dearie--an' I axe your pardon for so miscalling ye, I'm sure, seeing
ye've grown out o' nursing-clothes. Ye've getten a tidy handful o' wark
afore ye, an' Witherlee says to me this varry afternooin, 'Nanny,' says
he, 'them Ratcliffes is up an' astir like a hornet's nest; I'm hoping
th' Waynes 'ull bring swords an' sharp e'en to th' burying, for we can
noan on us tell what 'ull chance,' he says. That war what Witherlee
said, just i' so many words; an' though he's like a three-legged stool
about a house, allus tripping ye up wheniver ye stir, he can do part
thinking time an' time, can Witherlee. I war coming to axe ye afore he
spoke, for I war fain to see th' last o' th' owd Maister; but I war up
i' a brace o' shakes at after he'd gi'en me that notion, for I could see
'at a man wodn't frame to fight varry weel on th' top of a long neet's
wakefulness."
Nanny paused for breath, and the young Master took advantage of a break
that might not come soon again. "The Ratcliffes will wait till after
the burying. There's scant need for aught save wet eyes to-morrow,
Nanny," he said.
"Well, that's as it mun be; an' what mun be nowt 'ull alter, so we
willun't fash ourselns. But for owd love's sake, Maister, ye'll let me
bide by thy father? 'Tis long since I axed owt, big or little, of ye
Waynes, an' ye'll noan deny it me, now, will ye?"
Shameless Wayne, as he had said, was in a soft mood, and Nanny's sharp
face was so full of entreaty that he saw it would be a bitter blow to
her if he denied the boon. "Have it as thou wilt," he said. "Father
was always kindly in his thoughts of thee, Nanny, and it may please him
better than any watching of mine could do."
Rolf Wayne of Cranshaw, meanwhile, had ridden over to Marsh to see if
there were aught that he could do; and Nell, meeting him as he came in
at the hall door, gave him a warm welcome, for the late quarrel with her
brother had left her sad, and the silence of the death-chamber fostered
such sort of misery.
"Rolf, my step-mother has come back, and Ned has welcomed her," she
said, after they had talked awhile of this and that in hushed voices.
"What! Mistress Wayne come back?"
"Yes, mad as a marshland hare, with all her old pleading ways so
deepened that she has won Ned clean over to her side."
"Fairy-kist, is she?"
"Aye--though, to my thinking, she was always near to it."
"Then, lass, there's no room for anger. Let her be; 'tis ill-luck
crossing such, and we have need----"
"An old tale, Rolf!" she broke in stormily. "Ned said as much awhile
since--as though, God's pity, there could good luck come of harbouring
such as her. There! I am distraught. Wilt watch the bier, Rolf, while
I run out and cool my wits a little?"
"The night is over cold. Bide by a warm fireside, and talk thy troubles
out to one who cares for thee."
"Nay, I must be alone. Let me go, dear! I tell thee, my head throbs
and throbs, and I shall go the way of Mistress Wayne unless thou'lt
humour me."
She slipped a cloak about her, checking Rolf's efforts to detain her,
and went quietly out into the courtyard. There was a touch of winter in
the air, and a touch of spring, and overhead the stars shone dewy. The
girl shivered a little, but not for cold, as she crossed into Barguest
lane and saw a red moon climbing up above Worm's Hill. Up and down she
paced, up and down, thinking of Shameless Wayne, of her step-mother, of
everything that vexed and harassed her. Nor did her brain grow cooler
for the night's companionship; rather, the silence let stranger fancies
in than she would have harboured at any other time or place.
"Ned has such need to be strong, and he has ever been weak as running
water," she muttered, and stopped, and wondered that the breeze which
blew from the moor-edge down Barguest lane had grown so chill upon the
sudden.
Aware of some vague terror, yet acknowledging none, she held her breath
and bent her ear toward the lane-top. A sound of pattering footsteps
drifted down--they were close beside her now, as the wind brushed her
cloak--and now again the footsteps were dying at the far end of the
lane. And a whine that was half a growl crept downward in the wake of
pattering feet and icy wind.
"'Tis Barguest!" muttered Nell, and raced down the road, and across the
courtyard, and into the hall where Wayne of Cranshaw sat watching by the
dead.
Her pride was gone now, and the last impulse of defiance. She waited no
asking, but put her arms about Rolf's neck and bade him hold her close.
"I heard the Hound's voice in the lane just now," she whispered.
"There's trouble coming on us, Rolf--more trouble--I never heard his
step go pattering down the road so plain."
"Didst never hear the water try its new trick, thou mean'st. I was a
fool to let thee go and nurse thy fancies in such a spot," said her
lover roughly. But his eyes had another tale to tell, and across his
brow a deep line of foreboding showed itself.
"Fancies go as soon as thought of, and naught comes of them--but when
did I hear Barguest in an idle hour?" she said. "Dear, I am
ashamed--but--thou canst not hold me close enough--hark. There's
something at the door--a whining, Rolf, and the scrape of paws against
the oak----"
"Ay, 'tis Barguest," said Nanny Witherlee, stepping soft across the
polished boards and resting one hand on the bier.
"There's naught, save a wet wind sobbing through the firs," growled
Wayne of Cranshaw.
"Is there not? What say ye to that, Mistress? Ye an' me know Barguest
when we hear him, an' 'tis as I said to th' young Maister awhile back.
There's sorrow brewing thick, an' th' Brown Dog hes come to bid ye look
to pistol-primings an' th' like. He knaws, poor beast, an' he's
scratting at th' door this minute to ease his mind by telling ye."
"Get to bed, Nell," said Wayne of Cranshaw quietly; "when Nanny falls to
boggart-talk, and the maid who listens is half mad with sorrow----"
"Tales is tales, Maister Wayne," broke in Nanny, "an' I wod scare no
poor less wi' lies at sich a time--but Barguest is more nor a tale, an'
I should know, seeing th' years I've bided here at Marsh. I mind th'
neet when Mistress Nell's mother war ta'en, ten year agone, it war just
th' same--th' Brown Dog came pattering right up to th' door-stun,
an'----"
"God rest thee for the daftest fool in Marshcotes," cried Wayne of
Cranshaw, as he saw Nell go ashen-grey and all but fall. And then he
led the girl out, and helped her to the stair-top.
"There'll be one to watch the bier till dawn?" she asked wearily, as he
bade her good-night.
"Trust me to see to that. Never heed old wives' tales, Nell, and keep
up heart as best thou canst," he answered, and went down again into the
hall.
Nanny was fingering the shroud softly, and scarce glanced up as Wayne
approached. "Gooid linen, ivery yard on 't," she muttered, "though I
says it as shouldn't. Ay, an' bonnily hemmed a' all. Wayne o' Marsh
may lig proud, that he may, an' I war allus sartin sure 'at a man gets a
likelier welcome up aboon if he's buried i' gooid linen.--Begow, but his
face is none so quiet as I should hev liked to see it; there's summat
wick i' th' set on 't, as if he wod right weel like to be up an'
cracking Ratcliffe skulls."
"Where is the Master, Nanny?" asked Wayne of Cranshaw, cutting short her
musings.
"He war dahnstairs a while back, for I met him as I war coming in here.
But mad Mistress Wayne began to call out his name, an' he thinks nowt
too mich to do for her nowadays. He'll be gi'eing her another bite an'
sup, belike."
"Then who will watch? I was for riding back to Cranshaw, but if there's
need of me----"
"Who'll wake? Why, who should wake save Nanny Witherlee? Th' Maister
promised I should, for I axed him a while back; so ye needn't fash
yourseln about that, Maister."
"Then good-night to thee, Nanny--and--have a care of Mistress Nell, for
she is in strange mood to-night. Barguest is well enough for a fireside
gossip, nurse, but such talk comes ill when a maid's spirits are low."
Nanny laughed softly, and pointed a lean finger at him as he stood
halting near the door. "Ye do weel to mock at Guytrash, Maister, an' ye
do weel to give advice to one that's known more sorrow nor ye--but why
doan't ye cross th' threshold?"
Wayne of Cranshaw was ashamed to feel the sweat-drops trickling down his
face; but he could not kill the fear that brought them there.
"They say a Cranshaw Wayne fears nowt, man nor devil," went on the
Sexton's wife--"but there's one thing 'at maks his heart beat like th'
clapper of a bell--an' ye dursn't cross what ligs on th' door-stun."
He put his hand on the door and flung it wide; and the incoming wind
drove the flames of the death-candles slant-wise toward the further
wall. The moonlight lay quiet and empty on the threshold, and overhead
the firs were plaining fitfully. "There's naught lies there," said he
with a chill laugh, and went to fetch his horse from stable.
But Nanny's eyes were fixed on the door long after Wayne of Cranshaw had
pulled it to behind him--long after she had heard his horse trot up the
road--and she seemed to see there more than the candle-light sufficed to
show.
"Is there aught I can get thee, Nanny, before I wend to bed?" said
Shameless Wayne, entering a half-hour later.
"Nowt, an' thank ye. I've getten company, an' they'll keep me wake, I
warrant."
"_They_, say'st thou? God's truth, Nanny, but thy eyes are fain of the
doorway yonder!"
"Ay, I've getten th' owd Maister, an' I've getten Barguest. Get ye to
bed, Maister, for I tell ye there'll be need o' ye to-morn. Ye're ower
late as 'tis."
"Mistress Wayne would have me go and sit by her; she could no way sleep,
poor bairn, and it seemed to comfort her to have me at the bedside and
to hold my hand. She's sleeping now." He bent over the dead, and
whispered something; and when he lifted his face it showed deep lines of
purpose clean-chiselled in the youthful features. "Good-night, nurse.
God rest thee, and all of us," he said, with unwonted piety.
The candles were guttering in their sockets, and Nanny replaced them
soon as the lad's foot had ceased to creak on the stair. All were abed
now, save Nanny Witherlee--save Nanny, and the rats behind the
wainscoting, and something that scraped restlessly at the stout door of
oak.
"Why are they feared o' Barguest?" muttered the Sexton's wife. "He
niver yet did hurt to a Wayne or ony friends o' th' Waynes; nay, he's
that jealous for their safety 'at he can no way bide still when
mischief's brewing. Whisht, lad, whisht! Owd Nanny hearkens, an'
she'll mind 'at th' Waynes go armed to th' burial to-morn."
It might be twelve o'clock of that night, while Nanny sat still as the
body she watched by, that Shameless Wayne, trying to win sleep from a
hard pillow, heard a horseman ride up to the hall door. There were
three strokes, as of a hammer on a nail, and then, before he had well
leaped from bed, a voice came from the moonlight under his window.
"Ride hard to Cranshaw Rigg. There's somebody waits thee there, Wayne
the Shameless." It was Nicholas Ratcliffe's voice, hard and thin and
high-pitched.
Shameless Wayne snatched a pistol from the bed-head, and flung the
casement wide, and saw the Lean Man riding hard up Barguest lane. He
took a quick aim and pulled the trigger; but old Nicholas rode on, and
the moonlight showed him stark on the hilltop as he turned once for a
backward look at Marsh.
"So the hunt is up already," said Shameless Wayne, banging to the
casement and getting to bed again. "What has the lean rogue left on the
door down yonder?--well, we shall see to-morrow," he muttered presently,
turning over on his side. "There's naught gained by losing sleep--if
only sleep would come."
But sleep did not come yet awhile, and his thoughts wandered to Janet
Ratcliffe--Janet, whom he had met to-day upon the moor--Janet, the
daughter of that same Lean Man on whom he had just now turned a
pistol-muzzle.
Nanny Witherlee, too, had heard the three taps on the door, and the Lean
Man's high-pitched voice. "I know weel enough what he's put on th'
door," she said, not stirring from her stool at the bier-foot. "Th' owd
feud began i' th' same way, an' I mind to this day how th' Maister, who
cars so quiet yonder, looked when he came down i' th' morning an' fund
th' token that war left nailed to th' oak." Her eyes lit up on the
sudden, and a sombre mirth lengthened the thin line of her mouth. "But
one thing Nicholas Ratcliffe didn't know, I warrant--that Barguest war
ligged on th' door-stun! He crossed th' Brown Dog as he set nail to
door, an' a babby could tell what that spells. Sleep ye quiet,
Shameless Wayne, for ye'll turn th' spindle that's to weave th' Lean
Man's winding-sheet."
*CHAPTER VII*
*THE LEAN MAN'S TOKEN*
At dawn of the next day Shameless Wayne awoke from a troubled sleep,
with Nicholas Ratcliffe's visit fresh in his mind and a drear foreboding
at his heart. He could rest no longer, but hurried into his clothes and
went down to the shadowy hall, where the candles still burned and the
Sexton's wife still watched the dead.
"Didst hear Nicholas Ratcliffe's voice yesternight?" he said, coming
close to Nanny's elbow.
"For sure I did."
"And the tapping on the door? What was he at, think'st thou, Nanny?"
"Oppen th' door, Maister, an' ye'll see. But doan't look to find owt
bonnie."
She watched him as he pulled down the latch and stepped into the rainy
April dawn. The sun was red above Worm's Hill and its light fell
straight upon a man's hand fixed to the upper cross-bar of the door. A
broken stone, lying beside the lintel, showed how the Lean Man had
driven his nail into the wood. Shameless Wayne fell back a pace or two,
his eyes on the grisly token, while Nanny hobbled to the door.
"Ay, I guessed as mich," she said, looking once at the hand and thence
to the young Master's face. "Twenty year gone by it war th' same, an'
I've heard tell that, long afore I war born or thowt on, th' Lean Man's
grandfather rade down to Marsh one neet an' fixed a Wayne's hand to th'
door. Do ye mind th' tale, Maister? I telled it when ye war no higher
nor my knee."
"I had forgotten it, nurse. Yond is the badge of feud, then? So be it.
There'll be sword-play, Nanny, soon as father is well laid to rest."
"Afore, I warrant," said Nanny sharply. "Willun't ye hearken to me,
lad, when I tell ye that a devil sits snug behind ivery Ratcliffe
muzzle?"
"Save Mistress Janet's," muttered the other, absently.
"Oh, th' wind blows that road, does it? I've thowt as mich, time an'
time. Maister, I war aye fond o' ye, an' that ye knaw--gi'e no heed to
th' lass, for all her bonnie ways. Ye cannot grow taties i' mucky soil,
anor father a right sort o' love on a Ratcliffe."
"Hold thy peace, Nanny! who said I cared for Mistress Ratcliffe?"
"Your face, lad, said it. Theer! I've angered ye, an' ye've enough as
'tis to put up wi'.--I war saying, Maister, that ye'll niver bottom th'
meanness of a Ratcliffe, as I can do; an' when ye think 'at they'll
respect a dead man ony more nor a wick un, ye're sore mista'en."
"Nay, they're an ill lot--but even the Lean Man would scruple to set on
mourners at a grave-side."
"Trust an owd head, Maister. Witherlee put a plain question to Red
Ratcliffe yestermorn; he axed him fair an' square if they meant to let
th' burying go by i' peace; an' he telled by th' look o' th' chap 'at
they meant to do no sich thing.--Lad, I'll not axe ye to believe, for
ye've getten your father's trick o' thinking th' best of ony mon save
yourseln; but I will axe ye to humour an owd body's fancy, and to send
as quick as may be to your kin at Hillus, an' Cranshaw to bid 'em buckle
their sword on afore they come to Marsh."
"When did Marshcotes ever see armed mourners at a graveside?" he said,
eyeing her doubtfully. "'Twill wear a queer look, Nanny, if no attack
is made."
"It 'ull wear a queerer, my sakes, if they come an' cut ye all i' little
pieces. For owd sake's sake, Maister, promise me ye'll do it. Yond's
Simeon stirring at th' back o' th' house; I should know his step by now,
for he walks as if one foot war flaired-like to follow t' other. Bid
Simeon get hisseln to horseback----"
"I doubt it still, nurse. What if the Lean Man has nailed his token to
the door? There's time and to spare, by the Heart, for what will
follow."
"Fiddle o' that tale!" cried the Sexton's wife briskly. "If ye choose
to lig cold i'stead o' warm, I've ta'en trouble enough wi' ye i' times
past, that I hev, to warrant my stepping betwixt ye an' ony sich-like
foolishness. An' if ye doan't send Simeon, I'll walk myseln both to
Hillus an' to Cranshaw--ay, that I will--Maister, do ye knaw 'at th'
Lean Man crossed Barguest last neet as iver war?"
Shameless Wayne shook his head, smiling a little at the old woman's
fancy. "How should that be, nurse?" he said.
"Barguest war carred on th' door-stun, fair as if he'd been ony mortal
dog; an' while th' Lean Man war agate wi' hammering his nail in, I heard
th' hound whimper fit to mak ye cry for pity of him. But Nicholas
Ratcliffe niver heard th' poor beast, not he; an' I hugged myseln to
think 'at ivery stroke on th' nail-head war a stroke to his own coffin.
Ye've getten your chance, Maister, an' I willun't let ye loss it for a
lack of a bit o' forethowt."
Insensibly Wayne yielded to the old beliefs; reason might chide him, but
he knew in his heart, from that time forward, that he would be even with
the Lean Man before the end. What tales had Nanny not told him in
childhood, of Barguest and his ways? What musty traditions were not
grafted on his growing manhood, of the certain disaster that waited any
foeman of the Waynes who crossed the Spectre Hound? Ay, he believed, and
his eyes shone clear with the first light of hope that had touched them
since he returned two nights ago to the Bull tavern, a sobered and
heart-stricken man.
"There's Nell!" cried Wayne on the sudden, pushing Nanny roughly into
the house. "For God's sake keep her within-doors, nurse, till I have
plucked down yonder trophy."
"Sorrow's a rare un to get folk up betimes; how oft is Mistress Nell
astir wi' th' dawn, I wonder?" muttered Nanny, as she returned to the
hall, closing the door behind her.
"Good-morrow, nurse," said the girl, crossing the hall and laying her
two cold hands in Nanny's. "Art weary, belike, with the long watch?"
The Sexton's wife looked at Nell's white face and red-rimmed eyes, and
she could find no heart to answer; she just took the lass in her arms,
and kissed her, and comforted her with such little wordless tendernesses
as she had used when Nell had been frightened as a bairn.
While they stood thus, still with no speech between them, a horse pulled
up at the door, and they could hear the rider's voice strike, deadened a
little but clear, through the stout oaken planks.
"The feud is up, lad! When I rode home last night they had slain one of
my folk on Cranshaw Rigg."
"Ay, and the body lacked"--came the voice of Shameless Wayne.
"God's pity! Wrench it down. 'Tis my brother's hand, Ned," broke in
the first speaker.
"What is't?" cried Nell, freeing herself from Nanny's arms and turning
sharply. "That was Rolf's voice--and Ned is with him--what are they
doing, nurse?"
"Niver heed 'em, bairn--they're nobbut----"
"Ay, but thou canst not blind me, Nanny! I know! I dreamed of it the
night through--'tis the old token father told me of so oft--'tis a
Wayne's hand, nurse! Did I not tell thee Barguest went pad-footed down
the lane beside me?"
"Now, whisht ye, mistress! Your sweetheart's safe, as ye can hear, an'
he'll be in by an' by--he's coming now, an' ye'll noan want me, dearie,
when he's by to comfort ye. I'll waken th' wenches, an' then I mun lig
me down awhile, for there's a lot needs seeing to this day."
Nell stood there idly until the old woman's steps were lost among the
restless echoes of the house. On a sudden the main door was thrown
open, and Shameless Wayne came in alone.
"Why did not Rolf stay?" asked Nell.
"Because I gave him a message for his folk at Cranshaw. Nay, I cannot
tell thee what it was; 'twould only scare thee. --Come, Nell! I, too,
have to get to saddle, and I fear to leave thee with such misery in thy
face. Where are the lads?"
"Abed yet--wearied with their hunting."
"They must not come to the kirkyard. Bid them keep close to home till
we return."
"But, Ned, why should they keep away?" the girl began.
He stopped her, with the quiet, forceful air that she was learning to
obey. "Because I bid them," he said, and kissed her lightly on the
cheek, and went out to the stables.
Nell crossed to the bier, where her father lay heedless of the storm and
fret that his death had brought to old Marsh House. She sat her down,
and put her face between her hands, and let her thoughts go drifting
down the pathway of the years. From time to time the maids came in and
busied themselves with setting out the table for the feast that would
follow the old master's burial in a few hours' time; but the master's
daughter seemed to heed them as little as himself. She thought of her
brother, wondering at the change in him, yet doubting that the old
wildness would return soon as the first keen smart of shame was
softened; she thought of Mistress Wayne, who was a guest here in the
house which she had dishonoured in all men's eyes; and then again she
remembered what had chanced in Marshcotes kirkyard, and told herself
that surely a twelvemonth had hurried by since she went up to the
belfry-tower with a knife close hidden under her cloak.
Not two days ago she had watched the life ebb fast and red from the
wound in her father's back, while his murderer looked on and laughed;
and now he was ready for the grave; and in between there had seemed no
rest from the hurry of events. Dick Ratcliffe had paid his price; one
of the Cranshaw Waynes had fallen at the Lean Man's hand; the old
feud-token had been nailed over the Marsh doorway; and under all the
present misery--the grief and fret and long-drawn-out restlessness that
wait on burial--was the overshadowing sense of tragedy to come. To-day
they would lay their dead to rest; and then the smouldering embers of
the feud would leap to flame; and after that no man nor woman of them
all could count a day safe won through till it was done, and men's lives
and women's honour would be no more than straws upon the fast-racing
stream of chance.
All this went back and forth in the girl's mind, and the feud took on a
hundred different shapes each time she thought of it. It was the feud
she had heard of since earliest childhood, the feud whose memory was
grafted in by many a far-back legend and nearer tale of fight. Often
and often in the happier years she had wondered, as a girl will, how the
way of it would be if the quarrel broke out afresh: there had been deeds
of high courage and glamour of sword-thrust to make her almost love the
feud and count it noble; but now that it was on them, now that it hugged
the very threshold, naked, terrible and brutish, she understood the
reality and lost her dream-visions of the splendour and the majesty of
fight. Fight meant gaping wounds, and blood upon the floor, and men
going into the shadowy places when they were at the topmost of their
strength. God knew that, if the choice were hers, she would cry peace
once and for all and let the dead past rest.
Yet her mood changed like the gusty wind that whistled now and then
across the chimney-stacks. No sooner had she let that eager prayer for
peace escape her, than her hands clenched themselves, and her eyes
brightened, and the old vengeance-cry of her people rose hot to her
lips. Let bloodshed come, and slaughter--and she would take new heart
as one by one the Ratcliffes fell. Never in all the years that they had
been together had the likeness between the dead man and his daughter
shown more plain than now, as she laid her hand on his and counted his
wrongs afresh. The pride of her race, its pitiless sternness when
wronged, seemed gathered from the long-dead generations who had fought
the Wayne and Ratcliffe fight aforetime; and the hate of the fathers
woke again to splendour and to savagery in the slender-supple body of
this last daughter of the line.
She could sit still no longer, but got to her feet and crossed to the
garden-door. The house-air stifled her; men fought under the open sky,
and for that cause there was friendship in wind and sun and drifting
clouds. Something like a prayer--a masterful prayer, and a bitter--rose
to the girl's lips as she stood and felt the keen wind in her face.
"Keep warm my hate, Lord God!" she cried.
A light footstep sounded from the hall behind her. She turned and saw
little Mistress Wayne bending over her father's body, with the same
questioning, roguish air that she had worn last night.
"Wake, wake!" Mistress Wayne was lisping in the dead man's ear. "'Tis
my wedding-morn, I tell thee, and all at Marsh must come to see it."
Not touched at all was Nell by the piteousness of the scene. She
remembered only what this woman had done, and forgot how hard a penance
she was undergoing.
"Get ye gone," she said, clutching her step-mother fiercely by the arm.
"Is't not enough that you have killed him, but you must mock him after
death?"
Mistress Wayne shrank backward from her touch. "I did but try to wake
him, Nell. He would be angered if he missed my bridal-morn."