“Dear, to be sure, that’s a queer notion! How can ye be lwonesome wi’ so
many folks about?”
Lizzie rocked herself backwards and forwards in her chair, half moaning
to herself.
“I can’t find nothin’ what I’m used to. I can’t seem to hear nothin’—wi’
so much talkin’ an’ that there terr’ble noise outside, an’ I can’t find—”
She broke off suddenly, sitting bolt upright.
“Where be the settle?” she cried, in a loud, anxious tone. “Where be the
wold settle? Ye’ve never been an’ left that behind?”
Phoebe was taken aback for a moment: as a matter of fact, she had
purposely left it behind, not only because it seemed to her worthless in
itself, but because she thought the sight of it would conjure up those
crazy notions which she was so anxious to dispel. It was all very well
that her mother should dwell on the memory of Phoebe’s own departed
father; she might look at his chair as much as she liked, and accomplish
a bit of darning for the family, under the impression it was for him; but
it was quite a different matter to go on in such a foolish way about a
man who had been in his grave for more than fifty years, and to whom she
had been wed but for a few months. The neighbours would think Mrs
Sweetapple daft indeed if she were to regale them with such tales as she
had recently related to her daughter.
“Where be the settle?” repeated Lizzie, with a shrill cry.
“There, don’t ye take on,” said Phoebe soothingly; “there wasn’t room
for’t in the cart, d’ye see, an’ us’ll have to send to fetch it. ’Tis so
heavy—the poor harse couldn’t ha’ dragged it so far wi’ so many other
things.”
“It must be here by end of the week,” said Mrs Sweetapple. “It must be
here by Sunday. It’ll be Bartlett’s week, come Sunday.”
“We’ll send for it—we’ll send for it,” exclaimed Mrs Caines. “There now,
mother,” returning to an argument which she had before found efficacious,
“don’t ye go for to forget as this be father’s turn. Poor father—ye
didn’t ought for to forget he.”
“I don’t forget en, my dear, I don’t forget en,” said Lizzie, dropping
her head upon her breast. “I do feel a bit confused—I bain’t used to
childern, ye see, and—I do feel terr’ble lwonesome; I did ought to be
feedin’ chicken now,” she added, half rising, and then dropping back
again. “What’s become o’ the chicken, Phoebe?”
“Why, don’t ye know?” responded Phoebe, cheerfully. “Mr Foster—Keeper
Foster, ye know, he did take ’em all off your hands. He’ll see to the
little pheasants right enough, and he did pay money down for the chicken.
I’ve got it safe for ’ee. I did tell ’ee all about that.”
“So ye did, so ye did,” murmured Lizzie. “I was forgettin’—it do seem
strange to ha’ no chicken to see to. I d’ ’low father ’ull miss ’em so
well as me.”
“Eh?” said Mrs Caines, staring.
“I d’ ’low father’ll miss ’em,” repeated Lizzie. “He’ll be lookin’ to go
out wi’ me last thing to see how they be a-comin’ on.”
“My dear ’ooman,” exclaimed Phoebe, “you can’t go walkin’ out in the
street o’ nights here, fancy or no fancy. Ye mid be runned over an’
killed straight-off.”
“Runned over!” exclaimed Lizzie. She looked about her vaguely, and then
sank into silence.
Mrs Caines drew her John into the privacy of the back kitchen as soon as
he appeared, and, with many shakes of the head, explained to him the
state of affairs.
“Poor mother be queerer nor ever to-night. Us mustn’t lose sight of her
for a minute; there’s no knowin’ what she mid do. There, she’ve been
carryin’ on about takin’ father out to see the pens and about bein’ so
lwonesome—lwonesome here in the town, ye know. She says the noise an’
the voices an’ all do make her feel lwonesome.”
John Caines removed his pipe in order to grin at ease, and then put it
back again; he was a man of few words.
“So I was thinkin’,” continued Phoebe, “you’d best keep an eye to her
while I’m gettin’ childern to bed, an’ then so soon as I do come down
I’ll look after her. She’d best get early to bed herself, poor wold
body, she be fair wore out.”
Caines removed his pipe again: “But what must I do if she should take a
notion that I’m the wold gentleman—your father, I mean?” he enquired in
some alarm.
Phoebe caught at the idea. “That wouldn’t be a bad thing at all,” said
she. “I d’ ’low that ’ud keep her so quiet as anything. Jist you go an’
sit down in father’s chair an’ if she do say anything ye mid jist nod
back or say a word or two—my father was never a man of much talk. I d’
’low if anything ’ull pacify her that will, but mind you don’t let her
take up wi’ any notion o’ gettin’ out o’ door. Here, wait a minute, I’ll
come wi’ ye.”
She ran upstairs, presently returning with two or three socks, and
preceding John to the kitchen, held her mother in play while he seated
himself in old Sweetapple’s chair.
“Here, mother,” she cried, “here be some socks what want mendin’ awful
bad. See, I’ll light lamp an’ set it behind ye. They be father’s socks,
ye know—Sweetapple’s socks.”
Lizzie’s face lit up. “Ah, sure,” she replied, “Sweet-apple’s socks—this
’ere be Sweetapple’s week.”
She endeavoured to look past Phoebe towards the chair, but her daughter’s
portly figure blocked the way.
“Here be the needle, look-see, an’ here be the mendin’. The socks be
terr’ble broke at heel, bain’t they?”
Turning towards the light the old woman threaded the needle, and Phoebe
taking advantage of the opportunity thus created, stepped towards her
husband:—
“Don’t ye offer to talk to her,” she whispered, “without she speaks
first.”
He nodded in reply, and going towards the window she pulled down the
blind and jerked the curtains across. As she left the room she paused to
gaze at the two; John was leaning back in his chair, placidly smoking,
and Lizzie, who did not seem to perceive his presence, was intent on her
work.
Some minutes after her departure he bent forward and tapped his pipe upon
the hob, and his mother-in-law looked up, gazing towards him through the
semi-darkness with a pleasant smile.
“Ye’ve got your baccy pouch handy, Sweetapple, haven’t ye?” said she.
John nodded, and she dropped her eyes on her work again.
Presently a heavy waggon went lumbering past without, and Lizzie looked
up again.
“Wind blows hard,” she said. “D’ye think there’s a starm coming?”
“Shouldn’t wonder,” murmured John, indistinctly. Lizzie picked up her
sock once more, but presently paused.
“I’m not sure if I covered the pens,” she said. “Shall us go out an’
cover the pens, Sweetapple?”
John stared in alarm. What was he to do now? Phoebe had not given him
any instructions as to what he should say if her mother suggested going
out to see to the pens.
“They young pheasants,” went on Lizzie, talking rapidly to herself, “they
be terr’ble nesh. If a heavy starm of rain was to come on they mid all
be dead in the marnin’. Where be the lantern?”
She rose hurriedly, looking round her with a startled air. John rose
too, thoroughly frightened.
“Missis!” he shouted, “Phoebe! come down this minute! Here be the old
lady a-wantin’ to go out!”
Phoebe hurried down with all speed, finding her husband planted with his
back against the door for safety’s sake, while Lizzie, also standing, was
staring at him piteously.
“Sweetapple!” she gasped, “Richard—what be gone wi’ Richard? I can’t
think where I can be! What’s this strange place—and who’s this man?”
“Why ’tis John, mother. Don’t ye know John? You be here in our house.
You’ve a-come to bide along o’ we. Don’t ye mind—Squire settled it.”
“Squire?” echoed Lizzie. “Ees, I mind it now. I mind it.”
She came back to her chair without another word, and said no more until
her daughter presently took her up to bed.
“I don’t know as we’ve done so very well to toll mother here,” remarked
Phoebe, when she came down again. “She do seem to be frettin’ quite
sensible by times, an’ at others she’ll carry on wi’ nonsense same as ye
heard.”
“I don’t think ’tis such a very good notion, to go playin’ games wi’
her,” responded John. “I’ll not do it no more. I couldn’t think what
was comin’ next.”
Lizzie seemed comparatively tranquil on the morrow, however, though she
had slept but ill and was very low in spirits. She looked at the
children with the same bewildered air as on the previous day, and started
at the noises in the street, but she made no complaint, except once when
her daughter asked her to repeat some phrase which she had murmured to
herself.
“I only said there don’t seem to be no birds here,” said Mrs Sweetapple,
half apologetically. “It do feel lwonesome wi’out no birds.”
“Ye don’t look for birds in a town, do ye?” retorted Phoebe, sharply.
“Of course not,” agreed her mother. “I’m not used to towns.”
Towards evening she became restless again, and Mrs Caines despatched her
family to bed earlier than usual in order that she might keep guard
herself; her lord and master found it more convenient to keep out of the
way.
“Father’s chair” was duly set forth, and Mrs Sweetapple sat and watched
it, making an occasional remark; whenever these disjointed phrases were
of a dangerous tendency Phoebe took care to recall her mother to the
sense of her actual situation.
No catastrophe occurred that evening therefore, and as the days passed
Mrs Sweetapple seemed gradually to accustom herself to her surroundings;
towards the end of the week, indeed, she became as silent during the
evening hours as since her arrival at Branston she had proved herself
throughout the day.
When Sunday came, however, all was different. She went to church in the
morning, and behaved as well as even her daughter could wish; she seemed
pleased and interested, and as much excited as a child. She had not been
to church for many years, and all was new to her.
The unwonted exertion tired her, and she was even more quiet than usual
all that afternoon, dozing in her chair for the most part. Towards
evening, however, she woke up with a start.
“What’s gone wi’ the settle?” she cried. “Wherever be the settle?
Bartlett ’ull be here in a minute an’ he’ll not ha’ nowheres to sit.”
The children began to giggle, and even John could not repress a smile.
Before the perplexed Phoebe had time to formulate any soothing rejoinder,
Lizzie started from her chair.
“I’m fair dathered among ye,” she cried out. “Where be the settle, I
say? The settle what my father did make wi’ his own hands and what poor
Bartlett did always sit on. I’ll not be robbed on’t.”
“Robbed! Dear, to be sure, sich a notion! Who’d ever go for to steal
such a thing. We did leave it in the wood, don’t ye mind? ’Tisn’t worth
shiftin’—there, I’d ha’ thought ye’d ha’ forgot about it by now.”
“Nay, I’ve not forgot—an’ Bartlett, he’ve not forgot, I’ll go warrant.
He’ll be that vexed when he do come. There, Phoebe, I never thought
you’d go for to play I sich a trick. You did promise I sure as anything,
I should have it by the week-end, and here be Sunday, an’ Bartlett ’ull
be comin’, an’ he’ll not find it ready.”
“Well, ye shall have it to-morrow, we’ll send for it sartin sure
to-morrow. Ha’ done, childern (in a fierce aside to the youngsters),
I’ll not ha’ ye makin’ a mock o’ your grammer. Stop that, or I’ll gie ye
summat as ’ull make ye laugh wrong way round. There, mother, ye’d best
come upstairs and get to bed. ’Twill make to-morrow come all the sooner.
An’ I’ll see en fetch the settle by then.”
“But Bartlett ’ull be comin’,” murmured poor Lizzie, who was shaken with
the pitiful dry sobs of the old. “He’ll come an’ he’ll not find I here,
an’ he’ll not find settle here.”
“Nay now, mother, nay now. He’ll not come—he could never find his way to
our place. These houses warn’t built in Bartlett’s time. Why so like as
not,” she continued soothingly, struck by a sudden inspiration, “as like
as not he’s waitin’ for ye down in the wood—at the wold place, ye know.
Don’t ye think so, John?”
“Ees,” said John, controlling his features, “’Tis better nor likely he’m
waitin’ there.”
“Bidin’ there all alone,” sighed Lizzie. “The house be empty now, and
everything be changed. But the settle’s there.”
“Ees, the settle’s there,” responded Mrs Caines briskly. “An’ he’ll set
on’t jest so comfortable as can be. Now you come along o’ me, mother,
an’ get to bed. Don’t you bother yourself no more about Bartlett—he’s
all right.”
Mrs Sweetapple made no further objection, but went upstairs quietly
enough, suffering her daughter to undress her, and getting into bed in
obedience to her command.
When Alice, the eldest grandchild, who shared her room, came up, she
thought the old woman was asleep. But Lizzie was not asleep. She lay
there very wide-awake on the contrary, forcing herself to keep quiet with
difficulty, until the family should have retired to rest.
At last the house was absolutely still: a duet of snores from the
neighbouring room announced that Mr and Mrs Caines were sunk in slumber;
but Lizzie lay motionless for an hour or so longer; until, in fact, she
had heard the church clock strike twelve, and had noted the extinguishing
of the street lamp opposite her window.
Even then she lay still for a while longer, until the lamplighter’s steps
had died away, and the little town itself, which had ever seemed to her
so noisy, was wrapped in unbroken silence.
Then, stealing noiselessly from the bed, she began to put on her clothes
with as much haste as the necessity for caution would admit of. The
moonlight streamed in through the uncurtained window, and she could find
her way with ease about the little room. The bandbox containing her
bonnet was here, on top of the chest of drawers, her cloak hung on one of
the pegs beside it; here were her boots, but she would not put them on
until she found herself safely in the street.
Out of the room she crept, and down the narrow stairs; John and Phoebe
snoring unbrokenly on. Here was the door—the back door—oh, what a noise
the bolt made in shooting back! She paused breathless, but no sound
ensued, either of a hurried foot upon the stair, or of an alarmed cry.
With a gasp of relief Lizzie crept out into the night. Sitting down upon
the doorstep she donned her boots, the clock striking one just as the
operation was completed.
One! How late it was! Would Bartlett be tired of waiting? Would he
have gone before she reached home?
Down the hill she went, as fast as she could, and then across the market
place. How quiet all the houses looked as they stood thus with shuttered
windows and roofs shining in the moonlight. Now over the bridge and
under the chestnut trees, the cool breath from the river catching her
heated face, the delicious fragrance of the half-opened leaf buds filling
her nostrils.
Here was the turn now, and here the long, long hill. Bartlett and she
had trodden it once together when they had come back from that famous
outing to Shroton Fair. They had got out of the waggon which had given
them a friendly lift, just at the bridge, and had walked home together in
the moonlight. She had hung on to Bartlett’s arm, and he had talked
courting-talk all the way, just as when they were lovers.
The old woman smiled to herself as she tottered onwards. It had been
moonlight then and it was moonlight now, and she was going to meet
Bartlett. “He’ll wait, Bartlett ’ull wait,” she said to herself. “He’ll
not disapp’int I.”
But, dear to be sure, that was a very long hill, and Lizzie was quite
exhausted when she reached the top. She paused, gasping, while she
surveyed the prospect before her. There were the woods before her on her
right, the fir-trees sending out spicy scents which might have refreshed
her had she been less anxious to get on; on her left the fields sloped
away behind the hedge. They were asleep, too, fields and hedge, like the
houses in the town; nobody was awake but Lizzie and poor Bartlett,
waiting yonder, in the empty house.
But that dreary white road, how long it was? First a dip down and then a
climb up—a long tedious climb, and the corner round which she must turn
so far away that it was out of sight; and even when gained there was
still more road, long and straight and weary, before she could reach the
short cut which led across the fields to her own wood. While she
considered the greatness of the distance and the lateness of the hour
Lizzie became quite frightened, and wishing to make the most of the
downward incline, she set off at a kind of hobbling run. Then, all of a
sudden, she never quite knew how, something hit her in the face; her
whole frame jarred through and through; stretching out her hand she
groped about her blindly for she could not see, and felt grass and a tuft
of weeds: it must have been the ground which had risen up to buffet her.
But even while turning over this new idea in her mind she lost
consciousness.
* * *
“Hullo, Mrs Sweetapple!”
Lizzie opened her eyes and smiled vaguely; somebody had raised her head
and was dusting her face with a cotton handkerchief: Lizzie sat upright,
feeling still dizzy, but happy and hopeful. She had had dreams—curiously
pleasant dreams—and was at first astonished at not finding herself in her
bed; but presently remembered. Then a spasm of anguish crossed her face.
The moon was set, the gray light of dawn shone on her companion’s face
and showed forth the ghostly world about her. Would Bartlett still be
there?
“I couldn’t think whatever it was,” continued the man. “Me an’ Jinny was
a-joggin’ along so quiet as anything, wi’ our load, when I see’d summat
a-lyin’ aside o’ the road. First I thought ’twas a bundle, then I see’d
’twas a ’ooman, an’ then I turned ye over an’ says I: ‘’Tis Mrs
Sweetapple.’ You’ve a-had a bit of a tumble, haven’t ye? Ye did seem
stunned-like when I did pick ye up.”
Lizzie, looking at him vaguely, supposed she must have catched her foot
in something.
“Whatever be you a-doin’ out-o’-door at this time o’ marnin’?”
Lizzie collected her scattered thoughts, and resolved to make the most of
this unexpected opportunity. This was Jim Frizzle, the corn-merchant’s
man, who had so often driven past her house, with corn for the pheasantry
and forage for the keeper’s pony, and who had even now and then halted at
her own door, to deposit a bundle or two of straw for her private use.
“Be you—be you goin’ up—along our way?”
“’Ees, I be a-takin’ a truss or two o’ hay to Keeper Foster’s, an’ a sack
o’ Injun carn. There’s lots o’ room in my cart; would ye like a lift?”
“Thank ye kindly, Mr Frizzle, I would indeed. It be a good thought; I be
jist about tired.”
“Well, you’m afoot early. What brings ye out at this time o’ marnin’?”
Lizzie considered.
“Well, ’tis nice an’ cool,” she said falteringly. She was learning to be
cunning. People looked so strange and spoke so sharp when she told her
secrets that she was now resolved to keep them to herself. If she were
to let on to Jim Frizzle about Bartlett he might, as like as not, go and
send Phoebe after her.
Jim let down the tail-board of the cart, and lifted her in.
“Now you’m all right,” he said, as she sank down between the trusses of
hay. “You’ll be so snug as anything there. You’m a wonderful active
body for your years, I’ll say that. I heerd ye’d shifted,” he continued,
after a pause, “but I s’pose that bain’t true.”
Lizzie considered again.
“I’ve been a-biding wi’ my darter for a while,” she returned presently,
“jist for a while—I’m goin’ back now.”
Jim jerked the reins, and lit his pipe, and they proceeded on their way
in silence, Lizzie dozing now and then, and waking with a start. Their
journey took a considerable time, for Frizzle could not avail himself of
the short cut across the field and was obliged to proceed by road,
approaching the wood at length by a narrow green lane.
Lizzie opened her eyes wide when they turned into this lane, and raised
herself a little, gazing eagerly towards the longed-for goal.
The sun was up now, and all the fresh and dewy April world rejoicing.
The grey-green fringes of the larches swung in the breeze, busy birds
fluttered from bough to bough, sending forth ecstatic little notes; a
rabbit scudded across the path just as the cart entered the wood; Lizzie
clapped her hands and laughed. Jim turned round on his seat, and gazed
at her in surprise.
“What be that for?” he asked.
“I don’t know,” answered Lizzie, abashed; “’twas seein’ the rabbit, I
think. Did ye notice the rabbit, how he did kick up his little feet and
whisk his little tail?”
“Most rabbits does that,” commented Jim.
On they went, and now the cottage came in sight, the desolate cottage
with its smokeless chimney and shuttered windows.
“Why it be all shut up,” exclaimed Frizzle, as he stopped before the
closed door. “There b’ain’t nobody about, nor yet nothin’ stirrin’.”
He gazed towards the empty kennels and the piled up heaps of pens which
the keeper had not yet found time to remove. But Lizzie did not heed
him; she had risen to her feet and was endeavouring to descend from the
cart.
“Here, bide a bit, ’ooman, bide a bit. Ye can’t get down by yourself.
Wait till I help ye.”
He let down the tail-board and assisted her to alight, and Lizzie,
staggering towards the door, beat upon it with her open palm.
“Oh, I must get in—I must get in,” she cried. “I forgot about door bein’
locked! Oh, what shall I do, what shall I do! He’ll be gone!”
“There, there, that’s a job that’s easy managed,” responded Jim, and,
applying his vigorous shoulder to the door, he sent it swinging inwards
on its hinge.
Peering curiously in he saw a dismantled little room, dark, save for the
shafts of light which pierced their way through the chinks of the
shutters and down the chimney to the fireless grate, and dismantled, save
for a clumsy old oak settle which stood near the hearth. But to his
surprise Lizzie uttered a cry of rapture, and tottered forward into the
room.
“I knowed I’d find ye waitin’!” she exclaimed.
* * *
“I think I’d best look in again on my way back,” said Jim, as he
clambered into his cart again after depositing his load at the keeper’s.
“I’d no notion the old body was so childish as that. I never thought
someway she’d rid house altogether—”
“Oh, she’ve shifted for good,” interrupted Keeper Foster. “Her darter
came and carried her off, and none too soon either. There’d ha’ been
some mischance so sure as anything.”
“Well, I thought it a bit queer to find her out on the road so early.
She’d had a tumble too, mind ye, one side of her face was all bruised.
But ’twasn’t till I heerd her call out, ‘I knowed I’d find ye waitin’,’
in the empty room, that I knowed for certain she’d gone silly.”
“You must take her home—along wi’ ye,” said the keeper. “It’s not safe
to leave her, and Mrs Caines ’ll be in an awful state. Here, I’ll come
with ye, and we’ll persuade her between us.”
He got into the cart too, and they drove together to Lizzie’s cottage.
The door stood open as before, and the room was very still. Lizzie was
crouching in a corner of the settle, with her hands outstretched, and a
smile upon her face. In the green wood without the boughs were waving,
and the birds were singing. “Lwonesome Lizzie” was lonesome no more: she
had found Friend Death waiting for her in the deserted house, in the
guise of the husband of her youth.