When the shadows grew long and dew fell, and the daisies on the graves filled the house with their faint, innocent fragrance, and closed their pink-lined petals for the night, Hazel felt very miserable. This very night she was going to work the last charm—the charm of the bracken flower—and whoso she dreamed of with that flower beneath her pillow must be her lover. She felt traitorous to Edward in doing this. She and Edward were handfasted. How, then, could she have any lover but Edward? Why should she work the charm? She puzzled over this during prayers, but no answer came to her questioning. Life is a taciturn mother, and teaches not so much by instruction as by blows. Edward was reading the twenty-third Psalm, which always affected his mother to tears, and in reading which his voice was very tender, '… And lead thee forth beside the waters of comfort.'
The room was full of a deep exaltation, a passion of trustfulness.
'I went along by the water,' Hazel thought, 'and watched the piefinches and the canbottlins flying about. And I thought it was the waters of comfort. Only Mr. Reddin came and frit the birds and made the water muddy.' She did not feel as sure as the others did of the waters of comfort.
'So beautiful, dear,' murmured Mrs. Marston, 'so like your poor dear father.'
Edward's good night to Hazel was more curt than usual. She was looking so mysteriously lovely. Her stress of mind had given a touch of spirituality to her face, and there is nothing that stirs passion as spirituality does. She had on a print frock of a neat design reminiscent of old-fashioned china, and she had pinned a posy of daisies on her shoulder.
For one second, as she held up her cheek to be kissed, standing on the threshold of her moonlit room, Edward hesitated. Then he abruptly turned and shut his door.
His hour had struck. His hour had passed.
Hazel stood in the window reading the charm.
'On Midsummer Eve, when it wants a little of midnight, spread your smock where the bracken grows. For this is the night of the flowering of the brake, that beareth a blue flower on the stroke of midnight. But it is withered afore morning. Come you again about the time of the first bird-call. If aught is in the smock, take it; it is the dust of the flower. Sleep above it, and he you dream of is your lover. This is a sure charm, and cannot be broke.'
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