 | CHAPTER IV.
WHAT THE RUSHES HID. The shadow of Moloch mountain |  |
4. CHAPTER IV.
WHAT THE RUSHES HID.
Heart-wounds, while they sink deeper
and last longer in a woman's nature, convey
more instant agony to the firm fibre and
Beatrice Wansted went quietly home, and
stopped at the gate to speculate upon her future—preparing
herself, as it were, for the
slow death of many a lingering year—her
lover rushed from her presence, dazed, blind,
mad with agony, his tortured heart consenting
to no future, incredulous of any relief, present
or to come, feeling only that his hope had
failed him, his motive was gone, that earth
had lost its savor and life its salt.
Up to the last moment, even until he heard
her sternly call God to witness her words, he
had hoped that Beatrice would repent, and
since, as he had naïvely asserted, it was impossible
for him to retract his decision, that
she herself would yield to him, especially in
this matter, where, as he still told himself, his
own convictions should be final in both their
minds.
But now that she had decided against him,
and had so solemnly sealed her determination.
Marston's own ideas of truth and honor, his
reverence for the woman whom he adored,
would have withheld him from one word of
argument or entreaty, had she remained forever
in his presence. She had taken her resolution,
and he his. Hers, sealed by a solemn
oath, was to him irrevocable; his, simply
spoken, quite as much so. All was over between
them, over forever; and even while
ready to dash his life out against this self-created
barrier, it never occurred to Marston
Brent to try to scale it.
Wandering whither he knew not, moonrise
found him near the foot of the mountain and
in its densest shadow. The wood-path he had
been unconsciously pursuing ended in the secluded
road skirting the base of the mountain,
and leading from Milvor to Milvorhaven.
Beside this road, at the point of intersection,
lay a sluggish pool, product of the mountain
drainage retained in a natural hollow; and,
leaning upon the broken roadside-fence, the
young man stood staring into the shadow of
the willows and alder-bushes that had sprung
up around it. Hardly had he taken this position
when the sound of coming footsteps broke
upon the silence, and the figure of a stout lad,
dressed in farmer's costume, appeared coming
round the turn of the road.
With a gesture of annoyance, Brent would
have plunged again into the covert of the
wood, but the new-comer had already seen
him and called cheerily:
“Good-evening, Mr. Brent. I was just going
to your house, but meeting you will save
me the two-mile walk, and after digging potatoes
all day, I'm willing enough to lose it.”
Marston Brent, staring steadily in the young
man's face, answered him never a word; and he,
rather embarrassed and yet sturdily self-possessed,
went on:
“You know you were talking to me about
going into York State with you to learn lumbering;
and the more I think of it, the more I
think it will suit, and I've pretty much made
up my mind to try. The terms we talked of
the other day suit me well enough; and anyway,
I know you'll do the fair thing by me,
and I'd as lief have your word as a lawyer's
writing; but I can't leave Barstow's before
next week. When was you calculating on
going?”
“To-morrow morning,” said Brent hoarsely.
The boy whistled in dismay.
“Why, I thought you said the last of the
week, or the first of next. I can't leave to-morrow
morning, nohow. Mr. Barstow has
hired a man, but he isn't coming till Saturday,
and — to be sure Jabez Minot would come
and do the chores night and morning till then—
and to-day is Tuesday. But I want to go to
the haven and haul my money out of the savings-bank;
and, no, sir, I don't see as I could
go anyway to-morrow morning, but I can
come alone, and if you will give me the directions,
I will. I suppose you'd as lief pay my
fare next week as this?”
He waited for an answer, but Brent, his elbows
on the railing, his face buried in his
hands, had forgotten his presence.
The lad looked at him keenly.
“Do you feel bad anyway, Mr. Brent?”
asked he, touching him on the shoulder.
Brent started and raised his haggard face.
“What do you want?” asked he fiercely.
“I asked if you were sick or anything. I
thought you seemed to feel bad,” said the boy,
still fixing his keen eyes upon the other's
face, and silently deciding that neither intoxication
nor illness had produced the ghastly
change he saw.
“Sick? Oh! no, there's nothing the matter,
Paul. A little tired with walking, that's all.
You say you are going with me to Wahtahree.
I shall start in the morning, before light perhaps.
I am going to drive my horse and
wagon to Bloom, where I have sold it, and
take the cars there. You can come to my
"A white, white face, with wide-open black eyes."
[Description: 454EAF. Page 014. In-line image of a man standing in moonlight looking down at a dead face with open eyes.] house to-night and start with me, if you like.There, I won't keep you from your preparations.”
He turned away with a gesture of dismissal.
The boy looked intently at him a moment,
and then walked slowly away without
audible reply, although to himself he muttered:
“I'll think over it a bit first, I reckon. More
than that, I'll ask Miss Trix. She'll know
what's up.” He looked round at the turn of
the road. Brent had already forgotten his
presence, and leaning his folded arms upon
the rail, was again staring into the dark
shadow of the willows, his white face showing
ghastly and spectral against the black background.
So he stood when, an hour later, the moon,
climbing the crest of Moloch Mountain,
glanced athwart its shadow, and thrusting
aside with slender, trembling finger-rays the
leaves of willow and alder, peered down upon
the surface of the pool.
The black waters, sullen and irresponsive,
gave back no dimpling smile like that with
which Millbrook all night long received and
returned the kisses of the moon; but as the
rays, growing momently more vertical, plunged
deeper and deeper into the leafy cavern above
the pool, a strange horror and mystery gathered
from its depths, and lay waiting till those
accusing fingers should reach and pluck it
forth. From the pendent leaves, whose whisper
had told the story over and over to the
shuddering night; from the gnarled and
writhing roots, showing above the water like
the muscles of a tortured Titan; from the
blotched, unwholesome palms of the hand-like
leaves, held up in dismay by the foul
weeds rooted beneath the tide; from the tangled
grasses, floating like the hair of a drowned
woman upon its surface; from the faint mist
gathering in the dark recesses of the wood, and
creeping out to peer at the beholder, and see
how he should bear it; from the inarticulate
murmurs and whispers of the night—from
these, and all these, gathered the horror and
the mystery the moon had come to look at,
and, as they gathered, drew Marston Brent
within their circle and held him there.
In vain did he struggle to arise and flee.
In vain did he seek to throw off the mysterious
chain binding body and soul to the moment
he felt approaching. In vain even did
he try to fix his thoughts upon his own
misery, and the proud heartlessness of his
mistress.
Vainly, vainly. Moment by moment, the
slowly-creeping horror mastered all. Thought,
memory, consciousness, will, life itself, fell,
one by one, within its grasp, and all were concentrated
in a nameless horror, a breathless
expectancy of what must come.
Slowly the moon crept on; slowly and surely
the relentless fingers stole deeper and deeper
into the shadow—searching, groping always
for what they had come to seek, until in the
blackest recess of the covert they found it, and
with one shuddering flash seized and held it.
A white, white face, with wide-open black
eyes staring horribly at the sky; thick dark
hair, with which the waters, moved by a little
shivering breeze, toyed in ghastly fondness;
shrunken lips, showing the teeth strongly
clenched beneath; a dim figure half hidden
among the gnarled roots; a hand awfully outstretched,
as in dumb appeal—such was the
aspect, such the form of the slowly gathering
mystery and terror—such the secret that the
sullen pool had vainly tried to hide—such the
secret plucked from its recesses by the resistless
grasp of light and truth.
Marston Brent, staring incredulously at the
awful thing below him, watched while one
feature, then another, took form, vainly trying
the while to doubt the evidence of his own
senses, vainly arguing that it was but the
flickering light, the changing shadows, his
own disturbed imagination, that had formed
this ghastly image from the creeping mists
of the pool, and that he should see it presently
waver and change to some other if not less
hideous form. But still as he gazed, the
white face and staring eyeballs grew more
distinct and personal; the figure assumed
more unmistakably human proportions; the
stiff white hand seemed to beckon more and
more imperiously to him for aid and vengeance.
Slowly and with effort, he drew himself to
a standing posture, and looked stealthily
about him, half expecting to find the familiar
scene changed by sudden glamourie to one of
those wild regions where the soul, wandering
forlorn, lapses from horror to horror, and
wastes itself in vague and unfruitful efforts to
escape an unknown evil.
But the mild autumn night lay serene and
beautiful about him. The moon, now riding
high in heaven, looked calmly down, content
in having brought human consciousness to
human ill, and willing to leave the sequel to
the sure hand of justice.
Far down in the valley twinkled the lights
of the village with cheerful intimation of home
and companionship within reach. A solitary
farm-dog drowsily bayed the moon, and the
clock of the little church struck the hour
of ten.
It was these familiar sights and sounds,
more than any conscious effort of the will,
that restored to Marston Brent the self-possession
he so seldom lost; and to-night more
from the shattering blow, dealt by the hand
of the woman he loved, at all the plan and
hope of his life, than from any weakness of
organization or undue susceptibility to the
marvellous.
Standing with his back to the pool for a
few minutes, and forcing himself to note the
objects about him, the young man found both
his physical and mental excitement toned
rapidly down to a condition in which he could
once more exercise will and purpose, reässuming
as it were the reins of his own imagination,
and checking it to its ordinary sober
pace.
Then he turned, and, parting with his arms
the drooping limbs, gazed steadfastly into the
pool, satisfied himself that the drowned body
of a man actually lay there, and that he could
not reach it from the bank, and then, throwing
off his upper garments, stepped quietly
into the black waters, which curdled and
seethed about his limbs as if eager to draw
them within their corrupting grasp.
Reaching the body, the young man stooped
to examine the face more closely, but failed to
recognize it, and after a moment of hesitation
placed his hands beneath the arms of the
corpse, and, wading back to the shore, drew
it after him. His utmost strength, however,
no more than sufficed to place it upon the
bank, for the body was that of a stalwart
man, and the heavy clothes were saturated
with water.
“Lie there, then,” muttered Brent, arranging
the limbs as decently as he could, “while
I go for help.”
He stood a moment, gazing down at the
face of the dead man, in whose rigid lines
and staring eyeballs was to be read nor liking
nor disliking, assent or refusal, and then
turned away.
But with his feet upon the highway, he
paused, turning now this way, now that—
this, leading toward his own home, two miles
away, and inhabited only by a stupid serving-woman;
that, by which he should reach in ten
minutes the house of Deacon Barstow, the
house that for the last two months had been
to him more than home, but now—
“I must, but I need not see her,” muttered
he at last; and striking down the road in the
same direction taken by the boy called Paul,
he soon stood before the Old Garrison, and
half unconsciously noted, as he pushed open
the gate, the picturesque effect of the weatherbeaten
house, with its drooping woodbine-wreaths,
the dewy knoll and shining brook,
with the moonlight lying over all like the
silvery veil covering, but not concealing, the
charms of an Eastern bride.
The blaze in the great fireplace had died
away to a dull glow, and the arm-chairs of
the old man and his wife were vacant. A
glancing light in the rooms at the back of the
house showed Aunt Rachel thriftily preparing
for the morrow, and convincing herself that
the house was secure from intrusion. One
figure alone remained in the great east-room,
as it was called—the graceful figure of a girl
crouching upon the floor, her golden head
before, the gibbering maniac had lain to moan
away his life, her hands tightly clasped
across her eyes.
A piteous sight, and a cruel one to Marston
Brent, who, gazing, felt the great grief at his
heart rise again above the horror of the last
hour, and turn him sick and faint with its extremity
of anguish.
Had there been anger, pique, or jealousy in
that heart, that moment must have crushed
it out, and Beatrice Wansted had seen her
lover at her feet; but in the grand, simple nature
of the man, each added pang, each fresh
proof of intensest love but added another
line to the barrier between him and the woman
whose word was to be held by him as
truth too solemn for even a thought of
doubt.
“She called God to witness that she would
never yield, and I will never ask her; nor if
I were coward enough to do what I know
wrong to please her, would she accept the
lying sacrifice.”
So groaned he between clenched teeth, and
turned away.
At the window of his little chamber sat
Paul Freeman, his chin resting on the sill,
his eyes vacantly gazing at the moon. Not
looking at her, however, but using the luminous
surface as a tablet upon which fancy
painted pictures of the future, as brilliant
and beautiful, and, alas! as far away, as that
fair moon herself.
“Paul! Paul, I say!”
The boy started, and looking down, answered
quietly:
“Yes, sir. Do you want me?”
“Yes; come down as quickly as you can,
and make no noise.”
Paul disappeared from the window, and the
next minute slid back the bolt of the kitchen-door
and stepped out into the moonlight.
“Is Miss Rachel still up?” asked Brent.
“I guess so. She's the last one mostly.”
“Call her quietly.”
But the feline ears of Aunt Rachel had already
caught the slight disturbance, and as
Paul turned to enter the door, she stood upon
the threshold inquiring:
“Is that you, Marston?”
“Yes, Aunt Rachel, and I want some help.”
“Well, I'm ready.”
In a dozen words, Marston Brent told his
errand, and asked hospitality for the poor,
homeless effigy of a man lying stark and forlorn
upon the margin of Blackbriar Pool.
In one strong, brief sentence, Miss Rachel
bid him to bring it without delay, promising
to be ready when it should arrive. Then
when the men had departed, she turned into
the east-room. Beatrice rose, with a coldly
careless mask drawn so suddenly over the
anguish of her face as to but half conceal it.
Her aunt glanced keenly at her, and said
bluntly:
“Come, Trix, you must rouse up. There's
a man drowned, and they are bringing him
here.”
“A man!”
All the blood in the girl's veins flew to her
heart with a cruel pang, and then back to
her brain, sending her reeling against the
wall.
Had she murdered the man for whose pleasure
she would have died in torture? Had
she indeed “ruined his life” here and hereafter?
But she only gasped again:
“A man!”
Miss Rachel's keen gray eyes fixed themselves
steadily upon her niece's face.
“Yes,” said she coldly. “And the man is
not Marston Brent. He is no such fool as
that.”
| CHAPTER IV.
WHAT THE RUSHES HID. The shadow of Moloch mountain | |