With the finish of the holidays the guests at the Hall went their
several ways, and there was a lull in the feverish round of gaiety which
had moved Moresby out of its accustomed calm, and had introduced into
the usually contented breasts of the rustic portion of the community a
dissatisfaction with their former quiet life and a profound respect for
the new residents, quite apart from the prestige that descended upon
them by virtue of their dwelling at the Hall. Even in the matter of the
home farm, managed and worked entirely by women--which innovation had
been looked on distrustfully by the sons of the soil--the Chadwicks were
accorded a grudging recognition of success. The home farm was like to
prosper. Moreover, it would not interfere with local farmers.
Everything which it would produce was to be disposed of in markets which
Moresby did not reach. Mrs Chadwick had no intention of using her
wealth to the injury of her neighbours; and she made that clear to them
before she set about stocking her farm.
Since there was capital at the back of the enterprise, since the farm
was stocked with the best, and everything was up to date, and managers
and workers alike were keen and experienced, Mrs Chadwick had no
misgivings as to the ultimate result of this venture. It was a hobby of
hers, and one upon which she spent much time and thought. A woman
living in the country needed some outlet for her energy, she opined.
Robert, although he approved highly of Mrs Chadwick, was sternly
opposed to the idea of women farming. Hadn't he seen a woman "orched"?
And didn't he know how fearsome they were with cattle? Why, even the
milking was done by men nowadays, and a lot better done, in his opinion.
Mrs Chadwick invited him to inspect the farm and the model dairy, and,
because Robert interested her, she personally conducted his tour and
explained things to him, and listened to his comments attentively,
approving when he made a wise suggestion, which was seldom, and
maintaining silence before his cavilling remarks. One proposal which
she made out of the kindness of her heart threw Robert into such a fever
of angry trepidation that for the time his admiration for Mrs Chadwick
was seriously jeopardised--the proposal being that she should offer
Bob's young woman a position in the model diary. Robert stood still in
the path and eyed her stonily.
"Don't you do it, mum," he said, with such earnestness of manner, so
much angry opposition in his eyes, that Mrs Chadwick showed the
surprise she felt. "Don't you do it," he repeated.
"But why?" she asked. "I hoped I might be doing you, through Bob, a
little service."
"You'll be doin' me a much greater service in leavin' Bob's young woman
where 'er be," he replied. "If 'er comes yere Bob'll follow."
"I should have thought you and Hannah would be pleased at that," she
said.
"Maybe Hannah would. I don't doubt 'er would, 'cause 'er knows I'd be
vexed. Do you suppose," he added reproachfully, "that 'aving to go to
church more'n once o' Sundays, and sometimes in the week, I want to be
kep' awake o' nights listenin' to Bob 'ollering to the Lord? Hannah
don't mind, 'cause it isn't 'er profession; but when a man makes 'is
livin' through the Church 'e wants 'is off-time free o' it."
"I see," she said. "Yes; I had forgotten that. We will leave Bob's
young woman where she is."
"Don't think I'm not obliged to you, mum," Robert hastened to say,
relenting before her amiable reasonableness, "for thinking of it. But
it wouldn' be to your interest nohow. Bob's young woman would give more
time to 'er prayers than to your dairy. It's all soul wi' they, and
nothin' o' conscience. I wouldn' like you to be cheated like that
there; no, I wouldn'. A lady wot is so generous as you be ought to 'ave
'er interests studied."
Robert's zeal, like the zeal of many conscientious objectors to the
self-seeking of others, placed him beyond the proscribed limits of
profiting through Mrs Chadwick's generosity. He had profited
handsomely during the Christmas week; he profited again on that crisp
sunny morning when he parted from her after his inspection of the farm,
and left her walking leisurely across the fields with the pekinese
disporting itself beside her, running ahead of her in pursuit of
imaginary rabbits and running back again for approbation of its sporting
proclivities.
Where the fields were bisected by a country road Will Chadwick had
undertaken to meet her and motor her back. It was rather beyond the
hour fixed for the meeting, but Mr Chadwick was a patient man, and a
knowledge of his wife's habits prepared him for delay. He had brought
Diogenes with him in the car because Diogenes had expressed the wish to
accompany him; and Diogenes, not being blessed with the same amount of
patience, had been allowed to dismount, and was putting in his time, as
the pekinese was doing, in searching the hedges for possible sport.
Diogenes was not a sporting dog; but when he saw a cat, or any other
legitimate form of chase, he tried to cheat onlookers into believing
that he was. A pose is detestable in man or beast; it not infrequently
leads to his undoing. Diogenes posed so enthusiastically that he almost
deceived himself into mistaking the pose for the quality it sought to
emulate.
It was unfortunate that on this occasion, when he was especially bent on
imposing on himself, and was pursuing his snuffling search for hidden
prey among the dank fern-stalks and soft mould in the hedge, the
pekinese should at the same moment be engaged in a similar form of
deception on the farther side of the hedge. Diogenes detected the fur
of its long coat through the wet, shining leaves, and though familiarity
with the pekinese should have accustomed him to discriminate between it
and a cat, the practice of self-deception had become such an obsession
that he wilfully ignored this distinction and, with a low growl, burst
through the hedge and seized his quarry and shook it playfully in a
transport of delight, then laid the little limp body down and stood over
it in an attitude of satisfied triumph and barked a cheerful
accompaniment to Mrs Chadwick's screams.
Mrs Chadwick made a dart forward and struck at Diogenes with her hand,
to Diogenes' pained surprise; then she gathered the pekinese up in her
arms and fell to lamenting loudly.
Diogenes walked back to the car with an air of injured disgust and
wagged a short, tentative tail at his master; but Mr Chadwick, ignoring
these overtures, passed him, and was over the hedge in a trice and
beside his disconsolate wife.
"Oh, I say, Ruby, I am sorry!" was all that he could articulate, as he
gazed at the limp bit of fur in her arms and then into her weeping face.
He blamed himself for having brought Diogenes, but most of all he blamed
Diogenes for doing the last thing on earth that might have been expected
of him. As Mrs Chadwick continued to lament, and continued to hold the
dead dog in her arms, his perturbation increased to the extent of
causing him to swear.
"Damn that dog!" he exclaimed in exasperation, and put his arm about his
wife's shoulders, and took with his disengaged hand the limp, lifeless
thing from her. "He didn't suffer at all," he assured her. "It was so
quick, he couldn't have realised that he was hurt."
This knowledge was, of course, consoling to the bereaved mistress; but,
beside her grief at the loss of her tiny pet, the consolation was
insufficient to balance her distress. She laid her head on her
husband's shoulder and wept unrestrainedly, to the distrustful amazement
of a cow which lifted its head above the hedge to stare at this singular
grouping. Fortunately for the cow's peace of mind Diogenes was by now
thoroughly subdued, having gathered from the unusual noises disturbing
the tranquillity of the day that this game, like another game he had
played with Mr Musgrave's cat, promised a less agreeable ending than he
had foreseen. He recalled that on that occasion he had been beaten; so
he lay down docilely beside the motor and feigned slumber, in the hope
that when the fuss was over the cause of it would be forgotten. But
Diogenes' fate was even then being sealed on the other side of the
hedge.
"Don't cry, Ruby," Mr Chadwick said. "It won't bring the little beggar
to life, you know; and you'll make yourself sick. I'll get you another
pet, dear."
This promise, though well meaning, was mistaken. In the first shock of
her grief Mrs Chadwick recoiled from the suggestion.
"I couldn't have another pet," she wailed. "I loved him so. I couldn't
bear another dog in his place. I d-don't want to see a dog again."
"All right," he said. "But buck up, Ruby. Come and get into the car,
and I'll drive you home."
"I couldn't endure to have that brute in with me," she sobbed angrily.
"No, of course not. We'll leave the beast behind. You shan't be
worried with the sight of him again. I'll shoot him."
He made the promise glibly, in the hope that this threat would rouse
her. It roused her effectually, but not in the way in which he had
intended. She looked up with a gleam of vindictive satisfaction in her
eyes, showing through her tears.
"Oh, do!" she said. "Shoot him to-day. I couldn't see him about after
this."
"All right," he acquiesced, none too heartily. Diogenes was a valuable
dog, and had, moreover, a winning way with him towards the people whom
he liked, and Will Chadwick was certainly one of these. Mr Chadwick
could no more have shot the dog with his own hand than he could have
shot a child.
"I'll see to it," he said.
The first intimation Diogenes had that it was expected of him that he
should walk home was when the car started and left him, mute and
bewildered and bespattered with mud, in the road gazing after it. No
word had been vouchsafed him, no look. From the silence and the absence
of interest in himself he had been deluded into supposing that he was
not held responsible for the evil that had been done; but with the
disappearance of the car vague doubts disturbed him, and he started in a
sour, halfhearted way to follow the car and face his destiny. Even had
his intelligence been equal to grasping what that destiny was, so great
is the force of habit that he would have returned inevitably to meet it.
Diogenes got back some time after the car, and was met at the entrance
by one of the few men employed at the Hall. This person, who had
apparently been waiting for him, fastened a lead to his collar and took
up a gun which he had rested against a tree, seeming as though he too
were bent on posing as a sportsman, which he was not, save in the humble
capacity of cleaning his master's guns.
"You come along with me, old fellow," he said, and tried to look grim,
but softened on meeting Diogenes' inquiring eye. "Shame, I calls it,"
he ejaculated in a voice of disgust. "Anyone might 'a' made the mistake
of taking that there for a rabbit. Blest if I rekernised it for a dog
when I seed it first."
He led Diogenes out through the gate and down the road towards a field.
The gate of the field was troublesome to open. While he fumbled with
the padlock, his gun resting against the gatepost for the greater
freedom of his hands, a joyous bark from Diogenes, who previously had
worn a surprisingly docile and depressed mien, as though aware of what
was going forward which these preparations portended, caused him to
desist from the business of unfastening the gate to look up. When he
saw who it was whose hurrying figure Diogenes thus joyfully hailed, he
did not trouble to go on with his job, but waited for Peggy to approach.
She came up at a run, and caught at Diogenes' lead, and, holding it,
stared at the man.
"What were you going to do with him?" she asked, her accusing eyes going
from his face to the gun, and from the gun back again to his face.
"Shoot 'im, miss," he answered. "It's the master's orders."
"Absurd!" cried Peggy angrily. "I won't have it done."
"Sorry, miss," the man replied, looking at her with a mingling of doubt
and submission in his glance. "But I'm afraid it'll 'ave to be. Shoot
'im, without delay. Them's my orders."
"Well, you can't obey them," replied Peggy, as calmly as her agitation
allowed, "because, you see, I won't let you. You can't shoot him while
I hold him, can you?"
"No, miss," he replied. "But it's as much as my place is worth--"
Peggy cut him short.
"I am going to take him away," she said. "I'll hide him... send him
away from the place. But I won't have him sacrificed for--for a silly
accident like that. Both Mr and Mrs Chadwick will regret it later.
He's a very valuable dog."
"Yes, miss," he said. "I allow it's a shame. But the master was very
short and emphatic. What am I to say when 'e asks me if it's done?"
"He won't ask," Peggy answered, as confident that her uncle would be
nearly as pained at Diogenes' death as her aunt was over the pekinese.
"He will take it for granted, of course, that it is done. Go into the
field and fire off your gun, and then return to the house. I'll see to
Diogenes."
"You are quite sure, miss," the man said doubtfully, "that you won't let
no one see that there dog? If the master thought that I'd deceived
him--"
"No one shall see him," Peggy answered, not considering at the moment
the magnitude of this promise. "I take all responsibility. You leave
him with me."
"Very good, miss," he said cheerfully, as much relieved to be free from
the task appointed him as Peggy was to watch him vault the gate and
disappear, gun in hand, into the field.
The next thing she and Diogenes heard was the report of the gun as this
pseudo-murderer killed an imaginary dog in the field with bloodthirsty
zest.