CHAPTER XVI. THE BRIDE SPEAKETH WITH FACE-OF-GOD.
FEBRUARY had died into March, and March was now twelve days old, on afair and sunny day an hour before noon; and Face-of-god was in a meadow ascant mile down the Dale from Burgstead. He had been driving a bull intoa goodman’s byre nearby, and had had to spend toil and patience both ingetting him out of the fields and into the byre; for the beast was hotwith the spring days and the new grass. So now he was resting himself inhappy mood in an exceeding pleasant place, a little meadow to wit, on oneside whereof was a great orchard or grove of sweet chestnuts, which wentright up to the feet of the Southern Cliffs: across the meadow ran aclear brook towards the Weltering Water, free from big stones, in someplaces dammed up for the flooding of the deep pasture-meadow, and withthe grass growing on its lips down to the very water. There was a lowbank just outside the chestnut trees, as if someone had raised a dykeabout them when they were young, which had been trodden low and spreadingthrough the lapse of years by the faring of many men and beasts. Theprimroses bloomed thick upon it now, and here and there along it was alow blackthorn bush in full blossom; from the mid-meadow and right downto the lip of the brook was the grass well nigh hidden by the blossoms ofthe meadow-saffron, with daffodils sprinkled about amongst them, and inthe trees and bushes the birds, and chiefly the blackbirds, were singingtheir loudest.
There sat Face-of-god on the bank resting after his toil, and happy washis mood; since in two days’ wearing he should be pacing the Maiden Wardawaiting the token that was to lead him to Shadowy Vale; so he satcalling to mind the Friend as he had last seen her, and striving as itwere to set her image standing on the flowery grass before him, till allthe beauty of the meadow seemed bare and empty to him without her. Thenit fell into his mind that this had been a beloved trysting-place betwixthim and the Bride, and that often when they were little would they cometo gather chestnuts in the grove, and thereafter sit and prattle on theold dyke; or in spring when the season was warm would they go barefootinto the brook, seeking its treasures of troutlets and flowers andclean-washed agate pebbles. Yea, and time not long ago had they met hereto talk as lovers, and sat on that very bank in all the kindness of gooddays without a blemish, and both he and she had loved the place well forits wealth of blossoms and deep grass and goodly trees and clear runningstream.
As he thought of all this, and how often there he had praised to himselfher beauty, which he scarce dared praise to her, he frowned and slowlyrose to his feet, and turned toward the chestnut-grove, as though hewould go thence that way; but or ever he stepped down from the dyke heturned about again, and even therewith, like the very image and ghost ofhis thought, lo! the Bride herself coming up from out the brook andwending toward him, her wet naked feet gleaming in the sun as they troddown the tender meadow-saffron and brushed past the tufts of daffodils.He stood staring at her discomforted, for on that day he had much tothink of that seemed happy to him, and he deemed that she would nowquestion him, and his mind pondered divers ways of answering her, andnone seemed good to him. She drew near and let her skirts fall over herfeet, and came to him, her gown hem dragging over the flowers: then shestood straight up before him and greeted him, but reached not forth herhand to him nor touched him. Her face was paler that its wont, and hervoice trembled as she spake to him and said:
‘Face-of-god, I would ask thee a gift.’
‘All gifts,’ he said, ‘that thou mayest ask, and I may give, lie open tothee.’
She said: ‘If I be alive when the time comes this gift thou mayst wellgive me.’
‘Sweet kinswoman,’ said he, ‘tell me what it is that thou wouldest haveof me.’ And he was ill-at-ease as he waited for her answer.
She said: ‘Ah, kinsman, kinsman! Woe on the day that maketh kinshipaccursed to me because thou desirest it!’
He held his peace and was exceeding sorry; and she said:
‘This is the gift that I ask of thee, that in the days to come when thouart wedded, thou wilt give me the second man-child whom thou begettest.’
He said: ‘This shalt thou have, and would that I might give thee muchmore. Would that we were little children together other again, as whenwe played here in other days.’
She said: ‘I would have a token of thee that thou shalt show to the God,and swear on it to give me the gift. For the times change.’
‘What token wilt thou have?’ said he.
She said: ‘When next thou farest to the Wood, thou shalt bring me back,it maybe a flower from the bank ye sit upon, or a splinter from the daïsof the hall wherein ye feast, or maybe a ring or some matter that thestrangers are wont to wear. That shall be the token.’
She spoke slowly, hanging her head adown, but she lifted it presently andlooked into his face and said:
‘Woe’s me, woe’s me, Gold-mane! How evil is this day, when bewailing meI may not bewail thee also! For I know that thine heart is glad. Allthrough the winter have I kept this hidden in my heart, and durst notspeak to thee. But now the spring-tide hath driven me to it. Let summercome, and who shall say?’
Great was his grief, and his shame kept him silent, and he had no word tosay; and again she said:
‘Tell me, Gold-mane, when goest thou thither?’
He said: ‘I know not surely, may happen in two days, may happen in ten.Why askest thou?’
‘O friend!’ she said, ‘is it a new thing that I should ask thee whitherthou goest and whence thou comest, and the times of thy coming and going.Farewell to-day! Forget not the token. Woe’s me, that I may not kissthy fair face!’
She spread her arms abroad and lifted up her face as one who waileth, butno sound came from her lips; then she turned about and went away as shehad come.
But as for him he stood there after she was gone in all confusion, as ifhe were undone: for he felt his manhood lessened that he should thus andso sorely have hurt a friend, and in a manner against his will. And yethe was somewhat wroth with her, that she had come upon him so suddenly,and spoken to him with such mastery, and in so few words, and he withnone to make answer to her, and that she had so marred his pleasure andhis hope of that fair day. Then he sat him down again on the flowerybank, and little by little his heart softened, and he once more called tomind many a time when they had been there before, and the plays and thegames they had had together there when they were little. And hebethought him of the days that were long to him then, and now seemedshort to him, and as if they were all grown together into one story, andthat a sweet one. Then his breast heaved with a sob, and the tears roseto his eyes and burned and stung him, and he fell a-weeping for thatsweet tale, and wept as he had wept once before on that old dyke whenthere had been some child’s quarrel between them, and she had gone awayand left him.
Then after a while he ceased his weeping, and looked about him lestanyone might be coming, and then he arose and went to and fro in thechestnut-grove for a good while, and afterwards went his ways from thatmeadow, saying to himself: ‘Yet remaineth to me the morrow of to-morrow,and that is the first of the days of the watching for the token.’
But all that day he was slow to meet the eyes of men; and in the hallthat eve he was silent and moody; for from time to time it came over himthat some of his manhood had departed from him.