Читать книгу Judith of the Red Hand - J. Monk Foster - Страница 12

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One morning in July, just on the verge of noon, the pitman Roderick Norbury swung through Saxilham village taking the steep road leading to the Hill End Colliery. While he was still halfway between village and mine the shrill scream of a steam whistle rang out over valley and green upland, denoting that the dinner hour had arrived.

When he gained the level space at the adit's mouth the place seemed deserted. Banksmen, pit-brow women, surface labourers had vanished; and striding to the rough cabin a few paces away Norbury peeped in at the doorway. Women and men were eating and babbling; but he missed one face he sought, so turned away and glanced around.

Half a minute, and the miner was standing on the sward near a tall clump of elderberry bushes. Under their shade Judith Trafford was sitting, swallowing her midday repast. If the girl had heard the man's approach, she paid no heed; and for some moments he regarded her closely, silently.

"Good morning, Judith," he cried, presently.

"Good morning, Roderick. Not working to-day?" She had only half-turned her head at his greeting, and at once resumed her meal, unconcerned.

"Not to-day," he answered. "I slept too long this morning; and I'm glad now it happened so." She offered no comment, and he went on, "I've just discovered something, Judith—something that concerns you and me—another man and woman, too—and I thought I might as well come and tell you all about it, lass. You're not vexed I've come?"

"Vexed! Why should your comings and goings either vex or please me, Roderick Norbury? If your news concerns me I'll thank you for telling it; if it doesn't concern me I don't see why you've come here."

"It does concern you!" he cried. "And more than any other body in the world. Before this day ends, all Saxilham will be full of gabble about it. That's the gospel truth, Judith."

"But your news, Roderick?"

"You shall have it, lass. But do you recollect what I said to you one afternoon in May? I told you then that our young gaffer would never marry you—that he was clever and ambitious and would pick and choose a wife not from the pit brow. That was what I said, and you laughed at me, Judith."

"I laugh no longer. You were right and I was wrong," she said quietly.

"You know then?"

"Gabriel told me himself that he meant to marry another woman. That was some weeks ago, Roderick; so your news is no news to me."

"But the woman! Did he tell you that?"

"He did—the woman who pays him, and all of us, our wages."

"My God! He told you that and you never winced—never even made a sign, as so many lasses would have done. A word from you, Judith to—to her, might have spoiled his game! You did nothing?"

"There was nothing for me to do," was the quiet response. "Isn't a lass well rid of a man when he tells her that he's going to wed another woman?"

"That's so, and I'm glad, Judith! But you never really cared for him, lass," and his hard tones softened.

"Never cared for him!" and she turned on him swiftly, with a heaving bosom and flashing eyes. "My God! do you know that I would have given my body and soul to——" She stopped suddenly, became stonily calm again and added meekly, "Well, it is all over now."

"Yes, it is all over," he cried triumphantly. "And the best part of my news will be news even to you!"

"Have you more news to tell?"

"Only this. Gabriel Blackwood and Miss Nancy Haliburton were married in the village church less than an hour since. It had been kept quiet; I only heard it from old Thomas Barton, the verger, by chance. But I saw the wedding! I was there! They're off now for the honeymoon. Soon the bells will be——. Why, there they go now!"

Even as the pitman spoke the sweet clangour of merry bells sung and eddied through the sunny air of the green uplands, coming in soft melodious sweeps from the peaceful valley below. He watched her, but no word broke from her lips. She was sitting rigidly upright, her meal forgotten, her hands clenched, her sweet face the hue of grey stone.

What vivid pictures swept through the girl's mind then! Those peals she heard were for Gabriel, yet not for her; she saw him standing at the altar and another woman at his side; their ways had parted, and for ever now a wide black tide rolled between them.

"You had quarrelled Judith!" he suggested, and his voice dragged her to earth again.

"Yes; say it was that, Roderick."

"And this is his revenge on you!"

"Haply so; and God grant that his revenge may not lie more heavily on his soul than it lies on mine!"

"Why not curse him?" he demanded fiercely. "Give me the word, Judith, and I'll shame him—cut him to the very heart—some day before the whole village and his wife!"

"No! No! Let him go his way in peace. The woman is not to blame. Against her I harbour no grudge; and to shame him, to make any sign, would be only to lay bare my own naked heart."

She spoke to herself more than to him—seemed as if oblivious of his presence; and when he spoke, presently, his words roused her as from a mental stupor.

"Judith! You have not forgotten that the village is full of honest lads, strong men, who would lick the dust from your feet for a word or look. Is no man ever to pick up what Gabriel Blackwood has cast away? I have spoken twice—may I speak again?"

"Not now! Not now, Roderick! Is this the time to talk of that? Would you speak of love to a widow whose husband has just been lowered into his grave?" and her white face flashed on him for an instant.

"In a month—a year then," he said, doggedly. "Shall there be no cakes and ale, no loving and giving in marriage, because black Blackwood has played the part he has? And things are different now, Judith. What if I can make a lady of you now? I can and will! That old grand-dad of mine has left me some money. Marry me and I'll make you landlady of some nice little pub!"

"Roderick! Can't you—won't you understand?" Her voice was softer then than he had ever known it when addressing him. "In a month—a year, you shall have my answer. Now go, and leave me in peace!"

He turned away, and went moodily down the hillside, leaving her crying quietly. In a few minutes she went homeward also, pleading illness; but the week was out, and all the village was tiring of talking about the marriage of Gabriel Blackwood and Nancy Haliburton, when Judith went back to her work again.