. But at least, he told himself, he had one ally
here--Cilla herself. When she came down, and Yeoman Hirst heard from
her own lips that she had plighted troth last night, he could talk to
better advantage.
Cilla did not keep them waiting overlong. She had no need to change her
gown, but only to pour water into the ewer, and bathe her face, and
bathe it over and over again; for she knew that her father hated all
signs of tears, because they weakened him and loosed his steady grip on
life.
They heard her at the stair-head, the two men waiting below in enmity
and silence; and then they heard the door-sneck rattle, and Cilla stood
for a moment, looking across the candle-light to see who the guest
might be.
She faltered for a moment, seeing Reuben’s eyes fixed eagerly on hers;
then she moved to the dresser and leaned against it, one hand pressed
tight against the bosom of her dress, as her wont was always when she
was troubled.
“_You?_” she said faintly.
That was all; but Hirst, blind in his faith that Priscilla could never
stoop to such as Gaunt, interpreted her trouble as sheer disdain.
“Best come to what we’ve got to say at once, Cilla,” he began. “Mr.
Gaunt here said just now that you were going to wed him, and I said he
was a liar. Which of us was right, lile lass?”
Again Gaunt’s spirits fell. He had looked for silence--yes; but for
silence of the happy, maidish sort that is afraid to tell its secrets.
Priscilla of the Good Intent wore no such look; grave, and delicate,
and soft her face was, but her eyes were full of misery.
“You were right, both of you, father,” she said at last, “and both
wrong. I am not going to marry Mr. Gaunt, but I promised to, yestre’en.”
It was hard to say which of the men was more non-plussed. This slim
maid, standing with the candle-light upon her face, had robbed them
both of sure yet separate faiths.
“Ye promised, Cilla?” said Hirst, reaching for the snuff-box on the
mantel, and taking a pinch for habit’s sake.
“Yes, I promised, father. But this morning I walked up by Little Beck
Hollow, and I took my promise back.”
Gaunt understood at last; and in his heart he cursed Peggy Mathewson,
who had led him into this.
The yeoman was hard hit, and hit in his weakest spot; yet he gathered
his strength up somehow, and found a weakened echo of his usual laugh.
“Second thoughts run safest, lass. Ye may have been a lile, daft fool
yestre’en, but ye are wise to-day. Mr. Gaunt, is there aught more to be
said?”
“I fancy not. Good even to you,” said Reuben, with a desperate quiet.
“I would like to see Mr. Gaunt to the door, father, and talk with him,”
said Cilla unexpectedly.
Hirst looked at her, and saw the strong simplicity that hedged her
sorrow round from prying eyes. He did not know whether he were wise
or foolish--all old landmarks to-night were sundered from him--but he
nodded grimly.
“Ye may, Cilla. ’Tis the last time he will come here,” he said,
forgetting to touch wood when boasting openly.
Gaunt opened the door, and waited for her to pass through into the grey
moon-dusk of the porch.
“Cilla,” he began, “Cilla, ’twas kind of you--”
“Yes, ’twas kind of me--kind toward the lass I saw you with to-day
in Little Beck Hollow. Yestre’en was so much fancy, was it not? Nay,
you need not interrupt me. The drive from Keta’s Well--the curlews
dipping up and down the fields--the smell of violets in the wind that
blew about Garth valley--they made us fairy-kist, I think, and we
fancied--what did we not fancy, Reuben?”
Priscilla was self-possessed. The old reserve, half pride, half
modesty, had come to her again. She fenced herself about, and Reuben
Gaunt knew that the wall was strong.
“I loved you, Cilla, and I told you so.”
She strove to read his face, here by the light of the clouded moon that
shone upon the highway. Women had done as much before Cilla’s time, in
daylight and in dusk, and had found no answer.
“Loved me? I do not understand, Reuben. Love is for one and for always,
surely; ’tis not a game to play at hop-scotch with, as the children do
about Garth street. Reuben!” she went on, pain and sincerity between
them getting the better of her. “Reuben, I had heard stray talk of you
and Peggy Mathewson, and had passed it by, because I do not care for
gossip; but I saw to-day that what I’d heard was true--and, Reuben--you
needn’t fear our last night’s fairy-time.”
“Fear it, Cilla? ’Twas the love-time o’ my life. See ye, that other was
a tale old and done with, and--”
“Old and done with?” she echoed piteously. “If the cobwebs had not been
blown away, up yonder by the Hollow, _I_ should have been old and done
with, to-morrow, or the next day afterwards.”
Since grey old Garth was in the making, it had heard such women’s
cries; and to-night it listened sleepily, not stirring from its quiet.
“What d’ye want of me, Cilla?” he asked, drawing nearer with a caress
which she avoided.
“I want to see you wedded. ’Twas plain to be seen this morning that you
were promised to her, Reuben, and last night’s forgotten altogether.”
“Promised to her--what, to Peggy Mathewson?”
Priscilla would, or could not, realize all that was meant by Gaunt’s
hasty words--the surprise that he should be thought to have meant
at any time to marry Widow Mathewson’s daughter--the touch of chill
contempt in his voice--the acknowledgment that all was “over and done
with,” and that his wooing up at Intake Farm had been so much idle
devilry.
“Yes,” the girl answered simply. “What else, Reuben?”
Gaunt knew that he had lost her. Her simplicity, the return of that
gentle aloofness which from the first had thwarted and enticed him, the
lack of all upbraiding--these, and her trust in his good faith towards
Peggy convinced him. Random, full of odd weaknesses and hidden corners
where the better man in him took refuge, he was surprised to-night to
find how vital Cilla’s good opinion was.
Before he could answer, footsteps sounded down the road, and Priscilla
turned quickly. “Good night, Reuben,” she said. “All was glamour and
fairy-webs yestre’en. Forget it, soon or late.”
She was gone before he could find a last word to say. He watched her
go, slim, willowy, the clouded moonlight on her trim, bared head; and
then he turned, sick at heart, and went round to the croft to find his
horse, and afterwards rode up the highway.
David the Smith and Billy passed him twenty yards or so away from Good
Intent. David greeted his enemy coldly, but Billy seemed unaware that
anybody shared the highroad with himself and David.
“Surly fools, the two of them!” muttered Gaunt. “Could give any man a
greeting, I, at this hour of a warm night.”
Priscilla of the Good Intent had reached the porch, and stood there,
half in the inner dusk and half in the moonlight. She was thinking,
not of Reuben Gaunt, but of the night when she had seen David to
the door, had bidden farewell to him, and afterwards had called
“David--David, come back!” to unheeding ears. She was reaching out
again for David’s hand-grip, as she always did in time of need.
David himself, as it chanced, had refrained from stepping in at the
back door of Good Intent, as his wont had been. He had feared to meet
Cilla, lest his resolution to leave Garth should once again grow
weak. Yet now, as he glanced at the grey porch in passing, for old
affection’s sake, he saw Priscilla leaning against one of the two
round, limestone pillars that buttressed the porch.
“A fair night for the time o’ year, Priscilla,” he said, with would-be
cheeriness.
“Ay, fair, David. But the wind blows shrewd at times, for all that.”
“Tuts! We wouldn’t be living, if there weren’t a shrewd wind to blow
all our time o’ warmth away,” growled David, viewing life darkly,
almost tragically, for once. “We’d be dead, Priscilla, and in a bonnier
world.”
Billy the Fool had gone forward, with a quiet nod toward Cilla and an
easy slouch, as if he remembered nothing of the morning; but David
halted. In sun or rain, Priscilla was good to look at; to-night, with
the moon-glamour on her face and the fret of new-found understanding in
her voice, she was something up and above this world, to such as simple
David, like the moon in the grey, still sky.
“David, is it true that you are leaving Garth, as father hinted?”
“Ay, ’tis true. Not yet awhile, for a week or two; for my roots are
here, ye see, Priscilla, and I’m frightened-like to tear ’em out. So
I’m telling myself I’ve a job here and a job there that must be done;
and I’m making a few bits o’ business that weren’t there before; but
I’m going from Garth, soon as I’ve settled my heart into its place.”
“Oh, I shall miss you, David!” she said unthinkingly.
David the Smith laughed sadly. “Well, that’s somewhat to the good, at
any rate. Would be a poor business, eh, if a man could fare out to
heathen parts, and never be missed in the old home-place?”
The night, with its clouded moon, its restless wind that rose
uncertainly and fell again, was like a mirror to Priscilla’s humour.
She was impatient of David’s quiet acceptance of matters; perhaps, had
he stolen now into the porch and lost his diffidence, he would have had
no further right, or leave, to go away from Garth. But David had seen
what he had seen, and his faith that Cilla meant to marry Reuben Gaunt
was as sure as hers had been as regarded Peggy Mathewson.
And so, because guile was far from both of them, David said good night
and went his way, while Cilla could scarcely check the impulse to cry
once again: “David--David, come back.”
She gave a last glance at the street, wondering what her life would be
in coming days; then went indoors, to meet her father and go through
with all the talk and explanation which she knew awaited her.
The look of the house-place chilled her as she entered. The fire was
out. No friendly horn of ale rested at her father’s elbow; he was not
smoking even, but was sitting with his hands upon his knees, his head a
little bent, his shoulders not so square as she was wont to see them.
The two candles threw no cheerful light, and they were guttering now
in the sudden draught that came through the open doorway.
“I’ll light the lamp, father,” said Cilla, with faint-hearted
bustle. “Shame on me--the lamp unlit, and none to draw your ale for
you--and--daddy, won’t you fill your pipe?”
“Was dreaming, lile Cilla--just dreaming, I. Fill my pipe? To be sure,
I’d quite forgotten it. Ay, light the lamp, lile lass; I miss ye,
somehow, when ye’re not about.”
She brought his pipe, his tobacco-box; she lit the lamp, and fetched a
measure of ale and set it at his elbow; it took the keen edge from her
dreariness to minister to the wants of Yeoman Hirst.
“See ye now, Cilla,” he began, puffing fiercely at his pipe, “I want to
know a few odd whys and wherefores. Ye know my view of Reuben Gaunt?
Is’t sober truth that ye were foolish with him yesternight?”
“Yes, father.” She was sitting opposite him across the hearth, and her
troubled eyes met his without fear or secrecy. “I thought we loved each
other, and I promised myself to him.”
“God, ye rate yourself cheaper than I do, Cilla! There, lile lass,
there! I didn’t mean to be harsh! Well, then, what chanced to alter
you?”
“I walked up the fields this morning,” she said, with hesitation now.
“Ay, I know! What did ye find there? Not one to shift round like a
windle-straw, ye.”
“What I found is not for you to ask, or me to tell, father,” she
answered, meeting his glance again. “I can tell you this much--that the
gloaming and the moon between them were overstrong for me last night,
and the morning’s sunlight cured me of my fairy-madness.”
“Cured altogether, lile Cilla?” asked the farmer, after a silence and a
shrewd, long look at her.
“Cured altogether--yes,” she answered gravely.
“That’s good hearing. To tell the truth--and I’m no way hurting ye by
saying it now--if Garth Valley were islanded by water, and ye and me
and Gaunt were stranded on it--as folk _are_ stranded time and time
in those outlandish, heathen parts that David is going to, or says he
is--why, me and ye, lile lass, would keep to one quarter o’ the dry
land, and I’d ram my fist into Gaunt’s face if he came spying over
to our end o’ the safe, high country. Couldn’t bide him, I, if there
weren’t another man to talk to in the land.”
Priscilla scarcely heard him. Her glamour-tide was over, or seemed to
be; David was unrepentant of his forthrightness, and would not see how
she was hungering for the word, or the look, or the touch which only he
could give.
“Come here to my knee, lass,” said Hirst by and by.
She knelt on the patch-work rug, and put her hands on his knee and
rested her head on them, looking into the fireless grate. So she had
knelt in childhood’s days--and afterwards at rare intervals when she
and Yeoman Hirst were moved to special tenderness.
“I won’t deny my pride’s had a fall, and a steepish one,” he went on,
thinking that his touch upon her hair was gentle.
“So has mine, father; but life must go on, pride in one’s way or not.”
“Art going to be a lile wise-woman before thy time? Ay, pride tumbles
and gets muckied, and ye’ve to clean it up again wi’ patience, as ye
clean harness gear. Still, I’m sticking to my pride, Cilla, till they
coffin me up, and so are ye; the Hirsts all do, by nature.”
They said nothing for awhile, but between them was the speech of trust
and understanding.
“Cilla, lass?” said the yeoman presently.
“Yes, daddy?”
“Wish I knew more about this daft business. Wish ye could tell me,
like, just what ye saw up yond green pasture-lands to-day.”
“I wish so, too,” she answered simply; “but I cannot tell you, father.”
John Hirst took a pull at his ale--the first one. “D’ye know what I’ve
been thinking, Cilla?” he said, wiping the froth away from his lips
with a kerchief patterned all in blue and white.
“Nay, I could not guess.”
“That, if it came to a tussle ’twixt ye and me, I’d fare hard. Ye’re
so slim to look at, and I could lift ye wi’ one hand and think naught
on’t--but your will is made out of a piece o’ hickory wood, I do
believe. Like ye the better for ’t, I--though ye mustn’t let yourself
hear me say as much.”
“There’s likely to be no quarrel, father--now,” said she.
John Hirst sat brooding by the fire, long after Cilla had gone up to
bed.
He stepped out-of-doors, before locking up for the night, and looked at
the shrouded moon, and tasted the cold of the whimpering breeze.
“Cilla said somewhat of snow coming, a day or two gone by,” he
muttered, “and Billy the Fool turned weather prophet, too, to-night.
They’re apt to be right Billy and lile Cilla, and there’s a snarl and a
tremor i’ the wind that I should know by now.”
He did not confess so much to himself, but the superstition of those
cradled by the weather was with him, and in the wind’s contrariness and
spite he heard quiet omens of disaster to himself and those he loved.