NEXT morning when she awoke workmen were hammering and whistling. When
she looked out of her window she saw scaffolding. Long ladders were set
up stealthily against the old red walls. They were getting Folly Corner
ready for a bride. Those long ladders, that swung scaffolding, reminded
her that her wedding-day was fixed. She dressed and went down into the
garden, where the roses were all embroidered with dew and a white mist
puffed slowly across the meadows beyond the hedge. It was very early.
Len Daborn, going heavily to his work, looked like a patriarch, with
his crook-like stick and spreading white beard. She thought of his
daughters, all maids--because the bees had swarmed in the thatch. She
was very anxious to see Edred before breakfast, and, picking up one of
the potatoes which Daborn had left on the ground when he took the trug
to Hone, threw it in at the open window, crying, with meretricious
raillery:
“Come down. It is a lovely morning.”
She tried to speak quite airily, purposely choosing her words and tone.
Jethro was already about--looking after the young turkeys. Edred, his
voice muffled by sleep and the drawn curtains, called out that he
wouldn’t be long. She healed her heart by looking at her roses. The
garden always comforted her--drew her to it with strange, silent
magnetism. Before he came down, heavy-eyed and irritable, as he always
was in the early morning, she had decided, with infinite relief, that
she would stay at Folly Corner, and let him go back alone, fight life
alone, take his garish triumphs and risks without her.
“Jethro’s going to give you the two hundred pounds this morning,” she
said tersely, hardly lifting her head.
“You are a brick, Pam. We can leave here this afternoon. Pretend that
you have promised to take me over to Annie Jayne’s. We’ll bike to the
station. Never mind luggage. I can spare you plenty of frocks out of
the two hundred. London to-night. We’ll dine somewhere--a good dinner.
Then I’ll drive you to Bloomsbury--they’ll take you in. I can go to a
hotel. To-morrow I’ll get a license and we’ll be married.”
She picked a rose and pressed her nose right into the exquisite petals.
The fresh morning air, the farm sounds; dew, sun in a haze of slow
fire, bees streaming brown and yellow from the hives, the old house
foaming with the loose Devoniensis rose and lichened to the roof--all
these drew her.
“To-morrow morning,” he continued, with satisfaction, “I shall be able
to have a whisky-and-soda directly I wake. It pulls a fellow together.
Leave me alone with old Jeth after breakfast--I’m sorry for the poor
devil; you are treating him badly--but a woman has no heart. And, Pam,
hurry up dinner to-day. We’d better start soon after.”
Jethro came round the house from the yard. He looked a little careless
and rough. Directly he caught Pamela’s glance, his aristocratic face,
with the wholesome russet skin, lighted, and he jerked his thumb, with
a smile and a droll, tender gesture, toward the tall ladders and the
litter of the builders.
The house--restful, spacious, substantial; the figure beside it, all
honest devotion, decided her. She turned to Edred, lithe and dark,
flushed at the prospect of early emancipation from Folly Corner, which
had been to him merely a rambling prison with lax rules.
“I’ve altered my mind,” she whispered hurriedly, not daring to look at
him, not daring to stand close, for fear her hand should touch his
coat-sleeve and make her waver. “I’ll stay. I’ll marry Jethro. Don’t
come down. Lead your own life. In future, as you said, I shall only
know you in the newspapers--a day late. I shall be content, happy;
you’ll be free.”
He stared at her in frank amazement. He was disappointed, astounded,
relieved.
“You’ll stay.” He gave his cynical smile; then, as Jethro came up, his
face shining and his hands soiled with the poultry-yard, he strolled
off.
When breakfast was over she threw a look of meaning across the table
and left the room. As she turned to shut the door she saw the two men
disappear in the direction of Jethro’s little den--the home-made bureau
was in there, with the secret drawer and the bank notes.
Gainah was already settled at the oval table by the window, cutting
patchwork hearts, with the aid of a piece of carefully shaped tin.
Pamela went along the narrow passage into the drawing-room and tried to
dust, to rearrange china, alter furniture--anything for bodily energy.
Now and then she heard the loose lick of a plasterer’s brush. The
workmen outside were whistling blithely and calling to each other. They
all seemed to be named Bill. She sat down on the couch and laughed
foolishly. Why was the workingman always called Bill?
Nettie, the supercilious smirk stronger than usual on her pretty face,
came in to ask for the grocer’s list; the man was at the back door
waiting for orders. She gave it, forgetting nothing--table salt,
bedroom candles, matches, more turpentine--they had their own
beeswax--all the irritating, narrow things that make up the sum total
of a well-managed house. When the girl had gone, she sat down,
listening to the fluty whistles and rough voices outside, and wondering
if she would ever again give the order for the grocer.
She was a weathercock. Hadn’t she said that she would stay and be
Jethro’s wife? Edred had not been disappointed--but then he took
everything with a hard, cynical philosophy. She was to be Jethro’s
wife. Then why did she listen so intently for the opening and shutting
of doors; why gasp and spring to her feet at a footstep?
She was standing, the checked duster in one hand, the other painfully
at her side, when Jethro came in. Her white face was all lines and
furrows.
“I’ve given Edred the notes,” he said shortly. “He wants to be off as
soon as possible. I shan’t go to the Flagon House; very likely I shall
meet old Crisp at market to-morrow. We’ll all drive to the station in
the wagonette after dinner.”
He looked annoyed; the two hundred pounds had gone against the grain;
he was naturally close-fisted--it was the quality which had made the
fortunes of his house. Presently his face lighted, and he said:
“What color would you like them to paint the outside of the place? The
foreman suggests chocolate, but I fancy a nice green.”
“It must be white,” she said positively. “That is fashionable now, and
so clean and fresh--in the country.”
“Then I’ll tell him white. You’d like to see the last of Edred? We
might drive round by Turle on the way back; Nancy will be upset--I
thought there would be a match there.”
She didn’t answer; only rubbed viciously at the polished table.
All that morning she kept away from Edred, although she saw him
lounging about outside--in the garden, in the orchard, waiting for a
word with her. At dinner-time she came down in her most becoming dress.
Her cheeks were flushed, and her gray eyes sparkled and darted. She ate
very little. The two men made a hearty meal, Edred very voluble betwixt
his hurried mouthfuls--talking to Jethro in the superior, pitying way
of the town man. Gainah said nothing; they had ceased to regard her.
She was a machine. She stitched all day; she fed methodically; she
stared at them with her glassy, stupid eyes.
Jethro went out to hurry Daborn with the horse. Pamela, the untasted
pudding steaming on her plate, got up with a jerk, and spoke of putting
on her hat and gloves. Edred, who had been trying to catch her eye all
through the meal, touched her softly on the back of the hand with his
fingers. She gave a little cry, and flinched as if they had been hot
coal. Her wide eyes, searching his face for the first time, were wildly
appealing. He was piqued by her decision to stay behind and marry
Jethro. Now that there was a chance of losing her, she suddenly became
desirable.
“This won’t do,” he whispered eagerly. “You must come.”
“I can’t. Everything is settled.”
“Pooh! You could arrange----”
He had her hand. He was looking at her ardently. The impulse to go with
him--let fate bring what it might--was strong. She looked at him. He
was more in earnest, more in love than he had ever been. She had always
understood that it was a mistake to let a man know you loved him--but
then her feeling had always been so intense that she had been incapable
of hiding it. Her love had bubbled in her eyes, on her eager lips. But
it was bad strategy all the same.
She looked at the cold, dim room, at the foolishly intent old woman by
the window, stitching blue hearts on worn white dimity in a perfect
fury of aimless industry. She looked at the grim shadow of the yew,
at the yawning cavern of the open hearth, at the somber furniture. And
she thought of London, with its glitter, its hurry, and vivacity.
London and Love! She let her wrist relax, let her whole fluttering hand
be buried in that long, cool one.
“I might arrange----”
She broke off as Jethro came through the low door.
“You two ought to be ready,” he called out. “The horse is coming
round.”
She turned and faced him, with her cheeks like rouged cheeks and her
eyes like polished, many-faceted diamonds.
“There is really no need for you to go,” she said unsteadily “Edred
wouldn’t mind. Let Daborn drive us. You know you had an appointment at
the Flagon House.”
“But that was this morning. Of course I’ll come. Be quick and get your
hat on.”
She went up the shallow stairs, woe at her wavering, passionate heart.
It was no good; he must go alone. It was far better that he should go
alone.
“Edred can sit on the box with me. The wagonette is half filled up with
luggage,” Jethro said, as she came out of the gate.
“We can manage very well behind. Can’t we?” She turned, trembling, to
Edred, who was digging at his shoes with the point of his cane.
“Then jump in.” Jethro had the reins in his hand.
They flashed along the white roads. She and Edred kept their hands
clasped under the summer rug of Holland. Once she bent forward, first
looking cautiously at the figure on the box, and shook her head, and
whispered:
“I can’t do it. You see he _would_ come.”
Now and then Jethro, by a flick of his whip, pointed out some
feature of great interest--to him: another farmer’s hay or cattle,
a badly tilled field, a line of old cottages which he had been
renovating--putting slate roofs in place of thatch and square panes of
glass instead of lead lights. Those cottages were for Pamela; the rent
would be her pin money.
As they whizzed down the steep hill leading to the little wayside
station, the signal fell. The porter, who was just throwing back the
gates of the level crossing, waited for the horse to pass.
“We mustn’t stop to see him off,” Jethro said, as Edred’s baggage was
got out. “The mare shies at an engine.”
“We must wait.”
Her voice was so shrill that it startled her. She added, touching
Jethro’s arm, and feeling like Jael of old as she did so:
“Do please wait.”
“Very well. Here, sonny; hold the horse.”
He threw the reins to a boy, and the three of them walked into the tiny
station. Edred went into the booking office for his ticket. On the
platform there were several people--a few rustics, with baskets or
bulging red cotton handkerchiefs; one young woman with a tight,
leafless posy bound carefully round with newspaper.
“He ought to have had some flowers,” Jethro said, throwing a glance
inside at the lean figure at the ticket window.
“What would be the good? He hasn’t any home. He will go to an hotel
to-night.”
A wild, impotent desire to go with him made her quiver.
Another wagonette drove up and Mrs. Turle with Nancy alighted.
The girl’s face flooded when she saw Edred--in dark clothes--and saw
the various leather bags lying about on the platform. They were being
hurriedly labeled by the porter.
“Edred’s going away--for good.” Pamela turned her veiled cheek to the
red lips.
“To sea?”
Nancy’s face grew piteous.
“No. To the city.”
“Then he will come down sometimes.”
“Perhaps--but it is doubtful. He has found Folly Corner dull. London is
so full of attractions for a man.”
“Going away!” Aunt Sophy’s clear eyes seemed to pierce behind the lying
mask of her burning face. “Isn’t it very sudden, dear? You look quite
feverish, Pamela. A touch of headache?”
“My head never aches,” she said, almost rudely.
“Nancy and I will have an escort up. We are shopping; the summer sales
get earlier and earlier every year.”
The porter began to clang the noisy brass bell, and along the line,
which ran perfectly straight for a mile or more, they saw the blue
smoke and bulky, indistinct outline of the approaching engine:
“I’ll go and hurry Edred.”
She stepped out of the sun into the little booking-office, with its
torn excursion-bills and gay pictures of ocean liners.
He was scooping up his change, throwing it, with his accustomed
carelessly reckless air, into his trousers pocket. The door of the
waiting-room was half open. On the platform Aunt Sophy was talking
earnestly to Jethro about farming affairs, and Nancy was staring at the
enameled advertisement of a local seedsman.
“Come in here for a moment.”
She jerked her hand toward the open door. They went in. The window was
of frosted glass.
“I can’t go with you,” she said, looking up hopelessly through her
veil. “You see how it is! Aunt Sophy and Nancy are going up. Everything
is against us. Perhaps it is as well. Good-by.”
He had never been so nearly disposed to sacrifice himself for a woman.
Then, with his unquenchable selfishness, he remembered too that a
pretty woman would be positively useful in his mode of life: many a
dubious bit of business had been pulled off by a good dinner and an
attractive woman. She was so devoted to him. A devoted woman was
invaluable and very rare. They usually played their own game.
He kissed her turbulently on her closed eyes, through the crisp net,
on her burning cheeks and dry lips. They both felt the rush and sway of
the train as it rushed into the station. They both became conscious of
a figure in the narrow door. She lifted her head, unclasped her fierce
arms, to see Jethro.
“We were saying good-by,” she stammered.
Edred was cool.
“Pam and I have always been chums--we were left in the world together,”
he said in a matter-of-fact way, and insolently meeting the doubt in
Jethro’s steely eyes. “Good-by, old girl. By the way, I’ll send you a
telegram when I get to town, just to let you know I am all right.”
He went out into the sun, got into a carriage with the Turles, raised
his hat gayly as the train steamed out.
He was gone. It was all over. The railway banks were gay with
snapdragons, self-sown; ferns had sown themselves in the cutting and
thrust out their fronds like forked green tongues. The station-master’s
black-and-tan terrier bounded round Pamela’s skirts. Every little thing
was emphasized--as it would be in a nightmare.
“Did you think to ask Aunt Sophy the name of her kitchen-range?” asked
Jethro, as they went slowly up the hill.
She was on the box beside him. She felt cold and sick. She looked back
now and then at the empty seats.
“It is the Camelot,” she returned mechanically, and for the rest of the
drive she kept saying to herself, in a dazed way, “Camelot,” as if it
were a new word.
After tea Jethro drove to the Flagon House, saying he might stay to
supper. Folly Corner was quiet, growing mystic with twilight. Pamela
went down the bricked path, without a glance at the rich mosaic of the
herbaceous borders, and stood between the poplars, her arms on the
gate. By and by a boy came along the road. When he got close she saw
that he carried a red envelope. She took it languidly, saying that
there was no answer, and paying him sixpence for porterage.
“Be ready to start for London with me at half-past ten to-night. Am
coming back. Will wait under yew.”
It had been sent from Liddleshorn. Edred was waiting at Liddleshorn
now--waiting for the night, which was always kind to criminals.
She went into the house, put a few things together. Jethro came in soon
after nine. He was a bit surly--he had surly fits occasionally.
To-night she took no notice. She couldn’t find it in her heart to look
at him, knowing the part she was going to play.
By ten she was dressed and standing under the yew. Her bag and
umbrella, set against the wall of the house, seemed a grotesquely
modern touch beside the silence and starlight, in contrast to the sharp
delight and terror of her own face.
How white and gaunt the ladders and scaffolding looked! What a queer,
old-world interior the dining-room made! She could see straight
through; they rarely drew the curtains these light June nights.
The night-jar called harshly, a beetle dashed against her face, then
whirred away. From the stall came loud, human-sounding, trumpeting
moans. They made her shudder. She knew that one of the cows was
calving. Once she saw the light of a lantern--muddy and yellow, like a
bilious eye, beside the hard stars--go round the building. She hid
behind the yew, listening to the steady clump of Boyce’s boots as he
went in to tend the animal.
The church clock struck a quarter to eleven. He was late, a quarter of
an hour late; perhaps they wouldn’t catch the last up-train from
Liddleshorn. Very likely he was out in the road merely waiting, as a
matter of prudence, until Boyce went away. The loud moans of the
tortured cow struck her heart.
She strained her eyes, expecting every moment to see the tall, lithe
figure steal across the garden. She strained her ears, imagining she
heard the sharp ring of hoofs along the road. They came nearer, more
certain, more distinct. She advanced like a guilty thing to the gate,
creeping along in the starlight. Each time she reached the poplar there
was perfect silence. Each time she looked along the road it stretched
straight and blank across the common. Yet when she waited at the yew
again she fancied that she heard the ring of those quick hoofs.
The quarters chimed on. Boyce, with his yellow-eyed lantern, shuffled
out of sight. The world was only stars and boding night-jar and
sentinel trees which had hardly stirred a leaf in the hot, still air.
Twelve! Two clocks chimed midnight together, tripping each other up,
like stammering tongues.
He would never come now. Even as she stood there, sick and flushing,
the whistle of the last up-train tore the night, and on the horizon she
saw the lurid tail of fire.
She only wanted him to come, to creep behind the yew and kiss her, as
he had kissed that little pink fool, Nancy Turle. She didn’t trouble
her head about anything more; didn’t add to her agitation by worrying
over practical details. They could walk under the stars until
dawn--anything. Mere trifles like food, sleep, sore feet, light head,
were nothing. If only he would come! Those maddening hoofs kept ringing
along the road. A dozen times she ran along the bricked path.
As the clock struck one she turned away, went under the hooded door
like a thief, up the still staircase into her own room. She flung
herself, wide awake, dry-eyed, and tingling, on her smooth bed.
At two she heard the steady passing of feet--not Boyce’s this time.
With a strangled cry of joy she slipped off the bed and glided to the
open window. The stars were clouded, and a violent summer rain struck
straight from the sky. The feet stopped below Jethro’s window, a rattle
of gravel went against the glass. She looked out cautiously; listened;
heard Chalcraft tell his master that the ricks were not covered.
Jethro answered back that he, too, had heard the rain, and would be
down directly.
She heard him go down, heard the feet of the two men die away. Every
star was hidden. It was too dark to see anything.
She returned to the bed without undressing. She lay there flat on her
back, fully clothed, with her hands and lips clenched. Jethro came back
to the house, to his bed. She heard him steal by her door without his
shoes.
There was silence. Then the restless life of the farm began. Cocks
crowed; there were feet along the wet road. Across the fields, through
the dimness and mystery of the half-born day, Boyce, the cowman, was
weirdly hooting in the morning mist for the cattle to come and be
milked.