"O'ER MOOR AND FEN."
Self-reverence, self-knowledge, self-control,
These three alone lead life to sovereign power,
Yet not for power (power of herself
Would come uncall'd for), but to live by law,
Acting the law we live by without fear;
And, because right is right, to follow right
Were wisdom in the scorn of consequence.
TENNYSON.
And after all the struggle seemed utterly useless, for the Exeter
---- Institute would not accept him as secretary. He was in every
way suited for their purpose, and by far the most promising of the
candidates; but in a close cross-examination the insuperable barrier
was brought to light.
"And your religious views, sir?" asked the president. "As this is a
charitable institution, we always make a point of knowing the views
of our staff. It is well to be united. Do you belong to the High or
Low party?"
"To neither," said Donovan, stiffly. "I am an atheist."
And in those four words lay his doom; because the institute was a
_charitable_ one it could not help such a hardened sinner, could not
let its accounts and letters be contaminated by his touch.
"I have come from a great distance in the hope of getting this post,"
said Donovan, swallowing his pride. "I am very much in need of work.
Surely in the mechanical work of a secretary such a matter as one's
private creed might be passed over. What difference can it make to
anyone else?"
"My dear sir," said the head of the charitable institution, "I can
only refer you to the Bible, where you will find the injunction: 'Be
not unequally yoked together with unbelievers,' and 'What part hath
he that believeth with an infidel?'"
"Alas! for the rarity
Of Christian charity
Under the sun."
With the indifference of his kind, however, the frigid adherence to
the letter, and the disregard of the spirit, a sort of bitter
resolution awoke in Donovan's heart. He would not be doomed by a
"charitable" institution, he would not sink down quietly into
starvation. Life in itself was not worth a straw, but just from
opposition, from a manly love of breasting "the blows of
circumstance," he would struggle on, fight down all obstacles, live
to be of use too, in spite of the president's specimen of Christian
generosity and brotherliness. Fiercely through his teeth he quoted
Shylock's passionate words, "Hath not a Jew eyes? ... fed with the
same food ... warmed and cooled by the same winter and summer as a
Christian is?"
He had been two days at Exeter; now returning to his lodgings, he sat
down and resolutely went over all possible plans for his future.
Should he go back to Greyshot? Mr. Alleyne, the man with whom he
used to read, might possibly put him in the way of employment. It
was not very likely, though, and there were many objections to a
return to the old neighbourhood. Should he write to old Mr. Hayes?
He might be at home again by this time, though in the winter Doery
had said he was still abroad. But Mr. Hayes was poor, and would
unquestionably think only of monetary help. No, that would not do.
Should he go home and throw himself on his mother's mercy? But that
thought was too wildly impracticable as well as too painful to be
allowed for a moment. What connections had he in this part of the
world? What had his father's business in Plymouth been, when four
years ago they had gone there together? Searching back in his memory
he at length recalled the name of his father's acquaintance, and
remembered that he had described him as a pleasant elderly man. He
was a banker--there would be no difficulty in finding his address.
He began a letter to him at once, a brief, business-like, stiff
letter, not at all like that of a starving man asking for help. But
then he had no intention of starving. He was young and
strong-willed, undaunted still, notwithstanding his repulses.
Having despatched the letter, he made up his mind to follow it; there
was no hope of finding work in this quiet old city; at Plymouth he
would have more chance. He might just as well spend his time in
getting there as in loafing about the Exeter streets. Getting there
meant walking, for the proceeds of the clock were nearly exhausted,
and would barely suffice to get him some sort of food and shelter,
but he rather enjoyed the thought of the exercise, and even the
prospect of "roughing it" a little.
So the next morning, with his few belongings stowed away in a small
bag--the portmanteau had been discarded in Liverpool,--he set out on
his walk. The natural energy of his character shone out strangely
every now and then, in spite of the disastrous education which had so
cramped it. No one meeting him that day, as he walked briskly along
the Devonshire lanes, would have imagined that he was as poor as the
veriest tramp, and had infinitely fewer resources than most beggars.
His stern face was lighted up with resolute perseverance, there was a
sparkle, not exactly of enjoyment, but of keen determination, in his
eye; he held his head just as proudly as in the days when he had been
Donovan Farrant, Esq., of Oakdene Manor.
It was a lovely July day, a little hot for walking certainly,
especially in the deep lanes where every breath of air seemed to be
shut out; but there was something satisfactory about the whole
excursion, and Donovan walked on steadily. The high hedges were in
their full beauty--beautiful as only Devonshire hedges can be, with
their broad green fringes of harts-tongues, their drooping lady ferns
and sturdy bracken, their glorious wild roses and bramble bushes,
with here and there a bit of mossy grey stone cropping out, or a
miniature waterfall thrusting its silvery white head through the
grasses, and tumbling with splash and splutter into the tiny wayside
brook below. The smell of the new-mown hay gave a country fragrance
to the air, and in most of the fields the men and women were hard at
work, while wisps of sun-dried grass caught here and there on each
side of the road proved that loaded waggons had already passed that
way, leaving their trophies on the hedges.
Donovan had made up his mind to sleep at Chagford, and it was already
late when he crossed Fingle Bridge. The view there was so exquisite,
however, that he was obliged to stop for a few minutes; resting on
the grey stone parapet, he looked down at the transparently clear
river, along the green meadows and wooded valleys to the hills which,
encircling all, stood out clearly defined against the soft evening
sky. All was quiet and peaceful; in this country stillness and
exquisite beauty, it seemed possible almost to realise that once all
the world had been pronounced "very good." Donovan thought only,
however, of the contrast of this peace with the world of competition,
the overcrowded market of labourers in which he was trying to push
his way. It was with a sigh that he turned away and walked on to the
little grey town of Chagford, where the lights were beginning to
shine out from the cottage windows, and the square tower of the
church stood darkly above the lower roofs, a grim silent guardian.
Very early the next day he was on his way again, exulting in the
fresh morning air, and greatly looking forward to the crossing of the
moor. Waif scampered on in front, enjoying the exercise as much as
his master, and Donovan found himself whistling as he walked. At
length, leaving the cultivated region behind him, he struck across
the wild waste of Dartmoor, and then the full delights of his walk
came to him. The freshest, purest, strongest air in England was
blowing in his face, his feet were treading a springy elastic soil,
and all around him was a scene of the wildest beauty. The heather
was not yet out, but the gorse blossoms still lingered, and made a
golden glow over the great undulating expanse, while all round the
tors raised their rugged, granite heads, now in full sunshine silvery
white, now with a passing cloud shadow darkest purple--grotesque,
fancifully shaped, irregular, and yet exactly harmonizing with the
barren waste surrounding them.
On sped the dog and his master, now through marshy ground, springing
from one tuft of heather to another, now up across the scattered
granite blocks of a tor, and down again into a fresh featured waste
on the other side, now startling a troop of the wild Dartmoor ponies
which galloped away, their manes flying in the wind, and Waif barking
at their heels, now stepping across one of the old British
encampments with their imperishable "hut circles."
It was not till about five in the afternoon that he reached Prince
Town, and then for the time his pleasure was clouded, for the first
sight that greeted him was the great grey block of buildings where
poor Noir Frewin had been unjustly immured. Passing some wretched
little black cottages which are familiarly known as New London, he
went down the hill to the town itself, on the way encountering a gang
of convicts dragging a cart, and guarded by two warders, rifle in
hand. The sight was a painful one, the men half patient, half
sullen, looked at him curiously and envyingly; the warders urged them
on.
Donovan had half thought of sleeping at Prince Town. He had been
walking since seven o'clock that morning, and was rather tired, but
the gloom of the place so oppressed him that he could not endure the
thought of staying in it. He selected instead the cheapest-looking
public house from the large number which the little place offered,
had his dinner, and after a short rest prepared to go on again. The
people of the house in vain tried to induce him to stay. He was not
to be turned from his purpose, however, and having learnt that he
could put up for the night at the "Dousland Barn Inn," if he went by
the road, or at Sheepstor, if he went by the moor, he resolved to
take the latter course.
By this time it was between six and seven in the evening, but he
calculated that in even ordinary walking he should reach his
destination before dusk, and with the bold outline of Sheepstor
before him as a landmark, he steered his way across the waste. There
was something awe-inspiring in the entire loneliness as he passed on
further from Prince Town. Far and near not a creature, not a house
was to be seen. Beauty, grandeur, even a faint shadow of the
Infinite, who can fail to trace these in that glorious moor, unique
in its wildness and expanse?
Involuntarily Donovan fell into a deep reverie. The purer nobler
view of the world forced itself upon him; he had seen hitherto so
little but the evil. And then naturally his thoughts went back to
Dot, as they invariably did in his best moments, and he comforted
himself in that terribly insufficient and yet pathetic way which
Byron has expressed in one of his saddest poems.
"The better days of life were ours;
The worst can be but mine:
The sun that cheers, the storm that lowers
Shall never more be thine."
He had been walking on abstractedly; looking up at last, he was
dismayed to find that a sudden mist had arisen, completely veiling
the surrounding tors, and, what was worse, evidently spreading every
minute. Here was a hindrance which he had never for a moment
contemplated. The evening had seemed perfectly fine when he started;
he had no compass, and had trusted implicitly to his eye in choosing
the most direct route to Sheepstor. Now all traces of the tors were
entirely obliterated.
It was not a very pleasant prospect. All manner of stories he had
heard of travellers lost in the mist recurred to his memory; dismal
tales of people who had wandered round and round in a circle for
hours, never many yards distant from their starting-point, or of
unfortunate pedestrians overcome by fatigue and cold. He stood still
for a minute or two, called Waif to heel, and steadily faced the
facts of the case. The mist was rolling nearer and nearer, hemming
him in on every side; even now he could hardly see a yard in front of
him! Although it was a July evening, the cold was enough to make him
shiver; the mist pressed down on him impenetrably, every breath he
drew brought him into closer contact with the heavy, damp, chill fog.
Standing still was out of the question; he resolved to go on.
Sheepstor lay, he thought, rather to his left, and as he had heard
that the natural instinct in walking was to tend towards the right,
he took a very decided course in the opposite direction.
On and on he went, ceaselessly but almost hopelessly on. He was
growing very tired, too; the mist hung heavily upon him, he could not
see an inch before his feet. Fearing that Waif might possibly stray,
he had taken him up under his arm, and was plodding heavily along
when he suddenly came to marshy ground. For three or four steps he
floundered on, trying to regain the firm land, but what might have
been done with sight, was simply impossible in the blinding mist.
Another step, and he felt himself sinking deeper; a fierce struggle
to free himself, and in a moment he was up to his knees in one of the
treacherous Dartmoor bogs.
He uttered no invectives, but, when perfectly convinced of the
hopelessness of struggling out, he drew Waif's head up so that he
could look into the clear brown eyes.
"Waif, old boy," he said, "mother earth means to settle the question
for us. Do you feel inclined to have done with your master, your
bones, and biscuits, and wanderings?"
The dog, evidently understanding the danger, set up a howl so wildly
piteous that Donovan's heart was touched.
"Poor old fellow, you'd rather go on, would you?"
And for a moment they looked full into each other's eyes with the
strange comprehension that comes between some dogs and some men.
Then Waif licked his master's face, and Donovan, all the time feeling
that he was gradually sinking deeper, patted the white and tan head.
"Very well, Waif, as you say we'll have a try, take my hat, old boy,"
and he put his soft cloth hat into the dog's mouth, "scrunch it up,
never mind! a hundred to one I shall never want it again! find a man
if you can and bring him back here, do you understand? now go.
There!" and with some effort he threw the dog as far from him as
possible, and Waif, alighting where his trifling weight might be
borne, tore off like the wind with the hat between his teeth.
In throwing the dog Donovan felt the soft ground beneath him sink
considerably, an irresistible force sucked him down lower and lower,
very soon he was up to his waist in the cold wet mud. Then he spread
out both his arms and waited quietly for the end--whichever end it
was to be.
He felt strangely indifferent. If death did come to him, why, then
it would be well; if he was rescued, there would be the satisfaction
of not being conquered by the affection of good mother earth, who,
having dealt rather coldly with him all the days of his life, now
seemed determined to hold him in a clinging embrace.
His jacket was not fastened, he could see three buttons of his
waistcoat. With a sort of grim sense of the ludicrous he resolved to
use them as a measuring gauge, by which he could judge how fast he
was sinking. It was bitterly cold down in this wet slush, on the
whole he rather looked forward to the end. What was that odd
recollection that came to him? He was a little child again, and
Doery's prim face rose before him.
"Asleep in church, Master Donovan! oh! for shame! I wonder you
wasn't afraid you'd never open your eyes in this world again."
And in spite of his strange position, even now, he could not help
laughing as he recalled his childish sense of discomfort, and how for
several Sundays after that he had not been able to let his eyelids
drop in peace.
The first button disappeared.
Then he wandered on to recollections of his life with the Frewins,
how they would wonder what had become of him! He was back in Drury
Lane with Sweepstakes abusing him. He was in a railway carriage, and
Noir was waving the cards before his eyes in the three card trick.
He was sitting in the park and a bright-faced girl near him was
talking of home, the sort of home which he had never been able to
realise.
The second button disappeared.
Then he felt a strange impression of having been through this scene
before, of having felt the cold wall of mist hemming him in, and
after a time he remembered it had been in his nightmare about Dot.
And over and over the words rang in his ears;
"The better days of life were ours;
The worst can be but mine."
"You are safe, Dot, my darling. ''Tis nothing that I loved so well,'
I would not have you back even to the days that were ours. And the
worst may be over for me, Dot, ended here out on Dartmoor!"
The third button disappeared.
"I wish I had not gone to that billiard-room," he mused, "I wish I
could have died satisfied at least that my will was as strong as I
used to think it. To fail! how hateful it is to fail! If I thought
that I could get on, and not come to grief again so weakly, I should
almost wish to get out of this bog and have another try."
The mist had now rolled away, but it was almost dark and the stars
were shining above him. The night wind blew through his hair, waved
the cotton grass growing around him, sighed and moaned over the
desolate country. Nature sang him her dreariest death-song. Ah,
well! death could not be more dreary than his life had been!
By this time he was up to his shoulders, and was obliged to raise his
arms, the grass and rushes blew against his face. It was exceedingly
unlikely that Waif would find help. In a very short time he must
inevitably die. What a strange ending to his stormy life! strange
and yet perhaps not inappropriate, to die here alone in the darkness,
as he had lived, the grandeur and beauty and majesty of the great
moor close to him, all around, but shrouded in the black night; faint
imperfect images of the beautiful tors presented to him now and then,
but never a true idea of their form.
By-and-by came a light, flickering wavering far in the distance. Was
it a Will o' the wisp? Could he hold out any longer? Could he keep
rigidly motionless till this possible help should reach him? A sort
of dogged endurance and hatred of yielding came to renew his failing
powers, his voice clear and strong rang out into the night. Yet why
did he call? why did he not yield, and sink down quietly into
nothingness? For an instant life and death, the chances of each,
hung in a perfectly even balance, and his indifference turned to a
decided wish for the end of the struggle. Should he call again? he
thought not. But just as he was making his final resolution to keep
the silence which would inevitably lead to death, he heard Waif's
sharp anxious bark from afar.
"My dog, I won't be such a selfish brute," he exclaimed, realising
Waif's faithful devotion, and thinking of his despair if the search
should be of no use. "Ho! here! help!" and then, with his usual
whistle, he tried to attract the dog's notice.
In a few minutes Waif was close to him, whining with delight,
snorting with impatience, and tearing madly backwards and forwards
between the approaching lantern and his submerged master. Then the
bearer of the lantern came into view, a sturdy Devonshire farmer, and
his almost equally sturdy son. Donovan hailed them eagerly.
"Veth!" exclaimed the farmer, "stogg'd in Foxtor Mire that ye are!"
"Set fast here for hours," said Donovan.
"No tauny bye! (_don't tell me!_)" exclaimed the good man, much
shocked. "But we'd best talk when the deed's dune. The missus she
says to me, 'maister, you take the laistest bit o' rope with ye,
likely it's a bog accident.' So lay ye hold, my man, fast hold o'
the end, and veth! we'll sune have ye safe and dry. Hold on, my man,
and sure as my name's John Peek we'll have ye safe."
Then, with a tremendous effort, the sturdy Devonshire men pulled at
the rope till Donovan's shoulders were free once more. After that
they hastily threw a noose round him, and with infinite difficulty
succeeded at length in dragging him from his slimy grave.
In a few minutes Donovan, encrusted in black mud, and so stiff and
weary that he could hardly drag himself along, was safely on terra
firma once more, and Waif, proud and happy, was springing about his
feet.
Partly from physical causes, and partly from his sudden removal from
the near contemplation of death, he fell into a half dreamy state,
was not sure whether the sturdy farmer and his son were not after all
shadows, even doubted whether Waif was not an illusion, while every
weary step he took seemed to add to his strange indifference as to
what was to become of him. If left to himself he would have plodded
on and on till he dropped.
But John Peek was at his elbow--he was too muddy to be
touched--piloting him across the moor in the direction of the farm,
talking in his half unintelligible Devonshire dialect, and at length
leading him through the yard gate, across the roughly-paved granite
road to the little white farm house where he lived. At the sound of
their footsteps the wife hastened out, a comely Devonshire woman, her
short skirt, crossed neckerchief, smooth hair, and healthy-looking
face, all as fresh and neat as could be. The husband explained
matters, and Donovan was hurried into the kitchen, where, what with
the warmth of the peat fire, the contrast between his horrible state
of filth and the exquisite cleanliness of the place, added to the
extreme difficulty of understanding the dialect of the farmer and his
wife, he gradually came to himself, realised that he was actually
alive, that his surroundings were no shadowy phantoms of the
imagination, that he was still Donovan Farrant, possessed of little
but a dog and a will which had failed, and with a blank future
beyond, in which his primary object must be--not to starve.
In the immediate present, however, his only wish was to be clean once
more, and with some difficulty he made himself understood. Evidently
the farmer's wife thought cleanliness next to godliness, and fully
sympathised with the desire.
"Zich a jakes (_such a mess_) as never was seen, fit to make my flesh
crip, ess fay it is! Come ye up, zur, come ye up over the stairs,"
and the good woman led the way up the spotless staircase to a room
above, where, with much ado, she brought a huge wooden washing tub,
hot water, an enormous piece of soap, even a scrubbing-brush,
crowning all her favours by fetching him an entire set of her
husband's clothes!
Cincinnatus handled the plough, and doubtless wore the equivalent for
fustian. History does not relate how he looked in rustic guise, but
Donovan, with his "Roman" face and unmistakeable air of refinement,
presented a very comical appearance in Farmer Peek's marketing
costume. But the comfort of being dry and clean again was great, and
he joined the farmer and his family in the kitchen, feeling able to
speak the thanks for his rescue which till now had remained unsaid.
"And now zet down, zur, zet down, for ye hike mortal vagg'd," said
the farmer, drawing up one of the Windsor chairs to the hearth.
"Likely ye had a gude walk before ye got stogg'd i' the mire?"
"Yes, from Chagford," said Donovan, stretching his feet out to the
smouldering peats.
"No, tanny bye! on the trat the whole blessed day!" exclaimed the
wife, "and ye hike crewel tender."
He laughed and disclaimed any "tenderness."
"Zich walks isn't for the likes of ye," said the farmer, with a
shrewd look at the wearer of his market-day suit; "ye should lave it
to us pewer folk--it's not for gintry and passons."
Donovan could not help smiling at finding himself classed with
parsons.
"I am poor," he said--"a tramp."
"Aw!" exclaimed the farmer, shaking his head with a knowing smile,
"ye won't make us belave that, zur--no, no, us knows the gintry when
we zee 'em."
"In spite of which, I am poor and a tramp," said Donovan; "and what
few things I had left went down into Foxtor Mire."
"Ah, gude heaven!" exclaimed the wife, "it was a mercy ye didn't go
yurself; but what will ye plase to take for zupper, zur? there's
cream i' the dairy, and----"
"Whatever you would have for yourselves, nothing else," said Donovan.
The woman hesitated; he spoke as if he meant to be obeyed, but her
hospitable soul longed to set the best things in the house before the
hero of the evening.
"Veth, zur, it's not fitty for zich as ye," she began, but Donovan
interrupted her.
"Nothing else, thank you," and his tone, more than the actual words,
convinced the good woman that nothing but the usual supper must be
prepared.
So Donovan sat down with the farmer and his wife to broth and
"kettle-bread," and then, at his own request, was allowed to
establish himself for the night before the fire; for, in spite of the
summer evening, he had been so thoroughly chilled that he was glad of
the warmth.
Before long all was quiet in the house; Donovan, with Waif at his
feet, lay very still but very much awake in the little kitchen. By
this time all might have been over for him--how strange was the
thought! He might have entered on the "peace of nothingness;" life
might have been over, perplexities solved by the great silence, no
trace of him left even, to carry sorrow to his mother or remorse to
Ellis; and instead of this, he was still in the world, lying on his
back moralising by the light of a peat fire!
It was a curious accident which had brought him like this under a
hospitable roof; he had been in many odd places, but never in quite
such a homely place as this. Half dreamily he let his eyes wander
round the white-washed walls; opposite him was the tall eight-day
clock, and a large copper warming-pan reflecting the dull red glow of
the fire; above the high mantelshelf two rather ancient-looking guns,
and a great array of tin pots and platters; below, a spotless white
dimity frill hanging over the wide hearth; overhead, in the black
rafters, hung sundry hams.
His own clothes were hanging up to dry as near the peats as the
farmer's wife would allow, and glancing from them to the borrowed
garments he wore, and for the first time realising that Farmer Peek
was at least six inches shorter and immeasurably stouter than
himself, that the fustian clothes hung about him in folds, and that
his whole appearance was most utterly grotesque, he burst out
laughing--laughed till the wooden rafters rang, till Waif started up
and began to wag his tail sympathetically, till inevitably he would
have roused the farmer and his wife, had they not slept as soundly as
the Seven Sleepers. Certainly the personal danger he had been in had
not awed him as a moralist might have desired; he went to sleep with
nothing more sober in his thoughts than a verse out of Dot's
"Nonsense Book"--
"There was an old man of the West
Who wore a pale plum-coloured vest;
When they asked--does it fit?
He replied, not a bit,
That funny old man of the West."
The next morning came the rather humiliating necessity of explaining
to the farmer his utter inability to reward him for his rescue and
his hospitality. He was received, however, with all the delightful
warm-heartedness and real courtesy so general in the west country.
"Aw! zur, ye didn't think a wanted money! It's treu us a given ye
the laistest bit of a help, but God bless ye, zur, us has been plased
to du it."
"When I get on in the world, I shall not forget you, Mr. Peek," said
Donovan, with firm confidence in the "when." "All I can do now is to
thank you very much for your hospitality."
"Veth, zur, you're welcome. Us wull be plased to zee ye again, and I
wish ye weel in zaking zarvice."
"Seeking service!" Donovan smiled, but the expression was true
enough. He wished his worthy host good-bye, managed to leave his
last coin--half-a-crown--in the market-day coat, and set off briskly
on his fourteen mile walk to Plymouth.
Skirting round the foot of Sheepstor, he was soon on the road, with
the bold outlines of Sharpitor and Leathertor on one hand, and far in
the distance a line of silvery brightness where the sunlight fell on
the sea. Life felt good. On the whole, he felt really glad that the
blue vault was above him, not the black mud of the bog. Towards the
afternoon, however, when he had been walking some hours, his spirits
sank. The heat tried him a good deal; he began to feel very stiff
and tired, as well he might after his adventure of the previous
evening. And with the physical exhaustion came a degree less of
confidence in the future. What if his father's acquaintance, Mr.
X----, refused to help him? What if he could find no employment now?
He walked on heavily, but still with resolution--come ill or well, he
was ready to face it manfully, but his cheerfulness disappeared, and
it was a stern-faced and very oddly-dressed candidate who presented
himself at the door of the bank, and asked to see Mr. X----, the
manager.
The bank was closed, but one of the clerks appeared in answer to his
ring, and directed him to the manager's private house. He went
there, and, with the bearing of a proud man forced to ask a favour,
was shown into Mr. X----'s library.
A handsome keen-faced gentleman of about five and thirty was sitting
at the table writing. He glanced up as Donovan was announced,
scanned him from head to foot without rising, then bowed stiffly.
This was Donovan's view.
Mr. X----, on the other hand, saw before him a tall, gaunt, handsome
fellow, apparently about five and twenty, in clothes which were
stained and shrunk to such a degree that a tramp would scarcely have
said "thank you" for them, holding a ragged cloth hat in his band,
and in spite of his beggarly array, carrying his head very high.
Such a shabby-looking fellow as this could hardly be asked to sit
down on one of Mr. X----'s new red-morocco chairs. The good farmer's
wife had carefully dusted the Windsor chair for him the night before,
the banker was not so courteous or so well-bred. Throughout the
interview Donovan stood.
The banker briefly asked his business. It appeared that the elder
Mr. X---- had died two years before; the present one had never heard
of Colonel Farrant. And then, after a few mutual explanations, Mr.
X----'s rather quick peremptory manner became a little more suave as
he said,
"You must, I think, see, Mr. Farrant, that your claims upon me are of
the very slightest. Our respective fathers knew each other--at
least, you tell me so. Even should I take you at your word without
seeking to prove this to be the fact, however, it is hardly
sufficient ground for--in short, you understand me, I am sure. I
need not explain myself further."
"I understand perfectly," said Donovan, coldly. "You think I am come
to beg. I am quite aware that I look like a beggar, thanks to one of
your Devonshire bogs; but nothing is further from my thoughts. You
were the only person I knew in the neighbourhood. I want work, and
thought you might be able to advise me where to try for it."
"I am afraid, Mr. Farrant, you are a novice in these matters," said
the banker. "One cannot at a moment's notice cause situations to
spring up ready to hand; besides, in the letter I received from you
from Exeter, you gave me no particulars and no references."
"I have none to give," said Donovan, shortly.
"You can at least tell me what your previous employment has been."
"I have only just returned from the Continent."
The banker looked at him a little curiously.
"And before that?"
Donovan coloured slightly, but answered, firmly,
"Before that I was a card-sharper."
The banker started.
"Bless me! and after this you expect me to patronise you, Mr.
Farrant?"
"On the contrary," said Donovan, quietly, "I see plainly that that is
the last thing you will do."
There was irony in the tone; the banker smiled a little, looked again
at his strange visitor, and saw that, in spite of the beggarly array,
he was evidently a clever fellow. He liked clever fellows, and his
next remark sounded much more cordial; but Donovan's sensitive pride
at once recoiled from the slight touch of vulgarity.
"I see you're sharp enough, Mr. Farrant, no lack of brains; but even
if I knew of any situation likely to suit you, what guarantee should
I have that you might not prove a little too sharp again?"
"No guarantee," said Donovan, wincing. "But I should hardly have
answered your question with such perfect openness, if I had been the
knave you take me for. I can give you no guarantee but my honour."
"And in business that would hardly answer," said Mr. X----, with a
sharp-edged smile; "besides, the honour of an ex----"
"Good afternoon," said Donovan, moving to the door.
"Stay, stay," said the banker; "that was rather hard lines. I can't
help you to a situation, Mr. Farrant, but you seem in a very bad way,
and as I see you're a clever fellow I will break through my ordinary
rule. Day and Martin made their fortunes by giving away a stray
sovereign, and, though I can hardly hope to do that, I have still
great pleasure in giving you some small assistance."
He fumbled in his pocket, produced a gold coin, and pressed it into
his visitor's hand.
There are some deeds of so-called "charity" which wound more deeply
than actual unkindness, some favours which are more hard to endure
than blows, some ways of giving so utterly intolerable to the
recipient that even in need they must be rejected.
Donovan was actually penniless, he felt stiff, weary, ill, and
already very hungry, but no power on earth could have brought him to
accept the banker's tactless, ill-bred offer. He put down the
sovereign, bowed, and hurried out of the house.
For a time indignation and those heart-stirrings which follow after
an insult has been received kept him up; he tramped up and down the
Hoe physically strong again because of the inward tumult of feeling.
Then he wandered into the town, lounged wearily about the streets,
"Homeless near a thousand homes,"
and worse than homeless, utterly destitute in every way, sick at
heart, ashamed of his past, miserable in the present, and hopeless as
to the future.
When St. Andrew's clock struck nine, he was standing at the corner of
the churchyard idly watching the passers-by, wishing that night d
come that he might hide himself in the darkness and forget his
weariness in sleep. But as time passed he grew more and more uneasy,
and the dread of illness began to haunt him painfully; he had
certainly eaten nothing since early morning, but that was not
sufficient to account for the growing faintness which was stealing
over him. He had had a dim idea of enlisting, but that faded away
now, he was too wretched to wish for anything but shelter for the
night, precisely the thing he had not.
There were only three alternatives, either he must break his
resolution again and trust to his customary skill and good fortune,
or he must try to sell Waif, or he must adopt the beggar's
shelter--an arch or a doorway.
A sharp struggle was needed to dismiss the first idea, the merest
glance at the dog to prove the second impossible; then in pain and
great weariness he wandered on once more. Only a month or two before
he had had more money than he knew what to do with--it was strange to
look back to the old life, with its excitement and success, and
self-indulgence--and now, through his own doing, he was utterly cut
off from it all. But he knew that it was well, and in a larger sense
than before the words which had haunted him on Dartmoor came to him
now,
"The worst can be but mine."
Failure, pain, ruin, starvation, all these were apparently his
destiny; he felt that they were endurable because they involved no
harm to others; it had been a choice of life and pleasure at the
expense of his honour and his fellow-men, and death and suffering
affecting himself alone. His contact with the world had changed his
views greatly; a year ago he had been a misanthrope, now he saw the
position of self and others inverted.
More than four years had gone by since the grave-looking Indian
colonel and his son had passed up the steps of the Royal Hotel.
Donovan, fresh from his school disgrace, full of hurt pride and
bitter resentment of the injustice, had spent no very comfortable
night there. Unlikely as it may seem, he slept a great deal better
beneath the porch of one of the neighbouring houses than he had done
before in the luxurious room. With Waif crouched up as near him as
possible for the sake of warmth, with the cold night wind blowing on
him, he slept well; in the old times he had been his own slave, now
he was "lord of himself." Disheartened, humbled, with widened
sympathies and self thrust low, he was now, in spite of the verdict
of the president, a truer follower of Christ than some professing
Christians, the only difference being that he followed bravely and
painfully in the darkness, not even knowing his goal, while many of
them in their full light follow sleepily and lazily, attaining to
little of the broad-hearted love and self-abnegation to which they
have pledged themselves.
Donovan did not dream, he was too completely worn out; his sleep was
heavy and unbroken; but he woke early the next morning with a name in
his mind--Porthkerran. What brought it there he could not tell. In
thinking over his acquaintance in the West at Exeter, he had
naturally remembered the Tremains; but it seemed utterly improbable
that a doctor in a remote Cornish village would be able to help him
to work, and he had never thought even of applying to him. But now,
in the freshness of the July day, as he dragged himself up from his
resting-place, and felt the utter impossibility of seeking work in
his present state, the thought of Porthkerran, of the kindly doctor,
of Mrs. Tremain, came to him as a light in his darkness. He was at
that stage of illness when pride--even the pride of independence--is
brought low, and though he had rejected the banker's sovereign but a
few hours before, the idea of going to the Tremains and asking their
help did not seem hard to him.
The only question was, should he ever get there? To loiter about in
Plymouth in search of work would be both useless and impossible; but
with an actual goal, a definite thing to be done, it was different.
He made up his mind to go, and set off on the long walk patiently and
deliberately, though anyone with a degree less of courage and
resolution would have succumbed at once.
When he had walked about five or six miles the full difficulties of
his undertaking came to him. On first waking he had felt ill indeed,
but the sleep had to some extent refreshed him, and it was not till
later in the morning that the unknown pains of hunger beset him.
Still he toiled on, always on, with aching head and failing limbs,
while above the summer sun blazed down on him in fullest power. What
if the Tremains were no longer at Porthkerran? What if they turned
him away because of his previous life, or his religious views? These
were his only thoughts as he struggled on. By-and-by came faintness,
and he was obliged to stagger to the side of the road and lie down on
the grass, and then he lost count of time, and was very dimly aware
that the intolerable heat and glare changed to cloudy coolness; it
was not till a heavy shower of rain began that he came fully to
himself, staggered to his feet once more, and resumed his walk.
For more than an hour the rain fell ceaselessly; when it stopped, he
was soaked to the skin and very cold; even when the sun came out once
more he was shivering from head to foot. How much farther could he
manage? A sign-post, with "Porthkerran three miles," rather
comforted him; he must and would get there, and once more be forced
himself to go forward.
The road lay now along the cliffs overlooking the deep blue sea.
Donovan scarcely noticed anything, however, and it was not till the
ringing clang of metal fell upon his ear that he looked up. By the
side of the road was a blacksmith's forge; the blazing fire looked
tempting; he entered the shed, and asked leave to warm himself.
The smith, a fine-looking man, with thick black hair tinged with
grey, and eyes of deep blue like the Cornish seas, turned round
quickly on hearing himself addressed.
"Come in, friend, and welcome."
The voice was a hearty one, but the smith was busy, and turned to his
hammer and anvil once more, while Donovan drew near to the fire, and
felt a little temporary relief from the warmth.
Presently wheels were heard, and a carriage stopped at the door; the
smith put down his hammer and stepped briskly forward.
"Well, doctor--gude day to you--cast his shue, has he?"
Donovan heard the words distinctly, but they conveyed no meaning to
his mind; he stared down vacantly into the glowing furnace, not even
turning his head to see either the horse or the driver. A man's
voice was explaining.
"Half a mile back, Trevethan. How long will you take to put him on a
fresh one? I'm in a hurry to be at Mr. Penruddock's."
"Slow and sure, doctor--not less nor a quarter hour, and maybe more."
"Why don't you walk to the Penruddocks', papa? I can hold Star, and
Ajax is so quiet there'll be no fear of his doing any harm."
It was a girl's mellow voice speaking--a voice in which there lurked
laughter, tenderness, and yet a quaint sort of dignity. Donovan
recognised it in a moment, and with a sudden return of strength and
energy hurried to the door.