April was a busy month in the Dovecot. Young birds were chipping the
egg, parent birds were feeding their young or relieving each other on
the nest, and Jack and his master were constantly occupied and excited.
One night Daddy Darwin went to bed; but, though he was tired, he did not
sleep long. He had sold a couple of handsome but quarrelsome pigeons, to
advantage, and had added their price to the hoard in the bed-head. This
had renewed his old fears, for the store was becoming very valuable; and
he wondered if it had really escaped Jack's quick observation, or
whether the boy knew about it, and, perhaps, talked about it. As he lay
and worried himself he fancied he heard sounds without--the sound of
footsteps and of voices. Then his heart beat till he could hear nothing
else; then he could undoubtedly hear nothing at all; then he certainly
heard something which probably was rats. And so he lay in a cold sweat,
and pulled the rug over his face, and made up his mind to give the money
to the parson, for the poor, if he was spared till daylight.
He _was_ spared till daylight, and had recovered himself, and
settled to leave the money where it was, when Jack rushed in from the
pigeon-house with a face of dire dismay. He made one or two futile
efforts to speak, and then unconsciously used the words Shakespeare has
put into the mouth of Macduff, "All my pretty 'uns!" and so burst into
tears.
And when the old man made his way to the pigeon-house, followed by poor
Jack, he found that the eggs were cold and the callow young shivering in
deserted nests, and that every bird was gone. And then he remembered the
robbers, and was maddened by the thought that whilst he lay expecting
thieves to break in and steal his money he had let them get safely off
with his whole stock of pigeons.
Daddy Darwin had never taken up arms against his troubles, and this one
crushed him.
The fame and beauty of his house-doves were all that was left of
prosperity about the place, and now there was nothing left--
_nothing_! Below this dreary thought lay a far more bitter one,
which he dared not confide to Jack. He had heard the robbers; he
might have frightened them away; he might at least have given the lad a
chance to save his pets, and not a care had crossed his mind except for
the safety of his own old bones, and of those miserable savings in the
bed-head, which he was enduring so much to scrape together (oh satire!)
for a distant connection whom he had never seen. He crept back to the
kitchen, and dropped in a heap upon the settle, and muttered to himself.
Then his thoughts wandered. Supposing the pigeons were gone for good,
would he ever make up his mind to take that money out of the money-hole,
and buy a fresh stock? He knew he never would, and shrank into a meaner
heap upon the settle as he said so to himself. He did not like to look
his faithful lad in the face.
Jack looked him in the face, and, finding no help there, acted pretty
promptly behind his back. He roused the parish constable, and fetched
that functionary to the Dovecot before he had had bite or sup to break
his fast. He spread a meal for him and Daddy, and borrowed the Shaws'
light cart whilst they were eating it. The Shaws were good farmer-folk,
they sympathized most fully; and Jack was glad of a few words of pity
from Phoebe. She said she had watched the pretty pets "many a score of
times," which comforted more than one of Jack's heartstrings. Phoebe's
mother paid respect to his sense and promptitude. He had acted exactly
as she would have done.
"Daddy was right enough about yon lad," she admitted. "He's not one to
let the grass grow under his feet."
And she gave him a good breakfast whilst the horse was being "put to."
It pleased her that Jack jumped up and left half a delicious cold
tea-cake behind him when the cart-wheels grated outside. Mrs. Shaw sent
Phoebe to put the cake in his pocket, and "the Measter" helped Jack in
and took the reins. He said he would "see Daddy Darwin through it," and
added the weight of his opinion to that of the constable, that the
pigeons had been taken to "a beastly low place" (as he put it) that had
lately been set up for pigeon-shooting in the outskirts of the
neighboring town.
They paused no longer at the Dovecot than was needed to hustle Daddy
Darwin on to the seat beside Master Shaw, and for Jack to fill his
pockets with peas, and take his place beside the constable. He had
certain ideas of his own on the matter, which were not confused by the
jogtrot of the light cart, which did give a final jumble to poor Daddy
Darwin's faculties.
No wonder they were jumbled! The terrors of the night past, the shock of
the morning, the completeness of the loss, the piteous sight in the
pigeon-house, remorseful shame, and then--after all these years, during
which he had not gone half a mile from his own hearthstone--to be set up
for all the world to see, on the front seat of a market-cart, back to
back with the parish constable, and jogged off as if miles were nothing,
and crowded streets were nothing, and the Beaulieu Gardens were nothing;
Master Shaw talking away as easily as if they were sitting in two
armchairs, and making no more of "stepping into" a lawyer's office, and
"going on" to the Town Hall, than if he were talking of stepping up to
his own bedchamber or going out into the garden!
That day passed like a dream, and Daddy Darwin remembered what happened
in it as one remembers visions of the night.
He had a vision (a very unpleasing vision) of the proprietor of the
Beaulieu Gardens, a big greasy man, with sinister eyes very close
together, and a hook nose, and a heavy watch chain, and a bullying
voice. He browbeat the constable very soon, and even bullied Master Shaw
into silence. No help was to be had from him in his loud indignation at
being supposed to traffic with thieves.
When he turned the tables by talking of slander, loss of time, and
compensation, Daddy Darwin smelt money, and tremblingly whispered to
Master Shaw to apologize and get out of it. "They're gone for good," he
almost sobbed: "Gone for good, like all t' rest! And I'll not be long
after 'em."
But even as he spoke he heard a sound which made him lift up his head.
It was Jack's call at feeding-time to the pigeons at the Dovecot. And
quick following on this most musical and most familiar sound there came
another. The old man put both his lean hands behind his ears to be sure
that he heard it aright--the sound of wings--the wings of a dove!
The other men heard it and ran in. Whilst they were wrangling, Jack had
slipped past them, and had made his way into a weird enclosure in front
of the pigeon-house. And there they found him, with all the captive
pigeons coming to his call; flying, fluttering, strutting, nestling from
head to foot of him, he scattering peas like hail.
He was the first to speak, and not a choke in his voice. His iron
temperament was at white heat, and, as he afterwards said, he "cared no
more for yon dirty chap wi' the big nose, nor if he were a _ratten_[6]
in a hay-loft!"
[Footnote 6: _Anglicé_ Rat.]
"These is ours," he said, shortly. "I'll count 'em over, and see if
they're right. There was only one young 'un that could fly. A white
'un." ("It's here," interpolated Master Shaw.) "I'll pack 'em i' yon,"
and Jack turned his thumb to a heap of hampers in a corner. "T' carrier
can leave t' baskets at t' toll-bar next Saturday, and ye may send your
lad for 'em, if ye keep one."
The proprietor of the Beaulieu Gardens was not a man easily abashed, but
most of the pigeons were packed before he had fairly resumed his
previous powers of speech. Then, as Master Shaw said, he talked "on the
other side of his mouth." Most willing was he to help to bring to
justice the scoundrels who had deceived him and robbed Mr. Darwin, but
he feared they would be difficult to trace. His own feeling was that of
wishing for pleasantness among neighbors. The pigeons had been found at
the Gardens. That was enough. He would be glad to settle the business
out of court.
Daddy Darwin heard the chink of the dirty man's money, and would have
compounded the matter then and there. But not so the parish constable,
who saw himself famous; and not so Jack, who turned eyes of smouldering
fire on Master Shaw.
"Maester Shaw! you'll not let them chaps get off? Daddy's mazelin' wi'
trouble, sir, but I reckon you'll see to it."
"If it costs t' worth of the pigeons ten times over, I'll see to it, my
lad," was Master Shaw's reply. And the parish constable rose even to a
vein of satire as he avenged himself of the man who had slighted his
office. "Settle it out of court? Aye! I dare say. And send t' same chaps
to fetch 'em away again t' night after. Nay--bear a hand with this
hamper, Maester Shaw, if you please--if it's all t' same to you, Mr.
Proprietor, I think we shall have to trouble you to step up to t' Town
Hall by-and-by, and see if we can't get shut of them mistaking friends
o' yours for three months any way."
If that day was a trying one to Daddy Darwin the night that followed it
was far worse. The thieves were known to the police, and the case was
down to come on at the Town Hall the following morning; but meanwhile
the constable thought fit to keep the pigeons under his own charge in
the village lock-up. Jack refused to be parted from his birds, and
remained with them, leaving Daddy Darwin alone in the Dovecot. He dared
not go to bed, and it was not a pleasant night that he spent, dozing
with weariness, and starting up with fright, in an arm-chair facing the
money-hole.
Some things that he had been nervous about he got quite used to,
however. He bore himself with sufficient dignity in the publicity of the
Town Hall, where a great sensation was created by the pigeons being let
loose without, and coming to Jack's call. Some of them fed from the
boy's lips, and he was the hero of the hour, to Daddy Darwin's delight.
Then the lawyer and the lawyer's office proved genial and comfortable to
him. He liked civil ways and smooth speech, and understood them far
better than Master Shaw's brevity and uncouthness. The lawyer chatted
kindly and intelligently; he gave Daddy Darwin wine and biscuit, and
talked of the long standing of the Darwin family and its vicissitudes;
he even took down some fat yellow books, and showed the old man how many
curious laws had been made from time to time for the special protection
of pigeons in Dovecots, very ancient statutes making the killing of a
house-dove felony. Then 1 James I. c. 29 awarded three months'
imprisonment "without bail or main price" to any person who should
"shoot at, kill, or destroy with any gun, crossbow, stone-bow, or
longbow, any house-dove or pigeon;" but allowed an alternative fine of
twenty shillings to be paid to the churchwardens of the parish for the
benefit of the poor. Daddy Darwin hoped there was no such alternative in
this case, and it proved that by 2 Geo. III. c. 29, the twenty-shilling
fine was transferred to the owner of birds; at which point another
client called, and the polite lawyer left Daddy to study the laws by
himself.
It was when Jack as helping Master Shaw to put the horse into the cart,
after the trial was over, that the farmer said to him, "I don't want to
put you about, my lad, but I'm afraid you won't keep your master long.
T'old gentleman's breaking up, mark my words! Constable and me was going
into the _George_ for a glass, and Master Darwin left us and went
back to the office. I says, 'What are ye going back to t' lawyer for?'
and he says, 'I don't mind telling you, Master Shaw, but it's to make my
will.' And off he goes. Now, there's only two more things between that
and death, Jack March! And one's the parson, and t' other's the doctor."