“Why, gal alive! what rigmarole ’s this? Married—ay, an’ so you shall be, in gude time. You ’m light-headed, lass, I do b’lieve. But doan’t fret, I’ll have Doctor—”
“Hear me,” she said, almost roughly. “I kept my word—my first sacred word—to Will. I loved him, an’ none else but him; an’ ’tis done—I’ve married him this marnin’, for it had to be, an’ theer’s the sign an’ token of it I’ve brought along with me.”
She drew the copy of the register from her pocket, opened it with trembling fingers, set it before Mr. Lyddon, and waited for him to speak. But it was some time before he found words or wind to do so. Literally the fact had taken his breath. A curious expression, more grin than frown—an expression beyond his control in moments of high emotion—wrinkled his eyelids, stretched his lips, and revealed the perfect double row of his false teeth. His hand went forward to the blue paper now lying before him, then the fingers stopped half way and shook in the air. Twice he opened his mouth, but only a sharp expiration, between a sigh and a bark, escaped.
“My God, you’ve shook the sawl of un!” cried Billy, starting forward, but the miller with an effort recovered his self-possession, scanned the paper, dropped it, and lifted up his voice in lamentation.
“True—past altering—’t is a thing done! May God forgive you for this wicked deed, Phoebe Lyddon—I’d never have b’lieved it of ’e—never—not if an angel had tawld me. My awn that was, and my awnly one! My darter, my soft-eyed gal, the crown of my grey hairs, the last light of my life!”
“I pray you’ll come to forgive me in time, dear faither. I doan’t ax ’e to yet a while. I had to do it—a faithful promise. ’T was for pure love, faither; I lied for him—lied even to you; an’ my heart ’s been near to breakin’ for ’e these many days; but you’d never have listened if I’d told ’e.”
“Go,” he said very quietly. “I caan’t abear the sight of’e just now. An’ that poor fule, as thrawed his money in golden showers for ’e! Oh, my gude God, why for did ’E leave me any childern at all? Why didn’t ’E take this cross-hearted wan when t’ other was snatched away? Why didn’t ’E fill the cup of my sorrer to the brim at a filling an’ not drop by drop, to let un run awver now I be auld?”
Phoebe turned to him in bitter tears, but the man’s head was down on his hands beside his plate and cup, and he, too, wept, with a pitiful childish squeak between his sobs. Weakness so overwhelming and so unexpected—a father’s sorrow manifested in this helpless feminine fashion—tore the girl’s very heartstrings. She knelt beside him and put her arms about him; but he pushed her away and with some return of self-control and sternness again bid her depart from him. This Phoebe did, and there was silence, while Mr. Lyddon snuffled, steadied himself, wiped his face with a cotton handkerchief, and felt feebly for a pair of spectacles in his pocket. Mr. Chapple, meantime, had made bold to scan the paper with round eyes, and Billy, now seeing the miller in some part recovered, essayed to comfort him.
“Theer, theer, maister, doan’t let this black come-along-o’t quench ’e quite. That’s better! You such a man o’ sense, tu! ’T was awver-ordained by Providence, though a artful thing in a young gal; but women be such itemy twoads best o’ times—stage-players by sex, they sez; an’ when love for a man be hid in ’em, gormed if they caan’t fox the God as made ’em!”
“Her to do it! The unthankfulness, the cold cruelty of it! An’ me that was mother an’ father both to her—that did rock her cradle with these hands an’ wash the li’l year-auld body of her. To forget all—all she owed! It cuts me that deep!”