V. LACK-LUSTRE VIRTUE
Miranda put a finger to the tip of her nose and frowned.
“’Tis false,” she murmured querulously; “it is straight enough in all conscience. Oh, I abhor spite,” and, shrugging her shoulders angrily, she ran lightly through the green corn down upon the little wood below.
Here a pleasant brook fretted over tiny falls, and curled in eddies round large, smooth pebbles. The morning sun struck a slant through the willows, and patches of blue sky beamed up from the depths of the shallow water. Miranda stepped upon the frail bridge and leaned over the handrail. The mirror below her was full of wavering shadows and grey light. The stream trickled coolly in that secluded dell, and Miranda’s face was flushed and hot with her haste. The breeze went softly through the tresses of her hair. Miranda glanced along the shelving banks to where a grassy knoll jutted forth upon a corner of the brook. She left the bridge, and walking to the spot, looked down upon the water. The dell was silent.
Her eyes flew swiftly this way and that, in furtive diffidence, and then, fast as a flash, she slipped her shoes from under her feet, and flung her hosen down, and, dropping upon the knoll, dabbled her white feet in the current. The water washed about her ankles gently, and she watched the curves in her high arches dissolve and change and waver in the eddies. How translucent was the stream! How still and sweet the air! She bent forward and regarded her face in the deep pool. Suddenly, and with a little gasp of terror, she found the earth slipping from her. She threw herself back and clutched wildly at the grass. She felt the water creeping above her ankles. A cry escaped her, and on the next instant two hands were clasped beneath her arms, and she was swiftly drawn into safety, and lay high upon the grass upon her back. Miranda sat up, and looking round met the bashful eyes of a youth. At once his gaze dropped, and he fumbled his hands together, shifting from foot to foot.
“I beg your pardon,” said he, “but you——”
“Oh, you are very kind,” said Miranda earnestly. “I thank you, Sir. Another moment and I had been lost.”
“It is but shallow,” he mumbled smiling, and bit his nail.
Miranda laughed awkwardly. “Oh, but thank you, Sir,” she said, “you are very good.”
“’Twas but my duty,” he stammered, and looked away, frowning at the trees; “anyone would have done more for you,” he added, blushing.
Miranda’s gaze went down her gown, and hastily she plucked her bare feet under her skirt. There fell a long silence, during which he fidgeted with the stalks of the bracken, and Miranda beat her fingers impatiently upon her knee.
“Heavens! will the man never speak or go?” thought Miranda. ‘The sun shines bright, and the birds sing sweet,” says she; “we shall soon be in full spring.”
“Very bright,” said he, starting; “very sweet,” he added, and “’twill rain by nightfall,” he ventured, cocking his eye at the sky.
“Ah!” said Miranda, fanning herself with her hat.
Again a pause ensued. The young man shuffled on his feet; he whistled gently. Miranda yawned and drummed her fingers faster on her knee. She gave a little cough.
“I fear,” he stuttered, “you will grow cold upon the moist slope. The sun has little power upon the dews within this shade. If I might beg——”
Approaching, he held out a vague hand. Miranda shut her mouth with a snap.
“I thank you,” she said, with scorn, “but the dew delights me. I am never content save upon damp grass.”
“I—I crave your pardon,” he besought her. “I—I fancied——”
“I hate a fool!” quoth Miranda to herself, in anger.
His eyes wandered to the stream. “Why, there are your shoes,” says he, brightening, “and your hosen. Pray——”
He made a hasty movement forward.
“I beg you will be at no trouble for me,” cried Miranda, flaming. “Suffer me, at least, I pray you, the liberty to dispose of my own apparel. I am no child at nurse.”
He drew back, red and frightened, and Miranda, breathless, curled her feet closer beneath her gown. He watched her face askance. She bit her lips.
“He is only a fool; but I hate a fool,” said she.
Miranda sighed. He glanced at her anxiously.
“And you think it will rain?” she asked.
“I’ll swear it will,” he cried eagerly, and waited, open-mouthed, upon her condescension.
“I wonder,” said Miranda thoughtfully.
“But the sky is red,” he panted.
“I have my doubts,” said Miranda sagely, shaking her head. “The wood obscures the heaven. How is it possible to tell?”
“Indeed——” he began.
“Nay,” she interrupted; “but from the cornfield yonder you could descry with certainty, and I should be reassured.”
“I can see the cornfield through the trees,” he answered, “and the sun shines red above the hedges.”
Miranda shrugged her shoulders petulantly.
“What sound was that?” she said. “Surely some animal. I hate a cow!” she exclaimed. “Oh, Sir, pray run and see!”
“’Tis no cow,” he replied stolidly. “I know the fields by heart, and there is never a cow within two miles.”
“There is many a fool,” said Miranda bitterly.
“Aye, to be sure,” he assented easily; “and many a sinner, moreover,” he added thoughtfully.
“I think I prefer a sinner,” said Miranda vehemently.
“The sinner for me, too,” he agreed cheerfully.
Miranda put out her tongue at the grass. Idly he broke the bark of a silver birch. Miranda uttered an exclamation of anger. He turned.
“I beg your pardon,” said he. “I did not catch your words, but I do assure you that if there is aught I can do will——”
Miranda’s temper burst its bonds. “Nothing in the world,” she said, in sarcasm; “nothing in life for me, save only that you will leave me to enjoy my solitude.”
He started, stammered half a sentence, took off his hat, mopped his face, and, tumbling over a creeper, set off. Miranda’s heart pricked her pride. He looked forlorn, and he had done his best in honest stupidity.
“Stay!” she called impetuously. He tarried in wonder. “I meant no unkindness, Sir.” He came stumbling back. “I have an intermittent trick of petulance.” The light beamed in a broad grin upon his face.
Miranda shivered. He sat down squat upon the bracken. Miranda groaned.
“I wondered at your cruel words,” he began slowly. “Somehow they fitted ill your face, which is”—he blushed—”the sweetest I have seen.”
“Oh, you are rash,” said Miranda scornfully; “I dare swear that one with so much knowledge as yourself has weltered among scores of pretty faces.”
“Indeed——” he cried, but she broke in upon his protest.
“For myself, I lay no claim to beauty; let others flaunt their titles as they will. I am well enough, no doubt. I have the face of youth, and my eyes have no squint in them. But I am assured you have seen many pretty maidens.”
“That is so,” he cried eagerly, “and this the prettiest.”
Miranda smiled. “You do your friends a harsh injustice,” she answered. “I have my years to my credit, and no more, which is a virtue through which each must passage. And what, indeed, is beauty, if all be told?”
“Beauty? It is a pearl,” he gasped, and suddenly swallowed his emotion with a gulp.
“I set no value upon pearls,” said Miranda sedately. “Let others if they will. While the world swings on, folly will ring her bells, fools gape, and gossips chatter.”
He watched her ardently, and sidling a step nearer, resumed his argument.
“You cannot tell,” he said, “with how full a heart a man regards beauty. The tears start in his eyes at the sight, his breath catches, and his legs fall to trembling.”
“Ah! is it so?” asked Miranda indifferently.
He rolled himself upon his stomach, and looked up into her face.
“It is with me,” he said earnestly. His gaze embarrassed her. She turned her head away. “I have long wondered about this love,” he stammered, “and now I know.”
Miranda looked round at him quickly.
“What is it like?” she asked, with some interest.
Abashed, he thrust his fingers through his hair. “I—I beg your pardon,” he stuttered; “but I have scarce the wherewithal to clothe my feelings. It makes me—’tis like a—oh, I feel—indeed, and I would do anything in your behalf,” he concluded bravely.
Miranda stared at him a second, and then smiled softly. He sprawled so ungainly; he lay a huge hulk of ineptitudes; his large blue eyes were watered with affection.
“You are very good,” she murmured.
“’Tis no goodness,” he averred stoutly, “but out of the very bottom of indulgent selfishness. I would sacrifice worlds for you.”
Miranda glanced at him slyly. “Would you drown?” she asked.
He nodded.
“Would you surrender me forever?”
He hesitated.
“Would you sell your soul for me?”
He knit his brows into a frown of puzzlement.
“Why,” cried she, “you would never surely steal to set me smiling?”
He shook his head thoughtfully. “No,” he replied. “’Twould be a wrong you would not ask of me.”
“And if I did?” she insisted.
He searched her face, and then, “I would hire someone else for the job,” he declared, with a sigh.
Miranda lay back on the turf, and shook with laughter. Suddenly she sat up; in a flash the laughter ceased, and red and white in turn she tucked her bare feet beneath her gown again.
“I trust,” said he anxiously, “that you have not hurt yourself.”
“Oh, no,” she replied coldly. “Pray continue. Your philosophy was most entertaining. You make a scruple of theft, I understand. But you could love me to distraction. Oh, yes. You will pull down the world for me, an you do it not by your own hand. You will meet lions, an you can find another to replace you. You will swear and forswear, and break through the decalogue, if you can do all these things by substitute. Yours is a wonderful sense of passion, so new, so strange, so masterful.”
The young man nodded his head sagely. “’Tis marvellous what change Love will bring to a man, but,” he added doubtfully, “I would not break through the decalogue. I dare not have another’s blood upon me. Oh, there are many things one dare not do, nor would you ask them. Why do I talk so wildly? I am content to love you, if you will suffer me.”
He leaned forward and took her hand awkwardly, looking the while into her face with bashful affection. She snapped her hand away, and laughed impatiently.
“Oh, you are too good, fair Sir,” she cried. “I am not worthy of your devout devotion. I? I have sins enough upon my head, God wot, but none so great as this unequal partnership would be. You are too virtuous for such as I. You are too much composed of discreet renunciations. Renounce once more, and save your soul alive. Mine is the waywardness of the wild cat; I have the passions of the desperado. I break through a commandment daily. I am right to my hair in sins. Should I repent I should need an acre of sackcloth and gallons of ashes. But I do not; thank the Lord, I shall not. I am stark in my vices. I complete them with exultation; I plan them with rebellious joys. I am a fiend in a fair wig, a ghoul in a white gown. To love me is to love perdition.”
He stared at her dumbly, and withdrew a pace.
“Indeed,” said she, “you have every reason for your fears. I fear myself. O’ nights I lie awake and think of devilments; they float through my dreams. I pinch myself in wonder if I be really human. There is no audacity I could not dare, no shame to cause me blink.”
He shuffled a little further away.
“Come, come,” she cried, “begone ere I break out upon you. I have the very deuce of a temper. For you and yours I see the happy valleys open; for me is the rude path among the mountains. Get you gone, then, Sir, to your happiness and the sweet maid that awaits you. Mine is the bitter, narrow road to Hell!”
She rose to her feet and pointed at him mockingly with her finger. The young man turned, and casting back one glance across his shoulder, scampered heavily through the undergrowth without a word, and disappeared into the wood.
Miranda stopped, breathless. “I believe he took me for the Devil,” she said, and laughed. “But oh, the prickles!” she cried, drawing in her breath and grimacing. She flung herself upon the ground and rubbed her pretty feet.
Miranda reached for her hose. “’Twas difficult,” she murmured; “’twas very difficult; but at last—at last!”