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NicholasSynovic
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poor maid as well she mid be and so you see sir as all this happened just when we was packing your few traps and your mis ess s night rail and dressing things into the cart why it me yes well will you get the trunks upstairs and drink a cup of ale and hasten back as soon as you can in case you should be wanted had gone back to the inner parlour and sat down by the fire looking wistfully into it she heard s heavy footsteps up and down the stairs till he had done placing the luggage and heard him express his thanks for the ale her husband took out to him and for the he received s footsteps then died from the door and his cart away angel slid forward the massive oak bar which of the d secured the door and coming in to where she sat over the hearth pressed her cheeks between his hands from behind he expected her to jump up gaily and the toilet gear that she had been so anxious about but as e did not rise he sat down with her in the the candles on the supper table being too thin and glimmering to interfere with its glow i am so sorry you should have heard this sad story about the girls he said still don t let it you was naturally morbid you know without the least cause said while they who have cause to be hide it and pretend they are not this incident had turned the scale for her they were simple and innocent girls on whom the of love had fallen they had deserved better at the hands of fate she had deserved worse yet she was the chosen one it was wicked of her to take all without paying she would pay to the she would tell there and then this final determination she came to when she looked into the fire he holding her hand a steady glare from the now embers painted the sides and back of the fireplace with its colour and the well and the old brass that not meet the of the mantel shelf was flushed with the high coloured light and the legs of the table nearest the fire s face and neck reflected the same warmth which each turned into an or a a of white red and green flashes that their hues with her every do you remember what we said to each other this morning about telling our faults he asked abruptly finding that she still remained immovable we spoke lightly perhaps and you may well have done so but for me it was no light promise i want to make a confession to you love the consequence this from him so unexpectedly had the effect upon her of a you have to confess something she said quickly and even with gladness and relief you did not expect it ah you thought too highly of me now listen put your head there because i want you to forgive me and not to be indignant with me for not telling you before as perhaps i ought to have done how strange it was he seemed to be her double she did not speak and went on i did not mention it because i was afraid of my chance of you darling the great prize of my life my fellowship i c you my brother s fellowship was won at his college mine at well i would not risk it i was going to tell you a month ago at the time you agreed to be mine but i could not i thought it might frighten you away from me i put it off then i thought i would tell you yesterday to give you a chance at least of escaping me but i did not and i did not this morning when you proposed our our faults on the landing the sinner that i was but i must now i see you sitting there so solemnly i wonder if you will forgive me o yes i am sure that well i hope so but wait a minute you don t know to begin at the beginning though i imagine my poor father fears that i am one of the lost for my doctrines i am of course a in good morals as much as you i used to wish to be a teacher of men and it was a great disappointment to me when i found i could not enter the church i admired even though i could lay no claim to it and hated as i hope i do now whatever one may think of inspiration one must heartily to these words of paul be thou an example in word in conversation in charity in spirit in faith in purity it is the only op the d for us poor human beings int er says a roman poet who is strange company for st the man of upright life from free stands not in need of spear or bow well a certain place is paved with good intentions and having felt all that so strongly you will see what a terrible remorse it bred in me when in the midst of my fine aims for other people i myself fell he then told her of that time of his life to which allusion has been made when tossed about by doubts and difficulties in london like a cork on the waves he plunged into eight and f hours with a stranger happily i awoke almost immediately to a sense of my folly he continued i have no more to say to her and i came home i have never repeated the offence but i felt i like to treat you with perfect frankness and honour and i could not do so without telling this	45
do you forgive me she pressed his hand tightly for an answer then we will dismiss it at once and for ever too td as it is for the occasion and talk of something lighter o angel i am almost glad because now you can forgive i have not made my confession i have a confession too remember i said so ah to be e now then for it wicked little one perhaps although you smile it is as serious as yours or more so it can hardly be more serious dearest it cannot o no it cannot she up joyfully at the hope no it cannot be more serious certainly she cried because tis just the same i will tell you now she sat down again their hands were still joined the ashes under the consequence the grate were lit by the fire like a waste imagination might have beheld a last day in this red glow which fell on his face and hand and on hers peering into the loose hair about her brow and firing the delicate skin a large shadow of her shape rose upon the wall and ceiling she bent forward at which each diamond on her neck gave a sinister wink like a s and pressing her forehead against his temple she entered on her story of her acquaintance with d and its results murmuring the words without and with her eyelids drooping down end of phase the fourth phase the fifth the woman pays phase tee the woman pays her narrative ended even its re and secondary explanations were done s voice throughout had hardly risen higher than its opening tone there had been no phrase of any kind and she had not wept but the complexion even of external things seemed to suffer as her the fire in the grate looked funny as if it did not care in the least about her strait the grinned idly as if it too did not care the light from the water was merely engaged in a problem all material objects announced their with terrible and yet nothing had changed since the moments when he had been her or rather nothing in the substance of things but the essence of things had changed when she ceased the impressions from their previous seemed to away into the comers of their brains repeating themselves as echoes from a time of foolishness performed the act of stirring the fire the intelligence had not even yet got to the bottom of him after stirring the embers he rose to his feet all the force of her disclosure had imparted itself now his face had withered in the of the d ness of his he on the floor he could not by any contrivance think closely enough that was the meaning of his vague movement when he spoke it was in the most inadequate commonplace voice of the many varied tones she had heard from him yes dearest am i to believe this from your manner i am to take it as true o you cannot be out of your mind you ought to be yet you are not my wife my nothing in j ou such a supposition as that i am not out of my mind she said and yet he looked at her to resume with dazed senses why didn t you tell me before ah yes you would have told me in a way but i you i remember these and other of his words were nothing but the of the surface while the depths remained he turned away and bent over a chair followed him to the middle of the room where he was and stood there staring at him with eyes that did not weep presently she down upon her knees beside his foot and from this position she crouched in a heap in the name of our love forgive me she whispered with a dry mouth i have forgiven you for the same and as he did not answer she said again forgive me as you are forgiven forgive angel you yes you do but you do not forgive me o forgiveness does not apply to the case you were one person now you are another my god how can forgiveness meet such a grotesque as that he paused contemplating this definition then the woman pays suddenly broke into horrible laughter as unnatural and ghastly as a laugh in hell t don t it me quite that she shrieked have mercy upon me have mercy he did not answer and sickly white she jumped up angel angel what do you mean by that laugh she cried out do you know what this is to me he shook his head i have been hoping longing praying to make you happy i have thought what joy it will be to do it what an unworthy i shall be if i do not that s what i have felt angel i know that i thought angel that you loved me me my very self if it is i you do love o how can it be that you look and speak so it me having begun to love you i love you for ever in all changes in all because you are yourself i ask no more how can you o my own husband stop loving me i repeat the woman i have been loving is not you but who another woman in your shape she perceived in his words the of her own apprehensive in former times he looked upon her as a species of a guilty woman in the guise of an innocent one terror was upon her white face as she saw it her cheek was and her mouth had almost the aspect of a little hole the horrible sense of his view of	45
her so her that she staggered and he stepped forward thinking she was going to fall sit down sit down he said gently you are ill and it is natural that you should be she did sit down without knowing where she was that strained look still upon her face and her es such as to make his flesh creep op the d i don t belong to you any more then do i angel she asked helplessly it is not me but another woman like me that he loved he says the image raised caused her to take pity upon herself as one who was ill used her eyes filled as she regarded her position further she round and burst into a flood of self tears was relieved at this change for the effect on her of what had happened was to be a trouble to him only less than the woe of the disclosure itself he waited patiently till the violence of her grief had worn itself out and her rush of weeping had lessened to a catching gasp at intervals angel she said suddenly in her natural tones the insane dry voice of terror having left her now angel am i too wicked for you and me to live together i have not been able to think what we can do i shan t ask you to let me live with you angel because i have no right to i shall not write to mother and sisters to say we be married as i said i would do and i shan t finish the good i cut out and meant to make while we were in lodgings shan t you no i shan t do unless you order me to and if you go away from me i shall not follow ee and if you never speak to me any more i shall not ask why unless you tell me i may and if i do order you to do anything i will obey you uke your wretched slave even if it is to lie down and die you are very good but it strikes me that there is a want of harmony between your present mood of self sacrifice and your past mood of self preservation these were the first words of to fling elaborate at however was much like flinging them at a dog or cat the charms of their passed by her and she only received them as sounds which m ant the woman pays that anger ruled she remained mute not knowing that he was his affection for her she hardly observed that a tear descended slowly upon his cheek a tear so large that it the of the skin over which it rolled like the object of a meanwhile as to the terrible and total change that her confession had wrought in his life in his returned to him and he tried desperately to advance among the new conditions in which he stood some consequent action was necessary yet what he said as gently as he could speak i cannot stay in this room just now i will walk out a little way he quietly left the room and the two glasses of wine that he had poured out for their supper one for her one for him remained on the table this was what their had come to at tea two or three hours earlier they had in the of affection drunk from one cup the closing of the door behind gently as it had been to roused from her stupor he was gone she could not stay hastily flinging her around her she opened the door and followed putting out the candles as if she were never coming back the rain was over and the night was now dear she was soon dose at his heels for walked slowly and without his form beside her light grey figure looked black sinister and forbidding and e felt as sarcasm the touch of the jewels of which she had been so proud turned at hearing her footsteps but his recognition of her presence seemed to make no difference in him and he went on over the five yawning arches of the great bridge in front of the house the cow and horse tracks in the road were full of water the rain having been enough to charge them but not enough to wash them away across of the d minute pools the reflected stars flitted in a quick as she passed she would not have known they were shining overhead if she had not seen them there the things of the universe in objects so mean the place to which they had travelled to day was in the same valley as but some miles lower down the river and the being open she kept easily in sight of him away from the house the road through the and along these she followed without any attempt to come up with him or to attract him but with and vacant fidelity at last however her walk brought her up alongside him and still he said nothing the cruelty of honesty is often great after and it was mighty in now the air had apparently taken away from him all tendency to act on she knew that he saw her without in all her that time was his at her then behold when thy face is made bare he that loved thee shall hate thy face shall be no more fair at the fall of thy fate for thy life shall fall as a leaf and be shed as the rain and the veil of thine head all be grief and the shall be he was still intently thinking and her companionship had now insufficient power to break or divert the strain of thought what a weak thing her presence must have become to him she not	45
help addressing what have i done what have i done i have not told of that with or my love for you you don t think i planned it do you it is in your own mind what you are angry at angel it is not in me o it is not in me and i am not woman you think me h m well not my wife but not the same no not the same but do not make me the woman pays you i have sworn that i will not and i will do everything to avoid it but she went on pleading in her distraction and perhaps said things that have been better left to silence angel angel i was a child a child when it happened i knew nothing of men you were more against than that i then will you not forgive me i do forgive you but forgiveness is not all and love me to this question he did not answer o angel my mother says that it sometimes happens so she knows several cases where they were worse than i and the husband has not minded it much has got over it at least and yet the woman has not loved him as i do you don t don t argue different societies different manners you almost make me say you are an peasant woman who have never been into the proportions of social things you don t know what you say i am only a peasant by position not by nature she spoke with an impulse to anger but it went as it came so much the worse for you i think that parson who your would have done better if he had held his tongue i cannot help your decline as a family with this other fact of your want of firmness families imply wills conduct heaven why did you give me a handle for you more by informing me of your descent here was i thinking you a child of nature there were you the of an aristocracy lots of families are as bad as mine in that s family were once large and so were n s and the who of the d now are were once the de family you find such as i everywhere tis a feature of our county and i can t help it so much the worse for the county she took these reproaches in their bulk simply not in their he did not love her as he had loved her hitherto and to au else she was indifferent they wandered on again in silence it was said afterwards that a of who went out late that night for a doctor met two lovers in the pastures walking very slowly without converse one behind the other as in a funeral procession and the glimpse that he obtained of their faces seemed to that they were anxious and sad returning later he passed them again in the same field just as slowly and as regardless of the hour and of ttie cheerless night as before it was only on account of his with his own affairs and the illness in his house that he did not bear in mind the curious incident which however he recalled a long while after during the interval of the s going and coming she had said to her husband i don t see how i can help being the cause of much misery to you all your life the river is down there i can put an end to myself in it i am not afraid i don t wish to add murder to my other follies he said i will leave something to show that i did it myself on of my shame they will not blame you then don t speak so i wish not to hear it it is nonsense to have such thoughts in this kind of case which is rather one for laughter than for tragedy you don t in the least understand the quality of the it would be viewed in the light of a joke by nine of the world if it were the woman pays known please oblige me by returning to the house and going to bed i will said she they had round by a road which led to the well known ruins of the abbey behind the mill the latter having in centuries past been attached to the establishment the mill still worked on food being a necessity the abbey had perished being transient one continually sees the of the temporary the of the eternal their walk having been they were still not far from the house and in his direction she only had to reach the large stone bridge across the main river and follow the road for a few yards when she got back everything remained as she had left it the fibre being still burning she did not stay downstairs for more than a minute but proceeded to her chamber whither the luggage had been taken here she sat down on the edge of the bed looking around and presently began to in removing the light towards the its rays fell upon the of white something was hanging beneath it and she lifted the candle to see what it was a bough of angel had put it there she knew that in an instant this was the explanation of that mysterious parcel which it had been so difficult to pack and bring whose contents he would not explain to her saying that time would soon show her the purpose thereof in his zest and his gaiety he had it there how foolish and that looked now having nothing more to fear having scarce anything to hope for that he there seemed no promise whatever she lay down when sorrow ceases to be sleep sees	45
her opportunity among so many happier moods which forbid repose this was a mood which welcomed it and in a few minutes the lonely forgot existence op the d surrounded by the stillness of the chamber that had once possibly been the bride chamber of her own later on that night also his steps to the house entering softly to the sitting room he obtained a light and with the manner of one who had considered his course he spread his upon the old horse hair sofa which stood there and roughly shaped it to a sleeping couch before lying down he crept upstairs and listened at the door of her apartment her measured breathing told that she was ing profoundly thank god murmured and yet he was conscious of a pang of bitterness at the thought true though not wholly so that having shifted the burden of her life to his shoulders she was now without care he away to descend then faced round to her door again in the act he caught sight of one of the d whose portrait was immediately over the entrance to s in the the painting was more than unpleasant sinister design in the woman s features a concentrated purpose of revenge on the other sex so it seemed to him then the of the portrait was low precisely as s had been when he tucked it in to show the and again he experienced the distressing sensation of a resemblance between them the check was sufficient he resumed his retreat and descended his air remained calm and cold his small compressed mouth his powers of self control his face wearing still that terribly expression which had spread since her disclosure it was the face of a man who was no longer passion s slave yet who found no advantage in his he was simply regarding the of human experience tiie of the woman pays things nothing so pure so sweet so as had seemed possible all the long while that he had adored her up to an hour ago but the little less and what worlds he argued when he said to himself that her h was not in the honest freshness of her face but had no advocate to set him right it be possible he continued that eyes which as they gazed never expressed any from what the tongue was telling were yet ever seeing another world behind her one and he on his couch in the sitting room and extinguished the light the night came in and took up its place there and indifferent the night which had already swallowed up his happiness and was now it and was ready to swallow up the happiness of a thousand other people with as little disturbance or change of mien arose in the light of a dawn that was and as though associated with crime the fireplace confronted with its extinct embers the spread supper table whereon stood the two full glasses of wine now flat and her seat and his own the other articles of with their eternal look of not being able to help it their intolerable inquiry what was to be done from above there was no sound but in a few minutes there came a knock at the door he remembered that it be the s wife who was to minister to their wants while they remained here the presence of a third person in the house would be extremely awkward just now and being already dressed he opened the window and informed her that they manage to shift for themselves that morning she had a milk can in her hand which he told her to leave at the door when the dame had gone away he searched in the back of the house for fuel and speedily lit a fire there was plenty of eggs butter bread and so on in the and soon had breakfast laid his experiences at the having rendered him in domestic preparations the smoke of the kindled wood rose from the chimney without like a headed column local people who were passing by saw it and thought of the couple and envied their happiness angel cast a final glance round and then going to the foot of the stairs called in a conventional voice breakfast is ready he opened the front door and took a few steps in the woman pays the morning air when after a short space he came back she was in the sitting room mechanically the breakfast things as she was fully attired and interval since his calling her had been but two or three minutes she must have been dressed or nearly so before he went to summon her her hair was twisted up in a large round mass at the back of her head and she had put on one of the new pale blue garment with neck f of white her hands and face appeared to be cold and she had possibly been sitting dressed in the bedroom a long time without any fire the marked civility of s tone in calling her seemed to have inspired her for the moment with a new glimmer of hope but it soon died when she looked at him the pair were in truth but the ashes of their former fires to the hot sorrow of the previous night had succeeded it seemed as if nothing could either of them to of sensation any more he spoke gently to her and she replied with a like at last she came up to him looking in his sharply defined face as one who had no consciousness that her own formed a visible object also angel she said and paused touching him with her fingers lightly as a breeze as though she could hardly believe to be there in the flesh e man who was once her lover her eyes were bright her	45
pale cheek still showed its though tears had left glistening traces and the usually ripe red mouth was almost as pale as her cheek alive as she was still under the stress of her mental grief the life beat so that a little further pull upon it cause read illness dull her characteristic eyes and make her mouth thin she looked absolutely pure nature in her fantastic had set such a seal of of the d upon s countenance that he gazed at her with a air say it is not true no it is not truer it is true every word every word he looked at her as if he would willingly have taken a lie from her lips knowing it to be one and have made of it by some sort of a denial however she only repeated it is true is he living angel then asked the baby died but the man he is alive a last despair passed over s face is he in england yes he took a few vague steps my position is this he said abruptly i thought any man would have thought that by giving up all ambition to win a wife with social g with fortune with knowledge of the world i should secure rustic innocence as surely as i should secure pink cheeks but however i am no man to reproach you and i will not felt his position so entirely that the remainder had not been needed therein lay just the distress of it she saw that he had lost all angel i should not have let it go on to marriage with you if i had not known that after all there was a last way out of it for you though i hoped you would never her voice grew a last way i mean to get rid of me you can get rid of me how by me the woman pays good heavens how can you be so simple how can i divorce you can t you now i have told you i thought my confession would give you grounds for that o you are too too childish crude i suppose i don t know what you are you don t understand the law you don t understand what you cannot indeed i cannot a quick shame mixed with the misery upon his listener s face i thought i thought she whispered o now i see how wicked i seem to you believe me believe me on my i never thought but that you could i hoped you would not yet i believed without a doubt that you could cast me off if you were determined and didn t love me at at all you were mistaken he said o then i ought to have done it to have done it last night but i hadn t the courage that s just like me the courage to do what as she did not answer he took her by the hand what were you thinking of doing he inquired of putting an end to myself when she this manner of his last night she answered where under your my good how he asked sternly i ll tell you if you won t be angry with me she said shrinking it was with the cord of my box but i could not do the last thing i was afraid that it might cause a scandal to your name the unexpected quality of this confession wrung from her and not shook him but he still held her and letting his glance fall from her face downwards he said s of the d now listen to this you must not dare to think of such a horrible thing how you you will promise me as your husband to attempt that no more i am ready to promise i saw how wicked it was wicked the idea was unworthy of you beyond description but angel she pleaded her eyes in calm upon him it was thought of on your account to set you free without the scandal of the divorce that i thought you have to get i should never have of doing it on mine however to do it with my own hand is too good for me after all it is you my ruined husband who ought to strike the blow i think i love you more if that were possible if you bring yourself to do it since there s no other way of escape for ee i feel i am so utterly worthless so very greatly in the way well since you say no i won t i have no wish opposed to yours he knew this to be true enough since the desperation of the night her had dropped to and there was no further to be feared tried to busy herself again over the breakfast table with more or less success and they sat down both on the same side so that their glances did not meet there was at first something awkward in hearing each other eat and drink but this could not be escaped moreover the of eating done was small on both sides breakfast over he rose and telling her the hour at which he might be expected to dinner went to the miller s in a mechanical of the plan of studying that business which had been his only practical reason for coming here when he was gone stood at the window and presently saw his form crossing the great stone bridge the woman pays which conducted to the mill premises he sank behind it crossed the railway beyond and disappeared then without a sigh she turned her attention to the room and began the table and setting it in order the soon came her presence was at first a strain	45
upon but afterwards an at half past twelve she left her assistant alone in the kitchen and returning to the sitting room waited for the of angel s form behind the bridge about one he showed himself her face flushed although he was a quarter of a mile she ran to the kitchen to get the dinner served by the time he should enter he went first to the room where they had washed their hands together the day before and as he entered the sitting room the dish covers rose from the dishes as if by his own motion how punctual he said yes i saw you coming over the bridge said she the meal was passed in commonplace talk of what he had been doing during the morning at the abbey mill of the methods of and the old fashioned machinery which he feared would not him greatly on modem improved methods some of it seeming to have been in use ever since the days it ground for the in the adjoining buildings now a heap of ruins he left the house again in the course of an coming home at dusk and occupying himself through the evening with his papers she feared she was in the way and when the old woman was gone retired to the kitchen where she made herself busy as well as she could for more than an hour s shape appeared at the door you must not work like this he said you are not my servant you are my wife she raised her eyes and brightened somewhat i may think myself that indeed she murmured of the d in piteous you mean in name well i don t want to be anything more you may think so you are what do you mean i don t know she said hastily with tears in her accents i thought i because i am not respectable i mean i told you i thought i was not respectable enough long ago and on that account i didn t want to marry you only only you urged me she broke into sobs and turned her back to him it would almost have won round any man but angel within the remote depths of his constitution so gentle and affectionate as he was in general there lay hidden a hard logical deposit like a vein of metal in a soft which turned the edge of everything that attempted to it it had blocked his acceptance of the church it blocked his acceptance of moreover his affection itself was less fire than radiance and with regard to the other sex when he ceased to believe he ceased to follow in this with many natures who remain with what they despise he waited till her sobbing ceased i wish half the women in england were as respectable as you he said in an of bitterness against in general it isn t a question of respectability but one of principle he spoke such things as these and more of a kindred sort to her being still swayed by the wave which direct with such when once their vision finds itself by appearances there was it is true underneath a back of sympathy through which a woman of the world might have conquered him but did not think of this she took everything as her deserts and hardly opened her mouth the firmness of devotion to him was indeed almost pitiful as she naturally was nothing that he could say made her she sought not her own was the woman pays not provoked thought no evil of his treatment of her she might just now have been charity herself returned to a self seeking modem world this evening night and morning were passed precisely as the preceding ones had been passed on one and only one occasion did she the formerly free and independent venture to make any advances it was on the third occasion of his starting after a meal to go out to the flour mill as he was leaving the table he said good bye and she replied in the same words at the same time her mouth in the way of his he did not avail himself of the invitation sa as he turned hastily aside i all be home shrank into herself as if she had been struck often enough had he tried to reach those lips against her consent often had he said gaily that her mouth and breath tasted of the butter and eggs and milk and honey on which she mainly lived that he drew from them and other follies of that sort but he did not care for them now he observed her sudden shrinking and said gently you know i have to think of a course it was imperative that we should stay together a little while to avoid the scandal to you that would have resulted from our immediate parting but you must see it is only for form s sake yes said he went out and on his way to the mill stood still and wished for a moment that he had responded yet more kindly and kissed her once at least thus they lived through this despairing day or two in the same house truly but more widely apart than before they were lovers it was evident to her that he was as he had said living with in his endeavour to think of a plan of she was awe stricken to discover such determination under such apparent his was indeed too cruel she no longer op the d expected forgiveness now more than once she thought of going away from him his absence at the mill but she feared that this instead of him might be the means of and humiliating him yet more if it should become known meanwhile was meditating verily his thought had been	45
might get angry with me for any ordinary matter and knowing what you do of my you yourself might be tempted to say words and they might be overheard perhaps by my own children o what only hurts me now would torture and kill me then i will go to morrow and i shall not stay here though i didn t like to it i have seen that it was advisable we should part at least for a while till i can better see the shape that things have taken and can write to you stole a glance at her husband he was pale even tremulous but as before she was appalled by the determination revealed in the depths of this gentle being she had married the will to subdue the to the emotion the substance to the conception the flesh to the spirit tendencies habits were as dead leaves upon the wind of his imaginative he may have observed her look for he explained i think of people more kindly when i am away from them adding god knows perhaps we shall shake down together some day for weariness thousands have done it that day he began to pack up and she went upstairs and began to pack also both knew that it was of the d in their two minds that they might part the next morning for ever despite tiie of conjectures thrown over their proceeding because were of the sort to whom any parting which has an air of is a torture he knew and she knew that though the fascination which each had exercised over the other on her part of accomplishments probably in the first days of their separation be even more potent than ever time must that effect the practical arguments against accepting her as a might pronounce themselves more strongly in the light of a view moreover when two people are once parted have abandoned a common and a common new bud upward to fill each place accidents hinder intentions and old plans are forgotten midnight came and passed silently for there was nothing to it in the valley of the not long after one o clock there was a slight in the darkened once the mansion of the d who the upper chamber heard it and awoke it had come from the comer step of the staircase which as usual was loosely nailed she saw the door of her bedroom open and the figure of her husband crossed the stream of moonlight with a curiously careful tread he was in his shirt and trousers only and her first flush of joy died when she perceived that his eyes were fixed in an stare on when he reached the middle of the room he stood still and murmured in tones of indescribable sadness dead dead dead under the influence of any strongly disturbing force would occasionally walk in his sleep and even perform strange such as he had done on the night of their from market just before their marriage when he re in his bedroom his combat with the man who had insulted her saw that continued mental distress had wrought him into that state now her loyal confidence in him lay so deep down in her heart that awake or asleep he inspired her with no sort of personal fear if he had entered with a pistol in his hand he would scarcely have disturbed her trust in his came close and bent over her dead dead dead he murmured s of the d after regarding her for some moments with the same gaze of woe he bent lower enclosed her in his arms and rolled her in the sheet as in a then lifting her from the bed with as much respect as one would show to a dead body he carried her across the room my poor poor my dearest darling so sweet so good so true the words of withheld so severely in his waking hours were sweet to her forlorn and hungry heart if it had been to save her weary life she would not by moving or struggling have put an end to the position she found herself in thus she lay in absolute stillness scarcely venturing to breathe and wondering what he was going to do with her suffered herself to be borne out upon the landing my wife dead dead he said he paused in his labours for a moment to lean with her against the was he going to throw her down self solicitude was near in her and in the knowledge that he had planned to depart on the morrow possibly for always she lay in his arms in this precarious position with a sense rather of luxury than of terror if they could only fall together and both be dashed to pieces how fit how desirable however he did not let her fall but took advantage of the support of the to a kiss upon her lips lips in the scorned then he clasped her with a renewed firmness of hold and descended the staircase the of the loose stair did not awaken him and they reached the ground floor safely one of his hands from his grasp of her for a moment he slid back the door bar and passed out slightly striking his toe against the edge of the door but this he seemed not to mind and having room for extension in the open air he lifted her against his shoulder so that he could carry the woman pays her with ease the absence of clothes taking much from his burden thus he bore her off the premises in the direction of the river a few yards distant his ultimate intention if he had any she had not yet divined and she found herself on the matter as a third person might have done so	45
had she delivered her whole being up to him that it pleased her to think he was regarding her as his absolute possession to dispose of as he should choose it was the hovering terror of tomorrow s separation to feel that he really recognized her now as his wife and did not cast her off even if in that recognition he went so far as to to himself the right of her ah now she knew what he was dreaming of that morning when he had borne her along through the water with the other who had loved him nearly as much as she if that were possible which could hardly admit did not cross the bridge with her but proceeding several paces on the same side towards the adjoining mill at length stood still on the brink of the river its waters in creeping down these miles of frequently divided in curves themselves around little islands that had no name returning and re themselves as a broad main stream f on opposite the spot to which he had brought her was such a general and the river was and deep across it was a narrow foot bridge but now the autumn flood had washed the away leaving the bare plank only which lying a few inches above the current formed a giddy pathway for even steady heads and had noticed from the window of the house in the yoimg men walking across upon it as a feat in her husband had possibly observed the same performance anyhow he now mounted the plank and sliding one foot forward advanced along it of the d was he going to drown her probably he was the spot was lonely the river deep and wide enough to make such a purpose easy of accomplishment he might drown her if he would it would be better than parting to morrow to lead severed lives the swift stream and under them tossing and the moon s reflected face spots of travelled past and weeds waved behind the piles if they could both fall together into the current now their arms would be so tightly clasped together that they not be saved they would go out of the world almost and there would be no more reproach to her or to him for marrying her his last half hour with her would have been a loving one while if they lived till he awoke his aversion would return and this hour would remain to be contemplated only as a transient dream the impulse stirred in her yet she dared not indulge it to make a movement that would have them both into the gulf how she valued her own life had been proved but his she had no right to with it he reached the other side with her in safety here they were within a plantation which formed the abbey grounds and taking a new hold of her he went onward a few steps till they reached the ruined choir of the abbey church against the north wall was the empty stone coffin of an in which every with a turn for grim humour was accustomed to stretch himself in this carefully laid having kissed her lips a second time he breathed deeply as if a greatly desired end were attained then lay down on the alongside when he immediately fell into the deep dead slumber of exhaustion and remained motionless as a log the of mental excitement which had produced the effort was now over sat up in the coffin the night though dry and mild for the season was more than sufficiently cold to make it dangerous for him to remain here long the woman pays in his half clothed state if he were left to himself he would in all probability stay there till the morning and be chilled to certain death she had heard of such deaths after sleep walking but how could she dare to awaken him and let him know what he had been doing when it would him to discover his folly in respect of her however stepping out of her stone confine shook him slightly but was to arouse him without being violent it was indispensable to do something for e was beginning to shiver the sheet being but a poor protection her excitement had in a measure kept her warm the few minutes adventure but that interval was over it suddenly occurred to her to try persuasion and accordingly she whispered in his ear with as much firmness and decision as she could summon let us walk on darling at the same time taking him by the arm to her relief he her words had apparently thrown him back into his dream which seemed to enter on a new phase wherein he fancied she had risen as a spirit and was leading him to heaven thus she conducted him by the arm to the stone bridge in front of their residence crossing which they stood at the house door s feet were quite bare and the stones hurt her and chilled her to the bone but was in his stockings and appeared to feel no discomfort there was no further difficulty she induced him to lie down on his own sofa bed and covered him up warmly lighting a temporary fire of wood to dry any out of him the noise of these attentions she thought might awaken him and secretly wished that they might but the exhaustion of his mind and body was such that he remained undisturbed as soon as they met the next morning divined that angel knew little or nothing of how far she had been concerned in the night s excursion though as op the d regarded himself he may have been aware that he had not lain still in truth he had awakened that morning from a sleep deep as and during those first few moments	45
in which the brain like a shaking himself is trying its he had some dim notion of an unusual proceeding but the realities of his situation soon conjecture on the other subject he waited in to discern some mental pointing he knew that if any intention of his concluded over night did not vanish in the light of morning it stood on a basis to one of pure reason even if by impulse of feeling that it was so far therefore to be trusted he thus beheld in the pale morning light the resolve to separate from her not as a hot and indignant instinct but of the which had made it and bum standing in its bones nothing but a skeleton but none the less there no longer hesitated at breakfast and while they were packing the few remaining articles he showed his weariness from the night s effort so that was on the point of revealing all that had happened but the reflection that it would anger him grieve him him to know that he had instinctively manifested a fondness for her of which his common sense did not approve that his inclination had his dignity when reason slept again her it was too much like laughing at a man when sober for his deeds during it just crossed her mind too that he might have a faint recollection of his tender and was to allude to it from a conviction that she would take advantage of the it gave her of appealing to him anew not to go he had ordered by letter a vehicle from the nearest town and soon after breakfast it arrived she saw in it the beginning of the end the temporary end at the woman pays least for the revelation of his tenderness by the incident of the night raised dreams of a possible future with him the luggage was put on the top and the man drove them off the miller and the old expressing some surprise at their departure which attributed to his discovery that the mill work was not of the modem kind which he wished to investigate a statement that was true so far as it went beyond this there was nothing in the manner of their leaving to suggest o or that they were not going together to visit friends their route lay near the from which they had started with such solemn joy in each other a few days back and as wished to wind up his business with mr could hardly avoid paying mrs a call at the same time unless she would excite suspicion of their state to make the call as as possible they left the carriage by the leading down from the high road to the house and descended the track on foot side by side the bed had been cut and they could see over the the spot to which had followed her when he pressed her to be his wife to the left the in which she had been fascinated by his harp and far away behind the the which had been the scene of their first embrace the gold of the summer picture was now grey the mean the rich soil mud and the river cold over the gate the saw them and came forward throwing into his face the kind of deemed appropriate in and its vicinity on the of the newly married then mrs emerged from the house and several others of their old acquaintance though and did not seem to be there bore their sly attacks and friendly which affected her far otherwise than they supposed in the agreement of husband and of the d wife to keep their a secret they behaved as would have been ordinary and then although she would rather there had been no word spoken on the subject had to hear in detail the story of and the latter had gone home to her father s and had left to look for employment elsewhere they feared she would come to no good to the sadness of this recital went and bade all her favourite cows good bye touching each of them with her hand and as she and stood side by side at leaving as if body and soul there would have been something peculiarly sorry in their aspect to one who should have seen it truly two limbs of one life as they outwardly were his arm touching hers her touching him facing one way as against all the facing the other speaking in their as we and yet like the poles perhaps something stiff and embarrassed in their attitude some awkwardness in acting up to their profession of unity different from the shyness of young couples may have been apparent for when they were gone mrs said to her husband how the brightness of her eyes did seem and how they stood like images and talked as if they were in a dream didn t it strike ee that twas so had always strange in her and she s not now quite like the proud young bride of a well be doing man they re entered the vehicle and were driven along the roads towards and lane till they reached the lane inn where dismissed the fly and man they rested here a while and entering the were next driven onward towards her home by a stranger who did not know their relations at a point when had been passed and where there were cross roads stopped the conveyance and said to that if she meant to return to her mother s house it was here that he would leave her as they could not talk with the woman pays freedom in the driver s presence he asked her to accompany him for a few steps on foot along one of the branch roads she assented and directing the man to wait a few minutes they strolled	45
away on business and leaving her over the garden hedge and thus made her way to the house as she went up the garden path she heard her mother singing by the back door coming in sight of which she perceived mrs on the in the act of wringing a sheet having performed this without observing she went indoors and her daughter followed her the washing tub stood in the same old place on the same old quarter and her mother having thrown sheet aside was about to plunge her arms in anew why my i thought you was married married really and truly this time we sent the yes mother so i am going to be no i am married the woman pays married then where s thy husband oh he s gone away for a time gone away when was you married then the day you said yes tuesday mother and now tis on y saturday and he gone away yes he s gone what s the meaning o that nation seize such husbands as you seem to get say i mother went across to laid her face upon the matron s bosom and burst into sobs i don t know how to tell ee mother you said to me and wrote to me that i was not to tell him but i did tell him i couldn t help it and he went away o you little fool you little fool out mrs and herself in her agitation my good god that ever i should ha lived to say it but i say it again you little fool was with weeping the of so many days having relaxed at last i know it i know i know she gasped through her sobs but o my mother i not help it he was so good and i felt the wickedness of trying to blind him as to what had happened if if it were to be done again i should do the i could not i dared not so sin against him but you enough to marry him first yes yes that s where my misery do lie but i thought he could get rid o me by law if he were determined not to overlook it and o if you knew if you could only half know how i loved him how anxious i was to have him and how wrung i was between caring so much for him and my wi to be fair to him was so shaken that she could get no further and sank a helpless thing into a chair well well what s done can t be i m sure i don t know why children o my bringing forth op the d all be bigger than other people s not to know better than to such a thing as that when he t ha found it out till too late here mrs began shedding tears on her own account as a mother to be pitied what your father will say i don t know she continued for he s been talking about the wedding up at s and the pure drop every day since and about his family getting back to their position through you poor silly man and now you ve made this mess of it the lord a lord as if to bring matters to a s father was heard approaching at that moment he did not however enter immediately and mrs said that she would break the bad news to him herself keeping out of sight for the present after her first burst of disappointment began to take the as she had taken s original trouble as she would have taken a wet holiday or failure in the crop as a thing which had come upon them of desert or folly a chance external to be borne with not a lesson retreated upstairs and beheld casually that the beds had been shifted and new arrangements made her old bed had been adapted for two younger children there was no place here for her now the room below being she could hear most of what went on there presently her father entered apparently carrying a live hen he was a foot now having been obliged to sell his second horse and he travelled with his basket on his arm the hen had been carried about this morning as it was often carried to show people that he was in his work though it had lain with its legs tied under the table at s for more than an hour we ve just had up a story about began and thereupon related in detail to his wife a discussion which had arisen at the inn about the clergy originated by the fact of his daughter having the woman pays married into a family they was sir like my own he said though their true style strictly speaking is clerk only as had wished that no great should be given to the event he had mentioned no particulars he hoped she would remove that soon he proposed that the couple should take s own name d as it was better than her husband s he asked if any letter had come from her that day then mrs informed him that no letter had come but unfortunately had come herself when at length the was explained to him a mortification not usual with overpowered the influence of the cheering glass yet the quality of the event moved his less than its effect upon the minds of others to think now that this was to be the end o t said sir john and i with a family vault under that there church of as big as squire s ale cellar and my folk lying there in and as genuine	45
county bones and as any recorded in history and now to be sure what they at s and the pure drop will say to me how they ll and and say this is yer mighty match is it this is yer getting back to the true level of yer forefathers in king s time i feel this is too much i shall put an end to myself title and all i can bear it no longer but she can make him keep her if he s married her why yes but she won t think o doing that d ye think he really have married her or is it like the first poor who had heard as far as this could not bear to hear more the perception that her word could be doubted even here in her own parental house set her mind against the spot as nothing else could of the d have done how unexpected were the attacks of destiny and if her father doubted her a little would not s and doubt her much o she could not long at home a few days accordingly were all that she allowed herself here at the end of which time she received a short note from informing her that he had gone to the north of england to look at a farm in her craving for the lustre of her true position as his wife and to hide from her parents the vast extent of the division between them she made use of this letter as her reason for again departing leaving them under the impression that she was setting out to join him further to screen her husband from any of to her she took twenty five of the fifty pounds had given her and handed the sum over to her mother as if the wife of a man like angel weu afford it saying that it was a slight return for the trouble and humiliation she had brought upon them in years past with this assertion of her dignity she bade them farewell and after that there were lively doings in the household for some time on the strength of s her mother saying and indeed believing that the which had arisen between the young husband and wife had adjusted itself under their strong feeling that they could not live apart from each other it was three weeks after the that found himself descending the hill which led to the well known of his father with his downward course the tower of the church rose into the evening sky in a manner of inquiry as to why he had come and no living person in the town seemed to notice hun still less to expect him he was arriving like a ghost and the sound of his own footsteps was almost an to be got rid of the e of life had changed for him before this time he had known it but now he thought he knew it as a practical man though perhaps he did not even yet nevertheless stood before him no longer in the pensive sweetness of italian art but in the staring and ghastly attitudes of a museum and with the of a study by van his conduct during these first weeks had been beyond description after mechanically attempting to pursue his agricultural plans as though nothing unusual had happened in the manner recommended by the great and wise men of all ages he concluded that very few of those great and wise men had ever gone so far outside themselves as to test the of their counsel this is the chief thing be not said the pagan that was just s own opinion but he was let not your heart be troubled neither let it be afraid said the in cordially but his heart was troubled all the same how he would have liked to those two great of the d and earnestly appeal to them as fellow man to fellow men and ask them to teu him their method his mood itself into a dogged indifference till at length he fancied he was looking on his own existence with the passive interest of an he was by the conviction that all this desolation had been brought about by the accident of her being a d when he found that came of that exhausted ancient line and was not of the new tribes from below as he had fondly dreamed why had he not abandoned her in fidelity to his principles this was what he had got by and his punishment was deserved then he became weary and anxious and his anxiety increased he wondered if he had treated her he ate without knowing that he ate and drank without as the hours dropped past as the motive of act in the long series of days presented itself to his view he perceived how intimately the notion of having as a dear possession was mixed up with all his schemes and words and ways in going hither and thither he observed in the outskirts of a small town a red and blue setting forth the great advantages of the empire of as a field for the land was offered there on advantageous terms somewhat attracted him as a new idea could eventually join him there and perhaps in that country of scenes and notions and habits the would not be so which made life with her seem to him here in brief he was strongly inclined to try especially as the season for going thither was just at hand with this view he was returning to to disclose his plan to his parents and to make the best explanation he could make of arriving without the woman pays short of revealing what had actually separated them as he reached the door the new moon shone upon his face just as the old one had done in the small	45
hours of that morning when he had carried his wife in his arms across the river to the of the but his face was thinner now had given his parents no warning of his visit and his arrival stirred the atmosphere of the as the of the a quiet pool his father and mother were both in the drawing room but neither of his brothers was now at home angel entered and closed the door quietly behind him but where s your wife dear angel cried his mother how you surprise us she is at her mother s temporarily i have come home rather in a because i ve decided to go to why they are all roman there surely are they i hadn t thought of that but even the novelty and of his going to a land not for long mr and mrs s natural interest in their son s marriage we had your brief note three weeks ago announcing that it had taken place said mrs and your father sent your s gift to her as you know of course it was best that none of us should be present especially as you preferred to marry her from the and not at her home wherever that may be it would have embarrassed you and given us no pleasure your brothers felt that very strongly now it is done we do not complain particularly if she suits you for the business you have chosen to follow instead of the of the gospel yet i wish i could have seen her first angel or have known a little more about her we sent her no present of our own not knowing what would best of the d give her pleasure but you must suppose it only delayed angel there is no irritation in my mind or your father s against you for this marriage but we have thought it much better to reserve our liking for your wife till we could see her and now you have not brought her it seems strange what has happened he replied that it had been thought best by them that she should go to her parents home for the present whilst he came there i don t mind telling you dear mother he said that i always meant to keep her away from this house till i should feel she come with credit to you but this idea of is quite a recent one if i do go it will be for me to take her on this my first journey she will remain at her mother s till i come back and i shall not see her before you start he was afraid they would not his original plan had been as he had said to refrain from bringing her there for some little while not to their prejudices feelings in any way and for other reasons he had to it he would have to visit home in the course of a year if he went out at once and it would be possible for them to see her before he started a second time with her a hastily prepared supper was brought in and made further of his plans his mother s disappointment at not seeing the bride still remained with her s late enthusiasm for had her through her maternal sympathies till she had almost fancied that a good thing could come out of a charming woman out of she watched her son as he ate cannot you describe her i am sure she is very pretty angel of that there can be no question he said with a zest which covered its bitterness the woman pays and that she is and virtuous goes without question pure and virtuous of course she is i can see her distinctly you said the other day that she was fine in figure built had deep red lips like s bow dark and brows an immense rope of hair like a ship s cable and large eyes i did mother i quite see her and living in such seclusion she naturally had scarce ever seen any young man from the world without till she saw you scarcely you were her first love of course there are worse wives than these simple robust girls of the farm certainly i could have wished well since my son is to be an it is perhaps but proper that his e should have been accustomed to an life his father was less inquisitive but when the time came for the chapter from the bible which was always read before evening prayers the observed to mrs i think since angel has come that it will be more appropriate to read the thirty first of than the chapter which we should have had in the usual course of our reading yes certainly said mrs the words of king she could chapter and verse as well as her husband my dear son your father has decided to read us the chapter in in praise of a virtuous wife we shall not need to be reminded to apply the words to the absent one may heaven shield her in all her ways a lump rose in s throat the was taken out from the comer and set in the middle of the fireplace the two old servants came in i i of the d and angel s father began to read at the tenth verse of the chapter who can find a woman for her price is far above she while it is yet night and meat to her household she her with strength and her arms she that her is good her candle not out by night she well to the ways of her household and not the bread of idleness her children arise up and call her blessed her husband also and he her many daughters have done but	45
thou them all when prayers were over his mother said i could not help thinking how very that chapter your dear father read applied in some of its particulars to the woman you have chosen the perfect woman you see was a working woman not an not a fine lady but one who her hands and her head and her heart for the good of others her children arise up and call her blessed her husband also and he her many daughters have done but she them all well i wish i have seen her angel since she is pure and she would have been refined enough for me bear this no longer his eyes were of tears which seemed like drops of lead he bade a quick good night to these sincere and simple whom he loved so well who knew neither the world the flesh nor the devil in their own hearts only as something vague and external to themselves he went to his own chamber his mother followed him and tapped at his door opened it to discover her standing without with anxious eyes angel she asked is there something wrong that you go away so soon i am quite sure you are not yourself i am not quite mother said he about her now my son i know it is that i the woman pays know it is about her have you quarrelled in these three weeks we have not exactly quarrelled he said but we have had a angel is she a young woman whose history will bear investigation with a mother s instinct mrs had put her finger on the kind of trouble that would cause such a as seemed to her son she is he replied and felt that if it had sent him to eternal hell there and then he would have told that lie then never mind the rest after all there are few purer things in nature than an country maid any of manner which may offend your more educated sense at first will i am sure disappear under the influence of your companionship and such terrible sarcasm of blind brought home to the secondary perception that he had utterly wrecked his career by this marriage which had not b n among his early thoughts after the disclosure true on his own account he cared very little about his career but he had wished to make it at least a respectable one on account of his parents and brothers and now as he looked into the candle its flame expressed to him that it was made to shine on sensible people and that it lighting the face of a and a failure when his agitation had cooled he would be at moments with his poor wife for causing a situation in which he was obliged to practise deception on his parents he almost talked to her in his anger as if she had been in the room and then her voice plaintive in disturbed the darkness the velvet touch of her lips passed over his brow and he distinguish in the air the warmth of her breath this night the woman of his of the d was thinking how great and good her husband was but over them both there hung a deeper shade than the shade which angel namely the shade of his own with all his attempted independence of judgment this advanced and young man a product of the last twenty years was yet the slave to custom and when surprised back into his early no prophet had told him and he was not prophet enough to tell himself that essentially this young wife of his was as deserving of the praise of king as any other woman endowed with the same dislike of her moral value having to be reckoned not by achievement but by tendency moreover the figure near at hand suffers on such occasions because it up its without shade while vague figures afar off are honoured in that their distance makes artistic virtues of their in considering what was not he overlooked what she was and forgot that the can be more than the entire xl at breakfast was the topic and all endeavoured to take a view of s proposed experiment with that country s soil notwithstanding the reports of some farm who had thither and returned home within the twelve months after breakfast went into the little town to wind up such trifling matters as he was concerned with there and to get om the local bank all the money he possessed on his way back he encountered miss mercy chant by the church om whose walls she seemed to be a sort of she was an of for her and such was her view of life that events which produced in others wrought smiles upon her an although in the opinion of angel it was obtained by a curiously sacrifice of humanity to she had learnt that he was about to leave england and observed what an excellent and promising it seemed to be yes it is a likely scheme enough in a commercial sense no doubt he replied but my dear mercy it the of existence perhaps a would be a o angel well why you wicked man a a and a roman and roman sin and sin thou art in a state angel glory in my she said severely of the d then thrown by sheer misery into one of the moods in which a man does despite to his true principles called her close to him and whispered in her ear the most ideas he think of his momentary laughter at the horror which appeared on her fair face ceased when it in pain and anxiety for his welfare dear mercy he said you must forgive me i think i am going crazy she thought that he was and thus the interview ended and	45
re entered the with the local banker he deposited the jewels till happier days should arise he also paid into the bank thirty pounds to be sent to in a few months as she might require and wrote to her at her parents home in to inform her of what he had done this with the sum he had already placed in her hands about fifty pounds he be amply for her wants just at present as in an emergency she had been directed to apply to his father he deemed it best not to put his parents into communication with her by informing them of her address and being unaware of what had really happened to the two neither his father nor his mother suggested that he should do so during the day he left the for what he had to complete he wished to get done quickly as the last duty before leaving this part of england it was necessary for him to call at the in which he had spent with the first three days of their marriage the trifle of rent having to be paid the key given up of the rooms they had occupied and two or three small articles fetched away that they had left behind it was under this roof that the deepest shadow ever thrown upon his life had stretch its gloom over him yet when he had unlocked the door of the sitting room and looked into it the memory which returned first upon him was that of the woman pays their happy arrival on a similar afternoon the first fresh sense of sharing a habitation the first meal together the by the fire with joined hands the farmer and his wife were in the fields at the moment of his visit and was in the rooms alone for some time inwardly swollen with a renewal of sentiments that he had not quite reckoned with he went upstairs to her chamber which had never been his the bed was smooth as she had made it with her own hands on the morning of leaving the hung under the just as he had placed it having been there three or weeks it was turning colour and the leaves and were wrinkled angel took it down and crushed it into the grate standing there he for the first time doubted whether his course in this e had been a wise much less a generous one but had he not been cruelly blinded in the multitude of his emotions he knelt down at the bedside wet eyed o if you had only told me sooner i would have forgiven you he mourned hearing a footstep below he rose and went to the top of the stairs at the bottom of the flight he saw a woman standing and on her turning up her face recognized the pale dark eyed mr she said i ve called to see you and mrs and to inquire if ye be well i thought you might be back here again this was a girl whose secret he had guessed but who had not yet guessed his an honest girl who loved him one who would have made as good or nearly as good a practical farmer s wife as i am here alone he said we are not living here now explaining why he had come he asked which way are you going home i have no home at now sir she said why is that op the d looked down it was so dismal there that i left i am staying out this way she pointed in a contrary direction the direction in whidi he was well are you going there now i can take you if you wish for a lift her olive complexion grew richer in hue thank ee mr she said he soon found the farmer and settled the for his rent and the few other which had to be considered by reason of the sudden of the lodgings on s return to his horse and jumped up beside him i am going to leave england he said as they drove on going to and do mrs like the notion of such a journey she asked she is not going at present say for a year or so i am going out to to see what life there is like they sped along eastward for some considerable distance making no observation how are the others he how is she was in a sort of nervous state when i her last and so thin and hollow that a do seem in a decline nobody will ever fall in love wi her any more said and lowered her voice drinks indeed yes the has got rid of her and you i don t drink and i t in a decline but i am no great things at singing afore breakfast now how is that do you remember how neatly you used to turn twas down in s gardens and the tailor s breeches at morning the woman pays ah yes when you first came sir that was not when you had been there a bit why was that off her black eyes flashed up to his face for one moment by way of answer how weak of you for such as i he said and into reverie then suppose i had asked you to many me if you had i should have said yes and you would have married a woman who loved ee really down to the she whispered vehemently o my god did you never guess it till now by and by they reached a branch road to a village i must get down i live out there said abruptly never having spoken since her the horse he was against his fate bitterly disposed towards social for they had him up in a	45
comer out of which there was no legitimate pathway why not be on society by his future loosely instead of kissing the rod of in this manner i am going to alone said he i have separated from my wife for personal not reasons i may never live with her again i may not be able to love you but wiu you go with me instead of her you truly wish me to go i do i have been badly used enough to wish for relief and you at least love me yes i will go said after a pause you will you know what it means it means that i shall live with you for the time you are over there that s good enough for me remember you are not to trust me in morals now but i ought to remind you that it will be wrong doing in the eyes of civilization western civilization that is to say op the d i don t mind that no woman do when it to agony point and there s no other way then don t get down but sit where you are he drove past the cross roads one m e two miles without showing any signs of affection you love me very very much he suddenly asked i do i have said i do i loved you all the time we was at the together more than she shook her head no she not more than she how s that because nobody could love ee more than did she would have laid down her life for ee i could do no more like the prophet on the top of would fain have spoken at such a moment but the fascination exercised over her nature by s character compelled her to grace was silent his heart had risen at these straightforward words from such an quarter in his throat was something as if a sob had there his ears repeated she would have laid down life for ee i do no forget our idle talk he said turning the horse s head suddenly i don t know what i ve been saying i will now drive you back to where your lane branches off so much for honesty towards ee o how can i bear it how can i how can i burst into wild tears and beat her forehead as she saw what she had done do you regret that poor little act of justice to an absent one o don t spoil it by regret she herself by degrees very well sir perhaps i didn t know what i was the woman pays saying either wh when i agreed to go i what cannot be because i have a loving wife yes yes you have they reached the comer of the lane which they had passed half an earlier and she down please please forget my momentary levity he cried it was so ill considered so ill advised forget it never never o it was no levity to me he felt how richly he deserved the reproach that the wounded cry conveyed and in a sorrow that was down and took her hand well but we ll part friends anyhow you don t know what i ve had to bear she was a really generous girl and allowed no bitterness to mar their i forgive ee sir she said now he said while she stood beside him there forcing himself to the s part he was far from feeling i want you to tell when you see her that she is to be a good woman and not to give way to folly promise that and tell that there are more worthy men than i in the world that for my sake she is to act wisely and well remember the words wisely and well for my sake i send this message to them as a dying man to the dying for i shall never see them again and you you have saved me by your honest words about my wife from an incredible impulse towards folly and treachery women may be bad but they are not so bad as men in these things on that one account i can never forget you be always the good and sincere girl you have hitherto been and think of me as a worthless lover but a faithful friend promise she gave the promise heaven bless and keep you sir good bye he drove on but no sooner had turned into the lane and was out of sight than she flung of the d herself down on the bank in a fit of anguish and it was with a strained face that she entered her mother s cottage late that night nobody ever was told how spent the dark hours that between angel s parting from her and her arrival home too after bidding the girl farewell was wrought to aching thoughts and quivering lips but his sorrow was not for that evening he was within a feather weight s turn of his road to the nearest station and driving across that elevated line of south which divided him from his s home it was neither a contempt for her nature nor the probable state of her heart which him no it was a sense that despite her love as by s admission the facts had not changed if he was right at first he was right now and the of the course on which he had embarked tended to keep him going in it unless diverted by a stronger more sustained force than had played upon him this afternoon he could soon come bade to her he took the train that night for london and five days after shook hands in farewell of his brothers at the port of i from the foregoing events of the	45
winter time let us press on to an october day more than eight months subsequent to the parting of and we discover the latter in changed conditions instead of a bride with boxes and trunks which others bore we see her a lonely woman with a basket and a bundle in her own as at an earlier time when she was no bride instead of the ample means that were projected by her husband for her comfort through this period she can produce only a se after again leaving her home she had got through the spring and summer without any great stress upon her physical powers the time being mainly spent in rendering light irregular service at work near port to the west of the valley equally remote from her native place and from she preferred this to living on his allowance mentally she remained in utter a condition which the mechanical occupation rather than checked her consciousness was at that other at that other season in the presence of the tender lover who had confronted her there he who the moment she had grasped him to keep for her own had disappeared like a shape in a vision the work lasted only till the milk began to lessen for she had not met with a second regular engagement as at but had done duty as a only however as harvest was now beginning she had simply to remove from the to the to find plenty of further occupation and this continued till harvest was done op the d of the five and twenty pounds which had remained to her of s allowance after the other half of the fifty as a contribution to her parents for the trouble and expense to which she had put them she had as yet spent but little but there now followed an interval of wet weather during which she was obliged to fall back upon her sovereigns she could not bear to let them go angel had put them into her hand had obtained them bright and new from his bank for her his touch had consecrated them to of himself they appeared to have had as yet no other history than such as was created by his and her own experiences and to them was like giving away relics but she had to do it and one by one they left her hands she had been compelled to send her mother her address from time to time but she concealed her circumstances when her money had almost gone a letter from her mother reached her stated that they were in dreadful difficulty the autumn rains had gone through the of the house which required entire renewal but this could not be done because the previous had never been paid for new and a new ceiling upstairs also were required which with the previous bill would to a sum of twenty pounds as her husband was a man of means and had doubtless returned by this time she not send them the money had thirty coming to her almost immediately from angel s and the case being so deplorable as soon as the sum was received she sent the twenty as requested part of the remainder she was obliged to in winter clothing leaving only a sum for the whole season at hand when the last had gone a remark of angel s that whenever she required resources she was to apply to his father remained to be considered the woman pays but the more thought of the step the more reluctant was she to take it the same delicacy pride false shame whatever it may be called on s which had led her to hide from her own parents the of the her in to his that she was in want after the fair allowance he had left her they probably despised her already how much more they would despise her in the character of a the consequence was that by no effort could the parson s daughter in law bring herself to let him her state her reluctance to communicate with her husband s parents might she thought lessen with the lapse of time but with her own the reverse obtained on her leaving their house after the short visit subsequent to her marriage they were under the impression that she was ultimately going to join her husband and from that time to the present she had done nothing to their belief that she was awaiting his return in comfort hoping against hope that his journey to would result in a short stay only after whidi he come to fetch her or that he would write for her to join him in any case that they would soon present a united front to their families and the world this hope she still to let her parents know that she was a deserted wife dependent now that she had relieved their necessities on her own hands for a living after the of a marriage which was to the of the first attempt would be too much indeed the set of returned to her mind where had deposited them she did not know and it mattered little if it were true that she only use and not sell them even were they absolutely hers it would be passing mean to herself by a legal title to them which was not essentially hers at all meanwhile her husband s days had been by no means free from trial at this moment he was lying op the d ill of fever in the clay lands near in having been with thunder storms and by other hardships in common with all the farmers and farm who just at this time were into going thither by the promises of the government and by the assumption that those frames which and on english had resisted all the to whose moods they had been bom	45
could resist equally well all the by which they were surprised on plains to return thus it happened that when the last of s sovereigns had been spent she was with others to take their place while on of the season she f it difficult to get employment not being aware of the i of intelligence energy health and in any sphere of life she refrained from seeking an occupation fearing towns large houses people of means and social and of manners other than rural from that direction of black care had come society might be better than she supposed from her slight experience of it but she had no proof of this and her instinct in the circumstances was to avoid its the small to the west beyond port in which she had served as during the spring and summer required no further aid room would probably have been made for her at i only out of sheer compassion but comfortable as her life had been there she could not go back the anti climax would be too intolerable and her might bring reproach upon her husband she could not have borne their pity and their whispered remarks to one another upon her strange situation though she would almost have faced a knowledge of her circumstances by every individual there so long as her story had remained isolated in the mind of each it was the of ideas so the woman pays about her that made her could not account for this distinction she simply knew that she felt it she was now on her way to an farm in the centre of the county to which she had been recommended by a wandering letter which had reached her from had somehow heard that was separated from her husband probably through and the good natured and now girl in trouble had hastened to to her former friend that she herself had gone to this spot after leaving the and would like to see her there where there was room for other hands if it was really true that she worked again as of old with the of the days all hope of obtaining her husband s forgiveness began to leave her and there was something of the of the wild animal in the instinct with which she on herself by from her past at every step her identity giving no thought to accidents or whidi might make a quick discovery of her whereabouts by others of importance to her own happiness if not to theirs among the difficulties of her position not the least was the attention she excited by her appearance a certain bearing of distinction which she had caught from being to her natural whilst the clothes lasted which had been prepared for her marriage these casual glances of interest caused her no inconvenience but as soon as she was compelled to don the of a field woman rude words were addressed to her more than once but nothing occurred to cause her bodily fear till a particular november afternoon she had preferred the country west of the river to the farm for which she was now bound because for one thing it was nearer to the home of her husband s father and to about that region op the d with the notion that she might decide to call at the some day gave her pleasure but having once decided to try the higher and she pressed back eastward marching towards the village of chalk where she meant to pass the night the lane was long and and owing to the rapid of the days dusk came upon her before she was aware she had reached the top of a hill down which the lane stretched its length in glimpses when she heard footsteps behind her back and in a few moments she was overtaken by a man he stepped up alongside and said night my pretty maid to which she the light still remaining in the sky lit up her face though the landscape was nearly dark the man and stared hard at her why it is the young who was at awhile young squire d s friend i was there at that time though i don t live there now she recognized in him the well to do whom angel had knocked down at the inn for addressing her a of anguish shot through her and she returned him no answer be honest enough to own it and that what i said in the town was true though fancy man was so up about it hey my sly one you ought to beg my pardon for that blow of his considering still no answer came from there seemed only one escape for her hunted soul she suddenly took to her heels with the speed of the wind and without looking behind her ran along the road till she came to a gate which opened directly into a plantation into this e and did not pause till she was deep enough in its shade to be safe against any possibility of discovery sa the woman pays under foot the leaves were dry and the foliage of some bushes which grew among the trees was dense enough to keep off draughts she scraped together the dead leaves till she had formed them into a large heap making a sort of nest in the middle into this crept such sleep as she got was fitful she fancied she heard strange noises but persuaded herself that they were caused by the breeze she thought of her husband in some vague warm on the other side of the globe while she was here in the cold was there another such a wretched being as she in the world asked herself and thinking of her wasted life said all is vanity she repeated the words mechanically till she reflected that this was a most	45
inadequate thought for modem days solomon had thought as far as that more than two thousand years ago she herself though not in the van of had got further if all were only vanity who would mind it all was alas worse than vanity injustice death the wife of angel put her hand to her brow and felt its curve and the edges of her eye perceptible under the soft and thought as she did so that a time would come when that bone would be bare i wish it were now she said in the midst of these fancies she heard a new strange sound among the leaves it might be the wind yet there was scarcely any wind sometimes it was a sometimes a flutter sometimes it was a sort of gasp or soon e was certain that the noises came from wild creatures of some kind the more so when in the boughs overhead they were followed by the fall of a heavy body upon the ground had she been here under other and more pleasant conditions she would have become alarmed but outside humanity she had at present no fear day at length broke in the sky when it had op the d been day aloft for some little while it became day in the wood directly the assuring and light of the world s active hours had grown strong she crept from under her of leaves and looked around boldly then she perceived what had been going on to disturb her the plantation wherein she had taken shelter ran down at this spot into a peak which ended it outside the hedge being ground under the trees several lay about their rich with blood some were dead some feebly a wing some staring up at the sky some quickly some some stretched all of them in agony except the ones whose had ended during the night by the inability of to bear more guessed at once the meaning of this the birds had been driven down into this comer the day before by some shooting party and while those that had dropped dead under the shot or had died before nightfall had been searched for and carried off many badly birds had escaped and hidden away or risen among tiie thick boughs where they had maintained their position till they grew weaker with loss of blood in the when they had fallen one by one as she had heard them she had occasionally caught glimpses of these men in looking over hedges or peering through bushes and pointing their guns strangely a light in their eyes she had been told that rough and brutal as they seemed just then they were not like this all the year but were in fact quite civil persons save during certain weeks of autumn and winter when like the inhabitants of the they ran and made it their purpose to destroy life in this case creatures brought into being by artificial means solely to gratify these at once the woman pays so and so towards their weaker fellows in nature s family with the impulse of a soul who could feel for kindred as much as for herself s first thought was to put the still living birds out of their torture and to this end with her own hands she broke the necks of as many as she could find leaving them to lie where she had f them till the should come as they probably would come to look for them a second time poor to suppose myself the most miserable being on earth in the sight o such misery as yours she exclaimed her tears running down as she killed the birds tenderly and not a of bodily pain about me i be not and i be not bleeding and i have two hands to feed and clothe me she was ashamed of herself for her gloom of the night based on nothing more than a sense of condemnation imder an arbitrary law of society which had no foundation in nature it was now broad day and she started again emerging cautiously upon the highway but there was no need for caution not a soul was at hand and went onward with fortitude her recollection of the birds silent endurance of their night of agony upon her the of sorrows and the tolerable nature of her own if she could once rise high enough to despise opinion but that she could not do so long as it was held by she reached chalk and at an inn where several young men were complimentary to her good looks somehow she felt hopeful for was it not possible that her husband also might say these same things to her even yet she was bound to take care of herself on the chance of it and keep off these casual lovers to this end resolved to run no further risks from her appearance as soon as she got out of the village she entered a thicket and took from her basket one of the oldest field gowns which she had never put on even at the never since she had worked among the at she also by a thought took a handkerchief from her and tied it round her face under her bonnet covering her chin and half her cheeks and temples as if she were suffering from then with her little by the aid of a pocket looking glass she her eyebrows off and thus against admiration she went on her way what a of a maid said the next man who met her to a companion s the woman pays tears came into her eyes for very pity of herself as she heard him but i don t care she said o no i don t care i ll always be ugly now because angel is not here and	45
lead my present life paused but you be a gentleman s wife and it seems hardly fair that you live like this o yes it is quite fair though i am very well well he married you and you can be unhappy wives are unhappy sometimes from no fault of their husbands from their own you ve no faults that i m sure of and he s none so it must be something outside ye both dear will you do me a good turn without asking questions my husband has gone abroad and i have my allowance so that i have to fall back upon my old work for a time do not call me mrs but as before do they want a hand here o yes they ll take one always because few care to come tis a starve acre place com and are all they grow though i be here i feel tis a pity for such as you to come the woman pays but you used to be as good a as yes but i ve got out o that since i took to drink lord that s the only comfort i ve got now if you engage you ll be set that s what i be doing but you won t like it anything will you speak for me you will do better by speaking for yourself very well now remember nothing about him if i get the place i don t wish to bring his name down to the dirt who was really a girl though of grain than promised anything die asked this is pay night she said and if you were to come with me you would know at once i be real sorry that you are not happy but tis because he s away i know you couldn t be unhappy if he were here even if he d ye no money even if he used you like a that s true i could not they walked on together and soon reached the which was almost sublime in its there was not a tree within sight there was not at this season a green pasture nothing but and everywhere in large fields divided by hedges to waited outside the door of the till the group of work folk had received their wages and then introduced her the farmer himself it appeared was not at home but his wife who represented him this evening made no objection to on her agreeing to remain till old lady day female field labour was seldom offered now and its made it profitable for tasks which women could perform as readily as men having signed the agreement there was nothing more for to do at present than to get a lodging and she found one in the house at whose wall she had warmed herself it was a poor of the d that she had but it afford a shelter for the winter at any rate that night she wrote to inform her parents of her new address in case a letter should arrive at from her husband but she did not tell them of the of her situation it might have brought reproach upon him there was no exaggeration in s definition of ash farm as a starve acre place the single fat thing on the soil was herself and she was an of the three classes of village the village cared for by its lord the village cared for by itself and the village for either by itself or by its lord in other words the village of a resident squire s the village of free or copy and the owner s village with the land this place ash was the third but set to work patience that of moral courage with physical timidity was now no longer a minor feature in mrs and it sustained her the field in which she and her companion were set was a stretch of a odd acres in one patch on the highest ground of the farm rising above stony or the of veins in the chalk formation composed of of loose white in and shapes the upper half of had been eaten off by the live stock and it was the business of the two women to up the lower or half of the root with a fork called a that it might be eaten also every leaf of the vegetable having already been consumed the whole field was in colour a desolate it was a complexion without features as if a face from chin to brow should be only an expanse of skin the sky wore in another colour the same likeness a white of countenance with the gone so these two upper and op the d confronted each other all day long the white face looking down on the brown face and the brown face looking up at the white face without anything standing between them but the two girls crawling over the surface of the former like flies nobody came near them and their movements showed a mechanical regularity their forms standing in brown tied behind to the bottom to keep their gowns from blowing about scant revealing boots that reached high up the ankles and yellow gloves with the pensive character the hood lent to their bent heads would have reminded the observer of some early italian conception of the two they worked on hour after hour of the forlorn aspect they bore in the landscape not thinking of the justice or injustice of their lot even in such a position as theirs it was possible to exist in a dream in the afternoon the rain came on again and said that they need not work any more but if they did not work they would not be paid so they worked on it was so high a situation this field that	45
the rain had no occasion to fall but along upon the yelling wind sticking into them like glass till they were wet through had not known till now what was really meant by that there are d of and a very little is called being wet through in common talk but to stand working slowly in a field and feel the creep of rain water first on legs and shoulders then on and head then at bade front and sides and yet to work on till the leaden light and that the is down demands a distinct of even of yet they did not feel the so much as might be supposed they were both young and they were talking of the time when they lived and loved together at that happy green the woman pays tract of land where summer had been in hei gifts in substance to all to these would fain not have conversed with of the man who was if not actually her husband but the irresistible fascination of the subject her into s remarks and thus as has been said though the damp curtains of their into their faces and their about them to they lived all this afternoon in memories of green sunny romantic you can see a gleam of a hill within a few miles o valley from here when tis fine said ah can you said awake to the new value of this locality so the two forces were at work here as everywhere the inherent wiu to enjoy and the will against enjoyment s will had a method of assisting itself by taking from her pocket as the afternoon wore on a pint bottle with white rag from which she invited to drink s power of dreaming however being enough for her at present she declined except the merest and then took a pull from the spirits i ve got used to it she said and can t leave it off now tis my only comfort you see i lost him you didn t and you can do without it perhaps thought her loss as great as s but by the dignity of being angel s wife in the letter at least she accepted s amid this scene in the morning and in the afternoon rains when it was not it was in which process they off the earth and the with a before the roots for future use at this occupation they could shelter themselves by a if it rained but if it was frosty even their thick leather gloves could not prevent the fro en s op the d masses handled from biting fingers still hoped she had a conviction that sooner or later the which she persisted in reckoning as a chief of s character him to her to a humorous mood would discover the queer shaped and shriek with laughter remaining severely they often looked across the country to where the or was known to stretch even though they might not be able to see it and fixing their eyes on the gray mist imagined the old times they had spent out there ah said how i should like another or two of our old set to come here then we could bring up every day here and talk of he and of what nice times we had there and o the old things we used to know and make it all come back again a most in seeming s eyes softened and her voice grew vague as the visions returned i ll write to she said she s at home doing nothing now i know and i ll tell her we be here and ask her to come and perhaps is well enough now had nothing to say against the proposal and the next she heard of this plan for old joys was two or three days later when informed her that had replied to her inquiry and had promised to come if she could there had not been such a winter for years it came on in stealthy and measured like the moves of a player one morning the few lonely trees and the thorns of the appeared as if they had put off a vegetable for an animal every was covered with a white nap as of fur grown from the the night giving it four times its usual the whole bush or tree forming a staring sketch in white lines on the mournful grey of the sky and horizon revealed the woman pays their presence on sheds and walls where none had ever been observed till brought out into by the here hanging like of white from points of the posts and gates after this season of came a spell of dry frost when strange birds from behind the north pole began to arrive on the of ash gaunt creatures with eyes eyes which had witnessed scenes of horror in inaccessible regions of a magnitude such as no human being had ever conceived in that no man could endure which had the crash of and the slide of by the shooting light of the been half blinded by the whirl of colossal storms and and retained the expression of feature that such scenes had these nameless birds came quite near to and but of all they had seen which would never see they brought no account the traveller s ambition to teu was not theirs and with dumb they dismissed experiences which they did not value for the immediate incidents of this homely the trivial movements of the two girls in disturbing the with their so as to something or other that these as food then one day a peculiar invaded the air of this open country there came a moisture which was not of rain and a cold which was not of frost it chilled the of the twain made their brows ache penetrated to their affecting the surface of	45
the body less than its core they knew that it meant snow and in the night the snow came who continued to live at the cottage with the warm that cheered any lonely who paused beside it awoke in the night and heard above the noises which seemed to signify that the roof had turned itself into a of all the of the d winds when she lit her lamp to get up in the morning she found that the snow had blown through a in the forming a white of the finest powder against the inside and had also come down the chimney so that it lay sole deep upon the floor on which her shoes left tracks when she moved about without the storm drove so fast as to create a snow mist in the kitchen but as yet it was too dark out of doors to see anything knew that it was impossible to go on with the and by the time she had breakfast beside the solitary little lamp arrived to tell her that they were to join the rest of the women at reed drawing in the bam till the weather changed as soon therefore as the uniform cloak of darkness without began to turn to a disordered of they blew out the lamp wrapped themselves up in their tied their round their necks and across their and started for the bam the snow had followed the birds from the basin as a white pillar of a and individual could not be seen the blast smelt of seas and white bears the snow so that it licked the land but did not on it they with bodies through the fields keeping as well as they could in the shelter of hedges which however acted as rather than the air afflicted to with the multitudes that it twisted and spun them suggesting an chaos of things but both the young women were fairly cheerful such weather on a dry is not in itself ha ha the cunning northern birds knew this was coming said depend upon t they keep just in front o t all the way from the north star your husband my dear is i make no doubt having weather all this time lord if he could only see his pretty wife now not that this the woman pays weather hurts your beauty at all in fact it rather does it good you mustn t talk about him to me said severely well but surely you care for n do you instead of answering with tears in her eyes faced in the direction in which she imagined south america to lie and putting up her lips blew out a passionate kiss upon the snowy wind well well i know you do but my body it is a rum life for a married couple there i won t say another word well as for the weather it won t hurt us in the wheat bam but reed drawing is fearful hard work worse than i can stand it because i m stout but you be than i i can t think why should have set ee at it they reached the wheat bam and entered it one end of the long structure was full of com the middle was where the reed drawing was carried on and there had already been placed in the reed press the evening before as many of wheat as would be sufficient for the women to draw from during the day why here s said it was and she came forward she had walked all the way from her mother s home on the previous afternoon and not the distance so great had been arriving however just before the snow b an and sleeping at the ale house the farmer had agreed with her mother at market to take her on if she came to day and she had been afraid to disappoint him by delay in addition to and there were two women from a neighbouring village two sisters whom with a start remembered as dark car the queen of and her the queen of diamonds those who had tried to fight with her in the midnight quarrel at they showed no recognition of her and possibly had none for they had been under the influence of liquor on that of the d occasion and were only temporary there as here they did all kinds of men s work by preference including well sinking and without any sense of fatigue not reed drawers were they too and looked round upon the other three with some putting on their gloves all set to work in a row in front of the press an formed of two posts connected by a cross beam which the to be drawn from were laid ears outward the beam h g down by pins in the and lowered as the diminished the day hardened in colour the light coming in at the barn doors upwards from the snow instead of downwards from the sky the girls pulled handful after handful from the press but by reason of the presence of the strange women who were and not at first talk of old times as they wished to do presently they heard the muffled tread of a horse and the farmer rode up to the bam door when he had he came close to and remained looking at the side of her face she had not turned at first but his fixed attitude led her to look when she perceived that her employer was the native of from whom she had taken flight on the of his allusion to her history he waited till she had carried the drawn to the piles outside when he said so you be the woman who took my civility in such ill part be drowned if i didn t think you might be as soon	45
as i heard of your being hired weu you thought you had got the better of me the first time at the inn with your fancy man and the second time on the road when you bolted but now i think i ve got the better of you he concluded with a hard laugh between the and the farmer like a bird caught in a clap net returned no answer continuing to pull the straw she could read character o the woman pays sufficiently well to know by this time that she had nothing to fear from her employer s gallantry it was rather the induced by his mortification at s treatment of him upon the whole she preferred that sentiment in man and felt brave enough to endure it you thought i was in love with ee i suppose some women are such fools to take every look as serious earnest but there s nothing like a winter for taking that nonsense out o young heads and you ve signed and agreed till lady day now are you going to beg my pardon i think you ought to beg mine very well as you like but we ll see which is master here be they all the you ve done to day yes sir tis a very poor show just see what they ve done over there pointing to the two women the rest too have done better than you they ve all practised it before and i have not and i thought it made no difference to you as it is task work and we are only paid for what we do oh but it does i want the bam cleared i am going to work all the afternoon instead of leaving at two as the others will do he looked sullenly at her and went away felt that she not have come to a much worse place but anything was better than gallantry when two o clock arrived the professional reed drawers tossed off the last half pint in their put down their hooks tied their last and went away and would have done likewise but on hearing that meant to stay to make up by longer hours for her lack of skill they would not leave her looking out at the snow which still fell exclaimed now we ve got it all to ourselves and so at last tiie conversation turned to op the d their old experiences at the and of course the incidents of their affection for angel and said mrs angel with a dignity which was extremely seeing how very uttle of a wife she was i can t join in talk with you now as i used to do about mr you will see that i because although he is gone away from me for the present he is my husband was by nature the and most of all the four girls who had loved he was a very splendid lover no doubt she said but i don t think he is a too fond husband to go away from you so soon he had to go he was obliged to go to see about the land over there pleaded he might have ee over the winter ah that s owing to an accident a misunderstanding and we won t argue it answered with in her words perhaps there s a good deal to be said for him he did not go away hke some husbands without telling me and i can always find out where he is after this they continued for some long time in a reverie as they went on seizing the ears of com drawing out the straw gathering it under their arms and cutting off the ears with their bill hooks nothing sounding in the bam but the of the straw and the of the hook then suddenly and sank down upon the heap of wheat ears at her feet i knew you wouldn t be able to stand it cried it wants harder flesh than yours for this work just then the farmer entered oh that s how you get on when i am away he said to her but it is my own loss she pleaded not i want it finished he said as he crossed the bam and went out at the other door don t ee mind him there s a dear said the woman pays i ve worked here before now you go and lie down there and and i will make up your number i don t like to let you do that i m taller than you too however she was so overcome that she consented to lie down awhile and on a heap of the refuse after the straight straw had been drawn thrown up at the further side of the bam her had been as largely owing to agitation at the subject of her separation from her husband as to the hard work she lay in a state of without and the rustle of the straw and the cutting of the ears by the others had the weight of bodily touches she could hear from her comer in addition to these noises the murmur of their voices she felt certain that they were the subject already but their voices were so low that she could not catch the words at last grew more and more anxious to know what they were saying and persuading herself that she felt better she got up and resumed work then broke down she had walked more than a dozen miles the previous evening had gone to bed at midnight and had risen again at five o clock alone thanks to her bottle of liquor and her of build stood the strain upon back and arms without suffering urged to leave off agreeing as she felt better to finish the day without her and make equal division	45
of the number of accepted the offer gratefully and disappeared through the great door into the snowy track to her lodging as was the case every afternoon at this time on of the bottle began to fed in a romantic vein i should not have thought it of him never she said in a dreamy tone and i loved him so of the d i didn t mind his having you but this about is too bad in her start at the words narrowly missed cutting a finger with the bill hook is it about my husband she stammered well yes said don t ee tell her but i am sure i can t help it it was what he wanted to do he wanted her to go to with him s face faded as white as the scene without and its curves straightened and did refuse to go she asked i don t know anyhow he changed his mind then he didn t mean it twas just a man s jest yes he did for he drove her a good ways towards the station he didn t take her they pulled on in silence till without any symptoms burst out there said now i wish i hadn t told ee no it is a very good thing that you have done i have been living on in a way and have not seen what it may lead to i ought to have sent him a letter oftener he said i could not go to him but he didn t say i was not to write as often as i liked i won t like this any longer i have been very wrong and n in leaving ever to be done by him the dim light in the bam grew and they could see to work no longer when had reached home that evening and had entered into the privacy of her uttle white washed chamber she began writing a letter to but into doubt she could not finish it afterwards she took the ring from the ribbon on which she wore it next her heart and retained it on her finger all night as if to herself in the sensation that she was really the the woman pays wife of this lover of hers who could propose that should go with him abroad so shortly after he had left her knowing that how could she write entreaties to him or show tiiat she cared for him any more by the disclosure in the bam her thoughts were led anew in the direction which they had taken more than once of late to the distant it was through her husband s parents that she had been charged to send a letter to if she desired and to write to them direct if in difficulty but that sense of her having morally no claim upon him had always led to her impulse to send these notes and to the family at the therefore as to her own parents since her marriage she was non this self in both directions had been quite in with her independent character of desiring nothing by way of favour or pity to which she was not entitled on a fair consideration of her deserts she had set herself to stand or fall by her qualities and to such merely claims upon a strange family as had been established for her by the fact of a member of that family in a season of writing his name in a beside hers but now that she was stung to a fever by s tale there was a limit to her powers of why had her husband not written to her he had distinctly implied that he would at least let her know of the locality to which he had but he had not sent a to his address was he really indifferent but was he ill was it for her to make some advance surely she might summon the courage of solicitude call at the for intelligence and express her grief at his silence if angel s father were the good man she had heard him represented to the woman pays be he would be able to enter into her heart starved situation her social hardships she could conceal to leave the farm on a week day was not in her power sunday was the only possible opportunity ash being in the middle of the table land over whidi no railway had climbed as yet it would be necessary to walk and the distance being fifteen miles each way she would have to allow a long day for the undertaking by rising early a fortnight later when the snow had gone and had been followed by a hard black frost she took advantage of the state of the roads to try the experiment at four o clock that sunday morning she came downstairs and stepped out into the the weather was still favourable the ground ringing under her feet uke an and were much interested in her excursion knowing that the journey concerned her husband their lodgings were in a cottage a little further along the lane but they came and assisted in her departure and argued that she should dress up in her very prettiest guise to the hearts of her parents in law though she knowing of the austere and of old mr was indifferent and even doubtful a year had now elapsed since her sad marriage but she had preserved sufficient from the wreck of her then full wardrobe to clothe her very as a simple country girl with no pretensions to recent fashion a soft gray gown with white against the pink skin of her face and neck and a black velvet jacket and hat tis a thousand your husband can t see ee now you do look a real beauty said regarding as she stood on the threshold between	45
the without and the yellow within spoke with a of herself to the situation she could not be no woman with a heart bigger than a nut could be op the d to in her presence the influence which she exercised over those of her own sex being of a warmth and strength unusual curiously overpowering the less worthy feminine feelings of spite and with a final and touch here and a slight brush there they let her go and she was absorbed into the air of the fore dawn they heard her footsteps tap along the hard road as she stepped out to her full pace even hoped she would win and though without any particular respect for her own virtue felt glad that she had been prevented her friend when tempted by it was a year ago all but a day that had married and only a few days less than a year that he had been absent from her still to start on a brisk walk and on such an errand as hers on a dry dear wintry morning through the air of these backs was not and there is no doubt that her dream at starting was to win the heart of her mother in law tell her whole history to that lady her on her side and so gain back the in time she reached the edge of the vast below which stretched the of now misty and still in the dawn instead of the air of the the atmosphere down there was a deep blue instead of the great of a hundred acres in which she was now accustomed to toil there were little fields below her of less than half a dozen acres so numerous that they looked from this height like the of a net here the landscape was brown down there as in valley it was always green yet it was in that that her sorrow had taken shape and she did not love it as formerly beauty to her as to all who have felt lay not in the thing but in what the thing keeping the on her right she steadily the woman pays westward passing above the crossing at right angles the high road from to and and high with the between them called the de s kitchen still following the elevated way she reached cross in hand where the stone pillar stands desolate and silent to mark the site of a miracle or murder or both three miles further she cut across the straight and deserted roman road called long ash leaving which as soon as she reached it she down a hill by a lane into the small town or village of being now about half way over the distance she made a halt here and a second time heartily enough not at the sow and for she avoided but at a cottage by the church the second half of her journey was through a more gentle country by way of ben lane but as the lessened between her and the spot of her pilgrimage so did s confidence and her enterprise loom out more she saw her purpose in such staring lines and the landscape so faintly that she was sometimes in danger of losing her way however about noon she paused by a gate on the edge of the basin in which and its lay the square tower beneath which she knew that at that moment the and his congregation were gathered had a severe look in her eyes she wished that she had somehow contrived to come on a such a good man might be prejudiced against a woman who had chosen sunday never the necessities of her case but it was incumbent upon her to go on now she took off the thick boots in which she had walked thus far put on her pretty thin ones of patent leather and the former into the hedge by the gate post where she might readily find them again descended the hill the freshness of colour she had from the keen air of the d away in spite of her as she drew near the hoped for some accident that might favour her but nothing favoured her the shrubs on the lawn in the frosty breeze she could not feel by any stretch of imagination dressed to her highest as she was that the house was the residence of near relations and yet nothing essential in nature or emotion divided her from them in pains pleasures thoughts birth death and they were the same she herself by an effort entered the and rang the door bell the thing was done there could be no retreat no the was not done nobody answered to her ringing the effort had to be risen to and made again she rang a second time and the agitation of the act coupled with her weariness after the fifteen miles walk led her to support herself while she waited by resting her hand on her hip and her elbow against the wall of the porch the wind was so that the ivy leaves had become and grey each tapping incessantly upon its neighbour with a stir of her nerves a piece of blood stained paper caught up from some meat s dust heap beat up and down the road without the gate too to rest too heavy to fly away and a few kept it company the second peal had been louder and still nobody came then e walked out of the porch opened the gate and passed through and though she looked at the house front as if inclined to return it was with a breath of relief that she closed the gate a feeling her that she might have been recognized though how she could not tell and orders been given not to admit her went as far as the comer she had done all	45
she could do but determined not to escape present tion at the expense of future distress die walked back again quite past the house looking up at all the windows the woman pays ah the explanation was that they were all at church every one she remembered her husband saying that his father always insisted upon the household servants included going to morning service and as a consequence eating cold food when they came home it was therefore only necessary to wait till the service was over she would not make herself conspicuous by waiting on the spot and she started to get past the church into the lane but as she reached the churchyard gate the people began pouring out and foimd herself in the midst of them the congregation looked at her as only a congregation of small country walking home at its leisure can look at a woman out of the common whom it to be a stranger she quickened her pace and ascended the road by which e had come to find a retreat between its hedges till the s family should have and it might be convenient for them to receive her she soon the except two men who linked arm in arm were beating up behind her at a quick step as they drew nearer she could hear their voices engaged in earnest discourse and with the natural quickness of a woman in her situation did not fail to recognize in those voices the quality of her husband s tones the were his two brothers forgetting all her plans s one dread was lest they should overtake her now in her condition before she was prepared to them for though she felt that they could not identify her she instinctively dreaded their scrutiny the more briskly they walked the more briskly walked she they were plainly bent upon taking a short quick stroll before going to or di er to restore warmth to limbs chilled with sitting through a long service only one person had preceded up the hill a young woman somewhat interesting though of the d perhaps a trifle and had nearly overtaken her when the speed of her brothers in law brought them so nearly behind her back that she could hear every word of their conversation they said nothing however which particularly interested her till observing the young lady still further in front one of them remarked there is mercy chant let us overtake her knew the name it was the woman who had been destined for angel s life companion by his and her parents and whom he probably would have married but for her self she would have known as much without previous information if she had waited a moment for one of the brothers proceeded to say ah poor angel poor angel i never see that nice girl without more and more his in throwing himself away upon a or whatever she may be it is a queer business apparently whether she has joined him yet or not i don t know but she had not done so some months ago when i heard from him i can t say he never tells me anything nowadays his ill considered marriage seems to have completed that from me which was begun by his extraordinary opinions beat up the long hill still faster but she could not them without exciting notice at last they her altogether and passed her by the young lady still further ahead their footsteps and then there was a greeting and a of hands and the three went on they soon reached the summit of the hill and evidently intending this point to be the limit of their pace and turned all three aside to the gate had paused an hour before that time to the town before descending into it during their discourse one of the brothers the hedge carefully with his umbrella and dragged something to light the woman pays here s a pair of old boots he said thrown away i suppose by some tramp or other some who wished to come into the town perhaps and so excite sympathies said miss chant yes it must have been for they are excellent walking boots by no means worn out what a wicked thing to do i ll carry them home for some poor person who had been the one to find them picked them up for her with the of his stick and s boots were appropriated she who had heard this walked past under the screen of her veil till presently looking back she perceived that the church party had left the gate with her boots and retreated down the hill thereupon our heroine resumed her walk tears blinding tears were running down her face she knew that it was all sentiment all which had caused her to read the scene as her own condemnation nevertheless she could not get over it she could not in her own person all these it was impossible to think of returning to the angel s wife felt almost as if she had been up that hill like a scorned thing by those to her innocently as the slight had been inflicted it was somewhat unfortunate that she had the sons and not the father who despite his was far less and than they and had to the full the gift of charity as she again thought of her dusty boots she almost pitied those for the to which they had been subjected and felt how hopeless life was for their owner ah she said still sighing in pity of herself didn t know that i wore those over the part of the road to save these pretty ones he bought for me no they did not know it and they didn t think that he chose the colour o my pretty frock no of the d	45
how could they if they had known perhaps they would not have cared for they don t care much for him poor thing then she grieved for the beloved man whose conventional standard of judgment had caused her all these latter sorrows and she went her way without knowing that the greatest misfortune of her life was this feminine loss of courage at the last and critical moment through her her father in law by his sons her present condition was precisely one which would have the sympathies of old mr and mrs their hearts went out of them at a bound towards extreme cases when the subtle mental troubles of the less desperate among mankind failed to win their interest or regard in jumping at and they would forget that a word might be said for the of and and this defect or might have recommended their own daughter in law to them at this moment as a fairly choice sort of lost person for their love thereupon she began to back along the road by which she had come not altogether full of hope but full of a conviction that a crisis in her ufe was approaching no crisis apparently had and there was nothing left for her to do but to continue upon that starve acre farm till she could again summon courage to face the she did indeed take sufficient interest in herself to throw up her on this return journey as if to let the world see that she could at least exhibit a face such as mercy chant could not show but it was done with a sorry shake of the head it is nothing it is nothing she said nobody loves it nobody sees it who cares about the looks of a like me her journey back was rather a than a march it had no no purpose only a tendency along the tedious length of lane she began to grow tired and she leaned upon gates and paused by the woman pays she did not enter any house till at the seventh or eighth mile she descended the steep long hill below which lay the village or of ever where in the morning she had with such expectations the cottage by the church in whidi she again sat down was almost the first at that end of the village and while the woman fetched her some milk from the looking down the street perceived that the place seemed quite deserted the people are gone to afternoon service i suppose she said no my dear said the old woman tis too soon for that the t out yet they be all gone to hear the preaching in yonder bam a there between the services an excellent fiery christian man they say but lord i don t go to hear n what comes in the regular way over the pulpit is hot enough for i soon went onward into the village her footsteps echoing against the houses as though it were a place of the dead the central part her echoes were on by other and seeing the bam not far off the road she guessed these to be the of the preacher his voice became so distinct in the still clear air that she could soon catch his sentences though she was on the closed side of the bam the sermon as might be expected was of the type on justification by faith as in the of st paul this fixed idea of the was delivered with animated enthusiasm in a manner entirely for he had plainly no skill as a although had not heard the beginning of the address she learnt what the text had been from its constant o foolish who hath you that ye should not obey the truths before whose eyes christ hath been set forth among you was all the more interested as she stood s op the d listening behind in finding that the preacher s doctrine was a vehement form of the views of angel s father and her interest when the speaker began to detail his own spiritual experiences of how he had come by those views he had he said been the greatest of he had he had associated with the reckless and the but a day of awakening had come and in a human sense it had been brought about mainly by the influence of a certain clergyman whom he had at first insulted but whose parting words had sunk into his heart and had remained there till by the grace of heaven they had worked this change in him and made him what they saw him but more startling to than the doctrine had been the voice whidi impossible as it seemed was precisely that of d her face fixed in painful suspense she came round to the front of the bam and passed before it the low winter sun beamed directly upon the great double entrance on this side one of the doors being open so that the rays stretched far in over the floor to the preacher and his audience all sheltered from the northern breeze the listeners were entirely villagers among them being the man whom she had seen carrying the red paint pot on a former memorable occasion but her attention was given to the central figure who stood upon some of com facing the people and the door the three o clock shone full upon him and the strange conviction that her confronted her which had been gaining ground in ever since she had heard his words distinctly was at last established as a fact indeed end of phase the fifth phase the sixth the convert phase the sixth the convert till this moment she had never seen or heard from d since her departure from the came at a heavy moment one of all moments calculated to permit its with the least	45
shock but such was memory that though he stood there openly and a converted man who was for his past a fear overcame her her movement so that she neither retreated nor advanced to think of what from that countenance when she saw it last and to behold it now there was the same handsome of mien but now he wore neatly trimmed old fashioned whiskers the moustache having disappeared and his dress was half a which had changed his expression to abstract the from his features and to hinder for a second her belief in his identity to s sense there was just at first a ghastly a grim in the march of these solemn words of scripture out of such a mouth this too familiar less than four years earlier had brought to her ears expressions of such that her heart became quite sick at the irony of the contrast it was less a reform than a the op the d former curves of were now to lines of passion the lip shapes that had meant were now made to express the glow on the cheek that could be translated as was to day into the splendour of pious had become the bold rolling eye that had flashed upon her form in the old time with such mastery now beamed with the rude energy of a that was almost ferocious those which his face had used to put on when his wishes were now did duty in the who would insist upon turning again to his in the mire the as such seemed to complain they had been diverted from their hereditary to signify impressions for which nature did not intend them strange that their very elevation was a that to raise seemed to yet could it be so she would admit the sentiment no longer d was not the first wicked man who had turned away from his wickedness to save his soul alive and why should she deem it unnatural in him it was but the usage of thought which had been in her at hearing good new words in bad old notes the greater the sinner the greater the saint it was not necessary to far into christian history to discover that such impressions as these moved her vaguely and without strict as soon as the pause of her surprise would allow her to stir her impulse was to pass on out of his sight he had obviously not discerned her yet in her position against the but the moment that she moved again he recognized her the effect upon her old lover was electric far stronger than the effect of his presence upon her his fire the tumultuous ring of his eloquence seemed to go out of him his up struggled and trembled the the convert words that lay upon it but deliver them it could not as long as she faced him his eyes after their first glance upon her face hung in every other direction but hers but came back in a desperate leap every few seconds this lasted however but a short time for s energies returned with the of his and she walked as fast as she was able past the bam and onward as soon as she could reflect it appalled her this change in their relative he who had wrought her was now on the side of the spirit while she remained and as in the legend it had resulted that her c image had suddenly appeared upon his altar whereby the fire of the priest had been well nigh extinguished she went on without turning her head her back seemed to be endowed with a to is even her clothing so alive was she to a fancied gaze which might be resting upon her from the outside of that bam all the way along to this point her heart had been heavy with an sorrow now there was a change in the quality of its trouble that hunger for affection too long withheld was for the time by an almost physical sense of an past which still her it her consciousness of error to a practical despair the break of between her earlier and present existence which she had hoped for had not after all taken place never be complete till she was a herself thus absorbed she the northern part of long ash lane at right angles and presently saw before her the road ascending to the along margin the remainder of her journey lay its dry pale surface stretched severely onward by a single figure vehicle or mark save some occasional brown horse which dotted its cold here and there e slowly this ascent became conscious of footsteps behind her op the d and turning she saw approaching that well known form so strangely as the the one personage in all the world she wished not to encounter alone on this side of the grave there was not much time however for thought or and she yielded as calmly as she could to the necessity of letting him overtake her she saw that he was excited less by the speed of his walk than by the feelings within him he said she speed without looking round he repeated it is i d she then looked back at him and he came up i see it is she answered coldly well is that all yet i deserve no more of course he added with a slight laugh there is something of the ridiculous to your eyes in seeing me like this but i must put up with that i heard you had gone away nobody knew where you wonder why i have followed you i do rather and i would that you had not with all my heart yes you may well say it he returned grimly as they moved onward together she with unwilling tread but don	45
t mistake me i beg this because you may have been led to do so in noticing if you did notice it how sudden appearance me down there it was but a momentary faltering and considering what you had been to me it was natural enough but will helped me through it though perhaps you think me a for saying it and immediately afterwards i felt that of all persons in the world whom it was my duty and desire to save from the wrath to come sneer if you like the woman whom i had so wronged was that person i have come with that sole purpose in view nothing more there was the est vein of scorn in her words of have you saved yourself charity begins at home they say the convert have done nothing said he indifferently heaven as i have been telling my hearers has done all no amount of contempt that you can pour upon me will equal what i have poured upon myself the old adam of my former years well it is a strange story believe it or not but i can tell you the means by which my was brought about and i hope you will be interested enough at least to have you ever heard the name of the parson of you must have done so old mr one of the most earnest of his school one of the few intense men left in the church not so intense as the extreme wing of christian with which i have thrown in my lot but quite an exception among the established clergy the younger of whom are gradually the true doctrines by their till they are but the shadow of what they were i only differ from him on the question of church and state the interpretation of the text come out from among them and be ye separate the lord that s all he is one who i firmly has been the humble means of saving more souls in this country than any other man you can name you have heard of him i have she said he came to two or three years ago to preach on behalf of some missionary society and i wretched fellow that i was insulted him when in his he tried to reason with me and show me the way he did not resent my conduct he simply said that some day i should receive the first fruits of the spirit that those who came to sometimes remained to pray there was a strange magic in his words they sank into my mind but the loss of my mother hit me most and by degrees i was brought to see since then my one desire has been to hand on tiie true view to others and that is what i was trying to do to day though it is only lately that i have preached the first months of my have been spent in the north of the d of england among strangers where i preferred to make my earliest clumsy attempts so as to courage before that of all of one s sincerity addressing those who have known one and have be one s companions in the days of darkness if you could only know the pleasure of having a good slap at yourself i am sure don t go on with it she cried passionately as she turned away from him to a by the on which she bent herself i can t believe in such sudden things i feel indignant with you for talking to me like this when you know when you know what harm you ve done me you and those like you take fill of pleasure on earth by making the life of as me bitter and black with sorrow and then it is a fine thing when you have had enough of that to think of securing your pleasure in heaven by becoming converted out upon such i don t believe in you i hate it he insisted don t speak so it came to me like a jolly new idea and you don t believe me what don t you believe your your scheme of religion why she dropped her voice because a better man than you does not believe in such what a woman s reason who is this better man i tell you well he declared a resentment beneath his words seeming ready to spring out at a moment s notice god forbid that i should say i am a good man and you know i don t say any such thing i am new to goodness truly but see sometimes yes she replied sadly but i cannot believe in your to a new spirit such flashes as you i fear don t last thus speaking she turned from the over which she had been leaning and faced him whereupon his the convert eyes falling casually upon the familiar and form remained contemplating her the inferior man was quiet in him now but it was not extracted nor even entirely subdued don t look at me like that he said abruptly who had been quite unconscious of her action and mien instantly withdrew the large dark gaze of her eyes with a flush i b your pardon and there was revived in her the wretched sentiment which had often come to her before that in the with which nature had endowed her e was somehow doing wrong no no don t b my pardon but since you wear a veil to hide your good looks why don t you keep it down she pulled down the veil saying hastily it was mostly to keep off the wind it may seem harsh of me to dictate like this he went on but it is better that i should	45
not look too often on you it might be dangerous said well women s faces have had too much power over me already for me not to fear them an has nothing to do with such as they and it reminds me of the old times that i would forget after this their conversation to a casual remark now and then as they onward inwardly wondering how far he was going with her and not liking to send him back by positive frequently when they came to a gate or they found painted in red or blue letters some text of scripture and she asked him if he knew who had been at the pains to these he told her tiiat the man was employed by himself and others who were working with in that district to paint these that no means might be left which might move the hearts of a wicked generation op the d at length the road touched the spot called hand of all the spots on the and desolate this was the most forlorn it was so far removed from the charm which is sought in landscape by artists and view lovers as to reach a new kind of beauty a negative beauty of tragic tone the place took its name from a stone pillar which stood there a strange rude from a unknown in any local on whidi was roughly carved a human hand accounts were given of its history and purport some authorities stated that a cross had once formed the complete of which the present was but the stump others that the stone as it stood was entire and that it had been fixed there to mark a boundary or place of meeting anyhow whatever the origin of the there was and is something sinister or solemn according to mood in the scene amid which it stands something tending to impress the most by i think i must leave you now he remarked as they drew near to this spot i have to preach at s at six this evening and my way lies across to the right from here and you upset me somewhat too i cannot will not say why i must go away and get strength how is it that you speak so now who has taught you such good i have learnt things in my troubles she said what troubles have you had she told him of the first one the only one that related to him d was struck mute i knew nothing of this till now he next murmured why didn t you write to me when you felt your trouble coming on she did not reply and he broke the silence by adding well you will see me again the convert no she answered do not again come near me i will think but before we part come here he stepped up to the pillar this was once a holy cross relics are not in my creed but i fear you at moments far more than you need fear me at present and to lessen my fear put your hand upon that stone hand and swear that you will never tempt me by your charms or ways good god how can you ask what is so all that is from my thought yes but swear it half frightened gave way to his placed her hand upon the stone and swore i am sorry you are not a he continued that some should have got hold of you and unsettled your mind but no more now at home at least i can pray for you and i will and who knows what may not happen i m good bye he turned to a gate in the hedge and without letting his eyes again rest upon her over and out across the down in the direction of s as he walked his pace showed and by and by as if by a former thought he drew from his pocket a small book between the leaves of which was folded a letter worn and soiled as from much d opened the letter it was dated several months before this time and was signed by parson the letter began by expressing the writer s joy at d s and thanked him for his kindness in with the parson on the subject it expressed mr s warm assurance of forgiveness for d s former conduct and his interest in the young man s plans for the future he mr would much have to see d in the church to whose he had devoted so many years of his own life and would have helped him to enter a college to that op the d end but since his correspondent had possibly not cared to do this on of the delay it would have he was not the man to insist upon its importance every man must work as he could best work and in the method towards which he felt impelled by the spirit d read and this letter and seemed to himself he also read some passages from as he walked till his face assumed a calm and apparently the image of no longer troubled his mind she meanwhile had kept along the edge of the hill by which lay her nearest way home within the distance of a mile she met a solitary shepherd what is the meaning of that old stone i have passed she asked of him was it ever a holy cross cross no not a cross tis a thing of iu omen miss it was put up in times by the relations of a who was tortured there by his hand to a post and afterwards hung the bones lie they say he sold his soul to the devil and that he walks at times she felt the at this unexpectedly information and left the solitary	45
man her it was dusk when she drew near to ash and in the lane at the entrance to the hamlet she approached a girl and her lover without their observing her they were talking no secrets and the dear voice of the young woman in response to the warmer accents of the man spread into the chilly air as the one soothing thing within the dusky horizon full of a obscurity upon which nothing else for a moment the voices cheered the heart of till she reasoned that this interview had its origin on one side or the other in the same attraction which had been the to her own when she came dose the girl turned and recognized her the young man walking the convert oflf in embarrassment the woman was whose interest in s excursion immediately her own proceedings did not explain very clearly its results and who was a girl of tact began to speak of her own little affair a phase of which had just witnessed he is the chap who used to sometimes come and help at she explained indifferently he actually inquired and foimd out that i had come here and has followed me he says he s been in love wi me these two years but i ve hardly answered him several days had passed since her futile journey and was the dry winter wind still blew but a screen of erected in the eye of the blast kept its force away from her on the sheltered side was a machine whose bright blue hue of new paint seemed almost in the otherwise subdued scene opposite its front was a long or grave in which the roots had been preserved since early winter was standing at the end off with a bill hook the and earth from each root and throwing it after the operation into the a man was turning the handle of the machine and from its came the newly made the fresh smell of whose yellow was accompanied by the sounds of the wind the smart of the blades and the of the hook in s hand the wide of blank agricultural apparent where the had been pulled was beginning to be striped in wales of darker brown gradually to along the edge of each of these something crept upon ten legs moving without haste and without rest up and down the whole length of the field it was two horses and a man the plough going between them turning up the cleared ground for a spring for hours nothing relieved the monotony of things then far beyond the a black speck was seen it had come from the comer of a fence where there was a gap and its tendency the convert was up the incline towards the the proportions of a mere point it advanced to the shape of a and was soon perceived to be a man in black arriving from the direction of ash the man at the sheer having nothing else to do with his eyes continually observed the comer but who was occupied did not perceive him till her companion directed her attention to his approach it was not her hard farmer it was one in a semi who now represented what had once been the free and easy d not being hot at his preaching there was less enthusiasm about him now and the presence of the seemed to him a pale distress was already on s face and she her hood further over it d came up and said i want to speak to you you have refused my last request not to come near me said she yes but i have a good reason well tell it it is more serious than you may think he glanced to see if he were overheard they were at some distance from the man who turned the sheer and the movement of the machine too sufficiently prevented s words reaching other ears d placed himself so as to screen from the turning his back to the latter it is this he continued with capricious in thinking of your soul and mine when we last met i neglected to inquire as to your worldly condition you were well dressed and i did not think of it but i see now that it is hard harder than it used to be when i knew you harder than you deserve perhaps a good deal of it is owing to me she did not answer and he watched her op the d as with bent head her face completely by the hood she resumed her of the by going on with her work she felt better able to keep him outside her emotions he added with a sigh of discontent yours was the very worst case i ever was concerned in i had no idea of what resulted till you told me that i was to foul that innocent life the whole blame was mine the whole business of our time at you too the real blood of which i am but the base imitation what a blind yoimg thing you were as to possibilities i say in all earnestness that it is a shame for parents to bring up their girls in such dangerous ignorance of the and that the wicked may set for them their motive be a good one or the result of simple indifference still did no more than listen throwing down one root and taking up another with regularity the pensive of the mere field woman alone marking her but it is not that i came to say d went on my are these i have lost my mother since you were at and the place is my own but i intend to sell it and devote myself to missionary work in africa a devil of a poor hand i shall make at the trade no doubt	45
however what i want to ask you is will you put it in my power to do my duty to make the only i can make for the trick played you that is will you be my wife and go with me i have already obtained this precious document it was my old mother s dying wish he drew a piece of from his pocket with a slight of embarrassment what is it said e a marriage o no sir no she said quickly starting back you will not why is that a the convert and as he asked the question a disappointment which was not entirely the disappointment of duty crossed d s face it was a symptom that something of his old passion for her had been revived duty and desire ran hand in hand surely he b an again in more impetuous tones and then looked round at the who turned the too felt that the argument could not be ended there informing the man that a gentleman had come to see her with whom she wished to walk a little way she moved off with d across the field when they reached the first section he held out his hand to help her over it but she stepped forward on the of the earth rolls as if she did not see him you will not marry me and make me a self respecting man he repeated as soon as they were over the i cannot but why you know i have no affection for you but you get to feel that in time perhaps as soon as you really me never why so positive i love somebody else the words seemed to astonish him you do he cried somebody else but has not a sense of what is morally right and proper any weight with you no no no don t say that anyhow then your love for this other man may be only a passing feeling which you will overcome no no yes yes why not i cannot tell you you must in honour well then i have married him op the d ah he exclaimed and he stopped dead and gazed at her i did not wish to tell i did not mean to she pleaded it is a secret here or at any rate but dimly known so will you please will you keep from questioning me you must remember that we are now strangers strangers are we strangers for a moment a flash of his old irony marked his face but he it down is that man your husband he asked mechanically by a sign the who turned the machine that man she said proudly i should think not who then do not ask what i do not wish to tell she b and flashed her appeal to him from her face and lash eyes d was disturbed but i only ask for your sake he retorted hotly angels of heaven god forgive me for such an expression i came here i swear as i thought for your good don t look at me so i cannot stand your looks there never were such eyes surely before christianity or since there i won t lose my head i dare not i own that the sight of you has up my love for you which i believed was ed with all such feelings but i that our marriage might be a for us both the husband is by the wife and the wife is by the husband i said to myself but my plan is dashed from me and i must bear the disappointment he reflected with his eyes on the ground married married well that being so he added quite calmly tearing the slowly into and putting them in his pocket that being prevented i like to do some good to you and the convert your husband whoever he may be there are many questions that i am tempted to ask but i will not do so of course in opposition to your wishes though if i could know your husband i might more easily benefit him and you is he on this farm no she he is far away far away from you what sort of husband can he be o do not speak against him it was through you he out ah is it so that s sad yes but to stay away from you to leave you to work like this he does not leave me to work she cried springing to the defence of the absent one with all her he don t know it it is by my own arrangement then does he write i i cannot tell you there are things which are private to ourselves of course that means that he does not you are a deserted wife my fair in an impulse he turned suddenly to take her hand the glove was on it and he seized only the rough leather fingers which did not express the e or shape of those within you must not you must not she cried fearfully slipping her hand from the glove as from a pocket and leaving it in his grasp o will you go away for the sake of me and my husband go in the name of your own christianity yes yes i will he said abruptly and thrusting the glove back to her turned to leave facing however he said as god is my judge i meant no in taking your hand a of hoofs on the soil of the field which they had not noticed in their ceased close behind them and a voice reached her ear op the d what the devil are you doing away from your work at this time o day farmer had the two figures from the distance and had ridden	45
across to learn what was their business in his field don t speak like that to her said d his face with something that was not christianity indeed and what mid pa sons have to do with she who is the fellow asked d turning she went dose up to him go i do beg you she said what and leave you to that tyrant i can see in his face what a he is he won t hurt me he s not in love with me i can leave at lady day well i have no right but to obey i suppose but well good bye her whom she dreaded more than her having reluctantly disappeared the farmer continued his which took with the greatest coolness that sort of attack being independent of sex to have as a master this man of stone who would have her if he had dared was almost a relief after her former experiences she silently walked back towards the summit of the field that was the scene of her labour so absorbed in the interview which had just taken place that she was hardly aware that the nose of s horse almost touched her if so be you make an agreement to work for me till lady day i ll see that you carry it out he growled od rot the women now tis one thing and then tis another but i ll put up with it no longer knowing very well that he did not the other women of the farm as he harassed her out of spite for the convert the he had once received she did for one moment picture what might have been the result if she had been free to accept the offer just made her of being the s wife it would have lifted her completely out of not only to her present oppressive employer but to a whole world who seemed to despise her but no no she said i not have married him now he is so unpleasant to me that very night she began an appealing letter to concealing from him her and assuring him of her affection any one who had been in a position to read between the lines would have seen that at the back of her great love was some monstrous fear almost a desperation as to some secret which were not disclosed but again she did not finish her he had asked to go with him and perhaps he did not care for her at all she put the letter in her box and wondered if it would ever reach angel s hands after this her daily tasks were gone through heavily enough and brought on the day which was of great import to the day of the fair it was at this fair that new engagements were entered into for the twelve months following the lady day and those of the farming population who thought of changing their places attended at the county town where the fair was held nearly all the on ash farm intended flight and early in the morning there was a general in the direction of the town which lay at a distance of from ten to a dozen miles over country though also meant to leave at the quarter day she was one of the few who did not go to the fair having a vaguely shaped hope that something happen to render another engagement it was a peaceful february day of wonderful softness for the time and one almost have thought of the d that winter was over she had hardly finished her dinner when d s figure darkened the window of the cottage wherein she was a which she had all to herself to day jumped up but her visitor had knocked at the door and she hardly in reason run away d s knock his walk up to the door had some indescribable quality of from his air when she last saw him they seemed to be acts of which the was ashamed she thought that she not open the door but as there was no sense in that either she arose and having lifted the latch stepped back quickly he came in saw her and himself down into a chair before speaking i couldn t help it he began desperately as he wiped his heated face which had also a flush of excitement i felt that i must call at least to ask how you are i assure you i had not been thinking of you at all till i saw you that sunday now i cannot get rid of your image try how i may it is hard that a good woman do harm to a bad man yet so it is if you would only pray for me the suppressed discontent of his manner was almost pitiable and yet did not pity him how can i pray for you she said when i am forbidden to that the great power who moves the world alter his plans on my you really think that yes i have been ed of the of thinking otherwise cured by whom by my husband if i must tell ah your husband your husband how strange it seems i remember you hinted something of the sort the other day what do you really believe in these matters he asked you seem to have no religion perhaps owing to me but i have though i don t believe in anything supernatural the convert d looked at her with then do you think that the line i take is all wrong a good deal of it h m and yet i ve felt so sure about it he said uneasily i believe in the spirit of the sermon on the and so did my dear husband but i don t believe here she gave	45
month ago i should have been at such a possibility i ll go away to swear and ah can i to keep away then suddenly one one only for old friendship i am without defence a good man s honour is in my keeping think be ashamed well yes yes he clenched his lips with himself for his weakness his eyes were equally barren of worldly and religious faith the of those old fitful passions which had lain amid the lines of his face ever since his seemed to wake and come together as in a he went out though d had declared that this breach of his engagement to day was the simple of a s words as echoed from had made a deep impression upon him and continued to do so after he had left her he moved on in silence as if his energies were by the hitherto of that his position was reason had had nothing to do with his which was perhaps the mere of a careless man in search of a new the convert sensation and temporarily impressed by his mother s death the drops of logic had let fall into the sea of his enthusiasm served to chill its to he said to himself as he pondered again and again over the phrases that she had handed on to him clever fellow little thought that by telling her those things he might be my way back to her it is the of the last wheat at ash farm the dawn of the march morning is singularly and there is nothing to show where the eastern horizon lies against the twilight rises the top of the which has stood here through the washing and of the wintry weather when and arrived at the scene of operations only a rustling that others had preceded them to which as the light increased there were presently added the of two men on the they were busily the that is off the before beginning to throw down the and while this was in progress and with the other women workers in their brown stood waiting and shivering farmer having insisted upon their being on the spot thus early to get the job over if possible by the end of the day close under the of the and as yet barely visible was the red tyrant that the women had come to serve a timber framed construction with and wheels the machine which whilst it was going kept up a demand upon the endurance of their muscles and nerves a little way off there was another indistinct figure this one black with a sustained hiss that spoke of strength very much in reserve the long chimney running up beside an ash tree and the warmth which from the spot explained without the necessity of much daylight tiiat here was the engine which was the convert to act as the of this little world by the engine stood a dark motionless being a and of in a sort of trance with a heap of coals by his side it was the the of his manner and colour lent him the appearance of a creature from who had strayed into the of this region of yellow grain and pale soil with which he had nothing in common to and to its what he looked he felt he was in the world but not of it he served fire and smoke these of the fields served vegetation weather frost and sun he with his engine from farm to farm from to county for as yet the steam machine was in his part of he spoke in a strange northern accent his thoughts being turned upon himself his eye on his iron charge hardly perceiving the scenes him and caring for them not at all holding only strictly necessary intercourse with the natives as if some ancient doom compelled him to wander here against his will in the service of his master die long which ran from the driving wheel of his engine to the red under the ride was the sole tie line between and him while they uncovered the he stood beside his of force round whose hot blackness the morning air quivered he had nothing to do with preparatory labour his fire was waiting his steam was at high pressure in a few seconds he could make the long move at an invisible beyond its extent the might be com straw or chaos it was all the same to if any of the asked him what he called himself he replied shortly an engineer the ride was by full daylight the men then took their places the women mounted and the s of the d work began farmer or as they called him he had arrived ere this and by his orders was placed on the platform of the machine close to the man who fed it her business being to every of com handed on to her by who stood next but on the so that the could seize it and spread it over the revolving drum which out every grain in one moment they were soon in full progress after a preparatory or two which rejoiced the hearts of those who hated machinery the work sped on till when the was stopped for half an hour and on starting again after the meal the whole strength of the farm was thrown into the of the straw which began to grow beside the of com a hasty was eaten as stood without leaving their positions and then another couple of hours brought them near to dinner time the inexorable wheels continuing to spin and the penetrating hum of the to thrill to the very all who were near the revolving wire cage the old men on the rising straw talked of the past days when they had	45
waist you should be willing to share it and leave that mule you call husband for ever one of her leather gloves which she had taken off to eat her c e lay in her lap and without the slightest warning she passionately swung the glove by the directly in his face it was heavy and as a warrior s and it struck him flat on the mouth fancy might have regarded the act as the of a trick in which her armed were not fiercely started up from his position a scarlet appeared where her blow had alighted and in a moment the blood began dropping from his mouth upon the straw but he soon controlled himself calmly drew his hand the convert from his pocket and his bleeding lips she too had up but she sank down again now punish me she said up her eyes to him with the hopeless defiance of the s gaze before its its neck whip me crush me you need not mind those people under the i shall not cry out once victim always victim that s the law o no no he said i can make full allowance for this yet you most forget one thing that i would have married you if you had not put it out of my power to do so did i not ask you to be my wife hey answer me you did and you cannot be but remember one thing his voice hardened as his temper got the better of him with the recollection of his sincerity in asking her and her present ingratitude and he stepped across to her side and held her by the shoulders so that she shook under his grasp remember my lady i was your master once i will be your master again if you are any man s wife you are mine the now began to stir below so much for our quarrel he said letting her go now i shall leave you and shall come again for your answer the afternoon you don t know me yet but i know you she had not spoken again remaining as if d retreated over the and descended the ladder while the workers below rose and stretched their arms and shook down the beer they had drunk then the machine started afresh and amid the renewed rustle of the straw resumed her position by the drum as one in a dream after in endless succession in the afternoon the farmer made it known that the was to be finished that night since there was a moon by which they see to work and the man with the engine was engaged for another farm on the morrow hence the and humming and rustling proceeded with even less than usual it was not till time about three o clock that raised her eyes and gave a momentary glance round she felt but little surprise at seeing that d had come back and was standing under the hedge by the gate he had seen her lift her eyes and waved his hand to her while he blew her a kiss it meant that their quarrel was over looked down again and carefully from gazing in that direction thus the afternoon dragged on the wheat shrank lower and the straw grew higher and the corn were away at six o dock the wheat was about shoulder high from the ground but the remaining untouched seemed still notwithstanding the enormous that had been down by the fed by the man and through whose two hands the greater part of them had passed and the immense of straw where in the morning there had been nothing appeared as the of the same red from the west sky a shine all that wild march could afford in the way of sunset had burst forth after the cloudy day the tired and faces of the the convert and them with a light as also the flapping garments of the women whidi clung to them like dull flames a panting ache ran through the the man who fed was weary and could see that the red of his neck was with dirt and she still stood at her post her flushed and face with the and her white bonnet by it she was the only woman whose place was upon the machine so as to be shaken bodily by its spinning and the of the now separated her from and and prevented their changing duties with her as they had done the incessant quivering in which every fibre of her frame had thrown her into a reverie in which her arms worked on of her consciousness she hardly knew where she was and did not hear tell her from below that her hair was tumbling down by degrees the among them began to grow and eyed whenever lifted her head she beheld always the great straw with the men in shirt sleeves upon it against the grey north sky in front of it the long like a jacob s ladder on which a perpetual stream of straw ascended a yellow river running up hill and out on the top of the she knew that d was still on the scene observing her from some point or other though she could not say where there was an excuse for his remaining for when the drew near its final a little was always done and men with the sometimes dropped in for that performance sporting characters of all descriptions with and pipes with sticks and stones but there was another hour s work before the of live rats at the base of the would be of the d reached and as the evening light in the direction of the giant s hill by s dissolved away the white faced moon of the season arose from the horizon that lay towards abbey and on the other side	45
for the last hour or two had felt uneasy about whom she could not get near enough to speak to the other women having kept up their strength by drinking ale and having done without it through dread owing to its results at her home in childhood but still kept going if she could not fill her part she would have to leave and this which she would have regarded with and even with relief a month or two earlier had become a terror since d had begun to round her the and had now worked the so low that people on the could talk to them to s surprise farmer came up on the machine to her and said that if she desired to join her friend he did not wish her to keep on any longer and would send somebody else to take her place the friend was d she knew and also that this concession had been granted in obedience to the request of that friend or enemy she shook her head and toiled on the time for the rat catching arrived at last and the hunt began the creatures had crept downwards with the of the till they were all together at the bottom and being now uncovered from their last refuge they ran across the open ground in all directions a loud shriek from the by this time informing her companions that one of the rats had invaded her person a terror which the rest of the women had guarded against by various schemes of skirt and self elevation the rat was at last and amid the of dogs masculine shouts feminine screams oaths and confusion as of her the convert last the drum the ceased and she stepped from the machine to the her lover who had only looked on at the was promptly at her side what after all my insulting slap too said she in an she was so utterly exhausted that she had not strength to speak louder i should indeed be foolish to feel offended at anything you say or do he answered in the voice of the time how the little limbs tremble you are as weak as a calf you know you are and yet you need have done nothing since i arrived how could you be so obstinate however i have told the farmer that he has no right to employ women at steam it is not proper work for them and on all the better class of farms it has been given up as he knows very well i will walk with you as far as your home o yes she answered with a gait walk wi me if you will i do bear in mind that you came to marry me before you knew o my state perhaps perhaps you are a little better and kinder than i have been thinking you were whatever is meant as kindness i am grateful for whatever is meant in any other way i am at i cannot sense your meaning sometimes if i cannot our former relations at least i can assist you and i will do it with much more regard for your feelings than i formerly showed my religious or whatever it was is over but i retain a little good nature i hope i do now by all that s tender and strong between man and women trust me i have enough and more than enough to put you out of anxiety both for yourself and your parents and sisters i can make em all comfortable if you will only show confidence in me have you seen em lately she quickly inquired yes they didn t know where you were it was only by chance that i found you here of the d the cold moon looked upon s face between the twigs of the garden hedge as she paused outside the cottage which was her temporary home d pausing beside her don t mention my little brothers and sisters don t make me break down quite she said if you want to help them god knows they need it do it without telling me but no no she cried i will take nothing from you either for them or for me he did not accompany her further since as she lived with the household all was public indoors no sooner had she herself entered herself in a washing tub and shared supper with the family than she fell into thought and withdrawing to the table under the wall by the light of her own little lamp wrote in a passionate mood my own husband let me call you so i must even if it makes you angry to think of such an unworthy wife as i i must cry to you in my trouble i have no one else i i am so exposed to temptation angel i fear to say who it is and i do not like to write about it at all but i cling to you in a way you cannot think can you not come to me now at once before anything terrible happens o i know you cannot because you are so far away i i think i must die if ou do not come soon or tell me to come to you the punishment you have measured out to me is deserved i do know that well deserved and you are t and just to be angry with me but angel please please not to be just only a little kind to me even if i do not deserve it and come to me if you would come i could die in your arms i would be well content to do that if so be you had forgiven me angel i live entirely for you i love you too much to	45
blame you for going away and i know it was necessary you should find a farm do not think i shall say a word of sting or bitterness only come back to me i am desolate without you my darling o so desolate i do not mind having to work but if you will send me one little line and say am coming i will bide on angel so cheerfully it has so much my religion ever since we were married to be faithful to you in every thought and look that even when a man speaks a compliment to me before i am aware it seems you have you never felt one little bit of what you used to fed when we were at the if you have how can you keep away from me i am the same woman angel as you fell in love with yes the very same not the one you disliked but never saw what was tjie past to me as soon as i met you it was a dead thing altogether i became another woman filled full of new life from you how could i be the early one the convert why do you not see this dear if you would only be a little more conceited and believe in so far as to see that you were strong enough to work this change in me you would perhaps be in a mind to come to me your poor wife how silly i was in my happiness when i thought i could trust you always to love i ought to have known that such as that was not for poor me but i am side at heart not only for old times but for the present think think how it do hurt my heart not to see you ever ever i ah if i could only make your dear heart ache one little minute of each day as mine does every day and all day long it might lead you to show pity to your poor lonely one people still say that i am rather pretty angel handsome is the word they use since i wish to be truthful i am what they say but i do not value my good oo q i only like to have them because they belong to you my dear and that there may be at least one thing about me worth your having so much have i felt this that when i met with annoyance on account of the same i tied up my face in a as long as people would believe in it o angel i tell you all this not from vanity you will certainly know i do not but only that you may come to if you really cannot come to me will you let me come to i am as i say worried pressed to do what i will not do it cannot be that i shall yield one inch yet i am in terror as to what an accident might lead to and i so on account of my first error i cannot say more about this it makes me too miserable but if i break down by into some fearful my last state will be worse than my first o god i cannot think of it i let me come at once or at once come to i would be content ay glad to live with you as your servant if i may not as your wife so that i could only be near you and get glimpses of you and think of you as mine the daylight has nothing to show me since you are not here and i don t like to see the and in the fields because i grieve and grieve to miss you who used to see with me i long for only one thing in heaven or earth or under the earth to meet you my own dear i come to me come to me and save me from what your faithful the appeal duly found its way to the breakfast table of the quiet to the westward in that valley where tjie air is so soft and the soil so rich that the effort of growth requires but superficial aid by comparison with the at ash and where to the human world seemed so different though it was much the same it was purely for security that she had been requested by to send her communications through his father whom he kept pretty well informed of his changing addresses in the country he had gone to for himself with a heavy heart now said old mr to his wife when he had read the envelope if angel leaving for a visit home at the end of next month as he told us that he hoped to do i think this may hasten his plans for i believe it to be from his wife he breathed deeply at the thought of her and the letter was to be promptly sent on to angel dear fellow i hope he will get home safely murmured mrs to my dying day i shall feel that he has been ill used you should have sent him to cambridge in spite of his want of faith and given him the same chance as the other boys had he would have grown out of it under proper influence and perhaps have taken orders after all church or no church it would have been fairer to him this was the only wail with which mrs ever disturbed her husband s peace in respect of their sons and she did not vent this often for she the convert was as considerate as she was devout and knew that his mind too was troubled by doubts as to his justice in this matter only too often had she heard him lying awake at	45
night stifling sighs for angel with prayers but the did not even now hold that he would have been justified in giving his son an the same advantages that he had given to the two others when it was possible if not probable that those very advantages might have been used to the doctrines whidi he had made it his life s mission and desire to and the mission of his ordained sons likewise to put with one hand a the feet of the two faithful ones and with the other to the by the same artificial means he deemed to be alike inconsistent with his convictions his position and his hopes nevertheless he loved angel and in secret mourned over this treatment of him as might have mourned over the doomed while they went up the hill together his silent self regrets were far than the which his wife rendered audible they blamed themselves for this marriage if angel had never been destined for a farmer he would never have been thrown with girls they did not distinctly know what had separated him and his wife nor the date on which the separation had taken place at first they had supposed it must be something of the nature of a serious aversion but in his later letters he occasionally alluded to the intention of coming home to fetch her from which expressions they hoped the division might not owe its origin to so hopelessly permanent as that he had told them that she was with her relatives and in their doubts they had decided not to intrude into a situation which they knew no way of the eyes for which s letter was intended of the d were gazing at this time on a expanse of from the back of a mule which was bearing him from the interior of the south american continent towards the coast his experiences of this strange land had been sad the severe illness from which he had suffered shortly after his arrival had never wholly left him and he had by degrees decided to his hope of farming here though as long as the bare possibility existed of his remaining he kept this change of view a secret from his parents the crowds of agricultural who had come out to the in his wake dazzled by representations of easy independence had suffered died and wasted away he would see mothers from english farms along with their in their arms when the child would be stricken with fever and would die the mother would pause to dig a hole in the loose earth with her bare hands bury the babe therein with the same natural shed one tear and again on angel s original intention had not been to but a northern or eastern farm in his own country he had come to this place in a fit of desperation the movement among the english having by chance with his desire to escape from his past existence this time of absence he had mentally aged a dozen years what arrested him now as of value in life was less its beauty than its pathos having long the old systems of he now began to the old of morality he thought they wanted who was the moral man still more who was the moral woman the beauty or of a character lay not only in its achievements but in its aims and impulses its true history lay not among things done but among things willed how then about her in these lights a regret for his hasty the convert judgment b an to him did he reject her or did he not he could no longer he would always reject her and not to say that was in spirit to accept her now this growing fondness for her memory in point of time with her residence at ash but it was before she had felt herself at liberty to trouble him with a word about her circumstances or her feelings he was greatly perplexed and in his perplexity as to her motives in intelligence he did not thus her silence of was how much it really said if he had understood that she with literal to orders which he had given and forgotten that despite her natural she asserted no rights admitted his judgment to be in every respect the true one and bent her head in the before mentioned journey by through the interior of the country another man rode beside him angel s companion was also an englishman bent on the same errand though he came from another part of the island they were both in a state of mental depression and they spoke of home affairs confidence confidence with that curious tendency evinced by men more especially when in distant lands to to strangers details of their lives which they would on no account mention to friends angel admitted to this man as they rode along the sorrowful facts of his marriage the stranger had in many more lands and among many more than angel to his mind such from the social so immense to were no more than are the of and chain to the whole curve he viewed the matter in quite a different light from angel thought that what had been was of no importance beside what she would be and plainly told that he was wrong in coming away from her of the d the next day they were in a thunder angel s companion was struck down with fever and died by the week s end waited a few hours to bury him and then went on his way the remarks of the large minded stranger of whom he knew absolutely nothing beyond a common place name were by his death and influenced more than all the reasoned of the philosophers his own made him ashamed by its contrast his rushed upon him in a flood	45
he had persistently elevated at the expense of christianity yet in that civilization an was not certain surely then he might have regarded that of the state which he had inherited with the creed of as at least open to when the result was due to treachery a remorse struck into him the words of never quite in his memory came back to him he had asked if she loved him and she had replied in the affirmative did she love him more than did no she had replied would lay down her life for him and she herself could do no more he thought of as she had appeared on the day of the wedding how her eyes had lingered upon him how she had hung upon his words as if they were a god s and the terrible evening over the hearth when her simple soul itself to his how pitiful her face had looked by the rays of the fire in her inability to realize that his love and protection could possibly be withdrawn thus from being her critic he grew to be her advocate cynical things he had uttered to himself about her but no man can be always a and live and he withdrew them the mistake of expressing them had arisen from his allowing himself to be influenced by general principles to the disregard of the particular instance the convert but the reasoning is somewhat lovers and husbands have gone over the before to day had been harsh towards her there is no doubt of it men are too often harsh with women they love or have loved women with men and yet these are tenderness itself when compared with the universal out of which they grow the of the position towards the temperament of the means towards the aims of to day towards yesterday of hereafter towards to day the historic interest of her family that line of d whom he had despised as a spent force touched his sentiments now why had he not known the difference between the political value and the imaginative value of these things in the latter aspect her d descent was a fact of great dimensions worthless to it was a most useful to the to the on and falls it was a fact that would soon be forgotten that bit of distinction in poor s blood and name and oblivion would fall upon her hereditary link with the marble monuments and at so does time destroy his own in recalling her face again and again he thought now that he could see therein a flash of the dignity which must have her grand and the vision sent that through his veins which he had formerly felt and which left behind it a sense of sickness despite her not past what still abode in such a woman as the freshness of her fellows was not the of the grapes of better than the of so spoke love preparing the way for s devoted which was then just being forwarded to him by his father though owing to his distance inland it was to be a long time in reaching him meanwhile the writer s expectation that angel of the d come in response to the entreaty was alternately great and small what lessened it was that the facts of her life which had led to the parting had not changed could never change and that if her presence had not them her absence could not nevertheless she addressed her mind to the tender question of what she could do to please him best if he arrive sighs were expended on the wish that she had taken more notice of the times he played on his harp that she had inquired more curiously of him which were his favourite among those the country girls sang she indirectly inquired of who had followed from and by chance remembered that amongst the of melody in which they had indulged at the s to induce the cows to let down their milk had seemed to like s gardens i have i have hounds and the break o the day and had seemed not to care for the tailor s breeches and such a beauty i did grow excellent as they were to perfect the was now her desire she practised them privately at odd moments especially the break o the day arise arise arise and pick your love a all o the sweetest flowers that in the garden grow the and birds in every bough a building so in the may time at the break o the day it would have melted the heart of a stone to hear her singing these whenever she worked apart from the rest of the girls in this cold dry time the tears running down her cheeks all the while at the thought that perhaps he would not after all come to hear her and the simple silly words of the songs in painful mockery of the aching heart of the singer the convert was so up in this dream that she seemed not to know how the season was advancing that the days had lengthened that lady day was at hand and soon be followed by old lady day the end of her term here but before the quarter day had quite come something happened which made think of far different matters she was at her lodging as usual one evening sitting in the downstairs room with the rest of the family when somebody knocked at the door and inquired for through the doorway she saw against the declining light a figure with the height of a woman and the breadth of a child a tall thin girlish creature whom she did not recognize in the twilight till the girl said what is it lu asked in startled accents her sister whom a little over a year ago she	45
had left at home as a child had up by a sudden shoot to a form of this of which as yet lu seemed herself scarce able to understand the meaning her thin legs visible below her once long frock now short by her growing and her hands and arms revealed her youth and yes i have been about all day said lu with gravity a trying to find ee and i m very tired what is the matter at home mother is took very bad and the doctor says she s dying and as father is not very well neither and sa rs tis wrong for a man of such a high family as his to slave and at common work we don t know what to do stood in reverie a long time before she thought of asking lu to come in and sit down when she had done so and lu was having some tea she came to a decision it was imperative that she should go home her agreement did not end till old lady day the sixth of april but as the interval of the d was not a long one she resolved to run the risk of starting at once to go that night would be a gain of twelve but her sister was too tired to undertake such a distance till the morrow ran down to where and lived informed them of what had happened and begged them to make the best of her case to the farmer she got lu a supper and after that having tucked the younger into her own bed packed up as many of her as would go into a basket and started directing lu to follow her next morning she plunged into the chilly darkness as the clock struck ten for her fifteen miles walk under the stars in lonely districts night is a protection rather than a danger to a noiseless and knowing this pursued the nearest course along by lanes that she would almost have feared in the but were wanting now and fears were driven out of her mind by thoughts of her mother thus she proceeded mile after mile ascending and descending till she came to and about midnight looked from that height into the abyss of shade which was all that revealed itself of the on whose further side she was bom having already traversed about five miles on the die had now ten or eleven in the before her journey would be finished the winding road downwards became just visible to her under the wan as she followed it and soon she paced a soil so with that above it that the difference was perceptible to the tread and to the smell it was the heavy day land of and a part of the to which roads had never penetrated linger longest on these heavy having once been forest at this shadowy time it seemed to assert something of its old character the far and the near being blended and every tree and tall hedge making the most of its presence the that had been hunted here the that had been pricked and the green that at you as you passed the place of the d with in them still and they formed an multitude now at she passed the village inn whose sign in response to the greeting of her footsteps which not a human soul heard but herself under the roofs her mind s eye beheld relaxed and muscles spread out in the darkness beneath made of little purple squares and a process at the hands of sleep for renewed labour on the morrow as soon as a hint of pink appeared on hill at three she turned the last comer of the of lanes she had and entered passing the field in which as a girl she had first seen angel when he had not danced with her the sense of disappointment remained with her yet in the direction of her mother s house she saw a light it came from the bedroom window and a branch waved in front of it and made it wink at her as soon as she could discern the outline of the house newly with her money it had all its old effect upon s imagination part of her body and life it ever seemed to be the slope of its the finish of its the broken courses of brick which the chimney all had something in common with her personal character a had come into these to her regard it meant the illness of her mother she opened the door so softly as to disturb nobody the lower room was vacant but the neighbour who was sitting up with her mother came to the top of the stairs and whispered that mrs was no better though she was sleeping just then prepared herself a breakfast and then took her place as nurse in her mother s chamber in the morning when she contemplated the children they had all a curiously look although she had been away little more than a year their the convert growth was and the necessity of herself heart and to their needs took her out of her own cares her father s ill health was of the same indefinite kind and he sat in his chair as usual but the day after her arrival he was unusually bright he had a rational scheme for living and asked him what it was i m thinking of sending to all the old in this part of england he said asking them to to a to maintain me i m sure they d see it as a and proper thing to do they spend lots o money in keeping up old ruins and finding the bones o things and such like and living remains must be more interesting to em still if they only of me would	45
that somebody would go round and teu em what there is living among em and they thinking nothing of him if pa son who me had lived he d ha done it i m sure postponed her arguments on this high project till she had with pressing matters in hand which seemed little improved by her when necessities had been she turned her attention to external things it was now the season for planting and many gardens and of the villagers had already received their spring but the garden and the of the were she found to her dismay that this was owing to their having eaten all the seed potatoes that last lapse of the at the earliest moment die obtained what others she could procure and in a few days her father was well enough to see to the garden under s efforts while she herself undertook the plot which they in a field a couple of hundred yards out of the village she doing it after the confinement of the sick chamber where she was not now required by reason op the d of her mother s improvement violent motion relieved thought the plot of ground was in a high dry open where there were forty or fifty such pieces and where labour was at its when the hired labour of the day had ended digging began usually at six o clock and extended into the du or moonlight just now heaps of dead weeds and refuse were on many of the plots the dry weather their one fine day and lu worked on here with their neighbours till the last rays of the sun smote flat upon the white that divided the plots as soon as twilight succeeded to the of the couch grass and stalk fires began to light up the their outlines appearing and disappearing under the dense smoke as by the wind when a fire glowed banks of smoke blown level along the ground would themselves become illuminated to an lustre the from one another and the meaning of the pillar of a cloud which was a wall by day and a light by night could be understood as evening some of the men and women gave over for the night but the greater number remained to get their planting done being among them though she sent her sister home it was on one of the couch burning plots that she with her fork its four shining against the stones and dry in httle sometimes she was completely involved in the smoke of her fire then it would leave her figure free by the glare from the heap she was oddly dressed to night and presented a somewhat staring aspect her attire being a gown by many with a short black jacket over it the effect of the whole being that of a wedding and funeral guest in one the women further back wore white which with their pale faces were all that could be seen of them in the gloom except the convert when at moments they caught a flash from the flames westward the boughs of the bare thorn hedge which formed the of the field rose against the pale of the lower sky above like a full blown so bright as almost to ow a shade a few small stars were appearing elsewhere in the distance a dog and wheels occasionally rattled along the dry road still the continued to dick for it was not late and though the air was fresh and keen there was a whisper of spring in it that cheered the workers on something in the place the hour the fires the fantastic mysteries of light and shade made others as well as enjoy being there nightfall which in the frost of winter comes as a and in the warmth of summer as a lover came as a on this march day nobody looked at his or her companions the eyes of all were on the soil as its turned surface was revealed by the fires hence as stirred the and sang her foolish little songs with scarce now a hope that would ever hear them she did not for a long time notice the person who worked nearest to her a man in a long who she found was the same plot as herself and whom she supposed her father had sent there to advance the work she became more conscious of him when the direction of his digging brought him closer sometimes the smoke divided them then it and the two were visible to each other but divided from all the rest did not speak to her fellow nor did he speak to her nor did she think of him further than to recollect that he had not been there when it was broad daylight and that she did not know him as any one of the which was no wonder her having been so long and op the d of late years by and by he dug so dose to her that the fire beams were reflected as distinctly from the steel of his fork as from her own on going up to the fire to throw a pitch of dead weeds upon it she found that he did the same on the other side the fire up and she beheld the face of d the of his presence the of his appearance in a gathered such as was now worn only by the most old fashioned of the had a ghastly that chilled her as to its bearing d a low long laugh if i were inclined to joke i should say how much this seems like paradise he remarked looking at her with an inclined head what do you say she weakly asked a might say this is just like paradise you are eve and i am the old other one come to tempt you in the disguise of	45
so they changed and changed however all the so in village life did not entirely in the agricultural a was also going on the village had formerly contained side by side with the agricultural an interesting and better informed class distinctly above the former the class to which s father and mother had belonged and including the carpenter the smith the the together with the convert workers other than farm a set of people who owed a certain of aim and conduct to the fact of their being life s father or copy or occasionally small but as the long fell in they were seldom again let to similar tenants and were mostly pulled down if not absolutely required by the farmer for his hands who were not directly employed on the land were looked upon with and the of some starved the trade of others who were thus obliged to follow these families who had formed the of the village life in the past who were the of the traditions had to seek refuge in the large the process by as the tendency of the rural population towards the large towns being really the tendency of water to flow up hill when forced by machinery the cottage accommodation at having been in this manner considerably by every house which remained standing was required by the for his work people ever since the occurrence of the event which had cast such a shadow over s life the family whose descent was not had been looked on as one which would have to go when their lease ended if only in the interests of morality it was indeed quite true that the household had not been examples either of or the father and even the mother had got at times the younger children seldom had gone to church and the eldest daughter had made queer by some means the had to be kept pure so on this the first lady day on which the were the house being was required for a with a large and widow her daughters and lu the boy and the younger children had to go elsewhere of the d on the evening preceding their removal it was getting dark by reason of a rain which sky as it was the last night they would spend in the village which had been their home and mrs lu and had gone out to bid some friends good bye and was keeping house till they should return she was kneeling in the window bench her face dose to the where an outer pane of was sliding down the inner pane of glass her eyes rested on the web of a spider probably starved long ago which had been placed in a comer where no flies ever came and in the slight draught through the was reflecting on the position of the household in which she perceived her own evil influence had she not come home her mother and the children might probably have been allowed to stay on as weekly tenants but she had been observed almost immediately on her return by some people of scrupulous character and great influence they had seen her in the churchyard restoring as well as she could with a little a baby s grave by this means they had found that she was living here again her mother was for her sharp had ensued from who had offered to leave at once she had been taken at her word and here was the result i ought never to have come home said to herself bitterly she was so intent upon these thoughts that she hardly at first took note of a man in a white whom she saw riding down the street possibly it was owing to her face being near to the pane that he saw her so quickly and directed his horse so close to the cottage front that his hoofs were almost upon the narrow border for plants growing under the wall it was not till he touched the window with his that she observed him the rain had nearly so the convert ceased and she opened the in obedience to his gesture didn t you see me asked d i was not attending she said i heard you i believe though i fancied it was a carriage and horses i was in a sort of dream ah you heard the d coach perhaps you know the legend i suppose no my somebody was going to tell it me once but didn t if you are a genuine d i ought not to tell you either i suppose as for me i m a sham one so it doesn t matter it is rather dismal it is that this sound of a non coach can only be heard by one of d blood and it is held to be of ill omen to the one who hears it it has to do with a murder committed by one of the family centuries ago now you have it finish it very well one of the family is said to have some beautiful woman who tried to escape from the coach in which he was carrying her off and in the struggle he killed her or she killed him i forget which such is one version of the tale i see that your and are packed going away aren t you yes to morrow old lady day i heard you were but hardly believe it it seems so sudden why is it father s was the last life on the property and when that dropped we had no further right to stay though we might perhaps have stayed as weekly tenants if it had not been for me what about you i am not a proper woman d s face flushed what a shame miserable may their dirty souls be burnt to he	45
exclaimed in tones of resentment that s why you are going is it turned out of the d we are not turned out exactly but as they said we should have to go soon it was best to go now everybody was moving because there are better chances where are you going to we have taken rooms there mother is so about father s people that she will go there but your mother s family are not fit for lodgings and in a little hole of a town like that now why not come to my garden house at there are hardly any poultry now since my mother s death but there s the house as you know it and the garden it can be in a day and your mother can live there quite comfortably and i will put the children to a good school really i ought to do something for you but we have already taken the rooms at she declared and we can wait there wait what for for that nice husband no doubt now look here i know what men are and bearing in mind the grounds of your separation i am quite positive he will never make it up with you now though i have been your enemy i am your friend even if you won t believe it come to this cottage of mine we ll get up a regular colony of fowls and your mother can attend to them and the children can go to school breathed more and more quickly and at length she said how do i know that you would do all this your views may change and then we should be my mother would be again o no no i would you against such as that in writing if necessary think it over shook her head but d persisted she had seldom seen him so determined he would not take a negative please just tell your mother he said in emphatic s the convert tones it is her business to judge not yours i shall get the house swept out and to morrow morning and fires lit and it will be dry by the evening so that you can come straight there now mind i shall expect you again shook her head her throat swelling with complicated emotion she could not look up at d i owe you something for the past you know he resumed and you cured me too of that so i am glad i would rather you had kept the so that you had kept the practice whidi went with it i am glad of this of you a little to morrow i shall expect to hear your mother s goods give me your hand on it now dear beautiful with the last sentence he had dropped his voice to a murmur and put his hand in at the half open with stormy eyes she pulled the stay bar quickly and in doing so caught his arm between the and the stone you are very cruel he said out his arm no no i know you didn t do it on purpose well i shall expect you or your mother and the children at least i shall not come i have plenty of money she cried where at my father in law s if i ask for it you ask for it but you won t i know you you ll never ask for it you ll starve first with these words he rode off just at the comer of the street he met the man with the paint pot who asked him if he had deserted the brethren you go to the devil said d remained where she was a long while till a sudden rebellious sense of injustice caused the region of her eyes to swell with the rush of hot tears r of the d her husband himself had like others dealt out hard measure to her surely he had she had never before admitted such a thought but he had surely never in her life she could swear it from the bottom of her soul had she ever intended to do wrong yet these hard judgments had come whatever her sins they were not sins of intention but of and why should she have been punished so persistently she passionately seized the first piece of paper that came to hand and the following lines o why have you treated me so angel i i do not deserve it i have thought it all over carefully and i can never never you you know that i did not intend to wrong you why have you so wronged me you are cruel cruel indeed i will try to forget you it is all injustice i have received at hands t she watched till the passed by ran out to him with her and then again took her place inside the window panes it was just as well to write like that as to write tenderly how could he give way to entreaty the facts had not changed was no new event to alter his opinion it grew darker the shining over the room the two biggest of the younger children had gone out with their mother the four smallest their ages from three and a half years to eleven all in blade were gathered round the hearth their own little subjects at length joined them without lighting a candle this is the last night that we shall sleep here in the house where we were bom she said quickly we ought to think of it t we they all became silent with the of their age they were ready to burst into tears at the picture of she had up though all the day hitherto they had been rejoicing in the idea of a new place	45
changed the subject sing to me she said the convert what shall we sing anything you know i don t mind there was a momentary pause it was broken first by one little note then a second voice strengthened it and a third and a fourth in in with words they had learnt at the here we suffer grief and pain here we meet to part again in heaven we part no more the four sang on with the of persons who had long ago settled the question and there being no mistake about it felt that further thought was not required with features strained hard to the they continued to regard the centre of the flickering fire the notes of the youngest over into the pauses of the rest turned from them and went to the window again darkness had now fallen without but she put her face to the pane as though to peer into the gloom it was really to hide her tears if she could only believe what the children were singing if she were only sure how different all would now be how confidently she would leave them to providence and their future kingdom but in of that it her to do something to be their providence for to as to not a few millions of others there was ghastly satire in the poet s lines not in utter but trailing of glory do we come to her and her like birth itself was an ordeal of degrading personal whose nothing in the result seemed to justify and at best could only in the shades of the wet road she soon discerned her mother with tall lu and mrs s up to the door and opened it op the d i see the tracks of a horse outside the window said somebody called no said the children by the fire looked gravely at her and one murmured why the gentleman a horseback he didn t call said he spoke to me in passing who was the gentleman asked her mother your husband no he ll never never come answered in stony then who was it oh you needn t ask you ve seen him before and so have i ah what did he say asked curiously i win tell you when we are settled in our lodgings at to morrow every word it was not her husband she had said yet a consciousness that in a physical sense this man alone was her husband seemed to weigh on her more and more during the small hours of the next morning while it was still dark near the were conscious of a disturbance of their night s rest by noises continuing till daylight noises as certain to in this particular week of the month as the voice of the in the third week of the same they were the of the general removal the passing of the empty and to fetch the goods of the families for it was always by the vehicle of the farmer who required his services that the hired man was conveyed to his destination that this might be accomplished within the day was the explanation of the so soon after midnight the aim of the being to reach the door of the by six o clock when the of at once began but to and her mother s household no such anxious farmer sent his team they were only women they were not regular they were not particularly required anywhere hence they had to hire a at their own expense and got nothing sent it was a relief to when she looked out of the window that morning to find that though the weather was windy and it did not rain and that the had come a wet lady day was a whidi removing families never forgot damp furniture damp damp clothing accompanied it and left a train of ills her mother lu and were of the d awake but the younger children were let sleep on the four by the thin light and the was taken in hand it proceeded with some cheerfulness a friendly neighbour or two assisting when the large articles of furniture had been packed in position a circular nest was made of the beds and in which and the children were to sit through the journey after there was a long delay before the horses were brought these having been during the but at length about two o clock the whole was under way the cooking pot swinging from the of the mrs and family at the top the matron having in her lap to prevent injury to its works the head of the dock which at any exceptional of the struck one or one and a half in hurt tones and the next eldest girl walked alongside till they were out of the village they had called on a few neighbours that morning and the previous evening and some came to see them off all wishing them well though in their secret hearts hardly expecting welfare possible to such a family harmless as the were to all except themselves soon the began to ascend to higher ground and the wind grew with the change of level and soil the day being the sixth of april the met many other with families on the summit of the load which was built on a well nigh principle as peculiar probably to the rural as the to the bee the of the arrangement was the family which with its shining handles and finger marks and domestic evidences thick upon it stood in front over the tails of the shaft horses in its erect and natural position like some ark of the that they were bound to carry reverently some of the were lively some mournful the convert some were stopping at the doors of where in due time the also drew up to	45
the building known as the d aisle beneath which the huge lay over the of the was a beautifully window of many lights its date being the century it was called the d window and in the upper part could be discerned like those on s old seal and spoon drew the curtains round the bed so as to an excellent tent of it and put the smaller children inside if it comes to the worst we can sleep there too for one night she said but let us try further on and get something for the to eat o what s the use of your at gentlemen if it leaves us like this accompanied by lu and the boy she again ascended the little lane which secluded the church from the as soon as they got into the street they beheld a man on horseback gazing up and down ah i m looking for you i he said up to them this is indeed a family gathering on the historic spot it was d where is he asked personally had no liking for she signified the direction of the church and went on d saying that he would see them again in case they should be still in their search for shelter of which he had just heard the convert when they had gone d rode to the inn and shortly after came out on foot in the left with the children inside the remained talking with them awhile till seeing that no more could be done to make them comfortable just then she walked about the churchyard now beginning to be by the shades of nightfall the door of the church was and die entered it for the first time in her life within the window which the stood were the of the family covering in their dates several centuries they were altar shaped and plain their being and broken their torn from the the holes remaining like holes in a sand of all the that she had ever received that her people were extinct there was none so forcible as this she drew near to a dark stone on which was inscribed b lt tm did not read church latin like a cardinal but she knew that this was the door of her and that the tall knights of whom her father had in his cups lay inside she turned to passing near an altar tomb the oldest of them all on which was a figure in the dusk she had not noticed it before and would hardly have noticed it now but for an odd fancy that the moved as soon as she drew close to it she discovered all in a moment that the figure was a living person and the shock to her sense of not having been alone was so violent that she was quite overcome and sank down nigh to fainting not however till she had recognized d in the form he off the and supported her i saw you come in he said smiling and got up op the d there not to interrupt your meditations a family gathering is it not these old fellows us here listen he stamped with his heel heavily on the floor whereupon there arose a hollow echo from below that shook them a bit i ll warrant he continued and you thought i was the mere stone of one of them but no the old order the little finger of the sham d can do more for you than the whole of the real underneath now command me what shall i do go away she i win i ll look for your mother said he but in passing her he whispered mind this you ll be yet when he was gone she bent down upon the entrance to the and said why am i on the wrong side of this door in the meantime and had onward with the of the in the direction of their land of the egypt of some other family who had left it only that morning but the girls did not for a long time think of where they were going their talk was of angel and and s persistent lover whose connection with her previous history they had partly heard and partly guessed ere this t as though she had never known hun afore said his having won her once makes all the difference in the world be a thousand if he were to her away again mr can never be anything to us and why should we grudge him to her and not try to mend this quarrel if he could on y know what straits she s put to and what s hovering round he might come to take care of his own could we let him know they thought of this all the way to their the convert tion but the bustle of re establishment in their new place took up all their attention then but when they were settled a month later they heard of s approaching return though they had learnt nothing more of upon that agitated anew by their to him yet disposed to her the penny ink bottle they shared and a few lines were between the two girls d sir look to your wife if you do love her as much as she do love you for e is sore put to by an enemy in the shape of a friend sir there is one near her who ought to be away a woman should not be try d beyond her strength and continual will wear away a stone ay more a diamond from two well this they addressed to angel at the only place they had ever heard him to be connected with after which they continued in a mood of exaltation at their own generosity which made them sing in hysterical and	45
their separation and her dignified sense of their total was shown not much less by this than by the hardships she had chosen to of which he now learnt for the first time rather than apply to his father for more funds from this place they told him had gone without due notice to the home of her parents on the other side of and it therefore became necessary to find mrs she had told him she was not now at but had been curiously as to her actual address and the only course was to go to and inquire for it the farmer who had been so with was quite smooth to and lent him a horse and man to drive him towards the he had arrived in being sent back to for the limit of a day s journey with that horse was reached would not accept the loan of the farmer s vehicle for a further distance than to the outskirts of the and sending it back with the man who had driven him he put up at an inn and next day entered on foot the region wherein was the spot of his dear s birth it was as yet too early in the year for much colour to appear in the gardens and foliage the so called spring was but winter with a thin coat of and it was of a parcel with his expectations the house in which had passed the years of her childhood was now inhabited by another family who had never known her the new were in the garden taking as much interest in their own doings as if the had never passed its time in with the histories of others beside which to him the histories of these were but as a tale told fulfilment by an idiot they walked about the garden paths with thoughts of their own concerns entirely uppermost bringing their actions at every moment into collision with the dim ghosts behind them talking as though the time when lived there were not one whit in story than now even the spring birds sang over their heads as if they thought there was nobody missing in particular on inquiry of these precious to whom even the name of their was a failing memory learned that john was dead that his widow and children had left declaring that they were going to live at but instead of doing so had gone on to another place they mentioned by this time the house for ceasing to contain and hastened away from its hated presence without once looking back his way was by the field in which he had first beheld her at the dance it was as bad as the house even worse he passed on through the churchyard where amongst the new he saw one of a somewhat superior design to the rest the inscription ran thus in memory of john rightly d of the once powerful family of that name and direct through an illustrious line from sir pagan d one of the knights of the conqueror died march loth i how are the fallen some man apparently the had observed standing there and drew nigh ah sir now that s a man who didn t want to lie here but wished to be carried to where his ancestors be and why didn t they respect his wish oh no money bless soul sir why there i wouldn t wish to say it everywhere but even this for all the flourish wrote upon en is not paid for ah who put it up the man told the name of a in the village of the d and on leaving the churchyard called at the s house he found that the statement was true and paid the bill this done he turned in the direction of the the distance was too long for a walk but felt such a strong desire for that at first he would neither hire a conveyance nor go to a line of railway by which he might eventually reach the place at however he foimd he must hire but the way was such that he did not enter s place till about seven o clock in the evening having traversed a distance of over twenty miles since leaving the village being small he had little difficulty in finding mrs s which was a house in a walled garden remote from the main road where she had away her clumsy old furniture as best she could it was plain that for some reason or other she had not wished him to visit her and he felt his call to be somewhat of an intrusion she came to the door herself and the light from the evening sky fell upon her face this was the first time that had ever met her but he was too to observe more than that she was still a handsome woman in the garb of a respectable widow he was obliged to explain that he was s husband and his object in coming there and he did it awkwardly enough i want to see her at once he added you said you would write to me again but you have not done so because she ve not come home said do you know if she is well i don t but you ought to sir said she i admit it where is she staying from the beginning of the interview had disclosed her embarrassment by keeping her hand to the side of her cheek i don t know exactly where she is staying she answered she was but where was she fulfilment well she is not there now in her she paused again and the younger children had by this time crept to the door where pulling at his mother s skirts the murmured is this the gentleman who is going to	45
marry he has married her whispered go inside saw her efforts for and asked do you think would wish me to try and find her if not of course i don t think she would are you e i am e she wouldn t he was turning away and then he thought of s tender letter i am sure she would he retorted passionately i know her better than you do that s very likely sir for i have never really known her please tell me her address mrs in kindness to a lonely wretched man s mother again swept her cheek with her hand and seeing that he suffered she at last said in a low voice she is at ah where there has become a large place they say i don t know more than i have said for myself i was never there it was apparent that spoke the truth in this and he pressed her no further are you in want of anything he said gently no sir she replied we are fairly well provided for without entering the house turned away there was a station three miles ahead and paying off his coachman he walked thither the last train to left shortly after and it bore on its wheels at eleven o clock that night having a bed at one of the hotels and his address to his father immediately on his arrival he walked out into the streets of it was too late to call on or inquire for any one and he reluctantly postponed his purpose till the morning but he could not retire to rest just yet this fashionable watering place with its eastern and its western stations its its groves of pines its and its covered gardens was to angel like a fairy place suddenly created by the stroke of a and allowed to get a little dusty an eastern tract of the enormous waste was dose at hand yet on the very verge of tiiat piece of antiquity such a glittering novelty as this pleasure city had chosen to spring up within the space of a mile from its outskirts every of the soil was every channel an undisturbed british not a sod having been turned there since the days of the yet the had grown here suddenly as the prophet s and had drawn hither by the midnight lamps he went up and down the winding ways of this new world in an old one and could discern between the trees and against the stars the lofty roofs chimneys and towers of the numerous fanciful of which the place was composed it was a city of detached a lounging place on the english channel and as seen now by night it seemed even more imposing than it was fulfilment the sea was near at hand but not it murmured and he thought it was the pines the pines murmured in precisely the same tones and he thought they were the sea where could possibly be a cottage girl his young wife all this wealth and fashion the more he pondered the more was he puzzled were there any cows to milk here there certainly were no fields to till she was most probably engaged to do something in one of these large houses and he sauntered along looking at the chamber windows and their lights going out one by one and wondered which of them might be hers conjecture was useless and just after twelve o clock he entered and went to bed before putting out his light he s impassioned letter sleep however he could not so near her yet so far from her and he continually lifted the window blind and regarded the backs of the opposite houses and wondered behind which of the she at that moment he might almost as well have sat up all night in the morning he arose at seven and shortly after went out taking the direction of the chief post office at the door he met an coming out with letters for the morning delivery do you know the address of a mrs asked angel the shook his head then remembering that she would have been likely to continue the use of her maiden name said r a miss this also was strange to the addressed there s visitors coming and going every day as you know sir he said and without the name of the house tis impossible to find em one of his comrades hastening out at that moment the name was repeated to him op the d i know no name of but there is the name of d at the said the second s it cried pleased to think that she had to the real what place is the a lodging house tis all lodging houses here bless ee received directions how to find the house and hastened thither arriving with the the though an ordinary villa stood in its own grounds and was certainly the last place in which one would have expected to find lodgings so private was its appearance if poor was a servant here as he feared she would go to the back door to that and he was to go thither also however in his doubts he turned to the front and rang the hour being early the landlady herself opened the door for d or mrs d yes then passed as a married woman and he felt glad even though she had not adopted his name will you kindly tell her that a relative is anxious to see her it is rather early what name shall i give sir angel mr angel no angel it is my christian name she ll understand i ll see if she is awake he was shown into the front room the and looked out through the spring curtains at the uttle lawn and the and	45
was now in silence but from the drawing room there came sounds all that she could at first distinguish of them was one syllable continually repeated in a low note of moaning as if it came from a soul bound to some wheel o o or then a silence then a heavy sigh and again o o or the landlady looked through the only a small space of the room inside was visible but within that space came a comer of the breakfast table which was already spread for the meal and also a chair beside over the seat of the chair s face was bowed her posture being a kneeling one in front of it her hands were clasped over her head the skirts of her dressing gown and the of her night gown flowed upon the floor behind her and her feet from which the slippers had fallen upon the carpet it was from her lips that came the murmur of despair then a man s voice from the adjoining bedroom what s the matter she did not answer but went on in a tone which was a rather than an exclamation and a rather than a mrs only catch a portion and then my dear dear husband came home to me and i did not know it and you had used your cruel persuasion upon me you did not stop using it no you did not stop my little sisters and brothers and my mother s needs they were the things you moved me by and you said my husband would never come back never and you me and said what a i was to expect him and at last i believed you and gave way and then he came back now he is gone gone a second time and i have lost him now for ever and he fulfilment will not love me the bit ever any more only hate me o yes i have lost him now again because of you in with her head on the chair she turned her face towards the door and mrs see the pain upon it and that her lips were bleeding from the of her teeth upon them and that the long lashes of her closed eyes stuck in wet to her cheeks she continued and he is dying he looks as if he is dying and my sin will kill him and not kill me o you have torn my life all to pieces made me be what i prayed you in pity not to make me be again my own true husband will never never o god i can t bear this i cannot there were more and words from the man then a sudden rustle she had sprung to her feet mrs thinking that the speaker was coming to rush out of the door hastily retreated down the stairs she need not have done so however for the door of the sitting room was not opened but mrs felt it e to watch on the landing again and entered her own parlour below she hear nothing through the floor although she listened intently and thereupon went to the kitchen to finish her interrupted breakfast coming up presently to the front room on the ground floor she took up some sewing waiting for her to ring that she might take away the breakfast which she meant to do herself to discover what was the matter if possible overhead as she sat she now hear the floor boards slightly as if some one were walking about and presently the movement was explained by the rustle of garments against the the opening and the closing of the front door and the form of passing to the gate on her way into the street she was dressed now in the of a well to do lady in which she had arrived with the sole addition that over her hat and black feathers a veil was drawn of the d mrs had not been able to catch any of farewell temporary or otherwise between her tenants at the door above might have quarrelled or mr d might still be asleep for he was not an early she went into the back room which was more especially her own apartment and continued her sewing there the lady did not return nor did the gentleman ring his bell mrs pondered on the delay and on what probable relation the visitor who had called so early bore to the couple upstairs in reflecting she back in her chair as she did so her eyes glanced casually over the ceiling till they were by a spot in the middle of its white surface which she had never noticed there before it was about the size of a when she first observed it but it speedily grew as large as the palm of her hand and then she perceive that it was red the white with this scarlet blot in the midst had the appearance of a gigantic ace of hearts mrs had strange of she got upon the table and touched the spot in the ceiling with her fingers it was damp and she fancied that it was a blood stain descending from the table she left the parlour and went upstairs intending to enter the room overhead which was the at the back of the drawing room but woman as she had now become she could not bring herself to attempt the handle she listened the dead silence was broken only by a regular beat mrs hastened downstairs opened the front door and ran into the street a man she knew one of the workmen employed at an adjoining villa was passing by and she begged him to come in and go upstairs with her she feared something had happened to one of her the workman assented	45
and followed her to ttie landing fulfilment she opened the door of the drawing room and stood back for him to pass in entering herself behind him the room was empty the breakfast a substantial of coffee eggs and a cold ham lay spread upon the table untouched as when she had taken it up excepting that the carving knife was missing she asked the man to go through the into the adjoining room he opened the doors entered a step or two and came back almost instantly with a rigid face my good god the gentleman in bed is dead i think he has been hurt with a knife a lot of blood has run down upon the floor the alarm was soon given and the house which had lately been so quiet with the tramp of many footsteps a surgeon among the rest the wound was small but the point of the blade had touched the heart of the victim who lay on his back pale fixed dead as if he had scarcely moved after the of the blow in a quarter of an hour the news that a gentleman who was a temporary visitor to the town had been in his bed spread through every street and villa of the popular watering place meanwhile angel had walked along the way by which he had come and entering his hotel sat down over the breakfast staring at he went on eating and drinking unconsciously till on a sudden he demanded his bill having paid which he took his dressing bag in his hand the only luggage he had brought with him and went out at the moment of his departure a was handed to him a few words from his mother stating that they were glad to know his address and informing him that his brother had proposed to and been accepted by mercy chant up the paper and followed the route to the station reaching it he found that there would be no train leaving for an hour and more he sat down to wait and having waited a quarter of an hour felt that he could wait there no longer broken in heart and he had nothing to hurry for but he wished to get out of a town which had been the scene of such an experience and turned to walk to the first station and let the train pick him up there the highway that he followed was open and at a little distance dipped into a valley across which it could be seen running from edge to edge he had traversed the greater part of this depression and was climbing the western when pausing for breath he unconsciously looked back why he did so he not say but something seemed to him to the act the like of the road diminished in his rear as far as he could see and as fulfilment he gazed a moving spot on the white of its perspective it was a figure waited with a dim sense that somebody was trying to overtake him the form descending the incline was a woman s yet so entirely was his mind blinded to the idea of his wife s following him that even when she came nearer he did not recognize her under the totally changed attire in which he now beheld her it was not till she was quite close that he believe her to be i saw you away from the station just before i got there and i have been following you all this way she was so pale so breathless so quivering in every muscle that he did not ask her a single question but seizing her hand and pulling it within his arm he led her along to avoid meeting any possible he left the high road and took a under some fir trees when they were deep among the moaning boughs he stopped and looked at her angel she said as if waiting for this do you know what i have been running after you for to tell you that i have killed him a pitiful white smile lit her face as she spoke what said he thinking from the strangeness of her manner that she was in some delirium i have done it i don t know how she continued still i owed it to you and to myself angel i feared long ago when i struck him on the mouth with my glove that i might do it some day for the trap he set for me in my simple youth and his wrong to you through me he has come between us and ruined us and now he can never do it any more i never loved him at all angel as i loved you you know it don t you you believe it you didn t come back to me and i was obliged to go back to him why did you go away why did you when i loved you so op the d i can t think why you did it but i don t blame you only angel will you forgive me my sin against you now i have killed him i thought as i ran along that you would be sure to forgive me now i have done that it came to me as a shining light that i should get you back that way i could not bear the loss of you any longer you don t know how entirely i was unable to bear your not loving me say you do now dear dear husband say you do now i have killed him i do love you o i do it is all come back he said his arms round her with pressure but how do you mean you have killed him i mean that i have she murmured in	45
a reverie what bodily is he dead yes he heard me about you and he bitterly me and called you by a foul name and then i did it my heart could not bear it he had me about you before and then i dressed myself and came away to find you by degrees he was inclined to believe that she had faintly attempted at least what she said she had done and horror at her impulse was mixed with amazement at the strength of her affection for himself and at the strangeness of its quality which had apparently extinguished her moral sense altogether unable to realize the gravity of her conduct she seemed at last content and he looked at her as she lay upon his shoulder weeping with happiness and wondered what obscure strain in the d blood had led to this if it were an there flashed through his mind that the family tradition of the coach and murder might have arisen because the d had been known to do these things as well as his confused and excited ideas could reason he supposed that in the moment of mad grief of which she spoke her mind had lost its balance and plunged her into this abyss it was very terrible if true if a temporary fulfilment sad but anyhow here was this deserted wife of his this passionately fond woman clinging to him without a suspicion that he would be anything to her but a protector he saw that for him to be otherwise was not in her mind within the region of the possible tenderness was absolutely dominant in at last he kissed her with his white lips and held her hand and said i will not desert you i will protect you by every means in my power dearest love whatever you may have done or not have done they then walked on under the trees turning head every now and then to look at him worn and as he had become it was plain that she did not discern the least in his appearance to her he was as of old all that was perfection personally and mentally he was still her her even his sickly face was beautiful as the morning to her affectionate regard on this day no less than when she first beheld him for was it not the face of the one man on earth who had loved her purely and who had believed in her as pure with an instinct as to possibilities he did not now as he had intended make for the first station beyond the town but plunged stiu farther under the which here for miles each clasping the other the waist they over the dry bed of fir needles thrown into a vague atmosphere at the consciousness of being together at last with no living soul between them that there was a corpse thus they proceeded for several miles till herself looked about her and said timidly are we going anywhere in particular i don t know dearest why i don t know well we might walk a few miles further and when it is evening find lodgings somewhere or other in a lonely cottage perhaps can you walk well op the d o yes i could walk for ever and ever with your arm round me upon the whole it seemed a good thing to do thereupon they quickened their pace avoiding and following obscure tending more or less northward but there was an in their movements throughout the day neither one of them seemed to consider any question of effectual escape disguise or long concealment their every idea was temporary and like the plans of two children at mid day tliey drew near to a roadside inn and have entered it with him to get something to eat but he persuaded her to remain among the trees and bushes of this half half part of the tiu he come back her clothes were of recent fashion even the ivory handled that she carried was of a shape in the retired spot to which they had now wandered and the cut of such articles would have attracted attention in the settle of a tavern he soon returned with food enough for half a dozen people and two bottles of wine enough to last them for a day or more any emergency arise they sat down upon some dead boughs and shared their meal between one and two o clock they packed up the remainder and went on again i feel strong enough to walk any distance said she i think we may as well steer in a general way towards the interior of the country where we can hide for a time and are less likely to be looked for than near the coast remarked later on when they have forgotten us we can make for some port she made no reply to this beyond that of grasping him more tightly and straight inland they went though the season was an english may the weather was serenely bright and during the afternoon it was fulfilment quite warm through the latter miles of their walk their had taken them into the depths of the new forest and towards evening turning the comer of a lane they perceived behind a brook and bridge a large board on which was painted in white letters this desirable mansion to be let furnished particulars following with directions to apply to some london agents passing through the gate they could see the house an old brick of regular design and large accommodation i know it said it is court you can see that it is shut up and grass is growing on the drive some of the windows are open said just to air the rooms i suppose all these rooms empty and we without a roof to our heads you are getting tired	45
my he said we ll stop soon and kissing her sad mouth he again led her he was growing weary likewise for they had wandered a dozen or fifteen miles and it became necessary to consider what they should do for rest they looked from afar at isolated cottages and little and were inclined to approach one of the latter when their hearts failed them and they off at length their gait dragged and they stood still could we sleep under the trees she asked he thought the season advanced i have been thinking of that empty mansion we passed he said let us go back towards it again they their steps but it was half an hour before they stood without the entrance gate as earlier he then requested her to stay where e was whilst he went to see who was within she sat down among the bushes within the gate and crept tow s the house his absence lasted some considerable time and when he returned was wildly anxious not for herself but for him op the d he had found out from a boy that there was only one old woman in charge as and she only came there on fine days from the hamlet near to open and shut the windows she would come to shut them at sunset now we can get in through one of the lower windows and rest said he under his escort she went forward to the main front whose windows like excluded the of the door was reached a few steps further and one of the windows beside it was open in and pulled in after hun except the hall the rooms were all in darkness and they ascended the staircase up here also the shutters were tightly closed the being done for this day at least by opening the hall window in front and an upper window behind the door of a large chamber felt his way across it and parted the shutters to the width of two or three inches a shaft of dazzling sunlight glanced into the room revealing heavy old fashioned furniture crimson and an enormous four post along the head of which were carved running figures apparently s race rest at last said he setting down his bag and the parcel of they remained in great till the should have come to shut the windows as a precaution putting themselves in total darkness by the shutters as before lest the woman should open the door of their chamber for any casual reason between six and seven o clock she came but did approach the wing they were in they heard the windows fasten them lock the door and away then again stole a of light from the window and they shared another meal till by they were enveloped in the shades of night which they had no candle to the night was strangely solemn and still in the small hours she whispered to him the whole story of how he had walked in his sleep with her in his arms across the stream at the imminent risk of both their lives and laid her down in the stone at the abbey he had never known of that till now why didn t you tell me next day he said it might have prevented much misunderstanding and woe don t think of what s past said she i am not going to think outside of now why should we who knows what to morrow has in store but it apparently had no sorrow the morning was wet and and rightly informed that the only opened the windows on fine days ventured to creep out of their chamber and explore the house leaving asleep there was no food on the premises but there was water and he took advantage of the fog to from the mansion and fetch tea bread and butter from a shop in a little place two miles beyond as also a small tin kettle and spirit lamp that they might get fire without smoke his re entry awoke her and they on what he had brought they were to stir abroad and the day passed and the night following and the next and next till almost without their being aware five days had slipped by in absolute seclusion not a sight or sound of a being disturbing their such as it was the s weather were of the d their only events the birds of the new forest their only company by consent they hardly once spoke of any incident of the past subsequent to their wedding day the gloomy intervening time seemed to sink into chaos over which the present and prior times closed as if it never had been whenever he suggested that they should leave their shelter and go forwards towards or she showed a strange to move why we put an end to all that s sweet and lovely she what must come will come and looking through the all is trouble outside there inside here content he peeped out also it was quite true within was affection error forgiven outside was the inexorable and and she said pressing her cheek against his i fear that what you think of me now may not last i do not wish to your present feeling for me i would rather not i would rather be dead and buried when the comes for you to despise me so that it may never be known to me that you despised me i cannot ever despise you i also hope that but considering what my life has been i cannot see why any man should sooner or later be able to help me how mad i was yet formerly i never could bear to hurt a fly or a worm and the sight of a bird in a cage used often to make me cry they remained yet another day in the	45
night the dull cleared and the was that the old at the cottage awoke early the brilliant sunrise made her unusually brisk she decided to open the mansion immediately and to air it thoroughly on such a day thus it occurred that having arrived and opened the lower rooms before six o clock she ascended to the and was about to turn the handle of the one wherein they fulfilment lay at that moment she fancied she could hear the breathing of persons within her slippers and her antiquity had rendered her progress a noiseless one so far and she made for instant retreat then that her hearing might have deceived her she turned anew to the door and softly tried the handle the lock was out of order but a piece of furniture had been moved forward on the inside which prevented her opening the door more than an inch or two a stream of morning light through the fell upon the faces of the pair wrapped in profound slumber s lips being parted like a half opened flower near his cheek the was so struck with their innocent appearance and with the novelty of s gown hanging across a chair her silk stockings beside it the pretty and the other habits in which she had arrived because she had none else that her first indignation at the of and gave way to a momentary over this genteel as it seemed she the door and withdrew as softly as she had come to go and with her neighbours on the odd discovery not more than a minute had elapsed after her when woke and then both had a sense that something had disturbed them though they could not say what and the feeling whidi it grew stronger as soon as he was dressed he narrowly the lawn through the two or three inches of i think we will leave at once said he it is a fine day and i cannot help somebody is about the house at any rate the woman will be sure to come to day she assented and putting the room in order they took up the few articles that belonged to them and departed noiselessly when they had got into the forest she turned to take a last look at the house of the d ah happy house good bye she said my life can only be a question of a few weeks why should we not have stayed there don t say it we shall soon get out of this district altogether we ll continue our course as we ve begun it and keep straight north nobody will think of looking for us there we shall be looked for at the ports if we are sought at all when we are in the north we will get to a port and away having thus persuaded her the plan was pursued and they kept a bee line northward their long repose at the house lent them walking power now and towards mid day they found that they were approaching the city of which lay directly in their way he decided to rest her in a of trees during the afternoon and push onward imder cover of at dusk purchased food as usual and their night march began the boundary between upper and mid being crossed about eight o dock to walk across country without much r ard to roads was not new to and she showed her old in the performance the city ancient they were obliged to pass through in order to take advantage of the town bridge for crossing a large river that them it was about midnight when they went along the deserted streets lighted by the few lamps keeping off the pavement that it might not echo their footsteps the graceful pile of cathedral architecture rose dimly on their left hand but it was lost upon them now once out of the town they followed the road which after a few miles plunged across an open plain though the sky was dense with a diffused light from some fragment of a moon had hitherto helped them a little but the moon had now sunk the clouds seemed to settle almost on their heads and the night grew as dark as a cave however they found their way along keeping as much on the turf as fulfilment possible that their tread might not which it was easy to do there being no hedge or fence of any kind all around was open loneliness and black solitude over which a stiff breeze blew they had proceeded thus two or three miles further when on a sudden became conscious of some vast dose in his front rising sheer from the grass they had almost struck themselves against it what monstrous place is this said angel it said she he listened the wind upon the edifice produced a tune like the note of some gigantic one harp no other sound came from it and lifting his hand and advancing a step or two felt the surface of the structure it seemed to be of solid stone without joint or carrying his fingers onward he found that what he had come in contact with was a colossal pillar by stretching out his left hand he could feel a similar one adjoining at an indefinite height overhead something made the black sky which had the semblance of a vast the pillars they carefully entered beneath and between the echoed their soft rustle but they seemed to be still out of doors the place was drew her breath fearfully and angel perplexed said what can it be feeling sideways they encountered another pillar square and as the first beyond it another and another the place was all doors and pillars some connected above by continuous a very temple of the winds he said the next pillar was isolated others composed a others were prostrate their	45
forming a wide enough for a carriage and it was soon obvious that they made up a forest of of the d upon the grassy expanse of the plain the couple advanced further into this of the n ht till they stood in its midst it is said the heathen temple you mean yes older than the centuries older than the d well what shall we do darling we may find shelter further on but really tired by this time flung herself upon an that lay dose at hand and was sheltered from the wind by a pillar owing to the action of the sun during the preceding day the stone was warm and dry in comforting contrast to the rough and chill grass around which had her skirts and shoes i don t want to go any further angel she said stretching out her hand for his can t we bide here i fear not this spot is visible for miles by day although it does not seem so now one of my mother s people was a shepherd now i think of it and you used to say at that i was a heathen so now i am at home he knelt down beside her outstretched form and put his lips upon hers sleepy are you dear i think you are lying on an altar i like very much to be here she murmured it is so solemn and lonely after my great happiness with nothing but the sky above my face it seems as if there were no folk in the world but we two and i wish there were not except lu thought she might as well rest here till it get a little lighter and he flung his overcoat upon her and sat down by her side angel if anything happens to me will you watch over lu for my sake she asked when they had listened a long time to the wind among the pillars i will s fulfilment she is so good and simple and pure o angel i wish you would marry her if you lose me as you will do shortly o if you would if i lose you i lose all and she is my sister that s nothing dearest people marry sister law continually about and lu is so gentle and sweet and she is growing so beautiful o i could share you with her when we are spirits if you would train her and teach her angel and bring her up for your own self she has all the best of me without the bad of me and if she were to become yours it would almost seem as if death had not divided us well i have said it i won t mention it again she ceased and he fell into thought in the far north east sky he could see between tiie pillars a level streak of light the uniform of black was lifting bodily uke the lid of a pot letting in at the earth s edge the coming day against which the tower ing and began to be defined did they sacrifice to god here asked she no said he who to i believe to the sim that lofty stone set away by itself is in the direction of the sim which will presently rise behind it this reminds me dear she said you remember you never would interfere with any belief of mine before we were married but i knew your mind all the same and i thought as you thought not from any reasons of my own but because you thought so tell me now angel do you think we shall meet again after we are dead i want to know he kissed her to avoid a reply at such a time o angel i fear that means no said she with a suppressed sob and i wanted so to see you again so much so much what not even you and i angel who love each er so well of the d like a greater than himself to the critical question at the critical time he did not answer and they were again silent in a minute or two her breathing became more regular her clasp of his hand relaxed and she fell asleep the band of silver along the east horizon made even the distant parts of the great plain appear dark and near and the whole enormous landscape bore that impress of reserve and hesitation which is usual just before day the eastward pillars and their stood up against the light and the great flame shaped beyond them and the stone of sacrifice presently the night wind died out and the quivering little pools in the cup like hollows of the stones lay still at the same time something seemed to move on the verge of the dip eastward a mere dot it was the h d of a man approaching them from the hollow beyond the stone wished they had gone onward but in the circumstances decided to remain quiet the figure came straight towards the circle of pillars in which they were he heard something behind him the brush of feet turning he saw over the prostrate another figure then before he was aware another was at hand on the right under a and another on the left the dawn shone full on the front of the man westward and could discern from this that he was tall and walked as if trained they all closed in with evident her story then was true springing to his feet he looked around for a weapon loose stone means of escape anything by this time the nearest man was upon him it is no use sir he said there are sixteen of us on the plain and the whole country is reared let her finish her sleep he implored in	45
w brothers new york and london by tim or d x by by thomas hardy printed in the united of america by general preface to the and poems in accepting a proposal for a definite edition of these productions in prose and verse i have found an opportunity of the novels under heads that show the author s aim if not his achievement in each book of the series at the date of its composition sometimes the aim was lower than at other times sometimes where the intention was high force of circumstances among which the chief were the necessities of magazine publication compelled a great or slight of the original plan of a few however of the longer novels and of many of the shorter tales it may be assumed that they stand to day much as they would have stood if no accidents had the channel between the writer and the public that many of them if any stand as they would stand if written now is not to be supposed in the of these for which the name of the novels was adopted and is still retained the first group is called novels of character and and contains those which approach most nearly to works also one or two which whatever their quality in some few of their may claim a in general treatment and detail the second group is distinguished as and a sufficiently descriptive definition the third class novels of ingenuity show a not disregard of the probable in the chain of vii s s by general preface events and depend for their interest mainly on the incidents themselves they might also be as experiments and were written for the simply though despite the of their fable some of their scenes are not without fidelity to life it will not be supposed that these differences are distinctly perceptible in every page of every volume it was inevitable that and should occur in all moreover as it was not thought desirable in every instance to change the arrangement of the shorter stories to which readers have grown accustomed certain of these may be found under to which an acute judgment might deny it has sometimes been conceived of novels that their action on a scene as do many though not all of these that they cannot be so in their exhibition of as novels wherein the scenes cover large of in which events figure amid towns and cities even wander over the four quarters of the globe i am not concerned to argue this point further than to suggest that the conception is an one in respect of the passions but i would state that the limits of the stage here trodden were not absolutely forced upon the writer by circumstances he forced them upon himself from judgment i considered that our magnificent from the in dramatic literature f sufficient room for a large proportion of its action in an extent of their country not much larger than the half dozen here under the old name of that the domestic emotions have in with as much intensity as in the palaces of europe and that anyhow there was quite enough in for one man s literary purpose so far was i possessed by this idea that i kept within the when it would have been easier to them and give more features to the narrative viii by general preface thus though the people in most of the novels and in much of the v are in a province bounded on the north by the thames on the south by the english channel on the east by a line running from island to forest and on the west by the coast they were meant to be and essentially those of any and every place where thought s the slave of life and life time s fool beings in whose hearts and minds that which is apparently local should be really but whatever the success of this intention and the value of these novels as of humanity they have at least a humble quality of which i may be justified in reminding the reader though it is one that was and at the dates represented in the various things were like that in the inhabitants lived in certain ways engaged in certain occupations kept alive certain customs just as they are shown doing in these pages and in such i have often been reminded of s remarks on the trouble to which he was put and the he was obliged to make to some detail though the labour was one which would bring him no praise unlike his achievement however on which an error would as he says have brought if these country customs and and had been detailed nobody would have discovered such errors to the end of time yet i have inquiries to correct tricks of memory and against temptations to in order to preserve for my own satisfaction a fairly true record of a vanishing life it is advisable also to state here in response to inquiries from readers interested in landscape and e old english architecture that the description of these by general preface has been done from the real that is to say has something real for its basis however treated many features of the first two kinds have been given under their existing names for instance the of or hill hill high down the devil s kitchen cross in hand long ash lane lane giant s hill lane and the rivers or and are of course well known as such and the further idea was that large towns and points tending to mark the outline of such as bath the start bill etc should be named clearly the scheme was not greatly but whatever its value the names remain still in respect of places described under or ancient names in the novels	45
for reasons that seemed good at the time of writing them and kept up in the poems people have affirmed in print that they clearly recognize the such as in in in plain in the great plain chase in the chase in in hill in wool bridge in or lane in lane in in port maiden in chalk a farm near in ash in milton abbey in abbey in s in in in in oxford in reading in in in in and so on subject to the above given that no detail is by general preface that the of named towns and villages was only suggested by certain real places and from descriptions of them i do not contradict these keen hunters for the real i am with their statements as at least an indication of their interest in the scenes thus much for the novels turning now to the verse to myself the more individual part of my literary i would say that unlike some of the fiction nothing interfered with the writer s freedom in respect of its form or content several of the poems indeed many were produced before novel writing had been thought of as a but few saw the light till all the novels had been published the limited stage to which the majority of the latter confine their has not been to here in the same proportion the dramatic part especially having a very broad theatre of action it may thus relieve the treated in the prose if such relief be needed to be sure one might argue that by surveying europe from a celestial point of vision as in the that continent becomes a province a an even a mere garden and hence is made to to the principle of the novels however far it their region but that may be as it will the few volumes filled by the verse cover a producing period of some eighteen years first and last while the seventeen or more of novels represent about four and twenty years one is reminded by this in time and result how much more and expression becomes when given in form than when shaped in the language of prose one word on what has been called the present writer s philosophy of life as exhibited more particularly in this section of his by general preface views on the whence and the wherefore of things have never been advanced by this pen as a consistent philosophy nor is it likely indeed that imaginative writings extending over more than forty years exhibit a scientific theory of tjie universe even if it had been attempted of that universe concerning which owns to the thought that possibly there exists no comprehension of it anywhere but such has been attempted and the sentiments in the following pages have been stated truly to be mere impressions of the moment and not convictions or that these impressions have been condemned as as if that were a very wicked shows a it must be obvious that there is a higher characteristic of philosophy than or than or even than the of these critics which is truth existence is either ordered in a certain way or it is not so ordered and which best with experience are removed above all comparison with other which do not so so that to say one view is worse than other views without proving it the of a false view being better or more expedient than a true view and no can make that stand on its feet for it a denied to humanity and there is another consideration natures find their tongue in the presence of spectacles some natures become at tragedy some are made by comedy and it seems to me that to whichever of these aspects of life a writer s instinct for expression the more readily to that he should allow it to respond that before a side of things he remains need not be assumed to mean that he remains xii by general preface it was my hope to add to these volumes of verse as many more as would make a fairly comprehensive of the whole i had wished that those in dramatic ballad and narrative form should include most of the cardinal situations which occur in social and public life and those in form a round of experiences of some completeness but the petty done the undone the more written the more seems to remain to be written and the night i realize that these hopes and plans except possibly to the extent of a volume or two must remain t h by by of the d a pure faithfully presented note to the first edition the main portion of the following story appeared with slight in the newspaper other chapters more especially addressed to readers in the review and the national observer as sketches my thanks are to the and of those for me now to piece the and limbs of the novel together and print it complete as originally written two years ago i will just add that the story is sent out in all sincerity of purpose as an attempt to give artistic form to a true of things and in respect of the book s opinions and sentiments i would a any too genteel reader who cannot endure to have said what everybody nowadays thinks and feels to remember i a well worn sentence of st s if an come out of the truth better is it that the come than that the truth be concealed t h november by by preface to the fifth and later this novel being one wherein the great campaign of the heroine begins after an event in her experience which has usually been treated as fatal to her part of or at least as the ending	45
of her and hopes it was quite contrary to that the public should welcome the book and agree with me in holding that there was something more to be said in fiction than had been said about the shaded side of a weu known catastrophe but the spirit in which of the d has been by the readers of england and america would seem to prove that the plan of la down a story on the lines of opinion instead of making it to square with the merely of society is not altogether a wrong one even when in so and partial an achievement as the present for this i cannot refrain from expressing my thanks and my regret is that in a world where one so often in vain for friendship where even not to be misunderstood is felt as a kindness i shall never meet in person these readers male and female and shake them by the hand i include amongst them the by far the majority who have so generously welcomed the tale their words show that they like the others have only too largely repaired my defects of by their own imaginative xvii by op the d nevertheless though the novel was intended to be neither nor but in the parts to be representative simply and in the to be oftener charged with impressions than with convictions there have been both to the matter and to the rendering the more austere of these maintain a conscientious difference of opinion concerning among other things subjects fit for art and reveal an inability to associate the idea of the sub title with any but the artificial and meaning which has resulted to it from the of civilization they the meaning of the word in nature together with au claims upon it not to mention the spiritual interpretation afforded by the finest side of their own christianity others on which are no more than an assertion that the novel the views of life at the end of the nineteenth century and not those of an earlier and generation an assertion which i can only hope may be well let me repeat that a novel is an impression not an and there the matter must rest as one is reminded by which occurs in the letters of to on judges of this class they are those who seek only their own ideas in a representation and prize that which should be as higher than what is the cause of the therefore lies in the very first principles and it would be utterly impossible to come to an understanding with them and again as soon as i observe that any one when judging of poetical representations considers anything more important than the inner necessity and truth i have done with him in the words to the first edition i suggested the possible advent of the genteel person who would not be able to endure something or other in these pages that person duly appeared among the in one case he felt upset that by preface to later it was not possible for him to read the book through three times owing to my not having made that critical effort which alone can prove the salvation of such an one in another he objected to such vulgar articles as the devil s a lodging house carving knife and a shame bought appearing in a respectable story in another place he was a gentleman who turned christian for half an hour the better to express his grief that a phrase about the should have been used the same innate compelled him to excuse l e author in words of pity that one cannot be too thankful for he does but give us of his best i can assure this great critic that to exclaim against the gods singular or is not an original sin of mine as he seems to imagine true it may have some local originality though if shakespeare were an authority on history which perhaps he is not i could show that the sin was introduced into as early as the itself says in otherwise king of that as flies to wanton boys are we to the gods they kill us for their sport the remaining two or three of were of the sort whom most writers and readers would gladly forget professed literary who put on their convictions for the occasion modem of sworn ever on the watch to prevent the half success from becoming the whole success later on who plain and grow personal under the name of the great historical method however they may have causes to advance privileges to guard traditions to keep going some of which a mere who writes down how the things of the world strike him without any intentions whatever has overlooked and may by pure have run foul of when in the least mood per by r of the d some passing perception the of a dream hour would if generally acted on cause such an considerable inconvenience with respect to position interests family servant ox ass or neighbour s wife he therefore hides his personality nd a s shutters and cries shame so is the world thronged that any shifting of positions even the best advance somebody s such often begin in sentiment and such sentiment sometimes begins in a novel the foregoing remarks were written during the early career of this story when a spirited public and private criticism of its points was still fresh to the feelings the pages are allowed to stand for what they are worth as something once said but probably they would not have been written now even in the short time which has elapsed since the book was first published some of the critics who provoked the reply have gone down into silence as if to remind one of the in of both their say and mine the present edition	45
of this novel contains a few pages that have never appeared in any previous edition when the detached were collected as stated in the preface of these pages were overlooked though they were in the original they occur in chapter x respecting the sub title to which allusion was made above i may add that it was at the last moment after reading the final proofs as being the estimate left in a candid mind of the heroine s xx by preface to later character an estimate that nobody would be likely to dispute it was disputed more than anything else in the book but there it stands the novel was first published complete in three volumes in november t h march by by contents phase the first the maiden i xi i phase the second maiden no xii xv phase the third the xvi xxiv m phase the fourth the consequence xxv phase the fifth the woman pays phase the sixth the phase the seventh by by illustrations the amid the north eastern of the beautiful of or in which the fields are never brown and the springs never dry lay the village of typical of the home of the family is six miles from and contains a fine church of century the original name of the village was that name from the white clay or which is abundant there and which after exposure to the air into the church and many of the houses are built of it the river pacing p the valley the valley of the great the valley in which and butter grew to the plain so well watered by the river or in which lay the at where worked as a maid and was married to angel was situated a few miles from not far from the of the and roads on the southern margin of heath house p it is to house the idea of which is taken from house the old house formerly one of the homes of the d that angel and go after their marriage the house is situated near station clearly seen from the train as it enters the station of wool in this house may be found the two old by illustrations traits of s ancestors mentioned in the novel the legend the d coach is also attached to this house court pacing p the house in the new forest known as courts in which and angel take refuge after the murder of d seems to have been drawn from s court situated in the of in the days of this house was the residence of dame who was taken it to her execution at the house is said to be still haunted by her spirit map o the of the novels and poems end of vol by of the d by by phase the first the maiden by by phase the first the maiden i on an evening in the latter part of may a man was walking homeward from to the v age of in the adjoining of or tlie pair of legs that carried him were and there was a bias in his gait which inclined him somewhat to the left of a straight line he occasionally gave a smart nod as if in confirmation of some opinion though he was not thinking of anything in particular an empty egg basket was upon his arm the nap of his hat was a patch being quite worn away at its brim where his thumb came in taking it off presently he was met by an elderly parson on a gray mare who as he rode a wandering tune good night fee said the man with the basket good night sir john said the parson the after another pace or two halted and turned round now sir your pardon we met last market day on this road about this time and i good night and you made reply good night sir john as now i did said the parson and once before that near a month ago i may have then what might your meaning be in calling me by op the d sir john these different times when i be plain jack the the parson rode a step or two nearer it was only my whim he said and after a moment s hesitation it was on account of a discovery i made some little time ago whilst i was hunting up for the new history i am parson the of lane don t you really know that you are the representative of the ancient and family of the d who derive their descent from sir pagan d that renowned knight who came from with william the conqueror as appears by battle abbey roll never heard it before sir well it s true throw up your chin a moment so that i may catch the of your face better yes that s the d nose and chin a little your was one of the twelve knights who assisted the lord of in in his conquest of branches of your family held over all this part of england their names appear in the pipe rolls in the time of king in the reign of king john one of them was rich enough to give a to the knights and in edward the second s time your was summoned to westminster to attend the great there you declined a little in s time but to no serious extent and in charles the second s reign you were made knights of the royal oak for your l aye there have been generations of sir among you and if were hereditary like a as it practically was in old times when men were from father to son you would be sir john now ye don t say so in short concluded the parson his leg with his there s hardly such another family in england	45
by the maiden my eyes and isn t there said and here have i been knocking about year after year from pillar to post as if i was no more than the commonest in the parish and how long this news about me been pa son un the clergyman explained that as far as he was aware it had quite died out of knowledge and could hardly be said to be known at au his own had begun on a day in the preceding spring when having been engaged in tracing the of the d family he had observed s name on his and had thereupon been led to make inquiries about his father and grandfather till he had no doubt on the subject at first i resolved not to disturb you with such a useless piece of information said he however our impulses are too strong for our judgment sometimes i thought you might perhaps know something of it all the while weu i have heard once or twice tis true that my family had seen better days afore they came to but i took no notice o t thinking it to mean that we had once kept two horses where we now keep only one i ve got a silver spoon and a seal at home too but what s a spoon and seal and to think that i and these d were one flesh all the time twas said that my t had secrets and didn t care to talk of where he came from and where do we raise our smoke now parson if i may make so bold i mean where do we d live you don t live anywhere you are extinct as a county family that s bad yes what the family call extinct in the male line that is gone down gone under then where do we lie at sub rows and rows of by op the d you in your with your under and where be our family and estates you haven t any oh no lands neither none though you once had em in as i said for your family consisted of branches in this county there was a seat of yours at and another at and another at and another at and another at and we ever come into our own again that i can t tell and what had i better do about it sir asked after a pause oh nothing nothing except yourself with the thought of how are the mighty fallen it is a fact of some interest to the local historian and nothing more there are several families among the of this county of almost equal lustre good night but you ll turn back and have a of beer wi me on the strength o t pa son there s a very pretty in tap at the pure drop though to be sure not so good as at s no thank you not this evening you ve had enough already concluding thus the parson rode on his way with doubts as to his discretion in this curious bit of lore when he was gone walked a few steps in a reverie and then sat down upon the grassy bank by the roadside his basket before him in a few minutes a youth appeared in the distance walking in the same direction as that which had been pursued by the latter on seeing him held up his hand and the lad quickened his pace and came near boy take up that basket i want ee to go on an errand for me by the maiden the like frowned who be you then john to order me about and call me boy you know my name as well as i know yours do you do you that s the secret that s the secret now obey my orders and take the message i m going to charge ee wi well i don t mind you that the secret is that i m one of a noble race it has been just found out by me this present afternoon p m and as he made the announcement from his sitting position stretched himself out upon the bank among the the lad stood before and contemplated his length from crown to toe sir john d that s who i am continued the prostrate man that is if knights were which they be tis recorded in history all about me dost know of such a place lad as i ve been there to fair well under the church of that city there lie t a city the place i mean when i was there twas a little one eyed sort o place never you mind the place boy that s not the question before us under the ch of that there parish ue my ancestors hundreds of em in coats of mail and jewels in t lead weighing tons and tons there s not a man in the county o south that s got and nobler in his family than i oh now take up that basket and on to and when you ve come to the pure drop inn tell em to send a horse and carriage to me to carry me and in the bottom o the carriage they be to put a o in a small bottle and chalk it up to my account and when you ve done by of the d that on to my house with the basket and tell my wife to put away that washing because she needn t finish it and wait till i come as i ve news to tell her as the lad stood in a attitude put his hand in his pocket and produced a shilling one of the few that he possessed here s for your labour lad this made	45
a difference in the young man s estimate of the position yes sir john thank ee anything else i can do for ee john tell em at that i like for supper well lamb s if they can get it and if they can t black pot and if they can t get that well will do yes sir john the boy took up the basket and as he set out the notes of a brass band were heard from the direction of the village what s that said not on o i tis the women s club walking sir john why your da ter is one o the members to be sure i d quite forgot it in my thoughts of greater things weu on to will ye arid order that carriage and maybe i ll drive round and inspect the club the lad departed and lay waiting on the grass and in the evening sim not a soul passed that way for a long while and the faint notes of the band were the only sounds audible within the rim of blue hills by ii the village of lay amid the north eastern of the of or an and secluded region for the most part as yet by or landscape painter though within a four journey from london it is a whose acquaintance is best made by it from the of the hills that surround it except perhaps during the of an into its recesses in bad weather is apt to dissatisfaction with its narrow and ways this fertile and sheltered tract of in which the fields are never brown and the springs never dry is bounded on the south by the bold ch ridge that embraces the of hill high and down the traveller from the coast who after northward for a score of miles over downs and corn lands suddenly reaches the verge of one of these is and delighted to behold extended like a map beneath him a absolutely from that which he has passed through behind him the hills are open the sun down upon fields so large as to give an character to the landscape the lanes are white the hedges low and the atmosphere here in the valley the world seems to be constructed upon a smaller and more delicate scale the fields are mere so reduced that from this height appear a of dark green threads by op the d the paler of the grass the atmosphere beneath is and is so tinged with that what artists call the middle distance also of that hue while the horizon beyond is of the deepest lands are few and limited with but slight exceptions the prospect is a broad rich mass of grass and trees minor hills and within the major such is the of the district is of historic no less than of interest the was known in former times as the forest of white from a curious legend of king henry iii s reign in which the killing by a certain thomas de la of a beautiful white which the king had run down and spared was made the occasion of a heavy fine in those and till comparatively recent times the country was wooded even now traces of its earlier condition are to be found in the old oak and of timber that yet survive upon its slopes and the hollow trees that shade so many of its pastures the forests have departed but some old customs of their shades remain many however linger only in a or disguised form the may day dance for instance was to be discerned on the afternoon under notice in the guise of the club or walking as it was there called it was an interesting event to the younger inhabitants of though its real interest was not observed by the in the ceremony its lay less in the of a custom of walking in procession and dancing on each than in the members being solely women in men s clubs such were though less uncommon but either the natural shyness of the softer sex or a sarcastic attitude on the part of male relatives had such women s clubs as remained if any other did of this their glory and by the maiden the of alone lived to the local it had walked for hundreds of years if not as benefit club as of some sort and it walked still the ones were all dressed in white a gay from old style days when cheerfulness and may time were days before the habit of taking long views had reduced emotions to a monotonous average j their first exhibition of themselves was in a march of two and two round the parish ideal and real slightly as the sim lit up their figures against the green hedges and d house fronts for though the whole troop wore white garments no two were alike among them sane approached pure some had a some worn by the older characters which had possibly lain by folded for many a year inclined to a tint and to a style in addition to the distinction of a white frock every woman and girl carried in her right hand a willow and in her left a bunch of white flowers the of the former and the selection of the latter had been an operation of personal care there were a few middle aged and even elderly women in the train their silver hair and wrinkled faces by time and trouble having almost a grotesque certainly a pathetic appearance in such a situation in a true view perhaps there was more to be gathered and told of each anxious and experienced one to whom the years were drawing nigh when she should say i have no pleasure in than of her comrades but let the elder be passed over here for those whose the life quick and	45
bank and opened the gate what are you going to do a ed tlie i am inclined to go and have a fling with them why not all of us just for a minute or two it will not detain us long no no nonsense said the first t dancing in public with a troop of country suppose we should be seen come along or it will be dark before we get to and there s no place we can sleep at nearer than that besides we must get through another chapter of a to before we turn in now i have taken the trouble to bring the book a right overtake you and in five minutes don t stop i give my word that i will the two elder reluctantly left him and walked on taking their brother s to relieve him in following and tiie youngest entered the field is a thousand he said gallantly to two or three of the girls nearest him as soon as there was a pause in the dance where are your partners my they ve not left off work yet answered one of the they ll be here by and by till then will you be one sir certainly but what s one among so many better than none tis melancholy work facing and footing it to one of own sort and no and at all now pick and choose h don t be so for ard said a girl the young man thus invited glanced them over and attempted some but as the group were all so new to him he could not very well exercise by of the d it he took almost the first that came to hand which was not the speaker as she ha expected nor did it happen to be record the d did not help in her life s battle as yet even to the e of to her a over the heads of the so much for t ood by the name of the girl whatever it was has not been handed down but she was envied by all as the first who enjoyed the luxury of a masculine partner that evening yet such was the force of example that the village who had not hastened to enter the gate while no intruder was in the way now dropped in quickly and soon the couples became with rustic youth to a marked till at length the woman in the was no longer to foot it on the masculine side of the figure the church dock struck when suddenly the student said that he must leave he had been forgetting him he had to join his companions as he f out of the dance his eyes lighted on whose own large wore to tell the truth the faintest aspect of that he had not chosen her he too was sorry then that owing to her he had not observed her and with that in his mind he left the pasture on account of his long he started in a down the lane westward and had soon passed the hollow and the next rise he had not yet overtaken his brothers but he paused to get and looked back he see the white figures of the girls in the green whirling about as they had whirled when he was among them they seemed to have quite forgotten him already all of them except perhaps one this white shape stood apart by the hedge alone m her position he knew it to be the pretty maiden with whom i by the maiden he had not danced trifling as the matter was he yet instinctively felt that she was hurt by his he wished that he had asked her he wished that he had inquired her name she was so modest so expressive she had looked so soft in her thin white gown that he felt he had acted however it could not be helped and turning and bending himself to a rapid walk he dismissed the subject from his mind by ill as for she did not easily the incident from her consideration she had no spirit to again for a long time though she might have had plenty of partners but ah they did not speak so nicely as the strange young man had done it was not till the rays of the sun had absorbed the young stranger s retreating figure on the hill that she shook off her temporary sadness and answered her would be partner in the affirmative she remained with her comrades till dusk and with a certain zest in the dancing though heart whole as yet she enjoyed treading a measure purely for its own sake j little when she saw the soft the bitter sweets the pleasing pains and the agreeable of those who had been and won what she herself was capable of in that kind the struggles and of the lads for her hand in a were an amusement to her no more and when became fierce she them she might have stayed even later but the incident of her s odd appearance and returned upon the girl s mind to make her anxious and wondering what had become of him she dropped away from tiie dancers and bent her steps towards the end of the village at which the parental cottage lay while yet many score yards off other sounds than she had quitted became au ble to her sounds that she knew well so well they were a regular series of from the interior of the house occasioned by the violent rocking of a cradle z by thb maiden upon a stone floor to which movement a feminine voice kept time by singing in a vigorous the favorite of the spotted cow i saw her lie do own in yon green come lover and	45
tell you where the cradle and the song would cease simultaneously for a moment and an exclamation at high est pitch would take the place of the melody god bless thy eyes and thy cheeks and thy cheery mouth and s and every bit o thy blessed body after this tiie rocking and tiie singing would and the spotted cow proceed as before so matters stood when opened the door and paused upon the mat within it surveying the scene the interior in spite of the melody struck upon the girl s senses with an unspeakable the holiday of the field the white gowns the the willow the whirling movements on the green the flash of gentle sentiment towards the stranger to the yellow melancholy of this one spectacle what a step besides the jar of contrast there came to her a chill self reproach that she had not returned sooner to help her mother in these instead of herself doors there stood her mother amid the group of children as had left her hanging over the monday washing tub which had now as always lingered on to the end of l e week out of that tub had come the day before felt it with a dreadful sting of remorse the very white frock upon her back which she had so carelessly about the skirt on the grass which had been wrung up and by her mother s own hands as usual mrs was balanced on one foot beside the tub the other engaged in the by of the d business of rocking her youngest child the cradle had done hard duly for so many years under the weight of so many children on that tone floor that they were worn nearly flat in consequence of which a huge jerk accompanied each swing of the cot flinging the baby from side to side like a s as mrs excited by her song trod the with all the spring that was left in her after a long day s in the knock nick knock went the cradle the candle flame stretched itself tall and began up and down the water from the matron s and the song galloped on to the end of tiie verse mrs r her daughter the while even now when with a young family was a passionate lover of tune no floated into from tiie outer world but s mother caught up its in a week there still faintly beamed from tiie woman s features something of the freshness and even the of her youth rendering it probable that the personal which could boast of were in main part her mother s gift and therefore ril rock the cradle for ee said the daughter gently or i ll take off my best frock and you up i thought you had finished long ago her mother bore no ill will for leaving the house work to her single handed efforts for so long indeed her at any time but slightly the lack of s assistance whilst her instinctive plan for of her labours lay in them to night however she was even in a mood than usual was a a an exaltation in the look which the girl could not by the maiden i m glad you ve come her mother said as soon as the last note had passed out of her i want to go and fetch your father but what s more n that i want to tell ee what have happened y u be f ss enough my when th st mrs habitually spoke the dialect her daughter who had passed the sixth standard in the under a london trained mistress spoke two languages the dialect at home more or less ordinary english abroad and to persons of quality since i ve been away asked ay had it anything to do with father s making such a of himself in carriage this afternoon why did er i felt inclined to sink into the ground with shame we ve been f to be the greatest in the whole county reaching all back long before s time to the days of the pagan with monuments and and and and the lord knows what all in saint charles s days we was made knights o the royal oak our real name being d don t that make your bosom twas on this account that your father rode home in the not because he d been drinking as people supposed vm glad of that will it do us any good mother o yes tis that great things may come o t no doubt a of of own rank will be down here in their carriages as soon as tis known your father learnt it on his way from and he has been telling me the whole of the matter where is father now asked suddenly her mother gave information by way of answer he called to see the doctor to day in it is not consumption at all it seems it is fat round his heart a says there it is like this by of the d as she spoke curved a thumb and forefinger to the pe of the letter c and used the other forefinger as a at the present moment he says to your father your heart is enclosed all round there and all round there this space is still open a says as soon as it do meet so mrs closed her fingers into a circle complete off you will go like a mr a says you mid last ten years you mid go off in ten months or ten days looked alarmed her father possibly to go behind the eternal so soon notwithstanding this sudden greatness but where is father she asked again her mother put on a look now don t you be bursting out angry the poor man he	45
felt so after his by the pa son s news that he went up to s half an ago he do want to get up his strength for his journey tomorrow with that load of b must be delivered family or no he ll have to start shortly after twelve to night as tiie distance is so long get up his strength said the tears to her eyes o my god go to a public house to get up his strength and you as well agreed as he mother her rebuke and her mood seemed to fill the whole room and to impart a look to the furniture and candle and children playing about and to her mother s face no said the latter i be not agreed i have been waiting for ee to bide and keep house while i go to fetch him i ll go o no you see it would be no use did not she knew what her s objection meant mrs s jacket and bonnet were already hanging upon a chair by her side in readiness for this the d by the maiden for which the matron more than its necessity and take the fortune to the continued rapidly wiping her hands and the garments the com eat fortune was an old thick volume which lay on a table at her elbow so worn by that the mai had reached the edge of the type took it up and her mother started this going to hunt up her husband at the inn was one of mrs s still in the and of children to discover him at s to sit there for an hour or two by his side and dismiss all thought and care of the children during the interval made her happy a sort of an glow came over life then troubles and other re ties took on themselves a sinking to mere mental phenomena for serene contemplation and no longer stood as pressing which body and soul the not immediately within sight seemed rather bright and desirable than otherwise the incidents of daily ufe were not without and in their aspect there she felt a little as she had u to feel when she sat by her now wedded husband in the same spot during his shutting her eyes to his defects of character and regarding him only in his ideal as lover being left alone with the younger children went first to the with the fortune telling book and stuffed it into the a curious fear of this volume on the part of her mother prevented her ever allowing it to stay in the house all night and hither it was brought back whenever it had been consulted between the mother with her fast lumber of folk lore dialect and and the daughter with her trained national and standard by op the d edge under an infinitely code there was a gap of two hundred years as ordinarily understood when they were together the and the ages were returning along the garden path mused on what her mother could have to ascertain from the book on this particular day e guessed the recent discovery to bear upon it but did not divine that it solely concerned herself this however she busied herself with the linen dried during the in company with her nine year old brother and her sister of twelve and a half called li a lu the ones being put to bed there was an of four years and more between and the next of the the two who had filled the gap having died in their infancy and this lent her a attitude when she was alone with her next in to came two more hope and modesty then a boy of three and then the baby who had just completed his first year all these yoimg souls were passengers in the ship entirely on tlie judgment of the t wo for their pleasures their necessities their health even their existence if the heads of the household chose to sail into difficulty disaster starvation disease d death thither were these half dozen little under compelled to sail with them six helpless creatures who had never been asked if they wished for life on any terms much less if they wished for it on such hard conditions as were involved in being of the house of some people would like to know whence the poet whose philosophy is in these days deemed as profound and as his song is and pure gets his authority for speaking of nature s holy plan it grew later and neither father nor mother looked out of the door and took by the maiden a mental through the village was shutting its eyes candles and lamps were being put out everywhere she could inwardly behold the and the extended hand her mother s simply meant one more to fetch began to perceive that a man in health who proposed to start on a journey before one in the morning ought not to be at an inn at late hour his ancient blood she said to her little brother do you put on your hat you t afraid and go up to s and see what has gone wi and mother the boy jumped promptly from his seat and opened the door and the night swallowed him up half an hour passed yet again neither man woman nor child returned like his parents seemed to have been and caught by the inn i must go myself she said lu then went to bed and them in started on her way up the dark and crooked lane or street not made for hasty progress a street laid out before inches of land had and when one handed sufficiently the day by iv s the single at this end of the long and broken village could only boast of	45
an off license hence as nobody could l ally drink on the premises the amount of accommodation for con was strictly limited to a little board about six inches wide and two yards long fixed to the garden by pieces of wire so as to form a ledge on this board thirsty strangers deposited their cups as they stood in the road and drank and threw the dr s on the dusty ground to the pattern of and wished they could have a seat inside thus the strangers but there were also local customers who felt the same wish and where there s a will there s a way in a large bedroom upstairs the window of which was thickly with a great shawl lately discarded by the landlady mrs were gathered on this evening nearly a dozen persons all seeking all old inhabitants of the nearer end of and of this retreat not only did the distance to the pure drop the tavern at the further part of the dispersed village render its accommodation practically for at this end but the far more serious question the quality of the liquor confirmed the opinion that it was better to drink with in a comer of the than with the other landlord in a wide house a gaunt four post which stood in the room afforded sitting space for several persons gathered round three of its sides a more men had by the maiden themselves on a chest of drawers another rested on the oak carved two on the another on the stool and all were somehow seated at their ease the stage of mental comfort to which they had arrived at this hour was one wherein their expanded beyond their skins and spread their warmly through the room in this process the chamber and its furniture grew more and more dignified and luxurious the shawl hanging at the window took upon itself the richness of the brass handles of the chest of drawers were as golden and the carved bed posts seemed to have some with the magnificent pillars of solomon s temple mrs having quickly walked hither ward after parting from opened the front door crossed the downstairs room which was in deep gloom and then the stair door like one whose fingers knew the tricks of the well her ascent of the crooked staircase was a slower process and her face as it rose into the light above the last stair encountered the gaze of all the party assembled in the bedroom being a few private friends ive asked in to keep up walking at my own expense the land lady exclaimed at the sound of footsteps as as a repeating the while she peered over the stairs h tis you mrs how you frightened me i thought it might be some sent by government mrs was welcomed with glances and by the remainder of the and turned to where her husband sat he was to himself in a low tone i be as good as some folks here and there i ve got a great family vault at sub and finer than any man in i ve something to tell ee that s come into my head about that a grand whispered his cheerful by op the d wife here john don t ee see me she him while he looking through her as through a window pane went with his hush don t ee sing so loud my good man said the landlady in case any member of the ment should be passing and take away my he s told ee what s happened to us i suppose asked mrs yes in a way d ye think there s any mon hanging by it ah that s the secret said however tis well to be kin to a coach even if you don t ride in en she dropped her public voice and continued in a low tone to her husband i ve been thinking since you brought the news that there s a great rich lady out by on the edge o the chase of the name of d e hey what s that said sir john she repeated the information that lady must be our relation she said and my is to send to claim kin there is a lady of the name now you mention it said pa son didn t think of that but she s nothing beside we a junior branch of us no doubt long since king s day while this question was being discussed neither of the pair noticed in their that little am had crept into the room and was awaiting an opportunity of asking them to return she is rich and she d be sure to take notice o the maid continued mrs and be a very good thing i don t see why two branches o one family should not be on visiting terms yes and we ll all kin said brightly from under the and well all go and see her when has gone to live with her and we ll ride in her coach and wear black clothes how do you come here child what nonsense be by the maiden ye go away and play on the stairs till father and mother be ready well ought to go to this other member of our family she d be sure to win the lady would and likely enough lead to some noble gentleman marrying her in short i know it how i tried her fate in the fortune and it brought out that very thing you should ha seen how pretty she looked to day her skin is as as a s what says the maid herself to going i ve not asked her she don t know there is any such lady relation yet but it would certainly put her in the way of a	45
grand marriage and she won t say nay to going is queer but she s at bottom leave her to me though this conversation had been private sufficient of its import reached the understanding of those around to suggest to them that the had concerns to talk of now than common folks had and that their pretty eldest daughter had fine prospects in store is a fine figure o fun as i said to myself to day when i her round parish with the rest observed of the elderly in an but must mind that she don t get green in floor it was a local phrase which had a peculiar meaning and there was no reply the conversation became and presently other footsteps were heard crossing the room below being a few private friends asked in to night to keep up at my own expense the landlady had rapidly re used the she kept on hand for before she recognized that the was even to her mother s gaze the girl s young features a by of the d looked sadly out of place amid the which floated here as no medium for wrinkled middle age and hardly was a flash from s dark eyes needed to make her father and mother rise from their seats hastily finish their ale and descend the stairs behind her mrs s caution following their footsteps no noise please if ye u be so good my or i mid lose my and be and i don t know what all night t ye they went home together holding one arm of her father and mrs the other he had in truth drunk very little not a fourth of the quantity which a carry to on a sunday afternoon without a in his or but the weakness of sir john s constitution made mountains of his petty sins in this kind on reaching the fresh air he was sufficiently unsteady to incline the row of three at one moment as if they were marching to london and at another as if they were marching to bath which produced a effect frequent enough in families on and like most effects not quite so comic after all the two women disguised these forced excursions and as well as they could from their cause and from and from themselves and so they approached by degrees their own door the head of the family bursting suddenly into his former refrain as he drew near as if to his soul at sight of the of his present residence i ve got a at don t be so silly said his wife yours is not the only family that was of count in days look at the ai and and the themselves gone to seed a most as much as you though you was bigger folks than they that s true thank god i was never of no family and have nothing to be ashamed of in that way by the maiden don t you be so sure o that from your tis my belief youve disgraced selves more than any o us and was kings and queens outright at one time turned the subject by saying what was far more prominent in her own mind at the moment than thoughts of her i am afraid father won t be able to take the journey with the to morrow so early i i shall be all right in an hour or two said it was eleven o clock before the family were all in bed and two o clock next morning was the latest hour for starting with the if they were to be delivered to the in before the saturday market began the way thither lying by bad roads over a distance of between twenty and thirty miles and the horse and being of the at half past one mrs came into the large bedroom where and all her little brothers and sisters slept the poor man can t go she said to her eldest daughter whose great eyes had opened the moment her mother s hand touched the door sat up in bed lost in a vague between a dream and this information but somebody must go she replied it is late for the already will soon be over for the year and if we put off taking em till week s market the call for em will be past and they ll be thrown on our hands mrs looked unequal to the emergency some young perhaps go one of them who were so much after dancing with ee yesterday she presently suggested o no i wouldn t have it for the world declared proudly and letting everybody know the reason such a thing to be ashamed of i think could go if could go with me to me company by op the d her mother at length agreed to this arrangement was aroused from his deep sleep in a comer of the same apartment and made to put on his clothes while still mentally in the other world mean had hastily dressed herself and the t rain lighting a lantern went out to the stable the little was already laden and the girl led out the horse prince only a degree less than the vehicle the poor creature looked round at the night at the lantern at their two as if he could not believe that at that hour when every living thing was intended to be in shelter and at rest he was call upon to go out and labour they put a stock of candle ends into the lantern the latter to the off side of the load and directed e horse onward walking at his shoulder at first during the parts of the way in order not to an of so uttle vigour to cheer themselves as well as they they made an artificial morning	45
with the lantern some bread and butter and their own conversation the real morning being far from come as he more fully awoke for he had moved in a sort of trance so far began to talk of the strange shapes assumed by the various dark objects against the sky of this tree that looked like a raging tiger s from a of that which resembled a giant s h id when they had passed the little town of under its thick brown they reached higher ground still higher on their left the elevation called or well nigh the highest in south swelled into the by its the long road was fairly level for some distance onward they mounted in front of the and grew he said in a preparatory tone after a silence by the maiden yes t you glad that we ve become not glad but you be glad that you m going to marry a gentleman what said lifting her face that our great will help ee to marry a gentleman i our great relation we have no such relation what has put that into your head i heard em talking about it up at s when i went to find father there s a rich lady of our family out at and mother said that if you claimed kin with the lady she d put ee in the way of marrying a gentleman his sister became abruptly still and into a pondering silence talk on rather for the pleasure of utterance than for so that his sister s abstraction was of no he back against the and with face made observations on the stars whose cold were beating amid the black hollows above in serene from these two of human life he asked how far away those were and whether god was on the other side of them but ever and anon his childish to what impressed his imagination even more deeply than the wonders of creation if were made rich by marrying a gentleman would she have money enough to buy a spy glass so large that it would draw the stars as near to her as the renewed subject which seemed to have the whole family filled with impatience never mind that now she exclaimed did you say the stars were worlds yes all like ours i don t know but i think so they sometimes by op the d seem to be like the apples on our tree most of them splendid and sound a few do we live on a one or a one a one tis very unlucky that we didn t pitch on a sound one when there were so many more of em yes is it like that really said turning to her much impressed on of this rare information how would it have been if we had pitched on a sound one well father wouldn t have and about as he does and wouldn t have got too to go this journey and mother wouldn t have been wa rs washing and never getting finished and you would have been a lady ready made and not have had to be made rich by marrying a gentleman o don t don t talk of that any more left to his reflections soon grew drowsy was not skilful in the management of a horse but she thought that she could take upon herself the entire conduct of the load for the present and allow to go to sleep if he wished to do so she made him a sort of nest in front of the in such a manner that he could not fall and taking the reins into her own hands on as before prince required but slight attention lacking energy for superfluous movements of any sort with no longer a companion to her fell more deeply into reverie than ever her back leaning against the the mute procession past her of trees and hedges became attached to fantastic scenes outside and the occasional heave of the wind became the sigh of some immense sad soul with the universe in space and with history in time then examining the of events in her own by the maiden life she seemed to see the vanity of her father s pride the gentlemanly awaiting herself in her mother s fancy to see him as a personage laughing at her poverty and her everything grew more and more extravagant and she no longer knew how time passed a sudden jerk shook her in her seat and awoke from the sleep into which she too had fallen they were a long way further on than when she had lost consciousness and the had stopped a hollow groan anything she had ever heard in her life came from the front followed by a shout of there the lantern hanging at her had gone out but another was shining in her face much brighter than her own had been something terrible had happened the harness was entangled with an object blocked the way in consternation down and discovered the truth the groan had proceeded from her father s poor horse prince the morning with its two noiseless wheels along these lanes like an arrow as it always did had driven into her slow and the pointed shaft of the cart had entered the breast of the prince like a sword and from the wound his l e s blood was in a stream and falling with a hiss into the road in her despair sprang forward and put her hand upon the hole with the only result that she became from face to skirt with the crimson drops then she stood helplessly looking on prince also stood firm and motionless as long as he could till he suddenly sank down in a heap by this time the mail cart man had joined her and dragging and the hot form of	45
but he was already dead and seeing that nothing more could be done immediately the cart man to his own animal which was by op the d you was on the wrong side he said i am bound to go on with the mail bags so that the best thing for you to do is to bide here with your load i ll send somebody to help you as soon as i can it is getting daylight and you have nothing to fear he mounted and sped on his way while stood and waited the atmosphere turned pale the birds shook themselves in the hedges arose and the lane showed all its white features and showed hers still the huge pool of blood in front of her was already assuming the of and when the sun rose a hues were reflected from it prince lay alongside still and his eyes half open the hole in his chest looking scarcely large enough to have let out all that had animated him tis all my doing all mine the girl cried at the spectacle no excuse for me none what will mother and father live on now she shook the child who had slept soundly through the whole disaster we can t go on with our load prince is killed when realized all the of fifty years were on his young face why i danced and laughed only yesterday she went on to herself to think that i was such a fool tis because we be on a star and not a sound one isn t it murmured through his tears in silence they waited through an interval whidi seemed endless at length a sound and an approaching object proved to them that the driver of the had been as good as his word a farmer s man from near came up leading a strong he was to the of in the place of prince and the load taken on towards the evening of the same day saw the empty reach again the spot of the accident prince had lain by the maiden there in the ditch since the morning but the place of the blood pool was still visible in the middle of the road though scratched and scraped over by passing all that was left of prince was now hoisted into the he had formerly hauled and with his hoofs in the air and his shoes shining in the setting sunlight he the eight or nine miles to had gone back earlier how to break the news was more than she could think it was a relief to her tongue to find from the faces of her parents that they already knew of their loss though this did not lessen the self reproach which she continued to heap upon herself for her but the very of the household rendered the misfortune a less one to them than it would have been to a striving family though in the present case it meant ruin and in the other it only have meant inconvenience in the countenances there was nothing of the red wrath that would have burnt upon the girl from parents more ambitious for her welfare nobody blamed as she blamed herself when it was discovered that the and would give only a very few shillings for princess because of his rose to the occasion no said he i won t sell his old body when we d was knights in the land we didn t sell our for cat s meat let em keep their shillings he ve served me well in his lifetime and i won t part from him now he worked harder the next day in digging a grave for prince in the garden than he had worked for months to grow a crop for his family when the hole was ready and his wife tied a rope round the horse and dragged him up the path towards it the children following in funeral train and lu sobbed hope and modesty discharged their in loud which echoed from the walls and by of the d when prince was tumbled in they gathered round the grave the bread had been taken away from them what would they do is he gone to heaven asked between the sobs then began to in the earth and the children cried anew all except her face was dry and pale as though she regarded herself in the light of a by the business which had mainly depended on the horse became forthwith dis if not loomed in the distance was what was called a slack twisted fellow he had good strength to work at times but the times could not be relied on to with the hours of and having been to the regular toil of the day he was not particularly persistent when they did so meanwhile as the one who had dragged her parents into this was silently wondering what she could do to help them out of it and then her mother her scheme we must take the wi the downs said she and never could your high blood have been found out at a more called for moment you must try your friends do ye know that there is a very rich mrs d on the outskirts o the chase who must be our relation you must go to her and kin and ask for some help in our trouble i shouldn t care to do that says if there is such a lady be enough for us if she were friendly not to expect her to give us help you could win her round to anything my dear besides perhaps there s more in it than you know of i ve what i ve heard good the oppressive sense of the harm had done led to be more than she might otherwise have been to the maternal wish but she could not	45
understand why her mother should find such s by op the d in contemplating an enterprise of to her such doubtful profit her mother might have made in and have discovered that this mrs d was a lady of virtues and charity but s pride made the part of poor relation one of particular to her i d rather try to get work she murmured you can settle it said his wife turning to where he sat in the if you say she ought to go she will go i don t like my children going and making themselves to strange he i m the head of the noblest branch o the family and i ought to live up to it his reasons for away were worse to than her own objection to going well as i killed the horse mother she said mournfully i suppose i ought to do something i don t mind going and seeing her but you must leave it to me about for and don t go thinking about her m a match for me it is silly very well said observed her father sent y who said i had such a thought asked i fancy it is in your mind mother but i ll go rising early next day she walked to the hill town called and there took advantage of a van which twice in the week ran from eastward to passing near the parish in which the vague and mysterious mrs d had her residence s route on this memorable morning lay amid the north of the v e in which she had been and in which her life had unfolded the of was to her the world and its inhabitants the races thereof from the gates and of she had looked down its length in the wondering days of infancy and what had been mystery to her then was not much less than by the maiden mystery to her now she had seen daily from her window towers villages faint white above all the town of standing on its height its windows shining like lamps in the evening sun she had hardly ever visited the place only a small tract even of the and its being known to her by close inspection much less had she been far outside the valley every of the surrounding hills was as personal to her as that of her relatives faces but for what lay beyond her judgment was dependent on the teaching of the village school where she had held a leading place at the time of her leaving a year or two before this date in those early days she had been much loved by others of her own sex and age and had used to be seen about the village as one of three all nearly of the same year walking home from school side by side the middle one in a pink print of a finely pattern worn over a stuff frock that had lost its original colour for a marching on upon long legs in tight stockings which had little ladder like holes at the knees torn by kneeling in the roads and banks in search of vegetable and treasures her then earth coloured hair hanging like pot hooks the arms of the two outside girls resting round the waist of her arms on the of the two as grew older and began to see how matters stood she felt quite a towards her mother for giving her so many little sisters and brothers when it was such a trouble to nurse and provide for them her mother s intelligence was that of a happy child was simply an one and that not the eldest to her own long family of on providence however became beneficent the small ones and to help them as much as possible she used as soon as she left school to lend a by op the d hand at or on neighbouring farms or by preference at or butter making processes which she had when her father had owned cows and being it was a kind of work in which she every day seemed to throw upon her young shoulders more of the family burdens and that should be the representative of the at the d mansion came as a thing of course in this instance it must be admitted that the were putting their fairest side outward she alighted from the van at cross and ascended on foot a hill in the direction of the district known as the chase on the borders of which as she had been informed mrs d s seat the slopes would be found it was not a home in the ordinary sense with fields and pastures and a grumbling farmer out of whom the owner had to squeeze an income for himself and his family by hook or by it was more far more a house built for enjoyment pure and simple with not an acre of troublesome land attached to it beyond what was required for purposes and for a little fancy farm kept in hand by the owner and tended by a the crimson brick lodge came first in sight up to its in dense thought this was the mansion itself till passing through the side with some and onward to a point at which the drive took a the house proper stood in full view it was of recent indeed almost new and of the same rich red colour that formed such a contrast with the of the lodge far behind the comer of the house which rose like a bloom against the subdued stretched the soft landscape of the chase a truly venerable tract of forest land one of the few remaining in england of date wherein was still found on a by the maiden aged oaks and where enormous trees not planted by the	45
hand of man grew as had grown when they were for bows all this antiquity however though visible from the slopes was outside the immediate boundaries of the estate everything on this snug property was bright and well kept acres of glass houses stretched down the to the at their feet everything looked like money like the last coin issued from the the stables partly by pines and o and fitted with every late were as dignified as of base on the extensive lawn stood an ornamental tent its door being towards her simple stood at gaze in a alarmed attitude on the edge of the gravel sweep her feet had brought her onward to this point before she had quite realized where she was and now all was contrary to her expectation i thought we were an old family but this is all new she said in her she wished that she had not fallen in so readily with her mother s plans for claiming kin and had endeavoured to gain assistance nearer home the d or d as they at first called themselves who owned all this were a somewhat unusual family to find in such an part of the parson had spoken truly when he said that our john was the only really representative of the old d family existing in the county or near it he might have added what he knew very well that the d were no more d of the true tree than he was himself yet it must be admitted that this family formed a very good stock whereon to a name which sadly wanted such when old mr deceased liad by of the d made his as an honest merchant some said money in the north he decided to settle as a county man in the south of england out of hail of his business district and in doing this he felt the necessity of with a that would not too readily identify him with the smart of the past and that would be less commonplace than the original bald words for an hour in the british the pages of works devoted to extinct half extinct and ruined families to the quarter of england in which he proposed to settle he considered that d looked and sounded as well as any of them and d accordingly was to his own name for himself and his yet he was not an ant minded man in this and in his family tree on the new basis was reasonable in his and aristocratic links never a single title above a rank of strict moderation of this work of imagination poor and her parents were naturally in ignorance much to their discomfiture indeed the very possibility of such was unknown to them who supposed that though to be well favoured might be the gift of fortune a family name came by nature still stood hesitating like a about to make his plunge hardly knowing whether to retreat or to when a figure came forth from the dark door of the tent it was that of a tall young man smoking he had an almost complexion with full lips badly though red and smooth above which was a well black moustache with curled points though his age could not be more than three or four and twenty despite the touches of in his there was a singular force in the gentleman s face and in his bold eye well my beauty what can i do for you said by the maiden he coming and perceiving that she stood quite confounded never mind me i am mr d have you come to see me or my mother this of a d and a differed even more from what had expected than the house and grounds had differed she had dreamed of an aged and dignified face the of all the d with memories representing in the centuries of her family s and england s history but she herself up to the work in hand since she could not get out of it and answered i came to see your mother sir i am afraid you cannot see her she is an invalid replied the present representative of the house for this was mr the only son of the lately deceased gentleman cannot i answer your purpose what is the business you wish to see her about it isn t r it i can hardly say what pleasure h no why sir if i tell you it will seem s sense of a certain in her errand was now so strong that notwithstanding her awe of him and her general discomfort at being here her rosy curved towards a smile much to the attraction of the alexander it is so very she stammered i fear i can t tell you never mind i like foolish things try again my dear said he kindly asked me to come continued and indeed i was in the mind to do so myself likewise but i did not think it be like this i came sir to tell you that we are of the same family as you ho poor relations yes no d by of the d ay ay i mean d our names are worn away to but we have several proofs that we are d hold we are and and we have an old seal marked with a lion on a shield and a castle over him and we have a very old silver spoon round in the bowl like a little and marked with the same castle but it is so worn that mother uses it to stir the soup a castle is certainly my crest said he and my arms a lion and so mother said we ought to make ourselves to you as lost our horse by a bad accident and are the oldest branch	45
in his face then he broke into a loud laugh well i m damned what a funny thing ha and what a girl by vi went down the hill to and waited to take her seat in the van from to she did not know what the other occupants said to her as she entered though she answered them and when they had started anew she rode along with an inward and not an outward eye one among her fellow travellers addressed her more than any had spoken before why you be quite a and such roses in early june then she became aware of the spectacle she presented to their surprised vision roses at her t roses in her hat roses and in her basket to the brim she blushed and said that the flowers had been given to her when the passengers were not she stealthily removed the more prominent from her hat and placed them in the basket where she covered them with her handkerchief then she fell to reflecting again and in looking downwards a thorn of the rose remaining in her breast accidentally pricked her chin like all the in was in fancies and die thought this an ill omen the first she had noticed that day the van travelled only so far as and there were several miles of descent from that mountain town into the to her mother had advised her to stay here for the night at the house of a cottage woman they knew if she should feel too so by the maiden tired to come on and this did not descending to her home till the following afternoon when she entered the she in a moment from her mother s manner that something had occurred in the o yes i know all about it i told ee it would be all right and now tis proved since i ve been away what has said rather wearily her mother surveyed the girl up and down with arch approval and went on so you ve brought em round how do you know mother i ve had a letter then remembered that there would have been time for this they say mrs d says that she wants you to look after a little fowl farm which is her but this is only her artful way of getting ee there without raising your hopes she s going to own ee as kin that s e meaning o t but i didn t see her you somebody i suppose i saw her son and did he own ee he called me an i knew it he called her cried to her husband well he spoke to his mother of course and she do want ee there but i don t know that i am apt at tending fowls said the then i don t know who is apt you ve be n bom in the business and brought up in it they that be bom in a business always know more about it than any besides that s only just a show of something for you to do that you t feel i don t altogether i ought to go said thoughtfully who wrote the letter will you let me look at it si by op the d mrs d wrote it here it is the letter was in the third person and briefly informed mrs that her daughter s services would be useful to that lady in the management of her poultry farm that a comfortable room would be provided for her if she could come and that the wages would be on a liberal scale if they liked her that s all said you couldn t expect her to throw her arms round ee an to kiss and to ee all at once looked out of the window i would rather stay here with father and you she said but why i d rather not tell you why mother indeed i don t quite know why a week afterwards she came in one evening from an search for some light occupation in the immediate her idea had been to get together sufficient money during the to purchase another horse hardly had he crossed the threshold before one of the children danced across the room the gentleman s been here her mother hastened to explain smiles breaking from every inch of her person mrs d s son had called on horseback having been riding by chance in the direction of he had wish to know finally in the name of his mother if could really come to manage the old lady s fowl farm or not the lad who had the birds having proved mr d you must be a good girl if you are at all as you appear he knows you must be worth your weight in gold he is very much interested in ee truth to tell seemed for the moment really pleased to hear that she had won such high opinion from a stranger when in her own esteem she had sunk so low it is very good of him to think that she by the maiden and if i was quite sure how it would be living there i would go any when he is a mighty handsome man i don t so said coldly well there s your chance whether or no and i m sure he wears a beautiful diamond ring yes said little brightly from the window bench and i seed it and it did twinkle when he put his hand up to his mother why did grand relation keep on putting his hand up to his hark at that child cried mrs with admiration perhaps to show his diamond ring ed sir john from his chair i ll think it over said leaving the room well she s made a conquest o the younger branch ct us straight off	45
continued the matron to her husband and she s a fool if she don t follow it up i don t quite like my children going away from home said the as the h id of the family the rest ought to come to me but do let her go his poor wife he s struck wi her you can see that he called her he ll marry her most likely and make a lady of her and then she ll be what her forefathers was john had more conceit than energy or health and this supposition was pleasant to him well perhaps that s what young mr d means he admitted and sure enough he mid have serious thoughts about improving his blood by on to the old line the little rogue and have she really paid em a visit to such an end as this meanwhile was walking thoughtfully among the bushes in the garden and over prince s grave when she came in her mother pursued her advantage s by of the d well what be you going to do she asked i wish i had seen mrs d said i think you mid as well settle it then you ll see her soon enough her father in his chair i don t know what to say answered the girl it is for you to decide i killed the old horse and i suppose i ought to do something to get ye a new one but but i don t quite mr d being there the children who had made use of this idea of being taken up by their wealthy whidi they imagined the other family to be as a species of after the death of tiie horse began to cry at s reluctance and and reproached her for hesitating won t go o o and be made a la a of no she says she wo o on t they with square mouths and we shan t have a nice new horse and lots o golden money to buy and won t look pretty in her best no mo o ore her mother in to the same tune a certain way she had of making her labours in the house seem heavier than they were by them also weighed in the argument her father alone preserved an attitude of i will go said at last her mother could not repress her consciousness of the vision ed up by the girl s consent that s right for such a pretty maid as tis this is a fine chance smiled i hope it is a chance for earning money it is no other land of chance you had better say nothing of that silly sort about parish mrs did not promise she was not quite sure that she did not fed proud enough after the visitor s remarks to say a good deal by the maiden thus it was and the young girl wrote agreeing to be ready to set out on any day on which she might be required she was duly informed that mrs d was glad of her decision and that a spring cart be sent to meet her and her luggage at the top of the on the day after the morrow when she must hold herself prepared to start mrs d s handwriting seemed rather masculine a cart ed it might have been a carriage for her own kin having at last taken her course was less restless and abstracted going about her business with some self assurance in ttie thought of acquiring another horse for her father by an occupation which would not be c she had hoped to be a teacher at the school but the seemed to decide otherwise being mentally older than her mother she did not regard mrs s matrimonial hopes for her in a serious aspect for a moment the woman had been discovering good for her daughter almost from the year of her birth by vii on the morning appointed for her departure was awake before dawn at the minute of the dark when the grove is still mute save for one prophetic bird who sings with a dear conviction that he at least knows the correct time of day the rest preserving silence as if equally convinced that he is mistaken she remained upstairs packing till breakfast time and then came down in her ordinary week day clothes her sunday apparel being carefully folded in her box her mother you will never set out to see folks without dressing up more the than that but i am going to work said well yes said mrs and in a private tone at first there mid be a little pretence o t but i think it will be wiser of ee to put best side outward she added very well i suppose you know best replied with calm and to please her parent the girl put herself quite in s hands saying serenely do what you like with me mother mrs was only too delighted at this first she fetched a great basin and washed s hair with such that when dried and brushed it looked twice as much as at other times she tied it with a broader pink ribbon than then she put upon her the white frock that had worn at the club walking the airy fulness of which her imparted by the maiden to her developing figure an which her age and might cause her to be estimated as a woman when she was not much more than a child i declare there s a hole in my heel said never mind holes in your stockings they don t speak when i was a maid so long as i had a pretty bonnet the devil might ha found me in heels her mother s pride in the	45
girl s appearance led her to step back like a painter from his and survey her work as a whole you must self she cried it is much better than you was t other day as the looking glass was only large enough to reflect a very small portion of s person at one time mrs a black cloak outside the and so made a l e r of the panes as it is the wont of to do after this she went downstairs to her husband who was sitting in the lower room i u tell ee what tis said she he ll never have the heart not to love her but whatever you do don t too much to of his fancy for her and this chance she has got she is such an odd maid that it mid her against him or against going there even now if all goes well i shall certainly be for making some return to that pa son at lane for telling us d ar good man however as the moment for the girl s setting out drew nigh when the first excitement of the dr sing had passed off a slight found place in s mind it prompted the matron to say that she would walk a little way as far as to the point where the from tiie valley began its first steep ascent to the outer world at the top was going to be met with the spring cart sent by the and her box had already been wheeled ahead this summit by a lad with to be in readiness by op the d their mother put on her bonnet the younger children to go with her i do want to walk a little ways wi now she s going to marry our gentleman wear fine now said flushing and turning i ll hear no more o that mother how could you ever put such stuff into heads going to work my for our rich and get enough money for a new horse said mrs good bye father said with a throat good bye my maid said sir john raising his head from his breast as he suspended his nap induced by a slight excess this morning in honour of the occasion i hope my young friend will like such a of his own blood and n that sunk quite from om former grandeur i ll him the title yes sell it and at no figure not for less than a thousand pound cried lady n i ll take a thousand pound i ll take less when i come to think o t he ll adorn it better than a poor like can n he shall it for a hundred but i won t stand upon trifles n he shall it for fifty for twenty pound yes twenty pound that s the lowest family honour is family honour and i won t take a penny less s eyes were too fuu and her voice too to utter the sentiments that were in her she turned quickly and went out so girls and their mother all walked together a child on each side of holding her hand and looking at her from time to time as at one who was about to do great things her mother just behind with the smallest the group forming a picture of honest beauty by innocence and by the maiden backed by simple vanity they followed the way till reached the b of the ascent on the crest of which the vehicle from was to receive her this limit having been fixed to save the horse the labour of the last far away behind the first hills the like of broke the line of the ridge nobody was visible in the road which skirted the ascent save the lad whom they had sent on before them sitting on the of the that contained au s worldly possessions bide here a bit and the cart will soon come no doubt said mrs yes i see it yonder it had come appearing suddenly from behind the forehead of the nearest and stopping beside the boy with the her mother and the children thereupon to go no farther and bidding them a hasty good bye bent her steps up the hill they saw her white shape draw near to the on which her box was already placed but before she had quite it another shot out from a of trees on the came round the of the road there passed the art and halted beside who looked up as if in great surprise her mother for the first time that the second was not a humble conveyance like the first but a and span or dog cart highly and equipped the driver was a young man of three or f our and twenty with a between his teeth wearing a cap jacket breeches of the same hue white up collar and brown driving gloves in short he was the handsome young buck who had visited a week or two before to get her answer about mrs her hands like a then she looked down then stared again could she be as to the meaning of is the gentleman who ll make a lady asked the youngest child by op the d meanwhile the form of be seen standing still beside this whose owner was talking to her her seeming was in fact more than it was she would have preferred the humble cart the young man dismounted and appeared to urge her to ascend she turned her face down the hill to her relatives and regarded the little group something seemed to her to a determination possibly the thought that she had killed prince she suddenly stepped up he mounted beside her and immediately on the horse in a moment they had passed the slow cart with the	45
box and disappeared behind the shoulder of the hill directly was out of sight and the interest of the matter as a drama was at an end the little ones eyes filled with tears the youngest child said i wish poor poor wasn t gone away to be a lady and lowering the comers of his burst out the new point of view was and the next child did likewise and then the next till the whole three of them loud there were tears also in s eyes as she turned to go home but by the time she had got back to the village she was trusting to the favour of accident however in bed that night she sighed and her husband asked her what was the matter oh i don t know exactly she said i was thinking that perhaps it would ha been better if had not gone t ye to have thought of that before tis a chance for the maid still if the doing again i wouldn t let her go till i had found out whether the gentleman is really a yoimg man and over her as his woman yes you ought perhaps to ha done that sir john by the maiden always managed to find consolation somewhere well as one of the genuine stock she ought to make her way with en if she plays her card aright and if he don t marry her afore he w ll after for that he s all wi love for her any eye can see what s her card her d blood you mean no stupid her face as twas mine by viii having mounted beside her d drove rapidly along the crest of the first hill compliments to as they went the cart with her box being left far behind rising still an immense landscape stretched around them on every side the green valley of her birth before a gray country of whidi she knew nothing except from her first brief visit to thus they reached the verge of an incline down which the road stretched in a long straight descent of nearly a mile ever since the accident with her father s horse as she naturally was had been exceedingly timid on wheels the least of motion startled her she began to get uneasy at a certain in her conductor s driving you will go down slow sir i suppose she said with attempted d looked upon her his with the tips of his large white centre teeth and allowed his lips to smile slowly of themselves why he answered after another or two it isn t a brave girl like you who asks that why i go down at full gallop there s nothing like it for raising spirits but perhaps you ne not now ah he said shaking his head there are two to be with it is not me alone has to be considered and she has a very queer temper who why this mare i fancy she looked round at me in a very grim way just then didn t you notice it by the maiden don t try to frighten me sir said stiffly well i don t if any living man can manage this horse i can i won t say any living man can do it but if such has the power i am he why do you have such a horse ah well may you ask it it was my fate i suppose has killed one chap and just after i bought her she nearly killed me and then take my word for it i nearly killed her but she s still very and one s life is hardly safe behind her sometimes they were just beginning to descend and it was evident that the horse whether of her own will or of his the latter being the more likely knew so well the reckless performance expected of her that she hardly required a hint from down down they sped the wheels like a top the dog cart rocking right and left its acquiring a slightly set in relation to the line of progress the figure of the horse rising and falling in before them sometimes a wheel was off the ground it seemed for many yards sometimes a stone was sent spinning over the hedge and sparks from the horse s hoofs the daylight the aspect of the straight road enlarged with their advance the two banks dividing like a stick one rushing past at each shoulder the wind blew through s white muslin to her very skin and her washed hair flew out behind she was determined to show no open fear but she clutched d s rein arm don t touch my arm we shall be thrown out if you do hold on round my waist she grasped his waist and so they reached the bottom safe thank god in spite of said she her face on fire that s temper said d tis truth by op the d well you need not let go your hold of me so the moment you feel yourself out of danger she had not considered what she had been doing whether he were man or woman stick or stone in her hold on him recovering her reserve she sat without replying and thus they reached the summit of another now then again said d no no said show more sense do please but when people themselves on one of the highest points in the they must get down again he retorted he loosened rein and away they went a second time d turned his face to her as they rocked and said in now then put your arms round my waist again as you did before my beauty never said holding on as well as she could without touching him let me put one uttle kiss on those or even on that	45
the churchyard the descendants of these owners felt it almost as a slight to their family when the house which had so much of their affection had cost so much of their forefathers money and had been in their possession for several generations before the d came and built here was indifferently turned into a by mrs d as soon as the property fell into hand according to law twas good enough for christians in grandfather s time they said the rooms wherein of had at their nursing now with the tapping of distracted in occupied spots where formerly stood chairs supporting the chimney comer and once blazing hearth was now filled with in which the laid their eggs while out of doors the plots that each succeeding had carefully shaped with his were torn by the in wildest fashion by the maiden the garden in which the cottage stood was surrounded by a wall and could only be entered through a door when had occupied herself about an hour the next morning in and improving the arrangements according to her skilled ideas as the daughter of a professed the door in the wall opened and a servant in white cap and apron entered she had come from the house mrs d wants the fowls as usual she said but perceiving that did not quite understand she explained mis ess is a old lady and blind said almost before her at the news could find time to shape itself she took under her companion s direction two of the most beautiful of the in her arms and followed the maid servant who had likewise taken two to the adjacent mansion which though and imposing showed traces everywhere on this side that some of its chambers could bend to the love of dumb creatures feathers floating within view of the front and hen standing on the grass in a sitting room on the ground floor in an with her back to the light was the owner and mistress of the estate a white haired woman of not more than sixty or even less wearing a large cap she had the face frequent in those whose sight has decayed by stages has been laboriously after and reluctantly let go rather than the mien apparent in persons long or bom blind walked up to this lady with her charges one sitting on each arm ah you are the young woman come to look after my birds said mrs d a new footstep i hope you will be kind to them my tells me you are quite the proper person well ere are they ah this is but he is hardly so to day is he he is alarmed at being by op the d handled by a i suppose and yes they are a frightened aren t you dean but they will soon get used to you while the old lady had be speaking and the other maid in obedience to her gestures had placed the fowls in her lap and she had them over from head to tail examining their their the of the their wings and their her touch enabled her to recognise them in a moment and to discover if a single feather were crippled or she handled crops and knew what they had eaten and if too little or too much her face a vivid the passing in her mind the birds that the two girls had brought in were duly returned to the yard and the process was repeated till all the pet and had i submitted to the old woman and such other sorts as were in fashion just then her perception of visitor being seldom at fault as she received the bird upon her knees it reminded of a confirmation in which mrs d was the bishop the fowls the young people presented and and the maid servant the parson and of the parish bringing them up at the end of the ceremony mrs d abruptly asked and her face into can you whistle whistle ma am yes whistle tunes could whistle like most other country girls though the accomplishment was one which she did not care to profess in genteel company however she admitted that such was the fact then you will have to practise it every day i had a lad who did it very well but he has left i want you to whistle to my as i cannot see them i like to hear them and we em airs by the maiden that way tell her where the are elizabeth you begin to morrow or they will go back in their they have been neglected these several mr d whistled to em this morning ma am said elizabeth he the old lady s face into of and she made no further reply thus the reception of by her fancied and the birds were taken bade to quarters the girl s surprise at mrs d was not great for since seeing the size of the house she had expected no more but she was far from being aware that the old lady had never heard a word of the so called she gathered that no great affection flowed between the blind woman and her son but in that too she was mistaken mrs d was not the first mother compelled to love her offspring and to be bitterly fond in spite of the unpleasant of the day before inclined to the freedom and of her new position in the morning when the sun shone now that she was once there and she was curious to test her powers in the unexpected direction asked of her so as to ascertain her chance of retaining her post as soon as she was alone within the walled garden she sat herself down on a and seriously up her mouth for the long neglected practice she found her former ability to	45
going every night when work was done to a decayed market town two or three miles distant and returning in the small hours of the next morning to spend sunday in sleeping off the effects of the curious sold to them as beer by the of the once independent for a long time did not join in the weekly but under pressure from not much older than herself for a field man s wages being as high at twenty one as at forty marriage was early here at length consented to go her first experience of the journey afforded her more enjoyment than she had expected the of the others being quite after her monotonous attention to the poultry farm all the week she went again and again being graceful and interesting standing more by op the d over on the momentary threshold of womanhood her appearance drew down upon her some sly regards from in the streets of hence though sometimes her journey to the town was made she always searched for her fellows at nightfall to have the protection of their companionship homeward this had gone on for a month or two when there came a in september on which a fair and a market and the from sought double delights at the on that account s occupations made her late in setting out so that her comrades reached the town long before her it was a fine september evening just before sunset when yellow lights struggle with blue shades in lines and the atmosphere itself forms a prospect without aid from more solid objects except the innumerable winged insects that dance in it through this low lit walked along she did not discover the coincidence of the market with the fair till she had reached the place by whidi time it was close upon dusk her limited was soon completed and then as usual she b an to look for some of the at first she could not find them and she was informed that most of them had gone to what they called a private little at the house of a hay and dealer who had transactions with their farm he lived in an out of the way nook of the and in trying to find her course thither her eyes fell upon mr d standing at a street comer what my beauty you here so late he said she told him that she was simply waiting for company homeward i ll see you again said he over her shoulder as she went on down the back lane approaching the hay s she hear the notes of a proceeding from some building in the rear but no sound of dancing was audible an by the maiden exceptional of things for these parts where as a rule the stamping drowned the music the front door being open she could see straight through the house into the at the back as far as the shades of t would allow and nobody appearing to her knock she traversed the dwelling and went up the path to the whence the sound had attracted her it was a used for and from the open door there floated into the obscurity a mist of yellow radiance which at first thought to be illuminated smoke but on drawing nearer she perceived that it was a of dust lit by candles within the whose beams upon the haze carried the outline of the doorway into the wide night of the garden when she came dose and looked in she beheld indistinct forms up and down to the figure of the dance the silence of their arising from their being in that is to say the from the of and other the stirring of whidi by their turbulent feet created the that involved the scene through this of and hay mixed with the and warmth of the dancers and forming together a sort of human the feebly pushed their notes in marked contrast to the spirit with which the measure was trodden out they as they danced and laughed as they of the rushing couples there could barely be discerned more than the high lights the them to a of whirling a of attempting to and always failing at intervals a couple would approach the doorway for air and the haze no longer their the resolved themselves into the of her own next door neighbours could by op the d in two or three short hours have itself thus some of the throng sat on benches and hay by the wall and one of them recognized her the maids don t think it respectable to dance at the de he explained they don t like to let everybody see whidi be their fancy men besides the house sometimes up just when their begin to get so we come here and send out for liquor but when be any of you going home asked with some anxiety now a most directly this is all but the last she waited the drew to a dose and some of the party were in the mind for starting but others would not and another dance was formed this would surely end it thought but it in yet she became restless and uneasy yet having waited so long it was necessary to wait longer on account of the fair the roads were dotted with characters of possibly ill intent and though not f id of dangers she feared the unknown had she been near she have had less dread don t ye be nervous my dear good soul between his a young man with a wet face and his straw hat so far back upon his head that the brim encircled it like the of a saint what s yer hurry to morrow is sunday thank god and we can sleep it off in church time now have a turn with	45
me she did not dancing but she was not going to dance here the movement grew more passionate the behind the pillar of now and then varied the air by playing on the wrong side of the bridge or with the back of the bow but it did not matter the panting shapes spun they did not vary their partners if their inclination by the maiden were to stick to previous ones changing partners simply meant that a satisfactory choice had not as yet been arrived at by one or other of the pair and by this time every couple had been matched it was then that the ecstasy and the dream b an in which emotion was the matter of the universe and matter but an intrusion likely to hinder you from spinning where you wanted to spin suddenly there was a dull on the ground a couple had fallen and lay in a mixed heap the next couple unable to check its progress came over the obstacle an inner cloud of dust rose around the prostrate figures amid the general one of the room in which a of arms and legs was you shall catch it for this my gentleman when you get home burst in female accents from the human heap those of the unhappy partner of the man whose had caused the she happened also to be his recently married wife in which there was nothing at as long as any affection remained between wedded couples and indeed it was not in their later lives to avoid making odd lots of single people between whom there might be a warm understanding a loud laugh from behind s back in the shade of the garden united with the within the room she looked round and saw the red coal of a d was standing there done he beckoned to her and she reluctantly retreated towards him well my beauty what are you doing here she was so tired after her long day and her walk that she confided her trouble to him that she had been waiting ever since he saw her to have their company home the road at night was strange to her but it seems they will never leave off and i really think i will wait no longer by op the d certainly do not i have only a saddle horse here to day but come to the flower de and i ll hire a trap and drive you home with me though flattered had never quite got over her of and despite their she preferred to walk home with the work folk so e answered that she was much obliged to him but would not trouble him i have said that i will wait for em and they will expect me to now very well miss independence please yourself i not my good lord what a kick up they are having there he had not put himself forward into the light but some of them had perceived him and his presence led to a slight pause and a consideration of how the time was flying as soon as he had re lit a cigar and walked away the people n to collect themselves from amid those who had come in from other farms and prepared to leave in a body their bundles and baskets were gathered up and half an hour later when the dock sounded a quarter past eleven they were straggling along the lane which led up the towards their homes it was a three mile walk along a dry road made to night by the light of the mom soon perceived as she walked in the flock sometimes with this one sometimes with that that the night air was producing and courses among the men who had too freely some of the more careless women also were wandering in their gait to wit a dark car queen of till lately a favourite of d s her sister the queen of diamonds and the young married woman who had already tumbled down yet however and their appearance just now to the mean eye to themselves the case was different they followed the road with a by the maiden sensation that they were soaring along in a supporting medium possessed of original and profound thoughts themselves and surrounding nature forming an of which all the parts and each other they were as sublime as the moon and stars above them and the moon and stars were as ardent as they however had undergone such painful experiences of this kind in her father s house that the discovery of their condition spoilt the pleasure she was beginning to feel in the moonlight journey yet she stuck to the party for reasons above given in the open highway they had in scattered order but now their route was through a field gate and the foremost finding a in opening it they closed up together this leading was car the queen of who carried a basket containing her mother s her own and other purchases for the week the basket being large and heavy car had placed it for convenience of on top of her head where it rode on in balance as she walked with arms weu whatever is that a creeping down thy back car said one of the group suddenly all looked at car her gown was a light cotton print and from the back of her head a kind of rope could be seen descending to some distance below her waist like a s tis her hair falling down said another no it was not her hair it was a black stream of something from her basket and it like a snake in the cold still rays of the moon tis said an observant matron it was car s poor old grandmother had a weakness for the sweet stuff honey she had in plenty	45
had perceived that the horse was not the spirited one he sometimes rode and felt no alarm on that score though her seat was precarious enough despite her tight hold of him she begged him to ow the animal to a walk whidi accordingly did neatly done was it not dear he said by yes said she i am sure i ought to be much obliged to you and are you she did not reply why do you always dislike my kissing you i suppose because i don t love you you are quite sure i am angry with you sometimes ah i half feared as much nevertheless did not object to that confession he knew that anything was better than why haven t you told me when i have made you angry you know very well why because i cannot help myself here i haven t offended you often by love making you have sometimes how many times you know as well as i too many times every time i have tried she was silent and the horse along for a considerable distance till a faint fog which by of the d had hung in the hollows all the evening became general and enveloped them it seemed to hold the moonlight in rendering it more than in dear air whether on this account or from absent or from she did not perceive that they had long ago passed the point at which the lane to from the highway and that her conductor had not taken the track she was weary she had risen at five o clock every morning of that week had been on foot the whole of each day and on this evening had in addition walked the three miles to waited three hours for her neighbours without eating or drinking her impatience to start them preventing either she had then walked a mile of the way home and had undergone the excitement of the quarrel till with the slow progress of their it was now nearly one o clock only once however was she overcome by actual in that moment of oblivion her head sank gently against him d stopped the horse withdrew his feet from the turned sideways on the saddle and enclosed her waist with his arm to support her this immediately put her on the and with one of those sudden impulses of to which she was liable she gave him a little push from her in his position he nearly lost his balance and only just avoided rolling over into the road the horse though a powerful one being the he rode that is devilish he said i mean no harm only to keep you from falling she pondered suspiciously till thinking that this might after all be true she and said quite humbly i beg pardon sir i won t on you you show some confidence in me good god he burst out what am i to be so by a mere like you for by the maiden near three mortal months have you with my feelings me and me and i won t stand i ll leave you to morrow sir no you will not leave me to morrow will you i ask once more show your belief in me by letting me you with my arm come between us two and nobody else now we know each other well and you know that i love you and think you the prettiest girl in the world whidi you are t i treat you as a lover she drew a quick breath of objection uneasily on her seat looked far ahead and murmured i don t know i wish how can i say yes or no when he settled the matter by clasping his arm round her as he desired and no further negative thus they slowly onward till it struck her they had been advancing for an time f ar longer than was usually occupied by the short journey from even at this walking pace and that they were no longer on hard road but in a mere why where be we she exclaimed passing by a wood a wood what wood surely we are quite out of the road a bit of the chase the oldest wood in england it is a lovely night and why should we not our ride a little how could you be so treacherous said between and real dismay and getting rid of his arm by open his fingers one by one though at the ri of slipping off herself just when i ve been putting such trust in you and obliging you to please you because i thought i had wronged you by that please set me down and let me walk home you cannot walk home darling even if the air were clear we are miles away from if by op the d i must tell you and in this growing fog you might wander for hours among these trees never mind that she put me down i beg you i don t mind where it is only let me get down sir please very well then i will on one condition having brought you here to this out of the way place i fed responsible for your safe conduct home whatever you may yourself feel about it as to your getting to without assistance it is quite impossible for to tell the truth dear owing to this fog which so ever i don t quite know where we are myself now if you will promise to wait beside the horse while i walk through the bushes till i come to some road or house and ascertain exactly our whereabouts i ll deposit you here willingly when i come back i ll give you full directions and if you insist upon walking you may or you may ride at your pleasure	45
from her mother s door to try her fortune at poultry farm end op phase the by by phase the second maiden no by by the second maiden no more xii the basket was heavy and the bundle was large but she them along like a person who did not find her especial burden in material things ck she stopped to rest in a mechanical way by some gate or post and then giving the baggage another upon her full round arm went steadily on again it was a sunday morning in late october about four months after s arrival at and some few weeks subsequent to the night ride in the chase the time was not long past daybreak and the yellow upon the horizon behind her back lighted the ridge towards whidi her face was set the barrier of the wherein had of late been a stranger which she would have to over to reach her the ascent was on this side and the soil and scenery differed much from those within even the character and accent of the two had shades of difference despite the effects of a railway so that though less than twenty miles from the place of her at her native village had seemed a far away spot the shut in there northward and westward travelled and married northward and westward thought northward and westward those on this side mainly directed their energies and attention to the east and south by op the d the incline was the same down which d had driven with her so wildly on that day in june went up the remainder of its length without stopping and on reaching the edge of the gazed over the familiar green world beyond now in mist it was always beautiful from here it was terribly beautiful to to day for since her eyes last upon it she had learnt that the serpent hi es where the sweet birds sing and her views of ufe had been totally changed for her by the lesson verily another girl than the simple one she had been at home was she who bowed by thought stood still here and turned to look behind her she could not bear to look forward into the ascending by the long white road that herself had just up she saw a two wheeled vehicle beside which walked a man who held up his hand to attract her attention she obeyed the signal to wait for him with repose and in a few minutes man and horse stopped beside her why did you slip away by like this said d with on a sunday morning too when people were all in bed i only discovered it by accident and i have been driving like the deuce to overtake you just look at the mare why go off like this you know that nobody wished to hinder your going and how unnecessary it has been for you to toil along on foot and yourself with this heavy load i have followed uke madman simply to drive you the rest of the distance if you won t come back i shan t come back said she i thought you wouldn t i said so well then put up your baskets and let me help you on she placed her basket and bundle within the dog cart and stepped up and they sat side by side she had no fear of him now and in the cause of her confidence her sorrow lay by maiden no more d mechanically lit a cigar and the journey was continued with broken on the commonplace objects by the wa he had quite forgotten his struggle to kiss her when an the early summer they had driven in the opposite direction along the same road but she had not and she sat now a replying to his remarks in after some miles they came in view d the of trees beyond which the village of stood it was only then that her still face showed the least emotion a tear or two b to down what are you crying for he coldly asked i was only thinking that i was bom over there well we must all be bom somewhere i wish i had never been bom there or anywhere else well if you didn t wish to come to why did you come she did not reply you didn t come for love of me that i ll swear tis quite true if i had gone for love o you if i had ever sincerely loved you if i loved you still i should not so and hate myself for my weakness as i do now my eyes were dazed by you for a little and that was all he shrugged his shoulders she resumed i didn t understand your meaning till it was too late that s what every woman says how can you dare to use such words she cried turning upon him her eyes flashing as the latent spirit of which he was to see more some day awoke in her my god i could knock you out of the did it never strike your mind at what every woman says some women may fed very well he said laughing i am sorry to wound you i did wrong i admit it he dropped by op the d into some little bitterness as he continued only you needn t be so flinging it in my face i am ready to pay to the you need not work in the fields or the again you know you may clothe yourself with the best instead of in the bald plain way you have lately affected as if you couldn t get a ribbon more than you earn her lip lifted slightly though there was little as a rule in her large and impulsive nature i have said	45
i will not take anything more from you and i will not i cannot i be your creature to go on that and i won t one would think you were a princess from your manner in addition to a true and original d ha ha well dear i can say no more i suppose i am a bad a damn bad fellow i was bom bad and i have lived bad and i shall die bad in all probability but upon my lost soul i won t be bad towards you again and if certain circumstances should arise you in which you are in the least need the least difficulty send me one line and you shall have by return whatever you require i may not be at i am going to london for a time i can t stand the old woman but all letters will be forwarded she said that she did not wish him to drive her ther and they stopped just under the of trees d alighted and lifted her down bodily in his arms afterwards placing her articles on the ground beside her she bowed to him slightly her eye just lingering in his and then she turned to take the for departure d removed his cigar bent towards her and said you are not going to turn away like that dear come u you wish she answered indifferently see how you ve mastered me i by maiden no more she thereupon turned round and lifted her face to and remained like a marble term while he a kiss upon her cheek half half as if zest had not yet quite died out her eyes vaguely rested upon the remotest trees in the lane while the kiss was given as though she were nearly unconscious of what he did now the other side for old acquaintance sake she turned her head in the same passive way as one might turn at the request of a or and he kissed the other side his lips touching cheeks that were damp and smoothly chill as the skin of the in the fields around you don t give me your mouth and kiss me back you never do that you ll never love me i fear i have said so often it is true i have never really and truly loved you and i think i never can she added mournfully perhaps of all things a lie on this thing would do the most good to me now but i have honour enough left little as tis not to that lie if i did love you i may have the best o causes for letting you know it but i don t he a breath as if the scene were getting rather oppressive to his heart or to his conscience or to his well you are melancholy i have no reason for flattering you now and i can say plainly that you need not be so sad you can hold your own for beauty against any woman of t parts gentle or simple i say it to you as a practical man and if you are wise you will show it to the world more than you do before it and yet will you come back to me upon my i don t like to let you go like this never never i made up my mind as soon as i saw what i ought to have seen sooner and i won t come then morning my four months cousin bye by op the d he up lightly arranged the and was gone between the tall red b tied hedges did not look after him but wound along the crooked lane it was still early and though the sun s lower limb was just free of the hill his rays and peering addressed the eye rather than the touch as yet was not a human soul near sad october and her self seemed the only two that lane as she walked however some footsteps approached behind her the footsteps of a man and owing to the of his advance he was dose at her heels and had said good morning before she had been long aware of his he appeared to be an of some sort and carried a tin pot of red paint in his hand he asked in a business like manner if he should take her basket which she permitted him to do walking beside him it is early to be this sabbath mom he said cheerfully yes said when most people are at rest from their week s work she also assented to this though i do more real work to day than all the week besides do you all the week i work for the glory of man and on sunday for the glory of god that s more real than the other hey i have a little to do here at this the man turned as he spoke to an opening at the roadside leading into a pasture if you ll wait a moment he added i shall not be long as he had her basket she could not well do otherwise and she waited observing him he set down her basket and the tin pot and stirring the paint with the brush that was in it began painting lai e square letters on the middle board of the three the placing a after each word as if to give by maiden no more pause while that word was driven well home to the reader s heart thy not a pet ii against the peaceful landscape the pale tints of the the blue air of the horizon and the boards these staring words shone forth they seemed to shout themselves out and make the atmosphere ring some people might have cried alas poor at the hideous the	45
last grotesque phase of a creed which had served mankind well in its time but the words entered with horror it was as if this man had known her recent history yet he was a total stranger having finished his text he picked up her basket and she mechanically resumed her walk beside him do you believe what you paint she asked in low tones believe that do i believe in my own existence but said she suppose your sin was not of your own seeking he shook his head i cannot split hairs on that burning he said i have walked hundreds of miles past summer painting these on every wall gate and in the length and breadth of this district i leave their application to the hearts of the people who read em i think they are horrible said crushing killing that s what they are meant to be he replied in a trade voice you should read my ones them i for and they d make ye not but what this is a very good for rural districts ah there s a nice bit of blank wall up by that bam standing to waste i loi by op the d put one there one that it will be good for dangerous young females like to heed will ye wait no said she and taking her basket on a little way forward die turned her head the old gray wall b an to a similar fiery to the first with a strange and mien as if distressed at duties it had never before been called upon to perform it was with a sudden flush that she read and realized what was to be the inscription he was now half way through thou shalt not commit her cheerful friend saw her looking stopped his brush and shouted if you want to ask for on these things of moment there s a very earnest good man going to preach a charity sermon to day in the parish you are going to mr of i m not of his persuasion now but he s a good man and he ll as well as any parson i know twas he b an the work in me but did not answer she resumed her walk her eyes fixed on the ground i don t believe god said such things she murmured contemptuously when her flush had died away a of smoke up suddenly from her father s chimney the sight of which made her heart the aspect of the interior when she reached it made her heart ache more her mother who had just come downstairs turned to greet her from the fireplace where she was oak twigs under the breakfast kettle the young children were still above as was also her father it being sunday morning when he felt justified in l an additional half hour well my dear exclaimed her surprised mother jumping up and kissing the ru how be i by maiden no more ye i didn t see you till you was in upon me have you come home to be married no i have not come home for that mother then for a holiday yes for a holiday for a long holiday said what isn t your cousin going to do the handsome thing he s not my cousin and he s not going to marry me her mother eyed her narrowly come you have not told me all she said then went up to her mother put her face upon s neck and told and yet th st not got him to marry ee her mother any woman would have done it but you after that perhaps any woman would except me it would have been something like a story to come back with if you had continued mrs ready to burst into tears of vexation after all the talk about you and him which has reached us here who would have expected it to end like this why didn t ye think of doing some good for your instead o thinking only of self see how i ve got to and slave and poor weak father with his heart like a dripping pan i did hope for something to come out o this to see what a pretty pair you and he made that day when you drove away together four months ago he has given us all as we thought because w e were his kin but if he s not it must have been done because of his love for ee and yet you ve not got him to marry get d in the mind to marry her he marry on matrimony he had never once said a word and what if he had how a at social salvation might have impelled her to answer him she could not say but her poor fool by op the d mother little knew her present feeling towards this man perhaps it was unusual in the circumstances unlucky unaccountable but there it was and this as she had said was what made her herself she had never wholly cared for him she did not at all care for him now she had dreaded him before him to advantages he took of her helplessness then temporarily blinded by his ardent manners had been to confused surrender awhile had suddenly despised and disliked him and had run away that was all hate him she did not quite but he was dust and ashes to her and even for her name s sake she scarcely wished to marry him you ought to have been more careful if you didn t mean to get him to make you his wife o mother my mother cried the girl turning passionately upon her parent as if her poor heart break how could i be expected to know i was a child when i	45
left this house four months ago why didn t you tell me there was danger in men folk why didn t you warn me ladies know what to hands against because they read novels tell them of these tricks but i never had the chance o learning in that way and you did not help me her mother was subdued i thought if i spoke of his fond feelings and what they might lead to you would be l wi him and lose your chance she murmured wiping her eyes with her apron well we must make the best of it i suppose tis after all and what do please by xiii the event of s from the of her was abroad if rumour be not too large a word for a space of a square mile in the afternoon several young girls of mar former and acquaintances of called to see her arriving dressed in their best and as became visitors to a person who had made a conquest as they supposed and sat round the room looking at her with great for the fact that it was this said thirty first mr d who had fallen in love with her a gentleman not altogether local whose reputation as a reckless gallant and heart was beginning to spread beyond the immediate b of lent s supposed position by its a far higher fascination than it would have exercised if their interest was so deep that the younger ones whispered when her back was turned how pretty she is and how that best frock do set her off i believe it cost an immense deal and that it was a gift from him who was reaching up to get the tea things from comer cupboard did not hear these if she had heard them she might soon have set her friends right on the matter but her mother heard and s simple vanity having been denied the hope of a dashing marriage fed itself as well as it could upon the sensation of a dashing upon the whole she felt gratified even though such a limited and triumph ould involve by op the d her s reputation it might end in marriage yet and in the warmth of her to their admiration she invited her visitors to stay to tea their chatter their their good humoured above all their flashes and of envy revived s spirits also and as the evening wore on she caught the of their excitement and grew almost gay the marble hardness left her face she moved with something of her old step and flushed in all her young beauty at moments in spite of thought she would reply to their inquiries with a manner of superiority as if that her experiences in the field of courtship had indeed been slightly but so far was she from being in the words of robert south in love with her own ruin that the illusion was transient as lightning cold reason came back to mock her weakness the of her momentary pride would her and recall her to reserved again and the despondency of the next morning s dawn when it was no longer but monday and no best clothes and the laughing visitors were gone and she awoke alone in her old b the innocent younger children breathing softly her in place of the excitement of her return and the it had inspired she saw before her a long and stony highway which she had to tread without aid and with little sympathy her depression was then terrible and she could have hidden herself in a tomb in the course of a few weeks revived sufficiently to show herself so far as was necessary to get to church one sunday morning she liked to hear the such as it was and the old and to join in morning hymn that innate love of melody which she had inherited from her mother gave the simplest music a power over her which could nigh drag her heart out of her bosom at times io by maiden no more to be as much out of observation as possible for reasons of her own and to escape the of the young men she set out before the began and took a back seat under the gallery close to the lumber where only old men and women came and where the stood on end among the churchyard tools dropped in by and deposited themselves in rows before her rested of a minute on their as if they were praying though they were not then sat up and looked around when the came on one of her happened to be chosen among the rest old double chant but she did not know what it was called though she would much have liked to know she thought without exactly the thought how strange and was a s power who from the grave could lead through of emotion which he alone had felt at first a girl like her who had never heard of his name and never would have a clue to his personality the people who had turned their heads turned them again as the service proceeded and at last observing her they whispered to other she knew what their whispers were about grew sick at heart and felt that she could come to church no more the bedroom which she had shared with some of the children formed her retreat more continually than ever here under her few square yards of she watched winds and and rains gorgeous and successive at their full so dose kept she that at length almost everybody thought she had gone away the only exercise that took at this time was after dark and it was then when out in the woods that she seemed least solitary she knew how to hit to a hair s breadth that moment of evening when	45
the light and the darkness are so balanced that the of day and the suspense of night each other leaving absolute mental liberty it is then by op the d r that the plight of being alive becomes to its least possible dimensions she had no fear of the shadows her sole idea seemed to be to or rather that cold called the world which so terrible in the mass is so even pitiable in its on these lonely hills and her glide was of a piece with the element she moved in her and stealthy figure became an int part of the scene at times her fancy would natural processes her till they seemed a part of her own story rather they became a part of it for the world is only a phenomenon and what they seemed they were the midnight airs and moaning amongst the and bark of e winter twigs were of bitter reproach a wet day was the expression of grief at her weakness in the mind of some vague being whom she could not class definitely as the god of her childhood and could not comprehend as any other but this of her own based on of peopled by and voices to her was a sorry and mistaken creation of fancy a cloud of moral by which she was terrified without reason it was they that were out of harmony with the actual world not she walking among the sleeping birds in the hedges watching the on a or standing under a laden bough she looked upon herself as a figure of guilt into the of innocence but all the while she was making a distinction where there was no difference feeling herself in she was quite in accord she had been made to break an accepted social law but no law known to the in which she fancied herself such an los by xiv it was a sunrise in august the attacked by the warm beams were dividing and shrinking into isolated within hollows and where they waited till they should be dried away to nothing the sun on account of the mist had a curious personal look demanding the masculine for its adequate expression his present aspect coupled with the lack of all human forms in the scene explained the old time in a moment one could feel that a religion had never prevailed under the sky the was a golden haired beaming mild eyed god like e gazing down in the vigour and of youth upon an earth that was with interest for him his light a little later broke through of cottage throwing uke red hot upon of drawers and other furniture within and awakening who were not y but of all ruddy things that morning the brightest were two broad arms of painted wood which rose from the margin of a yellow hard by village they with two others below formed the revolving cross of the machine which had been brought to the field on the previous evening to be ready for operations this day the paint with which they were in hue by the imparted to them a look of having been in liquid fire the field had already been opened that is to by op the d say a lane a few feet wide had been hand cut through the wheat along the whole of the field for the first passage of the horses and machine two groups one of men and lads the other of women had come down the lane just at the hour when the shadows of the eastern hedge top struck the west hedge so that the he s of the groups were sunrise while their feet were still in the dawn they disappeared from the lane between the two stone posts which the nearest field gate presently there arose from within a uke the love making of the the machine had begun and a moving of three horses and the long machine was visible over the gate a driver sitting upon one of the horses and an attendant on the seat of the along one side of the field the whole went the arms of the mechanical revolving slowly till it passed down the hill quite out of sight in a minute it came up on the other side of the field at the same pace the brass star in the forehead of the fore horse catching the eye as it rose into view over the then the bright arms and then the whole machine the narrow lane of the field grew wider with each circuit and the standing com was reduced to smaller area as the morning wore on rats as into a unaware of the nature of their refuge and of the doom that awaited them later in the day when their covert shrinking to a more and more horrible they were huddled together friends and foes till the last few yards of upright wheat fell also under the teeth of the and they were every one put to death by the and stones of the the machine left the fallen com behind it in little heaps each heap being of the quantity for a and upon these the active in the rear no by maiden no more laid their hands mainly women but some of them men in print shirts and trousers supported round their by leather rendering useless the two buttons behind which and with at every movement of each as if they were a pair of eyes in the small of his back but those of the other sex were the most interesting of this company of by reason of the charm which is acquired by woman when she becomes part and parcel of nature and is not merely an object set down therein as at ordinary times a is a personality field woman is a portion of the she has somehow lost her	45
sobbing one night last year in the chase and it mid ha gone hard wi a certain party if folks had come along well a little more or a little less twas a thousand that it should have happened to she of all others but tis always the the plain ones be as safe as hey the speaker turned to one of the group who certainly was not ill defined as plain it was a thousand indeed it was impossible for even an enemy to feel otherwise on looking at as she sat there with her flower uke mouth and large tender eyes neither black nor blue nor gray nor violet rather all those shades together and a hundred others which could be seen if one looked into their shade behind shade tint beyond tint around pupils that had no bottom an almost standard woman but for the slight of character inherited from her race a resolution which had surprised herself had brought her into the fields this wc for the first time many months after wearing and wasting her heart with every engine of regret that lonely could devise common sense had her she felt that she would do well to be useful again to taste anew sweet independence at by maiden no more any price the past was past whatever it had been it was no more at hand whatever its consequences time would dose over them they would all in a few years be as if they had never been and she herself down and forgotten meanwhile the trees were just as green as before the birds sang and the sun one s clearly now as ever the familiar had not darkened because of her grief nor because of her pain she might have seen that what had bowed her head so profoundly the thought of the world s concern at her situation was on an she was not an existence an experience a passion a structure of sensations to anybody but herself to besides was only a passing thought even to friends she was no more than a frequently passing thought if she made herself miserable the night and day it was only this much to them ah she makes herself unhappy if she tried to be cheerful to dismiss all care to take pleasure in the day ht the flowers the baby she could only be this idea to them ah she bears it very well moreover alone in a desert island would she have been wretched at what had happened to her not greatly if she could have been but just created to discover herself as a mother with no experience of life except as the parent of a nameless child would the position have caused her to despair no she would have taken it and found pleasures therein most of the misery had been by her conventional aspect and not by her innate sensations whatever s reasoning some spirit had induced her to dress herself up neatly as e had formerly done and come out into the fields harvest hands being greatly in demand just then this was why she had borne herself with dignity and had looked people calmly in the face at times even when holding the baby in her arms the harvest men rose from the shock of com and by op the d stretched their and extinguished their pipes the horses which had been and fed were again attached to the scarlet machine having quickly eaten her own meal beckoned to her eldest sister to come and take away the baby fastened her dress put on the gloves again and stooped anew to draw a bond from the last completed for the tying of the next in the afternoon and evening the proceedings of the morning were continued staying on till dusk with the body of then they rode home in one of the largest in the company o a broad moon that had risen from tiie ground to the its face resembling the gold leaf of some worm eaten saint s female companions sang songs and showed themselves very s and glad at her out of doors though they could not refrain from throwing in a few verses of the ballad about the maid who went to the merry green wood and came back a changed state there are and in life and the event which had made of her a social warning had also for the moment made her the most interesting personage in the village to many their friendliness won her still further away from herself their lively spirits were and she became almost gay but now that her moral sorrows were passing away a fresh one arose on the natural side of her which knew no social law when she reached home it was to learn to her grief that the baby had been suddenly taken ill since the afternoon some such had been probable so tender and was its frame but the event came as a shock nevertheless the baby s offence against society in coming into the world was forgotten by the girl mother her soul s desire was to continue that offence by preserving the life of the child however it soon grew clear that the hour of for that little prisoner of the ii by maiden no more flesh was to arrive earlier than her worst had and when she had discovered this she was plunged into a misery which that of the s simple loss her baby had not been had drifted into a frame of mind which accepted the consideration that if she should have to bum for what she had done bum she must and there was an end of it like all village girls she was well in the holy and had studied the histories of and and knew the to be drawn but when the same question	45
arose with regard to the baby it had a very different colour her darling was about to die and no salvation it was nearly but she rushed downstairs and asked if she might send for the parson the moment happened to be one at which her father s sense of the antique nobility of his family was highest and his to the which had set upon that nobility most pronounced for he had just returned from his weekly at s inn no parson should come inside his door he declared into his affairs just then when by her shame it had become more necessary than ever to hide them he locked the door and put the key in his pocket the household went to bed and distressed beyond measure retired also she was waking as she lay and in the middle of the night found that the baby was still worse it was obviously dying quietly and but none the less surely in her misery she rocked herself upon the bed the dock struck the solemn hour of one that hour when fancy outside reason and malignant possibilities stand rock firm as facts she thought of the child consigned to the comer of hell as its double doom for lack of and lack of saw the arch tossing it with his three fork like the one they for by op the d the oven on days to which picture she added many other quaint and curious details of torment sometimes taught the young in this christian country the lurid so powerfully affected her imagination in the silence of the sleeping house that her became damp with perspiration and the shook with each throb of her heart the infant s breathing grew more difficult and the mother s mental increased it was useless to the little thing with kisses she could stay in bed no longer and walked about the room o merciful god have pity have pity upon my poor baby she cried heap as much anger as you want to upon me and welcome but pity the she against the chest of drawers and murmured for a long while till she suddenly started up ah perhaps baby can be saved perhaps it will be just the same she spoke so brightly that it seemed as though her face might have shone in the gloom surrounding her she lit a candle and went to a second and a third bed under the wall where she awoke her young sisters and brothers all of whom occupied the same room pulling out the washing stand so that she could get behind it she poured some water from a and made them kneel around putting their hands together with fingers exactly while the children scarcely awake awe stricken at her manner their eyes growing larger and larger remained in this position she took the baby from her bed a child s child so e as scarce to seem a sufficient personality to its with the maternal title then stood erect with the infant on her arm beside the basin the next sister held the prayer book open before her as the clerk at church held it ri by maiden no more before the parson and thus the set about her child her figure looked singularly tall and imposing as she stood in her long white a thick cable of twisted dark hair hanging straight down her bade to her waist the kindly of the weak candle abstracted from her form and features the little which sunlight might have revealed the upon her wrists and the weariness of her eyes her high enthusiasm having a ing effect upon the face which had been her showing it as a thing of beauty with a touch of dignity which was almost little ones round their sleepy eyes and red awaited her preparations full of a suspended wonder which their physical at that hour would not allow to become active the most impressed of them said be you really going to him the girl mother replied in a grave affirmative what s his name going to be she had not thought of that but a name suggested by a phrase in the book of came into her head as she proceeded with the service and now she pronounced it sorrow i thee in the name of the father and of the son and of the holy ghost she sprinkled the water and there was silence say amen children the tiny voices in obedient response amen went on we receive this child and so forth and do sign him with the sign of the cross here she dipped her hand into the basin and fervently drew an immense cross upon the baby with her forefinger with the customary sentences as to his fighting against sin the world and the devil and being a faithful soldier and servant unto his life s end she duly went on with by of the d the lord s prayer the children it after her in a thin like wail till at the conclusion raising th t voices to clerk s pitch they again into the silence amen then their sister with much confidence in the of this poured forth from the bottom of her heart the that follows uttering it boldly and triumphantly in the which her voice acquired when her heart was in her speech and which will never be forgotten by those who knew her the ecstasy of almost her it set upon her face a glowing and brought a red spot into the middle of each cheek while the miniature in her eye pupils shone like a diamond the children gazed up at her with more and more reverence and no longer had a will for questioning she did not look like to them now but as a being large towering and awful sl divine personage with whom they had nothing	45
she would not but she would often clasp her hands behind her head and muse when she was supposed to be working hard she noted dates as they came past in the revolution of the year the disastrous night of her at with its dark background of the chase also the dates of the baby s birth and death also her own birthday and every other day by incidents in which she had by maiden no more some share she suddenly thought one afternoon when looking in the glass at her that there was yet another date of greater importance to her than those that of her own death when all these charms would have disappeared a day which lay sly and among all the other days os the year giving no sign or when she passed over it but not the less y there when was it why did she not feel the chill of each yearly encounter with such a cold relation she had s thought that some time in the future those who had known her would say it is the th the day that poor died and there would be nothing to their minds in the statement of that day doomed to be her in time through all the ages she did not know the place in mon week season or year almost at a leap thus changed from simple girl to complex woman of passed into her face and a note of tragedy at times into her voice her eyes grew larger and more eloquent she became what would have been called a fine creature her aspect was fair and her soul that of a woman whom the turbulent experiences of the last year or two had quite failed to but for the world s opinion those experiences would have been simply a liberal education she had held so aloof of late that her trouble never generally known was nearly forgotten in but it became evident to her that she could never be really comfortable again in a place which had seen the of her family s attempt to claim kin and through her even closer with the rich d at least she could not be comfortable there till long years have her keen consciousness of it yet even now felt the pulse of hopeful life still warm within her she might be happy in some nook which had no memories to escape the past and all that was i as by op the d to it and to do that she would have to get away was once lost always lost really true of she would ask herself she might prove it false if she could veil the power which pervaded e was not denied to alone she waited a long time without finding for a new departure a particularly fine spring came round and the stir of was almost audible in the it moved her as it moved the wild animals and made her passionate to go at last one day in early may a letter reached her from a former friend of her mother s to whom she had addressed inquiries long before a person whom she had never seen that a skilful was at a many miles to the southward and that the would be glad to have her for the months it was not quite so far oft as have been wished but it was probably far enough her of movement and having been so small to persons of limited are as degrees as as provinces and on one point she was resolved there should be no more d air castles in the dreams and deeds of her new life she would be the and nothing more her mother knew s feeling on this point so well though no words had passed between them on the subject that she never alluded to the now yet such is human that one of the interests of the new place to her was the accidental virtue of its lying near her forefathers country for they were not men though her mother was to the bone the called for which she was bound stood not from some of the former estates of the d ia by maiden no more near the great family of her and their powerful husbands she would be able to look at them and think not only that d like had fallen but that the individual innocence of a humble could lapse as silently all the while she wondered if any strange good thing might come of her being in her land and some spirit within her rose as the sap in the twigs it was youth up anew after its temporary check and bringing with it hope and the invincible instinct towards of second by by phase the third the rally by by phase the third the rally xvi on a scented bird morning in may between two and three years after the return from silent years for she left her home for the second time having packed up her luggage so that it could be sent to her later she started in a hired trap for the little town of through which it was necessary to pass on her journey now in a direction almost opposite to that of her first on the of the nearest hill she looked back at and her father s house although e had been so anxious to get away her kindred dwelling there would probably continue their daily lives as heretofore with no great of pleasure in their consciousness although she would be far off and they deprived of her smile in a few days the children would engage in their games as merrily as ever without the sense of any gap left by her departure this leaving of the younger children she had decided to be for the best were e to remain they	45
would probably gain less good by her than harm by her example she went through without pausing and onward to a of where she could await a s van that ran to the south west for the which this interior tract of by op the d country had never yet struck across it while waiting however there came along a farmer in his driving in the direction that she wished to pursue though he was a stranger to her she accepted his offer of a seat beside him that its motive was a mere tribute to her countenance he was going to and by accompanying him thither she could walk the remainder of the distance instead of travelling in the van by way of did not stop at after this long drive further than to make a slight meal at noon at a cottage to which the farmer recommended her thence she started on foot basket in hand to reach the wide of heath dividing this district from the low lying of a further valley in whidi the stood that was the aim and end of her day s pilgrimage had never before visited this part of the country and yet she felt akin to the landscape not so very far to the left of her she could discern a dark patch in the scenery which confirmed her in supposing to be trees marking the of in the church of which parish the bones of her ancestors her useless ancestors lay she had no for them now she almost hated them for the dance they had led her not a thing of all that had been theirs did she retain but the old seal and spoon i have as much of mother as father in me she said all my comes from her and she was only a the journey over the intervening and of when she reach them was a more troublesome walk than she had anticipated the distance being actually but a few miles it was two hours owing to sundry wrong ere she found herself on a summit commanding the long sought for the valley of the great the valley in whidi milk and butter grew to and were a by the river the valley the valley of the great the valley in which milk and butter grew to the plain so well watered by the river or in which lay the at where worked as a maid and was married to angel was situated a few miles from not far from the of the and roads on the southern margin of heath by i f a k i by by by the rally produced more if less than at her home the plain so well watered by the river or it was different from the of little which save during her disastrous at she had exclusively known till now the world was drawn to a larger pattern here the numbered fifty acres instead of ten the were more extended the groups of cattle formed tribes there only families these of cows stretching under her eyes from the far east to the far west any she had ever seen at one glance before the green was as thickly with them as a canvas by van or with the ripe hue of the red and absorbed the evening sunlight which the white animals returned to the eye in rays almost dazzling even at the distant elevation on which she stood the bird s eye perspective before her was not so beautiful perhaps as that other one which she knew so well yet it was more cheering it lacked the intensely blue atmosphere of the rival and its heavy and the new air was clear ethereal the river itself which nourished the grass and cows of these renowned flowed not like the streams in those were slow silent often flowing over beds of mud into which the might sink and vanish unawares the waters were dear as the pure river of life shown to the rapid as the shadow of a with that to the sky all day long there the water flower was the lily the crow foot here either the change in the quality of the air from heavy to light or the sense of being amid new scenes where there were no eyes upon her sent up her spirits wonderfully her hopes mingled with the sunshine in an ideal which by op the d her as she bounded along against the soft south wind she heard a pleasant voice in every breeze and in every bird s note seemed to a joy her face had changed with changing states of mind continually between beauty and according as the thoughts were gay or grave one day she was pink and another pale and when she was pink she was feeling less than when pale her more perfect beauty accorded with her less elevated mood her more intense mood with her less perfect beauty it was her best face physically that was now set against the south wind the irresistible universal tendency to find sweet pleasure somewhere which all life from the meanest to the highest had at length mastered being even now only a young woman of twenty one who mentally and had not finished growing it was impossible that any event should have left upon her an impression that was not in time capable of and thus her spirits and her and her hopes rose higher and higher she tried several but found them inadequate till the that her eyes had so often wandered over of a sunday morning before she had eaten of the tree of knowledge she o ye sun and moon o ye stars ye green things upon the earth ye fowls of the air beasts and cattle children of men bless ye the lord praise him and him for	45
ever she suddenly stopped and murmured but perhaps i don t quite know the lord as yet and probably the half unconscious was a utterance in a setting women whose chief companions are the forms and fc of nature retain in their souls far more of the pagan of their remote forefathers than of the religion taught their race at by the rally later date however found at least expression for her feelings in the old that she had from infancy and it was enough such high contentment with such a slight performance as that of having started towards a means of independent living was a part of the temperament really w ed to walk while her father did nothing of the kind but she resembled him in being content with and small achievements and in having no mind for laborious effort towards such petty social advancement as could alone be effected by a family so heavily as the once powerful d were now there was it might be said the energy of her mother s family as well as the natural energy of s years after the whidi had so overwhelmed her for the time let the truth be told women do as a rule live through such and regain their spirits and again look about them with an interested eye while there s life there s hope is a conviction not so entirely unknown to the betrayed as some amiable would have us believe then in good heart and full of zest for life descended the slopes lower and lower towards the of her pilgrimage the marked difference in the final particular between the rival now showed itself the secret of was best discovered from the heights around to read aright the valley before her it was necessary to descend into its midst when had accomplished this feat she found herself to be standing on a level which stretched to the east and west as far as the eye could reach the river had stolen from the higher tracts and brought in to the all this land and now exhausted aged and lay along through the midst of its former i s by of the d not sure of her direction stood still upon the hemmed expanse of like a fly on a table of indefinite length and of no more consequence to the surroundings than that fly the sole effect of her presence upon the placid valley so far had been to excite the mind of a solitary which after descending to the ground not far from her path stood with neck erect looking at her suddenly there arose from all parts of the a prolonged and repeated call the east to the west the cries spread as if by accompanied in some cases by the barking of a dog it was not the expression of the valley s consciousness that beautiful had arrived but the ordinary announcement of time half past four o when the set about getting in the cows the red and white herd nearest at hand which had been waiting for the call now towards the in the background their great bags of milk swinging under them as they walked followed slowly in their rear and entered the by the open gate through which they had entered before her long sheds stretched round the their slopes with vivid green moss and their supported by wooden posts rubbed to a glossy by the of infinite cows and of years now passed to an oblivion almost inconceivable in its between the posts were ranged the each exhibiting herself at the present moment to a eye in the rear as a on two down the centre of which a moved wise while the sun lowering itself behind this patient row threw their shadows accurately upon the wall thus it threw shadows of these obscure and homely figures eveiy evening with as much care over each as if it had n the x by the rally of a court beauty on a palace wall copied them as diligently as it had shapes on marble long ago or the outline of alexander caesar and the they were the less cows that were those that would stand still of their own will were in the middle of the yard where many of such better behaved ones stood waiting now all prime such as were seldom seen out of this valley and not always within it nourished by the feed which the water supplied at this prime season of the year those of them that were spotted with white reflected the sunshine in dazzling brilliancy and the polished brass on their horns glittered with something of military display their large hung ponderous as the sticking out like ti ie legs of a s and as each animal lingered for her turn to arrive the milk forth and fell in drops to the ground by xvii the and men had down from their cottages and out of the house with the arrival of the cows from the the maids walking in not on account of the weather but to keep shoes above the of the each girl sat down on her three legged stool her face her right cheek resting against the cow and looked along the animal s flank at as she approached the male with hat turned down resting flat on their and gazing on the ground did not observe her one of these was a sturdy middle aged man whose long white was somewhat and than the of the others and whose jacket underneath had a aspect the master of whom she was in quest his double character as a working and butter maker here during six days and on the seventh as a man in shining broad cloth in his family at church being so marked as to have inspired a rhyme dick all the week on sundays	45
richard seeing standing at gaze he went across to her the majority of have a cross manner at time but it happened that mr was glad to get a new hand f or the days were busy ones now and he received her warmly inquiring for her mother and the rest of the family though this as a matter of form merely for in reality he had not been by the rally aware of mrs s existence till of the fact by a brief business letter about oh ay as a lad i part o the country very well he said though i ve never been there since and a aged woman of ninety that used to live nigh here but is dead and gone long ago told me that a family of some such name as in came originally from these parts and that a old ancient race that had all but perished off the earth though the new generations didn t know it but lord i took no notice of the old woman s not i oh no it is nothing said then the talk was of business only you can milk em clean my i don t want my cows going at this time o year she reassured him on that point and he surveyed her up and down she had been indoors a good deal and her complexion had grown delicate sure you can stand it tis comfortable enough here for rough folk but we don t live in a frame she declared that she could stand it and her zest and seemed to win him over well i suppose you ll want a dish o or of some sort hey not yet well do as ye like about it but faith if twas i i should be as dry as a wi travelling so far i ll begin now to get my hand in said she drank a little milk as temporary refreshment to the surprise indeed slight contempt of to whose mind it had apparently never occurred that milk was good as a oh if ye can that be it so he said indifferently while a held up the that she from tis what i t touched for years not i rot the stuff it would lie in my like lead you can try your hand upon she he pursued nodding by op the d to the nearest cow not but what she do milk rather hard we ve hard ones and we ve easy ones like other folks however you ll find out that soon enough when had changed her bonnet for a hood and was really on her stool under the cow and the milk was from her fists into the she appeared to feel that she really had laid a new foundation for her future the conviction bred serenity her pulse and she was able to look about her the formed quite a little of men and maids the men on the hard animals the maids on the natures it was a large there were nearly a hundred s management all told and of the herd the master six or eight with his own hands away from home these were the cows that hardest of all for his being more or less casually hired he would not this half dozen to their treatment lest from indifference they should not milk them fully nor to the maids lest they should fail in the same way for lack of finger grip with the result that in course of time the cows would go that is dry up it was not the loss for the moment that made slack so serious but that with the decline of demand there came decline and ultimately of supply after had settled down to her cow there was for a time no talk in the and not a sound interfered with the of the milk into the numerous except a momentary exclamation to one or other of the beasts her to turn round or stand still the only movements were those of the hands up and down and the swing of the cows tails thus they all worked on by the vast flat which extended to either slope of the valley a level landscape of old long forgotten and no by the rally doubt in character very greatly from the they composed now to my thinking said the rising suddenly from a cow he had just off up his three legged stool in one hand and the in the other and moving on to the next hard in his vicinity to my thinking the cows don t down their milk to day as upon my life if do b gin keeping back like this she ll not be worth going under by tis because there s a new hand come among us said noticed such things ore to be sure it may be so i didn t think o t i ve been told that it es up into their horns at such times said a well as to going up into their horns replied as though even might be limited by possibilities i couldn t say i certainly could not but as cows wiu keep it back as well as the ones i don t quite agree to it do ye know th t riddle about the cows why do cows give less milk in a year than i don t interposed the why do they because there t so many of em said the these do certainly keep bade their milk to day folks we must lift up a or two that s the only cure for t songs were often resorted to in as an to the cows when they showed signs of their usual yield and the band of at this request burst into melody in purely business like	45
tones it is true and with no great the result according to their own belief being a decided improvement during the song s continuance when they had gone through fourteen or fifteen verses of a cheerful ballad about a murderer who was afraid to go to bed in the dark because he by of the d saw certain flames around him one of the male said i wish singing on the stoop didn t use up so much of a man s wind you should get your harp sir not but what a fiddle is best who had given ear to this thought the words were addressed to the but she was wrong a reply in the shape of why came as it were out of the belly of a cow in the it had been spoken by a behind the animal whom she had not hitherto perceived o yes there s nothing like a fiddle said the though i do think that are more moved by a than cows at least that s my experience once there was a old aged man over at william by name one of the family that used to do a good deal of business as over there do ye mind i the man by sight as well as i know my own brother in a manner of speaking well this man was home along from a wedding where he had been his fiddle one fine moonlight night and for sake he took a cut across forty acres a field lying that way where a was out to grass the bull seed william and took after him horns b ad and though william his best and hadn t much drink in him considering twas a wedding and the folks well off he found he d never reach the fence and get over in time to save well as a last thought he out his fiddle as he and struck up a turning to the bull and towards the comer the bull softened down and stood still looking hard at william who on and on till a sort of a smile stole over the s face but no sooner did william stop his and to get over hedge than the bull would stop his smiling and lower his horns towards the seat of william s breeches well william had to turn about and play on a by the rally and twas only three o clock in the world and a that nobody would come that way for hours and he so and tired that a didn t know what to do when he had scraped till about four o clock he f that he verily would have to give over soon and he said to himself there s only last tune between me and et welfare heaven save me or i m a done man well then he called to mind how he d seen the cattle kneel o christmas in the dead o night it was not christmas eve then but it came into his head to play a trick upon the bull so he broke into the just as at christmas singing when lo and behold down went the bull on knees in his ignorance just as if the true night and hour as soon as his friend were down william turned off like a long dog and jumped safe over hedge before the praying had got on his feet again to take after him william used to say that he d seen a man look a fool a good many times but never such a fool as that bull looked when he found his pious feelings had been played upon and twas not christmas eve yes william that was the man s name and i can tell you to a foot where s he a lying in churchyard at this very moment just between the second tree and the north aisle it s a curious story it carries us back to times when faith was a living thing the remark singular for a yard was murmured by the voice behind the cow but as nobody the reference no notice was taken except that the seemed to think it might imply as to his tale well tis quite true sir whether or no i the man yes i have no doubt of it said the person behind the cow s attention was thus attracted to the s of whom she could see but the m by op the d merest patch owing to his his head so persistently in the flank of the she could not understand why he should be addressed as sir even by the himself but no explanation was he remained under the cow long enough to have three uttering a private now and then as if he could not get on take it gentle sir take it gentle said the tis not strength that does it so i find said the other standing up at last and stretching his arms i think i have finished her however though she made my fingers ache could see him at full length he wore the ordinary white and leather of a farmer when and his boots were dogged with the of the yard but this was all his local livery beneath it was something educated reserved subtle sad but the details of his aspect were temporarily thrust aside by the discovery that he was one whom she had seen before such had passed through since that time that for a moment e could not remember where she had met him and then it flashed upon her that he was the who had joined in the club dance at the passing stranger who had come she knew not whence had danced with others but not with her had left her and gone on his way with his friends the flood of memories brought back by	45
sir he said it was ordered by mr angel and should have been sent to him mr as if he had been struck he went home pale and dejected and called angel into his study look into this book my boy he said what do you know about it i ordered it said angel simply what for to read how can you think of reading it how can i why it is a system of philosophy there is no more moral or even religious work published yes enough i don t deny that but religious and for you who intend to be a minister of the gospel since you have alluded to the matter father said the son with anxious thought upon his face i ould like to say once for all at i should prefer not to take i fear i could not do so i love the church as one loves a parent i shall rs have the warmest affection for her there is s by the rally no institution for whose history i have a deeper admiration but i cannot honestly be ordained her minister as my brothers are while she refuses to her mind from an it had never occurred to the straightforward and simple minded that one of his own flesh and blood could come to this he was shocked and if angel were not going to enter the church what was the use of sending him to cambridge the university as a step to but seemed to this man of fixed ideas a preface without a volume he was a man not merely religious but devout a firm not as the phrase is now by in the church and out of it but in the old and ardent sense of the school one who could indeed that the eternal and divine did eighteen centuries ago in very truth angel s father tried argument persuasion entreaty no father i cannot article four leave alone the rest taking it in the literal and sense as required by the declaration and therefore i can t be a parson in the present state of affairs said angel my whole instinct in matters of religion is towards to quote your favourite to the the removing of those things that are shaken as of things are made thai those things which cannot he shaken may remain his father grieved so deeply that it made angel quite ill to see him what is the good of your mother and me and ourselves to give you a university education if it is not to be used for the honour and glory of god his father repeated by op the d why that it may be used for the honour and glory of man father perhaps if angel had he might have gone to cambridge like his brothers but the s view of that seat of learning as a stepping stone to orders alone was quite a family tradition and so rooted was the idea in his mind that perseverance began to appear to the sensitive son akin to an intent to a trust and wrong the pious heads of the household who had been and were as his father had hinted compelled to exercise much to carry out this uniform plan of education for the three young men i will do without cambridge said angel at last i fed that i have no right to go there in the circumstances the effects of this decisive debate were not long in showing themselves he spent years and years in studies and meditations he began to considerable indifference to social forms and the material distinctions of rank and wealth he despised even the good old family to use a favourite phrase of a late local worthy had no for him unless there were good new resolutions in its representatives as a balance to these when he went to live in london to see what the world was like and with a view to a profession or there he was carried off his head and nearly by a woman much older than himself though luckily he escaped not greatly the worse for the experience early association with country had bred in him an and almost unreasonable aversion to modem town life and shut him out from such success as he might have to by following a calling in the of the spiritual one but something had to be done he had wasted many valuable years and having an acquaintance who was starting on a life as a iso by the rally it occurred to angel that this might be a lead in the right direction either in the colonies america or at home farming at any rate after becoming well qualified for the business by a that was a which would probably afford an independence without the sacrifice of what he valued even more than a intellectual liberty so we find angel at six and twenty here at as a student of and as there were no houses near at hand in which he could get a comfort able lodging a at the s his room was an immense which ran the whole length of the house it could only be reached by a ladder from the cheese and had been closed up for a long time till he arrived and selected it as his retreat here had plenty of space and could often be heard by the folk pacing up and down when the household had gone to rest a portion was divided off at one end by a curtain behind which was his bed the outer part being furnished as a homely sitting room at first he lived up above entirely reading a good deal and upon an old harp which he had bought at a sale saying when in a bitter humour that he might have to get his living by it in the streets	45
by the rally the removed his hard gaze from and fixed it on his wife now that s a rum thing hey to think o the miles i ve o nights these last thirty year or trading or for doctor or for nurse and yet never had the least notion o that till now or my soul rise so much as an inch above my shirt the general attention being drawn to her including that of the s pupil flushed and remarking that it was only a fancy resumed her breakfast continued to observe her she soon finished her eating and having a consciousness that was regarding her began to trace imaginary patterns on the with her forefinger with the of a domestic animal that itself to be watched what a fresh and daughter of nature that is he said to himself and then he seemed to discern in her something that was familiar something which carried him bade into a joyous and past before the necessity of taking thought had made the heavens gray he concluded that he had beheld her before where he could not tell a casual encounter during some country it certainly had been and he was not greatly curious about it but the was sufficient to lead him to select in preference to the other pretty when he wished to contemplate by xix in general the cows were as they presented themselves without fancy or choice but certain cows will show a fondness for a particular pair of hands sometimes carrying this so far as to refuse to stand at all except to their favourite the of a stranger being kicked over it was s rule to insist on breaking down these and by constant since otherwise in the event of a or maid going away from the he was placed in a the maids private aims however were the reverse of the s rule the daily selection by each of the eight or ten cows to which she had grown accustomed rendering the operation on their willing easy and like her soon discovered which of the cows had a preference for her style of and her fingers having become delicate from the long to which she had subjected herself at intervals during the last two or three years she would have been glad to meet the views in this respect out of the whole there were eight in particular fancy lofty mist old pretty young pretty tidy and loud who though the of one or two were as hard as gave down to her with a readiness that made her work on them a mere touch of the fingers knowing however the s wish she ed to take the animals just as they came excepting the very hard which she could not yet manage by the rally but she soon found a curious correspondence between the chance position of the cows and her wishes in this matter till she felt that their order could not be the result of accident the s pupil had lent a hand in getting the cows together of late and at the fifth or sixth time she turned her eyes as she rested against the cow full of sly inquiry upon him mr you have ranged the cows she said blushing and in making the accusation of a smile gently lifted her upper lip in spite of her so as to show the tips of her teeth the lower lip remaining severely still well it makes no difference said he you will always be here to milk them do you think so i hope i shall but i don t she was angry with herself afterwards thinking that he unaware of her grave reasons for this seclusion might have mistaken her meaning she had spoken so earnestly to him as if his presence were somehow a in her wish her was such that at dusk when the was over she walked in the garden alone to continue her regrets that i e had disclosed to him her discovery of his it was a t summer evening in june the atmosphere being in such delicate and so that objects seemed endowed with or three senses if not five there was no distinction between the near and the far and an felt close to everything within the horizon the impressed her as a positive rather than as the mere of noise it was broken by the of strings had heard those notes in e above her head dim constrained by their confinement they had never appealed to her as now when they wandered in the air a quality like by op the d that of to speak absolutely both and execution were poor but the relative is all and as she listened like a fascinated bird could not leave the spot par from leaving she drew up towards the keeping behind the hedge that he might not guess her presence the of the garden in which found herself had been left for some years and was now damp and rank with grass which sent up mists of at a touch and with tall blooming weeds offensive smells weeds whose red and yellow and purple hues formed a as as that of cultivated flowers she went stealthily as a cat through this profusion of growth gathering on her that were her hands with and and rubbing off upon her naked arms which though snow white on the apple tree made on her skin thus she drew quite near to still unobserved of him was conscious of neither time nor space the exaltation which she had described as being at will by gazing at a star came now without any determination of hers she upon the notes of the second hand harp and their passed like breezes through her bringing tears into her eyes the floating seemed to be his notes made visible and the of the garden the	45
he said with some enthusiasm i should be only too glad my dear to help you to anything in the way of or any line of reading you would like to take up it is a lady again interrupted she holding out the bud she had what i mean that there are always more ladies than lords when you come to them never mind about the lords and ladies would you like to take up any course of study history for example sometimes i feel i don t want to know anything more about it than i know already why not because what s the use of learning that i am one of a long row only finding out that ere is set down in some old book somebody just like me and to know that i shall only act her part making me sad that s all the best is not to remember that nature and past doings have been just like thousands and thousands and that your coming life and doings be like thousands and thousands what really then you don t want to anything i shouldn t mind learning why why the sun do shine on the just and the unjust alike she answered with a slight in her voice but that s what books will not tell me for such bitterness of course he spoke with a conventional sense of duty only for that sort of wondering had not been to himself in days and as he looked at the mouth and he thought that such a daughter of the soil could only have caught up the sentiment by she went on the lords and ladies till regarding for a moment the wave like curl of her lashes as they drooped with her bent gaze on her soft cheek went away when he was i a by the rally gone she stood awhile thoughtfully the last bud and then awakening from her reverie flung it and all the crowd of nobility impatiently on the ground in an of displeasure with herself for her and with a warmth in her heart of hearts how stupid he must think her in an access of hunger for his good opinion she herself of what she had endeavoured to forget so unpleasant had been its issues the identity of her family with that of the d barren attribute as it was disastrous as its discovery had been in many ways to her perhaps mr as a gentleman and a student of history would respect her sufficiently to forget her childish conduct with the lords and ladies if he knew that those marble and people in church really represented her own forefathers that she was no d of money and ambition like those at but true d to the bone but before venturing to make the revelation indirectly the as to its possible effect upon mr by asking the former if mr had any great respect for old county families when they had lost all their money and land mr said the emphatically is one of the most you ever not a bit like the rest of his family and if there s one thing that he do hate more than another tis the notion of what s called a old family he says that it stands to reason that old families have done of work in past and can t have anything left in em now there s the and the and the and the st and the and the who used to own the lands for miles down this valley you could buy em all up now for an old song a most why our little by of the d here you know is one of the the old family that used to own lots o the lands out by king s now owned by the earl o afore even he or his was heard of well mr found this out and spoke quite to the poor girl for ah he says to her you ll never make a good au your skill was used up ages ago in and you must lie for a thousand years to strength for more deeds a boy came here t other day asking for a job and said his name was and when we a ed him his he said he d never heard that a had any and when we asked why he said he supposed his folks hadn t been long enough ah you re the very boy i want says mr jumping up and shaking hands wi en i ve great hopes of you and gave him half a crown o no he can t stomach old families after hearing this of s opinions poor was glad that she had not said a word in a weak moment about her family even though it was so unusually old as almost to have gone the circle and become a new one besides another girl was as good as she it seemed in that respect she held her tongue about the d vault and the knight of the conqueror whose name she bore the insight afforded into s character suggested to her that it was largely owing to her supposed that she had won interest in his eyes by xx the season developed and another year s of flowers leaves and such es took up their positions where only a year ago others had stood in their place when these were nothing more than and rays from the drew forth the and stretched them into long lifted up sap in noiseless streams opened and sucked out in invisible and s household of maids and men lived on comfortably placidly even merrily their position was perhaps the happiest of all positions in the social scale being above the line at which ends and below the line at which the b gin to natural feeling	45
and the stress of makes too little of enough thus passed the leafy time when seems to be the one thing aimed at out of doors and unconsciously studied each other ever balanced on the edge of a passion yet apparently keeping out of it au the while they were under an irresistible law as surely as two streams in one had never in her recent life been so happy as she was now possibly never would be so happy again she was for one thing physically and suited among these new surroundings the which had rooted down to a poisonous on the spot of its had been to a deeper soil moreover e and also stood as yet on the land between and love where i s by of the d no have been reached no reflections have set in awkwardly inquiring whither does this new current tend to carry me what does it mean to my future how does it stand towards my past was the merest stray phenomenon to angel as yet a rosy warming apparition which had only just acquired the attribute of in his consciousness so he allowed his mind to be occupied with her his to be no more than a philosopher s regard of an exceedingly novel fresh and interesting specimen of they met continually they could not help it they met daily in that strange and solemn interval the twilight of the morning in the violet or pink dawn for it was necessary to rise early so very early here was done and before the came the which began at a little past three it usually fell to the lot of some one or other of them to wake the rest the first being aroused by an and as was the arrival and they soon discovered that she could be depended upon not to sleep through the alarm as the others did this task was thrust most frequently upon her no sooner had the hour of three struck and than she left her room and ran to the s door then up the ladder to angel s calling him in a loud whisper then woke her fellow by the time that was dressed was downstairs and out in the air the remaining maids and the usually gave themselves another turn on the pillow and did not appear till a quarter of an hour later the gray half tones of daybreak are not the grey half tones of the day s dose though the degree of their shade may be the same in the twilight of the morning light seems active darkness passive in the twilight of evening it is the darkness which is active and and the light which is the drowsy reverse being so often possibly not always by chance i by the rally the first two persons to get up at the house th seemed to themselves the first persons up of all the world in these early days of her residence here did not but went out doors at once after rising where he was generally awaiting her the half light which per ed the open impressed them with a of as if they were adam and eve at this dim stage of the day seemed to to exhibit a dignified both of disposition and an almost power possibly because he knew that at that time hardly any woman so weu endowed in person as she was likely to be walking in the open air within the boundaries of his horizon very few in all england pair women are usually asleep at she was dose at and the rest were nowhere the mixed singular gloom in which they walked along together to the spot where the cows lay often made him think of the he little thought that the might be at his side whilst all the landscape was in shade his companion s face which was the of his eyes rising above the mist seemed to have a sort of upon it she looked ghostly as if e were merely a soul at large in reality her face without appearing to do so had caught the cold gleam of day from the north east his own face though he did not think of it wore the same aspect to her it was then as has been said that she impressed him most deeply she was no longer the but a visionary essence of woman a whole sex into one typical form he called her and other fanciful names half which she did not like because she did not them call me she would say and he did then it would grow lighter and her features would by op the d become simply feminine they had changed from those of a divinity who could bliss to those of a being who it at these non hours they could get quite close to the came with a great bold noise as of opening doors and shutters out c the boughs of a plantation which they frequented at the side of the or if already on the spot maintained their standing in the water as the pair walked by them by moving their heads round in a slow wheel like the turn of by they could then see the faint summer in level and apparently no thicker than spread about the meadows in detached of extent on the grey moisture of the grass were marks where the cows had lain through the night dark green islands of dry the of their in the general sea of dew from island proceeded a trail by which the cow had away to feed after getting up at the end of which trail they found her the puff from her nostrils when she recognized them making an little fog of her own amid the prevailing one then they drove the animals back to the or sat down to milk them	45
on the spot as the case might require or perhaps the fog was more general and the meadows lay like a white sea out of whidi the scattered trees rose like dangerous rocks birds would through it into the upper radiance and hang on the wing themselves or alight on the wet rails the which now shone like j ass rods minute diamonds of moisture from the mist hung too upon s and drops upon her hair uke seed pearls when the day grew quite strong and commonplace these dried off her moreover then lost her strange and ethereal beauty her teeth lips and eyes in the and she was i by the rally a ain the fair only who had to hold her own against the other women of the world about this time they would hear s the non resident for arriving u te and speaking sharply to old for not wailing her hands for heaven s sake pop thy hands under the pump upon my soul if the london folk only of thee and thy ways they d their milk and butter more than they do already and that s saying a good deal the till towards the end and in common with the rest could hear the heavy table dragged out from the wall in the kitchen by mrs this being the invariable to meal the same horrible scrape its return journey when the table had been by xxi was a great stir in the milk house just after breakfast the as usual but the butter would not come whenever this happened the was echoed the milk in the great but never arose the sound they waited for and his wife the and the married ones from the cottages also mr old and the rest stood gazing hopelessly at the and the boy who kept the horse going outside put on moon like eyes to show his sense of the situation even the melancholy horse himself seemed to look in at the window in despair at each walk round tis years since i went to s son in years said the bitterly and he was to what his father had been i have said fifty times if i have said once that i don t believe in en and i don t believe in en but i shall have to go to n if he s alive o yes i shall have to go to n if this sort of thing even mr began to feel at the s desperation pall t other side of that they used to call wide was a very good man when i was a boy said but he s rotten as by now my grandfather used to go to out at and a man a were so i ve heard er say continued mr but there s no such genuine folk about nowadays by the rally mrs s mind kept nearer to the matter in hand perhaps somebody in the house is in love she said i ve heard tell in my days that that will it why that maid we had years ago do ye mind and how the butter didn t come then ah yes yes but that isn t the rights o t it had nothing to do with the love making i can mind all about it twas the damage to the he turned to jack a s bird of a fellow we had here as at one time sir a yoimg woman over at and deceived her as he had deceived many afore but he had another sort o woman to reckon wi this time and it was not the girl herself one holy thursday of all days in the we was here as we mid be now only there was no in hand when we the girl s mother coming up to the door wi a great brass mounted in her hand that would ha an ox and saying do jack work here because i want him i have a big bone to pick with he i can assure n and some way behind her mother walked jack s young woman crying bitterly into her o here s a time said jack looking out o at em she ll murder me where shall i get where shall i don t tell her where i be and with that he scrambled into the through the trap door and shut himself inside just as the woman s mother into the milk house the villain where is he says she i ll his face for n let me only catch him she about everywhere jack by side and by jack lying a most stifled inside the and the poor maid or young woman rather standing at the door crying her eyes out i shall never forget it never have melted a marble stone but she couldn t find him nowhere at all by op the d the paused and one or two words of comment came from the listeners s stories often seemed to be ended when ihey were not really so and strangers were betrayed into premature of though old friends knew better the went on well how the old woman should have had the wit to guess it i could never tell but she found out that he was inside that there without saying a word she took hold of the it was turned by then and round she him and jack b an to about inside o stop the let me out he out his head i shall be into a he was a cowardly chap in his heart as such men mostly be not ye make amends for her virgin innocence says the old woman stop the you old witch screams he you call me old witch do ye you says she when ye ought to ha been calling me mother law	45
these last five months and on went the and jack s bones rattled round again well none of us ventured to interfere and at last a promised to make it right wi her yes i ll be as good as my word he said and so it ended that day while the listeners were smiling their comments there was a quick movement behind their backs and they looked pale faced had gone to the door how warm tis to day she said almost it was warm and none of them connected her with the reminiscences of the he went forward and opened the door for her saying with tender why he frequently with unconscious irony gave her this pet name the prettiest i ve got in my you mustn t get so as this at the first of summer weather or we shall a by the rally be finely put to for want of ee by dog days shan t we mr i was faint and i think i am better out o doors she said mechanically and disappeared outside fortunately for her the milk in the revolving at that moment changed its for a decided tis coming cried mrs and the attention of all was off from that fair sufferer soon recovered herself but she remained much depressed all the afternoon when the evening was done she did not care to be with the rest of them and went out of doors wandering along she knew not whither she was wretched o so wretched at the perception that to her companions the s story had been rather a humorous than otherwise none of them but herself seemed to see the sorrow of it to a certainty not one knew how cruelly it touched the tender place in her experience the evening sun was now ugly to her like a great wound in the sky only a solitary cracked reed greeted her from the bushes by the river in a sad machine made tone resembling that of a past friend whose friendship she had in these long days the and indeed most of the household went to bed at sunset or sooner the morning work before being so early and heavy at a time of full usually accompanied her fellows upstairs to night however she was the first to go to their common chamber and she had when the other girls came in she saw them in the orange light of the vanished s m which flushed their forms with its colour she again but she was by their voices and quietly turned her eyes towards neither of her three chamber companions had got into bed they were standing in a group in their by op the d at the window the last red rays of the west still warming their faces and necks and the walls around them all were watching somebody in the garden with deep interest their three faces dose together a jovial and round one a pale one with dark hair and a fair one whose were don t push you can see as well as i said the haired and youngest girl without removing her eyes from the window tis no use for you to be in love with him any more than me said faced the eldest his thoughts be of other cheeks than thine still looked and the others looked again there he is again cried the pale girl with dark damp hair and keenly cut lips you needn t say anything answered for i you kissing his shade what did you see her doing asked why he was standing over the tub to let off the and the shade of his face came upon the wall behind close to who was standing there filling a she put her mouth against the wall and kissed the shade of his mouth i her though he didn t o said a rosy spot came into the middle of s cheek well there was no harm in it she declared with attempted coolness and if i be in love wi en so is too and so be you come to that s full face could not blush past its i she said what a tale ah there he is again dear eyes dear dear mr there you ve owned it so have you so have we all said with by the rally the dry frankness of complete indifference to opinion it is silly to pretend otherwise amongst ourselves though we need not own it to other folks i would just marry n to morrow so would i and more murmured and i too whispered tlie more timid the listener grew warm we can t all marry him said we shan t either of us which is worse still said the there he is again they all three blew him a silent kiss why asked quickly because he likes best said lowering her voice i have watched him every day and have foimd it out there was a silence but she don t care for n at length breathed well i sometimes think that too but how silly all this is said impatiently of course he won t marry any one of us or either a gentleman s son who s going to be a great and farmer abroad more to ask us to come wi en as farm hands at so much a year one sighed and another sighed and s plump figure sighed biggest of all somebody in bed hard by sighed too tears came into the eyes of the pretty red haired youngest the last bud of the so important in the county annals they watched silently a little longer their three faces still dose together as before and the triple hues of their hair but the mr had gone indoors and they saw him no more and the shades	45
to they crept into their beds in a few minutes they heard him ascend the ladder to his own room was soon but did not drop into for a long time cried herself to sleep by op the d the deeper was very far from sleeping even then this conversation was another of the bitter she had been obliged to swallow that day scarce the least feeling of jealousy arose in her breast for that matter she knew herself to have the preference being more formed better educated and though the youngest except more woman than either she perceived that only the slightest ordinary care was necessary for holding her own in angel s heart against these her candid friends but the grave question was ought she to do this there was to be sure hardly a ghost of a chance for either of them in a serious sense but there was or had been a chance of one or the other inspiring him with a passing fancy for her and enjoying the e of his attentions while he stayed here such had led to marriage and she had heard from mrs that mr had one day asked in a laughing way what would be the use of his marrying a fine lady and all the while ten thousand acres of pasture to feed and cattle to rear and com to reap a farm woman would be the only sensible kind of wife for him but whether mr had spoken seriously or not why should she who could never allow any man to marry her now and who had determined that she never would be tempted to do so draw off mr s attention from other women for the brief happiness of herself in his eyes while he remained at by they came downstairs yawning next morning but and were proceeded with as usual and they went indoors to breakfast was discovered stamping about the house he had received a letter in a customer had complained that the butter had a j and so t have said the who held in his left hand a wooden on which a lump of butter was stuck yes taste for yourself several of them gathered round him and mr tasted also the other one or two of the men and last of all mrs who came out from the waiting breakfast table there certainly was a the who had thrown himself into abstraction to better realize the taste and so divine the particular species of weed to which it suddenly exclaimed tis and i thought there wasn t a blade left in that then all the old hands remembered that a dry into which a few of the cows had been admitted of late had in years gone by spoilt the butter in the same way the had not recognized the taste at that time and thought the butter we must that he resumed this mustn t all having armed themselves with old pointed knives they went out together as the plant could only be present in very ion by of the d to have escaped ordinary observation to find it seemed rather a hopeless attempt in the stretch of grass before them however formed themselves into line au assisting owing to the importance of the search the at the upper end with mr who had volunteered to help then and then bill and e married with her black hair and rolling eyes and from the winter o the water who lived in their respective cottages with eyes fixed upon the ground they crept slowly across a strip of the field returning a little further down in such a manner that when they should have finished not a single inch of the pasture but would have fallen under the eye of some one of them it was a most tedious business not more than half a dozen shoots of being in the whole field yet such was the s that probably one bite of it by one cow had been sufficient to season the whole s produce for the day one from another in natures and moods so greatly as they did they yet formed bending a curiously uniform row noiseless and an alien observer passing down the neighbouring lane well have been excused for them as as they crept along stooping low to discern the plant a soft yellow gleam was reflected from the into their shaded faces giving them an aspect though the was pouring upon their backs in all the strength of noon angel who stuck to his rule of part with the rest in everything glanced up now and it was not of course by accident that he walked next to well how are you he murmured very well thank you sir she replied y as tliey had been discussing a score of only half an hour before the by the rally style seemed a little superfluous but they got no further in speech just then they crept and crept the hem of her just touching and his elbow sometimes brushing hers at last the who came next could stand it no longer upon my and body this here stooping do fairly make my back open and shut he himself slowly with an look till quite upright and you you wasn t well a day or two ago this will make your head ache finely don t do any more if you fed leave the rest to finish it withdrew and dropped behind mr also stepped out of line and b an about for the weed when she found him near her her very at what she had heard the night before made her the first to speak t they look pretty she said who and had decided that either of these maidens make a good farmer s wife and that she ought to recommend them and obscure her own wretched charms pretty	45
well yes they are pretty girls afresh looking i have often thought so though poor won t last long o no they are excellent yes though not better than you they better than i do they remained observing them not without their observing him she is up continued who oh why is that because you are looking at her by op the self sacrificing as her mood might be could not well go further and cry marry one of them if you really do want a and not a lady and don t think of she followed and had the mournful satisfaction of seeing that remained behind this day she forced herself to take pains to avoid him never allowing herself as formerly to remain long in his company even if their were purely accidental she gave the other three every chance was woman enough to realize from their to herself that angel had the honour of all the in his keeping and her perception of his care to avoid the happiness of either in the least degree bred a tender respect in for what she deemed rightly or the sense of duty shown by him a quality which she had never expected to find in one of the opposite sex and in the absence of which more than one of the simple hearts who were his might have gone weeping on her pilgrimage by the hot weather of july had crept upon them unawares and the atmosphere of the flat hung heavy as an over the folk the cows and the trees hot steaming rains fell frequently making the grass where the cows fed yet more rank and the late in the other it was morning the was done the had gone home and the other three were dressing themselves rapidly the whole having agreed to go together to church which lay some three or four miles distant from the house she had now been two months at and this was her first excursion all the preceding afternoon and night heavy had down upon the and wa ed some of the hay into the river but this morning the sun shone out all the more brilliantly for the and the air was and clear the crooked lane leading from their own parish to ran along the lowest in a portion of its length and when the girls reached the most depressed spot they found that the result of the rain had been to flood the lane over shoe to a distance of some fifty yards this would have been no serious on a week day they would have through it in their high and boots quite but on day of vanity this sun s day when flesh went forth to with flesh while affecting business with spiritual things on this occasion for wearing their white stockings and thin shoes and their pink white and gowns on i i by of the d which every mud spot would be visible the pool was an awkward they hear the church bell calling as yet nearly a mile who would have expected such a rise in the river in summer time said from the top of the roadside bank on which they had climbed and were maintaining a precarious footing in the hope of creeping along its slope till they were past the pool we can t get there anyhow without walking right through it or else going round the way and that would make us so very late said pausing hopelessly and i do colour up so hot walking into church late and all the people staring round said that i hardly cool down again till we get into the that it may please while they stood clinging to the bank they heard a the bend of the road and presently appeared angel advancing along tiie lane towards them through the water four hearts gave a big throb simultaneously his aspect was probably as un a one as a parson s son often presented his attire being his clothes long boots a inside his hat to keep his head cool with a to finish him off he s not going to church said no i he was murmured angel in fact rightly or to adopt the safe phrase of preferred sermons in stones to sermons in churches and on fine summer days this morning moreover he had gone out to see if the damage to the hay by the flood was considerable or not on his walk he observed the girls from a long distance though they had been so occupied with their difficulties of passage as not to notice him he knew that the water had risen at that spot and that it would quite check their progress so he had hastened on with a dim by the rally idea of how he could help them one of them in particular the rosy bright eyed looked so charming in their light summer attire clinging to the roadside bank like on a roof slope that he stopped a moment to regard them before coming dose their skirts had brushed up from the grass innumerable flies and which unable to escape remained in the transparent as in an angel s eye at last fell upon the of the four e being full of suppressed laughter at their not meeting his glance he came beneath them in the water which did not rise over his long boots and stood looking at the flies and are you to get to he said to who was in including the next two in his remark but avoiding yes sir and tis getting late and my colour do come up so i ll carry you through the pool every of you the whole four flushed as if one heart beat through them i think you can t sir said it is the only way for you to get past	45
stand still nonsense you are not too heavy i d carry you au four together now attend he continued and put arms my shoulders so now hold on that s well done had lowered herself upon his arm and shoulder as directed and angel strode off with her his slim figure as viewed from behind looking like the mere stem to the great suggested by hers they disappeared round the curve of the road and only his footsteps and the top ribbon of s bonnet told where they were in a few minutes he reappeared was the next in order upon the bank i a by op the d here he comes she murmured and they could hear that her lips were dry with emotion and i have to put my arms round his neck and look into his face as did there s nothing in that said quickly there s a time for continued a time to embrace and a time to refrain from embracing the first is now going to be mine pie it is scripture yes said i ve always a ear at church for pretty verses angel to whom three quarters of this performance was a commonplace act of kindness now approached she and lowered herself into his arms and angel marched off with her when he was heard returning for the third time s throbbing heart could te almost seen to shake her he went up to the red haired girl and while he was seizing her he glanced at his lips could not have pronounced more plainly it will soon be you and i her comprehension appeared in her face she could not help it there was an between them poor little though by far the weight was the most troublesome of s burdens had been like a sack of meal a dead weight of under which he had literally staggered had sensibly and calmly was a of however he got through with the creature deposited her and returned could see over the hedge the distant three in a group standing as he had them on the next rising ground it was now her turn she was embarrassed to discover that at the of mr s breath and eyes which she had in her companions was in herself and as if fearful of betraying her secret she with him at the last moment i may be able to along the bank perhaps i by the rally can better than they you must be so tired mr no no said he quickly and almost before she was aware she was seated in his arms and resting against shoulder three to get one he whispered are better women than i she replied sticking to her resolve not to me said angel he saw her grow warm at this and they went some steps in silence i hope i am not too heavy she said timidly o no you should lift such a lump you are like an warmed by the sun and all this of muslin about you is the it is very pretty if i seem like that to you do you know that i have undergone three quarters of this labour entirely for the e of the fourth quarter no i did not expect such an event to day nor i the water came up so sudden that the rise in the water was what she understood him to refer to the state of her breathing stood still and inclined his face towards hers o he exclaimed the girl s cheeks burned to the breeze and she could not look into his eyes for her emotion it reminded angel that he was somewhat taking advantage of an accidental position and he went no further with it no definite words of love had crossed their lips as yet and at this point was desirable now however he walked slowly to make the remainder of the distance as long as possible but at last they came to the bend and the rest of their progress was in full view of the other three the dry land was reached and he set her down her friends were looking with round thoughtful eyes at her and him and she could see that they had i s by op the d been of her he hastily bade them farewell and splash back along the stretch of road the four moved on together as before till broke the silence by no in all truth we have no chance against her she looked at what do you mean asked the latter he likes ee best the very best we could see it as he brought ee he would have kissed ee if you had encouraged him to do it ever so uttle no no said she the gaiety with which they had set out had somehow vanished and yet there was no enmity or malice between them they were generous young souls they had been reared in the lonely country where is a strong sentiment and they did not blame her such was to be s heart ached there was no concealing from herself the fact that she loved angel perhaps all the more passionately from knowing that the others had also lost their hearts to him there is in this sentiment especially among women and yet that same hungry heart of hers her friends s honest nature had fought against this but too feebly and the natural result had followed i will never stand in your way nor in the way of either of you she declared to that night in the bedroom her tears running down i can t help this my dear i don t think marrying is in his mind at all but if he were even to ask me i should refuse him as i should refuse any man oh would you why said wondering it cannot be but	45
i will be plain putting myself quite on one side i don t think he will choose either of you i have never expected it thought of it moaned i wish i was dead x by the rally the poor child torn by a feeling which she hardly understood turned to the other two girls who came upstairs just then we be friends with her again she said to them she thinks no more of his choosing her than we do so the reserve went off and they were confiding and warm i don t seem to care what i do now said whose mood was to its lowest bass i was going to marry a at who s asked me twice but my soul i would put an end to myself rather n be his wife now why don t ye speak to confess then murmured i sure to day that he was going to kiss me as he held me and i lay still against his breast hoping and hoping and never moved at all but he did not i don t like here at any longer i shall go the air of the sleeping chamber seemed to with the hopeless passion of the girls they under the of an thrust on them by cruel nature s law an emotion which they had neither expected nor desired the incident of the day had tbe flame that was burning the inside of their hearts out and the torture was almost more than they could the differences which distinguished them as individuals were abstracted by this passion and each was but portion of one called sex there was so much frankness and so little jealousy because there was no hope each one was a girl of fair common sense and she did not herself with any vain or deny her love or give herself airs in the idea of the others the full recognition of the of their from a point of view its beginning its self bounded outlook its lack of everything to justify its existence in the eye of civilization while lacking nothing in the eye of by op the d nature the one fact that it did exist them to a killing joy all this imparted to them a resignation a dignity which a practical and sordid expectation of winning him as a husband would have destroyed they tossed and turned on their little beds and the cheese downstairs b you e whispered one half later it was s voice replied in the affirmative whereupon also and suddenly the off them and sighed so be i wonder what she is like the lady they say his family have looked out for him i wonder said some lady looked out for him gasped starting i have never heard o that yes tis whispered a young lady of his own rank chosen by his family a doctor of divinity s daughter near his father s parish of he don t much care for her they say but he is sure to marry her they had heard so very little of this yet it was enough to build up dreams upon there in the shade of the night they pictured all the details of his being won to consent of the wedding preparations of the bride s happiness of her dress and veil of her home with him when oblivion would have fallen upon themselves as far as he and their love were concerned thus they talked and ached and wept till sleep charmed their sorrow away after this disclosure nourished no foolish thought that there any grave and deliberate import in s attentions to her it was a passing summer love of her face for love s own temporary sake nothing more and the l by the rally crown of this sad conception was that she whom he really did prefer in a way to the rest she who knew herself to be more impassioned in nature more beautiful than they was in the eyes of propriety far less worthy of him than the ones whom he ignored by amid the and warm of the a season when the rush of could be heard below the hiss of it was impossible that the most fanciful love should not grow passionate the ready existing there were by their july passed over their heads and the weather which came in its wake seemed an effort on the part of nature to match the state of hearts at the air of the place so fresh in the spring and early was and now its heavy weighed upon them and at mid day the landscape seemed l ring in a the upper slopes of the pastures but there was still bright green here where the and as was oppressed by the outward so was he inwardly by of passion for the soft and silent the rains having passed the were dry the wheels of the s spring cart as he sped home from market licked up the surface of the highway and were followed by white of dust as if they had set a thin powder train on fire the cows jumped wildly over the five barred by the fly kept his shirt sleeves permanently rolled up from monday to saturday open windows had no effect in without open doors and in the garden the and crept about under the bt es rather in the manner of than by the rally of winged creatures the flies in the kitchen were lazy and familiar crawling about in unwonted places on the floor into drawers and over the backs of the hands conversations were concerning while butter making and still more butter keeping was a despair they entirely in the for coolness and convenience without driving in the cows during the day the animals followed the shadow of the smallest tree as it moved the stem with	45
of his time wi me add the with a which unconsciously was brutal and so i suppose he is beginning to see about his plans elsewhere how much longer is he to bide here asked the only one of the gloom stricken who could trust her voice with the question the others waited for the s answer as if their hung upon it with parted gazing on the table cloth with heat added to her throbbing and looking out at the well i can t mind the exact day without looking at my book replied with the same intolerable and even that may be altered a bit he ll bide to get a uttle practice in the out at the straw yard for certain he ll hang on till the end of the year i should say four months or so of ecstasy in his pleasure about with pain after that the of unutterable night at this moment of the morning angel was riding along a narrow lane ten miles distant from the in the direction of his father s at as well as he could a little basket which contained some black and a bottle of sent by mrs with her respects to his parents white lane stretched before him and by the consequence his eyes were upon it but they were staring into next year and not at the lane t he loved her ought he to marry her dared he to marry her what his mother and his brothers say what would he himself say a couple of years after the event that would depend upon whether the of the temporary emotion or whether it were a joy in her form only with no of his father s hill little town the church tower of red stone the of trees near the came at last into view beneath him and he rode down towards the well known gate casting a glance in the direction of the church before entering his home he beheld standing by the door a group of girls of ages between twelve and sixteen apparently awaiting the arrival of some other one who in a moment became visible a figure somewhat older than the school girls wearing a hat and highly morning gown with a couple of books in her hand knew her well he could not be sure that she observed him he hoped she did not so as to render it unnecessary that he should go and speak to her that she was an overpowering reluctance to greet her made him decide that she had not seen him the yoimg lady was miss mercy chant the only daughter of his father s neighbour and friend whom it was his parents quiet hope that he might wed some day i she was great at and bible and was plainly going to hold a class now s mind flew to the impassioned in the their rosy faces court patched with cow and to one the most impassioned of them au it was on the impulse of the moment that he had resolved to trot over to and hence had not written to his mother and father however to arrive about the breakfast hour before i by op the d they should have gone out to their parish duties he was a little late and they had already sat down to the morning meal the group at table jumped up to welcome him as soon as he entered they were his father and mother his brother the reverend at a town in the adjoining county home for the inside ci a fortnight and his other brother the reverend the classical scholar and fellow and dean of his down from cambridge for the long his mother appeared in a cap and silver spectacles and his father looked what in fact he was an earnest god fearing man somewhat gaunt in years about sixty five his pale face lined with and purpose over their heads hung the picture of angel s sister the eldest of the family sixteen years his senior who had married a missionary and gone out to africa cm mr was a clergyman of a type which within the last twenty years has well nigh dropped out of contemporary life a spiritual in the direct line from an of the a a man of simplicity in life and thought he had in his raw youth made up his mind once for all on the deeper questions of existence and admitted no further reasoning on them he was regarded even by those of his own date and school of thinking as extreme while on the other hand those totally opposed to him were unwillingly won to admiration for his and for the remarkable power he showed in di all question as to principles in his energy for applying them he loved paul of st john hated st james as much as he dared and regarded with mixed feelings and the new testament was less a than a to his intelligence less an than an his creed of was such that it almost amounted to a vice and quite amounted on its n side to a oa by the consequence philosophy which had with that of and he despised the and swore by the articles and deemed himself consistent through the whole cat which in a way he might have been one thing he certainly was sincere to the p an in natural life and womanhood which his son angel had lately been in his temper would have been in a high d had he either by inquiry or imagination be able to apprehend it upon a time angel had been so unlucky as to say to his father in a moment of irritation that it might have resulted far better for mankind if greece had been the source of the religion of modem tion and not and father s	45
grief was of that blank description which could not realize that there might a part of a truth much less a half truth or a whole truth in such a proposition he had simply at angel for some time after but the kindness of his heart was such that he never resented anything for long and welcomed his son to day with a smile which was as candidly sweet as a child s angel sat down and the place felt like home yet he did not so much as formerly feel himself one of the family gathered there every time that he returned hither he was of this and since he had last shared in the life it had grown even more distinctly foreign to his own than usual its aspirations still unconsciously based on the view of things a paradise a hell were as foreign to his own as if they had been the dreams of people on another planet he had seen only life felt only the great passionate pulse of existence by those which attempt to check what wisdom would be content to on their part they saw a great difference in him by op the d a growing from the angel of former times it was a difference in his manner that they noticed just now particularly his brothers he was getting to behave like a farmer he his l s about the muscles of his face had grown more expressive his eyes looked as much information as his tongue spoke and more the of the scholar had nearly d still more the manner of the drawing room young man a would have said that he had lost culture and a that he had become coarse such was the of fellowship with the and after breakfast he walked with his two brothers non well educated hall marked young men correct to their remotest fibre such models as are turned out yearly by the of a they were both somewhat and when it was the custom to wear a single and string they wore a single ey and string when it was the custom to wear a double glass they wore a double glass when it was the custom to wear spectacles they wore spectacles straightway all without reference to the particular variety of defect in their own vision when was they carried pocket copies and when was they allowed him to grow dusty on their shelves when s holy families were admired they admired s holy families when he was in favour of they followed suit without any personal objection if these two noticed angel s growing social he noticed their growing mental seemed to him all church all college his and were the of the world to one cambridge to the other brother candidly recognized that there were a few scores of millions of in civilized society persons who were neither by the consequence men nor but they were to be rather than reckoned with and respected they were both and attentive sons and were regular in their visits to their parents though an from a far more recent point in the of than his father was less and disinterested more than his father of a contradictory opinion in its aspect as a danger to its he was less ready than his father to pardon it as a slight to his own teaching was upon the whole the more minded though with greater he had not so much heart as they walked along the angel s former feeling revived in him that whatever advantages by comparison with himself neither saw or set life as it really was lived perhaps as with many men their of observation were not so good as their opportunities of expression neither had an adequate conception of the complicated forces at work outside the smooth and gentle current in which they and their associates floated neither saw the difference between local truth and universal truth that what the inner world said in their and hearing was quite a different thing from what the outer world was thinking i suppose it is farming or nothing for you now my dear fellow was saying among other things to his youngest brother as he looked through his spectacles at the distant fields with sad and therefore we must make the best of it but i do entreat you to endeavour to keep as much as possible in touch with moral farming of course means it but high thinking may go with plain living of course it may said angel was it not proved nineteen hundred years ago if i may upon your domain a little why should you that i am likely to drop my high thinking and my moral by op the d well i fancied from the tone of your letters and our conversation it may be fancy only that you were somehow losing intellectual grasp hasn t it struck you now said angel we are very good friends you know each of us treading our allotted circles but if it comes to intellectual grasp i think you as a contented had better leave mine alone and inquire what has become of yours they returned down the hill to dinner which was fixed at any time at which their father s and mother s morning work in the parish usually concluded as regarded afternoon was the last thing to enter into the consideration of unselfish mr and mrs though the three sons were sufficiently in on this matter to wish that their parents would a little to modem notions the walk had made them hungry angel in par who was now an man accustomed to the of the s somewhat laden table but neither of the old people had arrived and it was not till the sons were almost tired of waiting that their parents entered the self denying pair had been occupied in the of	45

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