University of Virginia Library

8. VIII.
THE FOREHEAD OF THE STORM.

TIME passed now more swiftly by them all: by
St. Denys, examining the great estate with
Redruth, offering suggestions, and relating incredible
feats of some machinery he had used on
summer fallows; by Miriam and Sir Rohan in
rides through the bridle-paths of the forest, where
tangled vines impeded progress and occasioned
sweet delays, and in rambles over the long swelling
moors seemingly grand and boundless as the
sea, purple with crackling knee-deep heath in
whose fragrance the winds were smothered, and
broken only by some white thorn-bush bearing
here and there a cluster of last year's scarlet
haws, and with eagles screaming far above them.
Nor is it to be doubted by whom he passed most
pleasantly.

In Miriam's thoughts Sir Rohan had become associated

with all the beautiful scenes in whose
enjoyment they had been companions. He had
lost, to her view, the air which at first characterized
him, or familiarity had made it more agreeable.
There were a thousand points, with which
St. Denys did not sympathize, that united them;
and there was moreover a kind of magnetic attraction
about Sir Rohan, that with his courtesy and
natural powers effected more for him than any
youth or beauty.

And as for him? He found Miriam only more
lovely than the loveliest margin with which he
could surround her. Delightedly he listened to the
bird-like voice; her slightest touch thrilled him; —
bitterly his old pain and despair threatened to fall
should she ever leave him. Most men, when
numbering his years, are best pleased by that
which recalls old reminiscences; but he, waving
those constantly away, was like one who has just
found his youth.

One sunset, as the two gentlemen were standing
near the shrubbery, Miriam came running up
the fields from the shore, a color blown into her
cheeks, and her arms full of sea-weed, reeds, and
all manner of marine growth.

“Do but look at them, Sir Rohan!” she cried.
“These blubbers, nettles, what-nots! They are
crimson and purple and dusty with gold. And
these corals, fine as fringes, like ragged rainbows.
And oh! these bloody sea-docks. But what is
this?”

“Why, Miriam, you are loaded with that wet
stuff,” exclaimed St. Denys.

“A fucus, Miss Miriam,” said Sir Rohan, taking
it. “The sensitive plant of the sea. It sways
to the heat of my hand as if blown across by a
breeze.”

“See these sponges, papa. They are the very
royalest purple, and fern-shaped,” and she plunged
among her booty to bring one up. To her chagrin,
it had forsaken its rich hues with its element, and
was only a yellowish brown. “O my heart!”
she ejaculated, “when I almost drowned myself
to get them! And what 's the matter with my
hands? They are covered with white blisters!”

“It is the vengeance of the nettles.”

“Where they stung me? The ungrateful things!
I 'll carry them back directly. Into the water you
go, every one,” and she sped down again to fulfil
her menace.

“How oddly the sea looks, Sir Rohan!” she
said, as he accompanied her. “It is so covered
with a kind of mist. And far out, do you see, a
great white line shining like a low cloud, only it
keeps changing, — now high, now broken, gone,
collected again.”

“It is the white forehead of a storm coming
over the horizon,” said he. “Or to speak less
poetically, you see the blore. It is many miles
away; listen, and you will hear the rote. We
shall have a Cornish storm soon, and to-night can
see the briony without any help from Redruth.”

“These little birds, with their wings stretched
on the waves, look like its prophets. How I like
such a fresh salt wind!”

“It whistles the megrims off one's nerves.”

“And I suppose when we looked at the sea
that divine day at Tyntagel this storm was ploughing
along the distance and hurrying to meet us.
I must wade out again, clearly. Don't you think
I shall catch my death of cold, get pains for
my pains, go to school to the rheumatism and
learn to compare ache, acher, achest, with the
chance of a lot in God's acre?” she asked, laughing.
“All water is damp, you know, but that with

a storm in it must be the dampest kind of
water!”

“It is too costly an experiment,” he returned.
“Give your bundle to me, Miss Miriam; here are
some stones upon which I can step, and deposit it
for you.”

“And that will sting two pair of hands.”

“Unnecessarily. Let me manage them, and it
will soon be done;” and in a minute more the
treasures were afloat, and Miriam had challenged
Sir Rohan to a race up the slope. Suddenly she
stopped, with her gay laugh broken in ringing,
and pointed at a horse waiting near the firs.

“Don't you know it?” she asked, with a look
of mock dismay. “Who is that with papa? My
hands need some liniment, Sir Rohan, and my
eyes too, after seeing him. I shall go to Mrs.
Redruth for it, and then I shall go to my room
and be altogether too ill to come down again.
Good night, Sir Rohan!”

He watched her till she disappeared within the
casement, and then by another path joined St.
Denys and Mr. Arundel.

The latter, who had, of course, seen Miriam, did
not inquire for her, and did not regard Sir Rohan

with more favorable eyes at her absence. By
turns affable and sarcastic, he mingled in the
conversation till obtaining its command, when he
conducted it to elicit Sir Rohan's peculiarities,
causing him to shrink nervously from the scalpel
so suddenly busy about him. He remained with
them upon the lawn till the great bell of the hall
clock tolled ten, when mounting with a parting
prophecy of rain, the galloping hoofs of his horse
were soon lost in distance. The wind, momently
increasing, bent the tall trees heavily when the
sound became undistinguishable, — and it already
blew a gale as they went in.