Princess Puck

It was September,—rich September, with warm lights and red shadows—when Bill went first to Haylands, Robert Morton’s farm. It was March when she went again; a grey afternoon, level light, and dead stillness over the bare ploughed land and the low white house. She drove from Wrugglesby with Theresa, a tedious drive along winding lanes,—not that she found it tedious, for nothing was tedious to Bill. Theresa, too, had enjoyed her homeward journey more than usual. She had talked gaily all the way until they turned in at her own gateway; then somehow her spirits flagged, and in silence they drove up the long chase which meandered across a grassy field, passed a duck-pond where grey geese waded, and so on to the little gate which shut in the overgrown garden. Bill looked quickly at the garden. It had been a flowery, weedy wilderness when she was there in September; it was bare now, so dry that the earth rose in dust at the touch of Theresa’s skirts, so bare that the leafless raspberry-canes, still though they were, seemed to shiver in their nakedness.

There was no one about; Robert, no doubt, was busy somewhere on the farm. For a moment Theresa hesitated with the reins in her hand, then a man appeared from the stables and took the pony away. Theresa led the way into the house, covertly casting an anxious glance at Bill.

“It is very cold,” she said, as she pushed open the door of her favourite room and went to the fire.

“Yes, I suppose it is,” Bill answered cheerfully. “I’m not cold though. What a jolly room! It is cubby, T.!”

“Do you like it? You saw it when you were here before,” Theresa said, feeling somehow a little warmer and very glad that Bill was with her. If it had been Polly or Bella they might have thought Robert neglectful, but as it was only Bill it did not matter.

By-and-bye Robert came in. He did not know that Bill was coming back with his wife, and when the guest was safely shut in her room he asked, “Why on earth did you bring her?”

“Do you mind?” Theresa asked in distress. “I am sorry; I did not think you would mind; she won’t trouble you much.”

“No, she won’t trouble me; still I don’t see what you wanted to have her for.”

“We thought—I thought, it might do her good.”

“Ill?” Morton asked, looking up sharply. “If she is ill, we certainly don’t want her here.”

“She is not ill. She does not get on very well at school; I mean—” Theresa felt the matter was difficult of explanation—“I mean, she is very young for her age.”

“She is very ugly,” Morton said, beginning to unlace his boots.

Theresa flushed. “She is my cousin,” she said.

“That don’t make her handsome, my dear,” he observed, without looking up.

“I don’t think her at all ugly.” Theresa’s voice showed that she was hurt. “If she were, it would not be her fault. Do you wish me to send her home at the end of the week?”

“I? No, please yourself as to that. Keep her as long as you like, as far as I am concerned.”

And he left her to take his boots to the wash-house with no idea that there were tears in her eyes. She forced them back, turning to the fire as she did so. It was certainly cold, a dreary, dreary afternoon. She was still standing by the fire, standing stiffly with something of unapproachable dignity about her, when Bill came down a few minutes later; but Bill was not troubled by the dignity, and curled herself up in the big chair on the other side of the fire evidently quite satisfied. She spent the evening helping Robert to mend whips, quite satisfied with that too; possibly she found it an improvement on learning grammar with Carrie and Alice.

Theresa was relieved to find that Bill and Robert showed so much inclination to friendliness; indeed, at the end of two days she came to the conclusion that they were better friends than ever Robert and Bella had been. It was a very good thing, she thought, as she watched Bill wandering about the cow-yard and investigating the pig-styes. Bill took the keenest interest in pigs and poultry, cows and butter; her interest extended to the dairy, the kitchen, and the store-room; she seemed anxious to do any work she could. Theresa gave her dusting and churning, and she worked with a will, though when the churning was done Theresa was rather horrified to find her young cousin scrubbing the dairy-floor.

“Bill! What are you doing?”

“Clearing up,—I upset some butter-milk.” Bill was kneeling on the bricks and she did not cease scrubbing to give the answer.

“But, my dear child, there is no necessity,—get up.”

“I like it, I like clearing up. I did the old fowls’ house just before I came in here; you should see it; it’s beautifully clean. This afternoon I am going to lime-wash it, and then I shall put in the biggest family of chickens. They have not half enough room where they are; Robert said I might move them if I liked.”

“Yes, but,—surely you need not lime-wash the house yourself; one of the men can do it. You must not do it; you will make yourself in such a state.”

“I am afraid I am rather a dirty worker.”

Theresa glanced at Bill’s present condition and saw that the statement was only too true. “You must leave off,” she said: “the soapsuds are all up your sleeves; besides, I want to speak to you.”

“All right, I can hear; you sit down on that wooden tub; I’m just done, and I can finish while you are talking.”

Theresa sat down in spite of her protestations. “I want to talk to you about the prayer-meeting,” she said. “You know, during Lent Mr. Johnson holds meetings once a week, a kind of Bible-reading. We meet at different houses and read passages from the Bible, and he explains them and gives a little address. They are really rather nice, and not too long. We meet at seven and it is all over quite early; we usually have supper about half-past eight.”

“Yes?” Bill was working industriously at the last corner.

“I meant—do you think you would care to go?” Theresa asked this somewhat doubtfully. Bella and Polly had been amused by the idea of the Ashelton prayer-meetings, and Bill, according to Polly’s account, was not likely to treat them more respectfully. However, to Theresa’s satisfaction, Bill answered with enthusiasm: “I should like it tremendously; is it to-night?”

“No, to-morrow. To-day is market-day at Wrugglesby, you know; nothing here is ever fixed on a market-day.”

“I see,” Bill said, taking up her pail of water; “then it’s to-morrow? I’ll come if you will take me,” and she went away to empty the pail.

Theresa watched her go, and then went into the house feeling that her guest was easy to entertain, and gave really very little trouble, in spite of Polly’s prognostications. Indeed she had been very glad of her company ever since her arrival, and especially so to-day as Robert had gone to market and was not likely to be back till late. The day seemed all the shorter for the girl’s presence in the house. The weather was gray and cloudy, and Theresa had a headache; she was very glad Bill was with her in the afternoon. Later on, in the evening, when her headache became bad, she was persuaded by her young cousin to go to bed and leave her to wait for Robert.

“I hardly like to go; you don’t think it will seem unkind?” Theresa offered this last protest standing by the door, her candle in her hand.

“No, of course not, I’ll explain.”

Bill somehow knew, though Theresa did not, that Robert did not view things in the same light as his wife did; so she persuaded her to go to bed and settled herself by the fire until the servant was ready to go up-stairs. After that she went round the house and fastened the doors, standing a moment in the hall curiously impressed by the silence of the place. “I have never been up alone in a sleeping house before,” she meditated as she put out the light and stretched out her hands in the darkness as if to feel to the full the sense of solitary night. At that moment she remembered that she had fastened the back door which Theresa had told her particularly to leave unlocked, as Robert always let himself in that way.

She went back and unfastened it, turned the handle to see if it were really unbolted, and stood a moment looking out. The night-breeze stirred her hair; the moist fragrance of the earth came to her; she drew her breath in deeply, slowly, turning her head from side to side, listening to the intense stillness; it seemed to her that she could almost hear things growing. Her heart began to beat faster; the blood in her veins stirred in unison with the moving sap in the hidden trees; some wild creature of the woods was waking in her, bidding her go forth into the darkness. A board creaked; it was only the timbers settling down for the night, but it recalled her to the house and to her task of waiting for its master’s return. With a last glance at the cloudy sky, she went in and shut the door.

There was another that night who found it dark, so dark that more than once he missed his way in the deep lanes which lay between Sales Green and Ashelton. More than once he anathematised the business which led him to come home from Wrugglesby market by way of the little village; the cross-roads were intricate and in bad repair, and under the darkness of the trees it was impossible to see so much as the hedgerow elms on either side. At last he heard the sound of wheels away on the left; he was clear of the lanes and out on the high road now; just as he emerged a vehicle without lights passed, or rather, nearly collided with him.

He pulled his horse up and demanded angrily: “Where the devil are you going? If you want the whole road you might at least carry lights so that one can see what you are doing!”

“Where—going ’self?” a thick voice retorted. “Damn your clumsiness! Wha’—what ’yer mean by running a man down li’ that!”

“Where are you trying to go?” The man was evidently too drunk to be argued with.

“Home;—that’sh if—if can get there. Brute pulls li’—like the devil.”

“You had better let me drive you home, Morton—it is Morton? I expect I can see better in the dark than you can.”

Morton raised no objection and the other dismounted as he spoke and climbed up beside him. “Pleashed, I’m sure,” Robert muttered. “Been to market? Oh, forgot,—saw you there myself, but you lef’ early; very cred’able, Mr. Harborough, you’ shober young man.”

He laughed in a maudlin way, and they started on a straight course in the darkness, Harborough’s horse, fastened by the bridle, trotting behind. A straight road lay before them, the ground rising clear from the shade of the trees, just showing paler against the blackness, then sloping gently downwards to deeper shadow until the turning by the village; there the road forked, now to the left, through the open gateway, up the chase, and so to the stables and home.

“Come on, ol’ chap, come in and have a—a glass of whishky,—don’t b’ unsociable.”

Harborough hesitated and thought of Mrs. Morton. He glanced up at the house; there was a light in one of the lower windows, the rest were dark—was she sitting up for her husband? He thought of the young wife with her serene, unconscious face, waiting for this, and yielding to the affectionate pressure on his arm he went in.

“There does not seem to be any one up,” he said, as he opened the door and paused on the threshold.

“Oh, yes, sure to be, sure—confound—”

As Morton stumbled, Harborough held him up, and then stood listening a moment. The house was very quiet except for the chirping of crickets in the kitchen. Guided more by instinct than by his companion he made his way to Mrs. Morton’s favourite sitting-room and opened the door, expecting yet dreading to meet the sweet face of the young wife. But she was not there; involuntarily he breathed a sigh of relief and braced himself to face her substitute. There was a substitute, someone curled up in the big chair by the fire, a slim young girl. She had been reading, and apparently had but just discovered their presence in the house, for she only looked up from her book as they entered.

“Theresa has gone to bed,” she said, rising as she spoke. She did not seem at all surprised to see them both. Harborough wondered if she understood, or if Morton returned in this condition so often that she was prepared for it. “Poor Theresa’s head was so bad that I persuaded her to go, and to let me sit up,” she added.

“That ’ch al’right, you’n I—quite happy without her,” Morton said thickly, smiling upon the girl.

“You won’t want to disturb her to-night,” she went on. “Her head is ever so bad; you will sleep in the blue room, won’t you? That will do nicely.”

“That’ll do—we won’t dish’turb her, poor—poor T.”

“Is the room ready?” Harborough asked quickly.

She shook her head, and flitted away with light noiseless feet. Morton stretched out a hand to detain her, but she passed him like a shadow and was gone.

“Make her sing when ’comes back—sing to you,—cap’tal song.”

Harborough turned away abruptly. Evidently she had not expected this sort of home-coming, or surely the room would have been ready. Probably it had not occurred before, to Mrs. Morton’s knowledge at least; if it had, she would never have left this child to face it alone; for a child she was, fifteen, sixteen perhaps, but a child certainly. A great anger rose in Harborough’s heart against the man who had brought his beastliness home here. He glanced round the room, which impressed him as daintily feminine, doubtless arranged by the bride nine months ago. Her work-basket stood on the table, a few spring flowers were on the mantelpiece; the whole place was pathetically eloquent of her presence. Harborough picked up a book which lay on the table and looked at the title—Romances and Drolls of the West of England—an old book of West Country legends and folk-lore, fairy tales of a primitive order, the book that the girl, who had just left the room, had been reading. Pleasant to call a child from her fairy-stories to meet a drunkard!

“Now come to bed.” She had returned as noiselessly as she had gone.

“Bed? Not ’f I know it!”

“Yes, come along.”

“I will see Mr. Morton to bed,” Harborough said. “Which is the room? No, tell me, don’t trouble to come.”

“Second door from the top of the stairs,” was the direction she gave, and Harborough, coercing his charge, went up-stairs. With the door safely shut on them he used more force than persuasion, feeling heartily sick of the whole business. When he came down again the girl was in her old position, reading her fairy-book as before.

“Is he in bed?” she asked.

“Yes. Are you alone here—I mean, are you going to shut the house up?”

“Yes, all that is still open. I must, you see, there is no one else. You can’t do it when you are outside, and you won’t want to stop in to do it; it is not difficult.”

“No. You are rather young to be left alone—I won’t keep you up; good-night.”

She went to the door with him, the one opening on to the yard by which he and Morton had entered a little while before. On the step he hesitated; he was standing in shadow, she in the light of the lantern she had brought that she might see to fasten the door after him.

“If I were you,” he said doubtfully, “I should not disturb Mr. Morton more than I could help. I would not pass his room unless it were necessary.”

“No.”

Nevertheless, after he had gone she stole noiselessly to the door and turned the key outside for fear the sleeper should awake and disturb Theresa in the night. But then that was quite necessary in her opinion, and no one was the wiser, for she unlocked it again between four and five in the morning.

As for Harborough, having given the caution, he felt satisfied and after repeating “good-night” went down the yard. He looked back once before she closed the door. She was still standing in the same position, the lantern in her hand, an elfin thing in its glow against the brown shadows of the passage, herself all brown and red, skin and hair and eyes, colours such as Rembrandt loved. She moved, scattering splashes of light from her lantern, then shut the door; and Harborough mounted his horse and rode a good mile home to Crows’ Farm.