BOOK FOUR. CHAPTER FIVE

I knew something had happened to upset Emmy whenever I saw her on the morning I returned home, but I had not the opportunity of questioning her, for I arrived only a few minutes before dinner. As the meal progressed, I began to wonder what was amiss with Mr Boyd, for he was unwont- edly mute. This silence was so unnatural to him that it made me feel uneasy. Only once did he break it and that was to admonish Emmy for speaking impatiently to mamma. I thought by this time we had all grown accustomed to Mr Boyd’s trying habit of giving his opinion on matters that did not concern him, but that day at dinner I saw Emmy glare at him so openly across the table that I wondered how she dared. She then repeated very sweetly her exact words to mamma, and looked coldly again at Mr Boyd, her eyebrows raised, as though demanding an explanation for his reproof. By the time we finished dinner I realised that what had upset Emmy had also caused Mr Boyd’s unusual silence.

She left the room whenever the meal was over to finish placing, side by side, the cool stone jars of this year’s jam in the cupboard in the hall. I heard her call to me to come and see how nice it looked. Mr Boyd followed me from the parlour and, without speaking to us as he passed, took his black hat and stick from the stand. For some seconds he stood with his back to us, his neck rolled above his collar, evidently debating whether or not he should take his coat. We saw him struggle into it and felt the house shake as he closed the door heavily behind him.

‘Emmy,’ I asked wonderingly, looking at the shut hall door, ‘whatever is the matter with Mr Boyd?’

Her face flushed deeply, as though at some uncomfortable recollection. ‘Oh, Lisbet,’ she said, ‘I do hope papa will be well soon. Nothing has gone right since that man has come. The very house feels different when he’s in it.’

‘But what has happened, Emmy?’ I asked.

‘The day before yesterday I was setting the flowers for mamma. Ever since you went he’s been strange, Lisbet. I can’t describe it, but he seemed to be what he would think was being nice to me, and I don’t know why, but I hated it. There’s something wrong about that man, Lisbet; I am sure he has all the wrong thoughts. I knew as well as though I read it on a page before me that he wanted to speak with me alone, and I was determined he wouldn’t. Somehow I didn’t want to hear what he was going to say. You’ve no idea how difficult it was, Lisbet, for it wasn’t as though you were at home. All my walks were spoiled, getting out of the house without his knowing and becoming breathless with hurry in case he was following. Do you know, even in the bedroom at night—I know it was silly and ridiculous—I kept looking round in a fright, thinking he was there. Well, the day before yesterday, I thought he had gone out—you know how regularly he takes his morning walk on other days, and I was setting the flowers for mamma alone in the parlour. I saw the door open and the next moment he put in his face to see if I were there. I knew he had caught me, for mamma was making papa’s bed with Nannie and wouldn’t be down for some time, but I went on snipping the flower stems as though nothing untoward were happening. I heard him say something that sounded very foolish about flowers and me, and the next thing I knew was that he was standing over me. He always seems to have so much face, and he came so near me that when I looked up I saw the network of tiny purple veins on his cheeks. I began to feel stifled, as though some one had lifted a flap of the carpet and filled my nose with dust. I felt he was trapping me and I wanted to run to the ends of the world from him, but he was like a wall before me. I knew he was going to propose and I felt I would do anything—anything—to stop him. I didn’t want to be borne down on and I felt if he kissed me I would be sick. I must have gone quite cold, for he took my hand and exclaimed it was like ice. I think he was quite enjoying the effect he saw he had on me. He said something about some one needing to take care of me. I knew what was coming, so I said to save his feelings and to give him a way out, “No, no, I don’t need any one to do that.” He came still nearer, if that were possible, and said something about my not knowing my own mind. I grew desperate then and said, “That’s the one thing I do know, Mr Boyd. I don’t want to marry any one and would have to say no should any one ask me.” I wanted to make it clear I wouldn’t marry him before he actually asked me, for I knew he could never bear it otherwise: he is such a preposterous man who sees everything out of proportion, particularly himself.’

‘And what did he say then, Emmy?’

‘He dropped my hand as though it had been fire. He didn’t say anything for a few minutes but he recovered himself astonishingly quickly, Lisbet. By the time he reached the door he was himself again, very red in the face but bristling with a terrible kind of laboured sarcasm. He stood moving up and down on his heels, you know the habit he’s got, and said, “So you are not going to marry? No, I don’t think you ever will, for I don’t suppose any one rich enough or handsome enough for you will ever come your way. And why, may I ask, do you make me your confidant?” I didn’t answer, of course, for I knew he was trying to save himself by taking advantage of my being like Nancy Baxter and refusing the man before he axed her. If that’s any consolation to him, he’s quite welcome to it as far as I am concerned.’

‘You were quite right, Emmy,’ I said hotly. ‘And what was he like to you—afterwards?’

‘Oh, unbearable. He never even says “good-morning” to me now and only speaks to me to censure me—you saw what he was like at dinner—as though he were my schoolmaster and wanted to lower me before the class. I do hate rudeness. I won’t sit in the same room with him unless some one else is there; but I don’t know what it is about him, he seems to overflow the house.’

She stood looking down at me from the kitchen chair. There was a clarity about her face, for her thoughts did not conflict; everything she said sprang from what she herself considered and was in no way prompted by or adjusted to what was expected of her. Her directness of speech and vividness of colouring, the brightness of her eyes, her brown hair dusted with gold, the delicately marked eyebrows, which gave a proud look to her face whether she willed it or not, all served to counteract the impression of extreme fragility which her very fine skin might have imparted.

She folded up the duster and carried the chair she had been standing on back to the kitchen. Mr Boyd, who was visiting some people on the other side of the loch, did not return until late that night. The house seemed to become ours again in his absence. As we sat at tea, we could hear in the distance the rumbling of the carts returning from the fields to Gow Farm. The afternoon sunshine shone brightly and the yellow leaves came raining down; their shadows poised and fluttered on floor and wall until one almost thought the leaves themselves were imprisoned in the rooms.

I lay awake that night after Emmy had fallen asleep, letting the familiar room and house gather round me again as though I had never left it. I heard Nannie rake out the kitchen fire before going to bed; the sound reached me as though from the bottom of a deep well and I, beginning to be rocked with sleep, took long to connect it with Nannie, the kitchen and myself. I heard Mr Boyd come in and lock up the door. After that, the house settled itself for the night, a shelter of silence cut off with mist, bounded by rain and cradled in winds.