They spent that night at Plymouth, and she made Nicky scrap his clothes
and get a new fit out; and the next day she took him home. No doubt her
yellow cat was terrible pleased to see the pair of 'em; but the
home-coming had its funny side too, for none marked them arrive--'twas
after dark when they did so--and they'd only just finished their meal,
when come heavy footsteps up the path, and Jenny well knew the sound of
'em.
"'Tis Bill Westaway!" she said. "He don't know as I've been away and no
doubt he's found what he's pretending to search for. Slip in here, afore I
let him come in, then you'll hear all about yourself."
There was a cupboard one side of the kitchen fireplace, and being quite
big enough to take in Spider, he crept there, and his wife put home the
door after him, but left a little space so as he could hear. And then she
went to the cottage door and let in the visitor. 'Twas William sure
enough, and his face was long and melancholy.
"A cruel time I've had--more in the river than out of it," he said. "I'm
bruised and battered and be bad in my breathing parts also along of
exposure and the wet. I dare say I've shortened my life a good bit; but
all that was nothing when I thought of you, Jenny. And now I'm terrible
afraid you must face the worst. I've made a beginning, I'm sorry to say."
He drew a parcel from under his arm and laid out afore her the wreck of a
water-sodden billycock hat, a rag of a dark-blue flannel shirt and one
ginger-coloured sock in a pretty ruinous state.
"What d'you make of these here mournful relics?" he asked. "Without doubt
they once belonged to your Spider, and where I found'em I'm afraid his
poor little bones ain't far off."
"They be even nearer than you think, William Westaway," she said. "In
fact, I've found'em myself."
"Found'em!" he gasped out, glazing with his shifty eyes at her and a
miz-maze of wonder on his face.
"Found'em--not in the Dart neither; but at Meldon Quarry. Nicky is alive
and well, and you know it, and you always knew it. And your day of
reckoning be near!"
She paused. You might have thought she'd expect for her husband to leap
out of the cupboard, but he didn't; he bided close where he was, like a
hare in its form; and she knew he would.
Of course Bill Westaway felt a good bit disappointed. He cussed Spider up
hill and down dale and poured a torrent of rude words upon him.
"That know-nought, black swine come back! And you put him afore the likes
of me I You don't deserve a decent man," he finished up. "And the patience
and trouble I've took, thinking you was worth it!"
"Go!" she said. "You're a wicked, bare-faced scamp, and God, He'll reward
you. You did ought to be driven out of Little Silver by the dogs, and no
right-thinking person ever let you over their drexels[1] no more."
[1] Drexels = Thresholds
"I'm punished enough," he told her. "Good-bye, my silly dear! A thousand
pities you've took that little worm back. You'd have grown very fond of me
in time. I'm worth a wagon-load of such rubbish as him."
He lit his pipe, cussed a bit more, hoping Spider would front him, and
then went away, banging the gate off its hinges very near; and after he
was well clear of the premises Nicky bounced out of his cupboard full of
brimstone and thunder.
"Lock the door," he said, "or I'll be after him and strangle him with
these hands!"
"I most feared you'd have blazed out and faced the wretch," said Jenny--to
please the little man.
"I managed to hold in. I drew out my knife however; but I put it back
again. I hadn't got the heart to spoil the night of my home-coming. His
turn ain't far off. His thread's spun. Nothing short of his death be any
good to me--not now."
"Us'll forget the scoundrel till to-morrow, then," said Mrs. White.
It was six months later and summer on the wane, when I met a fisherman on
the river--a gent I knew--and made him laugh a good bit with the tale of
they people.
"And what did Spider do after all, Mr. Bates?" inquired the fisher, when I
came to the end of the story, and I answered him in a parable like.
"When the weasel sucked the robin's eggs, sir, the robin and his wife was
properly mad about it and swore as they'd be fearfully revenged upon him."
"And what did they do?" axed the gentleman.
"What could they do?" I axed him back.
"Nothing."
"That's exactly what they did do; and that's exactly what Nicky White
done--nothing. Once--in the street a bit after he'd come home--Will
Westaway turned round and saw Spider making hideous faces at him behind
his back. So he walked across the road and smacked the little man's
earhole and pulled his beard. Nought happened, however."
"And what became of William Westaway?"
"Well, most of us was rather sorry for him. He'd took a lot of trouble to
queer Spider's pitch and put up a mighty clever fight for Jenny, you see.
But the woman liked her little black beetle best. In fact she adores him
to this day. Billy married a very fine girl from Princetown. But I reckon
he never felt so properly in love with her as what he did with Mrs.
White."