Greatheart Part 82

The smoke cleared from the embankment, and two figures were left facing one another on the gra.s.sy slope. Neither of them spoke a word. It was as if they were waiting for some sign. Scott was panting, but Dinah did not seem to be breathing at all. She stood there tense and silent, terribly white, her eyes burning like stars.

The last sound of the train died away in the distance, and then, such was their utter stillness, from the thorn-bush close to them a thrush suddenly thrilled into song. The soft notes fell balmlike into that awful silence and turned it into sweetest music.

Scott moved at last, and at once the bird ceased. It was as if an angel had flown across the heaven with a silver flute of purest melody and pa.s.sed again into the unknown.

He came to Dinah. "My dear," he said, and his voice was slightly shaky, "you shouldn't be here."

She stood before him, pillar-like, her two hands clenched against her sides. Her lips were quite livid. They moved soundlessly for several seconds before she spoke. "I--was waiting--for the express."

Her voice was flat and emotionless. It sounded almost as if she were talking in her sleep. And strangely it was that that shocked Scott even more than her appearance. Dinah's voice had always held countless inflections, little notes gay or sad like the trill of a robin. This was the voice of a woman in whom the very last spark of hope was quenched.

It pierced him with an intolerable pain. "Dinah--Dinah!" he said. "For G.o.d's sake, child, you don't mean--that!"

Her white, pinched face twisted in a dreadful smile. "Why not?" she said.

"There was no other way." And then a sudden quiver as of returning life went through her. "Why did you stop me?" she said. "If you hadn't, it would have been--all over by now."

He put out a quick hand. "Don't say it,--in heaven's name! You are not yourself. Come--come into the wood, and we will talk!"

She did not take his hand. "Can't we talk here?" she said.

He composed himself with an effort. "No, certainly not. Come into the wood!"

He spoke with quiet insistence. She gave him an inscrutable look.

"You think you are going to help me,--Mr. Greatheart," she said, "but I am past help. Nothing you can do will make any difference to me now."

"Come with me nevertheless!" he said.

He laid a gentle hand upon her shoulder, and she winced with a sharpness that tore his heart. But in a moment she turned beside him and began the ascent, slowly, labouringly, as if every step gave her pain. He moved beside her, supporting her elbow when she faltered, steadily helping her on.

They entered the wood, and the desolate sighing of the wind encompa.s.sed them. Dinah looked at her companion with the first sign of feeling she had shown.

"I must sit down," she said.

"There is a fallen tree over there," he said, and guided her towards it.

She leaned upon him, very near to collapse. He spread his coat upon the tree and helped her down.

"Now how long is it since you had anything to eat?" he said.

She shook her head slightly. "I don't remember. But it doesn't matter.

I'm not hungry."

He took one of her icy hands and began to rub it. "Poor child!" he said.

"You ought to be given some hot bread and milk and tucked up in bed with hot bottles."

Her face began to work. "That," she said, "is the last thing that will happen to me."

"Haven't you been to bed at all?" he questioned.

Her throat was moving spasmodically; she bowed her head to hide her face from him. "Yes," she said in a whisper. "My mother--my mother put me there." And then as if the words burst from her against her will, "She thrashed me first with a dog-whip; but dogs have got hair to protect them, and I--had nothing. She only stopped because--I fainted. She hasn't finished with me now. When I go back--when I go back--" She broke off.

"But I'm not going," she said, and her voice was flat and hard again.

"Even you can't make me do that. There'll be another express this afternoon."

Scott knelt down beside her, and took her bowed head on to his shoulder.

"Listen to me, Dinah!" he said. "I am going to help you, and you mustn't try to prevent me. If you had only allowed me, I would have gone home again with you yesterday, and this might have been avoided. My dear, don't draw yourself away from me! Don't you know I am a friend you can trust?"

The pitiful tenderness of his voice reached her, overwhelming her first instinctive effort to draw back. She leaned against him with painful, long-drawn sobs.

He held her closely to him with all a woman's understanding. "Oh, don't cry any more, child!" he said. "You're worn out with crying."

"I feel--so bad--so bad!" sobbed Dinah.

"Yes, yes. I know. Of course you do. But it's over, it's over. No one shall hurt you any more."

"You don't--understand," breathed Dinah. "It never will be over--while I live. I'm hurt inside--inside."

"I know," he said again. "But it will get better presently. Isabel and I are going to take you away from it all."

"Oh no!" she said quickly. "No--no--no!" She lifted her head from his shoulder and turned her poor, stained face upwards. "I couldn't do that!"

she said. "I couldn't! I couldn't!"

"Wait!" he said gently. "Let me do what I can to help you now--before we talk of that! Will you sit here quietly for a little, while I go and get you some milk from that farm down the road?"

"I don't want it," she said.

"But I want you to have it," he made grave reply. "You will stay here?

Promise me!"

"Very well," she a.s.sented miserably.

He got up. "I shan't be gone long. Sit quite still till I come back!"

He touched her dark head comfortingly and turned away.

When he had gone a little distance he looked back, and saw that she was crouched upon the ground again and crying with bitter, straining sobs that convulsed her as though they would rend her from head to foot. With tightened lips he hastened on his way.

She had suffered a cruel punishment it was evident, and she was utterly worn out in body and spirit. But was it only the ordeal of yesterday and the physical penalty that she had been made to pay that had broken her thus?

He could not tell, but his heart bled for her misery and desolation.

"Who is the other fellow?" he asked himself. "I wonder if Billy knows."

He found Billy awaiting him in the road, anxious and somewhat reproachful. "You've been such a deuce of a time," he said. "Is she all right?"

"She is very upset," he made answer. "And she is faint too for want of food."

"That's not surprising," commented Billy. "She can't have had anything since lunch yesterday. What shall I do? Run home and get something? The mater can't want her to starve."