Harvest by Mrs. Humphry Ward (most read books in the world of all time txt) 📕

/> The tall man put down the child, and was seized with a fit of coughing, which left him more pallid and sunken-eyed than before. When it was over, he noticed a group of elderly labourers. They had come late into the meeting, and were making for the bar of the Cow-roast Inn, but before they entered it Delane went up to one of them.

"I'm a stranger here," he said carelessly. "Can you tell me who all these people were in the wagons?"

The man addressed--who was old Halsey--gave the speaker a reconnoitring look.

"Well, I dunno neither," he said cautiously, "leastways, many of 'em. There was my old missus, in the first one. She didn't want to go, dressed up in them sunbonnets. But they made such a fuss of her, she had to. There was Farmer Broughton I seed, an' I don't know nobody else."

"Well, but the second wagon?" said Delane impatiently.

"Oh, the second wagon. Why, that was Miss Henderson. Don't ye know 'er? I works for 'er?"

"Is she on the land?"

The old man laughed.

"That she be! She's a farmer, is Miss Henderson, an' she frames pretty fair. She don't know much yet, but what she don't know Hastings tells, her."

"Who's Hastings?"

"Why, her bailiff, to be sure. You do be a stranger, not knowin' Muster Hastings?"

"I'm just here for a few weeks. It's a rum business, isn't it, this of women taking farms?"

Halsey nodded reflectively.

"Aye, it's a queer business. But they do be cleverer at it than ye'd think. Miss Henderson's a good head-piece of her own."

"And some money, I suppose?"

"Well, that's not my look out, is it, so long as I gits my wages? I dessay Colonel Shepherd, ee sees to that. Well, good-day to you. I'm goin' in to get summat to drink. It's a dryin' wind to-day, and a good bit walk from Ipscombe."

"Is that where you live?"

"Aye--an' Miss Henderson's place is just t'other side. A good mile to Ipscombe, and near a mile beyont. I didn't want to come, but my old woman she nagged me to come an' see her 'ome."

And with another nod, the old man turned into the public, where his mates were already enjoying the small beer of the moment.

For a few minutes, Delane strolled down the main road in silence, the child playing at his heels. Then he turned abruptly, called the child, and went up the side street from which he had appeared when the meeting began.

A quarter of an hour later he returned to the market-place alone. The service in the church was still going on. He could hear them singing, the harvest hymn: "We plough the fields and scatter--The good seed on the land." But he did not stop to listen. He walked on rapidly in the direction of Ipscombe.

Delane found the main line from Millsborough to Ipscombe dotted at intervals with groups of persons returning from the harvest festival--elderly women with children, a few old labourers, a few soldiers on leave, with a lively fringe of noisy boys and girls skirmishing round and about their elders, like so many young animals on the loose. The evening light was failing. The pools left by a passing shower, gleamed along the road, and the black elms and oaks, scarcely touched as yet by autumn gold, stood straight and sharp against a rainy sky.

The tall, slouching man scrutinized the various groups as he passed them, as though making up his mind whether to address them or not. He wore a shabby greatcoat, warmer than the day demanded, and closely buttoned across the chest. The rest of his dress, felt hat, dark trousers, and tan boots, had all of it come originally from expensive shops, but was now only just presentable. The one thing in good condition about him was the Malacca cane he carried, which had a carved jade handle, and was altogether out of keeping with his general appearance.

All the same there was something striking in that appearance. Face, figure and dress represented the wreck of more than one kind of distinction. The face must once have been exceptionally handsome, before an underlying commonness and coarseness had been brought out or emphasized by developments of character and circumstance. The mouth was now loose and heavy. The hazel eyes had lost their youth, and were disfigured by the premature wrinkles of either ill-health or dissipation. None the less, a certain carriage of the head and shoulders, a certain magnificence in the whole general outline of the man, especially in the defiant eyes and brow, marked him out from the crowd, and drew attention of strangers.

Many persons looked at him, as he at them, while he swung slowly along the road. At last he crossed over towards an elderly man in company with a young soldier, who was walking lamely with a stick.

"Excuse me," he said, formally, addressing the elder man, "but am I right for Ipscombe?"

"That you are, muster. The next turnin' to the right'll bring yer to it." Peter Betts looked the stranger over as he spoke, with an inquisitive eye.

"You've come from the meeting, I suppose?"

"Ay. We didn't go to the service. That worn't in our line. But we heerd the speeches out o' doors."

"The carts were fine!--especially the second one."

"Ay--that's our missis. She and the two girls done the dressin' o' the cart."

"What's her name?"

"Well, her name's Henderson," said the old man, speaking with an amiable, half careless detachment, the manner rather of a philosopher than a gossip.

"She's the farmer's wife?"

"Noa, she ain't. She's the farmer herself--'at's what she is. She's took the farm from Colonel Shepherd--she did--all on her own. To be sure there's Miss Leighton as lives with her. But it do seem to me as Miss Henderson's--as you might say--the top 'un. And me an' James Halsey works for her."

"_Miss_ Henderson? She's not married?"

"Not she!" said old Betts emphatically. "She's like a lot o' women nowadays, I guess. They doan't want to be married."

"Perhaps nobody 'as wanted to marry 'em, dad!" said his elder son, grinning at his own stale jest.

Betts shook a meditative head.

"Noa--yo'll not explain it that way," he said mildly. "Some of 'em's good-looking--Miss Henderson 'ersel', by token. A very 'andsome up-standin' young woman is Miss Henderson."

Delane followed all these remarks with close attention, and continued a rather skilful examination. He learnt that Great End was a farm of about two hundred and fifty acres, that Miss Henderson seemed to have "lots o' money," and had sold her autumn crops very well, that Miss Leighton managed the stock and the dairy with the help of two land-girls, and it was thought by the village that the two ladies "was doin' fine."

Arrived at the village, Betts turned into his cottage, with a nod to his companion, and Delane went on his way.

The lane on the farther side of the village was dark under branching trees. Delane stumbled along it, coughing at intervals, and gripped by the rising chill of the September evening. A little beyond the trees he caught sight of the farm against the hill. Yes, it was lonesome, as the old man said, but a big, substantial-looking place. Rachel's place! And Rachel had "lots o' money"--and as to her health and well-being, why the sight of her on that cart was enough. That vision of her indeed--of the flushed, smiling face under the khaki hat, of the young form in the trim tunic and leggings, and, not least, of the admiring crowd about her, kept returning upon the man's furious sense as something not to be borne, a recurrent blow from which he could not escape.

And that American chap--that Yankee officer who had walked off with her to the church--what was the meaning of that? They were not strangers, that was plain. She had beckoned to him from the cart. The manner of their short conversation, indeed, showed them well acquainted. She told him to go and speak--and he had gone--with alacrity--smiling back at her. Courting, no doubt! Rachel could never let a man alone--or live, without a man after her. A brutal phrase shaped itself--a vile epithet or two--flung into the solitude of the lane.

When he emerged from the trees into a space of greater light between two stubble fields, Delane suddenly drew a letter from his pocket. While Rachel was flaunting with "lots of money"--this was how his affairs were going.

"DEAR ROGER,--I can do nothing for you. Your demands are simply insatiable. If you write me any more begging letters, or if you attempt again to force your way into my house as you did last week, I shall tell the bank to cancel your allowance, and wash my hands of you altogether. My husband's determined to stop this kind of thing. Don't imagine you can either threaten us, or come round us. We have tried again and again to help and reform you. It is no good--and now we give you up. You have worn us out. If you are wise, you will not answer this--and if you keep quiet the allowance shall be continued. MARIANNE TILNEY."

That was a nice letter to get from a man's only sister! Allowance! What was L100 a year to a woman as rich as Marianne? And what was the use of L100 a year to him, with living at the price it was now? His wretched pittance besides, doled out to him by his father's trustees under his father's will, brought his whole income up to L300 a year. How was a man to live on that, and support a woman and child?

And here was Rachel--free--bursting with health--and possessed of "lots of money." She thought, no doubt, that she had done with him--thrust him out of her life altogether. He'd let her see! Whose fault was it that he had taken up with Anita? Nagging, impossible creature!--with her fine ladyisms and her tempers, and her insolent superior ways!

He walked on, consumed with a bitterness which held him like a physical anguish. By now he had reached the farm gate. The sunset had cleared and deepened. Great rosy thunder-clouds topped the down, and strong lights were climbing up the bronzed masses of wood behind the house. No one to be seen. At Millsborough they could hardly be out of church yet. He had time before him. He walked cautiously up the farm-lane, diverging to the left as he reached the buildings so as to escape the notice of any one who might be left in charge. As he slipped under the large cart-shed which backed on the cow-house, he heard somebody whistling inside. It was old Halsey, who had done the afternoon milking in the absence of the girls. Delane could hear the movements of the labourer, and the munching of the cows. A little farther on was the stable, and two horses' heads, looking pensively out from the open half of the door. Delane peered into the stable with the eye of one to whom all farming matters were familiar. Three fine horses--d---d fine horses!--must have cost L100 a piece at least. No doubt the cows were equally good stuff. And he had noticed under the outer cart-shed a brand-new reaper and binder, and other farm implements and machines of the best quality. Rachel was doing the thing in style.

But where was the farm-house? Then as he crept round the third side of the rough quadrangle, he became aware of a large window with