The Guilty River | Page 7

against the stream.
As the boat approached me in the moonlight, this person corrected my
first impression, and revealed herself as a young girl. So far as I could
perceive she was a stranger to me. Who could the girl be, alone on the
river at that time of night? Idly curious I followed the boat, instead of
pursuing my way to the village, to see whether she would stop at the
mill, or pass it.
She stopped at the mill, secured the boat, and stepped on shore.
Taking a key from her pocket, she was about to open the door of the
cottage, when I advanced and spoke to her. As far from recognizing her
as ever, I found myself nevertheless thinking of an odd outspoken child,
living at the mill in past years, who had been one of my poor mother's
favorites at our village school. I ran the risk of offending her, by
bluntly expressing the thought which was then in my mind.
"Is it possible that you are Cristel Toller?" I said.

The question seemed to amuse her. "Why shouldn't I be Cristel Toller?"
she asked.
"You were a little girl," I explained, "when I saw you last. You are so
altered now--and so improved--that I should never have guessed you
might be the daughter of Giles Toller of the mill, if I had not seen you
opening the cottage door."
She acknowledged my compliment by a curtsey, which reminded me
again of the village school. "Thank you, young man," she said smartly;
"I wonder who you are?"
"Try if you can recollect me," I suggested.
"May I take a long look at you?"
"As long as you like."
She studied my face, with a mental effort to remember me, which
gathered her pretty eyebrows together quaintly in a frown.
"There's something in his eyes," she remarked, not speaking to me but
to herself, "which doesn't seem to be quite strange. But I don't know his
voice, and I don't know his beard." She considered a little, and
addressed herself directly to me once more. "Now I look at you again,
you seem to be a gentleman. Are you one?"
"I hope so."
"Then you're not making game of me?"
"My dear, I am only trying if you can remember Gerard Roylake."
While in charge of the boat, the miller's daughter had been rowing with
bared arms; beautiful dusky arms, at once delicate and strong. Thus far,
she had forgotten to cover them up. The moment mentioned my name,
she started back as if I had frightened her--pulled her sleeves down in a
hurry--and hid the objects of my admiration as an act of homage to
myself! Her verbal apologies followed.

"You used to be such a sweet-spoken pretty little boy," she said, "how
should I know you again, with a big voice and all that hair on your
face?" It seemed to strike her on a sudden that she had been too familiar.
"Oh, Lord," I heard her say to herself, "half the county belongs to him!"
She tried another apology, and hit this time on the conventional form.
"I beg your pardon, sir. Welcome back to your own country, sir. I wish
you good-night, sir."
She attempted to escape into the cottage; I followed her to the threshold
of the door. "Surely it's not time to go to bed yet," I ventured to say.
She was still on her good behavior to her landlord. "Not if you object to
it, sir," she answered.
This recognition of my authority was irresistible. Cristel had laid me
under an obligation to her good influence for which I felt sincerely
grateful--she had made me laugh, for the first time since my return to
England.
"We needn't say good-night just yet," I suggested; "I want to hear a
little more about you. Shall I come in?"
She stepped out of the doorway even more rapidly than she had stepped
into it. I might have been mistaken, but I thought Cristel seemed to be
actually alarmed by my proposal. We walked up and down the
river-bank. On every occasion when we approached the cottage, I
detected her in stealing a look at the ugly modern part of it. There could
be no mistake this time; I saw doubt, I saw anxiety in her face. What
was going on at the mill? I made some domestic inquiries, beginning
with her father. Was the miller alive and well?
"Oh yes, sir. Father gets thinner as he gets older--that's all."
"Did he send you out by yourself, at this late hour, in the boat?"
"They were waiting for a sack of flour down there," she replied,
pointing in the direction of the river-side village. "Father isn't as quick
as he used to be. He's often