Chapter XIV: Seven Years After

"So, Lily, from those July hours,
No wonder we should call her."
--E. B. BROWNING.

Once more a summer day. The children, not long out of school, were loitering in the warm shadows of the village street, for the sun was still high in dazzling, cloudless blue, and there was no air stirring, not even enough to flutter the topmost leaves of the great trees that stood round about Markwood. The roses and the jessamine were out on the blacksmith's cottage, and its old yellow front looked just the same, opening on the little green yard. Beyond was the row of stately white lilies in full flower, and beyond them again the red rosebushes and the clusters of pinks. The house door stood open, but all was still, except for the sound of clanking iron that came from the forge. There the blacksmith of Markwood worked as usual, and was never in want of work, for his name, still more than those of his father and grandfather, was known all round the country as that of a clever and conscientious workman.

He was alone in the forge that afternoon, for the usual group of horses, which often came from miles away, had tramped off down the street, and though John in the prime of life was a more sociable man than in his younger days, he did not care now any more than then to have his workshop made a gossiping place for the village. Still, at thirty-five, he was the leader of all the best young fellows about in their cricket and other games, but still he was a man with few intimate friends--his home and his trade were enough for him.

He was finishing some work that afternoon, whistling a tune as his hammer clanked on the anvil, looking very black and very hot, with his shirt sleeves rolled up above his elbows, when the light from the door was suddenly darkened. John looked up, pushing back his hair from his forehead, and then stood upright, balancing his hammer and staring with bewildered eyes. In the doorway stood a tall young girl, dressed in white, with a shady hat, under which her fair hair fell in curling ripples to her shoulders. She was slender and pale, but though she did not look strong, the smile that shone in her blue eyes spoke of perfect happiness. She looked as if her life was all made of summer days, and better than this, the sweetness of her expression seemed to show that she loved making others happy. As she stood looking at John, the pale cheeks flushed a little, and she almost laughed at his wondering astonishment, but she said nothing.

"Why--Lily!" said John, under his breath, and then he too coloured suddenly, as if ashamed of himself. "I beg your pardon--I never thought of seeing you like that--a grown-up young lady."

"I'm not grown-up--I'm only fourteen," said Lily, and she stepped inside the forge and held out her hand. "Oh, John--I'm so glad to see you again. You're just the same--and how is mother?"

"She's very well, thank you," John replied; but he looked at his own black hand and shook his head and laughed. "No, that won't do," he said. "But it is your own self, and--I hope your father's well."

"Yes, thank you, John. We have come to Sir Henry Smith's for a few days, you know, and I did so want to see if you had forgotten me, and I asked Lady Smith if I might come here all alone, and she sent me in a pony-cart--it's waiting in the village. Did you think I was never coming back any more? I believe you had half forgotten me."

"No, no," said John hastily. "I couldn't ever forget you. But don't you see, you've grown up; you ain't the little child any more, and standing there with your back to the light, 'twas no wonder I was a bit puzzled. And it's a long time, to be sure----"

"So it is--but I've written to you always, haven't I, John? And you know how my father took us abroad very soon, so that we haven't been much in England since I left you. As for you, John, you are not altered in the very least. Just exactly the same."

"Ain't I? I've got some grey hairs, Miss Lily. Well, I have much to be thankful for," said John. "I've got a good wife and a dear little child. Now please to go to Mary in the house, and I'll clean myself and be with you in a minute. You'll take a cup of tea with us, for old sake's sake?"

"Please. I should like it very much," said Lily.

Mary was looking out of her kitchen door. She had heard John talking to some one in the forge, and had seen the light little figure in the doorway, and guessed very well who it was, though she had not seen Lily since the terrible day of Carsham Fair, when the child was the innocent cause of the greatest sorrow of her life. But she bore no malice for that now; she was far too happy as a woman to find it worth while remembering the troubles of a girl, and she could not have been married more than six years to John without catching something of his wide, generous, simple way of looking at life. It was with the kindest smile, therefore, that she came forward to welcome Colonel Maxwell's daughter.

"Oh, Mary, what a naughty little girl I was!" said the child, putting up her face to be kissed. "And you were always kind to me. But there never were people like John and mother. Tell me again, before he comes in, about his bringing me home that day."

"I'll tell you everything you like," said Mary, smiling. "But won't you come into the garden first and see the flowers. You used to like them--and mother's there--and you know there's another Lily."

"Yes; but why did you call her so?"

"It was John's wish. I expect he couldn't do without a Lily."

The old apple-trees seemed more bent, more mossy; their shade seemed deeper on the green garden paths; and there, her grandmother's faltering steps left far behind, a little child came running--a little shy child--and buried her face in her mother's gown. The girl, her namesake, looked down at this small creature wonderingly. This was the first strange element in her old home; a child who had more right there than she. The garden that used to be her own, with all its fruit and flowers, where she was queen, and the first of her subjects used to carry her throned on his shoulder--her garden now belonged to this fat, rosy creature of five years old, whose life had been troubled with no adventures, no wild changes of losing and finding, who had a little brown face and dark eyes like John's, and hair of that brown fairness which means to become dark by-and-by. This was Lily--John's Lily now;--but the child of fourteen, with all her sweet fancies and romantic recollections, shook her head and thought that this baby's name did not rightly belong to her. A dear little loving child, but not one of the flowers that rule the garden. She would be John's little maid, her father's pet and darling, but never a princess that ruled him with a look or touch, never the real "John's Lily."

But Mrs. Randal, looking eagerly over her spectacles, rather lame with rheumatism, came hobbling hastily along the path by the strawberry-bed, and her welcome was loving enough to make Lily Maxwell feel that there was one heart here, at least, where she still had the warmest corner. And then John came, with clean hands and face and in his Sunday coat. He was a little shy with this young lady, who was somehow so very different from the child who had been taken away from him seven years before. Just a shadow of her old wistfulness came into Lily's blue eyes as he turned away from her after a few words and caught up his own little girl to his shoulder, and whispering, "Lily like a ride?" rushed off with her round the long old path, the nice green slope round the strawberry-bed, so familiar to another child long ago.

But it was all peaceful and happy. There could not, indeed, be a happier village home than this where Lily came to visit her old friends. She stayed to tea with them in the quaint old kitchen, and lingered there, talking and telling them long stories about her life and that of her brothers, till the shadows were growing long, and the evening sweet and cool. Then she left them, promising to come again soon.

And little Lily Randal, John's own little girl, proudly showed her father what the pretty young lady had fastened round her neck: a gold chain with a small locket engraved with the letter L, just like one she wore herself, except that the hair in it was not dark, but pale gold like her own.

"She always was a sweet child, and she is still," said Mrs. Randal. "They haven't spoilt her. She told me the four years with us was the happiest of her life. I hope not. I hope there's many blessings in store for her."

"She was always something like an angel," said John thoughtfully. "When I looked up and see her standing in the door, all in white like that, I remembered when she come to me in the railway carriage. There was always the same look in her eyes."

And Mary smiled and said, "Ah! she'll always be John's Lily."

THE END.

LONDON AND WESTMINSTER:
WELLS GARDNER, DARTON AND CO.