“You can think for her, can ’e? You can stand between me an’ her to shield her against the man as would have faced fire an’ water an’ all hell’s delights for her ever since she was a li’l dinky maid! You ax me to forgive her—you? Christ A’mighty! she’m a lucky woman to have a man of your metal to stand up for her against me!”
“I didn’t mean that, Aggett; only I feared—”
“Doan’t I love her tu, you smooth-faced fule? Do ’e think one hair of her ban’t so precious to me as to you? Do ’e think because she’ve took your poison I’m mazed tu? I’ve got to live my life wi’out her; I’ve got to bide all my days wi’out her—that’s enough. But she’d have loved me still if she could. Ban’t her sin that you poured magic in her cup; ban’t her sin that she won’t wear glass beads no more now she thinks she’ve found a strong o’ di’monds.”
“You’re a better man than I am, John; you make me see what I’ve done; you make me wish I was dead.”
“Liar! Don’t prate no more to me. I hate the filthy sight of ’e, an’ the sound of thy oily tongue. I’d swing for ’e to-morrow, an’ keep my last breath to laugh with; but for she. Tell her—no, that I’ll do myself. I’ll tell her; an’ no call for you to fear as your fine name will get any hard knocks. I’ll never soil my mouth with it more arter to-day.”
He departed, and the other, in misery and shame, stood and watched him return to the threshing-floor. Yet, as the unhappy spirit who has sacrificed his life to a drug and creeps through shame and contumely back and back to the poison, counting nothing as vital that does not separate him therefrom, so now the man felt that Sarah Belworthy was his own and told himself that his honour, his self-respect, his fair repute were well lost in exchange for this unexampled pearl.
CHAPTER VI
At nightfall John Aggett visited the cottage of the Belworthys, but Sarah was from home for the day and he had a few words with her mother instead. That astute woman was well informed of affairs, and the romance now proceeding had long been the salt of her life, though she pretended no knowledge of it. In common with her husband, she hoped for glory from a possible union between the cot of Belworthy and the homestead of the Chaves. But these ambitions were carefully hidden from sight. All the smith said, when the matter was whispered, amounted to a pious hope that the Lord would look after his own—meaning Sarah; but presently it behooved both parents to stir in the matter, when they learned of the subsequent meeting between their daughter and John Aggett. A very unexpected determination on the girl’s part resulted from that occasion, and the matter fell out in this way.
Before seeing John again, Sally had lengthy speech with her new sweetheart, and he, a little dead to the danger of so doing, detailed at length his conversation with the cowman and explained the complete nature of his rival’s renunciation. This narrative set Timothy in a somewhat sorry light, and the fact that he unconsciously bore himself as a victor added to the unpleasant impression conveyed. Had Tim declared his own sorrow and shame, blamed himself and acknowledged John’s greatness with wholehearted or even simulated praise, the girl had accepted the position more readily; but as it was, young Chave, whose fear of rousing her pity for John rendered him less eloquent upon that theme than he felt disposed to be, by this very reticence and oblivion touching the other’s profound sorrow, awoke that pity he desired to stifle. Indeed, his story moved Sarah unutterably. While her love for Tim was the light of her life, yet at this juncture her nature forced her to turn to the first man, and now she held herself guilty of wickedness in her treatment of him. An instinct toward abstract justice, rare in women, uplifted her in this strait; the stricken man clung to her mind and would not be banished. Even before Timothy’s subsequent abasement and self-accusations, she could not forget the past or live even for an hour in the joy of the present. The very note of triumph in her loved one’s voice jarred upon her. It was, therefore, with feelings painfully mingled and heart distracted by many doubts that Sarah met John Aggett at last.
He was harsh enough—harsh to brutality—and for some subtle reason this attitude moved her to the step he least expected. Softness and kind speech might have sent Sarah weeping to Timothy after all; but the ferocity, despair and distraction of the big flaxen man confirmed her in a contrary course of action. She put her hands into his, cried out that, before God, she was his woman for all time, and that his woman she would remain until the end. John Aggett strangled his reason upon this loving declaration—as many a stronger spirit would have done. He told himself that his gigantic love might well serve for them both; he caressed the wanderer in love and called upon Heaven to hear his thanksgivings. New rosy-fledged hope sprang and soared in his heart at this unhoped blessing, and for a few blissful days light returned to his face, elasticity to his step. He had steeled his soul to part with her; he had told himself the worst of the agony was over, but in reality the girl had come back into his life again before the real grief of his loss had bitten itself into his mind. Now, despite the inner whisper that told him his joy rested on the most futile foundations possible, he took her back as he had resigned her—in a whirlwind of emotion. And he assured himself that, having once yielded her up, neither men nor God could reasonably ask him to do so again.