Back Aa

Heriot's Choice

<h2>CHAPTER XX</h2> <h3>WHARTON HALL FARM</h3> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> 'A dappled sky, a world of meadows, Circling above us the black rooks fly Forward, backward; lo, their dark shadow Flits on the blossoming tapestry. </div> <div class="stanza"> Bare grassy slopes, where kids are tethered Round valleys like nests all ferny-lined, Round hills, with fluttering tree-tops feathered, Swell high in their freckled robes behind.' </div> <div class="stanza"> Jean Ingelow. </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> Mr. Lambert was soon made acquainted with his son's disappointment; but his sympathy was somewhat chilled by Richard's composed tranquillity of bearing. Perhaps it might be a little forced, but the young man certainly bore himself as though he had sustained no special defeat; the concentrated gravity of purpose which had scared Ethel was still apparent. 'You need not be so anxious about me, father,' he said, with almost a smile, in return to Mr. Lambert's look of questioning sadness. 'I have climbed too high and have had a fall, that is all. I must bear what other and better men have borne before me.' 'My brave boy; but, Cardie, is there no hope of relenting; none?' 'She would not have me, that is all I can tell you,' returned Richard, in the same quiet voice. 'You must not take this too much to heart; it is my fate to love her, and to go on loving her; if she refused me a dozen times, it would be the same with me, father.' Mr. Lambert shook his head; he was greatly troubled; for the moment his heart was a little sore against this girl, who was the destroyer of his son's peace. 'You may hide it from me, but you will eat out your heart with sadness and longing,' he said, with something of a groan. Richard was very dear to him, though he was not Benjamin. He was more like Joseph, he thought, a little quaintly, as he looked up at the noble young face. 'Yes, Joseph, the ruler among his brethren. Ah, Cardie, it is not to be, I suppose; and now you will eat out your heart and youth with the longing after this girl.' 'Do not think so meanly of me,' returned the young man with a flush. 'You loved my mother for three years before you married her, and I only pleaded my cause yesterday. Do you think I should be worthy of loving the noblest, yes, the noblest of women,' he continued, his gray eyes lighting up with enthusiasm, 'if I were so weakly to succumb to this disappointment. Laborare est orare—that shall be my motto, father. We must leave results in higher hands.' 'God bless and comfort you, my son,' returned Mr. Lambert, with some emotion. He looked at Richard with a sort of tender reverence; would that all disappointed lovers could bear themselves as generously as his brave boy, he thought; and then they sat for a few minutes in silence. 'You do not mind my going away for a little while? I think Roy would be glad to have me?' asked Richard presently. 'No, Cardie; but we shall be sorry to lose you.' 'If I were only thinking of myself, I would remain; but it will be better for her,' he continued, hesitating; 'she could not come here, at least, not yet; but if I were away it would make no difference. I want you all to be kinder than ever to her, father,' and now his voice shook a little for the first time. 'You do not know how utterly lonely and miserable she is,' and the promise given, Richard quietly turned the conversation into other channels. But he was less reticent with Mildred, and to her he avowed that his pain was very great. 'I can bear to live without her; at least I could be patient for years, but I cannot bear leaving her to her father's sorry protection. If my love could only shield her in her trouble, I think I could be content,' and Mildred understood him. 'We will all be so good to her for your sake,' she returned, with a nice womanly tact, not wearying him with effusion of sympathy, but giving him just the comforting assurance he needed. Richard's fortitude and calmness had deceived his father, but Mildred knew something of the silence of exceeding pain. 'Thank you,' he said in a low voice; and Mildred knew she had said the right thing. But as he was bidding them good-bye two days afterwards, he beckoned her apart from the others. 'Aunt Milly, I trust her to you,' he said, hurriedly; 'remember all my comfort lies in your goodness to her.' 'Yes, Richard, I know; as far as I can, I will be her friend. You shall hear everything from me,' and so she sent him away half-comforted. Half—comforted, though his heart ached with its mighty burden of love; and though he would have given half his strong young years to hear her say, 'I love you, Richard.' Could older men love better, nay, half as well as he did, with such self-sacrificing purity and faith? Yes, his pain was great, for delay and uncertainty are bitter to the young, and they would fain cleave with impatient hand the veiled mystery of life; but nevertheless his heart was strong within him, for though he could not speak of his hope, for fear that others might call it visionary, yet it stirred to the very foundation of his soul; for so surely as he suffered now, he knew that one day he should call Ethel Trelawny his wife. When Richard was gone, and the household unobservant and occupied in its own business, Mildred quietly fetched her shady hat, and went through the field paths, bordered by tall grasses and great shining ox-eyed daises, which led to the shrubberies of Kirkleatham. The great house was blazing in the sunshine; Ethel's doves were cooing from the tower; through the trees Mildred could see the glimmer of a white gown; the basket-work chair was in its old place, under her favourite acacia tree; the hills looked blue and misty in the distance. Ethel turned very pale when she saw her friend, and there was visible constraint in her manner. 'I did not expect you; you should not have come out in all this heat, Mildred.' 'I knew you would scold me; but I have not seen you for nearly a week, so I came through the tropics to look after you,' returned Mildred, playfully. 'You are under my care now. Richard begged me to be good to you,' she continued, more seriously. A painful flush crossed Ethel's face; her eyelids dropped. 'You must not let this come between us, Ethel; it will make him more unhappy than he is, and I fear,' speaking still more gravely, 'that though he says so little about himself, that he must be very unhappy.' Ethel tried ineffectually to control her emotion. 'I could not help it. You have no right to blame me, Mildred,' she said in a low voice. 'No, you could not help it! Who blames you, dear?—not I, nor Richard. It was not your fault, my poor Ethel, that you could not love your old playmate. It is your misfortune and his, that is all.' 'I know how good he is,' returned Ethel, with downcast eyes. Yes, it was her misfortune, she knew; was he not brave and noble, her knight, sans peur and sans reproche, her lion-hearted Richard? Could any man be more worthy of a woman's love?—and yet she had said him 'nay.' 'I know he is good, too good,' she said, with a little spasm of fury against her own hardness of heart, 'and I was a churl to refuse his love.' 'Hush; how could you help it? we cannot control these things, we women,' returned Mildred, still anxious to soothe. She looked at the pale girl before her with a feeling of tender awe, not unmixed with envy, that she should have inspired such passionate devotion, and yet remained untouched by it. This was a puzzle to gentle Mildred. 'You must try to put it all out of your mind, and come to us again,' she finished, with an unconscious sigh. 'Richard wished it; that is why he has gone away.' 'Has he gone away?' asked Ethel with a startled glance, and Mildred's brief resentment vanished when she saw how heavy the once brilliant eyes looked. Richard would have been grieved as well as comforted if he had known how many tears Ethel's hardness of heart had caused her. She had been thinking very tenderly of him until Mildred came between her and the sunshine; she was sorry and yet relieved to hear he was gone; the pain of meeting him again would be so great, she thought. 'It was wise of him to go, was it not?' returned Mildred. 'It was just like his kind consideration. Oh, you do not know Richard.' 'No, I do not know him,' replied Ethel, humbly. 'When he came and spoke to me, I would not believe it was he, himself; it seemed another Richard, so different. Oh, Mildred, tell me that you do not hate me for being so hard, not as I hate myself.' 'No, no, my poor child,' returned Mildred fondly. Ethel had thrown herself on the grass beside her friend, and was looking up in her face with great pathetic eyes. With her white gown and pale cheeks she looked very young and fair. Mildred was thankful Richard could not see her. 'No, whatever happens, we shall always be the same to each other. I shall only love you a little more because Richard loves you.' There was not much talk after that. Ethel's shyness was not easily to be overcome. The sweet dreamy look had come back to her eyes. Mildred had forgiven her; she would not let this pain come between them; she might still be with her friends at the vicarage; and as she thought of this she blessed Richard in her heart for his generosity. But Mildred went back a little sadly down the croft, and through the path with the great white daisies. The inequality of things oppressed her; the surface of their little world seemed troubled and disturbed as though with some impending changes. They were girls and boys no longer, but men and women, with full-grown capacities for joy and sorrow, with youthful desires stretching hither and thither. 'Most men work out their lot in life. After all, Cardie may get his heart's desire; it is only women who must wait till their fate comes to them, sometimes with empty hands,' thought Mildred, a little rebelliously, looking over the long level of sunshine that lay before her; and then she shook off the thought as though it stung her, and hummed a little tune as she filled her basket with roses. 'Roses and sunshine; a golden paradise hiding somewhere behind the low blue hills; the earth, radiant under the Divine glittering smile; a fragrant wind sweeping over the sea of grass, till it rippled with green light; "and God saw that it was good," this beautiful earth that He had made, yes, it is good; it is only we who cloud and mar its brightness with our repinings,' thought Mildred, preaching to herself softly, as she laid the white buds among her ferns. 'A jarring note, a missing chord, and we are out of harmony with it all; and though the sun shines, the midges trouble us.' It was arranged that on the next day Mr. Marsden was to escort Mildred and her nieces to Wharton Hall, that the young curate might have an opportunity of witnessing a Westmorland clipping. It was an intensely hot afternoon, but neither Polly nor Chriss were willing to give up the expedition. So as Mildred was too good-natured to plead a headache as an excuse, and as Olive was always ready to enact the part of a martyr on an emergency, neither of them owned how greatly they dreaded the hot, shadeless roads. 'It is a long lane that has no turning,' gasped Hugh, as they reached the little gate that bounded the Wharton Hall property. 'It is a mercy we have escaped sunstroke.' 'Providence is kinder than you deserve, you see,' observed a quiet voice behind him. And there was Dr. Heriot leading his horse over the turf. 'Miss Lambert, have you taken leave of your usual good sense, or have you forgotten to consult your thermometer?' 'I was unwilling to disappoint the girls, that was all,' returned Mildred; 'they were so anxious that Mr. Marsden should be initiated into the mysteries of sheep-clipping. Mrs. Colby has promised us some tea, and we shall have a long rest, and return in the cool of the evening.' 'I think I shall get an invitation for tea too. My mare has lamed herself, and I wanted Michael Colby's head man to see her; he is a handy fellow. I was here yesterday on business; they were clipping then.' 'Mr. Marsden ought to have been here two years ago,' interposed Polly eagerly. 'Mr. Colby got up a regular old-fashioned clipping for Aunt Milly. Oh, it was such fun.' 'What! are there fashions in sheep-shearing?' asked Hugh, in an amused tone. They were still standing by the little gate, under the shade of some trees; before them were the farm-buildings and outhouses; and the great ivied gateway, which led to the courtyard and house. Under the gray walls were some small Scotch oxen; a peacock trailed its feathers lazily in the dust. The air was resonant with the bleating of sheep and lambs; the girls in their white dresses and broad-brimmed hats made a pretty picture under the old elms. Mildred looked like a soft gray shadow behind them. 'There are clippings and clippings,' returned Dr. Heriot, sententiously, in answer to Hugh's half-amused and half-contemptuous question. 'This is a very ordinary affair compared with that to which Polly refers.' 'How so?' asked Hugh, curiously. 'Owners of large stocks, I have been told, often have their sheep clipped in sections, employ a certain number of men from day to day, and provide a certain number of sheep, each clipper turning off seven or eight sheep an hour.' 'Well, and the old-fashioned clipping?' 'Oh, that was another affair, and involved feasting and revelry. The owner of a farm like this, for example, sets apart a special day, and bids his friends and neighbours for miles round to assist him in the work. It is generally considered that a man should clip threescore and ten sheep in a day, a good clipper fourscore.' 'I thought the sheep-washing last month a very amusing sight.' 'Ah, Sowerby tells me that sheep improve more between washing and clipping than at any other period of equal length. Have you ever seen Best's Farming Book, two hundred years old? If you can master the old spelling, it is very curious to read. It says there "that a man should always forbear clipping his sheep till such time as he find their wool indifferently well risen from the skin; and that for divers reasons."' 'Give us the reasons,' laughed Hugh. 'I believe if I were not in holy orders I should prefer farming to any other calling.' And Dr. Heriot drew out a thick notebook. 'I was struck with the quaintness, and copied the extract out verbatim. This is what old Best says:— <blockquote>'"I. When the wool is well risen from the skin the fleece is as it were walked together on the top, and underneath it is but lightly fastened to the undergrowth; and when a fleece is thus it is called a mattrice coat. '"II. When wool is thus risen there is no waste, for it comes wholly off without any bits or locks. '"III. Fleeces, when they are thus, are far more easy to wind up, and also more easy for the clippers, for a man may almost pull them off without any clipping at all. '"IV. Sheep that have their wool thus risen have, without question, a good undergrowth, whereby they will be better able to endure a storm than those that have all taken away to the very skin." </blockquote> 'You will notice, Marsden, as I did when I first came here, that the sheep are not so clearly shorn as in the south. They have a rough, almost untidy look; but perhaps the keener climate necessitates it. An old proverb says:— <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> "The man that is about to clip his sheepe Must pray for two faire dayes and one faire weeke."' </div> </div> 'That needs translation, Dr. Heriot. Chriss looks puzzled.' 'I must annotate Best, then. And here Michael Sowerby is my informant. Don't you see, farmers like a fine day beforehand, that the wool may be dry—the day he clips, and the ensuing week—that the sheep may be hardened, and their wool somewhat grown before a storm comes.' 'They shear earlier in the south,' observed Hugh. He was curiously interested in the whole thing. 'According to Best it used to be here in the middle of June, but it is rarely earlier than the end of June or beginning of July. There is an old saying, and a very quaint one, that you should not clip your sheep till you see the "grasshopper sweat," and it depends on the nature of the season—whether early or late—when this phenomenon appears in the pastures.' 'I see no sort of information comes amiss to Dr. Heriot,' was Hugh's admiring aside to Olive. Olive smiled, and nodded. The conversation had not particularly interested her, but she liked this idle lingering in the shade; the ivied walls and gateway, and the small blue-black cattle, with the peacock strutting in the sun, made up a pretty picture. She followed almost reluctantly, when Dr. Heriot stretched himself, and called to his mare, who was feeding beside them, and then led the way to the sheep-pens. Here there was blazing sunshine again, hoarse voices and laughing, and the incessant bleating of sheep, and all the bustle attendant on a clipping. Mr. Colby came forward to meet them, with warm welcome. He was a tall, erect man, with a pleasant, weatherbeaten face, and a voice with the regular Westmorland accent. Hugh, as the newcomer, was treated with marked attention, and regret was at once manifested that he should only witness such a very poor affair. But Hugh Marsden, who had been bred in towns, thought it a very novel and amusing sight. There were ten or twelve clippers at work, each having his stool or creel, his pair of shears, and a small cord to bind the feet of the victims. The patient creatures lay helplessly under the hands that were so skilfully denuding them of their fleece. Sometimes there was a struggling mass of wool, but in most instances there was no resistance, and it was impossible to help admiring the skill and rapidity of some of the clippers. The flock was penned close at hand; boys caught them when wanted, and brought them to the clippers, received them when shorn, and took them to the markers, who also applied the tar to the wounded. In the distance the lambs were being dipped, and filled the air with their distressful bleatings, refusing to recognise in the shorn, miserable creatures that advanced to meet them the comfortable fleecy parents they had left an hour ago. Olive watched the heartrending spectacle till her heart grew pitiful. The poor sheep themselves were baffled by the noxious sulphur with which the fleece of the lambs were dripping. In the pasture there was confusion, a mass of white shivering bodies, now and then ecstasies, recognition, content. To her the whole thing was a living poem—the innocent faces, the unrest, the plaintive misery, were intact with higher meanings. 'This miserable little lamb, dirty and woebegone, cannot find its mother,' she thought to herself. 'It is even braving the terrors of the crowded yard to find her; even with these dumb, unreasoning creatures, love casteth out fear.' 'Mr. Colby has been telling us such a curious thing,' said Hugh, coming to her side, and speaking with his usual loud-voiced animation. 'He says that in the good old times the Fell clergy always attended these clippings, and acted the part of "doctor;" I mean applied the tar to the wounded sheep.' 'Colby has rather a racy anecdote on that subject,' observed Dr. Heriot, overhearing him. 'Let's have it, Michael, while your wife's tea is brewing. By the bye, I have not tasted your "clipping ale" yet.' 'All right, doctor, it is to the fore. If the story you mean concerns the election of a minister, I think I remember it.' 'Of course you do; two of the electors were discussing the merits of the rival candidates, one of whom had preached his trial sermon that day.' Michael Colby rubbed his head thoughtfully. 'Ay, ay; now I mind.' '"Ay," says one, "a varra good sarmon, John; I think he'll du."' '"Du," says John; "ay, fer a Sunday priest, I'll grant ye, he's aw weel enugh; byt fer clippens en kirsnens toder 'ill bang him aw't nowt."' Mildred was no longer able to conceal that her head ached severely, and, at a whispered request from Polly, Dr. Heriot led the way to the farmhouse. Strangers, seeing Wharton Hall for the first time, are always struck by the beauty of the old gateway, mantled in ivy, through which is the trim flower-bordered inclosure, with its comfortable dwelling-house and low, long dairy, and its picturesque remnant of ruins, the whole forming three sides of a quadrangle. Wharton Hall itself was built by Thomas Lord Wharton about the middle of the sixteenth century, and is a good specimen of a house of the period. Part of it is now in ruins, a portion of it occupied as a farmhouse. Mrs. Colby, a trim, natty-looking little body, was bustling about the great kitchen with her maids. Tea was not quite ready, and there was a short interval of waiting, in a long, narrow room upstairs, with a great window, looking over the dairy and garden, and the beautiful old gateway. 'I call this my ideal of a farmhouse!' cried Hugh enthusiastically, as they went down the old crazy staircase, having peeped into a great empty room, which Polly whispered would make a glorious ballroom. The sunshine was streaming into the great kitchen through the narrow windows. July as it was, a bright fire burnt in the huge fireplace; the little round table literally groaned under the dainties with which it was spread; steel forks and delicate old silver spoons lay side by side, the great clock ticked, the red-armed maids went clattering through the flagged passages and dairies, a brood of little yellow chickens clucked and pecked outside in the dust. 'What a picture it all is,' said Olive; and Dr. Heriot laughed. The white dresses and the girls' fresh faces made up the principal part of the picture to him. The grand old kitchen, the sunshine, and the gateway outside were only the background, the accessories of the whole. Polly wore a breast-knot of pale pinky roses; she had laid aside her broad-brimmed hat; as she moved hither and thither in her trailing dress, with her short, almost boyishly-cropped hair, she looked so graceful and piquante that Dr. Heriot's eyes followed her everywhere with unconscious pleasure. Polly was more than eighteen now, but her hair had never grown properly—it was still tucked behind the pretty little ears, and the smooth glossy head still felt like the down of an unfledged bird; 'there was something uncommon about Polly Ellison's style,' as people said, and as Mildred sometimes observed to Dr. Heriot—'Polly is certainly growing very pretty.' He thought so now as he watched the delicate, high-bred face, the cheeks as softly tinted as the roses she wore. Polly's gentle fun always made her the life of the party; she was busily putting in the sugar with the old-fashioned tongs—she carried the cups to Dr. Heriot and Hugh with saucy little speeches. How well Mildred remembered that evening afterwards. Dr. Heriot had placed her in the old rocking-chair beside the open window, and had thrown himself down on the settle beside her. Chriss, who was a regular salamander, had betaken herself to the farmer's great elbow-chair; the other girls and Hugh had gathered round the little table; the sunshine fell full on Hugh's beaming face and Olive's thoughtful profile; how peaceful and bright it all was, she thought, in spite of her aching head; the girlish laughter pealed through the room, the sparrows and martins chirped from the ivy, the sheep bleating sounded musically from the distance. 'It is an ill wind that blows no one any good,' laughed Dr. Heriot; 'my mare's lameness has given me an excuse for idleness. Look at that fellow Marsden; it puts one into a good temper only to look at him; he reminds one of a moorland breeze, so healthy and so exuberant.' 'We are going to see the dairy!' cried Polly, springing up; 'Chriss and I and Mr. Marsden. Olive is too lazy to come.' 'No, I am only tired,' returned Olive, a little weary of the mirth and longing for quiet. When the others had gone she stole up the crazy stairs and stood for a long time in the great window looking at the old gateway. They all wondered where she was, when Hugh found her and brought her down, and they walked home through the gray glimmering fields. 'I wonder of what you were thinking when I came in and startled you?' asked Hugh presently. 'I don't know—at least I cannot tell you,' returned Olive, blushing in the dusky light. Could she tell any one the wonderful thoughts that sometimes came to her at such hours; would he understand it if she could? The young man looked disconcerted—almost hurt. 'You think I should not understand,' he returned, a little piqued, in spite of his sweet temper; 'you have never forgiven me my scepticism with regard to poetry. I thought you did not bear malice, Miss Olive.' 'Neither do I,' she returned, distressed. 'I was only sorry for you then, and I am sorry now you miss so much; poetry is like music, you know, and seems to harmonise and go with everything.' 'Nature has made me prosaic and stupid, I suppose,' returned Hugh, almost sorrowfully. He did not like to be told that he could not understand; he had a curious notion that he would like to know the thoughts that had made her eyes so soft and shining; it seemed strange to him that any girl should dwell so apart in a world of her own. 'How you must despise me,' he said at last, with a touch of bitterness, 'for being what I am.' 'Hush, Mr. Marsden, how can you talk so?' returned Olive in a voice of rebuke. The idea shocked her. What were her beautiful thoughts compared to his deeds—her dreamy, contemplative life contrasted with his intense working energies? As she looked up at the great broad-shouldered young fellow striding beside her, with swinging arms and great voice, and simple boyish face, it came upon her that perhaps his was the very essence of poetry, the entire harmony of mind and will with the work that was planned for him. 'Oh, Mr. Marsden, you must never say that again,' she said earnestly, so that Hugh was mollified. And then, as was often the case with the foolish-fond fellow, when he could get a listener, he descanted eagerly about his little Croydon house and his mother and sisters. Olive was always ready to hear what interested people; she thought Hugh was not without a certain homely poetry as she listened—perhaps the moonlight, the glimmering fields, or Olive's soft sympathy inspired him; but he made her see it all. The little old house, with its faded carpet and hangings, and its cupboards of blue dragon-china—'bogie-china' as they had called it in their childhood—the old-fashioned country town, the gray old almshouses, Church Street, steep and winding, and the old church with its square tower, and four poplar trees—yes, she could see it all. Olive and Chriss even knew all about Dora and Florence and Sophy; they had seen their photographs at least a dozen times, large, plain-featured women, with pleasant kindly eyes, Dora especially. Dora was an invalid, and wrote little books for the Christian Knowledge Society, and Florence and Sophy gave lessons in the shabby little parlour that looked out on Church Street; through the wire blinds the sisters' little scholars looked out at the old-fashioned butcher's shop and the adjoining jeweller's. At the back of the house there was a long narrow garden, with great bushes of lavender and rosemary. The letters that came to Hugh were all fragrant with lavender, great bunches of it decked the vases in his little parlour at Miss Farrer's; antimacassars, knitted socks, endless pen-wipers and kettle-holders, were fashioned for Hugh in the little back room with its narrow windows looking over the garden, where Dora always lay on her little couch. 'She is such a good woman—they are all such good women,' he would say, with clumsy eloquence that went to Olive's heart; 'they are never sad and moping, they believe the best of everybody, and work from morning till night, and they are so good to the poor, Sophy especially.' 'How I should like to know them,' Olive would reply simply; she believed Hugh implicitly when he assured her that Florence was the handsomest woman he knew; love had beautified those plain-featured women into absolute beauty, divine kindness and goodness shone out of their eyes, devotion and purity had transformed them. 'That is what Dora says, she would so like to know you; they have read your book and they think it beautiful. They say you must be so good to have such thoughts!' cried Hugh, with sudden effusion. 'What are you two young people talking about?' cried Dr. Heriot's voice in the darkness. 'Polly has quarrelled with me, and Chriss is cross, and Miss Lambert is dreadfully tired.' 'Are you tired, Aunt Milly? Mr. Marsden has been telling me about his sisters, and—and—I think we have had a little quarrel too.' 'No, it was I that was cross,' returned Hugh, with his big laugh; 'it always tries my temper when people talk in an unknown tongue.' Olive gave him a kind look as she bade him good-night. 'I have enjoyed hearing about your sisters, so you must never call yourself prosaic and stupid again, Mr. Marsden,' she said, as she followed the others into the house. <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <div style="break-after:column;"></div>

1 of 2

2 of 2

Update Required To play the media you will need to either update your browser to a recent version or update your Flash plugin.