 In the early morning of Midsummer Eve Hazel wandered up the hillslopes. There, the sheep, golden and gospel-like in the early light, fed on wet lawns, pale and unsubstantial as gauze. She did not, as the more self-conscious creatures of civilization would have done, envy their peace in so many words, but she did say wistfully to a particularly ample and contented one, you're pretty comfortable, isn't you? When she went into breakfast, she thought the same of Mrs. Marston. Afterwards they picked black currants. Mrs. Marston seated on a camp-stall and wearing her large mushroom hat, which always tilted slightly and made her look reekish. Whenever a blackbird dashed out of the grove of half-ripe red currants, scolding with demoniac vitality, she would look up and say, Naughty bird! She picked with deliberation and placed the currants in the basket with an air of benediction. The day was hot and splendid, a day to make the leaves limp and crack the flower beds, but it was cool in the shade of the mountain ash that grew near the currants and a breeze laden with wild thyme and moss fragrance played about the garden like an invisible child. At eleven, Martha appeared with cake and milk, and Edward returned from Old Solomon's bedside. Then they went on picking, while Edward read them snatches of natural law. Hazel was soothed by the reading, to the sense of which she paid no heed. It mingled with the drone of the hot bees falling in and out of the big red peonies, the far-off sound of grass cutting, the grave measured soliloquy of a blackbird hidden in the flame-flowered chestnut. Hazel felt that she would like to go on picking currants forever, growing more and more like Mrs. Marston every day, and at least becoming, possibly through sheer benignity, a grandmother. There seemed no place in her life for Redin, no time for Hunter Spinney. She thought, I want to go, I'll stay along at Edward, and no harm will come to me. But a peremptory voice said that she must go, and once more her soul became the passive battleground of a strange emotion of which she'd never even dreamed. While they fought there like creatures in the dark, Hazel, sitting in the aromatic shadow of the currants, fell fast asleep, and as Mrs. Marston could never bring herself to wake anyone, she slept until Martha rang the dinner bell. So the peaceful golden day wore on to green evening. It was a day that Hazel always remembered. When the shadows grew long and dew fell and the daisies on the graves filled the house with their faint innocent fragrance, and closed their pink-lined petals for the night, Hazel felt very miserable. This very night she was going to work the last charm, the charm of the bracken flower, and whoso she dreamed of with that flower beneath her pillow must be her lover. She felt traitorous to Edward in doing this. She and Edward were hand-fasted. How then could she have any lover but Edward? Why should she work the charm? She puzzled over this during prayers, but no answer came to her questioning. Life is a taciturn mother, and teaches not so much by instruction as by blows. Edward was reading the 23rd Psalm which always affected his mother to tears, and in reading which his voice was very tender, and lead the forth beside the waters of comfort. The room was full of a deep exaltation, a passion of trustfulness. I went along by the water, Hazel thought, and watched the pie-finches and the can-bottlings flying about, and I thought it was the waters of comfort. Only Mr. Redden came and fret the birds and made the waters muddy. She did not feel as sure as the others did of the waters of comfort. So beautiful, dear, murmured Mrs. Marston, so like your poor, dear father. Edward's good night to Hazel was more curt than usual. She was looking so mysteriously lovely. Her stress of mind had given a touch of spirituality to her face, and there is nothing that stirs passion, as spirituality does. She had on a print frock of a neat design reminiscent of old-fashioned china, and she had pinned a posy of daisies on her shoulder. For one second, as she held up her cheek to be kissed, standing on the threshold of her moonlit room, Edward hesitated. Then he abruptly turned and shut his door. The hour had struck, his hour had passed. Hazel stood in the window, reading the charm. On midsummer eve, when it wants a little of midnight, spread your smock where the bracken grows. For this is the night of the flowering of the break that beareth a blue flower on the stroke of midnight. But it is withered before morning. Come you again about the time of the first bird call. If ought is in the smock, take it. It is the dust of the flower. Sleep above it, and he you dream of is your lover. This is a sure charm and cannot be broke. She took a clean chemise from the draw, and when the landing clock struck the half hour she slipped out onto the hillside and laid it under a clump of bracken. As she stooped to set it smooth and straight, the moon swam out of cloud and flung her shadow, black and gigantic up the hillside. Frightened, she ran home, raked the fire together, and made herself a cup of tea to keep her awake. Sipping it in the dim parlor where familiar things looked eerie, she thought of Redden and his strange doings since her wedding. But it an anger-eddered sore if he came to know, she thought. What for it is Mr. Redden come when he can see I don't want him? A slow flush crept over her neck and temples as she half guessed the answer. She waited in the dove-gray hour that precedes dawn, an hour pregnant with the future. It is full of hope for what great deed may not be done, what ethereal idea caged in music or poetry or colour, what rare emotions struck out of pain in the coming day. It is full of grief for how many beautiful things will be trampled, great dreams torn, sensitive spirits crucified in the time between dusk and dusk. For the death-pack hunts at all hours, light and dark. It is no pale phantom of dreams. It is made not of spirit hounds with fiery eyes, a ghastly melody, a grizzly music, but of our fellows, all that have strength without pity. Sometimes our kith and kin, our nearest intimates are in the first flight, give a view hallow as we slip hopefully under a covert, are in at the death. It is not the killing that gives horror to the death-pack as much as the lack of the impulse not to kill. One flicker of merciful intention amid relentless action would redeem it, for the world is founded and built upon death, and the reality of death is neither to be questioned nor feared. Death is a dark dream, but it is not a nightmare. It is mankind's lack of pity, mankind's fatal propensity for torture that is the nightmare. When a man or woman confronted by helpless terror is without the impulse to save, the world becomes hell. It was this dimly but passionately felt that maid haze or shrink from redden, for unless redden was without this impulse to save, and had the mind of a fiend without pity, how could he in the mere pursuit of pleasure inflict wholly unnecessary torture as in fox hunting? She watched Venus shrink from a silver pool to a silver point. She was full of trouble and unrest. Would she dream of redden? Would she go to sleep at all? Mrs. Marston's armchair loomed in the gathering light and she felt guilty again. The east quickened as if someone had turned up a light there. She opened the window and in rushed the inexpressible sweetness of a dawn. The bush of syringa by the kitchen window swept in its whole fragrance, heady and sensuous. She took long breaths of it and thought of redden's green dress, of the queer look in his eyes when he stared long at her. A curious passivity quite foreign to her came over her now at the thought of redden. What would he look like? What would he say? Would he hold her roughly if she went to hunt a spinny? An unwilling elation possessed her as she thought of it. It did not occur to her to wonder why Edward did not kiss her as redden did. She took him as much for granted as a child takes its parents. Suddenly the first bird called silverly, startling the dusk. It was a woodlark and its song seemed even more vacillating than usual in the vast hush. At the first note all hazel sorts of redden fled. It seemed that clarity, freshness and music were bound up in her mind with Edward. She thought only of him as she ran up the hill over the minute starry carpet of mountain bedstraw. Maybe there'll be no flower and then the charms broke, she thought hopefully. If the charms broke I can a dream and I shan ago. But when she came to the white garment lying wet and pale in the half light she drew a sharp breath. There in the centre lay one minute blue petal. Its very smallness proved her its magic. It was a fairy flower. She took it up reverently and went home solemn as a child in church. When with blue petal under her pillow she lay down she fell asleep in a moment. She dreamt of redden for he had more control over her thoughts than Edward who appealed to her emotions while redden stirred her instincts. Waking at Martha's knock she said to herself with mingled heart sickness and elation the sign say so I am and go foxy wants me to go. She would not have believed that her third sign was no fairy flower but only a petal of blue milkwort little sister of the Bracken loosened by her own nervous hands the night before. End of chapter 24 recording by Rachel Linton Bristol UK. Chapter 25 of Gone to Earth. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org. Gone to Earth by Mary Webb chapter 25. On Sunday evening as usual the little bell began to sound plaintively in the soft air which was like a pale wild rose. Mrs. Marston had be taken herself out of her own door into that of the chapel with a good many sighs at the disturbance of her nap and with injunctions to Martha to put a bit of fire in the parlour. Edward had gone with his sermon to the back of the house where the tombstones were fewer and it was easier to walk while he read. Hazel ran up to her room and put on her white dress which was considered by Mrs. Marston too flighty for chapel. She leaned out of her window and looked away up the purple hill then she gathered a bunch of the tea roses that encircled it. They were deep cream flushed with rose. She pinned them into her breast and they matched her flushed face. She was becoming almost dainty in her ways. This enormously increased her attraction for both men. She put on her broad white wedding hat and slipped downstairs and out by the kitchen door while Martha was in the parlour. She shut the door behind her like a vanished life. She felt, she did not know why, a sense of excitement of some great happening, something impending in her appointment with Redin. She met no one as she ran down the batch for the chapel goers were all inside. The hedges were full of white archangel and purple vetch. When she came to the beginning of Hunter's Spinney she felt frightened. The woods were so far reaching so deep with shadow the trees made so sad a rumour and swayed with such full on abandon. In the dusky places the hyacinths broken but not yet faded made a purple carpet, solemn as a pool. Woodruff shone whitely by the path and besieged her with scent. Early wild roses stood here and there weighed down with their own beauty set with rare carmine and tints of shells and snow too frail to face the thunderstorm that even now advanced with unhurrying pomp far away beyond the horizon. She hurried along leaving the beaten track creeping under the broad skirts of the beaches and over the white prostrate larch bowls where the resin ran slowly like the dark blood of creatures beautiful defeated dying. She began to climb holding to the gray shining bowls of mountain ash trees. The bracken waist high at first was like small hoops at the top of the wood where the tiny golden torment hill made a carpet and the yellow pimpinelle was closing her eager eyes. Hazel came out on the bare hilltop where gnarled maitres dropping spent blossom were pink tinted as if the colours of the sunsets they'd known had run into their whiteness. Hazel sat down on the hilltop and saw the sleek farm horses far below feeding with their shadows, swifts flying with their shadows and hills eyeing theirs stilly. So with all life the shadow lingers incurious mute yet in the end victorious well-ming all. As Hazel sat there her own shadow lay darkly behind her growing larger than herself as the sun slipped lower. Bleetings and lowings the evening call of the rooks ascended to her a horse naid aggressively mail. From some distance came the loud crude voice of a man singing. He sang not in worship not for the sake of memory or melody or love but for the same reason that people sing so loudly in church in the urgent need of expending superabundant vitality. His voice rolled out under the purple sky as if he were the first man but half emerged from brutishness pursuing his mate in a world all fief to him. A world that revealed her as she fled through the door of mourning and the door of evening rolling its vaporous curtains back as she went through. It was redden come forth from his dark house as his foraging ancestors had done to take his will of the weaponess and ride down the will of others. He did not confess even to himself why he had come. His thoughts on sex were so prurient that in common with many people he considered any frankness about it most indecent. Sex was to him a thing that made the ears red. It is hard for them that have breeding stables to enter the kingdom of heaven. Too often the grave the majestic significance of the meeting of the sexes holding as it does the fate of the golden pageantry of life sacrificially spending as it does the present for the future is nothing to them. They see it only as a philip to appetite. So Sally Haggard usually spent most of the money earned by Redden Stallion the pride of Undern. He put the horse to a gallop as he came up under spinny to quench the voice that spoke within him saying things he would not hear that spoke of love and the tenderness and humility of love and how these did not detract from the splendour of manhood the fine rage of passion but rather glorified them. Something in his feeling for Hazel answered that voice and it worried him. By heredity and upbringing he'd been taught to dislike and distrust everything that savored of emotion or ideas to consider unmanly all that was of the spirit. Therefore he sang more loudly as he saw on the hilltop the flutter of Hazel's white dress to quench the voice that steadfastly spoke of mutual love as the one reason the one consecration of passion in man and woman the hoof beats thudded like a full pulse. Hazel got up suddenly she was afraid of the place more afraid than she'd ever been at the death pack which this evening she'd forgotten but before she could move away Redden shouted to her and came up the bridal path Hazel hesitated swaying like the needle of a compass and finally stood still. What are you wanting me for Mr. Redden? Don't you know? If I knew I should not ask. What do men generally want women for? I'm not a woman I don't want to be but what be it anyway? He felt in his pocket and drew out a small parcel. There don't say the giving's all on your side he remarked. She opened the parcel it contained two heavy old-fashioned gold bracelets each was set with a large ruby that stared unwinkingly from its setting of pale gold. They like drops of blood said Hazel like when Phaethish starts a killing the pig. He's a hardened his father hard as be writes. I'm much a bleach to you Mr. Redden but I don't want them. I cannot bear the sight of blood. Little fool said Redden they're worth pounds. He caught her wrists and fastened one bracelet on each she struggled but could not get free or undo the clasps. She began to cry loudly and easily as she always did all her emotions were sudden transparent and violent she also since her upbringing had not been refined began to swear damn your clumsy fists and your bloody bracelets she screamed take him off too I understand if you've done her. Redden laughed and in his eyes a glow began nothing could have so suited his mood you've got to wear him he said to show your mind I've been a yes I won't never be yes you will now she raved at him like a little wildcat pulling at the bracelets like a kitten at its neck ribbon he laughed again stilly he knew there was not a soul near for the people from the farm at the foot of the spinny had all gone to church look here Hazel he said not unkindly you've got to give in see I see not you've got to come and live with me at Undern you can wear those fine dresses I'm a cold said Hazel the sun's undring I best go home along come on then up you get we'll be there in no time you shall have some supper and what I want traipse into Undern when I live at the mountain you'll be asking to come soon he said with the crude wisdom of his kind you like me better than that soft person even now she shook her head I'm a man anyway she looked him over and owned he was but she did not want him she wanted freedom and time to find out how much she liked Edward well good neat to you she said I'm off she ran downhill into the wood redden hitched the reins to a tree and followed he caught her and flung her into the bracken and suddenly it seemed to her that the whole wood the whole world herself were all redden he was her sky her cloak the tense silence of the place was heavy on her away at God's little mountain Edward preached his sermon on the power of prayer how he could plant a hedge of prayer round the beloved to keep them all from harm the clock at old asleep down the valley struck eight in muffled tones they were burnt into Hazel's brain the plover's wheeled and cried sadly like the spirits of creatures too greatly outnumbered Edward was a dream God's little mountain was an old tale something forgotten missed big earth twilight thickened and birds began to shrill in the dew voices came up from the farm they were back from church Hazel felt crushed bruised robbed now up you get Hazel said redden who wanted his supper badly and no longer wanted Hazel up you get and tidy yourself and then home he felt rather sorry for her her she made no comment no dimmer instinctively she felt that she belonged to redden now though spiritually she was still Edwards she looked at redden passive doubtful the past evening had become unreal to her so they regarded one another mistrustfully like two creatures taken in a snare they both felt as if they had been trapped by something vast and intangible redden was dazed for the first time in his life he had felt passion instead of mere lust the same ideas that had striven within him on his way here uplifted their voices again staring dully at Hazel he felt a smarting at the back of his eyes and a choking in his throat what ails you catching your breath she asked he could not speak you've got tears in your eye redden put his hand up tell us what ails you he shook his head what for not my what for not she never called redden my soul that he could not or would not speak hazel's eyes were red also with tears of pain now she went again in sympathy with a grief she could not understand so they sat beneath the black slow waving branches under the threat of the oncoming night weeping like children they cowered it seemed beneath the hand raised to strike all that they did was wrong all that they did was inevitable two larches bent by the gales kept up a groaning as bowl war on bowl wounding each other every time they swayed in the indifferent order of the dark steeps the secret arcades the avenues leading nowhere crouched these two incarnations of the troubled earth sentient for a moment capable of sadness cruelty terror and revolt and then lapsed again into the earth forebodings of that lapse forebodings that follow the hour of climax as rooks follow the plough haunted them now though they found no words for what they felt but only knew a sense of the pressure of night it appeared to stoop nearer blind impassive but intensely aware of them under their dark canopy of leaves some being it seemed was listening there and not only listening but imposing in an effortless but inevitable way its veiled purpose hazel and redden he know less than her appeared to be deprived of identity like hypnotic mediums his hardness and strength took on a pitiful adult-like air before this prescient power when he at last stopped choking and licking the tears away surreptitiously as they rolled down his cheeks he was very angry with himself for crying with hazel for witnessing his disgrace that she should cry was nothing he thought women always cried at these times nor did he distinguish between her tears of pain and of sympathy you needn't stare he snapped if i've got a cold there's no reason to gape oh for be you shut up i'm not they climbed the crackling wood ghastly with a sound as of feet passing tiptoe into silence the multitudinous soft noises of a wood cones falling twigs snapping the wind in old driven leaves the subdued rustle of the trees they passed the place where she had talked with edward at the bark stripping the prostrate larches shone as whitely as her shoulder did through her torn gown she remembered edwards look and wept again what is it now he asked i was in this place before the blue bell died along with eddard why do you say the man's name like that it's no better than other names she had no reply for that and they came in silence to the tormented matri where the horse was tied his black mane and smooth back strewn with faded faintly coloured blossom redden lifted her arm and swung into the saddle she leaned against him silent and passive as with one arm round her he guided the horse down the difficult path a star shone through the trees but it was not a friendly star it was more like a stair than a tear when the rest of them sprang out like an army at the revale they were aloof and cold and they rode above in an ironic disdain too terrible to be resented redden put the horse to a gallop he wanted fierce motion to still the compunction that hazel's quiet crying brought a sense of imminent grief was on her gray loneliness and fear of the future he tried to comfort her dana say ought she sobbed you can't run the words or your tongue comfortable like eddard can what do you want me to say i don't know i want our foxy i'll fetch her in the morning no you mother she's safer eddard's letter bite i want to be at eddard's too who comes wailing in the black of night said the voice of vezans as they neared the whole door i thought it was the lady is no gold comfort her as hollers lost lost in the undurned copy end of chapter 25 recording by rachel linton bristol uk chapter 26 have gone to earth this is a libravox recording all libravox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit libravox.org gone to earth by mary webb chapter 26 undurned was in its doom mode pinks frothed over the edges of the borders and white bush roses flung their arms high over the porch all was heavily fragrant close muffling the senses the trees brooded the house brooded the hill hung above deeply recollected the bats went with a lagging flight it was like one of those spellbound places built for an hour or an eon or a moment on the borders of elfdom full of charms and old wizardry ready to fall inwards at a word but invincible to all but that word the hot scent of the trees and the garden mingled with the smell of manure pigsties cooking pigwash and vezans tom moody tobacco it made hazel feel faint a strange sensation to her vezans stood surveying them as he had done on the bleak night of hazel's first coming where he said at last the countless fine lines that covered his upper lip from nostril to mouth deepening wears the reverent receiving no reply but a scowl from his master he led the horse away redden with a kind of gauche gentleness said i'll show you the house they went through the echoing rooms and looked out of the low spider hung casements where young ivy leaves soft and vivid had edged their way through the cracks they stood under ceilings dark with the smoke of fires and lamps that had been lit unnumbered years ago for some old pathetic revelry in cupboards left a jar by a hurried hand that had long been still hung gowns with flower stains or wine stains on their faded folds the doors creaked and sighed after them the floors groaned and all about the house though the summer air was so light and low there was a moaning of wind it was as if all the storms that had blown around it the terror that had been felt in it the tears that had fallen in it had crept like forgotten spirits into its innermost recesses and now made complaint there forever a lonely listener on a stormy night might hear strange voices uplifted the sobbing of children songs of fiestas cries of laboring women young man's voices shouting in triumph the long intonations of prayer the death rattle and as redden and hazel surely the most strangely met of all couples that had owned and been owned by this house went through the darkening rooms they were not it seemed alone a sense of witnesses perturbed hazel a discomfort as from surveillance a soft rumour as of a mute but moving multitude crept along the passages in their wake be there go says she whispered i'd leave her sleep under the blue roof tree i feel like corn under a millstone in this dark place it's said to be haunted but i don't believe it he glanced over his shoulder who buy people that failed weaklings men that lost their money or their women and wives and daughters of the family that died young what for did they fail silly ideas not knowing what they wanted dear now foxy and me we're gonna all us know what we want you want me maybe if you don't you must learn to and if you don't know what you want you'll come to smash but when i do know fuck take it off me a long mournful cry came down the passages hazel screamed be that the lady is no gold comforts she whispered no you silly girl it's a barn owl but she said to cry in the copy on midsummer night things crying out as have been a long while hurted murmured hazel tonight's midsummer was she little like me i don't know did someone catch a hold of her a man did he laughed did she go young yes she died at 19 and so will it be with me she cried suddenly so will it be with me dark and strong in the full of life she flung herself on a faded blue settee and wept the impression of companionship of whisperers breaking out hands stretched forth the steady magnetism of countless unseen eyes was so strong that hazel could not bear it and even redden was glad to follow her back to the inhabited part of the house this is the bedroom redden said opening the door of a big room papered in faded gray and full of the smell of bygone days the great full poster draped with a chintz of roses on a black ground bored her redden opened a chest and took out the green dress he watched her with an air of proud proprietorship as she put it on she went down the shallow stairs like a leaf loosened from the tree vesons a beer bottle in either hand was so aghast at the pale apparition that he nearly dropped them i thought it was a ghost he said a comfortless ghost so i'd be comfortless hazel said to redden when vesons had retired her voice had a sound of tears in it like a dark tide broken on rocks and when i was comfortless at the mountain eddard was used to read comfortably my people as nice as nice are you fonder of masten than of me i don't know she sat down sadly in the home that was not home she remembered the half finished collar she was knitting for foxy also a customer'd grown up that she sang hymns in the evenings to eddard's accompaniment she missed these things she missed the irritations of that peaceful life mrs marston's way of clearing her throat softly and pertinaciously martha's habit of tidying all her little treasures into the kitchen grate eddard's absurd determination that she should have clean nails the ever renewed argument foxy's a bad dog she inna she's a good fox in my sight she's a bad dog now she had floated free of all this she was out of haven on the high seas she felt very lonely as the dead might feel free of the shackles of life it was certainly pleasant to wear the green dress that she missed her little duties clearing away the supper martha being gone fetching the candles mrs marston always shook her head at the third not from economy but from vicarious fellow progenitiveness eddard's reading of the book last thing had made her restless she had thought it a bother now it seemed a privilege to most girls god's little mountain would have been purgatory to her it was wonderful it was the first time she had shared in the peculiar beauty of home the daily sacrament of love eddard never forgot to kiss them both when he came in brought them flowers was always carpentering at surprises for them these last never turned out very well his technical skill was not keeping pace with his enthusiasm but hazel was not critical she in common with the other little creatures sat down in his shadow as in a city of refuge mrs marston shared this feeling she always fell asleep at once when eddard was at home in the evening ceasing to invent alarms about black men creeping through the kitchen window foxy getting into the larder and a great tempest from the lord blowing them all to perdition because lord's day was not kept as it used to be into the parlour at his own good time vesons brought the supper and dumped it on the large round table veneered like mahogany heavily victorian and ornamented with brass feet there were bread and cheese bacon and a good deal of beer hazel saw nothing amiss with it for though she had begun to grow accustomed to respectable middle-class meals life at the callow still seemed the homelier redding looked up from cutting bacon to say with unwonted thoughtfulness like some tea and toast he felt that toast was a triumph of imagination he was rather dubious about asking vesons to do it so instead he repeated you'll have some tea and toast vesons went into the kitchen and shut the door they waited for some time and hazel who whatever her fate her faults and sorrows was always as hungry as foxy looked longingly at redding's cheese and beer physical exhaustion brought tears of appetite to her at last redding went to the kitchen door where's that tea he asked tea yes you fool i know nothing about no tea i said you were to make some not to me and toast i've doubted the fire he had just done so look here my man there's a mrs at undone now you please her or go she tells me what she wants i tell you you do it i'll have no woman over me said vesons sullenly never will i never and mrs did i take not for all the pleasures of bed and board no narrow one i ever took maiden i am to my dying day the coupling of the ideas of vesons and maidenhood were so funny that redding burst out laughing and forgot his anger now make that tea vesons she ought to be here long asked vesons craftily yes for good hazel heard him for good did she want to be in this whispering house for good who did she want to be with for good not redding edward but he had not the passion of the greenwood in him the lust of the earth he was not of the tremulously ecstatic company of wild hunted creatures if redden was definitely antagonistic a hunter edward was neutral a looker on they were not her comrades they did not live her life she had to live theirs she wished she had never seen redden never gone to hunter spinny edwards house was at least peaceful and what she heard vesons say will your lordship sally virtue say she did not hear redden's reply it was fierce and low she wondered who sally virtue was but she was too tired to think much about it afterwards redden had some whiskey and vesons drank his health then redden picked out it's a fine hunting day on the old piano and sang it in a rough tenor vesons joined in from the kitchen in a voice quite free from any music and the roaring chorus echoed through the house ah stop i cannot abide it cried hazel but they did not hear vesons came and stood in the doorway with a teapot in one hand and the expression of acute agony he always wore when singing all trouble and care will be left far behind us at home not for the little foxes cried hazel and she plucked the music from the piano and ran past vesons knocking the teapot out of his hand she stuffed the music into the kitchen grate vesons was petrified well he said you've got the ways of wild cats and spinsters the world over this was an unwilling compliment and i'll say this for you whatever else i can i say you've got spirit enough for the 11 000 virgins redden felt that the scene was hardly festive enough he wondered that he himself did not feel more jubilant reaction had set in he wished that all should be gay as for a bridal but he felt that this was a bridal in all but the name but the old house like a being lethargic after long revelry clad in torn and stained garments seemed unready for mirth andrew was highly antagonistic the hound had bristled growling at the intruder and hazel he looked at hazel and the half-closed lids did she know what had happened he thought not perhaps intuition whispered to her certainly she avoided his eyes she sat drinking the tea which redden with much exertion of authority at last caused to appear she was one and her face looked very thin panic lingered about her eyes at the corner of her lips he realized that she was afraid of him his look his touch immediately he wanted to exercise his power he went across and took her chin in his hand laying the other on her shoulder her eyelids trembled one you after mauling me she said then a passion of tears shook her oh i want edward the old lady i want to go back to the mountain i do edward will be looking me up and down the country good lord so he will said redden and rousing the whole place you must write a letter hazel to say you're safe and happy and he's not to worry but i am there redden frowned at the spontaneity of this but he made her write the note saddle the mayor vessens and take this to the mountain you done a mind out much began vessens but redden cut him short get on he said and vessens knew by the tone that he had better push it under the parson's door knock and make yourself scarce vessens redden ordered you can go up to bed if you like hazel left alone he walked up and down the room puzzled and uneasy according to his idea he had done hazel the greatest honor a man can pay to a woman he could not see in what he had failed he was irritated with his conscience for being troublesome he had as he put it merely satisfied a need of his nature a need simple and urgent as eating and drinking he did not understand that in failing to find out whether it was also a need of hazel's nature and in nothing else at all lay his unpardonable crime that he had offended against the views of his church did not worry him for like many churchmen he had the happy gift of keeping profession and practice dogma and deeds in airtight compartments how many of the most fervent churchmen are not or have not been at some period of their lives exactly like redden of course i have been a bit of a beast in the past he thought but that's done with besides she doesn't know he reflected again i suppose i was a bit rough but she ought to have forgotten that by now i do wish she wouldn't keep on so about the parson he ran upstairs sorry i was rough hazel he said shame-facedly hazel stood at the open window in a nightdress that she'd found in one of the chests a frail yellowish thing with many frills of cobwebby lace made and worn by some dead woman on a forgotten bridle it was symbolic of hazel's whole life that she came in this way both to undone and the mountain as bare of woman's regalia as a winter leaf is of substance hazel was speaking when he entered he stood still astonished and suspicious who are you talking to he asked she turned him above she said i was saying the prayer edward learned me i said it three times at being mid-summer and ghost is going to an again and the death pack about he'll be bound to hearken to edwards prayer she looked small and pitiful standing in the flickering candlelight she turned again to the window and redden went downstairs quite overwhelmed and abashed the house seemed area than ever full of subdued complaints and whispering the faces of the roses around the window were woe be gone in the lamp light the rustle of the leaves had an expostulatory sound the one poplars down the meadow looked accusing it was almost as if the free masonry of the green world was up in arms for hazel she had its blood in her veins and shared with it the silent worship of freedom and beauty and had now been plunged so deeply into human life that she was lost to it it was as if every incarnation of perfection that she had seen in leaf and flower and she had seen much though remaining without expression of it every moment of deep comradeship with earthy duee things every illumined memory of colors and lights that her vivid mind had gathered and cherished in its rage of love and rapture had come now pacing disdainfully through this old haunt of crude humanity passing up the stairs standing about the great fore poster where so many reddens had died and been born gazing upon this face that had known dreams however childish of their eternal magic grieving as the tree for the leaf that has fallen they grieved but they did not forgive for the spirits of beauty and magic are as the bondsman of color knows and the bondsman of poetry inimical to the ordinary life and destiny of man they break up homes they lead a thousand wanderers into the unknown they brook no half service it is only the rarest exception when a man loves a woman and yet excels in his art and a woman must have an amazing genius if she is still a poet after childbirth but though sometimes these proud spirits will tolerate will even be sworn companions of human love it is only when it is a passion pure and burning that they know it for a sister spirit in the sexual meeting of hazel and redden there was nothing of this though it brought out the best in redden the best was so very poor and hazel was merely passive so they stood and wept above her and they foreswore her company forever she might regard the primrose eye to eye but she would receive no duee look of comprehension no lift of the spirit would come with the lifting leaves no pang of mysterious pain with birdsong star-set dewfall even her lover foxy would become a groping thing and not any longer would she know when her blind bird made its tentative music all it meant and all it dreamed this very night she had forgotten to lean out and listen as of old to the soft voices of the trees she had said her prayer and then she'd been so tired and pains had shot through her and her back at eight and she cried herself to sleep what for did i go to the hunter spinny she asked herself but the answer was too deep for her the traitorous impulse of her whole being too mysterious she could not answer her question redden pacing the room downstairs drinking whiskey and fuming at his own compunction at last grew tired of his silent house damn it why shouldn't i go up he said he opened hazel's door look here he said the house is mine and so are you i'm coming to bed he was met by that most intimidating reply to all blaster silence she was asleep an all night long while he snored she tossed in her sleep and moaned end of chapter 26 recording by rachel lintern bristol uk chapter 27 of gone to earth this is a libra vox recording all libra vox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit libra vox.org gone to earth by mary web chapter 27 early next morning vesons was calling the cows in for milking he lent over the lichen green gate contemplatively all the colors were so bright that they were grotesque and startling above the violently green fields the sky shone like blue glass and across the east were too long for million clouds behind the black hill the sun had shouldered up molten and the shadow of vesons standing monkey like on the lowest bar of the gate lay on the stretch of wet clover behind him a purple elfin creature gifted with a prehensile dignity the cows did not appear after his first call he lifted his head and called again in a high plaintive tone as one reasons with a fretful child come on come on then he sank into the landscape again after an interval a polished red and white cow appeared at a distance of five fields coming serenely on at her own pace a white one and a roam followed her at long distances they advanced through the shadows each going through the exact middle of the many gateways always kept open like doors in a suite of rooms at a reception vesons waited patiently more as a slave than a ruler only uttering his plaintive come on once when the last cow dallied overlong with a tuft of lush grass in the hedge this was the daily ritual every morning he appeared neutral tinted from the house and cried upon an apparently empty landscape every morning they meandered through the seven gates from a secret leafy polios where they spent the night mysterious of eye leisured vividly red and white they followed the old man as queens might follow an usher hazel was coming down the path from the house with mourning her abundant vitality had returned the outer world was new and bright and she wanted shyly to be up and dressed before red in a woke she was full of merriment at the subservience of pheasants to the cows do you say mum to him she inquired pheasants looked her up and down he was very angry not only at her criticism but at the difficulty of retort since he supposed she was now mrs his friendliness for her had gone entirely not as would have seemed natural since her last night's instalment at undone but since her marriage with edward he felt that she had gone back on him he had taken her as a comrade and now she'd gone over to the enemy he was also injured at having been kept up so late last night he chumpled his straw for some time until the last cow had disappeared then he said you m up early for a married woman or whatever you be mrs hazel laughed she had lived so completely outside the influence of the cannons of society that the taunt had no sting ha you're jealous she said then with a mercilessly accurate imitation of his voice and face she added a mrs at undone never will I he quailed under her mocking amber eyes her impish laughter then looking from side to side with suppressed fury he said then birds as after the cherries i'll get a gun i'll shoot him dead if you shoot a black bird the milk will turn bloody said hazel but vizens paid no heed all morning at any spare moment and after dinner which he brought in in complete silence and which was exceedingly unpalatable he lurked behind trees and crept along hedges shooting birds even redden felt awed and could not gather courage to expostulate with him in and out of the stealthy afternoon shadows black and solemn went the shambling old figure with his relentless face and outraged heart he shot thrushes as they fluted after a meal of wild raspberries he shot tiny silky willow wrens robins and swallows their sacredness did not awe him a pigeon on its nest black birds a dipper a goldfinch and a great many sparrows the garden and fields were struck into silence because of him only a flutter of terrified wings showed his whereabouts he piled his trophies all the delicate ruffled plumage of summer's prime on the kitchen table draggled and bloody hazel and redden crept from window to window silent watching his movements under and grew ghostlier than ever seeming as the shots rang out startlingly loud in the quiet like a moribund creature electrified by blows he'd leave for it was me than the birds said hazel where so ever I go folks kill things what for do they things must be killed it seems like the earth all bloody said hazel and it's all as a little small lens there he's got a jenny wren oh deary me it's like I've killed him it's all along of me coming to undurn hush said redden sharply what I'm afraid of is that he'll shoot himself he's so damn queer the last cow had sauntered to the gate before vizens opened it and milked them that night afterwards he went in with the pails set them on the parlor floor and said with fury to hazel bloody is it she owned faithfully that it was not and now said vizens turning on redden it's notice notice has been given one month by andrew vizens to john redden a square of undurn with tragic dignity he turned to go he saw neither hazel nor redden but only the swan the utri swan his creation now doomed to be forever unfinished the generations to come would look upon a beacless swan and would think he'd meant it so tears came into his eyes smarting difficult tears the room was full of brooding misery redden felt awkward and astounded why vizens he said in rather a sheepish tone vizens did not turn he fumbled with the door handle redden got up and went across to him why vizens he said again with a hand on his shoulder you and I can't part you know we mun but why man what's up with you andrew the rare christian name softened vizens he deigned to explain she is he said with a side long nod at hazel she mocked me did you hazel now then mrs vizens glared at her I only said her said never will I shouted vizens ah that's what her said never will I that's what I say he added with the pride of a frisemaker redden could make nothing of them one so red and angry the other in tears I'll do no woman's will said vizens look here vizens be reasonable listen to me I'm your master aren't I ah till a month well you take orders from me that's all that matters I'm master here the tones of his ancestry were in his voice an ancestry that ruled over and profited by men and women as good as themselves or better so we'll say no more about it he finished with the frank and winning smile that was one of his few charms vizens stared at him for some time and as he stared an idea occurred to him it was he felt a good idea it would enable him to keep his swan and his self-respect and to get rid of hazel as he pondered it his face slowly creased into smiles he touched his forelock a thing only done on paydays and withdrew murmuring notice is took back they saw him go past the window with the steps and the shears evidently to attend to the swan redden thought how easy it was to manage these underlings a little authority a little tact he turned to hazel crying in the high arm chair of black oak with its faded rose colored cushions she was crying not only because vizens had come off victorious but because her position was now defined and was not what she would have liked but also because redden's manner to her jarred after last night last night in the comfortless darkness of hunter spinny he had seemed for a little while to be a fellow fugitive of hers one of the defenceless fleeing from the vague unknown power that she feared then she pitied him self-forgetfully fiercely gathered his head to her breast as she so often gathered foxes but now he seemed to have forgotten seemed once more to be of the swift and strong ones that rode down small animals she sobbed afresh look here hazel said hey in a tone that he intended to be kind but firm look here i'm not angry with you only you must leave vizens alone you know you want the old fellow more than you want me don't be silly he has his uses you have yours he spoke with a quite unconscious brutality he voiced the theory of his class and his political party which tacitly or openly asserted that women servants and animals were in the world for their benefit i'm not grass to be trod on said hazel and if you cannot be civil spoken i'll go you can't he replied not now she knew it was true and the knowledge that her own physical nature had proved traitorous to her freedom enraged her the more you can't go he went on coming towards her chair to caress her shall i tell you why hazel sat up and looked at him her eyes gloomy her forehead red with crying he thought she was awaiting for his answer but hazel seldom did or said what he expected she let him kneel by her chair on one knee then frowning asked who cried in hunter spinny he jumped up as if he had an out on a pin he'd been trying to forget the incident and hope that she had he was bitterly ashamed of that really fine moment of his life don't hazel he said he felt quite frightened that he remembered how he had behaved a strange doubt of himself born that night stirred again was he all he had thought was the world what he had thought misgivings seized him perhaps you're not to have brought hazel here or to the spinny an older code than those of church and state began to flame before him condemning him suddenly he wanted reassurance you did want to come didn't you i didn't take advantage of you very much did i he asked you want to stay no i didn't want to come till you made me you got the better of me but maybe you couldn't help it maybe you would drove to it who buy he asked with an attempt at flippancy hazel's eyes were dark and haunted some are strong and drodsome as drives us all she said she had a vision of all the world racing madly round and round like the exhausted and terrified horse redden had that morning lunged but what power it was that stood in the center breaking without an effort the spirit of the mad fleeing tethered creature she could not tell redden sat brooding until hazel recovering first in her mercurial way said now i've come i'm in bite do you think the old fellow would let me cook some up for supper it's been pig food for us today but when they went to investigate they found vessens preparing a tremendous meal hot and savory as a victorious and penitent old man could make it he showed in his manner that bygones were to be bygones and night came down in peace on undone but it was a curious torrid piece like the hush before thunder end of chapter 27 recording by rachel linton bristol uk chapter 28 of gone to earth this is a librivox recording all librivox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit librivox.org gone to earth by mary web chapter 28 it was the friday after hazel's coming and redden was away much against his will at a horse fair he was quite surprised at the hurt it gave him to be away from hazel so far he had never been in the smallest sense any woman's lover he had taken what he wanted of them in a kind of animal self-consciousness that amounted to a stark innocence virility he felt was not of his seeking there it was and it must be satisfied now he was annoyed to find that he felt guilty when he remembered these women and that he wanted hazel not as with them occasionally but all the time he had been accustomed to say at far most dinners after indulging pretty freely oh damn it what you want with women between sun up and sun down his coarseness had been received with laughter and reproof now he felt that the reproof was juster than the laughter it was curious too how dull things became when hazel was not there hazel had something fresh to say about everything and their quarrels were the most invigorating moments he had ever known hazel was primitive enough to be feminine original enough to be boyish and mysterious enough to be exciting as versons remarked to the drake oh master you never saw the like it's hazel hazel the day long and a good man's spoil it was only partly spoiled before versons and hazel were spending the afternoon quarreling about the bees when redding was away hazel put off her new dignity and was versons equal because it was so dull to be anything else versons tolerated her presence for the sake of the subacid remarks that enabled him to make but chiefly because of the sardonic pleasure it gave him to remember how soon his resolve would be put into action they were in the walled garden and the bees were coming and going so fast that they made when hazel half closed her eyes long black threads swaying between the hive doors and the distant fields in the hilltop they hung in cones on the low front walls and lumped on the hive shelves in that apparently purposeless unrest that precedes creation but whether they intended any of them to create a new city that day none might know versons said not hazel always for adventure said they would and said also that she could hear the queen in one hive zeeping that strange music which like the maddeningly soft skull of bagpipes or the fiddling of ned pew has powered and your living creatures away from comfort and full hives into the unknown so darkly sweet i canna hear it said versons obstinately go on you're deaf mr versons deaf am i maybe i hear as much as i want to and more ah that i do well then why can i hear him listen at him now do you know the noise i mean do i know the noise versons voice grew almost tearful with rage do i know me as can make a thousand bees go through the neck of a pint bottle each after other like cows to the milking me maybe you'd like to learn me be keeping he continued with salty humility maybe you would never will i he began to tear off the top of the hives oh mr versons didn't be so cross hazel was afraid there would be another scene like monday's you take him off very neat she added with a pathetic attempt to be tactful as neat as my dad i'd have you know said versons as i take him off neater ah a deal neater bees and cows and new tree swans he went on reflectively i can manage better than any married man for what he puts into matrimony i put into my work now i ask you he fixed his eyes on her with the expression of a fanatic i ask you was there ever a beekeeper or a general or a sea captain as was anything to boast of being married never marriage kills the mind why is bees clever why is the skip all is full of honey at summer's end because they're all old maids the queen inna they all come from her versons glared for a moment then realizing defeat turned on his heel and went to feed the calves he had an ingenious way of getting the calves in he had no dog it was one of his dreams to have one but he managed very well first he opened the calf's kit door then he loose the pigs then he fetched a bucket and went to the field where the calves were followed by a turbulent squealing ferocious crowd of pigs he walked round the calves and the calves fled homewards far more afraid of the pigs than of a dog this piece of farm economy pleased vesons and peace being restored they laid tea amicably when redin came home to a pleasant scent of toast and the sight of hazel shining braids of hair new brushed and piled high on her head he felt very well pleased with himself he stretched in the red armchair and flung an arm round her his hard blue eyes his hard mouth smiled he felt that he could make a success of marriage though the parson as he called Edward could not women he reflected were quite easy to manage just show them whose master straight off and all's well here was hazel radiant soft submissive all the rough prickly husk gone since sunday why had he behaved so strangely in the spinny well well he must forget about that the hot tea ran very comfortably down his throat the toast was pleasantly resistant to his strong teeth he felt satisfied with life later on no doubt hazel would have a child that too would be a good thing two possessions were better than one and he could well afford children it never occurred to him to wonder whether hazel would like it or to be sorry for the pain in store for her he felt very unselfish as he thought when she can't go about i'll sit with her now and again it really was a good deal for him to say he'd never taken the slightest notice of sally haggard at such times got something for you he said pulling at his pocket oh it's an urchin cried hazel delightedly redden began bruising and pulling at its spines with his gloved hands done uh cried hazel redden pulled and wrenched until at last the hedgehog screamed a thin piercing wail most ghastly and pitiful and old ancient as the cry of the death said moth that faint ghostly shriek as of a tortured witch centuries of pain were in it the age-long terror of weakness bound and helpless beneath the knife and that's something vindictive and terrifying that looks up at the hunter from the eyes of trapped animals and sends the cuckoo fleeing in panic before the onset of little birds hazel knew the sound well it was the watchword of the little children of despair the password of the freemasonry to which she belonged before the cry had ceased to horrify the quiet room she had flung herself at redden a pattern of womanly obedience no longer but a desperate creature fighting in that most intoxicating of all crusades the suckering of weakness on redden's head a moment ago so smooth on his face a moment ago so bland rained the blows of hazel's hard little fists her blows were by no means so negligible as most women's for her hands were muscular and strong from digging and climbing and in her heart was the root of pity which nerves the most trembling hands to do mighty deeds what the devil spluttered redden here stop it you little vixen he caught one of her hands but the other was too quick for him give over tormenting of it then the hedgehog rolled on the floor and the fox hand came and sniffed it redden had her other hand now what you mean by it he asked very angry and tingling about the ears leave it be it's done you no harm lucky the hang dog she cried drive him off i'm going to have some fun seeing the dog kill it hazel went quite white you shana not till i'm dead she said it's come to me to be took care of and took care of it shall be she reached a foot out and kicked the hound redden's mood changed he burst out laughing you're a slight more amusing than hedgehogs he said the beast can go free for all i care he pulled her onto his knee and kissed her send the hound dog out then when the hound had gone resentfully the hedgehog a sphinx-like protestant ball enjoyed the peace and hazel became again as redden thought quite the right sort of girl to live with during the uproar they had not heard wheels in the drive so they were startled by vezzan's intrigue insertion of himself into a small opening of the door his firm shutting of it as if in face of a beleaguering host and his centurion whisper is clumbers now as if to say when you let a woman in you never know what will become of it tell him i'm ill dead said his master tell him i'm in the bath anything only send them away they heard vezzan's resistive the master's very sorry mum but he's got the colic too bad to see you it's heave curse heave curse till i pray for a good vomit the clumbers urgent upon his track shouldered past and strode in what the devil do they want muttered redden he rose sulkily i hear said the eldest miss clumber who had read bordello and was very clever that young locken va has taken to himself a bride this was quite up to her usual standard for not only had it the true literary flavor but it was ironic for she knew who hazel was uh queried redden shaking hands in his rather racecourse manner introduce me mr redden simpered amelia clomba it was painful when she simpered her mouth was made for sterner uses they surveyed hazel who shrank from their gaze something in their eyes made her feel as if they were her judges and as if they knew all about hunter spinny they looked at her with detestation they thought it was detestation for a sinner really it was for the woman who had in a few weeks after meeting him found favor in redden's eyes and attained that defeat which to women ever so desiccated as the clumbers is the one desired victory they had come as they told each other before and after their visit to snatch a brand from the burning what was in the heart of each the frantic desire to be mistress of undone they did not mention miss clumber had taken exception to amelia's tight dress for amelia had a figure and miss clomba had not she always flushed at the text we have a little sister and she hath no breasts amelia was aware of her advantage as she engaged redden in conversation he fell in with the arrangement for he detested her sister who always prefaced every remark with have you read as he never read anything he thought she was making fun of him and what asked miss clumber of hazel lowing her lids like blinds was your maiden name would us where were you married the mountain surely there's no church there ah edwards church edward ah he's minister you mean the chapel so that's your persuasion now mr redden is such a staunch churchman redden looked exceedingly discomfited and when did this happy event take place a cat with a mouse was nothing to miss clomba with a sinner at this point redden saw as he put it what she was driving at he was very sleepy having been out all day and eaten a large tea and he never combatted a physical desire so he cut across a remark of amelia's to the effect that marriage with the right woman so added to a man's comfort and said i'm not married if that's what you mean then who said miss clomba feeling that she had him now my keep he said boldly he thought they would go at that but they sat tight they had as miss clomba said afterwards a soul to save they both realized how pleasant might be the earthly lot of one engaged in this heavenly occupation ha you call a spade a spade mr redden said miss clomba with a frosty glance at hazel you are not as our dear browning has it mealy mouthed in the breast of a true woman said amelia authoritatively as a fishmonger might speak of fish is no room for blame true woman be damned miss clomba saw that for today the cause was lost at this point miss amelia uttered a piercing yell the hedgehog encouraged by being left to itself and by the slight dusk that had begun to gather in the northerly room of London where night came early had begun to creep about surreptitiously guided by hazel's foot it had crept under amelia's skirt and laid its cold inquiring head on her ankle thinly clad for conquest hazel went off into peels of laughter and miss amelia hated her more than before vessens in the kitchen shook his head i never heard the like of the noise there's been since that girl came never did i he said leave him said miss clomba to hazel on the doorstep she was going to add for my sake but substituted his you are causing him to sin she added hey i hazel felt that she was always causing something wrong then she sighed i cannot leave him why not he want to let me with that phrase all unconsciously she took a most ample revenge on the clombers for it rang in their ears all night and they knew it was true end of chapter 28 recording by rachel linton bristol uk chapter 29 of gone to earth this is a libra vox recording all libra vox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit libra vox.org gone to earth by mary web chapter 29 on sunday vessens put his resolve to go to the mountain and reveal hazel's whereabouts into practice if he had waited gossip would have done it for him he set out in the afternoon having cleaned himself and put on his pepper and salt suit buff leggings red waistcoat and the jockey like cap he affected he arrived at the back door just as martha was taking in supper well said martha who wanted to have her meal and go home well said vessens when i say well i mean what you want all us say what you mean who do you want me the master the master's out i'll wait then he sat down by the fire and looked so fixedly at martha as she poured out her tea that she offered him some in self defense he drew up his chair now that he was receiving hospitality he felt that he must be agreeable and complimentary single i suppose he asked ah said martha coyly i'm single but i've no objection to matrimony oh vessens spoke sourly i'm sorry for you then maybe you're a married man yourself never better late than never if i kept out of it in the heat of youth is it likely i'll go into it in the chili times maiden i am to my dying day but if you was to me a nice tidy woman has had a bit saved to martha a bridegroom of 65 seemed better than nothing if i met a scorer nice tidy women if i met a gross nice tidy woman it would be no different not if she could make strong ale i can make ale myself no woman shall come into my kitchen for uncounted gold martha sighed as she changed the subject what do you want the master for never tell your tidings said vessens till you meet the king martha mrs marston stood at the kitchen door in the most splendid of her caps a pagoda of white lace and her voice was as she afterwards said quite sharp its militulessness being very slightly reduced vessens rose touching his hair what is it my good man a bit of news mum for my son ah you may go martha said mrs marston and martha went without an acuity now mrs marston spoke encouragingly it's for the master he cannot see you the two old faces regarded each other with silent obstinacy and vessens recognized that for all mrs marston's soft outlines she was as obstinate as he was he cleared his throat several times mrs marston produced a lozenge which he etch reluctantly chumbling it with a nervous haste he was so afraid that she would give him another that he told her his news thank you she said keeping her dignity in a marvellous manner mrs edward marston of course wrote to the minister but she forgot to give her address accidents will happen vessens remarked as he went out it was some time before edward came in he had spent most of his time since last sunday tramping the hillsides it was not until he'd finished his very cursory meal that his mother said calmly looking over her spectacles i know where hazel is you know mother why didn't you tell me i am telling you dear there's nothing to be in a taking about you've had no supper yet a little preserve edward in a sudden passion that startled her through the jam dish across the room it made a red splash on the wall mrs marston stopped chumbling her toast and remained with the rotary motions of her mouth in abeyance then she said slowly your poor father always said dear that you'd break out someday and you have the best dish of course the jam i say little about jam is but jam after all but the cut glass dish can't you go on with the tail mother yes my dear yes but you fluster me like the silverton cheapjack does i never can buy the dish he holds up for i get in such a fluster for fear he'll break it and then he does and now you have edward pushed back his chair in desperation for pity's sake he said i'm telling you i never thought hazel was steadfast you know where is she why will you torment me an old man came a very untrustworthy old man i fear a defiant manor and that is never pleasant there he was in the kitchen with martha age is no barrier to wrong and martha was very flushed there was a deal of laughter too mother if you keep on like this i shall go mad why edward you are all in a fever there there it's more peaceful without her and i wish mr redden well of her redden what redden mr redden of undone who else damn the fellow edward what words to take on your lips and just think she went on sorrowfully that he seemed such a nice man he liked the gooseberry wine so much and gave me a man which is more than martha does half her time where are you going to undone what for hazel mrs mast and sat bolt upright but of course she'll never darken the door again i shall bring her back tonight of course but my dear you must divorce her however unpleasant on account of the papers remember she has been there a week what of that but a week dear mother i did not think to hear the talk of the filthy world from you you mrs masten quailed a little there is nothing in the world so pure so wonderful so strong as a young man's love can be nothing so spiritual nothing so brave mrs masten in her own words shed tears don't cry mother but help me edward said be ready for her love her she is as pure as a dew drop i know it and i want her more than life but if she doesn't want you edward what more is to do to seek and to save snapped edward and he banged the door and went hatless down the path between the heavy brow tombstones but he came back to suggest that there should be some tea ready as he went down the batch owls were shrieking in the woods and the sky was pied with gray and crimson like bloodstained marble the cries of the owls were hard as marble also and of a polished ferocity they would have their prey he walked fast through the lonely fields where hazel had passed on her mushrooming morning the roses that had then been in the bud were falling at oldersley people stared at him as he went by flushed and hatless from oldersley to wolf batch was some miles from there to undone the waylay over bitterly hill where he missed the path so it was quite dark when he came past undone pool lying black and ghastly in its ring of trees the foxhound set up a loud baying within only one window was lit edward hammered on the knocker and the sound echoed in the hollow house there was a noise within of a door opening and hazel's voice cried i wouldn't ago it's a tramp likely then redden laughed and edward clenched his hands in rage at the easy self-confidence of him the bolt was drawn back and redden stood in the doorway outlined by pale light who is it he asked in rather a jovial tone he felt at peace with the world now hazel was here beast edward said tersley just come in my lad and let's have a look at you people don't call me names twice hazel had heard edwards voice she ran to the door and the apple green gang rustled about her eddard eddard donna go for to miss call him he'll hurty he's stronger in you do we go back eddard never till you come to i like that said redden can't you see she's got my gown on her back she's mine she was never yours he looked meaningfully and triumphantly at edward oh donna jack what for do you go to shame me said hazel twisting her hands edward took no notice of her i don't know what evil means you used or how you brought the poor child here he said controlling himself with an effort but you have tried to rob me and you have insulted her oh don't come here talking like an injured husband redden said you know you aren't her husband keep your foul mouth shut before innocence to try and rob a poor child of her freedom of her soul hazel wondered at him his eyes darkened so upon redden his face was so powerful irradiated with love and anger so young he went on so young and as wild as a little bird how could anyone help letting her take her own way she wanted to go free in the woods i let her and there you were like a sneaking wolf he threw a look at hazel so full of wistful tenderness that she flung the green skirt over her head and sobbed stow it catch you said redden if you want to fight say so but don't preach all night his tone was injured he felt that he'd been particularly considerate to edward in sending him the letter also he was convinced that he had only taken what edward did not want that edward could love hazel was beyond his comprehension if a man loved a woman he possessed her took his pleasure of her love that was abnegation was to his idea impossible so that now when edward spoke of his love redden simply thought he was posing why didn't you let her be women don't want to be let be said redden with a very unpleasant laugh oh stop talking about me as if i want to hear cried hazel if she loved you i'd say nothing edward went on staring at redden fixedly the fact that i'm her husband would not have counted with me if you'd loved her and she you a fine pastor but you don't you only wanted oh you make me sick indeed well i'm man enough to take what i want you're not you trapped her you would have betrayed her but thank god a young girl's innocence is a wonderful and powerful thing redden was astounded could marten really be such a fool as to believe in hazel still the innocent young girl he began that hazel struck him on the mouth all right spitfire he said mum's the word he was surprisingly good-humoured well hazel edward spoke in a matter of fact tone shall we go home now denna asked me edward i'm an abide why hazel was silent she could not explain that strange instinct stronger than her wildness that redden had awakened in her and that chained her here with invisible chains come home little hazel he pleaded i canna she whispered why you can if you want to don't you want to ah i do that she was torn between her longing to go and her powerlessness to leave redden the light went out of edwards face do you love this man he asked no does it make you better to live with him no it was living with you as did that redden was so enraged that he struck her and her expression of submission as she cowered under the blow was worse to edward than the blow itself he forgot his views about violence and struck red in back come outside said redden in a tone of relief the situation had now taken a comprehensible turn for him if it's fighting you're after i'm with you that's settling it like gentlemen what are you grinning at he spoke huffily done a snab at each other what for do you said hazel because your husband's jealous edward was exasperated by the realization that his action incoming did look like that of the commonplace husband but after all what did it matter nothing mattered but hazel he looked across at her crouched in the armchair sobbing he went to her and patted her shoulder no one's angry with you dear he said afterwards when we're home you shall explain it all to me if you win put in redden edward stooped and kissed hazel's hand the momentary doubt of her cruel as hell had gone she was his lady and he was going to fight for her hazel looked up at him and in that instant she almost loved him they went out it was a black moon last night they stood near the lit window draw the blind up shouted redden hazel drew it up they faced each other in the square of light they were both quite collected it seemed difficult to begin the humour of this struck redden and he laughed edward looked at him disgustedly redden began to feel a fool we must begin he said seeing that edward was waiting for him to strike the first blow and not being angry enough to do so redden said coarsely no good fighting person she's mine from head to foot he received as good a blow as edward was capable of they fought with hard-drawn breath while they were neither of them in training to edward it seemed ridiculous to be fighting to redden it seemed ridiculous to be fighting such an opponent they moved out of the light and back again in the tense silence of the night a rat splashed in the pool and silence fell again edward could not do much more and defend himself and redden's eyes shone triumphantly within hazel leaned against the glass faintly it was as if evil and good angels and devils fought for her and whichever one she was equally she did not want heaven she wanted earth and the green ways of earth oh he'll kill edward she moaned edward staggered under a blow and she hid her eyes suddenly she thought of pheasants where was he she ran to the kitchen calling him he was not there she went to the stables he was nowhere to be found drawn by an irresistible curiosity she rushed back to the front of the house under the utri she ran into pheasants shh he whispered say nought i'll tell you what's a mortal good thing for a dogfight pepper he held up the kitchen pepper pot in the other hand he had the poker now our part and mrs you see quick then but as she spoke redden got in a blow on edwards jaw and he fell hazel rushed forward you murderer she screamed and she bit redden's hand as he stretched it out to catch her and bent over edward the victor in the fight was fated to be the loser with hazel for she had a never broken compact with all creatures defeated she ran to the pool for water catch a halt on him she cried to pheasants he's a murderer redden stood by confused and mystified at hazel's unlooked for behavior pheasants bent over edward he struck a match and held it to the end of his nose chuckling as edward winced i'll tell you summer as his mortal tough he remarked a minister of the lord will the gentleman stay supper he inquired of redden no said hazel mr redden will take supper alone for hours to his dying day put the horse in please mr pheasants right you are mrs redden was so taken aback by the turn of events and his head ate so much that he had nothing to say he watched pheasants bring the horse round blinked at hazel as she tore off the silk dress and borrowed edwards coat instead and glowered dumbly at edward as he was helped into the trap hazel sat between the two men pluck up said pheasants to the cob unemotionally and the trap jogged through the gate and out onto the open hill and if it causes me my place i'll tell you one thing pheasants said to himself there's as good to be had and better well i'm damned said redden as they disappeared in the darkness he went in and finished the whiskey in a state of mystification that ended in sleep end of chapter 29 recording by rachel linton bristol uk chapter 30 of gone to earth this is a libra vox recording all libra vox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit libravox.org gone to earth by mary web chapter 30 as the horse trotted along the hard road rabbits scuttled across in the momentary lamp light hazel tied her handkerchief round edwards head all the windows were dark in oldersly except one faint dormer where an old woman was dying they began to climb the lane that led up to the mountain cattle looked over hedges breathing hard with curiosity in an upland field a flock of horned sheep were racing to unfro through a gap in the hedge coughing and stamping at intervals and looking as the moon rose like fantastic devils working sorcery with their own shadows the lamps dimmed in the moonlight and the world seemed to widen infinitely like life at the coming of love the country lay below like a vast white mirror and the hill sloped vaguely to a silver sky bezons walked up the batch to ease the cob and edward looked down at hazel and murmured my little child dinner talk said hazel quickly it's bad for me she was afraid to break the magical silence afraid that the new piece that came with mastans presence would vanish like the moon in driving cloud and that she would feel the dragging chain that pulled her back to redden edward was silent puzzling over the question why had not hazel asked for his help redden must have seen her at least several times must have persecuted her he grew very uneasy he must ask hazel they drew up before the white centred graveyard bezons went up the path and knocked at the silent house then he threw handfuls of white spar off a grave at the windows the minocca cockerel crew readily that's unlucky said hazel mrs. marten put her head out very sleepy and asked who it was the conquering hero said bezons as edward and hazel came up the path deeply shadowed he got into the trap and drove off well under and will be somewhat like itself again now he thought it was a deal more peaceable without her naughty girl thought mrs. marten as she sadly and lethargically put on her clothes well edward she exclaimed when she came down in her crimson shawl with the ball fringe here's a to-do a minister of grace with a pocket handkerchief around his head coming to his house in the dead of night with a wild old man what's happened oh my dear is it your arteries we wondered where you were hazel marten i'm very shivery mother edward said something hot and sweet she bustled off they were alone for the first time hazel why didn't you tell me about this man it was not kind all right of you there was not to tell she fidgeted but he must have seen you several times i was near telling you that i thought you'd be angered angry with you oh to think of you in such danger what danger of things that thank god you never dream of he forged that letter i suppose or did he frighten you into writing it ah but why did you ever go he pulled me up on the horse and took me the man's a savage hazel checked a hasty denial that was on her lips what a pity you happened to meet him edward said ah but why didn't you want to come at once when i came to fetch you were you so afraid of him as that ah well it's over now he won't show his face here again we've done with him hazel sighed but whether it was her spiritual self sighing with relief at being with edward or her physical self longing for redden she could not have said only you could come through such an experience unchanged my sweet edward said i'm in go to foxy she cried desperately foxy wants me foxy wants a good beating said mrs masten benignly looking mercifully over her spectacles her roth was generally like the one drop of acid in a dell of honey smothered in loving kindness anambom one when hazel had gone she said you will send her away from here of course edward went out into the graveyard without a word he sat on one of the coffin shaped stones god send me some quiet he said mrs masten came and draped her shawl around him he got up despairing of peace and said he would go to bed there's a good boy so will i you'll be as bright as ever in the morning then she whispered you won't keep her here keep her who hazel of course hazel will stay here it's hardly right pleasant you mean mother you never liked her you want to be rid of her but how you can so misjudge a beautiful soul i cannot think i tell you she's as pure as a daisy why she could not even bear in her maidenly reserve the idea of marriage it is sheer blasphemy to say such things blasphemy my dear is not a thing you can do against people it is disagreeing with the lord that is blasphemy i must ask you anyway never to mention hazel's name to me until you can think of her differently when after saying good night to hazel and foxy edward had gone to bed mrs masten shook her head edward she said is not what he was she waited till hazel came in you're no wife for my son she said you've sinned with another man i han had done naught nor said naught it's all other folks doing and saying so i'd done a see as i've sinned and i never could have buried hazel cried i just leave you as dead as quick she rushed up to her room and flung herself on her bed sobbing she felt dazed like a child taken into a big toy shop and told to choose quickly life had been too hasty with her there were things she knew that she would have liked but she had so far not had time to find out what they were she wished she could tell edward all about it how could she explain that strange inner power that had driven her to hunter spinny how could she make him understand that she did not want to go and was yet obliged to go she could not tell him that although she was furious with redden on his behalf although she hated redden for the coarseness and cruelty in him yet parting with him had hurt her how could this be she did not know she only knew that as she lay in her little bed she wanted redden his bodily presence his kisses or his blows he had betrayed her utterly bringing to his aid forces he could not gauge or understand his crime was that he had made of a woman who could not be his spiritual bride since her spirit was unawakened and his was to seek his body's bride all the divine paradoxes of sex the mastery of the lover and his deep humility his idealization of his bride and her absolute surrender these he had dragged in the mud so instead of the mysterious transcendent illumination that passion brings to a woman she had only confusion darkness and a sense of something dragging at the roots of her being in the darkness her eyes needed his eyes to stare them down the bruises on her arms ached for his hard hands her very tears desired his roughness to set them flowing oh jack redden jack redden you've put a spell on me she moaned i want to be along of eddard and you've bound me to be along of you i don't like you but i cannot think of ought else she fought a hard battle that night the compulsion to get up and go straight to undone was so strong that it could only be compared to the pull of matter on matter she tried to call up eddard's voice quiet tender almost religious in its tone to her but she could only hear redden's voice forceful and dictatorial saying i'm master here and every nerve assented in defiance of her wistful spirit that he was master that when morning came she was still at the mountain showed an extraordinary power of resistance and was simply owing to the fact that redden had in what he called giving the pass and a good hiding opened her eyes very completely to his innate callousness and to his temperamental and traditional hostility to her creed of love and pity soon in the mysterious woods the owls turned home mysterious as the woods strong creatures driven on to the perpetual destruction of the defenseless destroyed in their turn and blown down the wind a few torn feathers end of chapter 30 recording by rachel lintern bristol uk