Volume 1 Chapter 3 - The White Gauntlet by Mayne Reid
The girl listened awhile to the departing hoof-strokes, as they came back with clear resonance from the hard causeway. Then, dropping her eyes to the ground, she stood silent under the tree—her swarth complexion still further darkened by sombre shadows, now overspreading every feature of her face.
Not long did she continue in this silent attitude.
“I would have taken the ribbon,” muttered she, “as a gift—if he had meant it that way. But it wasn’t so. No. It was only as wages he offered it to me; and his money—that was worse. Had it been a lock of his hair. Ah! I would rather he gave me that than all the gold coins in his purse, or all the silk in the shops of Uxbridge.”
“He called my hair beautiful: twice he said so!”
“Did he mean it? Or was it only mocking of me? I am sure I do not think so myself, though others have told me the same. I wish it were fair, instead of dark, like that of Mistress Marion Wade. Then perhaps, it would be beautiful?
“Blue don’t become me, he says. Lie there despised colour! Never more shall blue blossom be seen in the hair of Bet Dancey.”
As she said this she plucked the bunch of hare-bells from behind her comb, and flung the flowers at her feet.
“It was Will that gave them to me,” she continued. “He only gathered them an hour ago. What if he were to see them now? Ah! what care I? What should I care? I never gave him reason—not the least bit. They were worn to-day, not to please him; but in hopes of pleasing one I do care for. Had I thought that that one liked not blue, there were plenty of red ones in the old garden of Stone Dean. I might have gathered some as I came through it. What a pity I didn’t know the colour he likes best!”
“Ha!” she exclaimed, starting forward upon the path, and bending down over the spot where the flowers had fallen—and where the dust shewed signs of having been recently disturbed. “That is not the track of his horse. That little shoe—I know it—Mistress Marion Wade!”
For a second or two, the speaker preserved her stooping attitude, silently regarding the tracks. She saw they were fresh—that they had been made that morning—in fact, within the hour.
Her father was a forester—a woodman by calling—at times, a stealer of deer. She had been born in the forest—brought up under the shadow of its trees. She was capable of interpreting that sign—too capable for the tranquillity of her spirit.
“Mistress Marion has been here!” she muttered. “Of late, often have I seen these tracks; and twice the lady herself. What brings her along this lonely road? What has she been doing here this morning?—Could it be to meet him?”
She had no time to conjecture a response to this self-asked interrogatory. As the words passed from her lips, her attention was attracted to the sound of hoofs—a horse moving at a gallop along the main road.
Could it be the cavalier coming back?
No. It was a peasant, on a sorry steed—the same who had passed the other way scarcely an hour before—the same who had given chagrin to Mistress Marion Wade.
It was the woodman, Will Walford.
The girl appeared desirous of shunning him; but he had caught sight of her crimson cloak, and an encounter was unavoidable.
“Aw, Bet! be it thee, girl?” he cried out, as he came within speaking distance. “Why it beeant all o’ an hour since I left thee at thy hum! What’s brought thee this way?”
“Father got home, soon after you left. He came by the wood path, and missed you, I suppose.”
“Like enough for that part o’ the story,” replied the man, appearing to suspect prevarication; “But that a’nt giein a answer to my question. I asked as how you yerself coomed this way?”
“Oh! me you mean, Will?”
“Ees—myself Bet!”
“Father brought a letter from Uxbridge for Master Holtspur. He was tired when he got home; and, as you had the old horse, he sent me over to Stone Dean with it.”
“But Stone Dean a’nt here—not by a good half-mile.”
“I went there first. Master Holtspur wasn’t at home; and as the dummy made signs that he was gone along the road, and would be soon back, I followed him. Father said the letter was important; and told me to give it to Master Holtspur at once.”
“You seed Holtspur then?”
“I did; Will. I overtook him where he was stopping here, under the old beech tree.”
“And what did thee then?”
“Give him the letter—what else should I do?”
“Ay, what else? Dang it, Bet Dancey, thee art too fond o’ runnin’ after other people’s business, an’ this Master Holtspur’s in particklar—that’s what thee be.”
“It was my father’s business. What had I to do with the letter but deliver it, as I was told?”
“Never mind about it then!” rejoined the surly sweetheart, whose incipient jealousy was somewhat appeased by the explanation. “Jump up, an’ ride behint! I han’t got the pillion; but you won’t mind that: since it’s your own nag, and knows it’s you, Bet. He’ll make his old rump soft as a cushion for you. Hi—hullo! where’s the blue blossoms I gied you for your hair? Dang me if that beant them, scattered over the ground thear!”
“Indeed!” said Bet, with a feigned look of surprise, “so it is! They must have fallen out, as I was fixing my comb. Father started me off in such a hurry, I hadn’t half time to put it in its place. This hair of mine’s a bother, anyhow. It’s by half too thick, and gives me constant trouble to keep it pinned up. I shall have it cut short, I think; like those Puritan people, who are getting to be so plenty. How would you like that, Will?”
“Dang it! not at all. It would never do to crop thy bonny locks that fashion. ’Twould complete spoil it. Never mind them flowers, lass! Thear be plenty more where they coom from; an’ I’m a bit hurried just now to see thy father. Yee up, then; an’ let us haste home’rd.”
The girl, not without some show of reluctance, obeyed, what appeared as much a mandate as a request; and, climbing to the croup, she extended her arms round the waist of him, who—though calling himself her lover—was, to her, an object of fear rather than affection.