Shirley
authority as much as may be. Man, meantime, cannot do better than hold
his peace;' and so on."
"That willn't wash, miss."
"I dare say it will. My notions are dyed in faster colours than yours,
Joe. Mr. Scott, you are a thoroughly dogmatical person, and always
were. I like William better than you."
"Joe is well enough in his own house," said Shirley. "I have seen him as
quiet as a lamb at home. There is not a better nor a kinder husband in
Briarfield. He does not dogmatize to his wife."
"My wife is a hard-working, plain woman; time and trouble has ta'en all
the conceit out of her. But that is not the case with you, young misses.
And then you reckon to have so much knowledge; and i' my thoughts it's
only superficial sort o' vanities you're acquainted with. I can
tell--happen a year sin'--one day Miss Caroline coming into our
counting-house when I war packing up summat behind t' great desk, and
she didn't see me, and she brought a slate wi' a sum on it to t'
maister. It war only a bit of a sum in practice, that our Harry would
have settled i' two minutes. She couldn't do it. Mr. Moore had to show
her how. And when he did show her, she couldn't understand him."
"Nonsense, Joe!"
"Nay, it's no nonsense. And Miss Shirley there reckons to hearken to t'
maister when he's talking ower trade, so attentive like, as if she
followed him word for word, and all war as clear as a lady's
looking-glass to her een; and all t' while she's peeping and peeping out
o' t' window to see if t' mare stands quiet; and then looking at a bit
of a splash on her riding-skirt; and then glancing glegly round at wer
counting-house cobwebs and dust, and thinking what mucky folk we are,
and what a grand ride she'll have just i' now ower Nunnely Common. She
hears no more o' Mr. Moore's talk nor if he spake Hebrew."
"Joe, you are a real slanderer. I would give you your answer, only the
people are coming out of church. We must leave you. Man of prejudice,
good-bye.--William, good-bye.--Children, come up to Fieldhead to-morrow,
and you shall choose what you like best out of Mrs. Gill's store-room."
CHAPTER XIX.
A SUMMER NIGHT.
The hour was now that of dusk. A clear air favoured the kindling of the
stars.
"There will be just light enough to show me the way home," said Miss
Keeldar, as she prepared to take leave of Caroline at the rectory garden
door.
"You must not go alone, Shirley; Fanny shall accompany you."
"That she shall not. Of what need I be afraid in my own parish? I would
walk from Fieldhead to the church any fine midsummer night, three hours
later than this, for the mere pleasure of seeing the stars and the
chance of meeting a fairy."
"But just wait till the crowd is cleared away."
"Agreed. There are the five Misses Armitage streaming by. Here comes
Mrs. Sykes's phaeton, Mr. Wynne's close carriage, Mrs. Birtwhistle's
car. I don't wish to go through the ceremony of bidding them all
good-bye, so we will step into the garden and take shelter amongst the
laburnums for an instant."
The rectors, their curates, and their churchwardens now issued from the
church porch. There was a great confabulation, shaking of hands,
congratulation on speeches, recommendation to be careful of the night
air, etc. By degrees the throng dispersed, the carriages drove off. Miss
Keeldar was just emerging from her flowery refuge when Mr. Helstone
entered the garden and met her.
"Oh, I want you!" he said. "I was afraid you were already
gone.--Caroline, come here."
Caroline came, expecting, as Shirley did, a lecture on not having been
visible at church. Other subjects, however, occupied the rector's mind.
"I shall not sleep at home to-night," he continued. "I have just met
with an old friend, and promised to accompany him. I shall return
probably about noon to-morrow. Thomas, the clerk, is engaged, and I
cannot get him to sleep in the house, as I usually do when I am absent
for a night. Now----"
"Now," interrupted Shirley, "you want me as a gentleman--the first
gentleman in Briarfield, in short--to supply your place, be master of
the rectory and guardian of your niece and maids while you are away?"
"Exactly, captain. I thought the post would suit you. Will you favour
Caroline so far as to be her guest for one night? Will you stay here
instead of going back to Fieldhead?"
"And what will Mrs. Pryor do? she expects me home."
"I will send her word. Come, make up your mind to stay. It grows late;
the dew falls heavily. You and Caroline will enjoy each other's society,
I doubt not."
"I promise you, then, to stay with Caroline," replied Shirley. "As you
say, we shall enjoy each other's society. We will not be separated
to-night. Now, rejoin your old friend, and fear nothing for us."
"If there should chance to be any disturbance in the night, captain; if
you should hear the picking of a lock, the cutting out of a pane of
glass, a stealthy tread of steps about the house (and I need not fear to
tell _you_, who bear a well-tempered, mettlesome heart under your girl's
ribbon sash, that such little incidents are very possible in the present
time), what would you do?"
"Don't know; faint, perhaps--fall down, and have to be picked up again.
But, doctor, if you assign me the post of honour, you must give me arms.
What weapons are there in your stronghold?"
"You could not wield a sword?"
"No; I could manage the carving-knife better."
"You will find a good one in the dining-room sideboard--a lady's knife,
light to handle, and as sharp-pointed as a poniard."
"It will suit Caroline. But you must give me a brace of pistols. I know
you have pistols."
"I have two pairs. One pair I can place at your disposal. You will find
them suspended over the mantelpiece of my study in cloth cases."
"Loaded?"
"Yes, but not on the cock. Cock them before you go to bed. It is paying
you a great compliment, captain, to lend you these. Were you one of the
awkward squad you should not have them."
"I will take care. You need delay no longer, Mr. Helstone. You may go
now.--He is gracious to me to lend me his pistols," she remarked, as the
rector passed out at the garden gate. "But come, Lina," she continued,
"let us go in and have some supper. I was too much vexed at tea with the
vicinage of Mr. Sam Wynne to be able to eat, and now I am really
hungry."
Entering the house, they repaired to the darkened dining-room, through
the open windows of which apartment stole the evening air, bearing the
perfume of flowers from the garden, the very distant sound of
far-retreating steps from the road, and a soft, vague murmur whose
origin Caroline explained by the remark, uttered as she stood listening
at the casement, "Shirley, I hear the beck in the Hollow."
Then she rang the bell, asked for a candle and some bread and milk--Miss
Keeldar's usual supper and her own. Fanny, when she brought in the tray,
would have closed the windows and the shutters, but was requested to
desist for the present. The twilight was too calm, its breath too balmy
to be yet excluded. They took their meal in silence. Caroline rose once
to remove to the window-sill a glass of flowers which stood on the
sideboard, the exhalation from the blossoms being somewhat too powerful
for the sultry room. In returning she half opened a drawer, and took
from it something that glittered clear and keen in her hand.
"You assigned this to me, then, Shirley, did you? It is bright,
keen-edged, finely tapered; it is dangerous-looking. I never yet felt
the impulse which could move me to direct this against a
fellow-creature. It is difficult to fancy that circumstances could nerve
my arm to strike home with this long knife."
"I should hate to do it," replied Shirley, "but I think I could do it,
if goaded by certain exigencies which I can imagine." And Miss Keeldar
quietly sipped her glass of new milk, looking somewhat thoughtful and a
little pale; though, indeed, when did she not look pale? She was never
florid.
The milk sipped and the bread eaten, Fanny was again summoned. She and
Eliza were recommended to go to bed, which they were quite willing to
do, being weary of the day's exertions, of much cutting of currant-buns,
and filling of urns and teapots, and running backwards and forwards
with trays. Ere long the maids' chamber door was heard to close.
Caroline took a candle and went quietly all over the house, seeing that
every window was fast and every door barred. She did not even evade the
haunted back kitchen nor the vault-like cellars. These visited, she
returned.
"There is neither spirit nor flesh in the house at present," she said,
"which should not be there. It is now near eleven o'clock, fully
bedtime; yet I would rather sit up a little longer, if you do not
object, Shirley. Here," she continued, "I have brought the brace of
pistols from my uncle's study. You may examine them at your leisure."
She placed them on the table before her friend.
"Why would you rather sit up longer?" asked Miss Keeldar, taking up the
firearms, examining them, and again laying them down.
"Because I have a strange, excited feeling in my heart."
"So have I."
"Is this state of sleeplessness and restlessness caused by something
electrical in the air, I wonder?"
"No; the sky is clear, the stars numberless. It is a fine night."
"But very still. I hear the water fret over its stony bed in Hollow's
Copse as distinctly as if it ran below the churchyard wall."
"I am glad it is so still a night. A moaning wind or rushing rain would
vex me to fever just now."
"Why, Shirley?"
"Because it would baffle my efforts to listen."
"Do you listen towards the Hollow?"
"Yes; it is the only quarter whence we can hear a sound just now."
"The only one, Shirley."
They both sat near the window, and both leaned their arms on the sill,
and both inclined their heads towards the open lattice. They saw each
other's young faces by the starlight and that dim June twilight which
does not wholly fade from the west till dawn begins to break in the
east.
"Mr. Helstone thinks we have no idea which way he is gone," murmured
Miss Keeldar, "nor on what errand, nor with what expectations, nor how
prepared. But I guess much; do not you?"
"I guess something."
"All those gentlemen--your cousin Moore included--think that you and I
are now asleep in our beds, unconscious."
"Caring nothing about them--hoping and fearing nothing for them," added
Caroline.
Both kept silent for full half an hour. The night was silent too; only
the church clock measured its course by quarters. Some words were
interchanged about the chill of the air. They wrapped their scarves
closer round them, resumed their bonnets, which they had removed, and
again watched.
Towards midnight the teasing, monotonous bark of the house-dog disturbed
the quietude of their vigil. Caroline rose, and made her way noiselessly
through the dark passages to the kitchen, intending to appease him with
a piece of bread. She succeeded. On returning to the dining-room she
found it all dark, Miss Keeldar having extinguished the candle. The
outline of her shape was visible near the still open window, leaning
out. Miss Helstone asked no questions; she stole to her side. The dog
recommenced barking furiously. Suddenly he stopped, and seemed to
listen. The occupants of the dining-room listened too, and not merely
now to the flow of the mill-stream. There was a nearer, though a
muffled, sound on the road below the churchyard--a measured, beating,
approaching sound--a dull tramp of marching feet.
It drew near. Those who listened by degrees comprehended its extent. It
was not the tread of two, nor of a dozen, nor of a score of men; it was
the tread of hundreds. They could see nothing; the high shrubs of the