Part 14 (2/2)
Peregrine shrugged his shoulders.
”Living is hard, sir. Ask no questions.”
The Doctor looked tempted to turn back with the fruit, but such doubts were viewed as ultra scruples, and would hardly have been entertained even by a magistrate such as Sir Philip Archfield.
It was not a time for questions, and Peregrine remained with them till they embarked at the point, asking to be commended to Mrs.
Woodford, and hoping soon to come and see both her and poor Hans, he left them.
CHAPTER XI: PROPOSALS
”Hear me, ye venerable core, As counsel for poor mortals, That frequent pa.s.s douce Wisdom's door For glaikit Folly's portals; I for their thoughtless, careless sakes Would here propose defences, Their doucie tricks, their black mistakes, Their failings and mischances.”
BURNS.
For seven years Anne Woodford had kept Lucy Archfield's birthday with her, and there was no refusing now, though there was more and more unwillingness to leave Mrs. Woodford, whose declining state became so increasingly apparent that even the loving daughter could no longer be blind to it.
The coach was sent over to fetch Mistress Anne to Fareham, and the invalid was left, comfortably installed in her easy-chair by the parlour fire, with a little table by her side, holding a hand-bell, a divided orange, a gla.s.s of toast and water, and the Bible and Prayer-book, wherein lay her chief studies, together with a little needlework, which still amused her feeble hands. The Doctor, divided between his parish, his study, and his garden, had promised to look in from time to time.
Presently, however, the door was gently tapped, and on her call ”Come in,” Hans, all one grin, admitted Peregrine Oakshott, bowing low in his foreign, courteous manner, and entreating her to excuse his intrusion, ”For truly, madam, in your goodness is my only hope.”
Then he knelt on one knee and kissed the hand she held out to him, while desiring him to speak freely to her.
”Nay, madam, I fear I shall startle you, when I lay before you the only chance that can aid me to overcome the demon that is in me.”
”My poor--”
”Call me your boy, as when I was here seven years ago. Let me sit at your feet as then and listen to me.”
”Indeed I will, my dear boy,” and she laid her hand on his dark head. ”Tell me all that is in your heart.”
”Ah, dear lady, that is not soon done! You and Mistress Anne, as you well know, first awoke me from my firm belief that I was none other than an elf, and yet there have since been times when I have doubted whether it were not indeed the truth.”
”Nay, Peregrine, at years of discretion you should have outgrown old wives' tales.”
”Better be an elf at once--a soulless creature of the elements--than the sport of an evil spirit doomed to perdition,” he bitterly exclaimed.
”Hush, hus.h.!.+ You know not what you are saying!”
”I know it too well, madam! There are times when I long and wish after goodness--nay, when Heaven seems open to me--and I resolve and strive after a perfect life; but again comes the wild, pa.s.sionate dragging, as it were, into all that at other moments I most loathe and abhor, and I become no more my own master. Ah!”
There was misery in his voice, and he clutched the long hair on each side of his face with his hands.
”St. Paul felt the same,” said Mrs. Woodford gently.
”'Who shall deliver me from the body of this death?' Ay, ay! how many times have I not groaned that forth! And so, if that Father at Turin were right, I am but as Paul was when he was Saul. Madam, is it not possible that I was never truly baptized?” he cried eagerly.
”Impossible, Peregrine. Was not Mr. Horncastle chaplain when you were born? Yes; and I have heard my brother say that both he and your father held the same views as the Church upon baptism.”
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