CONCLUSION
I should like to conclude with a few words as to the fate of the
various people who have appeared in these pages.
Hazel Gibberty married Sebastian Thug--and an excellent husband he made
her. He gave up the sea and settled on his wife's farm. Mistress Ivy
Peppercorn came and lived with them and every summer they had a visit
from Master Nathaniel and Ranulph. Bawdy Bess left Lud at the time of
Sebastian's marriage--out of pique, said the malicious.
Luke Hempen entered the Lud Yeomanry, where he did so well that when
Mumchance retired he was elected Captain in his place.
Hempie lived to a ripe old age--long enough to tell her stories to
Ranulph's children; nor had she any scruples about telling them her
views on "neighbourliness." And when she died, as a tribute to her
long and loving service, she was buried in the family chapel of the
Chanticleers.
Mother Tibbs, after taking a conspicuous part in the wild revels which
followed on the arrival of the fairy army, vanished for ever from
Dorimare. Nor did anyone ever again see Portunus. But, from time to
time, a wild red-haired youth would arrive uninvited, and having turned
everything topsy-turvy with his pranks, would rush from the house,
shouting "Ho! Ho! Hoh!"
By degrees the Crabapple Blossoms recovered their spirits. But they
certainly did not grow up into the sort of young ladies their mothers
had imagined they would when they first sent them to Miss Primrose
Crabapple's Academy. They were never stinted of fairy fruit, for the
Dapple continued to bring its tribute to Dorimare, adding thereby
considerably to the wealth of the country. For, thanks to the sound
practical sense of Master Ambrose, a new industry was started--that
of candying fairy fruit, and exporting it to all the countries with
which they trafficked, in pretty fancy boxes, the painted lids of which
showed that art was creeping back to Dorimare.
As for Ranulph, when he grew up he wrote the loveliest songs that had
been heard since the days of Duke Aubrey--songs that crossed the sea
and were sung by lonely fishermen in the far North, and by indigo
mothers crooning to their babies by the doors of their huts in the
Cinnamon Isles.
Dame Marigold continued to smile, and to nibble marzipan with her
cronies. But she used sometimes sadly to wonder whether Master
Nathaniel had ever really come back from beyond the Debatable Hills;
sometimes, but not always.
And Master Nathaniel himself? Whether he ever heard the Note again
I cannot say. But in time he went, either to reap the fields of
gillyflowers, or to moulder in the Fields of Grammary. And below his
coffin in the family chapel a brass tablet was put up with this epitaph:
NATHANIEL CHANTICLEER
PRESIDENT OF THE GUILD OF MERCHANTS
THREE TIMES MAYOR OF LUD-IN-THE-MIST
TO WHOM WAS GRANTED NO SMALL SHARE OF
THE PEACE AND PROSPERITY
HE HELPED TO BESTOW ON
HIS TOWN AND COUNTRY.
An epitaph not unlike those he used to con so wistfully in his visits
to the Fields of Grammary.
And this is but another proof that the Written Word is a Fairy, as
mocking and elusive as Willy Wisp, speaking lying words to us in a
feigned voice. So let all readers of books take warning! And with this
final exhortation this book shall close.
Columbine
"And can the physician make sick men well,
And can the magician a fortune divine
Without lily, germander, and sops in wine?
With sweet-brier,
And bon-fire,
And strawberry-wire,
And columbine.
"Within and out, in and out, round as a ball,
With hither and thither, as straight as a line,
With lily, germander, and sops in wine.
With sweet-brier
And bon-fire
And strawberry-wire
And columbine.
"Any lass for a Duke, a Duke who wears green,
In lands where the sun and the moon do not shine,
With lily, germander, and sops in wine.
With sweet-brier
And bon-fire
And strawberry-wire
And columbine."
"When Aubrey did live there lived no poor,
The lord and the beggar on roots did dine
With lily, germander, and sops in wine.
With sweet-brier
And bon-fire,
And strawberry-wire,
And columbine."
"There are windfalls of dreams, there's a wolf in the stars,
And Life is a nymph who will never be thine,
With lily, germander, and sops in wine.
With sweet-brier,
And bon-fire,
And strawberry-wire,
And columbine."