XIV
NORTH DORMER'S celebration naturally included the villages attached toits township, and the festivities were to radiate over the whole group,from Dormer and the two Crestons to Hamblin, the lonely hamlet on thenorth slope of the Mountain where the first snow always fell. On thethird day there were speeches and ceremonies at Creston and CrestonRiver; on the fourth the principal performers were to be driven inbuck-boards to Dormer and Hamblin.
It was on the fourth day that Charity returned for the first time to thelittle house. She had not seen Harney alone since they had parted at thewood's edge the night before the celebrations began. In the interval shehad passed through many moods, but for the moment the terror which hadseized her in the Town Hall had faded to the edge of consciousness.She had fainted because the hall was stiflingly hot, and because thespeakers had gone on and on.... Several other people had been affected bythe heat, and had had to leave before the exercises were over. There hadbeen thunder in the air all the afternoon, and everyone said afterwardthat something ought to have been done to ventilate the hall....
At the dance that evening--where she had gone reluctantly, and onlybecause she feared to stay away, she had sprung back into instantreassurance. As soon as she entered she had seen Harney waiting for her,and he had come up with kind gay eyes, and swept her off in a waltz. Herfeet were full of music, and though her only training had been with thevillage youths she had no difficulty in tuning her steps to his. As theycircled about the floor all her vain fears dropped from her, and sheeven forgot that she was probably dancing in Annabel Balch's slippers.
When the waltz was over Harney, with a last hand-clasp, left her tomeet Miss Hatchard and Miss Balch, who were just entering. Charity hada moment of anguish as Miss Balch appeared; but it did not last. Thetriumphant fact of her own greater beauty, and of Harney's sense ofit, swept her apprehensions aside. Miss Balch, in an unbecoming dress,looked sallow and pinched, and Charity fancied there was a worriedexpression in her pale-lashed eyes. She took a seat near Miss Hatchardand it was presently apparent that she did not mean to dance. Charitydid not dance often either. Harney explained to her that Miss Hatchardhad begged him to give each of the other girls a turn; but he wentthrough the form of asking Charity's permission each time he led oneout, and that gave her a sense of secret triumph even completer thanwhen she was whirling about the room with him.
She was thinking of all this as she waited for him in the desertedhouse. The late afternoon was sultry, and she had tossed aside her hatand stretched herself at full length on the Mexican blanket because itwas cooler indoors than under the trees. She lay with her arms foldedbeneath her head, gazing out at the shaggy shoulder of the Mountain. Thesky behind it was full of the splintered glories of the descending sun,and before long she expected to hear Harney's bicycle-bell in the lane.He had bicycled to Hamblin, instead of driving there with his cousinand her friends, so that he might be able to make his escape earlierand stop on the way back at the deserted house, which was on the roadto Hamblin. They had smiled together at the joke of hearing the crowdedbuck-boards roll by on the return, while they lay close in theirhiding above the road. Such childish triumphs still gave her a sense ofreckless security.
Nevertheless she had not wholly forgotten the vision of fear that hadopened before her in the Town Hall. The sense of lastingness was gonefrom her and every moment with Harney would now be ringed with doubt.
The Mountain was turning purple against a fiery sunset from which itseemed to be divided by a knife-edge of quivering light; and abovethis wall of flame the whole sky was a pure pale green, like some coldmountain lake in shadow. Charity lay gazing up at it, and watching forthe first white star....
Her eyes were still fixed on the upper reaches of the sky when shebecame aware that a shadow had flitted across the glory-flooded room: itmust have been Harney passing the window against the sunset.... She halfraised herself, and then dropped back on her folded arms. The combs hadslipped from her hair, and it trailed in a rough dark rope across herbreast. She lay quite still, a sleepy smile on her lips, her indolentlids half shut. There was a fumbling at the padlock and she called out:"Have you slipped the chain?" The door opened, and Mr. Royall walkedinto the room.
She started up, sitting back against the cushions, and they looked ateach other without speaking. Then Mr. Royall closed the door-latch andadvanced a few steps.
Charity jumped to her feet. "What have you come for?" she stammered.
The last glare of the sunset was on her guardian's face, which lookedash-coloured in the yellow radiance.
"Because I knew you were here," he answered simply.
She had become conscious of the hair hanging loose across her breast,and it seemed as though she could not speak to him till she had setherself in order. She groped for her comb, and tried to fasten up thecoil. Mr. Royall silently watched her.
"Charity," he said, "he'll be here in a minute. Let me talk to youfirst."
"You've got no right to talk to me. I can do what I please."
"Yes. What is it you mean to do?"
"I needn't answer that, or anything else."
He had glanced away, and stood looking curiously about the illuminatedroom. Purple asters and red maple-leaves filled the jar on the table; ona shelf against the wall stood a lamp, the kettle, a little pile of cupsand saucers. The canvas chairs were grouped about the table.
"So this is where you meet," he said.
His tone was quiet and controlled, and the fact disconcerted her.She had been ready to give him violence for violence, but this calmacceptance of things as they were left her without a weapon.
"See here, Charity--you're always telling me I've got no rights overyou. There might be two ways of looking at that--but I ain't goingto argue it. All I know is I raised you as good as I could, and meantfairly by you always except once, for a bad half-hour. There's nojustice in weighing that half-hour against the rest, and you know it. Ifyou hadn't, you wouldn't have gone on living under my roof. Seems to methe fact of your doing that gives me some sort of a right; the rightto try and keep you out of trouble. I'm not asking you to consider anyother."
She listened in silence, and then gave a slight laugh. "Better wait tillI'm in trouble," she said. He paused a moment, as if weighing her words."Is that all your answer?"
"Yes, that's all."
"Well--I'll wait."
He turned away slowly, but as he did so the thing she had been waitingfor happened; the door opened again and Harney entered.
He stopped short with a face of astonishment, and then, quicklycontrolling himself, went up to Mr. Royall with a frank look.
"Have you come to see me, sir?" he said coolly, throwing his cap on thetable with an air of proprietorship.
Mr. Royall again looked slowly about the room; then his eyes turned tothe young man.
"Is this your house?" he inquired.
Harney laughed: "Well--as much as it's anybody's. I come here to sketchoccasionally."
"And to receive Miss Royall's visits?"
"When she does me the honour----"
"Is this the home you propose to bring her to when you get married?"
There was an immense and oppressive silence. Charity, quivering withanger, started forward, and then stood silent, too humbled for speech.Harney's eyes had dropped under the old man's gaze; but he raised thempresently, and looking steadily at Mr. Royall, said: "Miss Royall is nota child. Isn't it rather absurd to talk of her as if she were? I believeshe considers herself free to come and go as she pleases, without anyquestions from anyone." He paused and added: "I'm ready to answer anyshe wishes to ask me."
Mr. Royall turned to her. "Ask him when he's going to marry you,then----" There was another silence, and he laughed in his turn--abroken laugh, with a scraping sound in it. "You darsn't!" he shouted outwith sudden passion. He went close up to Charity, his right arm lifted,not in menace but in tragic exhortation.
"You darsn't, and you know it--and you know why!" He swung back againupo
n the young man. "And you know why you ain't asked her to marry you,and why you don't mean to. It's because you hadn't need to; nor anyother man either. I'm the only one that was fool enough not to knowthat; and I guess nobody'll repeat my mistake--not in Eagle County,anyhow. They all know what she is, and what she came from. They all knowher mother was a woman of the town from Nettleton, that followed one ofthose Mountain fellows up to his place and lived there with him like aheathen. I saw her there sixteen years ago, when I went to bring thischild down. I went to save her from the kind of life her mother wasleading--but I'd better have left her in the kennel she came from...."He paused and stared darkly at the two young people, and out beyondthem, at the menacing Mountain with its rim of fire; then he sat downbeside the table on which they had so often spread their rustic supper,and covered his face with his hands. Harney leaned in the window, afrown on his face: he was twirling between his fingers a small packagethat dangled from a loop of string.... Charity heard Mr. Royall draw ahard breath or two, and his shoulders shook a little. Presently hestood up and walked across the room. He did not look again at the youngpeople: they saw him feel his way to the door and fumble for the latch;and then he went out into the darkness.
After he had gone there was a long silence. Charity waited for Harney tospeak; but he seemed at first not to find anything to say. At length hebroke out irrelevantly: "I wonder how he found out?"
She made no answer and he tossed down the package he had been holding,and went up to her.
"I'm so sorry, dear... that this should have happened...."
She threw her head back proudly. "I ain't ever been sorry--not aminute!"
"No."
She waited to be caught into his arms, but he turned away fromher irresolutely. The last glow was gone from behind the Mountain.Everything in the room had turned grey and indistinct, and an autumnaldampness crept up from the hollow below the orchard, laying its coldtouch on their flushed faces. Harney walked the length of the room, andthen turned back and sat down at the table.
"Come," he said imperiously.
She sat down beside him, and he untied the string about the package andspread out a pile of sandwiches.
"I stole them from the love-feast at Hamblin," he said with a laugh,pushing them over to her. She laughed too, and took one, and began toeat.
"Didn't you make the tea?"
"No," she said. "I forgot----"
"Oh, well--it's too late to boil the water now." He said nothing more,and sitting opposite to each other they went on silently eating thesandwiches. Darkness had descended in the little room, and Harney's facewas a dim blur to Charity. Suddenly he leaned across the table and laidhis hand on hers.
"I shall have to go off for a while--a month or two, perhaps--to arrangesome things; and then I'll come back... and we'll get married."
His voice seemed like a stranger's: nothing was left in it of thevibrations she knew. Her hand lay inertly under his, and she left itthere, and raised her head, trying to answer him. But the words diedin her throat. They sat motionless, in their attitude of confidentendearment, as if some strange death had surprised them. At lengthHarney sprang to his feet with a slight shiver. "God! it's damp--wecouldn't have come here much longer." He went to the shelf, took down atin candle-stick and lit the candle; then he propped an unhinged shutteragainst the empty window-frame and put the candle on the table. It threwa queer shadow on his frowning forehead, and made the smile on his lipsa grimace.
"But it's been good, though, hasn't it, Charity?... What's thematter--why do you stand there staring at me? Haven't the days here beengood?" He went up to her and caught her to his breast. "And there'll beothers--lots of others... jollier... even jollier... won't there,darling?"
He turned her head back, feeling for the curve of her throat below theear, and kissing here there, and on the hair and eyes and lips. Sheclung to him desperately, and as he drew her to his knees on the couchshe felt as if they were being sucked down together into some bottomlessabyss.
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