THE VICAR'S PROPOSITION
I do not know how long I stood outside the door there in the passage.
After awhile I began to move softly to and fro, more than once reaching
the room where I was to sleep, but returning again to my old post. I was
loth to forsake it. A strange desire was on me. I wished that the door
would open, nay, to open it myself, and by my presence declare what was
now so plain to me. But to her it would not have been plain; for now I
was alone in the passage, and there was nothing to show the thing which
had come to me there, and there at last had left me. Yet it seemed
monstrous that she should not know, possible to tell her to-night,
certain that my shame-faced tongue would find no words to-morrow. It was
a thing that must be said while the glow and the charm of it were still
on me, or it would find no saying.
The light had burnt down very low, and gave forth a dim fitful glare,
hardly conquering the darkness. Now, again, I was standing still, lost
in my struggle. Presently, with glad amazement, as though there had
come an unlooked-for answer to my prayer, I heard a light step within.
The footfalls seemed to hesitate; then they came again, the bolt of the
door shot back, and a crack of faint light shewed. "Who's there?" asked
Barbara's voice, trembling with alarm or some other agitation which made
her tones quick and timid. I made no answer. The door opened a little
wider. I saw her face as she looked out, half-fearful, yet surely also
half-expectant. Much as I had desired her coming, I would willingly have
escaped now, for I did not know what to say to her. I had rehearsed my
speech a hundred times; the moment for its utterance found me dumb. Yet
the impulse I had felt was still on me, though it failed to give me
words.
"I thought it was you," she whispered. "Why are you there? Do you want
me?"
Lame and halting came my answer.
"I was only passing by on my way to bed," I stammered. "I'm sorry I
roused you."
"I wasn't asleep," said she. Then after a pause she added, "I--I thought
you had been there some time. Good-night."
She bade me good-night, but yet seemed to wait for me to speak; since I
was still silent she added, "Is our companion gone to bed?"
"Some little while back," said I. Then raising my eyes to her face, I
said, "I'm sorry that you don't sleep."
"Alas, we both have our sorrows," she returned with a doleful smile.
Again there was a pause.
"Good-night," said Barbara.
"Good-night," said I.
She drew back, the door closed, I was alone again in the passage.
Now if any man--nay, if every man--who reads my history, at this place
close the leaves on his thumb and call Simon Dale a fool, I will not
complain of him; but if he be moved to fling the book away for good and
all, not enduring more of such a fool as Simon Dale, why I will humbly
ask him if he hath never rehearsed brave speeches for his mistress's ear
and found himself tongue-tied in her presence? And if he hath, what did
he then? I wager that, while calling himself a dolt with most hearty
honesty, yet he set some of the blame on her shoulders, crying that he
would have spoken had she opened the way, that it was her reticence, her
distance, her coldness, which froze his eloquence; and that to any other
lady in the whole world he could have poured forth words so full of fire
that they must have inflamed her to a passion like to his own and burnt
down every barrier which parted her heart from his. Therefore at that
moment he searched for accusations against her, and found a
bitter-tasting comfort in every offence that she had given him, and made
treasure of any scornful speech, rescuing himself from the extreme of
foolishness by such excuse as harshness might afford. Now Barbara
Quinton had told Mistress Nell that I was forward for my station. What
man could, what man would, lay bare his heart to a lady who held him to
be forward for his station?
These meditations took me to my chamber, whither I might have gone an
hour before, and lasted me fully two hours after I had stretched myself
upon the bed. Then I slept heavily; when I woke it was high morning. I
lay there a little while, thinking with no pleasure of the journey
before me. Then having risen and dressed hastily, I made my way to the
room where Nell and I had talked the night before. I did not know in
what mood I should find her, but I desired to see her alone and beg her
to come to some truce with Mistress Quinton, lest our day's travelling
should be over thorns. She was not in the room when I came there.
Looking out of window I perceived the coach at the door; the host was
giving an eye to the horses, and I hailed him. He ran in and a moment
later entered the room.
"At what hour are we to set out?" I asked.
"When you will," said he.
"Have you no orders then from Mistress Gwyn?"
"She left none with me, sir."
"Left none?" I cried, amazed.
A smile came on his lips and his eyes twinkled.
"Now I thought it!" said he with a chuckle. "You didn't know her
purpose? She has hired a post-chaise and set out two hours ago, telling
me that you and the other lady would travel as well without her, and
that, for her part, she was weary of both of you. But she left a message
for you. See, it lies there on the table."
A little packet was on the table; I took it up. The innkeeper's eyes
were fixed on me in obvious curiosity and amusement. I was not minded to
afford him more entertainment than I need, and bade him begone before I
opened the packet. He withdrew reluctantly. Then I unfastened Nell's
parcel. It contained ten guineas wrapped in white paper, and on the
inside of the paper was written in a most laborious awkward scrawl (I
fear the execution of it gave poor Nell much pains), "In pay for your
dagger. E.G." It was all of her hand I had ever seen; the brief message
seemed to speak a sadness in her. Perhaps I deluded myself; her skill
with the pen would not serve her far. She had gone, that was the sum of
it, and I was grieved that she had gone in this fashion.
With the piece of paper still in my hands, the guineas also still
standing in a little pile on the table, I turned to find Barbara Quinton
in the doorway of the room. Her air was timid, as though she were not
sure of welcome, and something of the night's embarrassment still hung
about her. She looked round as though in search for somebody.
"I am alone here," said I, answering her glance.
"But she? Mistress----?"
"She's gone," said I. "I haven't seen her. The innkeeper tells me that
she has been gone these two hours. But she has left us the coach
and----" I walked to the window and looked out. "Yes, and my horse is
there, and her servant with his horse."
"But why is she gone? Hasn't she left----?"
"She has left ten guineas also," said I, pointing to the pile on the
table.
"And no reason for her going?"
"Unless this be one," I answered, holding out the piece of paper.
"I won't read it," said Barbara.
"It says only, 'In pay for your dagger.'"
"Then it gives no reason."
"Why, no, it gives none," said I.
"It's very strange," murmured Barbara, looking not at me but past me.
Now to me, when I pondered over the matter, it did not seem altogether
strange. Yet where lay the need to tell Mistress Barbara why it seemed
not altogether strange? Indeed I could not have told it easily, seeing
that, look at it how you will, the thing was not easy to set forth to
Mistress Barbara. Doubtless it was but a stretch of fancy to see any
meaning in Nell's mention of the dagger, save the plain one that lay on
the surface; yet had she been given to conceits, she might have used the
dagger as a figure for some wound that I had dealt her.
"No doubt some business called her," said I rather lamely. "She has
shown much consideration in leaving her coach for us."
"And the money? Shall you use it?"
"What choice have I?"
Barbara's glance was on the pile of guineas. I put out my hand, took
them up, and stowed them in my purse; as I did this, my eye wandered to
the window. Barbara followed my look and my thought also. I had no mind
that this new provision for our needs should share the fate of my last
guinea.
"You needn't have said that!" cried Barbara, flushing; although, as may
be seen, I had said nothing.
"I will repay the money in due course," said I, patting my purse.
We made a meal together in unbroken silence. No more was said of
Mistress Nell; our encounter in the corridor last night seemed utterly
forgotten. Relieved of a presence that was irksome to her and would have
rendered her apprehensive of fresh shame at every place we passed
through, Mistress Barbara should have shown an easier bearing and more
gaiety; so I supposed and hoped. The fact refuted me; silent, cold, and
distant, she seemed in even greater discomfort than when we had a
companion. Her mood called up a like in me, and I began to ask myself
whether for this I had done well to drive poor Nell away.
Thus in gloom we made ready to set forth. Myself prepared to mount my
horse, I offered to hand Barbara into the coach. Then she looked at me;
I noted it, for she had not done so much for an hour past; a slight
colour came into her cheeks, she glanced round the interior of the
coach; it was indeed wide and spacious for one traveller.
"You ride to-day also?" she asked.
The sting that had tormented me was still alive; I could not deny myself
the pleasure of a retort so apt. I bowed low and deferentially, saying,
"I have learnt my station. I would not be so forward as to sit in the
coach with you." The flush on her cheeks deepened suddenly; she
stretched out her hand a little way towards me, and her lips parted as
though she were about to speak. But her hand fell again, and her lips
shut on unuttered words.
"As you will," she said coldly. "Pray bid them set out."
Of our journey I will say no more. There is nothing in it that I take
pleasure in telling, and to write its history would be to accuse either
Barbara or myself. For two days we travelled together, she in her coach,
I on horseback. Come to London, we were told that my lord was at
Hatchstead; having despatched our borrowed equipage and servant to their
mistress, and with them the amount of my debt and a most grateful
message, we proceeded on our road, Barbara in a chaise, I again riding.
All the way Barbara shunned me as though I had the plague, and I on my
side showed no desire to be with a companion so averse from my society.
On my life I was driven half-mad, and had that night at Canterbury come
again--well, Heaven be thanked that temptation comes sometimes at
moments when virtue also has attractions, or which of us would stand?
And the night we spent on the road, decorum forbade that we should so
much as speak, much less sup, together; and the night we lay in London,
I spent at one end of the town and she at the other. At least I showed
no forwardness; to that I was sworn, and adhered most obstinately. Thus
we came to Hatchstead, better strangers than ever we had left Dover,
and, although safe and sound from bodily perils and those wiles of
princes that had of late so threatened our tranquillity, yet both of us
as ill in temper as could be conceived. Defend me from any such journey
again! But there is no likelihood of such a trial now, alas! Yes, there
was a pleasure in it; it was a battle, and, by my faith, it was close
drawn between us.
The chaise stopped at the Manor gates, and I rode up to the door of it,
cap in hand. Here was to be our parting.
"I thank you heartily, sir," said Barbara in a low voice, with a bow of
her head and a quick glance that would not dwell on my sullen face.
"My happiness has been to serve you, madame," I returned. "I grieve only
that my escort has been so irksome to you."
"No," said Barbara, and she said no more, but rolled up the avenue in
her chaise, leaving me to find my way alone to my mother's house.
I sat a few moments on my horse, watching her go. Then with an oath I
turned away. The sight of the gardener's cottage sent my thoughts back
to the old days when Cydaria came and caught my heart in her butterfly
net. It was just there, in the meadow by the avenue, that I had kissed
her. A kiss is a thing lightly given and sometimes lightly taken. It was
that kiss which Barbara had seen from the window, and great debate had
arisen on it. Lightly given, yet leading on to much that I did not see,
lightly taken, yet perhaps mother to some fancies that men would wonder
to find in Mistress Gwyn.
"I'm heartily glad to be here!" I cried, loosing the Vicar's hand and
flinging myself into the high arm-chair in the chimney corner.
My mother received this exclamation as a tribute of filial affection,
the Vicar treated it as an evidence of friendship, my sister Mary saw in
it a thanksgiving for deliverance from the perils and temptations of
London and the Court. Let them take it how they would; in truth it was
inspired in none of these ways, but was purely an expression of relief,
first at having brought Mistress Barbara safe to the Manor, in the
second place, at being quit of her society.
"I am very curious to learn, Simon," said the Vicar, drawing his chair
near mine, and laying his hand upon my knee, "what passed at Dover. For
it seems to me that there, if at any place in the world, the prophecy
which Betty Nasroth spoke concerning you----"
"You shall know all in good time, sir," I cried impatiently.
"Should find its fulfilment," ended the Vicar placidly.
"Are we not finished with that folly yet?" asked my mother.
"Simon must tell us that," smiled the Vicar.
"In good time, in good time," I cried again. "But tell me first, when
did my lord come here from London?"
"Why, a week ago. My lady was sick, and the physician prescribed the air
of the country for her. But my lord stayed four days only and then was
gone again."
I started and sat upright in my seat.
"What, isn't he here now?" I asked eagerly.
"Why, Simon," said my good mother with a laugh, "we looked to get news
from you, and now we have news to give you! The King has sent for my
lord; I saw his message. It was most flattering and spoke of some urgent
and great business on which the King desired my lord's immediate
presence and counsel. So he set out two days ago to join the King with a
large train of servants, leaving behind my lady, who was too sick to
travel."
I was surprised at these tidings and fell into deep consideration. What
need had the King of my lord's counsel, and so suddenly? What had been
done at Dover would not be opened to Lord Quinton's ear. Was he summoned
as a Lord of Council or as his daughter's father? For by now the King
must know certain matters respecting my lord's daughter and a humble
gentleman who had striven to serve her so far as his station enabled him
and without undue forwardness. We might well have passed my lord's coach
on the road and not remarked it among the many that met us as we drew
near to London in the evening. I had not observed his liveries, but that
went for nothing. I took heed of little on that journey save the bearing
of Mistress Barbara. Where lay the meaning of my lord's summons? It came
into my mind that M. de Perrencourt had sent messengers from Calais, and
that the King might be seeking to fulfil in another way the bargain
whose accomplishment I had hindered. The thought was new life to me. If
my work were not finished--. I broke off; the Vicar's hand was on my
knee again.
"Touching the prophecy----" he began.
"Indeed, sir, in good time you shall know all. It is fulfilled."
"Fulfilled!" he cried rapturously. "Then, Simon, fortune smiles?"
"No," I retorted, "she frowns most damnably."
To swear is a sin, to swear before ladies is bad manners, to swear in
talking to a clergyman is worst of all. But while my mother and my
sister drew away in offence (and I hereby tender them an apology never
yet made) the Vicar only smiled.
"A plague on such prophecies," said I sourly.
"Yet if it be fulfilled!" he murmured. For he held more by that than by
any good fortune of mine; me he loved, but his magic was dearer to him.
"You must indeed tell me," he urged.
My mother approached somewhat timidly.
"You are come to stay with us, Simon?" she asked.
"For the term of my life, so far as I know, madame," said I.
"Thanks to God," she murmured softly.
There is a sort of saying that a mother speaks and a son hears to his
shame and wonder! Her heart was all in me, while mine was far away.
Despondency had got hold of me. Fortune, in her merriest mood, seeming
bent on fooling me fairly, had opened a door and shown me the prospect
of fine doings and high ambitions realised. The glimpse had been but
brief, and the tricky creature shut the door in my face with a laugh.
Betty Nasroth's prophecy was fulfilled, but its accomplishment left me
in no better state; nay, I should be compelled to count myself lucky if
I came off unhurt and were not pursued by the anger of those great folk
whose wills and whims I had crossed. I must lie quiet in Hatchstead, and
to lie quiet in Hatchstead was hell to me--ay, hell, unless by some
miracle (whereof there was but one way) it should turn to heaven. That
was not for me; I was denied youth's sovereign balm for ill-starred
hopes and ambitions gone awry.
The Vicar and I were alone now, and I could not but humour him by
telling what had passed. He heard with rare enjoyment; and although his
interest declined from its zenith so soon as I had told the last of the
prophecy, he listened to the rest with twinkling eyes. No comment did he
make, but took snuff frequently. I, my tale done, fell again into
meditation. Yet I had been fired by the rehearsal of my own story, and
my thoughts were less dark in hue. The news concerning Lord Quinton
stirred me afresh. My aid might again be needed; my melancholy was
tinted with pleasant pride as I declared to myself that it should not be
lacking, for all that I had been used as one would not use a faithful
dog, much less a gentleman who, doubtless by no merit of his own but yet
most certainly, had been of no small service. To confess the truth, I
was so persuaded of my value that I looked for every moment to bring me
a summons, and practised under my breath the terms, respectful yet
resentful, in which I would again place my arm and sword at Barbara's
disposal.
"You loved this creature Nell?" asked the Vicar suddenly.
"Ay," said I, "I loved her."
"You love her no more?"
"Why, no," I answered, mustering a cool smile. "Folly such as that goes
by with youth."
"Your age is twenty-four?"
"Yes, I am twenty-four."
"And you love her no longer?"
"I tell you, no longer, sir."
The Vicar opened his box and took a large pinch.
"Then," said he, the pinch being between his finger and thumb and just
half-way on the road to his nose, "you love some other woman, Simon."
He spoke not as a man who asks a question nor even as one who hazards an
opinion; he declared a fact and needed no answer to confirm him. "Yes,
you love some other woman, Simon," said he, and there left the matter.
"I don't," I cried indignantly. Had I told myself a hundred times that I
was not in love to be told by another that I was? True, I might have
been in love, had not----
"Ah, who goes there?" exclaimed the Vicar, springing nimbly to the
window and looking out with eagerness. "I seem to know the gentleman.
Come, Simon, look."
I obeyed him. A gentleman, attended by two servants, rode past rapidly;
twilight had begun to fall, but the light served well enough to show me
who the stranger was. He rode hard and his horse's head was towards the
Manor gates.
"I think it is my Lord Carford," said the Vicar. "He goes to the Manor,
as I think."
"I think it is and I think he does," said I; and for a single moment I
stood there in the middle of the room, hesitating, wavering, miserable.
"What ails you, Simon? Why shouldn't my Lord Carford go to the Manor?"
cried the Vicar.
"Let him go to the devil!" I cried, and I seized my hat from the table
where it lay.
The Vicar turned to me with a smile on his lips.
"Go, lad," said he, "and let me not hear you again deny my propositions.
They are founded on an extensive observation of humanity and----"
Well, I know not to this day on what besides. For I was out of the house
before the Vicar completed his statement of the authority that underlay
his propositions.