Cripps, the Carrier: A Woodland Tale. Blackmore Richard Doddridge

Чтение книги онлайн.

СКАЧАТЬ stopped with the off-wheel of the cart within a few yards of the gap in the hedge, where Esther began her search that night. She knew the place at a glance, although in the snow it looked so different; and she ran to the gap, and peeped as if she expected to see it all again.

      In all the beauty of fair earth, few things are more beautiful than snow on clustering ivy-leaves. Wednesday's fall had been shaken off; for even in the coldest weather, jealous winds and evaporation soon clear foliage of snow. But a little powdery shed of flakes had come at noon that very day, like the flitting of a fairy; and every delicate star shone crisply in its cupped or pillowed rest. The girl was afraid to shake a leaf, because she had her best bonnet on; therefore she drew back, and called the reluctant Zacchary to gaze.

      "Nort but a sight of snow," said he; "it hath almost filled old quarry up. Harse have rested, and so have we. Shan't be home by candlelight. Wugg then! Dobbin – wugg then! wilt 'a?"

      "Stop, brother, stop! Don't be in such a hurry. Something I must tell you now, that I have been feared to tell anybody else. It was so dreadfully terrible! Do you see anything in the snow down there?"

      "As I am a sinner, there be something moving. Jump up into the cart, girl. I shall never get round with my things to-night."

      "There is something there, Zak, that will never move again. There is the dead body of a woman there!"

      "No romantics! No romantics!" the Carrier answered as he turned away; but his cheeks beneath a week's growth of beard turned as white as the snow in the buckthorn. No living man might scare him – but a woman, and a dead one —

      "Come, Zak," cried Esther, having seen much worse than she was likely now to see, "you cannot be afraid of 'romantics,' Zak. Come here, and I will show thee."

      Driven by shame and curiosity, the valiant Cripps came back to her, and even allowed himself to be led a little way through the gap into the deep untrodden and drifted snow. She took him as far as a corner, whence the nook of the quarry was visible; and there with trembling fingers pointed to a vast billow of pure white, piled by the driving east wind over the grave, as she thought, of the murdered one.

      "Enough," he said, having heard her tale, and becoming at once a man again in the face of something real; "my dear, what a fright thou must have had! How couldst thou have kept it all this time? I would not tell thee our news at home, for fear of tarrifying thee in the cold. Hath no one to Oxford told thee?"

      "Told me what? Oh, Zak, dear Zak, I am so frightened, I can hardly stand."

      "Then run, girl, run! We must go home, fast as ever we can, for constable."

      He took her to the cart, and reckless of Dobbin's indignation, lashed him up the hill, and made him trot the whole length of Beckley lane, then threw a sack over his loins and left his Christmas parcels in the frost and snow, while he hurried to Squire Oglander.

      CHAPTER VIII.

      BALDERDASH

      Worth Oglander sat in his old oak chair, weary, and very low of heart, but not altogether broken down. He had not been in bed since last Monday night, and had slept, if at all, in the saddle, or on the roof of the Henley and Maidenhead coach. For miles he had scoured the country round, until his three horses quite broke down, with the weather so much against them; and all the bran to be got in the villages was made away with in mashes. One of these horses "got the pipes;" and had to be tickled before he could eat.

      The Squire cared not a button for this. The most particular of mankind concerning what is grossly and contemptuously (if not carnivorously) spoken of as "horseflesh," forgets his tender feelings towards the noblest of all animals when his own flesh and blood come into competition with them. But ride, and lash, and spur as he might, the old Squire made no discovery.

      His daughter, his only child, in whom all the rest of his old life lived and loved, was gone and lost; not even leaving knowledge of where she lay, or surety of a better meeting. His faith in God was true and firm; for on the whole he was a pious man, although no great professor: and if it had pleased the Lord to take his only joy from his old age, he could have tried to bear it.

      But thus to lose her, without good-bye, without even knowing how the loss befell, and with the deep misery of doubting what she might herself have done – only a chilly stoic, or a remarkably warm Christian, could have borne it with resignation. The Squire was neither of these; but only a simple, kind, and loving-hearted gentleman; with many faults, and among them, a habit of expecting the Lord to favour him perpetually. And of this he could not quit himself, in the deepest tribulation; but still expected all things to be tempered to his happiness, according to his own ideas of what happiness should be. The clergyman of the parish, a good and zealous man, had called upon him, and with many words had proved how thankful he was bound to be for this kindly-ordered chastisement. The Squire, however, could not see it. He listened with his old politeness, but a sad and weary face, and quietly said that the words were good, but he could not yet enter into them. Hereat the parson withdrew, to wait for a softer and wiser season.

      And now, in the dusk of this cold dark day, Squire Oglander sat gazing from the window of his dining-room; with his head fallen back, and his white chin up, and hard-worn hands clasped languidly. His heavy eyes dwelled on the dreary snow that buried his daughter's handiwork – the dwarf plants not to be traced, and the tall ones only as soft hillocks, like the tufts in a great white counterpane. And more and more, as the twilight deepened, and the curves of white grew dim, he kept repeating below his voice, "Her winding-sheet, her winding-sheet; and her pretty eyes wide open perhaps!"

      "Now, sir, if you please, you must – you must," cried Mary Hookham, his best maid, trotting in with her thumbs turned back from a right hot dish, and her lips up as if she were longing to kiss him, to let out her feelings. "Here be a duster, by way of a cloth, not to scorch the table against Miss Grace comes home again. Sir, if you please, you must ate a bit. Not a bit have you aten sin' Toosday, and it is enough to kill a carrier's horse. 'Take on,' as my mother have often said; 'take on, as you must, if your heart is right, when the hand of the Lord is upon you; but never take off with your victuals.' And a hearty good woman my mother is, and have seen much tribulation. You never would repent, sir, of hearkening to me, and of trying of her, till such time as poor Miss Grace comes back. And not a penny would she charge you."

      "Let her come, if she will," he answered, without thinking twice about it; for he paid no heed to household matters in his present trouble. "Let her come, if you wish it, Mary. At any rate, she can do no harm."

      "She will do a mort of good, sir. But now do try to ate a bit. My mother will make you, if you have her, sir."

      The old man did his best to eat; for he knew that he must keep his strength up, to abide the end of it. And Mary, without asking leave, lit four good candles, and drew the curtains, and made the fire cheerful. "All of us has our troubles," said Mary; "but these here pickles is wonderful."

      "You are a good girl," answered the Squire; "and you deserve a good husband. Now, if either the man from Oxford or young Mr. Overshute should come, show them in directly; but I can see no other person. No more, thank you. Take all away, Mary."

      "Oh my! what a precious little bit you've had! But as sure as my name is Mary Hookham, you shall have three glasses of port, sir. You don't keep no butler, because you knows better; and no housekeeper, because you don't know mother. Likewise, Miss Grace is so clever – but there, now, if she stay long for her honeymoon, a housekeeper you must have, sir."

      The master was tempted to ask what she meant, but he scarcely thought it worth while, perhaps. By pressure of advice from all the womankind within his doors (whenever they could get hold of him) he had been sped on many bootless errands, as was natural. For without any ground, except that of СКАЧАТЬ