THE CABIN ON THE CINDER-HILL.
The cinder-hill cabin was situated at the mouth of an old shaft, long out
of use, but said to lead into the same pit as that now worked, the
entrance to which was about a quarter of a mile distant. The cabin was
about the same size as the hut from which the helpless family had been
driven; but the thatch wanted so much mending that Stephen and Martha
were obliged to draw over it one of their patchwork quilts, to shelter
them for the night from the rain which was threatened by the gathering
clouds. The door from the hut at Fern's Hollow was fortunately rather too
large instead of being too small for the doorway; and William Morris
promised to bring them a shutter for the window-place, where there was no
glass. Altogether, the cabin was not very inferior to their old home;
but, instead of the soft green turf and the fragrant air of the hills,
they were surrounded by barren cinder-heaps, upon which nothing would
grow but the yellow coltsfoot and a few weeds, and the wind was blowing
clouds of smoke from the limekilns over and round the dismal cabin.
Stephen, with the profound silence that began to frighten Martha, made
every arrangement he could think of for their comfort during the
quickly-approaching night; and as soon as this was finished, he washed
and dressed himself, as upon a Sunday morning, before going to meet Miss
Anne in the Red Gravel Pit. He was leaving the cabin without speaking,
when little Nan, who had watched everything in childish bewilderment and
dismay, set up a loud, pitiful cry, which he soothed with great
difficulty.
'Stevie going to live here?' said the little child at last, with a deep
sob.
'Ay, little Nan,' he answered; 'for a bit, darling. Please God, we'll go
home again some day. But little Nan shall always live with Stevie.
That'll do; won't it?'
'Ay, Stevie,' sobbed the child; and Stephen, kissing her tenderly, put
her on to Martha's lap, and walked out into the moonlight. The clouds
were hanging heavily in the western sky, but the clearer heavens shone
all the brighter by the contrast. The mountains lay before him, calm and
immovable in the soft light; and he could see the round outline of his
own hollow, at which his heart throbbed for a minute painfully. But there
was a hidden corner at the side of the cabin, and there Stephen knelt
down to pray earnestly before he went farther on his errand, until, calm
and quiet as the hills, and as the moon which seemed to be gazing
lovingly upon them, he went on with a brave and stedfast spirit to the
master's house.
Botfield Hall was a large, half-timbered farmhouse, with a gabled roof,
part of which was made of thatch and the rest of tiles. It stood quite
alone, at a little distance from the works, on the other side of them to
that where the village was built. The window-casements were framed of
stone; and the outer doors were of thick, solid oak, studded with
large-headed iron nails. The iron ring that served as a rapper on the
back door fell with a loud clang from Stephen's fingers upon the nails,
and startled him with its din, so that he could hardly speak to the
servant who answered his noisy summons. They crossed a kitchen, into
which many doors opened, to a kind of parlour beyond, fitted up with
furniture that looked wonderfully handsome and grand in Stephen's eyes,
and where the master was sitting by a comfortable fire. The impatient
servant pushed him within the door, and closed it behind her, leaving him
standing upon a mat, and shyly stroking his cap round and round, while
the master sat still, and gazed at him steadily with an assumed air of
amazement, though inwardly he was more afraid of the boy than Stephen was
of him. It makes a coward of a man or boy to do anybody an injury.
'Pray, what business brings you here, young Fern?' he asked in a gruff
voice.
'Sir,' said Stephen firmly, but without any insolence of manner, 'I want
to know who has turned us out of our own house. Is it the lord of the
manor, or you?'
'I've bought the place for myself,' answered the master, bringing his
hand down with a heavy blow upon the table before him, as if he would
like to knock Stephen down with the same force.
'There's nobody to sell it but me,' said the boy.
'You think so, my lad, do you? Why, if it were your own, you would have
no power over it till you are one-and-twenty. But the place was your
grandfather's, and he has sold it to me for £15. When your grandfather
returned from transportation his wife's hut became his; and his right to
it does not go over to anybody else till he is dead. It never belonged to
your father; and you can have no right to it. If you want to see the deed
of purchase, it is safe here, witnessed by my brother Thomas and Jones
the gamekeeper, and your grandfather's mark put to it. I would show it to
you; but I reckon, with all your learning, you would not make much out of
it.'
'Sir,' said Stephen, trembling, 'grandfather is quite simple and dark. He
couldn't understand that you were buying the place of him. Besides, he's
never had the money?'
'What do you mean, you young scoundrel?' cried the master. 'I gave it
into his own hands, and made him put it into his waistcoat pocket for
safety. Simple is he, and dark? He could attend his son's funeral four
miles off only a few months ago; and he can understand my niece Anne's
fine reading, which I cannot understand myself. Ask him for the three
five-pound notes I gave him, if you have not had them already.'
'How long ago is it?' inquired Stephen.
'You can't remember!' said the master, laughing: 'well, well, Jones left
you a keepsake at your garden wicket for you to remember the day by.'
Stephen's face flushed into a wrathful crimson, but he did not speak; and
in a minute or two the master said sharply,--
'Come, be off with you, if you've got nothing else to say.'
'I have got something else to say,' answered Stephen, walking up to the
table and looking steadily into his master's face. 'God sees both of us;
and He knows you have no right to the place, and I have. I believe some
day we'll go back again, though you have pulled the old house down to the
ground. I don't want to make God angry with _me_. But the Bible says He
seeth in secret, and He will reward us openly.'
The master shrank and turned pale before the keen, composed gaze of the
boy and his manly bearing; but Stephen's heart began to fail him, and,
with trembling limbs and eyes that could scarcely see, he made his way
out of the room, and out of the house, down to the end of the shrubbery.
There he could bear up no longer, and he sat down under the laurels,
shivering with a feeling of despair. The worst was come upon him now, and
he saw no helper.
'My poor boy,' said Miss Anne's gentle voice, and he felt her hand laid
softly on his shoulder. 'My poor Stephen, I have heard all, and I know
how bitterly hard it is to bear.'
Stephen answered her only with a low, half-suppressed groan; and then he
sat speechless and motionless, as if his despair had completely paralyzed
him.
'Listen, Stephen,' she continued, with energy: 'you told me once that the
clergyman at Danesford has some paper belonging to you, about the
cottage. You must go to him, and tell him frankly your whole story. I do
not believe that what my uncle has done would stand in law, and I myself,
if it be necessary, would testify that your grandfather could not
understand such a transaction. But perhaps it could be settled without
going to law, if the clergyman at Danesford would take it in hand; for my
uncle is very wishful to keep a good name in the country. But if not,
Stephen Fern, I promise you faithfully that should Fern's Hollow ever
come into my possession, and I be my uncle's only relative, I will
restore it to you as your rightful inheritance.'
She spoke so gravely, yet cheeringly, that a bright hope beamed into
Stephen's mind; and when Miss Anne held out her hand to him, as a pledge
of her promise, she felt a warm tear fall upon it. He rose up from the
ground now, and stood out into the moonlight before her, looking up into
her pale face.
'Stephen,' she said, more solemnly than before, 'do you find it possible
to endure this injury and temptation?'
'I've been praying for the master,' answered Stephen; but there was a
tone of bitterness in his voice, and his face grew gloomy again.
'He is a very miserable man,' said Miss Anne, sighing; 'I often hear him
walking up and down his room, and crying aloud in the night-time for God
to have mercy upon him; but he is a slave to the love of riches. Years
ago he might have broken through his chain, but he hugged it closely, and
now it presses upon him very hardly. All his love has been given to
money, till he cannot feel any love to God; and he knows that in a few
years he must leave all he loves for ever, and go into eternity without
it. He will have no rest to-night because of the injury he has done you.
He is a very wretched man, Stephen.'
'I wouldn't change with him for all his money,' said Stephen pityingly.
'Stephen,' continued Miss Anne, 'you say you pray for my uncle, and I
believe you do; but do you never feel a kind of spite and hatred against
him in your very prayers? Have you never seemed to enjoy telling our
Father how very evil he is?'
'Yes,' said the boy, hanging down his head, and wondering how Miss Anne
could possibly know that.
'Ah, Stephen,' she continued, 'God requires of us something more than
such prayers. He bids us really and truly to love our enemies--love which
He only can know of, because it is He who seeth in secret and into the
inmost secrets of our hearts. I may hear you pray for your enemies, and
see you try to do them good; but He alone can tell whether of a truth you
love them.'
'I cannot love them as I love you and little Nan,' replied Stephen.
'Not with the same kind of love,' said Miss Anne; 'in us there is
something for your love to take hold of and feed upon. "But if ye love
them which love you, what reward have ye? do not even the publicans the
same?" Your affection for us is the kind that sinners can feel; it is of
this earth, and is earthly. But to love our enemies is heavenly; it is
Christ-like, for He died for us while we were _yet_ sinners. Will you try
to do more than pray for my uncle and Black Thompson? Will you try to
love them. Will you try for Christ's sake?'
'Oh, Miss Anne, how can I?' he asked.
'It may not be all at once,' she answered tenderly; 'but if you ask God
to help you, His Holy Spirit will work within you. Only set this before
you as your aim, and resist every other feeling that will creep in;
remembering that the Lord Jesus Himself, who died for us, said to us,
"Love your enemies." He can feel for you, for "He was tempted in all
points as we are."'
As she spoke the last words, they heard the master's voice calling loudly
for Miss Anne, and Stephen watched her run swiftly up the shrubbery and
disappear through the door. There was a great bolting and locking and
barring to be heard within, for it was rumoured that Mr. Wyley kept large
sums of money in his house, and no place in the whole country-side was
more securely fastened up by day or night. But Stephen thought of him
pacing up and down his room through the sleepless night, praying God to
have mercy upon him, yet not willing to give up his sin; and as he turned
away to the poor little cabin on the cinder-hill, there was more pity
than revenge in the boy's heart.