THE BUSH-BEATING
In all the bleak country "the wood" represented mystery, glamour. It
made a dark wedge between two folds of moorland, its tree-tops level
with the piled boulders on the northern side, like a deeply green tarn
lapping the edge of some rocky shore. Oak, beech and ash, hawthorn,
sycamore and elder, went to make the solid bosses of verdure that filled
the valley, while at one end a grove of furs stood up blackly, winter
and summer. Giant laurels, twisted and writhing creations of a
nightmare, spread their snake-like branches beneath the rocky wall at
one side of the wood, and in spring they shook their pale, sickly
tassels in a gloom that was as green, as freckled with shallows of
light, as underseas. A stream gurgled through its depths, increasing the
illusion of a watery element. All over the sloping floor of the wood,
where the red leaves drifted high in due season, huge boulders were
piled, moss-grown, lividly decked with orange fungi, and surrounded by a
thick undergrowth of holly and elder bushes. This place had no name
beyond "the wood"--enough distinction in that county where a copse of
ash or fir was all that scarred moor and pasture with shadow. It was
just within Ishmael's property, marking his most inland boundary, and he
cherished it as something dearer than all his money-yielding acres. It
had been his ambition to make it the home of every bird that built its
nest there, of every badger or rabbit or toad or slow-worm that
sheltered in its fastnesses. No life should cry there for the teeth of
the trap, no feathers scatter for the brutal violating of the
sheltering bushes. Thus Ishmael, but otherwise Archelaus.... There was
little doubt what he and his fellows had come for: there were a
half-dozen of them when all were met, and all carried cudgels or flails
made of knotted cloth, and walked cautiously, whispering to each other
lest the birds should take premature flight. Ishmael and Killigrew
lagged behind them, waiting for certainty before discovering themselves.
It was deadlily dark in the wood, with a darkness more unbroken than the
stillness which yet seemed part of it. A thousand little scraping noises
broke the quiet air, chill and dank. Leaves pattered against each other,
twigs rubbed faintly, brittle things broke under the lightest foot.
Still hardly a wing unfolded ever so little, not a distressful chirp
heralded the slaughter that threatened. Gradually, to eyes growing used
to the gloom, differing shades of darkness became apparent; it was
faintly marked by them as the silence by the sounds....
Still the feathers were unstirred on the breasts where tiny beaks were
thrust in sleep; round, bright eyes were filmed by the delicate lids;
the bushes held undisturbed the little lives confided to them.
Suddenly a funnel of light flared into the darkness, intensifying it,
waking into vivid green a full-foliaged holly; a rain of blows echoed
back and forth through the night, a whirr of bewildered wings mingled
with it, a frantic piping that was drowned in the clamour even as it
burst forth. High overhead the startled wood-pigeons flew out into the
free air above the tree-tops, their clamour filling the whole place with
the beating of wings that in the dark seemed mighty as the wings of
avenging angels, but availed their tiny brethren nothing. In that one
minute there fell, beaten into the undergrowth to die miserably or
flailed into the greedy hands and caps of the murderers, some half a
hundred innocent and lovely lives, all of them torn out in an agony of
fear without knowing why. Ishmael ran forward, not even hearing his own
voice as it shouted oaths he never knew he had used.
The men stopped at their work, caps and sticks in hand, staring
stupidly; only Archelaus, after a first moment's pause, showed no
astonishment. It was not till long afterwards that it occurred to
Ishmael to wonder whether his brother had all along known he followed,
and it was a question that was to remain for ever unanswered. Archelaus
lifted his lantern, which first gleamed on the red surprise of
John-Willy Jacka's face, then on the foolish mask of Silly Peter, the
local idiot, who stood slackly agape between a couple of miners. Then
Archelaus brought the light round, to fall on Ishmael's pale face ere
swinging it on to Killigrew.
"Lads, here's the young gentlemen from the Manor!" he cried--"come to
see a bit o' bush-beaten; let's show 'en, shall us?" And, still holding
his lantern so that its light fell on them, he deliberately let drive
with his great stick at a branch where a wounded bird was crushed upon a
sharp twig.
Ishmael sprang forward and laid hands on the stick, twisting at it with
all his strength. Archelaus gave for a flash under the sudden onslaught,
but, recovering himself at once, held the stick steady with one hand
against all the twisting of Ishmael's two. He laughed a little as he did
so. Silly Peter, under the impression that it was all part of the fun,
laughed too.
"You beast!... you beast!..." Ishmael was saying as he tussled.
Killigrew caught at his arm.
"Say something to them, Ishmael; say something to them. Don't go on like
that ..." he muttered urgently.
Ishmael turned on him a face distorted with passion. "Say
something--what is there to say to brutes like that? Ah!..."
Archelaus had thrown the lantern underfoot and trampled it out; a
darkness impenetrable to dazzled eyes enwrapped them. Killigrew, keeping
his head amidst the scuffing he heard, dived for where he had seen young
Jacka standing in guilty stillness, his dark lantern dangling from his
hand. Almost at once Killigrew felt his own fingers meet its smooth,
slightly hot surface; he wrenched it away and fumbled desperately at the
slide. A beam, pale but wavering, shot out into the darkness as he
succeeded in his effort, and by its light, as men in moments of emotion
may see some one thing or action painted on their retina by a lightning
flash, he saw Archelaus bringing his stick, muffled in a coat, down on
Ishmael's head. The next second the blow fell--there had not been time
for Archelaus to check the impetus of the blow when the discovering
light flared onto him. There came the heavy sound of a body falling on
the thick-piled leaves. Archelaus stumbled up against Killigrew,
knocking the lantern from his hand; it hit against a boulder and went
out.
It was the voice of Archelaus that broke the stricken stillness.
"Don't 'ee move, you chaps ..." it said, in tones that made a ghastly
essay at confidence and trembled despite his efforts. "I fear Silly
Peter's done someone a hurt.... I saw en striking out.... Why ded'n 'ee
all keep still same as I ded ... someone light a lantern...." Followed a
sound of fumbling, and then a light wavered in Killigrew's fingers; he
picked up and lit a lantern. By its light could be seen Archelaus
holding a bewildered Silly Peter, whose mouth and eyes hung open with
fear, while from his hand depended a stick wrapped in a coat. Even in
that dim light wet marks could be seen on it. The brain of Archelaus,
perhaps stirred to activity by his first inspiration of attack as much
as by the hatred that had suddenly welled up uncontrollably, had for
once worked with a desperate quickness. Everyone stared at one another
over the body of Ishmael that lay huddled on its face in the leaves.
"Help me pick him up, you two," ordered Killigrew to Jacka; "and you
there, go ahead with the light. Who is the fastest runner?"
"I'll go for doctor," said Archelaus. "'Tes my right. He'n my brother."
He boggled a little at the word.
"You!" began Killigrew, then stopped. His quick intuition had told him
how important it was to Archelaus also to be the first to get the
doctor. Killigrew was not a cynic, even at that age; he was merely
supremely utilitarian.
"Off you go," he said, "and remember I shall be timing you. The doctor
must be at Cloom as soon as we are."
"He shall be," declared Archelaus, and meant it. He kept his word. By
the time that Ishmael had been laid beneath the drooping Christ who had
seen so much of passion and misery, of birth and death, in that same bed
spread before Him, the doctor was there too. And round the bed clustered
as many distraught women, and men hovering at their skirts, as gathered
at the foot of the plaster Calvary above. Even the intent dog was not
wanting, as poor Wanda, conscious of disaster to the being she
worshipped, whimpered and shivered, her back curved in an arch of
distress, by the head of the bed.