ANOTHER HELPER.
On that same morning when so many things occurred, young Lord Stanton
was seated in the library at Stanton, with a great deal of business to
do. He had letters to write, he had the accounts of his agent to look
over, and a hundred other very pressing matters which demanded his close
attention. Perhaps it was only natural in these circumstances that Geoff
should be unusually idle, and not at all disposed to tackle to his work.
Generally he was so much interested in what was real work that he did it
heartily, glad of the honest compulsion; but on this morning he was
unsettled, and not in his usual mood of industry. He watched the leaves
dropping from the trees outside, he listened idly to the sounds within;
he scribbled on the margin of his accounts, now a bit of Latin verse
(for Mr. Tritton was an elegant scholar), now a grotesque face, anything
but the steady calculations he ought to have made. Now and then a sudden
recollection of something he had read would cross his mind, when he
would get up in the middle of a letter to seek the book in which he
thought it was and verify his recollection on the spot, a thing he would
not have taken the trouble to do had that floating recollection had any
connection with the work in which he professed to be engaged. In short,
he was entirely idle, distracted, and _desœuvré_. Mr. Tritton was
reading to Lady Stanton in her morning room. It was early; the household
were all busy and occupied,--all except the young master of it, who
could not settle to his work.
He was sitting thus when his easily distracted attention was caught by a
movement outside, not like anything that could be made by bird or dog,
the only two living creatures likely to be there so close to his window.
It was the same window through which he had gone out the evening he made
his night expedition to the hills. The sound caught his attention, as
anything would have done that gave him an excuse for raising his head
from the letters he was now trying to write, having given up the
accounts in despair. When he saw a shadow skirt the grass, Geoff watched
with eager interest for what would follow--then there was a pause, and
he had bent over the letter again, thinking it a mere trick of fancy,
when a sound close to him made him start and look up. Some one was
standing with his back to the morning light--standing across the
window-sill with one foot within the room. Geoff started to his feet
with momentary alarm. “Who are you? Ah! is it Bampfylde?” he said.
“Just me, my young lord. May I come in and speak a word?”
“Certainly--come in. But why not go to the front door and come in like
any one else? You do not suppose I should have shut my doors on _you_?”
“Maybe, no; but I’m not a visitor for the like of you. I’m little credit
about a grand house. I’ve not come here for nothing now, but to ask you
a service.”
“What is it, Bampfylde? If I can do anything for you I will.”
“It’s not exactly for me, but you can do it if you will, my young lord.
It’s something I’m hindered from doing. It’s for the young ones at the
Castle, that you know of. Both the bairns are in trouble, so far as I
can judge. I gave the little boy a carrier to let off if he wanted help.
Me, and still more the old woman, we misdoubted that brother. And nigh a
week ago the carrier came home, but I was away on--on a hard job, that
I’m on still, and she did not understand. And when I saw her and told
her yesterday what the sign was, what does the old woman do but tell the
little lady--the little miss--and so far as I can hear _she’s_ away, the
creature herself, a flower of a thing, no bigger than my arm, the very
image of our Lily: her--that atom--she’s away to deliver her brother, my
young lord,” said the vagrant, leaning against the window. “I’m most
worn out by the same sort o’ work. There’s far too much of that been
done among us one way and another, and _she’s_ away now on the same
errand--to save her brother. It’s laughable if you think on’t,” he said,
with a curious gurgle in his throat of forlorn ridicule.
Geoff, who had leaned forward at the name of the children, saw that
Bampfylde was very pale and worn, his clothes in less order than usual,
and an air of utter weariness and harassment about him. He looked like a
man who had not slept or undressed for days.
“Has anything new happened?” Geoff asked hurriedly. “Of course I will do
whatever I can for the children--but tell me first--has anything
happened with you?”
“Ay, plenty,” said the rough fellow with a great sigh, which was not
sentiment but fatigue. “If that will not vex you, my young lord, saving
your presence, I’ll sit down and rest my bones while I talk to you, for
I’m near dead with tiredness. _He’s_ given us the slip--I cannot tell
you how. Many a fear we’ve had, but this time it’s come true. Tuesday
was a week he got away, the day after I’d been to see about the little
lad. We thought he was but hanging about the fells in corners that none
but him and me know, as he once did before, and I got him back. But it’s
worse than that. Lord! there’s many an honest man lost on the fells in
the mists, that has a wife and bairns looking to him. Would it not be
more natural to take the likes of him, and let the father of a family go
free? I cannot touch him, but there’s no law to bind the Almighty. But
all that’s little to the purpose. He’s loose ranging about the country
and me on his heels. I’ve all but had him three or four times, but he’s
aye given me the slip.”
“But this is terrible; it is a danger for the whole country,” said
Geoff. “The children!” The young man shuddered, he did not realize that
the children were at a distance. He thought of nothing more than perhaps
an expedition among the fells for Lilias--and what if she should fall
into the madman’s hands? “You should have help--you should rouse the
country,” he said.
“I’ll no do that. Please God I’ll get him yet, and this will be the
end,” said Bampfylde solemnly. “She cannot make up her mind to it even
now. She’s infatuate with him. I thought it would have ended when you
put your hand into the web, my young lord.”
“It is my fault,” said Geoff. “I should have done something more; but
then Mr. Musgrave fell ill, and I have been waiting. If he dies,
everything must be gone into. I was but waiting.”
“I am not blaming you. She cannot bide to hear a word, and so she’s been
all this long time. Now and then her heart will speak for the
others--them that suffer and have suffered--but it aye goes back to him.
And I don’t blame her neither,” said Bampfylde. “Its aye her son to her,
that was a gentleman and her pride.” He had placed himself not on the
comfortable chair which Geoff had pushed forward for him, but on the
hard seat formed by the library steps, where he sat with his elbows on
his knees, and his head supported in his hands, thus reposing himself
upon himself. “It’s good to rest,” he said, with something of the
garrulousness of weakness, glad in his exhaustion to stretch himself
out, as it were, body and soul, and ease his mind after long silence. He
almost forgot even his mission in the charm of this momentary repose.
“Poor woman!” he added, pathetically; “I’ve never blamed her. This was
her one pride, and how it has ended--if it were but ended! No,” he went
on after a pause, “please God there will be no harm. He’s no
murdering-mad, like some poor criminals that have done less harm than
him. It’s the solitary places he flees to, not the haunts o’ men; we’re
brothers so far as that’s counting. And I drop a word of warning as I
go. I tell the folks that I hear there’s a poor creature ranging the
country that is bereft of his senses, and a man after him. I’m the man,”
said Bampfylde, with a low laugh, “but I tell nobody that; and oh the
dance he’s led me!” Then rousing himself with an effort, “But I’m losing
time, and you’re losing time, my young lord. If you would be a help to
them you should be away. Get out your horse or your trap to take you to
the train.”
“Where has she gone--by the train?”
“Ay--and a long road. She’s away there last night, the atom, all by
herself. That’s our blood,” said Bampfylde, with again the low laugh,
which was near tears. “But I need not say our blood neither, for her
father has suffered the most of all, poor gentleman--the most of all!
Look here, my young lord,” he said, suddenly rising up, “if I sit there
longer I’ll go to sleep, and forget everything; and we’ve no time for
sleep, neither you nor me. Here’s the place. There’s a train at
half-past eleven that gets there before dark. You cannot get back
to-night; you’ll have to leave word that you cannot get back to-night.
And go now; go, for the love of God!”
Geoff did not hesitate; he rang the bell hastily, and ordered his
dog-cart to be ready at once, and wrote two or three lines of
explanation to his mother. And he ordered the servant, who stared at his
strange companion, to bring some food and wine. But Bampfylde shook his
head. “Not so,” he said; “not so. Bit nor sup I could not take here. We
that once made this house desolate, it’s not for us to eat in it or
drink in it. You’re o’er good, o’er good, my young lord; but I’ll not
forget the offer,” he added, the water rushing to his eyes. He stood in
front of the light stretching his long limbs in the languor of
exhaustion, a smile upon his face.
“You have overdone yourself, Bampfylde. You are not fit for any more
exertion. What more can you do than you have done? I’ll send out all the
men about the house, and----”
“Nay, but I’ll go to the last--as long as I can crawl. Mind you the
young ones,” he said; “and for all you’re doing, and for your good
heart, God bless you, my young lord!”
It seemed to Geoff like a dream when he found himself standing alone in
the silent room among his books, with neither sight nor sound of any
one near. Bampfylde disappeared as he had come, in a moment, vanishing
among the shrubberies; and the young man found himself charged with a
commission he did not understand, with a piece of dirty paper in his
hand, upon which an address was rudely scrawled. What was he to do at
this school, a day’s journey off, about which he knew nothing? He would
have laughed at the wild errand had he not been too deeply impressed by
his visitor’s appearance and manner to be amused by anything thus
suggested. But wild as it was, Geoff was resolved to carry it out. Even
the vaguest intimation of danger to Lilias would have sufficed to rouse
him, but he had scarcely taken that thought into his mind. He could
think of nothing but Bampfylde, and this with a pang of sympathy and
interest which he could scarcely explain to himself. As he drove along
towards the Stanton station, the first from Pennington, his mind was
entirely occupied with this rough fellow. Something tragic about him, in
his exhaustion, in the _effusion_ of his weakness, had gone to Geoff’s
heart. He looked eagerly for traces of him--behind every bush, in every
cross-road. And to increase his anxiety, the servant who accompanied him
began to entertain him with accounts of a madman who had escaped from an
asylum, and who kept the country in alarm. “Has he been seen anywhere?
has he harmed any one?” Geoff asked, eagerly. But there were no details
to be had; nothing but the general statement. Geoff gave the man orders
to warn the gamekeepers and out-door servants, and to have him secured
if possible. It was scarcely loyal perhaps to poor Bampfylde, who had
trusted him. Thus he had no thought but Bampfylde in his mind when he
found himself in the train, rushing along on the errand he did not
understand. It was a quick train, the one express of the day; and even
at the junction there were only a few minutes to wait: very unlike the
vigil that poor little Lilias had held there in the middle of night
under the dreary flickering of the lamp. Geoff knew nothing of this; but
by dint of thinking he had evolved something like a just idea of the
errand on which he was going. Lilias had been warned that her brother
was not happy, and had gone like a little Quixote to relieve him. Geoff
could even form an idea to himself of the pre-occupation of the house
with the Squire’s illness, which would close all ears to Lilias’ appeal
about Nello’s fancied unhappiness. Little nuisance! Geoff himself felt
disposed to say--thinking any unhappiness that could happen to Nello of
much less importance than the risk of Lilias. But he had not, of course,
the least idea of Nello’s flight. He arrived at the station about five
o’clock in the afternoon, adding another bewilderment to the solitary
official there, who had been telegraphed to from Penninghame, and
already that day had been favoured by two interviews with Mr. Swan. “A
young lady? I wish all young ladies were---- Here’s a message about her;
and the schoolmaster, he’s been at me, till I am sick of my life. What
young lady could there be here? Do you think I’m a-hiding of her?” he
cried, with that instinctive suspicion of being held responsible which
is so strong in his class. Geoff however, elicited by degrees all that
there was to find out, and discovered at the same time that the matter
was much more serious than he supposed. The little boy had run away from
school; the little girl, evidently coming to meet him, had disappeared
with him. It was supposed that they must have made for the railway, as
the woman in the cottage close by had confessed to having given them
breakfast; but they had disappeared from her ken, so that she
half-thought they had been ghost-children, with no reality in them; and
though the country had been scoured everywhere, neither they, nor any
trace of them, were to be found.
This was the altogether unsatisfactory ground upon which Geoff had to
work,--and at five o’clock on an October afternoon there is but little
time for detailed investigation of a country. His eye turned, as that of
Lilias had done, to the wood. It was the place in which she would
naturally take refuge. Had the wood been examined? he asked. Yes, every
corner of it. Geoff was at his wits’ end, and did not know what to do;
he went down the road where Lilias had gone in the morning and talked to
the woman, who told him a moving story of the tired pair, and declared
that she would not have let them go, seeing very well that they were a
little lady and gentleman, but that they had stolen away when her back
was turned. Geoff stood at the cottage door gazing round him, when he
saw something that no one else had noticed, a small matter enough.
Caught upon the hedge, which reached close to the cottage, there was a
shred of blue--the merest rag, a few threads, nothing more--such an
almost invisible indication as a savage might leave to enable his
companions to track him--a thing that could be seen only by instructed
eyes. Geoff’s eyes were inexperienced, but they were keen: and he knew
the colour of Lilias’ dress, which the other searchers were not aware
of. He disentangled the threads carefully from the twig. One long hair,
and that too was Lilias’ colour, had caught on the same thorn. This
seemed to him a trace unmistakeable, notwithstanding that the woman of
the cottage immediately claimed it. “Dear, I did not know that I had
torn my best blue dress,” she said, with genuine alarm. Geoff, however,
left her abruptly, and followed out his clue. He hastened by the
footpath behind the hedge towards the wood. It was the natural place for
Lilias to be. By this time the young man had forgotten everything except
the girl, who was at once a little child appealing to all his tenderest
sympathies, and a little visionary princess to whom he had vowed
himself. She was both in the combination of the moment--a tired child
whom he could almost carry away in his arms, who would not be afraid of
him, or shrink from these brotherly arms; but, at the same time, the
little mother-woman, the defender and protector of one more helpless
than herself. Geoff’s heart swelled with a kind of heavenly enthusiasm
and love. Never could there have been a purer passion. He hurried
through the wood and through the wood, searching in all its glades and
dells, peering into the very hollows of the old trees. There was
nothing: Was there nothing? Not a movement, not a sound, except the
birds chirping, the rush of a rabbit or squirrel, the flutter of the
leaves in the evening air. For it was evening by this time, that could
not be denied; the last, long, slant rays of the sun were sloping along
the trunks and roots of the trees, and the mossy greenness that covered
them. The day was over in which a man could work, and night--night that
would chill the children to the heart, and drive them wild with
fear--desolate, dark night, full of visionary terrors, and also real
dangers, was coming. Geoff had made up his mind certainly that they were
there. He did not think of a magician’s cave or a hermit’s cell, as
Lilias had done, but only whether there was some little hut anywhere,
where they could have found refuge,--a hollow, unknown to him, where
they might have hid themselves, not knowing a friend was near. The sun
had lit up an illumination in the west, and shone through the red and
yellow leaves with reflections of colour softer and more varying, but
still more brilliant, than their own. The world seemed all ablaze
between the two, with crimson and gold--autumn sun above, autumn foliage
below. Then tone by tone and colour by colour died out from the skies,
and the soft yet cold grey of the evening took possession of all. The
paths of the wood seemed to grow ghostly in the gathering dusk, the
colour stole out of the trees, the very sky seemed to drop lower as the
night gathered in. Geoff walked about in a kind of despair. He called
them, but there came no answer; he seemed to himself to poke into every
corner, into the damp depths where the cold dew seemed to ooze out from
the ground weighing down every leaflet. He was sure they were there.
Must they spend the night in the dark, and be frozen and frightened to
death before the morning? Geoff’s heart was full of anxiety and pity. It
seemed to him that he must stay there to keep them company, whether he
could find them or not.
Then all at once he heard a sound like a low sob. It seemed to come from
the ground, close to where he was standing, but he could see nothing but
a little tangle of wild brambles, long branches with still a solitary
berry here and there, the leaves scanty, scarlet and brown with the
frost. They were all clustered about the trunk of a big tree, a little
thicket, prickly and impregnable, but close to the path. And was it the
breathing of the night air only, or some wild creature in the brushwood,
or human respiration, that came soft, almost indistinguishable in the
soft murmur of the wood? He stood still, scarcely venturing himself to
breathe, so intent was he to listen; and by and by he heard the sound
again. A child’s sob, the soft pathetic reverberation of a sob, such as
continues to come after the weeping is over. With trembling eagerness,
yet caution, Geoff put aside the long tangles of the bramble which fell
in a kind of arch. It was a hard piece of work, and had to be done with
caution not to disturb the poor little nestlings, if nestlings there
were. There Geoff disclosed to the waning light the prettiest pathetic
picture. It was not the same green hollow in which the children had
first taken refuge. They had been roused by the sound of passengers
through the wood, and the voices of the people who were searching for
themselves, and had woke up in fright. When these noises ceased they had
strayed deeper into the wood to another and safer shelter, Nello being
too frightened and miserable to go on as Lilias wished. At last they had
found this refuge under the bramble bushes where nobody surely could
ever find them, meaning to lie there all day and creep out at night to
continue their journey. Lilias had seated herself first, spreading out
her skirt to protect her brother from the damp. There, lying with his
head and shoulders supported on her lap, he had gone to sleep again,
while Lilias waked and pondered; very anxious, frightened too, and
dissatisfied with the loss of time, she sat erect, supporting Nello, and
gazed up at the dark figure in the twilight with alarmed eyes, which
seemed to grow larger and larger as they shone in a passion of terror
through the long tangles of the bush. Lilias had covered her brother
with her shawl--she drew it over him now, covering the white little face
on her arm, “What do you want with me? I am only resting. There is no
one here to do any harm,” she said, with the sob coming again in spite
of her. She thought it was the cruel schoolmaster, the more cruel uncle,
who had condemned Nello to so many sufferings. She held her arms over
him, protecting him--resolute not to let him be taken from her. “Oh, do
not meddle with me!” she went on, growing more and more desperate. “I
have some money I will give you, if you will only--only leave me alone.
There is nobody--but me.”
Oh that sob! if she could only swallow it down and talk to him, this
robber chief, this Robin Hood, as if she were not afraid! for sometimes
these men are kind and do not hurt the weak. Lilias gazed, nothing but
her eyes appearing, glowing through the gathering shade: then suddenly
threw her brother off her lap in a transport of wild delight, “Oh Nello,
Nello, Nello!” she cried, till the wood rang, “it is Mr. Geoff!”