“How dare you!” she cried. “Such insolence! You forget yourself, sir, and if my father were here—”
“Which he isn’t, dear. But bravo! That’s very nice and pretty, and makes you look ten times as handsome as ever. I like it. I love to see a girl with some pluck in her. But come now, what’s the good of going on like that and pretending to be the fine lady, I know what you are, and who you are, and where you live, as I told you.”
“I desire you to leave me instantly, sir. My father is a gentleman, and you will be severely punished if you dare to interrupt me like this.”
“Go on,” said the man, with a laugh. “I know the old boy, and have talked to him twice. It’s all right, dear, don’t be so proud. I mean the right thing by you. I’m down here to take charge of the ‘White Virgin’ yonder, behind where you live, and want to take charge of this little white virgin too. See? I shall have a grand place of it, and I’ll make quite the lady of you. There now, you see it’s all right. Let me carry the basket; it’s too big and heavy for your pretty little hands.”
He made a snatch at the creel she was carrying, but she drew back quickly, and hurried on once more, fighting hard to keep back the hysterical tears, and vainly looking to right and left for help or a means of escape from the unwelcome attentions forced upon her. But she looked in vain. The hillside sloped off too rapidly for any one but a most able climber to mount, and to have attempted to descend meant doing so at great risk to life and limb.
There was nothing for it but to hurry on, and this she did with her breath coming faster—faster from excitement and exertion, as she recalled his words.
What did he say? He was in charge of the “White Virgin” mine—the old disused series of shaft and excavation down the narrow chasm which ran like a huge ragged gash into the mountain, and from which hundreds of thousands of tons of stone and refuse had been tilted down the mountain-side to form the moss-grown ugly cascade of stones which stood out from the hill-slope forming a prominent object visible for miles.
The shelf she was following led past the narrow ravine, with its many pathways cut in the steep sides all running towards the great shaft, fenced in with blocks of stone. She had been there several times with her father, bearing him company during his walks in search of minerals, so that the way was perfectly familiar to her, though it was a place not to be approached without a feeling of dread. Country superstition had made it the home of the old miners, who now and then revisited the glimpses of the moon; two people had been, it was said, murdered there, and their bodies hidden in the dark, wet mazes of the workings; and within the recollection of the oldest inhabitant an unhappy forsaken maiden, who feared to face the reproaches of her relatives, had sought oblivion in the water at the bottom of the principal shaft, and her body had never been found.
It was an uncanny place on a bright sunny day—after night a spot to be avoided for many reasons; but Dinah Gurdon approached it now with feelings of hope, for she felt that the man who was in charge would leave her there if she only maintained her firmness.
“Why, what a silly little thing it is!” he said, in a low, eager voice, his words sounding subdued and confidential as he uttered them close to her ear. “What are you afraid of? Why, bless your pretty heart, it’s plain to see you haven’t been troubled much by the stupid bumpkins about here. Running away like that just because a man tells you he loves you. And I do, my pretty one, and have ever since I came down here. Soon as I clapped eyes on you, I says to myself, ‘That’s the lass for me.’ Why, I’ve done down here what I haven’t done since I left Sunday-school—I’ve come three Sundays running to church, so as to see your bonny face. I saw you come by this morning when I was yonder leaning over the fence. ‘Going to market,’ I says. ‘Wonder whether she’d bring me an ounce of tobacco from the shop, if I asked her?’ But I was just too late, so I sat down and waited for you. ‘She won’t want me to be seen with her in the village,’ I said. ‘Girls like to keep these things quiet at first.’ So do I, dear. I say, it’s pretty lonesome for me down here till they begin working, but I’ve got plenty of time for you, so let’s make good use of it while we can.”