Early next morning, while the finch still dreamed its heavy dream and
the mice were still motionless balls, Hazel was awakened by a knock at
the massive oak door. She ran across and opened it a crack, peering out
from amid her hair like a squirrel from autumn leaves.
Vessons stood there with a pint mug of beer, which he proffered. But
Hazel had a woman's craving for tea.
'If so be the kettle's boiling,' she said apologetically.
'Tay!' said Vessons. 'Laws! how furiously the women do rage after tay!
I s'pose it's me as is to make it?'
'If kettle's boiling.'
'Kettle! O' course kettle's boiling this hour past. Or how would the
ca'ves get their meal?'
'Well, you needna shout. You'll wake 'im.'
Fright was in her eyes, strong and inexplicable to herself.
'I mun go!' she whispered.
'Ah! You go,' said Vessons, glad that for once duty and inclination
went hand in hand.
'I'll send you,' he added. 'Where d'yer live?'
She hesitated.
'You needna be frit to tell _me,_' said Vessons. 'I'm
six-and-sixty, and you're no more to me'--he surveyed her flushing
face contemplatively--'than the wold useless cat,' he concluded.
Hazel frowned; but she wanted a promise from Vessons, so she made no
retort.
'You wunna tell 'im?' she pleaded.
''Im? Never will I! Wild 'orses shanna drag it from me, nor yet blood
'orses, nor 'unters, nor cart-'orses, nor Suffolk punches!' Vessons
waxed eloquent, for again righteousness and desire coincided. He did
not want a woman at Undern.
'Well,' said Hazel, whispering through the crack, 'I lives at the
Callow.'
'What! that lost and forgotten place t'other side the Mountain?'
'Ah! But it inna lost and forgotten; it's better'n this. We've got
bees.'
'So've I got bees.'
'And a music.'
'Music? What's a music? You canna eat it.'
'And my dad makes coffins.'
'Does 'e, now?' said Vessons, interested at last. Then he bethought him
of the credit of Undern. 'But you anna got a mulberry-tree,' he said
triumphantly. 'Now then! _I_ 'ave!'
He creaked downstairs.
In a few moments Hazel also went down, and drank her tea by the red
fire in the kitchen, watching the frost-flowers being softly effaced
from the window as if someone rubbed them away with a sponge. Snow like
sifted sugar was heaped on the sill, and the yard and outbuildings and
fields, the pools and the ricks, all had the dim radiance of antimony.
'Where be the road?' asked Hazel, standing on the door-step and feeling
rather lost. 'How'll I find it?'
'You wunna find it.'
'Oh, but I mun!'
'D'you think Andrew Vessons'll let an 'ooman trapse in the snow when
he's got good horses in stable?' queried Vessons grandly. 'I'll drive
yer.'
'I'm much obleeged, I'm sure,' said Hazel. 'But wunna he know?'
'He'll sleep till noon if I let 'im,' said Andrew.
They drove off in silence, the snow muffling the plunging hoofs. Hazel
looked back as the sky crimsoned for dawn. The house fronted her with a
look of power and patience. She felt that it had not yet done with her.
She wondered how she would feel if Reddin suddenly appeared at his
window. And a tiny traitorous wish slipped up from somewhere in her
heart. She watched the windows till a turn hid the house, and then she
sighed. Almost she wished that Reddin had awakened.
But she soon forgot everything in delight; for the snow shone, the long
slots of the rabbits and hares, the birds' tracks in orderly rows, the
deep footprints of sheep, all made her laugh by their vagaries, for
they ran in loops and in circles, and appeared like the crazy steps of
a sleep-walker to those who had not the key of their activity. Hazel's
own doings were like that; everyone's doings are like it, if one sees
the doings without the motive.
Plovers wheeled and cried desolately, seeing the soft relentless snow
between themselves and their green meadows, sad as those that see fate
drawing thick veils between themselves and the meadows of their hope
and joy.
At the foot of the Callow Hazel got out.
'Never tell him,' she said, looking up.
'Never in life,' said Vessons.
Hazel hesitated.
'Never tell him,' she added, 'unless he asks a deal and canna rest.'
'He may ask till Doomsday,' said Vessons, 'and he may be restless as
the ten thousand ghosses that trapse round Undern when the moon's low,
but I'll ne'er tell 'im.'
Hazel sighed, and turned to climb the hill.
'A missus at Undern!' said Andrew to the cob's ears as they trotted
home. 'No, never will I!'
A magpie rose from a wood near the road, jibing at him. He looked round
almost as if it had been someone laughing at his resolve, and repeated,
'Never will I!'
'Where's Hazel?' asked Reddin.
'Neither wild 'orses, nor blood 'orses, nor race 'orses nor cart
'orses, nor Suffolk punches--' began Vessons whose style was
cumulative, and who, when he had made a good phrase, was apt to work it
to death like any other artist. 'Oh, you're drunk, Vessons!' said his
master.
'Shall drag it from me,' finished Vessons.
Reddin knew this was true, and felt rather hopeless. Still, he
determined not to give up the search until he had found Hazel.
He inquired at the Hunter's Arms, but Vessons had been there before
him, and he was met by pleasant stupidity.
Vessons was of the people, Reddin of the aristocracy, so the
frequenters of the Hunter's Arms sided as one man against Reddin.
'You'll not get another bite of that apple,' said Vessons with
satisfaction, when his master returned with downcast face.
'I can't stand your manners much longer, Vessons,' said he irritably.
'Gie me notice, then,' said Vessons, falling back on the well-worn
formula, and scoring his usual triumph.
Reddin had the faults of his class, but turning an old servant adrift
was not one of them. Vessons traded on this, and invariably said and
did exactly what he liked.