JOAN HASTE, H. RIDER HAGGARD [free ereaders TXT] 📗

"Dear Sir,

"I have received your kind letter, and write to tell you that it is of no use your coming to London to see me to-morrow, as I was married this afternoon to Mr. Samuel Rock; and so good-bye! With all good wishes,

"Believe me, dear sir, "Ever yours, "Joan."

Joan was married on a Thursday; and upon the following morning Henry, who had slept but ill, rose early and went out before breakfast. As it chanced, the weather was mild, and the Rosham fields and woods looked soft and beautiful in the hazy November light. Henry walked to and fro about them, stopping here to admire the view, and there to speak a few kindly words to some labourer going to his daily toil, or to watch the pheasants drawing back to covert after filling their crops upon the stubble. Thus he lingered till long past the hour for breakfast, for he was sad at heart and loath to quit the lands that, as he thought, he would see no more, since he had determined not to revisit Rosham when once he had made Joan his wife.

He felt that he was doing right in marrying her, but it was idle to deny that she was costing him dear. For three centuries his forefathers had owned these wide, familiar lands; there was no house upon them that they had not built; with the exception of a few ancient pollards there was scarcely a tree that they had not planted; and now he must send them to the hammer because he had been unlucky enough to fall in love with the wrong woman. Well, such was his fortune, and he must make the best of it. Still he may be pardoned if it wrung his heart to think that, in all human probability, he would never again see those fields and friendly faces, and that in his person the race of Graves were looking their last upon the soil that for hundreds of years had fed them while alive and covered them when dead.

In a healthy man, however, even sentiment is not proof against hunger, so it came about that at last Henry limped home to breakfast with a heavy heart, and, having ordered the dog that trotted at his heels back to its kennel, he entered the house by the side door and went to the dining-room. On this plate were several letters. He opened the first, which he noticed had an official frank in the left-hand corner. It was from his friend the under-secretary, informing him that, as it chanced, there was a billet open in Africa, and that he had obtained a promise from a colleague, in whose hands lay the patronage of the appointment, that if he proved suitable in some particulars, he, Henry, should have the offer of it. The letter added that, although the post was worth only six hundred a year, it was in a good climate, and would certainly lead to better things; and that the writer would be glad if he would come to town to see about the matter as soon as might be convenient to him, since, when it became known that the place was vacant, there were sure to be crowds of people after it who had claims upon the Government.

"Here's a bit of good news at last, anyway," thought Henry, as he put down the letter: "whatever happens to us, Joan and I won't starve, and I dare say that we can be jolly enough out there. By Jove! if it wasn't for my mother and the thought that some of my father's debts must remain unpaid, I should almost be happy," and for a moment or two he gave himself over to a reverie in which the thought of Joan and of her tender love and beauty played the largest part (for he tried to forget the jarring tone of that second letter)--Joan, whom, after so long an absence, he should see again that day.

Then, remembering that the rest of his correspondence was unread, he took up an envelope and opened it without looking at the address. In five seconds it was on the floor beside him, and he was murmuring, with pale lips, "'Married this afternoon to Samuel Rock.' Impossible! it must be a hoax!" Stooping down, he found the letter and examined it carefully. Either it was in Joan's writing, or the forgery was perfect. Then he thought of the former letter, of which the tenor had disgusted him; and it occurred to him that it was an epistle which a woman contemplating some such treachery might very well have written. had he, then, been deceived all along in this girl's character? It would seem so. And yet--and yet! She had sworn that she loved him, and that she hated the man Rock. What could have been her object in doing this thing? Only one that he could see--money. Rock was a rich man, and he--was a penniless baronet.

If this letter were genuine, it became clear that she thought him good enough for a lover but not for a husband; that she had amused herself with him, and now threw him over in favour of the solid advantage of a prosperous marriage with a man in her own class of life. Well, he had heard of women playing such tricks, and the hypothesis explained the attitude which Joan had all along adopted upon the question of becoming his wife. He remembered that from the first she disclaimed any wish to marry him. Oh! if this were so, what a blind fool he had been, and how unnecessarily had he tormented himself with doubts and searchings for the true path of duty! But as yet he could not believe that it was true. There must be some mistake. At least he would go to London and ascertain the facts before he passed judgment on the faith of such evidence. Why had he not gone before, in defiance of the doctor and Mrs. Bird?

Half an hour later he was driving to the station. As he drew near to Bradmouth he perceived a man walking along the road, in whom he recognised Samuel Rock.

"There's an end of that lie," he thought to himself, with a sigh of relief; "for if she married him yesterday afternoon he would be in London with her, since he could scarcely have returned here to spend his honeymoon."

At any rate he would settle the question. Giving the reins to the coachman, he jumped down from the cart, and, bidding him drive on a few yards, waited by the roadside. Presently Samuel caught sight of him, and stopped as though he meant to turn back. If so, he changed his mind almost instantly and walked forward at a quick pace.

"Good day, Mr. Rock," said Henry: "I wish to have a word with you. I have heard some strange news this morning, which you may be able to explain."

"What news?" asked Samuel, looking at him insolently.

"That you were married to Joan Haste yesterday."

"Well, what about that, Sir Henry Graves?"

"Nothing in particular, Mr. Rock, except that I do not believe it."

"Don't you?" answered Samuel with a sneer. "Then perhaps you will throw your eye over this." And he produced from his pocket a copy of the marriage certificate.

Henry read it, and turned very white; then he handed it back without a word.

"It is all in order, I think?" said Samuel, still sneering.

"Apparently," Henry answered. "May I ask if--Mrs. Rock--is with you?"

"No she isn't. Do you think that I am fool enough to bring her here at present, for you to be sneaking about after her? I know what your game was, 'cause she told me all about it. You were going up to town to-day to get hold of her, weren't you. Well, you're an hour behind the fair this time. Joan may have been a bit flighty, but she's a sensible woman at bottom, and she knew better than to trust herself to a scamp without a sixpence, like you, when she might have an honest man and a good home. I told you I meant to marry her, and you see I have kept my word. And now look you here, Sir Henry Graves: just you keep clear of her in future, for if I catch you so much as speaking to her, it will be the worse both for yourself and Joan--not that she cares a rotten herring about you, although she did fool you so prettily."

"You need not fear that I shall attempt to disturb your domestic happiness, Mr. Rock. And now for Heaven's sake get out of my way before I forget myself."

Samuel obeyed, still grinning and sneering with hate and jealousy; and Henry walked on to where the dog-cart was waiting for him. Taking the reins, he turned the horse's head and drove back to Rosham.

"Thomson," he said to the butler, who came to open the door, "I have changed my mind about going to town to-day; you can unpack my things. Stop a minute, though: I remember I am due at Monk's Lodge, so you needn't meddle with the big portmanteau. When does my mother come back?"

"To-morrow, her ladyship wrote me this morning, Sir Henry."

"Oh! very well. Then I sha'n't see her till Tuesday; but it doesn't matter. Send down to the keeper and tell him that I want to speak to him, will you? I think that I will change my clothes and shoot some rabbits after lunch. Stop, order the dog-cart to be ready to drive me to Monk's Lodge in time to dress for dinner."

To analyse Henry's feelings during the remainder of that day would be difficult, if not impossible; but those of shame and bitter anger were uppermost in his mind--shame that he had laid himself open to such words as Rock used to him, and anger that his vanity and blind faith in a woman's soft speeches and feigned love should have led him into so ignominious a position. Mingled with these emotions were his natural pangs of jealousy and disappointed affection, though pride would not suffer him to give way to them. Again and again he reviewed every detail of the strange, and to his sense, appalling story; and at times, overpowering as was the evidence, his mind refused to accept its obvious moral--namely, that he had been tricked and made a tool of--yes, used as a foil to bring this man to the point of marriage. How was it possible to reconcile Joan's conduct in the past and that wild letter of hers with her subsequent letters and action? Thus only: that as regards the first she had been playing on his feelings and inexperience of the arts of women; and that, as in sleep men who are no poets can sometimes compose verse which is full of beauty, so in her delirium Joan had been able to set on paper words and thoughts that were foreign to her nature and above its level. Or perhaps that letter was a forgery written by Mrs. Bird, who was "so romantic." The circumstances under which it reached him were peculiar, and Joan herself expressly repudiated all knowledge of it. Notwithstanding his doubts, perplexities and suffering, as might have been expected, the matter in the end resolved itself into two very simple issues: first, that, whatever may have been her exact reasons, Joan Haste had broken with him once and for all by marrying another man; and second, that, as a corollary to her act, many dangers and difficulties which had beset him had disappeared, and he was free, if he wished it, to marry another woman.

Henry was no fool, and when the first bitterness was past, and he could consider the matter, if not without passion as yet, at least more calmly, he saw, the girl being what she had proved herself to be, that all things were working together for