Part 20

It was easy to see that the man’s attitude of tragic self-righteousness roused all the scorn in the woman’s nature. Jeffray did not appear to realize how dishonorable his sentiments were when viewed in the calm light of impartial reason. He was disgustingly confident of his own honor. His smug conceit exasperated the lady.

“Richard,” she said, her voice sounding harsh and strained.

Jeffray faced her steadily.

“You have come to tell me that you are not going to marry me. That is so, is it not?”

“I have come to confess that my love is no longer what it was.”

“Did I not say so, cousin? What is the use of our clipping and trimming our phrases? To put it bluntly, you are sick of me.”

Jeffray regarded her as though trying to read her thoughts.

“I can only acknowledge my own guilt,” he said.

Miss Hardacre’s mouth gave a vicious twist.

“Then I may as well warn you, Richard,” she retorted, “that you must consult Sir Peter in the matter.”

“Sir Peter?”

“Of course.”

Richard gave a frank shrug of the shoulders.

“What has Sir Peter to do with our marriage?” he said. “It is no business compact. I cannot promise things to your father which I cannot promise here to you.”

Such dignified innocence became more exasperating each moment to the lady by the harpsichord. Yet she still smiled scornfully at her betrothed as though her superior knowledge of the world justified her in despising him.

“You misunderstand the whole matter, Richard,” she said. “You have promised to marry me, and you gained my father’s consent to the marriage. His authority must be consulted, though I can assure you, sir, he is not the man to suffer his daughter’s affections to be trifled with. I am a weak woman, Richard, and my honor, since you seem so careless of it, had better remain in my father’s keeping.”

Jeffray, looking white and stern, understood whither Miss Hardacre’s strategy was tending. He rallied himself, made her a polite bow, and confessed that he could suffer no parental interference.

“I have nothing to discuss with Sir Peter,” he said.

“Nothing!”

“I cannot recognize his authority, Jilian, nor can your father coerce my conscience. It is a miserable business, but one cannot save the wine when the flask is broken.”

This last sally dissipated the lady’s remaining self-control. Was there ever such a puritanical and canting young hypocrite? He would be quoting the Bible and the marriage service to her in a moment to prove that his dishonor was a commendable virtue. Quivering with the impatience of her spite, she started up, and flashed a look at Jeffray that was more significant than a judicial ruling.

“Drat your conscience, Richard,” she said. “I tell you, sir, that you are fickle and dishonorable, and that you have trifled with my affections. I may have lost some of my good looks, sir, but I am still a woman, to be treated with courtesy and not with cowardly lies and excuses.”

“Jilian!”

“Do not call me Jilian, sir. I refer you instantly to my father. And if you slink and dare not face him, I can promise you that my brother is a man of courage. I may be a weak woman, Mr. Jeffray, a woman who has treated you too kindly, and worn her heart upon her sleeve, but I am not to be trifled with as though I were some common farmer’s daughter. I tell you that you have insulted my affections, sir, compromised my honor and the honor of my family.”

Jeffray stood stock-still in the middle of the room, staring at Miss Hardacre’s red and angry face. Her fury had transfigured her, as though some witch’s wand had changed her from smiling youth into a fierce and scolding shrew. Few women look well when they are the creatures of wrath, and Jeffray was astonished and repelled by the transformation he beheld before him. Three months ago he would have been on his knees at Jilian’s feet. Now he realized that she could look old, vixenish, and ugly.

“I am sorry you have spoken like this,” he said.

“Sorry, sir—sorry! Nonsense; you don’t care the price of a new pin. I am disgusted, sir—disgusted at the miserable lies you have the impudence to throw at me. I thought you a gentleman, sir. I find that you are a villain.”

Jeffray crushed his hat between his hands, restrained himself by a great effort, and bowed to her with all the dignity he could command.

“I think that I had better take my leave of you,” he said, coldly.

“Ah, do so, by all means. Your righteous self-conceit sickens me.”

“Madam, I came to try and tell you the truth as courteously as I could.”

Miss Hardacre pointed him to the door.

“Tell me no more lies,” she said; “as for your conscience—I snap my fingers at it.”

Jeffray, mortified and not sorry to escape, bowed once more to the lady, and left her to her tears, her smelling-salts, and her brother.

XXXIV

The evening of the day that Jeffray rode to break his betrothal with Miss Hardacre, Isaac Grimshaw came limping across from his cottage to find Dan plastering new tiles on the roof of his small byre. Isaac stood at the foot of the ladder, squinting up at his son against the evening sunlight, his white hair shining under his hat.

Dan pressed a tile home upon its bed of plaster, and, laying his trowel on the roof, looked down at his father.

“What be ye a-wanting?” he asked, scratching his beard with a black thumb nail.

Isaac was frowning and looking fierce and out of humor.

“Come down, lad, I ain’t going to bellow at ye.”

Dan climbed down and stood with one hand on the ladder, staring inquisitively into his father’s face. It was not often that Isaac’s complacency was ruffled by a grievance. His arbitrary nature found few foul winds to trouble him in Pevensel.

“What’s amiss, dad?”

“That damned old she-dog Ursula’s in a pet.”

Dan grunted sympathetically.

“She be growing daft fast,” he said.

“So I say, lad, but the old fool has a tongue, and a meddlesome tongue, too, bad blood to her. She might be doing us a deal of harm unless we quiet her silly old soul.”

“What be Ursula whining for?”

“Guineas, lad; she be as sweet on the gold dirt as Solomon on his liquor.”

Isaac leaned against the wall of the byre and explained the nature of the old woman’s grievance. The gist of it was that Isaac had never given her the eighty guineas that he had promised her on Bess’s marriage. Ursula Grimshaw was slipping into her dotage, and, like many an old creature in that maudlin December of life, she had waxed querulous and testy, jealous of her rights and greedy of her due. Her love of gold had increased with the waning of her intellect, and she was forever bemoaning Bess’s absence and grumbling at her brother for cheating her of her rights. Isaac, who was never eager to disburse gold, and had kept the real secret of their wealth from all save Ursula and Dan, his son, had met the old woman’s complaints with banter, and chuckled at her demand for the guineas he had promised. Ursula, however, had flown at last into a fit of senile rage, spread her claws, and spluttered like a cat. She would have the money, or Isaac should repent of cheating her because she was old and feeble. Had not Dan given Bess the brooch of emeralds? The girl should hear the whole truth unless the money was forthcoming. With dramatic spite, Ursula had tottered up out of her chair, shaken her stick at Isaac, and cackled out threats that had made her brother change his tone.

“We must fetch another bag out of the chest, lad,” Isaac said, at the end of the recital, “unless you are for giving up the guineas I gave ye.”

Dan scratched his head and frowned at the suggestion.

“Drat the old hussy,” he retorted, “I’ll give her none of my guineas. I be wanting a new wagon and new gear, and the girl’ll be wasting a powerful lot of money.”

Isaac’s face suggested the thought that a tap with an axe on the old lady’s crown would have solved the difficulty as clearly as possible. He suppressed the temptation towards violence, however, and bade Dan call at his cottage that night after it was dark. They would go to the Monk’s Grave and bring back the gold that should keep old Ursula quiet.

Bess had been vexing her ingenuity to discover how she might charm from Dan the secret of the brooch. This golden bauble starred with its emerald eyes seemed to her the one talisman that could break the silence of the past. She had tried to charm some confession from old Ursula, but the dame would tell Bess nothing, despite her grievance against Isaac. Thus when Dan, surly and morose, came in to Bess at supper-time, and told her curtly that he would be out with his gun that night, the girl grew keen and alert as a deer that scents peril on the wind.

Had not Dan given her the brooch on the morning after his last night out with his gun in Pevensel? She remembered that he had brought no birds back with him in the morning, and the more Bess pondered it, the more suspicious she grew of her husband’s honesty. To be sure Dan would be out in the forest at night now and again, and she more than suspected that he was in league with the land smugglers who worked from the sea up through Pevensel. Thorney Chapel was notorious in the neighborhood, and it was whispered that the parson had once locked a hard-pressed cargo in the vestry. Bess assured herself that there was some secret to be discovered. She made up her mind to follow Dan, and to see where he went that night in Pevensel.

After supper, looking meek and innocent, she took her candle, bade Dan good-night, and went up to bed. Bolting the door after her, she sat down on the chest to listen, after throwing a gray cloak over her shoulders and buckling on her shoes ready for the adventure. Half an hour passed before she heard Dan stumping to and fro in the kitchen beneath. She heard him take his gun down from the beam, call to his black spaniel, and unlatch the door. Swift and sure-footed she was out of the bedroom, and down the creaking stairs into the kitchen. The wood fire was burning brightly on the irons, the light twinkling on the pewter, and playing with the shadows in the dark corners of the room. She tried the door softly—found that Dan had locked it and taken the key. With a feeling of tense excitement, Bess unlatched the casement, climbed out on to the ledge, and slipped down into the garden. She stood listening a moment, cowering under the shadow of the wall, and looking out into the dark. She could see a light twinkling behind the kitchen window of Isaac’s cottage and hear voices coming gruffly out of the gloom. Stooping, and gliding under cover of the rose-bushes and the pea-sticks to the garden gate, she slipped out and passed along under the shadows of the apple-trees.

The voices came from the direction of Isaac’s cottage. Bess recognized the old man’s impatient treble, Dan answering him curtly in his gruff bass. The candle went out of a sudden, and she heard the yelp of a dog and the closing and locking of a door. Two dim figures showed in the murk before her. They moved away towards the woods. Bess, running forward on the edge of the orchard, reached Isaac’s cottage and crouched under the window, listening. She caught the whimpering of a dog, and knew that Dan had left the spaniel locked in the cottage. It would be safer for her to follow them now that they were alone.

Brushing past the spreading bracken, halting, listening, peering from behind the great trunks, Bess followed the voices that led her through the forest. The scent of pines drifted through the warm darkness, while here and there a ghostly may-tree shed fragrance from its white dome. Soon Bess saw a light gleam out and go jigging and waving through the darkness. Isaac had lit his lantern. Bess blessed him for it, knowing that it would help her in the chase. She walked warily, her arched feet a-tingle with a sense of peril and adventure, her eyes watching the light that flashed and fled beyond the trees.

It was a mile before Isaac and his son came to the glade where a white-trunked fir grew on the Monk’s Knoll. They set the lantern down on the grass. Dan handling the spade, while Isaac squatted on the trunk of a fallen tree.

Bess, seeing that the light had become stationary among the trees, drew near slowly, slipping from trunk to trunk. Fearful of treading on dead wood and hearing it snap in the deathly stillness of the forest, she felt the ground with her foot each time before putting her weight upon it. At the edge of the glade bracken and white chervil and goutweed were growing. Bess, going down on her hands and knees, crawled slowly to where a low bush stood, and, drawing her hood forward over her face, looked out over the glade.

The lantern threw a vague circle of light over the grass barred with the black shadows cast by its frame. Bess could see old Isaac sitting hunched on the dead tree. He had lit his pipe, and a faint glow showed above the brown bowl, the smoke wreathing upward into the dark. The light from the lantern fell upon Dan, who had thrown off his coat and was working in his shirt. The bull neck and the hairy chest were showing, though the level of the light hardly reached his face.

Bess, crouching under the bush, which was a thorn, and holding her breath, saw Dan thrust his spade into the pile of earth beside the hole, catch something that Isaac threw to him, and bend his broad shoulders over the pit. The light from the lantern fell on his black and frowsy head and the swelling curves of his hairy forearms. Bess heard the click of a shooting lock. Dan reached deep into the hole and swung something that jingled on to the grass. Then he stood up, wiping his forehead with his forearm, and staring round into the darkness of the woods.

Isaac had reached for the bag of money when Bess, who was drawing back into the deeper shadow, set her hand on a dead thorn-bough. The spikes stabbed her palm. With the sudden pain of it she drew her breath in through her teeth with a slight and sibilant sound. She crouched down behind the thorn-bush, but both Dan and Isaac had heard her. The elder man was peering right and left like an old hawk, Dan stooping a little and staring straight to where Bess lay hid. He picked up the lantern and came striding round the edge of the glade, looking fiercely into the dark. Isaac had snatched up the gun and cocked it.

Bess, crouching behind the thorn-bush, trembled like a frightened hare. Dan was only twenty paces away, the lantern darting out arms of light into the forest. He would certainly see her if he passed the place, and with the swift instinct of the moment she chose the instant fortune of flight. Starting up like a wild thing from cover, she scurried back among the trees and took the winding path by which they had come.

Dan, giving a snort like a startled horse, dropped the lantern, flung up one arm, and plunged after her. He had seen the dark figure flit in among the trees, and could hear the crackling of twigs under her hurrying feet. With his mouth open and his hands clawing the air, he ran, rolling clumsily at the hips like a fat ketch in a heavy sea. Bess had twenty yards start of him and no more, and, quick and strong as she was, her skirts and cloak hindered her.

Bess heard him thudding in her wake, breathing hard like an angry bull. The trees sped by, solemn and untroubled, the winding path seemed to have no ending. Plod, plod, plod, came the heavy foot-falls at her heels till she felt like a child chased by an ogre. Strain as she would she could not outpace the man, and she knew enough of Dan’s doggedness to guess the end.

After all, why should she run from her own husband? She had merely caught him uncovering money in the forest, and there was no reason why he should suspect her. Halting suddenly and struggling for her breath, with her hands to her bosom, she stood in the middle of the path and laughed a shrill, breathless laugh as the man came up with her.

“Ha, Dan, I have led you a dance, hey!”

Dan stopped dead with a great oath, then came close to her, panting, and glaring in her face.

“What be you doing in the forest, you she-dog?”

“I may follow my husband when he goes hunting.”

Dan, with a curse, lifted up his great fist, struck her in the face, and bent over her as she lay half-stunned by the blow.

XXXV

Dan dragged Bess up by the wrist, and, seeing that she was dazed and faint, let her lean for a moment against a tree. The girl had been half stunned by the blow he had given her; blood was trickling from her mouth, her head drooping upon her bosom.

Dan, who was biting his nails and looking the creature of fury and indecision, turned on her at last, and, taking her by the cloak, dragged her back along the path. Bess had no spirit left in her for the moment. Faint, dizzy, and unable to think, she was yet conscious of the fact that she was utterly at her husband’s mercy. Dan dragged her along roughly, cursing her when she stumbled, and shifting his grip from her cloak to her arm. She felt his fingers bruising the flesh as he gripped the muscles, grinding his teeth and shaking her now and again as though she were a child.

Dan brought his wife to the Monk’s Grave again. From afar they saw the light of the lantern blinking through the forest, for Isaac had relit it and was standing on guard with his gun at full-cock. Dan gave a shout as he dragged Bess through the undergrowth, careless of how the boughs and briers smote and scratched her face. Isaac came limping up the glade towards them, the lantern in one hand, the gun in the other.

“Who be it, Dan?” he asked.

Dan laughed and held the girl out at arm’s-length towards his father. Isaac lifted the lantern. The light flashed upon Bess’s face with its wild and shadowy eyes and bleeding mouth.

“Bess!”

“A pretty trick she’s been playing us, father.”

“Odds my life, how much have you seen, wench—how much have you seen?”

He set the lantern down, seized Bess by the bosom of her gown, and shook her.

“Speak, you she-dog, what were you spying on us for?”

Bess shivered and her lips twitched.

“I followed Dan,” she said.

“The deuce—you did!”

“I saw him throw the money out.”

She broke suddenly into half-hysterical laughter, the mirthless and uncontrollable laughter of one unnerved by shock. Isaac threw her back from him so roughly that she reeled and staggered against Dan. Bess felt her husband’s hands over her bosom, gripping her so that she stood with her back to him and could not move. Isaac was limping to and fro before them, handling his gun, flashing now and again a fierce look at Bess. For the moment she understood but vaguely what was passing in the old man’s mind.

Isaac faced them suddenly, his eyes glinting from a net-work of wrinkles.

“Stand aside, lad,” he said, his fingers contracting about the stock of the gun.

Bess felt Dan’s arms tighten about her body.

“What be ye thinking of, father?” he asked.

“Stand aside.”

Bess, with a sudden flash of dread, understood the fierce purpose in him, and her terror swept away all other feelings for the instant. She twisted herself round in Dan’s arms and clung to him desperately, looking up into his face.

“No, no,” she panted, “hold me, Dan; dear God, don’t let the old man shoot me.”

Dan’s arms were fast about her, and he faced his father, who was poking the gun forward and licking his lips.

“Odd’s my life, stand aside from the she-dog.”

Dan kept his post, feeling the pressure of his wife’s arms and the terror of her appealing face.

“Put the gun down, father,” he said.

Isaac hesitated. Bess cast a rapid glance at him over her shoulder.

“I’ll not tell,” she said. “I’ll not tell.”

Dan still held her fast and kept his eyes fixed on his father’s face.

“Put the gun down,” he said, with a hoarse oath.

Isaac lowered the muzzle and came a step nearer to his son.

“Ye great fool,” he said, “will ye trust to a woman’s word!”

“I’ll not have ye shoot my wife like a dog,” quoth the younger man, fierce with the pride of ownership.

Isaac uncocked the gun and threw it from him with a curse.

“As ye will, as ye will,” he said, limping rapidly to and fro in his agitation. “I have heard o’ kings losing their crowns from the curse of a woman’s tongue.”

Dan had freed Bess. He sprang forward and picked up the gun.

“Ye shall not be doing murder this night, father,” he said.

The dawn was creeping up over Pevensel when Isaac, Dan, and Bess came through the woods towards the hamlet. The forest was full of mist and silence, vague and ghostly vapor standing in the glades. The stars sank back as the gray light increased in the vault above. Then came the first whimper of a waking bird, followed as by magic by the shrill piping from a thousand throats. The whole vast wilderness seemed to grow great with sound. The trees stood as though listening, their huge polls shrouded in mysterious vapor. From the east a gradual glory of gold swam up into the heavens, flashing over the misty hills, touching all the dewy greenness of the woods with light.

Isaac limped along in front, sniffing the air, and darting rapid glances from side to side. Bess and her husband followed him, the girl white and silent, her black hair in a tangle, her eyes dark with the perilous fortune of the night. She walked wearily, looking neither to the right hand nor the left, but watching old Isaac limping in the van. Dan, dour and sullen, strode at her side, his gun over one shoulder, spade and pick over the other.

Not till he reached his own doorway did Isaac turn and face the two who followed him. He gave a fierce glance at Bess, a questioning look at Dan, and, unlocking the door of the cottage, went in without a word. They heard the merry whimpering of the dog, the jingle of money, the sound of the old man rummaging in a cupboard. When he came out again there were pistols in his belt.

“Take her home, lad,” he said, curtly.

Dan nodded Bess towards the cottage beyond the orchard. She walked on slowly, Dan setting himself beside his father as they followed under the trees. Bess heard them talking together in undertones, the old man’s voice suave and insinuating, Dan’s gruff and obstinate. When they came through the garden, with its monthly roses dashed with dew and all its green life fragrant and full of a summer freshness, Dan laid a hand on Bess’s shoulder, unlocked the door, and pushed her over the threshold. He bade her sit down in the heavy oak chair, while Isaac sank with a tired grunt on the settle by the window. Dan brought Bess a mug of water and a hunch of bread and commanded her to eat. She obeyed mechanically, wondering what they were going to do with her. Isaac and his son watched her in silence.

When she had made a meal, Dan went out to the shed behind the cottage and brought back some fathoms of stout cord. He ordered Bess to hold out her hands. There was no sign of hesitation on his sullen, black-bearded face. He tied Bess’s hands together, bound her about the body and the ankles to the chair, Isaac watching with silent satisfaction. When Dan had bound her thus he went out with his father, locking the door after him, and left Bess to the fellowship of her thoughts.