Part 66 (1/2)
”What? Knaw what, Will? For the Lard's sake doan't 'e look at me like that; you'll frighten my heart into my mouth.”
”To think he knawed an' watched an' waited all these years! The spider patience o' that man! I see how 't was. He let the world have its way an' thought to see me broken wi'out any trouble from him. Then, when I conquered, an' got to Miller's right hand, an' beat the world at its awn game, he--an' been nursing this against me! The heart of un!”
He spoke to himself aloud, gazing straight before him at nothing.
”Will, tell me what 't is. Caan't your awn true wife help 'e now or never?”
Recalled by her words he came to himself, picked up her book, and walked on. She spoke again and then he answered,--
”No, 't is a coil wheer you caan't do nought--nor n.o.body. The black power o' waitin'--'t is that I never heard tell of. I thought I knawed what was in men to the core--me, thirty years of age, an' a ripe man if ever theer was wan. But this malice! 'T is enough to make 'e believe in the devil.”
”What have you done?” she cried aloud. ”Tell me the worst of it, an' how gert a thing he've got against you.”
”Bide quiet,” he answered. ”I'll tell 'e, but not on the public road.
Not but he'll take gude care every ear has it presently. Shut your mouth now an' come up to our chamber arter breakfast an' I'll tell 'e the rights of it. An' that dog knawed an' could keep it close all these years!”
”He's dangerous, an' terrible, an' strong. I see it in your faace, Will.”
”So he is, then; ban't no foxin' you 'bout it now. 'T is an awful power of waitin' he've got; an' he haven't bided his time these years an'
years for nothin'. A feast to him, I lay. He've licked his d.a.m.ned lips many a score o' times to think of the food he'd fat his vengeance with bimebye.”
”Can he taake you from me? If not I'll bear it.”
”Ess fay, I'm done for; credit, fortune, all gone. It might have been death if us had been to war at the time.”
She clung to him and her head swam.
”Death! G.o.d's mercy! you've never killed n.o.body, Will?”
”Not as I knaws on, but p'r'aps ban't tu late to mend it. It freezes me--it freezes my blood to think what his thoughts have been. No, no, ban't death or anything like that. But 't is prison for sure if--”
He broke off and his face was very dark.
”What, Will? If what? Oh, comfort me, comfort me, Will, for G.o.d's sake!
An' another li'l wan comin'!”
”Doan't take on,” he said. ”Ban't my way to squeal till I'm hurt. Let it bide, an' be bright an' cheery come eating, for mother 's down in the mouth at losin' Chris, though she doan't shaw it.”
Mrs. Blanchard, with little Timothy, joined the breakfast party at Monks Barton, and a certain gloom hanging over the party, Mr. Blee commented upon it in his usual critical spirit.
”This here givin' in marriage do allus make a looker-on down in the mouth if he 's a sober-minded sort o' man. 'T is the contrast between the courageousness of the two poor sawls jumpin' into the state, an' the solid fact of bein' a man's wife or a woman's husband for all time. The vows they swear! An' that Martin's voice so strong an' cheerful! A teeming cause o' broken oaths the marriage sarvice; yet each new pair comes along like sheep to the slaughter.”
”You talk like a bachelor man,” said Damaris.
”Not so, Mrs. Blanchard, I a.s.sure 'e! Lookers-on see most of the game.
Ban't the mite as lives in a cheese what can tell e' 'bout the flavour of un. Look at a married man at a weddin'--all broadcloth an'
cheerfulness, like the fox as have lost his tail an' girns to see another chap in the same pickle.”
”Yet you tried blamed hard to lose your tail an' get a wife, for all your talk,” said Will, who, although his mind was full enough, yet could generally find a sharp word for Mr. Blee.