“Take yer dog off!” I said.
Grimble never stirred.
A second of that grip and he as I loved so dear ud be dead and cold.
I rushed forrard, I, that had never wilfully hurt any living creature,
and as the great beast stood reared with his teeth in my maister’s
throat, I ran him through the heart.
The blood spurted, and the heavy body fell down all of a heap, and
Kester with it.
I pulled him away and dragged the dog’s jaws apart. There seemed to be
no life in Kester.
“Water!” I says to Huglet, who chanced to be nighest.
“Fetch water, you murderer! Brandy, Mister Camlet, please!”
He stooped over Kester.
“I mun burn the bite,” he said. “Best do it afore we bring him round.
But how to heat the iron?”
I stood up. I cared for nobody. They couldna have been more feared if
I’d been a savage queen.
“Six men pick up sticks!” I says. “And quick about it! And you, Grimble,
find flint and tinder.”
“I hanna got one,” he muttered.
“Find one!” I screamed like a wild thing, holding up the knife. “Find
one, or—”
The fire was blazing quicker than it takes to tell it. We poured a
little brandy down Kester’s throat, to keep the spark of life in, then
Mister Camlet burnt the bite, and Kester awoke with a shout of agony,
for being in a dead swound he hadna been ready for the pain.
“There, there, my dear!” I says. For the shriek went through my heart.
“There, there. It be done now! None shall touch you now.”
Mister Camlet bound him up, and I washed his face with cold water and
gave him more brandy.
“Not a deep wound,” says Mister Camlet. “We were only just in time,
though.”
“We couldna help but be in time,” I says, “I be his angel for to-day.”
And with that the green field swam up afore me and I swounded clean
away. When I came to myself there were Gideon and Jancis sitting by me
on the grass, and all the folks were gone.
“Where be he?” I says.
“Who? Weaver?” says Jancis. “He be all right and cared for. They’ve took
him back to Lullingford, and Missis Callard’ll stop with him.”
“She’s mighty pleased with the little bull,” said Gideon. “You saved
that chap’s life, and no mistake, Prue. I never saw the like! We were
just coming in at the field gate, and I looked across and saw you. ‘By
gum!’ I says. And that was all I did say. I ran, and Jancis ran, but
you’d done for the owd dog afore we could come at you. You take the
medal, Prue!”
“You canna ride home, Prue. Shall I run and ask Miller to take her,
Sarn? And couldna I come back and give her a hand with the work for a
day or two?”
“You can ask Miller and welcome. It’s a good thought. But as for coming
back, you know very well you’re Grimble’s vessel-maid now, till three
years.”
“I didna want to be. It’s you and Feyther made me.”
“Well, but you’ve seen the house, hanna you? You’ll be working for that
and the ’unt Ball and the silver plate.”
“Ah. I’ve seen the house, and I think it looks a dark, bitter old place,
for all it’s new, and I’d liefer never go to no ’unt Ball than lead the
life of a driven slave.”
She was crying, but it made no manner of difference to Gideon.
“You’ve got to go to Grimble’s and you’ve got to go to the ’unt Ball in
good time, so why make such a ding-dong?”
“But why must I, Sarn?”
“Because my mind’s set.”
It was almost as if he said, “Because I’m in the stocks.” As if his maid
called him to come maying, but, feet and hands, he was fast bound.
When she was gone, they gave me a sup of tea at the _Mug o’ Cider_, for
I was all of a tremble still, and then Miller helped me up into the gig,
and the old coach horse, that had known the merry sound of the horn
tooting, and the sudden light and commotion at the turnpikes, when they
rushed out in the dead dark to open, laboured into a trot. For indeed he
seemed much of Missis Miller’s mind, caring not if he never saw home
again. Missis Miller had nought to say, Miller as usual had nought also,
and Polly was asleep. After a while Missis Miller and Tim went to sleep
too. We drove on sadly in the chilly evening. It was dusk, and then it
was dark. Gideon was far ahead, for Bendigo was a good trotter, though
aged. The mill pony, tied to the back of the gig, clopped onwards with a
sorrowful sound.
It suited me, the quiet and the melancholy, for I was sad and quiet too.
He that I loved was hurt, and I couldna get to him. There he lay, as
weak as a babe, and only Missis Callard to tend him. I forgot that she,
having six, was well knowledged in tending helpless folk, for it is the
way of lovers to think that none can bless or succour their love but
their own selves. And there is a touch of truth in it, maybe more than a
touch. We went on and on, through country that was neither hilly nor
flat, in a night neither dark nor gleamy, feeling neither glad nor
sorry. I thought we were like people bound for some place beyond the
world that was neither hell nor heaven. Our six heads, counting the
nag’s, all nid-nodded, and I think we were all asleep, even the old
coach horse, when the miller spoke, out of his sleep, I do believe.
“I canna abide ’em,” he said, with a nod toerts his wife and children.
“I wish they were kit-cats, to drown in mill-pond. I wish the world and
all was a kit-cat.”
He said no more. It was like when they say the creed, solemn and choppy.
That was all the miller ever said to me, and I do think he said it in
his sleep. On we went, till we came to the dark mill, the soundless
water, like soft black crape. The others got out and untied the pony,
and Miller drove me back to Sarn. The night was full of the smell of
water and moss, with a drift of primrose scent now and again. I thought
of the weaver’s house, that seemed built of a spell, and him, lying
there in the kitchen with the loom, his face barred with the shadow of
it, cast by the rushlight, his hair all tousled and damp with the sweat
of pain.
“If Missis Callard spoke unkind to him, I could slap her babby,” I
thought. But I knew she wouldna. She was a good soul, though I always
thought she must have had a mind like a shell, hollow, to echo other
people as she did.
When we came to our place, there was Mother on the door-sill, very
consarned. She said what nobody else had, and what I’d never thought of.
“You met ha’ been killed, Prue!”
She sat down and began to cry, so I had to laugh at her and ask for
summat to eat, to show I was alive all right. So then she got me such a
meal as never was, though she should by rights have been asleep hours.
Seemingly Gideon had told her some sort of tale, but she must know more.
She wasna to be satisfied, but kept on wanting more. She put on her
spectacles and looked at me very attentive, sitting there in the big oak
chair. I was quite put-about with her staring so, with that still look
of a sitting bird when somebody comes and spies at her, and she never
winks nor flinches, but just looks back with sharp brown eyes, as much
as to say, “I’ll stand by what’s mine.” Mother seemed to be looking past
me at summat that threatened me. Maybe it was my Fate, as she thought it
to be. It was summat that threatened to do me harm, I’m sure, for after
a bit Mother looked very defiant and sat up ever so straight and said—
“We’ll have the weaver.”
Just as if somebody forbade her to have him.
She said nought of all I’d told her, never a word about it being a
foolish or forrard thing to save a strange young man’s life without with
your leave or by your leave. She only kept on giving little nods now and
again, and saying—
“Ah. Come summer, we’ll have weaver.”
Then she said she’d go to bed now, and I went and wrote in my book.
There was no change in our lives, only it was quieter without Jancis
coming in of a Sunday. The Stone House seemed very lonesome lacking her,
and Missis Beguildy not half the woman she had been. She seemed to cling
to me, and kept talking of the little ways and sayings of Jancis as if
she was dead. This made Beguildy very angry, for in truth he was sorry
Jancis was gone, not only because of the young squire, but because in
her unhandy way she’d got through a good bit of work. He’d say, “Now,
hush thy noise, woman. The wench’ll be back in no time, with twenty
pound in hand, dear me. Now, dunna go to talk of her as if she was dead,
fool! A gamesome lusty young woman the like of that! Many’s the golden
pound her’ll put in our pockets, when she’s learnt her duty, and given
over hankering after a man as was born under the threepenny planet,
and’ll come to be drowned. No offence meant, Prue, and none taken I’m in
behopes. You ploughed the gorsty bit right tidy, Prue, and us’ll do word
of four synnables this day, if you’ve a mind.”
Oh, there’s no doubt Beguildy was a very queer old man. I was used to
think if he’d had a good education he met have been one of these great
men we all think so much of. A great scholar he could have been, or a
music-man, or a rhymer, or a preacher. And maybe if all of his mind had
been used proper, he wouldna have brought ruination on hisself as he
did. Ah! And on more than hisself. But that we cannot know. We are His
mommets that made us, I do think. He takes us from the box, whiles, and
saith, “Dance now!” or maybe it must bow, or wave a hand or fall down in
a swound. Then He puts it back in box, for the part is played. It may be
a Mumming, or a Christmas or Easter play, or a tragedy. That is as He
pleases. The play is of His making. So the evil mommets do His will as
well as the good, since they act the part set for them. How would it be
if the play came to the hour when the villainous man must do evilly, and
see! he is on his knee-bones at his prayers. Then the play would be in
very poor case. There was a mommet once called Judas, and if he had
started away from his set part in fear, we should none of us have been
saved. Which is all a very strange mystery, and so we must leave it. But
it being so, I think we do wrongly to blame ill-doers too hardly. It is
a dreadful fate to be obleeged to act in a curst ugly way, when surely
none would choose it. “Needs be that offences come.” How should Gabriel
show his skill with a two-edged sword if Lucifer wouldna fight? “But woe
be to him by whom they come.” Ah! So if the play has a murder in it, or
if a good maid is brought to shame, a mommet must be found to do the bad
work, though very like, if they could choose, never a one but would say,
“Not me, Maister!” Only they know nought. For I think we be not very
different from the beasts, that work deathly harms in the dark of their
minds, knowing nothing, weltering in blood, crouching and springing on
their prey, with a sound of shrieks in the night, and yet all the while
as innicent as a babe. And I think we be not very much other than the
storms that raven in the forest, and the hungry fire that licks up lives
in a moment, and the lips of the water, sucking in our kin. It is all in
the Play. But if we be chosen for a pleasant, merry part, how thankful
we ought to be, giving great praise, and helping those less fortunate,
and even being grateful to that poor mommet which goeth about night and
day to work our destruction. For it might have been the other way.
So, in spite of all, I was always sorry for Beguildy, though, dear
knows, he was the villain in our story.
We had a very middling crop that summer, both of grass and grain. Our
lives went to the same tune, with no change, saving that Mother was as
good as her word and did send for Kester.
I thought she seemed very busy all that June, spinning as if it was ever
so, till even Gideon gave a word of praise. Then one day she said—
“There’s such a deal spun, I shall be obleeged to send for Weaver.”
But I was settled in my mind not to see him, so the day he was coming,
about the end of hay harvest, I took the brummock and went hedging in
the far fields where none would find me.
“I’m going hedging, Mother,” I says, “I’ll take some bread and cheese.
Can you see to the young turkeys and tell Gideon he must make shift with
the milking, for I shanna be back till dark.”
What must she do but begin to wring her hands and keep on saying under
breath—
“Oh, the pity, the pity, to be so curst!”
But go I did. And when I raught home, there in my attic were the bits of
wool and thread he’d left, and a very pleasant smell of tobacco. For he
liked to smoke a bit while he worked. And just by the corner of the loom
what should I find but a blue-and-white handkerchief, which I very
dishonestly did put in my locker, and turned the key with great
satisfaction. I said to myself in a kind of gloating way that some day
I’d launder it, and roll it up with a bit of lavender, and send it back.
But not yet.
Mother was full of tales about the weaver. Oh, he was such a kind man,
and strong, and so considerate! I thought I could have told her that.
Like a son to her, he’d been, she said. I should ha’ seen him a-sitting
on the settle at his tea. I dare say, I thought, and lose my heart worse
than ever! “Wanted to know if I’d any other family besides Sarn,” she
said. “So I told un.”
“Oh, Mother, what did you tell him?” I said.
“I told un I’d got the best girl in the ’orld, and a good daughter to
me, and very jimp and slender, with a long, silky plait to the knees,
and dark, meltin’ eyes, and such pleasant ways, merry and mocking and
pitiful. Ah! I told un! Proper, I did! And I told un you could do the
tall script and the short, and that Beguildy was learning you to read,
and that you could do words of four synnables now.”
“Dear to goodness, Mother,” I said, “what a tale you made out!”
“No tale, my dear, for ’tis the truth.”
“Did you say ought of Gideon’s letters? I mean, did you say I wrote
’em?”
“Why, no, my dear. Sarn met not ha’ liked it, nor Jancis, nor you.”
“No. You’ve got a lot of sense, Mother.”
“It was always said in our family as I had, my dear.”
“So Weaver thinks we’re a very well educated family, I make no doubt,
Mother, and he’ll take it for gospel that Gideon writes the letters.”