Cumner's Son & Other South Sea Folk: The Planter's Wife

The Planter's Wife

I

She was the daughter of a ruined squatter, whose family had been pursued
with bad luck; he was a planter, named Houghton. She was not an uncommon
woman; he was not an unusual man. They were not happy, they might never
be; he was almost sure they would not be; she had long ceased to think
they could be. She had told him when she married him that she did not
love him. He had been willing to wait for her love, believing that by
patience and devotion he could win it. They were both sorry for each
other now. They accepted things as they were, but they knew there was
danger in the situation. She loved some one else, and he knew it, but he
had never spoken to her of it--he was of too good stuff for that. He was
big and burly, and something awkward in his ways. She was pretty,
clear-minded, kind, and very grave. There were days when they were both
bitter at heart. On one such day they sat at luncheon, eating little, and
looking much out of the door across the rice fields and banana
plantations to the Hebron Mountains. The wife's eyes fixed on the hills
and stayed. A road ran down the hill towards a platform of rock which
swept smooth and straight to the sheer side of the mountain called White
Bluff. At first glance it seemed that the road ended at the cliff--a
mighty slide to destruction. Instead, however, of coming straight to the
cliff it veered suddenly, and ran round the mountain side, coming down at
a steep but fairly safe incline. The platform or cliff was fenced off by
a low barricade of fallen trees, scarcely noticeable from the valley
below. The wife's eyes had often wandered to the spot with a strange
fascination, as now. Her husband looked at her meditatively. He nodded
slightly, as though to himself. She looked up. Their understanding of
each other's thoughts was singular.

"Tom," she said, "I will ride the chestnut, Bowline, to that fence some
day. It will be a big steeplechase." He winced, but answered slowly. "You
have meant to say that for a long time past. I am glad it has been said
at last."

She was struck by the perfect quietness of his tone. Her eyes sought his
face and rested for a moment, half bewildered, half pitying.

"Yes, it has been in my mind often--often," she said. "It's a horrible
thought," he gravely replied; "but it is better to be frank. Still,
you'll never do it, Alice--you'll never dare to do it."

"Dare, dare," she answered, springing to her feet, and a shuddering sigh
broke from her. "The thing itself is easy enough, Tom."

"And why haven't you done it?" he asked in a hard voice, but still
calmly.

She leaned one hand upon the table, the other lay at her cheek, and her
head bent forward at him. "Because," she answered, "because I have tried
to be thoughtful for you."

"Oh, as to that," he said--"as to that!" and he shrugged his shoulders
slightly.

"You don't care a straw," she said sharply, "you never did."

He looked up suddenly at her, a great bitterness in his face, and laughed
strangely, as he answered: "Care! Good God! Care! . . . What's the use of
caring? It's been all a mistake; all wrong."

"That is no news," she said wearily. "You discovered that long ago."

He looked out of the door across the warm fields again; he lifted his
eyes to that mountain road; he looked down at her. "I haven't any hope
left now, Alice. Let's be plain with each other. We've always been plain,
but let us be plainer still. There are those rice fields out there, that
banana plantation, and the sugar-cane stretching back as far as the
valley goes--it's all mine, all mine. I worked hard for it. I had only
one wish with it all, one hope through it all, and it was, that when I
brought you here as my wife, you would come to love me--some time. Well,
I've waited, and waited. It hasn't come. We're as far apart to-day as we
were the day I married you. Farther, for I had hope then, but I've no
hope now, none at all."

They both turned towards the intemperate sunlight and the great hill. The
hollowness of life as they lived it came home to them with an aching
force. Yet she lifted her fan from the table and fanned herself gently
with it, and he mechanically lit a cigar. Servants passed in and out
removing the things from the table. Presently they were left alone. The
heavy breath of the palm trees floated in upon them; the fruit of the
passion-flower hung temptingly at the window; they could hear the sound
of a torrent just behind the house. The day was droning luxuriously, yet
the eyes of both, as by some weird influence, were fastened upon the
hill; and presently they saw, at the highest point where the road was
visible, a horseman. He came slowly down until he reached the spot where
the road was barricaded from the platform of the cliff. Here he paused.
He sat long, looking, as it appeared, down into the valley. The husband
rose and took down a field-glass from a shelf; he levelled it at the
figure.

"Strange, strange," he said to himself; "he seems familiar, and yet--"

She rose and reached out her hand for the glass. He gave it to her. She
raised it to her eyes, but, at that moment, the horseman swerved into the
road again, and was lost to view. Suddenly Houghton started; an
enigmatical smile passed across his face.

"Alice," said he, "did you mean what you said about the steeplechase--I
mean about the ride down the White Bluff road?"

"I meant all I said," was her bitter reply.

"You think life is a mistake?" he rejoined.

"I think we have made a mistake," was her answer; "a deadly mistake, and
it lasts all our lives."

He walked to the door, trained the glass again on the hill, then
afterwards turned round, and said:

"If ever you think of riding the White Bluff road--straight for the cliff
itself and over--tell me, and I'll ride it with you. If it's all wrong as
it is, it's all wrong for both, and, maybe, the worst of what comes after
is better than the worst of what is here."

They had been frank with each other in the past, but never so frank as
this. He was determined that they should be still more frank; and so was
she. "Alice," he said--

"Wait a minute," she interjected. "I have something to say, Tom. I never
told you--indeed, I thought I never should tell you; but now I think it's
best to do so. I loved a man once--with all my soul."

"You love him still," was the reply; and he screwed and unscrewed the
field-glass in his hand, looking bluntly at her the while. She nodded,
returning his gaze most earnestly and choking back a sob.

"Well, it's a pity, it's a pity," he replied. "We oughtn't to live
together as it is. It's all wrong; it's wicked--I can see that now."

"You are not angry with me?" she answered in surprise.

"You can't help it, I suppose," he answered drearily.

"Do you really mean," she breathlessly said, "that we might as well die
together, since we can't live together and be happy?"

"There's nothing in life that gives me a pleasant taste in the mouth, so
what's the good? Mind you, my girl, I think it a terrible pity that you
should have the thought to die; and if you could be happy living, I'd die
myself to save you. But can you? That's the question--can you be happy,
even if I went and you stayed?"

"I don't think so," she said thoughtfully, and without excitement.

"No, I don't think so."

"The man's name was Cayley--Cayley," he said to her bluntly.

"How did you know?" she asked, astonished. "You never saw him."

"Oh, yes, I've seen him," was the reply--"seen him often. I knew him
once."

"I do not understand you," she rejoined.

"I knew it all along," he continued, "and I've waited for you to tell
me."

"How did you know?"

"Cayley told me."

"When did he tell you?"

"The morning that I married you." His voice was thick with misery.

She became white and dazed. "Before--or after?" she asked. He paused a
moment, looking steadily at her, and answered, "Before."

She drew back as though she had been struck. "Good God!" she cried. "Why
did he not--" she paused.

"Why did he not marry you himself?" he rejoined.

"You must ask him that yourself, if you do not know."

"And yet you married me, knowing all--that he loved me," she gasped.

"I would have married you then, knowing a thousand times that."

She cowered, but presently advanced to him. "You have sinned as much as
I," she said. "Do you dare pay the penalty?"

"Do I dare ride with you to the cliff--and beyond?" Her lips framed a
reply, but no sound came.

"But we will wait till to-morrow," he said absently.

"Why not to-day?" she painfully asked.

"We will wait till to-morrow," he urged, and his eyes followed the trail
of a horseman on the hill.

"Why not while we have courage?" she persisted, as though the suspense
hurt her.

"But we will wait till to-morrow, Alice," he again repeated.

"Very well," she answered, with the indifference of despair.

He stood in the doorway and watched a horseman descending into valley.

"Strange things may chance before to-morrow," he said to himself, and he
mechanically lighted another cigar. She idled with her fan.

II

He did not leave the house that afternoon. He kept his post on the
veranda, watching the valley. With an iron kind of calmness he was facing
a strange event. It was full of the element of chance, and he had been
taking chances all his life. With the chances of fortune he had won; with
the chances of love and happiness he had lost. He knew that the horseman
on the mountain-side was Cayley; he knew that Cayley would not be near
his home without a purpose. Besides, Cayley had said he would come--he
had said it in half banter, half threat. Houghton had had too many
experiences backward and forward in the world, to be afflicted with
littleness of mind. He had never looked to get an immense amount of
happiness out of life, but he thought that love and marriage would give
him a possible approach to content. He had chanced it, and he had lost.
At first he had taken it with a dreadful bitterness; now he regarded it
with a quiet, unimpassioned despair. He regarded his wife, himself, and
Cayley, as an impartial judge would view the extraordinary claims of
three desperate litigants. He thought it all over as he sat there
smoking. When the servants came to him to ask him questions or his men
ventured upon matters of business, he answered them directly, decisively,
and went on thinking. His wife had come to take coffee with him at the
usual hour of the afternoon. There was no special strain of manner or of
speech. The voices were a little lower, the tones a little more decided,
their eyes did not meet; that was all. When coffee-drinking was over the
wife retired to her room. Still Houghton smoked on. At length he saw the
horseman entering into the grove of palms before the door. He rose
deliberately from his seat and walked down the pathway.

"Good day to you, Houghton," the horseman said; "we meet again, you see."

"I see."

"You are not overjoyed."

"There's no reason why I should be glad. Why have you come?"

"You remember our last meeting five years ago. You were on your way to be
married. Marriage is a beautiful thing, Houghton, when everything is
right and square, and there's love both sides. Well, everything was right
and square with you and the woman you were going to marry; but there was
not love both sides."

While they had been talking thus, Houghton had, of purpose, led his
companion far into the shade of the palms. He now wheeled upon Cayley,
and said sternly: "I warn you to speak with less insolence; we had better
talk simply."

Cayley was perfectly cool. "We will talk simply. As I said, you had
marriage without love. The woman loved another man. That other man loved
the woman--that good woman. In youthful days at college he had married,
neither wisely nor well, a beggar-maid without those virtues usually
credited to beggar-maidens who marry gentlemen. Well, Houghton, the
beggar-maid was supposed to have died. She hadn't died; she had shammed.
Meanwhile, between her death and her resurrection, the man came to love
that good woman. And so, lines got crossed; things went wrong. Houghton,
I loved Alice before she was your wife. I should have married her but for
the beggar-maid."

"You left her without telling her why."

"I told her that things must end, and I went away."

"Like a coward," rejoined Houghton. "You should have told her all."

"What difference has it made?" asked Cayley gloomily.

"My happiness and hers. If you had told her all, there had been an end of
mystery. Mystery is dear to a woman's heart. She was not different in
that respect from others. You took the surest way to be remembered."

Cayley's fingers played with his horse's mane; his eyes ran over the
ground debatingly; then he lifted them suddenly, and said: "Houghton, you
are remarkably frank with me; what do you mean by it?"

"I'll tell you if you will answer me this question: Why have you come
here?"

The eyes of both men crossed like swords, played with each other for a
moment, and then fixed to absolute determination. Cayley answered
doggedly: "I came to see your wife, because I'm not likely ever to see
her or you again. I wanted one look of her before I went away. There, I'm
open with you."

"It is well to be open with me," Houghton replied. He drew Cayley aside
to an opening in the trees, where the mountain and the White Bluff road
could be seen, and pointed. "That would make a wonderful leap," he said,
"from the top of the hill down to the cliff edge--and over!"

"A dreadful steeplechase," said Cayley.

Houghton lowered his voice. "Two people have agreed to take that fence."

Cayley frowned. "What two people?"

"My wife and I."

"Why?"

"Because there has been a mistake, and to live is misery."

"Has it come to that?" Cayley asked huskily. "Is there no way--no better
way? Are you sure that Death mends things?" Presently he put his hand
upon Houghton's arm, as if with a sudden, keen resolve. "Houghton," he
said, "you are a man--I have become a villain. A woman sent me once on
the high road to the devil; then an angel came in and made a man of me
again; but I lost the angel, and another man found her, and I took the
highway with the devil again. I was born a gentleman--that you know. Now
I am . . ." He hesitated. A sardonic smile crept across his face.

"Yes, you are--?" interposed Houghton.

"I am--a man who will give you your wife's love."

"I do not understand," Houghton responded. Cayley drew Houghton back from
where they stood and away from the horse.

"Look at that horse," he said. "Did you ever see a better?"

"Never," answered Houghton, running him over with his eye, "never."

"You notice the two white feet and the star on the forehead. Now, listen.
Firefoot, here!"

"My God!" said Houghton, turning upon him with staring eyes, "you are--"

"Whose horse is that?" interjected Cayley. Firefoot laid his head upon
Cayley's shoulder.

Houghton looked at them both for a moment. "It is the horse of Hyland the
bushranger," he said. "All Queensland knows Firefoot." Then he dazedly
added: "Are you Hyland?"

"A price is set on my head," the bushranger answered with a grim smile.

Houghton stood silent for a moment, breathing hard. Then he rejoined:
"You are bold to come here openly."

"If I couldn't come here openly I would not come at all," answered the
other. "After what I have told you," he added, "will you take me in and
let me speak with your wife?"

Houghton's face turned black, and he was about to answer angrily, but
Cayley said: "On my honour--I will play a fair game," he said.

For an instant their eyes were fixed on each other; then, with a gesture
for Cayley to follow, Houghton went towards the house.

Five, minutes later Houghton said to his wife: "Alice, a stranger has
come."

"Who is it?" she asked breathlessly, for she read importance in his tone.

"It is the horseman we saw on the hillside." His eyes passed over her
face pityingly. "I will go and bring him."

She caught his arm. "Who is it? Is it any one I know?"

"It is some one you know," he answered, and left the room. Bewildered,
anticipating, yet dreading to recognise her thoughts, she sat down and
waited in a painful stillness.

Presently the door opened, and Cayley entered. She started to her feet
with a stifled, bitter cry: "Oh, Harry!"

He hurried to her with arms outstretched, for she swayed; but she
straightway recovered herself, and, leaning against a chair, steadied to
his look.

"Why have you come here?" she whispered. "To say good-bye for always,"
was his reply.

"And why--for always?" She was very white and quiet.

"Because we are not likely ever to meet again."

"Where are you going?" she anxiously asked. "God knows!"

Strange sensations were working in her. What would be the end of this?
Her husband, knowing all, had permitted this man to come to her alone.
She had loved him for years; though he had deserted her years ago, she
loved him still--did she love him still?

"Will you not sit down?" she said with mechanical courtesy.

A stranger would not have thought from their manner that there were lives
at stake. They both sat, he playing with the leaves of an orchid, she
opening and shutting her fan absently. But she was so cold she could
hardly speak. Her heart seemed to stand still.

"How has the world used you since we met last?" she tried to say
neutrally.

"Better, I fear, than I have used it," he answered quietly.

"I do not quite see. How could you ill-use the world?" There was faint
irony in her voice now. A change seemed to have come upon her.

"By ill-using any one person we ill-use society--the world"--he meaningly
replied.

"Whom have you ill-used?" She did not look at him.

"Many--you chiefly."

"How have you--most-ill-used me?"

"By letting you think well of me--you have done so, have you not?"

She did not speak, but lowered her head, and caught her breath slightly.
There was a silence. Then she said: "There was no reason why I
should--But you must not say these things to me. My husband--"

"Your husband knows all."

"But that does not alter it," she urged firmly. "Though he may be willing
you should speak of these things, I am not."

"Your husband is a good fellow," he rejoined. "I am not."

"You are not?" she asked wearily.

"No. What do you think was the reason that, years ago, I said we could
never be married, and that we must forget each other?"

"I cannot tell. I supposed it was some duty of which I could not know.
There are secret and sacred duties which we sometimes do not tell, even
to our nearest and dearest . . . but I said we should not speak of these
things, and we must not." She rose to her feet. "My husband is somewhere
near. I will call him. There are so many things that men can talk
of-pleasant and agreeable things--"

He had risen with her, and as her hand was stretched out to ring, stayed
it. "No, never mind your husband just now. I think he knows what I am
going to say to you."

"But, oh, you must not--must not!" she urged.

"Pardon me, but I must," was his reply.

"As I said, you thought I was a good fellow. Well, I am not; not at all.
I will tell you why I left you. I was--already married."

He let the bare unrelieved fact face her, and shock her.

"You were--already married--when--you loved me," she said, her face
showing misery and shame.

He smiled a little bitterly when he saw the effect of his words, but said
clearly: "Yes. You see I was a villain."

She shuddered a little, and then said simply: "Your face was not the face
of a bad man. Are you telling me the truth?"

He nodded.

"Then you were wicked with me," she said at last, with a great sigh,
looking him straight in the eyes. "But you--you loved me?" she said with
injured pride and a piteous appeal in her voice. "Ah, I know you loved
me!"

"I will tell you when you know all," he answered evenly.

"Is there more to tell?" she asked heavily, and shrinking from him now.

"Much more. Please, come here." He went towards the open window of the
room, and she followed. He pointed out to where his horse stood in the
palms.

"That is my horse," he said. He whistled to the horse, which pricked up
its ears and trotted over to the window. "The name of my horse," he said,
"maybe familiar to you. He is called Firefoot."

"Firefoot!" she answered dazedly, "that is the name of Hyland's
horse--Hyland the bushranger."

"This is Hyland's horse," he said, and he patted the animal's neck gently
as it thrust its head within the window.

"But you said it was your horse," she rejoined slowly, as though the
thing perplexed her sorely.

"It is Hyland's horse; it is my horse," he urged without looking at her.
His courage well-nigh failed him. Villain as he was, he loved her, and he
saw the foundations of her love for him crumbling away before him. In all
his criminal adventures he had cherished this one thing.

She suddenly gave a cry of shame and agony, a low trembling cry, as
though her heart-strings were being dragged out. She drew back from
him--back to the middle of the room.

He came towards her, reaching out his arms. "Forgive me," he said.

"Oh, no, never!" she cried with horror.

The cry had been heard outside, and Houghton entered the room, to find
his wife, all her strength gone, turning a face of horror upon Cayley.
She stretched out her arms to her husband with a pitiful cry. "Tom," she
said, "Tom, take me away."

He took her gently in his arms.

Cayley stood with his hand upon his horse's neck. "Houghton," he said in
a low voice, "I have been telling your wife what I was, and who I am. She
is shocked. I had better go."

The woman's head had dropped on her husband's shoulder. Houghton waited
to see if she would look up. But she did not.

"Well, good-bye to you both," Cayley said, stepped through the window,
and vaulted on his horse's back. "I'm going to see if the devil's as
black as he's painted." Then, setting spurs to his horse, he galloped
away through the palms to the gate.

......................

A year later Hyland the bushranger was shot in a struggle with the
mounted police sent to capture him.

The planter's wife read of it in England, whither she had gone on a
visit.

"It is better so," she said to herself, calmly. "And he wished it, I am
sure."

For now she knew the whole truth, and she did not love her husband
less--but more.

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