Chapter II: The Lady in the Snow

The lull after the squall had left a waste world, dim yet white, beneath a cloud-strewn sky. High among the clouds the wind was still racing; and the aspect of the heavens was perpetually changing, as masses of vapour rose and scuttled before the blast like giant herds: rent apart, drawing closer, scattered again. Thus the land was a-flicker with shine and shadows, and yet lay dead under that semblance of life.

Paul Farrant, astride the old farm mare, had no thought to spare for the new appearance of the white wilderness; scarce even a feeling for the biting cold. His brain was all astir with vivid, angry images. His pulses throbbed with the excitement of the gambler playing for the highest stakes a man can win or lose.

“’Tis now your wit against your honour,” had said the Rakehell.

His honour! It had never been to Farrant the thing dearer than his own soul, which to lose, even to his own secret knowledge, were damnation. To know himself dishonoured meant to him merely disgrace if he could not save himself by his wit. Yet disgrace spelt the most unendurable fate that could overtake one in whose nature vanity played the chief part. And if he failed to fulfil the condition so contemptuously placed upon his worldly redemption, he knew his Rockhurst—all was over for Farrant the aspiring; for Farrant, who was already beginning to be envied; for Farrant, who had once sat at the King’s supper-table and had actually been honoured by a quip from his Majesty’s own lips!…

Drooping her great head, drawing her shaggy feet from the snow with dull, sucking sounds, the mare plodded on her way. He did not attempt to guide her, and she took him soberly to the highroad, then turned toward the downward slope leading to the village. On one side a black line of hedge ran in and out like a ribbon; on the other all barrier had disappeared under the drifting snow. Below the turn of the road was the smelter’s forge, redly aglow in the distance; and, something like a mile further, the village where the noted posset might even now be brewing; where comforted travellers, stamping the snow from their boots, might be capping each other’s tales of road hardships and perils. On the sturdy mare, Paul Farrant had no doubt he could reach the further goal; yet he hesitated. The plan which had driven him out into the night suddenly appeared to him ineffable folly. A paralysing vision arose before him: Rockhurst’s countenance at sight of Master Smelter, with the black fists, as the proposed evening comrade!… He could see the dilation of the nostrils, the haughty lips, barely apart upon a smile. What a tale would not Rockhurst’s tongue make of it for royal ears!—As for the inn, were he to find there some chance gentlefolk, how could he hope to induce them to come forth again on such a night, when, in truth, no coach was like to find a passage through the snow?

* * * * *

Through the great silence a distant cry pierced into his consciousness. Heard at first vaguely, it fell in with his thought: the note, it seemed, of his own distress. But in a moment it was repeated, higher, clearer, an unmistakable call for help.

He was in the mood to be swayed by the first impulse, to take the toss of fate. His was not the nature to turn out of its way to assist the afflicted; but now he wheeled the mare round and drove her up the hill, fiercely, as if his own deliverance, not that of some fellow-creature, was at stake. And, in truth, who shall say that it was not?

On the edge of the road, at its abrupt twist down the hill, stood the black bulk of a coach, horseless, crookedly embedded in the snow. It told its own tale. As he drew nearer, a cloaked figure staggered toward him and almost fell against his steed’s shoulder.

“Oh, do not pass; do not go by!” moaned a woman’s voice. “I am dying of the cold!”

She lifted her face. The faint light of the rifted sky, given back intensified by the white world, had a luminosity of its own in which most things were strangely visible. Paul Farrant saw that the woman who clutched at his reins was young and fair-favoured. He stared a moment in mere astonishment. Then a thought, devilish, acute, exultant, leaped into his brain.—There was his ransom!

“Madam,” he said, bending down over his horse’s neck and peering close into her face, “I am fortunate in having heard you. Are you indeed alone?”

“Alone, yes,” she answered through chattering teeth; “the servants rode away for help, God knows how long ago.… Perchance they are lost in the snow, dead, somewhere. Indeed, with this cold, I shall soon be dead, too!”

“Nay, madam, you are saved,” said Farrant, dismounting hastily.

Trembling with excitement, he tore his cloak from his shoulders to cast it about the slender figure that swayed as it stood; then he swung himself into the saddle again, and, stooping, caught her hands in both of his.

“Can you put your foot on my boot?” he asked. “Nay, then, by this mound. So—now in my arms! (On, Bess!) You are not afraid? Courage, madam, ’tis but a few yards to my house, to warmth and shelter!”

His arms still shook with excitement as he grasped the muffled figure and the reins as best he might. And the mare slowly lifted her heavy hoofs stable-ward again.

His frenzy lest his chance should escape, his evil joy over his prize, burned like fire in his veins. And something of his blood heat seemed to pass into the half-frozen woman. She stirred with more vitality in his grasp, settled herself with more definite volition on the mare’s broad shoulder, and heaved a sigh of returning energy. Suddenly she started; and he clutched her, alarmed.

“My servants!” she said, and turned her head so that her breath fanned his cheeks. Her dilated eyes were close to his in the snow-light.

“Madam?” He held her the tighter and urged forward.

“My servants, sir,” she repeated, a thrill of impatience running through her quick utterance. “They will return to find me gone!”

“Why, then,” he made answer, driving his heels into their steed’s bulging sides, “I will even send presently to the coach, and warn them of your safety.… They will be welcome likewise.… But we must go on—yonder is my gate—a very little while and you shall be by the fireside.”

As he turned off the road he cast a look backward down the slope and noticed a brace of yellow lights bobbing through the misty white of the valley: the traveller’s servants were returning with succour. Not a minute too much had fate granted him! But are not the ready ever the successful?

His boyish face was astir with silent laughter as he gathered the lady into his arms upon the threshold of his own door-step.