Orange Lily: Chapter XXVI

“By this, the sun was out o’ sight,

An’ darker gloaming brought the night;

The bum-clock humm’d wi’ lazy drone;

The kye stood rowtin i’ the loan.”

Burns.

“Since there’s no help, come, let us kiss and parte:

Nay, I have done: you get no more of me:

And I am glad, yea, glad with all my heart,

That thus so cleanly I myself can free!”

Drayton.

The women and the sick man at the farm saw, with vast interest, their two spokesmen set out for the Castle; and watched eagerly, and with still greater curiosity, for their return. But two hours passed—and only at noon, when they were sitting down to dinner, did Hans enter with a slow step and a dubious, almost dejected air, very different from his ardor of the morning—and alone.

“John would go home his lone,” were his first words, “but bid me say he’d be up this evening, maybe.”

The rest easily perceived that the young lad had no great news to tell; so, not to humiliate him, his father repressed the mother’s eager inquiries as to whether the Colonel had not been rightly angered by their tale, and bid Hans help himself to his food first, and then recount the morning’s doings in his own way.

Hans did so; and first remarked, with an air of chagrin, that there was little to say. However, said he, to their surprise, when they reached the Castle, and, after some delay, were shown into the justicing room, Danny was not there, but the stranger alone—so well-dressed and “troth! so much the gentleman!” and the Colonel seeming quite familiar with him, that the light left their eyes, as Hans expressed it, and both felt quite abashed.

John, however, was obliged to speak; and had no sooner given them, albeit dully, to understand that he had received his cousin’s promise of getting the first offer of the farm—but now found himself cheated—than both his hearers seemed surprised.

The stranger spoke up bravely, like an honest man, as Hans must acknowledge; and bid them both believe he had never known that any other man wanted the farm, let alone himself.

“You know that is so, Colonel!” he had said, appealing to the landlord.

“Certainly,” said the Colonel, who stood lifting his coat-tails before the empty fire place with one hand, and stroking his moustache with the other, as Hans described him; “and more than that, it is nearly a fortnight since Daniel Gilhorn sold his farm to Mr. Redhead, who was acting for his friend here, Mr.—”

“Lee,” put in the stranger.

“Whom I agreed to accept,” went on the Colonel, smiling, “as a fit and proper tenant.”

At that John and young Hans gaped, open-mouthed; but, before they could speak, the stranger again took up the word, adding—

“And your cousin was so eager to get rid of the farm that, although I never expected to come into possession of it till November next, when he would have got in the crops, he offered to make it over immediately; which Mr. Redhead, on my behalf, accepted.” Upon hearing, and at last thoroughly understanding, how, from first to last, his cousin must have been fooling him, John went clean mad, added Hans; and in his wrath blurted out the whole remaining part of the history of his ill-usage—“and why you had gone down to Danny’s house with him, Lill—plump and plain!”

At that the Colonel looked rather queerly at the stranger, but stroked his moustache still, and held his peace; while the other never said a word either, but looked straight out of the window. At last he turned round in a rather sudden manner, and asked Colonel Alexander to allow him kindly a few minutes’ private conversation with John, when he hoped they would come to a friendly understanding. The Colonel seemed at this not surprised—(which much surprised Hans!)—but agreed with an air of great kindness, and had the two men shown into the dining-room; whilst Hans—having no more business to transact—had been obliged to go out into the waiting-room, where he had cooled his heels, said he, for a good half-hour.

When, at last, the rivals did come out, John seemed quite daundered and silent, and refused to vouchsafe to his young companion one word of explanation of what had passed betwixt himself and the stranger. All Hans—who was disgusted at being treated in this childish way—could remark was, that, on parting, Gilhorn and the latter had shaken hands; the man called Lee observing that all that afternoon must be spent by him in having the goods and chattels at the sea-farm valued, since he had agreed to take them wholesale—but that he would not spend the night under the same roof with the mean cur who still owned it. Would he come up to his house, then, Big John had said. And the other hesitated, then replied that would depend upon what Gilhorn himself would tell him by evening.

This gave the whole Keag family much cause for discussion and surmises, and altogether unprofitable and puzzled talk; so that they all tarried longer than usual round the remains of their meal.

Hans, with a young lad’s hastiness to condemn his elders as slow-paced and dull-eyed, declared that Big Gilhorn had shown himself “soft” in the whole matter; and should let him, Hans, teach all Ballyboly how Danny should be treated according to his deserts. Osilla still more warmly defended the absent John from this charge. Upon which, her brother replied that it would be more fitting if she let her elder sister, with whom he never quarrelled, because of her reasonableness and gentle temper, say all that. The father had to quell the rising war of words by ordering his son outside to work; while Lily had some ado to soothe poor Osilla’s incensed feelings. Before he went, Hans, however, took occasion to whisper to the former,

“Big John bid me tryst you to meet him down the lane—after supper.”

So that evening found Orange Lily down the lane at the appointed time; with no joy in her heart, yet no sharp sting there either, since now her dread of having to live at the sea-farm was removed. Yet she had loved well its view facing the white strand and the broad sea across to Scotland, so blue and fair to gaze on up and down in the summers; so fresh, and changeful, and living a sight with its ebb and flow even in winter-time—when the small, bare fields around John Gilhorn’s home, like those below her father’s lane, made the country’s face like an ill-pieced, deplorably ugly patchwork quilt. It was late now; yet she never looked down the lane for her lover, but was industriously working at her flowering—as the white embroidery, which was well-nigh the sole means of gaining a livelihood known to the women in those parts, was called. Farmer Keag’s daughter did not, of course, depend on the few shillings to be gained by even the finest needlework, like others; but having the reputation of being the daintiest needle-woman in all the country, she had never to beg work, like many whom part of her earnings went secretly to console. Now she plied her shining needle through the little “hoop” that stretched the work, as if her sole thought was to finish a delicate flower-sprig before the red sun went down.

But the sun set, and the glory of the west faded to a golden gray; a mist rose up over the marsh down there, then blended with exhalations from other low-lying places into a tender, almost imperceptible veil over the land; and still she worked on—and he did not come. She had waited by a bit of fence, to gain more light than under the hedge. Across the field beyond lay the Castle woods, over which the moon was rising; seeming to her so like a beautiful silver thing hung there in the sky, that every summer and ever summer’s night seemed a new and exquisite sight, that she raised her eyes to admire it, awed—and, then only, became aware that John Gilhorn was almost by her side.

“I’m feared you’ve been waiting long,” said he, approaching.

“I was working; so that the time passed quickly,” Lill tranquilly replied, to reassure him. But he answered with a downcast air, to her surprise—

“I’m thinking, if ye cared much above the common for me—ye would har’ly make that reply.”

Orange Lily knew not what to say; never hitherto having credited John with much sensibility or delicacy of perception in such subtle matters as a maiden’s mind towards a man; but even while she hesitated he went on, looking downwards at his strong brogues and speaking steadily, as if reciting a speech learnt by heart—

“Those words you let drop yesterday have wrought queerly in my mind since … And I’m come this evening to say … that if it is your wish to be set free from your promise to me—I’m agreeable!”

To save him pain—and that meant much to her!—the young woman could not have prevented the great wave of relief, the sense of lightening that thrilled through her whole being. Yet she did not know how it had lighted up her face, till, raising her eyes, as if to see whether he truly meant it, she saw a vexed expression on poor John’s ordinarily unemotionable, kindly visage. Hastily—for him—he answered himself—

“There, there! … It’s easy seen that is good news to you.”

“Indeed, Mr. Gilhorn, I do think it will be happier for both of us,” she softly pleaded, grieved to have grieved him, yet knowing it was better so; and, above all, thinking how the blessed deliverance she had longed for had so unexpectedly come! It was wonderful! it was wonderful! so wonderful she could not realize it!

“Well … well … well,” said John, half turning on his heel, “I’m not angry that ye don’t like me better; for that should come natural … and if you haven’t got it, ye can’t help it. But I cannot but say I’m sorry, too, till give up a notion that has been in my mind this wee while back. You’re as good as gold—as good as gold! but maybe, as I thought to myself this day—ratherly too good for me!”

Seeing he still waited, Lill murmured—with a touch of feminine curiosity for details—but with real sympathy, too—

“When did you make up your mind to it—was it last night?”

“No—” replied her late lover, truthfully, “I went to sleep. But since some things that happened this morning, I lay all day at the back of a ditch and thought upon it, and for a long time I said nought but drat it! drat it! drat it! to myself, and then I took a turn for the better. Well, good night,” and he moved away.

“Will you tell my father yourself?” asked the girl.

Big John turned his head and looked at her, as if petitioning a last favor.

“Och! for any sake, could you not let on to them? And don’t blaze it out, to create a ruction between us, but let it slip from you softly.”

“I will so,” kindly assured his late sweetheart.

And with a slow and very serious good night, he went down the lane. But she, with a heart off which mountains seemed raised, went home, and took occasion to tell her parents that the disappointment about the sea-farm had put off John from thoughts of marrying yet awhile; at which, though plainly vexed, they were silent, and, knowing his tardiness, not surprised. Poor Lily’s brain was quite giddy, she felt so light-headed with relief—though ashamed, and almost grieved, to be so glad, so very faithfully, humbly thankful.

Young Hans had gone out, none knew whither.

But that night to Osilla, in the retirement of their joint little chamber, the elder sister was fain to confide all that had passed; feeling need of her present sisterly sympathy and future support—yet a little dreading her censure. For, in all matters relating to John Gilhorn, his old favorite, though almost torn asunder by her allegiance to both, took his part even before that of the sister who was, otherwise, her incarnate ideal and living example. To the other’s astonishment, soft-hearted Silla cried out, “O Lill, Lill! … I am so glad!” then melted into a rivulet of tears of joy. Drying her eyes hastily, however, with a scarlet blush the lassie protested that these foolish drops arose solely from the excess of her gladness that their home comforter was spared now a marriage that she had strangely never “rightly conceited” (however fair-seeming to others!). Her elder sister acquiesced in the truth of this assertion, the young girl plainly believing it true; but, even whilst she gravely kissed and quieted her, scales had fallen from Lill’s loving eyes, and she saw a thing plainly which before had been hidden from her, and still was dark to simple, young Osilla herself.

Order the new paperback edition of Orange Lily which includes an introduction, footnotes and a glossary of words by Dr Philip Robinson. The book also includes the short stories The Witch of Windy Hill and An Old Maid’s Marriage.