“Aye, but Gaunt’s as he made himself. I can’t abide the man, and never could.”
So Hirst, to his own surprise, found himself defending Reuben. He spoke warmly of his fearlessness at Ghyll, of his plucky fight to win back a good name for his house. Not until met by this dogged opposition of David’s, had the yeoman guessed how well he had grown to like Gaunt.
“Let bygones be bygones,” he finished. “’Tis not like ye, David, to keep up a grudge like this.”
“No, ’tis not like me, and I never felt it for another man; and I won’t say I’m proud o’ the feeling. But there it is, and there it will have to bide a while longer, seeing I can’t get rid on’t.”
Hirst, like a wise man, guessed that Cilla was the cause of the ill-feeling, and talked no more of Reuben. He chatted of Garth’s doings through the winter, led David on to talk of his adventures; but all the while he noted a growing restlessness in his companion. David kept glancing down toward the farm, then up at the pastures, as if in great fear or hope of some intrusion.
“No, she’s not at home,” said Hirst, with a sly roar of laughter. “The lile lass is faring out at Keta’s Well.”
David looked shyly at the yeoman, surprised that his secret had been guessed so easily. Then a great loneliness took hold of him, an instinct of trouble and foreboding. He had come straight to Good Intent, not pausing even for a visit to his forge; and there had been one picture in his mind. He would find Cilla, wearing the lilac gown, at the farm. He would see a new light in her eyes after the long absence and the unexpected return. He would find readier speech than of old.
“I’ve travelled so far,” he said, more to himself than to Hirst; “and she’s a stay-at-home most days o’ the year, and I fancied she’d be about the place just this one day.”
“Oh, tuts! She’ll be back i’ a few hours’ time, David. No need to go thinking the end o’ the world is coming because a lass is doing some bits o’ business for her father.”
Hirst, with all his cheeriness, was ill at ease. He knew that this man’s dream would not come true; he felt that a hint in time would be kindly, and yet he shrank from giving pain. In his indecision he turned slowly down the croft, and David followed him.