Part 10

“Certainly, my dear nephew,” she said, with an ironical twist of the mouth. “I am a little older than Miss Jilian Hardacre. We are both of us out of temper, sweet Jill and your old aunt, and when two cats will quarrel under one’s bedroom one of ’em must be silenced. Precisely so, my dear Richard; I will cumber your hospitality no longer.”

Jeffray, flushed and uncomfortable, and suffering the usual feelings of discourtesy and ingratitude that assail a young man on such occasions, clung to the conviction none the less, that the feud would not end without the Lady Letitia’s departure.

“I am sorry, madam,” he said, “that I am compelled to speak to you like this, but I shall be unable to quit myself as a man of honor to the Hardacres so long as you remain at Rodenham.”

Aunt Letitia’s eyes glittered as though it would please her to repeat a certain episode of her nephew’s youth when she had tanned him royally with a slipper.

“Do not apologize, sir,” she said; “perhaps you will have the goodness to tell me whether I am to be ejected to-morrow, or will you grant me a week’s respite to prepare for exile?”

“I pray you, consider your own convenience,” returned Jeffray, blushing.

“I must send Parsons to The Wells to engage decent rooms for me. My bankers must be negotiated with. This is so sudden, sir, that you have caught me unprepared.”

Jeffray suggested that he would be happy to oblige his aunt in any way that she might desire. Aunt Letitia frowned and played with her fan. The dowager’s treasure-chest was nearly empty, and it would be a month or more before she could count upon the paying of her dividends. Could her nephew oblige her with a loan of a hundred guineas at an interest of five per cent.? Aunt Letitia appeared in no wise distressed by having to confide such delicate matters to her nephew. In fact, she built a grievance out of her inconveniences, and spoke with sarcastic significance of being “taken by so sudden a surprise.” Richard, eager to salve the old lady’s feelings, offered her a loan of two hundred guineas, repudiating the very thought of usury with scorn. Aunt Letitia clutched at the concession, and the interview ended with some symptoms of amiability, the dowager actually kissing her nephew before she hobbled off to bed.

Richard was in the saddle early next morning and away for Hardacre with the spring sun streaming down upon the greens and purples of Pevensel. The bright zest of the day was in his blood, generous and blithe as the spirit of youth itself. He was eager to crave Jilian’s forgiveness, and to quit himself as his manhood prompted in the matter of saluting the Hardacre honor. Richard rode in the belief that he had shamed his kinswoman, and that he had bruised her kind heart by his aunt’s duplicity.

With the thickets of Pevensel towering on every hand, Jeffray’s thoughts sped back from Hardacre to the glowing face of Bess of the Woods. Richard, despite his sensitive obedience to the promptings of honor, could not think of the girl without a flush of feeling sweeping across his mind. Her face brought both mystery and gladness, deep witchery and a prophecy of pain. What was this tall, black-haired, lissome wench to him that she should make his heart beat louder as over the tragic breathing of some song? Richard, riding through Pevensel, strove to laugh such romantic memories away. Because the girl had a fine body and a passionate face, should he suffer his thoughts to dally with her in the deeps of her own mysterious woods? Yet despite his strainings after sanity he found himself wondering how she fared in the forest, whether Black Dan still pestered her, and whether she carried one of his pistols in her bosom?

In due course Jeffray came to Hardacre Chase where the oaks, gray and purple, with brown bracken beneath, strode down in giant companies upon the road. Mr. Lancelot, who had remained at home that morning in expectation of Jeffray’s coming, met his cousin as he rode up to the gate house. There was a cheering smile upon Mr. Hardacre’s face, for the inimitable Lot had no doubt at all of his sister’s willingness to forgive Richard Jeffray. Sir Peter, who happened to be standing in the oriel-window of the main gallery, had seen the young Squire of Rodenham ride up. The baronet and his son had discussed the problem that very morning.

“Good luck to ye, Richard,” said Mr. Lot, with confidential solemnity. “I have had a terrible tussle with Sir Peter. Egad, cousin, I had to sweat to persuade the governor to let you see Jill. I’ll take your horse. You know the room, Richard?”

Richard, who had dismounted, pressed Mr. Lancelot’s hand.

“I shall not forget your kindness, Lot,” he said.

“Bosh, sir, I always side with a man of spirit. Go up to her, cousin, and do your best. I’ll see you’re not interfered with.”

Richard, blushing, turned away and entered the house. As for Mr. Lot, he thrust his hands deep into his breeches-pockets, looked after his cousin whimsically, and laughed.

What a sweet picture of sanctity met Mr. Richard’s eyes as he opened the door of Miss Hardacre’s parlor bashfully after his knock had been softly acknowledged! Miss Jilian was seated in the window-seat, dressed in a silky green gown that rippled like water as she rose to meet her cousin. There was much lace upon her bosom and a knot of red ribbon over her heart.

“Cousin Jilian.”

Miss Hardacre let her eyes rest only for a moment on Richard’s face. Jeffray was blushing very handsomely.

“Jilian, I have come to ask you to forgive me.”

He went close to his cousin, and stood looking at her with humbled ardor on his face. Miss Hardacre appeared much distressed. Surely his sweet cousin’s eyes were somewhat red and swollen. And were those wrinkles under the lids?

“Jilian, will you forgive me?”

“Oh, Richard!”

“Aunt Letitia made fools of both of us, Jilian. I have told her to leave my house.”

Miss Hardacre hung her head and pressed her hands together.

“You know everything, Richard.”

“Poor Wilson told me everything, and it was nothing, Jilian.”

“I am a shamed and miserable woman.”

“Shamed, Jilian? Let me hear any man breathe a word against you.”

Miss Hardacre suffered her eyes to quaver up for a moment to Richard’s face. The lad could see tears ready to well up into those pellucid wells of light.

“What can I say to you, Richard?” she said. “Oh, I am very miserable.”

How could an honorable and generous youth refrain from going down on one knee, pressing the lady’s hand to his lips, and gazing up with enthusiastic homage into her face? The hot words were betwixt Richard’s lips in a moment, and Miss Hardacre was hiding her blushes behind her hand.

And then, for the climax, Richard’s lips pressed to Miss Jilian’s, and Sir Peter, who had been listening shrewdly on the landing, standing with admirable dumfoundedness before the innocently opened door. Of course Miss Jilian gave a shy scream, and Richard, red as the lips he had kissed, turned to play the hero before the parental demigod.

“Sir Peter Hardacre,” he said, with bashful dignity, “I have come to apologize to your daughter, sir, for the distress I innocently brought upon her the other night. I offer you my apologies, sir, also; I have always honored you, and you have been very kind to me.”

The lad drew himself up creditably, squared his shoulders, and looked the baronet straight in the face.

“Egad, sir,” quoth Sir Peter, glaring at his daughter and preparing to seem parental, “you appear quick at consoling the ladies. The Hardacre honor, sir—”

Mr. Richard became aware suddenly of a warm hand stealing into his. Miss Jilian gave him a look out of her gray eyes and a whispered word that carried a command. She went down on her knees before her father.

“What! Bless my soul, what’s this, eh? Stars and garters, Jill, what am I to understand from this?”

“Cousin Richard has asked me to be his wife,” said Miss Hardacre, with a divine simper.

“What!”

“With your consent, Sir Peter,” added Cousin Richard, half grimly.

And Sir Peter, noble and forgiving soul, put his pride in his pocket, beamed, and blessed them!

XV

Jeffray left Hardacre House that afternoon with his betrothal an assured fact in the eyes of Christendom. The way the fog had melted before him of a sudden had surprised even the generous Squireling of Rodenham. He had expected an unnerving interview with Sir Peter, and possibly a very affecting one with Miss Jilian, and here—in a morning he found himself betrothed to the daughter and embraced and blessed by a future father. Jeffray could only admire in Sir Peter the workings of an admirable and manly spirit of forgiveness. As for Mr. Lot, Richard still felt the slap that worthy gentleman had given him upon the shoulder and the hearty way he had crunched his hand. Jilian had been wondrous sweet and coy with her betrothed, and Jeffray should have boasted himself happy in possessing the right to clasp such perfumed purity in his arms.

Was it the inevitable reaction after so much sweet ecstasy and such squanderings of sentiment that threw Richard into a decidedly melancholy mood after taking leave of his Jilian on the terrace? No doubt the parting from the lady should have accounted for the onset of such a humor, but Richard’s inclinations were contrary to custom, since he desired to think and to be alone. Whether contact had crumbled up the romance, or whether the seriousness of the step bulked for the first time in Jeffray’s mind, he found himself meditating on the affair with a chilly reasonableness that was not begotten in the rapturous school of Venus.

Why was it that Aunt Letitia’s gibes and fables recurred with such vividness to his mind? He had not heeded them before the crisis; wherefore should he heed them now? He wished somehow that Wilson had not loved the girl ten years ago; ten years were ten years—despite idealism. What was amiss with him that the happy reunion of the morning lost some of its glamour and assumed the suggestive notion of a net? Surely he was not for recovering his own liberty, that liberty that had weighed as a mere feather in the balance against honor? Was not Jilian sweet and amiable, and still a girl, though older than himself? Surely he could imagine a father in Sir Peter and a worthy brother in honest Lot? And yet the vapor of melancholy persisted in Richard Jeffray’s mind, despite his angry reasonings with himself. He had been happy in the morning, righteously and sincerely happy. Why this loosening of the cords of confidence, this morbid introspection that suggested the possibility of error.

The day was such a one as begets the ideal of spring in the heart, warm, fragrant, like a dewy dawn in June. The hills and valleys were bathed in silvery light, a light more delicate and rare than the glare of summer. All the colors of the landscape were soft and beautiful, the dusky greens, the purples, the browns, the blue mistiness of the distant downs. On the far hills beyond Pevensel a piece of ploughed land would flash up almost as gold under the sun, or a chalk cliff glisten like foam at the throat of a bursting billow. The meadows in the lowlands were like a mosaic of emeralds set in silver.

Jeffray took the western track that plunged into Pevensel by White Hard Ghyll. The pines and firs stood out a rich and generous green against the sensitive azure of the sky, while the olive-colored trunks of the oaks upheld the purple feltwork of swelling buds above. The yellow palm was flashing in the breeze; primroses shone everywhere amid the moss and leaves. The ragged and tempestuous gorse flamed about the listening shadows of the woods. The track ran down into the wastes and crossed the stream that fretted by the ruins of the old Abbey of Holy Cross.

Richard had not seen the place since he had climbed and hunted there as a boy in the days when life flew fast and without thought. Holy Cross was a mile or more from the hamlet of the foresters, and perhaps some insensible magic drew Jeffray towards this relic of Popish power. The monastic calm, the glow of ancient memories, would be in keeping with the temper of the day. Certainly Mr. Richard was not anxious to return to the society of the Lady Letitia, and he found sufficient friendship in his thoughts. Yet the sly plea crept in amid the rest, for if chance favored him he might catch sight of Bess amid the woods, and learn how fortune had served her since she had nursed him in old Ursula’s cottage.

He walked his horse down the hill that closed in Holy Cross on the north. He saw the ruined walls and the ragged remnant of a tower rising beyond the trees that covered the hill-side. A stream came glinting through the green to swell into a broad pool above the stone weir that the monks had built of old. The thunder of the fall filled the dreamy silence of the valley, as though chanting an eternal mass for the souls of those who had lived and died in Holy Cross.

He gave himself to these Gothic mysteries for a while before turning his horse towards the ford that crossed the stream some sixty yards above the weir. The weir pool was hidden by undergrowth and a clump of firs and birches. The sound of his horse’s hoofs was deadened by the mossy grass as he rode down slowly from the ruins. As he rounded the birchen brake he saw something on the farther side of the stream that made him rein in suddenly.

Bess was sitting on a rock beside the pool, combing her hair with her fingers as it hung in a black mass over her shoulders. She looked up as Jeffray came splashing through the water, recognized him instantly, and flushed red as a poppy. A peculiar light kindled in her keen, blue eyes, softening their hardness, and making her face seem less petulant and heavy.

Jeffray dismounted and advanced towards her, leading his horse by the bridle. Bess had risen and came some paces to meet him, making no pretence to conceal her pleasure.

“Bess, I am glad I happened to take the track by the abbey.”

“I am glad, also, Mr. Jeffray.”

They looked at each other and smiled, instant sympathy flashing from face to face. Bess looked very handsome with her black hair about her, and Jeffray could not refrain from confessing the truth instinctively to himself. Never in all Italy had he seen such coloring, such eyes, or so fine a figure. To be sure her hands were a little red and rough, but they were prettily made, and suited her simple and brightly colored clothes.

“I have been wishing to see you,” said the girl, beginning to bind up her black hair and watching Jeffray all the while.

“To see me, Bess?”

“They seem long days since I nursed you in our cottage.”

Richard, good youth, experienced secret pleasure at the confession. The girl’s voice, deep, rich, and slightly husky, contrasted strangely with Miss Jilian’s prattle. She spoke slowly, as though with an inward effort, trying to temper her words to Jeffray’s superior culture. It was done without affectation, however, and her quaint, slow way of mouthing her words had an irresistible charm in it that made Jeffray delight in hearing her speak.

“You have been bathing, Bess?”

She laughed, blushed a little, and began to coil up her hair over the curve of her long, brown neck.

“You might have caught me, Mr. Jeffray.”

This time Richard colored.

“How are they treating you in Pevensel?” he made haste to ask.

“Treating me?”

“Yes.”

“I am glad of your pistols.”

Her expression changed suddenly from frankness to rebellion. Jeffray, who was studying her with a secret sense of delight, marked the hardening of her red mouth, the gleam in her fierce, far-sighted eyes. He had forgotten Miss Jilian completely for the moment, and the delicate and highly civilized sentiments that had made him throw his liberty at her feet.

“Tell me what your trouble is,” he asked her.

“They are for marrying me to Dan.”

“What!”

“They tried to force me into it. Mother Ursula was with them till Dan tried his bullying, and then she held him and his father off.”

The expression on Richard’s amiable face contradicted its habitual shinings towards sweetness.

“But, Bess, old Grimshaw promised me—”

“He’s as bad as Dan,” she said, with a snarl. “I hate—hate them both.”

“They can’t marry you against your will.”

“Not while I have the pistols.”

There was a look almost suggestive of fear on her face for the moment, despite its spirit of defiance. She glanced round her swiftly, and drew closer to Jeffray.

“I am afraid of Dan.”

“Afraid, Bess?”

“Yes, as much as I am of anything.”

Jeffray understood her meaning of a sudden. His sensitive face grew strangely stern and thoughtful, and there was a tightness about his mouth, a steadiness in his eyes that would have puzzled Mr. Lancelot Hardacre.

“You keep the pistols by you?” he asked, quietly.

Bess pointed to the rock where her red cloak lay.

“See, one is there,” she said. “They are the best friends I have in Pevensel. I look to the priming every day.”

Jeffray’s usually smooth brow was still knotted in thought.

“I wonder if I could help you, Bess,” he said.

She gazed at him curiously, with one hand at her throat.

“Perhaps,” she answered.

“How?”

She glanced round her rapidly as though accustomed to fear what the woods might conceal. The sun was low in the west and the forest-clad valley full of golden mist. She took her cloak and pistol from the rock, and pointed to a path that branched off from the main ride into a larch-wood, telling Jeffray that they could reach the Beacon Rock heath by the path.

Thus with the shadows of the twilight stealing over the woods, and the birds piping lustily in every thicket, Bess and Richard Jeffray wandered through Pevensel together, looking with questioning youth into each other’s eyes. Bess began to tell him of the memories that stood like frail ghosts on the threshold of her forest life. She told him of the flitting fancies of other days, of the faces and scenes she but half remembered. Jeffray, impressed by her eager intensity of belief, reacted to the many suggestions her words inspired. He watched her as she walked beside him, tall, lissome, and convincing, her looks eloquent towards the proving of her childish memories. Jeffray had seen what country hoydens were worth in the matter of charm and of beauty, and had discovered pretty milkmaids to be a myth. Bess was as different from any Sussex Blowzelinda as a stately cypress from a dwarf oak outcrowded in some sodden wood.

When she had ended he turned to her with no little eagerness, as though her needs were already his.

“Have you ever spoken of this to any one?” he asked her.

Her face had kindled in the telling of the tale, and her eyes met Jeffray’s and held them steadily.

“I have often spoken to old Ursula, but she has always laughed at me.”

“And you have no trinkets or rings that might have come from your mother?”

She shook her head, still looking at him solemnly.

“Not one.”

“And why do they want to marry you to Dan?”

“Because he’s hot for my sake,” she answered, coloring and looking fierce.

Jeffray walked on for a while in silence, his horse’s bridle over his arm. Peter Gladden had hinted at mysteries with regard to the forest-folk, and confessed that no one knew how the Grimshaws came by their money. Could Bess have been stolen away as a child in gypsy fashion? Were her memories of the sea, the great ship, and the rest mere dawn dreams or the dim evidences of her origin? He glanced at her as she swung along at his side, her strong chin up, her keen eyes watching the darkening woods. He had never seen a Sussex wench bear herself like Mistress Bess.

“Bess,” he said, suddenly.

Her eyes flashed round to him.

“There is something about you that makes me believe that you are not of the Grimshaw stock.”

“Ah—”

“You look as though you had been born to be a great lady, and not Mother Ursula’s niece.”

By the light in Bess’s eyes and the softness about her mouth, the innocent flattery seemed very sweet to her.

“Do you know what made me tell you all this, Mr. Jeffray?” she asked.

“No—”

“Because you are one of the great folk—and because I—am nothing.”

Jeffray missed her meaning for the moment, and then caught a subtle something in the girl’s eyes that made him hold his breath.

“God knows, Bess,” he said, “whether you are a Grimshaw or no. I have as much honor for you as though you were my sister.”

She colored and looked a little peevish about the mouth.

“Thank you, Mr. Jeffray,” she answered.

They had come out upon the heath that smiled in the evening light. The deep azure of the east curved up beyond. The woods stood a rare purple below them, and a few plover were flapping and wailing over the moor.

“Bess,” said the man, looking in her face.

She glanced at him and waited.

“You will count me your friend?”

“Ah—I have done so—already.”

“And I want to talk with you again.”

“I can be by the abbey.”

“On Monday—about four?”

“Yes. I can be there.”

They stood looking at each other in silence, as though there were some regret in either heart that the sun had sunk below the hills. It was growing dusk apace. Richard fumbled with his bridle and made as though to go. They were standing quite close to each other in the dusk, Bess’s eyes fixed upon Jeffray’s face, her lips half parted as though she were about to speak.

“I have not told you my dream,” she said, with a little laugh.

“St. Agnes’s dream?”

“Yes. I will tell it to you on Monday.”

Jeffray held out his hand to her. She was stooping a little, and her look suggested that she would have liked Richard to kiss her. The man remembered Miss Jilian Hardacre of a sudden, and he gazed at Bess as though some intangible barrier were between them.

“Good-night.”

“Good-night, Bess. I will think of you—till next time.”

XVI

The Lady Letitia, who was preparing for her departure from Rodenham, treated her nephew very courteously, and with a species of pitying kindness that suggested how profound and melancholy her forebodings were as to the future. She had received the news of the betrothal from Richard with unruffled dignity, showing neither malice nor irritation, and even deigning to wish her nephew a happy and prosperous marriage.

“Ah, mon cher Richard,” she said, sitting very stiff and straight on her brocaded fauteuil before the fire, “since I am the beaten party you must permit me to march out of Rodenham with the honors of war. I have been holding out for your liberty, sir, for you are young yet, Richard, nor have you seen a great deal of the world. There, sir, don’t shake your head at me; I will cease croaking. May you and your sweet Jilian be happy.”

The old lady appeared quite affected, and Jeffray bowed to her and kissed her hand.

“I trust that there is no ill-feeling left between us, madam,” he said.

Aunt Letitia remembered her nephew’s loan, and declared that she had never been out of temper with Richard personally.

“You are one of those sweet fellows, nephew,” she explained, “who need defending against their own generosity. Your honor is a sensitive and untarnished virtue, sir, nor have you learned what the world is worth. And now, my dear Richard, may an old woman be permitted to give you some last fragments of advice?”

Jeffray, both amused and interested, expressed himself eager to be benefited by the Lady Letitia’s wisdom.

“Well, sir,” she said, settling herself in her chair, “in the first place, do not count too much on marriage. It is not always the honey-pot young people imagine. And if you find your wife a little gay, Richard, don’t weep over it and make a misery of life, but be gay in turn. You will soon accustom yourself to being amused and satisfied by other women.”

The old lady was as grave and solemn over her cynicisms as a bishop over the expounding of the creed. Jeffray was not a little surprised at receiving such strange and ominous advice.

“Frankly, madam,” he said, “I must confess that I look for better things for Jilian and myself.”