Rhoda Penwynn had no idea of going to Gwennas Cove one morning when she
went off, in a dreamy, forgetful way, for a walk. She was low-spirited
and wretched. Her father's troubles and heavy losses were an endless
anxiety, and, to her sorrow, she saw that he had of late grown reckless.
How he was situated, or what he had lost, she could not tell, but there
was a grey, wrinkled look about his face that went to her very heart.
One thing was very evident, and that was that the banker had become
entangled in some venture--John Tregenna had hinted as much one evening
when at their house, but he had merely hinted, and she could not ask him
more.
One thing was very evident, and that was that people had lost confidence
in Penwynn, the banker. Other people might dabble in mines, lose, and
begin again; but the man to whom the savings of others were intrusted,
must be above reproach--above suspicion of speculation; and the Wheal
Carnac affair had been a heavy blow in more ways than one.
Mr Penwynn was not long in finding this out, for it resulted in a
quarrel with the principals of the great Cornish bank, of which his was
but a branch. Somehow--he never knew by what means--they had become
prejudiced against him, and a rapid depreciation of his value in Carnac
resulted when it was known that he was no longer over the bank.
Then came demands upon him for amounts trusted to him to invest--a
regular continuous drain; and Rhoda awoke to the fact that a change in
their position, for the worse, was rapidly coming on.
She bore the knowledge as cheerfully as she could, working hard to
comfort her father, bidding him not trouble about her, but to pay to the
uttermost farthing every demand.
"I shall not mind being poor," she said to him, but she felt that she
did not know all, and after long thought and trouble the feeling would
always come upon her that she must leave all to fate, for she could not
make her future even if she tried.
There was something very suggestive in John Tregenna's manner to her
now. He was never, in the slightest degree, effusive. If any thing, he
was rather cold, but at times there was a look in his eye that told her
he was waiting his time; and more than once, in the bitterness of her
spirit, she had thought of the possibility of his some day asking her
again to be his wife.
What should she say if he did?
No! The answer came readily enough, for a pang shot through her as she
thought of Geoffrey Trethick, and wondered whether she could forgive him
for the wrong he had done. She loved him still. She knew that, and in
time--perhaps even now, if he came to her in humbleness and confessed
his fault--she could have said forgiving words. Her pride would have
forbidden her to listen to him. There was forgiveness.
But that was all. He had been set up in the innermost niche of her
heart--an idol whom she had worshipped. From thence he had fallen, and
as the idol lay broken she had seen that what she thought sterling gold
was but miserable potter's clay.
Still there was her love for him--the love once roused never to be
completely crushed out. It burned still upon the altar before the empty
niche. The idol was gone, and a soft vapour rose concealing the
emptiness of the place--a place made often more dim and indistinct by
her moistened eyes.
If he had only come to beg forgiveness she would not have cared, but he
had taken up his stubborn stand, and to the very last time they had met
his eyes looked at her with an angry defiance that made her heart beat
fast with rage.
It was from no curiosity--there was not even a faint hope of meeting
Geoffrey--that she took that path, but a trick of fate, and she started
and turned pale, on suddenly raising her eyes, to see that she was only
some fifty yards from Prawle's cottage.
Bessie was standing by the door knitting, and the blood flushed into
Rhoda's cheeks as she saw what was by her side.
She saw that Bessie had seen her, and to have gone back would have
looked cowardly; so she kept on, feeling pretty sure that at that time
of day Geoffrey Trethick would not be there.
"I have not been to see you for a long time now, Bessie," said Rhoda,
making an effort to master her emotion and look calm.
"No, miss. My mother has often said she wished you would come. Will
you go in and see her?"
Rhoda hesitated.
"Father's out, miss. He has gone off in the boat with Mr Trethick, to
try for pollack. We're quite alone."
At the name of Trethick, Rhoda shrank away, but setting her teeth, she
determined not to give up like some weak girl. Geoffrey Trethick was
nothing to her now, and, as she thought that, a passionate, angry desire
to stand face to face with the woman who had robbed her of his love made
her take a step towards the door.
Bessie bent down and picked up the baby, which laughed and kicked as she
held it in her arms, but Rhoda snatched away her eyes. She hated it,
she told herself; and, following Bessie into the gloomy room, she looked
towards where Mrs Prawle was wont to sit, but the chair was empty.
"Mother is lying down in the bedroom," said Bessie. "I'll tell her you
are here, miss."
As she spoke, Bessie turned aside to place the baby in a pair of
extended hands before leaving the place.
Rhoda had not seen who was seated in the darkened portion of the room,
but Bessie's act told her who it was, and turning sharply, her veins
tingling, and her head giddy with her anger, she stood face to face with
Madge Mullion, the girl she hated in a way that she could not have
thought possible.
As she stood there, her fingers clenched together, the spirit was in her
to strike the girl--to curse her; but, when she saw the pale,
weary-looking face, and the great, staring eyes of the young mother, as
she clasped her little one to her breast, all Rhoda's anger seemed to
pass away as rapidly as it had come, and in its place there was a
feeling of profound pity.
They stood there gazing in each other's eyes for some minutes without
speaking, Rhoda proud and erect, Madge weak and piteous in the extreme;
and, as if in dread of her visitor, she held her little one between them
as a shield.
"Are you not ashamed to look me in the face?" said Rhoda, sternly.
"Am I not weak and suffering enough," retorted Madge, "that you say
these cruel words? Oh, Miss Penwynn, let me try and explain--let me
tell you how I have suffered for the pain I have caused you."
"Hold your tongue," said Rhoda, coldly. "Don't speak to me. I did not
come to see you. Do not speak to me again."
As Rhoda spoke she saw the poor girl's eyelids droop, and a ghastly
pallor came over her face. She was fainting, and had not the visitor
involuntarily caught the little one from its mother's hands, as she fell
back in the corner of the sofa, it would have dropped upon the brick
floor.
The child uttered a piteous cry, and seemed to stare with astonishment
at her who held it from her, stunned almost at her position. But as the
babe looked up in her handsome face, the wrinkles in its little
countenance departed, and it began to laugh and coo, trying to catch at
one of the long curls pendent above its face.
The little one seemed to disarm her resentment. She held it closer to
her, forgetful of its mother, and one of its little pinky hands went up
now and clutched at her face.
She could not help it. There was no one to see, and Rhoda seemed forced
to obey an uncontrollable impulse. One moment her face was hard and
stern; then there was a quiver, a softening of the muscles, the tears
gathered in her eyes, and began to fall upon the little upturned face.
"It at least is innocent," she muttered, as she held the little thing in
her bosom, and kissed it tenderly again and again.
There was a curious, yearning look in Rhoda Penwynn's countenance during
these fleeting moments. Then, recalling her position, she hastily laid
the child upon the rug, looking cold, hard, and stern once more, as she
took out her vinaigrette, and held it to the fainting girl's face.
"Oh, miss, is she ill?" cried Bessie, entering the room.
"Yes," said Rhoda, coldly; "she has fainted."
"Oh, miss," cried Bessie, reproachfully, "you have not been saying cruel
things to her?"
"And if I have, what then?" said Rhoda sternly.
"Why, it's a shame--a cruel shame," cried Bessie, angrily. "Why did you
come here to reproach her for what she has done? Don't you see how ill
she is, perhaps not long for this world? Oh, Miss Penwynn, it's a
shame!"
Rhoda flushed with anger, but she would not speak. She told herself
that she deserved what she had encountered by her foolish visit, and,
stung by the girl's reproaches, and angry with herself, she hurried out
of the cottage and hastened towards home.
She was bitterly angry with herself, more angry against Geoffrey, whom,
in her heart, she somewhat inconsistently accused of having caused her
the degradation which she told herself she had suffered but now.
She bit her lips as she thought of her folly in going there, for she
told herself that every one in Carnac would know where she had been; and
hardly had she writhed beneath the sting of this thought than she
encountered old Mr Paul walking slowly along the cliff.
She would have passed him with a bow, but he stopped short and held out
his hand, in which she placed her own, feeling shocked to see how the
old man had changed.
"The old painters were right," he said abruptly, as he retained her
hand.
"Old painters? Right?" faltered Rhoda.
"Yes, yes," said the old man, "when they painted their angels in the
form of a beautiful woman. God bless you, my dear, you are a good,
forgiving girl! I know where you have been."
"Oh, this is horrible!" ejaculated Rhoda, as she hurried away. "I
cannot bear it. What am I to suffer next?"
She would have turned out of the path, but unless she descended to the
rugged beach there was no other way back home; and, as if to make her
miseries culminate, she had not gone another quarter of a mile before
she met Miss Pavey, with a thick veil shrouding her countenance, and a
basket in her hand.
They stopped and looked at each other curiously, and as Miss Pavey
raised her veil there was a red spot burning in each of her cheeks.
"Have you been for a walk, dear?" she faltered.
"Yes," said Rhoda, abruptly. "And you--are you going for a walk?"
Miss Pavey trembled, and it was evident that she was having a battle
with her feelings. She was afraid to speak, and she looked
supplicatingly in Rhoda's eyes, which were fixed upon her in the most
uncompromising way.
For a moment a subterfuge was trembling upon her lips, but honesty
conquered, and, looking more bravely in Rhoda's face, she said,--
"Yes, dear. Mr Lee wishes it!--I didn't like it at first; but he says
it is a duty, and I will do it, whatever anybody else may say."
She said these last words almost passionately, as she looked defiantly
at Rhoda.
"And what are you going to do, Miss Pavey?"
"No, no, dear Rhoda, let it be Martha still," pleaded the little woman.
"Well then--Martha," said Rhoda, with a smile.
"I am going to see, and take a few comforts to poor Madge Mullion," said
the little woman, with an apologetic look; and then, after another
effort, "I have been twice before. Where have you been, dear?"
Rhoda looked at her half scornfully, and the change that had come over
her weak little friend struck her as being almost absurd, as, in a
defiant way, she said sharply,--
"I? Where have I been? Where you are going now. I have been to see
Madge Mullion and that man's child."
She hurried away with her hand pressed upon her heart, as the words
seemed to have leaped from her lips, while she felt that if she stayed
there a moment longer she would burst out into a hysterical fit of
laughter; and this feeling was still upon her as she passed through the
rugged streets of the little town and hastened home.