Volume I Part 11 (2/2)
The old woman's eyes sparkled with triumph for a moment as she said these words, but her voice sank low as she continued:
”Peter Meredith, if you have a sister, think of her while I speak of mine; she cannot be more pure than little Sinnamenta, nor less designing. Her weakness was one common to all women, but especially to those of our unhappy race; she was fond of finery--fine clothing, jewels, shawls; they became her; she looked like any princess when attired in them. Stanley Carew, who loved her in all honesty, could give her no such costly gifts as Ma.s.singberd Heath showered upon her, and, to help his end, even upon me. The gipsy's ragged coat looked mean and poor beside that of our guest. This man, too, whom you know but as a scowling tyrant, with a face scarred with pa.s.sion and excesses, was then a handsome youth. You smile, Peter, at the wonder of it; it is, however, not less true than that the wrinkled hag to whom you are now listening was then a bonny girl. Imagine that, Peter, and you can imagine anything. Ah, Time, Time, surely at the end of you, there will be something to recompense us for all that you have taken away!”
Once more Rachel Liversedge paused as if in pain; then with eyes whose sight seemed to receive but little of what was present, but were fixed on the unreturning Past, continued as follows:
”Yes, Ma.s.singberd Heath was handsome enough, unless when enraged; his wrath always brought the horse-shoe out upon his forehead.[1] Ay, and he was agreeable enough, too. He could smile as though he had a heart, and vow as though he owned a G.o.d. By his devilish art he managed to ingratiate himself with Sinnamenta; he caused her to treat poor Stanley ill, and then, pretending to take his part, got credit for generosity.
There are many who call us gipsies a base people, yet this excess of meanness was quite new to us; my little sister--that was what I always called her, because I loved her so--she believed him. She would have trusted to his word, and married him, according to our rites, and been his wife and drudge for all her life; but since this could not be without the consent both of her father and Morris, he had to ask it of them. He might as well have asked it of Sir Wentworth; they had got to know him well by close companions.h.i.+p, for men fathom men better than women do--even gipsy women, who foretell men's fortunes for them--and they answered, 'No.' They did not believe that he had the least intention of being with us longer that it suited him, and they peremptorily refused his request. After one burst of pa.s.sionate threats, the young man pretended to yield a.s.sent to their decision. Morris was inclined to think this acquiescence genuine; but my father, more warmly interested in the matter, and therefore perhaps less credulous, kept on his guard. Finding out that Ma.s.singberd Heath had secretly made overtures of reconciliation to his father, and missing him one night from the camp, he caused Morris to strike tent at once; and before morning we had put twenty miles between us and Fairburn. Nor was this effected too soon, for, as we heard long afterwards, the constables were searching this very wood for us at day-break.
”Our company was bound on a long travel to Kirk-Yetholm, Roxburghs.h.i.+re, one of the few places in Scotland, although but one mile from the frontier of Northumberland, where the gipsies reside in any number.
There we should meet with friends, and be safe from all molestation. It was late in the year to travel so far and into such a climate, but there was no help for it; and moreover, some of the Carews had a house there, to which Stanley said we should be welcome; and so it turned out. I believe Sinnamenta would rather that we had camped out of doors, even in that northern clime, so disinclined was she to be beholden to him or his friends, after what had happened, although she did not dare to say so.
Poor Stanley imagined that, now we had removed from the neighbourhood of his rival, he might renew his suit with success; but the proud girl would not listen to him. She did not exactly pine after the man whose wiles she had so narrowly escaped, but her life seemed henceforth saddened. The domestic duties which had hitherto sat so lightly upon her, became burdensome, and she set about them languidly. The whole of the time we remained at Kirk-Yetholm, and it was many, many months, she never mentioned Ma.s.singberd Heath, but never ceased to think of him. It was fated that she was to be undeceived about that man too late.”
[1] I am reminded by a friendly critic of the ”suspicious coincidence”
of a horse-shoe on the forehead, in the case of ”Redgauntlet.” I never think of Sir Ma.s.singberd without thinking of that worthy; and it has been a matter of doubt with me, whether Sir Walter Scott might not himself have seen the Squire of Fairburn and drawn him from the life--both as to mind and feature--in his famous novel.
CHAPTER XV.
THE REASON CONTINUED.
”About a year after our departure from Fairburn, Sinnamenta and I had been to sell some baskets, the making of which was a great trade with us at that time, at Wooler, in Northumberland; and on our return from the fair that was being held there, we met a number of gentlemen driving home from shooting in the Cheviots. They went by very rapidly, yet not so fast but that I recognized one of their number; I had only to look at my little sister's cheeks to see that she had recognized him also. The very next day came Ma.s.singberd Heath to our camp, professing himself injured by our abrupt withdrawal from his society, volunteering his companions.h.i.+p as before, and reiterating his vows and promises to Sinnamenta. She expressed herself in such a manner as to lead us almost to fear she might be induced to elope with him; while he, upon his side, seemed prepared to sacrifice everything to obtain her: his very selfishness caused him, as it were, to forget himself; and I do believe, if it had been insisted upon, he would have had the banns published in Wooler Church, in the hearing of the fine friends with whom he was staying, and been married by the parson. However, he again proposed to go through the Cingari ceremony, and this time, Morris and my father agreed to it. Having acknowledged himself to be an adopted gipsy, Ma.s.singberd Heath was joined in wedlock to Sinnamenta Liversedge; the ordinary ceremonies were dispensed with, by command of Morris, the bride and bridegroom only pledging themselves to one another solemnly in the presence of the a.s.sembled tribe. It was then, since he could not purchase suitable presents in such an out-of-the-way district, that I received from that man's hand this shooting-flask, as a remembrance of that day; my uncle commanded me to accept it (although I vehemently disapproved of what had been done), and I therefore keep it now, when every other gift of that accursed man has long been committed to the flames. For my part, I could not understand this novel pliancy on the part of Morris and my father; while Sinnamenta, as I think, implicitly believed in her lover's protestation, that for her sake he would all his life be a wanderer like ourselves. That very day, however, he took her away southward, on his road to London.
”For beauty, as I have said, and for gentleness, there never breathed the equal of my little sister, and yet in six short months this Heath grew weary of her; like a spoiled child tired with a fragile toy, he cared not what became of her, so long as it vexed his eyes no more. It is not necessary to tell what brutal insult he put upon her; enough to say that she fled from him in terror, as he had intended her to do, and returned to us, heart-stricken, woe-begone, about to become a mother, with nothing but wretchedness in the Future, and even her happy Past a dream dispelled. It was dreadful to look upon my little sister, and compare her to what she had been so short a time before. She felt the cold after her luxurious life in town; but she was far more ill at ease in mind than body. Above all, she sorrowed because her lover's desertion had left her disgraced--that she had brought shame upon all who belonged to her. Incited by the poor girl's misery, Morris and my father put into effect an audacious design which they had privately had long in hand. We were back again at Fairburn--all but Stanley Carew, who was away about a new horse for our covered cart--not camping in the plantation, as of old, for fear of Sir Wentworth, but upon the common hard by. On a certain morning, neither my father nor uncle went forth as usual, but sat at home smoking and watching at the opening of the tent.
Not long after breakfast, there appeared a wayfarer in the distance, whose form showed gigantic in the summer haze.
”That must be a big fellow, little sister,” said I, drawing her attention to it. She was sitting huddled up, as usual, in front of the fire; but no sooner had she caught sight of the object in question, than she ran with a cry to her father's knee, and besought him to save her from Ma.s.singberd Heath. Ah, even then, at that last moment, if father or uncle had but consulted me, or let me into their plans, I should not have my little sister's shuddering face before me as now, the large eyes wild, the full lips pale with terror. He had beaten her, poor darling, even before the scene that was coming; but she had even more reason than she knew for fear. This man came striding on to the entrance of the tent, and stood there looking at its inmates with a withering scowl. 'Why don't you speak,' said he, 'you vagabonds! For what is it that you have dared to send for me?'
”My father pointed towards Sinnamenta--'Is not that cause enough, Ma.s.singberd Heath?'
”'No,' retorted the ruffian coolly. 'What is she to me? The drab has come to her thieving friends again, it seems--the more fool she; for there was more than one who had a fancy for her in town, and would have taken her off my hands.'
”My father's fingers mechanically sought the knife which lay beside his half-finished basket; but my uncle Morris stood up between him and the speaker, and thus replied:--
”Ma.s.singberd Heath, I sent for you to tell you something which concerns both us and you. Many months ago, you came to us, uninvited and unwelcome, and elected to be a gipsy like ourselves. This makes you smile very scornfully; yet if you did not mean the thing you said, you lied. However, we believed you. You were admitted into what, however wretched and debased it may seem to you, was our home, and all we had to offer you was at your service. You fell in love with that poor girl yonder, and she did not tremble at your voice, as now, but trusted to your honour. It is true, your position in the world was high, and hers was what you saw it to be. Still you wooed her, and not she you; that is so, and you know it. Do not slander her, sir, lest presently you should be sorry for it. Again and again, then, you demanded her hand in marriage--such marriage, that is, as prevails among our people--not so ceremonious, indeed, as with the rest of the world, but not less binding. This we would not grant, because we disbelieved your protestations on your honour and before your G.o.d; and disbelieved them, as it has turned out, with reason. Then we fled from you and your false solicitations to the north, hundreds of miles away; even thither you followed us, or else accidentally fell in with us; I know not which. You renewed your offers and your oaths. We found, all worthless as you are, that the poor girl loved you still, and, yielding to your repeated importunity, we suffered her to become your wife.'
”'Wife!' repeated the renegade contemptuously. 'Do you suppose, then, that I valued your gipsy mummeries at a pin's head? You might as well attempt to tie these wrists of mine with the gossamer from yonder furze.'
”'We knew that, Ma.s.singberd Heath, although the girl did not know it; she trusted you, although your every word was false.'
”'She is fool enough for anything,' returned the other brutally. 'But I know all this. Have you dared to bring me here merely to repeat so stale a story?'
”'A story with an ending that you have yet to learn,' pursued my uncle sternly. You were wedded by no gipsy mummeries, as you call them; you took Sinnamenta Liversedge, in the presence of many persons, solemnly to wife.'
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