Agatha's Husband Part 41

Nevertheless, she was somewhat soothed, and began to compress the ma.s.s of imaginary wrongs into the one little wrong which had originated it all.

"What made you take a liking to that miserable house? I hate small rooms--I cannot breathe in them--I have never been used to a little house. Why must I now? I am not going to be extravagant--n.o.body could be if they tried, in a poor place like Kingcombe. Since you _will_ insist on our living there, and _will_ carry out your cruel pride of independence"--

"Cruel--oh, Agatha!" He absolutely groaned.

"Wis.h.i.+ng no extravagance, I do wish for comfort--perhaps some little elegance--as I have had all my life."

"You shall have it still, Agatha," her husband muttered. "I will coin my heart's blood into gold but you shall have it."

"Now you are talking barbarously! Or else--how very very wrong am I!

What can be the reason that we torture each other so?"

"Fate!" he cried, pacing wildly up and down. "Fate! that has netted us both to our own misery--nay, worse--to make us the misery of one another. Yet how could I know? You seemed a young simple girl, free to love--I felt sure I could make you love me. Poor dupe that I was! Oh, why did I ever see you, Agatha Bowen?"

He s.n.a.t.c.hed his wife on his knee, and kissed her repeatedly--madly--just as he had done on the morning of their wedding-day; never since! Then he let her go--almost with coldness.

"There--I will not vex you. I must not be foolish any more."

Foolis.h.!.+ He thought it foolish to show that he loved her! Without replying, Agatha sat down on the bench where her husband placed her. He might say what he liked: she was very patient now.

He began to explain his reasons for taking the house; that he had naturally more acquaintance with worldly matters than she had; that whatever their income, it was advisable for young people to begin housekeeping prudently, since it was easy to increase small beginnings, while of all outward domestic horrors there was nothing greater than the horror of running into debt. When he talked thus, at once with wisdom and gentleness, Agatha began to forgive him.

"After all," said she, brightening, "your prudence--which I might call by a harder word, but I'll be good now--your prudence is only restraining me in my little pleasures, and I don't much mind. But if you ever tried to restrain me in a matter of kindness, as you did yesterday, only I guessed the motive"--

"Did you?"

"There--don't look so startled and displeased. I saw you did not like the _eclat_ of political charities. But another time, if I want to do good--like Anne Valery, only in a very, very much smaller way--Hark!

what is that noise?"

It was a decent-looking working-man, standing out in the pouring rain, watching them through the panes, and rattling angrily at the locked conservatory-door.

"What a fierce eye! It looks quite wolfish. What can he want with us?"

"I will go and see. Some labourer wanting work, probably; but the fellow has no business to come beckoning and interrupting. Stay here, Agatha."

"No--I will come with you." And she tripped after her husband, the momentary content of her heart creating a longing to do good--a sort of t.i.the of happiness thankfully paid to Heaven.

Nathanael unfastened the gla.s.s-door, not without annoyance; for, unlike his wife, _his_ joy-t.i.the was not yet due.

"What do you want, my good fellow?"

"Some o' th' Harpers."

"Indeed! Are you after work? You don't look like one of the clay-cutters. Where do you come from?"

"I be Da.r.s.et, I be; but I comed fra Carnwall."

"From where?" asked Agatha, puzzled by the provincialism, and attracted at once by the man's intelligent face, and by a keen, misery-stricken, hungry look, which she had truly called "wolfish."

"I be comed fra the miners in Carnwall," reiterated the man, raising his voice threateningly. "They sent I back to Da.r.s.et to see some o' th'

Harpers."

"You must go in, Agatha; it is cold. I cannot have you standing here.

Go--quick." And Agatha was astonished to see how pallid and eager her husband looked, and how anxious he seemed to get her out of the way.

"No, thank you. I am not cold at all. I want to hear this man. Perhaps he is one of the poor miners Miss Valery spoke of at Wheal--what was it?"

"I be comed fra Wheal Caroline, Missus, and I do want one o' th'

Harpers. There be the old 'un at the window! Thick's the man for we."

And he was hurrying off to the bow-window of the Squire's room, which was alongside of the conservatory. But Nathanael called him back imperatively.

"Stay, friend. My father has nothing to do with the mines--it is I. I'll speak to you presently.--Some business of Anne's," he explained hastily to his wife. "Leave us, dear."

"Why do you make me go in? I want to hear about the poor miners; I want to help them, as well as Anne Valery."

"Do'ee help we, Missus!" implored the man, softened by a woman's kind looks. "Do'ee give we some'at to keep 'un fra starving!"

"Starving!" cried Agatha in horror. And even her husband's anxiety was for the moment quelled in the deep pity which overspread his countenance.

"It be nigh that, I tell'ee. Us be no cheats--there be other folk as has cheated we. Fine grand folk as knew nowt o' the mines, but shut 'un up, and paid no money."

"How wicked!"

"But I be come to find 'un out," cried the man fiercely, as his eye lit on Nathanael. "For I do know thick fine folk. And I tell'ee"--

"Silence! you forget you are speaking before a lady. Wait for me, and I will talk with you."

"Will'ee, Mister? Don't'ee cheat, now!" said the miner, with a rude attempt at a sneer.

The young man's cheek flushed, but he said very quietly--

"I promise you, I will speak with you here in half-an-hour. I am Nathanael Harper--Mr. Harper's youngest son."

After a minute's keen observation, the miner pulled off his cap respectfully. "Thank'ee, sir! You bean't _he_, I see. But you be th' old Squire's son, and--I be Da.r.s.et, I be!"

Another bow--the involuntary respect to the ancient county family from honest labour born upon its ancestral sod, and the man leaned exhausted against the ragged stem of one of the old vines.

"Missus," he said, looking up hungrily--at the lady this time-- "Missus, do'ee gie 'un a bit o' bread!"

Agatha, full of compa.s.sion, was eager to send the servants or take him into the kitchen, or even fetch him his dinner with her own hands. Mr.

Harper interfered.

"I will bring him some food myself. Stay here, my man; don't stir hence.

Remember, you have nothing to do with my father."

There was a warning severity in the tone which annoyed Agatha. Why did her husband speak harshly to the poor miner?

Still she obeyed Mr. Harper's evident wish that she should go away; and spent the time in Elizabeth's room, telling her of this little incident.