THE longed-for holiday came with a fine Monday morning, and Bessy, in a
muslin frock that her mother had helped to make for the occasion, was
impatient, an hour too soon, because Johnny lingered in bed; enjoying the
luxury of "losing a quarter" without paying the penalty.
But Johnny was ready for breakfast before eight, and, seeing the
shop-door open, ran to take down the shutters, a thing his mother
commonly did herself, because of his absence at work. "I always put 'em
up, and for once I'll take 'em down," he said, prancing in with the
first. "Look out, mother, or I'll bowl you over!"
"O no, Johnny," she said, "leave 'em. I'll only have to--" and at that
she stopped.
"Only have to what?" Johnny asked, going for another. "Only have to
serve the customers, eh, 'cause the shop's open? Of course you will--it
ain't _your_ holiday, you know--it's ours! Look out again! Shoo!"
Bessy rattled at the old barometer still, though for half an hour it had
refused to move its hand a shade; and she asked Johnny for the fiftieth
time if he were perfectly sure that the proper train wasn't earlier than
they were supposing. And when at last Johnny admitted that it was time
to start, Nan May kissed them and bade them good-bye with so wistful an
earnestness that Johnny was moved to pleasantry. "All right, mother," he
said, "we're coming back some day you know!"
They were scarce half-way to the railway-station when Bessy said:
"Johnny, I don't think mother's been very well lately. There'll be
another train soon; shall we go back an'--an' just see if she's all
right, first?"
Johnny laughed. "That's a good idea!" he said. "An' then I s'pose we'd
better miss the next, an' go back to see how she's getting on then, an'
the one after that, eh? Mother's all right. She's been thinking a bit
about--you know, gran'dad an' all that; and because we're goin' to the
forest it reminds her of it. Come on--don't begin the day with dumps!"
* * * * *
There was interest for both of them in the railway journey. They changed
trains at Stepney, and after a station or two more came in distant sight
of a part of the road they had traversed, on Bank's cart, when they came
to London, two winters back. There was the great, low, desolate
wilderness, treeless and void of any green thing, seen now from nearer
the midst, with the road bounding it in the distance; and here was the
chemical manure-factory, close at hand this time, with its stink at
short-hitting range, so that every window in the train went up with a
bang, and everybody in the long third-class carriage coughed, or
grimaced, or spat, or swore, according to sex and habit.
Then, out beyond Stratford, through Leyton and Leytonstone, they saw that
the town had grown much in twenty months, and was still growing. Close,
regular streets of little houses, all of one pattern, stared in raw
brick, or rose, with a forlorn air of crumbling sponginess, amid sparse
sticks of scaffolding. Bessy wondered how the butterflies were faring in
the forest, and how much farther they had been driven since she left it.
Then the wide country began to spin past, and pleasant single houses, and
patches of wood. The hills about Chigwell stood bright and green across
the Roding valley, as the low ground ran away between, and the high
forest land came up at the other side of the line. Till the train stood
in Loughton Station.
Through the village Bessy, flushed and eager, stumped and swung at a pace
that kept Johnny walking his best. Staple Hill was the nearest corner of
the forest, and for Staple Hill they made direct. Once past the
street-end it rose before them, round and gay, deep and green in the wood
that clothed it. Boys were fishing in the pond at its foot, and the
stream ran merrily under the dusty road.
"Come, Johnny!" Bessy cried. "Straight over the hill!" Nor did she
check her pace till the wide boughs shaded them, and her crutch went
softly on the mossy earth among old leaves. Then she stood and laughed
aloud, and was near crying. "Smell it, Johnny!" she cried, "smell it!
Isn't it heavenly?"
They went up the slope, across tiny glades, and between thick clumps of
undergrowth gay with dog-roses, Bessy's eyes and ears alert for
everything, tree, bird, or flower; now spying out some noisy jay that
upbraided their intrusion, now standing to hark for a distant woodpecker.
Johnny enjoyed the walk too, but with a soberer delight; as became an
engineer taking a day's relaxation amid the scenes of childish play now
half forgotten.
Down the other side of the hill they went, and over the winding stream at
the bottom. Truly it seemed a tiny stream now, and Johnny wondered that
he should ever have been proud of jumping it. He found a bend where the
water rushed through a narrow channel by the side of a bed of
clean-washed gravel, and got Bess across, though she scrambled down and
up with little help, such was her enthusiasm.
Then the trees grew sparser, and over the deep-grown flat of Debden Slade
Bessy stopped again and again to recognise some well-remembered
wild-flower; and little brown butterflies skimmed over the rushes and
tall grass, the sun mounted higher, and everything was brisk and bright
and sweet-smelling. Brother and sister climbed the hill before them
slowly, often staying to look back over the great prospect of rolling
woodland, ever widening as they rose. Till at last they stood at the
point of the ridge, in the gap through the earthwork made by ancient
Britons.
This beyond all others was the spot that Bessy had loved best. This
ragged ring of crumbling rampart and ditch, grown thick with fantastic
hornbeams, pollarded out of all common shape; its inner space a crowded
wonder of tall bracken, with rare patches of heather; its outer angles
watching over the silent woods below, and dominating the hills that
ranked beyond; this was the place where best an old book from the shelf
would fill a sunny afternoon. For the camp was a romance in itself, a
romance of closer presence than anything printed on paper. Here, two
thousand years ago, the long-haired savages had stood, in real fact, with
spears and axes, brandishing defiance to foes on the hillside. Here they
had entrenched themselves against the Roman legions--they and their
chief, fierce Cassivellaunus: more, to her, than a name in an old
history-book. For had not she seen the wild prince a hundred times in
her day-dreams, stalking under the oaks--with the sheeted Druids? Till
the wood grew alive with phantoms, and she hid her face in her book.
And now she sat here again, in the green shade, and looked out over the
thousand tree-tops, merry with the sunlight. How long had she left it
all? What was that fancy of a ride to London, of ship-yards, and of a
chandler's-shop? But Johnny whistled to a robin on a twig, and she
turned and looked at him, to see that here was the engineer, indeed, and
the painter of the chandler's-shop. Still, which was the dream, that or
this?
Left alone, Bessy would have sat here all the day. But there were other
places not to be forgotten, as Johnny reminded her. Over the heather
they went, then, to Monk Wood, where the trees were greater and the
flowers were more abundant than anywhere else in the forest; and they did
not leave it till Johnny insisted on dinner. Now this dinner was a great
excitement; for at setting out Johnny had repelled every suggestion of
sandwiches in a bag, and now dauntlessly marched into an inn on the main
road and ordered whatever was ready, with two glasses of beer. Bessy,
overwhelmed by the audacity of the act, nevertheless preserved her
appetite, and even drank a little of the beer. And the adventure cost
Johnny four shillings.
"Mother's having her dinner alone," said Bessy in a flutter of timid
delight. "She doesn't guess we're having ours at the Red Deer!"
Hence it was not far, by the lanes, to the high churchyard, for the
flowers gathered in Monk Wood were for gran'dad's grave, and it was a
duty of the day to mark the condition of the little headstone. All was
well with it, and it surprised them to find the grass cut neatly, and a
little clump of pansies growing on the mound. Bessy suspected Bob
Smallpiece.
And so went a perfect day. Their tea they took in Bob Smallpiece's
lodge. The keeper admitted having "gone over" old Mr. May's grave with
the grass shears--just once or twice. He avoided making any definite
reply to Johnny's and Bessy's invitations to come to Harbour Lane again.
Perhaps he'd come again, he said, some day. Meanwhile, had they seen the
cottage? As they had not, they set out all three together, and looked at
it.
The new tenancy had made little change. Down the glen the white walls
first peeped from among the trunks, and then the red tiles, just as ever.
The woodman was at work mending the old fence--it was always being mended
somewhere. The turbulent little garden still tumbled and surged against
it, threatening to lay it flat at any moment. Very naturally, the
woodman and his wife, though perfectly civil, took less personal interest
in Johnny and Bessy than Johnny and Bessy took in them and the cottage,
so that it was not long ere a last look was taken at the old fence, and
Bob Smallpiece went off another way on his walk of duty.
Shadows grew long, and thickets dark. To revisit every remembered nook
had been impossible, but they had seen and lingered in all them that had
most delighted Bessy in old times--all but Wormleyton Pits. Johnny had
turned that way once, thoughtlessly; but "No," Bessy said--almost
whispered--with her hand on his arm, "not that way, Johnny!"
And now they turned their backs on the fast darkening forest and took a
steep lane for the village below. The sweet smells, that go up at the
first blink of the evening star, met them on the breeze; and when they
turned for their last look toward the woods, the trees on the hill-top,
tall sentinels of the host beyond, barred the red west and nodded them
and the sun goodbye.
Out of the stony lane, Loughton was lighted, and at the end of a dusty
road was a small constellation of gas-lamps and railway signals. Now it
was plain that both were a little tired--Bessy perhaps more than a
little. But the train gave a welcome rest, and there were no passengers
to see, even if she slept, for they were alone in their compartment.
They had passed two stations, when Johnny, who had been standing to look
out at the opposite window, turned and saw that his sister was dozing,
with her head bent forward and her face hidden by the crutch-handle. It
was so wholly her figure as she sat in the cab at the old man's funeral,
that Johnny started, and sat where he stood, though he had never once
called the thing to mind since that day. And he took the crutch gently
away, to look at her face. But it was calm and untroubled; and he put
his hand at the farther side of it and pressed it to his shoulder; for
plainly she was tired out, and there were no cushions in the carriage.
* * * * *
It was nearing ten o'clock when at last they turned into Harbour Lane.
From a back street came the old watchman's cry, "Pa-a-ast nine o'clock!"
as he went his round in search of orders to wake early risers; and lights
in bedroom windows told of early risers already seeking sleep. Nobody
was in the shop, but as they came in, Johnny thought he saw his mother's
face vanish from beside the muslin curtain that obscured the glass in the
back-parlour door.
They passed through the shop, and into the back parlour. Their mother
and Mr. Butson sat facing them, side by side. Mr. Butson had a new suit
of clothes, and their mother wore her best, and smiles and tears were in
her face. Something had happened. What was it? Bessy and Johnny,
scarce within the door, stood and stared.
"Johnny--Bessy--" Nan faltered, looking from one to the other. "Have
you--enjoyed your holiday? . . . Won't you--kiss me, Johnny?"
She rose and made a step toward them. But something struck them still,
and they looked, wondering, from Nan to Butson, and back to their mother
again. . . . What was it?
Johnny moved first, and kissed his mother, absently, gazing at Mr. Butson
the while. Mr. Butson, who was smoking, said nothing, but lay back in
his chair and considered the ash of his cigar.
Nan's anxiety was plain to see. She put a hand on Johnny's shoulder and
an arm on Bessy's neck. "I,--we--you won't be vexed because I didn't
tell you, will you?" she said, pale, but trying to smile, "I--we--Mr.
Butson . . . Johnny, Bessy--don't look so!" Tears ran down her cheeks,
and she bent her head on Johnny's other shoulder. "We've been married
to-day!"