Orange Lily: Chapter XXVII

“The heavy hours are almost past

That part my love and me:

My longing eyes may hope at last

Their only wish to see.

“But how, my Delia, will you meet

The man you’ve lost so long?

Will love in all your pulses beat,

And tremble on your tongue?”

Lyttelton.

“And will I see his face again?

And will I hear him speak?

I’m downright dizzy wi’ the thought,

In troth, I’m like to greet!”

Mickle.

The next morning there was some stir in the country round. For it was told at the public-house and discussed at the smithy, and before noon the word had passed to most of the farms, that Daniel Gilhorn had taken French leave of the country.

Young Hans Keag knew as much of the matter as anybody, and told his knowledge to his family; but that rather sheepishly, for it did not add to his credit, he felt. It seemed that, burning to resent his sister’s wrongs and gratify his own ardor to engage in a good row on any decent pretext, he had urged William-Thomas Gilhorn to join him as his brother’s champion and go down in the past evening to Danny’s house to give him a beating. To this William-Thomas willingly agreed; but the misfortunate creature’s ill-luck stuck to him even in this, as Hans added with deep disgust. For, being such a sieve that he could keep no secret above an hour, and likewise thinking it a pity not to let some more friends join in the spree, he had gabbled about the matter to some other young men. His old farm-servant overheard him, and, being of a magpie nature, forthwith sent secret word to Danny’s ancient housekeeper, a crony of her own; lest the “crature would be scarred” out of her wits! To add to her transgressions, it seemed that Big John, on quitting Orange Lily in the lane that evening, went straight to the churchyard, where he had a tryst (as was supposed) with the stranger who had bought the sea-farm—and who had been waiting for him there for near two hours, sitting by a grave. Both, after some talk, had started to go back for the night to Big Gilhorn’s house like good friends, when, passing William-Thomas’s door close by, his brother stopped to look in. Then, murder and turf! the whole job was blazed out by the tongue of “that ould ijit,” as Hans unkindly designated the confiding granny; whereupon John, pressed thereto by the stranger, set off at a run to the sea-farm to keep the peace.

Meanwhile, the conspirators, after battering at Daniel’s gate in the dusk of that sweet summer’s night, forced an entrance only to find their enemy had given them the slip, and escaped. This crowning act of sneakingness on his part, bringing to nought their well-laid plan of retribution, roused the indignation of these punishers of evil-doing to such a pitch that they proposed and were just about to execute the wrecking of the house, when John Gilhorn and the stranger arrived and spoiled all the sport. The new-comer made himself master of the situation at once, as Hans was bound to acknowledge. He quieted them, reasoned with them; and when he made them finally understand that he had already paid down his money for the house and furniture, which were therefore his, they left him in peaceful possession, and departed. But that next day the gnashing of teeth among the small shop-keepers of Ballyboly, the smith and miller, and all to whom money had been owed, or from whom it had been borrowed, by Daniel Gilhorn, was great; for all that could be traced of him was that, having received a good sum from the in-comer that afternoon—he had slipped away like a thief in the night.

In the late afternoon, Orange Lily, who had been “misrested,” as the expression was, during the night by the revulsion of feeling and consequent excitement in her mind, asked her step-mother to spare her for an hour or two from work; and by way of holiday set out to visit a sick woman down the back-lane that ran towards the sea. Seldom, indeed, did she go abroad except on some such errand; for she had a great fear of wasting her time, and a mere idle walk such as other farmers’ daughters many a time took, would have been almost a sin to her—though it did not seem to her a sin in others.

She never judged her neighbors. But, this day, she was somewhat severely anxious to judge herself, although hardly knowing wherein she had erred. She was troubled without knowing why; glad of freedom, yet feeling a void; ready to blame herself for not yet having told her father of her dis-engagement—although conscious that she had been eager to snatch any good opportunity of doing so all day, and had only refrained because none had yet come, and she shrank from increasing the pain he would, surely, anyway feel.

The sick woman was unmarried, lonely, and such a sufferer that she could seldom creep further than her door for fresh air. The farm-maiden crossed its threshold now, like light to her eyes, said the poor soul.

“And, oh!” said she, as, after comforting her a good while, at last Orange Lily rose to go, “Miss Keag, dear—may God bless you and send you a good husband and children of your own, that you may never be left a lonely stick like me.”

As Lill went out, she hesitated an instant or two whether or not to turn homewards; but at last strolled slowly onwards down the solitary lane. The walk further was perhaps a luxury, yet that day she felt she wanted it; really needed a little time for thought; was glad of the solitariness and silence. Foolish, inconsistent feminine heart that hers was, the sick woman’s parting wish had stirred up too many dead longings, vain regrets within her bosom, which should have been only glad of deliverance, that day, from unwelcome marriage. She chid herself soberly, trying to reason fairly with herself. “Are you never satisfied?” she asked, as if this weak loving nature within her was another woman. “All you wanted lately was not to be John Gilhorn’s wife—now you have your wish, why be fretting again because you are likely to be an old maid; because you have no future but a blank after your parents go to sleep quietly in the churchyard, and when the wee ones will all be grown-up and married? Put away thought of that long-past time when you were loved and loved again.” Still Lill found herself quietly, regretfully weeping, for all that. But when the tears had washed her cheeks, she felt lighter-hearted again, and began to call pleasanter thoughts into her mind with a pale smile; putting by the sad remembrance of how complicated matters at home still must be, whilst her father’s debt was a mill-stone round his neck.

Daniel Gilhorn’s departure from the country, for ever, seemed to lift a cloud that had always hung in her otherwise clear mental horizon; and a little hope also lovingly crept about her sisterly heart, small as yet, but with much likelihood of one day becoming a great and joyous fact, that Big John might be consoled for loss of her, and yet find a more loving wife than she could have been to him, in the old farmhouse at home. Lily herself would, of course, now be a spinster and a “regular old maid.”

Thus musing, Lill took off her white sun-bonnet to let the sea-breeze play about her brow that pleasant sunny day; and since also the old lane was utterly solitary for a mile around, so no neighbors would be surprised at the indecorum of a farmer’s well-to-do daughter walking bareheaded a mile from home. The sunshine lit up Orange Lily’s warm-hued tresses as with an aureole. What tears still glistened in her eyes only made them the brighter, like dewdrops on a spray. Her face was now like that of an angel—holy, heaven-turned, and hardly sad—it was so still and gentle.

A few steps further, round a sharp bend, was a pleasant bit, where the high banks were topped with furze above and made a grassy seat below; and where once, long ago, two little children, coming home at evening, after a long day’s pleasuring by the shore, stopped to share their sea-spoils and to plight their troth with the rim of a limpet-shell.

The lonely poor soul had a wish—a foolish yearning to see the spot again.

Coming round the corner, the young woman found herself close beside a man already standing there. At that, taken aback, Lill stopped. The thought flashed through her that here was the new owner of the sea-farm. A man with full, dark, curling beard and ruddy complexion, strong-limbed and broad, who stood as if lost in reverie; his arms folded—now he turned. Three or four seconds both stood gazing at each other; then the earth seemed reeling under Lill, and the sky vanishing. “Tom Coulter!”—she shrieked, and would have fallen, but that the man, with a great exclamation, had already caught her in his arms—and was straining her to his breast as if two beings, whom supposed death had sundered, should meet again in full love and life on this side of the grave.

· · · · · · · · · ·

The first exquisite rapture of that meeting passed words. Neither could utter them. Yet each knew what the other felt; but it seemed as though they must not squander the knowledge on the vagrant tell-tale air around.

The afternoon passed; yet they had only stirred to sit together in close embrace side by side on the bank, as they had sat when far more youthful lovers. Time seemed as nothing to them, and their shadows on the sun-dials of their lives to have gone backward ten degrees. Often they looked in each other’s eyes, the soul’s windows, as if to see down into those very souls; and questioned each other’s faces to know what change time had wrought; or again felt both hearts and souls stilled in the calm of utter bliss, not to be stirred with even unspoken asking. They were like beings of a better world than ours in the perfectness and purity of their happiness—and in that they took no reckoning of past years, and only felt humanly mortal when, again and yet again, they kissed.

In Tom’s eyes, as he told her, Lill was not changed, but perfected. His girlish Orange Lily of eight years ago had only become fuller-blown, a gracious woman. To her, poor thing, Tom seemed just the living impersonation of all her proudest hopes and wildest dreams for his possible future. That he was, indeed, the very owner of the sea-farm, his lips told her; that he was well off his coat alone answered for; but now she asked to hear all the rest—the whole of his life and adventures since they so sorrowfully parted years ago.

“That will take the most of the rest of our lives in the telling,” said Tom, smiling fondly at his love with the old tone of mastership of their childhood so dear to her, perforce dropped later. “But come!—to give you a rough notion (like the wee maps I had to help you in drawing at ‘schuil’)—I had a harder time of it after we went out than I would have had folk at home know. It was for nearly two years like fighting hand to hand with fate—and feeling you’d be beaten! Then my poor father died; and though he was aye a burden that was dear to me, still I felt the better able to struggle on single-handed. Till then, though I am thankful to think he never wanted bread, yet many a day I had none; and I never knew how long still he could be fed. Ah! my lass, I was often glad you never knew it … !

“After that, I went off to California to the diggings, and had a rare run of luck. Everything seemed to prosper with me. The money seemed to turn up under my spade. I had a clever, fortunate partner, too, and was the envy of many another poor fellow.

“And then I would not write home to you; for first I feared you would not be suffered to get a letter, and next I said to myself it was best not to write till soon I’d have enough money made to start home, and surprise you—and the whole parish besides, that had looked down on the farm-servant. I was so uplifted with self-confidence that I said in my soul any man with a sound mind and a healthy body can get on in this world, and needs no help but himself. There was no more confident, masterful man ever walked God’s earth than I was during those months; only it seemed to me more man’s earth than His, handed over to us for the strongest to make the most of … Then I was suddenly struck down with a bad illness, and lay for days between life and death—and, when at last my senses came back, it was to find that my partner had, meanwhile, robbed me of every farthing, and made tracks clean away!

“At that, Lily—I own to you—I laid down my head and cried. I was as weak as a little child in mind and body; and far poorer than when I started out from here. My pride was utterly broken; and all my trust in my own strength rightly humbled; but the good that hard time did me,” Tom added, reverently and quietly, “I am now grateful from my heart for.

“Then, seeing an opening, back I went to New York, and became a clerk. My old education came in useful, and I worked at nights and picked up a good deal more. Often I used to go down to see the emigrant ships from home come in, and watch whether there was any face I recognized; and so once I saw young Henry-Thomas.

“He knew me too—this beard was not full-grown then—and told me about all in Ballyboly; but the only one I cared to hear of was you, and when he said how you were still unmarried, and a blessing to the parish—I cannot tell you, dear, what I felt.

“There was as yet no hope for me of going home for years. Still I was able to take the boy back with me, and give him a helping hand; but bid him not mention my name when writing to Ballyboly.”

“O, but—” cried out Lily Keag, with eyes that, though wet, shone with such a gladness and light as they had not known for many a day, “he did speak of having met a kind friend. And we, who never guessed it was you—”

Tom let her say no more.

“Only a month or two ago,” he resumed, “our junior partner in the firm—an old man, though—died. He had taken a fancy to me, and asked my history; and as he reminded me something of my dead father, I told him it—all. It seemed he had risen himself from being a mere clerk; but had not what I have—one, at least, in the world, dearer than myself. No living being was much more to him than another, poor old man! He spoke little to me afterwards, but seemed kind; and when he died—to my astonishment—had left poor Thomas Coulter a fortune!”

“And are you rich, then?” his old love cried; dwelling on the word, with a surprise the greater that this exceeded even her dreams for him—“well-to-do” having been their utmost limit.

“Not rich in the sense of gentle-folk; but three—four times as rich as your late lover, poor Big John,” cried Tom joyously, again embracing her.

The rest of the tale was soon told.

Even before he had left for America, his good friend, Mr. Redhead, had known most of his history; on the chance that he was still in that part of the country, Tom wrote again, telling him all. At Coulter’s earnest request to know whether the Majempsys’ farm was to be had (young Henry-Thomas having told him how that Daniel Gilhorn was wrecking it fast), the good pastor had successfully applied for it.

Tom quickly followed his letter. “On that day of the thunder-storm I was coming straight to see you,” said he. “Seeing none of your folk had recognized me in the field, I stayed as short a time as I could, and talked most to Osilla, knowing she could not remember me; for I would not betray myself till I should meet you—and was sorely disappointed to miss you down this lane. Next morning I called first to see the Colonel, who remembered me rightly when I told him who I was, (though they all say I am wonderfully altered, too). And his kindness to me—even though good Mr. Redhead had told all my story in his own way, and dressed it up till it seemed romantic—his great kindness, even considering that, was far more than I deserve. But when your young brother, that I had so often carried in my arms, and John Gilhorn, came in—O, when it was talked of, quite naturally, by both that, after all, you were soon to become his wife … Lill, dear, it went badly with me for a few moments! Well, we spoke alone together; and had all out. Poor John got a start when it suddenly flashed across him who I was. He said little about whether you were attached to him—you know his way; but I could guess pretty much how it was, and had some glad and selfish hopes again.

“Will you give me this day to turn it over in my mind,” said John at last, “seeing she is promised to me, and I like her very well? Maybe I’ll free her from her word … not being a hard man. Maybe I will not … for a bargain is a bargain. If she takes you without my consent, it will be a bad day for us all … but maybe by evening I might come round, for peace is peace. And a woman may be the best under heaven; but, if she doesn’t take kindly to you, a man might be happier with the second best.”

“And before we left he said he would not wish me, after all, to have had worse luck in life—having always had a kindly feeling to me, although it came ill upon him … poor old John!”

And, in return,” went on Tom, “I offered freely to give him up the farm, and leave the country for ever, if you found you liked him better than—”

But at that the Orange Lily reproached him with a hasty, joyful, loving ejaculation, and then a timid caress, for she was almost awed still by this outward-seeming stranger; and so the rest of that sentence was never finished, Tom being only too delighted to be thus diverted from it.

It was, indeed, no great wonder that he had been unrecognized by those who in former days had looked on him with indifferent or unappreciating eyes; for even the girl who loved him had not discerned all the possibilities of fine development in his character, and had only known its unpolished sterling worth. The ruddy plough-boy they had known had become a somewhat weather-beaten, bronzed, and bearded man; his coarse clothes were changed to as good a coat as the richest farmer around would wish to wear on week days; voice, accent, manner, were all refined and improved, so as to escape the memory of those who had not, like his sweetheart, kept the true spirit and meaning of them constantly in mind since years. And she now recognized them, but with gladness and wonder as transformed.

It was allowable enough, indeed, that young Hans had thought the stranger almost a gentleman. Travel, with eyes that saw and perceived, experience and self-education, though only fed on scraps of time and crumbs of knowledge, had made of Thomas Coulter a thoughtful, self-respecting, fairly cultured man. So the young woman knew, with a natural discrimination heightened of late years by the habit of looking with weary eyes at the other men in the country around—unconsciously asking herself whether any had such qualities as could please her mind or satisfy her soul. So she sat, hardly able to take her loving eyes an instant off the man’s manly face, except when she dropped them with modesty and overweening gladness—or because Tom caressed and praised her with such extravagance (as she thought, being meek and moderate) that she could not look up.

But why had Tom called himself Lee, she asked; and how had Danny been persuaded to sell the farm to his enemy? Tom laughed with glee, the sinner.

“I am Lee; it was the poor old gentleman’s name, and he wished me to take it with his fortune. And, as Thomas Coulters are as plentiful as blackberries, how was Danny to know that the rich Mr. Coulter-Lee—whose history good Mr. Redhead did not think it a gospel duty to tell him—was the poor little chap with his elbows out of his jacket, that Dan used to sneer at in school!

“That day of the thunderstorm, he was too drunk, when I did arrive, for him to recognize me. All the business was already done; though yesterday I thought it time to give myself the pleasure of watching his face when I disclosed the fact.”

“What was it like?” asked Lily, almost ready to pity the poor wretch for such a deep mortification.

“It was a treat!” dryly remarked Tom. “But he had not been drinking, and there was no gate between us—so he was very cowed. He forgave me in the most warm and humble manner the beating I last gave him, and was inclined to weep; and tried his utmost to cheat me into paying double what his furniture was worth. Well, he is gone anyway; and his memory go with him! … See, dear, it is getting late; and I want to walk back with you and make friends with your father again, and all the dear people upon the hill there, this very night.”

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.