Complete Works of Sheridan Le Fanu (Illustrated), page 775
THE STONE AND TREE.
MANY such excursions “the young Squire” made that day, in vain. It was in the evening, on the old weird ground, where, among the wild woods, stand the huge gray blocks of the Druid worship, that he saw his love at last.
“Euphan! I feared I was never to find you.”
She laughed; and was not there, under her clear brown tint, a beautiful crimson, for a minute flooding up, and then ebbing softly away?
“How did this wild bird come to me?” thought William, as he looked on her with a tender wonder.
And so he began to talk, approaching that with which his heart was fullest.
“I told you I had read,” he said, “of beautiful girls of your race, Euphan, who have married into ours, and they and their daughters have become great ladies; and they have continued to maintain friendship with their own people, and have done them, in their day, great services.”
“They were bad gipsies, though,” said Euphan, with a shake of her small head, and a smile. “There’s but the one way — the wild life or the tame. They could never come back, like a bird that has been tamed; her own will shun her.”
“But, oh! if she loved the man, could not she leave all, and be happy?” said William.
Again that beautiful tint dyed her cheeks. There was a silence, and her eyes were lowered to the fern, with which the tip of her slim shoe was fiddling.
“She might leave all, but she could not be happy, for she’d always know he’d a’ done wiser to have married one of his own. But ’tis nothing to me,” she said, with a slight fierce change, and her eyes glanced by his with a sudden flame; and then, with a cold contemptuous carelessness, she continued:— “I care for nothing — no one — not even myself. I’m a young lass — nineteen I count young — and I’m happy enough; let them settle their affairs that has such nonsense to manage, and when I hear the story ‘twill make Euphan laugh hearty. There’s many a man has been kind to me, and I’ll give him my hand, and wish him luck from my heart, and glad to say a goodnatured word to him; but for love, I don’t know what it is, and for its sake I would not pluck that weed. That’s not Euphan — she’s not like that; there’ll never live the man she’d walk a mile to meet, or fret an hour if he was to go forever.”
She stood, pale, and smiling, with her fiery eyes on William, with a cruel pride.
The worst pain he had ever known was at William’s heart as he looked on the graceful cold girl. For a little time he was silent.
“I won’t leave you, Euphan, even for that,” he said, in the low tone of a deeply wounded man. And so beginning, little by little, he recounted the wild story of his love — and on, and on, into passionate pleading. “Don’t turn — don’t go; it costs you but a moment’s patience to hear me out, and when it’s over you’ll say you don’t like me, and never can like me, or let me hope for your love.”
“I could not say that, Willie,” she answered, with her hands locked together, and looking at him, as he stood by her shoulder, with such a pale mournful face as painter never dreamed. “Willie, where was the use of breaking Euphan’s heart? I wish I liked ye less — I might be happy then.”
“O God! — my darling!” he said, and his face was pale, in his rapture, as that of a man who had received his death wound.
“Willie — Willie — Willie,” she said, as gently as a child — each “Willie” sounding like a sob— “you don’t know; you shouldn’t a’ spoke kind to me — you should a’ let me go.”
“Oh, Euphan!” he cried, with a dreadful thought, “you like some one else — you like another better!”
“Never, never! — no, Willie, never. There’s none, and never was, but only you. But, for all that, the night ye found me in the storm, standing by the stone, ‘twould a’ been well if you had passed me by — or better,” she said, with a sudden wild sob, “if ye had put your gun to my head and shot me.”
The anguish of an uncertainty dashed his rapture. Proud, pale, happy, yet with the same strange anguish, he held her hand clasped in both his, and looked with dilated gaze for his unknown fate in her beautiful face. For a time not a word was spoken — he wondering, in tumultuous silence, what grief lay at; the little heart that was so near him. At last he said, scarcely above a whisper: —
“Euphan! — Euphan, darling! say, I implore, what it is!”
“’Tis only — nothing; only Euphan’s heart is sore.”
“You don’t doubt me? Oh, Euphan you are not so cruel. You said I was true-hearted,” pleaded the young Squire.
“You could not think me false.”
“No; if I had a’ thought that, I would a never looked at you,” she said, with a cold fierce smile and tone of disdain, that seemed to chill him; and she went on, like herself: “No, no, Willie — never, no; nothin’ false in you — a gentleman, true and high — a one to live and die for. Oh, Willie! the world’s all wrong.” And with these words came a sudden gush of tears.
Hastily she laid her hands across her eyes, and turned, and walked hurriedly backwards and forwards within the circuit of the gray monumental blocks among which they stood. William followed; but with her hand, in her wayward mood, she impatiently pushed him back, and continued, with a passionate step, to walk to and fro.
She stopped, and looked up and down, and clasped her hands, and stamped.
“Oh! mad — mad! Did ye ever see a fool like Euphan? The sky, nor the grassy nor my own voice, nor nothing, is like itself — all’s gone changed. I know ye so short a time, Willie, and can I never forget ye? The quiet times long ago! — children’s very happy. Just a wee thing, four years old, stretching after flowers in the tarn. Oh! why didn’t they let me drown that time, and this poor heart wouldn’t a’ been bearin’ now!”
It seemed to Willie that this flood of feeling must be suffered to rush and eddy its own way into quiet; he had laid his arm against one of the huge old stones, and leaned, following her with the sad eyes and patient love that watch the tossings and ravings of sickness.
With a change of mood she came to his side, and laid her small Oriental hand on his shoulder, looking up into his face, with a sad childlike trust in her eyes. She said, very lowly and softly: —
“You’ve, handsome hair — soft, rich brown. Ah! yes, my handsome Willie, that fought for me.”
“My beautiful spirit! Here I found you,” said he, enthusiastically.
“What will your fortune be, Willie? — what? I won’t tell your fortune now. Well, am I to call ye ‘Willie’?”
Though her eyes were upon him, it was not as if she asked Willie, but something else.
William Haworth smiled, and laid his hand tenderly on her shoulder, with the adoration of all his manly heart.
“I’ll tell it tomorrow — shall I? — and Euphan’s too. And J must have a bit of your hair, mind — Willie’s hair. “‘Twill be a good fortune, and you’ll be a great man. Some kind grief first and then all good after; and Euphan’s will be a long one, and — a short.”
As she spoke thus softly, as it were, to herself, with her fingers over his shoulder, she was choosing a lock of the silken-brown hair, that grew, in long curls, at the back of his head. It was quietly, as if she had a right to it, and she never asked him.
He smiled fondly down at her, as he might on a beautiful wayward child.
And now up come her tiny scissors, tied to thin blue-silk ribbon; and she snips off the lock of brown hair gravely, and holds it before her sad eyes, and then winds a little bit of red thread fast round it, and places it in her bosom.
She looked up now, with her pretty laugh.
“Ain’t we queer cats, and never thinks o’ one thing — no, not half an hour? Come, now; and look ye, we are going to be merry, now; cryin’ comes in change and time; and time and change will dry our tears again, and I am going to make ye laugh with the dance we danced before. Ah, lad — if we had but a clever fiddler! I’ll go home alone, mind.”
She smiled over her shoulder as she turned away, and had reached the farthest stone of the ring, when she turned her head, stopping, and looking at him, said softly, to herself, “One other look;” and her look was all the sadder that her smile still lingered there, and then, with a little wave of her hand, away ran the pretty stranger, with a tread light and proud as a deer’s.
CHAPTER XXVI.
THE BED UNTREASURED.
IT was a merry evening at Haworth House. William smoked his pipe in the kitchen chimney-nook, for his half-hour, which grew to twice as long; and quaint song and dance made the hour hilarious, pretty, long remembered.
All is over now. He is in his study. The Dutch clock, in the firelight, ticks briskly; and its friendly face glows kindly over the young man’s romantic dreams of the Robin Hood life that is before him, with his nutbrown maid. The passion so sublime, the scenery so wild — all that is so true and yet so visionary —
“All that time has disenchanted.”
All the house, but this room, is dark now. In a little time more he, too, is in his bed, and fast asleep. Deep in the night comes a dream. How it began — what it was about — he forgets. Only he hears in it the wild song: —
“The hawthorn-tree
Is dear to me,
The elver-stone likewise —
The lonely air
That lingers there,
And thought, that never dies.”
The distant song, in his dream, sounded clear and sad. He started up, listening, with a beating heart. The notes seemed still in his ear. But the night-air was silent. The scenery of his dream had flown, and there was darkness only when he tried to recall it. It was as if he had dreamed only of a sweet voice issuing from darkness.
He sighed deeply, listening on. An unaccountable melancholy was heavy at his heart — that pure deep melancholy of a farewell in childhood, that hardly ever returns in afterlife.
Yet, why should it last? All was a dream. Nothing is changed. And so, after a while, he falls asleep again, and no dream comes.
Early he awakes, and is out among the trees in the morning air, with the restlessness of a lover. All his future is sweet with the opening flowers, and sparkles in the morning sun, and rustles with the freedom of the forest.
But that morning a change is to befall him.
He is now back again in his study; and at some time past nine o’clock, old Martha comes in, in a great taking, and stands to harangue him without closing the door. Her jolly old face is pale; she gesticulates indignantly, and is in a great excitement.
What she had to tell was this: Euphan, the girl, had totally disappeared. It was no accidentally late ramble in the fields or woodlands. The red bag, with the things she had brought with her, was gone; her gray cloak, which she never took in her walks with her, was gone also. She had made her bed, and the forsaken room was neat as ever, and the flowers stood in the glass on the little table beside the window. She must have visited the bedside of Mall, for some silver in a little bit of blue silk was pinned to the cover of her pillow, and a pretty little carved ivory needlecase, that Martha Gillyflower used to admire, was found tied round with a bit of silk ribbon in a bow, and in like manner pinned over old Martha’s head. The hall-door and back-door were undisturbed; but the side-door, that opened on what was called the meadow, was unbarred, and through it she had gone.
William Haworth stands before her, like a ghost, speechless — his face ashy-white. For a long time he can’t believe the story, and she has to repeat it over and over. Still he can’t believe it — won’t believe it.
He stalks by old Martha’s side from room to room, to visit the evidences of the flight, in dumb half-credulous panic. Old Martha is at his elbow, denouncing, in her grim northern dialect, the ingratitude of the lass who has turned her back on her best friends without a “God-b’-wi’- ye,” and “out o’ window wi’ her like a bird, and, God knows, none but a daffy would wish her back, the graceless lass!”
“She’s gone!” said William, wildly. “My God! why didn’t you look after her? She’s gone! — you’ve let her go! I shall never see her again; and I charge you with it all!”
He shook his hand in the air distractedly, as if he could have cursed her; and he looked so scared and furious that Martha could not “find,” as they say, “her tongue.” She stared at him, with her mouth agape, for the second that he stood thus — and then he was gone, and the hall-door clapped after him; and when she had recovered breath, she said: —
“Agoy! there’s a rageous lad for ye! Here’s a clitter-clatter! An’ all this coil, an’ rampin’ an’ rearin’, acos a firligig lass like that takes the road by night, and off to seek aunters, like that! Hev I bin winkin’ all this time, en Willie in love wi’ the lass! Who’d a’ thought they wor so sly! Weel! I say, he shud nae hev made that undacent hirdum-durdum; she’s a graceless lass, howe’er it be. But I sudna ca’ her a firligig; she’s nane o’ that lids. Na — na, puir tiling! she was as harmless, and had as many tricks, as a kittling,” she continued, softening. “Bonny and winsome she was. I could a’most wimple like a child — but, oh! she’ll come back — she could not do so — she’ll come again.”
So old Martha — excited and disquieted — ruminated, thinking sometimes one thing, and sometimes another. Sometimes her anger was kindled against Euphan, who seemed in her eyes an artful “hizzy” who had ensnared the affections of the Squire of Haworth; and sometimes she fancied that she had flown to prevent her losing her heart to a gentleman quite out of her rank; and sometimes she thought only of the change, and how the hour would be dull without Euphan.
CHAPTER XXVII.
PURSUIT.
WILLIAM did not return that night — nor for two long years. During that time he travelled all England over. By woods and wilds, by moss and moor, wherever a fleeting gipsy camp was pitched, his wandering search was directed.
Euphan Curraple — any tidings of her? He would make it worth their telling. They should have what they asked for the discovery. These strange people listened to his earnest imploring appeals, gravely and civilly — sometimes thoughtfully — and spoke together in their own language; but always it ended in their saying that they knew no such person. People of the name they knew, but no Euphan Curraple.
He tracked his old adversary, Lussha Sinfield. That rogue did not like him, for a gipsy can bear most things better than being foiled at the game on which he prides himself by a “Gorgio.” Still the Squire’s money was as good coin as another man’s, and William offered it freely for any tidings of Euphan.
The man eyed him with a dark steady gaze; he was civil, and heard him out, and was silent for a while after he had done.
Sinfield’s gray and chestnut had been sold, I suppose; old Cowper was holding a cart-horse by a halter when the Squire reached them. They stood under a group of two or three trees at the edge of a common, where a little brook runs by, and meant to make a halt of some hours.
Sinfield looked out of the corners of his large dark eyes, as if at a distant object, and repeated: “Euphan Curraple! I can’t say, I’m sure; I’ll ask my partner.”
And he turned on his heel, and walked to his comrade. William’s heart beat violently as he watched him, and a mist seemed to cover his eyes.
Sinfield leaned across the horse’s back, and talked with his companion in their own tongue. The old gipsy looked hard at the Squire, as they talked low, for a while. Then the young man turned about, and told William, carelessly: —
“No — he don’t know no such woman.”
“Did you tell him all I said?” exclaimed William. “Here! I say — you’re Cowper, I saw you at the fair — I’ll pay you what you please, if only you’ll tell me where I may hear anything of Euphan Curraple.”
“There’s many a woman might tell you,” said the surly old fellow.
“Where?” asked William, with his soul at his lips.
“What is she to you?” Cowper replied, in turn, with a question.
“She was a guest at Haworth, and she’s gone,” he answered; “and we don’t know what’s become of her.”
“And how should we?” answered Cowper, gruffly.
“Who are those women you spoke of,” urged William, “who could tell me anything of her?”
“Such as lives in tents,” said Sinfield; and Cowper nodded.
“Ay, ’tis them I mean,” said the old man, who was now stuffing his pipe with tobacco.
“Gipsies?” said William.
“Why not?” answered Cowper.
“Are there any hear here?” he asked, with a hope strangely rising into agony at his heart.
“There’s five tents at Tarlton.”
“That’s about ten miles away?” said William, pointing with his arm northward.
“And a bit,” added Sinfield.
The old fellow lighted his pipe.
“Is she with them?” asked William, awaiting the answer — with what feelings you may guess.
“Not as we know,” interposed Sinfield; “you know more about that young woman yourself than me and Cowper does, I’m thinkin’.”
“And — and what are they likely to tell me?” asked William.
“Cross their hands with gold and they’ll tell ye,” said the old man, sternly, at the same time carelessly.
And he and Sinfield both again looked hard at the Squire.
“Do they know? — Do you think they know? — How do they know?” asked William, all in a gush.
“By the planets, and the hand — how else?” said old Cowper, spitting on the ground.
“They’ll tell you what they knows, and very like they’ll tell ye what ye want.”
“Come, now,” said William, suddenly, “I know all about you. You and he, there, were pursuing that young girl Euphan Curraple; and, for anything I know, you may have waylaid her as she went; and by — ! if she’s either hurt or missing, I’ll make you out, though you were hid under a mountain; and if I don’t hear of her within a week, I’ll have a warrant from the nearest magistrate, and arrest you both.”
