Starvecrow Farm Read online

  CHAPTER III

  A WEDDING MORNING

  In one particular at least the Bow Street runner was right. TheGovernment which ruled England in that year, 1819, was made up ofbrave men; whether they were wise men or great men, or far-seeing men,is another question. The peace which followed Waterloo had beenwelcomed with enthusiasm. Men supposed that it would put an end to theenormous taxation and the strain which the nation had borne sogallantly during twenty years of war. The goddess of prosperity, withher wings of silver and her feathers of gold, was to bless a peoplewhich had long known only paper money. In a twinkling every trade wasto flourish, every class to be more comfortable, every man to havework and wage, plenty and no taxes.

  Instead, there ensued a period of want and misery almost without aparallel. During the war the country had been self-supporting, wheathad risen, land suitable and unsuitable had been enclosed and tilled.Bread had been dear but work had been plentiful. Now, at the prospectof open ports, wheat fell, land was left derelict, farmers wereruined, labourers in thousands went on the rates. Nor among thewhirling looms of Lancashire or the furnaces of Staffordshire werethings better. Government orders ceased with the war, while theexhausted Continent was too poor to buy. Here also thousands were castout of work.

  The cause of the country's misfortunes might be this or that. Whateverit was, the working classes suffered greater hardships than at anytime during the war; and finding no anxiety to sympathise in aParliament which represented their betters, began to form--ominoussign--clubs, and clubs within clubs, and to seek redress by unlawfulmeans. An open rising broke out in the Fen country, and there wasfighting at Littleport and Ely. There were riots at Spa Fields inLondon, where murder was committed; and there were riots again, whichalmost amounted to a rebellion, in Derbyshire. At Stock-port and inBirmingham immense mob meetings took place. In the northern countiesthe sky was reddened night after night by incendiary fires. In theMidlands looms were broken and furnaces extinguished. In Lancashireand Yorkshire the air was sullen with strikes and secret plottings,and spies, and cold and famine.

  In the year 1819 things came to a kind of head. There was a meeting atManchester in August. It was such a meeting as had never been seen inEngland. There were sixty thousand at it, there were eighty thousand,there were ninety thousand--some said one, some said the other. It wasso large, at any rate, that it was difficult to say that it was notdangerous; and beyond doubt many there would have snatched at theleast chance of rapine. Be that as it may, the magistrates, in theface of so great a concourse, lost their heads. They ordered a smallforce of yeomanry to disperse the gathering. The yeomanry becameentangled--a second charge was needful: the multitude fled every way.In ten minutes the ground was clear; but six lives were lost andseventy persons were injured.

  At once all England was cleft into parties--that which upheld thecharge, and that which condemned it. Feelings which had been confinedto the lower orders spread to the upper; and while from this date thesection which was to pass the Reform Bill took new shape, undergroundmore desperate enterprises were breeding. Undismayed the people met atPaisley and at Glasgow, and at each place there were collisions with,the soldiery.

  Mr. Bishop had grounds, therefore, for his opinion of the Governmentof which he shared the favour with the yeomanry--their country'sbulwark and its pride. But it is a far cry to Windermere, and nooffset from the storm which was convulsing Lancashire stirred the faceof the lake when Henrietta opened her window next morning and lookedout on the day which was to change all for her. The air was still, thewater grey and smooth, no gleam of sun showed. Yet the general aspectwas mild; and would have been cheerful, if the more distant prospectwhich for the first time broke upon Henrietta's eyes had not raised itand her thoughts to the sublime. Beyond the water, above the greenslopes and wooded knobs which fringed the lake, rose, ridge behindridge, a wall of mountains. It stretched from the Peak of Coniston onthe left, by the long snow-flecked screes of Bow Fell, to the icypoints of the Langdales on the right--a new world, remote, clear,beautiful, and still: so still, so remote, that it seemed to preach asermon--to calm the hurry of her morning thoughts, and the tumult ofyouth within her. She stood awhile in awe. But her hair was about hershoulders, she was only half-dressed; and by-and-by, when her firstsurprise waned, she bethought herself that _he_ might be below, andshe drew back from the window with a blush. What more likely, whatmore loverlike, than that he should be below? Waiting--on this morningwhich was to crown his hopes--for the first sight of her face, thefirst opening of her lattice, the gleam of her white arm on the sill?Had it been summer, and had the rose-tree which framed the window beenin bloom, what joy to drop with trembling fingers a bud to him, and toknow that he would treasure it all his life--her last maiden gift! Andhe? Surely he would have sent her an armful to await her rising, thatas she dressed she might plunge her face into their perfume, andsilently plighting her troth to him, renew the pure resolves which shehad made in the night hours!

  But when she peeped out shyly, telling herself that she was foolish toblush, and that the time for blushing was past, she failed to discoverhim. There was a girl--handsome after a dark fashion--seated on a lowwall on the farther side of the road; and a group of four or five menwere standing in front of the inn door, talking in excited tones.Conceivably he might be one of the men, for she could hear them betterthan she could see them--the door being a good deal to one side. Butwhen she had cautiously opened her window and put out her head--herhair by this time being dressed--he was not among them.

  She was drawing in her head, uncertain whether to pout or not, whenher eyes met those of the young woman on the wall; and the lattersmiled. Possibly she had noted the direction of Henrietta's glance,and drawn her inference. At any rate, her smile was so marked and somalicious that Henrietta felt her cheek grow hot, and lost no time indrawing back and closing the window.

  "What a horrid girl!" she exclaimed.

  Still, after the first flush of annoyance, she would have thought nomore of it--would indeed have laughed at herself for her fancy--ifMrs. Gilson's strident voice had not at that moment brought the girlto her feet.

  "Bess! Bess Hinkson!" the landlady cried, apparently from the doorway."Hast come with the milk? Then come right in and let me have it? Whatare you gaping at there, you gaby? What has't to do with thee? I dothink"--with venom--"the world is full of fools!"

  The girl with a sullen air took up a milk-pail that stood beside her;she wore the short linsey petticoat of the rustic of that day, and ahomespun bodice. Her hair, brilliantly black, and as thick as ahorse's mane, was covered only by a handkerchief knotted under herchin.

  "Bess Hinkson? What a horrid name!" Henrietta muttered as she watchedher cross the road. She did not dream that she would ever see thegirl again: the more as the men's voices--she was nearly ready todescend--fixed her attention next. She caught a word, then listened.

  "The devil's in it if he's not gone Whitehaven way!" one said. "That'show he's gone! Through Carlisle, say you? Not he!"

  "But without a horse? He'd no horse."

  "And what if he'd not?" the first speaker retorted, with theimpatience of superior intellect. "It's Tuesday, the day of the Manpacket-boat, and he'd be away in her."

  "But the packet don't leave Whitehaven till noon," a third struck in."And they'll be there and nab him before that. S'help me, he has notgone Whitehaven way!"

  "Maybe he'd take a boat?"

  "He'd lack the time"--with scorn.

  "He's took a boat here," another maintained. "That's what he has done.He's took a boat here and gone down in the dark to Newby Bridge."

  "But there's not a boat gone!" another speaker retorted in triumph."What do you say to that?"

  So far Henrietta's ear followed the argument; but her mind lagged atthe point where the matter touched her.

  "The Man packet-boat?" she thought, as she tied the last ribbon at herneck and looked sideways at her appearance in the squat, filmy
mirror."That must be the boat to the Isle of Man. It leaves Whitehaven thesame day as the Scotch boat, then. Perhaps there is but one, and itgoes on to the Isle of Man. And I shall go by it. And then--andthen----"

  A knock at the door severed the thread, and drove the unwonted languorfrom her eyes. She cast a last look at her reflection in the glass,and turned herself about that she might review her back-hair. Then sheswept the table with her eye, and began to stuff this and that intoher bandbox. The knock was repeated.

  "I am coming," she cried. She cast one very last look round the room,and, certain that she had left nothing, took up her bonnet and a shawlwhich she had used for a wrap over her riding-dress. She crossed theroom towards the door. As she raised her hand to the latch, a smilelurked in the dimples of her cheeks. There was a gleam of fun in hereyes; the lighter side of her was uppermost again.

  It was not her lover, however, who stood waiting outside, but ModestAnn--she went commonly by that name--the waiting-maid of the inn, whowas said to mould herself on her mistress and to be only a trifle lessformidable when roused. The two were something alike, for the maid wasbuxom and florid; and fame told of battles between them whence noordinary woman, no ordinary tongue, no mortal save Mrs. Gilson, couldhave issued victorious. Fame had it also that Modest Ann remainedafter her defeat only by reason of an attachment, held by most to behopeless, to the head ostler. And for certain, severe as she was, shepermitted some liberty of speech on the subject.

  Henrietta, however, did not know that here was another slave of love;and her face fell.

  "Is Mr. Stewart waiting?" she asked.

  "No, miss," the woman answered, civilly enough, but staring as if shecould never see enough of her. "But Mrs. Gilson will be glad if you'llspeak to her."

  Henrietta raised her eyebrows. It was on the tip of her tongue toanswer, "Then let her come to me!" But she remembered that thesepeople did not know who she was--knew indeed nothing of her. And sheanswered instead: "I will come. Where is she?"

  "This way, miss. I'll show you the way."

  Henrietta wondered, as the woman conducted her along severallow-ceiled passages, and up and down odd stairs, and past windowswhich disclosed the hill rising immediately at the back of the house,what the landlady wanted.

  "She is an odious woman!" she thought, with impatience. "How horridshe was to me last night! If ever there was a bully, she is one! Andthis creature looks not much better!"

  Modest Ann, turning her head at the moment, belied the ill opinion bypointing out a step in a dark corner.

  "There is a stair here, miss," she said. "Take care."

  "Thank you," Henrietta answered in her clear, girlish voice. "Is Mr.Stewart with Mrs.---- What's her name?"

  "Mrs. Gilson? No, miss."

  And pausing, the woman opened a door, and made way for Henrietta toenter.

  At that instant--and strange to say, not before--a dreadful suspicionleapt up in the girl's brain. What if her brother had followed her,and was there? Or worse still, Captain Clyne? What if she weresummoned to be confronted with them and to be taken home in shamefuldurance, after the fashion of a naughty child that had behaved badlyand was in disgrace? The fire sprang to her eyes, her cheeks burnt. Itwas too late to retreat; but her pretty head went up in the air, andher look as she entered spoke flat rebellion. She swept the room witha glance of flame.

  However, there was no one to be burned up: no brother, no slighted,abandoned suitor. In the room, a good-sized, pleasant room, looking onthe lake, were only Mrs. Gilson, who stood beside the table, which waslaid for breakfast, and a strange man. The man was gazing from thewindow, but he turned abruptly, disclosing a red waistcoat, as her eyefell on him. She looked from one to the other in great surprise, ingrowing surprise. What did the man there?

  "Where is Mr. Stewart?" she asked, her frigid tone expressing herfeelings. "Is he not here?"

  Mrs. Gilson seemed about to answer, but the man forestalled her.

  "No, miss," he said, "he is not."

  "Where is he?"

  She asked the question with undisguised sharpness.

  Mr. Bishop nodded like a man well pleased.

  "That is the point, miss," he answered--"precisely. Where is he?"