It was morning, and all the usual business was well begun; the cows were
out in their pasture on the hillside; the chickens about the close
vicinity of the house; nothing was audible except their busy cackle and
the hum of the bees, which Elizabeth Murray kept, and which were one of
her sources of income--and her own steps coming and going in her house.
Before you came in sight of the house you could hear those brisk steps,
stately and harmonious, giving a sign of life in the pleasant stillness.
Dick was in the potato-field close by; there had been a fine crop, and
he was digging them up for the market at Waterside. He was whistling as
he worked, but Elizabeth, whose mind was full of many cares, did not
sing snatches now of one song, now of another, as was her wont. How
seldom it is that the mother of children has not occasion for anxiety
about one or another! and it seemed to her that she had so much. Lily;
what should she do with Lily if the girl grumbled at the loneliness, as
she was likely to do, or pined for her friends, and for the admiration
she had called forth? All that would be natural--quite natural. After
half consenting to leave her daughter and to trust to her prudence,
Elizabeth had been seized with a panic on her return home, and had sent
instructions that Lily should return on Monday morning; and now again
she was doubtful, as was also so natural, of the wisdom of the step she
had taken. How would Lily bear the solitude? Up here among the hills,
nothing except the household work and the mild vicissitudes of the
chickens and the cows ever happened. Elizabeth herself did not mind,
because, as she said to herself, she was old, and all that was likely to
happen to her in this world had happened and was done with; and Dick did
not mind, for he had not begun yet to think of anything beyond his work,
and life was all before him, and he had been accustomed to the
tranquillity all his days--but Lily!
And on the other hand, there was Abel to think of--the lost boy--who yet
was so much greater and happier and better off than ever Elizabeth could
have made him. She sighed, but took herself to task for it, declaring to
herself with tears in her eyes that she did not grudge his
grandeur--that it was for his happiness she cared, not for her happiness
through him. "But oh, it cannot come to good that he should think shame
of his own folks," she sighed in the depths of her heart. Yet it was so
pleasant to think of him as "a gentleman." It seemed to Elizabeth that
if she could but see him enjoying that high estate, courted and made
much of by the great folks of the land, she would not want to speak to
him or betray him. Oh, far from that! She would live in the house with
him and never betray him.
Thus she was going on peacefully about her domestic work: the chickens
cackling outside, Dick whistling in the fields, the brook trickling over
the stones, the bees humming, everything full of the warmth and softness
of the summer day. The air was such that unless you were ill or in
trouble you gave God thanks, unenvious of other blessings, for nothing
but the day; and Elizabeth was a woman subject to such influences, and,
in spite of her cares, a softening of happiness stole into her mind.
After all, was not everything well? However anxious she might be, there
was no trouble in her family. Lily was not disobedient, and Abel, though
he did not come to see his family, yet "took an interest" in them. There
was no reason why she should not let the sunshine and the sweetness
steal into her heart, and allow herself to acknowledge that all was
well.
"Dick," she cried from the window, "lad, do you no hear a sound of
somebody coming? I think I hear a step by times, and surely somebody
cried to us, coming up the hill. Did you not hear?"
Dick stuck his spade into the soil, and, listening, said, "Mother, I
heard nothing. But now I'm quiet, ay, that was a sound."
"It's maybe Lily," said the mother.
"Lily's foot's too light to sound so far. But we'll see soon enough when
they come," said Dick, resuming his digging. He resumed his whistle too.
He was not curious. Whoever it was, would not they show themselves soon
enough? And in the meantime he had his work. Elizabeth, too, went in,
and went to her dairy, accepting Dick's philosophy. To be sure! there
was nothing so much to be expected but that when it appeared would be
time enough. Time enough! And so their life went on tranquil for ten
long sunny minutes more.
About that time both of them held their breath and stopped their work.
Dick stuck his spade again in the half-dug row of potatoes. Elizabeth
came out to the door. A hurrying, headlong step, coming on in mad haste,
now ceasing for a moment as it reached the bog, coming nearer, rushing
on--with other sounds, broken cries, gaspings and pantings, as of
somebody hunted, came to their ears. While the mother and son listened
in growing alarm, old Watch, the dog--most steady of dogs--suddenly
raised his old black muzzle and gave vent to a long wailing bark of
alarm, which echoed through the hills. Terror fell upon the minds of the
mother and son. What was it? The light seemed to go out of the sky, the
echoes to tingle all about them. These wild hurrying sounds did not come
even by the usual path, but, as Dick perceived sooner than his mother,
descended from the higher way, a way no one ever came. This was how it
was that when the new-comer reached the place at last, Elizabeth did not
see him. She knew nothing till he was close upon her. A terrible figure,
bare-headed, bloody, his clothes hanging torn about him, his face
ghastly and distorted, strange, harsh, broken sounds coming from his
lips. She turned round only when he was within a few steps of her, when
she saw him, and with a shriek of terror threw up her arms and started
out of his way. Dick came rushing to her help; but the stranger heeded
neither of them. He burst into the house, and threw himself, all
convulsed and shivering, before the kitchen fire.
"God help us, Dick--it's a madman!" cried Elizabeth. "What will we do?"
They both stood in terror at the door. There was a moment's pause of
horror and dismay. Dick was pale, but he was brave. "Go you and shut
yourself in the byre, mother, and I will see----"
"Nay, nay, my lad; your mother's life is less worth than yours. But look
at Watch!" she said, with a strange thrill at her heart.
Watch had been taken by surprise, and struck with terror as well as
themselves. He had run terrified out of the way with another howl when
the man rushed past. But now he had followed into the kitchen, without
either fear or anger apparently. "He never can bide a tramp," Elizabeth
said, with a strange aching wonder in her heart. They could see the
huddled mass of shivering limbs before the fire. Watch went in,
cautiously snuffed all round the prostrate figure, and then began slowly
to wag his tail--slowly at first, and then with an appearance of wild
joy, and yelps and barks of welcome. Elizabeth Murray's heart seemed to
stand still. She gave Dick a look of horrible suspicion and misery. Then
she made a gesture to him to keep behind her, and went in with the
silence and swiftness of a ghost.
The terrible being who had thus arrived upon them had fallen down on the
floor, apparently in a fit. He was lying writhing and struggling before
the fire, his face distorted, his eyes glaring, foam and blood on his
mouth. She went in and bent over him, then knelt down by him. She had
not seen him since he was a boy. He had been twelve years old when he
had gone away. She looked at him now, knowing before she looked who it
was. Heaven help her! had she ever been light of heart, peaceful, happy,
though this was coming? Was it years ago since she stood at her door and
heard Dick whistling and the bees humming? She knew who it was even
before she looked. She knew him for all his convulsed face, his terrible
struggles and contortions. Abel! her son--who was a gentleman, who was
too grand for his own people. The dog, faithful brute, with a truer
memory than even the mother's, was licking the terrible face. She gave a
great outcry, words and sobs together. "It's Watch that knows him, and
not me, first!" she said.
Then she got water and dashed in his face, and rubbed his stiffened
hands. She did not even know what to do for him. She knelt by his side,
her face too as pale as death, unconscious cries coming from her--"Oh my
lad! Oh be still! Oh let him be, good Lord, let him be!" She did not
know what she said. And Dick, with a face blanched to the colour of his
linen, kept plucking at her sleeve and calling softly, "Mother?" She
took no notice for a long time, then irritated by the repetition turned
upon him sharply, "What is it, lad?" Dick could not get any question out
of his parched lips, he only looked at her and then at the writhing
figure on the floor, "Can you not see for yourself?" she cried, with a
groan in which there was a kind of wild incredulous laugh. "Can you not
tell without asking? It's my boy Abel, him that's a gentleman; our pride
and our joy!"
How the rest of the horrible morning went they never knew. Their
peaceful occupations were all abandoned. In the midst of their cares for
Abel--whom after a while they managed to get transferred to a bed, when
the fit going off left him half unconscious and entirely
prostrate--arrived Lily, all unaware of any new event at home, but with
the news that a horrible murder had been discovered--Sir Richard
Featherstonhaugh lying dead on the hillside, all beaten and battered.
This did not seem to Elizabeth, for the moment at least, any concern of
theirs; but when Lily, very frightened and half reluctant, was taken
up-stairs to see her brother in his raving sleep, a gleam of painful
light, a dawning of some horror seemed to gleam among them, though they
could not perceive what it revealed. Lily turned from the room where lay
the stranger whom they called her brother Abel, with a suppressed
shriek. "It's the gentleman!" she cried; and when she had told all her
story the little awe-stricken party looked each other in the face, each
paler than the other, not knowing what to think. "Was he--friends--with
the lad that's killed?" Elizabeth asked, turning away her face. She
could not allow her children to perceive the dawn of meaning in it. When
Lily replied by a tremulous account of how and when she had seen them
together, Elizabeth made no comment, but by-and-by she went up-stairs
and returned with the clothes Abel had worn, made up into a bundle.
Lily, whose attention was still unaroused, did not notice what her
mother did. But Dick, who had watched her closely, went out after her,
and found her burying her bundle deep in the potato-field where he had
been digging. With tremulous energy she threw up the easily dug soil,
making a deep hole in a corner. She said nothing in explanation of what
she did, even to him, nor did he ask--but she took hold of his arm to
help her to the higher level on which he stood, and gripped it with a
convulsive strain. "God grant I'm a' wrong," she said, looking as if she
had been turned to stone. "Ay, mother," said Dick. It would have been
more comforting to her if he had not understood her so well.
But the events of the day were not yet over; enough, indeed, had passed
already to make it terrible. All this peaceful life, which had been so
quiet this morning, had disappeared from them, and in its place had come
a mystery and horror such as surely never before had come upon decent
folk. Who thought of the mild beasts in the field, the cows grazing, the
bees keeping up that busy hum of undisturbed labour, the milk that was
setting in the dairy, the eggs to be gathered, all the soft growth and
production of nature that was going on for their benefit? The whole had
been swept away from their thoughts by this sudden wreck, this falling
among them of a ruined being, a distracted life. How many anguishes had
come with him! terror, suspicion, crime! and yet it was all guess-work,
and there might be nothing after all but madness in poor Abel's misery.
Nothing but madness! which would have seemed the most horrible of
miseries yesterday, but now would be a relief from other fears. There
was only Lily in the house who did not entertain these fears. She had
not seen him come flying like a hunted creature to the one place that
could shelter him. She had not associated him with the murder of which,
on the other hand, her mind was full. Only yesterday Featherstonhaugh
had spoken to her, had tried to "court" her; had made an effort to take
her hand and draw her to him; and now he was murdered--murdered! lying
in his blood, scarcely recognisable! The story had been brought to the
village with all its terrible details before Lily started, and she could
not but go over them in her mind. So living, such power in him, such a
grand gentleman! and now with the life beaten out of him, a piece of
dishonoured clay! She sat down and cried, sitting by the door, while her
mother watched the other gentleman, who was her brother she could not
tell how. Lily sat alone in the solitude, and wept, partly for the
murdered man, partly out of vague agitation and excitement, partly for
herself, who had lost all pleasant things and pleasant prospects. What
was there for her now but solitude and forgetfulness, all the delights
of her youth over and done? She put up her hand to the little ribbon
with its hidden locket round her neck. Oh how sweet it had been to
receive that secret treasure! and now it was all that was left to her.
In all likelihood she would never, never see the giver more.
"Lily!" said a voice near to her. She gave a great start and cry and
rose to her feet. Had he come after her--and so soon? Notwithstanding
the sense of trouble about her, Lily's heart rose; but there was nothing
encouraging in the face of the lover whom she supposed to have come
after her. He was pale and haggard, his eyes bloodshot, his frame
trembling. "Where is he? Has he come here?" he cried. Of her, in the
old tender winning way, he took no notice at all; if it had been Dick,
Roger Ridley could not have been more indifferent. "Has he come here?"
he repeated, almost with impatience. Lily was wounded in her foolish
expectations. "How am I to tell who you mean?" she said. She stood in
the door barring his passage. The attitude meant a great deal more than
was in Lily's mind. She looked like the guardian and defender of the
secret that had come into the house.
Elizabeth, who was above, heard the voices and came to the window, which
she opened softly, looking out with anxious eyes. "I will not betray
him," she heard Roger say. Then he looked up and saw her, and beckoned
to her to come down. Elizabeth hesitated only for a moment. She must
hear sooner or later all there was to say. She must find out how to
defend her boy, and what he might be accused of. She locked the door
upon him as he lay there moaning in a stupor which was scarcely sleep,
and came down. She was but a common woman, with nothing to distinguish
her from the other cotters in the dale; but as she went slowly to the
door to hear her son's sentence, so to speak, she marched unconsciously
as a martyr might to his death. What would death have been in comparison
of this which she had to face?
"I have not come here to betray him," said Roger, "but neither need you
try to hide it from me. I saw him--God help me! shall I ever get it out
of my eyes? I saw him, but I was too late to save. I saw him kneeling,
striking at him, striking at him! God! I think I see it now."
He leant against the wall looking as if he would faint; but Elizabeth
did not faint. She stood, the colour of death, with her arms crossed
upon her bosom. If there had been any possibility of denial or
resistance she would have resisted and denied; but there was none, and
she needed no explanation. "He is mad," she said, "mad--he's no
responsible--mad! Do you hear what I say?"
"I've tracked him all the way," said Roger. "I know he must have been
here hours ago; more than one met _me_, but no one had seen him. God
knows what people may think of the trouble I was in. I thought after a
time it might put them on the scent, and then I asked no further
questions; but no one had seen him. They will not think of looking for
him here, if you are prudent; but you must keep him still, and not let
him move. Give me a draught of milk and I will go home and watch over
everything. If it is suspected where he is I will send you word."
"Mr Ridley, I will pray for you night and day on my bended knees," said
Elizabeth. "Oh, he's mad, my lad! he's no responsible. And oh, you, a
stranger, to take this burden upon you! What can I say? what can I say?"
"I saw him by accident," said Roger. "God help us. I am perhaps to
blame; he got insult through me, and he saved my life; and Lily," said
the young man, turning for a moment to look at her--"but all that's over
now," he added, with a sigh.
Lily had sat down on the step by the house door. She had hidden her face
in her hands and was weeping quietly, overpowered by the despair about
her. He was near enough to be within reach of her, and he put his hand
on her head. "Yes, it's over," he said, "it's all over," with a sudden
break of sobs in his voice. Who could think of happiness, or love, or
anything sweet in life now? His heart was sick with wretchedness and
horror. Roger did not know how he was ever to take up the common things
of existence again, how to get that spectacle out of his eyes.
It was Elizabeth herself who brought him out and served to him,
solemnly, as if it had been a sacrament, those simplest elements of
food, the common oaten cake and bowl of milk which was their ordinary
cottage fare. Lily sat and wept--her heart was broken--but the mother,
with her heavier burden, did everything. The two young creatures thrown
down there in moaning and despair--she leaning her head against the
cottage wall, he lying on the turf with his face buried in his hands,
were lightly weighted in comparison; but Elizabeth's heart yearned over
them, sorry for the trouble they were so much less capable of bearing.
"You must not stay here," she said to Roger, softly. "Oh, God bless you,
my young gentleman, and put me and mine out of your head, and all that's
happened this dreadful day! But you're rested now, and you mustna bide
here."
Roger rose reluctantly from the grass; the moment of rest had softened
his heart. He stood, looking disconsolately, wistfully, at the girl whom
he had so foolishly loved. He knew how foolish it had always been, and
it had fled from him like a shadow in presence of all the terrible
events of the morning. But when he looked back upon her now, seated
there in all the abandonment of the catastrophe, her pale face lying
back against the grey wall, her pretty hair falling from the comb, her
eyes shut, and two great tears stealing down her cheeks, a great pang
went through Roger's heart. Love and honour and pain strove in him.
Could he take her to him under this shadow of madness and ruin? Could
he leave her without a word? He stood for a moment irresolute--then made
a hasty step towards her, and stooping down, kissed her forehead.
"Farewell, my Lily! Farewell, my Lily!" he said, then turned, and went
quickly away. Lily uttered a low moaning cry--she made no other
response. It was all over, all over! There was nothing more to say.
Then the silence of the hills fell around the little house, folded up
with its secret in it, among the great slopes of the mountains. The
first night fell upon them, half a benediction in its darkness and
quiet, half an aggravation of the unseen dangers that now seemed to hem
them in. Dick sat up and watched all night, while his mother sat by the
bedside of the fugitive, who lay between stupor and raving, and had
recognised none of them, though they thought he was soothed by his
mother's presence and touch. Long were the hours of darkness, though so
few in the soft summer weather, which was then exceptionally soft for
the north. As for Lily, she was made to go to bed, with kind tyranny, by
both mother and brother, and slept, and was ashamed of herself for
sleeping. And then came the dawn again, tranquil and awful, the first
morning after the calamity,--the revelation of that changed world in
which no longer all was well. But the cows and the chickens had to be
looked to all the more that they had been neglected the night before,
and that was a consolation so far as it went. The day went on quietly
enough. They were on the alert for every sound, and Watch was posted out
on the hillside at a little distance to give an alarm if any one should
come; but no one came. And whatever might be doing down in the low
country, whatsoever course suspicion might be taking, whether Abel was
thought of at all in connection with the murder, or who was thought of
instead of him, here none could tell. Lily, heartsick, did her share of
the work, casting wistful looks down the road, and letting her heart and
her eyes roam downwards upon the water far in the distance, radiant with
sunshine, or dim with shadow, where all the business of life was being
enacted, though she knew not how. The others were glad (if that could be
called gladness) when the day was over without any incident; but oh how
long was the day to Lily, with her heart fluttering away upon the far
horizon, and this killing silence round her! And it was all over, the
other life, all over! Was this henceforward to be the tenor of her days:
this and the madman up-stairs who was said to be her brother? Had ever
any one before so hard a lot to bear? Lily repeated to herself that her
mother was old, and "wrapt-up" in "the boys," and Dick "did not mind;"
but she who had no boys, and was not old, and whose life was over, all
over! What was there so forlorn and terrible as this fate which had
fallen upon her?
It had come to be dark again; night falling, the time of terror, and
great stars coming out into the sky, peering over the shoulders of the
hills, and leaning out of the blue to see all that could be seen. The
family had come in and shut their door; never on a summer night had that
door been shut before; but it was always a bulwark the more in defence
of the wretched one within. Elizabeth came and went between the room
where he lay and the kitchen, where Lily sat by the smouldering fire,
crying in the darkness. There was no light in the room; they wanted no
light to be wretched by, and even the glimmer of the little lamp on the
high mantelpiece might betray them. The fire smouldered, a red speck and
no more in the darkness, and the low, square windows hung like faint
pictures on the wall. Dick was outside. It was not possible for him to
be confined in a room with closed doors. The night was thus darkening
over them, and dreariness and stillness falling like a pall, when all
the echoes were suddenly roused by the harsh, hoarse bark of Watch
baying, with his head up and wide throat extended. Elizabeth, who was
standing by Lily, took hold of her suddenly, grasping her trembling
frame with two passionate hands. This filled the girl with additional
terror; but it was her mother's silent way of strengthening herself, and
bracing herself for what was to come. Then Dick appeared, the defender
of the house. They could see him take his stand in front of the door, to
protect the entrance. Then there came a sound of voices, and Lily sprang
to her feet. "He's come back again, mother!" she said.
"There may be more with him," said Elizabeth; but she opened the door,
with jealous care, showing half of herself only, to parley. Was it
Roger, that dark figure against the light outside? He came pushing in
with a kind of rude imperativeness. "Do you try to keep me out?" he
said. "No, we are all in the same ship now. Let me in. I have nowhere
else to go."
"Is there more ill news to hear?" said Elizabeth.
"More ill news? No, not for you. Listen; but first light a lamp or
something, that I may see who I'm talking to. That's better. Yesterday,"
said Roger, with a curious laugh, "I could speak freely what I wanted to
say without thinking of the dark or the light."
"What is it, tell me what it is?--I must go to my lad that is alone."
"Alone! is he worse than others?" said Roger, fiercely; and then he
added, laughing again, "they say it was I--I--that did it! I have fled
from my father's house not to be taken up for murder. Oh, God!" he
cried, with a tone of agony. They all echoed it with one impulse. "You?"
they said, and Lily broke out wildly crying, half hysterical with the
misery which seemed to have its crown of anguish now.
"But no, no, it canna be! you have proofs to the contrary," cried
Elizabeth, upon whom this seemed an appeal against herself.
"They can prove everything," he said, with the calm of one who knew the
worst. "I had an appointment with him there for that morning. I was seen
going away, looking like a man that had killed another. I had quarrelled
with him (oh, poor Dick, poor Dick! I knew him all my life!) the day
before. There is no one but believes it. We are all in the same box,"
said Roger, sitting down, miserable but defiant; "there was nowhere I
could come but to you."
"Oh, sir," said Elizabeth, "no harm shall happen to you, not a hair
shall fall from your head--but spare him, spare him now."
"Spare him! am I harming him? I am giving my life for his," said Roger,
with a groan. "I wish he had let me break my neck from the old tower; it
would have been soon over. Spare him! I'm on my way now I know not
where. Whatever happens to him I am lost, Mrs Murray; my life, my good
name, everything. Look here, there is but one thing you can do for me;
give me Lily and let me go."
Lily had heard all from her stool by the fire, where she had sat in a
dull suspension of feeling, listening vaguely, too much crushed to care
for anything. At these words she rose up to her feet, and stood still,
rigid, waiting for what was next to be said.
"No," said Dick. "Mother, you could not be so cruel; let him bear his
just burden that did it. One should not perish for another. Mother, you
would not wish a sacrifice like that?"
"Oh, Dick!" she moaned, wringing her hands, "no harm shall happen to
him, not a hair shall fall from his head."
"But that's not all," said Dick, "that's but a little--honour is more
than life. Would you let him give up everything because Abel caught him
when he was falling? I would do that for any tramp. Mother, you will
never be so cruel."
"Look here," said Roger, "I've taken all the money I could lay my hands
on; that ought to keep us from starving. Tell Lily to come with me.
I've nothing else left in the world. Give me Lily and I will go."
"Lad!" cried Elizabeth, turning to her son with vehement self-defence,
"if I give him my Lily--my Lily, as he says----"
"That will not be to give him justice," cried Dick. "Mother, think
before you do it--it will never come to good."
"They would murder my lad," said Elizabeth, shivering; "they would take
no excuse, they would give no mercy. But when he's better he'll know
what to say for himself. They would put the stain of blood on your
father's house. We could never be clear of it to the third and fourth
generations. But him there, there's no trouble in his soul; he will not
suffer like the one who did it. If he was in danger of his life it would
be different. I tell you, not a hair of him should be touched; but
there's no danger of his life. And if I give him my Lily, as he
says----"
This controversy went on swift and low-toned, while the others stood
scarcely listening. Roger was full of the excitement of despair; he had
been warned that the warrant was out to arrest him and the officers on
their way. What could he say against it? There was every proof that he
was the man. He had been traced to the fatal spot, he had been seen
speeding like a ghost up the hillside afterwards; he had given no alarm;
and there had been that fatal quarrel the day before. Every fact was
against him, even to a blood-stain on his dress, which he had got
unawares as he pushed through the brushwood to see what it was the
madman had done. By no way but by giving the madman up could he clear
himself. And there was no time to think; all through that day he had
fancied that every one shrank from him and avoided him. When the old
village constable, whom he had known all his life, ventured to hint at
his danger, it seemed to Roger, impetuous and wretched as he was, that
there was but one thing for him to do. And he had plunged away through
the woods in the twilight as Abel Murray had done before him. He would
go if Lily would go with him. To this he made up his mind with the
obstinate simplicity of his nature. What was there at home to make him
desire to stay? He could neither marry as he liked nor live as he liked.
His sister, the only bright thing in the house, was plunged into
trouble. There was no comfort wherever he looked. If he had Lily to go
with him, he would go.
As for Lily, she stood in a wilder excitement, still feeling her fate in
the balance. She did not think of herself as having any choice. She
seemed to be suspended between a wild agony of happiness and a dreary
abyss of evil. To be raised, giddy, to the height she did not realise,
or dropped horribly into the pit below, was an affair of a minute or
two. She stood breathless, waiting--with her eyes wavering between her
mother and her lover, not knowing what was to be.
"Sir," said Elizabeth, breaking from her son's detaining hold, "you're
doing a great thing for me, and I'll do a great thing for you. You'll
promise me to wed my Lily? You'll vow to me afore God that she shall be
your wife?"
"I promise you before God," said Roger, taking the passive girl by the
hand.
"Then take her--take her--before I repent. Oh, go, my lass! go with him
and be a good wife to him, and make it up to him, if woman can. Go!
afore I repent. I'm buying one child with another," said Elizabeth,
lifting up her hands, wild tears bursting from her eyes. "I'm giving a
life for a life. Oh, Lord! forgive a poor woman driven out of her
senses, for I'm doing a base action. Go, go! afore I repent!"