Читать книгу A Pit-brow Lassie - John Monk Foster - Страница 6

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It was between three and four o'clock on a Saturday afternoon in mid-August, and the heat of the fierce sunrays would have been intolerable had they not been tempered by a light breeze that had been blowing since noonday.

Three miles or thereabouts from Ashford lay the pretty village of Altynnham, and hither had come this Saturday afternoon some three or four hundred of the Ashford townsfolk to celebrate the annual picnic of the Wesleyan Sunday-schools.

The spot selected for the picnic was a level piece of pasture land close by Dingley Wood, a long strip of lovely woodland lying in a deep valley, from which circumstance it derived its name. A pleasanter place for such a fête it would have been difficult to find.

The field adjoining the wood presented a bright and animated scene. In the centre was a brass band playing a lively dance, and many a score of dancers were keeping, or trying to keep, time with the music. Sturdy pitmen and their buxom partners, cotton operatives and pleasure-loving factory wenches, collier lads and weather-tanned pit-brow lassies were footing it lightly or heavily, but all merrily, over the level sward; pausing now and again to wipe their perspiring faces, and then off again at a mad pace.

In one corner of the field a number of youngsters were playing at cricket; in another a band of youths were chasing the leathern globe; beside the margin of the wood in the shadow of the trees there gyrated a huge kissing ring; and within the wood itself swings had been constructed by tying a few yards of rope to the far-stretching limbs of the trees.

Taken altogether the scene presented a pleasant picture of innocent enjoyment, that must perforce have given satisfaction to any well-balanced mind. Such a simple event as this picnic was a festival of great importance to those hard toilers, looked forward to maybe for many days, and they would commence the struggle for existence afresh on Monday all the better for the afternoon's play in the open air.

In a couple of young people among the dancers the reader has an interest. These were Luke Standish and Kate Leigh. The former had quite recovered from his injury, and in a couple of days he was to begin work again.

The pitman had not gone to the picnic with Kate, but knowing that she would be there he had made a point of attending it. He had asked her to try a dance, she had complied, and they were now threading their way as best they could through the tangled crowd of dancers.

Luke's love for his handsome partner had been growing, so it seemed to him, everyday since he saved Kate from the waggon wheels, but up to the present it had found no utterance; this afternoon it was almost certain to do so.

Many an opportunity of declaring his love had offered itself during the period of his confinement, but he had refrained from speaking because he did not desire to take any advantage of Kate. He wanted her to give him love for love; not to receive his love out of pity's sake, or on account of any obligation she owed him.

But he had come to the picnic with the definite resolve in his mind to tell Kate Leigh of the affection she had inspired him with, come what might of the attempt. And somehow he felt that her answer would be one to satisfy him.

The dance ended and the dancers came to a standstill. Full of the resolution he had made Luke suddenly determined to carry it into effect. Still retaining Kate's arm he said in as indifferent a tone as he could assume—

"What do you say to a walk in the wood? How cool and pleasant it looks under the trees."

She nodded assent, and they strolled slowly towards the stile that led into the woodland. He vaulted lightly over the bar, as happy as he was agile, and waited for her to descend. Then side by side they went along downward towards the brook in the shadow of the ripe-leaved timber.

Luke chose a path that followed the brook, winding as the rivulet itself, which flowed through the wood's deep green heart. It was a pleasant path with the clear stream gurgling over the many-colored pebbles, bathed here in sunlight, there in shadow, the deep-tinted leaves fluttering above them, the cool graceful ferns springing from out the luxurious grasses, here and there through the trees a glimpse of amber corn ready for the sickle.

They strolled on for a little space in silence, for Luke was trying to frame into words the thoughts running riot in his brain. Pausing a moment beside an elder bush he plucked a bunch of dark ripe fruit and offered it to Kate.

She took the berries with softly spoken thanks, ate one or two, then played with the remainder; twisting them between her finger and thumb in a preoccupied manner. She was half conscious of what was passing through her companion's mind, and was wondering what reply to make when he spoke.

Exchanging a word or two now and again they went onward, still following the babbling streamlet. Now she would stop to pick and eat the great luscious blackberries that grew so abundantly thereabouts, whilst he was busy making up a bouquet of autumn flowers—wood sage, sun spurge, nettle-leaved bellflower and golden rod, with its ebony clusters backed by two fronds of a lady-fern.

"Flowers to the fair," he said half smilingly, half gravely, as he held out the bouquet.

"And sweets to the sweet," she cried laughingly, taking the flowers and giving him a handful of blackberries in exchange.

They had paused beneath a copper beech, and through the flaming leaven the sunlight fell upon them a stream of fire. She was fastening the flowers in her breast, seemingly wrapt in her occupation; he was crushing the ripe berries between his great fingers whilst his love surged up to his lips.

"I love you, Kate," he burst out suddenly without the least premonition. "I have loved you ever since I first saw you that day on the pit brow. You love me a bit, don't you?"

She was silent, though her pale face was flushed a rosy red. She was biting her lips and her fingers were playing nervously with the bright clusters of the golden rod.

"Speak, Kate," he cried tremulously. "Don't you love me?"

"I do," fluttered softly from her lips, "but I cannot leave my mother."

He waited to hear no more. Taking her in his arms he pressed her against his madly-beating heart, and kissed her sweet face as he had never kissed any woman's face before.

They made a fair picture standing there in the first ecstasy of love's dream. He was so strong and manly, she so radiantly fair; and the red light of the copper beech fell around them like a halo—the heart-glow within them and the sun-glow without seeming to apotheosize both.

"You shall never leave your mother, Kate," he said, when listening to her entreaties he ceased to kiss her for a space. "Let us sit down and talk about our future, darling."

They seated themselves on a green shelving bank, with their faces to the brook, which laughed and smiled as it dashed noisily onward as if it knew what had just happened. And they prepared to talk of their future with all seriousness.

"There are only four of us, Kate—your mother and mine and ourselves, and when we are married we can all live together, eh?"

She shook her pretty head rather gravely. Wiser than he was in such matters she felt that a pair of mothers-in-law, no matter how amiable they might be, would be no aid to the happiness of a newly wedded couple.

"Of course I do not mean us to marry for ever so long yet, darling; not until I have a home fit to take you to. I shall study harder than ever now to get a mine-manager's certificate, and who knows what good luck may come my way? I might drop into a situation as soon as I have passed my examination."

"You might, Luke," she answered, "and I hope so. You deserve to succeed—and everybody says you will, too, some day."

He kissed her for her inspiring words of praise, and his honest face was aglow with perfect happiness and hope. The full measure of his ambition at that moment was to pass his examination, obtain the management of a colliery, and make sweet Kate Leigh his wife.

And all his faculties—his immeasurable love, his indomitable will and quick intelligence—spurred him on towards the consummation of those hopes. He would win them all. Of this he felt certain. Sooner or later every hope that now stirred his soul should be realised.

Thus it came to be understood between Luke Standish and Kate Leigh that they were engaged to each other, and although no definite period was fixed for their marriage, it was to take place as soon as circumstances permitted. With matters thus settled they began to converse of smaller personal affairs.

Luke had numberless questions to put to his sweetheart. He wanted to know all her history up to the moment he first saw her on the King pit brow that afternoon about two months ago, and as there was nothing in her past life that she did not desire him to know she told him her biography.