Chapter XLVI
When Joyce was left quite alone, and felt the shelter of the silence and solitude, she dropped again, as she had done in the room downstairs, upon the rug before the fire. Great distress and trouble are chilling things; they make the sick heart creep to the fire--the warmth gives a little forlorn comfort when all is low and ice-bound in the soul. She dropped there like a child--half seated, half on her knees. There was a kind of luxury in the feeling that no one could see or interrupt or sympathise with her--that she was safe for the long hours of the winter night, safe and alone.
What had she done? She had listened when she could not silence him. She had lost herself in listening, feeling his heart beat against her and his voice in her ears. She seemed to hear them now as soon as other people had left her--as soon as she was free from interrupting, unintelligible voices of others. He had told her, over and over again, what she knew--nothing but what she knew; and he must have felt her heart beating too, though not like his--beating heavily, loudly,--beating like a thing half stifled in bonds and ligatures--for he had not waited for any answer. He had taken her to himself when the climax came, and between them there could be no more said. Joyce recognised that there could have been no more said. She remembered that she was sobbing, unable to draw her breath, and that his breath too was exhausted, and all the words that could be used. She was not angry with him for taking her consent for granted--it was all that remained to be done. Their marriage and their long life together, and the height and crown of mortal existence, were all summed up in that moment. It had been, it was, and now it was past. She sat sunk upon herself by the fire and went over everything. That was the only way it could have been. She had for a time held him apart from her with good reasons, telling him how it could not be. And then she had been silenced; the words might have been withstood, but the throbbing of the heart (she could feel it still against her arm)--how could that be withstood? That was something more than words; and her own, so heavily throbbing, had sprung for a moment into the same measure, like something Joyce had never heard of nor read of--something that made an end of time and space and all limits. It had been too bewildering, too transporting, to think of. It was for a moment only; and whether it ought to have been or not was a different question. It had been, and nothing could undo it. And it was past. That was the one thing of which she was sure.
She had never consented, she had said nothing, she had not deceived him. Though she might have deceived others, him she had not deceived. So long as she could speak to him, she had said No. Afterwards, when her voice failed her, when she could only sob, that moment had been--not by her will, but by his will--by something which was inevitable and could not be resisted. But now it was all over and past. Now she was separated from him as far as if worlds lay between them. There was no longer any time to hesitate. It was all fixed and settled, like the laws of the Medes and Persians. She had seen him for the last time. It was not on that subject that she had any further conflict with herself. The question was not that--not that any longer. The question was, What must be done? what in the few hours that remained to her she must do?
She lay there for a long time where she had sunk down, quite still and motionless, notwithstanding that she had so little time, not even thinking at all. Things flitted across her brain, but scarcely moved her--broken scenes, broken words, a look there, an exclamation here. Oftenest in her confusion it was her own name she seemed to hear--Joyce! Joyce!--called out by everybody in turn, as everybody had appealed to her. Andrew whom she had deceived--he had the most right to blame her. She had never said that she loved him, but he had believed it. Poor Andrew! It would not be any gain to him though she lost. And her lady, who had been so dear, and then had changed--to whom she had said that Joyce would do what was wished of her. And then the oracle--the oracle that had said, ‘You could do--no other thing.’ No, she could do no other thing. That was settled. It was not to be discussed; there was no change possible in that. The only thing was what to do--oh, what to do!
Joyce never thought of taking away her own life. She would have given it joyfully for any of them to save them a pang; but take it away at her own caprice, no. She did not consciously reject this way, for she never took it into consideration. It was not among the things that were possible. And though she roused herself now and then at the end of a long discursive round of imaginations, some of them having no connection at all with what had happened, or was about to happen, to ask herself what she was to do, for a long time she did not think at all. Her candles burned, showing a light at her window long after every other light was out. In the barges lying about the bridge some way down the river, there were people who saw it shining, as was reported afterwards, through all the night. But Joyce was not even thinking. What roused her at last was the chill creeping over her--the cold of the deep night: her fire had fallen low, almost to nothing, a faint little red glow all blackening into darkness, and she shivered, and felt in her uncovered arms and shoulders the creeping dead cold, as if the frost had got in. This physical sensation, the shivering dullness, and ague of the cold, roused her when her trouble did not rouse her. She rose benumbed, her limbs stiff, and her heart sore, and wrapped a shawl round her, drawing it close for warmth. How grateful warmth is, when everything else has gone! It is the one thing in which there seems a little comfort. It brought her to life again, and the necessary movement helped that good effect. But bringing her back to life was to bring her back to thought; and she became conscious that time was running on, and that she had not yet decided what to do.
Time was running on. It was long past midnight, it was morning--the black morning of winter when everything is at its coldest, and all the world is desolate. Folding her arms in her shawl over her bosom to keep warm, her hand encountered the little frame of the miniature pinned on her breast. The touch woke her up with a keen prick of reality--as if it had been a sharp cold steel that had touched her. She unpinned it from her breast, and held it in her hand, and looked at it. There must have been magnetism in it. It seemed to bring a new flood of feeling, and will, and impulse over her. She had felt that strange inspiration in her veins before, that desire to arise and flee, she knew not whither. Her mother’s inheritance left behind her when she had fled--where no one could follow. It was a sad inheritance to come into the world with, but it was the only one that Joyce had. She looked at the pictured face so like her own, and that brief long-ended tragedy became clear to Joyce. The other Joyce had endured as long as she could, and then there had come upon her that irrestrainable despairing desire to fly and be seen no more. Oh that I had wings like a dove! It had not perhaps in some ways been so difficult for her as for the second Joyce it would be. There was nobody to go after her, to move heaven and earth to find her--there were perhaps, Joyce thought, confusedly exaggerating the time, and its changes, as youth is so apt to do--no telegraphs, no railways then--at least there was no father, no lover, no friends ready to put all modes of discovery in motion. For a moment she envied her mother; but then said to herself, with a sudden warm flush all over her. No, no! Thank God, in her case there was no second life involved; nobody to come into the world as she herself had done, in confusion and trouble, with all the lines of her life wrong from her birth, and this tragic conclusion always coming! The touch of the cold little miniature seemed to send thrills and icy touches through her veins. The eyes had a strange look in them, like the eyes of a hunted creature. Mrs. Hayward had said that her own eyes were more deep and true. She rose up to look at herself, to see if perhaps that look had come to her too. A girl does not think what is the expression in her eyes; but they had always been quiet eyes, she thought--not with that look. She went to the glass, with the miniature in her hand, to see. But when she stood before the glass, it was not her own expression, but the strange world of darkness and vacancy beyond, which caught Joyce’s confused and troubled intelligence. She remembered all the fanciful superstitions, half poetry, half mirth, of the countryside. How some one would come behind you and look over your shoulder, and you would see in the mirror the man you were to marry,--your fate; or how perhaps it might be a white-robed ghost, or a death’s-head that would advance out of the unseen and look over your shoulder; or how in that strange fathomless darkness of the mirror there might rise before you scenes--of what was going on among those you loved, or what was to happen in the future, shadows of the real. She could not see her own eyes for the wonder which carried her beyond them, which made her look into the reflected air as if it were another world.
What a waste of time it was, and how the time was running on! Only a few hours now before the step must be taken, and as yet no decision come to as to what it was to be! She went and sat down at the table where were her writing things, and in her writing-case the letters--Mrs. Bellendean’s note of farewell, and Andrew’s--poor Andrew’s! Even now she could not think, but only look at these two momentous bits of paper, and wonder what they would think, how they would feel, whether they would blame themselves. She even smiled to herself at the astonishment, the incredulity that would come over Andrew’s face, and his conviction that whoever she had fled from it could not be from him. The lady would know better--it would give her a pang--but so long as everything came as she wished, the pang would not hurt her, it would go away. And then the wonder, and the questions, and the strong feelings would widen out and die away like circles in the water, and Joyce would go down and disappear like a stone.
Again this vague round of thought and nothing decided on, nothing done--and the time was running on. Twelve hours hence it would be the afternoon of the November day, and he would be here. And before then all must be settled and done. And in the meantime the glow of the fire had gone out in the blackness of the night, and it was cold--cold--a cold that went to the heart.
At breakfast next morning Joyce showed little trace of a sleepless night; her eyes were quite clear, her colour varying, but sometimes bright, her aspect not radiant as might become a girl in her position, yet very clear, like a sky that has cleared after rain. Thinking it all over in the light of after events no one could recollect anything about her that had called for special notice. She was grave, yet not without a smile: and a girl on the eve of the greatest change in her life, though she may be very gay if she is happy, has reason to be grave as well. Joyce was always thoughtful, and there was nothing wonderful in the fact that underneath the soft smile with which she responded to what was said to her there should be a gravity quite natural in the circumstances. No doubt there was a great deal to think about--the opposition that might be raised, the difficulties she would have to encounter. It would not be all plain sailing. Mrs. Hayward, a little anxious in the strength of her newly awakened sympathies, thought that she quite understood. Joyce went out for her usual morning walk with her father, just as usual so far as the Colonel could see. She talked a little more than usual, perhaps to prevent him talking of the great subject of the moment. He for his part was much excited with the information his wife had given. He was full of enthusiasm for Norman. ‘If I had chosen the whole world through I could not have found a man whom I should have liked better,’ he said. ‘I always liked Norman Bellendean. I never could have imagined when we first came in contact in India, he a young sub and I his commanding officer, that he would ever be my son-in-law. How could I, not even knowing that I had--what good fortune was in store for me in finding you, my dear? But he was always a capital fellow. I liked him from the very first--fond of his profession and always ready for whatever was wanted--as good a fellow as ever lived,’ cried the Colonel, as he had done on his first introduction into these pages, taking upon him to answer to all the neighbours and tenants for the excellences of Captain Bellendean. Joyce listened very gravely, very sweetly, with a little inclination of her head in assent to all these praises. It pleased her to hear them, even though it was no business of hers.
‘But you must remember,’ she said, ‘always--that if there’s a pain in it, it’s leaving you. You’ve been good, good to me. I never knew what it was----’
‘Good!’ cried the Colonel, ‘there’s no credit in being good to you--and as for pain, my dear, no doubt we’ll miss you dreadfully, but it’s not as if he had to go away with the regiment to the end of the world. We’ll come and see you at Bellendean, and you’ll come to see us. I scarcely consider, with a man I like so thoroughly as Bellendean, that it will be leaving me.’
‘I was very ignorant when I came here,’ said Joyce; ‘I did not know what a father was. I was shy--shy to call you so. My old grandfather was so different. But, father, you have always understood, never discouraged me when I was most cast down, never lost patience. And I wish I could make you always mind that, when perhaps you may think of me--differently from what you do now.’
‘Why should I think of you differently? I may grudge a little to see my pretty Joyce marrying so soon, when I would have liked to keep her to myself: but it is the course of nature, my dear, and what parents must expect.’
‘I will always think upon you like this,’ she said: ‘the river flowing, and the banks green even though it’s winter, and the red oak-leaves stiff on the branches, and all the other big trees bare. And the sky blue, with white clouds flitting, and with a little cheerful wind, and the shining sun.’
‘Why in winter, Joyce?’ he said, smiling. ‘You might as well put me in a summer landscape if you are so fanciful! but you need not speak as if we were to be parted for ages, or as if you might not see me again. I’m not so dreadfully old, if that is what you mean.’
‘You will not be angry, father, if I speak to you of my old grandfather at home. When I saw him last he did not see me. He was walking through the corn, with his head bent and his heart sore. It was a bonnie summer day, and the corn all rustling in the wind, and high, almost up to his old bent shoulders. But he saw nothing, for he was thinking of poor little Joyce that he had bred up from a baby, and that was going away. I have been a great trouble to everybody that has cared for me.’
‘I am afraid I did not think enough of what it was to these old people, Joyce. To be sure, it was a loss never to be made up; but then when they knew it was for your good----’
‘It is for our good,’ said Joyce, ‘when we die: but it’s hard, hard to take comfort in that. I have never had that to bear, but I’ve seen it; and though a poor woman will believe that her little child has become one of the angels and will never have any trouble more, yet her heart will break just the same.’
‘That’s true, that’s true,’ he said: ‘but it’s not a cheerful subject, my dear, and just when your life is at its happiest----’
‘Don’t you think, father,’ said Joyce, ‘that when you are at your happiest it is like coming to an end?--for it seems as if heaven itself couldn’t do any more for you, and the next step must just be coming down among common folk.’
‘Don’t say that to Bellendean,’ cried the Colonel, ‘for you may be sure he thinks that heaven can do a good deal more for him, and you too.’
But it was always an effort on the Colonel’s part to bring her back to the contemplation of more cheerful prospects. She came in, however, freshened by the lively wind, her colour raised, her hair playing about her forehead in little rings, disentangled by the breeze, and was cheerful at luncheon, responding to all that was said. When they had left the table, she drew Mrs. Hayward aside for a moment, and asked if she might keep the miniature which had been given her to wear the previous night.
‘I think so, Joyce: you have the best right to it. Ask your father, if you have any doubt on the subject.’
‘I would rather ask you. It was kind, kind to bring it to me: nobody else would have had that thought.’
‘I have always wanted to be kind,’ Mrs. Hayward said, moved by an emotion which surprised her. ‘We may not always have understood each other, Joyce. I may have been sometimes not quite just, and you were not responsive. It was neither your fault nor mine. The circumstances were hard upon us: but in the future----’
‘I cannot call you mother,’ said Joyce. ‘You would maybe not like it, and I’m slow, slow to move, and I could not. But I would like to call you a true friend. I am sure you are a true friend. And we will never misunderstand each other again.’
‘My dear, there’s a kiss to that bargain,’ said Elizabeth, with her eyes full of tears. She said after a moment, with a tremulous laugh, ‘But we’ll misunderstand each other a hundred times, only after this it will always come right.’
There were no tears in Joyce’s eyes, but there was something in them which was not usually there. Mrs. Hayward, after she had kissed her, looked at her again with mingled anxiety and curiosity. ‘Joyce,’ she said, ‘you are tired out. I don’t think you can have slept last night. Go and lie down and rest a little. You have got that look that is in your mother’s eyes.’
When Joyce had gone upstairs, Mrs. Hayward went to the library, where the Colonel was seated with his paper. She said to him that she was not half so sure as she had been that Joyce was happy. ‘I thought there could be no doubt about it. If ever two people were in love with each other, I thought these two were: but I don’t feel so comfortable about it now.’
‘Nonsense, my dear!’ said the Colonel, who was a little drowsy. The room was warm, and the paper not interesting, and he had been proposing to himself to have a doze before Bellendean came to talk business and settlements. Mrs. Hayward did not disturb him further, but she was uneasy and restless. Some time after, she heard the outer door close, and came out into the hall with a little unexplainable anxiety to know who it was. ‘It was Miss Hayward, ma’am, a-going out for a walk,’ Baker said. Mrs. Hayward thought it was strange that Joyce should choose that time for going out, when Captain Bellendean might arrive at any moment. And then she suggested to herself that perhaps Joyce had gone to meet her lover----’ Anyhow, a little walk in the fresh air will do her good,’ she said to herself.
Norman arrived about half an hour afterwards, and was astonished and evidently annoyed that Joyce was not there to receive him. He went into the library, and had a long talk with the Colonel, and he came out again to the drawing-room where the tea-table was set out; but no Joyce.
‘Send up one of the maids to see if Miss Hayward is in her room,’ Mrs. Hayward said.
‘Miss Hayward have never come in, ma’am,’ said Baker; ‘for she never takes no latch-key, and nobody but me has answered the door.’
‘It is quite extraordinary. I cannot understand it,’ cried the mistress of the house. And then the usual excuses were suggested. She must have walked too far; she must have been detained. She had not taken her watch, and did not know how late it was. Norman said nothing, but his looks were dark; and thus the early evening past. The dinner-hour approached, and they all went upstairs somewhat silently to dress. Mrs. Hayward was pale with fright, though she did not know of what she was afraid. She had already sent off her own maid to go to Miss Marsham’s, to Mrs. Sitwell’s, to the rectory, to inquire if Joyce was at either of these places. But the answer was No; she had not been seen by any one. What did it mean? They met in the drawing-room--Mrs. Hayward more scared and pale, Captain Bellendean more dark and angry, than before.
‘Where is Joyce?’ said the Colonel. ‘You don’t mean to say she has never come back! Then there must be something wrong.’
‘If she is staying away on account of me----’ said Bellendean, looking almost black, with his eyebrows curved over his eyes, and his moustache closing sternly over his mouth.
‘On account of you! My dear fellow, what a strange idea! It’s only because of you that I’m surprised at all,’ said the Colonel, as if it had been the most ordinary thing in the world that Joyce should not come home to dinner. Mrs. Hayward said nothing, but she was very pale; though why Joyce should absent herself, or what was the meaning of it, she could not guess. ‘Let us go in to dinner,’ said the Colonel. ‘If anything had happened to her we must have heard at once. Probably she is dressing in a hurry now, knowing that we will all fall upon her as soon as she shows. Give my wife your arm, Bellendean.’ He was quite cheerful and at ease now that there was really, as Mrs. Hayward reflected, something to be anxious about; and he continued to talk and keep up the spirits of the party throughout dinner; but it was a lugubrious meal.
Mrs. Hayward ran upstairs to Joyce’s room as soon as she was free. She made a hurried survey of her tables and drawers, where nothing seemed to be wanting. She stood bewildered in the orderly silent room, where nothing had been disturbed since the morning--no signs of usage about, no ribbon or brooch on the table, or disarray of any kind. How cold it looked, how dead!--like a place out of which the inhabitant had gone. It exercised a kind of weird influence upon her mind. She stood back in alarm from the glass before which Joyce had stood last night, gazing into the unknown. Mrs. Hayward was not at all superstitious, but it frightened her to see the blank of the reflected vacancy, as if something might come into it. It could not be more blank than the vacant room, which threw no light whatever on the mystery. Where had she gone? There could not be anything in those suggestions which she had made, not without a chill of doubt, in the afternoon. Joyce could not be detained anywhere all this time, could not have taken too long a walk, or mistaken the time. It was impossible to believe in any such simple solution now: nearly nine o’clock--and she knew that her lover was to be here; and all the decorums of the dinner-hour and the regulations of the house. No, no, that was impossible. Could she be ill?--could she----
Mrs. Hayward started violently, though it was only a soft knock at the door. ‘If you please, Miss Marsham is downstairs wishing to see you.’ Ah, it was that then! she cried to herself, her heart giving a bound of relief. She was ill. Something had happened--a sprained ankle, or some easy matter of that kind. She ran downstairs relieved, almost gay. It might be a troublesome business, but so long as that was all----
Miss Marsham was standing in front of the fire with a large black veil tied over her hat. She was one of the feeble sisters who are always taking cold. She came forward quickly, holding out cold hands without gloves. ‘Oh!’ she cried, ‘has Joyce come back? is it all right? is there anything wrong?’
‘Do you mean,’ cried Mrs. Hayward harshly, ‘that you’ve only come to ask me questions--not to tell me anything?’
‘Oh!’ cried Miss Marsham, clasping her thin hands, ‘then she must have done it, though I did not advise her to do it: I did not understand----’
‘What?’ cried Mrs. Hayward, darting upon her, seizing her arm.
Miss Marsham told her story incoherently, as well as in her agitation she could tell it. ‘She asked my advice. There was some lady whose heart would be broken--who had never suffered, never been disappointed, and who had to be saved. And there were two gentlemen---- I cannot tell you any more--indeed, I cannot; I only half understood her. I told her--that to sacrifice one’s self was always the easiest.’
The gentlemen came in while Miss Marsham was speaking. The Colonel, still quite cheerful, saying, ‘Depend upon it, we shall find her in the drawing-room.’ Captain Bellendean was as dark as night. ‘I told her--that to sacrifice one’s self was always the easiest,’ were the words they heard as they came into the room; the sound of voices had made their hearts jump. Norman had taken a quick step forward when he saw that Mrs. Hayward was not alone. This strange figure was not like Joyce, but who could tell?----
‘I told her that it came easiest to women--that to sacrifice one’s self----’
‘To whom did you say that?’
‘Oh, Captain Bellendean! if I said what was wrong. I did not understand her. There was some one whose heart would be broken, a girl who had never been disappointed. I said to sacrifice one’s self----’
‘To sacrifice one’s self!’ cried Captain Bellendean, with a roll of low sound like the roar of an animal in pain.
‘I said it was the easiest--rather than to let some one else suffer, whoever it might be. Oh, God forgive me--God forgive me--if I said wrong!’
At this moment there was a knock at the door, and Mrs. Hayward’s maid came in. ‘If you please, ma’am,’ she said.
‘What is it? Miss Hayward has come back?’
‘If you please, ma’am,’ said the maid, ‘some of her clothes are--not there. And Mr. Baker says she sent away a box this morning.’
‘Where is Baker?’ said the Colonel.
He was not far off, but at the door, fully prepared for the emergency. He did not wait to be questioned. ‘It was a box,’ he said, ‘like as Miss Hayward have sent off before,--I didn’t take particular notice. The baker took it to the station. He had his cart at the door.’
‘What do you mean by a box!’ said the Colonel, to whom they all left this examination, and who asked the question without excitement, as only partially understanding the importance of it.
‘A box, Colonel!--well, just a common sort of a box--like the ladies sent to the ’Ospital Christmas-time--like Miss Hayward have sent off before----’
‘Did you see the address?’
‘You see, ma’am, the baker, his cart was at the door,--and he ups and says, if the young lady had no objection, he’d take it and welcome. So I gives him a hand up with it, and never see the address--except just London.’
‘You are sure it was London?’
‘Oh yes, Colonel--at least, I wouldn’t like to take nothing in the nature of an oath: but so far as being sure----’
‘That will do,’ said Mrs. Hayward quickly. ‘Now, you may go.’ She burst forth as soon as the door was closed, ‘She has done what her mother did; but why--but why?’
A little later, before this mournful company separated, Joyce’s little writing-case was brought downstairs, and in it was found Andrew’s letter and Mrs. Bellendean’s folded together. On a piece of paper separate--which, however, had no appearance of being intended for a letter--Joyce had written something in a large straggling hand, very different from her usual neat writing. It was this----
‘I can do no other thing. To him I would be mansworn--and to her no true friend. And what I said was, Joyce will do--what is wanted of her. I can do no other thing.’
Chapter XLVII
Nearly twenty-four hours later the chill of the wintry night had closed over the village of Bellendean. The frosty weather had gone, and was replaced by the clammy dampness and heavily charged atmosphere of a thaw. There had been showers during the day, and a Scotch mist had set in with the falling of the night. Janet Matheson and her old husband were sitting on either side of the fire. Peter had got to feel the severity of the winter weather, and though he still did his day’s work, he was heavy and tired, and sat stretching his long limbs across the hearth with that desire for more rest which shows the flagging of the strength and spirit. Janet on the other side of the fire was knitting the usual dark-grey stocking with yards of leg, which it was astonishing to think could be always wanted by one man. They were talking little. An observation once in half an hour or so, a little stir of response, and then the silence would fall over them again, unbroken by anything but the fall of the ashes from the grate, or the ticking of the clock. Sometimes Janet would carry on a little monologue for a few minutes, to which Peter gave here and there a deep growl of reply; but there was little that could be called conversation between the old pair, who knew all each other’s thoughts, and were ‘company’ to each other without a word said. There were few sounds even outside: now and then a heavy foot going by: now and then a boy running in his heavy shoes on some cold errand. The cold and the rain had sent indoors all the usual stragglers of the night.
‘Yon letter’s near a week auld,’ said Peter. They had not been talking of Joyce; but a quarter of an hour before had briefly, with a few straggling remarks at long intervals, discussed the crop which ‘the maister’ had settled upon for the Long Park, a selection of which Peter did not approve; but no explanation was needed for this introduction of a new subject. There could be no doubt between them as to what ‘yon letter’ meant.
‘There’ll be anither the morn,’ said Janet, ‘when she has passed the Thursday, it aye comes on the Saturday. She will have been thrang with something or other. It’s the time coming on for a’ thae pairties and balls.’
Peter gave a long low subterraneous laugh. ‘It would be a queer thing,’ he said, ‘for you and me to see oor Joyce at ane o’ thae grand balls.’
‘And wherefore no?’ said Janet. ‘Take you my word for’t, she’ll aye be ane o’ the bonniest there.’
‘I’m no doubtin’ that,’ he said; and silence fell again over the cottage kitchen--silence broken only after a long time by an impatient sigh from Janet, who had just cast off her stocking, rounding the ample toe.
‘Eh,’ she said, ‘just to hae ae glimpse of her! I would ken in a moment.’
‘What are ye wantin’ to ken?’
‘Oh, naething,’ said Janet, putting down the finished stocking after pulling it into shape and smoothing it with her hand. She took up her needles again and pulled out a long piece of worsted to set on the other, with again a suppressed sigh.
‘Siching and sabbing never mean naething,’ said Peter oracularly.
‘Weel, weel! I would like to see in her bonnie face that she’s happy amang thae strange folk. If ye maun ken every thocht that comes into a body’s heart----’
‘Hae ye ony reason----’ said Peter, and then paused with a ghost of his usual laugh. ‘Ye’re just that conceited, ye think she canna be happy but with you and me.’
‘It’s maybe just that,’ said Janet.
‘It’s just that. She has mair to mak’ her happy than the like of us ever heard tell of. I wouldna wonder if ye were just jealous--o’ a’ thae enterteenments.’
‘I wouldna wonder,’ Janet said. And then there was a long silence again.
Presently a faint sound of footsteps approaching from a distance came muffled from the silence outside. The old people, with their rural habit of attention to all such passing sounds, listened unawares each on their side. Light steps in light shoes, not any of the heavy walkers of Bellendean. Would it be somebody from the Manse coming from the station? or maybe one of the maids from the House? They both listened without any conscious reason, as village people do. At last Peter spoke----
‘If she wasna hunders o’ miles away, I would say that was her step.’
‘Dinna speak such nonsense,’ said Janet. Then suddenly throwing down her needles with a cry, ‘It’s somebody coming here!--whisht, whisht,’ she added to herself, ‘that auld man’s blethers puts nonsense in a body’s heid.’ Janet rose up to her feet with an agitated cry. Some one had touched the latch. She rushed to the door and turned the key-- ‘We were just gaun to oor beds,’ she cried, in a tone of apology.
And then the door was pushed open from without. The old woman uttered a shriek of wonder and joy, yet alarm, and with a great noise old Peter stumbled to his feet.
It was her or her ghost. The rain glistening upon her hat and her shoulders--her eyes shining like brighter drops of dew--a colour on her cheeks from the outdoor air, a gust of the fragrance of that outdoor atmosphere--the ‘caller air’ that had always breathed about Joyce--coming in with her. She stood and smiled and said, ‘It’s me,’ as if she had come home after a day’s absence, as if no chasm of time and distance had ever opened between.
No words can ever describe the agitated moment of such a return, especially when so unexpected and strange, exciting feelings of fear as well as delight. They took her in, they brought her to the fire, they took off her cloak which was wet, and the hat that was ornamented like jewels with glistening drops of the Scotch mist. They made her sit down, touching her shoulders, her hair, her arms, the very folds of her dress, with fond caressing touches, laughing and crying over her. Poor old Peter was inarticulate in his joy and emotion. Nothing but a succession of those low rolling laughs would come from him, and great lakes of moisture were standing under the furrows of his old eyebrows. He sat down opposite to her, and did nothing but gaze at her with a tenderness unspeakable, the ecstasy which was beyond all expression. Janet retained her power of movement and of speech.
‘Eh, my bonnie lamb! eh, my ain bairn! you’ve come back to see your auld folk. And the Lord bless you, my darlin’! it’s an ill nicht for the like of you--but we’ll warm you and dry you if we can do naething mair; and there’s your ain wee room aye ready, and oh, a joyfu’ welcome, a joyfu’ welcome!’
‘No, granny, I cannot go back to my own room. I’ve come but for a moment. I’m going away on a journey, and there’s little time, little time. But I couldn’t pass by----’
‘Pass by---- No, that would ha’ been a bonny business,’ said Peter, with his laugh--‘to have passed by.’
Joyce told them an incoherent story about a ship that was to sail to-night. ‘I am going from Leith--and there was just an hour or two--and I must be back by the nine o’clock train. It’s not very long, but I must not lose my ship.’
‘And are they with you, Joyce, waitin’ for you? and whatfor did ye no bring the Cornel? The Cornal wasna proud--he didna disdain the wee bit place. And no even a maid with ye to take care of ye! Oh ay, my bonnie woman, weel I understand that--you would have naebody with ye to disturb us, but just a’ to oorsels----’
‘Ony fule,’ said Peter, ‘would see that.’
‘We’re a’ just fules,’ said Janet, ‘for weel I see that, and yet I’m no sure I’m pleased that she’s let to come her lane--for I would have her guarded that nae strange wind, no, nor the rain, should touch her. I’m wantin’ twa impossible things--that she should be attendit like a princess, and yet that we should have her her lane, a’ to you and me.’
‘It’s very cold outside,’ said Joyce, ‘and oh, so warm and cosy here! I have never seen a place so warm nor so like home since I went away. Granny, will you mask some tea though it’s so late? I think I would like a cup of tea.’
‘That will I!’ cried Janet, with a sense of pleasure such as a queen might feel when her most beloved child asked her for a duchy or a diamond. Her face shone with pure satisfaction and delight, and her questions ran on as she moved to and fro, making the kettle boil (which was always just on the eve of boiling), getting out her china teapot, her best things, ‘for we maun do her a’ honour, like a grand visitor, though she’s our ain bairn and no the least changed----’ These observations Janet addressed to Peter, though they were mingled with a hundred tender things to Joyce, and so mixed that the change of the person was hard to follow.
‘Whatfor should she be changed?’ said Peter, with his tremulous growl of happiness. The old man sat, with an occasional earthquake of inward laughter passing over him, never taking his eyes from her. He was less critical than Janet; no suspicions or fears were in his mind. He took her own account of herself with profound faith. Whatfor should she be changed? Whatfor should she be otherwise than happy? She had come to see them in the moment she had in the middle of her journey, alone, as was natural--for anybody with her would have made a different thing of it altogether, and weel did Joyce ken that. He was thoroughly satisfied, and more blessed than words could say. He sat well pleased and listened, while Janet told her everything that had passed. Although it had been told in letters, word of mouth was another thing, and Joyce had a hundred questions to put. She was far more concerned to hear everything that could be told her than to tell about herself; but if Peter remarked this at all, it was only as a perfection the more in his ‘bonnie woman’--his good lassie that never thought of herself.
‘And oh, but the Captain was kind, kind!’ said Janet. ‘He came and sat where ye are sitten’, my bonnie doo, and just tauld me everything I wanted to ken--how ye were looking, and the way ye were speaking, and that you and the Cornel were great friends, and the very things ye were dressed in, Joyce. He must have taken an awfu’ deal of notice to mind everything. He would just come and sit for hoors----’
Joyce moved her seat a little farther from the fire. The heat was great, and had caught her cheek and made it flush. It grew white again when she withdrew from the glow, but she smiled and said in a low tone, ‘He is very kind: and you would see the lady, granny, and Miss Greta.’
‘No for a long time. You had always a great troke with them, Joyce, and they with you, but when once my bonnie bird was flown, it’s little they thought of your old granny. There was a great steer about the Captain and her, but I kenna if it was true. There’s aye a talk aboot something, but the half o’t is lees. He’s owre good for her, it’s my opinion. I’ve a real soft corner for the Captain.’
‘He kent the way to get roond ye,’ said Peter, ‘aye flatterin’ aboot that bit lassie there.’
‘He was real kind. He would just sit for hours, and mind everything.’
‘Granny,’ cried Joyce, interrupting hastily, ‘you have told me nothing about the new mistress, and how she took up my place.’
‘But I wrote it a’ down in my letters,’ said Janet. ‘That’s no like word of mouth, you’re thinking? Well, you see, Joyce’--and Janet went over the whole career of the new schoolmistress, who had not given entire satisfaction. ‘As wha could?’ said the old woman. ‘Ye just spoiled them, they could get nobody that would have pleased them after you.’
‘You’re no asking aboot Andrew,’ said Peter.
‘Eh, poor lad!’ cried Janet, ‘I wouldna have wondered if he had come ower the nicht: but now it’s too late.’
‘Granny,’ cried Joyce, with a little cry of alarm, ‘you’ll say nothing to Andrew? Oh, not a word! Never let him know I was here. I would fain, fain not be unkind--but there are some things that cannot be. Oh, I was very silly, I should have known. You’ll tell him to think of me no more--that I’m not worthy of it; but, oh, never tell I’ve been here.’
‘No, my bonnie lamb, no, my ain dear. He never was worthy o’ you. He shall hear not a word--nor nae ither person, if that’s your pleasure, Joyce.’
‘Oh, granny dear! but it’s time now, and I must go.’
Janet’s heart was very heavy; but there was no time for questions, and she saw that Joyce was little disposed to explain. ‘We’ll go with her to the station, and see her off,’ she said, taking her big shawl out of the aumrie. ‘I’m laith, laith to part with you, Joyce: but it would be nae kindness to make ye late, and they’ll be meeting you at the train.’
‘I must not be late,’ Joyce replied. She looked round with a faint smile, and tears were in her eyes, and her lips moved as if she was saying something. Janet’s heart was sore for her child. Why was she left to travel all alone in a wild and dark night like this? Why should she say nothing of her father, or of any one that was with her? Janet’s mind misgave her--she was full of fears: Joyce was ‘no hersel’. She was very loving, very tender, and smiled, and tried to look at ease; but she could not deceive the old woman whom love enlightened, who knew all her ways and her looks. There was something in her eyes which Janet did not know. She did not understand what it meant, but it meant trouble. There was trouble written all over Joyce. Her fond old guardian knew not what it was, only knew it was there.
The two old people went to the station with her through the windy, weeping night, saying little on either side. Joyce clasped her old grandmother’s arm tightly in hers, but scarcely spoke, and Peter stalked beside them, half exhilarated, half heart-broken--he did not know which. To have had her for a little was sweet, but then to see her go away. She clung to them, crying quietly under her veil, as they put her into a corner of a vacant carriage--not without a forlorn pride that it was first class--and wrapped her cloak round her. They had no fine phrases, but to smooth the folds of her dress, to tuck the cloak round her, was always some faint satisfaction. ‘I’ll write,’ she said, ’as soon as I can, but it may be long. You’ll not lose heart, only wait, wait, and I’ll write----’
‘Oh, my darlin’, we’ll wait--but, Joyce, where are you goin’, where are you goin’, that you speak like that?’
‘Good-bye, grandfather,--good-bye, granny, dear granny!’
Janet clutched Peter with a grasp that hurt even that old arm of his, all muscle and sinew. ‘Noo,’ she said, in an imperative whisper, ‘gang hame to your bed: I’m goin’ after her. Dinna say a word to me, but gang hame to you bed. I’ll come back the morn’s morning, or as soon as I can.’
‘Gaun after her! and what good will that do her?’ cried Peter in consternation.
‘At least, I’ll see her safe,’ said Janet, clambering into a third-class carriage. The train was almost in motion, and carried her off before her astonished husband could say another word. The old man stood bewildered, and looked after the train which carried them both from him. But he had that inexhaustible rural patience which makes so many things supportable. After a few minutes he went away, slowly shaking his head. ‘She has nae ticket,’ he said to himself, ‘and little money in her pooch, and what guid can she do in ony case?’ But after a while he obeyed Janet’s injunction and went slowly home.
It was hard work for Janet to keep sight of Joyce when they came to the great Edinburgh station: she was little accustomed to crowds--to be hustled and pushed about as a poor old woman getting out of a third-class carriage so often is: but fortunately her eyes had kept the long sight of youth, and she managed to trace the movements of her child. One thing was sure, that nobody was there to meet Joyce, not even a maid. The girl made her way by dark passages and corners to the place where another little train was starting for Leith, where Janet followed her breathless. It was very raw and cold, windy and gusty, the wind blowing about the light of the lamps, driving wild clouds across the sky, dashing rain from time to time against the carriage windows, and the atmosphere was dreary with a sense of the wilder darkness of the approaching sea. Presently they came to the port and to the quay, where a confused mass of vessels, made half visible by the flaring melancholy lights, lay together, with lamps swinging at their masts. The pavement was wet and slippery, the wind was keen and cold, and blew blasts of stinging rain like tears over her face as she toiled along. But she never lost sight of Joyce. The Firth was tumbling in dark waves, faintly visible in a liquid line, apparent at least so far that it was not solid earth, but something wilder, more dreadful, insecure--and it raved and dashed against the pier and the sides of the ships, sometimes sending up a leaping white vision of spray like something flying at your throat, and always a sound as of contending voices, the shout of oncoming, the long grinding drag of the withdrawal as wave followed wave. The boats moved and creaked at anchor, the lamps and dim masts and funnels rising and falling. There were gangways each with its little coloured smoky lamp, from one steamboat to another, lying ready to start, three or four deep against the pier. Janet saw the solitary figure which she had tracked so long pause, as if with a moment’s hesitation, at the first of these gangways, and she made a rush forward at the last after this long course, to grip her child by the dress, by whatever thing she could clutch and hold, and cry, ‘No, no; you’ll gang no further! oh, Joyce, my bairn, you’ll gang no further!’ But she slipped and fell, being exhausted with the long and weary walk, and, breathless with labour and fatigue, could get nothing out but a panting No, no, which had no meaning. When she got to her feet again the slim figure was gone. She thought she could trace it on the farthest point, standing upon the paddle-box of the steamer, and ever after believed that the speck of whiteness in the dark was Joyce’s face turned back towards home. That was the last she saw.
The old woman stood upon the pier for long after. She stood and watched while a few other passengers arrived, talking dolefully about the stormy night, and tried to take a little comfort thinking that perhaps ‘the Cornel’ might be among them, and Joyce after all have a protector and companions. There was one tall man, indeed, speaking ‘high English,’ whom Janet almost made up her mind, with an unspeakable lightening of her heart, must be ‘the Cornel.’ Her old eyes could not trace him through the maze of the steamboats to the one upon which she had kept a despairing watch: but fatigue and misery had by this time dimmed her faculties. Then that farthest boat, the one that held her child, with shouts and shrieks of steam, and lights wavering through the gloom, and every dreadful noise, got into motion, and went out upon the tumbling, stormy sea. Janet watched the light rising and sinking, the only thing visible, till that too disappeared in the darkness. And then all was quiet but the booming of the Firth against the piers, and the creek and jar of the other steamboats preparing to follow. She withdrew a little and leant against a post, and dried her eyes with a trembling hand. ‘Oh, my bairn! my bairn!’ she said to herself.
‘What ails the woman?’ said the watchman on the pier. ‘There’s naething to make a wark about; they’ll get a bit heezy, but nae danger. It’ll be a son or a daughter ye’ve been seeing off.’
‘Oh, man, I’m thankful to you!’ said Janet. ‘Are they a’ for the same airt.’
‘They’re a’ for the far north,’ said the watchman, continuing his heavy march.