JOSHUA HAGGARD’S DAUGHTER

LONDON: ROBSON AND SONS, PRINTERS, PANCRAS ROAD, N.W.

JOSHUA HAGGARD’S DAUGHTER

A Novel

BY THE AUTHOR OF

‘LADY AUDLEY’S SECRET’

ETC. ETC. ETC.

IN THREE VOLUMES

VOL. III.

LONDON JOHN MAXWELL AND CO. 4 SHOE LANE, FLEET STREET 1876 [All rights reserved]

CONTENTS OF VOL. III.

[Pg 1]

JOSHUA HAGGARD’S DAUGHTER

CHAPTER I. FULL OF SCORPIONS.

‘Will he come, will he come to see me?’

This was the question which Naomi asked herself when she arose next morning, to see another peerless summer day smiling at her, but to feel none of the joy of harvest; only a heart as dull and desolate as if she had awakened to find herself amidst some dwindled hope-forsaken band hemmed round by Arctic seas. What was summer to her, or harvest, or all the common joys of life—joys that gladden hearts which are not broken?

All through the feverish wakeful night the same doubt had agitated Naomi’s mind. Might not her lover have repented and returned to her? So [Pg 2]blessed a thing was just possible. He had loved her dearly once; surely that old love could not die. He had often told her that love was deathless. Fancy had gone astray, perhaps, and love had been true all the time. Absence had taught him that she was still dear. O, how tenderly she would have welcomed the returning prodigal, could she but be sure of his repentance, sure that her love could even yet make him happy! Thus argued hope; but despair took the other side. He had come back in secret for some evil purpose. He had come back to see Cynthia.

This day would show if he meant well or ill. If well, he would not fear to show himself at Mr. Haggard’s house. He would come and make peace with his betrothed. O, long hours of waiting, between morning prayer and noontide—hours in which the simple household tasks were performed, while the girl’s heart was given to alternate hope and despair! Would he come? Would he prove true and good, despite of all that had gone before!

Noon came, and dinner, and afternoon, and he [Pg 3]did not appear. Hope died in Naomi’s breast. She went about the house listlessly, yet was too restless to sit long at her work. It happened to be a busy afternoon in the drapery department, and aunt Judith was too well employed behind the counter to observe her niece’s idle moving to and fro, or else there would have been the small bitterness of that maiden lady’s lectures superadded to the great bitterness of Naomi’s despair.

Cynthia and Jim were in the garden. Those two were very friendly just now. The poor little stepmother clung to the honest outspoken lad in this time of cloud and brooding storm. Naomi’s coldness cut her to the heart. She felt that there was a great gulf between her and her husband. Of Judith’s dislike and distrust she was inwardly assured.

But Jim seemed fond of her, and he was of her husband’s flesh and blood. The poor little timid soul went out to him in its loneliness.

‘Do you really like me, James?’ she asked to-day, as they were tying up the carnations in the long garden border, Cynthia’s small face shaded by a dimity sun-bonnet.

[Pg 4]

‘Liking isn’t the word, Cynthia,’ answered the boy. ‘I’m uncommonly fond of you; and if you’d only show a little more spirit and make aunt Judith give up the housekeeping, I should have a still better opinion of you. Why should she stint us to one or two puddens a week, and those as hard as brickbats; and a fruit pasty once in a blue moon, when the garden’s running over with gooseberries and may-dukes? It isn’t her place to order the puddens. It’s yours. It was all very well to be trodden under her foot when we were orphans; but you’re our mother now, and you ought to stand by us. Why don’t we have bacon and fried potatoes for breakfast, like Christians? She’d let a whole side go rusty before she’d give us the benefit of it. And my father sits at the table and starves himself, and quotes William Law to show that starvation is a Christian duty. I’ve no patience! I’m sure I wonder I’ve grown up the fine young man I am upon such short commons.’

Jim came into the house half an hour later, and found Naomi in the parlour. She was standing by the window idle, her work in her hands, staring [Pg 5]absently at the bend in the road yonder, by which Oswald used to come on Herne the Hunter. Poor old faithful Herne! the tears came into her eyes when she thought of him. He had been turned out to grass, and she had seen him looking over gaps in the hedge, a haggard unkempt beast. She had called him and coaxed him, and held out her hand to invite his approach; and he had come with a shy sidelong gait close up to her, and even sniffed at her in a friendly way, and then shot off like a sky-rocket before she could caress his honest gray nose.

Jim burst into the parlour like a whirlwind.

‘I thought you was fond of those crinkly harts-tongues I got for you?’ he exclaimed, breathless with indignation.

‘So I am, Jim; very fond of them.’

‘Then you’d better get a bit of black stuff out of the shop and make yourself a mourning-gown!’

‘Are they dead?’

‘They’re as near it as anything in the fern line can be—as yellow as the inside of a poached egg, and half eaten by snails. How long is it since you’ve been in the wilderness?’

[Pg 6]

‘I don’t know: a few days—a week, perhaps.’

‘You’re a nice young woman for an industrious brother to toil for! The place is as dry as an ash-pit. What’s the use of my getting you fine specimens, if this is the way you treat ’em? There’s the parsley-fern crinkled up like a bit of whity-brown paper. Cynthia and I have been giving the things a good dowsing; but they’ve been shamefully neglected. I should have thought you could have found time to look after them. You’re not in the business,’ concluded Jim, with a superior air.

‘Don’t be cross, Jim,’ faltered Naomi gently. ‘It was wrong of me to neglect the ferns that you’ve taken such trouble to set for me; but I have not done any gardening lately; I have not been feeling well enough—’

And here Naomi burst into tears—Naomi, with whom tears were so rare.

Jim had his arms round her in a moment, and was hugging her like an affectionate bruin.

‘There, there, there!’ he cried; ‘don’t fret. I oughtn’t to have been so cross. You’ve had your troubles lately—father going and breaking off your [Pg 7]marriage without rhyme or reason. Nobody ever heard of such tyranny. I’ll be sworn William Law, the father of Methodism, is at the bottom of it. Suffering is good for us. It’s blessed to deny ourselves. And my poor little sister mustn’t marry the man she loves! Cheer up, Naomi; it will all come right in the end, I daresay, though things are going crooked now. Don’t worry about the wilderness. Cynthia and I are making things tidy—weeding and watering, and training the creepers over the rockwork. You can come down and look at us, if you like; it will cheer you up a bit.’

‘I’ll come presently, Jim dear,’ answered Naomi, drying her tears.

‘Be sure you do,’ said Jim; and then he hurried back to his work.

Naomi sat in the parlour for a quarter of an hour or so. She shed no more tears, but sat with dry eyes looking straight before her.

Why had he come back? Not for her—O, not for her!

The day was nearly done. She could hear the rattling of teacups in the pantry. Sally was getting [Pg 8]her tray ready. That meant half-past four o’clock. Naomi rose with a long heavy sigh, and went out into the garden. It was to please her brother she went. There was no pleasure or interest for her in earth or sky.

She walked slowly down the long straight garden path, where the clove carnations and double stocks were in their glory, and through the little orchard to the wilderness. Jim was hard at work—the perspiration running down his forehead, his coat off, and his shirt-sleeves rolled up to the elbow—dividing great tufts of primroses and overgrown hartstongue. Cynthia was on her knees weeding, a pretty picture of youth and fairness in the yellow sunlight.

Naomi stood and looked at her. What was the charm in her that had lured her false lover? Could the eye of another woman see the bait that had won weak and fickle man; the enchantment which had wrought alike upon the strong man in his meridian of knowledge and wisdom and the youth in his folly?

Yes, the charm revealed itself even to the cold eye of a resentful rival. It was not so much absolute [Pg 9]beauty which allured in this nameless waif as a soft and gracious innocence, a flower-like loveliness, that stole upon mind and heart unawares.

She charmed the senses, as roses and lilies do in the early morning while the dew is still on them. She appealed to the eye and held it, like some picture which, in a long gallery, stands out from all other images, and transfixes the spectator. She stole upon the soul like music heard afar off on a river, in the still summer night.

Nor was it this outward charm of perfect fairness and grace only which attracted. The soft lovableness of her disposition accorded with the tender grace of her beauty. She had the clinging affectionateness of a soft and yielding nature; a humility of spirit which made her ready to reverence the strong; a tenderness of heart which inclined her to pity the weak. In one word she was lovable—a woman created to be loved.

Naomi stood and looked at her, full of bitter thoughts. For the first time in her life she envied the gifts of another. She felt all the good things that Providence had given her of no account when [Pg 10]weighed against the bewitchment of fair looks and winning ways.

‘How wicked I am growing!’ she thought, shocked at her own bitterness.

‘There!’ exclaimed Jim, pulling down his shirt-sleeves; ‘I think I have done a tidy afternoon’s work. You’ll have oceans of primroses next year, sis.’

‘If they don’t all die,’ said Naomi, not hopefully. ‘Do you think it’s quite the right time for moving them?’

‘Primroses!’ cried Jim. ‘As if you could hurt a primrose! I know what I am about, sister. They wouldn’t take any harm by my moving if they were the delicatest flowers in a hot-house.’

He pulled on his coat, put away trowel and rake, and came out of the wild garden into the orchard. Cynthia rose too, with an absent-minded sigh, and followed him.

‘Now look here, little stepmother,’ he said, in his patronising way; ‘you’d better go in and make yourself tidy for tea, while I show Naomi what I have done to her primroses.’

Cynthia obeyed without a word, and left them. [Pg 11]Jim tucked his sister’s arm under his own, and began to perambulate the orchard.

‘What’s the matter, Jim?’

‘Cheer up, old woman; I’ve got some good news for you. I won’t see you trampled upon, not if I can help it. I won’t have your early affections blighted, and young Pentreath sent to the right-about, if I can prevent it. Don’t be afraid, sis; I’ll stand by you.’

‘Jim, what do you mean?’ cried Naomi piteously.

‘I’ve got a letter for you.’

Naomi’s heart leapt with sudden overwhelming joy. Oswald had written. Thank God, thank God! She was not utterly forgotten.

‘A letter, Jim?’ clasping his arm rapturously. ‘How did it come?’

‘How should it come? He brought it himself, of course.’

‘And gave it to you? You saw him? Dear, dear Jim, tell me all about it. How is he looking, ill or well?’

‘White and fagged; as if he’d been going to the—well, [Pg 12]you know—all the time he’s been in London. I only just caught a glimpse of him above the wall.’

‘And he gave you the letter—’

‘No, that’s the fun of it. He didn’t see me. It was just as I came back to the wilderness after I left you in the parlour. Cynthia was sitting reading on the bench yonder. Just as I came to the gate, I saw a pale face look over the wall; and then a white hand went up and threw something over. It fell among the ferns, not a yard from stepmother. But she never saw it; that was the lark. Her nose was in her book, poetry or some such trash. I gave a whistle, and off went my gentleman like a shot—scared away.’

‘And what became of the letter?’

‘Why, I picked it up unbeknown to Cynthia, when her back was turned. It’s wrapped round a stone. There’s no address on it—too artful for that—but I knew the party it was meant for.’

‘Are you sure it’s for me?’ asked Naomi, trembling a little. That exceeding great joy fainted in her heart. A letter unaddressed, and thrown at Cynthia’s feet!

[Pg 13]

‘Of course it’s for you. Stepmother sat with her back to the wall, and her head and shoulders smothered in that great sun-bonnet of hers. He might easy take her for you.’

‘Give me the letter, dear,’ said Naomi, with suppressed eagerness.

He handed her a little parcel—a goodish-sized pebble packed neatly in a sheet of letter-paper, and carefully sealed with the well-known coat-of-arms which had hung a year ago from the Squire’s fob.

‘Ain’t you going to read it?’ demanded Jim, as his sister stood looking at the packet.

‘Not just yet, dear. I had rather read it when I am quite alone.’

‘O my!’ ejaculated Jim. ‘For fear some of the love should run over, like clouted cream that hasn’t set properly. What it is to be in love! Well, sis, I’ll leave you to the enjoyment of your love-letter, while I go and clean myself.’

He ran off, leaving Naomi alone in the orchard. Fear held her hand for a moment, though hope whispered that this little packet was full of comfort and sweetness. It had fallen at Cynthia’s feet, said [Pg 14]fear. Was it not possible that it had been meant for Cynthia?

She broke the seal and carefully unfolded the sheet of Bath post—the fair wide paper which our forefathers used when letters were worth having.

It was a letter of three pages, written by a hand which betrayed its owner’s emotion. Naomi’s eyes shone with an angry light as they hurried over the lines. There was a name written here and there—a hateful name, that told her the letter was not for her—‘My Cynthia;’ ‘My Cynthia—mine by that mutual love which is our mutual sorrow!’

‘Villain and traitor!’ cried Naomi, with a burst of passion which transformed her.

Had he stood before her in that moment, and she armed, she could have stabbed him. This Naomi, who could have laid down her life to accomplish some good and great thing, was, for this one instant, capable of murder.

Such cruel perfidy, such heartless treachery, such shameless iniquity, outraged her sense of justice. It seemed to her as if Heaven had created a monster.

[Pg 15]

She had not yet read the letter, but Cynthia’s name stood out from the tremulous lines as if it had been written in fire. Slowly, with her hand pressed against her burning forehead, in the effort to keep brain and understanding clear, she addressed herself to the hateful task.

She would know the lowest deep of man’s infamy: a lover who could forsake his sworn love; a man, calling himself a gentleman, who could try to seduce a good man’s wife.

The letter was incoherent, passionate—despair’s foolish appeal against Fate:

‘I must see you once again—yes, dearest, at whatever hazard to you or me, at whatever cost. I have made up my mind to live and die far away from the dear place that holds you. The wide, bleak, barren sea shall roll between me and my beloved. I am going to America; that is far enough, surely! Death could part us no wider than the Atlantic. I shall look at that great sea, and think how the green waves roll up the golden sands of home and kiss your feet; how the white spray blows into your hair and [Pg 16]caresses you like a cloud—and I am no Jove, to be in that cloud, love. I shall be severed from you for ever. But before I sail for the other side of the sea I must see you once more; yes, Cynthia, my Cynthia—mine by that mutual love which is our mutual sorrow—I must see you once more, clasp your hand and say farewell; bless you, and be blessed by you. Trust me, trust me, my beloved, with but one meeting. There shall no evil word be spoken; you shall not even hear me complain against Fate. I will only take your hand in mine and say good-bye. Vain

blessing, you will say; but, dearest love, the memory of that moment will comfort me in weary days and nights to come. I would but know that you pity and forgive and pray for me; and that, if Fate had willed it so, you might have loved me. It will be like a parting between two friends when one is doomed to die. I shall think the executioner is waiting at the door, and the death-bell ready to toll. O dear love, by thy tender and pitying heart, I adjure thee, grant me this last prayer! Thy Werther, despairing unto death, pleads to thee! ‘I have come back to Devonshire for this only—to [Pg 17]see you once more. I have taken my passage for New York. All is settled; nothing can alter my decision. I am not weak enough, or guilty enough, to remain within reach of you. I thought that in London I might forget; but your image followed me everywhere I went; in crowds or in solitudes, you were always near; nothing but a lifelong exile can cure my wound or expiate my guilt. ‘Let me see you, beloved one. I shall contrive to convey this letter to you by some means in the

course of to-day. Meet me to-morrow afternoon; and to-morrow night, by the coach which starts from the First and Last at eight o’clock, I will leave Combhaven for ever. Your afternoons are always free; I shall wait for you, from two to four o’clock, on the common beyond Matcherly Wood, near the old shaft. It is rather far for you to come, but I think it is the safest place for our meeting. No one ever comes there but a stray cowboy in quest of his cattle. ‘Come, dearest; it is the only boon you can bestow upon one whose heart you have broken unawares.—Yours till death, ‘Oswald.’

[Pg 18]

This was the letter. Naomi read it slowly to the end, and then put it in her pocket.

A shrill shriek from the house-door roused her from abstraction.

‘Naomi, are you coming?’ at the top of aunt Judith’s high-pitched voice.

‘We never do have our teas like Christians nowadays!’ complained Miss Haggard, as Naomi came into the parlour breathless. ‘Have you seen another ghost, girl?’ she asked, staring at her niece. ‘You look as white as a yard of calico. Here’s your father not home to his tea again; that makes the third time this week.’

‘He is attending to his duty, no doubt, aunt.’

‘Who says he isn’t? But I wish he could contrive to combine duty with punctuality at meals. I hate a disorderly table.’

Joshua came in just as they had finished their meal. His large cup of tea had been put on one side for him, covered with a saucer. He sat down in his arm-chair and drank his tea in silence. He was looking exhausted and weary.

‘I am afraid you have had a hard afternoon’s [Pg 19]work, Joshua,’ Cynthia said, sitting down beside him timidly.

‘I have been in the house of death, my dear; that is always trying to weak humanity. And I have walked a long way in the sun.’

Naomi sat by the window darning Jim’s stockings. Aunt Judith retired to the drapery department. Joshua leant back in his chair, with closed eyes. Cynthia took up a book; it was Milton’s Paradise Lost, one of the few imaginative works of which Mr. Haggard did not disapprove.

They sat thus for some time, in a silence only broken by the lowing of distant cattle and the gentle lapping of summer waves upon the pebbly beach. Then Jim looked in at the door and called Cynthia. She rose quickly and went out to him, and Naomi was alone with her father.