It is the face of one who has suffered and been patient; who has loved much and will love on to the end; who, from the depths of a noble, selfless nature, looks out upon the world with mild eyes of charity; a woman, yet a girl in years, whom one termed his pearl among women.
Just now, standing under the elms, with her straight white folds and uncovered hair, for her sun-bonnet lay on the turf beside her, her wistful eyes looking far away seaward, one could have compared her to a Norman or a Druidical priestess under the shadow of the sacred oak; there is at once something so benignant and strong, so full of pathos, in her face and form.
Low swaying of branches, then the pattering of red and yellow rain round the rough-hewn bench, the brown baby awakes and stretches out its arms with a lusty cry—a suggestive human sound that effectually breaks up the stillness; for at the same instant an urchin whittling wood in the hedge scrambles out in haste, and a buxom-looking woman steps from the porch of an ivy-covered lodge, wringing the soap-suds from her white wrinkled hands.
Trifles mar tranquillity.
For a moment silence is invaded, and the dissonant sounds gather strength; for once infant tears fail to be dried by mother smiles, and, as if in answer to the shrill cries, flocks of snow-white geese waddle solemnly across the grass; the boy leaves off whittling wood and chases the yellow-bills; through the leafy avenue comes the loaded corn-wain, the jocund wagoner with scarlet poppies in his hat, blue corn-flowers and pink convolvuli trailing from the horses’ ears; over the fields sound the distant pealing of bells.
The girl wakes up from her musing fit with a deep sigh, and her face becomes suddenly very pale; then she moves slowly across the road toward a path winding through the bare harvest fields, where the gleaners are busily at work. From under the tamarisk hedge comes the shadow of a woman; as the white gown disappears and the lodge-keeper carries off her wailing child, the shadow becomes substance and grows erect into the figure of a girl.
Of a girl in shabby black, foot-sore and weary, who drags herself with hesitating steps to the spot where the other woman’s feet have rested, and there she stoops and hurriedly gathers a few blades of grass and presses them to her lips.
Silence once more over the landscape: the glitter of sunshine round the empty bench; the whirling of insects in the ambient air; under the shadowy elms a girl smiling bitterly over a few poor grasses, gathered as we pluck them from a loved one’s grave.
* * * * * *
Catharine, the lodge-keeper, sat rocking her baby in the old porch seat; through the open door one could catch glimpses of the bright red-tiled kitchen with its wooden settle and the tortoise-shell cat asleep on the great wicker chair; beyond, the sunny little herb-garden with its plots of lavender, marjoram, and sweet-smelling thyme, the last monthly roses blooming among the gooseberry bushes; a child cliqueting up the narrow brick path with a big sun-bonnet and burnished pail; in the corner a toy fountain gurgling over its oyster-shell border, and a few superannuated ferns.
Catharine sat contentedly in the shady porch, on her lap lay the brown baby with his face all puckered up with smiles; his tiny hole of a mouth just opened ready for the small moist thumb, and his bare rosy feet beating noiseless time to the birds; he was listening besides to his mother’s voice as she sat rocking him and talking unconsciously aloud.
“ ‘Heaven bless her!’ she muttered, with a cloud on her pleasant face; yes, those were her very words, as she stood like a picture under the old trees yonder.”
“ ‘Heaven bless her and him too,’—but there was not a speck of color in her face as she said the words, and I could see the tears in her beautiful eyes. Oh, but you are a saint, Miss Margaret—every one knows that; but, as I tell Martin, it is a sin and a shame to ring the joy bells for a feckless chit that folk never set eyes on; while our darling, Miss Margaret, is left alone in the old place.”
“What about Margaret, Catharine, for Heaven’s sake, what about Margaret?” and the shadow that had come from behind the tamarisk hedge now fell across the porch straight before the startled woman.
Catharine put down her apron from her eyes with something like a cry, and stood up trembling.
“Good gracious! is that you, Miss Crystal? why, you come before one like a flash of lightning on a summer’s day, to make one palpitate all over for fear of a storm.”
“And about as welcome, I suppose,” returned the young stranger, bitterly, “my good Catharine, your simile is a wonderfully true one.”
“I don’t know naught about ‘similies,’ Miss Crystal, but I know you are as welcome as the flowers in May. Come in—come in—my lamb, and don’t stand scorching your poor face in the sun; come in and I’ll give you Martin’s wicker-chair by the open window, where you can smell the sea and the fields together, and I’ll fetch you a sup of Daisy’s new milk, for you look quite faint and moithered, like a lost and weary bird, my pretty. Yes, just like a lost and weary bird.”
“You are right,” murmured the girl through her pale lips; then aloud, “have your own way, for you were ever an obstinate woman, Catharine, and fetch me a draught of Daisy’s sweet milk and a crust of the old brown loaf, and I will thank you and go; but not before you have told me about Margaret—all that you know, and that you hope and fear, Catharine.”
“Heaven bless you, Miss Crystal, it is the same tender heart as ever, I see. Yes, you shall hear all I know; and that’s little enough, I’ll be bound.” And so saying, she hustled up her dress over her linsey petticoat, and, taking a tin dipper from the dresser, was presently heard calling cheerfully to her milky favorite in the paddock, on her way to the dairy.
Left to herself, the girl threw herself down—not in the wicker-chair, where the cat lay like a furry ball simmering in the sun, but on the old brown settle behind the door, where she could rest her head against the wall, and see and not be seen.
She had taken off her broad-brimmed hat, and it lay on the table beside her; and the sunlight streamed through the lattice window full on her face.
Such a young face, and—Heaven help her—such a sad face; so beautiful too, in spite of the lines that sorrow had evidently traced on it, and the hard bitter curves round the mouth.
The dark dreamy eyes, the pale olive complexion, the glossy hair—in color the sun-steeped blackness of the south—the full curled lips and grand profile, might have befitted a Vashti; just so might the spotless queen have carried her uncrowned head when she left the gates of Shushan, and have trailed her garments in the dust with a mien as proud and as despairing.
There she sat motionless, looking over the harvest-fields, while Catharine spread a clean coarse cloth on the small oaken table beside her, and served up a frugal meal of brown bread, honey, and milk, and then stood watching her while the stranger eat sparingly and as if only necessity compelled.
“There,” she said at last, looking up at Catharine with a soft pathetic smile that lent new beauty to her face; “I have done justice to your delicious fare; now draw your chair closer, for I am starving for news of Margaret, and ‘like water to a thirsty soul is news from a far country.’ How often I say those words to myself.”
“But not bad news, surely, Miss Crystal; and it is like enough you’ll think mine bad when told. Hark, it only wants the half hour to noon, and they are man and wife now.”
“Man and wife! of whom are you talking, Catharine?”
“Of whom should I be talking, dearie, but of the young master?” but the girl interrupted her with strange vehemence.
“Catharine, you will drive me crazy with that slow soft tongue of yours. How can Hugh Redmond be married while Margaret stands under the elm trees alone?”
“But it is true, Miss Crystal, for all that—as sure as the blue sky is above us—Sir Hugh Redmond weds to-day with a bonny bit child from foreign parts that no one set eyes on, and whom he is bringing home as mistress to the old Hall.”
“I