Sandy McCray’s face was a study as he stood peering down, and fitting the boot first in one and then another print, ending by returning it to its proper service; and then it was that, if he had looked upwards instead of down, he would have seen that a pale, eager face was watching his every motion, as it had been for the last few minutes, and continued so to do, while, as if struck by a sudden thought, Sandy McCray laid his finger by the side of his nose, grinned a very fierce and savage grin, and then proceeded to erase the marks of trampling. Five minutes later he did turn his head upwards, and stole a glance at the window; but the pale face was not there, for Jane, who had never undressed, had seated herself upon the floor, and now, trembling and agitated, was having what she would have called “a good cry.”
There was not a footprint left when Jane had finished her cry, and stole to the window to peep. Neither was Sandy McCray there; but a little off to the right, upon a scrap of grass sparkling in the morning sun with a heavy burden of dewdrops, and as Jane looked, she saw the gardener sharpening his scythe viciously before he began to shave away at the grass, as if every daisy’s head were an enemy’s that he was determined to take off.
Jane sighed, as well she might, and once more she said aloud:
“Oh, what a happy world this would be if there were no men!”
That was an anxious day for poor Jane, whose thoughts at times made her shiver. Little as she had noticed them before, she could now recall scores of attentions on the gardener’s part, all of which evidently meant love. The warm apples from his pockets; the bunches of grapes; the peaches and nectarines; and the roses on Sundays; besides which, for months past it had been his habit to grin at her very widely, so as to show the whole of his teeth—loving smiles, no doubt, while now that he had seen those footsteps beneath her window, what would he do?
She asked herself another question, without trying to answer the former. What had he been doing there himself?
She told herself at last that he would lay no information against her, but that he would watch carefully, and then there would be perhaps a fight between him and Gurdon, who would be sure to come again, for he must have known that she was about to give way to his appeal.
It was plain enough now why Gurdon and McCray had always been such bad friends, quarrelling fiercely, till McCray would tauntingly ask the butler when he meant to use the flower-beds again, because he—the gardener—never liked pigs to sleep in his beds without straw. Jane had never troubled herself about McCray before, but she felt that she must now—that she was bound to do so, for most likely he would get help, and Gurdon, if he came, would be seized for trespassing. It was no use, she could not help it, she declared, and as soon as she found herself at liberty she determined to seek McCray, and trust to her woman’s wit for disarming him, should his designs be inimical.
Then she shrank back from the task, for it would be like putting herself in his power, and for a long time poor Jane’s mind was a chaos of conflicting doubts. At last, though, she felt determined, and she set off in the direction of the gardener’s cottage, telling herself that come what might Gurdon should get into no further trouble.
There was no one at the cottage, and on making inquiry of another of the gardeners, she learned that McCray had gone with a cart to the town to bring back some shrubs sent from some great nurseryman in London.