CHAPTER XI.
[PLANTING HYACINTHS].
Desdemona listening to the Moor is a parallel not now used for the first time. The "cultured" reader has met it before. But where to find a better? Matilda sat and listened with open-eyed attention while Considine told his story.
She had received him with some slight display of coolness, when he first appeared, but without question and comment. If the men cared no more than to forget their little plan of a lunch in the woods, of what consequence could it possibly be to them? They would know better than trouble him with their little female festivities again, that was all; and if he had been indifferent or rude, at least they knew better than make themselves absurd by showing offence. It was "good morning, Mr. Considine," when he appeared. "So sorry Penelope has gone out. However, she is only down at the farm, talking to Bruneau. She will be back presently." Considine had to say everything for himself, without the assistance which even pretending to call him to account would have given; while all the time he recognized how deeply he must have offended by the severity with which he was chilled and sat upon, as Miss Matilda went on most industriously with her embroidery.
"I failed to turn up at your pic-nic, Miss Matilda."
"Oh! It was no consequence. I dare say you would have found it dull if you had come. As it was, the day was so sultry we felt sure it would thunder, and did not go."
"But I really wished to go, Miss Matilda. I was most desirous---"
Matilda lifted her face to smile a sweet incredulous smile on the visitor, and then went on with her work.
"But it is so, Miss Matilda. I beg you will believe me. And do you suppose I would not have sent you word if it had been possible?"
"We were surprised at that, now I remember. But it was not a party. It was nothing. Pray do not mention it!"
"But I must, Miss Matilda. It was most important to me!"
Miss Matilda laid her work in her lap and looked up.
"I went to bed, Miss Matilda, intending to join your expedition. I got up next morning, still intending it, at six o'clock. You were not to start till eleven. I bathe every morning in the river. I went out in a boat, as usual--one of Podevin's boats. I plunged in and swam--just as I always do--when a rascal--I will not name him--took aim at me from the shore, and shot me in the shoulder. You see my arm is in a sling."
"Oh!" cried Matilda, half rising and dropping the work; "I did not notice your poor arm, Mr. Considine. Indeed I did not. Shot you in the arm? Did it hurt much? Shot--You? Pray tell me about it. Who was the person?"
"A person we both know. But you must not mention his name. Not that he deserves any consideration from honest folks, but for his wife's sake, who is a good woman, and would be horrified if she knew. It was Ralph Herkimer."
"Ralph Herkimer! But why?"
"He called on me with Jordan the night before, asking me to give up his uncle's money, which I hold in trust. You may have heard of the uncle's curious will, which tied up the money out of Ralph's reach. Ah! he knew the rascal. I could not give up the money. It would have been a breach of trust. And so, the very next morning, he fires at me while I am swimming in the river. Fired and struck me. I tried to regain the boat, but I could not. I was crippled of an arm, and I sank, and know no more."
"Mr. Considine!" and Matilda rose and came to the sofa where he sat, her cheek blanched, and betraying an interest which made him feel glad that he had suffered, to call it forth.
"And--well, Mr. Considine, what then?"
"The next thing I knew, I was barely conscious; but I was on dry land, feeling sick and stupid, and more dead than alive. A whole crowd of people were about me, shaking me, punching me, pulling me, bumping me, while I only wished they would let me alone, and let me die; for already I had gone through all the horrors of drowning, and this seemed like an after-death. And then I found myself among blankets, and some one--a witch she looked like--was forcing whisky down my throat, and fingering my wounded shoulder. I was drowsy and miserable, and, thinking I was already dead, I wondered if all this was for my sins. And then I slept, I suppose, for when I woke next it was dark or nearly so; and there was a jolting and rumbling which set my poor shoulder aching miserably; and I tried to sit up, but some one pushed me down again and bade me keep still. When I looked, the witch was perched upon my pillow, with the moonlight slanting through her grisly hair, and a long skinny arm pressing me down. She forced more whisky into my mouth, and then I slept."
"Oh! Mr. Considine. What an experience!"
"I woke again, and it was daylight, and the old hag seated on my pillow had fallen asleep. I sat up slowly and with difficulty, for I was stiff and sore. I was in a waggon under a tree. I tried to rise, but could find nothing save my blanket to dress in. The hag opened her eyes and looked at me, and grinned, and asked me what I wanted to do. I said,' to go home,' and then she laughed out, pointing to me, and reminding me I had no clothing; and at the sound of her voice there gathered round a whole crowd of swarthy vagabonds, grinning at me, and jeering, and when I looked at them, one rascal was wearing my coat, and another kicked up his heels and showed me my boots. A pimpled baby was rolled up in my nice clean shirt, and the captain of the gang pulling my watch out of his pocket, told me it was only five o'clock, and a heap too early for 'a swell cove' to think of rising. I was their prisoner, in short, though I must confess the old woman attended to my wounded shoulder very kindly; bathing it with cool water several times a day, and bandaging it as well as one of our surgeons could have done during the war. They kept me several days with them, in their journeyings and campings, travelling by all kinds of bye-ways and unfrequented places, and keeping me concealed whenever strangers came about the camp. They crossed the Lines, by-and-bye, and travelled into the States. I knew that by the nasal Yankee twang of the strangers' voices, though great care was taken that I should not get speech of them--and then, one day, the captain, the fellow, at least, who wore my watch, told me he thought I was strong enough to travel now, and if I would give them some money to buy me clothes, and pay for the care they had taken of me, I might go my ways. I was so helplessly in their power, that we did not haggle long about the price, though it was a pretty steep one. I wrote them a cheque, which they carried to a neighbouring bank, and so soon as my bankers had honoured it I was set at liberty. I put in a bad time, Miss Matilda, I promise you; but, if you will believe me, what vexed me most of all was to think how I had kept you waiting, and never been able to send a word of excuse. When I was drowning in the river, it was my very last thought, I remember, and when I came to myself it was my first."
"Oh! Mr. Considine. How very nice of you to say so. But don't! It is really too dreadful. It is horrible. I never did hear anything so frightful. And you say that Ralph Herkimer did this abominable deed? Are you sure you are not mistaken? Or it may have been an accident."
"Not a bit of it. I saw him as plain as I see you, and it was no accident. I saw him shoulder his gun to fire again, while I was struggling in the water, in case I had succeeded in gaining my boat."
"You will have him taken up, Mr. Considine? It seems wrong--and dangerous to leave such a person at large."
"I would if it were not for his wife. But you know how she would suffer. She never would be able to show face again. No! For her sake I mean to let the thing pass; and you must promise me, Miss Matilda, you will never mention it."
"How noble of you! Mr. Considine. I shall never be able to look at the ruffian again. And his son is here constantly. But we must put a stop to that. It will vex poor Muriel, I fear, but she will see the reason of the thing. You will allow me to explain to Muriel? There they go; passed the window this very minute. The assassin!"
"Nay! Miss Matilda. Let me intercede for the lad. There is no harm in my young friend Gerald. A fine manly youngster--his mother's son, every inch of him. No, no, my little Muriel--forgive the freedom--must know least of all. Young love! Miss Matilda. It is a charming sight to see. So full, and so trusting--so all-in-all, and yet so delicate and dainty. So fleeting, sometimes. Always so fragile and so irreparable if it gets a bruise. So hopeless to try and bring back its early lustre if once it grows dim. So--but--I'm a maundering old fogey, I suppose. Forgive an old bachelor's drivel, Miss Matilda."
"There's nothing to forgive, Mr. Considine. I sympa--I agree with--it's all so true! There's nothing like youth in all the world, and--love--but, there now! These are things which middle-aged people have no business with----"
"But surely, Miss Matilda. We--they--the middle-aged--have business with that? If our hearts have remained unwithered by the world--if there should still be a germ of life at the core, though hidden by the rind which time brings for a protection, like the scales on a hyacinth root in a gardener's drawer, do you not think it allowable and even fitting, that when warmth gets at them, and moisture, they may sprout forth worthily, even if out of season, each after its kind? Do you suppose a sound heart can ever grow incapable of love. Miss Matilda? Will love ever die?"
"Ah!" and Matilda looked upward. "My own feeling. So true! So comforting! Love never dies. The poets say so. Beyond the grave are we not assured that still and for ever we shall love? But yet--but yet--I fear sometimes that it shows a grovellingness in myself, that I do not cherish the thought more eagerly--as we grow older should our affections not take a higher flight? I long so for more warmth, and regret my coldness and frivolity; but I feel going to church so little helpful."
"You are lonely. Miss Matilda. Aspiring after unseen goodness is a high and abstract flight. It needs companionship. I, too, know what it means. But a man in the world is little able to withdraw his thoughts from worldliness, and I am alone. With help--a good woman's help--Matilda! May I say it? as I have long felt it?--with yours----"
He took her hand and held it, looking in her face.
She did not seem to hear him at first, her eyes were far away. And then she grew to feel the intentness of his gaze, and drew away her hands to hold before her face, where a blush was rising; for the look spoke more of a human than immortal love, and it confused her.
"We will be friends," she said.
"But friendship will not be enough for me, Matilda. You must be my wife."
Matilda was white now. She leaned back in the sofa, and her head fell forward. It seemed to Considine that she would faint, and he had risen to ring, when she recovered self-control, and looked up in his face.
Being a lady of an earlier generation, when fainting was occasionally practised as a climax to emotion, and brides sometimes wept at the altar on bidding adieu to the associations of their youth, allowance must be made for Matilda by young women of the modern and robuster school, who can ratify an engagement for life with the same outward composure as one for the next valse. The modes of emotional expression and disguise are as much a question of date as the fashions in hair-dressing. Matilda was no more a lackadaisical fool than you are, my good madam; nor are you, I do believe, one whit more hard or heartless than she, whom I take to have been a good and affectionate woman.
Penelope came in from the farm not long after, and there was much to tell her. Considine was persuaded to remain for dinner, and went away in the evening a happy man.
The hyacinths were getting their chance at last, and he promised himself that with care and shelter they would sprout yet, and bloom in the autumn, as fragrantly and gay as with other fortune they might have done in spring.