A BLOW.
"FATHER, it's been just the nicest day I ever had in all my life,"
cried little Nannie eagerly, as she rushed into the cottage; and it
was a rare thing for Nannie to have spirits to rush anywhere. "Such
games down in the Dingle, all of us together, and—oh! father, only
think—there was Mr. Prior and all of 'em in the carriage, with a real
great hamper of things for all of us to eat. And we had such fun on the
grass. O father, it's been just beautiful."
"Nasty foggy sort o' day," growled Amos.
"Ah, but the fog didn't last long, did it, father? I think 'twas all
the more fun driving home, when we couldn't see our way. And d'you know
they lost the pretty young lady for ever so long, and found her asleep
on the grass, 'cause Madge told me."
"Yer can hold yer clack," said Amos ungraciously, not being of a
sympathising turn of mind. He did not like to think of the provisions
which she had had, and he had missed.
"And the parson made me a beautiful basket out of the peel of my
orange," pursued Nannie, too happy to repress her delight at a moment's
notice.
"Didn't cost him nothin'," said Amos.
"Ah! But he's as kind—as kind—" repeated Nannie. "And the lady that's
come to the Rectory played some games with us, and then we all went up
the Dingle."
A grunt was the response. Nannie's excitement was fast cooling. She
gave one little patient sigh, as she lighted the tallow dip in the
disjointed tin candlestick, thereby revealing a small sombre room of
generally musty scent and comfortless aspect. Amos had chosen to close
the rickety shutter before her arrival, thus cutting off the last
remains of twilight. What a contrast to the Dingle, with its green
carpet spreading out in the sunshine.
Nannie felt sobered all at once—hardly knowing why. She talked no more
of the day's pleasure, but quietly took out her Testament, and began to
learn her next Sunday-school lesson—a text and part of a hymn printed
upon a small leaflet. But Amos interposed.
"I say—"
"Yes, father."
"Yer can stop that now."
"I'm only learning for Sunday-school," said Nannie timidly.
"I ain't ageing to have ye wastin' candles over that sort o' work. Get
away to bed."
Nannie knew that remonstrance would be useless. She closed her
Testament, and put it away quietly. And then, by a sudden impulse, she
crept close up to his side. Such an unattractive repellent old man—the
marvel was that she cared for him at all. And yet she loved him.
"Father—" she said.
"Tell ye, yer can get to bed," said Amos, jerking his thumb in the
direction of Nannie's sleeping apartment.
"Mayn't I say one thing first?" asked Nannie, with a little heart which
fluttered and yet was brave.
"Don't care!" said Amos surlily.
"Father, I ain't sure as you'll like it," said Nannie. "But I've
been thinking ever so about you to-day,—and I've prayed you may
love God,—but I'm so feared every morning that maybe it's the
Resurrection-Day, and if you don't make haste, you won't be in time.
I'd want the Day to come, but for that. O father—please!"
The little upturned face was touching in its humility. She had no
thought of setting him right, or of interfering in matters which did
not concern her. It was only that she was so anxious and frightened for
him, that she could not help trying a few beseeching words.
But Amos Ackman was not in a state of mind to bear them patiently.
Nannie received no answer in speech. His right arm and leg were thrust
out sharply at the same moment, towards the slight figure of the little
girl beside him. Not that he meant to hurt her. It was just a momentary
outbreak of his crusty vicious temper. The candle was struck down and
extinguished, and Nannie was flung away—somewhere—he did not know
where, only he heard the sound of her heavy fall.
A fall, and then silence. Not a moan or a murmur broke in upon that
stillness. A pin-fall would have sounded distinctly through the room.
How dark it was! Only a glimmer of departing twilight crept in through
the loosely-shuttered window. Amos did so wish he had not put up the
shutter that evening. But he did not dare to go and remove it. He did
not dare to lift a finger. He did not dare to leave his seat, for if he
moved, he must needs go and see after little Nannie.
And the thought of that was dreadful to him. Amos Ackman was a
coward at heart. He remembered the words Madge Hardwicke had once
uttered,—"Thank God He's kept you from being a downright murderer."
Was he a murderer now? Nannie was lying somewhere on the floor in that
small room—lying dead! Amos felt quite sure on that point. He had no
doubt at all about the matter. The force of his own blow, as it had
come back to his ears, and the sound of her heavy helpless fall, and
the silence following, all told the same tale. Nannie was surely dead.
And he was her murderer! It was her own father's arm which had struck
the brutal coward-blow. Her own father, whom little Nannie had always
loved so well. What a gentle little girl she had been to him for years
past, and especially of late! She had borne his rough usage with such
patience and fortitude, clinging to him so tenderly through all. How
bitterly he had seen her cry over his harsh treatment of her, and yet
how ready she had been in the very midst of her tears to run and do his
bidding.
And "his" arm had struck the blow. It came over him all at once, what
a strange and terrible sight that little room would present to any one
looking in. He pictured it to himself vividly, as he sat staring into
the darkness, with drops coming thickly out upon his clammy face. The
broken wooden dresser on one side, with two mugs and three cracked blue
plates upon it. And the rickety round table in the middle. And the
two chairs, one having lost a leg, and the other having lost half its
back. And the old battered saucepan hanging up upon the wall, and the
blackened pipe upon the narrow mantel-shelf, and the dirty stew pan
lying down below in the fender among the cold embers. And the figure
of the wretched bent old man, cowering and shaking on his three-legged
stool. And the lifeless form of the little child, lying upon the floor.
Amos saw it all in his mind, and he was glad that he had put up the
shutter after all. There was a sort of shelter in the darkness. He
felt that nobody could possibly look in and see what had taken place.
By-and-by, as daylight dawned, people would come and find out all,
and Amos would be dragged away to prison, and had up before the
magistrates, and then—why, then, if they did not contrive to bring him
in as insane, which Amos felt quite sure was not the truth, he knew
the alternative. It was very dreadful to think of all these things as
coming upon him, but still now—just now—he felt relieved to know that
nobody could look in through the darkness.
Nobody! What of ONE.
Amos started and shuddered. For happening to glance up, his eye was
caught by the steady shining of one brilliant star—a planet rather, but
it was all the same to Amos—the beams of which came through a hole in
the closed shutter, straight to where he sat.
"The eyes of the Lord are in every place beholding the evil and the
good."
"The darkness hideth not from Thee, but the night shineth as the day;
the darkness and the light are both alike to Thee."
Where had he heard those fearful words? What was there in the shining
of that star to bring them to his mind? Were those the verses little
Nannie had been conning over so busily in her low clear tones the
previous Sunday evening? He had listened a minute or two, and then had
struck her book angrily out of her hand, and sent her off supperless
to bed. He had little thought those words would ever come back to
him—words he had learnt at his own mother's knee in early boyhood, and
had long since forgotten. And here they were in strong living power
ringing in his ears.
"The eyes of the Lord are in every place."
"The darkness and the light are both alike to Thee!"
Then His Eyes were there, beholding the little room and all it
contained. Darkness could make no difference. Darkness was clear as
noonday to those all-seeing Eyes.
Amos could not stand the radiance of that star. He pushed his stool a
little on one side, so that he was not able to see it. But he wanted to
know soon if it were still there, so he pushed his stool back again.
And next he wanted to know if the star were shining on the spot where
Nannie lay. He half rose from his seat to go and see, and then he was
afraid, and sat down again.
"The wicked flee when no man pursueth, but the righteous are bold as
a lion."
What had brought "that" into his head now? He did not remember hearing
Nannie say it. Possibly he had, however, and that was how it had come
back to him. It was too bad. Amos hated having those texts ringing
in his cars. He would take care Nannie should go no more to the
Sunday-school, and then she would not pester him with them. No, nor to
Madge Hardwicke's either. Nannie should stay at home and be busy. He
would have no more nonsense.
Nannie stay at home! Nannie not go to the Sunday-school! Why, he had
forgotten! What could he be thinking about? If Nannie were dead, what
had she to do any more with Sunday-school or Madge?
Amos groaned, and let his face drop down in his bony hands. He had
nobody to help him. He thought how Madge Hardwicke would pray if she
were in trouble, but he knew nothing of prayer. He had scorned all
notion of religion. Prayer was a foreign language to him altogether.
Nobody to help him now. Nobody to love him ever again. Nat Tyrrell
would never speak to him after this, and Nat Tyrrell was his only
friend. He had dashed aside the love of the one frail little creature,
who had held to him so steadfastly. And now—nothing was left to him.
"Father!"
A cold touch came upon his hand in the dark. Amos started back
violently in his fear. The old ignorant superstitious man did not think
it was Nannie herself come to see him, in the poor little body which he
had used so badly, but something of a spirit form—something dreadful,
unnatural, terrible. He was ready to believe anything that night.
It was Nannie's own little voice, however, which said again—
"Father." And then, as she felt how he shook and trembled before her,
she added, "What's the matter, father?"
"'Taint Nannie, sure," said Amos hoarsely. "I—I wish yer 'd get along."
"Why, father, don't you know me?" asked Nannie. "I couldn't think what
you was after, when I got up, and saw you sitting there."
For early dawn was stealing in through the closed shutters, and the
long night-hours had passed away somehow. Amos did not know how. He
never would know. He might have lived through ten years, or only ten
minutes, since the evening before. It was all the same to him. He could
have believed either assertion.
Nannie went and opened the closed shutters with her little feeble
hands, which had not much of even their usual strength in them this
morning. Then she came back again, and for the first time he ventured
to look at her.
"I'd been thinkin' I'd killed you outright, Nan," he muttered. "I ain't
agoin' to knock you down again, though,—and I didn't mean to then,
neither."
"Won't you do it, father, even if I speak to you about the Lord Jesus
once in awhile?" asked little Nannie, true even in her pain and
weakness to her constant aim, as the needle to the pole.
"I'll let yer say what yer likes," returned Amos. "Be you very bad,
Nan?"
Nannie's white drooping face looked up with a brave smile. "I'll be
better soon, father. I'll go and lie down a bit, 'cause I'm so tired.
But we ain't going to tell nobody about to-night."
"They'd have me took up an' punished, sure enough, if 'twas known,"
said Amos in fear.
"No, nobody ain't to know," repeated Nannie. "I think I've been
stunned, you know, but I'll be better by-and-by. And you're going to
love me now, ain't you, please?"
She leant against him feebly. "I've been a bad father to yer, Nannie, I
have," he said self-reproachfully.
And then, with a gentle kiss—the first she had dared to give him for
a long while past—she walked away and laid herself down on the little
palliasse which formed her bed. And Nannie probably knew scarcely
better than did Amos himself that the long unconsciousness which
followed was not sleep, but alternate fainting and stupor. Poor little
Nannie! She had no one to help her in her need, so she only lay in
patient meek endurance.
Somewhere about nine o'clock Madge Hardwicke came to the door.
"Amos—up, are you?" she said. "Where's Nannie?"
"Asleep, an' you'd best leave her," said Amos, not caring that the two
should meet sooner than was needful.
"Maybe the little lass is tired with yesterday. 'Twas something new for
her, and she don't look well neither of late. Tell her from me, will
you, Amos, that I'm called off down in the town, and maybe won't be
back a good many days."
Amos concealed his satisfaction. "What's the matter? Doctor wants yer,
eh?"
"Miss Clyde's down with the fever. Will you give a truthful message for
me, Amos? Tell Nannie she's to pray. Poor young lady. I doubt me but
it's a bad case, and the doctor's nigh heart-broken already."
"I'll give yer message," said Amos, anxious to have her gone.
And Madge withdrew, marvelling much what could have made him so unlike
himself.
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