"Clem!"
The blind child awoke at the touch of his sister's hand on his shoulder, and turned drowsily in his bed.
"Eh? What's the matter?" A moment later he sat up in alarm and put out a hand as if to feel the darkness. "It isn't morning yet!"
"No; but the ground is all covered with snow, and you can't think what funny lights are dancing over it across the sky. I've been watching them for minutes and minutes."
"What sort of lights?"
"I can't tell you, because I never saw the like of them. Sometimes they're white, and sometimes they're violet, and then again green and orange. They run right across the sky like ribbons waving, and once they turned to red and lit up the snow as far as I could see."
"You've been catching your death of cold." Clem could hear her teeth chattering.
"I'm not so very cold," Myra declared bravely. "I took off the counterpane and wrapped it round me. You'll come, won't you, dear?"
Clem knew why he was summoned. Two days ago Susannah had told them of an old woman living at Market Jew who had mixed a pot of green ointment and touched her eyes with it, and ever afterwards seen the fairies. At once Myra, who was naught if not practical, had secreted Susannah's jar of cold cream (kept to preserve the children's skin from freckles) and a phial of angelica-water from the store-closet, had stirred these into a beautiful green paste, and had anointed her own eyes and Clem's with it, using incantations—
"Christ walked a little, a littleBefore the sun did rise;Christ mixed clay with spittle,And cured a blind man's eyes;This man, and that man,And likewise Bartimee—What Christ did for these poor menI hope He'll do for me."
"Christ walked a little, a littleBefore the sun did rise;Christ mixed clay with spittle,And cured a blind man's eyes;This man, and that man,And likewise Bartimee—What Christ did for these poor menI hope He'll do for me."
"Christ walked a little, a littleBefore the sun did rise;Christ mixed clay with spittle,And cured a blind man's eyes;This man, and that man,And likewise Bartimee—What Christ did for these poor menI hope He'll do for me."
The charm, however, had not worked. Perhaps it needed time to operate, and the children had despaired too soon.
"Why didn't you come to me at once?" demanded Clem.
"I didn't dare." Myra trembled now, on the verge of putting her hopes to the touch. Though these were but pisky-lights, what bliss if Clem should behold them! "Besides, I saw a light across the yard in Archelaus Libby's garret. I believe he is awake there, with his telescope, andhecan't have tried the ointment. You won't be terribly disappointed, dear, if—"
He slid out of bed and took her hand.
He was a brave boy; and when she led him to her window and he saw nothing, his first thought was for her disappointment, to soothe it as well as he might.
"Tell me about it," he whispered, nestling down on the window-seat and drawing her head close to his shoulder; for after the pause that destroyed hope she had broken down, her body shaking with muffled sobs, woeful to feel and to hear. Outside, the Northern Lights—the 'merry-dancers'—yet flickered over the snowy roof-ridges and the snowy uplands beyond.
"I am going to dress," she announced, as the gust of sobbing spent itself. "If Archelaus Libby is awake, he will tell us what it means."
"Take me with you."
Though prepared to go alone, she had hoped he would ask this, being—to confess the truth—more than half afraid of the dark landing and passages below. The two dressed themselves and crept downstairs. In the hall, remembering their former expedition, Myra felt the bolt of the front door cautiously; but this time it was shut. They stole down the side-passage to the kitchen, where a fire burned all night in the great chimney-place on a bed of white wood ashes. Kneeling in the faint glow of it they drew on and laced their boots, then unlatched the kitchen window and dropped out upon the snow.
Archelaus Libby had been given a garret over the cider house, where he slept or studied in a perpetual odour of dried russet apples and Spanish onions. He was awake and dressed, and welcomed the children gaily by the light of a tallow candle. His simple mind found nothing to wonder at in this nocturnal visit. Was not the Aurora Borealis performing in all its splendour? Then naturally the whole world must be awake with him and excited.
He showed Myra its wonders through the telescope, discoursing on them with glee.
"But what does itmean?" she asked.
He told her how it was caused, and how a clever man had once made a toy with a bright lamp, a globe sprinkled with ground glass, and the vapour of a sponge pressed on hot iron, repeating the phenomenon on a tiny scale. "We will try it ourselves to-morrow," he promised.
The ribbons of light were playing hide-and-seek behind a distant wooded hill, now and again so vividly that its outline stood up clear against them.
"That will be the moors above Damelioc," said Archelaus. "If you watch through the glass, you will see the monument there—the one on the battle-field, you know. I saw it, just now, plain as plain. And once I thought I saw the taller monument, over Bodmin." "That's where they've put Uncle Vro in gaol."
"I was thinking of him just now, Miss Myra. It will be cold for him to-night over there in his cell."
"I wonder if Lady Killiow knows," said Myra musingly.
"They were talking about it in the kitchen to-night," said Archelaus, "and all agreed that she knew naught about it. Miss Susannah was saying that Peter Benny had been across here, bold as a lion, this afternoon, and spoke up to your uncle about it. Their voices were so loud that from the great parlour she heard every word; and Mr. Benny was threatening to tell Lady Killiow what he was doing in her name, and, what's more, to write up to his brother and get the whole story in the London papers."
"Buthashe told her?"
Clem caught his sister suddenly by the arm. The child was shaking from head to foot. "Peter Benny has not told her! Come away, Myra, and leave Archelaus to his telescope. I want you, back at the house!"
"Why, whatever has taken you?" she asked, believing him ill. Having wished Archelaus good-night and hurried Clem down the garret stairs, she repeated her question anxiously. "Come back to bed, Clem; you're shaking like a leaf!"
"The lights!" stammered the child. "I saw them."
"You saw them!" Myra echoed slowly.
"Yes, yes—over Bodmin and over Damelioc. How far is it to Damelioc?"
"Four or five miles maybe. But, Clem, you don't mean—" She stared into his face by the wan light of the Aurora reflected from the snow. Reading his resolve, she became practical at once. "Stay here and don't stir," she commanded, "while I creep back to the larder and forage."
Dawn overtook them at the lodge-gates of Damelioc; a still dawn, with a clear, steel-blue sky and the promise of a crisp, bright day. It had been freezing all night, and was freezing still; the snow as yet lay like a fine powder, and so impetuously had they hurried, hand in hand, that along the uplands they scarcely felt the edge of the windless air. But here in the valley bottom, under the trees beside the stream, they passed into a different atmosphere, and shivered. Here, too, for the first half-mile—road and sward being covered alike with snow—Myra had much ado to steer, and would certainly have missed her way but for the black tumbling stream on her right. She knew that the drive ran roughly parallel with it, and never more than a few paces distant from its brink. Twice in her life she had journeyed with her grandmother in high June to Lady Killiow's rose-show, and she remembered being allowed to kneel on the cushions of the 'car' and wonder at the miniature bridges and cascades. By keeping close beside the water she could not go wrong.
They halted by a bridge below the lake where the woods divided to right and left at the foot of the great home-park. A cold fog lay over the water and the reedy islands where the wild duck and moorhens were just beginning to stir, but above it a glint or two of sunshine touched the wintry boughs, and while it grew and ran along them and lit up their snowy upper surfaces as with diamonds, a full morning beam smote on the façade of the house itself, high above the slope, uplifted above the fog as it were a heavenly palace raised upon a base of cloud.
Daunted by the vision, Myra glanced at Clem. His face was lifted towards the sunlight.
"The house!" she whispered. "Oh, Clem, it's ever so much grander than I remembered!" She began to describe it to him, while they divided and munched the crusts she had fetched from Susannah's bread-pan.
"If her palace is as fine as that," said Clem, with great cheerfulness, "she must be a very great lady, and can easily do what we want."
They took hands again and mounted the curving drive to the terrace and the cavernousporte-cochère, where hung a bell-pull so huge that Myra had to clasp it in both hands and drag upon it with all her weight. Far in the bowels of the house a bell clanged, deep and hollow-voiced as for a funeral.
A footman answered it—a young giant in blue livery and powder. Flinging wide the vast door, he stared down upon the visitors, and his Olympian haughtiness gave way to a broad grin.
"Well, I'm jiggered!" said the footman.
"You may be jiggered or not," answered Myra, with suddenaplomb(a moment before, she had been ready to run), "but we wish to see Lady Killiow. Will you announce us, please?"
Two hours later, when the sun had risen above the trees, Sir George Dinham came riding up through Damelioc Park. He too came to right a wrong, having given his promise to Mr. Benny overnight. He rode slowly, pondering. On his way he noted the footprints of two children on the snow, except by them untrodden; marked how they wandered off here and there toward the stream, but ever returned, regained the way, and held on for Damelioc. He wondered what they might mean.
Lady Killiow received him in her morning-room. She wore a bonnet and a long cloak of sables, and was obviously dressed for a drive. She rose from before her writing-table, where she was sealing a letter.
"I interrupt you?" said Sir George as they shook hands, and glancing out of the window he had a glimpse of the heads of a pair of restless bays. Unheard by him—the snow lying six inches deep before the porch—Lady Killiow's carriage had come round from the stables a minute after his arrival.
"But if I guess your errand," she said, "I was merely about to forestall it. I am driving to Bodmin."
"You knew nothing, then, of this poor old creature's case?" "My friend, I hope that you too have only just discovered it, or you would have warned me."
"I heard of it last night for the first time. Rosewarne alone is responsible for the prosecution?"
"He only." She nodded towards the letter on the writing-table. "I have asked him to attend here when I return, and explain himself. Meanwhile—"
"But what can you do?"
"The poor soul is in prison."
"That is where I came to offer my help. The Assizes are not over. The same judge who committed him has been delayed there for three days by anisi priussuit—an endless West Cornwall will case."
"You did not suppose, surely, that this was happening with any consent of mine?"
"No," Sir George answered slowly, "I did not. But do you know, Lady Killiow, that, without any consent of ours, you and I have nearly been in litigation over this same wretched ferry?" He smiled at her surprise. "Oh, yes, I could help the Radicals to make out a very good case against us!"
"I learned to trust my old steward. It seems that I have carried over my trust too carelessly to this son of his, and with the less excuse because I dislike the man. The fact is, I am getting old."
"May I say humbly that you defend yourself before a far worse sinner in these matters? And may I say, too, that your care for Damelioc and its tenantry has always been quoted in my hearing as exemplary?"
"I am not defending myself. I have been to blame, though," she added with a twinkle, "I do not propose to confess this to my steward. I have been bitterly to blame, and my first business at Bodmin will be to ask this old man's pardon."
"And after?"
"He must be released, and at once. Can this be done by withdrawing the suit? or must there be delays?"
"He must purge his offence, I fear, unless you can persuade the judge to reconsider it. If I can help you in this, I would beg for the privilege."
"Thank you, my friend. I was on the point of asking what you offer. You had best leave your horse here and take a seat in my carriage."
"But," said Sir George, as she moved to the door, "you have not yet told me how you learned the news—who was beforehand with me."
"You shall see." She crossed the corridor, and softly opening a door, invited him to look within. There, in the lofty panelled breakfast-room, at a table reflected as a small white island in a sea of polished floor, sat Myra and Clem replete and laughing, unembarrassed by the splendid footman who waited on them, and reckless that the huge bunch of grapes at which they pulled was of December's growing.
Sir George laughed too as he looked. "But, good heavens!" said he, remembering the footprints on the drive, "they must have left home before daylight!"
"They started in the dead of night, so far as I can gather. Eh? What is it?" she asked, turning upon another footman, who had come briskly down the corridor and halted behind her, obviously with a message.
"Mr. Rosewarne, my lady. He has just come in by way of the stables. He has seen the carriage waiting, but asks me to say that he will not detain your ladyship a minute."
"He has come for the children, no doubt. Very well; I will see him in the morning-room." As the man held open the door for her she motioned to Sir George to precede her. "I shall defer discussing Mr. Rosewarne's conduct with him. For the moment we have to deal with its results, and you may wish to ask him some questions."
Mr. Sam never committed himself to horseback, but employed a light gig for his journeys to and from Damelioc. The cold drive having reddened his ears and lent a touch of blue to his nose, his appearance this morning was more than usually unprepossessing.
"I will not detain your ladyship," he began, repeating the message he had sent by the footman. "Ah, Sir George Dinham? Your servant, Sir George! My first and chief business was to recover my runaways, whom your ladyship has so kindly looked after."
"You know why they came?" asked Lady Killiow.
"To tell the truth, I have not yet had an opportunity to question them. Some freak of the girl's, I should guess. The young teacher to whom I give house-room informs me that they were excited last night by an appearance of the Northern Lights—a very fine display, he tells me. I regret that, being asleep, I missed it. He suggested that the pair had set out to explore the phenomenon; and that, very likely, is the explanation—more especially as their footprints led me due northward. My housekeeper tells me that Myra—the elder child—firmly believes a pot of gold to be buried at the foot of every rainbow. A singular pair, my lady! and my late father scarcely improved matters by allowing them to run wild."
"You are mistaken, Mr. Rosewarne. Undoubtedly they followed the Northern Lights; but their purpose you Will hardly guess. It was to intercede for an old man of eighty, whom, it appears, I have been cruel enough to lock up in prison."
Mr. Sam's face expressed annoyance and something more.
"I sincerely trust, my lady, they have not succeeded in distressing you."
"I suppose I may thank Heaven, sir, that they at least succeeded so far."
Her tone completely puzzled Mr. Sam, who detected the displeasure beneath it, but in all honesty could not decide whether she blamed him or the children.
"A painful business, my lady. The poor man was past his work—a nuisance to himself and to others. These last scenes of our poor mortality— often, as it seems to us (couldwebe the judges), so unduly protracted—But some steps had to be taken. The ferry was becoming a scandal. I felt called upon to act, and to act firmly. If I may use the expression, your ladyship's feelings in the matter would naturally be those which do honour to your ladyship's sex; they would be, shall I say—er—"
"Why not say 'womanly,' Mr. Rosewarne?"
"Ha, precisely—womanly. I did my best to spare them."
"We will talk of that later. Just now, you will please instruct us how best to release the poor man, and at once. May I remind you that the horses are taking cold?"
"The horses?" Mr. Sam stared from Lady Killiow to Sir George. "Her ladyship doesn't tell me that she was actually proposing to drive to Bodmin?"
"I start within five minutes."
"But it is useless!"
"Useless?"
"The man is dead."
"Mr. Rosewarne—"
Mr. Sam drew a telegram from his pocket. "I received this as I was leaving home. The governor of the prison very kindly communicated with me as soon as the office opened. The prisoner—as I heard from the policeman who escorted him—collapsed almost as soon as they admitted him. I telegraphed at once to the governor, assuring him of my interest in the case and requesting information. This is his reply: 'Vro died three-thirty this morning. Doctor supposes senile decay.' It was considerate of him to make this addition, for it will satisfy your ladyship that we acted, though unwillingly, with the plainest possible justification. The man was hopelessly past his work."
Sir George, who had been staring out of window, wheeled about abruptly, lifted his head, and gazed at Mr. Sam for some twenty seconds with a wondering interest. Then he turned to Lady Killiow.
"Shall I send back the carriage?"
"Thank you," she said; and he went out, with a glance at her face which silently expressed many things.
"Mr. Rosewarne," she began, when they were alone, "if I began to say what I think of this business, a person of your instincts would at once fall to supposing that I shifted the blame on to your shoulders, which is just the last thing in the world I mean to do. But precisely because I am guilty, and precisely because I accept responsibility for my steward's actions, a steward who conceals his actions is of no use to me. You are dismissed."
"I saw the new moon late yestreen,Wi' the auld moon in her arm."
"I saw the new moon late yestreen,Wi' the auld moon in her arm."
"I saw the new moon late yestreen,Wi' the auld moon in her arm."
"Miss Marvin, does 'yestreen' mean 'last night'?"
"It does."
"Then I wish the fellow would say 'last night,'" grumbled Master Calvin. "And how could the new moon have the old moon in her arm?"
Hester explained.
"But moons haven't arms." He pushed the book away pettishly. "I hate this poetry! Why can't you teach me what I want?"
"That," said Hester, "is just what I am trying to discover. Will you tell me what you want?"
To her amazement, he bent his head down upon his arms and broke into sobbing. "I don't know what I want! Everyone hates me, and I—I hate it all!"
Somehow, Hester—who had started by misliking the child, and only with the gravest misgivings (yielding to pressure from his father) had consented to teach him in her spare hours—was beginning to pity him. This new feeling, to be sure, suffered from severe and constant checks; for he was unamiable to the last degree, and seldom awoke a spark of liking but he killed it again, and within five minutes, by doing or saying something odious. He differed from other children, and differed unpleasantly. He had taken the full tinge of his sanctimonious upbringing; he was pharisaical, cruel at times, incurably twisted by his father's creed that wrong becomes right when committed by a pious person from pious motives. (His mother had once destroyed a cat because she found herself growing fond of it and believed that a Christian's soul must be weaned of all earthly affections.) He appealed to Hester's pity because, with all this, he was unhappy.
She had been teaching him languidly and inattentively to-day, being preoccupied with a letter in her pocket; and to this letter, having set him to learn his verses from Sir Patrick Spens, she let her thoughts wander. It ran:—
"My dear Miss Marvin,—After much hesitation I have decided to commit to writing a proposal which has been ripening in my mind during our three months' acquaintance. My age and my convictions alike disincline me to set too much store on the emotion men call 'love,' which in my experience is illusory as the attractions provoking it are superficial. But as a solitary man I have long sighed for the blessings of Christian companionship, or a union founded on mutual esteem and fruitful in well-doing. While from the first not insensible to your charms of person, I have allowed my inclination to grow because I detected in you the superior graces of the mind and a strength of character which could not be other than sustaining to the man fortunate enough to possess you for a helpmeet. In short, my dear Miss Marvin, you would gratify me in the highest degree by consenting to be Mrs. R. I am, as you are probably aware, well-to-do. The circumstances of my being a widower will not, I hope, weigh seriously against this proposal in the mind of one who, while retaining the personal attractions above mentioned, may be reasonably supposed to have set aside the romantic illusions of girlhood. Awaiting your reply, which I trust may be favourable, I remain, yours very truly,""S. Rosewarne.""P.S.—Your exceptional gifts in the handling of children assure me that my son Calvin would receive from you a care no less than motherly. He would meet it, I feel equally sure, with a responsive affection."
"My dear Miss Marvin,—After much hesitation I have decided to commit to writing a proposal which has been ripening in my mind during our three months' acquaintance. My age and my convictions alike disincline me to set too much store on the emotion men call 'love,' which in my experience is illusory as the attractions provoking it are superficial. But as a solitary man I have long sighed for the blessings of Christian companionship, or a union founded on mutual esteem and fruitful in well-doing. While from the first not insensible to your charms of person, I have allowed my inclination to grow because I detected in you the superior graces of the mind and a strength of character which could not be other than sustaining to the man fortunate enough to possess you for a helpmeet. In short, my dear Miss Marvin, you would gratify me in the highest degree by consenting to be Mrs. R. I am, as you are probably aware, well-to-do. The circumstances of my being a widower will not, I hope, weigh seriously against this proposal in the mind of one who, while retaining the personal attractions above mentioned, may be reasonably supposed to have set aside the romantic illusions of girlhood. Awaiting your reply, which I trust may be favourable, I remain, yours very truly,""S. Rosewarne.""P.S.—Your exceptional gifts in the handling of children assure me that my son Calvin would receive from you a care no less than motherly. He would meet it, I feel equally sure, with a responsive affection."
"My dear Miss Marvin,—After much hesitation I have decided to commit to writing a proposal which has been ripening in my mind during our three months' acquaintance. My age and my convictions alike disincline me to set too much store on the emotion men call 'love,' which in my experience is illusory as the attractions provoking it are superficial. But as a solitary man I have long sighed for the blessings of Christian companionship, or a union founded on mutual esteem and fruitful in well-doing. While from the first not insensible to your charms of person, I have allowed my inclination to grow because I detected in you the superior graces of the mind and a strength of character which could not be other than sustaining to the man fortunate enough to possess you for a helpmeet. In short, my dear Miss Marvin, you would gratify me in the highest degree by consenting to be Mrs. R. I am, as you are probably aware, well-to-do. The circumstances of my being a widower will not, I hope, weigh seriously against this proposal in the mind of one who, while retaining the personal attractions above mentioned, may be reasonably supposed to have set aside the romantic illusions of girlhood. Awaiting your reply, which I trust may be favourable, I remain, yours very truly,""S. Rosewarne.""P.S.—Your exceptional gifts in the handling of children assure me that my son Calvin would receive from you a care no less than motherly. He would meet it, I feel equally sure, with a responsive affection."
The tone of this letter made Hester tingle as if some of its phrases had been thongs to scourge her.
Yet it must be answered.
That this odious man should have dared—and yet for weeks she had seen it coming. Incredible as she found it that a man from whom every nerve of her body recoiled with loathing should complacently ignore the signs, should complacently persevere in assuming himself to be agreeable and in pressing that assumption, she had to admit that the offer did not take her wholly by surprise. What bruised her was the insufferable obtuseness of the wording. How was it possible for a human being to sit down in good faith and pen such sentences without guessing that they hurt or insulted?
Nevertheless she blessed the impulse which had prompted him to write; for in writing he could be answered. All day she had gone in dread of meeting him face to face.
Once or twice, while she pondered her answer, she had glanced up at the child, as ifhecould explain his father. What fatal unhappy gift had they both, by which in all that they said or did they earned aversion?
When the child broke down, she arose with a pang of self-reproach, crossed to his chair, and laid a hand on his shoulder.
"Listen to me, Calvin," she said. "You have told me one thing you want: you want people to like instead of disliking you. Well, the quickest way is to find out what they want, and do it, forgetting yourself; and then, perhaps quite suddenly, you will wake up and discover not only that people like you already, but that you yourself are full of a happiness you can't explain."
The gust of his sobbing grew calmer by degrees. He lifted his head a little, but not to look her in the face.
"Is that puzzling to you?" she asked. "Well, then, just give it a small trial in practice, and see how it works. I want you, for instance, to learn those verses. You don't like them; but by learning them you will please me, and you want to please me. Try now!"
He pulled the book towards him and bent over it, his head between his hands. After three or four minutes he stood up, red-eyed and a little defiant—
"'I saw the new moon late yestreen,Wi' the auld moon in her arm;And if we gang to sea, master,I fear we'll come to harm.'""They hadna sail'd a league, a league,A league but barely ane—"
"'I saw the new moon late yestreen,Wi' the auld moon in her arm;And if we gang to sea, master,I fear we'll come to harm.'""They hadna sail'd a league, a league,A league but barely ane—"
"'I saw the new moon late yestreen,Wi' the auld moon in her arm;And if we gang to sea, master,I fear we'll come to harm.'"
"They hadna sail'd a league, a league,A league but barely ane—"
Hester listened with eyes withdrawn, in delicacy avoiding to meet his tear-reddened ones; and just then from the upper floor a scream rang through the house—a child's scream.
Master Calvin heard it, and broke off with a grin.
"That will be Myra," he announced. "She's catching it!"
Had she been less distraught, Hester might have marked and sighed over his sudden relapse into odiousness. But she had risen with a white face; for scream folllowed scream overhead, and the sound tortured her.
"You don't tell me,"—she began, putting up both hands to her ears. "No, no—there has been some accident! The poor child is calling for help!"
She ran out of the parlour, up the two flights of stairs and along a dark winding corridor, still guided by the screams. At the end of the corridor she found Susannah, pale, wringing her hands, outside a door which, however, she made no attempt to enter.
"Oh, miss, he's killing her!"
"Is the door locked?" panted Hester, at the same time flinging her weight against it as she turned the handle. It flew open, and she confronted— not Myra, but Mr. Sam.
He stood between her and the window with an arm uplifted and in his hand a leathern strap; and while she recoiled for an instant, the strap descended across the naked back and shoulders of little Clem, who drooped under it with bowed knees, helpless, his arms extended, his wrists bound together and lashed to the bed-post. The child made no sound. The piercing screams came not from him, but from an inner room—Myra's bedroom—and from behind a closed door.
"You shall not!" Hester flung herself forward, shielding the child from another blow. "Oh, what wickedness are you doing! What horrible wickedness!"
Mr. Sam had raised his arm again. The man indeed seemed to be transported with passion, with sheer lust of cruelty. It is doubtful if he had heard her enter. His dark face twitched distortedly in the fading light.
"I'll teach him—I'll teach him!" he panted.
"You shall not!" Hester, covering the child's limp body, could not see his face, but her eyes fell on his little shirt, ripped from neckband to flap, and lying on the floor as it had been torn from his body and tossed aside. She called to Susannah, still lingering doubtfully outside upon the mat, and pointed to the door behind Mr. Sam. Susannah plucked up courage, stepped across and turned the key. An instant later, like a small wild beast uncaged, Myra came springing and crouched beside her brother, facing his tormentor with blazing eyes.
Hester, catching sight of the housekeeper's scissors which Susannah wore at her waist, motioned to her to cut the cords binding Clem's wrists. Mr. Sam made no effort to oppose her, but stood panting, with one hand resting on the dressing-table. Susannah managed indeed to detach the scissors, but held them out falteringly, as though in sheer terror declining all responsibility.
"Give them to me, then."
But as Susannah held them out Myra leapt up and, snatching them, dashed upon her uncle. His hand still rested palm downwards on the dressing-table, and she struck at it. Undoubtedly the child would have stabbed it through—for, strange to say, he made no effort to fend her off or to avoid the stroke—had not Hester run in time to push her smartly by the shoulder in the very act of striking. As it was the scissor-point drove into the table, missing him by a bare two inches. Then and then only he lifted his hand and stared at it stupidly. He seemed about to speak, but turned with a click of the throat—a queer dry sound, as though a sudden thirst parched him—and walked heavily from the room. Hester gazed after him and back at the scissors on the dressing-table. She was reaching forward to pick them up when a cry from Susannah bade her hurry. Clem had fainted, his legs doubled beneath him, his head falling horribly back from his upstretched arms, which still, like ropes, held him fast to the bed-post.
Twenty minutes later Hester descended the stairs. Clem was in bed with his sister's arms about him; and Myra's last look at parting had been one of dumb gratitude, pitifully asking pardon for old jealousies, old misunderstandings. At any other time Hester would have rejoiced over the winning of a friend.
But the sight of the weals on Clem's back had for the moment killed all feeling in her but disgust and horror. So deep was her disgust that the sight of Master Calvin, whom she surprised in the act of listening outside the door, scarcely ruffled it afresh. So complete was her horror that it left no room for astonishment when, reaching the foot of the stairs, she found Mr. Sam himself lingering in the hall, apparently awaiting her.
She walked past him with set face. All the smooth, pietistic phrases of his letter rang a chime in her brain, to be retorted upon him as soon as he dared to speak. But he did not speak. He looked up, as if awaiting her; took half a step forward; then drew aside and let her pass. She went by with set face, not sparing a look for him. In the open air she drew a long breath.
Above all things she desired to consult with Peter Benny. In this there was nothing surprising, for everyone in trouble went to Peter Benny. He himself—honest man—had to admit that the number of confidences which came his way were, no doubt, extraordinary. He explained it on the simple ground that he wrote letters for seamen and made it a rule never to divulge their secrets. "Not that anyone would dream of it," he added; "but my secrecy, happening to be professional, gets its credit advertised."
It appeared that these professional duties were heavier than usual to-night. At any rate, when Hester reached the little cottage by the quayside, it was to find that he had made a hasty tea and departed for the office. In her urgency, after merely telling Mrs. Benny that she would be back in a few minutes, Hester ran down the court to the office, tapped hurriedly at the door, and pushed it open.
Within, with his back towards her, erect and naked to the waist under the rays of an oil lamp swinging from the beam, stood a young man. The light falling on his firm shoulders and the muscles along his spine showed the gleaming flesh tattooed with interwoven patterns, delicate as lacework; and in the midst, reaching from shoulder-blade to shoulder-blade, a bright blue tree with a cross above, and beneath it, the figures of Adam and Eve.
As she drew back, Mr. Benny, on the far side of the office, raised his eyes from a table over which he bent to dip a needle in a saucer of Indian ink; and at the same moment the young man under the lamp, suddenly aware of a visitor, faced about with a shy laugh. It was Tom Trevarthen. Hester, with a short cry of dismay, backed into the darkness, shutting the door as she retreated. When Mr. Benny returned to supper he forbore from alluding to the incident until Hester—her trouble still unconfided—shook hands with him for the night.
"I've heard," he said, "folks laugh at sailors for tattooing themselves. But 'tis done in case they're drowned, that their bodies may be known; and, if you look at that, 'tis a sacrament surely."
That night Hester awoke from a terrifying dream; and still, as she dreamed again, she saw a lash descending on a child's naked back, leaving at each stroke the mark of a cross interwoven with a strange and delicate pattern; and at each stroke heard a girl's voice which screamed, "It is a sacrament!"
Early next morning, having bound Mr. Benny to secrecy, she told him the whole story. At first his face merely expressed horror; but by and by his forehead lost its puckers. When she had done, his first comment took her fairly aback.
"Ay," said he, "I'd half guessed it a'ready. The poor creature's afflicted. It don't stand in nature for a man to deal around cruelty as he's been doing unless his brain is touched."
"Afflicted is he?" Hester answered indignantly. "I'm afraid I keep all my pity for those he afflicts."
"Then you do wrong," replied Mr. Benny, with much gravity. "That man wants help if ever a man did."
"He will get none from me, then," she said, and flushed, remembering the proposal in her pocket. "I won't endure the sight of him, after yesterday's work. I have written a letter resigning my teachership." "That isn't like you, somehow." Mr. Benny stood musing.
"Of course," she went on hastily, "I don't give my real reasons. The letter is addressed to you as Clerk, and you will have to read it to the Board. I am ready to fill the post until another teacher can be found."
"It seemed to me, some while ago, that Mr. Samuel had a fancy for you. Maybe I'm wrong, my dear; but you won't mind my speaking frankly. And if I'm right, and he has begun pestering you, I can't blame you for resigning. The man isn't safe."
His look carried interrogation at once shy and fatherly. She forced herself to meet his eyes and nod the answer which her cheeks already published.
"It is hateful," she murmured. "Yes, he asked me to marry him."
"Itoldyou he was afflicted," said Mr. Benny, still with simple seriousness; then, catching a sudden twinkle in her eyes, "Eh? What did I say? My dear, I didn't mean it that way!"
Mr. Benny had judged at once more charitably and more correctly than Hester. Had she looked up yesterday when she passed Mr. Sam at the foot of the stairs, she might have guessed the truth from his face.
The man was afflicted, and knew it; had suddenly discovered it, and was afraid of himself—for the moment, abjectly afraid. All his life he had been nursing a devil, feeding it on religion, clothing it in self-righteousness, so carefully touching up its toilet that it passed for saint rather than devil—especially in his own eyes, trained as they were in self-deception. For every action, mean or illiberal or tricky or downright cruel, he had a justificatory text; for his few defeats a constant salve in the thought that his vanquishers were carnal men, sons of Belial, and would find, themselves in hell some day. He was Dives or Lazarus as occasion served. If a plan miscarried, the Lord was chastening him; if, as oftener happened, it went prosperously, the Lord was looking after His own; but always the plan itself, beinghisplan, was certainly righteous, because he was a righteous man. A good tree could not bring forth evil fruit.
But all this while the devil had been growing fat and strong; and now on a sudden it had burst forth like a giant, mad, uncontrollable, flinging away disguise, a devil for all to see. There was no text, even in Solomon, which could be stretched to excuse tying up a small blind child and flogging him with a belt. He had done a thing for which men go to prison. Worse, he had not been far from a crime for which the law puts men to death. In his rage he had been absolutely blind, each blow deadening prudence, calling for another blow. If Hester Marvin had not run in, where would he have ended?
It happened to him now as it has happened to many a man fed upon conventional religion and accustomed to walk an aisle in public and eminent godliness. In the moment that he overbalanced public approval his whole edifice crumbled and collapsed, leaving him no stay. He was down from his eminence—down with the wild beasts; and among them the worst was the wild beast within him.
He had not philosophy enough even to render account with himself why he hated the small blind child. One reason, and perhaps the chief, was that he had already injured Clem; another, that Clem stood all unconsciously between his conscience and his son Calvin. In his fashion Mr. Sam loved his son, doomed to suffer, if the truth should ever be known, for his father's bastardy. But—to his credit perhaps—Mr. Sam forgot all excuses in sheer terror of himself; terror less of what he had done than of what he might hereafter do.
In panic of that devil he had placed himself in Hester's way, hoping against hope that she might help. He had built some hopes on her, and now in an hour or two all these hopes were merged in a desperate appeal to be saved from himself. He almost forgot that he had written asking her to be his wife; he could think only that she might possibly be his salvation. But Hester had passed him by without a glance. After this, meaning no cruelty at all, but merely from the instinct of self-preservation (than which nothing is crueller), he did, as will be seen, the cruellest deed of his life.
Mr. Benny was one of those rare souls who never dream of asking a favour for themselves, but can be shamelessly importunate on behalf of a fellow-creature. On receipt of Hester's resignation, which she submitted to him first in private and then sent to him formally through the post, he panted up the hill to seek an interview with Sir George Dinham.
"Dear me!" said Sir George; "it happens oddly that I was on the point of sending for you for the first time; and yet you have been my tenant for close upon twenty years, I believe?"
Mr. Benny might have seized the occasion to urge that his roof leaked and the quay wall beneath his office badly needed repointing. For years he had submissively relieved Sir George of these and other repairs. But he had come to engage Sir George's interest for Miss Marvin, a young person who had just thrown up her position as schoolmistress across the water, in circumstances perfectly honourable to her. Sir George, perhaps, would not press to know what those circumstances were; but Mr. Benny had chanced to hear that the Matron of the Widows' Almshouses had earned her pension and was resigning, and he ventured to recommend Miss Marvin for the post.
"And that again is odd," said Sir George, "for I was wondering if the situation would be agreeable to her."
Mr. Benny could scarcely believe his ears.
"But I think," pursued Sir George, "we had better take one thing at a time; and I wish to get the first job off my hands, because, strictly speaking, it is not my business. Lady Killiow (as you may have heard) requires a new steward, and has commissioned me to choose him for her. I had thought of you, Mr. Benny."
"Sir George!"
"Why not? You were clerk to the late Mr. Rosewarne and enjoyed his confidence, I believe?"
"Sir George—Sir George!" Mr. Benny could only repeat with stammering lips. If, a while ago, he could not believe his ears, just now he felt as if the sky were tumbling about them.
"There, my friend, go home and think it over. If you think well of the offer, be at the ferry at nine o'clock to-morrow. I will meet you there with the dogcart, and we can talk matters over on our way to Damelioc. From Damelioc, after your interview with Lady Killiow, we will drive straight to Bodmin; for I think you may be able to guess the first task she will lay upon you as her steward."
But Mr. Benny was too far bewildered.
"She will ask you, if I am not mistaken, to make arrangements for bringing home old Nicholas Vro's body and burying him where, as he would have said, he belongs to lie—in his own parish churchyard. There are no relatives to be consulted?"
"Neither chick nor child, kith nor kin, Sir George."
"God forgive me, I had come near saying 'so much the better.' Lady Killiow is a proud woman, as you know, and of a pride that would rejoice in bearing the fullest blame and making fullest amends. But her friends can only be glad to get this scandal over and as quietly as may be. I have written for the necessary order."
Once before we have seen Mr. Benny tempted to keep a secret from his wife. This time he would have told, but could not. He sat down to tea with a choking breast and a heart so big within him that it left no room for food. He strove to eat, but could get no morsel past his lips. At one moment the news seemed to bubble up within him, and his mouth opened to shout it aloud; the next, his courage failed at his own vaunting thoughts, and he reached a hand down to the table-leg, to 'touch wood,' as humble men do to avert Nemesis if by chance they have let slip a boastful word. Once he laughed outright, wildly, at nothing whatever.
Nuncey set down the teapot and eyed her parent with a puzzled frown. That frown had sat too often on her cheerful face during the past three months. In truth, Mr. Benny as a regrater fell disastrously short of success, being prone to sell at monstrous overweights, which ate up the profits. When Nuncey at length forbade him to touch the scales, he gave away apples to every child that chose to edge around the tail of the cart.
"There's something wrong with father to-night," she said. "He's like a thing hurried-in-mind. What's up with 'ee, my dear?—is it verses?" She paused with a sudden dark suspicion. "I see'd William Badgery walkin' after you down the street. Don't tell me you've let 'en persuade you into buying that lot of eggs he was preachin' up for fresh? for, if you have, I get no shoes this Christmas—that's all. Fresh? He've been salting them down these three months, against the Christmas prices, and no size in 'em to start with. I wouldn't sell 'em for sixpence the dozen."
"Shoes?" Good Lord, what a question these boots and shoes had been for all these years! Never a Saturday came round (it seemed to him) but one or other of the family wanted soleing or heeling. And henceforth they could all have shoes to their heart's content—and frocks—and new suits— and meat on the table without stint—
He set down his cup and rose hurriedly. In the act of pushing back his chair he met his wife's eyes. They were watching him with anxious concern—not with apparent love; but he alone knew what love lay behind that look which once or twice of late he had surprised in them. His own filled with sudden tears. No, he could not tell her now. To-night, perhaps, when he and she were alone, he would tell her, as so often he had told his worries and listened to hers. He dashed his frayed cuff across his eyes and fairly bolted from the room.
"It's about Nicky Vro that he's troublin'," said Mrs. Benny. "Terrible soft-hearted he is; but you ought to know your father better by this time than to upset 'en so."