STEPHEN'S FIRST VICTORY.
James Fern did not live many more days, and he was buried the Sunday
following his death. All the colliers and pitmen from Botfield walked
with the funeral of their old comrade and made a great burial of it. The
parish church was two miles on the other side of Botfield, and four miles
from Fern's Hollow; so James Fern and his family had never, as he called
it, 'troubled' the church with their attendance. All the household, even
to little Nan, went with their father's corpse, to bury it in the strange
and distant churchyard. Stephen felt as if he was in some long and
painful dream, as he sat in the cart, with his feet resting upon his
father's coffin, with his grandfather on a chair at the head, nodding
and laughing at every jolt on the rough road, and Martha holding a
handkerchief up to her face, and carrying a large umbrella over herself
and little Nan, to keep the dust off their new black bonnets. The boy,
grave as he was, could hardly think; he felt in too great a maze for
that. The church, too, which he had never entered before, seemed grand
and cold and immense, with its lofty arches, and a roof so high that it
made him giddy to look up to it. Now and then he heard a few sentences of
the burial service sounding out grandly in the clergyman's strange, deep
voice; but they were not words he was familiar with, and he could not
understand their meaning. At the open grave only, the clergyman said 'Our
Father,' which his father had taught him during his illness; and while
his tears rolled down his cheeks for the first time that day, Stephen
repeated over and over again to himself, 'Our Father! our Father!'
Stephen would have liked to stay in the church for the evening service,
for which the bells were already ringing; but this did not at all suit
the tastes of his father's old comrades. They made haste to crowd into
a public-house, where they sat and drank, and forced Stephen to drink
too, in order to 'drown his grief.' It was still a painful dream to him;
and more and more, as the long hours passed on, he wondered how he came
there, and what all the people about him were doing. It was quite dark
before they started homewards, and the poor old grandfather was no longer
able to sit up in his chair, but lay helplessly at the bottom of the
cart. Even Martha was fast asleep, and leaned her head upon Stephen's
shoulder, without any regard for her new black bonnet. The cart was now
crowded with as many of the people as could get into it, who sang and
shouted along the quiet Sunday road; and, as they insisted upon stopping
at every public-house they came to, it was very late before they reached
the lane leading up to Fern's Hollow. The grandfather was half dragged
and half carried along by two of the men, followed by Stephen bearing
sleepy little Nan in his arms, and by Martha, who had wakened up in a
temper between crying and scolding. The long, strange, painful dream of
father's funeral was not over yet, and Stephen was still trying to think
in a stupid, drowsy fashion, when he fell heavily asleep on the bed
beside his grandfather.
He awoke by habit very early in the morning, and aroused himself with
a great effort against dropping asleep again. He could realize and
understand his position better now. Father was dead; and there was no
one to earn bread for them all but himself. At this thought he sprang
up instantly, though his head was aching in a manner he had never felt
before. With some difficulty he awoke Martha to get his breakfast and
put up his dinner in a basket which he carried with him to the pit. She
also complained bitterly of her head aching, and moved about with a
listlessness very different to her usual activity. 'I only wish I knew
what was right,' said Stephen to himself; 'they told us we ought to show
respect for father, but I don't think he'd like this. Perhaps if I could
read the Bible all through, that would tell me everything.'
This thought reminded Stephen that he had promised his father to read his
chapter every day of his life till he knew how to read more; and,
carrying the old Bible to his favourite seat on the door-sill, a very
pleasant place in the cool, fresh summer morning, he read the verses
aloud, slowly and carefully, rather repeating than reading them, for he
knew his chapter better by heart than by the printed letters in the book.
Thank God, Stephen Fern did begin to know it _by heart_!
It was not a bad day in the pit. All the colliers, men and boys, were
more gentle than usual with the fatherless lad; and even Black Thompson,
his master since his father's illness, who was in general a fierce bully
to everybody about him, spoke as mildly as he could to Stephen. Yet all
the day Stephen longed for his release in the evening, thinking how much
work there wanted doing in the garden, and how he and Martha must be busy
in it till nightfall. The clanking of the chain which drew him up to the
light of day sounded like music to him; but little did he guess that an
enemy was lying in wait for him at the mouth of the pit. 'Hillo!' cried a
voice down the shaft as they were nearing the top; 'one of you chaps have
got to carry a sack o' coals one mile.'
The voice belonged to Tim Cole, who was the terror of the pit-bank, from
his love of mischief and his insatiable desire for fighting. He was
looking down the shaft now, with a grin and a laugh upon his red face,
round which his shaggy red hair hung like a rough mane. There were only
two other boys besides Stephen in the skip, and as their fathers were
with them it might be dangerous to meddle with them; so Tim fixed upon
Stephen as his prey.
'Thee has got to carry these coals, Steve,' he said, his eyes dancing
with delight.
'I won't,' replied Stephen.
'Thee shalt,' cried Tim, with an oath.
'I won't,' Stephen repeated stedfastly.
'Then we'll fight for it,' said Tim, clenching his fists and squaring his
arms, while the men and boys formed a ring round the two lads, and one
and another spoke encouragingly to Stephen, who was somewhat slighter and
younger than Tim. He had beaten Tim once before, but that was months ago;
yet the blood rushed into Stephen's face, and he set his lips together
firmly. Up yonder, just within the range of his sight, was Fern's Hollow,
with its neglected garden, and his supper waiting for him; and here was
the heavy sack of coals to be carried for a mile, or the choice of
fighting with Tim.
'I wish I knew what I ought to do,' he said, speaking aloud, though
speaking to himself.
'Ay, ay, lad,' cried Black Thompson; 'it's a shame to make thee fight,
and thy father not cold in the graveyard yet. I say, Tim, what is it thee
wants?'
'These coals,' answered Tim doggedly, 'are to be carried to the New Farm;
and if Stevie Fern won't take them one mile, he must fight me afore he
goes off this bank.'
'Now, lads, I'll judge between ye this time,' said Black Thompson.
'Stevie shall carry them to the end of Red Lane, and cut across the hill
home: that's not much out of the way; and if Tim makes him go one step
farther, I'll lick thee myself to-morrow, lad, I promise thee.'
Stephen hoisted the sack upon his shoulders in silence, and strode away
with a swelling heart, in which a tumult of anger and perplexity was
raging. 'If I had only a commandment about these things!' he thought. He
was not quite certain whether it would not have been best and wisest to
fight with Tim and have it out; especially as Tim was all the time
taunting him for being a coward. But his father had read much to him
during the last three months; and though he could not remember any
particular commandment, he felt sure that the Bible did not encourage
fighting or drunkenness. Suddenly, and before they reached the end of Red
Lane, a light burst upon Stephen's mind.
'I say, Tim,' he said, speaking to him for the first time, 'it's four
miles to the New Farm, and I'll go with thee a mile farther than Red
Lane.'
'Eh!' cried Tim; 'and get Black Thompson to lick me to-morrow?'
'No,' said Stephen earnestly, 'I'll not tell Black Thompson; and if he
hears talk of it, I'll say I did it of my own mind. Come thy ways, Tim;
let's be sharp, for I've my potatoes to hoe when I get home to-night.'
The boys walked briskly on for a few minutes, past the end of Red Lane,
though Stephen cast a wistful glance up it, and gave an impatient jerk to
the load upon his shoulders. Tim had been walking beside him in silent
reflection; but at last he came to a sudden halt.
'I can't make it out,' he said. 'What art thee up to, Stephen? Tell me
out plain, or I'll fight thee here, if Black Thompson does lick me for
it.'
'Why, I've been learning to read,' answered Stephen, with some pride,
'and of course I know things I didn't used to know, and what thee doesn't
know now.'
'And what's that to do with it?' inquired Tim.
'My chapter says that if any man forces me to go one mile, I am to go
two,' replied Stephen; 'it doesn't say why exactly, but I'm going to try
what good it will be to me to do everything that my book tells me.'
'It's a queer book,' said Tim, after a pause. 'Does it say a chap may
make another chap do his work for him?'
'No,' Stephen answered; 'but it says we are to love our enemies, and do
good to them that hate us, that we may be the children of our Father
which is in heaven--that is God, Tim. So that is why I am going a mile
farther with thee.'
'I don't hate thee,' said Tim uneasily, 'but I do love fighting; I'd
liever thee'd fight than come another mile. Don't thee come any farther,
I've been bone lazy all day, and thee's been at work. And I say, Stevie,
I'll help thee with the potatoes to-morrow, to make up for this bout.'
Stephen thanked him, and accepted his offer heartily. The load was
quickly transferred to Tim's broad back, and the boys parted in more
good-will than they had ever felt before; Stephen strengthened by this
favourable result in his resolution to put in practice all he knew of
the Bible; and Tim deep in thought, as was evident from his muttering
every now and then on his way to the New Farm, 'Queer book that; and
a queer chap too!'