Part 8

Taverner remained silent: her eyes seemed to burn their way into him. She shifted her position from one foot to the other; and went on, in an earnest tone, with a vibration in it from the strength of her emotion: 'I am bound to tell you all. If you are to be my husband, you must know everything. I cannot love you. What love I have that is not taken up by Temperance, and Charity, and Martha, and Willie, and Pattie, and Joe, and Kate, and father, and----' still looking frankly, earnestly at him, 'yes, and by Charles, I have given elsewhere. I cannot help it. It has been taken from me in a whirlwind of fire, as Elijah was caught up into heaven; it is gone from me; I cannot call it down again. If you insist on knowing to whom I gave it, I will tell you, but not now, not yet--afterwards. To show you, Mr. Langford, how I love my home, I had made up my mind to give him up, to throw away all that beautiful happiness, to forget it as one forgets a dream, because I would not be parted from my dear ones. I was resolved to give him up whom I love for them, and now I am required to give them up for you whom I love not.' She breathed heavily, her labouring heart beat. She drew the red cloak about her, lest the heaving bosom and bounding heart should be noticed. Langford saw the long drops run down her brow, but there were no tears in her eyes.

'You will never love me?' he asked.

'I cannot say; it depends how you treat my dear ones.'

She took a long breath.

'There is one reason why my consent costs me more when given to you than to another; but I cannot tell you that now. I will tell you later.'

She meant that by marrying him she was widening the breach between the uncle and nephew--that she was marrying the former for the express purpose of depriving the latter of his inheritance. She could not tell Langford this now.

'I will do my duty by you to the best of my lights. But I shall have one duty tying me here, and seven drawing me to the little cottage in the lane, and I feel--I feel that I shall be torn to pieces.'

Taverner Langford stood up and paced the room with his arms folded behind his back. His head was bowed and his cheeks pale. The girl said no more. She again shifted her feet, and rested both hands, under her cloak, on the table. Langford looked round at her; her head was bent, her yellow-brown hair was tied in a knot behind. As her head was stooping, the back of her neck showed above the red cloak. It was as though she bent before the executioner's axe. He turned away.

'Sit down,' he said. 'Why have you been standing? You look ill. What has ailed you?'

'In body nothing,' she answered.

'Who is it?' he asked surlily, looking out of the window, and passing his own fingers over his face.

She slightly raised her head and eyes questioningly.

'I mean,' he said, without turning to see her, but understanding by her silence that she asked an explanation--'I allude to what you were saying just now. Who is it whom you fancy?'

'If you insist, I will tell. If you have any pity you will spare me. In time--before the day, you shall know.'

He passed his hand over his face again.

'This is a pleasant prospect,' he said, but did not explain whether he alluded to the landscape or to his marriage. He said no more to force further confidence from her.

'Come,' said he, roughly, and he turned suddenly round, 'you shall see the house. You shall be shown what I have in it, all the rooms and the furniture, also the cowsheds, and the dairy--everything. You shall see what will be yours. You would get no other man with so much as I have.'

'Not to-day, Mr Langford. Let me go home. I should see nothing to-day. My eyes are full, and my heart fuller.'

'Then go,' he said, and reseated himself at the table.

She moved towards the door. He had his chin on his hand, and was looking at the grate. She hesitated, holding the handle.

'Hah!' exclaimed Langford, starting up. 'Did you hear that? a-fluttering down the passage? That was Mrs. Veale, trying to listen, but could hear nothing; trying to peep, but could see nothing, because I have covered every chink. Come here! come here, Mrs. Veale!'

As she did not respond, he rang the bell violently, and the pale woman came.

'Come here, Mrs. Veale! show the future mistress out of the house! Not by the kitchen, woman! Unbar the great door. Show her out, and curtsey to her, and at the same time take your own discharge.'

'"When one comes in the other goes out," as the man said of the woman in the weather-house,' remarked Mrs. Veale with a sneer. She curtsied profoundly. 'There's been calm heretofore. Now comes storm.'

*CHAPTER XXXII.*

*THE CHINA DOG.*

No sooner was the scarlet cloak gone than Mrs. Veale leaned back against the wall in the passage and laughed. Langford had never heard her laugh before, and the noise she made now was unpleasant. Her face was grey, her pale eyes glimmered in the dark passage.

'Will you be quiet?' said Taverner angrily. 'Get along with you into the kitchen and don't stand gulping here like water out of a narrow-necked bottle.'

'So!--that be the wife you've chosen, master! It is ill screwing a big foot into a small shoe; best suit your shoe to the size of your foot.'

'You have received notice to leave. A month from to-day.'

'This is breaking the looking-glass because you don't like your face,' said the housekeeper. '"Come help me on with the plough," said the ox to the gadfly. "With the greatest of pleasure," answered the fly, and stung the ox.'

'Gadfly!' shouted Taverner. 'Sheathe your sting, please, or don't practise on me.'

'You marry!' scoffed Mrs. Veale '"I'm partial to honey," said the fox, and upset the hive. "You must learn how to take it," answered the swarm, and surrounded him.'

'I'll turn you out at once,' said Langford, angrily.

'No, you will not,' answered the housekeeper; 'or you will have to pay my wage and get nothing for it. I've served you faithfully all these years, and this is my reward. I am turned away. What has been my pay whilst here? What! compared with my services? And now I am to make room for the sister of a thief. What will become of your earnings when she comes? If her brother picked a stranger, he will skin a relative. And the rest of them! "I am tilling for you," said the farmer to the rabbits; "come into my field and nibble the turnips." Love in an old man is like a spark in a stackyard. It burns up everything, even common sense.'

He thrust her down the passage. She kept her white face towards him, and went along sliding her hands against the wall, against which she leaned her back.

'I did suppose you had more sense than this. I knew you were bit, but not that you were poisoned. I thought that you would be too wise to go on with your courting when you found that you had been robbed by Charles. Who that is not a fool will give the run of his house to the man who has plundered him? Can you keep him out when you have married his sister? What of the young ones? They will grow up like their brother. Roguery is like measles, it runs through a house. Have not I been faithful? Have I taken a thread out of your clothes, or a nail from your shoe? Have I relations to pester you for help? Mine might have begged, but would not have stolen; yours will have their hands in all your pockets. Now you are everything in the house, and we are all your slaves. All is yours, your voice rules, your will governs. Will it be so when you bring a mistress home--and that Honor Luxmore? Everyone knows her; she governs the house.' Mrs. Veale laughed again. 'That will be a fine sight to see Master Taverner Langford under the slipper. "I'm seen in the half but lost in the full," said the man in the moon.'

Langford thrust her through the kitchen door and shut it, then returned to his parlour, where he bolted himself in, and paced the room with his arms folded behind his back.

There was enough of truth in what Mrs. Veale had said to make him feel uncomfortable. It was true that now he was absolute in his house; but would he reign as independently when married? Was not the ox inviting the gadfly to help to draw the plough? In going after the honey, like the fox, was he not inviting stings?

Langford had suffered great loss from rabbits. They came out of Chimsworthy plantation and fell on his turnips, nibbled pieces out of hundreds, spoiling whole rows, which when touched rotted with the first frost. Therefore Mrs. Veale's allusion to them went home. Yes!--there were a swarm of human rabbits threatening, the children from the cottage. They would all prey on him. He was inviting them to do so. 'I till for you,' said the farmer. Confound Mrs. Veale! Why was she so full of saws and likenesses that cut like knives? And Charles!--of course he would return when he knew that he would not be prosecuted. How could he be prosecuted when the brother-in-law of the man he had robbed? When he returned, how could he be kept away, how prevented from farther rascality? A thousand pounds gone! and he was not to punish the man who had taken the money. This was inviting him to come and rob him again. He did not think much of what Honor had said of an attachment to some unknown person. Taverner had never loved, and knew nothing of love as a passion. He regarded it as an ephemeral fancy. Every girl thought herself in love, got over it, and bore no scars. It would be so with Honor. Presently he rang for his breakfast. Mrs. Veale came in. She saw he was disconcerted, but she said nothing, till the tray was on the table, and she was leaving; then, holding the handle of the door, she said, 'It is a pity.'

'What is a pity?'

'The hare hunt.'

'What of that?' he asked angrily.

'That it was not put off a month, then changed to a stag hunt,' she replied, and went through the door quickly, lest he should knock her down.

Mrs. Veale went to her kitchen, and seated herself by the fire. She was paler than usual, and her eyelids blinked nervously. There was work to be done that morning, but she neglected it.

Her scheme had failed. She had endeavoured to force Charles Luxmore on to steal of his master, thinking that this must inevitably break the connection with the Luxmores. Taverner, she thought, could not possibly pursue his intentions when he knew he had been robbed by Charles. She was disappointed. What next to attempt she knew not. She was determined to prevent the marriage if she could. She had not originally intended to steal the cash-box, nor, indeed, to rob it of any of its contents, but she had been forced to take it, as Charles would not. Now she was given her dismissal, and if she left, she would take the money with her. But she had no desire to leave without further punishment of her ungrateful master. She had spent fifteen years in his service. She had plotted and worked and had not gained any of her ends. She had at first resolved on making him marry her. When she found it impossible to achieve this, she determined to make herself so useful to him, so indispensable, that he would in his old age fall under her power, and then, he would leave her by his will well off. She was now to be driven out into the cold, after all her labour, disappointments, to make room for a young girl. This should not be. If she must go, she would mar the sport behind her back. If Taverner Langford would not take her, he should take none other. If she was not to be mistress in the house, no young chit of a girl should be.

She stood up and took down from the chimney-piece a china dog blotched red, and turning it over, removed from the inside a packet of yellow paper.

She was so engrossed in her thoughts that she did not see that someone had entered the kitchen by the open backdoor.

'I declare! They'd make a pair!'

Mrs. Veale started, a shiver ran through her from head to foot. She turned, still quivering, and looked at the speaker. Kate Luxmore had entered, and stood near the table.

'Well, now,' said Kate, 'this is curious. We've got a dog just like that, with long curly ears, and turns his dear old head to the left, and you've one with the same ears, and same colour, turns his head to the right. We'd a pair once, but Joe broke the fellow. I reckon you'd a pair once, but your fellow is broke. 'Tis a pity they two dogs should be widowers and lonely.'

Mrs. Veale stared at her; Kate had never been there before. What had brought her there now? Were all the Luxmores coming to make that their home, even before the marriage?

'And what have you got there?' pursued Kate, full of liveliness. 'Why, that is one of the yellow paper rat-poison packets the man sold at the fair. I know it. 'Tis a queer thing you keeping the poison in the body of the dog. But I suppose you are right; no one would think to go there for it.'

'What do you want here?' asked Mrs. Veale, hastily replacing the packet and the dog on the mantel-shelf. 'Why have you come? We've had enough of you Luxmores already. Your brother Charles has played us a pretty tune, and now your sister's like to lead a dance.'

'I have come for Honor. Is she here?'

'She--no! She's been gone some time. Ain't she home? Perhaps she's walking over the land, and counting the acres that may be hers, and prizing the fleeces of the sheep.'

'She is wanted. As for Charles, there's naught proved against him, and till there is, I won't believe it. I've just had a talk with someone, and he tells me another tale altogether. So there--not another word against poor Charles. He wasn't ever sweet on you, I can tell you. 'Tis a pity, too, about those dogs. They're both water-spaniels--what intelligent eyes they have, and what lovely long curly ears! They ought to be a pair some day.'

'I tell you,' said Mrs. Veale, 'your sister is not here.'

'Our dog,' went on Kate, unabashed, 'don't belong to father. He is Honor's own. She had the pair, till Joe knocked one of them over. Her mother gave it her. 'Tis curious now that her dog should turn his blessed nose one way, and this dog should turn his nose the other way. It looks as if they were made for each other, which is more than is the case with some that want to be pairing. A mantel-shelf don't look as well with a spaniel in the middle as it do with one at each end. That is, I suppose, why your master is looking out for a wife. Well! I think he'd have matched better with you than with someone else whom I won't name. A house with one in it is like a mantel-shelf with one odd dog on it. Does this chimney ornament belong to you or to the house?'

'Never mind, go your ways. Don't you think ever to pair them two dogs, nor your sister and the master. There is a third to be considered. If one be broken, there is no pairing. Do y' know what the ash said to the axe?

Whether coupled or counter is wisht (unlucky) for me, My wood makes the haft for to fell my tree.'

*CHAPTER XXXIII.*

*AMONG THE GORSE.*

'Where be you going to, Larry?' asked his father. 'I've just seen the Red Spider running Langford way. Take care Uncle Taverner don't sloke that one away as he tried to sloke t'other.'

Hearing that Honor was gone over the moor to Langford, Hillary took that direction, and, as he had expected, encountered her as she was returning to her cottage, before she had left the down.

'You are going to give me a quarter of an hour,' said Larry. 'I dare say you may be busy, but I can't spare you till we've had it out with each other. I've but one arm now that I can use, but I'll bar the way with that, if you attempt to escape me.'

Honor looked at him hesitatingly. She was hardly prepared for the inevitable trial, then. She would have liked to defer it. But, on second thoughts, she considered that it was best to have it over. Sooner or later, an explanation must be made, so perhaps it would be as well for her that day to pass through all the fires. There on Broadbury, when the gorse is swaled (burnt), the cattle are driven through the flames. They plunge and resist, but a ring of men and dogs encloses them, armed with sharp stakes, and goad them forward, and at last, with desperation, lowing, kicking, leaping, angry and terrified, they plunge through the flames. Honor thought of this familiar scene, and that she was herself being driven on. Sooner or later she must enter the fire, be scorched, and pass through; she would traverse it without further resistance at once.

'I am ready, Larry,' she said in a low voice.

'My dear, dear Honor, what ails you? You are looking ill, and deadly white! What is it, Honor?'

'We all have our troubles, Larry. You have a broken arm, and I have a breakage somewhere, but never mind where.'

'I do mind,' he said vehemently, 'What is amiss?'

'You told me, Larry, the night your arm was hurt, that--your pride had sustained a fall and was broken.'

'So it was.'

'So also is mine.'

'But what has hurt you? How is it? Explain to me all, Honor.'

She shook her head. 'It is not my affair only. I have others to consider beside myself, and you must forgive me if my lips are locked.'

He put his left arm round her, to draw her to him, and kiss her. 'I will keep the key of those lips,' he said, but she twisted herself from his grasp.

'You must not do that, Larry.'

'Why not? We understand each other. Though we did not speak, that night, our hearts told each other everything.'

'Larry, do you remember what I said to you when we were together in the paddock?'

'I remember every word.'

'I told you that I regarded you--as a brother.'

'I remember every word but that.'

'You have been a friend, a dear friend, ever since we were children. You were always thoughtful towards us, my sister and me, when you thought of nothing else. You were always kind, and as Charles was away, of late, I came to think of you as a brother.'

'But I, Honor, I never have and never will consent to regard you as a sister. I love you more dearly than brother ever loved sister. I never had one of nay own, but I am quite sure I could not think of one in the way I think of you. I love you, Honor, with all my heart, and I respect you and look up to you as the only person who can make me lead a better life than I have led heretofore.'

Honor shook her head and sighed. It was her way to answer by nod or shake rather than by word.

'I have good news to tell you,' he went on; 'my father is delighted at the prospect, and he is nearly as impatient as I am to have your dear self in Chimsworthy.'

'I cannot go there,' said Honor in a tone that expressed the desolation of her heart.

'Why not?'

She hesitated.

'Why not, Honor? When I wish it, when my father is eager to receive you?'

'Dear Larry,' she said sadly, 'it can never, never be.'

'Come here,' he exclaimed impatiently, and drew her along with him. 'What is the meaning of this? I will understand.' Before them for nearly a mile lay a sheet of gold, a dense mass of unbroken gorse, in full blaze of flower, exhaling a nectareous fragrance in the sun, that filled the air. So dense were the flowers that no green spines could be seen, only various shades of orange and gold and pale yellow. Through it a path had been reaped, for rabbit-shooters, and along this Hillary drew her. The gorse reached to their waists. The fragrance was intoxicating.

'Look here, Honor,' said he, 'look at this furze. It is like my nature. It is said that there is not a month in the year in which it does not blossom. Sometimes there is only a golden speck here and there--when the snow is on the ground, not more than a few flowers, and then one stalk sets fire to another, as spring comes on, and the whole bush burns and is not consumed, like that in the desert, when God spoke to Moses from it. It has been so with me, Honor. I have always loved you. Sometimes the prickles have been too thick, and then there have been but few tokens of love; but never, never has the bloom died away altogether. In my heart, Honor, love has always lived, and now it is all blazing, and shining, and full of sweetness.'

'Larry,' answered Honor slowly, 'look here;' she put her hand to a gorse bush and plucked a mass of golden bloom.

'Honor!' he exclaimed, 'what have you done?' She opened her hand, it was full of blood.

'I have grasped the glorious flower,' she said, 'and am covered with wounds, and pierced with thorns.'

'No--no, dear Honor,' he said, taking her hand, removing from it the prickles, and wiping the blood away with the kerchief that bound his broken arm. 'There shall be no thorns in our life together. The thorns will all go from me when I have you to prune me. I have been wild and rough, and I dare say I may have given you pain. I know that I have. I was angry with you and behaved badly; but I was angry only because I loved you.' Then his pleasant sweet smile broke over his pale face, and he said in an altered tone, 'You do not harbour anger, Honor; you forgive, when the offender is repentant.'

She raised her eyes to him, and looked long and steadily into his.

'I forgive you for any little wrong you may have done me, heartily and wholly. But, O Larry! I must wrong you in a way in which I can expect to get no forgiveness from you.'

'That is quite impossible,' he said, smiling.

'Larry, you cannot even dream what my meaning is. When you know--there will not be a flower on the furze-bush, the last gold bud of love will fall off.'

'Never, never, Honor!'

'You do not know.'

He was perplexed. What could stand In the way of her ready acceptance of him, except his own former bad conduct?

'Honor,' he said, 'I have had some sleepless nights--these have not been altogether caused by my arm--and during the dark hours I have thought over all my past manner of life, and I have quite resolved to break with it. I will no longer be idle. I will no more boast. I will no more let the girls make a fool of me. I will work hard on the farm as any labourer--indeed, Honor, I will work harder and longer than they. If you mistrust me, prove me. I deserve this trial. My father would like you to be his daughter-in-law at once; but I know that I do not deserve you. In the old story, Jacob served fourteen years for Rachel, and I am not a Jacob--I will wait, though fourteen years is more than my patience will bear, still--dear Honor, dear heart!--I will wait. I will wait your own time, I will not say another word to you till you see that I am keeping my promise, and am becoming in some little way worthy of you. I know,' he said in a humble tone, 'that really I can never deserve you--but I shall be happy to try and gain your approval, and, if you do not wish me to say more of my love till I show you I am on the mend, so shall it be. I am content. Put on the kerchief when I am to speak again.'

He stopped, and looked at her. She was trembling, and her eyes cast down. Now, at last, the tears had come, and were flowing from her eyes. One, like a crystal, hung on her red cloak. Knowing that he awaited an answer, she raised her head with an effort, and looked despairingly right and left, but saw no help anywhere, only the flare of yellow blossom flickering through a veil of tears.

O, infinitely sweet, infinitely glorious was this sight and this outpouring of Larry's heart to her--but infinitely painful as well--piercing, wounding, drawing forth blood--like the gorse.

'Larry!' she said earnestly, 'No--no--not for one moment do I doubt your word. I believe everything you say. I could trust you perfectly. I know that with your promise would come fulfilment, but--it is not that.'

'What is it then?'

She _could_ not tell him. The truth was too repugnant to her to think, much less to tell--and tell to _him_.

'I cannot tell you; my father, my brothers and sisters.'