The Miller Of Old Church Part 57

"Our first thought must be to spare her," answered the lawyer. "It was her son's endeavour always, just as it was my poor old friend Jonathan's. If you will come with me into the library," he added to Kesiah, "we will take a few minutes to look over the papers I have arranged."

They moved away, walking side by side with halting steps, as though they were crushed by age, and yet were trying to the last to keep up an appearance of activity. For a minute Molly gazed after them. Then her eyes wandered to the light that s.h.i.+mmered over the meadows, and descending the stone steps into the side-garden, she walked slowly through the miniature maze, where the paths were buried deep in wine-coloured leaves which had drifted from the half bared trees on the lawn. Abel was coming, she knew, and she waited for him in a stillness that seemed akin to that softly breathing plant life around her. It was the hour for which she had hungered for weeks, yet now that it had come, she could hardly recognize it for the thing she had wanted. A sudden blight had fallen over her, as though she had brought the presence of death with her out of that still chamber. Every sound was hushed into silence, every object appeared as unsubstantial as a shadow. Beyond the lawn, over the jewelled meadows, she could see the white spire of Old Church rising above the coloured foliage in the churchyard, and beyond it, the flat ashen turnpike, which had led hundreds of adventurous feet toward the great world they were seeking. She remembered that the sight of the turnpike had once made her restless; now it brought her only a promise of peace.

Turning at the sound of a step on the dead leaves, she saw that Abel had entered the garden, and was approaching her along one of the winding paths. When he reached her, he spoke quickly without taking her outstretched hand. The sun was in his eyes and he lowered them to the over-blown roses in a square of box.

"I came over earlier," he said, "but I couldn't see any one except Mr.

Chamberlayne."

"He told me you would come back. That was why I waited."

For a moment he seemed to struggle for breath. Then he said quickly.

"Molly, do you believe it was an accident?"

She started and her hands shook.

"He said so at the end--otherwise--how--how could it have happened?"

"Yes, how could it have happened?" he repeated, and added after a pause, "He was a fine fellow. I always liked him."

Her tears choked her, and when she had recovered her voice, she put a question or two about Blossom--delaying, through some instinct of flight, the moment for which she had so pa.s.sionately longed.

"It was all so unnecessary," she said, "that is the worst of it. It might just as easily not have happened."

"I wish I could be of some use," he answered. "Perhaps Mr. Chamberlayne has thought of something he would like me to do?"

"He is in the library. Uncle Abednego will show you."

He put out his hand, "Then good-bye, Molly," he said gently.

But at the first touch of his fingers the spell was broken, and the mystery of life, not of death, rushed over her like waves of light.

She knew now that she was alive--that the indestructible desire for happiness was still in her heart. The meaning of life did not matter while the exquisite, the burning sense of its sweetness remained.

"Abel," she said with a sob, half of joy, half of sorrow, "if I go on my knees, will you forgive me?"

He had turned away, but at her voice, he stopped and looked back with the sunlight in his eyes.

"There isn't any forgiveness in love, Molly," he answered.

"Then--oh, then if I go on my knees will you love me?"

He smiled, and even his smile, she saw, had lost its boyish brightness and grown sadder.

"I'd like to see you on your knees, if I might pick you up," he said, "but, Molly, I can't. You've everything to lose and I've nothing on G.o.d's earth to give you except myself."

"But if that's all I want?"

"It isn't, darling. You may think so, but it isn't and you'd find it out. You see all this time since I've lost you, I've been learning to give you up. It's a poor love that isn't big enough to give up when the chance comes to it."

"If--if you give me up, I'll let everything go," she said pa.s.sionately.

"I'll not take a penny of that money. I'll stay at Old Church and live with Betsey Bottom and raise chickens. If you give me up I'll die, Abel," she finished with a sob.

At the sound of her sob, he laughed softly, and his laugh, unlike his smile, was a laugh of happiness.

"If you go to live with Betsey Bottom I'll come and get you," he answered, "but Molly, Molly, how you've tortured me. You deserve a worse punishment than raising chickens."

"That will be happiness."

"Suppose I insist that you shall draw the water and chop the wood? My beauty, your submission is adorable if it would only last!"

"Abel, how can you?"

"I can and I will, sweetheart. I might even make a miller's wife of you if it was likely that I'd ever do anything but wors.h.i.+p you and keep you wrapped in silk. Are you very much in love at last, Molly?"

The sound of his low laugh was in her blood, and while she leaned toward him, she melted utterly, drawing him with the light of her face, with the quivering breath between her parted lips. To his eyes she was all womanhood in surrender, yet he held back still, as a man who has learned the evanescence of joy, holds back when he sees his happiness within his grasp.

"It's too late except for one thing, Molly," he said. "If it isn't everything you're offering me--if you are keeping back a particle of yourself--body or soul--it is too late. I won't take anything from you unless I take everything--unless your whole happiness as well as mine is in your giving."

Then before the look in her face, he held out his arms and stood waiting.