Masters of the Novella

by Delphi Classics

  ‘You should have been in the field, helping with the hay,’ said she, in her calm, pleasant voice. I had heard her as I came near the house softly chanting some hymn-tune, and the peacefulness of that seemed to be brooding over her now.

  ‘Perhaps I should. It looks as if it was going to rain.’

  ‘Yes; there is thunder about. Mother has had to go to bed with one of her bad headaches. Now you are come in —

  ‘Phillis,’ said I, rushing at my subject and interrupting her, ‘I went a long walk to think over a letter I had this morning — a letter from Canada. You don’t know how it has grieved me.’ I held it out to her as I spoke. Her colour changed a little, but it was more the reflection of my face, I think, than because she formed any definite idea from my words. Still she did not take the letter. I had to bid her to read it, before she quite understood what I wished. She sate down rather suddenly as she received it into her hands; and, spreading it on the dresser before her, she rested her forehead on the palms of her hands, her arms supported on the table, her figure a little averted, and her countenance thus shaded. I looked out of the open window; my heart was very heavy. How peaceful it all seemed in the farmyard! Peace and plenty. How still and deep was the silence of the house! Tick-tick went the unseen clock on the wide staircase. I had heard the rustle once, when she turned over the page of thin paper. She must have read to the end. Yet she did not move, or say a word, or even sigh. I kept on looking out of the window, my hands in my pockets. I wonder how long that time really was? It seemed to me interminable — unbearable. At length I looked round at her. She must have felt my look, for she changed her attitude with a quick sharp movement, and caught my eyes.

  ‘Don’t look so sorry, Paul,’ she said. ‘Don’t, please. I can’t bear it. There is nothing to be sorry for. I think not, at least. You have not done wrong, at any rate.’ I felt that I groaned, but I don’t think she heard me. ‘And he, — there’s no wrong in his marrying, is there? I’m sure I hope he’ll be happy. Oh! how I hope it!’ These last words were like a wail; but I believe she was afraid of breaking down, for she changed the key in which she spoke, and hurried on.

  ‘Lucille — that’s our English Lucy, I suppose? Lucille Holdsworth! It’s a pretty name; and I hope — I forget what I was going to say. Oh! it was this. Paul, I think we need never speak about this again; only remember you are not to be sorry. You have not done wrong; you have been very, very kind; and if I see you looking grieved I don’t know what I might do; — I might breakdown, you know.’ I think she was on the point of doing so then, but the dark storm came dashing down, and the thunder-cloud broke right above the house, as it seemed. Her mother, roused from sleep, called out for Phillis; the men and women from the hay-field came running into shelter, drenched through. The minister followed, smiling, and not unpleasantly excited by the war of elements; for, by dint of hard work through the long summer’s day, the greater part of the hay was safely housed in the barn in the field. Once or twice in the succeeding bustle I came across Phillis, always busy, and, as it seemed to me, always doing the right thing. When I was alone in my own room at night I allowed myself to feel relieved; and to believe that the worst was over, and was not so very bad after all. But the succeeding days were very miserable. Sometimes I thought it must be my fancy that falsely represented Phillis to me as strangely changed, for surely, if this idea of mine was well-founded, her parents — her father and mother — her own flesh and blood — would have been the first to perceive it. Yet they went on in their household peace and content; if anything, a little more cheerfully than usual, for the ‘harvest of the first-fruits’, as the minister called it, had been more bounteous than usual, and there was plenty all around in which the humblest labourer was made to share. After the one thunderstorm, came one or two lovely serene summer days, during which the hay was all carried; and then succeeded long soft rains filling the ears of corn, and causing the mown grass to spring afresh. The minister allowed himself a few more hours of relaxation and home enjoyment than usual during this wet spell: hard earth-bound frost was his winter holiday; these wet days, after the hay harvest, his summer holiday. We sate with open windows, the fragrance and the freshness called out by the soft-falling rain filling the house-place; while the quiet ceaseless patter among the leaves outside ought to have had the same lulling effect as all other gentle perpetual sounds, such as mill-wheels and bubbling springs, have on the nerves of happy people. But two of us were not happy. I was sure enough of myself, for one. I was worse than sure, — I was wretchedly anxious about Phillis. Ever since that day of the thunderstorm there had been a new, sharp, discordant sound to me in her voice, a sort of jangle in her tone; and her restless eyes had no quietness in them; and her colour came and went without a cause that I could find out. The minister, happy in ignorance of what most concerned him, brought out his books; his learned volumes and classics. Whether he read and talked to Phillis, or to me, I do not know; but feeling by instinct that she was not, could not be, attending to the peaceful details, so strange and foreign to the turmoil in her heart, I forced myself to listen, and if possible to understand.

  ‘Look here!’ said the minister, tapping the old vellum-bound book he held; ‘in the first Georgic he speaks of rolling and irrigation, a little further on he insists on choice of the best seed, and advises us to keep the drains clear. Again, no Scotch farmer could give shrewder advice than to cut light meadows while the dew is on, even though it involve night-work. It is all living truth in these days.’ He began beating time with a ruler upon his knee, to some Latin lines he read aloud just then. I suppose the monotonous chant irritated Phillis to some irregular energy, for I remember the quick knotting and breaking of the thread with which she was sewing. I never hear that snap repeated now, without suspecting some sting or stab troubling the heart of the worker. Cousin Holman, at her peaceful knitting, noticed the reason why Phillis had so constantly to interrupt the progress of her seam.

  ‘It is bad thread, I’m afraid,’ she said, in a gentle sympathetic voice. But it was too much for Phillis.

  ‘The thread is bad — everything is bad — I am so tired of it all!’ And she put down her work, and hastily left the room. I do not suppose that in all her life Phillis had ever shown so much temper before. In many a family the tone, the manner, would not have been noticed; but here it fell with a sharp surprise upon the sweet, calm atmosphere of home. The minister put down ruler and book, and pushed his spectacles up to his forehead. The mother looked distressed for a moment, and then smoothed her features and said in an explanatory tone,— ‘It’s the weather, I think. Some people feel it different to others. It always brings on a headache with me.’ She got up to follow her daughter, but half-way to the door she thought better of it, and came back to her seat. Good mother! she hoped the better to conceal the unusual spirt of temper, by pretending not to take much notice of it. ‘Go on, minister,’ she said; ‘it is very interesting what you are reading about, and when I don’t quite understand it, I like the sound of your voice.’ So he went on, but languidly and irregularly, and beat no more time with his ruler to any Latin lines. When the dusk came on, early that July night because of the cloudy sky, Phillis came softly back, making as though nothing had happened. She took up her work, but it was too dark to do many stitches; and she dropped it soon. Then I saw how her hand stole into her mother’s, and how this latter fondled it with quiet little caresses, while the minister, as fully aware as I was of this tender pantomime, went on talking in a happier tone of voice about things as uninteresting to him, at the time, I very believe, as they were to me; and that is saying a good deal, and shows how much more real what was passing before him was, even to a farmer, than the agricultural customs of the ancients.

  I remember one thing more, — an attack which Betty the servant made upon me one day as I came in through the kitchen where she was churning, and stopped to ask her for a drink of buttermilk.

  ‘I say, cousin Paul,’ (she had adopted the family habit of
addressing me generally as cousin Paul, and always speaking of me in that form,) ‘something’s amiss with our Phillis, and I reckon you’ve a good guess what it is. She’s not one to take up wi’ such as you,’ (not complimentary, but that Betty never was, even to those for whom she felt the highest respect,) ‘but I’d as lief yon Holdsworth had never come near us. So there you’ve a bit o’ my mind.’ And a very unsatisfactory bit it was. I did not know what to answer to the glimpse at the real state of the case implied in the shrewd woman’s speech; so I tried to put her off by assuming surprise at her first assertion.

  ‘Amiss with Phillis! I should like to know why you think anything is wrong with her. She looks as blooming as any one can do.’

  ‘Poor lad! you’re but a big child after all; and you’ve likely never heared of a fever-flush. But you know better nor that, my fine fellow! so don’t think for to put me off wi’ blooms and blossoms and such-like talk. What makes her walk about for hours and hours o’ nights when she used to be abed and asleep? I sleep next room to her, and hear her plain as can be. What makes her come in panting and ready to drop into that chair,’ — nodding to one close to the door,— ‘and it’s “Oh! Betty, some water, please”? That’s the way she comes in now, when she used to come back as fresh and bright as she went out. If yon friend o’ yours has played her false, he’s a deal for t’ answer for; she’s a lass who’s as sweet and as sound as a nut, and the very apple of her father’s eye, and of her mother’s too’ only wi’ her she ranks second to th’ minister. You’ll have to look after yon chap, for I, for one, will stand no wrong to our Phillis.’

  What was I to do, or to say? I wanted to justify Holdsworth, to keep Phillis’s secret, and to pacify the woman all in the same breath. I did not take the best course, I’m afraid.

  ‘I don’t believe Holdsworth ever spoke a word of — of love to her in all his life. I’m sure he didn’t.’

  ‘Ay. Ay! but there’s eyes, and there’s hands, as well as tongues; and a man has two o’ th’ one and but one o’ t’other.’

  ‘And she’s so young; do you suppose her parents would not have seen it?’

  ‘Well! if you axe me that, I’ll say out boldly, “No”. They’ve called her “the child” so long— “the child” is always their name for her when they talk on her between themselves, as if never anybody else had a ewe-lamb before them — that she’s grown up to be a woman under their very eyes, and they look on her still as if she were in her long clothes. And you ne’er heard on a man falling in love wi’ a babby in long clothes!’

  ‘No!’ said I, half laughing. But she went on as grave as a judge.

  ‘Ay! you see you’ll laugh at the bare thought on it — and I’ll be bound th’ minister, though he’s not a laughing man, would ha’ sniggled at th’ notion of falling in love wi’ the child. Where’s Holdsworth off to?’

  ‘Canada,’ said I, shortly.

  ‘Canada here, Canada there,’ she replied, testily. ‘Tell me how far he’s off, instead of giving me your gibberish. Is he a two days’ journey away? or a three? or a week?’

  ‘He’s ever so far off — three weeks at the least,’ cried I in despair. ‘And he’s either married, or just going to be. So there.’ I expected a fresh burst of anger. But no; the matter was too serious. Betty sate down, and kept silence for a minute or two. She looked so miserable and downcast, that I could not help going on, and taking her a little into my confidence.

  ‘It is quite true what I said. I know he never spoke a word to her. I think he liked her, but it’s all over now. The best thing we can do — the best and kindest for her — and I know you love her, Betty—’

  ‘I nursed her in my arms; I gave her little brother his last taste o’ earthly food,’ said Betty, putting her apron up to her eyes.

  ‘Well! don’t let us show her we guess that she is grieving; she’ll get over it the sooner. Her father and mother don’t even guess at it, and we must make as if we didn’t. It’s too late now to do anything else.’

  ‘I’ll never let on; I know nought. I’ve known true love mysel’, in my day. But I wish he’d been farred before he ever came near this house, with his “Please Betty” this, and “Please Betty” that, and drinking up our new milk as if he’d been a cat. I hate such beguiling ways.’

  I thought it was as well to let her exhaust herself in abusing the absent Holdsworth; if it was shabby and treacherous in me, I came in for my punishment directly.

  ‘It’s a caution to a man how he goes about beguiling. Some men do it as easy and innocent as cooing doves. Don’t you be none of ‘em, my lad. Not that you’ve got the gifts to do it, either; you’re no great shakes to look at, neither for figure, nor yet for face, and it would need be a deaf adder to be taken in wi’ your words, though there may be no great harm in em.’ A lad of nineteen or twenty is not flattered by such an out-spoken opinion even from the oldest and ugliest of her sex; and I was only too glad to change the subject by my repeated injunctions to keep Phillis’s secret. The end of our conversation was this speech of hers, —

  ‘You great gaupus, for all you’re called cousin o’ th’ minister — many a one is cursed wi’ fools for cousins — d’ye think I can’t see sense except through your spectacles? I give you leave to cut out my tongue, and nail it up on th’ barn-door for a caution to magpies, if I let out on that poor wench, either to herself, or any one that is hers, as the Bible says. Now you’ve heard me speak Scripture language, perhaps you’ll be content, and leave me my kitchen to myself.’

  During all these days, from the 5th of July to the 17th, I must have forgotten what Holdsworth had said about cards. And yet I think I could not have quite forgotten; but, once having told Phillis about his marriage, I must have looked upon the after consequence of cards as of no importance. At any rate they came upon me as a surprise at last. The penny-post reform, as people call it, had come into operation a short time before; but the never-ending stream of notes and letters which seem now to flow in upon most households had not yet begun its course; at least in those remote parts. There was a post-office at Hornby; and an old fellow, who stowed away the few letters in any or all his pockets, as it best suited him, was the letter-carrier to Heathbridge and the neighbourhood. I have often met him in the lanes thereabouts, and asked him for letters. Sometimes I have come upon him, sitting on the hedge-bank resting; and he has begged me to read him an address, too illegible for his spectacled eyes to decipher. When I used to inquire if he had anything for me, or for Holdsworth (he was not particular to whom he gave up the letters, so that he got rid of them somehow, and could set off homewards), he would say he thought that he had, for such was his invariable safe form of answer; and would fumble in breast-pockets, waistcoat-pockets, breeches-pockets, and, as a last resource, in coat-tail pockets; and at length try to comfort me, if I looked disappointed, by telling me, ‘Hoo had missed this toime, but was sure to write to-morrow;’ ‘Hoo’ representing an imaginary sweetheart.

  Sometimes I had seen the minister bring home a letter which he had found lying for him at the little shop that was the post-office at Heathbridge, or from the grander establishment at Hornby. Once or twice Josiah, the carter, remembered that the old letter-carrier had trusted him with an epistle to ‘Measter’, as they had met in the lanes. I think it must have been about ten days after my arrival at the farm, and my talk to Phillis cutting bread-and-butter at the kitchen dresser, before the day on which the minister suddenly spoke at the dinner-table, and said, —

  ‘By-the-by, I’ve got a letter in my pocket. Reach me my coat here, Phillis.’ The weather was still sultry, and for coolness and ease the minister was sitting in his shirt-sleeves. ‘I went to Heathbridge about the paper they had sent me, which spoils all the pens — and I called at the post-office, and found a letter for me, unpaid, — and they did not like to trust it to old Zekiel. Ay! here it is! Now we shall hear news of Holdsworth, — I thought I’d keep it till we were all together.’ My heart seemed to stop beating, and I hung my head
over my plate, not daring to look up. What would come of it now? What was Phillis doing? How was she looking? A moment of suspense, — and then he spoke again. ‘Why! what’s this? Here are two visiting tickets with his name on, no writing at all. No! it’s not his name on both. MRS Holdsworth! The young man has gone and got married.’ I lifted my head at these words; I could not help looking just for one instant at Phillis. It seemed to me as if she had been keeping watch over my face and ways. Her face was brilliantly flushed; her eyes were dry and glittering; but she did not speak; her lips were set together almost as if she was pinching them tight to prevent words or sounds coming out. Cousin Holman’s face expressed surprise and interest.