The Shadow of the Sword | Page 8

a nearer name. But the marriage of such close kin is questionable in Brittany, and a special consent from the Bishop will be needed to bring it about; and besides, after all, they have never exchanged one syllable of actual love.
Doubtless they understand each other; for youth is electrical, and passion has many tones far beyond words, and it is not in Nature for a man and a maiden, both beautiful, to look upon each other without joy. To their vague delicious feeling in each other's society, however, they have never given a name. They enjoy each other as they enjoy the fresh sweet air, and the shining sun, and the happy blue vault above, and the sparkling sea below. They drink each other's breathing, and are glad. So is the Earth glad, whenever lovers so unconscious stir and tremble happily in her arms.
Mark them again, as Rohan rises from the cliff, and stands by the girl's side, and listens to her laughing rebuke. How does he answer? He takes her face between his two hands and kisses her on either cheek.
She laughs and blushes slightly; the blush would be deeper if he had kissed her on the lips.
Then he turns to the block of granite where he has left his hat and sabots, and slowly begins to put them on.
The sunset is fading now upon the ocean.
The vision of El Dorado, which has been burning for an hour on the far sea-line, will soon be lost for ever. The golden city with its purple spires, the strange mountains of pink-tinged snow beyond, the dark dim cloud-peak softly crowned by one bright green opening star, are dissolving slowly, and a cold breath comes now from those ruined sunset shores. The blood-red reefs, the wet sands, the flashing pools of water along the shingle and beneath the crags, are burning with dimmer and dimmer colours; the crows are winging past to some dark rookery inland; the sea-fowl are settling down with many murmurs on the nests among the cliffs; the night-owl is fluttering forth in the dark shadow of a crag; and the fishing lugger yonder is drifting on a dark and glassy sea.
Rohan looks down.
The lugger glides along on the swift ebb tide, and he can plainly see the men upon her deck, bare-headed, with hands folded in prayer and faces upraised to the very crags on which he stands; for not far beyond him, on the very summit of the cliffs, stands the little Chapel of Our Lady of Safety--the beloved beacon of the homeward-bound, the last glimpse of home the fisher sees as he sails away to the west, and the help, night and day, of all good mariners.
All this picture Rohan has taken in at a glance, and now, grasping his fowler's hook in one hand, and coiling the rope around his arm, he moves along the summit of the cliff followed by Marcelle. A well-worn path along the scanty sward leads to the door of the little Chapel, and this path they follow.
They have not proceeded far when a large white goat, which has been busy somewhere among the cliffs, climbs up close by, and stands looking at them curiously. The inspection is evidently satisfactory, for it approaches them slowly with some signs of recognition.
"See!" cries the girl. "It is Jannedik."
Jannedik answers by coming closer and rubbing its head against her dress. Then it turns to Rohan, and pushes its chin into his outstretched hand.
"What are you doing so far from home, Jannedik?" he asks, smiling, surprised. "You are a rover, and will some day break your neck. It is nearly bed-time, Jannedik!"
Jannedik is a lady among goats, and she belongs to the mother of Rohan. It is her pleasure to wander among the cliffs like Rohan himself; and she knows the spots of most succulent herbage and the secretest corners of the caves. There is little speculation in her great brown eyes, but she comes to the whistle like a dog, and she will let the village children ride upon her back, and she is altogether more instructed than most of her tribe, in which the cliffs abound.
As Rohan and Marcelle wander on to the little Chapel, Jannedik follows, pausing now and then to browse upon the way; but when they enter--which they do with a quiet reverence--Jannedik hesitates for a moment, stamps her foot upon the ground, and trots off homeward by herself.
She has many points of a good Christian, but the Church has no attractions for her.
The little Chapel stands open night and day. It was built by sailor hands, for sailor use, and with no small labour were the materials carried up hither from the village below. It is very tiny, and it nestles in the highest cliff like a white bird,