Jan Vedder's Wife - Amelia Edith Huddleston Barr (historical books to read txt) 📗

thee some things which belong to thee, if thou cares for them."

"What hast thou of mine?"

"Wilt thou look then? They are in the handkerchief."

He watched her keenly, perhaps a little hardly, as she untied the knot. He watched the faint rose-color deepen to scarlet on her face; he saw how her hands trembled, as she laid one by one the jewels on the table, and thoughtfully fingered the lace yellow with neglect. But there were no tears in her dropped eyes, and she could scarcely have been more deliberate in her examination, if she had been appraising their value. And yet, her heart was burning and beating until she found it impossible to speak.

Snorro's anger gathered fast. His own feelings were in such a state of excitement, that they made him unjust to a type of emotion unfamiliar to him.

"Well then," he asked, sharply, "dost thou want them or not?"

"Jan bought them for me?"

"Yes, he bought them, and thou sent them back to him. If thou had sent me one back, I had never bought thee another. But Jan Vedder was not like other men."

"We will not talk of Jan, thee and me. What did thou bring these to-night for?"

"I told thee I was going to Wick, and it would not be safe to leave them, nor yet to take them with me. I was so foolish, also, as to think that thou would now prize them for Jan's sake, but I see thou art the same woman yet. Give them to me, I will take them to the minister."

"Leave them here. I will keep them safely."

"The rattle was bought for little Jan. It was in his father's pocket when he was shipwrecked."

She stood with it in her hand, gazing down upon the tarnished bells, and answered not a word. Snorro looked at her angrily, and then stooped down, and softly kissed the sleeping child.

"Good-by, Margaret Vedder!"

She had lifted the locket in the interval, and was mechanically passing her fingers along the chain. "It is the very pattern I wished for," she whispered to her heart, "I remember drawing it for him." She did not hear Snorro's "good-by," and he stood watching her curiously a moment.

"I said 'good-by,' Margaret Vedder."

"Good-by," she answered mechanically. Her whole soul was moved. She was in a maze of tender, troubled thoughts, but Snorro perceived nothing but her apparent interest in the jewels. He could not forget his last sight of her standing, so apparently calm, with her eyes fixed upon the locket and chain that dangled from her white hand. "She was wondering how much they cost Jan," he thought bitterly; "what a cold, cruel woman she is!"

That she had not asked him about his own affairs, why he left so hurriedly, how he was going, for what purpose, how long he was to be away, was a part of her supreme selfishness, Snorro thought. He could no longer come into her life, and so she cared nothing about him. He wished Dr. Balloch could have seen her as he did, with poor Jan's love-gifts in her hands. With his heart all aflame on Jan's noble deeds, and his imagination almost deifying the man, the man he loved so entirely, Margaret's behavior was not only very much misunderstood by Snorro, it was severely and unjustly condemned.

"What did God make women for?" he asked angrily, as he strode back over the moor. "I hope Jan has forgotten her, for it is little she thinks of him."

On reaching his home again he dressed himself in his best clothes, for he could not sleep. He walked up and down the old town, and over the quays, and stood a five minutes before Peter Fae's store, and so beguiled the hours until he could go on board "The Lapwing."

At five o'clock he saw Lord Lynne come aboard, and the anchor was raised. Snorro lifted his cap, and said, "Good morning, Lord Lynne;" and my lord answered cheerily, "Good morning, Snorro. With this wind we shall make a quick passage to Wick."


CHAPTER XII.


SNORRO AND JAN.

"And yet when all is thought and said,
The heart still overrules the head;
Still what we hope, we must believe,
And what is given us receive."

Snorro had indeed very much misjudged Margaret. During her interview with him she had been absorbed in one effort, that of preserving her self-control while he was present. As soon as he had gone, she fled to her own room, and locking the door, she fell upon her knees. Jan's last love-gifts lay on the bed before her, and she bent her head over them, covering them with tears and kisses.

"Oh, Jan! Oh, my darling!" she whispered to the deaf and dumb emblems of his affection. "Oh, if thou could come back to me again! Never more would I grieve thee, or frown on thee! Never should thy wishes be unattended to, or thy pleasure neglected! No one on earth, no one should speak evil of thee to me! I would stand by thee as I promised until death! Oh, miserable, unworthy wife that I have been! What shall I do? If now thou knew at last how dearly Margaret loves thee, and how bitterly she repents her blindness and her cruelty!"

So she mourned in half-articulate sobbing words, until little Jan awoke and called her. Then she laid him in her own bed and sat down beside him; quiet, but full of vague, drifting thoughts that she could hardly catch, but which she resolutely bent her mind to examine. Why had Snorro kept these things so long, and then that night suddenly brought them to her at such a late hour? What was he going away for? What was that strange light upon his face? She had never seen such a look upon Snorro's face before. She let these questions importune her all night, but she never dared put into form the suspicion which lay dormant below them, that Jan had something to do with it; that Snorro had heard from Jan.

In the morning she took the trinkets with her to Dr. Balloch's. She laid them before him one by one, telling when, and how, they had been offered and refused. "All but this," she said, bursting into childlike weeping, and showing the battered, tarnished baby coral. "He brought this for his child, and I would not let him see the baby. Oh, can there be any mercy for one so unmerciful as I was?"

"Daughter, weep; thy tears are gracious tears. Would to God poor Jan could see thee at this hour. Whatever happiness may now be his lot, thy contrition would add to it, I know. Go home to-day. No one is in any greater trouble than thou art. Give to thyself tears and prayers; it may be that ere long God will comfort thee. And as thou goes, call at Snorro's house. See that the fire is out, lock the door, and bring me the key when thou comes to-morrow. I promised Snorro to care for his property."

"Where hath Snorro gone?"

"What did he say to thee?"

"That he was going to Wick. But how then did he go? There was no steamer due."

"Lord Lynne took him in his yacht."

"That is strange!" and Margaret looked steadily at Dr. Balloch. "It seems to me, that Lord Lynne's yacht was at Lerwick, on that night; thou knowest."

"When Skager and Jan quarreled?"

She bowed her head, and continued to gaze inquisitively at him.

"No, thou art mistaken. On that night he was far off on the Norway coast. It must have been two weeks afterward, when he was in Lerwick."

"When will Lord Lynne be here again?"

"I know not; perhaps in a few weeks, perhaps not until the end of summer. He may not come again this year. He is more uncertain than the weather."

Margaret sighed, and gathering her treasures together she went away. As she had been desired, she called at Snorro's house. The key was on the outside of the door, she turned it, and went in. The fire had been carefully extinguished, and the books and simple treasures he valued locked up in his wooden chest. It had evidently been quite filled with these, for his clothes hung against the wall of an inner apartment. Before these clothes Margaret stood in a kind of amazement. She was very slow of thought, but gradually certain facts in relation to them fixed themselves in her mind with a conviction which no reasoning could change.

Snorro had gone away in his best clothes; his fishing suit and his working suit he had left behind. It was clear, then, that he had not gone to the Wick fisheries; equally clear that he had not gone away with any purpose of following his occupation in loading and unloading vessels. Why had he gone then? Margaret was sure that he had no friends beyond the Shetlands. Who was there in all the world that could tempt Snorro from the little home he had made and loved; and who, or what could induce him to leave little Jan?

_Only Jan's father!_

She came to this conclusion at last with a clearness and rapidity that almost frightened her. Her cheeks burned, her heart beat wildly, and then a kind of anger took possession of her. If Snorro knew any thing, Dr. Balloch did also. Why was she kept in anxiety and uncertainty? "I will be very quiet and watch," she thought, "and when Lord Lynne comes again, I will follow him into the manse, and ask him where my husband is."

As she took a final look at Snorro's belongings, she thought pitifully, "How little he has! And yet who was so good and helpful to every one? I might have taken more interest in his housekeeping! How many little things I could easily have added to his comforts! What a selfish woman I must be! Little wonder that he despised me!" And she determined that hour to make Jan's friend her friend when he came back, and to look better after his household pleasures and needs.

She had plenty now to think about, and she was on the alert morning, noon, and night; but nothing further transpired to feed her hope for nearly a month. The fishing season was then in full business, and Peter Fae, as usual, full of its cares. There had been no formal reconciliation between Margaret and her father and stepmother, and there was no social intercourse between the houses, but still they were on apparent terms of friendship with each other. The anger and ill-will had gradually worn away, and both Peter and Suneva looked with respect upon a woman so much in the minister's favor and company. Peter sent her frequent presents from the store, and really looked upon his handsome little grandson with longing and pride. When he was a few years older he intended to propose to pay for his education. "We'll send him to Edinburgh, Suneva," he frequently said, "and we will grudge nothing that is for his welfare."

And Suneva, who had carefully fostered this scheme, would reply, "That is what I have always said, Peter. It is a poor family that has not one gentleman in it, and, please God and thy pocket-book, we will make a gentleman and a minister of our little Jan;" and the thought of his grandson filling a pulpit satisfied Peter's highest ambition.

So,