As she stood there in the light of the morning, Joyce Falconer was a fair picture of happy, joyous maidenhood. Her figure was lithe and supple, and though I am afraid her lilac cotton frock would be despised as only fit for a maid-servant in these days, it became her well. It was made with a full skirt and a loose body, cut rather low at the neck, with sleeves which were large on the shoulder, gradually tightening to the wrist, and displayed to advantage a well-rounded arm. Joyce's shoes were thick; but though, perhaps, a trifle clumsy, they did not spoil the symmetry of her pretty ankle and high-arched instep. Snowy "tuckers" of crimped muslin were sewn into the neck and wrists of her gown, and she wore an apron with a bib; an old-fashioned apron, guiltless of bows or lace.
Her abundant chestnut hair was gathered on the top of her small head, and fell in curls on either side of her smooth white brow; not concealed now by the large Dunstable straw bonnet, which was hanging to her arm by the strings, and left the gentle breeze of the morning free, to play amongst the clustering curls, at their own sweet will.
Joyce's features were regular, and her complexion rosy and healthy. Indeed, everything about her seemed to tell of youth and the full enjoyment of the gifts which God had given her.
"A perfect little rustic!" her aunt in the Vicar's close at Wells called her sometimes, and would suggest to her father that a year or two at a "finishing school" would be an advantage.
But the squire could not bring himself to part from his only daughter, and her education had been, I am afraid, sadly neglected.
"Well, little one," Mr. Falconer said, as he seated himself on a rough wooden bench, "what is this?" touching the cover of a book that peeped from her apron pocket.
"It is a book, father, Charlotte lent me: Mrs. Hemans' poems."
"Ah! poetry is a good thing when it is kept in its right place."
"I have been learning a long poem called 'Edith,' and I repeat it when I am darning stockings, picking up a stitch for every word. Don't you understand, father?"
"I never darned a stocking," he said, laughing.
"Ah! happy father! Mother has now given me six pairs of Melville's new socks, to strengthen the heels. In and out, in and out with the long needle; I have to try very hard not to grumble, so I say 'Edith' as a comfort, and to help me on."
'The woods – oh! solemn are the boundless woods
Of the great Western world when day declines,
And louder sounds the roll of distant floods,
More deep the rustling of the solemn pines;
When darkness gathers o'er the stilly air,
And mystery seems o'er every leaf to brood,
Awful it is for human heart to bear
The weight and burden of the solitude.'
"Father," she said, suddenly stopping, "you are thinking of something that troubles you. I know it by the deep line on your forehead, between your eyes. May I know, father?"
"Well, Sunshine, I am troubled about Melville; he wants to go and see the world, he says. I have given him as good an education as befits his station in life. He has made little use of it; and the bills for the last term at Oxford have been enormous."
"How shameful!" Joyce exclaimed.
"Things are so different from what they were when I was a boy," the squire said. "Why, I never dreamed of anything beyond doing my duty here. I took the farming business off your grandfather's shoulders before I was five-and-twenty. I was his steward, as Melville ought to be mine, and leave me free. As it is, I have to pay Watson, and look into everything myself, when I have a son of three-and-twenty, who ought to do all this for me. I suppose it can't be helped," the squire said, stretching out his legs, and taking up the gun which had been resting against the bench, "and as far as I can see the younger boys will be very little, if any, better than Melville."
"Oh! yes, father. Ralph will do anything you wish, I know; and Hal and Bunny are very good at school. Remember what the master said of them at Christmas."
"Yes, yes; they are good little fellows. Then there is poor Piers; he must always be an anxiety, poor boy!"
"I don't think any of us can be happier than Piers," Joyce said. "He never complains because he is lame; and he is as contented as possible, making his collection of moths and butterflies, and bird's eggs, and things. No, father, don't be unhappy about Piers."
"Do you think, Joyce, I ever forget that it was my carelessness which made the boy a cripple? I never forget it."
"No one else thinks of it, dear daddy," Joyce said, slipping her hand into her father's, as it rested on his knee. "No one else thinks of it; and you know the colt had been broken in, and – "
"The child ought never to have put his legs across it, Joyce; and I lifted him on, and told him not to be a coward. Ah!" said the squire, suddenly starting to his feet. "I cannot speak of it; I dare not."
He began an abrupt descent the way that they had come. Nip and Pip, who had been sleeping with their noses on their paws, and one eye open, raced off, while Duke drew himself into a standing position, and walked demurely down the steep bit of turf, with the brush of his tail waving from side to side as he went.
Joyce did not follow immediately. Her bright face was clouded with the sympathy she felt for her father. It all came back to her: the group before the Manor, the child of eight years old, saying, "I am afraid of riding Rioter, father." Then the father's answer, "Afraid! Don't be a coward, Piers; you have a good seat enough for such a little chap. Here, let me put you on." The boy's white, set face, as he grasped the reins; and Rioter was off like lightning. "His brothers rode long before they were his age," the squire had said; "it won't do to tie him to his mother's apron strings, because he happens to be the youngest." Then the sound of returning horse's feet, and Rioter rushed up the side drive to the stables riderless. Another minute and old Thomas appeared with a lifeless burden in his arms, which the squire took from him, with a groan of remorse, as he turned into the house with him and said to his wife, "I have killed the boy."
But Piers was not killed. His injuries were life-long, but his life was spared.
Whether it was from an instinctive feeling, that his father considered himself the cause of his lameness and generally invalided condition, or whether the latent buoyancy of his nature asserted itself above all the privations which the accident had brought upon him, or whether both of these causes were at work within him, certain it is that Piers was the most cheerful and most uncomplaining member of the squire's household, and never allowed any one to pity him, or to treat him as an object of compassion. Joyce was right when she said that no one was happier than Piers. Every bird and insect had a charm for him, and were his friends and companions. Books of natural history were rare; but Bewick's Birds sufficed for Piers' needs. The "Natural History of Selborne" and old Isaak Walton's "Angler" were also amongst the boy's scanty library, and keen perception and acute observation supplied the place of extraneous help; and Piers was content.
The cloud soon cleared from Joyce's face as a well-known whistle was heard from the copse, and Joyce answered it with a clear note of welcome:
"Here, Piers."
Then the quick, even thud of crutches, and Piers came in sight.
In a moment Joyce was springing down the grassy hill-side, and, with a hardly perceptible touch on her brother's shoulder, she joined him as he came up.
"I say, Joyce, if you go to Wells to-day with father, will you take this little sparrow-hawk to old Plume's to be stuffed? Here, rummage in my pocket, left-hand side – there he is! He is a perfect specimen, and a pretty rare one. The stable-boy found him lying on his back under the dove-cot. Perhaps he got the worst of it in a fight. Anyhow, he is dead, and I have a nice nook for him