The storm had abated. The sleet and rain had ceased, but the wind
still blew fierce and strong, driving black continents of cloud across
a crescent moon. It was bitingly cold. Rotha walked fast and spoke
little. Ralph understood their mission. “Is he far away?” he said.
“Not far.”
Her voice had a tremor of emotion, and as the wind carried it to him
it seemed freighted with sadness. But the girl would have hidden her
fears.
“Perhaps he's better now,” she said.
Ralph quickened his steps. The dog had gone on in front, and was lost
in the darkness.
“Give me your hand, Rotha; the sleet is hard and slape.”
“Don't heed me, Ralph; go faster; I'll follow.”
Just then a sharp bark was heard close at hand, followed by another
and another, but in a different key. Laddie had met a friend.
“He's coming,” Rotha said, catching her breath.
“He's here.”
With the shrill cry of a hunted creature that has got back, wounded,
to its brethren, Sim seemed to leap upon them out of the darkness.
“Ralph, take me with you--take me with you; do not let me go back to
the fell to-night. I cannot go--no, believe me, I cannot--I dare not.
Take me, Ralph; have mercy on me; do not despise me for the coward
that I am; it's enough to make me curse the great God--no, no; not
that neither. But, Ralph, Ralph--”
The poor fellow would have fallen breathless and exhausted at Ralph's
feet, but he held him up and spoke firmly but kindly to him,--
“Bravely, Sim; bravely, man; there,” he said, as the tailor regained
some composure.
“You sha'n't go back to-night. How wet you are, though! There's not a
dry rag to your body, man. You must first return with me to the fire
at the Red Lion, and then we'll go--”
“No, no, no!” cried Sim; “not there either--never there; better the
wind and rain, aye, better anything, than that.”
And he turned his head over his shoulder as though peering into the
darkness behind. Ralph understood him. There were wilder companions
for this poor hunted creature than any that lived on the mountains.
“But you'll never live through the night in clothes like these.”
Sim shivered with the cold; his teeth chattered; his lank hands shook
as with ague.
“Never live? Oh, but I must not die, Ralph; no not yet--not yet.”
Was there, then, something still left in life that a poor outcast like
this should cling to it?
“I'll go back with you,” he said more calmly. They turned, and with
Sim between them Ralph and Rotha began to retrace their steps. They
had not far to go, when Sim reeled like a drunken man, and when they
were within a few paces he stopped.
“No,” he said, “I can't.” His breath was coming quick and fast.
“Come, man, they shall give you the ingle bench; I'll see to that.
Come now,” said Ralph soothingly.
“I've walked in front of this house for an hour to-night, I have,”
said Sim, “to and fro, to and fro, waiting for you; waiting, waiting;
starting at my own shadow cast from the dim lowe of the windows, and
then flying to hide when the door did at last--at long last--open or
shut.”
Ralph shuddered. It had been as he thought. Then he said,--
“Yes, yes; but you'll come now, like a brave fellow--'a braw chiel,'
you know.”
Sim started at the pleasantry with which Ralph had tried to soothe his
spirits. It struck a painful memory. Ralph felt it too.
“Come,” he said, in an altered tone.
“No,” cried Sim, clasping his hands over his head. “They're worse than
wild beasts, they are. To-night I went up to the cave as usual. The
wind was blowing strong and keen in the valley; it had risen to a
tempest on the screes. I went in and turned up the bracken for my bed.
Then the rain began to fall; and the rain became hail, and the hail
became sleet, and pelted in upon me, it did. The wind soughed about my
lone home--my home!”
Again Sim reeled in the agony of his soul.
“This is peace to that wind,” he continued; “yes, peace. Then the
stones began to rumble down the rocks, and the rain to pour in through
the great chinks in the roof of the cave. Yet I stayed there--I
stayed. Well, the ghyll roared louder and louder. It seemed to
overflow the gullock, it did. I heard the big bowders shifted from
their beds by the tumbling waters. They rolled with heavy thuds down
the brant sides of the fell--down, down, down. But I kept closer,
closer. Presently I heard the howl of the wolves--”
“No, Sim; not that, old friend.” “Yes, the pack from Lauvellen. They'd
been driven out of their caves--not even they could live in their
caves tonight.” The delirium of Sim's spirit seemed to overcome him.
“No more now, man,” said Ralph, putting his arm about him. “You're
safe, at least, and all will be well with you.”
“Wait. Nearer and nearer they came, nearer and nearer, till I knew
they were above me, around me. Yet I kept close, I did, I almost felt
their breath. Well, well, at last I saw two red eyes gleaming at me
through the darkness--”
“You're feverish to-night, Sim,” interrupted Ralph.
“Then a great flash of lightning came. It licked the ground afore
me--ay, licked. Then a burst of thunder--it must have been a
thunderbolt--I couldn't hear the wind and sleet and water. I fainted,
that must have been it. When I came round I groped about me where I
lay--”
“A dream, Sim.”
“No, it was no dream! What was it I touched? I was delivered! Thank
heaven, _that_ death was not mine. I rose, staggered out, and fled.”
By the glimmering light from the windows of the inn--there came the
sound of laughter from within--Ralph could see that hysterical tears
coursed down the poor tailor's cheeks. Rotha stood aside, her hands
covering her face.
“And, at last, when you could not meet me here, you went to Fornside
for Rotha to seek me?” asked Ralph.
“Yes, I did. Don't despise me--don't do that.” Then in a supplicating
tone he added,--
“I couldn't bear it from you, Ralph.”
The tears came again. The direful agony of Sim's soul seemed at length
to conquer him, and he fell to the ground insensible. In an instant
Rotha was on her knees in the hardening road at her father's side; but
she did not weep.
“We have no choice now,” she said in a broken voice.
“None,” answered Ralph. “Let me carry him in.”
When the door of the inn had closed behind Ralph as he went out with
Rotha, old Matthew Branthwaite, who had recovered his composure after
Monsey's song, and who had sat for a moment with his elbow on his
knee, his pipe in his hand and his mouth still open, from which the
shaft had just been drawn, gave a knowing twitch to his wrinkled face
as he said,--
“So, so, that's the fell the wind blows frae!”
“Blow low, my black feutt,” answered Monsey, “and don't blab.”
“When the whins is oot of blossom, kissing's oot o' fashion--nowt will
come of it,” replied the sage on reflection.
“Wrong again, great Solomon!” said Monsey. “Ralph is not the man to
put away the girl because her father is in disgrace.”
“Do ye know he trystes with the lass?”
“Not I.”
“Maybe ye'r like the rest on us: ye can make nowt on him, back ner
edge.”
“Right now, great sage; the sun doesn't shine through him.”
“He's a great lounderan fellow,” said one of the dalesmen, speaking
into the pewter at his mouth. He was the blacksmith of Wythburn.
“What do you say?” asked Monsey.
“Nowt!” the man growled sulkily.
“So ye said nowt?” inquired Matthew.
“Nowt to you, or any of you.”
“Then didst a nivver hear it said, 'He that talks to himsel' clatters
to a fool'?”
The company laughed.
“No,” resumed Matthew, turning to the schoolmaster, “Ralph will nivver
tryste with the lass of yon hang-gallows of a tailor. The gallows
rope's all but roond his neck already. It's awesome to see him in his
barramouth in the fell side. He's dwinnelt away to a atomy.
“It baffles me where he got the brass frae to pay his rent,” said one
of the shepherds. “Where did he get it, schoolmaster?”
Monsey answered nothing. The topic was evidently a fearsome thing to
him. His quips and cracks were already gone.
“Where did he get it, _I_ say?” repeated the man; with the air of one
who was propounding a trying problem.
Old Matthew removed his pipe.
“A fool may ask mair questions ner a doctor can answer.”
The shepherd shifted in his seat.
“That Wilson was na shaks nowther,” continued Matthew quietly. “He was
accustomed to 'tummel' his neighbors, and never paused to inquire into
their bruises. He'd olas the black dog on his back--leastways
latterly. Ey, the braizzant taistrel med have done something for Ralph
an he lived langer. He was swearing what he'd do, the ungratefu' fool;
auld Wilson was a beadless body.”
“They say he threatened Ralph's father, Angus,” said Monsey, with a
perceptible shiver.
“Ay, but Angus is bad to bang. I mind his dingin' ower a bull on its
back. A girt man, Angus, and varra dreadfu' when he's angert.”
“Dus'ta mind the fratch thoo telt me aboot atween Angus and auld
Wilson?” said Reuben Thwaite to Matthew Branthwaite.
“What quarrel was that?” asked Monsey.
“Why, the last fratch of all, when Wilson gat the sneck posset frae
Shoulthwaite,” said Matthew.
“I never heard of it,” said the schoolmaster.
“There's nowt much to hear. Ralph and mysel' we were walking up to the
Moss together ya day, when we heard Angus and Wilson at a bout of
words. Wilson he said to Angus with a gay, bitter sneer, 'Ye'll fain
swappit wi' me yet,' said he. 'He'll yoke wi' an unco weird. Thy braw
chiel 'ul tryste wi' th' hangman soon, I wat.' And Angus he was fair
mad, I can tell ye, and he said to Wilson, 'Thoo stammerin' and
yammerin' taistrel, thoo; I'll pluck a lock of thy threep. Bring the
warrant, wilt thoo? Thoo savvorless and sodden clod-heed! I'll whip
thee with the taws. Slipe, I say, while thoo's weel--slipe!'”
“And Angus would have done it, too, and not the first time nowther,”
said little Reuben, with a knowing shake of the head.
“Well, Matthew, what then?” said Monsey.
“Weel, with that Angus he lifted up his staff, and Wilson shrieked oot
afore he gat the blow. But Angus lowered his hand and said to him,
says he, 'Time eneuf to shriek when ye're strucken.'”
“And when the auld one did get strucken, he could not shriek,” added
Reuben.
“We know nowt of that reetly,” said Matthew, “and maybe nivver will.”
“What was that about a warrant?” said Monsey.
“Nay, nay, laal man, that's mair ner ony on us knows for certain.”
“But ye have a notion on it, have ye not?” said Reuben, with a twinkle
which was intended to flatter Matthew into a communicative spirit.
“I reckon I hev,” said the weaver, with a look of self-satisfaction.
“Did Ralph understand it?” asked Monsey.
“Not he, schoolmaister. If he did, I could mak' nowt on him, for I
asked him theer and then.”
“But ye knows yersel' what the warrant meant, don't ye?” said Reuben
significantly.
“Weel, man, it's all as I telt ye; the country's going to the dogs,
and young Charles he's cutting the heed off nigh a'most iv'ry man as
fought for Oliver agen him. And it's as I telt ye aboot the spies of
the government, there's a spy ivrywhear--maybe theer's yan here
now--and auld Wilson he was nowt ner mair ner less ner a spy, and he
meant to get a warrant for Ralph Ray, and that's the lang and short on
it.”
“I reckon Sim made _the_ short on it,” said Reuben with a smirk. “He
scarce knew what a good turn he was doing for young Ralph yon neet in
Martinmas.”
“But don't they say Ralph saved Wilson's life away at the wars?” said
Monsey. “Why could he want to inform against him and have him hanged?”
“A dog winnet yowl an ye hit him with a bone, but a spy is worse ner
ony dog,” answered Matthew sententiously.
“But _why_ could he wish to do it?”
“His fratch with Angus, that was all.”
“There must have been more than that, Matthew, there must.”
“I never heeard on it, then.”
“Old Wilson must have had money on him that night,” said Monsey, who
had been looking gravely into the fire, his hands clasped about his
knees. Encouraged by this support of the sapient idea he had hinted
at, the shepherd who had spoken before broke in with, “Where else did
he get it _I_ say?”
“Ye breed of the cuckoo,” said Matthew, “ye've gat no rhyme but yan.”
Amid the derisive laughter that followed, the door of the inn was
again opened, and in a moment more Ralph Ray stood in the middle of
the floor with Simeon Stagg in his arms. Rotha was behind, pale but
composed. Every man in the room rose to his feet. The landlord stepped
forward, with no pleasant expression on his face; and from an inner
room his wife came bustling up. Little Monsey stood clutching and
twitching his fingers. Old Matthew had let the pipe drop out of his
mouth, and it lay broken on the hearth.
“He has fainted,” said Ralph, still holding his burden; “turn that
bench to the fire.”
No one stirred. Every one stood for the moment as if stupefied. Sim's
head hung over Ralph's arm: his face was as pale as death.
“Out of the way,” said Ralph, brushing past a great lumbering fellow,
with his mouth agape.
The company found their tongues at last. Were they to sit with “this
hang-gallows of a tailor”? The landlord, thinking himself appealed to,
replied that he “couldn't hev na brulliment” in his house.
“There need be no broil,” said Ralph, laying the insensible form on a
seat and proceeding to strip off the wet outer garments. Then turning
to the hostess, he said,--
“Martha, bring me water, quick.”
Martha turned about and obeyed him without a word.
“He'll be better soon,” said Ralph to Robbie Anderson. He was
sprinkling water on the white face that lay before him. Robbie had
recovered his wakefulness, and was kneeling at Sim's feet, chafing his
hands.
Rotha stood at her father's side, motionless.
“There, he's coming to. Martha,” said Ralph, “hadn't you better take
Rotha to the kitchen fire?”
The two women left the room.
Sim's eyes opened; there was a watery humor in them which was not
tears. The color came back to his cheeks, but with the return of
consciousness his face grew thinner and more haggard. He heaved a
heavy sigh, and seemed to realize his surroundings. With the only hand
disengaged (Robbie held one of them) he clutched at Ralph's belt.
“I'm better--let me go,” he said in a hoarse voice, trying to rise.
“No!” said Ralph,--“no!” and he gently pushed him back into his
recumbent position.
“You had best let the snuffling waistrel go,” said one of the men in a
surly tone. “Maybe he never fainted at all.”
It was the blacksmith who had growled at the mention of Ralph's name
in Ralph's absence. They called him Joe Garth.
“Be silent, you loon,” answered Robbie Anderson, turning upon the last
speaker.
Ralph seemed not to have heard him.
“Here,” he said, tossing Sim's coat to Matthew, who had returned with
a new pipe to his seat in the chimney corner, “dry that at the fire.”
The coat had been growing hard with the frost.
“This wants the batling stone ower it,” said the old weaver, spreading
it out before him.
“See to this, schoolmaster,” said Ralph, throwing Sim's cap into his
lap.
Monsey jumped, with a scream, out of his seat as though stung by an
adder.
Ralph looked at him for a moment with an expression of pity.
“I might have known you were timid at heart, schoolmaster. Perhaps
you're gallant over a glass.”
There could be no doubt of little Monsey's timidity. All his jests had
forsaken him.
Sim had seen the gesture that expressed horror at contact even with
his clothes. He was awake to every passing incident with a feverish
alertness.
“Let me go,” he said again, with a look of supplicatory appeal.
Old Matthew got up and opened the door.
“Sista, there's some betterment in the weather, now; it teem't awhile
ago.”
“What of that?” asked Ralph; but he understood the observation.
“For God's sake let me go,” cried Sim in agony, looking first at one
face and then at another.
“No,” said Ralph, and sat down beside him. Robbie had gone back to his
bench.
“Ye'll want the bull-grips to keep _him_ quiet,” said old Matthew to
Ralph, with a sneer.
“And the ass's barnicles to keep your tongue in your mouth,” added
Ralph sternly.
“For fault of wise men fools sit on the bench, or we should hev none
of this,” continued Matthew. “I reckon some one that's here is nigh
ax't oot by Auld Nick in the kirk of the nether world.”
“Then take care you're not there yourself to give something at the
bridewain.”
Old Mathew grumbled something under his breath.
There was a long silence. Ralph had rarely been heard to speak so
bitterly. It was clear that opposition had gone far enough. Sim's
watery eyes were never for an instant still. Full of a sickening
apprehension, they cast furtive glances into every face. The poor
creature seemed determined to gather up into his wretched breast the
scorn that was blasting it. The turf on the hearth gave out a great
heat, but the tailor shivered as with cold. Then Ralph reached the
coat and cap, and, after satisfying himself that they were dry, he
handed them back to Sim, who put them on. Perhaps he had mistaken the
act, for, rising to his feet, Sim looked into Ralph's face
inquiringly, as though to ask if he might go.
“Not yet, Sim,” said Ralph. “You shall go when I go. You lodge with me
to-night.”
Monsey in the corner looked aghast, and crept closer under the flitch
of bacon that hung above him.
“Men,” said Ralph, “hearken here. You call it a foul thing to kill a
man, and so it is.”
Monsey turned livid; every one held his breath. Ralph went on,--
“Did you ever reflect that there are other ways of taking a man's life
besides killing him?”
There was no response. Ralph did not seem to expect one, for he
continued,--
“You loathe the man who takes the blood of his fellow-man, and you're
right so to do. It matters nothing to you that the murdered man may
have been a worse man than the murderer. You're right there too. You
look to the motive that inspired the crime. Is it greed or revenge?
Then you say, 'This man must die.' God grant that such horror of
murder may survive among us.” There was a murmur of assent.
“But it is possible to kill without drawing blood. We may be murderers
and never suspect the awfulness of our crime. To wither with
suspicion, to blast with scorn, to dog with cruel hints, to torture
with hard looks',--this is to kill without blood. Did you ever think
of it? There are worse hangmen than ever stood on the gallows.”
“Ay, but _he's_ shappin' to hang hissel',” muttered Matthew
Branthwaite. And there was some inaudible muttering among the others.
“I know what you mean,” Ralph continued. “That the guilty man whom the
law cannot touch is rightly brought under the ban of his fellows. Yes,
it is Heaven's justice.”
Sim crept closer to Ralph, and trembled perceptibly.
“Men, hearken again,” said Ralph. “You know I've spoken up for Sim,”
and he put his great arm about the tailor's shoulders; “but you don't
know that I have never asked him, and he has never said whether he is
innocent or not. The guilty man may be in this room, and he may not be
Simeon Stagg. But if he were my own brother--my own father--”
Old Matthew's pipe had gone out; he was puffing at the dead shaft. Sim
rose up; his look of abject misery had given place to a look of
defiance; he stamped on the floor.
“Let me go; let me go,” he cried.
Robbie Anderson came up and took him by the hand; but Sim's brain
seemed rent in twain, and in a burst of hysterical passion he fell
back into his seat, and buried his head in his breast.
“He'll be hanged with the foulest collier yet,” growled one of the
men. It was Joe Garth again. He was silenced once more. The others had
begun to relent.
“I've not yet asked him if he is innocent,” continued Ralph; “but this
persecution drives me to it, and I ask him now.”
“Yes, yes,” cried Sim, raising his head, and revealing an awful
countenance. A direful memory seemed to haunt every feature.
“Do you know the murderer?”
“I do--that is--what am I saying?--let me go.”
Sim had got up, and was tramping across the floor. Ralph got up too,
and faced him.
“It is your duty, in the sight of Heaven, to give that man's name.”
“No, no; heaven forbid,” cried Sim.
“It is your duty to yourself and to--”
“I care nothing for myself.”
“And to your daughter--think of that. Would you tarnish the child's
name with the sin laid on the father's--”
“God in heaven help me!” cried Sim, tremulous with emotion. “Ralph,
Ralph, ask me no more--you don't know what you ask.”
“It is your duty to Heaven, I say.”
He put his hand on Sim's shoulder, and looked steadily in his eyes.
With a fearful cry Sim broke from his grasp, sprung to the door, and
in an instant was lost in the darkness without. Ralph stood where Sim
had left him, transfixed by some horrible consciousness. A slow
paralysis seemed to possess all his senses. What had he read in those
eyes that seemed to live before him still?
“Good neet,” said old Matthew as he got up and trudged out. Most of
the company rose to go. “Good night,” said more than one, but Ralph
answered nothing. Robbie Anderson was last.
“Good night, Ralph,” he said. His gruff voice was thick in his throat.
“Aye, good night, lad,” Ralph answered vacantly.
Robbie had got to the door, and was leaning with one hand on the
door-frame. Coming back, he said,--
“Ralph, where may your father be to-night?”
“At Gaskarth--it's market day--he took the last shearing.”
He spoke like one in a sleep. Then Robbie left him.
“Is Rotha ready to go?” he asked.