Philip felt shame of his subterfuge, but yet more ashamed of the truth; so he leaned against the door and watched in silence. The smell of hay floated down from the loft, and the odour of the cow"s breath came in gusts as she turned her face about. Kate sat on the milking-stool close by the ewer, and her head, on which she wore a sun-bonnet, she leaned against the cow"s side.
"No news of Pete, then? No?" she said.
"No," said Philip.
Kate dug her head deeper in the cow, and muttered, "Dear Pete! So simple, so natural."
"He is," said Philip.
"So good-hearted, too."
"Yes."
"And such a manly fellow--any girl might like him," said Kate.
"Indeed, yes," said Philip.
There was silence again, and two pigs which had been snoring on the manure heap outside began to snort their way home. Kate turned her head so that the crown of the sun-bonnet was toward Phillip, and said--
"Oh, dear! Can there be anything so terrible as marrying somebody you don"t care for?"
"Nothing so bad," said Philip.
The mouth of the sun-bonnet came round. "Yes, there"s one thing worse, Philip."
"No?"
"Not having married somebody you do," said Kate, and the milk rattled like hail.
In the straw behind. Kate there was a tailless Manx cat with three tailed kittens, and Philip began to play with them. Being back to back with Kate, he could keep his countenance.
"This old Horney is terrible for switching," said Kate, over her shoulder. "Don"t you think you could hold her tail?"
That brought them face to face again. "It"s so sweet to have some one to talk to about Pete," said Kate.
"Yes?"
"I don"t know how I could bear his long absence but for that."
"Are you longing so much, Kate?"
"Oh, no, not longing--not to say longing. Only you can"t think what it is to be... have you never been yourself, Philip?"
"What?" "Hold it tight... in love? No?"
"Well," said Philip, speaking at the crown of the sun-bonnet. "Ha! ha!
well, not properly perhaps--I don"t--I can hardly say, Kate."
"There! You"ve let it go, after all, and she"s covered me with the milk!
But I"m finished, anyway."
Kate was suddenly radiant. She kissed Horney, and hugged her calf in the adjoining stall; and as they crossed the haggard, Philip carrying the pail, she scattered great handfuls of oats to a c.o.c.k and his two hens as they cackled their way to roost.
"You"ll be sure to come again soon, Philip, eh? It"s so sweet to have some one to remind me of----" but Pete"s name choked her now. "Not that I"m likely to forget him--now is that likely? But it"s such a weary time to be left alone, and a girl gets longing. Did I now? Give me the milk, then. Did I say I wasn"t? Well, you can"t expect a girl to be _always_ reasonable."
"Good-bye, Kate."
"Yes, you had better go now--good-bye."
Philip went away in pain, yet in delight, with a delicious thrill, and a sense of stifling hypocrisy. He had felt like a fool. Kate must have thought him one. But better she should think him a fool than a traitor.
It was all his fault. Only for him the girl would have been walled round by her love for Pete. He would come no more.
IX.
Philip held to his resolution for three months, and grew thin and pale. Then another letter came from Pete--a letter for himself, and he wondered what to do with it. To send it by post, pretending to be ill again, would be hypocrisy he could not support. He took it.
The family were all at home. Nancy had just finished a noisy churning, and Kate was in the dairy, weighing the b.u.t.ter into pounds and stamping it. Philip read the letter in a loud voice to the old people in the kitchen, and the soft thumping and watery swishing ceased in the damp place adjoining. Pete was in high feather. He had made a mortal lot of money lately, and was for coming home quickly. Couldn"t say exactly when, for some rascally blackleg Boers, who had been corrupting his Kaffirs and slipped up country with a pile of stones, had first to be followed and caught. The job wouldn"t take long though, and they might expect to see him back within a twelvemonth, with enough in his pocket to drive away the devil and the coroner anyway.
"Bould fellow!" said Caesar.
"Aw, deed on Pete!" said Grannie.
"Now, if it wasn"t for that Ross----" said Nancy.
Philip went into the dairy, where Kate was now skimming the cream of the last night"s milking. He was sorry there was nothing but a message for her this time. Had she answered Pete"s former letters? No, she had not.
"I must be writing soon, I suppose," she said, blowing the yellow surface. "But I wish--_puff_--I could have something to tell him--_puff, puff_--about you."
"About me, Kate?"
"Something sweet, I mean "--_puff, puff, puff_.
She shot a sly look upward. "Aren"t you sure yet? Can"t say still? Not properly? No?"
Philip pretended not to understand. Kate"s laugh echoed in the empty cream tins. "How you want people to say things!"
"No, really--" began Philip.
"I"ve always heard that the girls of Douglas are so beautiful. You must see so many now. Oh, it would be delicious to write a long story to Pete. Where you met--in church, naturally. What she"s like--fair, of course. And--and all about it, you know."
"That"s a story you will never tell to Pete, Kate," said Philip.
"No, never," said Kate quite as light, and this being just what she wished to hear, she added mournfully. "Don"t say that, though. You can"t think what pleasure you are denying me, and yourself, too. Take some poor girl to your heart, Philip. You don"t know how happy it will make you."
"Are _you_ so happy, then, Kate?"