Barbara Lynn Part 26

MORNING AT THE SHEPHERDS' MEET

Flames leaped up the chimney at Greystones, and filled the kitchen with a ruddy glow. The shutters had been taken down, but the night seemed still to hug the window-panes, and a black wind moaned in the sycamores.

Barbara, cloaked and hooded, and Tom the hind, sat with porringers on their knees, eating their breakfast of hasty pudding and milk, while the sheep dogs eyed them intelligently, now and then thumping the flags with their tails--the stark cold dawn, that was yet night, and the shepherd staves propped against the wall, were signs which quickened their canine hearts.

Twice a year the Shepherds' Meet was held in Girdlestone Pa.s.s, at the back of Thundergay, when the sheep that had strayed into other flocks, were brought to be claimed by their owners. A wether was missing from the Greystones' heaf, and three strange ewes had been found, which were now penned at Ketel's Parlour, where Barbara and the hind would pick them up on their way.

They had to start while it was still dark in order to reach the place of the Meet at a reasonably early hour.

Clatter went the clogs of the servant-la.s.s, who tramped in and out with the sleep still in her eyes.

"You'll mind what I've told you, Jess," said Barbara, giving the dogs her empty porringer to lick.

The wench came to a standstill, then tossed her head confidently.

"Oh, aye!" she replied. "I'll not forget. I'll tie the legs o' the white coo, for fear she kicks over the pail--she's a spiteful creature, yon coo! And I'll give thy great-granny her tea at seven o'clock."

"The green tea, remember, Jess. And be sure the water is boiling."

"Oh, aye." Jess swung her head from side to side, and winked, when Barbara's back was turned, at the hind. She knew what to expect from Mistress Lynn if the old woman was not pleased with her ministrations.

"I'll speak soft and go quiet," she replied, tip-toeing into the dairy with no very light tread.

Barbara drew back the curtains of the four-poster, and looked in; she knew that Mistress Lynn was awake.

"I'm just off," she said, "Lucy will be up some time during the morning.

Jess will look after you till then."

The old woman raised herself upon her pillows.

"Joel Hart comes back to-day," she remarked, her eyes brightening with pleasure.

"He should arrive about now if he caught the coach."

"I shouldn't wonder if he paid me a visit before long--eh?"

"Very likely, great-granny."

"Fetch me my best cap--the one that's rucked and trimmed with Valenciennes, and the white shawl that Peter--the wastrel--gave me."

Barbara brought the things desired and helped the old woman to adorn herself.

"Well, good luck to thee, great-granddaughter," said Mistress Lynn, smiling and well pleased with herself. "Don't let any o' them fine fellows from Dove Dale or Patterdale persuade thee that there's better farms than Greystones on t'other side o' Thundergay."

Barbara and the hind went out. The air was damp, and the mountain pa.s.ses were choked with mist. Overhead the stars still shone, and an ungainly moon was in the act of tumbling out of sight behind the head of the dale, as they struck along the cattle-track to Swirtle Tarn.

Before dawn, in the fall of the year, the atmosphere is chilly and spiritless. The mystery of the night has gone, though the earth, to all appearance, is still under its rule. There is a uniform dulness on the landscape, while the stars grow dimmer, the mists cling closely, and life is sluggish. The wind--if a wind blows--is gusty; rain--if it falls--is listless. The brains of waking mortals are often oppressed with a sense of life's futility.

Barbara went along the path in some such mood. After her night of rapture had followed days of depression, when she tasted the bitterness of the cup, yet shrank back from drinking it. Like Jephthah's daughter, although she did not fear the sacrifice, she asked for a short respite to prepare herself for it. She had not seen Peter since they had read each other's souls in silence; and to Lucy, her great-grandmother, and all with whom she came in contact, she showed a serene brow. When no one was near, however, when she was alone on the hills, with only sheep and cattle to spy upon her, then her stricken face told of a pain that stabbed body, soul, and spirit, and was none the less real because it left no visible wounds. She tried to curtain her outlook and hide the years to come. A short view of life, so short that a day would compa.s.s it, was all that she held before her eyes each morning. Yet the future persisted in confronting her. With a stride it would come out of the darkness, and stare in her face, as much as to say--You shall not escape me. It was this att.i.tude of the future that harrowed Barbara's mind.

Present pain could be borne--she would brace herself to it; but the fear that endurance might not endure to the end, filled her with dread. Could the martyr be sure of his courage, martyrdom would be a state of exultation. It is the poltroonery of the flesh, and the trepidation of the spirit, that are his worst tormentors.

But, although Barbara was in a silent mood, Tom, the hind, was talkative.

"Have you heard," he asked, "that a murrain has broken out among the cattle further south?"

"Nay," replied Barbara. "Who told you?"

"A man from over the hills. He came into the Wild Boar last night, and was full of it."

This was news, and disconcerting news.

"There's many a tall hill between us and it," continued the hind, "but what's a hill to the murrain? The cow jumped ower the moon onced, so I was told when I was a bairn. Nay, nay, if the black bane comes, it comes by the will o' G.o.d, and there's no more to be said about it."

"I once saw the Need Fire lit," replied Barbara, "and the kye driven through the smoke."

"What good did it do?" asked Tom.

"The murrain never came to Boar Dale."

"We'd better light it again," said the hind with a sceptical laugh. "But it's my belief that the murrain will go up the land till it reaches John o' Groats, and then zizzel out like a heath fire, leaving a black waste behind it. Nowt stops it but the sea."

"You're not a true shepherd, Tom," said Barbara; "if you were you would hold fast to the faith of your forefathers and trust in your own good luck."

They had reached Ketel's Parlour, and there was a grey light in the sky.

The road into Girdlestone Pa.s.s ran round the top of the tarn, and on through a deep ravine, where the mist swirled and twirled, revealing one moment a patch of barren fell, then blotting it out, rolling away like clouds of dust before the feet of an army, pouring like smoke out of the clefts, and floating by like a veil torn into shreds.

The hind unpenned the ewes, and they started along the misty track--the Robber's Rake it was called, because popular rumour believed that Ketel, the giant, had used it when he made incursions upon the more fertile regions behind Thundergay.

Having rounded the tarn, they pa.s.sed from twilight into the mist. The sky and the landscape were smudged out as though a wet hand had been drawn across the picture. The ewes moved slowly, and Barbara and her companion had not gone far, when they heard voices behind them, and she recognised the unmistakable tones of Timothy Hadwin and Peter Fleming.

The colour came and went in her face, and her heart beat quickly. She felt mingled joy and fear--joy at the prospect of seeing Peter and talking to him, fear in case she might again betray herself, and lead him to disclose that which could not be the willing confession of so good a man.

With her knowledge of her own great love had come a consciousness of power. She knew that she held Peter's weal or woe in the hollow of her hand.

She paused and called through the mist. There was no reply for a moment.

Timothy had grown deaf lately, and it seemed to Barbara that Peter, like herself, was determining upon his part.

A call came back, startlingly clear, and two blurred figures moved upwards through the mist.

"You've stolen a march upon us, Barbara," said Peter; "here's Timothy priding himself on his early rising, making sure he'd be first on the track."

It was still too dark for them to see each other distinctly, but as they went along they talked--about the state of the weather, the roads, the prospect of a hard winter, all the trivial things which fill up the greater part of human intercourse.

The mists began to boil again, and rose up like smoke, dispersing as they reached higher air, or becoming small, detached clouds, that brightened to a carnation hue, when the light glimmered along the mountains. The little company turned instinctively to the east.

It blossomed like a garden in the sky, and the rim of the sun was just visible above the hills. As they watched, it rose higher, rested for a moment, so it seemed, on the top of a craggy ridge, then heaved itself into the sky, where it hung a glittering ball of fire.