CHAPTER XIII.
DOROTHY CURWEN.
I was at the breakfast-table, you may be sure, that morning no laterthan my host and his daughter. Mr. Curwen greeted me with an evidentrelief, but neither then nor afterwards did he ever refer to thejourney I had taken during the night. On the contrary, his talk wasall of Paris and France, plying me with many questions concerning theFrench generals, the Duc de Vendome, Marechal Villars, the Duc deNoailles, and the rest which I was at some loss to answer. Often andoften would he return to that subject with something of a boyish zestand enthusiasm. He had never been in France, he informed me, yet wouldtell me many stories concerning the Court and the magnificence ofVersailles and the great hunting-parties at Meudon when Monsieur wasalive, with so much detail that but for a certain extravagance, as ofone whose curiosity, through much feeding upon itself, has grownfantastic, I could not but have believed that he had himself beenpresent at their enactment. And then he would light his pipe and lookacross this quiet Ennerdale water to the rugged slopes beyond, with asigh, and so get him back to his romances. He was no less curiousconcerning Lorraine and the little Court at Bar-le-Duc; and when Itold him that I had myself had speech with the King, his enthusiasmrose to excitement.
"Oh!" he cried, starting up, "you have seen him? you have heard hisvoice speaking to you, as you hear mine now?" and all at once Iacquired a new honour in his eyes. "Mr. Clavering, you have somethingto compensate you for your outlawry."
"Yes," I replied, "he spoke to me and with the sweetest kindliness."
"And the King was hopeful--was positive in his hopes?"
"Very."
"That is right," he continued, walking about the room and smiling tohimself. "That is right So a strong man should be."
"And so weak men are," said I rather sadly, for I recalled all thatLord Bolingbroke had told me.
"Mr. Clavering," said the old gentleman, suddenly pausing in his walk,"you are the last man who should say that. You have lost all that aman holds dear, and are you not hopeful?"
I bowed my head to the rebuke. It was, indeed, well-timed and just,though for a very different reason than that which had inspired Mr.Curwen to utter it.
"I was so," said I humbly, "so lately as this morning. Nay," and Irose to my feet, "I am so still. Besides," I continued, reverting tothe King, "he has Lord Bolingbroke to help him, and I set great storeon that."
"Bolingbroke!" cried Mr. Curwen, and seldom have I seen a man's facechange so suddenly. A flame of anger kindled in his eyes and blazedacross his face, shrivelling all the gentleness which made its homethere. "Bolingbroke!" he cried wildly--"a knave! a debauched,villainous knave! God help the man, be he king or serf, that takes hiscounsel! Look you, Mr. Clavering, a very dishonest, treacherousknave;" and he wagged his head at me. I was astonished at theoutburst, since the Jacobites were wont to look with some deferencetowards Lord Bolingbroke.
"He is my kinsman," I said meekly, "and a very good friend to me;" andwhile Mr. Curwen was still humming and hawing in some confusion, hisdaughter came into the room, and gazing at his troubled face with someanxiety, put an end to the talk.
This was by no means, however, the last I was to hear of the matter,and in truth Lord Bolingbroke, through merely arousing Mr. Curwen'sindignation, was to prove a much better friend to me than ever I hadlooked for. For when we were again alone together:
"I regret the words I spoke to you," he said a little stiffly and withconsiderable effort in the apology. "I did not know Lord Bolingbrokewas your kinsman;" and then in a rush of sincerity: "But far more thanthe words, I regret your relationship with the man."
I began to make such defence of my kinsman as I could, pointing to hisindustry, and declaring how his services had always been thwarted byhis colleagues while he was in power.
"And what of the Catalans?" he asked.
Now, I knew very little about the Catalans.
"Well, what of the Catalans?" I asked doubtfully.
"Why, this," he returned. "We instigated them to war; we made them ourallies against Philip of Spain by the promise of restoring them theirancient liberties. They fought with us, spilled their blood on thestrength of that promise, and then Lord Bolingbroke patches up hispeace of Utrecht, and not a word in it from end to end about theirliberties. They continue the war alone, and he finds nothing better todo than to sneer at their obstinacy. They still continue, and he isready to send an English fleet to help in their destruction."
His voice increased in vehemence with every word he spoke, so that Ifeared each moment another outburst against my kinsman. It may be thathe feared it too, for he checked himself with some abruptness, and itwas his daughter who revived the subject later on during that sameday.
It was after dinner. I had taken a book with me, and climbed up to theorchard behind the house. But little I read in the book. The sun hadset behind the hills, but the brightness of that morning lingered onmy thoughts. I was, as Mr. Curwen had said, hopeful, though with nogreat reason, and being besides weary with the fatigue I hadundergone, fell into a restful state between sleep and waking. Withhalf-closed eyes I saw Dorothy Curwen come from the back of the house,and talk for a little with Mary Tyson. Then she mounted towards theorchard. I watched her, marked the lightness of her step, the supplecarriage of her figure, the delicate poise of her head, and then rosefrom the grass and went forward to meet her.
"Mr. Clavering," she began very decidedly, and paused in somedifficulty. Then she stamped her foot with a little imperiousmovement. "You talk too much of France and Paris and the great worldto my father. You will not do so any more."
She spoke with the prettiest air of command imaginable the while shelooked up at me, and it was the air I smiled at, not the command.
"No!" she said, "I mean it. You will not do so any more;" and shecoloured a little and spoke with a yet stronger emphasis.
"Madam," said I with a bow, "since you wish it----"
"I do wish it, Mr. Clavering," she interrupted me.
"I did not think----" I began.
"No," says she, "you are young and imprudent. I have noticed thatalready." And with great stateliness and dignity she walked for tenyards down the hillside. Then she began to hum a tune, and laughed asthough mightily pleased with herself and her stately walk changed to adance. A few yards further on, she sat down in the bracken with herback towards me and began plucking at the grasses. I remained whereshe had left me, quite content to watch from that distance the coilsof hair nestling about her head, and to hearken to the rippling musicof her song. But after a little she turned her head with a glanceacross her shoulder towards me, and so back again very quickly. I wentdown to her.
"The lecture is not ended?" said I, gravely.
She gave a start and looked at me, as though my presence there was thelast thing she expected, or indeed wished for. Then in an instant herwhole manner changed.
"I will tell you the truth of it," she said. "Something you willperhaps have guessed already, the rest you would discover did not Itell you."
I sat down by her side, and she continued, choosing her words.
"My father is not altogether--strong, and these stories do no good."Then she stopped. "It is more difficult to tell you than I thought."
"There is no need," said I, "that you should say another word."
"Thank you," said she very gratefully; and for a little we weresilent.
"Has he spoken to you of a ship?" she asked slowly; and I started."Ah! he thinks it is a secret from us. But we know, for he sold theland not so long ago wherewith to buy it He is the noblest man in theworld," she continued hurriedly. "The thought of any one sufferingtouches him to the quick; the thought of oppression kindles him toanger, and he will do his part, and more than his part, in relievingthe one and fighting against the other. So that unless Mary and I didwhat we could, he would not possess to-day so much as a farthing."
"I understand," said I, "Mary's welcome to me yesterday."
She looked at me with a smile.
"Yes," said she, "but your looks warranted her. The ship was to befitted out to help the Catalans. It lies at Whitehaven now. He wasthere but a few days ago."
"He spoke of it to me," said I, "with some hint that he might put meacross to France."
"But you will not go?" she said, turning to me quickly. "Any day thecountry may rise and every arm will be needed--I mean every youngarm."
I shook my head.
"The French King is dying, maybe is dead, and without his help willthe country rise? Besides, so long as I stay here, I endanger you."
I spoke reluctantly enough, for though I had no intention whatever toseek a refuge in France, I felt that if once Mr. Curwen definitelypromised to send me thither, I could not remain at Applegarth athowever small a risk to him and his. I must needs accept the offerand--betake me again to the hillside, in which case there was littleprobability that I should be able to effect anything towards AnthonyHerbert's enlargement before I was captured myself.
"There is no danger to us," she said. "For, some while since, wepersuaded my father to take no active share in the plans. There willbe no danger," and she stopped for a second, "if you will put out yourcandle when next you leave it in the stables."
"My candle?" I stammered, taken aback by her words. "I left itburning?"
"Last night," said she.
"I beg your pardon."
"There is very great reason that you should," she said with a laugh."For I must needs hurry on my clothes and put it out. As I said, youare very imprudent, Mr. Clavering;" and with that she tripped down tothe house, leaving me not so much concerned with what she had hintedabout her father, as with my own immediate need to secure theknowledge I was after quickly, and avert by my departure the smallestrisk from Applegarth.
I was on that account the more relieved when, late upon the thirdnight afterwards, Tash knocked at the door, and brought me a letterfrom Lord Derwentwater. I opened it eagerly, and read it through. Ittold me much which is common knowledge now, as that the Earl of Marhad summoned his friends in Scotland to meet him at Aboyne on the27th, upon the pretext of a great hunting-party; that the mug-houseriots in London were daily increasing in number and violence; but thatwith the French King, so near to his dissolution, and the precautionsof the English Government in bringing over Dutch troops, and throngingthe Channel with its ships, Lord Bolingbroke was all for delay. "ButGod knows," he added, "whether delay is any possible, and I fear forthe event. We have many of the nobles on our side--but the body of ourcountrymen? It will be like a game of chess in which one side playswithout pawns. We have Bishops and Knights and Castles, but no pawns."
There was more of the same kind, and I glanced through it hurriedly,until I came to that of which I was more particularly in search.
"The sheriff came with his posse to Lord's Island in the morning, sothat it was well you left during the night. He is still after you. Ipassed his messenger yesterday near Braithwaite, so it behoves you tobe wary. I do not think, however, he has winded you as yet, and assoon as I can discover an occasion I will have you sent over thewater. But being myself under the cloud of their suspicions, I have tostep very deliberately. Your cousin, Jervas Rookley, lives openlyunder his own name at Blackladies, and receives visits from the Whigattorney; and since he can only be staying there with the sufferanceof the Government, you may be certain what I told you is true. By theway, Mr. Anthony Herbert, the painter, disappeared on the same day orthereabouts that you did. It is rumoured that he has been arrested,but nothing certain is known. But if the rumour is true I greatly fearthat he owes his arrest to his acquaintanceship with you and myself. Isuspect Mr. Rookley's finger in the pie. Since he was playing falsewith the Government concerning you, he would most likely be anxious togive them an earnest of loyalty in some other matter. But I do notknow."
So far I read and clapped the letter down with a bang. For here wasthe fellow to my own suspicion.
I sat down and finished the letter. There was but another line to it.
"I got my information about Rookley from an oldish man who camesecretly here from Blackladies. He seemed in some doubt as to which ofyourself or your cousin he should call master, but he was veryinsistent that I should let you know of his coming. I had, indeed,some difficulty in comprehending him, for now he wished me to stylehim 'Aron' to you and now 'Ashlock.' Altogether I thought it wiser togive him no news as to your whereabouts. This, however, is certain,from what he said to me--there is a watch set about Blackladies on thechance that you might return."
This last sentence troubled me exceedingly. For it had been growing inmy mind that there was but one person who could tell me fully what Ineeded to know, and that person Mr. Jervas Rookley; and a vaguepurpose was gradually taking shape within me that I would once moremake use of Mr. Curwen's stables, and riding one night round byNewlands valley and Keswick, seek to take Mr. Rookley by surprise, andwrest the truth from him. That project the letter seemed to strikedead. Accordingly I took the occasion to write to Lord Derwentwater,and implored him, if by any means he could, to inform himself moreparticularly of Anthony Herbert's arrest, and whither he had beentaken. "For upon these two points," said I, "hangs not my safety, butmy soul's salvation;" and so hurried Tash off before the poor man washalfway through his supper, and waited impatiently for an answer.
Now, during this period of waiting, since each time that I foundmyself alone with Mr. Curwen, his talk would wander back inquisitivelyto the French Court, discovering there a lustre which no doubt it had,and a chivalry which it no less certainly lacked, I began of a setpurpose to avoid him; and avoiding him, was thrown the more into thecompany of Miss Dorothy. Moreover, the frankness with which she hadhinted to me the weakness of her father, brought about a closerintimacy between us as of friend and friend rather than as of hostessand guest. It was as though Mary Tyson and she were continuallybuilding up out of their love a fence around the father, and she hadjoined me in the work.
Many a time, when I was on the hillside behind the house I would bestartled by the sight of a horse and the flash of a red-coat upon thehorse's back, only to find my heart drumming yet the faster when Iperceived that it was Miss Dorothy Curwen in her red cramoisieriding-habit. Maybe I would be standing no great distance from thehouse, and she would see me and come up the grass while I went downtowards her, her hair straying about her ears and forehead in thesweetest disorder, and her cheeks wind-whipped to the rosiest pink. Onthe wet days, which were by no means infrequent, she would sit at herspinet and sing such old songs as that I had listened to on the firstnight of my coming. If the evenings were fine, we would sometimes rowout upon Ennerdale water, in a crazy battered boat, so that I was moreoften baling out the leakage in a tin pannikin than pulling at theoars. And on afternoons, when the sunlight fell through the leaveslike great spots of a gold rain we would climb up to the orchard, andI would spread an old cloak for her upon the grass, and we would sitamongst the crabbed trunks of trees. But at all times--in the dusk,when she sang and the rain whipped the panes; at night, when we rowedacross the moonlit lake as across a silver mirror, in the hush of aworld asleep--at all times a feverish impatience would seize on me foran answer to my letter, and a shadow would darken across our talk, sothat thereafter I sat mum and glooming and heard little that was saidto me. It was not, indeed, the shadow of the gallows, but rather ofthe fear lest while I lingered here at Applegarth, chance might thwartme of the gallows. For the girl's presence was to me as a perpetualaccusation.
Upon one such occasion, when we were together in the orchard, shelooked at me once or twice curiously.
"For one so imprudent," said she, a trifle petulantly, "you areextraordinary solemn."
"There are creatures," said I, with a weariful shake of the head, "whoare by nature solemn."
"True," says she, placidly, "but even they hoot at night;" and shelooked across the valley with extreme unconsciousness. But I noticedthat her mouth dimpled at the corners as if she was very
pleased.
"I know," said I, remorsefully, "that I make the dullest ofcompanions."
She nodded her head in cordial agreement
"Perhaps you cannot help it," says she, with great sympathy.
"The truth is," I exclaimed sharply, "I have overmuch to make mesolemn."
"No doubt," and the sympathy deepened in her voice, "and I am sureevery one must pity you. There was a king once who never smiled again.I am sure every one pitied him too."
"He only lost a son," I replied foolishly, meaning thereby that honourwas a thing of more worth.
"And you an estate," says she. "It is indeed very true," and sheclasped her hands and shook her head.
"Madam," I returned with some dignity, "you put words into my mouththat I had no thought of using. It was not of a mere estate that I wasspeaking."
"No?" says she reflectively. "Could it be a heart, then? Dear! dear!this is very tragical."
"No," I said very quickly; and on the instant fell to stammering "No,no."
"The word gains little force from repetition. In fact, I have heardthat two noes make a yes."
"Madam," said I stiffly, getting to my feet, "you persist inmisunderstanding me;" and I moved a step or two apart from her.
"I do not know," she said demurely, "that you use any great effort toprevent the mistake."
That I felt to be true. I wondered for a moment whether she had not aright to know, and I turned back to her. She was sitting with her headcocked on one side and glancing whimsically towards me from the tailof her eye. The glance became, on the instant, the blankest ofuninterested looks. I plumped down again on the grass.
"That evening," I began, "when I left the candle burning in thestables, I rode into Keswick. There was something I should have donebefore I came hither," and I stumbled over the words.
She took me up immediately with a haughty indifference, and her chinvery high in the air.
"Nay, I have no desire to pry into your secrets--not the least in theworld."
"Oh," said I, "I fancied you were curious."
"Curious?" she exclaimed, with a flash of her eyes. "Curious, indeed!And why should I be curious about your concerns, if you please?" Andshe spoke the word again with a laugh of scorn, "Curious!"
Said I, "The word gains no force from repetition."
Dorothy Curwen gasped with indignation.
"A very witty and polite rejoinder, upon my word," she said slowly,and began to repeat that remark too, but broke off at the second word.
For a little we were silent. Then she plucked a reed of grass and bitit pensively.
"No!" she said indifferently, "since my father has lived quietly atApplegarth, I have lost my interest in politics."
"It was no question of politics at all!" I exclaimed, and--
"Oh!" she exclaimed, swinging round to me with all her indifferencegone.
"No," I went on, but reluctantly, for I was no longer sure that Iought to tell her, and quibbled accordingly. "There was some one inKeswick for whom I had news which would not wait."
"News of your escape?" she interposed, with a certain constraint inher voice.
"Partly that," I replied, and continued, "and from whom I mostheartily desired news."
She sat for a moment with her face averted and very still.
"And what is she like?" she asked of a sudden.
The question startled me so that I jumped and stared at heropen-mouthed. But by the time I had fashioned an answer, she had nolonger any need for it For "No! No!" she exclaimed. "I have no wish tohear;" and she fell unaccountably to talking of Jervas Rookley, atfirst in something of a flurry, and afterwards in a tone as though shefound great comfort in the thought of him. "He is not so black as heis painted," was the burden of her speech, and she played manyvariations on the tune.
Now, I had in my pocket a certain letter from Lord Derwentwater, whichwas a clear disproof of her words, and, to speak the truth, her mannerstung me. For whatever part of my misfortunes I did not owe to myself,that I owed to Mr. Jervas Rookley.
"And I never could bring myself to believe that story of thewad-mines," she said. "Never! Ah, poor man! What will he be doing now?It is a thought which often troubles me, Mr. Clavering. Doubtless heis somewhere tossed upon the sea. It is a very noble life, a sailor's.There is no nobler, is there?" and she asked the question as if shehad no doubt whatever but that I should agree with her.
"I know nothing of that," I replied in some heat, "but as for thewad-mines I know that story to be true, for I have seen the shaft."
She shook her head at me with an air of disappointment. It seemed shethought I was slandering the man after slipping into his shoes. Iwhipped the letter out of my pocket and thrust it before her.
"There, Madam, there!" I exclaimed. "The thought of Mr. Rookley needno longer trouble you. I am glad, indeed, to have the opportunity ofdisposing of your trouble. It will be the one moment's satisfactionthe man has given me. He is nowhere tossed upon the sea, in thatnoblest of all lives, as you will be able to perceive for yourself, ifyou will glance through this letter, but, on the contrary, sittingquietly in an armchair in whatever room at Blackladies pleases himbest."
"I am not so short of sight," she observed sedately, "that I need thepaper to be rubbed against my nose."
She took it and read it through once and a second time. I told her thestory of my dealings with Mr. Rookley, from the moment of his comingto me at the Jesuit College in Paris, to the morning when I fled fromBlackladies, and so much of his dealings with me as I was familiarwith. It was, in fact, much the same story that I had told to my Lordand Lady Derwentwater, and contained little mention of Mr. Herbert,except the fact that he was painting my portrait, and no mentionwhatsoever of Mr. Herbert's wife. For I found that the whole accountof my proceedings since I had come to England, fell very naturallyinto two halves, each of which to all seeming was in itself complete.She heard me out to the end, and then in low, penitent voice, forwhich it seemed to me there was no occasion--
"I knew nothing of this," she said, "or I would never so much as haveuttered Mr. Rookley's name. I could not know. You will bear me out inthis; I could not know." And she turned to me with the sweetest appealin her grey eyes and a hand timidly outstretched.
"Indeed," said I, earnestly, "I will. You could not know, and I canwell believe Mr. Jervas Rookley's conduct was very different toyou." With that I took her hand, and again took it gingerly by thefinger-tips. Thereupon she snatched it away, and got quickly to herfeet.
"And for whom----" she began, and stopped, while she very deliberatelyfastened a button of her glove which was already buttoned.
"For whom--what?" said I.
"It is no matter," she said carelessly, and then, "For whom was thepicture intended?" and as though she was half-ashamed of the question,she ran lightly down the hillside without waiting for an answer.
"For no one," I cried out after her. "It was intended to hang in thegreat hall of Blackladies." But she descended into the house, and I--Ipassed through the orchard and up the hillside behind it, and over thecrest of the fell, until ridge upon ridge opened out beneath theoverarching sky, and the valleys between them became so many furrowsdrawn by a giant's plough. And coming into that great space andsolitude where no tree waved, no living thing moved, no human soundwas heard, I dropped upon the ground, pressing a throbbing face downamong the cool bracken, and twining my fingers about the roots offerns. It was the blackest hour that had ever till then befallen me;mercifully I could not know that it was but a foretaste of others yetblacker which were to follow. Something very new and strange wasstirring within me; I loved her. The truth was out that afternoon. Ithink it was her questioning which taught it me. For it brought Mrs.Herbert into my thoughts, and so I learned this truth by the bitterestof all comparisons. I saw the two faces side by side, and then the onevanished and the other remained. Here, I thought, was my life justbeginning to take some soul of meaning; here was its usual draba-flush with that rosy light, as of all the sunri
ses and all thesunsets which had ever brightened across the world--and I must give itup, and through my own fault. There was the hardest part of thebusiness--through my own fault! The knowledge stung and ached at myheart intolerably. There was nothing heroical in the reparation whichI purposed; here was no laying down of one's life at the feet of one'smistress, with a blithe heart and even a gratitude for the occasion,such as I had read of in Mr. Curwen's romances--and how easy thatseemed to me at this moment!--it was the mere necessary payment for asordid act of shame.
It was drawing towards night when I rose to my feet and came down themountain-side to Applegarth, and, as the outcome of my torturingreflections, one conviction, fixed very clearly in my mind before, hadgained an added impulsion. I must needs hasten on this reparation. Itwas not, I am certain, the fear that delay in the fulfilment wouldweaken my purpose, which any longer spurred me; but of those two faceswhich had made my comparison: one, as I say, had vanished from mythoughts, the other now occupied them altogether, and it seemed to methat if by any chance I missed the opportunity of atonement, I shouldbe doing the owner of that face an irreparable wrong.
Miss Dorothy Curwen came late from her room to supper, and the momentshe entered the parlour where Mr. Curwen and I were waiting, itappeared that something had gone amiss with her, and that we were inconsequence to suffer. Her face was pale and tired, her eyes hostile,and asperity was figured in the tight curve of her lips. From thecrown of her head to the toe-tips, she was panoplied in aggression, sothat the very ribands seemed to bristle on her dress.
It was plain, too, that she did but wait her opportunity. Mr. Curwenprovided it by a question as to her looks, and a suggestion that herhealth was disordered.
"No wonder," says she, and "Not a doubt of it." She snatched theoccasion with both hands as it were, and said, I think, more than sheintended. "I am much troubled by an owl that keeps me from my propersleep."
"An owl?" asked Mr. Curwen, with an innocent sympathy.
"An owl?" I asked in a sudden heat.
Her eyes met mine, very cold and blank.
"O-w-l," she answered, spelling the word deliberately.
I could not think what had caused this sudden change in her.
"But, my dear," said Mr. Curwen in perplexity, "are you certain youhave made no mistake?"
"Oh no, sir, there will be no mistake," says I, indignantly, or evershe could open her lips. But, indeed, I do not know whether in anycase she would have opened them or not. For her face was like a mask.
"But I did not know there was an owl at Applegarth," says he.
"He is a new-comer," says I; "but you may take my word for it, thereis an owl at Applegarth--a tedious, solemn owl."
Miss Dorothy nodded her head quietly at each epithet, and her actionmuch increased my anger.
"Then you have heard it, Mr. Clavering," says Mr. Curwen; and "IndeedI have," I cried in a greater heat than ever, for I noticed a certaincontentment begin to steal over the girl's face at each fresh evidenceof my rage. "Indeed I have--under the eaves at my bedroom window."
"But, my dear Mr. Clavering," expostulated Mr. Curwen, "what sort ofan owl is it?"
"A very uncommon owl," said I.
"Oh dear no, not at all," said Miss Curwen, stonily, with a lift ofher eyebrows.
"Well, we will have him out to-morrow," says the father.
"No, sir, to-night," says I, "this very night"
Dorothy gave a start and looked at me with a trace of anxiety.
"Yes," I repeated significantly, wagging my head in a fury,"to-night--no later."
"Oh, but I like owls," cried she of a sudden. "That can hardly be," Iinsisted, looking hard at her, "since they keep you awake o' nights."
At that she coloured and dropped her eyes from my face.
"Perhaps I exaggerated," she said weakly, and sat smoothing thetable-cloth on each side of her with her fingers. She glanced up atme. I was still looking at her. She glanced from me to her father. Hewas waiting for her answer, utterly at a loss.
"But I like owls," she said again in a queer little, high-pitched,plaintive voice; and somehow I began to laugh, and in a moment she waslaughing too. "You make too much of the trouble," said she.
"We will have him out to-morrow," said Mr. Curwen; and again shelaughed, but with something of mischief, so that though for that nightthere the matter dropped, I suspected she had devised some plan bywhich I was to suffer a penalty for her present discomfiture. And thatsuspicion I found to be true no later than the next morning.
For while we were yet at breakfast, Mr. Curwen returned to thesubject, and was for sending out Mary Tyson to fetch in one of theshepherds in order to oust the bird.
"Yes, indeed," cries Dorothy, with a delighted little clap of thehands and a quick meaning glance at Mary Tyson.
The shepherds were all on the hillside; not one of them was withinreach, said Mary, with suspicious promptitude.
"But we have a ladder," said Dorothy, speaking at me, and her eyessparkling and dancing.
I made as though I had not heard the suggestion.
"Then I will myself hunt him out," said Mr. Curwen, with a readyeagerness to make proof of his activity.
"Father, that cannot be," says she. "It would put us to shame. RatherI will take it in hand;" and again she looked at me.
There was no escape.
"It is a duty which naturally falls to me," said I, not with the bestgrace in the world.
"Nay," said she, "we cannot admit of duties in our guests. It must bea pleasure to you before we allow you to undertake it."
"Then it will be a pleasure," I agreed lamely.
"We will endeavour to make it one," she replied, with a malicious nodof the head.
I tried, you may be sure, to defer this chase for an owl which I knewdid not exist, and hoped by talking very volubly upon other topics todrive the thought of it from their minds, and to that end lingeredover my breakfast, even after the rest had for some while finished.But the moment we did rise from the table: "There is no time likepresent," hinted Dorothy, plainly; and Mr. Curwen warmly secondingher--for he began to show something of excitement, like a child whensome new distraction is offered to it--I fetched the ladder from anouthouse and reared it against the wall of Applegarth, at a spot shepointed out close to my window. Accordingly I mounted, the while Mr.Curwen and his daughter remained at the foot--he quite elated, shevery sedate and serious. But no sooner had I reached the topmostrungs, than Dorothy discovers the nest a good twenty feet away; and Imust needs descend, like the merest fool, shift the ladder, and mountagain. And when once more I was at the top, she discovers it at athird place, and so on through the morning. I know not how many timesI ran up and down that accursed ladder, but my knees ached until Ithought they would break. Once or twice I stopped, as if I would haveno more of it, whereupon she covered me with the tenderest apologiesand regrets.
"But it is a farce," said I, laughing in spite of myself.
"Of course you are very tired," said she, reproachfully. "It is ashame that I should put you to so much trouble;" and she pops her footupon the lowest rung of the ladder. So there was no other course, butup I must go again, until at last she was satisfied, and I beaten withfatigue.
"It is a strange thing," said Mr. Curwen, scratching his forehead,"that we cannot discover it."
"I fancy Mr. Clavering was right," says she, with a bubble of delight,"and it is a very uncommon owl."
And I was allowed to carry the ladder back to the outhouse.