The Vicar's People Part 79

Then came demands upon him for amounts trusted to him to invest--a regular continuous drain; and Rhoda awoke to the fact that a change in their position, for the worse, was rapidly coming on.

She bore the knowledge as cheerfully as she could, working hard to comfort her father, bidding him not trouble about her, but to pay to the uttermost farthing every demand.

"I shall not mind being poor," she said to him, but she felt that she did not know all, and after long thought and trouble the feeling would always come upon her that she must leave all to fate, for she could not make her future even if she tried.

There was something very suggestive in John Tregenna's manner to her now. He was never, in the slightest degree, effusive. If any thing, he was rather cold, but at times there was a look in his eye that told her he was waiting his time; and more than once, in the bitterness of her spirit, she had thought of the possibility of his some day asking her again to be his wife.

What should she say if he did?

No! The answer came readily enough, for a pang shot through her as she thought of Geoffrey Trethick, and wondered whether she could forgive him for the wrong he had done. She loved him still. She knew that, and in time--perhaps even now, if he came to her in humbleness and confessed his fault--she could have said forgiving words. Her pride would have forbidden her to listen to him. There was forgiveness.

But that was all. He had been set up in the innermost niche of her heart--an idol whom she had wors.h.i.+pped. From thence he had fallen, and as the idol lay broken she had seen that what she thought sterling gold was but miserable potter's clay.

Still there was her love for him--the love once roused never to be completely crushed out. It burned still upon the altar before the empty niche. The idol was gone, and a soft vapour rose concealing the emptiness of the place--a place made often more dim and indistinct by her moistened eyes.

If he had only come to beg forgiveness she would not have cared, but he had taken up his stubborn stand, and to the very last time they had met his eyes looked at her with an angry defiance that made her heart beat fast with rage.

It was from no curiosity--there was not even a faint hope of meeting Geoffrey--that she took that path, but a trick of fate, and she started and turned pale, on suddenly raising her eyes, to see that she was only some fifty yards from Prawle's cottage.

Bessie was standing by the door knitting, and the blood flushed into Rhoda's cheeks as she saw what was by her side.

She saw that Bessie had seen her, and to have gone back would have looked cowardly; so she kept on, feeling pretty sure that at that time of day Geoffrey Trethick would not be there.

"I have not been to see you for a long time now, Bessie," said Rhoda, making an effort to master her emotion and look calm.

"No, miss. My mother has often said she wished you would come. Will you go in and see her?"

Rhoda hesitated.

"Father's out, miss. He has gone off in the boat with Mr Trethick, to try for pollack. We're quite alone."

At the name of Trethick, Rhoda shrank away, but setting her teeth, she determined not to give up like some weak girl. Geoffrey Trethick was nothing to her now, and, as she thought that, a pa.s.sionate, angry desire to stand face to face with the woman who had robbed her of his love made her take a step towards the door.

Bessie bent down and picked up the baby, which laughed and kicked as she held it in her arms, but Rhoda s.n.a.t.c.hed away her eyes. She hated it, she told herself; and, following Bessie into the gloomy room, she looked towards where Mrs Prawle was wont to sit, but the chair was empty.

"Mother is lying down in the bedroom," said Bessie. "I'll tell her you are here, miss."

As she spoke, Bessie turned aside to place the baby in a pair of extended hands before leaving the place.

Rhoda had not seen who was seated in the darkened portion of the room, but Bessie's act told her who it was, and turning sharply, her veins tingling, and her head giddy with her anger, she stood face to face with Madge Mullion, the girl she hated in a way that she could not have thought possible.

As she stood there, her fingers clenched together, the spirit was in her to strike the girl--to curse her; but, when she saw the pale, weary-looking face, and the great, staring eyes of the young mother, as she clasped her little one to her breast, all Rhoda's anger seemed to pa.s.s away as rapidly as it had come, and in its place there was a feeling of profound pity.

They stood there gazing in each other's eyes for some minutes without speaking, Rhoda proud and erect, Madge weak and piteous in the extreme; and, as if in dread of her visitor, she held her little one between them as a s.h.i.+eld.

"Are you not ashamed to look me in the face?" said Rhoda, sternly.

"Am I not weak and suffering enough," retorted Madge, "that you say these cruel words? Oh, Miss Penwynn, let me try and explain--let me tell you how I have suffered for the pain I have caused you."

"Hold your tongue," said Rhoda, coldly. "Don't speak to me. I did not come to see you. Do not speak to me again."

As Rhoda spoke she saw the poor girl's eyelids droop, and a ghastly pallor came over her face. She was fainting, and had not the visitor involuntarily caught the little one from its mother's hands, as she fell back in the corner of the sofa, it would have dropped upon the brick floor.

The child uttered a piteous cry, and seemed to stare with astonishment at her who held it from her, stunned almost at her position. But as the babe looked up in her handsome face, the wrinkles in its little countenance departed, and it began to laugh and coo, trying to catch at one of the long curls pendent above its face.

The little one seemed to disarm her resentment. She held it closer to her, forgetful of its mother, and one of its little pinky hands went up now and clutched at her face.

She could not help it. There was no one to see, and Rhoda seemed forced to obey an uncontrollable impulse. One moment her face was hard and stern; then there was a quiver, a softening of the muscles, the tears gathered in her eyes, and began to fall upon the little upturned face.

"It at least is innocent," she muttered, as she held the little thing in her bosom, and kissed it tenderly again and again.

There was a curious, yearning look in Rhoda Penwynn's countenance during these fleeting moments. Then, recalling her position, she hastily laid the child upon the rug, looking cold, hard, and stern once more, as she took out her vinaigrette, and held it to the fainting girl's face.

"Oh, miss, is she ill?" cried Bessie, entering the room.

"Yes," said Rhoda, coldly; "she has fainted."

"Oh, miss," cried Bessie, reproachfully, "you have not been saying cruel things to her?"

"And if I have, what then?" said Rhoda sternly.

"Why, it's a shame--a cruel shame," cried Bessie, angrily. "Why did you come here to reproach her for what she has done? Don't you see how ill she is, perhaps not long for this world? Oh, Miss Penwynn, it's a shame!"

Rhoda flushed with anger, but she would not speak. She told herself that she deserved what she had encountered by her foolish visit, and, stung by the girl's reproaches, and angry with herself, she hurried out of the cottage and hastened towards home.

She was bitterly angry with herself, more angry against Geoffrey, whom, in her heart, she somewhat inconsistently accused of having caused her the degradation which she told herself she had suffered but now.

She bit her lips as she thought of her folly in going there, for she told herself that every one in Carnac would know where she had been; and hardly had she writhed beneath the sting of this thought than she encountered old Mr Paul walking slowly along the cliff.

She would have pa.s.sed him with a bow, but he stopped short and held out his hand, in which she placed her own, feeling shocked to see how the old man had changed.

"The old painters were right," he said abruptly, as he retained her hand.

"Old painters? Right?" faltered Rhoda.

"Yes, yes," said the old man, "when they painted their angels in the form of a beautiful woman. G.o.d bless you, my dear, you are a good, forgiving girl! I know where you have been."

"Oh, this is horrible!" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed Rhoda, as she hurried away. "I cannot bear it. What am I to suffer next?"

She would have turned out of the path, but unless she descended to the rugged beach there was no other way back home; and, as if to make her miseries culminate, she had not gone another quarter of a mile before she met Miss Pavey, with a thick veil shrouding her countenance, and a basket in her hand.

They stopped and looked at each other curiously, and as Miss Pavey raised her veil there was a red spot burning in each of her cheeks.

"Have you been for a walk, dear?" she faltered.

"Yes," said Rhoda, abruptly. "And you--are you going for a walk?"

Miss Pavey trembled, and it was evident that she was having a battle with her feelings. She was afraid to speak, and she looked supplicatingly in Rhoda's eyes, which were fixed upon her in the most uncompromising way.