when i came into supper that evening my friend of the fog was standing beside father on the parlor hearth-rug. directly i saw him, i wondered how i could have been such a fool as not to have guessed at once that that was mr. trayton harrod. but it had never occurred to me for a moment; and when i recognized in the man to whom i had promised to be friendly, also the person who had presumed to take me by the waist and pitch me over a gate, all my bad temper of before swelled up within me worse than ever, and i felt as though it would be quite impossible for me even to be civil. and yet i had since promised somebody, even more definitely than i had promised joyce, that i would do my best to make matters run smoothly.
on that very evening father had made an appeal to my better feelings. it seems that, while i had been out, reuben ruck and mother had had a real pitched battle. mother had told him to do something in preparation for the arrival of the bailiff, which he had[114] refused to do; and upon that mother had gone to father, and had said that it was absolutely necessary that reuben should leave.
when i came home i had found father standing on the terrace in the sunset. it was a very unwise thing for him to do, for the air was chill. i wondered what had brought him out, and whether he could be looking for me. the little feeling of estrangement that had been between us since he had settled for the bailiff to come to the farm had given me a great deal of pain, and a lump rose in my throat as i saw him there watching me come up the hill. it was partly repentance for the feelings i had had towards him, partly hope that he was going to want me again as he used to do.
"where have you been, lass?" said he, when i reached him. "you look sadly."
i laughed. the tears were near, but i laughed. my arm hurt me very much, and my head ached strangely; but i was so glad to hear him speak to me again like that.
"the mist has taken my hair out of curl," said i; "that's all. i have been down to the cliffs to take old warren some tea. did you want me?"
"yes," answered he; "i want to have a talk with you."
"well, come in-doors then," said i. "you know you oughtn't to be out so late."
we went into the study. mother and deb were getting supper ready in the front dwelling-room. there was no lamp lit; we sat down in the dusk.
"your mother and reuben have had a row, meg," began father, with a kind of twinkle in his eye, although he spoke gravely.
"a row!" echoed i; "what about?"
"about mr. trayton harrod," answered father; "she wants me to send reuben away."
"send reuben away!" cried i, aghast. "why, it wouldn't be possible. there would be more harm done by the old folks going away than any good that would come of new folks coming; that i'll warrant."
"that's not the question," said father, tapping the table with his hand. "mr. harrod has got to come, you know, and if the old folks don't like it, why, they'll have to go."
"there's one thing certain," added i, "reuben wouldn't go if he were sent away fifty times."
father laughed; the first time i had heard him laugh for a fortnight.
[115]
"well, he'll have to be pleasant if he does stay," said he.
"oh, you none of you understand reuben," said i. "he's not so stupid as you all think. he'll be pleasant if he thinks it's for our good that he should be pleasant. he wishes us well. but he'll want convincing first. and," i added, with a little laugh, "maybe i want convincing myself first."
and it was then that father appealed to my better feelings.
"yes, meg," said he, "i know that. i've seen that all along, and maybe it's natural. we none of us like strangers about. but i thought fit to have mr. harrod come for the good of the farm, and now what we all have to do is to treat him civilly, and make the work easy for him." i was silent, but father went on: "and what i want you to do, meg, is to help me make the work easy for him. it won't be easier to him than it is to us. if his father had not died beggared i suppose he would have had his own by now. it is a hard thing for children when their parents beggar them." it being dark, i could not see his face, but i heard him sigh, and i saw him pass his hand over his brow. "mother is right," he added. "we ought to make him feel it as little as we can, and as joyce is away, you're the daughter of the house now, meg. i want you to remember that. i want you to do the honors of the house as a daughter should. what a daughter is at home a wife will be when she is married."
"i shall never marry," said i, with a short laugh. "but i'll behave properly, father, never fear."
"that's right, my lass," said father, who seemed to take this speech as meaning something more conciliatory than it looks now as i set it down. "he is coming to-night to supper. mother means to ask him to come every night to supper. she would have liked to give him house-room, but that don't seem to be possible. so we mean to make him welcome to our board."
"all right," said i. "i suppose mother knows best."
"yes," echoed father; "mother always knows best. she's a wise woman, that's why every one loves her."
again i promised to do what i could to resemble mother—to conciliate reuben, and to make myself agreeable to our guest. and yet, alas! in spite of all that, i could not conquer my petty feelings of ill-temper when i came into the parlor and found that the man to whom i intended to be polite was the man who had offended me by being polite to me. what a foolish girl i was! as i look back upon it now i am half inclined to smile. but i was only nineteen.
[116]
mr. harrod had his back towards me when i came into the room. but i could not have failed to recognize the broad, strong shoulders and the very black curly hair. i must have been the more changed of the two, for i had brushed and braided my locks, which curled all the merrier for the wetting, and i had put on another dress. nevertheless, his eyes had scarcely rested upon me before his mouth broke again into that smile that showed the strong white teeth.
"i hope you're none the worse, miss," said he. "i was afraid you had got a bad shaking."
deborah, who was bringing in the supper, looked at me sharply. mother had not yet come in, and father was in a brown-study, but the remark had not escaped old deb. she could not keep silence even before a stranger.
"i thought you looked as if you had been up to some mischief again," said she. "your face is a nice sight."
i flushed angrily. i think it was enough to make any girl angry. it was bad enough to know that i was disfigured by a scratch on my cheek without having a stranger's attention attracted to it, and running a risk besides of a scolding from mother, who came in at the moment. luckily she did not hear what deborah had said. she was too much engaged in welcoming her guest, which she did with that gentle dignity that to some might have looked like a want of cordiality, but to me seems, as i look back upon it, to be just what a welcome should be—hospitable without being anxious. but when we were seated at the supper-table she noticed the mark on my face.
"it's only a fall that i got on the marsh," said i, in answer to her inquiry. "it isn't of the slightest consequence."
she said no more, neither did mr. harrod. i must say i was grateful to him. he saw that i wished the matter to be forgotten, and he respected my desire; but i have often wondered since, what construction he put upon my behavior. if he thought about me at all, he must have considered me a somewhat extraordinary example of a young lady, but i do not suppose that he did consider me at all. of course i was nothing but a figure to him; he had plenty to do feeling his level in the new life upon which he had just entered.
i am sure that mr. harrod was a very shy and a very proud man. when mother said that she should expect him every evening to sup at the grange, he refused her invitation with what i thought scant gratitude, although the words he used were civil enough; and when father spoke of his friendship with the squire, he said that he was beholden to the squire for his recommendation, but that he should[117] never consider himself a friend of a man who was in a different station of life to himself.
i think in my heart i admired him for this sentiment, and father should also have approved of it; but if i remember rightly, mother made some quiet rejoinder to the effect that it was not always the people who were on one's own level that were really one's best friends. i recollect that she, who was wont generally to sit and listen, worked hard that evening to keep up the conversation.
dear mother! whom with the arrogance of youth i had never considered excellent excepting as a housewife or a sick-nurse. county news, the volunteer camp, the drainage of the marsh, the scarcity of well-water, the want of enterprise in the towns-people, the coming elections—dear me, she had them all out, whereas father and i, who had undertaken, as it were, to put our best legs foremost, sat silent and glum. to do myself justice, i had a racking headache, and for once in my life i really felt ill, but i might have behaved better than i did.
mr. harrod began to thaw slowly under the influence of mother's kindness. she had such a winning way with her when she chose, that everybody gave way before it; and i noticed that even from the very first, when he was certainly in a touchy frame of mind towards these, his first employers, mr. harrod treated mother with just the same reverential consideration that every one always used towards her.
in spite of it all that first evening was not a comfortable time. father and mr. harrod compared notes upon different breeds of cattle and upon different kinds of grains; but there was a restraint upon us all, and i think every one was glad when mother made the move from the table and father lit his pipe. i have no knowledge of how they got on afterwards over their tobacco; when i rose from the table the room swam around me, and if it had not been for deborah, who, entering on some errand at the moment, took me by the shoulders and pushed me out of the door in front of her, i am afraid i should have made a most unusual and undignified exhibition of myself in the grange parlor. as it was i had to submit to be tucked up in bed by the old woman, and only persuaded her with the greatest difficulty not to tell mother of my accident, some account of which, as was to be expected, she wrung from me in explanation of mr. harrod's words in the parlor.
"i'd not have been beholden to him if i could have helped it," were the consoling words with which she left me; and as i lay there,[118] aching and miserable, i became quite convinced that any comradeship between myself and my father's bailiff had become all the more impossible because of the occurrence of the afternoon.
