CHAPTER VII.
Mr. Himes, or "Old Himes," as he was often, with irreverentfamiliarity, designated in the neighborhood, took his seat at thesupper-table in his own kitchen and looked across it with an expressionof mingled contempt and disgust at the woman who sat opposite andpoured his coffee.
Her face, though young and blooming, was hardly clean; her frowzy,unkempt hair was in curl papers over her forehead; her dress,originally a gayly colored calico, soiled, faded, and torn--a notinviting picture for even a rough, hard-working old farmer to see atthe head of his table.
"Things has changed considerable since courtin' days, B'lindy," heremarked in a bitter, sarcastic tone. "You used to slick up real nicein them times when you knowed I was comin'."
"Of course I did; but now my fortin's made, what ud be the use o' goin'to all that trouble?" she returned, with a short laugh.
"It's a kind o' cheatin', I think," he went on, eyeing her withincreasing disgust, "to 'low a man to marry you with the idee that he'sgettin' a neat, managin', orderly woman, and then turn out a slatternsuch as you."
"Not a bit more cheatin' than fer a man to give a woman the notion thathe'a a goin' to pet and humor her and give her everything she wants,and then, when he's got her fast, turn out mean and stingy and hard,wantin' to force her to work mornin', noon, and night, like a nigger,and never have nothin' decent to wear, let alone a cent o' money tocall her own," she retorted, angrily.
"I was just objectin' to your not lookin' decent. You've got clo'es aplenty if you'd wear 'em."
"I haven't. I'd ought to have a new dress this minute, and a handsomeone too. I'm sure I deserve it fer throwin' myself away on an oldcodger like you when there was a plenty o' likely young fellers aswould a been glad enough to get me, and treat me decent, too!" shecried, bursting into angry tears.
"That isn't no way to get nothin' out o' me, I kin tell ye!" he growled.
"You're an old brute! You're always abusin' me," she sobbed. "As ifanybody could keep fixed up and doin' all the hard, dirty work I haveto do."
"Some folks kin. There's Miss Heath, now; no matter what she's doin'she's always neat as a pin--hair done up smooth, dress clean and fresh,if it ain't but a cheap calico."
"Pity you hadn't married her!"
"Just what I think--if I could a got her. Don't know about that, seein'as I never asked her. I was fool enough to be took in with your blackeyes and red cheeks and simperin' ways. But I wouldn't a been if I'dknowed what a poor fist you'd make at housekeepin' an' cookin', lettin'things run to waste, and how you'd spoil all your good looks by keepin'yerself more'n half the time so slatternly and dirty. Neatness andcleanliness are better, to my way o' thinkin', than all the finery inthe world."
They were an ill-assorted couple, of uncongenial disposition andutterly dissimilar tastes and opinions, as was not surprising in viewof the fact that they had been very differently brought up, and thatshe was the younger by some forty years.
She, a penniless, almost friendless orphan, had married for a home andwith the vain expectation of being a petted darling, who would havelittle to do but deck herself in finery; he, to gratify a suddenfoolish fancy which had speedily changed to disgust when he becameacquainted with the true character of its object.
Such scenes of mutual anger and recrimination were now by no means ofrare occurrence between them. He presently rose, and with a partingfling at her untidy appearance and faulty housewifery, went out toattend to his cattle.
Belinda, springing to her feet, shook her clinched fist at his back ashe disappeared through the doorway, and muttering, "You old tyrant,I'll pay you off one o' these fine days, that I will!" began gatheringup the dishes and clearing the table with angry jerks and a great dealof clatter.
She smiled a grim smile of satisfaction as, on going to the door anhour later, she saw her husband walking briskly down the road in thedirection of the nearest neighbor's.
"There, he's off for a good long talk with Mr. Harkness, and I'll havethe house to myself for awhile," she said, half aloud, having, frombeing much alone, fallen into the habit of talking audibly to herself.
The sun had set, and within doors it was growing dark. She lighted alamp, swept and otherwise set to rights her dirty, disorderly kitchen,released her hair from its curl papers, combed, brushed, and arrangedit becomingly before a looking-glass hanging on the wall above a sidetable.
Then, lamp in hand, she went into an adjoining bedroom, where shechanged her dingy, dirty dress for a comparatively new and clean one,adding to her adornment collar, cuffs, and a showy breastpin.
She stood for several minutes smiling and simpering at her reflectionin the glass; then, pulling open a bureau drawer, took from it ascarlet shawl, which she folded with care and threw over her plumpshoulders. Next, a bonnet of crimson cotton velvet profusely trimmedwith cheap feathers and flowers was taken from a bandbox, turned aboutadmiringly in her hands, then tried on before the glass with arepetition of the simpering and smiling.
"It's just splendid!" she said, aloud, "and the becomingest thing out.But what on earth was that?" she cried, starting, and turning towardthe window with a frightened look. She had seemed to hear a quickbreath, a muttered curse.
She stood for a moment trembling with fear, gazing at the window withdilated eyes. There were no shutters, but a short muslin curtain wasdrawn across the lower sash, completely obstructing her view of any andeverything that might be upon the outside. "What was there?" She darednot go nearer to examine and satisfy her doubts by raising curtain orsash and looking out.
But there was no repetition of the sound, and presently she concludedshe had been mistaken; it was all imagination; and she fell to admiringherself and her finery as before.
There was a face at the window, pressed close against the glass, wherethe parting of the curtain left a slight opening through which a goodview might thus be obtained of all that was transpiring within theroom. It was the face of a tall, stoutly built man, very much youngerthan her husband and more comely of feature, but his expression as heglared upon her was at times almost diabolical.
"Yes, them's the things she's sold herself fer," he muttered, grindinghis teeth with rage. Then, softening a little, "But she is a purtycrayther, an' it's mesilf, Phalim O'Rourke, that cud a'most be foolenough to thry her agin if the ould thafe of a husband was out o' theway."
Then again, as he watched her childish delight in her finery, thesmiling, dancing eyes, the rosy cheeks dimpling, and the red lipswreathing themselves in smiles, his face darkened with jealous rage,and muttered curses were on his tongue. She was happy with his rival,the man who had robbed him of her (the pretty girl who had promisedherself to him before he went away to the war) by the superiorattraction of a well-filled purse.
The terror in her face when she overheard his curse gave him a sort offiendish delight for the moment. He would not have cared had she cometo the window and found him there, yet he thought it more prudent notto make her aware of his presence or further excite her fears.
At length the sound of approaching footsteps crunching the hard, frozensnow in the road on the other side of the fence sent him from thewindow.
He stepped quickly into the shadow of the house, then behind a tree,whence he could have almost laid his hand on the shoulder of the oldfarmer as he passed on his way from the front gate to the kitchen door.
"I moight a blowed his brains out and he'd never a knowed what hurthim," the intruder said to himself with a bitter laugh as he turned andstole away to seek shelter in the barn.
Meanwhile Himes was shaking and pounding the kitchen door. Belindaheard him, hastily threw aside bonnet and shawl, snatched up the lamp,and hurried to admit him.
"What are ye locked up fer?" he growled. "Keep a man freezin' outsidetill ye choose to let him in, will ye?"
"'Twasn't two minutes," she said; "and I can tell you I'm not a goin'to stay here alone after dark with the doors unfastened and burglarsabout."
"Fixed up at
last!" he remarked, jeeringly, and eyeing her askance asshe set the lamp on the table.
Picking it up, he walked into the bedroom. She had left the door ajarin her haste, and he seemed to know by intuition that she had beenthere, and at something she would prefer to hide from him.
That was the fact; for though he must, of course, learn at some time ofher new purchases, she wished, since it was sure to anger him, to putoff the evil day as long as possible.
She followed him with a half-terrified, half-defiant air.
"What, more finery?" he exclaimed, turning on her, his face flushingangrily. "Do you intend to ruin me, woman?"
"I've earned it--every cent of it--and ten times more!" she said,straightening herself and regarding him with scornful, flashing eyes."Do you suppose I'm a goin' to cook, bake, wash, scrub, and mend foryou fer nothin'? Not if I know myself, I ain't!"
"Humph! We'll see about that!" he grunted. "I'll go to every store inPrairieville and Riverside, Frederic and Fairfield, and tell 'em not totrust you, fer I won't be responsible fer yer debts."
"Very well; then you'll pay good wages to me or somebody else, or doyour work yourself!"
He made no reply in words, but snatching the bonnet, carried it out tothe kitchen, and threw it into the fire. She rushed after him, and madefrantic efforts to save it; but he held her back, and grimly smiling,watched it slowly burn to ashes.
Then she dried her eyes and vowed vengeance; she would have a divorceand make him maintain her without work.
"I hain't the least objection in the world to the first part o' that,"he said, "but we'll see about t'other."
For hours darkness and silence had reigned supreme in the farm-house.Belinda had wept herself to sleep by the side of her now detestedspouse, and he, too, was wrapped in slumber most profound.
The door from the kitchen opened with sudden, noiseless movement, andwith equally noiseless step a tall, dark figure drew near the bed.Slowly and cautiously it turned the light of a dark lantern upon theface of the sleeping woman and bent over her a darkly scowling facewhose eyes gleamed with concentrated rage and hate.
He held the lantern in his left hand, in the right a dagger. He glancedat it, at her, and back again at it. Had her eyes opened at thatinstant, perhaps she would have died of fright; but she slept on,breathing softly and regularly, though her face wore a sad and troubledlook, and traces of tears were on her cheeks, her pillow wet with them.
The sight moved him, stern and revengeful as he was; he gazed on, hisface gradually softening, and finally turned away, slipping the daggerinto its sheath, then half withdrawing it as his eye fell on the oldman on the farther side of the bed, soundly sleeping also, with hisface to the wall, and little dreaming that there was but a step betweenhim and a death of violence and blood. One moment of hesitation, andthe intruder withdrew as stealthily as he had entered, passing onthrough the kitchen into the open air.
"I'll let 'em alone," he muttered, "and they'll revinge Phalim O'Rourkeon aich ither better'n he cud do it hisself; an' that widout annydanger o' State prison fer sendin' 'em aforehand to purgatory, thatmabbe wadn't be no worse nor what they're makin' atween theirselvesnow."