“KITTY ALONE”
This is a lovely story, written in 1855, about life on the
River Teign,
and in Coombeinteignhead in particular.
Gentle Reader – Please spare a moment to think about what
is happening on our river.
Recently, thoughtless persons have destroyed the beautiful
night-time darkness of the River Teign by installing bright white floodlights
that shine all through the night and even before the dawn.
Other thoughtless persons destroy the quietness of the
river every day by their thoughtless use of petrol chainsaws without silencers.
You are invited to join the campaign to bring back daytime
peace and night-time darkness to our river. These things are precious.
And now we wish you good reading of the story that follows.
A printable copy can be downloaded here
D.W.
________________________
KITTY ALONE
A STORY OF THREE
FIRES
[1855]
BY
S. BARING GOULD
AUTHOR OF
“IN THE ROAR OF THE SEA” “THE QUEEN OF LOVE”
“MEHALAH” “CHEAP JACK ZITA” ETC. ETC.
In Three Volumes
Vol. I
METHUEN & CO.
ESSEX STREET, W.C.
LONDON
v
CONTENTS OF
VOL. I
CHAP.
II. A LUSUS NATURÆ
III. ALL INTO GOLD
VI. A
CAPTURE
VII. A
RELEASE
VIII. AN ATMOSPHERE OF LOVE
IX. CONVALESCENCE
XI. DISCORDS
XII. DAFFODILS
XIII. THE SPIRIT OF INQUIRY
XIV. TO THE FAIR
XVI. THE DANCING BEAR
XVII. INSURED
XVIII. BRAZIL NUTS
CONTENTS OF
VOL. II
CHAP.
XIX. SUGGESTIONS OF EVIL
XXI. AN OFFER
XXII. A RACE FOR LIFE
XXIII. BORROWING
XXIV. SHAVINGS
XXV. BORROWING AGAIN
XXVI. SILVER PENINKS
XXVII. TROUBLE
XXVIII. ALTERNATIVES
XXIX. A FRIEND GAINED
XXXI. ON MISCHIEF BENT
XXXII. JASON IN THE WAY
XXXIII. ONE CRIME LEADS TO ANOTHER
XXXIV. AND YET ANOTHER
XXXV. UNSUCCESSFUL
XXXVI. ALL IN VAIN
CONTENTS OF
VOL. III
CHAP.
XXXVII. THE ANSWER OF CAIN
XXXVIII. WANTED AT LAST
XXXIX. ONE FOR THEE AND TWO FOR ME
XL. A GREAT FEAR
XLI. TAKING SHAPE
XLII. AN UGLY HINT
XLIII. MUCH CRY AND A LITTLE WOOL
XLIV. PUDDICOMBE IN F
XLV. DAYLIGHT
XLVI. A TRIUMPH
XLVII. PARTED
XLVIII. A SHADOW-SHAPE
XLIX. FLAGRANTE DELICTO
LII. IN COURT
LIII. JASON’S STORY
________________________
KITTY ALONE
CHAPTER I
With a voice like that of a crow,
and singing with full lungs also like a crow, came Jason Quarm riding in his
donkey-cart to Coombe Cellars.
Jason Quarm was a short,
stoutly-built man, with a restless grey eye, with shaggy, long, sandy hair that
burst out from beneath a battered beaver hat. He was somewhat lame, wherefore
he maintained a donkey, and drove about the country seated cross-legged in the
bottom of his cart, only removed from the bottom boards by a wisp of straw,
which became dissipated from under him with the joltings of the conveyance.
Then Jason would struggle to his knees, take the reins in his teeth, scramble
backwards in his cart, rake the straw together again into a heap, reseat
himself, and drive on till the exigencies of the case necessitated his going
through the same operations once more.
Coombe Cellars, which Jason Quarm
approached, was a cluster of roofs perched on low walls, occupying a
promontory in the estuary of the Teign, in the south of Devon. A road, or
rather a series of ruts, led direct to Coombe Cellars, cut deep in the warm red
soil; but they led no farther.
Coombe Cellars was a farmhouse, a
depôt of merchandise, an eating-house, a ferry-house, a discharging wharf for
barges laden with coal, a lading-place for straw, and hay, and corn that had to
be carried away on barges to the stables of Teignmouth and Dawlish. Facing the
water was a little terrace or platform, gravelled, on which stood green benches
and a green table.
The sun of summer had blistered
the green paint on the table, and persons having leisure had amused themselves
with picking the skin off these blisters and exposing the white paint
underneath, and then, with pen or pencil, exercising their ingenuity in
converting these bald patches into human faces, or in scribbling over them
their own names and those of the ladies of their heart. Below the platform at
low water the ooze was almost solidified with the vast accumulation of cockle
and winkle shells thrown over the edge, together with bits of broken plates,
fragments of glass, tobacco-pipes, old handleless knives, and sundry other
refuse of a tavern.
Above the platform, against the
wall, was painted in large letters, to be read across the estuary—
PASCO PEPPERILL,
Hot Cockles and Winkles,
Tea and Coffee Always Ready.
Some wag with his penknife had
erased the capital H from “Hot,” and had converted the W in “Winkles” into a V,
with the object of accommodating the written language to the vernacular. One of
the most marvellous of passions seated in the human heart is that hunger after
immortality which, indeed, distinguishes man from beast. This deep-seated and
awful aspiration had evidently consumed the breasts of all the “’ot cockle and
vinkle” eaters on the platform, for there was literally not a spare space of
plaster anywhere within reach which was not scrawled over with names by these
aspirants after immortality.
Jason Quarm was merciful to his
beast. Seeing a last year’s teasel by the wall ten yards from Coombe Cellars’
door, he drew rein, folded his legs and arms, smiled, and said to his ass—
“There, governor, enjoy
yourself.”
The teasel was hard as wood,
besides being absolutely devoid of nutritious juices, which had been withdrawn
six months previously. Neddy would have nothing to say to the teasel.
“You dratted monkey!” shouted
Quarm, irritated at the daintiness of the ass. “If you won’t eat, then go on.”
He knelt up in his cart and whacked him with a stick in one hand and the reins
in the other. “I’ll teach you to be choice. I’ll make you swaller a holly-bush.
And if there ain’t relish enough in that to suit your palate, I’ll buy a job
lot of old Perninsula bayonets and make you munch them. That’ll be chutney, I
reckon, to the likes of you.”
Then, as he threw his lame leg
over the side of the cart, he said, “Steady, old man, and hold your breath
whilst I’m descending.”
No sooner was he on his feet,
than, swelling his breast and stretching his shoulders, with a hand on each
hip, he crowed forth—
“There was a frog lived in a well,
Crock-a-mydaisy, Kitty alone!
There was a frog lived in a well,
And a merry mouse lived in a mill,
Kitty alone and I.”
The door opened, and a man stood
on the step and waved a salutation to Quarm. This man was powerfully built. He
had broad shoulders and a short neck. What little neck he possessed was not
made the most of, for he habitually drew his head back and rested his chin
behind his stock. This same stock or muffler was thick and folded, filling the
space left open by the waistcoat, out of which it protruded. It was of blue
strewn with white spots, and it gave the appearance as though pearls dropped
from the mouth of the wearer and were caught in his muffler before they fell
and were lost. The man had thick sandy eyebrows, and very pale eyes. His
structure was disproportioned. With such a powerful body, stout nether limbs
might have been anticipated for its support. His thighs were, indeed, muscular
and heavy, but the legs were slim, and the feet and ankles small. He had the
habit of standing with his feet together, and thus presented the shape of a
boy’s kite.
“Hallo, Pasco—brother-in-law!”
shouted Quarm, as he threw the harness off the ass; “look here, and see
what I have been a-doing.”
He turned the little cart about,
and exhibited a plate nailed to the backboard, on which, in gold and red on
black, figured, “The Star and Garter Life and Fire Insurance.”
“What!” exclaimed Pepperill;
“insured Neddy and the cart, have you? That I call chucking good money away,
unless you have reasons for thinking Ned will go off in spontaneous
combustion.”
“Not so, Pasco,” laughed Jason;
“it is the agency I have got. The Star and Garter knows that I am the sort of
man they require, that wanders over the land and has the voice of a
nightingale. I shall have a policy taken out for you shortly, Pasco.”
“Indeed you shall not.”
“Confiscate the donkey if I
don’t. But I’ll not trouble you on this score now. How is the little toad?”
“What—Kate?”
“To be sure, Kitty Alone.”
“Come and see. What have you been
about this time, Jason?”
“Bless you! I have hit on
Golconda. Brimpts.”
“Brimpts? What do you mean?”
“Don’t you know Brimpts?”
“Never heard of it. In India?”
“No; at Dart-meet, beyond
Ashburton.”
“And what of Brimpts? Found a
diamond mine there?”
“Not that, but oaks, Pasco, oaks!
A forest two hundred years old, on Dartmoor. A bit of the primæval forest; two
hundred—I bet you—five hundred years old. It is not in the Forest, but on one
of the ancient tenements, and the tenant has fallen into difficulties with the
bank, and the bank is selling him up. Timber, bless you! not a shaky stick
among the lot; all heart, and hard as iron. A fortune—a fortune, Pasco, is to
be picked up at Brimpts. See if I don’t pocket a thousand pounds.”
“You always see your way to
making money, but never get far for’ard along the road that leads to good
fortune.”
“Because I never have had the
opportunity of doing more than see my way. I’m crippled in a leg, and though I
can see the road before me, I cannot get along it without an ass. I’m crippled
in purse, and though I can discern the way to wealth, I can’t take it—once
more—without an ass. Brother-in-law, be my Jack, and help me along.”
Jason slapped Pasco on the broad
shoulders.
“And you make a thousand pounds
by the job?”
“So I reckon—a thousand at the
least. Come, lend me the money to work the concern, and I’ll pay you at ten per
cent.”
“What do you mean by ‘work the
concern’?”
“Pasco, I must go before the bank
at Exeter with money in my hand, and say, I want those wretched scrubs of oak
and holm at Brimpts. Here’s a hundred pounds. It’s worthless, but I happen to
know of a fellow as will put a five pound in my pocket if I get him some knotty
oak for a bit of fancy-work he’s on. The bank will take it, Pasco. At the
bank they will make great eyes, that will say as clear as words, Bless us! we
didn’t know there was oak grew on Dartmoor. They’ll take the money, and
conclude the bargain right on end. And then I must have some ready cash to pay
for felling.”
“Do you think that the bank will
sell?”
“Sell? it would sell anything—the
soil, the flesh off the moors, the bones, the granite underneath, the water of
heaven that there gathers, the air that wafts over it—anything. Of course, it
will sell the Brimpts oaks. But, brother-in-law, let me tell you, this is but
the first stage in a grand speculative march.”
“What next?”
“Let me make my thousand by the
Brimpts oaks, and I see waves of gold before me in which I can roll. I’ll be
generous. Help me to the oaks, and I’ll help you to the gold-waves.”
“How is all this to be brought
about?”
“Out of mud, old boy, mud!”
“Mud will need a lot of turning
to get gold out of it.”
“Ah! wait till I’ve tied up
Neddy.”
Jason Quarm hobbled off with his
ass, and turned it loose in a paddock. Then he returned to his brother-in-law,
hooked his finger into the button-hole of Pepperill, and said, with a wink—
“Did you never hear of the
philosopher’s stone, that converts whatever it touches into gold?”
“I’ve heard some such a tale, but
it is all lies.”
“I’ve got it.”
“Never!” Pasco started, and
turned round and stared at his brother-in-law in sheer amazement.
“I have it. Here it is,” and he
touched his head. “Believe me, Pasco, this is the true philosopher’s stone.
With this I find oaks where the owners believed there grew but furze; with this
I bid these oaks bud forth and bear bank-notes. And with this same
philosopher’s stone I shall transform your Teign estuary mud into golden
sovereigns.”
“Come in.”
“I will; and I’ll tell you how
I’ll do it, if you will help me to the Brimpts oaks. That is step number one.”
CHAPTER II
The two men entered the house
talking, Quarm lurching against his companion in his uneven progress; uneven, partly
because of his lame leg, partly because of his excitement; and when he wished
to urge a point in his argument, he enforced it, not only by raised tone of
voice and cogency of reasoning, but also by impact of his shoulder against that
of Pepperill.
In the room into which they
penetrated sat a girl in the bay window knitting. The window was wide and low,
for the ceiling was low. It had many panes in it of a greenish hue. It
commanded the broad firth of the river Teign. The sun was now on the water, and
the glittering water cast a sheen of golden green into the low room and into
the face of the knitting girl. It illumined the ceiling, revealed all its
cracks, its cobwebs and flies. The brass candlesticks and skillets and copper
coffee-pots on the chimney-piece shone in the light reflected from the ceiling.
The girl was tall, with a
singularly broad white brow, dark hair, and long lashes that swept her cheek.
The face was pale, and when in repose it could not be readily decided
whether she were good-looking or plain, but all hesitation vanished when she
raised her great violet eyes, full of colour and sparkling with the light of
intelligence.
The moment that Quarm entered she
dropped the knitting on which she was engaged; a flash of pleasure, a gleam of
colour, mounted to eyes and cheeks; she half rose with timidity and hesitation,
but as Quarm continued in eager conversation with Pepperill, and did not notice
her, she sank back into her sitting posture, the colour faded from her cheek,
her eyes fell, and a quiver of the lips and contraction of the mouth indicated
distress and pain.
“How is it possible to turn mud
into gold?” asked Pepperill.
“Wait till I have coined my oak
and I will do it.”
“I can understand oaks. The
timber is worth something, and the bark something, and the tops sell for
firewood; but mud—mud is mud.”
“Well, it is mud. Let me light my
pipe. I can’t talk without my ’baccy.”
Jason put a spill to the fire,
seated himself on a stool by the hearth, ignited his pipe, and then, turning
his eye about, caught sight of the girl.
“Hallo, little Toad!” said he;
“how are you?”
Then, without waiting for an
answer, he returned to the mud.
“Look here, Pasco, the mud is
good for nothing where it is.”
“No. It is a nuisance. It chokes
the channel. I had a deal of trouble with the last coal-barge; she sank so deep
I thought she’d be smothered and never got in.”
“That’s just it. You would pay
something to have it cleared—dredged right away.”
“I don’t know about that. The
expense would be great.”
“You need not pay a half-crown.
It isn’t India only whose shining fountains roll down their golden sands. It is
Devonshire as well, which pours the river Teign clear as crystal out of its
Dartmoor reservoir, and which is here ready to empty its treasures into my
pockets and yours. But we must dispose of Brimpts oak first.”
“I’d like to know how you are
going to do anything with mud.”
“What is mud but clay in a state
of slobber? Now, hearken to me, brother-in-law. I have been where the soil is
all clay, clay that would grow nothing but moss and rushes, and was not worth
more than five shillings an acre, fit for nothing but for letting young stock
run on. That is out Holsworthy way. Well, a man with the philosopher’s stone in
his head, Goldsworthy Gurney, he cut a canal from Bude harbour right through
this arrant clay land. With what result? The barges travel up from Bude laden
with sand. The farmers use the sand over their clay fields, and the desert
blossoms as the rose. Land that was worth four shillings went up to two pound
ten, and in places near the canal to five pounds. The sand on the seashore is
worthless. The clay inland is worthless, but the sand and clay married
breed moneys, moneys, my boy—golden moneys.”
“That is reasonable enough,” said
Pasco Pepperill, “but it don’t apply here. We are on the richest of red soil,
that wants no dressing, so full of substance is it in itself. Besides, the mud
is nothing but our red soil in a state of paste.”
“It is better. It is richer, more
nutritious; but you do not see what is to be done with it, because you have not
my head and my eyes. I do not propose to do here what was done at Holsworthy,
but to invert the operation.”
“What do you mean?”
“Not to carry the sand to the
clay, but the mud to the sand. Do you not know Bovey Heathfield? Do you not
know Stover sands? What is there inland but a desert waste of sand-hill and
arid flat that is barren as my hand, bearing nothing but a little scrubby thorn
and thistle and bramble—sand, that’s not worth half a crown an acre? There is
no necessity for us to cut a canal. The canal exists, cut in order that the
Hey-tor granite may be conveyed along it to the sea. It has not occurred to the
fools that the barges that convey the stone down might come up laden with Teign
mud, instead of returning empty. This mud, I tell you, is not merely rich of
itself, but it has a superadded richness from seaweed and broken shells. It is
fat with eels and worms. Let this be conveyed up the canal to the sandy waste
of Heathfield, and the marriage of clay and sand will be as profitable there as
that marriage has been at Holsworthy. I would spread this rich mud over
the hungry sand, thick as cream, and the land will laugh and sing. Do you take
me now, brother-in-law? Do you believe in the philosopher’s stone?”
He touched his head. Pasco
Pepperill had clasped his right knee in his hands. He sat nursing it, musing,
looking into the fire. Presently he said—
“Yes; very fine for the owners of
the sandy land, but how about you and me?”
“We must buy up.”
“But where is the money to come
from?”
“Brimpts oak.”
“What! the profit made on this
venture?”
“Exactly. Every oak stick is a
rung in my ladder. There has been, for hundreds of years, a real forest of
oaks, magnificent trees, timber incomparable for hardness—iron is not harder.
Who knows about it save myself? The Exeter Bank knows nothing of the property
on which it has advanced money. The agent runs over it and takes a hasty
glance. He thinks that the trees he sees all up the slopes are thorn bushes or
twisted stumps worth nothing, and when he passes is too eager to get away from
the moor to stay and observe. I have felt my way. A small offer and money down,
and the whole forest is mine. Then I must fell at once, and it is not, I say,
calculable what we shall make out of that oak. When we have raked our money
together, then we will buy up as much as we can of sandy waste near the canal,
and proceed at once to plaster it over with Teign clay. Pasco, our fortune is
made!”
Jason kept silence for a while,
to allow what he had said to sink into the mind of his brother-in-law.
Then from the adjoining kitchen
came a strongly-built, fair woman, very tidy, with light hair and pale blue
eyes. She had a decided manner in her movements and in the way in which she
spoke. She had been scouring a pan. She held this pan now in one hand. She
strode up to the fireplace between the men and said in a peremptory tone—
“What is this? Speculating again?
I’ll tell you what, Jason, you are bent on ruining us. Here is Pasco as wax in
your hands. We’ve already lost half our land, and that is your doing. I do not
wish to be sold out of house and home because of your rash ventures—you risk
nothing, it is Pasco and I who have to pay.”
“Go to your scouring and
cooking,” said Jason. “Zerah, that is in your line; leave us men to our proper
business.”
“I know what comes of your
brooding,” retorted the woman; “you hatch out naught but disaster. If Pasco
turned a deaf ear, I would not mind all your tales, but more is the pity, he
listens, and listening in his case means yielding, and yielding, in plain
letters, is LOSS.”
Instead of answering his sister,
Jason looked once more in the direction of the girl, seated in the bay-window.
She was absorbed in her thoughts, and seemed not to have been attending to, or
to be affected by, the prospects of wealth that had been unfolded by her
father. When he had addressed her previously, she had answered, but as
he had not attended to her answer, she had relapsed into silence.
She was roused by his strident
voice, as he sang out—
“There was a
frog lived in a well
Crock-a-mydaisy, Kitty alone!
There was a
frog lived in a well,
And a merry
mouse lived in a mill,
Kitty alone
and I.”
Now her pale face turned to him
with something of appeal.
“How is the little worm?” asked
Quarm; “no roses blooming in the cheeks. Wait till I carry you to the moors.
There you shall sit and smell the honeybreath of the furze, and as the heather
covers the hillsides with raspberry-cream, the flush of life will come into
your face. I’m not so sure but that money might be made out of the spicy air of
Dartmoor. Why not condense the scent of the furze-bushes, and advertise it as a
specific in consumption? I won’t say that folks wouldn’t buy. Why not extract
the mountain heather as a cosmetic? It is worth considering. Why not the juice
of whortleberry as a dye for the hair? and pounded bog-peat for a dentifrice?
Pasco, my boy, I have ideas. I say, listen to me. This is the way notions come
flashing up in my brain.”
He had forgotten about his
daughter, so enkindled was his imagination by his new schemes.
Once again, discouraged and
depressed, the girl dropped her eyes on her work.
The sun shining on the flowing
tide filled the bay of the room with rippling light, walls and ceiling
were in a quiver, the glisten was in the glass, it was repeated on the floor,
it quivered over her dress and her pale face, it sparkled and winked in her
knitting-pins. She might have been a mermaid sitting below the water, seen through
the restless, undulatory current.
Mrs. Pepperill growled, and
struck with her fingers the pan she had been cleaning.
“What is a woman among men but a
helpless creature, who cannot prevent the evil she sees coming on? Talk of
woman as the inferior vessel! It is she has the common sense, and not man.”
“It was not you who brought
Coombe Cellars to me, but I brought you to Coombe Cellars,” retorted her
husband. “What is here is mine—the house, the business, the land. You rule in the
kitchen, that is your proper place. I rule where I am lord.”
Pasco spoke with pomposity,
drawing his chin back into his neck.
“When you married me,” said
Zerah, “nothing was to be yours only, all was to be yours and mine. I am your
wife, not your housekeeper. I shall watch and guard well against waste, against
folly. I cannot always save against both, but I can protest—and I will.”
On hearing the loud tones of Mrs.
Pepperill, Kate hastily collected her knitting and ball of worsted and left the
room. She was accustomed to passages of arms between Pasco and his wife, to
loud and angry voices, but they frightened her, and filled her with disgust.
She fled the moment the pitch of the voices was raised and their tones
became harsh.
“Look there!” exclaimed Zerah,
before the girl had left the room. “There is a child for you. Her father
returns, after having been away for a fortnight. She never rises to meet him,
she goes on calmly knitting, does not speak a word of welcome, take the
smallest notice of him. It was very different with my Wilmot; she would fly to
her father—not that he deserved her love; she would dance about him and kiss
him. But she had a heart, and was what a girl should be; as for your Kate,
brother Jason, I don’t know what to make of her.”
“What is the matter with Kitty?”
“She is not like other girls. Did
you not take notice? She was cold and regardless when you arrived, as if you
were a stranger—never even put aside her knitting, never gave you a word.”
Zerah was perhaps glad of an
excuse for not continuing an angry discussion with her husband before her
brother. She was hot; she could now give forth her heat upon the head of the
girl.
“I don’t think I gave her much
chance,” said Jason; “you see, I was talking to Pasco about the oaks.”
“Give her the chance?” retorted
Zerah. “As if my Wilmot would have waited till her father gave her the chance.
It is not for the father to dance after his child, but the child should run to
its father. I’ll tell you what I believe, Jason, and nothing will get me out of
the belief. You know how Jane Simmons’ boy was born without eyelashes; and
how last spring we had a lamb without any tail; and that Bessie Penny hasn’t
got any lobe of ear at all, only a hole in the side of her head; and Ephraim
Tooker has no toe-nails.”
“I know all that.”
“Very well. I believe—and you’ll
never shake it out of me—that child of yours was born without a heart.”
CHAPTER III
Pasco Pepperill was a man slow,
heavy, and apparently phlegmatic, and he was married to a woman full of energy,
and excitable.
Pasco had inherited Coombe
Cellars from his father; he had been looked upon as the greatest catch among
the young men of the neighbourhood. It was expected that he would marry well.
He had married well, but not exactly in the manner anticipated. Coombe Cellars
was a centre of many activities; it was a sort of inn—at all events a place to
which water parties came to picnic; it was a farm and a place of merchandise.
Pasco had chosen as his wife Zerah Quarm, a publican’s daughter, with, indeed,
a small sum of money of her own, but with what was to him of far more
advantage, a clear, organising head. She was a scrupulously tidy woman, a woman
who did everything by system, who had her own interest or that of the house
ever in view, and would never waste a farthing.
Had the threads of the business
been placed in Zerah’s hands, she would have managed all, made money in
every department, and kept the affairs of each to itself in her own
orderly brain.
But Pepperill did not trust her
with the management of his wool, coal, grain, straw and hay business. “Feed the
pigs, keep poultry, attend to the guests, make tea, boil cockles—that’s what
you are here for, Zerah,” said Pepperill; “all the rest is my affair, and with
that you do not meddle.”
The pigs became fat, the poultry
laid eggs, visitors came in quantities; Zerah’s rashers, tea, cockles were
relished and were paid for. Zerah had always a profit to show for her small
outlay and much labour.
She resented that she was not
allowed an insight into her husband’s business; he kept his books to himself,
and she mistrusted his ability to balance his accounts. When she discovered
that he had disposed of the greater portion of his land, then her indignation
was unbounded. It was but too clear that he was going on the high road to ruin,
by undertaking businesses for which he was not naturally competent; that by
having too many irons in the fire he was spoiling all.
Zerah waited, in bitterness of
heart, expecting her husband to explain to her his motives for parting with his
land; he had not even deigned to inform her that he had sold it.
She flew at him, at length, with
all the vehemence of her character, and poured forth a torrent of angry
recrimination. Pasco put his hands into his pockets, looked wonderingly at her
out of his great water-blue eyes, spun round like a teetotum, and left the
house.
Zerah became conscious, as she
cooled, that she had gone too far, that she had used expressions that were irritating
and insulting, and which were unjustifiable. On the other hand, Pasco was
conscious that he had not behaved rightly towards his wife, not only in not
consulting her about the sale, but in not even telling her of it when it was
accomplished.
Neither would confess wrong, but
after this outbreak Zerah became gentle, and Pasco allowed some sort of
self-justification to escape him. He had met with a severe loss, and was
obliged to find ready money. Moreover, the farm and the business could not well
be carried on simultaneously, one detracted from the other. Henceforth his
whole attention would be devoted to commercial transactions.
To some extent the sharpness of
Zerah’s indignation was blunted by the consciousness that her own brother,
Jason, was Pasco’s most trusted adviser; that if he had met with losses, it was
due to the injudicious speculations into which he had been thrust by Jason.
The governing feature of Pasco
was inordinate self-esteem. He believed himself to be intellectually superior
to everyone else in the parish, and affected to despise the farmers, because
they did not mix with the world, had not their fingers on its arteries like the
commercial man. He was proud of his position, proud of his means, and proud of
the respect with which he was treated, and which he demanded of everyone. He
valued his wife’s good qualities, and bragged of them. According to him, his
business was extensive, and conducted with the most brilliant success. For
many years one great object of pride with him had been his only child—a
daughter, Wilmot. As a baby, no child had ever before been born with so much
hair. No infant was ever known to cut its teeth with greater ease. No little
girl was more amiable, more beautiful; the intelligence the child exhibited was
preternatural. When, in course of time, Wilmot grew into a really pretty girl,
with very taking if somewhat forward manners, the exultation of the father knew
no bounds. Nor was her mother, Zerah, less devoted to the child; and for a long
period Wilmot was the bond between husband and wife, the one topic on which
they thought alike, the one object over which they were equally hopeful,
ambitious, and proud. Jason, left a widower with one daughter, Katherine, had
placed the child with his sister. He had a cottage of his own, small, rarely
occupied, as he rambled over the country, looking out for opportunities of
picking up money. He had not married again, he had engaged no housekeeper; his
daughter was an encumbrance, and had, therefore, been sent to Coombe Cellars,
where she was brought up as a companion and foil to Wilmot. Suddenly the
beloved child of the Pepperills died, and the hearts of the parents were
desolate. That of Zerah became bitter and resentful. Pasco veiled his grief
under his phlegm, and made of the funeral a demonstration that might solace his
pride. After that he spoke of the numbers who had attended, of the great
emotion displayed, of the cost of the funeral, of the entertainment given to
the mourners, of the number of black gloves paid for, as something for which he
could be thankful and proud. It really was worth having had a daughter
whose funeral had cost sixty pounds, and at which the church of
Coombe-in-Teignhead had been crammed.
The great link that for fifteen
years had held Zerah and Pasco together was broken. They had never really
become one, though over their child they had almost become so. The loss of the
one object on whom Zerah had set her heart made her more sensitive to
annoyance, more inclined to find fault with her husband. Yet it cannot be said
that they did not strive to be one in heart; each avoided much that was certain
to annoy the other, refrained from doing before the other what was distasteful
to the consort; indeed, each went somewhat out of the way to oblige the other,
but always with a clumsiness and lack of grace which robbed the transaction of
its worth.
Kate had been set back whilst her
cousin lived. Nominally the companion, the playfellow of Wilmot, she had
actually been her slave, her plaything. Whatever Wilmot had done was regarded
as right by her father and mother, and in any difference that took place
between the cousins, Kate was invariably pronounced to have been in the wrong,
and was forced to yield to Wilmot. The child soon found that no remonstrances
of hers were listened to, even when addressed to her father. He had other
matters to occupy him than settling differences between children. It was not
his place to interfere between the niece and her aunt, for, if the aunt refused
to be troubled with her, what could he do with Kate, where dispose her?
Kate had not been long out of the
room before her father and uncle also left, that they might talk at their ease,
without the intervention of Zerah.
Kate had gone with her knitting
to the little stage above the water, and was seated on the wall looking down on
the flowing tide that now filled the estuary. Hither also came the two men, and
seated themselves at the table, without taking any notice of her.
Kate had been studying the water
as it flowed in, covering the mud flats, rising inch by inch over the refuse
mass below the platform, and was now washing the roots of the herbage that
fringed the bank.
So full was her mind, full, as
though in it also the tide had been rising, that, contrary to her wont, she
broke silence when the men appeared, and said, “Father! uncle! what makes the
tide come and go?”
“The tide comes to bring up the
coal-barges, and to carry ’em away with straw,” answered Pasco.
“But, uncle, why does it come and
go?”
Pepperill shrugged his shoulders,
and vouchsafed no further answer.
“Look there,” said Jason,
pointing to an orchard that stretched along the margin of the flood, and which
was dense with daffodils. “Look there, Pasco, there is an opportunity let
slide.”
“I couldn’t help it. I sold that
orchard. I wanted to concentrate—concentrate efforts,” said Pasco.
“I don’t allude to that,” said
Quarm. “But as I’ve been through the lanes this March, looking at the orchards
and meadows a-blazing with Lent lilies, I’ve had a notion come to me.”
“Them darned daffodils are good
for naught.”
“There you are wrong, Pasco.
Nothing is good for naught. What we fellows with heads have to do is to find
how we may make money out of what to stupids is good for naught.”
“They are beastly things. The
cattle won’t touch ’em.”
“But Christians will, and will
pay for them. I know that you can sell daffodils in London or Birmingham or
Bristol, at a penny a piece.”
“That’s right enough, but London,
Birmingham, and Bristol are a long way off.”
“You are right there, and as long
as this blundering atmospheric line runs we can do nothing. But wait a bit,
Pasco, and we shall have steam-power on our South Devon line, and we must be
prepared to seize the occasion. I have been reckoning we could pack two hundred
and fifty daffodils easily without crushing in a maund. Say the cost of picking
be a penny a hundred, and the wear and tear of the hamper another penny, and
the carriage come to ninepence, and the profits to the sellers one and
eleven-pence ha’penny, that makes three shillings; sold at a penny apiece it is
twenty shillings—profit, seventeen and ten; strike off ten for damaged daffies
as won’t sell. How many thousand daffodils do you suppose you could get out of
that orchard and one or two more nests of these flowers? Twenty-five thousand?
A profit of seventeen shillings on two hundred and fifty makes sixty-eight
shillings a thousand. Twenty times that is sixty-eight pounds—all got out
of daffodils—beastly daffies.”
“Of course,” said Pasco, “I was
speaking of them as they are, not as what they might be.”
“Look there,” said Jason,
pointing over the glittering flood, “look at the gulls, tens of hundreds of
’em, and no one gives them a thought.”
“They ain’t fit to eat,” observed
Pasco. “Dirty creeturs.”
“No, they ain’t, and so no one shoots
them. Wait a bit. Trust me. I’ll go up to London and talk it over with a great
milliner or dressmaker, and have a fashion brought in. Waistcoats for ladies in
winter of gulls’ breasts. They will be more beautiful than satin and warmer
than sealskin. It is only for the fashion to be put on wheels and it will run
of itself. There is reason, there is convenience, there is beauty in it. How
many gulls can we kill? I reckon we can sweep the mouth of the Teign clear of
them, and get ten thousand, and if we sell their breasts at five shillings
apiece, that is, twenty-five pounds a hundred, and ten thousand makes just two
thousand five hundred pounds out of gulls—dirty creeturs!”
“Of course, I said that at
present they are no good; not fit to eat. What they may become is another
matter.”
Quarm said nothing for a while.
His restless eye wandered over the landscape, already green, though the month
was March, for the rich red soil under the soft airs from the sea, laden with
moisture, grows grass throughout the year. No frosts parch that herbage whose
brilliance is set forth by contrast with the Indian-red rocks and soil.
The sky was of translucent blue, and in the evening light the inflowing sea,
with the slant rays piercing it, was of emerald hue.
“Dear! dear! dear!” sighed Quarm;
“will the time ever come, think you, old fellow, that we shall be able to make
some use of the sea and sky—capitalise ’em, eh? Squeeze the blue out of the
firmament, and extract the green out of the ocean, and use ’em as patent dyes.
Wouldn’t there be a run on the colours for ladies’ dresses! What’s the good of
all that amount of dye in both where they are? Sheer waste! sheer waste! Now,
if we could turn them into money, there’d be some good in them.”
Jason stood up, stretched his
arms, and straightened, as far as possible, his crippled leg. Then he hobbled
over to the low wall on which his daughter was seated, looking away at the
emerald sea, the banks of green shot with golden daffodil, and overarched with
the intense blue of the sky, clapped her on the back, and when with a start she
turned—
“Hallo, Kate! What, tears! why
crying?”
“Oh, father! I hate money.”
“Money! what else is worth living
for?”
“Oh, father, will you mow down
the daffodils, and shoot down the gulls, and take everything beautiful out of
sea and sky? I hate money—you will spoil everything for that.”
“You little fool, Kitty Alone.
Not love money? Alone in that among all men and women. A fool in that as in all
else, Kitty Alone.”
Then up came Zerah in excitement,
and said in loud, harsh tones, “Who is to go after Jan Pooke? Where is Gale?
The train is due in ten minutes.”
“I have sent Roger Gale after
some hides,” said Pasco.
“We have undertaken to ferry Jan
Pooke across, and he arrives by the train just due. Who is to go?”
“Not I,” said Pepperill. “I’m
busy, Zerah, engaged on commercial matters with Quarm. Besides, I’m too big a
man, of too much consequence to ferry a fare. I keep a boat, but am not a
boatman.”
“Then Kate must go for him. Kate,
look smart; ferry across at once, and wait at the hard till Jan Pooke arrives
by the .. He has been to Exeter, and I promised that the boat should meet him
on his return at the Bishop’s Teignton landing.”
The girl rose without a word.
“She is not quite up to that?”
said her father, with question in his tone.
“Bless you, she’s done it scores
of times. We don’t keep her here to eat, and dress, and be idle.”
“But suppose—and the wind is
bitter cold.”
“Some one must go,” said Zerah. “Look sharp, Kate.”
“Alone?”
“Of course. The man is away. She
can row. Kitty must go alone.”
CHAPTER IV
The engineer Brunel was fond of
daring and magnificent schemes, carried out at other people’s expense. One of
these schemes was the construction of the South Devon Railway, running from
Exeter to Plymouth, for some portion of its way along the coast, breasting the
sea, exposed to the foam of the breaking tide, and worked by atmospheric
pressure. Brunel was an admirer of Prout’s delightful sketches—Prout, the man
who taught the eye of the nineteenth century to observe the picturesque.
Brunel, having other folks’ money to play with, thought himself justified in
providing therewith subjects for sepia and Chinese white studies in the future.
Taking as his model Italian churches, with their campaniles, he placed
engine-houses for the atmospheric pressure at every station, designed on these
models. That they were picturesque no one could deny, that they were vastly
costly the shareholders were well aware.
For a while the atmospheric
railway was worked from these Italian churches, the campaniles of which
contained the exhausting pumps. Then the whole scheme collapsed, when the
pumps had completely exhausted the shareholders’ pockets.
The system was ingenious, but it
should have been tried on a small scale before operations were carried on upon
one that was large, and in a manner that was lavish.
The system was this. A tube was
laid between the rails, and the carriages ran connected with a piston in the
tube. The air was pumped out before the piston, and the pressure of the
atmosphere behind was expected to propel piston and carriages attached to it.
The principle was that upon which we imbibe sherry-cobbler.
But there was a difficulty, and
that was insurmountable. Had the carriages been within the tube they would have
swung along readily enough. But they were without and yet connected with the
piston within; and it was precisely over this connection that the system broke
down. A complex and ingenious scheme was adopted for making the tubes air-tight
in spite of the long slit through which slid the coulter that connected the
carriages with the piston. The train carried with it a sort of hot flat-iron
which it passed over the leather flap bedded in tallow that closed the slit.
But the device was too intricate
and too open to disturbance by accident to be successful. Trains ran
spasmodically. The coulter, raising the flap, let the air rush into the
artificially formed vacuum before it, and so act as a break on the propelling
force of the air behind. The flap became displaced. The tallow under a hot
sun melted away. The trains when they started were attended on their
course by a fizzing noise as of a rocket about to explode, very trying to the
nerves. They had a habit of sulking and stopping in the midst of tunnels, or of
refusing to start from stations when expected to start. By no means
infrequently they arrived at their destination propelled by panting passengers,
and the only exhaustion of atmosphere of which anything could be spoken, was
that of the lungs of those who had paid for their tickets to be carried along
the line, not to shove along the carriages with their shoulders.
At the time when our story opens,
this unfortunate venture, so ruinous to many speculators, was in process of
demonstrating how unworthy it was of the Italian churches and campaniles that
had been erected for its use.
After a while steam locomotives
were brought to the stations and held in readiness to fly to the aid of
broken-down atmospheric trains. A little later, and the atmospheric engines and
tubes were broken up and sold for old iron, and the ecclesiastical edifices
that had contained the pumps were let to whoever would rent them, as cider
stores or depôts of guano and dissolved bone.
John Pooke, only son of the
wealthiest yeoman in the parish of Coombe-in-Teignhead, had been put across the
estuary that morning so that he might go by train to Exeter, to be fitted for a
suit and suitably hatted for the approaching marriage of his sister. In two or
three parishes beside the Teign the old yeoman has held his own from before
Tudor days. From century to century the land has passed from father to
son. These yeomen families have never extended their estates, and have been
careful not to diminish them. The younger sons and the daughters have gone into
trade or into service, and have looked with as much pride to the ancestral
farms as can any noble family to its baronial hall. These yeomen are without
pretence, do not affect to be what they are not, knowing what they are, and
content, and more than content, therewith. There are occasions in which they do
make some display, and these are funerals and weddings.
It was considered at the family
gathering of the Pooke clan that, at the approaching solemnity of the marriage
of the daughter of the house, no village tailor, nay, not even one of the town
of Teignmouth, could do justice to the occasion, and that it would be advisable
for the son and heir to seek the superior skill of an Exeter tradesman to invest
his body in well-fitting and fashionable garments, and an Exeter hatter to
provide him with a hat as worn by the leaders of fashion.
John Pooke had been ferried over
in the morning, and had requested that the boat might be in waiting for him on
his return in the evening by the last train.
Kate had often been sent across
on previous occasions. She could handle an oar. The tide was still flowing, and
there was absolutely no danger to be anticipated. At no time was there risk,
though there might be inconvenience, and the latter only when the tide was
ebbing and the mud-banks were becoming exposed. To be stranded on one of these
would entail a tedious waiting in mid-river till return of tide, and with
the flow the refloating of the ferry-boat.
Kate rowed leisurely across the
mouth of the Teign. The evening was closing in. The sun had set behind the
green hills to the west; a cold wind blew down the river, sometimes whistling,
sometimes with a sob in its breath, and as it swept the tide it crisped it into
wavelets.
Now that the sunlight was no
longer on or in the water, the latter had lost its exquisite greenness, and had
assumed a sombre tint. The time of the year was March; no buds had burst on the
trees. The larch plantations were hesitating, putting forth, indeed, their
little blood-purple “strawberry baskets”—their marvellous flower, and ready at
the first warm shower to flush into emerald green. The limes, the elms, were
red at every spray with rising sap. The meadows, however, were of an intense
brilliancy of verdure.
At the mouth of the Teign rose
the Ness, a very Bardolph’s nose for rubicundity, and the inflowing tide was
warm in colour in places where it flowed over a loosely compacted bank of sand
or mud. Thus the river was as a piece of shot silk of two tinctures.
Kate was uncertain whether the
train had passed or not. The atmospheric railway had none of the bluster of the
steam locomotive. No puffs of vapour like white cotton wool rose in the air to
forewarn of a coming train, or, after one had passed, to lie along the course
and tell for five minutes that the train had gone by. It uttered no whistle,
its breaks produced no jar. Its lungs did not pant and roar. It slid along
almost without a sound.
Consequently, Kate, knowing that
the ferry-boat had been despatched late, almost expected to find John Pooke
stamping and growling on the hard. When, however, she ran the boat aground at
the landing-place, she saw that no one was there in expectation.
The girl fastened the little
vessel to a ring and went up the river bank in quest of someone who could
inform her about the train.
She speedily encountered a
labourer with boots red in dust. He, however, could say nothing relative to the
down train. After leaving work—“tilling ’taters”—he had been into the public-house
at Bishop’s Teignton for his half-pint of ale, to wash the red dust down the
redder lane; the train might have gone by while he was refreshing himself; but
there was also a probability that it had not. Continuing her inquiries, Kate
met a woman who assured her that the train had passed. She had seen it, whilst
hanging out some clothes; she had been near enough to distinguish the
passengers in the carriages.
Whilst this woman was
communicating information, another came up who was equally positive in her
asseverations that the train had not gone by. She had been looking out for it,
so as to set her clock by it. A lively altercation ensued between the women,
which developed into personalities; their voices rose in pitch and in volume of
tone. A third came up and intervened. A train had indeed passed, but it was an
up and not a down train. Thus the first woman was right—she had seen the train
and observed the passengers; and the second was right—the down train by
which she had set her clock had not gone by. Far from being satisfied at this
solution of the difficulty, both women who had been in controversy turned in
combined attack upon the third woman who would have reconciled them. What right
had she to interfere? who had asked for her opinion? Everyone knew about
her—and then ensued personalities. The third woman, hard pressed, covered with
abuse, sought escape by turning upon Kate and rating her for having asked
impertinent questions. The other two at once joined in, and Kate was driven to
fly the combined torrent of abuse and take refuge in her boat. There she could
sit and wait the arrival of the fare, and be undisturbed save by her own uneasy
thoughts. The wind was rising. It puffed down the river, then held its breath,
filled its bellows and puffed more fiercely, more ominously. The evening sky
was clouding over, but the clouds were chopped, and threatened a stormy night.
Kate had brought her shawl, and
she now wrapped it about her, as she sat waiting in the boat. When the glow
passed away, caused by her exertion in rowing and her run from the exasperated
women, it left her cold and shivering.
The tide was beyond the full, and
was beginning to ebb. This was vexatious. Unless John Pooke arrived speedily,
there would be difficulty in traversing the Teign, for the water would warp out
rapidly with the wind driving it seawards.
She must exercise patience and
wait a little longer. What should she do if the young man did not arrive
before the lapse of half an hour? this was a contingency for which she
must be prepared. Her aunt Zerah had bidden her remain till Pooke appeared. But
if he did not appear before the tide was out, then she would be unable to cross
that evening. It would be eminently unsatisfactory to be benighted, and to have
to seek shelter on the Bishop’s Teignton side. She had no friends there, and to
be rambling about with Pooke in quest of some place where both might be
accommodated was what she could not think of. To await the turn of the tide in
her boat was a prospect only slightly less agreeable. The wind was from the
east, it cut like a knife. She was ill provided for exposure to it in the
night. The sun had set and the light was ebbing out of the sky as fast as the
water was draining out of the estuary. There was no moon. There would be little
starlight, for the clouds as they advanced became compacted into a leaden
canopy that obscured the constellations.
Kate looked across the water to
Coombe Cellars. Already a light had been kindled there, and from the window it
formed a glittering line on the running tide.
She gazed wistfully down the
river. All was dark there. She could hear the murmur of the sea behind the Den,
a bar of shingle and sand that more than half closed the mouth of the river.
Kate leaned over the side of the
boat. The water gulped and curled away; in a quarter of an hour it would be
gone. She thrust her boat farther out, as already it was being left high and
dry.
She would allow Pooke five
minutes longer, ten minutes at the outside; yet she had no watch by which to
measure the time. She shrank from being benighted on that side of the river.
She shrank from the alternative of a scolding from her aunt should she come
across without Pooke.
What if John Pooke were to arrive
at the landing-place one minute after she had departed? What if she waited for
John Pooke one minute over the moment at which it was possible to cross? Whilst
thus tossed in doubt, the train glided by. There were lights in the carriages,
a strong light in the driving carriage cast forward along the rails. The train
did not travel fast—at a rate not above thirty miles an hour.
Kate heaved a sigh. “At last!
Pooke will be here directly. Oh dear! I hope not too late.”
The atmospheric train slipped away
into darkness with very little noise, and then the only sound Kate heard was
that of the lapping of the water against the sides of the boat, like that
produced by a dog drinking.
CHAPTER V
“Halloa! Ferry, ho!”
“Here you are, sir.”
“Who is that singing out?”
“It is I—Kate Quarm.”
“What—Kitty Alone? Is that what
is to be? Over the water together—Kitty Alone and I?”
On the strand, in the gloom,
stood a sturdy figure encumbered with a hat-box and a large parcel, so that
both hands were engaged.
“Are you John Pooke?”
“To be sure I am.”
In another moment the young
fellow was beside the boat.
“Here, Kitty Alone! Lend a hand.
I’m crippled with these precious parcels. This blessed box-hat has given me
trouble. The string came undone, and down it went. I have to carry the concern
tucked under my arm; and the parcel’s bursting. It’s my new suit dying to show
itself, and so is getting out of this brown-paper envelope as fast as it may.”
“We are very late,” said Kate
anxiously. “The tide is running out hard, and it is a chance if we get over.”
“Right, Kitty. I’ll settle the
hat-box and the new suit—brass buttons—what d’ye think of that? And straps to
my trousers. I shall be fine—a blazer, Kitty—a blazer!”
“Do sit down, John; it is but a
chance if we get across. You are so late.”
“The Atmospheric did it, for
one—my hat for the other, tumbling in the darkness out of the box, and in the
tunnel too. Fancy if the train had gone over it! I’d have wept tears of blood.”
“Do, John Pooke, do sit down and
take an oar.”
“I’ll sit down in a minute, when
I’ve put my box-hat where I nor you can kick it about, and the new suit where
the water can’t stain it.”
“John, you must take an oar.”
“Right I am. We’ll make her
fly—pist!—faster than the blessed Atmospheric, and no sticking half-way.”
“I’m not so sure of that.”
Kate thrust off. She had altered
the pegs, and now she gave John an oar.
“Pull for dear life!” she said;
“not a moment is to be lost.”
“Yoicks away!” shouted Pooke. “So
we swim—Kitty Alone and I.”
Kate, more easy now that the boat
was started, said, “You asked me my name. I said Kate Quarm.”
“Well, but everyone knows you as
Kitty Alone.”
“And every one knows you as Jan
Tottle, but I shouldn’t have the face to so call you; and I don’t see why you
should give me any name than what properly belongs to me.”
“Your father always so calls
you.”
“You are not my father, and have
no right to take liberties. My father may call me what he pleases, because he
is my father. He is my father—you my penny fare.”
“And the penny fare has no
rights?”
“He has right to be ferried over,
not to be impudent.”
Pooke whistled through his teeth.
The girl laboured hard at the
oar; Pooke worked more easily. He had not realised at first how uncertain was
the passage. The tide went swirling down to the sea with the wind behind it,
driving it as a besom.
“I say, Kate Quarm—no, Miss
Catherine Quarm. Hang it! how stiff and grand we be! Do you know why I have
been to Exeter?”
“I do not, Jan.”
“There, you called me Jan. You’ll
be ’titling me Tottle, next. That gives me a right to call you Kitty.”
“Once, but no more; and Kitty
only.”
“I’ve been to Exeter to be rigged
out for sister Sue’s weddin’. My word! it has cost four guineas to make a
gentleman of me.”
“Can they do that for four guineas?”
“Now don’t sneer. Listen. They’d
took my measure afore, and they put me in my new suit, brass buttons and
everything complete, and a new tie and collars standing to my ears—and a
box-hat curling at the sides like the waves of the ocean—and then they told me
to walk this way, please sir! So I walked, and what should I see but a
gentleman stately as a dook coming towards me, and I took off my hat and said,
Your servant, sir! and would have stepped aside. Will you believe me, Kate! it
was just myself in a great cheval glass, as they call it. You’ll be at the
wedding, won’t you?—if only to see me in my new suit. I do believe you’ll fall
down and worship me, and I shall smile down at you and say, Holloa! is that my
good friend Kitty Alone? And you’ll say, Your very humble servant, sir!”
“That I shall never do, Mr.
Pennyfare,” laughed Kate, and then, becoming grave, immediately said, “Do pull
instead of talking nonsense. We are drifting; look over your shoulder.”
“So we are. There is Coombe
Cellars light, right away up stream.”
“The wind and stream are against
us. Pull hard.”
Jan Pooke now recognised that he
must use his best exertions.
“Hang it!” said he, watching the
light; “I don’t want to be carried out to sea.”
“Nor do I. That would be a dear
penn’orth.”
Pooke pulled vigorously; looked
over his shoulder again and said, “Kate, give up your place to me. I’m worth
more than you and me together with one oar apiece.”
She moved the rowlock pins, and
Jan took her place with two oars; but the time occupied in effecting
the change entailed loss of way, and the boat swept fast down the estuary.
“This is more than a joke,” said
Pooke; “we are down opposite Shaldon. I can see the Teignmouth lights. We shall
never get across like this.”
“We must.”
“The tide tears between the end
of the Den and the farther shore like a mill-race.”
“We must cross or run aground.”
“Kate, can you see the breakers
over the bar?”
“No, but I can hear them. They
are nothing now, as wind and tide are running off shore. When the tide turns
then there will be a roar.”
“I believe we are being carried
out. Thunder! I’m not going to be swept into Kingdom Come without having put on
box-hat and new suit, and cut a figure here.”
The wind poured down the trough
of the Teign valley with such force, that in one blast it seemed to catch the
boat and drive it, as it might take up a leaf and send it flying over the
surface of a hard road.
The waves were dancing, foaming,
uttering their voices about the rocks of the Ness, mumbling and muttering on
the bar. If the boat in the darkness were to get into the throat of the
current, it would be sucked and carried into the turbulent sea; it might,
however, get on the bar and be buffeted and broken by the waves.
“Take an oar,” said Pooke; “we
must bring her head round. If we can run behind the Den, we shall be in still
water.”
“Or mud,” said Kate, seating
herself to pull. “Anything but to be carried out to sea.”
The two young people struggled
desperately. They were straining against wind and tide, heading about to get
into shallow water, and out of the tearing current.
After a while Kate gasped, “I’m
finished!”
Her hair was blown round her head
in the gale; with the rapidity of her pulsation, lights flashed before her eyes
and waves roared in her ears.
“Don’t give up. Pull away!”
Mechanically she obeyed. In
another minute the strain was less, and then—the boat was aground.
“If this be the Den, all right,”
said Pooke. “We can get ashore and walk to Teignmouth.” He felt with the oar,
standing up in the boat. It sank in mud. “Here’s a pretty pass,” said he. “I
thought it bad enough to be stuck in the tunnel when the Atmospheric broke
down, but it is worse to be fast in the mud. From the tunnel we could extricate
ourselves at once, but here—in this mud, we are fast till flow of tide.
Kitty,—I mean Kate,—make up your mind to accept my company for some hours. I
can’t help you out, and I can’t get out myself. What is more, no one on shore,
even if we could call to them, would be able to assist us. Till the tide turns,
we are held as tight as rats in a gin.”
“I wonder,” said the girl,
recovering her breath, “what makes the tides ebb and flow.”
“I don’t know, and I don’t care,”
said John Pooke; “it is enough for me that they have lodged us here on a
mud bank in a March night with an icy east wind blowing. By George! I’ve a
mind to have out a summons against the Atmospheric Company.”
“Why so?”
“For putting us in this blessed
fix. The train came to a standstill in the tunnel by the Parson and Clerk rock,
between Dawlish and Teignmouth. We had to tumble out of the carriages and shove
her along into daylight. That is how my band-box got loose; as I got out of the
carriage the string gave way and down went the box in the tunnel, and opened,
and the hat came out. There was an east wind blowing like the blast of a
blacksmith’s bellows through the tunnel, and it caught my new hat and carried
it along, as if it were the atmospheric train it had to propel. I had to run
after it and catch it, all in the half-dark, and all the while the guard and
passengers were yelling at me to help and shove along the train; but I wasn’t
going to do that till I had recovered my hat. I must think of sister Sue’s
wedding, and the figure I shall cut there, before I consider how to get the
train out of a tunnel.”
In spite of discomfort and cold,
Kate was constrained to laugh.
“If you or I am the worse for
this night in the cold, and if my box-hat has had the nap scratched off, and my
new suit gets stained with sea-water, I’ll summons the company, I will. What
have you got to keep you warm, Kate?”
“A shawl.”
“Let me feel it.”
Pooke groped in the dark and
caught hold of what the girl had cast over her head and shoulders.
“It’s thin enough for a June
evening,” said he. “It may keep off dews, but it will not keep out frost.
Please goodness, we shall have neither hail nor rain; that would be putting an
edge on to our misery.”
Both lapsed into silence. The
prospect was cheerless. After about five minutes Kate said, “I wonder why there
are twelve hours and a half between tides, and not twelve hours.”
“I am sure I cannot tell,”
answered Pooke listlessly; he had his head in his hand.
“You see,” remarked Kate, “if the
tides were twelve hours exactly apart, there would always be flow at the same
hour.”
“I suppose so.” Pooke spoke
languidly, as if going to sleep.
“But that extra half-hour, or
something like it, throws them out and makes them shift. Why is it?”
“How can I say? Accident.”
“It cannot be accident, for
people can calculate and put in the almanacks when the tides are to be.”
“I suppose so.”
“And then—why are some tides much
bigger than others? We are having high tides now.”
Pooke half rose, seated himself
again, and said in a tone of desperation, “Look here, Kitty! I ain’t going to
be catechised. Rather than that, I’ll jump into the mud and smother. It is bad
enough having to sit here in the wind half the night, without having one’s
head split with thinking to answer questions. If we are to talk, let it be
about something sensible. Shall you be at sister Sue’s wedding?”
“I do not know. That depends on
whether aunt will let me go.”
“I want you to see and worship me
in my new suit.”
“I may see—I shan’t worship you.”
“I almost bowed down to myself in
the cheval glass, I looked so tremendous fine; and if I did that—what will you
do?”
“Many a man worships himself whom
others don’t think much of.”
“There you are at me again.
Fancy—Kate—ducks”—
“And green peas?”
“No—bottle-green. Ducks is what I
am going to wear, with straps under my boots—lily-white, and a yellow nankeen
waistcoat, and a bottle-green coat with brass buttons,—all here in this
parcel,—and the hat. My honour! I never was so fine before. Four guineas—with
the hat.”
“Do you call this ‘talking
sensible’?” asked Kate.
Again they subsided into silence.
It was hard, in the piercing wind, in the darkness, to keep up an interest in
any topic.
The cold cut like a razor. The
wind moaned over the bulwarks of the ferry-boat. The mud exhaled a dead and
unpleasant odour. Gulls fluttered near and screamed. The clouds overhead
parted, and for a while exposed tracts of sky, thick strewn with stars that
glittered frostily.
Presently the young man said,
“Hang it! you will catch cold. Lie in the bottom of the boat, and I will throw
my coat over you.”
“But you will yourself be
chilled.”
“I—I am tough as nails. But stay.
I know something better. I have my new bottle-green coat, splendid as the day.
You shall have that over you.”
“But it may become crumpled.”
“Sister Sue shall iron it again.”
“Or stained.”
“You shan’t die of cold just to
save my bottle-green. Lie down. I wish the hat could be made to serve some
purpose. There’s no water in the boat?”
“None.”
“And I am glad. It would have
gone to my heart like a knife to have had to bale it out with my box-hat.”
Kate was now very chilled. After
the exertion, and the consequent heat in which she had been, the reaction had
set in, and the blood curdled in her veins. The wind pierced the thin shawl as
though it were a cobweb. Pooke folded up his garments to make a pillow for her
head, insisted on her lying down, so that the side of the boat might in some
measure screen her from the wind, and then he spread his new coat over her.
“There, Kitty. Hang it! we are
comrades in ill-luck; so there is a brotherhood of misery between us. Let me
call you Kitty, and let me be Jan to you—Tottle if you will.”
“Only when you begin to boast
about your new suit”—
“There, Kitty, don’t be hard on
me. I must think of something to keep me warm, and what else so warming as the
thoughts of the ducks, and nankeen, and bottle-green, and the box-hat. I don’t
believe anything else could make me keep up my spirits. Go to sleep, and when I
feel the boat lift, I will sing out.”
Kate was touched by the kindness
of the soft-headed lad. As she lay in the bottom of the boat without speaking,
and he thought she was dozing, he put down his hand and touched the clothes
about her. He wished to assure himself that she was well covered.
Kate was not asleep; she was
thinking. She had not met with much consideration in the short span of her
life. Lying in the boat with her eyes fixed on the stars, her restless mind was
working.
Presently, moved by an
uncontrollable impulse, she asked, “John, why do some of the stars twinkle and
others do not?”
“How should I know? I suppose
they were out on a spree when they ought to ha’ been in bed, and now can’t keep
their eyes from winking.”
“Some, however, burn quite
steadily.”
“Them’s the good stars, that keep
regular hours, and go to bed when they ought. Your eyes’ll be winking no end
to-morrow.”
“John, what becomes of the stars
by day?”
“Kitty—Kate, don’t ask any more
questions, or I shall jump overboard. I can’t bear it; I can’t indeed. It makes
my head ache.”
CHAPTER VI
Kate Quarm had never felt a
mother’s love. She could not recall her mother, who had died when she was an
infant. Her father, encumbered with a motherless babe, had handed the child
over to his sister Zerah, a hard woman, who resented the infliction upon her in
addition to the cares and solicitudes of her house. From her aunt Kate received
no love. Her uncle paid to her no attention, save when he was provoked to
rebuke by some noise made in childish play, or some damage done in childish
levity.
Thus Kate had grown up to the
verge of womanhood with all her affections buried in her bosom. That dark heart
was like a cellar stored with flower bulbs and roots. They are not dead, they
send forth bleached and sickly shoots without vigour and incapable of bloom.
Hers was a tender, craving nature, one that hungered for love; and as she
received none, wherever she turned, to whomsoever she looked, she had become
self-contained, reserved, and silent. Her aunt thought her sullen and
obstinate.
As already related, Mrs.
Pepperill had not been always childless. She had possessed a daughter,
Wilmot, who had been the joy and pride of her heart. Wilmot had been a bright,
merry girl, with fair hair and forget-me-not blue eyes, and cheeks in which the
lily was commingled with the rose. Wilmot was a born coax and coquette; she
cajoled her mother to give her what she desired, and she flattered her father
into humouring her caprices.
Naturally, the reserved, pale
Kate was thrown into shadow by the forward, glowing Wilmot; and the parents
daily contrasted their own child with that of the brother, and always to the
disadvantage of the latter.
Wilmot had a mischievous spirit,
and delighted in teasing and tyrannising over her cousin. Malevolent she was
not, but inconsiderate; she was spoiled, and, as a spoiled child, capricious
and domineering. She liked—in her fashion, loved—Kate, as she liked and loved a
plaything, that she might trifle with and knock about; not as a playfellow, to
be considered and conciliated. Association with Wilmot hardly in any degree
brightened the existence of Kate; it rather served to cloud it. Petty wrongs,
continuous setting back, repeated slights, wounded and crushed a naturally
expansive and susceptible nature. Kate hardly ventured to appeal to her father
or to her aunt against her cousin, even when that cousin’s treatment was most
unjust and insupportable; the aunt naturally sided with her own child, and the
father heedlessly laughed at Kate’s troubles as undeserving of consideration.
Then, suddenly, Wilmot was attacked
by fever, which carried her off in three days. The mother was
inconsolable. The light went out of her life with the extinction of the
vital spark in the bosom of her child.
The death of Wilmot was of no
advantage to Kate. She was no longer, indeed, given over to the petty tyranny
of her cousin, but she was left exposed to a hardened and embittered aunt, who
resented on her the loss of her own child. Into the void heart of Zerah, Kate
had no chance of finding access; that void was filled with discontent,
verjuice, and acrimony. An unreasonable anger against the child who was not
wanted and yet remained, in place of the child who was the apple of her eye,
and was taken from her, made itself felt in a thousand ways.
Without being absolutely unkind
to her, Zerah was ungracious. She held Kate at arm’s length, spoke to her in
harsh and peremptory tones, looked at her with contracted pupils and with
puckered brow. Filled with resentment against Providence, she made the child
feel her disappointment and antagonism. The reserve, the lack of
light-heartedness in the child told against her, and Zerah little considered
that this temperament was produced by her own ungenerous treatment.
At the time of this story, Kate
was of real service in the house. The Pepperills kept no domestic servant; they
required none, having Kate, who was made to do whatever was necessary. Her aunt
was an energetic and industrious woman, and Kate served under her direction.
She assisted in the household washing, in the work of the garden, in the
feeding of the poultry, in the kitchen, in all household work; and when folk
came to eat cockles and drink tea, Kate was employed as waitress. For all
this she got no wage, no thanks, no forbearance, no kind looks, certainly no
kind words.
The girl’s heart was sealed up,
unread, misunderstood by those with whom she was brought into contact. She had
made no friends at school, had no comrades in the village; and her father
inconsiderately accepted and applied to her a nickname given her at school by her
teacher, a certain Mr. Solomon Puddicombe,—a nickname derived from the burden
of a foolish folk-song, “Kitty Alone.”
Now the girl lay in the bottom of
the boat, under Pooke’s Exeter tailor-made clothes, shivering. What would her
father think of her absence? Would he be anxious, and waiting up for her? Would
Aunt Zerah be angry, and give her hard words?
Her eyes peered eagerly at the
stars—into that great mystery above.
“They are turning,” she said.
“What are turning?” asked Pooke.
“Ain’t you asleep, as you ought to be?”
“When I was waiting for you at
the Hard, I saw them beginning to twinkle.”
“What did you see?”
“Yonder, those stars. There are
four making a sort of a box, and then three more in a curve.”
“That is the Plough.”
“Well, it is something like a
plough. It is turning about in the sky. When I was waiting for the
Atmospheric, I saw it in one way, and now it is all turned about
different.”
“I daresay it is.”
“But why does it turn about?”
“When I’ve ploughed to one end of
a field, I turn the plough so as to run back.”
“But this isn’t a real plough.”
“I know nothing about it,” said
Pooke desperately; “and, what is more, I won’t stand questioning. This is a
ferry-boat, not a National School, and you are Kitty Quarm, not Mr. Puddicombe.
I haven’t anything more of learning to go through the rest of my days, thankful
to say.”
The night crept along, slow,
chilly as a slug; the time seemed interminable. Benumbed by cold, Kate finally
dozed without knowing that she was slipping out of consciousness. Sleep she did
not—she was in a condition of uneasy terror, shivering with cold, cramped by
her position, bruised by the ribs of the boat, with the smell of mud and new
cloth in her nose, and with occasionally a brass button touching her cheek, and
with its cold stabbing as with a needle. The wind, curling and whistling in the
boat as it came over the side, bored into the marrow of the bones, the muscles
became hard, the flesh turned to wax.
Kate discovered that she had been
unconscious only by the confusion of her intellect when Pooke roused her by a
touch, and told her that the boat was afloat. She staggered to her knees,
brushed the scattered hair out of her dazed eyes, rose to her feet, and seated
herself on the bench. Her wits were as though curdled in her brains. They
would not move. Every limb was stiff, every nerve ached. Her teeth chattered;
she felt sick and faint. Sleepily she looked around.
No lights were twinkling from the
windows on the banks. In every house candles had long ago been extinguished.
All the world slept.
The clouds overhead had been
brushed away, and the lights of heaven looked down and were reflected in the
water. The boat was as it were floating between two heavens besprent with
stars, the one above, the other below, and across each was drawn the silvery
nebulous Milky Way. The constellation of the Great Bear—the Plough, as Pooke
called it—was greatly changed in position since Kate had commented on it.
Cassiopēa’s silver chair was planted in the great curve of the Milky Way.
To the south the hazy tangle of Berenice’s Hair was faintly reflected in the
inflowing tide.
Although the boat was lifted from
the bank, yet it was by no means certain that Coombe Cellars could be reached
for at least another half-hour. The tide, that had raced out, seemed to return
at a crawl. Nevertheless, it was expedient to restore circulation by the
exercise of the arms. Kate assumed one oar, John the other, and began to row;
she at first with difficulty, then with ease, as warmth returned and her blood
resumed its flow. The swelling tide carried the boat up with it, and the oars
were leisurely dipped, breaking the diamonds in the water into a thousand
brilliants.
As they approached the reach
where lay Coombe-in-Teignhead, John Pooke said: “There is a light burning
in your house. They are all up, anxious, watching for you, and in trouble. On
my word, will not my father be in a condition of fright and distress concerning
me if he hears that I am out? I went off without saying anything to anybody. I
intended to be back all right in the evening by the Atmospheric. But there’s no
telling, father may have been asking after me. Then, as I didn’t turn up at
supper, he may have sent about making inquiries, and have heard at the Cellars
that I’d gone over the water, and given command to be met by the last train.
Then they will be in a bad state of mind, father and sister Sue. Hulloa! what
is that light? It comes from our place.”
John Pooke rested on his oar, and
turned.
From behind an orchard a glow, as
of fire, was shining. It had broken forth suddenly. The light streamed between
the trees, sending fiery arrows shooting over the water, it rose in a halo
above the tops of the trees.
“Kate! whatever can it be? That
is our orchard. There is our rick-yard behind. It never can be that our ricks
are afire, or our house! The house is just beyond. The blaze is at our
place—pull hard!”
“It’s a chance if there is water
enough to carry us ashore.”
Then, from above the belt of orchard
broke lambent flame, and cast up tufts of ignited matter into the air, to be
caught and carried away by the strong wind. Now there lay a fiery path between
the ferry-boat and the shore. Pooke seated himself. He was greatly agitated.
“Kate, it is our rick-yard. That
chap, Roger, has done it.”
The words had hardly escaped him
before a boat shot past, and his oar clashed with that of the rower in that
boat. As it passed, John saw the face of the man who was rowing, kindled by the
orange blaze from the shore. The recognition was instantaneous.
“Redmore, it is you!” Then
breathlessly, “Kate, about! we must catch him. He has set our ricks ablaze.”
The boat was headed round, and
the young arms bent at the oars, and the little vessel flew in pursuit. The man
they were pursuing rowed clumsily, and with all his efforts made little way, so
that speedily he was overtaken, and Jan ran the ferry-boat against the other,
struck the oar out of the hands of the rower, and flung himself upon the man,
and gripped him.
“Kate—hold the boats together.”
Then ensued a furious struggle.
Both men were strong. The position in which both were was difficult—Jan Pooke
half in one boat, half in the other, but Roger Redmore grasped at the seat in
his boat, while holding an oar in his right hand.
The flaring rick sent a yellow
light over them. The boats reeled and clashed together, and clashing drifted
together with the tide up the river, past Coombe Cellars. Pooke, unable as he
was to master his man, cast himself wholly into his adversary’s boat. Redmore
had let go the oar, and now staggered to his feet. The men,
wrestling, tossed in the rolling boat, fell, were up on their knees, and
then down again in the bottom.
“Quick, Kate!” shouted Jan. “I
have him! Quick!—the string of my parcel.”
Kate handed him what he desired.
In another moment Pooke was
upright. “He is safe,” said he, panting. “I have bound his wrists behind his
back. Now—Kate!”
The boats had run ashore, a
little way above the Cellars, drifted to the strand by the flowing tide.
“Kate,” said Pooke, jumping out,
“you hold that cord—here. I have fastened it round the rowlock. He can’t
release himself. Hold him, whilst I run for help. We will have him tried—he
shall swing for this! Do you know that, Roger Redmore? What you have done is no
joke—it will bring you to the gallows!”
CHAPTER VII
Kate sat in her boat holding the
string that was twisted round the rowlock and that held Roger Redmore’s hands
bound behind his back. He was crouched in the bottom of the boat, sunken into a
heap, hanging by his hands. Now and then he made a convulsive effort with his
shoulders to release his arms, but was powerless. He could not scramble to his
feet, held down as he was behind. He turned his face, and from over Coombe
Cellars, where the sky was alight with fire, a glow came on his countenance.
“You be Kitty Alone?” said
he.
Kate hardly answered. Her heart
was fluttering; her head giddy with alarm and distress, coming after a night’s
exposure in the open boat. As yet, no sign of dawn in the east; only the flames
from the burning farm-produce lighted up the sky to the south-west, and were
reflected in the in-flowing water.
The agricultural riots which had
filled the south of England with terror at the close of were, indeed, a thing of the past, but the
reminiscence of them lay deep in the hearts of the labourers; and for ten
and fifteen years after, at intervals, there were fresh outbreaks of
incendiarism. There was, indeed, no fresh organisation of bodies of men going
about the country, destroying machinery and firing farms, but in many a
district the threat of the firebrand was still employed, and the revenge of a
fire among the stacks and barns was so easy, and so difficult to bring home to
the incendiary, that it was long before the farmer could feel himself safe.
Indeed, nothing but the insurance office prevented this method of obtaining
revenge from being had recourse to very frequently. When every dismissed
labourer or workman who had met with a sharp reprimand could punish the farmer
by thrusting a match among his ricks, fires were common; but when it became
well known that an incendiary fire hurt not the farmer, but an insurance
company, the malevolent and resentful no longer had recourse to this method of
injury.
In the “Swing” riots many men had
been hung or transported for the crimes then committed, and the statute against
arson passed in the reign of George IV., making such an offence felony, and to
be punished capitally, was in force, and not modified till much later. When,
therefore, Jan Pooke threatened Redmore with the gallows, he threatened him
with what the unhappy man knew would be his fate if convicted.
Kate was acquainted with the
story of Roger. He had been a labourer on Mr. Pooke’s farm. He was a morose
man, with a sickly wife and delicate children, occupying a cottage on the farm.
At Christmas the man had taken a drop too much, and had been insolent to
his master. The intoxication might have been forgiven—not so the impertinence.
He was at once discharged, and given notice to quit his cottage at Lady Day.
For nearly three months the man had been out of work. In winter there is no
demand for additional hands; no great undertakings are prosecuted. All the
farmers were supplied with workmen, and had some difficulty in the frosty
weather in finding occupation for them. None were inclined to take on Roger
Redmore. Moreover, the farmers hung together like bees. A man who had offended
one, incurred the displeasure of all.
Redmore wandered from one farm to
another, seeking for employment, only to meet with refusal everywhere. In a day
or two he would be cast forth from his cottage with wife and family. Whither to
go he knew not. He had exhausted what little money he had saved, and had
nowhere found work. Kate felt pity for the man. He had transgressed, and his
transgression had fallen heavy upon him. He was not an intemperate man; he did
not frequent the public-house. Others who drank, and drank hard, remained with
their masters, who overlooked their weakness. In the forefront of Roger’s
offence stood his insolence; and Pooke, the richest yeoman in the place, was
proud, and would not forgive a wound to his pride.
As Kate held the string, she felt
that the wretched man was shivering. He shook in his boat, and chattered its
side against her boat.
“Are you very cold?” asked the
girl.
“I’m hungry,” he answered
sullenly.
“You are trembling.”
“I’ve had nor bite nor crumb for
forty-eight hours. That’s enough to make a man shake.”
“Nothing to eat? Did you not ask
for something?”
“I went to the Rectory. Passon
Fielding gave me a loaf, but I took it home—wife and little ones were more
starving than I, and I cut it up between ’em.”
“I think—I almost think I have a
piece of bread with me,” said Kate. She had, in fact, taken some in her pocket
the night before, when she crossed, and had forgotten to eat it, or had no
appetite for it. Now she produced the slice.
“I cannot take it,” said the
bound man. “My hands be tied fast behind me. You must please put it into my
mouth; and the Lord bless you for it.”
Holding the cord with her right,
Kate extended the bread with the other hand to the man, whose face was averted,
and thrust it between his lips.
“You must hold your hand to my
mouth while I eat,” said he. “I wouldn’t miss a crumb, and it will fall if you
take your hand from me.”
Consequently, with her hand full
of bread much broken, she fed the unfortunate man, and he ate it out of her
palm. He ate greedily till he had consumed the last particle.
It moved Kate to the heart to
feel the hungry wretch’s lips picking the crumbs out of her palm.
“Oh, Roger!” she said in a tone
full of compassion and sorrow, rather than reproach, “why—why did you do
it?”
“Do what, Kitty?”
“Oh, burn the stack!”
“I’ll tell you why. I couldn’t
help it. Did you know my Joan? Her was the purtiest little maid in all Coombe.
Her’s dead now.”
“Dead, Roger!”
“Ay, I reckon; died to-night in
her mother’s lap; died o’ want, and cold, and nakedness. Us had no bread till
Pass’n gave me that loaf—and no coals, and no blankets, and naught but rags.
The little maid has been sick these three weeks. Us can’t have no doctor. I’ve
been out o’ work three months, and now the parish must bury her. Joan, she wor
my very darling, nigh my heart.”
He was silent. The boat he was in
chattered more vigorously against that of Kate.
“I knowed,” he pursued, “I knowed
what ha’ done it. It wor Farmer Pooke throwed me out of employ—took the bread
out o’ our mouths. Us had a bit o’ candle-end, and I wor down on my knees
beside my wife, and little Joan lyin’ on her lap; and wife and I neither could
speak; us couldn’t pray; us just watched the poor little maid passin’ away.”
He was silent, but Kate heard
that he was sobbing. Presently he said, “You’ve been kind. If you’ve got a bit
o’ handkercher or what else, wipe my face with it, will’y. There’s something,
the dew or the salt water from the oars, splashed over it.”
The girl passed her shawl over
the man’s face.
“Thank’y kindly,” he said. Then
he drew a long breath and continued his story. “Well, now, when wife and I saw
as little Joan were gone home, then her rose up and never said a word, but laid
her on our ragged bed; and I—I had the candle-end in my hand, and I put it into
the lantern, and I went out. My heart were full o’ gall and bitterness, and my
head were burning. I know’d well who’d killed our Joan; it were Farmer Pooke as
turned me out o’ employ all about a bit o’ nonsense I said and never meant, and
when I wor sober never remembered to ha’ said; so, mad wi’ sorrow and anger,
I—I gone and done it with that there bit o’ candle-end.”
“Oh, Roger, Roger! you have made
matters much worse for yourself, for all.”
“I might ha’ made it worser
still.”
“You could not—now. Oh, what will
become of you, and what of your poor wife and little ones?”
“For me, as Jan Tottle said,
there’s the gallows; and I reckon for my Jane and the childer, there’s the
grave.”
“If you had not fired the rick,
Roger!”
“I tell you I might ha’ done
worse than that, and now been a free man.”
“I cannot see that.”
“Put your hand down by my right
thigh. Do you feel nothing there, hanging to the strap round my waist?”
Kate felt a string and a knife, a
large knife, as she groped.
“Do you mean this, Roger?”
“Yes, I does. As Jan Tottle wor
a-wrastlin’ wi’ me here in this boat, and trying to overmaster me, the thought
came into my head as I might easy take my knife and run it in under his ribs
and pierce his heart. Had I done that, he’d ha’ falled dead here, and I’d a’
gotten scot-free away.”
“Roger!”
Kate shrank away in horror.
“I didn’t do it, but I might. I’d
no quarrel with young Jan. He’s good enough. It’s the old fayther be the hard
and cruel one. I knowed what was afore me, as young Jan twisted and turned and
threw me. I must be took to Exeter gaol, and there be hanged by the neck till
dead—but I wouldn’t stain my hands wi’ an innocent lad’s blood. I wouldn’t have
it said of my little childer they was come o’ a murderin’ villain.”
Kate shuddered. Still holding
fast the cord that constrained the man, and kept him in his position of
helplessness, she drew back from him as far as she could without surrendering
her hold.
“I had but to put down my hand
and slip open my clasp-knife—and I would have been free, and Jan lying here in
his blood.”
She hardly breathed. A band as of
iron seemed to be about her breast and tightening.
“Kitty,” said the man, “you have
fed me with bread out of your hand, and with your hand you have wiped the salt
tears from my eyes. With that hand will you give me over to the gallows? If you
do, my death will lie on you, and those of my Jane and the little ones.”
“Roger, I am here in trust.”
“I spared Jan. Can you not spare
me?”
Kate trembled. She hardly
breathed.
“Let me go, and I swear to you—I
swear by all those ten thousand eyes o’ heaven looking down on us—that I will
do for you what you have done for me.”
“That is an idle promise,” said
Kate; “you never can do that.”
“Who can say what is to be, or is
not to be? Let me go, for my wife and poor children’s sake.”
She did not answer.
“Let me go because I spared Jan
Pooke.”
She did not move.
“Let me go for the little dead
Joan’s sake—that when she lies i’ the churchyard, they may not say of her,
‘Thickey there green mound, wi’ them daisies on it, covers a poor maid whose
father were hanged.’”
Then Kate let go the string, it
ran round the rowlock, and the man scrambled to his feet.
“Cut it with my knife,” he said.
She took the swinging knife,
opened the blade, and with a stroke cut through the cord that held his wrists.
Then Roger Redmore shook the strings
from his hands, and held up his freed arms to heaven, and cried, “The Lord, who
sits enthroned above thickey shining stars, reward you and help me to do for
you as you ha’ done for me. Amen.”
He leaped from the boat and was
lost in the darkness.
A minute later, and John Pooke,
with a party of men among whom was Pasco Pepperill, came up.
“John,” said Kate, “he is
gone—escaped.”
She drew the young man aside. “I
will not deceive you—I let him go. He begged hard. He might have killed you.
His little Joan is dead.”
John Pooke was at first
staggered, and inclined to be angry, but he speedily recovered himself. He was
a good-natured lad, and he said in a low tone, “Tell no one else. After all, it
is best. I shouldn’t ha’ liked to have appeared against him, and been the
occasion of his death.”
Kate returned with her uncle to
Coombe Cellars.
“I hope my new boat is no worse,”
said he. “How is it you’ve been out all night?”
Kate told her story.
“The boat is all right, I
suppose. She cost me six pounds.”
“Yes; no harm is done to it. I
hope aunt has not been anxious about me.”
“What, Zerah? Oh, she’s in bed. I
waited up, and when there was a cry of fire ran out.”
“You waited for me, uncle?”
“I had my accounts.”
“And father—was he anxious about
me?”
“Your father? You come in, and
you’ll hear his snore all over the house. He’s a terrible noisy sleeper.”
CHAPTER VIII
After the fierce north-east wind
came one from the south-east, whose wings were laden with moisture, and which
cast cold showers over the earth. It is said that a breath from this quarter
brings a downpour that continues unintermittently for forty-eight hours. On
this occasion, however, the rain was not incessant. The sky lowered when it did
not send down its showers, and these latter were cold and unfertilising.
“February fill dyke, March dry it up,” is the saying, but March this year was
one of rain, and February had been a month of warmth and sunshine, which had
forced on all vegetation, which March was cutting with its cruel frosts and
beating down with its pitiless rains.
That had come about in Coombe
Cellars which might have been anticipated. Kate had been sent across the water
with the scantiest provision against cold, and with no instruction as to how to
act in the event of delay of the atmospheric train. She was not a strong child,
and the bitter cold had cut her to the marrow. On the morning following she was
unable to rise, and by night she was in a burning fever.
Kate had an attic room where there
was no grate—a room lighted by a tiny window that looked east across the river.
Against the panes the rain
pattered, and the water dripped from the eaves upon the window-ledge with the
monotonous sound of the death-watch. Hard by was the well-head of a fall-pipe,
in which birds had made their nests, and had so choked it that the water,
unable to descend by the pipe, squirted and plashed heavily on the slates
below.
A candle, brought from the
kitchen, stood on the window-shelf guttering in the wind that found its way
through the ill-fitting lattice and cracked diamond panes. It cast but an
uncertain shimmer over the face of the sick girl.
On the floor stood an iron
rushlight-holder, the sides pierced with round holes. In this a feeble
rushlight burned slowly.
Beside the bed sat Mrs.
Pepperill, and the old rector of Coombe-in-Teignhead stood with bowed head, so
as not to knock his crown against the ceiling, looking intently at the girl.
Zerah was uneasy. Her conscience reproached her. She had acted inconsiderately,
if not wrongly, in sending her niece across the water. She was afraid lest she
should be blamed by the parson, and lest her conduct should be commented on by
the parish.
She reasoned with herself,
without being able thoroughly to still the qualms of her conscience. What cause
had she to suppose that the train would not arrive punctually? How could she
have foreseen that it would come in so late that it made it impossible for
Kate to cross in the then condition of the tide? Had Jan Pooke arrived but ten
minutes earlier than he did, then, unquestionably, the boat would have come
over, if not at Coombe Cellars, yet somewhat lower down the river. She was not
gifted with the prophetic faculty. She had so many things to occupy her mind
that she could not provide for every contingency. Should the child die, no
blame—no reasonable blame—could attach to her. The fault lay with Mr. Brunel,
who had laid down the atmospheric railway; with the engineer at the Teignmouth
exhausting-pump, who had not done his duty properly; with the guard of the
train, who had not seen that the rollers for opening and closing the valves did
their work properly; with John Pooke, for delaying over his hat that he had let
fall; with Jason Quarm, for not offering to ferry the boat in the place of his
daughter, instead of staying over the fire with her husband, filling his head
with mischievous nonsense about making money out of mud and sinking capital
which would never come to the surface again. Finally, the fault lay with
Providence, that blind and inconsiderate power, which had robbed her of Wilmot,
and now had not retarded the ebb by ten minutes, which might easily have been
effected by shifting the direction of the wind to the south-west.
The feeble light flickered in the
window, and almost in the same manner did the life of the girl flicker, burning
itself away as the candle guttered in the overmuch and irregular heat, now
quivering under the in-rush of draught, hissing blue and faint, and ready to
expire, then flaring up in exaggerated incandescence. The cheeks flushed,
the eyes burned with unnatural light, and the pulse ebbed and flowed.
“Where do the stars go by day?”
asked Kate in delirium; “and why does the Plough turn in heaven? Is God’s hand
on it?”
“My child,” said the parson,
“God’s plough in the earth is the frost, that cuts deep and turns and crumbles
the clods ready for the seed; and God’s plough on human hearts is great sorrow
and sharp disappointment—to make the necessary furrow into which to drop the
seeds of faith, and love, and patience.”
“She is not speaking to you,
sir,” said Mrs. Pepperill. “She’s talking rambling like. But she’s terrible at
questions—always.”
The clergyman held his hands
folded behind his back, and looked intently at the fevered face. The eyes were
bright, but not with intelligence. Kate neither recognised him, nor understood
what he said.
“I wonder now where the doctor
is?” said Zerah. “I reckon he has gone to some patient who can pay a guinea
where we pay seven shillings and sixpence. Doctor Mant will be with such twice
a day—as we are poor, he will come to us only now and then.”
“You judge harshly. You have but
just sent for him.”
“I did not think Kate was bad
enough to need a doctor.”
“God is the Great Physician. Put
your trust in Him.”
“That is what you said when
Wilmot was ill. I lost her all the same.”
“It was the will of Heaven. God’s
plough, maybe, was needed.”
“In what way did I deserve to be
so treated? My beautiful child! my own, very very own child.” Zerah’s eyes
filled, but her lips contracted, making crow-feet at the corners. “I have had
left to me instead this cold-hearted creature, my niece, who can in no way make
up to me for what I have lost. I’ve had a sovereign taken from me and a
ha’penny left in my hand.”
“God has given you this child to
love and care for. For His own wise purposes He took away Wilmot, whom you were
spoiling with over-much affection and blind admiration. Now He would have you
love and cherish the treasure He has left in your hands.”
“Treasure?”
“Ay, treasure. Love her.”
“Of course I love her! I do my
duty by her.”
“You have done your duty—of that
I have no doubt. But how have you done it? Do you know, Mrs. Pepperill, there
are two ways in which everything may be done—as a duty to God, in the spirit of
bondage or in the spirit of love? So with regard to the image of God in this
innocent and suffering child. You may do your duty perfunctorily or in
charity.”
“I do it in charity. Her father
has not paid a penny for her keep.”
“That is not what I mean; charity
is the spirit of love. There are two minds in which man may stand before
God, to everything, to everyone—there is the servant mind and the filial mind,
the duty mind, and the mind of love. And with what mind have you treated this
child?” The parson put his hand to Kate’s brow and drew back from it the dark
hair, sweeping the locks aside with his trembling fingers.
“Look,” said he. “What a forehead
she has got—what a brow! full, full, full of thought. This is no common
head—there is no vulgar brain in this poor little skull.”
“Wilmot had a head and brains,”
said Mrs. Pepperill, “and her forehead was higher and whiter.”
Zerah’s conscience was stinging
her. What the rector said was true, and the consciousness that it was true made
her angry.
Would she have sent Wilmot across
the water insufficiently protected against the east wind? would she have done
this without weighing the chances of the atmospheric railway breaking down? If
death were to snatch this child from her, she would ever feel that some
responsibility had weighed on her. However much she might shift the blame, some
of it must adhere to her.
She had not been kind to the
motherless girl. It was true she had not been unkind to her; but then Kate had
a right to a share of her heart. She had valued her niece chiefly as a foil to
her daughter; and when the latter died, her feelings toward Kate had been
dipped in wormwood.
Zerah was not a bad woman, but
she was a disappointed woman. She was disappointed in her husband,
disappointed in her child. Her heart was not congealed, nor was her
conscience dead, but both were in a torpid condition.
Now, as by the glimmer of the
swaling candle she looked on the suffering girl, the ice about her heart
cracked—a warm gush of pity, an ache of remorse, came upon her; she bowed and
kissed the arched brow of her niece.
The rector knelt and prayed in
silence. He loved the intelligent child in his Sunday school—the nightingale in
his church choir. Zerah obeyed his example.
Then both heard the stair creak,
and a heavy tread sounded on the boards.
Mrs. Pepperill looked round, but
the irregular tread would have told her who had entered the attic chamber
without the testimony of her eyes. She stood up and signed to Jason Quarm to be
less noisy in his movements.
“Pshaw!” said he; “it is nothing.
Kitty will get over it. You, Zerah, are tough. I am tough. Leather toughness is
the characteristic of us Quarms. When she is better, send her to me—to the
moor. That will set her up.”
The rector rose.
Jason went to the head of the bed
and laid his large hand on the sick girl’s brow. The coolness of his palm
seemed to do her good.
“You see—it comforts the little
toad,” said her father. “There is nothing to alarm you in the case. Children
are like corks. They go under water and are up again—mostly up. Dipping under
is temporary—temporary and soon over. Parson, do you want to speculate? I
am buying oak dirt cheap—to sell at a tremendous profit. Ten per cent. at the
least. What do you say?”
The rector shook his head.
“Well, I shouldn’t go away from
Coombe with Kitty ill but that I expect to make my fortune and hers. She’ll
have a dower some day out of the Brimpts oaks.”
Then the man stumped out of the
room and down the steep stairs.
Jason Quarm was always sanguine.
“Do you think Kate will live?”
asked Zerah, who did not share his views.
“I trust so,” answered the
rector. “If she does, then regard her as a gift from heaven. Once before she
was put, a frail and feeble object, into your arms to rear and cherish. You
were then too much engrossed in your daughter to give to this child your full
attention. Your own Wilmot has been taken away. Now your niece has been almost
withdrawn from you. But the hand that holds the issues of life and death spares
her; she is committed to you once more—again helpless, frail, and committed to
you that you may envelop her in an atmosphere of Love.”
“I have loved her,” said Mrs.
Pepperill. “This is the second time, sir, that you have charged me with lack of
love towards Kate.”
“Wilmot,” said the rector, “was
one who stormed the heart. She went up against it, with flags flying and
martial music, and broke in at the point of the bayonet. Kate’s nature is
different. She will storm no heart. She sits on the doorstep as a beggar, and
does not even knock and solicit admission. Throw open your door, extend your
hand, and the timid child will falter in, frightened, yet elate with hope.”
“I don’t know,” said Zerah
meditatively. “You’ll excuse my saying it, but when a child is heartless”—
“Heartless?—who is heartless?”
“Kate, to be sure.”
“Heartless?” repeated the rector.
“You are in grievous error. No child is heartless. None of God’s creatures are
void of love. God is love Himself, and we are all made in the image of the
Creator. In all of us is the divine attribute of love. We were made to love and
to be loved. It is a necessity of our nature. This poor little spirit—with how
much love has it been suckled? With how much has its nakedness been clothed?
The cream of your heart’s affection was given to your own daughter, and only
the whey—thin and somewhat acidulated—offered to the niece. Turn over a new
leaf, Mrs. Pepperill. Treat this child in a manner different from that in which
she has been treated. I allow frankly that you have not been unkind, unjust,
ungracious. But such a soul as this cannot flower in an atmosphere of
negatives. You know something about the principle on which the atmospheric
railway acts, do you not, Mrs. Pepperill? There is a pump which exhausts the
air. Now put a plant, an animal, into a vessel from which the vital air has
been withdrawn, and plant or animal will die at once. It has been given
nothing deleterious, nothing poisonous has been administered. It dies
simply because it has been deprived of that atmosphere in which God ordained that
it should live and flourish. My good friend,” said the rector, and his voice
shook with mingled tenderness of feeling and humour, “if I were to take you up
and set you under the exhausting apparatus, and work at the pump, you would
gasp—gasp and die.”
The woman turned cold and blank
at the suggestion.
“If I did that,” continued the
parson, “the coroner who sat on you would pronounce that you had been murdered
by me. I should be sent to the assizes, and should infallibly be hung. Very
well: there are other kinds of murder than killing the body. There is the
killing of the noble, divine nature in man, and that not by acts of violence
only, but by denial of what is essential to its existence. Remember this, Mrs.
Pepperill: what the atmosphere is to the lungs, that love is to the heart. God
created the lungs to be inflated with air, and the heart to be filled with
Love.”
CHAPTER IX
The voice of Pasco was heard
shouting up the stairs to his wife. Mrs. Pepperill, glad to escape the lecture,
went to the door and called down, “Don’t make such a noise, when the girl is
ill.”
“Come, will you, Zerah; there’s
some one wants to have a say with you.”
With a curt excuse to the parson,
Mrs. Pepperill descended. She found her husband at the foot of the stairs, with
his hand on the banister.
“Pasco,” said she, “what do’y
think now? The parson has been accusing me of murdering Kate. If she dies, he
says he’ll have me up to Exeter Assizes and hung for it. I’ll never set foot in
church again, never—I’ll join the Primitive Methodists.”
“As you please,” said her
husband. “But go to the door at once. There is John Pooke waiting, and won’t be
satisfied till he has had a talk with you about Kate. He wants to know all
about Kitty—how she’s doing, whether she’s in danger, if she wants anything
that the Pookes can supply. He’s hanging about the door like what they
call a morbid fly. He’s in a terrible taking, and won’t be put off with
what I can tell.”
“Well, now,” exclaimed Zerah,
“here’s an idea! Something may come of that night on a mud-bank after all, and
more than she deserves. Oh my! if my Wilmot was alive, and Jan Pooke were to
inquire after her! Go up, Pasco, and send that parson away. I won’t speak to
him again—abusing of me and calling me names shameful, and he an ordained
minister. What in the world are we coming to?”
When the doctor arrived, he
pronounced that he would pull Kate through.
Presently the delirium passed
away, and on the following morning the light of intelligence returned to her
eyes.
“They are still there,” she said
eagerly, raising her head and listening.
“What are still there?” asked her
aunt.
“The gulls.”
In fact, these animated
foam-flakes of the ocean were about in vast numbers, uttering their peculiar
cries as they hovered over the mud.
“Of course they are there—why
not?”
“Father said he was going to make
ladies’ waistcoats of them, and I’ve been fretting and crying—and then, the
daffodils”—
“Oh, bother the daffodils and the
gulls! They may wait a long while before waistcoats are made of them.”
“It is not of daffodils father
was going to make waistcoats. He said he would have all the gulls shot.”
“Never worrit your head about
that. The birds can take care of themselves and fly away to sea.”
“But the daffodils cannot get
away. He was going to have a scythe and mow them all down and sell them.”
“Wait till folk are fools enough
to buy.”
There was much to be done in the
house. Mrs. Pepperill was unable to be always in the room with her niece. It
was too early in the year for pleasure parties to come up the river in boats
for tea or coffee, winkles and cockles, in the open air, but the house itself
exacted attention—the cooking, the washing, had to be done. Now that Zerah was
deprived of the assistance of her niece, perhaps for the first time did she realise
how useful the girl had been to her. By night Kate was left alone; there was no
space in the attic chamber for a second bed, nor did her condition require
imperatively that some one should be with her all night.
When her consciousness returned, Kate
woke in the long darkness, and watched the circular spots of light that danced
on the walls and careered over the floor, as the rushlight flickered in the
draught between window and door. Above, on the low ceiling, was the circle of
light, broad and yellow as the moon, cast by the candle, its rays unimpeded in
that direction, but all round was the perforated rim, and through that the rays
shot and painted stars—stars at times moving, wheeling, glinting; and Kate, in
a half-torpid condition, thought she could make out among them the Plough with
its curved tail, and wondered whether it were turning. Then she passed into
dreamland, and woke and saw in the spots of light the white pearls of her
uncle’s neckcloth, and was puzzled why they did not remain stationary. Whilst
vexing her mind with this question she slid away into unconsciousness again,
and when next her eyes opened, it was to see an orchard surrounding her, in
which were daffodils that flickered, and she marvelled what that great one was
above on the ceiling, so much larger than all the rest. Always, whenever with
the ebb the gulls came up the river in thousands, and their laugh rang into the
little room, it was to Kate as though a waft of sea-air blew over her hot face;
and she laughed also, and said to herself, “They are not yet made into
waistcoats.”
Occasionally she heard under her
window a whistle piping, “There was a frog lived in a well,” and she once asked
her aunt if that were father, and why he did not come upstairs to see her.
“Your father is on Dartmoor,”
answered Zerah. Then, with a twinkle in her eye, she added, “I reckon it is Jan
Pooke. He has taken on terribly about you. He comes every day to inquire.”
Whenever Mrs. Pepperill had a
little spare time, she clambered up the steep staircase to see that her niece
lacked nothing, to give her food, to make her take medicine, to shake up her
bed. And every time that she thus mounted, she muttered, “So, I am killing her
with cruelty! The only suitable quarters for me is Exeter gaol; the proper end
for me is the gallows! I have put her into one of the atmospheric engine-towers
and have pumped the life out of her! And yet, I’m blessed if I’m not run
off my legs going up and down these stairs! If I ain’t a ministering angel to
her; if she doesn’t cost me pounds in doctor’s bills; I don’t begrudge it—but
I’m a murderess all the same!”
Certain persons are mentally
incapable of understanding a simile; a good many are morally unwilling to apply
one to themselves. Whether, when it was spoken, Mrs. Pepperill comprehended or
not the bearing of the rector’s simile relative to the exhausting engine, in
the sequel she came to entirely misconceive it, and to distort it into
something quite different from what the speaker intended. That was easily
effected. She was quite aware that much that the parson had said was true; her
conscience tingled under his gentle reproof; but no sooner was that unfortunate
simile uttered, than her opportunity came for evading the cogency of his
reproach, and for working herself up into resentment against him for having
charged her falsely. That is one of the dangers that lurk in the employment of
hyperbole, and one of the advantages hyperbole gives to those addressed in
reprimand with it. Zerah had sufficient readiness of wit to seize on the
opportunity, and use her occasion against the speaker, and in self-vindication.
The rector had not said that
Zerah was depriving her niece of vital air; that mattered not—he had said that
she was depriving her of what was as essential to life as vital air.
“It is my own blessed self that I
am killing,” said Mrs. Pepperill; “running up these stairs ten hundred times
in the day, my heart jumping furiously, and pumping all the vital air out
of my lungs. I’m sure I can’t breathe when I get up into Kate’s room. And he
don’t call that love! He ought to be unfrocked by the bishop.”
She came into the girl’s chamber
red in the face and puffing, and went direct to her.
“There, now; I’m bothered if
something does not come of it to your advantage and mine, Kate, for I’m tired
of having to care about you. Jan Pooke has been here again. That’s the second
time to-day; of course asking after you. There is no one in the family but Jan
and his sister, and she is about to be married. The Pookes have a fine farm and
money in the bank. If you manage matters well, you’ll cut out that conceited
minx, Rose, who has marked him down. Come, you are a precious!”
She stooped to kiss Kate, but the
girl suddenly turned her face with a flaming cheek to the wall.
Zerah tossed her head and said to
herself, “Love? she won’t love! I was about to kiss her, and she would not have
it.”
Then she got her needlework and
seated herself at the window. Kate turned round at once to look at her. She had
shrunk from her aunt involuntarily; not from her kiss, but from her words,
which wounded her.
A strange child Kate was. If not
asking questions with her lips, she was seeking solutions to problems with her
eyes. She had fixed her great solemn orbs on her aunt, and they remained on
her, not withdrawn for a moment, till Zerah Pepperill became uneasy, fidgeted
in her seat, and said sharply, “Am I a murderess or an atmospheric pump
that you stare at me? Can’t you find something else to look at?”
Kate made no reply, but averted
her face. Ten minutes later, nevertheless, Zerah felt again that the eyes were
on her, studying her features, her expression, noting everything about her,
seeming to probe her mind and search out every thought that passed in her head.
“Really, if this is going on, I
cannot stay,” she said, rose and folded up the sheet she was hemming. “There’s
such a thing as manners. I hate to be looked at—it is as if slugs were crawling
over me.”
As Zerah descended, she muttered,
“The girl is certainly born without a heart. I would have kissed her but that
she turned from me. I wish the parson had seen that!”
The weather changed, the edge was
taken off the east wind, the sun had gained power. The rooks were in excitement
repairing their nests and wasting sticks about the ground under the trees, making
a mess and disorder of untidiness. The labourers begged a day from their
masters, that they might set their potatoes; after work hours on the farms they
were busy in their gardens.
In spring the sap of health rises
in young arteries as in plants, and Kate recovered, not perhaps rapidly, but
nevertheless steadily. She continued to be pale, with eyes preternaturally
large.
She was able to leave her
chamber, and after a day or two assist in light housework.
CHAPTER X
One day, when her uncle was at
home busy about his accounts, which engaged him frequently without greatly
enlightening him, but serving rather to involve his mind in confusion, Kate was
assisting her aunt in preparing for the early dinner, when a tap at the door
announced a caller.
Pasco shouted to the person
outside to come in, and a young man entered—tall, with fair hair, and clear,
steady grey eyes.
“I am the new schoolmaster,” said
he frankly. “I have thought it my duty to come and see you, as you are church-warden
and one of the managers of the National School.”
“Quite right; sit down. I have
been busy. I am a man of the commercial world. This is our meal-time. I am
disengaged from my accounts; you can sit and eat, and we will converse whilst
eating.”
Mrs. Pepperill entered, and her
hard eye rested on the young man.
“The new schoolmaster,” she said.
“Do you come from these parts?”
“No; I am a stranger to this
portion of England.”
“That’s a misfortune. If you
could be born again, and in the west country, it would be a mercy for you. From
where do you come?”
“From Hampshire.”
“That’s right up in the north.”
The schoolmaster raised his
eyebrows. “Of course—in the south of England.”
“It doesn’t follow,” said Zerah;
“by your speech I took you to be foreign.”
“And what may your name be,” said
Pasco, “if I may be so bold as to ask? I have heard it, but it sounded French,
and I couldn’t recollect it.”
“My name is very English—Walter
Bramber.”
“Never heard anyone so called
before. Brambles, and Bramptons, and Branscombes. It don’t sound English to our
ears. I may as well tell you—sit down, and take a fork—that we liked our last
schoolmaster uncommon much. He was just the right sort of man for us; but the
rector took against him.”
“I thought he was rather given to
the”—
“Well, what of that? We have, all
of us, our failings. A trout is an uncommon good fish, but it has bones like
needles. You have your failings, my wife has hers. I will say this for Mr.
Solomon Puddicombe—he never got tight in our parish. When he was out for a
spree, he went elsewhere—to Newton, or Teignmouth, and sometimes to Ashburton.
He couldn’t help it. Some folks have fits, others have bilious attacks. When he
wasn’t bad, he was very good; the children liked him, the parents liked him.
I liked him, and I’m the churchwarden. He had means of his own, beside the
school pence and his salary. A man has a right to spend his money as he
chooses. If he had got tight on the school pence, I can understand that there
might have been some kind of objection; but when it was on his private means,
then I don’t see that we have anything to do with it. Have you means of your
own?”
“I am sorry to say—none.”
“We always respect those who have
means. If you have none, of course you can’t go on the spree anywhere, and oughtn’t
to do so. It would be wrong and immoral. Take my advice, and call on the old
schoolmaster. The parish will be pleased, as it has been terribly put about at
the rector giving him his dismissal.”
“But—I thought there had been an
unhappy scandal; that, in fact, he had been committed to”—
“Well, well, he was locked up,”
said Pasco. “There was a cock-fight somewhere up country. Not in this country,
but at a place called Waterloo.”
“There is no such place in
England,” said Bramber. “Waterloo is in Belgium; it lies about five miles from
Brussels.”
“You are a schoolmaster, and
ought to know. But of this I am quite sure—it was in England where he got into
trouble, and the name of the place was Waterloo.”
“He may have been at some inn
called the Waterloo, but positively there is no place in England so
designated,” said Bramber.
“I know very well the place was
Waterloo, and that Mr. Solomon Puddicombe got into trouble there. We are
all liable to troubles. I have lost my daughter. Troubles are sent us; the
parson himself has said so. Puddicombe got locked up. You see, cock-fighting is
a pursuit to which he was always very partial. You go and call on him, and
he’ll sing you his song. It begins—
‘Come all you cock-fighters from far and near,
I’ll sing you a cock match when and where,
On Aspren Moor, as I’ve heard say,
A charcoal black and a bonny bonny grey.’
That is how the song begins. But
it is about another cock-fight; not that at Waterloo. Cock-fighting is Mr. Puddicombe’s
pursuit. We have all got our pursuits, and why not? There’s a man just outside
Newton is wonderful hot upon flowers. His garden is a picture; he makes it
blaze with various kinds of the finest coloured—foreign and English plants:
that’s his pursuit. Then there is a doctor at Teignmouth who goes out with a
net catching butterflies, and he puts ale and treacle on the trees in the
evening for catching moths: that’s his pursuit. And our parson likes dabbling
with a brush and some paints: that’s his pursuit. And business is mine: that’s
my pursuit and my pleasure—and it’s profit too.”
“Sometimes; not often,” threw in
Zerah.
“Well, I don’t know what your
pursuits be, Mr. Schoolmaster,” said Pepperill. “Let us hope they’re innocent
as those of Mr. Puddicombe.”
The young man glanced round him,
staggered at his reception, and caught the eye of Kate. She was looking at
him intently, and in her look were both interest and pity.
“We won’t argue any more,” said
Pasco. “I suppose you can eat starigazy pie?”
“I am ashamed to say I never
heard of it.”
“Never heard of it? And you set
to teach our children! Zerah, tell Mr. Schoolmaster what starigazy pie is.”
“There is nothing to tell,” said
Zerah ungraciously. It was her way to be ungracious in all she said and all she
did. “It is fish pie—herrings or pilchards—with their heads out of the crust
looking upwards. That is what they call star-gazing in the fishes, and, in
short, starigazy pie. But if you don’t like it, there is our old stag coming on
presently.”
“Do you know, I shall have made
two experiences to-day that are new to me. In the first place, I shall make
acquaintance with starigazy pie, that promises to be excellent; and in the next
place, I may add that it never has been my luck hitherto to taste venison.”
“What’s that?” asked Mrs.
Pepperill sharply; she thought Bramber was poking fun at her.
“I never have had the chance
before of tasting venison—the meat of the rich man’s table.”
“No means, you know,” said Pasco.
“Without private means you can’t expect to eat chicken.”
“Our old stag is hardly chicken,”
said Zerah. “You see, now we’ve got a young stag, we didn’t want the old one
any more.”
“Solomon Puddicombe married my
second cousin,” observed Pepperill. “Her name was Eastlake. Are you
single?”
“Yes, that is my forlorn
condition.”
“Well, look sharp and marry into
the parish. It’s your only chance. You see, the farmers are all against you.
They were partial to Puddicombe, and I hear he is intending to set up a private
school. The farmers and better-class folk will send their children to him. They
don’t approve of their sons and daughters associating with the labourers’
children, though they did send some to the National School so long as Solomon
Puddicombe was there; but that was because he was so greatly respected.”
“Do you mean to say that Mr.
Puddicombe is still in Coombe-in-Teignhead?”
“Certainly. When he returned from
Waterloo, as the place was called where was that cock-fight, and he got into
some sort of difficulty, he came back to his own house. He got it through his
wife, who was an Eastlake—my cousin. It is his own now, and he has private
means, so he intends setting up a school. It will be very select; only
well-to-do parents’ children will be admitted. When they let Mr. Puddicombe out
of gaol at Waterloo, which is somewhere in the Midlands,—leastways in
England,—then the people here were for ringing a peal to welcome him home. The
parson put the keys in his pocket and went off. They came to me. I am
churchwarden, and I knocked open the belfry door. We gave Puddicombe a peal,
and the rector wasn’t over-pleased. I am churchwarden, and that is something.
You see, Mr. Puddicombe has means, and a house he got through my cousin
Eastlake. I don’t know how the school will be kept up now that the rector has
had Puddicombe turned out of it. None of the farmers will subscribe. We have no
resident squire. He will have to make up your salary out of his own pocket. He
is not married, so he can well afford it. If he don’t consult our feelings, I
don’t see why we should consider his pocket. None of us wished to lose Solomon
Puddicombe; everyone trusted him, and he was greatly respected.”
Again the schoolmaster looked
round him. A sense of helplessness had come over him. Again his eye encountered
that of Kate, and he instinctively understood that this girl felt for him in
his difficulties and humiliation, and understood how trying his position was.
“Now for a bit of our old stag,”
said Pasco.
“Stag?” exclaimed Bramber; “that
is fowl!”
“What you call fowl, is stag to
us. He crowed till his voice cracked. He may be tough because old, but he’s
been long boiling.”
“Oh, a cock!” Bramber learned
that day that a cock in Devonshire is entitled stag.
The meal ended, Pasco Pepperill
stood up and said, “Mr. What’s-your-name, I daresay you would like to look over
my stores. You’ll be wanting coals, and I sell coals by the bushel. You drink
cider, I daresay; I can provide you with a hogshead—or half, if that will do.
If you want to do shopping—I speak against my interests—but Whiteaway deals in
groceries; you’ll find his shop up the street. If there be anything he hasn’t
got, and you need to go into Teignmouth, why, this is the ferry, and we
charge a penny to put you across, and it is a penny back. If you desire to be
polite to friends, and would like to entertain them, there are cockles and
winkles, tea or coffee, to be had here, six-pence a head; but if the number
were over twenty, we might come to an arrangement at fourpence-ha’penny. And if
you desire a conveyance at any time, I have a cob and trap I let out at a
shilling a mile, and something for the driver. And if you smoke and drink, I
have—I mean, I dare-say I could provide for you tobacco and spirits that—you
know—haven’t seen the Customs, and are accordingly cheap. And if you should
happen to know of a timber merchant who wants a lot of oak, I’ve dropped over a
hundred pounds on some prime stuff I shall sell only to such as know good oak
from bad. And if you’ve any friends in the weaving trade, I do some business in
wool, and am getting first-class fleeces from Dartmoor. If you can oblige me in
any way like this—well, I daresay I shan’t be so prejudiced for Mr.
Puddicombe.”
Pasco Pepperill conducted the
schoolmaster about his premises in an ostentatious manner, showed him his stores,
his stable, the platform on which tea and coffee, winkles and cockles were
served. He named the prices he had paid, and gave the new-comer to understand
that he was a man who had plenty of money at his disposal.
Then an idea occurred to Pasco.
Perhaps this schoolmaster might help him with his accounts. He himself could
not disentangle them and balance his books. He was shy of letting anyone else
see them; but this Bramber was a complete stranger, a man whom he could
reduce to dependence on himself; he had no private means, no friends in the
place; he had given the man a dinner, and might make of him a very serviceable
slave.
“Look here,” said Pepperill in a
haughty tone, “Mr. Schoolmaster, I suppose you know something of accounts and
book-keeping?”
“Certainly I do.”
“I shouldn’t mind now and then
paying you a trifle, giving you a meal, and favouring you with my support—I am
churchwarden, and consequently on the committee of the National School. Me and
the bishop, and the archdeacon and rector, and Whiteaway as well. I mean, I’ll
stand at your back, if you will oblige me now and then, and hold your tongue.”
“I will do anything I can to
oblige you,” said Bramber. “And as to holding my tongue, what is it you desire
of me?”
“Merely to help me with my accounts.
My time is so occupied, and I do business in so many ways, that my books get
somewhat puzzling—I mean to a man who is taken up with business.”
“I am entirely at your service.”
“But—you understand—I don’t want
my affairs talked about. People say I have plenty of money, that I’m a man who
picks it up everywhere; but I don’t desire that they should know how much I
have, and what my speculations are, and what they bring in.”
“I can hold my tongue.”
“Would you look at my books now?”
“Certainly.”
Accordingly, Walter Bramber
re-entered the house, and was given the books in a private sitting-room, and
worked away at them for a couple of hours. The confusion was great: Pepperill
might have had a genius for business, but this was not manifest in his books.
Presently Pasco came in.
“Well,” said he, “make ’em out,
eh?”
“You must excuse my saying it,”
said Bramber; “but—if these are all—your affairs are in a very unsatisfactory
condition.”
“Unsatisfactory? oh, pshaw! Of
course, I have other resources; there’s the Brimpts forest of oaks. There’s—oh,
lots; winkles and cockles, tea and coffee not entered.”
“Sixpence a head; over twenty,
fourpence ha’penny,” said Walter Bramber drily.
“Oh, lots—lots of other things. I
haven’t entered all.”
“I sincerely hope it is so.”
“It is so, on my word.”
“Because—you seem to me to be
losing seriously on every count.”
“Losing? You don’t know creditor
from debtor account. That comes of education; it is never of use. Nothing like
business for teaching a man. I don’t believe in your book-learning.”
“I’ll come again to-morrow and go
more carefully into the accounts.”
“Oh, thank you, not necessary. It
is clear to me you do not understand my system—and mistake sides.” Pasco
became red and angry. “Look here, Mr. Schoolmaster, let me give you a word. You
don’t belong to the labourers—you won’t be able to make friends of them. You
don’t belong to the gentry; there are none here—so you need not think of their
society. You don’t belong to the middle class—you are not a farmer, or a
tradesman, or a merchant; so they will have nothing to do with you. You make my
accounts all right, and the balance on the right side; give up your foolish
book-keeping as learned at college, and set my accounts right by common sense,
and I’ll see what I can do to get you taken up by some respectable people. And,
one thing more. Don’t go contradicting men of property, and saying that there
was no cock-fighting at Waterloo, because there was; and people don’t like
contradictions. When I broke open the belfry door that the ringers might give
Mr. Puddicombe a peal, I let the world see I wasn’t going to be priest-ridden;
and we are not going to be schoolmaster-ridden neither, and told our accounts
are wrong, and that Waterloo, where the cock-fight was, is not in England.”
CHAPTER XI
Walter Bramber left Coombe
Cellars greatly discouraged. He had unintentionally ruffled the plumes of the
churchwarden by disputing his knowledge of the situation of Waterloo, and mainly
by discovering that his affairs were in something worse than confusion, that
they wore a complexion which indicated the approach of bankruptcy. And Pasco
Pepperill was one of the magnates of the village, and full of consciousness
that he was a great man.
Bramber walked to the little
village shop belonging to Whiteaway, the second churchwarden, who was also on
the committee of management, and trustee for the school under the National
Society.
Here also his reception was not
cordial. It was intimated to him that his presence in the village and tenure of
the mastership of the school would be tolerated only on condition that he
supplied himself with groceries, draperies, boots, and lollipops from
Whiteaway’s shop. He walked to his lodgings.
Such were the men with whom he
was thrown. From two instances he generalised. They were to be gained
through their interests. Unless he got one set of things at one store and
another set at another, the two mighty men who ruled Coombe-in-Teignhead would
turn their faces against him, and make his residence in the place intolerable.
As he walked slowly along the
little street, he encountered a cluster of children, talking and romping
together, composed of boys and girls of all ages. Directly they saw him, they
became silent, and stood with eyes and mouths open contemplating him. Bramber
heard one boy whisper to the next—
“That’s the new teacher—ain’t he
a duffer?”
He nodded, and addressed a few
kindly words to the children; expressed his hope that they would soon be well
acquainted and become fast friends. To which no response was accorded. But no
sooner was he past than the whole crew burst into a loud guffaw, which set the
blood rushing into the young man’s face.
A moment later a stone was
hurled, and hit him on the back. He turned in anger, and saw the whole pack
disappear behind a cottage and down a side lane. He considered a moment whether
to pursue and capture the offender, but believing that he would have great
difficulty in discovering him, even if he caught the whole gang, he deemed it
expedient to swallow the affront.
On reaching his lodgings, Bramber
unpacked his few goods; and as he did this, his heart ached for his Hampshire
home. Old associations were connected with the trifles he took out of his
box, linked with the irrevocable past, some sad, others sunny. Then he seated
himself at his window and sank into a brown study.
Young, generous, he had come to
this nook of the West full of enthusiasm for his task, eager to advance
education, to lift the children out of the slough of ignorance and prejudice in
which their fathers and forefathers had been content to live. That his efforts
would meet with ready and enthusiastic support, would be gratefully hailed by
parents and children alike, by rich and by poor, he had not doubted.
“There is no darkness but
ignorance,” said the fool in “Twelfth Night”; and who would not rejoice to be
himself lifted out of shadows into light, and to see his children advanced to a
higher and better walk than had been possible for himself?
But his hopes were suddenly and
at once damped. He was a fish out of water. A youth with a certain amount of
culture, and with a mind thirsting after knowledge, he was pitchforked into a
village where culture was not valued, where the only books seen were, “The
Norwood Gipsy’s Dream-Book” and “The Forty Thieves,” exposed in the grocer’s
window. He had been accustomed to associate with friends who had an interest in
history, travels, politics, scenery, poetry, and art; and here in this
backwater no one, so far as he could see, had interest in anything save what
would fill his pocket or his paunch. Sad and temporarily discouraged, he took
his violin and began to play. This instrument was to be to him in exile
companion, friend, and confidant. Presently he heard a male voice
downstairs talking loudly to his landlady. He stayed his bow, and in
another moment a stout and florid man stumbled up the staircase.
“How do’y, schoolmaister?” said
this visitor, extending a big and moist hand. “I’m Jonas Southcott, landlord of
the Lamb and Flag. As I was passing, I heard your fiddle squeak. You’re just
the chap us wants. Peter Adams as played first fiddle at church is dead; he was
the man for you—he could turn you off a country dance, a hornpipe, or a reel.”
“What, in church?”
“No, not exact-ly that. At our little hops at the Lamb and Flag; and on Sunday
he was wonderful at an anthem or a psalm. We want someone who can take his
place. You please to come and be sociable when the young folks want a dance.
What can you play—‘Moll in the Wad,’ ‘The Devil among the Tailors,’ ‘Oil of
Barley,’ ‘Johnny, come tie my cravat’? These were some of Peter Adams’s tunes.
And on Sunday you should have heard him in Jackson’s ‘Tee-dum,’ or at Christmas
in ‘While shepherds watched.’ It was something worth going to church for.”
“I hardly know what to say,”
gasped Walter Bramber. “I am but newly arrived, and have not as yet shaken into
my place.”
“This is practising night. The
instruments will all be in my parlour this evening at half-past six. If you
like to come and be sociable, and have a glass of spirits and water, and try
your hand at Jackson’s ‘Tee-dum,’ I reckon the orchestra will be uncommon
gratified.”
“You are very good, but”—
“And when the practice is over,
we’ll whip in some young folks and have a dance, and if you’ll fiddle some of
them tunes—‘Moll in the Wad,’ or ‘The Parson among the Peas,’ or ‘The Devil
among the Tailors,’ you’ll get intimate with young and old alike. Then, also,
you can keep your eyes open, and pick out a clean, comely maiden, and keep
company with her, and walk her out on Sundays—and so look to settling among us.
You have a head-wind and a strong tide against you. The old master was such a favourite, and so greatly respected, that I doubt, unless
you make an effort, you won’t go down here.”
“This evening you must excuse me;
I’m very tired.”
“Well, this was kindly intended.
I thought to put you on good terms with the parish at once. Perhaps you’re shy
of playing Jackson’s ‘Tee-dum’ till you’ve tried it over privately. I’ll see if
I can borrow you the notes. Jackson’s ‘Tee-dum’”—
“I presume you mean the ‘Te
Deum.’”
“We always call it ‘Tee-dum’
here, and if you give it any other name, no one will understand you. We are
English, not French or Chinese, in Coombe-in-Teignhead.”
The landlord of the Lamb and Flag
descended the stairs, and Bramber, fearing lest he should have given offence,
accompanied him to the street door. His landlady was a widow. When Jonas Southcott
was out of the house, she beckoned to Walter Bramber, and said—
“I be main glad you ain’t going
to the practice to-night, for I have axed Jane Cann in to tea.”
“Who is Jane Cann?”
“Her teaches sewing and the
infants in the National School. I thought you’d best become acquainted in a
friendly way at the outset. She used to keep a dame’s school herself, and a
very good school it was. But when the parson set up the new National School, he
did not want exactly to offend folk, and to take the bread out of Jane Cann’s
mouth,—you know she’s akin to me, and to several in the place,—so he appointed
her to the infants. Her’s a nice respectable young woman, but her had a bit o’
a misfortune as a child; falled and hurt her back, and so is rather crooked and
short. Her may be a trifle older than you, but folk do say that is always best
so; for when the wife is young”—
“Goodness preserve us! you don’t
suppose I am going to marry her because she is the sewing-mistress?”
“You might do worse. Folk are
sure to talk anyhow, and it’s best to give ’em some grounds for their talk. You
see, she and you must walk together going to school and coming away, and she
lives close by here. As I was saying, people say that when the wife is much
younger than her husband there comes a long family, and the man is old and past
work when some of the youngest are still no better than babies.”
Bramber felt a chill down his
spinal marrow, as though iced water were trickling there.
“I speak against my own
interest,” continued the widow, “but it does seem a pity that you should not
put your salaries together and occupy one house. She gets twenty pounds a
year. If you was to marry her, you’d be twenty pounds the richer. ’Twas
unfortunate, though, about that cricket ball.”
“What about a cricket ball?”
“Why, Jane Cann was looking on at
a cricket match among the boys, and a ball came by accident and hit her on the
side of her head, so that she’s hard o’ hearing in her right ear. You’ll please
to sit by her on the left, and then she can hear well enough. Jane Cann is my
cousin, and I’d like to do her a good turn, and as she’s maybe about seven
years older than you, you need not fear a long family.”
“Preserve me!” gasped the
schoolmaster.
“I’ll set you a stool on her left
side, and give her a high chair, then you’ll be about on a level with her
hearing ear.”
“I—I am going out to tea,” said
Bramber, snatching up his hat to fly the cottage; but was arrested at the door
by a burly farmer who entered.
“This is Mr. Prowse of Wonnacot,”
said the widow to Bramber. Then to the farmer, “This, sir, is the new teacher,
who is going to lodge with me.”
“I’ve heard of him from
Southcott,” said Prowse. “I’ve been told you play the fiddle. Perhaps you know
also how to finger the pianer. My girls, Susanna and Eliza, are tremendously
eager to learn the pianer, and I thought that after school hours you might drop
in at my little place—Wonnacot—and give the young ladies lessons. I’d take it
as a favour, and as I am a not inconsiderable subscriber to the National
School, and”—
The widow, in a tone of
admiration, threw in an aside to Bramber—“He subscribes half a sovereign.”
The farmer inflated his chest,
smiled, raised himself in his boots, and, thrusting his right hand into his
pocket, rattled some money. He had heard the aside, as it was intended that he
should.
“I may say,” continued Mr.
Prowse, “that I am a bulwark and a buttress of the National School, and as such
I lay claim to the services of the teacher; and if, after hours, he can hop
over to my little place and give my girls an hour three times a week, then”—he
raised his chin and smiled down on the schoolmaster—“then I shall not begrudge
my subscription.”
“It is true,” said Bramber, “that
I can play a little on the piano, but—I am not sure that I am competent to give
lessons. Moreover, I doubt if I shall have the time at my disposal. I am still
young, and must prosecute my studies.”
“If you expect to remain here in
comfort,” said the farmer testily, “you’ll have to do what you are asked. You
don’t expect me to subscribe to the National School and get no advantage out of
it?”
Thus it was—some made demands on
the time, some on the purse, and others desired to dispose of the person of the
new-comer.
To escape meeting the crooked
sewing-mistress, deaf of the right ear, Walter ran into the street, and walked
through the village.
A labourer came up to him.
“I want a word with you, Mr.
Schoolmaister,” said he. “My boy goes to the National School, and I gives
you fair warning, if you touches him with your hand or a stick, I’ll have the
law of you.”
“But suppose he be disobedient,
rude, disorderly?”
“My boy is not to be punished. He
is well enough if let alone.”
“But—do you send him to school to
be let alone?”
“I send him to school to be out
of the way when my missus is washing or doing needlework.”
A little farther on his way, a
woman arrested Walter Bramber, and said, “You be the new teacher, be you not?
Please, I’ve five childer in your school and three at home. Some of the scholars
bain’t clean as they should be. I can’t have my childer come home bringing with
them what they oughtn’t, and never carried to school from my house. So will’y,
now, just see to ’em every day, as they be all right, afore you let ’em leave
school, and I’ll thank’y for it kindly.”
Presently a mason returning from
his work saluted Bramber.
“Look here, schoolmaister! I want
you to take special pains wi’ my children and get ’em on like blazes. If they
don’t seem to get forward in a week or two, I shall take ’em away and send them
to Mr. Puddicombe, who is going to open a private school.”
Then another man came up, halted,
and, catching hold of the lappet of Bramber’s coat, said, “My name is Tooker.
I’m not a churchman, but I have several children at your school. I won’t have
them taught the Church Catechism. I’m a Particular Baptist, and I won’t
have no childer of mine taught to say what their godfather and godmother
promised and vowed for them—for they ain’t had no godfathers nor godmothers,
and ain’t a-going to have none. You can’t mistake my childer. One has got a red
head, another is yaller, and the third is a sort of whitey-brown—and has
sunspots, and a mole between the shoulder-blades, and the boy never had no
toe-nails. So mind—no catechism for them.”
“And there is something,” said
again another, “upon which I want to lay down what I think. I wish you to teach
readin’ and writin’ in a rational manner.”
“I hope to do that.”
“Ah! but you’ve been too much at
college, and crammed wi’ book-larnin’. Why should you teach childer, and fret
their little heads about the H, when it’s a thing of no concern whatever. Mr.
Puddicombe, he was the reasonable man. Sez he, ‘Raisin puddin’ is good, and
duffy puddin’ wi’out raisins is good—so is it with the English language—it’s
good all round, and the H’s are just the raisins; you can put ’em in or leave
’em out as you pleases, and stick ’em in by the scores or just a sprinklin’,
and it’s no odds—it’s good anyways.’ Them’s the principles of spellin’ I expect
my little ones to larn at your school.”
“And I hopes, Mr. Teacher,” said
another sententiously, “as you’ll never forget that it is not enough to teach
the children readin’, writing, and ’rithmetic. There is something more”—
“There is a great deal
more—geography, history, the Elements”—
“There is something above all
that, and you should make it the first thing, and readin’ and the rest after.”
“What’s that?”
“Temperance—teetotal principles.”
Bramber walked on. His
discouragement was becoming greater at every moment.
As he passed the Lamb and Flag,
he was greeted by a hideous bray of instruments both stringed and brazen. This
outburst was followed by a marvellous coruscation of instrumental music, races,
leaps, a helter-skelter of fiddles, flutes, cornets, bass-viol, now together,
more often running ahead or falling behind each other, then one a-pickaback on
the rest.
At the door of the public-house
stood Mr. Jonas Southcott with his face radiant.
“Well, Mr. Schoolmaister!”
shouted he; “what do you think of this? You’ve never heard such moosic before,
I warrant. That is what I call moosic of the spears! It’s Jackson’s ‘Tee-dum.’”
CHAPTER XII
Unwilling to return to his
lodgings, where in vain the net was spread in his sight, Bramber walked towards
Coombe Cellars. There for sixpence he could have his tea—cockles, winkles, and
presumably bread and butter.
There also would he see that
pale-faced girl with the large violet-blue eyes, which had been fixed on him
with so much sympathy. Disappointed in proportion to the sanguineness of his
expectations, Walter felt that he needed some relief from his discouragement, a
word from some one who could understand him. On that day he had looked straight
into many eyes, into beaming eyes, into irises that were dull with no speech in
them, into stupid eyes, into boastful, into defiant, into insolent eyes.
Those of his landlady were clear
as crystal, and he could see to their bottom; but what he saw there was but the
agglomeration of common details of everyday life—so many loaves per week, a
pint of milk, a beefsteak or mutton chop for supper, coals at so much a bushel,
so much cleaning, so much washing. As in a revolving slide in a magic lantern,
the same figures, the same trees, the same houses, reappear in endless
iteration; so would it be with the eyes of the landlady, week by week, year by
year, till those eyes closed in death; nought else would be revealed in their
shadows but loaves and milk, and coals and washing, over and over and over
again. There are eyes that are stony and have no depth in them; such were those
of Zerah. Others have profundity, but are treacherous; such were those of
Pasco. In the two glimpses into the eyes of the pale girl, whose name he did
not know, Bramber had seen depths that seemed unfathomable; wells which had
their sources in the heart, deeps full of mystery and promise.
The evening might have been one
in summer. A light east wind was playing; the sky was clear. The sun had been hot
all day. Marsh marigolds blazed at the water brim, reflecting their golden
faces in the tide. The orchards were sheeted with daffodils. The evening sky
was blue shot with primrose, and every hue was mirrored in the water.
Bramber asked to have his tea out
of doors on the little platform above the water, and Mrs. Pepperill bade Kate
attend on the schoolmaster, and remain on the terrace so as to be ready to
bring him anything he required; and, in the event of his desiring company, to
be present to converse with him. She herself was engaged, and could not give
him her attention.
The evening was so warm, so
balmy, that it could do the convalescent no harm to sit outside the house. Kate
took her needlework and planted herself on the low wall above the water, one
foot in a white stocking and neat shoe touching the gravel. She was at some
distance from the schoolmaster, who opened a book and read whilst taking his
tea. He did not, apparently, require her society, and she had no thought of
forcing herself on him.
Yet, occasionally, unobserved by
her, Bramber looked her way. Behind her was an orchard-sweep golden with
daffodils, and the slant setting sun, shooting down a gap in the hills, kindled
the whole multitude of flower-heads into a blaze of wavering sunfire. Kate sat,
a dark figure against this luminous background, but her plum-coloured kerchief,
bound round her throat and tied across her breast, was wondrous in contrast
with the brilliant flowers.
Occasionally, moreover, Kate, who
long looked at the flower carpet which by its radiance threw a golden light
into her face, turned her head to see if the schoolmaster needed more milk or
butter; and then her eyes rested on the book he held with much the same greed
with which a child fastens its eyes on sweets and a miser on gold.
The setting sun had fired glass
windows on the opposite side of the estuary, and it flashed in every ripple
running in from the sea.
Kate wore a little bunch of
celandines in her bosom, pinned into the purple kerchief. The flowers were open
through the warmth of their position, and when she stooped and a streak of
sunlight fell on them and filled their cups, they sent a golden sheen over her
chin. The girl was looking dreamily with turned head at the sheet of blazing
daffodils, drinking in the beauty of the scene, and sighing, she knew not
why, when she was startled to hear a voice at her ear, and, looking round, saw
the schoolmaster.
“Are you admiring the daffodils?”
he asked.
“Yes,” answered Kate, too shy,
too surprised to say more.
“And I,” said he, “I also have
been looking at them; and then I turned to familiar lines in Wordsworth, the
poet I am reading. Do you know them?”
“About lent-lilies? I know
nothing.”
“Listen.”
Then Bramber read—
“I wandered lonely as a cloud
That floats on high o’er vales and hills,
When all at once I saw a crowd,
A host of golden daffodils;
Beside the lake, beneath the trees,
Fluttering and dancing in the breeze.
Continuous as the stars that shine
And twinkle in the Milky Way,
They stretched in never-ending line
Along the margin of a bay:
Ten thousand saw I at a glance,
Tossing their heads in sprightly dance.
The waves beside them danced; but they
Outdid the sparkling waves in glee:—
A poet could not but be gay,
In such a jocund company:
I gazed—and gazed—but little thought
What wealth the show to me had brought:
For oft when on my couch I lie
In vacant or in pensive mood,
They flash upon that inward eye
Which is the bliss of solitude,
And then my heart with pleasure fills,
And dances with the daffodils.”
Kate’s dark blue eyes were fixed
with intensity on the reader’s face. Then they became full to overflowing.
“Why,” exclaimed Bramber, “you
are crying!”
“It is so true, it is so
beautiful,” she said, and her voice shook; and as she spoke the tears ran down
her white cheeks. “How did he who wrote that know about my illness, and that I
was thinking about, and troubled about, the daffodils when I was in my fever?
It is all true”; she put her hands to her bosom; “I feel it—I cannot bear it.”
Walter Bramber paused in
surprise. He was himself a passionate lover of nature, of flowers, and he was
fond of the words of the poet of nature—words that touched deep chords in his
spirit. But here was a pale, reserved girl, to whom the words of the poet appealed
with even greater force than to himself.
“Are you fond of poetry?” he
asked.
She hesitated, and slightly
coloured before answering.
“I do not know. Father sings a
song or two. There are words, they rhyme, and they are set to a tune, and
sometimes a good tune helps along bad words; but I never before heard words
that had the music in themselves and wanted nothing to carry them along as on
the wings of a bird. When you read that to me, it was just as though I heard
what I had felt in my heart over and over again, and had never found how I
could put it.”
“Do you know why these flowers
are called daffodils?”
She turned her solemn eyes on him
again.
“Because they are daffodils; why
else?”
“I suppose,” said Bramber, “when
the Normans came to England, they brought these yellow flowers with them, and
with the flowers the name by which they had known them in Normandy—Fleurs d’Avril, which means April flowers.”
“They do come in April, but also in
March, and this year the weather has been warm, and everything is advanced.”
“So,” continued Bramber, “when
the English tried to pronounce the French name, Fleurs d’Avril, they made daverils, and then
slid away into further difference, and settled down on daffodils. Do you know
about the Conquest by the Normans?”
Kate shook her head sadly.
“I know nothing—nothing at all.”
Then, after a pause, she asked timidly, “Will you be very good and kind, and repeat
those verses, and let me learn them by heart? Oh,” she gasped, and expanded,
and clasped her hands, “it would be such a joy to me! and I could repeat them
for ever and ever, and be happy.”
“I shall be delighted.”
Kate planted herself on one of
the benches by the table, leaned her chin in her hands, and listened to each
line of the poem with concentrated attention. One or two words she did not
understand, and Bramber explained their meaning to her. When the piece had been
read over slowly, she said—
“May I try? Do you mind? I think
I know it.”
Then she recited the poem with
perfect accuracy.
“You are quick at learning,” said
Bramber. “I hope I may find my pupils in the National School as eager to
acquire and as ready to apprehend.”
“I never heard words like these
before,” said Kate.
“May I tell you what they are
like to me?”
“Certainly.”
“They are like lightning on a
still night, without rain, without thunder. The heavens are open and there is
light—that is all. Is there more in that book?”
“A great deal,” answered the
young man; and, pointing to the celandines in Kate’s bosom, said, “The poet has
something to say about these flowers.”
“What, buttercups?”
“They are not buttercups. Take
them out from where they are pinned. I will teach you a lesson—how to
distinguish sorts.”
As the girl removed the bunch and
placed it on the table, he said, “Do you see the petals? The golden leaves of
the flower are called petals. They are pointed. Now, remember, a buttercup has
rounded petals.”
“You are right, and they come out
later. They are more like little drunkards.”
“Drunkards? What do you mean?”
“The large golden cups that grow
by the water’s edge—these we call drunkards, but they drink only water.”
“You mean the marsh marigold.”
“Perhaps so, but it is very
different from the marigold of the garden. The leaves”—
Bramber laughed. “Now you are
going to teach me to distinguish. You are quite right—that water-drinker
is not a marigold at all. But country people give it that name because it is
the great golden flower that blooms at or about Lady Day, and the lady is the
Virgin Mary. Now consider. The celandine has sharply-pointed petals. Do you see
the difference between them and those of the golden water-drinker?”
“I see this clearly now.”
“He who wrote those verses about
the daffodils has written three poems on the celandine.”
“What! on these little flowers?”
Kate coloured with delight and
surprise.
“Yes, and very beautiful they
are. I will reserve them for another day. You have enough to think about in the
lines on the daffodils.”
“How did the man who wrote them
know of my illness, and how I dreamed and troubled about the daffodils?”
“He knew nothing of you.”
“He must have done so. He says he
was lonely as a cloud, and I am Kitty Alone.”
“Is that your name?”
“They call me so because I have
no companions and no friends, and because”—She checked herself and hung her
head.
“But you have relatives.”
“Yes—my father and Aunt Zerah.
But for all that I am alone. They are grown big and old, and so of course
cannot understand me—a child. And at school I didn’t have friends. Then
the man must have been here, for he says—
‘Beside the lake, beneath the trees,
Fluttering and dancing in the breeze
Continuous as the stars that shine
And twinkle in the Milky Way,
They stretched in never-ending line
Along the margin of a bay.’
There they are—‘in never-ending
line.’”
“There are daffodils elsewhere,
as there are solitary spirits elsewhere than in this little being”—and Walter
lightly touched the girl’s brow.
Both were silent for a minute.
Presently Kate said, “When I was looking at the daffodils, as the sun was on
them, they blazed in at my eyes and I was full of light, and now those
beautiful words are like the sun on the flowers that I shall carry away with
me, and as I lie in bed in the dark I shall think of them, and the golden light
will fill my room and fill my heart—
‘Flashing upon that inward eye,
Which is the bliss of solitude.’
That is true of the inward eye.
You can see more with that than with the real eye. The man was a prophet. He
knew and wrote of things that are not known or are not talked about in the
world.”
“So they call you Kitty Alone.
You did not give me the second reason. What is that reason?”
The girl looked embarrassed.
“You will laugh at me.”
“Indeed I will not,” answered
Bramber earnestly.
She still hesitated.
“You fear me? Surely you can
trust me.”
“You are so good—indeed I can.
You speak to me as does no one else, and that is just why I do not wish to
appear ridiculous in your eyes.”
“That you never will.”
Then she said, blushing and
hanging her head, “It is all along of a song my father sings.”
“What song is that?”
“It is some silly nonsense about
a frog that lived in a well—and the burden is—‘Kitty Alone’—and then ‘Kitty
Alone and I.'”
“Sing me the words.”
She did as requested.
“The air is pleasant and very
quaint. It deserves better words. Will you remain here whilst I run for my
violin?”
“Yes, unless my aunt calls me
within.”
Walter Bramber hastened to his
lodgings, and brought away his cherished instrument. He made the girl sing over
a few verses of the song, and then struck in with the violin.
He speedily caught the melody,
and played it, then went off into variations, returning anon to the pleasant
theme, and Kate listened in surprise and admiration. Never before had she
thought that there was much of air, or of grace and delicacy in the tune as
sung by her father, and cast jeeringly at her in scraps by the youths of
Coombe-in-Teignhead. Zerah looked out at the door and summoned her niece.
Kate started as from a dream.
“My bunch of flowers,” she said.
Bramber had secured the
celandines.
CHAPTER XIII
Kate entered the house, at the
summons of her aunt, and found that John Pooke was within, standing with his
hat in his hand, in front of him, twirling it about and playing with the string
that served to contract the lining band.
“I am so glad to see that you are
well, Kitty.”
Kate thanked him. She was not a
little vexed at being called away from conversation with the schoolmaster,
whose talk was so unlike that of any other man she had met. The rector she knew
and loved, but she was before him as a scholar to be instructed in spiritual
concerns, and their conversation never turned on such matters as had been
mooted between her and the schoolmaster. For a little while she had been
translated into a new sphere, and had heard words of another order to those
that had hitherto met her ears. Now she was brought back into the world of
commonplace, and could not at once recover herself and accommodate herself to
it. This made her shy and silent. Pooke also was shy, but he was awkward to
boot.
“Have you nothing to say to me,
Kate?” he asked in suppliant tone.
“Indeed, I thank you many times,
Jan, for inquiring about me when I was ill. Now, as you see, I am myself
again.”
“I was the cause of your
illness.”
“No indeed, no blame attaches to
you. We will not talk of blame—there is none.”
“Are you going to Ashburton Fair
on Tuesday?”
“I do not know.”
“Yes, you do,” threw in Aunt Zerah;
then to John Pooke, “She is going to the moor to her father for a change. It is
her father’s wish, so that she may be soon strong again. He will meet her at
Ashburton at the fair, if we can get her so far.”
“I am going to the fair,” said
Pooke eagerly. “That is to say, sister Sue and I be going together there. The
young man to whom she is about to be married lives at Ashburton, and will have
it that she goes. There is room for a third in our trap. I should so much like
to take you—I mean, sister Sue would wish it, if you would favour me—I mean
sister Sue.”
“Thank you again, Jan, for
another kindness,” said the girl, “but I shall be driven to Ashburton by my
uncle. I really had not considered that the fair was on Tuesday.”
“Your uncle can spare you,” thrust
in Zerah; “and if Jan Pooke is so civil as to invite you to go in his
conveyance, it is only proper you should accept.”
“But, aunt,” said Kate, slightly
colouring, “my father has settled that I am to go with Uncle Pasco, and I do
not like”—
“Oh, so long as you are got to
Ashburton, it doesn’t matter who takes you,” interrupted Zerah.
“If it does not matter,” said
Kate, “then let me hold to my father’s arrangement.”
“That is not kind to me—I mean to
sister Sue,” said Pooke dolefully.
“I intend no unkindness,”
answered the girl, “but when my father has made a plan, I do not like to break
it even in little matters.”
The young man twirled his hat
about, and pulled out the string from the band. He paused, looked ashamed, and
said, “You don’t choose to go with me, that is the long and the short of it.
Your aunt will excuse you from going with Pasco Pepperill.”
“Do not tease me, Jan,” pleaded
Kate, confused and unhappy. She was well aware that there had been village talk
about her having been in the boat with Jan, that her aunt was desirous of
thrusting her upon him. With maidenly reserve she shrank from his proposal,
lest by riding in the trap with him some colour might be given to the
suspicions entertained in the village, and some food should be supplied to the
gossips.
The lad went to the window, and
looked out on the little platform with moody eyes.
“Why,” said he, “there is that
new schoolmaster there.” He stood watching him. “He’s a noodle. What do’y think
he is about? He has got three or four faded buttercups, and he is putting them
between the leaves of his note-book, just as though there was something
wonderful in them; just as if they were the rarest flowers in the world. I
always thought he was a fool—now I know it.”
Kate winced.
“I say,” pursued Jan, “have you
heard about him and Jackson’s ‘Tee-dum’? The landlord went to him civil-like,
and invited him to join the choir. He bragged about his violin as if he could
play finer than anyone hereabouts. But when the landlord told him our chaps
could play Jackson’s ‘Tee-dum,’ he ran away. I reckon Jackson’s ‘Tee-dum’ is a
piece to find out the corners of a man. He daren’t face it. Kitty, if you won’t
come with me to the fair, I swear I’ll offer the odd seat to Rose Ash.”
Then he left the house.
Kate attempted to fly, for she
knew what was coming, but was arrested by her aunt, who grasped her by the
shoulders.
“You little fool!” she said.
“Don’t you see what may come of this if you manage well, or let me manage for
you? Jan Tottle came here every day to inquire when you were ill, and now you
let him slip between your fingers and into the hands of that designing Rose. He
is a ball that has come to you, and you toss it to her. Don’t think she is fool
enough to toss him back to you. When she has him she will close her fingers on
him. What is going to become of you, I’d like to know, that you should act like
this? Do not reckon on anything your father will bring you; or on your uncle
either. One is helping the other down the road to ruin, and we may all be
nearer the poorhouse than you imagine.”
She let go her hand, for Bramber
came in, and asked what he had to pay.
“Sixpence,” answered Zerah, “and
what you like to the little maid. I reckon she’ll take a ha’penny.”
Kate’s head fell, covered with
shame, and she thrust her hands behind her back.
Walter paid Mrs. Pepperill, and
said, without looking at Kate, “The little maid and I understand each other,
and the account between us is settled.”
“Now look here,” said Zerah,
allowing her niece to escape, and laying hold of the young man, “I want a word
with you, Mr. Schoolmaster. My husband has let you go through his accounts. I
reckon he’d got that muddled himself, he didn’t know his way out, and thought
you’d have led him, as well as Jack-o’-lantern leads out of a bog. The light is
good enough, but when the mire is there, what can the light do but show it? It
can’t dry it up. If it weren’t for the cockles and coffee as I get a few
sixpences by, I reckon we’d have been stogged (mired) long ago. But Pasco, he
has the idea that he’s a man of business and can manage a thousand affairs, and
as ill-luck will have it, that brother o’ mine feeds his fancies wi’ fresh
meat. Now I want you to tell me exactly what you found in his books.”
“I am not justified in speaking
of Mr. Pepperill’s private affairs.”
“What! not to his wife?”
“Not to anyone. I was taken into
confidence.”
“Bless you! he couldn’t help
himself. Set a man as don’t know nothing about machinery to manage an
engine, and he’ll get it all to pieces in no time. Pasco knows nothing
about business, and there he is trying to run coal stores, wool, timber—all
kinds o’ things. I know what it will come to, though you keep mum.”
To escape further questioning,
Bramber left Coombe Cellars, and walked towards the village.
The school was closed for a week.
Some painting and plastering had to be done in it before he could begin his
duties. It was as well, he thought; it allowed him time to find his bearings,
to get to understand something of the people amongst whom he was to be settled,
and whose children he was to instruct.
As Bramber walked in the dusk, he
encountered the rector, Mr. Fielding, who stopped him.
“Are you going indoors?” asked
the parson; “or have you leisure and inclination for a stroll?”
“You do me an honour, sir; I
shall be proud.”
“Let us walk by the water-side.
This is a beautiful hour—neither night nor day—something of one, something of
the other, like life. And who can say of the twilight in which he walks whether
it will broaden into perfect day or deepen into utter night.”
The rector took the young man’s
arm.
Mr. Fielding belonged to a type
that has completely disappeared; peculiar to its time and necessarily
transitory. He belonged to that school of Churchmen which had been founded by
Newman and Keble; of men cultured, scholarly, refined in thought, steeped in
idealism, unconsciously affected, aiming at what was impossible,—at
least, fully to achieve,—and not knowing practicable methods, not able to
distinguish proportion in what they sought after, ready to contend to death
equally for trifles as for principles.
Mr. Fielding wore tall white
collars and a white tie, a black dress coat and open black waistcoat. His hat
was usually at the back of his head, and he walked with his head bent forwards
and his shoulder against the wall—a trick caught and copied from Newman, caught
when first under his influence, and now unconsciously followed.
Mr. Fielding was unmarried, a
quiet, studious man, courteous to all, understood by none.
They walked together a little way,
and talked on desultory matters. Then Walter Bramber asked the rector, “Would
you mind telling me, sir, where my predecessor got into trouble? Mr. Pepperill
says it was at Waterloo.”
“Waterloo? dear me, no; it was at
Wellington.”
“I knew it could not be at
Waterloo, but he insisted on it, and that it was in England.”
“There was, you see, a connection
of ideas. There is always that, in the worst blunders. Did you correct him?”
“Yes; I said Waterloo was not in
England.”
“You should have let it pass,
till you knew how to enlighten him as to where the place really was. Never show
a man he is wrong till you can show him how he can be right. Also, never let a
man see you are pulling him out of a ditch, always let him think he is
scrambling out of it himself. A man’s self-respect is his best governing
motive, and should not be wounded.”
They paced along together a
little way.
“You are a young man,” said the
rector, “and a young man is sanguine.” He paused, and walked on without saying
anything for a minute, then he added, “I was sanguine once. That arises from
confidence in one’s self, and confidence in one’s cause, and confidence in
mankind. You have a noble cause—the priest and the schoolmaster have the
greatest of missions: to educate what is highest in man, spirit and intellect.
You have no reason to be shaken by any doubt, to feel any hesitation in
adhesion to the cause of education. ‘Let there be light!’ was the first word
God spake. There is the keynote of creation, the moral law laid down for the
whole intelligent world. We walk in the twilight that we know is brightening
into day.”
He paused again; then after a
dozen paces he proceeded, “You have confidence in yourself. You have
enthusiasm, you have ability, you know what you have to teach, and you long to
impart to others what you value yourself. Is it not so?”
“It is so indeed.”
“Discouragement will come, and it
is my duty to prepare you for it. You have confidence in human nature. You
think all will be as eager to drink in instruction as you are eager to dispense
it. You may be mistaken, and will be disappointed. It has taken me some years,
Mr. Bramber, to learn a fact which I will communicate to you, as a caution
against losing heart. You will remember that when the sower went forth to sow,
though all his seed was good, yet only one-fourth part came to anything.
We must work for the work’s sake, and not for results. In your patience possess
ye your souls. That is one of the hardest of lessons to acquire.”
“I will try not to expect too
much.”
“Expect nothing. Look to the
work, and the work only. One sows, another reaps, a third grinds, a fourth
bakes, but it is the fifth who eats the loaf and tastes how good it is. Did you
ever hear what Mme. de Maintenon said of the carps, that had been transferred
to the marble basins of Marly, in which they died? ‘Ah!’ said she, ‘they are
like me, they regret their native mud.’ You will find that your pupils do not
want to be translated to purer fountains, that in them there is a hankering
after their native ignorance. That there will be little receptiveness, no
enthusiasm after the light, no hunger after the bread of the Spirit—that is
what you must be prepared to find. I have found it so, and am now content with
the smallest achievements—to make them take a few crumbs from my palm, to
accept the tiniest ray let into their clouded minds. Be content to do your
work, and do not be asking for results. Do your duty, leave results to another
day and to the reapers. You and I are the humble sowers, enough for us to know
that, but for us, there would be no golden harvest which we shall not see.”
The rector withdrew his hand from
the arm of Bramber.
“There is a saying, ‘Except ye be
as little children’—You know the rest. What does that mean? Not the simplicity
of children—simplicity springs out of inexperience; not the
innocence—which arises from ignorance—but the inquisitiveness of the child,
which is its characteristic. The child asks questions, it wants to know
everything, often asking what it is inconvenient to answer. Mr. Bramber, unless
we have this spirit of inquiry, we cannot enter into any kingdom above that of
animal life. There is the intellectual kingdom, and when there is eagerness to
know, then there is advance into that realm, and you will be the great prophet
and mystagogue who will lead the young of this village into that kingdom. Then,
secondly, there is the spiritual kingdom, but of that I will not now speak. I
hope you will find some pupils apt to learn, but the many will, I fear, be
listless.”
“A single swallow does not make a
summer,” said the schoolmaster; “but I have already met with one here who
verily hungers and thirsts after knowledge.”
“Ah!” Mr. Fielding looked round,
and his face lightened. “You have met—talked to Kitty.”
“Yes, sir; she is full of
eagerness.”
“Oh that we had many other minds
as active! Alas! alas! I fear in that she is, as they call her, Kitty Alone.”
CHAPTER XIV
“Heigh! schoolmaister!” Pasco
Pepperill shouted from his tax-cart to Walter Bramber, who was walking along
the road collecting wild-flowers—the earliest of the year—that showed in a
sheltered hedge.
In the trap with Pasco was Kate.
“I say, schoolmaister,” said
Pepperill, reining in his grey cob, “be you inclined for a drive? I’m off to
Ashburton Fair, where I may have business. You have not yet seen much of our
country. Jump up! She”—he indicated Kate with a jerk of his chin—“she can squat
behind.”
The day was lovely, the prospect
of a drive engaging; but Bramber hesitated about dislodging Kate, who had,
however, immediately begun to transfer herself from the seat beside her uncle
to the place behind.
“That is not fair nor right,”
said the young man. “Let her keep her place, and let me accommodate myself in
the rear.”
“Not a bit! not a bit!” exclaimed
Pepperill. “I’ve asked you for company’s sake.”
“But you have the best company in
your niece.”
“She!”—Pasco uttered a
contemptuous sniff,—“she is no company. She either sits as a log or pesters one
with questions. What do you think she has just asked of me?” Imitating Kate’s
voice, he said, “Uncle, why have horses so many hairs in their ears? Why the
dowse does it matter whether horses have hair in their ears or not? Now,
schoolmaister, get up in front.”
Bramber still objected.
“Oh, nonsense!” said Pasco; “I’m
taking you up so as to be freed from these questions. It is catechising, or
nothing at all.”
Bramber looked uneasily at Kate’s
face, but her countenance was unmoved; she was accustomed to contemptuous
treatment. She raised her timid eyes to Walter, and he said hastily, with some
earnestness—
“You and I, Mr. Pepperill, form
very different opinions of what entertainment is. When I was having tea at your
house, she and I had plenty to say to each other. I found her full of
interest”—
“In what?” sneered the uncle.
“Daffodils.”
“Oh, daffodils!” he laughed. “Any
ass likes daffodils.”
“Pardon me,” answered Bramber
warmly; “the ass and animals of like nature reject or pass them by unnoticed.”
“Well, I care not. Get up if you
are coming with me. I’ll show you a better sight than daffodils, and something
worthier of conversation.”
Pasco took up the schoolmaster,
not solely for his own entertainment, but because he was somewhat uneasy
at having let him into the secrets of his affairs. In his perplexity and inability
to balance his accounts, he had grasped at the chance offered by the advent of
Bramber; but now he feared he had been too confiding, and that the young man
might blab what he had seen. It was requisite, or advisable, that he should
disabuse his mind of any unfavourable impression that might have been received
from the perusal of his accounts; and, like a stupid, conceited man, he thought
that he could best effect this by ostentation and boastfulness.
In his pride, Pepperill would not
admit that his circumstances were involved, though an uneasy feeling lay as a
sediment at the bottom of his heart, assuring him that there was trouble in
store.
“Why do horses have hair in their
ears?” said Bramber on taking his seat, turning to the girl in the back of the
carriage. “I will tell you why. If a cockchafer or an earwig were to get into
your little pink shell, in a minute up would go the finger in protection of the
organ, and to relieve you of the intruder. A horse cannot put up his hoof to
clear his ear, therefore he is provided with a natural strainer, which will
guard him from being irritated, and perhaps injured, by anything penetrating
where it should not.”
“Thank you,” said Kate. “There is
a reason for everything.”
“You don’t happen to know
anything about business?” asked Pepperill, impatient to engross the
conversation. “I mean—commercial business.”
“My mother kept a shop—in quite a
small way.”
“Ah! in quite a small way. I don’t mean anything in a small way,” said Pasco, swelling. “I refer to buying in gross and
retailing coal, wool, hides, bark, timber. That’s my line. I do nothing myself
in a small way—still, I can understand there are people who do.”
Pasco nodded to right and left as
he drove along, in return to salutations he received from men driving cattle,
from farmers ambling on their cobs.
“You observe,” said Pepperill,
“I’m pretty well known and respected.”
Presently he drew up at a wayside
inn.
“I like to step into these
publics,” said he apologetically; “not that I’m a man as takes nips—but one
meets one’s fellows; it is all in the way of business; one hears of bargains.
There is more dealing done over a tavern table than in a market-place. I’ll be
with you shortly—unless you will join me in a glass inside. Kitty will mind the
cob.”
“Thank you; I will await you
here, and keep Kitty company.”
“Ah, you will never be popular as
was Puddicombe, unless you take your glass!”
Then Pepperill entered the house.
Bramber turned in his seat, and
met Kate’s earnest blue eyes. There was question in them.
“Now,” said he, “I know your head
is full of notes of interrogation.”
“I do not understand you.”
“Your uncle and others do not
like to be questioned. I am a schoolmaster. I delight in answering
questions and communicating information. Put to me any queries you like, and as
many as you like, and I will do my best to satisfy you.”
“Why do some stars twinkle and
others do not?” asked Kate at once. This difficulty had been troubling her mind
ever since the night in the boat.
“Planets do not twinkle.”
“What are planets?”
“Worlds on high. Stars that flash
are suns that illumine worlds. They glitter with their own light; planets shine
with borrowed, reflected light.”
“The planets are worlds?”
“Yes.”
“Very tiny ones?”
“Not at all. Some are far larger
than our globe. They circle round our sun.”
Kate looked the young man
steadily in the face. The thought was too great, too awful, to be received at
once. She supposed he was joking. But his countenance was an assurance to her
that he spoke the truth.
“Oh,” said she, with a long
breath, “what it is to know!”
“There is no higher pleasure.”
“Nothing gives me greater joy
than to learn.”
“But did you not get taught such
simple truths as this in school?” asked Bramber.
“Mr. Puddicombe did not tell us much,”
answered Kate. “We learned our letters and to cypher—nothing more.”
“I am glad you can read,” said
Bramber.
“I can read, but I have no books.
It is like having thirst and no water. I have learned how to walk, but may not
use my feet. I am always like one who is hungry; I want to know about this, and
about that, and I get no answer. Why are there tides? Why are some higher than
others? What becomes of the stars by day?”
“The matter of the tides is
beyond you. The stars are in the sky still, but, owing to the blaze of the sun
by day, you cannot discern their lesser glories. If, however, you were at the
bottom of a well, you would be able, on looking up, to see the stars, pale,
indeed, but distinctly visible, in the heavens.”
“I should love to go down a well,
and see that with my own eyes.”
“I wish—oh, I wish you were
coming to school!”
Kate heaved a sigh.
“But as you cannot come to me,”
said Walter, “I shall have to come to you.”
Kate shook her head. “That means
sixpence a time in cockles and tea. It would ruin you.”
“Well, I will lend you books.”
“Mr. Fielding once did that, but
Aunt Zerah was angry, and sent them back to the Rectory. She said that she did
not want me to be a scholar, and have all kinds of book nonsense put into my
head. I was to be a maid-of-all-work.”
Bramber did not speak. He was
very sorry for the girl, craving for knowledge, gasping for the very air in
which her spirit could live—and denied it. Then he said, pointing to the
board above the inn-door—
“Do you notice the tavern sign,
Kitty?”
“Yes—‘The Rising Sun.’”
“Recently repainted and gilt.
Now, I will repeat to you the lines I withheld the other day concerning the
celandine; that is to say, such as I remember:
‘I have not a doubt but he
Whosoe’er the man might be,
Who, the first, with painted rays,
(Workman worthy to be sainted,)
Set the signboard in a blaze,
When the risen sun he painted,
Took the fancy from a glance
At thy glittering countenance.’”
Then a rattle of wheels and a tramp
of horse’s hoofs. A dogcart was approaching rapidly. As it came near, the
driver reined in and drew up alongside.
Kate recognised John Pooke, with
Rose Ash at his side; behind, clinging uncomfortably to the back rail, was
Susan Pooke. The young man flourished his whip and saluted Kate joyously.
“We shall meet at the fair. I
shall await you, Kitty.”
Then he lashed the horse, and
whirled away. Kate saw Rose’s face turned towards her, wearing a dissatisfied
frown.
“Who are those?” asked Walter,
with a little twinge of displeasure in his heart.
“The young man is Jan Pooke, he
whose rick was burned; and with him is Rose Ash, the prettiest girl in
all Coombe. Jan’s father has the orchard in which are the daffodils. It
belonged to uncle. Uncle had a bit of farm, but he gave it up—sold it—to devote
himself more to business. Behind, in the dogcart, is Susan Pooke. She is going
to be married at Easter to someone in Ashburton.”
Then, wiping his lips and
buttoning his pockets, Pasco came from the tavern. He mounted to his place and
resumed the reins and whip.
“Well,” said he, “got some talk
out of the girl?—foolery—rank foolery, I’ll swear. Never heard her say anything
sensible; but you and I will have a good conversation as we drive along. We
will talk about bullocks.”
CHAPTER XV
Walter Bramber sprang from his
seat beside Pasco, on the latter drawing up outside the inn at Ashburton, and
ran to the back of the tax-cart that he might assist Kate to descend. There was
no step at the back. He held up his arms to receive her; she was standing
preparing to spring.
As he looked up, he exclaimed,
“They are planets!”
“What are planets?”
“Those blue orbs—their light is
so still and true.”
Then he caught her as she sprang,
glad to cover her confusion. A compliment was something to which Kate was
wholly unaccustomed, and one startled and shamed her.
“Now, whither?” he asked.
“To my father.”
“But where is he?”
“I do not know.”
“Come, come!” said Pepperill, who
had consigned the reins to the ostler. “I want you, schoolmaster; I cannot let
you go fairing yet. I have business on my hands and desire your presence.
Afterwards, if you will, and when we have got rid of Kate, I’ll find you some
one more agreeable with whom you can go and see the shows.”
“But, in the meanwhile, who is to
take care of her?” asked Bramber.
“I will do that,” said John
Pooke, who came up, elbowing his way through the crowd. “Here are several of us
Coombe-in-Teignhead folk: there is sister Sue, but she is off with her
sweetheart; and here is Rose Ash, and here is Noah Flood.”
There was no help for it; much to
his disappointment. Bramber had to relinquish Kate, and accompany her uncle
into the market.
Kate hesitated about going with
John Pooke, but knew not what else to do. Her uncle shook her off, concerned
himself no more about her, and carried the schoolmaster with him. Alone she was
afraid to remain. A shy girl, unwont to be in a crowd; the noise of the fair,
the shouts of chapmen, the objurgations of drovers sending their cattle through
the thronged street, the braying of horns and beating of drums outside the
shows, the hum of many voices, the incessant shifting of groups, combined to
bewilder and alarm her. But she did not like to attach herself to Jan Pooke’s
party. Tongues had already been set a-wagging relative to herself and the young
man. The adventure in the boat, followed up by his solicitude during her
illness, had attracted attention in the village, and had become a topic of
conversation and speculation.
Rose Ash, as was well known, had
set her mind on winning John; she was a handsome girl, of suitable age and
position, the miller’s daughter. Everyone had said that they would make a pair.
Jan, in his amiable, easy-going way, had offered no resistance; he had,
perhaps, been a little proud of being considered the lover of the prettiest
girl in the district; he had made no advances himself, but had submitted to
hers with mild complacency, taking care not to compromise himself irrevocably.
Since John had been associated
with Kate in that adventure on the mud-bank, he had been less cordial to Rose,
had kept out of her way, and avoided being left alone with her. Rose was
ready-witted enough to see that a spoke had been put into her wheel, and to
discover how that spoke had been inserted. She felt jealous of, and resentful
towards Kate, and lost no occasion of hinting ill-natured things, and throwing
out wounding remarks both to Kate’s face and behind her back. Kate had every
reason to shrink from joining this party, sure that it would lead to vexation.
But she had no choice.
“Come along, Kate,” said John;
“sister Sue and I and the rest are ready. What do you wish?”
“I think I might be consulted,”
said Rose sullenly.
“I know your wishes already—you
want to go into the fair,” replied Jan, turning to the pouting girl.
“And if she wishes to be out of
it,—in the mud, for instance,—are we all to be dragged in with her?” asked
Rose.
“Tell me, Kitty, what do you
desire?”
“I would like to find my father.”
“Where is he? do you know? We
will go through the fair and look for him.”
Kate held back. John came after
her and said, “If we cannot find your father at once, where would you like to
go?”
Half laughing and half crying,
the girl answered, “I should like to be at the bottom of a well; Mr. Bramber
says that there one could see the stars, even in broad daylight.”
“By all means, put her there and
leave her there; we are well content,” said Rose, who had followed and
overheard what was said.
“There is no well in Ashburton,”
said Jan, taking Kate’s arm. “There are better things to be seen than stars by
daylight. Come, we will seek your father. I will be sworn we shall light on
him.”
Kate withdrew from the young
man’s hold, but nevertheless allowed herself to accompany the little party that
now moved in the direction of the fair. The girl was unaccustomed to be in a
crowd. Neither her father nor her uncle had concerned himself to give her
diversion, to take her out of the monotony and solitude of her life in Coombe
Cellars. A country fair presented to her all the attractions of novelty, at the
same time that the noise and movement alarmed her. Susan Pooke’s intended
husband had hooked her on to his arm, and the two, sufficient to each other,
separated from the rest and took their own way among the booths. Kate was
therefore left with Rose, John Pooke, and Noah Flood.
Noah was an acquaintance rather
than a friend of John, and a cousin of Rose. Jan did not discourage him. Noah
was one of Rose’s many admirers; a hopeless one hitherto, as he felt his
inability to compete with Pooke. Now, Jan was glad of his presence as likely to
relieve him of Rose; and that girl was also content to have him by, hoping that
by showing him some favour she might rouse the jealousy of the torpid Jan. The
little company, in which prevailed such discordant elements, moved along the
street to the market-place. Every neighbouring parish had sent in a contingent
of farmers to buy and sell, of young folks to gape and amuse themselves, of
servants who sought masters and mistresses, of employers in quest of servants.
All elbowed, pushed their way along, met friends, laughed, shouted, made merry.
Presently Jan arrested his party at a stall on which numerous articles
attractive to the female heart were exposed for sale.
“Now, Kate,” said he, “I have
long owed you something, and a fairing you expect as your due.”
“It is I who have a right to it,”
said Rose hastily. “You brought me to the fair. That is fine manners for a lad
to bring a girl, desert her, and give his fairing to another.”
“I am going to make presents to
both of you,” replied Jan, colouring. “I invited Kitty before I asked you.”
“Oh, indeed?” Rose flared up. “I
am to come second-best after that frog, unfortunately, against her wishes, not
now in a well. I refuse your presents. I will take what Noah will give me.”
“Do not be angry, Rose,” said
Jan. “Kitty, you see, has no one with her. Her uncle and that schoolmaster
fellow have deserted her. As for a fairing—I owe it her. It was all along of me
that”—
“I know,” scoffed Rose. “She ran
you on a mud-bank. It was done on purpose. A designing hussy.”
“For shame!” said Jan.
“No respectable girl would have
done it I know what folks say”—
Jan boiled up. “You are a spiteful
cat, Rose. I will not give you anything. Kate, what would you like to have?
Choose anything on this stall; it is yours.”
“I do not wish for anything,”
answered the girl timidly. Yet her eyes had ranged longingly among the
treasures exposed.
“You shall have some present from
me,” persisted Pooke. “Here, a dark blue silk handkerchief—the colour of your
eyes.”
“I am going to have that,”
exclaimed Rose. “Noah was about to take it up when you spoke. It is mine.”
“There are two, I’ll be bound,”
said Jan.
“No, there are not. Get her a
yellow one—the blue is mine.” Rose snatched at it.
There actually was no second of
the same colour.
“Yellow becomes you best,” said
Jan angrily; “you are so jealous and spiteful.”
“Jealous? of whom?”
“Of Kate.”
“I!—I!” jeered the handsome,
spoiled girl, with an outburst of laughter. “I jealous of that creature.
Cockles and winkles picked off a mud-bank!”
“Give up that handkerchief,”
exclaimed Jan passionately.
“I really will not have it. I
assure you I will not. Take it,” pleaded Kate, “I have no right to accept any
present.”
“Nonsense,” said Pooke. “I
invited you to the fair, and here you are with me. I must and I will give you
something by which to remember me.”
He stepped back and pushed his
way through the crowd to another stall. Kate remained where she was with
fluttering heart, averting her burning face from the eyes of Rose, and looking
eagerly among the throng for her uncle or father.
Presently Jan returned.
“There,” said he, “now I have
something more worthy of you: a really good and handsome workbox.”
He held out a polished box with
mother-of-pearl shield on the lid, and scutcheon for the keyhole.
“Look at it!” he said, and,
raising the lid, displayed blue silk lined and padded compartments, stocked
with thimble, scissors, reels, pins, needles, bodkin, and a tray. “Look!”
exclaimed Jan, his cheeks glowing with mingled anger and pleasure; “underneath
a place where you can put letters—anything; and you can lock the whole up.
There, it is yours.”
Kate was shy about accepting so
handsome a gift, yet could not refuse it. The workbox had been bought and paid
for. It was the custom for a young man to give a damsel a present at the
fair, but then, to do so was tantamount to declaring that he had chosen her as
his sweetheart. With thanks, more in her eyes than on her lips, Kate accepted
the offering, and took it under her arm. Rose had turned away her head with a
toss of the chin, and had pretended not to have seen the transaction.
“Let us move on,” urged Pooke;
“there is a shooting-place beyond, and, by George! I’ll have a try for nuts and
fill your pockets, Kate.”
Noah and Rose had already drifted
from the booth at which the altercation had taken place. The girl had knotted
the blue silk kerchief about her throat in defiance; her cheeks were flaming,
her eyes glistening, and her mouth quivering. She pretended to be devoted to
Noah, who was vastly elated, but her eyes ever and anon stealthily returned to
Jan and Kate.
A large tray full of hazel nuts
stood before a battered target, and on the nuts lay a couple of guns.
“Now then! a penny a shot! only
one penny!” yelled the proprietor; and his wife dipped a tin half-pint measure
into the nuts, shook it, poured them out and echoed, “Only one penny. Half a
pint in the red, a pint in the gold! Only one penny. A dozen nuts for the
white. Only one penny.”
“I’ll have a shy,” said Noah,
laid down his coin and fired. He struck the white, and received a dozen nuts.
“I’ll do better than that!”
shouted Jan, and took the gun from Flood’s hand, threw down threepence, and
said, “I’ll have three shots and stuff my pockets.” He fired—and missed.
“By George!” Jan looked
astonished. “I always considered myself a crack shot.”
He fired again and hit the black.
The woman offered him half a dozen nuts.
“I won’t have ’em—I’ll clear the
stall presently.”
He aimed carefully and missed
again.
Then Kate touched him on the arm
and said, “Do you not see all your shots have gone one way—to the right, low
down. Aim at the right-hand corner to the left, just outside the black.”
“You try,” said Jan, and threw
down a penny with one hand and passed the gun to Kate with the other.
The girl aimed, and put her arrow
into the bull’s-eye.
She handed back the gun, saying
to Pooke, “The barrel is crooked, that is why your shot went wrong.”
“Try again, Kitty.”
She shook her head.
“Well,” said Jan, “I’ll follow
your directions.”
He fired, and his shot flew into
space beyond the target. “There!” he exclaimed reproachfully, turning to the
girl.
“The woman changed the gun,” said
Kate. “Now aim at the centre, and I will soon tell you what is wrong.”
He did as she directed, and his
shot went into the outer green.
“I see,” said Kate; “this barrel
is given a twist in another way. Now look where your arrow strikes. Draw a
line from that across the gold, and aim at the point in the outer ring exactly
opposite.” The young man did as instructed, and hit the red.
“Kitty Alone, I have it now!”
laughed he; threw down another copper, and this time his shot quivered in the
bull’s-eye.
“Why, Kate! however did you
discover the secret?” he asked in amazement.
“I watched. I knew you aimed
straight, so I was sure the fault lay in the barrel. There is, you know, a
reason for everything.”
“Lor’, Kitty! I should never have
found out that.”
“I saw it because you went wrong.
I considered why you went wrong, and so considering, I saw that the fault must
be in the barrel. There is a reason for everything, even for our blunders, and
if we seek out the reason where we have blundered, we go right afterwards and blunder
no more.”
CHAPTER XVI
“Have some nuts, Rose?” said Jan
Pooke. He had got a large paper-bag full of those he had earned.
“I don’t want any of your nuts,”
answered the girl. “I hate hazel cobs, specially when old and dry. I’m going to
have some of that sort, and Noah is bringing me some.” She pointed to some
Brazil nuts.
“They’re like slugs turned to
stone,” said Jan. “There can’t be good eating in such as them.”
“We shall see. Crack them, Noah.”
This was easier ordered than
done.
Flood compressed two nuts in his
palm, but could not crush them. He tried his teeth, and they failed. He put a
nut under his heel, but in the throng was thrust aside and lost his nut.
“I’ll do it presently, Rose, as
soon as I can find something hard on which to crack ’em.”
“Do, Noah. I’m longing to eat
them. I wouldn’t give a straw for them dried, shrivelled hazel cobs.”
“I promise you I’ll break ’em—the
first occasion.” Then, suddenly, “Rose! Kate! Jan! Come along this way;
there is a man here with a dancing bear.”
“A bear? Oh, I do want to see a
bear!” exclaimed Kate eagerly.
“I don’t care for a bear,” said
Rose.
“But he’s dancing—beautiful,”
urged Noah.
“Oh, if he’s dancing, that’s
another matter,” said Rose.
Kate was most desirous to see a
bear. She had read of the beast in Æsop’s Fables—seen pictures of Bruin as he
smelt about the traveller who feigned himself dead whilst his fellow escaped up
a tree; also as he tore himself with his claws after having overset the hives
and was attacked by the bees. She had formed in her own mind an idea of the
beast as very big, and as very stupid.
A considerable throng surrounded
the area in which the bear was being exhibited, but Jan and Noah were
broad-shouldered, and not scrupulous about forcing a way where they desired to
pass, and of thrusting into the background others less broad and muscular.
Following close after the two young men, dragged along by them, were Rose and
Kate, and they were speedily in the inner ring, in full view of Bruin and his
master, an Italian, who held him by a chain. The bear was muzzled, and had a
collar to which the chain was attached. A woman, in dirty Neapolitan costume,
played a hurdy-gurdy and solicited contributions.
The bear was made to stand on his
hind legs, raise one foot, then the other, in clumsy imitation of a dance, and
then to take a stick and go through certain evolutions which a lively
imagination might figure as gun practice.
“De bear—he beg pretty—von penny,
shentlemensh!”
Bruin, instructed by a jerk of
the chain and a rap, put his front paws together. Then, tired of his upright
attitude, he went down on all-fours.
The brute was not equal to Kate’s
anticipations, certainly not as massive and shaggy as pictured by Bewick in his
Æsop’s Fables. About the neck it was rubbed by the collar, and the hair was
gone. Its fur over the body was patchy and dirty. The beast seemed to be
without energy and to be out of health. Its movements were ungainly, its humour
surly.
Kate soon tired of observing the
creature, and would have withdrawn from the ring had she been able; but the
crowd was compact behind, and she was wedged into her place.
The passive disposition of Bruin
was all at once changed by the appearance of a dog that had passed between the
legs of the spectators, and which entered the ring and flew at the bear with
barks and snaps.
“De dogue! Take de dogue away!”
shouted the Italian. “De bear no like dogue.”
But no owner of the dog answered
and attempted to call it off, and the lookers-on were delighted to have the
opportunity of seeing sport.
The dog, apparently a butcher’s
brute, sprang about the bear, endeavouring to bite, and darting out of his way
whenever Bruin struck at it with his fore-paws.
The woman gave up turning the
handle of the hurdy-gurdy, and screamed at the dog to desist from irritating
the bear, but it paid no attention to her words. Some fellows in the crowd
shouted to the assailant to persevere and take a bite.
The conductor of the bear
shortened the chain so as to obtain a portion wherewith to lash the dog, but he
was as unsuccessful as his wife. These united attempts to drive it off served
only the more to incense the dog and stimulate it against the bear. The man
became angry as the young fellows encouraged the dog, and as the bear became
unruly, and endeavoured to wrench the end of the chain from his hand, so as to
have more scope for defending himself against his adversary.
Rose nudged Noah, and said in a
whisper, “Knock her workbox from under her arm.”
Flood answered, “’Twould be a
shame.”
“I won’t speak to you again if
you don’t.”
“Heigh!” yelled Noah; “go it,
Towser!”
“Is dat your dogue?” shouted the
bearward.
“No, not mine,” answered Noah.
“He looks a towser, that’s why I called him so. Go it, Towser!”
When the bear made a dash at his tormentor,
the dog sprang back, and the circle that surrounded the area became an ellipse.
On one of these occasions Kate
made an effort to withdraw, but Jan caught her by the arm and insisted on
retaining her.
“Here comes another!” he said, as
a terrier dashed in. “We shall soon have a proper bear-bait.”
The Italian woman had stooped and
picked up the baton with which the bear had gone through his drill, and
with it she endeavoured to drive away the dogs. The man swore and kicked with
his iron-shod boots at them when they came near; but if the dogs showed signs
of retreat, they were kicked forward again by the young men in the ring. The
owner of Bruin had lost his temper; he saw that the bystanders were amusing
themselves at his expense, and that the baited beast was getting beyond his
control, being driven wild and desperate by his assailants.
The yelping of the dogs, the
cries of the woman and her husband, the cheers and laughter of the crowd,
formed a combination of noise frightening to such a girl as Kate.
The bear, frantic at being unable
to reach and maul his tormentors, was now tearing at his muzzle. The terrier
was on his back, snapping, and the bear rolled over, and with one paw succeeded
in forcing the muzzle aside.
At that moment a blow was struck behind
Kitty’s back at the workbox she carried, and it was propelled into the arena,
where it fell, was broken open, and its contents were scattered—thimble,
scissors, reels of black and white cotton, pins and pincushion.
“Who did that? By George, it was
you, Noah!” shouted Jan, who happened to have turned at the moment and saw the
movement of Noah’s fist.
Kate asked no questions as to who
had done her this wrong. With a cry of dismay, regardless of danger, concerned
only for her precious workbox and its contents, she darted forward to pick up
what was strewn about. For the moment she forgot the presence of the bear and
the dogs, and, stooping, began to collect what she could, regardless of
the cries of the bystanders. Bruin had at the same time wrenched himself free
from his guardians, and had fallen upon one of the dogs, which howled, and bit,
and writhed, and rolled over at Kate’s feet.
Jan Pooke, enraged at the
cowardly act of Noah, without looking towards Kate, without a thought that she
was in danger, struck Flood full in the face with his clenched fist, and Noah,
stung by the blow, and already jealous of Pooke, retaliated.
Immediately the ring that had
been formed about the bear and dogs dissolved, and re-formed itself into a
figure eight about the several contending parties—some clustering round the
bear and dogs, others about the two burly young men, whose fight promised to
give greater entertainment than that in the other circle.
Kate was suddenly grasped by a
firm hand and drawn away out of danger. She looked up, and saw that she was
held by Walter Bramber.
“Oh, my workbox!”
“Never mind your workbox. You
were exposed to great risk.”
He drew her through the throng.
“Oh, Mr. Bramber, look! look!
There is Jan fighting with Noah. It is all because of the workbox. Do go and
separate them.”
“Not till I have brought you to
your father. You cannot be safely trusted in such a crowd,—at least, not with
such reckless and quarrelsome fellows as Pooke and the other.”
“Yes,” said Kate, the tears
running down her cheeks, “take me to my father. I wish I had not come here; but
indeed—indeed—this is no fault of mine.”
“No; of that I am very sure. You
are inexperienced, that is all. There come the constables; they will separate
the combatants. Be no further concerned for them. I will not now leave you till
you are safe out of the fair.”
CHAPTER XVII
Pasco Pepperill had taken the
schoolmaster with him through the market-place. He was greeted on all sides by acquaintances
and would-be dealers. Pasco’s strut became more consequential as he returned
the salutations, and he looked out of the corners of his eyes at his companion,
to see what impression was made on him by the deference with which he was
received.
“I bought wool—two hundred
pounds’ worth—of that man. Coaker is his name,” said Pasco, indicating a moor
farmer jogging in on his cob. “I bought last Friday. Do you see Ezra Bornagin?
There, sneaking behind his missus. He’s had coals of me all the winter, on
tick. Hasn’t paid a penny, and I’m in doubts whether I shall see the colour of
my money. But I’m not one to be crushed by a few bad debts.” Presently,
“There’s the landlady of the ‘Crown,’ at Newton. She knows where to get good
spirits at a moderate figure—that hasn’t paid duty—tobacco also. Coombe Cellars
is a fine place for a trade in such goods.”
“How d’ y’ do, Pepperill?” said a
bluff farmer, coming up and extending an immense red hand. “Come here to
buy or to sell to-day?”
“Both,” answered Pasco. “It
doesn’t do to let money lie idle.”
“Ah! if a chap has got money—but
when he hasn’t, that’s another matter. I want to sell.”
“What?”
“Hides; will you buy? Had bad
luck with my beasts.”
“Don’t know; I’ll see.”
“It’s terrible bad times,” said
the big man.
“I suppose it is—for some folks,”
answered Pepperill.
“I say, I hear you’ve got the
‘Swing’ on again down your way.”
“Not quite that, I hope. There
has been an incendiary fire, but it was the work of one man, not of a gang. I
reckon the ‘Swing’ conspiracy was done with in ’.”
“Don’t be too sure. One fire has
a fatal knack o’ kindling others, ’specially if the fellow gets off who did the
job.”
“He has escaped,” said Pasco;
“but we know pretty well who did the mischief. It was one Roger Redmore. He’d
been turned off for imperence to his master, and drink,
and that’s how he revenged himself. I wish he’d been caught. A fellow who sets
fire a-purpose to rick or barn or house, if I had my way, would be hung without
mercy. No transportation; that’s too mild. Swing, I say, at a rope’s end, and
so put an end to all incendiarism.”
“I reckon you’re about right,”
said the farmer. “If there comes another fire, I shall get insured. The
fellow is at large.”
“Ay, but he won’t do any further
mischief of this sort. It was a bit o’ personal revenge, nothing more; not like
them old combinations.”
“Well, but who is safe? If I say
a word to one of my men that he doesn’t like, he may serve me as Redmore has
served Pooke.”
“That’s true,” said Pepperill.
“More’s the reason that Roger should be made an example of. If I see’d him I’d
shoot him down as I would a wild beast, or hang him, as I might a lamb-worrying
dog, with my own hands—that I would!”
“I know, of those rascals who
were sentenced to be hung in ’, more than half got off with transportation; and
of them as was transported, most got let off with six or seven years—more’s the
pity.”
“We’re too merciful—that’s our
fault,” said Pasco. “Show no pity to the offender,—chief of all, to the
incendiary,—and such crimes will soon be put a stop to. We encourage criminals
by our over-gentleness.”
“Well, I hope this firing o’
stacks won’t spread; but it’s like scarlet fever. What business are you on
to-day?”
“I’ve bought the oaks at
Brimpts,” said Pepperill.
“So I’ve heard.”
“And I’ve a mind to dispose of
the bark.”
“Then here’s your man—Hamley the
tanner.”
The man alluded to came up—a
tall, handsome fellow, with a cheery face.
“Mr. Hamley,” said Pasco, “you’re
the chap I want. I shall have tons o’ bark to sell shortly.”
“Well, Mr. Pepperill, I’m always
ready for bark, if the figure suits. Tan is my trade, you know.”
“I shall have stuff the like of
which you have not had the chance of buying, I’ll be bound. I’ve bought the
oaks of Brimpts.”
“What, at Dart-meet?”
“Yes; bought the lot. The timber
is three hundred years old; hard as iron. And conceive what the bark must be
when the timber is so good.”
“I doubt if we shall come to
terms over that.”
“Why not? You won’t have another
chance. What will you give me a ton?”
“Is the bark running now? It is
full early. The sap don’t begin to rise so soon as this,—leastways, not in
timber trees,—and the moor is always three weeks or a month behind the Hams.”
“The bark will be all right, if
you will buy. What is the market price?”
“Best bark has been up to seven
guineas, but it’s not that now. Five guineas is an outside price for
thirty-year-old coppice.”
“But Brimpts is not coppice—far
from it.”
“I know, and the value will be
according. Sapling, of some forty years, comes second, at four guineas; then
last quality is timber-bark, if not too old, say three pound ten.”
“Three pound ten?” echoed
Pepperill. “A pretty price, indeed. You do not understand. Brimpts oaks must
be three hundred years old, and so worth seven guineas a ton.”
“I won’t give three guineas for
this bark. Take off a pound for every hundred years. If I take it, I don’t mind
two guineas.”
“Two guineas? that’s not worth
having. The bark is first-rate—must be, it is so tremendous old.”
“That is just what spoils it. We get the tan-juice from the under
rind. We don’t want the crust, or outer bark; that is so much waste. Young
coppice is the best for our purpose, and worth more for tanning than thrice the
value of your old timber. I’ll give you two guineas; not a penny more. And let
me tell you, you’ll have some difficulty in barking the old trees. The sap is a
wonderful ticklish thing to run in them; it’s like the circulating of blood in
old men.”
“Two guineas! I won’t look at
’em,” said Pepperill, and passed on. He was angry and disappointed. He had
reckoned on making a good price out of the bark. This meeting with Mr. Hamley
would have a bad effect on the schoolmaster. Pepperill turned to him and said,
“He’s a cunning file. He knows the Brimpts bark is worth seven guineas at least,
but he’s trying to drive a bargain. He’ll come round in time, and be glad to
buy at my price.”
“Halloo!”
Pepperill was clapped on the
back, and, turning, saw his brother-in-law.
“Pasco, old boy,” said Jason, “is
it true you bought his two years’ stock of fleeces off Coaker?”
“Yes, I did.”
“More fool you. What did you
pay?”
“Thirteenpence.”
“Done you are. Have you not heard
that wool has dropped to tenpence?”
“Jason! it is not true?”
“It is. There have come in
several cargoes of Australian wool, finer than ours; and behind, they say, is
simply any amount—mountains of wool. This comes of your not reading the papers.
Coaker knew it, and that made him so eager to sell. I hear we shall have a
further drop. You are done, old boy, in that speculation. Why did you not
consult me? Have you paid Coaker?”
“I gave him fifty pounds, and a
bill at two months.”
“Try what you can do with the
Sloggitts. They may want to buy, but don’t reckon on making more than tenpence.
Lucky if you get that. I dare swear they will offer no more than ninepence.”
Pepperill’s face became white,
but he quickly rallied, and said to Bramber, “That is Quarm all over; he loves
a joke, and he thought to frighten me. I’ll go at once to Sloggitt; I know
where to find him. He has a mill at Buckfastleigh.”
He caught the schoolmaster’s arm,
and drew him along with him. He had not gone many steps before a stranger
addressed him—
“Mr. Pepperill, I believe?”
“Certainly.”
“You were pointed out to me. You
have done some business with us—the wood at Brimpts. I am the agent of the
bank. I think we oughtn’t to have come to so hasty a conclusion. The fact is,
we hadn’t any idea there was so much forest timber there. But as it is, of
course, it can’t be helped; only bank rules, you understand, must be observed.”
“And what are they?”
“Well—it is all the same, whether
we were dealing with the Duke of Bedford or with you. Rules are rules, you
know.”
“Of course rules are rules. But
what are your rules?”
“I’m only an underling; I don’t
make rules. It is my duty to see they are carried out. You comprehend?”
“To be sure; and what are those
rules?”
“Well, you are aware in the bank
we always expect payment before delivery. There is the agreement. Mr. Quarm saw
our head clerk, and it is all settled. I just came along over the moor to
Ashburton Fair, and had a look at Brimpts on my way. They sent me, you know, to
see that all is square, and all that sort of thing. I have nothing more to do
than just see that you comprehend the rules.”
“What am I to do?” asked
Pepperill sharply.
“Well, well; it is just this. We
don’t allow any timber—nothing—to be removed till full payment has been made,
and I see you have already begun felling.”
“Yes; I suppose my brother-in-law
has begun to cut.”
“You know, that’s all right and
proper; but rules are rules, and I’m not my own master. I don’t make
regulations; I am held to seeing them carried out. There’s a matter of a couple
of hundred pounds you’ll have to pay into the bank before a stick is disposed
of, or a ton of bark removed.”
“And when do you demand the
money? Will not a bill do?”
“Rules, you see, are rules! they
ain’t india-rubber, that you can pull about to accommodate as is desired. I
daresay you want to get the timber removed as quickly as you can, but, hang it!
rules are rules, and you can’t till the money is paid in cash. Personally I
love bills, but the bank don’t, that’s a fact. I suppose you, or Mr. Quarm,
will be over next week at the bank, and pay up. Then we’ve nothing to say but
clear away the timber and the bark as you can.”
When Pepperill had shaken off the
agent of the bank, he turned to Bramber, and said, “Did you catch his
admission? He said that the bank had made a mistake in letting us have Brimpts
wood so cheap. Actually it sold without ever having seen. Of course I shall pay
up; and if I don’t pocket a thousand pounds out of the transaction, call me a
fool.”
A moment later he was touched on
the arm, and saw the landlady of the Crown, Mrs. Fry. She made him a sign, and
whispered, “Take care; the revenue officers have smelt something. Have you a
stock by you?”
Pepperill nodded.
“That’s bad. Get rid of it as
quick as you can, lest they pay you a visit. I’ve had a hint.”
“Thanks,” said Pasco, looking
uncomfortable.
His visit to Messrs. Sloggitt was
more discouraging than he had been led to expect. Mr. James Sloggitt, who
was in Ashburton, told him bluntly that the firm was indisposed to buy
wool at any price. The importations from Australia had disturbed the market,
and there was no knowing to what extent wool might fall. They would buy nothing
till they had received advice as to how much more foreign wool was coming in.
“That won’t touch me,” said
Pasco. “Down it goes in a panic, and up it will swing in a month or two, and
then I shall sell. Come with me to the Red Lion, and have a glass of ale.”
“Thank you,” said Bramber; “if
you will excuse me, I should wish to go into the fair.”
“There is time enough,” answered
Pepperill; “I shall not let you go yet. What! Jason—here again?”
Quarm limped up, and planted
himself in front of him.
“I have hardly had a word with
you yet, Pasco. How is my sister—and how is Kitty?”
“Both pretty middling. Kate is
here—in the fair. I left her with Jan Pooke and his party. Something may come
of this, Zerah thinks. Jan has been mightily attentive since they were together
in the boat.”
“Pasco,” said Jason, “that
fellow, Roger Redmore, is abroad still.”
“Yes; he has not been caught.”
“If I was you, I would insure.”
“Pshaw! I’m not afraid of fire.”
“There is no telling. You keep
such a stock of all kinds of goods in your place—coals, spirits, wool,
hides—and now you are likely to have bark in. Take my advice and insure,
in case of accident.”
“It is throwing good money away.”
“Not a bit. If Pooke had insured,
he would not now be the loser to the tune of fifty pounds.”
“Well; I don’t mind; but if I
insure, it shall be for a round sum.”
“Two or three hundred?”
“Bah! A thousand.”
“A thousand?”
“Why not? My stores are worth
it.”
“Are they? Stores, and house as
well?”
“No, stores alone. I’ll consider
about the house.”
“A thousand pounds! You don’t
mean it, Pasco?”
“Ay. I’ll insure for one thousand
two hundred. I shall have all Coaker’s wool in, and the Brimpts tan which
Hamley won’t buy; and I shall be having coals in during summer when price is
down, to sell in winter when prices are up. Twelve hundred, Jason; not a penny
under.”
“Come on, then, to the office,
and have your policy drawn.”
“We do business in a large way,”
said Pepperill, turning to Bramber. “Twelve hundred would not cover my loss,
were that scoundrel Redmore to set fire to my stores. Now I will let you go;
may you enjoy yourself. Come, Jason—twelve hundred!”
CHAPTER XVIII
The constables, always on the alert
for some breach of the law during the fair, had come down on the combatants,
arrested them, and conveyed them to the courthouse.
On fair-days a magistrate was
ever at hand to dispose of such cases as might arise, disputes over
engagements, quarrels, petty thefts, etc.
Mr. Caunter, the justice who
lived in the town, and who had undertaken not to absent himself that day, was
summoned. Another joined him.
The two young men presented a
somewhat battered and deplorable condition. Noah, bruised in the face, had his
eye darkened and swelling; but Jan showed the most damaged appearance, as his
head had been cut, and the blood had flowed over his forehead and stained his
cheek. Something had been done to wash his face and to staunch the flow, but
this had been only partially successful.
The court-house was crowded.
Friends and acquaintances had deserted the bear, that they might see the end
of the brawl between the lusty young men, and to exhibit their sympathy
and give evidence in their favour if required.
After the constables had recorded
their evidence, the magistrate called on John Pooke to say what he had to state
in answer to the charge. It was a case of affray, and of common assault if one
of the parties chose to complain.
“You seem to be the one most damaged,”
said the justice. “What is your name?”
“John Pooke.”
“Where from?”
“Coombe-in-Teignhead, sir.”
“I think I have heard your name.
Your father is a most respectable yeoman, I believe.”
“Yes, sir, and woundy fat.”
“Never mind about his obesity.
With so respectable a parent, in such a position, it is very discreditable that
you should be brought up before me as taking a principal part in a vulgar
brawl.”
“Brawl, sir? where?”
“Here in Ashburton, in the
market-place, according to the account of the constables, you were principal in
an affray, and an affray—according to Lord Coke—is a public offence to the
terror of the king’s subjects, so called because it affrighteth and maketh men
afraid.”
“I, sir? Whom did I affright and
make afraid?”
“The public, before whom you were
fighting.”
“Lor, bless you, sir! they loved
it. It was better sport than a little dog snapping at a mangy bear.”
“Never mind whether they liked it
or not; it was an affray and an assault. Now tell me your version of the
circumstances.”
“What circumstances?”
“The brawl. Did you not hear what
the constables said?”
“Oh, that little tittery matter!
We was looking at a bear and a dog.”
“Well—proceed”
“The dog didn’t understand how to
get hold of the bear; he thought he was wus’ than he was, and the bear could do
nothing till he had his muzzle off. Then up came a little terrier. My word! he
was a daring little dowse of a dog.”
“I want to hear nothing about the
dogs and the bear, but about yourselves. What was the occasion of your quarrel
with your adversary?”
“Adversary?”
“Yes; the other—Noah Flood, I
believe he is called. You see he has a swollen eye, and his face is puffed and
bruised. I presume you admit you hit this man Flood?”
“What!—Noah?”
“Yes, Noah.”
“Was that him you called my
adversary?”
“Yes; you were fighting him, so
the constable says.”
“Bless y’! Noah is a right-down
good fellow, and a chum o’ mine. He’s no adversary.”
“Anyhow, you banged him about,
assaulted him, and did him grievous bodily harm.”
“Who—I?”
“Yes, you.”
“Lawk, sir! Noah and I was at
school together with Mr. Puddicombe. That was before his little misfortune,
sir, when he lost the school because of cock-fighting. Father never approved of
his being turned out, nor did I—nor Noah neither. We got on famous wi’ Puddicombe; didn’t us, Noah?”
“I want to hear nothing about
your school reminiscences,” said the magistrate sharply. “Moreover, you will
please to confine your observations to the Bench, and not address questions to
your fellow under arrest.”
“Thank you, sir. What is that?”
This last to the constable. “I beg your pardon, the constable tells me I ought
to say ‘your worship,’ and so I does. Noah and I was in the same class; we left
the school together, and the very last thing we learned was, ‘Vital spark of
heavenly flame’; wasn’t it, Noah?”
Noah assented.
“I do not care what the course of
instruction was in the school,” protested Mr. Caunter. “To the point, if you
please, and remember, address yourself to the Bench. There was some sort of
affray between you and Flood. The constables separated you. What led to this?”
“I believe there was some tittery
bit of a thing. I titched Noah, and Noah titched me, and my hat falled off. You
see, your worship, I’d pomatumed my hair this morning, and so my hat didn’t sit
easy. My head was all slithery like, and a little titch, and away went my hat.”
“Here is the hat, your worship,”
said a constable, producing and placing on the table a battered and
trampled piece of headgear.
“Is that your hat, John Pooke?”
“I reckon it may ha’ been. But
her’s got terrible knocked about. It wor a mussy that I hadn’t on my new hat I
got at Exeter—that would ha’ been a pity. I bought she for sister’s Sue’s
wedding. Sister Sue be a-going to be married after Easter, your worship.”
“I don’t want to hear about
sister Sue. So Noah Flood knocked your hat off, and that occasioned”—
“I beg your pardon, sir, I never
said that. I said my head was that slithery wi’ pomatum the hat falled off, and
then folks trod on it.”
“Come, this is trifling with the
Bench, and with the majesty of the law. The people may have trampled on your
hat, but not on your head, which is cut about and battered almost as much as
the hat.”
“No, sir, I don’t fancy nobody
trod on my head.”
“How comes it about that you are
so cut and bruised? I see you have had your wounds plastered.”
“Yes, your worship. The surgeon,
he sewed up the wust place.”
“And your dear good friend and
chum, and school companion, and comrade in learning ‘Vital spark of heavenly
flame,’ did that, I presume?”
“No, sir, it was the surgeon did
it.”
“What, cut your head open?”
“No, sir; sewed it up.”
“Then who cut your head open?”
“Nobody, sir.”
“Someone must have done it. This
evasion only makes the case worse.”
“Nobody did it at all. It was the
Brazil nuts.”
“Brazil nuts?” exclaimed the
magistrate in astonishment. “I do not understand you.”
“Well, your worship, they’re
terrible hard, and have got three corners. Noah! hand over some of them nuts to
his honour. Just you try your teeth on ’em, Mr. Caunter. You can’t do it. It
was the Brazil nuts as cut my head. Not that it matters much. My head be nicely
sewed up again, and right as ever it was.”
“Explain the circumstances to the
Bench, and no meandering, if you please.”
“Well, that’s easy done, your
worship. Noah, he’d bought thickey nuts at a stall. What did you give for ’em,
Noah?”
“Tu’pence,” said Flood solemnly.
“Hish! hish!” from the nearest
constable.
“Twopence he paid, your worship,
and then he wanted to crack ’em and couldn’t do it. He couldn’t wi’ his teeth,
nor in his fist. If your worship will be pleased to try on the desk, you’ll
find how hard the nuts be.”
“Go on, and to the point.”
“You see, Rose, she’s got a
wonderful fancy for nuts”—
“Who may Rose be?”
“Her’s the beautifullest maid in
Coombe-in-Teignhead—red cheeks as she ought to have, being called Rose; and as
for twinkling eyes”—
“Never mind a description; what
is the other name?”
“Rose Ash. She is here, sir,
looking on and blushing.”
“We’ll call her presently.
Proceed with your story.”
“Rose, she wanted Noah to crack
the nuts, and he hadn’t a hammer, nor a stone, so”—
“He broke them on your head?”
“No, sir, he broke my head with
the nuts.”
“Oh, that is the rights of the
story, is it? You objected, and a fight ensued?”
“He’d undertaken to crack the
nuts for Rose, sir.” Then, turning to Flood, “That’s about it, ain’t it, Noah?
Shake hands; we’re old friends.”
“I agrees with everything as my
friend Jan Pooke said. He puts it beautiful,” said Flood.
“Step aside, John Pooke,” said
the magistrate; “we will now hear what the other fellow has to say.”
Nothing, however, was to be
extracted from Flood but that he agreed with Jan, and Jan could speak better than
he. He referred himself to Jan. Jan knew all about it, and he himself was so
bewildered that he could not remember much, but as Jan spoke, all came out
clear. As to the Brazil nuts, he had them in his hand, and it was true he “had
knocked Jan on the head wi’ ’em. If the gentleman would overlook it this time,
he hoped no offence; but he’d buy no more Brazil nuts—never as long as he
lived.”
“Call Rose Ash!” said the
justice. “Perhaps she can throw some light on this matter.”
Rose was in court, and was soon
in the witness-box, looking very pretty, and very conscious that the eyes
of every one in the place were on her. She kissed the New Testament with a
glance round of her twinkling eyes that said as plain as words, “Would not
every young fellow in this room like to be in the place of the book?”
“It was all the fault of Kitty
Alone,” said Rose. “We were in peace and comfort till she came meddling and
setting one against another; just like her—the minx!”
“And who, if you please, is Kitty
Alone?”
“Kitty Quarm. There never would
have been any unpleasantness unless she had poked her nose in. Me and Jan Pooke
drove to the fair, and then up comes Kitty and will interfere and be
disagreeable.”
“Constable, send for Catherine
Quarm,” ordered the magistrate. “I presume she is not far off. Go on, Miss Ash,
and tell us precisely the cause of the quarrel.”
“That is more than I can
undertake to do. All I know is that Kitty was at the bottom of it.”
“How do you know that?”
“Every one who knows Kitty knows
that she is a mischief-maker. Nasty, meddlesome toad!”
“Rose, this is spite, and nothing
more,” exclaimed Jan.
“Silence!” ordered the
magistrate. “The witness is not to be interfered with.”
“Please, your worship, I won’t
have her slandering an innocent girl just because I gave her a workbox as a
fairing.”
The justice endeavoured, but in
vain, to get a connected story out of Rose. That Kitty was at the bottom of
the fight, guilty of setting the young men boxing and belabouring each
other: that was the burden of her evidence.
“A word with John Pooke,” said
the justice, “whilst we are waiting for the other witness.”
Jan was put into the dock again.
“Is it your intention to summons
Flood for assault?”
“What—Noah?”
“Yes, on account of your head
being cut open.”
“My head is sewn up.”
“But you have suffered loss of
blood.”
“The nuts did that, not Noah.”
“Then you forgive him?”
“Whom?”
“Noah Flood.”
“There is nothing to forgive. The
nuts were terrible hard. He’ll never buy any more.”
Kate Quarm was now brought into
court, and placed in the witness-box. She was bidden to give a succinct account
of the quarrel.
“I was standing looking at the
bear,” she said, “and someone knocked my workbox from under my arm. I do not
know who did it, there was such a crowd, and all were in motion because the
bear had got free of his chain and muzzle. Then I ran to pick up what was
fallen, and when next I looked about me, Jan Pooke and Noah Flood were
fighting.”
“What made them fight?”
“I do not know, sir. Perhaps Jan thought
Noah had knocked my workbox from under my arm. But I cannot tell. I had
gone after my scattered things, and then I was drawn away to be taken to my
father.”
“You did not hear Pooke say
anything to Flood, or vice versâ, about cracking nuts?”
“Not then, sir; a little before,
Rose had asked to have the Brazil nuts cracked, and Noah had promised to crack
them when the opportunity came.”
“I told you so, your worship,”
threw in Pooke.
“Well,” said the magistrate,
“this girl Kate Quarm is the only one among you who seems to have her wits
about her, and can tell a simple tale in an intelligent way. As for you, John
Pooke, and you, Noah Flood, I shall bind you over to keep the peace, and
dismiss you with a caution.”
END OF VOL. I.
KITTY ALONE
A STORY OF THREE
FIRES
BY
S. BARING GOULD
AUTHOR OF
“IN THE ROAR OF THE SEA” “THE QUEEN OF LOVE”
“MEHALAH” “CHEAP JACK ZITA” ETC. ETC.
In Three Volumes
Vol. II
METHUEN & CO.
ESSEX STREET, W.C.
LONDON
v
CONTENTS OF
VOL. II
CHAP.
XIX. SUGGESTIONS OF
EVIL
XX. A FACE IN THE
WATER
XXI. AN OFFER
XXII. A RACE FOR LIFE
XXIII. BORROWING
XXIV. SHAVINGS
XXV. BORROWING AGAIN
XXVI. SILVER PENINKS
XXVII. TROUBLE
XXVIII. ALTERNATIVES
XXIX. A FRIEND GAINED
XXX. UNDER THE
MULBERRY TREE
XXXI. ON MISCHIEF BENT
XXXII. JASON IN THE
WAY
XXXIII. ONE CRIME
LEADS TO ANOTHER
XXXIV. AND YET ANOTHER
XXXV. UNSUCCESSFUL
XXXVI. ALL IN VAIN
KITTY ALONE
CHAPTER XIX
The crowd in the market-place and
in the streets of Ashburton began to thin as the afternoon crept on. In vain
did the showmen blow their trumpets, ring their bells, and invite to their
entertainments. Those who had come to the fair had spent their loose cash. The
proprietors of the stalls offered their wares at reduced prices, but found few
purchasers. Young men who had been hired by the farmers swaggered about singing
or shouting, some tipsy, others merely on the road to tipsiness. The ostlers in
the inns were harnessing horses to the traps, market carts, gigs, dog-carts,
that had brought in the farmers and their wives. Empty waggons were departing.
The roads were full of streams of people flowing homeward to the surrounding
villages.
Pasco Pepperill started with the schoolmaster.
He had surrendered Kate to her father. The reins were in his hand, and he had
whipped the cob, when he saw Coaker, the man from whom he had bought the
wool, coming towards him.
The blood rushed into Pepperill’s
face.
“How d’ye do?” asked the farmer.
“Going home?”
“I be,” answered Pasco, with
constrained anger.
“You’ll find all the wool there.
I sent off the lot this morning—three waggon-loads.”
“Why did you not inform me?—and I
would have waited for it, and not come to the fair.”
“I did not know how the weather
might be—and I wished to be rid of it.” Coaker laughed.
This angered Pasco further, and,
losing command of himself, he said, “’Twas scurvy—that selling me at such a
price when you knew wool was down.”
“That was your concern. Each man
for himself. But I reckon you’ve made a worse bargain at Brimpts, if, as they
tell me, you have bought the wood.”
“How so? Is not the timber
first-rate?”
“Oh, the timber is good enough.”
“Then what is wrong?”
“Have you been to Brimpts?”
“No—but Quarm has.”
“Then you don’t know the road. It
is thus”—Coaker made a motion with his hand up and down. “The waves of the sea
mountains high is nothing to it—and bad—the road is! Lor’ bless y’! the cost o’
moving the timber when cut will swallow up all the profits.”
“Pshaw! The distance from
Ashburton is only three miles.”
“Better ten on a decent road.
You’ll never get the timber drawn, or, if you do, farewell to all profits.
But when you have got it to Ashburton—who will buy it there?”
“Oh, Quarm has an idea of
disposing of the oak to the Government—selling it to the dockyard at
Devonport.”
“How far off is that? Some
five-and-twenty miles—and over the moor!” Coaker laughed.
“If I don’t sell the oak, I am
a”—Pasco’s face was as red as blood. He checked himself from the confession
that he would be a ruined man, and said between his teeth, “I’ll never speak to
Quarm again. He’s led me into a pretty quandary.”
“Quarm? He’s a
Jack-o’-lantern—don’t trust he.”
Coaker waved his hand, and, still
laughing, went his way to the stable-yard to get his cob.
Pasco whipped his horse and drove
homewards. His lips were closed, his brows knitted, he looked straight before
him at the ears of his horse. He was in no disposition to speak. Nor, for the
matter of that, was his companion. Bramber was thinking of Kitty, of the
uncongenial surroundings, the hot-headed father, running himself and his
brother-in-law into speculative ventures that must lead them to ruin; of the
uncle, boastful, conceited, and withal stupid; of the hard, selfish aunt. He saw
that young Pooke admired her, and this did not altogether please Bramber. Pooke
might be well off and amiable, but he was dull of intellect—a boor—and could
never be a suitable companion to the eager Kitty, whose mind was greedy for
knowledge, and whose tastes were those of a class above that in which she was
cast. The admiration of Jan Pooke brought on her contrariety. It had
involved her in the quarrel between Jan and Noah, and had roused the jealousy
of Rose Ash.
As the trap passed out of
Ashburton, many a salutation was cast at Pepperill, but he hardly acknowledged
any. He put up his hand and beat his hat down over his brows, then lashed
savagely at his cob.
All at once something arrested
his eye, and he instinctively drew up, then muttered, and whipped his brute
again. What he had observed was a little plate, affixed to a house, with the
title of the Insurance Company on it, with which he had that day had dealings.
“I wonder,” thought Pasco, “what
that house is insured for? Not for twelve hundred pounds, I’ll swear.”
Then a sense of bitterness rose
in his heart against his brother-in-law for drawing him into this expense of
insuring his property;—he had that day expended all the gold he had about him
in paying the first premium. There remained only some silver in one pocket, and
coppers in the other. Where was he to find the money for the payment of the
oaks he had bought? Where that to meet the bill for the wool? The tanner would
not pay enough for the bark to cover the cost of rending. Quarm had told him
that the sap rose badly, and that it would involve much labour and waste of
time to attempt to bark the trees.
Fevered with anxiety and
disappointment, Pasco thrashed his cob savagely, and sent it along at its
fullest pace, whirling past the gigs and waggons returning from the fair, and
giving the drivers hardly time to get on one side to avoid him. He
relieved his breast by swearing at them for their sluggishness in making way,
and some retaliated with oaths, as, in order to escape him, they ran into the
hedge or over a heap of stones.
Presently his horse slackened
speed, as it reached a sharp ascent, and there Pasco met an empty waggon, with
“Coaker—Dart-meet” on it. He stopped his panting horse, and shouted to the driver
of the team, and asked whence he came.
“I’ve been to your place—Coombe
Cellars,” answered the waggoner. “Master sent me with a load of fleeces.”
“Did my wife give you anything?”
“Not a glass of cider,” answered
the man. “We had to unload and do the work of hoisting into the warehouse
ourselves—no one was about.”
“She left it for me—she knew you
would meet us.”
Tossing his head, to shake off
the depression that had come upon him, and with a flash of his vanity through
the gloom, he put his hand in his pocket and drew out a couple of shillings.
“There,” said he; “you’d have had
more, but I have spent most of my cash at the fair. Buying, buying, buying,
that’s my trade. Go and drink a glass to my health.”
Then he drove on.
On descending the hill another waggon
was encountered. This was also one that had conveyed fleeces to Coombe Cellars.
Pasco gave this driver a couple of shillings. Then he turned to Bramber
and said, “Two years of wool—I paid as much as thirteen pence a pound, and I
can’t sell at tenpence. They say it is going down to sevenpence; that is nearly
half what I gave. A loss to me of sixpence a pound; I have bought three
waggonload. A good sheep may have sixteen pounds on his back, but the average
is ten or eleven. Coaker must keep a couple of hundred. You’re a schoolmaster;
reckon that up—two hundred sheep at eleven. I’m not a quick man at figures
myself.”
“Nothing can be simpler than that
calculation. Two thousand two hundred.”
“Ah! But two years’ wool?”
“Well, that is four thousand four
hundred.”
“And I have lost, say, sixpence a
pound.”
“Then you lose a hundred and ten
pounds by the transaction.”
“Think of that. A hundred and ten
pounds—say a hundred and twenty. That is something for a man to lose and make
no account of.” The vanity of the man was flattered by the thought of the
amount of his loss. “And then,” said he, “there was what Coaker said about the
oak. I’ve undertaken to lay out two hundred pounds on that; and there is the
fellin’ and cartin’—say another hundred. Suppose I lose this also—that is a
matter of three hundred. With the wool, four hundred and twenty pound. I
reckon, schoolmaster, you’ve never had the fingering of so much money as I am
losing.”
Bramber looked round at Pasco
with surprise. He could not understand the sort of pride that was
manifesting itself in the man.
“Are you able to meet such
losses?”
“If not—I can but fail. It’s
something to fail for a good sum. But I’ll not fail; I am full of resources.”
He beat the horse. “I shall sell the wool. It will go up. I shall sell the
timber at a good figure, and pocket a thousand pounds. I am sorry I did not
give those men half a crown each, but I have spent most of my money, and”—
Crash! He drove against a post,
and upset the trap.
Pasco staggered to his feet.
“Schoolmaister—are you hurt?”
“No.” Walter sprang to the horse
and seized its head.
“It would have been best had I
broken my neck and finished so,” said Pepperill. Then he regretted the sudden
outburst of despair, and added, “So some folks might ha’ said, but I’ve disappointed
’em. I may have a chuck down, but I’m up again in a jiffy. That’s been my way all along, and will be to the end.”
One of the shafts was broken, and
there ensued delay whilst it was being patched up with rope. Then, when they
were able to pursue their career, Pasco was constrained to drive more carefully
and less rapidly. Night was coming on as they neared Newton Abbot.
“I’ll tell you what it is,” said
Pasco; “I’m uncommon hungry, and I’ll just go into the first public-house and
have a mouthful of something, and you shall do the same. The cob is a bit
shaken with that spill, and I’ll have the shaft fastened up firmer before
we proceed. What say you? Here’s the ‘Crown and Anchor.’ How the place is
changed. Ah, ha! It is insured at the same office as I am. Why—bless my
life!—the old inn was a ramshackle sort of a place.”
Pepperill descended from his
trap, and gave instructions to the ostler what he was to do to the broken
shaft. “I’ll pay you well if you do your work,” said he. Then to Bramber, “Come
in! Cold meat and bread-and-cheese, and a glass of ale. We need refreshment,
and the house looks as if it could provide it. Don’t be concerned about the
cost. I don’t suppose you are overflush with cash. I’ll pay—you are my guest.”
Pasco’s self-conceit was a constant
spring of energy in him. Dashed his spirits might be by disaster, but he
speedily recovered his buoyancy, owing to this characteristic element in his
nature. It is said that the fertility of Manitoba is due to the fact that below
the surface the soil is frozen hard in winter, and during the summer the warmth
of the sun penetrating ever farther thaws the ice, and thus water incessantly
wells up, nourishing and moistening the roots of the corn. There was a
perennial body of self-esteem deep in the heart of Pasco Pepperill, and this
fed and sustained in vigorous growth a harvest of generosity in dealing with
his inferiors, of liberality towards the poor, of display in his mercantile
transactions, that imposed on the public and made it suppose that he was
prosperous in his many affairs.
The landlord came to the door.
“How do you do, Mr.
Pepperill?—glad to see you. You do not often favour me.”
“Well—no. If I come this way I
mostly stop at the Golden Sun. You see, you are rather near my home.”
“I hope this, though the first
visit, is not the last!”
“I daresay not. What brings me
now is an accident. Can you let us have some supper?”
“Certainly. What would you
like—cold beef, cold mutton, or chops and potatoes?”
“You have a supply of good
things.”
“I am obliged to have. I get
plenty of custom now.”
“What! more than of old?”
“Oh, double, since I have rebuilt
my house.”
“I see. The place is completely
changed. You had but a poor sort of a tavern.”
“Yes; and now”—the landlord
looked round, smiled, and put his hands into his waistband—"middling good,
I think."
“Uncommon,” said Pasco. “I
suppose it is the better look of the house that has brought better custom.”
“That’s just it. I had only
common wayfarers before—mostly tramps. Now—the better sort altogether. Where I
turned over a penny before, I turn over a shilling now.”
“So you rebuilt your public-house
to get better business?”
“Well, you see, I couldn’t help
myself. The old place caught fire and burnt down.”
“And it did not ruin you?”
“Dear me, no. I was insured.”
“So—that set you on your legs
again?”
“It was the making of me, was
that fire.”
“How long had you been insured
before you were burnt out?”
“Well, now, that is the curious
part of the story,” said the landlord; “hardly a week.”
“And how did your place catch
fire?”
“There was a tramp. I refused to
take him in, as he had no money. That was the best stroke of business I ever
did in my life. He hid himself in a sort o’ lean-to there was over the pigs’
houses, joined on to the house, and in it was straw. I reckon he went to sleep
there with his pipe alight, and he set fire to the place.”
“Was he burnt?”
“No; he got away all right; but
the straw set fire to the rafters, and they ran into the wall. It was a poor
old wall, with no mortar in it, and the rafters came in just under those of the
upstairs chambers, so that when the roof of the linhay was afire, it set the
house in a blaze too. That was how it all came about.”
“And a good job it was for you!”
“It was the making of me.”
Pasco was silent through the
meal. He seemed hardly to taste what he was eating. He gulped down his food and
drank copiously.
Bramber was relieved when he
left. He was afraid Pepperill would drink more than he could bear. At the entrance
to the village he left the cart, and thanked Pasco for the lift.
Pepperill drove on to Coombe
Cellars.
As he came up, he saw his wife
standing at the door with a light in her hand.
“Pasco, is that you?”
“Who else?”
“So, you are home at last. There
has been the coal merchant here; he swears he will bring you no more, and that,
unless you pay up this month, he will set the lawyers on you.”
Pepperill flung himself from his
cart.
“Heavens!” said he, looking
sullenly at his stores; “if they would but burn!”
“Burn—what burn?” asked Mrs.
Pepperill sharply. “Do you think you cannot leave the house for a day but some
mischief must come on it? As if I were not to be trusted, and everything lay
with you.”
“I did not mean that, Zerah.”
“Then what did you mean?”
“I meant that it might have got
me out of difficulties.”
“What might?”
Pasco did not answer.
“I should like to know how, if
the store were to be burnt, any good would come of that. You’ve been drinking,
Pasco.”
“I’m insured,” said he in a low tone.
“Oh, it has come to that, has it?
Heaven help us!”
The woman beat her face with her
open palms, turned, and went within.
CHAPTER XX
Kate Quarm was very happy on the
moor. Her father had fetched her from Ashburton, and had lodged her in a
cottage near Dart-meet, the point where the East and West Darts, rushing
foaming from the moors, dancing over boulders, breaking over granite floors,
plunging under tufts of golden gorse, and through brakes of osmund and male
fern, reach each other and meet in one silver flood.
The weather was fine, though
cold, that is to say, the sun was hot, but a keen east wind blew. But then this
is one of the charms of the moor, that shelter can always be found from the wind.
A mighty bank of mountains rose as a wall against the east, and in its dingles
and dells, dense with gorse, now in blaze of flower, the air was warm, and
balmy, and still.
At Coombe Cellars Kate had been
kept continually employed; her aunt, an active woman, gave the child no rest.
If she saw her flag in her work, Zerah goaded her with reproach to fresh
activity; she was, moreover, never accorded a word of encouragement. Zerah
accepted her work as a matter of course; if it was well done, that was but
as it ought to be; everything that fell short of well, was occasion for a
scolding. Kate’s nature was one that needed repose from manual and sordid
labour, for her mind desired to be active, and craved for freedom in which to
expand, and for liberty to seek material on which to feed. This Zerah did not
understand; with any other activity, except that of the body in scrubbing and
rubbing, in cooking and baking, she had no sympathy; she entertained a positive
aversion for books. She had no eye for beauty, no ear for melody, no heart for
poetry.
Now Kate had leisure—now for the
first time in her life in which her soul could draw its tender wings out of its
case and flutter them in freedom. She felt much as must the May-fly when it
breaks from its chrysalis.
It was, moreover, a joy to think
that her father had considered her so far as to require her to be sent to the
moor to recover. He usually paid little heed to Kitty, and now her heart was
warm with gratitude because he had given her that very thing of all others
which she most desired—rest in the presence of nature awakening under a spring
sun.
Kate had another source of
pleasure with her. As Walter Bramber parted from her at Ashburton, he put a
little book into her hand, and said—
“I will lend it you. I know you
will value it.”
The book was Wordsworth’s poems.
As she sat beside her father in
the gig, she had her hand on the volume all the while, and her heart swelled
with excitement and eagerness to read it. At night she hugged the book to
her bosom, and fell asleep with both hands clasped over it. She could hardly
endure that night should, with its darkness, deny her the happiness of reading.
She woke early, and in the breaking daylight devoured the pages. As she read,
she laughed and cried—laughed and cried with sheer delight. She had a book to
read; and such a book!
This happy girl turned first to
the verses on the daffodils that she had learned by heart, to make quite
certain that she had all, that not a line had been missed, not a word got awry.
Then she looked at the little poems on the celandine, and never did a famished
child devour a meal with greater avidity than did Kate read and master these
verses. There was much in Wordsworth that she could not understand, but the
fact that she encountered passages that were unintelligible to her were of
advantage, her clear intellect striking on these hard portions threw out
sparks—ideas that had light in them. The book not only nourished her mind, but
proved educative to her imagination.
Kate was at first overwhelmed
with the flood of happiness that rolled over her. Her eyes could not satiate
themselves with the beauty of the moorland scenery. She ran among the rocks,
she dived into the coombs, she stepped on the boulders over the water, she
watched the workmen engaged in felling trees.
Spring flowers peeped from behind
rocks, bog plants peered out of the morasses. Kate began collecting. She dried
the flowers between the leaves of her Prayer-book.
She scrambled among the towering
rocks that overhung the Dart below the meeting of the waters, and watched the
shadows and lights travel over the vast tract of moorland that stretched away
as far as the eye could see in every direction but the east, where the river
rolled out of its mountain cradle into a lap of the richest woodland. Sometimes
the beauty of the scenery, the variety of landscape, were too much for her; she
sought change and repose by creeping among the rocks and drawing the book from
her bosom.
Yet she could not read for long.
The verses exacted close attention, and a flash of passing sun, or impatience
at some passage she could not comprehend, made her close the volume and
recommence her rambles. The exhilarating air, the brilliancy of the light, the
complete change from the mild and languid atmosphere in the Teign estuary told
on Kate’s spirits and looks. Her cheeks gathered roundness and colour, and her
tread acquired elasticity. Her spirits were light; they found vent occasionally
in racing the cloud shadows over a smooth hillside.
One day, with her lap full of
moss of every rainbow hue, she came upon the rector of Coombe-in-Teignhead,
painting.
At her exclamation he turned,
recognised her, and smiled.
“So—I thought I must soon see
you,” he said. “My dear little Kitty, I come with messages for you and kind inquiries.”
“From whom—from uncle and aunt?”
“No; not from them. The
schoolmaster, Mr. Bramber, when he heard whither I was coming, begged me to see
you and ascertain how you were, and whether you liked the book he lent
you.”
“Oh, sir, I read it every day! I know
several pieces by heart.”
“That you are well, I see. I
never saw you with such a glow of health and happiness in your bonnie face
before.”
“Thank you, sir. And will you see
him soon?”
“Whom? Bramber?”
“Yes, sir,” answered Kate, the
glow in her face deepening. “And will you say that I have been picking the
flowers as they come out, and I can find them, and that I do want to know what
they are called? God brought the beasts to Adam to name them, and I do not
think Adam can have been happy with the beasts till he had given each a name.
It is so with me and the flowers. I see them, and I love them; but I don’t feel
content till I can tell what each is called. Mr. Bramber can name them all.”
“You have made a collection?”
“Yes, I have dried them in my
Prayer-book. They are waiting for Mr. Bramber to name. But”—Kate drew
back—"I am in your way, sir; you are painting the old bridge."
“Yes; but you can sit down there
if you like, and will not disturb me.”
“May I? Oh, I shall be pleased.”
Kate placed herself on a lichen-covered
rock on one side, at a little distance from the water.
“I have left my few sheep for a
couple of days,” said Mr. Fielding apologetically, partly to Kate, mostly to
himself; “but I do not think I have done wrong. Moses went up into the Mount,
and came back to his people with his face shining. I do not know, but it seems
to me that when I have been here aloft, speaking with nature and nature’s God,
face to face, that I can go back and carry with me some of the brightness and
the freshness and the fragrance of the mountain. I may be wrong, finding an
excuse for myself, because I love to come here.”
“Please, sir,” said Kate, “the
Great Master of all dismissed the multitude and went up into the mountain
apart.”
“Yes, child, yes,” answered the
rector, painting as he talked; “and when He came down, He walked on the stormy
waves. And I—His humble follower—I think I can tread on the troubles and cares
of life erect, and not be swallowed up after I have been here.”
“I do not know how I shall bear to
go back to Coombe Cellars,” said Kate sadly.
“You will go back braced to do
your work. We cannot always play, Kitty dear. You know the fable of the bow. It
was relaxed only that it might be the better weapon when restrung. Besides,
when you return you will have pleasure.”
“I shall think about my
delightful holiday.”
“Yes; and learn the names of the
flowers you have dried in your Prayer-book,” said Mr. Fielding, with a twinkle
in the corner of his eye.
Kate dropped her head in
confusion, but looked up again and said frankly, “Yes, that will be pleasant;
and I can tell where each grew and how I found it.”
“Tell whom—your aunt?” A faint
crease in the old man’s cheek showed he was smiling.
“No, sir! she won’t care. I shall
tell Mr. Bramber, if I have the chance.”
“Kitty, I get very downhearted
over my work sometimes. Then I come up here, and gather courage and strength,
and—and trust, Kitty. You will return to Coombe Cellars strengthened and nerved
to do your duty well and hopefully. Remember, it was kind of your aunt to let
you come. She has to drudge hard whilst you are absent, but she does it because
you have been ill and need relaxation in mind and invigoration of body. She
does it, Kitty, because she loves you.”
“Oh, sir!” Kate coloured with
astonishment and with a twinge of pain at her heart.
“Yes, dear little friend, she
loves you. She is not a demonstrative person. She is a clear-headed, practical
woman. She has had a hard life, and much to try her, and to give her a cold and
perhaps repellent manner. Nevertheless, her heart is sound and warm. When you
were ill I spoke with her. I saw how anxious she was for your welfare. I saw
into her heart, and I read love there.”
Kate trembled, and let the mosses
fall from her lap and strew themselves about her feet. The tears came into her
eyes.
“Oh, sir, I should like to go
home at once and do everything I can for her! I did not think she really cared
for me.”
“You do not return till your
father decides that you are to go back to work. Then, you will return with
a good courage, as I said.”
“With all my heart!” answered
Kate fervently, and her face brightened as though the sun shone on it.
Afraid of disturbing the old
rector at his painting, Kate withdrew. She was happy at heart. What he had said
had done her good. She had shrunk from the thought of return to the humdrum of
her usual life, but Mr. Fielding had given her a motive for facing work with
cheerfulness. It was a delight to her to think that her aunt loved her. She
loved her aunt. Daily association with Zerah had made her cling to the hard,
captious woman; she had had no one else to love, and the young heart must love
someone.
Kate delighted to lie by the
river, or lie on a rock in it, and look down into its pellucid pools, or at the
flowing crystal where it broke between the stones. She was accustomed to the
muddy estuary, and though the sea-water when it flowed was clear, it had none
of the perfect transparency of this spring water near its source. The sea
sweeping up the creek was as bottle-green glass, but this was liquid crystal
itself, without colour of any sort, and through it everything in the depths was
visible as though no medium intervened.
Kate could look at the shining
pebbles, at the waving water-weed, at the darting fish. When she had left Mr.
Fielding, she went to one of her favourite haunts beside the Dart, where it
brawled over a cataract of rocks and then spread into a pool still as glass.
Now she saw what puzzled her, and
set her active brain questioning the reason. As she looked into the water,
she could see no reflection of her own face; the light sky was mirrored, and
where the shadow of her head came, she could see far more distinctly to the
bottom of the pool than elsewhere. Indeed, when a fish darted past she could
discern its fins and scales, but when it passed beyond her shadow, its form
became indistinct.
Then Kate rose on her elbows, and
as she did this the sun caught her cheek and nose, and cheek and nose were at
once reflected in the water, and where the reflection came, there the water was
less transparent to her eyes.
To observe was to rouse in the
girl’s mind a desire to find an explanation for the very simple phenomenon that
puzzled her.
She was thus engaged, raising her
face, then a hand, so as to be now sunlit, then to intercept the light, and see
what the effect was on the water, when she was startled to observe in the
liquid mirror the reflection of a second face looking down from above. The sun
was on it, in the eyes, and they glittered up at her from below.
With an exclamation of alarm, she
turned and saw a man standing above her.
CHAPTER XXI
Kate rose to a sitting posture,
and drew her feet under her, rested one hand on the rock, and with the other screened
her eyes from the glare of the sun, to observe the intruder on her solitude.
Then she recognised Roger
Redmore. He was without his coat, an axe over one shoulder. In his right hand
he held a tuft of cotton grass dug up by the roots.
“I knowed as you wor here,” said
he, “but I dursn’t speak before others, lest they should find me out who I
wor.”
“Are you living here, Roger?”
“I be working here at the felling
Brimpts oaks. You see, your fayther, he’s so little at Coombe that he don’t
know me, and I thought I might get money by working here. And I want you to do
a little job for me.”
“What is it, Roger?”
“There’s two jobs. First, do y’
see this here root o’ white shiny grass? Well, I want y’ to take it to Coombe
and to set it on my little maid’s grave. Stick the roots in. It may grow and it
mayn’t. Hereabouts it groweth mostly in wet land. But anyhows by it I
shall know where the little maid lies when I come back to Coombe.”
“You are returning, Roger?”
“Not by day. I reckon some night
I shall be back just for an hour or so, and I want, when I does come, to go to
the churchyard and find out at once where my darlin’ lieth. If it be moonlight,
or dimmets (twilight), and I see the little silver tuft glitter above her head,
then I shall know where her be. I can’t go wi’ my wife; that would be tellin’
folks I wor home agin. I mun go by myself. Whereabouts now have they put her?”
“By the wall where the cedar is, on the east side.”
“There’ll niver be no headstone
there,” observed Redmore, “but what o’ that? When once I know where her lieth,
sure but I’ll put a fresh new tuft of silver tassels as oft as the old ones
die, and I reckon they’ll die, not being in a wet place. My little maid’s grave
won’t be wet save wi’ her father and mother’s tears, and her fayther he can’t
be there but on the sly, and now and then.”
“I will do it for you gladly,”
said Kate. “When do you think you will be home?”
“Home!” repeated Roger; “I’ve no
home—not like to have. My wife and my little ones, wherever they be, that’s all
the world to me, and I cannot see them but at night, and very chancy, when I
don’t think nobody’s about. And t’other thing be this.”
Roger put his hand into his
pocket and drew forth some coin, and gave it to the girl.
“Take this to my old woman. I’ve
earned wi’ my work a bit o’ money, and here is what I can send her. Tell
her to leave the door ajar. I may come any night; but,” he paused, “I reckon
they’ve turned her out o’ house and home now.”
“Not yet, Roger,” answered Kate.
“Mr. Pooke has not insisted on her leaving at quarter-day, but I believe he has
a fresh workman coming to him in a week, and then she will have to leave.”
“And where will she go? Will they
drive her into the street?”
“I really do not know; but”—she
considered and said timidly, “I have had it on my heart, but have been afraid
to speak of it as yet to my father. There is his cottage, never or hardly ever
occupied. Now I will take courage, and beg him to let your wife go into it till
something can be settled; but you must keep out of danger, and you are not safe
here.”
“I cannot go far till my wife and
little ones are secure and have a home. Here no one know’th me, the other
woodcutters are all men from the moor. There was but your father, and he did
not recognise me when I axed him to take me on at felling the timber.”
“I will entreat him to allow your
wife and children to go into his house till something can be done for them. You
will have to escape into another part of the country.”
“Ay, I will go. If I were took,
it would go bad with us all, and there’d be the shame on my little ones—that
their father wor hanged. They’d never shake it off.” Then he touched Kate on
the head. “My hand be but a wicked un. It hev set fire to a rick, but it
be the hand o’ a hunted man, as be nigh crushed with sorrows, as was druv to
wickedness thro’ his sufferin’s, and hev bitter repented it since, and swears
he’ll niver do it agin, so help me God!” He raised his hand solemnly to heaven.
“That’s one thing I ha’ larned, as doin’ wrong niver brings matters right.
There wor just that gettin’ drunk. Then there wor the cheek to Farmer Pooke.
Then my heart were all wormwood; and when my little maid died, I thought it wor
his doin’; and so in a way it wor, for I’d no work and no wage, and us was just
about starvin’, and I did that deed o’ fire. It’s kindled a fire in here”—he
touched his heart—"that nothink can quench. The Lord ha’ pity on me. I
don’t know as I’d ha’ come to this mind but for you, little Kitty Alone, as was
pitiful to me when I were bound and like to be given over to gaol, and you let
me go, and fed me wi’ crumbs out o’ your hand; and now you will find a house
for my dear ones." He laid his hand on her head again. “Mebbe the Lord’ll
hear a sinful thief o’ a man, and I ax His blessin’ on thee; an’ if I can iver
do anything to show you I’m thankful, I will. Amen.”
“Hah!”
Roger. Redmore started. He was
caught by a hand in his collar-band.
Kate sprang to her feet. Her
uncle, Pasco Pepperill, was there. He had come up from behind unobserved, and had
laid hold of the incendiary.
“I have you, you burning
vagabond!” shouted he; “and by heaven! I’ll hand you over to the constables,
and see you hanged, as you deserve. Kate, run away—away at once!”
“Oh, uncle, do not be cruel! Let
him go.”
“You mind your business,”
answered Pasco sharply. “It’s my belief you let him escape after Jan Pooke had
bound him in the boat. Jan left you in charge, and Roger slipped away then.”
“But think, uncle, of his poor
wife and children.”
With a sudden wrench Roger freed
himself, and then, standing back with brandished axe, he said—
“Touch me, and I’ll split your
head.”
“Get away from here,” ordered
Pasco, turning to his niece; “and as for you, Redmore, I want a word. You know
very well that if I give the hue and cry you will be caught, even though now
you have slipped from me. Lower your hatchet; I’m not going to hurt you if you
be reasonable; but wait till that girl is out of earshot.”
Pepperill put his hands into his
pockets and watched Kate as she withdrew. Roger assumed an attitude of
wariness. He was ready at a moment’s notice to defend himself with his axe, or
to take to flight.
“Look here,” said Pasco,
satisfied that he could not be overheard, “it seems to me that you, with your
head almost in the noose, have done a wonderful silly thing to stay so near the
scene of your crime.”
“I’d my reasons as is not for you
to know,” answered Redmore surlily. “I’m sure you don’t consarn yourself for me
and mine so as to care.”
“There you are mistaken,” said
Pasco. “I don’t mean to say that I am deeply interested in you, but I
don’t intend, unless driven to it, to take any steps to get you acquainted with
Jack Ketch.”
“I can defend myself pretty well,
suppose you do.”
“I’m not the fool to risk my head
in another man’s quarrel.”
“And I can take to my heels and
find a hiding-place anywhere on these moors.”
“Ay, and a starving-place where
your bones will rot.”
“What have you to say to me?”
Redmore spoke surlily. Now that
his whereabouts was discovered, it would be needful for him to shift his place
of refuge.
“I suppose you don’t deny setting
fire to Farmer Pooke’s rick?” said Pasco.
Roger shrugged his shoulders and
jerked his head.
“How did you do it? smoking a
pipe under the tree when drunk?”
“No, it warn’t.”
“How was it, then?”
“I warn’t drunk, niver but that
once, and that wor just because o’ Jackson’s ‘Tee-dum.’ I’ve a bit of a orgin
in zingin’, and the innkeeper he wor terrible longing to have me in the choir.
So he got me in, and they tried to teach me the tenor part o’ Jackson’s ‘Tee-dum,’
and I cu’dn’t maister it noways; and they stood me liquor, and I tried, and I
cu’d do naught wi’ it. You see t’other parts went curling up and about, and
bothered me. If they’d a’ stopped and let me zing alone, I cu’d ha’ done it.
Then I went out into the open air, and it wor cold and frosty, and somehow
I got mazed wi’ the drink and the ‘Tee-dum’ together, and I rinned agin my
maister, Farmer Pooke, and I reckon I zed what I ort not, and he turned me off.
That wor it. I niver did it avor, and I’ll niver do it agin. Save and presarve
me from liquor and Jackson’s ‘Tee-dum’!”
“Never mind about that. So you
didn’t fire the rick with your pipe?”
“No, I didn’t. If it had niver
been for Jackson’s ‘Tee-dum,’ I’d not now be in risk of bein’ hanged.”
“Of course it was Jackson did it
all,” sneered Pasco.
“I don’t mean to say that. It wor
the beginning on it. I were throwed out o’ work, and were starvin’, and my
little maid, her died, and then I wor like a mazed chap, and I ran out wi’ the
cann’l, and so I did it.”
“Oh, with the candle?”
“It wor a rushlight.”
“I’ve heard of barns and
storehouses being set fire to by men going into them to sleep, and lighting
their pipes. There was the landlord of the Crown and Anchor at Newton. He had a
miserable sort of a house, but a tramp got in one night”—
“What, into his house?”
“No, into a linhay over the
pigstye, and slept there, or went there to sleep, and there was straw in the
loft, and in smoking his pipe he managed to set fire to the straw, and then the
whole public-house was in a blaze and burnt down.”
“I’ve heard of that. Nobody knows
what became o’ the tramp. There wor roast pig found in the ashes, and
whether roast tramp nobody cared to inquire.”
“The inn has been rebuilt. They
call it a hotel now.”
“I daresay they does.”
“The insurance money did that.”
“I s’pose so. Lucky the house wor
insured. I wish Varmer Pooke ’ad been.”
“You do?”
“I reckon I does. I’m sorry for
what I did when I wor in a b’ilin’ blue rage. Now I can’t get over it noways,
and you may tell’n so.”
“Why, that fire was the making of
the landlord. He feels no ill-will against the tramp. What are you going to do
with yourself now?”
“I don’t know.”
“I suppose you will want to see
your wife again?”
“I s’pose I shall.”
“For that you will return to
Coombe?”
“In coorse I must.”
“At night—lest you should be
seen?”
“Ay—to be sure.”
“You will lurk about—be in
hiding. I’ll tell you what, I’m your good friend. I will do you no harm. I’ll
just leave the door of my stores open—unhasped; and if you want to creep in,
there’s a lot of wool and other things there, you can be warm there, Roger,
warm in the wool.”
“Thanky’, sir. You’ll not peach?”
“And if—if you like a pipe—well”—
“No, Mr. Pepperill, I won’t do
you that ill turn if you’re so good to me—and the little maid, Kitty, too.”
“Oh, I did not mean that. I can’t
say but if a spark chanced to fall among the wool, and the whole was to blaze
away, I should be sorry. I can’t say that I should be troubled, any more than
was the landlord at Newton when the tramp set fire to his linhay over the
pigs.”
Redmore said nothing. Pepperill
spoke slowly, and did not look the man in the face as he spoke.
“If that chance was to happen to
me as happened to the man at Newton, it might, there’s no saying, be a saving of
me from a great misfortune, and—I shouldn’t mind being a liberal friend, and
helping you out of the country.”
“That is what you mean, is it?”
“It might be a convenience to
both of us.”
“’Tis a wonderful world,”
exclaimed Redmore, “when the biggest rascals go free, and one of them be you! A
little rascal like me, who’s sorry that ever he done wrong, is chivied like a
mad dog.”
“Well—what do you say?”
“You’re a rascal and I despise
you,” cried Roger, and turned to go.
“Will you have me as your friend
or your enemy?”
“Your enemy rather than friend on
them terms.”
“Then I’ll hang you!” exclaimed
Pasco, and set off running in the direction of Brimpts.
CHAPTER XXII
Kate had walked away without a
thought of attempting to gather the subject of her uncle’s conversation with
Redmore. She resolved at once to seek her father and obtain from him permission
to house the unfortunate wife with her children in his cottage. She had been
told that he had gone to a farm lying somewhat to the right of the Ashburton
road, near the prominent and stately rock citadel of Sharpitor. She therefore
ascended the long, steep hill, up which scrambles the high road from Dart-meet.
Halfway up the ascent is an
oblong mass of granite, lying in the moor, which goes by the name of the Coffin
Stone, because on it coffins are rested by those who are bearing a corpse to
its lasting resting-place in the distant churchyards of Buckland or Ashburton.
Kate had reached this stone, and was panting for breath, when she heard shouts
and cries in the valley she was leaving, and, leaping upon the Coffin Stone,
she saw a swarm of men on the opposite bank of the Dart—the Brimpts
side—running in the direction of the bridge, headed by her uncle, who was then
levelling a gun he carried.
From her elevation she could not
only see but hear everything.
“An incendiary! He set fire to a
stack. A pound to any man who takes him, alive or dead!” shouted Pasco, and to
Kate every word was audible. Then she saw the flash of the gun, and a little
later heard the report. The shot had missed, for her uncle urged on the men to
run and not let the scoundrel escape, and he himself lagged behind to reload
his barrel.
She looked for the fugitive, but
was able to see him for one moment only, as he leaped a ruinous fence in his
flight down stream.
Why was he taking that direction?
Because the way into the fastnesses of the moorland was closed to him by his
pursuers. He could not run up the hill that Kate ascended, as he would be
exposed throughout, without the smallest cover, to the gun of Pepperill. Though
a course down the river led ultimately into inhabited land, yet between the
moor and population lay the great woodland belt of Buckland and Holme Chase,
where the river wound its way in sweeps among dense forest and rock, and where
Redmore knew he could hide with the greatest ease. But before he could be in
the woodland he had a long stretch of moor to traverse, where there was no
road, at best a fisherman’s track, among rocks scattered in confusion, among
heather and furze bushes, with here and there sloe and thorn trees and an
occasional “witch beam” or rowan growing out of the rocks. Almost immediately
after the junction of the East with the West Dart, the united
stream doubles round Sharpitor, that shoots high above it on one side, and
under the ridges of Benjietor on the other side, in whose lap grows a little
copse, and which, from its crags to the water’s edge, is green with bracken in
summer, but at this period was russet with withered leaves. Thence smoke rose—some
boys had ignited the gorse, and the flames ran among the withered ferns and the
fallen oak-leaves, and blackened and burnt the copse.
Kate hastened on her way. She
knew that on reaching the head of the ridge a short distance intervened between
the road and the precipices of Sharpitor that overhung the ravine. Thence she
could see all that followed—if Roger Redmore succeeded in turning the moorland
spur round which the river foamed.
Hot, trembling, and breathless,
Kate ran, then halted to gasp, then ran on, and did not rest for more than a
minute till she had reached the vantage-point on the rocks, and looked down
into a wondrous ravine of river, granite boulder, and glaring golden furze, and
with the blue smoke of the smouldering fern forming a haze that hung in its
depths, but which rose in places above the rocky crests of the moor and showed
brown against the luminous sky.
Kate ensconced herself among the
piles of granite, with a “clatter,” as it is locally termed, at her feet, a
mass of rocky ruin, composed of granite, in fragments of every size and in
various conditions of disintegration.
She saw Redmore as he doubled the
foot of the mountain, and for awhile had the advantage of being invisible to
his pursuers, and safe from the gun of Pepperill. He stood on a great rock
half-way out of the water, and looked about him. He was resolving what to do,
whether to continue his course down stream, or to endeavour to conceal himself
at once. The fire and smoke on the farther side in the bosom of Benjietor made
it impossible for him to secrete himself there—every lurking-place was scorched
or menaced by the flames. The slope of Sharpitor on his left, though strewn
with the wreckage of the crags above, offered no safe refuge; it was exposed to
full light, without any bushes in it other than the whortle and heather. Roger
did not take long to make up his mind; he pursued his course down the river,
now wading, then scrambling over stones, then leaping from rock to rock, and
then again flying over a tract of smooth turf. Occasionally the wind, playing
with the smoke, carried a curl of it across the river, and drew it out and
shook it as a veil, obscuring Redmore from the eyes of Kate, who watched him in
panting unrest, and with prayers for his safety welling up in her heart. Then
shouts—the men who hunted him had rounded the flank of Shapitor, and had caught
sight of the man they were endeavouring to catch. One fellow, with very long
legs, familiar with the ground, accustomed all his life to the moor, was making
great way, and bade fair to catch Roger.
Redmore looked behind him. He had
cast away his axe, and was therefore unarmed, but was lightened for the race.
“A sovereign to the man who
catches him!” yelled Pepperill. “Knock him down, brain him!”
Then one man heaved a stone,
picked out of the river, and threw it. A vain attempt. He was not within reach
of Redmore; but in a pursuit, none can quite consider what is possible, and
measure distances with nicety, without much greater coolness than is possessed
by men running and leaping over difficult ground. The long-legged man kept
forging ahead, with his elbows close to his sides; he had distanced the rest.
He was fleet of foot, he sprang from stone to stone without pausing to
consider, and without ever missing his footing. Roger advanced slowly: he was
unaccustomed to such difficult ground; sometimes he fell; he floundered into
the river up to his armpits and scrambled out with difficulty. His pursuer
never got into the water. The man had not merely long legs, he had a long nose
and protruding eyes, and as he ran, with his elbows back, he held his
forefingers extended, the rest folded. Every stride brought him nearer to
Redmore, and Roger, who had just scrambled upon a rock in the river, saw that
he must be overtaken, and he prepared for the inevitable struggle.
Kate, leaning forward in her
eagerness, at this moment displaced a large block, that slid down, turned on
its edge and rolled, then leaped, then bounded high into the air, crashed down
on another rock, and from it leaped again in its headlong course.
The girl held her breath. It
seemed as though the rock must strike the running pursuer, and if it struck him
it would inevitably be his death. The rattle of displaced stones, the crash of
the block as it struck, the cries of those behind, who saw the danger,
arrested the long-legged man. He halted, and looked up and around, and at that
moment the stone whizzed past and plunged into the river. Kate saw in a moment
the advantage thus gained, and in palpitating haste threw down every stone she
could reach or tilt over from its resting-place, where nicely balanced, thus
sending a succession of volleys of leaping, whistling stones across the path,
between the pursued and the pursuers.
She heard shouts and execrations
from those who were coming up, and who stood still, not daring to continue
their course, and run the risk of having their brains beaten out by one of the
falling stones. She regarded them not. Her one idea was to save Roger. She
could see that the man for whom she acted had recognised her intervention, and
continued his flight. She could see that the pursuers were stationary,
uncertain what to do.
Then her uncle again raised his
gun. Kate put her hands to her mouth and called to Roger, who looked over his
shoulder, and dropped behind a stone just as the gun was discharged.
Then he picked himself up once
more and ran on. Kate dared not desist. She continued to send block after block
rolling. Some were shattered in their descent, and resolved themselves into a
cloud of whizzing projectiles. Some in striking the soil set a mass of rubble
in motion that shot down and threw up a cloud of dust.
She was hot, weary, her hands
wounded. But the consciousness of success strung her to renewed exertion. Pasco
Pepperill called the party in pursuit together. He shouted up the height
to the girl. Who it was there engaged in dislodging stones he couldn’t discern,
for Kate kept herself concealed as far as possible, and the confusion of the
granite rocks thrown into heaps and dislocated, served to disguise the presence
of anyone among them. He threatened, but threatened in vain; Kate did not stay
her hand to give time to listen to what he cried.
After a brief consultation, as
the avalanche did not decrease, the party resolved to cross the river and
continue the pursuit down it on the farther side, through the smoke and over
the ashes of the conflagration. By this means Roger Redmore could be kept in
sight, and possibly it would be more easy to run over the charred soil among
bushes reduced to ash. Moreover, few, if any, of the stones dislodged by Kate
had sufficient weight and velocity to carry them to the farther side of the
river.
Accordingly, the party began to
step on the rocks that projected from the water, or to wade, so as to reach the
farther side, Pepperill lingering behind reloading his gun, and keeping his eye
on the fugitive. Then a sudden idea struck him, and, calling to the men to
proceed as they had proposed, he started to climb the steep tide of Sharpitor, at
a point where not menaced by the falling stones, judging that by this means he
would dislodge the person who had come to the assistance of the fugitive, and
at the same time be able to follow the flight of the latter with his eye better
than below, and to obtain a more leisurely shot at him when a suitable occasion
offered, as his poising himself on a rock, or halting to resolve on his course.
Kate desisted from sending down
volleys of stones, till the occasion should arise again. She watched the flight
of Roger, and perceived that he was aiming at a coppice which was in a fold of
the hills undiscernible by those on the farther side of the river; by means of
this coppice, if he could reach it, Roger would be able to effect his escape.
In three minutes he was safe;
then Kate drew a long breath. At the same moment she was touched on the
shoulder, and, looking round, saw her father.
“What’s all this about? What’s
this shouting and firing of guns?”
“Oh, father, I hope I have not
done wrong! Uncle and all the men are after Roger Redmore.”
“Who is he?”
“The man who burnt Mr. Pooke’s
ricks, and he has been working for you here—and uncle recognised him, and sent
the men to take him, and he ran away, and I have helped him.”
“You?”
“Yes; by rolling down rocks.”
Jason burst into a fit of
laughter. “Come, that is fine. You and I, Kitty, aiders and abettors of an
incendiary. Is he clear off now?”
“Yes; but here comes uncle up the
steep side.”
Jason hobbled to the edge of the
rock, and, leaning over called, “Halloo, Pasco! Here we are waiting for
you—Kitty Alone and I.”
CHAPTER XXIII
“It is you—you two!” exclaimed
Pepperill, as he reached the summit. He gasped the words; he could not shout, so
short of breath was he. His face with heat was purple as a blackberry. “What’s
the meaning of this?” He held to a projection of granite, and panted.
“Interfering with law—protecting a scoundrel.” He paused to wipe his face. “A
malefactor—a criminal—guilty”—again gasped like a fish out of
water—"guilty of incendiarism, of arson, of felony!"
“Why, Pasco, you’re hot. Keep
cool, old boy,” said Jason, laughing. “Who has created you constable, or
sheriff of the county, that you are so anxious to apprehend rogues?”
“Rogues? rogues? Only rogues
assist rogues in escaping the reward of their deeds.”
“Is there a warrant out for his
apprehension?”
“I don’t know.”
“Then what on earth makes you put
yourself in a heat and commotion to catch him?”
Pasco mopped his brow, and,
tearing up some ferns, dry though they were, proceeded to fan his face.
“Why? Do you ask? For the public
security, of course. And now”—again he puffed—"now I can’t talk; my wind
is gone."
Pepperill looked into the ravine.
He could see that the men on the farther side of the stream were at a nonplus.
The fugitive had escaped them, had dived out of their sight into the
coppice-wood, and they knew that pursuit was in vain. He turned sharply on his
brother-in-law.
“This is your doing—you and Kate.
First you give him work, and then you let him escape. He who helps a felon is a
felon himself.”
“My dear Pasco,” said Jason
Quarm, laughing, “what makes you so fiery in this matter?”
“Fiery? of course I’m fiery. And
look there, Jason! There are the workmen, a dozen of them, doing nothing, and
we shall have to pay their wages for a half day, and nothing to show for it.”
“Whose fault is that? You sent
them from their tasks.”
“Yes, to catch a villain.”
“Which was no concern of yours.”
“It is a concern of mine, and of every
honest man. How can one be safe with such a malefactor at large? I have my
house, my stores; I shall not be able to sleep at night with ease, knowing that
this fellow is at large. If anything happens, I shall come on you.”
“You’ll get nothing from me.”
“That is the worst; I know it.
Why did you help the man to escape? No one is safe—no one. And I, least of
all; for now he regards me as his enemy. He has sworn vengeance; he may come on
me and cut my throat.”
“Not much throat to be cut,
Pasco.”
“There is my money-box”—
“Box, not money.”
“He may set fire to my house—my
barns—burn me and my wife—your sister—Kitty—your daughter. Don’t you care for
that?”
“I am not afraid. If you went
after him, and have angered him, well, we helped him, as you suppose, and have
won his good-will.”
“As I know. Have I not found you
here? Who else could have rolled down the rocks? Show me your hands. There, I
said so!—there is blood on Kate’s hands; they are cut and bruised. She has been
doing what she could; and you, her father, who ought to have known better, have
encouraged her. Rascals! rogues!—rogues all!”
“And oh, how honest am I!—eh,
Pasco?”
“Of course I’m an honest man. I
don’t encourage burglars, and murderers, and incendiaries.”
“I did not know that Redmore was a
murderer or a burglar.”
“Who can say but, having been an
incendiary, he may go on to murder and plunder; these things run together. One
who can commit arson is capable of doing the other crimes as well. I shall have
to drive back to Ashburton alone.”
“Kitty returns with you.”
“What help is there in Kitty?
That fellow Roger, full of rage and desire of revenge, is about the woods, and
may shoot me.”
“He has not a gun.”
“He may spring upon me with his
axe.”
“He has thrown it away,” said
Kate.
“You mind your own concerns,”
exclaimed the angry man, turning on his niece. “There are plenty of ways in
which he may fall on me and murder me, and then he will pick my pockets and
make off in my clothes, and Kitty will help him.”
“You are talking nonsense, Pasco.
Are you such a weakling that you cannot defend yourself? But, pshaw! the man
will not injure you.”
“He will steal by night to
Coombe. His wife is there; his children are there. He knows where I am. He has
sworn revenge against me.”
“When? When he escaped?”
“No; before I set the men after
him.”
“Before he knew you would hunt
him? A probable story!”
“Probable or improbable, it is
true. I threatened him, and I would have arrested him, but could not. Kate
knows I had him by the throat; but he was armed with his axe, and I could not
retain him. Then he swore he would do me an evil turn, and he will keep his
word.”
“He cannot harm you; he is afraid
for himself.”
“He can harm me. He can do to my
house, my stores, what he did to Pooke’s rick.”
“Well, that would not hurt you
greatly; you are insured over value.”
“Not over value, with the wool
in.”
“You were a fool about that wool,
Pasco. Why did you not consult me before dealing with Coaker? I knew of the
fall.”
“Oh, you know everything. You
knew that the Brimpts oak bark was worth three times more than it is; and now
you are felling, without considering that the bark at present is practically
worthless.”
“The sap doesn’t run.”
“If the sap ran like the Dart, it
would not make the bark sell for tan. You either knew nothing about the
conditions, or you wilfully deceived me; and I dare be sworn it was the latter.
I can believe even that of you now, a favourer of incendiaries.”
“Come, do not be extravagant.
What other criminals have I ever favoured?”
“I am too hot and too angry to
argue,” retorted Pasco. “But I want to know something for certain about this
Brimpts wood. It is well enough to cut it down, but what I want to know is, how
will you transport the oak so as to make it pay?”
“Sell on the spot.”
“To whom?”
“To timber merchants.”
“They will reckon the cost of
carriage.”
“We shan’t have to pay for it.”
“We shall sell at a good price.”
“We shall sell! Such oak as
Brimpts oak is not to be had every day.”
“Have you offered it to
anyone—advertised it?”
“No, I have not. Time for that
when it is all felled.”
“You will make as much a
misreckoning in this as you have along of the bark.”
“Trust me. The oak will sell
high.”
“You said the same of the bark.
All your ducks are swans. I must have money.”
“So must I,” said Quarm. “I want
it as the March fields want April showers.”
“I am in immediate need,” urged
Pepperill.
“In a fortnight I shall require
money to pay the men their wages,” observed Quarm.
“I have nothing. You were right;
I have a cash-box, but no cash in it. I have paid away all I had.”
“Dispose of something,” said
Quarm cheerily.
“Dispose of what? Coals? No one
wants coals now.”
“Then something else.”
“Wool, and lose on every pound?
That were fatal. I have not paid for all the wool yet. I want money to satisfy the
coal-merchant, money to meet the bill I gave Coaker; and then the agent for the
bank which has its hold on the Brimpts estate says we may not remove a stick
till everything is paid.”
“Then do not remove,” said Quarm.
“Sell on the spot.”
“To whom?”
“There are plenty will buy.”
“Why have you not advertised?”
asked Pasco testily.
“For one thing, because I did not
know you were in immediate need of cash; for the other, because, till the
timber is down, it cannot be measured. Never sell sticks standing. A timber
merchant will always buy the trees before felled, and many a landowner is fool
enough to sell standing trees. The merchant knows his gain; the landlord does
not know his loss.”
“Felled or unfelled, I must
realise. My condition is desperate. I cannot meet any of the demands on me.”
Pepperill had lost his purple
colour. He wiped his brow again, but this time the drops did not rise from
heat, but from uneasiness of mind.
“You have drawn me into this
Brimpts venture, and I have now all my fortunes on one bottom. If this fails, I
am ruined; there will remain nothing for me but to sell Coombe Cellars, and
then—I am cast forth as a beggar into the roads. I have trusted you; you must
not fail me.”
“Oh, all will come right in the
end.”
“The end—the end! It must come
right now. I tell you that I have to meet the demands of the bank, or I can do
nothing with the sale of the oak, and all now hangs on that. Owing to the
ruinous purchase of Coaker’s fleeces, I am driven to desperate straits. I
cannot sell them at a loss. I calculated it with the schoolmaster—a loss of
some hundred and twenty pounds. You must help me out of my difficulty.”
“I can but suggest one thing. Go
to Devonport, and see if the Government Dockyard will buy the oak. Ship-building
can’t go on without material. If Government will take the timber, you need
not concern yourself about the bank’s demand; it will be satisfied, and more
than satisfied, that the money is safe. Bless you! in these times a man is
happy to see his money within twelve months of him, and know he must have it.”
“I don’t mind; but I’ll go to
Devonport at once,” said Pepperill.
Whilst the conversation thus
detailed was taking place, the three had crossed a strip of moor that
intervened between Sharpitor and the high road, walking slowly, for Pasco was
fagged with his scramble, and Jason was crippled.
“I don’t mind,” said Pasco again.
“But I shall want a few pounds to take me there, and my pockets are empty.”
“I can’t help you. Mine wouldn’t
yield if wrung out.”
“Here comes the parson,” said
Pepperill—"our parson, jogging along as if nothing were the matter and
went contrary in the world. I’ll borrow of him."
“Oh, uncle,” protested Kate,
flushing crimson, “pray do not, if you have no chance of paying.”
“You impudent hussy, mind your
own concerns,” answered Pasco angrily. “I, with no chance of paying! I’m a man
of means. I’ll let you see what that signifies. How d’ y’ do, parson?”
“What! my churchwarden?”
exclaimed Mr. Fielding, drawing rein. “What brings you to the moors?”
“Business, sir, a trifle with
regard to oak timber. I’ve bought the Brimpts wood—cost me a few hundred, and
will bring me a thousand.”
“Glad to hear it, Mr.
Pepperill;—and then we shall have a double subscription to our school.”
“I daresay, Mr. Fielding; I’m a
free man with my money, as you and others have found. And, by the way, talking
of that, could you kindly accommodate me with a little loan of a few pounds. I
started from home without a thought but of returning to-day, and I learn that
the Government has an eye on these oaks—first-rate timber—and I must to
Devonport to strike a bargain. I won’t come to their terms, they must come to
mine. Such timber as this is worth its weight in gold.”
“How much do you want, Mr.
Pepperill?”
“How much can you spare, Mr.
Fielding?”
“Well, let me see.” The rector of
Coombe opened his purse. “I have about six guineas here. I shall want to retain
one for current expenses. When can you let me have the loan returned.”
“Any day. I’ll drop you a line to
my wife—or—on my return. I’m only going to Devonport to get the best price for
the timber, and then I shall be back. If you can spare me five guineas—or five
sovereigns—I shall be obliged. You know me—a man of substance, a man of means,
a warm man. We represent the Church, do we not, Mr. Fielding? and hang
Dissenters all, say I.”
“I can let you have five pounds,”
said the rector; “I see I am short of silver.”
“That will suffice,” answered
Pasco, with dignity. “I will let you have it back directly I have settled with
Government about the oaks.”
Mr. Fielding gave Pepperill the
gold, then excused himself, as he desired to reach home before dark, and rode
on his way.
“I had no idea that to borrow was
so easy,” said Pasco. “Of course, all depends on the man who asks. Everyone
knows me—sound as the Bank of England.”
“And same thing,” said Quarm;
“all depends on the man solicited.”
Then Pepperill, with his hands in
his pockets and head in the air, his spirits revived as though he had borrowed
five hundred pounds in place of five pounds, walked towards Dart-meet Bridge
humming the old harvest song,—
“We’ve cheated the parson; we’ll cheat him again;
For why should the vicar have one in ten?
One in ten?
We’ll drink off our liquor while we can stand,
And hey for the honour of Old England!
Old England!”
CHAPTER XXIV
With five pounds in his pocket,
Pepperill drove to Plymouth and on to Devonport. His moral courage was up again
now he had gold to spend. When his purse was empty, his spirits, his tone of
mind, became depressed and despairing. A very little—a few pounds—sufficed to
send them up to bragging point. There was no limit to his self-complacency and
assurance as he appeared at the dockyard.
His spirits, his consequence that
had so risen, were doomed to sink when he learned that no oak, however good,
was required. Okehampton Park, the finest, the most extensive in the county,
had been delivered over by the impecunious owners to the woodman; thousands of
magnificent trees, as ancient and as sound as those of Brimpts, had been
felled. The market was glutted, oak of the best quality sold cheap as beech;
and the Government had bought as much at Okehampton as would be needed for
several years.
“That is the way with all
Government concerns, stupidly managed by blunderheads. I can do business better
with private firms. I know very well what this means—to grease the palms
of the authorities. I am a man of principle—I won’t do it.” So said Pepperill,
as he swung away from the dockyard. “Bah! I’ve always been a staunch supporter
of Church and State, churchwarden and Tory. If the Government can’t oblige me
when I want a little favour done, but must go to the cheapest shop, blow me if
I don’t turn Whig—that’s not bad enough—roaring Radical, and cry, Down with the
Constitution and the Crown! As for the Church, I don’t say as I’ll go in for
disestablishment and disendowment just now. There is some benefit in an
Established Church when it will accommodate one at a pinch with five pounds,
and don’t press to have it returned till convenient.”
Pasco betook himself now to
private firms of shipbuilders, but was unable to dispose of his timber. The
mowing down of Okehampton Park had flooded the market with first-quality oak.
One firm was inclined to deal with him, if he would draw the timber into
Plymouth. Sanguine at this undertaking, he returned to Dart-meet to drive a
bargain with some of the farmers on the moor for conveying the oak logs to the
seaport town. He found that their charges were likely to be high. The way was
long, the road hilly, in places bad. It would take them two days at least to
convey each load, with a pair of horses, or a team of three, to Plymouth; and
what was one load?—what, but a single log. Then there was the return journey,
that might be done in a long day; but after three such days, the horses would
not be fit for work on the fourth. A pair of horses was ten shillings; and
for three days—that was five-and-twenty; but in reality three horses would be
needed, and that would be thrice fifteen—two pounds five for each stick of
timber before it was sold. As for the spray,—all the upper portion of the
trees,—that would have to be disposed of on the spot; and Pepperill foresaw,
with something like dismay, that he would get no price for it. The expense of
carriage would deter all save moor farmers from purchasing, and they were so
few in number, that the supply would exceed the demand, especially as they
could have as much turf as they wanted for the cutting; and practically not
sufficient would be got from the sale of the faggot wood to pay for the felling
of the timber.
It is one of the peculiar
features of England that our roads are absolutely without any of the facilities
which modern engineering would yield to travellers on wheels. Our ancient
highways were those struck out by packmen, and when wheeled conveyances came
into use, the carriages had to scramble over roads only suitable for
pack-horses. In France and Germany it is otherwise, there modern
road-engineering has made locomotion easy. The main arteries of traffic ascend
and descend by gentle gradients, and make sweeps where a direct course would be
arduous and exhaustive of time.
Now the road from Dart-meet, a
main thoroughfare over the moor, might be carried along the river-bank, with a
gentle fall of a hundred feet in the mile, for six miles. But instead of that,
it scrambles for a mile up a hogsback of moor, nearly five hundred feet in
sheer ascent, then comes down to the Dart again; then scrambles another
ridge, and then again descends to the same river. Nothing could be easier than
to have a trotting road the whole way; but in mediæval times packmen went up
and down hill; consequently we in our brakes, and landaus, and dog-carts must
do the same; not only so, but the transport of granite, peat, wool, and the
oaks from the felled forest was rendered a matter of heavy labour and great
cost. Pepperill saw that it was quite hopeless to expect to effect any dealings
on the Ashburton side, on account of the tremendous hills that intervened.
With rage and mortification at
his heart, he sought for his brother-in-law, and could not find him. He was
told that Quarm had gone to Widdecomb. Some repairs were to be done in the
church, the parsonage was to be rebuilt, and he was going to ascertain whether
oak timber would be required there, and how much, and whether he could dispose
of some of the wood of Brimpts for this object.
He could not wait for Quarm. He
wanted to be home. He was to convey Kate to Coombe Cellars—it had been so
arranged. His wife was impatient for her return, had begun to discover what a
useful person in the house Kate was. Moreover, the moor air had done what was
required of it, had restored health to the girl’s cheeks.
In rough and testy tone,
Pepperill told his niece to put together her traps and to jump up beside him.
“You’ve had play enough at our
expense,” he growled. “Your aunt has had to hire a girl, and she’s done nothing
but break, break—and she’s given Zerah cheek—awful. Time you was back. We
can’t be ruined just because your father wants you to be a lady, and idle.
We’re not millionaires, that we can afford to put our hands in our pockets and
spend the day loafing. If your father thinks of bringing you up to that, it’s a
pity he hasn’t made better ventures with his money.” After a pause, with a
burst of rancour, “His money! His money, indeed! it is mine
he plays games with, it is my hard-earned coin he plays ducks and drakes
with—chucks it away as though I hadn’t slaved to earn every groat.”
As he talked, he worked himself
up into great wrath; and like a coward poured forth his spite upon the harmless
child at his side, because harmless, unable to retaliate. He was accustomed to
hear his wife find fault with Kate, and now he followed suit. We all, unless
naturally generous, cast blame on those who are beneath us; on our children,
our servants, the poor and weak, when we are conscious of wrong within
ourselves, but are too proud for self-accusation. It has been so since Adam
blamed Eve for his fall, and Eve threw the blame on the serpent.
“I don’t hold with
holiday-making,” said Pasco. “It is all very well for wealthy people, but not
for those who are workers for their daily bread. I might ha’ been, and I would
ha’ been, an independent man, and a gentleman living on my own means, but for
your father. He’s been the mischief-maker. He has led me on to speculate in
ventures that were rotten from root to branch, and all my poor savings, and all
that your aunt Zerah has earned by years of toil—it is all going—it is all
gone. There are those workmen cutting down the oak, they are eating my
silver, gorging themselves on my store, and reducing me and Zerah to beggary.
To the workhouse—that’s our goal. To the workhouse—that is where your father is
driving us. What are you staring about you for like an owl in daylight?”
“Oh, uncle,” answered Kate in a
voice choked with tears, “I have been so happy on the moor, and it is all so
beautiful, so beautiful—a heaven on earth; and I was only looking my last—and
saying good-bye to it all.”
“Not listening to what I said?”
“Indeed I was, and I was
unhappy—and what you said made me feel I should never come back here, and I
must work hard now for Aunt Zerah. There was no harm in my looking my last at
what I have loved and shall not see again! It is so beautiful.”
“Beautiful? Gah!” retorted Pasco.
“A beastly place. What is beautiful here? The rocks? The peat? The heather?
Gah! It is all foul stuff—I hate it. What are you hugging there as if it were a
purse of gold?”
“Oh, uncle, it is something I
love so! The schoolmaster sent it me by Mr. Fielding. It’s only a book.”
“A book? of what sort? Let me
see.”
Kate reluctantly produced the
cherished volume.
“Pshaw!” said Pasco, rejecting it
with disgust. “Poetry—rotten rubbish—I hate it. It’s no good to anyone, it
stuffs heads with foolery. I wish I was king, and I’d make it a hanging matter
to write a line of poetry and publish it. It’s just so much poison. No wonder
you don’t like work, when you read that vile, unwholesome trash.”
Kate hastily folded up the volume
and replaced it in her bosom.
“No wonder you and your father
encourage vagabonds and incendiaries if you read poetry.”
“Father did not help Roger
Redmore to escape,” said Kate. “It was I who rolled down the stones. Father
came up when he had already got away to a hiding-place. I, and I alone, did
it.”
“More shame to you! You’re a bad
girl, a vicious girl, and will come to no good.”
He continued grumbling and
snarling and harping on his grievances, and, for some while, jerking out
spiteful remarks. Presently he relapsed into silence, and let the tired cob jog
along till he reached a point where, near Holne, roads branched: one went down
the hill to Ashburton without passing through the village, the other went round
by the church and village inn. Here Pasco drew up, uncertain which road to
take. There was not much difference in the distance. The direct way was the
shorter, but by not more than half a mile, whereas the other afforded opportunity
for refreshment.
At this point was a carpenter’s
shop. The workman was not there, but he had left his shop open, and outside was
a great pile of shavings.
As Pasco sat ruminating, doubtful
which way to take, his eye rested for some while on the shavings. Presently,
without a word, he got out of the conveyance, let down the back of the
cart, collected as many shavings as he could carry, and thrust them in, under
the seat. He went back to the pile, took as many more as he thought would
suffice, and crammed the body of the cart with them. Then, still without
speaking, he shut the back, remounted, and drove down the shortest way—the
steep hill, the direct road to Ashburton that avoided the village.
“Uncle!” said Kate, after a
while.
Pepperill started, as though he
had been stung. “Bless me!” he exclaimed; “I had forgotten you were here.”
“Uncle,” pursued the girl, “you
know my dear mother left a little money, a few hundred pounds, for me. And my
father is trustee, and he has charge of it, and has invested it somewhere for
me. If you are in difficulties, and really want money, I am sure you are
heartily welcome to mine. I will ask my father to let you have the use of it. I
cannot do other—you and Aunt Zerah have been very kind to me.”
“Yes, that we have, and been to
tremendous expense over your keep; and there was your education with Mr.
Puddicombe, and the doctor’s bill coming in, and the medicines; and there has
been your clothing—and you have always eaten—awful. That costs money, and ruins
one. Yes, you are right, you couldn’t do other. I had not thought of that. But
I don’t know what your father will say.”
“In a very few years I shall be
old enough to have it as my own to do with as I like. I do not think that
my father will object to its being employed as I wish. And I know it will
be quite safe with you.”
“Oh, perfectly safe, safe as in
the Bank of England. I’m one of your sound men. Sound, and straight, and
square, all round—everything you can desire, you know. Everyone trusts me. A
man of substance, a man of means—and with a head for business.”
“I will ask father when I see
him.”
“That is right. It will be a
little relief. You are a good girl, I always said you were, and had your heart
in the right place. You will write to your father to-morrow.”
Pasco Pepperill was comparatively
genial, even boastful, on the rest of the way. When he arrived at Coombe
Cellars, his wife heard the wheels and came to the door. She received Kate
without cordiality, and took her husband’s little bag of clothes he had taken with
him. Kate carried hers in her hand.
“Anything in the cart? Shall I
open?” asked Zerah.
“Nothing—absolutely nothing.
Leave the cart alone,” answered Pasco hastily. “Nothing at all.”
Pepperill drew his horse away,
unharnessed it, and ran the dog-cart into the coach-house. Then he stood for a
moment musing, and looking at it. Presently he turned his back, locked the
door, and left his conveyance undischarged of its load of shavings.
“I may chuck ’em away, any time,”
said he, “or give ’em to Zerah to kindle her kitchen fire with, or”— He did not
finish the sentence, even in thought.
CHAPTER XXV
When Pepperill, tired with his
long day’s journey, and harassed in mind, went to his bedroom, Zerah at once
fell upon him.
“How have you fared, I’d like to
know? But lawk! what’s the good of my axing, when I’m pretty confident your
journey has been all down hill, with an upset of the cart presently.”
“And if it be so, who is to blame
but your brother?” retorted Pepperill angrily.
“My brother may have made his
mistakes sometimes, but not always—you never by any chance fail to do the wrong
thing.”
“He has dragged me into this
confounded affair of the Brimpts timber; and now—I cannot sell the bark or the
oaks.”
“He had nothing to say to the
wool. What made you buy at a wrong price?”
“The market is always changing.”
“Yes—against your interests. We
shall end in the workhouse.”
“Things will come right.”
“They cannot. Look here! Here is
a lawyer’s letter about the coals. You must pay by the first of the next month,
or they will put in the bailiffs.”
“It will come right. I have had
an offer.”
“For the oak?”
“No, of a loan. Kate, like a good
and reasonable and affectionate girl, is going to get Jason to withdraw her
money and lend it to me.”
Zerah flushed crimson. “So!” she
exclaimed, planting herself in front of her husband, and lodging her hands on
her hips; “you want to swindle the orphan out of her little fortune. You know
as well as I do, if that money gets into your hands, it will run between your
fingers as has all other money that ever got there. Folks say that there is a
stone as turns all base metal to gold. I say that your palm has the faculty of
converting gold into quicksilver, that escapes and cannot be recovered.”
“This is only a temporary
embarrassment.”
“It shall not be done,” said
Zerah. “I don’t myself believe Jason will hear of it, and if he does, and
prepares to carry it out, I’ll knock his head off—that’s my last word. The
parson said I didn’t love Kate, that I was starving her; but I’ll stand up for
her against you—and her own father if need be.”
“The coal merchant must wait,”
said Pasco, shrugging his shoulders.
“He will not wait. You have
passed over unnoticed his former demands, and now, unless in a fortnight
the money is paid, he will make the house too hot to hold us.”
“We can sell something.”
“What? You have parted with your
farm, the orchard, the meadow—with everything but the house, to follow your
foolish passion to be a merchant.”
“He must wait. I have to wait till
folk pay me my little bills. Money doesn’t come in rushes, but in leaks.”
“He will not wait. Where is the
ready money to come from?”
Pasco scratched his head.
“If everything else fails,” said she
further, “then I propose you go to old Farmer Pooke and get a loan of him.”
“Pooke? he won’t lend money.”
“I am not so sure of that. Jan
has called several times since Kitty has been away, and yesterday he told me,
in his shy, awkward fashion, that he had spoken with his father about her. The
old man made some to-do—he had fancied Rose Ash as a match for his son, as she
is likely to have a good round sum of money; but when Jan insisted, he gave
way. You see everyone in the place knows that Kate has something left by her
mother, but they don’t know how much, and, instead of three hundred pounds or
so, they have got the notion into their heads that it is a thousand pounds.
Now, as the father is ready to let his son marry Kate, I think it like enough
he would help you, so as to prevent the scandal of bailiffs in Coombe Cellars.”
“He may make that the excuse for
breaking off the match.”
“Jan is obstinate. When that lad
sets his head on a thing, there is no turning him, and that his father knows
well. He’d ha’ turned his son away from Kitty and on to Rose if he could, but
he can’t do it; and what he is aware of is, that the least show of opposition
will make Jan ten times more set on it than before.”
“Then you go to Farmer Pooke and
borrow.”
“I! I made to go round as a
beggar-woman! You have brought trouble on the house. You must ask for the
loan.”
Next day, Pasco Pepperill started
for Pooke’s house. The lion is said to lash itself with its tail till it lashes
itself into fury. Pasco blustered and bragged with everyone he encountered,
till he had worked himself up into self-confidence and assurance enough for his
purpose, and then, with bold face and swaggering gait, entered the farm-house.
Pooke senior was a stout man, as
became a yeoman of substance; he had a red, puffed face, with stony dark eyes;
his hands were enormous, and their backs were covered with hair.
Pooke and Pepperill had not been
on the best of terms. Pooke for some time had been churchwarden, but in a fit
of pique had thrown up the office, when Pepperill had been elected in his room.
But Pooke had not intended his resignation to be accepted seriously. He had
withdrawn to let the parish feel that it had absolutely no one else fit to take
his place, and he had anticipated that he would have been entreated to
reconsider his resignation. When, however, Pepperill stepped into his
vacant office, and everything went on as usual, Pooke was very irate, and spoke
of the supplanter with bitterness and contempt.
“How do y’ do?” said Pooke, and
extended his hand with gracious condescension, such as he only used to the
rector and to those whom he considered sufficiently well-off to deserve his
salutation. “What have you come here about?—that matter of Jan?”
“Well, now,” answered Pepperill,
with a side look at a servant, “between ourselves, you know, we are men who
conduct business in a different way from the general run.”
“Get along with you, Anne,” said
Pooke to the maid. “Now we are by ourselves, what is it? That boy Jan is
headstrong. It runs in the blood. I married, clean contrary to my father’s
wishes, just because I knew he didn’t like the girl. I don’t think that it was
anything else made me do it. But your niece, Kitty, has money.”
“Money? oh, of course! We are a
moneyed family.”
“That is well. Mine is a moneyed
family. One cannot be comfortable oneself without money, nor have anything to
do comfortably with other people unless they’re moneyed. I have often thought
there is a great gulf fixed between the comfortably off and those who are in
poor circumstances, and those who are in comfort can’t pass to the other
side—not right they should; let them make their associates among the
comfortably off. That’s my doctrine.”
“And mine also,” said Pasco. “I
like to hear you talk like this—it’s wholesome.”
“Well, and what do you want with
me?”
Pepperill crossed his legs,
uncrossed them, and crossed them again.
“I’ve been doing a lot o’
business lately,” said he.
“So I hear. But do you want to do
business with me? I bought your orchard and meadow. There I think you did wrong.
Hold on to land; never let that go—that’s my doctrine. You got rid of it, and
where are you now? In Coombe Cellars, without as much as five acres around it
of your own.”
“I never was calculated to be a
farmer,” said Pasco. “My head was always set on a commercial life, and I can’t
say I regret it. A lot of money has passed through my hands.”
“I don’t care so much for the
passing as the sticking of money,” retorted Pooke.
“Well, in my line, money comes in
with a tide and goes out with a tide. When it is out, it is very much out
indeed; but I have only to wait awhile, and, sure as anything in nature, in
comes the tide once more.”
Pooke’s stony eye was fixed on
Pepperill.
“Which is it now—high tide or low
water?”
“There it is—low.”
“Oh!”
Pooke thrust his chair back, and
looked at the space between him and Pepperill, as though it were the great gulf
fixed, across which no communication was possible.
“Merely temporary,” said Pasco,
with affected indifference. “Nevertheless, unpleasant rather; not that I
am inconvenienced and straitened myself, but that I am unable to extend my
money ventures. You see, I have been buying a great oak wood on
Dartmoor—splendid oak, hard as iron; will make men-of-war, with which we shall
bamboozle the French and Spaniards. Then I’ve bought in a quantity of wool.”
“What, now? It is worth nothing.”
“Exactly—because there is a
panic. In my business this is a time for buying. There will be a rebound, and I
shall sell. It is the same with coals. I lay in now when cheap, and sell when dear—in
winter.”
“What do you want with me?” asked
Pooke suspiciously.
“The thing is this. I find I have
to pay for the timber before I can sell a stick to Government, and I haven’t
the cash at this instant. I’ve had to pay for the wool,—I bought in two years’
fleeces,—and for the coals, and if I could lay my hand on four hundred pounds”—
“Four hundred pound ain’t things
easy laid hands on.”
“I want the money for three
months at the outside. I’ll give you my note of hand, and what interest you
demand.”
“Likely to make a good thing out
of Government? I’ve always heard as dealing with Government is like dealing
with fools—all gain your side, all loss theirs.”
“Well! ’Tis something like that,”
said Pepperill, with a knowing wink. “But don’t trouble yourself; if you can’t
conveniently raise four or five hundred, I can easily go elsewhere. I came
to you, because my wife said there was likely to be a marriage between the
families, and so I thought you might help me to make this hit.”
“Now, look here,” said Pooke. “I’ve
often had a notion I should like to deal with Government. I’ve a lot of hay and
straw.”
“I’m your man. Trust me. If I get
to deal with Government about the timber, they’ll have confidence in me, for
the oak is about first-rate, and no mistake. They’ll become confiding,
and I’ll speak a word for you. But if you haven’t any loose cash, such as four
or five hundred pounds”— Pepperill stood up, and took his hat.
“Don’t go in a hurry,” said
Pooke. “That’s been my ambition, to deal with Government. Then if one has
mouldy hay, one can get rid of it at a good figure, and Government is so
innocent, it will buy barley straw for wheaten.”
“If you are so hard up that you
have no money”—
“I—I hard up? Sit down again,
Pasco.”
Pooke considered for a moment,
and then said, “Now, I know well enough that in business matters sometimes one
wants a loan. It is always so. If you’ll just give me a leg up with Government,
I don’t mind accommodating you. But—I must have security.”
“On my stores?”
“No; they might sell out. On your
house.”
“Won’t my note of hand do?”
“No, it won’t,” answered Pooke.
“See here: my Jan has gone down your way to make it up with Kitty.
When they have settled, you get me your deeds, and then I don’t mind
advancing the sum you want on that security—that is, if Kitty accepts Jan.”
“She will do so, of course,” said
Pepperill.
“Well, of course,” said Pooke.
CHAPTER XXVI
As soon in the morning as Kate
could disengage herself from the tasks which her aunt at once imposed on her, she
ran to the cottage occupied by the wife and children of Roger Redmore. It was
of cob, or clay and straw beaten and trampled together, then shaved down, and
the whole thatched.
Such cottages last for centuries,
and are warm and dry. So long as the thatch is preserved over the walls, there
is simply no saying how long they may endure, but if the rain be suffered to
fall on the top of the walls, the clay crumbles rapidly away. The cob is
usually whitewashed, and the white faces of these dwellings of the poor under
the brown velvet-pile thatched roofs, with the blinking windows beneath the
straw thatching just raised, like the brow of a sleepy eye, have an infinitely
more pleasing, cosy appearance than the modern cottages of brick or stone,
roofed with cold blue slate.
The cottage of the Redmores was
built against a red hedge, rank with hawthorn and primroses. But in verity it
was no longer the cottage of the Redmores, for the family had been given
notice to quit, and although after Lady-Day Farmer Pooke had suffered the woman
to inhabit it for a few weeks, yet now the term of his concession was exceeded.
He had a new workman coming in, and the unhappy woman was forced to leave.
When Kate arrived at the
dwelling, she found that some sympathetic neighbours were there, who were
assisting Jane Redmore to remove her sticks of furniture from the interior. The
labourer who was incomer was kindly, and also lent a hand. Her goods had been
brought out into the lane, and were piled up together against the bank, and on them
she sat crying, with her children frightened and sobbing around her. Neighbours
had been good to her, and now endeavoured to appease the tears and distress of
the children with offers of bread and treacle, and bits of saffron cake, and
endearments. The woman herself was helpless; she did not know whither she
should betake herself for the night, where she should bestow her goods.
The incomer urged Mrs. Redmore to
tell him what were her intentions. He must bring in his own family that
afternoon, and would help her, as much as he was able, to settle herself
somewhere. It was not possible for her to remain in the road. The parish
officers would interfere, and carry her off to the poorhouse; but it was
uncertain whether she could be accommodated there, interposed a neighbour, as
the house was full of real widows.
Mrs. Redmore was a feeble,
incapable creature, delicate, without the mental or moral power of rising to an
emergency and forming a resolution. She sat weeping and crying out that
she was without Roger, and he always managed for her.
“But you see, Jane,” argued a
neighbour, “as how Roger can’t be here for very good reasons, which us needn’t
mention, and so someone must do something, and who else is there but you?”
“I wish I was dead,” wailed the
poor creature.
“Well, now, Jane,” said the
neighbour, “don’t ye be so silly. If you was dead, what ’d become o’ the
childer?”
At this juncture Kate arrived,
breathless with running.
“It is well.” She stood panting,
with her eyes bright with pleasure at the consciousness that she brought
relief. “I asked my father, and he says Mrs. Redmore and the little ones may go
into his cottage at Roundle Post, and stay there till something is settled.”
“That’s brave!” exclaimed the
women who were standing round. “Now, let me take the little ones, Jane, and you
lead the way, and Matthew Woodman, he’ll help to carry some of your things.”
“I have the key,” said Kate; “and
the distance is nothing.”
“Lawk a mussy!” exclaimed one of
the women; “what would us ever a’ done wi’out you, Kitty. The poor creetur is
that flummaged and mazed, her don’t seem right in her head, and us couldn’t do
nothing with she.”
Mrs. Redmore caught Kate’s hand,
and kissed it.
“We’d all a’ died here, but for
you,” she said.
“Indeed,” answered Kate, hastily
snatching her hand away, “it is my father who has come to your assistance
not I. He lends you the house.”
“But you axed him for it. Oh, if
Roger could do anything for you!”
“I assure you my father is the
one to be thanked, if anyone is.”
“Well, if Roger could do aught
for he, it would be the same as to you.”
“Come, let us be on the move.”
A little procession formed—women
carrying the children, or crocks, a couple of men with wheelbarrows, removing some
of the heavier goods. Then up came Jan Pooke, and at once offered his
assistance, and worked as hard as any.
As soon as the poor woman was
settled into her new quarters, Jan sidled up to Kate, and, seizing her hand and
breathing heavily, said, “Kitty, I want to say something to you.”
The girl looked at him
inquiringly, waiting for what he had to say.
“I mean, Kitty, alone.”
“I am Kitty Alone,” observed she,
with a smile.
“I don’t mean that. I have
something I want to say to you.”
“What is it?” said she. “You look
very odd.”
“It’s—it’s—the silver peninks.”
“What of them?”
It must be premised that the
“silver peninks” are the narcissus poeticus.
“They are in an orchard.”
“I know it,” said Kate. “Lovely
they are—and yet, somehow, I like the daffodils as well.”
“Now, it’s a curious thing,” said
Jan, “that the same roots bring up first daffies, and then silver peninks.”
“That is not possible,” objected
Kate.
“But it is so. Come into the
orchard, Kitty, and see for yourself.”
“I know, without seeing, that it
cannot be.”
“If you will come and look,
Kitty, you will see that just where the daffies were, there the peninks are
now. When the daffies die down, the peninks bloom.”
“Exactly, Jan, because their time
for blooming is a month later than the daffodils.”
“But they come out of the same
roots.”
“That cannot be, by any means.”
Pooke rubbed his head, and said
humbly, “I know, Kitty, I’m a duffer, and that you’re clever, but I’ve seen ’em
with my own eyes.”
“Have you ever dug up the bulbs?”
“No, I can’t say I have done
that.”
“Till you have, you cannot say
that the golden flower and the silver flower spring from one root.”
“It isn’t only the peninks,
Kitty—can’t you understand?”
“I do not. You are very wonderful
to-day.”
“I want to talk to you in the
orchard.”
“You can say what it is, here.”
“No, I cannot. I want to show you the silver peninks, and I
want to say”—he let go her hand, with which he had been sawing.
Kate looked round. It would be considerate
to leave the poor woman alone with her children to get settled into her new
quarters, and she desired to escape another outburst of gratitude.
“Well, Jan, I will go and look at
the flowers, and I hope to show you your mistake—the withered heads of daffodil apart from the bursting bud of the penink.”
The two young people walked
together down the lane to the gate into the orchard. Jan threw this open, and
Kate, without hesitation, stepped in.
“Now,” said Jan, “I said it was
not the peninks.”
“What is not the peninks—the
daffodils? I thought you said that the one plant was the same which throws up
yellow flowers and white ones.”
“You try not to understand me,
Kitty.”
“I am trying hard to understand
you, Jan.”
“Look here,” he exclaimed,
letting go the gate. Kate did as desired; she looked him full in the face. His
mouth was twitching. “Tell me, Kate”—
She waited for him to conclude
the sentence, and as he did not, she asked him gently what it was that he
desired her to tell him.
“You know already what I mean,”
he exclaimed, breathing short and quick.
Kate shook her head.
“Look here, Kitty. My father has
given his consent at last, and I am going to be married.”
“I am so glad to hear it, Jan.”
“Kate, you tease me. You—you”—
“Indeed, I wish you all happiness.”
“That I can only have with you.”
“With me?” Kate was frightened,
drew back, and fixed her great, dark blue, tranquil eyes on him. The sweat
rolled off his brow.
“Oh, Jan! What do you mean?”
“You know what I mean. You shall
be my missus.”
“Jan—that cannot be.”
“Why not? Give me your hand—no,
give me both.”
“I cannot do that.”
A pause ensued.
“Kitty, you don’t care for me?”
“I do care for you, Jan.”
“Then love me—take me. Sister Sue
will be so pleased.”
“I cannot do it, Jan, even for
sister Sue.”
“You cannot love me?” he gasped,
and his face lost its colour. “Oh, Kitty, since we were in the boat together I
have thought only of you.”
“And before that, of Rose. Was it
not so?”
“No, Kitty. Rose rather teased
me.”
“Jan, you are a dear, good old
fellow, and I like you better than any—I mean, almost better than anyone else
in the world.”
“Whom do you like better?” he
inquired in a tone between sulk and anger.
“My dear father, of course.”
“Oh, your father!—anyone else?”
“I love the dear old parson.”
“The parson? why so?”
“Because one can learn so much
from him.”
“Oh, learn, learn!” exclaimed
Pooke impatiently. “At that rate you will love the schoolmaster, for he can
teach you all sorts of things—why some stars twinkle and others do not; and why
the tides do not come regular by half an hour. If that sort of foolery suits
you, he’ll do.”
“It is no foolery, dear friend
Jan. I have said that I did regard and like you.” Her face had become crimson.
“But you will not love me.”
“Jan, I shall always think of you
as a brother or a cousin. You are so good, so true, so kind. You deserve the
best girl in Coombe, and I am not that.”
He wanted to interrupt her, but
she proceeded, laying her finger-tips on his breast.
“No, Jan, I am not that—I know it
well; and I know that your father, not even sister Sue, would have you marry
me. I cannot love you, and you would be unhappy with me.”
“Why that?”
“Because I would be for ever
asking you questions which you could not answer. And I, with you, would not be
happy, because I could get no answers out of you. You would be telling me such
things as that silver peninks sprang out of daffodil roots, and that—I could
not believe.”
“So you refuse me?”
“Jan, you must get a good dear
wife, who will believe that silver peninks grow out of daffodil bulbs—will
not bother whether they do or not—one who loves you with her whole heart. I
know one who does that—no—listen to me!” as he made a gesture of impatience, as
if he would turn away. “Let me speak plainly, Jan. Rose is a merry,
good-hearted girl; and if she has done an unkind thing to me, it has not been
out of malice, but because it made her mad to think that you did not love her,
and cared a little for me. No one in Coombe can say a bad word against her. She
is the prettiest girl in all the country round. She is always neat and fitty
(dapper). If you know at all what love is, Jan, you must judge how miserable
Rose is, when, loving you with all her heart, she finds you indifferent, and
even rough towards her; she hates me, only because you prefer me to her. Your
father, I am quite sure, has no wish to see you marry anyone but Rose. Sister
Sue is her friend, and Sue knows and cares nothing about me. Let us always
remain friends. I shall ever value you for your goodness of heart, dear Jan. I
wish I could love you enough to accept you, but I cannot—I cannot, Jan—and
after saying that silver peninks”—
“Oh, confound the peninks!” he
used a worse word than “confound.”
“Jan! Do not say that. It is a
necessity of my heart to learn. I must ask questions, and I never can love a
man who cannot give me something to satisfy my mind. Dear Jan, if we were
married, and you said that silver”—
He stamped his feet.
“Well, never mind the peninks. It
cannot be, Jan. It cannot be. We were never created for each other. Woman
is made out of a rib of the man to whom she must belong. If I am so eager to
ask questions, and get to know things, that shows, Jan, I was never made out of
your rib, never taken from your side, and so never can go there.”
CHAPTER XXVII
When Kate returned to Coombe
Cellars, she saw that some trouble had occurred. Her aunt was sitting at the
table in tears, Pasco had planted himself on the settle, with his legs
stretched before him, wide apart, the soles turned up and his hands in his pockets.
His hat was on and he was whistling a tune—a strain out of Jackson’s
“Tee-dum”—in unconcern.
Kate had heard enough of the
altercations between her aunt and uncle to be aware that their circumstances
were strained, and that Zerah disbelieved in her husband’s business capacities.
Pasco had himself admitted to her, on the drive from Brimpts, that he was in
difficulties.
Zerah, so far from refraining
from her comments before Kate, hailed her entrance as an opportunity for
renewing her animadversions on Pasco.
“Look here, Kitty! Here is what
we have come to—read that! Your uncle, like a reckless fool, has gone and
bought wool when there is no sale for it, and has given a bill for it which has
expired. The bank has returned it to Coaker, dishonoured,—dishonoured, do you
hear that, Pasco?—and here is Coaker, furious, and demanding immediate
payment. On the other side, there is the Teignmouth coal merchant threatening
proceedings. What is to be done?”
Kate looked at her uncle.
“Don’t be excited and angry,
Zerah,” said he, with the utmost composure. “After rain comes sunshine. It is
darkest before dawn. When the tide is at lowest ebb, it is on the turn to the
flow.”
“But what is to be done?
Dishonoured!” exclaimed Zerah.
“Dishonoured?—fiddlesticks! The
bill is returned, that is all. The money will come.”
“Whence. Can you stamp on the
ground and make the coin leap up? Can you throw your net into the Teign and
gather guineas as you can shrimps?”
“It will come right,” said Pasco.
“There is no need for this heat, I tell you. I have seen Farmer Pooke, and he
will advance me five hundred pounds.”
“Yes—on the security of this
house.”
“Well, what of that?”
“And five hundred pounds will not
suffice to meet all the claims.”
“Well, there are Kitty’s
hundreds.”
“They shall not be touched.”
“You promised me the loan of
them, did you not, Kitty?” asked her uncle, scarcely raising his head to look
at her.
“Yes, you are heartily welcome to
them,” said the girl.
“They shall not be touched!”
exclaimed Zerah, leaning her fists on the table.
“That is as Jason thinks and
chooses,” answered Pasco. “He is trustee for Kitty, not you. He got me into the
hobble, and must get me out.”
“What!—did he get you into this
about the wool?”
“I should have managed about the
wool, were it not for the Brimpts business.”
“And the coals?” asked Zerah
ironically.
“I can manage well enough when
not drawn away into foreign speculations. Jason persuaded me against my will to
embark in this timber business, and that is it which is creating this
obstruction. He got me in—he must get me out. Kate’s a good girl,—she helps,
and don’t rate and rant as you do, Zerah.”
“I don’t say she is not a good
girl,” retorted Zerah. “What I say is, you are a bad uncle to desire to rob
her”—
“Rob her? I ask only a loan for a
few weeks. Her money and that from Pooke will set us on our feet again.”
At that moment, the man just
alluded to came in with much noise. His face was red, his expression one of
great anger, and without a greeting, he roared forth—
“It is an insult. The girl is an
idiot. She has refused him—him—a Pooke!”
“Who? What?” asked Zerah, letting
go the table and staggering back, overcome by a dreadful anticipation of evil.
“Who? What?” retorted Pooke,
shaking his red face and then his great flabby hand at Kate. “She—Kitty
Alone—has said No to my John!”
Zerah uttered an exclamation of
dismay. Pasco’s jaw fell, and, drawing in his feet, he pulled his hands
from his pockets and leaned them on the arms of the settle, to be ready to lift
himself.
“She—that chit—has dared to
refuse him!” roared Pooke. “Not that I wanted her as my daughter. Heaven
defend! I think my John is worth better girls than she. But that she should
have refused him—my John—she who ought to have gone down on her knees and
thanked him if he gave her a look—that she should have the
impudence—the—the”—he choked with rage. “Now, not one penny of mine shall you
have, not on note of hand, on no security of your beggarly house—a cockle and
winkle eating tea-house—bah!—not a penny!”
Then he turned, snapped his
fingers at Zerah and Pasco, and went out.
There ensued a dead hush for some
moments. Kate had turned very white, and looked with large frightened eyes at
her uncle, then at her aunt. She felt that this was but the first puff of a
storm which would break in full force on her head.
Pasco stumbled to his feet,
planted his right fist in the hollow of his left palm, and, coming up close to
Kate, said hoarsely, “You won’t have him? You, you frog in a well! You won’t
have him, the richest young chap in Coombe! I say you shall have him. You shall
run after Mr. Pooke, and say it is all a mistake—you take Jan thankfully—you
only said No just out of bashfulness, you did not think yourself worthy. Tell
him you said No because you thought Jan was asking you against his father’s
wishes. Say that now you know how the old man feels, you gratefully
accept. Do you hear? Run.”
Kate did not move. Her head had
fallen on her bosom when he began, now she raised it, and, looking her uncle
steadily in the face, she said, “I cannot. I have told Jan my reasons.”
“Reasons, indeed! precious
reasons. What are they?”
Kate did not answer. Her reasons
were such as Pasco could not understand.
“Kate,” interposed Zerah in an
agitated voice, “what is the meaning of this?”
“Oh, dear aunt, it is true, I
cannot take Jan. I have refused him, and I cannot, will not withdraw the No. In
this matter I alone am answerable, and answerable to God.”
“I insist,” stormed Pasco.
“I cannot obey,” answered Kate.
“Cannot—will not obey us who have
brought you up. I suppose next you will refuse to obey your father?”
“In this matter, yes, if he were
to order me to take Jan Pooke.”
“I’ll force you to take him.”
“You cannot do that, uncle.” She
spoke with composure, whereas he was in a towering passion.
“Look at this,” said he,
snatching up the letter from the table. “I’m dishonoured now, indeed, as Zerah
says. If you take Jan, all is well. The old father will find me money, and all
runs on wheels. You put in your spoke, and everything is upset. Dishonoured,
ruined, beggared—and all through you.”
He beat down his hat over his
brows, laughed wildly, and shook his fist at Kate. “I was chucked out of the
trap t’other day. I wish I had broken my neck sooner than come to this. I’ve
nourished a viper in my bosom, and now it turns and stings me.”
“Leave her to me,” said Zerah.
“You make matters worse by your violence. That is the way with you men. Leave
her to me.”
Pasco flung himself back in the
settle, and thrust out his legs as before, and rammed his fists into his
pockets. Before he had held his chin up, now it was buried in his shirt front.
Then Zerah pulled her niece into
the window. Kate drew a long breath. She knew that now came the worst trial of
all.
“Kitty,” said the aunt, holding
both the girl’s arms, and looking into her face. “Are you utterly heartless? Is
it a matter of no concern to you that we should be ruined? You have but to run
after Mr. Pooke, and all will be well. Why should you not give way to my wishes
and those of your uncle? What have you against the lad? He is good, and he is
rich.”
“I do not love him,” answered
Kate confusedly.
“But he is so well off. There is
no one with half his prospects in the place. I can’t understand. He likes you.
He is desperately fond of you.”
“I will never take one I do not love,”
said Kate, shaking her head.
“And you have heard the condition
we are in? Your uncle owes money on all sides. If money is due to him, he
cannot recover it. He has sold the farm, there remains only this house. If he
sells that, we are without a home. Then where will you be? Come—yield to our
wishes, child.”
“I cannot, indeed I cannot,”
answered Kate, trembling in all her limbs. “I would have taken Jan if I could.”
“What is to prevent you?”
Kate was silent.
“There is—there can be no one
else in the way?” pursued Zerah.
Again no answer.
“Stubborn and hardhearted, that
is what you are,” said Zerah bitterly. “It is all the same to you what becomes
of us. We reared you. We have loved you. I have been to you as a mother. You
have never shown either your uncle or me that you were grateful for what we
have done for you. Your own father you treat as though he were a dog—take no
notice of him. I have heard of hearts of stone, I never believed in them
before. I do now. No; there is—there can be no one else so insensible. You have
not got it in you to love anyone.”
Kate sighed. The tears ran down
her cheeks.
“Dear aunt, I have always loved
you, and I love you now, and ever will.”
“Then show me that you have a
heart,” said Zerah. “Words without deeds are wind. If my own dear child Wilmot
had been alive, this would not have happened. Jan would have loved her, not
you; and even if she had not cared for him, yet, when she knew my wishes,
she would have yielded. She would have given her heart’s blood for me.”
Kate pressed her folded hands to
her bosom; her heart was bursting with pain.
“What is it that I ask of you?”
pursued Zerah, and brushed the tears from her own eyes. “Nothing but what is
for your own advantage, your own happiness. How will you like starvation—rags,
no roof over your head? If you take Jan Pooke, you become the first woman in
the place. You will have money to do with just as you likes. Jan is a
good-hearted fellow. Never have you heard of his having wronged man, woman, or
child. He is amiable; you can turn him round your little finger. What more can
a woman wish for?”
Kate’s mind was tossed with
trouble. She had so often longed that the opportunity might arise for her to
prove to her aunt that she loved her. Now the occasion had come. The future was
full of threat and disaster, and one word from her might avert this and restore
serenity; and not only would that one word relieve her uncle and aunt in their
present distress, but it would also suffice to make poor, worthy Jan a happy
man. But that word she could not speak, she could not prevail with herself to
speak it. She liked John Pooke, and but for one thing she perhaps might have
yielded—that one thing was that she had met with a man very different from the
young yeoman, one who could answer questions and satisfy her hungry mind.
“I cannot, dear auntie.”
“Cannot? What stands in the
way? Who stands in the way?”
“I cannot, auntie.”
“Perverse, headstrong, heartless
child! When luck comes to you, you throw it away, and cast your own self, and
all belonging to you, into misery. I wish you had never come here; I wish I had
never nursed you in my arms, never cared for you as a child, never watched over
you as a grown girl.”
“Auntie!”
“Away—I will not speak to you
again.”
CHAPTER XXVIII
Pasco had left the room and the
house. His anger with Kate was obscured by his unrest as to his own condition.
What could he do? He must meet the bill for the wool, he must pay for the
Brimpts timber before he removed any of it, or forfeit what had already been
spent over felling the trees. He must pay the coal merchant’s account, or
bailiffs would be put into the house.
He went into his stores and
observed the contents of his warehouse. There was wool on the upper storey,
coal was lodged below. Above stairs all the space was pretty well filled with
fleeces.
Then he went to his stable, and
looked at his cob, then into the covered shed that served as coach-house. He
put his hand in his pocket, pulled out the key, and opened the back of the
cart. The shavings he had put in were there still. He could not carry them into
the house now, whilst Zerah was engaged with Kate. Besides, he would not
require so much kindling matter within doors. Where should he bestow it?
Suspecting that he heard a step
approach, Pasco hastily closed the flap of the cart, and went to the front
of the shed. No one was there. He returned to the shed and reopened the box of
the cart, and filled his arms with shavings, came out and hastily ran across
with them to his warehouse.
Then he came back on his traces,
carefully picking up the particles that had escaped him. There remained more in
his dog-cart. Would it do for him to run to and fro, conveying the light
shavings from shed to warehouse? Might it not attract attention? What would a
customer think were he to come for coals, and find a bundle of kindling wood
among them? What would neighbours think at the light curls caught by the wind
and carried away over the fields?
He went hastily back to the
warehouse and collected the bundle he had just taken there, and brought it all
back in a sack, and rammed this sack into the box of his cart; and then went
again to the stores, and raked the coals over the particles of shavings that
remained.
Then Pasco harnessed his cob, and
drove away to the little town of Newton. A craving desire had come over him to
see again the new public-house erected in the place of that which had been
burnt. He had no clear notion why he desired to see it.
As he drove along, he passed the
mill, and Ash, the miller, who was standing outside his house, hailed him.
“By the way, Pepperill—sorry to
detain you; there is a little account of mine I fancy has been overlooked. Will
you wait?—I will run in and fetch it; my Rose—she does all the writing for
me, I’m a poor scholard—she has just made it out again. It was sent in
Christmas, and forgot, I s’pose, then again Lady-Day, and I reckon again
overlooked. You won’t mind my telling of it, and if you could make it
convenient to pay”—
“Certainly, at once,” answered
Pasco, and thrust his hand into his pocket and drew it forth empty. “No hurry
for a day or two, I reckon? I find I have come away without my purse.”
“Oh no, not for a day or two; but
when it suits you, I shall be obliged.”
“Will to-morrow do?”
“Of course. I say, Pepperill,
your brother-in-law is a right sort of a man.”
“Why do you say that?”
“Giving up his cottage to that
poor creetur, Jane Redmore.”
“I do not understand you.”
“What—have you not heard? There was
like to be a proper mess. Farmer Pooke wanted Roger’s cottage for his new man,
and so she, poor soul, had to turn out. There was no help for it. She had no
notion where to go, and what to do. A lost sort of creetur I always thought,
and now that Roger is away and not to be found, and what wi’ the death of her
little maid, gone almost tottle (silly). Her had to clear out, and folks was
nigh mazed to know what to do wi’ her, when your niece, Kitty Alone, came and
said as how her father Jason gave his cottage till Jane Redmore could settle
something.”
“I never heard a word of this
till this moment,” said Pasco. “When did it happen?”
“To-day—not long ago. Jane
Redmore is in Jason Quarm’s house now. Kate gave her the key.”
Pepperill grew red, and said, not
looking Ash in the face, but away at the ears of his horse, “I don’t like
this—not at all. We ought to get rid of Redmore and all his belongings. You are
not safe in your house, your mill is not safe, I am not safe, with that
firebrand coming and going amongst us—and come and go he will so long as his
wife and children be here. He were mighty fond of they.”
“Roger will do you no harm. Your
people have been good to him.”
“What! do you call Jason ‘my
people’?”
“Jason and Kitty have housed his
wife.”
“It don’t follow that he loves
me. I set the men in pursuit of him at Dart-meet, and he knows it, and hates
me. I live in fear of him as long as he is uncaught.”
The miller shrugged his
shoulders. “Roger is not so bad, but Farmer Pooke did try him terrible. I won’t
detain you. You’ll mind and pay that little account, will you not—to-morrow?”
“Yes—certain.”
Then Pepperill drove on. He
passed a man in a cart, and the man did not salute him. In fact, the way was
narrow, and the fellow was careful that the wheels should clear, and had not
leisure to look at and touch his hat to Pasco. But Pepperill regarded the
omission as an intentional slight. He was in an irritable condition, and
when shortly after he drove before a cottage, and the woman in the doorway,
hushing her child, did not address him, or answer his address, his brows
knitted and he swore that everyone was against him. His disturbed and anxious
mind longed for recognition, flattery, to give it ease, and unless he received
this from everyone, he suspected that there was a combination against him, that
a wind of his difficulties had got abroad, and that folk considered he was no
longer worth paying attention to.
There were not many on the road,
and he acted capriciously towards those few. Some he greeted, others he passed
without notice. He fancied he detected a sneer in the faces of such as returned
his salutation or a purposeful lessening of cordiality. On reaching the new inn
at Newton, his heart was full of anger against all mankind.
The host did not receive him with
cordiality, as he expected; he looked out at the door and went in again with a
hasty nod.
In the yard Pasco cautiously
opened his gig-box when the ostler was not looking and drew out a halter, then,
hastily closed the flaps, and, extending the cord, said, “I’m not going to stay
many minutes; don’t take the cob out of harness. Let him stand and eat a bite,
that is all.”
Then Pepperill went into the inn
and called for a glass of ale.
“Halloa, Pepperill!” said a
cheery voice, and Coaker moved up to him at the table. “How are you? Sold
the wool yet? I hear there is a rise.”
Pepperill drew back and turned
blood-red; this was the man to whom he owed so much money—the man to whom he
had given the bill that was dishonoured.
“No, I haven’t sold,” answered
Pasco surlily.
“I advise you not to. You’ll make
something yet. That Australian wool won’t go down with our weavers. It’s not
our quality, too fine, not tough enough. Hold back, and you will make your
price.”
“That is all very well for you to
say, but”— Pasco checked himself. What was on his lips was—"It is
ready-money I need, not a profit a few months hence."
“There’s good things coming to
you yet,” continued Coaker. “I heard on the moor that your brother-in-law has
near on made a sale of the Brimpts oaks.”
“He has?”
“Yes; there has been a timber
merchant from Portsmouth come there. He wanted the Okehampton oaks, but was too
late, they had been picked up, so he came on to Dart-meet, and I reckon now it
is only about price they are haggling, that is all.” Coaker dropped his voice
and said, “There’s an awkwardness about that bill of yours. Nay, don’t kick
out; I won’t be so terrible down on you just for a fortnight or three weeks.
I’ll let you turn that timber over first if you will be sharp about it. There,
don’t say I’m down on you. A fortnight or three weeks I give you.”
Pasco held up his head, but the
sudden elation was damped by the thought that he could not remove any of
the timber till the covenanted price had been paid for it, and whence was this
money to come? Money he must have to enable him to hold on with the wool till
it fetched a better price, and to dispose of the oaks he had felled on the
moor, to enable him to escape the scandal and humiliation of having the
bailiffs put in his house by the coal merchant.
But then, in the event of a
certain contingency which loomed before Pasco’s inner eye, there would be no
wool to be disposed of, it would have been reduced to—even to himself he would
not complete the sentence. Would that matter? The insurance would more than
cover the loss, and he would be able to dispose of the oak.
“Will you have a pipe?” asked
Coaker, and after having stuffed his tobacco into his bowl, he produced a
match-box and struck a light with a lucifer. At the period of this tale lucifer
matches were a novelty. The tinder-box was in general use for domestic
purposes, and men carried about with them small metal boxes, armed with a steel
side, containing amadou and flint, for kindling their pipes and cigars.
“What do you call that?” asked
Pepperill, observing the proceedings of the farmer.
“Ah! I reckon this be one of the
finest inventions of the times. Have you never seen or read of this yet? It is
better than the phosphorus bottle, and than Holmberg’s box. Look here. This
little stick has got some chemical stuff, sulphur and something else,
phosphorus, I believe, at the end; all you have to do is to rub, and the whole
bursts into flame.”
Pepperill took the box, turned it
over, opened it, looked at and smelt the matches.
“Are they terrible expensive?” he
asked musingly.
“Oh no. There, as you are curious
about it, I’ll give you the box, and you can show it to your missus.”
Pasco put out his hand to shake
that of Coaker. It was cold and trembled.
The devil was playing a game with
him. He was offering him a reprieve from his embarrassments, and at the same
time thrusting him forward to the accomplishment of the evil deed on which he
brooded, and was placing in his hands the means of executing it.
Pasco sank into deep thought, looking
at the match-box and playing with it, now opening, then shutting it.
“I’m depriving you of it,” he
said.
“Not a bit. I have a dozen. They
are just brought in from London and are selling off amazin’ fast at Ashburton.
In a week they’ll be all over the country and the tinder boxes chucked away.”
“Are they dangerous—I mean to
carry about with one?” asked Pasco.
“Not a bit. There is no fire till
you strike it out.”
Then Pepperill again fell into
meditation. He put the box into his pocket, and sat looking before him into
space, speechless.
Suddenly a shock went through his
frame. He had been touched on the arm by Coaker.
“What is it?” he asked, with
quivering lips.
“Look at the landlord,” said the
farmer in an undertone, with his hand to his mouth. “Do you know what folks say
of him?”
Pasco asked with his eyes. He
could not frame the words with his lips.
“They do say that he set fire to
the old place, so as to get the insurance money for rebuilding in grand style.”
“A tramp did it—got into the
cellar,” said Pasco in a whisper.
“Nobody never saw thickey tramp
come, and sure and sartain nobody never saw him go. I don’t believe in the
tramp. He did it himself.”
“You should not speak that unless
sure of it,” said Pepperill, thrusting back his chair. “You have no evidence.”
“Oh, evidence! Folks talk, and
form their opinion.”
“Talk first and form opinions
after on the idle chatter—that’s about it.”
Pasco stood up. He was alarmed.
He was afraid he had not fastened the box of his dog-cart. The flap might have
fallen, and then the interior would be exposed to view; and what would the
ostler, what would anyone think who happened to come into the stable-yard and
saw what constituted the lading of his cart? His hand had shaken as he turned
the key, after bringing out the halter; almost certainly in his
nervousness he had imperfectly turned it. He could not rest. He went out into
the yard and looked at his dog-cart. It was closed. He tried the key. The lock
was fast.
“Put the cob in,” said he to the
ostler, and he returned, much relieved, to the house.
Coaker had departed. Pepperill
called for another glass of ale, and found interest in observing the landlord.
That man had set fire to his tavern so that he might construct an hotel. He
seemed cheery. He was not bowed down with consciousness of guilt. His voice was
loud, his spirits buoyant. He looked Pepperill full in the eyes, and it was the
eyes of Pepperill that fell, not those of the landlord.
“I wonder,” considered Pasco,
“whether he did do it, or did not? If he did not, it is just as bad as if he
did, for people charge him with it all the same. No one will believe he is
innocent. Suppose he did it—and I reckon it is most likely—well, Providence
don’t seem to ha’ turned against him; on the contrary, it is a showering o’ prosperity
over him. P’r’aps, after all, there ain’t no wrong in it. It was his own house
he burnt. A man may do what he will with his own.” He put resolutely from him
the thought of fraud on the insurance company. What was a company? Something
impersonal. Then Pepperill rose, paid for his ale, and went forth. As he jumped
into the dog-cart, the ostler held up the halter.
“Will you give me the key and I
will put it inside?” asked the man.
“No, thank you—hand it to me.”
The ostler gave him the halter,
and Pepperill fastened it to the splashboard and drove on. He had attached it
hastily, carelessly, and before long the rope uncoiled and hung before him. His
eyes were drawn to it.
“What would come to me if the bailiffs
were put into the house, and Coombe Cellars were sold over my head to pay what
I owe?”
Pasco was a man who could live
only where he was esteemed, looked up to, and where he could impose on
underlings and brag among equals. The idea of being in every man’s mouth as
“gone scatt”—a ruined man—was intolerable. “I would die rather than that,” he
exclaimed aloud, and put his hand to the halter to twist it and knot it again.
It was a sin to commit suicide.
His life was his own, but he could not take that. His storehouse with his
stores was his own. Would it be wrong for him to destroy that? Better that than
his own life. There were but two courses open to him. He must either use the
halter for his own neck and swing in the barn, or recover himself out of the
insurance money on his stores. He drove on brooding over this question, arguing
with his conscience, and presently he held up his head. He saw that his life
was too precious to be thrown away. What would Zerah do without him? He must
consider his wife, her despair, her tears. He had no right to make her a widow,
homeless. Were he to die—that would not relieve the strain. The sale would
take place just the same, and Zerah be left destitute. Pepperill held up his
head. He felt virtuous, heroic; he had done the right thing for the sake of his
dear wife, made his election, and saw a new day dawning—dawning across a lurid
glare.
CHAPTER XXIX
Kate fled upstairs to her
bedroom, where she might be alone and have free scope for tears. She threw herself
on her knees by her bed, and putting her hands under the patchwork quilt, drew
it over her ears and head, that the sound of her sobs might be muffled, so as
not to reach her aunt were she to ascend the staircase. She feared lest there
should be a repetition of the scene on the return of her father. Aunt Zerah
would wait impatiently for him, and the moment that he arrived, would pour
forth her story, not in his ear only, but in Kate’s as well, whom she would
forcibly retain to hear it and receive the reproaches of her father. That her
father would be disappointed that she had put from her the chance of becoming a
well-to-do yeoman’s wife, she knew for certain. He had never concerned himself
very greatly about her, had never endeavoured to sound her mind and put his
finger on her heart, and would be quite unable to appreciate the reasons she
could give for her conduct; he would look on her refusal of young Pooke as a
bit of girlish caprice. She feared that he would view it as a bad speculation,
and would hasten off without consulting her, to endeavour to pacify the
mortified vanity of the old man, and to assure the young one that she, Kate,
had rejected him out of girlish bashfulness, whilst loving him in her heart.
There was no bond of sympathy between her father and herself. That which filled
his mind had no place in hers; what interested him she shrank from. She had
returned from Dartmoor with heart glowing with gratitude to him for having
insisted on her having a holiday, to her uncle for having taken her out to
Dartmoor, and to her aunt for having spared her. It had been her desire to find
occasions to prove to them that she was grateful, and now, her first act on
return was to run contrary to their wishes, and anger her uncle and aunt, and
lay up matter for reprimand on the arrival of her father.
Her aunt had never comprehended
the character of Kate, filled to the full as her heart was with bitterness at
the loss of her own daughter. Kate was in all points the reverse of Wilmot, and
because so unlike, woke the antipathy of the bereaved mother, as though the
silence and reserve of Kate were assumed out of slight to the memory of the
merry, open-hearted girl. She looked on her niece as perverse, as acting in
everything out of a spirit of contrariety. How else explain that a young girl
with warm blood in her veins should not retain the longings and express the
wishes common to other girls of her age? that she had no fancy for dress, made
no efforts to coquette with anyone, had no desire for social amusements?
Wilmot had been frolicsome,
roguish, winsome—did Kate desire to eschew everything that had made her
cousin a sunbeam in the house, and the delight of her mother’s heart, out of
wilfulness, and determination not to please her aunt, not to make up to her for
the loss of her own child?
Not only by her aunt was Kate
regarded as heartless and perverse. That was the character she bore in the
village, among the girls of her own age, among the elders who adopted the
opinions of their daughters. Kate had been brought in contact with the village
girls at school, in the choir, and elsewhere, and some had even attempted to
make friends with her. But those things which occupied the whole souls of such
young creatures—dress, the budding inclination to attract the youths of the
place—were distasteful to Kate; there was nothing in common between them and
her, and when both became conscious of this, they mutually drew apart, and the
girls arrived at the same conclusion as her aunt, that she was a dull,
unfeeling child, who was best left alone.
Kate had felt acutely this
solitariness in which she lived; her aunt had often thrown it in her teeth that
she made no friends. Her father was displeased that he heard no good report of
his daughter; her uncle had rudely told her that a girl who made herself so
unpopular to her own sex would never attract one of the other. Now the
opportunity had come to her to falsify his predictions, to gratify her father,
and to make her aunt proud—but she had rejected it, and was more than ever alone.
Loneliness was endurable ordinarily. Kitty had her occupations, and, when not
occupied, her thoughts, recently her book, to engross her; but now, when
her own relatives were against her it was more than she could bear. The pain of
desolation became insupportable. There were but two persons she knew with whom
she was in touch, two persons only who could feel with and for her, and to one
of these she could not fly.
The rector, whom she had loved
and respected, was the only friend to whom she could unburden her trouble, and
she feared to approach him, because she had just done what he might not like,
any more than did her uncle and aunt. He would hear, and that speedily, of her
conduct, and Kate wished greatly to see him, and explain her refusal to him as far
as she could, that he might not blame her. But even should her explanation
prove unsatisfactory to him, she was not prepared to withdraw her refusal. Kate
never wavered. She was one of those direct persons who, when they have taken a
course, hold to it persistently.
She rose from her knees, bathed
her face, brushed her hair, and descended.
Her aunt was in the kitchen, and
averted her face as the girl entered. She did not ask Kate where she was going,
nor turn her head to see what she was about.
“I shall be back again in a few
minutes, auntie; if you can spare me, I should like to go out.”
No answer; and Kate left.
She had not taken many steps from
the house, walking with her head down, as the glare of the sun was too strong
for her tear-stung eyes, when she was caught, and before she could see in
whose arms she was, she was boisterously kissed.
“You are a dear! you are a
darling! I shall always love you.”
Kitty saw before her Rose Ash,
with glowing cheeks and dancing eyes.
“You darling! I never believed it
of you, you are so still. I thought you were sly. I am so sorry I misunderstood
you; so sorry I did anything or said anything against you. I will never do it
again. I will stand your friend; I will fight your battles. And, look here!”
A polished wood workbox was at
her feet. She had put it down for the purpose of disengaging her hands to hug
Kate.
“Look, Kitty! This is my own
workbox. Is it not beautiful? It has a mother-of-pearl escutcheon on it and
lock-plate. And it locks—really locks—not make-believe, like some you buy. And,
see! pink silk inside. It is for you. I give it to you. It is nearly new. I am
not much of a needlewoman, and so have not used it. It is really a hundred
times better than that which Noah knocked—I mean, that which the bear danced upon
and smashed. And there is a silver thimble in it. I give it you with all my
heart—that is to say, with as much heart as I have left to give to anyone.”
Kate stepped back in
astonishment. What did this mean?
“O Kitty! you really shall no longer
be Kitty Alone; it shall be Kitty and Rose. We shall be regular friends. Only
think! I was so jealous of you. I thought that Jan Pooke had taken a fancy
to you—and I suppose the silly noodle had done so for a bit, but you know he
properly belongs to me. We are to make a pair—everyone says so, and his father
and sister Sue wish it; and I’m sure, I’m sure, so do I. But men are cruel
giddy, they turn and turn like weathercocks; and just for a while Jan fancied
you. But you put him off bravely, you did.”
“What have I done to you?” asked
Kate.
“My dear, I heard it all. I saw
you and Jan going to the orchard, and I was so jealous that I hid myself in the
linhay. I got over the hedge and tore my frock in a bramble, but I did not heed
it; I slipped in where I could peep and see, and put out my ears and listen. I
know everything. I heard how you spoke up for me, and quite right and
reasonable too; and how you refused him, and very sensible you was. Just think
what a thing it would ha’ been, Kitty, if he’d gone right off his head and
married you, and then come to his senses and found he had got the wrong one,
and it was me all along he should have had. You would never have known
happiness after. You never would have enjoyed peace of conscience again. But
you were a sensible child, and did what you ought to ha’ done, and nobody can’t
do more than that; nor promise and vow to do more than what is in the
catechism. So, now, I’m all for you, and there is my workbox I give you in
place of that the bear kicked to pieces. I don’t mind telling you now, Kate,
that Noah did it. I put him up to it; I told him he was to do it. He didn’t
like it, but I forced him to it—I mean to knock the workbox from under your
arm. He’s a good chap is Noah, and now that it is all put right between
Jan and me”—
“Is it? Have you spoken with
him?”
“Oh no, I can’t say that; but you
have refused him. It will take him a day or two to steady his head, and then he
will come up right again, and we will make it up, and be the better friends in
the end. And, what is more, I’ll stand friend to you, Kate. I daresay you’d
like Noah, and I’ll get him to walk you out on Sundays and to sweetheart you.”
“I don’t want Noah,” said Kate,
shrinking.
“Oh yes, you do. Every girl must
have her young chap. It ain’t natural without. I’ll speak with him. He’s a
terrible good chap is Noah; he’ll do anything I ask him. I made him knock the
workbox under the bear’s feet, and if he’d do that much for me, I’m sure you
need not be afraid but he’d sweetheart you at my axing. Besides, he’ll be
tremendous thrown out when he sees me take up with Jan again, and he’ll want
some one to walk with, and may just as well take you as another.”
“No; please, Rose, do not. I had
rather be left alone.”
“Stuff and fiddlesticks! It is
not right that you should be without a sweetheart. You leave all that to me.”
“No, dear Rose, no. You be my
friend; that suffices.”
“It is because I am your friend
that I will do a friend’s part.”
“No, no, Rose.”
“Well, you always were queer; I
can’t understand you. But never mind; we are friends, though you make me a
helpless one. What is the good of a friend but to assist a girl to a lover?”
CHAPTER XXX
Kate disengaged herself from
Rose, and hastened to the Rectory. She opened the garden gate. She was a
privileged person there, coming when she liked about choir matters, sent
messages by her uncle, who was churchwarden, running in when she had a spare
hour to look at Mr. Fielding’s picture-books, in strawberry time to gather the
fruit and eat it, in preserving time to collect his raspberries, currants,
plums, for the cook to convert into jams.
She saw the rector sitting under
a mulberry tree on his lawn with a book on his lap. He had removed his hat, and
the spring air fluttered his silver hair.
He saw Kate at once, and,
smiling, beckoned to her to come and sit by him on the bench that half
encircled the old tree.
This she would not do, but she
stood before him with downcast eyes and folded hands, and said, “Please, sir, I
am afraid you will be cross with me.”
“I am never that, Kitty.”
“No, sir, never.” She raised her
flashing blue eyes for a moment. “Perhaps you may be vexed with me. I’ve
just gone and done clean contrary to what you said.”
“What did I say?”
“You said after my holiday I was to
go home, and obey my uncle and aunt in everything.”
“I am sure I never said that.”
“It was something like it—be
obliging and good.”
“Well, have you not been obliging
and good?”
“No, sir.”
“What have you done?”
“I’ve crossed them, and I fancy
father will be cross too.”
“What have you done to cross
them?”
“Refused Jan Pooke.”
The rector drew back against the
tree and smiled.
“Refused? I don’t quite
understand.”
“Please, sir, Jan wanted to make
me his wife.”
“Well?”
“And I said ‘No.’”
“You had made up your mind
already?”
“I knew I must say ‘No.’ Do you
know, sir, Jan thought that silver peninks came from daffodil roots.”
“Oh! and accordingly you could
not say ‘Yes’?”
“It was silly; was it not?”
“And that was your real, true
reason for saying ‘No’?”
Kitty looked down.
“You are not angry with me, sir?”
“No. Are your relations so?”
“Yes; uncle and aunt are
dreadfully vexed, and that is what has made me cry. I came home wishing to
do everything to please them, and the first thing I did was to make them angry
and call me a little viper they had brought up in their bosom. You do not think
I did wrong? You are not angry also?”
“No; I do not think you could
have done otherwise, if you did not care for John Pooke.”
“I did, and I do care for John
Pooke.”
“Then why did you not take him?
Only because of the silver peninks?”
“No, sir; not that only. I care
for him, but not enough; I like him, but not enough.”
“Quite so. You like, but do not
love him.”
“Yes, that is it.” Kate breathed freely.
“I did not know how to put it. Do you think I did right?”
The rector paused before he
answered. Then he said, signing with his thin hand, “Come here, little Kitty.
Sit by me.”
He took her hand in his, and,
looking before him, said, “It would have been a great thing for this parish had
you become John Pooke’s wife, the principal woman in the place, to give tone to
it, the one to whom all would look up, the strongest influence for good among
the girls. I should have had great hopes that all the bread I have strewed upon
the waters would not be strewn in vain.”
“I thought you wished it,” burst
forth from the girl, with a sob. “And yet I could not—I could not indeed. Now I
have turned everyone against me—everyone but Rose,” she added, truthful in
everything, exact in all she said.
“No, Kitty, I do not wish it. It
is true, indeed, that it would be a rich blessing to such a place as this to
have you as the guiding star to all the womanhood in the place, set up on such
a candlestick as the Pookes’ farm. But I am not so sure that the little light
would burn there and not be smothered in grease, or would gutter, and become
extinguished in the wind there. The place is good in itself, but not good for
you. It might be an advantage to the parish, but fatal to yourself. John Pooke
is an honest, worthy fellow, and he has won my respect because he saw your
value and has striven to win you. But he is not the man for you. For my little
Kitty I hope there will come some one possessed of better treasures than broad
acres, fat beeves, and many flocks of sheep; possessed of something better even
than amiability of temper.”
“What is that, sir?”
“A well-stored intellect—an
active mind. Kitty, no one has more regard for young John than myself, but it
would have been terrible to you to have been tied to him. ‘Thou shalt not
plough with an ox and an ass together’ was the command of Moses, and we must
not unite under one yoke the sluggish mind with that which is full of activity.
No, no, Kitty. You acted rightly. The man who will be fitted to be coupled in
the same plough with you will be one of another mould. He will be”—
The garden gate opened, and
Walter Bramber entered. A twig of laurel caught his sleeve, and he turned to
extricate himself, and did not perceive the rector and Kate. A sudden confusion
came over the girl, caused—whether by her thoughts, whether by the words
of the rector, whether from natural shyness, she could not tell, but she
started from the seat and slipped behind the mulberry.
The schoolmaster came up to the rector
when called, and found the old man with a smile playing about his lips.
“I have come, sir,” said Bramber,
“to ask your advice.”
“In private?”
“Yes, sir, if you please.”
“Then I cannot grant you an
audience now. If you will run round the mulberry, you will discover why.”
Bramber was puzzled.
“Do what I say. There is someone
there, someone who must retire farther than behind a tree if you are to consult
me without being overheard.”
The schoolmaster stepped aside to
go about the mulberry, and saw Kate standing there, leaning against the trunk,
holding together her skirts, and looking down.
“Oh!” laughed Walter; “this is
the audience! I do not in the least mind a discussion of my concerns before
such an one.”
“Come out, Kitty! You hear your
presence is desired,” called Mr. Fielding, and the girl stepped forward. “Take
the place where you were before on one side of me, and Mr. Bramber shall sit on
the other, and we will enter on the consideration of his affairs. What are they
as to complexion, Bramber, sanguine or atrabilious?”
“Not cheerful, I am afraid. I
have my troubles and difficulties before my eyes.”
“So has Kitty. She comes to me
from the same cause.” Then he added, “Well, let us hear and consider.”
“It concerns Mr. Puddicombe. I do
not know what I ought to do, or whether I should do anything. There is an
organised opposition to me, and the late schoolmaster is at the bottom of it. I
can clearly perceive that not parents only, but children as well, have been
worked upon to offer stubborn opposition to all my changes, and to make myself
ridiculous. I need not enter into details. There is this feeling of antagonism
in the place, and it paralyses me. If the children were left unmanipulated, I
could get along and gain their confidence; but at home they hear what their
parents say, what is said to their parents, and they come to school with a
purpose not to obey me, not to listen to my instructions, and to make my task
in every particular irksome and distasteful. I see precisely what Puddicombe is
aiming at—to force me to use the cane, not once or twice, but continuously, and
to force me to it by making discipline impossible without it. Then he will have
a handle against me, and will rouse the parish to hound me out. What am I to
do?”
“Have you called on him?”
“No, sir, I have not. I really
could not pluck up courage to do so. I hardly know what I could say to him that
is pleasant if we did meet.”
“You have not yet met him?”
“No. I do not know him by sight.”
“He is not a bad fellow; jovial,
a sportsman at heart, and his heart was never in the school; it was to be
sought in the kennels, in stables, in the ring, anywhere save in class.
That was the blemish in the man. His thoroughness was not where it should have
been. His centre of gravity was outside the sphere in which it was his duty to
turn. But he is not a bad fellow, good-hearted, placable, and only your enemy
because his vanity rather than his pocket is touched by his dismissal. I hear
he has announced his intention of becoming a Dissenter; but as he hardly ever
came to church when he was professedly a Churchman, I do not suppose chapel
will see much of him when he professes himself a Nonconformist. It is a great
misfortune when a man’s interests lie outside his vocation.”
“What shall I do, sir?”
“Call on him.”
“What shall I say to him?”
“Something that will please
him—nothing about the school; nothing about your difficulties.”
“I am supremely ignorant of the
cockpit and the race-course. It is very hard when two men belonging to different
spheres meet; they can neither understand the other.”
“My dear young man, that is what
I have been experiencing these many years here; we must strive to accommodate
ourselves to inferior ways of thinking and speaking, and then, then only, shall
we be able to insinuate into the gross and dark minds some spark of the higher
life. Kitty, have I your permission to tell Mr. Bramber what it is that you
have just communicated to me? It will be public property throughout Coombe in
half an hour, if everyone does not know it now, so it will be revealing no
secrets.”
Kate looked, with a startled
expression in her eyes, at the rector. Why should he care to speak of this
matter now? Why before Bramber? But she had confidence in him, and she did not
open her lips in remonstrance.
With a quiet smile, Mr. Fielding
said: “You have not yet heard the tidings with regard to our little friend
here, I presume?”
“Tidings—what?” The schoolmaster
looked hastily round and saw Kate’s head droop, and a twinkle come in the rector’s
eye. A slight flush rose to his temples.
“Merely that she has received an
offer”—
“Offer?” Bramber caught his
breath, and the colour left his face.
“Of marriage,” continued Mr.
Fielding composedly. “A most remarkable offer. The young man is eminently respectable,
very comfortably off; age suitable; looks prepossessing; parents acquiescing.”
“Kate! Kitty!” Bramber’s voice
was sharp with alarm and pain.
“I do not know whether the
attachment has been one of long continuance,” proceeded the rector. “The fact
of the proposal—now passing through Coombe—is like the dropping of a meteorite
in its midst. Popular fame had attributed Rose Ash to John Pooke.”
“John Pooke, is it?” gasped the
schoolmaster, and he sprang to his feet.
“John Pooke the younger, not the
father, who is a widower of many years’ standing. The disparity of ages
makes that quite impossible. The younger John it is who has aspired.”
“Kate, tell me—it cannot be. It
must not be,” exclaimed Bramber, stepping before the girl, and in his
excitement catching her hands and drawing them from her face, in which she had
hidden them. She looked up at him with a flutter in her eyes and hectic colour
in her cheeks. She made no attempt to withdraw her hands.
“By the way,” said the rector, “I
will look up cockfighting in my Encyclopædia Britannica, and make an extract from the article, if I find one, that
may be serviceable to you, Bramber, when you call on Mr. Puddicombe. I’ll go to
my library. I shall not detain you many minutes.”
The many minutes were protracted
to twenty. When Mr. Fielding returned, the young people were seated close to
each other under the mulberry-tree, and still held hands; their eyes were
bright, and their cheeks glowing.
“I am sorry I have been so long,”
said the rector; “but there was a great deal of matter under the head of
‘Cock-pit’ in the Encyclopædia; and I had to run through it,
and cull what would be of greatest utility. I have written it out. Do not rise.
I will sit beside you—no, not between you—listen! ‘It must appear astonishing
to every reflecting mind, that a mode of diversion so cruel and inhuman as that
of cockfighting should so generally prevail, that not only the ancients,
barbarians, Greeks, and Romans should have adopted it; but that a practice so
savage and heathenish should be continued by Christians of all sorts, and
even pursued in these better and more enlightened times.’ That is how the
article begins—very true, but won’t do for Mr. Puddicombe. ‘The islanders of
Delos, it seems, were great lovers of cockfighting; and Tanagra, a city in
Bœotia, the Isle of Rhodes, Chalcis in Eubœa, and the country of Media, were
famous for their generous and magnanimous race of chickens.’ I don’t think this
is much good. Puddicombe, though a schoolmaster, will hardly know the whereabouts
of Delos, Tanagra, Rhodes, and Chalcis. ‘The cock is not only an useful animal,
but stately in his figure, and magnificent in his plumage. His tenderness
towards his brood is such, that, contrary to the custom of many other males, he
will scratch and provide for them with an assiduity almost equal to that of the
hen; and his generosity is so great, that, on finding a hoard of meat, he will
chuckle the hens together, and, without touching one bit himself, will
relinquish the whole of it to them. He was called the bird, κατ’ ἐξοχήν by
many of the ancients’—But, bless me, are you attending?”
“Mr. Fielding,” answered Bramber,
“I do not think I shall have much trouble in finding a topic on which to speak
with my predecessor in the school. He was Kitty’s schoolmaster. She will
introduce me to him. We will go to him at once; and when he hears what we have
to say,—that I, the new schoolmaster, am going to take to me the favourite,
most docile, the best scholar of the old one; and when he learns that he is the
first person to whom we make the announcement, and that he is at liberty to run
up and down, and in and out of every house, communicating the news,—why, I
am pretty sure that he will be won.”
“Well, now!”
“And Kitty will cease to be Kitty
Alone some time next year.”
CHAPTER XXXI
When Pasco returned from Newton,
he drew up his tax-cart close to the door of the storehouse, took the horse
out, but did not unharness him; he merely removed the bridle and gave the brute
a feed.
Then he entered the
dwelling-house and seated himself at the kitchen table without a word to his
wife, and emptied his pocket on the board. A couple of sovereigns and a few
shillings clinked together. With his forefinger he separated the gold from the
silver coins.
“What! money come in, in place of
going out?” asked Zerah. Then, looking over his shoulder, she said, “And
precious little it is.”
“Little is better than nothing,”
growled Pasco. “I got this from Cole, the baker. I’d somehow forgot he owed me
a trifle, and he stopped me and paid his account. I owe something to the
miller, so I’m no better off than I was. In at one pocket, out at the other.”
“Now look here, Pasco,” said his
wife. “For first and last I say this. I have laid by a trifle that I have earned
by cockles and winkles, whilst you have been chucking away in coals and
wool. If you will pass me your word not to run into extravagance, and not to
listen to any more of Jason’s schemes, I will let you have this. No”—she
corrected her intent; “you are not to be trusted with the money. It shall not
leave my hand to go into yours. And your word ain’t of any strength, it is as
weak as your resolutions. I’ll settle the matter of the coals with the merchant
at Teignmouth; that is the great call at this moment. I don’t do it for you,
but to avoid the scandal of having bailiffs in the house—a house where I’ve
kept myself respectable so many years, and where my Wilmot was born and died. I
wouldn’t have the brokers sell the bed she laid on when dead, not for all my
savings. So I’ll over to Teignmouth and see what I can manage about the coal
merchant’s bill; and you, just take that money and pay Ash the miller, and have
done with him.”
Again the thought rose up in the
mind of Pasco that the Evil One was making sport of him. At one time he was in
a condition of hopelessness, in another moment there was a lightening in the
sky before him. The means of striking fire had been put into his hands at the
same time that he was shown that his difficulties were not insurmountable. But
the heart which has once resolved on a crime very speedily comes to regard this
object as a goal at which it must necessarily aim, and to look with impatience
upon all suggestions of relief, upon all dissuasives, and stubbornly, with shut
eyes, to pursue the course determined on. The struggle to form the
determination once overpassed, the mind shrinks from entering into struggle
again, and allows itself to be swept along as though impelled by fatality,
as though launched on a stream it is powerless to oppose.
Now his wife’s suggestion that
she should go to Teignmouth and settle with the merchant for the coals opened
up to him a prospect, not of relief from his pecuniary difficulty, but of
getting rid of her to enable him the more easily to carry out his intention
unobserved. He put his shaking hand into his breast-pocket for his
handkerchief, and in pulling this forth drew out also the lucifer match-box,
that in falling rattled on the table.
“What have you there, Pasco?”
asked Zerah.
“Nothing,” he answered, and
hastily replaced the box.
“Don’t tell me that was nothing
which I saw and heard,” said his wife testily.
“Well—it’s lozenges.”
“Didn’t know you had a cough.”
“Never mind about that, Zerah,”
said Pasco. “If you go to Teignmouth it must be at once, or the tide will be
out, and I don’t see how you can get back to-night.”
“I’ve my cousin, Dorothy Bray,
there. I’ll go to her. I’ve not seen her some months, and she has a room. I’ll
leave Kitty at home now, to attend to the house, and you won’t need me to the
morning flow. I suppose, between you, you can manage to light a fire?”
Pasco started and looked at his
wife with alarm, thinking that she had read his thoughts; but he was reassured
by her changing the topic. “There—I’ll give you three pounds towards the
miller’s bill.”
Pepperill was now all anxiety to
hurry his wife off. He urged precipitancy on account of the falling tide. He
bade her row herself across, and leave the boat on the farther shore till the
next morning.
His impatience in a measure woke
her suspicion.
“You seem mighty eager to get rid
of me,” she said querulously.
“’Tain’t that, Zerah,” he
answered; “but I want myself to be off to Brimpts.”
“To Brimpts?—and leave Kitty
alone in the house?”
“No; I shall take her with me.”
“What!—leave the house to take
care of itself?”
“What can harm it? No one will
break in. They know pretty well there is nothing to be got but bills that ain’t
paid.”
“I don’t half like it—and the
stores?”
“There is no moving wool or coals
without waggons, and I shall lock up.”
Zerah stood in uncertainty.
“I wish you’d not go, Pasco.”
“I may or may not—but be off, or
you’ll get stuck in the mud, as did Kitty.”
In ten minutes Pasco was alone.
He stood on the platform where were the tea-tables and benches, and watched
till his wife was half-way across. Then he drew a long breath, and passed
through the house, went out at the main door, and hastened to the cart. Again
he stood still, and looked searchingly in every direction; then he let down the
flap behind, drew out first the sack of shavings and carried it within,
and then he cleared out all that remained. He was not satisfied till with a
broom he had swept every particle of chip within, leaving not a tell-tale white
atom without. Then he tacked some scraps of sacking over the window that no one
might look within, and he proceeded to place bundles of the shavings among the
coals, not in one great heap, but dispersed in handfuls here and there, and he
broke up some pieces of board into splinters and thrust them among the
shavings.