CHAPTER II.—WHAT MIGHT BE.
The place was the garden of Willowmere. The time was the middle of August, when trees and fields and bracken were faltering into that full ripeness which bodes decay. At that period, note the gradation of hues in the forest land—from deep watery green to pale, sensitive yellow, every leaf trembling in the sunlight with ever-changing shades. In the garden the forward apples were showing ruddy cheeks, and the late pear presented a sullen gray green.
The persons were Madge Heathcote, niece of Richard Crawshay, the sturdy yeoman farmer of Willowmere, and Philip Hadleigh, son of the master of Ringsford Manor.
She was somewhat pale and anxious: he was inclined to hustle her anxiety aside with the blissful hopefulness of youth and indifference to consequences.
‘I am going to give you very bad advice, Madge; will you listen to it?’
‘Is it very bad?’ she asked, lifting her eyes, in which there was an expression curiously compounded of pathos and coquetry.
‘Very bad indeed,’ he responded cheerfully, ‘for I am going to tell you that you are not to mind your uncle at all, but be guided by me now, as you will be, I hope, at no very distant date.’
‘But you know he always liked you, Philip, and you must have done something—something awfully bad to have made him turn so suddenly against you.’
But although she tried to make him believe that she was quite sure he had done something very wicked, she somehow failed to impress the youth with any deep sense of her indignation.
‘I cannot measure the degree of my iniquity until you give me some hint as to what it is.’
‘Don’t you know?’
‘On my honour I do not. My conscience is as clear of it as your own. Now speak—tell me my crime.’
‘If you don’t know what it is,’ she said slowly, whilst she studied intently a weed that had grown in the path and which now sprouted at her restless foot. ‘If you really don’t know what it is—I think we had better say nothing about it.’
‘Very well and with all my heart. Still I can’t help thinking that your uncle might have come to me, or allowed me to go to him, before he made up his mind that we should never pull together.’
‘He did not say that exactly’——
‘Would you have believed him if he had?’ he interrupted, with an under-current of laughter in his voice and yet with a shade of curiosity in his expression.
She looked at him. That was enough. The pale blue eyes, which seemed in extreme lights quite gray, had that wistful, trustful expression of a dog when being chidden by a loved master for some offence of which it is innocent. But presently the expression changed to one of thoughtfulness, the flush faded from her cheek, and she again sought inspiration from the weed at her foot.
‘How can I tell you what I might believe about the future? All that I know is—I trust you, and am content’——
‘That’s my Madge,’ he said in a low glad tone, as he clasped her hand.
‘At the same time,’ she went on gravely, ‘you must remember that Uncle Dick has not only been good and kind to me; but he has, besides, shown himself wise in the advice he has given to others, and it would be very wrong of me not to think seriously over anything he may counsel about my future.’
‘Now you are playing Miss Prim, and I don’t admire you in that character. I like your uncle and respect his judgment—except of course in the present instance’—— Then, suddenly checking himself: ‘But what did he say?’
‘Not very much, but he was in earnest. He told me that if I cared for myself or cared for him, I was to have nothing more to do with any of the Ringsford Manor people.’
‘That was when he came home from the market yesterday?’
‘Yes—but you must not think’——
‘No, no—I was not suspecting him of having stayed too long at the King’s Head, although I daresay he might not be so cool as when he started in the morning. I know that he would be out of humour with our people, for he had some dispute with my father, old Cone tells me. Whether it was about the price of corn, or a pig, or the points of a horse, is known only to themselves, but they parted in a bad temper. You will see that your uncle will not bear me malice on that account. Did he say anything else?’
‘Yes.’ Her lips trembled a little and she did not seem disposed to continue.
‘Well, out with it,’ he exclaimed cheerfully.
‘He said—that—he wished he saw you fairly off on your wildgoose chase.’
Philip understood now why the lips had trembled and why the words came from her lips with so much effort.
‘Poor Madge,’ he said gently as he drew her arm under his own and patted the hand which rested on his wrist.
Then they walked together in silence.
He was a broad-shouldered, stalwart fellow, with short, curly, brown hair, a moustache of darker hue; chin and cheeks bare. His was a frank, sanguine face—Hope flashing from the clear eyes and brightening all the features. The square brow, the well-defined lines of nose and jaws, were suggestive of firmness; the soft curves of mouth and chin dispelled all hints of hardness in the character. A resolute but not an obdurate man, one might say.
She was tall and graceful, age between twenty-three and twenty-five, but in certain moods she appeared to be much older; and in others no one would have thought that she was quite out of her teens. Long regular features; silken hair that had once been very fair but had darkened as she grew in years; a quiet, self-possessed manner which made all comers easy in her presence, instantly inspiring confidence and respect. Some people said she had more influence over the labourers in the parish than the parson himself. The parson’s wife—although a kindly woman in her way—never had anything like the success of ‘Missie’ Heathcote, as she was affectionately called by the working-folk, in persuading Hodge to give up his extra pot of a Saturday and inducing Hodge’s ‘old woman’ to keep her cottage and her children neat.
To Philip Hadleigh in his calmest ravings about her she was the most beautiful creature in all woman-nature. He had learned Wordsworth’s lines about the ‘noble woman nobly planned’ who was yet ‘not too bright or good for human nature’s daily food,’ and he was never tired of repeating them to himself. They presented a perfect portrait of Madge. She, too, was beautiful in mind and body—true, earnest, devoted. She would die for the man she loved; she could never be false to him. And he had won that love! He did not know how, or why or when. He was dazed by his great fortune. He could not realise it; so he shut his eyes and was happy.
But ‘Missie’ Heathcote herself knew that she was capable of saying and doing very foolish things. She feared that she was capable of Hate as passionate and fierce as her Love.
So far all had gone smoothly with them. True, their engagement was between themselves; there had been no formal asking of the sanction of her uncle and guardian’s leave, or of his father’s approval. But everybody knew what had been going on and no objection had been raised. In his easy way Philip took for granted that those who had any right to their confidence understood everything and did not require him to go through the conventional explanations. She had not considered explanations necessary until they should come to the arrangements for the wedding-day.
Their elders did understand: Mr Hadleigh of Ringsford was indifferent or too proud to proffer even to his son advice which was not asked: Crawshay of Willowmere was content to let Madge please herself. He thought her choice a good one, for he liked Philip and believed in him. Of course in the way of money and position she might have done better. (Was there ever a parent or guardian of a girl who did not think that ‘she might have done better?’) Hadleigh was a wealthy man, but his ownership of Ringsford was of recent date, and although he was doing everything in his power to secure recognition as one of the county families, all his riches could not place him on a level with Dick Crawshay, whose ancestors had been masters of Willowmere from a period before the arrival of the Conqueror—going back to the time of the Romans, as was sometimes asserted.
Crawshay was not a man of prejudice when he considered things calmly. So, in this matter of his niece’s choice of a partner, he was content since she was satisfied.
In this way it happened that the heads of the houses had given no formal consent to the proposed marriage; and now that a quarrel had arisen, each felt free to approve or disapprove of it in accordance with his own humour.
Madge regarded the quarrel—as she was inclined to regard most matters—with serious eyes. Philip was convinced that it was nothing more than a petty squabble—a few angry words spoken in a moment of temper, which both men were no doubt ashamed of and would be glad to have forgotten. He was not disturbed about that unpleasant little event.
What elicited that sympathetic whisper ‘Poor Madge’—and what had kept them silent so long as they passed down by the dense old hawthorn hedge to the orchard, was a matter of much more importance than the falling-out of their elders. At length, he continued:
‘Would you like me to give up this business of mine altogether?... We can do without it.’
‘No; I should not like that at all,’ she answered with prompt decision. ‘You believe the result will be of great advantage to your father’s firm and to yourself; the experience will certainly be valuable to you; and when you come home again!’——
‘Ah, when I come home again—that will be a glad day,’ he said with subdued enthusiasm. ‘Let me take up the picture where you laid down the brush.... When I come home again there will be a little conversation with the vicar. Then two young people—just like you and me, Madge—will march into the church on a week-day. The parson will be there and a few friends will be there, and we shall all be very merry. Next will come a sweet month when these selfish young people will hide themselves away from all the world in some out-of-the-way nook, where they will make a joyful world of their own in being together, knowing that only death is to part them now. Won’t that be good fun? Do you think you will like it?’
‘I think so,’ she answered, smiling at his fancy and blushing a little at the happy prospect.
‘Next they return to their cottage by the wood; and the lady is busy with her housekeeping, and the man is busy admiring her more and more every day, finding new beauty in her face, new love in her heart as the years go on. They will not be always alone, perhaps; and when they are old she will be a sweet-faced dame with beautiful white hair, and there will be strong young arms for her to lean upon as she goes to church on Sunday. The old man will totter by her side, resting on his staff, and still her lover—her lover till death do them part.... What do you say to that fine forecast?’
‘Ay—if it might be, Philip,’ she said with a bright smile—a hint of tears in its brightness, for she had followed his vision of the future with tender sympathy throughout.
‘Will you try to make it what I have so often dreamed it may be, should be—must be?’
‘I will try.’
His arm was round her waist: they were sheltered by the apple-trees and the great hedge: he kissed her.
‘Then that’s all right,’ was his glad comment; ‘and now I am going to hunt for Uncle Dick, and have it out with him for playing such a wicked joke upon us. I won’t say good-bye, for I shall be coming back with him. I don’t think I shall say good-bye until—— Why are you so troubled about this trip, Madge? It is really nothing more than a trip, and there is still time enough to give it up altogether.’
‘You are not to speak of that again,’ she replied with playful reproach. ‘It was your mother’s wish.’
‘So be it. But here is a new idea!’
‘Are you sure it is new?’
‘Quite. Suppose we pay that visit to the church before I start, and then we could travel together? That would be capital.’
She shook her head.
‘You know it would never do. You would either neglect the purpose of your journey, or neglect me—and that would be a terrible crime!’
‘I am not likely to commit it, and if I did you would forgive me.’
They had reached the stile at the end of the orchard, and he vaulted over it. His foot slipped as he descended, but he saved himself from falling by clutching the top bar of the stile.
‘That is not a good omen,’ said Madge, laughing gently; ‘you ought to have been content to clamber over like other people.’