he entered the dark gorge of the Clough; but to him darkness
and light were alike, and as for the snow, it was more than a
transformation-scene is to the petted child of a jaded civilization.
He watched the flakes as they came down in their wild race from
the sky, and saw them disappear on touching the stream that ran
through the heart of the Clough. He gathered masses of the flaky
substance in his hand, and, squeezing them into balls, threw them
at distant objects, and then filled his mouth with the icy
particles, and revelled in the shock and chill of the melting
substance between his teeth as no connoisseur of wine ever
revelled in the juices of the choice vintages of Spain and France.
Then he would shake and clap his hands because of what he called
the 'hot ache' that seized them, only to scamper off again after
some new object around which to weave another dream of wonder.
The dusk gave place to gloom, and still faster fell the snow,
white and feathery, silent and sublime. The child felt the charm,
and began to lose himself in the impalpable something that, like a
curtain of spirit, gathered around. He, too, was now as white as
the shrubs through which he wended his way, and every now and then
he doffed his cap, and, with a wild laugh of delight, flung its
covering of snow upon the ground. Then, out of sheer fulness of
life and rapport with the scene, he would rush for a yard or two
up the steep sides of the Clough and roll downwards in the soft
substance which lay deeply around.
The gloom thickened and nightfall came, but the snow lighted up
the dark gorge, and threw out the branching trees, the tall trunks
of which rose columnar-like as the pillars of some cathedral nave.
Did the boy think of home--of fire--of bed? Not he! He thought
only of Jenny Greenteeth, the sprite of the Clough, and of the Gin
Spa Well, above which she was said to sleep; and on he roamed.
And now the path became narrower and more tortuous, while on the
steep sides the snow was gathering in ominous drifts. Undaunted he
struggled on, knee-deep, often stumbling, yet always rising to
dive afresh into the yielding element that lay between himself and
the enchanted ground beyond. In a little time he came to a great
bulging bend, around the foot of which the waters flowed in sullen
sweeps. Here, careful as he was, he slipped, and lay for a moment
stunned and chilled with his sudden immersion. Struggling to the
bank, he regained his foothold, and, rounding the promontory of
cliff which had almost defeated his search, he turned the angle
that hid the grotto, and found himself at the Gin Spa Well.
He heard the 'drip, drip' of falling waters as they oozed from out
their rocky bed, and fell into one of those tiny hollows of nature
which, overflowing, sent its burden towards the stream below. He
looked above, and saw the fabled ledge--its mossy bank all
snow-covered--with the entrance to Jenny Greenteeth's chambers
dark against the white that lay around. Tired with the search, yet
glad at heart with the find, he climbed and entered, the
somnolence wrought by the snow soon closing his eyes, and its
subtle opiate working on his now wearily excited brain. There he
slept--and dreamed.
* * * * *
As soon as Mr. Penrose and Malachi reached the search party, and
heard how the boy had been missing since the afternoon, the
minister suggested they should search the Clough, as it was his
favourite haunt. His advice was at first unheeded, Oliver
declaring he had been taken off in a gipsy caravan, and Amos
capping his suspicion by speaking of the judgments of the Almighty
on little lads who gathered flowers on Sunday, and blew
wickin-whistles in school, and refused to learn their catechism.
Second thoughts, however, brought them over to Mr. Penrose's mind,
and they set out for the Clough.
The descent was far from easy, the banks being steep, and
treacherous with their covering of newly-fallen snow. Once or
twice Amos, in his declaration of the Divine will, nearly lost his
footing, and narrowly escaped falling into the defile, the
entrance to which they sought to gain. Oliver manifested his
anxiety and parental care in sundry oaths, while Moses Fletcher,
who had loved the child ever since saving him from the Lodge, said
little and retained his wits.
When the search party entered the heart of the Clough, Oliver's
dog began to show signs of excitement, that became more and more
noticeable as they drew near to the Gin Spa Well. Here the brute
suddenly stopped and whined, and commenced to wildly caper.
'Th' dog's goin' mad,' said Amos.
'It's noan as mad as thee, owd lad,' replied Moses. 'I'll lay
ought we'n noan so far fro' th' chilt.'
'It is always wise to stop when a dog stops,' assented the
minister.
'Yi; yo' connot stand agen instink,' said Malachi.
'Good lad! good lad! find him!' sobbed Oliver to his dog; and the
brute again whined and wagged its tail and ran round and between
the legs of the men.
'There's naught here,' impatiently cried Amos.
I'll tak' a dog's word agen thine ony day, owd lad,' said Moses.
'Well, thaa's no need to be so fond o' th' dog. It once welly
worried thi dog, and thee into th' bargain.'
'Yi; it's bin a bruiser i' id time, an' no mistak'; but it's
turned o'er a new leaf naa--and it's noan so far off th' child;'
and Malachi, too, commenced to encourage it in its search.
'It looks to me as th' child's getten up theer somehaa;' and so
saying, Moses pointed to the ledge of rock where Jenny Greenteeth
was said to slumber through the winter's cold.
'What mut th' child ged up theer for?' asked Amos. 'Thaa talks
like a chap as never hed no childer.'
At this rebuff Moses was silent; for not only was he a childless
man, but until the day he saved the very child they were now
seeking from the Green Fold Lodge, children had been nothing to
him. Now, however, he had learned to love them, and none better
than the little lost offspring of Oliver o' Deaf Martha's.
While the two men were wrangling, Mr. Penrose stepped aside and
commenced the climb towards the ledge. The snow lay white and
undisturbed on the shelving surface, and there was no sign of
recent movements. Looking round, he discovered the mouth of the
recess. There it stood, black and forbidding. In another moment
the minister stooped down and looked in; but all was dark and
silent, nor did he care to go further along what to him was an
unknown way.
'Have any of you a light?' asked he of the men below; and Malachi
handed him his collier's candle and matches, with which he
commenced to penetrate the gloom.
It was a small cavernous opening out of which, in years past, men
had quarried stone. Damp dripped from the roof, and ran down its
seamed and discoloured sides. Autumn leaves, swept there by the
wind, strewed its uneven floor, and lay in heaps against the
jutting angles. A thin line of snow had drifted in through the
mouth, and ran like a river of light along the gloomy entrance, to
lose itself in the recesses beyond.
The feeble flicker of the candle which Mr. Penrose held in his
hand flung hideous shadows, and lighted up the cave dimly enough
to make it more eerie and grotesque. The minister had not searched
long before he was startled by a cry--a faint and childish cry:
'Arto Jenny Greenteeth?'
'No, my boy; I'm Mr. Penrose.'
'It's noan th' parson aw want; aw want th' fairy.'
And then the chilled and startled boy was carried down to the men
below.
In a moment Oliver o' Deaf Martha's seized his boy and wrapped him
in the bosom of his coat, hugging and kissing him as though he
would impart the warmth of his own life to the little fellow.
'It's noan like thee to mak' a do like that, Oliver,' said Amos,
unmoved, 'but thaa shaps (shapes) weel.' And as the child began to
cry and struggle, Amos continued, 'Sithee! he's feeard on thee.
He's noan used to it. He thinks he ought to hev a lickin' or
summat.'
But Oliver continued his caresses.
'Well, Oliver, I've never sin thee takken th' road afore.'
'Nowe, lad! I've never lost a chilt afore.'
VI.
MIRIAM'S MOTHERHOOD.
1. A WOMAN'S SECRET.
2. HOW DEBORAH HEARD THE NEWS.
3. 'IT'S A LAD!'
4. THE LEAD OF THE LITTLE ONE.
I.
A WOMAN'S SECRET.
On a little mound, within the shadow of her cottage home, and
eagerly scanning the moors, stood Miriam Heap. An exultant light
gleamed in her dark eyes, and her bosom rose and fell as though
swept with tumultuous passion. Ever womanly and beautiful, she
was never more a queen than now, as the wind tossed the raven
tresses of her crown of hair, and wrapped her dress around the
well-proportioned limbs until she looked the draped statue of a
classic age. There was that, too, within her breast which filled
her with lofty and pardonable pride, for she awaited her husband's
return to communicate to him the royal secret of a woman's life.
Miriam and Matthias--or Matt, as she called him--had been
seven years married, the only shadow of their home being its
childlessness. Matt's prayers and Miriam's tears brought no
surcease to this sorrow, while the cruel superstition that dearth
of offspring was the curse of heaven and the shame of woman,
rested as a perpetual gloom over the otherwise happy home.
Of late, however, the maternal hope had arisen in the heart of
Miriam; nor was the hope belied. To her, as to Mary of old, the
mystic messengers had whispered, and He with whom are the issues
of life had regarded the low estate of His handmaiden. That of
which she so long fondly dreamed, and of late scarce dared to
think of, was now a fact, and a great and unspeakable joy filled
her heart.
As yet her secret was unshared. Even her husband knew it not, for
Matt was away in a distant town, fitting up machinery in a
newly-erected mill. Miriam felt it to be as hard to carry alone
the burden of a great joy as the burden of a great sorrow. But she
resolved that none should know before him, whose right it was to
first share the secret with herself; so she kept it, and pondered
over it in her heart.
And now Matt was on his homeward journey, and Miriam knew that
shortly they would be together in their cottage home. How should
she meet him, and greet him, and confess to him the joy that
overwhelmed her? What would he say? Would he love her more, or
would the advent of the little life divide the love hitherto her
undisputed own? Was the love of father towards mother a greater
and stronger and holier love than that of husband towards wife? or
did the birth of children draw off from each what was before a
mutual interchange? Thus she teased her throbbing brain, and vexed
her mind with questions she knew not how to solve. And yet her
woman's instincts told her that the new love would weld together
more closely the old, and that she and Matt would become one as
never before. And then a dim memory of a sentence in the old creed
came upon her--something about 'One in three and three in one,
undivided and eternal'--but she knew not what she thought.
As Miriam stood upon the little mound within the shadow of her
roof-tree, eagerly scanning the moors for Matt's return, cool airs
laden with moorland scents played around her, and masses of snowy
cloud sailed along the horizon, flushing beneath the touch of the
after-glow with as pure a rose as that mantling on her womanly
face. The blue distances overhead were deepening with sundown, and
the great sweeps of field and wild were sombre with the hill
shadows that began to fall. In a copse near where she stood a
little bird was busy with her fledglings, and from a meadow came
the plaintive bleat of a late yeaned lamb. From the distant
village the wind carried to her ears the cry of an infant--a cry
that lingered and echoed and started strange melodies in the
awakening soul of Miriam. Child of the hills as she was, never
before in all her thirty years of familiarity with them, and
freedom among them, had she seen and felt them as now. A great and
holy passion was upon her, and she took all in through the medium
of its golden haze. The early flowers at her feet glowed like
stars of hope and promise--and the bursting buds of the trees told
of spring's teeming womb and dew of youth; while the shadow of her
cottage gable and chimney--falling as it did across the little
mound on which she stood--recalled to her the promises of Him who
setteth the solitary in families.
Then she returned to herself, and to her new and opening world of
maternity. No longer would she be the butt at which the rude,
though good-natured, jests of her neighbours were thrown, for she
too would soon hold up her head proudly among the mothers of
Rehoboth. And as for Matt's mother--fierce Calvinist that she was,
and whom in the past she had so much feared--what cared she for
her now? She would cease to be counted by her as one of the
uncovenanted, and told that she had broken the line of promise
given to the elect. How well she remembered the night when the old
woman, taking up the Bible, read out aloud: 'The promise is unto
you, and to your children,' afterwards clinching the words by
saying: 'Thaa sees, Miriam, thaas noan in it, for thaa's no
childer'; and how, when she gently protested, 'But is not the
promise to all that are afar off?' the elect sister of the church
and daughter of God destroyed her one ray of hope by saying: 'Yi!
but only to as mony as the Lord aar God shall co.' And Matt--poor
Matt--across whom the cold shadow had so long lain, and which,
despite his love of her, would creep now and again like a cloud
over the sunshine of his face--Matt, too, would be redeemed from
his long disappointment, and renewed in strength as he saw a
purpose in his life's struggle, even the welfare of his posterity.
These thoughts, and many others, all passed through Miriam's mind
as she stood looking out from the mound upon the sundown moors.
Dreaming thus, she was startled by a well-known voice; and looking
in the direction whence the sound came, she saw her husband in the
distance beckoning her to meet him. Nor did she wait for his
further eager gesticulations, but at once, with fleet foot,
descended the slope, towards the path by which he was approaching.
Ere she reached him, however, she realized as never before the
secret she was about to confide, and for the first time in her
life became self-conscious. How could she meet Matt, and how could
she tell him? In a moment her naturalness and girlish buoyancy
forsook her. She was lost in a distrait mood. Joy changed to
shyness; a hot flush, not of shame, but of restraint, mounted her
cheeks. Then she slackened her pace, and for a moment wished that
Matt could know all apart from her confession.
To how many of nervous temperament is self-consciousness the bane
of existence--while the more such try to master it, the more
unnatural they become! It separates souls, begetting an aloofness
which, misunderstood, ends in mistrust and alienation; and it lies
at the root of too many of the fatal misconceptions of life. There
are loving hearts that would pay any price to be freed from the
self-enfolding toils that wrap them in these crisis hours. And so
would Miriam's, for she felt herself shrink within herself at the
approach of Matt. She knew nothing of mental moods, never having
heard of them, nor being able to account for, or analyze, them.
All she knew, poor girl, was that for the first time in her life
she was not herself; and as she responded to Matt's warm greeting,
she felt she was not the wife, nor the woman, who but a few weeks
ago had so affectionately farewelled him, and who but a few
moments ago so longed for his return.
Nor was Matt unconscious of this change, for as soon as the
greeting was over he said, with tones of anxiety in his voice:
'What ails thee, my lass?'
'Who sez as onnythin' ails me?' was her reply, but in a tone of
such forced merriment that Matt only grew the more concerned.
'Who sez as onnything ails thee?' cried he. 'Why those bonny een
o' thine--an' they ne'er tell lies.'
Miriam was walking at his side, her dark eyes seeking the ground,
and half hidden by the droop of their long-fringed lids. Indeed,
she was too timid to flash their open searching light, as was her
wont, into the face of Matt; and when she did look at him, as at
times she was forced to, the glance was furtive and the gaze
unsteady.
'Come, mi bonny brid (bird),' said her husband, betraying in his
voice a deeper concern, 'tell thi owd mon what's up wi thee. I've
ne'er sin thee look like this afore. Durnd look on th' grass so
mich. Lift that little yed (head) o' thine. Thaa's no need to be
ashamed o' showing thi face--there's noan so mony at's better
lookin'--leastways, I've sin noan.'
Miriam was silent; but as Matt's hand stole gently into hers, and
she felt the warm touch of his grasp, her heart leapt, and its
pent-up burden found outlet in a sob. Then he stayed his steps,
and looked at her, as a traveller would pause and look in
wonderment at the sudden portent in the heavens of a coming storm,
and putting his hand beneath the little drooping chin, he raised
the pretty face to find it wet with tears.
'Nay! nay! lass, thaa knows I conrot ston salt watter, when it's
i' a woman's een.
But Miriam's tears fell all the faster
'I'll tell yo' what it is, owd lass. I shornd hev to leave yo'
agen,' and his arm stole round the little neck, and he drew the
sorrowful face to his own, and kissed it. 'But tell yor owd mon
what's up wi yo'.'
'Ne'er mind naa, Matt; I'll--tell--thee--sometime,' sobbed the
wife.
'But I mun know naa, lass, or there'll be th' hangments to play.
I'll be bun those hens o' Whittam's hes been rootin' up thi flaars
in th' garden. By gum! if they hev, I'll oather neck 'em, or mak'
him pay for th' lumber (mischief).'
'Nowe, lad--thaa'rt--mista'en--Whittam's hens hesn't bin i' th'
garden sin' thaa towd him abaat 'em last.'
'Then mi mother's bin botherin' thee agen,' said Matt, in a sharp
tone, as though he had at last hit upon the secret of his wife's
sorrow.
'Wrang once more,' replied Miriam, with a light in her eye; and
then, looking up at her husband with a gleam, she said: 'I durnd
think as thi mother'll bother me mich more, lad.'
'Surely th' old lass isn't deead!' he cried in startled tones. And
then, recollecting her treatment of Miriam, he continued: 'But I
needn't be afeard o' that, for thaa'll never cry when th' old girl
geets to heaven. Will yo', mi bonnie un?'
'Shame on thee, Matt,' said Miriam, smiling through her tears.
'Bless thee for that smile, lass. Thaa looks more thisel naa.
There's naught like sunleet when it's in a woman's face.'
'Thaa means eyeleet,' Miriam replied, with a gleam of returning
mirth.
'Ony kind o' leet, so long as it's love-leet and joy-leet, and i'
thi face, an o'. But thaa's noan towd me what made thee so feeard
(timid) when aw met thee.'
By this time Matt and his wife were on the threshold of their
cottage, and the woman's heart beat loudly as she felt the moment
of her great confession was at hand.
'Naa, come, Merry' (he always called her Merry in the higher
moments of their domestic life)--'come, Merry, no secrets, thaa
knows. There's naught ever come atween thee and me, and if I can
help, naught ever shall.'
Miriam started, and once more wondered if the little life of which
Matt as yet knew nothing would come in between herself and him,
and divide them; or whether it would bind more closely their
already sacred union.
'Naa, Merry,' continued he, seating himself in the rocking-chair,
or 'courtin'-cheer,' as he called it, and drawing his blushing,
yielding wife gently on his knee, 'naa, Merry, whod is it?'
'Cornd ta guess?' asked she, hiding her face on his shoulder.
'Nowe, lass; aw've tried th' hens and mi mother, and aw'm wrang i'
both, an' aw never knew aught bother thee but t' one or t' other
on 'em. Where mun I go next?'
Again there were tears in Miriam's eyes, and with one supreme
effort she raised her blushing face from Matt's shoulder to his
bushy whiskers, and burying her rosy lips near his ear, whispered
something, and then sank on his breast.
Then Matt drew his wife so closely to him that she bit her lips to
stifle the cry of pain that his love-clasp brought; and when he
let her go, it was that he might shower on her a rain of kisses,
diviner than had ever been hers in the seven happy years of their
past wedded life. For some minutes Matt sat with Miriam in his
arms, a spell of sanctity and silence filling the room. In that
silence both heard a voice--a little voice--preludious of the
music of heaven, and they peopled the light which haloed them with
a presence, childlike and pure. Then it was that Miriam looked up
at her husband and said:
'Th' promise is not brokken, thaa sees, after all. It's to us and
to aar childer, for all thi mother hes said so mich abaat it.'
'Ey, lass,' replied he, his manhood swept by emotion, 'o' sich is
the kingdom o' heaven.'
And a gleam of firelight fell on the darkening wall, and lit up an
old text which hung there, and they both read, 'Children are a
heritage from God.'
* * * * *
'An' arto baan to keep it a secret, lass?' asked Matt, when once
the spell of silence was broken.
'Why shouldn't I? There's no one as aw know as has any reet to
know but thee.'
'But they'll noan be so long i' findin' it aat. Then they'll never
let us alone, lass. There'll be some gammin', aw con tell thee.'
'I'm noan feared on 'em, Matt. I con stan' mi corner if thaa con.'
'Yi, a dozen corners naa, lass. Thaa knows it used to be hard
afore when they were all chaffin' me at th' factory, but they can
talk their tungs off naa for aught I care. But they'll soon find
it aat.'
'None as soon as thaa thinks, Matt. They've gan o'er sperrin
(being inquisitive) long sin', and when they're off th' scent
they're on th' wrang scent.'
'Aw think aw'd tell mi mother, lass, if aw were thee.'
'Let her find it aat, as t'others 'll hev to do.'
'As thaa likes, lass. But thaa knows hoo's fretted and prayed and
worrited hersel a deal abaat thee for mony a year. And if hoo deed
afore th' child were born we sud ne'er forgive aarsels.'
'Thaa'rt mebbe reet, lad. It'll pleaz her to know, and hoo's bin a
good mother to thee.'
'Yi. Hoo's often said as if hoo could nobbud be a gron'mother
hoo'd say, as owd Simeon said, "Mine een hev sin Thy salvation."'
'Well, we'll go up and see her when th' chapel loses to-morrow
afternoon. Put that leet aat, lad; it's time we closed aar een.'
Matt turned down the lamp, and shot the bolt of his cottage door,
and followed his wife up the worn stone stairway to the room
above, to rest and await the dawning of the Sabbath.
That night, as the moonbeams fell in silver shafts through the
little window, and filled the chamber with a haze of subdued
light, a mystic presence, unseen, yet felt, filled all with its
glory. The old four-poster rested like an ark in a holy of
holies, its carved posts of oak gleaming as the faces of watching
angels on those whose weary limbs were stretched thereon. The
rugged features of Matt were touched into grand relief, his hair
and beard dark on the snowy pillow and coverlet on which they
lay. On his strong, outstretched arm reposed she whom he so
dearly, and now so proudly, loved, her large, lustrous eyes
looking out into the sheeted night, her pearly teeth gleaming
through her half-opened lips, from which came and went her breath
in the regular rhythm and sweetness of perfect health. Long after
her husband slept she lay awake, silently singing her own
'Magnificat'--not in Mary's words, it is true, but with Mary's
music and with Mary's heart.
And then she slept--and the moonbeams paled before the sunrise,
and the morning air stirred the foliage of the trees that kissed
the window-panes, and little birds came and sang their matins, and
another of God's Sabbaths spread its gold and glory over the hills
of Rehoboth.
II.
HOW DEBORAH HEARD THE NEWS.
It was Sabbath on the moors--on the moors where it was always
Sabbath.
Old Mr. Morell used to say, 'For rest, commend me to these eternal
hills;' and so Matt Heap thought as he threw open his chamber
casement and looked on their outline in the light of morning
glory. Their majesty and strength were so passionless, their
repose so undisturbed. How often he wondered to himself why they
always slept--not the sleep of weariness, but of strength! And how
often, when vexed and jaded, had he shared their calm as his eyes
rested on them, or as his feet sought their solitudes! How they
stirred the inarticulate poetry of his soul! At times he found
himself wondering if their sweeping lines were broken arcs of a
circle drawn by an infinite hand; and anon, he would ask if their
mighty mounds marked the graves of some primeval age--mounds
raised by the gods to the memory of forces long since extinct.