A to Z Classics - Bram Stoker - The Complete Novels

“Come now, Art. Murdock, you stay and pull.” I ran to him, and, taking my hands full of earth, caught the rope also.

The next few minutes saw a terrible struggle. Our faces were almost black with the rush of blood in stooping and lifting so long and so hard, our hands and backs ached to torture, and we were almost in despair, when we saw the bog move just under us. This gave us new courage and new strength, and with redoubled effort we pulled at the rope.

Then up through the bog came a large mass. We could not see what it was, for the slime and the bog covered it solidly; but with a final effort we lifted it. Each instant it grew less weighty as the resistance of the bog was overcome, and the foul slimy surface fell back into its place and became tranquil. When we lifted and pulled the mass on the rock bank, Murdock rushed forward in a frenzied manner, and shouted to us:

“Kape back! Hands off! It’s mine, I say, all mine! Don’t dar even to touch it, or I’ll do ye a harrum! Here, clear off! This is my land! Go!” and he turned on us with the energy of a madman and the look of a murderer.

I was so overcome with my physical exertions that I had not a word to say, but simply, in utter weariness, threw myself upon the ground; but Dick, with what voice he could command, said:

“You’re a nice grateful fellow to men who have helped you. Keep your find to yourself, man alive; we don’t want to share. You must know that as well as I do, unless your luck has driven you mad. Handle the thing yourself, by all means. Faugh! how filthy it is!” and he too sat down beside me.

It certainly was most filthy. It was a shapeless, irregular mass, but made solid with rust and ooze and the bog surface through which it had been dragged. The slime ran from it in a stream; but its filth had no deterring power for Murdock, who threw himself down beside it and actually kissed the nauseous mass, as he murmured:

“At last, at last, me threasure! All me own!”

Dick stood up with a look of disgust on his handsome face.

“Come away, Art; it’s too terrible to see a man degraded to this pitch. Leave the wretch alone with his god.”

Murdock turned to us, and said with savage glee:

“No, shtay — shtay an’ see me threasure! It’ll make ye happy to think of afther. An’ ye can tell Phelim Joyce what I found in me own land — the land what I tuk from him.” We stayed.

Murdock took his spade and began to remove the filth and rubbish from the mass; and in a very few moments his discovery proclaimed itself.

There lay before us a rusty iron gun-carriage. This was what we had dragged with so much effort from the bottom of the bog; and beside it Murdock sat down with a scowl of black disappointment.

“Come away,” said Dick. “Poor devil, I pity him! It is hard to find even a god of that kind worthless.” And so we turned and left Murdock sitting beside the gun-carriage and the slime, with a look of baffled greed which I hope never to see on any face again.

We went to a brook at the foot of the Hill, Andy being by this time in the sheebeen about half a mile off. There we cleansed ourselves as well as we could from the hideous slime and filth of the bog, and then walked to the top of the hill to let the breeze freshen us up a bit if possible. After we had been there for a while, Dick said:

“Now, Art, you had better run back to the cottage. Miss Joyce will be wondering what has become of you all this time, and may be frightened.” It was so strange to hear her — Norah, my Norah — called “Miss Joyce,” that I could not help smiling, and blushing while I smiled.

Dick noticed and guessed the cause. He laid his hand on my shoulder, and said:

“You will hear it often, old lad. I am the only one of all your friends privileged to hear of her by the name you knew her by at first. She goes now into your class and among your own circle; and, by George! she will grace it too — it or any circle — and they will naturally give to her folk the same measure of courtesy that they mete to each other. She is Miss Joyce — until she shall be Mrs. Arthur Severn!”

What a delicious thrill the very thought sent through me!

I went up to the cottage, and on entering found Norah still alone. She knew that I was under promise not to tell anything of Murdock’s proceedings, but noticing that I was not so tidy as before — for my cleansing at the brook-side was a very imperfect one — went quietly and got a basin with hot water, soap, and a towel, and clothes-brush, and said I must come and be made very tidy.

That toilet was to me a sweet experience, and is a sweet remembrance now. It was so wifely in its purpose and its method that I went through it in a languorous manner, like one in a delicious dream. When, with a blush, she brought me her own brush and comb and began to smooth my hair, I was as happy as it is given to a man to be. There is a peculiar sensitiveness in their hair to some men, and to have it touched by hands that they love is a delicious sensation. When my toilet was complete Norah took me by the hand and made me sit down beside her. After a pause, she said to me with a gathering blush:

“I want to ask you something.”

“And I want to ask you something,” said I. “Norah, dear, there is one thing I want much to ask you.”

She seemed to suspect or guess what I was driving at, for she said:

“You must let me ask mine first.”

“No, no,” I replied, “you must answer me; and then, you know, you will have the right to ask what you like.”

“But I do not want any right.”

“Then it will be all the more pleasure to me to give a favor — if there can be any such from me to you.”

Masculine persistence triumphed — men are always more selfish than women — and I asked my question.

“Norah, darling, tell me when will you be mine — my very own? When shall we be married?”

The love-light was sweet in her eyes as she answered me with a blush that made perfect the smile on her lips:

“Nay, you should have let me ask my question first.”

“Why so, dearest?”

“Because, dear, I am thinking of the future. You know, Arthur, that I love you, and that whatever you wish I would and shall gladly do; but you must think for me too. l am only a peasant girl —”

“Peasant!” I laughed. “Norah, you are the best lady I have ever seen! Why, you are like a queen — what a queen ought to be!”

“I am proud and happy, Arthur, that you think so; but still I am only a peasant. Look at me — at my dress. Yes, I know you like it, and I shall always prize it because it found favor in your eyes.”

She smiled happily, but went on:

“Dear, I am speaking very truly. My life and surroundings are not yours. You are lifting me to a higher grade in life, Arthur, and I want to be worthy of it and of you. I do not want any of your family or your friends to pity you and say, ‘Poor fellow, he has made a sad mistake. Look at her manners; she is not of us.’ I could not bear to hear or to know that such was said — that any one should have to pity the man I love, and to have that pity because of me. Arthur, it would break my heart.”

As she spoke the tears welled up in the deep dark eyes and rolled unchecked down her cheeks. I caught her to my breast with the sudden instinct of protection, and cried out:

“Norah, no one on earth could say such a thing of you — you who would lift a man, not lower him. You could not be ungraceful if you tried; and as for my family and friends, if there is one who will not hold out both hands to you and love you, he or she is no kin or friend of mine.”

“But, Arthur, they might be right. I have learned enough to know that there is so much more to learn — that the great world you live in is so different from our quiet, narrow life here. Indeed, I do not mean to be nervous as to the future, or to make any difficulties; but, dear, I should like to be able to do all that is right and necessary as your wife. Remember, that when I leave here I shall not have one of my own kin or friends to tell me anything — from whom I could ask advice. They do not themselves even know what I might want — not one of them all. Your world and mine, dear, are so different — as yet.”