CHAPTER VITHE BROWN DOG'S STEPMarsh House lay lower than Wildwater, and it had a softer look with it, though built much after the same pattern so far as roominess and stout building went. The trees grew big about it and a pleasant orchard ran from the garden to the chattering stream; yet was it ghostly, in a quiet fashion of its own, and not all its trees and sheltered garden-nooks could rob it of a certain eeriness, scarce felt but not to be gainsaid. On either hand the gateway two balls of stone had lately topped the uprights; but one of these had fallen and lay unheeded in the courtyard—a quiet and moss-grown mourner, so it seemed, for the lost pride of the Waynes of Marsh. Behind the house, leading up to the sloping shoulder of the moor, ran a narrow, grass-grown way, scarce wide enough to let a horseman through and lined on either hand by grassy banks and lichened walls of sandstone; they called it Barguest lane, and the Spectre Hound who was at once the terror of the moorside and the guardian spirit of the Waynes, was said to roam up and down between the moor and Marsh House whenever trouble was blowing in the wind.And true it was that at certain times—oftenest when the air was still, and dusk of late evening or dark of night brooded quiet over house and garden—a wild music would sweep down the lane, not crisp and sharp-defined, but softened like the echo of a hound's baying far away. The hardier folk were wont to laugh at Barguest, with a backward turn of the head to make sure he was not close behind them, and these vowed that the Brown Dog of Marsh was no more than the voice of the stream which ran in a straitened channel underneath the road; water had strange tricks of mimicry, they said, when it swept through hollow places, and the deep elfin note that haunted Barguest lane was own brother to many a bubbling cry and groan that they had hearkened to amongst the stream-ways of the moor. And this son of talk was well enough when treacle posset was simmering on some tap-room hearth; but abroad, and especially if gloaming-tide surprised them within hail of old Marsh House, they found no logic apt enough to meet their terror of the Spectre Hound. As for the Waynes, there were some among them who pretended to disclaim their guardian Dog; yet there was not one who would oust tradition from his veins—not one who failed to loosen his sword-blade in the scabbard if any told him that Barguest had lately given tongue.The spirit of the homestead was strong on Shameless Wayne to-night, as he sat alone in the hall, watching the dead and thinking his own remorseful thoughts. All that was left of his father rested, gaunt and still, on the bier in the centre of the hall, where it was laid out in state with candles burning low at head and feet. Mistress Nell and the serving-wenches were all in the back part of the house; the lads had not returned from hawking in the lowland pastures; the last of the day's visitors had bidden the corpse farewell and had gone home again, leaving the new master of Marsh House to watch the closed eyes of his forerunner.A ray of fading sunlight crept across the hall and rested on the dead man's face, which showed white as the cere-cloth that bound his jaws."Father, father!" he cried, laying one hand on the waxen cheek. "Do you know what chanced yesternight? Do you know that I, who should have carried the quarrel, sat drinking your honour and my own away?—God, I could see each Wayne of them all look askance at me to-day, as they came and stood beside you here. And each man was saying to himself, 'There is none of the old breed left at Marsh.' They were right, father—and sometimes, when the candle-shadows play about your face, I seem to see you laughing at thought of Shameless Wayne—laughing to know him for your son."The sunlight moved from the bier, and up the oak-panelled walls and backward along the ceiling-beams until it vanished outright. Dusk came filtering through the lattices. A low stir of bees sounded from the garden, where corydalis and white arabis had newly opened to the spring. And still Wayne sat on, listening to the thousand voiceless rumours that creep up and down an empty house."I cannot wipe out the stain, father," he went on, in a quieter voice; "but I will do all that is left to me—I'll pluck Janet out of my heart—and there shall none say, for all my shamelessness, that I let the land go backward, though in old days you'll remember there was no love spilt 'twixt me and farming matters. But the Wayne lands were always better-tilled than any in the moorside, and 'twould hurt you, father, if I let them grow foul and poor of crop.—Yet, for all that, 'tis easier to swear to hunt out every Ratcliffe from this to Lancashire," he added, with a whimsical straightforwardness which showed that a sense of fellowship with the dead had come to him through long watching by the bier.And then he let his thoughts drift idly and was near to falling into a doze when he was called to his feet by a tapping at the window. He crossed the floor and the light scarce sufficed to show him his step-mother's face pressed close against the glass."Open to me, Ned, open to me," she was crying.He went to the narrow door that led into the garden and opened it; and Mistress Wayne clung tight to him while he took her to the hearth—keeping her fast in talk the while, lest she should see what lay in the middle of the hall."You are cold, little bairn," he said, using the same half-tender, half-scornful name he had given her at the vault-stone yesternight."Yes, cold and weary, Ned—so weary! All night I wandered up and down the moor, seeking somebody—but I never found him—and the wind came, and the rain—and all about the moor were prying eyes—and strange birds called out of the darkness, and strange beasts answered them——""Well, never heed them. Haply 'twas Shameless Wayne you sought, and he will see that none does you hurt."She put her face close to his and looked at him fixedly in the deepening gloom. A shaft of flame struck out at her from the hearth and showed a would-be alertness in the babyish eyes. "Yes, yes," she whispered. "I thought it was a lover I was seeking, a lover who had strong arms and tender words—but I was wrong—'twas thee I sought, Ned, all through the weary night—and I want nothing now that I have found thee—and—Ned, wilt keep the ghosties off?""Every one, little bairn.—Now, see how stained your gown is with—with rain. I shall not love you at all if you do not run and change it before you come with me to supper.""Not love me!" she repeated, with a look of doubt.—"Why, then, I'll change my gown thrice every day, because you are kind to me. No one else is kind to me, Ned. The wind buffets me, and rude men turn me forth of doors whenever I cross a threshold—save Sexton Witherlee, who was wondrous kind to me last night. All afternoon, Ned, I wandered about Marsh before I dared come in—I feared you would scowl at me, like the redmen of Wildwater." She turned, and in a moment she was clapping her hands for glee. "Look, look, Ned! Pretty candles—see'st thou how the shadows go playing hide-and-find-me up the walls?""They're bad shadows; have naught to do with them," said Shameless Wayne, turning her face to the hearth again and wondering to find what care he had for this frail woman's malady.But she slipped from his hands, and ran forward to the bier, and was reaching out for one of the candles when its light showed her the pale face of Wayne of Marsh. The sight did not frighten her at all; but she stood mute and still, as if she were trying to understand in dim fashion that once this man had been her husband."Would he answer if I spoke to him? No, I think he would not; he looks too stern," Wayne heard her murmur. "I've seen that face—in dreams, long, long ago, it must have been. Perhaps he was my lover—strange that I should seek him all about the moor, when he was lying so quietly here.""Come away, little bairn. He has no word for you," said her step-son, wearily.Mistress Wayne halted a moment, then stooped and kissed the dead man's lips. And then she laughed daintily and rubbed her mouth with one forefinger. "Why does he not care!" she lisped. "His lips are cold as a beggar's welcome, Ned—we'll none of him, will we, thou and I?"The door behind them opened and Nell Wayne came slowly across the floor until she stood within arm's reach of her step-mother. Scorn was in the girl's face, and a hatred not to be appeased."What brings this woman here?" she asked.Mistress Wayne crept close to her protector. "All are cruel except thou, Ned. Keep her from me—she will turn me out into the cold again.""Ay, Mistress—to starve of cold and want, if I had my way," said Nell.Shameless Wayne put one arm about the pleading woman and turned upon his sister hotly. "Canst not see how it is with her?" he cried. "They say that men are hard, but God knows ye women make us seem soft-hearted by the contrast.""The dead cannot speak, or father yonder would up and cry shame on her," the girl answered, covering the pair of them with a disdainful glance."Nay, thou'rt wronging him. Had she been whole of mind, he might have done—but 'twas never father's way to double any blow that fell upon a woman.""She shall not stay here! 'Tis pollution," cried Nell."And I say the poor bairn shall bide here so long as she lacks a home; andIam master here, not thou."His sister stared open-eyed at him. Since last night he had been contrite to the verge of womanishness; but now he showed a sterner glimpse of the Wayne temper than she had looked for in him. She felt wronged and baffled, and for her life could not keep back the stinging answer."Ay, thou art master," she said slowly, "and thou beginnest well—first to let another fight for thee, and then to welcome the betrayer with open arms. Small wonder that they call thee Shameless Wayne."For a breathing-space she thought he would have struck her. But this lad, who until yesterday had never seen need to check his lightest whim, was learning a hard lesson well. He struggled with his pride awhile, and crushed it; and when he spoke his voice was quiet and sad."Nell," he said, "'tis no fit place for brawling, and thou art right in what thou say'st of me. But Mistress Wayne shall bide, and not if all our kin cry out on me, will I go back on what I promised.""I am cold again, and very hungry. Send yond girl away," wailed the little woman."Does naught soften thee, lass?" said Wayne, glancing from his sister to the shrinking figure that held so closely fast to him."Naught," Nell answered, hard and cold. "The years will pass, and sorrows age, may be—but I shall never lose my hate of her.""Yet think," he went on patiently. "She cleaves to me, Nell, and thou know'st how the fairy-kist bring luck to those they favour. 'Tis a good omen for the long fight that's coming.""If pity does not move me, will a country proverb, think'st thou? Have thy way, Ned, since there's none to stay thee—but at the least take thy new friend from the death-room. Thou'lt see father turn and writhe if she stay longer by him, and 'tis my turn to watch the bier.""Let's begone, little bairn. Haply thou'lt know here to find thy wearing-stuff if I take thee to the old room above," said Shameless Wayne, leading his step-mother to the door.But Nell was fevered, and would not brook such prompt obedience to her wish. "Where are the lads?" she asked. "Frolicking, belike, when sober sitting within-doors would better have fitted the occasion."Shameless Wayne turned on the threshold. "I sent them hawking," he answered, the new firmness gaining in his voice. "There's one claim of the dead, lass, and another of the living; and 'tis better they should brace their muscle for the days to come than sit moping over what is past.""He grows masterful already. The shame has slipped clean off from him," murmured Nell, as she took a pair of snuffers from the mantel and trimmed the death-candles.Yet Ned had not killed his shame. He was but battling with it, and the effort to show something like a man, in his own eyes at least, rendered his mood at once strangely tender and strangely savage. But he could find naught save tenderness for Mistress Wayne, as they climbed the wide stairway hand-in-hand and went in at the door of what had been his father's bed-chamber—his father's and that of the little woman by his side. She was no longer an unfaithful wife; she was a child, bewildered in the midst of enemies, and she had no friend but him.Mistress Wayne stood in the middle of the room, fearful a little and asking a mute question of her step-son."This shall be thy room. Nay, there's naught to fear!" he said. "Peep into the drawers yonder by and by, and thou'lt find pretty clothes to wear; but thou'rt tired now, and must lie down on the bed. So! Now I'll cover thee snugly up, and bring thee meat. I doubt thou need'st it, bairn."She was passive in his hands, and fell to crooning happily while he drew a great rug of badgerskin across her. "'Tis pleasant to have friends, and to be warm," she murmured."Unless I hasten, thou'lt be asleep before I bring thee supper!" he cried. "Rest quiet, and be sure I'll keep the boggarts from the door."He went quietly down again, feeling his own troubles lighter for this fresh claim upon his sympathies; nor did he doubt the dead man's view of it, since there was scarce man or woman on the moor who did not hold that madness cancelled all back-reckonings."I will see what is to be found in the kitchen; haply the half of a moor-cock would tempt her appetite," he thought, as he turned down the passage.He was met by his four brothers, just returned from hawking. Their faces were flushed and their sturdy bodies panting with the hard run home."We've had rare sport, Ned! Rare sport!" cried the eldest, a lad of sixteen. And then, remembering who lay not far away, cold forever to sport of hawk or hound, he dropped his head shamefacedly."It has taken you far, I warrant; for the sun has been down this half-hour past.""Ay, for at the end of all we fell to flying at magpies down the hedgerows toward Heathley, and yond unbacked eyes of mine at which thou jestest trussed seven. Peep in the kitchen, Ned, and see what game we took. We carried the goshawk, too, and she struck a hare up by Wildwater——""What! Ye have been near Wildwater?" cried Shameless Wayne, his face darkening on the sudden."Ay, 'twas in one of the Lean Man's fields we struck the hare—and, Ned, we saw such a queer sight up yonder. Just as I was going to cast at a snipe, Ralph here whispered that the Lean Man himself was coming.""So we hid in the heather," put in Ralph eagerly, "and he passed as close to us, Ned, as thou stand'st to me. He had a great cut across his cheek, and his hands were red, and we could hear him laughing to himself in a way that made us feared.""When the Lean Man's hands are red, and his throat holds laughter, it means but the one thing," muttered Shameless Wayne. "He has killed his man—God pity one of our kin!—and the feud is out before we looked for it. They'll let the burying get done with—even a Ratcliffe never did less than that; and then 'twill be fast and merry.""Tush! We were not feared," cried Griff, the eldest. "We could have caught him, Ned, the four of us, if we had had swords to our hands."Shameless Wayne laughed quietly. "Ye will learn soon to buckle your sword-belts on whenever ye move abroad," he said. "Listen to me, lads. A house with a dead man in it is no healthy place, and so I bade you go out hawking this morning, and kept what I had to tell you until night. Ye've heard of the old feud of Wayne and Ratcliffe?""Ay, have we!" said Griff. "Such tales old Nanny Witherlee used to tell us of——""Well, 'twill be out again, belike, soon as your father is buried. The Ratcliffes will kill us whenever they get a chance, and we shall kill a Ratcliffe whenever he shows himself within sword-hail. And ye must take your share of it if ye wish to keep whole skins. Griff, thou canst play a shrewdish blade even now; and what ye lack, the four of you, I'll teach you by and by.""Hawking will show tame after this," cried Griff, his eyes brightening. "Shall I meet the Lean Man one day, think'st thou, Ned?""If God spares thee, lad. But no more frolics yet awhile on the Lean Man's land. Ye must keep close to home, and I will teach you cut and thrust until your arms are stiffened.""Was it a Ratcliffe who killed father?" asked Ralph suddenly. They had no understanding of death, as yet, these youngsters; its sorrow glanced off from them, too vague and dark to oust their lads' relish of a fight."Ay—and a Wayne who slew the murderer yesternight.""Why, then, 'twas thou!" cried Griff. "Old Nanny told us that the eldest-born must always fight the father's enemy. Where didst thrust him, Ned?"Shameless Wayne grew hot, and the blood flushed red to brow and cheeks. "Go seek your suppers, lads," he said, turning on his heel.Going to the kitchen, still bent on finding some dainty that would tempt his step-mother, he found Nanny Witherlee, the Sexton's wife, talking hard and fast to one of the maids."Th' young Maister 'ull noan deny it me, I tell thee," Nanny was saying."Then ask him, Nanny, and he'll tell thee quickly whether or not he will deny thee," said Shameless Wayne from the doorway."Sakes, Maister! I war that thrang wi' spache—though 'tis noan a habit o' mine—that I niver heard your step. I've comed up fro' Marshcotes to axe a bit of a kindness, like.""Thou'lt win it, likely, for I'm in a softish mood," said Wayne, half sneering at himself."'Tis that ye'll let me watch th' owd Maister th' neet-time through. I knawed him when he war a young un, an' I knawed him when he wedded th' first wife, an' I nursed ye all fro' babbies. 'Twould be kindly, like, to let me sit by him this last neet of all.""That was to be my care, Nanny. Dost want me to let a second chance slip by of honouring father?""Now, doan't tak things so mich to heart—doan't, lad, there's a dearie—an' I axe your pardon for so miscalling ye, I'm sure, seeing ye've grown out o' nursing-clothes. Ye've getten a tidy handful o' wark afore ye, an' Witherlee says to me this varry afternooin, 'Nanny,' says he, 'them Ratcliffes is up an' astir like a hornet's nest; I'm hoping th' Waynes 'ull bring swords an' sharp e'en to th' burying, for we can noan on us tell what 'ull chance,' he says. That war what Witherlee said, just i' so many words; an' though he's like a three-legged stool about a house, allus tripping ye up wheniver ye stir, he can do part thinking time an' time, can Witherlee. I war coming to axe ye afore he spoke, for I war fain to see th' last o' th' owd Maister; but I war up i' a brace o' shakes at after he'd gi'en me that notion, for I could see 'at a man wodn't frame to fight varry weel on th' top of a long neet's wakefulness."Nanny paused for breath, and the young Master took advantage of a break that might not come soon again. "The Ratcliffes will wait till after the burying. There's scant need for aught save wet eyes to-morrow, Nanny," he said."Well, that's as it mun be; an' what mun be nowt 'ull alter, so we willun't fash ourselns. But for owd love's sake, Maister, ye'll let me bide by thy father? 'Tis long since I axed owt, big or little, of ye Waynes, an' ye'll noan deny it me, now, will ye?"Shameless Wayne, as he had said, was in a soft mood, and Nanny's sharp face was so full of entreaty that he saw it would be a bitter blow to her if he denied the boon. "Have it as thou wilt," he said. "Father was always kindly in his thoughts of thee, Nanny, and it may please him better than any watching of mine could do."Rolf Wayne of Cranshaw, meanwhile, had ridden over to Marsh to see if there were aught that he could do; and Nell, meeting him as he came in at the hall door, gave him a warm welcome, for the late quarrel with her brother had left her sad, and the silence of the death-chamber fostered such sort of misery."Rolf, my step-mother has come back, and Ned has welcomed her," she said, after they had talked awhile of this and that in hushed voices."What! Mistress Wayne come back?""Yes, mad as a marshland hare, with all her old pleading ways so deepened that she has won Ned clean over to her side.""Fairy-kist, is she?""Aye—though, to my thinking, she was always near to it.""Then, lass, there's no room for anger. Let her be; 'tis ill-luck crossing such, and we have need——""An old tale, Rolf!" she broke in stormily. "Ned said as much awhile since—as though, God's pity, there could good luck come of harbouring such as her. There! I am distraught. Wilt watch the bier, Rolf, while I run out and cool my wits a little?""The night is over cold. Bide by a warm fireside, and talk thy troubles out to one who cares for thee.""Nay, I must be alone. Let me go, dear! I tell thee, my head throbs and throbs, and I shall go the way of Mistress Wayne unless thou'lt humour me."She slipped a cloak about her, checking Rolf's efforts to detain her, and went quietly out into the courtyard. There was a touch of winter in the air, and a touch of spring, and overhead the stars shone dewy. The girl shivered a little, but not for cold, as she crossed into Barguest lane and saw a red moon climbing up above Worm's Hill. Up and down she paced, up and down, thinking of Shameless Wayne, of her step-mother, of everything that vexed and harassed her. Nor did her brain grow cooler for the night's companionship; rather, the silence let stranger fancies in than she would have harboured at any other time or place."Ned has such need to be strong, and he has ever been weak as running water," she muttered, and stopped, and wondered that the breeze which blew from the moor-edge down Barguest lane had grown so chill upon the sudden.Aware of some vague terror, yet acknowledging none, she held her breath and bent her ear toward the lane-top. A sound of pattering footsteps drifted down—they were close beside her now, as the wind brushed her cloak—and now again the footsteps were dying at the far end of the lane. And a whine that was half a growl crept downward in the wake of pattering feet and icy wind."'Tis Barguest!" muttered Nell, and raced down the road, and across the courtyard, and into the hall where Wayne of Cranshaw sat watching by the dead.Her pride was gone now, and the last impulse of defiance. She waited no asking, but put her arms about Rolf's neck and bade him hold her close."I heard the Hound's voice in the lane just now," she whispered. "There's trouble coming on us, Rolf—more trouble—I never heard his step go pattering down the road so plain.""Didst never hear the water try its new trick, thou mean'st. I was a fool to let thee go and nurse thy fancies in such a spot," said her lover roughly. But his eyes had another tale to tell, and across his brow a deep line of foreboding showed itself."Fancies go as soon as thought of, and naught comes of them—but when did I hear Barguest in an idle hour?" she said. "Dear, I am ashamed—but—thou canst not hold me close enough—hark. There's something at the door—a whining, Rolf, and the scrape of paws against the oak——""Ay, 'tis Barguest," said Nanny Witherlee, stepping soft across the polished boards and resting one hand on the bier."There's naught, save a wet wind sobbing through the firs," growled Wayne of Cranshaw."Is there not? What say ye to that, Mistress? Ye an' me know Barguest when we hear him, an' 'tis as I said to th' young Maister awhile back. There's sorrow brewing thick, an' th' Brown Dog hes come to bid ye look to pistol-primings an' th' like. He knaws, poor beast, an' he's scratting at th' door this minute to ease his mind by telling ye.""Get to bed, Nell," said Wayne of Cranshaw quietly; "when Nanny falls to boggart-talk, and the maid who listens is half mad with sorrow——""Tales is tales, Maister Wayne," broke in Nanny, "an' I wod scare no poor less wi' lies at sich a time—but Barguest is more nor a tale, an' I should know, seeing th' years I've bided here at Marsh. I mind th' neet when Mistress Nell's mother war ta'en, ten year agone, it war just th' same—th' Brown Dog came pattering right up to th' door-stun, an'——""God rest thee for the daftest fool in Marshcotes," cried Wayne of Cranshaw, as he saw Nell go ashen-grey and all but fall. And then he led the girl out, and helped her to the stair-top."There'll be one to watch the bier till dawn?" she asked wearily, as he bade her good-night."Trust me to see to that. Never heed old wives' tales, Nell, and keep up heart as best thou canst," he answered, and went down again into the hall.Nanny was fingering the shroud softly, and scarce glanced up as Wayne approached. "Gooid linen, ivery yard on 't," she muttered, "though I says it as shouldn't. Ay, an' bonnily hemmed a' all. Wayne o' Marsh may lig proud, that he may, an' I war allus sartin sure 'at a man gets a likelier welcome up aboon if he's buried i' gooid linen.—Begow, but his face is none so quiet as I should hev liked to see it; there's summat wick i' th' set on 't, as if he wod right weel like to be up an' cracking Ratcliffe skulls.""Where is the Master, Nanny?" asked Wayne of Cranshaw, cutting short her musings."He war dahnstairs a while back, for I met him as I war coming in here. But mad Mistress Wayne began to call out his name, an' he thinks nowt too mich to do for her nowadays. He'll be gi'eing her another bite an' sup, belike.""Then who will watch? I was for riding back to Cranshaw, but if there's need of me——""Who'll wake? Why, who should wake save Nanny Witherlee? Th' Maister promised I should, for I axed him a while back; so ye needn't fash yourseln about that, Maister.""Then good-night to thee, Nanny—and—have a care of Mistress Nell, for she is in strange mood to-night. Barguest is well enough for a fireside gossip, nurse, but such talk comes ill when a maid's spirits are low."Nanny laughed softly, and pointed a lean finger at him as he stood halting near the door. "Ye do weel to mock at Guytrash, Maister, an' ye do weel to give advice to one that's known more sorrow nor ye—but why doan't ye cross th' threshold?"Wayne of Cranshaw was ashamed to feel the sweat-drops trickling down his face; but he could not kill the fear that brought them there."They say a Cranshaw Wayne fears nowt, man nor devil," went on the Sexton's wife—"but there's one thing 'at maks his heart beat like th' clapper of a bell—an' ye dursn't cross what ligs on th' door-stun."He put his hand on the door and flung it wide; and the incoming wind drove the flames of the death-candles slant-wise toward the further wall. The moonlight lay quiet and empty on the threshold, and overhead the firs were plaining fitfully. "There's naught lies there," said he with a chill laugh, and went to fetch his horse from stable.But Nanny's eyes were fixed on the door long after Wayne of Cranshaw had pulled it to behind him—long after she had heard his horse trot up the road—and she seemed to see there more than the candle-light sufficed to show."Is there aught I can get thee, Nanny, before I wend to bed?" said Shameless Wayne, entering a half-hour later."Nowt, an' thank ye. I've getten company, an' they'll keep me wake, I warrant.""They, say'st thou? God's truth, Nanny, but thy eyes are fain of the doorway yonder!""Ay, I've getten th' owd Maister, an' I've getten Barguest. Get ye to bed, Maister, for I tell ye there'll be need o' ye to-morn. Ye're ower late as 'tis.""Mistress Wayne would have me go and sit by her; she could no way sleep, poor bairn, and it seemed to comfort her to have me at the bedside and to hold my hand. She's sleeping now." He bent over the dead, and whispered something; and when he lifted his face it showed deep lines of purpose clean-chiselled in the youthful features. "Good-night, nurse. God rest thee, and all of us," he said, with unwonted piety.The candles were guttering in their sockets, and Nanny replaced them soon as the lad's foot had ceased to creak on the stair. All were abed now, save Nanny Witherlee—save Nanny, and the rats behind the wainscoting, and something that scraped restlessly at the stout door of oak."Why are they feared o' Barguest?" muttered the Sexton's wife. "He niver yet did hurt to a Wayne or ony friends o' th' Waynes; nay, he's that jealous for their safety 'at he can no way bide still when mischief's brewing. Whisht, lad, whisht! Owd Nanny hearkens, an' she'll mind 'at th' Waynes go armed to th' burial to-morn."It might be twelve o'clock of that night, while Nanny sat still as the body she watched by, that Shameless Wayne, trying to win sleep from a hard pillow, heard a horseman ride up to the hall door. There were three strokes, as of a hammer on a nail, and then, before he had well leaped from bed, a voice came from the moonlight under his window."Ride hard to Cranshaw Rigg. There's somebody waits thee there, Wayne the Shameless." It was Nicholas Ratcliffe's voice, hard and thin and high-pitched.Shameless Wayne snatched a pistol from the bed-head, and flung the casement wide, and saw the Lean Man riding hard up Barguest lane. He took a quick aim and pulled the trigger; but old Nicholas rode on, and the moonlight showed him stark on the hilltop as he turned once for a backward look at Marsh."So the hunt is up already," said Shameless Wayne, banging to the casement and getting to bed again. "What has the lean rogue left on the door down yonder?—well, we shall see to-morrow," he muttered presently, turning over on his side. "There's naught gained by losing sleep—if only sleep would come."But sleep did not come yet awhile, and his thoughts wandered to Janet Ratcliffe—Janet, whom he had met to-day upon the moor—Janet, the daughter of that same Lean Man on whom he had just now turned a pistol-muzzle.Nanny Witherlee, too, had heard the three taps on the door, and the Lean Man's high-pitched voice. "I know weel enough what he's put on th' door," she said, not stirring from her stool at the bier-foot. "Th' owd feud began i' th' same way, an' I mind to this day how th' Maister, who cars so quiet yonder, looked when he came down i' th' morning an' fund th' token that war left nailed to th' oak." Her eyes lit up on the sudden, and a sombre mirth lengthened the thin line of her mouth. "But one thing Nicholas Ratcliffe didn't know, I warrant—that Barguest war ligged on th' door-stun! He crossed th' Brown Dog as he set nail to door, an' a babby could tell what that spells. Sleep ye quiet, Shameless Wayne, for ye'll turn th' spindle that's to weave th' Lean Man's winding-sheet."CHAPTER VIITHE LEAN MAN'S TOKENAt dawn of the next day Shameless Wayne awoke from a troubled sleep, with Nicholas Ratcliffe's visit fresh in his mind and a drear foreboding at his heart. He could rest no longer, but hurried into his clothes and went down to the shadowy hall, where the candles still burned and the Sexton's wife still watched the dead."Didst hear Nicholas Ratcliffe's voice yesternight?" he said, coming close to Nanny's elbow."For sure I did.""And the tapping on the door? What was he at, think'st thou, Nanny?""Oppen th' door, Maister, an' ye'll see. But doan't look to find owt bonnie."She watched him as he pulled down the latch and stepped into the rainy April dawn. The sun was red above Worm's Hill and its light fell straight upon a man's hand fixed to the upper cross-bar of the door. A broken stone, lying beside the lintel, showed how the Lean Man had driven his nail into the wood. Shameless Wayne fell back a pace or two, his eyes on the grisly token, while Nanny hobbled to the door."Ay, I guessed as mich," she said, looking once at the hand and thence to the young Master's face. "Twenty year gone by it war th' same, an' I've heard tell that, long afore I war born or thowt on, th' Lean Man's grandfather rade down to Marsh one neet an' fixed a Wayne's hand to th' door. Do ye mind th' tale, Maister? I telled it when ye war no higher nor my knee.""I had forgotten it, nurse. Yond is the badge of feud, then? So be it. There'll be sword-play, Nanny, soon as father is well laid to rest.""Afore, I warrant," said Nanny sharply. "Willun't ye hearken to me, lad, when I tell ye that a devil sits snug behind ivery Ratcliffe muzzle?""Save Mistress Janet's," muttered the other, absently."Oh, th' wind blows that road, does it? I've thowt as mich, time an' time. Maister, I war aye fond o' ye, an' that ye knaw—gi'e no heed to th' lass, for all her bonnie ways. Ye cannot grow taties i' mucky soil, anor father a right sort o' love on a Ratcliffe.""Hold thy peace, Nanny! who said I cared for Mistress Ratcliffe?""Your face, lad, said it. Theer! I've angered ye, an' ye've enough as 'tis to put up wi'.—I war saying, Maister, that ye'll niver bottom th' meanness of a Ratcliffe, as I can do; an' when ye think 'at they'll respect a dead man ony more nor a wick un, ye're sore mista'en.""Nay, they're an ill lot—but even the Lean Man would scruple to set on mourners at a grave-side.""Trust an owd head, Maister. Witherlee put a plain question to Red Ratcliffe yestermorn; he axed him fair an' square if they meant to let th' burying go by i' peace; an' he telled by th' look o' th' chap 'at they meant to do no sich thing.—Lad, I'll not axe ye to believe, for ye've getten your father's trick o' thinking th' best of ony mon save yourseln; but I will axe ye to humour an owd body's fancy, and to send as quick as may be to your kin at Hillus, an' Cranshaw to bid 'em buckle their sword on afore they come to Marsh.""When did Marshcotes ever see armed mourners at a graveside?" he said, eyeing her doubtfully. "'Twill wear a queer look, Nanny, if no attack is made.""It 'ull wear a queerer, my sakes, if they come an' cut ye all i' little pieces. For owd sake's sake, Maister, promise me ye'll do it. Yond's Simeon stirring at th' back o' th' house; I should know his step by now, for he walks as if one foot war flaired-like to follow t' other. Bid Simeon get hisseln to horseback——""I doubt it still, nurse. What if the Lean Man has nailed his token to the door? There's time and to spare, by the Heart, for what will follow.""Fiddle o' that tale!" cried the Sexton's wife briskly. "If ye choose to lig cold i'stead o' warm, I've ta'en trouble enough wi' ye i' times past, that I hev, to warrant my stepping betwixt ye an' ony sich-like foolishness. An' if ye doan't send Simeon, I'll walk myseln both to Hillus an' to Cranshaw—ay, that I will—Maister, do ye knaw 'at th' Lean Man crossed Barguest last neet as iver war?"Shameless Wayne shook his head, smiling a little at the old woman's fancy. "How should that be, nurse?" he said."Barguest war carred on th' door-stun, fair as if he'd been ony mortal dog; an' while th' Lean Man war agate wi' hammering his nail in, I heard th' hound whimper fit to mak ye cry for pity of him. But Nicholas Ratcliffe niver heard th' poor beast, not he; an' I hugged myseln to think 'at ivery stroke on th' nail-head war a stroke to his own coffin. Ye've getten your chance, Maister, an' I willun't let ye loss it for a lack of a bit o' forethowt."Insensibly Wayne yielded to the old beliefs; reason might chide him, but he knew in his heart, from that time forward, that he would be even with the Lean Man before the end. What tales had Nanny not told him in childhood, of Barguest and his ways? What musty traditions were not grafted on his growing manhood, of the certain disaster that waited any foeman of the Waynes who crossed the Spectre Hound? Ay, he believed, and his eyes shone clear with the first light of hope that had touched them since he returned two nights ago to the Bull tavern, a sobered and heart-stricken man."There's Nell!" cried Wayne on the sudden, pushing Nanny roughly into the house. "For God's sake keep her within-doors, nurse, till I have plucked down yonder trophy.""Sorrow's a rare un to get folk up betimes; how oft is Mistress Nell astir wi' th' dawn, I wonder?" muttered Nanny, as she returned to the hall, closing the door behind her."Good-morrow, nurse," said the girl, crossing the hall and laying her two cold hands in Nanny's. "Art weary, belike, with the long watch?"The Sexton's wife looked at Nell's white face and red-rimmed eyes, and she could find no heart to answer; she just took the lass in her arms, and kissed her, and comforted her with such little wordless tendernesses as she had used when Nell had been frightened as a bairn.While they stood thus, still with no speech between them, a horse pulled up at the door, and they could hear the rider's voice strike, deadened a little but clear, through the stout oaken planks."The feud is up, lad! When I rode home last night they had slain one of my folk on Cranshaw Rigg.""Ay, and the body lacked"—came the voice of Shameless Wayne."God's pity! Wrench it down. 'Tis my brother's hand, Ned," broke in the first speaker."What is't?" cried Nell, freeing herself from Nanny's arms and turning sharply. "That was Rolf's voice—and Ned is with him—what are they doing, nurse?""Niver heed 'em, bairn—they're nobbut——""Ay, but thou canst not blind me, Nanny! I know! I dreamed of it the night through—'tis the old token father told me of so oft—'tis a Wayne's hand, nurse! Did I not tell thee Barguest went pad-footed down the lane beside me?""Now, whisht ye, mistress! Your sweetheart's safe, as ye can hear, an' he'll be in by an' by—he's coming now, an' ye'll noan want me, dearie, when he's by to comfort ye. I'll waken th' wenches, an' then I mun lig me down awhile, for there's a lot needs seeing to this day."Nell stood there idly until the old woman's steps were lost among the restless echoes of the house. On a sudden the main door was thrown open, and Shameless Wayne came in alone."Why did not Rolf stay?" asked Nell."Because I gave him a message for his folk at Cranshaw. Nay, I cannot tell thee what it was; 'twould only scare thee. —Come, Nell! I, too, have to get to saddle, and I fear to leave thee with such misery in thy face. Where are the lads?""Abed yet—wearied with their hunting.""They must not come to the kirkyard. Bid them keep close to home till we return.""But, Ned, why should they keep away?" the girl began.He stopped her, with the quiet, forceful air that she was learning to obey. "Because I bid them," he said, and kissed her lightly on the cheek, and went out to the stables.Nell crossed to the bier, where her father lay heedless of the storm and fret that his death had brought to old Marsh House. She sat her down, and put her face between her hands, and let her thoughts go drifting down the pathway of the years. From time to time the maids came in and busied themselves with setting out the table for the feast that would follow the old master's burial in a few hours' time; but the master's daughter seemed to heed them as little as himself. She thought of her brother, wondering at the change in him, yet doubting that the old wildness would return soon as the first keen smart of shame was softened; she thought of Mistress Wayne, who was a guest here in the house which she had dishonoured in all men's eyes; and then again she remembered what had chanced in Marshcotes kirkyard, and told herself that surely a twelvemonth had hurried by since she went up to the belfry-tower with a knife close hidden under her cloak.Not two days ago she had watched the life ebb fast and red from the wound in her father's back, while his murderer looked on and laughed; and now he was ready for the grave; and in between there had seemed no rest from the hurry of events. Dick Ratcliffe had paid his price; one of the Cranshaw Waynes had fallen at the Lean Man's hand; the old feud-token had been nailed over the Marsh doorway; and under all the present misery—the grief and fret and long-drawn-out restlessness that wait on burial—was the overshadowing sense of tragedy to come. To-day they would lay their dead to rest; and then the smouldering embers of the feud would leap to flame; and after that no man nor woman of them all could count a day safe won through till it was done, and men's lives and women's honour would be no more than straws upon the fast-racing stream of chance.All this went back and forth in the girl's mind, and the feud took on a hundred different shapes each time she thought of it. It was the feud she had heard of since earliest childhood, the feud whose memory was grafted in by many a far-back legend and nearer tale of fight. Often and often in the happier years she had wondered, as a girl will, how the way of it would be if the quarrel broke out afresh: there had been deeds of high courage and glamour of sword-thrust to make her almost love the feud and count it noble; but now that it was on them, now that it hugged the very threshold, naked, terrible and brutish, she understood the reality and lost her dream-visions of the splendour and the majesty of fight. Fight meant gaping wounds, and blood upon the floor, and men going into the shadowy places when they were at the topmost of their strength. God knew that, if the choice were hers, she would cry peace once and for all and let the dead past rest.Yet her mood changed like the gusty wind that whistled now and then across the chimney-stacks. No sooner had she let that eager prayer for peace escape her, than her hands clenched themselves, and her eyes brightened, and the old vengeance-cry of her people rose hot to her lips. Let bloodshed come, and slaughter—and she would take new heart as one by one the Ratcliffes fell. Never in all the years that they had been together had the likeness between the dead man and his daughter shown more plain than now, as she laid her hand on his and counted his wrongs afresh. The pride of her race, its pitiless sternness when wronged, seemed gathered from the long-dead generations who had fought the Wayne and Ratcliffe fight aforetime; and the hate of the fathers woke again to splendour and to savagery in the slender-supple body of this last daughter of the line.She could sit still no longer, but got to her feet and crossed to the garden-door. The house-air stifled her; men fought under the open sky, and for that cause there was friendship in wind and sun and drifting clouds. Something like a prayer—a masterful prayer, and a bitter—rose to the girl's lips as she stood and felt the keen wind in her face."Keep warm my hate, Lord God!" she cried.A light footstep sounded from the hall behind her. She turned and saw little Mistress Wayne bending over her father's body, with the same questioning, roguish air that she had worn last night."Wake, wake!" Mistress Wayne was lisping in the dead man's ear. "'Tis my wedding-morn, I tell thee, and all at Marsh must come to see it."Not touched at all was Nell by the piteousness of the scene. She remembered only what this woman had done, and forgot how hard a penance she was undergoing."Get ye gone," she said, clutching her step-mother fiercely by the arm. "Is't not enough that you have killed him, but you must mock him after death?"Mistress Wayne shrank backward from her touch. "I did but try to wake him, Nell. He would be angered if he missed my bridal-morn."Nell made no answer, but turned her back on the little woman; and Mistress Wayne crept, softly as she had come, out of the chamber whose guest perplexed her so."Her bridal-morn!" cried Nell, as though her father could hear that she was speaking to him. "Is it for malice that she gowns herself in white on such a day, and prates of weddings? Father, why didst go to the Low Country for a wife? She has brought disaster on disaster since the first day she set foot in Marsh."A new thought came to her, adding its own load to the burden that was already over-heavy for her. Would Ned win free of his passion for Janet Ratcliffe, or would his marriage, too, be ill-fated as his father's? To wed from the Low Country was folly, but marriage between a Ratcliffe and a Wayne would be a crime on which the country-side would up and cry out shame.And then, in a moment, all the girl's fierceness, her resolution and tearless pride, were lost. God had made her a woman, and like a woman she fell prone across the bier, and wept, and thought neither of vengeance nor of hatred, but of the love that had grown through twenty years of comradeship between the dead man and herself. It was not her father's strength, his sweeping recklessness in fight, that she remembered now; but she recalled his gentleness toward her, his clean and upright courtesy, his generosity to rich and poor among his neighbours.Marsh House was full of the unrest that goes before a burial, the fruitless wandering to-and-fro which seems to ease the sorrow of the living. The menservants were idling in the courtyard with a subdued sort of noisiness; the maids were still passing and re-passing from the kitchen; and Nanny Witherlee, unable to snatch more than the briefest spell of sleep, came hobbling by and by into the hall.The old woman stopped on seeing Nell stretched across the bier, and half advanced toward her; then shook her head. "I'll let her be; happen 'twill be best for her to cry her een out," she muttered, and turned down the passage to the kitchen.Nanny showed different altogether this morning from the quivering, ghost-ridden watcher who had kept so long a vigil with only the dead and strange voices in the wind for company. Then there had been no work to be done, no household cares to rouse the old instincts in her; but now that preparations for the burial feast were going busily forward she slipped naturally into the place which had been hers at Marsh aforetime. Brisk as though she had had a full night's sleep, she fell to doing this and that, rating the maids the while with a keenness that robbed the day of half its sadness for her."Now then, ye idle wenches!" she cried, soon as she had crossed the kitchen threshold. "Do ye think gaping at a mutton-pasty 'ull mak it walk to th' dining board? Martha, tha'rt allus mooning ower thy work like a goose wi' a nicked head. An' look at Mary yonder! Standing arms under apron when th' house 'ull soon be full o' hungry folk. An' th' Waynes allus had good appetites, sorrow or no sorrow."Nanny was setting parsley-sprigs round a dish of neat's tongue all this time; and when this was done she climbed onto the settle and reached down piece after piece of haver-bread that was drying on the creel. The same instinct that had bidden her test the quality of Wayne's winding sheet, while yet she was deep in sorrow for him, was with her now, and her mind was set on leaving no unremembered detail, of wine or meat or ripe October ale, to mar the burial-feast."It's weel to do nowt, same as some folk!" she cried, stopping to glance sourly at the progress of the maids. "I don't know what wenches are made on nowadays, that I don't.""Do nowt, my sakes! When my knees is dibble-double-ways wi' weariness," cried Martha."Hoity-toity! I've done as mich before breakfast ivery day o' th' week when I war a lass.—Mary, wilt gi'e me a hand wi' this cheese, or mun I let it fall to th' floor-stuns?"The maids, run off their feet already, without any help from outside, grew wild with the natter-natter of the Sexton's wife; but awe of her kept any but the briefest snaps of anger from their tongues, and it was a relief to both when the door opened slowly and they saw Hiram Hey standing on the threshold. Clean-shaven and spruce of body was Hiram, and a certain melancholy drooping of the mouth-corners could not quench his sober gaiety of mien."'Tis a sad day, this, for us at Marsh," he said, thrusting his head forward and sniffing the air with unctuous wonder that the women could think of victuals at all at such a time.Nanny turned quickly. "It willun't be ony brighter for thy coming, Hiram Hey. We want no men-folk here," she cried.The maids looked from Nanny to the farm-man, and then at each other. There was a stiff breeze always when these two met, and Nanny was apt to find her match at such times."Well, now, are ye winning forrard-like?" said Hiram, leaning against the doorway in his idlest attitude."Ay, an' no thanks to thee," snapped the Sexton's wife."It beats me to know how folk can eat an' drink, an' drink an' eat, when there's a burying. It seems a mockery o' th' dead, that it does—as mich as to say, 'See what it is to be wick, lad; tha'll niver put victuals down thy throat again, same as I'm doing now.' Ay, I've oft thowt it's enough to mak a corpse turn round an' scowl at ye.""I've seen thee at a burying, Hiram," said the Sexton's wife, quietly, "an' tha can do thy share, I've noticed. It's all talk, an' nowt but, wi' sich as ye. Tha cannot see we're thrang, mebbe?"His only answer was to shift his shoulder to a more easiful position against the doorway, and Nanny left him to it. At another time she would have had a sharper tongue for Hiram Hey, nor would his own responses have lacked their sting; but the old Master's influence had never been so strong as it was now, and a sense of seemliness—a fear, perhaps, of waking the last sleep of him who lay so near to them—held even the rough tongues of these upland folk in check.Hiram glanced at Martha, soon as the little old woman had hobbled out to lay fresh dishes in the hall; and Martha answered his glance in a way that showed there was an understanding between them—as indeed there was like to be, seeing that Hiram Hey had been wooing her off and on these two years past."Hast been to th' fields this morn?" asked Martha."Ay, iver sin' th' sun war up, lass.""Tha'll be dry, then, Hiram, at after thy morning's work.""Dry, now? Well, I wodn't say just dry—but that way on a bit. I niver war a drinker myseln, as I telled shepherd Jose nobbut yesterday; but there's a time for iverything, an' if I war to see a quart, say, of October frothing ower th' lip o' th' mug——""Tha'd find a mouth to fit it? Well, an' shall, says I," cried Martha.Hiram stretched his limbs more lengthily before the peats, as a soothing gurgle from the pantry told him that Martha was already filling him a measure. She was back again by and by, with a brim-full pewter in her hands."Drink, lad Hiram; what wi' work an' sadness, there's need for strong liquor here at Marsh," she said.The firelight struck with a ruddy, softened sheen on the pewter as Hiram lifted it. He drank slowly, and his face was full of unwonted cheerfulness until he had set down the empty mug beside him."Theer! It war gooid, Martha," he murmured sorrowfully, "but I doubt there's nowt mich in it when all's said. Drink is all varry weel, but there's one ower i' th' hall yonder who'll niver warm to liquor again this side o' Judgment. Nay, I'm fair shamed o' myseln to be supping ale while th' owd Maister ligs so cold."He stopped and eyed the empty pewter; and Martha, reaching across the settle-back, picked up the mug again."Tha's getten too soft a heart, Hiram," she said. "Sup while ye can, an' mak th' most on't.""Nay, nay, I'm no drinker. Plain watter is nigh th' same to me as ale, an' there's no call for thee to fill afresh—leastways, I wodn't say a full quart, tha knows."But Martha was back again before he had well finished with his protests. "Get done wi' 't, Hiram, afore Nanny comes back," she whispered. "She carries an ill tongue, does Nanny, when she finds life going too easy wi' a body.""There's queer things bahn to happen," said Hiram presently."By th' Heart, I thowt there'd been queer happenings enough of late!""The shepherds telled me this morn that th' Ratcliffes is all a-buzz, an' folk are shaking their heads all up an' dahn th' moorsides. Besides, th' owd house here fair rustles, like, as I've known it do afore when trouble war i' store. I tell thee, I can hear th' boggarts creeping wick as scropels fro' roof to cellar.""Hod thy whisht—do, now, for goodness sake. Tha flairs me," cried Martha, glancing behind her. And then she clutched the farm-man by the arm with sudden terror. "Look yonder, Hiram! Look yonder!" she cried.Hiram looked and started to his feet. "Begow, I thowt 'twar a right boggart this time," he muttered. "What ails th' little body to move so quiet about a house?"Mistress Wayne, dressed all in white, with celandines at her breast and fair hair rippling to her waist, had come in from the garden and stood at the open kitchen-door; and she was smiling, carelessly and trustfully, on the frightened maids and on old Hiram."'Tis my wedding-morn," she said, "and I've been to talk with the fairies, Martha. They say 'tis well to get the wee folks' blessing for the bairns to come."Hiram gave her a long glance, then looked away; and an unwonted pity stirred him. "Nay, I've no sorrow to waste. She's made herself a nettle-bed, an' she mun lig on't," he muttered."Come in, Mistress, come in, an' warm yourseln a bit; ye're looking cold and wan, like," cried Martha, recovering from her fright."Oh, no, that is not true. I peeped at myself in the well out there just now, and I thought that I had never seen a happier face. Hiram, thou must come to my wedding, too; wilt thou?""Ay, Mistress—ay, I'll come, choose what."She smiled again, and waved her hand, and slipped away into the sunshine that shimmered over the wet flagstones of the yard. And neither Martha nor the farm-men found aught to say to one another for awhile."What dost mak of it?" said Hiram Hey at last."Nay, I can mak nowt of it. But 'tis a drear start for a burial. Hiram, lad, Marsh is no healthy place just now, an' I for one could wish to be weel out on't. It isn't th' blood-shed I fear, an' it isn't th' dead man yonder—but it's th' ghosts! Tha'rt right when tha says they fair creep fro' floor to garret."A thought crossed Hiram's mind—no new thought, either, but one that showed livelier than its wont now Martha was in such trouble."Tha'd be fain to change dwellings, like?" he ventured, putting a hand on her shoulder and half drawing her toward him.Martha yielded to his touch, and a puzzled look came over Hiram's face; he had pondered over this last step for four-and-twenty months, and needed a twelvemonth longer in which to make sure of its wisdom. His doubts were settled, however, by the intrusion of the Sexton's wife, who stopped on seeing what was afoot and glanced from Hiram to the empty mug."So that's what's browt thee here, Hiram Hey?" she cried. "Tha'rt a bonnie un to come talking o' what's seemly i' a house o' death! First, to drink thyseln dizzy-crazy, an' then to go prettying wi' a wench that mud weel by thy own grandchild. Nay, I've no patience wi' thee; tha'rt owd enough to be thinking o' thy own latter end i'stead o' fly-by-skying wi' lasses, an'——"Hiram for once could find no answer, but stood ruffling the frill of hair under his clean-shaven chin and shifting his feet from side to side."I have talked with my cousin, Nanny," came the Master's voice from the door.Nanny turned and saw Shameless Wayne standing there, pale and quiet, with the straight downward rent between his brows which seemed to have been fixed there two nights ago for good and all."About th' burying, Maister?" she queried eagerly."Aye. We are to go armed; the word has been sent round.""Now God be praised! Ye're wise to list to what Barguest hes to tell," said the Sexton's wife, and forgot to rate the maids, forgot the fifty little household cares that claimed attention.
CHAPTER VI
THE BROWN DOG'S STEP
Marsh House lay lower than Wildwater, and it had a softer look with it, though built much after the same pattern so far as roominess and stout building went. The trees grew big about it and a pleasant orchard ran from the garden to the chattering stream; yet was it ghostly, in a quiet fashion of its own, and not all its trees and sheltered garden-nooks could rob it of a certain eeriness, scarce felt but not to be gainsaid. On either hand the gateway two balls of stone had lately topped the uprights; but one of these had fallen and lay unheeded in the courtyard—a quiet and moss-grown mourner, so it seemed, for the lost pride of the Waynes of Marsh. Behind the house, leading up to the sloping shoulder of the moor, ran a narrow, grass-grown way, scarce wide enough to let a horseman through and lined on either hand by grassy banks and lichened walls of sandstone; they called it Barguest lane, and the Spectre Hound who was at once the terror of the moorside and the guardian spirit of the Waynes, was said to roam up and down between the moor and Marsh House whenever trouble was blowing in the wind.
And true it was that at certain times—oftenest when the air was still, and dusk of late evening or dark of night brooded quiet over house and garden—a wild music would sweep down the lane, not crisp and sharp-defined, but softened like the echo of a hound's baying far away. The hardier folk were wont to laugh at Barguest, with a backward turn of the head to make sure he was not close behind them, and these vowed that the Brown Dog of Marsh was no more than the voice of the stream which ran in a straitened channel underneath the road; water had strange tricks of mimicry, they said, when it swept through hollow places, and the deep elfin note that haunted Barguest lane was own brother to many a bubbling cry and groan that they had hearkened to amongst the stream-ways of the moor. And this son of talk was well enough when treacle posset was simmering on some tap-room hearth; but abroad, and especially if gloaming-tide surprised them within hail of old Marsh House, they found no logic apt enough to meet their terror of the Spectre Hound. As for the Waynes, there were some among them who pretended to disclaim their guardian Dog; yet there was not one who would oust tradition from his veins—not one who failed to loosen his sword-blade in the scabbard if any told him that Barguest had lately given tongue.
The spirit of the homestead was strong on Shameless Wayne to-night, as he sat alone in the hall, watching the dead and thinking his own remorseful thoughts. All that was left of his father rested, gaunt and still, on the bier in the centre of the hall, where it was laid out in state with candles burning low at head and feet. Mistress Nell and the serving-wenches were all in the back part of the house; the lads had not returned from hawking in the lowland pastures; the last of the day's visitors had bidden the corpse farewell and had gone home again, leaving the new master of Marsh House to watch the closed eyes of his forerunner.
A ray of fading sunlight crept across the hall and rested on the dead man's face, which showed white as the cere-cloth that bound his jaws.
"Father, father!" he cried, laying one hand on the waxen cheek. "Do you know what chanced yesternight? Do you know that I, who should have carried the quarrel, sat drinking your honour and my own away?—God, I could see each Wayne of them all look askance at me to-day, as they came and stood beside you here. And each man was saying to himself, 'There is none of the old breed left at Marsh.' They were right, father—and sometimes, when the candle-shadows play about your face, I seem to see you laughing at thought of Shameless Wayne—laughing to know him for your son."
The sunlight moved from the bier, and up the oak-panelled walls and backward along the ceiling-beams until it vanished outright. Dusk came filtering through the lattices. A low stir of bees sounded from the garden, where corydalis and white arabis had newly opened to the spring. And still Wayne sat on, listening to the thousand voiceless rumours that creep up and down an empty house.
"I cannot wipe out the stain, father," he went on, in a quieter voice; "but I will do all that is left to me—I'll pluck Janet out of my heart—and there shall none say, for all my shamelessness, that I let the land go backward, though in old days you'll remember there was no love spilt 'twixt me and farming matters. But the Wayne lands were always better-tilled than any in the moorside, and 'twould hurt you, father, if I let them grow foul and poor of crop.—Yet, for all that, 'tis easier to swear to hunt out every Ratcliffe from this to Lancashire," he added, with a whimsical straightforwardness which showed that a sense of fellowship with the dead had come to him through long watching by the bier.
And then he let his thoughts drift idly and was near to falling into a doze when he was called to his feet by a tapping at the window. He crossed the floor and the light scarce sufficed to show him his step-mother's face pressed close against the glass.
"Open to me, Ned, open to me," she was crying.
He went to the narrow door that led into the garden and opened it; and Mistress Wayne clung tight to him while he took her to the hearth—keeping her fast in talk the while, lest she should see what lay in the middle of the hall.
"You are cold, little bairn," he said, using the same half-tender, half-scornful name he had given her at the vault-stone yesternight.
"Yes, cold and weary, Ned—so weary! All night I wandered up and down the moor, seeking somebody—but I never found him—and the wind came, and the rain—and all about the moor were prying eyes—and strange birds called out of the darkness, and strange beasts answered them——"
"Well, never heed them. Haply 'twas Shameless Wayne you sought, and he will see that none does you hurt."
She put her face close to his and looked at him fixedly in the deepening gloom. A shaft of flame struck out at her from the hearth and showed a would-be alertness in the babyish eyes. "Yes, yes," she whispered. "I thought it was a lover I was seeking, a lover who had strong arms and tender words—but I was wrong—'twas thee I sought, Ned, all through the weary night—and I want nothing now that I have found thee—and—Ned, wilt keep the ghosties off?"
"Every one, little bairn.—Now, see how stained your gown is with—with rain. I shall not love you at all if you do not run and change it before you come with me to supper."
"Not love me!" she repeated, with a look of doubt.—"Why, then, I'll change my gown thrice every day, because you are kind to me. No one else is kind to me, Ned. The wind buffets me, and rude men turn me forth of doors whenever I cross a threshold—save Sexton Witherlee, who was wondrous kind to me last night. All afternoon, Ned, I wandered about Marsh before I dared come in—I feared you would scowl at me, like the redmen of Wildwater." She turned, and in a moment she was clapping her hands for glee. "Look, look, Ned! Pretty candles—see'st thou how the shadows go playing hide-and-find-me up the walls?"
"They're bad shadows; have naught to do with them," said Shameless Wayne, turning her face to the hearth again and wondering to find what care he had for this frail woman's malady.
But she slipped from his hands, and ran forward to the bier, and was reaching out for one of the candles when its light showed her the pale face of Wayne of Marsh. The sight did not frighten her at all; but she stood mute and still, as if she were trying to understand in dim fashion that once this man had been her husband.
"Would he answer if I spoke to him? No, I think he would not; he looks too stern," Wayne heard her murmur. "I've seen that face—in dreams, long, long ago, it must have been. Perhaps he was my lover—strange that I should seek him all about the moor, when he was lying so quietly here."
"Come away, little bairn. He has no word for you," said her step-son, wearily.
Mistress Wayne halted a moment, then stooped and kissed the dead man's lips. And then she laughed daintily and rubbed her mouth with one forefinger. "Why does he not care!" she lisped. "His lips are cold as a beggar's welcome, Ned—we'll none of him, will we, thou and I?"
The door behind them opened and Nell Wayne came slowly across the floor until she stood within arm's reach of her step-mother. Scorn was in the girl's face, and a hatred not to be appeased.
"What brings this woman here?" she asked.
Mistress Wayne crept close to her protector. "All are cruel except thou, Ned. Keep her from me—she will turn me out into the cold again."
"Ay, Mistress—to starve of cold and want, if I had my way," said Nell.
Shameless Wayne put one arm about the pleading woman and turned upon his sister hotly. "Canst not see how it is with her?" he cried. "They say that men are hard, but God knows ye women make us seem soft-hearted by the contrast."
"The dead cannot speak, or father yonder would up and cry shame on her," the girl answered, covering the pair of them with a disdainful glance.
"Nay, thou'rt wronging him. Had she been whole of mind, he might have done—but 'twas never father's way to double any blow that fell upon a woman."
"She shall not stay here! 'Tis pollution," cried Nell.
"And I say the poor bairn shall bide here so long as she lacks a home; andIam master here, not thou."
His sister stared open-eyed at him. Since last night he had been contrite to the verge of womanishness; but now he showed a sterner glimpse of the Wayne temper than she had looked for in him. She felt wronged and baffled, and for her life could not keep back the stinging answer.
"Ay, thou art master," she said slowly, "and thou beginnest well—first to let another fight for thee, and then to welcome the betrayer with open arms. Small wonder that they call thee Shameless Wayne."
For a breathing-space she thought he would have struck her. But this lad, who until yesterday had never seen need to check his lightest whim, was learning a hard lesson well. He struggled with his pride awhile, and crushed it; and when he spoke his voice was quiet and sad.
"Nell," he said, "'tis no fit place for brawling, and thou art right in what thou say'st of me. But Mistress Wayne shall bide, and not if all our kin cry out on me, will I go back on what I promised."
"I am cold again, and very hungry. Send yond girl away," wailed the little woman.
"Does naught soften thee, lass?" said Wayne, glancing from his sister to the shrinking figure that held so closely fast to him.
"Naught," Nell answered, hard and cold. "The years will pass, and sorrows age, may be—but I shall never lose my hate of her."
"Yet think," he went on patiently. "She cleaves to me, Nell, and thou know'st how the fairy-kist bring luck to those they favour. 'Tis a good omen for the long fight that's coming."
"If pity does not move me, will a country proverb, think'st thou? Have thy way, Ned, since there's none to stay thee—but at the least take thy new friend from the death-room. Thou'lt see father turn and writhe if she stay longer by him, and 'tis my turn to watch the bier."
"Let's begone, little bairn. Haply thou'lt know here to find thy wearing-stuff if I take thee to the old room above," said Shameless Wayne, leading his step-mother to the door.
But Nell was fevered, and would not brook such prompt obedience to her wish. "Where are the lads?" she asked. "Frolicking, belike, when sober sitting within-doors would better have fitted the occasion."
Shameless Wayne turned on the threshold. "I sent them hawking," he answered, the new firmness gaining in his voice. "There's one claim of the dead, lass, and another of the living; and 'tis better they should brace their muscle for the days to come than sit moping over what is past."
"He grows masterful already. The shame has slipped clean off from him," murmured Nell, as she took a pair of snuffers from the mantel and trimmed the death-candles.
Yet Ned had not killed his shame. He was but battling with it, and the effort to show something like a man, in his own eyes at least, rendered his mood at once strangely tender and strangely savage. But he could find naught save tenderness for Mistress Wayne, as they climbed the wide stairway hand-in-hand and went in at the door of what had been his father's bed-chamber—his father's and that of the little woman by his side. She was no longer an unfaithful wife; she was a child, bewildered in the midst of enemies, and she had no friend but him.
Mistress Wayne stood in the middle of the room, fearful a little and asking a mute question of her step-son.
"This shall be thy room. Nay, there's naught to fear!" he said. "Peep into the drawers yonder by and by, and thou'lt find pretty clothes to wear; but thou'rt tired now, and must lie down on the bed. So! Now I'll cover thee snugly up, and bring thee meat. I doubt thou need'st it, bairn."
She was passive in his hands, and fell to crooning happily while he drew a great rug of badgerskin across her. "'Tis pleasant to have friends, and to be warm," she murmured.
"Unless I hasten, thou'lt be asleep before I bring thee supper!" he cried. "Rest quiet, and be sure I'll keep the boggarts from the door."
He went quietly down again, feeling his own troubles lighter for this fresh claim upon his sympathies; nor did he doubt the dead man's view of it, since there was scarce man or woman on the moor who did not hold that madness cancelled all back-reckonings.
"I will see what is to be found in the kitchen; haply the half of a moor-cock would tempt her appetite," he thought, as he turned down the passage.
He was met by his four brothers, just returned from hawking. Their faces were flushed and their sturdy bodies panting with the hard run home.
"We've had rare sport, Ned! Rare sport!" cried the eldest, a lad of sixteen. And then, remembering who lay not far away, cold forever to sport of hawk or hound, he dropped his head shamefacedly.
"It has taken you far, I warrant; for the sun has been down this half-hour past."
"Ay, for at the end of all we fell to flying at magpies down the hedgerows toward Heathley, and yond unbacked eyes of mine at which thou jestest trussed seven. Peep in the kitchen, Ned, and see what game we took. We carried the goshawk, too, and she struck a hare up by Wildwater——"
"What! Ye have been near Wildwater?" cried Shameless Wayne, his face darkening on the sudden.
"Ay, 'twas in one of the Lean Man's fields we struck the hare—and, Ned, we saw such a queer sight up yonder. Just as I was going to cast at a snipe, Ralph here whispered that the Lean Man himself was coming."
"So we hid in the heather," put in Ralph eagerly, "and he passed as close to us, Ned, as thou stand'st to me. He had a great cut across his cheek, and his hands were red, and we could hear him laughing to himself in a way that made us feared."
"When the Lean Man's hands are red, and his throat holds laughter, it means but the one thing," muttered Shameless Wayne. "He has killed his man—God pity one of our kin!—and the feud is out before we looked for it. They'll let the burying get done with—even a Ratcliffe never did less than that; and then 'twill be fast and merry."
"Tush! We were not feared," cried Griff, the eldest. "We could have caught him, Ned, the four of us, if we had had swords to our hands."
Shameless Wayne laughed quietly. "Ye will learn soon to buckle your sword-belts on whenever ye move abroad," he said. "Listen to me, lads. A house with a dead man in it is no healthy place, and so I bade you go out hawking this morning, and kept what I had to tell you until night. Ye've heard of the old feud of Wayne and Ratcliffe?"
"Ay, have we!" said Griff. "Such tales old Nanny Witherlee used to tell us of——"
"Well, 'twill be out again, belike, soon as your father is buried. The Ratcliffes will kill us whenever they get a chance, and we shall kill a Ratcliffe whenever he shows himself within sword-hail. And ye must take your share of it if ye wish to keep whole skins. Griff, thou canst play a shrewdish blade even now; and what ye lack, the four of you, I'll teach you by and by."
"Hawking will show tame after this," cried Griff, his eyes brightening. "Shall I meet the Lean Man one day, think'st thou, Ned?"
"If God spares thee, lad. But no more frolics yet awhile on the Lean Man's land. Ye must keep close to home, and I will teach you cut and thrust until your arms are stiffened."
"Was it a Ratcliffe who killed father?" asked Ralph suddenly. They had no understanding of death, as yet, these youngsters; its sorrow glanced off from them, too vague and dark to oust their lads' relish of a fight.
"Ay—and a Wayne who slew the murderer yesternight."
"Why, then, 'twas thou!" cried Griff. "Old Nanny told us that the eldest-born must always fight the father's enemy. Where didst thrust him, Ned?"
Shameless Wayne grew hot, and the blood flushed red to brow and cheeks. "Go seek your suppers, lads," he said, turning on his heel.
Going to the kitchen, still bent on finding some dainty that would tempt his step-mother, he found Nanny Witherlee, the Sexton's wife, talking hard and fast to one of the maids.
"Th' young Maister 'ull noan deny it me, I tell thee," Nanny was saying.
"Then ask him, Nanny, and he'll tell thee quickly whether or not he will deny thee," said Shameless Wayne from the doorway.
"Sakes, Maister! I war that thrang wi' spache—though 'tis noan a habit o' mine—that I niver heard your step. I've comed up fro' Marshcotes to axe a bit of a kindness, like."
"Thou'lt win it, likely, for I'm in a softish mood," said Wayne, half sneering at himself.
"'Tis that ye'll let me watch th' owd Maister th' neet-time through. I knawed him when he war a young un, an' I knawed him when he wedded th' first wife, an' I nursed ye all fro' babbies. 'Twould be kindly, like, to let me sit by him this last neet of all."
"That was to be my care, Nanny. Dost want me to let a second chance slip by of honouring father?"
"Now, doan't tak things so mich to heart—doan't, lad, there's a dearie—an' I axe your pardon for so miscalling ye, I'm sure, seeing ye've grown out o' nursing-clothes. Ye've getten a tidy handful o' wark afore ye, an' Witherlee says to me this varry afternooin, 'Nanny,' says he, 'them Ratcliffes is up an' astir like a hornet's nest; I'm hoping th' Waynes 'ull bring swords an' sharp e'en to th' burying, for we can noan on us tell what 'ull chance,' he says. That war what Witherlee said, just i' so many words; an' though he's like a three-legged stool about a house, allus tripping ye up wheniver ye stir, he can do part thinking time an' time, can Witherlee. I war coming to axe ye afore he spoke, for I war fain to see th' last o' th' owd Maister; but I war up i' a brace o' shakes at after he'd gi'en me that notion, for I could see 'at a man wodn't frame to fight varry weel on th' top of a long neet's wakefulness."
Nanny paused for breath, and the young Master took advantage of a break that might not come soon again. "The Ratcliffes will wait till after the burying. There's scant need for aught save wet eyes to-morrow, Nanny," he said.
"Well, that's as it mun be; an' what mun be nowt 'ull alter, so we willun't fash ourselns. But for owd love's sake, Maister, ye'll let me bide by thy father? 'Tis long since I axed owt, big or little, of ye Waynes, an' ye'll noan deny it me, now, will ye?"
Shameless Wayne, as he had said, was in a soft mood, and Nanny's sharp face was so full of entreaty that he saw it would be a bitter blow to her if he denied the boon. "Have it as thou wilt," he said. "Father was always kindly in his thoughts of thee, Nanny, and it may please him better than any watching of mine could do."
Rolf Wayne of Cranshaw, meanwhile, had ridden over to Marsh to see if there were aught that he could do; and Nell, meeting him as he came in at the hall door, gave him a warm welcome, for the late quarrel with her brother had left her sad, and the silence of the death-chamber fostered such sort of misery.
"Rolf, my step-mother has come back, and Ned has welcomed her," she said, after they had talked awhile of this and that in hushed voices.
"What! Mistress Wayne come back?"
"Yes, mad as a marshland hare, with all her old pleading ways so deepened that she has won Ned clean over to her side."
"Fairy-kist, is she?"
"Aye—though, to my thinking, she was always near to it."
"Then, lass, there's no room for anger. Let her be; 'tis ill-luck crossing such, and we have need——"
"An old tale, Rolf!" she broke in stormily. "Ned said as much awhile since—as though, God's pity, there could good luck come of harbouring such as her. There! I am distraught. Wilt watch the bier, Rolf, while I run out and cool my wits a little?"
"The night is over cold. Bide by a warm fireside, and talk thy troubles out to one who cares for thee."
"Nay, I must be alone. Let me go, dear! I tell thee, my head throbs and throbs, and I shall go the way of Mistress Wayne unless thou'lt humour me."
She slipped a cloak about her, checking Rolf's efforts to detain her, and went quietly out into the courtyard. There was a touch of winter in the air, and a touch of spring, and overhead the stars shone dewy. The girl shivered a little, but not for cold, as she crossed into Barguest lane and saw a red moon climbing up above Worm's Hill. Up and down she paced, up and down, thinking of Shameless Wayne, of her step-mother, of everything that vexed and harassed her. Nor did her brain grow cooler for the night's companionship; rather, the silence let stranger fancies in than she would have harboured at any other time or place.
"Ned has such need to be strong, and he has ever been weak as running water," she muttered, and stopped, and wondered that the breeze which blew from the moor-edge down Barguest lane had grown so chill upon the sudden.
Aware of some vague terror, yet acknowledging none, she held her breath and bent her ear toward the lane-top. A sound of pattering footsteps drifted down—they were close beside her now, as the wind brushed her cloak—and now again the footsteps were dying at the far end of the lane. And a whine that was half a growl crept downward in the wake of pattering feet and icy wind.
"'Tis Barguest!" muttered Nell, and raced down the road, and across the courtyard, and into the hall where Wayne of Cranshaw sat watching by the dead.
Her pride was gone now, and the last impulse of defiance. She waited no asking, but put her arms about Rolf's neck and bade him hold her close.
"I heard the Hound's voice in the lane just now," she whispered. "There's trouble coming on us, Rolf—more trouble—I never heard his step go pattering down the road so plain."
"Didst never hear the water try its new trick, thou mean'st. I was a fool to let thee go and nurse thy fancies in such a spot," said her lover roughly. But his eyes had another tale to tell, and across his brow a deep line of foreboding showed itself.
"Fancies go as soon as thought of, and naught comes of them—but when did I hear Barguest in an idle hour?" she said. "Dear, I am ashamed—but—thou canst not hold me close enough—hark. There's something at the door—a whining, Rolf, and the scrape of paws against the oak——"
"Ay, 'tis Barguest," said Nanny Witherlee, stepping soft across the polished boards and resting one hand on the bier.
"There's naught, save a wet wind sobbing through the firs," growled Wayne of Cranshaw.
"Is there not? What say ye to that, Mistress? Ye an' me know Barguest when we hear him, an' 'tis as I said to th' young Maister awhile back. There's sorrow brewing thick, an' th' Brown Dog hes come to bid ye look to pistol-primings an' th' like. He knaws, poor beast, an' he's scratting at th' door this minute to ease his mind by telling ye."
"Get to bed, Nell," said Wayne of Cranshaw quietly; "when Nanny falls to boggart-talk, and the maid who listens is half mad with sorrow——"
"Tales is tales, Maister Wayne," broke in Nanny, "an' I wod scare no poor less wi' lies at sich a time—but Barguest is more nor a tale, an' I should know, seeing th' years I've bided here at Marsh. I mind th' neet when Mistress Nell's mother war ta'en, ten year agone, it war just th' same—th' Brown Dog came pattering right up to th' door-stun, an'——"
"God rest thee for the daftest fool in Marshcotes," cried Wayne of Cranshaw, as he saw Nell go ashen-grey and all but fall. And then he led the girl out, and helped her to the stair-top.
"There'll be one to watch the bier till dawn?" she asked wearily, as he bade her good-night.
"Trust me to see to that. Never heed old wives' tales, Nell, and keep up heart as best thou canst," he answered, and went down again into the hall.
Nanny was fingering the shroud softly, and scarce glanced up as Wayne approached. "Gooid linen, ivery yard on 't," she muttered, "though I says it as shouldn't. Ay, an' bonnily hemmed a' all. Wayne o' Marsh may lig proud, that he may, an' I war allus sartin sure 'at a man gets a likelier welcome up aboon if he's buried i' gooid linen.—Begow, but his face is none so quiet as I should hev liked to see it; there's summat wick i' th' set on 't, as if he wod right weel like to be up an' cracking Ratcliffe skulls."
"Where is the Master, Nanny?" asked Wayne of Cranshaw, cutting short her musings.
"He war dahnstairs a while back, for I met him as I war coming in here. But mad Mistress Wayne began to call out his name, an' he thinks nowt too mich to do for her nowadays. He'll be gi'eing her another bite an' sup, belike."
"Then who will watch? I was for riding back to Cranshaw, but if there's need of me——"
"Who'll wake? Why, who should wake save Nanny Witherlee? Th' Maister promised I should, for I axed him a while back; so ye needn't fash yourseln about that, Maister."
"Then good-night to thee, Nanny—and—have a care of Mistress Nell, for she is in strange mood to-night. Barguest is well enough for a fireside gossip, nurse, but such talk comes ill when a maid's spirits are low."
Nanny laughed softly, and pointed a lean finger at him as he stood halting near the door. "Ye do weel to mock at Guytrash, Maister, an' ye do weel to give advice to one that's known more sorrow nor ye—but why doan't ye cross th' threshold?"
Wayne of Cranshaw was ashamed to feel the sweat-drops trickling down his face; but he could not kill the fear that brought them there.
"They say a Cranshaw Wayne fears nowt, man nor devil," went on the Sexton's wife—"but there's one thing 'at maks his heart beat like th' clapper of a bell—an' ye dursn't cross what ligs on th' door-stun."
He put his hand on the door and flung it wide; and the incoming wind drove the flames of the death-candles slant-wise toward the further wall. The moonlight lay quiet and empty on the threshold, and overhead the firs were plaining fitfully. "There's naught lies there," said he with a chill laugh, and went to fetch his horse from stable.
But Nanny's eyes were fixed on the door long after Wayne of Cranshaw had pulled it to behind him—long after she had heard his horse trot up the road—and she seemed to see there more than the candle-light sufficed to show.
"Is there aught I can get thee, Nanny, before I wend to bed?" said Shameless Wayne, entering a half-hour later.
"Nowt, an' thank ye. I've getten company, an' they'll keep me wake, I warrant."
"They, say'st thou? God's truth, Nanny, but thy eyes are fain of the doorway yonder!"
"Ay, I've getten th' owd Maister, an' I've getten Barguest. Get ye to bed, Maister, for I tell ye there'll be need o' ye to-morn. Ye're ower late as 'tis."
"Mistress Wayne would have me go and sit by her; she could no way sleep, poor bairn, and it seemed to comfort her to have me at the bedside and to hold my hand. She's sleeping now." He bent over the dead, and whispered something; and when he lifted his face it showed deep lines of purpose clean-chiselled in the youthful features. "Good-night, nurse. God rest thee, and all of us," he said, with unwonted piety.
The candles were guttering in their sockets, and Nanny replaced them soon as the lad's foot had ceased to creak on the stair. All were abed now, save Nanny Witherlee—save Nanny, and the rats behind the wainscoting, and something that scraped restlessly at the stout door of oak.
"Why are they feared o' Barguest?" muttered the Sexton's wife. "He niver yet did hurt to a Wayne or ony friends o' th' Waynes; nay, he's that jealous for their safety 'at he can no way bide still when mischief's brewing. Whisht, lad, whisht! Owd Nanny hearkens, an' she'll mind 'at th' Waynes go armed to th' burial to-morn."
It might be twelve o'clock of that night, while Nanny sat still as the body she watched by, that Shameless Wayne, trying to win sleep from a hard pillow, heard a horseman ride up to the hall door. There were three strokes, as of a hammer on a nail, and then, before he had well leaped from bed, a voice came from the moonlight under his window.
"Ride hard to Cranshaw Rigg. There's somebody waits thee there, Wayne the Shameless." It was Nicholas Ratcliffe's voice, hard and thin and high-pitched.
Shameless Wayne snatched a pistol from the bed-head, and flung the casement wide, and saw the Lean Man riding hard up Barguest lane. He took a quick aim and pulled the trigger; but old Nicholas rode on, and the moonlight showed him stark on the hilltop as he turned once for a backward look at Marsh.
"So the hunt is up already," said Shameless Wayne, banging to the casement and getting to bed again. "What has the lean rogue left on the door down yonder?—well, we shall see to-morrow," he muttered presently, turning over on his side. "There's naught gained by losing sleep—if only sleep would come."
But sleep did not come yet awhile, and his thoughts wandered to Janet Ratcliffe—Janet, whom he had met to-day upon the moor—Janet, the daughter of that same Lean Man on whom he had just now turned a pistol-muzzle.
Nanny Witherlee, too, had heard the three taps on the door, and the Lean Man's high-pitched voice. "I know weel enough what he's put on th' door," she said, not stirring from her stool at the bier-foot. "Th' owd feud began i' th' same way, an' I mind to this day how th' Maister, who cars so quiet yonder, looked when he came down i' th' morning an' fund th' token that war left nailed to th' oak." Her eyes lit up on the sudden, and a sombre mirth lengthened the thin line of her mouth. "But one thing Nicholas Ratcliffe didn't know, I warrant—that Barguest war ligged on th' door-stun! He crossed th' Brown Dog as he set nail to door, an' a babby could tell what that spells. Sleep ye quiet, Shameless Wayne, for ye'll turn th' spindle that's to weave th' Lean Man's winding-sheet."
CHAPTER VII
THE LEAN MAN'S TOKEN
At dawn of the next day Shameless Wayne awoke from a troubled sleep, with Nicholas Ratcliffe's visit fresh in his mind and a drear foreboding at his heart. He could rest no longer, but hurried into his clothes and went down to the shadowy hall, where the candles still burned and the Sexton's wife still watched the dead.
"Didst hear Nicholas Ratcliffe's voice yesternight?" he said, coming close to Nanny's elbow.
"For sure I did."
"And the tapping on the door? What was he at, think'st thou, Nanny?"
"Oppen th' door, Maister, an' ye'll see. But doan't look to find owt bonnie."
She watched him as he pulled down the latch and stepped into the rainy April dawn. The sun was red above Worm's Hill and its light fell straight upon a man's hand fixed to the upper cross-bar of the door. A broken stone, lying beside the lintel, showed how the Lean Man had driven his nail into the wood. Shameless Wayne fell back a pace or two, his eyes on the grisly token, while Nanny hobbled to the door.
"Ay, I guessed as mich," she said, looking once at the hand and thence to the young Master's face. "Twenty year gone by it war th' same, an' I've heard tell that, long afore I war born or thowt on, th' Lean Man's grandfather rade down to Marsh one neet an' fixed a Wayne's hand to th' door. Do ye mind th' tale, Maister? I telled it when ye war no higher nor my knee."
"I had forgotten it, nurse. Yond is the badge of feud, then? So be it. There'll be sword-play, Nanny, soon as father is well laid to rest."
"Afore, I warrant," said Nanny sharply. "Willun't ye hearken to me, lad, when I tell ye that a devil sits snug behind ivery Ratcliffe muzzle?"
"Save Mistress Janet's," muttered the other, absently.
"Oh, th' wind blows that road, does it? I've thowt as mich, time an' time. Maister, I war aye fond o' ye, an' that ye knaw—gi'e no heed to th' lass, for all her bonnie ways. Ye cannot grow taties i' mucky soil, anor father a right sort o' love on a Ratcliffe."
"Hold thy peace, Nanny! who said I cared for Mistress Ratcliffe?"
"Your face, lad, said it. Theer! I've angered ye, an' ye've enough as 'tis to put up wi'.—I war saying, Maister, that ye'll niver bottom th' meanness of a Ratcliffe, as I can do; an' when ye think 'at they'll respect a dead man ony more nor a wick un, ye're sore mista'en."
"Nay, they're an ill lot—but even the Lean Man would scruple to set on mourners at a grave-side."
"Trust an owd head, Maister. Witherlee put a plain question to Red Ratcliffe yestermorn; he axed him fair an' square if they meant to let th' burying go by i' peace; an' he telled by th' look o' th' chap 'at they meant to do no sich thing.—Lad, I'll not axe ye to believe, for ye've getten your father's trick o' thinking th' best of ony mon save yourseln; but I will axe ye to humour an owd body's fancy, and to send as quick as may be to your kin at Hillus, an' Cranshaw to bid 'em buckle their sword on afore they come to Marsh."
"When did Marshcotes ever see armed mourners at a graveside?" he said, eyeing her doubtfully. "'Twill wear a queer look, Nanny, if no attack is made."
"It 'ull wear a queerer, my sakes, if they come an' cut ye all i' little pieces. For owd sake's sake, Maister, promise me ye'll do it. Yond's Simeon stirring at th' back o' th' house; I should know his step by now, for he walks as if one foot war flaired-like to follow t' other. Bid Simeon get hisseln to horseback——"
"I doubt it still, nurse. What if the Lean Man has nailed his token to the door? There's time and to spare, by the Heart, for what will follow."
"Fiddle o' that tale!" cried the Sexton's wife briskly. "If ye choose to lig cold i'stead o' warm, I've ta'en trouble enough wi' ye i' times past, that I hev, to warrant my stepping betwixt ye an' ony sich-like foolishness. An' if ye doan't send Simeon, I'll walk myseln both to Hillus an' to Cranshaw—ay, that I will—Maister, do ye knaw 'at th' Lean Man crossed Barguest last neet as iver war?"
Shameless Wayne shook his head, smiling a little at the old woman's fancy. "How should that be, nurse?" he said.
"Barguest war carred on th' door-stun, fair as if he'd been ony mortal dog; an' while th' Lean Man war agate wi' hammering his nail in, I heard th' hound whimper fit to mak ye cry for pity of him. But Nicholas Ratcliffe niver heard th' poor beast, not he; an' I hugged myseln to think 'at ivery stroke on th' nail-head war a stroke to his own coffin. Ye've getten your chance, Maister, an' I willun't let ye loss it for a lack of a bit o' forethowt."
Insensibly Wayne yielded to the old beliefs; reason might chide him, but he knew in his heart, from that time forward, that he would be even with the Lean Man before the end. What tales had Nanny not told him in childhood, of Barguest and his ways? What musty traditions were not grafted on his growing manhood, of the certain disaster that waited any foeman of the Waynes who crossed the Spectre Hound? Ay, he believed, and his eyes shone clear with the first light of hope that had touched them since he returned two nights ago to the Bull tavern, a sobered and heart-stricken man.
"There's Nell!" cried Wayne on the sudden, pushing Nanny roughly into the house. "For God's sake keep her within-doors, nurse, till I have plucked down yonder trophy."
"Sorrow's a rare un to get folk up betimes; how oft is Mistress Nell astir wi' th' dawn, I wonder?" muttered Nanny, as she returned to the hall, closing the door behind her.
"Good-morrow, nurse," said the girl, crossing the hall and laying her two cold hands in Nanny's. "Art weary, belike, with the long watch?"
The Sexton's wife looked at Nell's white face and red-rimmed eyes, and she could find no heart to answer; she just took the lass in her arms, and kissed her, and comforted her with such little wordless tendernesses as she had used when Nell had been frightened as a bairn.
While they stood thus, still with no speech between them, a horse pulled up at the door, and they could hear the rider's voice strike, deadened a little but clear, through the stout oaken planks.
"The feud is up, lad! When I rode home last night they had slain one of my folk on Cranshaw Rigg."
"Ay, and the body lacked"—came the voice of Shameless Wayne.
"God's pity! Wrench it down. 'Tis my brother's hand, Ned," broke in the first speaker.
"What is't?" cried Nell, freeing herself from Nanny's arms and turning sharply. "That was Rolf's voice—and Ned is with him—what are they doing, nurse?"
"Niver heed 'em, bairn—they're nobbut——"
"Ay, but thou canst not blind me, Nanny! I know! I dreamed of it the night through—'tis the old token father told me of so oft—'tis a Wayne's hand, nurse! Did I not tell thee Barguest went pad-footed down the lane beside me?"
"Now, whisht ye, mistress! Your sweetheart's safe, as ye can hear, an' he'll be in by an' by—he's coming now, an' ye'll noan want me, dearie, when he's by to comfort ye. I'll waken th' wenches, an' then I mun lig me down awhile, for there's a lot needs seeing to this day."
Nell stood there idly until the old woman's steps were lost among the restless echoes of the house. On a sudden the main door was thrown open, and Shameless Wayne came in alone.
"Why did not Rolf stay?" asked Nell.
"Because I gave him a message for his folk at Cranshaw. Nay, I cannot tell thee what it was; 'twould only scare thee. —Come, Nell! I, too, have to get to saddle, and I fear to leave thee with such misery in thy face. Where are the lads?"
"Abed yet—wearied with their hunting."
"They must not come to the kirkyard. Bid them keep close to home till we return."
"But, Ned, why should they keep away?" the girl began.
He stopped her, with the quiet, forceful air that she was learning to obey. "Because I bid them," he said, and kissed her lightly on the cheek, and went out to the stables.
Nell crossed to the bier, where her father lay heedless of the storm and fret that his death had brought to old Marsh House. She sat her down, and put her face between her hands, and let her thoughts go drifting down the pathway of the years. From time to time the maids came in and busied themselves with setting out the table for the feast that would follow the old master's burial in a few hours' time; but the master's daughter seemed to heed them as little as himself. She thought of her brother, wondering at the change in him, yet doubting that the old wildness would return soon as the first keen smart of shame was softened; she thought of Mistress Wayne, who was a guest here in the house which she had dishonoured in all men's eyes; and then again she remembered what had chanced in Marshcotes kirkyard, and told herself that surely a twelvemonth had hurried by since she went up to the belfry-tower with a knife close hidden under her cloak.
Not two days ago she had watched the life ebb fast and red from the wound in her father's back, while his murderer looked on and laughed; and now he was ready for the grave; and in between there had seemed no rest from the hurry of events. Dick Ratcliffe had paid his price; one of the Cranshaw Waynes had fallen at the Lean Man's hand; the old feud-token had been nailed over the Marsh doorway; and under all the present misery—the grief and fret and long-drawn-out restlessness that wait on burial—was the overshadowing sense of tragedy to come. To-day they would lay their dead to rest; and then the smouldering embers of the feud would leap to flame; and after that no man nor woman of them all could count a day safe won through till it was done, and men's lives and women's honour would be no more than straws upon the fast-racing stream of chance.
All this went back and forth in the girl's mind, and the feud took on a hundred different shapes each time she thought of it. It was the feud she had heard of since earliest childhood, the feud whose memory was grafted in by many a far-back legend and nearer tale of fight. Often and often in the happier years she had wondered, as a girl will, how the way of it would be if the quarrel broke out afresh: there had been deeds of high courage and glamour of sword-thrust to make her almost love the feud and count it noble; but now that it was on them, now that it hugged the very threshold, naked, terrible and brutish, she understood the reality and lost her dream-visions of the splendour and the majesty of fight. Fight meant gaping wounds, and blood upon the floor, and men going into the shadowy places when they were at the topmost of their strength. God knew that, if the choice were hers, she would cry peace once and for all and let the dead past rest.
Yet her mood changed like the gusty wind that whistled now and then across the chimney-stacks. No sooner had she let that eager prayer for peace escape her, than her hands clenched themselves, and her eyes brightened, and the old vengeance-cry of her people rose hot to her lips. Let bloodshed come, and slaughter—and she would take new heart as one by one the Ratcliffes fell. Never in all the years that they had been together had the likeness between the dead man and his daughter shown more plain than now, as she laid her hand on his and counted his wrongs afresh. The pride of her race, its pitiless sternness when wronged, seemed gathered from the long-dead generations who had fought the Wayne and Ratcliffe fight aforetime; and the hate of the fathers woke again to splendour and to savagery in the slender-supple body of this last daughter of the line.
She could sit still no longer, but got to her feet and crossed to the garden-door. The house-air stifled her; men fought under the open sky, and for that cause there was friendship in wind and sun and drifting clouds. Something like a prayer—a masterful prayer, and a bitter—rose to the girl's lips as she stood and felt the keen wind in her face.
"Keep warm my hate, Lord God!" she cried.
A light footstep sounded from the hall behind her. She turned and saw little Mistress Wayne bending over her father's body, with the same questioning, roguish air that she had worn last night.
"Wake, wake!" Mistress Wayne was lisping in the dead man's ear. "'Tis my wedding-morn, I tell thee, and all at Marsh must come to see it."
Not touched at all was Nell by the piteousness of the scene. She remembered only what this woman had done, and forgot how hard a penance she was undergoing.
"Get ye gone," she said, clutching her step-mother fiercely by the arm. "Is't not enough that you have killed him, but you must mock him after death?"
Mistress Wayne shrank backward from her touch. "I did but try to wake him, Nell. He would be angered if he missed my bridal-morn."
Nell made no answer, but turned her back on the little woman; and Mistress Wayne crept, softly as she had come, out of the chamber whose guest perplexed her so.
"Her bridal-morn!" cried Nell, as though her father could hear that she was speaking to him. "Is it for malice that she gowns herself in white on such a day, and prates of weddings? Father, why didst go to the Low Country for a wife? She has brought disaster on disaster since the first day she set foot in Marsh."
A new thought came to her, adding its own load to the burden that was already over-heavy for her. Would Ned win free of his passion for Janet Ratcliffe, or would his marriage, too, be ill-fated as his father's? To wed from the Low Country was folly, but marriage between a Ratcliffe and a Wayne would be a crime on which the country-side would up and cry out shame.
And then, in a moment, all the girl's fierceness, her resolution and tearless pride, were lost. God had made her a woman, and like a woman she fell prone across the bier, and wept, and thought neither of vengeance nor of hatred, but of the love that had grown through twenty years of comradeship between the dead man and herself. It was not her father's strength, his sweeping recklessness in fight, that she remembered now; but she recalled his gentleness toward her, his clean and upright courtesy, his generosity to rich and poor among his neighbours.
Marsh House was full of the unrest that goes before a burial, the fruitless wandering to-and-fro which seems to ease the sorrow of the living. The menservants were idling in the courtyard with a subdued sort of noisiness; the maids were still passing and re-passing from the kitchen; and Nanny Witherlee, unable to snatch more than the briefest spell of sleep, came hobbling by and by into the hall.
The old woman stopped on seeing Nell stretched across the bier, and half advanced toward her; then shook her head. "I'll let her be; happen 'twill be best for her to cry her een out," she muttered, and turned down the passage to the kitchen.
Nanny showed different altogether this morning from the quivering, ghost-ridden watcher who had kept so long a vigil with only the dead and strange voices in the wind for company. Then there had been no work to be done, no household cares to rouse the old instincts in her; but now that preparations for the burial feast were going busily forward she slipped naturally into the place which had been hers at Marsh aforetime. Brisk as though she had had a full night's sleep, she fell to doing this and that, rating the maids the while with a keenness that robbed the day of half its sadness for her.
"Now then, ye idle wenches!" she cried, soon as she had crossed the kitchen threshold. "Do ye think gaping at a mutton-pasty 'ull mak it walk to th' dining board? Martha, tha'rt allus mooning ower thy work like a goose wi' a nicked head. An' look at Mary yonder! Standing arms under apron when th' house 'ull soon be full o' hungry folk. An' th' Waynes allus had good appetites, sorrow or no sorrow."
Nanny was setting parsley-sprigs round a dish of neat's tongue all this time; and when this was done she climbed onto the settle and reached down piece after piece of haver-bread that was drying on the creel. The same instinct that had bidden her test the quality of Wayne's winding sheet, while yet she was deep in sorrow for him, was with her now, and her mind was set on leaving no unremembered detail, of wine or meat or ripe October ale, to mar the burial-feast.
"It's weel to do nowt, same as some folk!" she cried, stopping to glance sourly at the progress of the maids. "I don't know what wenches are made on nowadays, that I don't."
"Do nowt, my sakes! When my knees is dibble-double-ways wi' weariness," cried Martha.
"Hoity-toity! I've done as mich before breakfast ivery day o' th' week when I war a lass.—Mary, wilt gi'e me a hand wi' this cheese, or mun I let it fall to th' floor-stuns?"
The maids, run off their feet already, without any help from outside, grew wild with the natter-natter of the Sexton's wife; but awe of her kept any but the briefest snaps of anger from their tongues, and it was a relief to both when the door opened slowly and they saw Hiram Hey standing on the threshold. Clean-shaven and spruce of body was Hiram, and a certain melancholy drooping of the mouth-corners could not quench his sober gaiety of mien.
"'Tis a sad day, this, for us at Marsh," he said, thrusting his head forward and sniffing the air with unctuous wonder that the women could think of victuals at all at such a time.
Nanny turned quickly. "It willun't be ony brighter for thy coming, Hiram Hey. We want no men-folk here," she cried.
The maids looked from Nanny to the farm-man, and then at each other. There was a stiff breeze always when these two met, and Nanny was apt to find her match at such times.
"Well, now, are ye winning forrard-like?" said Hiram, leaning against the doorway in his idlest attitude.
"Ay, an' no thanks to thee," snapped the Sexton's wife.
"It beats me to know how folk can eat an' drink, an' drink an' eat, when there's a burying. It seems a mockery o' th' dead, that it does—as mich as to say, 'See what it is to be wick, lad; tha'll niver put victuals down thy throat again, same as I'm doing now.' Ay, I've oft thowt it's enough to mak a corpse turn round an' scowl at ye."
"I've seen thee at a burying, Hiram," said the Sexton's wife, quietly, "an' tha can do thy share, I've noticed. It's all talk, an' nowt but, wi' sich as ye. Tha cannot see we're thrang, mebbe?"
His only answer was to shift his shoulder to a more easiful position against the doorway, and Nanny left him to it. At another time she would have had a sharper tongue for Hiram Hey, nor would his own responses have lacked their sting; but the old Master's influence had never been so strong as it was now, and a sense of seemliness—a fear, perhaps, of waking the last sleep of him who lay so near to them—held even the rough tongues of these upland folk in check.
Hiram glanced at Martha, soon as the little old woman had hobbled out to lay fresh dishes in the hall; and Martha answered his glance in a way that showed there was an understanding between them—as indeed there was like to be, seeing that Hiram Hey had been wooing her off and on these two years past.
"Hast been to th' fields this morn?" asked Martha.
"Ay, iver sin' th' sun war up, lass."
"Tha'll be dry, then, Hiram, at after thy morning's work."
"Dry, now? Well, I wodn't say just dry—but that way on a bit. I niver war a drinker myseln, as I telled shepherd Jose nobbut yesterday; but there's a time for iverything, an' if I war to see a quart, say, of October frothing ower th' lip o' th' mug——"
"Tha'd find a mouth to fit it? Well, an' shall, says I," cried Martha.
Hiram stretched his limbs more lengthily before the peats, as a soothing gurgle from the pantry told him that Martha was already filling him a measure. She was back again by and by, with a brim-full pewter in her hands.
"Drink, lad Hiram; what wi' work an' sadness, there's need for strong liquor here at Marsh," she said.
The firelight struck with a ruddy, softened sheen on the pewter as Hiram lifted it. He drank slowly, and his face was full of unwonted cheerfulness until he had set down the empty mug beside him.
"Theer! It war gooid, Martha," he murmured sorrowfully, "but I doubt there's nowt mich in it when all's said. Drink is all varry weel, but there's one ower i' th' hall yonder who'll niver warm to liquor again this side o' Judgment. Nay, I'm fair shamed o' myseln to be supping ale while th' owd Maister ligs so cold."
He stopped and eyed the empty pewter; and Martha, reaching across the settle-back, picked up the mug again.
"Tha's getten too soft a heart, Hiram," she said. "Sup while ye can, an' mak th' most on't."
"Nay, nay, I'm no drinker. Plain watter is nigh th' same to me as ale, an' there's no call for thee to fill afresh—leastways, I wodn't say a full quart, tha knows."
But Martha was back again before he had well finished with his protests. "Get done wi' 't, Hiram, afore Nanny comes back," she whispered. "She carries an ill tongue, does Nanny, when she finds life going too easy wi' a body."
"There's queer things bahn to happen," said Hiram presently.
"By th' Heart, I thowt there'd been queer happenings enough of late!"
"The shepherds telled me this morn that th' Ratcliffes is all a-buzz, an' folk are shaking their heads all up an' dahn th' moorsides. Besides, th' owd house here fair rustles, like, as I've known it do afore when trouble war i' store. I tell thee, I can hear th' boggarts creeping wick as scropels fro' roof to cellar."
"Hod thy whisht—do, now, for goodness sake. Tha flairs me," cried Martha, glancing behind her. And then she clutched the farm-man by the arm with sudden terror. "Look yonder, Hiram! Look yonder!" she cried.
Hiram looked and started to his feet. "Begow, I thowt 'twar a right boggart this time," he muttered. "What ails th' little body to move so quiet about a house?"
Mistress Wayne, dressed all in white, with celandines at her breast and fair hair rippling to her waist, had come in from the garden and stood at the open kitchen-door; and she was smiling, carelessly and trustfully, on the frightened maids and on old Hiram.
"'Tis my wedding-morn," she said, "and I've been to talk with the fairies, Martha. They say 'tis well to get the wee folks' blessing for the bairns to come."
Hiram gave her a long glance, then looked away; and an unwonted pity stirred him. "Nay, I've no sorrow to waste. She's made herself a nettle-bed, an' she mun lig on't," he muttered.
"Come in, Mistress, come in, an' warm yourseln a bit; ye're looking cold and wan, like," cried Martha, recovering from her fright.
"Oh, no, that is not true. I peeped at myself in the well out there just now, and I thought that I had never seen a happier face. Hiram, thou must come to my wedding, too; wilt thou?"
"Ay, Mistress—ay, I'll come, choose what."
She smiled again, and waved her hand, and slipped away into the sunshine that shimmered over the wet flagstones of the yard. And neither Martha nor the farm-men found aught to say to one another for awhile.
"What dost mak of it?" said Hiram Hey at last.
"Nay, I can mak nowt of it. But 'tis a drear start for a burial. Hiram, lad, Marsh is no healthy place just now, an' I for one could wish to be weel out on't. It isn't th' blood-shed I fear, an' it isn't th' dead man yonder—but it's th' ghosts! Tha'rt right when tha says they fair creep fro' floor to garret."
A thought crossed Hiram's mind—no new thought, either, but one that showed livelier than its wont now Martha was in such trouble.
"Tha'd be fain to change dwellings, like?" he ventured, putting a hand on her shoulder and half drawing her toward him.
Martha yielded to his touch, and a puzzled look came over Hiram's face; he had pondered over this last step for four-and-twenty months, and needed a twelvemonth longer in which to make sure of its wisdom. His doubts were settled, however, by the intrusion of the Sexton's wife, who stopped on seeing what was afoot and glanced from Hiram to the empty mug.
"So that's what's browt thee here, Hiram Hey?" she cried. "Tha'rt a bonnie un to come talking o' what's seemly i' a house o' death! First, to drink thyseln dizzy-crazy, an' then to go prettying wi' a wench that mud weel by thy own grandchild. Nay, I've no patience wi' thee; tha'rt owd enough to be thinking o' thy own latter end i'stead o' fly-by-skying wi' lasses, an'——"
Hiram for once could find no answer, but stood ruffling the frill of hair under his clean-shaven chin and shifting his feet from side to side.
"I have talked with my cousin, Nanny," came the Master's voice from the door.
Nanny turned and saw Shameless Wayne standing there, pale and quiet, with the straight downward rent between his brows which seemed to have been fixed there two nights ago for good and all.
"About th' burying, Maister?" she queried eagerly.
"Aye. We are to go armed; the word has been sent round."
"Now God be praised! Ye're wise to list to what Barguest hes to tell," said the Sexton's wife, and forgot to rate the maids, forgot the fifty little household cares that claimed attention.