It was nearly seven before Mr. Archer left his apartment. On the landing
he found another door beside his own opening on a roofless corridor, and
presently he was walking on the top of the ruins. On one hand he could
look down a good depth into the green court-yard; on the other his eye
roved along the downward course of the river, the wet woods all smoking,
the shadows long and blue, the mists golden and rosy in the sun, here and
there the water flashing across an obstacle. His heart expanded and
softened to a grateful melancholy, and with his eye fixed upon the
distance, and no thought of present danger, he continued to stroll along
the elevated and treacherous promenade.
A terror-stricken cry rose to him from the courtyard. He looked down,
and saw in a glimpse Nance standing below with hands clasped in horror
and his own foot trembling on the margin of a gulf. He recoiled and
leant against a pillar, quaking from head to foot, and covering his face
with his hands; and Nance had time to run round by the stair and rejoin
him where he stood before he had changed a line of his position.
‘Ah!’ he cried, and clutched her wrist; ‘don’t leave me. The place
rocks; I have no head for altitudes.’
‘Sit down against that pillar,’ said Nance. ‘Don’t you be afraid; I
won’t leave you, and don’t look up or down: look straight at me. How
white you are!’
‘The gulf,’ he said, and closed his eyes again and shuddered.
‘Why,’ said Nance, ‘what a poor climber you must be! That was where my
cousin Dick used to get out of the castle after Uncle Jonathan had shut
the gate. I’ve been down there myself with him helping me. I wouldn’t
try with you,’ she said, and laughed merrily.
The sound of her laughter was sincere and musical, and perhaps its beauty
barbed the offence to Mr. Archer. The blood came into his face with a
quick jet, and then left it paler than before. ‘It is a physical
weakness,’ he said harshly, ‘and very droll, no doubt, but one that I can
conquer on necessity. See, I am still shaking. Well, I advance to the
battlements and look down. Show me your cousin’s path.’
‘He would go sure-foot along that little ledge,’ said Nance, pointing as
she spoke; ‘then out through the breach and down by yonder buttress. It
is easier coming back, of course, because you see where you are going.
From the buttress foot a sheep-walk goes along the scarp—see, you can
follow it from here in the dry grass. And now, sir,’ she added, with a
touch of womanly pity, ‘I would come away from here if I were you, for
indeed you are not fit.’
Sure enough Mr. Archer’s pallor and agitation had continued to increase;
his cheeks were deathly, his clenched fingers trembled pitifully. ‘The
weakness is physical,’ he sighed, and had nearly fallen. Nance led him
from the spot, and he was no sooner back in the tower-stair, than he fell
heavily against the wall and put his arm across his eyes. A cup of
brandy had to be brought him before he could descend to breakfast; and
the perfection of Nance’s dream was for the first time troubled.
Jonathan was waiting for them at table, with yellow, blood-shot eyes and
a peculiar dusky complexion. He hardly waited till they found their
seats, before, raising one hand, and stooping with his mouth above his
plate, he put up a prayer for a blessing on the food and a spirit of
gratitude in the eaters, and thereupon, and without more civility, fell
to. But it was notable that he was no less speedily satisfied than he
had been greedy to begin. He pushed his plate away and drummed upon the
table.
‘These are silly prayers,’ said he, ‘that they teach us. Eat and be
thankful, that’s no such wonder. Speak to me of starving—there’s the
touch. You’re a man, they tell me, Mr. Archer, that has met with some
reverses?’
‘I have met with many,’ replied Mr. Archer.
‘Ha!’ said Jonathan. ‘None reckons but the last. Now, see; I tried to
make this girl here understand me.’
‘Uncle,’ said Nance, ‘what should Mr. Archer care for your concerns? He
hath troubles of his own, and came to be at peace, I think.’
‘I tried to make her understand me,’ repeated Jonathan doggedly; ‘and now
I’ll try you. Do you think this world is fair?’
‘Fair and false!’ quoth Mr. Archer.
The old man laughed immoderately. ‘Good,’ said he, ‘very good, but what
I mean is this: do you know what it is to get up early and go to bed
late, and never take so much as a holiday but four: and one of these your
own marriage day, and the other three the funerals of folk you loved, and
all that, to have a quiet old age in shelter, and bread for your old
belly, and a bed to lay your crazy bones upon, with a clear conscience?’
‘Sir,’ said Mr. Archer, with an inclination of his head, ‘you portray a
very brave existence.’
‘Well,’ continued Jonathan, ‘and in the end thieves deceive you, thieves
rob and rook you, thieves turn you out in your old age and send you
begging. What have you got for all your honesty? A fine return! You
that might have stole scores of pounds, there you are out in the rain
with your rheumatics!’
Mr. Archer had forgotten to eat; with his hand upon his chin he was
studying the old man’s countenance. ‘And you conclude?’ he asked.
‘Conclude!’ cried Jonathan. ‘I conclude I’ll be upsides with them.’
‘Ay,’ said the other, ‘we are all tempted to revenge.’
‘You have lost money?’ asked Jonathan.
‘A great estate,’ said Archer quietly.
‘See now!’ says Jonathan, ‘and where is it?’
‘Nay, I sometimes think that every one has had his share of it but me,’
was the reply. ‘All England hath paid his taxes with my patrimony: I was
a sheep that left my wool on every briar.’
‘And you sit down under that?’ cried the old man. ‘Come now, Mr. Archer,
you and me belong to different stations; and I know mine—no man
better—but since we have both been rooked, and are both sore with it,
why, here’s my hand with a very good heart, and I ask for yours, and no
offence, I hope.’
‘There is surely no offence, my friend,’ returned Mr. Archer, as they
shook hands across the table; ‘for, believe me, my sympathies are quite
acquired to you. This life is an arena where we fight with beasts; and,
indeed,’ he added, sighing, ‘I sometimes marvel why we go down to it
unarmed.’
In the meanwhile a creaking of ungreased axles had been heard descending
through the wood; and presently after, the door opened, and the tall
ostler entered the kitchen carrying one end of Mr. Archer’s trunk. The
other was carried by an aged beggar man of that district, known and
welcome for some twenty miles about under the name of ‘Old Cumberland.’
Each was soon perched upon a settle, with a cup of ale; and the ostler,
who valued himself upon his affability, began to entertain the company,
still with half an eye on Nance, to whom in gallant terms he expressly
dedicated every sip of ale. First he told of the trouble they had to get
his Lordship started in the chaise; and how he had dropped a rouleau of
gold on the threshold, and the passage and doorstep had been strewn with
guinea-pieces. At this old Jonathan looked at Mr. Archer. Next the
visitor turned to news of a more thrilling character: how the down mail
had been stopped again near Grantham by three men on horseback—a white
and two bays; how they had handkerchiefs on their faces; how Tom the
guard’s blunderbuss missed fire, but he swore he had winged one of them
with a pistol; and how they had got clean away with seventy pounds in
money, some valuable papers, and a watch or two.
‘Brave! brave!’ cried Jonathan in ecstasy. ‘Seventy pounds! O, it’s
brave!’
‘Well, I don’t see the great bravery,’ observed the ostler,
misapprehending him. ‘Three men, and you may call that three to one.
I’ll call it brave when some one stops the mail single-handed; that’s a
risk.’
‘And why should they hesitate?’ inquired Mr. Archer. ‘The poor souls who
are fallen to such a way of life, pray what have they to lose? If they
get the money, well; but if a ball should put them from their troubles,
why, so better.’
‘Well, sir,’ said the ostler, ‘I believe you’ll find they won’t agree
with you. They count on a good fling, you see; or who would risk it?—And
here’s my best respects to you, Miss Nance.’
‘And I forgot the part of cowardice,’ resumed Mr. Archer. ‘All men
fear.’
‘O, surely not!’ cried Nance.
‘All men,’ reiterated Mr. Archer.
‘Ay, that’s a true word,’ observed Old Cumberland, ‘and a thief, anyway,
for it’s a coward’s trade.’
‘But these fellows, now,’ said Jonathan, with a curious, appealing
manner—‘these fellows with their seventy pounds! Perhaps, Mr. Archer,
they were no true thieves after all, but just people who had been robbed
and tried to get their own again. What was that you said, about all
England and the taxes? One takes, another gives; why, that’s almost
fair. If I’ve been rooked and robbed, and the coat taken off my back, I
call it almost fair to take another’s.’
‘Ask Old Cumberland,’ observed the ostler; ‘you ask Old Cumberland, Miss
Nance!’ and he bestowed a wink upon his favoured fair one.
‘Why that?’ asked Jonathan.
‘He had his coat taken—ay, and his shirt too,’ returned the ostler.
‘Is that so?’ cried Jonathan eagerly. ‘Was you robbed too?’
‘That was I,’ replied Cumberland, ‘with a warrant! I was a well-to-do
man when I was young.’
‘Ay! See that!’ says Jonathan. ‘And you don’t long for a revenge?’
‘Eh! Not me!’ answered the beggar. ‘It’s too long ago. But if you’ll
give me another mug of your good ale, my pretty lady, I won’t say no to
that.’
‘And shalt have! And shalt have!’ cried Jonathan. ‘Or brandy even, if
you like it better.’
And as Cumberland did like it better, and the ostler chimed in, the party
pledged each other in a dram of brandy before separating.
As for Nance, she slipped forth into the ruins, partly to avoid the
ostler’s gallantries, partly to lament over the defects of Mr. Archer.
Plainly, he was no hero. She pitied him; she began to feel a protecting
interest mingle with and almost supersede her admiration, and was at the
same time disappointed and yet drawn to him. She was, indeed, conscious
of such unshaken fortitude in her own heart, that she was almost tempted
by an occasion to be bold for two. She saw herself, in a brave attitude,
shielding her imperfect hero from the world; and she saw, like a piece of
heaven, his gratitude for her protection.