 Chapter 34 of Crips the Carrier, by Richard Dodridge Blackmore. This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. CHAPTER 34 A WOLHOPEAN It is only fair, towards Mr. Sharpe, to acquit him of all intention to trust his wife with a very important secret, as long as he could help it. He was well aware of the risk he ran in taking such a desperate step, but the risk was forced upon him now by several circumstances. Although he wanted her aid just now, in a matter in which he could not possibly have it without trusting her, hence he resolved to make a virtue of necessity, as the saying is, and at the same time get the grand relief, which even a strong mind in long scheming obtains, by having its burden shared. This resolve of his was no sudden one, for several days he had made up his mind that when he should be questioned upon the subject, which he foresaw must happen, it would earn the credit of Kandor, and the grace of womanly gratitude, by making a clean breast of it. There could be no better season than this. The house was quiet, his son was away, the shadows of the coming evening softly fell before her step. Cross-duck Lane looked very touching in the calm of twilight. And Mrs. Sharpe was in the melting mood. Therefore the learned and conscientious lawyer perceived that the client's affairs about which he was going to busy himself might safely wait for another day, while he was sweeping his own hearth clean. So he locked the door, and looked out of the window where sparrows were swarming to their ivy roost, and then he drew in the old lattice, and turned the iron tongue that fastened it. Mrs. Sharpe looked on, while some little suggestion of fear came to qualify eagerness. "'Luke, I declare you quite make me nervous. I shall be afraid to go to bed to-night. Really a stranger or a timid person would think that you were going to confess a murder.' "'My dear, if you feel at all inclined to give way,' Mr. Sharpe answered, as if glad to escape, "'we will have out our talk to-morrow, or no, to-morrow I have an appointment at Woodstock. The day after that we will recur to it. I see that it will be better, so.' "'Luke, is your mind astray? I quite fear so. Can you imagine that I could wait for two days after what you have told me?' "'My dear, I was only considering yourself. If you wish it, I will begin at once. Only for your own sake I must insist on your sitting calmly down. There, my dear, now do not agitate yourself. There is nothing to frighten anybody. It is the most simple thing, and you will laugh when you have heard it. Then I wish I had heard it, Luke, for I feel more inclined to cry than laugh. Miranda, you must not be foolish. Such a thing is not at all like you. Very well. Now you are quite sedate. Now please do not interrupt me once, but ask your questions afterwards. If you ask me a question I shall stop, and go to the office with my papers. Mr. Sharp looked at his wife, and she bowed her head in obedience. To begin at the very beginning, he said, with a smile to reassure her, you will do me the justice to remember that I have worked very hard for my living, and I have prospered well, Miranda, having you as both the foundation and the crown of my prosperity. I was perfectly satisfied, as you know, living quite up to my wishes, and putting a little cash by every year of our lives, and paying on a heavy life insurance, in case of my own life-dropping, for the sake of you and Christopher. You know all that. Darling, Luke, I do, but you make me cry when you talk like that. Very well. That is as it should be. You were as happy as need be expected until the great wrong befell us, the fierce injustice of losing every farthing to which we were clearly entitled. You were the proper successor to all the property of old Firmitage, that old Trumudgeon, and wholesale prisoner of the university, made a fool of himself towards his latter-end by marrying Miss O'Glander, old Blackstrap, as of course we know, had no other motive for doing such a thing, except his low ambition to be connected with a good old family. Ever since he began life as a bottle-boy in the cellars of old Jerry Pigout... He never did that, Luke. How can you speak so of my father's first cousin? He was an extremely respectable young man. My father always said so. While he was making his money, Miranda, of course he was respectable, and everybody respected him as soon as he made it. However, I have not the smallest intention of reproaching the poor old villain. He acted according to his lights, and they led him very badly. A foolish ambition induced him to marry that pompous old maid, Joan O'Glander, who had been jilted by Commodore Patch, the son of the famous Captain. We all know what followed. The old man was but a doll in the hands of his lady-wife. He left all the scrapings and screwings of his life for her to do what she pleased with. At least everybody supposes so. What do you mean, Luke? Ask Mrs. Sharp, having inkling of legal surprises. Do you mean that there is a later will? Has he done justice to me, after all? No, my dear, he never saved his soul by attending to his own kindred. But he just had the sense to make a little change at last when his wife would not come near him. You know what he died of. It was coming on for weeks, though that last it struck him suddenly. The portwine fungus of his old vaults grew into his lungs, and stopped them. It had shown for some time in his face and throat, and his wife was afraid of catching it. She took it to be some infectious fever, of which she was always so terribly afraid. The old man knew that his time was short, but to take to his bed he would not. Of all born men the most stubborn he was, as any man must be, to get on well. If I am to die of the fungus, he said, I will have a little more of it. And he went, and with his own hands hunted up a magnum of port, which had been laid by from the vintage of 1745, in the first day of Jerry Pigout, but before that he had sent for me, and I was there when he opened it. Luke, you take my breath away. Such wonderful things I have never heard, at least not in our own family. Of course, my dear, we all accept wonders with quietude, till they come home to us. While when he fetched out his old bottle it was fungus inside from heel to neck. He held it up against the light and the glass being whiter than now they make. And the wine gone almost white with age. There you could see this extraordinary growth, like cords in a bottle, and valves across it, and a long yellow sheath like a crocus flower. I'd never seen anything like it before, but he knew all about it. I know a gentleman." He grunted in his throat. He could never say gentleman, as you remember. A gentleman as would give a hundred guineas for this here bottle. Quibbles! He shouldn't have it for a thousand. My boy, you and I will drink it. Say no, and I'll cut off your wife with a half-penny. Miranda, what could I do but to try to honour him to the utmost? If I had had the smallest inkling of the inquietous will he had made, of course, I never would have sat on the head of the cask, down in his dingy and reeking vaults by the hour together to please him. But never mind that. In a moment he took a long-handled knife or chopper and holding the bottle upright struck off the neck and a part of the shoulder. As straight as a line at the level of the wine. How many men could do that? He said. None of your clumsy corkscrewers for me. Now, Quibbles, here's a real treat for you. Look of bee-swing, my boy, here's a bee-hive, and really it was more like eating than drinking wine, for all the body was gone into the fungus. Nasty-er stuff I never tasted, but luckily he took the lion's share. Now, Quibbles, I'll tell you a secret, he said after swallowing at least a quart. A very pretty girl came and kissed me the other day, and among these very bottles such a little duck, not a bit ashamed or a-feared of my fungus as my missus is, and her breath was as sweet as the violets of twenty. Well, now my little dear thinks I, as I stood back and looked at her. That was kind of you to kiss an old man a-dying of port wine, fungus, and if he only lives another day you shall have the right to kiss the royal family if you cares to do it. Quibbles, I wouldn't call in you nor any other thief of a lawyer. Lawyers are very well over a glass, but keep them outside of the cellar, say I. Very good company in their way, but the only company I put trust in is the one I have dealt with all my life, and many a thousand pounds I have paid them, the royal wine company of Aporto. So now, if anything happens to me, though I am not in such a hurry to be binned away and walled up for the resurrection, Quibbles wait six months, and then you go to the royal porto company and ask for a gentleman of the name of Jolly Fellows. Now, Luke, I'm all anxiety to hear, exclaim Mrs. Sharp with a sudden interruption. What was the end of this very strange affair? I perceive now that I have foreseen the whole of it. But it is not right that you should speak so long without one more silver refreshment. It is many hours since you dined, my dear, and a very poor dinner you had of it. You shall have a glass of white wine and a slice of tongue between a little cold roll and butter. It will not in any way interrupt you. I can get it all for you without ringing the bell. Only let me ask you one thing first. Why have you never told me this till now? Mrs. Miranda, it would disturb your mind, and I know that you cannot endure suspense. Moreover, I scarcely knew what to think of it. Poor old firmitage! What with the fungus already in his tubes and what he was taking down might be talking sheer nonsense for all that I knew, and indeed for a long time I treated it so, and I had no stomach for a voyage to a porto, upon mere speculation and for the benefit only of some pretty girl. Then I found out, by purest chance, that no voyage to a porto was needful, that old Port Wine, who departed on his cast to a better world the day after his magnum, meant nothing more than the London store as an agency of the a porto company, and even after that I made one expedition to the minorities all for nothing. Two or three very polite young dons stared at me and thought that I was come to chaff them, or perhaps had turned up from their vaults top heavy, when I asked for senior jolly fellows, and so I came away and lost some months, and might never have thought it worth while to go again except for another mere accident. My dear, what a chapter of accidents! cried Mrs. Sharp while feeding him. I thought that you were a great deal too clever to allow any room for accidents. Women think so, men know better, the lawyer replied sententiously, his ability was too well known to need his vindication, and Miranda you forget that I had, as yet, no personal interest in the question, but when I happened to have a Portuguese gentleman as a client, a man who had spent many years in England, and happened to be talking of our language to him, I told him one part of the story, and asked if he could throw any light on it. He told me at once that the name which had so puzzled me must be Galofalos, a Portuguese surname, by no means common, and the next time I was in town I had occasion to call in St. John's Street, and found myself almost by accident again not far from the company's offices. Mr. Sharp you left such a thing to chance, when you knew that it might pull down that dreadful woman's insolence. My dear, it is not the duty of my life to mitigate feminine arrogance, and to undertake such a crusade, Gretis, I am equal to take a bold stroke as you will see if your patience lasts, but never to such a vast undertaking. When it comes before me in the way of business naturally I take it up, but this was no business of my own. And the will was proved, and assets called in for the old rogue to not owe one penny. Well, I went again, and this time I got a hold of the right man. Miranda, I hear the bell. The new office bell, the successor of the one that succumbed to Russell Overshoot, rang as hard as ring it could. A special messenger was come from London, and in half an hour Mr. Luke Sharp was sitting on the box of the night-up mail. End of Chapter 34 Chapter 35 of Cripps the Carrier by Richard Doddridge Blackmore This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. Chapter 35 Nightingales The sudden departure of Mr. Luke Sharp in the very marrow of his story left his good wife in a trying and altogether discontented state of mind. She knew that she could have no more particulars until he came back again. Her Sharp had even less faith in the post than the post of that period deserved. She might have to wait for days and days with a double anxiety urging her. In the first place, although she felt nothing but pity for poor old Mrs. Firmitage, and would not have been really sorry to hear of anything likely to vex her, she could not help being desirous to know if there were any danger of a thing so sad, but her second anxiety was a great deal keener, being sharpened by the ever-moving grit of love. In a dreadful state of mind her son was in, how would all this act upon him? His father had been forced by some urgency of things to put on his box-coat and make off, without even time for a hurried whisper as to the residue of his tail. Mrs. Sharp felt that there might be something which her husband feared to spread before her, without plenty of time to lead up to it, and having for many years been visited, whenever she was not quite herself, with poignant doubts whether Mr. Sharp was anchored upon scriptural principles, she almost persuaded herself for the moment that he meant to put up with the loss of the money. However, a little reflection suffice to clear away this sadly awful cloud of skepticism, and to assure her that Mr. Sharp, however, he might swerve in theory, would be orthodox enough in practice to follow the straight path towards the money, and then she began to think of nothing except her own beloved kit. The last hurried words of her husband had been, Not one word to kit, or you ruin all, let him groan as he likes, only watch him closely. I shall be back by Saturday night. God bless you, my dear, keep up your spirits. I have the whip-hand of the lot of them. Herein lay her faith and hope. She never had known her husband fail when he really made up his mind to succeed, and therefore in the bottom of her heart she doubted the genuine loss of Grace O'Glander. Sharp had discovered and traced to their end clues of the finest gossamer when his interest laid him to do so, that he should be baffled and own himself to be so, was beyond her experience. Therefore, although as yet she had no more than a gas at her husband's schemes, she could not help fancying, after his words, that they might have to do with Grace O'Glander. Before she had time to think out her thoughts, Christopher, their main subject, returned from Wytham Wood, after holding long rivalry of war with nightingales, he still carried on and well carried off the style of love-lorn Romeo. He swung his cloak quite as well as could be expected of an Englishman who is born to hate-fly-away apparel, all of which is womanish. But the necessities of his position had driven him now to a very short pipe. His favorite mirsham had fallen into sorrow as terrible as his own. In a highly poetical moment he had sucked it so hard that the oil arose, and took him with a hot spot upon a white tongue, impregnated then with a sonnet. All sonnets are of the tongue and ear, but Kitt misliked having his split up, just when it was coming to the final nick. Before he gave his pipe a thump beyond such a pipe's endurance, and being as sensitive as himself, and of equally fine material it simply refused to draw any more, as long as he breathed poetry. Still breathing poetry he marched home, with the stump of a farthing clay, newly baked in the summer-town road to console him. Now if this young man had failed of one of the triple human combination, weed and clay and fire, where and how might he have ended not only that one evening, but all the rest of the evenings of his young life, his appearance and manner had first imported to any one whom he came across, and he truly did come across them in his wide and loose march out of Oxford City, that he might be sought for in a few hours' time, and only in the inferior portion found. His mother worried him. So did his father. So did all humanity, save one, who worried him more than any, or all of it put together. The trees and the road and the singing of birds and the gladness of the green world worried him. Luckily for himself he had bought a good box of German tender, and from ash to ash his spirit glowed slowly into a more philosophic state. Finally the beauty of the trees and hedges and the sloping fields began to seal around him the warbled pleasure of the little birds made overture to his sympathy, and the lustrous calm of shadowed waters spread its pitcher through his mind. His body also responded to the influences of the time of the day and the love of nature freshened into the natural love of cupboard. Hunger awoke in his system somewhere and spread sweet pitchers in a tasteful part, for a moment of supreme agony he wrestled with the course of material instinct, and turned on his heel, as our novelists say, and made off for his father's kitchen. His poor mother caught him in the moment he came in and pulled off his hat and his opera cloak, and frizzled up his curls for him. She seemed to think that he must have been for a journey of at least a hundred leagues, that the fault of his going was hers, and the virtue of his ever coming back was all his own. Then she looked at him slyly, and with some sadness, and yet a considerable touch of pride, by the light of a three-wicked cocoa candle, and feeling quite sure that she had him to herself trembled at the boldness of the shot she made. Oh, Kit, why have you never told me? I have found it all out. You have fallen in love. Everaffirmated, sharp, Esquire, as he always entitled himself upon the collar of spaniel or terrier, had nothing to say for a moment, but softly withdrew to have his blush and shadow. Of all the world best he loved his mother, before or after somebody else, and his simple, unpracticed, and uncored heart was shy of the job it was carrying on. Therefore he turned from his mother's face and her eager eyes in expectant arms. Come and tell me, my darling," she whispered, trying to get a good look at his reluctant eyes, and wholly oblivious of her promise to his father. I will not be angry at all, Kit, although you should never have left me to find it out in this way. There is nothing to find out," he answered, making a turn towards the kitchen stairs. I just want my supper if there is anything to eat. To eat, Kit, and I thought so much better of you. After all, I must have been quite wrong. What a shame to invent such stories. You must have invented them yourself, dear mother," said Kit, with recovered bravery. Let me hear it all out when I have had my supper. I will go down this moment and see what there is," replied his mother eagerly. Is there anything now that can coax your appetite? Yes, mother Oysters will be over tomorrow. I should like two dozen, fried with butter, and a pound and a quarter of rump steak, cut thick and not overdone. You shall have them, my darling, in twenty minutes. Now be sure that you put your first slippers on. I saw quite a fog coming over Port Meadow, as much as half an hour ago. This is the worst time of year to take cold. A May cold is a thirty-day cold. What a stoop I must be! She continued to herself, to imagine that the boy could be in love. I will take care not to say another word, or I might break my promise to his father. What a pity! He has a noble mustache coming, and only his mother to admire it. In spite of all disappointment this good mother paid the warmest heed to the ordering. I and the cooking of the supper of her only child. A juicier steak never sat on a gridiron, fat or oysters never frizzled with the pure bubble of goodness. Kit sat up and made short work of all that came before him. No, mother, what is it you want to say? His tone was not defiant, but nicely self-possessed, and softly rich with triumph of digestion, and a silver-tankered of Morrell's ale helped him to express himself. My dear boy! I have nothing to say except that you have lifted a great weight off my mind, a very great weight beyond description, by leaving behind you not even a trace of the existence of that fine rump steak. CHAPTER XXXVI It was the morn when the tall and shapely tower of Magdalen is crowned with a fillet of shining white awaiting the first step of sunrise. Once a year for generations this has been the sign of it, eager eyes and gaping mouths, little knuckles blue with cold, and clumsy little feet inclined to slide upon the slippery lead, all are bound to keep together for the radiant moment, all are a little elated at their height above all other boys, all have a strong idea that the sun when he comes will be full of them, and every one of them longs to be back beneath his mother's blankets. As a tradition with this choir, handed or chanted down from very ancient choral ancestry, the sun never rises on May Day without iced dew to glance upon. Scientific record here comes in to prop tradition. The icy saints may be going by, but they leave their breath behind them. And the poets, who have sent forth their maids to gather the dews of May, knew and meant that dew must freeze to stand that operation. But though the sky was bright and the dew lay sparkling for the maidens, the frost in this particular morning was not so keen as usual. The trees that took the early light, more chaste without the yellow ray, glistened rather with a soft moisture than with stiff encrustment, and sprays that kept their sally into fickle air half-latent, showed only little scalloped crinkles with a knob in them, held in every downy quillet liquid rather than solid gem. Christopher Sharpe, looking none the worse for his excellent supper of last night, laid his fetish elbow on the parapet of the bridge and mused. Poetical feeling had fetched him out, thus early in the morning to hear the choir salute the sun, and to be moved with sympathy. The moon is the property of all true lovers, and has them under good command when she pleases, of her half the weeks of a month she declines to sit in the court of lunacy, at least as regards this earth, having her own men and women to attend to. This young man knew that she could not be found, and with a view to meditation now, and his mind relapsed to the sun, a coarse power, poetical only when he sets and rises. With strength and command of the work of men, leaving their dreams to his sister, the sun leapt up, with the shake of his brow and scattering of the dew-clouds, the gates of the east swung right and left, so that tall trees on a hill seemed less than reeds in the rush of glory, and lines, like the spread of a crystal fan, trembled along lowland. Inlets now, and lanes of vision, scarcely open yesterday and closed perhaps to-morrow, guided shafts of light along the level, widening ways they love. Tree and tower, hill and wall, and water and broad meadow, stood or lay or leaned, according to the stamp set on them, one and all receiving, sharing and rejoicing in the day. Between the battlements and above them burst and rose the choral hymn, and as the laws of sound compelled it to go upward mainly, the part that came down was pleasing. Christopher, seeing but little of the boys and not hearing very much, was almost unable to regard the whole as a vocal effort of the angels, and thus in solemn thought he wandered as far as the high-told Turnpike gate. I will he me to Cowley, said he to himself instead of turning back again. There will I probe the hidden import of impending destiny. This long and dark suspense is more than can be broke by human power. I know a jolly gypsy woman, and if I went home I should have to wait three hours for my breakfast. With these words he felt in the pockets of his coat to be sure that the oracular cash was there and found a silk purse with more money than usual, stored for the purchase of a dog called Pablo, a hero among badgers. What is Pablo to me or I to Pablo? He muttered with a smothered sigh. She told me she thought it a cruel and cowardly thing to kill fifty rats in five minutes. Nevermore, alas, nevermore, with a resolute step but a clouded brow he buttoned his coat and strode onward. Now if he had been in a fit state of mind for looking about him he might have found a thousand things worth looking at. But none of them, in his present hurry, one from him either glimpse or thought, he trudged along the broad London road at a good brisk rate, while the sun glanced over the highlands, and the dewy ridges away on the left towards Shotover. The noble city behind him stretched its rising sweep of tower and spire and dome and seared betelment, stately among ancient trees and rich with more than mere external glory to an Englishman. And away to the right-hand sloped and broad meadows green with spring and fluttered with the pearly hylene of dew, lifting pillars of dark willow in the distance where the Isis ran. But what are these things to a lover unless they hit the moment's mood? A fair, unfenced, free-landscaped road for him might just as well have been waddled, like a skiddle alley, and roofed with Kroggen's patent felt. At certain or rather uncertain moments he might have rejoiced in the wide glad heart of nature's spread to welcome him, and must have felt as lovers feel the ravishment of beauty. It happened, however, that his eyes were open to nothing above or around or before him unless it should present itself in the image of a gypsy's tent. He turned to the left before the road entered the new enclosures toward Ifley, and trod his own track towards Cowley Marsh. The crisp dew brushed by his hasty feet ran into large globes behind him and jerks of dust brought up by pleasure fell and curdled on them. In the haze of the morning he looked much larger than he had any right to seem, and the shadow of his arms and hat stretched into hollow places. There was no other moving figure to be seen except from time to time of a creature, a colonist of commons, whose mental frame was not so unlike his own just now as bodily form and style of walking might and misty grandeur seem. Though Kitt was not such a stupid fellow, when free from his present bewitchment, scant of patience he came to a place where the elbow of a hedge jutted forth upon the common. A mighty hedge of beatling brows, an overhanging shagginess and shelfy curves and brambly depths, and true Devonian amplitude, high farming would have swept it down and out of its long course plowed an acre. Young Sharpe had not traced its windings far before he came upon a tidy-looking tent pitched with the judgment of experience in a snug and sheltered spot. The rest of the camp might be seen in the distance glistening in the sunrise. This tent seemed to have crept away for the sake of peace and privacy. Christopher quickened his steps, expecting to be met by a host of children rushing forth with outstretched hands and shaggy hair and wild black eyes, but there was not so much as a child to be seen, nor the curling smoke of a hedge trough fire, nor even the scattered ash betokening cookery of the night before. The canvas of the tent was down, no head peep forth, no naked leg or grimy foot protruded to show that the inner world was sleeping, even the dog so rarely absent seemed to be really absent now. Young man knew that the tent was not very likely to be unoccupied, but naturally he did not like to peep into it uninvited. He turned away to visit the chief community of rovers, when the sound of a low, soft moan recalled him. Still for a moment he hesitated until he heard the like sound again. Low and clear and musical from the deepest chords of sorrow, kit felt sure that it must be a woman, in storms of trouble and helpless, and full as he was of his own affairs he was impelled to interfere, so he lifted back the canvas, drawn across the opening, and looked in. There lay a woman on the sandy ground, with her back turned towards the light and her neck and shoulders a little raised by the short support of one elbow, and her head, and all that therein was, fixed a rigor of gazing. Although her face was not to be seen, and the hopeless moan of her wail had ceased, kit sharp knew that he was in the presence of a grand and long abiding woe. He drew back, and he tried to make out what it was, and he sighed for concert, even as a young dog whimpers to a mother who has lost her pups, and little as he knew of women, from his own mother or whether or no he judged that this woman had lost a child, that it was her only one, and more than he could tell or guess. The woman disturbed by the change of light turned round and steadily gazed at him, or rather at the opening which he filled, for her eyes had no perception of him. Kit was so scared that he jerked his head back, and nearly knocked his head off. He never had seen such a thing before, and if he had his choice he never would see such a thing again. The great dark hollow eyes had lost similitude of human eyes. Hope and fear and thought were gone. Nothing remained but desolation and bare, reckless misery. Christopher's gaze fell under hers. It would be a sheer impertinence to lay his small troubles before such a woe. What is it? Asked the woman at last having some idea that somebody was near her. I am very sorry I assure you, ma'am, that I never felt more sorry in all my life, said Kit, who was a very kind-hearted fellow, and now has spied a small boy lying dead. I give you my word of honour, ma'am, that if I could have guessed it I would never have looked in. Without any answer the gypsy woman turned again to her dead child and took two little hands in hers, and rubbed them, and set up imagining that she felt some sign of life. She drew the little boy to her breast and laid the face to hers, and breathed into pale open lips, scarcely fallen into death, and lifted the little eyelids with her tongue, and would not be convinced that no light came in from under them. And then she rubbed again at every place where any warmth or polish of skin yet lingered. She fancies that she felt the little fellow coming back to her, and she kept the whole of her own body moving to encourage him. There was nothing to encourage. He had breathed his latest breath. His mother might go on with kisses, friction, caresses, but every power she possessed, of muscle and lungs and brain and heart, there he lay as dead as a stone, one stone more on the earth, and the whole earth could not bring him back again. Sinementa bowed her head, she laid a little bit of all she ever loved upon her lap, and fetched the small arms so that she could hold them both together, and spread the careless face upon the breast, where once it had felt its way, and then she, looking up in search of kit, or any one to say something to, It is just the thing, I have earned it. I have robbed an old man of his only child, and I am robbed of mine. These words she spoke not in her own language, but in plain good English, and then she lay down in her quiet scoop of sand, and folded her little boy in with her. He never saw that there was nothing to be done. He cared to go no further in search of fortune-tellers, and being too young to dare to offer worthless consolation, he wisely resolved to go home, and have fried bacon, wherein he succeeded. CHAPTER XXXVI Mother, he said, I shall have a bit of early grub, and take my rod, and try whether I can't manage to bring you a few perch-home for supper, or if the perch are not taking yet, I may have a chance of a trout or two. Oh, that will be delightful, Kit! We can dine whenever we please, you know, as your father is from home. We will have the cold lamb at one o'clock. I can easily make my dinner, then. And then, Kit, if you are very good, what do you think I will try to do? Such a treat as you hardly ever had! What, mother? What? I must be off to get my tackle ready. My dear, I will send to Mr. Squeaker Smith, and order a nice, light vehicle with a very steady pony, and, Kit, I will put on my very worst cloak and a bonnet not worth six pence, and stout India rubber overshoes, and you shall drive me wherever you please, and I will see you catch all the fish, and you will enjoy every fish twice as much, because your dear mother is looking at you. I will bring some sandwiches, my pet, and your father's flask of sherry, and we can stay out till it is quite dark. Why, Kit, you don't look pleased about it. Mother, how can I be pleased to hear you speak of such things at this time of year? The spring is scarcely beginning yet, and the edges of the water are all swampy. You would be up to your knees in no time in the most horrible yellow slime. I should be most delighted to have your company, my dearest mother, but it will not do. Very well, Kit, you know best. But at least I can have the ride with you and wait somewhere while you go fishing. If I were going anywhere else, perhaps we might have contrived it so, but while the wind stays in the present quarter, it is worse than useless to think of fishing, except in the most outlandish places. There would not even be a public house, if you could stop at such a place. Within miles of the water I am going to, and the roads are beyond conception. No wheels can get along them, except at the very height of summer, or a dry black frost. My dear mother, I am truly grieved to lose your company, but I must ride the old Cobb Sam and tie him to a tree or gate. And over and over again you have told me how long you have been waiting for the chance of a good long afternoon to do a little shopping, and the London fashions for the summer season arrived by the coach only yesterday. Did they indeed? Are you sure of that? Well, Kit, I would rather have come with you than seen the whole world of fashions, although you can judge and a lady cannot. But I do not care about that, my dear. If only you enjoy yourself. Ring the bell, my darling, and I will see about your dinner. His heart burned within him sadly, and his cheeks kept it well in countenance. As the shocking fraud thus practised by him upon his good unselfish mother. However, there was no help for it, and, after all, mothers must be made to be cheated. Or why do they love it so? Thus well balanced with his conscience. Kit put all his smartest clothes on, as soon as the early dinner was done, and he felt quite sure in his own mind that his mother was safely embarked upon her grand expedition of shopping. He saw her as clean as possible off the premises and round the utmost corner of the lane. And then he waited for a minute and a half to be sure she had not forgotten her purse or something else most essential. At last he became sure as sure could be that his admirable mother must now be sitting on a high chair in a fashionable shop. And with that he ran up to his own room and kicked off his everyday breeches, and with great caution and vast study drew a brand new pair of noble pantaloons, with a military stripe up his well-nourished and established legs. He gazed at the result and found that, on the whole, it was not bad. And then he put on his best velvet waistcoat of a chaste spring pattern not too gaudy, a waterfall tie with a turquoise pin and a cutaway coat of a soft bottle-green, completed him for the eyes of the public, and, for which he cared far more, certain especially private eyes. Christopher, feeling himself thus attired and receiving the silent approval of his glass, stole downstairs in a very clever way and took from his own private cupboard a whip of white, pelucid whalebone, silver-mounted and set with a large and radiant Cairngorm pebble. His mother had given him this on his very last birthday, and he had never used it, wisely fearing to be laughed at. But now he tucked it under his arm, and, swaggering as he had seen whose ours do, turned into a passage leading to his private outlet. Hugging himself upon all his skill and feeling assured of grand success, Kitt allowed his heels to clank, and carried his head with an arrogant twist, and so, near a window, where good light came in large quantity from the garden, he marched into his mother's arms. "'Kitt!' cried his mother, and he said, "'Yes!' being unable to deny the truth. His mother looked at him in his jaunty whip and particularly lively suit of clothes, and she knew that he had been telling lies to her by the hundred or the bushel, and she would have been very glad to scorn him, if she could have helped being proud of him. Kitt was unable to carry on any more in the way of falsehood. He tried to look fierce, but his mother laughed, and he saw that he must knock on her. "'My dear boy,' she said, for the moment daring to follow up her triumph. "'Is this the costume in which you go forth to fish in the most outlandish places with the yellow ooze above your knees? And is that your fishing-rod? Oh, Kitt, come, Kitt, now you are caught at last!' "'My dear mother, I have told you stories, but I will leave off at last. Now there is not one instant to explain. I have not so much as a moment to spare. If you only could guess how important it is, you would draw in your cloak in a moment. You never shall know another single word unless you have the manor's mother to pull in your cloak and let me go by.' "'Kitt, you may go. When you look at me like that, you may as well do anything. You have gone by your mother for ever so long, or at any rate gone away from her.' With these words Mrs. Sharp made way for her son to pass her, and Kitt, in reckless manner, was going to take advantage of it. Then he turned back, his face, to say good-bye, and his mother's eyes were away from him. She could not look at him, because she knew that her look would pain him, but she held out her hand, and he took it, and kissed it. And then he made off as hard as he could go. Mrs. Sharp turned back and showed some hankering to run after him. And then she remembered what a laugh would arise in cross-duck lane to see such sport, and so she sighed a heavy sigh, knowing how long she must have to wait, and retired to her own thoughtful corner, with no heart left for shopping. But Kitt saw that now it was neck or nothing. With best foot foremost he made his way through back lanes leading towards the conscientious obscurity of Worcester College, or Beaumont Street still abode in the future, and skirting the coasts of Jericho dangerously hospitable, he emerged at last in broad St. Giles without a stone to pray to his whereabouts. Here he went into lively stables where he was well known, and found the cob Sam at his service, for no university man would ride him, even upon Hobson's choice, because of his increasing nominous aspect. But Kitt knew his value in lasting powers and sagacious gratitude, and whenever he wanted a horse trustworthy in patience, obedience, and wit, he always took brown Sam. To Sam it was a treat to carry Kitt, because of the vitals ordered at almost every lenient stage, and the grand largesy of oats and beans was more than he could get for a week in the stable, and so he set forth with a spirited nay on the Kidlington Road to cross the chairwell, and make his way towards Weston. The heart of Christopher burned within him whenever he thought of his mother, but a man is a man for all that, and cannot be tied to apron strings. So, Kitt shook his whip, and it came going flashed in the sun, and the spirit of youth did the same. He was certain to see the sweet maid to-day, knowing her manners and customs, and when she was ordered forth for her mossy walk upon the margin of the wood. The soft song hung in the light of the wood, as if he were guided by the breeze and air, and gentle warmth flowed through the alleys, where the nesting pheasant ran. Little fluttering, timid things, that meant to be leaves, please God some day, but had been baffled and beaten about so, that their faith was shrunk to hope, little rifts of cover also keeping beauty coiled inside and ready to open, like a bivalve shell to the pulse of summer tide, and then to be sweet blossom, and the ground below them pressing upward with ambition of young green, and the sky above them spread with liquid blue behind white pillows. But these things are not well to be seen without just entering into the wood, and in doing so there can be no harm, with the light so inviting and the way so clear. She said a little idea that perhaps she had better stop outside the wood, but still that walk was within her bounds, and her orders were to take exercise, and she saw some very pretty flowers there, and if they would not come to her she had nothing to do but to go to them. Still she ought to have known that now things had changed from what they were as little as a week ago, that a doubted veil of innumerable buds would hang between her and the good Miss Patch, while many forward trees were casting quite a shade of mystery. Nevertheless she had no fear. If anybody did come near her it would only be somebody thoroughly afraid of her, for now she knew and was proud to know that Kit was the prey of her bow and spear, whether she cared for him or not was a wholly different question. But in her dismal dullness and long weary-some seclusion the finest possible chance was offered for any young gentleman to meet her and make acquaintance of nature's doing. At first she had kept this to herself in dread of conceit and vanity. But when an outgrew accident she told Aunt Patch the whole affair, and asked what she was to do about it. Thereupon she was told to avoid the snares of childish vanity to look at the back of her looking-glass, and never dared to dream again that any one could be drawn by her. Her young mind had been eased by this, although with a good deal of pain about it, and it made her more venturesome to discover whether the whole of that superior estimate of herself was true. Whether she was so entirely vain or stupid whenever she looked at herself, and whether it was so utterly and bitterly impossible that anybody should come, as he said, miles and miles for the simple pleasure of looking for one or two minutes at herself, Grace was quite certain that she had no desire to meet anybody when she went into the wood. She hoped to be spared any trial of that sort. She had been told, on the highest authority, that nobody could come looking after her. The assertion was less flattering, perhaps, than reassuring. And to test its truth she went a little further than she meant to go. Suddenly at a corner where the whole of the ground fell downward and grass was overhanging grass so early in the season, sapling shoots from the self-same stool stood a yard above each other, and down in the hollow a little brook sang of its stony troubles to the whispering reeds. Here Grace O'Glander happened to meet a very fine young man indeed. The astonishment of these two might be seen at a moment's glance to be mutual. The maiden, by gift of nature, was the first to express it, with dress and hand and eye. She showed a warm eagerness to retire yet waited half a moment for the sake of proper dignity. Kit looked at her with a clear intuition that now was his chance of chances to make certain sure of her, if he could only now be strong and take her consent for granted. And so induce her to set seal to it. She never would withdraw, and the two might settle the rest at their leisure. He loved the young lady with all his heart, and beyond that he knew nothing of her, except that she was worthy. But she had not given her heart as yet. And with natural female common sense she would like to know a great deal more about him, before she said too much to him. Also in her mind, if not in her heart, there was a clear likeness of a very different man, a man who was a man in earnest and walked with a stronger and firmer step and lurked behind no corners. This path is so extremely narrow, Miss O'Glander said with a very pretty blush, and the ground is so steep that I fear I must put you to some little inconvenience, but if I hold carefully by this branch, perhaps there will be room for you to pass. You are most kind and considerate," he answered as if he were in peril of a precipice. But I would not for the world give you such trouble, and I don't want to go any further now. It cannot matter in the least. I do assure you. But surely you must have been going somewhere. You are most polite, but I cannot think for a moment of turning you back like this. Then may I sit down? I feel a little tired, and the weather has suddenly become so warm. Don't you think it is very trying? To people who are not very strong, perhaps it is, but surely it ought not to be so to you. Well, I must not put all the blame upon the weather. There are so many other things, much worse, if I could only tell you. Oh, I am so very sorry, Mr. Sharp. I had no idea you had such troubles. It must be so sad for you while you are so young. Yes, I suppose many people call me young, and perhaps to the outward eye I am so, but no one except myself can dream of the anxieties that prey upon me. Christopher by this time was growing very crafty, as the above speech of his will show. The paternal gift was awakening within him, but softened by maternal goodness, so that it was not likely to be used with much severity. And now at the end of his speech he sighed, and without any thought laid his right hand on the rich heart of his velvet waistcoat, where beautiful forget-me-nots were blooming out of the willow leaves. Then Grace could not help thinking how that trouble-worn right hand had been uplifted in her cause, and had descended on the rabbit-man. And although she was most anxious to discourage the present vein of thought, she could not suppress one little sigh, sweeter music to the ear of kit than ever had been played or dreamed. Now, would you really like to know? Are you so wonderfully good? He continued with his eyes cast down and every possible appearance of his excessive misery. Would you, I mean, do your best, not only not to be offended, but to pity and forgive me if, for rather supposing that I were to endeavor to explain what it is, who she is—no, I do not quite mean that. I scarcely know how to express myself. Things are too many for me. Oh! But you must not allow them to be so, Mr. Sharpe. Indeed you mustn't. I am sure that you must have a very good mother, from what you told me the other day, and if you have done any harm, though I scarcely can think such a thing of you. The best and most straightforward course is to go and tell your mother everything, and then it is so nice afterwards. Yes, to be sure how wise you are. You seem to know almost everything. I never saw any one like you at all. But the fact is that I am a little too old. I am obliged now to steer my own course in life. My mother is as good as gold, and much better. But she never could understand my feelings. Then come in, and tell my dear old Aunt Patch. She's so virtuous, and she always never doubts about anything. She sees the right thing to be done in a moment, and she never listens to arguments. If you will only come in and see her, it might be such a relief to you. You seem to mistake me altogether, cried the young man with his patience gone. What good could any old aunt's do me? Surely you know who it is that I want. How can I imagine that? Why, you! Only you! Only you, sweet Grace! I should like to see the whole earth swallowed up if only you and I were left together. Grace O'Glander blushed at the power of his words and pressure of his hand on hers. Then having plenty of her father's spirit, she fixed her bright sensible eyes on his face, so that he saw that he had better stop. I am afraid that it is no good, he said. I am very much obliged to you, answered Grace with her fair cheeks full of color and her hands drawn carefully back to their sides. But will you be kind enough to stand up and let me speak for a moment? I believe that you are very good and I may say very harmless and you have helped me in the very kindest way, and I never shall forget your goodness. Ever since you came I am sure I have been glad to think of you, and your dogs, and your gun, and your fishing rod reminded me of my father, and I am very, very sorry that what you have just said will prevent me from thinking any more about you or coming anywhere into any kind of places where there are trees like this again. I ought to have done it, at least I mean I never ought to have done it at all, but I did think that you were so nice and now you have undeceived me. I know who your father is very well, although I have seldom seen him, and though I dislike the law I declare that would not have mattered very much to me. But you do not even know my name, as several times you have proved to me. And how you can ride thirty miles from Oxford in all sorts of weather without being tired and your dog so fresh has always been a puzzle to me! Thirty miles from Oxford! Christopher Sharpe cried in great amazement for in the very lowest condition of the hard figures will maintain themselves. Yes, thirty miles or thirty leagues. Sometimes I hear one thing and sometimes the other. Where you are standing now is about seven miles and three quarters from Somertown Gate. Surely, Mr. Sharpe, you are laughing at me. How far am I from Beckley then according to your calculation? How did you ever hear of Beckley? It is quite a little village, a miserable little place. Indeed then it is not. It is the very finest place in all the world, or at any rate the nicest and the dearest and the prettiest. But how can you just come from America have such an opinion of such a little hall? A little hall? Why, it stands on a hill. You never can have been here it if you think of calling it a hall. And as for my coming from America you seem to have no geography. I have never been further away from darling Beckley to my knowledge than I am now. Kit Sharpe looked at her with greater amazement than that with which she looked at him. And then with one accord they spied a fat man coming along the hollow and trying not to glance at them. With keen young instinct they knew that this villain was purely intent upon watching them. Come again if you please to-morrow, said Grace while pretending to gaze at the clouds. You have told me such things that I never shall sleep. Come earlier and wait for me. Not that you must think anything, only that now you are bound as a gentleman to go on with what you were telling me." CHAPTER 38 The Dignity of the Family If Grace had only stayed five minutes longer in the place where she was when the fat man came in sight her eyes and heart would have been delighted by the appearance of a true old friend, but she felt so much terror of that stout person who always seemed to be watching her afar, that in spite of the extraordinary interest aroused by some of her companion's words, as well as by his manner, she could not help running away abruptly and taking shelter in the little-boward cottage. Meanwhile, the stout man in the white frock coat slouched along the fursy valley with a clownish step. He carried a long pig-wib and now and then indulged in a crack or flick at some imaginary pig, while a crafty grin or a wink of one little eye enlivened his heavy countenance. He was clearly aware of all that had been happening in the wood above him. For the buds as yet rather served a guide the lines of sight than to baffle them, but he showed no desire to interfere. For instead of taking the cross-path, which would have brought him face to face with kit, he kept down the glade towards a timber-track, which led in another direction. By the side of the little brook he turned the corner of a thick holly-bush, and suddenly met his brother, Master Zachary Cripps, the carrier. The carrier was in no pleasant mood. His eyes were stern and steadfast and the color of his healthy cheeks was deepened into crimson. He bore with a bent arm and set muscle the sceptral whip of the family, bound with spiral brass, and newly fitted with a heavy lash. Moreover he had come with his Sunday hat on, and his air and walk were menacing. Leviticus started and turned pale, and his cunning eyes glanced for a chance of escape. "'Thou goest not hence, brother Tickus,' said Cripps, "'until thou hast answered what I shall axe, and answered with thine eyes on mine.' "'Axe away,' said the big man, sprawling out his fat legs as if he did not care. "'Axe away, so long as it be of thy own concerns. It is of my own concerns to keep my father's sons from being rogues and liars, and getting into Oxford Jail, and into the hands of the hangmen.' Leviticus trembled with fear more than anger. "'Thou always was a foul mouth,' he muttered. "'It is a lie,' shouted Zachary. "'As big a lie as ever thou spakest. I always were that clean of tongue. No odds for that now. Will th' answer me, or will not? Thou liedest to me in Oxford streets the last time as I spake to thee. Well, well, maybe a small piece I did. But nothing to lay hold on much. Brother Zach, thou must not be so hard. What man can always be accurate? A man can spake the truth if he goeth to try, or else he must be a fuel, and Tickus, thou wasst always more rogue than fool. Now here am I, to ax thee special. What roguery thou beest up to now? Whom has thou got at the cottage in the wood? Thou'd best way go up there, and see for thyself. An old lady from America is wanted to retire frowth the world. Own her zen thee a-runnin' down the hill. And I'd like to see thee, Zach, heard lay thy own whip about thee. And her tongue be worse, nor a dozen whips. Really, while Tickus was telling this lie he managed to look at his brother so firmly in the rally of impudence brought to bay that Zach for the moment, in spite of all experience, believed him. And the carrier dreaded, as the lord of Swine knew well, nothing so much as a fierce woman's tongue. What be the reason, then? He went on still keeping his eyes on the face of Tickus. Thou hast been keeping thyself and thy pigs out of market, and even thy wife and children to home, same as if him had gotten the plague. And what be the reason, Leviticus, crypts, that thou fearst to go to a wholesome public house, and have thy pint of ale and see thy neighbors as behooveeth a God-fearing man? To my mind, either you art gone daft, and the woman should take the lead of thee, or else thou art screwed out of honest ways. The carrier now looked at his brother with more of pity than suspicion. Tickus had always been regarded as the weak member of the family, because he laid on more fat than muscle, even in a time of most active growth. And to keep him regularly straight was more than all the sad efforts of the brotherhood could, even when he was young, affect. Therefore Zach stood back some little, and the butt of his whip fell down to earth. Leviticus saw his chance and seized it. Concerning of going to a public house, I would never be too particular. A man may do it, or a man may not, according to the manner of his things at home, or his own little brew, or temper of his wife. I would not blame him, nor yet praise him for things as he knoweth best about. To make light of a man for not going to public is the same as to blame him for stopping from church. A man is careth for good opinion, go with the both. But I cannot always do it. And I ain't been in church now for more nor a week of Sundays. The force of his reasoning came home to Cripps. If a man was unable to go to church, there was good room for arguing that his duty towards the public house must not be too rigidly exacted. Zachary therefore fetched a sigh. None of the race had broken up at so early an age as that of Tickus. But still, from his own sad experience, a carer knew what pigs were. And he thought that his brother, though younger than himself, might be called away before him. Tickus, he said, I may have been too hard. Nobody knows but them that has to do it what the word of the rogues is. I may have said a word here and there too much, and a bit outside the gospel, according to they a man must believe a liar. Unforgiven, unforgiven, over and over again, the same as I try to forgive you, Tickus, Zachary offered his hand to his brother, but Leviticus was ashamed to take it. With the load now weighing upon his mind in the sense of his heart of what Zachary was, Tickus, whatever his rogues was, could not make believe to have none of it. So he turned away, with his feelings hurt too much for the clasp, fraternal. When a man hath no more respect for hisle, he muttered over his puckered shoulder, but no more respect for his father and mother of Oren than to call his very next brother but one a rogue and a liar, and a schemer against publics, to my mind he have gone too far, and not shown the manners relied upon. Very well, replied Crips, just as you like, Tickus, though I never did here as I were short of manners, and there's twelve miles a road as no is better than that. Now, since you go on like that and there seemeth no chance of supper long of ye, I shall just walk up to Cottage, and ax any orders for the carrier. Good evening, brother Tickus! With these words, ax set off, and Tickus repented sadly of the evil temper which had forbidden him to shake hands, but now to oppose the carrier's purpose would be a little too suspicious. He must go his way and take his chance. He was worse than a pig when his mind was made up. Go thine way, and be dang'd to thee, thought Leviticus looking after him. Little thou wilt take, however, but to knock thy thick head again a wall. Old lady, looketh out too sharp for any of thee dang'd old beckley carcasses. Come thee now to our house! He shouted an irony after his brother, and tell us the news thou hast picked up, and what on be doing in America? A vine-time of life for thee to turn spy. It was lucky for him that he made off briskly among the thick brushwood and tangled swamps, for Zachary Crips at the last word turned round, with his face of a fine plum-color and a stamp of rage which made his stiff knees tingle worse than a dozen turnpikes. Spy, did thou'd say? He shouted, staring with his honest wrathful eyes, through every glimpse of thicket near the spot where his brother had disappeared. Spy! If thou beest a man, come out, and say it again to the face of me. I'll show you how to spell spy pretty quick. Leviticus Crips, thou art a coward, to the back of a thief in a sneaking skulk, unless thou comest out of thee thick places to stand to the word thou hast spoken. Zachary stood in a wide bay of cops. He knew to this voice went through the wood, for he spoke with the whole power of his lungs, and the tender leaves above him quivered like a little breath of fringe, and the birds flew out of their ivy castles, and a piece of bare-faced rock in the distance answered him. But nothing else. Thou art a bigger man than ivy! shouted the carrier, being carried beyond himself by the state of things. Come out of thou art a man, and hast any blood of Crips in thee! But this appeal received no answer except from the quiet rock again, and a peaceful thrush sitting over his nest, and well accustomed to the woodman's call. Zachary had always felt scorn of Ticcus, but now he almost disdained himself for springing of one wedlock with him. He stood in the place where he must be seen if Ticcus wished to see him, until he was quite sure that no such longing existed on his brother's part. Then the family seemed to be lowered so by his behavior of a leading member. Then when a carrier moved his legs, he had not the spirit to crack his whip. What shall us do? What shall us do? He said to himself, more reasonably, with the anger dying out of his kind blue eyes, a half assaulted of me, but half a big family of little ones to keep up, my hard no knowledge of how that sort of thing might drive a man out of his proper ways, like enough and make it them careful to tell lies, and shun the thrashing. Taking this view of the case, Master Crips turned away from the path towards his brother's house, to which in the flush of first anger he meant to go, and there to wait for him. And being rather slow of resolution, he naturally set forth again on a track of the one last interrupted. He would go to this cottage in the wood, of which he had heard through one of his washer-women, though none of them had any washing-thence, and then he would satisfy his own mind concerning an ugly rumour, which had unsettled that mind since Tuesday, for in his own hearing it had been said, by a woman it is true, but still a woman who came of a truthful family, and was married now into the like, that Master Leviticus Crips was harboring pirates and conspirators, believed to have come from America, and a little place out of the way of all honest people, where the death-old woman was. Nobody ever had lived to the house, never a butcher, nor a baker, nor a tea-grocer, nor a milk-man, or even a respectable washer-woman. There was nothing except a great dog to rush out and fight without even barking. Zachary had no easy task to find the little cottage of which he had heard, for it lay well back from all thoroughfares, and so embedded among ivied trees that he passed and repass several times before he described it, and even then he would not have done so if it had not chanced that Miss Patch, who loved good things when she could get them, was about to dine on a juicy roaster supplied by the wary Leviticus. Grace herself had prepared the current sauce before she went forth for her daily walk, and death-old Marjorie Daw was stooping over the fierce wood fire on the ground, and basting with a short iron spoon. The double result was a wreath of blue smoke rising from the crooked chimney in a very rich odor streaming forth from door and window on the vernal air. The eyes and the nose of the carrier at once presented him with clear impressions. "'Americans understand good livin'.'" Giving utterance to this profound and incontrovertible reflection, Cripps came to a halt and sagely considered the situation. The first thing he asked, as usual, was, "'How would the law of the land lie?' There was a lonely unprotected cottage inhabited by an elderly foreign lady who has specially sought retirement. Had he any legal right to insist on knowing who she was and all about her? Would he not rather be a trespasser and liable to a fine and perhaps the jail, if he forced himself in without invitation and willfully against the inhabitants' wish, and even if that came to nothing, as it might? Could he say that it was a manly and straightforward action on his part? He had no enemy that he knew of unless it was Black George, the poacher. But there were always plenty of people ready to say ill-natured things about a prosperous neighbor, and like enough they would set at a foot that he had gone spying on a helpless lady because she had never employed him. And then his brother's reproach, which had so fiercely aroused him, came back to his mind. Neither was it wholly absent from his thoughts that a great dog was said to reside on these premises, whose manner was peculiarly unattractive, one of rushing out to bite without a bark. The carrier had suffered in his time from dogs, as was natural to his calling, and although his flesh was so wholesome that the result had never been serious, he was conscious of a definite desire to defer all increase of experience in that line. Spy! He exclaimed as he sat down rather to rest his stiff knee than to watch the hut. That never hath been said of me, and never shall, without a lie! A one on him might come out, mayhap, and give me some satisfaction, before his words were cool Miss Patch herself appeared in the doorway. She saw not Crips, who had happened to put himself in a knowing corner, and being in a quietly savage mood, from desire of pig and dread that stupid old marjory was murdering pig by revolving him too near the fire. She cast such a glance that the young leaves around her had seemed enough to nip them in the bud. Then she threw away something with a scornful sweep, and Crips believed almost every word his brother had been saying. I'll be blessed if I don't scuttle off! He said to himself in the moss he was sitting on, in my time I have seen all sorts of women, but none to come nigh this sample as to be over from America. Sarvath me right for curiosity! Amend me, if ever I come an eye, of any Americanians again! CHAPTER 39 A Tombstone Are there any who do not quicken to the impulse of young life, lifted free of long repression and the dread of dull relapse? Can we find a man or a woman, holding almost any age, able to come out and meet the challenge of the sun, conveyed in cartel of white clouds of may, and yet to stick to private sense of sulky wrongs and brooding hate, if we could find such a man or woman by great waste of labor in a search ungracious, and if it should seem worthwhile to attempt to cure the case scarcely anything could be thought of, leading more directly towards the end in view, than to fetch that person, and plant him or her without a word of explanation among the flower beds on the little lawn of Beckley Barton. The flowers themselves and their open eyes and the sparkling smile of the grass and the untold commerce of the freighted bees, and rich voluntaries of thrush and blackbird, ruffled to the throat with song, and over the whole the soft flow of sunshine, like a vast pervasive river of gold, with silver wave of clouds, who could dwell on petty aches and pains among such grandeur. The old squire sat in his bower chair with a warm cloak over his shoulders. His age was three score and ten this day, and he looked back through the length of years and marveled at their fleeting, the stirring times of his youth and the daily perils of his prime of life, the long hard battle and the slow promotion, because he had given offense by some projection of honest opinion, the heavy disappointment and the forced retirement from the army when the wars were over with only the rank of major which he preferred to sink in squire, because he ought to have been, according to his own view of the matter, a good lieutenant general, and then a very short golden age of five years and a quarter from his wedding day to the death of his wife, a single and sweet-hearted wife, and after that, as sorrow sank into the soothing breast of time, the soft and gentle and undreamed of step of comfort coming almost faster than was welcome while his little daughter grew. After that the old man tried to think no more, but be content to let the little scenes of dancing and of asking and of listening and of looking puzzled and of waiting to know truly whether all was earnest, because already childhood had suspicion that there might be things intended to dilute it and of raising from the level of papa's well-button pocket clear bright eyes that did not know a guinea from a half-penny, and then, with the very extraordinary spring from the elasticity of red calves, which happily departs right early, and jumping into opened arms in the laying-on of little lips and the murmurs of delighted love, to let his recollections of all these die out and to do without them, was this old man's business now, for he had been convinced at last strange as it may seem, until we call to mind how the strongest convictions are produced by the weakest logic, at last he could no longer hope to see his grace again, because he had beheld her tombstone. Having made up his mind to go to church that very Sunday morning, in spite of all widow Hookam could do to stop him, he had spied a new stone in the graveyard corner, sacred to the family of Oglander, the old man went up to see what it was, and nobody liked to follow him, and nobody was surprised that he did not show his white head at the chancel door, though the person waited five minutes for him, being exceeding loath to waste ten lines which he had interlardered into a sermon of thirty years back for the present sad occasion. For the old squire sat on his grandfather's tombstone, a tabular piece of memorial, suited to an hospitable man, where all his descendants might sit around and have their dinners served to them, and he leaned his shaven chin on the head of his stout oak staff, and he took off his hat, and let his white hair fall about. He fixed his still bright eyes on the tombstone of his daughter, and tried to fasten his mind there also, and to make out how old she was. He was angry with himself for not being able to tell to a day without thinking. But days and years and thoughts and doings of quiet love quite slipping by, and spreading without ruffle, had left him little to lay hold of as a knotted record, therefore he sat with his chin on his stick, and had no sense of church time until the choir, which comprised seven crypts, bellowed out an anthem which much have shaken their grandfathers and their graves, unless in their time they had done the same. In this great uproar and applause which always travelled for half a mile, the squire had made his escape from the graveyard, and then he had gone home without a word and eaten his dinner, because he must when the due time came for it, and now being filled with substantial faith that his household was nicely enjoying itself, he was come to his bower to think and wonder, and perhaps by and by to fall fast asleep, but never awake to bright hope again. To this relief and mild incline of gentle age his head was bowing and his white hair settling down, according as the sun or wind or clouds or time of day desired. When some one darkened half his light and there stood Mary Hookam. Mary had the newest of all new spring fashions on her head and breast and waist and everywhere, a truly spirited girl was she, as well as a very handy one, and she never thought twice of a sixpence or shilling if a soiled paper pattern could be had for it, and now she was busy with half a guinea, kindly beginning to form its impress on her moist, hard-working palm. He have had a time of it, she exclaimed as her master began to gaze around. Oh, my, what a time of it he have had! Mary, I suppose you're talking of me. Yes, I have had a bad time on the whole, but many people have had far worse. Yes, sir, and will you see one who hath, as fine a young gentleman has ever lived, so ready to speak up for everybody, and walking like a statute, it give me such a turn, I do believe you never would know him, sir, without his name come in with him. Squire overshoot, sir, if you please, requesteth the honour of seeing of you. Mary, I am hardly fit for it. I was doing my best to sit quite quiet and try to think of things. I am not as I was yesterday, or even as I was this morning. But if I ought to see him, I—I will. And perhaps I ought, no doubt, when I come to think of things, the poor young man has been very ill. To be sure, I remember all about it. Show him where I am at once. What a sad thing for his mother, his mother is a wonderful clever woman of this soundest views in politics. His mother be dead, sir. I had better tell you for fear of begetting any trifles with him, although he was told to keep such things from you. How some ever I do think that he be coming to himself. Or he would not have fallen out of patience as hath done. And now here he be, sir. Russell overshoot narrowed and flattened into half of his proper size, and frightened thereby to unnatural stature, for stoop he would not, although so weak. Here he was walking along the damp walk, when a bed or sofa or a drawn-out chair at shot-over-grange was his proper place. He walked with the help of a crutch-handled stick, and his deep morning dress made him look almost ghastly. His eyes, however, were bright and steady, and he made an attempt at a cheerful smile, as he congratulated the squire on the great improvement of his health. For that I have to thank you, my dear friend," answered Mr. Orglander, for weeks I had been helpless till I helped myself. I mean, of course, by the great blessing of the Lord. But of your sad troubles, whatever shall I say? My dear sir, say nothing, if you please. I cannot bear it as yet to speak of them. I ought to be thankful that life is spared to me, doubtless for some good purpose, and I think I know what their purpose is. Though now I am confident of nothing. Neither am I, Russell, neither am I," said the old man, observing how low his voice was, and speaking in a low, sad voice himself. I used to have confidence in the good and the watchful care of the Almighty over all who trust in him. But now, there is something over there, he pointed towards the churchyard, which shows that we may carry such ideas to a foolish point. But I cannot speak of it. Say no more. I will own," replied Overshoot, studying the squire's downcast face, to see how far he might venture. At one time I thought that you yourself carried such notions to a foolish length. That was before my illness. Now I must fully believe that you were quite right. Yes, I suppose that I was, so far as duty goes and the Parsons advice. But as for the result, where is it? As yet we see none. But we very soon shall. Can you bear to hear something I want to say and to listen to it attentively? I believe that I can, Russell. There is nothing now that can disturb me very much. This will disturb you, my dear sir, but in a very pleasant way, I hope. As sure as I stand and look at you here, and as sure as the Almighty looks down at us both, that grave and beckley churchyard holds a gypsy woman and no child of yours. I put it to her properly as I always do, but give me your arms, sir, and walk a few steps. I am not very strong any more than you are, but please, God, we will both get stronger as soon as our troubles begin to lift. Each of them took the right course to get stronger, by putting forth his little strength to help and guide the other's steps. Russell, what did you say just now? Mr. O'Glander asked when the bear had managed to get as far as another little bower. Grace's zone, and there sat down. I must have taken your meaning wrong. I am not so clear as I was, and often there is a noise inside my head. I told you, sir, that I had proved for certain that your dear daughter has not been buried here or anywhere else to my firm belief. Also I have found out and established, to my own most bitter cost, who it was that lies buried here, and of what terrible disease she died, as regards my own illness, I would go through it again, come what might come of it, for the sake of your darling Grace. But alas, I have lost my own dear mother through this utterly fiendish plot. For such it is, I do believe, this poor girl buried here was the younger sister of Cineminta. Cineminta! said the squire trying to arouse old memory. Surely I have heard that name, but tell me all, Russell, for God's sake, tell me all, and how you came to find it out, and what it has to do with my lost pet. My dear sir, if you tremble so I shall fear to tell you another word. Remember, it is all good as far as it goes. Instead of trembling you should smile and rejoice. So I will, so I will, or at least I will try. There, now look, I have taken a pinch of snuff. You need have no fear of me after that. All I know beyond what I have told you is that your Gracie, and my Grace, too, was driven off in a chase in pair, through the narrow lanes towards Whitley. I have not been able to follow the track in my present helpless condition, and indeed what I know I only learned this morning, and I thought at my duty to come and tell you at once. I had it from poor sentiment as own lips, who for a week or more had been lurking near the house to see me. This morning I could not resist a little walk, lonely and miserable as it was, and the poor thing told me all she knew. She was in the deepest affliction herself at the loss of her only surviving child, and she fancied that I had saved his life before, and she had deep pangs of ingratitude, and of nemesis, et cetera, and hence she was driven to confess all her share, which was but a little one. She was tempted by the chance of getting money enough to place her child in the care of a first rate doctor. But, Grace, my poor Grace, how was she tempted, or was she forced away from me? That I cannot say as yet. Sinementa had no idea. She did not even see the carriage, for she herself was borne off by her tribe, who were quite in a panic at the fever. But she heard that no violence was used, and there was a lady in the chase, and poor Grace went quite readily, though she certainly did seem to sob a little. It was no elopement, Mr. O'Glander, or anything at all of that kind. The poor girl believed that she was acting under your orders and all that she did, just as she had believed that same when she left her aunt's house to meet you on the Homeward Road through that forged letter which, most unluckily, she put into her pocket. There I believe I have told you all I can think of for the moment. Of course you will keep the whole to yourself, for we have to deal with subtle brutes. Is there anything you would like to ask? Russell Overshoot, said the squire, I am not fit to go into things, now. I mean all the little ins and outs, and you look so very ill, my dear fellow. I am quite ashamed of allowing you to talk. Come into the house and have some nourishment, if any man ever wanted it, you do now. How did you come over? Well, I broke a very ancient vow. If there is anything I detest it is to see a young man sitting alone inside of a closed carriage, but we never know what we may come to. I tried to get upon my horse, but could not. By the by, do you know Harden now? Not much, said the squire. I have seen him once or twice, and I know that he is a great friend of yours. He is one of the new lights, is not he? I am sure I don't know or care. He is a wonderfully clever fellow, and is true as steel, and a gentleman. He has heard, of course, of your sad trouble, but only the popular account of it. He does not even know of my feelings. But I will not speak now of them. You may, my dear fellow, with all my heart. You have behaved like a true son to me, and if ever gracious providence overshoot took Mr. O'Glander's hand and held it in silence for a moment. He could not bear the idea of even the faintest appearance of a bargain now. The squire understood and liked him all the better, and waved his left hand towards the dining-room. One thing more, while we are alone, resumed a young man much as he longed for in absolutely needed good warm vitals. Hard now is a tremendous walker. Six miles an hour are nothing to him. The flying Dutchman, he is called, although he hasn't got a bit of a calf. Of course, I would not introduce him into this matter without your leave. But may I tell him all, and send him scouting while you and I are so laid upon the shelf, he can go where you and I could not, and nobody will suspect him. And, of course, as regards intelligence alone, he is worth a dozen of that ass John Smith. At any rate he would find no mare's nests. May I try it? If so, I will take on the carriage to Oxford as soon as I have had a bit to eat. With all my heart, cried the squire, whose eyes were full again of life and hope. Hard now owes a debt to Beckley. It was scripts who got him his honors and fellowship, or at least the carrier says so, and we all believe our carrier. And after all, whatever there is to do, nobody does it like a gentleman, and especially a good scholar. I remember a striking passage in the syntax of the Eaton Latin grammar. I make no pretension to learning when I quote it, for it hath been quoted in the House of Lords. Perhaps you remember it, my dear Russell? My Latin has turned quite rusty, squire, answered overshoot, knowing as well as Proteus what was coming. The passage is this. Mr. O'Glander always smote his frilled shirt in this erudition, and delivered or a rotondo. Silicet ingenius, dedicitie, fideliter artes, immolet moris, nic sinnet ese ferros. CHAPTER 40 Let Me Out At about the same hour of that Sunday afternoon, Miss Patch sat alone in her little cottage, stubbornly reasoning with herself. She was growing rather weary of her task, which had been a long and heavy one. A great deal longer, and a great deal heavier, than she could ever have dreamed at the outset. It was for the sake of the Kingdom of Heaven that she had laid her hand to this plow, and now it seemed likely to be a plow, in the sense in which that word is lightly used by undergraduates. For public opinion Miss Patch cared nothing. Her view of the world was purely and precisely scriptural, according to her own interpretation. Any line of action was especially recommended to her by the certainty that the world would condemn it. She had led a life of misery with her father, the gambling captain, the man of fashion, who made slaves of his children, and being already of a narrow gauge of mind, she laid herself out for theology. Not true religion, but enough to please her, and make her sure that she was always right. Grace, being truly of a docile nature, and most unsuspicious as her father was before her, had implicit faith in the truth and honor of her good aunt Patch. She looked upon her as so devoutly pious and grandly upright, that any idea of fraud on her part seemed almost profanity. She believed the good lady to be acting wholly under the guidance of her own father, and as his representative, in which there seemed nothing either strained or strange, especially as the squire had once placed his daughter in the charge of Miss Patch, for a course of scriptural and historical reading, and the first misgiving in the poor girl's mind arose from what Christopher Sharp had told her, of pining and lonely weariness, weeks and weeks she had endured, under the firm belief that her father was compelled to have it so, and in the hope of the glorious time when he should come to take her home. For all that she could see good reason, according to what she had been told, but she could see no reason whatever why Miss Patch should have told her falsehoods as to the place in which they lived. Having been challenged upon this subject by her indignant niece, the elderly lady now sat thinking, she was as firmly convinced as ever that in all she had done she had acted strictly and purely for the glory of the Lord. Grace, a great heiress and a silly girl, was at the point of being snapped up by the papus, and made one of them, where upon both an immortal soul and one hundred fifty thousand pounds would be devoted to perdition. Of this Miss Patch had been thoroughly assured before she would give her help at all. It was well known that Russell Overshoot loved and would win Grace O'Glander, and that Russell's dearest friend was hard now of brazen hose, and at hard now was the deepest Jesuit ever admitted to holy orders in the Church of England. Therefore, at heart, Russell Overshoot must be a papist of the deepest die, and anybody with half an eye could see through that conspiracy. To defeat such a scheme Miss Patch would have promised to spend six months in a hollow tree, but promise and performance are a very different pair of shoes, and the lady, though fed, like a woodpecker, on the choicest of all sylvan food, even now in four months' time was tiring of her martyrdom. Her cottage in a wood had long been growing loathsome to her, the deeds of the Lord she admired greatly when they were homicidal, but of his large and kindly work she had no congenial liking, the fluttering spread of leaves that hang like tips of empty gloves one day, and after one kind night lift forth, like the hand of a baby with his mind made up, and the change of colour all under the trees, whether the ground be grasped or naked. Also the delicate sliding of the light in and out of the peeling wands of brushwood, and flat upon the lichen stones, and even in the coarsest hour of the day, which generally is from one to two p.m., an all-mankind or dining, the quiet spread and receptive width of growth that has to catch its light. For none of these pretty little scenes had Miss Patch care so much as half a patch, and she was sure that they gave her rheumatism. She was longing to be in London now, to sit beneath the noble eloquence of preachers and orators most divine, who spent the prime of the year in reviling their friends and extolling the Negro, whereas for weeks and weeks in this ungodly forest she had no chance of receiving any spiritual administration, save once when Tickus, on a Sunday morning, had driven her and his pig- cart to a little Wesleyan chapel some three miles off at the end of a hamlet. Here people stared at her so, and asked such questions that she durst not go again, and indeed the pleasure was not worth the risk, for the shoemaker who preached was a thoroughly quiet, ungifted man, without an evil word for anybody. Not only these large regrets and yearnings were thronging upon this lady now, but also a small, elo-feminine feeling of desire for support and guidance, strong-minded as she was, and conscious of her lofty mission. From time to time she grew faint-hearted in that dreary solitude, without the encouragement of the cool male will. This for some days she had not received and she knew not why it had failed her. Though the afternoon was so bright with temptation, the woods so rich with wonders, Miss Patch preferred to nurse her knee by the little fire in the parlour. She had always hated to be out of doors, and to see too much of things which did not bear out her opinions, and to lose that clear knowledge of the will of the Lord, which is lost by those who study him. She loved to discern in everything that happened to her liking, the grand and infinite potentiality of an all-wise providence. And, if a little thing went amiss, she laid all the blame to the badly principled interference of the devil. While she was deeply pondering thus and warming her little teapot, in ran the beautiful and lively girl who had long been growing too much for her. It was not only the brighter spring of young life in this Gracie, and her pretty ways and nice surprises, and pleasure in pleasing others, and graceful turns of cookery, but also her pure fount of loving-kindness which, having no other way out, was obliged to steal around Miss Patch herself, although she had been ill-content with the only explanation she could get about her dwelling-place. To wit, that in these roadless parts distance was very much a matter of conjecture, Grace had no suspicion yet of any plot or conspiracy. All things had been planned so deeply and carried out so cleverly that any such suspicion would have been contrary to her nature. She had lost, by some unaccountable carelessness, both the note from her father, which she had received at her Aunt Joan's, and also his more important letter delivered to her when she met the chase, by her kind and pious Auntie Patch, in the first note, delivered by a little boy. She had simply been called forth to meet her father in the lane, and to walk home with him, as he pleased to speak with her by herself. She was not to wait to pack any of her clothes, as they would be sent for afterwards, and he hoped that her Aunt Joan would excuse his deferring their little dinner for the present, but when instead of meeting him she found the chase with Miss Patch inside it and was invited to step in, a real letter was handed to her. The whole of which in the waning light, the day being very brown and gloomy, she could not easily make out. But she learned enough to see that she was to place herself under the care of Miss Patch, and not expect to see her father for at least some weeks to come. Her hair, for the reason therein given, was to be cut off at once, and not even kept in the carriage, and the poor girl submitted with a few low sobs to the loss of her beautiful bright tresses. But what were they? How small and selfish of her to think twice of them in the presence of the heavy trouble threatening her dear father, and the anguish of losing him for so long, without even so much as a kiss of farewell. For after his first brief scrawl he had found that by starting at once he could catch at Fallmouth the packet for Demerara, and thus save a fortnight in getting to his estates, which were threatened with ruin, if these should be lost to him gracey new, as he had no secrets from her, that half of his income would go at one sweep, which for his own sake would matter little, but for the sake of his darling must, if possible, be prevented. He had no time now for another word, except that he had left his house at Beckley, just as it stood, to be let by his agent to cover the expenses of his long voyage, and to get him out of two difficulties. He could not have left his dear child there alone, and, if he could, he would not have done so, for a most virulent fever had long been hanging about, and had now broken out hard by, and Dr. Splinters had strictly ordered, the moment he heard of it, that the dear child's hair should be cropped to her head, and burned or cast away for nothing harbored infection as hair did, with a few words of blessing and comfort and love and a promise to write from Demerara, and a fatherly hope that for his sake she would submit to Miss Patch and all things, and make the most of this opportunity for completing her course of scriptural and historical reading, the dear old father had signed himself her loving papa, W. O. Grace would have been a very different girl from her own frank self, if she had even dreamed of suspecting the genuineness of this letter. It was in her father's crabbed and upright and clearly jointed hand, from the first line to the last. For a moment, indeed, she had been surprised that he called himself her papa, because he did not like the word, and thought it a piece of the foreign stuff which had better continue to be foreign, but there stood the word, and in his hurry how could he stop such trifles. This letter had been lost. Poor Grace, he could not imagine how, because she had taken such great care of it, and had slept with it under her pillow always. Nevertheless, it had disappeared, leaving tears of self-reproach in her own downcast eyes, as she searched the wood for it. And this made her careful tenfold of the two letters she had received from Georgetown. But now, as she came with her Sunday hat on, and her pretty woodstock gloves, and her neat brown skirt looped up, for challenge of briars and furs and dog-rows, and best of all with the bloom on her cheeks, and the sparkle in her clear, soft eyes, and the may sun making glory in her rolling clouds of new-grown hair, and better than best that smile of the heart filling the whole young face with light, she really looked as if it would be impossible to say no to her. Auntie, she began, it is quite an age since you have let me have a walk at all. One would think that I wanted to run away with that very smart young gentleman, who possesses and exhibits that extremely lustrous riding-whip, if he has only got a horse to match it. What is the name, dear Auntie, of that inestimable historical jewel that somebody stole out of somebody's eye? Grace, will you never remember anything? It is now called the Orlov, or Shafras gem, and is set in a Russian scepter. Then that must be the name of this gentleman's horse to enable it to go with such a whip. Dear Auntie, now even that whip will not tempt me or move me to run away from you. Only do please to allow me forth. This horrid little garden is so shaded and sour that even a daisy cannot live. But in the wood I find all things lovely. May I have a run for only half an hour upon one condition, replied Miss Patch, that if you see any one you shall come back at once and let me know. What, even the fat man with the flapped hat and smock on? I never go out without seeing him, though he never seems to see me at all. He must be very short-sighted. Oh, no, my dear, never mind that poor man. He looks after the cattle or something. What I mean is, any young gentleman who ought to be at home on the Sabbath day, and wrestle with your natural frorality, my dear, that no worldly thoughts may assault and hurt the soul upon this holy day. I will do my best, Auntie. But how can I help thinking of the things I see? Miss Patch, having less than any faith in unregenerate human nature, feared that she might have been wrong in allowing even this limited freedom to grace. The truth of it was that, without fresh guidance from a mind far deeper than her own, she could not see the right thing to do in the new complication arising, the interviews between Kit, Sharp, and Grace, with the very thing desired, and surely must have led to something good, which ought to be carefully followed up, and yet, if she met him again, she would be quite sure to go on with her questions, and Kit, being purely outside of the plot, would reply with the most inconvenient truth. Miss Patch had written, as promptly as could be, to ask what she ought to do in this crisis. But no answer had come through the trusty tickus, nor any well-provided visit. The Christian-minded lady could not tell at all what to make of it. Then, calling to mind the sacredness of the day, she dismissed the subject, and sternly rebuked deaf Marjorie Daw for not keeping the kettle-boiling. End of Chapter 40