Collected works of j s f.., p.50
Collected Works of J S Fletcher, page 50
“You think so, Will, but you do not know it. But even if Rupert did slay your father, what had Dennis to do with that?”
“He is a Watson.”
“Pooh! Am I to be blamed for all the vagaries that Englishmen are now carrying on because I am of the nation too? You are wrong, Will. ’Tis better to be at peace than at enmity. Again, why did you chide Lucy? Did Dennis do anything but a neighbourly act in giving the maidens a lift? Why, ’twas snowing heavy that night!”
“Lucy had no business to accept a favour from him,” I said.
“Why, man, that is, to my mind, pure folly,” said Ben. “However, we will not argue the point. Only, I should not like to be hated by thee, Will, for thou art a good hater. Well, can we go back to the fire now?”
“Not till I have told you what I want, Ben. You must sleep here to-night and go with me in the morning. You can do that at least for me, whether you think me right or wrong.”
“Very well,” he said; and we went towards the house again, but had not crossed the fold when I caught sight of a lad standing at the gate with a paper in his hand. He came over when he saw us and gave me the paper, saying that Master Dennis Watson had sent it.
“Let us see what he has to say,” I said, turning away with Ben and breaking the seal. “Listen, Ben.
“‘If William Dale is in the same mind that he was in this morning, let him bring a friend with him to meet Dennis Watson and his friend at the old sheep-fold in Went Vale to-morrow morning at eight of the clock.’
“You see, Ben,” I said, “he is not minded to let things rest. So now we must fight. Tell your master,” I continued, turning to the boy, “that I will do what he wishes.”
“God’s mercy!” said Ben, sighing deeply. “What a state of things is this, where men grown do act like children! Well, I will stand by thee to the end, Will, and if you fall I will protect the women. Alas! you had much better have gone to the wars, for there you would have had some chance. And now let us inside to the fire.”
During the rest of that day I was very restless and unsettled in my demeanour, and I suppose that Rose Lisle must have noticed it, for she kept looking at me in a strange way. I could neither talk nor eat, but wandered about from parlour to kitchen and in and out of the house, so that my mother and Lucy both spoke of my restlessness. And this was from no fear on my part, but because I wanted the time to pass and the affair to be over.
Late that night in my own chamber I cleaned my pistol and made ready my powder and shot, placing them in readiness next morning. Somehow, the sight and handling of them restored my calmness, and presently I went to bed and slept as soundly as was usual with me. And when I woke the grey light was struggling through the window, whereupon I rose and woke Ben, and finding that it was nearly time for our meeting we wrapped ourselves in our cloaks and set forth across the snow to the woods.
Now that the time was at hand I felt as cool and unconcerned as ever I did in all my life; but poor Ben, who neither liked the business we were on nor leaving his warm bed for the frosty morning, was woebegone and miserable, and did shiver and tremble so that I had to give him my arm.
“Why, Ben,” said I, “this is the wrong way about. It is you who ought to support me, not I you. You might be going to be shot at yourself, man.”
“It is all very well to talk, Will, but I had rather be shot at myself than see another man shot at. Fancy the suspense while you take aim at one another! Whew! it makes me run cold to think of it!”
“Then do not think of it. And prithee pluck up some courage, for see, here they are, and I would not that either of us should show any signs of fright.”
“Who is it that Dennis hath brought with him?” said Ben, as we stepped into the enclosure. “Is it any one we know?”
“It is Tom Gascoyne,” I said. “Ah! that is another man I like not. Birds of a feather are these two, Ben. But see, here is Tom coming towards us. Go you to meet him, Ben, and settle your plans quickly. Let us have no tarrying, so that the thing may be over and done with.”
“Alas!” groaned Ben, and went to meet Gascoyne, while I stayed behind watching them. They met, conversed a moment, examined and loaded the pistols, and then fell to talking again. Presently I saw Ben exhibit decided signs of dissent, shaking his head vehemently at what the other said, and growing so decided in his nonagreement that he came away to speak to me.
“What think you, Will?” said he. “They want you to face each other at fifteen paces, which is reasonable enough, but they also want you to fire in turn, the first turn to be tossed for. Why, ’tis murder, say I!”
“Nonsense, man,” said I. “Let them have their own way about it. I have as good a chance of winning the toss as Watson hath.”
“’Tis naught but murder!” grumbled Ben. “I wish I had set the magistrates on you.” But he went back, and presently he and Gascoyne took the best of three tosses, and then Ben, with a lugubrious face, came to say that Dennis was to have the first shot.
“And they say he shoots well with the pistol,” sighed Ben. “Heaven turn the bullet from thee, Will. You are to stand here. Oh that I had never come into this murderous business!”
“Come, Ben, be a man. I do not think he will hit me. See, Gascoyne calls thee.”
So there I stood, a clear mark against the snow-covered trees, and Dennis Watson stood fifteen paces away, his pistol hanging down by his side. Somehow I had no fear that he would hit me. I only felt curious to know what would happen.
“Gentlemen,” said Tom Gascoyne, “are you ready? Then, when I say ‘Fire,’ you, Dennis, will raise your piece and fire instantly.”
“There must be no taking aim,” groaned Ben. “It were murder if he took aim.”
“There must be no taking aim,” said Gascoyne. “The pistol must be lifted and fired at the word. Are you ready?”
“Yes,” I called. “Quite ready.”
I looked straight at Dennis Watson as I spoke, and saw his eyes staring directly at mine.
“One — two — three,” said Gascoyne, slowly and clearly.
But ere he could say the fatal word, some one cried, “Stop,” in a voice that made us all start and turn. And there we stood fixed and motionless, looking at Rose Lisle as she burst into the clearing, her face whiter than the snow, and her large eyes full of horror at the sight before her.
CHAPTER V.
OF CERTAIN JOYFUL EVENTS.
I SUPPOSE that a child which is caught in the very midst of some naughtiness feels pretty much as I did at that moment. There I stood, with the pistol hanging in my hand, first staring at Rose and then gradually dropping my gaze before the shocked and startled look which I saw in her eyes. Indeed, I felt remarkably ashamed of myself now that we had been interrupted, and did not think of the affair in the same light as before. When Rose came upon the scene Gascoyne was just about to speak, and he now stood staring at her, his lips still formed in readiness to give the word which might have sent me into another world on the instant. Seeing, however, that the affair was over, he drew himself up, and muttering, “A woman is always sure to spoil sport,” he went over towards his principal, who still stood covering me with his pistol. Rose came across the thicket towards us. I knew she was looking first at one and then at the other, but I dare not look at her. I pretended to be examining the lock of my pistol.
“Gentlemen,” said Rose, and I knew she was standing between us and again looking from one to the other with that gaze I dare not meet, “what is this you would have done? Fie upon you! Surely you do not call it manly to steal out here at this hour, as if you were thieves, so that you might fire at each other? Why, this is a coward’s action.”
“Oh,” said Ben, “what wise words! Just what I said myself. Go on, Mistress Rose; go on and spare not.”
“If I had not come when I did,” she continued, paying no more heed to Ben than if he had been a tree-stump, “one of you might now have been lying dead. What sort of news would that have been for his friends? Brave men, truly, to think so little of other people’s feelings.”
“Admirable!” cried Ben Tuckett. “Go on; sure-faith, I could not have said more myself.”
“Put up your pistols,” she said, “put up your pistols and go home for pity’s sake. Let us have no fighting here. Pray God give you better minds of it.”
Now, I had never wanted to fight, and wanted less than ever now, and I was ready enough to put up my pistol and go. But Dennis Watson was not minded to take Rose’s advice, neither was he slow in saying so.
“That is all very well, mistress,” said he, with a sneer on his dark face, “but it is not agreeable to me. I came out here to shoot Will Dale yonder, and as fortune hath favoured me with the first shot, shoot him I will. So retire, mistress, if you do not wish to see blood spilt.”
She looked at him very steadily and sternly, for I think that speech of his had shown her what manner of man he was, and he somewhat blanched as he met the glance she gave him. But she came rather closer to me, keeping herself between me and the pistol in his hand.
“Then, sir,” she said, “you may shoot him through me. For I shall not stand aside whatever you say or threaten.”
“Stand aside, dear Rose,” I said, speaking for the first time since she entered the clearing. “Let him fire, if he will: I do not believe he can hit me.”
“Nay,” she said. “There shall be nothing left to chance.”
And there she stood facing Dennis Watson’s pistol, which he still held ready to discharge. And he, presently seeing that her purpose was firm, began to mutter threats and oaths, and then taunts and jeers.
“Ah!” he said, “I see how it is. A pretty plot is this, and mighty neat in its arrangement. We have been fooled, Tom Gascoyne. A pretty thing for a man who is going to fight a duel to arrange matters so that a lady stops the affair at the right moment. I warrant me Mistress Rose would not have stepped out so promptly if our enemy had had first shot.”
Now, this so incensed me that I started forward fiercely, intending to chastise Dennis for his insolence, but Rose barred my path and prevented me.
“Leave him alone, Will,” she said, and at the touch of her hand I restrained myself. “Master Watson,” she continued, turning to Dennis, “you are a poor, pitiful liar. If you were aught of a man you would know that a woman would not lend herself to such a poor trick as that. Do you think I could not find this matter out for myself?”
“Gentlemen,” said Tom Gascoyne, “this affair is at an end, I think. What say you, Master Tuckett?”
“I say yes,” said Ben. “And very gladly, for ’tis a cold morning and I am shivering. Let us withdraw our forces.”
“Come, Dennis,” said Gascoyne, “let us go;” and he took Watson’s arm to lead him away.
But Dennis went reluctantly, favouring me and Rose with many an evil glance. And at the edge of the clearing he turned and looked at us once more, and cried out, “I will hit you yet, Will Dale, and in your tenderest spot too,” and disappeared in the woods, which echoed to his sneering laughter. And so the duel was over.
“Beshrew me,” said Ben, “but I am as cold as any icicle. I shall run homewards, with your permission, for I doubt not you will be able to bring Mistress Rose home by yourself, Will.”
And therewith he leapt the fence into the meadows and went homewards at a dog-trot, so that his short, sturdy figure was soon out of sight in the dim winters light, and Rose and I were alone. There we stood in the clearing for a moment or two, neither of us speaking. I think she was looking at me, but I am quite sure that I did not dare to look at her. Yet it was necessary to say some word or other, so at last I plucked up courage to speak.
“Mistress Rose,” I said, “I beg your pardon.”
After this was out I felt bold enough to meet her gaze. She was looking at me with reproachful eyes, and I noticed that she was very pale, and that her face bore an expression of pain which I had never seen there before. She said nothing when I spoke, but still looked at me. And yet I could see that she was not angry with me as she had been with Dennis, for her expression was more like that of a mother whose child had offended her by some act of naughtiness than of real anger at my conduct.
“I beg your pardon,” I said again. “I have brought you from your bed on a morning like this all because I am headstrong and foolish. If I had not been so fiery I should not have caused you so much anxiety. If I had taken Ben’s advice I should have done better. However, what is done is done. Only I hope you will forgive me for causing you so much trouble.”
“It was not that,” she said, “not that. Suppose you had been killed, Will — suppose I had come here just in time to see you fall dead?”
She shuddered, and raised her hands to her face as if to shut out the sight she spoke of. I went nearer to her and laid my hand on her shoulder.
“And if you had, Rose, would you have been so troubled? There is many a better man than I shot in a duel. Would you have cared so much?”
She lifted her eyes to mine for an instant and looked at me, and then, somehow or other, my arms were round her and her head was lying upon my shoulder and our lips had met in their first kiss. It was all so sudden and so soon over, and without a word spoken by either, and yet I knew that she was mine for ever. “My dear, my dear!” I said, “so you have some love in your heart for me after all my folly and thoughtlessness?”
“So much,” she whispered, “so much that it filled all my heart, Will. All my heart!”
“And it is mine?”
“Yours, if you will have it. And could you never see that before? Oh, Will, and I have loved you ever since you were a great boy and I a little maiden scarcely up to your shoulder. How slow you were to see it!”
“Why, my dear,” I said, “I never did see it, only somehow I fancied and hoped it might be so. And now that I know it is so, I can hardly believe it. Kiss me again, Rose, so that I may know it is no dream, but blessed reality.”
I can remember all that as if it were yesterday. It was a cold, grey winter morning, and the snow, six or eight inches deep underfoot, hung from the trees around us in all sorts of fantastic drapery. There was a strange stillness in the woods now that we were alone, broken only by a robin that came hopping along the branches above our heads, and chirping at us or at his fellows that were trying to find something eatable under the firs and pines. Yet I felt nothing of the cold, and the wintry prospect might have been a fine summer night, so much summer had she put into my heart, this dear one of mine. For now all barriers were suddenly swept away between us, and there was her sweet face resting against my breast, rosy and full of life now, with the dear eyes looking shyly into mine, and the sweeter mouth ready to say, “I love you,” in unison with the eloquent eyes. But of this I need write no more, for every true and happy lover hath experience of what I might say.
So we went homewards across the snowbound meadows, feeling, I think, as if we were walking through some Paradise, rather than across the good old fields where every landmark was familiar to me. And all the way my heart was singing gaily to itself, and its song was of love and hope and happiness, and I forgot all about Dennis Watson and his threats, and had no memory of the sad strife then agitating the land, for I could think of nothing but Rose. And so hand in hand we went into the great kitchen, where Ben was warming his blue fingers against the fire and audibly lamenting his folly in going out on such a morning. “And on such an errand too,” growled he, when Rose had gone away to remove her snow-covered garments. “Yea, indeed, if I go on like this I shall soon let out my head for the crows to pick at. For indeed my brains must be soft enow when I go forth to see two fools shoot at each other.”
“Hold thy peace, chatterer!” I said. “What, man, this is the happiest morning I ever knew. Ah, old Ben, thou talkest about happiness! Why, man, thou knowest not the meaning of that word. Indeed, I think nobody was ever happy until now.”
“Oh!” said Ben, rising up and steadily regarding me with questioning eyes. “Oh!
Ah! Why, now, but really, Will, is thy brain turning? Nay, he is sane enough. Why, man, what has happened? Ah, now I see it all — thou hast been making matters square with Mistress Rose. Am I right, Will?”
“Right indeed, Ben. Congratulate me. Is she not divine, eh? Is she not lovelier than a dream, eh, Ben?”
“There is a little mole in her left cheek,” said Ben.
“’Tis a beauty-spot, man. But what knowest thou about beauty?”
“Enough to tell thee that thou hast got one of the fairest women in all the kingdom, old Will. Ye will make a grand pair. Will, what dost say if you and Rose and Lucy and I get married soon? All at the same time, eh? Say upon Easter Monday? Is it not a good idea, lad?”
“Good enough, Ben, but the ladies must be consulted.”
“If only Jack would bring himself a sweetheart home from the wars,” said Ben, “we might all be married together. But I fear me, Jack is not a man for matrimony. Yea, he will live and die a bachelor.”
Now, that day will always remain fresh and green in my mind, even though I live to be a hundred years old, for it was a day of rejoicing and gladness. First of all, there was the presenting Rose to my mother as her daughter indeed, in which new capacity she was welcomed warmly and gladly, for my mother had learnt to love her as if she were really her own. As for Lucy, she was as pleased as if Ben had brought her some piece of good news affecting their own prospects. And old Jacob Trusty, to whom I soon told my story, was so delighted that for that day he did little in the way of work, but remained giving orders to his assistant — for he now had a boy to help him with the cattle — and relating anecdotes concerning previous brides in our family, none of whom, he said, could quite compare with Mistress Rose Lisle.
“An I were thou, William,” said Jacob, “I should not delay matters very long. There is Master Benjamin and Lucy are ready enough for a ring, I warrant; why, then, should ye not all marry at the same time. ‘Twill be a gay sight and a good one for sore eyes, that same wedding.”
“But these are troublous times to marry in, Jacob,” I answered. “And then, you see, Master Lisle is away at the wars, and we must have his consent before we settle anything.”
