A Set of Rogues Part 20

"That may be done if you take horse," says Anne Fitch, "for he travels afoot."

"But which way shall we turn?"

"The way that any man would take, seeking to dispel a useless sorrow,"

answers the wise woman; "the way to London."

"G.o.d bless you!" cries Moll, clasping the withered old woman to her heaving breast and kissing her. Then the next moment she would be gone, bidding me get horses for our pursuit.

So, as quickly as I might, I procured a couple of nags, and we set out, leaving a message for Don Sanchez, who was not yet astir. And we should have gone empty, but that while the horses were a-preparing (and Moll, despite her mighty haste at this business too), I took the precaution to put some store of victuals in a saddle bag.

Reckoning that Mr. G.o.dwin (as I must henceforth call him) had been set out two hours or thereabouts, I considered that we might overtake him in about three at an easy amble. But Moll was in no mood for ambling, and no sooner were we started than she put her nag to a gallop and kept up this reckless pace up hill and down dale,--I trailing behind and expecting every minute to be cast and get my neck broke,--until her horse was spent and would answer no more to the whip. Then I begged her for mercy's sake to take the hill we were coming to at a walk, and break her fast. "For," says I, "another such half-hour as the last on an empty stomach will do my business, and you will have another dead man to bring back to life, which will advance your journey nothing, and so more haste, less speed." Therewith I opened my saddle bag, and sharing its contents, we ate a rare good meal and very merry, and indeed it was a pleasure now to look at her as great as the pain had been to see her so unhappy a few hours before. For the exercise had brought a flood of rich colour into her face, and a lively hope sparkled in her eyes, and the sound of her voice was like any peal of marriage bells for gaiety. Yet now and then her tongue would falter, and she would strain a wistful glance along the road before us as fearing she did hope too much.

However, coming to an inn, we made enquiry, and learnt that a man such as we described had surely pa.s.sed the house barely an hour gone, and one adding that he carried a basket on his stick, we felt this must be our painter for certain.

Thence on again at another tear (as if we were flying from our reckoning) until, turning a bend of the road at the foot of a hill, she suddenly drew rein with a shrill cry. And coming up, I perceived close by our side Mr. G.o.dwin, seated upon the bridge that crossed a stream, with his wallet beside him.

He sprang to his feet and caught in an instant the rein that had fallen from Moll's hand, for the commotion in her heart at seeing him so suddenly had stopped the current of her veins, and she was deadly pale.

"Take me, take me!" cries she, stretching forth her arms, with a faint voice. "Take me, or I must fall," and slipping from her saddle she sank into his open, ready arms.

"Help!" says Mr. G.o.dwin, quickly, and in terror.

"Nay," says she; "I am better--'tis nothing. But," adds she, smiling at him, "you may hold me yet a little longer."

The fervid look in his eyes, as he gazed down at her sweet pale face, seemed to say: "Would I could hold you here for ever, sweetheart."

"Rest her here," says I, pointing to the little wall of the bridge, and he, complying (not too willingly), withdrew his arm from her waist, with a sigh.

And now the colour coming back to her cheek, Moll turns to him, and says:

"I thought you would have come again. And since one of us must ask to be forgiven, lo! here am I come to ask your pardon."

"Why, what is there to pardon, Madam?" says he.

"Only a girl's folly, which unforgiven must seem something worse."

"Your utmost folly," says he, "is to have been over-kind to a poor painter. And if that be an offence, 'tis my misfortune to be no more offended."

"Have I been over-kind?" says Moll, abashed, as having unwittingly pa.s.sed the bounds of maiden modesty.

"As nature will be over-bounteous in one season, strewing so many flowers in our path that we do underprize them till they are lost, and all the world seems stricken with wintry desolation."

"Yet, if I have said or done anything unbecoming to my s.e.x--"

"Nothing womanly is unbecoming to a woman," returns he. "And, praised be G.o.d, some still live who have not learned to conceal their nature under a mask of fashion. If this be due less to your natural free disposition than to an ignorance of our enlightened modish arts, then could I find it in my heart to rejoice that you have lived a captive in Barbary."

They had been looking into each other's eyes with the delight of reading there the love that filled their hearts, but now Moll bent her head as if she could no longer bear that searching regard, and unable to make response to his pretty speech, sat twining her fingers in her lap, silent, with pain and pleasure fluttering over her downcast face. And at this time I do think she was as near as may be on the point of confessing she had been no Barbary slave, rather than deceive the man who loved her, and profit by his faith in her, which had certainly undone us all; but in her pa.s.sion, a woman considered the welfare of her father and best friends very lightly; nay, she will not value her own body and soul at two straws, but is ready to yield up everything for one dear smile.

A full minute Mr. G.o.dwin sat gazing at Moll's pretty, blushing, half-hid face (as if for his last solace), and then, rising slowly from the little parapet, he says:

"Had I been more generous, I should have spared you this long morning ride. So you have something to forgive, and we may cry quits!" Then, stretching forth his hand, he adds, "Farewell."

"Stay," cries Moll, springing to her feet, as fearing to lose him suddenly again, "I have not eased myself of the burden that lay uppermost. Oh!" cries she, pa.s.sionately, casting off all reserve, "I know all; who you are, and why you first came hither, and I am here to offer you the half of all I have."

"Half, sweet cousin?" answers he, taking her two hands in his.

"Aye; for if I had not come to claim it, all would have been yours by right. And 'tis no more than fair that, owing so much to Fortune, I should offer you the half."

"Suppose that half will not suffice me, dear?" says he.

"Why, then I'll give you all," answers she; "houses, gardens, everything."

"Then what will you do, coz?"

"Go hence, as you were going but just now," answers she, trembling.

"Why, that's as if you took the diamond from its setting, and left me nothing but the foil," says he. "Oh, I would order it another way: give me the gem, and let who will take what remains. Unless these little hands are mine to hold for ever, I will take nothing from them."

"They are thine, dear love," cries she, in a transport, flinging them about his neck, "and my heart as well."

At this conjuncture I thought it advisable to steal softly away to the bend of the road; for surely any one coming this way by accident, and finding them locked together thus in tender embrace on the king's highway, would have fallen to some gross conclusion, not understanding their circ.u.mstances, and so might have offended their delicacy by some rude jest. And I had not parted myself here a couple of minutes, ere I spied a team of four stout horses coming over the brow of the hill, drawing the stage waggon behind them which plies betwixt Sevenoaks and London. This prompting me to a happy notion, I returned to the happy, smiling pair, who were now seated again upon the bridge, hand in hand, and says I:

"My dear friends,--for so I think I may now count you, sir, as well as my Mistress Judith here,--the waggon is coming down the hill, by which I had intended to go to London this morning upon some pressing business.

And so, Madam, if your cousin will take my horse and conduct you back to the Court, I will profit by this occasion and bid you farewell for the present."

This proposal was received with evident satisfaction on their part, for there was clearly no further thought of parting; only Moll, alarmed for the proprieties, did beg her lover to lift her on her horse instantly.

Nevertheless, when she was in her saddle, they must linger yet, he to kiss her hands, and she to bend down and yield her cheek to his lips, though the sound of the coming waggon was close at hand.

Scarcely less delighted than they with this surprising strange turn of events, I left 'em there with bright, smiling faces, and journeyed on to London, and there taking a pair of oars at the Bridge to Greenwich, all eagerness to give these joyful tidings to my old friend, Jack Dawson. I found him in his workroom, before a lathe, and sprinkled from head to toe with chips, mighty proud of a bed-post he was a-turning. And it did my heart good to see him looking stout and hearty, profitably occupied in this business, instead of soaking in an alehouse (as I feared at one time he would) to dull his care; but he was ever a stout, brave fellow, who would rather fight than give in any day. A better man never lived, nor a more honest--circ.u.mstances permitting.

His joy at seeing me was past everything; but his first thought after our hearty greeting was of his daughter.

"My Moll," says he, "my dear girl; you han't brought her to add to my joy? She's not slinking behind a door to fright me with delight, hey?"

"No," says I; "but I've brought you great news of her."

"And good, I'll swear, Kit, for there's not a sad line in your face.

Stay, comrade, wait till I've shook these chips off and we are seated in my parlour, for I do love to have a pipe of tobacco and a mug of ale beside me in times of pleasure. You can talk of indifferent things, though, for Lord! I do love to hear the sound of your voice again."

I told him how the ceiling of our dining-hall had been painted.

"Aye," says he. "I have heard of that; for my dear girl hath writ about that and nought else in her letters; and though I've no great fancy for such matters, yet I doubt not it is mighty fine by her long-winded praises of it. Come, Kit, let us in here and get to something fresher."

So we into his parlour, which was a neat, cheerful room, with a fine view of the river, and there being duly furnished with a mighty mug of ale and clean pipes, he bids me give him my news, and I tell him how Moll had fallen over head and ears in love with the painter, and he with her, and how that very morning they had come together and laid open their hearts' desire one to the other, with the result (as I believed) that they would be married as soon as they could get a parson to do their business.

"This is brave news indeed," cries he, "and easeth me beyond comprehension, for I could see clearly enough she was smitten with this painter, by her writing of nothing else; and seeing she could not get at his true name and condition, I felt some qualms as to how the matter might end. But do tell me, Kit, is he an honest, wholesome sort of man?"

"As honest as the day," says I, "and a n.o.bler, handsomer man never breathed."