Volume 26 — CHAPTER XXI.

Most of the actions and events of our lives are chameleon-hued: their colors vary according to the light by which we view them. Thus Eve, who the night before had seen nothing but happiness in the final arrangement between Adam and herself, awoke on the following morning with a feeling of dissatisfaction and a desire to be critical as to the rosy hues which seemed then to color the advent of their love.

The spring of tenderness which had burst forth within her at sight of Adam's humility and subsequent despair had taken Eve by surprise. She knew, and had known for some time, that much within her was capable of answering to the demands which Adam's pleading love would most probably require; but that he had inspired her with a passion which would make her lay her heart at his feet, feeling for the time that, though he trampled on it, there it must stay, was a revelation entirely new, and, to Eve's temperament, rather humiliating. She had never felt any sympathy with those lovesick maidens whose very existence seemed swallowed up in another's being, and had been proudly confident that even when supplicated she should never seem to stoop lower than to accept. Therefore, just as we experience a sense of failure when we find our discernment led astray in our perception of a friend, so now, although she studiously avoided acknowledging it, she had the consciousness that she had utterly misconceived her own character, and that the balance by which she had adjusted the strength of her emotions had been a false one. A dread ran through her lest she should be seized hold upon by some further inconsistency, and she resolved to set a watch on the outposts of her senses, so that they might not betray her into further weakness.

These thoughts were still agitating her mind when Joan suddenly awoke, and after a time roused herself sufficiently to say, "Why, whatever made you pop off in such a hurry last night, Eve? I runned in a little after ten, and there wasn't no signs of you nowheres; and then I come upon Adam, and he told me you was gone up to bed."

"Yes," said Eve: "I was so tired, and my foot began to ache again, so I thought there wasn't any use in my sitting up any longer. But you were very late, Joan, weren't you?"

"Very early, more like," said Joan: "'twas past wan before I shut my eyes. Why, I come home three times to see if uncle was back; and then I wouldn't stand it no longer, so I went and fetched un."

"What, not from—where he was?" exclaimed Eve.

Joan nodded her head. "Oh Lors!" she said, "'tain't the fust time by many; and," she added in a tone of satisfaction, "I lets 'em know when they've brought Joan Hocken down among 'em. I had Jerrem out, and uncle atop of un, 'fore they knawed where they was. Awh, I don't stand beggin' and prayin', not I: 'tis 'whether or no, Tom Collins,' when I come, I can tell 'ee."

"Well, they'd stay a very long time before they'd be fetched by me," said Eve emphatically.

"Awh, don't 'ee say that, now," returned Joan. "Where do 'ee think there'd be the most harm in, then—sittin' comfortable at home when you might go down and 'tice 'em away, or the goin' down and doin' of it?"

"I've not a bit of patience with anybody who drinks," exclaimed Eve, evading a direct answer.

"Then you'll never cure anybody of it, my dear," replied Joan. "You'm like Adam there, I reckon—wantin' to set the world straight in one day, and all the folks in it bottommost side upward; but, as I tell un, he don't go to work the right way. They that can't steer 'ull never sail; and I'll bet any money that when it comes to be counted up how many glasses o' grog's been turned away from uncle's lips, there'll be more set to the score o' my coaxin' than ever 'ull be to Adam's bullyraggin'."

"Perhaps so," said Eve; and then, wishing to avoid any argument into which Adam could be brought, she adroitly changed the subject, and only indifferent topics were discussed until, their dressing completed, the two girls were ready to go down stairs.

The first person who answered the summons to breakfast was Uncle Zebedee—not heavy-eyed and shamefaced, as Eve had expected to see him, but bright and rosy-cheeked as an apple. He had been up and out since six o'clock, looking after the repairs which a boat of his was laid up to undergo, and now, as he came into the house fresh as a lark, he chirruped in a quavery treble,

That's for all the world what yourn is," he said, breaking off to bestow a smacking kiss on Joan. "So look sharp, like a good little maid as you be, and gi'e us sommat to sit down for;" and he drew a chair to the table and began flourishing the knife which had been set there for him. Then, catching sight of Eve, whose face, in her desire to spare him, betrayed an irrepressible look of consciousness, he exclaimed, "Why, they've bin tellin' up that I was a little over-free in my speech last night about you, Eve: is there any truth in it, eh? I doan't fancy I could ha' said much amiss—did I?"

"Oh, nothing to signify, uncle."

"'Twas sommat 'bout you and Adam, warn't it?" he continued with a puzzled air: "'tis all in my head here, though I can't zackly call it to mind. That's the divil o' bein' a little o'ertook that ways," he added with the assurance of meeting ready sympathy: "'tis so bafflin' to set things all ship-shape the next mornin'. I minds so far as this, that it had somehow to do with me holdin' to it that you and Adam was goin' to be man and wife; but if you axes for the why and the wherefore, I'm blessed if I can tell 'ee."

"Why, whatever put such as that into your head?" said Joan sharply.

"Wa-al, the liquor, I reckon," laughed Zebedee. "And, somehow or 'nother, Maister Adam didn't seem to have overmuch relish for the notion;" and he screwed up his face and hugged himself together as if his whole body was tickled at his son's discomfiture. "But there! never you mind that, Eve," he added hastily: "there's more baws than one to Polperro, and I'll wager for a halfscore o' chaps ready to hab 'ee without yer waitin' to be took up by my son Adam."

Poor Eve! it was certainly an embarrassing situation to be placed in, for, with no wish to conceal her engagement, to announce it herself alone, and unaided by even the presence of Adam, was a task she naturally shrank from. In the endeavor to avoid any direct reply she sat watching anxiously for Adam's arrival, her sudden change of manner construed by Zebedee into the effect of wounded vanity, and by Joan into displeasure at her uncle's undue interference. By sundry frowns and nods of warning Joan tried to convey her admonitions to old Zebedee, in the midst of which Adam entered, and with a smile at Eve and an inclusive nod to the rest of the party took a chair and drew up to the table.

"Surely," thought Eve, "he intends telling them."

But Adam sat silent and occupied with the plate before him.

"He can't think I can go living on here with Joan, even for a single day, and they not know it;" and in her perplexity she turned on Adam a look full of inquiry and meaning.

Still, Adam did not speak: in his own mind he was casting over the things he meant to say when, breakfast over and the two girls out of the way, he would invite his father to smoke a pipe outside, during the companionship of which he intended taking old Zebedee decidedly to task, and, putting his intended marriage with Eve well to the front, clinch his arguments by the startling announcement that unless some reformation was soon made he would leave his native place and seek a home in a foreign land. Such words and such threats as these could not be uttered to a father by a son save when they two stood quite alone; and Adam, after meeting a second look from Eve, shook his head, feeling satisfied that she would know that only some grave requirement deterred him from immediately announcing the happiness which henceforth was to crown his life. But our intuition, at the best, is somewhat narrow, and where the heart is most concerned most faulty: therefore Eve, and Adam too, felt each disappointed in the other's want of acquiescence, and inclined to be critical on the lack of mutual sympathy.

Suddenly the door opened and in walked Jerrem, smiling and apparently more radiant than usual under the knowledge that he was more than usually an offender. Joan, who had her own reasons for being very considerably put out with him, was not disposed to receive him very graciously; Adam vouchsafed him no notice whatever; Uncle Zebedee, oppressed by the sense of former good fellowship, thought it discreet not to evince too much cordiality; so that the onus of the morning's welcome was thrown upon Eve, who, utterly ignorant of any offence Jerrem had given, thought it advisable to make amends for the pettish impatience she feared she had been betrayed into on the previous morning.

Old Zebedee, whose resolves seldom lasted over ten minutes, soon fell into the swing of Jerrem's flow of talk; a little later on and Joan was forced to put in a word; so that the usual harmony was just beginning to recover itself when, in answer to a remark which Jerrem had made, Eve managed to turn the laugh so cleverly back upon him that Zebedee, well pleased to see what good friends they were growing, exclaimed, "Stop her mouth! stop her mouth, lad! I'd ha' done it when I was your years twenty times over 'fore this. Her's too sarcy—too sarcy by half, her is."

Up started Jerrem, but Adam was before him. "I don't know whether what I'm going to say is known to anybody here already," he burst out, "but I think it's high time that some present should be told by me that Eve has promised to be my wife;" and, turning, he cast a look of angry defiance at Jerrem, who, thoroughly amazed, gradually sank down and took possession of his chair again, while old Zebedee went through the dumb show of giving a long whistle, and Joan, muttering an unmeaning something, ran hastily out of the room. Eve, angry and confused, turned from white to red and from red to white.

A silence ensued—one of those pauses when some event of our lives seems turned into a gulf to separate us from our former surroundings.

Adam was the first to speak, and with a touch of irony he said, "You're none of you very nimble at wishing us joy, I fancy."

"And no wonder, you've a-tooked us all aback so," said old Zebedee. "'T seems to me I'm foaced to turn it round and round afore I can swaller it for rale right-down truth."

"Why, is it so very improbable, then?" asked Adam, already repenting the abruptness of the disclosure.

"Wa-al, 'twas no later than last night that you was swearin' agen and cussin' everybody from stem to starn for so much as mentionin' it as likely. Now," he added, with as much show of displeasure as his cheery, weatherbeaten old face would admit of, "I'll tell 'ee the mind I've got to'ard these sort o' games: if you see fit to board folks in the smoke, why do it and no blame to 'ee, but hang me if I can stomach 'ee sailin' under false colors."

"There wasn't anything of false colors about us, father," said Adam in a more conciliatory tone; "for, though I had certainly spoken to Eve, it was not until after I'd parted with you last night that she gave me her answer."

"Awh!" said the old man, only half propitiated. "Wa-al, I s'pose you can settle your consarns without my help; but I can tell 'ee this much, that if my Joanna had took so long afore she could make her mind up, I'm blamed if her ever should ha' had the chance o' bein' your mother, Adam—so there!"

Adam bit his lip with vexation. "There's no need for me to enter upon any further explanations," he said: "Eve's satisfied, I'm satisfied, so I don't see why you shouldn't be satisfied."

"Awh, I'm satisfied enough," said Zebedee; "and, so far as that goes, though I ain't much of a hand at speechifyin', I hopes that neither of 'ee 'ull never have no raison to repent yer bargain. Eve's a fine bowerly maid, so you'm well matched there; and so long as she's ready to listen to all you say and bide by all you tells her, why 'twill be set fair and sail easy."

"I can assure you Eve isn't prepared to do anything of the sort, Uncle Zebedee," exclaimed Eve, unable to keep silence any longer. "I've always been told if I'd nothing else I've got the Pascals' temper; and that, according to your own showing, isn't very fond of sitting quiet and being rode over rough-shod."

The whistle which Uncle Zebedee had tried to choke at its birth now came out shrill, long and expressive, and Adam, jumping up, said, "Come, come, Eve: we've had enough of this. Surely there isn't any need to take such idle talk as serious matter. If you and me hadn't seen some good in one another we shouldn't have taken each other, I suppose; and, thank the Lord, we haven't to please anybody but our two selves."

"Wa-al, 'tis to be hoped you'll find that task aisier than it looks," retorted Uncle Zebedee with a touch of sarcasm; while Jerrem, after watching Adam go out, endeavored to throw a tone of regret into the flattering nothings he now whispered by way of congratulation, but Eve turned impatiently away from him. She had no further inclination to talk or to be talked to; and Uncle Zebedee having by this time sought solace in a pipe, Jerrem joined him outside, and the two sauntered away together toward the quay.

Left to the undisturbed indulgence of her own reflections, Eve's mood was no enviable one—the more difficult to bear because she had to control the various emotions struggling within her. She felt it was time for plain speaking between her and Adam, and rightly judged that a proper understanding come to at once would be the safest means of securing future comfort. Turn and twist Adam's abrupt announcement as she would, she could assign but one cause for it, and that cause was an overweening jealousy; and as the prospect came before her of a lifetime spent in the midst of doubt and suspicion, the strength of her love seemed to die away and her heart grew faint within her. For surely if the demon of jealousy could be roused by the sight of commonplace attentions from one who was in every way like a brother—for so in Eve's eyes Jerrem seemed to be—what might not be expected if at any time circumstances threw her into the mixed company of strangers? Eve had seen very little of men, but whenever chance had afforded her the opportunity of their society she had invariably met with attention, and had felt inwardly gratified by the knowledge that she was attracting admiration; but now, if she gave way to this prejudice of Adam's, every time an eye was turned toward her she would be filled with fear, and each time a look was cast in her direction her heart would sink with dread.

What should she do? Give him up? Even with the prospect of possible misery staring at her, Eve could not say yes, and before the thought had more than shaped itself a dozen suggestions were battling down the dread alternative. She would change him, influence him, convert him—anything but give him up or give in to him. She forgot how much easier it is to conceive plans than to carry them out—to arrange speeches than to utter them. She forgot that only the evening before, when, an opportunity being afforded, she had resolved upon telling Adam the whole circumstance of Reuben May and the promise made between them, while the words were yet on her lips she had drawn them back because Adam had said he knew that the promise was "nothing but the promise of a letter;" and Eve's courage had suddenly given way, and by her silence she had led him to conclude that nothing else had passed between them. Joan had spoken of the envious grudge which Adam had borne toward Jerrem because he had shared in his mother's heart, so that this was not the first time Adam had dropped in gall to mingle with the cup of his love.

The thought of Joan brought the fact of her unexplained disappearance to Eve's mind, and, full of compunction at the bare suspicion of having wounded that generous heart, Eve jumped up with the intention of seeking her and of bringing about a satisfactory explanation. She had not far to go before she came upon Joan, rubbing and scrubbing away as if the welfare of all Polperro depended on the amount of energy she could throw into her work. Her face was flushed and her voice unsteady, the natural consequences of such violent exercise, and which Eve's approach but seemed to lend greater force to.

"Joan, I want to speak to you."

"Awh, my dear, I can't listen to no spakin' now," replied Joan hastily, "and the tables looking as they do."

"But Tabithy always scrubs the tables, Joan: why should you do it?"

"Tabithy's arms ain't half so young as mine—worse luck for me or for she!"

Having by this time gained a little insight into Joan's peculiarities, Eve argued no further, but sat herself down on a convenient seat, waiting for the time when the rasping sound of the brush would come to an end. Her patience was put to no very great tax, for after a few minutes Joan flung the brush along the table, exclaiming, "Awh, drabbit the ole scrubbin'! I must give over. I b'lieve I've had enuf of it for this time, 't all events."

"Joan, you ain't hurt with me, are you?" said Eve, trying to push her into the seat from which she had just risen. "I wanted to be the first to tell you, only that Adam spoke as he did, and took all I was going to say out of my mouth. It leaves you to think me dreadfully sly."

"Awh, there wasn't much need for tellin' me," said Joan with a sudden relax of manner. "When I didn't shut my eyes o' purpose I could tell, from the first, what was certain to happen."

"It was more than I could, then," said Eve. "I hadn't given it a thought that Adam meant to speak to me, and when he asked me I was quite taken aback, and said 'No' for ever so long."

"What made 'ee change yer mind so suddent, then?" said Joan bluntly.

Eve hesitated. "I hardly know," she said, with a little confusion. "I think it was seeing him so cast down made me feel so dreadfully sorry."

"H'm!" said Joan. "Didn't 'ee never feel no sorrow for t'other poor chap that wanted to have 'ee—he to London, Reuben May?"

"Not enough to make me care in that way for him: I certainly never did."

"And do you care for Adam, then?"

"I think I do."

"Think?"

"Well, I am sure I do."

"That's better. Well, Eve, I'll say this far;" and Joan gave a sigh before the other words would come out: "I'd rather it should be you than anybody else I ever saw."

The struggle with which these words were said, their tone and the look in Joan's face, seemed to reveal a state of feeling which Eve had not suspected. Throwing her arms round her, she cried out, "Oh, Joan, why didn't he choose you? You would have been much better for him than me."

"Lord bless the maid!"—and Joan tried to laugh through her tears—"I wouldn't ha' had un if he'd axed me. Why, there'd ha' bin murder 'tween us 'fore a month was out: us 'ud ha' bin hung for one 'nother. No: now don't 'ee take no such stuff as that into yer head, 'cos there's no sense in it. Adam's never looked 'pon me not more than a sister;" and, breaking down, Joan sobbed hysterically; "and when you two's married I shall feel 'zackly as if he was a brother, and be gladder than e'er a one else to see how happy you makes un."

"That's if I do make him happy," said Eve sadly.

"There's no fear but you'll do that," said Joan, resolutely wiping the tears from her eyes; "and 'twill be your own fault if you bain't happy too yourself, Eve. Adam's got his fads to put up with, and his fancies same as other men have, and a masterful temper to keep under, as nobody can tell better than me; but for rale right-down goodness I shouldn't know where to match his fellow—not if I was to search the place through; and, mind 'ee, after all, that's something to be proud of in the man you've got to say maister to."

Eve gave a little smile: "But he must let me be mistress, you know, Joan."

"All right! only don't you stretch that too far," said Joan warningly, "or no good 'ull come of it; and be foreright in all you do, and spake the truth to un. I've many a time wished I could, but with this to hide o' that one's and that to hush up o' t'other's, I know he holds me for a downright liard; and so I am by his measure, I 'spects."

"I'm sure you're nothing of the sort, Joan," said Eve. "Adam's always saying how much people think of you. He told me only yesterday that he was certain more than half the men of the place had asked you to marry them."

"Did he?" said Joan, not wholly displeased that Adam should hold this opinion. "Awh, and ax they may, I reckon, afore I shall find a man to say 'Yes' to."

"That is what I used to think myself," said Eve.

"Iss, and so you found it till Roger put the question," replied Joan decisively. Then, after a minute's pause, she added, "What be 'ee goin' to do 'bout the poor sawl to London, then—eh? You must tell he somehow."

"Oh, I don't see that," said Eve. "I mean to write to him, because I promised I would; and I shall tell him that I've made up my mind not to go back, but I sha'n't say anything more. There isn't any need for it, that I see—at least, not yet a while."

"Best to tell un all," argued Joan. "Why shouldn't 'ee? 'Tis the same, so far as you'm concerned, whether he's killed to wance or dies by inches."

But Eve was not to be persuaded. "There isn't any reason why I should," she said.

"No reason?" replied Joan. "Oh, Eve, my dear," she added, "don't 'ee let happiness harden your heart: if love is sweet to gain, think how bitter 'tis to lose; and, by all you've told me, you'll forfeit a better man than most in Reuben May."

The Author of "Dorothy Fox."

[TO BE CONTINUED.]