THE DIPPING-POOL
A GROUP of men, sitting round a blazing fire, some on heavy wooden
chairs, some on a long settle, looked up as he entered. All were
smoking. Those on the chairs gave them a deferential push back when
they saw the new-comer.
"Very damp night outside," observed Rhys, nodding to the company.
"Indeed, so it be, sir. Come you in here near to the warm-ship, Master
Walters," said a jolly-looking individual who sat closest to the
chimney-corner, pointing invitingly to his next neighbour's chair. His
next neighbour, an undersized man with a goat's beard, called Johnny
Watkins, jumped up obediently.
"Thanks, thanks, don't disturb yourself," said Rhys politely, seating
himself in the corner of the settle, "this will do very well for me."
The fire-place round which they were gathered was the broad kitchen
range of the Dipping-Pool Inn, in which modest establishment bar and
kitchen were one and the same place. Being situated in such an
out-of-the-way spot, it was too little frequented by any but the few
travellers over the mountain to make any addition profitable, Hosea
Evans, the landlord, whose sign hung outside, entertaining his guests
comfortably in the kitchen. He was assisted in his business by one
Mary Vaughan, who stood in what would have been the character of
barmaid in a larger hostelry, and brought to the company such drinks
as were called for from the inner room in which she sat. Within the
memory of a few old people, the dried-up bed of the brook, which made
a rough path to the house, had been a swift stream running into a pool
before the door. This had been used for sheep-washing at one time, and
Hosea, when he took the little inn, had not troubled himself to invent
a new name for it; so, though its appropriateness was not apparent,
the "Dipping-Pool" it remained.
It was an unpretending, whitewashed house, squatting in the green
creek as though ashamed to be seen within range of the public eye.
Many people thought that it had reason to be so, as its present
proprietor had borne an indifferent character for honesty in certain
small ways, and had left Llangarth, where he had formerly lived, on
account of the inconvenient attitude of local opinion. He was a
thick-set, smiling man, of florid complexion, round whose broad face
the red hair, beard, and whiskers formed such a perfect halo, that
now, as he entered the kitchen and his head appeared over a wooden
screen standing at the door, it produced something of the effect of a
sunrise.
"Well, Mr. Walters," he began, when he had shut the door of the inner
room carefully and sat down cumbrously beside Rhys, "and how be you
minded to do?"
The company took its pipe out of its mouth and turned its gaze upon
the young man. There was a pause. "There's a good deal against it,"
said Rhys, returning the stare, "but let's have a drop of something
hot before we sit down to the matter. How about the kettle, Hosea, and
a bottle of spirits?"
"Wal, I don't have no objection, not I," hazarded Charley Turnbull,
the man by the chimney-corner, drawing a large hand across his mouth,
and reflecting that Rhys would pay for it.
A call from Hosea brought in Mary Vaughan. She stood waiting while he
gave the order with her eyes fixed upon Rhys, who was studiously
contemplating his muddy boots; he never so much as looked up to bid
her good-evening.
"When you've brought the liquor, don't be settin' up, girl," said the
landlord. "Go you up-stairs and leave we to our bysiness. I'll mind
the hearth."
Mary's look wandered over the assembly, lighting for a moment upon
Rhys Walters; her eyes were large and brilliant, and shone out of her
serious face like flames; there seemed to be a slow fire behind them.
She made no reply, but brought what was wanted, leaving the room with
an indistinct good-night.
"If her did get to know, it would not do for we--indeed that it would
not," remarked Johnny Watkins, shaking his head.
"Lawk! no; her would soon tell the old man," answered Turnbull. "Be
the door fast behind her, Hosea?"
"Yes, sure."
"But put you the key well into the hole," continued Charley, "that
there be no sound to go through."
"Be her a wag-tongued wench?" asked a man who had not yet spoken, and
who, having come from a distance, was a stranger to some of those
present.
"No, no," replied Hosea, "but her father do keep the toll-gate down
below Pig Lane."
"Ah, well, to be sure."
The company again sat silent while the kettle was put on to boil and
the fire stirred up; a shower of sparks flew out as Hosea punched and
turned the logs with a plebeian-looking poker.
"Master Rhys--beg pardon, Mr. Walters, sir--no offence. Us have knowed
ye since ye was no more nor a little lump of a boy," began Charley,
who regarded himself as spokesman, with the every-day result that he
was quietly accepted as such. "If you be to come along of us at the
time we know of, us have thought, and indeed we all do say"--here he
looked round upon the men for corroboration--"that Rebecca bein' a
Bible person and a leading woman of power and glory in this job, we
will be proud if you be she."
The orator stopped and replaced his pipe in his mouth as a kind of
full-stop to the sentence.
Rhys Walters had never before considered himself in the light of a
"Bible person," and he smiled slightly. "Is that your wish?" he
inquired, scanning the faces in the firelight.
"Yes, surely," said Johnny Watkins, his squeaky voice audible above
the murmur of assent. "Stevens and I were sayin'"--here he pointed to
a man, who, finding himself brought under popular notice, wriggled in
his chair with mingled anguish and enjoyment--"just before you come
in, sir, what a beautiful female you would be."
Rhys, who had about as much resemblance to a woman as a pointer has to
a lap-dog, laughed, and the others, at this, laughed too, while Johnny
Watkins began to perceive in himself a wit of the highest order.
"It's very well I'm a clean-shaved man," said Walters, stroking his
lean jaw. "It wouldn't have done for your style of looks, Hosea."
The company, being one to which a personality never failed to appeal,
again roared with laughter, and Watkins saw with dismay that a greater
than he had arisen; he made one mighty effort.
"Yes," he remarked, at the pitch of his penetrating voice, "yes. An a'
might have set fire to the toll-gate with a's whiskers!"
Hosea turned upon him an awful glare, for his red hair had long been a
weapon in the hands of his foes. He had no sprightliness of retort,
but he was determined that Johnny's pleasantries should not continue
for want of a solid, knock-down blow.
"If I had a beard like a billy-goat waggin' about under an ass's
face," he said solemnly, "I'd keep it out o' the sight o' folks, for
fear it might be made a mock of--that I would."
Johnny Watkins gave a gasp which made his beard wag more vehemently
than ever, and retired abashed into silence.
Rhys had not come through the fog at that hour of the evening to
listen to profitless disputes. The matter in hand, which was a
projected attack upon a toll-gate not far from Llangarth, interested
him more now that he had become the prominent person in it, for he had
arrived at the inn uncertain whether or no he would lend active
support to the affair, it being more of a piece of out-of-the-way
amusement to him than anything affecting his opinions.
At this time a wave of wrath which had a considerable foundation of
justice was surging over South Wales. By a general Highway Act, a new
principle of road-government had been brought in, under which the
trustees of turnpike roads might raise money through tolls, sufficient
to pay the interest of the debts and keep the highways in repair. For
this reason the gates were withdrawn from the operation of the Highway
Laws, the tolls increased in amount, and every means used by those in
authority to uphold the revenues of their trusts. The gates had, in
some cases, been taken by professional toll-renters, men who came from
a distance, and who were consequently regarded with suspicion by the
intensely conservative population of the rural districts. These
people, having higher rents to make up, had refused to give credit to
farmers, or to allow them to compound for tolls on easy terms as had
been formerly their custom.
The effect of all this had been to rouse the public to a state of
fury, which had resulted, in many places, in serious riots. In
carrying out the provisions of their respective Acts, the trustees
were under little or no control; they erected fresh gates, interpreted
the laws as they thought fit, and there was no appeal from their
decisions. Added to these difficulties, a succession of wet harvests,
and the fall in price of live stock had reduced the farmers' capital,
and they and their dependents resented, as well they might, the new
devices for raising money out of their emptying pockets.
The first riot had broken out at Carmarthen, and was the signal for a
series of like disturbances all over the country. Although it had
taken place in May, and now, as Rhys Walters and his companions sat by
the Dipping-Pool fire, the year had almost reached its end, the reign
of terror created was still going on, though it had not, so far, begun
in Breconshire. The Carmarthen rioters had banded themselves together
about three hundred strong, under a person whom the law never
succeeded in identifying, and who, assuming the name of "Rebecca,"
appeared dressed as a woman and mounted upon a black horse. "Rebecca
and her children," as they were called by the terrified neighbourhood,
marched upon one of the gates in the town armed with every conceivable
kind of weapon, pitchforks, pistols, hay-knives--to say nothing of the
crowbars and the mallets which they carried with them and with which
they intended to destroy the bar. "Rebecca" had been chosen as a name
for their captain in reference to an Old Testament text, which tells
how Rebecca, bride of Isaac, on leaving her father's house, was
blessed by Laban in these words: "Let thy seed possess the gate of
those that hate them."
About two o'clock in the morning the strange tribe, some mounted and
some on foot, had appeared near the toll and placed sentinels in the
surrounding streets; and, before the astonished inhabitants, roused
from their beds by the noise and the loud orders of Rebecca, could
realize what was happening, the work of destruction was going bravely
forward, the rioters using their implements like demons, not only upon
the toll-bar, but upon all who tried to hinder them.
The toll-keeper came to his door remonstrating with the mob, but his
appearance provoked a shower of stones, and he fled back into shelter
pursued by shouts and jeers. His wife, a brave woman and a much better
man than her husband, then came out and stood quietly in the middle of
the road, and, in the lull of surprise which her action provoked,
entreated the leader to spare the house, as her child lay dangerously
ill within. One or two of the more ruffianly flung stones at the
woman, but Rebecca turned upon them, dealing one of them a blow which
sent him staggering, and announcing her intention of going to find out
the truth.
Then, in the grey early light, the extraordinary figure, gigantic in
its female dress, dismounted and stalked after the distracted mother
into the toll-house. When it emerged, the order was given to retreat,
and the cavalcade dashed through the wrecked gate and disappeared in
various directions into the country, just as the local police,
according to time-honoured custom, were arriving half-an-hour too
late. One or two dismounted stragglers were caught and punished, but
the ringleader and most of the offenders escaped, though every effort
was made to trace them; but it was whispered with bated breath that
Rebecca rode abroad in distinguished company, and that many of the
younger farmers, and even the gentry, were not above suspicion.
After this matters grew worse and worse. The success at Carmarthen
encouraged the lawlessness that broke out on every side, and in some
districts there was hardly a toll-bar remaining intact. Seeing this,
the magistrates took decided action, the military were called out and
special police enrolled, with the result that when the opposing forces
met, each encounter was more serious and bloody than the last.
The panic spread on all sides. People told each other lying tales of
cruelties practised by the devastating hordes, with details which made
the hair of the respectable stand upright, while children who had read
of Rebecca in their Bible lessons and now gathered from their elders
that she was actually going about, fancied that Old Testament days had
come back. They were prepared at any moment to meet any sort of Sunday
character, from Joseph in his coat of many colours to Satan himself,
horned, tailed, black, and pitchforked, and without a stitch of
clothes upon his unhallowed person.
"I think I shall have to come with you, neighbours," said Rhys, "and
we had better be stirring and settle our doings. We should be ready
for the first week of the year, for we don't want the moon rising on
us too early. She ought to be up about eleven; that would do well
enough. We'd be done and home by then."
"And how about horses?" inquired Hosea. "Them knowin' old badgers in
Llangarth will soon see who's movin'. An' ye can't dress up a beast as
ye can a man."
"Trew enough," observed Charley Turnbull solemnly. He was beginning to
wonder how he could get hold of a horse of some one else's.
"As to that, I shall ride a young mare I haven't had above a week.
She's never been seen in the valley, and a lick of white paint down
the faces of some o' your nags, and a white stocking here and there
makes a wonderful difference. Those who have white-footed ones can use
the blacking brush. And you must risk something," added Rhys, looking
hard at Turnbull, and guessing his thoughts exactly.
"Woman's clothing be a fine protection," remarked Stevens; and
Turnbull wished he had not been so reckless in giving away the part of
Rebecca.
"Be you to ride all o' one side like the wenches do?" inquired the man
who came from a distance, "or will ye put your leg across the saddle
like a Christian?"
"Oh, I'll ride astride," said Rhys, "or I shan't be able to lay about
me so well if need be."
"Petticoats an' all?"
"I suppose so."
Here a roar of laughter went up at the thought of his appearance,
which Mary could hear plainly in the room overhead.
Had poor old Eli been in his son's place, the whimsicalities of his
own costume would have given him hours of study and enjoyment. But it
was not so with Rhys; humour was not predominant in him. He did not
live sufficiently outside himself for that.
"I must look round for some sort of clothes," he said, rather stiffly.
"It would be well for everybody to have something to hide their faces.
I'll get Nannie Davis up at the farm to lend me an old sun-bonnet."
"An' I'll give ye a brown bit of a gown my sister Susan left here when
her was over for Crishowell feast September last," volunteered Hosea.
"It's been hangin' behind the door ever since."
"An' I'll find ye a cloak more fit for a skeercrow than for any other
person," said a man called Jones. "Will ye have it?"
"Oh, yes, it'll do," replied Rhys.
"G'arge! an' you'll be a right hussy! Fit to skeer the old limb
without any o' we."
Here there was another laugh.
"When ye spoke o' skeercrows," observed Johnny Watkins, who had been
silent much longer than he liked, "it minds me o' a crewel turn one o'
they figgers served my poor mother. Father could never abide the sight
o' one since."
Rhys looked encouragingly at Johnny. He was nothing loth to change the
subject. "What was that?" he asked.
"It were when old Hitchcock were parson down at Crishowell. He and his
lady had a great notion o' each other, an' when each fifth of August
come round--bein' their marriage-day--any one as did go to the
Vicarage with a 'good luck to ye, sir and madam,' or 'many happy
returns o' the day,' got a bottle o' beer from Madam Hitchcock to take
home an' drink their good health in. My mother, though she were a bit
hard o' seein', did use to go, an' never missed a weddin'-day from the
time her come to the parish to the day her was taken up on high. One
year, as her went, her peered over the garden wall an' dropped a bob
to the parson as he was in the midst o' the onion-bed standing quiet
an' lookin' at the fruit. At the house, the missis were at the window
an' her bobbed again. 'Wish you luck o' this day, ma'am,' says she.
'Thank you, Betty,' says madam, smilin' sweet. 'And good luck to the
Reverend Hitchcock that's standin' among the onions outside. Never did
I see the reverend parson look so well an' handsome,' says mother,
smilin' an' laughin' more than was needful, her bein' a bit bashful.
The lady give a look at her so as poor mother were fairly dazed, an'
down come the window wi' a bang an' madam was gone. Mother waited
there three-quarters of an hour full, until a lad were sent out to
tell her to go home an' no ale. One day as her an' father was passin',
her said to father, says mother, 'Hitchcock be a wonderful man for
flowers. Never a day do I go by but he's there squintin' at them.'
"'Lawk, you poor foondy[1] woman,' says father, 'do parson have straw
round a's legs? 'Tis the skeercrow.' An' when he found how the dummy
had cheated him out o' his beer, never could he look one i' the face
again. 'Twas crewel, that it was."
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[1] Foolish.