Joan Haste | Page 4

girls, the daughters of poor clergymen and
widows, ladies by birth, with whom she consorted instinctively, and
who did not repel her advances.
At the age of nineteen she was informed suddenly that she must leave
her school, though no hint of this determination had been previously
conveyed to her. Indeed, but a day or two before her aunt had spoken of
her return thither as if it were a settled thing. Pondering over this

decision in much grief, Joan wondered why it had been arrived at, and
more especially whether the visit that morning of her uncle's landlord,
Mr. Levinger, who came, she understood, to see about some repairs to
the house, had anything to do with it. To Mr. Levinger himself she had
scarcely spoken half a dozen times in her life, and yet it seemed to her
that whenever they met he regarded her with the keenest interest. Also
on this particular occasion Joan chanced to pass the bar-parlour where
Mr. Levinger was closeted with her aunt, and to overhear his parting
words, or rather the tag of them--which was "too much of a lady," a
remark that she could not help thinking had to do with herself. Seeing
her go by, he stopped her, keeping her in conversation for some
minutes, then abruptly turned upon his heel and left the house with the
air of a man who is determined not to say too much.
Then it was that Joan's life became insupportable to her. Accustomed as
she had become to more refined associations, from which henceforth
she was cut off, the Crown and Mitre, and most of those connected
with it, grew hateful in her sight. In her disgust she racked her brain to
find some means of escape, and could think of none other than the
time-honoured expedient of "going as a governess." This she asked
leave to do, and the permission was accorded after the usual pause; but
here again she was destined to meet with disappointment. Her
surroundings and her attainments were too humble to admit of her
finding a footing in that overcrowded profession. Moreover, as one
lady whom she saw told her frankly, she was far too pretty for this walk
of life. At length she did obtain a situation, however, a modest one
enough, that of nursery governess to the children of the rector of
Bradmouth, Mr. Biggen. This post she held for nine months, till Mr.
Biggen, a kind-hearted and scholarly man, noting her beauty and
intelligence, began to take more interest in her than pleased his wife--a
state of affairs that resulted in Joan's abrupt dismissal on the day
previous to the beginning of this history.
To come to the last and greatest of her troubles: it will be obvious that
such a woman would not lack for admirers. Joan had several, all of
whom she disliked; but chiefly did she detest the most ardent and
persistent of them, the favoured of her aunt, Mr. Samuel Rock. Samuel

Rock was a Dissenter, and the best-to-do agriculturalist in the
neighbourhood, farming some five hundred acres, most of them rich
marsh-lands, of which three hundred or more were his own property
inherited and acquired. Clearly, therefore, he was an excellent match
for a girl in the position of Joan Haste, and when it is added that he had
conceived a sincere admiration for her, and that to make her his wife
was the principal desire of his life, it becomes evident that in the nature
of things the sole object of hers ought to have been to meet his
advances half-way. Unfortunately this was not the case. For reasons
which to herself were good and valid, however insufficient they may
have appeared to others, Joan would have nothing to do with Samuel
Rock. It was to escape from him that she had fled this day to
Ramborough Abbey, whither she fondly hoped he would not follow her.
It was the thought of him that made life seem so hateful to her even in
the golden afternoon; it was terror of him that caused her to search out
every possible avenue of retreat from the neighbourhood of Bradmouth.
She might have spared herself the trouble, for even as she sighed and
sought, a shadow fell upon her, and looking up she saw Samuel Rock
standing before her, hat in hand and smiling his most obsequious smile.
CHAPTER II
SAMUEL ROCK DECLARES HIMSELF
Mr. Samuel Rock was young-looking rather than young in years, of
which he might have seen some thirty-five, and, on the whole, not
uncomely in appearance. His build was slender for his height, his eyes
were blue and somewhat shifty, his features sharp and regular except
the chin, which was prominent, massive, and developed almost to
deformity. Perhaps it was