They brought the yellow-haired little maiden to the mill (ran the
story), and Gloam called her Swanhilda. Jael, the old housekeeper,
looked at her sharply, and asked what good such a little creature could
be among poor people? the girl was of no use herself, and would only
hinder those who had to work.
Gloam answered, "Heaven has sent her to us. She shall be our
inspiration, and the symbol of our good. Treat her with reverence, and
tenderly, as you would treat the best and purest aspiration of your
heart. If we wrong her, it will be our deadliest sin. If we cherish
her, the sins we have committed may be forgiven us."
"She is a gentleman's daughter, at all events," said Jael. "Look at the
shape of her hands and feet! No, she never worked, nor did her mother
before her. Well, maybe her family will come after her some day, and
pay us well for taking care of her. Or who knows but she may turn out
heiress to some great estate, when she grows up? If that were so....
David, son, come hither. See--she's a pretty little thing."
Handsome David stooped down and took the child's small soft hand. "And
so she is--a little beauty!" he exclaimed, looking into her blue eyes.
"Can't speak English, eh? That's a pity; but live and learn. Right glad
am I that you brought her here, sir," he added to Gloam. "Where did you
pick her up?"
"She's the rainbow after the storm," Gloam answered, smiling. "But I
shall not teach her English. Let her speak only the language which she
has brought with her." And he led the child away.
"That may do for him," muttered David, "but it won't do for me. He can
talk with her and I can't; so if he won't teach her English I will.
Devil take me if she isn't a sweet little fairy; and she's quite
enchanted the Scholar already. He's a changed man since yesterday. But
he shan't have all the fun to himself."
"She looks thirteen, don't you think?" said Jael. "She won't be a child
much longer, David. Why, come three years or so, she'll be old enough to
be married."
"Ay, old woman; but I shall be too old to marry her," he answered, with
a keen look and a laugh.
"I tell you, son, she's a lady, and good enough to mate with any man."
"That's your notion, and likely enough it's true. But good blood isn't
all I want--I've got that already, thanks to your good looks; what I
want and haven't got is money. And Miss Swanhilda, pretty as she is, has
less money even than I."
"But she has relations--rich relations; her own father and mother may be
alive for all we know. If she was saved off a ship where all the rest
were lost, of course there'll be no telling for some time to come. But
it's worth waiting for."
"Did no papers come ashore--nothing to help identify her?"
"I asked Poyntz that," said Jael, "and so far as I can make out, I think
there hasn't been anything."
"Well, I'll make sure of that next time I go over. We might advertise in
the foreign papers after awhile. A right pretty little thing she is, and
no mistake. But I'm not a-going to run any risks, old woman. Supposing I
was to get tied down to her for life, and then find out that she'd got
nothing, what would I do then?"
"There's no need of supposing any such thing, David. As if you couldn't
make the girl fond of you so as she wouldn't marry any but you; then
you'd have her safe, and if all turned out well, 'twould be time enough
to put the ring on her finger."
"Ay, that's about the idea, I suppose. Well, the Scholar's got the start
of us now; and 'twon't do to let him see what we're up to; luckily he
never did see what's going on under his nose. By-the-way, that's a
quaint bit of a necklace the child wears; mayhaps that'll help us to
find out something----"
He broke off suddenly, with an oath, and he and his mother stood
listening, pale-faced. His eyes were angry, but terror lurked in those
of the woman.
A strange jarring sound filled the air; it seemed to come from every
side, and screamed harshly into the listeners' ears. If a fiend had
burst into a long fit of malignant laughter close at hand the effect
could not have been more hateful and discordant.
"The laugh again!" David muttered between his teeth. "It would be just
our luck if it scared our best customer away. Devil take me if I don't
begin to believe it is the soul of that cursed husband of yours, that
you treated so affectionately. I'll swear there's not a spot of rust on
the machinery as big as a pin's head."
"Oh, son, don't look that way at me," said the woman, in a shaken voice.
"I would prevent it if I could; what can I do?"
"You might jump in and follow your husband; that's what he wants, I
suppose," returned the son, angrily. "It's you that wronged him, not I;
and as long as you're here we'll have no luck. That's the long and short
of it!"
The laugh had died away, and Jael, pressing her hand above her heart,
turned aside and passed out. She loved her son, and would have shed her
blood for him; but this was not the first time he had spoken thus.
After she was gone, David stood at the window, biting his lips and
muttering to himself. Suddenly he heard Gloam's step behind him, and
looked round in surprise.
"What was that noise?" Gloam asked.
"Why, nothing new, sir. The same old story. Something wrong with the
wheel again, I suppose."
"I remember no such sound before," said Gloam, excitedly. "It is
hideous, like the shriek of an evil spirit. Let it never come again; it
frightens Swanhilda, and comes between us like a prophecy of woe. Let it
never come again!"
"You have taken to hearing through her ears and feeling through her
senses--that's all the matter," answered David, smiling. "It sounds bad
to you because it makes her head ache. As to stopping it, I'd do so, and
gladly, if I but knew how. It loses us half our custom, for folks say
the devil's at the bottom of it, sure enough."
"It is a wicked sound!" exclaimed Gloam again, "full of mockery and
bitterness. Swanhilda was born to hear divine harmonies, and she will
leave us if we greet her with such hideous discord."
"She was born to take her chance with the rest of the world, Mr. Gloam,"
replied the younger man, in a harder tone. Then he smiled again and
added, in his muttering way, as he left the room, "She'll get used to it
fast enough, never fear."
But a long time passed without the recurrence of the hateful sound,
and meanwhile Swanhilda was recovering from her first melancholy and
home-sickness. Gloam had told her that she would see her father and
mother again some day, and by degrees her anxiety calmed down to a quiet
and not uncheerful expectation. She seemed to know little of the history
of her family, or else was averse from discussing it; for amidst all her
winning sweetness and pure sincerity she retained a maidenly reserve and
dignity not lightly to be overcome. But the guileless fascination which
she unconsciously exercised upon all she met was impossible to resist.
She gladdened all eyes and hearts, and the mill became a storehouse of
beauty and gladness as well as of grain and meal. People came from all
the surrounding neighbourhood to see Scholar Gloam's water-nymph; and at
last, when the Laughing Mill was mentioned, they thought of Swanhilda's
airy merriment--not of the ill-omened sound that had first given it
that name, but was already being fast forgotten. So the prosperity of
handsome David increased, and was greater than it had ever been before;
he had as many customers as the mill could supply, and bade fair, in the
course of years, to become a wealthy man. He and Jael treated the little
water-nymph with every kindness, as well they might; and what Gloam had
said seemed likely to come true--that she would be the means of their
regeneration.
And Gloam himself was as a man transfigured. He lived no longer amidst
his books, but made himself free to all; and the neighbours wondered
to find him so genial and gladsome. He and Swanhilda were constantly
together; they played and laughed like children; they went on long
rambles hand-in-hand; in winter they pelted each other with snow-balls;
in summer and autumn they gathered flowers and berries and nuts. He
treated her with the most reverent and entire affection; he was ready to
sacrifice anything for her sake, to give her anything--unless it were,
perhaps, the freedom to be to another all that she was to him. But
apparently she was well content. Gloam was the only one who spoke her
language, and the only one, therefore, with whom she could converse
unrestrainedly. He would not teach her English, and if others attempted
to do so it was without his knowledge or consent. He believed, it
may be, that no one but himself could appreciate her full worth, and
thought it would be a kind of desecration to let another approach her
too nearly. Certainly they were happy together. That part of his nature
to which she appealed was not less youthful than she was herself; and in
her society he felt himself immortally young. He forgot that there were
lines upon his brow, and that his figure was bent, and that his hair had
begun to be prematurely white. And he doubted not that as he felt so he
seemed to her.
Was his confidence justified? Had this child who was just beginning to
be a young woman, penetration to see the fresh soul within the imperfect
body? A more experienced man would have had misgivings, knowing that
young women are apt to judge by appearances, and to be more swayed by
downright power and passion than by abstract right and beauty. But
Gloam's experience had not taught him this. He did not dream that she
could ever learn to deceive him, or to give him less than the first
place in her heart. But he dreamed that some day, distant perhaps, at
least indefinite--they would be married. By all rights they belonged to
each other, and when they had played their childish games to the end,
and had wearied of them, then would they enter upon that new phase of
life. Meanwhile he would not speak to her of the deeper love, lest she
should be startled, and the frankness of their present intercourse be
impaired. But women have been lost ere now through fear of startling
them.
So more than two years slipped away, and the child Swanhilda had grown
to be a tall and graceful maiden; which seemed half a miracle, so
quickly had the time passed. Her blue eyes had waxed larger and deeper,
and in moments of excitement they became almost black. Her hair was
yellow as an evening cloud; her face and bearing full of life and
warmth. Her nature was strengthening and expanding; she was beginning to
measure herself against her associates. Though so gentle, she was all
untamed; no one had ever mastered or controlled her. She knew neither
her own strength nor weakness, but the time approached when she would
seek to know them. Every woman is both weaker and stronger than she
believes, and it is well for her, when the trial comes, if her strength
be not the betrayer of her weakness.