III

Simon uttered an exclamation when he saw the figure on the wall. His heart leaped first with a supernatural fear, and then with a sudden foreboding of some normal ill. His nerves were still unstrung from his experience with the car, and ready enough to shape familiar objects into ghosts. Even when he had recognised May and spoken her name, he could not rid himself of his feeling of alarm.

So he was not pleased to see her when she came running down, and Sarah, who had spent so kindly a morning with her, was not pleased either. In the last few miles she had seemed to travel out of human touch, and there was a jar in the sudden intrusion of even this one thing left to her to love. Her brow contracted both with the effort of thought and the effort of sight, but indeed she knew well enough why May was there. Her intuition had worked uncertainly all the day, but it warned her now. She knew what impulse had brought May out to await their coming home.

Simon, however, had no clue to this sudden appearance at his journey’s end. He sat still in the trap as she came swiftly through the yard, and then leaned out to address her with an anxious frown.

“Nay, now whatever’s brought you trapesin’ here so late? Nowt wrong, is there? Father badly again? Is he axin’ for me, by any chance?”

She reassured him with a shake of the head and a smile, and, as in the case of Mr. Dent, he felt a sudden resentment towards smiles. In all his life Simon had never encountered so many smiling faces as had looked at him that day.

“All’s right, thank you.⁠ ⁠… Father’s much about the same. I wanted a word with Mrs. Thornthet, that was all.

“You’ve been a terble while on the road, though!” she added gaily, before he could speak. “I’d about made up my mind as I’d have to be getting back.”

“We were kept at Blindbeck, that’s how it was,” Simon said, remembering suddenly and with gloom the precise circumstances under which they had been kept. “But if you nobbut wanted a word wi’ the missis, you could surely ha’ waited while morn. It’s a daft-like trick to be lakin’ on t’sands when it’s getting dark.”

His words made her turn again to throw a glance at the inn, but still there was no summoning gleam from the room upstairs. “Ay, but tide isn’t till six,” she answered him coaxingly, turning back, “and I shan’t be long. Father’ll show a light for me when it’s time I was setting off.”

Sarah, ignoring the pair of them, had already clambered out, and Simon remembered that he had the horse to stable and the cows to milk and feed. “Danged foolishness, that’s what it is!” he growled, as he scrambled down, giving May a very unaccustomed scowl. “If I did as I ought, I’d be skifting you pretty sharp. Say what you’ve gitten to say, and then clear out!”

Sarah had been moving away from them towards the house, but, as May followed her, she swung about. There was no invitation, however, in her rigid face.

“You’ve nowt to say as I know on,” she said in a curt tone, “and I’m rarely tired. Anyway, there’s no sense in lossing yourself for a bit of a chat.”

“I’ll not lose myself, not I!” May laughed, advancing towards her, full of kindly warmth. She had been prepared for some such reception as this, and was not depressed. “What, I’ve been across that often, it’s the same to me as the road! I’ve been over when it was snowing⁠—ay, and by moonlight, too. As for Geordie,” she added, with a tender laugh, “he’s crossed in the pitch dark, with only his nose to tell him where he was at!

“I was bound to ask you again before I slept,” she urged, casting a glance at Simon, busy with the horse. “Can’t I come in a minute?⁠—I won’t be long. It’s late to be telling my business in the yard.”

“You’ve no business wi’ me,” Sarah said stolidly, “so you can stop off yon weam voice. You’re not coming into Sandholes tonight, May Fleming, so that’s flat!”

May laughed again, but there was less confidence in the laugh. She waited to speak again until Simon had moved away, the dog leaping and barking under the horse’s nose.

“It’s a shame,” she said cheerfully, “to bother you so late, but I just couldn’t bring myself to wait. It was you as brought it all back, Mrs. Thornthet, come to that, with yon talk at the doctor’s of Geordie coming home!”

“There’s no talk of him coming,” Sarah said coldly, “and never was.” With one magnificent sweep she disposed of the fallacy of the afternoon. “You ought to ha’ more sense than to go fancying things like that!”

“But you’d a letter, you said, begging his fare?” May was slightly bewildered, but went pressing on. “You said he was keen to come, if he had the brass.”

“Ay, and there wasn’t no brass; so yon’s finished and by wi’,” Sarah said.

“Ay, but there is,” May pleaded. “Plenty o’ brass!” She faltered a little before the other’s lack of response. “Nay, Mrs. Thornthet, don’t you look like that! What does it matter where it comes from if it makes folks glad?”

“I’ll buy no gladness o’ mine from you, my lass, as I said before.”

“I can spare the brass right enough⁠—if it’s only that.”

“Ay, but I can’t spare the pride to take it,” Sarah said.

“Ay, well, then, think as you’re buying my happiness!” May begged. “I’d be real proud to think as I’d brought him back, even if he never looked aside at me again.”

“You’d have lile or nowt to be proud on, I’ll be bound!” There was a touch of weary impatience in Sarah’s voice. “And what-like happiness would it be for you in the end? Nay, May, my girl, we’ve thrashed the matter out, and I’m overtired to be fret wi’ it tonight.”

May sighed, and stood looking at her with troubled eyes, but she was unable to let the whole of her hope go.

“I’m right sorry to have put you about,” she said sadly. “It’s a real shame! Can’t you promise to think it over a bit? I’ll come over tomorrow for another talk.”

“I want neither talking nor thinking, so that’s flat!” Sarah snapped. “I’ll promise to turn key in the door when I see you coming, and that’s all!”

The tears came into May’s eyes.

“You’ve no call to go telling me off like that,” she said, with a little break in her voice. “I haven’t done anything that’s wrong, I’m sure.”

“You’ve shoved your nose into other folks’ business,” Sarah said roughly⁠—“that’s what you’ve done! I’ll thank you to leave us to do for our lad as’ll suit us best!”

“He was mine, too!” May flung at her suddenly, roused at last. “Long ago, maybe⁠—years on years⁠—but he was mine as well!”

Sarah gave a sneering laugh.

“There’ll be more than one lass, I reckon, setting up to think that!”

May uttered a little cry, wounded to the heart.

“Eh, but you’re a cruel woman, Mrs. Thornthet!” she exclaimed, in a voice quivering with pain. “It’s true I’d be glad to see Geordie again, but it don’t make that much difference now. It’s for your sake and poor Mr. Thornthet’s that I want to see him back.⁠ ⁠…

“You’re fond o’ me, nowadays,” she went on bravely, controlling herself again. “You like me well enough now, whatever you felt once. Can’t you take the money for the sake of bygone times?”

But already Sarah had turned away from her and was moving towards the door. She fitted the key in the lock with the ease of use, and gave the rickety door an opening push. And again May followed and stood, strong in the courage of those who plead for the thing that they have at heart.

“Don’t go away feeling mad with me, Mrs. Thornthet!” she begged. “I’m sorry I spoke as I did. Think on how happy we were together, this morning, you and me. Think how it would be if he was to come marching into the yard.⁠ ⁠…”

Sarah was now over the threshold, with her hand against the door, but May’s hand was also against it, refusing to let it close. Her face was white as a flower upon the dusky air, pleading and sweet with frank lips and tearful eyes. Sarah herself was engulfed by the dark house, a shadow that was yet more surely a block than the actual door. It seemed to May that she had all the passionless resistance of some ancient, immovable stone. A lantern across showed the black squares of the shippon stalls, the white coats of the beasts and Simon moving from dark to light. May did not know that the old woman’s purpose was giving in the pause, that that last sentence of hers had broken the stubborn will. She waited despairingly, seeking for more to say, and finding nothing, since the right word had been said. And because she despaired she broke the pause too soon, in an access of hopelessness flinging away her chance. Taking her hand from the door, she pointed to Simon at his job.

“I’ll ask Mr. Thornthet, then!” she cried sharply, beginning to move away. “Happen he’ll see to it for me instead of you. Happen he’ll see the offer’s kindly meant, and not let pride and suchlike stand between!”

But Sarah, too, cried out before she had gone a yard, her voice harsh with wrath and a sort of fear.

“You leave Simon be,” she cried fiercely⁠—“let him be! I’ve had enough o’ your worry, without plaguin’ him an’ all. You get back to your dad, and don’t come interfering again. You came between me and my lad, but you shan’t meddle wi’ my man! You mean well enough, I don’t doubt, but you’re nobbut a meddler, all the same. It never does to go shoving kindnesses at folk who keep on saying nay. If you force ’em, you do ’em more harm than good in the long run, by a deal. D’you think I want Geordie coming back in rags, as like a tramp on t’roads as a couple o’ peas? D’you think I want a drunken do-nowt loafing about t’spot⁠—a thief, maybe, or happen summat worse? What sort o’ food and drink would yon be to Blindbeck, d’you think? Eliza’s gitten enough on her tongue, without the likes o’ that! Nay, the lad as went was a limb, but he was bonny and smart, and Eliza’ll always think of him like yon. She’ll always think in her heart as he was the better o’ Jim, for all she talks so loud. But if he come back to shame us, it’d rob me even o’ that. I couldn’t abide it!” she finished vehemently. “It’d be worse than death. I’d rather the sea took him afore ever he reached home!”

She stopped with an indrawn breath, and the door, creaking abruptly, showed that her weight was heavy on the latch. May stood still in the yard, as still as the shadow that had once again turned to ancient stone. The silence that had fallen between them seemed to push her away, to drive them so far apart that never again would they be able to speak. At last, in that terrible outpouring, May had discovered the real barrier to her desire. There were pride and generosity in the way, but there was also something which she could not fight. The monstrous, lifelong obsession of Eliza had slopped even the natural road to a mother’s heart.

Fear came over her, a more terrible fear than had taken her on the sands. In the quiet spot that should have been homely because of the moving light and the dumb beasts, she had a hint of something not quite sane. Things that had no place in the life of the soil seemed suddenly to have forced a passage in. She peered into the darkness of Sarah’s mind, as her bodily eyes sought for her hidden face.

She was startled into action again by the old dog’s nose thrust kindly into her hand. He had listened to the urgent voices with constantly pricked ears, knowing by instinct that somebody suffered and was afraid. Now he came to May, begging her to take charge of her soul, lest he, too, whose only trust was in Man, should suffer fear. She laid her hand for a moment on the warmth of his head, dropping her gaze to meet his upturned eyes. Instantly, however, as if he had brought her a further message, she looked towards the bay, and saw the lamp in her father’s window spring to life.

She was loth to go with this wreck of things at her feet, but in her destitution of heart she was afraid to stay. Armed with the promise, she would have cared nothing for dark or tide, but with this weight at her heart it seemed as if it would take her all the night to cross the sand. She tried to believe that she would return to wrestle with Sarah in the day, but she knew well enough that she would never return. Eliza, and all that Eliza had meant in their spoiled lives, lay like a poisonous snake across her path.

She wondered drearily what had become of the passionate certainty with which she had set out. The sea still sundered her lover and herself, the bar of the sea so much greater than any possible stretch of land. There were people to whom the sea was a sort of curse, and perhaps, without knowing it, she was one of those. She loved it, indeed, but she never forgot that it had taken her first hope. Perhaps it mocked at her love as Sarah had mocked her love. Perhaps it was only waiting out in the dark to do her harm.⁠ ⁠…

She made one last entreating movement towards the shadow that was stone, but nobody moved in the darkness and nobody spoke. She could not be sure at that moment whether Sarah was there, or whether all that she begged of was merely blackened space. Then she began by degrees to move away, wrenching her feet, as it were, from the ground of the yard. Sadly, without looking back, she mounted the seawall, bowed by her burden of failure and sorrow and self-contempt. But the fear took her again as soon as she faced the sands, and she hurried down the further side. The good angel of the Thornthwaites fled away into the night as if driven by flails.