It may easily be conjectured that the parson’s daughter did not take up her abode at Rodenham priory, and that Jeffray surrendered to Miss Hardacre’s prejudices. He rode home in rather a sulky mood that day, meditating on the fact that in betrothing himself to her he appeared to have taken most baffling responsibilities upon his conscience.
Richard did not tell Jilian of his tryst at Holy Cross with Bess of the Woods. He conceived that there was no shame in the adventure, since the girl was in trouble and needed the counsel of a friend. Silent as to his purpose, Richard rode to Hardacre that Monday, and found Miss Hardacre vaporish and out of humor with the world. She was cross; nor did she attempt to hide her petulance, expecting the lad to sympathize with her over the shortcomings of her maid and Sir Peter’s stinginess in the matter of pin-money. Richard, blushing and looking a little uncomfortable, offered her guineas out of his own purse. Jilian’s eyes glittered at the suggestion. She did not refuse the favor, and showed no delicate dislike to taking Richard’s money.
Jeffray excused himself early, and rode through the chase and over the heath towards Pevensel. The sky was gray and sullen, cloud masses moving fast over the waving woods, and no sunlight splashing upon the greens and purples of the forest. Dead leaves whirled and danced in the glades; there was much swaying of pine-tops against the hungry sky.
He rode down through the woods, past the Calvary in the meadows, and came towards Holy Cross asleep amid the green. Moving amid the broken walls and arches he saw the girl spring down from the recess of a window, a gray cloak and hood upon her head and shoulders. She unbuckled the cloak and threw it aside as she came towards Jeffray over the grass, her black hair gleaming almost with a purplish lustre, her face aglow, her eyes shining. Jeffray had dismounted and thrown his bridle over the bough of a stunted thorn. He turned towards Bess with a curious shyness and a sense of rapid beating at the heart.
“Am I late?” he asked her.
She laughed, showing the regular whiteness of her teeth, the lustre in her eyes increasing.
“I had to run from the hamlet,” she said, standing a little apart from him with her hands over her heart. “They have been bullying me again; it was yesterday, but the pistols kept them off. Mother Ursula is for me—now.”
Richard was watching her with an instinctive delight in the splendid aliveness of her beauty. There was something inevitable about her, a passionate naturalness that made Miss Jilian seem a tangle of affectations. Bess spoke out, looked straight with her keen, blue eyes, and did not ogle, flirt, or simper.
“I am sorry that they will not leave you in peace,” he said.
“Peace! There will be no peace for me unless I shoot Dan or run away or—”