Читать книгу The Glad Summer - John Jeffery Farnol - Страница 5

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For a week Nicholas rambled to and fro about this vast Harbourne estate, visiting every sequestered hamlet and village, and everywhere found misery—saw and heard so much of futile anger, haggard anxiety for the future and distress for the present, that he was deeply stirred, more especially upon two occasions, first as thus:

Upon a sunny afternoon he was exploring a certain leafy, winding by-lane, when he heard what he believed to be the doleful mewing of a cat, until, turning a sudden corner, he beheld an aged woman crouched upon grassy bank, white head bowed between clutching hands, and knew this odd sound for the voice of her strangled weeping; so he approached and, guessing her answer, enquired, gently:

“Grandmother, what is your trouble?”

“Go—way!” she snarled, with feeble though furious gesture. “I don’t want nobody, so lemme be!”

Seating himself beside this desolate old creature, he set his arm about her and repeated his question:

“Granny, pray what is your trouble?”

Now his arm was so strong and comforting, his voice so gently compelling, that, despite her gasping sobs, she told him:

“The cottage yonder ... tidn’t very big ... but it held all my earthly happiness.... ’Twas there my Tom brought me ... his bride. ’Twas there my three boys was born ... ’twas there my deary Tom died! And now, in a little while, I ... must leave it.”

“Why, Granny?”

“B’ reason as they rose the rent again, and ’tis beyond my strength to earn.... I be too old to work like as I could and did.”

“Then what shall you do now?”

“Creep away to hide myself and die and ... the sooner the better.”

“Lord no, Grandma, that will never do....”

“Well, then, what can I do?” she demanded fiercely. “Tell me that, will ee!”

“Why, to be sure,” he replied, somewhat at a loss. “There is always the future and hope for better times.”

“ ’Ope?” she repeated bitterly. “ ’Ope died long ago, and the best never no wise come my way since my deary Tom took and died.”

“Well,” said Nicholas, more at a loss than ever, “do you—believe in prayer?”

“I did, but I don’t and never shall no more, not me—no! I prayed the Lord to bring my three sojer sons safe back t’ me—but He let ’em all be killed and buried far away ... overseas! I prayed the Lord to spare my Tom, but, even while I prayed ... my dear Tom died! So I’m never a-goin’ to pray no more, not me—no!”

“How long is it before you must leave your cottage, Granny?”

“Only fifteen days!” she sighed, struggling to her feet with his ready aid.

“And, pray, Granny, what is your name?”

“I be Mrs. Mills, old Becky Mills as nobody don’t love and as don’t love nobody neither—not me!” And up she reared her old, white head defiantly. “Ah, well, young man, you’ve talked me out o’ my fullish tears and for that I thank ee—ay, and I hope the Lord God’ll treat ee kinder than He’ve used me!” So saying, she hobbled across the lane and into her little cottage, slamming the stout door against him—and the cruel world in general.

The second occasion was at evening time as he stood where he might look down upon that farmstead called Fallowdene.

A stately old house ruddy of brick, creamy of plaster, its massive timbers richly carved, like the heavy bargeboards of its steep gables, a gracious old house mellowed by time and loving care to a thing of beauty. Behind the house was a spacious rickyard with thatched barns and stabling, beyond which lay yellow cornfields and lush meadows, while before and beside this ancient house were smooth lawns edged with blooming flowerbeds, and a paddock where two sleek horses cropped the grass, and before this again a walled kitchen-garden and shady orchard. Distant figures he saw busied at their divers labour, but nowhere any sight of the one form his keen gaze was seeking.

Descending the hill, Nicholas approached until he reached the orchard wall, to pause there instinctively.

And thus he became aware of yet another woman’s grief, but this time nowise hushed or strangled, for this woman sobbed and wept unrestrainedly. Reaching up long arms, Nicholas drew himself up with the utmost caution until he could peep over the wall, and thus beheld her lying face down beneath an apple tree nearby, out-stretched in the very abandonment of grief.

With the same extremity of caution Nicholas lowered himself to stand in no little perplexity, pondering what was best to do about it and in what possible manner to check this all too passionate grief; thus he deliberated, until, moved by sudden inspiration, he took off his hat and tossed it over the wall, aiming for that particular tree beneath which she lay.... The weeping stopped instantly; Nicholas began whistling an old sea shanty and, having given the weeper time to dry her eyes and compose herself, drew himself up and was astride the wall in as many moments.

“Oh—you!” she exclaimed, whereat Nicholas turned, made pretence to start violently, checked his whistling and answered:

“Myself, marm!”

“Of course!” said she angrily, rising the better to frown up at him. “It could be—only you!”

“Yes, merely me myself, marm.”

“Why did you throw your nasty old hat at me?”

“Not at you, marm, only towards you.”

“What for? And do—not—call me ‘marm’.”

“That I might follow it, Miss Joanne—like this!” And, speaking, down he leapt within a yard of her.

“I think you are a most outrageously audacious wretch!”

“And yet,” he sighed, looking as meek as possible, “my audacity is tempered with a very real humility.”

“Why are you trespassing here?”

“First for my hat and——”

“Oh, take it and go!”

“I will. But first may this most humble wretch venture again to ask if he can help you—I mean can you find him work of any kind?”

“No—ah, no!” she replied, with sound very like a sob. “You are too late! I am giving up the farm.... Aunt Jemima, little Priscilla and I must leave, and we ... are going dreadfully soon!”

“Who says so, pray?”

“I say so!”

“But you are merely a very young, extremely human woman, and, being so, are probably mistaken.”

“Oh, if I only were! But I’m not.”

“Are you so sure?”

“Of course I’m sure, too hatefully sure and perfectly certain.”

“But is anything certain in this world, and can anyone be sure of the future?”

“Yes—I am, because I know.”

“But my dear child——”

“I’m neither yours nor a child!”

“However, no mere human, young or old, man or woman, can possibly know what is not yet and yet therefore to be.”

“That sounds absolute nonsense!”

“Yet in it is more sense, Miss Joanne, than you sense, despite your sense, common or otherwise, seems able to sense.”

“Meaning I am not only a ‘mere woman’ but a fool beside. Well now, hateful trespasser, I think you had better go.”

“This moment!” he agreed and, putting on his hat, swung himself up and back astride the wall. But here he paused to remove his hat again, saying very tenderly:

“Poor, dear, silly child, don’t cry until you are really hurt, or cross bridges till they’re really there, or trouble trouble till trouble troubles you; in a word—don’t worry!”

“Oh,” she murmured brokenly, “it isn’t ... trite phrases I need ... but strength to ... comfort me....” Now as she spoke, these eyes that Nicholas was sure now were the gentlest, loveliest and most beautiful he had ever seen, brimmed with sudden tears as, turning swiftly to hide them, she sped away, weeping again and more bitterly than ever.

Wherefore and therefore Nicholas, seated this same evening in his cosy bed-sitting-room, wrote a letter, which, though brief, was to cause widespread commotion, alter the lives of many and, with them, his own.