It was less wonderful, the suspicionless conduct of the villagers towards Ruth, than the calm prudence with which she conducted all the details relating to her secret; her poverty was well known, yet she daily procured a double portion of food, which was won by double labour; she toiled in the fields for the meed of oaten cake and potatoes, or she dashed out in a crazy boat on the wide ocean to win with the dredgers the spoils of the oyster beds that lie on its bosom; the daintier fare was for the unhappy guest, and daily did she wander among the rocks, when the tides were retiring, for the shell-fish which they had flung among the fissures in their retreat, which she bore, exhausted with fatigue, to her home—and which her lovely child, now rising into womanhood, prepared for the luxurious meal; it was wonderful too, the settled prudence of the little maiden, who spoke nothing of the food which was borne from their frugal board; if she suspected the secret of her mother, she respected it too much to allow others to discover that she did so.
Many sad hours did Ruth pass in the robber’s cave; and many times, by conversing with him upon the subject of her destiny, did she seek to alleviate the pangs its recollection gave her; but the result of such discussions were by no means favourable to her hopes; Rhys had acknowledged that his threat had originated in malice, and that he intended to alarm and subdue, but not to the extent that he had effected: “I knew well,” said he, “that disgrace alone would operate upon you as I wished, for I foresaw you would glory in the thought of nobly sustained misfortune; I meant to degrade you with the lowest; I meant to attribute to you what I now painfully experience to be the vilest of the vices; I intended to tell you, you were destined to be a thief, but I could not utter the words I had arranged, and I was struck with horror at those I heard involuntarily proceeding from my lips; I would have recalled them but I could not; I would have said, ‘Maiden, I did but jest,’ but there was something that seemed to withhold my speech and press upon my soul, ‘so as thou hast said shall this thing be’—yet take comfort, my own fortunes have ever deceived me, and doubtlessly ever will, for I feel as if I should one day return to this cave and make it my final home.”
He spoke solemnly and wept,—but the awful eye of his companion was unmoved as she looked on in wonder and contempt at his grief. “Thou knowest not how to endure,” said she to him, “and as soon as night shall again fall upon our mountains, I will lead thee forth on thy escape; the danger of pursuit is now past; at midnight be ready for thy journey, leave the cave, and ascend the rocks by the path I shewed thee, to the field in which its mouth is situated; wait me there a few moments, and I will bring thee a fleet horse, ready saddled for the journey, for which thy gold must pay, since I must declare to the owner that I have sold it at a distance, and for more than its rated value.”
That midnight came, and Meredith waited with trembling anxiety for the haughty step of Ruth; at length he saw her, she had ascended the rock, and, standing on its verge, was looking around for her guest; as she was thus alone in the clear moonlight, standing between rock and sky, and scarcely seeming to touch the earth, her dark locks and loose garments scattered by the wind, she looked like some giant spirit of the older time, preparing to ascend into the mighty black cloud which singly hung from the empyreum, and upon which she already appeared to recline; Meredith beheld her and shuddered,—but she approached and he recovered his recollection.
“You must be speedy in your movements,” said she, “when you leave me; your horse waits on the other side of this field, and I would have you hasten lest his neighings should betray your purpose. But, before you depart, Rhys Meredith, there is an account to be settled between us: I have dared danger and privations for you; that the temptations of the poor may not assail me, give me my reward and go.”
Rhys pressed his leathern bag to his bosom, but answered nothing to the speech of Ruth: he seemed to be studying some evasion, for he looked upon the ground, and there was trouble in the working of his lip. At length he said cautiously, “I have it not with me; I buried it, lest it should betray me, in a field some miles distant; thither will I go, dig it up, and send it to thee from B—, which is, as thou knowest, my first destination.”
Ruth gave him one glance of her awful eye when he had spoken; she had detected his meanness, and smiled at his incapacity to deceive. “What dost thou press to thy bosom so earnestly?” she demanded; “surely thou art not the wise man I deemed thee, thus to defraud my claim: thy friend alone thou mightest cheat, and safely; but I have been made wretched by thee, guilty by thee, and thy life is in my power; I could, as thou knowest; easily raise the village, and win half thy wealth by giving thee up to justice; but I prefer reward from thy wisdom and gratitude; give, therefore, and be gone.”
But Rhys knew too well the value of the metal of sin to yield one half of it to Ruth; he tried many miserable shifts and lies, and at last, baffled by the calm penetration of his antagonist, boldly avowed his intention of keeping all the spoil he had won with so much hazard. Ruth looked at him with scorn: “Keep thy gold,” she said; “if it thus can harden hearts, I covet not its possession; but there is one thing thou must do, and that ere thou stir one foot. I have supported thee with hard earned industry, that I give thee; more proud, it should seem, in bestowing than I could be, from such as thee, in receiving: but the horse that is to bear thee hence to-night I borrowed for a distant journey; I must return with it, or with its value; open thy bag, pay me for that, and go.”
But Rhys seemed afraid to open his bag in the presence of her he had wronged. Ruth understood his fears; but, scorning vindication of her principles, contented herself with entreating him to be honest. “Be more just to thyself and me,” she persisted: “the debt of gratitude I pardon thee; but, I beseech thee, leave me not to encounter the consequence of having stolen from my friend the animal which is his only means of subsistence: I pray thee, Rhys, not to condemn me to scorn.”
It was to no avail that Ruth humbled herself to entreaties; Meredith answered not, and while she was yet speaking, cast side-long looks towards the gate where the horse was waiting for his service, and seemed meditating, whether he should not dart from Ruth, and escape her entreaties and demands by dint of speed. Her stern eye detected his purpose; and, indignant at his baseness, and ashamed of her own degradation, she sprung suddenly towards him, made a desperate clutch at the leathern bag, and tore it from the grasp of the deceiver. Meredith made an attempt to recover it, and a fierce struggle ensued, which drove them both back towards the yawning mouth of the cave from which he had just ascended to the world. On its very verge, on its very extreme edge, the demon who had so long ruled his spirit now instigated him to mischief, and abandoned him to his natural brutality: he struck the unhappy Ruth a revengeful and tremendous blow. At that moment a horrible thought glanced like lightning through her soul; he was to her no longer what he had been; he was a robber, ruffian, liar; one whom to destroy was justice, and perhaps it was he—. “Villain!” she cried, “thou—thou didst predict that I was doomed to be a murderer! art thou—art thou destined to be the victim?” She flung him from her with terrific force, as he stood close to the abyss, and the next instant heard him dash against its sides, as he was whirled headlong into the darkness.