he was--well--too busy. I said he dropped you out of his life a bit too
much and didn’t humour you enough. I told him plump out that he wasn’t
so kind as he might be. Now you’re properly angered with me, no doubt;
but just think if you’ve a right to be."
She was silent, and her flush faded and her eyes fixed on him and grew
puzzled.
"’Twas only because I knew him so well and his straight, just way that I
dared," he continued. "And now you’ve got to say if that talk did harm
or good. And if it did harm, heap hard words on me; but if it did
good--"
She put out her hand impulsively, but not until a silent minute had
sped. During the moments she retraced the past and remembered what had
surprised her and made her happier. Then she stretched out her hand and
clasped his.
"Good came of it," she said.
"If that’s so, I’ve gained something to-day as well as lost something,
Madge."
"David--it shows what he is, Hartley."
"Yes. He’s high above anything small or mean."
She continued to reflect. It was impossible to say much more on the
subject, and, indeed, the brightest that could be said was spoken. The
wife, though she knew that her husband had long since resumed his old
absorbed attitude and found less and less leisure for amenity and
tenderness, could not whisper this outside her own heart.
"It was good and brave of you," she said. "And dear David belongs to
the large-souled sort of men that ban’t above learning even on such a
sacred, secret business as his wife. But he knew you had known me ever
since I was a little girl."
Bartley nodded.
"So long as you can tell me that good came of it, I’m content. Now
leave it. Eat your lunch and then I must go. And strive to bring ’em
both--Rhoda and David--to the funeral."
"All Sheepstor will surely go."
She brought her food from her pocket and he watched her eat some little
sandwiches made of bread and cheese. Their backs were turned to
Nosworthy bridge, but they were quite visible from it.
"There’s more here than I want," she said. "I wish you’d take some."
The whimsical child in the man, even on this dark day, broke loose.
"Feed me," he said. "Don’t think I’m a fool for asking; but feed me. I
mean it. ’Twill comfort me. I’m cruel miserable, though not to the
eye."
Of old she remembered his follies and fancies.
"When you was young you was always like a little, silly, petted bird or
puppy," she said, smiling.
"So I often am still--and especially when I’m down on my luck. There’s
no dear, silly mother to pet me no more and make me chirrup again. How
she would do it! Feed me, Madge."
She held a sandwich to his mouth.
"One more."
"Here’s four more. Eat ’em quick. And then I must get going."
One by one she put the morsels of food to his lips, and laughed at him,
in spite of herself, while she did so. Then he thanked her and declared
that he was much the better and happier for her charity.
"Mother’s in heaven," he said. "And I’m going to her again some day.
If a man believes that really, and doesn’t only fool himself to think he
believes it, ’tis the greatest comfort of all. And I didn’t ought to be
miserable to-day, and I’m damned if I will be."
"Of course you believe it. So do I--heart and soul--and so do every
true, faithful Christian creature."
"Of course. Didn’t you say you counted to meet Rhoda here?"
"Yes--’tis time she came by."
"I shall pass her going back; and I’ll tell her you’re at the bridge
waiting for her. Good-bye, Madge; and the Lord bless you for the kind
things you’ve said to me."
"And thank you, too, Bartley, for--for--"
"That was nought."
He helped her back from the island to the road; then he left her and
went his way in expectation of meeting Rhoda at every turn. But he did
not meet her, because she had already passed by.
She had flitted swiftly over the bridge; but stricken to passivity by a
sudden and astounding sight--she had stood a moment upon the farther
side. She had then gone forward without disturbing those who astonished
her.
Therefore Margaret and Mr. Crocker were wholly unaware that Rhoda Bowden
had seen her sister-in-law not only putting food into the man’s mouth,
but also laughing at him while he ridiculously imitated the fluttering
action of a fledgling bird.
Rhoda gasped and slipped her foot once or twice from sheer absorption of
mind as she proceeded homeward. She considered this spectacle in the
light of news just gleaned at Sheepstor.
"And the man’s mother not much more than cold in her grave-clothes!" she
thought.
*BOOK III*
*CHAPTER I*
*MYSTERY*
The company at ’The Corner House’ had divided into two groups, and each
was concerned with a separate subject. Mr. Shillabeer himself, with
Bartley Crocker, Mr. Moses, Simon Snell, and Bart Stanbury, discussed a
strange phenomenon that had of late startled the dwellers at Sheepstor;
while, with their backs to this throng, Ernest Maunder, his friend
Timothy Mattacott, and Billy Screech whispered together upon a private
problem.
"The thing can be explained in a word," said Moses; "there be amongst us
some high-minded, religious creature that have got hold of this way of
advertising the Truth. He have said to himself, ’There’s nought like a
gate to catch the eye of the passer-by.’ And so, where a gate happens
to stand by the wayside, he have gone by night and painted up a Bible
truth. Farmer Chave found ’_Prepare to meet thy God_’ on his bullock
byre yesterday morning, and there’s ’Eternity’--just that one solemn
word--on every second gate betwixt here and Meavy."
"He’s come out our way, too, since last week," said Bart Stanbury.
"There be a text up over on the moor-gate above our house: ’_Now is the
accepted time_.’"
Young Stanbury was courting a girl at Nosworthy Farm, near his home, and
this text, staring out of the dawn-lit desert, had come to him with the
force of a direct command. But he made no mention of its private
significance in his affairs.
"The party means well enough," declared Hartley. "There’s no doubt about
that. And it can’t be denied that coming upon these solemn things all
of a sudden makes men and women think. The puzzle is to know who’s
doing it."
"Some of the people that own the gates don’t like it, however," said
Simon Snell. "Farmer Bassett, out to Yellowmead, says ’tis a form of
trespass and battery to write on a man’s gatepost; and it don’t bring
you any more within the law because you write up Scripture. The man
stuck up ’_Let there be light_’ on Mr. Bassett’s big gate--the one going
into his four-acre field--and Bassett was cruel vexed and said as how
he’d let light into the chap himself if ever he caught him."
"And he’s cleaned his gate with sand-paper," added young Stanbury.
"’Tis written on again since then," said Mr. Shillabeer. "I was that way
not long since, and there’s words written there again--namely, ’God is
Love.’"
"Strange thing is that Ernest Maunder on his nightly rounds should have
never catched the man," mused Crocker.
"Not at all," explained Mr. Moses. "The man no doubt knows the way of
Ernest’s beat as well as Ernest himself do, and avoids him. They were
saying yesterday that it might even be parson’s self; but of course
that’s a rash and silly idea. His reverence is as much interested in it
as anybody--especially since he found ’_The Lord loveth a cheerful
giver_’ on his own back-garden door--the one that leadeth out into the
lane. He holds that the man means well; all the same, he wants him
catched and stopped."
"What could be done to him if they did lay hold on him?" asked Reuben
Shillabeer.
"Why, there you beat me," answered Moses. "I’m sure I don’t know. The
lord of the manor might talk to him; but I don’t think any law has been
broken, whereas ’tis certain many people have been made to think about
religion in consequence."
"My mother for one," asserted Mr. Snell. "She came across ’_After death
the Judgment_’ ’pon a broken paling out Yennadon Down way, and it turned
her faint on the instant and made her very unwell. But ’twas all to the
good, as she herself declared two days afterwards. The man’s doing a
very proper work, whoever the man is."
"With a pot of blacking and letters cut out of tin he does it," said
Bartley Crocker. "It ought to be pretty easy to find him out. He must
have been round here only a day or two ago. I see he’s been busy at the
bottom of your paddock, ’Dumpling.’"
"Yes," admitted Mr. Shillabeer. "He knows a bit about everybody.
’_Swear not at all_’ he put up on my fence, down the bottom end of my
cabbage plot. That ought to be a lesson to us in this bar, for, try as
I will, the crooked words slip out among you."
"I quite agree," said Mr. Snell. "I catched myself saying ’damn’ to a
young dog only yesternight. And no fault of the dog."
"If we was all as careful as you, no great harm would come to the
parish," answered Charles Moses. "For my part, swearing never drew me.
I found I could be righteously angry without it, and also forcible of
speech."
"Some fall back upon it as natural as drink," asserted Bartley, "though
’tis certainly no sign of strength to put in swear words."
"Yet Sir Guy Flamank, his honourable self, be a great hand with them,"
argued Snell. "I’ve heard him in the hunting field use the most
terrible parts of speech you can imagine--though not when ladies was
out, I admit that."
"Take my good friend, David Bowden," said Bartley. "No man ever yet
heard him use an oath. And yet, by all accounts, nobody gets his way
quicker with smooth words."
Mr. Shillabeer nodded.
"Without a shade of unkindly feeling against the man, I could wish he
wasn’t quite so own-self, all the same," he said. "That wrapped up
heart and soul in work and money-making, that he haven’t eyes for
anything else in the earth."
Mr. Crocker looked round about him.
"What you say is gospel truth, ’Dumpling.’ We’re all friends here, I
believe--friends to ’em both. Therefore none will think it anything but
kindness in us to be sorry about ’em."
"I met Margaret a while back," said Mr. Shillabeer. "My wife was
terrible fond of her when she was a mere strip of a girl. We had some
talk together, and--there ’twas. I’d give my whiskers to make ’em go
along a thought happier; and yet when you say the word, she’ll have
nought of it and tell you there never was a happier, luckier creature."
"In a way that’s true," declared Bartley, "but in another way ’tis
false. What did you say to her, Reuben?"
"To be plain," answered Mr. Shillabeer, guiltily, "I was full of rather
gloomy thoughts along of it being the death-day of the wife. And I
said, in my darkness, that self-slaughter might not be all bad, if a man
had outlived his value. And she reproved me--yes, she said the word in
season."
"You oughtn’t to think of such things, Shillabeer," declared Mr. Moses.
"I know it, Charles; yet thoughts will come over the mind unbidden. But
leave that."
"As to David, he’s easier to talk sense to than you might think," added
Crocker. "I risked it once, and he took it in a very manly spirit that
made me respect him more than ever. But I doubt he’s forgotten it all
long ago. Why for don’t you try, Moses? You’re a light among us and
carry the weight of the church on your shoulders. Catch the man coming
out one Sunday and go a bit of the way back-along with him, and some of
us will take Madge and Rhoda out of earshot."
"No," answered the shoemaker. "Don’t ask me to attempt any such a
thing. You can’t alter it, and they can’t alter it. ’Tis in them:
they’re built so. Just a pinch of salt makes or mars a stew, and just a
pinch of character makes or mars a home. If we even knew exactly what
’twas, we couldn’t alter it. You can’t pull out a bit of human nature,
like a hollow tooth. Just an over-seasoning of pepper in a man, or a
pinch of softness in a woman, may spoil all. It takes terrible little
to wreck a home, and I’ve known large tragedies rise up out of nought
but a taste."
"That’s true," declared Bartley. "A man with a failing, or a fancy, as
wouldn’t count against him in one woman’s eyes, may come to eternal
smash on it if he happens to wed with another woman. ’Tis the little
twists of character that lead to the biggest troubles, as the acorn
breeds the oak."
Mr. Shillabeer obliged with an instance.
"I knowed a very good Christian girl who was a moderate drinker and
never dreamed of taking a thimble too much afore she married. And she
never would have done so afterwards, but for the bad luck of her husband
being a furious teetotaller. I’ve seed that man talk about drink till
you’d think he was blind drunk himself! And so he was--drunk with rage
at the thought of there being such a thing as drink in the universe.
And what come of it? She took to drink, that woman did, driven to it,
you might say, out of sheer spite; and the man catched his only son
market merry at ten years old; and he dashed him to the earth in his
righteous indignation and broke the poor child’s arm in two places."
"’Tis just the sort of thing that happens every day," declared Charles
Moses, mournfully. "But, please God, with the Bowden pair, they are
both too sensible to drift apart. ’Tis a terrible sad thing to see
husband and wife lost, as it were--each feeling along alone, trying to
find the man or the woman they loved and married, and not finding ’em.
For why? Because each have gone back to themselves, and put off all
that hoodwinking toggery they was hidden in during the courting time.
We talk about being disguised in drink, Reuben Shillabeer, but we ought
to talk about being disguised in love also. There’s nought makes a man
act further from his true self than wanting to win a woman."
"’Tis supposed to bring out the best of us; but I’m with you there; I
don’t know that it does," said Bartley.
Mr. Snell stared.
"For my part, though you might say such a man as me hasn’t the right to
lift his voice afore such a learned person like you, Mr. Moses, yet I do
believe in love. I wouldn’t go so far as to say that I’ve felt it more
than here and there--back and forward, like rheumatism, according to the
state of the blood and the season of the year; but when it comes, it
makes me more valiant without a doubt; and that’s to the good."
Mr. Crocker looked at his rival. Then he opened his mouth to speak; and
then he shut it again and kept silence.
Elsewhere Mattacott, Maunder, and William Screech debated a great
matter. They argued now as to whether Mr. Shillabeer should hear the
secret, and the policeman advised against it.
"An honest and an upright man, outside prize-fighting," he said; "but in
this you can’t expect him to take sides. We are all his customers--Bart
Stanbury just as much as Mattacott here; therefore I say, ’keep the
thing from him.’"
"And from everybody," added Mattacott. "If it get’s out, all’s marred.
The fewer hear of it, the better; and I hope you won’t tell your wife,
Billy."
Mr. Screech laughed.
"That shows how little you know of the world, Timothy. Why, ’twas my
wife had the brilliant thought! She knowed Mattacott wanted for to
marry Jane West, and I told her how another man was after Jane also, and
that she couldn’t decide between ’em. Then says Dorcas--quick as a
needle, that woman--’Jane believes in all that rummage about Crazywell.
So what Mattacott have got to do is to plan to get her that way come
next Christmas Eve; and he’ve got to lie hid; and when he sees her,
he’ve got to shout out the name of t’other chap; and Jane will think
’tis the spirits; and she’ll fancy t’other chap is bound to die afore
the year’s out; so he’ll be no good to her whether she likes him or not.
Then, of course, she’ll take Mattacott.’ Those were her very words, as
near as I can call ’em home. And when did you hear a cleverer thing?"
"’Tis terrible clever," confessed Mattacott. "But Jane West wouldn’t
never go up past the pool alone on Christmas Eve for a hundred pounds;
so us must plan somehow for somebody to go along with her. ’Tis a very
tricky business to be drawn into a plot."
"All be fair in love," said Mr. Maunder; "else, of course, I couldn’t
countenance any such a plan. But the matter is outside the law and
therefore I’m not called to take any steps--especially as I very much
want to see Mattacott get the woman. He’s the wrong side of forty now,
and ’tis more than time he was suited, if it is to be."
Mr. Mattacott looked across jealously at the innocent Bart Stanbury.
"He’s too young for her even if she’d have him," he said. "’Tis his
sandy hair and his blue, silly eyes have made her think twice about
him."
"Keep to business," interrupted Billy Screech. "Now it’s agreed we get
the girl to Crazywell come Christmas Eve next; and that’s nearly two
months off, so we’ve got plenty of time to cabal against Bart. The
first question is, who shall take her to Crazywell on the day?"
They all frowned over this problem; then Screech solved it brilliantly.
"Why, Bart hisself, to be sure! What better could happen? He hears his
doom come up out of the water; and of course, even if they was tokened,
he’d have to release her after that. Any man would have to do it."
They applauded and Mattacott was especially enthusiastic. But the
policeman acknowledged a doubt.
"It don’t strike you as too terrible a thing?" he asked. "For my part,
as a tender man, though guardian of law and order, I can’t think we
should let the fellow hear his own fate. He might believe it and go
mad. Stranger things have happened."
"Have no fear: he won’t believe it," said Mr. Screech. "’Tis her that
will believe it, and ’tis her that we want to believe it."
"A fine stroke certainly--to make Bart hear it himself," admitted
Maunder; "that is, if I’ve got your word for it the man won’t be hurt in
his mind by such an adventure."
"That’s settled then; and now there’s the great question of who does the
spirit," continued Screech. "Of course, ’tis Mattacott’s job--not mine;
yet I must point out that his voice is not well suited to the deed."
"I wouldn’t do it for anything," said Mattacott. "I’m nought at a pinch;
and if ’twas thrust upon me to do it, fifty to one but I should go and
lose my head and very like shout out the wrong name, or some such
foolishness."
"’Tis true," said Maunder. "With all your good gifts, Timothy, you’re
the very man to make a mess of this. Besides, your voice will surely
betray you."
"I ax this here chap to do it," said Mattacott, turning to Screech
himself. "Maunder, no doubt, would do it for me, as my lifelong friend;
but he’s a government servant and his time is not his own. Therefore I
ax Billy; and, if it goes right, I’ll pay him down a crown; and if it
don’t go right, I’ll pay half-a-crown; and who can say fairer?"
"So far so good then," summed up Billy; "and I’m bound to say I think
you’re right. I can put a hollow sound into my voice and bring it up
from my boots, in a way that would make any girl go goose-flesh if she
heard me after dark on a common week-day, not to name Christmas Eve at
Crazywell. Leave that to me when the time cometh. Now the next thing
is, what shall I say?"
"Nought but the man’s name," advised Ernest Maunder; "the less you say
the awfuller ’twill be."
"Just ’Bart Stanbury! Bart Stanbury!’ twice," whispered Mattacott.
"You’ll be snug hid in a fuzz bush, of course; and once you mark that
she’s heard you, you can slip off home as quick as need be to prove
’twasn’t you, if anything comes to be said about it after."
Billy nodded.
"Just so; but I mustn’t say ’Bart’ Stanbury," he explained. "You see
the man’s christening name is ’Bartholomew,’ and the spirit wouldn’t
know as we called him ’Bart’ for shortness. The full name must be
spoken, and that I shall do. So there ’twill be, and Jane West will
believe that the man’s booked for death afore another year be out."
Mr. Mattacott showed a little emotion on Stanbury’s account, but Billy
overruled his qualms. The matter was allowed to drop and a diversion
threw the two groups together and turned conversation into a former
topic.
Ellas Bowden came in, cold and rosy, out of the night.
"Evening, souls!" he said. "On my way up-along and thought I’d give the
pony five minutes and myself a drop out of the special bottle. What’s
the best news?"
"’Tis for you to tell us what’s the latest, master," said Bartley.
"The latest," answered Mr. Bowden, "is this: that pious blade with his
blacking brush and his Bible have been up over! Ess fay; Nap and
Wellington runned in with the news after daylight. There’s no gates up
my way except my own; but he’d fastened ’pon that, and there it was. I
heard a dog bark last night, but ’twas dark as pitch and no good looking
out the window."
"And what might he have chosen for you?" asked Ernest Maunder.
"The solemn words, ’_Jesus wept_,’" answered Elias. "A drop more water
to this, Shillabeer, if you please. Yes, he’d writ those deep words
there. Can’t say exactly why he put them in particular; but they drive
the love of the Lord into the mind and make a man religious, no doubt.
Not that I’m ever anything else, when you come to the bottom of me, I
hope."
"The thought that the Redeemer of mankind shed tears is a very sad
thought, however," declared Mr. Moses. "And yet not all sad, if I make
my meaning clear, because it brings Him nearer to us on the human side;
and the nearer, the better."
"Very well put, Charles," said Reuben Shillabeer. "The nearer the
better, I’m sure."
"Upon the rocks in the warrens too--so the boys tell me," continued the
master of Ditsworthy. "The busy man have set up a good text or two here
and there. I doubt he’ll take to writing ’em life-size upon the tors
next."
"That’s a great idea, now!" declared Shillabeer. "Then everybody passing
by could catch the Word. In fact, none could miss it if the letters was
big enough."
"For that matter, if I may say so," argued Mr. Moses, "the tors be the
word of God a’ready, and nought out of the Bible could make ’em grander
than they be. Not that this curious man thinks so. Without a doubt
he’d write great Bible news across the moon’s self, if he could only
find a ladder long enough to reach her; and a brush big enough for the
work."
*CHAPTER II*
*A PESSIMIST*
Three days before Christmas and an hour before dusk, Mr. Shillabeer, gun
in hand, called at Coombeshead Farm, and Constance Stanbury opened the
door for him.
"I’m that finger-cold," he said, "that I thought as I might make so free
as to drop in and warm myself a bit afore going back."
"And welcome. Come in; come in. My husband will be home in a few
minutes, so you’ll have a bit of male company. We women be that
chuckle-headed."
"No, no! Won’t hear you run yourself down," said the ’Dumpling,’
gallantly. "There’s no better company in these parts than your company,
and very few women be in it for sense alongside of you."
"Tea or cider?" she asked.
"A drop of tea, if ’tis making. And I’ll leave a bird, if you’ll please
to accept it. The plovers are on the Moor very plenty. A hard winter’s
in store."
"Each be harder than the last nowadays," she answered. "And thank you,
I’m sure. A plover’s pretty eating, but too good for the likes of us."
"Don’t you say that. You’m like me--take yourself too humble; but ’tis
a mistake. People in the world always pull us a peg lower than our own
conceit of ourselves. So we should screw up a peg higher--to be ready
for ’em. How’s Margaret? You’ll never hear no two opinions about
her--such an angel as she be."
"Yes," admitted Constance; "and I’m much feared that she’s got more in
common with the angels than us could wish. ’Tis coming over me worse
and worse; and over her, too, poor lamb."
"What ever do you mean?" he asked. Then he walked to the fire, removed
his right gaiter and rubbed his huge leg where the strap had pressed too
hardly upon it.
"My Madge is not like every girl you meet," said Mrs. Stanbury.
"Wish there was more of the same pattern."
"And I’m terrible jealous for her--I’ll fight the world for her, like a
hen with one chick; because her vartues are her own, and her faults she
got from me."
"Faults!--who ever heard tell of her faults?"
"I take no credit in her beautiful goodness," continued the mother.
"But I take shame in her softness. Too soft and gentle and yielding she
is for this world, and the people in it. And, as her parent, I’m
savage--savage as a wild cat, down in my secret heart--when I see people
don’t understand. ’Tis me they ought to blame, not she."
Mr. Shillabeer stared. His fingers were spread and a saucer of tea
smoked upon them.
"You do amaze me; but I’ll make bold to say you’m all wrong for once.
’Tis her softness that people take joy in. Always wanting to do for
others--always putting herself on one side."