But alas! and alas! the letter was enclosed in one written by another hand, and the poor soldier’s own unfinished missive bore a postscript of a sinister kind—a deep red-brown stain.
The writer of the enclosure—an ambulance-nurse, no doubt—related how poor Jim had been so anxious for the letter to be sent that she had despatched it as it was. At his request the envelope bore Mrs. Frizzell’s name, and for her the enclosure was intended. Would she, the writer asked, break to her daughter that Gunner Barton’s wounds were of so serious a nature that it was impossible he could recover? He had been struck and fearfully shattered by some fragments of a shell—in fact, by the time his letter reached its destination he must be dead.
Martha was standing supporting herself by the table, and vainly trying to muster up courage to face Susan, when a cry from behind her made her start and look furtively round. There, on the narrow stairs, stood the girl herself, her figure unnaturally tall in its clinging white nightdress, her eyes dilated, her pale lips apart.
Not a word could the mother say. She stood clutching the papers which fluttered in her hand.
But Susie had already seen that terrible smear, and again a cry rang through the house.
“Oh, Mother! oh, Mother! you’ve done it! You’ve got your wish—he’s dead!”
And Mrs. Frizzell, darting forward, was just in time to catch her as she fell.
But a little later, after being carried back to bed with the aid of Mrs. Cross—whom Martha prudently banished on the first sign which Susie gave of “coming to”—the poor girl wept as much with gladness as with grief.
“He did love me, Mother; you see how he did love me, and he did mean to make amends. Thank God for that! Oh, thank God for that! If he hadn’t ha’ wrote you’d never ha’ believed me; but I knew—I knew! But now I shall never see his face no more.”
And then, pressing the letter to her heart, she turned and hid her face upon the pillows, refusing to be comforted.
Mrs. Frizzell went downstairs and sank into the elbow-chair.
“Lard forgive me!” she said to herself over and over again. “Good Lard, forgive me! I can scarce think I wished en dead, but I did wish for en not to come back, and I did tell so many lies that they’ve a-come true to punish I. There, my child be a-breakin’ her heart, and ’tis me as has done it.”
By-and-bye Mrs. Cross peered in again, anxious and curious.
“What did make Susan take that bad turn, I wonder?”
“Why,” returned Mrs. Frizzell, looking up with red eyes, but with an odd sense of returning self-respect—this time, at least, she was telling no untruth—“it be enough to upset her. She’ve a-had a letter from her husband, wrote afore he died: so lovin’. And it be all stained wi’ blood.”
“Dear heart alive!” groaned the other sympathetically. “Poor Mr. Griggs! They took it off en after he were dead, I suppose?”
Mrs. Frizzell’s face fell. It was hard, after all, to persevere in the path of rectitude.
“’Ees,” she said faintly. “Leastways, the nurse as sent it on said he were almost gone when she took it off en.”
“Ah-h-h!” groaned the neighbour again. “Well, we do know he be dead, Mrs. Frizzell, don’t we? seein’ as his name were in the paper, and all.”
“Oh, ’ees,” agreed Mrs. Frizzell, still more falteringly.
“And his blood was on the letter,” resumed Mrs. Cross, with a certain gruesome relish, though her eyes were full of tears. “Dear, now, I should like to see it. It ’ud be really summat to see, wouldn’t it?”
“Ah, but my poor Susan, she won’t let nobody look at it,” returned the mother in quick alarm. “She’ve a-got it under her pillow, and she’ve a-got fast hold on’t.”
“Poor young thing! Well, I can understand her feelings—p’r’aps some other day—”
“Nay, don’t think it, Mrs. Cross—don’t look for’t! Says she to I, ‘Mother, you won’t never let no stranger set eyes on this here. ’Twas meant for nobody but me,’ says she, and I do mean to keep it for myself.’ . . . And there’s another,” lamented the poor woman almost in despair.
“Oh, very well, mum; I’m sure I don’t want to put myself forrard where I bain’t wanted,” retorted Mrs. Cross in a tone of offended dignity. “But I thought I mid make so bold as to ax, seein’ as I’ve a-knowed your Susan since she were no bigger than her own blessed orphan child.”
“Nay, now, no offence. I don’t suppose, Mrs. Cross, as Susan ’ull so much as let Father see it. There now, talkin’ of the baby, would you like to look at en? I’ll fetch en in a minute; he be comin’ on finely.”
“Well, I haven’t seen en for two or three days—I couldn’t take much notice on en jist now when Susan seemed so bad,” returned Mrs. Cross, lingering in the hope of picking up a further crumb or two of information. “Ye don’t seem to take much notice on en yourself, my dear—I do scarcely ever see you nursin’ en.”
“I’ve a-been so taken up with Susan, d’ye see,” said Mrs. Frizzell, with a sudden pang of remorse.
She went upstairs for the child, and after he had been duly admired, and the visitor had withdrawn, she still sat looking down at the little placid face.
“Poor fellow!” she said to herself. “Poor fellow! Ah! I fancy he’d have been proud if he’d ha’ lived to come back an’ own ye, Baby. Dear, dear! they mid all ha’ been so happy—and all forgive an’ forgot. Ah! he were sorry enough, poor chap, and he did repent—the Lard ’ull ha’ mercy on him for that. . . . ’Ees, I can fancy he’d ha’ been proud if he could ha’ seen ye, Baby; but there, all of en as ’ull ever come back is them few lovin’ words and that dreadful spot o’ blood.”
And then Mrs. Frizzell fell to weeping again for pure pity, and kissed the little soft face of the dead soldier’s child and the tiny rings of ruddy gold which no father’s hand would ever stroke.
When John came in she conveyed the tidings to him in half-inarticulate shouts, between bursts of sobbing. The big dull man stood gazing at her for a moment in perturbed amazement, and then went, slowly and heavily, upstairs.
Susan still lay with her face hidden, and her slight frame heaving with convulsive sobs.
Her father paused in the doorway, and then came lumbering forward towards the bed, stooping when he reached it and patting the girl’s shoulder with his great horny, toil-worn hand.
“Don’t ’ee take on, Susie, my dear,” he murmured, blubbering too, poor fellow. “There, don’t ’ee cry, Maidie.”
“Nay, Father,” moaned Susan, “don’t ’ee call me that—don’t ’ee never call me that no more! I be a widow—I be a real widow now.”
“Ah, ’tis true,” murmured poor Frizzell indistinctly. “Ye be a widow, my poor maid—ye be a widow now, sure!”
* * * * *
But it was not so sure after all. As Mrs. Frizzell sometimes said, the most wonderfullest things did certainly happen in her family. Lo! no sooner was Private Griggs decently, and, as she imagined, finally interred than Gunner Barton took upon himself to return to life; and the complications which ensued were so bewildering that even Mrs. Frizzell was unable to cope with them. For, on the receipt of the letter which announced that Jim, though so seriously injured that he would be more or less of a cripple all his life, was indubitably recovering, and would in fact be shortly shipped home, Susan, hitherto so meek and broken, became utterly unmanageable.
She was about to set forth on some household errand when she met the postman, who informed her that he had a letter for her mother from abroad.
“Give it to me,” cried Susan quickly.
“’Tis for Mrs. Frizzell,” said the rural messenger in surprise; but the girl, with a flaming face, had already torn open the envelope.
In another moment she rent the air with strange cries and shrieks of joy.
All the inhabitants of the place came hastening forth to inquire the reason of the outcry, and there beheld the relict of Private Griggs, with her yellow hair streaming over her shoulders, and her face alight with a very passion of rapture, trampling on her widow’s bonnet, and brokenly telling her baby that Daddy was coming home.
Mrs. Frizzell rose to the emergency. Putting her arm round her daughter, she propelled her gently towards the house, without deigning to notice by word or look the importunate crowd.
Presently she went out, closing the door after her, and repossessed herself of the obnoxious bonnet, which a thoughtful neighbour had rescued from the dust and set upon a gatepost.
Before she could re-enter the house one or two anxious friends, who had been eagerly on the look-out for her from divers points of ambush, emerged from their respective doors.
“Summat very strange must have happened, Mrs. Frizzell, I’m sure, to make Susan behave as she did just now,” one said.
“Ah, I never did see nothing like it,” chimed in another.
“I’ve seen a man as was a bit drinky-like throw off his hat and tread on it, but never a respectable young ’ooman, same as Mrs. Griggs.”
“The poor thing didn’t know what she was a-doin’,” returned Mrs. Frizzell. “There, it be all so mixed up I do scarce know how to tell ye. We’ll know the right o’ things in a few days. It do seem now as if we’d ha’ made some mistake in thinkin’ Susie was a widow.”
“Lard, now, you don’t say so? Weren’t Private Griggs killed, then, after all? Why, we did see’s name in papers.”
“Them papers do make mistakes, though,” cried Mrs. Cross. “I did see oncet or twicet as they did say: ‘So-and-so, stated to be missin’, is now found to be dead,’ and t’other way round. This here be t’other way round, I suppose?”
“’Ees,” groaned Mrs. Frizzell, passing her band wearily over her brow. It was very much the other way round; the whole world, as it seemed to her, had turned completely topsy-turvy.
“Dear, I don’t wonder as poor Susan be half out of her mind. You don’t look so very well pleased yourself, my dear.”
“I scarce do know what I feel. I scarce can think it be true. If it bain’t true, what’s to become o’ Susan? As you do say, Mrs. Cross, she’s very near out o’ her mind now. And if it be true—there, them as wrote did say as he were so terrible bad he were bound to be crippled for life.”
“Crippled!” ejaculated both women together; and they looked at the mother aghast.
“Then,” cried Mrs. Cross, “Susan ’ull have en to keep!”
She exchanged a look of blank dismay with her companion; it was plain that in the eyes of both the calamity originally believed in—that of the honourable demise of Private Griggs—was regarded as a much less serious misfortune.
“And when do ye think ye’ll be likely to know for certain, my dear?” insinuated Mrs. Cross, with her head on one side.
“Well, they be a-sending somebody home, they do tell me, but whether it be Susan’s husband or not I can’t say. I suppose we’ll know as soon as he gets to England.”
“Ah-h-h, dear, it do seem a strange story, to be sure. And very likely when you do see en ye’ll find as it bain’t Private Griggs at all.”
“Very likely indeed,” agreed Mrs. Frizzell, with extraordinary warmth of manner, but with a sinking heart.
* * * * *
How she contrived to keep Susan from divulging the whole story to her interested neighbours was a mystery known only to the indomitable little mother herself; for the girl, in her excited state, was for doing away at once with pretence and owning the truth to all comers. It was lucky for both that the suspense was not of long duration. A few weeks after receiving the astonishing tidings of Jim Barton’s resurrection came the news that he had arrived in England, and that he had been actually sent to the temporary hospital at the Artillery Barracks in Dorchester.
And so it came to pass that one day two women appeared in the doorway of the ward in which Gunner Barton lay, and paused for a moment as though in uncertainty. Then, with a stifled cry, the younger of the two rushed forward, past the long line of beds, where, propped on pillows, were to be seen many faces pale and drawn with pain. By the side of one—the palest of all, so pale indeed that had it not been for the red-brown eyes and auburn hair it might have been called utterly colourless—she paused and fell upon her knees. She forgot that many curious eyes were bent upon her; she forgot that she was an injured woman; and that Jim, who had wronged her, was so maimed and shattered as to be in truth a very wreck of a man; she forgot everything but that he was there, and that he loved her. And so, poor little soft foolish thing, she put her arm about his neck and laid her face upon the pillow beside his, and kissed him, and murmured incoherent words of tenderness and joy.
And Jim—poor Jim, his broken frame was so weak, and his heart so torn by gladness mingled with a piercing sorrow, that he hid his face upon her shoulder and wept like a little child.
By-and-bye Susie, throwing back her shawl, disclosed the sleeping face of the babe with a kind of shrinking pride; and Jim, with his great gaunt frame still shaking with sobs, raised himself on his one serviceable elbow and looked at him long and earnestly, though his eyes were still dim.
“I’d like,” he said, “I’d like to make all square for him and you, Susan; but ’tis puzzlin’ to know what’s right. I’m just fit for nothin’, my girl; I’ll never be fit to do a hand’s turn for myself.”
“And that’s true,” put in Mrs. Frizzell, who had been standing at the foot of the bed, wiping her eyes and sniffing violently. “’Ees, poor fellow, I can see from here where they’ve a-took off your leg. I can see quite plain that it bain’t aside of the other under the clothes.”
Susie did not hear her; her face was burning as she bent it close to Jim’s.
“I’ll not mind nothin’, Jim,” she said. “I’d be only too proud and glad to work for ’ee.”
“There’d be my pension of course,” said he. “But you’re so young, Susie; you might do better p’r’aps—if ’tweren’t for the little chap here.”
He thrust out his long, feeble hand and touched the child’s soft face, his own working with emotion the while. Wife, and child, and home—all there within the grasp of those weak hands. Could he give them up? And yet to be a burden all his days to the trusting creature, of whose ignorance he had already taken shameful advantage.
“Susie,” he whispered, “you don’t know what you’re doing.”
“Nay,” she returned earnestly, “I do know it very well—I do ax but one thing, Jim.”
“And what’s that?”
“God’s blessin’,” said Susie; and stretching out her hand she pressed to his lips the finger which was encircled by the wedding-ring.
* * * * *
Mrs. Frizzell returned in the evening alone, it having been arranged that Susan was to remain in Dorchester until Jim was sufficiently recovered for the marriage to take place. She looked very worn and pale and tired as she turned in at her garden-gate, and was anything but gratified to find the alert Mrs. Cross on the watch for her.
“Well, my dear, so you’ve come back wi’out her! ’Twas the right man, then, after all?”
“’Ees,” returned Mrs. Frizzell faintly, “’twas the right man. And him and Susie be to set up house so soon as he gets a bit better.”
“Ah-h-h. Be he so bad, then, my dear?”
“Well,” said Mrs. Frizzell, putting down her basket and setting her arms akimbo, “he be that bad that he haven’t a-got but one leg, and not much use in that; and one of his arms be damaged. But Susan—dear! a body ’ud think there was nothin’ ever so j’yful in the world as the notion o’ keepin’ en.”
“Bless me! it do seem queer! She’ll find it ’ard work, won’t she, Mrs. Frizzell? I suppose he’ll want just so many victuals as if he were a sound man, and not be doin’ nothin’ to earn ’em.”
“Well, he’ve a-got a pension. There, don’t ’ee talk to me, Mrs. Cross, my dear. To tell ’ee the truth, I do scarce know what I be doin’. It bain’t what I did look for, d’ye see. The man himself—my daughter’s ’usband—he bain’t the man I did take en for.”
“Ye don’t tell me so!” ejaculated Mrs. Cross, with a dropping jaw. “In what way be he different, Martha?”
“Why,” returned Mrs. Frizzell slowly, “I d’ ’low I did tell ’ee as my daughter’s ’usband were a dark man. Well, that’s one thing as I did make a mistake about—his hair be red, Mrs. Cross.”
“Red!” repeated the other, with a gasp.
“’Ees, red,” reiterated Mrs. Frizzell, assuming a stolid expression. “That be the colour on it, Mrs. Cross.”
“Well, I am surprised. To be sure, the blessed baby’s hair’s red, too—it be easy accounted for now, bain’t it? seein’ as Private Griggs’s hair be red. I wonder how you did come to make sich a mistake, Mrs. Frizzell.”
“I wonder!” said the poor woman. “My mind were fair muddled up, I do think, and I did get a lot o’ queer notions in my head. There’s another thing now; his name bain’t Griggs.”
“Lard! you do give I quite a turn. However did you come to think it were? And what mid his name be, Mrs. Frizzell?”
Mrs. Frizzell opened her mouth, shut it again, and swallowed down what seemed to be a very unpleasant morsel; finally she said, fixing her impenetrable eyes upon her neighbour’s face—
“His name be Barton—Gunner James Barton. ’Ees, that be the name.”
“Barton!” ejaculated Mrs. Cross, in utter bewilderment; then, after a momentary pause, she continued—“It bain’t so very like Griggs, be it?”
For once Mrs. Frizzell’s lively imagination was at fault; she had no explanation to offer. “Nay,” she said feebly, “it bain’t.”
Old Joseph Frisby stood at his garden gate one fine bright evening in early spring. A dirty, disreputable-looking old vagabond was he, a frequenter of the “Pure Drop,” “The True Lovers’ Knot,” “The Three Choughs,” and every such place of entertainment within reach of his tottering old legs. This evening he was perforce sober, for he had not possessed a penny that he could call his own for several months, and the landlords of the above-named hostelries had unanimously declined to give him credit. As he stooped over the rickety gate, his lean bent old figure clad in a tattered linen coat that had once been white, and nether garments of inconceivably ancient and patched corduroy, he looked forlorn and miserable enough; there was even a certain pathos in his unwashed, unshaven face, and his small bleared eyes peered anxiously out of the network of furrows which surrounded them. Every now and then he placed his hand over his ear and turned his head as though listening, and by-and-by the long expected sound for which he had been waiting made itself heard.
The back door of the neighbouring cottage closed with a bang, and a man came quickly round the house and down the tiny flagged path through the little garden, which was already bright with primroses and double daisies, and opened a gate similar to that on which Joseph was leaning. He was a wiry elderly man, with a fresh-coloured face framed in iron-grey whiskers. His garments were very much like those worn by Frisby, except that they possessed the merit of being clean. He carried a basketful of potatoes, and a spade and fork rested on his shoulder.
“Good evenin’, neighbour,” said Joseph, straightening himself, and looking eagerly at him. “Ye be goin’ up to the ’lotments, I d’ ’low?”
“Aye,” said the other, glancing round, but without slackening his pace. “I’m off to the ’lotments—pretty late, too; I must hurry.”
“Nay now, bide a bit; I want to speak to ye a minute, Jim. Lard! I’ve waited here nigh upon an hour.”
“Oh, an’ did ye?” said the man called Jim, coming unwillingly back.
“Aye. Ye see ’tis this way. Neighbour Cross, I haven’t touched a drap this three months, very near.”
“Han’t ye? Well, I’m glad on’t. I’m teetottle myself, an’ ’tis the only way to get along, I do believe. I’m truly glad to hear ye han’t had no drunks lately, Joe. Now that ye say so I do call to mind noticin’ that ye’ve been a-walkin’ uncommon straight—aye, ’tis quite a while since you was found in a ditch, ’tis sure, and ye haven’t been run in not this year, I don’t think.”
“Aye,” agreed Joseph, with modest pride. “Ye’re quite right, Jim; I haven’t been run in this year.”
He paused, rubbing his hands slowly together, and eyeing the well-filled basket of “sets”.
“We’re gettin’ help from the parish now,” he resumed, “else we couldn’t make out at all. My pore wife, ye see, she’s reg’lar crippled, an’ not able to do nothin’, an’ I’m not fit for much—I’m falterin’, neighbour, an’ farmers hereabouts has a bad opinion o’ me for some raison or another—I can scarcely ever get a day’s work.”
“’Tis very onfart’nate for ’ee, Joe; ’tis that. But yer luck will change very like. We must ’ope it will. Well, I must be gettin’ along.”
“Ye be goin’ to plant yer taters,” persisted Joseph; and stretching out his lean old hand he took hold of the basket. “Them be real fine taters, neighbour; chock-full of eyes. Lard! if I had but a few of these I’d soon plant my bit of garden.”
“Haven’t ye got none this year?” inquired Jim, visibly stiffening.
“Not a single one, an’ no cabbage neither. I’m terribly badly off this year—I don’t know however me an’ the poor body inside ’ll get on. Not a bit o’ green stuff, an’ not a set to put in the ground. Three-an’-six a week is every penny we have to look to, an’ ye may think it don’t go very far. Bread an’ tea, bread an’ tea, an’ not so much as a drop o’ milk to’t. My missus, she’s that cute along o’ me likin’ a drap now and then, she wouldn’t let the Union folk give it us in money—we jest hev an order for half a pound o’ tea once a week, an’ we takes out the rest in bread. Ah dear! a body has to be clever to live on it, I can tell ’ee.”
He paused, leered insinuatingly in his neighbour’s face, and finally murmured, still fingering the basket: “If ye was to let me have a few of these now, neighbour, I could pay ye back i’ th’ autumn.”
Jim dexterously twisted his property away from the trembling hand.
“So that’s what ye’re at!” he cried. “Nay, nay, Joe; I’ve had enough o’ your payin’ back. I know what that manes. You an’ yer missus ’ud make yer dinner off ’em, if ye didn’t chop the lot for a drink straight off.”
“No, no,” pleaded Joe, almost tearfully; “’tis too bad to say such things, and take a pore man’s character away. I’ll gi’e ye me Bible oath—dang me, an’ everythin’ reg’lar by the Book—that I’d put ’em straight in the ground, Jim Cross.”
“Well, I can’t spare the taters, anyhow,” grumbled Jim. “I’m a pore man an’ have to purvide for mysel’ an’ my family. I’m sorry I can’t obleege ye, but so ’tis.”
He walked off, leaving poor old Joe staring blankly after him.
By and by a light quick tread was heard approaching from the opposite direction, and a dapper-looking young fellow rounded the corner of the lane, whistling to himself as he advanced. He, too, carried a fork, and a half-filled sack was flung over his shoulder.
“Goin’ up to the ’lotments?” inquired Joseph falteringly.
“Yes, I’ve jest knocked off work, an’ am goin’ up there for an hour or two before dark. Fine evenin’, Mr. Frisby.”
“Aye, sure,” said Joseph. “Ye’ve got a grand sackful there, Jan.”
“’Tis a big piece to fill up, Mr. Frisby. We han’t got above half enough o’ our own. We’ll have to buy some.”
“I haven’t got one to put in my bit o’ ground,” said Joseph impressively. “What do ye think of that, Jan Domeny? Not one; no, nor not so much as a stalk o’ cabbage.”
“Well now,” said Jan, “’tis very sad, that, Mr. Frisby. A sorrowful tale, indeed. May-hap Parson ’ud help ye.”
“Nay,” returned Joseph lugubriously; “we be chapel folk, an’ Parson he says he han’t got no faith in me.”
“Well, ’tis terrible onfart’nate for ’ee, I’m sure,” returned Mr. Domeny unconcernedly. “But bad times can’t laist for ever. There’s comfort in that, Mr. Frisby. The Lard trumpets the wind to the sore lamb, as Scriptur’ says.”
Having delivered himself of this edifying aphorism, young Jan Domeny hoisted his sack a little higher up on his shoulder, and strode on.
“They be all alike,” muttered Joe to himself; “they be a stony-hearted lot. Not one among ’em ’ud gi’e a man a helpin’ hand. Dang ’em all!” cried Joe, and he thumped upon the gate.
He turned and shuffled slowly towards the house, pushing open the door. A little old woman was sitting, propped up by pillows, in an armchair near the hearth. She was almost crippled by rheumatism, yet managed in some inexplicable way to preserve a tolerable appearance of neatness and cleanliness, both in her own person and in such of her surroundings as came within reach of her poor distorted fingers. The hearth was tidy, for instance, and the kitchen utensils and crockery on the little dresser behind her chair were bright and clean. It must be supposed that her husband, who would have been much the better for a share of her attention, kept himself systematically out of reach.
“Well?” she inquired, eagerly looking up as he entered.
“Well, ’tain’t a bit o’ use. They’ll none o’ them do a thing for me.”
Mrs. Frisby sighed. “Come, sit down anyhow,” she said. “Supper’s ready, an’ the tea’s drawed beautiful.”
Joe shambled over and sat down. His wife, leaning painfully forward in her chair, moved the little brown teapot from the hob to the table, and then, stooping again with yet more difficulty, took up a plateful of dry toast and proffered it to the old man.
“There!” she said. “I made ye that for a bit of a change. The fire was burnin’ up so clear an’ nice, I jest thought I’d do it. ’Twill be a nice change for ’ee, Joseph—’twill sure.”
She spoke in a high quavering voice, peering anxiously the while at her spouse.
He took a piece of toast and turned it over; then broke off a bit and flung it on the table.
“’Tis as hard as flint, woman,” he said indignantly. “Where d’ye think I can find teeth to bite en?”
“Nay now, ’tis not so ’ard as that comes to,” urged she. “I can bite en, an’ I han’t got a single tooth left. Sop it in yer tea, do ’ee now, an’ it’ll slip down nice.”
“Slip down, indeed! It ’ud want a bit o’ butter, or a bit o’ graise for that. But here us be—two old ancient folks as has lived in this parish man an’ wife for fifty-two year, an’ they’ll not so much as gi’e us a tater.”
“Yes a tater ’ud be nice, sure,” quavered the old woman. “It ’ud be very nice.”
“Or a bit o’ green stuff ’ud be nice,” went on Frisby emphatically. “I could eat this bread if they’d gi’e I a bit o’ green to put to’t. But no, ’tis ‘Go away, I’ve nothin’ for ’ee’ all round. There’s every man an’ bwoy in the place workin’ up at the ’lotments, gettin’ the taters into the ground as fast as ever they can stick ’em. If they was to gi’e us half a dozen each they’d never miss it, an’ I could get my bit ’o ground planted up. But no, they be all took up wi’ theirselves—never a thought for we.”
Mrs. Frisby rubbed her shrivelled hands together, and sighed.
“Ah, ’tis hard,” she said; “’tis hard, sure.”
And then silence fell between the old couple, and each consumed their meagre fare without any great appearance of appetite.
Presently Joseph set down his cup, pushed back his chair, and stood up.
“Where be goin’?” asked his wife querulously. “I never seed such a fidget of a man.”
“I’m goin’ up to the ’lotments,” he responded curtly.
“Laive me a pail o’ water first, do, so as I can be washin’ up. I reckoned ye’d ha’ helped me a bit to-night—rheumatics is terrible bad.”
Joseph took up the pail without a word and went out; presently an excruciating creaking and squeaking was heard as he turned the rusty handle of the windlass.
After some time he hobbled back, the water splashing from the overflowing bucket at every step.
“Dear! what a mess the man d’ make!” groaned Mrs. Frisby. “Carry it studdy, for the Lard’s sake. Now sit down, do ’ee, an’ gi’e me a hand.”
“Nay, I’m off,” responded her lord in surly tones; and in another moment the garden gate creaked on its hinges, and his departing steps fell heavily on the lane outside.
This somewhat circuitous path led first past a horse-pond, then skirted the beautifully kept churchyard, with the ancient, ivy-grown edifice in the centre. Then it darted off at an abrupt angle, apparently to avoid encroaching on the farm premises in the rear of the church, where the picturesque building which had once been a tithe-barn was now devoted to humbler purposes. The lane ceased at its junction with the high road, but crossing the latter, and following the footpath for a little way, Joseph came to another lane which, after a few hundred yards, became a steep ascent.
The blackthorn was still in flower here and there in the hedges, which accounted, as the country folk would have said, for the peculiarly keen and chilly quality of the evening blast; but the twisted twigs of the more genial hawthorn were powdered, as it were, with a delicate dust of green. Trailing tendrils of honeysuckle were already in full leaf, and young saplings of elder stretched out slender bare limbs tufted at the ends with crimson. Downy catkins, moreover, on many a willow bough gave further promise of the rapid approach of the “Sweet o’ the Year;” and there were violets in the banks, and here and there a patch of primroses; and a glory of dandelions everywhere.
But poor old Joe Frisby, as he toiled painfully up the stony incline, had no eye for any of these trivialities; his mind was set upon more weighty matters—he was bent, indeed, upon nothing less important than an appeal to the community at large. Singly the neighbours had rejected and despised his petition; taken collectively they might, for very shame’s sake, be moved to grant it. No man, as Joseph dimly felt, likes his individual generosity to be overmuch counted upon; but a whole community—each member making quite sure that his neighbour does as much as he—may sometimes be persuaded to accede to a claim which all alike acknowledge.
Now voices fell upon his ear, accompanied by the sound of spades at work. An opening in the hedge revealed a gate towards which Joseph made his way. On the other side lay the allotments; narrow strips of ground, most of which were already broken up into brown ridges, while a few were still encumbered with the lingering stalks of last year’s cabbages, or an untidy growth of weeds. On this propitious evening the place seemed alive with men and women; some delving, some hoeing, some cutting up the “sets”—not a patch of ground but had its occupant. Every one was busy and every one seemed merry. Jan Domeny, with coat flung off and shirt-sleeves rolled high, was lustily chanting a three-year-old music-hall ditty, which had just found its way to Dorset. Further away the bent back of Jim Cross formed a moving arch against the sky-line; a grandchild had joined him, and was trotting along beside him carrying the basket of potatoes.
Joseph stood leaning over the gate for a little while, his eyes travelling slowly from one group to another; after long hesitation he passed in and walked deliberately up the grassy track which divided two batches of the allotments. Many of the workers looked up a moment with a word or nod of recognition, and Joseph nodded back, paused as if to speak, hesitated, and then went on. At last he reached the centre of the ground, and there came to a halt. He took off his battered hat, flourished it to attract attention, and began, pitching his quavering voice as high as he could:—
“Neighbours all, I’ve summat to say to ’ee.”
“Hello!” cried the man nearest to him, straightening himself and staring. “Here’s old Joe Frisby turned Methody praicher.”
“Nay, he’ve a-jined the Salvation Army, sure,” cried another, who was himself a regular subscriber to the “War Cry”.
“I know what he’s after,” muttered Jan, working away very diligently. “Don’t you take no heed, none of you.”
“I’ve been countin’ of ye up,” pursued Joseph, leaning on his stick and looking nervously round. “Here be twenty chaps workin’ in the ’lotments; aye, twenty chaps, not reckonin’ women and childern, an’ ye be all puttin’ in taters. An’ here am I wi’ my garden at home waitin’ to be planted, an’ not a bit o’ seed to put in it.”
“I telled ’ee, didn’t I?” muttered Jan to his nearest neighbour. “I knowed ’twas that he was at.”
“I’ve lived among ye man and bwoy for seventy-five year. Aye, an’ my wife an’ me has been wed among ye fifty-two year. There she d’ sit at home crippled, poor soul. We’ve nought in the world but what parish gives us. Half a pound o’ tea a week, an’ some bread. Bread an’ tea, neighbours, bread an’ tea; ’tisn’t very satisfyin’ to the innards. Me an’ my wife was never great folks for mate, but we d’ like a tater to our dinner, or a bit o’ green stuff. An’ so I’ve a-bin thinkin’—”
He looked round again, hesitatingly and pitifully.
“’Tis a mortal sight o’ taters as is here among ye between one an’ another—aye, a mortal lot. I d’ ’low”—again the pause and the appealing glance—“if every man ’ud spare me a few like I’d get two or three ranks made up without any of ye bein’ at much loss.”
The bystanders looked at each other, then each man glanced involuntarily at his own store. None of them were over well endowed with this world’s goods, and the calculations of each had been made to a nicety. Old Jim Cross continued to work without turning his head, and Jan Domeny smiled somewhat sarcastically.
“Why, ye see ’tis this way, Joseph,” said a large mild man, with an habitually puzzled expression of countenance; “we be pore folks, all on us; we’ve a many little mouths to feed, an’ not much to put in ’em. An’ what wi’ prices goin’ up an’ rent day a-comin’ round so often like, a man’s hand d’ seem to be always in his pocket, an’ it’s give, give, an’ pay, pay, ever an’ always, d’ye see? Now my taters,” he cast a calculating eye upon the half-filled sack at his feet, “they’ll not go so far to make up three ranks for ourselves, an’ three ranks is the least we can do wi’. Aye, wi’ a houseful of growin’ childern taters d’ last—well, I mid say they lasses next to no time.”
His hearers drew a long breath of relief. If Ed’ard Boyt, who was well known to be a poor man with a long family, had been imprudently generous, what might not be expected of other folks who might be supposed better able to afford him assistance?
“Aye, ’tis very true what Ed’ard says. Charity d’ begin at home. It ’ud seem a bit ’ard to go a-buyin’ for oneself along of helpin’ a neighbour,” said somebody.
“Aye, I d’ ’low ’tis true,” agreed another.
“True enough, sure!” chimed in a third.
“We be sarry for ’ee,” summed up a fourth; “aye, we be very sarry for ’ee, Joseph, but ’tis the onfart’nate natur’ o’ things as pore folks d’ have to do the best they can.”
Then, amid a general chorus of regretful approval, spades were plied, and backs were bent as before.
Joe shambled back to the gate again, and stood for some time leaning over it and staring at the toilers. His face was very red, and his loose irregular under-lip trembled. A few furtive glances were cast in his direction, but no one spoke, and after a time he turned and went down the lane again, his bent form, clad in its shabby white coat, travelling slowly past gap after gap in the hedge until it drifted out of the range of vision of the workers. As he walked, however, his heart was hot within him with rage and disappointment and a bitter sense of injustice.
“They’ll lave me to starve,” he said to himself; “an’ I’ve a-lived among ’em for seventy-five year.”
His sense of injury deepened each time that he recalled this fact, and he shook his head vengefully.
As he tottered on his resentment gradually suggested to him a startling plan of action. He thought of it all the way down the lane and across the road, and along by the tithe-barn and the church, and by the time he came to the horse-pond his mind was made up.
“A man must live,” he said. “If other folks won’t help en he must help hisself.”
There was a fine moon that night, and had any one been abroad an hour or so after midnight, he would have marked a white shape creeping slowly up the lane which led to the allotments, and presently entering in at the gate already described, and moving from one newly planted patch of ground to another.
“Only three from Ed’ard because he’ve a-spoke me fair,” murmured Joseph to himself; “an’ I’ll not take ’em altogether, neither. I wouldn’t lave the pore chap wi’ a great gap in the rank.”
Joseph dropped something carefully into the sack which he carried over his arm, and then he drew together the disturbed clods and patted them down. Then waddling along with his legs across the drill he cautiously removed another “set,” and then another.
“That’ll do for Ed’ard,” he muttered. “’Tis for feedin’ the pore, so the Lard’ll make it up to en. Now, Jan, I’ll take a good few from ’ee, because ye be a danged ’ard-’arted chap. An’ I don’t care where I d’ take ’em, nor if it do make gaps—nay, that I don’t. Ye’ve a-sowed, an’ ye’ve a-watered, so to speak, Jan, but I d’ ’low that it’ll sarve ’ee right if the Lard don’t give ’ee no increase.”
He unearthed the “sets,” taking every precaution, however, to make the ground look undisturbed. He went the rounds, in fact, till his sack was nearly full, and then beat a retreat, carrying home his booty unobserved.
It chanced that Jim Cross, waking with the dawn, fancied he heard the sound of a spade in the next garden. On his way to work, a little later on, he observed that a goodly portion of Joseph’s patch of ground was indeed freshly dug up. Joseph was standing by the gate as usual, and nodded affably as his neighbour passed.
“I see ye’ve a-bin diggin’,” remarked Jim, pausing with a surprised expression. “Looks as if ye was a-gettin’ the ground ready for taters.”
“Well, an’ maybe I am a-gettin’ the ground ready for taters,” returned Joseph warmly. “I puts my trust where trust be due. My fellow-creatur’s have a-turned their backs on me, so I looks to the Lard. Aye,” repeated Joseph, turning up his eyes piously, “I looks to the Lard for ’elp, Jim Cross. The Lard’ll purvide.”
Jim was much impressed.
“I’ve put me trust in Providence,” pursued Joseph, peering at him cautiously out of the corner of his eye; “and to show as I’ve a-put my trust in Providence, I’m a-gettin’ ready my bit o’ ground. When the Lard sends me them taters, neighbour, he’ll find I ready.”
Jim looked hard at him, and Joseph folded his arms and looked back steadily and mildly.
“I don’t bear ’ee no grudge, Jim,” he went on. “I don’t bear nobody no grudge, but I do put my trust in the Lard.”
Jim went on his way, scratching his head from time to time, and casting back sundry furtive glances at his neighbour, who suddenly appeared to him in a new and impressive light.
When he disappeared Joseph went back to his digging, his countenance still wearing an expression of aggrieved virtue. After much pondering on his own conduct, and the circumstances which had led up to it, he had come to look upon himself rather in the light of a martyr, and to consider his recent action not only justifiable, but in a certain sense inspired. He was, therefore, scarcely surprised when, late that evening, Jim Cross came up to him with a deprecating air.
“Me an’ a few of ’em yonder have been a-talkin’ about you, Joseph,” he remarked.
“Have ye?” responded Joseph, with an air of lordly unconcern.
“Aye. We was sayin’ it did seem a bit ’ard to disapp’int ’ee like, when you was so trustful an’ patient, so we agreed as we’d try an’ spare ’ee a few ‘sets’ between us. As I did say, the Lard’ll make it up to we; an’ I d’ think He will, neighbour.”
“He will, sure,” agreed Joseph solemnly, as he held out his grimy hand for the basket which Jim respectfully tendered him.
Next came Ed’ard Boyt with a small, a very small bagful, but a heart overflowing with good-will. Joseph thanked him for his contribution almost with the air of one bestowing a benediction.
“’Tis very well done of ’ee, Ed’ard; an’ ye’ll not be no loser. Nay, you’ll see how things ’ll turn out wi’ ye.”
One after another they came, ending with Jan Domeny, whom Frisby received a little distantly, but on the whole forgivingly.
“’Tis but a pore lot as ye’ve brought me, Jan. I d’ ’low as Ed’ard Boyt have done better nor you. Aye, he’ve done very well for he, such a pore man as he be, an’ such a long fam’ly as he have.”
“Why, we’ve a-had to buy, Mr. Frisby,” returned Jan apologetically. “But there, I’ll see if we can spare a few more, an’ fetch ’em round to-morrow.”
“To-morrow ’ll do very well,” agreed Joseph generously; and so they parted.
Then Frisby fell to work with a joyful heart, setting out first of all the potatoes which he had purloined, and which he had originally designed to plant surreptitiously by night, intending, when the first shoots made their appearance, to assure his neighbours that they had sprung miraculously from the ground. This was better: moreover the second edition of “sets” was much larger than the first, and he now found himself in a position to stock his entire garden.
“The Lard ’elps them as ’elps theirselves,” he said to himself once more, as he waded solemnly up and down the drills.
From that day forward Joseph Frisby was respected by all the village folk. He had “got religion,” to begin with—more religion than anybody had credited him with, and he had evidently been singled out by Heaven for special favours. His crop prospered wonderfully; people were quite amazed to see the marvellous return made by their contributions, and were the more astonished because other small producers had not found it such a very good year for taters. There were many gaps among the ranks at the allotments, and it was noticeable that Jan Domeny, in particular, had suffered severely.
No one was more loud in commiserating this misfortune than Joseph Frisby.
“The ways of Providence be wonderful, as the Scriptur’s say, Jan Domeny,” he remarked one day. “Aye, ’tis what I often d’ say to myself: a man may plant and a man may water, but ’tis the Lard as gives the increase.”
“Well,” returned Jan, a little grudgingly, “I d’ ’low that He’ve a-gi’ed it to you, Mr. Frisby.”
“He have, Jan; He have!” agreed Joseph heartily.
A little group of houses nestling in the hollow near the church, about half a mile from the village proper; all with tiled roofs more or less the worse for wear, and in consequence highly picturesque, tiny patches of flower-garden in front, and larger strips, devoted to vegetables, in the rear. Some of these cottages stood back to back, others retired a little from their fellows, and one shot out at a bold angle from its neighbour with a certain independent air which was increased by the rakish poise of its somewhat dilapidated chimney.
As the hands of the ancient grandfather’s clock in this last-named dwelling-house approached the hour of noon, a short, spare, elderly woman threw open the door and took up her position on the carefully whitened step. She looked expectantly up the road in the direction of the village, and of the town beyond.
Presently another couple of doors were thrown back, and two additional figures—the figures of Mrs. Stuckhey’s nearest neighbours—also emerged into the open and cast glances of anticipation in the same direction.
The coincidence seemed to strike one of the party, a fat woman with a good-humoured face and untidy wisps of greyish hair escaping from the control of the solitary and crooked brass hairpin which was supposed to keep them in their place.
“We be all on the look-out, we mid say,” she remarked. “I be awaitin’ for the childern. ’Tis time they were home from school. I have to send David on a message before he goes back after dinner.”
“My son d’ seen to be a bit late too,” chimed in the lady whose doorstep was parallel to that of the last speaker; a somewhat vixenish-looking person this, with a pinched and pointed nose, and a sour mouth that seldom smiled. “He be kept awful busy up at the line,” she continued fretfully. “He do seem to work twice so hard as he did since that there old war began. I d’ wish it was ended, that I do.”
“There’s more than you wishes that, Mrs. Woolridge,” said the owner of the independent house, folding her arms and holding up her head with a certain assumption of dignity. “Them that has friends out there—them that has sons out there, they be the folks as wish the war was well over; and they do do it, Mrs. Woolridge—I d’ ’low they do.”
“An’ so they may,” retorted Mrs. Woolridge acidly. “I’m sure I can’t think what ever makes folks go to be soldiers! I wouldn’t have my son a soldier—no, not if he was to go down on his bended knees I wouldn’t agree.”
“Well, I don’t go so far as that,” returned Mrs. Stuckhey. “It d’ seem a bit hard, I d’ ’low, to part wi’ ’em; but ’tis a fine thing for to serve Queen and country, and I d’ feel so to speak proud o’ my Joe. E-es, I mid say I am proud of him! It’s summat, after all, to think as he’s the only soldier in the place—the only soldier in Riverton.”
“An’ a good job too,” retorted Mrs. Woolridge; “I’m glad there bain’t no more on ’em. If there wasn’t no soldiers there wouldn’t be no wars; and to my mind wars is wicked things—reg’lar flying in the face o’ Providence.”
“Nay, now,” put in good-natured Mrs. Blanchard, “I’m sure everybody, high and low, the gentry and sich as we together, all d’ seem to think the world o’ the soldiers. And it be quite natural as you should feel a bit proud, Mrs. Stuckhey, my dear, seeing as your son is the only soldier as comes fro’ this here village. Why, we was a-prayin’ for the soldiers to-week, Mrs. Woolridge, so I can’t think as war can be anyways wicked.”
“E-es, indeed,” agreed Susan Stuckhey, addressing herself pointedly to the last speaker, for she had been somewhat hurt by Mrs. Woolridge’s remarks. “I d’ ’low I could very near ha’ cried o’ Sunday, when the service was gi’ed out for the soldiers, seein’ as all the prayers in this place was a-goin’ up for my Joe. I went round to the rectory afterwards, and I did thank the Reverend. ‘’Tis very kind o’ ye, I’m sure, sir,’ says I, ‘to take so much trouble for my son.’ ‘What trouble, Susan?’ says he, looking a bit dazy like. ‘Why, the service, sir,’ says I. ‘All the long prayers, and the collect, and all—for our soldiers, you know. My Joe be the only soldier from Riverton.’ So now when he do meet me he do al’ays ax, ‘Any noos, Susan, from our only soldier?’ That reminds me, postman be late to-day, bain’t he? The mail do come in from abroad to-day, d’ye see, and I’m on the look-out for a letter.”
Mrs. Blanchard and Mrs. Stuckhey craned their heads once more, peering anxiously up the road; but Mrs. Woolridge remained ostentatiously immovable.
“I thought that was what fetched you out,” she remarked ungraciously. “I suppose you’ll ’low as postmen be o’ some use. It d’ seem to me as they d’ serve their country just so well as soldiers; and there’s others as serves their country too. I reckon as my son Robert d’ serve his country better nor any soldier. What ’ud the country do wi’out trains?”
Mrs. Stuckhey smiled pityingly, and replied in a tone of dignified amusement, “They be useful too, no doubt, in their way; but ye’ll hear different to your notion, Mrs. Woolridge. ‘Soldiers of the Queen,’ you know: they stand high, d’ye see—more partic’lar jest now. ‘Your country’s love to you!’—nobody wouldn’t go for to say that to a postman, would they now? nor yet to a man what was workin’ on the line.”
“And that’s true,” agreed Mrs. Blanchard.
Mrs. Woolridge tossed her head.
“Well, I think there’s a deal too much fuss made about them soldiers,” she said—“not meanin’ your son in partic’lar, Mrs. Stuckhey, but the lot of ’em; and I can’t think as the Lard’s blessin’ can rest on this here war. It d’ stand to reason as it can’t—sendin’ up the price o’ everythin’, and makin’ it so hard for the poor to live. Why, the very price o’ coal be doubled very near. Don’t tell me as the A’mighty can approve o’ that.”
A faint colour overspread the sallow cheek of the soldier’s mother, and there is no knowing how severe might have been her retort had not the long-expected form of the one-armed postman chanced to round the corner at this juncture, escorted by some five or six juvenile Blanchards.
As he drew near he was observed to fumble in his bag, and presently halted before the group of matrons, his face wreathed with smiles.
“I’ve got summat for ’ee to-day, Mrs. Stuckhey. Noos fro’ the front; a letter fro’ the soldier.”
“Ah!” exclaimed Susan, and her small black eyes twinkled as she thrust forward an eager hand.
The postman detached one letter from the packet which he drew forth from his bag, and, after it had passed from his possession, proceeded to tighten the string which was tied round the remainder, his teeth coming very deftly to the assistance of his fingers.
“He be with Buller, bain’t he?” he inquired, casting a sidelong glance at the mother as she hastily unfastened the envelope.
“E-es, he’s wi’ Mr. Buller,” corrected Mrs. Stuckhey.
“Mr. Buller! Be that what ye d’ call him?” and the postman’s keen eyes twinkled.
“Well, it do seem more respectful like for I. Joe, he do say the General; but it seems more natural for me to say Mr. Buller.”
“I thought it was Lord Buller,” observed Mrs. Blanchard doubtfully.
“Well, never mind; Buller’s enough for I,” said the postman. “Does your son chance to say if they’re pretty near Ladysmith now?”
His much-frayed string seemed somewhat knotted, and opportunities of hearing news direct from the front were sufficiently rare to justify a little extra care in disentangling it.
Mrs. Stuckhey drew forth and unfolded the missive, and her audience duly composed themselves. Even Mrs. Woolridge was conscious of a certain unwilling interest which she endeavoured to disguise by an attitude of indifference—head thrown back, nose screwed up, hands planted negligently on hips.
This was merely the formula by which Soldier Joe, who was a person of some education, considered it necessary to inaugurate his letters; and the information which it ostensibly conveyed was not intended to be taken literally, as was proved by the fact that on one occasion this conventional statement had been immediately followed by the announcement that he was wounded and in hospital.
“I have got Back to the front Again and we are going to make another start for Ladysmith before long.”
“Why, I thought they was close to Ladysmith by now,” interrupted the postman. “The papers said yesterday they was but eight mile away.”
“Ah, you can’t trust them papers,” said Mrs. Blanchard in a tone of conviction. “They do exaggerate, them papers; they just prints a lot o’ lies in ’em to make ’em sell.”
“Very like your son have made a mistake,” observed Mrs. Woolridge loftily. “Joe, he’s but young.”
“Well, it stands to reason as them that’s on the spot must know better what’s goin’ on nor them that’s miles an’ miles away,” retorted Mrs. Stuckhey with some heat. “This here noos comes direct.”
It did not seem to occur to any one that the tidings in question were three weeks old.
She fell to the reading of her letter again, spelling out the words slowly, and running the sentences one into another; indeed it might have been a little difficult to do otherwise, for Joe used capital letters impartially, and absolutely disdained stops.
“You may bet there won’t be no turning Back this time I hope you are saving the Papers for me and I hope when Ladysmith is Relieved you will hang out a Flag and give us Three cheers we deserve it I can Tell you dear Mother when the bullets are whistling round you it is not exactly Pleasant but they don’t like the cold Steel and I hope we shall get near enough to give them that I should like a Dig at the man what shot me give my best Love to Maria and Jane I Fancy you was all thinking of me on Christmas day I hope you had Roast beef and enjoyed yourselves we had only a Dirty old stew in hospital it will be a Good day when I come home you must have a Ox ready and as many spuds as would grow in the garden for two or three years dear Mother I think there is no more this time give my love to all friends and don’t Forget the Flag.
“From your loving son,
“Joseph Stuckhey.”
“Ah!” commented the mother, wiping her eyes, “I d’ ’low we did think o’ him on Christmas Day. Maria—that’s my maid what’s in service at Bourne—she were here for her holiday; and Jane, my married daughter, you know, she come over wi’ her husband and childern. We’d ha’ been a merry party if Joe’d been here; but we did talk of him a’most wi’ every mouthful.”
The postman finished tying the last knot, and slung his bag round under his empty sleeve.
“I must be getting on,” he said. He would repeat items from Joe Stuckhey’s letter in the various villages through which he passed in making his round.
“Well, to be sure, ’tis nice to hear direct,” observed Mrs. Blanchard, slowly backing into her house, and almost tumbling over two of three of her offspring as she did so.
Mrs. Woolridge sniffed, scratched her elbows with an absent air, cast another frowning glance up the road, and finding her son was not in sight betook herself indoors.
The soldier’s mother went in too, sat down to her dinner—a cold one, for, being a washerwoman by profession, Monday was a busy day with her, and she would not waste time even in boiling herself a “spud” or two. She spread out Joe’s letter on the table and meditated over it while she ate.
“I’ll get a flag,” she said to herself. “E-es, I must get a little flag. And when my Joe do come back he shall have as good a bit of roast beef as I can buy, bless him!”
As she went about her work that day her gaze wandered, even more frequently than usual, to Joe’s portrait, which hung in a prominent position over the mantelpiece. This work of art had been presented by the young soldier to his mother soon after he had enlisted. He had not spared expense, and the result, though somewhat wooden in attitude and uneasy in expression, was eminently satisfactory to her.
While she wrung out her clothes or hung them on the line she crooned to herself the refrain of the popular ditty, “Tommy Atkins,” altering the name of the hero to suit her own taste:—
“Oh-h, Joey, Joey Stuckhey,
You’re a good one, heart and hand,
You’re a credit to your country,
And to all your native land.
May your luck be never-failing,
May your love be ever true—
“And that it will, I’ll be bound; there never were a more lovin’ lad. How he did hug I, to be sure, afore he left last time.”
It will be observed that Susan’s reading of the line was not quite the same as that intended by the author of the song. She wiped her eyes, sighed, and resumed with renewed energy:—
“May your luck be never-failing,
May your love be ever true.
God bless you, Joey Stuckhey,
Here’s your country’s lo-o-o-o-ve to you!”
She threw so much expression into the last line that the word love expanded into a polysyllable.
A few days later news flew round the parish that Ladysmith had actually been relieved; the authority vouched for being no less than that of her Majesty the Queen. The baker brought the news to Riverton. His eyes appeared ready to jump from his head with excitement as he made the announcement.
“You’ll be hearin’ bells a-ringin’ to-night,” he said. “Ah, they be runnin’ up flags all over the place a’ready. And they do say as they be a-goin’ to ’luminate.”
“Flags!” ejaculated Mrs. Stuckhey. “I must get a flag at once. I’ll start so soon as I’ve a-had my tea. I wish I’d a-got it afore; but my son—him that’s the only soldier here, you know, baker—he did say when he last wrote as they was but startin’ to relieve Ladysmith.”
“I can scarce believe as the noos be true,” observed pessimistic Mrs. Woolridge. “I wouldn’t be in too great a hurry to get that flag if I was you.”
“Well, I should think the Queen ought to know,” retorted her neighbour with spirit. “I’m a-goin’ to get it, anyhow.”
“I’ll go along with ’ee, my dear,” cried Mrs. Blanchard, who was always ready for an outing. “I can’t afford no flags myself, but I’m sure I wish ’ee well, an’ am pleased at your son’s success. I’ve only got to give the childern their tea, and clean me a bit, and put on bonnet and shawl, and I’ll be ready.”
The baker’s cart jolted away and the two women hastened indoors. It took Mrs. Blanchard some time to complete her preparations, and it was past six o’clock by the time they reached the little town.
The market-place presented an unusually gay appearance: bunting floated from the church tower, the Corn Exchange, and all the principal buildings; rows of light were already appearing in many of the windows; groups of people stood about, laughing, talking, singing; many of them cheered as newcomers arrived upon the scene and were told the news.
Mrs. Stuckhey and her friend, having purchased the flag, attached themselves to one of the groups in question, and heard how the tidings had first come “down the line,” and how, subsequently, a telegram had arrived at the Royal George. Mrs. Stuckhey was in the act of expatiating on the information conveyed in her son’s letter when, with a mighty clang, the bells rang out.
“They’re at it,” cried a man, detaching himself from the knot of people the better to flourish his hat. “Three cheers for Buller and White. Hip—hip—hip—”
“Hurray!” roared the crowd.
Cling, cling, clang! chimed the bells.
Then all at once, no one knew how, the merry-making ceased, the cheerful jangling came to an end, the ringers loosing the ropes so suddenly that the bells continued to swing for some little time longer, sending forth occasional slow faint notes of most funereal sound. As anxious glances sought the church tower the flag was seen to have disappeared; moreover, it was observed that the kindred trophy which had proudly surmounted the Corn Exchange was being hauled down. What had happened—what was wrong?
The disappointing news soon flew from mouth to mouth: it was all a mistake. Ladysmith was not relieved after all. Someone had just telegraphed from London to say that there was no foundation for the report. The War Office had, in fact, declared it to be false.
“’Tis my belief as that there War Office don’t know so very much,” remarked Mrs. Stuckhey, indignant in her disappointment. “When my son Joe was wounded they did send me a very nice letter, to be sure—Lord Lansdowne I believe it was from, and a beautiful hand his lordship do write—but he didn’t tell I nothin’ about it—not whether ’twas in his arm, or leg, or nowhere in partic’lar. So there, I just sent him a telegraft to ax how my son were, and he never took no notice. Don’t ’ee tell I as he knows what’s going forrard better nor the Queen.”
“Well, but they do say now as the Queen didn’t say nothin’,” said somebody ruefully.
The lights were being blown out, the flags removed; people were returning homewards. Mrs. Stuckhey, still unconvinced and irate, was constrained to follow their example, clutching her little sixpenny flag in its paper wrapper.
“Lard! how awful molloncolly that there bell do sound,” groaned Mrs. Blanchard dolefully. “Dear, to be sure, a body mid think as it were tollin’ for a funeral.”
“There, my dear, don’t ’ee talk so foolish,” responded Susan with some acerbity. “’Tis but the ringers as has left the ropes a-swingin’. I should be ashamed, Mary Blanchard, to go a-givin’ way like that, and you with all them childern, as ought to know better.”
“I be that nervish, d’ye see. Lard, I do feel shaky all over. I have a kind o’ porsentiment as summat have a-happened—that I have, and I can’t say no different, Mrs. Stuckhey, not if it be to please you.”
At this moment the pair were overtaken by a stout, elderly man, who, recognising them as he passed, turned to greet the person whom the news might be supposed to concern most nearly.