JOHNNY LUDLOW.
"We spake of many a vanished scene,
Of what we once had thought and said,
Of what had been, and might have been,
And who was changed, and who was dead."
LONGFELLOW.
JOHNNY LUDLOW.
BY
MRS. HENRY WOOD,
AUTHOR OF "EAST LYNNE," "THE CHANNINGS," ETC.
_FIRST SERIES._
[Illustration]
+Fiftieth Thousand.+
LONDON:
RICHARD BENTLEY AND SON,
+Publishers in Ordinary to Her Majesty the Queen.+
1895.
(_All rights reserved._)
CONTENTS.
PAGE
I. LOSING LENA 1
II. FINDING BOTH OF THEM 16
III. WOLFE BARRINGTON'S TAMING 28
IV. MAJOR PARRIFER 48
V. COMING HOME TO HIM 64
VI. LEASE, THE POINTSMAN 80
VII. AUNT DEAN 98
VIII. GOING THROUGH THE TUNNEL 117
IX. DICK MITCHEL 133
X. A HUNT BY MOONLIGHT 150
XI. THE BEGINNING OF THE END 165
XII. "JERRY'S GAZETTE" 182
XIII. SOPHIE CHALK 203
XIV. AT MISS DEVEEN'S 219
XV. THE GAME FINISHED 238
XVI. GOING TO THE MOP 256
XVII. BREAKING DOWN 275
XVIII. REALITY OR DELUSION? 293
XIX. DAVID GARTH'S NIGHT-WATCH 308
XX. DAVID GARTH'S GHOST 329
XXI. SEEING LIFE 348
XXII. OUR STRIKE 368
XXIII. BURSTING-UP 389
XXIV. GETTING AWAY 409
XXV. OVER THE WATER 427
XXVI. AT WHITNEY HALL 447
JOHNNY LUDLOW.
I.
LOSING LENA.
We lived chiefly at Dyke Manor. A fine old place, so close upon the
borders of Warwickshire and Worcestershire, that many people did not
know which of the two counties it was really in. The house was in
Warwickshire, but some of the land was in Worcestershire. The Squire
had, however, another estate, Crabb Cot, all in Worcestershire, and very
many miles nearer to Worcester.
Squire Todhetley was rich. But he lived in the plain, good old-fashioned
way that his forefathers had lived; almost a homely way, it might be
called, in contrast with the show and parade that have sprung up of
late years. He was respected by every one, and though hotheaded and
impetuous, he was simple-minded, open-handed, and had as good a heart as
any one ever had in this world. An elderly gentleman now, was he, of
middle height, with a portly form and a red face; and his hair, what was
left of it, consisted of a few scanty, lightish locks, standing up
straight on the top of his head.
The Squire had married, but not very early in life. His wife died in
a few years, leaving one child only; a son, named after his father,
Joseph. Young Joe was just the pride of the Manor and of his father's
heart.
I, writing this, am Johnny Ludlow. And you will naturally want to hear
what I did at Dyke Manor, and why I lived there.
About three-miles' distance from the Manor was a place called the Court.
Not a property of so much importance as the Manor, but a nice place,
for all that. It belonged to my father, William Ludlow. He and Squire
Todhetley were good friends. I was an only child, just as Tod was; and,
like him, I had lost my mother. They had christened me John, but always
called me Johnny. I can remember many incidents of my early life now,
but I cannot recall my mother to my mind. She must have died--at least I
fancy so--when I was two years old.
One morning, two years after that, when I was about four, the servants
told me I had a new mamma. I can see her now as she looked when she came
home: tall, thin, and upright, with a long face, pinched nose, a meek
expression, and gentle voice. She was a Miss Marks, who used to play the
organ at church, and had hardly any income at all. Hannah said she was
sure she was thirty-five if she was a day--she was talking to Eliza
while she dressed me--and they both agreed that she would probably turn
out to be a tartar, and that the master might have chosen better. I
understood quite well that they meant papa, and asked why he might have
chosen better; upon which they shook me and said they had not been
speaking of my papa at all, but of the old blacksmith round the corner.
Hannah brushed my hair the wrong way, and Eliza went off to see to her
bedrooms. Children are easily prejudiced: and they prejudiced me against
my new mother. Looking at her with the eyes of maturer years, I know
that though she might be poor in pocket, she was good and kindly, and
every inch a lady.
Papa died that same year. At the end of another year, Mrs. Ludlow, my
step-mother, married Squire Todhetley, and we went to live at Dyke
Manor; she, I, and my nurse Hannah. The Court was let for a term of
years to the Sterlings.
Young Joe did not like the new arrangements. He was older than I, could
take up prejudices more strongly, and he took a mighty strong one
against the new Mrs. Todhetley. He had been regularly indulged by his
father and spoilt by all the servants; so it was only to be expected
that he would not like the invasion. Mrs. Todhetley introduced order
into the profuse household, hitherto governed by the servants. They and
young Joe equally resented it; they refused to see that things were
really more comfortable than they used to be, and at half the cost.
Two babies came to the Manor; Hugh first, Lena next. Joe and I were sent
to school. He was as big as a house, compared with me, tall and strong
and dark, with an imperious way and will of his own. I was fair, gentle,
timid, yielding to him in all things. His was the master-spirit, swaying
mine at will. At school the boys at once, the very first day we entered,
shortened his name from Todhetley to Tod. I caught up the habit, and
from that time I never called him anything else.
And so the years went on. Tod and I at school being drilled into
learning; Hugh and Lena growing into nice little children. During the
holidays, hot war raged between Tod and his step-mother. At least
_silent_ war. Mrs. Todhetley was always kind to him, and she never
quarrelled; but Tod opposed her in many things, and would be generally
sarcastically cool to her in manner.
We did lead the children into mischief, and she complained of that. Tod
did, that is, and of course I followed where he led. "But we can't let
Hugh grow up a milksop, you know, Johnny," he would say to me; "and he
would if left to his mother." So Hugh's clothes in Tod's hands came to
grief, and sometimes Hugh himself. Hannah, who was the children's nurse
now, stormed and scolded over it: she and Tod had ever been at daggers
drawn with each other; and Mrs. Todhetley would implore Tod with tears
in her eyes to be careful with the child. Tod appeared to turn a deaf
ear to them, and marched off with Hugh before their very eyes. He really
loved the children, and would have saved them from injury with his life.
The Squire drove and rode his fine horses. Mrs. Todhetley had set up a
low basket-chaise drawn by a mild she-donkey: it was safer for the
children, she said. Tod went into fits whenever he met the turn-out.
But Tod was not always to escape scot-free, or incite the children to
rebellion with impunity. There came a day when he brought himself,
through it, to a state of self-torture and repentance.
It occurred when we were at home for the summer holidays, just after
the crop of hay was got in, and the bare fields looked as white in
the blazing sun as if they had been scorched. Tod and I were in the
three-cornered meadow next the fold-yard. He was making a bat-net with
gauze and two sticks. Young Jacobson had shown us his the previous day,
and a bat he had caught with it; and Tod thought he would catch bats
too. But he did not seem to be making much hand at the net, and somehow
managed to send the pointed end of the stick through a corner of it.
"I don't think that gauze is strong enough, Tod."
"I am afraid it is not, Johnny. Here, catch hold of it. I'll go indoors,
and see if they can't find me some better. Hannah must have some."
He flew off past the ricks, and leaped the little gate into the
fold-yard--a tall, strong fellow, who might leap the Avon. In a few
minutes I heard his voice again, and went to meet him. Tod was coming
away from the house with Lena.
"Have you the gauze, Tod!"
"Not a bit of it; the old cat won't look for any; says she hasn't time.
I'll hinder her time a little. Come along, Lena."
The "old cat" was Hannah. I told you she and he were often at daggers
drawn. Hannah had a chronic complaint in the shape of ill-temper, and
Tod called her names to her face. Upon going in to ask her for the
gauze, he found her dressing Hugh and Lena to go out, and she just
turned him out of the nursery, and told him not to bother her then with
his gauze and his wants. Lena ran after Tod; she liked him better than
all of us put together. She had on a blue silk frock, and a white straw
hat with daisies round it; open-worked stockings were on her pretty
little legs. By which we saw she was about to be taken out for show.
"What are you going to do with her, Tod?"
"I'm going to hide her," answered Tod, in his decisive way. "Keep where
you are, Johnny."
Lena enjoyed the rebellion. In a minute or two Tod came back alone. He
had left her between the ricks in the three-cornered field, and told her
not to come out. Then he went off to the front of the house, and I stood
inside the barn, talking to Mack, who was hammering away at the iron of
the cart-wheel. Out came Hannah by-and-by. She had been dressing herself
as well as Hugh.
"Miss Lena!"
No answer. Hannah called again, and then came up the fold-yard, looking
about.
"Master Johnny, have you seen the child?"
"What child?" I was not going to spoil Tod's sport by telling her.
"Miss Lena. She has got off somewhere, and my mistress is waiting for
her in the basket-chaise."
"I see her just now along of Master Joseph," spoke up Mack, arresting
his noisy hammer.
"See her where?" asked Hannah.
"Close here, a-going that way."
He pointed to the palings and gate that divided the yard from the
three-cornered field. Hannah ran there and stood looking over. The ricks
were within a short stone's throw, but Lena kept close. Hannah called
out again, and threw her gaze over the empty field.
"The child's not there. Where can she have got to, tiresome little
thing?"
In the house, and about the house, and out of the house, as the old
riddle says, went Hannah. It was jolly to see her. Mrs. Todhetley and
Hugh were seated patiently in the basket-chaise before the hall-door,
wondering what made Hannah so long. Tod, playing with the mild
she-donkey's ears, and laughing to himself, stood talking graciously to
his step-mother. I went round. The Squire had gone riding into Evesham;
Dwarf Giles, who made the nattiest little groom in the county, for all
his five-and-thirty years, behind him.
"I can't find Miss Lena," cried Hannah, coming out.
"Not find Miss Lena!" echoed Mrs. Todhetley. "What do you mean, Hannah?
Have you not dressed her?"
"I dressed her first, ma'am, before Master Hugh, and she went out of
the nursery. I can't think where she can have got to. I've searched
everywhere."
"But, Hannah, we must have her directly; I am late as it is."
They were going over to the Court to a children's early party at the
Sterlings'. Mrs. Todhetley stepped out of the basket-chaise to help in
the search.
"I had better fetch her, Tod," I whispered.
He nodded yes. Tod never bore malice, and I suppose he thought Hannah
had had enough of a hunt for that day. I ran through the fold-yard to
the ricks, and called to Lena.
"You can come out now, little stupid."
But no Lena answered. There were seven ricks in a group, and I went into
all the openings between them. Lena was not there. It was rather odd,
and I looked across the field and towards the lane and the coppice,
shouting out sturdily.
"Mack, have you seen Miss Lena pass indoors?" I stayed to ask him, in
going back.
No: Mack had not noticed her; and I went round to the front again, and
whispered to Tod.
"What a muff you are, Johnny! She's between the ricks fast enough. No
danger that she'd come out when I told her to stay!"
"But she's not there indeed, Tod. You go and look."
Tod vaulted off, his long legs seeming to take flying leaps, like a
deer's, on his way to the ricks.
To make short of the story, Lena was gone. Lost. The house, the outdoor
buildings, the gardens were searched for her, and she was not to be
found. Mrs. Todhetley's fears flew to the ponds at first; but it was
impossible she could have come to grief in either of the two, as they
were both in view of the barn-door where I and Mack had been. Tod avowed
that he had put her amid the ricks to hide her; and it was not to be
imagined she had gone away. The most feasible conjecture was, that she
had run from between the ricks when Hannah called to her, and was hiding
in the lane.
Tod was in a fever, loudly threatening Lena with unheard-of whippings,
to cover his real concern. Hannah looked red, Mrs. Todhetley white. I
was standing by him when the cook came up; a sharp woman, with red-brown
eyes. We called her Molly.
"Mr. Joseph," said she, "I have heard of gipsies stealing children."
"Well?" returned Tod.
"There was one at the door a while agone--an insolent one, too. Perhaps
Miss Lena----"
"Which way did she go?--which door was she at?" burst forth Tod.
"'Twas a man, sir. He came up to the kitchen-door, and steps inside as
bold as brass, asking me to buy some wooden skewers he'd cut, and saying
something about a sick child. When I told him to march, that we never
encouraged tramps here, he wanted to answer me, and I just shut the door
in his face. A regular gipsy, if ever I see one," continued Molly; "his
skin tawny and his wild hair jet-black. Maybe, in revenge, he have stole
off the little miss."
Tod took up the notion, and his face turned white. "Don't say anything
of this to Mrs. Todhetley," he said to Molly. "We must just scour the
country."
But in departing from the kitchen-door, the gipsy man could not by any
possibility have made his way to the rick-field without going through
the fold-yard. And he had not done that. It was true that Lena might
have run round and got into the gipsy's way. Unfortunately, none of
the men were about, except Mack and old Thomas. Tod sent these off in
different directions; Mrs. Todhetley drove away in her pony-chaise to
the lanes round, saying the child might have strayed there; Molly and
the maids started elsewhere; and I and Tod went flying along a by-road
that branched off in a straight line, as it were, from the kitchen-door.
Nobody could keep up with Tod, he went so fast; and I was not tall and
strong as he was. But I saw what Tod in his haste did not see--a dark
man with some bundles of skewers and a stout stick, walking on the other
side of the hedge. I whistled Tod back again.
"What is it, Johnny?" he said, panting. "Have you seen her?"
"Not her. But look there. That must be the man Molly spoke of."
Tod crashed through the hedge as if it had been so many cobwebs,
and accosted the gipsy. I followed more carefully, but got my face
scratched.
"Were you up at the great house, begging, a short time ago?" demanded
Tod, in an awful passion.
The man turned round on Tod with a brazen face. I say brazen, because he
did it so independently; but it was not an insolent face in itself;
rather a sad one, and very sickly.
"What's that you ask me, master?"
"I ask whether it was you who were at the Manor-house just now,
begging?" fiercely repeated Tod.
"I was at a big house offering wares for sale, if you mean that, sir. I
wasn't begging."
"Call it what you please," said Tod, growing white again. "What have you
done with the little girl?"
For, you see, Tod had caught up the impression that the gipsy _had_
stolen Lena, and he spoke in accordance with it.
"I've seen no little girl, master."
"You have," and Tod gave his foot a stamp. "What have you done with
her?"
The man's only answer was to turn round and walk off, muttering to
himself. Tod pursued him, calling him a thief and other names; but
nothing more satisfactory could he get out of him.
"He can't have taken her, Tod. If he had, she'd be with him now. He
couldn't eat her, you know."
"He may have given her to a confederate."
"What to do? What do gipsies steal children for?"
Tod stopped in a passion, lifting his hand. "If you torment me with
these frivolous questions, Johnny, I'll strike you. How do I know what's
done with stolen children? Sold, perhaps. I'd give a hundred pounds
out of my pocket at this minute if I knew where those gipsies were
encamped."
We suddenly lost the fellow. Tod had been keeping him in sight in the
distance. Whether he disappeared up a gum-tree, or into a rabbit-hole,
Tod couldn't tell; but gone he was.
Up this lane, down that one; over this moor, across that common; so
raced Tod and I. And the afternoon wore away, and we had changed our
direction a dozen times: which possibly was not wise.
The sun was getting low as we passed Ragley gates, for we had finally
got into the Alcester road. Tod was going to do what we ought to have
done at first: report the loss at Alcester. Some one came riding along
on a stumpy pony. It proved to be Gruff Blossom, groom to the Jacobsons.
They called him "Gruff" because of his temper. He did touch his hat to
us, which was as much as you could say, and spurred the stumpy animal
on. But Tod made a sign to him, and he was obliged to stop and listen.
"The gipsies stole off little Miss Lena!" cried old Blossom, coming out
of his gruffness. "That's a rum go! Ten to one if you find her for a
year to come."
"But, Blossom, what do they do with the children they steal?" I asked,
in a sort of agony.
"They cuts their hair off and dyes their skins brown, and then takes 'em
out to fairs a ballad-singing," answered Blossom.
"But why need they do it, when they have children of their own?"
"Ah, well, that's a question I couldn't answer," said old Blossom.
"Maybe their'n arn't pretty children--Miss Lena, she is pretty."
"Have you heard of any gipsies being encamped about here?" Tod demanded
of him.
"Not lately, Mr. Joseph. Five or six months ago, there was a lot 'camped
on the Markis's ground. They warn't there long."
"Can't you ride about, Blossom, and see after the child?" asked Tod,
putting something into his hand.
Old Blossom pocketed it, and went off with a nod. He was riding
about, as we knew afterwards, for hours. Tod made straight for the
police-station at Alcester, and told his tale. Not a soul was there but
Jenkins, one of the men.
"I haven't seen no suspicious characters about," said Jenkins, who
seemed to be eating something. He was a big man, with short black hair
combed on his forehead, and he had a habit of turning his face upwards,
as if looking after his nose--a square ornament, that stood up straight.
"She is between four and five years old; a very pretty child, with blue
eyes and a good deal of curling auburn hair," said Tod, who was growing
feverish.
Jenkins wrote it down--"Name, Todhetley. What Christian name?"
"Adalena, called 'Lena.'"
"Recollect the dress, sir?"
"Pale blue silk; straw hat with wreath of daisies round it; open-worked
white stockings, and thin black shoes; white drawers," recounted Tod, as
if he had prepared the list by heart coming along.
"That's bad, that dress is," said Jenkins, putting down the pen.
"Why is it bad?"
"'Cause the things is tempting. Quite half the children that gets stole
is stole for what they've got upon their backs. Tramps and that sort
will run a risk for a blue silk that they'd not run for a brown holland
pinafore. Auburn curls, too," added Jenkins, shaking his head; "that's a
temptation also. I've knowed children sent back home with bare heads
afore now. Any ornaments, sir?"
"She was safe to have on her little gold neck-chain and cross. They are
very small, Jenkins--not worth much."
Jenkins lifted his nose--not in disdain, it was a habit he had. "Not
worth much to you, sir, who could buy such any day, but an uncommon bait
to professional child-stealers. Were the cross a coral, or any stone of
that sort?"
"It was a small gold cross, and the chain was thin. They could only be
seen when her cloak was off. Oh, I forgot the cloak; it was white:
llama, I think they call it. She was going to a child's party."
Some more questions and answers, most of which Jenkins took down.
Handbills were to be printed and posted, and a reward offered on the
morrow, if she was not previously found. Then we came away; there was
nothing more to do at the station.
"Wouldn't it have been better, Tod, had Jenkins gone out seeking her and
telling of the loss abroad, instead of waiting to write all that down?"
"Johnny, if we don't find her to night, I shall go mad," was all he
answered.
He went back down Alcester Street at a rushing pace--not a run but a
quick walk.
"Where are you going now?" I asked.
"I'm going up hill and down dale until I find that gipsies' encampment.
You can go on home, Johnny, if you are tired."
I had not felt tired until we were in the police-station. Excitement
keeps off fatigue. But I was not going to give in, and said I should
stay with him.
"All right, Johnny."
Before we were clear of Alcester, Budd the land-agent came up. He was
turning out of the public-house at the corner. It was dusk then. Tod
laid hold of him.
"Budd, you are always about, in all kinds of nooks and by-lanes: can you
tell me of any encampment of gipsies between here and the Manor-house?"
The agent's business took him abroad a great deal, you know, into the
rural districts around.
"Gipsies' encampment?" repeated Budd, giving both of us a stare.
"There's none that I know of. In the spring, a lot of them had the
impudence to squat down on the Marquis's----"
"Oh, I know all that," interrupted Tod. "Is there nothing of the sort
about now?"
"I saw a miserable little tent to-day up Cookhill way," said Budd. "It
might have been a gipsy's or a travelling tinker's. 'Twasn't of much
account, whichever it was."
Tod gave a spring. "Whereabouts?" was all he asked. And Budd explained
where. Tod went off like a shot, and I after him.
If you are familiar with Alcester, or have visited at Ragley or anything
of that sort, you must know the long green lane leading to Cookhill; it
is dark with overhanging trees, and uphill all the way. We took that
road--Tod first, and I next; and we came to the top, and turned in the
direction Budd had described the tent to be in.
It was not to be called dark; the nights never are at midsummer; and
rays from the bright light in the west glimmered through the trees. On
the outskirts of the coppice, in a bit of low ground, we saw the tent,
a little mite of a thing, looking no better than a funnel turned upside
down. Sounds were heard within it, and Tod put his finger on his lip
while he listened. But we were too far off, and he took his boots off,
and crept up close.
Sounds of wailing--of some one in pain. But that Tod had been three
parts out of his senses all the afternoon, he might have known at
once that they did not come from Lena, or from any one so young. Words
mingled with them in a woman's voice; uncouth in its accents, nearly
unintelligible, an awful sadness in its tones.
"A bit longer! a bit longer, Corry, and he'd ha' been back. You needn't
ha' grudged it to us. Oh----h! if ye had but waited a bit longer!"
I don't write it exactly as she spoke; I shouldn't know how to spell it:
we made a guess at half the words. Tod, who had grown white again, put
on his boots, and lifted up the opening of the tent.
I had never seen any scene like it; I don't suppose I shall ever see
another. About a foot from the ground was a raised surface of some sort,
thickly covered with dark green rushes, just the size and shape of a
gravestone. A little child, about as old as Lena, lay on it, a white
cloth thrown over her, and just touching the white, still face. A torch,
blazing and smoking away, was thrust into the ground and lighted up the
scene. Whiter the face looked now, because it had been tawny in life. I
would rather see one of our faces in death than a gipsy's. The contrast
between the white face and dress of the child, and the green bed of
rushes it lay on was something remarkable. A young woman, dark too, and
handsome enough to create a commotion at the fair, knelt down, her brown
hands uplifted; a gaudy ring on one of the fingers, worth sixpence
perhaps when new, sparkled in the torchlight. Tod strode up to the dead
face and looked at it for full five minutes. I do believe he thought at
first that it was Lena.
"What is this?" he asked.
"It is my dead child!" the woman answered. "She did not wait that her
father might see her die!"
But Tod had his head full of Lena, and looked round. "Is there no other
child here?"
As if to answer him, a bundle of rags came out of a corner and set up a
howl. It was a boy of about seven, and our going in had wakened him up.
The woman sat down on the ground and looked at us.
"We have lost a child--a little girl," explained Tod. "I thought she
might have been brought here--or have strayed here."
"I've lost _my_ girl," said the woman. "Death has come for her!" And,
when speaking to us, she spoke more intelligibly than when alone.
"Yes; but this child has been lost--lost out of doors! Have you seen or
heard anything of one?"
"I've not been in the way o' seeing or hearing, master; I've been in
the tent alone. If folks had come to my aid, Corry might not have died.
I've had nothing but water to put to her lips all day?"
"What was the matter with her?" Tod asked, convinced at length that Lena
was not there.
"She have been ailing long--worse since the moon come in. The sickness
took her with the summer, and the strength began to go out. Jake have
been down, too. He couldn't get out to bring us help, and we have had
none."
Jake was the husband, we supposed. The help meant food, or funds to get
it with.
"He sat all yesterday cutting skewers, his hands a'most too weak to
fashion 'em. Maybe he'd sell 'em for a few ha'pence, he said; and he
went out this morning to try, and bring home a morsel of food."
"Tod," I whispered, "I wish that hard-hearted Molly had----"
"Hold your tongue, Johnny," he interrupted sharply. "Is Jake your
husband?" he asked of the woman.
"He is my husband, and the children's father."
"Jake would not be likely to steal a child, would he?" asked Tod, in a
hesitating manner, for him.
She looked up, as if not understanding. "Steal a child, master! What
for?"
"I don't know," said Tod. "I thought perhaps he had done it, and had
brought the child here."
Another comical stare from the woman. "We couldn't feed these of ours;
what should we do with another?"
"Well: Jake called at our house to sell his skewers; and, directly
afterwards, we missed my little sister. I have been hunting for her ever
since."
"Was the house far from here!"
"A few miles."
"Then he have sunk down of weakness on his way, and can't get back."
Putting her head on her knees, she began to sob and moan. The child--the
living one--began to bawl; one couldn't call it anything else; and
pulled at the green rushes.
"He knew Corry was sick and faint when he went out. He'd have got back
afore now if his strength hadn't failed him; though, maybe, he didn't
think of death. Whist, then, whist, then, Dor," she added, to the boy.
"Don't cry," said Tod to the little chap, who had the largest, brightest
eyes I ever saw. "That will do no good, you know."
"I want Corry," said he. "Where's Corry gone?"
"She's gone up to God," answered Tod, speaking very gently. "She's gone
to be a bright angel with Him in heaven."
"Will she fly down to me?" asked Dor, his great eyes shining through
their tears at Tod.
"Yes," affirmed Tod, who had a theory of his own on the point, and used
to think, when a little boy, that his mother was always near him, one of
God's angels keeping him from harm. "And after a while, you know, if you
are good, you'll go to Corry, and be an angel, too."
"God bless you, master!" interposed the woman. "He'll think of that
always."
"Tod," I said, as we went out of the tent, "I don't think they are
people to steal children."
"Who's to know what the man would do?" retorted Tod.
"A man with a dying child at home wouldn't be likely to harm another."
Tod did not answer. He stood still a moment, deliberating which way to
go. Back to Alcester?--where a conveyance might be found to take us
home, for the fatigue was telling on both of us, now that disappointment
was prolonged, and I, at least, could hardly put one foot before
another. Or down to the high-road, and run the chance of some vehicle
overtaking us? Or keep on amidst these fields and hedgerows, which would
lead us home by a rather nearer way, but without chance of a lift? Tod
made up his mind, and struck down the lane the way we had come up. He
was on first, and I saw him suddenly halt, and turn to me.
"Look here, Johnny!"
I looked as well as I could for the night and the trees, and saw
something on the ground. A man had sunk down there, apparently from
exhaustion. His face was a tawny white, just like the dead child's. A
stout stick and the bundles of skewers lay beside him.
"Do you see the fellow, Johnny? It is the gipsy."
"Has he fainted?"
"Fainted, or shamming it. I wonder if there's any water about?"
But the man opened his eyes; perhaps the sound of voices revived him.
After looking at us a minute or two, he raised himself slowly on his
elbow. Tod--the one thought uppermost in his mind--said something about
Lena.
"The child's found, master!"
Tod seemed to give a leap. I know his heart did. "Found!"
"Been safe at home this long while."
"Who found her?"
"'Twas me, master."
"Where was she?" asked Tod, his tone softening. "Let us hear about it."
"I was making back for the town" (we supposed he meant Alcester), "and
missed the way; land about here's strange to me. A-going through a bit
of a groove, which didn't seem as if it was leading to nowhere, I heard
a child crying. There was the little thing tied to a tree, stripped,
and----"
"Stripped!" roared Tod.
"Stripped to the skin, sir, save for a dirty old skirt that was tied
round her. A woman carried her off to that spot, she told me, robbed her
of her clothes, and left her there. Knowing where she must ha' been
stole from--through you're accusing _me_ of it, master--I untied her to
lead her home, but her feet warn't used to the rough ground, and I made
shift to carry her. A matter of two miles it were, and I be not good for
much. I left her at home safe, and set off back. That's all, master."
"What were you doing here?" asked Tod, as considerately as if he had
been speaking to a lord. "Resting?"
"I suppose I fell, master. I don't remember nothing, since I was
tramping up the lane, till your voices came. I've had naught inside my
lips to-day but a drink o' water."
"Did they give you nothing to eat at the house when you took the child
home?"
He shook his head. "I saw the woman again, nobody else. She heard what I
had to say about the child, and she never said 'Thank ye.'"
The man had been getting on his feet, and took up the skewers, that were
all tied together with string, and the stick. But he reeled as he stood,
and would have fallen again but for Tod. Tod gave him his arm.
"We are in for it, Johnny," said he aside to me. "Pity but I could be
put in a picture--the Samaritan helping the destitute!"
"I'd not accept of ye, sir, but that I have a child sick at home, and
want to get to her. There's a piece of bread in my pocket that was give
me at a cottage to-day."
"Is your child sure to get well?" asked Tod, after a pause; wondering
whether he could say anything of what had occurred, so as to break the
news.
The man gazed right away into the distance, as if searching for an
answer in the far-off star shining there.
"There's been a death-look in her face this day and night past, master.
But the Lord's good to us all."
"And sometimes, when He takes children, it is done in mercy," said Tod.
"Heaven is a better place than this."
"Ay," rejoined the man, who was leaning heavily on Tod, and could never
have got home without him, unless he had crawled on hands and knees.
"I've been sickly on and off for this year past; worse lately; and I've
thought at times that if my own turn was coming, I'd be glad to see my
children gone afore me."
"Oh, Tod!" I whispered, in a burst of repentance, "how could we have
been so hard with this poor fellow, and roughly accused him of stealing
Lena?" But Tod only gave me a knock with his elbow.
"I fancy it must be pleasant to think of a little child being an angel
in heaven--a child that we have loved," said Tod.
"Ay, ay," said the man.
Tod had no courage to say more. He was not a parson. Presently he asked
the man what tribe he belonged to--being a gipsy.
"I'm not a gipsy, master. Never was one yet. I and my wife are
dark-complexioned by nature; living in the open air has made us darker;
but I'm English born; Christian, too. My wife's Irish; but they do say
she comes of a gipsy tribe. We used to have a cart, and went about the
country with crockery; but a year ago, when I got ill and lay in a
lodging, the things were seized for rent and debt. Since then it's been
hard lines with us. Yonder's my bit of a tent, master, and now I can get
on alone. Thanking ye kindly."
"I am sorry I spoke harshly to you to-day," said Tod. "Take this: it is
all I have with me."
"I'll take it, sir, for my child's sake; it may help to put the strength
into her. Otherwise I'd not. We're honest; we've never begged. Thank ye
both, masters, once again."
It was only a shilling or two. Tod spent, and never had much in his
pockets. "I wish it had been sovereigns," said he to me; "but we will do
something better for them to-morrow, Johnny. I am sure the Pater will."
"Tod," said I, as we ran on, "had we seen the man close before, and
spoken with him, I should never have suspected him. He has a face to be
trusted."
Tod burst into a laugh. "There you are Johnny, at your faces again!"
I was always reading people's faces, and taking likes and dislikes
accordingly. They called me a muff for it at home (and for many other
things), Tod especially; but it seemed to me that I could read people as
easily as a book. Duffham, our surgeon at Church Dykely, bade me _trust
to it_ as a good gift from God. One day, pushing my straw hat up to draw
his fingers across the top of my brow, he quaintly told the Squire that
when he wanted people's characters read, to come to me to read them. The
Squire only laughed in answer.
As luck had it, a gentleman we knew was passing in his dog-cart when we
got to the foot of the hill. It was old Pitchley. He drove us home: and
I could hardly get down, I was so stiff.
Lena was in bed, safe and sound. No damage, except fright and the loss
of her clothes. From what we could learn, the woman who took her off
must have been concealed amidst the ricks, when Tod put her there. Lena
said the woman laid hold of her very soon, caught her up, and put her
hand over her mouth, to prevent her crying out; she could only give one
scream. I ought to have heard it, only Mack was making such an awful
row, hammering that iron. How far along fields and by-ways the woman
carried her, Lena could not be supposed to tell: "Miles!" she said. Then
the thief plunged amidst a few trees, took the child's things off, put
on an old rag of a petticoat, and tied her loosely to a tree. Lena
thought she could have got loose herself, but was too frightened to try;
and just then the man, Jake, came up.
"I liked _him_," said Lena. "He carried me all the way home, that my
feet should not be hurt; but he had to sit down sometimes. He said he
had a poor little girl who was nearly as badly off for clothes as that,
but she did not want them now, she was too sick. He said he hoped my
papa would find the woman, and put her in prison."
It is what the Squire intended to do, chance helping him. But he did not
reach home till after us, when all was quiet again: which was fortunate.
"I suppose you blame me for that?" cried Tod, to his step-mother.
"No, I don't, Joseph," said Mrs. Todhetley. She called him Joseph nearly
always, not liking to shorten his name, as some of us did. "It is so
very common a thing for the children to be playing in the three-cornered
field amidst the ricks; and no suspicion that danger could arise from it
having ever been glanced at, I do not think any blame attaches to you."
"I am very sorry now for having done it," said Tod. "I shall never
forget the fright to the last hour of my life."
He went straight to Molly, from Mrs. Todhetley, a look on his face that,
when seen there, which was rare, the servants did not like. Deference
was rendered to Tod in the household. When anything should take off the
good old Pater, Tod would be master. What he said to Molly no one heard;
but the woman was banging at her brass things in a tantrum for three
days afterwards.
And when we went to see after poor Jake and his people, it was too late.
The man, the tent, the living people, and the dead child--all were
gone.
II.
FINDING BOTH OF THEM.
Worcester Assizes were being held, and Squire Todhetley was on the grand
jury. You see, although Dyke Manor was just within the borders of
Warwickshire, the greater portion of the Squire's property lay in
Worcestershire. This caused him to be summoned to serve. We were often
at his house there, Crabb Cot. I forget who was foreman of the jury that
time: either Sir John Pakington, or the Honourable Mr. Coventry.
The week was jolly. We put up at the Star-and-Garter when we went
to Worcester, which was two or three times a-year; generally at the
assizes, or the races, or the quarter-sessions; one or other of the busy
times.
The Pater would grumble at the bills--and say we boys had no business to
be there; but he would take us, if we were at home, for all that. The
assizes came on this time the week before our summer holidays were up;
the Squire wished they had not come on until the week after. Anyway,
there we were, in clover; the Squire about to be stewed up in the county
courts all day; I and Tod flying about the town, and doing what we
liked.
The judges came in from Oxford on the usual day, Saturday. And, to
make clear what I am going to tell about, we must go back to that
morning and to Dyke Manor. It was broiling hot weather, and Mrs.
Todhetley, Hugh, and Lena, with old Thomas and Hannah, all came on the
lawn after breakfast to see us start. The open carriage was at the
door, with the fine dark horses. When the Squire did come out, he
liked to do things well; and Dwarf Giles, the groom, had gone on to
Worcester the day before with the two saddle-horses, the Pater's and
Tod's. They might have ridden them in this morning, but the Squire
chose to have his horses sleek and fresh when attending the high
sheriff.
"Shall I drive, sir?" asked Tod.
"No," said the Pater. "These two have queer tempers, and must be handled
carefully." He meant the horses, Bob and Blister. Tod looked at me; he
thought he could have managed them quite as well as the Pater.
"Papa," cried Lena, as we were driving off, running up in her white
pinafore, with her pretty hair flying, "if you can catch that naughty
kidnapper at Worcester, you put her in prison."
The Squire nodded emphatically, as much as to say, "Trust me for that."
Lena alluded to the woman who had taken her off and stolen her clothes
two or three weeks before. Tod said, afterwards, there must have been
some prevision on the child's mind when she said this.
We reached Worcester at twelve. It is a long drive, you know. Lots of
country-people had arrived, and the Squire went off with some of them.
Tod and I thought we'd order luncheon at the Star--a jolly good one;
stewed lampreys, kidneys, and cherry-tart; and let it go into the
Squire's bill.
I'm afraid I envied Tod. The old days of travelling post were past, when
the sheriff's procession would go out to Whittington to meet the judges'
carriage. They came now by rail from Oxford, and the sheriff and his
attendants received them at the railway station. It was the first time
Tod had been allowed to make one of the gentlemen-attendants. The Squire
said now he was too young; but he looked big, and tall, and strong. To
see him mount his horse and go cantering off with the rest sent me into
a state of envy. Tod saw it.
"Don't drop your mouth, Johnny," said he. "You'll make one of us in
another year or two."
I stood about for half-an-hour, and the procession came back, passing
the Star on its way to the county courts. The bells were ringing, the
advanced heralds blew their trumpets, and the javelin-guard rode at a
foot-pace, their lances in rest, preceding the high sheriff's grand
carriage, with its four prancing horses and their silvered harness. Both
the judges had come in, so we knew that business was over at Oxford;
they sat opposite to the sheriff and his chaplain. I used to wonder
whether they travelled all the way in their wigs and gowns, or robed
outside Worcester. Squire Todhetley rode in the line next the carriage,
with some more old ones of consequence; Tod on his fine bay was nearly
at the tail, and he gave me a nod in passing. The judges were going to
open the commission, and Foregate Street was crowded.
The high sheriff that year was a friend of ours, and the Pater had an
invitation to the banquet he gave that evening. Tod thought he ought to
have been invited too.
"It's sinfully stingy of him, Johnny. When I am pricked for sheriff--and
I suppose my turn will come some time, either for Warwickshire or
Worcestershire--I'll have more young fellows to my dinner than old
ones."
The Squire, knowing nothing of our midday luncheon, was surprised that
we chose supper at eight instead of dinner at six; but he told the
waiter to give us a good one. We went out while it was getting ready,
and walked arm-in-arm through the crowded streets. Worcester is always
full on a Saturday evening; it is market-day there, as every one knows;
but on Assize Saturday the streets are almost impassable. Tod, tall and
strong, held on his way, and asked leave of none.
"Now, then, you two gents, can't you go on proper, and not elbow
respectable folks like that?"
"Holloa!" cried Tod, turning at the voice. "Is it you, old Jones?"
Old Jones, the constable of our parish, touched his hat when he saw it
was us, and begged pardon. We asked what he was doing at Worcester; but
he had only come on his own account. "On the spree," Tod suggested to
him.
"Young Mr. Todhetley," cried he--the way he chiefly addressed Tod--"I'd
not be sure but that woman's took--her that served out little Miss
Lena."
"That woman!" said Tod. "Why do you think it?"
Old Jones explained. A woman had been apprehended near Worcester the
previous day, on a charge of stripping two little boys of their clothes
in Perry Wood. The description given of her answered exactly, old Jones
thought, to that given by Lena.
"She stripped 'em to the skin," groaned Jones, drawing a long face as he
recited the mishap, "two poor little chaps of three years, they was,
living in them cottages under the Wood--not as much as their boots did
she leave on 'em. When they got home their folks didn't know 'em; quite
naked they was, and bleating with terror, like a brace of shorn sheep."
Tod put on his determined look. "And she is taken, you say, Jones?"
"She was took yesterday, sir. They had her before the justices this
morning, and the little fellows knowed her at once. As the 'sizes was
on, leastways as good as on, their worships committed her for trial
there and then. Policeman Cripp told me all about it; it was him that
took her. She's in the county gaol."
We carried the tale to the Pater that night, and he despatched a
messenger to Mrs. Todhetley, to say that Lena must be at Worcester on
the Monday morning. But there's something to tell about the Sunday yet.
If you have been in Worcester on Assize Sunday, you know how the
cathedral is on that morning crowded. Enough strangers are in the town
to fill it: the inhabitants who go to the churches at other times
attended it then; and King Mob flocks in to see the show.
Squire Todhetley was put in the stalls; Tod and I scrambled for places
on a bench. The alterations in the cathedral (going on for years before
that, and going on for years since, and going on still) caused space
to be limited, and it was no end of a cram. While people fought for
standing-places, the procession was played in to the crash of the organ.
The judges came, glorious in their wigs and gowns; the mayor and
aldermen were grand as scarlet and gold chains could make them; and
there was a large attendance of the clergy in their white robes. The
Bishop had come in from Hartlebury, and was on his throne, and the
service began. The Rev. Mr. Wheeler chanted; the Dean read the lessons.
Of course the music was all right; they put up fine services on Assize
Sundays now; and the sheriff's chaplain went up in his black gown to
preach the sermon. Three-quarters of an hour, if you'll believe me,
before that sermon came to an end!
Ere the organ had well played its Amen to the Bishop's blessing, the
crowd began to push out. We pushed with the rest and took up our places
in the long cathedral nave to see the procession pass back again. It
came winding down between the line of javelin-men. Just as the judges
were passing, Tod motioned me to look opposite. There stood a young boy
in dreadful clothes, patched all over, but otherwise clean; with great
dark wondering eyes riveted on the judges, as if they had been stilted
peacocks; on their wigs, their solemn countenances, their held-up
scarlet trains.
Where had I seen those eyes, and their brightness? Recollection flashed
over me before Tod's whisper: "Jake's boy; the youngster we saw in the
tent."
To get across the line was impossible: manners would not permit it, let
alone the javelin-guard. And when the procession had passed, leaving
nothing but a crowd of shuffling feet and the dust on the white
cathedral floor, the boy was gone.
"I say, Johnny, it is rather odd we should come on those tent-people,
just as the woman has turned up," exclaimed Tod, as we got clear of the
cathedral.
"But you don't think they can be connected, Tod?"
"Well, no; I suppose not. It's a queer coincidence, though."
_This_ we also carried to the Squire, as we had the other news. He was
standing in the Star gateway.
"Look here, you boys," said he, after a pause given to thought; "keep
your eyes open; you may come upon the lad again, or some of his folk. I
should like to do something for that poor man; I've wished it ever since
he brought home Lena, and that confounded Molly drove him out by way of
recompense."
"And if they should be confederates, sir?" suggested Tod.
"Who confederates? What do you mean, Joe?"
"These people and the female-stripper. It seems strange they should both
turn up again in the same spot."
The notion took away the Pater's breath. "If I thought that; if I find
it is so," he broke forth, "I'll--I'll--transport the lot."
Mrs. Todhetley arrived with Lena on Sunday afternoon. Early on Monday,
the Squire and Tod took her to the governor's house at the county
prison, where she was to see the woman, as if accidentally, nothing
being said to Lena.
The woman was brought in: a bold jade with a red face: and Lena nearly
went into convulsions at the sight of her. There could be no mistake the
woman was the same: and the Pater became redhot with anger; especially
to think he could not punish her in Worcester.
As the fly went racing up Salt Lane after the interview, on its way to
leave the Squire at the county courts, a lad ran past. It was Jake's
boy; the same we had seen in the cathedral. Tod leaped up and called to
the driver to stop, but the Pater roared out an order to go on. His
appearance at the court could not be delayed, and Tod had to stay with
Lena. So the clue was lost again. Tod brought Lena to the Star, and then
he and I went to the criminal court, and bribed a fellow for places. Tod
said it would be a sin not to hear the kidnapper tried.
It was nearly the first case called on. Some of the lighter cases were
taken first, while the grand jury deliberated on their bills for the
graver ones. Her name, as given in, was Nancy Cole, and she tried to
excite the sympathies of the judge and jury by reciting a whining
account of a deserting husband and other ills. The evidence was quite
clear. The two children (little shavers in petticoats) set up a roar in
court at sight of the woman, just as Lena had done in the governor's
house; and a dealer in marine stores produced their clothes, which
he had bought of her. Tod whispered to me that he should go about
Worcester after this in daily dread of seeing Lena's blue-silk frock
and open-worked stockings hanging in a shop window. Something was said
during the trial about the raid the prisoner had also recently made on
the little daughter of Mr. Todhetley, of Dyke Manor, Warwickshire, and
of Crabb Cot, Worcestershire, "one of the gentlemen of the grand jury at
present sitting in deliberation in an adjoining chamber of the court."
But, as the judge said, that could not be received in evidence.