Part 3

Instead of that, Miss Page began searching herself. On the book-shelves; on the side-board; in all the nooks and corners. It was found in the drawer of an unused table that stood against the wall.

"Well, I declare!" she exclaimed, as she drew it out. "I wonder who put it in here?"

In turning over the leaves to look for what she wanted, a piece of paper, loosely folded, fell to the ground. John Drench picked it up.

"Why!" he said, "it is a note from Jessy."

It was the letter written to them by Jessy, saying she had found a situation and hoped to suit and be happy in it. The _one_ letter: for no other had ever come. Abigail, missing the letter months ago, supposed it had got burnt.

"Yes," she said with a sigh, as she glanced over the few lines now, standing by Susan's work-table, "it is Jessy's letter. She might have written again. Every morning of my life for weeks and weeks, I kept looking for the letter-man to bring another. But the hope died out at last, for it never came."

"She is a heartless baggage!" cried Miss Susan. "In her grand lady's-maid's place, amongst her high people, she is content to forget and abandon us. I'd never have believed it of her."

A pause ensued. The subject was a painful one. Mortifying too: for no one likes to be set at nought and forgotten by one that they have loved and cherished and brought up from a little child. Abigail Page had tears in her eyes.

"It's just a year ago to-day that she came into the church to help us to dress it," said John Drench, his tender tone of regret grating on Miss Susan's ear. "In her blue mantle she looked sweeter and brighter than a fairy."

"Did you ever see a fairy, pray?" asked Miss Susan, sharply taking him up. "She acted like a fairy, didn't she?"

"Best to forget her," interposed Abigail, suppressing a sigh. "As Susan says, she is heartless. Almost wicked: for what is worse than ingratitude? Never to write: never to let us know where her situation is and with what people: never to ask or care whether her poor father, who had nothing but love for her, is living or dead? It's best to forget her."

She went out of the room with the note and receipt-book as she spoke, softly closing the door behind her, as one does who is feeling trouble. Miss Susan worked on with rapid and angry stitches; John Drench looked out on the low-lying snow. The storm had passed: the sky was blue again.

Yes. Christmas-Eve had come round, making it just a year since Jessy in her pretty blue mantle had chosen the sprays of holly in the church. They had never had from her but that one first unsatisfactory letter: they knew no more how she went, or why she went, or where she was, than they had known then. Within a week or two of the unsatisfactory journey to London of Miss Abigail and John Drench, a letter came to the farm from Mr. Marcus Allen, inquiring after Jessy, expressing hopes that she had been found and was at home again. It was not answered: Miss Page, busy with her father's illness, neglected it at first, and then thought it did not matter.

Mr. Page had recovered from his stroke: but he would never be good for anything again. He was very much changed; would sit for hours and never speak: at times his daughters thought him a little silly, as if his intellect were failing. Miss Page, with John Drench's help, managed the farm: though she always made it a point of duty to consult her father and ask for his orders. In the month of June they heard again from Mr. Marcus Allen. He wrote to say that he was sorry not to fulfil his promise (made in the winter's visit) of coming to stay with them during the time of hay-making, but he was busy finishing a painting and could not leave it: he hoped to come at some other time. And this was now December.

Susan Page worked on: John Drench looked out of the window. The young lady was determined not to break the silence.

"The Dunn Farm is to let," said he suddenly.

"Is it?" slightingly returned Miss Susan.

"My father has some thoughts of taking it for me. It's good land."

"No better than other land about here."

"It's very good, Susan. And just the place I should like. There's an excellent house too, on it."

Susan Page began rummaging in the deep drawer of the work-table for her box of buttons. She had a great mind to hum a tune.

"But I couldn't take it, or let father take it for me, unless you'd promise to go to it with me, Susan."

"Promise to go to it with you, John Drench!"

"I'd make you as good a husband as I know how. Perhaps you'll think of it."

No answer. She was doubling her thread to sew on the button.

"_Will_ you think of it, Miss Susan?"

"Well--yes, I will," she said in a softer tone, "And if I decide to bring my mind to have you, John Drench, I'll hope to make you a good and faithful wife."

He held out his hand to shake hers upon the bargain. Their eyes met in kindliness: and John Drench knew that the Dunn Farm would have its mistress.

* * * * *

We were going to dress the church this year as we did the last. Clerk Bumford's cough was bad, and the old sexton was laid by as usual. Tod and I got to the church early in the afternoon, and saw the Miss Pages wading their way through the coppice, over their ankles in snow: the one lady having finished her cake-making and the other her shirt-mending.

"Is Leek not here yet?" cried they in surprise. "We need not have made so much haste."

Leek with his large truck of holly was somewhere on the road. He had started, as Miss Page said, while they were at dinner. And he was not to be seen!

"It is all through his obstinacy," cried Susan. "I told him he had better take the highway, though it was a little further round; but he said he knew he could well get through the little valley. That's where he has stuck, truck and all."

John Drench came up as she was speaking. He had been on some errand to Church Dykely; and gave a bad account of the snow on the roads. This was the third day of it. The skies just now were blue as in spring; the sun, drawing towards the west, was without a cloud. After waiting a few minutes, John Drench started to meet Leek and help him on; and we cooled our heels in the church-porch, unable to get inside. As it was supposed Leek would be there sooner than any one else, the key of the church had been given to him that he might get the holly in. There we waited in the cold. At last, out of patience, Tod went off in John Drench's wake, and I after him.

It was as Miss Susan surmised. Leek and his truck had stuck fast in the valley: a low, narrow neck of land connecting a byeway to the farm with the lane. The snow was above the wheels: Leek could neither get on nor turn back. He and John Drench were hard at work, pulling and pushing; and the obstinate truck refusing to move an inch. With the help of our strength--if mine was not worth much, Tod's _was_--we got it on. But all this caused ever so much delay: and the dressing was begun when it ought to have been nearly finished. I could not help thinking of the other Christmas-Eve; and of pretty Jessy who had helped--and of Miss Susan scolding her for coming in her best blue mantle--and of the sudden looming upon us of the stranger, Marcus Allen. Perhaps the rest were thinking about it as I was. One thing was certain--that there was no liveliness in this year's dressing; we were all as silent as mutes and as dull as ditch-water. Charley Page, who had made enough noise last year, was away this. He went to school at Worcester now, and had gone to spend the Christmas with some people in Gloucestershire, instead of coming home.

The work was in progress, when who should look in upon us but Duffham. He was passing by to visit some one ill in the cottages. "Rather late, shan't you be?" cried he, seeing that there was hardly any green up yet. And we told him about the truck sticking in the snow.

"What possessed Leek to take it through the valley?" returned Duffham.

"Because he is fonder of having his own way than a mule," called out Miss Susan from the aisle.

Duffham laughed. "Don't forget the gala bunch over the parson's head; it looked well last year," said he, turning to go out. And we told him there was no danger of forgetting it: it was one of our improvements on old Bumford's dressing.

Darkness overtook us before half the work was done. There was nothing for it but to get candles from the Copse Farm to finish by. No one volunteered to fetch them: a walk through the snow did not look lively in prospective to any one of us, and Leek had gone off somewhere. "I suppose it must be me," said John Drench, coming out from the holly to start: when Miss Page suddenly bethought herself of what the rest of us were forgetting--that there might be candles in the church. On a winter's afternoon, when it grew dark early and the parson could not see through his spectacles to finish his sermon, Clerk Bumford would go stumping into the place under the belfry, and re-appear with a lighted candle and hand it up to the pulpit. He ought to have a stock of candles in store.

John Drench struck some matches, and we went to explore Bumford's den--a place dimly lighted by the open slits in the belfry above. The first thing seen was his black gown hanging up, next a horn lantern on the floor and the grave-digging tools, then an iron candlestick with a candle end in it, then a stick half-a-mile long that he menaced the boys with if they laughed in church; and next a round tin candlebox on a nail in the wall. It was a prize.

There were ten candles in it. Leaving one, in case it should be wanted on the morrow afternoon, the nine others were lighted. One was put into the iron candlestick, the rest we stuck upright in melted tallow, wherever one was wanted: how else could they be set up? It was a grand illumination: and we laughed over Clerk Bumford's dismay when he should find his store of candles gone.

_That_ took time: finding the candles, and dropping the tallow, and talking and laughing. In the midst of it the clock struck five. Upon that, Miss Abigail told us to hinder no more time, or the work would not be done by midnight. So we set to with a will. In a couple of hours all the dressing was finished, and the branches were ready to be hung over the pulpit. John Drench felt for the string. He seemed to take his time over it.

"Where on earth is it?" cried he, searching his pockets. "I'm sure I brought some."

He might have brought it; but it was certain he had not got it then. Miss Abigail, who had no patience with carelessness, told him rather sharply that if he had put it in his pockets at all, there it would be now.

"Well, I did," he answered, in his quiet way. "I put it in on purpose. I'm sure I don't know where it can have got to."

And there we were: at a standstill for a bit of string. Looking at one another like so many helpless noodles, and the flaring candles coming to an end! Tod said, tear a strip off the tail of Bumford's gown; he'd never miss it: for which Miss Abigail gave it him as sharply as if he had proposed to tear it off the parson's.

"I might get a bit of string at old Bumford's," I said. "In a few minutes I'll be back with it."

It was one of the lightest nights ever seen: the air clear, the moon bright, the ground white with snow. Rushing round the north and unfrequented side of the church, where the grass on the graves was long and no one ever walked, excepting old Bumford when he wanted to cut across the near way to his cottage, I saw something stirring against the church wall. Something dark: that seemed to have been looking in at the window, and now crouched down with a sudden movement behind the buttress, as if afraid of being seen.

"Is that you, Leek?" I called out.

There was no answer: no movement: nothing but a dark heap lying low. I thought it might be a fox; and crossed over to look.

Well--I had had surprises in my life, but never one that so struck upon me as this. Foxes don't wear women's clothes: this thing did. I pulled aside the dark cloak, and a face stood out white and cold in the moonlight--the face of Jessy Page.

You may fancy it is a slice of romance this; made up for effect out of my imagination: but it is the real truth, as every one about the place can testify to, and its strangeness is talked of still. Yet there are stranger coincidences in life than this. On Christmas-Eve, a year before, Jessy Page had been helping to dress the church, in her fine blue mantle, in her beauty, in her light-hearted happiness: on this Christmas-Eve when we were dressing it again, she re-appeared. But how changed! Wan, white, faint, wasted! I am not sure that I should have known her but for her voice. Shrinking, as it struck me, with shame and fear, she put up her trembling hands in supplication.

"Don't betray me!--don't call!" she implored in weak, feverish, anxious tones. "Go away and leave me. Let me lie here unsuspected until they have all gone away."

What ought I to do? I was just as bewildered as it's possible for a fellow to be. It's no exaggeration to say that I thought her dying: and it would never do to leave her there to die.

The stillness was broken by a commotion. While she lay with her thin hands raised, and I was gazing down on her poor face, wondering what to say, and how to act, Miss Susan came flying round the corner after me.

"Johnny Ludlow! Master Johnny! Don't go. We have found the string under the unused holly. Why!--what's that?"

No chance of concealment for Jessy now. Susan Page made for the buttress, and saw the white face in the moonlight.

"It's Jessy," I whispered.

With a shriek that might have scared away all the ghosts in the churchyard, Susan Page called for Abigail. They heard it through the window, and came rushing out, thinking Susan must have fallen at least into the clutches of a winter wolf. Miss Susan's voice trembled as she spoke in a whisper.

"Here's Jessy--come back at last!"

Unbelieving Abigail Page went down on her knees in the snow to trace the features, and convince herself. Yes, it was Jessy. She had fainted now, and lay motionless. Leek came up then, and stood staring.

Where had she come from?--how had she got there? It was just as though she had dropped from the skies with the snow. And what was to be done with her?

"She must--come home," said Abigail.

But she spoke hesitatingly, as though some impediment might lie in the way: and she looked round in a dreamy manner on the open country, all so white and dreary in the moonlight.

"Yes, there's no other place--of course it must be the farm," she added. "Perhaps you can bring her between you. But I'll go on and speak to my father first."

It was easy for one to carry her, she was so thin and light. John Drench lifted her and they all went off: leaving me and Leek to finish up in the church, and put out the candles.

William Page was sitting in his favourite place, the wide chimney-corner of the kitchen, quietly smoking his pipe, when his daughter broke in upon him with the strange news. Just in the same way that, a year before, she had broken in upon him with that other news--that a gentleman had arrived, uninvited, on a visit to the farm. This news was more startling than that.

"Are they bringing her home?--how long will they be?" cried the old man with feverish eagerness, as he let fall his long churchwarden pipe, and broke it. "Abigail, will they be long?"

"Father, I want to say something: I came on to say it," returned Miss Page, and she was trembling too. "I don't like her face: it is wan, and thin, and full of suffering: but there's a look in it that--that seems to tell of shame."

"To tell of what?" he asked, not catching the word.

"May Heaven forgive me if I misjudge her! The fear crossed me, as I saw her lying there, that her life may not have been innocent since she left us: why else should she come back in this most strange way? Must we take her in all the same, father?"

"Take her in!" he repeated in amazement. "YES. What are you thinking of, child, to ask it?"

"It's the home of myself and Susan, father: it has been always an honest one in the sight of the neighbours. Maybe, they'll be hard upon us for receiving her into it."

He stared as one who does not understand, and then made a movement with his hands, as if warding off her words and the neighbours' hardness together.

"Let her come, Abigail! Let her come, poor stray lamb. Christ wouldn't turn away a little one that had strayed from the fold: should her own father do it?"

And when they brought her in, and put her in an easy-chair by the sitting-room fire, stirring it into a blaze, and gave her hot tea and brandy in it, William Page sat down by her side, and shed fast tears over her, as he fondly stroked her hand.

* * * * *

Gay and green looked the church on Christmas morning, the sun shining in upon us as brightly as it shone a year before. The news of Jessy Page's return and the curious manner of it, had spread; causing the congregation to turn their eyes instinctively on the Pages' pew. Perhaps not one but recalled the last Christmas--and the gallant stranger who had sat in it, and found the places in the Prayer-book for Jessy. Only Mr. Page was there to-day. He came slowly in with his thick stick--for he walked badly since his illness, and dragged one leg behind the other. Before the thanksgiving prayer the parson opened a paper and read out a notice. Such things were uncommon in our church, and it caused a stir.

"William Page desires to return thanks to Almighty God for a great mercy vouchsafed to him."

We walked to the Copse Farm with him after service. Considering that he had been returning thanks, he seemed dreadfully subdued. He didn't know how it was yet; where she had been, or why she had come home in the manner she did, he told the Squire; but, anyway, she had come. Come to die, it might be; but _come home_, and that was enough.

Mrs. Todhetley went upstairs to see her. They had given her the best bed, the one they had given to Marcus Allen. She lay in it like a lily. It was what Mrs. Todhetley said when she came down: "like a lily, so white and delicate." There was no talking. Jessy for the most part kept her eyes shut and her face turned away. Miss Page whispered that they had not questioned her yet; she seemed too weak to bear it. "But what do you _think_?" asked Mrs. Todhetley in return. "I am afraid to think," was all the answer. In coming away, Mrs. Todhetley stooped over the bed to kiss her.

"Oh don't, don't!" said Jessy faintly: "you might not if you knew all. I am not worth it."

"Perhaps I should kiss you all the more, my poor child," answered Mrs. Todhetley. And she came downstairs with red eyes.

But Miss Susan Page was burning with impatience to know the ins and outs of the strange affair. Naturally so. It had brought more scandal and gossip on the Copse Farm than even the running away of the year before. That was bad enough: this was worse. Altogether Jessy was the home's heartsore. Mr. Page spoke of her as a lamb, a wanderer returned to the fold, and Susan heard it with compressed lips: in her private opinion, she had more justly been called an ungrateful girl.

"Now, then, Jessy; you must let us know a little about yourself," began Susan on this same afternoon when she was with her alone, and Jessy lay apparently stronger, refreshed with the dinner and the long rest. Abigail had gone to church with Mr. Page. Susan could not remember that any of them had gone to church before on Christmas-Day after the morning service: but there was no festive gathering to keep them at home to-day. Unconsciously, perhaps, Susan resented the fact. Even John Drench was dining at his father's. "Where have you been all this while in London?"

Jessy suddenly lifted her arm to shade her eyes; and remained silent.

"It _is_ in London, I conclude, that you have been? Come: answer me."

"Yes," said Jessy faintly.

"And _where_ have you been? In what part of it?--who with?"

"Don't ask me," was the low reply, given with a suppressed sob.

"Not ask you! But we must ask you. And you must answer. Where have you been, and what have you been doing?"

"I--can't tell," sobbed Jessy. "The story is too long."

"Story too long!" echoed Susan quickly, "you might say in half-a-dozen words--and leave explanations until to-morrow. Did you find a place in town?"

"Yes, I found a place."

"A lady's-maid's place?--as you said."

Jessy turned her face to the wall, and never spoke.

"Now, this won't do," cried Miss Susan, not choosing to be thwarted: and no doubt Jessy, hearing the determined tone, felt something like a reed in her hands. "Just you tell me a little."

"I am very ill, Susan; I can't talk much," was the pleading excuse. "If you'd only let me be quiet."

"It will no more hurt you to say in a few words where you have been than to make excuses," persisted Miss Susan, giving a flick to the skirt of her new puce silk gown. "Your conduct altogether has been most extraordinary, quite baffling to us at home, and I must hear some explanation of it."

"The place I went to was too hard for me," said Jessy after a pause, speaking out of the pillow.

"Too hard!"

"Yes; too hard. My heart was breaking with its hardness, and I couldn't stop in it. Oh, be merciful to me, Susan! don't ask any more."

Susan Page thought that when mysterious answers like these were creeping out, there was all the greater need that she should ask for more.

"Who found you the place at first, Jessy?"

Not a word. Susan asked again.

"I--got it through an advertisement," said Jessy at length.

Advertisements in those days, down in our rural district, were looked upon as wonderful things, and Miss Susan opened her eyes in surprise. A faint idea was upon her that Jessy could not be telling the truth.

"In that letter that you wrote to us; the only one you did write; you asserted that you liked the place."

"Yes. That was at first. But afterwards--oh, afterwards it got cruelly hard."

"Why did you not change it for another?"

Jessy made no answer. Susan heard the sobs in her throat.

"Now, Jessy, don't be silly. I ask why you did not get another place, if you were unable to stay in that one?"

"I couldn't have got another, Susan. I would never have got another."

"Why not?" persisted Susan.

"I--I--don't you see how weak I am?" she asked with some energy, lifting her face for a moment to Susan.

And its wan pain, its depth of anguish, disarmed Susan. Jessy looked like a once fair blossom on which a blight had passed.

"Well, Jessy, we will leave these matters until later. But there's one thing you must answer. What induced you to take this disreputable mode of coming back?"

A dead silence.

"Could you not have written to say you were coming, as any sensible girl would, that you might have been properly met and received? Instead of appearing like a vagabond, to be picked up by anybody."

"I never meant to come home--to the house."

"But _why_?" asked Susan.

"Oh, because--because of my ingratitude in running away--and never writing--and--and all that."

"That is, you were ashamed to come and face us."

"Yes, I was ashamed," said Jessy, shivering.

"And no wonder. Why did you go?"

Jessy gave a despairing sigh. Leaving that question in abeyance, Susan returned to the former one.

"If you did not mean to come home, what brought you down here at all?"

"It didn't matter where I went. And my heart was yearning for a look at the old place--and so I came."

"And if we had not found you under the church wall--and we never should but for Johnny Ludlow's running out to get some string--where should you have gone, pray?"

"Crawled under some haystack, and let the cold and hunger kill me."

"Don't be a simpleton," reproved Susan.

"I wish it had been so," returned Jessy. "I'd rather be dying there in quiet. Oh, Susan, I am ill; I am indeed! Let me be at peace!"

The appeal shut up Susan Page. She did not want to be too hard upon her.