Perhaps I’ve gone a little too far in taking notice of the pretty little thing and stealing a kiss now and then. You’re such a grave, steady fellow, you don’t understand the temptation to such trifling. I’m sure I wouldn’t bring any trouble or annoyance on her and the good Poysers on any account if I could help it. But I think you look a little too seriously at it. You know I’m going away immediately, so I shan’t make any more mistakes of the kind. But let us say good-night”—Arthur here turned round to walk on—“and talk no more about the matter. The whole thing will soon be forgotten.”
“No, by God!” Adam burst out with rage that could be controlled no longer, throwing down the basket of tools and striding forward till he was right in front of Arthur. All his jealousy and sense of personal injury, which he had been hitherto trying to keep under, had leaped up and mastered him. What man of us, in the first moments of a sharp agony, could ever feel that the fellow-man who has been the medium of inflicting it did not mean to hurt us? In our instinctive rebellion against pain, we are children again, and demand an active will to wreak our vengeance on. Adam at this moment could only feel that he had been robbed of Hetty—robbed treacherously by the man in whom he had trusted—and he stood close in front of Arthur, with fierce eyes glaring at him, with pale lips and clenched hands, the hard tones in which he had hitherto been constraining himself to express no more than a just indignation giving way to a deep agitated voice that seemed to shake him as he spoke.
“No, it’ll not be soon forgot, as you’ve come in between her and me, when she might ha’ loved me—it’ll not soon be forgot as you’ve robbed me o’ my happiness, while I thought you was my best friend, and a noble-minded man, as I was proud to work for. And you’ve been kissing her, and meaning nothing, have you? And I never kissed her i’ my life—but I’d ha’ worked hard for years for the right to kiss her. And you make light of it. You think little o’ doing what may damage other folks, so as you get your bit o’ trifling, as means nothing. I throw back your favours, for you’re not the man I took you for. I’ll never count you my friend any more. I’d rather you’d act as my enemy, and fight me where I stand—it’s all th’ amends you can make me.”
Poor Adam, possessed by rage that could find no other vent, began to throw off his coat and his cap, too blind with passion to notice the change that had taken place in Arthur while he was speaking. Arthur’s lips were now as pale as Adam’s; his heart was beating violently. The discovery that Adam loved Hetty was a shock which made him for the moment see himself in the light of Adam’s indignation, and regard Adam’s suffering as not merely a consequence, but an element of his error. The words of hatred and contempt—the first he had ever heard in his life—seemed like scorching missiles that were making ineffaceable scars on him. All screening self-excuse, which rarely falls quite away while others respect us, forsook him for an instant, and he stood face to face with the first great irrevocable evil he had ever committed. He was only twenty-one, and three months ago—nay, much later—he had thought proudly that no man should ever be able to reproach him justly. His first impulse, if there had been time for it, would perhaps have been to utter words of propitiation; but Adam had no sooner thrown off his coat and cap than he became aware that Arthur was standing pale and motionless, with his hands still thrust in his waistcoat pockets.
“What!” he said, “won’t you fight me like a man? You know I won’t strike you while you stand so.”
“Go away, Adam,” said Arthur, “I don’t want to fight you.”
“No,” said Adam, bitterly; “you don’t want to fight me—you think I’m a common man, as you can injure without answering for it.”
“I never meant to injure you,” said Arthur, with returning anger. “I didn’t know you loved her.”
“But you’ve made her love you,” said Adam. “You’re a double-faced man—I’ll never believe a word you say again.”
“Go away, I tell you,” said Arthur, angrily, “or we shall both repent.”
“No,” said Adam, with a convulsed voice, “I swear I won’t go away without fighting you. Do you want provoking any more? I tell you you’re a coward and a scoundrel, and I despise you.”
The colour had all rushed back to Arthur’s face; in a moment his right hand was clenched, and dealt a blow like lightning, which sent Adam staggering backward. His blood was as thoroughly up as Adam’s now, and the two men, forgetting the emotions that had gone before, fought with the instinctive fierceness of panthers in the deepening twilight darkened by the trees. The delicate-handed gentleman was a match for the workman in everything but strength, and Arthur’s skill enabled him to protract the struggle for some long moments. But between unarmed men the battle is to the strong, where the strong is no blunderer, and Arthur must sink under a well-planted blow of Adam’s as a steel rod is broken by an iron bar. The blow soon came, and Arthur fell, his head lying concealed in a tuft of fern, so that Adam could only discern his darkly clad body.
He stood still in the dim light waiting for Arthur to rise.
The blow had been given now, towards which he had been straining all the force of nerve and muscle—and what was the good of it? What had he done by fighting? Only satisfied his own passion, only wreaked his own vengeance. He had not rescued Hetty, nor changed the past—there it was, just as it had been, and he sickened at the vanity of his own rage.
But why did not Arthur rise? He was perfectly motionless, and the time seemed long to Adam. Good God! had the blow been too much for him? Adam shuddered at the thought of his own strength, as with the oncoming of this dread he knelt down by Arthur’s side and lifted his head from among the fern. There was no sign of life: the eyes and teeth were set. The horror that rushed over Adam completely mastered him, and forced upon him its own belief. He could feel nothing but that death was in Arthur’s face, and that he was helpless before it. He made not a single movement, but knelt like an image of despair gazing at an image of death.
Chapter II.
A Dilemma
It was only a few minutes measured by the clock—though Adam always thought it had been a long while—before he perceived a gleam of consciousness in Arthur’s face and a slight shiver through his frame. The intense joy that flooded his soul brought back some of the old affection with it.
“Do you feel any pain, sir?” he said, tenderly, loosening Arthur’s cravat.
Arthur turned his eyes on Adam with a vague stare which gave way to a slightly startled motion as if from the shock of returning memory. But he only shivered again and said nothing.
“Do you feel any hurt, sir?” Adam said again, with a trembling in his voice.
Arthur put his hand up to his waistcoat buttons, and when Adam had unbuttoned it, he took a longer breath. “Lay my head down,” he said, faintly, “and get me some water if you can.”
Adam laid the head down gently on the fern again, and emptying the tools out of the flag-basket, hurried through the trees to the edge of the Grove bordering on the Chase, where a brook ran below the bank.
When he returned with his basket leaking, but still half-full, Arthur looked at him with a more thoroughly reawakened consciousness.
“Can you drink a drop out o’ your hand, sir?” said Adam, kneeling down again to lift up Arthur’s head.
“No,” said Arthur, “dip my cravat in and souse it on my head.”
The water seemed to do him some good, for he presently raised himself a little higher, resting on Adam’s arm.
“Do you feel any hurt inside sir?” Adam asked again
“No—no hurt,” said Arthur, still faintly, “but rather done up.”
After a while he said, “I suppose I fainted away when you knocked me down.”
“Yes, sir, thank God,” said Adam. “I thought it was worse.”
“What! You thought you’d done for me, eh? Come help me on my legs.”
“I feel terribly shaky and dizzy,” Arthur said, as he stood