The Star-Gazers

She shuddered.

“The insolent gaol-bird!”

“He frightened me, though I tried very hard to be firm, and ordered him to leave the place; but he only laughed at me, and caught me in his arms, and tried to kiss me. I was struggling with him for a long time, and no help seemed to be coming. I screamed out, and that frightened him, and he left me; but, before I could fasten the door, he came back and spoke gently to me, but when I would not listen to him, he tried to seize me again, and I cried for help, and you – ”

She did not shrink this time, as, throbbing with passion, and uttering threats against the scoundrel, Rolph once more folded her in his arms.

Again she struggled from him, trembling.

“I am not doing right,” she said firmly. “If you love me, Rob – ”

“If I love you!” he said reproachfully.

“I am sure you have pity for me,” she said, taking his hand and raising it to her lips, to utter a cry of horror, for the hand was bleeding freely, and the ruddy current dyed her lips.

“Hurt in my defence,” she said with a pained smile, as she bound her own handkerchief about the bleeding knuckles.

“I’d die in your defence,” he whispered passionately; “your protector always, dearest.”

“Then protect me now,” she said, “that I am weak, and let me trust in you. You wish me to be your wife, Robert?”

“Eh? Yes, of course, of course,” he said hurriedly.

“And you won’t let your mother sending me away make any difference?”

“How could it, little stupid! I’m not a boy,” he said, banteringly. “But I must go now, and, as for Master Caleb Kent, I’ll just set the policeman on his track.”

“But that will mean his being taken before the magistrates, Rob.”

“Yes, and a long spell for him this time, or I’ll know the reason why.”

“No, no,” cried the girl, hurriedly. “You mustn’t do that.”

“Why?”

“Because he hates you enough as it is. He said he’d kill you.”

“Will he?” muttered Rolph, between his teeth.

“And I should have to go before the magistrates as a witness; and there’s no knowing what Caleb might say.”

Rolph looked at her searchingly, while she clung to him till he promised to let the matter rest.

“But suppose he comes again?”

“Father will take care of that,” she said confidently. “But do mind yourself as you go. Caleb may be hiding, and waiting for you.”

“To come back here,” he said sharply.

“If he does, he’ll find the door locked,” said Judith quietly. “Must you go now?”

“Yes: your father may come back.”

“But that doesn’t matter now, Rob, does it? Why not tell him we’re engaged?”

“No, no: not yet. Leave that to me. Good-bye, now.”

He drew the clinging arms from about his neck rather roughly, gave the girl’s lips a hasty kiss, and hurried out and across the clearing, turning back twice as he went to see Judith looking after him, with her face shadowed by tears, and then, as their eyes encountered, beaming with sunshine. And again, after he had passed out of sight, he stole back through the trees to find that she was still wistfully gazing at the spot where she saw him last.

And, as unseen he watched her, his thoughts were many upon her unprotected state, and as to whether he ought not to stay until her father’s return.

“No,” he said, “the beggar will not dare to come back!” and, after making a circuit of the place, and searching in all directions, he walked thoughtfully away, thinking of what must be done with regard to Caleb Kent, and then about his cousin, against whom his indignation grew hotter the more he thought of what he had seen.

“She must have known that Caleb was in the cottage insulting Judith, and she was glorying in it and would not stir a step to save her, when her presence would have been enough to drive the beggar away. Oh, it seems impossible that a woman could be so spiteful. Hang it! Madge has got hold of that now. It’s like being at her mercy. Phew! I’m getting myself in a devil of a mess. I meant to fight shy of her now altogether, but of course no fellow could help running to save a woman in distress.”

He stopped short, for a sudden thought struck him.

“Then Judy hasn’t heard about Glynne yet. Confound it all! what a tangle I’m getting in.”

He took out and lit a cigar. Then smoking rapidly, he felt better.

“All right,” he muttered; “the old woman sets that square, and the sooner they’re off the estate the better for everybody. But there’s no mistake about it, Judy is deuced nice after all.”

“Day, sir,” said a sharp voice, and Rolph started round to find himself face to face with Hayle.

“Ah, Ben! – you!”

“Yes, sir, me it is,” said the keeper, sternly. “Down, dogs!”

This to the animals which began to play about the captain.

“Oh, let ’em be,” said Rolph, patting one of the setters on the head.

“Never mind the dogs, sir. I’ve got something more serious to think about. I suppose you know as the missus has sacked me, and we’re off?”

“Yes, Ben, I know; but it was no doing of mine.”

“I never thought it was, sir; but me and Judy’s to go at once – anywhere, for aught she cares. She’d like me to emigrate, I think.”

“No, don’t do that, Ben. England’s big enough.”

“For some people, sir. I don’t know as it is for me. Well, sir, I’m sacked, and I dare say it will be a long time before anyone will take me on. My character usen’t to be of the best, and the reasons for going ’ll be again me. Of course you know why it is.”

“Well – er – I suppose – ”

“That’ll do, sir. You know well enough, it’s about you and my Judy.”

The captain laughed.

“There, sir, you needn’t shuffle with me. I’m my gal’s father, and we may as well understand one another.”

“My good fellow, recollect whom you are talking to,” said the captain, haughtily.

“I do, sir. My late missus’s son; and I recollect that I’m nobody’s servant now, only an Englishman as can speak out free like. So I say this out plain. Of course, after what’s been going on, you mean to marry my Judith?”

“Marry her? Well – er – Ben – ”

“No, you don’t,” said the keeper fiercely, “so don’t tell me no lies, because I know you’ve been and got yourself engaged to young Miss Glynne over at Brackley.”

“Well, sir, and if I have, what then?” said Rolph haughtily.

“This, sir,” cried the keeper, with his eyes flashing, “that you’ve been playing a damned cowardly mean part to Miss Glynne and to my Judith. You’ve led my gal on to believe that you meant to marry her, and then you’ve thrown her over and took up with Sir John Day’s gal. And I tell you this; if my Judith hadn’t been what she is, and any harm had come of it, you might have said your prayers, for as sure as there’s two charges o’ shot in this here gun, I’d put one through you.”

“What?”

“You heared what I said, sir, and you know I’m a man of my word. And now, look here: you’ve been to the lodge to see Judith, for the last time, of course, for if ever you speak to her again, look out. Now, don’t deny it, my lad. You’ve been to my cottage, for it is mine till to-night.”

“Yes, I have been to the lodge, Hayle,” said Rolph, who was thoroughly cowed by the keeper’s fierce manner. “I was going through the wood when, just as I drew near the cottage, I heard a cry for help.”

“What?” roared Hayle.

“I ran to the porch just as a man was after Miss Hayle – Steady there.”

The sound was startling, for involuntarily the keeper had cocked both barrels of his gun; and, as he stood there with his eyes flashing, and the weapon trembling in the air, the three dogs looked as if turned to stone, their necks outstretched, heads down, and their long feathery tails rigid, waiting for the double report they felt must follow.

“And – and – what did you do?” cried the keeper in a slow, hoarse voice, which, taken in conjunction with the rapid cocking of the gun, made Rolph think that, if it had been the father who had come upon that scene, there might have been a tragedy in Thoreby Wood that day.

“I say, what did you do?” said the keeper again, in a voice full of suppressed passion.

“That!” said Rolph, slowly raising his right hand to unwind from it Judith’s soft white handkerchief, now all stained with blood, and display his knuckles denuded of skin.

“Hah!” ejaculated the keeper, as his eyes flashed. “God bless you for that, sir. You knocked him down?”

“Of course.”

“Yes – yes?”

“And he jumped up and drew his knife and struck at me.”

“But he didn’t hit you, sir; he didn’t hit you?” cried the keeper, forgetting everything in his excitement as he clutched the young man’s arm.

“No; I was too quick for him; and then he ran off into the wood.”

“Damn him!” roared the keeper. “If I had only been there this would have caught him,” he cried, patting the stock of his gun. “I’d have set the dogs on him after I’d given him a couple of charges of shot; I would, sir, so help me God.”

The veins were standing out all over the keeper’s brow, as he ground his teeth and shook his great heavy fist.

“But wait a bit. It won’t be long before we meet.”

“I am very glad you were not there, Hayle,” said Rolph, after watching the play of the father’s features for a few moments.

“Why, sir, why?”

“Because I don’t want to have you take your trial for manslaughter.”

“No, no; I had enough of that over the breaking of Jack Harris’s head, sir; but – ”

“Yes, but,” said Rolph, quickly, “I wanted to talk to you about that.”

“It was Caleb Kent,” said the keeper, with sudden excitement.

“Yes, it was Caleb Kent.”

“I might have known it; he was always for following her about. Curse him! But talking’s no good, sir; and, perhaps, it’s as well I wasn’t there. Thankye, sir, for that. It makes us something more like quits. As for Caleb Kent, perhaps I shall have a talk to him before I go. But mind you don’t speak to my Judy again.”

He shouldered his gun, gave Rolph a nod, and then walked swiftly away, the dogs hesitating for a few moments, and then dashing off, to follow close at his heels.

Rolph stood watching the keeper for a few minutes till he disappeared.

“Well out of that trouble then,” he muttered. “Not pleasant for a fellow; it makes one feel so small. Poor little Judy! she’ll be horribly wild when she comes to know. What a lot of misery our marriage laws do cause in this precious world.”

“Now then for home,” he said, after walking swiftly for a few minutes, and, “putting on a spurt” as he termed it, he reached the house and went straight to the library.

He had entered and closed the door to sit down and have a good think about how he could “square Madge,” when he became aware that the lady in his thoughts was seated in one of the great arm-chairs with a book in her hand, which she pretended to read. She cowered as her cousin started, and stood gazing down at her with a frowning brow, and a look of utter disgust and contempt about his lips which made her bosom rise and fall rapidly.

“Do you want this room, Rob?” she said, breaking an awkward silence.

“Well, yes, after what took place this morning, you do make the place seem unpleasant,” he said coolly.

“Oh, this is too much,” cried Madge, her face, the moment before deadly pale, now flushing scarlet, as she threw down the book she had held, and stood before him, biting her lips with rage.

“Yes, too much.”

“And have we been to the cottage to see the fair idol? Pray explain,” said Marjorie, who was beside herself with rage and jealousy. “I thought gentlemen who were engaged always made an end of their vulgar amours.”

“Quite right,” said Rolph, meaningly. “I did begin, as you know.”

She winced, and her eyes darted an angry flash at him.

“You mean me,” she said, with her lips turning white.

“I did not say so.”

“But would it not have been better, now we are engaged to Glynne Day – I don’t understand these things, of course – but would it not have been better for a gentleman, now that he is engaged, to cease visiting that creature, and, above all, to keep away when he was not wanted?”

“What do you mean? – not wanted?”

“I mean when she was engaged with her lover, who was visiting her in her father’s absence.”

“The scoundrel!” cried Rolph, fiercely.

“Yes; a miserable, contemptible wretch, I suppose, but an old flame of hers.”

“Look here, Madge; you’re saying all this to make me wild,” cried Rolph, “but it won’t do. You know it’s a lie.”

Madge laughed unpleasantly.

“It’s true. He was always after her. She told me so herself, and how glad she was that the wretch had been sent to prison – of course, because he was in the way just then.”

“Go on,” growled Rolph. “A jealous woman will say anything.”

“Jealous? – I? – Pah! – Only angry with myself because I was so weak as to listen to you.”

“And I was so weak as to say anything to a malicious, deceitful cat of a girl, who is spiteful enough to do anything.”

“I, spiteful? – Pah!”

“Well, malicious then.”

“Perhaps I shall be. I wonder what dear Glynne would say about this business. Suppose I told her that our honourable and gallant friend, as they call it in parliament, had been on a visit to that shameless creature whom poor auntie had been compelled to turn away from the house, and in his honourable and gallant visit arrived just in time to witness the end of a lover’s quarrel; perhaps you joined in for ought I know, and – I can’t help laughing – Poor fellow! You did. You have been fighting with your rival, and bruised your knuckles. Did he beat you much, Rob, and win?”

Robert Rolph was dense and brutal enough, and his cousin’s words made him wince, but he looked at the speaker in disgust as the malevolence of her nature forced itself upon him more and more.

“Well,” he cried at last, “I’ve seen some women in my time, but I never met one yet who could stand by and glory in seeing one whom she had looked upon as a sister insulted like poor Judy was.”

“A sister!” cried Marjorie, contemptuously. “Absurd! – a low-born trull!”

“Whom you called dear, and kissed often enough till you thought I liked her, and then – Hang it all, Madge, are you utterly without shame!”

She shrank from him as if his words were thongs which cut into her flesh, but as he ceased speaking, with a passionate sob, she flung her arms about his neck, and clung tightly there.

“Rob! Don’t, I can’t bear it,” she cried. “You don’t know what I have suffered – what agony all this has caused.”

“There, there, that will do,” he said contemptuously. “I am engaged, my dear.”

She sprang from him, and a fierce light burned in her eyes for a moment, but disappointment and her despair were too much for her, and she flung herself upon his breast.

“No, no, Rob, dear, it isn’t true. I couldn’t help hating Judith or any woman who came between us. You don’t mean all this, and it is only to try me. You cannot – you shall not marry Glynne; and as to Judith, it is impossible now.”

“Give over,” he said roughly, as he tried to free himself from her arms.

“No, you sha’n’t go. I must tell you,” she whispered hoarsely amidst her sobs. “I hate Judith, but she is nothing – not worthy of a thought I will never mention her name to you again, dear.”

“Don’t pray,” he cried sarcastically. “If you do, I shall always be seeing you gloating over her trouble as I saw you this morning.”

“It was because I loved you so, Rob,” she murmured as she nestled to him. “It was because I felt that you were mine and mine only, after the past; and all that was forcing her away from you.”

“Bah!” he cried savagely. “Madge! Don’t be a fool! Will you loosen your hands before I hurt you.”

But she clung to him still.

“No, not yet,” she whispered. “You made me love you, Rob, and I forget everything in that. Promise me first that you will break all that off about Glynne Day.”

“I promise you that I’ll get your aunt to place you in a private asylum,” he cried brutally, “if you don’t leave go.”

There was a slight struggle, and he tore himself free, holding her wrists together in his powerful grasp and keeping her at arm’s length.

“There! Idiot!” he cried. “Must I hold you till you come to your senses.”

“If you wish – brute!” she cried through her little white teeth as her lips were drawn away. “Kill me if you like now. I don’t care a bit: you can’t hurt me more than you have.”

“If I hurt you, it serves you right. A nice, ladylike creature, ’pon my soul. Pity my mother hasn’t been here to see the kind of woman she wanted me to marry.”

“Go on,” she whispered, “go on. Insult me: you have a right. Go on.”

“I’m going off,” he said roughly. “There, go up to your room, and have a good hysterical cry and a wash, and come back to your senses. If you will have it you shall, and the whole truth too. I never cared a bit for you. It was all your own doing, leading me on. Want to go.”

“Loose my hands, brute.”

“For you to scratch my face, my red-haired pussy. Not such a fool. I know your sweet temper of old. If I let go, will you be quiet?”

Marjorie made no reply, but she ceased to struggle and stood there with her wrists held, the white skin growing black – a prisoner – till, with a contemptuous laugh, he threw the little arms from him.

“Go and tell Glynne everything you know – everything you have seen, if you like,” he said harshly, “only tell everything about yourself too, and then come back to me to be loved, my sweet, amiable, little white-faced tigress. I’m not afraid though, Madge. You can’t open those pretty lips of yours, can you? It might make others speak in their defence.”

“Brute,” she whispered as she gazed at him defiantly and held out her bruised wrists.

“Brute, am I? Well, let sleeping brutes lie. Don’t try to rouse them up for fear they should bite. Go to your room and bathe your pretty red eyes after having a good cry, and then come and tell me that you think it is best to cry truce, and forget all the past.”

“Never, Rob, dear,” she said with a curious smile. “Go on; but mind this: you shall never marry Glynne Day.”

“Sha’n’t I? We shall see. I think I can pull that off,” he cried with a mocking laugh. “But if I don’t, whom shall I marry?”

She turned from him slowly, and then faced round again as she reached the door.

“Me,” she said quietly; and the next minute Robert Rolph was alone.

Volume One – Chapter Ten.

A Cloudy Sky

“Oh, father, I’m so glad you’ve come.”

This was Ben Hayle’s greeting as he reached the keeper’s lodge.

“Eh? Are you?” he said, with an assumed look of ignorance; but the corners of his eyes were twitching, and he was asking himself how he was to tell his child matters that would nearly break her heart, as he yielded his hand to hers, and let her press him back into his windsor arm-chair. “Nothing the matter, is there?”

She knelt at his feet, and told him all that had passed, and the strong man’s muscles jerked, and his grasp of her arm grew at times painful. As she went on, he interjected a savage word from time to time.

“Good girl, good girl. It has hurt you, my darling, but it was right to tell me all, and keep nothing back.”

Then he laid his hand softly on her glossy hair, and sat staring straight before him at the window, the moments being steadily marked off by the tick-tack of the old eight-day clock in the corner, and no other sound was heard in the room.

Outside, the silence of the fir wood was broken by the cheery lay of a robin in one of the apple-trees of the garden, and once there came the low, soft cooing of a dove, which the soft, sunny autumn day had deluded into the belief that it was spring.

Then all was again silent for a time, and it seemed to Judith, as she looked up into the stern, thoughtful face, with its dark, fierce eyes, that the heavy throbbing of her heart drowned the beat of the clock; at other times the regular tick-tack grew louder, and she could hear nothing else.

“You’re not cross with me, father?” she said at last.

“No, it was no fault of yours. Ah, Judy, my girl, I was so proud of your bonny face, but it seems as if it is like to be a curse to you – to us both.”

“Father!”

“Yes, my lass; and I don’t know which of they two we ought to be most scared of – Caleb Kent or the captain.”

“Oh! father!” cried Judith; and she let her head fall upon his knee, as she sobbed wildly.

“I need hardly ask you, then, my girl,” he said, as with tender, loving hands, he took her head and bent over it, with his dark, fierce eyes softening. “You like him, then?”

She looked up proudly.

“He loves me, father.”

“Ay, and you, my lassie?”

“Yes, father. I have tried very hard not to think about him, but – Yes, I do love him very dearly, and I’m going to be his wife. He said he would speak to you.”

“Yes, my dear, and he has spoken to me.”

“Oh!” she cried, as she reached up to lay her hands upon the keeper’s shoulders, and gaze inquiringly in his eyes.

“It was all one big blunder, my dear,” he said; “you ought never to have gone up to the house, and learned things to make you above your station. I used to think so, as I sat here o’ night’s and smoked my pipe, and say to myself, ‘She’ll never care for the poor old cottage again.’”

Judith looked up quickly, and her arm stole round her father’s neck.

“And then,” she whispered, “you said to yourself, ‘It is not true, for she’ll never forget the old home.’”

“You’re a witch, Judy,” he cried, drawing her to him, with his face brightening a little. “I did. And if it could have been that you’d wed the captain, and gone up to the house among the grand folk, you would have had me there; you would not have been ashamed of the old man – would you?”

“Why do you ask me that, dear?” said Judith, with her lips quivering. “You know – you know.”

“Yes,” he said, “I know. But we shall have to go away from the old place, Judy, for it can’t never be.”

“Oh, father!”

“No, my dear, it won’t do. It’s all been a muddle, and I ought to have known better, instead of being a proud old fool, pleased as could be to see my lassie growing into a lady. There, I may as well tell you the truth, lass, at once.”

“The truth, father?” she said sharply.

“Yes, my dear, though it goes again me to hurt your poor little soft heart.”

“What do you mean, father?” she cried, startled now by the keeper’s looks.

“It must come, Judy; but I wish you’d found it out for yourself. Young Robert isn’t the man his dead father was. He’s a liar and a scoundrel, girl, and – ”

She sprang from him with her eyes flashing, and a look of angry indignation convulsing her features.

“It’s true, my girl. He never meant to marry you, only to make you his plaything because he liked your pretty face.”

“It isn’t true,” said the girl harshly; and the indignation in her breast against her father made her wonderfully like him now.

“It is true, Judy, my pretty. I wouldn’t lie to you, and half break your heart. You’ve got to face it along with me. We’re sent away because the captain is going to marry.”

“It isn’t true, father; he wouldn’t marry Madge Emlin, with her cruel, deceitful heart.”

“No, my lass; he’s chucked her over too. He’s going to marry Sir John Day’s gal, over at Brackley Hall – her who came here and painted your face in the sun bonnet, when you were home those few days the time I had rheumatiz.”

“Is this true, father?”

“As true as gospel, lass.”

She gave him a long, searching look, as if reading his very soul, and then crept back to a low chair, sank down, and buried her face in her hands.

“Hah!” he said to himself, “she takes it better than I thought for. Thank God, it wasn’t too late.”

He stood thinking for a few minutes.

“Where am I to get a cottage, Judy, my lass?” he said at last. “One of those at Lindham might do for the present, out there by your grandmother’s, if there’s one empty. Mother Wattley would know. I’ll go and see her. Let’s get out of this. Poor old place, though,” he said, as he looked round. “It seems rather hard.”

Judith had raised her head, and sat gazing straight before her, right into the future, but she did not speak.

Volume One – Chapter Eleven.

In a Mist

Glynne Day was seated in her favourite place – a bright, cheerful-looking room connected with her bedchamber on the first floor at Brackley, and turned by her into a pleasant nest; for the French windows opened into a tiny conservatory over a broad bay window of the dining-room, where were displayed the choicest floral gems that Jones, the head gardener, could raise, all being duly tended by her own hands.