A Long Time Ago. A story

Front matter

% Slorp. ET META ORRED. First Actor. And the bead aud tail of the matter, sir ? Second Actor,. Sir, it hath neither head nor tail. F. A. How, sir? S. A. Sir, it comet h to no head — yet is it good matter. F. A. Sir, I conceive you -its corporation is sound. S A. I warrant you, sir, and it telleth its own tale. Neither Head nor Tail. LONDON : CHAPMAN AND HALL, 193, PICCADILLY. 1876. [All Rights reserved.] CONTENTS.

Chapter I. Marjorie

" Good-day, Reuben." " Good-day, Miss Marjorie." The two speakers, a man and a girl, stood one on either side of a little wicket-gate opening on to a flagged pathway leading through a small plot of orchard ground to a grey, granite built cottage. The girl was young, about twenty. She was tall and slight though with firmly knit limbs, and an air of wild freedom in every movement. Her fair hair was caught back from her face, and rolled tightly in a shining mass, that glinted and shone like the gorse in the bright moorland sun, with here a curl, and there B a tendril like the spiral of the wild briony round the broad white brow. Her eyes were large, dark, and full of thought and earnest feeling ; and though her mouth and chin were slightly too massive and square, they could not materially mar the nobility of expression.

It was a sweet, womanly, loving face, and a grand head. And so thought Reuben Yool, as he stood with one hand grasping the gate — a slight barrier between them. Reuben must have been at least twenty years older than Marjorie Fleming. He was tall and strongly built, with great square shoulders, large hands and feet, and a grave still face with an in tensity of will and concentration of force, com bined with latent power, which was very remarkable. Reuben Yool, independent and wealthy yeoman farmer, was in love with Marjorie Fleming, the ex coast-guard's daughter. A keen observer would have at once judged from her address to him how hopeless as yet was his suit. She called him " Reuben," he called her "Miss Marjorie" — therein lay difference supreme. To her he was Reuben Yool, the great moorland farmer, who lived in the remains of an ancient priory, five miles from them; a strange, silent, lonely, kindly man; their landlord; a friend MARJORIE. 3 who had latterly come over day by day to their lonely cottage to inquire after the rapidly declining health of her father ; and — nothing more.

He was stand ing now with his rough cap in his hand, his loose riding-coat flapping against his legs, and his bridle slung over one arm, loosely enough to allow the powerful horse he had been riding to crop a few blades of grass. He was looking at her wistfully and in silence. He had ridden over to reassure them about their rent ; which was due rather awkwardly as regarded Mr. Fleming's pension and the quarter day ; they were backward, and had sent a message requesting a week or two's grace. And now he had said briefly that their time was his time. " It is very good of you," said Marjorie, after a slight pause. " It has been very expensive fitting out Edward Fleming." "He is coming here, is he not ?" " Yes, we expect him very soon, indeed to-night — he sails on the 20th. I can't bear to think of his going for so long — he is just like my brother.

I have known him all my life." A grey look passed over Reuben's face, but she did not notice it, for she did not love the man. B " You will catch cold out here," he said next. She laughed. " Oh ! no, I have lived here too long for that ; this is such delicious air." He made some inquiries for her father and then departed ; whilst she stood shading her eyes with her singers and watching him ride slowly over the high swelling ridge to the left. Then she went in. " Reuben has been here, father ; he is so good," she said, bending over an emaciated figure cowering before a bright fire. ■•' What did he say, my Meg ?" "That the rent does not in the least signify. Father, is not Edward very late ?" " No. Come here/child, and let me look at you, my bonnie, bonnie bird," he went on murmuringly, as she crept closer to him and kissed his thin white hands.

" My darling, my darling, if only " he stopped abruptly. And she could not induce him to continue. Mr. Fleming was dying of decline, and the thoughts of Marjorie, his only child, being left utterly alone in the world at his death, weighed on his mind and seemed to paralyse his efforts to rouse himself. He had been obliged to resign his appointment in MARJORIE. 5 the south, where at least the climate had been in his favour, and had returned to the north, the former home of his dead wife, to find himself dying. The only relation he knew of was his orphan nephew, a lieutenant in the navy. There had been feud be tween his father and Mr. Fleming, and his now dying uncle was bent on obliterating as much as possible all remains of the quarrel, by doing what he could for this nephew. It had not been much that was in his power, but as soon as Edward lost both father and mother, his uncle had written to tell him that whenever he chose, and had opportunity, he would find a home-welcome with himself and Marjorie.

And the boy went gladly at such times as he could. As yet he had never been north, but he would arrive this evening for a short week, before sailing for the West Indies. Marjorie had lively recollections of her boy-cousin five years before ; and the whole day she was flitting up and down the house incessantly ; out of her room and into his with this, that, and the other ; tiny treasures to decorate his little abode. On the mantel-shelf she put the two lovely pink shells, and the stuffed parrot he had brought her in former visits ; then retiring backwards to glance at the effect, she struck against the little couch. Ah! out she ran and fetched in a Spanish leather, richly-embroidered cushion, also one of his gifts. She poked the fire, gave a settling touch to the gorse and holly in the white mug on the table, put two feather-screens behind the shells, and then lilting a merry sea-song, ran down the little narrow, wooden stairs, to await his arrival.

Katie in the kitchen was making hot coffee, and singing to herself too. Good, strong, honest, cheerful Katie. A foundling brought home by Mr. Fleming, and always kindly treated and trusted ; she repaid the kind-hearted sailor to the utmost, by taking watchful care of Marjorie, by working early and late, and never flagging in cheerfulness and good temper. Marjorie found her father dozing. She brought a great buffalo robe, a relic of better days, and wrapped him tenderly in it; and then seized by an uncon trollable fit of restlessness, she wandered round the room, settling things. She gave a twist to most of the furniture, altered the butter-dish, settled the coffee-pot, peeped into the cream jug, and altogether MARJORIE. 7 disported herself in a very impatient way, with frequent and nervous starts and bendings of the head to listen — yet with all this movement she was so gentle and trod so lightly, that the sleeper never stirred.

Pre sently the little gate clanged, and a hasty step came running up the pathway. The colour flew over Mar jorie's face, she shook all over, stood for one second motionless, and then flying to her father she clung to him, saying : " Awake ! awake !" As Mr. Fleming opened his eyes drowsily and murmured " What?" the door flew open. Katie was seen very red and smiling, and there stood Edward Fleming; a tall, slight, fair, young man, with tightly curling hair, and merry, dancing eyes. He made a dash at Marjorie, and then stopped suddenly on seeing how tall and womanly she had grown. Colouring scarlet, he seized both his uncle's hands and nearly squeezed them off. " Ned ! Ned !" said the sick man, with startling energy, " how fresh and well you look ! how strong, how like " And then he faltered and his breath stopped, whilst Ned, shocked at the great change in his uncle since they had last met, stammered and stuttered, and finally said nothing.

Meanwhile, Marjorie suddenly found her head was going round, her heart was beating like a sledge hammer; her face was hot and her hands were cold; that Edward was grown into a man, and that — well, she did not quite know what more. " Won't you shake hands ?" said a deep, shy voice; and then her fingers nearly lost all feeling in that warm grasp, and her eyes fell before that honest, ad miring glance. For a short time everybody was very shy and un comfortable after that coming together, so unlike what each had imagined it might be, and they all and severally tried so hard to find meeting-points, that they signally and lamentably failed, which occasioned the most alarming pauses; when two of them, or all three would plunge wildly to the rescue, and generally contrive to come out with exactly the same thought in different words.

However, by degrees, matters came straight. Mr. Fleming was drinking coffee and holding Ned by one hand, and Marjorie and Edward were talking very fast indeed, and look ing at each other as though they had never met before MARJORIE. 9 and were very strange creatures. When the meal was over, Edward having eaten nothing to speak of, having felt his hunger vanish in a mysterious manner ; and Majorie having eaten nothing at all, but persistently spoilt her bread by crumbling it up and putting it down again; they all three drew round the little fire and talked; at least the two young ones did, and so fast, and both together, that when they had finished they hardly knew what they had said, so began again ad libitum. Mr. Fleming, who had stayed up later than usual, kept nid-nodding, till at last he said : " Marjorie, darling, I must go to bed."

Then taking Edward's arm, and Majorie's hand, they all three went up-stairs. At his door he bade them good-night and blessed them very solemnly, went in and closed it; and those two others were left without, on the last step, silent. Now a strange thing happened; they neither spoke, but Marjorie suddenly took it into her head that Edward wanted her to go down again and have a chat, as they used to do in old days, surreptitiously. For as children, when every one supposed them to be safe in bed, they would steal down at night, rake out the embers, still glowing and warm, and tell each other the most awful, horrible, and utterly improbable stories, till it became imperative on them to hold each other tightly and breathe hard to prevent screaming out loud, and so bring down on them the united and righteous indignation of Mr. Fleming and Katie, and thus put a stop for ever to this highly-entertain ing proceeding.

With Marjorie, to think Edward wished a thing, was to do it instantly, so down she sped and he after her. The instant they were safely inside the parlour, he said : " Marjorie !" In all her life past, present, and to come, Marjorie never had thought, or again thought, her name sounded like that Majorie — so utterly beautiful, in deed, did it sound to her that she trembled all over, and the great tears came throbbing in her eyes. Now, no more shall be written regarding anything that was said in the Marjorie-tone, because those things cannot be written of; and indeed little was said, actually. Imagine then those two sitting before the fire, on the floor; the girl's head on the man's shoulder, and their three hands tightly locked. I say three hands, as Edward was obliged to place one arm round Marjorie's waist, to keep her from falling into MARJORIE. 11 the fire, or tumbling backwards against the sofa, the position they were in being slightly insecure.

The wild moor wind moaned up against the window, the shadows danced up and down on the walls, and the fire-light glowed on their two faces, suffused with that heavenly thrill that comes but once in every life, and not always that. They first talked a great deal of nonsense, then they were silent, and then they talked of a thousand and one things ; of Mr. Fleming's health, or Marjorie's lonely life, of Edward's prospects, of this coming voyage, which was somehow to make his fortune, only no one knew how exactly, and then of Reuben Yool, of his kindness and friendliness ; and Marjorie expatiated on his goodness about the rent, and told Edward how she respected him and liked him, till Edward opined he was indeed a good fellow, and he would ride over and thank him (and pay the rent, only he did not say that).

And then they came back to Edward himself and his long voyage, and what he would bring back for Marjorie, and how she was to go on loving him more and more, and not forget him, and — &c, till the clock struck twelve. At last they went up to bed, leaving the fire out, and the room cold, and a long, grey, trailing shadow lying across the rug where they had been sitting, which looked like a heavy, wet shroud, and was only the reflection of the narrow mirror. As he closed the door he saw it, and shuddered with all a sailor's superstition; but she smiled in his face, and then said anxiously : " Are you cold ?" laying a gentle hand on his arm, and thus sending a thrill through his every vein that would have slain any cold, however lurking. Marjorie went into her little chamber with a firmer and more thoughtful tread than she had ever planted there before, and did not hear him go down-stairs again, peep into the parlour, look at the shadow and go up to it, in order to convince himself as to what caused it.

Then come up again more slowly, pause at her door and hearken, and finally go into his own room. No, she heard nothing of all this. With her beautiful hair all down, she was kneeling by her little bed, thanking God over and over for the love of this strong, true-hearted sailor ; and the swelling tears had their own way now, though indeed she still kept pressing them back with her long, white fingers; MARJORIE. 13 tears of delicious feeling and gratitude. "Marjorie — Marjorie" — her sweet name came backhand yet back again to her like some faint whisper of future joy and unutterable happiness. That he, who had been her idol, her darling from childhood, should love her and wish her to be his wife was no surprise to her, but an enthralling joy. How she would love him, how true she would be to him ; he had asked her if she would wait ?

Aye, that she would, for ever, on into Eternity : never weary, through sickness and health, and separa tion — and death in life, silence; she would wait, wait, wait, here in her lonely — lonely, with thoughts of him ! — lonely northern home. She would live and think, dream and prav, of and for him. Her whole being was flooded with happiness. Marjorie, standing by her window gazing out over the moorland, because in her intense feeling it seemed to her, her outward vision as well as her inner wanted expansion ; Marjorie, in her trembling happiness, with that thrilling light on her noble head and trans figured face, was beautiful exceedingly.

Chapter II. Edward

Mr. Fleming was not astonished at the news which greeted him in the morning. He perhaps kissed Marjorie more tenderly than usual, and wrung Edward's hand a little harder, whilst watching those two beaming faces with a yearning love painful in its intensity ; for it marked how far he had travelled towards that bourn from whence is no returning. The birds in the orchard thought the morning very delightful no doubt, for it was bright and sunny in the gnarled and twisted apple-trees ; and the hoar frost on the moss and lichen melted quickly enough not to freeze their little feet, as they hopped about after the crumbs which Marjorie tossed to them with generous abundance. But, ah ! to her the glory of EDWARD. 15 the day shone in her lover's face, now turned on her, now on her father. And the sunlight, reflecting the passionate tints of the gorse, lay warm and nestling in her heart, full of its adoring love.

Mr. Fleming, knowing well how strong, and true, and tender her lover was, rejoiced to think of the husband his child would have ; and taking heart of grace from his trust, he braced and girded himself anew to live till this voyage was past, and then, he thought, lying back in his arm-chair and watching those two bright, young heads bent close together — then, " home to my wife, thank God, and our child will be safely sheltered by tha dear, noble Ned." i And all that day, like the distant roll of an organ came those words : " I have loved thee, with an everlasting love, therefore with loving kindness have I drawn thee." Edward took an early opportunity — not of riding, for the grey cob on which he had counted had died two years before — of walking over to Yool Farm. He started at a swinging trot, but paused on the ridge to the left to look back and wave his cap to Marjorie ; he caught up a bit of gorse and blew it towards her, sending a shower of golden spray in the air ; and then with a merry shout, clipped down in the hollow and raced on his way.

There was no distinct track, but Marjorie had so accurately described to him how to proceed, that it seemed easy enough. "What awful desolation !" he said to himself, paus ing to get breath, after a wild scamper of about a mile over ups and downs of moorland, with tufts of gorse, and bracken, and heather, and weird looking grey boulders lying in all directions. Mar jorie's home lay in a hollow near the outer edge of the moor, but Yool Farm was nearly five miles further in. How monks ever came to build in so dreary and lonely a place, I cannot undertake to say. An ancestor of Reuben's had obtained possession of the partially destroyed priory during the troubles pre ceding the Commonwealth. It might have been cheerful enough, who knows ? with plenty of monks for company ; or in the time of the Roundhead Yool, who had plenty of money and energy, and kept great numbers of domestics and hinds : but now it was dreary and lonely enough, for though the energy was hereditary, the money bags were not.

The farm consisted principally of sheep : sheep you saw everywhere — sheep on the moors ; sheep in the EDWARD. 17 pens ; sheep in the very garden, though they did not stay there long when the "Dame" caught sight of them. Lambs lay (it seemed the whole year round) before the kitchen fire. Sheep-skins, cleaned'and dyed, decked the house in the shape of door-mats, and chair and bed-covers — in fact, sheep abounded inside and out. There were several men on the farm ; chief amongst them was Robin, a sort of Eidolon to Reuben — of whom more anon ; but only one woman had lived there for years and years, " Dame " being the name by which she was known — of whom, also, more anon. Just surrounding the house stood a few stunted and twisted fir-trees — so twisted, so stunted, that they looked like spirits doomed to eternal agony.

The wind was for ever piping to them, and they danced weird dances in the autumn and winter evenings. Sometimes, in summer, they donned golden flake armour, and rang and sang sharp, harp-like ditties, with their contorted branches clashing to gether like wooden cymbals; they were the only trees on the moor, and Yool Farm was proud of possessing them. Oh ! the desolation of desolation of the country round the farm, as it stretched away for miles up and c down — grev, green; green, grey — with no living thing on it but sheep, wild and shaggy; with its great cairns of grey granite — the tiny rills that went flowing between the lichens and mosses, just deep enough to submerse the feet of the wagtails, and enable them to take a bath in the long summer days : with the great, ironbound-looking clouds, piling up in the north all through the winter nights ; with its dreary, restless wind, that howled and tore, and raged and moaned, and sobbed and wailed over its wastes — a horror of desolation lay always brooding on the moor ; except, perhaps, in the height 'of summertime, when the gorse, and thyme, and harebells were out, and the lichens and mosses lay jewelled by the rill, and the larks were trilling their hearts away to the azure heavens; and the great, fat doubledores droned away blunderingly over the thistles ; when cloud-shadows lay on the rocks, and golden gleams of warm sunlight came with flying warm feet, and touched with dainty haste the short turf and coltsfoot.

Ah ! then one might wander, and never feel weary, all alone ; with the wind, soft and alluring, pressing against one's face, and the lark's singing ringing a sweet refrain ; — one forgot, then, the horror of deso- EDWARD. 19 lation — at least, if one had never been out on that moor in the dead of winter. Reuben Yool loved the wildness of it dearly; he had been born and bred there; and though he had gone south for some schooling, he had only been away a year or two, and had come back with a greater love for it than ever — with that sort of clinging, heart-deep feeling generally only known to moun taineers. Reuben had a powerful, drastic intelligence, and seized and held knowledge firmly. If he had lived in these days, or if, even then, he had lived with minds more akin, he might have become a great man.

But in those days there were few books of the kind he valued ; and even those there were, were difficult to obtain ; so he fought on in the dark, and strove with his eager mind as he best might — feeling his powers cramped and straitened, and meeting with no sympathy — till he grew to shrink from speech of any kind that would betray even involuntarily his bent of thought, and bring down ridicule on his far-reaching, anxious ideas. To look at him, he was a big, burly farmer ; and yet his sensitiveness — proceeding from the very quickc i ness of his intellect — was intense to pain. His only present companion, the " Dame," was not one to converse with ; so that after a long and hard day's work, Reuben would sit silent, and brood over many things which vexed his brain and mind, with vague, because unanswerable, questionings, till his spirit grew stern in its very power — and sad, unutterably.

Five years before this story opens, the Flemings had come to the cottage; and then and there Reuben fell in love with Marjorie. He loved her with a blind, idolising devotion that engrossed his whole being, and submerged his whole soul. For gotten were all his old struggles and lonely vigils. His one idea was Marjorie Fleming ; her voice was in the wind to him ; her eyes in every flower he loved most dearly ; her footfall for ever at his door. He was possessed by a sweet, strange spirit, as truly as any being ever was or could be so, and his possession was Marjorie. He could not remember his mother, but could he not swear that she must have been even such a one as Marjorie ? with the same sweet eyes and noble face, the same ready hand, and open, loving heart ? He was always on the moors, if only to catch a distant peep at her.

She lent him EDWARD. 21 books from her father's tiny store. She could con verse with him (mark you, converse), on many of his favourite subjects. He found, indeed, that she knew many things that he did not, for Marjorie had been well and curiously taught by her father; not in mere finger and voice accomplishments only, but in sound, logical knowledge. Reuben studied and read with redoubled ardour and vigour, and was in a state of beatitude, till one day she named Edward Fleming. And then, O ! blow most bitter, the light that came burning in her eyes, the colour that came flooding in her cheek, betrayed her at once to the man who loved her so dearly. In fact, Reuben knew before she did, that she loved her cousin. The knowledge, cruel as it was, came just in time to save his being rejected ; he had meant to have spoken that very night, but alas !

Fate willed it otherwise. Reuben went home that night with a sick despair, for what had he to look forward to in his lonely life ? Worse than lonely now, for he had actually grasped the very skirts of happiness and now it had vanished utterlv. He had thought summer was come for him, after his lonely days of suffering and coldness of heart; and behold it was only an early and treacherous spring, which in those northern climes is often more bitter than winter. Reuben was sitting in the low, long, vaulted cham ber known as the Refectory, when Robin put his head in and said, " Wanted." He looked up from his books and saw hastily entering a slight, hand some young sailor. No need to tell him who. He rose in silence, for he never wasted words, a trick Robin had long since caught. " Reuben Yool ?" said Edward, interrogatively ; then added frankly, " I came to see you, because I have heard so much of you from my cousin Marjorie Fleming, and I want to know all those whom she knows and likes, and who have been good to her.

I am Edward Fleming." For his life Reuben could not say "You are wel come," though he wished to do so. " Will you sit down ?" he managed to sav gravely, and Edward perched himself sideways on one of the long narrow tables that ran down each side of the hall, and went on : " Marjorie says [you have been beyond measure good to her and her father." Then with a slight hesi- EDWARD. 23 tation, " She is mine now, and I want to thank you ; will you shake hands, and let us be friends ?" And the sailor held out both his brown, honest hands to the yeoman standing before him, and looked up at him with his frank blue eyes. " Aye, I will," and they shook hands. " Marjorie sets great store by you," said Edward, laughing cheerily. " You are the noblest and most generous fellow. What an advantage you have had over me all these years ; why I have never once seen her."

"More fool he that did," said a harsh croaking voice at the door that made the sailor start. The strangest little creature stood there, uttering that weird sound. A little old witch of a woman; with a tight black dress on, a large white cap, black mittens, and a long apron. And such a cadaverous face, with two cruel-looking, projecting teeth. " Fool ! fool ! fool !" she reiterated passionately, pointing at Reuben, but advancing no further than the threshold. " Dame, I am busy," said the farmer sternly, and with a jarring, mocking laugh, she vanished. " Gramercy ! you have a queer companion," said Edward, considerably astonished. "Aye, she is my grandmother," said Reuben, curtly ; and the subject being evidently painful, Ed ward forbore to make any further remark on the beldame. " You came surely with a purpose ?" began Reuben after a slight pause.

"Yes, firstly to see and thank you, and then to pay the rent." "Which I refuse, you not being my tenant," answered Reuben, as though the words were blows. " But, as Marjorie's future husband," began the sailor. " I distinctly refuse to accept the money — let us say no more on the subject." Edward looked at the gloomy face, and strong knotted hands of the yeoman, and seeing no mere words would move him, wisely dropped the point at issue. And as Reuben did not offer to take him over the farm, or continue the conversation, there was nothing further to be done or said, and so bidding him good-bye and inwardly marvelling at Marjorie's EDWARD. 25 admiration for any one so apparently silent and surly, the sailor departed. Going round to the front of the house, I knovv not why, but some sudden, unaccountable fancy seized him to go and peer in at a splendid old bay-window.