"Have I done wrong?" Young Waldron asked himself, as he strode down the hill, with his face still burning, and that muddy hat on. "Most fellows would have knocked him down. I hope that nice girl heard nothing of the row. The walls are jolly thick, that's one good thing; as thick as my poor head, I dare say. But when the fellow dared to laugh! Good Heavens, is our family reduced to that? I dare say I am a hot-headed fool, though I kept my temper wonderfully; and to tell me I am not a gentleman! Well, I don't care a rap who sees me now, for they must hear of this affair at Walderscourt. I think the best thing that I can do is to go and see old Penniloe. He is as honest as he is clear-headed. If he says I'm wrong, I'll believe it. And I'll take his advice about other things."
This was the wisest resolution of his life, inasmuch as it proved to be the happiest. Mr. Penniloe had just finished afternoon work with his pupils, and they were setting off; Pike with his rod to the long pool up the meadows, which always fished best with a cockle up it, Peckover for a long steeple-chase, and Mopuss to look for chalcedonies, and mosses, among the cleves of Hagdon Hill; for nature had nudged him into that high bliss, which a child has in routing out his father's pockets. The Parson, who felt a warm regard for a very fine specimen of hot youth, who was at once the son of his oldest friend, and his own son in literature—though Minerva sat cross-legged at that travail—he, Mr. Penniloe, was in a gentle mood, as he seldom failed to be; moreover in a fine mood, as behoves a man who has been dealing with great authors, and walking as in a crystal world, so different from our turbid fog.
To him the young man poured forth his troubles, deeper than of certain Classic woes, too substantial to be laid by any triple cast of dust. And then he confessed his flagrant insult to a rising member of the great Profession.
"You have behaved very badly, according to your own account;" Mr. Penniloe said with much decision, knowing that his own weakness was to let people off too easily, and feeling that duty to his ancient friend compelled him to chastise his son; "but your bad behaviour to Jemmy Fox has some excuse in quick temper provoked. Your conduct towards your mother and sister is ten times worse; because it is mean."
"I don't see how you can make that out." Young Waldron would have flown into a fury with any other man who had said this. Even as it was, he stood up with a doubtful countenance, glancing at the door.
"It is mean, in this way," continued the Parson, leaving him to go, if he thought fit, "that you have thought more of yourself than them. Because it would have hurt your pride to go to them, with this wrong still unredressed, you have chosen to forget the comfort your presence must have afforded them, and the bitter pain they must feel at hearing that you have returned and avoided them. In a like case, your father would not have acted so."
Waldron sat down again, and his great frame trembled. He covered his face with his hands, and tears shone upon his warted knuckles; for he had not yet lost all those exuberances of youth.
"I never thought of that," he muttered; "it never struck me in that way. Though Jakes said something like it. But he could not put it, as you do. I see that I have been a cad, as Jemmy Fox declared I was."
"Jemmy is older, and he should have known better than to say anything of the sort. He must have lost his temper sadly; because he could never have thought it. You have not been what he calls a cad; but in your haste and misery, you came to the wrong decision. I have spoken strongly, Tom, my boy; more strongly perhaps than I should have done. But your mother is in weak health now; and you are all in all to her."
"The best you can show me to be is a brute; and I am not sure that that is not worse than a cad. I ought to be kicked every inch of the way home; and I'll go there as fast as if I was."
"That won't do at all," replied the Curate smiling. "To go is your duty; but not to rush in like a thunderbolt, and amaze them. They have been so anxious about your return, that it must be broken very gently to them. If you wish it, and can wait a little while, I will go with you, and prepare them for it."
"Sir, if you only would—but no, I don't deserve it. It is a great deal too much to expect of you."
"What is the time? Oh, a quarter past four. At half past, I have to baptise a child well advanced in his seventh year, whose parents have made it the very greatest personal favour to me, to allow him to be 'crassed'—as they express it. And I only discovered their neglect, last week! Who am I to find fault with any one? If you don't mind waiting for about half-an-hour, I will come back for you, and meanwhile Mrs. Muggridge will make your hat look better; Master Jemmy must have lost his temper too, I am afraid. Good-bye for the moment; unless I am punctual to the minute, I know too well what will happen—they will all be off. For they 'can't zee no vally in it,' as they say. Alas, alas, and we are wild about Missions to Hindoos, and Hottentots!"
As soon as Mr. Penniloe had left the house, the youth, who had been lowered in his own esteem, felt a very strong desire to go after him. Possibly this was increased by the sad reproachful gaze of Thyatira; who, as an old friend, longed to hear all about him, but was too well-mannered to ask questions. Cutting all consideration short—which is often the best thing to do with it—he put on his fairly re-established hat, and cared not a penny whether Mrs. Channing, the baker's wife, was taking a look into the street or not; or even Mrs. Tapscott, with the rosemary over her window.
Then he turned in at the lych-gate, thinking of the day when his father's body had lain there (as the proper thing was for a body to do) and then he stood in the churchyard, where the many ways of death divided. Three main paths, all well-gravelled, ran among those who had toddled in the time of childhood down them, with wormwood and stock-gilly flowers in their hands; and then sauntered along them, with hands in pockets, and eyes for the maidens over tombstone-heads; and then had come limping along on their staffs; and now were having all this done for them, without knowing anything about it.
None of these ways was at all to his liking. Peace—at least in death—was there, green turf and the rounded bank, gray stone, and the un-household name, to be made out by a grandchild perhaps, proud of skill in ancient letters, prouder still of a pocket-knife. What a faint scratch on soft stone! And yet the character far and away stronger than that of the lettered times that follow it.
Young Waldron was not of a morbid cast, neither was his mind introspective; as (for the good of mankind) is ordained to those who have the world before them. He turned to the right by a track across the grass, followed the bend of the churchyard wall, and fearing to go any further, lest he should stumble on his father's outraged grave, sat down upon a gap of the gray enclosure. This gap had been caused by the sweep of tempest that went up the valley at the climax of the storm. The wall, being low, had taken little harm; but the great west gable of the Abbey had been smitten, and swung on its back, as a trap-door swings upon its hinges. Thick flint structure, and time-worn mullion, massive buttress, and deep foundation, all had gone flat, and turned their fangs up, rending a chasm in the tattered earth. But this dark chasm was hidden from view, by a pile of loose rubble, and chunks of flint, that had rattled down when the gable fell, and striking the cross-wall had lodged thereon, breaking the cope in places, and hanging (with tangles of ivy, and tufts of toad-flax) over the interval of wall and ruin, as a snowdrift overhangs a ditch.
Here the young man sat down; as if any sort of place would do for him. The gap in the wall was no matter to him, but happened to suit his downcast mood, and the misery of the moment. Here he might sit, and wait, until Mr. Penniloe had got through a job, superior to the burial-service, because no one could cut you in pieces, directly afterwards, without being hanged for it. He could see Mr. Penniloe's black stick, standing like a little Parson—for some of them are proud of such resemblance—in the great south porch of the church; and thereby he knew that he could not miss his friend. As he lifted his eyes to the ancient tower, and the black yew-tree still steadfast, and the four vanes (never of one opinion as to the direction of the wind, in anything less than half a gale), and the jackdaws come home prematurely, after digging up broad-beans, to settle their squabble about their nests; and then as he lowered his gaze to the tombstones, and the new foundation-arches, and other labours of a parish now so hateful to him—heavy depression, and crushing sense of the wrath of God against his race, fell upon his head; as the ruin behind him had fallen on its own foundations.
He felt like an old man, fain to die, when time is gone weary and empty. What was the use of wealth to him, of bodily strength, of bright ambition to make his Country proud of him, even of love of dearest friends, and wedded bliss—if such there were—and children who would honour him? All must be under one black ban of mystery insoluble; never could there be one hearty smile, one gay thought, one soft delight; but ever the view of his father's dear old figure desecrated, mangled, perhaps lectured on. He could not think twice of that, but groaned—"The Lord in Heaven be my help! The Lord deliver me from this life?"
He was all but delivered of this life—happy, or wretched—it was all but gone. For as he flung his body back, suiting the action to his agony of mind—crash went the pile of jagged flint, the hummocks of dead mortar, and the wattle of shattered ivy. He cast himself forward, just in time, as all that had carried him broke and fell, churning, and grinding, and clashing together, sending up a cloud of powdered lime.
So sudden was the rush, that his hat went with it, leaving his brown curls grimed with dust, and his head for a moment in a dazed condition, as of one who has leapt from an earthquake. He stood with his back to the wall, and the muscles of his great legs quivering, after the strain of their spring for dear life. Then scarcely yet conscious of his hair-breadth escape, he descried Mr. Penniloe coming from the porch, and hastened without thought to meet him.
"Billy-jack!" said the clergyman, smiling, yet doubtful whether he ought to smile. "They insisted on calling that child 'Billy-jack.' 'William-John' they would not hear of. I could not object, for it was too late; and there is nothing in it uncanonical. But I scarcely felt as I should have done, when I had to say—'Billy-jack, I baptise thee,' etc. I hope they did not do it to try me. Now the Devonshire mind is very deep and subtle; though generally supposed to be the simplest of the simple. But what has become of your hat, my dear boy? Surely Thyatira has had time enough to clean it."
"She cleaned it beautifully. But it was waste of time. It has gone down a hole. Come, and I will show you. I wonder my head did not go with it. What a queer place this has become!"
"A hole! What hole can there be about here?" Mr. Penniloe asked, as he followed the young man. "The downfall of the Abbey has made a heap, rather than what can be called a hole. But I declare you are right! Why, I never saw this before; and I looked along here with Haddon, not more than a week age. Don't come too near; it is safe enough for me, but you are like Neptune, a shaker of the earth. Alas for our poor ivy!"
He put on his glasses, and peered through the wall-gap, into the flint-strewn depth outside. Part of the ruins, just dislodged, had rolled into a pit, or some deep excavation; the crown of which had broken in, probably when the gable fell. The remnant of the churchyard wall was still quite sound, and evidently stood away from all that had gone on outside.
"Be thankful to God for your escape," Mr. Penniloe said, looking back at the youth. "It has indeed been a narrow one. If you had been carried down there head-foremost, even your strong frame would have been crushed like an egg-shell."
"I am not sure about that; but I don't want to try it. I think I can see a good piece of my hat; and I am not going to be done out of it. Will you be kind enough, sir, to wait, while I go round by the stile, and get in at that end? You see that it is easy to get down there; but a frightful job from this side. You won't mind waiting, will you, sir?"
"If you will take my advice," said the Curate, "you will be content to let well alone. It is the great lesson of the age. But nobody attends to it."
The young man did not attend to it; and for once Mr. Penniloe had given bad advice; though most correct in principle, and in practice too, nine times and a half out of every ten.
"Here I am, sir. Can you see me?" Sir Thomas Waldron shouted up the hole. "It is a queer place, and no mistake. Please to stop just where you are. Then you can give me notice, if you see the ground likely to cave in. Halloa! Why, I never saw anything like it! Here's a stone arch, and a tunnel beyond it, just like what you've got at the rectory, only ever so much bigger. Looks as if the old Abbey had butted up against it, until it all got blown away. If I had got a fellow down here to help me, I believe I could get into it. But all these chunks are in the way."
"My dear young friend, it will soon be dark; and we have more important things to see to. You are not at all safe down there; if the sides fell in, you would never come out alive."
"It has cost me a hat; and I won't be done. I can't go home without a hat, till dark. I am not coming up, till I know all about it. Do oblige me, sir, by having the least little bit of patience."
Mr. Penniloe smiled. The request, as coming from such a quarter, pleased him. And presently the young man began to fling up great lumps of clotted flint, as if they were marbles, right and left.
"What a volcano you are!" cried the Parson, as the youth in the crater stopped to breathe. "It is nothing but a waste of energy. The hole won't run away, my dear Tom. You had much better leave it for the proper man to-morrow."
"Don't say that. I am the proper man." How true his words were, he had no idea. "But I hear somebody whistling. If I had only got a fellow, to keep this stuff back, I could get on like a house on fire."
It was Pike coming back from the long pool in the meadow, with a pretty little dish of trout for supper. His whistling was fine; as a fisherman's should be, for want of something better in his mouth; and he never got over the Churchyard stile, without this little air of consolation for the ghosts.
As he topped the ridge of meadow that looks down on the river, Mr. Penniloe waved his hat to him, over the breach of the churchyard wall; and he nothing loth stuck his rod into the ground, pulled off his jacket, and went down to help.
"All clear now. We can slip in like a rabbit. But it looks uncommonly black inside, and it seems to go a long way underground;" Waldron shouted up to the clergyman. "We cannot do anything, without a light."
"I'll tell you what, sir," Pike chimed in. "This passage runs right into the church, I do believe."
"That is the very thing I have been thinking;" answered Mr. Penniloe. "I have heard of a tradition to that effect. I should like to come down, and examine it."
"Not yet, sir; if you please. There is scarcely room for three. And it would be a dangerous place for you. But if you could only give us something like a candle——"
"Oh, I know!" The sage Pike suggested, with an angler's quickness. "Ask him to throw us down one of the four torches stuck up at the lych-gate. They burn like fury; and I dare say you have got a lucifer, or a Promethean."
"Not a bad idea, Pike;" answered Mr. Penniloe. "I believe that each of them will burn for half-an-hour."
Soon he returned with the driest of them, from the iron loop under the covered space; and this took fire very heartily, being made of twisted tow soaked in resin.
"I am rather big for this job;" said Sir Thomas, as the red flame sputtered in the archway, "perhaps you would like to go first, my young friend."
"Very much obliged," replied Pike drawing back; "but I don't seem to feel myself called upon to rush into the bowels of the earth, among six centuries of ghosts. I had better stop here, perhaps, till you come back."
"Very well. At any rate hold my coat. It is bad enough; I don't want to make it worse. I shan't be long, I dare say. But I am bound to see the end of it."
Young Waldron handed his coat to Pike, and stooping his tall head with the torch well in front of him, plunged into the dark arcade. Grim shadows flitted along the roof, as the sound of his heavy steps came back; then the torchlight vanished round a bend of wall, and nothing could either be seen or heard. Mr. Penniloe, in some anxiety, leaned over the breach in the churchyard fence, striving to see what was under his feet; while Pike mustered courage to stand in the archway—which was of roughly chiselled stone—but kept himself ready for instant flight, as he drew deep breaths of excitement.
By-and-by, the torch came quivering back, throwing flits of light along the white-flint roof; and behind it a man, shaking worse than any shadow, and whiter than any torchlit chalk.
"Great God!" He cried, staggering forth, and falling with his hand on his heart against the steep side of the pit. "As sure as there is a God in heaven, I have found my father!"
"What!" cried the Parson; "Pike, see to the torch; or you'll both be on fire."
In a moment, he ran round by way of the stile, and slid into the pit, without thinking of his legs, laying hold of some long rasps of ivy. Pike very nimbly leaped up the other side; this was not the sort of hole to throw a fly in.
"Give me the torch. You stay here, Tom. You have had enough of it." Mr. Penniloe's breath was short, because of the speed he had made of it. "It is my place now. You stop here, and get the air."
"I think it is rather my place, than of any other man upon the earth. Am I afraid of my own dear dad? Follow me, and I will show him to you."
He went with a slow step, dazed out of all wonder—as a man in a dream accepts everything—down the dark passage again, and through the ice-cold air, and the shivering fire. Then he stopped suddenly, and stooped the torch, stooping his curly head in lowliness behind it; and there, as if set down by the bearers for a rest, lay a long oaken coffin.
Mr. Penniloe came to his side, and gazed. At their feet lay the good and true-hearted Colonel, or all of him left below the heaven, resting placidly, unprofaned, untouched by even the hand of time; unsullied and honourable in his death, as in his loyal and blameless life.
The clear light fell upon the diamond of glass, (framed in the oak above his face, as was often done then for the last look of love) and it showed his white curls, and tranquil forehead, and eyelids for ever closed against all disappointment.
His son could not speak, but sobbed, and shook, with love, and reverence, and manly grief. But the clergyman, with a godly joy, and immortal faith, and heavenly hope, knelt at the foot, and lifted hands and eyes to the God of heaven.
"Behold, He hath not forsaken us! His mercy is over all His works. And his goodness is upon the children of men."
At the Old Barn that afternoon, no sooner was young Sir Thomas gone, than remarkable things began to happen. As was observed in a previous case, few of us are yet so vast of mind, as to feel deeply, and fairly enjoy the justice of being served with our own sauce. Haply this is why sauce and justice are in Latin the self-same word. Few of us even are so candid, as to perceive when it comes to pass; more often is a world of difference found betwixt what we gave, and what we got.
Fox was now treated by Nicie's brother, exactly as he had treated Gilham about his sister Christie. He was not remarkably rash of mind—which was ever so much better for himself and friends—yet he was quick of perception; and when his sister came and looked at him, and said with gentle sympathy—"Oh, Jemmy, has Sir Thomas forbidden your bans? No wonder you threw his hat at him"—it was a little more than he could do, not to grin at the force of analogy.
"He is mad." He replied, with strong decision. Yet at the twinkle of her eyes, he wondered whether she held that explanation valid, in a like case, not so very long ago.
"I have made up my mind to it altogether;" he continued, with the air magnanimous. "It is useless to strive against the force of circumstances."
"Made up your mind to give up Nicie, because her brother disapproves of it?" Christie knew well enough what he meant. But can girls be magnanimous?
"I should think not. How can you be so stupid? What has a brother's approval to do with it? Do you think I care twopence for fifty thousand brothers? Brothers are all very well in their way; but let them stick to their own business. A girl's heart is her own, I should hope; and her happiness depends on herself, not her brother. I call it a great piece of impudence, for a brother to interfere in such matters."
"Oh!" said Christie, and nothing more. Neither did she even smile; but went to the window, and smoothed her apron, the pretty one she wore, when she was mixing water-colours.
"You shall come and see him now;" said Jemmy, looking at the light that was dancing in her curls, but too lofty to suspect that inward laughter made them dance. "It can't hurt him now; and my opinion is that it might even do him a great deal of good. I'll soon have him ready, and I'll send his blessed mother to make another saucepanful of chicken broth. And Chris, I'll give you clear decks, honour bright."
"I am quite at a loss to understand your meaning." The mendacious Christie turned round, and fixed her bright eyes upon his most grandly; as girls often do, when they tell white lies—perhaps to see how they are swallowed.
"Very well then; that is all right. It will save a lot of trouble; and perhaps it is better to leave him alone."
"There again! You never seem to understand me, Jemmy! And of course, you don't care how much it upsets a poor patient, never to see a change of faces. Of course you are very kind; and so is Dr. Gronow; and poor Mrs. Gilham is a most delightful person. Still, after being for all that time so desperately limited—that's not the word at all—I mean, so to some extent restricted, or if you prefer it prohibited, from—from any little change, any sort of variety of expressions, of surroundings, of in fact, society——"
"Ah yes, no doubt! Of etcetera, etcetera. But go you on floundering, till I come back, and perhaps then you will know what you mean. Perhaps also you would look a little more decent with your apron off," Dr. Fox suggested, with the noble rudeness so often dealt out to sisters. "Be sure you remind him that yesterday was Leap-year's day; and then perhaps you will be able to find some one to understand you."
"If that is the case, you may be quite certain that I won't go near him."
But before very long she thought better of that. Was it just to punish one for the offences of another? With a colour like the first bud of monthly rose peeping through its sepals in the southern corner, she ran into the shrubbery—for there was nothing to call a garden—and gathered a little posy of Russian violets and wild primrose. Then she pulled her apron off, and had a good look at herself, and could not help knowing that she had not seen a lovelier thing for a long time; and if love would only multiply it by two,—and it generally does so by a thousand—the result would be something stupendous, ineffable, adorable.
Such thoughts are very bright and cheerful, full of glowing youth and kindness, young romance and contempt of earth. But the longer we plod on this earth, the deeper we stick into it; as must be when the foot grows heavy, having no talaria. Long enduring pain produces a like effect with lapse of years. The spring of the system loses coil, from being on perpetual strain; sad proverbs flock into the brain, instead of dancing verses.
Frank Gilham had been ploughed and harrowed, clod-crushed, drilled, and scarified by the most advanced, enlightened, and practical of all medical high-farmers. If ever Fox left him, to get a breath of air, Gronow came in to keep the screw on; and when they were both worn out, young Webber (who began to see how much he had to learn, and what was for his highest interest) was allowed to sit by, and do nothing. A consultation was held, whenever the time hung heavily on their hands; and Webber would have liked to say a word, if it could have been uttered without a snub. Meanwhile, Frank Gilham got the worst of it.
At last he had been allowed to leave his bed, and taste a little of the fine Spring air, flowing down from Hagdon Hill, and bearing first waft of the furze-bloom. Haggard weariness and giddy lightness, and a vacant wondering doubt (as to who or what he was, that scarcely seemed worth puzzling out), would have proved to any one who cared to know it, that his head had lain too long in one position, and was not yet reconciled to the change. And yet it should have welcomed this relief, if virtue there be in heredity, inasmuch as this sofa came from White Post farm, and must have comforted the head of many a sick progenitor.
The globe of thought being in this state, and the arm of action crippled, the question was—would heart arise, dispense with both, and have its way?
For awhile it seemed a doubtful thing; so tedious had the conflict been, and such emptiness left behind it. The young man, after dreams most blissful, and hopes too golden to have any kin with gilt, was reduced to bare bones and plastered elbows, and knees unsafe to go down upon. But the turn of the tide of human life quivers to the influence of heaven.
In came Christie, like a flush of health, rosy with bright maidenhood; yet tremulous as a lily is, with gentle fear and tenderness. Pity is akin to love—as those who know them both, and in their larger hearts have felt them, for our smaller sakes pronounce—but when the love is far in front, and pauses at the check of pride; what chance has pride, if pity comes, and takes her mistress by the hand, and whispers—"try to comfort him?" None can tell, who are not in the case, and those who are know little of it, how these strange things come to pass. But sure it is that they have their way. The bashful, proud, light-hearted maiden, ready to make a joke of love, and laugh at such a fantasy, was so overwhelmed with pity, that the bashfulness forgot to blush, the pride cast down its frightened eyes, and the levity burst into tears. But of all these things she remembered none.
And forsooth they may well be considered doubtful, in common with many harder facts; because the house was turned upside down, before any more could be known of it. There was coming, and going, and stamping of feet, horses looking in at the door, and women calling out of it; and such a shouting and hurrahing, not only here but all over the village, that the Perle itself might well have stopped, like Simöis and Scamander, to ask what the fish out of water were doing. And it might have stopped long, without being much wiser; so thoroughly everybody's head was flown, and everybody's mouth filled with much more than the biggest ears found room for.
To put it in order is a hopeless job, because all order was gone to grit. But as concerns the Old Barn (whose thatch, being used to quiet eaves-droppings, had enough to make it stand up in sheaf again)—first dashed up a young man on horseback, (and the sympathetic nag was half mad also) the horse knocking sparks out of the ground, as if he had never heard of lucifers, and the man with his legs all out of saddle, waving a thing that looked like a letter, and shouting as if all literature were comprised in vivâ voce. Now this was young Farrant, the son of the Churchwarden; and really there was no excuse for him; for the Farrants are a very clever race; and as yet competitive examination had not made the sight of paper loathsome to any mind cultivating self-respect.
"You come out, and just read this;" he shouted to the Barn in general. "You never heard such a thing in all your life. All the village is madder than any March hare. I shan't tell you a word of it. You come out and read. And if that doesn't fetch you out, you must be a clam of oysters. If you don't believe me, come and see it for yourselves. Only you will have to get by Jakes, and he is standing at the mouth, with his French sword drawn."
"In the name of Heaven, what the devil do you mean?" cried Fox, running out, and catching fire of like madness, of all human elements the most explosive, "and this—why, this letter is the maddest thing of all! A man who was bursting to knock me down, scarcely two gurgles of the clock ago! And now, I am his beloved Jemmy! Mrs. Gilham, do come out. Surely that chicken has been stewed to death. Oh, Ma'am, you have some sense in you. Everybody else is gone off his head. Who can make head or tail of this? Let me entreat you to read it, Mrs. Gilham. Farrant, you'll be over that colt's head directly. Mrs. Gilham, this is meant for a saner eye than mine. Your head-piece is always full of self-possession."
Highly flattered with this tribute, the old lady put on her spectacles, and read, slowly and decorously.
"Beloved Jemmy,
"I am all that you called me, a hot-headed fool, and a cad; and everything vile on the back of it. The doctors are the finest chaps alive, because they have never done harm to the dead. Come down at once, and put a bar across, because Jakes must have his supper. Perlycross folk are the best in the world, and the kindest-hearted, but we must not lett them go in there. I am off home, for if anybody else was to get in front of me, and tell my mother, I should go wild, and she would be quite upsett. When you have done all you think proper, come up and see poor Nicie.
"From your affectionate, and very sorry,
"T. R. Waldron."
"Now the other, Ma'am!" cried Doctor Fox. "Here is another from the Parson. Oh come now, we shall have a little common sense."
"My Dear Jemmy,
"It has pleased the Lord, who never afflicts us without good purpose, to remove that long and very heavy trouble from us. We have found the mortal remains of my dear friend, untouched by any human hand, in a hollow way leading from the Abbey to the Church. We have not yet discovered how it happened; and I cannot stop to tell you more, for I must go at once to Walderscourt, lest rumour should get there before us; and Sir Thomas must not go alone, being of rather headlong, though very noble nature. Sergeant Jakes has been placed on guard, against any rash curiosity. I have sent for the two Churchwardens and can leave it safely to them and to you, to see that all is done properly. If it can be managed, without undue haste, the coffin should be placed inside the Church, and the doors locked until the morning. When that is done, barricade the entrance to the tunnel; although I am sure that the people of our parish would have too much right feeling, as well as apprehension, to attempt to make their way in, after dark. To-morrow, I trust we shall offer humble thanks to the Giver of all good, for this great mercy. I propose to hold a short special service; though I fear there is no precedent in the Prayer-book. This will take a vast weight off your mind, as well as mine, which has been sorely tried. I beg you not to lose a minute, as many people might become unduly excited.
"Most truly yours,
"Philip Penniloe.""P.S.—This relieves us also from another dark anxiety, simply explaining the downfall of the S.E. corner of the Chancel."
"It seems hard upon me; but it must be right, because the Parson has decreed it;" Dr. Fox cried, without a particle of what is now called "slavish adulation of the Church"—which scarcely stuck up for herself in those days—but by virtue of the influence which a kind and good man always gains, when he does not overstrain his rights. "I am off, Mrs. Gilham, I can trust you to see to the pair of invalids upstairs."
Then he jumped upon young Mr. Farrant's horse, and leaving him to follow at foot leisure, dashed down the hill towards Perlycross. At the four cross-roads, which are the key of the position, and have all the village and the valley in command, he found as fine a concourse perhaps as had been there since the great days of the Romans. Not a rush of dread, and doubting, and of shivering back-bones, such as had been on that hoary morning, when the sun came through the fog, and showed Churchwarden Farmer John, and Channing the clerk, and blacksmith Crang, trudging from the potato-field, full of ghastly tidings, and encountering at that very spot Sergeant Jakes, and Cornish, and the tremulous tramp of half the village, afraid of resurrection.
Instead of hurrying from the churchyard, as a haunt of ghouls and fiends, all were hastening towards it now, with deep respect reviving. The people who lived beyond the bridge, and even beyond the factory, and were much inclined by local right to sit under the Dissenting minister—himself a very good man, and working in harmony with the Curate—many of these, and even some from Priestwell, having heard of it, pushed their right to know everything, in front of those who lived close to the Church and looked through the railings every day. Farmer John Horner was there on his horse, trotting slowly up and down, as brave as a mounted policeman is, and knowing every one by name called out to him to behave himself. Moreover Walter Haddon stood at the door of the Ivy-bush, with his coat off, and his shirtsleeves rolled, and ready to double his fist at any man who only drank small beer, at the very first sign of tumult. But candidly speaking this was needless, powerful as the upheaval was, and hot the spirit of enquiry; for the wives of most of the men were there, and happily in an English crowd that always makes for good manners.
Fox was received with loud hurrahs, and many ran forward to shake his hand; some, who had been most black and bitter in their vile suspicions, having the manliness to beg his pardon, and abuse themselves very heartily. He forgave them with much frankness, as behoves an Englishman, and with a pleasant smile at their folly, which also is nicely national. For after all, there is no other race that can give and take as we do; not by any means headlong, yet insisting upon decision—of the other side, at any rate—and thus quickening the sense of justice upon the average, in our favour.
Fox, with the truly British face of one who is understood at last, but makes no fuss about it, gave up his horse at the lych-gate, and made off where he was beckoned for. Here were three great scaffold-poles and slings fixed over the entrance to the ancient under-way; and before dark all was managed well. And then a short procession, headed by the martial march of Jakes, conveyed into the venerable Church the mortal part of a just and kind man and a noble soldier, to be consigned to-morrow to a more secure, and ever tranquil, and still honoured resting-place.
This being done, the need of understanding must be satisfied. Dr. Fox, and Dr. Gronow, with the two Churchwardens, and Channing the clerk, descended the ladder into the hole, and with a couple of torches kindled went to see the cause and manner of this strange yet simple matter—a four-month mystery of darkness, henceforth as clear as daylight.
When they beheld it, they were surprised, not at the thing itself—for it could scarcely have happened otherwise, under the circumstances—but at the coincidences, which had led so many people of very keen intelligence into, as might almost be said, every track, except the right one. And this brought home to them one great lesson—"If you wish to be sure of a thing, see it with your own good eyes." And another—but that comes afterwards.
The passage, dug by the Monks no doubt, led from the Abbey directly westward to the chancel of the Church, probably to enable them to carry their tapers burning, and discharge their duties there promptly and with vestments dry, in defiance of the weather. The crown, of loose flints set in mortar, was some eight feet underground, and the line it took was that adopted in all Christian burial. The grave of the late Sir Thomas Waldron was prepared, as he had wished, far away from the family vault (which had sadly undermined the Church), and towards the eastern end of the yard, as yet not much inhabited. As it chanced, the bottom lay directly along a weak, or worn-out part of the concrete arch below; and the men who dug it said at the time that their spades had struck on something hard, which they took to be loose blocks of flint. However being satisfied with their depth, and having orders to wall the bottom, they laid on either side some nine or ten courses of brickwork, well flushed in with strong and binding mortar; but the ends being safe and bricks running short, to save any further trouble, they omitted the cross-wall at the ends. Thus when the weight of earth cast in pressed more and more heavily upon the heavy coffin, the dome of concreted flints below collapsed, the solid oaken box dropped quietly to the bottom of the tunnel, and the dwarf brick sides having no tie across, but being well bonded together, and well-footed, full across the vacancy into one another, forming a new arch, or more correctly a splay span-roof, in lieu of the old arch which had yielded to the strain. Thus the earth above took this new bearing, and the surface of the ground was no more disturbed than it always is by settlement.
No wonder then that in the hurried search, by men who had not been down there before, and had not heard of any brickwork at the sides, and were at that moment in a highly nervous state, not only was the grave reported empty—which of course was true enough—but no suspicion was entertained that the bottom they came to (now covered with earth) was anything else than a rough platform for the resting-place. And the two who could have told them better, being proud of their skill in foundations, had joined the builders' staff, and been sent away to distant jobs.
In the heat of foregone conclusion, and the terror created by the blacksmith's tale, and the sad condition of that faithful little Jess, the report had been taken as final. No further quest seemed needful; and at Squire Mockham's order, the empty space had been filled in at once, for fear of the excitement, and throng of vulgar gazers, gathering and thickening around the empty grave.
Such are the cases that make us wonder at the power of co-incidence, and the very strange fact that the less things seem to have to do with one another, the greater is their force upon the human mind, when it tries to be too logical.
Many little things, all far apart, had been fetched together by fine reasoning process, and made to converge towards a very fine error, with certainty universal.
Even that humble agent, or patient, little Jess—despised as a dog, by the many who have no delight in their better selves—had contributed very largely to the confluence of panic. If she could only have thrown the light of language on her woeful plight, the strongest clench to the blacksmith's tale would never have come near his pincers. For the slash that rewarded her true love fell, not from the spade of a Churchyard-robber, but from a poacher's bill-hook. This has already been intimated; and Mr. Penniloe must have learned it then; if he had simply taken time, instead of making off at five miles an hour, when Speccotty wanted to tell his tale. This should be a warning to Clergymen; for perhaps there was no other man in the parish, whose case the good parson would thus have postponed, without prospect of higher consolation. And it does seem a little too hard upon a man, that because his mind is gone astray unawares, his soul should drop out of cultivation!
That poor little spaniel was going home sadly, to get a bit of breakfast, and come back to her duty; when trespassing unwittingly upon the poacher's tricks, at early wink of daylight, she was taken for a minion of the Evil One, and met with a vigour which is shown too seldom, by even true sportsmen, to his emissaries. Perhaps before she quitted guard, she may have had a nip at the flowers on the grave, and dropped them back, when she failed to make sweet bones of them.
Without further words—though any number of words, if their weight were by the score, would be too few—the slowest-headed man in Perlycross might lay to his heart the second lesson, read in as mild a voice as Penniloe's, above. And without a word at all, he may be trusted to go home with it; when the job is of other folk's hands, but his own pocket.
"Never scamp your work," was preached more clearly by this long trouble, and degradation of an honourable parish, than if Mr. Penniloe had stood in the pulpit, for a week of Sundays, with the mouth of King Solomon laid to his ear, and the trump of the Royal Mail upon his lips.
If it be sweet to watch at ease the troubles of another, how much sweeter to look back, from the vantage ground of happiness, upon one's own misfortunes! To be able to think—"well, it was too bad! Another week would have killed me. How I pulled through it, is more than I can tell; for everybody was against me! And the luck—the luck kept playing leap-frog; fifty plagues all upon one another's back; and my poor little self at the bottom. Not a friend came near me; they were all so sorry, but happened to be frightfully down themselves. I assure you, my dear, if it had not been for you, and the thought of our blessed children, and perhaps my own—well, I won't say 'pluck,' but determination to go through with it; instead of arranging these flowers for dinner, you would have been wreathing them for a sadder purpose."
The lady sheds a tear, and says—"Darling Jack, see how you have made my hand shake! I have almost spoiled that truss of Hoya, and this Schubertia won't stand up. But you never said a word about it, at the time! Was that fair to me, Jack?" And the like will come to pass again, perhaps next year, perhaps next week.
But the beauty of country-life, as it then prevailed (ere the hungry hawk of Stock-exchange poised his wings above the stock-dove) was to take things gently, softly, with a cooing faith in goodness, both above us and around. Men must work; but being born (as their best friends, the horses, are), for that especial purpose, why should they make it still more sad, by dwelling upon it, at the nose-bag time? How much wiser to allow that turbulent bit of stuff, the mind, to abide at ease, and take things in, rather than cast them forth half-chewed, in the style of our present essayists?
Now this old village was the right sort of place, to do such things, without knowing it. There was no great leading intellect (with his hands returned to feet), to beat the hollow drum, and play shrill fife, and set everybody tumbling over his best friend's head. The rule of the men was to go on, according to the way in which their fathers went; talking as if they were running on in front, but sticking effectually to the old coat-tail. Which in the long run is the wisest thing to do.
They were proud of their church, when the Sunday mood was on, and their children came home to tell about it.
There she was. Let her stand; if the folk with money could support her. It was utterly impossible to get into their heads any difference betwixt the Church in the churchyard, and the one that inhabits the sky above. When a man has been hard at work all the week, let his wife be his better half on Sunday.
Nothing that ever can be said, or done, by the most ardent "pastor," will ever produce that enthusiasm among the tegs of his flock, which spreads so freely among the ewes, and lambs. Mr. Penniloe would not be called a Pastor; to him the name savoured of a cant conceit. Neither did he call himself a Priest; for him it was quite enough to be a Clergyman of the Church of England; and to give his life to that.
Therefore, when the time came round, and the turn of the year was fit for it, this Parson of that humbler type was happy to finish, without fuss, the works that he had undertaken, with a lofty confidence in the Lord, which had come to ground too often. His faith, though fine, had never been of that grandly abstract quality, which expects the ravens to come down, with bread instead of bills, and build a nest for sweet doves gratis. To pay every penny that was fairly due, and shorten no man of his Saturday wage, towards the Sunday consolation; to perceive that business must not be treated as a purely spiritual essence; and to know that a great many very good people drip away (as tallow does from its own wick) from their quick flare of promises; also to bear the brunt of all, and cast up the toppling column, with the balance coming down on his own chest—what wonder that he had scarcely any dark hair left, and even the silver was inclined to say adieu?
When a man, who is getting on in years, comes out of a long anxiety, about money, and honour, and his sense of right, he finds even in the soft flush of relief that a great deal of his spring is gone. A Bachelor of Arts, when his ticks have been paid by a groaning governor, is fit and fresh to start again, and seldom dwells with due remorse upon the sacrifice Vicarious. His father also, if of right paternal spirit, soars above the unpleasant subject; leaves it to the mother to drive home the lesson—which she feels already to be too severe—and says, "Well, Jack, you have got your degree; and that's more than the Squire's son can boast of."
But the ancient M.A. of ten lustres, who has run into debt on his own hook, and felt the hook running into him, is in very different plight, even when he has wriggled off. Parson Penniloe was sorely humble, his placid forehead sadly wrinkled, and his kindly eyes uncertain how to look at his brother men, even from the height of pulpit; when in his tremulous throat stuck fast that stern and difficult precept—"Owe no man anything."
Even the strongest of mankind can scarcely manage to come up to that, when fortune is not with him, and his family tug the other way. The glory of the Lord may be a lofty prospect, but becomes a cloudy pillar, when the column is cast up, and will not square with cash in hand. Scarcely is it too much to say, that since the days of Abraham, it would have been hard to find a man of stronger faith than Penniloe,—except at the times when he broke down (in vice of matters physical) and proved at one break two ancient creeds—Exceptio probat regulam; and Corruptio optimi pessima.
While he was on the balance now, as a man of the higher ropes should be, lifting the upper end of his pole, that the glory of his parish shone again, yet feeling the butt inclined to swag, by reason of the bills stuck upon it, who should come in to the audience and audit but young Sir Thomas Waldron? This youth had thought perhaps too little of himself,—because those candid friends, his brother-boys had always spoken of his body so kindly, without a single good word for his mind—but now he was authorized, and even ordered, by universal opinion to take a much fairer view of his own value.
Nothing that ever yet came to pass has gone into words without some shift of colour, and few things even without change of form; and so it would have been beyond all nature if the events above reported had been told with perfect accuracy even here. How much less could this be so, in the hot excitement of the time, with every man eager to excel his neighbour's narrative, and every woman burning to recall it with her own pure imagination! What then of the woman, who had been blessed enough to enrich the world, and by the same gift ennoble it, with the hero, who at a stroke had purged the family, the parish, and the nation?
Nevertheless he came in gently, modestly, and with some misgivings, into the room, where he had trembled, blushed, and floundered on all fours, over the old gray Latin steps, which have broken many a knee-cap.
"If you please, sir," he said to his old tutor, who alone had taught him anything, for at Eton he had barely learned good manners; "my mother begs you to read this. And we are all ashamed of our behaviour."
"No, Tom, no. You have no cause for that. Your mother may have been a little hard at first. But she has meant to be just throughout. The misery she has passed through—none but herself can realise."
"You see, sir, she does not sing out about things, as most women do; and that of course makes it ever so much worse for her."
The young man spoke, like some deep student of feminine nature; but his words were only those of the good housekeeper at Walderscourt. Mr. Penniloe took them in that light, and began to read without reply.
"Truly esteemed and valued sir. With some hesitation of the mind I come to say that in all I have said and done, my mind has been of the wrong intelligence most largely. It always appears in this land of Britain, as if nobody of it could make a mistake. But we have not in my country such great wisdom and good fortune. Also in any other European land of which I have the acquaintance, the natives are wrong in their opinions sometimes.
"But this does not excuse me of my mistake. I have been unjust to you and to all people living around my place of dwelling. But by my dear son, and his very deep sagacity, it has been made manifest that your good people were considered guilty, without proper justice, of a wrong upon my husband's memory. Also that your good church, of which he thought so well in the course of his dear life, has treated him not with ignominy, but with the best of her attention, receiving him into the sacred parts, where the Priests of our religion in the times of truth conversed. This is to me of the holiest and most gracious consolation.
"Therefore I entreat you to accept, for the uses of so good a building, the little sum herewith committed to your care, which flows entirely from my own resources, and not from the property of my dear husband, so much engaged in the distribution of the law. When that is disengaged, my dear son Rodrigo, with my approbation will contribute from it the same amount for the perfection of the matter."
"One, two, three, four, five. And every one of them a hundred pounds! My dear Tom, I feel a doubt——"
Mr. Penniloe leaned back and thought. He was never much excited about money, except when he owed it to, or for the Lord.
"I call it very poor amends indeed. What would ten times as much be, after all that you have suffered? And how can you refuse it, when it is not for yourself? My mother will be hurt most dreadfully, and never think well again of the Church of England."
"Tom, you are right;" Mr. Penniloe replied, while a smile flitted over his conscience. "I should indeed convey a false impression of the character of our dear mother. But as for the other £500—well——"
"My father's character must be considered, as well as your good mother's." Sir Thomas was not strong at metaphor. "And I am sure of one thing, sir. If he could have known what would happen about him, and how beautifully every one behaved, except his own people—but it's no use talking. If you don't take it, I shall join the Early Methodists. What do you think of that, sir? I am always as good as my word, you know."
"Ah! Ah! It may be so;" the Curate answered thoughtfully, returning to the mildness of exclamation from which these troubles had driven him. "But allow me a little time for consideration. Your mother's very generous gift, I can accept without hesitation, and have no right to do otherwise. But as to your father's estate, I am placed in a delicate position, by reason of my trusteeship; and it is possible that I might go wrong; at any rate, I must consult——"
"Mrs. Fox, sir, from Foxden!" Thyatira Muggridge cried, with her face as red as a turkey's wattle, and throwing the door of the humble back-room as wide as if it never could be wide enough. For the lady was beautifully arrayed.
"I come to consult, not to be consulted. My confidence in myself has been misplaced;" said the mother of Jemmy and Christie, after making the due salutation. "Sir Thomas, I beg you not to go. You have some right to a voice in the matter; if as they tell me at Old Barn, you have conquered your repugnance to my son, and are ready to receive him as your brother-in-law."
"Madam, I was a fool," said Tom, offering his great hand with a sheepish look. "Your son has forgiven me; and I hope that you will. Jemmy is the finest fellow ever born."
"A credit to his mother, as his mother always thought. And what is still better for himself, a happy man, in winning the affections of the sweetest girl on earth. I have seen your dear sister—what a gentle darling!"
"Nicie is very well in her way, madam. But she has a strong will of her own. Jemmy will find that out, some day. Upon the whole, I am sorry for him."
"He talks in the very same way of his sister. If young men listened to young men, none of them would ever marry. Oh, Mr. Penniloe, you can be trusted at any rate, to look at things from a higher point of view."
"I try sometimes; but it is not easy. And I generally get into scrapes, when I do. But I have one consolation. Nobody ever takes my advice."
"I mean to take it," Mrs. Fox replied, looking into his gentle eyes, with the faith which clever women feel in a nature larger than their own. "You need not suppose that I am impulsive. But I know what you are. When every one else in this stupid little place condemned my son, without hearing a word, there was one who was too noble, too good a Christian, to listen to any reason. He was right when the mother herself was wrong. For I don't mind telling you, as I have even told my son, that knowing what he is, I could not help suspecting that he—that he had something to do with it. Not that Lady Waldron had any right whatever—and it will take me a long time to forgive her, and her son is quite welcome to tell her that. What you felt yourself was quite different, Sir Thomas."
"I can't see that my mother did any harm. Why, she even suspected her own twin-brother! If you were to bear ill-will against my mother——"
"Of such little tricks I am incapable, Sir Thomas. And of course I can allow for foreigners. Even twenty years of English life cannot bring them to see things as we do. Their nature is so—well, I won't say narrow. Neither will I say 'bigoted,' although——"
"We quite understand you, my dear madam." Mr. Penniloe was shocked at his own rudeness, in thus interrupting a lady, but he knew that very little more would produce a bad breach betwixt Walderscourt and Foxden. "What a difference really does exist among people equally just and upright——"
"My dear mother is as just and upright as any Englishwoman in the world, Protestant or Catholic," the young man exclaimed, having temper on the bubble, yet not allowing it to boil against a lady. "But if his own mother condemned him, how—I can't put it into words, as I mean it—how can she be in a wax with my mother? And more than that—as it happens, Mrs. Fox, my mother starts for Spain to day, and I cannot let her go alone."
"Now the Lord must have ordered it so," thought the Parson. "What a clearance of hostile elements!" But fearing that the others might not so take it, he said only—"Ah, indeed!"
"To her native land?" asked Mrs. Fox, as a Protestant not quite unbigoted; and a woman who longed to have it out. "It seems an extraordinary thing just now. But perhaps it is a pilgrimage."
"Yes, madam, for about £500,000," answered Sir Thomas, in his youthful Tory vein, not emancipated yet from disdain of commerce; "not for the sake of the money, of course; but to do justice to the brother she had wronged. Mr. Penniloe can tell you all about it. I am not much of a hand at arithmetic."
"We won't trouble any one about that now;" the lady replied with some loftiness. "But I presume that Lady Waldron would wish to see me, before she leaves this country."
"Certainly she would if she had known that you were here. My sister had not come back yet, to tell her. She will be disappointed terribly, when she hears that you have been at Perlycross. But she is compelled to catch the Packet; and I fear that I must say 'good-bye'; mother would never forgive me, if she lost her voyage through any fault of mine."
"You see how they treat us!" said Mrs. Fox of Foxden, when the young man had made his adieu with great politeness. "I suppose you understand it, Mr. Penniloe, though your mind is so very much larger?"
The clergyman scarcely knew what to say. He was not at all quick in the ways of the world; and all feminine rush was beyond him. "We must all allow for circumstances," was his quiet platitude.
"All possible allowance I can make;" the lady replied with much self-command. "But I think there is nothing more despicable than this small county-family feeling! Is Lady Waldron not aware that I am connected with the very foremost of your Devonshire families? But because my husband is engaged in commerce, a military race may look down upon us! After all, I should like to know, what are your proudest landowners, but mere agriculturists by deputy? I never lose my temper; but it makes me laugh, when I remember that after all, they are simply dependent upon farming. Is not that what it comes to, Mr. Penniloe?"
"And a very noble occupation, madam. The first and the finest of the ways ordained by the Lord for the sustenance of mankind. Next to the care of the human soul, what vocation can be——"
"You think so. Then I tell you what I'll do, if only to let those Waldrons know how little we care for their prejudices. Everything depends upon me now, in my poor husband's sad condition. I will give my consent to my daughter's alliance—great people call it alliance, don't they?—with a young man, who is a mere farmer!"
"I am assured that he will make his way," Mr. Penniloe answered with some inward smile, for it is a pleasant path to follow in the track of ladies. "He gets a higher price for pigs, than either of my Churchwardens."
"What could you desire more than that? It is a proof of the highest capacity. Mr. and Mrs. Frank Gilham shall send their wedding cards to Walderscourt, with a prime young porker engraved on them. Oh, Mr. Penniloe, I am not perfect. But I have an unusual gift perhaps of largeness of mind, and common sense; and I always go against any one, who endeavours to get the whip-hand of me. And I do believe my darling Christie gets it from her mother."
"She is a most charming young lady, Mrs. Fox. What a treasure she would be in this parish! The other day, she said a thing about our Church——"
"Just like her. She is always doing that. And when she comes into her own money—but that is a low consideration. It is gratitude, my dear sir, the deepest and the noblest feeling that still survives in these latter days. Without that heroic young man's behaviour, which has partly disabled him for life, I fear, I should have neither son nor daughter. And you say that the Gilhams are of very good birth?"
"The true name is Guillaume, I believe. Their ancestor came with the Conqueror. Not as a rapacious noble, but in a most useful and peaceful vocation; in fact——"
"Quite enough, Mr. Penniloe. In such a case, one scorns particulars. My daughter was sure that it was so. But I doubted; although you can see it in his bearing. A more thoroughly modest young man never breathed; but I shall try to make him not afraid of me. He told my daughter that, in his opinion, I realised—but you would think me vain; and I was justly annoyed at such nonsense. However, since I have had your advice, I shall hesitate no longer."
Mrs. Fox smiled pleasantly, because her mind was quite made up, to save herself a world of useless trouble in this matter, and yet appear to take the upper hand in her surrender.
Wondering what advice he could have been supposed to give, the mild yet gallant Parson led her to the Foxden carriage, which had halted at his outer gate, and opposite the school house. Here with many a bow they parted, thinking well of one another, and hoping for the like regard. But as the gentle curate passed the mouth of the Tænarian tunnel leading to his lower realms, a great surprise befell him.
"What has happened? There is something wrong. Surely at this time of day, one ought to see the sunset through that hole," he communed with himself in wonder, for the dark arcade ran from east to west. "There must be a stoppage somewhere. I am almost sure I can see two heads. Good people, come out, whoever you may be."
"The fact of it is, sir," said Sergeant Jakes, marching out of the hole with great dignity, though his hat was white with cob-webs; "the fact of it is that this good lady hath received a sudden shock——"
"No sir, no sir. Not at all like that, sir. Only as St. Paul saith in chapter 5 of Ephesians—'this is a great mystery.'"
"It is indeed. And I must request to have it explained immediately."
Thyatira's blushes and the sparkling of her eyes made her look quite pretty, and almost as good as young again, while she turned away with a final shot from the locker of old authority.
"You ought to be ashamed, sir, according to my thinking, to be standing in this wind so long, without no hat upon your head."
"You see, sir, it is just like this," the gallant sergeant followed up, when his love was out of hearing; "time hath come for Mrs. Muggridge to be married, now or never. It is not for me to say, as a man who fears the Lord, that I think He was altogether right in the institooting of wedlock, supposing as ever He did so. But whether He did it, or whether He did not, the thing hath been so taken up by the humankind—women particular—that for a man getting on in years, 'tis the only thing respectable. Thyatira hath proven that out of the Bible, many times."
"Mr. Jakes, the proper thing is to search the Scriptures for yourself."
"So Thyatira saith. But Lord! She findeth me wrong at every text, from looking up to women so. If she holdeth by St. Paul, a quarter so much as she quoteth him, there won't be another man in Perlycross with such a home as I shall have."
"You have chosen one of the few wise virgins. Jakes, I trust that you will be blest not only with a happy home in this world, but what is a thousand-fold more important, the aid of a truly religious wife, to lead a thoroughly humble, prayerful, and consistent Christian life."
"Thank 'e, sir. Thank 'e. With the grace of God, she will; and my first prayer to the Lord in heaven will be just this—to let me live long enough for to see that young fool of a Bob the butcher ahanging fom his own steelyard. By reason of the idiot he hath made of his self, by marrying of that silly minx, Tamar Haddon!"
"The grace of God is boundless; and Tamar may improve. Try to make the best of her, Mr. Jakes. She will always look up to you, I am sure, feeling the strength of your character, and the example of higher principles."
"She!" replied the sergeant without a blush, but after a keen reconnoitring glance. "The likes of her doesn't get no benefit from example. But I must not keep you, sir, so long without your hat on."
"This is a day of many strange events," Mr. Penniloe began to meditate, as he leaned back in his long sermon-chair, with the shadows of the Spring night deepening. "Lady Waldron gone, to support her brother's case in Spain, because she had so wronged him. A thousand pounds suddenly forthcoming, to lift us out of our affliction; sweet Nicie left in the charge of Mrs. Webber, who comes to five at Walderscourt; Christie Fox allowed to have her own way, as she was pretty sure to do; and now Thyatira, Thyatira Muggridge, not content to lead a quiet, useful, respectable, Christian, and well-paid life, but launched into matrimony with a man of many stripes! I know not how the school will be conducted, or my own household, if it comes to that. Truly, when a clergyman is left without a wife——"
"I want to come in, and the door won't open"—a clear but impatient voice was heard—"I want to see you, before anybody else does." And then another shake was given.
"Why, Zip, my dear child! Zip, don't be so headlong. I thought you were learning self-command. Why, how have you come? What is the meaning of all this?"
"Well, now they may kill me, if they like. I told them I would hear your voice again, and then they might skin me, if it suited them. I won't have their religion. There is none of it inside them. You are the only one I ever saw, that God has made with his eyes open. I like them very well, but what are they to you? Why, they won't let me speak as I was made! It is no good sending me away again. Parson, you mustn't stand up like that. Can't you see that I want to kiss you?"
"My dear little child, with all my heart. But I never saw any one half so——"
"Half so what? I don't care what, so long as I have got you round the neck," cried the child as she covered his face with kisses, drawing back every now and then, to look into his calm blue eyes with flashes of adoration. "The Lord should have made me your child, instead of that well-conducted waxy thing—look at my nails! She had better not come now."
"Alas! Have you cultivated nothing but your nails? But why did the good ladies send you home so soon? They said they would keep you until Whitsuntide."
"I got a punishment on purpose, and I let the old girls go to dinner. Then I said the Lord's Prayer, and slipped down the back stairs."
"And you plodded more than twenty miles alone! Oh Zip, what a difficult thing it will be to guide you into the ways of peace!"
"They say I talks broad a bit still sometimes, and they gives me ever so much roilying. But I'd sit up all night with a cork in my mouth, if so be, I could plaize 'e, Parson."
"You must want something better than a cork, my dear"—vexed as he was, Mr. Penniloe admired the vigorous growth and high spirit of the child—"after twenty-two miles of our up and down roads. Now go to Mrs. Muggridge, but remember one thing—if you are unkind to my little Fay, how can you expect me to be kind to you?"
"Not a very lofty way for me to put it," he reflected, while Zip was being cared for in the kitchen; "but what am I to do with that strange child? If the girl is mother to the woman, she will be none of the choir Angelic, contented with duty, and hymns of repose. If 'nature maketh nadders,' as our good people say, Zippy[2] hath more of sting than sugar in her bowl."
But when the present moment thrives, and life is warm and active, and those in whom we take delight are prosperous and happy, what is there why we should not smile, and keep in tune with all around, and find the flavour of the world returning to our relish? This may not be of the noblest style of thinking, or of living; but he who would, in his little way, rather help than harm his fellows, soon finds out that it cannot be done by carping and girding at them. By intimacy with their lower parts, and rank insistence on them, one may for himself obtain some power, yielded by a hateful shame. But who esteems him, who is better for his fetid labours, who would go to him for comfort when the world is waning, who—though in his home he may be loveable—can love him?
Mr. Penniloe was not of those who mount mankind by lowering it. From year to year his influence grew, as grows a tree in the backwood age, that neither shuns nor defies the storm. Though certain persons opposed him still—as happens to every active man—there was not one of them that did not think all the others wrong in doing so. For instance Lady Waldron, when she returned with her son from Spain, thought Mrs. Fox by no means reasonable, and Mrs. Fox thought Lady Waldron anything but sensible, when either of them differed with the clergyman and the other. For verily it was a harder thing to settle all the important points concerning Nicie and Jemmy Fox, than to come to a perfect understanding in the case of Christie and Frank Gilham.