Judith Shakespeare: Her love affairs and other adventures. William Black

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СКАЧАТЬ not miss the going forth to meet him for all the lovers between here and London town!"

      "Your father comes home to-morrow, Mistress Judith?" said he, in somewhat startled accents.

      "In truth he does; and Master Tyler also, and Julius Shawe – there will be a goodly company, I warrant you, come riding to-morrow through Shipston and Tredington and Alderminster; and by your leave, reverend sir, the magic must wait."

      "That were easily done," he answered, after a moment's thought, "by the alteration of a sign, if the day following might find you at liberty. Will it so, gracious lady?"

      "The day after! At what time of the day?" she asked.

      "The alteration of the sign will make it but an hour earlier, if I mistake not; that is to say, at eleven of the forenoon you must be at the appointed place – "

      "Where, good wizard!" said she – "where am I to see the wraith, the ghost, the phantom husband that is to own me?"

      "That know I not myself as yet; but my aids and familiars will try to discover it for me," he answered, taking a small sun-dial out of his pocket and adjusting it as he spoke.

      "And with haste, so please you, good sir," said she, "for I would not that any chance comer had a tale of this meeting to carry back to the gossips."

      He stooped down and placed the sun-dial carefully on the ground, at a spot where the young corn was but scant enough on the dry red soil, and then with his forefinger he traced two or three lines and a semicircle on the crumbling earth.

      "South by west," said he, and he muttered some words to himself. Then he looked up. "Know you the road to Bidford, sweet lady?"

      "As well as I know my own ten fingers," she answered.

      "For myself, I know it not, but if my art is not misleading there should be, about a mile or more along that road, another road at right angles with it, bearing to the right, and there at the junction should stand a cross of stone. Is it so?"

      "'Tis the lane that leads to Shottery; well I know it," she said.

      "So it has been appointed, then," said he, "if the stars continue their protection over you. The day after to-morrow, at eleven of the forenoon, if you be within stone's-throw of the cross at the junction of the roads, there shall you see, or my art is strangely mistaken, the man or gentleman – nay, I know not whether he be parson or layman, soldier or merchant, knight of the shire or plain goodman Dick – I say there shall you see him that is to win you and wear you; but at what time you shall become his wife, and where, and in what circumstances, I cannot reveal to you. I have done my last endeavor."

      "Nay do not hold me ungrateful," she said, though there was a smile on her lips, "but surely, good sir, what your skill has done, that it can also undo. If it have power to raise a ghost, surely it has power to lay him. And truly, if he be a ghost, I will not have him. And if he be a man, and have a red beard, I will not have him. And if he be a slape-face, I will have none of him. And if he have thin legs, he may walk his ways for me. Good wizard, if I like him not, you must undo the charm."

      "My daughter, you have a light heart," said he, gravely. "May the favoring planets grant it lead you not into mischief; there be unseen powers that are revengeful. And now I must take my leave, gracious lady. I have given you the result of much study and labor, of much solitary communion with the heavenly bodies; take it, and use it with heed, and so fare you well."

      He was going, but she detained him.

      "Good sir, I am your debtor," said she, with the red blood mantling in her forehead, for all through this interview she had clearly recognized that she was not dealing with any ordinary mendicant fortune-teller. "So much labor and skill I cannot accept from you without becoming a beggar. I pray you – "

      He put up his hand.

      "Not so," said he, with a certain grave dignity. "To have set eyes on the fairest maid in Warwickshire – as I have heard you named – were surely sufficient recompense for any trouble; and to have had speech of you, sweet lady, is what many a one would venture much for. But I would humbly kiss your hand; and so again fare you well."

      "God shield you, most courteous wizard, and good-day," said she, as he left; and for a second she stood looking after him in a kind of wonder, for this extraordinary courtesy and dignity of manner were certainly not what she had expected to find in a vagabond purveyor of magic. But now he was gone, and she held the charm in her hand, and so without further ado she set out for home again, getting down through the brushwood to the winding path.

      She walked quickly, for she had heard that Master Bushell's daughter, who was to be married that day, meant to beg a general holiday for the school-boys; and she knew that if this were granted these sharp-eyed young imps would soon be here, there, and everywhere, and certain to spy out the wizard if he were in the neighborhood. But when she had got clear of this hanging copse, that is known as the Wier Brake, and had reached the open meadows, so that from any part around she could be seen to be alone, she had nothing further to fear, and she returned to her leisurely straying in quest of flowers. The sun was hotter on the grass now; but the swallows were busy as ever over the stream; and the great bees hummed aloud as they went past; and here and there a white butterfly fluttered from petal to petal; and, far away, she could hear the sound of children's voices in the stillness. She was in a gay mood. The interview she had just had with one in league with the occult powers of magic and witchery did not seem in the least to have overawed her. Perhaps, indeed, she had not yet made up her mind to try the potent charm that she had obtained; at all events the question did not weigh heavily on her. For now it was,

      Oh, mistress mine, where are you roaming?

      and again it was,

      For a morn in spring is the sweetest thing

      Cometh in all the year!

      and always another touch of color added to the daintily arranged nosegay in her hand. And then, of a sudden, as she chanced to look ahead, she observed a number of the school-boys come swarming down to the foot-bridge; and she knew right well that one of them – to wit, young Willie Hart – would think a holiday quite thrown away and wasted if he did not manage to seek out and secure the company of his pretty cousin Judith.

      "Ah! there, now," she was saying to herself, as she watched the school-boys come over the bridge one by one and two by two, "there, now, is my sweetheart of sweethearts; there is my prince of lovers! If ever I have lover as faithful and kind as he, it will go well. 'Nay, Susan,' says he, 'I love you not; you kiss me hard, and speak to me as if I were still a child; I love Judith better.' And how cruel of my father to put him in the play, and to slay him so soon; but perchance he will call him to life again – nay, it is a favorite way with him to do that; and pray Heaven he bring home with him to-morrow the rest of the story, that Prue may read it to me. And so are you there, among the unruly imps, you young Prince Mamillius? Have you caught sight of me yet, sweetheart blue-eyes? Why, come, then; you will outstrip them all, I know, when you get sight of Cousin Judith; for as far off as yon are, you will reach me first, that I am sure of; and then, by my life, sweetheart Willie, you shall have a kiss as soft as a dove's breast!"

      And so she went on to meet them, arranging the colors of her straggling blossoms the while, with now and again a snatch of careless song:

      Come, blow thy horn, hunter!

      Come, blow thy horn, hunter!

      Come, blow thy horn – jolly hunter!

      CHAPTER II.

      SIGNIOR CRAB-APPLE

      There СКАЧАТЬ