Saraband for Two Sisters

My parents were uneasy because of his fiery preaching, which they feared might bring trouble to the neighborhood. They believed that every man had a right to his opinions on the manner in which God should be worshiped, but it seemed to them the wise way was to keep one’s thoughts to oneself. Thomas Gast was not like that. He was a man who believed firmly that Thomas Gast was right and everyone who disagreed with him in the slightest detail was wrong. Moreover, he was not content to leave them in their ignorance. He would chastise them with words and if he got the opportunity, as he did with his own family-with a leather strap.

He had ten children-and they and their poor little mother lived in fear lest they incur his wrath by an ill-chosen word or some action which could be construed as sinful.

He was a most uncomfortable man, but as my father said, the best smith he had ever known.

When I took in my mare he looked at me with disapproval, I presumed because I was wearing my riding hat at too jaunty an angle or perhaps my contemplation of revenge had made me appear to cherish a zest for life. However, my appearance displeased him.

I told him what had happened, and gently he examined the horse. He nodded grimly.

“If you could please shoe her right away I’d be glad,” I said. He nodded again, looking at me with his bright black eyes. I could see the whites round his pupils, which made him look as though he were staring like Grandfather Casvellyn, and a little mad. He was a fanatic and when people carry their fanaticism as far as he did perhaps that could be construed as madness. I said, “It’s a beautiful morning, Thomas. It makes you feel good to be alive on such a day.”

I really wasn’t good at all with Bastian’s deceit so recent, but there was in me a grain of mischief and I knew that anyone’s finding pleasure even in God-given nature would fill Thomas Gast with the desire to rant.

“You should be thinking of all the sin in the world,” he growled.

“What sin? The sun is shining. The flowers are blooming. You should see the hollyhocks and sunflowers in the cottage gardens. And the bees are mad with joy over the lavender.”

“You’re a feckless young woman,” said Thomas Cast. “If you don’t see the blackness of sin all around you you’ll be heading for hellnre.”

“Well, Mr. Cast,” I said mischievously, “so many of us are. You seem to be the only one who is without sin. You’ll be very lonely when you get to Heaven. »

“Don’t ‘ee joke about matters as is sacred, Mistress Bersaba,” he said sternly. “You be watched and all your sins be noted. Never forget that. All your jesting mockery will be recorded and one day you’ll answer for it” I thought then of lying in the woods with Bastian and I knew that Thomas Gast would consider this a cardinal sin which could only earn eternal damnation and for a moment I trembled for there was something about Thomas Gast which made one believe, while one was in his company, that there might be something in his doctrines. I watched him, his strong face flushed by the furnace, his gentleness with the horse-the only time he was ever gentle was with horses-and he began to declaim as though he were addressing an audience in the barn. The day of judgment was coming. Then those who now strutted in their finery would be cast into utter despair. The torments of Hell were beyond human imagination. He licked his lips. I think he saw himself as one of God’s executioners-a role, I decided, which would suit him very well.

I grew weary of his diatribe and, interrupting it, I said I would stroll off and return when the horse was shod.

So I left the smithy and looked at the gardens in the little row of cottages. There were six of them-all built of the gray Cornish stone which was a feature of the countryside; they had long gardens in front and a patch behind in which most of them grew vegetables or kept a goat or a pig. But the front gardens were full of flowers with the exception of the blacksmith’s. He grew vegetables in his, and at the back, pigs were kept. I had been inside the cottage once when the latest Gast was born and my mother had sent Angelet and me over with a basket of good things. Everything in the house was plain and for use, not for ornament. The girls of the household-there were four of them-always wore black garments with collars tight at the neck; so did their mother. Their hair was hidden by caps so that it was not easy to tell which was which. Angelet and I were always sorry for the Gast children.

As I came round by the cottages I saw one of the girls in the garden; she was weeding. I had heard that they all had their tasks and if these were not done to their father’s satisfaction they were severely beaten. As I approached I called good morning and the Cast girl straightened up and spoke to me. I looked at her steadily and guessed her to be the eldest girl. She was about seventeen-my age. I noticed how she took in my riding habit, which must have seemed as elegant to her as Carlotta’s did to me.