Читать книгу A Whaleman's Wife - Frank Thomas Bullen - Страница 3

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UNREQUITED LOVE

‘Yew don’ seem ter keer any gret amount fer me, Pris.’

The speaker was a young man of twenty or thereabouts, whose loosely jointed frame showed, even under the shapely rig of homespun, consisting of just a shirt and pants, a promise to the observant eye that he would presently develop into a man of massive mould. He lay upon the stubbly ground, his head resting on one arm, looking wistfully up into the face of a girl about his own age. His clean-shaven face wore that keenness of outline so characteristic of the true Yankee blend in which the broad Saxon or Frisian features seem to have been modified by the sharp facial angles of the indigenous owners of the soil. But in the softness of his grey eyes a close observer would have foreseen a well of trouble springing up for their owner on behalf of others. It was the face of the typical burden-bearer.

In her face, on the other hand, there were evident manifestations of discontent and weariness of restraint. A healthy, pleasant countenance enough, with dark brown eyes and curling hair, well-shaped nose and short upper lip just spotted with freckles. The eyes looked, however, as if they could harden and grow black upon occasion, while the square chin and firm curve of the shut mouth told a plain tale of self-will. There was just a touch of petulance in the quick movement of her head as she replied:

‘You’re so exactin’, Rube. An’ surely you wouldn’t want me to be a hypocrite an’ gush over you when I don’t feel a bit like it. The honest fact is that I like you better than anybody I’ve ever seen, but you know I haven’t seen many people at all; and as for the men folks about here, they’re almost as dull and stupid as the cattle themselves. An’ more than that, Rube, I’m afraid I don’t know what this love is that you seem to be et up with, an’ I’m not going to say I do to please anybody.’

There was silence. Over the wide stretches of newly reaped land not a breath of air was stirring; at evening’s beckoning finger the voices of the day were hushed. It was nearing the gloaming of one of those heavenly days common in Vermont towards the end of harvest, when Nature seems to be contemplating in satisfied peace the result of her summer’s fruitage, and baring her bosom to the mellowing sun for a while, as if to store up warmth against the coming of the fierce blasts of the bitter Northern winter. The smell of the patient earth was sweet, restful in its effect upon the senses, and insensibly moulding impressions upon the mind that would remain through life ineffaceable by any subsequent experiences, and assert themselves in after-years by vivid reproductions of the present scene. Yet the calm beauty of their surroundings had upon each of the two young people an almost entirely opposite effect. He was permeated with a serene sense of satisfaction with life in all its details but one—if only he could be certain that Priscilla loved him! Born and bred upon the typical Green Mountain farm, educated up to the simple standard of the village school, and utterly unacquainted with the seething world beyond his horizon, he was as nearly happy as it is good for man to be in this stage of his existence. His parents, although, like himself, New Englanders born and bred, had somehow escaped from the soul-withering domination of that cruel creed that finds an awful satisfaction in the consignment to eternal fires of all who by one hair’s-breadth should dare to differ from its blindly ignorant conception of theology. Love formed the basis of their faith, and their ideas of an immanent God were mainly derived from the parable of the Prodigal Son.

Under such mild influences it was hardly wonderful that Reuben Eddy had early ‘got religion,’ in the queer phraseology of the States, although in his case, as in that of his parents, there was scarcely any point of resemblance common to the ordinary religious professor. Following none of the orthodox forms of worship, and pretending to no formulated creed, the Eddys lived and moved and had their being in a quiet consciousness of the friendliness of God. They looked as if they would at no time have been surprised, as they certainly would have been unafraid, to see His face with their mortal eyes. They seemed to love God, as birds sing, from an inward impulse that is not a duty but a part of the organism, as natural a necessity as the breath or the heart-beat. Yet, or perhaps because of this, they were intensely human. There was none of that aloofness from the interests of their kind that some excellent people regard as the hall-mark of a Christian. In fact, they were a lovable family whose influence was like that of the spring sun upon all (though they were but few) with whom they came in contact.

Within this last year or two, however, Reuben had felt the deep placid current of his life strangely disturbed. His life-long playmate, Priscilla Fish, whose parents’ farm (three miles away) was the nearest to that of the Eddys, had suddenly assumed a totally different appearance in his eyes. For some time he went about dreamily wondering whatever the change could be that had at once removed her so far above the category of ordinary, everyday people, and at the same time had made him long for her society so ardently that every hour spent away from her seemed to drag, and every thought was shot through and through with side-issues about her. Now between him and his father there had been a life-long intimacy, gently sought and fostered by the elder man as soon as Rube was old enough to know him. Thus they were more than father and son—they were David and Jonathan, with no secrets from one another. So after Reuben had wrestled with this new experience long enough to be able to reduce it to some formulable expression, he took it to his father, as he had done every other difficulty as long as he could remember. The old man listened in sympathetic silence while his son described his symptoms with a gravity that would have been ludicrous but for its earnestness and sincerity. How he felt like a caged bird until he saw Priscilla, yet when she appeared he became hot and cold by turns, and felt so awkward and clumsy that he wanted to hide himself in the earth, and so on, in the same old way that was all so new and disconcerting to him.

Very gently the old man explained matters to him, winding up with a merry twinkle in his eyes, as he said:

‘Haow en the name er pashense yeu’ve shun clar ov this complaint all these years ez er merricle. Ef I know ye—en I ain’t so dead certain of that as I wuz—yew’re just the kinder lad to fall in love fust go. Anyhow, I’m goin’ ter chip in ’n ’elp ye if it kin be did et all.’

With all his fatherly instincts aroused, the fine old fellow trudged over to his neighbour’s farm that same evening, and sought out old man Fish. In quaint fashion, and blaming himself whimsically for his lack of observation in not seeing how things were going before, he explained the situation, finding, much to his gratification, that Priscilla’s father was entirely agreeable to the match. Solemnly the two patriarchs discussed ways and means, planning all manner of pleasant things for the future of their children as far as their sober wishes would allow them. That Reuben and Priscilla should marry, inherit the Eddy homestead, and glide placidly along through life as their parents had done, seemed to these two fond old hearts as roseate a prospect as could be desired. So they sat on, exchanging their slow-moving thoughts, until long past their usual early hour for bed. After a long pause, Farmer Eddy stretched himself with a yawn and said:

‘Wall, Zeke, I reckon I’ll be gittin’ to’rds hum. Seems ter me we ben havin’ er mighty long yarn to-night, ’relse I’m most amazin’ sleepy. Good-night t’ye.’

There was no reply. It was perfectly dark, for they had been sitting in the barn, and when the night closed softly down they had not thought to get a lamp, in their earnestness of conversation. Slightly raising his voice, Farmer Eddy repeated his salutation, but it fell upon the unresponsive darkness around like a pebble dropped into a deep well. With a chill creeping over his scalp the old man reached forward to where his friend was sitting and groped for his hand. It was some seconds before he could find what he sought, and when he did, the truth sank into his marrow instantly: Ezekiel Fish was dead.

Trembling in every fibre, Eddy hastily made for the house, coming into the well-lighted living-room with his message in his face. The family, consisting of Mrs. Fish, her two grown-up sons, and Priscilla, were all seated there, eagerly discussing a knotty point in some book Priscilla had been reading aloud, but the entry of the old man and their first glance at his face froze them into silence. Going straight up to the mother, Eddy laid his trembling hand upon her shoulder, and said, ‘Hepziber, the Lord be good t’ye. He’s taken away yew’re husband.’

There was no outcry. Priscilla came swiftly to her mother’s side and tried to soothe the heavily stricken woman, whose silent suffering was pitiful to see; while the two sons and the old man, bearing lights, returned to the barn and reverently carried in the body. The usual sad offices were soon rendered to the remains, and with slow, uncertain steps Eddy returned home to tell his sorrowful story and warn Reuben that, for the present at any rate, a prior claim to attention had been made upon their neighbour’s family.

Some months, therefore, elapsed before anything of the matter that lay so close to his heart passed Reuben’s lips. But he was by no means impetuous, and besides, he had always been trained to subordinate his wishes to those of others, so that while his love was undoubtedly rooting and grounding itself more firmly every day, he was able to abstain from all mention of it to its object. Summer came, and with it an opportunity during a long Sunday afternoon’s ramble with Priscilla to broach the important matter to her. She listened—somewhat listlessly, it is true, but still she listened; while Rube, growing bolder as he went on, and marvelling at his own powers of speech, poured out to her his hopes and plans. But no enthusiasm could hold out long under the unconcealed air of indifference with which his fervent speech was received, and he soon sobered down to wonder quietly how it was she took his vehemence so coolly. Being ready, however, to supply all deficiencies from his own abundant stock, he was not unduly depressed. And as the days went by his sweet sunny temperament asserted itself, and hope, almost amounting to certainty, arose within him that she would presently, as he had done, find all things changed under the new light of love. Yet in spite of his hopefulness, a weary sense of the hilly road he was travelling would occasionally give him serious pause, and he grew hungry for some return, however slight, of his lavish affection. And it was with one of these moods that this chapter and the story open.