The Tryst at Girdlestone Pass
"Shall we go to the Shepherd's Rest?" Lucy timidly suggested.
Joel would not hear of it. The good-wife was in the house, he said, and she had a tongue for babbling that would challenge any mountain beck. But in that wild and rock-strewn pass was many a sheltered nook, where two people could meet unnoticed, and undisturbed, save by wandering sheep or screaming curlews. He guided Lucy to the stone, which gave its name to the place, and there they sat down.
A more secluded spot they could not have found. It was wild beyond expression. Before them the fellside shelved away, strewn with slatey scree, at the foot of which a stream tumbled, and sent its thunders reverberating along the pass. The pack-horse track marched with the stream in the direction of the inn, which stood below them to the left, hidden by the unevenness of the ground. To the right the road still went on up a steep ascent, then, dipping over a brow, ran through low and marshy moorland for many miles, until it reached the great North Road. In the midst of this boggy part lay Quaking Hag. Overhead was poised the girdle stone, a massive fragment fallen from the crags above, and supported by rocks, that the storms of centuries had rough-hewn into the shape of pillars. Underneath it the ground was dry and sheltered from the raw air. Behind rose the mountain Thundergay, as rugged on this side as upon that which looked into Boar Dale.
Joel regarded Lucy with an intent gaze, and she stole many a glance at him. He was not as altered as she had expected to find him. Indeed, save for a restless light in his eyes, lines about his mouth, and the pallor of his face there was little change to be seen. She wondered why he had not returned to Forest Hall; for he had recovered from his illness sufficiently to have walked the few miles between the Shepherd's Rest and High Fold.
"So you've come to see me at last, Lucy," he said, fondling her fingers and looking into her face.
"Did you expect me before?" she asked, wishing to withdraw her hand from his, yet not liking to do so for fear it would seem unkind.
"No, but I wondered if you would manage to give Peter the slip some day, and get away. I used to buoy myself up through the long nights when I couldn't sleep, with the hope of hearing your voice in the morning."
"I'm sorry you have been so ill, Joel."
"Don't be sorry, Lucy, at least don't cry, for it clouds your eyes, which are just like two bits of blue sky, and there's not much blue sky to be seen to-day. Do you know, my dear, when I lay sick in the inn yonder, I often comforted myself by thinking that you were sitting by the bedside, hidden behind the curtains, and that I could, if I liked, pull them back and look at you. Fortunately I had sense enough not to try the experiment. So I got the pleasure without the disappointment."
"I wanted to come," she began hurriedly, "I would have come, but Barbara wouldn't let me. I longed and longed and longed——"
She broke off abruptly for his glance disturbed her. What was the meaning of the light in his eyes? She had seen them grow radiant in the past as lamps lit by some inner fire, but never seen them shine as now, so fierce and glowing that they frightened her. She cast a look in the direction of the Shepherd's Rest.
"Isn't it too cold for you out here?" she said. "I don't mind being seen by the woman at the inn. We are doing nothing we need hide. It is quite natural that I should come to see how you are when Peter is away."
"Is it?" he asked with a strange laugh. "I doubt if the good-wife would think so."
"Well, if it isn't," she replied, colouring and feeling more and more reluctant to stay alone with him, "I'd better go home."
He controlled his feelings, whatever they were, and laid a detaining hand upon her arm.
"Let's talk calmly like two sensible folk," he said.
"I'm sure you oughtn't to be out. Don't forget how ill you've been, and that this isn't a summer's day."
"It's been a summer's day since you came, Lucy. But sit down. I haven't spent five years in a land covered with snow for half the time without becoming inured to some discomfort. Be good and kind. I've seen so little of you, and thought so much that you shouldn't grudge me this bit of pleasure."
She sat down again, drawing her cloak closer about her. She thought that the Girdlestone was not a fitting spot to talk with a man who had once been her lover. She was perplexed at his manner. She felt instinctively that a change had taken place in him. She could not have defined it; but the deterioration which had been going on in his character for the last few weeks showed through his words and actions, though they were as affectionate as they had always been.
For some moments he leaned back against the rock, letting his eyes rove over her face.
"I've carried your picture here," he said, tapping his breast, "all the years I've been away; I'm now comparing it with the original."
"Well," she inquired at last, "am I like it or have I changed?"
"The same, the same, yet not the same. There's a firmer line about your mouth than you could draw round it in the old days."
"Age should bring wisdom, should it not?" She sighed and then continued. "But I'm afraid I don't learn and grow wise."
"I know who put that line there," he said sharply.
She looked up, surprised.
"It was Barbara, Barbara, damn her, the night she prevented you coming to see me."
She winced and rose to her feet. He saw that he had made a mistake, and drew her gently to his side.
"Oh, Lucy, Lucy," he cried suddenly, "I'm beside myself. I can't live without you any longer. I'm mad I know; but I want you, I want you as a man never wanted a woman before. We were born for each other, you can't deny it. Come away with me. We'll go and make happiness for ourselves in a corner of the earth, where no one will ever seek us."
He put his arms round her, and she only half resisted, though she said:
"But, oh, Joel, you forget that I'm another man's wife."
"I don't forget it. The fact's there; but we'll disregard it. We'll go away, now, at once...."
She tore herself suddenly from him as though his embrace stung her. "What am I doing? What are you saying? Oh, Joel, we cannot...."
It was not till then that she realised her position. She loved this man, and, though she had married Peter Fleming, his image had floated before her mind through all the years of his absence, and she had often regretted that she had not waited for him. His return had excited her; she liked his admiration and his caresses, and, at their last meeting, she had let her feelings have their way. She had been full of thoughts of that which might have been. But she had never intended being seriously disloyal to her husband. She had come to see Joel, so she told herself, merely to bid him good-bye; to tell him that they must not meet again; and to say that she hoped he would be happy. Now she was aghast at the place where her actions had brought her. Go off with Joel? She could not dream of such a thing! He was an honourable man, only over-wrought by his love for her. He could never really think of taking her away.
"Be brave, Lucy," he said.
"I must leave you. We must part."
"Be true to yourself, Lucy."
"I should loathe myself if I did as you asked."
"You love me, my dear."
"But I'm Peter's wife."
"Peter can get another, and you shall have me for a husband."
"It can't be, Joel. We must say good-bye. I only came to say good-bye."
"We'll both say good-bye—to High Fold and Boar Dale—we'll say it together, and go away."
She drew back to the furthest corner of their retreat, and stared at him.
"Do you know what you are asking me to do?" she said, scarcely above a whisper.
"I've thought it all out; I've planned it."
"But I cannot go away with you."
"You love me," he repeated triumphantly.
"I did once," she cried, "but I'm afraid of you now. Peter would never ask a woman to do what you are asking me, no matter how much he cared for her."
Joel moved to the entrance, and stood with his back to her for a moment. The clouds were darker, the fellside more stern, the foam of the beck whiter in the waning light. But the outlook was not so wild as the picture which he saw within himself, when he turned the eye of his mind upon it.
Man never grasps the significance of his own thoughts. They cross and recross, and deal with each other often apart from his direct consciousness, and that which he has to accept is their conclusion.
Hope and despair, hate and honour—all these had filled Joel's brain, had joined forces or fought—as the case might be—and now he saw it strewn with the remains of war, where one figure stalked, and its name was hate. Then a faint light glimmered down, and he was aware of the star of love still shining overhead. There was commotion in his mind. Hate menaced the star but could not put it out.
Turning to Lucy, he said:
"Must it be good-bye?"
Her lips quivered and she nodded.
"It's a little word," he replied, "and very ill to say. I'll not say it. If you go ... but you'll not go. Think of me, Lucy. Give a thought to the loneliness of my life. Remember how I worked to get rich for your sake. That bit of gold—have you got it?" She made a movement of assent. "We'll still have it made into a ring, and you shall wear it. You're mine in heart. Why should you be afraid to trust yourself to me? I'll take care of you, Lucy. You shall be happy, you shall be rich. You shall have everything you want, if you'll only put yourself into my keeping."
"You might give me all these things," she whispered, "but you don't understand, Joel. I should have the mind of a ... I should be like a toad. Barbara said so."
"I knew it was Barbara, who had changed your feelings towards me," he bitterly replied.
"I do think of you," she said, "I know you will be sad and lonely. So shall I be. You do not think of me, Joel."
He looked moodily through the gathering gloom.
"The day is nearly over," he muttered, "and we have made little use of it. For days I've been wanting to see you, wondering how I could bring you to the Girdlestone. Now you bid us part, and forever. Well, let us go. The sooner good-bye is said the better ... if it must be said."
They went down the brae to the stream, which they crossed by a bridge. The long, withered branches of a wild rose draggled in the rushing water, catching hold of the flotsam that the swift current brought down, and tangling it into a mat of twigs, leaves and sheepswool.
The roar of the beck seemed to give Lucy confidence. She wiped her tears, tried to smile bravely into the gloomy face of the man by her side, and gently touched his arm.
"You'll find someone much handsomer and better than me, Joel, to be your wife."
He shrugged his shoulders, and made no reply.
"I've been like yon briar," she said in an undertone, "letting myself draggle in a torrent, and holding on to all the regrets and disappointments it's brought me. But now I'll shake them off. From to-day, this hour, I'll lift myself up and hope that a green and blooming time will come for you as well as me."
"A green and blooming time will surely come," he replied quickly. "It's coming now. I can't let you go, Lucy. It's no use pretending that I mean to let you go. We must twine together...." His looks began to get wild and his voice shook as though he were losing control of himself again. "You know the song:
'Out of her bosom there grew a red rose
And out of her lover's a briar, a briar....'
But I'm talking nonsense, and frightening you."
A scared look came into her eyes. The afternoon was darkening, and it was high time that she should be getting home, if she did not want to be benighted upon the fells. She might lose her way unless she reached the Robber's Rake before dusk.
"Good-bye, Joel," she said, her voice trembling, not only with the emotion that the words called up—for she knew that whatever more was said, good-bye must be the last word uttered between them—but she was startled by the fierce face turned upon her.
"I told you we could not say it," he muttered.
"But we must: we can't do anything else."
"Speak the truth, Lucy, do you love Peter or me best?" He took her by the shoulders, so that she must face him. "I loved you first," he cried, "long before he did. You promised yourself to me. He has no right to you."
Joel's pent up hatred burst forth. It flowed from his lips like a venomous flood upon the shrinking head of the woman. Deeper than his love for her, so it seemed, ran his hate.
"Let me go," said Lucy, "you don't know what you are saying."
"Which of us do you love best?" he continued, taking no notice of her attempts to free herself. "If you say Peter, I'll throw you into the beck—its deep enough to drown you. But you love me best. I know it, I've always known it. Be brave, be strong, Lucy. I've got a horse waiting just beyond the dip in the road to take us away. We'll go away now, and before anyone can follow us we shall be on the seas."
He drew her along the pack-horse track in the direction that he indicated.
She struggled to free herself. She felt all the love which she had for him ooze out of her. His attitude opened her eyes, and she realized, with renewed dread, in what a dangerous position she had placed herself. Her thoughts turned with a frantic rush towards her husband. Oh, if only his face would appear through the gloom.... If only she could hear his kindly voice calling to her.... But Peter was far away by now on the road to London. She was alone. There was no one near, no one who could help her. Joel's handsome countenance was like a nightmare: his fond words, his embraces—the idea of ever having received such expressions of love from him became suddenly repulsive.
"Let me be, Joel," she said, "or I'll call out."
He did not heed her.
"Where shall we go, Lucy," he said, "there's all the world to choose from?"
"Go where you like," she replied, "only take your hand off my shoulder."
She noticed that twilight was drawing swiftly down. In half an hour it would be night, and the clouds were already settling lower on the fells, so that the horrors of loneliness and darkness would be doubled by the bewildering presence of the mist. But she had not time to think just now of how she would get home. She must flee anywhere; she must escape from Joel, who was acting and speaking as though he had gone suddenly mad. Girdlestone Pass provided plenty of hiding places if she could only succeed in baffling him. She cast her eyes swiftly over the landscape. She must not take to the hillside—it was too steep and rough for her to hope to elude him there; she would betray herself by falling, if she did not come to a crag that she could not climb. The moorland on the left, with it brown hummocks, scrub, and mossy stones, would provide her with a surer means of escape. She never thought of Quaking Hag, she did not know where it lay, for she had rarely been in the pass before.
She wondered once if she should scream, but it was unlikely that anyone would hear her. The Shepherd's Rest was too far off, and travellers rarely passed that way.
Every minute the dusk deepened, Joel had shifted his hand to her arm, when he found that she ceased to resist him. He was peering forward, trying to see the horse which he had tied to a tree so that it might be in readiness.
Then Lucy bent down, and set her teeth in his hand. He gave a sharp exclamation, loosened his grasp, and she fled from him into the shadows.