CHAPTER VII. A ROSE OF WOMANHOOD
When he emerged from the spruce wood and entered the orchard his heartgave a sudden leap, and he felt that the blood rushed madly to his face.She was there, bending over the bed of June lilies in the centre of thegarden plot. He could only see her profile, virginal and white.
He stopped, not wishing to startle her again. When she lifted her headhe expected to see her shrink and flee, but she did not do so; she onlygrew a little paler and stood motionless, watching him intently.
Seeing this, he walked slowly towards her, and when he was so closeto her that he could hear the nervous flutter of her breath over herparted, trembling lips, he said very gently,
"Do not be afraid of me. I am a friend, and I do not wish to disturb orannoy you in any way."
She seemed to hesitate a moment. Then she lifted a little slate thathung at her belt, wrote something on it rapidly, and held it out to him.He read, in a small distinctive handwriting,
"I am not afraid of you now. Mother told me that all strange men werevery wicked and dangerous, but I do not think you can be. I have thoughta great deal about you, and I am sorry I ran away the other night."
He realized her entire innocence and simplicity. Looking earnestly intoher still troubled eyes he said,
"I would not do you any harm for the world. All men are not wicked,although it is too true that some are so. My name is Eric Marshall andI am teaching in the Lindsay school. You, I think, are Kilmeny Gordon.I thought your music so very lovely the other evening that I have beenwishing ever since that I might hear it again. Won't you play for me?"
The vague fear had all gone from her eyes by this time, and suddenly shesmiled--a merry, girlish, wholly irresistible smile, which broke throughthe calm of her face like a gleam of sunlight rippling over a placidsea. Then she wrote, "I am very sorry that I cannot play this evening.I did not bring my violin with me. But I will bring it to-morrow eveningand play for you if you would like to hear me. I should like to pleaseyou."
Again that note of innocent frankness! What a child she was--what abeautiful, ignorant child, utterly unskilled in the art of hiding herfeelings! But why should she hide them? They were as pure and beautifulas herself. Eric smiled back at her with equal frankness.
"I should like it more than I can say, and I shall be sure to cometo-morrow evening if it is fine. But if it is at all damp or unpleasantyou must not come. In that case another evening will do. And now won'tyou give me some flowers?"
She nodded, with another little smile, and began to pick some of theJune lilies, carefully selecting the most perfect among them. He watchedher lithe, graceful motions with delight; every movement seemed poetryitself. She looked like a very incarnation of Spring--as if all theshimmer of young leaves and glow of young mornings and evanescentsweetness of young blossoms in a thousand springs had been embodied inher.
When she came to him, radiant, her hands full of the lilies, a coupletfrom a favourite poem darted into his head--
"A blossom vermeil white That lightly breaks a faded flower sheath, Here, by God's rood, is the one maid for me."
The next moment he was angry with himself for his folly. She was,after all, nothing but a child--and a child set apart from her fellowcreatures by her sad defect. He must not let himself think nonsense.
"Thank you. These June lilies are the sweetest flowers the spring bringsus. Do you know that their real name is the white narcissus?" She lookedpleased and interested.
"No, I did not know," she wrote. "I have often read of the whitenarcissus and wondered what it was like. I never thought of it being thesame as my dear June lilies. I am glad you told me. I love flowers verymuch. They are my very good friends."
"You couldn't help being friends with the lilies. Like always takes tolike," said Eric. "Come and sit down on the old bench--here, where youwere sitting that night I frightened you so badly. I could not imaginewho or what you were. Sometimes I thought I had dreamed you--only," headded under his breath and unheard by her, "I could never have dreamedanything half so lovely."
She sat down beside him on the old bench and looked unshrinkingly in hisface. There was no boldness in her glance--nothing but the most perfect,childlike trust and confidence. If there had been any evil in hisheart--any skulking thought, he was afraid to acknowledge--thoseeyes must have searched it out and shamed it. But he could meet themunafraid. Then she wrote,
"I was very much frightened. You must have thought me very silly, but Ihad never seen any man except Uncle Thomas and Neil and the egg peddler.And you are different from them--oh, very, very different. I was afraidto come back here the next evening. And yet, somehow, I wanted to come.I did not want you to think I did not know how to behave. I sent Neilback for my bow in the morning. I could not do without it. I cannotspeak, you know. Are you sorry?"
"I am very sorry for your sake."
"Yes, but what I mean is, would you like me better if I could speak likeother people?"
"No, it does not make any difference in that way, Kilmeny. By the way,do you mind my calling you Kilmeny?"
She looked puzzled and wrote, "What else should you call me? That is myname. Everybody calls me that."
"But I am such a stranger to you that perhaps you would wish me to callyou Miss Gordon."
"Oh, no, I would not like that," she wrote quickly, with a distressedlook on her face. "Nobody ever calls me that. It would make me feelas if I were not myself but somebody else. And you do not seem like astranger to me. Is there any reason why you should not call me Kilmeny?"
"No reason whatever, if you will allow me the privilege. You have a verylovely name--the very name you ought to have."
"I am glad you like it. Do you know that I was called after mygrandmother and she was called after a girl in a poem? Aunt Janet hasnever liked my name, although she liked my grandmother. But I am gladyou like both my name and me. I was afraid you would not like me becauseI cannot speak."
"You can speak through your music, Kilmeny."
She looked pleased. "How well you understand," she wrote. "Yes, I cannotspeak or sing as other people can, but I can make my violin say thingsfor me."
"Do you compose your own music?" he asked. But he saw she did notunderstand him. "I mean, did any one ever teach you the music you playedhere that evening?"
"Oh, no. It just came as I thought. It has always been that way. When Iwas very little Neil taught me to hold the violin and the bow, and therest all came of itself. My violin once belonged to Neil, but he gave itto me. Neil is very good and kind to me, but I like you better. Tell meabout yourself."
The wonder of her grew upon him with every passing moment. How lovelyshe was! What dear little ways and gestures she had--ways and gesturesas artless and unstudied as they were effective. And how strangelylittle her dumbness seemed to matter after all! She wrote so quickly andeasily, her eyes and smile gave such expression to her mobile face, thatvoice was hardly missed.
They lingered in the orchard until the long, languid shadows of thetrees crept to their feet. It was just after sunset and the distanthills were purple against the melting saffron of the sky in the west andthe crystalline blue of the sky in the south. Eastward, just over thefir woods, were clouds, white and high heaped like snow mountains, andthe westernmost of them shone with a rosy glow as of sunset on an Alpineheight.
The higher worlds of air were still full of light--perfect, stainlesslight, unmarred of earth shadow; but down in the orchard and under thespruces the light had almost gone, giving place to a green, dewy dusk,made passionately sweet with the breath of the apple blossoms and mint,and the balsamic odours that rained down upon them from the firs.
Eric told her of his life, and the life in the great outer world, inwhich she was girlishly and eagerly interested. She asked him manyquestions about it--direct and incisive questions which showed that shehad already formed decided opinions and views about it. Yet it was plainto be seen that she did not regard it as anything she might ever shareherself. He
rs was the dispassionate interest with which she might havelistened to a tale of the land of fairy or of some great empire longpassed away from earth.
Eric discovered that she had read a great deal of poetry and history,and a few books of biography and travel. She did not know what anovel meant and had never heard of one. Curiously enough, she was wellinformed regarding politics and current events, from the weekly paperfor which her uncle subscribed.
"I never read the newspaper while mother was alive," she wrote, "nor anypoetry either. She taught me to read and write and I read the Bible allthrough many times and some of the histories. After mother died AuntJanet gave me all her books. She had a great many. Most of them had beengiven to her as prizes when she was a girl at school, and some of themhad been given to her by my father. Do you know the story of my fatherand mother?"
Eric nodded.
"Yes, Mrs. Williamson told me all about it. She was a friend of yourmother."
"I am glad you have heard it. It is so sad that I would not like to tellit, but you will understand everything better because you know. I neverheard it until just before mother died. Then she told me all. I thinkshe had thought father was to blame for the trouble; but before she diedshe told me she believed that she had been unjust to him and that hehad not known. She said that when people were dying they saw things moreclearly and she saw she had made a mistake about father. She said shehad many more things she wanted to tell me, but she did not have time totell them because she died that night. It was a long while before I hadthe heart to read her books. But when I did I thought them so beautiful.They were poetry and it was like music put into words."
"I will bring you some books to read, if you would like them," saidEric.
Her great blue eyes gleamed with interest and delight.
"Oh, thank you, I would like it very much. I have read mine over sooften that I know them nearly all by heart. One cannot get tired ofreally beautiful things, but sometimes I feel that I would like some newbooks."
"Are you never lonely, Kilmeny?"
"Oh, no, how could I be? There is always plenty for me to do, helpingAunt Janet about the house. I can do a great many things"--she glancedup at him with a pretty pride as her flying pencil traced the words. "Ican cook and sew. Aunt Janet says I am a very good housekeeper, and shedoes not praise people very often or very much. And then, when I amnot helping her, I have my dear, dear violin. That is all the company Iwant. But I like to read and hear of the big world so far away and thepeople who live there and the things that are done. It must be a verywonderful place."
"Wouldn't you like to go out into it and see its wonders and meet thosepeople yourself?" he asked, smiling at her.
At once he saw that, in some way he could not understand, he had hurther. She snatched her pencil and wrote, with such swiftness ofmotion and energy of expression that it almost seemed as if she hadpassionately exclaimed the words aloud,
"No, no, no. I do not want to go anywhere away from home. I do not wantever to see strangers or have them see me. I could not bear it."
He thought that possibly the consciousness of her defect accountedfor this. Yet she did not seem sensitive about her dumbness and madefrequent casual references to it in her written remarks. Or perhapsit was the shadow on her birth. Yet she was so innocent that it seemedunlikely she could realize or understand the existence of such a shadow.Eric finally decided that it was merely the rather morbid shrinking of asensitive child who had been brought up in an unwholesome and unnaturalway. At last the lengthening shadows warned him that it was time to go.
"You won't forget to come to-morrow evening and play for me," he said,rising reluctantly. She answered by a quick little shake of her sleek,dark head, and a smile that was eloquent. He watched her as she walkedacross the orchard,
"With the moon's beauty and the moon's soft pace,"
and along the wild cherry lane. At the corner of the firs she paused andwaved her hand to him before turning it.
When Eric reached home old Robert Williamson was having a lunch of breadand milk in the kitchen. He looked up, with a friendly grin, as Ericstrode in, whistling.
"Been having a walk, Master?" he queried.
"Yes," said Eric.
Unconsciously and involuntarily he infused so much triumph into thesimple monosyllable that even old Robert felt it. Mrs. Williamson, whowas cutting bread at the end of the table, laid down her knife and loaf,and looked at the young man with a softly troubled expression in hereyes. She wondered if he had been back to the Connors orchard--and if hecould have seen Kilmeny Gordon again.
"You didn't discover a gold mine, I s'pose?" said old Robert dryly. "Youlook as if you might have."