Elfride was still steadfast in her opinion that honour compelled her to meet him. Probably the very longing to avoid him lent additional weight to the conviction; for she was markedly one of those who sigh for the unattainable--to whom, superlatively, a hope is pleasing because not a possession. And she knew it so well that her intellect was inclined to exaggerate this defect in herself.
So during the day she looked her duty steadfastly in the face; read Wordsworth"s astringent yet depressing ode to that Deity; committed herself to her guidance; and still felt the weight of chance desires.
But she began to take a melancholy pleasure in contemplating the sacrifice of herself to the man whom a maidenly sense of propriety compelled her to regard as her only possible husband. She would meet him, and do all that lay in her power to marry him. To guard against a relapse, a note was at once despatched to his father"s cottage for Stephen on his arrival, fixing an hour for the interview.
Chapter XXI
"On thy cold grey stones, O sea!"
Stephen had said that he should come by way of Bristol, and thence by a steamer to Castle Boterel, in order to avoid the long journey over the hills from St. Launce"s. He did not know of the extension of the railway to Camelton.
During the afternoon a thought occurred to Elfride, that from any cliff along the sh.o.r.e it would be possible to see the steamer some hours before its arrival.
She had acc.u.mulated religious force enough to do an act of supererogation. The act was this--to go to some point of land and watch for the ship that brought her future husband home.
It was a cloudy afternoon. Elfride was often diverted from a purpose by a dull sky; and though she used to persuade herself that the weather was as fine as possible on the other side of the clouds, she could not bring about any practical result from this fancy. Now, her mood was such that the humid sky harmonized with it.
Having ascended and pa.s.sed over a hill behind the house, Elfride came to a small stream. She used it as a guide to the coast. It was smaller than that in her own valley, and flowed altogether at a higher level. Bushes lined the slopes of its shallow trough; but at the bottom, where the water ran, was a soft green carpet, in a strip two or three yards wide.
In winter, the water flowed over the gra.s.s; in summer, as now, it trickled along a channel in the midst.
Elfride had a sensation of eyes regarding her from somewhere. She turned, and there was Mr. Knight. He had dropped into the valley from the side of the hill. She felt a thrill of pleasure, and rebelliously allowed it to exist.
"What utter loneliness to find you in!"
"I am going to the sh.o.r.e by tracking the stream. I believe it empties itself not far off, in a silver thread of water, over a cascade of great height."
"Why do you load yourself with that heavy telescope?"
"To look over the sea with it," she said faintly.
"I"ll carry it for you to your journey"s end." And he took the gla.s.s from her unresisting hands. "It cannot be half a mile further. See, there is the water." He pointed to a short fragment of level muddy-gray colour, cutting against the sky.
Elfride had already scanned the small surface of ocean visible, and had seen no ship.
They walked along in company, sometimes with the brook between them--for it was no wider than a man"s stride--sometimes close together. The green carpet grew swampy, and they kept higher up.
One of the two ridges between which they walked dwindled lower and became insignificant. That on the right hand rose with their advance, and terminated in a clearly defined edge against the light, as if it were abruptly sawn off. A little further, and the bed of the rivulet ended in the same fashion.
They had come to a bank breast-high, and over it the valley was no longer to be seen. It was withdrawn cleanly and completely. In its place was sky and boundless atmosphere; and perpendicularly down beneath them--small and far off--lay the corrugated surface of the Atlantic.
The small stream here found its death. Running over the precipice it was dispersed in spray before it was half-way down, and falling like rain upon projecting ledges, made minute gra.s.sy meadows of them. At the bottom the water-drops soaked away amid the debris of the cliff. This was the inglorious end of the river.
"What are you looking for? said Knight, following the direction of her eyes.
She was gazing hard at a black object--nearer to the sh.o.r.e than to the horizon--from the summit of which came a nebulous haze, stretching like gauze over the sea.
"The Puffin, a little summer steamboat--from Bristol to Castle Boterel,"
she said. "I think that is it--look. Will you give me the gla.s.s?"
Knight pulled open the old-fashioned but powerful telescope, and handed it to Elfride, who had looked on with heavy eyes.
"I can"t keep it up now," she said.
"Rest it on my shoulder."
"It is too high."
"Under my arm."
"Too low. You may look instead," she murmured weakly.
Knight raised the gla.s.s to his eye, and swept the sea till the Puffin entered its field.
"Yes, it is the Puffin--a tiny craft. I can see her figure-head distinctly--a bird with a beak as big as its head."
"Can you see the deck?"
"Wait a minute; yes, pretty clearly. And I can see the black forms of the pa.s.sengers against its white surface. One of them has taken something from another--a gla.s.s, I think--yes, it is--and he is levelling it in this direction. Depend upon it we are conspicuous objects against the sky to them. Now, it seems to rain upon them, and they put on overcoats and open umbrellas. They vanish and go below--all but that one who has borrowed the gla.s.s. He is a slim young fellow, and still watches us."
Elfride grew pale, and shifted her little feet uneasily.
Knight lowered the gla.s.s.
"I think we had better return," he said. "That cloud which is raining on them may soon reach us. Why, you look ill. How is that?"
"Something in the air affects my face."
"Those fair cheeks are very fastidious, I fear," returned Knight tenderly. "This air would make those rosy that were never so before, one would think--eh, Nature"s spoilt child?"
Elfride"s colour returned again.
"There is more to see behind us, after all," said Knight.
She turned her back upon the boat and Stephen Smith, and saw, towering still higher than themselves, the vertical face of the hill on the right, which did not project seaward so far as the bed of the valley, but formed the back of a small cove, and so was visible like a concave wall, bending round from their position towards the left.
The composition of the huge hill was revealed to its backbone and marrow here at its rent extremity. It consisted of a vast stratification of blackish-gray slate, unvaried in its whole height by a single change of shade.
It is with cliffs and mountains as with persons; they have what is called a presence, which is not necessarily proportionate to their actual bulk. A little cliff will impress you powerfully; a great one not at all. It depends, as with man, upon the countenance of the cliff.
"I cannot bear to look at that cliff," said Elfride. "It has a horrid personality, and makes me shudder. We will go."
"Can you climb?" said Knight. "If so, we will ascend by that path over the grim old fellow"s brow."