Lady Good-for-Nothing: A Man's Portrait of a Woman

by Arthur Quiller-Couch

  Chapter VI.

  "YET HE WILL COME--".

  The cabin stood close above the fall. It was built of oak logs split intwo, with the barked and rounded sides turned outward. Pete Vanderswould have found pine logs more tractable and handier to come by, andthey would have outlasted his time; but, being a Dutchman, he had builtsolidly by instinct.

  Also, he had chosen his ledge cunningly or else with amazing luck.A stairway shaped in the solid rock--eight treads and no more--led downto the very brink of the first cascade; yet through all these years,with their freshets and floods, the cabin had clung to its perch.Within doors the ears never lost the drone of the waters. There weretop-notes that lifted or sank as the wind blew, but below them the deepbass thundered on.

  Ruth had doffed her riding-dress for a bodice and short skirt of russet,and moved about the cabin tidying where she had tidied a score of timesalready. Through the window-opening drifted wisps of smoke, aromaticand pungent, from the fire she had built in an angle of the crags a fewyards from the house. (It had been the Dutchman's hearth. She hadfound it and cleared the creepers away, and below them the rock-face wasyet black with the smoke of old fires.) Some way up the gorge, where, atthe foot of a smaller waterfall, the river divided and swirled about anisland covered with sweet grass--a miniature meadow--her mare grazed atwill. About a fortnight ago, having set aside three days for thesearch, on the second Ruth had found a circuitous way through the woods.A part of it she had cleared with a billhook, and since then Madcap hadtrodden a rough pathway with her frequent goings and comings.It had immensely lightened the labour of furnishing, but she feared thatthe pasturage would last but a day or two. Her lover, when he came,must devise means of sending the mare back.

  She never doubted his coming. He would probably miss the bridle-path,the opening of which she had carefully hidden, and be forced to make theascent on foot. But he would come. See, she was laying out his clothesfor him! He had sent to Sweetwater, at her request, two valises full,packed by Manasseh; and she had conveyed them hither with the rest ofthe furniture. Carefully now she made her selection from the store:coat, breeches of homespun and leather, stout boots, moccasined leggingssuch as the Indians wore, woollen shirts--but other shirts also offinest cambric--with underclothes of silk, and delicate nightshirts, andsilken stockings that could be drawn like soft ribbons between thefingers. She thrilled as she handled them garment by garment.Along the wall hung his two guns, with shot-bag and powder-flask.

  Here was his home. Here were his clothes. . . . She had forgiven him,hours ago, without necessity for his pleading. So would he forgive her.After all, what store did he set by church ceremony. He had vowed toher a dozen times that he set none. He loved her; that was enough, andassurance of his following. He would confess that she had been right. . . . As she moved about, touching, smoothing this garment and that,there crossed her memory the Virgilian refrain--

  "_Nihil ille deos, nil carmina curat. Ducite ab urbe domum, mea carmina, ducite Daphnin._"

  She murmured it, smiling to herself as she recalled also the dour figureof Mr. Hichens in the library at Sabines, seated stiffly, listeningwhile she construed. If only tutors guessed what they taught!

  She hummed the lines: "_Nihil ille deos_"--he cared nothing for churchrites; "_nil carmina_"--she needed no incantations.

  She never doubted that he would arrive; but, as the day wore on, shetold herself that very likely he had missed his road. He would arrivehungered, in any event. . . . She stepped out to the cooking-pot, and,on her way, paused for a long look down the glen. The sun, streamingits rays over the high pines behind her, made rainbows in the spray ofthe fall and cast her shadow far over the hollow at her feet.The water, plunging past her, shot down the valley in three separatecascades, lined with slippery rock, in the crevices of which many fernshad lodged and grew, waving in the incessantly shaken air. From thepool into which the last cascade tumbled--a stone dislodged by her footdropped to it almost plumb--the stream hurtled down the glen, followingthe curve of its sides until they overlapped; naked cliffs above,touched with sunlight, their feet set in peat, up which the forest treesclambered as if in a race for the top--pines leading, with heather andscrubby junipers, oaks and hemlocks some way behind; alders, mostly bythe waterside, with maples in swampy patches, and here and there a birchwaving silver against the shadow. The pines kept their funereal plumes,like undertakers who had made a truce with death by making a business ofit. But these deciduous trees, that had rioted in green through springand summer, wrapped themselves in robes to die, the thinner the moreroyal; the maples in scarlet, the swamp-oak in purple--bloody purplewhere the sun smote on its upper boughs. Already the robes had wornthin, and their ribs showed. Leaves strewed the flat rock where Ruthstood, looking down.

  She was not thinking of the leaves, nor of the fall of the year.She was thinking that her lord would be hungered. She went back to hercooking-pot under the cliff overhung with heath and juniper.

  Herself fearless--or less fearful than other women--she did not for sometime let her mind run on possible accidents to him. He was a man, andwould arrive, though tired and hungered. Not until the sun sank behindthe upper pines did any sense of her own loneliness assail her.Then she bethought her that with night, if he delayed, the forest wouldwrap her around, formless, haunted by wild beasts. The singing ofbirds, never in daylight utterly drowned by the roar of the fall, hadceased about her; the call of the hidden chickadees, the cheep-cheep ofa friendly robin, hopping in near range of the cooking-pot, the sawingof busy chipmunks.

  These sounds had ceased; but she did not feel the silence until, far upthe valley behind her, a loon sent forth its sole unhappy cry.It rang a moment between the cliffs. As it died away she felt howfriendly had been these casual voices, and wondered what beasts theforest might hold.

  She went back to the cabin, lit a lamp, and lifted one of the guns offits rack. She charged it--well she had learnt how to charge a gun.

  Twilight was falling. The fire burned beneath the cooking-pot; but,seated on the flat stone with the gun laid across her knees and the fallsounding beneath her, she had another thought--that the fire, set in anangle of the rock, and moreover hidden around the house's corner, wasbut a poor signal. It shed no ray down the glen.

  She would light another fire on the flat stone. In the dusk shecollected dry twigs, piled stouter sticks above them, covered the wholewith leaves, and lit it, fetching a live brand from under thecooking-pot. The flame leapt up, danced over the leaves, died down andagain revived. When assured that it was caught, she sat beside it,staring across the flame over the valley now swallowed in darkness,still with the gun laid across her knees.

  "Ruth! O Ruth!"

  His voice came up over the roar of the fall--which, while he stumbledamong the boulders below, had drowned his footsteps.

  "Dear! Ah--have a care!"

  "Yes; hold a light. . . . It must be dangerous here."

  She snatched a brand from the fire. She had collected a fresh heap oftwigs and leaves in the lap of her gown, groping in the dusk for them;and his first sight of her had been as she stood high emptying them in ared stream to feed the flames. A witch she seemed, pouring sacrifice onthat wild altar, while the light of it danced upon her face and figure.Having gained the ledge of the second cascade, he anchored himself ongood foothold and stared up, catching breath before he hailed.

  Her first glimpse of him, as she held the blazing stick over the edge ofthe fall, was of a face damp with sweat or with spray, and of his handsreaching up the slimed rock, feeling for a grip.

  "Ah, be careful! Shall I come down to you?" For the first time sherealised his peril.

  "_Over rocks that are steepest_," he quoted gaily, between grunts ofhard breathing. He had handhold now. "Hero on her tower--and faith,Leander came near to swimming for it--once or twice" (grunt) "_Over themountains, And over the waves_--hullo! that rock of yours overhangs.What's to the left?" (grunt) "Grass?
I mistrust grass on these ledges. . . . Reach down your hand, dear Ruth, to steady me only. . . ."

  She flung herself prone on the flat rock beside the fire, and gave ahand to him. He caught it, heaved himself over the ledge with a finalgrunt of triumph, and dropped beside her, panting and laughing.

  "You might have killed yourself!" she shivered.

  "And whom, then, would you have reproached?"

  "You might have killed yourself--and then--and then I think I shouldhave died too."

  "Ruth!"

  "My lord will be hungry. He shall rest here and eat."

  He flung a glance towards the cabin; or rather--for the dusk hid itsoutlines--towards the light that shone cosily through the window-hatch.

  "Not yet!" she murmured. "My lord shall rest here for a while."She was kneeling now to draw off his shoes. He drew away his foot,protesting.

  "Child, I am not so tired, but out of breath, and--yes--hungry as ahunter."

  "My lord will remember. It was the first service I ever did for him."It may have been an innocent wile to anchor him fast there and helpless. . . . At any rate she knelt, and drew off his shoes and carried them toa little distance. "Next, my lord shall eat," she said; and havingrinsed her hands in the stream and spread them a moment to the flame todry, sped off to the cabin.

  In a minute she was back with glasses and clean napkins, knives, forks,spoons, and a bottle of wine; from a second visit she returned withplates, condiments, and a dish of fruit. Then, running to thecooking-pot, she fetched soup in two bowls. "And after that," shepromised, "there will be partridges. Mr. Strongtharm shot them for me,for I was too busy. They are turning by the fire on a jack my mothertaught me to make out of threads that untwist and twist again. . . .Shall I sit here, at my lord's feet?"

  "Sit where you will, but close; and kiss me first. You have not kissedme yet--and it is our wedding day. Our wedding feast! O Ruth--Ruth, mylove!"

  "Our wedding feast! . . . Could it be better! O my dear, dear lord! . . . But I'll not kiss you yet."

  "Why, Ruth?"

  "Why, sir, because I will not--and that's a woman's reason.Afterwards--but not now! You boasted of your hunger. What has becomeof it?"

  They ate for a while in silence. The stream roared at their feet.Above them, in the gap of the hills, Jupiter already blazed, and as thelast of the light faded, star after star came out to keep him company.

  He praised her roasting of the partridges. "To-morrow," she answered,"you shall take your gun and get me game. We must be good providers.To-morrow--"

  "To-morrow--and for ever and ever--" He poured wine and drank itslowly.

  "Ah, look up at the heavens! And we two alone. Is this not best,after all? Was I not right?"

  "Perhaps," he answered after a pause. "It is good, at all events."

  "To-morrow we will explore; and when this place tires us--but my lordhas not praised it yet--"

  "Must I make speeches?"

  "No. When this place tires us, we will strike camp and travel upthrough the pass. It may be we shall find boatmen on the upper waters,and a canoe. But for some days, O my love, let these only woods beenough for us!"

  Their dessert of fruit eaten, she arose and turned to the business ofwashing-up. He would have helped; but she mocked him, having hidden hisshoes. "You are to rest quiet, and obey!"

  Before setting to work she brought him coffee and a roll oftobacco-leaf, and held a burning stick for him while he lit and inhaled.

  For twenty minutes, perhaps, he watched her, stretched on the rock,resting on his elbow, his hunger appeased, his whole frame fatigued, butin a delicious weariness, as in a dream.

  Far down the valley the full moon thrust a rim above the massed oaks andhemlocks. It swam clear, and he called to her to come and watch it.

  She did not answer. She had slipped away to the house--as he supposedto restore the plates to their shelves. Apparently it took her a longwhile. . . . He called again to her.

  The curtain of the doorway was lifted and she stood on the threshold,all in white, fronting the moon.

  "Will my lord come into his house?"

  Her voice thrilled down to him. . . . Then she remembered that he stoodthere shoeless; and, giving a little cry, would have run barefoot downthe moonlit rocky steps, preventing him.

  But he had sprung to his unshod feet, and with a cry rushed up to her,disregarding the thorns.

  She sank, crossing her arms as a slave--in homage, or, it may be, toprotect her maiden breasts.

  "No, no--" she murmured, sliding low within his arms. "Look firstaround, if our house be worthy!"

  But he caught her up, and lifting her, crushing her body to his, carriedher into the hut.