CHAPTER XXII.
Trayton Harrod did not leave Knellestone. I think we had to thank the squire for that. Father and he being so proud and obstinate, they would never have come to an understanding alone, nor would either certainly have accepted me for a mediator.
I don't know whether Mr. Broderick persuaded father to ask his bailiff to remain, or how the matter was arranged. I only know that a few days after the squire's return I met Harrod down at the haymaking on the eastern marsh, and that he told me he was not going to leave us. I remember very well how he told it me with a smile; not that quick flash which I have sometimes noticed before as being characteristic of him when moved to sudden mirth, but a kind of half-smile that had something triumphant in it.
"Yes," he said, looking round on the meadows that were ready for the scythe, "we shall have a mowing-machine on them before the week's out."
That was all; but the words told me he was going to remain. I know I looked up with an answering smile of satisfaction, but it faded as I saw Jack Barnstaple's gloomy eye fixed on me. The very silence of a faithful servant reproved me for my disloyalty. For in my first content I had forgotten that satisfaction to such a speech was disloyalty to father, to the horror of machines that had always been my creed till now.
"I'm sorry—" I began, but then I stopped, confused. I was too honest to tell a lie. How could I say that I was sorry he had triumphed? He turned and said some word to the laborer, and I had time to lose my sudden blushes. Had he noticed them? I think I scarcely cared. I was strangely happy.
All that day I was happy. In the eventide we followed the last wagon up the hill. Tired horses, teased to madness by the ox-fly in the heat, tired men shouldering their forks, tired women in curious sun-bonnets, and girls not too tired yet to laugh with the lads, went before, and we two followed afterwards, not at all tired of anything—at least I speak for myself.
A long line of flame marked the horizon behind the hill and upon the red sky, the houses of the village, the three roofs and the square tower of the old church, the ivied grayness of the ancient gate-way, and the solitary pines that marked the ridge here and there, all lay dark upon the brightness, their shapes defined and single. Close behind us the sea was cool and fragrant. Upon the hem of the wide soft sands that shone in sunset reflections, a regal old heron had fetched his evening meal from out of the little pools that the sea had left, and unfolding his huge pinions, sailed away in a queer oblique and apparently leisurely flight to the tall trees that were his inland home. We left the haymakers to take the road, and followed the heron across the marsh.