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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/36115-0.txt b/36115-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..e2e3dab --- /dev/null +++ b/36115-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,12511 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Peccavi, by E. W. Hornung + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Peccavi + +Author: E. W. Hornung + +Release Date: May 15, 2011 [EBook #36115] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: UTF-8 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK PECCAVI *** + + + + +Produced by Steven desJardins and the Online Distributed +Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This book was +produced from scanned images of public domain material +from the Google Print project.) + + + + + + +PECCAVI + +BY E. W. HORNUNG + +AUTHOR OF "THE AMATEUR CRACKSMAN," "MY LORD +DUKE," "YOUNG BLOOD," ETC. + +CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS +NEW YORK 1901 + +COPYRIGHT, 1900, BY +CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS + +All rights reserved + +THE CAXTON PRESS +NEW YORK. + + + + + CONTENTS + + Chapter Page + I. Dust to Dust 1 + II. The Chief Mourner 11 + III. A Confession 18 + IV. Midsummer Night 29 + V. The Man Alone 45 + VI. Fire 51 + VII. The Sinner's Prayer 66 + VIII. The Lord of the Manor 77 + IX. A Duel Begins 89 + X. The Letter of the Law 100 + XI. Labour of Hercules 115 + XII. A Fresh Discovery 125 + XIII. Devices of a Castaway 131 + XIV. The Last Resort 137 + XV. His Own Lawyer 150 + XVI. End of the Duel 162 + XVII. Three Weeks and a Night 186 + XVIII. The Night's Work 193 + XIX. The First Winter 209 + XX. The Way of Peace 230 + XXI. At the Flint House 249 + XXII. A Little Child 262 + XXIII. Design and Accident 275 + XXIV. Glamour and Rue 291 + XXV. Signs of Change 306 + XXVI. A Very Few Words 316 + XXVII. An Escape 323 + XXVIII. The Turning Tide 335 + XXIX. A Haven of Hearts 348 + XXX. The Woman's Hour 362 + XXXI. Advent Eve 378 + XXXII. The Second Time 390 + XXXIII. Sanctuary 397 + + + + +PECCAVI + +I + +DUST TO DUST + + +Long Stow church lay hidden for the summer amid a million leaves. It had +neither tower nor steeple to show above the trees; nor was the +scaffolding between nave and chancel an earnest of one or the other to +come. It was a simple little church, of no antiquity and few exterior +pretensions, and the alterations it was undergoing were of a very +practical character. A sandstone upstart in a countryside of flint, it +stood aloof from the road, on a green knoll now yellow with buttercups, +and shaded all day long by horse-chestnuts and elms. The church formed +the eastern extremity of the village of Long Stow. + +It was Midsummer Day, and a Saturday, and the middle of the Saturday +afternoon. So all the village was there, though from the road one saw +only the idle group about the gate, and on the old flint wall a row of +children commanded by the schoolmaster to "keep outside." Pinafores +pressed against the coping, stockinged legs dangling, fidgety hob-nails +kicking stray sparks from the flint; anticipation at the gate, +fascination on the wall, law and order on the path in the +schoolmaster's person; and in the cool green shade hard by, a couple of +planks, a crumbling hillock, an open grave. + +Near his handiwork hovered the sexton, a wizened being, twisted with +rheumatism, leaning on his spade, and grinning as usual over the +stupendous hallucination of his latter years. He had swallowed a +rudimentary frog with some impure water. This frog had reached maturity +in the sexton's body. Many believed it. The man himself could hear it +croaking in his breast, where it commanded the pass to his stomach, and +intercepted every morsel that he swallowed. Certainly the sexton was +very lean, if not starving to death quite as fast as he declared; for he +had become a tiresome egotist on the point, who, even now, must hobble +to the schoolmaster with the last report of his unique ailment. + +"That croap wuss than ever. Would 'ee like to listen, Mr. Jones?" + +And the bent man almost straightened for the nonce, protruding his chest +with a toothless grin of huge enjoyment. + +"Thank you," said the schoolmaster. "I've something else to do." + +"Croap, croap, croap!" chuckled the sexton. "That take every mortal +thing I eat. An' doctor can't do nothun for me--not he!" + +"I should think he couldn't." + +"Why, I do declare he be croapun now! That fare to bring me to my own +grave afore long. Do you listen, Mr. Jones; that croap like billy-oh +this very minute!" + +It took a rough word to get rid of him. + +"You be off, Busby. Can't you see I'm trying to listen to something +else?" + +In the church the rector was reciting the first of the appointed psalms. +Every syllable could be heard upon the path. His reading was Mr. +Carlton's least disputed gift, thanks to a fine voice, an unerring sense +of the values of words, and a delivery without let or blemish. Yet there +was no evidence that the reader felt a word of what he read, for one and +all were pitched in the deliberate monotone rarely to be heard outside a +church. And just where some voices would have failed, that of the Rector +of Long Stow rang clearest and most precise: + +_"When thou with rebukes dost chasten man for sin, thou makest his +beauty to consume away, like as it were a moth fretting a garment: every +man therefore is but vanity._ + +_"Hear my prayer, O Lord, and with thine ears consider my calling: hold +not thy peace at my tears._ + +_"For I am a stranger with thee: and a sojourner, as all my fathers +were._ + +_"O spare me a little, that I may recover my strength: before I go +hence, and be no more seen . . ."_ + +The sexton was regaling the children on the wall with the ever-popular +details of his notorious malady. The schoolmaster still strutted on the +path, now peeping in at the porch, now reporting particulars to the +curious at the gate: a quaint incarnation of conscious melancholy and +unconscious enjoyment. + +"Hardly a dry eye in the church!" he announced after the psalm. "Mr. +Carlton and Musk himself are about the only two that fare to hide what +they feel." + +"And what does Mr. Carlton feel?" asked a lout with a rose in his coat. +"About as much as my little finger!" + +"Ay," said another, "he cares for nothing but his Roman candles, and his +transcripts and gargles."[1] + +[Footnote 1: Transepts and gargoyles.] + +"Come," said the schoolmaster, "you wouldn't have the parson break down +in church, would you? I'm sorry I mentioned him. I was thinking of +Jasper Musk. He just stands as though Mr. Carlton had carved him out of +stone." + +"The wonder is that he can stand there at all," retorted the fellow with +the flower, "to hear what he don't believe read by a man he don't +believe in. A funeral, is it? It's as well we know--he'd take a weddun +in the same voice." + +The schoolmaster turned away with an ambiguous shrug. It was not his +business to defend Mr. Carlton against the disaffected and the undevout. +He considered his duty done when he informed the rector who his enemies +were, and (if permitted to proceed) what they were saying behind his +back. The schoolmaster made a mental mark against the name of one +Cubitt, ex-choirman, and, forthwith transferring his attention to the +audience on the wall, put a stop to their untimely entertainment before +returning softly to the porch. + +In Long Stow churchyard there was shade all day, but in the church it +was dusk from that moment in the forenoon when the east window lost the +sun. This peculiarity was partly temporary. The church was in a +transition stage; it was putting forth transepts north and south; +meanwhile there was much boarding within, and a window in eclipse on +either side. The surrounding foliage added its own shade; and each time +the schoolmaster stole out of the sunlight into the porch, to peer up +the nave, it was several moments before he could see anything at all. +And then it was but a few high lights in a sea of gloom: first the east +window, as yet unstained, its three quatrefoils filled with summer sky, +the rest with waving branches; next, the brass lectern, the surplice +behind it, the high white forehead above. Then in the chancel something +gleamed: that was the coffin, resting on trestles. Then in the choir +seats, otherwise deserted, a figure grew out of the shadows, a solitary +and a massive figure, that stood even now when everybody else was +seated, finely regardless of the fact. It was a man, elderly, but very +powerfully built. The hair stood white and thick upon the large strong +head, less white and shorter on the broad deep jowl. The head was +carried with a certain dignity, rude, savage, indomitable. The eyes +gazed fixedly at the opposite wall; not once did they condescend to the +thing that gleamed upon the trestles. One great hand was knotted over +the knob of a mighty stick, on which the old man leant stiffly. He was +dressed in black, not quite as a gentleman, yet as befitted the most +substantial man but one in the parish. And that was Jasper Musk. + +The parson finished the lesson, and his white brow bent over the closed +book; the face beneath was bearded and much tanned, and in it there +burnt an eye that came as a surprise after that formal voice; and the +hand that closed the book was sensitive but strong. Stepping from the +lectern, the clergyman declared his calibre in an obeisance towards the +altar, then led the way slowly down the aisle. Bearers rose from the +shades and followed with the coffin; they were almost at the porch +before Jasper Musk took notice enough to limp after them with much noise +from his stick. The congregation waited for him, swarming into the aisle +in the big man's wake. So they came to the grave. + +And there broad daylight revealed a circumstance that came as a shock to +most of those who had followed the body from the church, but as an +outrage to the officiating clergyman: the coffin bore no plate. Mr. +Carlton coloured to the hair, and his deep eye flashed upon the chief +mourner; the latter leant upon his stick and replied with a grim glare +across the open grave. For a moment the wind washed through the trees, +and every sparrow made itself heard; then the rector's eyes dropped to +his book, but his voice rang colder than before. And presently the earth +received its own. + +Mr. Carlton had pronounced the benediction, and a solemn hush still held +all assembled, when a bicycle bell jarred staccato in the road; a moment +later, with a sharp word for some children who had tired of the funeral +and strayed across his path, the rider dismounted outside the saddler's +workshop, a tiny cabin next his house and opposite the church. The +cyclist was a lad in his teens, dark, handsome, dapper, but small for +his age, which was that of high collars and fancy ties; and he rode a +fancy bicycle, the high machine of the day, but extravagantly nickelled +in all its parts. + +"Well, Fuller," said he, "who are they burying?" + +Fuller, the saddler, who enjoyed a local monopoly in the exercise of his +craft, but whose trade was the mere relaxation of a life spent in +reading and disseminating the news of the day, was spelling through the +_Standard_ at his bench behind the open window. He dropped his paper and +whipped the spectacles from a big dogmatic nose. + +"Gord love yer, Mr. Sidney, do you stand there and tell me you haven't +heard?" + +"How could I hear when I'm only home from Saturdays to Mondays? I'm on +my way home now. Old Sally Webb--is it--or one of the old Wilsons?" + +"No, sir," said the saddler; "that's no old person. Gord love yer," he +cried again, "I wish that was!" + +"Who is it, Mr. Fuller?" + +"That's Molly Musk," said Fuller, slowly; "that's who that is, Mr. +Sidney." + +The boy had not the average capacity for astonishment; he was not, in +fact, the average boy; but at the name his eyebrows shot up and his +mouth grew round. + +"Molly Musk! I thought nobody knew where she was? When did she turn up?" + +"Tuesday night, and died the next." + +"But I say, Fuller, this is interesting!" Perhaps the average boy would +have been no more shocked; he might not even have found it interesting. +This one leant his bicycle against the wall, and his elbows on the bench +within the open window. "Where's she been all this time?" he queried, +confidentially. "What did she die of? What's it all mean?" And there was +a knowing curl about the corners of his mouth. + +"Mean?" said the saddler; "there's more than you want to know that, Mr. +Sidney, but want must be their master. That old Jasper, _he_ know, so +they say; but I'm not so sure. It was he fetched her home, poor old +feller; got the letter Monday morning, had her home by Tuesday night. +That's a man I never liked, Mr. Sidney. I've said it to his face, and +I'll say it as long as I live; but, Gord love yer, I'm sorry for him +now! That's given _him_ a rare doing and no mistake, and less wonder. A +trim little thing like poor Molly Musk! Not that I'm so surprised as +some; a man of my experience don't make no mistake, and I never did care +for the breed. But there, even my heart bleed when that don't boil; as +for the reverend here, he feel it as much as anybody else, and that _I_ +know. That young Jim Cubitt, he come by just now, and says he, 'He's +taking the service as if it was a wedding.' 'You've been kicked out of +the choir,' I says; 'that's what's the matter with you still, or you +wouldn't want a man to be a woman. Thank goodness there's one live man +in the parish,' I says, 'though I don't fare to hold with him.' And no +more I do, Mr. Sidney; but, Gord love yer, that make no difference to +men of our experience. I like the reverend's Popery as little as the +squire like it, and I tell him so, yet he go on bringing me the +_Standard_ every day when he've done with it. Is there another clergyman +that'd do the like to a man that went against him in the parish? Would +the Reverend Preston at Linkworth? Would the Reverend Scrope at Burton +Mills? Or Canon Wilders, or any other man Jack of 'em? No, sir, not +one!" + +"But if he doesn't read them himself," said the boy, "it doesn't amount +to so very much." And he laid his hand on three more _Standards_, +unopened, with the parson's name in print upon the wrapper. + +"What I was coming to," cried the saddler; "only when I get on the +reverend my tongue will wag. They say he don't feel. I say he do, and I +know: all this week I've had no _Standard_, so this morning I was so +bold as to up and mention it, and there was all six unopened. +'Reverend,' I says, 'you must be ill--with that there Egyptian Question +to argue about'--for we're rare 'uns to argue, the reverend and me--'and +no trace yet o' them PhÅ“nix Park varmin!' But he shake his head. 'Not +ill, Fuller,' he says; 'but there's tragedy enough in this parish +without going to the papers for more. And I haven't the heart to argue +even with you,' he says. So that's my answer to them as says our +reverend don't feel." + +The boy had been patiently pricking the bench with a saddler's punch; +now he raised his deliberate dark eyes and looked at the other +point-blank. + +"You talk about a tragedy," he said, "but you won't say where the +tragedy comes in. What has killed the girl?" + +"I hardly like to tell a young gentleman like you," said the saddler; +"though, to be sure, you'll hear of nothing else in the village." + +"Perhaps," said the boy, with a rather sinister smile, "I'm not quite so +innocent as I ought to be. Come on, out with it!" + +"Well, then, the poor young thing was brought home in trouble," sighed +the saddler. "And in her trouble she died next night." + +The boy looked at the man through narrow eyes with a knowing light in +them, and the curves cut deep at the corners of his mouth. + +"In trouble, eh? So that's why she disappeared?" he said at length. +"Molly--Musk!" + + + + +II + +THE CHIEF MOURNER + + +Jasper Musk remained some minutes at the grave, alone, and more than +ever a mark for curious eyes; his own were raised, and his lips moved +with a significance difficult to mistake, but in him yet more difficult +to accept. The infidelity of the man was notorious, and, indeed, the +raised face was not the face of prayer. It was flint bathed in gall, too +bitter for faith, too savage for sorrow; it was a frozen sea of wrinkles +without a single ripple of agitation. Yet the lips moved, and were still +moving when Jasper Musk passed through the crowd now assembled about the +gate, erect though halt, a glitter in his eyes, but that was all. + +As the folk had waited and made way for him in the church, so they +waited and made way outside. Thus, as he limped down into the road, Musk +had the village almost to himself. He turned to the right, and the west +wind blew in his face, strong and warm, with cloud upon cloud of yellow +dust; overhead the other clouds flew high and white and broken, a +flotilla of small sail upon the blue. But Musk was done gazing at the +sky, neither did he look right or left as he trudged in the middle of +the road. So the saddler's place, and then the woody opening of the road +to Linkworth, with the white bridge gleaming through the trees, and the +ripe leaves purling in the wind like summer surf, all fell behind on the +left; as, on the right, did the rectory gate, terminating that same +flint wall which had been the children's grand stand. Rectory, church, +and glebe stood all together, an indivisible trinity, with open uplands +east and north. Westward began the cottages, buff-coloured, thatched; +and it was cottages for half a mile, but healthy cottages, with plenty +of space between, here a wheatfield, there a meadow; for every +householder of Long Stow has also his holding of land, and there is no +more independent parish in East Anglia. Of private houses that are not +cottages, however, the village has only three: the rectory at one end, +the hall near the other, and the Flint House between the two. + +The Flint House now belonged to Jasper Musk. Report said that he had +bought it outright for nine hundred pounds, with the meadow he was now +passing on his left, and the wild garden reaching to the river. +Originally part and parcel of the Long Stow estate, the place had been +let for years, with a good slice of land, to London sportsmen who spent +just two months of the twelve there. Musk had been the lessee's bailiff, +and had feathered his nest so well that when the whole estate changed +hands, and the part went with the whole, the ex-bailiff was in a +position to buy a house and grounds for which the new squire had no use. +None knew how he could have come honestly by so much profit; yet he was +a man of tried integrity, but a hard man, and the last to get fair +treatment behind his back. A more genuine marvel was the way in which he +had spent his money, on a house that could scarcely fail to be a white +elephant to such a man, and a hideous house into the bargain. It abutted +directly on the road, grim and rambling, with false windows like +wall-eyes, and facets of flint so sharp that to brush against the wall +was to rip a sleeve to ribbons. There were many rooms, musty and +mice-ridden, and now only two old people to inhabit them. Musk had +driven all his sons from home, thus doing his country an unwitting +service, for there was the stuff that knits an empire in the blood. But +only one daughter had been born to him, and now he had left her in the +ground, and would wash his mind of her for ever. + +The resolution was easier than its accomplishment: on his very threshold +a shrill small cry assailed and insulted Jasper Musk. And in the parlour +walked his wife, meek-spirited, flat-chested, leaden-eyed; too weary for +much grief, as he was too bitter; in her thin arms an infant not four +days old. + +Musk put himself in her path. + +"Stop walking!" + +"That'll set him off again," sighed Mrs. Musk, though not before she had +obeyed. + +"I don't care," said Jasper. "That can cry till that die," he added +brutally, as the fit returned; "and the sooner the better. Hold it up a +bit. There, now! I want to have a look at the brat. I want to see who +that's like!" + +"It's like poor Molly," whimpered the grandmother, shedding tears that +she could neither check nor hide. + +Musk thumped his stick on the floor. + +"Molly? Molly? You let me hear that name again! Haven't I told you once +and for all never to lay your tongue to that name, in my hearing or +behind my back, as long as you live? Then don't you forget it; and none +o' your lies. That's no more like her than that's like you. But a look +of somebody it have, though I can't for the life of me think who. Wait a +bit. Give me time. That'll come--that'll come!" + +But the thin shrill screaming continued till the little red face grew +livid and wrinkled almost beyond resemblance to its kind; then Musk +relinquished his futile scrutiny, and signed to his wife to resume the +walking, but himself remained in the room. And he leant on his stick as +he had leant on it at the funeral; but here in his house he wore his +hat; and from under its broad brim he followed them, backward and +forward, to and fro, with smouldering eyes. + +"Do you know what I've vowed?" he presently went on. "Do you know the +oath I took, there at that open grave, when all the tomfoolery was over, +and that Jesuit jerry-builder had taken his hook?" + +"I'm sure I don't," sighed Mrs. Musk, as the child lay once more still +against her withered bosom. + +"I stood there," said Jasper, "and I swore I'd find the man. And I swore +I'd tear his heart out when I've found him. And I'll do both!" + +His voice rose so swiftly to so fierce a pitch that the woman started +violently, and the infant wailed again. Instantly the room shook, and +with one stride, paid for by a spasm of pain, the husband towered above +the wife; and this time it was a heavy hand upon her shrunk and +shrinking shoulder that put a stop to the walk. + +"Do _you_ know who it is?" he cried. "My God, I believe you do!" + +"I don't, indeed!" + +"She never told you?" + +"God knows she did not." + +"Or anybody else?" + +"I don't know." + +"But you think--you think! I see it in your face. Who is it you think +she may have told? I'll soon find out from him or her; trust me to wring +that out!" + +For answer, the woman subsided in sobs upon the horsehair sofa, rocking +herself and the baby in her grief and terror. "You'll be that angry with +me," she moaned; "you'll be right mad!" + +"Oh, no, I sha'n't," said Musk, in a kindlier voice. "I'm not so bad as +all that, though this do fare to make a man crazy. Tell away, old woman, +and don't you be afraid." + +"Oh, Jasper, it was when you were gone to Lakenhall for the doctor--that +last time!" + +"Well?" + +"She knew the end was near. Poor thing! Poor thing!" + +"What did she say?" + +"That she'd die more happier if only she could speak--if only I would +send----" + +"Not for Carlton?" + +The wife could only nod in her fear and desperation. + +"You sent for that man the moment my back was turned?" + +"Oh, I knew that'd make you right wild--I knew--I knew!" + +Musk controlled himself by an effort. + +"That don't. That sha'n't. I'll have it out of him, that's all; he's not +the Church o' Rome yet! Go on. Go on." + +"I went myself. No one knew. I left her alone time I was gone." + +"And you brought him back with you?" + +"Well, he got here first. He ran all the way." + +"He knew better than to let me catch him. Jesuit! How long was he with +her?" + +"Not long, Jasper, not long indeed!" + +"And you heard nothing?" + +"Not a word. I stayed downstairs. I had to promise her that before I +went. She had something to say to Mr. Carlton that nobody else must +know." + +"But somebody else shall!" said Jasper grimly. "That was it, you may +depend; you should have listened at the door. But that make no matter. +Somebody else is going to know before he's many minutes older!" + +And an ugly smile broadened on the thick-set face; but the woman gasped. +Quick as thought the child was on the sofa, the grandmother on her feet. +Trembling and terrified, she stood in her husband's path. + +"Jasper! You're never going up to the rectory?" + +"I am, though--this minute!" + +"Oh, Jasper!" + +"Do you let me by." + +"But I promised you should never know! You've made me break my solemn +word! He'll know I've broken it!" + +"Yes, I'm going to learn him a thing or two. Will you let me by?" + +"_She'll_ know--too--wherever she has gone to!" + +"You'd better not keep me no more." + +"Jasper! Jasper! On her death-bed I promised her----" + +"Out of my light!" + + + + +III + +A CONFESSION + + +The rector's study was on the ground floor, facing south. It was a long +room, but narrow, and so low that the present incumbent, who stood +six-feet-two, had contracted a stoop out of continual and instinctive +dread of the ancient beams that scored his study ceiling, combined with +a besetting habit of pacing the floor. There were two doors; one led +into the garden, providing parishioners with immediate access to the +rector when he was not to be found at the church; the other terminated +an inner passage. Both were of immemorial oak, and, like the lattice +casement over the writing table, both rattled in the least wind. Such +was the room which the Reverend Robert Carlton haunted when driven or +detained indoors: rickety, ill-lighted, and draughty when it was not +close, it was still a habitable hole enough, and picturesque in spite of +its occupant. + +Optional surroundings afford a fair clue to the superficial man, but no +real key to character; thus Mr. Carlton's furniture suggested a soul +devoid of the æsthetic sense. He had the sense in all its fineness, but +it found expression in another place. Like many ritualists, Carlton was +a religious æsthete; none more fastidious in the service of the +sanctuary; on the other hand, after the fashion of his peers in two +Churches, the trappings of his own life were severely simple. They had +nearly all been purchased second-hand, those wire-covered shelves and +the books they bore, that oak settle, and the huge arm-chair filled with +miscellaneous lumber. Two baize-covered forms were there for the +accommodation of various classes which the rector held; a prayer desk +faced east in the one orderly corner of the room. Only three pictures +hung on the walls; a Holy Family and Guido Reni's St. Sebastian, +ordinary silver prints in Oxford frames, mementoes of a pilgrimage to +Rome; and an ancient cricket eleven, faded from age, and fly-blown for +long want of a glass. There were also a couple of tin shields, bearing +the heraldic devices of Robert Carlton's public school and of his Oxford +college, while a crucifix hung over the prayer desk. Among the books two +volumes on _Building Construction_ might have been remarked upon the +settle, together with a tattered copy of Parker's _Introduction to +Gothic Architecture_; among the lumber, a mason's trowel and a +cold-chisel. Lastly, the study smelt, but did not reek, of common +birdseye. + +Jasper Musk, passing the open lattice, caught the parson hastily rising +from his knees, not at the prayer desk, but beside his writing table, +upon which a large book lay open. A newspaper lay on top of the book +when Musk was admitted some moments after he had knocked. + +He entered with his heavy, uneven steps, but took up a position barely +within the threshold, and began by declining a seat with equal emphasis +and stiffness. + +"No, I thank you, Mr. Carlton. I've never been here before in your +time, and I'm never likely to come again. I'm only here now to ask a +question--and return a compliment!" + +And the visitor's eye gleamed as Mr. Carlton creased the forehead that +was so white in comparison with his face: at the moment this contrast +was not conspicuous. + +"From what I hear," explained Musk, "you've done me the kindness of +coming to my house when my back was turned." + +"And you have only heard of it now?" + +"Within the last ten minutes; and I come here right straight. You may +think I wouldn't come for nothing, me that's never darkened your door +before to-day. I don't hold with you, Mr. Carlton, and I'm not the only +one. That's true--I'm not a religious man, and never was; but, if I ever +was to be, it wouldn't be your religion. No, sir, when I fare to want +Christmas-trees in church I'll go to Rome and be done with it; and +that's where you ought to be, Mr. Carlton, before you get a parcel of +women to confess their sins to you as though you was God Almighty!" + +Mr. Carlton sat quite still under this uncalled-for criticism; he even +looked relieved, and one sensitive finger brushed the brown moustache to +either side of his mouth. + +"I have never advocated auricular confession," said he, "whatever I may +think. I have merely said, to those in doubt, in difficulty, or in +trouble, I will help them with God's help if I can." + +"In trouble!" cried Musk scornfully. "I know one that never might have +got herself into trouble if she'd never listened to you! And that's what +brings me here; I'll beat about the bush no more. My wife said she +fetched you the other night. I don't blame you for going, I won't go so +far as that. What I want to know, and what I mean to know, is this: did +my--that young woman lying there--confess to you or did she not?" It was +a fist that he had flung in the direction of the churchyard. + +"Confess what?" + +And the parson's voice was cold and constrained, as it had been beside +the grave; but that white forehead glistened like a dead man's. + +"The name of the father of her child!" + +Carlton took an ivory paper-knife from his desk, and the thin blade +snapped in two between his fingers. A pause followed. Musk stood like +granite, stick and hat in hand, frowning down on the clergyman seated at +his writing table. At length the latter looked up. + +"I might say that is a question you have no right to ask, Mr. Musk; +what is certain, had there been any question of confession, I should +have no right to answer you. There was none. Your daughter sent for +me, to speak to me; and speak we did; but she did not tell me +that--scoundrel's--name." + +"But you know!" + +"How dare you say that?" cried Carlton; and a flash of anger played for +an instant on his pallor. + +"I see it in your face; but I'll have it out of you! I'll have it out of +you," roared Musk, in a sudden frenzy, striking his stick to the floor, +"if I have to tear your smooth tongue out along with it! So smooth you +could read over that murdered girl, and know all the time who'd murdered +her, and think to keep that to yourself! But you sha'n't; no, that you +sha'n't; not if I have to stand here till midnight. You know! You know! +Deny it if you can!" + +"I shall deny nothing," retorted the other. "No, I shall deny nothing!" +he reiterated as if to himself. "But think for a minute, Mr. Musk--I +entreat you to think calmly for one minute! Suppose I could tell you +what you ask, could it serve any good end for you to know?" + +"Good end!" cried Musk. "Why, you know it could. I could kill the man +who's killed my daughter--and kill him I will--and swing for him if they +like. That'll be a wonderful good end all round!" + +"Then is it for me to throw temptation in your way? Is it for me to +spoil a life, if not to end it? For all you know, Mr. Musk, it may be a +life otherwise honest, useful, and of good report. Nay!" exclaimed Mr. +Carlton, as if suddenly impatient of his own reticence, "I'll go so far +as to say that it once was all three. And the man would do such +duty--make such amends----" + +A groan admitted that there were none to make, and finished a sentence +to which Musk had not listened; the one before was sufficient for him; +and his broad face shone with the satisfaction of a point gained. + +"Come," said he, "that's fairer! So you do know him, and you say so like +a man. I always took you for a man, sir, though there's been no love +lost between us; and I'll say I'm sorry I spoke so harsh just now, Mr. +Carlton; for I had a hold of the wrong end o' the stick--I see that now. +It was the man that confessed--it was the man. Sir, if you're the +Christian gentleman that I take you for, and this here Christianity o' +yours ain't all cant an' humbug, you'll tell me that man's name; for I +can't call to mind a single one she so much as looked at--unless it was +that young Mellis." + +"No, no; poor George is innocent enough, God knows!" + +"He's like to be, for all I hear. They say he carries a cross for you o' +Sundays--but I won't say no more about that. If he's your right hand in +the parish, as they tell me he is, at least I should hope he'd be +straight." + +A puff of wind came through the open window. It lifted the newspaper +from the open book, but the rector's hand fell quickly upon both. And +there it rested. And his wretched eyes rested upon his hand. + +"So I've never thought twice about George Mellis. I'd as soon think o' +you, sir. Then who can it be?" + +Mr. Carlton bounded to his feet, white as his collar, and quivering to +his nostrils. + +"You want to know?" + +"I mean to know, sir." + +"And to kill him--eh?" + +"I reckon I'll go pretty near it." + +"Ah, don't do it by halves!" cried Carlton in a strange high voice. +"Kill him now!" His hands fell open at his side; his head fell forward +on his breast; and he who had sinned grossly against God and man, yet +was not born to be a hypocrite, stood defenceless, abject, +self-destroyed. + +Moments passed; became minutes; and all the sound in the rectory study +came from the rattling of its inner door, or through the outer one from +the garden. Then by degrees a hard breathing broke on Robert Carlton's +ears; but he himself was the next to speak, flinging back his head in +sudden misery. + +"Why don't you strike?" he cried out. "You've got your stick; strike, +man, strike!" + +It seemed an hour before the answer came, in a voice scarcely +recognizable as that of Jasper Musk, it was so low and calm; yet there +was an intensity in the deep, slow tones that matched the fearful +intensity of the fixed light eyes; and the massive face was still and +livid from the short steel beard to the virile silver hair. + +"Oh, yes, I'll strike!" hissed Musk. "I'll strike! I'll strike!" And he +struck with his eyes until the other's fell once more; until the guilty +man collapsed headlong in his chair, his arms upon the table, and his +face upon his arms. "But I'll strike in my own way, thank you," Musk +went on, "and in my own good time. You shall smart a bit first--learn +what it's like to suffer--taste hell upon earth in case there's no hell +for bloody murderers beyond! How I wish you could see yourself! How I +wish your precious flock could see you--and they shall. Whited sepulchre +. . . filthy hypocrite . . . living lie!" + +Deliberately chosen, with long pauses between, with many a rejection of +the word that came uppermost--the worse word that was too strong to +sting--these measured epithets carved round the heart that unbridled +abuse would have stabbed and stunned. Carlton could hide his face, but +he quivered where he sprawled, and the other nodded in savage +self-esteem. + +"Not that I had ought to be surprised," continued Musk; "it's what might +have been expected of a Jesuit in disguise; the only wonder is I didn't +suspect you from the first. I never set up for being a charitable man; +but that seems I was a damned sight too charitable towards you. I +thought no wrong, whatever else I may have thought of you and your ways. +No; I may have jeered, I may have been vexed, but my mind wasn't nasty +enough for that. God! that I can keep my stick off you, when I remember +the choir practices, and the organ practices, and the Bible classes, and +the Young Women's Christian Association. Sounds well, don't it? Young +Women's Christian Association! Now we know what it meant; now we know +what it all means, church and parsons, religion and all; a sink of +iniquity and a set of snivelling, whining, licentious----" + +"Stop!" cried Carlton, manned at last, and on his feet to enforce the +word. "Say what you please of me, do what you will to me. Nothing is too +bad for me--I deserve the very worst. But abuse my Church you shall not, +in my hearing." + +"His Church!" sneered Musk. "A lot you've done to make me respect it, +haven't you? My God, can you stand there looking at me as if I were in +the wrong instead o' you? Do you know what you've done, and confessed to +doing? You've murdered my girl, just as much as though you'd taken and +cut her throat, you have: more, you've murdered her body and soul, you +that snivel about the soul! And you can stand there and whine about your +Church! Is that all you've got to say for yourself--to the father of the +woman you've ruined to her grave?" + +"That is all I have to say to you, Mr. Musk. I will not insult you by +asking your forgiveness, much less by attempting to make the shadow of +an excuse; there could be none; nor can there be any forgiveness for me +from you or your wife; nor do I look for any mercy in this parish, or +this world. Go, spread the news, and ruin me in my turn; it's what I +deserve, and mean to bear." + +"Not so fast," said Musk--"not so fast, if you please. So I'm to spread +the news, am I? And do you think I'm so proud that's the reverend? By +your leave, Mr. Carlton, I'll keep that same news to myself till I've +had all I want from it." + +"Any refinement you like," said Carlton. "It will not be too bad for +me--or too much--please God!" + +Jasper Musk put on his hat, but came close up to the clergyman before +taking his leave. + +"I wish I knew you better!" he ground out through his teeth. "I wish I'd +made up to you like the women, instead of giving you the wide berth I +have. Do you know why? Because I'd have known how to hit you hardest," +said Musk, hissing like a snake; "because I'd have known where to hurt +you most!" + +Carlton stood a trifle more upright: his enemy's malice ministered +subtly to his remnant of self-respect. + +"I wish I'd been a church-goer," continued Musk; "but it's never too +late to mend! I may be there to-morrow to hear you preach; maybe I'll +have a word to say myself; maybe I shall not. You'll know when the time +comes, and not before." + +Carlton quailed, for the first time at a threat, and his visible terror +seemed to intoxicate the other. Seizing him by the shoulder as he had +seized his wife, clutching him like a wild beast, and thrusting his +great face to within an inch of that of the unhappy clergyman, Jasper +Musk spat lewd names, and foul insult, and wanton blasphemy, until +breath failed him. All the vileness he had heard in sixty years, and +could recall in half as many seconds, poured from him in a very +transport of insensate ribaldry; words that had never left his lips +before, crowded to them now; and were still ringing in a swimming head +when Robert Carlton woke to the fact that he was once more alone. + +His first sensation was one of overwhelming nausea. His very vitals +writhed; and he reeled heavily against an open bookcase, casting an arm +along one of the upper shelves, and resting his face upon the sleeve. +For a few moments all his weight was upon that arm; then he opened his +eyes, and the titles of the books engaged his dazed attention. None was +apt, but all were familiar, and the familiarity maddened the stricken +man. He stood glaring from one low wall to another, filled with those +doubts which are the cruel satellites of transcendent anguish. Had it +really happened after all? The room was so unchanged, from the few +things on the walls to the many in the chair! All was so homely, so +intimate, so reassuring; and no visible trace of Musk! Had he ever been +there at all? + +Ah, yes, for he had gone! In the distance a gate had squealed, and shut +with a rattle; the sound had lain in his ear; now it sank to the brain. +Now, too, another sound, intermittent all this time, but meaningless +hitherto, assumed a like significance. This was the continued rustling +of a newspaper, as the wind whisked in at the open door and out by the +open window in invisible harlequinade. The man's mind fled back a +little lifetime of minutes. And he recalled the last puff and rustle, +and the quick falling of his own hand upon the paper, which lay on his +desk, as the last event of a past era of his existence--the last act of +Robert Carlton, hypocrite! + +And what was the peril that had made the final demand upon his caution +and his cunning? It was a new irony to perceive at once that it had +existed chiefly in guilty imagination; to remove the paper, and to +reveal nothing more incriminating than the parish register of deaths, +with an unfinished entry in his own hand, a spatter of ink in place of a +name, and some round white blisters lower down the leaf. Yet this it was +that had brought Carlton to his knees an hour ago; and it brought him to +his knees again, not at the desk of formal prayer, but here at his table +as before. + +"Father have mercy on me," he prayed, "for I neither deserve nor desire +any mercy from man!" + + + + +IV + +MIDSUMMER NIGHT + + +And while he knelt the situation was developing, with unforeseen and +truly merciful rapidity, in an utterly unsuspected quarter; thus an +aggressive knock at the inner door came in a sense as an answer to the +prayer it interrupted. + +The rectory servants consisted at this time of a small but entire family +employed wholesale out of pure philanthropy. And this was the mother, +red-hot in her cheap crape, to say that she had heard everything--could +not help hearing--and that house was no longer any place for respectable +women and an honest lad--no, not if they had to sleep in the fields. So +the lad had got their boxes on a barrow, but he would bring it back. And +they would go, all of them, to Lakenhall Union, sooner than stay another +hour in that house of shame. + +Mr. Carlton produced his cash-box without a word, and counted out a +month's wages for each in addition to arrears. The poor woman made a +gallant stand against the favour, but, submitting, returned to her +kitchen of her own accord, and to her master's study in a quarter of an +hour, to tell him she had laid the table, and there was a wire cover +over the meat. + +"And may God forgive you, sir!" cried she at parting. "I couldn't have +believed it if I hadn't heard it from your own lips with my own ears!" + +There was much that Carlton himself could not believe. He sat half +stupefied in his deserted rectory, like a man marooned, his one acute +sensation that of his sudden solitude. What was so hard to realize was +that the people knew! that the whole parish would know that night, and +his own family next week, and the whole world before many days. He was +well aware of the certain consequences of this scandal and its +disclosure; he had faced them only too often during the nightmare of the +past week, imagining some, ascertaining others. What seemed so +incredible was that he had made the disclosure himself, that the very +father had not suspected him to the end! + +The last reflection convulsed him with self-contempt. What a hypocrite +he must be! What an unconscious hypocrite, the worst kind of all! + +Here he was eating his supper; he had no recollection of coming to the +table; yet, now that he had caught himself, the food did not choke him, +he was not sick with shame; he only despised himself--and went on. + +It was dusk. He must have lit the lamp himself; as he lifted it from the +table, having risen, he caught sight of its reflection and his own in +the overmantel, and set the lamp upon the chimneypiece, and by its light +had a better look at himself than he could remember having taken in his +life before. There was no vanity in the man; he was studying his face +out of sheer curiosity, from a new and quite impersonal point of view, +as that of an enormous hypocrite and voluptuary. + +Human nature was very strange: he himself would never have suspected +such a face. The forehead was so broad and high, the deep-set eyes so +steadfast, and yet so fervid! They were the eyes of a zealot, but no +visionary: wisdom and understanding were in that bulge of the brow over +each. But the evil writing is lower down, unless you look for positive +crime or madness; yet these nostrils were sensitive, not sensual; and +the mouth, yes, the mouth showed between the short brown beard and the +heavy brown moustache; but what it showed was its strength. No; neither +weakness nor wickedness were there; even Robert Carlton admitted that. +But to be strong, and yet to fall; to mean well, and do evil; to look +one thing, and to be another: all that was to embody a type for which he +himself had ever entertained an unbridled loathing and contempt. + +He carried the lamp to his study, and as he entered from within there +was a knock at the outer door. One was waiting to see the rector, one +who had waited and knocked there oftener than any other in the parish. + +Carlton drew back, and the impulse of flight was strong upon him for the +first time. It needed all his will to shut the inner door behind him, +and to cry with any firmness, "Is that George Mellis?" + +In response there burst into the room a lad in knickerbockers, +broad-shouldered, muscular, yet smooth-faced, and mild-eyed all his +nineteen years; but this was the supreme moment of them all; and his +woman's eyes were on fire as he planted himself before the rector and +his lamp, pale as ashes in its rays. + +"Is it true?" he gasped. "Is it true?" + +This lad was Carlton's chief disciple, his admirer, his imitator, his +enthusiastic champion and defender; his right hand in all good works; +nay more, his acolyte, his lieutenant of the sanctuary; and, before a +broad chest so agitated, and innocent eyes so wild, the culprit's +courage failed him at last, so that the truth clove to his tongue. + +"It's all over the village," the lad continued in gasps. "You know what +I mean. They're all saying it. They say you've admitted it; for God's +sake say you haven't! Only deny it, and I'll go back and cram their lies +down their throats!" + +But by this Mr. Carlton had recovered himself, and was looking his last +upon the anxious eager face of the lad who had loved and honoured him: +his final pang was to see the eagerness growing, the anxiety lessening, +his look misunderstood. And this time the admission was halt and hoarse. + +What followed was also different; for, with scarcely a moment's +interval, young Mellis burst into tears like the overgrown child that he +was, and, flinging himself into the rector's chair, sobbed there +unrestrainedly with his smooth face in his strong red hands. Carlton +watched him by a prolonged effort of the will; he would shirk no part of +his punishment; and no part to come could hurt much more than this. His +fixed eyes were waiting for the boy's swimming ones when at length the +latter could look up. + +"You, of all men!" whispered Mellis. "You who have kept us all +straight--me for one. Why, the very thought of you has helped me to +resist things! You, with your religion: no more religion for me!" + +At that the other broke out; his religion he could still defend; or +thought he could, until he came to try, and his own unworthiness slowly +strangled the words in his throat. + +"Say what you like," said Mellis; "it was you brought me to church; it's +you who turn me away; and I'll go to no other after yours. Only to +think----" + +And he plunged into puerile reminiscences of their religious life in +common, quoting extreme points in the rich ritual in which he had been +privileged to assist, as though they aggravated the case, and made it +more incredible than it was already. + +"If our Lord Himself----" + +It did not need the rector's finger to check that blasphemy; but the +thing was said; the thought was there. + +"Yes; better go," said Carlton, as the lad leapt up. "Go; and let no one +else come near me who ever believed in me; for I can better face my +bitterest enemies. Yet you--you must be one of them! After her own +father, no man should hate me more!" + +And there was a new pain in his voice, a new agony of remorse, as memory +stabbed him in a fresh place. But the boy shook his head, and hung it +with a blush. + +"You think I cared for her," he said. "I thought so, too, until she went +away. I should have cared more then! It troubled me for a time; but I +got over it; and then I knew I was too young for all that. Besides, she +never looked at me after you came; that's another thing I see now; and I +know I ran less after her. Yes, I was too young to love a woman," cried +this village lad, "but I wasn't too old to love you, and look up to +you, and follow you in all you did. I tell you the honest truth, Mr. +Carlton," and his great eyes flashed their last reproach: "I'd have died +for you, sir, I would! And I'd die now--thankfully--if it could make you +the man I thought you were!" + +This interview left Carlton's mind more a blank than ever. It might have +been an hour later, or it might have been in ten minutes, that the +thought occurred to him--if his dearest disciple felt thus, what must +the enemy feel? And he was a man with enemies enough in the parish, +having followed the old order of country parson, and that with more +vigour than diplomacy. In eighteen months his reforms had been manifold +and drastic beyond discretion. It is true that his preaching had won him +more followers than his priestcraft had turned away. Yet a more acute +ecclesiastic would have tapped the wedge instead of hammering it; the +consummate priest would have condescended further in the direction of a +more immediate and a wider popularity. Carlton had gone his own way, +consulting none, attracting many, offending not a few. And he expected +the speedy settlement of many a score. + +Nor had he long to wait. Lamp in hand, he was locking up the house as +mechanically as he had fed his body; but one thing had pricked him in +the performance, and he tingled still between gratitude and fresh grief. +He had a Scotch collie, Glen by name, a noble dog, that was for ever at +its master's heels. So, during any service, the chain was a necessary +evil; but straight from his vestry, in cassock and biretta, the rector +would march to his backyard to release the dog. To-day he had +forgotten; nor was it till the master's round brought him to the back +premises that the poor beast barked itself into notice. Then, indeed, +the dazed man realized that his outer ear had been calmly listening to +the barking for some time; and, with a small thing to be sorry for +again, and one friend behind him, he continued his round, a sentient +being once more. + +It was upstairs that the dog barked afresh, causing Carlton to snatch +his head from the basin of cold water in which he had sought to assuage +its fever, and to go over to his open window, towel in hand. No sooner +had he reached it than he started back, and stood very still with the +water dripping from his beard. When he did dry his face it was as though +he wiped all colour from it too. And it was six feet of quivering clay +that returned on tip-toe to that open window. + +The new moon was setting behind the trees towards Linkworth; there was +no need of its meagre light. Lanterns, bright lanterns, were closing in +upon the rectory: at first the unhappy man had seen lanterns only, +swinging close to the ground, swilling the lawn with light. Stealthy +legs, knee-deep in this light, he remembered after his recoil. But not +till he had driven himself back to the window did he see the set faces, +or realize the fury of his people, kindled against him by his own +confession of his own guilt. + +When he saw this his nerve went, and he stood with clasped hands, the +perspiration bursting from his skin. And the lanterns shook out into a +chain along the edge of the lawn, and were held up to search the face of +the house, all as yet without a word. + +"That's his room," whispered one at last; "that--where the light is!" + +It was the voice of the schoolmaster, himself a churchwarden, and withal +an honest creature who was merely as many things as possible to as many +men. His part had been a little difficult lately. "This has simplified +it," thought the rector; and the twinge of bitterness did him good. + +He was a man again for one moment; the next, "He's in his room," cried +another, aloud; "that's him standing at the window!" + +And there burst forth a howl of execration, that rose to a yell as the +delinquent disappeared and in his panic put out the light. + +"You coward!" + +"Ah, you skunk!" + +"Bloody Papist!" + +"Hypocrite!" + +They were the better names; each shot his own, and capped the last; the +schoolmaster, mad with excitement, blaspheming with the best. + +"Come down out of that, ye devil!" + +"Do you show yourself, you cur!" + +And this command Robert Carlton obeyed, his manhood rising yet again. +But no sooner was he at the window than both panes crashed to powder +over his head, and the surrounding bricks rang with the volley. The +clergyman had a scratch from the falling glass, and a stone stung him on +the hand. The blood bubbled in his veins. + +"Cowards and curs yourselves!" he shouted down, shaking his fists at the +crowd; and in ten seconds he was at the front door, with a couple of +walking-sticks snatched from the stand. But he himself had turned the +key and shot the bolt within the last few minutes, and this gave him +time to think. + +"Quiet, sir--quiet!" he cried to the dog at his heels. "They've right on +their side," he groaned, "after all! Quiet, old doggie; come back; it's +all deserved. And it's only the beginning of what we've got to bear!" + +So he bore it, sitting on the stairs, where no window overlooked him, +and soothing Glen with one hand, restraining him with the other; and +yet, for his sin, despising his forbearance, even while he continued +telling himself it was his duty to forbear. + +And now breaking glass and barking dog made night a nightmare in the +dark and empty house: the infuriated villagers were smashing the rectory +windows one by one. Where the blind was up, the glass spread, and the +stone flew far into the room; where the blind was down, stone and glass +rattled against it, and fell in one heap with one clatter. So +dining-room and drawing-room were wrecked in turn, at short range, with +the heaviest available metal, and much interior damage. And still the +master of the house sat immovable within, nodding grimly at each crash; +wincing more at the curses; and once releasing the dog to stop his ears +altogether. + +It was no use; curiosity compelled him to listen; he was forbidden to +shirk one stripe. And that was a communicant, that cursing demon; this +was the schoolmaster, yelling like one of his own boys; the other +Palmer, of the Plough and Harrow, a very old enemy, hoarse as a crow +with drink and triumph. Young Cubitt, again, who cheered each crash, was +one of the disaffected; but till to-night most of this howling mob had +been his flock. Now all the good work was undone, was stultified, the +good seed poisoned in the ground; and not for the first, and not for the +fiftieth time that week, the confessed rake asked himself whether more +harm than good would not come of his confession. + +Meanwhile, of all the voices that he heard and could distinguish, only +one diverted his self-contempt for an instant. This was the soft, +passionless voice of a young gentleman, evidently not himself engaged in +the stone-throwing, pointing out panes still to break to those who were. +This was the voice of Sidney Gleed. + +The thing had gone on for ten minutes or more when the outcry altered in +character: an interruption had occurred: was it the police? No, the +rector of the parish was too well acquainted with the character of its +solitary constable. He would come up when all was over. Then who could +this be? + +The shower of stones had ceased as suddenly as it had begun. New oaths +were flying in a new direction, and a voice hitherto unheard was heaping +abuse on the abusers; with a strange thrill, the clergyman recognised it +as the voice of Tom Ivey, the young contractor who was building the +transepts; and he could remain no longer on the stairs. Stealing into +the drawing-room, he stumbled across a crackling drift of glass, and, +unnoticed now, stood in the wrecked bow-window, with the fresh air upon +his face once more. + +Lanterns were skipping right and left, their erratic rays giving +momentary glimpses of a stalwart figure in pursuit, a stick whirling +about his ears, and resounding on the backs and shoulders of the +retreating rabble. Some stayed to stone the new foe before they ran; and +one, Palmer the publican, set his lantern on the gravel and squared up +in style. Robert Carlton never saw what followed; for at this moment his +maddened dog, which had been tearing about the house in search of an +outlet, bounded past him through the shattered window; and, when the +rout was complete, the inn-keeper's lantern was a solitary star in the +nether darkness. Then the gate clattered, a swinging step approached, +and Tom Ivey caught up the lantern in his stride. + +Carlton sprang through the window to meet him, every other emotion sunk +for the moment in one of overflowing gratitude. + +"Tom," he cried, "how can I thank you----" + +"Keep your thanks to yourself." + +"But--Tom----" + +"Don't 'Tom' me! Keep your distance too. Do you think I haven't heard +about it? Do you think I'd lift a finger for _you_--let alone a stick? +No, sir, I'd liefer take that to your own back; but I fare to mind when +the Rector of Long Stow was a good man, who didn't preach too tall, but +acted up to what he did preach; and I won't see the house he lived in +wrecked and ruined because a blackguard's followed him." + +"I am all that," said Mr. Carlton. "Go on!" + +The other stared, not so much disarmed as confounded. + +"I'm sorry to open so wide, and you know I'm sorry," he at length burst +out. "'Tain't for me to call you over, sir, and I won't tell you no more +lies. I couldn't bear to see them snarling curs setting on you the +moment you was down, and that's the truth! But it wasn't what I come +back to say," continued Ivey doggedly. "I come back to say you can get +another party to go on with that there building, for I won't work no +more for you. The plant's yours; you found that for the job; you can +find more men. I throw up the contract: take the law of me if you like." + +Robert Carlton was back in his study. It was the one front room which +had escaped inviolate; the open lattice had saved it; not a pebble added +to the old disorder. The rector sighed relief as he held up the lamp on +entering; then he shot the rubbish out of the big arm-chair, and himself +lay back in it like the dead. A bloody smear, where the glass had grazed +his cheek, enhanced his pallor; his eyes were closed; no muscle moved. +And yet his wits clung to him like wolves, till presently the white brow +wrinkled, the heavy eyelids twitched. + +"May I come in, reverend?" said the saddler's voice. + +Carlton assented with a sigh, but did not raise himself to greet the +visitor, who came in mopping his forehead, reversed the chair at the +writing table, and seated himself with ominous deliberation. Then he +mopped again, and was slow to speak; but his scornful expression +prepared the clergyman for more of that which he was resolved to bear. + +"Pharisees!" cried Fuller at last. "Humbugs and hypocrites!" + +The words were precisely those which Robert Carlton expected and must +endure, but against the plural number he felt bound to protest. "We are +not all alike, Mr. Fuller," he said; "thank God, I am but one out of +many thousands." + +"You?" cried the saddler. "Gord love yer, reverend, did you think I +meant _you_? No, sir, it's the stupid fools and canting cowards _I_ +mean, that take and hit a man as soon as ever he's down; not the man +they hit." + +Mr. Carlton sat silent, astounded, and tingling between pain and +pleasure. He fancied he had run through the gamut of the emotions, but +here was a new one that he feared to dissect. + +"Not the man," proceeded the saddler in raised tones--"not the man who +is worth the rest of the parish put together--saint or sinner--guilty or +innocent!" + +Yes, it was pleasure! It was pleasure, acute and lawless, wicked, +ungovernable, and yet to be governed. To have one man's sympathy, how +sweet it was, but how shameful in a guilty heart that would be contrite +too! It had brought a colour to his face, a light to his eyes; ere the +one had faded, and the other failed, Robert Carlton's will had frozen +that tiny rill of comfort at its fount. + +"You mustn't say that," was his belated reply; but it came curt and cold +enough to please himself. + +"But I do say it," cried old Fuller, "and I will say it, and I won't say +a word more than I mean. Let there be no mistake between us, reverend: I +don't deny I felt what _is_ felt when first I heard; but when I come to +think of it, that fared to break my heart more'n to make that boil; and +when I thought a bit deeper, I see how easy that is to make bad worse. +Not as it ain't right bad; but that wasn't for us to make it worse. So +it was me fetched Tom Ivey. And now he tells me what he ups and says +himself when all was over. 'Gord love yer, Tom,' says I, 'you'll be +ashamed of that when you're a man of my experience! You forget the good +our reverend's been doing amongst us all this time, and you think only +o' this here evil. I'll go up,' says I, 'and I'll show him there's one +fair-minded, level-headed man o' the world in this here hotbed o' fools +and Pharisees.'" + +"But Tom was right, and you were wrong." + +"Don't tell me, reverend," said the saddler, edging his chair nearer to +the long limp figure under the lamp. "You can't undo the good you've +once done, not if you try. Leave religion out of it, and look at all +you've done for the poor: look at the coal club, and the book club, and +the dispensary, and the Young Man's----" + +"Unhappily, Fuller, all this is beside the question." + +And the cold tone was no longer put on; neither did it cover an emotion +which called for conscientious suppression; for these officious sallies +only fretted the spirit they were intended to soothe. + +"Well, then," rejoined Fuller, "if you prefer it, and for the sake of +argument, look at a poor old feller like me. What should _I_ ha' done +without you, reverend? I don't come to church, yet you take no offence +when I tell you why, but you argue the point like a rare 'un, and you +lend me the paper just the same. The Reverend Jackson wouldn't ha' done +it, though I durs'n't stay away in his day; he'd have stopped my +livelihood in a week. So don't you fare to make yourself out worse than +you are, reverend; you've done wrong, I allow, but so did Solomon, and +so did David; and weren't so quick to own up to it, either! Like them, +you've done good, too, and plenty of it, and that sha'n't be forgotten +if I can help it. As for the poor young thing that's gone----" + +"Don't name her, I beg!" + +"Very well, sir, I won't. I'm as sorry as the rest o' the parish; but we +shouldn't be unfair because we're sorry. They may say what they like, +but a man of my experience knows that nine times out of ten the woman's +more to blame----" + +"Out of my house!" + +Carlton had leapt to his feet, was standing at his full height for the +first time that night, and pointing sternly to the door. His face was +white with passion. The saddler's jaw dropped. + +"What, sir?" he gasped. + +"Out of my sight--this instant!" + +"For sayun----" + +"For daring to say one half of what you have said! It's my own fault. +I've spoilt you; but out you go." + +Fuller rose slowly, amazed, bewildered, and mortified to the quick. He +was a kind-hearted man, but he had all the superior peasant's obstinacy +and self-conceit: the one had helped to bring him to the clergyman's +side, the other to wag his tongue. Yet his sympathy was genuine enough; +and the theory, of which the bare hint had spilled vials of wrath upon +his head, was in fact his profound conviction. Smarting vanity, +however, was the absorbing sensation of the moment. And for the next +hour the saddler could have returned every few minutes with some fresh +retort; but in the moment of humiliation he could not rise above a +grumble: + +"I might as well have thrown stones with the rest!" + +"Better," the clergyman cried after him. "You had a right to punish me; +to pity and excuse me you had none. Least of all----" + +He broke off, and stood at his door till the quick steps stopped, and +the gate clattered, and the steps died away. The night was dark, and +this end of the village already very still: the Plough and Harrow was +nearer the other. The wind had not fallen; a murmur of very distant +thunder came with it from the west. Nearer home a peewit called, and +Robert Carlton caught himself wondering whether there would be rain +before morning. + + + + +V + +THE MAN ALONE + + +At midnight he was still alone, and the slow torture of his own thoughts +was still a relief. As the dining-room clock struck--he noted its +preservation--and the thin strokes floated through those broken windows +and in at that of the study, he gave up listening for the next step. His +privacy seemed secure at last. He could abandon his spirit to its proper +torments; he could enter upon another night in hell. Yet, even now, the +worst was over, and there would be no more nights of secret grief, +secret remorse, secret shame. He had confessed his sin, and thereby +earned his right to suffer. No more to hide! No more deceit! He could +not realize it yet; he only knew that his heart was lighter already. He +felt ashamed of the relief. + +Yet another night came back to him as he paced his floor: a last year's +night when the full moon shone through ragged trees. It also had been +worse than this: it was the inner life that lay in ruins then. He +remembered pacing till sunrise as he was pacing now: such a still night +but for that; one had but to stand and listen to hear the very fall of +the leaf. He remembered thus standing, there at the door, in the +moonlight, and a line that had buzzed in his head as he listened. + + "And yet God has not said a word!" + +God had spoken now! + +And the man was glad. + +Glad! He almost revelled in his disgrace; it produced in him unexpected +sensations--the sensations of the debtor who begins to pay. Here was an +extreme instance of the things that are worse to dream of than to +endure. He felt less ignominious in the hour of his public ignominy than +in all these months of secret shame. He was living a single life once +more. The wind roamed at will through the damaged house as through the +ribs of a wreck; and its ruined master drew himself up, and his stride +quickened with his blood. He was no longer lording it in his pulpit, the +popular preacher of the countryside, drawing the devout from half a +dozen parishes, a revelation to the rustic mind, a conscious libertine +all the while, with a tongue of gold and a heart of lead. More than all, +he was no longer the one to sit secure, in loathsome immunity, in +sickening esteem: he, the man! The woman had suffered; it was his turn +now. Woman? The poor child . . . the poor, dead, murdered child . . . +Well! the wages of his sin would be worse than death; they were worse +already. And again the man was glad; but his momentary and strange +exultation had ended in an agony. + +The poor, poor girl . . . + +No; nothing was too bad for him--not even the one thing that he would +feel more than all the rest in bulk. He put his mind on that one thing. +He dwelt upon it, wilfully, not in conscious self-pity, but as one eager +to meet his punishment half-way, to shirk none of it. The attitude was +characteristic. The sacrificial spirit informed the man. In another age +and another Church he had done barbaric violence to his own flesh in the +name of mortification. Living in the latter half of the nineteenth +century, a mere Anglican, he was content to play tricks with a fine +constitution in Lent. + +"I will look my last upon it," he said aloud: "it would be insulting God +and man to attempt to take another service after this; I have held my +last, and laid my last stone. Let me see what I have sown for others to +reap." + +And he picked his way through the darkness to the church. + +The path intersected a narrow meadow with the hay newly cut, and lying +in tussocks under the stars; a light fence divided this reef of glebe +from the churchyard; and, just within the latter, a lean-to shed faced +the scaffolding of the north transept, its back against the fence. The +shed was flimsy and small, but it had come out of the rector's pocket; +the transepts themselves were to be his gift, because the living was too +good for a celibate priest, and it was his sermons that had made the +church too small. So he had paid for everything, even to the mason's +tools inside the shed, because Tom Ivey had never had a contract before +and lacked capital. And the out-door interest of the building had formed +a healthy complement to the engrossing affairs of the sanctuary; and, +indeed, they had developed side by side. Perhaps the material changes +had proved the more absorbing to one who threw himself headlong into +whatsoever he undertook. Of late, especially, it had been remarked that +the reverend was taking quite an extraordinary part in these +proceedings: cultivating a knack he had of carving in stone; neglecting +cottages for his mason's shed; and tiring himself out by day like a man +who dreads the night. How he had dreaded it none had known, but now all +might guess. + +Yet he had loved his work for its own sake, not merely as a distraction +from gnawing thoughts; there was in him something of the elemental +artist: the making of anything was his passionate delight. And now the +scene of his industry inflicted a pang so keen that he forgot to +appreciate it as part of his deserts; and, for the moment, priest and +sinner disappeared in the grieving artist, bidding good-bye not only to +his studio, but to art itself. It was very dark; the place was strewn +with uncut boulders, poles, barrows, heaps of rubble; but he knew his +way through the litter, and, in the double darkness of the shed, could +lay his hand on anything he chose. He took something down from a shelf. +It was a gargoyle of his own making, meant for the vestry door in the +south transept. He stood with it in both hands, and his thumbs felt the +eyes and his palms the cheeks, at first as gently as though the stone +were flesh, then suddenly with all his strength, as if to crush the +grotesque head to powder. It was not a useful thing: no water could +spout from the sham mouth which he had wrought with loving pains. It was +only his idea for finishing off the label moulding of the vestry door; +it was only something he had made himself--for others to throw away, or +to keep and show as the handiwork of the immoral rector of Long Stow. He +restored it to his place; and retraced his sure steps through the +rubbish, artist no more. Good-bye to that! + +He crossed over to the church, went round to the porch, and entered by +the only door in use during the alterations. Eighteen months ago he +would have found it locked. It was he who had opened the House of God to +all comers at all hours, and made every sitting free. He stole up the +aisle as one seeing in the dark. His feet fell softly on the matting, +where in early days they had clattered on bare flags, and yet more +softly when they had mounted a step without stumbling. The matting in +the aisle was his addition, the rich carpet in the chancel was his gift. +All his innovations had not provoked dissension. Presently he lit a +lamp, a Syrian treasure, highly wrought, that hung over the lectern: he +had bought it at Damascus, years before, for his church when he should +have one. Yes; he had given freely to God's House, to make it also the +House Beautiful, though he took no trouble to adorn his own. + +And this was to be the end! For events could take but one course now: a +complaint to the bishop (all the parish would sign it), a summons to the +palace, a trial at the consistory court; suspension certainly; +deprivation, perhaps; he had been at some pains to inform himself on the +subject. The bishop would be sore. He had taken such an interest in +everything at the confirmation, his sympathy had been so full and +unexpected, his approval so stimulating, so hearty and frank! Carlton +was ashamed of thinking of his bishop instead of praying to God upon his +knees. He longed to kneel and pray, for the last time, there at the +table which he chose to call the altar, but which he had found ugly and +bare, and was leaving richly laden and richly hung. In the small and +distant light of the lectern lamp he stood gazing at the damask +hangings, the green frontal, the silver candlesticks, the flowers from +his own garden--the flowers he grew for this. He longed to kneel, but +could not. He could not pray. He could not weep. His heart was a grave, +and the grave filled in and the weight of the earth upon his spirit. He +had been quite wrong an hour ago. _This_ was the blackest hour of all. +To have done and given so much, and to lose it all! To have set his +whole soul for years towards the light, to have striven so to turn the +souls of others; and to be thrust into outer darkness for one sin! + +This wave of bitterness, of blind rebellion and human egotism, bore him +out of his church, for the last time, in a passion of defiance and +self-defence: a sudden and deplorable change in such a man at such an +hour. Happily, it was short-lived. His angry stride brought him tripping +into fresh earth, and he started back, aghast at his egotism, stunned +afresh by his sin, and overwhelmed by such a flood of penitence and +remorse as even he had not endured before. Under his eyes the new grave +was growing clearer in the starlight, and not less cruel, and not less +cold. An hour later he was still kneeling over it, and his tears had not +ceased to flow. + + + + +VI + +FIRE + + +Witnesses have differed as to the exact hour at which the inhabitants of +Long Stow, sound asleep after excitement enough for one night, were +frightened from their beds by a sudden and violent ringing of the church +bells. The midsummer night was as dark as ever, and so it remained or +seemed to remain for a considerable time. It cannot have been more than +two o'clock. + +A few minutes before the alarm, Robert Carlton had forced himself to his +feet, to be struck with fresh shame at two apparent evidences of the +mood in which he had quitted the church. He had left the door wide open +and the church lit up. Every stone showed on the path, in the stream of +light poured upon it from the porch, into which, however, it was +impossible to see from where the rector stood. The porch projected from +the south side, while the new grave was directly opposite the west +window, every square of which stood out against the glare within. An +instant's reflection showed Carlton that this could not be the light +which he had left; he went to see what it was. A sudden heat upon his +face broke the truth to him in the porch, and in a stride he knew the +worst. A little fire was raging in the church: two or three pews were in +flames. + +Robert Carlton stood inactive for a score of seconds. It looked the kind +of fire that a vigorous man might have beaten out with his coat. Yet one +in the full vigour of his manhood stood thinking a score of thoughts +while the flames bit through the varnish into the wood. Nor was this the +fascination of horror: the fire looked such a little fire at the first +glance. It was rather the obsession of an astounding puzzle: what in the +world could have caused a fire at all? + +A guilty feeling came in answer: he must have dropped the match with +which he lit that lamp. The feeling escaped in the simultaneous +discovery that the lamp in question had been extinguished, but that it +and others were slightly awry, and one or two still swaying on their +chains, as though all the lamps had been rudely meddled with. And now +horror came. The flames were spreading with curious facility, shooting +their blue tongues over the woodwork before the yellow fangs took hold, +but all so quickly that the burning area seemed to have doubled itself +in these few seconds, while from the heart of it there came the crisp +crackle of quicker fuel, culminating in a blaze as though a rick had +caught; and, sure enough, as these flames leapt high, their source was +revealed in a pile of the rector's new straw hassocks. + +The puzzle was one no more: plainer work of incendiary was never seen. +Through the smoke now swinging in black coils to the roof, the east +window showed in holes made within the last hour, obviously to promote +the draught that blew in Carlton's face as he rushed back to the open +door and laid hold of all the bell-ropes at once. + +The bells were small and jangling; a new peal, and a tower to hang them +in, were among the things which the rector had said that he would have +some day. But as the old bells clanged for the last time, in the dead of +that summer night, they were heard at Linkworth, a mile and a half +across the wind, but down the wind they rang up half Bedingfield, which +is three good miles from Long Stow. + +The first inhabitant to reach the scene was the fleet and sturdy Tom +Ivey, whose mother kept the post-office in the middle of the village; as +he ran the ringing stopped, and the first glass smashed with the heat, +flame and smoke making a mouthpiece of the mullioned window in the north +wall as Tom dashed up by the short cut through the rectory garden. He +was greatly alarmed at finding no one in the churchyard, and rushed into +the church with the full expectation of discovering the ringer senseless +at his post. What he did find was the rector, standing within the +church, to windward of the conflagration, his back to the door, +absorbed, as it seemed, in a perfectly passive contemplation of the +fire. + +"Mr. Carlton!" shouted Tom. + +Before replying, the clergyman spun something into the heart of the +flames; in the thickening smoke it was impossible to see what; but the +same second he was round upon his heel, coughing and choking, his face +black, his eyes fires themselves, purpose and determination in every +limb. + +"Tom? Thank God it's you! We must get this under. Out of it before we +suffocate!" And with his own rush he carried the builder into the open +air. + +"What's done it, sir?" + +"Done it? Wait till we've undone it! We can if we work together. Ah! +here are more of you. Buckets, men--buckets!" cried Carlton, rushing to +meet a half-dressed medley at the gate, and commanding them as though +there had been no other meeting earlier in the night. "You who live +near, run for your own; the rest into my kitchen and find what you can; +buckets are the thing! One of you pump; the rest form line from my well +to the church, and keep passing along. You see to it, Mr. Jones!" + +And for a while the schoolmaster and churchwarden, carried away as usual +by his feelings and self-importance, was as busy enforcing the rector's +orders as he had made himself in breaking his windows an hour or two +before. + +"Let one man ride or run for the Lakenhall engine; not you, Tom!" +exclaimed the clergyman, seizing Ivey by the arm. "They'll be all night +coming, and I can't spare you." + +"I'll stay, sir." + +"Water's no use to windward of a fire; it's spreading straight up the +church. We want to be on the other side to stop it." + +"The aisle's not afire!" + +"But they couldn't get the water to us, even if we got through alive. +No; where the walls are down for the transepts--that's the place. Which +side's boarded strongest?" + +"Both the same, sir." + +"Then we'll hack through the nearest! A saw and an axe, and we'll be +through by the time the first bucketful's ready for us." + +And, friends again, but both unconscious of the change, they rushed +together to the shed of which Robert Carlton had so lately taken leave: +in the fever of the moment even that leave-taking was forgotten. + +It was the north transept which faced the shed. Already the walls were a +dozen feet high, but a doorway had been left. The greater gap between +transept and nave was vertically boarded over within the church, and on +these boards fell the rector with his axe, to make an opening for Tom's +saw. They had light enough for their work. The interstices between the +boards were as the red-hot strings of a colossal harp; quickly a couple +were cut, and the boards beaten in; and it was as though the wind had +come down a smoking chimney. The pair fell back on either side of the +black stream that gushed out like water. Then cried Carlton in his voice +of command: + +"Look here! you stay where you are, Tom." + +"With you, sir?" + +"No, I must have a look; but one's enough." + +"Not for me, Mr. Carlton. I follow you." + +"Then you keep me where I am," said Carlton, sternly. + +"All right, sir! You follow me!" + +Next instant they were both through the breach, the builder first by the +depth of his chest. And they stood up within, but were glad to crouch +again out of the smoke. Already a dense reek hid the roof, and every +moment added to the depth of that inverted sea. It was a sea of +ineffectual currents, setting towards the smashed windows, the new +breach, the open door, but caught and diverted and sucked into the inky +whirlpool that the wind made under the roof, and escaping only by chance +fits and sudden starts. On the other hand, there was still air enough to +breathe within a few feet of the ground, and with water it seemed as if +something might yet be done. But it was no longer a very little fire: at +best the nave must be gutted now; to save roof and chancel was the +utmost hope. Yet here and there the worst seemed over. The blazing +hassocks were now only a glowing heap, and still the roof had not +caught. As the two men crouched and watched, the flames felt the front +pews with their splay blue tentacles, and the woodwork which was still +untouched glistened like a human body in pain. + +"You see that?" said Mr. Carlton, pointing to this moisture. + +"What is it?" + +"Paraffin! Look at the lamps; he's simply emptied them----" + +"Who, sir--who?" + +"God knows, and may God forgive him! I have enemies enough this morning, +though not more than I deserve. If only they will be my friends for one +hour, for the sake of the church! Are they never coming with that water? +Run and tell them a bucketful would make a difference now, but cartloads +will make none in ten more minutes! And tell them what I said just now: +bid them for God's sake think of nothing but the fire till we get it +under." + +He was thinking of nothing else himself, confident still of some measure +of success, only fretting for his water. In Ivey's absence he stripped +to the waist, and with his long coat essayed to beat the little flames +out as they spread and leapt, the blue and yellow surf of the +encroaching tide; but for one he extinguished he fanned a hundred, so he +retreated before he was flayed alive. And they found him stooping near +the opening, half-naked, scorched, begrimed, but not disheartened; a +strange figure in the place that knew him best in vestments, if any of +them thought of that. + +The first man had a bucket in each hand, but had spilt freely from both +in his haste. Carlton would not let him in, but received the buckets +through the hole, dashed their contents over the burning pews, and +returned them empty without waiting to see results. When he had time to +look, a little steam was rising, but the fire raged with undiminished +fury. The next comer was a boy with a brimming watering-can; but it is +difficult to fling water with effect from such a vessel, and pouring was +impossible in the increasing heat. Then came Tom Ivey with two more +buckets. + +"Keep outside," cried Carlton, taking them. "There's only work for one +in here. Can't they form line as I said, and pass along instead of +carrying?" + +"No, sir--not enough of us for the distance." + +"Not enough of you who'll put the church before the parson! That's what +you mean. The parson may deserve burning alive, but the poor church has +done no wrong!" + +And he continued his exertions in a bitter spirit not warranted by the +real circumstances, for his masterful monopoly of all danger had won +some sympathy outside, and many a one who had flung a stone was running +with a bucket now. More, however, stood with their hands in their +pockets; for East Anglia is constitutionally phlegmatic, and not all the +village had joined in the indignant excesses of the evening. + +The saddler came no farther than the fence in front of his house and +workshop. He was that implacable creature, the offended countryman. + +George Mellis did not even see the fire; already he had shaken the dust +of Long Stow from his feet for good. + +Thus, of the three types, as far removed from one another as the points +of an equilateral triangle, who had put in their individual word of +reproach, of denunciation, and of sympathy more insufferable than +either, only one was present on this lurid scene; but that one was doing +the work of ten. + +"That there Tom Ivey," said one of a group on the safe side of the +rectory fence, "he fares all of a wash. Yet I do hear as how he come up +to the rectory when he'd cleared the garden and called Carlton over +somethun wonderful." + +"I lay it was nothun to the calling over he had from Jasper." + +"Where is Jasper?" + +"Been indoors ever since: a touch of the old trouble, the missus told +Jones when he called." + +"That's a pity. This would've soothed his sore." + +One or two observed that that fared to soothe theirs; for there was no +reaction on the safe side of the fence. But the worst said in the +Suffolk tongue was invariably capped by a different order of voice, +which chimed in now. + +"The best thing Carlton can do is to cockle up with his church. The +governor'll build you a new church and find a new man to fill it. +There's nobody keener on a change as it is. I should like to be there +when he hears . . ." + +The speaker was smoking a cigarette on a barrow wheeled from the shed. +He might have been watching a display of fireworks, and one which was +beginning to bore him. His unmoved eye sought change. It found the +sexton hobbling in the glare. + +"Hi, Busby! Come here, I want you. What the dickens do you mean by +setting fire to the church?" + +"Me set fire to it, Master Sidney? Me set a church afire? He! he! you +allus fare to have yer laugh." + +"It will be no laughing matter for you when you're run in for it, +Busby." + +"Go on, Master Sidney; you know better than that." + +"I wish I did. They hang for arson, you know! But I say, Busby, how's +the frog?" + +The wizened face grew grave, but only as the screen darkens between the +pictures; next instant it was alight with the ineffable joy of gratified +monomania. The sexton hobbled nearer, clawing his vest. + +"Oh, that croap away; that's at that now! Would 'ee like to listen, +Master Sidney?" + +"No, thanks, Busby; don't you undo a button," said the young gentleman, +hastily. "I can hear it from where I am." + +The sexton went into senile raptures. + +"You can hear it? You can hear it? Do you all listen to that: he can +hear it, he can hear it from where he sit. The little varmin, to croap +so loud! That must be the fire. That fare to make him blink! An' Master +Sidney, he can hear him from where he sit!" + +The sexton hurried off to spread his triumph; but he boasted to deaf +ears. There was a sudden light below the sharp horizon between black +roof and slaty sky, yet no flame rose above the roof. It was as though +the southern eaves had caught. Ivey rushed out of the north transept. +Mr. Carlton followed, axe in hand. His chest and arms were smudged and +inflamed, his blinking eyelids were burnt bare, and the sweat stood all +over him in the red light leaping from the shivered windows. + +"It's no use, lads!" he called to those still running with the buckets; +"the boards have caught on the other side. Come and help me smash them +in, and we may save the chancel yet! Every man who is a man," he shouted +to the group across the fence, "come--lend a hand to save God's +sanctuary!" + +And he led the way with his axe, stinging to the waist in the open air, +but drunk with battle and the battle's joy. And there was no more +talking behind the rectory fence; not a man was left there to talk; even +Sidney Gleed had dropped his cigarette to follow the inspired madman +with the axe. + +The south transept was a stage less advanced than the north. Carlton got +upon one low wall, ran along it to that of the nave, and swung his axe +into the burning wood to his right. A rent was quickly made; he leapt +into the transept and improved it, his axe ringing the seconds, the +muscles of his back bulging and bubbling beneath the scorched skin. Men +watched him open-mouthed. It seemed incredible that such nerve, such +sinew, such indomitable virility, should have hidden from their +vengeance that very night. + +"A ladder!" he cried. "There's one behind the shed." + +The wood screen was rent, but not to the top. Below, the fire was +checked, but above it still crawled east. Waiting for the ladder, +Carlton employed himself in widening the gap that he had made; when it +came, he had it held vertically against the eaves, left intact above the +boarding, and ran up to finish his own work with the axe held short in +his left hand. A couple of planks were smashed in unburnt. He stayed on +the ladder to see whether the flames would leap the completed chasm, +stayed until the rungs smoked under his nose. When the burning boards +fell in on his left, and those on his right did not even smoulder, he +returned quickly to the ground. + +Throats which had groaned that night were parching for a cheer. The time +was not ripe. A shrill cry came instead: the boarding upon the other +side had ignited in its turn. + +"Round with the ladder," cried the rector; "we'll soon have it out. We +know more about it now. We'll save the chancel yet! Find another axe; +we'll begin top and bottom at once." + +And now the scene was changing every minute. A sky of slate had become a +sky of lead. The tens who had witnessed the first stages of the fire had +multiplied into hundreds. Frightened birds were twittering in the trees; +frightened horses neighed in the road; every kind of vehicle but a +fire-engine had been driven to the scene. Among the graves stood a tall +and aged gentleman, with the top-hat of his youth crammed down to his +snowy eyebrows, and an equally obsolete top-coat buttoned up to his +silver whiskers, in conversation with Sidney Gleed. + +"The damned rascal!" said the old gentleman. "But how the devil did it +come out?" + +"Musk seems to have smelt a rat, and went to him after the funeral. And +he owned up as bold as brass; the servants heard him. There he goes, up +the ladder again on this side. Keeps the fun to himself, don't he? Who's +going to win the Leger, doctor? Shotover again?" + +"Damn the Leger," said Dr. Marigold, whose sporting propensities, bad +language, and good heart were further constituents in the most +picturesque personality within a day's ride. "To think I should have +stood at her death-bed," he said, "and would have given ten pounds to +know who it was; and it's your High Church parson of all men on God's +earth! The infernal blackguard deserves to have his church burnt down; +but he's got some pluck, confound him." + +"Sucking up," said Master Sidney: "playing to the gallery while he's got +the chance." + +"H'm," said the doctor; "looks to me pretty badly burnt about the back +and arms. If he wasn't such a damned rascal I'd order him down." + +"He's doing no good," rejoined the young cynic, "and he knows it. He's +only there for effect. Look! There's the roof catching, as any fool knew +it must; and here's the Lakenhall engine, in time for 'God save the +Queen.'" + +Dr. Marigold swore again: his good heart contained no niche for the heir +to the Long Stow property. He turned his back on Sidney, his face to the +sexton, who had been at his elbow for some time. + +"Well, Busby, what are you bothering about?" + +"The frog, doctor. That croap louder than ever." + +"You infernal old humbug! Get out!" + +"But that's true, doctor--that's Gospel truth. Do you stoop down and +you'll hear it for yourself. Master Sidney, _he_ heard it where he sit." + +"Did he, indeed! Then he's worse than you." + +"But that steal every bit I eat; that do, that do," whined the sexton. +"I've tried salts, I've tried a 'metic, an' what else can I try? That +fare to know such a wunnerful lot. Salts an' 'metics, not him! He look +t'other way, an' hang on like grim death for the next bit o' meat. +That's killin' me, doctor. That's worse nor slow poison. That steal +every bite I eat." + +"Well, it won't steal this," said the doctor, dispensing half-a-crown. +"Now get away to bed, you old fool, and don't bother me." + +And neither thanks nor entreaties would divert his eyes from the burning +church again. + +The antiquated doctor was one of Nature's sportsmen: his inveterate +sympathies were with the losers of up-hill games and games against time; +and this blackguard parson had played his like a man, only to lose it +with the thunder of the fire-engine in his ears. The roof had caught at +last; in a little it would be blazing from end to end; and half-a-dozen +country fire-engines, and half a hundred Robert Carltons, could do no +good now. Carlton came slowly enough down his ladder this time, and +stood apart with his beard on his chest. + +"Hard lines, hard lines!" muttered Dr. Marigold in his top-coat collar; +and "Those slow fools! Those sleepy old women!" with his favourite +participle in each ejaculation. + +A sky of lead had turned to one of silver. Across the open uplands, +beyond the conflagration, a kindlier glow was in the east. And in the +broad daylight the fire reached its height with as small effect as the +firemen plied their water. Nothing could check the roof. Ceiling, +joists, and slates burnt up like good fuel in a good grate. Now it was a +watershed of living fire; now an avalanche of red-hot ruin; now a column +of smoke and sparks, rising out of blackened walls; a column unbroken by +the wind, which had fallen at dawn with a little rain, the edge of a +shower that had shunned Long Stow. + +When the roof fell in there were few of the hundreds present who had not +retreated out of harm's way. Only the helmed firemen held their ground, +and two others with bare heads. Of the pair, one was standing dazed, +with his beard on the rough coat thrown about him, and an ear deaf to +his companion's entreaties, when the crash came and the sparks flew high +and wide through rent walls and gaping windows. The sparks blackened as +they fell. The first smoke lifted. And the dazed man lay upon his face, +the other kneeling over him. + +Dr. Marigold came running, for all his years and his long top-coat. + +"Did anything hit him, Ivey?" + +"Not that I saw, sir; but he fared as if he'd fainted on his feet, and +when the roof went, why, so did he." + +Marigold knelt also, and a thickening ring enclosed the three. + +"He's rather nastily burnt, poor devil." + +And the old doctor lifted a leaden wrist, felt it in a sudden hush, +examined a burn upon the same arm, and looked up through eyebrows like +white moustaches. + +"But not dangerously, damn him!" + + + + +VII + +THE SINNER'S PRAYER + + +The bishop of the diocese sat at the larger of the two desks in the +palace library. It was the thirteenth of the following month, and a wet +forenoon. At eleven o'clock his lordship was intent upon a sheet of +unlined foolscap, with sundry notes dotted down the edge, and the rest +of the leaf left blank. The bishop's sight was failing, but against +glasses he had set his face. So his whiskers curled upon the paper; and +the wide mouth between the whiskers was firmly compressed; and this +compression lengthened a clean-shaven upper lip already unduly long. But +the pose displayed a noble head covered with thin white hair, and the +broad brow that was the casket of a broad mind. Seen at his desk, the +massive head and shoulders suggested both strength and stature above the +normal. Yet the bishop on his legs was a little man who limped. And the +surprise of this discovery was not the last for an observer: for the +little lame man had a dignity independent of his inches, and a majesty +of mind which lost nothing, but gained in prominence, by the constant +contrast of a bodily imperfection. + +The bishop stood up when his visitor was announced, a minute after +eleven, and supported himself with one hand while he stretched the other +across his desk. Carlton took it in confusion. He had expected that +shut mouth and piercing glance, but not this kindly grasp. He was +invited to sit down. The man who complied was the ghost of the Rector of +Long Stow, as his spiritual overseer remembered him. His whole face was +as white as his forehead had been on the day of the fire. It carried +more than one still whiter scar. Yet in the eyes there burnt, brighter +than ever, those fires of zeal and of enthusiasm which had warmed the +bishop's heart in the past, but which somewhat puzzled him now. + +"I am sorry," said his lordship, "that you should have such weather for +what, I am sure, must have been an undertaking for you, Mr. Carlton. You +still look far from strong. Before we begin, is there nothing----" + +Carlton could hear no more. There was nothing at all. He was quite +himself again. And he spoke with some coolness; for the other's manner, +despite his mouth and his eyes, was almost cruel in its unexpected and +undue consideration. It was less than ever this man's intention to play +upon the pity of high or low. He had an appeal to make before he went, +but it was not an appeal for pity. Meanwhile his back stiffened and his +chest filled in the intensity of his desire not to look the invalid. + +"In that case," resumed the bishop, "I am glad that you have seen your +way to keeping the appointment I suggested. In cases of complaint--more +especially a complaint of the grave character indicated in my letter--I +make it a rule to see the person complained of before taking further +steps. That is to say, if he will see me; and I don't think you will +regret having done so, Mr. Carlton. It may give you pain----" + +Carlton jerked his hands. + +"But you shall have fair play!" + +And his lordship looked point-blank at the bearded man, as he had looked +in his day on many a younger culprit; and his voice was the peculiar +voice that generations of schoolboys had set themselves to imitate, with +less success than they supposed. + +Carlton bowed acknowledgment of this promise. + +"In the questions which I feel compelled to put"--and the bishop glanced +at his sheet of foolscap--"you will perhaps give me credit for studying +your feelings as far as is possible in the painful circumstances. I +shall try not to leave them more painful than I find them, Mr. Carlton. +But the complaint received is a very serious one, and it is not made by +one person; it has very many signatures; and it necessitates plain +speaking. It is a fact, then, that you are the father of an illegitimate +child born on the twentieth of last month in your own parish?" + +"It is a fact, my lord." + +"And the woman is dead?" + +"The young girl--is dead." + +The bishop's pen had begun the descent of the clean part of his page of +foolscap; when the last answer was inscribed, the writer looked up, +neither in astonishment nor in horror, but with the clear eye and the +serene brow of the ideal judge. + +"Of course," said he, "I am informed that you have already made the +admission. Let there be no affectation or misunderstanding between us, +on that or any other point. But as your bishop, and at least hitherto +your friend, I desire to have refutation or confirmation from your own +lips. You are at perfect liberty to deny me either. It will make no +difference to the ultimate result. That, as you know, will be out of my +hands." + +"I desire to withhold nothing, my lord," said Robert Carlton in a firm +voice. + +"Very well. I think we understand each other. This poor young woman, I +gather, was the daughter of a prominent parishioner?" + +"Of a prominent resident in my parish--yes." + +"But she herself was conspicuous in parochial work? Is it a fact that +she played the organ in church?" + +"It is." + +The fact was noted, the pen laid down; and the little old man, who +looked only great across his desk, leant back in his chair. + +"I am exceedingly anxious that you should have fair play. Let me say +plainly that these are not my first inquiries into the matter. I am +informed--I wish to know with what truth--that the young woman +disappeared for several months before her death?" + +"It is quite true." + +"And returned to give birth to her child?" + +"And to die!" said Carlton, in his grim determination neither to shield +nor to spare himself in any of his answers. But his hands were clenched, +and his white face glistened with his pain. + +The bishop watched him with an eye grown mild with understanding, and a +heart hot with mercy for the man who had no mercy on himself. But the +tight mouth never relaxed, and the peculiar voice was unaltered when it +broke the silence. It was the voice of justice, neither kind nor unkind, +severe nor lenient, only grave, deliberate, matter-of-fact. + +"My next question is dictated by information received, or let me say by +suspicions communicated. It is a vital question; do not answer unless +you like. It is, however, a question that will infallibly arise +elsewhere. Were you, or were you not, privy to this poor young woman's +disappearance?" + +"Before God, my lord, I was not!" + +"I understand that her parents had no idea where she was until the very +end. Had you none either?" + +"No more than they had. We were equally in the dark. We believed that +she had gone to stay with a friend from the village--a young woman who +had married from service, and was settled near London. It was several +weeks before we discovered that her friend had never seen her." + +"And all this time you did not suspect her condition?" + +"Yes; then I did; but not before." + +"She made no communication before she went away?" + +"None whatever to me--none whatever, to my knowledge." + +"And this was early in the year?" + +"She left Long Stow in January, and we had no news of her till the +middle of June, when strangers communicated with her father." + +Again the bishop leant over his foolscap. + +"Did you ever offer her marriage?" he asked abruptly. + +"Repeatedly!" + +The clear eyes looked up. + +"Did you not tell her father this?" + +"No; I couldn't condescend to tell him," said Carlton, flushing for the +first time. "My lord, I have made no excuses. There are none to make. +That was none at all." + +His lordship regarded the changed face with no further change in his +own. + +"So you loved her," he said softly, after a pause. + +"Ah! if only I had loved her more!" + +"If excuse there could be . . . love . . . is some." + +It was the old man murmuring, as old men will, all unknown to the bishop +and the judge. + +"But I want no excuses!" cried Carlton, wildly. "And let me be honest +now, whatever I have been in the past; if I deceived myself and others, +let me undeceive myself and you! Oh, my lord, that wasn't love! It's the +bitterest thought of all, the most shameful confession of all. But love +must be something better; that can't be love! It was passion, if you +like; it was a passion that swept me away in the pride of my strength; +but, God forgive me, it was not love!" + +He hid his face in his writhing hands; and, with those wild eyes off +him, the bishop could no longer swallow his compassion. The lines of his +mouth relaxed, and lo, the mouth was beautiful. A tender light suffused +the aged face, and behold, the face was gentle beyond belief. + +"Love is everything," the old man said; "but even passion is something, +in these cold days of little lives and little sins. And honesty like +yours is a great deal, Robert Carlton, though your sin be as scarlet, +and the Blood of our Blessed Lord alone can make you clean." + +Carlton looked up swiftly, a new solicitude in his eyes. + +"In me it was scarlet: not in her. She loved . . . she loved. Oh, to +have loved as well--to have that to remember! . . . She thought it would +spoil my life; and I never guessed it was that! But now I know, I know! +It was for my sake she went away . . . poor child . . . poor mistaken +heroine! She died for me, and I cannot die for her. Isn't that hard? I +can't even die for her!" + +His bodily weakness betrayed itself in his swimming eyes; in the night +of his agony no tear had dimmed them before men. But his will was not +all gone. With clenched fists, and locked jaw, and beaded brow, he +fought his weakness, while the good bishop sat with his head on his +hand, and closed eyes, praying for a brother in the valley of despair. +When he opened his eyes, it was as though his prayer was heard; for +Robert Carlton was bearing himself with a new bravery; and the +incongruous unquenched fires, which had caused surprise at the outset of +the interview, burnt brightly as before in the younger eyes. The old man +met them with a sad, grave scrutiny. But the lines of his mouth remained +relaxed. And, when he spoke again, his voice was very gentle. + +"You may think that I have put you to unnecessary pain," he said, "when +I give you fair warning that your case must form the subject of further +proceedings in another place. But I had heard that your conduct was +indefensible, root and branch, from beginning to end. Of that I am now +able to form my own opinion. Yet my individual opinion can make no +difference in the result, since absolute deprivation I had never +contemplated in your case, and it is only the extreme penalty which +rests with me. On the other hand, it will be my duty to set the +ecclesiastical law in motion; and the ecclesiastical law must take its +course. I take it that you do not propose to defend your case?" + +A grim light flickered for an instant in Robert Carlton's eyes. "Have I +defended it hitherto, my lord?" + +"Then there can only be one result; and you must make up your mind, as +you have doubtless already done, to suspension for a term of years. If +word of mine can lessen that term, it shall be spoken in your favour, +both out of consideration of the great work that you were doing, and +have done, and in view of certain circumstances which our conversation +has brought to light." + +"But can you want me back in the Church?" cried Carlton; and his heart +beat high with the question; but turned heavier than before in the +interval of prudent deliberation which preceded any answer. + +"I would punish no man beyond the letter of the law," declared the +bishop at length, "even if it were in my power to do so. The Act debars +suspended clergymen from all exercise of their divine calling and from +all pecuniary enjoyment of their benefice until the term of such +suspension is up. I would not, if I could, prolong the period of +disability by throwing further let or hindrance in the way of an erring +brother who repents him truly of his sin. I would rather say, 'Come back +to your work, live down the past, and, by your example in the years that +may be left you, pluck up the tares that your bad example has surely +sown. Retrieve all but the irretrievable. Undo what you can.'" + +Carlton's eyes melted in gratitude too great for speech, but plain as +the benediction which his trembling lips left eloquently unsaid. + +"That," continued the bishop, "is what I should say to you--because I +think we understood each other. You have not sought to palliate your +offence; nor are you the man to misconstrue the little I may have said +concerning the offence itself. What is there to be said? You know well +enough that I lament it as I lament its mournful result, and deplore it +as I deplore the blot on the whole body of Christ's Church militant here +on earth. You have committed a great sin, against humanity, against God, +and against your Church; yet he would commit a greater who sought on +that account to hound you from that Church for ever. Courage, brother! +Pray without ceasing. Look forward, not back; and do not despair. +Despair is the devil's best friend; better give way to deadly sin than +to deadlier despair! Remember that you have done good work for God in +days gone by; and live for that brighter day when you have purged your +sin, and may be worthy to work for Him again." + +"And meanwhile?" whispered Carlton, for fear of shouting it in his +passionate anxiety. "Is there nothing I may do meanwhile--among my own +poor people--before the tares come up?" + +"If you are suspended you will be unable to hold any service; and I +hardly think you will care to go among your parishioners while that is +so." + +"But I shall not be forbidden my own parish?" + +"Not forbidden." + +"Nor my rectory?" + +"No; so far as I am aware, at least, you retain your right to reside +there; but I can hardly think that it would be expedient." + +"And the church! They must have their church back again. Who is going to +rebuild it for them?" + +Carlton was on his feet in the last excitement. The bishop regarded him +with puzzled eyebrows. + +"I have heard nothing on that subject as yet; it is a little early, is +it not? But I have no doubt that it will be a matter for subscription +among themselves." + +"Among my poor people?" + +"With substantial aid, I should hope, from men of substance in the +neighbourhood." + +"But why should they pay?" cried Carlton, impetuously. "The church was +not burnt down for my neighbours' sins, nor for the sins of the parish, +but for mine alone . . . Oh, my lord, if I could but go back among my +people, and be their servant, I who was too much their master before! I +was not quite dependent--thank God, I had a little of my own--but every +penny should be theirs!" + +And the profligate priest stood upright before his bishop--his white +hands clasped, his white face shining, his burning eyes moist--zealot +and suppliant in one. + +"You desire to spend your income----" + +"No, no, my capital!" + +"On the poor of your parish? I--I fail to understand." + +"And I scarcely dare make you!" confessed Carlton, his full voice +failing him. "I so fear your disapproval; and I could set my face +against all the world, but against you never, much less after this +morning . . . Oh, my lord, I have set my poor people a dastardly +example, and brought cruel shame upon my cloth; for its sake and for +theirs, if not for my own, let me at least leave among them a tangible +sign and symbol of my true repentance. I have the chance! I have such a +chance as God alone in His infinite mercy could vouchsafe to a miserable +sinner. My church at Long Stow has been burnt down through me--through +my sin--to punish me----" + +"Are you sure of that, Mr. Carlton?" + +"I know it, my lord. And I want to do what only seems to me my bounden +and my obvious duty, and to do it soon." + +The bishop looked enlightened but amazed. + +"You would rebuild the church out of your own pocket? Is that really +your wish?" + +"It is my prayer!" + + + + +VIII + +THE LORD OF THE MANOR. + + +Wilton Gleed owed his success in life to a natural bent for the politic +virtues, and to the quality of energy unalloyed by enterprise. He was a +man of much shrewdness and extraordinary tenacity, but absolutely no +initiative; so he had taken his opportunities and held his ground +without running a risk that he could remember. Not a self-made man, he +was, however, the son of one who had made himself by dint of that very +enterprise which was lacking in Wilton Gleed. The father had seen a +certain want and filled it to the satisfaction of the wide world; the +son had extended the business without meddling with the product of the +firm. Monopolies die hard. Gleed & Son did nothing to deserve a swift +demise. They just stalked behind the times, and appeared to thrive on a +sublime contempt of competition. And those who knew him best were the +most surprised when Wilton Gleed turned the great concern into a limited +liability company, and made a fortune out of the transaction alone; it +was the most daring thing that he had ever done. + +The reason for the step may be related as characteristic of the man. Age +had given the firm a certain aristocracy of degree--not of kind--even +age could not soften the fact that Gleed & Son sold things in tins. And +the tins it was that turned plain Gleed & Son into Gleed & Son, Limited. +Some innovator was making tins with cunning openers attached; the lesser +firms jumped at the improvement. The lesser firms were already doing +Gleeds' some slight damage in their go-ahead little way; but the worst +they could all do together was as nothing compared with the extra +expenditure of an appreciable fraction of a farthing per tin on an +output of millions in the year. Wilton Gleed could not face the +immediate hole in his profits. He had never taken a risk in his life, +and was not going to begin. He had increased his expenses by going into +Parliament, and he was not such a fool as to play tricks with his +income. He faced the situation as though it were ruin staring him in the +face, and lost a discernible measure of flesh before his big resolve. It +was all he did lose over the ultimate operation. He retired into private +and public life with more money than he knew how to spend. + +The average man is at his best as host, and in that capacity Wilton +Gleed was popular among his friends. He was an excellent sportsman of +the selfish sort; cherished a contempt for the various games which +involve playing for one's side; but was a first-rate shot, a fine +fisherman, and a good rider spoilt by his great principle of refusing +the risks. To shoot and dine with him was to see Gleed at his very best. +He was a bald little man, with silver-sandy moustache and close-cropped +whiskers; but his full-blooded face was still pink with health, his +fixed eye unerring as ever, his step elastic as the heather he loved to +tread. Gun in hand, in his tweeds and gaiters, and with his cap pulled +well over his head, Wilton Gleed never passed the prime of life; it was +late in the evening before he collected the years blown away on the +moor; and in its way the evening was as delectable as the day. The +dinner was a good one, and the host abandoned himself to its joys with a +schoolboy's ardour. Irreproachable champagne flowed like water, more +especially at the head of the table. Gleed carried it like a gentleman, +also the port that followed, though a little inclined to be garrulous +about the latter. As he sipped and gossiped, and settled the Eastern +Question in two words, and Mr. Gladstone's hash in one, the skin would +shine as it tightened on the bald head, and the always intent eye would +fix the listener beyond the needs of the conversation. It was very +seldom, however, that a syllable slid out of place, or that Wilton Gleed +went to bed looking quite his age. + +For some years he had leased various shootings in the autumn, spending +the other seasons at a lordly but suburban retreat inherited from his +father, with an occasional swoop abroad--the correct place at the +correct time--less for enjoyment than for other reasons. Gun, rod, and +cellar were what he did enjoy, and of these delights he vowed to have +his fill after getting out of Gleeds with unexpected spoils. A sporting +estate was in the market within two hours and a half of town; and for +forty thousand pounds Wilton Gleed became squire of Long Stow, patron of +an excellent living, and a large landowner in a country where he had a +nucleus of friends and soon made more. As Member of Parliament for that +division of London in which Gleeds had employed hundreds of hands for +half a hundred years, he at the same time bought a house in town, and +let the place outside. Subtler investments followed. The man was +becoming a gambler in his old age; but he played his own game with +ineradicable care and foresight, and rose Sir Wilton Gleed when his side +lost in the General Election of 1880. It was only a knighthood, and Sir +Wilton might have entertained justifiable hopes of his baronetcy; but +one or the other had been a moral certainty for some time. + +It was in Hyde Park Place that Sir Wilton first heard of the Long Stow +scandal and its immediate sequel. The news came in a few dry lines from +Sidney, by the first post on the Monday morning, June 26, 1882. It fell +like a firebrand in a keg of gunpowder. Sir Wilton, however, had even +better reasons than were obvious for his paroxysm of rage and +indignation; personal mortification was not the least of his emotions. +He would have gone down by the next train to "horsewhip the hound within +an inch of his life," but the cur had taken refuge in Lakenhall +Infirmary, "with very little the matter with him," in Sidney's words. +And just then the House was an Aceldama which no good soldier could +desert for a night, with the Government satisfactorily on the spit +between PhÅ“nix Park and Alexandria, and the Opposition creeping up vote +by vote. Sir Wilton decided to run down on the Wednesday for twenty-four +hours, and talked of having the rectory furniture thrown into the street +if the rector was not there to take it and himself away for good. Sir +Wilton had his own impression as to his powers as patron of the living, +and he very naturally swore that he would "have that blackguard out of +it" within the week. A friend at the Carlton put him right on the point. + +"You can't do that, Gleed. A living's like nothing else. My lord gives, +but my lord can't take away." + +"Then what on earth am I to do?" + +"Get him inhibited and make him resign. It will come to the same thing." + +The fire was in all the newspapers, with the hint of a scandal at the +end of the paragraph. Among those who spoke to Sir Wilton on the subject +was a jaunty politician who had never yet recognised him at the club. + +"Sir Wilton Gleed, I think? I fancy we have met before?" + +"Indeed, my lord?" + +It was the noble who had chosen to forget the circumstance hitherto; +to-day he was all courtesy and confidential concern. What was this about +the church that had been burnt down? He had heard it was on the other's +estate. Sir Wilton professed to know no more as yet than the papers told +him. + +"I ask because it reads to me----don't you know? Some scandal----what? +And I'm sorry to say--fellow Carlton--sort of connection of mine." + +"To be sure," said Sir Wilton. "I remember hearing it." + +"Odd fish, I'm afraid. Here in town for years, at that ritualistic shop +across the park--forget my own name next. Might have had a good time if +he'd liked. Never went out. Preferred the mews. Made a specialty of +footmen and fellows. Had a night club somewhere, where he taught 'em to +box, and brought my own man home himself one night with an eye like +your boot. It was about the only time we met. Remember hearing he could +preach, though; only hope he hasn't been making a fool of himself down +there!" + +"I hope not also," said the discreet knight; "but I am going down +to-morrow, so I shall hear." + +He went down very grim: for Robert Carlton had not only been a thorn in +his side that twelve-month past; he actually stood for the one false +move, of importance, which Sir Wilton Gleed was conscious of having made +in all his life. Yet he had taken no step with more complete confidence +and self-approval. A gentleman and man of brain, reported by Lady Gleed +and their daughter, and duly admitted by himself, to be the best +preacher they had ever heard; a man of family into the bargain, and not +such a distant cadet as the head of that family implied; could any +combination have promised a more suitable successor to the venerable +sportsman who had scorned white ties and caught his death coursing in +mid-winter with Dr. Marigold? And yet the fellow had proved a perfect +pest from the beginning. He had gone his own gait with a quiet +independence only less exasperating than his personal courtesy and +deference in every quarrel. In fact there had been no regular quarrel: +the squire had only been rather rude to the rector's face, and very +abusive behind his back. Nor was Sir Wilton's annoyance in the least +surprising. Devoid himself of a single religious conviction, but the +natural enemy of change, he viewed the inevitable, but too immediate, +innovations in the light of a personal affront; but when his own +expostulations were met with polite argument on a subject which he had +never studied, and he found himself at issue with a cleverer and a +stronger man, who put him in the illogical position of objecting in the +country to what his family approved in town, then there was no +alternative for the squire but to withdraw from the unequal field and +wait upon revenge. Too politic to break with one who after all had more +followers than foes, and who speedily made himself the first person in +the parish, Sir Wilton very naturally hated his man the more for those +very considerations which induced him to curb his tongue. But his +disappointment was manifold. It was not as if the fellow had proved +personally congenial to himself. He preferred teaching the lads cricket +to shooting with the squire, and he was a poor diner-out. His +predecessor had shot almost (but not quite) as well as Sir Wilton +himself, and had the harder head of the two for port. Carlton was not +even in touch with his own people. There was no advantage in the man at +all. + +But now the end was in sight--the incredibly premature and disgraceful +end. Sir Wilton went down grim enough, but much less angry and indignant +than he supposed. Most of his wrath was the accumulation of months, free +for expression at last. He was, however, a good and clean citizen +according to his lights, and he did undoubtedly feel the rightful +indignation with which the story from Long Stow was calculated to +inspire many a worse man. Arrived at Lakenhall, where the stanhope was +waiting for him, he asked but one question on the way to Long Stow, and +then drove straight past the hall to the church. Here he got down, and +examined the black ruins with his hands in his pockets and his shoulders +very square and a fixed glare of mingled rage and exultation. Then he +walked past the broken windows, and the stanhope met him at the rectory +gate. He drove home without a word. His one question had elicited the +fact that the rector was still in the infirmary. + +The village street cut clean through the high-walled hall garden, and +the brown-brick hall itself stood as near the road as the mansion in +Hyde Park Place, and was the uglier building of the two, from the dormer +windows in the steep slates to the portico with the painted pillars. +Within was the depressing atmosphere of a great house all but empty. Sir +Wilton hurried through a twilit drawing-room in deadly order, and forth +by a French window into a pleasaunce of elms and plane-trees whose +shadows lay sharp as themselves upon the shaven sward. A girl was coming +across the grass to meet him, a girl at the awkward age, with her dark +hair in a plait and her black dress neither long nor short. Sir Wilton +brushed her cheek with his bleached moustache. + +"Where's Fraulein?" he said. + +"In the schoolroom, I think, uncle." + +"I want to speak to her. I'm only down for the night and shall be busy. +I'll be looking round the garden, tell her." + +And he walked away from the house, treading vigorously on the cropped +grass; and presently a little middle-aged lady, with a plain, shrewd +face, flitted over it in her turn. She found Sir Wilton between the four +yew hedges and the mathematical parterres of the Italian garden at the +further end of the lawn. He shook hands with her, but gave free rein, +for the second time in five minutes, to his idiosyncrasy of hard +staring. + +Fraulein Hentig had been many years in the family, and had taken many +parts; at present she was permanent housekeeper in the country, but had +lately also recommenced old schoolroom duties on the adoption by Sir +Wilton of his only brother's only child. There was no nonsense about +Fraulein Hentig. She told Sir William all that she had heard and all +that she believed was true, without mincing facts or wincing at the +expletives which more than once interrupted her tale. As it proceeded +the fixed eyes lightened with a vindictive glitter; but the end found +Sir Wilton scowling. + +"I wish I'd been here! I wouldn't have let them break his windows; no, I +should have claimed the privilege of horsewhipping him with my own +hands. I'd do it still if he were here; but he'll never show his nose in +Long Stow again. I suppose there's no doubt the church was wilfully set +fire to?" + +"None at all from what I hear, Sir Wilton." + +"Is nobody suspected?" + +"George Mellis was. They say he was in love with the girl, and he +disappeared on Saturday night. However, it turns out that he was already +in Lakenhall hours before the fire, and he never came back. It appears +he went straight to the rectory when he heard the scandal, and almost as +straight out of Long Stow when Mr. Carlton admitted everything. Already +I hear that he has enlisted in London." + +"You don't mean it! That's another thing at that blackguard's door; it's +a nice list! But it's enough to send the whole parish to the dogs. By +the way, you would get Lady Gleed's letter?" + +"Yes, Sir Wilton. I wrote last night to tell her ladyship that she might +make her mind easy about her niece. She is very innocent, and when I +told her the windows had been broken because Mr. Carlton had done +something dishonourable, she was amazed of course, but she asked no more +questions. I spoke at once to the servants, and I made Gwynneth promise +not to go among the people at present; they have already typhoid fever +in one of the cottages, and that was my excuse." + +"Excellent!" said Sir Wilton. "I won't have her in and out of the +cottages in any case, and I shall tell her so before I go. She's much +too young for that kind of nonsense. And she mustn't read just exactly +what she likes. She had a book in her hand just now--I couldn't see +what--but she seems inclined to fill her head with any folly. We must +find a school for her, and meanwhile bring her up as we've brought up +our own child." + +Fraulein Hentig smiled judiciously. + +"They are already rather different characters," she said. "But I will do +my best, Sir Wilton." + +When the pair quitted the Italian garden, the gentleman hurrying to make +other inquiries before dinner, while the German gentlewoman dropped +behind, two brown eyes saw them from an upper window, whither the girl +had carried her book in vain. Her attention had been intermittent +before, but now she could not even try to read. The air was full of +mystery, and the mystery was more absorbing than that in any book. It +was also absolute and unfathomable in the girl's mind. Yet her brain +teemed with questions and surmises. She had come upstairs because she +felt that they wanted her out of the way, her uncle and the good, slow, +serious Fraulein. Yet that was not enough for them: they also must +retire as far as possible for their talk. Of course Gwynneth knew what +they had to talk about; but what was the dishonourable action that a +clergyman could commit and that could not be so much as mentioned in her +hearing? She was not thinking of "a clergyman" in the abstract. She was +thinking of the man with the beautiful, sad face; of the passionate +preacher with the voice that thrilled the senses and the words that +filled the mind. She had heard him preach of sin and suffering with +equal sympathy. Phrases came back to her. Now she understood. But what +could he have done, that he should suffer so, and that a perfectly kind +person like Fraulein Hentig should exult in his suffering? + +Gwynneth was splendidly and terribly innocent, but all the more +inquisitive on that account. She was unacquainted with the facts, yet +not with the tragedy of life. In a tragic atmosphere she had been born +and bred. Quentin Gleed had been fatally lacking in the politic virtues +cultivated by his brother. He had deserted his wife and drunk himself to +death within the memory of Gwynneth. The young girl recalled dim years +of bitter scenes in a luxurious home, and vivid years of peace and +poverty in a tiny cottage. And now her mother was gone also; the dear, +independent, wilful little mother, who had taught her child all but the +wickedness that was in the world! And that child sat at her bedroom +window in the new home that never could be home to her; and the drooping +sun could find no bottom to her dark and limpid eyes, no flaw upon her +pure warm skin; and neither the cuckoo in the poplar, nor the thrush in +the elm, nor the sparrows in the eaves just overhead, could tell her +anything of the wickedness that was in even her small world. + + + + +IX + +A DUEL BEGINS + + +Late in the afternoon of July 13, a Lakenhall fly rattled through Long +Stow, and waited in the rain outside the rectory gate while one of the +occupants ran up to the house. He was such a short time gone, and so few +people were about in the wet, that the fly was on its way back to +Lakenhall before the Long Stow folk realised that it was the rector who +had upset prophecy by showing his nose among them in broad daylight. He +had done no more, however, nor was anything further seen or heard of him +during the month of July. It appeared that he had returned for some +private papers only. The rectory was locked up by the squire's orders, +but the rector had forced his own study door, and his muddy footmarks +were confined to that room. The same evening he went up to town--and +disappeared. But his address was known in an official quarter. And all +day and every day he might have been discovered in the reading room of +the British Museum: a memorable figure, stooping amid mountains of +architectural tomes, and drawing or copying plans in the few inches of +table-land they left him, all with a nervous eagerness of face and hand +not daily to be seen beneath that dispiriting dome. + +Then the call came, and he was tried in the consistorial court of his +own diocese, before the chancellor thereof, at the beginning of August. +No need to record more than the fact. The proceedings were brief because +the accused pleaded guilty and his own word was the only evidence +against him. The sentence was that of suspension foreshadowed by the +bishop. The Reverend Robert Carlton was formally suspended _ab officio +et beneficio_ for the period of five years. + +The result was reported in the London papers; there was only matter for +a few lines. "Mr. Carlton was suspended for five years" was the +concluding sentence in _The Times_ report; and that was good enough for +Sir Wilton Gleed. It was a happy omen for the holidays, which began for +him that very day. The family were already in the country. Sir Wilton +took the last train to Lakenhall and drove himself home for good in the +highest spirits. Four miles of the five were over his own acres, and +every one of them was crumbling with rabbits in the rosy dusk. Later, +the larkspur and peonies on the dinner-table were as the very breath and +blush of the gorgeous English country; and a thrush sang its welcome +through the open window, and a nightingale trilled the tired Londoner to +sleep; but he dreamt of a pheasant that he had heard calling between +Lakenhall and Long Stow. + +In the country Sir Wilton was an early riser, and he was abroad next +morning while the shadows of the elms still stretched to the house and +quivered up its bare brick walls. The great lawn was dusted with a milky +dew in which Sir Wilton positively wallowed in his water-tight boots; +it was not his least delight to be in shooting-boots and knickerbockers +and soft raiment once more. The first few minutes of the more excellent +life produced an unseasonable geniality in the breast of Wilton Gleed. +The man was a human being, and he longed for companionship in his joy. +But Sidney never rose before he must, nor the gardeners either, it +appeared. In the stable-yard a groom was encountered, but Sir Wilton had +seen his face every day in town. He went out into the village, and +naturally turned to the left. The cottage doors were open, and they were +filled with homely figures that touched a cap or courtesied as he passed +with a pleasant word for all. It was good to be back, to be a little +king again. Sir Wilton pulled the cap over his eyes because the sun was +in them, and admired the ripe wheat in the field beyond the post-office, +the barley in the field beyond that. So he passed the Flint House on the +other side with unruffled mind, and was passing the Flint House meadow +before his thoughts took the inevitable turn which led to profane +mutterings through shut teeth. But this morning it did not lead quite so +far; this morning, with the scented air of England in his nostrils, and +a twitter in the ears from every thatch, even Sir Wilton Gleed could +find it in his heart to pity the sinner fallen from his high estate in +what was paradise enough for the squire. + +"Poor devil!" he said as he came to the rectory gate and saw the long +grass within. It was sufficiently in key with the old quaint rectory, in +its rags of ivy and its shawl of disreputable tiles. The windows were +still broken and the shutters shut. Otherwise the picture was as +alluring as its fellows to the lord of the manor. The trees that hid the +church at midsummer would screen its ruins for many a day. + +Sir Wilton entered to refresh his memory as to the minor damages, and +they changed his mood. Who was to pay for twenty-nine panes of +glass--no, he had missed a window--for thirty-three? He was a man who +did not care to spend a penny without obtaining his pennyworth; but he +was not clear as to his legal obligations; and he bristled at the idea +of paying for the immorality of the parson and the excesses of his +flock. He had paid enough in other ways. And there was the church. Who +was to rebuild the church? They might expect him to do that once he +began doing things; and the man fell into premature fuming between his +love of the lavish and his detestation of expense. Meanwhile he had +found a whole window, that of the study, and the door beside it stood +ajar. This he pushed open as though the place belonged to him (his view +in so many words), and stood still upon the threshold. + +"Well, I'm damned!" he cried at last. + +Robert Carlton sat asleep in his chair, his hands in his overcoat +pockets, the collar turned up about his ears. His boots and trousers +were brown and yellow with the dust of the district. In an instant he +was on his feet, scared, startled, and abashed. + +"So you've come back, have you?" + +"An hour or two ago. I walked from Cambridge. I don't know how you +heard!" + +"Heard? You must think me in a hurry for your society! No, this is an +unexpected pleasure, and I use the words advisedly. It's something to +find you don't come twice in broad daylight." + +"I have come on business, as before, but this time the business will +occupy more than a few minutes. I wished to get it in train with as +little fuss as possible. Then I was coming to see you, Sir Wilton." + +It was quietly spoken, without bitterness or defiance, but also without +the abject humility which had trembled in the clergyman's first words. +The other made some attempt to modify his manner: nothing could put him +in the wrong, but he realised that it might be as well to abstain from +mere brutality. And what he had just heard implied a certain +reassurance. + +"I see," said Gleed. "You have come to make arrangements about your +furniture and effects. I am glad to hear it." + +"My furniture and effects?" queried Carlton. "What arrangements do you +mean?" + +"Well, you can't leave them here, can you?" + +"Why not, Sir Wilton?" + +"Why not!" echoed the squire, turning from pink to purple with the two +words. "Because you've been disgraced and degraded as you deserve; +because you're the hound you are; because you've been suspended for five +years, and I won't have you or your belongings cumber my ground for a +single day of them! So now you know," continued Gleed in lower tones, +his venom spent. "I didn't think it would be necessary to tell you my +opinion of you; but you've brought it on yourself." + +Carlton bowed to that, but respectfully pointed out the difference +between suspension and deprivation, his tone one of apology rather than +of triumph. + +"I don't say which I deserved," he added, "but I do thank God for the +mercy He has shown me. This gives me another chance--in five years' +time. Meanwhile I am not only entitled to keep my furniture in the +rectory. I believe I may live in it if I like." + +Gleed stood convulsed with wrath redoubled. He had been too busy in town +to prime himself upon a point which could not arise before he went down +to the country; and here it was, awaiting him. His disadvantage alone +was enough to put him in a passion; but the last statement was monstrous +in itself. + +"I don't believe it! I don't believe a word you say! A man who can live +a lie will tell nothing else!" + +Carlton drew himself up, his nostrils curling. + +"Better go and ask your solicitor," he said. "I have forfeited the +right--as you so well know--to the only possible reply." + +"Rights apart," rejoined Gleed, his colour heightening by a shade, "do +you mean to tell me you would seriously think of remaining on the very +scene of your shame?" + +"I didn't say I would do anything. I said I believed I could." + +"You have done enough harm in the place; surely you wouldn't come back +to do more?" + +"No; if I came at all, it would be to undo a little of the harm--to live +it down, Sir Wilton, by God's help!" said Carlton, and his voice shook. +"But I do not mean to live here. I have spoken to the bishop, and his +advice is against it, though he leaves me free to follow my own +judgment. This afternoon I hoped to speak to you. There is another +matter which is really a duty, so that I can be in no doubt as to what +to do there. It will not involve my remaining on the spot, or obtruding +myself in any way. But the church has been burnt down on my account, and +I intend to rebuild it before the winter." + +"The church is mine!" said Gleed, savagely. + +"I don't want to contradict you, Sir Wilton; but you should really see +your lawyer on all these points." + +"The land is mine!" + +"Not the church land, Sir Wilton; and the rector is not only entitled, +but he may be compelled, to restore and rebuild within certain limits. +Your solicitor will turn up the Act and show it you in black and white. +And after that I think you will hardly stand between me and my bounden +duty." + +"I don't recognise it as your duty. Your first duty is to resign the +living lock-stock-and-barrel--if you've any sense of decency left; but +you haven't--not you, you infernal blackguard, you!" + +Gleed was standing on the drive, his arms akimbo and his fists clenched, +his flushed face thrust forward and his stockinged legs planted firmly +apart. It was Carlton's lithe figure which had been filling the doorway +for some minutes; but at this he strode upon his adversary, and towered +over him with a hand that itched. + +"Why must you insult me?" he cried. "Do you think that's the way to get +me to do anything? Or are you bent upon having me up for assault? For +heaven's sake remember your own manhood, Sir Wilton, and respect mine; +don't trade too far upon my readiness to admit that I am all men choose +to call me. Have a little pride! I am ready to take my punishment, and +more. I will keep away from the place as much as possible. If I can let +the rectory, that will be so much more money for the church. Don't +oppose me; if you can't help me by your countenance (and I grant you +it's more than I have a right to expect), at least be neutral, and let +me work out my own salvation in my own way. It will make no difference +to the past. It may make all the difference in the future. God knows I +can't reinstate myself in His sight and in the hearts of men by building +a church! But I can leave behind me a sign of my sorrow and my true +penitence. I can leave behind me a name and an example, bad enough in +all conscience, but yet not wholly vile to the very last. And think what +even that would be to me! And think what it would be if I could but pave +the way, not to forgiveness, but to some reconciliation with those whom +I have loved but led amiss . . . Well, that may be too much to hope +. . . no, I have no right to dream of that . . . but at least let me +make the one material reparation in my power; let me do my duty! When +it is done, if you and they will have no more of me, then you shall all +be rid of me for good." + +Gleed wavered, partly because in mere personality he was no match for +the other, partly because the prospect of a new church for nothing made +its own appeal to the man who had counted the cost of the broken +windows. His mind ran over the pecuniary scheme and detected a flaw. + +"And what's to become of the parish for the next five years?" he asked. +"Who's to pay a man to do your work?" + +"There's the stipend I cannot touch and would not if I could; a part of +that will doubtless be set aside. Until the church is habitable, +however, the case will probably be met by one of the curates coming over +from Lakenhall and taking a service in the schoolroom." + +"And how do _you_ know?" cried Sir Wilton, not unjustifiably. + +"The bishop sent for me," said Carlton--and his eyes fell. "I ventured +to speak to him on the subject before I left. Do you think I don't care +what happens here in my absence? I hope the services will begin next +Sunday--the building next week. I have worked the whole thing out. I +could show you the figures and the plans. The new ones are ready, if you +can call them new. I shall be my own architect as before for the +transepts, but the rest shall be exactly as it was." + +"We'll see about that," said Sir Wilton grimly. He knew those melting +eyes, that enthusiastic voice. They had brought their hundreds to this +man's feet before. They might do so again. Even the squire felt their +power in his own despite. + +"It is my one chance!" the voice went on in softer accents. "Do not ask +me to forego it altogether; but I will keep in the background as much as +you like; all I want to know is that the work is going on. Suppose I did +resign, and you appointed another man. Why should he give towards the +church? Why should he come where there is none? Let me build the new one +first!" + +"Has it come to letting? I understood I couldn't prevent you?" + +"No more you can; although----" + +"We'll see!" cried Gleed. "That's quite enough for me. We'll see!" + +"But, Sir Wilton----" + +"Damn your 'buts,' sir!" shouted the other, shaking with rage. "You +disgrace the parish, and you won't leave it. You come back, and set +yourself against me, and think you can do what you like after doing what +you've done. By God, it's monstrous! There's not a man in the country +who won't agree with me; you'll find that out to your cost. Build the +church, would you? I'll see you further! Law or no law, I'll have you +out of this! I'll hound you out of it! I'll have you torn in pieces if +you stay!" + +"I have already told you I don't intend to stay," said Carlton quietly. +"I only intend to rebuild the church." + +"All right! You try! You try!" + +And with his fixed eyes flashing, and his fresh face aged with anger, +but scored with implacable resolve, Sir Wilton Gleed swung on his heel, +and so down the drive with every step a stamp. + + + + +X + +THE LETTER OF THE LAW + + +In the village he met Tom Ivey, but passed him with a savage nod, and +was some yards further on when a thought smote him so that he spun round +in his stride. + +"That you, Ivey?" he called. "I wasn't thinking; you're the very man I +wanted to see. How are you, eh?" + +"Nicely, thank you, Sir Wilton," said Tom, coming up. + +"Plenty of work, I hope?" + +"Well, not just lately, Sir Wilton." + +"Good! I may have some for you. I'll see you about it this evening or +to-morrow; meanwhile keep yourself free. By the way, how's your mother?" + +"Very sadly, Sir Wilton. I sometimes fare to think she's not long for +this world." + +"Nonsense, man! What's the matter with her?" + +Tom hardly knew. That was old age, _he_ thought. Then the house was that +old and small; sometimes she fared to stifle for want of air. And this +Tom said doggedly, for a reason. + +"Ah!" cried Sir Wilton, his fixed eye brightening. "Wasn't there a +question of repairs some time since?" + +"There was, Sir Wilton." + +"Well, I'll reconsider it. We must do what we can to make the old lady +comfortable for the winter. I'll come and see her, and I'll see you +again about the other matter. Keep yourself free meanwhile. Don't you +let any of those Lakenhall fellows snap you up!" + +And Sir Wilton went on chuckling, but again turned quickly and called +the other back. + +"By the way, Tom, who _were_ those fellows you used to work for in +Lakenhall?" + +"Tait & Taplin, Sir Wilton." + +A note was taken of the names. + +"The only builders in the town, eh?" + +"Well, Sir Wilton, there's old Isaac Hoole, the stonemason." + +"A stonemason, by Jove!" and down went his name. "What other builders +and stonemasons have we in the district--near enough to undertake some +work here? I'm not thinking of the job I've got for you, Tom." + +Ivey thought of three within fifteen miles, and several at greater +distances, but doubted whether any of the latter would accept a contract +so far afield. Their names were taken, nevertheless, and Sir Wilton +stared his hardest as he put his pocket-book away. + +"I shall want you all the same," he said, "and I shall expect to get you +when I want you. Understand? If anybody else offers you a job, remember +you've got one. And I'll see your mother this morning." + +Tom went his way with his honest wits in a knot. He could not conceive +what was coming. Ten minutes ago he had found a note slipped under the +door in the night, and he was going straight to the rectory without his +breakfast. Had Sir Wilton been there before him, and was he going to +rebuild the church? Then what had the reverend to say to it, now that he +was suspended for five years? And what in the world could he have to say +to Tom Ivey? + +He said nothing at all until they had shaken hands, and nothing then +about the fire; it is with the hand alone that men pay their big debts +to men, and Robert Carlton did not weaken his thanks with words. + +"Have you got a job, Tom?" were his first. + +"I have and I haven't, sir," said Ivey. + +"You're not free to take one from me?" + +"I wish I was, sir!" cried Tom, impulsively (he was not so sure about it +on reflection); and in his simplicity he explained why he was not free. +"But perhaps that's the same job, sir?" he added, hopefully. + +Carlton shook his head, and looked wistfully on the friendly face; a few +words (he knew his power) and the very man he wanted would be on his +side against all odds. But he must not begin by dividing the village +into factions; he must fight his own battle, with mercenaries from +neutral ground, or none at all. + +"Where was it you served your time, Tom?" he asked at length. + +"Tait & Taplin's, sir, in Lakenhall." + +"Thanks. I won't keep you, Tom. It will do you no good to be seen up +here." + +He held out his hand with a dismal smile. It was the other's turn to +wring hard. "I care nothing about that, sir! We've been shoulder to +shoulder once already; my mind don't go no further back than that; and +we'll be shoulder to shoulder again!" + +Carlton found flour and tea in the store-room, and in the fowl-house two +new-laid eggs. He cooked his first breakfast with the sun pouring +through the open kitchen window upon six weeks' dirt and dust. He was +not a man of very hearty habit, but he had learnt of old the evil of +exercise upon too light a diet. His pony was fattening in the glebe; but +a fastidious sense of fitness forbade him to drive, and between nine and +ten he set out for Lakenhall on foot. + +It was an ordeal for the first half-mile: the sunlight flooding the +village felt like limelight turned on him alone. Some children +courtesied as though nothing was changed; their elders stared at him +without further sign; only one shouted after him, he knew not who or +what. He reached the open country with a raging pulse, thinking only +upon circuitous ways back; but three solitary miles restored his nerve. +And in Lakenhall it was only every other passer who stopped and turned +and stared. Entering the town he was nearly run over by a dogcart. It +was Sir Wilton driving, and Carlton caught the gleam of his eye even as +he leapt to one side for his life, but mistook its significance until he +was within sight of Tait & Taplin's. Then it occurred to him, and he +entered fully prepared. + +"No, thank you, sir--not for us! We've heard of you, and we don't deal +with your sort. Do you hear, or do you want to hear more?" + +Carlton searched in vain for another builder, and only got the name of +a stonemason by going into the cemetery and looking at the newer +gravestones. He had then to discover where the man lived, and he was +ashamed to ask questions in shops. He was still scouring the town, and +it was afternoon, when a gig was pulled up in the middle of the road. + +"So you're back? Well, you look better than you did." + +"I am," said Carlton, "thanks to you." + +"Who are you looking for?" + +"Hoole, the stonemason." + +"Jump up and I'll drive you there." + +The tone was too humane for Carlton. + +"Thank you, doctor, but I like walking." + +"Then find him for yourself, and be damned to you!" + +And Marigold drove on, red to the hoar of his eighty years; but, as +Carlton stood watching him out of sight with vain compunction, the old +doctor turned in his seat and pointed up an alley with his whip in +passing. + +Hoole, the stonemason, was not rude, but he was as firm as Tait & Taplin +in his refusal. He was an elderly man, of few words, but he admitted +that Sir Wilton Gleed had been there that morning. That was enough for +Carlton, who was turning away when something in his visible fatigue and +dejection moved the mason to give him a hint. + +"You won't get anybody in the district to work for you against Sir +Wilton," he said. "That stands to reason." + +"Then I must go out of the district," said Carlton. And he bought a +county directory at a shop where he had been a regular customer; but +they insisted on the settlement of his current bill first; and even then +he had to help himself to the new book, and leave the money on the +counter, because they scorned to serve him. The directory contained the +names and addresses of the very few builders and master-masons within a +day's journey of Long Stow. And it was all there was to show for the +long day's round of retribution and rebuff when, late in the afternoon, +Carlton returned as he had come, too tired and too dispirited to walk an +inch out of his way; and the school-children who had courtesied in the +morning knew better now, and cried after the bent figure slinking home +at dusk. + +The next day was Sunday, and the school-bell tinkled towards eleven +o'clock, and stopped precisely at the hour. Then Carlton knew that his +own idea had been adopted, and that somebody was saying matins in the +parish school-room: he read the service to himself in his study, and +evensong when evening came, with a sermon of Charles Kingsley's after +each: for doctrine could not help him now, but brave humanity could and +did. + +The Monday was Bank Holiday; but Carlton only knew it when he had +trudged ten miles to have speech with a builder whose premises were +closed; and so another day was lost. On the Tuesday he tried again, but +with as little avail. Sir Wilton Gleed had been there before him (as +long ago as the Saturday afternoon), and it was the same elsewhere. The +week went in fruitless visits to small contractors and working masons in +this large village or in that little town; the enemy had been first in +every field, with a cunning formula which Carlton reconstructed from the +various answers he received. + +"Of course, the church will have to be rebuilt," Sir Wilton had been +saying; "but not by him. He hasn't the money, for one thing; it had +better be an iron church, if he is to pay you for it. Help me to get rid +of him, and you shall hear from me again. We will have a decent church +when we are about it, and a local man shall get the job." + +Meanwhile the boycott was nowhere more operative than in Long Stow +itself, and no human being came near the rectory, where the rector +subsisted on a providential store of bacon and the daily deposit of +eggs, and on strange bread of his own baking, for he would risk no more +insults in the shops. But one night a forgotten friend came back into +his life: his collie, Glen, came bounding down the drive to meet him, +and the mad uproar of that welcome was heard through half the village, +and duly became the talk. The dog had been a vagabond and a rogue for +six wild weeks, and it came back gaunt and hard, its brush clotted and +raw underneath with the spray from a farmer's gun. Carlton washed the +wound with warm water, and the two pariahs supped together, and lay that +night upon the same bed, and went abroad together next morning, to try +the last man left. + +The day after that they stayed at home, and word reached the hall that +the rector had been seen among the ruins of his church; he was, indeed, +exploring them for the first time, and that both with method and +deliberation. When seen, however (from the lane that runs under the +fine east window of to-day, past the lawn-tennis court which was then a +fowl run, and the glebe that is still the glebe), he was seated on a +sandstone block in front of the little lean-to shed; and, as a matter of +fact, his back was to the ruins. He was contemplating similar blocks and +slabs of the undressed stone that lay where they had been lying on +Midsummer Day: some were still smutty from the fire, all were slightly +stained by the weather, otherwise there was no change that Carlton could +see as he sat thus. At one end of the shed rose a great yellow cairn of +material raw from the quarry--a stack of stones about as much of one +size and shape as so many lumps of sugar; enough to finish the +transepts, as matters had stood; a mere fraction of the amount required +now. Carlton looked on what he had got, and his eyes closed in a +calculation beyond his powers in mental arithmetic; he had to take a +pencil to it, and then a foot-rule to the blackened courses, and +presently a pair of compasses to the plans in the study. + +In the afternoon he tidied the shed. Every tool was intact; a little +rust had been the worst intruder; and the feel of the cool sleek handles +quickened Carlton's pulse. Nay, the hammer rang a few strokes on the +cold-chisel, for he could not help it, and the music reminded him of his +poor bells, now cumbering the porch; it was almost as good to hear; and +the way the soft stone peeled, in creamy flakes, thrilled the hand as it +charmed the eye. But a very few minutes served to make the enthusiast +ashamed of his enthusiasm; and though he spent more time in the ruins, +now testing a standing wall, now scraping a charred stone, ardour and +determination had died down in an eye that was looking within; a wistful +irresolution flickered in their place. And that night the lonely man +walked his room once more, from twilight to twilight, with long +intervals spent upon his knees, in agonies of doubt and self-distrust, +in passionate entreaty for a right judgment, and for the strength to +abide by it. Yet his duty had not dawned upon him with the day. + +Towards eleven the school-bell tinkled. It was Sunday once more; and +once more he read the prayers upon his knees and the psalms and lessons +standing; but no sermon to-day. No man could help him in his struggle +with himself; he must trust to the strength of his own soul, to the +singleness of his own heart, and to the guidance of the God who was +drawing nearer and nearer to him in these days--with each prayer that +rose from his heart--with each bead that stood upon his brow. And so at +last, when the burden of doubt and darkness became more than the man +could bear, it was as though the heavens had opened, and a beam of +celestial light flooded the narrow room with the low ceiling and the +cross-beams; for the peace of a mind made up had descended upon the +solitary therein. And that night his sleep was sound, so that in the +morning he had to ask himself why; the answer made him catch his breath; +it did not shake his resolve. + +"He shall have his chance," said Carlton; "he shall have it fairly to +his face. And he will take it--and that will be the end!" + +He hung about the ruins till it was ten o'clock by his watch, and then +went straight to the hall. Sir Wilton was at home; but the footman +hesitated to admit this visitor. Carlton's own hesitation was, however, +at an end, and his eye forbade rebuff. He was shown into the +drawing-room, where a very young girl was at the piano, evidently +practising, and yet playing in a way that made Carlton sorry when she +stopped. The cool room smelling of flowers; the glimpse of garden +through an open window, with the court marked out and chairs under the +trees; the momentary sound of a fine instrument finely touched: it was +all the very breath and essence of the pleasant every-day world from +which he had rightly and richly earned dismissal, and it all was branded +in his brain. Then the young girl rose, and stood in doubt with the sun +upon her plaited hair, and eyes great with innocent distress; but +Carlton barely bowed, and the child hardly knew how she got across the +room. + +Sir Wilton entered with jaunty step. His whiskered jaw was set like a +vice, but the light of conscious triumph danced in his fixed eyeballs. +Carlton had come prepared to have his intrusion treated as his latest +crime; a glance convinced him that the other was too sure of victory to +object to an interview with the virtually vanquished. + +"So you are quite determined that I shall not rebuild the church?" + +It was a point-blank beginning. Sir Wilton shrugged and smiled. "I have +told you to build it if you can," said he. + +"But you mean to make that an impossibility?" + +"Naturally I don't intend to make it easy." + +"Admit that by foul means, since none are fair, you are deliberately +preventing me from doing my duty!" Carlton pressed his point with a +heat he regretted, but could not help. + +"I admit nothing," said the other, doggedly--"least of all what you are +pleased to consider your 'duty.' Your real duty I've already told you. +Resign the living. Let us see the last of you." + +Carlton met the rigid stare with one as unwavering and more acute. It +was as though he would have seen to the back of the other's brain. + +"Very well," he said at length. "You shall!" + +"Ah!" cried Sir Wilton, when he had recovered from his surprise. But it +was not the cry of victory; there was an uncharacteristic lack of +finality in the clergyman's tone. + +"You shall see the last of me this very morning," he continued swiftly, +nervously, "if you like! But it will rest with you. I am not going +unconditionally. Will you listen to what I have to say?" + +Gleed shrugged again, but this time there was no accompanying smile. The +other threw up his head with a sudden decisiveness--a pulpit trick of +his when about to make a primary point--and his right fist fell into his +left palm without his knowing it. + +"Very well," said Carlton; "now I'll tell you exactly on what conditions +you shall have your heart's desire, and I will renounce mine. In spite +of what I hear you've been saying, I have a little money of my own--not +much, indeed--but enough for me to have subsisted upon for these next +years. I am not going to touch a penny of it--I shall pick up a living +for myself elsewhere. Meanwhile I have turned my income into capital +which is now lying in the bank at Lakenhall. It is a trifle under two +thousand pounds, and I want the whole of it to go into the new church. +Wherever I am I ought to be able to earn a little more, either as a +coach or with my pen; so let the offer stand at a church to cost two +thousand pounds. I long to have the building of it. I make no secret of +that. But I have been trying to read my own heart, and I see the +selfishness of such longings; and I have been trying to read your heart, +Sir Wilton, and I see the naturalness of your opposition. So I come to +you and I say, build the church yourself, and I withdraw. Build a better +church out of your abundance, and I will resign as you wish. Give me +your written undertaking, here and now, and you shall have my written +resignation in exchange." + +The words clung to his lips; he alone knew what it cost him to utter +them; he alone, in his absolute freedom from the mercenary instinct, +would have felt certain of the result. But the rich man was touched upon +his tender spot. What return was he offered for his money? Who would +thank him for building a church in the heart of the country? The church +could be built by subscription; bad enough to have to head the list. +Besides, he was flushed with triumph; he saw but a beaten man in the +nervous wretch before him. Fancy bribing a beaten man to fly! + +"I like your impudence," said Wilton Gleed. "Upon my word! _My_ written +undertaking--to _you_!" + +"Do you refuse to give it?" asked Carlton quickly. + +"Certainly--to you." + +"Undertakings apart, do you entertain my suggestion, or do you not?" + +"That's my business." + +Carlton felt his patience slipping. + +"Do you mean to say that you don't even yet recognise that it's mine +too, as rector of the parish? Are you still so ignorant of the legal +bearings of the situation? God knows, Sir Wilton, it is not for me to +speak of right and wrong; but I do assure you that you're putting +yourself wilfully in the wrong in this matter. You hinder me from doing +my legal duty, and you refuse to assume any responsibility! Suspended or +not, I am bound to keep my chancel, at all events, 'in good and +substantial repair, restoring _and rebuilding when necessary_.'" + +Sir Wilton's eyes, fixed as usual, caught fire suddenly. + +"Oh, you're bound, are you?" + +"Legally bound." + +"You're sure that's the law?" + +"The very letter of the law, Sir Wilton." + +"Then see that you keep it! You come here blustering about your legal +rights; but you forget that I've got mine. Where there's a law there's a +penalty, and by God I'll enforce it! 'The very letter of the law,' eh? +I'll take you at your word; you shall keep it to the letter. Build away! +Build away! The sooner you begin the better--for you!" + +This was probably the boldest move that Sir Wilton Gleed ever made in +his life; it was certainly the least considered. But what satisfaction +sweeter than hoisting the enemy with his own petard? It is the +quintessence of poetic justice, the acme of personal triumph; and the +sudden opportunity of achieving his end by means so neat was more than +even Wilton Gleed could resist. Every builder and mason within reach was +already on his side; not a man of them who would work for dissolute +hypocrisy in defiance of might and right. No need to say another word to +the masons and the builders. They could be trusted on the whole, and the +untrustworthy could be bribed. Gleed had not the smallest scruple in the +matter, and he was characteristically forearmed with a public defence of +his private conduct. He believed that every right-thinking man would +applaud his sharp practice in the cause of religion and of morality; and +his confidence was not to be shaken by the way in which his challenge +was received. + +"Are you in earnest?" asked Carlton. "Do you seriously propose to hinder +me with one hand and to compel me with the other?" + +"I mean to take you at your word," Gleed repeated. "You are fond of +talking about your duty. Let's see you do it." + +"You set the builders against me, and then you tell me to build. May I +ask if you are prepared to defend such clumsy trickery?" + +"Any day you like, and glad of the opportunity!" cried Sir Wilton, +cheerfully. "All I have done is to give you your proper character where +it deserves to be known; you have it to thank if you can't get men to +work for you; and it's your look-out. I've heard about enough of you and +your church. Go and build it. Go and build it." + +"I will," said Carlton. "You have had your chance." And he bowed and +withdrew with strange serenity. + +A parting shot followed him through the hall. + +"You will have to do it with your own two hands!" + +Carlton made no reply. But in the village he committed a fresh enormity. + +He was seen to smile. + + + + +XI + +LABOUR OF HERCULES + + +All the church had not been burnt to the ground. West of the porch +(itself not hopelessly destroyed) stood thirteen feet of sound south +wall, blackened on the inside, calcined in the upper courses, but plumb +and firm as far as it went. A corresponding portion of the north wall, +the sixteen-foot strip west of the window almost opposite the porch, +stood equally rigid and erect. And, thus supported on either hand, the +entire west end rose practically intact, without a missing or a ruined +stone; the window was still truly bisected by its single mullion; +neither head nor tracery had given the fraction of an inch; only the +mangled leads, with here and there a fragment of smoked glass adhering, +would have told of a fire to one led blindfold under the west window, +and there given his first view of the church. + +But that was the one good wall and real exception to a rule of utter +ruin. The rest of the original building was either razed already or else +unfit to stand. The embryonic transepts were not quite demolished, but +they had never been many feet above ground. Sections of wall still stood +where there were no windows to weaken them, but east of the porch +nothing stood firm. Worst of all was the east end, from which the +chancel walls had been burnt away on either side. It stood as though +balanced, with an alarming outward list. One mullion of the great window +had gone by the sill; the other was cracked and crooked, as if +supporting the entire weight of the gable overhead; and it looked as +though a push would send the tottering fabric flat. + +Black ruin lay thick and deep within. To peep in was to see an ashpit +through a microscope. The remnants of the slate and timber roof lay +uppermost. Tie-beams, corbels, king-posts, ridge, struts, wall-plates, +pole-plates, rafters principal and common, joists, battens, laths and +fillets, half-burnt and black as the pit, save where some spilled +sheet-lead shone in the sun, spread a common pall over nave and chancel, +aisle and pews. It was as a midnight sea frozen in mid-storm, the +twisted lectern alone rising salient like a mast. Slates lay in shallow +heaps as though dealt from a pack; and certain pages, brown and brittle +at the edges, which the wind had torn from the burnt Bible before +Carlton rescued the remains, still fluttered in the crannies when the +wind went its rounds. And the hum of bees was in the air; but there had +been great distress among the sparrows, and one heard more of the +rectory cocks and hens. + +Upon this desolate and dead spot, in the heart of the warm, live +country, Robert Carlton stood looking within a few minutes of his exit +from the hall. But he did not stand looking long. He had changed into +flannels at top speed, and there was still more change in the man. His +eye glowed with a grim decision which lightened without dispelling the +settled sadness of the face. Passionate aspiration had cooled and +hardened into dogged and defiant resolve; and there was an end to all +compunction and self-questioning suspense. Carlton knew exactly what he +was going to do; he had known where to begin since the day before +yesterday. He wore neither coat nor waistcoat, his sleeves were rolled +up, he had a crowbar in one hand, and a heavy hammer in the other. He +began immediately on the thirteen feet of good wall to the left of the +porch. + +He had tested this wall on Saturday. The upper courses were loose and +crumbling; the sooner they went the better. Carlton climbed upon the +wall, and, sitting astride where it was firmest, began working off the +loose stones one by one with the crowbar. Iron would ring on iron twice +or thrice, and then a twist of the bar send the charred stone tumbling. +It was easy work, but the position was awkward, and Carlton soon went +for a ladder; on the way he was surprised to find that he was already +drenched with perspiration, and rather hungry. + +But the next hour tired him more, or rather the time that seemed an hour +to him, for it afterwards turned out to be three hours by the watch that +he had left indoors. Only the topmost course, or the stones on which the +red-hot eaves had rested, lent themselves to off-hand treatment; they +had been burnt to cinders--the mortar binding them, to powder; it needed +but a wrench to dislodge each one. But the next few courses were a +different matter. Half the stones were too loose to leave, too good to +chip in the removal. Carlton worked upon them with the cold-chisel +first, the crowbar next, and finally with his naked fingers, removing +the stones with immense care, and very deliberately dropping each into +its own bed in the long grass outside. At last the little strip of wall +was left without an unsound member from serrated crest to plinth: not a +stone that shook or shifted at a conscientious push; and the workman +took his eyes from his work. But he did not peer through the trees in +search of other eyes, for he was not thinking of himself or of his work +from a spectacular point of view. He merely saw that the sun had +travelled the church from end to end while he had been busy. And +suddenly he found himself sinking for want of food, and unable to stand +upright without intolerable pain. But he was back within half-an-hour, +and remained at work upon the sixteen-foot strip opposite till after +sunset. + +"But it hasn't been anything like a full day, old dog," said Carlton, as +they crept up to bed between eight and nine. And he set his +seven-and-six-penny alarum at four o'clock. + +Next forenoon the sixteen-foot strip was done with in its turn; no +infirm stone left standing upon another. Scraped and repointed, with the +uninjured pieces replaced in fresh mortar, and an entirely new top +course, these two short walls would be worthy of the gallant west end to +which they acted as buttresses. Its wounds were not skin-deep, thanks to +the west wind which had driven the flames the other way. It looked as +though a sponge would cleanse it, and Carlton sighed as he turned his +back upon the one good wall. + +Elsewhere, as has been said, there were fragments fit to use again, but +not to remain as they were. It cost Carlton a couple of days to take +these to pieces, laying the good stones carefully in the grass, as his +practice had been hitherto. The fourth day, however, he tried a change +of labour to ease his aching limbs, and went round and round with a +barrow, picking the sound stones from the grass, and stacking them near +the shed. Next morning he fought his way into the chancel, and stood +chin-deep in the wreckage, contemplating the leaning east end. And all +this time no soul had come near him; through the trees he had indeed +heard whispers that were not of the trees, but he had never thrown more +than a glance in their direction, and the green screen was still +charitably thick. + +The east end must come down sooner or later--therefore sooner. Carlton +was no engineer, but he was a man with a distinct turn for mechanics; +had used a lathe as a lad, and taught his Boys' Friendly how to use it +in their turn; had picked up much from Tom Ivey, and was himself blessed +with sound instincts concerning application and control of power. Here +was a tottering wall to come down altogether. It was too insecure to +pull to pieces. The problem was to get it down with as little damage and +as little danger as possible. One man could do it, Carlton thought, but +not without considerable risk of a broken head at least. If he could but +make sure of the whole wall falling in the one outward direction! He +revolved about it, mentally and on his feet, till he became angry with +himself for the loss of time, ceased to speculate, and went to work in +desperation. He would trust to luck; he despised himself for having +studied a risk so small. He had done so out of no absurd consideration +for his own skin, but entirely from the depth and strength of his +artistic impulse to do a thing properly or not at all. Even now he had +to prepare the ground: he had to clear the chancel enough to give +himself free play. + +Then he found a scaffolding-pole which had not been used, and tilted at +a tree for practice. The pole was unmanageable from its length. He sawed +it shorter. It was still too unwieldy to use amid the _débris_. He +shortened it until he had a battering-ram some eighteen feet long. But +all these preliminaries had taken unimagined hours, and again Carlton +felt sick with hunger before he thought of food, and unequal to further +effort until he had some. So he turned a breaking but reluctant back +upon the church, and went indoors; remembering everything on the way, +and loathing himself afresh: at his work he was beginning to forget! + +Thus far this outcast had subsisted chiefly on eggs; he beat up a couple +now, and tossed the stuff off with a little wine and water. Then he fell +upon a box of biscuits, but threw the dog as many as he munched himself, +striding up and down the while, and for all his fatigue. The room was +the one in which he had studied his own physiognomy. It might have been +any other. He had no eyes for himself to-day, and not many thoughts, +for, in the midst of his contrition for forgetting, he had forgotten +again. His mind had escaped to the chancel; the flesh followed in a few +minutes, having eaten and rested on its legs. + +The dog bounded ahead, and presently announced an intruder at the top of +its voice. Carlton quickened his pace, frowning at the thought of +interruption; he was on the spot before curiosity had tempered his +annoyance; and there among the ruins stood Sir Wilton Gleed, not +frowning at all, but forcing a smile behind his cigar. + +"How long is this tomfoolery to go on?" said he. + +Carlton stood looking at him for some seconds; then he picked up his +pole without replying. "You'd better stand to one side," was all he +said. "Kennel up, Glen!" + +"Going to do something desperate?" + +"The further you get away from me the safer you'll be." + +But he did not look round as he spoke, and Sir Wilton gripped his stick +without occasion. Carlton's blood was boiling none the less. The enemy +had surprised him at his worst. He was, for the first time, attempting +single-handed the work of several men; and he might be going about it in +a very ridiculous way. He could not tell till he tried; and it was one +thing to experiment in private, but quite another thing to court open +discomfiture of the very nature which would most delight the looker-on. +And the man was worn out with hard and unaccustomed labour, dyspeptic +from evil feeding, nervous and irritable from both causes combined. Sir +Wilton Gleed could hardly have chosen a worse moment for renewing the +duel. + +In Carlton the longing to do something violent suddenly outweighed his +desire to raze the east end of the church. He poised his pole and fixed +both eyes on the one remaining mullion of the east window. If the +mullion went, he still thought that the whole fabric should collapse, +forgetting the inherent independence of arches; and his mind dwelt +wistfully on the effect of the crash upon Sir Wilton Gleed. But his aim +was not the less accurate, nor did his anxiety hinder him from utilising +every muscle in his body at the ideal moment. The end of the ram smote +the mullion fairly and powerfully, where it was already cracked. The +mullion flew asunder; a quatrefoil shifted a little, robbed of its +support. The whole wall seemed to shudder; but that was all. + +"You remind me of Don Quixote," said Sir Wilton's voice. + +Carlton spun round. The pole trailed behind him from his right hand. He +took fresh hold of it, lower down, and there was no mistaking his look. + +"You go about your business," said he, fiercely. + +"I've come about it," was the bland reply. "I'm not trespassing either; +don't put yourself in the wrong. Remember your own advice; and let's +have a civil answer to a civil question. My good friend, what do you +think you're trying to do?" + +The artificial geniality of address, the settled malice underneath, the +tone that people take with a wilful child, all galled and goaded the +tired man beyond endurance. + +"You had better go," he said. + +"Do you really propose to rebuild the church with your own ten fingers?" +inquired Sir Wilton, not to be daunted by a threat. + +"You proposed it. I mean to do it." + +Sir Wilton shook his head with a venomous smile. "Oh, no, you don't! You +mean to pretend to try. You mean to pose." + +Carlton flung the pole from him, and strode forward, swinging open +hands. + +"I'm not going to talk to you," he said, "and you sha'n't make me strike +you; but if you don't go out you'll be put out, Sir Wilton." + +Gleed smiled again. His collar was seized. He smiled no more, but lashed +out with his stick. The stick was wrenched away from him. It whistled in +the air. And Robert Carlton had his enemy at his mercy, still held by +the collar, in the place where he had preached goodwill to men. For he +was much the taller of the two and an old athlete, whereas the other was +only an elderly sportsman. Carlton could have whipped him like a little +dog. He did almost worse: released him without a cut, and handed him his +stick without a word. + +And at that moment there came the crash that would have saved this +collision a few seconds before. Both men turned, rubbing their eyes; a +cloud of yellow dust had filled them as it filled the chancel. The cloud +dispersed, and wall and window were gone from sill to gable; what +remained was nowhere higher than a man could reach. + +"Now leave me in peace," said Carlton, "for I shall have my hands full; +and don't trouble to come again, because I sha'n't listen to you. You've +had two chances. I promised to live away and only find the money and the +men; you wouldn't have it. I invited you to build the church yourself; +you wouldn't hear of that. No; you would force me to do my duty, having +tied my hands! You would take me at my word. I am taking you at yours. +I should try fresh ground, if I were you; meanwhile you could sue me +for assault." + +Gleed had fully intended doing so, but the scornful suggestion killed +the thought, and for once he had no last word. But his last look made +amends. + + + + +XII + +A FRESH DISCOVERY + + +His son was waiting for him at the gate. + +"The man's mad!" cried Sir Wilton with a harsh laugh. + +"What's he been doing? What was that row?" + +Sidney's manner with his father was subtly disrespectful; he seldom +addressed him by that name, enjoyed arguing with him (having the clearer +head), and argued in slang. Yet his tongue was as dexterous and +plausible as it was always smooth, and he was a difficult boy to convict +of a specific rudeness. + +"There's some method in his madness," was his comment on the father's +account of the work accomplished under his eyes. + +"But he says he's going to build it up again!" + +"I wonder if he will," speculated Sidney. + +"What--by himself?" + +"Yes." + +"Of course he won't. No man could. He's a lunatic." + +They were walking home. Sidney said nothing for some paces. Then he +asked an innocent question. It was a little way of his. + +"I suppose one man could finish one stone, though, father?" + +Sir Wilton conceded this. + +"And fix it in its place, shouldn't you say?" + +A gruffer concession. + +"Then I'm not sure that he couldn't do more than you think," said +Sidney. "The windows might stump him, and the roof would; but he could +do the rest." + +"Nonsense!" cried Sir Wilton. "You don't know what you're talking +about." + +"Of course I don't," admitted Sidney readily. "That was why I asked +about the one man and the one stone." + +Sir Wilton had not half his boy's brain. The cold-blooded little wretch +would boast that he could "score off the governor without his knowing +it." Sir Wilton's merit was his tenacity of purpose. + +"I tell you the man's mad," he reiterated; "and if he doesn't take care +I'll have him shut up." + +"A great idea!" cried Sidney. "But, I say, if that's so we oughtn't to +be too rough on him!" + +"In any case I'll have him out of this," quoth Sir Wilton through his +teeth; but his mind dwelt on the shutting-up notion: it really was "a +great idea." And Carlton himself had given him another: he just would +"take fresh ground." + +He sought it that evening by a painful path. Jasper Musk and Sir Wilton +Gleed were not friends; they had not spoken for years. Sir Wilton had +not been long in the parish before he discovered that Musk had "cheated" +him over the Flint House. The word was much too strong; but some little +advantage had no doubt been taken. The quarrel had lasted to the +present time; but Sir Wilton had often felt that Musk must hate the +common scourge even more bitterly than he did himself, and that he would +be a very valuable ally. He was a strong man and solid, the one powerful +peasant in the neighbourhood. Unfortunately, sciatica had bound him to +his chair from the very day of his daughter's funeral. It would have +been comparatively easy to accost the old fellow in the open, and to +disarm him with instantaneous expressions of sympathy and of +indignation. It was more difficult for the lord of the manor to knock at +the door of an enemy who was not a tenant--a door opening on the very +street, and a door that might be slammed in his face for all Long Stow +to see or hear. So Sir Wilton went after dinner, on a dark night; was +admitted without demur; and stayed till after eleven. + +Next day he went again; he was also seen at the village constable's; and +the village constable was seen at the Flint House; and Sir Wilton +happened to call once more while he was there. The afternoon was rich in +developments, and duly murmurous with theory, prophecy, speculation. The +schoolmaster was summoned from the school, the saddler from his bench: +it was the latter who fetched Tom Ivey from the room that he was adding +to his mother's cottage at Sir Wilton's expense. Meanwhile the village +whisper became loud talk; but its arrows, shot at a venture, flew wide +of any mark. For through all his dark disgrace, as now when the odium +attaching to him was gathering like snow on a rolling snowball; from the +night of the fire to this eighteenth day of August; there was one thing +of which Robert Carlton had never been suspected by those who had loved +or feared him for a year and a half. + +Naturally the excitement penetrated to the hall, where Sir Wilton kept +dinner waiting, but, very properly, did not refer to the unsavoury +subject at that meal. He was, however, in singularly high spirits, and +drank a vast amount of excellent champagne; yet his own wife left the +table in ignorance of what had happened. Now Lady Gleed was a very +particular person, a great stickler for restraint, her own being +something strenuous and exotic. She seldom spoke of ordinary things +above a whisper, and would have dealt with the village scandal in dumb +show if she could. To her daughter she had genuinely preferred never to +mention it at all. + +But Lydia Gleed--it should have been Languish--was a more modern type. +She was frankly interested in the affair. It had given quite a zest to +what would otherwise have been an insufferably dull month for Lydia. The +girl had the makings of a perfect woman of society, and yet the end of +her second season found her still an unknown distance from the first +step to the realisation of that ideal. Proposals she had received, but +none such as an heiress of her calibre was entitled to expect. She had +actually been engaged to an adventurer; but that had only retarded +matters. + +There may have been purer causes. Feeble and inanimate in her every-day +life, and constitutionally bored by the familiar, Miss Gleed kept her +best side for those whom she knew least; could chatter to +acquaintances, the newer the better; was in her element at parties, and +out of it at home. Even in her element, however, Lydia never forgot to +conceal as much of her appreciation as possible, and would dance +angelically with the corners of her mouth turned down, and take like +medicine the wine which really did make glad her heart. This August she +was feeling particularly _blasée_ and dissatisfied; and the romantic +downfall of the rector--whose sermons had kept her awake--was a French +novel without the trouble of reading it or the risk of confiscation. +To-night, therefore, it was Lydia who invited Gwynneth to play, and +pressed the invitation with a compliment; it was her commoner practice +to snub the much younger girl. And it was Lydia who drew her chair close +to that of Lady Gleed, and began the whispering, to which Gwynneth was +made to shut her ears with all ten fingers. Yet for once Lady Gleed was +frankly interested herself. + +"But what _has_ he done?" + +The music had stopped. They had not noticed it. The ungrown girl was +standing in the middle of the room. She was dressed in white, and her +face looked as white in the candle-light, but her eyes and hair the +darker and more brilliant by contrast. And the eyes were great with a +pity and a pain which were at least not less than the natural curiosity +of a healthy child. + +"Mind your own business," said Lydia, bluntly. + +But even as she spoke the door opened. + +"What's this? What's this?" cried Sir Wilton, who was beaming, and +good-naturedly concerned to see the tears starting to his brother's +child's eyes. "Whose business have you been minding, little woman?" + +"It was about Mr. Carlton," the child said with a sob. "I hear everybody +saying nothing's bad enough for him--nothing--and I thought he was so +good! I only asked what he had done. I won't again. Please--please let +me go!" + +"In an instant," said Sir Wilton, detaining her with familiarity. "You +mustn't be a little goose." + +"Let her go, Wilton," whispered his wife. + +"Not till I've told her what Mr. Carlton has done!" + +And Sir Wilton Gleed beamed more than ever upon the consternation of his +ladies. + +"But, Wilton----" + +Lady Gleed had risen, and was even forgetting to whisper. Lydia merely +looked unusually wide-awake, and prettier for once than the child under +the chandelier, who was terribly disfigured by her embarrassment and +distress. + +"If you want to know what Mr. Carlton has done," said Sir Wilton to his +niece, "it was he who set fire to the church!" + + + + +XIII + +DEVICES OF A CASTAWAY + + +Left in peace, Carlton threw himself into his task with redoubled +spirit, and presently forgot the existence of Sir Wilton Gleed. He had +just three hours before dark. In this time he succeeded in pulling the +rest of the east wall to pieces, even to the loosened plinth, and was +adding the good stones to his stack when night fell. It was a night not +to be forgotten in the history of Robert Carlton's case. Nothing +happened. But he had no proper food in the house, and he began to feel +really ill for the want of it. Eggs and bacon he had, but the lighting +of the fire fatigued him more than anything he had done all day, and he +fell asleep in the kitchen, and the bacon went brittle, and his attempt +at bread was become an unmasticable fossil. A very little whisky, from a +bottle that had been open for months, did him more good, and enabled him +to face the food problem in earnest before he went to bed. It was a very +serious problem indeed. Health and strength, success or failure, +continued vigour or a swift collapse, all hinged upon the inglorious +question, which engrossed till near midnight one of the plainest livers +on earth, as his labours had absorbed him since dawn. He had to reckon +with his enemies in the matter. He had not the slightest hope of +obtaining supplies in the village. But at daylight he walked some miles +to see a farmer who had sometimes trudged as many to hear him preach; +and the farmer gave him breakfast with a surly pity, which Carlton +suffered, as he accepted the meal, for his hard work's sake. + +He had explained that he came on business, and after breakfast the +farmer asked him, not without suspicion, what his business was. + +"Do you kill your own sheep?" inquired Mr. Carlton. + +"Only for ourselves." + +"When do you kill?" + +"Let's see. Friday, is it? Then we kill this mornin'." + +"May I wait and watch?" + +The other stared. + +"I want some mutton," Carlton explained. + +"But I don't keep a butcher's shop," growled the farmer. "Well, we'll +see what we can do; we may be able to let you have a bit of the +neck-end." + +"I should be very grateful for it. But I'm afraid I want more." + +"What more?" + +"A flock of sheep." + +He was willing to pay outside prices. So a bargain was struck; and the +sheep were in the glebe that night. Meanwhile he had seen one killed and +dressed, and was not the less thankful that he had neck-end chops enough +to last him that week. + +The stacking of the stones was finished early on the Friday afternoon, +and Carlton determined to take the rest of that day easily. So he set +himself to retrieve the lectern from the ruins, and did finally wheel it +to the rectory, on two barrows; the first broke under its weight. +Moreover, this had consumed the entire afternoon, as another would have +foreseen at a glance, and Carlton emerged as from a pool of ink. Since +he had made himself rather hot and black, however, he thought it a pity +not to clear a little more of the interior while the light lasted. It +must be done some day; but again the task was more formidable than it +appeared to dauntless eyes still aflame with vast endeavour. The firemen +had not spared the water when all was over, so the big bones of the roof +were not burnt through. Tie-beams and principal rafters, in particular, +lay whole and heavy, and immovable less from their weight than from the +inextricable tangle in which they had fallen. There was nothing but the +saw for these, and Carlton had already sawn the lectern from its grave. +He learnt to saw with his left hand that evening; and after all had very +little but his own personal condition to show for his labour: only the +nucleus of a wood-heap near the stack of stones, and a crooked, +blackened, brass thing in the dining-room. But then he had not intended +to do much that afternoon; he went indoors, and drew the water for his +bath with that consolation. + +Meat for the second time that day! Carlton began to feel a man. He paced +his study with the old rapid step; and he determined to order and +arrange his day's work so that the muscles should relieve each other in +gangs: varied exertions; that was the principle of all continuous +labour. You cannot sit down to rest when you are working hard; but you +can do something else. Carlton never rested till he went to bed. But +this evening he sat down at his desk. + +A sheet of sermon paper was ruled in six columns and a margin; the +columns were headed by the days of the week; down the margin the days +were divided into three periods, a short and two long; it was the +class-room chart of his school-days over again. In future he would rise +at five; four was too early. The short period before breakfast should be +daily devoted to work in the house. The place must be made and kept +habitably clean; that could be left partly to the wet days. Then there +was the kitchen work, the preparation of food for the day, baking two +days a week, the occasional slaughter of a sheep; and here Carlton +paused to grapple with the appalling problem presented by the hungriest +of living men and the smallest of slain sheep . . . Salt seemed the +solution . . . Salt mutton? . . . At any rate all carnal cares and +menial duties should be disposed of for the day as early as possible in +the early morning; not till then would he break his fast; and the real +day's work should begin as near eight o'clock as might be, but as often +as possible on the right side of the hour. Moreover, it should begin +with the lighter labour: scraping and repointing the uncondemned walls, +for example; that would take one man weeks or months; but it would not +tire him out at the beginning of the day. Then there was the preparation +of the stones; the careful scraping of those preserved; classification +as to size for the various courses; cutting and fitting of fresh +stones; the actual building with trowel and plummet. All this went under +one head, and was for the body of the day; a long spell broken by a good +meal and a determined rest. The day should finish, for many a day to +come, with a savage attack upon the chaos within the walls. A hand too +tired for skilled labour would still be fit for that. + +And as Robert Carlton reached this stage in the laying of his ingenious +plans, he leaned back in his chair, and stared at his dull reflection in +the diamond panes above his writing table, in a sudden horror of himself +and all his ways and works. He was actually happy--he! The reaction was +the same in kind as that which had come to him at the shed, in the joy +of touching hammer and chisel again, and which had driven him to the +hall next morning. But it was greater in degree: for then he had seen +how happy he might be; to-night he knew how happy he was. + +"But only in my work! Only in my work!" he cried, and fell upon his +knees to crave forgiveness from the Almighty for daring to enjoy the +consolation which He had ordained for him. + +The artist was dead in Carlton for that night. He rose a very miserable +sinner, every thought a whip for his poor spirit that had dared to come +to life without leave. He had committed deadly sin with deadliest +result; let him never forget it! He, God's servant----the morbid +rehearsal may be spared. But he did not spare himself. All the +aggravating circumstances were recalled, none that extenuated; all that +he had suffered he must needs suffer anew, slowly, deliberately, and in +due order; that he might not forget, that he might never forget again! +Now he was confessing to Musk, now to George Mellis; poor George, where +was he? Now they were breaking his windows, and now Tom Ivey was +refusing his hand. But at last he was before the bishop; that strong, +queer voice was croaking across the desk; and all at once the croak +ended, and the voice rang like a sovereign with words of refined gold. + +"Courage, brother! Pray without ceasing. Look forward, not back; do not +despair. Despair is the devil's best friend; better give way to deadly +sin than to deadlier despair!" + +And he prayed again; but not in the house. + +"For I will look forward," he said as he went. "But let me never again +forget!" + +There was neither wind nor moon. The sparrows were still, but not the +shrill little swifts. And somewhere a thrush was singing, clear and +mellow and certain as a bell; and once a bat's wing brushed the bowed +bare head of him who prayed not for forgiveness but for the peace of a +soul; for neither was it in the ruins that Robert Carlton knelt once +more. + + + + +XIV + +THE LAST RESORT + + +Carlton chose a fresh stone from the heap; he was going to begin all +over again. He got it in his arms, and he managed to stagger with it to +the front of the shed. The stone was at least two feet long, and its +other dimensions were about half that of the length; as Carlton set it +down, himself all but on the top of it, he trusted it was the largest +size in the heap. It was of a rich reddish yellow, roughly rectangular, +but lumpy as ill-made porridge, exactly as it had come from the quarry. +Carlton tilted it up against a smaller stone, smooth enough in parts, +but palpably untrue in its planes and angles. This was the stone that he +had been all day spoiling; it had been as big as the new one that +morning, when he had begun upon it with a view to the lower eleven-inch +courses; and now he had failed to make even a six-inch job of it. The +stone was so soft. It cut like cheese. But he was not going to spoil +another. + +So he rested a minute before beginning again, and he marshalled his +tools upon a barrow within reach of his hand. It was rather late on the +Saturday afternoon. In the morning he had felt disinclined for violent +exertion, but just equal to trying his hand at that stone-dressing which +would presently become his chief labour; and his hand had disappointed +him. It had the wrong kind of cunning: as amateurs will, Carlton had +picked up his fancy craft at the fancy end: gargoyles were his +specialty, and an even surface beyond him. + +"But I can learn," he had been saying all day; and most times the dog +had wagged his tail. + +Ten minutes ago his tone had changed. + +"I'll start afresh! I'll do one to-night! I won't be beaten!" + +And that time Glen had leapt up with his master, and lashed his shins +with his tail, as much as to say, "Beaten? Not you!" and had accompanied +him to the heap, and was pretending to rest with him now. But Carlton +was constitutionally impatient of conscious rest; and this afternoon +certain sounds, louder though less incessant than those of his constant +comrades, the bees and birds, informed him that the Boys' Friendly were +not too proud to use the far strip of glebe land which the rector had +levelled for them last year. The discovery made him glad. But it also +brought him to his feet within the minute that he had promised himself; +and the hammer rang swift blows on the cold-chisel as much to drown the +music of bat and ball as to clear the grosser irregularities from one +surface of the stone. + +This done (and this much he had done successfully enough before), hammer +and cold-chisel were thrown aside, and the marbling-hammer taken up, +because Tom Ivey had always used it to make the rough sufficiently +smooth. But it is a mongrel implement at best, being hammer and chisel +in one, with changeable bits like a brace, and yet with less of these +than of the pickaxe in its cross-bred composition. Like a pick you wield +it, yet lightly and with the one and only curve, or at a stroke you go +too deep. + +Chip, chip, chip went the sharp seven-eighths-of-an-inch bit; and off +curved the soft yellow flakes, to turn to powder as they fell. + +Chip, chip, chip along the top; and the keen bit left its mark each +time; and the finished row of these was like the key-board of a toy +piano. + +Chip, chip, chip, always from left to right, a tier below, and then the +tier below that. The toy piano is becoming a toy organ of many manuals; +and the hue of the keys is not that of the rough outer surface: as they +first see the light they are nearer the colour of cigar-ash. + +Chip, chip, chip--chip, chip, chip; but _swish_, _swish_, _swish_ is a +thought nearer the sound. So soft that stone, so sharp that bit, so +timorous and tentative the unpractised strokes of Robert Carlton! + +Every now and then he would stop, and anxiously apply a straight lath to +the spreading smoothness; but he was improving, and in the end the plane +was at least as true as it was smooth. The key-marks of the +marbling-hammer were not always parallel or of even length, and the rows +declined from left to right like the hand of a weak writer: "bad +batting," Tom Ivey would have called it, a "bat" being the mark in +question, and long, even bats, "straight along the stone," the mason's +ideal, as the inquisitive amateur had discovered the first day Ivey +worked for him. But knowledge and skill lie a gulf apart, and on the +whole Carlton felt encouraged. He had done but one side of four, but +the one was smooth enough to face the world as coursed rubble; let him +but get and keep his angles, and the other three would matter less. So +now he took the straight-edge, as the lath was called, and the bit of +black slate which Tom had also left behind him; and with these and the +mason's square a rectangular parallelogram with eleven-inch ends was +duly ruled on the satisfactory surface. Hammer and cold-chisel again. +Much use of the square, but no more play with the marbling-hammer. No +need to perfect the parts doomed to mortar and eternal night; rough +criss-cross work with a mason's axe is the thing for them; as Carlton +knew when he rather reluctantly applied himself to the mastery of that +implement, just as he was beginning to acquire some proficiency with the +other. The mason's axe was the most treacherous of them all. It was a +hand pickaxe with a point like a stiletto; a touch, and the steel lay +buried. But it was the right tool to use, and Carlton used it to the +best of his ability, stooping more and more over his work as the light +began to fail him. + +He was going to succeed at last! If only he had not lost so much time! +Then he might have mixed some mortar and laid the first stone of his own +cutting--the first stone of the new church! That would have been +something like a day's work; yet he was not dissatisfied with his +progress. Swish, swish, swish; he might have done much worse. He had +pulled down the bad walls--swish--and what was good of them--swish--he +had saved and there they were. He looked up, the perspiration standing +thick upon his white forehead, his eyes all eagerness and +determination. He stood upright to rest a moment in the mellow +light--happy again! Happy because he had not time to think of himself, +but only of what he was doing, and of what he felt certain he could do: +happy in his aching limbs and soaking flannels, and all that with a +happiness he was for once not destined to realise and to check. For, +even as he stood, Glen barked, and Carlton turned in time to see the +village constable tuck his cane under his arm while he stood still to +feel in his pockets. The man was in full uniform--a strange circumstance +in itself. + +"Good evening, Frost," said Mr. Carlton. + +"Evenin', sir." + +The constable was an imposing figure of a man, with a handsome stupid +face, and a stolid deliberation of word and deed which gave an +impression of artless but indefatigable vigilance. In reality the fellow +had few inferiors in the parish. + +"For me?" and Carlton held out his hand as the other produced a paper. + +"For you an' me," said the constable, winking as he kept the paper to +himself. And in an impressive voice he read out a warrant for the +apprehension of the Reverend Robert Carlton, Clerk in Holy Orders, on a +charge of unlawfully and maliciously setting fire to the parish church +of Long Stow, in the County of Suffolk, on the night of the 24th or the +morning of the 25th June, in the year of grace 1882; the warrant was +signed by two justices--Sir Wilton Gleed of Long Stow Hall, and Canon +Wilders of Lakenhall. + +"Like to see it for yourself?" inquired Frost. + +"No, thank you; that's quite enough for me. Well, upon my word!" + +And Carlton stood staring into space, a glitter in his eyes, a smile +upon his lips, incapable of unmixed indignation: really, Sir Wilton was +a better fighter than he had supposed. + +"You will have to come with me to Lakenhall," said the constable's +voice. + +Carlton realised the situation. + +"To-night?" + +"At once, sir, if _you_ please. They've sent a trap for us from +Lakenhall. That's waiting at the gate." + +The mason's axe was still in his hand, the unfinished stone at his feet. +Carlton looked wistfully from one to the other, and thence in appeal to +the officer of the law. + +"I say, Frost, is there any hurry for a quarter of an hour? I'd--I'd +give a sovereign to finish this stone!" + +Virtue blazed in the constable's face. + +"You don't bribe _me_, sir!" he cried. "I'm ashamed of you, I am, for +tryin' that on! No, Mr. Carlton, you've got to come straight away." + +"But surely I may change first?" + +"You'll have to be quick, and I'll have to come with you." + +"Is that necessary?" asked Carlton with some heat, as he flung his tools +under cover. + +"That's left to me, sir, and I don't trust no gentleman in his +dressing-room. My orders are to take you alive, Mr. Carlton." + +Carlton was upon him in two strides. + +"Very well," said he, "you shall; and you shall come upstairs and see +me change. But address another word to me at your peril!" + +A small crowd had collected at the gate; a Lakenhall policeman was +waiting in the trap. Carlton came down the drive with his long coat +flying and his head thrown back. Somehow he was allowed to depart +without a groan. + +On the way he never spoke, and something kept the constables from +speaking before him. They had a slow horse; it was nearly an hour before +Carlton saw the inside of a police-station for the first time in his +life. Here he was formally charged by a portly inspector with whom he +had some slight acquaintance; the charge concluded with the usual +warning that anything he said might be given in evidence against him. + +"I hear," said Carlton. "And now?" + +The inspector shrugged his personal regret. + +"I'm afraid there's only one thing for it now, sir." + +"The cells, eh?" + +"That's it, Mr. Carlton." + +"Till when?" + +"Monday morning, sir, the magistrates sit." + +"Lead the way, then," said Carlton. "I can spend my Sunday in gaol as +well as in my own rectory." + +His eye was stern but steady; he was filled with contempt, but without a +fear. He knew who was at the bottom of this charge, and had begun by +quite admiring the man's resource; but his admiration did not survive a +second thought. What a fool the fellow must be! No fool like an old +fool, said the proverb; and none so insanely reckless as your prudent +people, once they lose their head, thought Robert Carlton in his cell. +Of the charge itself he scarcely condescended to think at all; for to +his mind, the more innocent on that score for his guilt upon another, +the thing seemed more preposterous than it really was. He burn the +church! With what object, pray? And what did they suppose he had risked +his life for at the fire? Remorse, or show? He could have laughed; he +was unable to imagine a shred of evidence against himself. + +There was a Testament on the table, but he had brought his Bible in his +pocket; and by the gas-jet in its wire guard, that striped the walls +with lean shadows like the bars of some wild beast's cage, Robert +Carlton forgot his own sins, persecution and imprisonment, in those of +his hero St. Paul; and was in another world when the rattle of a key +brought him back to this. It was the fat inspector himself, with good +news on his face, and in his hand the card of Canon Wilders, Rector of +Lakenhall and chairman of the local bench. + +"He doesn't want to see me, does he?" said Carlton, in plain alarm. + +"If you've no objection to seeing him, sir." + +"But he was one of those who signed the warrant! Tell him I can't see +anybody. Thank him very much. Say that I appreciate his kindness, but +would prefer to be alone." + +In a few minutes the man returned. + +"That's a pity you won't see the canon, sir; he don't half like it. He +couldn't help signing the warrant, not in his position; that seem to me +to be the very reason why he come the minute he heard we had you here; +and it's my opinion he'd like to see you out of custody." + +"You mean on bail?" + +"Yes, sir." + +"Because I'm a clergyman, and it's a disgrace to the cloth!" + +This explanation was a sudden idea impulsively expressed; but the +inspector's face was its tacit confirmation. + +"Is he here still?" demanded the prisoner. + +"Yes, sir, he is." + +"You can say I've been taken on a false and abominable charge," cried +Carlton, "and I don't want my liberty till the falsehood's proved! But I +am equally obliged to Canon Wilders," he added with less scorn, "and you +will kindly tell him so with my compliments." + +But he paced his cell in a curious twitter for one who had entered it +without a qualm. In all his trouble this was the first word from a +clerical neighbour: to a man they had stood aloof from him in his shame. +His own movements were in part responsible: he had disappeared from +view. Nor had he expected or coveted their sympathy; yet, now that one +of them had come forward, Carlton was conscious of a wound he had not +felt before. There was Preston of Linkworth--but his wife would account +for him. There was Bosanquet of Bedingfield, and there were others. They +might have inquired at the infirmary (Preston had), but he had never +heard of it. As for Wilders, he was a worthy man of local mark, for whom +Carlton had preached upon occasion; one prosperous alike in worldly +welfare and in spiritual satisfaction; the last person to go into +disgrace; and yet, by reason of a certain officiousness of character, +the first to come forward as he had done. Carlton had no wish to be +ungracious or ungrateful, or to make a personal matter of the signing of +the warrant; but he could not face his fellows with this new charge +hanging over him, nor was he going free by the favour of living man. On +the other hand, he pondered more upon his brother clergymen that +Saturday night in gaol than in all these eight weeks past. And the sense +of mere social downfall, the dullest of his aches hitherto, became +suddenly acute, so that for that alone he wished they had not put him in +prison. But for all the rest he cared as little as before, and showed as +little interest in the pending event. + +His indifference quite troubled the inspector, who evinced a desire to +show the prisoner every possible consideration, and was an early visitor +next morning. + +"That ain't no business of mine, sir; but you'll be wanting to see a +solicitor during the day?" + +"Why so?" asked Carlton. + +"Well, sir, your case will come up to-morrow morning." + +"But what do I want with a solicitor?" + +"Why, sir, every pris--that is, accused----" + +The inspector boggled at the word, and stood confounded by the other's +density. + +"Oh, I see!" cried Carlton. "So you're thinking of my defence, are you? +Thanks very much, but I don't want a lawyer to defend me. I make your +side a present of the lawyers, Mr. Inspector; they'll want them all. +It's for them to prove me guilty, not for me to prove my innocence." + +"And do you really think we have no case against you?" inquired the +inspector, with a change of tone, for he happened to have charge of the +case himself. + +"I don't think about it," returned Carlton, with unaffected +indifference. "The thing's too preposterous to be worth a thought." + +"I'm glad you find it so," said the other, nettled; "let's hope you +won't change your mind. I only spoke for your own good; there's plenty +would blame me for speaking at all. I won't trouble you no more, sir. I +might have known I'd get no thanks, after the way you served Canon +Wilders last night. Defend yourself, and let's see you do it!" + +The door shut with a clang, and Carlton watched the vibrations in some +distress. He was sorry to hurt the feelings of his would-be friends, but +he needed no man's friendship in the present crisis. God would be his +friend; his faith in Him was as profound as his contempt of the false +charge hanging over himself. The latter, he felt convinced, must break +down as it deserved; but if not, then the meaning would be clear. It +would mean that he had not been punished sufficiently for what he had +done, and must accordingly be prepared to suffer something for that +which he had not done, but of which his sin had indubitably caused the +doing. And Robert Carlton was so prepared in his heart of hearts. Yet he +was unable to carry his pious fatalism to its logical conclusion, and to +abate his bitterness against the human instruments of a vengeance he was +willing to think Divine. + +On the contrary, he condescended at intervals of the day to give his +mind to the proceedings of the next; and he did recall one or two +circumstances which prejudice and malice might twist against him. To +consider these was to be instantly inspired with a conclusive reply on +every point; but Carlton was not sure whether the law would permit him +to reply at all. So in the afternoon he begged for newspapers, and his +request, though acceded to, was all over Lakenhall by nightfall. A +suspended clergyman who thought so little of his notorious sins that he +could ask for newspapers on a Sunday afternoon! The inference drawn by a +small community, greatly excited about the case, and unconsciously +anxious to believe the worst of one who was bad enough at best, will be +readily imagined. The whole town shook its head. + +Meanwhile the object of popular detestation was comparatively happy in +the exercise of his receptive powers. By good luck his bundle of +provincial newspapers contained that which can only be met with in a +local press: a verbatim report of the police-court proceedings in a +painful case of infinitesimal interest to the world at large. The +interest, however, was all-absorbing to Robert Carlton. The accused had +been represented by a solicitor. The solicitor had fought his case +tooth-and-nail. There had been certain "scenes in court"; all were +reported in the local paper, and no point involved was lost upon the +alert brain of the imprisoned clergyman. It was with difficulty that he +dismissed the subject from his mind when the church-bells rang once more +through the quiet country town. It happened, however, that the parish +church was quite near the police-court; and in the morning Carlton had +been enabled to follow the whole service, partly through knowing it by +heart, partly from the strains of hymn or psalm that reached him at due +intervals through the grated window: and ever since then he had been +looking forward to evensong. So now when first the bells ceased, and +then the voluntary, the prisoner presently rehearsed the exhortation (in +silence) on his feet, the general confession (half aloud) upon his +knees; then followed the psalms, also from memory, his lips moving, his +hands folded; then knelt again to pray the prayers. And his eyes were as +earnest, his attitude as reverent, and even certain gestures as +punctilious, as though he were back in his church that had been burnt, +instead of lying in gaol for burning it. + +The August evening came early to its close; a little while the new moon +glimmered in the cell; then the organ pealed the people out of church, +and a few steps passed that way, and a few voices floated in through the +bars, before all was quiet in the little old town. And Robert Carlton +thought no more that night upon his enemies, and took no further heed +for the morrow. + + + + +XV + +HIS OWN LAWYER + + +Canon Wilders was supported by Mr. Preston, of Linkworth, and by a +youthful justice whom Robert Carlton did not know by name, but who sat +like the graven image of Rhadamanthus, encased in the atrocious trousers +and the excruciating collar of the year 1882. + +Considering the romantic interest of the case, this was by no means "a +full bench"; there were, however, some conspicuous and deliberate +absentees, including Sir Wilton Gleed and Dr. Marigold. Carlton was less +surprised at his enemy's abstinence than at the position voluntarily +occupied by James Preston, an indolent cleric but genial gentleman, who +had been his friend. His surprise deepened when Preston nodded to him, +hastily enough, and with a change of colour, but yet in a way that +thrilled Carlton with a doubt as to whether he had altogether lost that +friend. He was in no such suspense concerning the stately chairman, who +very properly looked at the prisoner as though he had never seen him +before, and never addressed him without tuning his voice to the proper +pitch of distant disapproval. This was not a question of losing a +friend, but of having made an enemy of the most potent personage in the +court. + +The latter was densely crowded when the stout inspector opened the case, +but the familiar faces stood out in quick succession, and they were not +a few. In a doorway apart stood a Long Stow trio--the saddler, the +sexton, and Tom Ivey; all three were in their Sunday clothes, and more +or less visibly ill at ease; but it was only Ivey who reddened and +looked away when the prisoner caught his eye. As for Carlton, he became +so lost in sudden and absorbing speculation that it was some minutes +before he realised that the inspector had finished a bald brief +statement of his case, and that a witness was already in the box and +giving evidence. The witness, however, was only Frost, the village +constable, and his evidence merely that of the arrest on the Saturday at +Long Stow. Carlton nevertheless whipped out his pocket-book, and the +witness waited before standing down. + +"May I ask him two or three questions?" said the prisoner, addressing +himself with courtesy to the bench. + +"As many as you please," replied the chairman, "provided they are +relevant." + +Carlton bowed before turning to the witness. + +"How far were you responsible for the warrant on which you arrested me?" + +"Re-spon-si-ble!" exclaimed the chairman in separate syllables. "What do +you mean?" + +"I wish to ascertain exactly in what measure the witness has been +concerned in trumping up this charge against me." + +"That is not the language in which to inquire!" + +"Your worships may discover that it is exceedingly mild language, before +the case is over." + +"I shall not allow you to cross-examine witnesses unless you do so with +due respect to the bench." + +The clerk to the justices, who had examined the witness, was the means +of averting an immediate scene. + +"I think, your worship, that he wishes to know whether the witness laid +the information against him." + +"I thank you," said Carlton, an incredible twinkle in his eye, as he +again turned to the witness. "I do desire to ask you, with due respect +to the bench, whether you 'laid this information' against me, or whether +you did not?" + +"I did," said Frost. + +"Before whom did you 'lay' it?" + +"The magistrate." + +"What magistrate?" + +"Sir Wilton Gleed." + +"And when?" + +"Last Friday." + +"The date, please!" + +"That would be the 18th." + +"The 18th of August! And the church was burnt on the morning of the 25th +of June! How is it that it took you eight weeks all but two days to 'lay +your information' against me?" + +The witness looked confused; but the chairman was quick to interpose; he +had been waiting his opportunity. + +"That may or may not transpire in the evidence," said he; "it is in +either event an absolutely inadmissible question, and I should strongly +recommend you to employ a solicitor. If you like I will adjourn the +court for half-an-hour while you instruct one; but I will not have the +time of the court wasted by irrelevant and inadmissible questions such +as you seem inclined to put. If you have nothing better to ask the +witness I shall order him to stand down." + +"Let him stand down," returned the prisoner, indifferently. "I have done +with him." + +Robert Carlton had surprised himself. He had come into court with the +most admirable intentions that it was possible to entertain: he was to +have kept cool but humble, to have curbed his contempt of proceedings +conducted (if not instituted) in the best of good faith, and never for +an instant to have forgotten his guilt of sin in his innocence of crime. +In this spirit he had risen from his knees that morning, and with this +resolve he had left his cell and been ushered into court; but the very +atmosphere of the place had made the blood sing in his veins; and it +needed but the chairman's voice to make it boil. He had sinned, and +chosen to suffer for his sin: so no crime was too dastardly to lay at +his door. He was down, and deservedly down, so friends and acquaintances +alike must gather and conspire to trample him. Carlton's point of view +went round like a weathercock in the wind; flesh and blood flew to the +front, in despite of spirit; and all the man in him rebelled at man's +injustice, in despite of his prayers. + +So when the next witness was being sworn (it was his own sexton), and +James Preston whispered to Canon Wilders, the man who had preached for +both of them looked on grimly. + +"As you seem bent upon conducting your own case," said Wilders, leaning +back, "you may possibly prefer a chair at the table; if so, there is one +at your disposal." And he pointed into the well of the court. + +Carlton thanked him in the voice that all his will could not purge of +all its scorn; he was perfectly comfortable where he was. Then he looked +pointedly at Preston, and his face and tone softened together. "But I +shall not forget the suggestion," he said; and again his friend changed +colour. + +The decrepit hero of the overweening hallucination had hobbled into the +witness-box meanwhile. Carlton had not come in contact with him since +the morning before the fire, and he little thought that his last +conversation with the sexton was about to come up in evidence against +him. Yet such was the case. + +Old Busby had been responsible for the lighting of the church. He had +kept the paraffin and filled the lamps. But in the month of June the +lamps were rarely needed. They had not been lighted on the Sunday before +the fire. There would have been even less occasion for them--by one +minute--the following Sunday. And yet, on the Saturday morning, the +prisoner had ordered the witness to see that the lamps were full! + +So Busby deposed; and the point seemed of sinister significance. It took +the prisoner plainly by surprise: the circumstance had escaped his +memory. In a minute, however, he had recalled it in detail; and his +cross-examination, though provocative of some mirth, and curtailed in +consequence, was by no means ineffectual. + +"You remember when the lamps went out, through your neglect, in the +middle of even-song?" + +"I'm like to remember it. That was when I swallowed the frog." + +The court laughed, but not the prisoner, who was too much in earnest +even to smile. + +"I reminded you pretty often about the lamps after that?" + +"Ay, you were for ever at me about 'em." + +"Now, on the morning you mention, where was I when I told you to go and +fill the lamps?" + +The sexton thought. + +"In your study, sir." + +"And what were you doing there? Do you remember?" + +"I do that! I was telling you about the frog." + +This time the prisoner smiled himself. + +"And did I listen to you?" he demanded, a sudden change upon his face, +as though the act of smiling had put him in pain. + +"No, that you didn't," the old man grumbled; "you fared as though you +didn't hear." + +"So I told you to go away and fill your lamps," said Carlton, sadly, +"even though it was Midsummer Day! I have finished with the witness." + +He was as one who had brilliantly parried a deadly thrust, and yet +received a secret wound in the onset. He rested his head upon his hand +to hide his pain, and only raised it at the sound of James Preston's +voice putting the first question from the bench: + +"As sexton, did you keep the key of the church?" + +"In the old days I did, sir; but that's been open church ever since Mr. +Carlton come." + +"You mean that the church was open day and night?" + +"To be sure it was." + +"Thank you," said Preston hastily, as though glad to relapse into +silence. Carlton did not add to his embarrassment by a glance, but his +heart throbbed with gratitude for the goodwill he could no longer +question. + +"_Did_ you fill the lamps?" asked the chairman as the witness was +preparing to hobble from the box. + +"Yes, sir, I did." + +And, watching the chairman's face, Carlton was still more thankful to +have one friend upon the bench; for it seemed to him that the young +gentleman in the tall collar and the tight trousers was alone in +preserving a Rhadamanthine impartiality. + +What surprised him equally was the strength and the nature of the +evidence produced. In his complete innocence of the crime imputed to +him, he had been unable to conceive or to recall a single incriminating +circumstance not susceptible of an easy and immediate explanation. Yet +more than one arose during the afternoon, when first the saddler, and +afterwards Tom Ivey, went into the box to bear witness against him; and +more than once the explanation, so full and clear in his own mind, was +incapable of confirmation or admission in the form of evidence. The +more striking instances were afforded by Fuller, whose testimony, though +convincing enough, and not the less so for its real or apparent +reluctance, came as a complete surprise to the prisoner. It appeared +that the saddler had returned to the rectory on the fatal night, more +than an hour after his first visit and summary dismissal, in order to +have his "say," and "not let the reverend have it all his own way." The +midnight visitor had found a light in the study, but the door shut, and +only the dog within. He had not entered, but had waited about the drive, +till, seeing a light in the church, he had made up his mind that "the +reverend" was there, and had decided not to interrupt him. So the +saddler had gone home and to bed, and was fast asleep when the +church-bells sounded the alarm. + +"And what made you so sure that it was Mr. Carlton in the church with +the light?" inquired Mr. Preston. + +"Because I couldn't find him in the rectory." + +"But you did not go in?" + +"I knocked and called, but I only made the dog bark." + +The chairman leaned forward in his turn. + +"Was the barking loud?" he asked. "Loud enough to be heard all over the +house?" + +Carlton sprang to his feet. He had been accommodated with a chair, of +which he had quietly availed himself during the examination of this +witness, and the suddenness of his movement brought all eyes to his +face. It was quick with impatience and sarcastic disregard. + +"If you are labouring to prove that I was not at my house, but in the +church," he cried, "your worship may save himself the time and trouble. +I was in the church. I lit one of the lamps." + +This did not strike the prisoner as the sensational statement that it +was; he was therefore amazed at its effect upon the bench, where even +Rhadamanthus came to life, while James Preston opened eyes of horror, +and Wilders whispered to the clerk. + +"That," said the chairman, "is an extremely serious statement, and one +that you are surely ill-advised in making. It is not evidence, but it is +being taken down in writing, and may be given in evidence against you at +your trial. I should certainly advise you to refrain from further +statements of the kind." + +"I thought you wanted to get at the truth?" + +"So we do. But I have warned you. Have you any questions to ask the +witness?" + +"Not one; he is equally correct in his statements and his suppositions." + +Thomas Ivey was then sworn, amid the hush of deepening interest, and +gave his evidence in a manly, straightforward, level-headed fashion, +that added its own weight to what he said for good or ill; and his +testimony told both ways. He described the scene in the church on his +arrival; the character of the fire, and the attitude of Mr. Carlton; +both of which, he admitted (in answer to a question from the chairman), +had struck him as suspicious at the first glance. + +"But did you see him _do_ anything that you thought suspicious?" asked +the well-meaning Mr. Preston. + +"I did, sir." + +"What was that?" from the chairman. + +"He threw something into the flames. But I couldn't see what that was." + +"Did you afterwards find out?" + +"No, sir." + +Once more the prisoner attracted every eye. It was felt that he would +make another of his reckless and voluntary declarations. But this time +he was silent enough; and though the evidence now took a turn in his +favour, that silence left its mark. + +Everybody knew how the clergyman had risked his life, when it was too +late, to save the church. But the story had not yet been told as Mr. +Preston contrived to elicit it from the lips of Tom Ivey. The Rector of +Linkworth had been from home when the fire took place. There was nothing +unnatural in his desire for details, nor did he put an improper +question. The chairman, however, betrayed more than a little impatience, +while the junior justice, on the other hand, displayed excitement of +another kind, and actually put in his word at last. + +"Do you mean to say you let him throw the water single-handed," said he, +"while the rest of you stayed outside?" + +"There was no stopping him, sir," said Ivey. "He would have all the +danger to himself." + +"Then you could not see what use he made of the water?" suggested the +chairman, dryly. + +"No, sir," said Tom; "I could only see the steam." And his tone was +still more dry. + +Wilders looked at the clock as the examination concluded. The case had +not been taken till the afternoon; it was now nearly five. Wilders +beckoned and spoke to the inspector, subsequently addressing the +prisoner in his coldest tone. + +"I understand that this is the last witness to be called against you," +said he. "Do you propose to cross-examine him?" + +"I do." + +"And may I ask if you have any witnesses to call for your defence?" + +"I may have one." + +"Then it becomes my duty to adjourn the case." He whispered again to the +inspector, and at greater length with his colleagues, James Preston +appearing tenacious of some point upon which the chairman ultimately +gave way. "As the police have completed their case," continued Wilders, +"a remand of one day will be sufficient, and we shall simply adjourn +until to-morrow morning. But you may, if you like, apply for bail; +though the question, having due regard to the evidence which we have +heard, is one that would now require our grave consideration." + +"You may spare yourselves the trouble," said Carlton shortly. "I don't +want bail." + +And he went back to prison to lament his temper, but not to go through +the form of further prayer for patience and humility; for he felt that +these were beyond him in that public court, packed with prejudice from +door to door. + +"I told you what he'd say," grumbled Wilders in the retiring-room. + +"I don't blame him," said Mr. Preston. "My dear sir, he's innocent of +this!" + +"I shall form _my_ opinion to-morrow," returned the canon, with dignity. +"Meanwhile I confess to some curiosity as to whom he thinks of calling +as his witness." + +"The chappie shows us sport," quoth Rhadamanthus, "guilty or not guilty; +and I'm not giving odds either way." + + + + +XVI + +END OF THE DUEL + + +Rhadamanthus reappeared without a visible garment that he had worn the +day before. He came spurred and breeched from the saddle, with a +horseshoe pin in his snowy tie, a more human collar, and a keener front +for the proceedings withal. Carlton felt his eye upon him from the +first, and returned the compliment by taking a new interest in the +nameless youth; he had long read the minds of the other two; his fate +was in this young fellow's keeping. He had no time, however, for idle +speculation as to the result. Tom Ivey was back in the witness-box, and +the accused was invited to cross-examine without delay. + +Carlton soon showed that the interval had enabled him to profit by the +experience of the previous day. His questions were cunningly prepared. +He began with one not easy to put in an admissible form, yet he +succeeded in so putting it. + +"You have sworn," said he, "that your very first glimpse of me in the +burning church was sufficient to create a certain suspicion in your +mind. Did you mention this suspicion to anybody--that night?" + +"Not that night." + +"That month?" + +"Nor yet that month, sir." + +"And why?" + +"I didn't suspect you any more, sir." + +Carlton tried hard to suppress his satisfaction, as a sensation to which +he was no longer entitled. He had come back to this in the night; but it +was harder to abide by it during the day. He paused a little, in honest +effort to rid his mind and tone of any taint of triumph; but his +advantage had to be pursued. + +"May I ask when this suspicion perished?" + +"Before we had been five minutes together, trying to save the church!" + +"You are getting upon dangerous ground," said the chairman. "What the +witness thought, or when he ceased to think it, is not evidence." + +"Another point, then," said Carlton: "do you remember the appearance of +the lamps?" + +"Yes." + +"What was it?" + +"They were crooked." + +"Did you notice any paraffin spilt about?" + +"Yes, when my attention was called to it." + +"Where was this paraffin?" + +"On the pews that were catching fire." + +"And who called your attention to it?" + +"You did yourself, sir." + +"I did myself!" repeated Carlton, struggling with his tone. "That will +do for that. I am going back for a moment to those suspicions of yours. +Have you never mentioned them to a human being?" + +"Yes, sir, I have." + +"As things of the past?" + +"As things of the past." + +"When was it that you first spoke of them?" + +"Last Friday--the eighteenth, sir." + +"And did you then speak of your own accord, or were you questioned?" + +"I was questioned." + +"As the first man to reach the burning church?" + +"Yes, sir." + +"Take care!" cried Wilders. "That was a leading question." + +"It is the last," replied Carlton. "I have finished with the witness. I +would take this opportunity, however, of apologising to your worships +for the various errors and excesses which I have committed, and may +still commit, in my ignorance and inexperience of the law, and my +indignation at the charge. In this respect, and this alone, I crave the +indulgence of the bench, and beg leave to rectify one of my mistakes. I +spoke in haste when I said, yesterday, that I had no questions to ask +the witness Fuller. I desire, with your worships' permission, to have +that witness recalled." + +The chairman was rather sharp: subsequent evidence might make the recall +of witnesses a necessity, but the lost opportunities of counsel, or of +accused persons conducting their own defence, were an altogether +insufficient reason. However, the man was in court, and the application +would be allowed. + +"I appreciate the privilege," said Carlton, "and promise that it shall +not detain us many moments." + +He was becoming as fluent and adroit as a past practitioner; in the +pauses of the fight he felt ashamed of his facility, a haunting sense +that it was indecent in him to defend himself at all. Yet he was one +against many; and, in this matter, an innocent man. Fight he must, and +that with all the skill and spirit in his power. His liberty, his +self-respect; his one remaining chance, object, and desire in life; nay, +his very life itself was at stake with these. It was no time for +dwelling upon the past. The sin that he had committed was one thing; the +crime that he had not committed was another. It was his duty to be just +to himself. Yet this was how he treated himself, whenever he had time to +think! He resolved to give himself fairer play than he seemed likely to +receive at the hands of others; and his resolve declared itself in the +ringing voice that shocked not a few who heard it, having found him +guilty already in their hearts. + +"About that very story of the empty rectory and the light in the +church," he began, with Fuller--"about that perfectly true story," he +added, wilfully, "which you told us yesterday. Did you tell it to +anybody at the time?" + +"Only Tom Ivey." + +"Why only to him?" + +"He asked me to keep that to myself." + +"And did you?" + +"I did my best, sir, but that slipped out one day when I was talking +to----" + +"Never mind his or her name. You did your best to keep the matter to +yourself, but it slipped out one day in conversation. Now when did you +last tell that true story, not counting yesterday, as fully and +particularly as you told it here in court? Think. I want the exact date +of the very last occasion." + +"That was last Friday, sir--to-day's the 22nd--that would be the 18th of +August." + +"Last Friday, the 18th of August; a fatal day to me!" said Robert +Carlton. "Thank you. That is all I want from you." + +The justices put no question. The clerk did not re-examine. The witness +was ordered to stand down. Then followed a short but heavy silence, +pregnant with speculation as to the drift of all these questions and the +object of so much unexplained insistence upon a date. It meant +something. What could it mean? Carlton stood upright in the dock, calm, +confident, inscrutable; it seemed a great many moments before the +silence was broken by the formal tones of the clerk. + +"Do you call any witness for the defence?" he asked. + +Carlton dropped his eyes into the well of the court, and they fell upon +a pair that were fastened upon his face with the glitter of fixed +bayonets. + +"Yes," said he. "I wish you to call Sir Wilton Gleed." + +Quietly though distinctly spoken, the name clapped like thunder on the +court. Amazement fell on all alike, for the issue between these two had +been the common theme for days. Popular sympathy had rightly sided with +morality, and its champion had lost nothing by his tactful magnanimity +in refraining from sitting upon the bench; that he should be put in the +box instead, and by his shameless adversary, was an audacity as hard to +credit as to understand. There was a moment's hush, then a minute's +buzz, to which the justices themselves contributed. Wilders muttered +that the man was mad; his colleague on the right confessed himself +nonplussed; his colleague on the left dropped his shaven chin upon his +gold horseshoe, and his shoulders shook with joy. Meanwhile Sir Wilton +had forced a grin and found his voice. + +"You want me in the box, do you?" + +"I do." + +"Very well; you shall have me." + +And he was sworn, still grinning, with an odd mixture of malevolence and +deprecation for those who ran to read. "I meant to keep out of this," +the florid face said; "but now I'm in it--well, you'll see! It's the +fellow's own fault; his blood" etc., etc. But this was not what Sir +Wilton was saying in his heart. + +Carlton began at the beginning. + +"You are the patron of the living of Long Stow, are you not?" + +"You know I am." + +"I want the bench to have it from you; kindly answer my question." + +"I am the patron of the living of Long Stow," said Sir Wilton, with mock +resignation. + +"In the year 1880 did you, of your own free will and accord, present +that living to me?" + +"Yes, and I've repented it ever since!" + +There was a sympathetic murmur at the back of the court. It was +immediately checked. Every face was thrust forward, every ear strained, +every eye absorbed between the prisoner in the dock and the witness in +the box. It was no longer the uphill fight of one against many; it was +single combat between man and man, and the electricity of single combat +charged the air. + +"You have repented it more than ever of late?" asked Carlton in steady +tones. The skin upon his forehead seemed stretched with pain; the veins +showed blue and swollen; but the many judged him from his voice alone. + +"Naturally," sneered Sir Wilton. + +"So much so that you were resolved I should resign?" + +"I hoped you would have the decency to do so." + +"Did you come to the rectory on the fifth of this month, and tell me it +was my first duty to resign the living?" + +"I don't remember the date." + +"Was it the Saturday before Bank Holiday?" + +"I daresay. Yes, it must have been. I didn't expect to find you there. I +went to see the wreck and ruin of your home and church, not you." + +"But you did come, and you did see me, and you did tell me it was my +first duty to resign my living?" + +"Certainly I did." + +"Do you remember your words?" + +"Some of them." + +Carlton looked at his pocket-book--at a note made overnight. + +"Do you remember making use of the following expressions: 'Law or no +law, I'll have you out of this! I'll hound you out of it! I'll have you +torn in pieces if you stay'?" + +"I may have said something of the kind," said the witness, with assumed +indifference. + +"Did you, or did you not?" cried Carlton, slapping his hand on the rail +of the dock; the voice, the look, the gesture were familiar to many +present who had heard him preach; and thrilled them for all their new +knowledge of the preacher. + +"Really I can't recall my exact words. I rather fancied they were +stronger." + +Some one laughed at this, and the witness managed to recapture his grin; +but his demeanour was unconvincing. + +"I am not talking about their strength," said Carlton. "Will you swear +that you did _not_ say, 'I'll have you out of this! I'll hound you out +of it'?" + +"No, I will not." + +"I thank you," said Carlton; and his ringing voice fell at a word to the +pitch of perfect courtesy. He ticked off the note in his pocket-book, +and the court breathed again; but its worthy president did more: he had +forgotten his position for several minutes, and he hastened to reassert +it with the first observation that entered his head. + +"I don't see the point of this examination," said Canon Wilders. + +"You will presently." + +"If I don't I shall put a stop to it!" + +Carlton raised his eyes from his notes, but not to the bench; they were +only for the witness now. + +"Do you remember when and where we met again?" + +"You had the insolence to call at my house." + +"Was it on a Monday morning, the first after the Bank Holiday?" + +"I suppose it was." + +"I do not ask you to recall your exact words on that occasion. I simply +ask you to inform the bench whether I did, or did not, offer to resign +the living then and there--on a certain condition." + +"Yes; you did," said Sir Wilton, doggedly. He was very red in the face. + +Carlton could not resist a moment's enjoyment of his discomfiture: it +heightened the pleasure of letting him off. + +"And did you decline?" he said at length. + +"Stop a moment," said the chairman. "What was this condition, Sir +Wilton?" + +"Am I obliged to give it?" + +"Oh, if you think it inexpedient----" + +"I think it unnecessary," said the witness, emphatically. "I think it +has nothing whatever to do with the case." + +"In that case, Sir Wilton, we shall be only too happy not to press the +point." + +Carlton had a great mind to press it himself. He had invited his enemy +to build the church out of his own pocket. The invitation had been +declined. Would it also be denied? Carlton was curious to see; but he +overcame his curiosity. It would not strengthen his defence, and to mere +revenge he must not stoop. So one temptation was resisted, and one +advantage thrown away, even in the final phase of the long duel between +these good fighters. But the other saw the struggle, and felt as he had +done when Carlton had returned him his stick in the ruins of the church. + +"And did you decline?" repeated Carlton, in identically the same voice +as before. + +"I did." + +"Did I then point out to you that I was not only entitled, but might be +compelled, to keep my chancel, at any rate, 'in good and substantial +repair, restoring and rebuilding when necessary'? I quote the Act, your +worships, as I quoted it then. Do you remember, Sir Wilton?" + +"I do." + +"I made the point as plain as I have made it now?" + +"Yes." + +"And what did you say to that?" + +The sudden change in the style of the question was glossed over by the +single artifice which Robert Carlton permitted himself during the +conduct of his case: instead of ringing triumphant, his voice dropped as +though he feared the answer. Sir Wilton fell into the trap. + +"I said, 'If that's the law I'll see you keep it. Go and build your +church! Where there's a law there will be a penalty; go build your +church or I'll enforce it.'" + +"Which did you expect to enforce--the penalty or the law?" + +"I didn't mind which," declared the witness, after hesitation; and his +indifference was less successfully assumed than before. + +"Oh!" said Carlton; "so you didn't mind my building the church after +all?" + +Sir Wilton appealed wildly to the Bench. + +"Am I to be browbeaten and insulted, by a convicted libertine and evil +liver, without one word of protest or reproof?" + +The chairman coloured with confusion and indecision. + +"I am afraid that you must answer his question, Sir Wilton," said Mr. +Preston, mildly. + +"I share your opinion," said Rhadamanthus, in a tone that went further +than the words. + +The chairman threw up his chin with an air, and fixed the accused with +his sternest glance. + +"Pray what are you endeavouring to establish by this round-about and +impertinent examination?" + +"In plain language?" asked Robert Carlton. + +"The plainer the better." + +"Then I am endeavouring to establish--and I _will_ establish, either +here or at the assizes--the fact that that man there"--pointing to Sir +Wilton Gleed--"has tried by fair means and by foul to rob me of a +benefice which is still mine in more than name. And I will further +establish, either here or at the higher court, if you like to send me +there, the patent and the blatant fact that this very charge is the last +and the foulest means by which that man has attempted to get rid of me!" + +His clear voice thundered through the little court; his fine eye +flashed with as fine a scorn. But it was neither look nor tone that made +the silence when he ceased. It was the first unrestrained expression of +a personality incomparably stronger than any other there present; it was +the first just and unanimous--if unconscious--appreciation of that +personality in that place. There was a round clock that ticked many +times and noisily before the presiding magistrate broke the spell. + +"A-bom-in-able language!" cried he in the separate syllables of his most +important moments. "You deserve to answer for your words alone in the +other court of which you speak!" + +"I intend to prove them in this one," retorted Carlton, "if you give me +fair play." + +"Oh, by all means let him have fair play!" exclaimed the witness, in +high tones that trembled. "I can take care of myself; don't study _me_. +Let him say what he likes, and let those who know his character and mine +judge between him and me." + +Carlton looked at the quivering lip between the cropped whiskers, and +his jaws snapped on a smile as he returned to his pocket-book. But the +whole of his examination of Sir Wilton Gleed does not call for elaborate +report: its weakness and its strength will be recognised with equal +readiness. With a stronger spirit on the bench, or a weaker spirit in +the dock, or even a capable solicitor to prosecute for the police, much +of it had never been; as the play was cast it was the accused clergyman +who presided over that country court for the longest hour in his enemy's +life; nor, when he had won his ascendancy, did he use his power as +unsparingly as in the winning of it. The witness was allowed to come out +of the corner into which he had been driven before his appeal to the +bench; he had contradicted himself, and the contradiction was left to +tell its own tale without being pressed home. On the other hand, some +startling admissions were obtained in regard to the responsibility with +which the witness had finally sought to saddle the accused; he had bade +him build the church because he believed Carlton would find it an +impossible task; he recklessly admitted it, with a pale bravado that +imposed upon few people in court, and on but one upon the bench. + +"You were still determined to get rid of me," said Carlton, "one way or +another?" + +"I was." + +"And this struck you as another way?" + +"It did--at the moment." + +"Ah," murmured the chairman, "we are all subject to the impulse of the +moment!" + +Carlton put this point aside. + +"And why did you think that I should find it an impossible task to +rebuild the church?" + +"I thought you would find a difficulty in getting local men to work for +you." + +"Your grounds for thinking that?" + +"I considered your reputation in the district." + +"Any other reason?" + +"One or two builders and masons had spoken to me on the subject." + +Carlton found a new place in his pocket-book, and read out a list of +nine names. + +"Were any of these local men among the number?" + +"Yes." + +"All of them?" + +"Ye--es." + +"What! You admit having discussed me, during the present month, and +since I first spoke to you about rebuilding the church, with these nine +local builders or stonemasons?" + +"I don't deny it," said Sir Wilton, stoutly. + +"And do you know of any builder or stonemason in the neighbourhood with +whom you have _not_ discussed me?" + +"Can't say I do." + +"That's quite enough," said Carlton. "I shall not ask you what you said. +I do not purpose calling these men, at this court; time enough for that +at the assizes." And without further comment he took the witness through +one or two details of their last interview in the ruins; by no means +all; indeed, the date was the point most insisted upon. + +"And so the very next day was last Friday, the 18th of August?" +concluded Carlton with apparent levity. + +The witness refused to answer, appealed to the bench, and secured +another reprimand for the accused. + +"I harp upon that date," said Carlton, "because, as I have already +remarked, it seems to have been a fatal date for me. It has arisen so +many times in the course of this case! This, however, is not the precise +moment for enumerating those occasions; let us first finish with each +other. Did you, Sir Wilton Gleed, on the eighteenth day of this present +month, have separate or collective conversation with the witnesses +Busby, Fuller, and Ivey?" + +"Yes, I did," said Gleed, hot, white, and glaring. + +"Separate or collective? Did you speak to them one at a time or all +together?" + +"Both, if you like!" cried the witness, wildly. "I can't remember. +Better say both!" + +"You interviewed these witnesses, separately and collectively, on the +very day that the other witness, Frost, laid an information against me +before yourself as Justice of the Peace?" + +"I said it was that day. You ask the same question again and again!" + +The man was fuming, trembling, near to tears or curses of mortification +and blind rage. + +"I have but two more questions to ask you, and I am done," rejoined +Carlton. "Did the witness Fuller tell you of the light in the church, +and the witness Ivey of what _he_ saw later on, during these +conversations of the fatal eighteenth?" + +"They did." + +"And was this the first you had heard of those experiences?" + +"It was." + +"That is my last question, Sir Wilton Gleed." + +The justices put none. Gleed glared at them as he left the box. + +"I think," said he, "that this is the most scandalous incident--most +disgraceful thing I ever heard of in my life!" + +"I quite agree with you," whispered Wilders. + +"And I also," said Mr. Preston, in a different tone. + +But no word fell from Rhadamanthus. His small eyes did not leave +Carlton's face for above one second in the sixty. But their expression +was inscrutable. + +"May I now claim the indulgence of the court for a very few minutes?" +asked the clergyman in the dock. + +The clergymen on the bench looked at the clock and at each other. It was +already past the hour for luncheon. + +"Better go on," urged Preston, "and get it over." + +"If you mean what you say," said Wilders to the accused, "we will hear +you now; if you proceed to treat us to a mere display of words, I shall +adjourn the court. Meanwhile it is my duty to remind you that whatever +you say will be taken down in writing, and may be given in evidence +against you upon your trial." + +"In the event of my committal," returned Robert Carlton, "I am prepared +to stand or fall by every word that I have uttered or may utter now; and +I shall not detain you long. I am well aware how I have trespassed +already upon the time of this court, but I will waste none upon vain or +insincere apology. I came here to answer to a very terrible charge; it +was and it is my duty to do so as fully and as emphatically as I +possibly can. Yet I have little to add to the evidence before you; a +comment or two, and I am done. + +"It seems to me that the witnesses called by the police have between +them produced but three points of any weight against me, or worthy of +the serious consideration of this or any other court of law. I will +take these three points in their proper order, and will give my answer +to each in the fewest possible words in which I can express my meaning +to your worships. + +"Arthur Busby has sworn that on the morning before the fire I ordered +him to fill the lamps with paraffin, though it was extremely unlikely +that any artificial light would be required in church next evening. But +on the man's own showing he was wearying and distressing me beyond +measure at the time--a more terrible time than this!" cried Carlton from +his heart; and was brought to pause, not for effect (though the effect +was marked) but by the very suddenness of his emotion. "And on the man's +own showing," he continued in a lower key, "he had once omitted this +important duty of filling the lamps, and I was 'for ever at him' on the +subject. What more natural than to tell him to go away and fill his +lamps, as one had told him a dozen times before, but this time without +thinking and simply to get rid of the man? On the other hand, if the +paraffin had been wanted for the felonious purpose suggested, could +anything be more incriminating and incredible than the suggested method +of obtaining it? I submit these two questions, with the highly important +point involved, to the consideration of the bench; and I do so with some +confidence. + +"The next point, I confess, is more difficult to dismiss. I shall not +attempt to dismiss it from any mind in court. I shall simply leave it to +the consideration of your worships as men of the world and students of +the human heart. It is near midnight. I am not to be found at the +rectory, and a light is seen in the church. I admit that I was in the +church, and that I lighted one of the lamps. + +"Here I am forced to allude to another matter: a matter in which, God +knows, I have never denied my guilt, as I do deny my guilt of the crime +of arson: a matter in which I have never sought to defend myself, as I +have been compelled to do in this court for a very long day and a half. + +"Consider my case on the night of the fire. I will not dwell upon it; it +is surely within the knowledge or the imagination of most present. . . . +There was my church. I had held my last service there. I felt that I +could never hold another. And, whatever I had been, I loved my church! +You upon the bench . . . you Members of Christ's Church . . . I ask not +for your sympathy but for your insight. Can you think that I went into +the church I loved, wilfully and deliberately to burn it to the ground? +Can you not conceive my going there, in the dead of that dreadful night, +to look my last upon it--to bid my church good-bye?" + +His emotion was piteous, but never pitiful. It shook nothing but his +voice. It neither bowed his head nor dimmed the brilliance of an eye +turned full upon his fellows. And so he stood silent for a space, and +none other spoke; then through Tom Ivey's evidence with a lighter touch. +It was evidence in his favour: he scorned to enlarge upon it. The one +adverse point was lightly--perhaps too lightly--dismissed. He had been +seen to throw something into the flames. Did the prosecution suggest +that he had thrown fresh fuel? Other points, already made in +cross-examination, were left to take care of themselves: the paraffin on +the pews, to which he himself had called Ivey's attention, was one. +Indeed, in the whole course of the prisoner's speech, it was never +admitted that the church had been purposely set fire to at all; the +suggestion had been made in the heat of cross-examination, but it was +not made again. It even seemed as though Robert Carlton had grown either +certain, or careless, of the result of the inquiry--and the impression +was not removed by the close of his remarks. + +"And now," he said, "I have to deal with the evidence of Sir Wilton +Gleed. I shall endeavour to deal with that evidence as dispassionately +as I can, and as summarily as it deserves. Sir Wilton Gleed is a man +with a genuine grievance, which you all know and I have never denied. +But I do not propose to enter into the matter at issue between Sir +Wilton Gleed and myself, or to suggest for an instant that he was +anything but right in determining to rid his village of one who had +brought himself to bitter but merited sorrow and disgrace. I am not here +to defend my sins; nor have I defended them elsewhere; nor have I shrunk +from suffering from anything I have done. But here have I been brought +to book for something I never did--taken prisoner and brought to you on +a criminal charge and no other. And I tell you that this criminal charge +is as false as another was true, but for which this one would never have +been made. But enough of mere assertion; let me crystallise some of the +evidence that has come before you. + +"The witnesses swear to three or four suspicious circumstances between +them. Yet they seem scarcely to have opened their lips--nobody seems to +have heard of those circumstances--until Friday of last week. On Friday +last--my fatal date--these witnesses open their mouths with one accord. +And, curiously enough, it is in Sir Wilton Gleed that they are one and +all led to confide! + +"But there is a still more curious and informing coincidence. Sir Wilton +Gleed and I have several very stormy interviews, in which he tries, +first by one artifice, then by another--all frankly admitted in his +evidence--to drive me from a position which I have finally refused to +resign. My refusal may be just as obdurate and indefensible as you are +pleased to think it; that is not the point at all. The point is this +contest of tenacity on his part and on mine, culminating in a final +interview between us on the eve of the day upon which all these +witnesses break their more or less complete silence concerning my +movements on the night of the fire, and break it in the ear of Sir +Wilton Gleed! + +"I invite you to consider the obvious inference. My enemy has tried +every other means of dislodging me. He has threatened and insulted me. +He has set every builder and mason in the neighbourhood against me. He +has deprived me--as he thinks--of the means of building my church, and +then he turns round and tells me to build it or take the consequences! I +make a beginning in spite of him; he has to think of some new method of +expulsion; so, with infinite ingenuity, he trumps up this present charge +against me." + +Wilders opened his lips, but the prisoner's hand flew upward in +arresting gesture. + +"With infinite ingenuity, your worship, but not necessarily in bad +faith. I have never yet questioned the _bona fides_ of Sir Wilton Gleed; +nor do I now. On the contrary, I am convinced that he honestly and +sincerely believes me capable of any crime in the calendar; but my +capability, again, is not the point; and belief and proof are very +different things. If your worships hold that this horrible charge has +been proved against me--proved sufficiently for this court--then send me +to a higher one as your duty dictates. But if you think that hatred and +prejudice, however deserved, have played the part of genuine and +spontaneous suspicion; that facts have been distorted to fit a +preconception, and the wish, however unconsciously, allowed to father +the thought; that, in short, an honest man has been quite honestly +blinded and misled by very loathing of me and all my doings; then I +implore your worships to dismiss this charge against me--and let me get +back to the work I left to meet it!" + +The last words came as an after-thought, but they came from the heart, +and as no anti-climax to those who knew the nature of the work named. In +absolute silence Carlton availed himself of the chair in the dock, +dropping all but out of sight, and bending double, his heart throbbing, +his head singing, his hot hands pressed across his eyes. It was the +sudden hum of talk which told him that the justices had retired; days +passed in his brain before a hush as sudden announced their return. +Meanwhile there were the scraps of conversation that found their way to +his ears. Hearing all, he could distinguish little; but now and then a +familiar phrase leapt home, as familiar faces declare themselves afar. +"The gift of the gab" was one, and "He'd argue black was white" another. +But some one said, "Give the devil his due"; and with that single crumb +of justice Robert Carlton had to crouch content until his present fate +was sealed. + +But the hush came at last, and sank to profound silence as the +magistrates took their seats--Rhadamanthus keen and grim--the clergymen +plainly angry with each other. Preston's honest face hid no more of his +feelings than heretofore, but the chairman cloaked annoyance with the +fraction of a smile, and only his voice betrayed him as he addressed the +prisoner. + +"After a long and patient hearing," said Wilders, "the bench find this a +case of ve-ry con-sid-er-able doubt in-deed. But, upon the whole, and +taking all the cir-cum-stances into care-ful con-sid-er-ation, they are +of o-pin-i-on that there is not enough ev-i-dence to justify them in +sending the case to the assizes. The charge is therefore dis-missed. I +should like, however, to add one word in respect to a witness, who +might, had he been a less chiv-al-rous opponent--a less mag-nan-i-mous +man--have sat here upon the bench instead of entering the witness-box to +suffer the remorseless cross-questioning of a personal enemy. I could +wish, indeed"--with covert meaning--"that Sir Wilton Gleed had seen fit +to take his proper place in this court! I need hardly say that he quits +it without stain or slur, of any sort or kind, upon his character; and +that he does so with the heartfelt sympathy of one, at all events, of +his colleagues upon the bench." + +Rhadamanthus turned his back to hide his face, but James Preston did not +rise till he had finished as he begun. He caught Carlton's eye, and +nodded once more to him, but this time unblushingly and with much +vigour. There was a little hissing as the prisoner vanished, a free man; +and some hooting in the street, in which he reappeared, contrary to +expectation, within a minute. It was like his brazen face, so they told +him as he strode through the little crowd as one who neither heard nor +saw a man of them. But no hand was lifted, no missile thrown, for the +deaf ear is no earnest of physical passivity, and it was notorious that +this man could take care of himself with his hands as well as with his +tongue. Such a very deaf ear did he turn, however, that a flyman had to +follow him to the outskirts of the town, and shout till he was hoarse, +before Robert Carlton paid more heed to him than to his revilers. And +all the time it was a decent man from Linkworth, only begging him to +jump in, as the clergyman at last discovered with instant suspicions of +the truth. + +"Who sent you after me?" + +"Mr. Preston, sir; leastways, he told me to be here all day, in case you +wanted me." + +"God bless Jim Preston!" muttered Carlton, and jumped into the fly +forthwith. + +But presently they were at some cross-roads. And the driver drew rein +with a troubled face. He wanted to go a long way round, but his reasons +were wild and unintelligible. Carlton, however, divined the real reason, +and whose it was, and he himself pulled the other rein. + +"No, no," said he; "drive me through my own village! They drove me +through it on Saturday; take me back as they took me away. But it was +like Mr. Preston to think of it. Tell him I said so, and that I'll never +forget his kindness as long as I live!" + +It was the red-gold heart of the August afternoon, and the shrill little +choir of the ruined church sang a welcome to the friend who had never +sinned against them; and Glen came bounding and barking defiance at the +outside world; and the unfinished stone, the first stone that Robert +Carlton was to dress and to lay with his own hands, it was just as they +had made him leave it on the Saturday evening. But the story of his +return was still being bandied from door to door, when a new sound came +with the song of birds from the ruin in the trees, and a new ending was +given to the story. + +The sound was the swish, swish, swish of the mason's axe, with the +stiletto's point, through sandstone as soft as cheese. + + + + +XVII + +THREE WEEKS AND A NIGHT + + +Carlton completed that historic stone within another hour, and actually +laid it that night. Jaded in body and brain, with every nerve exhausted, +he must needs do this or drop in the attempt. It was the first stone in +the new church. It was finished at last. He touched it here and there +with the straight-edge. He felt its angles with the square. This stone +would do. He whipped out his foot-rule and measured carefully. The stone +was eleven inches all ways but one. It was the exact depth for the lower +courses, but it was seventeen inches long. A seventeen-inch gap must +therefore be found or made for it. And Carlton went prowling round the +blackened walls, with his foot-rule and his dog, before resting from his +labours. The job should be finished this time, the first stone should be +laid that night. + +A place was found in the base of the east end, over a stable portion of +the plinth; the situation was of sacred omen, and Carlton cleared away +the old mortar with immense energy. Then his difficulties began. There +was new mortar to make; this was an altogether new undertaking. It had +been Tom Ivey's affair. Carlton had tried his hand at most branches of +the masonic art, but he had never attempted to mix the mortar. He +barely knew how to begin. There was a heap of sand at one end of the +shed, and a load of lime under cover. These were the ingredients. That +he knew; but it was not enough. + +Suddenly, he remembered his _Building Construction_ in two volumes; the +bulkier of the two treated of materials. In a minute the book was found, +deep in dust, and carried to the shed for consultation on the spot. And +there was only too much about mortar; the subject monopolised a column +of the index; its vastness oppressed Carlton, who nevertheless attacked +it then and there. A great disappointment was in store: so he was to +begin by "slaking" his lime. He had forgotten that step; now he had a +dim recollection of the process. According to the book it took two or +three hours at least; even this minimum presupposed that the lime was a +"fat lime," whatever that might be. Carlton, lacking all means of +deciding such a point, gave his inclination the benefit of the doubt, +and left his shovelful of quicklime under water and sand for exactly two +hours and a half. + +This check came in the nick of time. It reminded Robert Carlton of the +flesh, whose needs he had once more neglected, though now he would have +cooked and eaten if only to have killed an hour. He lit a fire. He put +on the kettle. He toasted some very stale bread; he boiled an egg warm +from the hen-house, then another; and having eaten he rested while he +must. The sun set; the new moon whitened in the sky, but as yet could +not light a man at his work when it was really dark. And that was why +the lantern stood so long upon the ground outside the shed, in a whirl +of tiny wings, while the mortar was being mixed at last. + +But the lantern stood longer still upon a salient fragment of the razed +east end, while the trowel rang, and the mortar flopped, until all lay +smooth and glistening in its light. Then Carlton knelt, and lifted his +handiwork with bursting muscles; and the mortar spattered his waistcoat +as the great stone dropped into place. A wrench, a push, a tap with the +trowel; a finishing touch with its point, a word of thanksgiving before +he rose; and Robert Carlton had laid the first stone of a new church, +and of his own new life. + +Next morning he began systematic work, rising at five, lighting his +fire, making his bed, sweeping, dusting, pumping, rinsing, all before +the day's work started after breakfast, with the gentler arts of +scraping and re-pointing, and all in strict obedience to the schedule +which Carlton had drawn up before his arrest. The working day ended, as +then arranged, with a violent assault upon that black disorder which had +been the nave; but this also acquired system as the days closed in; +while the influence of time was not less apparent in the gradual +disappearance of that tendency to morbid reaction which had been +inevitable in the first days of bodily and spiritual strain, of +incessant and excessive hardship, of a solitude consummate and profound. +But here time was assisted by the good sense and the strong will of +Carlton himself, who knew how little virtue there is in mere remorse, +and who struggled against it with all his might. It was a long time, +however, before even he was master of himself in this regard. One day, +in the exaltation of overwork, the high excitement of nervous and of +physical exhaustion, he was actually heard whistling at his walls, and +it was all over the village before he caught himself in the act; but +none seemed to hear how suddenly he stopped at last; none saw the raised +face, the clasped hands, the lips moving in meek apology for an +instant's joy. Nor did any man dream how this one would still mortify +himself, after such a lapse, with deliberate dwelling on the past. There +was but one link, indeed, in all the mournful chain of recent events, +upon which Robert Carlton would never permit his thoughts to +concentrate; that was his successful conduct of his own case before the +magistrates, culminating in his final triumph over Sir Wilton Gleed. He +had made the rule in the hour of his release, and he called in all his +strength of mind to its rigorous observance. + +It was now three weeks since he had spoken to a human being, none having +come near him to his knowledge; then one morning the air was full of +whispers, though the yellowing elms hung stagnant in an autumn mist; and +the outcast, looking over the wall which he was scraping, beheld a bevy +of school-children perched on that of the churchyard. + +He bent a little lower to his work. The wall was that thirteen-foot +strip, to the left of the porch, upon which he had spent the first +morning of all in getting rid of the unsound upper courses. It was still +his own height in most places; so the children could not watch him at +his work; but the sound of them was enough. Poor little children! To +grow up with such an example and such knowledge as would be theirs! His +heart had seldom smitten him so hard. + +"_Then said He unto the disciples, It is impossible but that offences +will come: but woe unto him through whom they come!_ + +"_It were better for him that a millstone were hanged about his neck, +and he cast into the sea, than that he should offend one of these little +ones._" + +The text came unbidden; it cut the deeper for that. Woe unto him, +indeed! Of all men, woe unto him! Hammer and chisel slipped from his +hands; he hid his face. His thumbs went to his ears, but were drawn +back. The children's voices were more than he could bear, so he bore +them for his sin until another aspect of the case was driven home to his +intelligence. Next moment he appeared in the porch, and the children +were vanishing from the wall. + +"Don't run away," he called. "Come back, you bigger ones!" + +It was his old voice, come unbidden like the text; he might have been +using it all these weeks. The children had never disobeyed that quiet +but imperious summons. They did not begin to-day. + +"Why aren't you all at school?" + +There was silence, broken eventually by some bold but still respectful +spirit. + +"Please, sir, it's a holiday." + +"Not Saturday, is it?" + +He was beginning to lose count of the week-days; once already the +Sabbath school-bell had nipped a day's work in the bud. + +"No, sir, it's an extra holiday." + +"Then spend it better. Get away into the fields, or down the river. I +won't have you hanging about here. There's nothing for you to +see--nothing that will do you any good. Run away all, and forget who has +spoken to you. But don't let me have to speak again!" + +There was no need for another word. And the workman went back to his +wall; but his hands had lost their cunning; his heart was as heavy as +the stones themselves. + +Why had he never been harassed in this way before? He had not to think +very long. He was without that friend of friendless man, his dog. The +good Glen, his second shadow in these days, had chosen this one to +desert him; and Carlton was glad, for nothing else would have made him +appreciate the dog at his true worth. Now he thought of it, how often +the faithful brute had gone barking to wall or gate, and come back +wagging his tail! Preoccupied with his work, he had taken no thinking +heed at the time. But now he remembered and understood. + +Instead of working all the afternoon, he went in search of Glen. It +surprised him to find how much he missed a companion whose presence he +had often ignored for hours together; he felt as though he could do no +good without the animal now; its dumb sympathy seemed to have had no +small share in all that he had done as yet. That wag of the tail, how +well he knew it after all! It was like the grasp of a good man's hand. +That wistful eye, watching over him at his work, was it a blasphemous +conceit to think of it as the mild eye of the All-seeing, shining +through the mask of one of His humblest creatures, upon another as +humble, and countenancing the work if not the man? If this was +blasphemy, then Robert Carlton blasphemed for once in his heart; and had +his deserts in an unsuccessful quest. + +He had searched the garden and the house; had stood whistling at the +gate, and in each of the far corners of the glebe. Night fell upon him +sawing a huge tie-beam through and through to shift it, and sawing with +all the irritable energy of the unwilling workman, very remarkable in +him. And for once he was glad to put on his coat. + +What could have happened to the dog? Its master could scarcely eat for +wondering. Now he sat frowning heavily. Anon his brow cleared, and a +fixed purpose glittered in his eyes. A little later he was in the +village street once more. + + + + +XVIII + +THE NIGHT'S WORK + + +The night was as dark as it could possibly be. The day's mist still +lingered, impervious to stars, and there was no moon. Carlton was not +sorry, for he had no wish to be seen by more people than was absolutely +necessary; neither was he allowing for the shabby tweeds he had +unearthed to work in, for his cloth cap and untrimmed beard, which +obliterated the clergyman and changed the man. + +He had not gone far before he stopped in astonishment. He had met no +one, and the village was as dark as the firmament; in the first few +cottages there were no lights at all. Carlton groped his way up the path +of one, and knocked twice without receiving an answer or detecting any +sound within. It was as though his sin had driven his parishioners to +the four winds. + +He went on with increasing amazement, still without encountering a soul; +then swerved of a sudden from the middle of the road, and hugged the +wheatfield wall on the right-hand side while passing the Flint House on +the left. Here were lights, and more. The front door stood open, pouring +a broken beam of lamplight into the road. And on the single step, +leaning upon his great stick, towered the silhouette of Jasper Musk, +only less colossal than his shadow in the lighted slice of road. + +Carlton half expected a challenge, and passed slowly and openly; instead +of slinking as his shame dictated. But there was neither word nor sign +of recognition from the gigantic figure on the step; and the lights +ended where they had begun. There were none beneath the gabled thatch +immediately beyond the wheatfield; and so for another hundred yards; not +a glimmer to right or left, with the single exception of a lattice +window over the post-office, where the bed-ridden Mrs. Ivey lay as she +had been lying for many months. Carlton saw the shadow of a flower-pot +on the widow's blind; no doubt it was the geranium he had taken her in +early summer; he remembered placing it on the sill. His pace quickened. +He was now at the long lane leading to the Plough and Harrow; and there +at last were the missing lights. The inn was lit up in every window, and +not only the unmistakable sound, but the very smell of feasting +travelled to the road, where Robert Carlton hesitated longer than his +wont. He might as well go home. It was quite bad enough to face his +people piece-meal. On the other hand, there was the dog; a +characteristic fixity of purpose in its owner; and a natural curiosity +to know more of the entertainment that could empty every home. + +The front of the inn revealed nothing after all. The brilliantly lighted +parlour was deserted by all but a single attendant behind the bar; the +scene of revelry was audibly the barn at the back. The inn itself had +once been a farm-house, and this barn came in for all the festivals. + +Carlton peered through the parlour window, and nodded to himself. The +face within was new to him, but that might well prove an advantage. It +was the florid face of a stout young man, passing the time with a +newspaper and a cigar, the first of which he threw aside to answer the +incomer's questions. + +No, he had seen nothing of any collie dog; but he was a stranger +himself, only come to lend a hand for the night. Black and tan collie, +but more black than tan? No; the only dogs he had seen all day were the +governor's tyke and a thoroughbred bitch belonging to the young +gentleman at the hall. + +"But have a drink," said the stout young man, reaching for a tankard. + +Carlton declined civilly, though not without betraying some +astonishment. + +"That's free beer to-night, old man," explained the other. + +"Indeed?" + +"I'm here to serve ut. Change your mind?" + +"No, thank you." + +"Then I will." + +And the young man drew a foaming pint, while a burst of revelry came +through the inner doors, but slightly deadened by its passage through +the open air. + +"May I ask what is going on?" inquired Carlton. + +"That's the biggest spread ever seen in Long Stow," said the stout +youth, drawing his sleeve along his lips and turning a shade more florid +than before. + +"Not the harvest-home already?" + +"No; that's a dinner given by the squire to every sowl in the +parish--men, women, an' kids--all but one." + +The questioner stood absorbed. + +"All but one," repeated the temporary barman with knowing emphasis. And +he winked as he leant across the bar. + +"Ah!" + +"Their reverend ain't here--not much!" + +"I don't suppose he is. And why is the squire doing this sort of thing +on this scale?" + +"Why, in honour of the victory, to be sure." + +"What victory?" + +"Why, the one we've just had in Egypt. Tel-el----but here that is, in +the _Bury Post_, and a fair jaw-breaker, too." + +It was the first newspaper which Robert Carlton had seen for several +weeks. His _Standard_ subscription had run out at mid-summer; he had +never renewed it. The world had renounced him utterly, and so must he +renounce the world. To live as he was living, and yet to have an ear for +the busy hum--he could not do it. For already he recognized the +startling truth: it was its very completeness which rendered his +isolation endurable. + +Yet his eyes glistened as he ran them down the stirring columns, and his +tanned face wore a coppery glow as he returned the paper across the bar. + +"Thanks very much," he said. "I am glad to have seen that." + +"Is it the first you've heard of it?" + +"Yes; I don't often see a paper." + +The young barman was eyeing him up and down, from the old tweed trousers +to the old cloth cap. + +"On the tramp, are you?" + +Carlton did not choose to reply. + +"Yet you seemed to know all about their reverend here!" + +"Who does not?" cried the man in tweeds, with involuntary bitterness. + +"Ah, you may well say that! And what do _you_ think of him?" + +"I think the same as everybody else." + +"That he's the biggest blackguard unhung?" + +"Indeed, one of them!" + +"That's what the young gentleman from the hall say, when he was in here +this afternoon. But the governor, Master Palmer--O Lord! how he do hate +him! 'Unhung?' he say. 'Why, hangun's too good for him.' An' so it is, +come to think of it: to go and do what _he_ done, an' to top all by +settun fire to his own church!" + +"Come," said Carlton, "that wasn't proved." + +"But everybody know it, bless you!" + +"Though the charge was dismissed in open court?" + +"Bah! 'Not guilty, but don't do that again!'" + +And the stout youth nodded sagely over his tankard's rim. + +"So that's the opinion of the neighbourhood, is it?" + +"That is, and that's not likely to change." + +Carlton was not astonished. He had foreseen this even from the +prisoner's dock, in that pause of the proceedings when he had felt +ashamed of his facility in self-defence, a haunting doubt of the +propriety of his defending himself at all. And yet the virile instinct +which had inspired him then was not yet dead in his breast; he could not +let all this pass; the conversation was none of his seeking, yet he must +say something more. + +"I have never stuck up for him," he began; "but give even him his due! +What possible object could a man have in burning down his own church?" + +"What I asked the governor," replied the barman. "'Dog in the manger,' +he say; 'didn't want the next man to reap where he've sowed. What's +more, that give him an excuse for stoppun in the place,' he say." + +Carlton was under no temptation to confute these arguments; his only +difficulty was to suppress a smile. + +"So his people don't think any the better of him for getting himself +off, eh?" + +"The better? That's made them right mad! The governor here, he say that +was the gift of the gab and nothun else; all parsons have their fair +share; but this here reverend, he do seem to be a holy terror, an' no +mistake. A gentleman like Sir Wilton Gleed haven't a chance agen him; so +they're all a-sayun, all but Sir Wilton himself. The young gent who was +in here this afternoon, he was a-sayun as how the squire wouldn't have +the reverend's name so much as spoken at the hall; and he's never been +heard to name it himself since the day of the trial, he's that mad. But +have you heard the latest?" + +Carlton had heard quite enough, and his hand was on the latch, nor did +he withdraw it as he turned his head. + +"Against the reverend?" inquired he. + +"That's it," said the young barman with renewed gusto. "And I nearly let +you go without tellun you!" + +"What has he been doing now?" + +Carlton was curious to hear. + +"That's not what he've been doün, but what keep comun o' what he've +done," his informant said ominously. "The latest is that some young chap +would go to the devil because the reverend had, so he 'listed, and he've +been in the very battle there's all this to-do about!" + +Of Mellis's enlistment Carlton had heard; the rest was news indeed; and +his hand tightened on the latch. + +"Has anything happened to him, then?" he faltered, sick at heart. + +"Not as we know on yet," said the stout youth, hopefully. "But the lists +ain't in, and, if this young chap's killed, everybody says it'll be +another death at the reverend's door." + +"So they want his blood!" exclaimed Carlton. "But what they say is +true." + +As he opened the door a burst of cheering came round from the barn. + +"That's for the squire," he left the barman saying. "He've been on his +legs these ten minutes." + +The outcast had shut the door behind him, and was groping his way in a +darkness no deeper than before, though perfectly opaque after the +strong light within. + +"And one cheer more!" screamed a voice from the barn. + +Carlton need scarcely have left his rectory to have heard the final +roar. Yet it was not the end. + +"And three groans . . ." + +This voice was hoarse; the name was lost in the night; but the outcast +well knew whose it was. And he stopped instinctively, standing firm upon +his feet while the groans were given--as though they lashed him like +wind and rain. Then he turned his face to the storm. He could not help +it. There was more clapping of the hands. Something further was to come; +he might as well hear what. + +The barn was a clash of violent lights and impenetrable shade. Its +outlines were inseparable from the sky; but its great doors had been +flung flush with their wall, which gaped twenty feet from jamb to jamb. +This space, illumined by slung lanterns and naked candle-light, and +streaked with tables, which ran the full length of the barn, stood out +like the lighted stage of a darkened theatre. Outside hovered the +unworthy element which the smallest community cannot escape, or the +largest charity embrace; these vagabonds were absolutely invisible to +those within; and were themselves too dazzled and disgusted to take note +of each addition to their number. + +Sir Wilton Gleed, on his legs once more, at the high table furthest from +the doors, was making that preliminary pause which is a little luxury of +the habitual orator and an embarrassing necessity to the novice. He was +supported by the schoolmaster on one side and by his own son on the +other. The former wore the shiny flush which was the badge of every +reveller visible from without; but that was not many while all heads +were turned towards the squire. + +Sir Wilton began by observing, with sparkling eyes, that he was very +sorry to hear that name: he himself would have preferred such an +occasion to pass over without a reminder of the fact that they had a +leper in their midst. It was many moments before the speaker was +suffered to proceed; then he repeated the successful epithet at the top +of his voice, and drove it home with a synonym; recovering his own +composure during a second outburst, and continuing with conspicuous +self-restraint. Now that the matter had come up, he would not let it +drop, even upon that inappropriate occasion, without one word from +himself; but, he promised them, it should be his last public utterance +on the subject, in that parish at all events, as it was most certainly +his first. And another deliberate pause ended in a sudden gesture and a +new tone. + +"What's the use of talking?" exclaimed the squire. "The law of England +is against us; there's no more to be said while the law remains what it +is. I'm not thinking of my brother magistrates' decision the other day; +it would ill become me to pass one single syllable of comment upon that. +No, gentlemen, I confine my criticism to that law which empowers a +clergyman, convicted of the vilest villainy, to retain his living in +the teeth of every protest, and to continue poisoning the clean air of +this parish by wilfully remaining in our midst." + +"Shame! Shame!" + +"Shame or no shame," cried Sir Wilton, "I intend to bring the matter +before Parliament itself"--a further outburst of vociferous +approval--"intend to lay this very case before the House of Commons at +the earliest possible opportunity. And I think that I can promise you +some amendment of the law before another year is out. Meanwhile"--and +Sir Wilton raised his hand to quell renewed enthusiasm--"meanwhile let +us respect the law while it lasts. In signifying our detestation of this +monstrous wrong, let us be careful not to drift into the wrong +ourselves. There must be no more broken windows, mind!" + +And it was now a single finger that Sir Wilton Gleed held up. + +"But," he continued, "what we can do--what we are justified in +doing--what it is our bounden duty to do--is henceforth to ignore this +man's very existence in our midst." + +"Don't call him a man!" + +"That's a devil out of hell!" + +"Man or devil," cried Sir Wilton, "let us absolutely ignore his +existence among us. Don't go near him; don't even turn to look at him as +you pass. There he is--pretending to rebuild the church--posing as a +martyr--really laughing in his sleeve and crowing over all right-minded +men. We shall see who laughs last! Meanwhile, take no notice of him, one +way or the other; forbid your children the churchyard, if not that end +of the village altogether; nothing that can feed the morbid appetite for +notoriety which makes me sometimes think the man's a lunatic after all. +But if he dares to show his nose among you, that's another thing; hunt +him out of it as you would hunt a mad dog! He won't show himself twice. +But for the present my advice to you is to leave the cur in his kennel, +and the lazar in the lazar-house!" + +The unseen listener left amid the musketry of prolonged clapping, +mingled with a banging of tables, and a dancing of glass and silver, +that followed him into the outer darkness as a sound of cymbals and big +drums. He was not sorry to have heard what he had heard: in his position +it was a distinct advantage to know the worst that was being said. +Certainly he would not go into the village again without necessity--as +certainly as he would do so the moment such necessity arose. It was as +well, however, to go prepared. The present experience might rank as a +narrow escape; but Robert Carlton would not have been without it if he +could. + +He began to think better of his opponent. So he was going to Parliament +as the final court! That was legitimate; that he could admire. There is +infinite stimulus in the man who does not know when he is beaten--to an +adversary resembling him in that respect. And this seemed to be the one +characteristic common to Mr. Carlton and Sir Wilton Gleed. + +Yet the outcast felt a little hardened. And his critical faculty, always +keen, though only of himself unsparing, went insensibly to work upon the +new material, even as he strode on through the deserted village, not to +give up his dog just yet. + +"I believe he had that speech by heart, for all its opening. It came too +pat." + +That was Carlton's first conclusion. The next made him stop dead. + +"I'll be shot if the whole function wasn't a peg to hang that speech +on!" + +And on he went with a short laugh of scornful conviction; there was no +doubt whatever in his mind; but the speech was not worth a second +thought. There was Glen to find, and there was George Mellis to think +about, since think he must. Poor lad! Yes, that was his fault again; the +people were right; he would be blood-guilty if the boy fell. One thing, +however, was quite certain: if the worst news came it could be trusted +to come to him; meanwhile he could pray for his friend, as his heart was +praying now, a clean sky above him, and the untrammelled air of an open +country all around. + +The village had been left behind; the Lakenhall road followed for half a +mile, then left at a tangent in its turn; and this open country, upon +which Carlton of all men had the audacity to trespass, was the vast +rabbit-warren of Sir Wilton Gleed. The dog might be caught in one of the +traps; that was at once its master's fear and hope; for a broken leg +would mend, and his one friend think twice before deserting him again. +Carlton could even enjoy the prospect of the cripple's complete +dependence upon himself: it would be something to be indispensable to +living creature now. But meanwhile he could neither see nor hear +anything of his dog, though he walked, and stopped, and whistled till he +was tired, and then called, "Glen! Glen! Glen!" No sound came back to +him in reply; not even the echo of his own voice; and at midnight he +gave up the search. + +At midnight also the Long Stow festivities culminated in the National +Anthem, its secular companion, and much hoarse roystering on the way +home; all this as Carlton approached the village; and for once he was +deterred. To march into the middle of a tipsy crowd, freshly inflamed +against himself, was to provoke a brawl at best. He would go round +instead by the river that flowed parallel with the village street. So he +crossed at the lock near the mill at this end of Long Stow, and +recrossed by the white wood bridge on the Linkworth road at the other +end. But this was an hour later; for three-quarters had been wasted +opposite the Flint House, with its river frontage of trim mead and wild +garden, and a very faint light in one back room. + +By this time all was so still that the returning rector became the +earlier aware of an erratic lantern and tell-tale voices in the road +ahead; and he was walking slowly to let these people pass the rectory +gate, when in the light went lurching before his eyes. He hurried +softly. The intruders were half-way up the drive, whispering thickly, +but leaving a continuous sound in their wake, from something or other +that they had in tow. Carlton followed on the grass, a horrible +suspicion already in his heart; but he recognised their voices first. + +"Where shall we plant ut? Which is his winder?" + +"That there near the end. O Lord, what a lark!" + +"Yes--to think he come talkun to me while you was all in the barn. The +cheek! But here's his answer for him." + +The first and last speaker was the stout young barman from the Plough +and Harrow; the other was Jim Cubitt, an unworthy character who had been +turned out of the choir some months before. And Robert Carlton's +"answer" was his missing dog, lying dead in the lantern's light, with +particles of gravel glistening in his lacklustre coat. + +At this, the climax of his long night's search, with its ironic +interludes--all as honey matched with this--a very madness seized on +Carlton, so that he sprang out of the dark into the lighted area where +these two young ruffians stood, and fell upon them like a fiend. Not a +word was said; there was no time even for a cry. But Cubitt came first, +and had the muddled senses shaken out of him and new ones kicked in +before his comrade could so much as attempt a rescue. This, however, the +young barman did so gamely that the ex-chorister was flung in a heap and +his champion sent tripping over him with a boxing crack upon the jaw. +And Carlton towered breathless, his fists still doubled, waiting for the +fallen youths to rise and fall again. + +The one from the public-house merely sat upright, ruefully and sullenly +enough, but with a sound discretion which the Long Stow lout had the wit +to imitate. + +"_We_ never 'urt your dorg," the former vowed. "He was dead before I see +him, and I don't know now who done ut. I never knew anything about that +till after you was in to-night, when I heared who it must ha' been." + +"I don't care!" cried Carlton, in a fury still. "You helped to drag it +here--my poor dog! You would spite me like that, you whom I never saw +before to-night! You're worse than Jim Cubitt; he at least had an old +grievance against me; and you're both of you worse than the man who did +this foul thing, whoever he may be, and I don't want to know. Out of my +sight, both of you, and spread this as far as you please: what you got +from me, and what you did to get it. You'll find yourselves the martyrs +of the countryside!" + +"I'm sorry," said the young barman, getting up. "I'm sorry, and I can't +say no fairer, 'cept that I must ha' been an' got right tight. But I +ain't tight now. I'm not a Long Stow chap, sir, and I shall tell them, +where I come from, that you're a man, whatever else you are. But as to +spreadun, I don't think I shall do much o' that; what do you say, mate?" + +"I never killed his dog," said the former choirman. + +Nor did Carlton ever actually know, or seek finally to ascertain, the +author of a deed even more detestable than it had appeared at first +sight. For when the study lamp had been brought out into the still +night, the first thing it revealed was that the poor beast had been +neither shot nor poisoned; its brains had been beaten out. And Carlton +felt as though his own heart had been beaten out with them, as he +fetched a spade from the shed, and dug a grave by lamplight a few yards +from his study door. + + + + +XIX + +THE FIRST WINTER + + +The last leaf had filtered from the elms; the horse chestnuts had long +been bare. And now there was no more cover for the blackened stump of +Long Stow church, in its ring of rotting leaves, and its meshes of trunk +and twig, than for the guilty genius of this mournful spot. All the +world could see him now, and gauge the crass pretence of his +preposterous task; there was no deceiving such a wise little world; but +it had been requested not to look, and was accordingly content with +passing glimpses of a drama in which its interest was indeed upon the +wane. There were some things, however, which even a docile and +phlegmatic community could not help noticing as winter set in. It might +not be honest work, but it was making a thin man thinner. And he was +always at it. Yet it no longer seemed to give him any pleasure. Indeed, +his face was changed. Its dominant expression was grim and dogged. There +were no more lights and shadows. It was the face of a workman who has +lost interest in his work. Nevertheless, the work went on. + +It went on in all weathers. At first Carlton had tried devoting the wet +days to indoor work. He had cleaned his house from top to bottom, +emptied most of the rooms, stored furniture in the others, and covered +with sheets like a careful housewife. Not that he cared greatly for his +things; but his hermitage should not grow foul. The two rooms which he +retained in use were the kitchen and his study (in which Carlton slept), +with the flagged scullery for his bath. The rest of the house he shut +up, after robbing his picture-frames to patch the broken windows, which +he treated so ingeniously that they looked quite wonderful from the +road; but on windy nights the constant rattle and the occasional crash +were one long outcry for putty and a glazier. There was no more to be +done indoors. And still it rained. So one day he marched through the +village (unmolested after all), and it was duly ascertained that he had +taken a return ticket to Felixstowe, of all places, apparently for +change of air. But through the very next day's rain he could be seen +(and heard) very busy at his walls: in a suit of oilskins and a +sou'wester. Thus the work went on once more. + +By Christmas every stone that was to stand had been scraped and pointed; +a few sound ones had been scraped and relaid; here and there an entirely +new stone had been cut to fit the place of one charred out of shape; but +in the lower courses such instances were rare, too rare to suit his own +creative taste, but Carlton was determined to deal with the lowest +courses first, and to raise all the walls to his own height before +finishing one. In the case of those which were to contain windows, it +might be well to pause at the sill; the windows alone might take him a +couple of years. Meanwhile these were the walls which had suffered +most, and first let him reach the sills: if he did that within the next +six months Carlton thought he would be lucky. For his progress was as +that of the insect which builds the reef; it was often imperceptible +even to himself; yet always the work was going on. + +The man was all muscle now; spare at his best, he had scarcely an ounce +of mere flesh left. Yet, for his work's sake, he made wonderfully +regular meals, often with a relish; and twice in the autumn killed a +sheep, having cold mutton for many days in the colder weather. But the +preliminary tragedy and the ultimate waste were equally disgusting, and +his normal needs seemed better met by predatory visits to the hen-yard. +Practice made him a fair baker and a moderate cook; but, as he had never +been particular about his food, and his only object was to maintain +bodily strength, he sometimes defeated his end, and added the dejection +of dyspepsia to all other ills. Otherwise the physical life suited +Carlton; he was out all day long; and the worst discomforts rarely +followed him into the open air. At his work, for instance, he was always +warm; indoors, only when he went to bed. He never had a fire, except to +cook by; thus he still had a few coals left, but he doubted whether +anybody would sell him any more. There was, however, all the half-burnt +woodwork of the church; most of this would burn again; and, with +economy, might keep him in firing throughout the term of his suspension. +Meanwhile, lamp, rug, and overcoat gave all the heat that Carlton would +allow himself in the study. Once, when his stock of paraffin had run +out, he had to tramp for fresh supplies into a town where his face was +unknown; and that experience made him more than ever economical of such +fuel as he had. + +Unparalleled position for an endowed clergyman of the Church of England, +the incumbent of an enviable living, an Oxford man, a man of family, a +zealous High Churchman, an enlightened and alluring preacher, towards +the latter end of the nineteenth century! Scandalous priest though he +had also proved himself, his case was as pitiable as unique; a pariah in +his own parish; the outcast of his own people; an inland Crusoe, driven +to the traditional expedients of the castaway, and living the very life +of such within sight and hail of a silent and unseeing world. It was a +position which few men would have faced for an instant. This man +maintained it throughout the winter. And throughout the winter his work +went on. And the spring found him technically sane. + +But his brain bore it better than his heart. Some vital part of him was +certain to suffer. His brain escaped altogether, his body for a time; +but his heart was hard within him; all his prayers could not soften it; +and presently he lost the power even to pray. + +This was the meaning of the changed face seen from the road, in the days +and weeks succeeding the Long Stow celebration of the battle of +Tel-el-Kebir. Thereafter it was the face of one in the coils of +malignant despair. But the more gradual and substantial change, in such +a man, was terrible beyond deduction from its mere outward shadow. + +Here was no sudden and sweeping infidelity; no plucking of loose roots +from a shallow soil. Shallow this man was not, nor easily shaken in the +least of his convictions. His general tenets stood intact. He still +believed in the efficacy, under God, of earnest and worthy prayer. But +he could no longer believe in the efficacy of his own prayers. They were +not worthy: that was the whole truth. They were earnest enough, but +utterly unworthy, and it was better not to pray at all. + +His most passionate prayers had been for his own forgiveness, for the +restoration of his own peace of mind, for the blessing of God upon his +own little labours; selfish prayers, one and all; and he saw the +selfishness at last. It shocked him. He tried to stamp it out, this new +and obtrusive egoism; but he failed. Denied all contact with his +fellow-creatures, with only his own wishes to consult, his own work to +do, his own heart to probe, his own life to discipline, the man was an +egoist before he knew it; and it was only through his prayers that he +ever discovered it at all. They were not only unanswered; they no longer +brought their own momentary comfort, as heretofore. Of old it had been +much more than momentary; now it was no comfort at all. There must be +some reason for this; he asked himself what reason; and the answer was +this revelation of the true character of his prayers. They were poisoned +at the fount. He tried to purify them, but all in vain. Self would creep +in. So then he prayed only for a renewal of the faculty of pure and +unselfish prayer. And this was the most passionate of all his prayers. +But it also was unanswered. So he prayed no more. + +He was unforgiven: so Carlton explained it to himself. And a little +brooding convinced him of his idea. If God had forgiven him, He would +have shown some sign of His clemency through men. But what had men done? +They had broken his windows; they had burnt his church; they had closed +up every avenue to such poor atonement as was in his power; they had +forced him into a position which he had never sought, though for a +little it had consoled him; then tried, by false accusation, to force +him out of it; and now they had cut him off from themselves, had set him +apart as a thing eternally unclean, had even stooped to destroy the one +dumb being that clung to him in his exile! + +The murder of the dog was no little thing in itself; coming at the foot +of such a list, at the bitter end of a night of bitterness, it was the +last drop that petrified a truly humble and a strenuously contrite +heart. + +But it did not petrify his hand; and the work of that hand went on +without ceasing, save on that day which was now the Day of Rest +indeed--and nothing more. The other six, his energies were redoubled. If +he was now more than ever a traitor to his Master, well, there was still +this one thing that he could do for the Master's sake. And he did it +with all his might. + +No day was too wet for him; no day was too cold. His fingers might turn +blue, his moustache might freeze; it is beside the point that the winter +chanced to be too mild for the latter contingency. While five fingers +could control the chisel, and the other hand strike true, no weather +could have deterred him. And no weather did. + +So the New Year came, and the work went on through January and February +without a break. But the month of March, as it often will, made late +amends for the insipidity of its predecessors. A spell of colourless +humidity was broken by bright skies and a keen wind; the latter grew +bitter with the day; the former darkened before it was time. And when +Robert Carlton opened his study doors next morning, to air the room +while he took his bath, a little snowdrift came tumbling in through the +outer one. + +Carlton looked forth upon a white world in dazzling contrast to the +clear dark grey of a starless sky; at first there was no third tint. But +every moment seemed lighter than the last, and presently the trees +showed brittle and black as ever against the sky; for the drifted snow +lay everywhere but on their waving branches; and the wind blew hard and +bitter as before. + +Carlton bathed grimly in broken ice; he was not going to be baffled by a +little snow. He was very gradually rebuilding the east end, using the +old stones where he could, but cutting more new ones than he had +bargained for. He could not help it. This wall was going up. It was too +near the lane. It should hide the builder's head before he left it for +another wall. It was up to his thighs already. + +So all that day he laboured with his feet in the snow, and only his legs +entrenched against the cutting wind. The stones were ready; he now +prepared them by the course. They had only to be carried from the shed +with mortar mixed expressly overnight; but to avoid dropping them in the +slush and snow, each stone was laid out of hand; and a considerable +muscular exertion thus followed by a prolonged niggling with trowel and +plummet and transverse string, and this in the fangs of the wind, as +often as twice or thrice an hour. It was the hardest day yet. But it was +also the most successful. The entire course was laid by half-past three +in the afternoon. + +In earlier days Carlton would undoubtedly have given way to that +spontaneous elation for which he had been wont to pay so dearly; now a +tired man crept back to his bed, without a thought beyond the next +hour's rest (he had seldom been so tired), and the meal that he must +then prepare as mere munition of war. Yet on his study threshold he +paused and turned, as doomed men may at the door of the dreadful shed. + +There was little in the scene itself to stamp it on the mind. Already +the snow was beginning to disappear; but the sky was still hard and +clean; and the east wind cut to the bone. The ridge of firs, cresting +the ploughed uplands beyond the lane, notched the bleak sky with dark +cockades on russet stems; white clouds floated above, a white moon hung +higher. A robin hopped in the snow at Carlton's feet; he was a good +friend to the birds, and had not forgotten them that morning. Somewhere +a blackbird sung him indoors; somewhere a starling smacked its beak. And +this was all; but Robert Carlton carried the impression to his grave. + +Instead of sleeping for an hour, he slept far into the night; and spent +the rest of it in misery between bouts of shivering and of intolerable +heat. His throat was on fire, to quench it he coughed, and already his +cough hurt queerly. In the morning the man was ill enough to know that +he was going to be worse. He took characteristic measures while he +could. + +It was a fine instinct which had inspired him to economise his coal; now +was the time when that little hoard might save his life. But he had only +one scuttle, and for the moment felt baffled; then he dried his bath, +and put the coals in that, thus eventually getting them to the study in +one load. These exertions hurt Carlton like his cough. In both cases it +was as though his body had been transfixed. His head swam with the pain. +Yet next moment he was reeling back for wood; and not less than ten +infernal minutes did he spend on such errands, a furious fever alone +sustaining him. It was constructive suicide, yet not to have these +things was certain death. Now it was all the alcohol in the house, in a +bottle that had lasted nearly a year; now a basin of eggs, of which he +had always a fair store indoors; now pail upon pail of water for his +kettle. Carlton had been a great visitor of the sick, and seen many a +death from the disease he was preparing to resist. He had therefore a +rough idea of what to do for himself; he was only doubtful as to how +long he might be able to do anything at all. The lightest breath had now +become a pang. Already he was alarmingly ill, and must inevitably grow +much worse. But he did not intend to die. He trusted the constitution of +a lean and hardy race, and he trusted his own nerve. + +At last the fire was alight, a full kettle mounted, and the spout +trained upon the pillow, the bed itself being drawn up close to the +fire. Under the bed was the bath full of coals, and within as easy reach +the eggs, the whisky, a breakfast-cup, and the pails of water. But even +now the sick man was not in his bed; he was lying in a heap upon the +floor, where he had fallen the moment he could afford to faint. + +On recovering he shook off half his clothes, crawled between the +blankets, and beat up an egg with whisky. This was all he took that day. +And there he lay, breathing needles and coughing daggers until he slept. + +"I'm not going to die. They shan't get rid of me like that. I don't die +like a rat in his hole!" + +That seemed to be the burden of his thoughts for many days; in reality +the time was forty-eight hours. And whenever the determination rose +afresh in his heart, and the dry lips moved with its expression, the +whole man would rouse himself to an effort beside which the building of +the church was pastime. He would sit up and put on more coals with a +hand black from the constant operation. Then he would lean as close as +possible to the singing kettle, and inhale the steam until the gaunt arm +supporting his weight could do so no more. Even then he would make a +still longer arm before lying down, and replenish the kettle from one of +the pails, using the breakfast-cup for a dipper. So the kettle would +cease singing for a time, and, each occasion entirely exhausting the +spent man, the chances were that he would fall into a sleep that was +half a swoon. But he never slept very long. He would dream that the fire +was black, and start up to mend it--often before the kettle had +recovered its voice. So far from the fire going out, for sixty hours it +never went down. Carlton would mend it almost in his sleep. Even on the +third day, when a kind delirium destroyed sensation for some hours, he +never forgot his fire; the lean black hand would still feel its way to +the bath beneath the bed, and there grope weakly for the smaller coals. +All lucid thought and all delirious whispers were gradually monopolised +by the fire. It became the sick man's life. He would not let it out +while he lived. And live he would. When the fire died out, then so would +he. But he was not going to die this time. + +"Their latest dodge to get rid of me, is it? Trust to Général +Février--no, March! Never mind; he shan't lay his bony finger on me +. . . You'll burn 'em if you try! . . . I tell you the law's on my +side." + +Delirium grew from the exception into the rule. The kettle sang no +longer; the bottom was out and the whole thing red-hot; for the fire had +never been so good. The fender was inches deep in ashes. With or without +his reason Carlton knew enough to thrust the poker through and through +the lower glow. It was a clear fire all the time. + +And the heat of it at such a range! It singed the sheets; it flayed the +face; but it also helped incalculably to keep this stricken body and +this strenuous soul together. + +The crisis came before its time. Carlton grew too weak to hold the poker +or to lift a coal, but cruelly clear in his mind. Thus far he had never +prayed. He had abandoned prayer with all deliberation and in all his +vigour. It needed more than the fear of death to make him pray again, +least of all for mere life. Now that the fire was going out, and +recovery no longer possible, the case was changed; and this erring +servant broke his long silence with God, to pray both for forgiveness +and for a speedy issue out of his afflictions. And in the same hour came +the seeming answer, as if to assure him that even his prayers had still +some value in the eyes of the Most High. For delirium had dwindled into +coma, with these few lucid minutes between, and the fever and the pain +had passed away. + +Yet it was in this world that Robert Carlton awoke yet again, to find +his precious fire alight after all, and a dilapidated figure nodding +over it to the song of a fresh kettle. It was old Busby, the sexton. The +sick man could not speak; his little finger seemed to weigh a stone; it +was some minutes before he achieved movement enough to attract the +sexton's attention. But all this time the live coals had been warming +his soul. And already he lay convinced that he also was going to live. + +The sexton turned his face at last. It was a startling face for sick +eyes at such a range. The toothless mouth, which never closed, had often +reminded Mr. Carlton of one of his own gargoyles. It did so now. And a +continual trickle of saliva added a disgusting realism to the image, +which was, however, immediately dispelled by a human grin of profound +slyness. + +"And have you been bad?" inquired the sexton. + +"Beat--up--an egg. I--can't--speak." + +Evidently he could not, for Busby was bending a horrid ear. + +"Eh? eh?" + +Carlton made a fresh effort with shut eyes. + +"No food . . . faint for want . . . there no eggs?" + +"Eggs? Why, yes, here's one." + +"Beat up for me . . . too bad to speak." + +The sexton looked more sententious than ever. + +"Ah, I thought as how you'd been bad," said he, with all the nods of the +successful seer. "I thought as how you'd been bad!" + +"It's only been a cold," whispered Carlton, in sudden terror of the +public pity. + +"Only a cold?" + +"Oh, yes--that's all." + +"Then you've not been as bad as me!" cried Busby, triumphantly. "Do you +mind what I had inside me last year? That's there still! I can hear +that----" + +"Will you do what I ask?" + +It was a peremptory whisper now. + +"I would, sir, but I don't fare to know the road." + +"Then give me the egg, for heaven's sake, and you hold the cup." + +Carlton managed to rise a few inches in his impatience; but his fingers +had less power than those of the babe new-born, and the egg slipped +through them. With fortuitous dexterity, the sexton caught it in the +cup; there was a crack; and accident had accomplished the design. + +"Look what you've gone and done," said Busby, reproachfully, displaying +the yolk in the cup. Thereupon he received instructions which even he +could follow; and at length the mess was down, stinging with the +sexton's notion of a teaspoonful of whisky. This second accident was +even happier than the first; there was instant agitation in every vein. +And now Busby could hear without stooping. + +"When did you find me?" + +"That fare to be an hour ago, I suppose. Ah, but I thought as how you +looked bad! Soon as ever I see you, I say to myself, 'The reverend's +found what beat him at last,' I say; 'he do look wunnerful bad,' I say. +And you see, I was right." + +There was the tiniest gleam in the great bright eyes. + +"You were partly right," said Carlton, "and partly wrong. I'm not done +with yet, Busby. So then you lit the fire for me?" + +"That wasn't wholly out." + +"Ah!" + +"That soon burnt up. Then I went and got another kettle." + +The great eyes flashed suspicion. + +"And told everybody you saw, I suppose!" + +"I should be very sorry," said the sexton, significantly. "No, I come +an' went by the lane, an' took wunnerful care that nobody set eyes on I. +I thought as how you might fare to like a cup o' tea, an' that was a +rare mess you'd made o' _your_ kettle." + +"You've done well," whispered Carlton. "You've saved my--saved my cold +from getting worse. You shall never regret it, Busby; only don't you +tell anybody I've had one--do you hear? Don't you tell a single soul +that you found me in bed!" + +"No fear," chuckled the sexton. "I should be very sorry to tell anybody +I'd found you at all. They might hear o' that somewhere else!" + +Carlton lay still with thought and purpose; and death itself could not +have given the lower part of his face a harsher cast; but the hot eyes +were fixed upon the fading diamonds of the window over the table. At +last he spoke--and it was a pity there was but the sexton to hear the +firm tones of so faint a voice. + +"Find my keys, Busby. I'm going to give you a sovereign----" + +"A what?" + +"The first of several if you do what I want!" + +Not much later the sexton was hobbling towards Lakenhall, for the first +time in many years; and the sick man lay greatly doubting whether he +should ever see him again. His weakness was terrible now. The excitement +of conversation had provoked a relapse as grave as it was inevitable in +one so weak. The flickering lamp was only fed by the stimulus of +suspense, the glow of the fire, and the man's own indomitable will. The +latter, however, never failed him for a moment. + +"I _will_ pull through," he would mutter at his worst. "I will--I will +. . . Oh, is he never, never . . ." + +He came at last--with corn-flour, meat-extract, a bottle of port, and +such other requisites as had entered the sick man's head under the spur +of his overdose of ardent spirits. And, simple and inadequate as they +were, these things spelt the first syllable of recovery. + +The sexton came night after night; he also was a lonely man; and he +dearly loved a pound. In a week he was richer than he had ever been +before. It became difficult for him to take a disinterested view of the +determined progress which the patient made towards complete recovery and +consequent independence. The situation, however, had its little +compensations: at all events it enabled the imaginary sufferer to crow +over the real one to his heart's content. + +"Ah, sir, you don't fare to know what that is to be right ill, like I. +_You_ never had a fine fat frog settun in your middle an' keepun all the +good out o' your stummick. That get every bite I eat, an' then that cry +for more. Croap, croap, croap!" + +One day brought forth an unsuspected fact. The sexton was no longer +sexton at all. There had been no more burials. The school-bell was rung +on Sundays, as all the week, by the schoolmaster's son. Busby had been +dismissed with a present, as long ago as the month of August; but that +was not all. He had thereupon left the Church in justifiable dudgeon, +and thrown in his spiritual lot with the Particular Baptists in the +little flint chapel between the Linkworth turning and the Flint House. +He now exhorted Mr. Carlton to do the same. + +"If you do, sir," said Busby, "you'll never fall no more." + +Carlton winced. But the man had saved his life. Nothing should annoy him +from the kind old imbecile who had come to his succour while the sound +world stood aloof. + +"You don't know that," he said quietly. + +"But I do," declared the other. "I'm like to know. God's children can't +sin, and I'm one on 'em." + +Carlton opened his eyes. + +"Do you mean to tell me you never sin?" + +"I mean to tell you, sir," said the solemn sexton, "that, since God laid +his hand on me, now seven month ago, I've never once committed the +shadder of a sin." + +"Then, if I were you, I should remember what St. Paul says--'Let him +that thinketh he standeth take heed--lest--he--fall.'" + +The text faltered; it was terribly two-edged; but Carlton had not +perceived the pitfall until he was over the brink. He had forgotten +himself in his scorn, and spoken impulsively as the man that he had been +the year before. But the inveterate egotist was conveniently full of +himself, and his pat retort quite free from offence. + +"Fall?" said he, with his foolish eyes wide open. "Why, I couldn't do +that if I tried; and I have tried, just to see; but I fare to have +forgotten how to sin. Do you believe me, sir, I can't even raise a swear +at this little varmin what's killun me inch by inch. Why, I'm grateful +to it! But I do sometimes fare to cry to think I have to stay another +day in this world o' sin, when I know there's a place prepared for me in +heaven above." + +This stupendous speech was too much for even Mr. Carlton's self-control. +Its snivelling tone, its evident conviction (confirmed by a gargoyle's +grin of infinite self-esteem), were aggravated by the complete surprise +of this spiritual revelation; and between them they awoke a dormant +nerve. Robert Carlton did not exhibit that annoyance which he had +determined to conceal; he did much worse. He burst out laughing in the +sexton's face. And his laughter was long, loud, high-pitched and +hysterical, alike from weakness and from long disuse. + +The sexton on his legs, in a perfect palsy of horror and offence, alone +put a stop to it. + +"I beg your pardon," gasped Carlton, his eyes full of tears; "oh, I +beg----" + +And again that hysterical, high-pitched laughter got the better of him, +ringing weirdly enough through the empty house. + +"Ah!" said the dotard, when it had stopped at last; and the monosyllable +contented him for some moments. "Well," he at length continued, with a +brisker manner and a brighter face; "well, thank God I pulled you +through; thank God I didn't let you die in your sins and go to +everlasting hell without another chance of immortal life. You wicked +man! You wicked man! I'll go and I'll pray for you; but I'll never come +near you no more." + +So the solitary regained his solitude; when he spoke again, it was to +himself. + +"Well, he has his money," he reflected aloud: he had paid the sexton +some seven pounds in all. "And my gratitude!" he cried later. "I must +never forget that I owe my life to that egregious old man." + +Yet the greater gratitude was beginning to stir within him, as the sap +was even then stirring in the trees. It was a mild, bright day, one of +the last in March. The invalid had not yet been out; he would go out +now. In an instant he was wrapping up. + +Oh, but it was wonderful! the feel and noise of the moist gravel under +the soles of his boots; the green, damp grass; the watery sun; the +beloved birds; the mild, beneficent air. + +His steps took the old direction of their own accord. In a minute he was +there, at the church, and seated on the very wall which he had been +building a fortnight before, surveying his work. + +Had some one been carrying it on in his absence? Or was it only that one +noticed no difference from day to day, but all the difference in the +world after an unaccustomed absence? Yes, this was it; and he drew the +deep breath which his first idea had checked. + +Still it was wonderful: one wall seemed so much higher, another so much +cleaner than before; and yet there was no stone either laid or scraped +which Carlton did not recognize at a glance, with sudden memories of +special travail; and the string was still where he had stretched it to +keep the line. He had under-estimated his progress at the time; that was +all; but again it was as though the sap was rising in his heart. + +The very tangle of blackened timber, which still cumbered nine-tenths of +the inner area, no longer struck Carlton as the unconquerable chaos it +had appeared on that bitter day which seemed so many days ago; yet, when +he laid white hands upon such a beam as he had easily shouldered then, +he could not lift it an inch. Ah, that day! It would take him weeks to +undo its evil work. The wet feet and the cutting wind, he could feel +them both again, with the sweat freezing on his body, and every pore an +open door to death. There was the ridge of red-stemmed firs, too far +east to blunt the cold steel of that deadly wind; and here beneath him +the barrier he had been building last, and must finish now before he did +another thing. How firm and true was this top course, that he had laid +that day with the bony fingers at his throat! Well, he would have died +with a good day's work behind him . . . It must have been a very near +thing . . . he wondered how near when the sexton came, and why the +sexton had come at all. The man had never given a good reason. He had +only just fared to think there might be something wrong. + +On the way indoors, the invalid stopped at a tree. It was one of the +horse-chestnuts; and already every delicate extremity was swollen and +sticky to the touch; and the birds sang of summer in the branches. +Carlton passed on with the short, quick steps of a feeble person in a +hurry. Rivers were running in his heart; he wanted to be where he could +kneel. + + + + +XX + +THE WAY OF PEACE + + +Three years later the man was still alone, and the church still growing +under his unaided but untiring hand. Indeed, from one end, it looked +almost ready for the roof, the west gable rising salient through the +trees, with the original window intact underneath. But this window was +the exception, the sole survivor from the fire, and for the past year +the rest had been one long impediment. Even now, only the three single +lights, in either transept and to the right of the porch respectively, +had been wrought to a finish from sill to arch; a mullioned window was +just begun; the remainder all yawned to the sky in ragged gaps of +varying width. But the village looked daily on the one good end, flanked +by the west walls of either transept, which happened not to have a +window between them, and were consequently finished. And the village was +softening a little towards its outcast, though no man said so above his +breath; nor was a living soul known to have been near him all these +years, unless it was the new sexton to dig a grave, or a Lakenhall +curate to make an entry in the parish register. + +There had, however, been one or two others; the first knocking at the +study door on the evening of the first funeral, some months after +Carlton's illness. + +Carlton was reading at the time. His heart stopped at the sound. It was +repeated before he could bring himself to open the door. + +"Tom Ivey!" + +"That's me, sir; may I come in?" + +"Surely, Tom." + +The hulking mason entered awkwardly, and refused a chair. His large +frame bulked abnormally in a ready-made suit of stiff black cloth. He +seemed to take up half the room, as he stood and glowered, a full-length +figure of surly embarrassment and dark resolve. + +"There was a funeral to-day," he began at last. + +"I know." + +"That was my poor mother, Mr. Carlton." + +"Yes, I heard. Tom, I'm so sorry for you!" + +Their hands flew together, and were one till Carlton winced. + +"There's nothun to be sorry for," said Tom, with husky philosophy. "Her +troubles are over, poor thing. So's one o' mine! You can start me +to-morrow." + +"Start you, Tom?" + +"Yes, sir, I mean to work for you now. I'd like to see the man who'll +stop me! You've shown 'em all the man you are; now that's _my_ turn." + +And the broad face beamed and darkened with alternate enthusiasm and +defiance. Carlton beheld it with parted lips and startled eye; and so +they stood through a long silence, till Carlton sat down with a smile. +It was a singularly gentle smile, as he leant back in his worn old +chair, and the lamplight fell upon his face. + +"After all these months," he murmured; "after all these months!" + +"I fare to hide my face when I count 'em up," admitted Ivey, bitterly. +"But what was the good of comun when I couldn't come for good? And how +could I in poor mother's time? It'd have meant--there's no sayun what +that wouldn't have meant." + +"You mean as regards Sir Wilton?" + +"I do, Mr. Carlton." + +"He will have been a good friend to you?" + +"Oh, yes." + +"Did those repairs, did he?" + +"Yes," sighed Ivey, "he was better than his word about them; you would +hardly know the place now. It made a lot of difference to mother. And I +had the job." + +"Oh!" + +"He's kept me busy, I must say. I've never wanted work." + +"Until now, I suppose?" + +"To tell you the truth, sir, I'm at work for him still." + +"For Sir Wilton Gleed?" + +"Yes--odd jobs about the estate." + +"Then my good fellow, what do you mean by offering yourself to me?" + +"Mean?" exclaimed Ivey, his black determination leaping into flame. "I +mean as I've made up my mind to give him the go-by for you. I'd have +done that long ago if it hadn't been for mother; but better late than +never. You've shown 'em the man you are, and now that's my turn. Look at +what you've done with your own two hands--there'll be other two from +to-morrow! You shan't work yourself right to death before my eyes. Why, +your hair's white with it already!" + +Carlton wheeled further from the lamp. + +"Not white," he murmured. + +"But that is, sir. When did you look in a glass?" + +"I don't know." + +"Then do you look to-morrow. That's white as snow. And your beard's +grey." + +"It's certainly too long," said Carlton, covering half with his hand. + +"And your hand--your hand!" + +It was scarred and horny as the mason's own. Carlton removed it from the +light, but said nothing. + +"That's done its last day's work alone," cried Tom. "I start with you +to-morrow, whether you want me or not. I'll show 'em! I'll show 'em!" + +And he stood nodding savagely to himself. + +"My dear fellow, you can't behave like that." + +The words fell softly after a long silence. + +"Why can't I?" + +Carlton gave innumerable reasons. + +"It would put us both in the wrong," was the last. "Go on working for +Sir Wilton--at any rate for another year. You owe it to him, Tom. And +don't you fret about me; I am a happier man than I ever deserved to be +again. Last winter it was different; but God has shown me infinite mercy +and compassion. And now He has sent you to me, as a sign that even man +may forgive me in the end! That is enough for me, Tom. You cannot do +more for me than you have done to-night. But your duty you must do, by +God's help, as long as it is as clear as it is now. Don't bother your +head about me! I am getting into the knack. Perhaps by the time I come +to the roof--if I ever do--the want of a church may induce others to +help me finish mine. Then, if you like, you shall come back; but I won't +have you made an outcast on my account; one is enough." + +There were no more visits from Tom Ivey. This one came to the ears of +Sir Wilton; and that diplomatist instead of playing into the enemy's +hands by discharging his man, capped all his kindness to the mason by +getting him the offer of an irresistible berth in that London district +for which he himself sat. Thus Sir Wilton removed a wavering ally, and +at the same time renewed the lease of his allegiance. + +Carlton heard of it some months later, when there was another funeral, +and the Lakenhall curate came in again to make the entry. This curate +was a gentleman. He had a good heart and better tact. He not only +conversed with Carlton as with the perfectly normal clergyman, in +perfectly normal circumstances, but he would prolong these conversations +as far as he deemed possible without exciting a suspicion of the +profound pity which inspired him. He would bring bits of local gossip, +or the latest national event; once he let fall that Sidney Gleed was up +at Cambridge, and said to stand a chance of "coxing the eight," while +Lydia was now a Mrs. Goldstein, the mistress of a splendid mansion in +Holland Park, and another up the Thames. It was from the same source +that Carlton obtained belated news of George Mellis, who had come +through two campaigns without a scratch, yet never been back to play the +hero on his native heath. In a word this curate, who was a very young +and rather commonplace fellow, came soon to stand for the outside world, +the world of newspapers and talk, to Robert Carlton, who liked him none +the less because his older eye saw through the artless arts with which +the lad sought to mask his charity. + +The visitations of this curate, who also conducted the one weekly +service in the village school, was a little arrangement between those +fast friends, Sir Wilton Gleed and Canon Wilders, who would have been +interested to learn the way in which their delegate improved the rare +occasion of a funeral. For marriages and baptisms the Long Stow folk had +taken to walking across the heath to Linkworth. + +Early in the second year there came a visitor whom Robert Carlton knew +at a glance, though he had never before seen him in the flesh. This was +a person with the appearance of a rather dissipated sporting man, who +tooled tandem through the village, and pulled up at the ruins in broad +daylight. The thing was thus a scandal from the first moment of its +occurrence, and the cockaded groom was beset by horrified rustics before +his master's red neck had disappeared among the low and ragged walls. + +Carlton had withdrawn into the invisible seclusion of the west end, +where he was nervously scraping at the nearest stone when the visitor +appeared, only to stop short with a whistle. + +"I thought this was the church the parson was building with his own +hands?" + +"So it is, my lord." + +"And you are what he calls his own hands!" + +"No, I am he." + +The visitor stared. + +"You the parson?" + +"I know I don't look like one," admitted Carlton, glancing from his +ruined hands to the shabby clothes in which he worked; "nor can I fairly +consider myself one at present. Yet I am still the only rector of this +parish, and it was I who wrote to your lordship about the stone. Yours +are the only quarries in this part of the country. The stone I am now +using came from them. But it is just finished, and unless you will let +me have some more I may have to stop; otherwise I believe that I could +build up to the roof, in time, without assistance." + +"And why should you?" + +"My church was burnt down through my own--fault." + +"I know all about that," said his lordship. "What I ask is, why should +you insist upon building it up single-handed?" + +"I didn't insist originally," sighed Carlton. "It is a very long story." + +The earl regarded him with a pair of very penetrating little eyes; he +was an ugly man with an ugly reputation, but one of those who take as +little trouble to conceal their worst characteristics as to display +their best. + +"To be quite frank with you," said he, "I happen to know something of +your story; and I consider it a jolly sight more discreditable to others +than to you. That's _my_ opinion, and I don't care who knows it. So you +are really and literally doing this thing with your own two hands?" + +"Literally--as yet." + +"And who looks after you?" + +"Oh, no one comes near me; but I am bound to say that I have learnt to +look pretty well after myself. I have found it absolutely necessary for +my work." + +"Cookin' for yourself, and all that sort of thing?" + +"Cooking and even killing when necessary." + +"Is the boycott as wide and as bad as all that?" + +"It is no worse than I deserve." + +The visitor, looking sharply to see whether this was cant, was convinced +of its sincerity at a glance, though he loudly disagreed with the +opinion. + +"I call it a jolly shame," said he; "but I'm not going to hurt your +feelings by expressing mine. I'm the last man to rake up the past. But +it would be a different thing if you had really fired the church; that +was the last iniquity, charging you with that! How do I know you didn't? +There was a young friend of mine on the bench, and I had it from him as +a fact, with a jolly lot more besides. Now show me what you've done +before I go." + +This did not take a minute; there was so little to show for the first +long year and more of scraping, re-pointing, or rebuilding from the +ground. Save at the end where they had stood talking, there was +scarcely a wall that reached to their shoulders, and their tour of +inspection was closely followed from the road. It was conducted with few +words on either side, though the noble Earl muttered several which would +not have been muttered in other company. In the end he made a startling +undertaking. He would not only send as much more stone as was required, +but neither the stuff nor its delivery should cost Mr. Carlton a penny. + +Carlton turned a deeper bronze, but begged as a favour to be allowed to +pay. The new church was his debt to the parish. It was the one debt that +he would pay. The uttermost farthing and the least last stone were to +have come out of his own pocket. That had been his undertaking; it was +still his heart's ambition; but as such he saw its unworthy side; and +would place himself in his lordship's hands, sooner than be swayed by +false pride in such a matter. + +"Then you shall pay through the nose!" the other promised him; "and I'm +damned if I don't think all the more of you. I beg your pardon. I was +trying not to swear. But I never could stand parsons, and I suppose +it'll shock you when I tell you straight that you're the best I've +struck! You're a man, you are, and I take off my hat to you." + +He did so openly before the wide eyes and wider mouths of those watching +from the road; and so ended an incident which Sir Wilton Gleed described +as one of the most scandalous in all his experience. "Birds of a +feather," was, however, his ready and untiring comment; and the saying +went from door to door, as "not guilty but don't do it again," had gone +before it; for there is nothing like a timeworn saying to crystallise a +widespread sentiment. + +This one did not come to Robert Carlton's ears, but he was perhaps the +first to whom the obvious comment had occurred, and its easy +justification did a little damp the glow in which his latest champion +had left him. It were better to have won the allegiance of a better man. +Yet who was he to judge his fellows? He had forfeited the right to +criticise another. Let him then be truly and duly thankful; for with +each waning year he had more and more occasion. Surely the heart of man +was beginning at last to soften towards an erring brother, who repented +very bitterly of his sin, and who was doing faithfully the little that +he could to undo the least of his sin's results. Ah, that he could have +done more! Ah, that by dying he could bring the dead to life! + +He was only a man; he could only suffer in his turn. That he had done, +was doing, and was still to do. And he thanked God for it again; so much +of the old spirit still endured. Yet was he none the less thankful for +every token of pardon or of pity from mere men. He knew that many would +justly execrate his name until the end. He knew of one at least who +would never forgive him in this life. + +This one came on a moonlight night in the spring of this fourth year; +came limping into the churchyard, leaning on his great stick, and +growling savagely to himself; little suspecting that he had Carlton +caught in the ruins, listening, watching, fascinated, from one of those +ragged interstices with which even his perseverance and even his +ingenuity could scarcely cope. To be exact, it was, or was to be, the +mullioned window in the south transept; and as Musk advanced past this +angle of the building, the clergyman first leant, then crept, over the +sill to watch him. + +He stole into the open. Musk had his back turned; his shoulders were +very round. Carlton knew well at what grave the other stood staring, and +his heart stirred heavily within him. Oh, his wickedness! Oh, his sin! +How could there be any forgiveness, in heaven or on earth, for him a +clergyman? The poor old man, so old, so bent! He must speak to him; he +must throw himself at his feet; so bent, so lame! Oh, that that stick +might strike the life out of him then and there! + +He was creeping forward; suddenly he stopped. Musk was stooping, moving +his stick to and fro across the grave, with a sweeping movement, as of a +scythe. What was he doing? Carlton remembered--divined--and his blood +ran cold. The snowdrops were out; he had put some on the grave. It had +no stone, no name. It was only the tidiest and the greenest mound in all +the churchyard. He saw to that. And yet his flowers desecrated it; must +be swept to the winds . . . + +Musk had come away. He was looking at the south wall where it had +obviously been rebuilt. Carlton was skulking in the porch. The high moon +fell heavily on the upturned face, covering it with white patches and +black wrinkles; and these were working like a seething mass; but for a +long time the great frame stood motionless. Then, in a flash, a huge +fist flew from the huge shoulder, struck the sandstone a sickening blow, +swung round and was shaken at the rectory through the trees until the +blood dripped from the mangled knuckles. Carlton was so near that he +could both see and hear the heavy drops. He drew further within the +porch: he had also seen his enemy's face. + +Carlton had the fair mind and the true eye of the exceptional man. He +saw most things immediately as they really were, not as he wished to see +them, still less as they affected himself. He saw the moonlit face of +Jasper Musk for many a day. It did not haunt him. He could have +dismissed the vision from his mind at will; he preferred to consider it +calmly in a white light. There was hate undying and invincible. There +was something to respect. Carlton compared the petty though persistent +enmity of Sir Wilton Gleed with the great dumb hatred of Jasper Musk; +the last was inexorable as it was just; the first not wholly one or the +other, or Carlton was mistaken in the smaller man. Sir Wilton might be +the last man on earth to forgive him, yet in the very end he would +follow the world, supposing for a moment that the world ever led. But +Jasper Musk would hate the harder as the hate of others dwindled and +died. + +This conviction cast no new shadow across Carlton's life, but it brought +a new name into his prayers, and put the fine edge on an old anxiety. He +had always been anxious about his child, though in the beginning that +sense had been overborne by others. Now, however, it was acute enough. +What was becoming of the boy? Did he live? Was Musk bringing him up? +Was he kindly treated? Yes, yes, they would be kind enough! Carlton +trusted his enemy there; but his own position was none the less grieving +as he came to realise what it was. He had no position at all towards the +child--no rights, no control, no voice, no _locus standi_ whatsoever. +Was it better so, or worse? What were they teaching the child? Would he +also grow up to deny God, and to execrate the name of his unworthy +minister? + +Yes, it was a shadow; but no new one; it only fell heavier and stretched +further than before. And gradually Carlton became obsessed with the idea +that he must do something, take some step, give some earnest of +voluntary responsibility, no matter what new humiliation awaited him. +But what to do, what step to take, for the best! As life grew a very +little easier in other ways that have been shown, this problem came upon +Carlton as a fresh complication, and as a poignant reminder of his +original wickedness. It was not, however, a problem to be solved out of +hand. It required infinite thought, and ceaseless prayer for that right +judgment for which Robert Carlton now again looked upward as well as +within. But while he thought, and even while he prayed, the walls were +still growing under his hands. + +And in his work he was strangely and serenely happy; there were no more +spasmodic joys and qualms. Enormous difficulties lay between him and the +impossible roof. He was at once artist and man enough to be stimulated +by these. He drew in chalk, upon the bare floors of his disused rooms, +full-size diagrams of all his arches, divided into as many parts as +there were to be stones, according to the easy rule set forth in his +precious book. Then he collected all the boxes, tin, wood, and +cardboard, that he could find upon the premises, and cut these up into +numbered patterns coinciding exactly with the diagrams on the floor, +thus providing himself with evening occupation for a whole winter, and +having all in readiness by the spring. Summer, however, found him still +in travail with the mullioned window in the north transept; and the +mullion and the tracery he was omitting altogether; the bare arch beat +him long enough. + +Prolonged solitude may debase a man to the savage or exalt him to the +saint; it never leaves him the mere man he was. Robert Carlton was still +too human to merit for a moment the hyperbole of saint; nevertheless he +developed in his loneliness several of those traits which are less of +this world than of a better. His mind dwelt continuously upon holy +things; it had ceased altogether to feed upon itself. He had suffered no +more sickness, either of body or of soul, such as that which had +threatened to destroy both in the first awful winter. The whole man was +chastened, purified, simplified and refined, by the consuming fires +through which he had passed. His faith had never been stronger than it +was now; it had never, never been so near in sheer simplicity to the +faith of a little child. In a word, and little as he knew it, this great +sinner, proven libertine, suspected incendiary, was now living in the +very sight and smile of God; and even His humblest creatures loved and +trusted him as never in the days of prosperity and good report; for now +he loved them first. Nature, indeed, had not endowed him with that +sympathetic insight into inferior life--that genius for herself--which +is born in most people who are to have it at all. To Robert Carlton the +talent only came in his lonely and dishonoured prime, as the solace of +his exile, as a new interest and occupation for his mind, and surely +also as a sign of grace returning. There grew upon him in these years +the knowledge and love of very little things, trodden under foot or +brushed aside until now; a larger passion for nature in all her moods, +and all their manifestations; and, above all, the equal peace and +independence of him to whom the grasses whisper and the elements sing. + +So one wind braced him to titanic effort, and another confirmed him in +patient toil, and another relaxed both mind and members in merited ease; +so he came to know the birds about him, almost as a shepherd knows his +sheep, and even to discover some individuality beneath the feathers. +There was one huge sparrow, a perfect demon for the crumbs which Carlton +strewed every morning near the scene of his day's work, so that he might +not be quite alone. The lowest human qualities came out in this small +bird until finally, and with infinite ingenuity, it was trapped, +rationed, and compelled to watch a feast of the smaller fry through the +wires of a cage. Then there was a robin which in time came to perch upon +the solitary's hat while he worked; only in the beginning were there +crumbs in the brim. And again there was a starling that entertained him +by the hour together, and all for love, from an elder-bush close to the +shed. + +But each of these years brought riper knowledge, until God's leafy acre, +with its canopy of changing sky, both teeming with life to his quickened +vision, became not only the outcast's second Bible, but all the almanac +he needed or possessed. With no newspaper to distract his mind, and +perhaps not a letter or a human voice for months, it was on bird and +leaf that he came to rely for the time of year; while the field of his +research was greatly extended by nocturnal exercise upon the +pine-serrated plateau beyond the church. Now the tips of the chestnut +twigs might bulge and bud, but spring was not spring until the plover +paraded his new black breast, or a peewit rose screaming at the midnight +intruder. All summer the small bird was king; hedgerows twittered; +crumbs were scorned; man was jilted for slug and worm. But the end came +in sight with the homebred mallard, flying feebly in his summer +feathers; and the flight of the wild duck was the end of all. The third +year found Carlton watching for the mallard as his bird of ill-omen, and +redoubling his efforts while his ear prepared for the shrill music of +the full-grown quills in final flight. Harsh experience had taught him +how little he could do, with any certainty or any continuity, in the +season when the little birds and he were best friends. + +It was late in May, and the church would soon be hidden for another +summer; meanwhile Carlton was still at work upon his transept window, in +a corner which a great stack of undressed sandstone made invisible from +the lane, as it already was from the road. The folk from other villages +were beginning to stop and watch him longer than he liked, and he did +not care to be a cynosure at all. He only asked to build his church in +peace, and with it an example which should do at least a little to +counteract the one he had already set; and he meant both for his own +people, not for the outlying world. He really feared a reaction in his +favour on the part of the sentimental outsider. It would do him fresh +injury in the eyes of many of whom he honestly longed to win back in the +end. Moreover, his head was very level in these days. He saw nothing +heroic in his own conduct. With all his wish to undo a little of the +harm that he had done to others, there was a very human eagerness to +redeem his own past, so far as that was possible upon earth. Carlton was +never unaware of this incentive. He entertained no illusions about +himself, nor did he wish to create any in others. For example, there was +his work. It was never easy, sometimes hopeless, always fascinating. But +the man himself desired no credit for devotion to labour which he loved +for its own sake, and in which he was still capable (but no longer +ashamed) of forgetting the past. + +The transept window engrossed him to the last degree; mullion or no +mullion, it involved the largest arch that Carlton had yet attempted; +and already it alone had occupied many weeks. The patterns had been the +easy recreation of his winter evenings, but it had taken him all the +spring to reproduce a score of these in solid stone; for though the +walls were coursed rubble, the windows must have ashlar facings, to be +as they had been before; and ashlar is to coursed rubble what broadcloth +is to Harris tweed. What with indefatigable labour, however, and the +general proficiency which he had now attained in his self-taught craft, +Carlton had his jambs up by the end of May, and his arched framework +fixed between them, all ready to support the arch itself. He was now +engaged upon the nine wedge-shaped stones to form the latter, working +each to the fine ashlar finish, as also to the exact dimensions of its +fellow in tin, wood, or cardboard, and laying them in couples on +alternate sides of the wooden centre, so as to weight it evenly as the +book ordained. + +It was the middle of the afternoon, and the quiet corner was already in +shadow; beyond, the wet grass glistened, for the day was a duel between +sun and rain. Carlton was taking the busier advantage of a brilliant +interval, and roughing out a new voussoir with the bold precision of the +expert mason. Ting, ting, ting, fell the hammer on the cold-chisel; the +soft, wet sandstone peeled off in curling flakes; the quick strokes rang +like a bell through the cool and cleanly air. It had been honest rain, +and it was honest sunshine. The green world broke freshly upon all the +senses. Every colour was more vivid than its wont, from the reddish +yellow of the rain-soaked stone to lilac and laburnum in the rectory +garden; from the creamy castles of the full-blown chestnuts to the +emerald sprays which were all that the slower elms had as yet to show +against an uncertain sky. Every inch of earth, every blade and petal, +was contributing its quota to the sweet summer smell. The birds sang; +the bees hummed; the hammer rang. And Carlton was so intent upon his +task, so bent upon making up for time lost that day, that it might have +been mid-winter for the little he looked and listened; yet he heard and +saw none the less; and his face was filled with quiet peace. + +In appearance he was many years older; at a distance he might have +passed for the father of the man who had drawn a larger congregation +than the old church would hold. His hair was grey; his beard was +grizzled. Incessant manual toil had aged him even more by giving his +body a constant stoop. And the hands were the hands of a labouring man. +But the brown eye, once inflammable, was now all gentleness and +humility; the whole face was sweetened and exalted by solitude and +suffering; in expression more patient, less austere; though the +untrained beard and moustache, hiding mouth and jaw, had something to do +with this. + +To his gentleness, however, there was striking testimony even now, as +his hammer rained ringing blows upon the cold-chisel; for within easy +reach of it perched the tame robin on another stone, quizzically +watching the performance. Then, in the same moment, three things +happened. The robin flew away, Carlton turned his head, and the ringing +blows broke off. + + + + +XXI + +AT THE FLINT HOUSE + + +"The child must have a name, Jasper." + +"All right, you give it one. That's nothun to me." + +"But he must be christened properly." + +"Why must he?" + +"Oh, Jasper, if you don't fare to believe, his mother did, poor thing!" + +"And a lot of good that did her . . . but do you have your way. Make a +canting little Christian of him if you like. Do you think I care what +you do with the brat? I know what I'd do with it, if that wasn't for the +law!" + +So, in the early days, while Robert Carlton was still learning to live +alone, his son was trundled across the heath to Linkworth, and there +christened George after no one in particular. Followed the remaining +period of extreme infancy, during which Jasper Musk seldom set eyes upon +the child, and was more or less oblivious to its concrete existence. +Then one afternoon, the second summer, as Jasper sat smoking at a back +window, in the big chair to which his sciatica would bind him from +morning till night, there was a shuffling and a grunting in the passage, +and in came the child on all fours, with the lamp of adventure alight +and shining in grimy cheeks and great grey eyes. + +Musk took the pipe from his mouth, and met the small intruder with an +expressionless stare. Had his wife been by, no doubt he would have +bidden her take the little devil out of his sight; he had done so +before, using a harsher and more literal epithet for choice. But this +afternoon he was alone, and very weary of his solitary confinement. So +for the moment Musk sat stolidly intent; and the child, after a halt +induced by the creaking of the open door and the austere apparition +within, advanced once more, with the infantile equivalent for a cheer. + +"Well, you've got a cheek!" said Jasper, grimly. + +The boy had reached his legs, and was pulling himself up by the +particularly lame one, chattering the while in the foreign tongue of one +year old. Musk winced and muttered, then suddenly encircled the small +body with his mighty hands, and set the child high and dry upon his +knee. + +"And now what?" said he. "And now what?" + +For answer a chubby hand flew straight at his whiskers, grabbed them +unerringly, and pulled without mercy, but with yells of delight that +brought Musk's wife in hot haste from a far corner of the rambling +house. In the doorway she threw up her arms. + +"Oh, Georgie!" she cried aghast. "You naughty boy--you naughty boy!" + +Jasper had already created a diversion in favour of his whiskers, and +was in the act of blowing open an enormous watch when his wife +appeared. + +"Now you take and mind your own business," snapped he, "and we'll mind +ours . . . Blow--can't you blow? Like this, then--p-f-f-f--and there you +are! Now you try; blow, and that'll open again." + +Georgie walked before the summer was over; and this was the year in +which Jasper scarcely set foot to the ground, so he made use of the +child from the first. Now it was his pipe, now his spectacles, now the +newspaper; these were the first familiar objects which the child came to +know by name before he could speak; and he never saw any one of the +three without taking it as straight as he could toddle to the great grey +man in the chair. + +Mrs. Musk suddenly found half her work with Georgie taken entirely off +her hands. She was even quicker over another discovery. Jasper would not +own that he had taken to the child; in her presence, on the contrary, he +ignored its very existence as utterly as heretofore. Yet now every day +she could have found them together at most hours; only she knew better. + +Cheerless environment for this new life--a gloomy old house--a grim old +couple. Nevertheless, and in very spite of all the circumstances of his +birth, Georgie from the first evinced that temperament which is a sun +unto itself. An expansive gaiety was his normal mood, and for years the +only variant was a terrible and overwhelming indignation with all his +world. He was, in fact, an entirely healthy little savage, with all the +wild spirits and facile affections of his age, and no exemption from its +traditional ills. Once he had croup so severely that two doctors came +in the middle of the night, and Georgie never forgot their grave faces +and his grandfather's grim one at the foot of the bed. Indeed, the scene +formed his first permanent impression, though the sequel was more +memorable in itself. Georgie seemed to go to sleep for days and days, +and to awake in another world, though the bed was the same, and the +medicine-bottles, and the singing kettle; for it was day-time, and the +room full of sun, and the doctors gone; but in the sunlight there stood +instead the loveliest lady whom Georgie had beheld in his three or four +years of earthly experience. Thereupon he lay with his firm little mouth +pursed up, his grey eyes greater than even their wont, and his mind at +work upon some surreptitious teaching of his grandmother. It was a very +simple question that he asked in the end, but it made the lady kiss him +and cry over him in a way he never could understand. + +"Are you a angel?" Georgie had said. + +Gwynneth happened to be somewhat morbidly aware of her own poverty in +angelic qualities, though it was not this that made her cry. She was +alone at the hall for the winter, which Sir Wilton and Lady Gleed were +spending upon a well-beaten track abroad, while Sidney was still at +Cambridge. Gwynneth also might have drifted from Cannes to Nice, and +from Nice to Mentone, for she had been taken from school on Lydia's +marriage, and assigned a permanent position at the side of Lady Gleed. +In this capacity the girl had not shone, though her peculiar character +had lost nothing by the duty and faithful practice of consistent +self-suppression. On the other hand, there was the demoralising sense of +personal superiority, which was thrust upon Gwynneth at every turn of +this companionship, causing her to take an unhealthy interest in her own +faults, in order to preserve any humility at all; for she was full of +mental and of bodily vigour, and her aunt was signally devoid of both. +Consequently when Lydia petitioned to go instead (having become a mother +to her great disgust, and demanding an immediate separation from her +infant), the proposal was adopted to the equal satisfaction of all +concerned. Gwynneth, for her part, was very sorry not to travel and see +the world; but she knew, from a tantalising experience, that hotel life +was all that one could count upon seeing with Lady Gleed; and from every +other point of view it was infinite relief to be alone. Literally alone +she was not, since the little German housekeeper never left the hall. +But Fraulein Hentig was a self-contained and entirely tactful companion, +with whom it was possible to enjoy the delights of solitude while +escaping the disadvantages. The two were very good friends. + +Gwynneth was now in her twentieth year, a tall and graceful girl, albeit +with the slight stoop of the natural student that she was. At her school +she had won all available honours, but it was not a modern school, and +in those days such as Gwynneth had no definite knowledge of any wider +arena. So she left her school without great regret. She had learnt all +that they could teach her there. And she taught herself twice as much in +stolen hours spent in the hall library, which had been bought with the +place, and hitherto only used by Sidney on wet days. But now there was +no need to steal an hour; the girl's time was all her own, and she held +high revel among the books. Moreover, it was the dawn of the University +Extension system, and Gwynneth heard of a course of lectures upon +English literature, only eight miles from Long Stow, just in time to +attend. To do so she had to fight a weekly battle with the coachman, but +Fraulein Hentig took her side, and the opposition did not endure. +Gwynneth took voluminous notes and wrote elaborate essays, bringing to +the whole interest that energy, thoroughness and enthusiasm, to which, +though each was an essential characteristic, she was only now enabled to +give free play. Yet the young girl was no mere bookworm, though at this +stage of her career she seemed little else. It was a phase of +intellectual absorption, but all the while it needed but a touch of +human interest in her life to awake the deeper nature of the eternal +woman. Such awakening had come with the most alarming period of +Georgie's illness. Gwynneth was starting for her lecture, primed with +sharp pencils and her new essay, when she heard in the village that two +doctors had been at the Flint House in the night. She did not go to that +lecture at all, but for two days and nights was scarcely an hour absent +from the bedside of a little boy whom she had barely known by sight +before. And his first comprehensible words formed the question which +Gwynneth, worn out by watching, had answered in the fashion he could +never understand. + +Well, she was destined to be the boy's good angel, though he never +mistook her for one again; and sometimes she looked the part. The dark +eyes, so ardent in the pursuit of knowledge, or of any other of her +heart's desires, could yet sparkle with childish glee, or soften with +the tenderness of the ideal Madonna. The self-willed mouth and nose were +only sweet as Georgie saw them; and none but he knew the warmth of the +pale brown cheek or the crisp electric touch of the dark brown hair. +Little knowing it before, and never dreaming of it now, Gwynneth had +long been hankering for all that the little child gave her out of the +fulness and purity of his tiny heart. She supposed that she was happy +because at last she was being of some trifling use to somebody; it made +her think more of herself. Looking deeper (as she thought), through the +deceptive lenses of her inner consciousness, Gwynneth took a still less +favourable view of her latest interest in life. It was that and not much +more to the imperfect introspection of her morbid mood. + +Nevertheless, this was the happiest time that she had ever known. +Georgie and she became inseparable, even when the boy was well again; +and on him Gwynneth was really lavishing all the love and tenderness +which had been gathering in her heart since the hour when she had kissed +a dead forehead for the last time. The fact was that the girl had an +inborn capacity for passionate devotion, and was now once more enabled +to indulge this sweet instinct to the full. She still went to her weekly +lecture, read every book in the syllabus, and wrote her essay with as +much care for detail as her innate energy would permit. Nor was her work +the worse for the counter-attraction which now filled her young life to +the brim. Georgie spoke of Gwynneth as his "lady," with a sufficient +emphasis upon the possessive pronoun, and to her by a succession of pet +names of their joint invention. + +Croup is an enemy that lives to fight another day, as Dr. Marigold said +when he paid his last visit; and that word was sufficient for the Musks. +Thenceforward Georgie had only to sneeze to be put to bed, where he +wasted many days before the winter was over. But Georgie was not to be +depressed, and as Gwynneth would come and play with him for hours it was +perhaps no wonder. They both had some imagination; one showed it by +extemporary flights of downright romance, and the other by following +these with immense eyes and not a syllable of his own from beginning to +end. Then and there they would dramatise the story, for it was usually +one of adventure, and Georgie had a clockwork paddle-steamer called the +_Dover_, which sailed the bed manned by cardboard sailors of Gwynneth's +making. In these seas the roughest weather was experienced in crossing +Georgie's legs, but the best fun was in the polar regions, where the +vessel lay wedged for months between two pillows, while the crew hunted +bear and walrus over Georgie's person, and dug winter quarters under the +clothes. + +One day, when he really had a cold, and had fallen asleep upon the +icebergs, Gwynneth took upon herself to search the cupboard for some +picture-book which he might not have seen before; and in so doing she +came across the photograph of a comely young woman, not much older than +herself, which compelled her attention rather than her curiosity, for +she guessed at once who it was. Moreover, the face was striking and +interesting in itself. The eyes had a strange look, half reckless, half +defiant, but, even in a faded and inartistic photograph, of a subtle +fascination. There was some slight coarseness of eyelid and nostril; but +for all that it was a fine expression, full of courage and full of will. +The will was obvious in the mouth. It had the strength of Musk himself. +Yet there was something about the mouth--so firm--so full--that Gwynneth +did not like. She could not have said what it was, but she preferred +looking into the eyes. They fascinated her, and she did not lift her own +eyes from them till Mrs. Musk entered and caught her thus engaged. + +"Oh, where did you find that? Give it to me--give it to me!" and the +poor soul held out hands that trembled with her voice. "That's Georgie's +poor mother," she sobbed, "and I didn't know there was another left. I +thought he'd taken and burnt them every one!" + +And she slipped the photograph inside her bodice, and pressed her lean +hands upon it, as though it were the babe itself at her breast once +more. Next instant Gwynneth's arms were about the old woman's neck, and +her fresh lips had touched the wet and shrivelled cheek of Georgie's +grandmother. + +"Ah! but you are good to us," said Mrs. Musk. "I never would have +believed a young lady could be so sweet and kind as you!" + +Not that Gwynneth was in the habit of going among the people; that was a +practice which Lady Gleed would not permit in a young lady over whom she +exercised any sort of control. Consequently there was some talk in the +village at this time, and a little scene at the hall soon after Sir +Wilton and his wife arrived for the Easter recess. But Gwynneth argued +that in no sense could the Musks be accounted ordinary villagers; and +the squire himself took her side very firmly in the matter. + +"I won't have you rate Musk among the yokels," said Sir Wilton +afterwards. "He is the one substantial man in the place, and a very good +friend of mine." + +"Well, I don't consider it nice for Gwynneth to be always with that +child." + +"She doesn't know the child's history; you have only to hear her talk +about him to see that." + +"I don't think it nice, all the same," Lady Gleed repeated. + +"Then take her back to town with you." + +"No, she is out now, and I can't be bothered with her this season. She +is not like other girls. I've a good mind to send her abroad for a +year." + +"You can do as you like about that. It might be a very good thing. +Meanwhile I'm not going to have Musk's feelings hurt; only yesterday, +when I went to see him, he was telling me all Gwynneth has done for them +during the winter. I'm not going to break with a man like that by +suddenly forbidding her to do any more." + +So it was decided that Gwynneth should go for a year to a relation of +Fraulein Hentig's at Leipzig, for the sake of her music, which the girl +had neglected rather disgracefully since leaving school, but of which +she was none the less fond, given the proper stimulus. Gwynneth herself +acclaimed the plan, and indeed had a voice in it; there was only one +reason why she was not entirely glad to go; and her devotion to Georgie +was more constant than ever during the few weeks which were left to her. + +Summer was beginning, and the boy was well and strong, with chubby +cheeks and sturdy bare legs. Often Gwynneth had him to play in the hall +garden--this on Sir Wilton's own suggestion--but more often she took him +for a walk. There were beautiful walks all round Long Stow. There was +the windy walk across the heather towards Linkworth; there were cool +walks by the tiny river that ran parallel with the village street, +bounding the hall meadow and both meadow and garden of the Flint House; +there was a fascinating expedition, with spade and pail, to the +sand-hills off the road to Lakenhall. Yet it was on none of these +excursions that Gwynneth lost Georgie, but while leaving some papers at +the saddler's workshop, in Long Stow itself. + +Fuller would keep her to talk politics, or rather to listen to his own: +it was the year of the first Home Rule Bill, and even Mr. Gladstone had +never stirred the saddler's anger, hatred and contempt to such a pitch +as they reached in this connection. Gwynneth, on her side, had an +insufficient grasp of the measure, but an instinctive veneration for the +man; and she was young enough to grow heated in argument, even with the +saddler. When at length she turned away, more flushed than victorious, +there was no vestige of the child. + +"Georgie! Georgie!" + +Neither was there any answer. Gwynneth turned upon the politician. + +"Didn't you see him, Mr. Fuller?" + +"Gord love you, miss, I thought you come alone!" + +And the saddler leant across his bench until his spectacles were flush +with the open window at which Gwynneth stood. + +"Alone? Georgie Musk was with me; and I've lost him through arguing with +you." + +She inquired at the next cottage. Yes, they had seen him pass "with you, +miss," but that was all. There were no cottages further on; the +saddler's was the last on that side and at that end of the village. +Opposite was the rectory gate, with the low flint wall running far to +the right, overhung at present by the great leaves and heavy blossoms of +the chestnuts. And all at once Gwynneth noticed that the chestnut leaves +were very dark, the sky overcast, and another shower even then +beginning. + +"He will get wet--it may kill him!" + +And the girl ran wildly on along the road; but it was a straight road, +and she could see further than Georgie could possibly have travelled. So +now there was only the lane running up by the church. + +Gwynneth took it at top speed; an instant brought her abreast of the +east end, gaping wide and deep for the east window, yet built like a +rock on either side to the height of the eaves. Another step, and +Gwynneth was standing still. + +Already her sub-consciousness had remarked the silence of hammer and +chisel, which had tinkled in her ears as she brought Georgie up the +village, ringing more distinctly at every step, and quite loud when +first they had stopped at the saddler's window. Then it must have ceased +altogether. But now Gwynneth heard another sound instead. + + + + +XXII + +A LITTLE CHILD + + +Georgie stood beyond the mason's litter, his firm legs planted in the +wet grass, his holland pinafore less brown than his knees. A sailor hat, +with the brim turned down, threw the roguish face into shadow; but the +flush of successful flight was not extinguished; and the great eyes +fixed on Carlton were nowise abashed. Shyness had never been a feature +of Georgie's character. + +"Hallo!" said he. + +Carlton stood like his own walls. + +So this was the child. + +A new instinct was awake in the man's breast; he had never an instant's +doubt. + +And it struck him dumb. + +"I say," said Georgie, "are you angry?" + +But he showed no anxiety on the point, merely beaming while the grown +man fought for words. + +"Angry? No--no----" + +And now he was fighting for the power of speech--fighting hot eyes and +twitching lips for his own manhood--and for the little impudent face +that would fill with fear if he lost. But he won. + +"Of course I'm not angry; but"--for he must know for certain--"what's +your name?" + +"Georgie." + +"That's not all." + +"Georgie Musk." + +Carlton filled his lungs. + +"And who sent you here, Georgie?" + +"Nobody di'n't." + +"Then how have you come?" + +"By my own self, course." + +"What! all the way from the Flint House? That's where you live, isn't +it?" + +Carlton put the second question with sudden misgiving. The name was not +unique in that country; he might be mistaken after all. And already--in +these few moments--he could not bear the idea of being thus mistaken in +this sturdy, friendly, independent boy. + +"Yes, that's where," said Georgie, nodding. + +"Then what can have brought him here!" + +"Well, you see," said Georgie, confidentially, "my lady taked me for a +walk----" + +"Your lady?" + +"And I wunned away." + +"But who do you mean by your lady?" + +"My lady," said Georgie, turning dense. + +"Your governess?" guessed Carlton. + +"Oh, my governess, my governess!" cried Georgie, roaring with laughter +because the word was new to him, but made a splendid expletive: "oh, my +governess, gwacious me!" + +"Well, whoever it is," muttered Carlton, "she oughtn't to have lost you; +and you stay with me until she finds you." + +"That's good," said Georgie, with conviction. "I liker stay wif you." + +Carlton caught the child up suddenly, and swung him shoulder-high. What +a laugh he had! And what a firm boy, so heavy and straight and strong! +Carlton sat down in his barrow, taking the little fellow on his knee, +yet holding him at arm's length for self-control. + +"How can you like being with a person you've never seen before?" asked +Carlton, tremulous again, for all his strength. + +"'Cos I heard you makin' somekin," said Georgie, who was looking about +him. "What are you makin', I say?" + +It was here that, without any particular provocation, Robert Carlton's +resolution suddenly failed him, so that he hugged and kissed the child, +in a sudden access of uncontrollable emotion. This, however, was as +suddenly suppressed. Georgie had wriggled from his knee; but instead of +running away (as the other feared for one breathless moment), he +continued looking about him as before, bored a little, but nothing more. + +"What are you buildin', I say?" he now inquired. + +"A church." + +"What's a church?" + +Carlton came straight to his feet. + +"Do you never go to one?" he asked; but his tone was nearly all remorse. + +"No, I never." + +"Then have you never heard of God?" + +And now the tone was his most determined one. + +"Yes," said Georgie, subdued but not frightened. + +"You are sure that you have been told about God?" + +"Yes, sure." + +"Who has taught you?" + +"My lady and granny--not grand-daddy." + +"You say your prayers to Him?" + +"Yes, I always." + +"Sure?" + +"Yes, sure." + +Carlton stood with heaving chest. He was spared something at last; his +cup was not to overflow after all. And, as he stood, the grass +whispered, and the rain came down. + +Again Georgie was caught up, to be set down next instant in the shed; +but this time he was really offended. + +"I don't want to come in," he whimpered. "I want to build wif your +bwicks. They're much, much bigger'n mine!" + +"But it's raining, don't you see? It would never do for Georgie to get +wet." + +"Oh, I wish I would play wif your bwicks!" + +"Why, Georgie, you couldn't lift them; you're not strong enough." + +"But I are, I tell you. I really are!" + +"Here's one, then," said Carlton, who kept his misfits in the shed. "You +try." + +Georgie did try. He rolled the stone over, though it was no small one; +lift it he could not. + +"You see, it was heavier than you thought." + +"'Cos never mind," coaxed Georgie, in another formula of his own; "you +carry it for me!" + +"But it's raining, and we should both be wet through." + +"'Cos _never_ mind!" + +"But I do mind; and, what's more, everybody else would mind as well." + +"Then what _shall_ we do?" cried Georgie, from his depths. + +Carlton had no idea. But the boy was weary, and must be amused; that was +the first necessity; and he who had never laid himself out to conciliate +men must strain every nerve to please this little child. His eyes flew +round the shed. And there upon the shelf stood his gargoyles deep in +dust. + +"Oh, what a funny old man!" cried Georgie. "Oh, ho, ho!" + +But Carlton, in his ignorance of children, had over-estimated a strong +child's strength; the stone head slipped through the tiny hands, +narrowly missing the tiny toes; and when Georgie stooped and rolled it +over, it was seen that a terrible accident had really occurred. + +"Oh, oh, oh!" cried an alarming little voice, "Oh, he's broken his nose, +he's broken it to bits; oh, oh!" + +Carlton made a dive for the other gargoyle; but this was a peculiarly +sinister face; and Georgie's tears only ran the faster. + +"Oh, I don't like that one. It's a ho'ble face. I don't like it." + +Carlton cast the thing from him, and at the same moment became and +looked inspired. + +"Shall I make you a new face, Georgie? A better one than either of the +others?" + +"Yes, do, I say! A new face! A new face!" + +And shouts of delight came from the tear-stained one: such was the sound +that Gwynneth heard in the lane. + +A very inspiration it proved. All unpractised in their earliest +accomplishment, the hard-worked hands had never been so deft before; nor +ever stone softer or chisel sharper than the first of each that could be +found. They were trembling, those tanned and twisted fingers, but that +only seemed to impart a nervous vigour to their touch. When the thing +had taken rough shape, and a deep curve or two suggested a whole head of +hair; when eyes and nose had come from the same sure delving, and the +mouth almost at a touch; then the mouth of Georgie, long open in mere +fascination, recovered its primary function, and yelled approval in +surprising terms. + +"Oh, my Jove, my Jove!" he roared. "What a lovely, lovely, _lovely_ +face! Oh, my Jove, I must show it to my lady!" + +Carlton looked upon a baby face on fire with rapture; and for once no +dissimilar light shone upon his own. + +"Will you--give me a kiss for it, Georgie?" + +Without a word the little arms flew round a weatherbeaten neck that bent +to meet them, and the glowing cheeks buried themselves, voluntarily, in +the beard that had only hurt before; and not one kiss, but countless +kisses, were Georgie's thanks for the lump of sandstone that had grown +into a face before his eyes. And such was the scene whereon Gwynneth +Gleed arrived. + +At first she drew back, hesitating in the rain, because neither of them +saw her, and she could not, could not understand! But her hesitation was +short-lived, or, rather, it had to be conquered and it was. So with +flaming cheeks--because they would not see her--and dark hair limp from +the rain--eyes sparkling, lips parted, teeth peeping--came Gwynneth to +the shed at last. + +And the child ran to her, while the man's eyes followed him hungrily, +climbing no higher than Georgie's height. + +"Oh, look what a lovely, lovely face the workman made me; do look, I +say! Is it wery kind of him to make me such a lovely thing?" + +Gwynneth had been dragged to where the new head stood mounted upon a +misfit; and Carlton had been obliged to rise. But his eyes had not risen +from the child. + +"Is it kind of him, I tell you?" persisted Georgie. + +"Very kind," said Gwynneth, "indeed." + +And civility compelled Carlton to look up at last. + +"It was only to pass the time," he said. "I was obliged to bring him in +out of the rain." + +"It was so good of you," murmured Gwynneth. "But it was not good of +Georgie to run away as soon as my back was turned!" + +Georgie paid no heed to this reproach; he was busy playing with the +uncouth head. + +"Oh, don't say that," said Carlton, quickly; "I don't get so many +visitors! Are you the little chap's governess?" he added, yet more +quickly, to undo the visible effects of his words. + +"No, I'm--from the hall, you know." + +He could not but start at this. But now he was guarding his tongue. And, +as he reflected, there came back to him the vague memory of a face in +church, followed by the sharper picture of a very young girl at the +piano in a pleasant room--the last that he had ever been in. + +Gwynneth had recalled the same scene, and could see him as he had been, +while she gazed upon him as he was. + +"I remember," he said, gravely. "So you take an interest in this little +chap, Miss Gleed?" + +"Rather more than that," replied Gwynneth, taken out of herself in an +instant, and declaring her innocence by her sudden and unconscious +enthusiasm. "I love him dearly," she said from her heart: and together +their eyes returned to the round sailor hat, the brown pinafore and the +browner legs which were all that was now to be seen of Georgie the +engrossed. + +"He is indeed a dear little fellow," said Carlton, smothering his sighs. + +"And so affectionate!" added Gwynneth, thinking of the strange pair +together as she had found them. + +"Marvellously independent, too, for his age." + +"He is not quite four. You would think him older." + +"Indeed I would . . . And so you are his 'lady'!" + +"So he insists on calling me." + +"You seem to be very much to him," said Robert Carlton, jealously +enough at heart, as he looked for once into the fine, kind, enthusiastic +eyes of Gwynneth; but they fell embarrassed, and his own were quick +enough to wander back to the boy. + +"I have been more or less alone since last autumn," said Gwynneth. +"Georgie has been as much to me as I can possibly have been to him." + +"But he lives at the Flint House, does he not? I--I gathered he was a +grandchild of the Musks." + +"So he is." + +"Are they bringing him up?" + +"Yes." + +"Kindly?" + +"Oh, yes--kindly. But----" + +"Are they fond of him?" + +"Touchingly so; but, of course, they are two old people." + +"And so you stepped in to lighten and brighten a little child's life!" + +Gwynneth blushed unseen; for all this time he was looking at Georgie and +not at her. + +"You mustn't put it like that," she said, "for it isn't the case. It was +quite a selfish pleasure. I was all alone. And it began by his being +dreadfully ill." + +"What--Georgie?" + +"Yes, and I was able to nurse him a little. And after that we couldn't +do without each other. But now we shall have to try." + +He had looked at her with the last quick question, and was looking +still, a new anxiety in his eyes. + +"Do you mean that you are going away?" he said; and his tone did not +conceal his disappointment. + +"I am sorry to say I am," replied Gwynneth, feeling all she said. + +"Soon?" + +"To-morrow." + +"Far?" + +"Abroad." + +"But not for long!" + +"A year." + +Her eyes fell at last before the frank trouble in his; and he ended the +pause with a sigh. "I am very sorry," he said. "I was hoping that you +would often bring him here to see me." Nor was any compliment taken or +intended in a speech which rang with the primitive sincerity of one who +had spoken very little for a very long time. + +Gwynneth took the short step that brought her to the opening of the +shed. She had suddenly discovered that the rain had never ceased +pattering on the corrugated roof, and was wondering when the shower +would stop. She wished it was fair, for more reasons than one. It was +high time she took Georgie away; and she did not know what Musk would +say when he heard where they had been. She only knew his opinion of +parsons generally, and of all that they professed, though she had once +heard him allow that they were not all as bad as this one. Besides, even +Gwynneth felt natural qualms in the society of an outcast whom no one +else went near, quite apart from the popular conviction that he had +burnt his own church to the ground. That she had never believed. And +now, when she found him all but at his work; when she saw him at close +quarters, aged and bent, with tattered clothes and battered hands, yet +handsome as ever, and now picturesque; and when she looked upon the +gigantic work that had aged him, the finished wall here, the deliberate +preparations there; then that old calumny was blown to final shreds for +Gwynneth. He might have done worse, as she had sometimes heard said, but +he had not done that. And the woman went to work within her: was there +nothing she could do for him? Was there no little luxury she could get +and send him? His clothes were torn--if only she could mend them! Alas! +that she was going abroad next day. + +Another moment and she was glad: how could she do anything, a young +girl, when all the rest of the world held aloof? Anything that she did, +or tried to do, would inevitably, if not rightly and properly, be +misconstrued. Yet, after this, it would be too painful to live so near +and to go on doing nothing. She had felt that long ago; and the memory +of their last encounter reoccupied her thoughts. No, she could do no +more now than she had been able to do then. Therefore she was glad to be +going away. And all this passed through her mind in the mere minute that +elapsed before the rain stopped as suddenly as it had begun. + +Yet in that minute Robert Carlton had got Georgie back upon his knee, +and Gwynneth caught him trying to extract a promise from the child; in +another he had risen, a duskier bronze than before, and was telling her +honestly what the promise was to have been. + +"I wanted him to come again to see me finish that head, but not to tell +his grandparents where he was going, or they would not let him. You see, +I am ashamed of it already! Make allowances for one who has not spoken +to either woman or child for very nearly four years." + +Gwynneth was deeply moved. + +"Allowances," she could but repeat; "allowances!" + +"Allow'nces, allow'nces!" chimed Georgie, to whom a new word was +necessarily humorous. + +Carlton picked him up, and kissed him lightly for the last time. To +Gwynneth he only bowed. And she was longing to take his hand. + +"Good-bye, Miss Gleed; a good journey and a happy time to you." + +Gwynneth had to say something, since she could do nothing, to show her +sympathy. "I think it's all wonderful--wonderful!" was all she did say, +with a little wave towards the sandstone walls. And yet her small speech +haunted her for weeks, seeming in turns so many things that she had +never meant it to be. + +Georgie also waved with energy. "Good-bye, good-bye, I'll see you in the +mornin'!" was his irresponsible farewell. + +And so they disappeared together, as the sun shone again through the +trees with the emerald tips, now dripping diamonds too; but to Robert +Carlton that little scene of his endless labours, the shed, the strewed +stones, the barrow, the rising walls, the blossoming chestnuts, the +jewelled elms, had never looked so drab and desolate before. + +Yet, long after it was really dark, the lonely man still hovered about +the spot, now standing where the child had stood with his brown pinafore +and his browner legs; now sitting empty-kneed in the empty barrow; now +handling the rough stone head that he had hewn in a few minutes for +little Georgie. + + + + +XXIII + +DESIGN AND ACCIDENT + + +Next morning he was early at his arch, and had soon finished the +voussoir which he had been roughing out when this vital interruption +occurred. But he was not satisfied with the stone, and wasted much time +in turning it over and over and wondering whether it would do or not. +Now this was a point upon which Carlton usually knew his mind in a +twinkling. Indecision of any sort was, indeed, among the last of his +failings; but that man is not himself who has not closed an eye all +night; and Robert Carlton had only closed his in prayer. + +Later in the morning his case was worse. He would think of the boy until +the chisel went too deep and spoilt another stone. Or, just when he was +beginning to get on, he would drop his tools and wheel round suddenly, +half hoping to see a second little apparition in a sailor hat with the +brim turned down. But these things do not happen twice, much less when +looked and longed for, as Carlton knew very well. And yet his knowledge +did not help him in the matter; on the other hand, it drove him again +and again to his gate, to gaze wistfully up and down the road he never +traversed; and this was the most disastrous habit of all. + +Once more the work stood still; for the first time in three whole years, +it stood practically still for days. + +Meanwhile, at the Flint House, there had never been any secret as to +what had happened between showers at the church. Gwynneth had told Mrs. +Musk, and Mrs. Musk had deemed it better to tell Jasper himself than to +let him gather the truth from Georgie's prattle. And in the event Musk +took it better than his wife had dared to hope, merely vilifying quick +and dead with renewed rancour, and grimly undertaking that the incident +should not occur again. + +So Georgie saw more of his grandfather than he had ever seen before, and +rather more than he cared to see after his close association with +Gwynneth, whose wonderful letter from Leipzig was small comfort to so +small a soul, though Mrs. Musk had to read it to Georgie many times a +day. + +"Oh! I wish I would go and see workman," the boy would exclaim without +fear. "I wish I would! I wish I would!" + +"I daresay you do," Jasper would growl from his chair. + +"Then can I; can I, I say, grand-daddy?" + +"No, you can't." + +"Oh! why can't I?" + +"Because I tell you." + +"But, you see, grand-daddy, he was making me such a lovely, lovely face. +I must go back for it. Really I must. He did say he finish fen I go +back. So of course I must go. See? See? See?" + +Thus pestered, Jasper once thundered: + +"Oh, yes, I see! I know him--I know him. I see hard enough! But if ever +you do go I'll--I'll--I'll give ye what ye never had afore and'll never +want again!" + +"Oh, don't be angry wif me," Georgie whimpered. "Oh, I wish my lady +would come back!" + +"I daresay you do," said Jasper, calming. "And I don't." + +But a child forgets; at all events Georgie did; and so surely as his +_ennui_ in the garden, within strict sight of the terrible old man in +the chair, reached a certain pitch, so surely did the treasonable +aspiration rise to his innocent lips. + +"I wish I would go and see workman. I _wish_ I would!" + +But at last one day the old man rose, stick and all; and at this even +Georgie trembled; for it was long since he had seen his grandfather on +his feet. Over the grass he came hobbling, ungainly, abnormal, frowning +down upon the buttercups. Georgie crept aside. But Musk passed him +without a word. Three times he limped the length of the overgrown lawn, +muttering, frowning; and the third time his lameness was palpably less. + +"Why, Jasper," cried Mrs. Musk, running out, "you're getting better!" + +"No, I ain't," he roared. "You mind your own business and get away +indoors." + +Mrs. Musk was meekly obeying, and Georgie escaping at her skirt, when a +second roar recalled the child. Jasper was leaning with both hands on +the stick before him, his frown gone, but in its place a surely devilish +smile, since the child mistook it for the real thing. + +"So you're still longun to go back and see the workman, as you call him, +at the church?" + +"Oh, yes, I are!" + +And round eyes kindled at the thought. + +"Very well. You may." + +Georgie could scarcely believe his ears. + +"Fen may I? Now? Now, I say?" + +"When you like, so long as you don't bother me." + +Georgie jumped and shouted in his joy. + +"Goin' to see workman, goin' to see workman! Oh, my Jove, my Jove! Goin' +to see workman makin' lovely, lovely faces all for me--every bit!" + +"Hold your noise," said Jasper, roughly; "and go, if you're going." + +Carlton had given up expecting him, divining at last that Musk knew of +their one interview, and would never let them have another. So once more +Georgie surprised him at his work; but this time he had to hail his +friend; for now Carlton was making up for lost time, and at the moment, +up on a scaffolding, was all absorbed in the exciting task of fitting +the finished voussoirs over the wooden centre which supported the arch +until the keystone should complete it. And the keystone was actually in +one hand, a trowel full of mortar in the other, when the first sound of +Georgie's voice drove all else from his mind. + +"I say, I say, I say!" he ran up shouting. "Workman, workman!" + +But now the workman was only collecting himself, and thanking God with +quivering lips, before he could trust himself upon his ladder. + +"So here you are at last," he said, swinging the child off his legs +without endearment. Yet all his being yearned towards the merry +independent little boy. The straight strong legs seemed browner and +rounder already. It might have been the same holland pinafore; it was +the same sailor hat. + +"Yes, here I are," said Georgie, "and I wish you would make lovely, +lovely faces out of bwick." + +"Not run away again, I hope?" + +"No, 'cos I came by my own self." + +Carlton asked no more questions. Any minute the child might be missed +and sent for; every moment was precious meanwhile. It was a heavenly day +in early June, the elms in full leaf at last against the blue, the +churchyard dappled with light and shade, the fresh sandstone yellow as +gold where the sun caught it fairly. And in the sunlight stood its own +incarnation--sturdy champion of the golden age--laughing child of June. + +Carlton could see nothing else. + +"Come on, I say," urged Georgie; "come an' make faces, quick, sharp!" + +And he dragged the sculptor to his rude studio. + +"There it is, there it is," shouted Georgie, spying the unfinished head +high up on the shelf. "You did say you finish fen I come back. +Finish--finish--quick, sharp!" + +Carlton brought the thing outside, for the shed was close, and went to +work at the foot of his ladder, with Georgie sitting on the lowest +rung. And any merit which the rough attempt had possessed was speedily +removed by an over-elaboration on which Georgie insisted, and which +certainly served its purpose by earning his vociferous applause. + +"Oh, his eyes! What funny eyes! Make them open and shut, I say--can +you?" + +A doll, which Gwynneth had unearthed, before she knew her Georgie very +well, had retained this accomplishment even when the head was off its +body. + +"I'm afraid I can't do that," said Carlton. + +"Try--try." + +So Carlton gouged in the soft stone till the holes for the eyeballs had +disappeared. + +"Now open them again!" + +And fresh holes were made: they were the most sunken eyes ever seen +before Georgie was tired of the game. Next he must have ears, which were +supposed to be concealed by the very heavy head of hair; and when the +ears arrived, they were not worth having without ear-rings; but there +the sculptor was nonplussed, and struck. + +"All right," said Georgie, cheerfully; "then I'll carry it home +without." + +"What, run away directly it's done?" + +The cold-blooded ingratitude of infancy was new to Carlton, as his hurt +face was to Georgie, who eyed it with some compassion. + +"All right," said he; "I'll stay a little bit if you like." + +"And sit on my knee, Georgie." + +"All right." + +But there was no sentiment about Georgie to-day; it was mere +magnanimity, and he showed it. + +"Quite comfy, Georgie?" + +"No," sighed the boy, screwing about on the one thin thigh; "I think +it's only a little comfy." + +"That better?" + +And, the other leg being slipped under his small person, Georgie said it +was. + +"Are you sure, Georgie, that you want to take that head home at all?" + +"Course I are," said Georgie, decidedly. "I must take it, you see; +course I must." + +Carlton was again tormented by the ignoble inclination which he had +overcome by impulse rather than by will at the last interview. Was a +child of four too young to keep a secret? If only this one could be +induced to go and come back, and back, and back, without ever saying a +word to anybody! The proposition had shamed him before; and did now; but +the new love within him was stronger than his shame. + +"You wouldn't show it," suggested Carlton, "to your grandfather, would +you?" + +"Course I'll show it to him," said Georgie, for whom the stipulation was +too oblique. + +"But he'll be angry!" + +"Course he won't," said Georgie, more superior than ever, and with the +air of one who does not care to argue any more. + +"But you know he was before," said Carlton, drawing his bow. + +"Oh, bovver!" exclaimed Georgie, losing patience. "Well, then, he won't +be angry to-day, I know he won't." + +"How do you know, Georgie?" + +"'Cos he did tell me I could come." + +"Not here?" + +Georgie nodded solemnly. + +"Yes, he did. I know he did." + +What could it mean? The child was strangely dependable for his years; +indeed, it was impossible to look in those great and candid eyes and to +doubt the testimony of the equally candid little tongue. Then what could +it mean? Had Musk relented? Was he relenting? Carlton's heart leapt at +the thought, and with his heart his eyes; and in the same second he had +his answer. + +Close at hand in the sunlight, where Georgie had stood last, brimming +over with delight, there now stood Jasper Musk himself, huge with hate, +livid with rage, vindictive, remorseless--but not surprised. Carlton saw +this at the first glance, in the triumphant lightning flashing from the +fixed eyes, and playing over the heavy, grim, inexorable face. And that +was his answer; furthermore it prepared him for all, and more than all, +that was to come. + +"Put the boy down," said Jasper Musk, with sinister self-control. + +Instinctively the child slipped to the ground; but there his courage +failed him, so that he turned his back upon the terrible old man, and +hid his face in the lap that he had left. + +"Come here, George!" + +But Carlton held him firmly with both hands. + +Musk bore down on them in a series of little shuffling steps, his great +face wincing with the pain of each. His voice had already risen; now it +was so terrible to hear, so hoarse and high with passion, that in an +instant Carlton had his thumbs in the small boy's ears. + +"Snivelling hypocrite! Whited sepulchre! Do you hand the child over to +me, or I'll break this stick across your back. So I've caught ye, +temptun him here to make up to him behind my back! But you don't--no, +you don't--not while I'm alive to stop that. He's nothun to you and +you're nothun to him, and do you meddle with him again at your peril. +I've taken the trouble to learn the law of it, so I know. God damn ye! +will you take your hands off him, or am I to break your blasted head?" + +"You can do what you like," said Carlton; "but the boy shall not hear +you using that language to me. So you will never get a better +opportunity than you have." And his nostrils curled as he bent his +defenceless head over that of the boy, and pressed a little harder with +his thumbs. + +The other gnashed his teeth, and his great hand tightened on his stick. +But he could not strike like that. And his enemy knew it; trust him to +know when he was safe! + +"I'm not going to prison for ye," said Musk, "if that's what you want. I +daresay you'd think that worth a crack on the head to get me locked up +for a bit; well, then, you shan't. Do you leave go o' the kid, and I +won't swear no more." + +The effort at self-control was plain enough, as Carlton looked up, +without complying all at once. + +"One moment," he said. "You sent him here yourself, I think?" + +"What, the child?" + +"Yes." + +"I didn't send him. He was pestering me to come. So at last I gave him +leave to do as he liked." + +"In order that you might follow and abuse me in front of him!" + +"I'll tell no lies," said Musk, sturdily. "I meant to let him hear what +I thought of you, and I won't deny it." + +Carlton looked a little longer upon the broad face between the steely +bristles and the silvery hair; it had aged nothing in these years which +had been as twenty to himself; and for the moment there was all the old +rugged dignity in its independent purpose and honest unrelenting hate. A +bargain had been in Carlton's mind, but at the last he decided to trust +his enemy instead. + +"It's all right, Georgie," he whispered: "we are not really angry with +each other. Run away and play." + +"But I don't want to!" + +"You must," said Carlton, and rose without taking further notice of the +child. "Mr. Musk," he said, in a low voice but firm, "is it to be like +this between us to the bitter end?" + +"That is." + +"I do not ask your forgiveness----" + +"Glad to hear it." + +"I only ask--in pity's name--to be allowed to do something for the boy!" + +Musk moved a muscle at last, and his eyes came close together with a +gleam. "I daresay you do," said he. + +"But will you not listen----" + +"I'm listening now, ain't I?" + +"Ah, but not to my prayer! I see it in your face; you have no pity. God +knows how little I deserve! Yet it's little enough that I ask: only to +see him sometimes, and not even to see him if you set your face against +it. I would be content--at least I would try to be--if I knew he was +going to good schools, if--if I might have hand or voice in his life. +You say I have no rights. That is my punishment; a new one, that I never +felt until I saw the boy for the first time the other day; but if you +knew how I have felt it since! If you knew what it would be to me to do +anything--give anything----" + +"I knew that were comun," said Musk, nodding to himself . . . "So you'd +like to do the handsome, would you?" His whole face became suddenly +suffused, as with walnut-juice; the very whites of his eyes seemed white +no longer, while the pupils shrank to steel points in their midst. "I +know you!" he cried, beside himself again; "but don't you try them games +with me. That's your line, that is--buy your way back! You'd buy it with +the parish, by making them a church; and you'd buy it with the boy, by +making things for him; but that's what you never shall do, not while I +live to prevent it . . . What you got there, George? You give that +here!" + +It was the sandstone head with the sunken eyes, and Georgie was clinging +to it in his trouble underneath the scaffolding; in an instant Musk had +seized it from him, and dashed it with all his might against the wall, +so that the soft stone flew into a dozen pieces. It was like blood to a +wild beast: the demon of destruction broke loose in Jasper Musk. + +"And that's how I'd treat the rest of your damned handiwork," he roared, +"if I was the village! I'd have no church of your building; I'd bring +that down about your ears right quick!" His wild eye lit upon the wooden +centre of the unfinished arch, and "This is what I'd do," he shouted, +lunging at the woodwork with his heavy stick. "Hypocrite! Pharisee! +Disgrace to God and man! Leper as----" + +But the centre had been dealt a heavy thrust, as from a battering ram, +with each expression; with each it had bulged a little; but the last +lunge drove the whole framework from under the unfinished arch, which +came crashing down amid a yellow cloud. Musk shuffled backward in time +to save his toes; for an instant then both he and Carlton stood aghast. + +Robbed of his latest treasure, and moreover having seen it smashed to +atoms before his eyes, Georgie had been howling lustily when the crash +came: when the yellow cloud lifted he lay silent enough, in a little +brown heap below the scaffolding, and already the blood was through his +hair. + +Carlton had him in his arms that instant. + +"He's insensible," he said quietly. "A nasty scalp wound, and may be +more. What day is this?" + +"Wednesday." + +Musk did not know what he was saying, but the cool question had elicited +a correct though unconscious reply. + +"Wednesday used to be the doctor's day at the dispensary----" + +"And is still," cried Musk, coming to his senses. + +"Then one of us must run for him." + +"I can't run!" + +"Then you must hold him while I do. Stop! I'll take him to the house; +you must bathe his head while I'm gone." + +Another minute and the boy lay in the rectory study, upon the little bed +in which Carlton had fought death and won three years before; yet +another, and up limped Jasper, crooked with pain, out of breath, but +gasping for news of Georgie as though he had been a week on the way. + +"Has he come to yet?" + +"No, and there's a lot of blood. We must stop it if we can. Wait till I +get a sponge and some water." + +Jasper Musk was bending over the boy, looking huger than ever upon his +knees, when Carlton returned to the room. + +"What have I done?" he was muttering. "What have I done? What have I +done?" + +"Nothing that you could help," replied Carlton, briskly. "Now you keep +squeezing this sponge out over his head--never mind the bed--till I get +back." + +Georgie lay insensible for hours. It was not the loss of blood, which +looked much worse than it was, and ceased altogether with the dressing +of the wound. There was, however, somewhat serious concussion +underneath; and Dr. Marigold bluntly refused to guarantee the event. + +"The pity is to move him," he grumbled towards night. "But is there +anybody here who could nurse the boy?" + +"Only myself," said Carlton, who had been quiet and quick to help all +the afternoon. + +The doctor shot an upward glance through his shaggy white eyebrows. + +"Well, you're handy enough, I must say; and, as we know, the very devil +to do things single-handed; but this you couldn't do. No, I'd like to +take him straight to the infirmary, only I'm on horseback." + +"There are traps in the village." + +"They would jolt too much." + +"Then let me carry him." + +"It's five miles." + +"Never mind. I could do it. And he shouldn't jolt--he shouldn't jolt!" + +The mellow voice that had charmed the countryside in bygone years, it +fell and quivered with infinite tenderness and love, and it sped to the +heart of the gaunt old doctor. So this time Marigold raised his whole +head, and his look was open, prolonged, and penetrating. + +"No, no, Mr. Carlton," he said at length, and in the tone of old times. +"It might do no good, after all. But I'll tell you what you shall do: +you shall carry him to the Flint House, and I'll spend the night there +if I must." + +All this while Jasper Musk was sitting stunned and staring in the +rector's chair. He had not moved for an hour, nor did he now until +Carlton touched him on the shoulder. + +"We are going, Mr. Musk. I am carrying Georgie to your house." + +Musk raised a ghastly face. + +"He isn't dead?" + +"No." + +"Nor going to die?" + +"God forbid! But the danger is great. The doctor is going to stay with +him all night." + +And there was a touch of jealousy in his tone, lost upon Jasper Musk, +but not on him who inspired it. Silently they left the house, and stole +down the drive in the blue twilight. Carlton led, treading almost on +tip-toe, as if not to wake a child that only slept in his arms. And so +they came to the Flint House, its master limping on the doctor's arm. + +"Go in, Mr. Carlton," said Marigold. "There's no one else to carry him +upstairs." + +And he detained Jasper below. + +"You must let that man stay till he is out of danger," the doctor said. + +"Why must I?" + +"Because I am not justified in staying all night; and he will look after +the boy as you and your wife cannot, and as no one else will, now that +Miss Gleed is away." + +Jasper bowed sullenly to his fate. But the doctor was not done. + +"Besides," said he, his kind hand on the other's arm; "besides, he feels +this as much as you do, and God knows he's gone through enough! To-day, +I tell you candidly, but for him your little lad would be in a worse way +than he is. Now don't you think after this that all of us--even +you--might begin to be just a little less hard--even on him?" + + + + +XXIV + +GLAMOUR AND RUE + + +Georgie's lady was meanwhile enjoying her life in Leipzig, and the more +keenly since she had gone abroad without any thought of pleasure, but +only to work. This was characteristic of Gwynneth Gleed. She was not +light-hearted enough for a young girl; there had been too much sorrow in +her early years, too little sympathy in those that came after; natural +joy she had never known. A born delight in books, a blind appreciation +of the country, a passion for music, and the love of one little child; +these were the pleasures of Gwynneth in her twentieth year; nor as yet +did they include that zest in the present, that joy of merely living, +that healthy appetite for admiration, that proper pride in one's own +person, that catholicity of liking for one's fellow-creatures, which are +of the very spirit and essence of youth. And to youth Gwynneth added +something at least akin to beauty; but never knew it until she came to +live among strangers in a strange land. + +These strangers, who were mostly English, and many of them young +students like herself at the Conservatoire, were singularly kind to +Gwynneth from the first. In some ways they were the best friends the +girl ever had. They taught her the duty of gaiety at her time of life, +and the absolute necessity of a certain amount of vanity in every human +being. Gwynneth was given to understand that she had more to be vain +about than most. Attracted themselves by the uncommon girl with the fine +eyes and the shy manner, her new friends did much to mitigate the latter +by making the very most of her looks and accomplishments, and seeing to +it that Gwynneth did the same. She was not allowed to dress as she liked +in Leipzig, nor to spend the whole of a fine afternoon at her piano, nor +to be out of anything that was going on. The gaieties of the English +colony were of a simple character in themselves, but they were +Gwynneth's high-water-mark in dissipation, and ere long she was throwing +herself into them with that enthusiasm which she brought to every +pursuit. She had learnt to waltz remarkably well, and to talk brightly +about nothing in particular to the acquaintance of a minute's standing. +She was none the less assiduous at her practising and her harmony, and +was still capable of immediate and immense excitement over this poet or +that composer; but these were no longer her only topics. Nor was a +holland pinafore and the small urchin it contained entirely forgotten in +these days. Gwynneth wrote to Georgie oftener than to anybody else in +England. And yet it was to the theatres and a real ball or so that she +first looked forward upon her return. + +Lady Gleed was much more than agreeably disappointed in the new +Gwynneth; herself incapable of seeing beneath the thinnest surface, she +could scarcely believe it was the same girl. Gwynneth was better-looking +and had more to say for herself than had ever appeared possible to Lady +Gleed, who decided to keep her niece in town for the rest of the season, +if not to present so creditable a _débutante_ at the next drawing-room. +And a much more critical person, her son Sidney, coming up from +Cambridge for a night, was not less favourably impressed. + +Gleed of Trinity, a third-year man, was in his turn a vast improvement +upon the private scholar who had seldom addressed a syllable to Gwynneth +in his holidays, but had gone past whistling with his dogs. He was now a +really handsome little man, with a clear brown skin and a moustache as +mature as his manner; looked and spoke like a man of thirty; and could +be amusing enough with his sly satire and his ready repartee. Cynical +this youth must always be, but the cynicism was more good-humoured and +less ill-natured than formerly, and not abhorrent in the man as it had +been in the boy. At all events it amused Gwynneth, who was furthermore +surprised and excited to find that Sidney had read quite a number of +great books, and rather entertained than otherwise by his blasphemous +opinions of many of them. So they had something in common after all; and +Sidney was certainly very attentive and gay and nice-looking. + +It was in the drawing-room in Hyde Park Place, during an hour which went +very quickly, that Gwynneth made these discoveries; she was still too +simple to remark, much less read, the calculating droop of Sidney's +eyelids or the veiled preoccupation of the hereditary stare. + +"I wonder if you'd care to have a look at Cambridge," at last said +Sidney, in the purely speculative tone. + +"Like to? I'd love it!" cried Gwynneth at once. + +Sidney paused, without relaxing his stare. She was certainly very +animated. Sidney was not sure that he cared for quite so much animation +with so little cause. + +"I shouldn't wonder if you did rather like it," he proceeded, "in +May-week--which never is in May, you know." + +"Oh? When is it?" + +"The week after next. There'll be heaps going on. Races every +afternoon----" + +"And don't you steer your boat?" interrupted Gwynneth, a partisan on the +spot. + +Sidney smiled. + +"I cox it, Gwynneth; and if we aren't head of the river we shall not be +very far off. But it isn't only the races; there are all sorts of other +things, a good match, garden-parties galore, and a dance every night." + +"You dance there!" + +"Yes," said Sidney; "do you?" + +"Rather!" + +"Get some in Leipzig?" + +"All that there was to get." + +"They dance well out there?" + +"I don't know." + +"But you do, of course?" + +Gwynneth saw the drift of this examination, and showed that she saw it, +but Sidney liked her the better for her dry reply: + +"You'd better try me." + +"You'd better try _me_," he rejoined adroitly. + +"Very well," said Gwynneth. "Here?" + +"Come on," said Sidney, his eyes sparkling, his brown skin a warmer hue; +and in an instant they were threading their way between the cumbrous +chairs and tiny tables of the big room, ploughing through its heavy +pile, he in patent leather boots, she in her walking shoes, and not so +much as a piano-organ in the street to set the time. Yet, even under +these conditions, a turn was enough for Sidney, though he did not want +to stop, and was very quick in asking whether he would do. + +"You know you will," said Gwynneth, forgetting everything in the +prospect of so excellent a partner. + +"And you dance rippingly," declared her cousin; "by Jove, I wish we +could have you at the First Trinity ball!" + +So did Gwynneth; but, instead of betraying further eagerness, sat down +at the piano, and, saying it was nothing without the music, forthwith +treated Sidney to snatch after snatch of the waltzes of the hour, +rendering each with a brilliance of touch and a delicacy of execution +alike worthy of a better cause. A year ago Gwynneth would not have done +this. + +Sidney, his hands in his pockets, but a sparkle still in his eyes, stood +watching her without a word until the end. + +"Look here," he then announced, "you've simply got to come, and that's +all about it. Of course the mater couldn't get away, but Lydia isn't so +full up, and I should think she'd jump at it. I'll write to her and fix +it up. There's a piano in our rooms, and we'll have it tuned for you; +no, we'll get a grand in for the week; and the whole court will be full +of men listening." + +"Who are 'we'?" inquired Gwynneth. + +"Oh, I share rooms with another fellow; an Eton man; you'll like him." + +And once more Sidney looked a little critically at his cousin, as though +he wanted to be quite sure that the Eton man would like her. But at this +moment the dressing-gong threw him into consternation. It appeared that +he was dining out at some club, had come up for this dinner, was only +sleeping in the house, and would be gone first thing in the morning. So +he had better say good-bye; and did so with rather unnecessary warmth, +Gwynneth thought; nevertheless, it was the dullest evening she had yet +spent in Hyde Park Place, though there was a little dinner-party there +also, after which the inevitable performance by Gwynneth was received +with the customary acclamation. + +It may be supposed that the girl was not enchanted with the prospect of +Lydia for chaperone; but she determined thus early to allow nothing to +interfere with her enjoyment of the Cambridge festivities. So when Mrs. +Goldstein came in her carriage on the next day but one, to say that she +supposed they must go, not that she was keen upon it herself, but to +please Sidney, and also because she thought it only right for young +girls like Gwynneth to have a good time while they could, the latter +tried to seem as grateful as though every word of Lydia's did not +irritate or repel her. She there and then received dictatorial +instructions as to dresses requisite for the week, and undertook to +follow them to the letter. It was not a congenial attitude for Gwynneth +to assume, but she also was at present bent upon that "good time" which +her cousin recommended. Lydia, on the other hand, cultivated the air of +one who is personally past all that. She seldom smiled, but yet had a +certain secret fondness for excitement. Gwynneth feared that she was far +from happy; she seemed dissatisfied with her position in society, and +spoke disrespectfully (when she did speak) of the dark, dapper, capable +man of business, her indulgent husband. + +There came a time when Gwynneth Gleed would have given much to forget +the merriest week of her life, but the memory of the next few days was +not to be destroyed. The girl never forgot the narrow streets teeming +with exuberant youth, the narrow river in similar case, the crush and +rush and uproar on the banks, the procession of boats flashing past, +each with an eight in which Gwynneth took no interest, but a ninth who +had always the same calm, brown, clean-cut face in her mind's eye. How +well he looked, swinging with his crew, he in his blazer, cool and +malicious, doing his part with splendid precision if only they did +theirs! One night they made their bump right opposite the boat in which +Gwynneth stood on tiptoe; and Sidney's smile at the supreme moment was +one of her vivid recollections; and her little scene with Lydia another, +which she brought upon herself by cheering as loud as any of the men. +Sidney seemed very popular. Gwynneth was so proud to be seen with him, +especially when he wore his battered mortar-board and blue gown, which +appealed in some foolish way to her own vague intellectual aspirations. +And she looked down upon all the gowns that were not blue. + +But everything in Cambridge did appeal to Gwynneth, from the anthem and +the chancel-roof in King's Chapel to luncheon with Sidney and the Eton +man in Old Court. Lydia was for ever reproving her cousin's enthusiasm; +but Gwynneth was enjoying herself too much to resent anything that Mrs. +Goldstein could say. At the outset, however, a close observer might have +caught even Sidney with a cocked eyebrow, and the eye beneath upon the +Eton man; the girl was so frank and unsophisticated in the display of +her delight; but the Eton man seemed to admire it in her, and Sidney +gave up looking like that. The Eton man was twice his height, could +sing, and swore that nobody had ever played his accompaniments as +Gwynneth did; but he was not in any boat, and he could not compare with +Sidney as a partner. Nevertheless, his attentions and attractions had +more to answer for than anybody knew. + +Gwynneth had thought Sidney very nice in town, but at Cambridge he was +perfect. He was a thorough little man of the world, unconscious, +unconcerned, whereas many of the men whom Gwynneth met were scarcely +worthy of the name. Sidney did things like a prince, having an enviable +allowance, and a very good idea of the way in which things should be +done. And his arrangements were masterly; no day like the last, or +next; and the whole a whirl of gaiety and excitement literally +intoxicating to one whose experience of this kind was so limited as poor +Gwynneth's. It all ended with the First Trinity ball. There is no need +to dilate on the astonishing magnificence of this revel; it was the most +memorable and splendid of them all; and the Backs by night, with a moon +in the heaven above and another in the water below, and grey old gables +salient in its light, and the Guards' Band in the faint distance, that +ought to have been so loud and near; all this was even more entrancing +than the ball itself, and Gwynneth moved as in a dream. She had had the +audacity to divide her dances between Sidney and the Eton man; but one +of them was given cause to complain towards the end, and the more so +since the girl had never looked so radiant in her life. The next day +Gwynneth and Lydia (who would not speak to her) were to return to town. +It had never been arranged that Sidney was to accompany them; yet he +did; and before evening there was trouble in Hyde Park Place. + +Sir Wilton would not hear of it at first; he was soon obliged to do +that. But he stood firm in refusing his consent to a formal engagement +between Sidney and his first cousin, and found an unexpected ally in +Gwynneth herself. The girl was paying for her week's delirium by a +deeper depression than her face betrayed or her heart admitted. Already +she was beginning to disappoint her cousin. But this was too much. + +"You agree with him?" gasped Sidney. "You'd rather _not_ be engaged? +Then why, my darling, did you ever say 'yes'?" + +"It wasn't to that question, dear," said Gwynneth, colouring. + +"It amounted to the same thing." + +"It will amount to the same thing," Gwynneth said earnestly; "at least I +hope and pray that it may. But, of course, it's quite true that we're +both very young; and at least it's within the bounds of possibility +that--one or other of us might--some day--change." + +"Speak for yourself," said Sidney, with a taunting bitterness. + +"Dear, if you'll believe me, I'm thinking quite as much of you. At +twenty-two you would tie yourself for life!" + +"That's my look-out," said Sidney, grandly. "Age isn't everything, and +I'm not a boy; anyhow I know my own mind, if you don't know yours." + +Gwynneth's eyes filled with tears. + +"Oh, why did you tell me you cared for me?" she exclaimed. "Why did you +make me say I cared for you? It was true--it was true--but we seem to +have spoilt it by putting it into words. Oh, I was so happy before you +spoke! I never was so happy as all last week. I could have gone on like +that--I was so happy. And now it's all different already; you are, and I +am . . ." + +Sidney was watching her tears unmoved, for she had made him reflect. All +at once he saw his heartlessness, and next moment he was kissing her +tears away; vowing there was no difference in him; but, if it was +otherwise with her, well, then, let them consider everything unsaid, and +start afresh. + +Gwynneth shook her head. Her eyes were dry again and full of thought. + +"No, dear, we can't do that; and you mustn't think I am not happy in +your love, because I am. Only, there seemed to be such a spell between +us before we were sure of each other. But perhaps it's always like +that." + +In the end they were engaged, but it was not to be a public engagement +for six months. Meanwhile Sidney returned to Cambridge for the Long, +having taken only a part of his degree; and Gwynneth quickly recovered +her reputation as a reformed character in the eyes of Lady Gleed, who +was less against the match than her husband, and who took the girl to +innumerable parties, each of which Gwynneth made a determined effort to +enjoy as thoroughly as the first half of the First Trinity ball. + +She seemed always in the highest spirits; and there was no one about her +who knew her well enough to know also that this perpetual brightness was +hard and unnatural in Gwynneth. Closer observers than Sir Wilton and his +wife might indeed have suspected as much; but there was only one +occasion upon which Gwynneth betrayed the livelier symptoms of a +troubled spirit. This was on her birthday at the beginning of July; upon +the breakfast table was a registered packet with the Cambridge +post-mark, and in its morocco case Gwynneth presently beheld a richer +necklace than she had ever dreamt of possessing as her own. Yet the +look in her face was so strange that Lady Gleed was obliged to speak. + +"Don't you like pearls, my dear?" + +"Oh! yes, oh! yes." + +"But you don't look pleased." + +"No more I am!" + +And she rushed from the room in unaccountable tears, and upstairs to her +own, where she was presently discovered writing a letter at top speed, +and crying bitterly as she wrote; it was Lady Gleed herself who +discovered her. + +"What _is_ the matter, Gwynneth?" + +"I am writing to Sidney. I cannot take such presents from him. I am +writing to tell him why." + +"I think you are very silly," said Lady Gleed. "But your uncle wants to +see you in his study; that is really why I came up; and I don't think +you'll be so silly when you have heard what he has to tell you." + +There was an air of mystery about Lady Gleed, who furthermore kissed +Gwynneth before they separated on the landing. The girl went downstairs +with chill forebodings. Sir Wilton was seated at his massive desk, but +rose fussily as she entered, and wheeled up a chair with almost +excessive courtesy. Gwynneth had seldom seen him looking so benign. + +"I sent for you," said Sir Wilton, resuming his own seat, "because I +have some news for you, Gwynneth, which I am sure you will be as glad to +hear as I am to communicate it. It is against the law to dwell upon a +lady's age, but at yours I think you can afford to forgive me. I +believe that you are twenty-one to-day?" + +Gwynneth had not thought of that before, and at the present moment she +could scarcely believe she was no more. She made her admission with a +sigh. + +"Then for twenty-one years," pursued Sir Wilton, beaming, "or let us say +for as many of them as you can remember, you have, I presume, looked +upon yourself as an entirely penniless young lady? That has not been the +case; at least it is the case no longer. I--I hope I am not giving you +bad news?" + +Gwynneth was trembling all over. She had lost every vestige of colour. + +"My mother!" she gasped. "Why did she never know?" + +"Because, under the terms of your grandfather's will, nobody but myself +was to know anything at all about it until to-day." + +"It was cruel," cried the girl, in a breaking voice; "it might have kept +her here! It makes me not want to hear anything now . . . but of course +I must . . . forgive me, please." + +"My dear child," said Sir Wilton, kindly, "it is natural enough that you +should feel that. I can only ask you to believe that I at least had no +choice in the matter. And there were reasons; it is too painful to go +into them; your father was my brother, and I had rather say no more. I, +for my part, was obliged to fulfil the conditions. I have tried to do my +duty. I would gladly have done more, but your dear mother was the most +independent woman I ever met. I honoured her for it. But what could I +do? I must beg of you, my dear, to look upon the bright side; and, +believe me, this business has the very brightest side it is possible to +imagine." + +Gwynneth did her best. It was fine to be independent in her turn. But +the thought of her mother made her ashamed to touch a penny. And it was +a matter of several thousand pounds, invested all these years at +compound interest, yet with that absolute safety which distinguished the +financial operations of Sir Wilton Gleed. + +Sir Wilton could not say off-hand what the present capital would yield +if left where it was at simple interest, but he fancied it would work +out at seven or eight hundred a year at the very least. And these +figures, which sounded fabulous to poor Gwynneth, were obviously in +themselves the bright side upon which her uncle had harped. Yet he +continued to beam as though there was something more to come, and looked +so knowing that Gwynneth was obliged to ask him what it was. + +"Can't you see?" he said. "Can't you see?" + +"It is an immense amount of money. I can't see beyond that." + +"You heard me say that nobody knew anything at all about it except +myself, and, of course, my solicitors?" + +"Yes." + +"Even your aunt did not know until I told her just now." + +"Indeed." + +"And Sidney won't know until you tell him!" + +Then Gwynneth saw. Sir Wilton took care that she should. He did not on +principle approve of marriages between cousins; he said so frankly; he +might be wrong. But there was one thing which made him very proud of his +son's choice. And this was that thing; there were others also upon which +Sir Wilton touched with much playful gallantry. + +"But perhaps," said he, "you won't have anything more to say to the poor +lad now!" + + + + +XXV + +SIGNS OF CHANGE + + +Georgie was a short head taller, and no pinafore concealed the glories +of his sailor suit; but it was still the same baby face, round as the +eyes that greeted all comers with the same friendly gaze. His sentences +were longer and more ambitiously constructed; but he still said +"somekin" and "I wish I would," and, when excited, "my Jove!" And his +lady once more danced attendance by the hour and day together; for Sir +Wilton and Lady Gleed were paying visits until September; and Sidney was +still understood to be making up for lost time at Cambridge. + +Gwynneth had enjoyed the child's society the year before; now she seemed +dependent upon it. She would have him with her daily on one pretext or +another, sometimes upon none at all. She said she liked to hear him +talk, and that was well, for Georgie's tongue only rested in his sleep. +But now there was often an intrinsic interest in his conversation. He +gave Gwynneth many an item of village news which was real news to her. +Thus it was from his own lips that she first heard of his accident, on +seeing the scar through his hair. + +"Course I was in bed," swaggered Georgie; "I was in bed for years an' +years an' years--in bed and sensible." + +"Oh, Georgie, do you mean insensible?" + +"No, sensible, I tell you." + +"Did you know what was going on?" + +"Course I di'n't, not a bit. How could I fen I was sensible?" + +"My poor darling, it might have killed you! How ever did you do it?" + +But, as so often happens in such cases, that was what Georgie had never +been able to remember. So Gwynneth turned to Jasper Musk, who sat within +earshot; it was in the Flint House garden, on the very afternoon of her +return. + +"That was my fault," said Jasper, gruffly enough, yet with such a glance +at Georgie that Gwynneth was sorry she had broached the subject, and +changed it at once. + +But she reverted to it as soon as she had Georgie to herself. Who had +looked after him when he was ill? She was feeling very jealous of +somebody. + +"Granny did." + +"No one else?" + +"An' grand-daddy." + +"Was that all, Georgie?" + +Gwynneth was very sorry she had ever gone abroad. + +"Course it wasn't all," said Georgie, remembering. "There was the funny +old man from the church." + +"Mr. Carlton?" + +"Yes." + +"So _he_ came to see you?" + +"Yes, he often. I love him," Georgie announced with emphasis; "he makes +lovely, lovely, _lovely_ faces!" + +"And does he ever come now?" + +"No, not now, course he doesn't; he's too busy buildin' his church." + +"So he's building still!" + +"Yes, 'cos he builds wery nicely," Georgie was pleased to say; "better'n +me, he builds, far better'n me." + +"And is he still alone?" + +"All alone," said Georgie; "all alonypony by his own little self!" + +And the inconsequent nonsense sent him off into untimely laughter, +louder and more uproarious than ever, quite a virile guffaw. But +Gwynneth could not even smile. And now when neither listening to Georgie +nor haunted by her engagement, Gwynneth began to think of the lonely +outcast behind those trees, as she had begun indeed to think of him the +spring before last, while her mind and life were yet unfilled by the +motley interests which this last year had brought into both. + +The thought afflicted her with a sense of personal hardness and cruelty; +there was this lonely man, doing the work of ten, not spasmodically, but +day after day, and year after year, still unaided and unforgiven by the +very people in whose midst and for whose benefit those prodigies of +labour were being performed. Gwynneth knew now that there had been some +mysterious wickedness before the burning of the church. It was all she +cared to know. What crime could warrant such hardness of heart in the +face of such devotion, skill, patience, consummate endurance, and +invincible determination? These were heroic qualities, no matter what +vileness lay beneath or behind them; and the generous capacity for +hero-worship was very strong in Gwynneth. She would have honoured this +man for his splendid pertinacity, and have wiped all else from the +slate. That his own parishioners continued to dishonour him, and that +she perforce had to do as they did, made her indignant with them and +dissatisfied with herself. So far as Gwynneth was honestly aware, this +feeling was a purely impersonal one. It would have been excited by any +other being who had achieved the like and been thus rewarded. It is +noteworthy, however, that Gwynneth found it necessary to explain the +position to herself. + +It was strange, too, how her life had impinged upon his, strange because +the points of contact had in each case left a disproportionate +impression upon her mind. She often thought of them. There was once in +the very beginning, when she had actually stopped him in the village to +ask the name of the poem from which he had quoted on Sunday. Gwynneth +had never told a soul about this, she was so ashamed of her unmaidenly +impulse; but she still remembered the look of pleasure that had flashed +through his pain, and the kind sad voice which both answered her +question and thanked her for asking it. That must have been only a day +or two before the fire; the same summer there was the silent scene +between them in the drawing-room, when she longed to shake hands with +him, to show him her sympathy, but did not dare. Then came the finding +of Georgie in the stonemason's shed, only the spring before last; but +Gwynneth found that she had been gauche as usual even then, that she had +never risen to any of these occasions, but that her one small attempt to +express her sympathy had been nothing less than a piece of tactless +presumption on her part. And yet she felt so much! + +Well, it was something that Musk had opened his doors to him, if only +under pressure of a harrowing occasion; even then it was much, very +much, in the prime infidel of the parish. It was a beginning, an +example; it might show others the way. Gwynneth presently discovered +that it had. + +She had not brought Georgie to see the saddler this time, and she was +trying to follow that thinker's harangue as though she had really come +to him for political instruction; but all the while the sound from among +the trees distracted her attention and mystified her mind. It was +neither the ringing impact of iron upon iron, nor the swish of a sharp +steel point through the soft sandstone. It was the drone of a saw, as +Gwynneth knew well enough when she asked what the sound was in the first +opportunity afforded her. + +"That's the reverend," said the saddler, dryly. + +"It sounds like sawing," said disingenuous Gwynneth. "Has he reached the +roof?" + +"Gord love yer, miss, not he!" + +Gwynneth was consumed with an interest that she feared to show, +especially with the saddler looking at her through his spectacles as +others had done when Mr. Carlton supplied the topic of conversation. It +was a look that seemed to ask her how much she knew, and it always +offended her. She did not want to know what he had done; all her +interest was in what he was doing, alone there behind the trees. Yet now +she felt that speak she must, if it was only to soften a single heart, +in the very slightest degree, towards that unhappy man; and she had come +to the saddler with no other purpose. + +"Does no one go near him yet?" she asked point-blank. + +The saddler leant across his bench; the girl had refused the only chair +in the little workshop, and was standing outside at the open window, as +all his visitors did. + +"You won't tell Sir Wilton, miss?" + +"I shan't go out of my way to make mischief, Mr. Fuller, if that's what +you mean. But you had better not tell me any secrets," said Gwynneth, +with a coldness that cost her an effort; however, the saddler's skin was +in keeping with his calling. + +"Then you can keep that or not," said he, "as you think fit; but _I_ go +and see him now and then, and, what's more, I'm not ashamed of it." + +"I should think not!" the girl broke out; and Fuller sunned himself in +the warmth of fine eyes on fire. "I mean," stammered Gwynneth, "after +all this time, and all he has done!" + +"What I said to myself last Christmas, miss; and I'm the only man that +say it to-day, in this here village full of old women and hypocrites; if +you'll excuse my blunt way o' speaking to a young lady like you. 'This +here's gone on long enough,' thinks I; 'an' it's the season of peace an' +good-will,' I says to myself; 'darned if I don't step across the road to +cheer up the poor old reverend, an' Sir Wilton can turn me out of house +an' home if he find out an' think proper.' Don't you mistake me, miss; I +wasn't thinking of Sir Wilton in what I said just now, and ought not to +have said to a young lady like you. No, miss, Sir Wilton has his own +quarrel with the reverend; and _I_ had _my_ quarrel, as far as that go; +but, Gord love yer, a man of my experience can afford to forgive an' +forget, an' be generous as well as just. There isn't a juster man alive +than me, Miss Gwynneth; and not a soul in this parish, or out of it, +that can say I'm not generous too." + +"I'm sure of it, Mr. Fuller. But did you go over to the rectory?" + +"There and then," cried Fuller; "there--and--then. And I told him +straight that I for one--but that's no use to go over what I said and he +said," observed the saddler, hastily. "I can only tell you that in ten +minutes we were chattun away as though nothun had ever come between us. +And what do you suppose, miss? What do you suppose?" + +Gwynneth shook her head, unable to imagine what was coming, and anxious +to hear. + +"He hadn't seen a newspaper in all these years! Hadn't so much as heard +of that there Home Rule Bill of old Gladstone's, and didn't even know +there'd been a war in the Sowd'n!" Gwynneth looked equally ignorant of +this. "You know, miss? The Sowd'n, where General Gordon was betrayed +and deserted by them varmin you'd stick up for. But we won't quarrel no +more about that: only to think of the poor old reverend knowun no more +about it than the man in the moon until I told him! Why, I had to tell +him one of the Royal Family was dead an' buried; it would have been just +the same if it had been the Queen herself, God bless her!" + +"So he has been absolutely shut off from the world," Gwynneth murmured. + +"There you've hit it, miss! 'Shut off from the world,' there you've put +it into better language than I did," said the saddler, with his most +complimentary air. "Gord love yer, miss, it used to be the reverend that +passed his _Standard_ on to me; but ever since last Christmas it's been +me that's taken my _East Anglian_ over to him; so the boot's been on the +other leg properly; and right glad I've been to do anything for him, and +to take my pipe across now and then as though nothun had ever happened. +Not that he fare to care much for that, neither; he've been so long +alone, I do believe he've got to like his own society as well as any. +Yes, miss, shut off from the world he have been and he is; but he won't +be shut off from the world much longer!" + +"Oh?" + +Gwynneth's interest was re-awakened. + +"No," said Fuller, with the air of mystery in which his class delights; +"no, miss, he's not one to be shut off longer than he can help. Hear +that sound?" + +"I do indeed." + +Latterly she had been listening to nothing else. + +"That's a saw!" + +"Well?" + +"Do you know what he's sawun?" + +"No." + +"Planks for benches!" + +Gwynneth repeated the last word in a puzzled whisper; and so stood +staring until the obvious explanation had become obvious to her. It +remained inexplicable. + +"I don't see the good of benches before the church is finished, Mr. +Fuller." + +"He mean to hold his services whether that's finished or not. And I mean +to attend 'em," the saddler said with an air. + +"But--I thought----" + +"He was suspended for five year, and the bishop has given him leave to +get to work directly the five year is up. That I happen to know." + +"It must be nearly up now!" + +"That's up next Sunday as ever is, and you'll know it when you hear the +bell ring. He's got one of the old uns slung to a tree, for I helped him +to sling it, and it's the first help he's had all this time. I wouldn't +mention it, miss, for the reverend doesn't want a crowd; there'll be +quite enough come when they hear the bell, if it's only to see what +happens; but the whole neighbourhood 'll be there if that get about." + +"And there's really going to be service in the church--just as it +is--without a roof--this very next Sunday!" + +It sounded incredible to Gwynneth, and yet it thrilled her as the +incredible does not. The very drone of the saw was thrilling now. + +"There is, miss, and I mean to be there," said the village Hampden, with +inflated chest. "I can't help it if that cost me Sir Wilton's custom, +the reverend and me are good friends again, and I mean to be there." + + + + +XXVI + +A VERY FEW WORDS + + +It had been in the air all Saturday, but few believed the rumour until +ten minutes to eleven next morning. At that hour and at that minute Long +Stow was electrified by the measured ringing of a single bell--a bell +hoarse with five years' rest and rust--a bell no ear had heard since the +night of the fire. + +Gwynneth was afield upon the upland, far beyond the church, a pitiful +waverer between desire and indecision. Now she must go; and now she must +not think of it. It was unnecessary, gratuitous, provocative, +ostentatious, unmaidenly, immodest--and yet--both her duty and her +desire. So the string of adjectives might be applied to her; they were +no deterrent to a nature which hesitated often, but seldom was afraid. +Gwynneth treated more respectfully the poignant query of her own +consciousness: was she absolutely certain that she did not at all desire +to show off like the saddler? She was not. + +She did desire to show off, if it was showing off to honour openly the +man whom she admired and wished others to admire. She gloried in the +man's achievement, and possibly also in her own appreciation of it and +him. That was her real point of contact with the saddler. But for +Fuller there was the excuse of unconsciousness, and for Gwynneth there +was not. So she read herself that Sunday morning, under an August sky +without a fleck and a sun that drew the resin from those very pine-trees +upon which the outcast had so often gazed. It was thereabouts that +Gwynneth lingered, of self-analysis all compact. Then the hoarse bell +began--came calling up to her from the clump of chestnuts and of +elms--calling like a friend in pain . . . + +Gwynneth reached church by way of the strip of glebe behind it and the +gate into this from the lane, thus escaping the throng already gathered +at the other gate. She saw nothing but the rude benches as she entered +in; the last of these was too near for her; she shrank to the far end of +it, close against the wall, and the bell stopped as she sank upon her +knees. The beating of her heart seemed to take its place. Then there +came a light yet measured step. It passed very near, with a subdued and +subtle rustle, that might yet have meant one other woman. But Gwynneth +knew better, though she never looked. + +"_I will arise, and go to my father, and will say unto him, Father, I +have sinned against heaven, and before thee, and am no more worthy to be +called thy son._" + +Already the girl could not see; all her being was involved in an effort +to suppress a sob. It was suppressed. There were no tears in the voice +that so moved Gwynneth. How serene it was, though sad! It began to +soothe her, as she remembered that it had done when she was quite a +little girl. She was a little girl again: these five years fled . . . +But oh, why had he chosen _that_ sentence of the scriptures? Gwynneth +looked at her book (for now she could see) and found that some of the +others would have been worse. + +At last she could raise her eyes; and there was Fuller in the very +front; and not another soul. + +But Gwynneth cared for nothing any more except the gentle voice that it +was her pride to follow in the general confession, kneeling indeed, yet +kneeling bolt upright in her proud allegiance. + +A strange picture, the rude benches, the ragged walls; the east window +still a chasm, the hot sun streaming through it down the aisle; and over +all the blue cruciform of sky, broken only by the nodding plumes of the +taller elms. And a congregation yet more strange--only Gwynneth and the +saddler. But this did not continue. Gwynneth heard movements in the +porch behind her, and presently a stumble on the part of one driven in +by the press; but no voices; not a whisper; and ere-long he who had been +forced in, tired of standing, came on tiptoe and occupied the end of +Gwynneth's bench. + +Now it was the second lesson. The rector was reading it in the same +sweet voice, with all his old precision and knowledge of his mother +tongue, and never a trip or an undue emphasis. No one would have +believed that that voice had been all but silent for five whole years. +And yet some change there was, something different in the reading, +something even in the voice; the clerical monotone was abandoned, the +reading was more human, natural, and sympathetic. The change was in +keeping with others. The rector wore no vestments in the naked eye of +heaven, but only his cassock, his surplice, and his Oxford hood. There +were flowers upon the simple table behind him, such roses as still grew +wild in his tangled garden, but no candle to melt double in the sun. The +lectern he had done his best to burnish; but it was still a cripple from +the fire. Above, the rector's hair shone like silver, for the sun swept +over it, but the lean dark face was all in shadow. Gwynneth only saw the +fresh trim cut of the grizzled beard, and the walnut colour of the +gnarled hand drooping over the book. That speaking hand! + +Now it was the first hymn--actually! So he dared to have hymns, and to +sing them if necessary by himself! But it was not necessary, and not +only Gwynneth joined in with all the little voice she possessed, but +presently there were false notes from the other end of the bench, and +the saddler was not silent. But Robert Carlton's voice rang sweet and +clear above the rest:-- + + "Jesu, Lover of my soul, + Let me to Thy Bosom fly, + While the gathering waters roll, + While the tempest still is high: + Hide me, O my Saviour, hide, + Till the storm of life is past: + Safe into the haven guide, + O receive my soul at last . . ." + +The hymn haunted Gwynneth upon her knees, taking her mind from the +remaining prayers. It was a hymn that she had loved as a little child, +and now it seemed so simple and so whole-hearted to one who longed +always to be both. But it was the passionate humility of it that touched +and filled the heart; and yet there had been neither tremor nor appeal +in the voice that led; and the humility was only in accord with one of +the simplest services ever held. + +The second hymn was another of Gwynneth's favourites; she could not +afterwards have said which, for in the middle Mr. Carlton knelt, and +then came forward to the twisted lectern at the head of the aisle. + +It was not a sermon; it was only a very few words. Yet in Long Stow +nothing else was talked of that day, nor for many a day to follow. + +The few words were these:-- + + "The first verse of the nineteenth psalm: + + "_The heavens declare the glory of God; and the + firmament sheweth his handywork._ + + "Though I have given you a text, my brethren, I do not + intend this morning to preach any sermon. If you care + to hear me again--if you choose to give me another + trial--if you are willing to help me to start + afresh--then come again next Sunday, only come in + properly, and make the best of the poor benches which + are all I have to offer you as yet. There will only be + one weekly service at present. I believe that you + could nearly all come to that--if you would! But I am + afraid that many would have to stand. + + "I cannot tell you how grieved I am that your church + is not ready for you; but I hope and believe, as I + stand before you here, that it will be ready soon, + much sooner than you suppose. Then one great wrong + will be righted, though only one. + + "Meanwhile, so long as we are blessed with days like + these--and I pray that many may be in store for + us--meanwhile, could there be a fitter or a lovelier + roof to the House of God than His own sky as we see it + above us to-day? Though at present we can have no + music worthy the name, have you not noticed, during + all this our service, the constant song and twitter of + those friends of man, as I know them to be, of whom + Jesus said, 'Not one of them is forgotten before God'? + And for incense, what fragrance have we not, in our + unfinished church, that is the House of God all the + more because it is also His open air. + + "My brethren, _you_ need be no farther from heaven, + here in this place, unfinished as it is, than when the + roof is up, and the windows are in, and proper seats, + and when a new organ peals . . . and one whom you can + respect stands where I am standing now . . . + + "My brethren--once my friends--will you never, never + be my friends again? + + "_Oh spare me a little that I may recover my strength: + before I go hence, and be no more seen . . ._ + + "Dear friends, I have said far more than I ever meant + to say. But it is your own fault; you have been so + good to me; so many of you have come in; and you are + listening to me--to me! If you never listen to me + again, if you never come near me any more, I shall + still thank you--thank you--to my dying hour! + + "But let no eye be dim for me. I do not deserve it. I + do not want it. If you ever cared for me--any of + you--be strong now and help me . . . + + "And remember--never, never forget--that a just God + sits in yonder blue heaven above us--that He is not + hard--that I told you . . . He is merciful . . . + merciful . . . merciful . . . + + "O look above once more before we part, and see again + how '_The heavens declare the glory of God; and the + firmament sheweth his handywork_.' + + * * * * * + + "And now to God the Father, God the Son, and God the + Holy Ghost, be ascribed all honour, power, dominion, + might, henceforth and for ever. Amen." + +He had controlled himself by a superb effort. The end was as calm as the +beginning; but the rather hard, almost defiant note, that might have +marred the latter in ears less eager than Gwynneth's and more sensitive +than those of the people in the porch, that note had passed out of +Robert Carlton's voice for ever. + +And there no longer were any people in the porch; one by one they had +all crept in to listen, some stealing to the rude seats, more standing +behind, none remaining outside. Thus had they melted the heart they +could not daunt, until all at once it was speaking to their hearts out +of its own exceeding fulness, in a way undreamed of when the preacher +delivered his text. + +And this was to be seen as he came down the aisle, white head erect, +pale face averted, and so through the midst of his people--his once +more--without catching the eye of one. + + + + +XXVII + +AN ESCAPE + + +Mr. Fuller had made a hasty exit; but he waylaid Gwynneth on the road. +"Excuse me, miss," he cried, and the girl felt bound to do so. Next +moment she was trying to sort the mixed emotions in the saddler's face, +for a few steps had brought them to his house, and he had halted at the +workshop window. + +"Well, miss, and what do _you_ think of it?" + +"Oh, Mr. Fuller, please don't ask me." + +"I don't mean the sermon, miss; I mean the flock of sheep that come and +listened to the sermon," said the saddler, with a bitterness that +astonished Gwynneth. + +"But, surely, Mr. Fuller, you were glad they did come? I was so +thankful!" declared the girl. + +"So was I, miss; so was I," said the saddler, grimly; "but, Gord love +yer, do you suppose they ever would have shown their noses if you an' me +hadn't given 'em the lead?" + +"Then we ought to be very proud, Mr. Fuller; at least you ought, since +but for you I never should have known in time." + +"But do you think a man of 'em 'll admit it?" continued Fuller fiercely. +"Not they--I know 'em. They'll take the credit, the moment there's any +credit to take--them that hasn't given him a word or a look in all these +years. But the reverend, _he_ know--_he_ know!" + +"I'm sure he does," said Gwynneth, kindly; and left the forerunner to +his ignoble jealousy, only hoping there was some foundation for it, and +that a real reaction was already in the air. + +Even on her way home there were further signs. Jones the schoolmaster, +an implacable enemy these five years, but an emotional man all his life, +was still dabbing his eyes as he held unguarded converse with the +phlegmatic owner of the mill on the lock, who had been his fellow +churchwarden in the days before the fire. + +"I'll be his churchwarden again," declared the schoolmaster, "and Sir +Wilton can say what he likes. We know who ruled the roast before, and we +know----" + +Gwynneth caught no more as she hurried on, her first desire a quiet hour +without a whisper from the world. She wished to recall every word of the +sermon, while every syllable remained in her mind, and then to write it +all down and to possess it for ever. Such was her first feverish +resolve; nor, analytical as she was, did she stop to analyse this. The +stable gates were open; it never occurred to Gwynneth to wonder why. +There was a good way through the stable-yard to the garden, whose +uttermost end she might thus reach without being seen from the house. +And Fraulein Hentig had known where she was thinking of going, had +shaken Gwynneth not a little with her remonstrances, but would be none +the less certain to ask questions when next they met. + +Near the Italian garden was a certain walk, with stark yew hedges on +either hand, and fine grass stretched like a drugget from end to end. +Across this strip the old English flowers, poppies and peonies, +hollyhocks and larkspur, faced each other in serried lines as in a +country dance; and the vista ended in a thatched summer-house where it +was always cool. The spot was a favourite haunt of Gwynneth, who would +catch herself humming the old English songs there, and thinking of +patches and powder and the minuet. It had not that effect this morning; +she neither saw nor smelt the flowers, nor heard the thrush which was +singing to her with persistent sweetness from the stately trees upon the +lawn beyond. Gwynneth was in that other world which had existed all +these years within half-a-mile of this one. What she heard was the +virile cadence of the voice which had always thrilled her; strong and +masterful in the beginning; softening all at once, as the people pressed +in to hear; then for a little high-pitched and hoarse, spasmodic, +tremulous, too touching even to remember with dry eyes; then that last +pause, and the silver clarion of his proper voice once more and to the +end. And what Gwynneth saw, through her tears, was the sunlight resting +on that stricken head, as though God had stretched out His hand in final +mercy and forgiveness. + +But what she was to see, before many minutes were past, or the sermon +over in her mind, was a dapper figure approaching between the old +flowers and the spruce hedges, a figure in riding breeches, swinging a +cutaway coat in his walk. + +It was Sidney, ridden over from Cambridge on a hired horse. Gwynneth had +time to come out of the summer-house to meet him, but none to think. So +he had given her a kiss before she realised what that meant--and knew in +her heart that it must be the last. And the next moment she saw that he +was displeased. + +"So here you are!" was his verbal greeting: "I've been looking for you +all over the shop." + +"I'm so sorry," said poor Gwynneth. "If you had only let us know----" + +"Oh, that's all right; I took my risk, of course." + +He looked her up and down, as she stood in the sunlight, tall and +comely, her state of mind instinctively and successfully concealed; and +the brown tinge came upon his handsome face as the annoyance vanished. +Endearments fell from his lips, but now she made him keep his distance, +though so tactfully that he obviously did not realise his repulse. +Gwynneth looked at him for an instant with great compassion; then she +led the way into the summer-house, her mind made up. + +"You haven't been here all the morning, have you?" he went on. "No, I +see you haven't; there are your gloves." + +"Yes." + +"Been for a walk?" + +"Well, I did go for one." + +"What do you mean?" demanded Sidney, struck at last by her manner. + +"I've been to church!" + +"What! Over to Linkworth and back?" + +"No." + +Her tone trembled; he was not helping her at all. + +"Then what church did you go to, and what on earth's up with you, +darling?" + +"I went to our own church." + +"But I thought that Lakenhall chap only came in the afternoon?" + +"He doesn't go to the church." + +Sidney stared an instant, and was on his feet the next. "You don't mean +to say you've been up to the church talking to--to Carlton?" he cried. + +"No, not talking to him." + +"Then do you mind telling me what you do mean?" + +Gwynneth did her best to explain the occasion and to describe the +service, but found herself unable to do the subject justice in a few +words, and drifted into a nervous enthusiasm as she went. Sidney's eyes +seemed smaller than when she began; she had never known he had so sharp +a chin. But he heard her out, standing in the doorway, and not always +looking her way; it was when averted that his face looked so hard. When +she had finished he gave her his whole attention, and was some time +regarding her, his hands in his pockets, without a word. + +"So you deliberately went to hear that blackguard!" + +"You needn't call him that," said Gwynneth, hotly. + +"But I do." + +"I should be ashamed to abuse him after all he has done!" + +"That doesn't alter what--what you apparently and very properly know +nothing about, Gwynneth." + +"And I don't want to know!" cried the girl, indignant at his tone. "I +only say, whatever he has done, he has paid very bitterly for it, and +made such amends as were never made by anybody I ever heard of. He may +have been all you say. He is more than all that I can say now!" + +"And what do you say?" inquired Sidney, with polite contempt. + +"That we shall honour ourselves in future by honouring him, and +dishonour ourselves by continuing to dishonour him. He has had his +punishment, and look how he has borne it! Why, he has done what was +never done in the world before by one solitary man." + +Gwynneth stopped breathless. Sidney eyed her coolly, his nostrils +curling. "So that's your opinion," he sneered. + +"It's a good deal more than that," cried Gwynneth. "It's my fixed +conviction and personal resolve." + +"To honour that fellow, eh?" + +Gwynneth coloured. + +"To the extent of attending his services when I happen to be here," she +said. And Sidney gave her a pregnant look--a more honest look--angry and +determined as her own. + +"And what about me?" he said. "What if I object?" + +Gwynneth was slow to answer, to tell him the sharp truth outright. + +"Do you mean to go your own way in spite of me, in spite of the +governor, in spite of all of us?" + +Gwynneth saw that she could not remain at the hall and follow such a +course. So this question went unanswered like the last, though for a +different reason. Meanwhile Sidney was accounting for her silence to his +own satisfaction, and he now conceived that the moment had arrived for +him to play the strong man. + +"Look here, Gwynneth," said he, "this is all rot and bosh, and worse--if +you'll take my word for it. And you must take my word, and take it on +trust in a thing like this, or you never will in anything. I tell you +this fellow Carlton is the most unspeakable skunk. But it isn't a thing +we can discuss together. Isn't that enough for you? Isn't my wish +enough, in a thing like this, which I know all about and you don't? Have +I got to enforce it while we're still engaged? If so----" + +Gwynneth had raised her head slowly, and at last she spoke. + +"We are not engaged, Sidney," she said quietly. + +"Not--engaged?" + +"It has never been a proper engagement." + +"A proper engagement!" Sidney gasped. "Not a public one, if you like! +What difference does that make?" + +"No difference. It only makes it--easier----" + +"What does it make easier?" he demanded fiercely. + +Gwynneth was choking with humiliation. It was some moments before she +could command her voice. Her distress was pitiful; but the young man was +already busy pitying himself. A sudden change had come over Sidney. It +was not in all respects a change for the worse. His cynical aplomb had +already disappeared, leaving a tremulous, an angry, but a human being +behind. So Gwynneth felt a leaning to him even at the last; but this +time she knew her mind. + +And she spoke it with equal candour and humility: it was all her fault: +she could never forgive herself; but he would forgive her, when he saw +for himself what the woman will always see quicker than the man. She +liked him better than anybody she knew; that week at Cambridge had been +the happiest week in her life; one day they would, they must, be good +friends again. Meanwhile they had both made a miserable mistake. This +was not love. + +"Speak for yourself," cried Sidney, all bitterness and mortification. +"And I never believed in a woman before," he groaned; "my God, I never +shall again!" + +And he strode out savagely into the sun; but a different Sidney was back +next moment, one that reminded Gwynneth of the very old days, when he +would pass her whistling with his dog. A sneer was on his lips, and his +dry eyes glittered. + +"I beg your pardon for making a scene, Gwynneth; it isn't in my line, as +you know, and I apologise. But do you mind telling me when you +discovered that you had--changed?" + +"I have not changed, Sidney. That is my shame." + +"Do you mean that you never did care about me?" + +"Never in that way. I am ashamed to say it--more humiliated and ashamed +than you can ever know. But it's the truth." + +"Yet at the First Trinity ball, I remember, if you don't----" + +His tone was more than Gwynneth could endure. + +"Yes, I remember," she cried; "and I can explain it, though explanations +are no excuse. Sidney, you know what my life was until the last few +months? Happy enough in heaps of ways, but not the least gaiety in it; +and suddenly I felt the want of it. I felt it first abroad, and you met +that want in your May-week in a way beyond my dreams. You may sneer at +me now, but you were awfully nice to me then, and I shall never, never +forget it. You were so nice that I honestly did think for a little that +you met every other want as well! Yet I tell you now, what I tried to +tell you once before, that when once you had spoken nothing was the +same. It was like touching a bubble. The bubble had burst." + +"You felt like that from the first?" + +Gwynneth turned away, for now they were both upon their feet, restlessly +hovering between the summer-house and the sunlight. + +"And yet it has taken you two months to tell me," pursued Sidney without +remorse. + +"I know; it was dreadful of me; yet I could not tell you till I was +absolutely certain, and it is not so easy to be certain of oneself in +such things. If you find no difficulty, Sidney, then you might pity +those who do. Nevertheless, I did write, on my birthday, when you sent +me those beautiful pearls. Sidney, you must take them back--for my sake. +I meant to send them back at once, but you know what I heard that very +morning! It may have been cowardly and weak, but how could I tell you I +did not love you the moment I knew I was to have a little money of my +own? It's hard enough as it is; but I had not the pluck for that. Yet it +is hard enough now," repeated Gwynneth, with great feeling; "and you +haven't made it easier, Sidney. No, I don't mean anything you may have +said; you have not said more than I deserve. But you tempted me--you +little know how you have tempted me--to be dishonest with you to the +end. It would have been so easy to make poor Mr. Carlton the whole +cause, and not to have told you the truth at all!" + +"Then I wish to God you had done so!" Sidney cried out, revealing the +character of his wound unawares, yet once more human, young, and vain. +Moreover there was passion enough in his eyes and voice, as there had +been in his wooing. "Besides," he continued, "poor Mr. Carlton, as you +call him, _is_ the cause, I don't care what you say. Curse him! Curse +him, body and soul!" + +Gwynneth was outside in the sun, doubly adorable now that he had lost +her, and for other reasons too. Her sweet skin was flushed, and even her +tears inflamed the unhappy young man. He looked at her long and +passionately, then muttered venom through his teeth. + +"What did you say?" + +"I said it was like him, too, the blackguard!" + +"I don't know what you mean, and I don't want to." + +"It's as well," jeered Sidney, with exceeding malice; but already she +was turning away. She was turning away without one word. In an instant +he had her by both wrists, as the devil possessed himself. + +"Let me go," cried Gwynneth. "You're hurting me!" + +"I'm not. I'm not. I'm only going to let you know the kind of beast +that's come between us." + +Gwynneth stood with unresisting wrists. Her scorn was splendid. + +"I am not sorry to have seen you in your true colours, Sidney." + +"You are going to see some one else in his." + +Her scorn had destroyed his last scruple. His eyes were devilish now. + +"Let me go, you brute!" + +"There are worse, Gwynneth, there are worse. It isn't a thing we can +discuss, as I told you. But did you never notice the likeness?" + +Her blank face put the involuntary question he desired. + +"Only between the one big villain in this parish--and the one rather +jolly little boy!" + +At last her wrists were released. But Gwynneth remained standing in the +sun. She was not looking at Sidney; on the contrary, her face declared +her oblivious to his continued presence. It was white with several kinds +of horror; it was pinched with many separate pangs. So she stood a few +moments, then went her way slowly, only turning with a shudder. As for +him, his fever subsided as he watched; and, before the diminishing +figure had passed out of the vista of cropped hedges and crude flowers, +even Sidney Gleed knew himself, for once in his life, for what he was +and would be to its end. + + + + +XXVIII + +THE TURNING TIDE + + +Next Sunday there was a real congregation. Yet the benches were almost +as empty as before, the people herding near the porch until entreated +either to occupy such seats as there were, or to leave the church. +"Curiosity may have brought some of you here," said Mr. Carlton; "but I +earnestly hope that none will remain in that spirit." The benches were +full in a minute, and many had still to stand. All the next week Robert +Carlton spent in sawing more planks to one length, and more props to one +height for their support. And on the third Sunday his church was packed. + +The summer of 1887 was, however, a remarkable one. And the month of +August was an ideal month for the inauguration of open-air services, +where there were trees. + +In those hot still days came visitors of every type, and in greater +numbers than Robert Carlton desired. The tide had turned; he was early +aware of his danger now. Again and again it became his own sore duty to +remind this one or the other, distantly perhaps, yet none the less +unmistakably, of that which they might forget, but he never. Their open +admiration tried him acutely. He did like it a little for its own sake, +after five years' ostracism; more for the fresh purchase it gave him +over simple hearts; but he was very hard on himself for liking it at +all. On the other hand, he knew that it must put many a mind, the +subtler minds, more than ever against him. It also renewed his own +shame. So it was not admiration that he wanted at all; it was +confidence, forgiveness, love; and these if possible by degrees. It was +not possible, and Robert Carlton had to suffer in turn from the saddler, +the schoolmaster, and the rest. The first would come to hedge and hedge +with a view to Sir Wilton's imminent return; the next would intercept +him as he came away, learn what he had been saying, and forthwith step +across to the church to let the reverend know how the schoolmaster's +character impressed itself upon a man of his experience. It was an +unattractive trait in Fuller that he questioned everybody's sincerity +but his own, albeit his strictures were not seldom justifiable. He +talked, however, as though for years he had been the one and only +philanthropist to hold any dealings with the rector; at last it became +necessary to set him right on the point, which Mr. Carlton did with a +mild account of his illness and the sexton's aid. + +"I do wish I'd ha' known," said Fuller, with perfect truth; "I do wish +I'd ha' known an' had the nursun of yer, reverend, instead o' him. And +he never come near you no more; so I should expect." + +"But you tell me he's very ailing, Fuller." + +"He haven't been ailun all these years." + +"We--we had a little tiff in the end. It was my fault. I wonder if he'd +see me now?" + +"I'll make him, reverend, I'll tell him he's got to." + +"No, Fuller, I can't allow that. Besides, he has not got to do anything +of the sort; he has turned dissenter, and may prefer me to stop away. +Nevertheless I shall call, if only to ask how he is." + +There was no need to ask, in the event. The old sexton was failing fast, +and "not long for this world," as his daughter announced in front of +him. The poor man was in bed, and very dirty, but as sensible as he ever +had been; and he welcomed the rector with cadaverous grins. + +"They tell me," he whispered, "you fare to finish the church with your +own two hands. You're a wonderful man, sir--and I'm another." + +"You are, indeed. Why, you must be nearly ninety, Busby?" + +"Eighty-eight, sir, come next September. But I wasn't thinkun o' my age, +sir. Do you remember that little varmin I swallered out 'f a pond?" + +"I remember." + +"I've killed that, sir!" + +And the sunken eyes shone like lamps. + +"I congratulate you, Busby." + +"I killed that two year ago; and you'll never guess how!" The ex-sexton +proceeded to rehearse the various remedies he had tried in vain. "I +killed that with bacca-smoke," he concluded in sepulchral triumph. "It +was the minister's idea. I had to swaller the bacca-smoke instead o' +puffun that out, an' that choked that in three pipes!" + +The rector said it must be a great relief to be rid of such an incubus. +Busby, however, with a sick man's reluctance to admit any alleviating +circumstance in his case, was not so sure about that. He sometimes fared +to wish he had the little varmin back. Croap, croap, croap! That had +been wonderful good company after all. The ex-sexton was not too ill to +wax eloquent upon his favourite topic. And the tenor of his talk was +that mankind had been building churches since the world began, but what +other man had lived for years with a live frog on his chest? + +Their religious dispute was evidently forgotten, and Mr. Carlton did not +feel it incumbent upon him to risk another in the circumstances of the +case. On the way home the other egotist waylaid him, with his opinion of +old Busby's hallucination and general sanity since the saddler could +remember him. + +"But half the village and half the county is the same, reverend. Silly +Suffolk!" + +"Yet you're a Suffolk man yourself, Fuller," observed Mr. Carlton, +mildly. + +"Yes, reverend, but there was corn in Egypt, if you recollect." + +Meanwhile the building still went on, and was rapidly nearing a point +beyond which Carlton himself could not proceed unaided. That point was +the last window; the others were all finished. He had left out the +single mullions and all the tracery. They might be added afterwards by +an expert hand. They were not essential to the windows, which were ready +for glazing as they were. But the east window was another affair. It +must have its two mullions as before, with the quatrefoil tracery which +had remained undamaged in the west window opposite. All this was beyond +the self-taught hewer of coursed rubble and of gargoyles; the arch +itself must be two feet wider than any he had yet attempted; but on a +worthy east window he had set his heart. + +Such was the dilemma in which Robert Carlton found himself at the end of +August, and there seemed only one thing to be done. He must call for aid +at last, and now he knew that aid would come, for he had received +various offers of assistance since the beginning of the month. Some of +these were from local firms which had refused his work in the beginning; +Carlton had promised that if he called for tenders he would consider +theirs; and now call he must. Yet he could not bring himself to do so +all at once. + +To call in the world after all! To open his leafy solitude to the +British workmen in gangs, to hear their chaff, to smell their tobacco, +where he had laboured in quiet and alone through so many, many seasons! + +But it had to come. A tinge of autumn was on the trees. Any Sunday now +the open-air service might prove a discomfort and a peril to all; in a +few weeks at most it would become impossible. But the people must have +their church. They had waited long enough. Therefore any further +reluctance in him was little and unworthy, as Carlton saw at once for +himself. Yet there was now so much else to do, so many poor folks to +see, so many old threads to take up, that for once he temporised. And +even as he temporised, his mind made up, and a competition pending +between the masons of the neighbourhood, Sir Wilton Gleed arrived in +Long Stow for the shooting. + +Sir Wilton arrived with a frown. It deepened but little at what he +heard. He was prepared for everything; and about Gwynneth he knew. She +had left his house, she had gone her own way, he washed his hands of +her, and only congratulated Sidney on his escape. That chapter was +closed. It was the older matter that harassed Sir Wilton Gleed. + +So that devil had reinstated himself after all! The fact might not be +finally accomplished; it was none the less inevitable, imminent. And Sir +Wilton had long been prepared for it; for the last two years he had been +unable to move without hearing the name he abhorred; it dogged him in +town, it followed him to Scotland, it awaited him in every hole and +corner of the Continent. Once he had been fond of speaking of his +property; but in two senses it was hard to do this without giving the +place a name. Sir Wilton was learning to deny himself the boast +altogether. + +Long Stow? Could there be two Long Stows? Then that must be the place +where the parson was building up his church. What a romance! And what a +man! Oh, no doubt he was a very dreadful person also; but there, in any +case, was a Man. + +Sir Wilton could not deny it; and by degrees he wearied of insisting +upon the deplorable side of the man's character. The task was +ungrateful; it put himself in an ungenerous light, which was the harder +upon one who was by no means ill-natured in grain. Gradually he took to +admitting his adversary's good points; even admitted them to himself; +but that did not remove the chronic irritation of infallible defeat. And +defeated Sir Wilton already was, with the people flocking to that man +again, and doubtless willing to help him finish his church. His own +parishioners had forgiven him--and well they might, said Sir Wilton's +friends in every country-house. Besides, the suspended parson was a +figure of the past; the law was done with him; he was absolutely free to +begin afresh. Henceforth the vindictiveness of the individual must +recoil deservedly upon the individual's head. + +Sir Wilton saw all this before his actual return; and he realised the +madness of either urging or attempting to coerce his tenantry to harden +their hearts, a second time, against one who had committed no second +sin. If he failed it would destroy his influence in the neighbourhood; +even if he succeeded it would damage his popularity elsewhere. And a +chat with the schoolmaster, a call upon one or two of the neighbouring +clergy, a word with old Marigold in his gig, all served but to convince +him finally of these facts. + +Sir Wilton's mind was made up. He had come back primed with a desperate +measure for the last of all. Once it was resolved upon, his spirits +rose. + +He told his wife and took her breath away; but a very little reasoning +brought the lady round the compass to his view. This was after breakfast +on the second day. The same forenoon Sir Wilton went up the village, +brisk and rosy, a flower in his coat, and a word for all. Past the Flint +House he began to walk slowly, took no notice of a courtesy, swung round +suddenly himself, and was knocking at Jasper Musk's door that minute, +still a thought less confident than he had been. + +Musk was in his garden, fast as usual to his chair. Mrs. Musk brought +out another chair for Sir Wilton, and drove Georgie indoors on her way +back. Sir Wilton watched the child out of sight, and then favoured +Jasper with his peculiarly fixed stare. There was unusual meaning in it +this morning. + +"So the world has forgiven him," said Sir Wilton Gleed. + +Musk stared in his turn, his great face glowing with contempt. "Have +you?" said he at last. + +"Not yet," replied Sir Wilton, a shade more pink in the face. He had +meant to lead up to his intention. He was taken aback. + +"But you mean to, do you?" pursued Musk, pressing his point in no +respectful tone: in all their relations this one had never pandered to +the other. + +"I don't say that, either," replied Sir Wilton, in studied tones. + +"Then what do you say?" + +"Less than anybody else, a good deal less," declared the squire. "I--I +don't quite understand your tone, Musk, I must say; but I can well +understand your position in this matter. It is unique, of course. So is +mine, in a sense. But I must beg of you not to jump to conclusions. I am +the last person to make a hero of the man I did my best to kick out of +the parish five years ago; next to yourself, no one has reason to love +the fellow less. I thought it a public scandal that he should be +empowered to stay here against all our wills. My opinion of that whole +black matter is absolutely and totally unchanged. But I do confess to +you, Musk, that this last year or two have somewhat modified my opinion +of the man himself." + +Musk's eyes had never dropped or lifted from his visitor's face. Their +expression was inscrutable. The iron cast of that massive countenance +was the only key to the workings of the mind within: the lines seemed +subtly emphasised, as in the faces of the dead. And his gigantic body +was the same; only the eyes seemed alive; and they were as still as the +rest of him. + +"What if I've modified mine?" + +Sir Wilton looked up quickly; for the habitual starer had been for once +outstared. "Do you mean that you have?" cried he. + +"I don't say as I have or I haven't. But that's a man, Sir Wilton, and I +won't deny it." + +"Exactly what everybody is saying. I say no more myself." + +"And I won't say no less . . . Suppose you was to patch it up with him, +Sir Wilton?" + +"I should help him finish his church." + +Musk sat silent for some time. His eyes seemed smaller. But they had not +moved. + +"That would be a wonderful good action on your part, Sir Wilton," he +said at last. + +"Not at all, Musk. I should be doing it for the people, not for Mr. +Carlton." + +Another pause. + +"And yet, Sir Wilton, in a manner o' speaking, you might say as he +deserved it, too?" + +Sir Wilton was quite himself again--a gentleman in keeping with the +flower in his coat. + +"I certainly never expected to hear you say so, Musk," said he frankly; +"though it's what I've sometimes thought myself." + +"I haven't said as _I_ forgave him, have I?" + +"No, no, Musk, you haven't; it is not in human nature that you could." + +It was a strange tongue that had spoken in the massive head; there was +no forgiveness in that voice. Yet in the next breath the note of hate +was hushed as suddenly as it had been struck. + +"That may be in human natur'," said Musk, "but that ain't in mine. I'm +not a religious man, Sir Wilton. That may be the reason. But I do have +enough respect for religion to wish to see that church up again before I +die." + +"I consider it very generous of you to say so, Musk," declared the +other, with enthusiasm. + +"But I do say it, Sir Wilton, and I never said a truer word." + +"So I hear; and that decides me!" cried Sir Wilton, jumping up. "I +really had decided--for the sake of the parish--and was actually on my +way to the church to take the whole job over. A gang of competent +workmen could polish it off in a couple of months; and it ought to be +polished off. But it's really wonderful what he has done!" + +"I don't deny it," said Musk; and waited for the squire to recover his +point, his own set face unchanged. + +"Yes," resumed Sir Wilton, suddenly, "I was on my way up to make him +that proposal just now; but as I passed your door I could not resist +coming in. I thought I would like to tell you what I intended to do, and +to give you my reasons for doing it." + +"There was no need to do that," said Musk, with an upward movement of +the lips, hardly to be called a smile; for once also his great head +moved slowly from side to side. + +"And now I shall be going on," announced Sir Wilton, who did not like +this look, and was now less inclined to suffer disrespect. + +"Hold on a bit, Sir Wilton. I'm glued tight to this here chair by my old +enemy; that seem to get worse and worse, and I'm jealous I shall soon +set foot to the ground for the last time. That take me ten minutes to +mount upstairs to bed. I haven't been further'n this here lawn these +twelve months. So I can't come and see you, Sir Wilton; and I should +like another word or two now we're on the subject. You see, he was here +a good bit when the boy was bad, and even I don't feel all I did about +him, though forgive him I never shall on earth. At the same time I'd +like to see him have his church. That'd want consecrating again, sir, I +suppose?" + +"I suppose it would." + +"Would the bishop do it, think you?" + +"Like a shot," said Sir Wilton, a touch of pique in his tone. "I had +some correspondence with him years ago about this matter, and I was +surprised at the view the bishop took. He will come, if he is alive." + +Jasper had taken his eyes from Sir Wilton's face at last; they were +resting on the level sunlit land beyond the river. "That'll be a great +day for Long Stow," he murmured almost to himself; and suddenly his lips +came tight together at the corners. + +"It should be a very interesting ceremony," said Sir Wilton, foreseeing +his part in it. He had forgiven his enemy, the scandalous clergyman who +had lived down a scandal and a tragedy; it was Sir Wilton who had helped +him to live them down. Not at first; then he had been adamant; but his +justice in the beginning was only equalled by his generosity in the end, +when the man had proved his manhood, and the sinner had atoned for his +sin, so far as atonement was possible in this world. That poor +pertinacious devil had been five years running up the walls. Sir Wilton +Gleed had thrown his money and his influence into the scale, and +finished the whole thing in less than five months. They were saying all +this at the opening ceremony; everybody was there. His magnanimity was +being talked of in the same breath with the parson's pluck. The bishop +was his guest. + +"A very interesting ceremony," repeated Sir Wilton. "We could have it at +Christmas, if not before." + +"That won't see me," said Jasper Musk. "I couldn't get, even if I wanted +to. But sciatica that don't kill, and I hope to live to see the day." +And again the corners of his mouth were much compressed. + +"Yet you think you can never forgive him?" + +Sir Wilton felt that he could not be the bearer of too much good-will, +now that he was about it; but Musk turned his eyes full upon him, and +there was a queer hard light in them. + +"I don't think," said he. "I know." + +And so it fell out that in an hour of unusual depression, and of natural +hesitation which was yet not natural in Robert Carlton, he looked up +suddenly and once more saw his enemy in the sanctuary which would soon +be his very own leafy sanctuary no longer. Carlton had come there to +meditate and to pray, but not to work. That sort of work was not for him +any more. Others must take it up; the time was ripe; only the beginning +was hard. And here was Sir Wilton Gleed advancing towards him. + +And Sir Wilton was holding out his hand. + + + + +XXIX + +A HAVEN OF HEARTS + + +Slower to decide than most young persons of her independent character, +Gwynneth was one of those who are none the less capable of decisive +conduct in a definite emergency. She behaved with spirit in the +predicament in which her weakness and her strength had combined to place +her. She had jilted Sidney; outsiders might not know it; but she had +treated him in a way which he and his were never likely to forgive. +After that, and that alone, his home could not have been her home any +more; but Gwynneth had other and even stronger reasons for determining +to leave Long Stow; and there were none why she should not. She had her +money. She was of age. She would be a good riddance now. It was her +first thought in the garden. The thought hardened to resolve while +Sidney, full of bitterness and champagne, was still galling his hired +horse back to Cambridge. Gwynneth also was gone within the week. + +It was a chance acquaintance to whom the girl had written in her need. +She had met in Leipzig a strangely interesting woman: commanding, +mysterious, self-contained. This lady, a Mrs. Molyneux by name, had +taken notice of Gwynneth, and, at the close of their short acquaintance, +had given her a card inscribed in pencil with the name of St. Hilda's +Hospital, Campden Hill. + +"You have never heard of it," Mrs. Molyneux had said with a smile; "but +I shall be very glad if you will come and see me and my hospital some +day when you are in town." + +Gwynneth had felt honoured, she could scarcely have said why, for she +knew no more of this lady than she had seen for herself, which was +really very little. But there is a kind of distinction which appeals to +the instinct rather than to the conscious perceptions, and Gwynneth had +felt both awed and flattered by an invitation which was obviously +sincere. She had said that she should love to see the hospital--and had +never been near it yet. + +"I don't know whether you have ever thought of being a nurse," Mrs. +Molyneux had added with Gwynneth's hand in hers; "but if you ever +should--or if ever you want to do something, and don't know what else to +do--I wish you would write to me, and let me be your friend." + +The second invitation had been given with a wonderfully understanding +look--a look which seemed to sift the secrets of Gwynneth's heart--a +look she would not have cared to meet during the late season. She had +promised again, however, very gratefully indeed; and it was her second +promise that Gwynneth eventually kept. + +"I had such a strong feeling about you," Mrs. Molyneux wrote by return. +"I knew that I should hear from you sooner or later . . . I like your +frankness in saying that it is no fine impulse, or love of nursing for +its own sake, that makes you wish to come. I do not seek to know what it +is. Even if you are no nurse you can play the organ in our little chapel +as it has not been played yet; and that would be very much to me. So +come any day and make your home with us at least for a time." The writer +contrived to refer to herself as "Reverend Mother," in emphatic +capitals, and her letter was signed "Constance Molyneux, Mother in God." + +It happened that Gwynneth had spoken of Mrs. Molyneux to her aunt, who +knew a good name when she heard it, and had often asked Gwynneth if she +was not going to pay that call on Campden Hill; thus her recklessness in +casting herself among strangers was more apparent than real, and little +likely to aggravate her prime offence against kith and kin. Nor did it; +nevertheless it was a plunge into all but unknown waters. The hospital +was a private one, and Mrs. Molyneux both spoke and wrote of it as her +own. It was a cancer hospital for women, evidently run upon religious +lines, and those not easy to define, since Gwynneth happened to know +that the Reverend Mother was not a Roman Catholic. And these things were +all she did know when her hansom drew up before a red-brick building +with ecclesiastical windows, and a cross over the door, in a leafy road +not five minutes' climb from Kensington High Street. + +Gwynneth pulled the wrought-iron bell-handle, and next moment caught her +breath. The door had been opened by a portress in austere but becoming +garb, a young girl like herself, and the pretty face between the quaint +cap and collar was smiling a sweet greeting to the newcomer. A few worn +steps of snowy stone, and a Gothic doorway, with the oak door standing +open, showed more girls within against the wainscot; all were pretty; +and all wore blue serge, with white aprons and long cambric cuffs, +square bib-collars trimmed with lace, and Normandy caps with streamers +of fine lawn. Gwynneth blushed for her own conventional attire, as she +was ushered through this hall, past a dispensary where another of the +uniformed girls was busy among the bottles, and so into the presence of +the Reverend Mother. + +Mrs. Molyneux, the well-dressed woman of the world whom Gwynneth had +known in Leipzig, was a lost identity in a habit which marked her sway +only by its supreme severity; an order of St. John of Jerusalem hung +upon her bosom, and a crucifix dangled at her side. Her hands were +hidden beneath some short and shapeless garment reaching to the waist, +but one emerged for a moment to greet Gwynneth warmly. "Do you feel as +if you had come into a convent?" the Reverend Mother asked, a gentle +humour in her lowered voice. It was exactly what Gwynneth did feel, and +the sensation was by no means displeasing to her. The Mother herself +then showed Gwynneth over the establishment, which was indeed a singular +amalgam of the hospital and the nunnery. The dining-room was termed the +"refectory"; a cross hung over every bed in the wards upstairs, and in +the nurses' cubicles below the wards. Cap and apron, bib-collar and +cuffs, were laid out on Gwynneth's bed, and these she found herself +expected to don then and there. The Mother returned when she was ready, +and showed her the chapel last of all. It was a tiny chapel, but as +beautiful as antique carving, rich embroidery, much stained glass, and +hanging lights could make it. In her innocence Gwynneth wondered why +these lights were burning while the summer sun, shining through the +stained glass, filled the chapel with vivid beams of purple and red. She +was even puzzled by the unmistakable odour of recent incense; but she +said, with truth, that the chapel delighted her. + +"I knew it would," the Mother whispered with her penetrating smile. + +"How could you know?" Gwynneth asked, smiling also, because she had +never touched on religion with Mrs. Molyneux. + +"I saw you once in the English church," the Mother said. "It was before +I knew you; and yet, you see, I did know you, even then!" + +In this chapel there were daily matins, vespers, nones; and at each of +the three services attendance was compulsory on the part of all nurses +not required at an actual deathbed, and of all patients who were still +up and about. French-capped, pink-frocked maid-servants and ward-maids +filled the front rows of chairs; the patients sat behind; and on either +hand, in the carved oak stalls, were the pretty nurses, the Reverend +Mother near the entrance in their midst. The services, conducted by an +attendant Anglican of small account, were punctuated by genuflexions and +the sacred sign; and it was impossible to follow them in the Book of +Common Prayer. + +Gwynneth tried hard to lift up her heart in this strange sanctuary. She +longed for real religion as she had longed for little in her life +before. At the first blush, it seemed as though Providence alone could +have led her into so unique a haven of equal sanctity and usefulness; +and yet, also from the first, the girl was repelled a little if +attracted more. She liked her work; she was a natural nurse, and soon +grew used, but never hardened, to hopeless suffering and slow death. +There were patients who loved Gwynneth, and not a nurse who was not fond +of her, before she had been at St. Hilda's a month. Already she was +playing the organ at all three services, and her own music, and the +voices floating up to her, at these set times, filled her heart with +peace; but she wondered if it was the right kind of peace; she wondered +whether this was religion at all. Sometimes the sweet little chapel--for +it was all that to Gwynneth's mind--struck her also as a stage of +studied effects. The nurses were so pretty, their garb so becoming, and +the blue of it had such a perfect foil in the maid-servants' pink. But +then the Reverend Mother, in her sombre supremacy, gradually revealed +herself as the superb mistress of deliberate effect; and a strange study +Gwynneth found her; of foibles and fascination all compact; at once +subtle, simple, vain, and noble. It appeared that Mrs. Molyneux was an +extremely wealthy widow, whose one consoling hobby was this anomalous +retreat upon Campden Hill. + +The patients paid nothing; the nurses received nothing; it was a retreat +for both, and Gwynneth was not the only one who had sought it +primarily, and frankly, for peace of mind and salvation from self. Her +hands at least were not the less tender and untiring on that account. +Some of her capped and cuffed comrades were no older than herself; many +were refreshingly frivolous, and properly free from care. Gwynneth's +chief crony was Nurse Ella, a bright young widow, who wore spectacles, +and declared herself unable to understand what the Reverend Mother had +ever seen in her, as she was neither pretty nor religious, nor as young +as the rest. + +Nurse Ella had, however, a shrewd wit and a sharp tongue; made wicked +fun of the Mother's sacerdotal pretensions when alone with Gwynneth; and +thus stimulated the latter to think for herself, if only to refute her +friend's arguments. Nurse Ella was above all things an extraordinarily +decided character, aggressively so in immaterial issues, but good for +Gwynneth by that very fact. + +These opposites became fast friends. Often they would talk over the +refectory fire--a wood fire in an ancient grate, which cast the right +mediæval glow over the polished floor and the dark wainscotting--long +after the others were in their cubicles. Nurse Ella had the greatest +scorn for the conventual side of St. Hilda's, which Gwynneth would +defend warmly, while her heart admitted more than her lips; the +discussion would ramify, and become animated on both sides; then all at +once Nurse Ella would look at her watch, and no persuasion would induce +her to stay another minute. Gwynneth could have sat up half the night, +and would plead in vain for ten minutes more; it seldom took Nurse Ella +as many seconds to suit her action to her word. She said she would do a +thing, and did it; that was Nurse Ella's principle in life. + +So there was no exchange of confidences between these two, both reticent +natures, and neither unduly inquisitive about the other's affairs. +Gwynneth only knew that her friend's married life had been a very short +one; for her own part, she had said nothing to let Nurse Ella suppose +that she had herself been even asked in marriage. But one night they +were speaking of another nurse, who had left St. Hilda's that day, in +floods of tears, to be married the following week. + +"If I felt like that," Gwynneth had declared, "I wouldn't be married at +all." + +Nurse Ella looked up quickly, her glasses flaming in the firelight. +"What, not after you had given your word?" said she. + +"Certainly not, if I felt I had made a mistake." Gwynneth was staring +into the fire. + +"You would break your solemn promise in a thing like that?" the other +persisted. + +"Better one promise than two lives," replied Gwynneth, with oracular +brevity. Nurse Ella watched her in sidelong astonishment. + +"It's easy to talk, my dear! I believe you are the last person who would +do anything so dishonourable." + +"I don't call it dishonourable." + +"But it is, to break your word." + +"Suppose you have changed?" + +"You have no business to change. Say you'll do a thing, and do it." + +The spectacled face had assumed a rigid cast which Gwynneth knew well, +and for which Nurse Ella had just the chin. + +"But supposing you never really loved----" + +"Love is an inexact term; it's not always easy to tell when it applies +to your feelings, and when it does not. But when you say you'll marry +anybody, that's a definite promise, and nothing in the world should make +you break it, unless it's been extracted under false pretences. We are +both very positive, aren't we?" and Nurse Ella smiled. "I wonder why you +are, Gwynneth?" + +"Because," said the girl, impelled to frankness, yet hanging her head, +"as a matter of fact, I've been more or less engaged myself." + +"And you got out of it?" + +"I broke it off." + +"Simply because you had changed?" + +"No--it was a mistake from the beginning. I had never really cared. That +was my shame." + +"And you broke your word--you had the courage!" + +The tone was a low one of mere surprise. There was more in the look +which accompanied the tone. But Gwynneth had her eyes turned inward, and +her wonder was not yet. + +"It had to be done," she said simply. "It was humiliating enough, but it +was not so bad as going on . . . Can anything be so bad as marrying a +man you do not love, just because you have made a mistake, and are too +proud to admit it?" + +"No . . . you are right . . . that is the worst of all." + +It might have been a studied picture that the two young women made, in +the old oak room, with the firelight falling on their quaint sweet garb, +and reddening their pensive faces, only conscious of the inner self. +Nurse Ella was standing up, gazing down into the fire, her back turned +to Gwynneth; but now her tone was enough. It was neither wistful nor +bitter, but only heavy with conviction; and in another moment Nurse Ella +was gone, not more abruptly than usual, but without letting Gwynneth see +her face again. Then Gwynneth recalled the look with which the other had +exclaimed upon her courage, and either she flattered herself, or that +look had been one of envy pure and simple. Could it be that her friend's +decided character was all self-conscious and acquired? Was her +intolerance of the slightest hesitation, in matters of no account, a +life's reaction from a fatal irresolution in some crisis of her own +career? + +Gwynneth never knew; for a fine mutual reserve distinguished the +intimacy of this pair, and even drew them together, opposite as they +were in so many other respects, more than impulsive confidences on +either side. One had suffered; the other was suffering now; each was a +little mystery to her friend. And there was one more reason for this: +neither was sure of the other's sympathy: at every point of contact they +diverged. + +So Gwynneth used to wonder whether Nurse Ella was in reality a widow at +all, and Nurse Ella was quite sure that Gwynneth was still in love, +probably with the man she had jilted, according to the wise way of +women; she was so ready to speak of love in the abstract; and once she +spoke so passionately. This was in Kensington Gardens, one foggy Sunday, +when the two nurses were on their way to church; for they were allowed +to worship where they listed after matins at St. Hilda's. Nurse Ella +rented a sitting under a fashionable preacher who discoursed with much +wisdom and some acidity on topics of the hour; but Gwynneth was still +seeking her spiritual ideal. They would walk together as far as the +Bayswater Road, where their ways diverged, unless Nurse Ella could +induce Gwynneth to go with her; on this particular morning they were +arguing about a novel when the houses loomed upon them through the bare +trees and the fog. + +"She never would have forgiven him," Nurse Ella had declared, in crisp +settlement of the point at issue. "No young wife would forgive a young +husband who behaved like that. So it may be the cleverest novel in the +language, but it isn't true to life." Whereupon Gwynneth, who had been +defending a masterpiece with laudable spirit, walked some yards in +silence. "Are you sure that it matters how people behave," she then +inquired, "if you really love them?" + +"How they behave?" echoed her friend. "Why, Gwynneth, of course! Nothing +does matter except behaviour." + +"It wouldn't to me," Gwynneth exclaimed, almost through her teeth. + +"But surely what one does is everything!" + +"Not in love," averred Gwynneth, whose convictions were few but firm; +"and those two are more in love than any other couple I know in fiction +or real life. No; you love people for what they are, not for what they +do." + +Nurse Ella laughed outright. + +"That may be good metaphysics," said she, "but it's shocking +common-sense! Our actions are the only possible test of our character, +as its fruit is the only test of a tree." + +In Gwynneth's eyes burnt wondrous fires, and on her cheeks; and her +breath was coming very quickly. But most persons look straight ahead as +they walk and talk, and between these two fell the kindly fog besides. + +"Suppose you loved somebody," the young girl cried at last; "and +suppose you suddenly discovered he had once done something +dreadful--unspeakable. Would that alter your feeling towards him?" + +"It could never fail to do so, Gwynneth." + +"It would not alter mine!" + +Nurse Ella turned her head. But in the road the fog seemed thicker than +in the gardens. And, apart from its vigour, Gwynneth's tone had sounded +impersonal enough. + +"I believe it would," her friend persisted, "when the time came." + +"And I know that it would not," said Gwynneth, half under her breath and +half through her teeth. + +"Well, Gwynneth," said Nurse Ella, with a laugh, "we were evidently born +to differ. In my view that would be the one sort of excuse for changing +one's mind about a man--whereas you see others!" + +"But I am not talking about one's mind," cried Gwynneth; "the feeling I +mean, the feeling those two have in the book, lies infinitely deeper +than the mind." + +"And no crime could alter it?" + +"Not if he atoned--not if the rest of his life were one long atonement." + +"But, Gwynneth, that would make all the difference." + +Gwynneth walked on in silence. She was reconsidering her own last words. + +"Atonement or no atonement," she exclaimed at length, "it would make no +difference--if I loved the man. Atonement or no atonement!" repeated +Gwynneth defiantly. + +Nurse Ella had a passion for the last word, but they were come to her +corner, and there was Gwynneth glowing through the fog, her eyes alight, +her cheeks flaming, a new being in the puzzled eyes of her friend. + +"Come with me, Gwynneth," begged Nurse Ella, at length; "don't go off by +yourself. Come, dear, and hear a shrewd, hard-headed sermon, without +sentiment or superstition!" + +Gwynneth smiled. That was the last thing to meet her mood. + +"Then where shall you go?" + +"Either St. Simeon's or All Souls'," said Gwynneth. "I haven't made up +my mind." + +Nurse Ella shook her head over an admission as characteristic as her +disapproval. This was the Gwynneth that she knew. + +"When do you make it up!" exclaimed Nurse Ella without inquiry. + +"When it's a matter of the least importance," said Gwynneth, choosing to +reply. "What can it signify which church I go to, what difference can it +possibly make? As a matter of fact I rather think of going to All +Souls'." + +"I thought you didn't care about music and nothing else?" + +"I don't know that there is nothing else. I think of going to see. I +have often thought of it before, but St. Simeon's is rather nearer, and +I generally end by going there. I shall decide on the way." + +"What a girl you are, Gwynneth!" exclaimed Nurse Ella, with frank +impatience. "You never seem to know your own mind--never!" + +Gwynneth made no reply; but she kindled afresh, and this time very +tenderly, as she went her own way through the fog. + + + + +XXX + +THE WOMAN'S HOUR + + +All Souls' was dark and hazy with its share of the ubiquitous fog, here +a little aggravated by the subtle fumes of incense newly burnt. In the +haze hung quivering constellations of sallow gaslight, and through it +gleamed an embroidered frontal, and the silken backs of praying priests, +lit by candles four. Delicate strains came from an invisible organ; a +light patter and a rich rustling from the feet and garments of some +departing after matins, some taking their places for choral eucharist, +women to the left, men to the right. Men and women, goers and comers +alike, with few exceptions, bowed the knee with Romish humility at the +first or the last glimpse of that shimmering frontal with the four +candles above and the motionless vestments below. + +The congregation was one of well-dressed women and well-to-do men; their +quiet devotion was not the less noteworthy on that account. A fine +reverence animated every face: the stray observer would have missed the +passive countenance of the merely pious, as Gwynneth did, and discovered +in its stead the happy ardour of those whose religion was a delight +rather than a duty. Yet the congregation took scarcely any part in the +actual service. Few untrained voices joined in the exquisite singing; +few, in the body of the church, left their places to take part in the +sacred climax. The congregation might have been only an audience; yet +somehow it was not. Somehow also there was nothing spectacular in an +office of equal dignity, distinction, and fervour. + +Yet the yellow lights in a yellow fog, the perfect organ, trained +voices, rich embroideries, incense, genuflexions, all these seemed at +one religious pole; and Long Stow church on a summer's day, with the sky +above and the birds singing, and Mr. Carlton in his surplice in the sun, +surely that was at the other! It was Gwynneth's fate, at all events, to +carry that single service in her heart and mind for ever, and to put +every other one against it. She did so now, involuntarily at first, and +then unwillingly, as she knelt or stood at the end of her row--her +cambric cuffs and fine lawn streamers in high relief against the rich +furs and the sombre feathers of those about her. + +On the other side of the nave, far back and close to the wall, a +grizzled gentleman stood and knelt by turns, in much obscurity; and his +attention never flagged. No detail of the elaborate ritual appeared +unfamiliar to this worshipper, and yet for a time his expression was +rather that of the alien critic. Gradually, however, the lines +disappeared from his forehead, his eyes opened wider, and brightened +with the peaceful ardour which he himself had already remarked in the +eyes of others. He was a tall thin man, very weather-beaten and rather +bent, wearing a new overcoat and a soft muffler; there was nothing in +his appearance to declare him of the cloth himself. His grey beard was +close trimmed. He wore gloves and carried a tall hat shoulder high in +the press going out. He was no more readily recognisable as the lonely +builder of Long Stow church, than Gwynneth in her nurse's garb as the +niece of Sir Wilton Gleed. But their separate fates brought them face to +face in the porch, and recognition was immediate on both sides. + +"Miss Gleed?" said Robert Carlton, raising his hat before it covered his +grey hairs. + +"Mr. Carlton!" she exclaimed in turn. There had been no time to think, +and her voice told only of her surprise; her own ear noticed it, and she +had time to marvel at herself. + +"I thought I could not be mistaken," Carlton was saying. And they were +shaking hands. + +"I never expected to see you here," said Gwynneth, with a strange +emphasis, as though the declaration were due to herself. + +"I never thought of coming until an hour or two ago." + +No more had Gwynneth: then the miracle was twofold. Her heart gave +thanks. It was not afraid. + +Meanwhile the crowd was carrying them gently, insensibly, but side by +side, across the flagged yard to the gate. + +"It's the first Sunday I've spent in town for years," observed Carlton; +"you are here altogether, I believe?" + +"Well, for some years, at least. I am learning to be a nurse." + +And Gwynneth blushed for her conspicuous attire, just as Carlton gave a +downward glance at the quaint cap on a level with his shoulder. + +"So I heard," he said. "May I ask which hospital you are at?" He could +recall none where the uniform was so picturesque. + +"You would not know it, Mr. Carlton; it is a private hospital on Campden +Hill." + +They had passed through the gate, and they paused with one consent. + +"Are you returning there now, Miss Gleed?" + +"Yes--through the gardens." + +"Then so far our way is the same." He did not ask whether he might +accompany her, but took the outer edge of the pavement as a matter of +course. "I am staying at Charing Cross," he explained as they walked; +"early this morning I went to the abbey. I did mean to go back there; +then I suddenly thought I should like to come here instead. I was once +one of the assistant clergy at this church." + +"I know," said Gwynneth. She would not deny it. That was why she had so +often thought of coming to All Souls'--only to resist the temptation +time and time again. Why, to-day of all days, had she been unable to +resist? Why had she thought of him this morning, and why had the thought +been so strong? These were questions for a lifetime's consideration. Now +she was walking at his side. + +"It was strange to go back there after so many years," pursued Carlton, +with the fine unguarded candour which he had brought back with him into +the world; "that service, in particular, was very strange to me. I did +not care for it at first. It seemed so artificial after our simple +service in the country. Then I looked at the faces of the men near me, +and I saw how narrow one can get. It was not artificial to them; it was +only beautiful; and there lies the root of the whole matter. Simple +services for simple folk--that is my watchword now--but beauty, +brightness, elaboration by all means for those who need it and can +appreciate it. It is the right thing for these rich congregations of +hard-worked professional men and busy society women; the trappings of +their religious life must not compare meanly with those of their daily +lives; let us order God's house as we would our own. But the opposite is +the case--though the principle is the same--with a primitive country +parish like ours at Long Stow . . . And yet I had not the wit to see +that when I went there first." + +He was musing aloud as men seldom do unless very sure of their audience. +How came he to be so sure of Gwynneth? They had seen nothing of each +other; this was the first time they had been alone together long enough +to exchange ideas; yet in a moment he was revealing his as few men do to +more than one woman in the world. And the one woman's heart was singing +at his side. + +She was with him; that was enough. Already it was the sweetest hour of +all her life; for the thought of him had haunted her for months, and was +full of pain; but in his presence all pain passed away. That was so +wonderful to Gwynneth! So wonderful was it that she herself was aware of +it at the time; it was her one great discovery and surprise. To be with +him was to forget all that he had ever done, all that she had never +before forgotten--the good with the evil. It was to sweep aside the +earthly and the palpable, to feel the divine domination of spirit over +spirit, and the peace which comes with even the secret surrender of soul +to soul. Hers was a conscious surrender, and Gwynneth made it without +shame. Since it was her secret, why should she be ashamed? She was +exalted, exultant, and yet serene. She might carry her secret to the +grave; her life would be the richer for it, for these few minutes, for +every word he spoke. So she caught each one as it fell, and laid the +treasure in her heart, even while she listened for the next. + +But in a minute they were come as far as he intended to escort her; +there were the palings and the stark trees close upon them in the fog; +and an omnibus passing, huge as a house. Gwynneth had been treading thin +air; now she was back in the sticky streets, inhaling the raw mist, to +exhale it in clouds under a microscopic magenta sun. They had stopped at +the corner; he was hesitating: her breath disappeared. + +"I have to get over to that side sooner or later," he said. "I may just +as well walk across with you, if you don't mind." + +"I shall be delighted," said Gwynneth, frankly, brightly; but her breath +came like a puff of smoke, and she felt her colour come with it as they +crossed the road. + +"I want to tell you about the church," he said, as they entered upon the +broad walk. "This is the first Sunday that I haven't taken service there +since the beginning of August." + +"The first!" exclaimed Gwynneth. "Have you actually gone on up to now +without a roof?" + +Carlton turned in his stride. + +"But we have a roof, Miss Gleed!" + +"You have one?" + +"It has been on some weeks." + +Gwynneth was standing quite still. "Do you mean to say that the church +is finished?" she cried, incredulous. + +"Yes," said Carlton; "thank God, I can say that at last." + +"But it seems such a short time! I don't understand. It seemed +impossible to me--by yourself?" + +"Oh, but I have not been by myself. I have had help." + +"At last!" + +"I wonder you have not heard. Everybody has helped me--everybody!" + +"Do you mean--my people--among others?" + +And Gwynneth preferred walking on to facing him here. + +"Is it possible you haven't heard?" exclaimed Carlton, incredulous in +turn. + +"Not a word," replied Gwynneth, bitterly. "They never write." + +But her bitterness was new-born of her indignation, not that they never +wrote, but that they had not written to tell her this. He told her +himself with much feeling and more embarrassment. + +"Why, Miss Gleed, I owe everything to Sir Wilton! It is the last thing I +ever--I can hardly realise it yet--or trust myself to speak of it to +you. My heart is so full! But it is Sir Wilton who has finished the +church; he came to me, and he took it over. He called for tenders; he +poured in workmen; the place has been like a hive. So the roof was on in +a month; and we never missed a Sunday, we had one service all the time; +but now we have three and four--thanks entirely to Sir Wilton Gleed!" + +He paused. But Gwynneth had nothing to say, and his embarrassment +increased. It was so hard to speak of Sir Wilton's magnanimity without +alluding to his previous attitude, and thus indirectly to its notorious +cause; and Carlton could not see that his companion was entirely taken +up with his news, could not realise the surprise it was to her, or +apprehend for a moment what impression it had made. He might, however, +have had some inkling of her view from the manner in which Gwynneth +eventually said that she was glad to hear her uncle had done something. + +"Something?" echoed Carlton. "He has done everything, and it is like his +generosity that you should hear it first from me!" + +Gwynneth shook her head unseen, though now he was looking at her, his +eyebrows raised; but she seemed intent upon picking her steps through +the thin mud of the broad walk. + +"And what that is like," continued Carlton, "from my point of view, you +will see when I tell you why I am in town to-day. It is the first Sunday +I have missed; but Mr. Preston of Linkworth and other friends are kindly +dividing my duty between them. Sir Wilton has arranged that, by the way. +He telegraphed yesterday to save me the journey; for I was going down +for the day, and returning to-morrow. Yet I came up last Monday, and am +still hard at work--buying for the new church." + +Gwynneth asked what it was that he had to buy; but her tone was so +mechanical that Robert Carlton did not at once reply. He was beginning +to feel strangely disappointed, to wish that he had gone his own gait to +Charing Cross, or at least held his peace about the church. But there +was one point upon which he felt constrained to convince his companion +before they parted; he might do more than justice to an absent man; but +she should not do less. And the spire of St. Mary Abbot's was already +dimly discernible through the yellow haze. + +"There is nothing we have not to buy, for the interior," he said at +length. "The lectern is the one exception, and I have had it +straightened and lacquered into a new thing. Sir Wilton wanted me to +keep it as it was; but that would never have done. However, he would +have an inscription to the effect that it is the same lectern which was +in the fire, which is quite a sufficient advertisement of the fact. I +was in favour of restoring the communion plate also, but Sir Wilton +insisted on presenting us with a new set, which I have been choosing +among other things this week. The other things are too numerous to +mention--carpets, curtains, collecting-boxes, alms-bags, a Litany desk, +and the hundred and one things you take for granted as part of the +church itself. But each has to be chosen and bought, and I only wish +that I had had your help. I have found the best things most difficult to +choose--the plate and a very handsome cross and candlesticks of polished +brass--all of which are my choice, but Sir Wilton's gift. So is the +organ which is being built for us. Can you wonder, then, that his +generosity has moved me more than I can possibly tell you?" + +"Indeed, no!" cried Gwynneth, in her own kind voice; but her honour was +all for the man who claimed it for another; and, until she opened them +now, her lips had been pursed in mute rebellion. She could fancy so much +that the true generosity would never even see! Gwynneth had not that +sort herself; she did not profess to have it. On the other hand, she was +anxious to be fair, even in her own mind; so she asked a question or two +concerning the hired and skilled labour which had been thrown into the +scale with such effect; and, after all, it appeared that Sir Wilton +Gleed had not paid for this. + +"But he wanted to," said Carlton, quickly. "It was not his fault that I +would not hear of his doing so; it was my obstinacy, because I had set +my heart on rebuilding the church myself, in one sense or the other." + +"Yet you said he took it over from you!" + +"So he did, Miss Gleed. He lent me his influence and support; that was +much more to me than the money, which I had and didn't want. Besides, he +is a business man, which I am not, and he did take the whole business +off my hands. That is what I meant." + +Gwynneth wondered whether it was what the countryside understood; but +said no more about the matter. She had other things to think of during +their last moments together; for she had stopped at the corner near the +palace; nor did she mean to let him accompany her any further. She was +still so decided and serene. She was still exalted and strengthened out +of all self-knowledge in the quiet presence of the man she loved, and +must love for ever, even though her love were to remain her heart's +prisoner for this life. This life was not all. + +So it was that she could look her last upon him, perhaps for ever, with +her own face transfigured and beautified by a joy not of earth alone: so +it was that she could speak to him, and hear him speak, without a tremor +to the end. + +His church was to be consecrated that day week--Advent Sunday. The +bishop was coming to perform the ceremony; his voice softened as he +spoke of the bishop, who was to be his own guest at the rectory. His +face shone as he added that. It was going to be a very simple ceremony. +And here something set him twisting at one of his gloves; then suddenly +he looked Gwynneth in the eyes. + +"You don't happen to be coming down, Miss Gleed?" + +"I don't think it very likely." + +"It--it wouldn't of course be worth your while----" + +"It would! It would! It would be more than worth it; but, to be quite +frank, I don't know that I shall ever come down again, Mr. Carlton." + +Was he sorry? He did not even show surprise; and not a word more: for he +had heard stray words in Long Stow concerning Gwynneth's departure and +its reason as alleged. "I should have liked you to see the church," was +all he said. + +"And do you know," rejoined Gwynneth, speaking out her mind at last, +"that I am in no great hurry to see it? I know it is foolish of me--for +no one man could have finished such a work--no other man living would +have got as far as you did without a soul to help you! Yet somehow I +don't so much want to see the church that they came in and finished; it +would spoil the picture that I can see so plainly now, and always +shall--of the stones you cut and the walls you built with your own two +hands--and every other hand against you!" + +She was holding out her own. Carlton looked from it to her face, a +strange surprise in his eyes. He had wriggled out of one of his gloves, +and was twisting it round the iron paling at the corner where they +stood. + +"May I come no further?" he said. + +"No, I could not think of taking you another yard out of your way. And +it is really not so very many yards from where we stand!" + +Gwynneth smiled brightly; but her voice was the very firm one of this +half-hour of her existence. And ever afterwards she was to marvel why +neither smile nor words were an effort to her at the time: so his +presence supported her to the end, when the clasp of that indomitable +hand, now bare, and horny even through her glove, left Gwynneth +outwardly unmoved. She returned his pressure with honest warmth; her +smile was kind and bright; then the cold mist fell between them in a +widening yellow gulf, with a diminishing patter of firm footsteps, that +Carlton could hear when the nurse's streamers had quite disappeared in +the fog. + +And he stood where he was to hear the last of her; and still he stood, +wishing he had disregarded tact, and persisted in his escort, whether it +embarrassed her or not, if only to find out where her hospital was. He +felt inclined to call before leaving town; already there was something +that he wished he had said; he kept saying it to himself as he wandered +back through dark gardens and a desert park. + +"So you prefer to think of it before the roof was on, as I managed to +make it by myself! You are the first to say that or to feel it--except +me! And I have put the feeling down; thank God, I have got it under; yet +it is a help to know that one other felt the same. Perhaps it was a +human feeling; but in me at least it was unworthy. God help me! But in +you it is sweet, and to me very wonderful . . . that you should +understand and sympathise . . . a young girl like you!" + +This whole fatality left the man sadly unsettled; tired and yet restless +in body and soul; humbly thankful for a woman's sympathy after so long, +and so much, yet the prey of a new depression. A woman's sympathy! Or +was it only a woman's pity? No, she understood; but it mattered little +to Robert Carlton; there could be no second woman in his life. That he +had always felt; but he was not sure that he had ever before defined the +feeling. It was a part of his eternal punishment; but he was quite sure +that he had not previously regarded it in that light. + +A coxcomb Carlton had never been; he had no suspicion of the kind of +impression he had made upon Gwynneth; his sole concern was the +impression which she had made on him. Like the rest of the world, she +was flying to extremes; only in her case, if she especially magnified +the good, it was because she was still ignorant of the original evil. It +could be nothing else; but his feeling about himself was more complex. +He alone knew how much or how little of the highest and the best in him +had redeemed that passion born of passion which had blighted his life. +It was of further significance that for years Carlton had not looked +upon his life as blighted. The blight fell upon the shining vision of +the woman he could have loved. And all had been so sudden that the man +was dazed. + +He could not eat, though he was hungry; nor rest, though tired to the +bone. He would go out again. It was good to be out, even in a London +fog, which was nothing to the fogs he remembered, for there was no +question of groping one's way; one could see it for fifty yards, often +for more. But now there was not even a small magenta sun; it was the +middle of the brief December afternoon when Robert Carlton left his +hotel; and near its close before he found himself in Kensington Gardens +once more. He hardly knew what brought him there. It was partly, but not +altogether, a sentimental impulse. Carlton had also some idea of finding +the hospital if he could, some hope of seeing Gwynneth again, if only to +assure himself that his imaginings of the last few hours had made her +other than what she was. And then he could rectify those omissions of +the morning; but neither was this all; a strong inexplicable attraction +drew him straight to the spot where he had stood so long after Gwynneth +was gone. + +And Gwynneth herself was standing there again! + +He was almost upon her before he saw her in the dusk, then those long +lawn streamers leapt like lightning to his eyes; and now he was creeping +backwards across the path. But she had not heard him, or she did not +heed: her back was turned, and bent, for she was leaning over the iron +paling which he had grasped before. And she shook with tears. + +Carlton was shaking, too; passion had taken him by the shoulders, and +was shaking the strength out of his heart. Horror had driven him back, +passion was spurring him on again. If she loved him--if she loved +him--then the hand of God was in all this. + +He was back upon the spot where recognition had come. Oh, yes, it was +she! She had given a little cry; she was stooping lower over the paling; +her voice was unmistakable. Then she rose, half turning, and he saw her +profile plain. She was raising something to her eyes; in another moment +it was at her lips, and she was kissing it, and sobbing over it, +whatever it might be. + +Carlton thought he knew what it was, and conceived a new horror of +himself in his involuntary capacity of spy. Yet instinctively he was +feeling in both overcoat pockets at once; in one there was a single +glove; in the other nothing at all. Cold with shame, but shivering with +excitement, the man stood torn between the newborn desire of his eyes, +and the fixed resolve of his soul. But he could not tear himself from +the spot--nor was it any longer necessary. Gwynneth was gone herself; +gone without seeing him; out of sight this time in an instant. And +Robert Carlton, white, trembling, but himself--the man with a will at +least--was listening a second time to the failing music of her feet, his +own planted firmly on the walk. + + + + +XXXI + +ADVENT EVE + + +The bishop arrived on the Saturday afternoon. He was still the same +little old man, with the side-whiskers and the long mouth, the queer +voice and the ungainly limp; and Robert Carlton found him neither more +nor less cordial than at their last dread interview; but he asked to see +the church before it was too dark. + +All was in readiness at last. But the cocoanut matting in the aisle and +transepts, and the maroon axminster in the chancel, had only been laid +that day. As yet there was no stained glass, and only the east window +and the west were mullioned as of old; but through the latter a wintry +sun poured thick red beams, already too much aslant to touch the floor, +but just falling upon the altar with its glimmering candlesticks, its +rich green cover, its violet frontal, all three gifts from the hall. The +bishop heard this without remark, his mouth a mere seam. But he approved +of the rows of rush-seated chairs in place of pews, and he admired the +simple pulpit of pitch pine. There was a pleasant smell of pitch pine in +the church. All the woodwork was of this wood, including the ceiling and +all panelling; and the pores of the fragrant timber were not stopped up +with varnish. The new red hassocks looked very bright under each chair, +and the new black prayer-books shone like polished jet on the book-rests +behind them. In the south transept, a space was boarded off for the new +organ; and here chaos had still a corner to itself; nor was either the +lighting or the heating apparatus quite complete. Oil-stoves were +already burning, however, at various points, and their odour compared +unfavourably with that of the pitch pine. + +"I do not want you to catch cold to-morrow," said Carlton, as he locked +the door behind them when they left. + +"Tut!" said the bishop, "I am not such an old man that you need coddle +me." + +Nor did he look a day older for all these years, as they went out +together into the raw red sunset. But Robert Carlton seemed almost to +have caught him up: he had come back from London so haggard and +hollow-eyed. + +They talked very little until the evening. Carlton had servants now, +that very widow who had been the first to desert him being head and +chief once more; and she signalised the occasion by serving one of the +soundest meals of her career. But it was in the long low study, now a +study pure and simple, and an infinitely tidier one than aforetime, that +the bishop smoked his after-dinner pipe like any deacon, while Carlton +also tasted his first tobacco for five years and a half. And still they +were strangely silent, until the occurrence of an incident, little in +itself, but great with suggestion. + +There was a tiny patter on the worn carpet, and all at once the bishop +beheld a big brown mouse seated upright within a few inches of his +companion's boot. The bishop exclaimed, and the mouse fled with a +scuttle and a squeak. + +"I tamed him," Carlton explained with a slight access of colour. "The +house is overrun with them, but this fellow lets none of the others in +here." + +The bishop was slow to follow up his exclamation. He certainly was a man +of fewer words than formerly. + +"You ought not to have made yourself such an anchorite," he said at +last. "You might have smoked your pipe--you say that's your first--and +written to me sooner!" + +So that still rankled. Carlton was not altogether surprised. + +"My lord," said he, "how could I? You had advised me to live anywhere +else, and yet here I was!" + +"The circumstances justified you, Mr. Carlton. I could not foresee such +circumstances, I assure you. I heard of them, however, at the time." + +Carlton had never written till the five years were nearly up, when it +became a necessary preliminary to the resumption of those offices from +which he had been debarred; but, when he did write, he had done so to +such effect that certain other preliminaries had been foregone. + +"Though you did not write," continued the bishop, "Sir Wilton Gleed did. +We had some correspondence about you, and we disagreed; that is one +reason why I declined his invitation and accepted yours. I would not +mention it, only you are now such excellent friends. And I understand +that he himself makes no secret of his former attitude towards you." + +"On the contrary, he has expressed the most generous regret for the line +he took." + +"He may well regret it," said the bishop. + +But Carlton had accepted his old enemy's aid, and would not hear ill of +him, whatever he might think. "It was natural enough," he murmured. + +"What! To prevent you from making the one reparation in your power? To +have you boycotted right and left? To trump up a criminal charge? To +force you, a clergyman, to remain in your own parish, labouring like a +convict by the year together? To trample the cloth underfoot in the eyes +of all the world?" + +"Oh," groaned Carlton, "it was I who did that! I alone am to blame for +that--I alone!" + +He leant his elbows on the chimney-piece, his face in his hands; for +stand he must if he was only to hear harsh words--that night of all +nights! Carlton was unprepared for such severity at this stage; and +infinitely hurt; for at his worst, when he deserved no sympathy at all, +the bishop had shown much more. But behind his back the blazing eyes +were quenched, and the long mouth relaxed. + +"No, no," a softer voice said; "you have done just the opposite--just +the opposite. You have been hard enough upon yourself; but the world was +harder on you--once." + +There was kindness in the rasping voice, but no enthusiasm. None other +had made so little of the mere physical feat of this man; and to him +the tone was unmistakable. + +"I know what you mean," said Carlton, turning round, his own eye alight. +"You think the world is going to the other extreme!" + +"It generally does," replied the bishop. "I do not mean to be unkind." + +"You are not, my lord--unless you think I haven't seen this for myself!" + +The bishop nodded gravely to himself. + +"You would see the danger. I am sure of that. You must want to hear the +last of what you have done; superhuman and heroic in itself--I am the +first to admit it--it is nevertheless the last chapter of a book which +you must want to close once and for all. The last chapter recalls the +first. Close the book; put it behind you; start afresh." + +Robert Carlton stood looking down with a curious smile upon his haggard +face. + +"That is exactly what I am going to do," said he. + +"But the parish must do the same; they must help you. Let them also +think no more of the past, either remote or immediate." + +"They must think of what they will," rejoined Carlton, queerly. "They +cannot help me much longer, nor I them. I am resigning the living, my +lord." + +"Resigning it?" cried the bishop. + +"I intend to do so to-morrow night. It always has been my intention. But +you are the first whom I have told." + +"I'm glad to hear that!" the bishop exclaimed, as he scrambled to his +feet another being. "You have taken my breath away! My dear fellow, let +me dissuade you from any such course." + +Carlton shook his head. + +"My work here is done." + +"It is just beginning!" + +"No, it is done. I have given my parishioners the church I owed them, +since they lost their last church through me. I set them once an example +for which I shall pray to be forgiven till my life's end; but now, +please God, I have at least shown them that because a man falls it need +not be utterly and for ever. He can rise; or, at any rate, he can try. +God knows I have tried; and they know it; and it may help them in their +own day of bitter trouble. But it was you, my lord, who first helped me, +by bidding me never despair. I have tried to teach your lesson; that is +all." + +"But you have not finished," the bishop urged, gently. "Go on teaching +it--go on." + +"No. It is no sudden thought. I undertook in the beginning, when Sir +Wilton Gleed wanted to turn me out forcibly, to go of my own accord when +I had built the church. He may forget it, but I do not." + +"Then I devoutly hope he will not accept your resignation!" + +"He must. I have made my arrangements. There is need of clergy in the +far corners of our empire, greater need than here. There was an +Australian at the hotel I have been staying at in London, and he has +shown me my field. I am going out to offer my services to the Bishop of +Riverina, and I am relying upon a word from you for their acceptance. I +hope to sail at the beginning of next month; my passage is already +taken." + +"I suppose you took it when you were in town?" the bishop grumbled. +Carlton coloured in an instant. + +"I did--but I had long been thinking of it," he said, hastily. "Oh, my +lord, in my place you would do the same! How could I continue here to be +smiled on by these poor people? It was easier when they looked the other +way, when I lived in this room alone, doing everything for myself, and +not a soul came near me. How can I settle down again to a prosperous +life--here of all places--with my child in the parish, and his poor +mother . . . That is what they all forget in the generous warmth of +their reaction; but the more they forget, the more keenly I remember. +Ah! do you think I ever have forgotten--for an hour--for a moment--since +I left off working with my hands?" + +One of these was stretched in the direction of the churchyard; and the +bishop read its touching testimony for the first time. + +"There," whispered Carlton, in strange excitement, "there lies one . . . +whose ruin and whose death are at my door. I don't forget--I never have +forgotten. I have paid, and I will pay till the end. And there shall be +no other woman . . ." + +His tongue failed him; his face was grief-stricken; the whole man was +changed. So then the human being, his bishop, knew that there was +another woman in his heart already; recalled the most terrible part of +this man's confession to him, years before; and presently plucked him by +the sleeve. And the voice that Robert Carlton heard, as he leaned once +more with his elbow on the chimney-piece, and his face between his +hands, was the voice of their last interview, at the bishop's palace, in +the blank forenoon of a wet summer's day. + +"Forgive me," it said, "for I also have misjudged you in my turn. But +now I see--but now I see, and am ashamed . . . Your life has been hard, +my brother, but it has been brave! You have been through the depths, but +you have also touched the heights, and I think that God must be very +near you to-night. I see now that you are right to go; you are both +nobler and wiser than I thought; may happiness, and peace, and love +itself go with you first or last. Let us kneel together before I leave +you, and humbly pray that it may still be so!" + +When the bishop retired, Robert Carlton returned to his study, and +prayed by himself until a knock at the outer door brought him to his +feet, much startled; for it was eleven at night. + +He was still more startled when he reached the door, for there stood a +soldier straight and tall, sunburnt and jaunty; a medal with clasps and +the Egyptian star upon his scarlet breast; a smile behind the trim +moustache; right hand at the salute. It was only after a prolonged stare +that Carlton recognised the smart young man. + +"George Mellis?" he cried. "Come in--come in!" + +"That's me, sir," said George, entering like a machine. "But--can it be +you, Mr. Carlton?" + +And his smile vanished as the lamplight fell upon the grey hairs and the +deep furrows which made the clergyman look nearly twice his years. + +"Yes, George. I have aged a little. But so have you." + +"Oh, I'm all right," said the young soldier with his fine eyes on the +other's face; "but I want to kill somebody, that's all!" + +"I should have thought you'd done enough of that at the wars," rejoined +Carlton, smiling. "Come, George, it's you I want to hear about. Of +course I have heard of you. So you enlisted in the Grenadiers, and you +got straight to Tel-el-Kebir; and that's the clasp, and not the only +one! And now you're a colour-sergeant, and certain of your stripes, they +tell me; you're a great hero in the village, George; and yet I have +heard them complain that you never even came back to show yourself after +the war." + +"I haven't come back to show myself now, Mr. Carlton." + +And the young fellow looked rather grim above his brass and scarlet. + +"I didn't mean to hurt your feelings." + +"Nor have you, sir. But can't you guess why I've come back for the first +time to-night?" + +Carlton considered, and suddenly his hollow eyes lit up; but those of +the grenadier had lighted first. + +"Was it--was it really to--to be here to-morrow, George?" + +"That was it, sir--and nothing else! I'd heard how you were building it +up with your own----" + +"Never mind that, George." + +"I heard it from Tom Ivey, who found me out in barracks not long since, +and gave me all the Long Stow news. That's how I came to hear of the +consecration to-morrow. He said he was coming down for it, and I said I +would too if I could get leave; and I did; and we've come down together +to-night." + +Neither of them had dreamt of intruding at that hour; but Mellis had +seen the old light in the old window, and felt he must just come up to +shake hands. Yes, he would come in gladly after church to-morrow. No, he +had seen no one else to speak to as yet, except Mrs. Musk; and the +grenadier stood confused. + +"Where did you see her?" + +"Driving away from the Flint House." + +"That old woman at this time of night?" + +"Musk is bad, and she was going for the doctor herself. I offered to go +instead, but she had the girl with her, and there was no stopping them." + +"Bad!" echoed Carlton. "He has been bad for weeks; he may be dying--and +all alone!" He dashed from the room, but was back next moment in his +wideawake. "I must go to him, George! He will hate it, but I must go. +Open the door, and I'll put out the light; if he's dying I shall stay." + +It was a clear keen night with a worn moon curling in the west; and the +hard road rang like a drum as red-coat and black ran elbow to elbow down +the village, jerking a word here and there as they went. + +"Been bad long, sir?" + +"Sciatica for years; only just taken to his bed." + +"Sciatica shouldn't kill." + +"This must be something else. The man is old--and the one enemy I have +left!" + +They ran on. Before the Flint House came first its meadow and then its +garden wall, with the gate left open, and a rude drive twisting through +trees to the side of the house. "This way," said Carlton; and in half a +minute they were at the side door. This also had been left open. Carlton +lowered his voice, his hand upon the latch. + +"You wait here, like a good fellow. If he will not let me say one +word--if he orders me out--then you must come up instead. If he is so +ill that his wife goes herself at midnight for the doctor, then he is +too ill to be left with no one in the house but a child of five!" + +Carlton's concern was not a little for the child. Suppose he had +awakened to call and call in vain--perhaps to run for succour to a +corpse! The thought made Carlton shudder as he found his way through +passages with which he had been permitted to become familiar after +Georgie's accident. At the head of the stairs there was Georgie's room; +the father had to pass it; and could not, without peeping in. + +For this door was ajar, and a night-light burning on the chest of +drawers. Georgie was breathing gently in his cot. Carlton approached on +tip-toe, and stood gazing downward with clasped hands. Boisterous and +robust upon his feet, the boy looked still a baby in his sleep; his face +was so round and innocent; his hands seemed such toys; and the light +hair, too seldom cut, was lightest at the roots, and still curly at the +ends, as it lay upon the pillow where his last movement had tossed it. +It was a sweet face, even with the great eyes closed; the eyelashes +looked so much longer and darker against the pure skin; they were many +shades darker than the hair; and the eyebrows were assuming a very +delicate definition of their own. The mouth was beautiful. That brown +little hand was perfectly shaped. Carlton bent over, and kissed the warm +smooth cheek with infinite tenderness; then went upon his knees, and +prayed over the child, and for him, and for his future, out of the +fulness of a brimming heart. He forgot that Musk's death would make a +difference to the child and to himself; for the moment he forgot that +Musk was in any danger of dying, and that this was his house. He and his +child were alone together once more, it might be for the last time, one +never knew. + +"God keep you, my own poor boy, and lead you not into temptation, but +deliver you from evil, for ever and ever, Amen." + +He stooped once more over the cot, pushed the long hair back, running +his fingers through it gently, and kissed the pure forehead again and +again. And it seemed to Robert Carlton--but the night-light was very +dim--that at the last his son had smiled upon him in his sleep. + + + + +XXXII + +THE SECOND TIME + + +In Musk's room there was more light. It lay under the closed door like a +yellow rod. Carlton knocked gently. There was no answer. He knocked +louder. Not a sound from within. Then the chill fell on him, and he +entered ready for any discovery but the one he was to make. + +Neither the quick nor the dead lay within. + +A fire was burning as well as the lamp; the very bed looked warm, but +was not; the sick man must have left it some minutes at least. + +The lame man, the man who could not walk, had left his bed if not the +house! Carlton caught up the lamp to go in search. And even on the +landing a voice came hailing him from the region below. + +"Mr. Carlton! Mr. Carlton! Quick, sir, quick!" + +George Mellis was still at the side door, and in the lamplight the other +could not see an inch beyond. + +"Have you found him, George? He's not in bed!" + +"Who--Musk? No, sir, no!" + +"Then what have you seen?" + +The grenadier had a wet skin, a quivering lip, a starting eye. + +"Oh, I can't tell you, sir! I may be wrong. God grant it! But give me +the lamp, and go outside and look for yourself!" + +In sheer perplexity Carlton complied; and for an instant imagined some +outrageous freak of nature; for the trees of the Flint House drive, +black as night a few minutes before, now stood etched against the +reddest dawn that he had ever seen--at midnight in December! Then a +flame shot upwards, and another, and another; and Mellis was left +standing, lamp in hand, a brilliant patch of light and colour, yet less +brilliant every instant in the face of that unearthly glare in the east. +Swift feet were pattering down the drive; and had such a start, before +the soldier found his senses, that it was only in the churchyard he +caught them up. + +Long Stow church was on fire for the second time, and burning faster +than it had burnt between five and six years before. The crackle of the +pitch pine was loud as musketry already. The roof was already burning; +its destruction had been the climax of the former fire. + +Robert Carlton stood with folded arms heaving on his chest. The bishop +was there already, in his overcoat and rug, with the whiter and the +sterner face. The servants had called him: they also were there, in +pitiful case, but no more had arrived as yet. + +"It is no use their coming. The roof's on fire in three or four +different places. He has done his work better this time; more oil for +him, with those stoves!" + +The voice was Carlton's, because his lips moved, and those of the +bishop were compressed out of sight. Otherwise Mellis, for one, would +never have recognised so sad a discord of heartbreak and devil-may-care. + +"Some things might be saved," said the bishop. + +"They might and shall! George, run to my study for the key; it's on a +nail beside the fireplace. And to think I locked up myself lest +something might happen at the last!" cried Carlton, with a single note +of high hollow laughter, as the soldier vanished. "But I never thought +of you! No, you have cheated me very cleverly this time. You almost +deserve your triumph--over me!" + +"Do you mean to say you know who has done it?" cried the bishop. + +"Yes--the man who did it before." + +"But was that ever known?" + +"No; but I knew. I found his hat in the church." + +"And you never told?" + +"Nor shall I now. But I do wonder where he got in! And he was well +enough to climb a ladder--my dying man!" + +Carlton said no more; he was sorry he had said so much. Yet this time it +was sure to come out. There was the empty bed. Mellis would speak of it, +though he had not seen it with his own eyes. Was the malingerer back in +it already? What hellish artifice! And the house emptied for the nonce! +The man's own wife would never have suspected him. + +Carlton was quite calm. There was nothing to be done. The roof was +flaring at either end and in the middle. Only a fire-engine could have +put it out, and there was still none nearer than Lakenhall. The mind +will often puzzle over an immaterial question in the face of facts too +terrible to be realised at once: the known is blinding, but the unknown +is the dark, and it is a relief to grope there even for that which is +useless when discovered. So Robert Carlton was still wondering how the +incendiary had got in, and out, and exactly what he had done inside, +when Mellis came running with the key. In a few moments they were in the +church. + +Nothing could have been less like the corresponding impression of the +former fire. Then the pews had been discovered burning; but now +rush-seated chairs and pitch pine stalls stood equally intact; and a +first glance did not reveal the source of the dull red light which +filled the church. On the other hand, a badly-broken window in the north +transept satisfied Carlton's curiosity on the immaterial point; and +supplied another, pregnant with irony; for it was the window whose arch +he had been building when Georgie first swam into his ken. + +But now Mellis was looking straight above him, and calling to Mr. +Carlton to do the same. In three places the ceiling was on fire, and +burning planks beginning to drop; in another a spreading patch of brown +burnt through even as they watched. Almost simultaneously came a shriek +from the women and a roar from the men now gathering outside; it was Tom +Ivey who came rushing in. + +"There's some one overhead! He's smashing the skylight over the north +transept! That's the man that done it--that's the man that done +it--fairly caught!" + +The saddler came on Tom's heels. + +"Gord love us all, that's Jasper Musk!" + +Carlton darted into the south transept without waste of words, and in an +instant had disappeared in the part that was boarded off until the new +organ should be established in its place there; meanwhile the very +ceiling had not been carried to the end of the transept, and a ladder +led to the natural loft that it formed. Up this ladder the incendiary +must have climbed, and up this ladder the rector was running when Mellis +and Ivey, with the rest at their heels, reached its foot. + +"Come down, sir, come down, for God's sake!" + +"I am not coming down alone." + +"Then I'll fetch you," roared Ivey; "you are not going to risk your life +for him!" + +But the red-coat was first upon the ladder, and in a few seconds both +young men were in the triangular tunnel between the ceiling and the +roof; a space so confined that under the apex alone was it possible to +walk upright; and that only for the few feet dividing them from the +nearest flames. + +"Look out!" cried Tom Ivey from the top rung. "It wasn't made for a +floor; get on your hands and knees, and the weight won't be all in one +place." So they crept into the centre of the cross; and there they knelt +upright to see over a fringe of fire that burnt their eyelids bare as +they gazed. + +Roof and ceiling of chancel and of nave, both were in roaring flames to +right and to left of them; through the flaming barrier in their faces, +and the hole already burnt, they could see the pulpit and the chairs in +the north transept thirty feet below; and across the gulf, Jasper Musk +and Robert Carlton face to face. Carlton had made the leap; they could +not; already the flames were driving them back and back. + +In the steady roar and crackle they could hear no words. Musk was +crouching under a skylight all too narrow for his gigantic shoulders, a +tell-tale oil-tin overturned at his feet. His face was livid, but +fearless, and his light eyes gleamed with hate. Carlton's back was +turned to the watchers, and for a second motionless; then he looked +round, saw them through smoke and flame, and clapped a hand to his +mouth. + +"Down, both of you," he shouted, "and round with the ladder to the +outside here, and one of you fetch up an axe. The skylight's too +small--we must make it bigger!" + +Musk's lips moved, and his eyes flashed their own fire; the others could +almost see the words. + +"Well?" said Mellis. + +"Come on; it's our only chance." + +In an instant they were down the ladder, and had it horizontal in a +minute. Then Ivey began to fume. + +"It'll take some time getting through the porch!" + +"Shove it through the broken window." + +"Good man! Stand by, out there, to haul out this ladder!" + +The red-coat ran round, his medal twinkling in the glare, while Ivey +rushed for the axe. + +"Up with her, comrades! That's it--altogether--_now_!" + +The ladder was up outside. Ivey, axe in hand, had leapt upon the fourth +rung at a bound, and was taking the rest two at a time. Below it was +light as day; the naked trees stood brown and brittle in the glare; the +upturned faces white as the curled moon. A whiter face peered through +the skylight. + +"Look alive with that axe, Tom; he can't breathe, and he's being +roasted!" + +"He deserve ut! Do you come through first, sir. There's room for you as +'tis. He can bide his turn." + +The white face flushed indignant dominion. + +"Unless you obey me, you are my murderer too!" + +A stifled curse came from under the tiles. + +"There, then! Would you save him after that? Leave him the axe and +through you come, you that can, or else I'll pull you through!" + +And his great arm thickened as he thrust it out, and grabbed at the +straight white collar, before relinquishing the axe from his other hand; +but at that moment there was a crackling groan, and a sudden unbearable +weight on Ivey's hand and arm, as the frail inner roof gave way; then a +blinding flame in his face, a crash below, and a cry of anguish from a +hundred hearts rent as one. + +The axe tumbled as Tom Ivey flung both arms round the ladder, and so +descended like a drunken man, a crumpled collar still warm and tight +between the clenched fingers of his right hand. + + + + +XXXIII + +SANCTUARY + + +Long Stow church rose salient from its knoll at the eastern extremity of +the village, still in its wintry network of a million twigs. It was not +the ruin it had been before; but the new roof had vanished; and the +chancel was in the condition to which the first fire had reduced the +whole edifice. The other walls still stand as their builder built them, +and as they stood on that December day when he was laid to rest in their +shadow. The grave is in the angle of the north transept and the nave, +not a dozen paces from the site of the shed. The stone was not up when +Gwynneth visited it, but the grave was as easily identified as it is +to-day. It lay beneath a cairn of dead flowers, picked out with many +fresh ones. The cards still fluttered upon some of the wreaths, and +Gwynneth could not help seeing the surprising names upon some; but the +humble little home-made offerings, the bunches of snow-drops and the +early crocuses, touched her more. Yet she showed no feeling as she stood +and gazed. She had brought no flowers herself. There was no pretence of +mourning in her dress. She shed no tears. + +From his own observatory the saddler had seen who was in the covered +fly, when Gwynneth got out. He was at his usual work upon the latest +newspaper, and he took it up again for a minute. But Gwynneth was more +than a minute, and more than five; the saddler lost patience, and +wandered across the road. + +"Where did you bring that young lady from? Lakenhall?" + +"Yes." + +"And are you going to take her back again?" + +"Yes, in time for the 5.40 train; and she only got down by the 2.10." + +Gwynneth, who had not stirred a feature or a limb, started indignantly +at the sound of a profaning step; but had forgiven Fuller before he +reached her hand with his own outstretched. There had seemed so much +that she might never know, could never ask; it would not be necessary +with the saddler. + +"Why, Miss Gwynneth, is that you?" he cried, when he had crushed her +hand; and his eyes widened with concern. + +"Am I so much changed?" asked Gwynneth, smiling gallantly. + +"Changed! Gord love yer, miss, you're the shadder of what you was." + +"There is plenty of substance still, Mr. Fuller." + +"And where's your colour, miss?" + +"In London, I suppose." + +"That's it," cried Fuller; "that London! I wouldn't live there, not if +you paid me: nasty, beastly, smoky, overcrowded sink of iniquity and +disease! If I was the Government I'd pull that down and build it up +again on twice the space. That isn't good manners to run down the place +where you live, miss, I know; but I never could abide that London, and +now I shall hate it more than ever." + +"But I thought you were never there, Mr. Fuller?" + +"And never mean to be, miss, and never mean to be! I've too much sense. +Look at me: sixty-eight I am, and a bit over, and not an ache or a pain +from top to toe. That's because I live in the pure air and know what I +eat; now in London, if you'll excuse my saying so, you never do. Where +should I be if I'd been swallerun London fogs and adulterated milk and +butter all my life? In my grave these thirty years! Do you take the +advice of a man of my experience, miss: shake the soot of London off +your feet, and come you back to good living and good air, and you won't +know yourself in a week." + +Gwynneth let the saddler run on; a more sensitive man would have seen +that she was not hearkening to a word. Her eyes were very hard and +bright; they rested once more upon the faded flowers and the fluttering +cards. + +"So this is Mr. Carlton's grave!" + +The belated words told nothing at all. Fuller removed his cap. + +"Yes, miss, there lie the biggest and the bravest heart that ever beat +in this here parish or anywhere near it. And I have a right to say so. +Many has come back to him this last twelvemonth or so. But I was the +first." + +"Were you at the fire, Mr. Fuller?" + +"Was I at the fire! Why, it was me that saw that first, Miss Gwynneth. +Young George Mellis, with his red-coat and his bamboo cane, he would +have it that it was him; but there are some folks that fare to be first +in everything, and General George'll be getting too big for his uniform +if he don't take care. You see, I hadn't closed an eye when I saw the +first flicker on the ceiling; but an old man like me have to get on some +clothes before he can run outside in the depths o' winter. Meanwhile, +Master George, who haven't been near his old friend all these years, he +can come down fast enough when the reverend's got the ball at his feet +again; and there were the two of them at the Flint House, inquiring +after Jasper Musk, said to be at death's door at the very moment he was +setting fire to the church." + +"Fiend!" + +"You may well say that, miss, for it was the second time he'd done it; +and the reverend had known, all these years, and that must've been +Jasper's hat he flung into the first fire when Tom Ivey come, puttun two +an' two together. What make that worse, it seem old Jasper used to say +he hoped to live to see the new church consecrated; and some say he'd +smile as he said it; but now we know what he meant. And he used to limp +up and down his room, for practice, when even the doctor thought he +couldn't set foot to the ground; for the servant girl heard him at it. +Yes, Miss Gwynneth, he was deep and strong and cruel, like the sea, was +Jasper; that's what the bishop said himself, for I heard him; but I will +say this for him, he asked no more quarter than he gave. Tom Ivey heard +his last words through the skylight, and they aren't fit for a young +lady like you to hear, but they were a man's words whatever else they +were. The worst is that the dear old reverend could've squeezed through +himself if only he'd have let Jasper slip; but that he wouldn't; so they +both went through with the ceiling and were killed." + +"For his enemy!" whispered Gwynneth, an unearthly radiance in her poor +hard eyes. + +"Yes, for the man that burnt the church down twice, and deserved to burn +himself; that was the worst of it." + +The listener's lips were consistently compressed, but at this they +parted again. + +"Oh, no, it was the best. It was the best. A great death, a glorious +death!" And the pale thin face was white-hot with a pride which consumed +all else. + +"The bishop said his life was greater still. You should ha' heard his +sermon, out here, at the open grave, when it was all over. There never +was such a funeral in the countryside before, and there never will be +another like it. The place was packed. I stood where you are standing +now, miss. I was one o' the bearers; and Ivey, Mellis, and Jones the +schoolmaster, they were the other three. Then you should have seen the +clergy; there was a rare procession of the clergy from all round; the +Reverend Scrope from Burton Mills, the Reverend Preston from Linkworth, +and Canon Wilders, and a lot more. But the bishop was in all his +toggery, and I never see a man look so fine; he's little and he's lame, +but the face he preached with, across this here open grave, you'd have +said that belonged to some old giant. And what a sermon! That didn't +make us cry; that dried our tears, an' made us want to build churches +and be killed ourselves. You might guess the text: 'Greater love hath no +man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friend.' I kept +waitun for him to point out that Musk was not the reverend's friend, but +his worst enemy; but he never did. I would have done; otherwise, he said +just what I would like to have said myself, let alone the one thing that +took the whole lot of us by surprise. And I tell you, Miss Gwynneth, the +place was right black with people; not only in the churchyard, but +across the fence in the medder as well; there was hardly a blade o' +grass to be seen." + +"What was the surprise, Mr. Fuller?" + +"He'd made up his mind to resign the living! He had told his lordship. +He meant to resign next night--I can't for the life of me think why!" + +But Gwynneth could; and, with the second sight begotten of her love, +read the dead man even in his grave, divining immediately some of the +very reasons which he had given to the bishop in his last hours. She was +never to divine them all. + +Meanwhile the saddler, having imparted a satisfactory amount of +information, was beginning to look for some return in kind, and supposed +Miss Gwynneth would be going to the hall. No, they were all from home; +indeed, Gwynneth had waited for that. Yet she made her answer with a +candid look, the prelude to a gratuitous admission. + +"I am going on to the Flint House," said she. + +"Well, there!" cried Fuller, "if I hadn't forgot to tell you where Musk +lie! He don't lie here, miss; he left it that he would go to Lakenhall +cemetery, in onconsecrated ground, some say. And Mrs. Musk--you won't +have heard it--but she's fair lost her know, poor thing!" + +"Yes, I had heard. Poor thing, indeed! Yet in her case it seems almost +merciful. But I am not going to see Mrs. Musk." + +"Then haven't you heard about little Georgie? That's a grand thing, +that! There's a lady in London (that's the only part I don't like), some +young widder with none of her own, that's going to adopt him instead." + +"I know that, too," said Gwynneth, flushing slightly as she smiled. "The +lady is a friend of mine; she heard of Georgie through me. We were in a +hospital together, but now we have taken a flat--for I am going to live +with her too. And it is for Georgie I am come to-day." + +Her companion had served her purpose; but would not go; and a hint might +betray that which had obviously never entered the saddler's head. So +Gwynneth looked her last upon her own heart's grave with the same pale +face and the same unbending carriage; but the bright eyes were softer +now, though radiant still with a heavenly pride. So his ashes exalted +her as his living presence; so his undying soul still strengthened hers. + +It was a pale February day, the grass very green, a subtle gloss of life +upon the bough; but it was man's handiwork that appealed to Gwynneth; +and all at once an astounding fact forced itself upon her vision and +understanding. The church was almost exactly as she had seen it last. +The east end was the worst; the roof was not begun. It was just as it +had been six months before; and only the work of the hireling had +perished after all; that of the self-taught mason, the pariah, the +penitent, still endured as an oblation and a sacrifice for his sins, and +as a monument to the man for all time. Gwynneth could have gone down on +her knees in thanksgiving for this miracle; as it was she saw his +resting-place but dimly for the last time. At that moment the starling +which had entertained him in life began a gossip in the elderbush at his +head; a jealous sparrow poured abuse from every tree; and so she left +him, at rest where he never rested, on the field where that rest had +been won. + +A married Musk with many children, one of the sons who had quarrelled +with their father, had already established himself and family in the +Flint House. He had thankfully accepted Gwynneth's proposal, made, +however, in Nurse Ella's name; and Georgie was ready when Gwynneth +called for the second time on her way back from the church. He was also +in tremendous spirits, leaping upon his lady like a wild beast, and, +later, roaring his farewells through the fly-window, as they drove away +towards a watery sunset, Gwynneth sitting far back on the deeper seat +She let him shout till he was tired; by that time she was mistress of +herself once more, and the dusk was such as to destroy all present +evidence of another character. So at last she could take him on her +knee. + +"And are you glad to come away with Gwynneth, darling?" + +"I should think I are; jolly glad; but I thought there was anunner lady +too?" + +"We shall find her where we are going. Do you know where we are going, +Georgie?" + +"Course I do. We're goin' to London to see the Queen. I wish we would +soon be there!" + +"So we shall, Georgie." + +"In a minute?" + +"No, not in a minute; we have to go in the train first. Have you ever +seen a real train, Georgie?" + +"No, never. I know I haven't," Georgie averred. "You are kind to take me +in one! I do love you, I say!" + +"Do you, darling?" + +"Yes, really. I love you bestest in the world. I know I do!" + +They were entering Lakenhall, and it was quite dark in the fly; but now +Georgie knew that Gwynneth was crying, for she was kissing him at the +same time, and as he never had been kissed before. + +"And you always will, Georgie--you always will?" + +"Course I will," said Georgie, gaily. + +"And go to school when Gwynneth sends you, and turn into a great strong +man, and be good to poor Gwynneth then?" + +"Gooder'n all the world," said Georgie. + + +THE END + + + + +"Mr. Hornung's books are stories pure and simple, excellently +constructed, well written, cleanly, humorous, kindly. The plot is always +well managed, the telling is lively, with no waste of irrelevant +episode, and the untying is sure to be left to the last."--_New York +Evening Post_. + + +OTHER BOOKS BY E. W. HORNUNG + + +Dead Men Tell No Tales + +A Novel. 12mo, $1.25 + +"In this novel, as in the previous ones from Mr. Hornung's pen, there is +a wealth of well-handled incidents. It is story-telling of the most +direct kind and holds the attention from the first page to the last Mr. +Hornung seems to us in each succeeding book from his pen to gain in +confidence and authority, and we do not hesitate to place him among the +first of the comparatively new writers who must be reckoned +with."--_Literature_. + + +The Amateur Cracksman + +12mo, $1.25 + +"There is not a dull page from beginning to end. . . . He is the most +interesting rogue we have met for a long time."--_New York Evening Sun_. + +"Raffles is amazing; his resource is perfect; he talks like a gentlemen +and acts like one, except when occupied with pressing business in +another man's house, at midnight, and naturally he has a 'cool nerve,' a +nerve positively arctic. They all have nerves like that, these +Raffleses."--_New York Tribune_. + + + + +BOOKS BY MR. HORNUNG + + +"Mr. Hornung has certainly earned the right to be called the Bret Harte +of Australia."--_Boston Herald_. + + +Some Persons Unknown + +12mo, $1.25 + + CONTENTS + + Kenyon's Innings + A Literary Coincidence + "Author! Author!" + The Widow of Piper's Point + After the Fact + The Voice of Gunbar + The Magic Cigar + The Governess at Greenbush + A Farewell Performance + A Spin of the Coin + The Star of the "Grasmere" + +"_In about half-a-dozen cases the scene is laid in Australia, and the +dramatic and tragic aspects of Colonial life are treated by Mr. Hornung +with that happy union of vigor and sympathy which has stood him in such +good stead in his earlier novels._"--London Spectator. + + +The Rogue's March + +A ROMANCE + +12mo, $1.50 + +"Mr. Hornung has succeeded admirably in his object: his Australian +scenes are a veritable nightmare; they sear the imagination, and it +will be some time before we get Hookey Simpson, the clank of the +chains, and the hero's degradation off our mind."--_London Saturday +Review_. + +"Vividly and vigorously told."--_London Academy_. + + +My Lord Duke + +12mo, $1.25 + +"Mr. Hornung is a natural humorist, and has the art of telling a +story."--_Philadelphia Evening Telegraph_. + +"_It is pleasant to turn to a real story by a real story-writer. Such is +'My Lord Duke.' . . . Its story is its own, both in plot and in +characterization. It is a capital little novel._"--The Nation. + + +Young Blood + +12mo, $1.25 + +"_Whether Lowndes be entirely realized or not does not much matter; the +conception of him is already a distinction. He is an adventurer of +genius, but not built on the usual lines. . . . And his vitality is +inexhaustible. We leave him, not without a stain upon his character, but +with considerable regret in our minds._"--The Bookman. + + + + +IN THE IVORY SERIES + + +The Boss of Taroomba + +16mo, 75 cents + +"There are passages in E. W. Hornung's latest story, 'The Boss of +Taroomba,' which remind us by their vividness and fantastic quality of +Stevenson in some of his South Sea Island tales. . . . The hero is an +uncommon creation even for fiction."--_Chicago Times-Herald_. + + +A Bride from the Bush + +16mo, 75 cents + +"Mr. E. W. Hornung is one of the most successful delineators of Bush +life."--_Chicago Tribune_. + + +Irralie's Bushranger + +16mo, 75 cents + +"A capital little story of Australian love and adventure. There is no +flagging in the press and stir of the story."--_The Nation_. + + + CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS, Publishers + 153-157 Fifth Avenue, New York + + + + +Transcriber's Note: Numerous words were hyphenated inconsistently in the +original text (for instance, "evensong" and "even-song"). These +inconsistencies have been retained. End-of-line hyphens have been +retained or removed based on the predominant usage elsewhere in the +text. + +In Chapter II, "The resolution was easier than its accomplshment" was +changed to "The resolution was easier than its accomplishment". + +In Chapter XIX, a missing quotation mark was added before "I will--I +will", and "it's last day's work" was changed to "its last day's work". + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Peccavi, by E. W. 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Thus, we do not necessarily +keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper edition. + + +Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility: + + http://www.gutenberg.org + +This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, +including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary +Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to +subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks. diff --git a/36115-0.zip b/36115-0.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..a379ba5 --- /dev/null +++ b/36115-0.zip diff --git a/36115-8.txt b/36115-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..c226da0 --- /dev/null +++ b/36115-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,12511 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Peccavi, by E. W. Hornung + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Peccavi + +Author: E. W. Hornung + +Release Date: May 15, 2011 [EBook #36115] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK PECCAVI *** + + + + +Produced by Steven desJardins and the Online Distributed +Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This book was +produced from scanned images of public domain material +from the Google Print project.) + + + + + + +PECCAVI + +BY E. W. HORNUNG + +AUTHOR OF "THE AMATEUR CRACKSMAN," "MY LORD +DUKE," "YOUNG BLOOD," ETC. + +CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS +NEW YORK 1901 + +COPYRIGHT, 1900, BY +CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS + +All rights reserved + +THE CAXTON PRESS +NEW YORK. + + + + + CONTENTS + + Chapter Page + I. Dust to Dust 1 + II. The Chief Mourner 11 + III. A Confession 18 + IV. Midsummer Night 29 + V. The Man Alone 45 + VI. Fire 51 + VII. The Sinner's Prayer 66 + VIII. The Lord of the Manor 77 + IX. A Duel Begins 89 + X. The Letter of the Law 100 + XI. Labour of Hercules 115 + XII. A Fresh Discovery 125 + XIII. Devices of a Castaway 131 + XIV. The Last Resort 137 + XV. His Own Lawyer 150 + XVI. End of the Duel 162 + XVII. Three Weeks and a Night 186 + XVIII. The Night's Work 193 + XIX. The First Winter 209 + XX. The Way of Peace 230 + XXI. At the Flint House 249 + XXII. A Little Child 262 + XXIII. Design and Accident 275 + XXIV. Glamour and Rue 291 + XXV. Signs of Change 306 + XXVI. A Very Few Words 316 + XXVII. An Escape 323 + XXVIII. The Turning Tide 335 + XXIX. A Haven of Hearts 348 + XXX. The Woman's Hour 362 + XXXI. Advent Eve 378 + XXXII. The Second Time 390 + XXXIII. Sanctuary 397 + + + + +PECCAVI + +I + +DUST TO DUST + + +Long Stow church lay hidden for the summer amid a million leaves. It had +neither tower nor steeple to show above the trees; nor was the +scaffolding between nave and chancel an earnest of one or the other to +come. It was a simple little church, of no antiquity and few exterior +pretensions, and the alterations it was undergoing were of a very +practical character. A sandstone upstart in a countryside of flint, it +stood aloof from the road, on a green knoll now yellow with buttercups, +and shaded all day long by horse-chestnuts and elms. The church formed +the eastern extremity of the village of Long Stow. + +It was Midsummer Day, and a Saturday, and the middle of the Saturday +afternoon. So all the village was there, though from the road one saw +only the idle group about the gate, and on the old flint wall a row of +children commanded by the schoolmaster to "keep outside." Pinafores +pressed against the coping, stockinged legs dangling, fidgety hob-nails +kicking stray sparks from the flint; anticipation at the gate, +fascination on the wall, law and order on the path in the +schoolmaster's person; and in the cool green shade hard by, a couple of +planks, a crumbling hillock, an open grave. + +Near his handiwork hovered the sexton, a wizened being, twisted with +rheumatism, leaning on his spade, and grinning as usual over the +stupendous hallucination of his latter years. He had swallowed a +rudimentary frog with some impure water. This frog had reached maturity +in the sexton's body. Many believed it. The man himself could hear it +croaking in his breast, where it commanded the pass to his stomach, and +intercepted every morsel that he swallowed. Certainly the sexton was +very lean, if not starving to death quite as fast as he declared; for he +had become a tiresome egotist on the point, who, even now, must hobble +to the schoolmaster with the last report of his unique ailment. + +"That croap wuss than ever. Would 'ee like to listen, Mr. Jones?" + +And the bent man almost straightened for the nonce, protruding his chest +with a toothless grin of huge enjoyment. + +"Thank you," said the schoolmaster. "I've something else to do." + +"Croap, croap, croap!" chuckled the sexton. "That take every mortal +thing I eat. An' doctor can't do nothun for me--not he!" + +"I should think he couldn't." + +"Why, I do declare he be croapun now! That fare to bring me to my own +grave afore long. Do you listen, Mr. Jones; that croap like billy-oh +this very minute!" + +It took a rough word to get rid of him. + +"You be off, Busby. Can't you see I'm trying to listen to something +else?" + +In the church the rector was reciting the first of the appointed psalms. +Every syllable could be heard upon the path. His reading was Mr. +Carlton's least disputed gift, thanks to a fine voice, an unerring sense +of the values of words, and a delivery without let or blemish. Yet there +was no evidence that the reader felt a word of what he read, for one and +all were pitched in the deliberate monotone rarely to be heard outside a +church. And just where some voices would have failed, that of the Rector +of Long Stow rang clearest and most precise: + +_"When thou with rebukes dost chasten man for sin, thou makest his +beauty to consume away, like as it were a moth fretting a garment: every +man therefore is but vanity._ + +_"Hear my prayer, O Lord, and with thine ears consider my calling: hold +not thy peace at my tears._ + +_"For I am a stranger with thee: and a sojourner, as all my fathers +were._ + +_"O spare me a little, that I may recover my strength: before I go +hence, and be no more seen . . ."_ + +The sexton was regaling the children on the wall with the ever-popular +details of his notorious malady. The schoolmaster still strutted on the +path, now peeping in at the porch, now reporting particulars to the +curious at the gate: a quaint incarnation of conscious melancholy and +unconscious enjoyment. + +"Hardly a dry eye in the church!" he announced after the psalm. "Mr. +Carlton and Musk himself are about the only two that fare to hide what +they feel." + +"And what does Mr. Carlton feel?" asked a lout with a rose in his coat. +"About as much as my little finger!" + +"Ay," said another, "he cares for nothing but his Roman candles, and his +transcripts and gargles."[1] + +[Footnote 1: Transepts and gargoyles.] + +"Come," said the schoolmaster, "you wouldn't have the parson break down +in church, would you? I'm sorry I mentioned him. I was thinking of +Jasper Musk. He just stands as though Mr. Carlton had carved him out of +stone." + +"The wonder is that he can stand there at all," retorted the fellow with +the flower, "to hear what he don't believe read by a man he don't +believe in. A funeral, is it? It's as well we know--he'd take a weddun +in the same voice." + +The schoolmaster turned away with an ambiguous shrug. It was not his +business to defend Mr. Carlton against the disaffected and the undevout. +He considered his duty done when he informed the rector who his enemies +were, and (if permitted to proceed) what they were saying behind his +back. The schoolmaster made a mental mark against the name of one +Cubitt, ex-choirman, and, forthwith transferring his attention to the +audience on the wall, put a stop to their untimely entertainment before +returning softly to the porch. + +In Long Stow churchyard there was shade all day, but in the church it +was dusk from that moment in the forenoon when the east window lost the +sun. This peculiarity was partly temporary. The church was in a +transition stage; it was putting forth transepts north and south; +meanwhile there was much boarding within, and a window in eclipse on +either side. The surrounding foliage added its own shade; and each time +the schoolmaster stole out of the sunlight into the porch, to peer up +the nave, it was several moments before he could see anything at all. +And then it was but a few high lights in a sea of gloom: first the east +window, as yet unstained, its three quatrefoils filled with summer sky, +the rest with waving branches; next, the brass lectern, the surplice +behind it, the high white forehead above. Then in the chancel something +gleamed: that was the coffin, resting on trestles. Then in the choir +seats, otherwise deserted, a figure grew out of the shadows, a solitary +and a massive figure, that stood even now when everybody else was +seated, finely regardless of the fact. It was a man, elderly, but very +powerfully built. The hair stood white and thick upon the large strong +head, less white and shorter on the broad deep jowl. The head was +carried with a certain dignity, rude, savage, indomitable. The eyes +gazed fixedly at the opposite wall; not once did they condescend to the +thing that gleamed upon the trestles. One great hand was knotted over +the knob of a mighty stick, on which the old man leant stiffly. He was +dressed in black, not quite as a gentleman, yet as befitted the most +substantial man but one in the parish. And that was Jasper Musk. + +The parson finished the lesson, and his white brow bent over the closed +book; the face beneath was bearded and much tanned, and in it there +burnt an eye that came as a surprise after that formal voice; and the +hand that closed the book was sensitive but strong. Stepping from the +lectern, the clergyman declared his calibre in an obeisance towards the +altar, then led the way slowly down the aisle. Bearers rose from the +shades and followed with the coffin; they were almost at the porch +before Jasper Musk took notice enough to limp after them with much noise +from his stick. The congregation waited for him, swarming into the aisle +in the big man's wake. So they came to the grave. + +And there broad daylight revealed a circumstance that came as a shock to +most of those who had followed the body from the church, but as an +outrage to the officiating clergyman: the coffin bore no plate. Mr. +Carlton coloured to the hair, and his deep eye flashed upon the chief +mourner; the latter leant upon his stick and replied with a grim glare +across the open grave. For a moment the wind washed through the trees, +and every sparrow made itself heard; then the rector's eyes dropped to +his book, but his voice rang colder than before. And presently the earth +received its own. + +Mr. Carlton had pronounced the benediction, and a solemn hush still held +all assembled, when a bicycle bell jarred staccato in the road; a moment +later, with a sharp word for some children who had tired of the funeral +and strayed across his path, the rider dismounted outside the saddler's +workshop, a tiny cabin next his house and opposite the church. The +cyclist was a lad in his teens, dark, handsome, dapper, but small for +his age, which was that of high collars and fancy ties; and he rode a +fancy bicycle, the high machine of the day, but extravagantly nickelled +in all its parts. + +"Well, Fuller," said he, "who are they burying?" + +Fuller, the saddler, who enjoyed a local monopoly in the exercise of his +craft, but whose trade was the mere relaxation of a life spent in +reading and disseminating the news of the day, was spelling through the +_Standard_ at his bench behind the open window. He dropped his paper and +whipped the spectacles from a big dogmatic nose. + +"Gord love yer, Mr. Sidney, do you stand there and tell me you haven't +heard?" + +"How could I hear when I'm only home from Saturdays to Mondays? I'm on +my way home now. Old Sally Webb--is it--or one of the old Wilsons?" + +"No, sir," said the saddler; "that's no old person. Gord love yer," he +cried again, "I wish that was!" + +"Who is it, Mr. Fuller?" + +"That's Molly Musk," said Fuller, slowly; "that's who that is, Mr. +Sidney." + +The boy had not the average capacity for astonishment; he was not, in +fact, the average boy; but at the name his eyebrows shot up and his +mouth grew round. + +"Molly Musk! I thought nobody knew where she was? When did she turn up?" + +"Tuesday night, and died the next." + +"But I say, Fuller, this is interesting!" Perhaps the average boy would +have been no more shocked; he might not even have found it interesting. +This one leant his bicycle against the wall, and his elbows on the bench +within the open window. "Where's she been all this time?" he queried, +confidentially. "What did she die of? What's it all mean?" And there was +a knowing curl about the corners of his mouth. + +"Mean?" said the saddler; "there's more than you want to know that, Mr. +Sidney, but want must be their master. That old Jasper, _he_ know, so +they say; but I'm not so sure. It was he fetched her home, poor old +feller; got the letter Monday morning, had her home by Tuesday night. +That's a man I never liked, Mr. Sidney. I've said it to his face, and +I'll say it as long as I live; but, Gord love yer, I'm sorry for him +now! That's given _him_ a rare doing and no mistake, and less wonder. A +trim little thing like poor Molly Musk! Not that I'm so surprised as +some; a man of my experience don't make no mistake, and I never did care +for the breed. But there, even my heart bleed when that don't boil; as +for the reverend here, he feel it as much as anybody else, and that _I_ +know. That young Jim Cubitt, he come by just now, and says he, 'He's +taking the service as if it was a wedding.' 'You've been kicked out of +the choir,' I says; 'that's what's the matter with you still, or you +wouldn't want a man to be a woman. Thank goodness there's one live man +in the parish,' I says, 'though I don't fare to hold with him.' And no +more I do, Mr. Sidney; but, Gord love yer, that make no difference to +men of our experience. I like the reverend's Popery as little as the +squire like it, and I tell him so, yet he go on bringing me the +_Standard_ every day when he've done with it. Is there another clergyman +that'd do the like to a man that went against him in the parish? Would +the Reverend Preston at Linkworth? Would the Reverend Scrope at Burton +Mills? Or Canon Wilders, or any other man Jack of 'em? No, sir, not +one!" + +"But if he doesn't read them himself," said the boy, "it doesn't amount +to so very much." And he laid his hand on three more _Standards_, +unopened, with the parson's name in print upon the wrapper. + +"What I was coming to," cried the saddler; "only when I get on the +reverend my tongue will wag. They say he don't feel. I say he do, and I +know: all this week I've had no _Standard_, so this morning I was so +bold as to up and mention it, and there was all six unopened. +'Reverend,' I says, 'you must be ill--with that there Egyptian Question +to argue about'--for we're rare 'uns to argue, the reverend and me--'and +no trace yet o' them Phoenix Park varmin!' But he shake his head. 'Not +ill, Fuller,' he says; 'but there's tragedy enough in this parish +without going to the papers for more. And I haven't the heart to argue +even with you,' he says. So that's my answer to them as says our +reverend don't feel." + +The boy had been patiently pricking the bench with a saddler's punch; +now he raised his deliberate dark eyes and looked at the other +point-blank. + +"You talk about a tragedy," he said, "but you won't say where the +tragedy comes in. What has killed the girl?" + +"I hardly like to tell a young gentleman like you," said the saddler; +"though, to be sure, you'll hear of nothing else in the village." + +"Perhaps," said the boy, with a rather sinister smile, "I'm not quite so +innocent as I ought to be. Come on, out with it!" + +"Well, then, the poor young thing was brought home in trouble," sighed +the saddler. "And in her trouble she died next night." + +The boy looked at the man through narrow eyes with a knowing light in +them, and the curves cut deep at the corners of his mouth. + +"In trouble, eh? So that's why she disappeared?" he said at length. +"Molly--Musk!" + + + + +II + +THE CHIEF MOURNER + + +Jasper Musk remained some minutes at the grave, alone, and more than +ever a mark for curious eyes; his own were raised, and his lips moved +with a significance difficult to mistake, but in him yet more difficult +to accept. The infidelity of the man was notorious, and, indeed, the +raised face was not the face of prayer. It was flint bathed in gall, too +bitter for faith, too savage for sorrow; it was a frozen sea of wrinkles +without a single ripple of agitation. Yet the lips moved, and were still +moving when Jasper Musk passed through the crowd now assembled about the +gate, erect though halt, a glitter in his eyes, but that was all. + +As the folk had waited and made way for him in the church, so they +waited and made way outside. Thus, as he limped down into the road, Musk +had the village almost to himself. He turned to the right, and the west +wind blew in his face, strong and warm, with cloud upon cloud of yellow +dust; overhead the other clouds flew high and white and broken, a +flotilla of small sail upon the blue. But Musk was done gazing at the +sky, neither did he look right or left as he trudged in the middle of +the road. So the saddler's place, and then the woody opening of the road +to Linkworth, with the white bridge gleaming through the trees, and the +ripe leaves purling in the wind like summer surf, all fell behind on the +left; as, on the right, did the rectory gate, terminating that same +flint wall which had been the children's grand stand. Rectory, church, +and glebe stood all together, an indivisible trinity, with open uplands +east and north. Westward began the cottages, buff-coloured, thatched; +and it was cottages for half a mile, but healthy cottages, with plenty +of space between, here a wheatfield, there a meadow; for every +householder of Long Stow has also his holding of land, and there is no +more independent parish in East Anglia. Of private houses that are not +cottages, however, the village has only three: the rectory at one end, +the hall near the other, and the Flint House between the two. + +The Flint House now belonged to Jasper Musk. Report said that he had +bought it outright for nine hundred pounds, with the meadow he was now +passing on his left, and the wild garden reaching to the river. +Originally part and parcel of the Long Stow estate, the place had been +let for years, with a good slice of land, to London sportsmen who spent +just two months of the twelve there. Musk had been the lessee's bailiff, +and had feathered his nest so well that when the whole estate changed +hands, and the part went with the whole, the ex-bailiff was in a +position to buy a house and grounds for which the new squire had no use. +None knew how he could have come honestly by so much profit; yet he was +a man of tried integrity, but a hard man, and the last to get fair +treatment behind his back. A more genuine marvel was the way in which he +had spent his money, on a house that could scarcely fail to be a white +elephant to such a man, and a hideous house into the bargain. It abutted +directly on the road, grim and rambling, with false windows like +wall-eyes, and facets of flint so sharp that to brush against the wall +was to rip a sleeve to ribbons. There were many rooms, musty and +mice-ridden, and now only two old people to inhabit them. Musk had +driven all his sons from home, thus doing his country an unwitting +service, for there was the stuff that knits an empire in the blood. But +only one daughter had been born to him, and now he had left her in the +ground, and would wash his mind of her for ever. + +The resolution was easier than its accomplishment: on his very threshold +a shrill small cry assailed and insulted Jasper Musk. And in the parlour +walked his wife, meek-spirited, flat-chested, leaden-eyed; too weary for +much grief, as he was too bitter; in her thin arms an infant not four +days old. + +Musk put himself in her path. + +"Stop walking!" + +"That'll set him off again," sighed Mrs. Musk, though not before she had +obeyed. + +"I don't care," said Jasper. "That can cry till that die," he added +brutally, as the fit returned; "and the sooner the better. Hold it up a +bit. There, now! I want to have a look at the brat. I want to see who +that's like!" + +"It's like poor Molly," whimpered the grandmother, shedding tears that +she could neither check nor hide. + +Musk thumped his stick on the floor. + +"Molly? Molly? You let me hear that name again! Haven't I told you once +and for all never to lay your tongue to that name, in my hearing or +behind my back, as long as you live? Then don't you forget it; and none +o' your lies. That's no more like her than that's like you. But a look +of somebody it have, though I can't for the life of me think who. Wait a +bit. Give me time. That'll come--that'll come!" + +But the thin shrill screaming continued till the little red face grew +livid and wrinkled almost beyond resemblance to its kind; then Musk +relinquished his futile scrutiny, and signed to his wife to resume the +walking, but himself remained in the room. And he leant on his stick as +he had leant on it at the funeral; but here in his house he wore his +hat; and from under its broad brim he followed them, backward and +forward, to and fro, with smouldering eyes. + +"Do you know what I've vowed?" he presently went on. "Do you know the +oath I took, there at that open grave, when all the tomfoolery was over, +and that Jesuit jerry-builder had taken his hook?" + +"I'm sure I don't," sighed Mrs. Musk, as the child lay once more still +against her withered bosom. + +"I stood there," said Jasper, "and I swore I'd find the man. And I swore +I'd tear his heart out when I've found him. And I'll do both!" + +His voice rose so swiftly to so fierce a pitch that the woman started +violently, and the infant wailed again. Instantly the room shook, and +with one stride, paid for by a spasm of pain, the husband towered above +the wife; and this time it was a heavy hand upon her shrunk and +shrinking shoulder that put a stop to the walk. + +"Do _you_ know who it is?" he cried. "My God, I believe you do!" + +"I don't, indeed!" + +"She never told you?" + +"God knows she did not." + +"Or anybody else?" + +"I don't know." + +"But you think--you think! I see it in your face. Who is it you think +she may have told? I'll soon find out from him or her; trust me to wring +that out!" + +For answer, the woman subsided in sobs upon the horsehair sofa, rocking +herself and the baby in her grief and terror. "You'll be that angry with +me," she moaned; "you'll be right mad!" + +"Oh, no, I sha'n't," said Musk, in a kindlier voice. "I'm not so bad as +all that, though this do fare to make a man crazy. Tell away, old woman, +and don't you be afraid." + +"Oh, Jasper, it was when you were gone to Lakenhall for the doctor--that +last time!" + +"Well?" + +"She knew the end was near. Poor thing! Poor thing!" + +"What did she say?" + +"That she'd die more happier if only she could speak--if only I would +send----" + +"Not for Carlton?" + +The wife could only nod in her fear and desperation. + +"You sent for that man the moment my back was turned?" + +"Oh, I knew that'd make you right wild--I knew--I knew!" + +Musk controlled himself by an effort. + +"That don't. That sha'n't. I'll have it out of him, that's all; he's not +the Church o' Rome yet! Go on. Go on." + +"I went myself. No one knew. I left her alone time I was gone." + +"And you brought him back with you?" + +"Well, he got here first. He ran all the way." + +"He knew better than to let me catch him. Jesuit! How long was he with +her?" + +"Not long, Jasper, not long indeed!" + +"And you heard nothing?" + +"Not a word. I stayed downstairs. I had to promise her that before I +went. She had something to say to Mr. Carlton that nobody else must +know." + +"But somebody else shall!" said Jasper grimly. "That was it, you may +depend; you should have listened at the door. But that make no matter. +Somebody else is going to know before he's many minutes older!" + +And an ugly smile broadened on the thick-set face; but the woman gasped. +Quick as thought the child was on the sofa, the grandmother on her feet. +Trembling and terrified, she stood in her husband's path. + +"Jasper! You're never going up to the rectory?" + +"I am, though--this minute!" + +"Oh, Jasper!" + +"Do you let me by." + +"But I promised you should never know! You've made me break my solemn +word! He'll know I've broken it!" + +"Yes, I'm going to learn him a thing or two. Will you let me by?" + +"_She'll_ know--too--wherever she has gone to!" + +"You'd better not keep me no more." + +"Jasper! Jasper! On her death-bed I promised her----" + +"Out of my light!" + + + + +III + +A CONFESSION + + +The rector's study was on the ground floor, facing south. It was a long +room, but narrow, and so low that the present incumbent, who stood +six-feet-two, had contracted a stoop out of continual and instinctive +dread of the ancient beams that scored his study ceiling, combined with +a besetting habit of pacing the floor. There were two doors; one led +into the garden, providing parishioners with immediate access to the +rector when he was not to be found at the church; the other terminated +an inner passage. Both were of immemorial oak, and, like the lattice +casement over the writing table, both rattled in the least wind. Such +was the room which the Reverend Robert Carlton haunted when driven or +detained indoors: rickety, ill-lighted, and draughty when it was not +close, it was still a habitable hole enough, and picturesque in spite of +its occupant. + +Optional surroundings afford a fair clue to the superficial man, but no +real key to character; thus Mr. Carlton's furniture suggested a soul +devoid of the æsthetic sense. He had the sense in all its fineness, but +it found expression in another place. Like many ritualists, Carlton was +a religious æsthete; none more fastidious in the service of the +sanctuary; on the other hand, after the fashion of his peers in two +Churches, the trappings of his own life were severely simple. They had +nearly all been purchased second-hand, those wire-covered shelves and +the books they bore, that oak settle, and the huge arm-chair filled with +miscellaneous lumber. Two baize-covered forms were there for the +accommodation of various classes which the rector held; a prayer desk +faced east in the one orderly corner of the room. Only three pictures +hung on the walls; a Holy Family and Guido Reni's St. Sebastian, +ordinary silver prints in Oxford frames, mementoes of a pilgrimage to +Rome; and an ancient cricket eleven, faded from age, and fly-blown for +long want of a glass. There were also a couple of tin shields, bearing +the heraldic devices of Robert Carlton's public school and of his Oxford +college, while a crucifix hung over the prayer desk. Among the books two +volumes on _Building Construction_ might have been remarked upon the +settle, together with a tattered copy of Parker's _Introduction to +Gothic Architecture_; among the lumber, a mason's trowel and a +cold-chisel. Lastly, the study smelt, but did not reek, of common +birdseye. + +Jasper Musk, passing the open lattice, caught the parson hastily rising +from his knees, not at the prayer desk, but beside his writing table, +upon which a large book lay open. A newspaper lay on top of the book +when Musk was admitted some moments after he had knocked. + +He entered with his heavy, uneven steps, but took up a position barely +within the threshold, and began by declining a seat with equal emphasis +and stiffness. + +"No, I thank you, Mr. Carlton. I've never been here before in your +time, and I'm never likely to come again. I'm only here now to ask a +question--and return a compliment!" + +And the visitor's eye gleamed as Mr. Carlton creased the forehead that +was so white in comparison with his face: at the moment this contrast +was not conspicuous. + +"From what I hear," explained Musk, "you've done me the kindness of +coming to my house when my back was turned." + +"And you have only heard of it now?" + +"Within the last ten minutes; and I come here right straight. You may +think I wouldn't come for nothing, me that's never darkened your door +before to-day. I don't hold with you, Mr. Carlton, and I'm not the only +one. That's true--I'm not a religious man, and never was; but, if I ever +was to be, it wouldn't be your religion. No, sir, when I fare to want +Christmas-trees in church I'll go to Rome and be done with it; and +that's where you ought to be, Mr. Carlton, before you get a parcel of +women to confess their sins to you as though you was God Almighty!" + +Mr. Carlton sat quite still under this uncalled-for criticism; he even +looked relieved, and one sensitive finger brushed the brown moustache to +either side of his mouth. + +"I have never advocated auricular confession," said he, "whatever I may +think. I have merely said, to those in doubt, in difficulty, or in +trouble, I will help them with God's help if I can." + +"In trouble!" cried Musk scornfully. "I know one that never might have +got herself into trouble if she'd never listened to you! And that's what +brings me here; I'll beat about the bush no more. My wife said she +fetched you the other night. I don't blame you for going, I won't go so +far as that. What I want to know, and what I mean to know, is this: did +my--that young woman lying there--confess to you or did she not?" It was +a fist that he had flung in the direction of the churchyard. + +"Confess what?" + +And the parson's voice was cold and constrained, as it had been beside +the grave; but that white forehead glistened like a dead man's. + +"The name of the father of her child!" + +Carlton took an ivory paper-knife from his desk, and the thin blade +snapped in two between his fingers. A pause followed. Musk stood like +granite, stick and hat in hand, frowning down on the clergyman seated at +his writing table. At length the latter looked up. + +"I might say that is a question you have no right to ask, Mr. Musk; +what is certain, had there been any question of confession, I should +have no right to answer you. There was none. Your daughter sent for +me, to speak to me; and speak we did; but she did not tell me +that--scoundrel's--name." + +"But you know!" + +"How dare you say that?" cried Carlton; and a flash of anger played for +an instant on his pallor. + +"I see it in your face; but I'll have it out of you! I'll have it out of +you," roared Musk, in a sudden frenzy, striking his stick to the floor, +"if I have to tear your smooth tongue out along with it! So smooth you +could read over that murdered girl, and know all the time who'd murdered +her, and think to keep that to yourself! But you sha'n't; no, that you +sha'n't; not if I have to stand here till midnight. You know! You know! +Deny it if you can!" + +"I shall deny nothing," retorted the other. "No, I shall deny nothing!" +he reiterated as if to himself. "But think for a minute, Mr. Musk--I +entreat you to think calmly for one minute! Suppose I could tell you +what you ask, could it serve any good end for you to know?" + +"Good end!" cried Musk. "Why, you know it could. I could kill the man +who's killed my daughter--and kill him I will--and swing for him if they +like. That'll be a wonderful good end all round!" + +"Then is it for me to throw temptation in your way? Is it for me to +spoil a life, if not to end it? For all you know, Mr. Musk, it may be a +life otherwise honest, useful, and of good report. Nay!" exclaimed Mr. +Carlton, as if suddenly impatient of his own reticence, "I'll go so far +as to say that it once was all three. And the man would do such +duty--make such amends----" + +A groan admitted that there were none to make, and finished a sentence +to which Musk had not listened; the one before was sufficient for him; +and his broad face shone with the satisfaction of a point gained. + +"Come," said he, "that's fairer! So you do know him, and you say so like +a man. I always took you for a man, sir, though there's been no love +lost between us; and I'll say I'm sorry I spoke so harsh just now, Mr. +Carlton; for I had a hold of the wrong end o' the stick--I see that now. +It was the man that confessed--it was the man. Sir, if you're the +Christian gentleman that I take you for, and this here Christianity o' +yours ain't all cant an' humbug, you'll tell me that man's name; for I +can't call to mind a single one she so much as looked at--unless it was +that young Mellis." + +"No, no; poor George is innocent enough, God knows!" + +"He's like to be, for all I hear. They say he carries a cross for you o' +Sundays--but I won't say no more about that. If he's your right hand in +the parish, as they tell me he is, at least I should hope he'd be +straight." + +A puff of wind came through the open window. It lifted the newspaper +from the open book, but the rector's hand fell quickly upon both. And +there it rested. And his wretched eyes rested upon his hand. + +"So I've never thought twice about George Mellis. I'd as soon think o' +you, sir. Then who can it be?" + +Mr. Carlton bounded to his feet, white as his collar, and quivering to +his nostrils. + +"You want to know?" + +"I mean to know, sir." + +"And to kill him--eh?" + +"I reckon I'll go pretty near it." + +"Ah, don't do it by halves!" cried Carlton in a strange high voice. +"Kill him now!" His hands fell open at his side; his head fell forward +on his breast; and he who had sinned grossly against God and man, yet +was not born to be a hypocrite, stood defenceless, abject, +self-destroyed. + +Moments passed; became minutes; and all the sound in the rectory study +came from the rattling of its inner door, or through the outer one from +the garden. Then by degrees a hard breathing broke on Robert Carlton's +ears; but he himself was the next to speak, flinging back his head in +sudden misery. + +"Why don't you strike?" he cried out. "You've got your stick; strike, +man, strike!" + +It seemed an hour before the answer came, in a voice scarcely +recognizable as that of Jasper Musk, it was so low and calm; yet there +was an intensity in the deep, slow tones that matched the fearful +intensity of the fixed light eyes; and the massive face was still and +livid from the short steel beard to the virile silver hair. + +"Oh, yes, I'll strike!" hissed Musk. "I'll strike! I'll strike!" And he +struck with his eyes until the other's fell once more; until the guilty +man collapsed headlong in his chair, his arms upon the table, and his +face upon his arms. "But I'll strike in my own way, thank you," Musk +went on, "and in my own good time. You shall smart a bit first--learn +what it's like to suffer--taste hell upon earth in case there's no hell +for bloody murderers beyond! How I wish you could see yourself! How I +wish your precious flock could see you--and they shall. Whited sepulchre +. . . filthy hypocrite . . . living lie!" + +Deliberately chosen, with long pauses between, with many a rejection of +the word that came uppermost--the worse word that was too strong to +sting--these measured epithets carved round the heart that unbridled +abuse would have stabbed and stunned. Carlton could hide his face, but +he quivered where he sprawled, and the other nodded in savage +self-esteem. + +"Not that I had ought to be surprised," continued Musk; "it's what might +have been expected of a Jesuit in disguise; the only wonder is I didn't +suspect you from the first. I never set up for being a charitable man; +but that seems I was a damned sight too charitable towards you. I +thought no wrong, whatever else I may have thought of you and your ways. +No; I may have jeered, I may have been vexed, but my mind wasn't nasty +enough for that. God! that I can keep my stick off you, when I remember +the choir practices, and the organ practices, and the Bible classes, and +the Young Women's Christian Association. Sounds well, don't it? Young +Women's Christian Association! Now we know what it meant; now we know +what it all means, church and parsons, religion and all; a sink of +iniquity and a set of snivelling, whining, licentious----" + +"Stop!" cried Carlton, manned at last, and on his feet to enforce the +word. "Say what you please of me, do what you will to me. Nothing is too +bad for me--I deserve the very worst. But abuse my Church you shall not, +in my hearing." + +"His Church!" sneered Musk. "A lot you've done to make me respect it, +haven't you? My God, can you stand there looking at me as if I were in +the wrong instead o' you? Do you know what you've done, and confessed to +doing? You've murdered my girl, just as much as though you'd taken and +cut her throat, you have: more, you've murdered her body and soul, you +that snivel about the soul! And you can stand there and whine about your +Church! Is that all you've got to say for yourself--to the father of the +woman you've ruined to her grave?" + +"That is all I have to say to you, Mr. Musk. I will not insult you by +asking your forgiveness, much less by attempting to make the shadow of +an excuse; there could be none; nor can there be any forgiveness for me +from you or your wife; nor do I look for any mercy in this parish, or +this world. Go, spread the news, and ruin me in my turn; it's what I +deserve, and mean to bear." + +"Not so fast," said Musk--"not so fast, if you please. So I'm to spread +the news, am I? And do you think I'm so proud that's the reverend? By +your leave, Mr. Carlton, I'll keep that same news to myself till I've +had all I want from it." + +"Any refinement you like," said Carlton. "It will not be too bad for +me--or too much--please God!" + +Jasper Musk put on his hat, but came close up to the clergyman before +taking his leave. + +"I wish I knew you better!" he ground out through his teeth. "I wish I'd +made up to you like the women, instead of giving you the wide berth I +have. Do you know why? Because I'd have known how to hit you hardest," +said Musk, hissing like a snake; "because I'd have known where to hurt +you most!" + +Carlton stood a trifle more upright: his enemy's malice ministered +subtly to his remnant of self-respect. + +"I wish I'd been a church-goer," continued Musk; "but it's never too +late to mend! I may be there to-morrow to hear you preach; maybe I'll +have a word to say myself; maybe I shall not. You'll know when the time +comes, and not before." + +Carlton quailed, for the first time at a threat, and his visible terror +seemed to intoxicate the other. Seizing him by the shoulder as he had +seized his wife, clutching him like a wild beast, and thrusting his +great face to within an inch of that of the unhappy clergyman, Jasper +Musk spat lewd names, and foul insult, and wanton blasphemy, until +breath failed him. All the vileness he had heard in sixty years, and +could recall in half as many seconds, poured from him in a very +transport of insensate ribaldry; words that had never left his lips +before, crowded to them now; and were still ringing in a swimming head +when Robert Carlton woke to the fact that he was once more alone. + +His first sensation was one of overwhelming nausea. His very vitals +writhed; and he reeled heavily against an open bookcase, casting an arm +along one of the upper shelves, and resting his face upon the sleeve. +For a few moments all his weight was upon that arm; then he opened his +eyes, and the titles of the books engaged his dazed attention. None was +apt, but all were familiar, and the familiarity maddened the stricken +man. He stood glaring from one low wall to another, filled with those +doubts which are the cruel satellites of transcendent anguish. Had it +really happened after all? The room was so unchanged, from the few +things on the walls to the many in the chair! All was so homely, so +intimate, so reassuring; and no visible trace of Musk! Had he ever been +there at all? + +Ah, yes, for he had gone! In the distance a gate had squealed, and shut +with a rattle; the sound had lain in his ear; now it sank to the brain. +Now, too, another sound, intermittent all this time, but meaningless +hitherto, assumed a like significance. This was the continued rustling +of a newspaper, as the wind whisked in at the open door and out by the +open window in invisible harlequinade. The man's mind fled back a +little lifetime of minutes. And he recalled the last puff and rustle, +and the quick falling of his own hand upon the paper, which lay on his +desk, as the last event of a past era of his existence--the last act of +Robert Carlton, hypocrite! + +And what was the peril that had made the final demand upon his caution +and his cunning? It was a new irony to perceive at once that it had +existed chiefly in guilty imagination; to remove the paper, and to +reveal nothing more incriminating than the parish register of deaths, +with an unfinished entry in his own hand, a spatter of ink in place of a +name, and some round white blisters lower down the leaf. Yet this it was +that had brought Carlton to his knees an hour ago; and it brought him to +his knees again, not at the desk of formal prayer, but here at his table +as before. + +"Father have mercy on me," he prayed, "for I neither deserve nor desire +any mercy from man!" + + + + +IV + +MIDSUMMER NIGHT + + +And while he knelt the situation was developing, with unforeseen and +truly merciful rapidity, in an utterly unsuspected quarter; thus an +aggressive knock at the inner door came in a sense as an answer to the +prayer it interrupted. + +The rectory servants consisted at this time of a small but entire family +employed wholesale out of pure philanthropy. And this was the mother, +red-hot in her cheap crape, to say that she had heard everything--could +not help hearing--and that house was no longer any place for respectable +women and an honest lad--no, not if they had to sleep in the fields. So +the lad had got their boxes on a barrow, but he would bring it back. And +they would go, all of them, to Lakenhall Union, sooner than stay another +hour in that house of shame. + +Mr. Carlton produced his cash-box without a word, and counted out a +month's wages for each in addition to arrears. The poor woman made a +gallant stand against the favour, but, submitting, returned to her +kitchen of her own accord, and to her master's study in a quarter of an +hour, to tell him she had laid the table, and there was a wire cover +over the meat. + +"And may God forgive you, sir!" cried she at parting. "I couldn't have +believed it if I hadn't heard it from your own lips with my own ears!" + +There was much that Carlton himself could not believe. He sat half +stupefied in his deserted rectory, like a man marooned, his one acute +sensation that of his sudden solitude. What was so hard to realize was +that the people knew! that the whole parish would know that night, and +his own family next week, and the whole world before many days. He was +well aware of the certain consequences of this scandal and its +disclosure; he had faced them only too often during the nightmare of the +past week, imagining some, ascertaining others. What seemed so +incredible was that he had made the disclosure himself, that the very +father had not suspected him to the end! + +The last reflection convulsed him with self-contempt. What a hypocrite +he must be! What an unconscious hypocrite, the worst kind of all! + +Here he was eating his supper; he had no recollection of coming to the +table; yet, now that he had caught himself, the food did not choke him, +he was not sick with shame; he only despised himself--and went on. + +It was dusk. He must have lit the lamp himself; as he lifted it from the +table, having risen, he caught sight of its reflection and his own in +the overmantel, and set the lamp upon the chimneypiece, and by its light +had a better look at himself than he could remember having taken in his +life before. There was no vanity in the man; he was studying his face +out of sheer curiosity, from a new and quite impersonal point of view, +as that of an enormous hypocrite and voluptuary. + +Human nature was very strange: he himself would never have suspected +such a face. The forehead was so broad and high, the deep-set eyes so +steadfast, and yet so fervid! They were the eyes of a zealot, but no +visionary: wisdom and understanding were in that bulge of the brow over +each. But the evil writing is lower down, unless you look for positive +crime or madness; yet these nostrils were sensitive, not sensual; and +the mouth, yes, the mouth showed between the short brown beard and the +heavy brown moustache; but what it showed was its strength. No; neither +weakness nor wickedness were there; even Robert Carlton admitted that. +But to be strong, and yet to fall; to mean well, and do evil; to look +one thing, and to be another: all that was to embody a type for which he +himself had ever entertained an unbridled loathing and contempt. + +He carried the lamp to his study, and as he entered from within there +was a knock at the outer door. One was waiting to see the rector, one +who had waited and knocked there oftener than any other in the parish. + +Carlton drew back, and the impulse of flight was strong upon him for the +first time. It needed all his will to shut the inner door behind him, +and to cry with any firmness, "Is that George Mellis?" + +In response there burst into the room a lad in knickerbockers, +broad-shouldered, muscular, yet smooth-faced, and mild-eyed all his +nineteen years; but this was the supreme moment of them all; and his +woman's eyes were on fire as he planted himself before the rector and +his lamp, pale as ashes in its rays. + +"Is it true?" he gasped. "Is it true?" + +This lad was Carlton's chief disciple, his admirer, his imitator, his +enthusiastic champion and defender; his right hand in all good works; +nay more, his acolyte, his lieutenant of the sanctuary; and, before a +broad chest so agitated, and innocent eyes so wild, the culprit's +courage failed him at last, so that the truth clove to his tongue. + +"It's all over the village," the lad continued in gasps. "You know what +I mean. They're all saying it. They say you've admitted it; for God's +sake say you haven't! Only deny it, and I'll go back and cram their lies +down their throats!" + +But by this Mr. Carlton had recovered himself, and was looking his last +upon the anxious eager face of the lad who had loved and honoured him: +his final pang was to see the eagerness growing, the anxiety lessening, +his look misunderstood. And this time the admission was halt and hoarse. + +What followed was also different; for, with scarcely a moment's +interval, young Mellis burst into tears like the overgrown child that he +was, and, flinging himself into the rector's chair, sobbed there +unrestrainedly with his smooth face in his strong red hands. Carlton +watched him by a prolonged effort of the will; he would shirk no part of +his punishment; and no part to come could hurt much more than this. His +fixed eyes were waiting for the boy's swimming ones when at length the +latter could look up. + +"You, of all men!" whispered Mellis. "You who have kept us all +straight--me for one. Why, the very thought of you has helped me to +resist things! You, with your religion: no more religion for me!" + +At that the other broke out; his religion he could still defend; or +thought he could, until he came to try, and his own unworthiness slowly +strangled the words in his throat. + +"Say what you like," said Mellis; "it was you brought me to church; it's +you who turn me away; and I'll go to no other after yours. Only to +think----" + +And he plunged into puerile reminiscences of their religious life in +common, quoting extreme points in the rich ritual in which he had been +privileged to assist, as though they aggravated the case, and made it +more incredible than it was already. + +"If our Lord Himself----" + +It did not need the rector's finger to check that blasphemy; but the +thing was said; the thought was there. + +"Yes; better go," said Carlton, as the lad leapt up. "Go; and let no one +else come near me who ever believed in me; for I can better face my +bitterest enemies. Yet you--you must be one of them! After her own +father, no man should hate me more!" + +And there was a new pain in his voice, a new agony of remorse, as memory +stabbed him in a fresh place. But the boy shook his head, and hung it +with a blush. + +"You think I cared for her," he said. "I thought so, too, until she went +away. I should have cared more then! It troubled me for a time; but I +got over it; and then I knew I was too young for all that. Besides, she +never looked at me after you came; that's another thing I see now; and I +know I ran less after her. Yes, I was too young to love a woman," cried +this village lad, "but I wasn't too old to love you, and look up to +you, and follow you in all you did. I tell you the honest truth, Mr. +Carlton," and his great eyes flashed their last reproach: "I'd have died +for you, sir, I would! And I'd die now--thankfully--if it could make you +the man I thought you were!" + +This interview left Carlton's mind more a blank than ever. It might have +been an hour later, or it might have been in ten minutes, that the +thought occurred to him--if his dearest disciple felt thus, what must +the enemy feel? And he was a man with enemies enough in the parish, +having followed the old order of country parson, and that with more +vigour than diplomacy. In eighteen months his reforms had been manifold +and drastic beyond discretion. It is true that his preaching had won him +more followers than his priestcraft had turned away. Yet a more acute +ecclesiastic would have tapped the wedge instead of hammering it; the +consummate priest would have condescended further in the direction of a +more immediate and a wider popularity. Carlton had gone his own way, +consulting none, attracting many, offending not a few. And he expected +the speedy settlement of many a score. + +Nor had he long to wait. Lamp in hand, he was locking up the house as +mechanically as he had fed his body; but one thing had pricked him in +the performance, and he tingled still between gratitude and fresh grief. +He had a Scotch collie, Glen by name, a noble dog, that was for ever at +its master's heels. So, during any service, the chain was a necessary +evil; but straight from his vestry, in cassock and biretta, the rector +would march to his backyard to release the dog. To-day he had +forgotten; nor was it till the master's round brought him to the back +premises that the poor beast barked itself into notice. Then, indeed, +the dazed man realized that his outer ear had been calmly listening to +the barking for some time; and, with a small thing to be sorry for +again, and one friend behind him, he continued his round, a sentient +being once more. + +It was upstairs that the dog barked afresh, causing Carlton to snatch +his head from the basin of cold water in which he had sought to assuage +its fever, and to go over to his open window, towel in hand. No sooner +had he reached it than he started back, and stood very still with the +water dripping from his beard. When he did dry his face it was as though +he wiped all colour from it too. And it was six feet of quivering clay +that returned on tip-toe to that open window. + +The new moon was setting behind the trees towards Linkworth; there was +no need of its meagre light. Lanterns, bright lanterns, were closing in +upon the rectory: at first the unhappy man had seen lanterns only, +swinging close to the ground, swilling the lawn with light. Stealthy +legs, knee-deep in this light, he remembered after his recoil. But not +till he had driven himself back to the window did he see the set faces, +or realize the fury of his people, kindled against him by his own +confession of his own guilt. + +When he saw this his nerve went, and he stood with clasped hands, the +perspiration bursting from his skin. And the lanterns shook out into a +chain along the edge of the lawn, and were held up to search the face of +the house, all as yet without a word. + +"That's his room," whispered one at last; "that--where the light is!" + +It was the voice of the schoolmaster, himself a churchwarden, and withal +an honest creature who was merely as many things as possible to as many +men. His part had been a little difficult lately. "This has simplified +it," thought the rector; and the twinge of bitterness did him good. + +He was a man again for one moment; the next, "He's in his room," cried +another, aloud; "that's him standing at the window!" + +And there burst forth a howl of execration, that rose to a yell as the +delinquent disappeared and in his panic put out the light. + +"You coward!" + +"Ah, you skunk!" + +"Bloody Papist!" + +"Hypocrite!" + +They were the better names; each shot his own, and capped the last; the +schoolmaster, mad with excitement, blaspheming with the best. + +"Come down out of that, ye devil!" + +"Do you show yourself, you cur!" + +And this command Robert Carlton obeyed, his manhood rising yet again. +But no sooner was he at the window than both panes crashed to powder +over his head, and the surrounding bricks rang with the volley. The +clergyman had a scratch from the falling glass, and a stone stung him on +the hand. The blood bubbled in his veins. + +"Cowards and curs yourselves!" he shouted down, shaking his fists at the +crowd; and in ten seconds he was at the front door, with a couple of +walking-sticks snatched from the stand. But he himself had turned the +key and shot the bolt within the last few minutes, and this gave him +time to think. + +"Quiet, sir--quiet!" he cried to the dog at his heels. "They've right on +their side," he groaned, "after all! Quiet, old doggie; come back; it's +all deserved. And it's only the beginning of what we've got to bear!" + +So he bore it, sitting on the stairs, where no window overlooked him, +and soothing Glen with one hand, restraining him with the other; and +yet, for his sin, despising his forbearance, even while he continued +telling himself it was his duty to forbear. + +And now breaking glass and barking dog made night a nightmare in the +dark and empty house: the infuriated villagers were smashing the rectory +windows one by one. Where the blind was up, the glass spread, and the +stone flew far into the room; where the blind was down, stone and glass +rattled against it, and fell in one heap with one clatter. So +dining-room and drawing-room were wrecked in turn, at short range, with +the heaviest available metal, and much interior damage. And still the +master of the house sat immovable within, nodding grimly at each crash; +wincing more at the curses; and once releasing the dog to stop his ears +altogether. + +It was no use; curiosity compelled him to listen; he was forbidden to +shirk one stripe. And that was a communicant, that cursing demon; this +was the schoolmaster, yelling like one of his own boys; the other +Palmer, of the Plough and Harrow, a very old enemy, hoarse as a crow +with drink and triumph. Young Cubitt, again, who cheered each crash, was +one of the disaffected; but till to-night most of this howling mob had +been his flock. Now all the good work was undone, was stultified, the +good seed poisoned in the ground; and not for the first, and not for the +fiftieth time that week, the confessed rake asked himself whether more +harm than good would not come of his confession. + +Meanwhile, of all the voices that he heard and could distinguish, only +one diverted his self-contempt for an instant. This was the soft, +passionless voice of a young gentleman, evidently not himself engaged in +the stone-throwing, pointing out panes still to break to those who were. +This was the voice of Sidney Gleed. + +The thing had gone on for ten minutes or more when the outcry altered in +character: an interruption had occurred: was it the police? No, the +rector of the parish was too well acquainted with the character of its +solitary constable. He would come up when all was over. Then who could +this be? + +The shower of stones had ceased as suddenly as it had begun. New oaths +were flying in a new direction, and a voice hitherto unheard was heaping +abuse on the abusers; with a strange thrill, the clergyman recognised it +as the voice of Tom Ivey, the young contractor who was building the +transepts; and he could remain no longer on the stairs. Stealing into +the drawing-room, he stumbled across a crackling drift of glass, and, +unnoticed now, stood in the wrecked bow-window, with the fresh air upon +his face once more. + +Lanterns were skipping right and left, their erratic rays giving +momentary glimpses of a stalwart figure in pursuit, a stick whirling +about his ears, and resounding on the backs and shoulders of the +retreating rabble. Some stayed to stone the new foe before they ran; and +one, Palmer the publican, set his lantern on the gravel and squared up +in style. Robert Carlton never saw what followed; for at this moment his +maddened dog, which had been tearing about the house in search of an +outlet, bounded past him through the shattered window; and, when the +rout was complete, the inn-keeper's lantern was a solitary star in the +nether darkness. Then the gate clattered, a swinging step approached, +and Tom Ivey caught up the lantern in his stride. + +Carlton sprang through the window to meet him, every other emotion sunk +for the moment in one of overflowing gratitude. + +"Tom," he cried, "how can I thank you----" + +"Keep your thanks to yourself." + +"But--Tom----" + +"Don't 'Tom' me! Keep your distance too. Do you think I haven't heard +about it? Do you think I'd lift a finger for _you_--let alone a stick? +No, sir, I'd liefer take that to your own back; but I fare to mind when +the Rector of Long Stow was a good man, who didn't preach too tall, but +acted up to what he did preach; and I won't see the house he lived in +wrecked and ruined because a blackguard's followed him." + +"I am all that," said Mr. Carlton. "Go on!" + +The other stared, not so much disarmed as confounded. + +"I'm sorry to open so wide, and you know I'm sorry," he at length burst +out. "'Tain't for me to call you over, sir, and I won't tell you no more +lies. I couldn't bear to see them snarling curs setting on you the +moment you was down, and that's the truth! But it wasn't what I come +back to say," continued Ivey doggedly. "I come back to say you can get +another party to go on with that there building, for I won't work no +more for you. The plant's yours; you found that for the job; you can +find more men. I throw up the contract: take the law of me if you like." + +Robert Carlton was back in his study. It was the one front room which +had escaped inviolate; the open lattice had saved it; not a pebble added +to the old disorder. The rector sighed relief as he held up the lamp on +entering; then he shot the rubbish out of the big arm-chair, and himself +lay back in it like the dead. A bloody smear, where the glass had grazed +his cheek, enhanced his pallor; his eyes were closed; no muscle moved. +And yet his wits clung to him like wolves, till presently the white brow +wrinkled, the heavy eyelids twitched. + +"May I come in, reverend?" said the saddler's voice. + +Carlton assented with a sigh, but did not raise himself to greet the +visitor, who came in mopping his forehead, reversed the chair at the +writing table, and seated himself with ominous deliberation. Then he +mopped again, and was slow to speak; but his scornful expression +prepared the clergyman for more of that which he was resolved to bear. + +"Pharisees!" cried Fuller at last. "Humbugs and hypocrites!" + +The words were precisely those which Robert Carlton expected and must +endure, but against the plural number he felt bound to protest. "We are +not all alike, Mr. Fuller," he said; "thank God, I am but one out of +many thousands." + +"You?" cried the saddler. "Gord love yer, reverend, did you think I +meant _you_? No, sir, it's the stupid fools and canting cowards _I_ +mean, that take and hit a man as soon as ever he's down; not the man +they hit." + +Mr. Carlton sat silent, astounded, and tingling between pain and +pleasure. He fancied he had run through the gamut of the emotions, but +here was a new one that he feared to dissect. + +"Not the man," proceeded the saddler in raised tones--"not the man who +is worth the rest of the parish put together--saint or sinner--guilty or +innocent!" + +Yes, it was pleasure! It was pleasure, acute and lawless, wicked, +ungovernable, and yet to be governed. To have one man's sympathy, how +sweet it was, but how shameful in a guilty heart that would be contrite +too! It had brought a colour to his face, a light to his eyes; ere the +one had faded, and the other failed, Robert Carlton's will had frozen +that tiny rill of comfort at its fount. + +"You mustn't say that," was his belated reply; but it came curt and cold +enough to please himself. + +"But I do say it," cried old Fuller, "and I will say it, and I won't say +a word more than I mean. Let there be no mistake between us, reverend: I +don't deny I felt what _is_ felt when first I heard; but when I come to +think of it, that fared to break my heart more'n to make that boil; and +when I thought a bit deeper, I see how easy that is to make bad worse. +Not as it ain't right bad; but that wasn't for us to make it worse. So +it was me fetched Tom Ivey. And now he tells me what he ups and says +himself when all was over. 'Gord love yer, Tom,' says I, 'you'll be +ashamed of that when you're a man of my experience! You forget the good +our reverend's been doing amongst us all this time, and you think only +o' this here evil. I'll go up,' says I, 'and I'll show him there's one +fair-minded, level-headed man o' the world in this here hotbed o' fools +and Pharisees.'" + +"But Tom was right, and you were wrong." + +"Don't tell me, reverend," said the saddler, edging his chair nearer to +the long limp figure under the lamp. "You can't undo the good you've +once done, not if you try. Leave religion out of it, and look at all +you've done for the poor: look at the coal club, and the book club, and +the dispensary, and the Young Man's----" + +"Unhappily, Fuller, all this is beside the question." + +And the cold tone was no longer put on; neither did it cover an emotion +which called for conscientious suppression; for these officious sallies +only fretted the spirit they were intended to soothe. + +"Well, then," rejoined Fuller, "if you prefer it, and for the sake of +argument, look at a poor old feller like me. What should _I_ ha' done +without you, reverend? I don't come to church, yet you take no offence +when I tell you why, but you argue the point like a rare 'un, and you +lend me the paper just the same. The Reverend Jackson wouldn't ha' done +it, though I durs'n't stay away in his day; he'd have stopped my +livelihood in a week. So don't you fare to make yourself out worse than +you are, reverend; you've done wrong, I allow, but so did Solomon, and +so did David; and weren't so quick to own up to it, either! Like them, +you've done good, too, and plenty of it, and that sha'n't be forgotten +if I can help it. As for the poor young thing that's gone----" + +"Don't name her, I beg!" + +"Very well, sir, I won't. I'm as sorry as the rest o' the parish; but we +shouldn't be unfair because we're sorry. They may say what they like, +but a man of my experience knows that nine times out of ten the woman's +more to blame----" + +"Out of my house!" + +Carlton had leapt to his feet, was standing at his full height for the +first time that night, and pointing sternly to the door. His face was +white with passion. The saddler's jaw dropped. + +"What, sir?" he gasped. + +"Out of my sight--this instant!" + +"For sayun----" + +"For daring to say one half of what you have said! It's my own fault. +I've spoilt you; but out you go." + +Fuller rose slowly, amazed, bewildered, and mortified to the quick. He +was a kind-hearted man, but he had all the superior peasant's obstinacy +and self-conceit: the one had helped to bring him to the clergyman's +side, the other to wag his tongue. Yet his sympathy was genuine enough; +and the theory, of which the bare hint had spilled vials of wrath upon +his head, was in fact his profound conviction. Smarting vanity, +however, was the absorbing sensation of the moment. And for the next +hour the saddler could have returned every few minutes with some fresh +retort; but in the moment of humiliation he could not rise above a +grumble: + +"I might as well have thrown stones with the rest!" + +"Better," the clergyman cried after him. "You had a right to punish me; +to pity and excuse me you had none. Least of all----" + +He broke off, and stood at his door till the quick steps stopped, and +the gate clattered, and the steps died away. The night was dark, and +this end of the village already very still: the Plough and Harrow was +nearer the other. The wind had not fallen; a murmur of very distant +thunder came with it from the west. Nearer home a peewit called, and +Robert Carlton caught himself wondering whether there would be rain +before morning. + + + + +V + +THE MAN ALONE + + +At midnight he was still alone, and the slow torture of his own thoughts +was still a relief. As the dining-room clock struck--he noted its +preservation--and the thin strokes floated through those broken windows +and in at that of the study, he gave up listening for the next step. His +privacy seemed secure at last. He could abandon his spirit to its proper +torments; he could enter upon another night in hell. Yet, even now, the +worst was over, and there would be no more nights of secret grief, +secret remorse, secret shame. He had confessed his sin, and thereby +earned his right to suffer. No more to hide! No more deceit! He could +not realize it yet; he only knew that his heart was lighter already. He +felt ashamed of the relief. + +Yet another night came back to him as he paced his floor: a last year's +night when the full moon shone through ragged trees. It also had been +worse than this: it was the inner life that lay in ruins then. He +remembered pacing till sunrise as he was pacing now: such a still night +but for that; one had but to stand and listen to hear the very fall of +the leaf. He remembered thus standing, there at the door, in the +moonlight, and a line that had buzzed in his head as he listened. + + "And yet God has not said a word!" + +God had spoken now! + +And the man was glad. + +Glad! He almost revelled in his disgrace; it produced in him unexpected +sensations--the sensations of the debtor who begins to pay. Here was an +extreme instance of the things that are worse to dream of than to +endure. He felt less ignominious in the hour of his public ignominy than +in all these months of secret shame. He was living a single life once +more. The wind roamed at will through the damaged house as through the +ribs of a wreck; and its ruined master drew himself up, and his stride +quickened with his blood. He was no longer lording it in his pulpit, the +popular preacher of the countryside, drawing the devout from half a +dozen parishes, a revelation to the rustic mind, a conscious libertine +all the while, with a tongue of gold and a heart of lead. More than all, +he was no longer the one to sit secure, in loathsome immunity, in +sickening esteem: he, the man! The woman had suffered; it was his turn +now. Woman? The poor child . . . the poor, dead, murdered child . . . +Well! the wages of his sin would be worse than death; they were worse +already. And again the man was glad; but his momentary and strange +exultation had ended in an agony. + +The poor, poor girl . . . + +No; nothing was too bad for him--not even the one thing that he would +feel more than all the rest in bulk. He put his mind on that one thing. +He dwelt upon it, wilfully, not in conscious self-pity, but as one eager +to meet his punishment half-way, to shirk none of it. The attitude was +characteristic. The sacrificial spirit informed the man. In another age +and another Church he had done barbaric violence to his own flesh in the +name of mortification. Living in the latter half of the nineteenth +century, a mere Anglican, he was content to play tricks with a fine +constitution in Lent. + +"I will look my last upon it," he said aloud: "it would be insulting God +and man to attempt to take another service after this; I have held my +last, and laid my last stone. Let me see what I have sown for others to +reap." + +And he picked his way through the darkness to the church. + +The path intersected a narrow meadow with the hay newly cut, and lying +in tussocks under the stars; a light fence divided this reef of glebe +from the churchyard; and, just within the latter, a lean-to shed faced +the scaffolding of the north transept, its back against the fence. The +shed was flimsy and small, but it had come out of the rector's pocket; +the transepts themselves were to be his gift, because the living was too +good for a celibate priest, and it was his sermons that had made the +church too small. So he had paid for everything, even to the mason's +tools inside the shed, because Tom Ivey had never had a contract before +and lacked capital. And the out-door interest of the building had formed +a healthy complement to the engrossing affairs of the sanctuary; and, +indeed, they had developed side by side. Perhaps the material changes +had proved the more absorbing to one who threw himself headlong into +whatsoever he undertook. Of late, especially, it had been remarked that +the reverend was taking quite an extraordinary part in these +proceedings: cultivating a knack he had of carving in stone; neglecting +cottages for his mason's shed; and tiring himself out by day like a man +who dreads the night. How he had dreaded it none had known, but now all +might guess. + +Yet he had loved his work for its own sake, not merely as a distraction +from gnawing thoughts; there was in him something of the elemental +artist: the making of anything was his passionate delight. And now the +scene of his industry inflicted a pang so keen that he forgot to +appreciate it as part of his deserts; and, for the moment, priest and +sinner disappeared in the grieving artist, bidding good-bye not only to +his studio, but to art itself. It was very dark; the place was strewn +with uncut boulders, poles, barrows, heaps of rubble; but he knew his +way through the litter, and, in the double darkness of the shed, could +lay his hand on anything he chose. He took something down from a shelf. +It was a gargoyle of his own making, meant for the vestry door in the +south transept. He stood with it in both hands, and his thumbs felt the +eyes and his palms the cheeks, at first as gently as though the stone +were flesh, then suddenly with all his strength, as if to crush the +grotesque head to powder. It was not a useful thing: no water could +spout from the sham mouth which he had wrought with loving pains. It was +only his idea for finishing off the label moulding of the vestry door; +it was only something he had made himself--for others to throw away, or +to keep and show as the handiwork of the immoral rector of Long Stow. He +restored it to his place; and retraced his sure steps through the +rubbish, artist no more. Good-bye to that! + +He crossed over to the church, went round to the porch, and entered by +the only door in use during the alterations. Eighteen months ago he +would have found it locked. It was he who had opened the House of God to +all comers at all hours, and made every sitting free. He stole up the +aisle as one seeing in the dark. His feet fell softly on the matting, +where in early days they had clattered on bare flags, and yet more +softly when they had mounted a step without stumbling. The matting in +the aisle was his addition, the rich carpet in the chancel was his gift. +All his innovations had not provoked dissension. Presently he lit a +lamp, a Syrian treasure, highly wrought, that hung over the lectern: he +had bought it at Damascus, years before, for his church when he should +have one. Yes; he had given freely to God's House, to make it also the +House Beautiful, though he took no trouble to adorn his own. + +And this was to be the end! For events could take but one course now: a +complaint to the bishop (all the parish would sign it), a summons to the +palace, a trial at the consistory court; suspension certainly; +deprivation, perhaps; he had been at some pains to inform himself on the +subject. The bishop would be sore. He had taken such an interest in +everything at the confirmation, his sympathy had been so full and +unexpected, his approval so stimulating, so hearty and frank! Carlton +was ashamed of thinking of his bishop instead of praying to God upon his +knees. He longed to kneel and pray, for the last time, there at the +table which he chose to call the altar, but which he had found ugly and +bare, and was leaving richly laden and richly hung. In the small and +distant light of the lectern lamp he stood gazing at the damask +hangings, the green frontal, the silver candlesticks, the flowers from +his own garden--the flowers he grew for this. He longed to kneel, but +could not. He could not pray. He could not weep. His heart was a grave, +and the grave filled in and the weight of the earth upon his spirit. He +had been quite wrong an hour ago. _This_ was the blackest hour of all. +To have done and given so much, and to lose it all! To have set his +whole soul for years towards the light, to have striven so to turn the +souls of others; and to be thrust into outer darkness for one sin! + +This wave of bitterness, of blind rebellion and human egotism, bore him +out of his church, for the last time, in a passion of defiance and +self-defence: a sudden and deplorable change in such a man at such an +hour. Happily, it was short-lived. His angry stride brought him tripping +into fresh earth, and he started back, aghast at his egotism, stunned +afresh by his sin, and overwhelmed by such a flood of penitence and +remorse as even he had not endured before. Under his eyes the new grave +was growing clearer in the starlight, and not less cruel, and not less +cold. An hour later he was still kneeling over it, and his tears had not +ceased to flow. + + + + +VI + +FIRE + + +Witnesses have differed as to the exact hour at which the inhabitants of +Long Stow, sound asleep after excitement enough for one night, were +frightened from their beds by a sudden and violent ringing of the church +bells. The midsummer night was as dark as ever, and so it remained or +seemed to remain for a considerable time. It cannot have been more than +two o'clock. + +A few minutes before the alarm, Robert Carlton had forced himself to his +feet, to be struck with fresh shame at two apparent evidences of the +mood in which he had quitted the church. He had left the door wide open +and the church lit up. Every stone showed on the path, in the stream of +light poured upon it from the porch, into which, however, it was +impossible to see from where the rector stood. The porch projected from +the south side, while the new grave was directly opposite the west +window, every square of which stood out against the glare within. An +instant's reflection showed Carlton that this could not be the light +which he had left; he went to see what it was. A sudden heat upon his +face broke the truth to him in the porch, and in a stride he knew the +worst. A little fire was raging in the church: two or three pews were in +flames. + +Robert Carlton stood inactive for a score of seconds. It looked the kind +of fire that a vigorous man might have beaten out with his coat. Yet one +in the full vigour of his manhood stood thinking a score of thoughts +while the flames bit through the varnish into the wood. Nor was this the +fascination of horror: the fire looked such a little fire at the first +glance. It was rather the obsession of an astounding puzzle: what in the +world could have caused a fire at all? + +A guilty feeling came in answer: he must have dropped the match with +which he lit that lamp. The feeling escaped in the simultaneous +discovery that the lamp in question had been extinguished, but that it +and others were slightly awry, and one or two still swaying on their +chains, as though all the lamps had been rudely meddled with. And now +horror came. The flames were spreading with curious facility, shooting +their blue tongues over the woodwork before the yellow fangs took hold, +but all so quickly that the burning area seemed to have doubled itself +in these few seconds, while from the heart of it there came the crisp +crackle of quicker fuel, culminating in a blaze as though a rick had +caught; and, sure enough, as these flames leapt high, their source was +revealed in a pile of the rector's new straw hassocks. + +The puzzle was one no more: plainer work of incendiary was never seen. +Through the smoke now swinging in black coils to the roof, the east +window showed in holes made within the last hour, obviously to promote +the draught that blew in Carlton's face as he rushed back to the open +door and laid hold of all the bell-ropes at once. + +The bells were small and jangling; a new peal, and a tower to hang them +in, were among the things which the rector had said that he would have +some day. But as the old bells clanged for the last time, in the dead of +that summer night, they were heard at Linkworth, a mile and a half +across the wind, but down the wind they rang up half Bedingfield, which +is three good miles from Long Stow. + +The first inhabitant to reach the scene was the fleet and sturdy Tom +Ivey, whose mother kept the post-office in the middle of the village; as +he ran the ringing stopped, and the first glass smashed with the heat, +flame and smoke making a mouthpiece of the mullioned window in the north +wall as Tom dashed up by the short cut through the rectory garden. He +was greatly alarmed at finding no one in the churchyard, and rushed into +the church with the full expectation of discovering the ringer senseless +at his post. What he did find was the rector, standing within the +church, to windward of the conflagration, his back to the door, +absorbed, as it seemed, in a perfectly passive contemplation of the +fire. + +"Mr. Carlton!" shouted Tom. + +Before replying, the clergyman spun something into the heart of the +flames; in the thickening smoke it was impossible to see what; but the +same second he was round upon his heel, coughing and choking, his face +black, his eyes fires themselves, purpose and determination in every +limb. + +"Tom? Thank God it's you! We must get this under. Out of it before we +suffocate!" And with his own rush he carried the builder into the open +air. + +"What's done it, sir?" + +"Done it? Wait till we've undone it! We can if we work together. Ah! +here are more of you. Buckets, men--buckets!" cried Carlton, rushing to +meet a half-dressed medley at the gate, and commanding them as though +there had been no other meeting earlier in the night. "You who live +near, run for your own; the rest into my kitchen and find what you can; +buckets are the thing! One of you pump; the rest form line from my well +to the church, and keep passing along. You see to it, Mr. Jones!" + +And for a while the schoolmaster and churchwarden, carried away as usual +by his feelings and self-importance, was as busy enforcing the rector's +orders as he had made himself in breaking his windows an hour or two +before. + +"Let one man ride or run for the Lakenhall engine; not you, Tom!" +exclaimed the clergyman, seizing Ivey by the arm. "They'll be all night +coming, and I can't spare you." + +"I'll stay, sir." + +"Water's no use to windward of a fire; it's spreading straight up the +church. We want to be on the other side to stop it." + +"The aisle's not afire!" + +"But they couldn't get the water to us, even if we got through alive. +No; where the walls are down for the transepts--that's the place. Which +side's boarded strongest?" + +"Both the same, sir." + +"Then we'll hack through the nearest! A saw and an axe, and we'll be +through by the time the first bucketful's ready for us." + +And, friends again, but both unconscious of the change, they rushed +together to the shed of which Robert Carlton had so lately taken leave: +in the fever of the moment even that leave-taking was forgotten. + +It was the north transept which faced the shed. Already the walls were a +dozen feet high, but a doorway had been left. The greater gap between +transept and nave was vertically boarded over within the church, and on +these boards fell the rector with his axe, to make an opening for Tom's +saw. They had light enough for their work. The interstices between the +boards were as the red-hot strings of a colossal harp; quickly a couple +were cut, and the boards beaten in; and it was as though the wind had +come down a smoking chimney. The pair fell back on either side of the +black stream that gushed out like water. Then cried Carlton in his voice +of command: + +"Look here! you stay where you are, Tom." + +"With you, sir?" + +"No, I must have a look; but one's enough." + +"Not for me, Mr. Carlton. I follow you." + +"Then you keep me where I am," said Carlton, sternly. + +"All right, sir! You follow me!" + +Next instant they were both through the breach, the builder first by the +depth of his chest. And they stood up within, but were glad to crouch +again out of the smoke. Already a dense reek hid the roof, and every +moment added to the depth of that inverted sea. It was a sea of +ineffectual currents, setting towards the smashed windows, the new +breach, the open door, but caught and diverted and sucked into the inky +whirlpool that the wind made under the roof, and escaping only by chance +fits and sudden starts. On the other hand, there was still air enough to +breathe within a few feet of the ground, and with water it seemed as if +something might yet be done. But it was no longer a very little fire: at +best the nave must be gutted now; to save roof and chancel was the +utmost hope. Yet here and there the worst seemed over. The blazing +hassocks were now only a glowing heap, and still the roof had not +caught. As the two men crouched and watched, the flames felt the front +pews with their splay blue tentacles, and the woodwork which was still +untouched glistened like a human body in pain. + +"You see that?" said Mr. Carlton, pointing to this moisture. + +"What is it?" + +"Paraffin! Look at the lamps; he's simply emptied them----" + +"Who, sir--who?" + +"God knows, and may God forgive him! I have enemies enough this morning, +though not more than I deserve. If only they will be my friends for one +hour, for the sake of the church! Are they never coming with that water? +Run and tell them a bucketful would make a difference now, but cartloads +will make none in ten more minutes! And tell them what I said just now: +bid them for God's sake think of nothing but the fire till we get it +under." + +He was thinking of nothing else himself, confident still of some measure +of success, only fretting for his water. In Ivey's absence he stripped +to the waist, and with his long coat essayed to beat the little flames +out as they spread and leapt, the blue and yellow surf of the +encroaching tide; but for one he extinguished he fanned a hundred, so he +retreated before he was flayed alive. And they found him stooping near +the opening, half-naked, scorched, begrimed, but not disheartened; a +strange figure in the place that knew him best in vestments, if any of +them thought of that. + +The first man had a bucket in each hand, but had spilt freely from both +in his haste. Carlton would not let him in, but received the buckets +through the hole, dashed their contents over the burning pews, and +returned them empty without waiting to see results. When he had time to +look, a little steam was rising, but the fire raged with undiminished +fury. The next comer was a boy with a brimming watering-can; but it is +difficult to fling water with effect from such a vessel, and pouring was +impossible in the increasing heat. Then came Tom Ivey with two more +buckets. + +"Keep outside," cried Carlton, taking them. "There's only work for one +in here. Can't they form line as I said, and pass along instead of +carrying?" + +"No, sir--not enough of us for the distance." + +"Not enough of you who'll put the church before the parson! That's what +you mean. The parson may deserve burning alive, but the poor church has +done no wrong!" + +And he continued his exertions in a bitter spirit not warranted by the +real circumstances, for his masterful monopoly of all danger had won +some sympathy outside, and many a one who had flung a stone was running +with a bucket now. More, however, stood with their hands in their +pockets; for East Anglia is constitutionally phlegmatic, and not all the +village had joined in the indignant excesses of the evening. + +The saddler came no farther than the fence in front of his house and +workshop. He was that implacable creature, the offended countryman. + +George Mellis did not even see the fire; already he had shaken the dust +of Long Stow from his feet for good. + +Thus, of the three types, as far removed from one another as the points +of an equilateral triangle, who had put in their individual word of +reproach, of denunciation, and of sympathy more insufferable than +either, only one was present on this lurid scene; but that one was doing +the work of ten. + +"That there Tom Ivey," said one of a group on the safe side of the +rectory fence, "he fares all of a wash. Yet I do hear as how he come up +to the rectory when he'd cleared the garden and called Carlton over +somethun wonderful." + +"I lay it was nothun to the calling over he had from Jasper." + +"Where is Jasper?" + +"Been indoors ever since: a touch of the old trouble, the missus told +Jones when he called." + +"That's a pity. This would've soothed his sore." + +One or two observed that that fared to soothe theirs; for there was no +reaction on the safe side of the fence. But the worst said in the +Suffolk tongue was invariably capped by a different order of voice, +which chimed in now. + +"The best thing Carlton can do is to cockle up with his church. The +governor'll build you a new church and find a new man to fill it. +There's nobody keener on a change as it is. I should like to be there +when he hears . . ." + +The speaker was smoking a cigarette on a barrow wheeled from the shed. +He might have been watching a display of fireworks, and one which was +beginning to bore him. His unmoved eye sought change. It found the +sexton hobbling in the glare. + +"Hi, Busby! Come here, I want you. What the dickens do you mean by +setting fire to the church?" + +"Me set fire to it, Master Sidney? Me set a church afire? He! he! you +allus fare to have yer laugh." + +"It will be no laughing matter for you when you're run in for it, +Busby." + +"Go on, Master Sidney; you know better than that." + +"I wish I did. They hang for arson, you know! But I say, Busby, how's +the frog?" + +The wizened face grew grave, but only as the screen darkens between the +pictures; next instant it was alight with the ineffable joy of gratified +monomania. The sexton hobbled nearer, clawing his vest. + +"Oh, that croap away; that's at that now! Would 'ee like to listen, +Master Sidney?" + +"No, thanks, Busby; don't you undo a button," said the young gentleman, +hastily. "I can hear it from where I am." + +The sexton went into senile raptures. + +"You can hear it? You can hear it? Do you all listen to that: he can +hear it, he can hear it from where he sit. The little varmin, to croap +so loud! That must be the fire. That fare to make him blink! An' Master +Sidney, he can hear him from where he sit!" + +The sexton hurried off to spread his triumph; but he boasted to deaf +ears. There was a sudden light below the sharp horizon between black +roof and slaty sky, yet no flame rose above the roof. It was as though +the southern eaves had caught. Ivey rushed out of the north transept. +Mr. Carlton followed, axe in hand. His chest and arms were smudged and +inflamed, his blinking eyelids were burnt bare, and the sweat stood all +over him in the red light leaping from the shivered windows. + +"It's no use, lads!" he called to those still running with the buckets; +"the boards have caught on the other side. Come and help me smash them +in, and we may save the chancel yet! Every man who is a man," he shouted +to the group across the fence, "come--lend a hand to save God's +sanctuary!" + +And he led the way with his axe, stinging to the waist in the open air, +but drunk with battle and the battle's joy. And there was no more +talking behind the rectory fence; not a man was left there to talk; even +Sidney Gleed had dropped his cigarette to follow the inspired madman +with the axe. + +The south transept was a stage less advanced than the north. Carlton got +upon one low wall, ran along it to that of the nave, and swung his axe +into the burning wood to his right. A rent was quickly made; he leapt +into the transept and improved it, his axe ringing the seconds, the +muscles of his back bulging and bubbling beneath the scorched skin. Men +watched him open-mouthed. It seemed incredible that such nerve, such +sinew, such indomitable virility, should have hidden from their +vengeance that very night. + +"A ladder!" he cried. "There's one behind the shed." + +The wood screen was rent, but not to the top. Below, the fire was +checked, but above it still crawled east. Waiting for the ladder, +Carlton employed himself in widening the gap that he had made; when it +came, he had it held vertically against the eaves, left intact above the +boarding, and ran up to finish his own work with the axe held short in +his left hand. A couple of planks were smashed in unburnt. He stayed on +the ladder to see whether the flames would leap the completed chasm, +stayed until the rungs smoked under his nose. When the burning boards +fell in on his left, and those on his right did not even smoulder, he +returned quickly to the ground. + +Throats which had groaned that night were parching for a cheer. The time +was not ripe. A shrill cry came instead: the boarding upon the other +side had ignited in its turn. + +"Round with the ladder," cried the rector; "we'll soon have it out. We +know more about it now. We'll save the chancel yet! Find another axe; +we'll begin top and bottom at once." + +And now the scene was changing every minute. A sky of slate had become a +sky of lead. The tens who had witnessed the first stages of the fire had +multiplied into hundreds. Frightened birds were twittering in the trees; +frightened horses neighed in the road; every kind of vehicle but a +fire-engine had been driven to the scene. Among the graves stood a tall +and aged gentleman, with the top-hat of his youth crammed down to his +snowy eyebrows, and an equally obsolete top-coat buttoned up to his +silver whiskers, in conversation with Sidney Gleed. + +"The damned rascal!" said the old gentleman. "But how the devil did it +come out?" + +"Musk seems to have smelt a rat, and went to him after the funeral. And +he owned up as bold as brass; the servants heard him. There he goes, up +the ladder again on this side. Keeps the fun to himself, don't he? Who's +going to win the Leger, doctor? Shotover again?" + +"Damn the Leger," said Dr. Marigold, whose sporting propensities, bad +language, and good heart were further constituents in the most +picturesque personality within a day's ride. "To think I should have +stood at her death-bed," he said, "and would have given ten pounds to +know who it was; and it's your High Church parson of all men on God's +earth! The infernal blackguard deserves to have his church burnt down; +but he's got some pluck, confound him." + +"Sucking up," said Master Sidney: "playing to the gallery while he's got +the chance." + +"H'm," said the doctor; "looks to me pretty badly burnt about the back +and arms. If he wasn't such a damned rascal I'd order him down." + +"He's doing no good," rejoined the young cynic, "and he knows it. He's +only there for effect. Look! There's the roof catching, as any fool knew +it must; and here's the Lakenhall engine, in time for 'God save the +Queen.'" + +Dr. Marigold swore again: his good heart contained no niche for the heir +to the Long Stow property. He turned his back on Sidney, his face to the +sexton, who had been at his elbow for some time. + +"Well, Busby, what are you bothering about?" + +"The frog, doctor. That croap louder than ever." + +"You infernal old humbug! Get out!" + +"But that's true, doctor--that's Gospel truth. Do you stoop down and +you'll hear it for yourself. Master Sidney, _he_ heard it where he sit." + +"Did he, indeed! Then he's worse than you." + +"But that steal every bit I eat; that do, that do," whined the sexton. +"I've tried salts, I've tried a 'metic, an' what else can I try? That +fare to know such a wunnerful lot. Salts an' 'metics, not him! He look +t'other way, an' hang on like grim death for the next bit o' meat. +That's killin' me, doctor. That's worse nor slow poison. That steal +every bite I eat." + +"Well, it won't steal this," said the doctor, dispensing half-a-crown. +"Now get away to bed, you old fool, and don't bother me." + +And neither thanks nor entreaties would divert his eyes from the burning +church again. + +The antiquated doctor was one of Nature's sportsmen: his inveterate +sympathies were with the losers of up-hill games and games against time; +and this blackguard parson had played his like a man, only to lose it +with the thunder of the fire-engine in his ears. The roof had caught at +last; in a little it would be blazing from end to end; and half-a-dozen +country fire-engines, and half a hundred Robert Carltons, could do no +good now. Carlton came slowly enough down his ladder this time, and +stood apart with his beard on his chest. + +"Hard lines, hard lines!" muttered Dr. Marigold in his top-coat collar; +and "Those slow fools! Those sleepy old women!" with his favourite +participle in each ejaculation. + +A sky of lead had turned to one of silver. Across the open uplands, +beyond the conflagration, a kindlier glow was in the east. And in the +broad daylight the fire reached its height with as small effect as the +firemen plied their water. Nothing could check the roof. Ceiling, +joists, and slates burnt up like good fuel in a good grate. Now it was a +watershed of living fire; now an avalanche of red-hot ruin; now a column +of smoke and sparks, rising out of blackened walls; a column unbroken by +the wind, which had fallen at dawn with a little rain, the edge of a +shower that had shunned Long Stow. + +When the roof fell in there were few of the hundreds present who had not +retreated out of harm's way. Only the helmed firemen held their ground, +and two others with bare heads. Of the pair, one was standing dazed, +with his beard on the rough coat thrown about him, and an ear deaf to +his companion's entreaties, when the crash came and the sparks flew high +and wide through rent walls and gaping windows. The sparks blackened as +they fell. The first smoke lifted. And the dazed man lay upon his face, +the other kneeling over him. + +Dr. Marigold came running, for all his years and his long top-coat. + +"Did anything hit him, Ivey?" + +"Not that I saw, sir; but he fared as if he'd fainted on his feet, and +when the roof went, why, so did he." + +Marigold knelt also, and a thickening ring enclosed the three. + +"He's rather nastily burnt, poor devil." + +And the old doctor lifted a leaden wrist, felt it in a sudden hush, +examined a burn upon the same arm, and looked up through eyebrows like +white moustaches. + +"But not dangerously, damn him!" + + + + +VII + +THE SINNER'S PRAYER + + +The bishop of the diocese sat at the larger of the two desks in the +palace library. It was the thirteenth of the following month, and a wet +forenoon. At eleven o'clock his lordship was intent upon a sheet of +unlined foolscap, with sundry notes dotted down the edge, and the rest +of the leaf left blank. The bishop's sight was failing, but against +glasses he had set his face. So his whiskers curled upon the paper; and +the wide mouth between the whiskers was firmly compressed; and this +compression lengthened a clean-shaven upper lip already unduly long. But +the pose displayed a noble head covered with thin white hair, and the +broad brow that was the casket of a broad mind. Seen at his desk, the +massive head and shoulders suggested both strength and stature above the +normal. Yet the bishop on his legs was a little man who limped. And the +surprise of this discovery was not the last for an observer: for the +little lame man had a dignity independent of his inches, and a majesty +of mind which lost nothing, but gained in prominence, by the constant +contrast of a bodily imperfection. + +The bishop stood up when his visitor was announced, a minute after +eleven, and supported himself with one hand while he stretched the other +across his desk. Carlton took it in confusion. He had expected that +shut mouth and piercing glance, but not this kindly grasp. He was +invited to sit down. The man who complied was the ghost of the Rector of +Long Stow, as his spiritual overseer remembered him. His whole face was +as white as his forehead had been on the day of the fire. It carried +more than one still whiter scar. Yet in the eyes there burnt, brighter +than ever, those fires of zeal and of enthusiasm which had warmed the +bishop's heart in the past, but which somewhat puzzled him now. + +"I am sorry," said his lordship, "that you should have such weather for +what, I am sure, must have been an undertaking for you, Mr. Carlton. You +still look far from strong. Before we begin, is there nothing----" + +Carlton could hear no more. There was nothing at all. He was quite +himself again. And he spoke with some coolness; for the other's manner, +despite his mouth and his eyes, was almost cruel in its unexpected and +undue consideration. It was less than ever this man's intention to play +upon the pity of high or low. He had an appeal to make before he went, +but it was not an appeal for pity. Meanwhile his back stiffened and his +chest filled in the intensity of his desire not to look the invalid. + +"In that case," resumed the bishop, "I am glad that you have seen your +way to keeping the appointment I suggested. In cases of complaint--more +especially a complaint of the grave character indicated in my letter--I +make it a rule to see the person complained of before taking further +steps. That is to say, if he will see me; and I don't think you will +regret having done so, Mr. Carlton. It may give you pain----" + +Carlton jerked his hands. + +"But you shall have fair play!" + +And his lordship looked point-blank at the bearded man, as he had looked +in his day on many a younger culprit; and his voice was the peculiar +voice that generations of schoolboys had set themselves to imitate, with +less success than they supposed. + +Carlton bowed acknowledgment of this promise. + +"In the questions which I feel compelled to put"--and the bishop glanced +at his sheet of foolscap--"you will perhaps give me credit for studying +your feelings as far as is possible in the painful circumstances. I +shall try not to leave them more painful than I find them, Mr. Carlton. +But the complaint received is a very serious one, and it is not made by +one person; it has very many signatures; and it necessitates plain +speaking. It is a fact, then, that you are the father of an illegitimate +child born on the twentieth of last month in your own parish?" + +"It is a fact, my lord." + +"And the woman is dead?" + +"The young girl--is dead." + +The bishop's pen had begun the descent of the clean part of his page of +foolscap; when the last answer was inscribed, the writer looked up, +neither in astonishment nor in horror, but with the clear eye and the +serene brow of the ideal judge. + +"Of course," said he, "I am informed that you have already made the +admission. Let there be no affectation or misunderstanding between us, +on that or any other point. But as your bishop, and at least hitherto +your friend, I desire to have refutation or confirmation from your own +lips. You are at perfect liberty to deny me either. It will make no +difference to the ultimate result. That, as you know, will be out of my +hands." + +"I desire to withhold nothing, my lord," said Robert Carlton in a firm +voice. + +"Very well. I think we understand each other. This poor young woman, I +gather, was the daughter of a prominent parishioner?" + +"Of a prominent resident in my parish--yes." + +"But she herself was conspicuous in parochial work? Is it a fact that +she played the organ in church?" + +"It is." + +The fact was noted, the pen laid down; and the little old man, who +looked only great across his desk, leant back in his chair. + +"I am exceedingly anxious that you should have fair play. Let me say +plainly that these are not my first inquiries into the matter. I am +informed--I wish to know with what truth--that the young woman +disappeared for several months before her death?" + +"It is quite true." + +"And returned to give birth to her child?" + +"And to die!" said Carlton, in his grim determination neither to shield +nor to spare himself in any of his answers. But his hands were clenched, +and his white face glistened with his pain. + +The bishop watched him with an eye grown mild with understanding, and a +heart hot with mercy for the man who had no mercy on himself. But the +tight mouth never relaxed, and the peculiar voice was unaltered when it +broke the silence. It was the voice of justice, neither kind nor unkind, +severe nor lenient, only grave, deliberate, matter-of-fact. + +"My next question is dictated by information received, or let me say by +suspicions communicated. It is a vital question; do not answer unless +you like. It is, however, a question that will infallibly arise +elsewhere. Were you, or were you not, privy to this poor young woman's +disappearance?" + +"Before God, my lord, I was not!" + +"I understand that her parents had no idea where she was until the very +end. Had you none either?" + +"No more than they had. We were equally in the dark. We believed that +she had gone to stay with a friend from the village--a young woman who +had married from service, and was settled near London. It was several +weeks before we discovered that her friend had never seen her." + +"And all this time you did not suspect her condition?" + +"Yes; then I did; but not before." + +"She made no communication before she went away?" + +"None whatever to me--none whatever, to my knowledge." + +"And this was early in the year?" + +"She left Long Stow in January, and we had no news of her till the +middle of June, when strangers communicated with her father." + +Again the bishop leant over his foolscap. + +"Did you ever offer her marriage?" he asked abruptly. + +"Repeatedly!" + +The clear eyes looked up. + +"Did you not tell her father this?" + +"No; I couldn't condescend to tell him," said Carlton, flushing for the +first time. "My lord, I have made no excuses. There are none to make. +That was none at all." + +His lordship regarded the changed face with no further change in his +own. + +"So you loved her," he said softly, after a pause. + +"Ah! if only I had loved her more!" + +"If excuse there could be . . . love . . . is some." + +It was the old man murmuring, as old men will, all unknown to the bishop +and the judge. + +"But I want no excuses!" cried Carlton, wildly. "And let me be honest +now, whatever I have been in the past; if I deceived myself and others, +let me undeceive myself and you! Oh, my lord, that wasn't love! It's the +bitterest thought of all, the most shameful confession of all. But love +must be something better; that can't be love! It was passion, if you +like; it was a passion that swept me away in the pride of my strength; +but, God forgive me, it was not love!" + +He hid his face in his writhing hands; and, with those wild eyes off +him, the bishop could no longer swallow his compassion. The lines of his +mouth relaxed, and lo, the mouth was beautiful. A tender light suffused +the aged face, and behold, the face was gentle beyond belief. + +"Love is everything," the old man said; "but even passion is something, +in these cold days of little lives and little sins. And honesty like +yours is a great deal, Robert Carlton, though your sin be as scarlet, +and the Blood of our Blessed Lord alone can make you clean." + +Carlton looked up swiftly, a new solicitude in his eyes. + +"In me it was scarlet: not in her. She loved . . . she loved. Oh, to +have loved as well--to have that to remember! . . . She thought it would +spoil my life; and I never guessed it was that! But now I know, I know! +It was for my sake she went away . . . poor child . . . poor mistaken +heroine! She died for me, and I cannot die for her. Isn't that hard? I +can't even die for her!" + +His bodily weakness betrayed itself in his swimming eyes; in the night +of his agony no tear had dimmed them before men. But his will was not +all gone. With clenched fists, and locked jaw, and beaded brow, he +fought his weakness, while the good bishop sat with his head on his +hand, and closed eyes, praying for a brother in the valley of despair. +When he opened his eyes, it was as though his prayer was heard; for +Robert Carlton was bearing himself with a new bravery; and the +incongruous unquenched fires, which had caused surprise at the outset of +the interview, burnt brightly as before in the younger eyes. The old man +met them with a sad, grave scrutiny. But the lines of his mouth remained +relaxed. And, when he spoke again, his voice was very gentle. + +"You may think that I have put you to unnecessary pain," he said, "when +I give you fair warning that your case must form the subject of further +proceedings in another place. But I had heard that your conduct was +indefensible, root and branch, from beginning to end. Of that I am now +able to form my own opinion. Yet my individual opinion can make no +difference in the result, since absolute deprivation I had never +contemplated in your case, and it is only the extreme penalty which +rests with me. On the other hand, it will be my duty to set the +ecclesiastical law in motion; and the ecclesiastical law must take its +course. I take it that you do not propose to defend your case?" + +A grim light flickered for an instant in Robert Carlton's eyes. "Have I +defended it hitherto, my lord?" + +"Then there can only be one result; and you must make up your mind, as +you have doubtless already done, to suspension for a term of years. If +word of mine can lessen that term, it shall be spoken in your favour, +both out of consideration of the great work that you were doing, and +have done, and in view of certain circumstances which our conversation +has brought to light." + +"But can you want me back in the Church?" cried Carlton; and his heart +beat high with the question; but turned heavier than before in the +interval of prudent deliberation which preceded any answer. + +"I would punish no man beyond the letter of the law," declared the +bishop at length, "even if it were in my power to do so. The Act debars +suspended clergymen from all exercise of their divine calling and from +all pecuniary enjoyment of their benefice until the term of such +suspension is up. I would not, if I could, prolong the period of +disability by throwing further let or hindrance in the way of an erring +brother who repents him truly of his sin. I would rather say, 'Come back +to your work, live down the past, and, by your example in the years that +may be left you, pluck up the tares that your bad example has surely +sown. Retrieve all but the irretrievable. Undo what you can.'" + +Carlton's eyes melted in gratitude too great for speech, but plain as +the benediction which his trembling lips left eloquently unsaid. + +"That," continued the bishop, "is what I should say to you--because I +think we understood each other. You have not sought to palliate your +offence; nor are you the man to misconstrue the little I may have said +concerning the offence itself. What is there to be said? You know well +enough that I lament it as I lament its mournful result, and deplore it +as I deplore the blot on the whole body of Christ's Church militant here +on earth. You have committed a great sin, against humanity, against God, +and against your Church; yet he would commit a greater who sought on +that account to hound you from that Church for ever. Courage, brother! +Pray without ceasing. Look forward, not back; and do not despair. +Despair is the devil's best friend; better give way to deadly sin than +to deadlier despair! Remember that you have done good work for God in +days gone by; and live for that brighter day when you have purged your +sin, and may be worthy to work for Him again." + +"And meanwhile?" whispered Carlton, for fear of shouting it in his +passionate anxiety. "Is there nothing I may do meanwhile--among my own +poor people--before the tares come up?" + +"If you are suspended you will be unable to hold any service; and I +hardly think you will care to go among your parishioners while that is +so." + +"But I shall not be forbidden my own parish?" + +"Not forbidden." + +"Nor my rectory?" + +"No; so far as I am aware, at least, you retain your right to reside +there; but I can hardly think that it would be expedient." + +"And the church! They must have their church back again. Who is going to +rebuild it for them?" + +Carlton was on his feet in the last excitement. The bishop regarded him +with puzzled eyebrows. + +"I have heard nothing on that subject as yet; it is a little early, is +it not? But I have no doubt that it will be a matter for subscription +among themselves." + +"Among my poor people?" + +"With substantial aid, I should hope, from men of substance in the +neighbourhood." + +"But why should they pay?" cried Carlton, impetuously. "The church was +not burnt down for my neighbours' sins, nor for the sins of the parish, +but for mine alone . . . Oh, my lord, if I could but go back among my +people, and be their servant, I who was too much their master before! I +was not quite dependent--thank God, I had a little of my own--but every +penny should be theirs!" + +And the profligate priest stood upright before his bishop--his white +hands clasped, his white face shining, his burning eyes moist--zealot +and suppliant in one. + +"You desire to spend your income----" + +"No, no, my capital!" + +"On the poor of your parish? I--I fail to understand." + +"And I scarcely dare make you!" confessed Carlton, his full voice +failing him. "I so fear your disapproval; and I could set my face +against all the world, but against you never, much less after this +morning . . . Oh, my lord, I have set my poor people a dastardly +example, and brought cruel shame upon my cloth; for its sake and for +theirs, if not for my own, let me at least leave among them a tangible +sign and symbol of my true repentance. I have the chance! I have such a +chance as God alone in His infinite mercy could vouchsafe to a miserable +sinner. My church at Long Stow has been burnt down through me--through +my sin--to punish me----" + +"Are you sure of that, Mr. Carlton?" + +"I know it, my lord. And I want to do what only seems to me my bounden +and my obvious duty, and to do it soon." + +The bishop looked enlightened but amazed. + +"You would rebuild the church out of your own pocket? Is that really +your wish?" + +"It is my prayer!" + + + + +VIII + +THE LORD OF THE MANOR. + + +Wilton Gleed owed his success in life to a natural bent for the politic +virtues, and to the quality of energy unalloyed by enterprise. He was a +man of much shrewdness and extraordinary tenacity, but absolutely no +initiative; so he had taken his opportunities and held his ground +without running a risk that he could remember. Not a self-made man, he +was, however, the son of one who had made himself by dint of that very +enterprise which was lacking in Wilton Gleed. The father had seen a +certain want and filled it to the satisfaction of the wide world; the +son had extended the business without meddling with the product of the +firm. Monopolies die hard. Gleed & Son did nothing to deserve a swift +demise. They just stalked behind the times, and appeared to thrive on a +sublime contempt of competition. And those who knew him best were the +most surprised when Wilton Gleed turned the great concern into a limited +liability company, and made a fortune out of the transaction alone; it +was the most daring thing that he had ever done. + +The reason for the step may be related as characteristic of the man. Age +had given the firm a certain aristocracy of degree--not of kind--even +age could not soften the fact that Gleed & Son sold things in tins. And +the tins it was that turned plain Gleed & Son into Gleed & Son, Limited. +Some innovator was making tins with cunning openers attached; the lesser +firms jumped at the improvement. The lesser firms were already doing +Gleeds' some slight damage in their go-ahead little way; but the worst +they could all do together was as nothing compared with the extra +expenditure of an appreciable fraction of a farthing per tin on an +output of millions in the year. Wilton Gleed could not face the +immediate hole in his profits. He had never taken a risk in his life, +and was not going to begin. He had increased his expenses by going into +Parliament, and he was not such a fool as to play tricks with his +income. He faced the situation as though it were ruin staring him in the +face, and lost a discernible measure of flesh before his big resolve. It +was all he did lose over the ultimate operation. He retired into private +and public life with more money than he knew how to spend. + +The average man is at his best as host, and in that capacity Wilton +Gleed was popular among his friends. He was an excellent sportsman of +the selfish sort; cherished a contempt for the various games which +involve playing for one's side; but was a first-rate shot, a fine +fisherman, and a good rider spoilt by his great principle of refusing +the risks. To shoot and dine with him was to see Gleed at his very best. +He was a bald little man, with silver-sandy moustache and close-cropped +whiskers; but his full-blooded face was still pink with health, his +fixed eye unerring as ever, his step elastic as the heather he loved to +tread. Gun in hand, in his tweeds and gaiters, and with his cap pulled +well over his head, Wilton Gleed never passed the prime of life; it was +late in the evening before he collected the years blown away on the +moor; and in its way the evening was as delectable as the day. The +dinner was a good one, and the host abandoned himself to its joys with a +schoolboy's ardour. Irreproachable champagne flowed like water, more +especially at the head of the table. Gleed carried it like a gentleman, +also the port that followed, though a little inclined to be garrulous +about the latter. As he sipped and gossiped, and settled the Eastern +Question in two words, and Mr. Gladstone's hash in one, the skin would +shine as it tightened on the bald head, and the always intent eye would +fix the listener beyond the needs of the conversation. It was very +seldom, however, that a syllable slid out of place, or that Wilton Gleed +went to bed looking quite his age. + +For some years he had leased various shootings in the autumn, spending +the other seasons at a lordly but suburban retreat inherited from his +father, with an occasional swoop abroad--the correct place at the +correct time--less for enjoyment than for other reasons. Gun, rod, and +cellar were what he did enjoy, and of these delights he vowed to have +his fill after getting out of Gleeds with unexpected spoils. A sporting +estate was in the market within two hours and a half of town; and for +forty thousand pounds Wilton Gleed became squire of Long Stow, patron of +an excellent living, and a large landowner in a country where he had a +nucleus of friends and soon made more. As Member of Parliament for that +division of London in which Gleeds had employed hundreds of hands for +half a hundred years, he at the same time bought a house in town, and +let the place outside. Subtler investments followed. The man was +becoming a gambler in his old age; but he played his own game with +ineradicable care and foresight, and rose Sir Wilton Gleed when his side +lost in the General Election of 1880. It was only a knighthood, and Sir +Wilton might have entertained justifiable hopes of his baronetcy; but +one or the other had been a moral certainty for some time. + +It was in Hyde Park Place that Sir Wilton first heard of the Long Stow +scandal and its immediate sequel. The news came in a few dry lines from +Sidney, by the first post on the Monday morning, June 26, 1882. It fell +like a firebrand in a keg of gunpowder. Sir Wilton, however, had even +better reasons than were obvious for his paroxysm of rage and +indignation; personal mortification was not the least of his emotions. +He would have gone down by the next train to "horsewhip the hound within +an inch of his life," but the cur had taken refuge in Lakenhall +Infirmary, "with very little the matter with him," in Sidney's words. +And just then the House was an Aceldama which no good soldier could +desert for a night, with the Government satisfactorily on the spit +between Phoenix Park and Alexandria, and the Opposition creeping up vote +by vote. Sir Wilton decided to run down on the Wednesday for twenty-four +hours, and talked of having the rectory furniture thrown into the street +if the rector was not there to take it and himself away for good. Sir +Wilton had his own impression as to his powers as patron of the living, +and he very naturally swore that he would "have that blackguard out of +it" within the week. A friend at the Carlton put him right on the point. + +"You can't do that, Gleed. A living's like nothing else. My lord gives, +but my lord can't take away." + +"Then what on earth am I to do?" + +"Get him inhibited and make him resign. It will come to the same thing." + +The fire was in all the newspapers, with the hint of a scandal at the +end of the paragraph. Among those who spoke to Sir Wilton on the subject +was a jaunty politician who had never yet recognised him at the club. + +"Sir Wilton Gleed, I think? I fancy we have met before?" + +"Indeed, my lord?" + +It was the noble who had chosen to forget the circumstance hitherto; +to-day he was all courtesy and confidential concern. What was this about +the church that had been burnt down? He had heard it was on the other's +estate. Sir Wilton professed to know no more as yet than the papers told +him. + +"I ask because it reads to me----don't you know? Some scandal----what? +And I'm sorry to say--fellow Carlton--sort of connection of mine." + +"To be sure," said Sir Wilton. "I remember hearing it." + +"Odd fish, I'm afraid. Here in town for years, at that ritualistic shop +across the park--forget my own name next. Might have had a good time if +he'd liked. Never went out. Preferred the mews. Made a specialty of +footmen and fellows. Had a night club somewhere, where he taught 'em to +box, and brought my own man home himself one night with an eye like +your boot. It was about the only time we met. Remember hearing he could +preach, though; only hope he hasn't been making a fool of himself down +there!" + +"I hope not also," said the discreet knight; "but I am going down +to-morrow, so I shall hear." + +He went down very grim: for Robert Carlton had not only been a thorn in +his side that twelve-month past; he actually stood for the one false +move, of importance, which Sir Wilton Gleed was conscious of having made +in all his life. Yet he had taken no step with more complete confidence +and self-approval. A gentleman and man of brain, reported by Lady Gleed +and their daughter, and duly admitted by himself, to be the best +preacher they had ever heard; a man of family into the bargain, and not +such a distant cadet as the head of that family implied; could any +combination have promised a more suitable successor to the venerable +sportsman who had scorned white ties and caught his death coursing in +mid-winter with Dr. Marigold? And yet the fellow had proved a perfect +pest from the beginning. He had gone his own gait with a quiet +independence only less exasperating than his personal courtesy and +deference in every quarrel. In fact there had been no regular quarrel: +the squire had only been rather rude to the rector's face, and very +abusive behind his back. Nor was Sir Wilton's annoyance in the least +surprising. Devoid himself of a single religious conviction, but the +natural enemy of change, he viewed the inevitable, but too immediate, +innovations in the light of a personal affront; but when his own +expostulations were met with polite argument on a subject which he had +never studied, and he found himself at issue with a cleverer and a +stronger man, who put him in the illogical position of objecting in the +country to what his family approved in town, then there was no +alternative for the squire but to withdraw from the unequal field and +wait upon revenge. Too politic to break with one who after all had more +followers than foes, and who speedily made himself the first person in +the parish, Sir Wilton very naturally hated his man the more for those +very considerations which induced him to curb his tongue. But his +disappointment was manifold. It was not as if the fellow had proved +personally congenial to himself. He preferred teaching the lads cricket +to shooting with the squire, and he was a poor diner-out. His +predecessor had shot almost (but not quite) as well as Sir Wilton +himself, and had the harder head of the two for port. Carlton was not +even in touch with his own people. There was no advantage in the man at +all. + +But now the end was in sight--the incredibly premature and disgraceful +end. Sir Wilton went down grim enough, but much less angry and indignant +than he supposed. Most of his wrath was the accumulation of months, free +for expression at last. He was, however, a good and clean citizen +according to his lights, and he did undoubtedly feel the rightful +indignation with which the story from Long Stow was calculated to +inspire many a worse man. Arrived at Lakenhall, where the stanhope was +waiting for him, he asked but one question on the way to Long Stow, and +then drove straight past the hall to the church. Here he got down, and +examined the black ruins with his hands in his pockets and his shoulders +very square and a fixed glare of mingled rage and exultation. Then he +walked past the broken windows, and the stanhope met him at the rectory +gate. He drove home without a word. His one question had elicited the +fact that the rector was still in the infirmary. + +The village street cut clean through the high-walled hall garden, and +the brown-brick hall itself stood as near the road as the mansion in +Hyde Park Place, and was the uglier building of the two, from the dormer +windows in the steep slates to the portico with the painted pillars. +Within was the depressing atmosphere of a great house all but empty. Sir +Wilton hurried through a twilit drawing-room in deadly order, and forth +by a French window into a pleasaunce of elms and plane-trees whose +shadows lay sharp as themselves upon the shaven sward. A girl was coming +across the grass to meet him, a girl at the awkward age, with her dark +hair in a plait and her black dress neither long nor short. Sir Wilton +brushed her cheek with his bleached moustache. + +"Where's Fraulein?" he said. + +"In the schoolroom, I think, uncle." + +"I want to speak to her. I'm only down for the night and shall be busy. +I'll be looking round the garden, tell her." + +And he walked away from the house, treading vigorously on the cropped +grass; and presently a little middle-aged lady, with a plain, shrewd +face, flitted over it in her turn. She found Sir Wilton between the four +yew hedges and the mathematical parterres of the Italian garden at the +further end of the lawn. He shook hands with her, but gave free rein, +for the second time in five minutes, to his idiosyncrasy of hard +staring. + +Fraulein Hentig had been many years in the family, and had taken many +parts; at present she was permanent housekeeper in the country, but had +lately also recommenced old schoolroom duties on the adoption by Sir +Wilton of his only brother's only child. There was no nonsense about +Fraulein Hentig. She told Sir William all that she had heard and all +that she believed was true, without mincing facts or wincing at the +expletives which more than once interrupted her tale. As it proceeded +the fixed eyes lightened with a vindictive glitter; but the end found +Sir Wilton scowling. + +"I wish I'd been here! I wouldn't have let them break his windows; no, I +should have claimed the privilege of horsewhipping him with my own +hands. I'd do it still if he were here; but he'll never show his nose in +Long Stow again. I suppose there's no doubt the church was wilfully set +fire to?" + +"None at all from what I hear, Sir Wilton." + +"Is nobody suspected?" + +"George Mellis was. They say he was in love with the girl, and he +disappeared on Saturday night. However, it turns out that he was already +in Lakenhall hours before the fire, and he never came back. It appears +he went straight to the rectory when he heard the scandal, and almost as +straight out of Long Stow when Mr. Carlton admitted everything. Already +I hear that he has enlisted in London." + +"You don't mean it! That's another thing at that blackguard's door; it's +a nice list! But it's enough to send the whole parish to the dogs. By +the way, you would get Lady Gleed's letter?" + +"Yes, Sir Wilton. I wrote last night to tell her ladyship that she might +make her mind easy about her niece. She is very innocent, and when I +told her the windows had been broken because Mr. Carlton had done +something dishonourable, she was amazed of course, but she asked no more +questions. I spoke at once to the servants, and I made Gwynneth promise +not to go among the people at present; they have already typhoid fever +in one of the cottages, and that was my excuse." + +"Excellent!" said Sir Wilton. "I won't have her in and out of the +cottages in any case, and I shall tell her so before I go. She's much +too young for that kind of nonsense. And she mustn't read just exactly +what she likes. She had a book in her hand just now--I couldn't see +what--but she seems inclined to fill her head with any folly. We must +find a school for her, and meanwhile bring her up as we've brought up +our own child." + +Fraulein Hentig smiled judiciously. + +"They are already rather different characters," she said. "But I will do +my best, Sir Wilton." + +When the pair quitted the Italian garden, the gentleman hurrying to make +other inquiries before dinner, while the German gentlewoman dropped +behind, two brown eyes saw them from an upper window, whither the girl +had carried her book in vain. Her attention had been intermittent +before, but now she could not even try to read. The air was full of +mystery, and the mystery was more absorbing than that in any book. It +was also absolute and unfathomable in the girl's mind. Yet her brain +teemed with questions and surmises. She had come upstairs because she +felt that they wanted her out of the way, her uncle and the good, slow, +serious Fraulein. Yet that was not enough for them: they also must +retire as far as possible for their talk. Of course Gwynneth knew what +they had to talk about; but what was the dishonourable action that a +clergyman could commit and that could not be so much as mentioned in her +hearing? She was not thinking of "a clergyman" in the abstract. She was +thinking of the man with the beautiful, sad face; of the passionate +preacher with the voice that thrilled the senses and the words that +filled the mind. She had heard him preach of sin and suffering with +equal sympathy. Phrases came back to her. Now she understood. But what +could he have done, that he should suffer so, and that a perfectly kind +person like Fraulein Hentig should exult in his suffering? + +Gwynneth was splendidly and terribly innocent, but all the more +inquisitive on that account. She was unacquainted with the facts, yet +not with the tragedy of life. In a tragic atmosphere she had been born +and bred. Quentin Gleed had been fatally lacking in the politic virtues +cultivated by his brother. He had deserted his wife and drunk himself to +death within the memory of Gwynneth. The young girl recalled dim years +of bitter scenes in a luxurious home, and vivid years of peace and +poverty in a tiny cottage. And now her mother was gone also; the dear, +independent, wilful little mother, who had taught her child all but the +wickedness that was in the world! And that child sat at her bedroom +window in the new home that never could be home to her; and the drooping +sun could find no bottom to her dark and limpid eyes, no flaw upon her +pure warm skin; and neither the cuckoo in the poplar, nor the thrush in +the elm, nor the sparrows in the eaves just overhead, could tell her +anything of the wickedness that was in even her small world. + + + + +IX + +A DUEL BEGINS + + +Late in the afternoon of July 13, a Lakenhall fly rattled through Long +Stow, and waited in the rain outside the rectory gate while one of the +occupants ran up to the house. He was such a short time gone, and so few +people were about in the wet, that the fly was on its way back to +Lakenhall before the Long Stow folk realised that it was the rector who +had upset prophecy by showing his nose among them in broad daylight. He +had done no more, however, nor was anything further seen or heard of him +during the month of July. It appeared that he had returned for some +private papers only. The rectory was locked up by the squire's orders, +but the rector had forced his own study door, and his muddy footmarks +were confined to that room. The same evening he went up to town--and +disappeared. But his address was known in an official quarter. And all +day and every day he might have been discovered in the reading room of +the British Museum: a memorable figure, stooping amid mountains of +architectural tomes, and drawing or copying plans in the few inches of +table-land they left him, all with a nervous eagerness of face and hand +not daily to be seen beneath that dispiriting dome. + +Then the call came, and he was tried in the consistorial court of his +own diocese, before the chancellor thereof, at the beginning of August. +No need to record more than the fact. The proceedings were brief because +the accused pleaded guilty and his own word was the only evidence +against him. The sentence was that of suspension foreshadowed by the +bishop. The Reverend Robert Carlton was formally suspended _ab officio +et beneficio_ for the period of five years. + +The result was reported in the London papers; there was only matter for +a few lines. "Mr. Carlton was suspended for five years" was the +concluding sentence in _The Times_ report; and that was good enough for +Sir Wilton Gleed. It was a happy omen for the holidays, which began for +him that very day. The family were already in the country. Sir Wilton +took the last train to Lakenhall and drove himself home for good in the +highest spirits. Four miles of the five were over his own acres, and +every one of them was crumbling with rabbits in the rosy dusk. Later, +the larkspur and peonies on the dinner-table were as the very breath and +blush of the gorgeous English country; and a thrush sang its welcome +through the open window, and a nightingale trilled the tired Londoner to +sleep; but he dreamt of a pheasant that he had heard calling between +Lakenhall and Long Stow. + +In the country Sir Wilton was an early riser, and he was abroad next +morning while the shadows of the elms still stretched to the house and +quivered up its bare brick walls. The great lawn was dusted with a milky +dew in which Sir Wilton positively wallowed in his water-tight boots; +it was not his least delight to be in shooting-boots and knickerbockers +and soft raiment once more. The first few minutes of the more excellent +life produced an unseasonable geniality in the breast of Wilton Gleed. +The man was a human being, and he longed for companionship in his joy. +But Sidney never rose before he must, nor the gardeners either, it +appeared. In the stable-yard a groom was encountered, but Sir Wilton had +seen his face every day in town. He went out into the village, and +naturally turned to the left. The cottage doors were open, and they were +filled with homely figures that touched a cap or courtesied as he passed +with a pleasant word for all. It was good to be back, to be a little +king again. Sir Wilton pulled the cap over his eyes because the sun was +in them, and admired the ripe wheat in the field beyond the post-office, +the barley in the field beyond that. So he passed the Flint House on the +other side with unruffled mind, and was passing the Flint House meadow +before his thoughts took the inevitable turn which led to profane +mutterings through shut teeth. But this morning it did not lead quite so +far; this morning, with the scented air of England in his nostrils, and +a twitter in the ears from every thatch, even Sir Wilton Gleed could +find it in his heart to pity the sinner fallen from his high estate in +what was paradise enough for the squire. + +"Poor devil!" he said as he came to the rectory gate and saw the long +grass within. It was sufficiently in key with the old quaint rectory, in +its rags of ivy and its shawl of disreputable tiles. The windows were +still broken and the shutters shut. Otherwise the picture was as +alluring as its fellows to the lord of the manor. The trees that hid the +church at midsummer would screen its ruins for many a day. + +Sir Wilton entered to refresh his memory as to the minor damages, and +they changed his mood. Who was to pay for twenty-nine panes of +glass--no, he had missed a window--for thirty-three? He was a man who +did not care to spend a penny without obtaining his pennyworth; but he +was not clear as to his legal obligations; and he bristled at the idea +of paying for the immorality of the parson and the excesses of his +flock. He had paid enough in other ways. And there was the church. Who +was to rebuild the church? They might expect him to do that once he +began doing things; and the man fell into premature fuming between his +love of the lavish and his detestation of expense. Meanwhile he had +found a whole window, that of the study, and the door beside it stood +ajar. This he pushed open as though the place belonged to him (his view +in so many words), and stood still upon the threshold. + +"Well, I'm damned!" he cried at last. + +Robert Carlton sat asleep in his chair, his hands in his overcoat +pockets, the collar turned up about his ears. His boots and trousers +were brown and yellow with the dust of the district. In an instant he +was on his feet, scared, startled, and abashed. + +"So you've come back, have you?" + +"An hour or two ago. I walked from Cambridge. I don't know how you +heard!" + +"Heard? You must think me in a hurry for your society! No, this is an +unexpected pleasure, and I use the words advisedly. It's something to +find you don't come twice in broad daylight." + +"I have come on business, as before, but this time the business will +occupy more than a few minutes. I wished to get it in train with as +little fuss as possible. Then I was coming to see you, Sir Wilton." + +It was quietly spoken, without bitterness or defiance, but also without +the abject humility which had trembled in the clergyman's first words. +The other made some attempt to modify his manner: nothing could put him +in the wrong, but he realised that it might be as well to abstain from +mere brutality. And what he had just heard implied a certain +reassurance. + +"I see," said Gleed. "You have come to make arrangements about your +furniture and effects. I am glad to hear it." + +"My furniture and effects?" queried Carlton. "What arrangements do you +mean?" + +"Well, you can't leave them here, can you?" + +"Why not, Sir Wilton?" + +"Why not!" echoed the squire, turning from pink to purple with the two +words. "Because you've been disgraced and degraded as you deserve; +because you're the hound you are; because you've been suspended for five +years, and I won't have you or your belongings cumber my ground for a +single day of them! So now you know," continued Gleed in lower tones, +his venom spent. "I didn't think it would be necessary to tell you my +opinion of you; but you've brought it on yourself." + +Carlton bowed to that, but respectfully pointed out the difference +between suspension and deprivation, his tone one of apology rather than +of triumph. + +"I don't say which I deserved," he added, "but I do thank God for the +mercy He has shown me. This gives me another chance--in five years' +time. Meanwhile I am not only entitled to keep my furniture in the +rectory. I believe I may live in it if I like." + +Gleed stood convulsed with wrath redoubled. He had been too busy in town +to prime himself upon a point which could not arise before he went down +to the country; and here it was, awaiting him. His disadvantage alone +was enough to put him in a passion; but the last statement was monstrous +in itself. + +"I don't believe it! I don't believe a word you say! A man who can live +a lie will tell nothing else!" + +Carlton drew himself up, his nostrils curling. + +"Better go and ask your solicitor," he said. "I have forfeited the +right--as you so well know--to the only possible reply." + +"Rights apart," rejoined Gleed, his colour heightening by a shade, "do +you mean to tell me you would seriously think of remaining on the very +scene of your shame?" + +"I didn't say I would do anything. I said I believed I could." + +"You have done enough harm in the place; surely you wouldn't come back +to do more?" + +"No; if I came at all, it would be to undo a little of the harm--to live +it down, Sir Wilton, by God's help!" said Carlton, and his voice shook. +"But I do not mean to live here. I have spoken to the bishop, and his +advice is against it, though he leaves me free to follow my own +judgment. This afternoon I hoped to speak to you. There is another +matter which is really a duty, so that I can be in no doubt as to what +to do there. It will not involve my remaining on the spot, or obtruding +myself in any way. But the church has been burnt down on my account, and +I intend to rebuild it before the winter." + +"The church is mine!" said Gleed, savagely. + +"I don't want to contradict you, Sir Wilton; but you should really see +your lawyer on all these points." + +"The land is mine!" + +"Not the church land, Sir Wilton; and the rector is not only entitled, +but he may be compelled, to restore and rebuild within certain limits. +Your solicitor will turn up the Act and show it you in black and white. +And after that I think you will hardly stand between me and my bounden +duty." + +"I don't recognise it as your duty. Your first duty is to resign the +living lock-stock-and-barrel--if you've any sense of decency left; but +you haven't--not you, you infernal blackguard, you!" + +Gleed was standing on the drive, his arms akimbo and his fists clenched, +his flushed face thrust forward and his stockinged legs planted firmly +apart. It was Carlton's lithe figure which had been filling the doorway +for some minutes; but at this he strode upon his adversary, and towered +over him with a hand that itched. + +"Why must you insult me?" he cried. "Do you think that's the way to get +me to do anything? Or are you bent upon having me up for assault? For +heaven's sake remember your own manhood, Sir Wilton, and respect mine; +don't trade too far upon my readiness to admit that I am all men choose +to call me. Have a little pride! I am ready to take my punishment, and +more. I will keep away from the place as much as possible. If I can let +the rectory, that will be so much more money for the church. Don't +oppose me; if you can't help me by your countenance (and I grant you +it's more than I have a right to expect), at least be neutral, and let +me work out my own salvation in my own way. It will make no difference +to the past. It may make all the difference in the future. God knows I +can't reinstate myself in His sight and in the hearts of men by building +a church! But I can leave behind me a sign of my sorrow and my true +penitence. I can leave behind me a name and an example, bad enough in +all conscience, but yet not wholly vile to the very last. And think what +even that would be to me! And think what it would be if I could but pave +the way, not to forgiveness, but to some reconciliation with those whom +I have loved but led amiss . . . Well, that may be too much to hope +. . . no, I have no right to dream of that . . . but at least let me +make the one material reparation in my power; let me do my duty! When +it is done, if you and they will have no more of me, then you shall all +be rid of me for good." + +Gleed wavered, partly because in mere personality he was no match for +the other, partly because the prospect of a new church for nothing made +its own appeal to the man who had counted the cost of the broken +windows. His mind ran over the pecuniary scheme and detected a flaw. + +"And what's to become of the parish for the next five years?" he asked. +"Who's to pay a man to do your work?" + +"There's the stipend I cannot touch and would not if I could; a part of +that will doubtless be set aside. Until the church is habitable, +however, the case will probably be met by one of the curates coming over +from Lakenhall and taking a service in the schoolroom." + +"And how do _you_ know?" cried Sir Wilton, not unjustifiably. + +"The bishop sent for me," said Carlton--and his eyes fell. "I ventured +to speak to him on the subject before I left. Do you think I don't care +what happens here in my absence? I hope the services will begin next +Sunday--the building next week. I have worked the whole thing out. I +could show you the figures and the plans. The new ones are ready, if you +can call them new. I shall be my own architect as before for the +transepts, but the rest shall be exactly as it was." + +"We'll see about that," said Sir Wilton grimly. He knew those melting +eyes, that enthusiastic voice. They had brought their hundreds to this +man's feet before. They might do so again. Even the squire felt their +power in his own despite. + +"It is my one chance!" the voice went on in softer accents. "Do not ask +me to forego it altogether; but I will keep in the background as much as +you like; all I want to know is that the work is going on. Suppose I did +resign, and you appointed another man. Why should he give towards the +church? Why should he come where there is none? Let me build the new one +first!" + +"Has it come to letting? I understood I couldn't prevent you?" + +"No more you can; although----" + +"We'll see!" cried Gleed. "That's quite enough for me. We'll see!" + +"But, Sir Wilton----" + +"Damn your 'buts,' sir!" shouted the other, shaking with rage. "You +disgrace the parish, and you won't leave it. You come back, and set +yourself against me, and think you can do what you like after doing what +you've done. By God, it's monstrous! There's not a man in the country +who won't agree with me; you'll find that out to your cost. Build the +church, would you? I'll see you further! Law or no law, I'll have you +out of this! I'll hound you out of it! I'll have you torn in pieces if +you stay!" + +"I have already told you I don't intend to stay," said Carlton quietly. +"I only intend to rebuild the church." + +"All right! You try! You try!" + +And with his fixed eyes flashing, and his fresh face aged with anger, +but scored with implacable resolve, Sir Wilton Gleed swung on his heel, +and so down the drive with every step a stamp. + + + + +X + +THE LETTER OF THE LAW + + +In the village he met Tom Ivey, but passed him with a savage nod, and +was some yards further on when a thought smote him so that he spun round +in his stride. + +"That you, Ivey?" he called. "I wasn't thinking; you're the very man I +wanted to see. How are you, eh?" + +"Nicely, thank you, Sir Wilton," said Tom, coming up. + +"Plenty of work, I hope?" + +"Well, not just lately, Sir Wilton." + +"Good! I may have some for you. I'll see you about it this evening or +to-morrow; meanwhile keep yourself free. By the way, how's your mother?" + +"Very sadly, Sir Wilton. I sometimes fare to think she's not long for +this world." + +"Nonsense, man! What's the matter with her?" + +Tom hardly knew. That was old age, _he_ thought. Then the house was that +old and small; sometimes she fared to stifle for want of air. And this +Tom said doggedly, for a reason. + +"Ah!" cried Sir Wilton, his fixed eye brightening. "Wasn't there a +question of repairs some time since?" + +"There was, Sir Wilton." + +"Well, I'll reconsider it. We must do what we can to make the old lady +comfortable for the winter. I'll come and see her, and I'll see you +again about the other matter. Keep yourself free meanwhile. Don't you +let any of those Lakenhall fellows snap you up!" + +And Sir Wilton went on chuckling, but again turned quickly and called +the other back. + +"By the way, Tom, who _were_ those fellows you used to work for in +Lakenhall?" + +"Tait & Taplin, Sir Wilton." + +A note was taken of the names. + +"The only builders in the town, eh?" + +"Well, Sir Wilton, there's old Isaac Hoole, the stonemason." + +"A stonemason, by Jove!" and down went his name. "What other builders +and stonemasons have we in the district--near enough to undertake some +work here? I'm not thinking of the job I've got for you, Tom." + +Ivey thought of three within fifteen miles, and several at greater +distances, but doubted whether any of the latter would accept a contract +so far afield. Their names were taken, nevertheless, and Sir Wilton +stared his hardest as he put his pocket-book away. + +"I shall want you all the same," he said, "and I shall expect to get you +when I want you. Understand? If anybody else offers you a job, remember +you've got one. And I'll see your mother this morning." + +Tom went his way with his honest wits in a knot. He could not conceive +what was coming. Ten minutes ago he had found a note slipped under the +door in the night, and he was going straight to the rectory without his +breakfast. Had Sir Wilton been there before him, and was he going to +rebuild the church? Then what had the reverend to say to it, now that he +was suspended for five years? And what in the world could he have to say +to Tom Ivey? + +He said nothing at all until they had shaken hands, and nothing then +about the fire; it is with the hand alone that men pay their big debts +to men, and Robert Carlton did not weaken his thanks with words. + +"Have you got a job, Tom?" were his first. + +"I have and I haven't, sir," said Ivey. + +"You're not free to take one from me?" + +"I wish I was, sir!" cried Tom, impulsively (he was not so sure about it +on reflection); and in his simplicity he explained why he was not free. +"But perhaps that's the same job, sir?" he added, hopefully. + +Carlton shook his head, and looked wistfully on the friendly face; a few +words (he knew his power) and the very man he wanted would be on his +side against all odds. But he must not begin by dividing the village +into factions; he must fight his own battle, with mercenaries from +neutral ground, or none at all. + +"Where was it you served your time, Tom?" he asked at length. + +"Tait & Taplin's, sir, in Lakenhall." + +"Thanks. I won't keep you, Tom. It will do you no good to be seen up +here." + +He held out his hand with a dismal smile. It was the other's turn to +wring hard. "I care nothing about that, sir! We've been shoulder to +shoulder once already; my mind don't go no further back than that; and +we'll be shoulder to shoulder again!" + +Carlton found flour and tea in the store-room, and in the fowl-house two +new-laid eggs. He cooked his first breakfast with the sun pouring +through the open kitchen window upon six weeks' dirt and dust. He was +not a man of very hearty habit, but he had learnt of old the evil of +exercise upon too light a diet. His pony was fattening in the glebe; but +a fastidious sense of fitness forbade him to drive, and between nine and +ten he set out for Lakenhall on foot. + +It was an ordeal for the first half-mile: the sunlight flooding the +village felt like limelight turned on him alone. Some children +courtesied as though nothing was changed; their elders stared at him +without further sign; only one shouted after him, he knew not who or +what. He reached the open country with a raging pulse, thinking only +upon circuitous ways back; but three solitary miles restored his nerve. +And in Lakenhall it was only every other passer who stopped and turned +and stared. Entering the town he was nearly run over by a dogcart. It +was Sir Wilton driving, and Carlton caught the gleam of his eye even as +he leapt to one side for his life, but mistook its significance until he +was within sight of Tait & Taplin's. Then it occurred to him, and he +entered fully prepared. + +"No, thank you, sir--not for us! We've heard of you, and we don't deal +with your sort. Do you hear, or do you want to hear more?" + +Carlton searched in vain for another builder, and only got the name of +a stonemason by going into the cemetery and looking at the newer +gravestones. He had then to discover where the man lived, and he was +ashamed to ask questions in shops. He was still scouring the town, and +it was afternoon, when a gig was pulled up in the middle of the road. + +"So you're back? Well, you look better than you did." + +"I am," said Carlton, "thanks to you." + +"Who are you looking for?" + +"Hoole, the stonemason." + +"Jump up and I'll drive you there." + +The tone was too humane for Carlton. + +"Thank you, doctor, but I like walking." + +"Then find him for yourself, and be damned to you!" + +And Marigold drove on, red to the hoar of his eighty years; but, as +Carlton stood watching him out of sight with vain compunction, the old +doctor turned in his seat and pointed up an alley with his whip in +passing. + +Hoole, the stonemason, was not rude, but he was as firm as Tait & Taplin +in his refusal. He was an elderly man, of few words, but he admitted +that Sir Wilton Gleed had been there that morning. That was enough for +Carlton, who was turning away when something in his visible fatigue and +dejection moved the mason to give him a hint. + +"You won't get anybody in the district to work for you against Sir +Wilton," he said. "That stands to reason." + +"Then I must go out of the district," said Carlton. And he bought a +county directory at a shop where he had been a regular customer; but +they insisted on the settlement of his current bill first; and even then +he had to help himself to the new book, and leave the money on the +counter, because they scorned to serve him. The directory contained the +names and addresses of the very few builders and master-masons within a +day's journey of Long Stow. And it was all there was to show for the +long day's round of retribution and rebuff when, late in the afternoon, +Carlton returned as he had come, too tired and too dispirited to walk an +inch out of his way; and the school-children who had courtesied in the +morning knew better now, and cried after the bent figure slinking home +at dusk. + +The next day was Sunday, and the school-bell tinkled towards eleven +o'clock, and stopped precisely at the hour. Then Carlton knew that his +own idea had been adopted, and that somebody was saying matins in the +parish school-room: he read the service to himself in his study, and +evensong when evening came, with a sermon of Charles Kingsley's after +each: for doctrine could not help him now, but brave humanity could and +did. + +The Monday was Bank Holiday; but Carlton only knew it when he had +trudged ten miles to have speech with a builder whose premises were +closed; and so another day was lost. On the Tuesday he tried again, but +with as little avail. Sir Wilton Gleed had been there before him (as +long ago as the Saturday afternoon), and it was the same elsewhere. The +week went in fruitless visits to small contractors and working masons in +this large village or in that little town; the enemy had been first in +every field, with a cunning formula which Carlton reconstructed from the +various answers he received. + +"Of course, the church will have to be rebuilt," Sir Wilton had been +saying; "but not by him. He hasn't the money, for one thing; it had +better be an iron church, if he is to pay you for it. Help me to get rid +of him, and you shall hear from me again. We will have a decent church +when we are about it, and a local man shall get the job." + +Meanwhile the boycott was nowhere more operative than in Long Stow +itself, and no human being came near the rectory, where the rector +subsisted on a providential store of bacon and the daily deposit of +eggs, and on strange bread of his own baking, for he would risk no more +insults in the shops. But one night a forgotten friend came back into +his life: his collie, Glen, came bounding down the drive to meet him, +and the mad uproar of that welcome was heard through half the village, +and duly became the talk. The dog had been a vagabond and a rogue for +six wild weeks, and it came back gaunt and hard, its brush clotted and +raw underneath with the spray from a farmer's gun. Carlton washed the +wound with warm water, and the two pariahs supped together, and lay that +night upon the same bed, and went abroad together next morning, to try +the last man left. + +The day after that they stayed at home, and word reached the hall that +the rector had been seen among the ruins of his church; he was, indeed, +exploring them for the first time, and that both with method and +deliberation. When seen, however (from the lane that runs under the +fine east window of to-day, past the lawn-tennis court which was then a +fowl run, and the glebe that is still the glebe), he was seated on a +sandstone block in front of the little lean-to shed; and, as a matter of +fact, his back was to the ruins. He was contemplating similar blocks and +slabs of the undressed stone that lay where they had been lying on +Midsummer Day: some were still smutty from the fire, all were slightly +stained by the weather, otherwise there was no change that Carlton could +see as he sat thus. At one end of the shed rose a great yellow cairn of +material raw from the quarry--a stack of stones about as much of one +size and shape as so many lumps of sugar; enough to finish the +transepts, as matters had stood; a mere fraction of the amount required +now. Carlton looked on what he had got, and his eyes closed in a +calculation beyond his powers in mental arithmetic; he had to take a +pencil to it, and then a foot-rule to the blackened courses, and +presently a pair of compasses to the plans in the study. + +In the afternoon he tidied the shed. Every tool was intact; a little +rust had been the worst intruder; and the feel of the cool sleek handles +quickened Carlton's pulse. Nay, the hammer rang a few strokes on the +cold-chisel, for he could not help it, and the music reminded him of his +poor bells, now cumbering the porch; it was almost as good to hear; and +the way the soft stone peeled, in creamy flakes, thrilled the hand as it +charmed the eye. But a very few minutes served to make the enthusiast +ashamed of his enthusiasm; and though he spent more time in the ruins, +now testing a standing wall, now scraping a charred stone, ardour and +determination had died down in an eye that was looking within; a wistful +irresolution flickered in their place. And that night the lonely man +walked his room once more, from twilight to twilight, with long +intervals spent upon his knees, in agonies of doubt and self-distrust, +in passionate entreaty for a right judgment, and for the strength to +abide by it. Yet his duty had not dawned upon him with the day. + +Towards eleven the school-bell tinkled. It was Sunday once more; and +once more he read the prayers upon his knees and the psalms and lessons +standing; but no sermon to-day. No man could help him in his struggle +with himself; he must trust to the strength of his own soul, to the +singleness of his own heart, and to the guidance of the God who was +drawing nearer and nearer to him in these days--with each prayer that +rose from his heart--with each bead that stood upon his brow. And so at +last, when the burden of doubt and darkness became more than the man +could bear, it was as though the heavens had opened, and a beam of +celestial light flooded the narrow room with the low ceiling and the +cross-beams; for the peace of a mind made up had descended upon the +solitary therein. And that night his sleep was sound, so that in the +morning he had to ask himself why; the answer made him catch his breath; +it did not shake his resolve. + +"He shall have his chance," said Carlton; "he shall have it fairly to +his face. And he will take it--and that will be the end!" + +He hung about the ruins till it was ten o'clock by his watch, and then +went straight to the hall. Sir Wilton was at home; but the footman +hesitated to admit this visitor. Carlton's own hesitation was, however, +at an end, and his eye forbade rebuff. He was shown into the +drawing-room, where a very young girl was at the piano, evidently +practising, and yet playing in a way that made Carlton sorry when she +stopped. The cool room smelling of flowers; the glimpse of garden +through an open window, with the court marked out and chairs under the +trees; the momentary sound of a fine instrument finely touched: it was +all the very breath and essence of the pleasant every-day world from +which he had rightly and richly earned dismissal, and it all was branded +in his brain. Then the young girl rose, and stood in doubt with the sun +upon her plaited hair, and eyes great with innocent distress; but +Carlton barely bowed, and the child hardly knew how she got across the +room. + +Sir Wilton entered with jaunty step. His whiskered jaw was set like a +vice, but the light of conscious triumph danced in his fixed eyeballs. +Carlton had come prepared to have his intrusion treated as his latest +crime; a glance convinced him that the other was too sure of victory to +object to an interview with the virtually vanquished. + +"So you are quite determined that I shall not rebuild the church?" + +It was a point-blank beginning. Sir Wilton shrugged and smiled. "I have +told you to build it if you can," said he. + +"But you mean to make that an impossibility?" + +"Naturally I don't intend to make it easy." + +"Admit that by foul means, since none are fair, you are deliberately +preventing me from doing my duty!" Carlton pressed his point with a +heat he regretted, but could not help. + +"I admit nothing," said the other, doggedly--"least of all what you are +pleased to consider your 'duty.' Your real duty I've already told you. +Resign the living. Let us see the last of you." + +Carlton met the rigid stare with one as unwavering and more acute. It +was as though he would have seen to the back of the other's brain. + +"Very well," he said at length. "You shall!" + +"Ah!" cried Sir Wilton, when he had recovered from his surprise. But it +was not the cry of victory; there was an uncharacteristic lack of +finality in the clergyman's tone. + +"You shall see the last of me this very morning," he continued swiftly, +nervously, "if you like! But it will rest with you. I am not going +unconditionally. Will you listen to what I have to say?" + +Gleed shrugged again, but this time there was no accompanying smile. The +other threw up his head with a sudden decisiveness--a pulpit trick of +his when about to make a primary point--and his right fist fell into his +left palm without his knowing it. + +"Very well," said Carlton; "now I'll tell you exactly on what conditions +you shall have your heart's desire, and I will renounce mine. In spite +of what I hear you've been saying, I have a little money of my own--not +much, indeed--but enough for me to have subsisted upon for these next +years. I am not going to touch a penny of it--I shall pick up a living +for myself elsewhere. Meanwhile I have turned my income into capital +which is now lying in the bank at Lakenhall. It is a trifle under two +thousand pounds, and I want the whole of it to go into the new church. +Wherever I am I ought to be able to earn a little more, either as a +coach or with my pen; so let the offer stand at a church to cost two +thousand pounds. I long to have the building of it. I make no secret of +that. But I have been trying to read my own heart, and I see the +selfishness of such longings; and I have been trying to read your heart, +Sir Wilton, and I see the naturalness of your opposition. So I come to +you and I say, build the church yourself, and I withdraw. Build a better +church out of your abundance, and I will resign as you wish. Give me +your written undertaking, here and now, and you shall have my written +resignation in exchange." + +The words clung to his lips; he alone knew what it cost him to utter +them; he alone, in his absolute freedom from the mercenary instinct, +would have felt certain of the result. But the rich man was touched upon +his tender spot. What return was he offered for his money? Who would +thank him for building a church in the heart of the country? The church +could be built by subscription; bad enough to have to head the list. +Besides, he was flushed with triumph; he saw but a beaten man in the +nervous wretch before him. Fancy bribing a beaten man to fly! + +"I like your impudence," said Wilton Gleed. "Upon my word! _My_ written +undertaking--to _you_!" + +"Do you refuse to give it?" asked Carlton quickly. + +"Certainly--to you." + +"Undertakings apart, do you entertain my suggestion, or do you not?" + +"That's my business." + +Carlton felt his patience slipping. + +"Do you mean to say that you don't even yet recognise that it's mine +too, as rector of the parish? Are you still so ignorant of the legal +bearings of the situation? God knows, Sir Wilton, it is not for me to +speak of right and wrong; but I do assure you that you're putting +yourself wilfully in the wrong in this matter. You hinder me from doing +my legal duty, and you refuse to assume any responsibility! Suspended or +not, I am bound to keep my chancel, at all events, 'in good and +substantial repair, restoring _and rebuilding when necessary_.'" + +Sir Wilton's eyes, fixed as usual, caught fire suddenly. + +"Oh, you're bound, are you?" + +"Legally bound." + +"You're sure that's the law?" + +"The very letter of the law, Sir Wilton." + +"Then see that you keep it! You come here blustering about your legal +rights; but you forget that I've got mine. Where there's a law there's a +penalty, and by God I'll enforce it! 'The very letter of the law,' eh? +I'll take you at your word; you shall keep it to the letter. Build away! +Build away! The sooner you begin the better--for you!" + +This was probably the boldest move that Sir Wilton Gleed ever made in +his life; it was certainly the least considered. But what satisfaction +sweeter than hoisting the enemy with his own petard? It is the +quintessence of poetic justice, the acme of personal triumph; and the +sudden opportunity of achieving his end by means so neat was more than +even Wilton Gleed could resist. Every builder and mason within reach was +already on his side; not a man of them who would work for dissolute +hypocrisy in defiance of might and right. No need to say another word to +the masons and the builders. They could be trusted on the whole, and the +untrustworthy could be bribed. Gleed had not the smallest scruple in the +matter, and he was characteristically forearmed with a public defence of +his private conduct. He believed that every right-thinking man would +applaud his sharp practice in the cause of religion and of morality; and +his confidence was not to be shaken by the way in which his challenge +was received. + +"Are you in earnest?" asked Carlton. "Do you seriously propose to hinder +me with one hand and to compel me with the other?" + +"I mean to take you at your word," Gleed repeated. "You are fond of +talking about your duty. Let's see you do it." + +"You set the builders against me, and then you tell me to build. May I +ask if you are prepared to defend such clumsy trickery?" + +"Any day you like, and glad of the opportunity!" cried Sir Wilton, +cheerfully. "All I have done is to give you your proper character where +it deserves to be known; you have it to thank if you can't get men to +work for you; and it's your look-out. I've heard about enough of you and +your church. Go and build it. Go and build it." + +"I will," said Carlton. "You have had your chance." And he bowed and +withdrew with strange serenity. + +A parting shot followed him through the hall. + +"You will have to do it with your own two hands!" + +Carlton made no reply. But in the village he committed a fresh enormity. + +He was seen to smile. + + + + +XI + +LABOUR OF HERCULES + + +All the church had not been burnt to the ground. West of the porch +(itself not hopelessly destroyed) stood thirteen feet of sound south +wall, blackened on the inside, calcined in the upper courses, but plumb +and firm as far as it went. A corresponding portion of the north wall, +the sixteen-foot strip west of the window almost opposite the porch, +stood equally rigid and erect. And, thus supported on either hand, the +entire west end rose practically intact, without a missing or a ruined +stone; the window was still truly bisected by its single mullion; +neither head nor tracery had given the fraction of an inch; only the +mangled leads, with here and there a fragment of smoked glass adhering, +would have told of a fire to one led blindfold under the west window, +and there given his first view of the church. + +But that was the one good wall and real exception to a rule of utter +ruin. The rest of the original building was either razed already or else +unfit to stand. The embryonic transepts were not quite demolished, but +they had never been many feet above ground. Sections of wall still stood +where there were no windows to weaken them, but east of the porch +nothing stood firm. Worst of all was the east end, from which the +chancel walls had been burnt away on either side. It stood as though +balanced, with an alarming outward list. One mullion of the great window +had gone by the sill; the other was cracked and crooked, as if +supporting the entire weight of the gable overhead; and it looked as +though a push would send the tottering fabric flat. + +Black ruin lay thick and deep within. To peep in was to see an ashpit +through a microscope. The remnants of the slate and timber roof lay +uppermost. Tie-beams, corbels, king-posts, ridge, struts, wall-plates, +pole-plates, rafters principal and common, joists, battens, laths and +fillets, half-burnt and black as the pit, save where some spilled +sheet-lead shone in the sun, spread a common pall over nave and chancel, +aisle and pews. It was as a midnight sea frozen in mid-storm, the +twisted lectern alone rising salient like a mast. Slates lay in shallow +heaps as though dealt from a pack; and certain pages, brown and brittle +at the edges, which the wind had torn from the burnt Bible before +Carlton rescued the remains, still fluttered in the crannies when the +wind went its rounds. And the hum of bees was in the air; but there had +been great distress among the sparrows, and one heard more of the +rectory cocks and hens. + +Upon this desolate and dead spot, in the heart of the warm, live +country, Robert Carlton stood looking within a few minutes of his exit +from the hall. But he did not stand looking long. He had changed into +flannels at top speed, and there was still more change in the man. His +eye glowed with a grim decision which lightened without dispelling the +settled sadness of the face. Passionate aspiration had cooled and +hardened into dogged and defiant resolve; and there was an end to all +compunction and self-questioning suspense. Carlton knew exactly what he +was going to do; he had known where to begin since the day before +yesterday. He wore neither coat nor waistcoat, his sleeves were rolled +up, he had a crowbar in one hand, and a heavy hammer in the other. He +began immediately on the thirteen feet of good wall to the left of the +porch. + +He had tested this wall on Saturday. The upper courses were loose and +crumbling; the sooner they went the better. Carlton climbed upon the +wall, and, sitting astride where it was firmest, began working off the +loose stones one by one with the crowbar. Iron would ring on iron twice +or thrice, and then a twist of the bar send the charred stone tumbling. +It was easy work, but the position was awkward, and Carlton soon went +for a ladder; on the way he was surprised to find that he was already +drenched with perspiration, and rather hungry. + +But the next hour tired him more, or rather the time that seemed an hour +to him, for it afterwards turned out to be three hours by the watch that +he had left indoors. Only the topmost course, or the stones on which the +red-hot eaves had rested, lent themselves to off-hand treatment; they +had been burnt to cinders--the mortar binding them, to powder; it needed +but a wrench to dislodge each one. But the next few courses were a +different matter. Half the stones were too loose to leave, too good to +chip in the removal. Carlton worked upon them with the cold-chisel +first, the crowbar next, and finally with his naked fingers, removing +the stones with immense care, and very deliberately dropping each into +its own bed in the long grass outside. At last the little strip of wall +was left without an unsound member from serrated crest to plinth: not a +stone that shook or shifted at a conscientious push; and the workman +took his eyes from his work. But he did not peer through the trees in +search of other eyes, for he was not thinking of himself or of his work +from a spectacular point of view. He merely saw that the sun had +travelled the church from end to end while he had been busy. And +suddenly he found himself sinking for want of food, and unable to stand +upright without intolerable pain. But he was back within half-an-hour, +and remained at work upon the sixteen-foot strip opposite till after +sunset. + +"But it hasn't been anything like a full day, old dog," said Carlton, as +they crept up to bed between eight and nine. And he set his +seven-and-six-penny alarum at four o'clock. + +Next forenoon the sixteen-foot strip was done with in its turn; no +infirm stone left standing upon another. Scraped and repointed, with the +uninjured pieces replaced in fresh mortar, and an entirely new top +course, these two short walls would be worthy of the gallant west end to +which they acted as buttresses. Its wounds were not skin-deep, thanks to +the west wind which had driven the flames the other way. It looked as +though a sponge would cleanse it, and Carlton sighed as he turned his +back upon the one good wall. + +Elsewhere, as has been said, there were fragments fit to use again, but +not to remain as they were. It cost Carlton a couple of days to take +these to pieces, laying the good stones carefully in the grass, as his +practice had been hitherto. The fourth day, however, he tried a change +of labour to ease his aching limbs, and went round and round with a +barrow, picking the sound stones from the grass, and stacking them near +the shed. Next morning he fought his way into the chancel, and stood +chin-deep in the wreckage, contemplating the leaning east end. And all +this time no soul had come near him; through the trees he had indeed +heard whispers that were not of the trees, but he had never thrown more +than a glance in their direction, and the green screen was still +charitably thick. + +The east end must come down sooner or later--therefore sooner. Carlton +was no engineer, but he was a man with a distinct turn for mechanics; +had used a lathe as a lad, and taught his Boys' Friendly how to use it +in their turn; had picked up much from Tom Ivey, and was himself blessed +with sound instincts concerning application and control of power. Here +was a tottering wall to come down altogether. It was too insecure to +pull to pieces. The problem was to get it down with as little damage and +as little danger as possible. One man could do it, Carlton thought, but +not without considerable risk of a broken head at least. If he could but +make sure of the whole wall falling in the one outward direction! He +revolved about it, mentally and on his feet, till he became angry with +himself for the loss of time, ceased to speculate, and went to work in +desperation. He would trust to luck; he despised himself for having +studied a risk so small. He had done so out of no absurd consideration +for his own skin, but entirely from the depth and strength of his +artistic impulse to do a thing properly or not at all. Even now he had +to prepare the ground: he had to clear the chancel enough to give +himself free play. + +Then he found a scaffolding-pole which had not been used, and tilted at +a tree for practice. The pole was unmanageable from its length. He sawed +it shorter. It was still too unwieldy to use amid the _débris_. He +shortened it until he had a battering-ram some eighteen feet long. But +all these preliminaries had taken unimagined hours, and again Carlton +felt sick with hunger before he thought of food, and unequal to further +effort until he had some. So he turned a breaking but reluctant back +upon the church, and went indoors; remembering everything on the way, +and loathing himself afresh: at his work he was beginning to forget! + +Thus far this outcast had subsisted chiefly on eggs; he beat up a couple +now, and tossed the stuff off with a little wine and water. Then he fell +upon a box of biscuits, but threw the dog as many as he munched himself, +striding up and down the while, and for all his fatigue. The room was +the one in which he had studied his own physiognomy. It might have been +any other. He had no eyes for himself to-day, and not many thoughts, +for, in the midst of his contrition for forgetting, he had forgotten +again. His mind had escaped to the chancel; the flesh followed in a few +minutes, having eaten and rested on its legs. + +The dog bounded ahead, and presently announced an intruder at the top of +its voice. Carlton quickened his pace, frowning at the thought of +interruption; he was on the spot before curiosity had tempered his +annoyance; and there among the ruins stood Sir Wilton Gleed, not +frowning at all, but forcing a smile behind his cigar. + +"How long is this tomfoolery to go on?" said he. + +Carlton stood looking at him for some seconds; then he picked up his +pole without replying. "You'd better stand to one side," was all he +said. "Kennel up, Glen!" + +"Going to do something desperate?" + +"The further you get away from me the safer you'll be." + +But he did not look round as he spoke, and Sir Wilton gripped his stick +without occasion. Carlton's blood was boiling none the less. The enemy +had surprised him at his worst. He was, for the first time, attempting +single-handed the work of several men; and he might be going about it in +a very ridiculous way. He could not tell till he tried; and it was one +thing to experiment in private, but quite another thing to court open +discomfiture of the very nature which would most delight the looker-on. +And the man was worn out with hard and unaccustomed labour, dyspeptic +from evil feeding, nervous and irritable from both causes combined. Sir +Wilton Gleed could hardly have chosen a worse moment for renewing the +duel. + +In Carlton the longing to do something violent suddenly outweighed his +desire to raze the east end of the church. He poised his pole and fixed +both eyes on the one remaining mullion of the east window. If the +mullion went, he still thought that the whole fabric should collapse, +forgetting the inherent independence of arches; and his mind dwelt +wistfully on the effect of the crash upon Sir Wilton Gleed. But his aim +was not the less accurate, nor did his anxiety hinder him from utilising +every muscle in his body at the ideal moment. The end of the ram smote +the mullion fairly and powerfully, where it was already cracked. The +mullion flew asunder; a quatrefoil shifted a little, robbed of its +support. The whole wall seemed to shudder; but that was all. + +"You remind me of Don Quixote," said Sir Wilton's voice. + +Carlton spun round. The pole trailed behind him from his right hand. He +took fresh hold of it, lower down, and there was no mistaking his look. + +"You go about your business," said he, fiercely. + +"I've come about it," was the bland reply. "I'm not trespassing either; +don't put yourself in the wrong. Remember your own advice; and let's +have a civil answer to a civil question. My good friend, what do you +think you're trying to do?" + +The artificial geniality of address, the settled malice underneath, the +tone that people take with a wilful child, all galled and goaded the +tired man beyond endurance. + +"You had better go," he said. + +"Do you really propose to rebuild the church with your own ten fingers?" +inquired Sir Wilton, not to be daunted by a threat. + +"You proposed it. I mean to do it." + +Sir Wilton shook his head with a venomous smile. "Oh, no, you don't! You +mean to pretend to try. You mean to pose." + +Carlton flung the pole from him, and strode forward, swinging open +hands. + +"I'm not going to talk to you," he said, "and you sha'n't make me strike +you; but if you don't go out you'll be put out, Sir Wilton." + +Gleed smiled again. His collar was seized. He smiled no more, but lashed +out with his stick. The stick was wrenched away from him. It whistled in +the air. And Robert Carlton had his enemy at his mercy, still held by +the collar, in the place where he had preached goodwill to men. For he +was much the taller of the two and an old athlete, whereas the other was +only an elderly sportsman. Carlton could have whipped him like a little +dog. He did almost worse: released him without a cut, and handed him his +stick without a word. + +And at that moment there came the crash that would have saved this +collision a few seconds before. Both men turned, rubbing their eyes; a +cloud of yellow dust had filled them as it filled the chancel. The cloud +dispersed, and wall and window were gone from sill to gable; what +remained was nowhere higher than a man could reach. + +"Now leave me in peace," said Carlton, "for I shall have my hands full; +and don't trouble to come again, because I sha'n't listen to you. You've +had two chances. I promised to live away and only find the money and the +men; you wouldn't have it. I invited you to build the church yourself; +you wouldn't hear of that. No; you would force me to do my duty, having +tied my hands! You would take me at my word. I am taking you at yours. +I should try fresh ground, if I were you; meanwhile you could sue me +for assault." + +Gleed had fully intended doing so, but the scornful suggestion killed +the thought, and for once he had no last word. But his last look made +amends. + + + + +XII + +A FRESH DISCOVERY + + +His son was waiting for him at the gate. + +"The man's mad!" cried Sir Wilton with a harsh laugh. + +"What's he been doing? What was that row?" + +Sidney's manner with his father was subtly disrespectful; he seldom +addressed him by that name, enjoyed arguing with him (having the clearer +head), and argued in slang. Yet his tongue was as dexterous and +plausible as it was always smooth, and he was a difficult boy to convict +of a specific rudeness. + +"There's some method in his madness," was his comment on the father's +account of the work accomplished under his eyes. + +"But he says he's going to build it up again!" + +"I wonder if he will," speculated Sidney. + +"What--by himself?" + +"Yes." + +"Of course he won't. No man could. He's a lunatic." + +They were walking home. Sidney said nothing for some paces. Then he +asked an innocent question. It was a little way of his. + +"I suppose one man could finish one stone, though, father?" + +Sir Wilton conceded this. + +"And fix it in its place, shouldn't you say?" + +A gruffer concession. + +"Then I'm not sure that he couldn't do more than you think," said +Sidney. "The windows might stump him, and the roof would; but he could +do the rest." + +"Nonsense!" cried Sir Wilton. "You don't know what you're talking +about." + +"Of course I don't," admitted Sidney readily. "That was why I asked +about the one man and the one stone." + +Sir Wilton had not half his boy's brain. The cold-blooded little wretch +would boast that he could "score off the governor without his knowing +it." Sir Wilton's merit was his tenacity of purpose. + +"I tell you the man's mad," he reiterated; "and if he doesn't take care +I'll have him shut up." + +"A great idea!" cried Sidney. "But, I say, if that's so we oughtn't to +be too rough on him!" + +"In any case I'll have him out of this," quoth Sir Wilton through his +teeth; but his mind dwelt on the shutting-up notion: it really was "a +great idea." And Carlton himself had given him another: he just would +"take fresh ground." + +He sought it that evening by a painful path. Jasper Musk and Sir Wilton +Gleed were not friends; they had not spoken for years. Sir Wilton had +not been long in the parish before he discovered that Musk had "cheated" +him over the Flint House. The word was much too strong; but some little +advantage had no doubt been taken. The quarrel had lasted to the +present time; but Sir Wilton had often felt that Musk must hate the +common scourge even more bitterly than he did himself, and that he would +be a very valuable ally. He was a strong man and solid, the one powerful +peasant in the neighbourhood. Unfortunately, sciatica had bound him to +his chair from the very day of his daughter's funeral. It would have +been comparatively easy to accost the old fellow in the open, and to +disarm him with instantaneous expressions of sympathy and of +indignation. It was more difficult for the lord of the manor to knock at +the door of an enemy who was not a tenant--a door opening on the very +street, and a door that might be slammed in his face for all Long Stow +to see or hear. So Sir Wilton went after dinner, on a dark night; was +admitted without demur; and stayed till after eleven. + +Next day he went again; he was also seen at the village constable's; and +the village constable was seen at the Flint House; and Sir Wilton +happened to call once more while he was there. The afternoon was rich in +developments, and duly murmurous with theory, prophecy, speculation. The +schoolmaster was summoned from the school, the saddler from his bench: +it was the latter who fetched Tom Ivey from the room that he was adding +to his mother's cottage at Sir Wilton's expense. Meanwhile the village +whisper became loud talk; but its arrows, shot at a venture, flew wide +of any mark. For through all his dark disgrace, as now when the odium +attaching to him was gathering like snow on a rolling snowball; from the +night of the fire to this eighteenth day of August; there was one thing +of which Robert Carlton had never been suspected by those who had loved +or feared him for a year and a half. + +Naturally the excitement penetrated to the hall, where Sir Wilton kept +dinner waiting, but, very properly, did not refer to the unsavoury +subject at that meal. He was, however, in singularly high spirits, and +drank a vast amount of excellent champagne; yet his own wife left the +table in ignorance of what had happened. Now Lady Gleed was a very +particular person, a great stickler for restraint, her own being +something strenuous and exotic. She seldom spoke of ordinary things +above a whisper, and would have dealt with the village scandal in dumb +show if she could. To her daughter she had genuinely preferred never to +mention it at all. + +But Lydia Gleed--it should have been Languish--was a more modern type. +She was frankly interested in the affair. It had given quite a zest to +what would otherwise have been an insufferably dull month for Lydia. The +girl had the makings of a perfect woman of society, and yet the end of +her second season found her still an unknown distance from the first +step to the realisation of that ideal. Proposals she had received, but +none such as an heiress of her calibre was entitled to expect. She had +actually been engaged to an adventurer; but that had only retarded +matters. + +There may have been purer causes. Feeble and inanimate in her every-day +life, and constitutionally bored by the familiar, Miss Gleed kept her +best side for those whom she knew least; could chatter to +acquaintances, the newer the better; was in her element at parties, and +out of it at home. Even in her element, however, Lydia never forgot to +conceal as much of her appreciation as possible, and would dance +angelically with the corners of her mouth turned down, and take like +medicine the wine which really did make glad her heart. This August she +was feeling particularly _blasée_ and dissatisfied; and the romantic +downfall of the rector--whose sermons had kept her awake--was a French +novel without the trouble of reading it or the risk of confiscation. +To-night, therefore, it was Lydia who invited Gwynneth to play, and +pressed the invitation with a compliment; it was her commoner practice +to snub the much younger girl. And it was Lydia who drew her chair close +to that of Lady Gleed, and began the whispering, to which Gwynneth was +made to shut her ears with all ten fingers. Yet for once Lady Gleed was +frankly interested herself. + +"But what _has_ he done?" + +The music had stopped. They had not noticed it. The ungrown girl was +standing in the middle of the room. She was dressed in white, and her +face looked as white in the candle-light, but her eyes and hair the +darker and more brilliant by contrast. And the eyes were great with a +pity and a pain which were at least not less than the natural curiosity +of a healthy child. + +"Mind your own business," said Lydia, bluntly. + +But even as she spoke the door opened. + +"What's this? What's this?" cried Sir Wilton, who was beaming, and +good-naturedly concerned to see the tears starting to his brother's +child's eyes. "Whose business have you been minding, little woman?" + +"It was about Mr. Carlton," the child said with a sob. "I hear everybody +saying nothing's bad enough for him--nothing--and I thought he was so +good! I only asked what he had done. I won't again. Please--please let +me go!" + +"In an instant," said Sir Wilton, detaining her with familiarity. "You +mustn't be a little goose." + +"Let her go, Wilton," whispered his wife. + +"Not till I've told her what Mr. Carlton has done!" + +And Sir Wilton Gleed beamed more than ever upon the consternation of his +ladies. + +"But, Wilton----" + +Lady Gleed had risen, and was even forgetting to whisper. Lydia merely +looked unusually wide-awake, and prettier for once than the child under +the chandelier, who was terribly disfigured by her embarrassment and +distress. + +"If you want to know what Mr. Carlton has done," said Sir Wilton to his +niece, "it was he who set fire to the church!" + + + + +XIII + +DEVICES OF A CASTAWAY + + +Left in peace, Carlton threw himself into his task with redoubled +spirit, and presently forgot the existence of Sir Wilton Gleed. He had +just three hours before dark. In this time he succeeded in pulling the +rest of the east wall to pieces, even to the loosened plinth, and was +adding the good stones to his stack when night fell. It was a night not +to be forgotten in the history of Robert Carlton's case. Nothing +happened. But he had no proper food in the house, and he began to feel +really ill for the want of it. Eggs and bacon he had, but the lighting +of the fire fatigued him more than anything he had done all day, and he +fell asleep in the kitchen, and the bacon went brittle, and his attempt +at bread was become an unmasticable fossil. A very little whisky, from a +bottle that had been open for months, did him more good, and enabled him +to face the food problem in earnest before he went to bed. It was a very +serious problem indeed. Health and strength, success or failure, +continued vigour or a swift collapse, all hinged upon the inglorious +question, which engrossed till near midnight one of the plainest livers +on earth, as his labours had absorbed him since dawn. He had to reckon +with his enemies in the matter. He had not the slightest hope of +obtaining supplies in the village. But at daylight he walked some miles +to see a farmer who had sometimes trudged as many to hear him preach; +and the farmer gave him breakfast with a surly pity, which Carlton +suffered, as he accepted the meal, for his hard work's sake. + +He had explained that he came on business, and after breakfast the +farmer asked him, not without suspicion, what his business was. + +"Do you kill your own sheep?" inquired Mr. Carlton. + +"Only for ourselves." + +"When do you kill?" + +"Let's see. Friday, is it? Then we kill this mornin'." + +"May I wait and watch?" + +The other stared. + +"I want some mutton," Carlton explained. + +"But I don't keep a butcher's shop," growled the farmer. "Well, we'll +see what we can do; we may be able to let you have a bit of the +neck-end." + +"I should be very grateful for it. But I'm afraid I want more." + +"What more?" + +"A flock of sheep." + +He was willing to pay outside prices. So a bargain was struck; and the +sheep were in the glebe that night. Meanwhile he had seen one killed and +dressed, and was not the less thankful that he had neck-end chops enough +to last him that week. + +The stacking of the stones was finished early on the Friday afternoon, +and Carlton determined to take the rest of that day easily. So he set +himself to retrieve the lectern from the ruins, and did finally wheel it +to the rectory, on two barrows; the first broke under its weight. +Moreover, this had consumed the entire afternoon, as another would have +foreseen at a glance, and Carlton emerged as from a pool of ink. Since +he had made himself rather hot and black, however, he thought it a pity +not to clear a little more of the interior while the light lasted. It +must be done some day; but again the task was more formidable than it +appeared to dauntless eyes still aflame with vast endeavour. The firemen +had not spared the water when all was over, so the big bones of the roof +were not burnt through. Tie-beams and principal rafters, in particular, +lay whole and heavy, and immovable less from their weight than from the +inextricable tangle in which they had fallen. There was nothing but the +saw for these, and Carlton had already sawn the lectern from its grave. +He learnt to saw with his left hand that evening; and after all had very +little but his own personal condition to show for his labour: only the +nucleus of a wood-heap near the stack of stones, and a crooked, +blackened, brass thing in the dining-room. But then he had not intended +to do much that afternoon; he went indoors, and drew the water for his +bath with that consolation. + +Meat for the second time that day! Carlton began to feel a man. He paced +his study with the old rapid step; and he determined to order and +arrange his day's work so that the muscles should relieve each other in +gangs: varied exertions; that was the principle of all continuous +labour. You cannot sit down to rest when you are working hard; but you +can do something else. Carlton never rested till he went to bed. But +this evening he sat down at his desk. + +A sheet of sermon paper was ruled in six columns and a margin; the +columns were headed by the days of the week; down the margin the days +were divided into three periods, a short and two long; it was the +class-room chart of his school-days over again. In future he would rise +at five; four was too early. The short period before breakfast should be +daily devoted to work in the house. The place must be made and kept +habitably clean; that could be left partly to the wet days. Then there +was the kitchen work, the preparation of food for the day, baking two +days a week, the occasional slaughter of a sheep; and here Carlton +paused to grapple with the appalling problem presented by the hungriest +of living men and the smallest of slain sheep . . . Salt seemed the +solution . . . Salt mutton? . . . At any rate all carnal cares and +menial duties should be disposed of for the day as early as possible in +the early morning; not till then would he break his fast; and the real +day's work should begin as near eight o'clock as might be, but as often +as possible on the right side of the hour. Moreover, it should begin +with the lighter labour: scraping and repointing the uncondemned walls, +for example; that would take one man weeks or months; but it would not +tire him out at the beginning of the day. Then there was the preparation +of the stones; the careful scraping of those preserved; classification +as to size for the various courses; cutting and fitting of fresh +stones; the actual building with trowel and plummet. All this went under +one head, and was for the body of the day; a long spell broken by a good +meal and a determined rest. The day should finish, for many a day to +come, with a savage attack upon the chaos within the walls. A hand too +tired for skilled labour would still be fit for that. + +And as Robert Carlton reached this stage in the laying of his ingenious +plans, he leaned back in his chair, and stared at his dull reflection in +the diamond panes above his writing table, in a sudden horror of himself +and all his ways and works. He was actually happy--he! The reaction was +the same in kind as that which had come to him at the shed, in the joy +of touching hammer and chisel again, and which had driven him to the +hall next morning. But it was greater in degree: for then he had seen +how happy he might be; to-night he knew how happy he was. + +"But only in my work! Only in my work!" he cried, and fell upon his +knees to crave forgiveness from the Almighty for daring to enjoy the +consolation which He had ordained for him. + +The artist was dead in Carlton for that night. He rose a very miserable +sinner, every thought a whip for his poor spirit that had dared to come +to life without leave. He had committed deadly sin with deadliest +result; let him never forget it! He, God's servant----the morbid +rehearsal may be spared. But he did not spare himself. All the +aggravating circumstances were recalled, none that extenuated; all that +he had suffered he must needs suffer anew, slowly, deliberately, and in +due order; that he might not forget, that he might never forget again! +Now he was confessing to Musk, now to George Mellis; poor George, where +was he? Now they were breaking his windows, and now Tom Ivey was +refusing his hand. But at last he was before the bishop; that strong, +queer voice was croaking across the desk; and all at once the croak +ended, and the voice rang like a sovereign with words of refined gold. + +"Courage, brother! Pray without ceasing. Look forward, not back; do not +despair. Despair is the devil's best friend; better give way to deadly +sin than to deadlier despair!" + +And he prayed again; but not in the house. + +"For I will look forward," he said as he went. "But let me never again +forget!" + +There was neither wind nor moon. The sparrows were still, but not the +shrill little swifts. And somewhere a thrush was singing, clear and +mellow and certain as a bell; and once a bat's wing brushed the bowed +bare head of him who prayed not for forgiveness but for the peace of a +soul; for neither was it in the ruins that Robert Carlton knelt once +more. + + + + +XIV + +THE LAST RESORT + + +Carlton chose a fresh stone from the heap; he was going to begin all +over again. He got it in his arms, and he managed to stagger with it to +the front of the shed. The stone was at least two feet long, and its +other dimensions were about half that of the length; as Carlton set it +down, himself all but on the top of it, he trusted it was the largest +size in the heap. It was of a rich reddish yellow, roughly rectangular, +but lumpy as ill-made porridge, exactly as it had come from the quarry. +Carlton tilted it up against a smaller stone, smooth enough in parts, +but palpably untrue in its planes and angles. This was the stone that he +had been all day spoiling; it had been as big as the new one that +morning, when he had begun upon it with a view to the lower eleven-inch +courses; and now he had failed to make even a six-inch job of it. The +stone was so soft. It cut like cheese. But he was not going to spoil +another. + +So he rested a minute before beginning again, and he marshalled his +tools upon a barrow within reach of his hand. It was rather late on the +Saturday afternoon. In the morning he had felt disinclined for violent +exertion, but just equal to trying his hand at that stone-dressing which +would presently become his chief labour; and his hand had disappointed +him. It had the wrong kind of cunning: as amateurs will, Carlton had +picked up his fancy craft at the fancy end: gargoyles were his +specialty, and an even surface beyond him. + +"But I can learn," he had been saying all day; and most times the dog +had wagged his tail. + +Ten minutes ago his tone had changed. + +"I'll start afresh! I'll do one to-night! I won't be beaten!" + +And that time Glen had leapt up with his master, and lashed his shins +with his tail, as much as to say, "Beaten? Not you!" and had accompanied +him to the heap, and was pretending to rest with him now. But Carlton +was constitutionally impatient of conscious rest; and this afternoon +certain sounds, louder though less incessant than those of his constant +comrades, the bees and birds, informed him that the Boys' Friendly were +not too proud to use the far strip of glebe land which the rector had +levelled for them last year. The discovery made him glad. But it also +brought him to his feet within the minute that he had promised himself; +and the hammer rang swift blows on the cold-chisel as much to drown the +music of bat and ball as to clear the grosser irregularities from one +surface of the stone. + +This done (and this much he had done successfully enough before), hammer +and cold-chisel were thrown aside, and the marbling-hammer taken up, +because Tom Ivey had always used it to make the rough sufficiently +smooth. But it is a mongrel implement at best, being hammer and chisel +in one, with changeable bits like a brace, and yet with less of these +than of the pickaxe in its cross-bred composition. Like a pick you wield +it, yet lightly and with the one and only curve, or at a stroke you go +too deep. + +Chip, chip, chip went the sharp seven-eighths-of-an-inch bit; and off +curved the soft yellow flakes, to turn to powder as they fell. + +Chip, chip, chip along the top; and the keen bit left its mark each +time; and the finished row of these was like the key-board of a toy +piano. + +Chip, chip, chip, always from left to right, a tier below, and then the +tier below that. The toy piano is becoming a toy organ of many manuals; +and the hue of the keys is not that of the rough outer surface: as they +first see the light they are nearer the colour of cigar-ash. + +Chip, chip, chip--chip, chip, chip; but _swish_, _swish_, _swish_ is a +thought nearer the sound. So soft that stone, so sharp that bit, so +timorous and tentative the unpractised strokes of Robert Carlton! + +Every now and then he would stop, and anxiously apply a straight lath to +the spreading smoothness; but he was improving, and in the end the plane +was at least as true as it was smooth. The key-marks of the +marbling-hammer were not always parallel or of even length, and the rows +declined from left to right like the hand of a weak writer: "bad +batting," Tom Ivey would have called it, a "bat" being the mark in +question, and long, even bats, "straight along the stone," the mason's +ideal, as the inquisitive amateur had discovered the first day Ivey +worked for him. But knowledge and skill lie a gulf apart, and on the +whole Carlton felt encouraged. He had done but one side of four, but +the one was smooth enough to face the world as coursed rubble; let him +but get and keep his angles, and the other three would matter less. So +now he took the straight-edge, as the lath was called, and the bit of +black slate which Tom had also left behind him; and with these and the +mason's square a rectangular parallelogram with eleven-inch ends was +duly ruled on the satisfactory surface. Hammer and cold-chisel again. +Much use of the square, but no more play with the marbling-hammer. No +need to perfect the parts doomed to mortar and eternal night; rough +criss-cross work with a mason's axe is the thing for them; as Carlton +knew when he rather reluctantly applied himself to the mastery of that +implement, just as he was beginning to acquire some proficiency with the +other. The mason's axe was the most treacherous of them all. It was a +hand pickaxe with a point like a stiletto; a touch, and the steel lay +buried. But it was the right tool to use, and Carlton used it to the +best of his ability, stooping more and more over his work as the light +began to fail him. + +He was going to succeed at last! If only he had not lost so much time! +Then he might have mixed some mortar and laid the first stone of his own +cutting--the first stone of the new church! That would have been +something like a day's work; yet he was not dissatisfied with his +progress. Swish, swish, swish; he might have done much worse. He had +pulled down the bad walls--swish--and what was good of them--swish--he +had saved and there they were. He looked up, the perspiration standing +thick upon his white forehead, his eyes all eagerness and +determination. He stood upright to rest a moment in the mellow +light--happy again! Happy because he had not time to think of himself, +but only of what he was doing, and of what he felt certain he could do: +happy in his aching limbs and soaking flannels, and all that with a +happiness he was for once not destined to realise and to check. For, +even as he stood, Glen barked, and Carlton turned in time to see the +village constable tuck his cane under his arm while he stood still to +feel in his pockets. The man was in full uniform--a strange circumstance +in itself. + +"Good evening, Frost," said Mr. Carlton. + +"Evenin', sir." + +The constable was an imposing figure of a man, with a handsome stupid +face, and a stolid deliberation of word and deed which gave an +impression of artless but indefatigable vigilance. In reality the fellow +had few inferiors in the parish. + +"For me?" and Carlton held out his hand as the other produced a paper. + +"For you an' me," said the constable, winking as he kept the paper to +himself. And in an impressive voice he read out a warrant for the +apprehension of the Reverend Robert Carlton, Clerk in Holy Orders, on a +charge of unlawfully and maliciously setting fire to the parish church +of Long Stow, in the County of Suffolk, on the night of the 24th or the +morning of the 25th June, in the year of grace 1882; the warrant was +signed by two justices--Sir Wilton Gleed of Long Stow Hall, and Canon +Wilders of Lakenhall. + +"Like to see it for yourself?" inquired Frost. + +"No, thank you; that's quite enough for me. Well, upon my word!" + +And Carlton stood staring into space, a glitter in his eyes, a smile +upon his lips, incapable of unmixed indignation: really, Sir Wilton was +a better fighter than he had supposed. + +"You will have to come with me to Lakenhall," said the constable's +voice. + +Carlton realised the situation. + +"To-night?" + +"At once, sir, if _you_ please. They've sent a trap for us from +Lakenhall. That's waiting at the gate." + +The mason's axe was still in his hand, the unfinished stone at his feet. +Carlton looked wistfully from one to the other, and thence in appeal to +the officer of the law. + +"I say, Frost, is there any hurry for a quarter of an hour? I'd--I'd +give a sovereign to finish this stone!" + +Virtue blazed in the constable's face. + +"You don't bribe _me_, sir!" he cried. "I'm ashamed of you, I am, for +tryin' that on! No, Mr. Carlton, you've got to come straight away." + +"But surely I may change first?" + +"You'll have to be quick, and I'll have to come with you." + +"Is that necessary?" asked Carlton with some heat, as he flung his tools +under cover. + +"That's left to me, sir, and I don't trust no gentleman in his +dressing-room. My orders are to take you alive, Mr. Carlton." + +Carlton was upon him in two strides. + +"Very well," said he, "you shall; and you shall come upstairs and see +me change. But address another word to me at your peril!" + +A small crowd had collected at the gate; a Lakenhall policeman was +waiting in the trap. Carlton came down the drive with his long coat +flying and his head thrown back. Somehow he was allowed to depart +without a groan. + +On the way he never spoke, and something kept the constables from +speaking before him. They had a slow horse; it was nearly an hour before +Carlton saw the inside of a police-station for the first time in his +life. Here he was formally charged by a portly inspector with whom he +had some slight acquaintance; the charge concluded with the usual +warning that anything he said might be given in evidence against him. + +"I hear," said Carlton. "And now?" + +The inspector shrugged his personal regret. + +"I'm afraid there's only one thing for it now, sir." + +"The cells, eh?" + +"That's it, Mr. Carlton." + +"Till when?" + +"Monday morning, sir, the magistrates sit." + +"Lead the way, then," said Carlton. "I can spend my Sunday in gaol as +well as in my own rectory." + +His eye was stern but steady; he was filled with contempt, but without a +fear. He knew who was at the bottom of this charge, and had begun by +quite admiring the man's resource; but his admiration did not survive a +second thought. What a fool the fellow must be! No fool like an old +fool, said the proverb; and none so insanely reckless as your prudent +people, once they lose their head, thought Robert Carlton in his cell. +Of the charge itself he scarcely condescended to think at all; for to +his mind, the more innocent on that score for his guilt upon another, +the thing seemed more preposterous than it really was. He burn the +church! With what object, pray? And what did they suppose he had risked +his life for at the fire? Remorse, or show? He could have laughed; he +was unable to imagine a shred of evidence against himself. + +There was a Testament on the table, but he had brought his Bible in his +pocket; and by the gas-jet in its wire guard, that striped the walls +with lean shadows like the bars of some wild beast's cage, Robert +Carlton forgot his own sins, persecution and imprisonment, in those of +his hero St. Paul; and was in another world when the rattle of a key +brought him back to this. It was the fat inspector himself, with good +news on his face, and in his hand the card of Canon Wilders, Rector of +Lakenhall and chairman of the local bench. + +"He doesn't want to see me, does he?" said Carlton, in plain alarm. + +"If you've no objection to seeing him, sir." + +"But he was one of those who signed the warrant! Tell him I can't see +anybody. Thank him very much. Say that I appreciate his kindness, but +would prefer to be alone." + +In a few minutes the man returned. + +"That's a pity you won't see the canon, sir; he don't half like it. He +couldn't help signing the warrant, not in his position; that seem to me +to be the very reason why he come the minute he heard we had you here; +and it's my opinion he'd like to see you out of custody." + +"You mean on bail?" + +"Yes, sir." + +"Because I'm a clergyman, and it's a disgrace to the cloth!" + +This explanation was a sudden idea impulsively expressed; but the +inspector's face was its tacit confirmation. + +"Is he here still?" demanded the prisoner. + +"Yes, sir, he is." + +"You can say I've been taken on a false and abominable charge," cried +Carlton, "and I don't want my liberty till the falsehood's proved! But I +am equally obliged to Canon Wilders," he added with less scorn, "and you +will kindly tell him so with my compliments." + +But he paced his cell in a curious twitter for one who had entered it +without a qualm. In all his trouble this was the first word from a +clerical neighbour: to a man they had stood aloof from him in his shame. +His own movements were in part responsible: he had disappeared from +view. Nor had he expected or coveted their sympathy; yet, now that one +of them had come forward, Carlton was conscious of a wound he had not +felt before. There was Preston of Linkworth--but his wife would account +for him. There was Bosanquet of Bedingfield, and there were others. They +might have inquired at the infirmary (Preston had), but he had never +heard of it. As for Wilders, he was a worthy man of local mark, for whom +Carlton had preached upon occasion; one prosperous alike in worldly +welfare and in spiritual satisfaction; the last person to go into +disgrace; and yet, by reason of a certain officiousness of character, +the first to come forward as he had done. Carlton had no wish to be +ungracious or ungrateful, or to make a personal matter of the signing of +the warrant; but he could not face his fellows with this new charge +hanging over him, nor was he going free by the favour of living man. On +the other hand, he pondered more upon his brother clergymen that +Saturday night in gaol than in all these eight weeks past. And the sense +of mere social downfall, the dullest of his aches hitherto, became +suddenly acute, so that for that alone he wished they had not put him in +prison. But for all the rest he cared as little as before, and showed as +little interest in the pending event. + +His indifference quite troubled the inspector, who evinced a desire to +show the prisoner every possible consideration, and was an early visitor +next morning. + +"That ain't no business of mine, sir; but you'll be wanting to see a +solicitor during the day?" + +"Why so?" asked Carlton. + +"Well, sir, your case will come up to-morrow morning." + +"But what do I want with a solicitor?" + +"Why, sir, every pris--that is, accused----" + +The inspector boggled at the word, and stood confounded by the other's +density. + +"Oh, I see!" cried Carlton. "So you're thinking of my defence, are you? +Thanks very much, but I don't want a lawyer to defend me. I make your +side a present of the lawyers, Mr. Inspector; they'll want them all. +It's for them to prove me guilty, not for me to prove my innocence." + +"And do you really think we have no case against you?" inquired the +inspector, with a change of tone, for he happened to have charge of the +case himself. + +"I don't think about it," returned Carlton, with unaffected +indifference. "The thing's too preposterous to be worth a thought." + +"I'm glad you find it so," said the other, nettled; "let's hope you +won't change your mind. I only spoke for your own good; there's plenty +would blame me for speaking at all. I won't trouble you no more, sir. I +might have known I'd get no thanks, after the way you served Canon +Wilders last night. Defend yourself, and let's see you do it!" + +The door shut with a clang, and Carlton watched the vibrations in some +distress. He was sorry to hurt the feelings of his would-be friends, but +he needed no man's friendship in the present crisis. God would be his +friend; his faith in Him was as profound as his contempt of the false +charge hanging over himself. The latter, he felt convinced, must break +down as it deserved; but if not, then the meaning would be clear. It +would mean that he had not been punished sufficiently for what he had +done, and must accordingly be prepared to suffer something for that +which he had not done, but of which his sin had indubitably caused the +doing. And Robert Carlton was so prepared in his heart of hearts. Yet he +was unable to carry his pious fatalism to its logical conclusion, and to +abate his bitterness against the human instruments of a vengeance he was +willing to think Divine. + +On the contrary, he condescended at intervals of the day to give his +mind to the proceedings of the next; and he did recall one or two +circumstances which prejudice and malice might twist against him. To +consider these was to be instantly inspired with a conclusive reply on +every point; but Carlton was not sure whether the law would permit him +to reply at all. So in the afternoon he begged for newspapers, and his +request, though acceded to, was all over Lakenhall by nightfall. A +suspended clergyman who thought so little of his notorious sins that he +could ask for newspapers on a Sunday afternoon! The inference drawn by a +small community, greatly excited about the case, and unconsciously +anxious to believe the worst of one who was bad enough at best, will be +readily imagined. The whole town shook its head. + +Meanwhile the object of popular detestation was comparatively happy in +the exercise of his receptive powers. By good luck his bundle of +provincial newspapers contained that which can only be met with in a +local press: a verbatim report of the police-court proceedings in a +painful case of infinitesimal interest to the world at large. The +interest, however, was all-absorbing to Robert Carlton. The accused had +been represented by a solicitor. The solicitor had fought his case +tooth-and-nail. There had been certain "scenes in court"; all were +reported in the local paper, and no point involved was lost upon the +alert brain of the imprisoned clergyman. It was with difficulty that he +dismissed the subject from his mind when the church-bells rang once more +through the quiet country town. It happened, however, that the parish +church was quite near the police-court; and in the morning Carlton had +been enabled to follow the whole service, partly through knowing it by +heart, partly from the strains of hymn or psalm that reached him at due +intervals through the grated window: and ever since then he had been +looking forward to evensong. So now when first the bells ceased, and +then the voluntary, the prisoner presently rehearsed the exhortation (in +silence) on his feet, the general confession (half aloud) upon his +knees; then followed the psalms, also from memory, his lips moving, his +hands folded; then knelt again to pray the prayers. And his eyes were as +earnest, his attitude as reverent, and even certain gestures as +punctilious, as though he were back in his church that had been burnt, +instead of lying in gaol for burning it. + +The August evening came early to its close; a little while the new moon +glimmered in the cell; then the organ pealed the people out of church, +and a few steps passed that way, and a few voices floated in through the +bars, before all was quiet in the little old town. And Robert Carlton +thought no more that night upon his enemies, and took no further heed +for the morrow. + + + + +XV + +HIS OWN LAWYER + + +Canon Wilders was supported by Mr. Preston, of Linkworth, and by a +youthful justice whom Robert Carlton did not know by name, but who sat +like the graven image of Rhadamanthus, encased in the atrocious trousers +and the excruciating collar of the year 1882. + +Considering the romantic interest of the case, this was by no means "a +full bench"; there were, however, some conspicuous and deliberate +absentees, including Sir Wilton Gleed and Dr. Marigold. Carlton was less +surprised at his enemy's abstinence than at the position voluntarily +occupied by James Preston, an indolent cleric but genial gentleman, who +had been his friend. His surprise deepened when Preston nodded to him, +hastily enough, and with a change of colour, but yet in a way that +thrilled Carlton with a doubt as to whether he had altogether lost that +friend. He was in no such suspense concerning the stately chairman, who +very properly looked at the prisoner as though he had never seen him +before, and never addressed him without tuning his voice to the proper +pitch of distant disapproval. This was not a question of losing a +friend, but of having made an enemy of the most potent personage in the +court. + +The latter was densely crowded when the stout inspector opened the case, +but the familiar faces stood out in quick succession, and they were not +a few. In a doorway apart stood a Long Stow trio--the saddler, the +sexton, and Tom Ivey; all three were in their Sunday clothes, and more +or less visibly ill at ease; but it was only Ivey who reddened and +looked away when the prisoner caught his eye. As for Carlton, he became +so lost in sudden and absorbing speculation that it was some minutes +before he realised that the inspector had finished a bald brief +statement of his case, and that a witness was already in the box and +giving evidence. The witness, however, was only Frost, the village +constable, and his evidence merely that of the arrest on the Saturday at +Long Stow. Carlton nevertheless whipped out his pocket-book, and the +witness waited before standing down. + +"May I ask him two or three questions?" said the prisoner, addressing +himself with courtesy to the bench. + +"As many as you please," replied the chairman, "provided they are +relevant." + +Carlton bowed before turning to the witness. + +"How far were you responsible for the warrant on which you arrested me?" + +"Re-spon-si-ble!" exclaimed the chairman in separate syllables. "What do +you mean?" + +"I wish to ascertain exactly in what measure the witness has been +concerned in trumping up this charge against me." + +"That is not the language in which to inquire!" + +"Your worships may discover that it is exceedingly mild language, before +the case is over." + +"I shall not allow you to cross-examine witnesses unless you do so with +due respect to the bench." + +The clerk to the justices, who had examined the witness, was the means +of averting an immediate scene. + +"I think, your worship, that he wishes to know whether the witness laid +the information against him." + +"I thank you," said Carlton, an incredible twinkle in his eye, as he +again turned to the witness. "I do desire to ask you, with due respect +to the bench, whether you 'laid this information' against me, or whether +you did not?" + +"I did," said Frost. + +"Before whom did you 'lay' it?" + +"The magistrate." + +"What magistrate?" + +"Sir Wilton Gleed." + +"And when?" + +"Last Friday." + +"The date, please!" + +"That would be the 18th." + +"The 18th of August! And the church was burnt on the morning of the 25th +of June! How is it that it took you eight weeks all but two days to 'lay +your information' against me?" + +The witness looked confused; but the chairman was quick to interpose; he +had been waiting his opportunity. + +"That may or may not transpire in the evidence," said he; "it is in +either event an absolutely inadmissible question, and I should strongly +recommend you to employ a solicitor. If you like I will adjourn the +court for half-an-hour while you instruct one; but I will not have the +time of the court wasted by irrelevant and inadmissible questions such +as you seem inclined to put. If you have nothing better to ask the +witness I shall order him to stand down." + +"Let him stand down," returned the prisoner, indifferently. "I have done +with him." + +Robert Carlton had surprised himself. He had come into court with the +most admirable intentions that it was possible to entertain: he was to +have kept cool but humble, to have curbed his contempt of proceedings +conducted (if not instituted) in the best of good faith, and never for +an instant to have forgotten his guilt of sin in his innocence of crime. +In this spirit he had risen from his knees that morning, and with this +resolve he had left his cell and been ushered into court; but the very +atmosphere of the place had made the blood sing in his veins; and it +needed but the chairman's voice to make it boil. He had sinned, and +chosen to suffer for his sin: so no crime was too dastardly to lay at +his door. He was down, and deservedly down, so friends and acquaintances +alike must gather and conspire to trample him. Carlton's point of view +went round like a weathercock in the wind; flesh and blood flew to the +front, in despite of spirit; and all the man in him rebelled at man's +injustice, in despite of his prayers. + +So when the next witness was being sworn (it was his own sexton), and +James Preston whispered to Canon Wilders, the man who had preached for +both of them looked on grimly. + +"As you seem bent upon conducting your own case," said Wilders, leaning +back, "you may possibly prefer a chair at the table; if so, there is one +at your disposal." And he pointed into the well of the court. + +Carlton thanked him in the voice that all his will could not purge of +all its scorn; he was perfectly comfortable where he was. Then he looked +pointedly at Preston, and his face and tone softened together. "But I +shall not forget the suggestion," he said; and again his friend changed +colour. + +The decrepit hero of the overweening hallucination had hobbled into the +witness-box meanwhile. Carlton had not come in contact with him since +the morning before the fire, and he little thought that his last +conversation with the sexton was about to come up in evidence against +him. Yet such was the case. + +Old Busby had been responsible for the lighting of the church. He had +kept the paraffin and filled the lamps. But in the month of June the +lamps were rarely needed. They had not been lighted on the Sunday before +the fire. There would have been even less occasion for them--by one +minute--the following Sunday. And yet, on the Saturday morning, the +prisoner had ordered the witness to see that the lamps were full! + +So Busby deposed; and the point seemed of sinister significance. It took +the prisoner plainly by surprise: the circumstance had escaped his +memory. In a minute, however, he had recalled it in detail; and his +cross-examination, though provocative of some mirth, and curtailed in +consequence, was by no means ineffectual. + +"You remember when the lamps went out, through your neglect, in the +middle of even-song?" + +"I'm like to remember it. That was when I swallowed the frog." + +The court laughed, but not the prisoner, who was too much in earnest +even to smile. + +"I reminded you pretty often about the lamps after that?" + +"Ay, you were for ever at me about 'em." + +"Now, on the morning you mention, where was I when I told you to go and +fill the lamps?" + +The sexton thought. + +"In your study, sir." + +"And what were you doing there? Do you remember?" + +"I do that! I was telling you about the frog." + +This time the prisoner smiled himself. + +"And did I listen to you?" he demanded, a sudden change upon his face, +as though the act of smiling had put him in pain. + +"No, that you didn't," the old man grumbled; "you fared as though you +didn't hear." + +"So I told you to go away and fill your lamps," said Carlton, sadly, +"even though it was Midsummer Day! I have finished with the witness." + +He was as one who had brilliantly parried a deadly thrust, and yet +received a secret wound in the onset. He rested his head upon his hand +to hide his pain, and only raised it at the sound of James Preston's +voice putting the first question from the bench: + +"As sexton, did you keep the key of the church?" + +"In the old days I did, sir; but that's been open church ever since Mr. +Carlton come." + +"You mean that the church was open day and night?" + +"To be sure it was." + +"Thank you," said Preston hastily, as though glad to relapse into +silence. Carlton did not add to his embarrassment by a glance, but his +heart throbbed with gratitude for the goodwill he could no longer +question. + +"_Did_ you fill the lamps?" asked the chairman as the witness was +preparing to hobble from the box. + +"Yes, sir, I did." + +And, watching the chairman's face, Carlton was still more thankful to +have one friend upon the bench; for it seemed to him that the young +gentleman in the tall collar and the tight trousers was alone in +preserving a Rhadamanthine impartiality. + +What surprised him equally was the strength and the nature of the +evidence produced. In his complete innocence of the crime imputed to +him, he had been unable to conceive or to recall a single incriminating +circumstance not susceptible of an easy and immediate explanation. Yet +more than one arose during the afternoon, when first the saddler, and +afterwards Tom Ivey, went into the box to bear witness against him; and +more than once the explanation, so full and clear in his own mind, was +incapable of confirmation or admission in the form of evidence. The +more striking instances were afforded by Fuller, whose testimony, though +convincing enough, and not the less so for its real or apparent +reluctance, came as a complete surprise to the prisoner. It appeared +that the saddler had returned to the rectory on the fatal night, more +than an hour after his first visit and summary dismissal, in order to +have his "say," and "not let the reverend have it all his own way." The +midnight visitor had found a light in the study, but the door shut, and +only the dog within. He had not entered, but had waited about the drive, +till, seeing a light in the church, he had made up his mind that "the +reverend" was there, and had decided not to interrupt him. So the +saddler had gone home and to bed, and was fast asleep when the +church-bells sounded the alarm. + +"And what made you so sure that it was Mr. Carlton in the church with +the light?" inquired Mr. Preston. + +"Because I couldn't find him in the rectory." + +"But you did not go in?" + +"I knocked and called, but I only made the dog bark." + +The chairman leaned forward in his turn. + +"Was the barking loud?" he asked. "Loud enough to be heard all over the +house?" + +Carlton sprang to his feet. He had been accommodated with a chair, of +which he had quietly availed himself during the examination of this +witness, and the suddenness of his movement brought all eyes to his +face. It was quick with impatience and sarcastic disregard. + +"If you are labouring to prove that I was not at my house, but in the +church," he cried, "your worship may save himself the time and trouble. +I was in the church. I lit one of the lamps." + +This did not strike the prisoner as the sensational statement that it +was; he was therefore amazed at its effect upon the bench, where even +Rhadamanthus came to life, while James Preston opened eyes of horror, +and Wilders whispered to the clerk. + +"That," said the chairman, "is an extremely serious statement, and one +that you are surely ill-advised in making. It is not evidence, but it is +being taken down in writing, and may be given in evidence against you at +your trial. I should certainly advise you to refrain from further +statements of the kind." + +"I thought you wanted to get at the truth?" + +"So we do. But I have warned you. Have you any questions to ask the +witness?" + +"Not one; he is equally correct in his statements and his suppositions." + +Thomas Ivey was then sworn, amid the hush of deepening interest, and +gave his evidence in a manly, straightforward, level-headed fashion, +that added its own weight to what he said for good or ill; and his +testimony told both ways. He described the scene in the church on his +arrival; the character of the fire, and the attitude of Mr. Carlton; +both of which, he admitted (in answer to a question from the chairman), +had struck him as suspicious at the first glance. + +"But did you see him _do_ anything that you thought suspicious?" asked +the well-meaning Mr. Preston. + +"I did, sir." + +"What was that?" from the chairman. + +"He threw something into the flames. But I couldn't see what that was." + +"Did you afterwards find out?" + +"No, sir." + +Once more the prisoner attracted every eye. It was felt that he would +make another of his reckless and voluntary declarations. But this time +he was silent enough; and though the evidence now took a turn in his +favour, that silence left its mark. + +Everybody knew how the clergyman had risked his life, when it was too +late, to save the church. But the story had not yet been told as Mr. +Preston contrived to elicit it from the lips of Tom Ivey. The Rector of +Linkworth had been from home when the fire took place. There was nothing +unnatural in his desire for details, nor did he put an improper +question. The chairman, however, betrayed more than a little impatience, +while the junior justice, on the other hand, displayed excitement of +another kind, and actually put in his word at last. + +"Do you mean to say you let him throw the water single-handed," said he, +"while the rest of you stayed outside?" + +"There was no stopping him, sir," said Ivey. "He would have all the +danger to himself." + +"Then you could not see what use he made of the water?" suggested the +chairman, dryly. + +"No, sir," said Tom; "I could only see the steam." And his tone was +still more dry. + +Wilders looked at the clock as the examination concluded. The case had +not been taken till the afternoon; it was now nearly five. Wilders +beckoned and spoke to the inspector, subsequently addressing the +prisoner in his coldest tone. + +"I understand that this is the last witness to be called against you," +said he. "Do you propose to cross-examine him?" + +"I do." + +"And may I ask if you have any witnesses to call for your defence?" + +"I may have one." + +"Then it becomes my duty to adjourn the case." He whispered again to the +inspector, and at greater length with his colleagues, James Preston +appearing tenacious of some point upon which the chairman ultimately +gave way. "As the police have completed their case," continued Wilders, +"a remand of one day will be sufficient, and we shall simply adjourn +until to-morrow morning. But you may, if you like, apply for bail; +though the question, having due regard to the evidence which we have +heard, is one that would now require our grave consideration." + +"You may spare yourselves the trouble," said Carlton shortly. "I don't +want bail." + +And he went back to prison to lament his temper, but not to go through +the form of further prayer for patience and humility; for he felt that +these were beyond him in that public court, packed with prejudice from +door to door. + +"I told you what he'd say," grumbled Wilders in the retiring-room. + +"I don't blame him," said Mr. Preston. "My dear sir, he's innocent of +this!" + +"I shall form _my_ opinion to-morrow," returned the canon, with dignity. +"Meanwhile I confess to some curiosity as to whom he thinks of calling +as his witness." + +"The chappie shows us sport," quoth Rhadamanthus, "guilty or not guilty; +and I'm not giving odds either way." + + + + +XVI + +END OF THE DUEL + + +Rhadamanthus reappeared without a visible garment that he had worn the +day before. He came spurred and breeched from the saddle, with a +horseshoe pin in his snowy tie, a more human collar, and a keener front +for the proceedings withal. Carlton felt his eye upon him from the +first, and returned the compliment by taking a new interest in the +nameless youth; he had long read the minds of the other two; his fate +was in this young fellow's keeping. He had no time, however, for idle +speculation as to the result. Tom Ivey was back in the witness-box, and +the accused was invited to cross-examine without delay. + +Carlton soon showed that the interval had enabled him to profit by the +experience of the previous day. His questions were cunningly prepared. +He began with one not easy to put in an admissible form, yet he +succeeded in so putting it. + +"You have sworn," said he, "that your very first glimpse of me in the +burning church was sufficient to create a certain suspicion in your +mind. Did you mention this suspicion to anybody--that night?" + +"Not that night." + +"That month?" + +"Nor yet that month, sir." + +"And why?" + +"I didn't suspect you any more, sir." + +Carlton tried hard to suppress his satisfaction, as a sensation to which +he was no longer entitled. He had come back to this in the night; but it +was harder to abide by it during the day. He paused a little, in honest +effort to rid his mind and tone of any taint of triumph; but his +advantage had to be pursued. + +"May I ask when this suspicion perished?" + +"Before we had been five minutes together, trying to save the church!" + +"You are getting upon dangerous ground," said the chairman. "What the +witness thought, or when he ceased to think it, is not evidence." + +"Another point, then," said Carlton: "do you remember the appearance of +the lamps?" + +"Yes." + +"What was it?" + +"They were crooked." + +"Did you notice any paraffin spilt about?" + +"Yes, when my attention was called to it." + +"Where was this paraffin?" + +"On the pews that were catching fire." + +"And who called your attention to it?" + +"You did yourself, sir." + +"I did myself!" repeated Carlton, struggling with his tone. "That will +do for that. I am going back for a moment to those suspicions of yours. +Have you never mentioned them to a human being?" + +"Yes, sir, I have." + +"As things of the past?" + +"As things of the past." + +"When was it that you first spoke of them?" + +"Last Friday--the eighteenth, sir." + +"And did you then speak of your own accord, or were you questioned?" + +"I was questioned." + +"As the first man to reach the burning church?" + +"Yes, sir." + +"Take care!" cried Wilders. "That was a leading question." + +"It is the last," replied Carlton. "I have finished with the witness. I +would take this opportunity, however, of apologising to your worships +for the various errors and excesses which I have committed, and may +still commit, in my ignorance and inexperience of the law, and my +indignation at the charge. In this respect, and this alone, I crave the +indulgence of the bench, and beg leave to rectify one of my mistakes. I +spoke in haste when I said, yesterday, that I had no questions to ask +the witness Fuller. I desire, with your worships' permission, to have +that witness recalled." + +The chairman was rather sharp: subsequent evidence might make the recall +of witnesses a necessity, but the lost opportunities of counsel, or of +accused persons conducting their own defence, were an altogether +insufficient reason. However, the man was in court, and the application +would be allowed. + +"I appreciate the privilege," said Carlton, "and promise that it shall +not detain us many moments." + +He was becoming as fluent and adroit as a past practitioner; in the +pauses of the fight he felt ashamed of his facility, a haunting sense +that it was indecent in him to defend himself at all. Yet he was one +against many; and, in this matter, an innocent man. Fight he must, and +that with all the skill and spirit in his power. His liberty, his +self-respect; his one remaining chance, object, and desire in life; nay, +his very life itself was at stake with these. It was no time for +dwelling upon the past. The sin that he had committed was one thing; the +crime that he had not committed was another. It was his duty to be just +to himself. Yet this was how he treated himself, whenever he had time to +think! He resolved to give himself fairer play than he seemed likely to +receive at the hands of others; and his resolve declared itself in the +ringing voice that shocked not a few who heard it, having found him +guilty already in their hearts. + +"About that very story of the empty rectory and the light in the +church," he began, with Fuller--"about that perfectly true story," he +added, wilfully, "which you told us yesterday. Did you tell it to +anybody at the time?" + +"Only Tom Ivey." + +"Why only to him?" + +"He asked me to keep that to myself." + +"And did you?" + +"I did my best, sir, but that slipped out one day when I was talking +to----" + +"Never mind his or her name. You did your best to keep the matter to +yourself, but it slipped out one day in conversation. Now when did you +last tell that true story, not counting yesterday, as fully and +particularly as you told it here in court? Think. I want the exact date +of the very last occasion." + +"That was last Friday, sir--to-day's the 22nd--that would be the 18th of +August." + +"Last Friday, the 18th of August; a fatal day to me!" said Robert +Carlton. "Thank you. That is all I want from you." + +The justices put no question. The clerk did not re-examine. The witness +was ordered to stand down. Then followed a short but heavy silence, +pregnant with speculation as to the drift of all these questions and the +object of so much unexplained insistence upon a date. It meant +something. What could it mean? Carlton stood upright in the dock, calm, +confident, inscrutable; it seemed a great many moments before the +silence was broken by the formal tones of the clerk. + +"Do you call any witness for the defence?" he asked. + +Carlton dropped his eyes into the well of the court, and they fell upon +a pair that were fastened upon his face with the glitter of fixed +bayonets. + +"Yes," said he. "I wish you to call Sir Wilton Gleed." + +Quietly though distinctly spoken, the name clapped like thunder on the +court. Amazement fell on all alike, for the issue between these two had +been the common theme for days. Popular sympathy had rightly sided with +morality, and its champion had lost nothing by his tactful magnanimity +in refraining from sitting upon the bench; that he should be put in the +box instead, and by his shameless adversary, was an audacity as hard to +credit as to understand. There was a moment's hush, then a minute's +buzz, to which the justices themselves contributed. Wilders muttered +that the man was mad; his colleague on the right confessed himself +nonplussed; his colleague on the left dropped his shaven chin upon his +gold horseshoe, and his shoulders shook with joy. Meanwhile Sir Wilton +had forced a grin and found his voice. + +"You want me in the box, do you?" + +"I do." + +"Very well; you shall have me." + +And he was sworn, still grinning, with an odd mixture of malevolence and +deprecation for those who ran to read. "I meant to keep out of this," +the florid face said; "but now I'm in it--well, you'll see! It's the +fellow's own fault; his blood" etc., etc. But this was not what Sir +Wilton was saying in his heart. + +Carlton began at the beginning. + +"You are the patron of the living of Long Stow, are you not?" + +"You know I am." + +"I want the bench to have it from you; kindly answer my question." + +"I am the patron of the living of Long Stow," said Sir Wilton, with mock +resignation. + +"In the year 1880 did you, of your own free will and accord, present +that living to me?" + +"Yes, and I've repented it ever since!" + +There was a sympathetic murmur at the back of the court. It was +immediately checked. Every face was thrust forward, every ear strained, +every eye absorbed between the prisoner in the dock and the witness in +the box. It was no longer the uphill fight of one against many; it was +single combat between man and man, and the electricity of single combat +charged the air. + +"You have repented it more than ever of late?" asked Carlton in steady +tones. The skin upon his forehead seemed stretched with pain; the veins +showed blue and swollen; but the many judged him from his voice alone. + +"Naturally," sneered Sir Wilton. + +"So much so that you were resolved I should resign?" + +"I hoped you would have the decency to do so." + +"Did you come to the rectory on the fifth of this month, and tell me it +was my first duty to resign the living?" + +"I don't remember the date." + +"Was it the Saturday before Bank Holiday?" + +"I daresay. Yes, it must have been. I didn't expect to find you there. I +went to see the wreck and ruin of your home and church, not you." + +"But you did come, and you did see me, and you did tell me it was my +first duty to resign my living?" + +"Certainly I did." + +"Do you remember your words?" + +"Some of them." + +Carlton looked at his pocket-book--at a note made overnight. + +"Do you remember making use of the following expressions: 'Law or no +law, I'll have you out of this! I'll hound you out of it! I'll have you +torn in pieces if you stay'?" + +"I may have said something of the kind," said the witness, with assumed +indifference. + +"Did you, or did you not?" cried Carlton, slapping his hand on the rail +of the dock; the voice, the look, the gesture were familiar to many +present who had heard him preach; and thrilled them for all their new +knowledge of the preacher. + +"Really I can't recall my exact words. I rather fancied they were +stronger." + +Some one laughed at this, and the witness managed to recapture his grin; +but his demeanour was unconvincing. + +"I am not talking about their strength," said Carlton. "Will you swear +that you did _not_ say, 'I'll have you out of this! I'll hound you out +of it'?" + +"No, I will not." + +"I thank you," said Carlton; and his ringing voice fell at a word to the +pitch of perfect courtesy. He ticked off the note in his pocket-book, +and the court breathed again; but its worthy president did more: he had +forgotten his position for several minutes, and he hastened to reassert +it with the first observation that entered his head. + +"I don't see the point of this examination," said Canon Wilders. + +"You will presently." + +"If I don't I shall put a stop to it!" + +Carlton raised his eyes from his notes, but not to the bench; they were +only for the witness now. + +"Do you remember when and where we met again?" + +"You had the insolence to call at my house." + +"Was it on a Monday morning, the first after the Bank Holiday?" + +"I suppose it was." + +"I do not ask you to recall your exact words on that occasion. I simply +ask you to inform the bench whether I did, or did not, offer to resign +the living then and there--on a certain condition." + +"Yes; you did," said Sir Wilton, doggedly. He was very red in the face. + +Carlton could not resist a moment's enjoyment of his discomfiture: it +heightened the pleasure of letting him off. + +"And did you decline?" he said at length. + +"Stop a moment," said the chairman. "What was this condition, Sir +Wilton?" + +"Am I obliged to give it?" + +"Oh, if you think it inexpedient----" + +"I think it unnecessary," said the witness, emphatically. "I think it +has nothing whatever to do with the case." + +"In that case, Sir Wilton, we shall be only too happy not to press the +point." + +Carlton had a great mind to press it himself. He had invited his enemy +to build the church out of his own pocket. The invitation had been +declined. Would it also be denied? Carlton was curious to see; but he +overcame his curiosity. It would not strengthen his defence, and to mere +revenge he must not stoop. So one temptation was resisted, and one +advantage thrown away, even in the final phase of the long duel between +these good fighters. But the other saw the struggle, and felt as he had +done when Carlton had returned him his stick in the ruins of the church. + +"And did you decline?" repeated Carlton, in identically the same voice +as before. + +"I did." + +"Did I then point out to you that I was not only entitled, but might be +compelled, to keep my chancel, at any rate, 'in good and substantial +repair, restoring and rebuilding when necessary'? I quote the Act, your +worships, as I quoted it then. Do you remember, Sir Wilton?" + +"I do." + +"I made the point as plain as I have made it now?" + +"Yes." + +"And what did you say to that?" + +The sudden change in the style of the question was glossed over by the +single artifice which Robert Carlton permitted himself during the +conduct of his case: instead of ringing triumphant, his voice dropped as +though he feared the answer. Sir Wilton fell into the trap. + +"I said, 'If that's the law I'll see you keep it. Go and build your +church! Where there's a law there will be a penalty; go build your +church or I'll enforce it.'" + +"Which did you expect to enforce--the penalty or the law?" + +"I didn't mind which," declared the witness, after hesitation; and his +indifference was less successfully assumed than before. + +"Oh!" said Carlton; "so you didn't mind my building the church after +all?" + +Sir Wilton appealed wildly to the Bench. + +"Am I to be browbeaten and insulted, by a convicted libertine and evil +liver, without one word of protest or reproof?" + +The chairman coloured with confusion and indecision. + +"I am afraid that you must answer his question, Sir Wilton," said Mr. +Preston, mildly. + +"I share your opinion," said Rhadamanthus, in a tone that went further +than the words. + +The chairman threw up his chin with an air, and fixed the accused with +his sternest glance. + +"Pray what are you endeavouring to establish by this round-about and +impertinent examination?" + +"In plain language?" asked Robert Carlton. + +"The plainer the better." + +"Then I am endeavouring to establish--and I _will_ establish, either +here or at the assizes--the fact that that man there"--pointing to Sir +Wilton Gleed--"has tried by fair means and by foul to rob me of a +benefice which is still mine in more than name. And I will further +establish, either here or at the higher court, if you like to send me +there, the patent and the blatant fact that this very charge is the last +and the foulest means by which that man has attempted to get rid of me!" + +His clear voice thundered through the little court; his fine eye +flashed with as fine a scorn. But it was neither look nor tone that made +the silence when he ceased. It was the first unrestrained expression of +a personality incomparably stronger than any other there present; it was +the first just and unanimous--if unconscious--appreciation of that +personality in that place. There was a round clock that ticked many +times and noisily before the presiding magistrate broke the spell. + +"A-bom-in-able language!" cried he in the separate syllables of his most +important moments. "You deserve to answer for your words alone in the +other court of which you speak!" + +"I intend to prove them in this one," retorted Carlton, "if you give me +fair play." + +"Oh, by all means let him have fair play!" exclaimed the witness, in +high tones that trembled. "I can take care of myself; don't study _me_. +Let him say what he likes, and let those who know his character and mine +judge between him and me." + +Carlton looked at the quivering lip between the cropped whiskers, and +his jaws snapped on a smile as he returned to his pocket-book. But the +whole of his examination of Sir Wilton Gleed does not call for elaborate +report: its weakness and its strength will be recognised with equal +readiness. With a stronger spirit on the bench, or a weaker spirit in +the dock, or even a capable solicitor to prosecute for the police, much +of it had never been; as the play was cast it was the accused clergyman +who presided over that country court for the longest hour in his enemy's +life; nor, when he had won his ascendancy, did he use his power as +unsparingly as in the winning of it. The witness was allowed to come out +of the corner into which he had been driven before his appeal to the +bench; he had contradicted himself, and the contradiction was left to +tell its own tale without being pressed home. On the other hand, some +startling admissions were obtained in regard to the responsibility with +which the witness had finally sought to saddle the accused; he had bade +him build the church because he believed Carlton would find it an +impossible task; he recklessly admitted it, with a pale bravado that +imposed upon few people in court, and on but one upon the bench. + +"You were still determined to get rid of me," said Carlton, "one way or +another?" + +"I was." + +"And this struck you as another way?" + +"It did--at the moment." + +"Ah," murmured the chairman, "we are all subject to the impulse of the +moment!" + +Carlton put this point aside. + +"And why did you think that I should find it an impossible task to +rebuild the church?" + +"I thought you would find a difficulty in getting local men to work for +you." + +"Your grounds for thinking that?" + +"I considered your reputation in the district." + +"Any other reason?" + +"One or two builders and masons had spoken to me on the subject." + +Carlton found a new place in his pocket-book, and read out a list of +nine names. + +"Were any of these local men among the number?" + +"Yes." + +"All of them?" + +"Ye--es." + +"What! You admit having discussed me, during the present month, and +since I first spoke to you about rebuilding the church, with these nine +local builders or stonemasons?" + +"I don't deny it," said Sir Wilton, stoutly. + +"And do you know of any builder or stonemason in the neighbourhood with +whom you have _not_ discussed me?" + +"Can't say I do." + +"That's quite enough," said Carlton. "I shall not ask you what you said. +I do not purpose calling these men, at this court; time enough for that +at the assizes." And without further comment he took the witness through +one or two details of their last interview in the ruins; by no means +all; indeed, the date was the point most insisted upon. + +"And so the very next day was last Friday, the 18th of August?" +concluded Carlton with apparent levity. + +The witness refused to answer, appealed to the bench, and secured +another reprimand for the accused. + +"I harp upon that date," said Carlton, "because, as I have already +remarked, it seems to have been a fatal date for me. It has arisen so +many times in the course of this case! This, however, is not the precise +moment for enumerating those occasions; let us first finish with each +other. Did you, Sir Wilton Gleed, on the eighteenth day of this present +month, have separate or collective conversation with the witnesses +Busby, Fuller, and Ivey?" + +"Yes, I did," said Gleed, hot, white, and glaring. + +"Separate or collective? Did you speak to them one at a time or all +together?" + +"Both, if you like!" cried the witness, wildly. "I can't remember. +Better say both!" + +"You interviewed these witnesses, separately and collectively, on the +very day that the other witness, Frost, laid an information against me +before yourself as Justice of the Peace?" + +"I said it was that day. You ask the same question again and again!" + +The man was fuming, trembling, near to tears or curses of mortification +and blind rage. + +"I have but two more questions to ask you, and I am done," rejoined +Carlton. "Did the witness Fuller tell you of the light in the church, +and the witness Ivey of what _he_ saw later on, during these +conversations of the fatal eighteenth?" + +"They did." + +"And was this the first you had heard of those experiences?" + +"It was." + +"That is my last question, Sir Wilton Gleed." + +The justices put none. Gleed glared at them as he left the box. + +"I think," said he, "that this is the most scandalous incident--most +disgraceful thing I ever heard of in my life!" + +"I quite agree with you," whispered Wilders. + +"And I also," said Mr. Preston, in a different tone. + +But no word fell from Rhadamanthus. His small eyes did not leave +Carlton's face for above one second in the sixty. But their expression +was inscrutable. + +"May I now claim the indulgence of the court for a very few minutes?" +asked the clergyman in the dock. + +The clergymen on the bench looked at the clock and at each other. It was +already past the hour for luncheon. + +"Better go on," urged Preston, "and get it over." + +"If you mean what you say," said Wilders to the accused, "we will hear +you now; if you proceed to treat us to a mere display of words, I shall +adjourn the court. Meanwhile it is my duty to remind you that whatever +you say will be taken down in writing, and may be given in evidence +against you upon your trial." + +"In the event of my committal," returned Robert Carlton, "I am prepared +to stand or fall by every word that I have uttered or may utter now; and +I shall not detain you long. I am well aware how I have trespassed +already upon the time of this court, but I will waste none upon vain or +insincere apology. I came here to answer to a very terrible charge; it +was and it is my duty to do so as fully and as emphatically as I +possibly can. Yet I have little to add to the evidence before you; a +comment or two, and I am done. + +"It seems to me that the witnesses called by the police have between +them produced but three points of any weight against me, or worthy of +the serious consideration of this or any other court of law. I will +take these three points in their proper order, and will give my answer +to each in the fewest possible words in which I can express my meaning +to your worships. + +"Arthur Busby has sworn that on the morning before the fire I ordered +him to fill the lamps with paraffin, though it was extremely unlikely +that any artificial light would be required in church next evening. But +on the man's own showing he was wearying and distressing me beyond +measure at the time--a more terrible time than this!" cried Carlton from +his heart; and was brought to pause, not for effect (though the effect +was marked) but by the very suddenness of his emotion. "And on the man's +own showing," he continued in a lower key, "he had once omitted this +important duty of filling the lamps, and I was 'for ever at him' on the +subject. What more natural than to tell him to go away and fill his +lamps, as one had told him a dozen times before, but this time without +thinking and simply to get rid of the man? On the other hand, if the +paraffin had been wanted for the felonious purpose suggested, could +anything be more incriminating and incredible than the suggested method +of obtaining it? I submit these two questions, with the highly important +point involved, to the consideration of the bench; and I do so with some +confidence. + +"The next point, I confess, is more difficult to dismiss. I shall not +attempt to dismiss it from any mind in court. I shall simply leave it to +the consideration of your worships as men of the world and students of +the human heart. It is near midnight. I am not to be found at the +rectory, and a light is seen in the church. I admit that I was in the +church, and that I lighted one of the lamps. + +"Here I am forced to allude to another matter: a matter in which, God +knows, I have never denied my guilt, as I do deny my guilt of the crime +of arson: a matter in which I have never sought to defend myself, as I +have been compelled to do in this court for a very long day and a half. + +"Consider my case on the night of the fire. I will not dwell upon it; it +is surely within the knowledge or the imagination of most present. . . . +There was my church. I had held my last service there. I felt that I +could never hold another. And, whatever I had been, I loved my church! +You upon the bench . . . you Members of Christ's Church . . . I ask not +for your sympathy but for your insight. Can you think that I went into +the church I loved, wilfully and deliberately to burn it to the ground? +Can you not conceive my going there, in the dead of that dreadful night, +to look my last upon it--to bid my church good-bye?" + +His emotion was piteous, but never pitiful. It shook nothing but his +voice. It neither bowed his head nor dimmed the brilliance of an eye +turned full upon his fellows. And so he stood silent for a space, and +none other spoke; then through Tom Ivey's evidence with a lighter touch. +It was evidence in his favour: he scorned to enlarge upon it. The one +adverse point was lightly--perhaps too lightly--dismissed. He had been +seen to throw something into the flames. Did the prosecution suggest +that he had thrown fresh fuel? Other points, already made in +cross-examination, were left to take care of themselves: the paraffin on +the pews, to which he himself had called Ivey's attention, was one. +Indeed, in the whole course of the prisoner's speech, it was never +admitted that the church had been purposely set fire to at all; the +suggestion had been made in the heat of cross-examination, but it was +not made again. It even seemed as though Robert Carlton had grown either +certain, or careless, of the result of the inquiry--and the impression +was not removed by the close of his remarks. + +"And now," he said, "I have to deal with the evidence of Sir Wilton +Gleed. I shall endeavour to deal with that evidence as dispassionately +as I can, and as summarily as it deserves. Sir Wilton Gleed is a man +with a genuine grievance, which you all know and I have never denied. +But I do not propose to enter into the matter at issue between Sir +Wilton Gleed and myself, or to suggest for an instant that he was +anything but right in determining to rid his village of one who had +brought himself to bitter but merited sorrow and disgrace. I am not here +to defend my sins; nor have I defended them elsewhere; nor have I shrunk +from suffering from anything I have done. But here have I been brought +to book for something I never did--taken prisoner and brought to you on +a criminal charge and no other. And I tell you that this criminal charge +is as false as another was true, but for which this one would never have +been made. But enough of mere assertion; let me crystallise some of the +evidence that has come before you. + +"The witnesses swear to three or four suspicious circumstances between +them. Yet they seem scarcely to have opened their lips--nobody seems to +have heard of those circumstances--until Friday of last week. On Friday +last--my fatal date--these witnesses open their mouths with one accord. +And, curiously enough, it is in Sir Wilton Gleed that they are one and +all led to confide! + +"But there is a still more curious and informing coincidence. Sir Wilton +Gleed and I have several very stormy interviews, in which he tries, +first by one artifice, then by another--all frankly admitted in his +evidence--to drive me from a position which I have finally refused to +resign. My refusal may be just as obdurate and indefensible as you are +pleased to think it; that is not the point at all. The point is this +contest of tenacity on his part and on mine, culminating in a final +interview between us on the eve of the day upon which all these +witnesses break their more or less complete silence concerning my +movements on the night of the fire, and break it in the ear of Sir +Wilton Gleed! + +"I invite you to consider the obvious inference. My enemy has tried +every other means of dislodging me. He has threatened and insulted me. +He has set every builder and mason in the neighbourhood against me. He +has deprived me--as he thinks--of the means of building my church, and +then he turns round and tells me to build it or take the consequences! I +make a beginning in spite of him; he has to think of some new method of +expulsion; so, with infinite ingenuity, he trumps up this present charge +against me." + +Wilders opened his lips, but the prisoner's hand flew upward in +arresting gesture. + +"With infinite ingenuity, your worship, but not necessarily in bad +faith. I have never yet questioned the _bona fides_ of Sir Wilton Gleed; +nor do I now. On the contrary, I am convinced that he honestly and +sincerely believes me capable of any crime in the calendar; but my +capability, again, is not the point; and belief and proof are very +different things. If your worships hold that this horrible charge has +been proved against me--proved sufficiently for this court--then send me +to a higher one as your duty dictates. But if you think that hatred and +prejudice, however deserved, have played the part of genuine and +spontaneous suspicion; that facts have been distorted to fit a +preconception, and the wish, however unconsciously, allowed to father +the thought; that, in short, an honest man has been quite honestly +blinded and misled by very loathing of me and all my doings; then I +implore your worships to dismiss this charge against me--and let me get +back to the work I left to meet it!" + +The last words came as an after-thought, but they came from the heart, +and as no anti-climax to those who knew the nature of the work named. In +absolute silence Carlton availed himself of the chair in the dock, +dropping all but out of sight, and bending double, his heart throbbing, +his head singing, his hot hands pressed across his eyes. It was the +sudden hum of talk which told him that the justices had retired; days +passed in his brain before a hush as sudden announced their return. +Meanwhile there were the scraps of conversation that found their way to +his ears. Hearing all, he could distinguish little; but now and then a +familiar phrase leapt home, as familiar faces declare themselves afar. +"The gift of the gab" was one, and "He'd argue black was white" another. +But some one said, "Give the devil his due"; and with that single crumb +of justice Robert Carlton had to crouch content until his present fate +was sealed. + +But the hush came at last, and sank to profound silence as the +magistrates took their seats--Rhadamanthus keen and grim--the clergymen +plainly angry with each other. Preston's honest face hid no more of his +feelings than heretofore, but the chairman cloaked annoyance with the +fraction of a smile, and only his voice betrayed him as he addressed the +prisoner. + +"After a long and patient hearing," said Wilders, "the bench find this a +case of ve-ry con-sid-er-able doubt in-deed. But, upon the whole, and +taking all the cir-cum-stances into care-ful con-sid-er-ation, they are +of o-pin-i-on that there is not enough ev-i-dence to justify them in +sending the case to the assizes. The charge is therefore dis-missed. I +should like, however, to add one word in respect to a witness, who +might, had he been a less chiv-al-rous opponent--a less mag-nan-i-mous +man--have sat here upon the bench instead of entering the witness-box to +suffer the remorseless cross-questioning of a personal enemy. I could +wish, indeed"--with covert meaning--"that Sir Wilton Gleed had seen fit +to take his proper place in this court! I need hardly say that he quits +it without stain or slur, of any sort or kind, upon his character; and +that he does so with the heartfelt sympathy of one, at all events, of +his colleagues upon the bench." + +Rhadamanthus turned his back to hide his face, but James Preston did not +rise till he had finished as he begun. He caught Carlton's eye, and +nodded once more to him, but this time unblushingly and with much +vigour. There was a little hissing as the prisoner vanished, a free man; +and some hooting in the street, in which he reappeared, contrary to +expectation, within a minute. It was like his brazen face, so they told +him as he strode through the little crowd as one who neither heard nor +saw a man of them. But no hand was lifted, no missile thrown, for the +deaf ear is no earnest of physical passivity, and it was notorious that +this man could take care of himself with his hands as well as with his +tongue. Such a very deaf ear did he turn, however, that a flyman had to +follow him to the outskirts of the town, and shout till he was hoarse, +before Robert Carlton paid more heed to him than to his revilers. And +all the time it was a decent man from Linkworth, only begging him to +jump in, as the clergyman at last discovered with instant suspicions of +the truth. + +"Who sent you after me?" + +"Mr. Preston, sir; leastways, he told me to be here all day, in case you +wanted me." + +"God bless Jim Preston!" muttered Carlton, and jumped into the fly +forthwith. + +But presently they were at some cross-roads. And the driver drew rein +with a troubled face. He wanted to go a long way round, but his reasons +were wild and unintelligible. Carlton, however, divined the real reason, +and whose it was, and he himself pulled the other rein. + +"No, no," said he; "drive me through my own village! They drove me +through it on Saturday; take me back as they took me away. But it was +like Mr. Preston to think of it. Tell him I said so, and that I'll never +forget his kindness as long as I live!" + +It was the red-gold heart of the August afternoon, and the shrill little +choir of the ruined church sang a welcome to the friend who had never +sinned against them; and Glen came bounding and barking defiance at the +outside world; and the unfinished stone, the first stone that Robert +Carlton was to dress and to lay with his own hands, it was just as they +had made him leave it on the Saturday evening. But the story of his +return was still being bandied from door to door, when a new sound came +with the song of birds from the ruin in the trees, and a new ending was +given to the story. + +The sound was the swish, swish, swish of the mason's axe, with the +stiletto's point, through sandstone as soft as cheese. + + + + +XVII + +THREE WEEKS AND A NIGHT + + +Carlton completed that historic stone within another hour, and actually +laid it that night. Jaded in body and brain, with every nerve exhausted, +he must needs do this or drop in the attempt. It was the first stone in +the new church. It was finished at last. He touched it here and there +with the straight-edge. He felt its angles with the square. This stone +would do. He whipped out his foot-rule and measured carefully. The stone +was eleven inches all ways but one. It was the exact depth for the lower +courses, but it was seventeen inches long. A seventeen-inch gap must +therefore be found or made for it. And Carlton went prowling round the +blackened walls, with his foot-rule and his dog, before resting from his +labours. The job should be finished this time, the first stone should be +laid that night. + +A place was found in the base of the east end, over a stable portion of +the plinth; the situation was of sacred omen, and Carlton cleared away +the old mortar with immense energy. Then his difficulties began. There +was new mortar to make; this was an altogether new undertaking. It had +been Tom Ivey's affair. Carlton had tried his hand at most branches of +the masonic art, but he had never attempted to mix the mortar. He +barely knew how to begin. There was a heap of sand at one end of the +shed, and a load of lime under cover. These were the ingredients. That +he knew; but it was not enough. + +Suddenly, he remembered his _Building Construction_ in two volumes; the +bulkier of the two treated of materials. In a minute the book was found, +deep in dust, and carried to the shed for consultation on the spot. And +there was only too much about mortar; the subject monopolised a column +of the index; its vastness oppressed Carlton, who nevertheless attacked +it then and there. A great disappointment was in store: so he was to +begin by "slaking" his lime. He had forgotten that step; now he had a +dim recollection of the process. According to the book it took two or +three hours at least; even this minimum presupposed that the lime was a +"fat lime," whatever that might be. Carlton, lacking all means of +deciding such a point, gave his inclination the benefit of the doubt, +and left his shovelful of quicklime under water and sand for exactly two +hours and a half. + +This check came in the nick of time. It reminded Robert Carlton of the +flesh, whose needs he had once more neglected, though now he would have +cooked and eaten if only to have killed an hour. He lit a fire. He put +on the kettle. He toasted some very stale bread; he boiled an egg warm +from the hen-house, then another; and having eaten he rested while he +must. The sun set; the new moon whitened in the sky, but as yet could +not light a man at his work when it was really dark. And that was why +the lantern stood so long upon the ground outside the shed, in a whirl +of tiny wings, while the mortar was being mixed at last. + +But the lantern stood longer still upon a salient fragment of the razed +east end, while the trowel rang, and the mortar flopped, until all lay +smooth and glistening in its light. Then Carlton knelt, and lifted his +handiwork with bursting muscles; and the mortar spattered his waistcoat +as the great stone dropped into place. A wrench, a push, a tap with the +trowel; a finishing touch with its point, a word of thanksgiving before +he rose; and Robert Carlton had laid the first stone of a new church, +and of his own new life. + +Next morning he began systematic work, rising at five, lighting his +fire, making his bed, sweeping, dusting, pumping, rinsing, all before +the day's work started after breakfast, with the gentler arts of +scraping and re-pointing, and all in strict obedience to the schedule +which Carlton had drawn up before his arrest. The working day ended, as +then arranged, with a violent assault upon that black disorder which had +been the nave; but this also acquired system as the days closed in; +while the influence of time was not less apparent in the gradual +disappearance of that tendency to morbid reaction which had been +inevitable in the first days of bodily and spiritual strain, of +incessant and excessive hardship, of a solitude consummate and profound. +But here time was assisted by the good sense and the strong will of +Carlton himself, who knew how little virtue there is in mere remorse, +and who struggled against it with all his might. It was a long time, +however, before even he was master of himself in this regard. One day, +in the exaltation of overwork, the high excitement of nervous and of +physical exhaustion, he was actually heard whistling at his walls, and +it was all over the village before he caught himself in the act; but +none seemed to hear how suddenly he stopped at last; none saw the raised +face, the clasped hands, the lips moving in meek apology for an +instant's joy. Nor did any man dream how this one would still mortify +himself, after such a lapse, with deliberate dwelling on the past. There +was but one link, indeed, in all the mournful chain of recent events, +upon which Robert Carlton would never permit his thoughts to +concentrate; that was his successful conduct of his own case before the +magistrates, culminating in his final triumph over Sir Wilton Gleed. He +had made the rule in the hour of his release, and he called in all his +strength of mind to its rigorous observance. + +It was now three weeks since he had spoken to a human being, none having +come near him to his knowledge; then one morning the air was full of +whispers, though the yellowing elms hung stagnant in an autumn mist; and +the outcast, looking over the wall which he was scraping, beheld a bevy +of school-children perched on that of the churchyard. + +He bent a little lower to his work. The wall was that thirteen-foot +strip, to the left of the porch, upon which he had spent the first +morning of all in getting rid of the unsound upper courses. It was still +his own height in most places; so the children could not watch him at +his work; but the sound of them was enough. Poor little children! To +grow up with such an example and such knowledge as would be theirs! His +heart had seldom smitten him so hard. + +"_Then said He unto the disciples, It is impossible but that offences +will come: but woe unto him through whom they come!_ + +"_It were better for him that a millstone were hanged about his neck, +and he cast into the sea, than that he should offend one of these little +ones._" + +The text came unbidden; it cut the deeper for that. Woe unto him, +indeed! Of all men, woe unto him! Hammer and chisel slipped from his +hands; he hid his face. His thumbs went to his ears, but were drawn +back. The children's voices were more than he could bear, so he bore +them for his sin until another aspect of the case was driven home to his +intelligence. Next moment he appeared in the porch, and the children +were vanishing from the wall. + +"Don't run away," he called. "Come back, you bigger ones!" + +It was his old voice, come unbidden like the text; he might have been +using it all these weeks. The children had never disobeyed that quiet +but imperious summons. They did not begin to-day. + +"Why aren't you all at school?" + +There was silence, broken eventually by some bold but still respectful +spirit. + +"Please, sir, it's a holiday." + +"Not Saturday, is it?" + +He was beginning to lose count of the week-days; once already the +Sabbath school-bell had nipped a day's work in the bud. + +"No, sir, it's an extra holiday." + +"Then spend it better. Get away into the fields, or down the river. I +won't have you hanging about here. There's nothing for you to +see--nothing that will do you any good. Run away all, and forget who has +spoken to you. But don't let me have to speak again!" + +There was no need for another word. And the workman went back to his +wall; but his hands had lost their cunning; his heart was as heavy as +the stones themselves. + +Why had he never been harassed in this way before? He had not to think +very long. He was without that friend of friendless man, his dog. The +good Glen, his second shadow in these days, had chosen this one to +desert him; and Carlton was glad, for nothing else would have made him +appreciate the dog at his true worth. Now he thought of it, how often +the faithful brute had gone barking to wall or gate, and come back +wagging his tail! Preoccupied with his work, he had taken no thinking +heed at the time. But now he remembered and understood. + +Instead of working all the afternoon, he went in search of Glen. It +surprised him to find how much he missed a companion whose presence he +had often ignored for hours together; he felt as though he could do no +good without the animal now; its dumb sympathy seemed to have had no +small share in all that he had done as yet. That wag of the tail, how +well he knew it after all! It was like the grasp of a good man's hand. +That wistful eye, watching over him at his work, was it a blasphemous +conceit to think of it as the mild eye of the All-seeing, shining +through the mask of one of His humblest creatures, upon another as +humble, and countenancing the work if not the man? If this was +blasphemy, then Robert Carlton blasphemed for once in his heart; and had +his deserts in an unsuccessful quest. + +He had searched the garden and the house; had stood whistling at the +gate, and in each of the far corners of the glebe. Night fell upon him +sawing a huge tie-beam through and through to shift it, and sawing with +all the irritable energy of the unwilling workman, very remarkable in +him. And for once he was glad to put on his coat. + +What could have happened to the dog? Its master could scarcely eat for +wondering. Now he sat frowning heavily. Anon his brow cleared, and a +fixed purpose glittered in his eyes. A little later he was in the +village street once more. + + + + +XVIII + +THE NIGHT'S WORK + + +The night was as dark as it could possibly be. The day's mist still +lingered, impervious to stars, and there was no moon. Carlton was not +sorry, for he had no wish to be seen by more people than was absolutely +necessary; neither was he allowing for the shabby tweeds he had +unearthed to work in, for his cloth cap and untrimmed beard, which +obliterated the clergyman and changed the man. + +He had not gone far before he stopped in astonishment. He had met no +one, and the village was as dark as the firmament; in the first few +cottages there were no lights at all. Carlton groped his way up the path +of one, and knocked twice without receiving an answer or detecting any +sound within. It was as though his sin had driven his parishioners to +the four winds. + +He went on with increasing amazement, still without encountering a soul; +then swerved of a sudden from the middle of the road, and hugged the +wheatfield wall on the right-hand side while passing the Flint House on +the left. Here were lights, and more. The front door stood open, pouring +a broken beam of lamplight into the road. And on the single step, +leaning upon his great stick, towered the silhouette of Jasper Musk, +only less colossal than his shadow in the lighted slice of road. + +Carlton half expected a challenge, and passed slowly and openly; instead +of slinking as his shame dictated. But there was neither word nor sign +of recognition from the gigantic figure on the step; and the lights +ended where they had begun. There were none beneath the gabled thatch +immediately beyond the wheatfield; and so for another hundred yards; not +a glimmer to right or left, with the single exception of a lattice +window over the post-office, where the bed-ridden Mrs. Ivey lay as she +had been lying for many months. Carlton saw the shadow of a flower-pot +on the widow's blind; no doubt it was the geranium he had taken her in +early summer; he remembered placing it on the sill. His pace quickened. +He was now at the long lane leading to the Plough and Harrow; and there +at last were the missing lights. The inn was lit up in every window, and +not only the unmistakable sound, but the very smell of feasting +travelled to the road, where Robert Carlton hesitated longer than his +wont. He might as well go home. It was quite bad enough to face his +people piece-meal. On the other hand, there was the dog; a +characteristic fixity of purpose in its owner; and a natural curiosity +to know more of the entertainment that could empty every home. + +The front of the inn revealed nothing after all. The brilliantly lighted +parlour was deserted by all but a single attendant behind the bar; the +scene of revelry was audibly the barn at the back. The inn itself had +once been a farm-house, and this barn came in for all the festivals. + +Carlton peered through the parlour window, and nodded to himself. The +face within was new to him, but that might well prove an advantage. It +was the florid face of a stout young man, passing the time with a +newspaper and a cigar, the first of which he threw aside to answer the +incomer's questions. + +No, he had seen nothing of any collie dog; but he was a stranger +himself, only come to lend a hand for the night. Black and tan collie, +but more black than tan? No; the only dogs he had seen all day were the +governor's tyke and a thoroughbred bitch belonging to the young +gentleman at the hall. + +"But have a drink," said the stout young man, reaching for a tankard. + +Carlton declined civilly, though not without betraying some +astonishment. + +"That's free beer to-night, old man," explained the other. + +"Indeed?" + +"I'm here to serve ut. Change your mind?" + +"No, thank you." + +"Then I will." + +And the young man drew a foaming pint, while a burst of revelry came +through the inner doors, but slightly deadened by its passage through +the open air. + +"May I ask what is going on?" inquired Carlton. + +"That's the biggest spread ever seen in Long Stow," said the stout +youth, drawing his sleeve along his lips and turning a shade more florid +than before. + +"Not the harvest-home already?" + +"No; that's a dinner given by the squire to every sowl in the +parish--men, women, an' kids--all but one." + +The questioner stood absorbed. + +"All but one," repeated the temporary barman with knowing emphasis. And +he winked as he leant across the bar. + +"Ah!" + +"Their reverend ain't here--not much!" + +"I don't suppose he is. And why is the squire doing this sort of thing +on this scale?" + +"Why, in honour of the victory, to be sure." + +"What victory?" + +"Why, the one we've just had in Egypt. Tel-el----but here that is, in +the _Bury Post_, and a fair jaw-breaker, too." + +It was the first newspaper which Robert Carlton had seen for several +weeks. His _Standard_ subscription had run out at mid-summer; he had +never renewed it. The world had renounced him utterly, and so must he +renounce the world. To live as he was living, and yet to have an ear for +the busy hum--he could not do it. For already he recognized the +startling truth: it was its very completeness which rendered his +isolation endurable. + +Yet his eyes glistened as he ran them down the stirring columns, and his +tanned face wore a coppery glow as he returned the paper across the bar. + +"Thanks very much," he said. "I am glad to have seen that." + +"Is it the first you've heard of it?" + +"Yes; I don't often see a paper." + +The young barman was eyeing him up and down, from the old tweed trousers +to the old cloth cap. + +"On the tramp, are you?" + +Carlton did not choose to reply. + +"Yet you seemed to know all about their reverend here!" + +"Who does not?" cried the man in tweeds, with involuntary bitterness. + +"Ah, you may well say that! And what do _you_ think of him?" + +"I think the same as everybody else." + +"That he's the biggest blackguard unhung?" + +"Indeed, one of them!" + +"That's what the young gentleman from the hall say, when he was in here +this afternoon. But the governor, Master Palmer--O Lord! how he do hate +him! 'Unhung?' he say. 'Why, hangun's too good for him.' An' so it is, +come to think of it: to go and do what _he_ done, an' to top all by +settun fire to his own church!" + +"Come," said Carlton, "that wasn't proved." + +"But everybody know it, bless you!" + +"Though the charge was dismissed in open court?" + +"Bah! 'Not guilty, but don't do that again!'" + +And the stout youth nodded sagely over his tankard's rim. + +"So that's the opinion of the neighbourhood, is it?" + +"That is, and that's not likely to change." + +Carlton was not astonished. He had foreseen this even from the +prisoner's dock, in that pause of the proceedings when he had felt +ashamed of his facility in self-defence, a haunting doubt of the +propriety of his defending himself at all. And yet the virile instinct +which had inspired him then was not yet dead in his breast; he could not +let all this pass; the conversation was none of his seeking, yet he must +say something more. + +"I have never stuck up for him," he began; "but give even him his due! +What possible object could a man have in burning down his own church?" + +"What I asked the governor," replied the barman. "'Dog in the manger,' +he say; 'didn't want the next man to reap where he've sowed. What's +more, that give him an excuse for stoppun in the place,' he say." + +Carlton was under no temptation to confute these arguments; his only +difficulty was to suppress a smile. + +"So his people don't think any the better of him for getting himself +off, eh?" + +"The better? That's made them right mad! The governor here, he say that +was the gift of the gab and nothun else; all parsons have their fair +share; but this here reverend, he do seem to be a holy terror, an' no +mistake. A gentleman like Sir Wilton Gleed haven't a chance agen him; so +they're all a-sayun, all but Sir Wilton himself. The young gent who was +in here this afternoon, he was a-sayun as how the squire wouldn't have +the reverend's name so much as spoken at the hall; and he's never been +heard to name it himself since the day of the trial, he's that mad. But +have you heard the latest?" + +Carlton had heard quite enough, and his hand was on the latch, nor did +he withdraw it as he turned his head. + +"Against the reverend?" inquired he. + +"That's it," said the young barman with renewed gusto. "And I nearly let +you go without tellun you!" + +"What has he been doing now?" + +Carlton was curious to hear. + +"That's not what he've been doün, but what keep comun o' what he've +done," his informant said ominously. "The latest is that some young chap +would go to the devil because the reverend had, so he 'listed, and he've +been in the very battle there's all this to-do about!" + +Of Mellis's enlistment Carlton had heard; the rest was news indeed; and +his hand tightened on the latch. + +"Has anything happened to him, then?" he faltered, sick at heart. + +"Not as we know on yet," said the stout youth, hopefully. "But the lists +ain't in, and, if this young chap's killed, everybody says it'll be +another death at the reverend's door." + +"So they want his blood!" exclaimed Carlton. "But what they say is +true." + +As he opened the door a burst of cheering came round from the barn. + +"That's for the squire," he left the barman saying. "He've been on his +legs these ten minutes." + +The outcast had shut the door behind him, and was groping his way in a +darkness no deeper than before, though perfectly opaque after the +strong light within. + +"And one cheer more!" screamed a voice from the barn. + +Carlton need scarcely have left his rectory to have heard the final +roar. Yet it was not the end. + +"And three groans . . ." + +This voice was hoarse; the name was lost in the night; but the outcast +well knew whose it was. And he stopped instinctively, standing firm upon +his feet while the groans were given--as though they lashed him like +wind and rain. Then he turned his face to the storm. He could not help +it. There was more clapping of the hands. Something further was to come; +he might as well hear what. + +The barn was a clash of violent lights and impenetrable shade. Its +outlines were inseparable from the sky; but its great doors had been +flung flush with their wall, which gaped twenty feet from jamb to jamb. +This space, illumined by slung lanterns and naked candle-light, and +streaked with tables, which ran the full length of the barn, stood out +like the lighted stage of a darkened theatre. Outside hovered the +unworthy element which the smallest community cannot escape, or the +largest charity embrace; these vagabonds were absolutely invisible to +those within; and were themselves too dazzled and disgusted to take note +of each addition to their number. + +Sir Wilton Gleed, on his legs once more, at the high table furthest from +the doors, was making that preliminary pause which is a little luxury of +the habitual orator and an embarrassing necessity to the novice. He was +supported by the schoolmaster on one side and by his own son on the +other. The former wore the shiny flush which was the badge of every +reveller visible from without; but that was not many while all heads +were turned towards the squire. + +Sir Wilton began by observing, with sparkling eyes, that he was very +sorry to hear that name: he himself would have preferred such an +occasion to pass over without a reminder of the fact that they had a +leper in their midst. It was many moments before the speaker was +suffered to proceed; then he repeated the successful epithet at the top +of his voice, and drove it home with a synonym; recovering his own +composure during a second outburst, and continuing with conspicuous +self-restraint. Now that the matter had come up, he would not let it +drop, even upon that inappropriate occasion, without one word from +himself; but, he promised them, it should be his last public utterance +on the subject, in that parish at all events, as it was most certainly +his first. And another deliberate pause ended in a sudden gesture and a +new tone. + +"What's the use of talking?" exclaimed the squire. "The law of England +is against us; there's no more to be said while the law remains what it +is. I'm not thinking of my brother magistrates' decision the other day; +it would ill become me to pass one single syllable of comment upon that. +No, gentlemen, I confine my criticism to that law which empowers a +clergyman, convicted of the vilest villainy, to retain his living in +the teeth of every protest, and to continue poisoning the clean air of +this parish by wilfully remaining in our midst." + +"Shame! Shame!" + +"Shame or no shame," cried Sir Wilton, "I intend to bring the matter +before Parliament itself"--a further outburst of vociferous +approval--"intend to lay this very case before the House of Commons at +the earliest possible opportunity. And I think that I can promise you +some amendment of the law before another year is out. Meanwhile"--and +Sir Wilton raised his hand to quell renewed enthusiasm--"meanwhile let +us respect the law while it lasts. In signifying our detestation of this +monstrous wrong, let us be careful not to drift into the wrong +ourselves. There must be no more broken windows, mind!" + +And it was now a single finger that Sir Wilton Gleed held up. + +"But," he continued, "what we can do--what we are justified in +doing--what it is our bounden duty to do--is henceforth to ignore this +man's very existence in our midst." + +"Don't call him a man!" + +"That's a devil out of hell!" + +"Man or devil," cried Sir Wilton, "let us absolutely ignore his +existence among us. Don't go near him; don't even turn to look at him as +you pass. There he is--pretending to rebuild the church--posing as a +martyr--really laughing in his sleeve and crowing over all right-minded +men. We shall see who laughs last! Meanwhile, take no notice of him, one +way or the other; forbid your children the churchyard, if not that end +of the village altogether; nothing that can feed the morbid appetite for +notoriety which makes me sometimes think the man's a lunatic after all. +But if he dares to show his nose among you, that's another thing; hunt +him out of it as you would hunt a mad dog! He won't show himself twice. +But for the present my advice to you is to leave the cur in his kennel, +and the lazar in the lazar-house!" + +The unseen listener left amid the musketry of prolonged clapping, +mingled with a banging of tables, and a dancing of glass and silver, +that followed him into the outer darkness as a sound of cymbals and big +drums. He was not sorry to have heard what he had heard: in his position +it was a distinct advantage to know the worst that was being said. +Certainly he would not go into the village again without necessity--as +certainly as he would do so the moment such necessity arose. It was as +well, however, to go prepared. The present experience might rank as a +narrow escape; but Robert Carlton would not have been without it if he +could. + +He began to think better of his opponent. So he was going to Parliament +as the final court! That was legitimate; that he could admire. There is +infinite stimulus in the man who does not know when he is beaten--to an +adversary resembling him in that respect. And this seemed to be the one +characteristic common to Mr. Carlton and Sir Wilton Gleed. + +Yet the outcast felt a little hardened. And his critical faculty, always +keen, though only of himself unsparing, went insensibly to work upon the +new material, even as he strode on through the deserted village, not to +give up his dog just yet. + +"I believe he had that speech by heart, for all its opening. It came too +pat." + +That was Carlton's first conclusion. The next made him stop dead. + +"I'll be shot if the whole function wasn't a peg to hang that speech +on!" + +And on he went with a short laugh of scornful conviction; there was no +doubt whatever in his mind; but the speech was not worth a second +thought. There was Glen to find, and there was George Mellis to think +about, since think he must. Poor lad! Yes, that was his fault again; the +people were right; he would be blood-guilty if the boy fell. One thing, +however, was quite certain: if the worst news came it could be trusted +to come to him; meanwhile he could pray for his friend, as his heart was +praying now, a clean sky above him, and the untrammelled air of an open +country all around. + +The village had been left behind; the Lakenhall road followed for half a +mile, then left at a tangent in its turn; and this open country, upon +which Carlton of all men had the audacity to trespass, was the vast +rabbit-warren of Sir Wilton Gleed. The dog might be caught in one of the +traps; that was at once its master's fear and hope; for a broken leg +would mend, and his one friend think twice before deserting him again. +Carlton could even enjoy the prospect of the cripple's complete +dependence upon himself: it would be something to be indispensable to +living creature now. But meanwhile he could neither see nor hear +anything of his dog, though he walked, and stopped, and whistled till he +was tired, and then called, "Glen! Glen! Glen!" No sound came back to +him in reply; not even the echo of his own voice; and at midnight he +gave up the search. + +At midnight also the Long Stow festivities culminated in the National +Anthem, its secular companion, and much hoarse roystering on the way +home; all this as Carlton approached the village; and for once he was +deterred. To march into the middle of a tipsy crowd, freshly inflamed +against himself, was to provoke a brawl at best. He would go round +instead by the river that flowed parallel with the village street. So he +crossed at the lock near the mill at this end of Long Stow, and +recrossed by the white wood bridge on the Linkworth road at the other +end. But this was an hour later; for three-quarters had been wasted +opposite the Flint House, with its river frontage of trim mead and wild +garden, and a very faint light in one back room. + +By this time all was so still that the returning rector became the +earlier aware of an erratic lantern and tell-tale voices in the road +ahead; and he was walking slowly to let these people pass the rectory +gate, when in the light went lurching before his eyes. He hurried +softly. The intruders were half-way up the drive, whispering thickly, +but leaving a continuous sound in their wake, from something or other +that they had in tow. Carlton followed on the grass, a horrible +suspicion already in his heart; but he recognised their voices first. + +"Where shall we plant ut? Which is his winder?" + +"That there near the end. O Lord, what a lark!" + +"Yes--to think he come talkun to me while you was all in the barn. The +cheek! But here's his answer for him." + +The first and last speaker was the stout young barman from the Plough +and Harrow; the other was Jim Cubitt, an unworthy character who had been +turned out of the choir some months before. And Robert Carlton's +"answer" was his missing dog, lying dead in the lantern's light, with +particles of gravel glistening in his lacklustre coat. + +At this, the climax of his long night's search, with its ironic +interludes--all as honey matched with this--a very madness seized on +Carlton, so that he sprang out of the dark into the lighted area where +these two young ruffians stood, and fell upon them like a fiend. Not a +word was said; there was no time even for a cry. But Cubitt came first, +and had the muddled senses shaken out of him and new ones kicked in +before his comrade could so much as attempt a rescue. This, however, the +young barman did so gamely that the ex-chorister was flung in a heap and +his champion sent tripping over him with a boxing crack upon the jaw. +And Carlton towered breathless, his fists still doubled, waiting for the +fallen youths to rise and fall again. + +The one from the public-house merely sat upright, ruefully and sullenly +enough, but with a sound discretion which the Long Stow lout had the wit +to imitate. + +"_We_ never 'urt your dorg," the former vowed. "He was dead before I see +him, and I don't know now who done ut. I never knew anything about that +till after you was in to-night, when I heared who it must ha' been." + +"I don't care!" cried Carlton, in a fury still. "You helped to drag it +here--my poor dog! You would spite me like that, you whom I never saw +before to-night! You're worse than Jim Cubitt; he at least had an old +grievance against me; and you're both of you worse than the man who did +this foul thing, whoever he may be, and I don't want to know. Out of my +sight, both of you, and spread this as far as you please: what you got +from me, and what you did to get it. You'll find yourselves the martyrs +of the countryside!" + +"I'm sorry," said the young barman, getting up. "I'm sorry, and I can't +say no fairer, 'cept that I must ha' been an' got right tight. But I +ain't tight now. I'm not a Long Stow chap, sir, and I shall tell them, +where I come from, that you're a man, whatever else you are. But as to +spreadun, I don't think I shall do much o' that; what do you say, mate?" + +"I never killed his dog," said the former choirman. + +Nor did Carlton ever actually know, or seek finally to ascertain, the +author of a deed even more detestable than it had appeared at first +sight. For when the study lamp had been brought out into the still +night, the first thing it revealed was that the poor beast had been +neither shot nor poisoned; its brains had been beaten out. And Carlton +felt as though his own heart had been beaten out with them, as he +fetched a spade from the shed, and dug a grave by lamplight a few yards +from his study door. + + + + +XIX + +THE FIRST WINTER + + +The last leaf had filtered from the elms; the horse chestnuts had long +been bare. And now there was no more cover for the blackened stump of +Long Stow church, in its ring of rotting leaves, and its meshes of trunk +and twig, than for the guilty genius of this mournful spot. All the +world could see him now, and gauge the crass pretence of his +preposterous task; there was no deceiving such a wise little world; but +it had been requested not to look, and was accordingly content with +passing glimpses of a drama in which its interest was indeed upon the +wane. There were some things, however, which even a docile and +phlegmatic community could not help noticing as winter set in. It might +not be honest work, but it was making a thin man thinner. And he was +always at it. Yet it no longer seemed to give him any pleasure. Indeed, +his face was changed. Its dominant expression was grim and dogged. There +were no more lights and shadows. It was the face of a workman who has +lost interest in his work. Nevertheless, the work went on. + +It went on in all weathers. At first Carlton had tried devoting the wet +days to indoor work. He had cleaned his house from top to bottom, +emptied most of the rooms, stored furniture in the others, and covered +with sheets like a careful housewife. Not that he cared greatly for his +things; but his hermitage should not grow foul. The two rooms which he +retained in use were the kitchen and his study (in which Carlton slept), +with the flagged scullery for his bath. The rest of the house he shut +up, after robbing his picture-frames to patch the broken windows, which +he treated so ingeniously that they looked quite wonderful from the +road; but on windy nights the constant rattle and the occasional crash +were one long outcry for putty and a glazier. There was no more to be +done indoors. And still it rained. So one day he marched through the +village (unmolested after all), and it was duly ascertained that he had +taken a return ticket to Felixstowe, of all places, apparently for +change of air. But through the very next day's rain he could be seen +(and heard) very busy at his walls: in a suit of oilskins and a +sou'wester. Thus the work went on once more. + +By Christmas every stone that was to stand had been scraped and pointed; +a few sound ones had been scraped and relaid; here and there an entirely +new stone had been cut to fit the place of one charred out of shape; but +in the lower courses such instances were rare, too rare to suit his own +creative taste, but Carlton was determined to deal with the lowest +courses first, and to raise all the walls to his own height before +finishing one. In the case of those which were to contain windows, it +might be well to pause at the sill; the windows alone might take him a +couple of years. Meanwhile these were the walls which had suffered +most, and first let him reach the sills: if he did that within the next +six months Carlton thought he would be lucky. For his progress was as +that of the insect which builds the reef; it was often imperceptible +even to himself; yet always the work was going on. + +The man was all muscle now; spare at his best, he had scarcely an ounce +of mere flesh left. Yet, for his work's sake, he made wonderfully +regular meals, often with a relish; and twice in the autumn killed a +sheep, having cold mutton for many days in the colder weather. But the +preliminary tragedy and the ultimate waste were equally disgusting, and +his normal needs seemed better met by predatory visits to the hen-yard. +Practice made him a fair baker and a moderate cook; but, as he had never +been particular about his food, and his only object was to maintain +bodily strength, he sometimes defeated his end, and added the dejection +of dyspepsia to all other ills. Otherwise the physical life suited +Carlton; he was out all day long; and the worst discomforts rarely +followed him into the open air. At his work, for instance, he was always +warm; indoors, only when he went to bed. He never had a fire, except to +cook by; thus he still had a few coals left, but he doubted whether +anybody would sell him any more. There was, however, all the half-burnt +woodwork of the church; most of this would burn again; and, with +economy, might keep him in firing throughout the term of his suspension. +Meanwhile, lamp, rug, and overcoat gave all the heat that Carlton would +allow himself in the study. Once, when his stock of paraffin had run +out, he had to tramp for fresh supplies into a town where his face was +unknown; and that experience made him more than ever economical of such +fuel as he had. + +Unparalleled position for an endowed clergyman of the Church of England, +the incumbent of an enviable living, an Oxford man, a man of family, a +zealous High Churchman, an enlightened and alluring preacher, towards +the latter end of the nineteenth century! Scandalous priest though he +had also proved himself, his case was as pitiable as unique; a pariah in +his own parish; the outcast of his own people; an inland Crusoe, driven +to the traditional expedients of the castaway, and living the very life +of such within sight and hail of a silent and unseeing world. It was a +position which few men would have faced for an instant. This man +maintained it throughout the winter. And throughout the winter his work +went on. And the spring found him technically sane. + +But his brain bore it better than his heart. Some vital part of him was +certain to suffer. His brain escaped altogether, his body for a time; +but his heart was hard within him; all his prayers could not soften it; +and presently he lost the power even to pray. + +This was the meaning of the changed face seen from the road, in the days +and weeks succeeding the Long Stow celebration of the battle of +Tel-el-Kebir. Thereafter it was the face of one in the coils of +malignant despair. But the more gradual and substantial change, in such +a man, was terrible beyond deduction from its mere outward shadow. + +Here was no sudden and sweeping infidelity; no plucking of loose roots +from a shallow soil. Shallow this man was not, nor easily shaken in the +least of his convictions. His general tenets stood intact. He still +believed in the efficacy, under God, of earnest and worthy prayer. But +he could no longer believe in the efficacy of his own prayers. They were +not worthy: that was the whole truth. They were earnest enough, but +utterly unworthy, and it was better not to pray at all. + +His most passionate prayers had been for his own forgiveness, for the +restoration of his own peace of mind, for the blessing of God upon his +own little labours; selfish prayers, one and all; and he saw the +selfishness at last. It shocked him. He tried to stamp it out, this new +and obtrusive egoism; but he failed. Denied all contact with his +fellow-creatures, with only his own wishes to consult, his own work to +do, his own heart to probe, his own life to discipline, the man was an +egoist before he knew it; and it was only through his prayers that he +ever discovered it at all. They were not only unanswered; they no longer +brought their own momentary comfort, as heretofore. Of old it had been +much more than momentary; now it was no comfort at all. There must be +some reason for this; he asked himself what reason; and the answer was +this revelation of the true character of his prayers. They were poisoned +at the fount. He tried to purify them, but all in vain. Self would creep +in. So then he prayed only for a renewal of the faculty of pure and +unselfish prayer. And this was the most passionate of all his prayers. +But it also was unanswered. So he prayed no more. + +He was unforgiven: so Carlton explained it to himself. And a little +brooding convinced him of his idea. If God had forgiven him, He would +have shown some sign of His clemency through men. But what had men done? +They had broken his windows; they had burnt his church; they had closed +up every avenue to such poor atonement as was in his power; they had +forced him into a position which he had never sought, though for a +little it had consoled him; then tried, by false accusation, to force +him out of it; and now they had cut him off from themselves, had set him +apart as a thing eternally unclean, had even stooped to destroy the one +dumb being that clung to him in his exile! + +The murder of the dog was no little thing in itself; coming at the foot +of such a list, at the bitter end of a night of bitterness, it was the +last drop that petrified a truly humble and a strenuously contrite +heart. + +But it did not petrify his hand; and the work of that hand went on +without ceasing, save on that day which was now the Day of Rest +indeed--and nothing more. The other six, his energies were redoubled. If +he was now more than ever a traitor to his Master, well, there was still +this one thing that he could do for the Master's sake. And he did it +with all his might. + +No day was too wet for him; no day was too cold. His fingers might turn +blue, his moustache might freeze; it is beside the point that the winter +chanced to be too mild for the latter contingency. While five fingers +could control the chisel, and the other hand strike true, no weather +could have deterred him. And no weather did. + +So the New Year came, and the work went on through January and February +without a break. But the month of March, as it often will, made late +amends for the insipidity of its predecessors. A spell of colourless +humidity was broken by bright skies and a keen wind; the latter grew +bitter with the day; the former darkened before it was time. And when +Robert Carlton opened his study doors next morning, to air the room +while he took his bath, a little snowdrift came tumbling in through the +outer one. + +Carlton looked forth upon a white world in dazzling contrast to the +clear dark grey of a starless sky; at first there was no third tint. But +every moment seemed lighter than the last, and presently the trees +showed brittle and black as ever against the sky; for the drifted snow +lay everywhere but on their waving branches; and the wind blew hard and +bitter as before. + +Carlton bathed grimly in broken ice; he was not going to be baffled by a +little snow. He was very gradually rebuilding the east end, using the +old stones where he could, but cutting more new ones than he had +bargained for. He could not help it. This wall was going up. It was too +near the lane. It should hide the builder's head before he left it for +another wall. It was up to his thighs already. + +So all that day he laboured with his feet in the snow, and only his legs +entrenched against the cutting wind. The stones were ready; he now +prepared them by the course. They had only to be carried from the shed +with mortar mixed expressly overnight; but to avoid dropping them in the +slush and snow, each stone was laid out of hand; and a considerable +muscular exertion thus followed by a prolonged niggling with trowel and +plummet and transverse string, and this in the fangs of the wind, as +often as twice or thrice an hour. It was the hardest day yet. But it was +also the most successful. The entire course was laid by half-past three +in the afternoon. + +In earlier days Carlton would undoubtedly have given way to that +spontaneous elation for which he had been wont to pay so dearly; now a +tired man crept back to his bed, without a thought beyond the next +hour's rest (he had seldom been so tired), and the meal that he must +then prepare as mere munition of war. Yet on his study threshold he +paused and turned, as doomed men may at the door of the dreadful shed. + +There was little in the scene itself to stamp it on the mind. Already +the snow was beginning to disappear; but the sky was still hard and +clean; and the east wind cut to the bone. The ridge of firs, cresting +the ploughed uplands beyond the lane, notched the bleak sky with dark +cockades on russet stems; white clouds floated above, a white moon hung +higher. A robin hopped in the snow at Carlton's feet; he was a good +friend to the birds, and had not forgotten them that morning. Somewhere +a blackbird sung him indoors; somewhere a starling smacked its beak. And +this was all; but Robert Carlton carried the impression to his grave. + +Instead of sleeping for an hour, he slept far into the night; and spent +the rest of it in misery between bouts of shivering and of intolerable +heat. His throat was on fire, to quench it he coughed, and already his +cough hurt queerly. In the morning the man was ill enough to know that +he was going to be worse. He took characteristic measures while he +could. + +It was a fine instinct which had inspired him to economise his coal; now +was the time when that little hoard might save his life. But he had only +one scuttle, and for the moment felt baffled; then he dried his bath, +and put the coals in that, thus eventually getting them to the study in +one load. These exertions hurt Carlton like his cough. In both cases it +was as though his body had been transfixed. His head swam with the pain. +Yet next moment he was reeling back for wood; and not less than ten +infernal minutes did he spend on such errands, a furious fever alone +sustaining him. It was constructive suicide, yet not to have these +things was certain death. Now it was all the alcohol in the house, in a +bottle that had lasted nearly a year; now a basin of eggs, of which he +had always a fair store indoors; now pail upon pail of water for his +kettle. Carlton had been a great visitor of the sick, and seen many a +death from the disease he was preparing to resist. He had therefore a +rough idea of what to do for himself; he was only doubtful as to how +long he might be able to do anything at all. The lightest breath had now +become a pang. Already he was alarmingly ill, and must inevitably grow +much worse. But he did not intend to die. He trusted the constitution of +a lean and hardy race, and he trusted his own nerve. + +At last the fire was alight, a full kettle mounted, and the spout +trained upon the pillow, the bed itself being drawn up close to the +fire. Under the bed was the bath full of coals, and within as easy reach +the eggs, the whisky, a breakfast-cup, and the pails of water. But even +now the sick man was not in his bed; he was lying in a heap upon the +floor, where he had fallen the moment he could afford to faint. + +On recovering he shook off half his clothes, crawled between the +blankets, and beat up an egg with whisky. This was all he took that day. +And there he lay, breathing needles and coughing daggers until he slept. + +"I'm not going to die. They shan't get rid of me like that. I don't die +like a rat in his hole!" + +That seemed to be the burden of his thoughts for many days; in reality +the time was forty-eight hours. And whenever the determination rose +afresh in his heart, and the dry lips moved with its expression, the +whole man would rouse himself to an effort beside which the building of +the church was pastime. He would sit up and put on more coals with a +hand black from the constant operation. Then he would lean as close as +possible to the singing kettle, and inhale the steam until the gaunt arm +supporting his weight could do so no more. Even then he would make a +still longer arm before lying down, and replenish the kettle from one of +the pails, using the breakfast-cup for a dipper. So the kettle would +cease singing for a time, and, each occasion entirely exhausting the +spent man, the chances were that he would fall into a sleep that was +half a swoon. But he never slept very long. He would dream that the fire +was black, and start up to mend it--often before the kettle had +recovered its voice. So far from the fire going out, for sixty hours it +never went down. Carlton would mend it almost in his sleep. Even on the +third day, when a kind delirium destroyed sensation for some hours, he +never forgot his fire; the lean black hand would still feel its way to +the bath beneath the bed, and there grope weakly for the smaller coals. +All lucid thought and all delirious whispers were gradually monopolised +by the fire. It became the sick man's life. He would not let it out +while he lived. And live he would. When the fire died out, then so would +he. But he was not going to die this time. + +"Their latest dodge to get rid of me, is it? Trust to Général +Février--no, March! Never mind; he shan't lay his bony finger on me +. . . You'll burn 'em if you try! . . . I tell you the law's on my +side." + +Delirium grew from the exception into the rule. The kettle sang no +longer; the bottom was out and the whole thing red-hot; for the fire had +never been so good. The fender was inches deep in ashes. With or without +his reason Carlton knew enough to thrust the poker through and through +the lower glow. It was a clear fire all the time. + +And the heat of it at such a range! It singed the sheets; it flayed the +face; but it also helped incalculably to keep this stricken body and +this strenuous soul together. + +The crisis came before its time. Carlton grew too weak to hold the poker +or to lift a coal, but cruelly clear in his mind. Thus far he had never +prayed. He had abandoned prayer with all deliberation and in all his +vigour. It needed more than the fear of death to make him pray again, +least of all for mere life. Now that the fire was going out, and +recovery no longer possible, the case was changed; and this erring +servant broke his long silence with God, to pray both for forgiveness +and for a speedy issue out of his afflictions. And in the same hour came +the seeming answer, as if to assure him that even his prayers had still +some value in the eyes of the Most High. For delirium had dwindled into +coma, with these few lucid minutes between, and the fever and the pain +had passed away. + +Yet it was in this world that Robert Carlton awoke yet again, to find +his precious fire alight after all, and a dilapidated figure nodding +over it to the song of a fresh kettle. It was old Busby, the sexton. The +sick man could not speak; his little finger seemed to weigh a stone; it +was some minutes before he achieved movement enough to attract the +sexton's attention. But all this time the live coals had been warming +his soul. And already he lay convinced that he also was going to live. + +The sexton turned his face at last. It was a startling face for sick +eyes at such a range. The toothless mouth, which never closed, had often +reminded Mr. Carlton of one of his own gargoyles. It did so now. And a +continual trickle of saliva added a disgusting realism to the image, +which was, however, immediately dispelled by a human grin of profound +slyness. + +"And have you been bad?" inquired the sexton. + +"Beat--up--an egg. I--can't--speak." + +Evidently he could not, for Busby was bending a horrid ear. + +"Eh? eh?" + +Carlton made a fresh effort with shut eyes. + +"No food . . . faint for want . . . there no eggs?" + +"Eggs? Why, yes, here's one." + +"Beat up for me . . . too bad to speak." + +The sexton looked more sententious than ever. + +"Ah, I thought as how you'd been bad," said he, with all the nods of the +successful seer. "I thought as how you'd been bad!" + +"It's only been a cold," whispered Carlton, in sudden terror of the +public pity. + +"Only a cold?" + +"Oh, yes--that's all." + +"Then you've not been as bad as me!" cried Busby, triumphantly. "Do you +mind what I had inside me last year? That's there still! I can hear +that----" + +"Will you do what I ask?" + +It was a peremptory whisper now. + +"I would, sir, but I don't fare to know the road." + +"Then give me the egg, for heaven's sake, and you hold the cup." + +Carlton managed to rise a few inches in his impatience; but his fingers +had less power than those of the babe new-born, and the egg slipped +through them. With fortuitous dexterity, the sexton caught it in the +cup; there was a crack; and accident had accomplished the design. + +"Look what you've gone and done," said Busby, reproachfully, displaying +the yolk in the cup. Thereupon he received instructions which even he +could follow; and at length the mess was down, stinging with the +sexton's notion of a teaspoonful of whisky. This second accident was +even happier than the first; there was instant agitation in every vein. +And now Busby could hear without stooping. + +"When did you find me?" + +"That fare to be an hour ago, I suppose. Ah, but I thought as how you +looked bad! Soon as ever I see you, I say to myself, 'The reverend's +found what beat him at last,' I say; 'he do look wunnerful bad,' I say. +And you see, I was right." + +There was the tiniest gleam in the great bright eyes. + +"You were partly right," said Carlton, "and partly wrong. I'm not done +with yet, Busby. So then you lit the fire for me?" + +"That wasn't wholly out." + +"Ah!" + +"That soon burnt up. Then I went and got another kettle." + +The great eyes flashed suspicion. + +"And told everybody you saw, I suppose!" + +"I should be very sorry," said the sexton, significantly. "No, I come +an' went by the lane, an' took wunnerful care that nobody set eyes on I. +I thought as how you might fare to like a cup o' tea, an' that was a +rare mess you'd made o' _your_ kettle." + +"You've done well," whispered Carlton. "You've saved my--saved my cold +from getting worse. You shall never regret it, Busby; only don't you +tell anybody I've had one--do you hear? Don't you tell a single soul +that you found me in bed!" + +"No fear," chuckled the sexton. "I should be very sorry to tell anybody +I'd found you at all. They might hear o' that somewhere else!" + +Carlton lay still with thought and purpose; and death itself could not +have given the lower part of his face a harsher cast; but the hot eyes +were fixed upon the fading diamonds of the window over the table. At +last he spoke--and it was a pity there was but the sexton to hear the +firm tones of so faint a voice. + +"Find my keys, Busby. I'm going to give you a sovereign----" + +"A what?" + +"The first of several if you do what I want!" + +Not much later the sexton was hobbling towards Lakenhall, for the first +time in many years; and the sick man lay greatly doubting whether he +should ever see him again. His weakness was terrible now. The excitement +of conversation had provoked a relapse as grave as it was inevitable in +one so weak. The flickering lamp was only fed by the stimulus of +suspense, the glow of the fire, and the man's own indomitable will. The +latter, however, never failed him for a moment. + +"I _will_ pull through," he would mutter at his worst. "I will--I will +. . . Oh, is he never, never . . ." + +He came at last--with corn-flour, meat-extract, a bottle of port, and +such other requisites as had entered the sick man's head under the spur +of his overdose of ardent spirits. And, simple and inadequate as they +were, these things spelt the first syllable of recovery. + +The sexton came night after night; he also was a lonely man; and he +dearly loved a pound. In a week he was richer than he had ever been +before. It became difficult for him to take a disinterested view of the +determined progress which the patient made towards complete recovery and +consequent independence. The situation, however, had its little +compensations: at all events it enabled the imaginary sufferer to crow +over the real one to his heart's content. + +"Ah, sir, you don't fare to know what that is to be right ill, like I. +_You_ never had a fine fat frog settun in your middle an' keepun all the +good out o' your stummick. That get every bite I eat, an' then that cry +for more. Croap, croap, croap!" + +One day brought forth an unsuspected fact. The sexton was no longer +sexton at all. There had been no more burials. The school-bell was rung +on Sundays, as all the week, by the schoolmaster's son. Busby had been +dismissed with a present, as long ago as the month of August; but that +was not all. He had thereupon left the Church in justifiable dudgeon, +and thrown in his spiritual lot with the Particular Baptists in the +little flint chapel between the Linkworth turning and the Flint House. +He now exhorted Mr. Carlton to do the same. + +"If you do, sir," said Busby, "you'll never fall no more." + +Carlton winced. But the man had saved his life. Nothing should annoy him +from the kind old imbecile who had come to his succour while the sound +world stood aloof. + +"You don't know that," he said quietly. + +"But I do," declared the other. "I'm like to know. God's children can't +sin, and I'm one on 'em." + +Carlton opened his eyes. + +"Do you mean to tell me you never sin?" + +"I mean to tell you, sir," said the solemn sexton, "that, since God laid +his hand on me, now seven month ago, I've never once committed the +shadder of a sin." + +"Then, if I were you, I should remember what St. Paul says--'Let him +that thinketh he standeth take heed--lest--he--fall.'" + +The text faltered; it was terribly two-edged; but Carlton had not +perceived the pitfall until he was over the brink. He had forgotten +himself in his scorn, and spoken impulsively as the man that he had been +the year before. But the inveterate egotist was conveniently full of +himself, and his pat retort quite free from offence. + +"Fall?" said he, with his foolish eyes wide open. "Why, I couldn't do +that if I tried; and I have tried, just to see; but I fare to have +forgotten how to sin. Do you believe me, sir, I can't even raise a swear +at this little varmin what's killun me inch by inch. Why, I'm grateful +to it! But I do sometimes fare to cry to think I have to stay another +day in this world o' sin, when I know there's a place prepared for me in +heaven above." + +This stupendous speech was too much for even Mr. Carlton's self-control. +Its snivelling tone, its evident conviction (confirmed by a gargoyle's +grin of infinite self-esteem), were aggravated by the complete surprise +of this spiritual revelation; and between them they awoke a dormant +nerve. Robert Carlton did not exhibit that annoyance which he had +determined to conceal; he did much worse. He burst out laughing in the +sexton's face. And his laughter was long, loud, high-pitched and +hysterical, alike from weakness and from long disuse. + +The sexton on his legs, in a perfect palsy of horror and offence, alone +put a stop to it. + +"I beg your pardon," gasped Carlton, his eyes full of tears; "oh, I +beg----" + +And again that hysterical, high-pitched laughter got the better of him, +ringing weirdly enough through the empty house. + +"Ah!" said the dotard, when it had stopped at last; and the monosyllable +contented him for some moments. "Well," he at length continued, with a +brisker manner and a brighter face; "well, thank God I pulled you +through; thank God I didn't let you die in your sins and go to +everlasting hell without another chance of immortal life. You wicked +man! You wicked man! I'll go and I'll pray for you; but I'll never come +near you no more." + +So the solitary regained his solitude; when he spoke again, it was to +himself. + +"Well, he has his money," he reflected aloud: he had paid the sexton +some seven pounds in all. "And my gratitude!" he cried later. "I must +never forget that I owe my life to that egregious old man." + +Yet the greater gratitude was beginning to stir within him, as the sap +was even then stirring in the trees. It was a mild, bright day, one of +the last in March. The invalid had not yet been out; he would go out +now. In an instant he was wrapping up. + +Oh, but it was wonderful! the feel and noise of the moist gravel under +the soles of his boots; the green, damp grass; the watery sun; the +beloved birds; the mild, beneficent air. + +His steps took the old direction of their own accord. In a minute he was +there, at the church, and seated on the very wall which he had been +building a fortnight before, surveying his work. + +Had some one been carrying it on in his absence? Or was it only that one +noticed no difference from day to day, but all the difference in the +world after an unaccustomed absence? Yes, this was it; and he drew the +deep breath which his first idea had checked. + +Still it was wonderful: one wall seemed so much higher, another so much +cleaner than before; and yet there was no stone either laid or scraped +which Carlton did not recognize at a glance, with sudden memories of +special travail; and the string was still where he had stretched it to +keep the line. He had under-estimated his progress at the time; that was +all; but again it was as though the sap was rising in his heart. + +The very tangle of blackened timber, which still cumbered nine-tenths of +the inner area, no longer struck Carlton as the unconquerable chaos it +had appeared on that bitter day which seemed so many days ago; yet, when +he laid white hands upon such a beam as he had easily shouldered then, +he could not lift it an inch. Ah, that day! It would take him weeks to +undo its evil work. The wet feet and the cutting wind, he could feel +them both again, with the sweat freezing on his body, and every pore an +open door to death. There was the ridge of red-stemmed firs, too far +east to blunt the cold steel of that deadly wind; and here beneath him +the barrier he had been building last, and must finish now before he did +another thing. How firm and true was this top course, that he had laid +that day with the bony fingers at his throat! Well, he would have died +with a good day's work behind him . . . It must have been a very near +thing . . . he wondered how near when the sexton came, and why the +sexton had come at all. The man had never given a good reason. He had +only just fared to think there might be something wrong. + +On the way indoors, the invalid stopped at a tree. It was one of the +horse-chestnuts; and already every delicate extremity was swollen and +sticky to the touch; and the birds sang of summer in the branches. +Carlton passed on with the short, quick steps of a feeble person in a +hurry. Rivers were running in his heart; he wanted to be where he could +kneel. + + + + +XX + +THE WAY OF PEACE + + +Three years later the man was still alone, and the church still growing +under his unaided but untiring hand. Indeed, from one end, it looked +almost ready for the roof, the west gable rising salient through the +trees, with the original window intact underneath. But this window was +the exception, the sole survivor from the fire, and for the past year +the rest had been one long impediment. Even now, only the three single +lights, in either transept and to the right of the porch respectively, +had been wrought to a finish from sill to arch; a mullioned window was +just begun; the remainder all yawned to the sky in ragged gaps of +varying width. But the village looked daily on the one good end, flanked +by the west walls of either transept, which happened not to have a +window between them, and were consequently finished. And the village was +softening a little towards its outcast, though no man said so above his +breath; nor was a living soul known to have been near him all these +years, unless it was the new sexton to dig a grave, or a Lakenhall +curate to make an entry in the parish register. + +There had, however, been one or two others; the first knocking at the +study door on the evening of the first funeral, some months after +Carlton's illness. + +Carlton was reading at the time. His heart stopped at the sound. It was +repeated before he could bring himself to open the door. + +"Tom Ivey!" + +"That's me, sir; may I come in?" + +"Surely, Tom." + +The hulking mason entered awkwardly, and refused a chair. His large +frame bulked abnormally in a ready-made suit of stiff black cloth. He +seemed to take up half the room, as he stood and glowered, a full-length +figure of surly embarrassment and dark resolve. + +"There was a funeral to-day," he began at last. + +"I know." + +"That was my poor mother, Mr. Carlton." + +"Yes, I heard. Tom, I'm so sorry for you!" + +Their hands flew together, and were one till Carlton winced. + +"There's nothun to be sorry for," said Tom, with husky philosophy. "Her +troubles are over, poor thing. So's one o' mine! You can start me +to-morrow." + +"Start you, Tom?" + +"Yes, sir, I mean to work for you now. I'd like to see the man who'll +stop me! You've shown 'em all the man you are; now that's _my_ turn." + +And the broad face beamed and darkened with alternate enthusiasm and +defiance. Carlton beheld it with parted lips and startled eye; and so +they stood through a long silence, till Carlton sat down with a smile. +It was a singularly gentle smile, as he leant back in his worn old +chair, and the lamplight fell upon his face. + +"After all these months," he murmured; "after all these months!" + +"I fare to hide my face when I count 'em up," admitted Ivey, bitterly. +"But what was the good of comun when I couldn't come for good? And how +could I in poor mother's time? It'd have meant--there's no sayun what +that wouldn't have meant." + +"You mean as regards Sir Wilton?" + +"I do, Mr. Carlton." + +"He will have been a good friend to you?" + +"Oh, yes." + +"Did those repairs, did he?" + +"Yes," sighed Ivey, "he was better than his word about them; you would +hardly know the place now. It made a lot of difference to mother. And I +had the job." + +"Oh!" + +"He's kept me busy, I must say. I've never wanted work." + +"Until now, I suppose?" + +"To tell you the truth, sir, I'm at work for him still." + +"For Sir Wilton Gleed?" + +"Yes--odd jobs about the estate." + +"Then my good fellow, what do you mean by offering yourself to me?" + +"Mean?" exclaimed Ivey, his black determination leaping into flame. "I +mean as I've made up my mind to give him the go-by for you. I'd have +done that long ago if it hadn't been for mother; but better late than +never. You've shown 'em the man you are, and now that's my turn. Look at +what you've done with your own two hands--there'll be other two from +to-morrow! You shan't work yourself right to death before my eyes. Why, +your hair's white with it already!" + +Carlton wheeled further from the lamp. + +"Not white," he murmured. + +"But that is, sir. When did you look in a glass?" + +"I don't know." + +"Then do you look to-morrow. That's white as snow. And your beard's +grey." + +"It's certainly too long," said Carlton, covering half with his hand. + +"And your hand--your hand!" + +It was scarred and horny as the mason's own. Carlton removed it from the +light, but said nothing. + +"That's done its last day's work alone," cried Tom. "I start with you +to-morrow, whether you want me or not. I'll show 'em! I'll show 'em!" + +And he stood nodding savagely to himself. + +"My dear fellow, you can't behave like that." + +The words fell softly after a long silence. + +"Why can't I?" + +Carlton gave innumerable reasons. + +"It would put us both in the wrong," was the last. "Go on working for +Sir Wilton--at any rate for another year. You owe it to him, Tom. And +don't you fret about me; I am a happier man than I ever deserved to be +again. Last winter it was different; but God has shown me infinite mercy +and compassion. And now He has sent you to me, as a sign that even man +may forgive me in the end! That is enough for me, Tom. You cannot do +more for me than you have done to-night. But your duty you must do, by +God's help, as long as it is as clear as it is now. Don't bother your +head about me! I am getting into the knack. Perhaps by the time I come +to the roof--if I ever do--the want of a church may induce others to +help me finish mine. Then, if you like, you shall come back; but I won't +have you made an outcast on my account; one is enough." + +There were no more visits from Tom Ivey. This one came to the ears of +Sir Wilton; and that diplomatist instead of playing into the enemy's +hands by discharging his man, capped all his kindness to the mason by +getting him the offer of an irresistible berth in that London district +for which he himself sat. Thus Sir Wilton removed a wavering ally, and +at the same time renewed the lease of his allegiance. + +Carlton heard of it some months later, when there was another funeral, +and the Lakenhall curate came in again to make the entry. This curate +was a gentleman. He had a good heart and better tact. He not only +conversed with Carlton as with the perfectly normal clergyman, in +perfectly normal circumstances, but he would prolong these conversations +as far as he deemed possible without exciting a suspicion of the +profound pity which inspired him. He would bring bits of local gossip, +or the latest national event; once he let fall that Sidney Gleed was up +at Cambridge, and said to stand a chance of "coxing the eight," while +Lydia was now a Mrs. Goldstein, the mistress of a splendid mansion in +Holland Park, and another up the Thames. It was from the same source +that Carlton obtained belated news of George Mellis, who had come +through two campaigns without a scratch, yet never been back to play the +hero on his native heath. In a word this curate, who was a very young +and rather commonplace fellow, came soon to stand for the outside world, +the world of newspapers and talk, to Robert Carlton, who liked him none +the less because his older eye saw through the artless arts with which +the lad sought to mask his charity. + +The visitations of this curate, who also conducted the one weekly +service in the village school, was a little arrangement between those +fast friends, Sir Wilton Gleed and Canon Wilders, who would have been +interested to learn the way in which their delegate improved the rare +occasion of a funeral. For marriages and baptisms the Long Stow folk had +taken to walking across the heath to Linkworth. + +Early in the second year there came a visitor whom Robert Carlton knew +at a glance, though he had never before seen him in the flesh. This was +a person with the appearance of a rather dissipated sporting man, who +tooled tandem through the village, and pulled up at the ruins in broad +daylight. The thing was thus a scandal from the first moment of its +occurrence, and the cockaded groom was beset by horrified rustics before +his master's red neck had disappeared among the low and ragged walls. + +Carlton had withdrawn into the invisible seclusion of the west end, +where he was nervously scraping at the nearest stone when the visitor +appeared, only to stop short with a whistle. + +"I thought this was the church the parson was building with his own +hands?" + +"So it is, my lord." + +"And you are what he calls his own hands!" + +"No, I am he." + +The visitor stared. + +"You the parson?" + +"I know I don't look like one," admitted Carlton, glancing from his +ruined hands to the shabby clothes in which he worked; "nor can I fairly +consider myself one at present. Yet I am still the only rector of this +parish, and it was I who wrote to your lordship about the stone. Yours +are the only quarries in this part of the country. The stone I am now +using came from them. But it is just finished, and unless you will let +me have some more I may have to stop; otherwise I believe that I could +build up to the roof, in time, without assistance." + +"And why should you?" + +"My church was burnt down through my own--fault." + +"I know all about that," said his lordship. "What I ask is, why should +you insist upon building it up single-handed?" + +"I didn't insist originally," sighed Carlton. "It is a very long story." + +The earl regarded him with a pair of very penetrating little eyes; he +was an ugly man with an ugly reputation, but one of those who take as +little trouble to conceal their worst characteristics as to display +their best. + +"To be quite frank with you," said he, "I happen to know something of +your story; and I consider it a jolly sight more discreditable to others +than to you. That's _my_ opinion, and I don't care who knows it. So you +are really and literally doing this thing with your own two hands?" + +"Literally--as yet." + +"And who looks after you?" + +"Oh, no one comes near me; but I am bound to say that I have learnt to +look pretty well after myself. I have found it absolutely necessary for +my work." + +"Cookin' for yourself, and all that sort of thing?" + +"Cooking and even killing when necessary." + +"Is the boycott as wide and as bad as all that?" + +"It is no worse than I deserve." + +The visitor, looking sharply to see whether this was cant, was convinced +of its sincerity at a glance, though he loudly disagreed with the +opinion. + +"I call it a jolly shame," said he; "but I'm not going to hurt your +feelings by expressing mine. I'm the last man to rake up the past. But +it would be a different thing if you had really fired the church; that +was the last iniquity, charging you with that! How do I know you didn't? +There was a young friend of mine on the bench, and I had it from him as +a fact, with a jolly lot more besides. Now show me what you've done +before I go." + +This did not take a minute; there was so little to show for the first +long year and more of scraping, re-pointing, or rebuilding from the +ground. Save at the end where they had stood talking, there was +scarcely a wall that reached to their shoulders, and their tour of +inspection was closely followed from the road. It was conducted with few +words on either side, though the noble Earl muttered several which would +not have been muttered in other company. In the end he made a startling +undertaking. He would not only send as much more stone as was required, +but neither the stuff nor its delivery should cost Mr. Carlton a penny. + +Carlton turned a deeper bronze, but begged as a favour to be allowed to +pay. The new church was his debt to the parish. It was the one debt that +he would pay. The uttermost farthing and the least last stone were to +have come out of his own pocket. That had been his undertaking; it was +still his heart's ambition; but as such he saw its unworthy side; and +would place himself in his lordship's hands, sooner than be swayed by +false pride in such a matter. + +"Then you shall pay through the nose!" the other promised him; "and I'm +damned if I don't think all the more of you. I beg your pardon. I was +trying not to swear. But I never could stand parsons, and I suppose +it'll shock you when I tell you straight that you're the best I've +struck! You're a man, you are, and I take off my hat to you." + +He did so openly before the wide eyes and wider mouths of those watching +from the road; and so ended an incident which Sir Wilton Gleed described +as one of the most scandalous in all his experience. "Birds of a +feather," was, however, his ready and untiring comment; and the saying +went from door to door, as "not guilty but don't do it again," had gone +before it; for there is nothing like a timeworn saying to crystallise a +widespread sentiment. + +This one did not come to Robert Carlton's ears, but he was perhaps the +first to whom the obvious comment had occurred, and its easy +justification did a little damp the glow in which his latest champion +had left him. It were better to have won the allegiance of a better man. +Yet who was he to judge his fellows? He had forfeited the right to +criticise another. Let him then be truly and duly thankful; for with +each waning year he had more and more occasion. Surely the heart of man +was beginning at last to soften towards an erring brother, who repented +very bitterly of his sin, and who was doing faithfully the little that +he could to undo the least of his sin's results. Ah, that he could have +done more! Ah, that by dying he could bring the dead to life! + +He was only a man; he could only suffer in his turn. That he had done, +was doing, and was still to do. And he thanked God for it again; so much +of the old spirit still endured. Yet was he none the less thankful for +every token of pardon or of pity from mere men. He knew that many would +justly execrate his name until the end. He knew of one at least who +would never forgive him in this life. + +This one came on a moonlight night in the spring of this fourth year; +came limping into the churchyard, leaning on his great stick, and +growling savagely to himself; little suspecting that he had Carlton +caught in the ruins, listening, watching, fascinated, from one of those +ragged interstices with which even his perseverance and even his +ingenuity could scarcely cope. To be exact, it was, or was to be, the +mullioned window in the south transept; and as Musk advanced past this +angle of the building, the clergyman first leant, then crept, over the +sill to watch him. + +He stole into the open. Musk had his back turned; his shoulders were +very round. Carlton knew well at what grave the other stood staring, and +his heart stirred heavily within him. Oh, his wickedness! Oh, his sin! +How could there be any forgiveness, in heaven or on earth, for him a +clergyman? The poor old man, so old, so bent! He must speak to him; he +must throw himself at his feet; so bent, so lame! Oh, that that stick +might strike the life out of him then and there! + +He was creeping forward; suddenly he stopped. Musk was stooping, moving +his stick to and fro across the grave, with a sweeping movement, as of a +scythe. What was he doing? Carlton remembered--divined--and his blood +ran cold. The snowdrops were out; he had put some on the grave. It had +no stone, no name. It was only the tidiest and the greenest mound in all +the churchyard. He saw to that. And yet his flowers desecrated it; must +be swept to the winds . . . + +Musk had come away. He was looking at the south wall where it had +obviously been rebuilt. Carlton was skulking in the porch. The high moon +fell heavily on the upturned face, covering it with white patches and +black wrinkles; and these were working like a seething mass; but for a +long time the great frame stood motionless. Then, in a flash, a huge +fist flew from the huge shoulder, struck the sandstone a sickening blow, +swung round and was shaken at the rectory through the trees until the +blood dripped from the mangled knuckles. Carlton was so near that he +could both see and hear the heavy drops. He drew further within the +porch: he had also seen his enemy's face. + +Carlton had the fair mind and the true eye of the exceptional man. He +saw most things immediately as they really were, not as he wished to see +them, still less as they affected himself. He saw the moonlit face of +Jasper Musk for many a day. It did not haunt him. He could have +dismissed the vision from his mind at will; he preferred to consider it +calmly in a white light. There was hate undying and invincible. There +was something to respect. Carlton compared the petty though persistent +enmity of Sir Wilton Gleed with the great dumb hatred of Jasper Musk; +the last was inexorable as it was just; the first not wholly one or the +other, or Carlton was mistaken in the smaller man. Sir Wilton might be +the last man on earth to forgive him, yet in the very end he would +follow the world, supposing for a moment that the world ever led. But +Jasper Musk would hate the harder as the hate of others dwindled and +died. + +This conviction cast no new shadow across Carlton's life, but it brought +a new name into his prayers, and put the fine edge on an old anxiety. He +had always been anxious about his child, though in the beginning that +sense had been overborne by others. Now, however, it was acute enough. +What was becoming of the boy? Did he live? Was Musk bringing him up? +Was he kindly treated? Yes, yes, they would be kind enough! Carlton +trusted his enemy there; but his own position was none the less grieving +as he came to realise what it was. He had no position at all towards the +child--no rights, no control, no voice, no _locus standi_ whatsoever. +Was it better so, or worse? What were they teaching the child? Would he +also grow up to deny God, and to execrate the name of his unworthy +minister? + +Yes, it was a shadow; but no new one; it only fell heavier and stretched +further than before. And gradually Carlton became obsessed with the idea +that he must do something, take some step, give some earnest of +voluntary responsibility, no matter what new humiliation awaited him. +But what to do, what step to take, for the best! As life grew a very +little easier in other ways that have been shown, this problem came upon +Carlton as a fresh complication, and as a poignant reminder of his +original wickedness. It was not, however, a problem to be solved out of +hand. It required infinite thought, and ceaseless prayer for that right +judgment for which Robert Carlton now again looked upward as well as +within. But while he thought, and even while he prayed, the walls were +still growing under his hands. + +And in his work he was strangely and serenely happy; there were no more +spasmodic joys and qualms. Enormous difficulties lay between him and the +impossible roof. He was at once artist and man enough to be stimulated +by these. He drew in chalk, upon the bare floors of his disused rooms, +full-size diagrams of all his arches, divided into as many parts as +there were to be stones, according to the easy rule set forth in his +precious book. Then he collected all the boxes, tin, wood, and +cardboard, that he could find upon the premises, and cut these up into +numbered patterns coinciding exactly with the diagrams on the floor, +thus providing himself with evening occupation for a whole winter, and +having all in readiness by the spring. Summer, however, found him still +in travail with the mullioned window in the north transept; and the +mullion and the tracery he was omitting altogether; the bare arch beat +him long enough. + +Prolonged solitude may debase a man to the savage or exalt him to the +saint; it never leaves him the mere man he was. Robert Carlton was still +too human to merit for a moment the hyperbole of saint; nevertheless he +developed in his loneliness several of those traits which are less of +this world than of a better. His mind dwelt continuously upon holy +things; it had ceased altogether to feed upon itself. He had suffered no +more sickness, either of body or of soul, such as that which had +threatened to destroy both in the first awful winter. The whole man was +chastened, purified, simplified and refined, by the consuming fires +through which he had passed. His faith had never been stronger than it +was now; it had never, never been so near in sheer simplicity to the +faith of a little child. In a word, and little as he knew it, this great +sinner, proven libertine, suspected incendiary, was now living in the +very sight and smile of God; and even His humblest creatures loved and +trusted him as never in the days of prosperity and good report; for now +he loved them first. Nature, indeed, had not endowed him with that +sympathetic insight into inferior life--that genius for herself--which +is born in most people who are to have it at all. To Robert Carlton the +talent only came in his lonely and dishonoured prime, as the solace of +his exile, as a new interest and occupation for his mind, and surely +also as a sign of grace returning. There grew upon him in these years +the knowledge and love of very little things, trodden under foot or +brushed aside until now; a larger passion for nature in all her moods, +and all their manifestations; and, above all, the equal peace and +independence of him to whom the grasses whisper and the elements sing. + +So one wind braced him to titanic effort, and another confirmed him in +patient toil, and another relaxed both mind and members in merited ease; +so he came to know the birds about him, almost as a shepherd knows his +sheep, and even to discover some individuality beneath the feathers. +There was one huge sparrow, a perfect demon for the crumbs which Carlton +strewed every morning near the scene of his day's work, so that he might +not be quite alone. The lowest human qualities came out in this small +bird until finally, and with infinite ingenuity, it was trapped, +rationed, and compelled to watch a feast of the smaller fry through the +wires of a cage. Then there was a robin which in time came to perch upon +the solitary's hat while he worked; only in the beginning were there +crumbs in the brim. And again there was a starling that entertained him +by the hour together, and all for love, from an elder-bush close to the +shed. + +But each of these years brought riper knowledge, until God's leafy acre, +with its canopy of changing sky, both teeming with life to his quickened +vision, became not only the outcast's second Bible, but all the almanac +he needed or possessed. With no newspaper to distract his mind, and +perhaps not a letter or a human voice for months, it was on bird and +leaf that he came to rely for the time of year; while the field of his +research was greatly extended by nocturnal exercise upon the +pine-serrated plateau beyond the church. Now the tips of the chestnut +twigs might bulge and bud, but spring was not spring until the plover +paraded his new black breast, or a peewit rose screaming at the midnight +intruder. All summer the small bird was king; hedgerows twittered; +crumbs were scorned; man was jilted for slug and worm. But the end came +in sight with the homebred mallard, flying feebly in his summer +feathers; and the flight of the wild duck was the end of all. The third +year found Carlton watching for the mallard as his bird of ill-omen, and +redoubling his efforts while his ear prepared for the shrill music of +the full-grown quills in final flight. Harsh experience had taught him +how little he could do, with any certainty or any continuity, in the +season when the little birds and he were best friends. + +It was late in May, and the church would soon be hidden for another +summer; meanwhile Carlton was still at work upon his transept window, in +a corner which a great stack of undressed sandstone made invisible from +the lane, as it already was from the road. The folk from other villages +were beginning to stop and watch him longer than he liked, and he did +not care to be a cynosure at all. He only asked to build his church in +peace, and with it an example which should do at least a little to +counteract the one he had already set; and he meant both for his own +people, not for the outlying world. He really feared a reaction in his +favour on the part of the sentimental outsider. It would do him fresh +injury in the eyes of many of whom he honestly longed to win back in the +end. Moreover, his head was very level in these days. He saw nothing +heroic in his own conduct. With all his wish to undo a little of the +harm that he had done to others, there was a very human eagerness to +redeem his own past, so far as that was possible upon earth. Carlton was +never unaware of this incentive. He entertained no illusions about +himself, nor did he wish to create any in others. For example, there was +his work. It was never easy, sometimes hopeless, always fascinating. But +the man himself desired no credit for devotion to labour which he loved +for its own sake, and in which he was still capable (but no longer +ashamed) of forgetting the past. + +The transept window engrossed him to the last degree; mullion or no +mullion, it involved the largest arch that Carlton had yet attempted; +and already it alone had occupied many weeks. The patterns had been the +easy recreation of his winter evenings, but it had taken him all the +spring to reproduce a score of these in solid stone; for though the +walls were coursed rubble, the windows must have ashlar facings, to be +as they had been before; and ashlar is to coursed rubble what broadcloth +is to Harris tweed. What with indefatigable labour, however, and the +general proficiency which he had now attained in his self-taught craft, +Carlton had his jambs up by the end of May, and his arched framework +fixed between them, all ready to support the arch itself. He was now +engaged upon the nine wedge-shaped stones to form the latter, working +each to the fine ashlar finish, as also to the exact dimensions of its +fellow in tin, wood, or cardboard, and laying them in couples on +alternate sides of the wooden centre, so as to weight it evenly as the +book ordained. + +It was the middle of the afternoon, and the quiet corner was already in +shadow; beyond, the wet grass glistened, for the day was a duel between +sun and rain. Carlton was taking the busier advantage of a brilliant +interval, and roughing out a new voussoir with the bold precision of the +expert mason. Ting, ting, ting, fell the hammer on the cold-chisel; the +soft, wet sandstone peeled off in curling flakes; the quick strokes rang +like a bell through the cool and cleanly air. It had been honest rain, +and it was honest sunshine. The green world broke freshly upon all the +senses. Every colour was more vivid than its wont, from the reddish +yellow of the rain-soaked stone to lilac and laburnum in the rectory +garden; from the creamy castles of the full-blown chestnuts to the +emerald sprays which were all that the slower elms had as yet to show +against an uncertain sky. Every inch of earth, every blade and petal, +was contributing its quota to the sweet summer smell. The birds sang; +the bees hummed; the hammer rang. And Carlton was so intent upon his +task, so bent upon making up for time lost that day, that it might have +been mid-winter for the little he looked and listened; yet he heard and +saw none the less; and his face was filled with quiet peace. + +In appearance he was many years older; at a distance he might have +passed for the father of the man who had drawn a larger congregation +than the old church would hold. His hair was grey; his beard was +grizzled. Incessant manual toil had aged him even more by giving his +body a constant stoop. And the hands were the hands of a labouring man. +But the brown eye, once inflammable, was now all gentleness and +humility; the whole face was sweetened and exalted by solitude and +suffering; in expression more patient, less austere; though the +untrained beard and moustache, hiding mouth and jaw, had something to do +with this. + +To his gentleness, however, there was striking testimony even now, as +his hammer rained ringing blows upon the cold-chisel; for within easy +reach of it perched the tame robin on another stone, quizzically +watching the performance. Then, in the same moment, three things +happened. The robin flew away, Carlton turned his head, and the ringing +blows broke off. + + + + +XXI + +AT THE FLINT HOUSE + + +"The child must have a name, Jasper." + +"All right, you give it one. That's nothun to me." + +"But he must be christened properly." + +"Why must he?" + +"Oh, Jasper, if you don't fare to believe, his mother did, poor thing!" + +"And a lot of good that did her . . . but do you have your way. Make a +canting little Christian of him if you like. Do you think I care what +you do with the brat? I know what I'd do with it, if that wasn't for the +law!" + +So, in the early days, while Robert Carlton was still learning to live +alone, his son was trundled across the heath to Linkworth, and there +christened George after no one in particular. Followed the remaining +period of extreme infancy, during which Jasper Musk seldom set eyes upon +the child, and was more or less oblivious to its concrete existence. +Then one afternoon, the second summer, as Jasper sat smoking at a back +window, in the big chair to which his sciatica would bind him from +morning till night, there was a shuffling and a grunting in the passage, +and in came the child on all fours, with the lamp of adventure alight +and shining in grimy cheeks and great grey eyes. + +Musk took the pipe from his mouth, and met the small intruder with an +expressionless stare. Had his wife been by, no doubt he would have +bidden her take the little devil out of his sight; he had done so +before, using a harsher and more literal epithet for choice. But this +afternoon he was alone, and very weary of his solitary confinement. So +for the moment Musk sat stolidly intent; and the child, after a halt +induced by the creaking of the open door and the austere apparition +within, advanced once more, with the infantile equivalent for a cheer. + +"Well, you've got a cheek!" said Jasper, grimly. + +The boy had reached his legs, and was pulling himself up by the +particularly lame one, chattering the while in the foreign tongue of one +year old. Musk winced and muttered, then suddenly encircled the small +body with his mighty hands, and set the child high and dry upon his +knee. + +"And now what?" said he. "And now what?" + +For answer a chubby hand flew straight at his whiskers, grabbed them +unerringly, and pulled without mercy, but with yells of delight that +brought Musk's wife in hot haste from a far corner of the rambling +house. In the doorway she threw up her arms. + +"Oh, Georgie!" she cried aghast. "You naughty boy--you naughty boy!" + +Jasper had already created a diversion in favour of his whiskers, and +was in the act of blowing open an enormous watch when his wife +appeared. + +"Now you take and mind your own business," snapped he, "and we'll mind +ours . . . Blow--can't you blow? Like this, then--p-f-f-f--and there you +are! Now you try; blow, and that'll open again." + +Georgie walked before the summer was over; and this was the year in +which Jasper scarcely set foot to the ground, so he made use of the +child from the first. Now it was his pipe, now his spectacles, now the +newspaper; these were the first familiar objects which the child came to +know by name before he could speak; and he never saw any one of the +three without taking it as straight as he could toddle to the great grey +man in the chair. + +Mrs. Musk suddenly found half her work with Georgie taken entirely off +her hands. She was even quicker over another discovery. Jasper would not +own that he had taken to the child; in her presence, on the contrary, he +ignored its very existence as utterly as heretofore. Yet now every day +she could have found them together at most hours; only she knew better. + +Cheerless environment for this new life--a gloomy old house--a grim old +couple. Nevertheless, and in very spite of all the circumstances of his +birth, Georgie from the first evinced that temperament which is a sun +unto itself. An expansive gaiety was his normal mood, and for years the +only variant was a terrible and overwhelming indignation with all his +world. He was, in fact, an entirely healthy little savage, with all the +wild spirits and facile affections of his age, and no exemption from its +traditional ills. Once he had croup so severely that two doctors came +in the middle of the night, and Georgie never forgot their grave faces +and his grandfather's grim one at the foot of the bed. Indeed, the scene +formed his first permanent impression, though the sequel was more +memorable in itself. Georgie seemed to go to sleep for days and days, +and to awake in another world, though the bed was the same, and the +medicine-bottles, and the singing kettle; for it was day-time, and the +room full of sun, and the doctors gone; but in the sunlight there stood +instead the loveliest lady whom Georgie had beheld in his three or four +years of earthly experience. Thereupon he lay with his firm little mouth +pursed up, his grey eyes greater than even their wont, and his mind at +work upon some surreptitious teaching of his grandmother. It was a very +simple question that he asked in the end, but it made the lady kiss him +and cry over him in a way he never could understand. + +"Are you a angel?" Georgie had said. + +Gwynneth happened to be somewhat morbidly aware of her own poverty in +angelic qualities, though it was not this that made her cry. She was +alone at the hall for the winter, which Sir Wilton and Lady Gleed were +spending upon a well-beaten track abroad, while Sidney was still at +Cambridge. Gwynneth also might have drifted from Cannes to Nice, and +from Nice to Mentone, for she had been taken from school on Lydia's +marriage, and assigned a permanent position at the side of Lady Gleed. +In this capacity the girl had not shone, though her peculiar character +had lost nothing by the duty and faithful practice of consistent +self-suppression. On the other hand, there was the demoralising sense of +personal superiority, which was thrust upon Gwynneth at every turn of +this companionship, causing her to take an unhealthy interest in her own +faults, in order to preserve any humility at all; for she was full of +mental and of bodily vigour, and her aunt was signally devoid of both. +Consequently when Lydia petitioned to go instead (having become a mother +to her great disgust, and demanding an immediate separation from her +infant), the proposal was adopted to the equal satisfaction of all +concerned. Gwynneth, for her part, was very sorry not to travel and see +the world; but she knew, from a tantalising experience, that hotel life +was all that one could count upon seeing with Lady Gleed; and from every +other point of view it was infinite relief to be alone. Literally alone +she was not, since the little German housekeeper never left the hall. +But Fraulein Hentig was a self-contained and entirely tactful companion, +with whom it was possible to enjoy the delights of solitude while +escaping the disadvantages. The two were very good friends. + +Gwynneth was now in her twentieth year, a tall and graceful girl, albeit +with the slight stoop of the natural student that she was. At her school +she had won all available honours, but it was not a modern school, and +in those days such as Gwynneth had no definite knowledge of any wider +arena. So she left her school without great regret. She had learnt all +that they could teach her there. And she taught herself twice as much in +stolen hours spent in the hall library, which had been bought with the +place, and hitherto only used by Sidney on wet days. But now there was +no need to steal an hour; the girl's time was all her own, and she held +high revel among the books. Moreover, it was the dawn of the University +Extension system, and Gwynneth heard of a course of lectures upon +English literature, only eight miles from Long Stow, just in time to +attend. To do so she had to fight a weekly battle with the coachman, but +Fraulein Hentig took her side, and the opposition did not endure. +Gwynneth took voluminous notes and wrote elaborate essays, bringing to +the whole interest that energy, thoroughness and enthusiasm, to which, +though each was an essential characteristic, she was only now enabled to +give free play. Yet the young girl was no mere bookworm, though at this +stage of her career she seemed little else. It was a phase of +intellectual absorption, but all the while it needed but a touch of +human interest in her life to awake the deeper nature of the eternal +woman. Such awakening had come with the most alarming period of +Georgie's illness. Gwynneth was starting for her lecture, primed with +sharp pencils and her new essay, when she heard in the village that two +doctors had been at the Flint House in the night. She did not go to that +lecture at all, but for two days and nights was scarcely an hour absent +from the bedside of a little boy whom she had barely known by sight +before. And his first comprehensible words formed the question which +Gwynneth, worn out by watching, had answered in the fashion he could +never understand. + +Well, she was destined to be the boy's good angel, though he never +mistook her for one again; and sometimes she looked the part. The dark +eyes, so ardent in the pursuit of knowledge, or of any other of her +heart's desires, could yet sparkle with childish glee, or soften with +the tenderness of the ideal Madonna. The self-willed mouth and nose were +only sweet as Georgie saw them; and none but he knew the warmth of the +pale brown cheek or the crisp electric touch of the dark brown hair. +Little knowing it before, and never dreaming of it now, Gwynneth had +long been hankering for all that the little child gave her out of the +fulness and purity of his tiny heart. She supposed that she was happy +because at last she was being of some trifling use to somebody; it made +her think more of herself. Looking deeper (as she thought), through the +deceptive lenses of her inner consciousness, Gwynneth took a still less +favourable view of her latest interest in life. It was that and not much +more to the imperfect introspection of her morbid mood. + +Nevertheless, this was the happiest time that she had ever known. +Georgie and she became inseparable, even when the boy was well again; +and on him Gwynneth was really lavishing all the love and tenderness +which had been gathering in her heart since the hour when she had kissed +a dead forehead for the last time. The fact was that the girl had an +inborn capacity for passionate devotion, and was now once more enabled +to indulge this sweet instinct to the full. She still went to her weekly +lecture, read every book in the syllabus, and wrote her essay with as +much care for detail as her innate energy would permit. Nor was her work +the worse for the counter-attraction which now filled her young life to +the brim. Georgie spoke of Gwynneth as his "lady," with a sufficient +emphasis upon the possessive pronoun, and to her by a succession of pet +names of their joint invention. + +Croup is an enemy that lives to fight another day, as Dr. Marigold said +when he paid his last visit; and that word was sufficient for the Musks. +Thenceforward Georgie had only to sneeze to be put to bed, where he +wasted many days before the winter was over. But Georgie was not to be +depressed, and as Gwynneth would come and play with him for hours it was +perhaps no wonder. They both had some imagination; one showed it by +extemporary flights of downright romance, and the other by following +these with immense eyes and not a syllable of his own from beginning to +end. Then and there they would dramatise the story, for it was usually +one of adventure, and Georgie had a clockwork paddle-steamer called the +_Dover_, which sailed the bed manned by cardboard sailors of Gwynneth's +making. In these seas the roughest weather was experienced in crossing +Georgie's legs, but the best fun was in the polar regions, where the +vessel lay wedged for months between two pillows, while the crew hunted +bear and walrus over Georgie's person, and dug winter quarters under the +clothes. + +One day, when he really had a cold, and had fallen asleep upon the +icebergs, Gwynneth took upon herself to search the cupboard for some +picture-book which he might not have seen before; and in so doing she +came across the photograph of a comely young woman, not much older than +herself, which compelled her attention rather than her curiosity, for +she guessed at once who it was. Moreover, the face was striking and +interesting in itself. The eyes had a strange look, half reckless, half +defiant, but, even in a faded and inartistic photograph, of a subtle +fascination. There was some slight coarseness of eyelid and nostril; but +for all that it was a fine expression, full of courage and full of will. +The will was obvious in the mouth. It had the strength of Musk himself. +Yet there was something about the mouth--so firm--so full--that Gwynneth +did not like. She could not have said what it was, but she preferred +looking into the eyes. They fascinated her, and she did not lift her own +eyes from them till Mrs. Musk entered and caught her thus engaged. + +"Oh, where did you find that? Give it to me--give it to me!" and the +poor soul held out hands that trembled with her voice. "That's Georgie's +poor mother," she sobbed, "and I didn't know there was another left. I +thought he'd taken and burnt them every one!" + +And she slipped the photograph inside her bodice, and pressed her lean +hands upon it, as though it were the babe itself at her breast once +more. Next instant Gwynneth's arms were about the old woman's neck, and +her fresh lips had touched the wet and shrivelled cheek of Georgie's +grandmother. + +"Ah! but you are good to us," said Mrs. Musk. "I never would have +believed a young lady could be so sweet and kind as you!" + +Not that Gwynneth was in the habit of going among the people; that was a +practice which Lady Gleed would not permit in a young lady over whom she +exercised any sort of control. Consequently there was some talk in the +village at this time, and a little scene at the hall soon after Sir +Wilton and his wife arrived for the Easter recess. But Gwynneth argued +that in no sense could the Musks be accounted ordinary villagers; and +the squire himself took her side very firmly in the matter. + +"I won't have you rate Musk among the yokels," said Sir Wilton +afterwards. "He is the one substantial man in the place, and a very good +friend of mine." + +"Well, I don't consider it nice for Gwynneth to be always with that +child." + +"She doesn't know the child's history; you have only to hear her talk +about him to see that." + +"I don't think it nice, all the same," Lady Gleed repeated. + +"Then take her back to town with you." + +"No, she is out now, and I can't be bothered with her this season. She +is not like other girls. I've a good mind to send her abroad for a +year." + +"You can do as you like about that. It might be a very good thing. +Meanwhile I'm not going to have Musk's feelings hurt; only yesterday, +when I went to see him, he was telling me all Gwynneth has done for them +during the winter. I'm not going to break with a man like that by +suddenly forbidding her to do any more." + +So it was decided that Gwynneth should go for a year to a relation of +Fraulein Hentig's at Leipzig, for the sake of her music, which the girl +had neglected rather disgracefully since leaving school, but of which +she was none the less fond, given the proper stimulus. Gwynneth herself +acclaimed the plan, and indeed had a voice in it; there was only one +reason why she was not entirely glad to go; and her devotion to Georgie +was more constant than ever during the few weeks which were left to her. + +Summer was beginning, and the boy was well and strong, with chubby +cheeks and sturdy bare legs. Often Gwynneth had him to play in the hall +garden--this on Sir Wilton's own suggestion--but more often she took him +for a walk. There were beautiful walks all round Long Stow. There was +the windy walk across the heather towards Linkworth; there were cool +walks by the tiny river that ran parallel with the village street, +bounding the hall meadow and both meadow and garden of the Flint House; +there was a fascinating expedition, with spade and pail, to the +sand-hills off the road to Lakenhall. Yet it was on none of these +excursions that Gwynneth lost Georgie, but while leaving some papers at +the saddler's workshop, in Long Stow itself. + +Fuller would keep her to talk politics, or rather to listen to his own: +it was the year of the first Home Rule Bill, and even Mr. Gladstone had +never stirred the saddler's anger, hatred and contempt to such a pitch +as they reached in this connection. Gwynneth, on her side, had an +insufficient grasp of the measure, but an instinctive veneration for the +man; and she was young enough to grow heated in argument, even with the +saddler. When at length she turned away, more flushed than victorious, +there was no vestige of the child. + +"Georgie! Georgie!" + +Neither was there any answer. Gwynneth turned upon the politician. + +"Didn't you see him, Mr. Fuller?" + +"Gord love you, miss, I thought you come alone!" + +And the saddler leant across his bench until his spectacles were flush +with the open window at which Gwynneth stood. + +"Alone? Georgie Musk was with me; and I've lost him through arguing with +you." + +She inquired at the next cottage. Yes, they had seen him pass "with you, +miss," but that was all. There were no cottages further on; the +saddler's was the last on that side and at that end of the village. +Opposite was the rectory gate, with the low flint wall running far to +the right, overhung at present by the great leaves and heavy blossoms of +the chestnuts. And all at once Gwynneth noticed that the chestnut leaves +were very dark, the sky overcast, and another shower even then +beginning. + +"He will get wet--it may kill him!" + +And the girl ran wildly on along the road; but it was a straight road, +and she could see further than Georgie could possibly have travelled. So +now there was only the lane running up by the church. + +Gwynneth took it at top speed; an instant brought her abreast of the +east end, gaping wide and deep for the east window, yet built like a +rock on either side to the height of the eaves. Another step, and +Gwynneth was standing still. + +Already her sub-consciousness had remarked the silence of hammer and +chisel, which had tinkled in her ears as she brought Georgie up the +village, ringing more distinctly at every step, and quite loud when +first they had stopped at the saddler's window. Then it must have ceased +altogether. But now Gwynneth heard another sound instead. + + + + +XXII + +A LITTLE CHILD + + +Georgie stood beyond the mason's litter, his firm legs planted in the +wet grass, his holland pinafore less brown than his knees. A sailor hat, +with the brim turned down, threw the roguish face into shadow; but the +flush of successful flight was not extinguished; and the great eyes +fixed on Carlton were nowise abashed. Shyness had never been a feature +of Georgie's character. + +"Hallo!" said he. + +Carlton stood like his own walls. + +So this was the child. + +A new instinct was awake in the man's breast; he had never an instant's +doubt. + +And it struck him dumb. + +"I say," said Georgie, "are you angry?" + +But he showed no anxiety on the point, merely beaming while the grown +man fought for words. + +"Angry? No--no----" + +And now he was fighting for the power of speech--fighting hot eyes and +twitching lips for his own manhood--and for the little impudent face +that would fill with fear if he lost. But he won. + +"Of course I'm not angry; but"--for he must know for certain--"what's +your name?" + +"Georgie." + +"That's not all." + +"Georgie Musk." + +Carlton filled his lungs. + +"And who sent you here, Georgie?" + +"Nobody di'n't." + +"Then how have you come?" + +"By my own self, course." + +"What! all the way from the Flint House? That's where you live, isn't +it?" + +Carlton put the second question with sudden misgiving. The name was not +unique in that country; he might be mistaken after all. And already--in +these few moments--he could not bear the idea of being thus mistaken in +this sturdy, friendly, independent boy. + +"Yes, that's where," said Georgie, nodding. + +"Then what can have brought him here!" + +"Well, you see," said Georgie, confidentially, "my lady taked me for a +walk----" + +"Your lady?" + +"And I wunned away." + +"But who do you mean by your lady?" + +"My lady," said Georgie, turning dense. + +"Your governess?" guessed Carlton. + +"Oh, my governess, my governess!" cried Georgie, roaring with laughter +because the word was new to him, but made a splendid expletive: "oh, my +governess, gwacious me!" + +"Well, whoever it is," muttered Carlton, "she oughtn't to have lost you; +and you stay with me until she finds you." + +"That's good," said Georgie, with conviction. "I liker stay wif you." + +Carlton caught the child up suddenly, and swung him shoulder-high. What +a laugh he had! And what a firm boy, so heavy and straight and strong! +Carlton sat down in his barrow, taking the little fellow on his knee, +yet holding him at arm's length for self-control. + +"How can you like being with a person you've never seen before?" asked +Carlton, tremulous again, for all his strength. + +"'Cos I heard you makin' somekin," said Georgie, who was looking about +him. "What are you makin', I say?" + +It was here that, without any particular provocation, Robert Carlton's +resolution suddenly failed him, so that he hugged and kissed the child, +in a sudden access of uncontrollable emotion. This, however, was as +suddenly suppressed. Georgie had wriggled from his knee; but instead of +running away (as the other feared for one breathless moment), he +continued looking about him as before, bored a little, but nothing more. + +"What are you buildin', I say?" he now inquired. + +"A church." + +"What's a church?" + +Carlton came straight to his feet. + +"Do you never go to one?" he asked; but his tone was nearly all remorse. + +"No, I never." + +"Then have you never heard of God?" + +And now the tone was his most determined one. + +"Yes," said Georgie, subdued but not frightened. + +"You are sure that you have been told about God?" + +"Yes, sure." + +"Who has taught you?" + +"My lady and granny--not grand-daddy." + +"You say your prayers to Him?" + +"Yes, I always." + +"Sure?" + +"Yes, sure." + +Carlton stood with heaving chest. He was spared something at last; his +cup was not to overflow after all. And, as he stood, the grass +whispered, and the rain came down. + +Again Georgie was caught up, to be set down next instant in the shed; +but this time he was really offended. + +"I don't want to come in," he whimpered. "I want to build wif your +bwicks. They're much, much bigger'n mine!" + +"But it's raining, don't you see? It would never do for Georgie to get +wet." + +"Oh, I wish I would play wif your bwicks!" + +"Why, Georgie, you couldn't lift them; you're not strong enough." + +"But I are, I tell you. I really are!" + +"Here's one, then," said Carlton, who kept his misfits in the shed. "You +try." + +Georgie did try. He rolled the stone over, though it was no small one; +lift it he could not. + +"You see, it was heavier than you thought." + +"'Cos never mind," coaxed Georgie, in another formula of his own; "you +carry it for me!" + +"But it's raining, and we should both be wet through." + +"'Cos _never_ mind!" + +"But I do mind; and, what's more, everybody else would mind as well." + +"Then what _shall_ we do?" cried Georgie, from his depths. + +Carlton had no idea. But the boy was weary, and must be amused; that was +the first necessity; and he who had never laid himself out to conciliate +men must strain every nerve to please this little child. His eyes flew +round the shed. And there upon the shelf stood his gargoyles deep in +dust. + +"Oh, what a funny old man!" cried Georgie. "Oh, ho, ho!" + +But Carlton, in his ignorance of children, had over-estimated a strong +child's strength; the stone head slipped through the tiny hands, +narrowly missing the tiny toes; and when Georgie stooped and rolled it +over, it was seen that a terrible accident had really occurred. + +"Oh, oh, oh!" cried an alarming little voice, "Oh, he's broken his nose, +he's broken it to bits; oh, oh!" + +Carlton made a dive for the other gargoyle; but this was a peculiarly +sinister face; and Georgie's tears only ran the faster. + +"Oh, I don't like that one. It's a ho'ble face. I don't like it." + +Carlton cast the thing from him, and at the same moment became and +looked inspired. + +"Shall I make you a new face, Georgie? A better one than either of the +others?" + +"Yes, do, I say! A new face! A new face!" + +And shouts of delight came from the tear-stained one: such was the sound +that Gwynneth heard in the lane. + +A very inspiration it proved. All unpractised in their earliest +accomplishment, the hard-worked hands had never been so deft before; nor +ever stone softer or chisel sharper than the first of each that could be +found. They were trembling, those tanned and twisted fingers, but that +only seemed to impart a nervous vigour to their touch. When the thing +had taken rough shape, and a deep curve or two suggested a whole head of +hair; when eyes and nose had come from the same sure delving, and the +mouth almost at a touch; then the mouth of Georgie, long open in mere +fascination, recovered its primary function, and yelled approval in +surprising terms. + +"Oh, my Jove, my Jove!" he roared. "What a lovely, lovely, _lovely_ +face! Oh, my Jove, I must show it to my lady!" + +Carlton looked upon a baby face on fire with rapture; and for once no +dissimilar light shone upon his own. + +"Will you--give me a kiss for it, Georgie?" + +Without a word the little arms flew round a weatherbeaten neck that bent +to meet them, and the glowing cheeks buried themselves, voluntarily, in +the beard that had only hurt before; and not one kiss, but countless +kisses, were Georgie's thanks for the lump of sandstone that had grown +into a face before his eyes. And such was the scene whereon Gwynneth +Gleed arrived. + +At first she drew back, hesitating in the rain, because neither of them +saw her, and she could not, could not understand! But her hesitation was +short-lived, or, rather, it had to be conquered and it was. So with +flaming cheeks--because they would not see her--and dark hair limp from +the rain--eyes sparkling, lips parted, teeth peeping--came Gwynneth to +the shed at last. + +And the child ran to her, while the man's eyes followed him hungrily, +climbing no higher than Georgie's height. + +"Oh, look what a lovely, lovely face the workman made me; do look, I +say! Is it wery kind of him to make me such a lovely thing?" + +Gwynneth had been dragged to where the new head stood mounted upon a +misfit; and Carlton had been obliged to rise. But his eyes had not risen +from the child. + +"Is it kind of him, I tell you?" persisted Georgie. + +"Very kind," said Gwynneth, "indeed." + +And civility compelled Carlton to look up at last. + +"It was only to pass the time," he said. "I was obliged to bring him in +out of the rain." + +"It was so good of you," murmured Gwynneth. "But it was not good of +Georgie to run away as soon as my back was turned!" + +Georgie paid no heed to this reproach; he was busy playing with the +uncouth head. + +"Oh, don't say that," said Carlton, quickly; "I don't get so many +visitors! Are you the little chap's governess?" he added, yet more +quickly, to undo the visible effects of his words. + +"No, I'm--from the hall, you know." + +He could not but start at this. But now he was guarding his tongue. And, +as he reflected, there came back to him the vague memory of a face in +church, followed by the sharper picture of a very young girl at the +piano in a pleasant room--the last that he had ever been in. + +Gwynneth had recalled the same scene, and could see him as he had been, +while she gazed upon him as he was. + +"I remember," he said, gravely. "So you take an interest in this little +chap, Miss Gleed?" + +"Rather more than that," replied Gwynneth, taken out of herself in an +instant, and declaring her innocence by her sudden and unconscious +enthusiasm. "I love him dearly," she said from her heart: and together +their eyes returned to the round sailor hat, the brown pinafore and the +browner legs which were all that was now to be seen of Georgie the +engrossed. + +"He is indeed a dear little fellow," said Carlton, smothering his sighs. + +"And so affectionate!" added Gwynneth, thinking of the strange pair +together as she had found them. + +"Marvellously independent, too, for his age." + +"He is not quite four. You would think him older." + +"Indeed I would . . . And so you are his 'lady'!" + +"So he insists on calling me." + +"You seem to be very much to him," said Robert Carlton, jealously +enough at heart, as he looked for once into the fine, kind, enthusiastic +eyes of Gwynneth; but they fell embarrassed, and his own were quick +enough to wander back to the boy. + +"I have been more or less alone since last autumn," said Gwynneth. +"Georgie has been as much to me as I can possibly have been to him." + +"But he lives at the Flint House, does he not? I--I gathered he was a +grandchild of the Musks." + +"So he is." + +"Are they bringing him up?" + +"Yes." + +"Kindly?" + +"Oh, yes--kindly. But----" + +"Are they fond of him?" + +"Touchingly so; but, of course, they are two old people." + +"And so you stepped in to lighten and brighten a little child's life!" + +Gwynneth blushed unseen; for all this time he was looking at Georgie and +not at her. + +"You mustn't put it like that," she said, "for it isn't the case. It was +quite a selfish pleasure. I was all alone. And it began by his being +dreadfully ill." + +"What--Georgie?" + +"Yes, and I was able to nurse him a little. And after that we couldn't +do without each other. But now we shall have to try." + +He had looked at her with the last quick question, and was looking +still, a new anxiety in his eyes. + +"Do you mean that you are going away?" he said; and his tone did not +conceal his disappointment. + +"I am sorry to say I am," replied Gwynneth, feeling all she said. + +"Soon?" + +"To-morrow." + +"Far?" + +"Abroad." + +"But not for long!" + +"A year." + +Her eyes fell at last before the frank trouble in his; and he ended the +pause with a sigh. "I am very sorry," he said. "I was hoping that you +would often bring him here to see me." Nor was any compliment taken or +intended in a speech which rang with the primitive sincerity of one who +had spoken very little for a very long time. + +Gwynneth took the short step that brought her to the opening of the +shed. She had suddenly discovered that the rain had never ceased +pattering on the corrugated roof, and was wondering when the shower +would stop. She wished it was fair, for more reasons than one. It was +high time she took Georgie away; and she did not know what Musk would +say when he heard where they had been. She only knew his opinion of +parsons generally, and of all that they professed, though she had once +heard him allow that they were not all as bad as this one. Besides, even +Gwynneth felt natural qualms in the society of an outcast whom no one +else went near, quite apart from the popular conviction that he had +burnt his own church to the ground. That she had never believed. And +now, when she found him all but at his work; when she saw him at close +quarters, aged and bent, with tattered clothes and battered hands, yet +handsome as ever, and now picturesque; and when she looked upon the +gigantic work that had aged him, the finished wall here, the deliberate +preparations there; then that old calumny was blown to final shreds for +Gwynneth. He might have done worse, as she had sometimes heard said, but +he had not done that. And the woman went to work within her: was there +nothing she could do for him? Was there no little luxury she could get +and send him? His clothes were torn--if only she could mend them! Alas! +that she was going abroad next day. + +Another moment and she was glad: how could she do anything, a young +girl, when all the rest of the world held aloof? Anything that she did, +or tried to do, would inevitably, if not rightly and properly, be +misconstrued. Yet, after this, it would be too painful to live so near +and to go on doing nothing. She had felt that long ago; and the memory +of their last encounter reoccupied her thoughts. No, she could do no +more now than she had been able to do then. Therefore she was glad to be +going away. And all this passed through her mind in the mere minute that +elapsed before the rain stopped as suddenly as it had begun. + +Yet in that minute Robert Carlton had got Georgie back upon his knee, +and Gwynneth caught him trying to extract a promise from the child; in +another he had risen, a duskier bronze than before, and was telling her +honestly what the promise was to have been. + +"I wanted him to come again to see me finish that head, but not to tell +his grandparents where he was going, or they would not let him. You see, +I am ashamed of it already! Make allowances for one who has not spoken +to either woman or child for very nearly four years." + +Gwynneth was deeply moved. + +"Allowances," she could but repeat; "allowances!" + +"Allow'nces, allow'nces!" chimed Georgie, to whom a new word was +necessarily humorous. + +Carlton picked him up, and kissed him lightly for the last time. To +Gwynneth he only bowed. And she was longing to take his hand. + +"Good-bye, Miss Gleed; a good journey and a happy time to you." + +Gwynneth had to say something, since she could do nothing, to show her +sympathy. "I think it's all wonderful--wonderful!" was all she did say, +with a little wave towards the sandstone walls. And yet her small speech +haunted her for weeks, seeming in turns so many things that she had +never meant it to be. + +Georgie also waved with energy. "Good-bye, good-bye, I'll see you in the +mornin'!" was his irresponsible farewell. + +And so they disappeared together, as the sun shone again through the +trees with the emerald tips, now dripping diamonds too; but to Robert +Carlton that little scene of his endless labours, the shed, the strewed +stones, the barrow, the rising walls, the blossoming chestnuts, the +jewelled elms, had never looked so drab and desolate before. + +Yet, long after it was really dark, the lonely man still hovered about +the spot, now standing where the child had stood with his brown pinafore +and his browner legs; now sitting empty-kneed in the empty barrow; now +handling the rough stone head that he had hewn in a few minutes for +little Georgie. + + + + +XXIII + +DESIGN AND ACCIDENT + + +Next morning he was early at his arch, and had soon finished the +voussoir which he had been roughing out when this vital interruption +occurred. But he was not satisfied with the stone, and wasted much time +in turning it over and over and wondering whether it would do or not. +Now this was a point upon which Carlton usually knew his mind in a +twinkling. Indecision of any sort was, indeed, among the last of his +failings; but that man is not himself who has not closed an eye all +night; and Robert Carlton had only closed his in prayer. + +Later in the morning his case was worse. He would think of the boy until +the chisel went too deep and spoilt another stone. Or, just when he was +beginning to get on, he would drop his tools and wheel round suddenly, +half hoping to see a second little apparition in a sailor hat with the +brim turned down. But these things do not happen twice, much less when +looked and longed for, as Carlton knew very well. And yet his knowledge +did not help him in the matter; on the other hand, it drove him again +and again to his gate, to gaze wistfully up and down the road he never +traversed; and this was the most disastrous habit of all. + +Once more the work stood still; for the first time in three whole years, +it stood practically still for days. + +Meanwhile, at the Flint House, there had never been any secret as to +what had happened between showers at the church. Gwynneth had told Mrs. +Musk, and Mrs. Musk had deemed it better to tell Jasper himself than to +let him gather the truth from Georgie's prattle. And in the event Musk +took it better than his wife had dared to hope, merely vilifying quick +and dead with renewed rancour, and grimly undertaking that the incident +should not occur again. + +So Georgie saw more of his grandfather than he had ever seen before, and +rather more than he cared to see after his close association with +Gwynneth, whose wonderful letter from Leipzig was small comfort to so +small a soul, though Mrs. Musk had to read it to Georgie many times a +day. + +"Oh! I wish I would go and see workman," the boy would exclaim without +fear. "I wish I would! I wish I would!" + +"I daresay you do," Jasper would growl from his chair. + +"Then can I; can I, I say, grand-daddy?" + +"No, you can't." + +"Oh! why can't I?" + +"Because I tell you." + +"But, you see, grand-daddy, he was making me such a lovely, lovely face. +I must go back for it. Really I must. He did say he finish fen I go +back. So of course I must go. See? See? See?" + +Thus pestered, Jasper once thundered: + +"Oh, yes, I see! I know him--I know him. I see hard enough! But if ever +you do go I'll--I'll--I'll give ye what ye never had afore and'll never +want again!" + +"Oh, don't be angry wif me," Georgie whimpered. "Oh, I wish my lady +would come back!" + +"I daresay you do," said Jasper, calming. "And I don't." + +But a child forgets; at all events Georgie did; and so surely as his +_ennui_ in the garden, within strict sight of the terrible old man in +the chair, reached a certain pitch, so surely did the treasonable +aspiration rise to his innocent lips. + +"I wish I would go and see workman. I _wish_ I would!" + +But at last one day the old man rose, stick and all; and at this even +Georgie trembled; for it was long since he had seen his grandfather on +his feet. Over the grass he came hobbling, ungainly, abnormal, frowning +down upon the buttercups. Georgie crept aside. But Musk passed him +without a word. Three times he limped the length of the overgrown lawn, +muttering, frowning; and the third time his lameness was palpably less. + +"Why, Jasper," cried Mrs. Musk, running out, "you're getting better!" + +"No, I ain't," he roared. "You mind your own business and get away +indoors." + +Mrs. Musk was meekly obeying, and Georgie escaping at her skirt, when a +second roar recalled the child. Jasper was leaning with both hands on +the stick before him, his frown gone, but in its place a surely devilish +smile, since the child mistook it for the real thing. + +"So you're still longun to go back and see the workman, as you call him, +at the church?" + +"Oh, yes, I are!" + +And round eyes kindled at the thought. + +"Very well. You may." + +Georgie could scarcely believe his ears. + +"Fen may I? Now? Now, I say?" + +"When you like, so long as you don't bother me." + +Georgie jumped and shouted in his joy. + +"Goin' to see workman, goin' to see workman! Oh, my Jove, my Jove! Goin' +to see workman makin' lovely, lovely faces all for me--every bit!" + +"Hold your noise," said Jasper, roughly; "and go, if you're going." + +Carlton had given up expecting him, divining at last that Musk knew of +their one interview, and would never let them have another. So once more +Georgie surprised him at his work; but this time he had to hail his +friend; for now Carlton was making up for lost time, and at the moment, +up on a scaffolding, was all absorbed in the exciting task of fitting +the finished voussoirs over the wooden centre which supported the arch +until the keystone should complete it. And the keystone was actually in +one hand, a trowel full of mortar in the other, when the first sound of +Georgie's voice drove all else from his mind. + +"I say, I say, I say!" he ran up shouting. "Workman, workman!" + +But now the workman was only collecting himself, and thanking God with +quivering lips, before he could trust himself upon his ladder. + +"So here you are at last," he said, swinging the child off his legs +without endearment. Yet all his being yearned towards the merry +independent little boy. The straight strong legs seemed browner and +rounder already. It might have been the same holland pinafore; it was +the same sailor hat. + +"Yes, here I are," said Georgie, "and I wish you would make lovely, +lovely faces out of bwick." + +"Not run away again, I hope?" + +"No, 'cos I came by my own self." + +Carlton asked no more questions. Any minute the child might be missed +and sent for; every moment was precious meanwhile. It was a heavenly day +in early June, the elms in full leaf at last against the blue, the +churchyard dappled with light and shade, the fresh sandstone yellow as +gold where the sun caught it fairly. And in the sunlight stood its own +incarnation--sturdy champion of the golden age--laughing child of June. + +Carlton could see nothing else. + +"Come on, I say," urged Georgie; "come an' make faces, quick, sharp!" + +And he dragged the sculptor to his rude studio. + +"There it is, there it is," shouted Georgie, spying the unfinished head +high up on the shelf. "You did say you finish fen I come back. +Finish--finish--quick, sharp!" + +Carlton brought the thing outside, for the shed was close, and went to +work at the foot of his ladder, with Georgie sitting on the lowest +rung. And any merit which the rough attempt had possessed was speedily +removed by an over-elaboration on which Georgie insisted, and which +certainly served its purpose by earning his vociferous applause. + +"Oh, his eyes! What funny eyes! Make them open and shut, I say--can +you?" + +A doll, which Gwynneth had unearthed, before she knew her Georgie very +well, had retained this accomplishment even when the head was off its +body. + +"I'm afraid I can't do that," said Carlton. + +"Try--try." + +So Carlton gouged in the soft stone till the holes for the eyeballs had +disappeared. + +"Now open them again!" + +And fresh holes were made: they were the most sunken eyes ever seen +before Georgie was tired of the game. Next he must have ears, which were +supposed to be concealed by the very heavy head of hair; and when the +ears arrived, they were not worth having without ear-rings; but there +the sculptor was nonplussed, and struck. + +"All right," said Georgie, cheerfully; "then I'll carry it home +without." + +"What, run away directly it's done?" + +The cold-blooded ingratitude of infancy was new to Carlton, as his hurt +face was to Georgie, who eyed it with some compassion. + +"All right," said he; "I'll stay a little bit if you like." + +"And sit on my knee, Georgie." + +"All right." + +But there was no sentiment about Georgie to-day; it was mere +magnanimity, and he showed it. + +"Quite comfy, Georgie?" + +"No," sighed the boy, screwing about on the one thin thigh; "I think +it's only a little comfy." + +"That better?" + +And, the other leg being slipped under his small person, Georgie said it +was. + +"Are you sure, Georgie, that you want to take that head home at all?" + +"Course I are," said Georgie, decidedly. "I must take it, you see; +course I must." + +Carlton was again tormented by the ignoble inclination which he had +overcome by impulse rather than by will at the last interview. Was a +child of four too young to keep a secret? If only this one could be +induced to go and come back, and back, and back, without ever saying a +word to anybody! The proposition had shamed him before; and did now; but +the new love within him was stronger than his shame. + +"You wouldn't show it," suggested Carlton, "to your grandfather, would +you?" + +"Course I'll show it to him," said Georgie, for whom the stipulation was +too oblique. + +"But he'll be angry!" + +"Course he won't," said Georgie, more superior than ever, and with the +air of one who does not care to argue any more. + +"But you know he was before," said Carlton, drawing his bow. + +"Oh, bovver!" exclaimed Georgie, losing patience. "Well, then, he won't +be angry to-day, I know he won't." + +"How do you know, Georgie?" + +"'Cos he did tell me I could come." + +"Not here?" + +Georgie nodded solemnly. + +"Yes, he did. I know he did." + +What could it mean? The child was strangely dependable for his years; +indeed, it was impossible to look in those great and candid eyes and to +doubt the testimony of the equally candid little tongue. Then what could +it mean? Had Musk relented? Was he relenting? Carlton's heart leapt at +the thought, and with his heart his eyes; and in the same second he had +his answer. + +Close at hand in the sunlight, where Georgie had stood last, brimming +over with delight, there now stood Jasper Musk himself, huge with hate, +livid with rage, vindictive, remorseless--but not surprised. Carlton saw +this at the first glance, in the triumphant lightning flashing from the +fixed eyes, and playing over the heavy, grim, inexorable face. And that +was his answer; furthermore it prepared him for all, and more than all, +that was to come. + +"Put the boy down," said Jasper Musk, with sinister self-control. + +Instinctively the child slipped to the ground; but there his courage +failed him, so that he turned his back upon the terrible old man, and +hid his face in the lap that he had left. + +"Come here, George!" + +But Carlton held him firmly with both hands. + +Musk bore down on them in a series of little shuffling steps, his great +face wincing with the pain of each. His voice had already risen; now it +was so terrible to hear, so hoarse and high with passion, that in an +instant Carlton had his thumbs in the small boy's ears. + +"Snivelling hypocrite! Whited sepulchre! Do you hand the child over to +me, or I'll break this stick across your back. So I've caught ye, +temptun him here to make up to him behind my back! But you don't--no, +you don't--not while I'm alive to stop that. He's nothun to you and +you're nothun to him, and do you meddle with him again at your peril. +I've taken the trouble to learn the law of it, so I know. God damn ye! +will you take your hands off him, or am I to break your blasted head?" + +"You can do what you like," said Carlton; "but the boy shall not hear +you using that language to me. So you will never get a better +opportunity than you have." And his nostrils curled as he bent his +defenceless head over that of the boy, and pressed a little harder with +his thumbs. + +The other gnashed his teeth, and his great hand tightened on his stick. +But he could not strike like that. And his enemy knew it; trust him to +know when he was safe! + +"I'm not going to prison for ye," said Musk, "if that's what you want. I +daresay you'd think that worth a crack on the head to get me locked up +for a bit; well, then, you shan't. Do you leave go o' the kid, and I +won't swear no more." + +The effort at self-control was plain enough, as Carlton looked up, +without complying all at once. + +"One moment," he said. "You sent him here yourself, I think?" + +"What, the child?" + +"Yes." + +"I didn't send him. He was pestering me to come. So at last I gave him +leave to do as he liked." + +"In order that you might follow and abuse me in front of him!" + +"I'll tell no lies," said Musk, sturdily. "I meant to let him hear what +I thought of you, and I won't deny it." + +Carlton looked a little longer upon the broad face between the steely +bristles and the silvery hair; it had aged nothing in these years which +had been as twenty to himself; and for the moment there was all the old +rugged dignity in its independent purpose and honest unrelenting hate. A +bargain had been in Carlton's mind, but at the last he decided to trust +his enemy instead. + +"It's all right, Georgie," he whispered: "we are not really angry with +each other. Run away and play." + +"But I don't want to!" + +"You must," said Carlton, and rose without taking further notice of the +child. "Mr. Musk," he said, in a low voice but firm, "is it to be like +this between us to the bitter end?" + +"That is." + +"I do not ask your forgiveness----" + +"Glad to hear it." + +"I only ask--in pity's name--to be allowed to do something for the boy!" + +Musk moved a muscle at last, and his eyes came close together with a +gleam. "I daresay you do," said he. + +"But will you not listen----" + +"I'm listening now, ain't I?" + +"Ah, but not to my prayer! I see it in your face; you have no pity. God +knows how little I deserve! Yet it's little enough that I ask: only to +see him sometimes, and not even to see him if you set your face against +it. I would be content--at least I would try to be--if I knew he was +going to good schools, if--if I might have hand or voice in his life. +You say I have no rights. That is my punishment; a new one, that I never +felt until I saw the boy for the first time the other day; but if you +knew how I have felt it since! If you knew what it would be to me to do +anything--give anything----" + +"I knew that were comun," said Musk, nodding to himself . . . "So you'd +like to do the handsome, would you?" His whole face became suddenly +suffused, as with walnut-juice; the very whites of his eyes seemed white +no longer, while the pupils shrank to steel points in their midst. "I +know you!" he cried, beside himself again; "but don't you try them games +with me. That's your line, that is--buy your way back! You'd buy it with +the parish, by making them a church; and you'd buy it with the boy, by +making things for him; but that's what you never shall do, not while I +live to prevent it . . . What you got there, George? You give that +here!" + +It was the sandstone head with the sunken eyes, and Georgie was clinging +to it in his trouble underneath the scaffolding; in an instant Musk had +seized it from him, and dashed it with all his might against the wall, +so that the soft stone flew into a dozen pieces. It was like blood to a +wild beast: the demon of destruction broke loose in Jasper Musk. + +"And that's how I'd treat the rest of your damned handiwork," he roared, +"if I was the village! I'd have no church of your building; I'd bring +that down about your ears right quick!" His wild eye lit upon the wooden +centre of the unfinished arch, and "This is what I'd do," he shouted, +lunging at the woodwork with his heavy stick. "Hypocrite! Pharisee! +Disgrace to God and man! Leper as----" + +But the centre had been dealt a heavy thrust, as from a battering ram, +with each expression; with each it had bulged a little; but the last +lunge drove the whole framework from under the unfinished arch, which +came crashing down amid a yellow cloud. Musk shuffled backward in time +to save his toes; for an instant then both he and Carlton stood aghast. + +Robbed of his latest treasure, and moreover having seen it smashed to +atoms before his eyes, Georgie had been howling lustily when the crash +came: when the yellow cloud lifted he lay silent enough, in a little +brown heap below the scaffolding, and already the blood was through his +hair. + +Carlton had him in his arms that instant. + +"He's insensible," he said quietly. "A nasty scalp wound, and may be +more. What day is this?" + +"Wednesday." + +Musk did not know what he was saying, but the cool question had elicited +a correct though unconscious reply. + +"Wednesday used to be the doctor's day at the dispensary----" + +"And is still," cried Musk, coming to his senses. + +"Then one of us must run for him." + +"I can't run!" + +"Then you must hold him while I do. Stop! I'll take him to the house; +you must bathe his head while I'm gone." + +Another minute and the boy lay in the rectory study, upon the little bed +in which Carlton had fought death and won three years before; yet +another, and up limped Jasper, crooked with pain, out of breath, but +gasping for news of Georgie as though he had been a week on the way. + +"Has he come to yet?" + +"No, and there's a lot of blood. We must stop it if we can. Wait till I +get a sponge and some water." + +Jasper Musk was bending over the boy, looking huger than ever upon his +knees, when Carlton returned to the room. + +"What have I done?" he was muttering. "What have I done? What have I +done?" + +"Nothing that you could help," replied Carlton, briskly. "Now you keep +squeezing this sponge out over his head--never mind the bed--till I get +back." + +Georgie lay insensible for hours. It was not the loss of blood, which +looked much worse than it was, and ceased altogether with the dressing +of the wound. There was, however, somewhat serious concussion +underneath; and Dr. Marigold bluntly refused to guarantee the event. + +"The pity is to move him," he grumbled towards night. "But is there +anybody here who could nurse the boy?" + +"Only myself," said Carlton, who had been quiet and quick to help all +the afternoon. + +The doctor shot an upward glance through his shaggy white eyebrows. + +"Well, you're handy enough, I must say; and, as we know, the very devil +to do things single-handed; but this you couldn't do. No, I'd like to +take him straight to the infirmary, only I'm on horseback." + +"There are traps in the village." + +"They would jolt too much." + +"Then let me carry him." + +"It's five miles." + +"Never mind. I could do it. And he shouldn't jolt--he shouldn't jolt!" + +The mellow voice that had charmed the countryside in bygone years, it +fell and quivered with infinite tenderness and love, and it sped to the +heart of the gaunt old doctor. So this time Marigold raised his whole +head, and his look was open, prolonged, and penetrating. + +"No, no, Mr. Carlton," he said at length, and in the tone of old times. +"It might do no good, after all. But I'll tell you what you shall do: +you shall carry him to the Flint House, and I'll spend the night there +if I must." + +All this while Jasper Musk was sitting stunned and staring in the +rector's chair. He had not moved for an hour, nor did he now until +Carlton touched him on the shoulder. + +"We are going, Mr. Musk. I am carrying Georgie to your house." + +Musk raised a ghastly face. + +"He isn't dead?" + +"No." + +"Nor going to die?" + +"God forbid! But the danger is great. The doctor is going to stay with +him all night." + +And there was a touch of jealousy in his tone, lost upon Jasper Musk, +but not on him who inspired it. Silently they left the house, and stole +down the drive in the blue twilight. Carlton led, treading almost on +tip-toe, as if not to wake a child that only slept in his arms. And so +they came to the Flint House, its master limping on the doctor's arm. + +"Go in, Mr. Carlton," said Marigold. "There's no one else to carry him +upstairs." + +And he detained Jasper below. + +"You must let that man stay till he is out of danger," the doctor said. + +"Why must I?" + +"Because I am not justified in staying all night; and he will look after +the boy as you and your wife cannot, and as no one else will, now that +Miss Gleed is away." + +Jasper bowed sullenly to his fate. But the doctor was not done. + +"Besides," said he, his kind hand on the other's arm; "besides, he feels +this as much as you do, and God knows he's gone through enough! To-day, +I tell you candidly, but for him your little lad would be in a worse way +than he is. Now don't you think after this that all of us--even +you--might begin to be just a little less hard--even on him?" + + + + +XXIV + +GLAMOUR AND RUE + + +Georgie's lady was meanwhile enjoying her life in Leipzig, and the more +keenly since she had gone abroad without any thought of pleasure, but +only to work. This was characteristic of Gwynneth Gleed. She was not +light-hearted enough for a young girl; there had been too much sorrow in +her early years, too little sympathy in those that came after; natural +joy she had never known. A born delight in books, a blind appreciation +of the country, a passion for music, and the love of one little child; +these were the pleasures of Gwynneth in her twentieth year; nor as yet +did they include that zest in the present, that joy of merely living, +that healthy appetite for admiration, that proper pride in one's own +person, that catholicity of liking for one's fellow-creatures, which are +of the very spirit and essence of youth. And to youth Gwynneth added +something at least akin to beauty; but never knew it until she came to +live among strangers in a strange land. + +These strangers, who were mostly English, and many of them young +students like herself at the Conservatoire, were singularly kind to +Gwynneth from the first. In some ways they were the best friends the +girl ever had. They taught her the duty of gaiety at her time of life, +and the absolute necessity of a certain amount of vanity in every human +being. Gwynneth was given to understand that she had more to be vain +about than most. Attracted themselves by the uncommon girl with the fine +eyes and the shy manner, her new friends did much to mitigate the latter +by making the very most of her looks and accomplishments, and seeing to +it that Gwynneth did the same. She was not allowed to dress as she liked +in Leipzig, nor to spend the whole of a fine afternoon at her piano, nor +to be out of anything that was going on. The gaieties of the English +colony were of a simple character in themselves, but they were +Gwynneth's high-water-mark in dissipation, and ere long she was throwing +herself into them with that enthusiasm which she brought to every +pursuit. She had learnt to waltz remarkably well, and to talk brightly +about nothing in particular to the acquaintance of a minute's standing. +She was none the less assiduous at her practising and her harmony, and +was still capable of immediate and immense excitement over this poet or +that composer; but these were no longer her only topics. Nor was a +holland pinafore and the small urchin it contained entirely forgotten in +these days. Gwynneth wrote to Georgie oftener than to anybody else in +England. And yet it was to the theatres and a real ball or so that she +first looked forward upon her return. + +Lady Gleed was much more than agreeably disappointed in the new +Gwynneth; herself incapable of seeing beneath the thinnest surface, she +could scarcely believe it was the same girl. Gwynneth was better-looking +and had more to say for herself than had ever appeared possible to Lady +Gleed, who decided to keep her niece in town for the rest of the season, +if not to present so creditable a _débutante_ at the next drawing-room. +And a much more critical person, her son Sidney, coming up from +Cambridge for a night, was not less favourably impressed. + +Gleed of Trinity, a third-year man, was in his turn a vast improvement +upon the private scholar who had seldom addressed a syllable to Gwynneth +in his holidays, but had gone past whistling with his dogs. He was now a +really handsome little man, with a clear brown skin and a moustache as +mature as his manner; looked and spoke like a man of thirty; and could +be amusing enough with his sly satire and his ready repartee. Cynical +this youth must always be, but the cynicism was more good-humoured and +less ill-natured than formerly, and not abhorrent in the man as it had +been in the boy. At all events it amused Gwynneth, who was furthermore +surprised and excited to find that Sidney had read quite a number of +great books, and rather entertained than otherwise by his blasphemous +opinions of many of them. So they had something in common after all; and +Sidney was certainly very attentive and gay and nice-looking. + +It was in the drawing-room in Hyde Park Place, during an hour which went +very quickly, that Gwynneth made these discoveries; she was still too +simple to remark, much less read, the calculating droop of Sidney's +eyelids or the veiled preoccupation of the hereditary stare. + +"I wonder if you'd care to have a look at Cambridge," at last said +Sidney, in the purely speculative tone. + +"Like to? I'd love it!" cried Gwynneth at once. + +Sidney paused, without relaxing his stare. She was certainly very +animated. Sidney was not sure that he cared for quite so much animation +with so little cause. + +"I shouldn't wonder if you did rather like it," he proceeded, "in +May-week--which never is in May, you know." + +"Oh? When is it?" + +"The week after next. There'll be heaps going on. Races every +afternoon----" + +"And don't you steer your boat?" interrupted Gwynneth, a partisan on the +spot. + +Sidney smiled. + +"I cox it, Gwynneth; and if we aren't head of the river we shall not be +very far off. But it isn't only the races; there are all sorts of other +things, a good match, garden-parties galore, and a dance every night." + +"You dance there!" + +"Yes," said Sidney; "do you?" + +"Rather!" + +"Get some in Leipzig?" + +"All that there was to get." + +"They dance well out there?" + +"I don't know." + +"But you do, of course?" + +Gwynneth saw the drift of this examination, and showed that she saw it, +but Sidney liked her the better for her dry reply: + +"You'd better try me." + +"You'd better try _me_," he rejoined adroitly. + +"Very well," said Gwynneth. "Here?" + +"Come on," said Sidney, his eyes sparkling, his brown skin a warmer hue; +and in an instant they were threading their way between the cumbrous +chairs and tiny tables of the big room, ploughing through its heavy +pile, he in patent leather boots, she in her walking shoes, and not so +much as a piano-organ in the street to set the time. Yet, even under +these conditions, a turn was enough for Sidney, though he did not want +to stop, and was very quick in asking whether he would do. + +"You know you will," said Gwynneth, forgetting everything in the +prospect of so excellent a partner. + +"And you dance rippingly," declared her cousin; "by Jove, I wish we +could have you at the First Trinity ball!" + +So did Gwynneth; but, instead of betraying further eagerness, sat down +at the piano, and, saying it was nothing without the music, forthwith +treated Sidney to snatch after snatch of the waltzes of the hour, +rendering each with a brilliance of touch and a delicacy of execution +alike worthy of a better cause. A year ago Gwynneth would not have done +this. + +Sidney, his hands in his pockets, but a sparkle still in his eyes, stood +watching her without a word until the end. + +"Look here," he then announced, "you've simply got to come, and that's +all about it. Of course the mater couldn't get away, but Lydia isn't so +full up, and I should think she'd jump at it. I'll write to her and fix +it up. There's a piano in our rooms, and we'll have it tuned for you; +no, we'll get a grand in for the week; and the whole court will be full +of men listening." + +"Who are 'we'?" inquired Gwynneth. + +"Oh, I share rooms with another fellow; an Eton man; you'll like him." + +And once more Sidney looked a little critically at his cousin, as though +he wanted to be quite sure that the Eton man would like her. But at this +moment the dressing-gong threw him into consternation. It appeared that +he was dining out at some club, had come up for this dinner, was only +sleeping in the house, and would be gone first thing in the morning. So +he had better say good-bye; and did so with rather unnecessary warmth, +Gwynneth thought; nevertheless, it was the dullest evening she had yet +spent in Hyde Park Place, though there was a little dinner-party there +also, after which the inevitable performance by Gwynneth was received +with the customary acclamation. + +It may be supposed that the girl was not enchanted with the prospect of +Lydia for chaperone; but she determined thus early to allow nothing to +interfere with her enjoyment of the Cambridge festivities. So when Mrs. +Goldstein came in her carriage on the next day but one, to say that she +supposed they must go, not that she was keen upon it herself, but to +please Sidney, and also because she thought it only right for young +girls like Gwynneth to have a good time while they could, the latter +tried to seem as grateful as though every word of Lydia's did not +irritate or repel her. She there and then received dictatorial +instructions as to dresses requisite for the week, and undertook to +follow them to the letter. It was not a congenial attitude for Gwynneth +to assume, but she also was at present bent upon that "good time" which +her cousin recommended. Lydia, on the other hand, cultivated the air of +one who is personally past all that. She seldom smiled, but yet had a +certain secret fondness for excitement. Gwynneth feared that she was far +from happy; she seemed dissatisfied with her position in society, and +spoke disrespectfully (when she did speak) of the dark, dapper, capable +man of business, her indulgent husband. + +There came a time when Gwynneth Gleed would have given much to forget +the merriest week of her life, but the memory of the next few days was +not to be destroyed. The girl never forgot the narrow streets teeming +with exuberant youth, the narrow river in similar case, the crush and +rush and uproar on the banks, the procession of boats flashing past, +each with an eight in which Gwynneth took no interest, but a ninth who +had always the same calm, brown, clean-cut face in her mind's eye. How +well he looked, swinging with his crew, he in his blazer, cool and +malicious, doing his part with splendid precision if only they did +theirs! One night they made their bump right opposite the boat in which +Gwynneth stood on tiptoe; and Sidney's smile at the supreme moment was +one of her vivid recollections; and her little scene with Lydia another, +which she brought upon herself by cheering as loud as any of the men. +Sidney seemed very popular. Gwynneth was so proud to be seen with him, +especially when he wore his battered mortar-board and blue gown, which +appealed in some foolish way to her own vague intellectual aspirations. +And she looked down upon all the gowns that were not blue. + +But everything in Cambridge did appeal to Gwynneth, from the anthem and +the chancel-roof in King's Chapel to luncheon with Sidney and the Eton +man in Old Court. Lydia was for ever reproving her cousin's enthusiasm; +but Gwynneth was enjoying herself too much to resent anything that Mrs. +Goldstein could say. At the outset, however, a close observer might have +caught even Sidney with a cocked eyebrow, and the eye beneath upon the +Eton man; the girl was so frank and unsophisticated in the display of +her delight; but the Eton man seemed to admire it in her, and Sidney +gave up looking like that. The Eton man was twice his height, could +sing, and swore that nobody had ever played his accompaniments as +Gwynneth did; but he was not in any boat, and he could not compare with +Sidney as a partner. Nevertheless, his attentions and attractions had +more to answer for than anybody knew. + +Gwynneth had thought Sidney very nice in town, but at Cambridge he was +perfect. He was a thorough little man of the world, unconscious, +unconcerned, whereas many of the men whom Gwynneth met were scarcely +worthy of the name. Sidney did things like a prince, having an enviable +allowance, and a very good idea of the way in which things should be +done. And his arrangements were masterly; no day like the last, or +next; and the whole a whirl of gaiety and excitement literally +intoxicating to one whose experience of this kind was so limited as poor +Gwynneth's. It all ended with the First Trinity ball. There is no need +to dilate on the astonishing magnificence of this revel; it was the most +memorable and splendid of them all; and the Backs by night, with a moon +in the heaven above and another in the water below, and grey old gables +salient in its light, and the Guards' Band in the faint distance, that +ought to have been so loud and near; all this was even more entrancing +than the ball itself, and Gwynneth moved as in a dream. She had had the +audacity to divide her dances between Sidney and the Eton man; but one +of them was given cause to complain towards the end, and the more so +since the girl had never looked so radiant in her life. The next day +Gwynneth and Lydia (who would not speak to her) were to return to town. +It had never been arranged that Sidney was to accompany them; yet he +did; and before evening there was trouble in Hyde Park Place. + +Sir Wilton would not hear of it at first; he was soon obliged to do +that. But he stood firm in refusing his consent to a formal engagement +between Sidney and his first cousin, and found an unexpected ally in +Gwynneth herself. The girl was paying for her week's delirium by a +deeper depression than her face betrayed or her heart admitted. Already +she was beginning to disappoint her cousin. But this was too much. + +"You agree with him?" gasped Sidney. "You'd rather _not_ be engaged? +Then why, my darling, did you ever say 'yes'?" + +"It wasn't to that question, dear," said Gwynneth, colouring. + +"It amounted to the same thing." + +"It will amount to the same thing," Gwynneth said earnestly; "at least I +hope and pray that it may. But, of course, it's quite true that we're +both very young; and at least it's within the bounds of possibility +that--one or other of us might--some day--change." + +"Speak for yourself," said Sidney, with a taunting bitterness. + +"Dear, if you'll believe me, I'm thinking quite as much of you. At +twenty-two you would tie yourself for life!" + +"That's my look-out," said Sidney, grandly. "Age isn't everything, and +I'm not a boy; anyhow I know my own mind, if you don't know yours." + +Gwynneth's eyes filled with tears. + +"Oh, why did you tell me you cared for me?" she exclaimed. "Why did you +make me say I cared for you? It was true--it was true--but we seem to +have spoilt it by putting it into words. Oh, I was so happy before you +spoke! I never was so happy as all last week. I could have gone on like +that--I was so happy. And now it's all different already; you are, and I +am . . ." + +Sidney was watching her tears unmoved, for she had made him reflect. All +at once he saw his heartlessness, and next moment he was kissing her +tears away; vowing there was no difference in him; but, if it was +otherwise with her, well, then, let them consider everything unsaid, and +start afresh. + +Gwynneth shook her head. Her eyes were dry again and full of thought. + +"No, dear, we can't do that; and you mustn't think I am not happy in +your love, because I am. Only, there seemed to be such a spell between +us before we were sure of each other. But perhaps it's always like +that." + +In the end they were engaged, but it was not to be a public engagement +for six months. Meanwhile Sidney returned to Cambridge for the Long, +having taken only a part of his degree; and Gwynneth quickly recovered +her reputation as a reformed character in the eyes of Lady Gleed, who +was less against the match than her husband, and who took the girl to +innumerable parties, each of which Gwynneth made a determined effort to +enjoy as thoroughly as the first half of the First Trinity ball. + +She seemed always in the highest spirits; and there was no one about her +who knew her well enough to know also that this perpetual brightness was +hard and unnatural in Gwynneth. Closer observers than Sir Wilton and his +wife might indeed have suspected as much; but there was only one +occasion upon which Gwynneth betrayed the livelier symptoms of a +troubled spirit. This was on her birthday at the beginning of July; upon +the breakfast table was a registered packet with the Cambridge +post-mark, and in its morocco case Gwynneth presently beheld a richer +necklace than she had ever dreamt of possessing as her own. Yet the +look in her face was so strange that Lady Gleed was obliged to speak. + +"Don't you like pearls, my dear?" + +"Oh! yes, oh! yes." + +"But you don't look pleased." + +"No more I am!" + +And she rushed from the room in unaccountable tears, and upstairs to her +own, where she was presently discovered writing a letter at top speed, +and crying bitterly as she wrote; it was Lady Gleed herself who +discovered her. + +"What _is_ the matter, Gwynneth?" + +"I am writing to Sidney. I cannot take such presents from him. I am +writing to tell him why." + +"I think you are very silly," said Lady Gleed. "But your uncle wants to +see you in his study; that is really why I came up; and I don't think +you'll be so silly when you have heard what he has to tell you." + +There was an air of mystery about Lady Gleed, who furthermore kissed +Gwynneth before they separated on the landing. The girl went downstairs +with chill forebodings. Sir Wilton was seated at his massive desk, but +rose fussily as she entered, and wheeled up a chair with almost +excessive courtesy. Gwynneth had seldom seen him looking so benign. + +"I sent for you," said Sir Wilton, resuming his own seat, "because I +have some news for you, Gwynneth, which I am sure you will be as glad to +hear as I am to communicate it. It is against the law to dwell upon a +lady's age, but at yours I think you can afford to forgive me. I +believe that you are twenty-one to-day?" + +Gwynneth had not thought of that before, and at the present moment she +could scarcely believe she was no more. She made her admission with a +sigh. + +"Then for twenty-one years," pursued Sir Wilton, beaming, "or let us say +for as many of them as you can remember, you have, I presume, looked +upon yourself as an entirely penniless young lady? That has not been the +case; at least it is the case no longer. I--I hope I am not giving you +bad news?" + +Gwynneth was trembling all over. She had lost every vestige of colour. + +"My mother!" she gasped. "Why did she never know?" + +"Because, under the terms of your grandfather's will, nobody but myself +was to know anything at all about it until to-day." + +"It was cruel," cried the girl, in a breaking voice; "it might have kept +her here! It makes me not want to hear anything now . . . but of course +I must . . . forgive me, please." + +"My dear child," said Sir Wilton, kindly, "it is natural enough that you +should feel that. I can only ask you to believe that I at least had no +choice in the matter. And there were reasons; it is too painful to go +into them; your father was my brother, and I had rather say no more. I, +for my part, was obliged to fulfil the conditions. I have tried to do my +duty. I would gladly have done more, but your dear mother was the most +independent woman I ever met. I honoured her for it. But what could I +do? I must beg of you, my dear, to look upon the bright side; and, +believe me, this business has the very brightest side it is possible to +imagine." + +Gwynneth did her best. It was fine to be independent in her turn. But +the thought of her mother made her ashamed to touch a penny. And it was +a matter of several thousand pounds, invested all these years at +compound interest, yet with that absolute safety which distinguished the +financial operations of Sir Wilton Gleed. + +Sir Wilton could not say off-hand what the present capital would yield +if left where it was at simple interest, but he fancied it would work +out at seven or eight hundred a year at the very least. And these +figures, which sounded fabulous to poor Gwynneth, were obviously in +themselves the bright side upon which her uncle had harped. Yet he +continued to beam as though there was something more to come, and looked +so knowing that Gwynneth was obliged to ask him what it was. + +"Can't you see?" he said. "Can't you see?" + +"It is an immense amount of money. I can't see beyond that." + +"You heard me say that nobody knew anything at all about it except +myself, and, of course, my solicitors?" + +"Yes." + +"Even your aunt did not know until I told her just now." + +"Indeed." + +"And Sidney won't know until you tell him!" + +Then Gwynneth saw. Sir Wilton took care that she should. He did not on +principle approve of marriages between cousins; he said so frankly; he +might be wrong. But there was one thing which made him very proud of his +son's choice. And this was that thing; there were others also upon which +Sir Wilton touched with much playful gallantry. + +"But perhaps," said he, "you won't have anything more to say to the poor +lad now!" + + + + +XXV + +SIGNS OF CHANGE + + +Georgie was a short head taller, and no pinafore concealed the glories +of his sailor suit; but it was still the same baby face, round as the +eyes that greeted all comers with the same friendly gaze. His sentences +were longer and more ambitiously constructed; but he still said +"somekin" and "I wish I would," and, when excited, "my Jove!" And his +lady once more danced attendance by the hour and day together; for Sir +Wilton and Lady Gleed were paying visits until September; and Sidney was +still understood to be making up for lost time at Cambridge. + +Gwynneth had enjoyed the child's society the year before; now she seemed +dependent upon it. She would have him with her daily on one pretext or +another, sometimes upon none at all. She said she liked to hear him +talk, and that was well, for Georgie's tongue only rested in his sleep. +But now there was often an intrinsic interest in his conversation. He +gave Gwynneth many an item of village news which was real news to her. +Thus it was from his own lips that she first heard of his accident, on +seeing the scar through his hair. + +"Course I was in bed," swaggered Georgie; "I was in bed for years an' +years an' years--in bed and sensible." + +"Oh, Georgie, do you mean insensible?" + +"No, sensible, I tell you." + +"Did you know what was going on?" + +"Course I di'n't, not a bit. How could I fen I was sensible?" + +"My poor darling, it might have killed you! How ever did you do it?" + +But, as so often happens in such cases, that was what Georgie had never +been able to remember. So Gwynneth turned to Jasper Musk, who sat within +earshot; it was in the Flint House garden, on the very afternoon of her +return. + +"That was my fault," said Jasper, gruffly enough, yet with such a glance +at Georgie that Gwynneth was sorry she had broached the subject, and +changed it at once. + +But she reverted to it as soon as she had Georgie to herself. Who had +looked after him when he was ill? She was feeling very jealous of +somebody. + +"Granny did." + +"No one else?" + +"An' grand-daddy." + +"Was that all, Georgie?" + +Gwynneth was very sorry she had ever gone abroad. + +"Course it wasn't all," said Georgie, remembering. "There was the funny +old man from the church." + +"Mr. Carlton?" + +"Yes." + +"So _he_ came to see you?" + +"Yes, he often. I love him," Georgie announced with emphasis; "he makes +lovely, lovely, _lovely_ faces!" + +"And does he ever come now?" + +"No, not now, course he doesn't; he's too busy buildin' his church." + +"So he's building still!" + +"Yes, 'cos he builds wery nicely," Georgie was pleased to say; "better'n +me, he builds, far better'n me." + +"And is he still alone?" + +"All alone," said Georgie; "all alonypony by his own little self!" + +And the inconsequent nonsense sent him off into untimely laughter, +louder and more uproarious than ever, quite a virile guffaw. But +Gwynneth could not even smile. And now when neither listening to Georgie +nor haunted by her engagement, Gwynneth began to think of the lonely +outcast behind those trees, as she had begun indeed to think of him the +spring before last, while her mind and life were yet unfilled by the +motley interests which this last year had brought into both. + +The thought afflicted her with a sense of personal hardness and cruelty; +there was this lonely man, doing the work of ten, not spasmodically, but +day after day, and year after year, still unaided and unforgiven by the +very people in whose midst and for whose benefit those prodigies of +labour were being performed. Gwynneth knew now that there had been some +mysterious wickedness before the burning of the church. It was all she +cared to know. What crime could warrant such hardness of heart in the +face of such devotion, skill, patience, consummate endurance, and +invincible determination? These were heroic qualities, no matter what +vileness lay beneath or behind them; and the generous capacity for +hero-worship was very strong in Gwynneth. She would have honoured this +man for his splendid pertinacity, and have wiped all else from the +slate. That his own parishioners continued to dishonour him, and that +she perforce had to do as they did, made her indignant with them and +dissatisfied with herself. So far as Gwynneth was honestly aware, this +feeling was a purely impersonal one. It would have been excited by any +other being who had achieved the like and been thus rewarded. It is +noteworthy, however, that Gwynneth found it necessary to explain the +position to herself. + +It was strange, too, how her life had impinged upon his, strange because +the points of contact had in each case left a disproportionate +impression upon her mind. She often thought of them. There was once in +the very beginning, when she had actually stopped him in the village to +ask the name of the poem from which he had quoted on Sunday. Gwynneth +had never told a soul about this, she was so ashamed of her unmaidenly +impulse; but she still remembered the look of pleasure that had flashed +through his pain, and the kind sad voice which both answered her +question and thanked her for asking it. That must have been only a day +or two before the fire; the same summer there was the silent scene +between them in the drawing-room, when she longed to shake hands with +him, to show him her sympathy, but did not dare. Then came the finding +of Georgie in the stonemason's shed, only the spring before last; but +Gwynneth found that she had been gauche as usual even then, that she had +never risen to any of these occasions, but that her one small attempt to +express her sympathy had been nothing less than a piece of tactless +presumption on her part. And yet she felt so much! + +Well, it was something that Musk had opened his doors to him, if only +under pressure of a harrowing occasion; even then it was much, very +much, in the prime infidel of the parish. It was a beginning, an +example; it might show others the way. Gwynneth presently discovered +that it had. + +She had not brought Georgie to see the saddler this time, and she was +trying to follow that thinker's harangue as though she had really come +to him for political instruction; but all the while the sound from among +the trees distracted her attention and mystified her mind. It was +neither the ringing impact of iron upon iron, nor the swish of a sharp +steel point through the soft sandstone. It was the drone of a saw, as +Gwynneth knew well enough when she asked what the sound was in the first +opportunity afforded her. + +"That's the reverend," said the saddler, dryly. + +"It sounds like sawing," said disingenuous Gwynneth. "Has he reached the +roof?" + +"Gord love yer, miss, not he!" + +Gwynneth was consumed with an interest that she feared to show, +especially with the saddler looking at her through his spectacles as +others had done when Mr. Carlton supplied the topic of conversation. It +was a look that seemed to ask her how much she knew, and it always +offended her. She did not want to know what he had done; all her +interest was in what he was doing, alone there behind the trees. Yet now +she felt that speak she must, if it was only to soften a single heart, +in the very slightest degree, towards that unhappy man; and she had come +to the saddler with no other purpose. + +"Does no one go near him yet?" she asked point-blank. + +The saddler leant across his bench; the girl had refused the only chair +in the little workshop, and was standing outside at the open window, as +all his visitors did. + +"You won't tell Sir Wilton, miss?" + +"I shan't go out of my way to make mischief, Mr. Fuller, if that's what +you mean. But you had better not tell me any secrets," said Gwynneth, +with a coldness that cost her an effort; however, the saddler's skin was +in keeping with his calling. + +"Then you can keep that or not," said he, "as you think fit; but _I_ go +and see him now and then, and, what's more, I'm not ashamed of it." + +"I should think not!" the girl broke out; and Fuller sunned himself in +the warmth of fine eyes on fire. "I mean," stammered Gwynneth, "after +all this time, and all he has done!" + +"What I said to myself last Christmas, miss; and I'm the only man that +say it to-day, in this here village full of old women and hypocrites; if +you'll excuse my blunt way o' speaking to a young lady like you. 'This +here's gone on long enough,' thinks I; 'an' it's the season of peace an' +good-will,' I says to myself; 'darned if I don't step across the road to +cheer up the poor old reverend, an' Sir Wilton can turn me out of house +an' home if he find out an' think proper.' Don't you mistake me, miss; I +wasn't thinking of Sir Wilton in what I said just now, and ought not to +have said to a young lady like you. No, miss, Sir Wilton has his own +quarrel with the reverend; and _I_ had _my_ quarrel, as far as that go; +but, Gord love yer, a man of my experience can afford to forgive an' +forget, an' be generous as well as just. There isn't a juster man alive +than me, Miss Gwynneth; and not a soul in this parish, or out of it, +that can say I'm not generous too." + +"I'm sure of it, Mr. Fuller. But did you go over to the rectory?" + +"There and then," cried Fuller; "there--and--then. And I told him +straight that I for one--but that's no use to go over what I said and he +said," observed the saddler, hastily. "I can only tell you that in ten +minutes we were chattun away as though nothun had ever come between us. +And what do you suppose, miss? What do you suppose?" + +Gwynneth shook her head, unable to imagine what was coming, and anxious +to hear. + +"He hadn't seen a newspaper in all these years! Hadn't so much as heard +of that there Home Rule Bill of old Gladstone's, and didn't even know +there'd been a war in the Sowd'n!" Gwynneth looked equally ignorant of +this. "You know, miss? The Sowd'n, where General Gordon was betrayed +and deserted by them varmin you'd stick up for. But we won't quarrel no +more about that: only to think of the poor old reverend knowun no more +about it than the man in the moon until I told him! Why, I had to tell +him one of the Royal Family was dead an' buried; it would have been just +the same if it had been the Queen herself, God bless her!" + +"So he has been absolutely shut off from the world," Gwynneth murmured. + +"There you've hit it, miss! 'Shut off from the world,' there you've put +it into better language than I did," said the saddler, with his most +complimentary air. "Gord love yer, miss, it used to be the reverend that +passed his _Standard_ on to me; but ever since last Christmas it's been +me that's taken my _East Anglian_ over to him; so the boot's been on the +other leg properly; and right glad I've been to do anything for him, and +to take my pipe across now and then as though nothun had ever happened. +Not that he fare to care much for that, neither; he've been so long +alone, I do believe he've got to like his own society as well as any. +Yes, miss, shut off from the world he have been and he is; but he won't +be shut off from the world much longer!" + +"Oh?" + +Gwynneth's interest was re-awakened. + +"No," said Fuller, with the air of mystery in which his class delights; +"no, miss, he's not one to be shut off longer than he can help. Hear +that sound?" + +"I do indeed." + +Latterly she had been listening to nothing else. + +"That's a saw!" + +"Well?" + +"Do you know what he's sawun?" + +"No." + +"Planks for benches!" + +Gwynneth repeated the last word in a puzzled whisper; and so stood +staring until the obvious explanation had become obvious to her. It +remained inexplicable. + +"I don't see the good of benches before the church is finished, Mr. +Fuller." + +"He mean to hold his services whether that's finished or not. And I mean +to attend 'em," the saddler said with an air. + +"But--I thought----" + +"He was suspended for five year, and the bishop has given him leave to +get to work directly the five year is up. That I happen to know." + +"It must be nearly up now!" + +"That's up next Sunday as ever is, and you'll know it when you hear the +bell ring. He's got one of the old uns slung to a tree, for I helped him +to sling it, and it's the first help he's had all this time. I wouldn't +mention it, miss, for the reverend doesn't want a crowd; there'll be +quite enough come when they hear the bell, if it's only to see what +happens; but the whole neighbourhood 'll be there if that get about." + +"And there's really going to be service in the church--just as it +is--without a roof--this very next Sunday!" + +It sounded incredible to Gwynneth, and yet it thrilled her as the +incredible does not. The very drone of the saw was thrilling now. + +"There is, miss, and I mean to be there," said the village Hampden, with +inflated chest. "I can't help it if that cost me Sir Wilton's custom, +the reverend and me are good friends again, and I mean to be there." + + + + +XXVI + +A VERY FEW WORDS + + +It had been in the air all Saturday, but few believed the rumour until +ten minutes to eleven next morning. At that hour and at that minute Long +Stow was electrified by the measured ringing of a single bell--a bell +hoarse with five years' rest and rust--a bell no ear had heard since the +night of the fire. + +Gwynneth was afield upon the upland, far beyond the church, a pitiful +waverer between desire and indecision. Now she must go; and now she must +not think of it. It was unnecessary, gratuitous, provocative, +ostentatious, unmaidenly, immodest--and yet--both her duty and her +desire. So the string of adjectives might be applied to her; they were +no deterrent to a nature which hesitated often, but seldom was afraid. +Gwynneth treated more respectfully the poignant query of her own +consciousness: was she absolutely certain that she did not at all desire +to show off like the saddler? She was not. + +She did desire to show off, if it was showing off to honour openly the +man whom she admired and wished others to admire. She gloried in the +man's achievement, and possibly also in her own appreciation of it and +him. That was her real point of contact with the saddler. But for +Fuller there was the excuse of unconsciousness, and for Gwynneth there +was not. So she read herself that Sunday morning, under an August sky +without a fleck and a sun that drew the resin from those very pine-trees +upon which the outcast had so often gazed. It was thereabouts that +Gwynneth lingered, of self-analysis all compact. Then the hoarse bell +began--came calling up to her from the clump of chestnuts and of +elms--calling like a friend in pain . . . + +Gwynneth reached church by way of the strip of glebe behind it and the +gate into this from the lane, thus escaping the throng already gathered +at the other gate. She saw nothing but the rude benches as she entered +in; the last of these was too near for her; she shrank to the far end of +it, close against the wall, and the bell stopped as she sank upon her +knees. The beating of her heart seemed to take its place. Then there +came a light yet measured step. It passed very near, with a subdued and +subtle rustle, that might yet have meant one other woman. But Gwynneth +knew better, though she never looked. + +"_I will arise, and go to my father, and will say unto him, Father, I +have sinned against heaven, and before thee, and am no more worthy to be +called thy son._" + +Already the girl could not see; all her being was involved in an effort +to suppress a sob. It was suppressed. There were no tears in the voice +that so moved Gwynneth. How serene it was, though sad! It began to +soothe her, as she remembered that it had done when she was quite a +little girl. She was a little girl again: these five years fled . . . +But oh, why had he chosen _that_ sentence of the scriptures? Gwynneth +looked at her book (for now she could see) and found that some of the +others would have been worse. + +At last she could raise her eyes; and there was Fuller in the very +front; and not another soul. + +But Gwynneth cared for nothing any more except the gentle voice that it +was her pride to follow in the general confession, kneeling indeed, yet +kneeling bolt upright in her proud allegiance. + +A strange picture, the rude benches, the ragged walls; the east window +still a chasm, the hot sun streaming through it down the aisle; and over +all the blue cruciform of sky, broken only by the nodding plumes of the +taller elms. And a congregation yet more strange--only Gwynneth and the +saddler. But this did not continue. Gwynneth heard movements in the +porch behind her, and presently a stumble on the part of one driven in +by the press; but no voices; not a whisper; and ere-long he who had been +forced in, tired of standing, came on tiptoe and occupied the end of +Gwynneth's bench. + +Now it was the second lesson. The rector was reading it in the same +sweet voice, with all his old precision and knowledge of his mother +tongue, and never a trip or an undue emphasis. No one would have +believed that that voice had been all but silent for five whole years. +And yet some change there was, something different in the reading, +something even in the voice; the clerical monotone was abandoned, the +reading was more human, natural, and sympathetic. The change was in +keeping with others. The rector wore no vestments in the naked eye of +heaven, but only his cassock, his surplice, and his Oxford hood. There +were flowers upon the simple table behind him, such roses as still grew +wild in his tangled garden, but no candle to melt double in the sun. The +lectern he had done his best to burnish; but it was still a cripple from +the fire. Above, the rector's hair shone like silver, for the sun swept +over it, but the lean dark face was all in shadow. Gwynneth only saw the +fresh trim cut of the grizzled beard, and the walnut colour of the +gnarled hand drooping over the book. That speaking hand! + +Now it was the first hymn--actually! So he dared to have hymns, and to +sing them if necessary by himself! But it was not necessary, and not +only Gwynneth joined in with all the little voice she possessed, but +presently there were false notes from the other end of the bench, and +the saddler was not silent. But Robert Carlton's voice rang sweet and +clear above the rest:-- + + "Jesu, Lover of my soul, + Let me to Thy Bosom fly, + While the gathering waters roll, + While the tempest still is high: + Hide me, O my Saviour, hide, + Till the storm of life is past: + Safe into the haven guide, + O receive my soul at last . . ." + +The hymn haunted Gwynneth upon her knees, taking her mind from the +remaining prayers. It was a hymn that she had loved as a little child, +and now it seemed so simple and so whole-hearted to one who longed +always to be both. But it was the passionate humility of it that touched +and filled the heart; and yet there had been neither tremor nor appeal +in the voice that led; and the humility was only in accord with one of +the simplest services ever held. + +The second hymn was another of Gwynneth's favourites; she could not +afterwards have said which, for in the middle Mr. Carlton knelt, and +then came forward to the twisted lectern at the head of the aisle. + +It was not a sermon; it was only a very few words. Yet in Long Stow +nothing else was talked of that day, nor for many a day to follow. + +The few words were these:-- + + "The first verse of the nineteenth psalm: + + "_The heavens declare the glory of God; and the + firmament sheweth his handywork._ + + "Though I have given you a text, my brethren, I do not + intend this morning to preach any sermon. If you care + to hear me again--if you choose to give me another + trial--if you are willing to help me to start + afresh--then come again next Sunday, only come in + properly, and make the best of the poor benches which + are all I have to offer you as yet. There will only be + one weekly service at present. I believe that you + could nearly all come to that--if you would! But I am + afraid that many would have to stand. + + "I cannot tell you how grieved I am that your church + is not ready for you; but I hope and believe, as I + stand before you here, that it will be ready soon, + much sooner than you suppose. Then one great wrong + will be righted, though only one. + + "Meanwhile, so long as we are blessed with days like + these--and I pray that many may be in store for + us--meanwhile, could there be a fitter or a lovelier + roof to the House of God than His own sky as we see it + above us to-day? Though at present we can have no + music worthy the name, have you not noticed, during + all this our service, the constant song and twitter of + those friends of man, as I know them to be, of whom + Jesus said, 'Not one of them is forgotten before God'? + And for incense, what fragrance have we not, in our + unfinished church, that is the House of God all the + more because it is also His open air. + + "My brethren, _you_ need be no farther from heaven, + here in this place, unfinished as it is, than when the + roof is up, and the windows are in, and proper seats, + and when a new organ peals . . . and one whom you can + respect stands where I am standing now . . . + + "My brethren--once my friends--will you never, never + be my friends again? + + "_Oh spare me a little that I may recover my strength: + before I go hence, and be no more seen . . ._ + + "Dear friends, I have said far more than I ever meant + to say. But it is your own fault; you have been so + good to me; so many of you have come in; and you are + listening to me--to me! If you never listen to me + again, if you never come near me any more, I shall + still thank you--thank you--to my dying hour! + + "But let no eye be dim for me. I do not deserve it. I + do not want it. If you ever cared for me--any of + you--be strong now and help me . . . + + "And remember--never, never forget--that a just God + sits in yonder blue heaven above us--that He is not + hard--that I told you . . . He is merciful . . . + merciful . . . merciful . . . + + "O look above once more before we part, and see again + how '_The heavens declare the glory of God; and the + firmament sheweth his handywork_.' + + * * * * * + + "And now to God the Father, God the Son, and God the + Holy Ghost, be ascribed all honour, power, dominion, + might, henceforth and for ever. Amen." + +He had controlled himself by a superb effort. The end was as calm as the +beginning; but the rather hard, almost defiant note, that might have +marred the latter in ears less eager than Gwynneth's and more sensitive +than those of the people in the porch, that note had passed out of +Robert Carlton's voice for ever. + +And there no longer were any people in the porch; one by one they had +all crept in to listen, some stealing to the rude seats, more standing +behind, none remaining outside. Thus had they melted the heart they +could not daunt, until all at once it was speaking to their hearts out +of its own exceeding fulness, in a way undreamed of when the preacher +delivered his text. + +And this was to be seen as he came down the aisle, white head erect, +pale face averted, and so through the midst of his people--his once +more--without catching the eye of one. + + + + +XXVII + +AN ESCAPE + + +Mr. Fuller had made a hasty exit; but he waylaid Gwynneth on the road. +"Excuse me, miss," he cried, and the girl felt bound to do so. Next +moment she was trying to sort the mixed emotions in the saddler's face, +for a few steps had brought them to his house, and he had halted at the +workshop window. + +"Well, miss, and what do _you_ think of it?" + +"Oh, Mr. Fuller, please don't ask me." + +"I don't mean the sermon, miss; I mean the flock of sheep that come and +listened to the sermon," said the saddler, with a bitterness that +astonished Gwynneth. + +"But, surely, Mr. Fuller, you were glad they did come? I was so +thankful!" declared the girl. + +"So was I, miss; so was I," said the saddler, grimly; "but, Gord love +yer, do you suppose they ever would have shown their noses if you an' me +hadn't given 'em the lead?" + +"Then we ought to be very proud, Mr. Fuller; at least you ought, since +but for you I never should have known in time." + +"But do you think a man of 'em 'll admit it?" continued Fuller fiercely. +"Not they--I know 'em. They'll take the credit, the moment there's any +credit to take--them that hasn't given him a word or a look in all these +years. But the reverend, _he_ know--_he_ know!" + +"I'm sure he does," said Gwynneth, kindly; and left the forerunner to +his ignoble jealousy, only hoping there was some foundation for it, and +that a real reaction was already in the air. + +Even on her way home there were further signs. Jones the schoolmaster, +an implacable enemy these five years, but an emotional man all his life, +was still dabbing his eyes as he held unguarded converse with the +phlegmatic owner of the mill on the lock, who had been his fellow +churchwarden in the days before the fire. + +"I'll be his churchwarden again," declared the schoolmaster, "and Sir +Wilton can say what he likes. We know who ruled the roast before, and we +know----" + +Gwynneth caught no more as she hurried on, her first desire a quiet hour +without a whisper from the world. She wished to recall every word of the +sermon, while every syllable remained in her mind, and then to write it +all down and to possess it for ever. Such was her first feverish +resolve; nor, analytical as she was, did she stop to analyse this. The +stable gates were open; it never occurred to Gwynneth to wonder why. +There was a good way through the stable-yard to the garden, whose +uttermost end she might thus reach without being seen from the house. +And Fraulein Hentig had known where she was thinking of going, had +shaken Gwynneth not a little with her remonstrances, but would be none +the less certain to ask questions when next they met. + +Near the Italian garden was a certain walk, with stark yew hedges on +either hand, and fine grass stretched like a drugget from end to end. +Across this strip the old English flowers, poppies and peonies, +hollyhocks and larkspur, faced each other in serried lines as in a +country dance; and the vista ended in a thatched summer-house where it +was always cool. The spot was a favourite haunt of Gwynneth, who would +catch herself humming the old English songs there, and thinking of +patches and powder and the minuet. It had not that effect this morning; +she neither saw nor smelt the flowers, nor heard the thrush which was +singing to her with persistent sweetness from the stately trees upon the +lawn beyond. Gwynneth was in that other world which had existed all +these years within half-a-mile of this one. What she heard was the +virile cadence of the voice which had always thrilled her; strong and +masterful in the beginning; softening all at once, as the people pressed +in to hear; then for a little high-pitched and hoarse, spasmodic, +tremulous, too touching even to remember with dry eyes; then that last +pause, and the silver clarion of his proper voice once more and to the +end. And what Gwynneth saw, through her tears, was the sunlight resting +on that stricken head, as though God had stretched out His hand in final +mercy and forgiveness. + +But what she was to see, before many minutes were past, or the sermon +over in her mind, was a dapper figure approaching between the old +flowers and the spruce hedges, a figure in riding breeches, swinging a +cutaway coat in his walk. + +It was Sidney, ridden over from Cambridge on a hired horse. Gwynneth had +time to come out of the summer-house to meet him, but none to think. So +he had given her a kiss before she realised what that meant--and knew in +her heart that it must be the last. And the next moment she saw that he +was displeased. + +"So here you are!" was his verbal greeting: "I've been looking for you +all over the shop." + +"I'm so sorry," said poor Gwynneth. "If you had only let us know----" + +"Oh, that's all right; I took my risk, of course." + +He looked her up and down, as she stood in the sunlight, tall and +comely, her state of mind instinctively and successfully concealed; and +the brown tinge came upon his handsome face as the annoyance vanished. +Endearments fell from his lips, but now she made him keep his distance, +though so tactfully that he obviously did not realise his repulse. +Gwynneth looked at him for an instant with great compassion; then she +led the way into the summer-house, her mind made up. + +"You haven't been here all the morning, have you?" he went on. "No, I +see you haven't; there are your gloves." + +"Yes." + +"Been for a walk?" + +"Well, I did go for one." + +"What do you mean?" demanded Sidney, struck at last by her manner. + +"I've been to church!" + +"What! Over to Linkworth and back?" + +"No." + +Her tone trembled; he was not helping her at all. + +"Then what church did you go to, and what on earth's up with you, +darling?" + +"I went to our own church." + +"But I thought that Lakenhall chap only came in the afternoon?" + +"He doesn't go to the church." + +Sidney stared an instant, and was on his feet the next. "You don't mean +to say you've been up to the church talking to--to Carlton?" he cried. + +"No, not talking to him." + +"Then do you mind telling me what you do mean?" + +Gwynneth did her best to explain the occasion and to describe the +service, but found herself unable to do the subject justice in a few +words, and drifted into a nervous enthusiasm as she went. Sidney's eyes +seemed smaller than when she began; she had never known he had so sharp +a chin. But he heard her out, standing in the doorway, and not always +looking her way; it was when averted that his face looked so hard. When +she had finished he gave her his whole attention, and was some time +regarding her, his hands in his pockets, without a word. + +"So you deliberately went to hear that blackguard!" + +"You needn't call him that," said Gwynneth, hotly. + +"But I do." + +"I should be ashamed to abuse him after all he has done!" + +"That doesn't alter what--what you apparently and very properly know +nothing about, Gwynneth." + +"And I don't want to know!" cried the girl, indignant at his tone. "I +only say, whatever he has done, he has paid very bitterly for it, and +made such amends as were never made by anybody I ever heard of. He may +have been all you say. He is more than all that I can say now!" + +"And what do you say?" inquired Sidney, with polite contempt. + +"That we shall honour ourselves in future by honouring him, and +dishonour ourselves by continuing to dishonour him. He has had his +punishment, and look how he has borne it! Why, he has done what was +never done in the world before by one solitary man." + +Gwynneth stopped breathless. Sidney eyed her coolly, his nostrils +curling. "So that's your opinion," he sneered. + +"It's a good deal more than that," cried Gwynneth. "It's my fixed +conviction and personal resolve." + +"To honour that fellow, eh?" + +Gwynneth coloured. + +"To the extent of attending his services when I happen to be here," she +said. And Sidney gave her a pregnant look--a more honest look--angry and +determined as her own. + +"And what about me?" he said. "What if I object?" + +Gwynneth was slow to answer, to tell him the sharp truth outright. + +"Do you mean to go your own way in spite of me, in spite of the +governor, in spite of all of us?" + +Gwynneth saw that she could not remain at the hall and follow such a +course. So this question went unanswered like the last, though for a +different reason. Meanwhile Sidney was accounting for her silence to his +own satisfaction, and he now conceived that the moment had arrived for +him to play the strong man. + +"Look here, Gwynneth," said he, "this is all rot and bosh, and worse--if +you'll take my word for it. And you must take my word, and take it on +trust in a thing like this, or you never will in anything. I tell you +this fellow Carlton is the most unspeakable skunk. But it isn't a thing +we can discuss together. Isn't that enough for you? Isn't my wish +enough, in a thing like this, which I know all about and you don't? Have +I got to enforce it while we're still engaged? If so----" + +Gwynneth had raised her head slowly, and at last she spoke. + +"We are not engaged, Sidney," she said quietly. + +"Not--engaged?" + +"It has never been a proper engagement." + +"A proper engagement!" Sidney gasped. "Not a public one, if you like! +What difference does that make?" + +"No difference. It only makes it--easier----" + +"What does it make easier?" he demanded fiercely. + +Gwynneth was choking with humiliation. It was some moments before she +could command her voice. Her distress was pitiful; but the young man was +already busy pitying himself. A sudden change had come over Sidney. It +was not in all respects a change for the worse. His cynical aplomb had +already disappeared, leaving a tremulous, an angry, but a human being +behind. So Gwynneth felt a leaning to him even at the last; but this +time she knew her mind. + +And she spoke it with equal candour and humility: it was all her fault: +she could never forgive herself; but he would forgive her, when he saw +for himself what the woman will always see quicker than the man. She +liked him better than anybody she knew; that week at Cambridge had been +the happiest week in her life; one day they would, they must, be good +friends again. Meanwhile they had both made a miserable mistake. This +was not love. + +"Speak for yourself," cried Sidney, all bitterness and mortification. +"And I never believed in a woman before," he groaned; "my God, I never +shall again!" + +And he strode out savagely into the sun; but a different Sidney was back +next moment, one that reminded Gwynneth of the very old days, when he +would pass her whistling with his dog. A sneer was on his lips, and his +dry eyes glittered. + +"I beg your pardon for making a scene, Gwynneth; it isn't in my line, as +you know, and I apologise. But do you mind telling me when you +discovered that you had--changed?" + +"I have not changed, Sidney. That is my shame." + +"Do you mean that you never did care about me?" + +"Never in that way. I am ashamed to say it--more humiliated and ashamed +than you can ever know. But it's the truth." + +"Yet at the First Trinity ball, I remember, if you don't----" + +His tone was more than Gwynneth could endure. + +"Yes, I remember," she cried; "and I can explain it, though explanations +are no excuse. Sidney, you know what my life was until the last few +months? Happy enough in heaps of ways, but not the least gaiety in it; +and suddenly I felt the want of it. I felt it first abroad, and you met +that want in your May-week in a way beyond my dreams. You may sneer at +me now, but you were awfully nice to me then, and I shall never, never +forget it. You were so nice that I honestly did think for a little that +you met every other want as well! Yet I tell you now, what I tried to +tell you once before, that when once you had spoken nothing was the +same. It was like touching a bubble. The bubble had burst." + +"You felt like that from the first?" + +Gwynneth turned away, for now they were both upon their feet, restlessly +hovering between the summer-house and the sunlight. + +"And yet it has taken you two months to tell me," pursued Sidney without +remorse. + +"I know; it was dreadful of me; yet I could not tell you till I was +absolutely certain, and it is not so easy to be certain of oneself in +such things. If you find no difficulty, Sidney, then you might pity +those who do. Nevertheless, I did write, on my birthday, when you sent +me those beautiful pearls. Sidney, you must take them back--for my sake. +I meant to send them back at once, but you know what I heard that very +morning! It may have been cowardly and weak, but how could I tell you I +did not love you the moment I knew I was to have a little money of my +own? It's hard enough as it is; but I had not the pluck for that. Yet it +is hard enough now," repeated Gwynneth, with great feeling; "and you +haven't made it easier, Sidney. No, I don't mean anything you may have +said; you have not said more than I deserve. But you tempted me--you +little know how you have tempted me--to be dishonest with you to the +end. It would have been so easy to make poor Mr. Carlton the whole +cause, and not to have told you the truth at all!" + +"Then I wish to God you had done so!" Sidney cried out, revealing the +character of his wound unawares, yet once more human, young, and vain. +Moreover there was passion enough in his eyes and voice, as there had +been in his wooing. "Besides," he continued, "poor Mr. Carlton, as you +call him, _is_ the cause, I don't care what you say. Curse him! Curse +him, body and soul!" + +Gwynneth was outside in the sun, doubly adorable now that he had lost +her, and for other reasons too. Her sweet skin was flushed, and even her +tears inflamed the unhappy young man. He looked at her long and +passionately, then muttered venom through his teeth. + +"What did you say?" + +"I said it was like him, too, the blackguard!" + +"I don't know what you mean, and I don't want to." + +"It's as well," jeered Sidney, with exceeding malice; but already she +was turning away. She was turning away without one word. In an instant +he had her by both wrists, as the devil possessed himself. + +"Let me go," cried Gwynneth. "You're hurting me!" + +"I'm not. I'm not. I'm only going to let you know the kind of beast +that's come between us." + +Gwynneth stood with unresisting wrists. Her scorn was splendid. + +"I am not sorry to have seen you in your true colours, Sidney." + +"You are going to see some one else in his." + +Her scorn had destroyed his last scruple. His eyes were devilish now. + +"Let me go, you brute!" + +"There are worse, Gwynneth, there are worse. It isn't a thing we can +discuss, as I told you. But did you never notice the likeness?" + +Her blank face put the involuntary question he desired. + +"Only between the one big villain in this parish--and the one rather +jolly little boy!" + +At last her wrists were released. But Gwynneth remained standing in the +sun. She was not looking at Sidney; on the contrary, her face declared +her oblivious to his continued presence. It was white with several kinds +of horror; it was pinched with many separate pangs. So she stood a few +moments, then went her way slowly, only turning with a shudder. As for +him, his fever subsided as he watched; and, before the diminishing +figure had passed out of the vista of cropped hedges and crude flowers, +even Sidney Gleed knew himself, for once in his life, for what he was +and would be to its end. + + + + +XXVIII + +THE TURNING TIDE + + +Next Sunday there was a real congregation. Yet the benches were almost +as empty as before, the people herding near the porch until entreated +either to occupy such seats as there were, or to leave the church. +"Curiosity may have brought some of you here," said Mr. Carlton; "but I +earnestly hope that none will remain in that spirit." The benches were +full in a minute, and many had still to stand. All the next week Robert +Carlton spent in sawing more planks to one length, and more props to one +height for their support. And on the third Sunday his church was packed. + +The summer of 1887 was, however, a remarkable one. And the month of +August was an ideal month for the inauguration of open-air services, +where there were trees. + +In those hot still days came visitors of every type, and in greater +numbers than Robert Carlton desired. The tide had turned; he was early +aware of his danger now. Again and again it became his own sore duty to +remind this one or the other, distantly perhaps, yet none the less +unmistakably, of that which they might forget, but he never. Their open +admiration tried him acutely. He did like it a little for its own sake, +after five years' ostracism; more for the fresh purchase it gave him +over simple hearts; but he was very hard on himself for liking it at +all. On the other hand, he knew that it must put many a mind, the +subtler minds, more than ever against him. It also renewed his own +shame. So it was not admiration that he wanted at all; it was +confidence, forgiveness, love; and these if possible by degrees. It was +not possible, and Robert Carlton had to suffer in turn from the saddler, +the schoolmaster, and the rest. The first would come to hedge and hedge +with a view to Sir Wilton's imminent return; the next would intercept +him as he came away, learn what he had been saying, and forthwith step +across to the church to let the reverend know how the schoolmaster's +character impressed itself upon a man of his experience. It was an +unattractive trait in Fuller that he questioned everybody's sincerity +but his own, albeit his strictures were not seldom justifiable. He +talked, however, as though for years he had been the one and only +philanthropist to hold any dealings with the rector; at last it became +necessary to set him right on the point, which Mr. Carlton did with a +mild account of his illness and the sexton's aid. + +"I do wish I'd ha' known," said Fuller, with perfect truth; "I do wish +I'd ha' known an' had the nursun of yer, reverend, instead o' him. And +he never come near you no more; so I should expect." + +"But you tell me he's very ailing, Fuller." + +"He haven't been ailun all these years." + +"We--we had a little tiff in the end. It was my fault. I wonder if he'd +see me now?" + +"I'll make him, reverend, I'll tell him he's got to." + +"No, Fuller, I can't allow that. Besides, he has not got to do anything +of the sort; he has turned dissenter, and may prefer me to stop away. +Nevertheless I shall call, if only to ask how he is." + +There was no need to ask, in the event. The old sexton was failing fast, +and "not long for this world," as his daughter announced in front of +him. The poor man was in bed, and very dirty, but as sensible as he ever +had been; and he welcomed the rector with cadaverous grins. + +"They tell me," he whispered, "you fare to finish the church with your +own two hands. You're a wonderful man, sir--and I'm another." + +"You are, indeed. Why, you must be nearly ninety, Busby?" + +"Eighty-eight, sir, come next September. But I wasn't thinkun o' my age, +sir. Do you remember that little varmin I swallered out 'f a pond?" + +"I remember." + +"I've killed that, sir!" + +And the sunken eyes shone like lamps. + +"I congratulate you, Busby." + +"I killed that two year ago; and you'll never guess how!" The ex-sexton +proceeded to rehearse the various remedies he had tried in vain. "I +killed that with bacca-smoke," he concluded in sepulchral triumph. "It +was the minister's idea. I had to swaller the bacca-smoke instead o' +puffun that out, an' that choked that in three pipes!" + +The rector said it must be a great relief to be rid of such an incubus. +Busby, however, with a sick man's reluctance to admit any alleviating +circumstance in his case, was not so sure about that. He sometimes fared +to wish he had the little varmin back. Croap, croap, croap! That had +been wonderful good company after all. The ex-sexton was not too ill to +wax eloquent upon his favourite topic. And the tenor of his talk was +that mankind had been building churches since the world began, but what +other man had lived for years with a live frog on his chest? + +Their religious dispute was evidently forgotten, and Mr. Carlton did not +feel it incumbent upon him to risk another in the circumstances of the +case. On the way home the other egotist waylaid him, with his opinion of +old Busby's hallucination and general sanity since the saddler could +remember him. + +"But half the village and half the county is the same, reverend. Silly +Suffolk!" + +"Yet you're a Suffolk man yourself, Fuller," observed Mr. Carlton, +mildly. + +"Yes, reverend, but there was corn in Egypt, if you recollect." + +Meanwhile the building still went on, and was rapidly nearing a point +beyond which Carlton himself could not proceed unaided. That point was +the last window; the others were all finished. He had left out the +single mullions and all the tracery. They might be added afterwards by +an expert hand. They were not essential to the windows, which were ready +for glazing as they were. But the east window was another affair. It +must have its two mullions as before, with the quatrefoil tracery which +had remained undamaged in the west window opposite. All this was beyond +the self-taught hewer of coursed rubble and of gargoyles; the arch +itself must be two feet wider than any he had yet attempted; but on a +worthy east window he had set his heart. + +Such was the dilemma in which Robert Carlton found himself at the end of +August, and there seemed only one thing to be done. He must call for aid +at last, and now he knew that aid would come, for he had received +various offers of assistance since the beginning of the month. Some of +these were from local firms which had refused his work in the beginning; +Carlton had promised that if he called for tenders he would consider +theirs; and now call he must. Yet he could not bring himself to do so +all at once. + +To call in the world after all! To open his leafy solitude to the +British workmen in gangs, to hear their chaff, to smell their tobacco, +where he had laboured in quiet and alone through so many, many seasons! + +But it had to come. A tinge of autumn was on the trees. Any Sunday now +the open-air service might prove a discomfort and a peril to all; in a +few weeks at most it would become impossible. But the people must have +their church. They had waited long enough. Therefore any further +reluctance in him was little and unworthy, as Carlton saw at once for +himself. Yet there was now so much else to do, so many poor folks to +see, so many old threads to take up, that for once he temporised. And +even as he temporised, his mind made up, and a competition pending +between the masons of the neighbourhood, Sir Wilton Gleed arrived in +Long Stow for the shooting. + +Sir Wilton arrived with a frown. It deepened but little at what he +heard. He was prepared for everything; and about Gwynneth he knew. She +had left his house, she had gone her own way, he washed his hands of +her, and only congratulated Sidney on his escape. That chapter was +closed. It was the older matter that harassed Sir Wilton Gleed. + +So that devil had reinstated himself after all! The fact might not be +finally accomplished; it was none the less inevitable, imminent. And Sir +Wilton had long been prepared for it; for the last two years he had been +unable to move without hearing the name he abhorred; it dogged him in +town, it followed him to Scotland, it awaited him in every hole and +corner of the Continent. Once he had been fond of speaking of his +property; but in two senses it was hard to do this without giving the +place a name. Sir Wilton was learning to deny himself the boast +altogether. + +Long Stow? Could there be two Long Stows? Then that must be the place +where the parson was building up his church. What a romance! And what a +man! Oh, no doubt he was a very dreadful person also; but there, in any +case, was a Man. + +Sir Wilton could not deny it; and by degrees he wearied of insisting +upon the deplorable side of the man's character. The task was +ungrateful; it put himself in an ungenerous light, which was the harder +upon one who was by no means ill-natured in grain. Gradually he took to +admitting his adversary's good points; even admitted them to himself; +but that did not remove the chronic irritation of infallible defeat. And +defeated Sir Wilton already was, with the people flocking to that man +again, and doubtless willing to help him finish his church. His own +parishioners had forgiven him--and well they might, said Sir Wilton's +friends in every country-house. Besides, the suspended parson was a +figure of the past; the law was done with him; he was absolutely free to +begin afresh. Henceforth the vindictiveness of the individual must +recoil deservedly upon the individual's head. + +Sir Wilton saw all this before his actual return; and he realised the +madness of either urging or attempting to coerce his tenantry to harden +their hearts, a second time, against one who had committed no second +sin. If he failed it would destroy his influence in the neighbourhood; +even if he succeeded it would damage his popularity elsewhere. And a +chat with the schoolmaster, a call upon one or two of the neighbouring +clergy, a word with old Marigold in his gig, all served but to convince +him finally of these facts. + +Sir Wilton's mind was made up. He had come back primed with a desperate +measure for the last of all. Once it was resolved upon, his spirits +rose. + +He told his wife and took her breath away; but a very little reasoning +brought the lady round the compass to his view. This was after breakfast +on the second day. The same forenoon Sir Wilton went up the village, +brisk and rosy, a flower in his coat, and a word for all. Past the Flint +House he began to walk slowly, took no notice of a courtesy, swung round +suddenly himself, and was knocking at Jasper Musk's door that minute, +still a thought less confident than he had been. + +Musk was in his garden, fast as usual to his chair. Mrs. Musk brought +out another chair for Sir Wilton, and drove Georgie indoors on her way +back. Sir Wilton watched the child out of sight, and then favoured +Jasper with his peculiarly fixed stare. There was unusual meaning in it +this morning. + +"So the world has forgiven him," said Sir Wilton Gleed. + +Musk stared in his turn, his great face glowing with contempt. "Have +you?" said he at last. + +"Not yet," replied Sir Wilton, a shade more pink in the face. He had +meant to lead up to his intention. He was taken aback. + +"But you mean to, do you?" pursued Musk, pressing his point in no +respectful tone: in all their relations this one had never pandered to +the other. + +"I don't say that, either," replied Sir Wilton, in studied tones. + +"Then what do you say?" + +"Less than anybody else, a good deal less," declared the squire. "I--I +don't quite understand your tone, Musk, I must say; but I can well +understand your position in this matter. It is unique, of course. So is +mine, in a sense. But I must beg of you not to jump to conclusions. I am +the last person to make a hero of the man I did my best to kick out of +the parish five years ago; next to yourself, no one has reason to love +the fellow less. I thought it a public scandal that he should be +empowered to stay here against all our wills. My opinion of that whole +black matter is absolutely and totally unchanged. But I do confess to +you, Musk, that this last year or two have somewhat modified my opinion +of the man himself." + +Musk's eyes had never dropped or lifted from his visitor's face. Their +expression was inscrutable. The iron cast of that massive countenance +was the only key to the workings of the mind within: the lines seemed +subtly emphasised, as in the faces of the dead. And his gigantic body +was the same; only the eyes seemed alive; and they were as still as the +rest of him. + +"What if I've modified mine?" + +Sir Wilton looked up quickly; for the habitual starer had been for once +outstared. "Do you mean that you have?" cried he. + +"I don't say as I have or I haven't. But that's a man, Sir Wilton, and I +won't deny it." + +"Exactly what everybody is saying. I say no more myself." + +"And I won't say no less . . . Suppose you was to patch it up with him, +Sir Wilton?" + +"I should help him finish his church." + +Musk sat silent for some time. His eyes seemed smaller. But they had not +moved. + +"That would be a wonderful good action on your part, Sir Wilton," he +said at last. + +"Not at all, Musk. I should be doing it for the people, not for Mr. +Carlton." + +Another pause. + +"And yet, Sir Wilton, in a manner o' speaking, you might say as he +deserved it, too?" + +Sir Wilton was quite himself again--a gentleman in keeping with the +flower in his coat. + +"I certainly never expected to hear you say so, Musk," said he frankly; +"though it's what I've sometimes thought myself." + +"I haven't said as _I_ forgave him, have I?" + +"No, no, Musk, you haven't; it is not in human nature that you could." + +It was a strange tongue that had spoken in the massive head; there was +no forgiveness in that voice. Yet in the next breath the note of hate +was hushed as suddenly as it had been struck. + +"That may be in human natur'," said Musk, "but that ain't in mine. I'm +not a religious man, Sir Wilton. That may be the reason. But I do have +enough respect for religion to wish to see that church up again before I +die." + +"I consider it very generous of you to say so, Musk," declared the +other, with enthusiasm. + +"But I do say it, Sir Wilton, and I never said a truer word." + +"So I hear; and that decides me!" cried Sir Wilton, jumping up. "I +really had decided--for the sake of the parish--and was actually on my +way to the church to take the whole job over. A gang of competent +workmen could polish it off in a couple of months; and it ought to be +polished off. But it's really wonderful what he has done!" + +"I don't deny it," said Musk; and waited for the squire to recover his +point, his own set face unchanged. + +"Yes," resumed Sir Wilton, suddenly, "I was on my way up to make him +that proposal just now; but as I passed your door I could not resist +coming in. I thought I would like to tell you what I intended to do, and +to give you my reasons for doing it." + +"There was no need to do that," said Musk, with an upward movement of +the lips, hardly to be called a smile; for once also his great head +moved slowly from side to side. + +"And now I shall be going on," announced Sir Wilton, who did not like +this look, and was now less inclined to suffer disrespect. + +"Hold on a bit, Sir Wilton. I'm glued tight to this here chair by my old +enemy; that seem to get worse and worse, and I'm jealous I shall soon +set foot to the ground for the last time. That take me ten minutes to +mount upstairs to bed. I haven't been further'n this here lawn these +twelve months. So I can't come and see you, Sir Wilton; and I should +like another word or two now we're on the subject. You see, he was here +a good bit when the boy was bad, and even I don't feel all I did about +him, though forgive him I never shall on earth. At the same time I'd +like to see him have his church. That'd want consecrating again, sir, I +suppose?" + +"I suppose it would." + +"Would the bishop do it, think you?" + +"Like a shot," said Sir Wilton, a touch of pique in his tone. "I had +some correspondence with him years ago about this matter, and I was +surprised at the view the bishop took. He will come, if he is alive." + +Jasper had taken his eyes from Sir Wilton's face at last; they were +resting on the level sunlit land beyond the river. "That'll be a great +day for Long Stow," he murmured almost to himself; and suddenly his lips +came tight together at the corners. + +"It should be a very interesting ceremony," said Sir Wilton, foreseeing +his part in it. He had forgiven his enemy, the scandalous clergyman who +had lived down a scandal and a tragedy; it was Sir Wilton who had helped +him to live them down. Not at first; then he had been adamant; but his +justice in the beginning was only equalled by his generosity in the end, +when the man had proved his manhood, and the sinner had atoned for his +sin, so far as atonement was possible in this world. That poor +pertinacious devil had been five years running up the walls. Sir Wilton +Gleed had thrown his money and his influence into the scale, and +finished the whole thing in less than five months. They were saying all +this at the opening ceremony; everybody was there. His magnanimity was +being talked of in the same breath with the parson's pluck. The bishop +was his guest. + +"A very interesting ceremony," repeated Sir Wilton. "We could have it at +Christmas, if not before." + +"That won't see me," said Jasper Musk. "I couldn't get, even if I wanted +to. But sciatica that don't kill, and I hope to live to see the day." +And again the corners of his mouth were much compressed. + +"Yet you think you can never forgive him?" + +Sir Wilton felt that he could not be the bearer of too much good-will, +now that he was about it; but Musk turned his eyes full upon him, and +there was a queer hard light in them. + +"I don't think," said he. "I know." + +And so it fell out that in an hour of unusual depression, and of natural +hesitation which was yet not natural in Robert Carlton, he looked up +suddenly and once more saw his enemy in the sanctuary which would soon +be his very own leafy sanctuary no longer. Carlton had come there to +meditate and to pray, but not to work. That sort of work was not for him +any more. Others must take it up; the time was ripe; only the beginning +was hard. And here was Sir Wilton Gleed advancing towards him. + +And Sir Wilton was holding out his hand. + + + + +XXIX + +A HAVEN OF HEARTS + + +Slower to decide than most young persons of her independent character, +Gwynneth was one of those who are none the less capable of decisive +conduct in a definite emergency. She behaved with spirit in the +predicament in which her weakness and her strength had combined to place +her. She had jilted Sidney; outsiders might not know it; but she had +treated him in a way which he and his were never likely to forgive. +After that, and that alone, his home could not have been her home any +more; but Gwynneth had other and even stronger reasons for determining +to leave Long Stow; and there were none why she should not. She had her +money. She was of age. She would be a good riddance now. It was her +first thought in the garden. The thought hardened to resolve while +Sidney, full of bitterness and champagne, was still galling his hired +horse back to Cambridge. Gwynneth also was gone within the week. + +It was a chance acquaintance to whom the girl had written in her need. +She had met in Leipzig a strangely interesting woman: commanding, +mysterious, self-contained. This lady, a Mrs. Molyneux by name, had +taken notice of Gwynneth, and, at the close of their short acquaintance, +had given her a card inscribed in pencil with the name of St. Hilda's +Hospital, Campden Hill. + +"You have never heard of it," Mrs. Molyneux had said with a smile; "but +I shall be very glad if you will come and see me and my hospital some +day when you are in town." + +Gwynneth had felt honoured, she could scarcely have said why, for she +knew no more of this lady than she had seen for herself, which was +really very little. But there is a kind of distinction which appeals to +the instinct rather than to the conscious perceptions, and Gwynneth had +felt both awed and flattered by an invitation which was obviously +sincere. She had said that she should love to see the hospital--and had +never been near it yet. + +"I don't know whether you have ever thought of being a nurse," Mrs. +Molyneux had added with Gwynneth's hand in hers; "but if you ever +should--or if ever you want to do something, and don't know what else to +do--I wish you would write to me, and let me be your friend." + +The second invitation had been given with a wonderfully understanding +look--a look which seemed to sift the secrets of Gwynneth's heart--a +look she would not have cared to meet during the late season. She had +promised again, however, very gratefully indeed; and it was her second +promise that Gwynneth eventually kept. + +"I had such a strong feeling about you," Mrs. Molyneux wrote by return. +"I knew that I should hear from you sooner or later . . . I like your +frankness in saying that it is no fine impulse, or love of nursing for +its own sake, that makes you wish to come. I do not seek to know what it +is. Even if you are no nurse you can play the organ in our little chapel +as it has not been played yet; and that would be very much to me. So +come any day and make your home with us at least for a time." The writer +contrived to refer to herself as "Reverend Mother," in emphatic +capitals, and her letter was signed "Constance Molyneux, Mother in God." + +It happened that Gwynneth had spoken of Mrs. Molyneux to her aunt, who +knew a good name when she heard it, and had often asked Gwynneth if she +was not going to pay that call on Campden Hill; thus her recklessness in +casting herself among strangers was more apparent than real, and little +likely to aggravate her prime offence against kith and kin. Nor did it; +nevertheless it was a plunge into all but unknown waters. The hospital +was a private one, and Mrs. Molyneux both spoke and wrote of it as her +own. It was a cancer hospital for women, evidently run upon religious +lines, and those not easy to define, since Gwynneth happened to know +that the Reverend Mother was not a Roman Catholic. And these things were +all she did know when her hansom drew up before a red-brick building +with ecclesiastical windows, and a cross over the door, in a leafy road +not five minutes' climb from Kensington High Street. + +Gwynneth pulled the wrought-iron bell-handle, and next moment caught her +breath. The door had been opened by a portress in austere but becoming +garb, a young girl like herself, and the pretty face between the quaint +cap and collar was smiling a sweet greeting to the newcomer. A few worn +steps of snowy stone, and a Gothic doorway, with the oak door standing +open, showed more girls within against the wainscot; all were pretty; +and all wore blue serge, with white aprons and long cambric cuffs, +square bib-collars trimmed with lace, and Normandy caps with streamers +of fine lawn. Gwynneth blushed for her own conventional attire, as she +was ushered through this hall, past a dispensary where another of the +uniformed girls was busy among the bottles, and so into the presence of +the Reverend Mother. + +Mrs. Molyneux, the well-dressed woman of the world whom Gwynneth had +known in Leipzig, was a lost identity in a habit which marked her sway +only by its supreme severity; an order of St. John of Jerusalem hung +upon her bosom, and a crucifix dangled at her side. Her hands were +hidden beneath some short and shapeless garment reaching to the waist, +but one emerged for a moment to greet Gwynneth warmly. "Do you feel as +if you had come into a convent?" the Reverend Mother asked, a gentle +humour in her lowered voice. It was exactly what Gwynneth did feel, and +the sensation was by no means displeasing to her. The Mother herself +then showed Gwynneth over the establishment, which was indeed a singular +amalgam of the hospital and the nunnery. The dining-room was termed the +"refectory"; a cross hung over every bed in the wards upstairs, and in +the nurses' cubicles below the wards. Cap and apron, bib-collar and +cuffs, were laid out on Gwynneth's bed, and these she found herself +expected to don then and there. The Mother returned when she was ready, +and showed her the chapel last of all. It was a tiny chapel, but as +beautiful as antique carving, rich embroidery, much stained glass, and +hanging lights could make it. In her innocence Gwynneth wondered why +these lights were burning while the summer sun, shining through the +stained glass, filled the chapel with vivid beams of purple and red. She +was even puzzled by the unmistakable odour of recent incense; but she +said, with truth, that the chapel delighted her. + +"I knew it would," the Mother whispered with her penetrating smile. + +"How could you know?" Gwynneth asked, smiling also, because she had +never touched on religion with Mrs. Molyneux. + +"I saw you once in the English church," the Mother said. "It was before +I knew you; and yet, you see, I did know you, even then!" + +In this chapel there were daily matins, vespers, nones; and at each of +the three services attendance was compulsory on the part of all nurses +not required at an actual deathbed, and of all patients who were still +up and about. French-capped, pink-frocked maid-servants and ward-maids +filled the front rows of chairs; the patients sat behind; and on either +hand, in the carved oak stalls, were the pretty nurses, the Reverend +Mother near the entrance in their midst. The services, conducted by an +attendant Anglican of small account, were punctuated by genuflexions and +the sacred sign; and it was impossible to follow them in the Book of +Common Prayer. + +Gwynneth tried hard to lift up her heart in this strange sanctuary. She +longed for real religion as she had longed for little in her life +before. At the first blush, it seemed as though Providence alone could +have led her into so unique a haven of equal sanctity and usefulness; +and yet, also from the first, the girl was repelled a little if +attracted more. She liked her work; she was a natural nurse, and soon +grew used, but never hardened, to hopeless suffering and slow death. +There were patients who loved Gwynneth, and not a nurse who was not fond +of her, before she had been at St. Hilda's a month. Already she was +playing the organ at all three services, and her own music, and the +voices floating up to her, at these set times, filled her heart with +peace; but she wondered if it was the right kind of peace; she wondered +whether this was religion at all. Sometimes the sweet little chapel--for +it was all that to Gwynneth's mind--struck her also as a stage of +studied effects. The nurses were so pretty, their garb so becoming, and +the blue of it had such a perfect foil in the maid-servants' pink. But +then the Reverend Mother, in her sombre supremacy, gradually revealed +herself as the superb mistress of deliberate effect; and a strange study +Gwynneth found her; of foibles and fascination all compact; at once +subtle, simple, vain, and noble. It appeared that Mrs. Molyneux was an +extremely wealthy widow, whose one consoling hobby was this anomalous +retreat upon Campden Hill. + +The patients paid nothing; the nurses received nothing; it was a retreat +for both, and Gwynneth was not the only one who had sought it +primarily, and frankly, for peace of mind and salvation from self. Her +hands at least were not the less tender and untiring on that account. +Some of her capped and cuffed comrades were no older than herself; many +were refreshingly frivolous, and properly free from care. Gwynneth's +chief crony was Nurse Ella, a bright young widow, who wore spectacles, +and declared herself unable to understand what the Reverend Mother had +ever seen in her, as she was neither pretty nor religious, nor as young +as the rest. + +Nurse Ella had, however, a shrewd wit and a sharp tongue; made wicked +fun of the Mother's sacerdotal pretensions when alone with Gwynneth; and +thus stimulated the latter to think for herself, if only to refute her +friend's arguments. Nurse Ella was above all things an extraordinarily +decided character, aggressively so in immaterial issues, but good for +Gwynneth by that very fact. + +These opposites became fast friends. Often they would talk over the +refectory fire--a wood fire in an ancient grate, which cast the right +mediæval glow over the polished floor and the dark wainscotting--long +after the others were in their cubicles. Nurse Ella had the greatest +scorn for the conventual side of St. Hilda's, which Gwynneth would +defend warmly, while her heart admitted more than her lips; the +discussion would ramify, and become animated on both sides; then all at +once Nurse Ella would look at her watch, and no persuasion would induce +her to stay another minute. Gwynneth could have sat up half the night, +and would plead in vain for ten minutes more; it seldom took Nurse Ella +as many seconds to suit her action to her word. She said she would do a +thing, and did it; that was Nurse Ella's principle in life. + +So there was no exchange of confidences between these two, both reticent +natures, and neither unduly inquisitive about the other's affairs. +Gwynneth only knew that her friend's married life had been a very short +one; for her own part, she had said nothing to let Nurse Ella suppose +that she had herself been even asked in marriage. But one night they +were speaking of another nurse, who had left St. Hilda's that day, in +floods of tears, to be married the following week. + +"If I felt like that," Gwynneth had declared, "I wouldn't be married at +all." + +Nurse Ella looked up quickly, her glasses flaming in the firelight. +"What, not after you had given your word?" said she. + +"Certainly not, if I felt I had made a mistake." Gwynneth was staring +into the fire. + +"You would break your solemn promise in a thing like that?" the other +persisted. + +"Better one promise than two lives," replied Gwynneth, with oracular +brevity. Nurse Ella watched her in sidelong astonishment. + +"It's easy to talk, my dear! I believe you are the last person who would +do anything so dishonourable." + +"I don't call it dishonourable." + +"But it is, to break your word." + +"Suppose you have changed?" + +"You have no business to change. Say you'll do a thing, and do it." + +The spectacled face had assumed a rigid cast which Gwynneth knew well, +and for which Nurse Ella had just the chin. + +"But supposing you never really loved----" + +"Love is an inexact term; it's not always easy to tell when it applies +to your feelings, and when it does not. But when you say you'll marry +anybody, that's a definite promise, and nothing in the world should make +you break it, unless it's been extracted under false pretences. We are +both very positive, aren't we?" and Nurse Ella smiled. "I wonder why you +are, Gwynneth?" + +"Because," said the girl, impelled to frankness, yet hanging her head, +"as a matter of fact, I've been more or less engaged myself." + +"And you got out of it?" + +"I broke it off." + +"Simply because you had changed?" + +"No--it was a mistake from the beginning. I had never really cared. That +was my shame." + +"And you broke your word--you had the courage!" + +The tone was a low one of mere surprise. There was more in the look +which accompanied the tone. But Gwynneth had her eyes turned inward, and +her wonder was not yet. + +"It had to be done," she said simply. "It was humiliating enough, but it +was not so bad as going on . . . Can anything be so bad as marrying a +man you do not love, just because you have made a mistake, and are too +proud to admit it?" + +"No . . . you are right . . . that is the worst of all." + +It might have been a studied picture that the two young women made, in +the old oak room, with the firelight falling on their quaint sweet garb, +and reddening their pensive faces, only conscious of the inner self. +Nurse Ella was standing up, gazing down into the fire, her back turned +to Gwynneth; but now her tone was enough. It was neither wistful nor +bitter, but only heavy with conviction; and in another moment Nurse Ella +was gone, not more abruptly than usual, but without letting Gwynneth see +her face again. Then Gwynneth recalled the look with which the other had +exclaimed upon her courage, and either she flattered herself, or that +look had been one of envy pure and simple. Could it be that her friend's +decided character was all self-conscious and acquired? Was her +intolerance of the slightest hesitation, in matters of no account, a +life's reaction from a fatal irresolution in some crisis of her own +career? + +Gwynneth never knew; for a fine mutual reserve distinguished the +intimacy of this pair, and even drew them together, opposite as they +were in so many other respects, more than impulsive confidences on +either side. One had suffered; the other was suffering now; each was a +little mystery to her friend. And there was one more reason for this: +neither was sure of the other's sympathy: at every point of contact they +diverged. + +So Gwynneth used to wonder whether Nurse Ella was in reality a widow at +all, and Nurse Ella was quite sure that Gwynneth was still in love, +probably with the man she had jilted, according to the wise way of +women; she was so ready to speak of love in the abstract; and once she +spoke so passionately. This was in Kensington Gardens, one foggy Sunday, +when the two nurses were on their way to church; for they were allowed +to worship where they listed after matins at St. Hilda's. Nurse Ella +rented a sitting under a fashionable preacher who discoursed with much +wisdom and some acidity on topics of the hour; but Gwynneth was still +seeking her spiritual ideal. They would walk together as far as the +Bayswater Road, where their ways diverged, unless Nurse Ella could +induce Gwynneth to go with her; on this particular morning they were +arguing about a novel when the houses loomed upon them through the bare +trees and the fog. + +"She never would have forgiven him," Nurse Ella had declared, in crisp +settlement of the point at issue. "No young wife would forgive a young +husband who behaved like that. So it may be the cleverest novel in the +language, but it isn't true to life." Whereupon Gwynneth, who had been +defending a masterpiece with laudable spirit, walked some yards in +silence. "Are you sure that it matters how people behave," she then +inquired, "if you really love them?" + +"How they behave?" echoed her friend. "Why, Gwynneth, of course! Nothing +does matter except behaviour." + +"It wouldn't to me," Gwynneth exclaimed, almost through her teeth. + +"But surely what one does is everything!" + +"Not in love," averred Gwynneth, whose convictions were few but firm; +"and those two are more in love than any other couple I know in fiction +or real life. No; you love people for what they are, not for what they +do." + +Nurse Ella laughed outright. + +"That may be good metaphysics," said she, "but it's shocking +common-sense! Our actions are the only possible test of our character, +as its fruit is the only test of a tree." + +In Gwynneth's eyes burnt wondrous fires, and on her cheeks; and her +breath was coming very quickly. But most persons look straight ahead as +they walk and talk, and between these two fell the kindly fog besides. + +"Suppose you loved somebody," the young girl cried at last; "and +suppose you suddenly discovered he had once done something +dreadful--unspeakable. Would that alter your feeling towards him?" + +"It could never fail to do so, Gwynneth." + +"It would not alter mine!" + +Nurse Ella turned her head. But in the road the fog seemed thicker than +in the gardens. And, apart from its vigour, Gwynneth's tone had sounded +impersonal enough. + +"I believe it would," her friend persisted, "when the time came." + +"And I know that it would not," said Gwynneth, half under her breath and +half through her teeth. + +"Well, Gwynneth," said Nurse Ella, with a laugh, "we were evidently born +to differ. In my view that would be the one sort of excuse for changing +one's mind about a man--whereas you see others!" + +"But I am not talking about one's mind," cried Gwynneth; "the feeling I +mean, the feeling those two have in the book, lies infinitely deeper +than the mind." + +"And no crime could alter it?" + +"Not if he atoned--not if the rest of his life were one long atonement." + +"But, Gwynneth, that would make all the difference." + +Gwynneth walked on in silence. She was reconsidering her own last words. + +"Atonement or no atonement," she exclaimed at length, "it would make no +difference--if I loved the man. Atonement or no atonement!" repeated +Gwynneth defiantly. + +Nurse Ella had a passion for the last word, but they were come to her +corner, and there was Gwynneth glowing through the fog, her eyes alight, +her cheeks flaming, a new being in the puzzled eyes of her friend. + +"Come with me, Gwynneth," begged Nurse Ella, at length; "don't go off by +yourself. Come, dear, and hear a shrewd, hard-headed sermon, without +sentiment or superstition!" + +Gwynneth smiled. That was the last thing to meet her mood. + +"Then where shall you go?" + +"Either St. Simeon's or All Souls'," said Gwynneth. "I haven't made up +my mind." + +Nurse Ella shook her head over an admission as characteristic as her +disapproval. This was the Gwynneth that she knew. + +"When do you make it up!" exclaimed Nurse Ella without inquiry. + +"When it's a matter of the least importance," said Gwynneth, choosing to +reply. "What can it signify which church I go to, what difference can it +possibly make? As a matter of fact I rather think of going to All +Souls'." + +"I thought you didn't care about music and nothing else?" + +"I don't know that there is nothing else. I think of going to see. I +have often thought of it before, but St. Simeon's is rather nearer, and +I generally end by going there. I shall decide on the way." + +"What a girl you are, Gwynneth!" exclaimed Nurse Ella, with frank +impatience. "You never seem to know your own mind--never!" + +Gwynneth made no reply; but she kindled afresh, and this time very +tenderly, as she went her own way through the fog. + + + + +XXX + +THE WOMAN'S HOUR + + +All Souls' was dark and hazy with its share of the ubiquitous fog, here +a little aggravated by the subtle fumes of incense newly burnt. In the +haze hung quivering constellations of sallow gaslight, and through it +gleamed an embroidered frontal, and the silken backs of praying priests, +lit by candles four. Delicate strains came from an invisible organ; a +light patter and a rich rustling from the feet and garments of some +departing after matins, some taking their places for choral eucharist, +women to the left, men to the right. Men and women, goers and comers +alike, with few exceptions, bowed the knee with Romish humility at the +first or the last glimpse of that shimmering frontal with the four +candles above and the motionless vestments below. + +The congregation was one of well-dressed women and well-to-do men; their +quiet devotion was not the less noteworthy on that account. A fine +reverence animated every face: the stray observer would have missed the +passive countenance of the merely pious, as Gwynneth did, and discovered +in its stead the happy ardour of those whose religion was a delight +rather than a duty. Yet the congregation took scarcely any part in the +actual service. Few untrained voices joined in the exquisite singing; +few, in the body of the church, left their places to take part in the +sacred climax. The congregation might have been only an audience; yet +somehow it was not. Somehow also there was nothing spectacular in an +office of equal dignity, distinction, and fervour. + +Yet the yellow lights in a yellow fog, the perfect organ, trained +voices, rich embroideries, incense, genuflexions, all these seemed at +one religious pole; and Long Stow church on a summer's day, with the sky +above and the birds singing, and Mr. Carlton in his surplice in the sun, +surely that was at the other! It was Gwynneth's fate, at all events, to +carry that single service in her heart and mind for ever, and to put +every other one against it. She did so now, involuntarily at first, and +then unwillingly, as she knelt or stood at the end of her row--her +cambric cuffs and fine lawn streamers in high relief against the rich +furs and the sombre feathers of those about her. + +On the other side of the nave, far back and close to the wall, a +grizzled gentleman stood and knelt by turns, in much obscurity; and his +attention never flagged. No detail of the elaborate ritual appeared +unfamiliar to this worshipper, and yet for a time his expression was +rather that of the alien critic. Gradually, however, the lines +disappeared from his forehead, his eyes opened wider, and brightened +with the peaceful ardour which he himself had already remarked in the +eyes of others. He was a tall thin man, very weather-beaten and rather +bent, wearing a new overcoat and a soft muffler; there was nothing in +his appearance to declare him of the cloth himself. His grey beard was +close trimmed. He wore gloves and carried a tall hat shoulder high in +the press going out. He was no more readily recognisable as the lonely +builder of Long Stow church, than Gwynneth in her nurse's garb as the +niece of Sir Wilton Gleed. But their separate fates brought them face to +face in the porch, and recognition was immediate on both sides. + +"Miss Gleed?" said Robert Carlton, raising his hat before it covered his +grey hairs. + +"Mr. Carlton!" she exclaimed in turn. There had been no time to think, +and her voice told only of her surprise; her own ear noticed it, and she +had time to marvel at herself. + +"I thought I could not be mistaken," Carlton was saying. And they were +shaking hands. + +"I never expected to see you here," said Gwynneth, with a strange +emphasis, as though the declaration were due to herself. + +"I never thought of coming until an hour or two ago." + +No more had Gwynneth: then the miracle was twofold. Her heart gave +thanks. It was not afraid. + +Meanwhile the crowd was carrying them gently, insensibly, but side by +side, across the flagged yard to the gate. + +"It's the first Sunday I've spent in town for years," observed Carlton; +"you are here altogether, I believe?" + +"Well, for some years, at least. I am learning to be a nurse." + +And Gwynneth blushed for her conspicuous attire, just as Carlton gave a +downward glance at the quaint cap on a level with his shoulder. + +"So I heard," he said. "May I ask which hospital you are at?" He could +recall none where the uniform was so picturesque. + +"You would not know it, Mr. Carlton; it is a private hospital on Campden +Hill." + +They had passed through the gate, and they paused with one consent. + +"Are you returning there now, Miss Gleed?" + +"Yes--through the gardens." + +"Then so far our way is the same." He did not ask whether he might +accompany her, but took the outer edge of the pavement as a matter of +course. "I am staying at Charing Cross," he explained as they walked; +"early this morning I went to the abbey. I did mean to go back there; +then I suddenly thought I should like to come here instead. I was once +one of the assistant clergy at this church." + +"I know," said Gwynneth. She would not deny it. That was why she had so +often thought of coming to All Souls'--only to resist the temptation +time and time again. Why, to-day of all days, had she been unable to +resist? Why had she thought of him this morning, and why had the thought +been so strong? These were questions for a lifetime's consideration. Now +she was walking at his side. + +"It was strange to go back there after so many years," pursued Carlton, +with the fine unguarded candour which he had brought back with him into +the world; "that service, in particular, was very strange to me. I did +not care for it at first. It seemed so artificial after our simple +service in the country. Then I looked at the faces of the men near me, +and I saw how narrow one can get. It was not artificial to them; it was +only beautiful; and there lies the root of the whole matter. Simple +services for simple folk--that is my watchword now--but beauty, +brightness, elaboration by all means for those who need it and can +appreciate it. It is the right thing for these rich congregations of +hard-worked professional men and busy society women; the trappings of +their religious life must not compare meanly with those of their daily +lives; let us order God's house as we would our own. But the opposite is +the case--though the principle is the same--with a primitive country +parish like ours at Long Stow . . . And yet I had not the wit to see +that when I went there first." + +He was musing aloud as men seldom do unless very sure of their audience. +How came he to be so sure of Gwynneth? They had seen nothing of each +other; this was the first time they had been alone together long enough +to exchange ideas; yet in a moment he was revealing his as few men do to +more than one woman in the world. And the one woman's heart was singing +at his side. + +She was with him; that was enough. Already it was the sweetest hour of +all her life; for the thought of him had haunted her for months, and was +full of pain; but in his presence all pain passed away. That was so +wonderful to Gwynneth! So wonderful was it that she herself was aware of +it at the time; it was her one great discovery and surprise. To be with +him was to forget all that he had ever done, all that she had never +before forgotten--the good with the evil. It was to sweep aside the +earthly and the palpable, to feel the divine domination of spirit over +spirit, and the peace which comes with even the secret surrender of soul +to soul. Hers was a conscious surrender, and Gwynneth made it without +shame. Since it was her secret, why should she be ashamed? She was +exalted, exultant, and yet serene. She might carry her secret to the +grave; her life would be the richer for it, for these few minutes, for +every word he spoke. So she caught each one as it fell, and laid the +treasure in her heart, even while she listened for the next. + +But in a minute they were come as far as he intended to escort her; +there were the palings and the stark trees close upon them in the fog; +and an omnibus passing, huge as a house. Gwynneth had been treading thin +air; now she was back in the sticky streets, inhaling the raw mist, to +exhale it in clouds under a microscopic magenta sun. They had stopped at +the corner; he was hesitating: her breath disappeared. + +"I have to get over to that side sooner or later," he said. "I may just +as well walk across with you, if you don't mind." + +"I shall be delighted," said Gwynneth, frankly, brightly; but her breath +came like a puff of smoke, and she felt her colour come with it as they +crossed the road. + +"I want to tell you about the church," he said, as they entered upon the +broad walk. "This is the first Sunday that I haven't taken service there +since the beginning of August." + +"The first!" exclaimed Gwynneth. "Have you actually gone on up to now +without a roof?" + +Carlton turned in his stride. + +"But we have a roof, Miss Gleed!" + +"You have one?" + +"It has been on some weeks." + +Gwynneth was standing quite still. "Do you mean to say that the church +is finished?" she cried, incredulous. + +"Yes," said Carlton; "thank God, I can say that at last." + +"But it seems such a short time! I don't understand. It seemed +impossible to me--by yourself?" + +"Oh, but I have not been by myself. I have had help." + +"At last!" + +"I wonder you have not heard. Everybody has helped me--everybody!" + +"Do you mean--my people--among others?" + +And Gwynneth preferred walking on to facing him here. + +"Is it possible you haven't heard?" exclaimed Carlton, incredulous in +turn. + +"Not a word," replied Gwynneth, bitterly. "They never write." + +But her bitterness was new-born of her indignation, not that they never +wrote, but that they had not written to tell her this. He told her +himself with much feeling and more embarrassment. + +"Why, Miss Gleed, I owe everything to Sir Wilton! It is the last thing I +ever--I can hardly realise it yet--or trust myself to speak of it to +you. My heart is so full! But it is Sir Wilton who has finished the +church; he came to me, and he took it over. He called for tenders; he +poured in workmen; the place has been like a hive. So the roof was on in +a month; and we never missed a Sunday, we had one service all the time; +but now we have three and four--thanks entirely to Sir Wilton Gleed!" + +He paused. But Gwynneth had nothing to say, and his embarrassment +increased. It was so hard to speak of Sir Wilton's magnanimity without +alluding to his previous attitude, and thus indirectly to its notorious +cause; and Carlton could not see that his companion was entirely taken +up with his news, could not realise the surprise it was to her, or +apprehend for a moment what impression it had made. He might, however, +have had some inkling of her view from the manner in which Gwynneth +eventually said that she was glad to hear her uncle had done something. + +"Something?" echoed Carlton. "He has done everything, and it is like his +generosity that you should hear it first from me!" + +Gwynneth shook her head unseen, though now he was looking at her, his +eyebrows raised; but she seemed intent upon picking her steps through +the thin mud of the broad walk. + +"And what that is like," continued Carlton, "from my point of view, you +will see when I tell you why I am in town to-day. It is the first Sunday +I have missed; but Mr. Preston of Linkworth and other friends are kindly +dividing my duty between them. Sir Wilton has arranged that, by the way. +He telegraphed yesterday to save me the journey; for I was going down +for the day, and returning to-morrow. Yet I came up last Monday, and am +still hard at work--buying for the new church." + +Gwynneth asked what it was that he had to buy; but her tone was so +mechanical that Robert Carlton did not at once reply. He was beginning +to feel strangely disappointed, to wish that he had gone his own gait to +Charing Cross, or at least held his peace about the church. But there +was one point upon which he felt constrained to convince his companion +before they parted; he might do more than justice to an absent man; but +she should not do less. And the spire of St. Mary Abbot's was already +dimly discernible through the yellow haze. + +"There is nothing we have not to buy, for the interior," he said at +length. "The lectern is the one exception, and I have had it +straightened and lacquered into a new thing. Sir Wilton wanted me to +keep it as it was; but that would never have done. However, he would +have an inscription to the effect that it is the same lectern which was +in the fire, which is quite a sufficient advertisement of the fact. I +was in favour of restoring the communion plate also, but Sir Wilton +insisted on presenting us with a new set, which I have been choosing +among other things this week. The other things are too numerous to +mention--carpets, curtains, collecting-boxes, alms-bags, a Litany desk, +and the hundred and one things you take for granted as part of the +church itself. But each has to be chosen and bought, and I only wish +that I had had your help. I have found the best things most difficult to +choose--the plate and a very handsome cross and candlesticks of polished +brass--all of which are my choice, but Sir Wilton's gift. So is the +organ which is being built for us. Can you wonder, then, that his +generosity has moved me more than I can possibly tell you?" + +"Indeed, no!" cried Gwynneth, in her own kind voice; but her honour was +all for the man who claimed it for another; and, until she opened them +now, her lips had been pursed in mute rebellion. She could fancy so much +that the true generosity would never even see! Gwynneth had not that +sort herself; she did not profess to have it. On the other hand, she was +anxious to be fair, even in her own mind; so she asked a question or two +concerning the hired and skilled labour which had been thrown into the +scale with such effect; and, after all, it appeared that Sir Wilton +Gleed had not paid for this. + +"But he wanted to," said Carlton, quickly. "It was not his fault that I +would not hear of his doing so; it was my obstinacy, because I had set +my heart on rebuilding the church myself, in one sense or the other." + +"Yet you said he took it over from you!" + +"So he did, Miss Gleed. He lent me his influence and support; that was +much more to me than the money, which I had and didn't want. Besides, he +is a business man, which I am not, and he did take the whole business +off my hands. That is what I meant." + +Gwynneth wondered whether it was what the countryside understood; but +said no more about the matter. She had other things to think of during +their last moments together; for she had stopped at the corner near the +palace; nor did she mean to let him accompany her any further. She was +still so decided and serene. She was still exalted and strengthened out +of all self-knowledge in the quiet presence of the man she loved, and +must love for ever, even though her love were to remain her heart's +prisoner for this life. This life was not all. + +So it was that she could look her last upon him, perhaps for ever, with +her own face transfigured and beautified by a joy not of earth alone: so +it was that she could speak to him, and hear him speak, without a tremor +to the end. + +His church was to be consecrated that day week--Advent Sunday. The +bishop was coming to perform the ceremony; his voice softened as he +spoke of the bishop, who was to be his own guest at the rectory. His +face shone as he added that. It was going to be a very simple ceremony. +And here something set him twisting at one of his gloves; then suddenly +he looked Gwynneth in the eyes. + +"You don't happen to be coming down, Miss Gleed?" + +"I don't think it very likely." + +"It--it wouldn't of course be worth your while----" + +"It would! It would! It would be more than worth it; but, to be quite +frank, I don't know that I shall ever come down again, Mr. Carlton." + +Was he sorry? He did not even show surprise; and not a word more: for he +had heard stray words in Long Stow concerning Gwynneth's departure and +its reason as alleged. "I should have liked you to see the church," was +all he said. + +"And do you know," rejoined Gwynneth, speaking out her mind at last, +"that I am in no great hurry to see it? I know it is foolish of me--for +no one man could have finished such a work--no other man living would +have got as far as you did without a soul to help you! Yet somehow I +don't so much want to see the church that they came in and finished; it +would spoil the picture that I can see so plainly now, and always +shall--of the stones you cut and the walls you built with your own two +hands--and every other hand against you!" + +She was holding out her own. Carlton looked from it to her face, a +strange surprise in his eyes. He had wriggled out of one of his gloves, +and was twisting it round the iron paling at the corner where they +stood. + +"May I come no further?" he said. + +"No, I could not think of taking you another yard out of your way. And +it is really not so very many yards from where we stand!" + +Gwynneth smiled brightly; but her voice was the very firm one of this +half-hour of her existence. And ever afterwards she was to marvel why +neither smile nor words were an effort to her at the time: so his +presence supported her to the end, when the clasp of that indomitable +hand, now bare, and horny even through her glove, left Gwynneth +outwardly unmoved. She returned his pressure with honest warmth; her +smile was kind and bright; then the cold mist fell between them in a +widening yellow gulf, with a diminishing patter of firm footsteps, that +Carlton could hear when the nurse's streamers had quite disappeared in +the fog. + +And he stood where he was to hear the last of her; and still he stood, +wishing he had disregarded tact, and persisted in his escort, whether it +embarrassed her or not, if only to find out where her hospital was. He +felt inclined to call before leaving town; already there was something +that he wished he had said; he kept saying it to himself as he wandered +back through dark gardens and a desert park. + +"So you prefer to think of it before the roof was on, as I managed to +make it by myself! You are the first to say that or to feel it--except +me! And I have put the feeling down; thank God, I have got it under; yet +it is a help to know that one other felt the same. Perhaps it was a +human feeling; but in me at least it was unworthy. God help me! But in +you it is sweet, and to me very wonderful . . . that you should +understand and sympathise . . . a young girl like you!" + +This whole fatality left the man sadly unsettled; tired and yet restless +in body and soul; humbly thankful for a woman's sympathy after so long, +and so much, yet the prey of a new depression. A woman's sympathy! Or +was it only a woman's pity? No, she understood; but it mattered little +to Robert Carlton; there could be no second woman in his life. That he +had always felt; but he was not sure that he had ever before defined the +feeling. It was a part of his eternal punishment; but he was quite sure +that he had not previously regarded it in that light. + +A coxcomb Carlton had never been; he had no suspicion of the kind of +impression he had made upon Gwynneth; his sole concern was the +impression which she had made on him. Like the rest of the world, she +was flying to extremes; only in her case, if she especially magnified +the good, it was because she was still ignorant of the original evil. It +could be nothing else; but his feeling about himself was more complex. +He alone knew how much or how little of the highest and the best in him +had redeemed that passion born of passion which had blighted his life. +It was of further significance that for years Carlton had not looked +upon his life as blighted. The blight fell upon the shining vision of +the woman he could have loved. And all had been so sudden that the man +was dazed. + +He could not eat, though he was hungry; nor rest, though tired to the +bone. He would go out again. It was good to be out, even in a London +fog, which was nothing to the fogs he remembered, for there was no +question of groping one's way; one could see it for fifty yards, often +for more. But now there was not even a small magenta sun; it was the +middle of the brief December afternoon when Robert Carlton left his +hotel; and near its close before he found himself in Kensington Gardens +once more. He hardly knew what brought him there. It was partly, but not +altogether, a sentimental impulse. Carlton had also some idea of finding +the hospital if he could, some hope of seeing Gwynneth again, if only to +assure himself that his imaginings of the last few hours had made her +other than what she was. And then he could rectify those omissions of +the morning; but neither was this all; a strong inexplicable attraction +drew him straight to the spot where he had stood so long after Gwynneth +was gone. + +And Gwynneth herself was standing there again! + +He was almost upon her before he saw her in the dusk, then those long +lawn streamers leapt like lightning to his eyes; and now he was creeping +backwards across the path. But she had not heard him, or she did not +heed: her back was turned, and bent, for she was leaning over the iron +paling which he had grasped before. And she shook with tears. + +Carlton was shaking, too; passion had taken him by the shoulders, and +was shaking the strength out of his heart. Horror had driven him back, +passion was spurring him on again. If she loved him--if she loved +him--then the hand of God was in all this. + +He was back upon the spot where recognition had come. Oh, yes, it was +she! She had given a little cry; she was stooping lower over the paling; +her voice was unmistakable. Then she rose, half turning, and he saw her +profile plain. She was raising something to her eyes; in another moment +it was at her lips, and she was kissing it, and sobbing over it, +whatever it might be. + +Carlton thought he knew what it was, and conceived a new horror of +himself in his involuntary capacity of spy. Yet instinctively he was +feeling in both overcoat pockets at once; in one there was a single +glove; in the other nothing at all. Cold with shame, but shivering with +excitement, the man stood torn between the newborn desire of his eyes, +and the fixed resolve of his soul. But he could not tear himself from +the spot--nor was it any longer necessary. Gwynneth was gone herself; +gone without seeing him; out of sight this time in an instant. And +Robert Carlton, white, trembling, but himself--the man with a will at +least--was listening a second time to the failing music of her feet, his +own planted firmly on the walk. + + + + +XXXI + +ADVENT EVE + + +The bishop arrived on the Saturday afternoon. He was still the same +little old man, with the side-whiskers and the long mouth, the queer +voice and the ungainly limp; and Robert Carlton found him neither more +nor less cordial than at their last dread interview; but he asked to see +the church before it was too dark. + +All was in readiness at last. But the cocoanut matting in the aisle and +transepts, and the maroon axminster in the chancel, had only been laid +that day. As yet there was no stained glass, and only the east window +and the west were mullioned as of old; but through the latter a wintry +sun poured thick red beams, already too much aslant to touch the floor, +but just falling upon the altar with its glimmering candlesticks, its +rich green cover, its violet frontal, all three gifts from the hall. The +bishop heard this without remark, his mouth a mere seam. But he approved +of the rows of rush-seated chairs in place of pews, and he admired the +simple pulpit of pitch pine. There was a pleasant smell of pitch pine in +the church. All the woodwork was of this wood, including the ceiling and +all panelling; and the pores of the fragrant timber were not stopped up +with varnish. The new red hassocks looked very bright under each chair, +and the new black prayer-books shone like polished jet on the book-rests +behind them. In the south transept, a space was boarded off for the new +organ; and here chaos had still a corner to itself; nor was either the +lighting or the heating apparatus quite complete. Oil-stoves were +already burning, however, at various points, and their odour compared +unfavourably with that of the pitch pine. + +"I do not want you to catch cold to-morrow," said Carlton, as he locked +the door behind them when they left. + +"Tut!" said the bishop, "I am not such an old man that you need coddle +me." + +Nor did he look a day older for all these years, as they went out +together into the raw red sunset. But Robert Carlton seemed almost to +have caught him up: he had come back from London so haggard and +hollow-eyed. + +They talked very little until the evening. Carlton had servants now, +that very widow who had been the first to desert him being head and +chief once more; and she signalised the occasion by serving one of the +soundest meals of her career. But it was in the long low study, now a +study pure and simple, and an infinitely tidier one than aforetime, that +the bishop smoked his after-dinner pipe like any deacon, while Carlton +also tasted his first tobacco for five years and a half. And still they +were strangely silent, until the occurrence of an incident, little in +itself, but great with suggestion. + +There was a tiny patter on the worn carpet, and all at once the bishop +beheld a big brown mouse seated upright within a few inches of his +companion's boot. The bishop exclaimed, and the mouse fled with a +scuttle and a squeak. + +"I tamed him," Carlton explained with a slight access of colour. "The +house is overrun with them, but this fellow lets none of the others in +here." + +The bishop was slow to follow up his exclamation. He certainly was a man +of fewer words than formerly. + +"You ought not to have made yourself such an anchorite," he said at +last. "You might have smoked your pipe--you say that's your first--and +written to me sooner!" + +So that still rankled. Carlton was not altogether surprised. + +"My lord," said he, "how could I? You had advised me to live anywhere +else, and yet here I was!" + +"The circumstances justified you, Mr. Carlton. I could not foresee such +circumstances, I assure you. I heard of them, however, at the time." + +Carlton had never written till the five years were nearly up, when it +became a necessary preliminary to the resumption of those offices from +which he had been debarred; but, when he did write, he had done so to +such effect that certain other preliminaries had been foregone. + +"Though you did not write," continued the bishop, "Sir Wilton Gleed did. +We had some correspondence about you, and we disagreed; that is one +reason why I declined his invitation and accepted yours. I would not +mention it, only you are now such excellent friends. And I understand +that he himself makes no secret of his former attitude towards you." + +"On the contrary, he has expressed the most generous regret for the line +he took." + +"He may well regret it," said the bishop. + +But Carlton had accepted his old enemy's aid, and would not hear ill of +him, whatever he might think. "It was natural enough," he murmured. + +"What! To prevent you from making the one reparation in your power? To +have you boycotted right and left? To trump up a criminal charge? To +force you, a clergyman, to remain in your own parish, labouring like a +convict by the year together? To trample the cloth underfoot in the eyes +of all the world?" + +"Oh," groaned Carlton, "it was I who did that! I alone am to blame for +that--I alone!" + +He leant his elbows on the chimney-piece, his face in his hands; for +stand he must if he was only to hear harsh words--that night of all +nights! Carlton was unprepared for such severity at this stage; and +infinitely hurt; for at his worst, when he deserved no sympathy at all, +the bishop had shown much more. But behind his back the blazing eyes +were quenched, and the long mouth relaxed. + +"No, no," a softer voice said; "you have done just the opposite--just +the opposite. You have been hard enough upon yourself; but the world was +harder on you--once." + +There was kindness in the rasping voice, but no enthusiasm. None other +had made so little of the mere physical feat of this man; and to him +the tone was unmistakable. + +"I know what you mean," said Carlton, turning round, his own eye alight. +"You think the world is going to the other extreme!" + +"It generally does," replied the bishop. "I do not mean to be unkind." + +"You are not, my lord--unless you think I haven't seen this for myself!" + +The bishop nodded gravely to himself. + +"You would see the danger. I am sure of that. You must want to hear the +last of what you have done; superhuman and heroic in itself--I am the +first to admit it--it is nevertheless the last chapter of a book which +you must want to close once and for all. The last chapter recalls the +first. Close the book; put it behind you; start afresh." + +Robert Carlton stood looking down with a curious smile upon his haggard +face. + +"That is exactly what I am going to do," said he. + +"But the parish must do the same; they must help you. Let them also +think no more of the past, either remote or immediate." + +"They must think of what they will," rejoined Carlton, queerly. "They +cannot help me much longer, nor I them. I am resigning the living, my +lord." + +"Resigning it?" cried the bishop. + +"I intend to do so to-morrow night. It always has been my intention. But +you are the first whom I have told." + +"I'm glad to hear that!" the bishop exclaimed, as he scrambled to his +feet another being. "You have taken my breath away! My dear fellow, let +me dissuade you from any such course." + +Carlton shook his head. + +"My work here is done." + +"It is just beginning!" + +"No, it is done. I have given my parishioners the church I owed them, +since they lost their last church through me. I set them once an example +for which I shall pray to be forgiven till my life's end; but now, +please God, I have at least shown them that because a man falls it need +not be utterly and for ever. He can rise; or, at any rate, he can try. +God knows I have tried; and they know it; and it may help them in their +own day of bitter trouble. But it was you, my lord, who first helped me, +by bidding me never despair. I have tried to teach your lesson; that is +all." + +"But you have not finished," the bishop urged, gently. "Go on teaching +it--go on." + +"No. It is no sudden thought. I undertook in the beginning, when Sir +Wilton Gleed wanted to turn me out forcibly, to go of my own accord when +I had built the church. He may forget it, but I do not." + +"Then I devoutly hope he will not accept your resignation!" + +"He must. I have made my arrangements. There is need of clergy in the +far corners of our empire, greater need than here. There was an +Australian at the hotel I have been staying at in London, and he has +shown me my field. I am going out to offer my services to the Bishop of +Riverina, and I am relying upon a word from you for their acceptance. I +hope to sail at the beginning of next month; my passage is already +taken." + +"I suppose you took it when you were in town?" the bishop grumbled. +Carlton coloured in an instant. + +"I did--but I had long been thinking of it," he said, hastily. "Oh, my +lord, in my place you would do the same! How could I continue here to be +smiled on by these poor people? It was easier when they looked the other +way, when I lived in this room alone, doing everything for myself, and +not a soul came near me. How can I settle down again to a prosperous +life--here of all places--with my child in the parish, and his poor +mother . . . That is what they all forget in the generous warmth of +their reaction; but the more they forget, the more keenly I remember. +Ah! do you think I ever have forgotten--for an hour--for a moment--since +I left off working with my hands?" + +One of these was stretched in the direction of the churchyard; and the +bishop read its touching testimony for the first time. + +"There," whispered Carlton, in strange excitement, "there lies one . . . +whose ruin and whose death are at my door. I don't forget--I never have +forgotten. I have paid, and I will pay till the end. And there shall be +no other woman . . ." + +His tongue failed him; his face was grief-stricken; the whole man was +changed. So then the human being, his bishop, knew that there was +another woman in his heart already; recalled the most terrible part of +this man's confession to him, years before; and presently plucked him by +the sleeve. And the voice that Robert Carlton heard, as he leaned once +more with his elbow on the chimney-piece, and his face between his +hands, was the voice of their last interview, at the bishop's palace, in +the blank forenoon of a wet summer's day. + +"Forgive me," it said, "for I also have misjudged you in my turn. But +now I see--but now I see, and am ashamed . . . Your life has been hard, +my brother, but it has been brave! You have been through the depths, but +you have also touched the heights, and I think that God must be very +near you to-night. I see now that you are right to go; you are both +nobler and wiser than I thought; may happiness, and peace, and love +itself go with you first or last. Let us kneel together before I leave +you, and humbly pray that it may still be so!" + +When the bishop retired, Robert Carlton returned to his study, and +prayed by himself until a knock at the outer door brought him to his +feet, much startled; for it was eleven at night. + +He was still more startled when he reached the door, for there stood a +soldier straight and tall, sunburnt and jaunty; a medal with clasps and +the Egyptian star upon his scarlet breast; a smile behind the trim +moustache; right hand at the salute. It was only after a prolonged stare +that Carlton recognised the smart young man. + +"George Mellis?" he cried. "Come in--come in!" + +"That's me, sir," said George, entering like a machine. "But--can it be +you, Mr. Carlton?" + +And his smile vanished as the lamplight fell upon the grey hairs and the +deep furrows which made the clergyman look nearly twice his years. + +"Yes, George. I have aged a little. But so have you." + +"Oh, I'm all right," said the young soldier with his fine eyes on the +other's face; "but I want to kill somebody, that's all!" + +"I should have thought you'd done enough of that at the wars," rejoined +Carlton, smiling. "Come, George, it's you I want to hear about. Of +course I have heard of you. So you enlisted in the Grenadiers, and you +got straight to Tel-el-Kebir; and that's the clasp, and not the only +one! And now you're a colour-sergeant, and certain of your stripes, they +tell me; you're a great hero in the village, George; and yet I have +heard them complain that you never even came back to show yourself after +the war." + +"I haven't come back to show myself now, Mr. Carlton." + +And the young fellow looked rather grim above his brass and scarlet. + +"I didn't mean to hurt your feelings." + +"Nor have you, sir. But can't you guess why I've come back for the first +time to-night?" + +Carlton considered, and suddenly his hollow eyes lit up; but those of +the grenadier had lighted first. + +"Was it--was it really to--to be here to-morrow, George?" + +"That was it, sir--and nothing else! I'd heard how you were building it +up with your own----" + +"Never mind that, George." + +"I heard it from Tom Ivey, who found me out in barracks not long since, +and gave me all the Long Stow news. That's how I came to hear of the +consecration to-morrow. He said he was coming down for it, and I said I +would too if I could get leave; and I did; and we've come down together +to-night." + +Neither of them had dreamt of intruding at that hour; but Mellis had +seen the old light in the old window, and felt he must just come up to +shake hands. Yes, he would come in gladly after church to-morrow. No, he +had seen no one else to speak to as yet, except Mrs. Musk; and the +grenadier stood confused. + +"Where did you see her?" + +"Driving away from the Flint House." + +"That old woman at this time of night?" + +"Musk is bad, and she was going for the doctor herself. I offered to go +instead, but she had the girl with her, and there was no stopping them." + +"Bad!" echoed Carlton. "He has been bad for weeks; he may be dying--and +all alone!" He dashed from the room, but was back next moment in his +wideawake. "I must go to him, George! He will hate it, but I must go. +Open the door, and I'll put out the light; if he's dying I shall stay." + +It was a clear keen night with a worn moon curling in the west; and the +hard road rang like a drum as red-coat and black ran elbow to elbow down +the village, jerking a word here and there as they went. + +"Been bad long, sir?" + +"Sciatica for years; only just taken to his bed." + +"Sciatica shouldn't kill." + +"This must be something else. The man is old--and the one enemy I have +left!" + +They ran on. Before the Flint House came first its meadow and then its +garden wall, with the gate left open, and a rude drive twisting through +trees to the side of the house. "This way," said Carlton; and in half a +minute they were at the side door. This also had been left open. Carlton +lowered his voice, his hand upon the latch. + +"You wait here, like a good fellow. If he will not let me say one +word--if he orders me out--then you must come up instead. If he is so +ill that his wife goes herself at midnight for the doctor, then he is +too ill to be left with no one in the house but a child of five!" + +Carlton's concern was not a little for the child. Suppose he had +awakened to call and call in vain--perhaps to run for succour to a +corpse! The thought made Carlton shudder as he found his way through +passages with which he had been permitted to become familiar after +Georgie's accident. At the head of the stairs there was Georgie's room; +the father had to pass it; and could not, without peeping in. + +For this door was ajar, and a night-light burning on the chest of +drawers. Georgie was breathing gently in his cot. Carlton approached on +tip-toe, and stood gazing downward with clasped hands. Boisterous and +robust upon his feet, the boy looked still a baby in his sleep; his face +was so round and innocent; his hands seemed such toys; and the light +hair, too seldom cut, was lightest at the roots, and still curly at the +ends, as it lay upon the pillow where his last movement had tossed it. +It was a sweet face, even with the great eyes closed; the eyelashes +looked so much longer and darker against the pure skin; they were many +shades darker than the hair; and the eyebrows were assuming a very +delicate definition of their own. The mouth was beautiful. That brown +little hand was perfectly shaped. Carlton bent over, and kissed the warm +smooth cheek with infinite tenderness; then went upon his knees, and +prayed over the child, and for him, and for his future, out of the +fulness of a brimming heart. He forgot that Musk's death would make a +difference to the child and to himself; for the moment he forgot that +Musk was in any danger of dying, and that this was his house. He and his +child were alone together once more, it might be for the last time, one +never knew. + +"God keep you, my own poor boy, and lead you not into temptation, but +deliver you from evil, for ever and ever, Amen." + +He stooped once more over the cot, pushed the long hair back, running +his fingers through it gently, and kissed the pure forehead again and +again. And it seemed to Robert Carlton--but the night-light was very +dim--that at the last his son had smiled upon him in his sleep. + + + + +XXXII + +THE SECOND TIME + + +In Musk's room there was more light. It lay under the closed door like a +yellow rod. Carlton knocked gently. There was no answer. He knocked +louder. Not a sound from within. Then the chill fell on him, and he +entered ready for any discovery but the one he was to make. + +Neither the quick nor the dead lay within. + +A fire was burning as well as the lamp; the very bed looked warm, but +was not; the sick man must have left it some minutes at least. + +The lame man, the man who could not walk, had left his bed if not the +house! Carlton caught up the lamp to go in search. And even on the +landing a voice came hailing him from the region below. + +"Mr. Carlton! Mr. Carlton! Quick, sir, quick!" + +George Mellis was still at the side door, and in the lamplight the other +could not see an inch beyond. + +"Have you found him, George? He's not in bed!" + +"Who--Musk? No, sir, no!" + +"Then what have you seen?" + +The grenadier had a wet skin, a quivering lip, a starting eye. + +"Oh, I can't tell you, sir! I may be wrong. God grant it! But give me +the lamp, and go outside and look for yourself!" + +In sheer perplexity Carlton complied; and for an instant imagined some +outrageous freak of nature; for the trees of the Flint House drive, +black as night a few minutes before, now stood etched against the +reddest dawn that he had ever seen--at midnight in December! Then a +flame shot upwards, and another, and another; and Mellis was left +standing, lamp in hand, a brilliant patch of light and colour, yet less +brilliant every instant in the face of that unearthly glare in the east. +Swift feet were pattering down the drive; and had such a start, before +the soldier found his senses, that it was only in the churchyard he +caught them up. + +Long Stow church was on fire for the second time, and burning faster +than it had burnt between five and six years before. The crackle of the +pitch pine was loud as musketry already. The roof was already burning; +its destruction had been the climax of the former fire. + +Robert Carlton stood with folded arms heaving on his chest. The bishop +was there already, in his overcoat and rug, with the whiter and the +sterner face. The servants had called him: they also were there, in +pitiful case, but no more had arrived as yet. + +"It is no use their coming. The roof's on fire in three or four +different places. He has done his work better this time; more oil for +him, with those stoves!" + +The voice was Carlton's, because his lips moved, and those of the +bishop were compressed out of sight. Otherwise Mellis, for one, would +never have recognised so sad a discord of heartbreak and devil-may-care. + +"Some things might be saved," said the bishop. + +"They might and shall! George, run to my study for the key; it's on a +nail beside the fireplace. And to think I locked up myself lest +something might happen at the last!" cried Carlton, with a single note +of high hollow laughter, as the soldier vanished. "But I never thought +of you! No, you have cheated me very cleverly this time. You almost +deserve your triumph--over me!" + +"Do you mean to say you know who has done it?" cried the bishop. + +"Yes--the man who did it before." + +"But was that ever known?" + +"No; but I knew. I found his hat in the church." + +"And you never told?" + +"Nor shall I now. But I do wonder where he got in! And he was well +enough to climb a ladder--my dying man!" + +Carlton said no more; he was sorry he had said so much. Yet this time it +was sure to come out. There was the empty bed. Mellis would speak of it, +though he had not seen it with his own eyes. Was the malingerer back in +it already? What hellish artifice! And the house emptied for the nonce! +The man's own wife would never have suspected him. + +Carlton was quite calm. There was nothing to be done. The roof was +flaring at either end and in the middle. Only a fire-engine could have +put it out, and there was still none nearer than Lakenhall. The mind +will often puzzle over an immaterial question in the face of facts too +terrible to be realised at once: the known is blinding, but the unknown +is the dark, and it is a relief to grope there even for that which is +useless when discovered. So Robert Carlton was still wondering how the +incendiary had got in, and out, and exactly what he had done inside, +when Mellis came running with the key. In a few moments they were in the +church. + +Nothing could have been less like the corresponding impression of the +former fire. Then the pews had been discovered burning; but now +rush-seated chairs and pitch pine stalls stood equally intact; and a +first glance did not reveal the source of the dull red light which +filled the church. On the other hand, a badly-broken window in the north +transept satisfied Carlton's curiosity on the immaterial point; and +supplied another, pregnant with irony; for it was the window whose arch +he had been building when Georgie first swam into his ken. + +But now Mellis was looking straight above him, and calling to Mr. +Carlton to do the same. In three places the ceiling was on fire, and +burning planks beginning to drop; in another a spreading patch of brown +burnt through even as they watched. Almost simultaneously came a shriek +from the women and a roar from the men now gathering outside; it was Tom +Ivey who came rushing in. + +"There's some one overhead! He's smashing the skylight over the north +transept! That's the man that done it--that's the man that done +it--fairly caught!" + +The saddler came on Tom's heels. + +"Gord love us all, that's Jasper Musk!" + +Carlton darted into the south transept without waste of words, and in an +instant had disappeared in the part that was boarded off until the new +organ should be established in its place there; meanwhile the very +ceiling had not been carried to the end of the transept, and a ladder +led to the natural loft that it formed. Up this ladder the incendiary +must have climbed, and up this ladder the rector was running when Mellis +and Ivey, with the rest at their heels, reached its foot. + +"Come down, sir, come down, for God's sake!" + +"I am not coming down alone." + +"Then I'll fetch you," roared Ivey; "you are not going to risk your life +for him!" + +But the red-coat was first upon the ladder, and in a few seconds both +young men were in the triangular tunnel between the ceiling and the +roof; a space so confined that under the apex alone was it possible to +walk upright; and that only for the few feet dividing them from the +nearest flames. + +"Look out!" cried Tom Ivey from the top rung. "It wasn't made for a +floor; get on your hands and knees, and the weight won't be all in one +place." So they crept into the centre of the cross; and there they knelt +upright to see over a fringe of fire that burnt their eyelids bare as +they gazed. + +Roof and ceiling of chancel and of nave, both were in roaring flames to +right and to left of them; through the flaming barrier in their faces, +and the hole already burnt, they could see the pulpit and the chairs in +the north transept thirty feet below; and across the gulf, Jasper Musk +and Robert Carlton face to face. Carlton had made the leap; they could +not; already the flames were driving them back and back. + +In the steady roar and crackle they could hear no words. Musk was +crouching under a skylight all too narrow for his gigantic shoulders, a +tell-tale oil-tin overturned at his feet. His face was livid, but +fearless, and his light eyes gleamed with hate. Carlton's back was +turned to the watchers, and for a second motionless; then he looked +round, saw them through smoke and flame, and clapped a hand to his +mouth. + +"Down, both of you," he shouted, "and round with the ladder to the +outside here, and one of you fetch up an axe. The skylight's too +small--we must make it bigger!" + +Musk's lips moved, and his eyes flashed their own fire; the others could +almost see the words. + +"Well?" said Mellis. + +"Come on; it's our only chance." + +In an instant they were down the ladder, and had it horizontal in a +minute. Then Ivey began to fume. + +"It'll take some time getting through the porch!" + +"Shove it through the broken window." + +"Good man! Stand by, out there, to haul out this ladder!" + +The red-coat ran round, his medal twinkling in the glare, while Ivey +rushed for the axe. + +"Up with her, comrades! That's it--altogether--_now_!" + +The ladder was up outside. Ivey, axe in hand, had leapt upon the fourth +rung at a bound, and was taking the rest two at a time. Below it was +light as day; the naked trees stood brown and brittle in the glare; the +upturned faces white as the curled moon. A whiter face peered through +the skylight. + +"Look alive with that axe, Tom; he can't breathe, and he's being +roasted!" + +"He deserve ut! Do you come through first, sir. There's room for you as +'tis. He can bide his turn." + +The white face flushed indignant dominion. + +"Unless you obey me, you are my murderer too!" + +A stifled curse came from under the tiles. + +"There, then! Would you save him after that? Leave him the axe and +through you come, you that can, or else I'll pull you through!" + +And his great arm thickened as he thrust it out, and grabbed at the +straight white collar, before relinquishing the axe from his other hand; +but at that moment there was a crackling groan, and a sudden unbearable +weight on Ivey's hand and arm, as the frail inner roof gave way; then a +blinding flame in his face, a crash below, and a cry of anguish from a +hundred hearts rent as one. + +The axe tumbled as Tom Ivey flung both arms round the ladder, and so +descended like a drunken man, a crumpled collar still warm and tight +between the clenched fingers of his right hand. + + + + +XXXIII + +SANCTUARY + + +Long Stow church rose salient from its knoll at the eastern extremity of +the village, still in its wintry network of a million twigs. It was not +the ruin it had been before; but the new roof had vanished; and the +chancel was in the condition to which the first fire had reduced the +whole edifice. The other walls still stand as their builder built them, +and as they stood on that December day when he was laid to rest in their +shadow. The grave is in the angle of the north transept and the nave, +not a dozen paces from the site of the shed. The stone was not up when +Gwynneth visited it, but the grave was as easily identified as it is +to-day. It lay beneath a cairn of dead flowers, picked out with many +fresh ones. The cards still fluttered upon some of the wreaths, and +Gwynneth could not help seeing the surprising names upon some; but the +humble little home-made offerings, the bunches of snow-drops and the +early crocuses, touched her more. Yet she showed no feeling as she stood +and gazed. She had brought no flowers herself. There was no pretence of +mourning in her dress. She shed no tears. + +From his own observatory the saddler had seen who was in the covered +fly, when Gwynneth got out. He was at his usual work upon the latest +newspaper, and he took it up again for a minute. But Gwynneth was more +than a minute, and more than five; the saddler lost patience, and +wandered across the road. + +"Where did you bring that young lady from? Lakenhall?" + +"Yes." + +"And are you going to take her back again?" + +"Yes, in time for the 5.40 train; and she only got down by the 2.10." + +Gwynneth, who had not stirred a feature or a limb, started indignantly +at the sound of a profaning step; but had forgiven Fuller before he +reached her hand with his own outstretched. There had seemed so much +that she might never know, could never ask; it would not be necessary +with the saddler. + +"Why, Miss Gwynneth, is that you?" he cried, when he had crushed her +hand; and his eyes widened with concern. + +"Am I so much changed?" asked Gwynneth, smiling gallantly. + +"Changed! Gord love yer, miss, you're the shadder of what you was." + +"There is plenty of substance still, Mr. Fuller." + +"And where's your colour, miss?" + +"In London, I suppose." + +"That's it," cried Fuller; "that London! I wouldn't live there, not if +you paid me: nasty, beastly, smoky, overcrowded sink of iniquity and +disease! If I was the Government I'd pull that down and build it up +again on twice the space. That isn't good manners to run down the place +where you live, miss, I know; but I never could abide that London, and +now I shall hate it more than ever." + +"But I thought you were never there, Mr. Fuller?" + +"And never mean to be, miss, and never mean to be! I've too much sense. +Look at me: sixty-eight I am, and a bit over, and not an ache or a pain +from top to toe. That's because I live in the pure air and know what I +eat; now in London, if you'll excuse my saying so, you never do. Where +should I be if I'd been swallerun London fogs and adulterated milk and +butter all my life? In my grave these thirty years! Do you take the +advice of a man of my experience, miss: shake the soot of London off +your feet, and come you back to good living and good air, and you won't +know yourself in a week." + +Gwynneth let the saddler run on; a more sensitive man would have seen +that she was not hearkening to a word. Her eyes were very hard and +bright; they rested once more upon the faded flowers and the fluttering +cards. + +"So this is Mr. Carlton's grave!" + +The belated words told nothing at all. Fuller removed his cap. + +"Yes, miss, there lie the biggest and the bravest heart that ever beat +in this here parish or anywhere near it. And I have a right to say so. +Many has come back to him this last twelvemonth or so. But I was the +first." + +"Were you at the fire, Mr. Fuller?" + +"Was I at the fire! Why, it was me that saw that first, Miss Gwynneth. +Young George Mellis, with his red-coat and his bamboo cane, he would +have it that it was him; but there are some folks that fare to be first +in everything, and General George'll be getting too big for his uniform +if he don't take care. You see, I hadn't closed an eye when I saw the +first flicker on the ceiling; but an old man like me have to get on some +clothes before he can run outside in the depths o' winter. Meanwhile, +Master George, who haven't been near his old friend all these years, he +can come down fast enough when the reverend's got the ball at his feet +again; and there were the two of them at the Flint House, inquiring +after Jasper Musk, said to be at death's door at the very moment he was +setting fire to the church." + +"Fiend!" + +"You may well say that, miss, for it was the second time he'd done it; +and the reverend had known, all these years, and that must've been +Jasper's hat he flung into the first fire when Tom Ivey come, puttun two +an' two together. What make that worse, it seem old Jasper used to say +he hoped to live to see the new church consecrated; and some say he'd +smile as he said it; but now we know what he meant. And he used to limp +up and down his room, for practice, when even the doctor thought he +couldn't set foot to the ground; for the servant girl heard him at it. +Yes, Miss Gwynneth, he was deep and strong and cruel, like the sea, was +Jasper; that's what the bishop said himself, for I heard him; but I will +say this for him, he asked no more quarter than he gave. Tom Ivey heard +his last words through the skylight, and they aren't fit for a young +lady like you to hear, but they were a man's words whatever else they +were. The worst is that the dear old reverend could've squeezed through +himself if only he'd have let Jasper slip; but that he wouldn't; so they +both went through with the ceiling and were killed." + +"For his enemy!" whispered Gwynneth, an unearthly radiance in her poor +hard eyes. + +"Yes, for the man that burnt the church down twice, and deserved to burn +himself; that was the worst of it." + +The listener's lips were consistently compressed, but at this they +parted again. + +"Oh, no, it was the best. It was the best. A great death, a glorious +death!" And the pale thin face was white-hot with a pride which consumed +all else. + +"The bishop said his life was greater still. You should ha' heard his +sermon, out here, at the open grave, when it was all over. There never +was such a funeral in the countryside before, and there never will be +another like it. The place was packed. I stood where you are standing +now, miss. I was one o' the bearers; and Ivey, Mellis, and Jones the +schoolmaster, they were the other three. Then you should have seen the +clergy; there was a rare procession of the clergy from all round; the +Reverend Scrope from Burton Mills, the Reverend Preston from Linkworth, +and Canon Wilders, and a lot more. But the bishop was in all his +toggery, and I never see a man look so fine; he's little and he's lame, +but the face he preached with, across this here open grave, you'd have +said that belonged to some old giant. And what a sermon! That didn't +make us cry; that dried our tears, an' made us want to build churches +and be killed ourselves. You might guess the text: 'Greater love hath no +man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friend.' I kept +waitun for him to point out that Musk was not the reverend's friend, but +his worst enemy; but he never did. I would have done; otherwise, he said +just what I would like to have said myself, let alone the one thing that +took the whole lot of us by surprise. And I tell you, Miss Gwynneth, the +place was right black with people; not only in the churchyard, but +across the fence in the medder as well; there was hardly a blade o' +grass to be seen." + +"What was the surprise, Mr. Fuller?" + +"He'd made up his mind to resign the living! He had told his lordship. +He meant to resign next night--I can't for the life of me think why!" + +But Gwynneth could; and, with the second sight begotten of her love, +read the dead man even in his grave, divining immediately some of the +very reasons which he had given to the bishop in his last hours. She was +never to divine them all. + +Meanwhile the saddler, having imparted a satisfactory amount of +information, was beginning to look for some return in kind, and supposed +Miss Gwynneth would be going to the hall. No, they were all from home; +indeed, Gwynneth had waited for that. Yet she made her answer with a +candid look, the prelude to a gratuitous admission. + +"I am going on to the Flint House," said she. + +"Well, there!" cried Fuller, "if I hadn't forgot to tell you where Musk +lie! He don't lie here, miss; he left it that he would go to Lakenhall +cemetery, in onconsecrated ground, some say. And Mrs. Musk--you won't +have heard it--but she's fair lost her know, poor thing!" + +"Yes, I had heard. Poor thing, indeed! Yet in her case it seems almost +merciful. But I am not going to see Mrs. Musk." + +"Then haven't you heard about little Georgie? That's a grand thing, +that! There's a lady in London (that's the only part I don't like), some +young widder with none of her own, that's going to adopt him instead." + +"I know that, too," said Gwynneth, flushing slightly as she smiled. "The +lady is a friend of mine; she heard of Georgie through me. We were in a +hospital together, but now we have taken a flat--for I am going to live +with her too. And it is for Georgie I am come to-day." + +Her companion had served her purpose; but would not go; and a hint might +betray that which had obviously never entered the saddler's head. So +Gwynneth looked her last upon her own heart's grave with the same pale +face and the same unbending carriage; but the bright eyes were softer +now, though radiant still with a heavenly pride. So his ashes exalted +her as his living presence; so his undying soul still strengthened hers. + +It was a pale February day, the grass very green, a subtle gloss of life +upon the bough; but it was man's handiwork that appealed to Gwynneth; +and all at once an astounding fact forced itself upon her vision and +understanding. The church was almost exactly as she had seen it last. +The east end was the worst; the roof was not begun. It was just as it +had been six months before; and only the work of the hireling had +perished after all; that of the self-taught mason, the pariah, the +penitent, still endured as an oblation and a sacrifice for his sins, and +as a monument to the man for all time. Gwynneth could have gone down on +her knees in thanksgiving for this miracle; as it was she saw his +resting-place but dimly for the last time. At that moment the starling +which had entertained him in life began a gossip in the elderbush at his +head; a jealous sparrow poured abuse from every tree; and so she left +him, at rest where he never rested, on the field where that rest had +been won. + +A married Musk with many children, one of the sons who had quarrelled +with their father, had already established himself and family in the +Flint House. He had thankfully accepted Gwynneth's proposal, made, +however, in Nurse Ella's name; and Georgie was ready when Gwynneth +called for the second time on her way back from the church. He was also +in tremendous spirits, leaping upon his lady like a wild beast, and, +later, roaring his farewells through the fly-window, as they drove away +towards a watery sunset, Gwynneth sitting far back on the deeper seat +She let him shout till he was tired; by that time she was mistress of +herself once more, and the dusk was such as to destroy all present +evidence of another character. So at last she could take him on her +knee. + +"And are you glad to come away with Gwynneth, darling?" + +"I should think I are; jolly glad; but I thought there was anunner lady +too?" + +"We shall find her where we are going. Do you know where we are going, +Georgie?" + +"Course I do. We're goin' to London to see the Queen. I wish we would +soon be there!" + +"So we shall, Georgie." + +"In a minute?" + +"No, not in a minute; we have to go in the train first. Have you ever +seen a real train, Georgie?" + +"No, never. I know I haven't," Georgie averred. "You are kind to take me +in one! I do love you, I say!" + +"Do you, darling?" + +"Yes, really. I love you bestest in the world. I know I do!" + +They were entering Lakenhall, and it was quite dark in the fly; but now +Georgie knew that Gwynneth was crying, for she was kissing him at the +same time, and as he never had been kissed before. + +"And you always will, Georgie--you always will?" + +"Course I will," said Georgie, gaily. + +"And go to school when Gwynneth sends you, and turn into a great strong +man, and be good to poor Gwynneth then?" + +"Gooder'n all the world," said Georgie. + + +THE END + + + + +"Mr. Hornung's books are stories pure and simple, excellently +constructed, well written, cleanly, humorous, kindly. The plot is always +well managed, the telling is lively, with no waste of irrelevant +episode, and the untying is sure to be left to the last."--_New York +Evening Post_. + + +OTHER BOOKS BY E. W. HORNUNG + + +Dead Men Tell No Tales + +A Novel. 12mo, $1.25 + +"In this novel, as in the previous ones from Mr. Hornung's pen, there is +a wealth of well-handled incidents. It is story-telling of the most +direct kind and holds the attention from the first page to the last Mr. +Hornung seems to us in each succeeding book from his pen to gain in +confidence and authority, and we do not hesitate to place him among the +first of the comparatively new writers who must be reckoned +with."--_Literature_. + + +The Amateur Cracksman + +12mo, $1.25 + +"There is not a dull page from beginning to end. . . . He is the most +interesting rogue we have met for a long time."--_New York Evening Sun_. + +"Raffles is amazing; his resource is perfect; he talks like a gentlemen +and acts like one, except when occupied with pressing business in +another man's house, at midnight, and naturally he has a 'cool nerve,' a +nerve positively arctic. They all have nerves like that, these +Raffleses."--_New York Tribune_. + + + + +BOOKS BY MR. HORNUNG + + +"Mr. Hornung has certainly earned the right to be called the Bret Harte +of Australia."--_Boston Herald_. + + +Some Persons Unknown + +12mo, $1.25 + + CONTENTS + + Kenyon's Innings + A Literary Coincidence + "Author! 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Hornung is one of the most successful delineators of Bush +life."--_Chicago Tribune_. + + +Irralie's Bushranger + +16mo, 75 cents + +"A capital little story of Australian love and adventure. There is no +flagging in the press and stir of the story."--_The Nation_. + + + CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS, Publishers + 153-157 Fifth Avenue, New York + + + + +Transcriber's Note: Numerous words were hyphenated inconsistently in the +original text (for instance, "evensong" and "even-song"). These +inconsistencies have been retained. End-of-line hyphens have been +retained or removed based on the predominant usage elsewhere in the +text. + +In Chapter II, "The resolution was easier than its accomplshment" was +changed to "The resolution was easier than its accomplishment". + +In Chapter XIX, a missing quotation mark was added before "I will--I +will", and "it's last day's work" was changed to "its last day's work". + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Peccavi, by E. W. 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W. Hornung. + </title> + <style type="text/css"> + p { margin-top: .75em; + margin-bottom: .75em; + } + h1,h2,h3,h4,h5,h6 { + text-align: center; /* all headings centered */ + clear: both; + } + hr.wide { width: 65%; margin-top: 2em; margin-bottom: 2em; + margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; clear: both;} + hr.thin { width: 45%; margin-top: 1.25em; margin-bottom: 1.25em; + margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; clear: both;} + + table {margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;} + + body{margin-left: 10%; + margin-right: 10%; + } + + .pagenum { /* uncomment the next line for invisible page numbers */ + /* visibility: hidden; */ + position: absolute; + left: 92%; + font-size: smaller; + text-align: right; + } /* page numbers */ + + .linenum {position: absolute; top: auto; left: 4%;} /* poetry number */ + .blockquot{margin-left: 5%; margin-right: 10%;} + + .center {text-align: center; margin-left: 15%; margin-right: 15%;} + .smcap {font-variant: small-caps;} + .u {text-decoration: underline;} + .bigtext {font-size: 120%;} + .smalltext {font-size: 80%;} + .caption {font-size: 90%; text-align: center; + margin-left: 15%; margin-right: 15%;} + + .chapnum {text-align: right;} + .chapname {text-align: left; + padding-left: 1em; padding-right: 3em;} + .chappage {text-align: right;} + .newchapter {margin-top: 4em;} + + .figcenter {margin: auto; text-align: center;} + + .figleft {float: left; clear: left; margin-left: 0; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-top: + 1em; margin-right: 1em; padding: 0; text-align: center;} + + .figright {float: right; clear: right; margin-left: 1em; margin-bottom: 1em; + margin-top: 1em; margin-right: 0; padding: 0; text-align: center;} + + .footnotes {border: dashed 1px;} + .footnote {margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%; font-size: 0.9em;} + .footnote .label {position: absolute; right: 84%; text-align: right;} + .fnanchor {vertical-align: super; font-size: .8em; text-decoration: none;} + ul.advert {list-style-type: none; margin-left: 25%; margin-right: 25%; + padding-left: 25%; text-indent: -8em;} + p.title {text-align: center; margin-top: 2em; font-size: 110%; font-weight: bold;} + p.price {text-align: center; font-weight: bold;} + .poem {margin-left:10%; margin-right:10%; text-align: left;} + .poem br {display: none;} + .poem .stanza {margin: 1em 0em 1em 0em;} + .poem span.i0q {display: block; margin-left: 0em; padding-left: 3em; text-indent: -3em;} + .poem span.i0 {display: block; margin-left: 0.4em; padding-left: 3em; text-indent: -3em;} + .poem span.i2 {display: block; margin-left: 2.4em; padding-left: 3em; text-indent: -3em;} + .poem span.i4 {display: block; margin-left: 4.4em; padding-left: 3em; text-indent: -3em;} + </style> + </head> +<body> + + +<pre> + +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Peccavi, by E. W. Hornung + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Peccavi + +Author: E. W. Hornung + +Release Date: May 15, 2011 [EBook #36115] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK PECCAVI *** + + + + +Produced by Steven desJardins and the Online Distributed +Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This book was +produced from scanned images of public domain material +from the Google Print project.) + + + + + + +</pre> + + +<h1>PECCAVI</h1> + +<p class="center">BY<br /><span class="bigtext">E. W. HORNUNG</span></p> + +<p class="center">AUTHOR OF "THE AMATEUR CRACKSMAN," "MY LORD +DUKE," "YOUNG BLOOD," ETC.</p> + +<p class="center">CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS<br /> +NEW <span style="word-spacing: 3em;">YORK 1901</span></p> + +<p class="center"><span class="smcap">Copyright, 1900, by</span> +CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS</p> + +<p class="center"><i>All rights reserved</i></p> + +<p class="center">THE CAXTON PRESS<br /> +NEW YORK.</p> + +<hr class="wide" /> + +<h2><a name="CONTENTS" id="CONTENTS"></a>CONTENTS</h2> + +<table class="figcenter" border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" summary="Table of Contents"> +<tr> +<td class="chapnum smalltext">Chapter</td> +<td class="chapname smalltext"> </td> +<td class="chappage smalltext">Page</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td class="chapnum">I.</td> +<td class="chapname">Dust to Dust</td> +<td class="chappage"><a href="#CHAPTER_I">1</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td class="chapnum">II.</td> +<td class="chapname">The Chief Mourner</td> +<td class="chappage"><a href="#CHAPTER_II">11</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td class="chapnum">III.</td> +<td class="chapname">A Confession</td> +<td class="chappage"><a href="#CHAPTER_III">18</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td class="chapnum">IV.</td> +<td class="chapname">Midsummer Night</td> +<td class="chappage"><a href="#CHAPTER_IV">29</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td class="chapnum">V.</td> +<td class="chapname">The Man Alone</td> +<td class="chappage"><a href="#CHAPTER_V">45</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td class="chapnum">VI.</td> +<td class="chapname">Fire</td> +<td class="chappage"><a href="#CHAPTER_VI">51</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td class="chapnum">VII.</td> +<td class="chapname">The Sinner's Prayer</td> +<td class="chappage"><a href="#CHAPTER_VII">66</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td class="chapnum">VIII.</td> +<td class="chapname">The Lord of the Manor</td> +<td class="chappage"><a href="#CHAPTER_VIII">77</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td class="chapnum">IX.</td> +<td class="chapname">A Duel Begins</td> +<td class="chappage"><a href="#CHAPTER_IX">89</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td class="chapnum">X.</td> +<td class="chapname">The Letter of the Law</td> +<td class="chappage"><a href="#CHAPTER_X">100</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td class="chapnum">XI.</td> +<td class="chapname">Labour of Hercules</td> +<td class="chappage"><a href="#CHAPTER_XI">115</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td class="chapnum">XII.</td> +<td class="chapname">A Fresh Discovery</td> +<td class="chappage"><a href="#CHAPTER_XII">125</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td class="chapnum">XIII.</td> +<td class="chapname">Devices of a Castaway</td> +<td class="chappage"><a href="#CHAPTER_XIII">131</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td class="chapnum">XIV.</td> +<td class="chapname">The Last Resort</td> +<td class="chappage"><a href="#CHAPTER_XIV">137</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td class="chapnum">XV.</td> +<td class="chapname">His Own Lawyer</td> +<td class="chappage"><a href="#CHAPTER_XV">150</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td class="chapnum">XVI.</td> +<td class="chapname">End of the Duel</td> +<td class="chappage"><a href="#CHAPTER_XVI">162</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td class="chapnum">XVII.</td> +<td class="chapname">Three Weeks and a Night</td> +<td class="chappage"><a href="#CHAPTER_XVII">186</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td class="chapnum">XVIII.</td> +<td class="chapname">The Night's Work</td> +<td class="chappage"><a href="#CHAPTER_XVIII">193</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td class="chapnum">XIX.</td> +<td class="chapname">The First Winter</td> +<td class="chappage"><a href="#CHAPTER_XIX">209</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td class="chapnum">XX.</td> +<td class="chapname">The Way of Peace</td> +<td class="chappage"><a href="#CHAPTER_XX">230</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td class="chapnum">XXI.</td> +<td class="chapname">At the Flint House</td> +<td class="chappage"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXI">249</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td class="chapnum">XXII.</td> +<td class="chapname">A Little Child</td> +<td class="chappage"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXII">262</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td class="chapnum">XXIII.</td> +<td class="chapname">Design and Accident</td> +<td class="chappage"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXIII">275</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td class="chapnum">XXIV.</td> +<td class="chapname">Glamour and Rue</td> +<td class="chappage"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXIV">291</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td class="chapnum">XXV.</td> +<td class="chapname">Signs of Change</td> +<td class="chappage"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXV">306</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td class="chapnum">XXVI.</td> +<td class="chapname">A Very Few Words</td> +<td class="chappage"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXVI">316</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td class="chapnum">XXVII.</td> +<td class="chapname">An Escape</td> +<td class="chappage"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXVII">323</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td class="chapnum">XXVIII.</td> +<td class="chapname">The Turning Tide</td> +<td class="chappage"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXVIII">335</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td class="chapnum">XXIX.</td> +<td class="chapname">A Haven of Hearts</td> +<td class="chappage"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXIX">348</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td class="chapnum">XXX.</td> +<td class="chapname">The Woman's Hour</td> +<td class="chappage"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXX">362</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td class="chapnum">XXXI.</td> +<td class="chapname">Advent Eve</td> +<td class="chappage"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXXI">378</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td class="chapnum">XXXII.</td> +<td class="chapname">The Second Time</td> +<td class="chappage"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXXII">390</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td class="chapnum">XXXIII.</td> +<td class="chapname">Sanctuary</td> +<td class="chappage"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXXIII">397</a></td> +</tr> +</table> + +<hr class="wide" /> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_1" id="Page_1">[Pg 1]</a></span></p> + +<h2><a name="PECCAVI" id="PECCAVI"></a>PECCAVI</h2> + +<h2 class="newchapter"><a name="CHAPTER_I" id="CHAPTER_I"></a>I<br /> +<span class="smalltext">DUST TO DUST</span></h2> + + +<p>Long Stow church lay hidden for the summer amid a million leaves. It had +neither tower nor steeple to show above the trees; nor was the +scaffolding between nave and chancel an earnest of one or the other to +come. It was a simple little church, of no antiquity and few exterior +pretensions, and the alterations it was undergoing were of a very +practical character. A sandstone upstart in a countryside of flint, it +stood aloof from the road, on a green knoll now yellow with buttercups, +and shaded all day long by horse-chestnuts and elms. The church formed +the eastern extremity of the village of Long Stow.</p> + +<p>It was Midsummer Day, and a Saturday, and the middle of the Saturday +afternoon. So all the village was there, though from the road one saw +only the idle group about the gate, and on the old flint wall a row of +children commanded by the schoolmaster to "keep outside." Pinafores +pressed against the coping, stockinged legs dangling, fidgety hob-nails +kicking stray sparks from the flint; anticipation at the gate, +fascina<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_2" id="Page_2">[Pg 2]</a></span>tion on the wall, law and order on the path in the +schoolmaster's person; and in the cool green shade hard by, a couple of +planks, a crumbling hillock, an open grave.</p> + +<p>Near his handiwork hovered the sexton, a wizened being, twisted with +rheumatism, leaning on his spade, and grinning as usual over the +stupendous hallucination of his latter years. He had swallowed a +rudimentary frog with some impure water. This frog had reached maturity +in the sexton's body. Many believed it. The man himself could hear it +croaking in his breast, where it commanded the pass to his stomach, and +intercepted every morsel that he swallowed. Certainly the sexton was +very lean, if not starving to death quite as fast as he declared; for he +had become a tiresome egotist on the point, who, even now, must hobble +to the schoolmaster with the last report of his unique ailment.</p> + +<p>"That croap wuss than ever. Would 'ee like to listen, Mr. Jones?"</p> + +<p>And the bent man almost straightened for the nonce, protruding his chest +with a toothless grin of huge enjoyment.</p> + +<p>"Thank you," said the schoolmaster. "I've something else to do."</p> + +<p>"Croap, croap, croap!" chuckled the sexton. "That take every mortal +thing I eat. An' doctor can't do nothun for me—not he!"</p> + +<p>"I should think he couldn't."</p> + +<p>"Why, I do declare he be croapun now! That fare to bring me to my own +grave afore long. Do you listen, Mr. Jones; that croap like billy-oh +this very minute!"</p> + +<p>It took a rough word to get rid of him.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_3" id="Page_3">[Pg 3]</a></span>"You be off, Busby. Can't you see I'm trying to listen to something +else?"</p> + +<p>In the church the rector was reciting the first of the appointed psalms. +Every syllable could be heard upon the path. His reading was Mr. +Carlton's least disputed gift, thanks to a fine voice, an unerring sense +of the values of words, and a delivery without let or blemish. Yet there +was no evidence that the reader felt a word of what he read, for one and +all were pitched in the deliberate monotone rarely to be heard outside a +church. And just where some voices would have failed, that of the Rector +of Long Stow rang clearest and most precise:</p> + +<p><i>"When thou with rebukes dost chasten man for sin, thou makest his +beauty to consume away, like as it were a moth fretting a garment: every +man therefore is but vanity.</i></p> + +<p><i>"Hear my prayer, O Lord, and with thine ears consider my calling: hold +not thy peace at my tears.</i></p> + +<p><i>"For I am a stranger with thee: and a sojourner, as all my fathers +were.</i></p> + +<p><i>"O spare me a little, that I may recover my strength: before I go +hence, and be no more seen . . ."</i></p> + +<p>The sexton was regaling the children on the wall with the ever-popular +details of his notorious malady. The schoolmaster still strutted on the +path, now peeping in at the porch, now reporting particulars to the +curious at the gate: a quaint incarnation of conscious melancholy and +unconscious enjoyment.</p> + +<p>"Hardly a dry eye in the church!" he announced after the psalm. "Mr. +Carlton and Musk himself are about the only two that fare to hide what +they feel."</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_4" id="Page_4">[Pg 4]</a></span>"And what does Mr. Carlton feel?" asked a lout with a rose in his coat. +"About as much as my little finger!"</p> + +<p>"Ay," said another, "he cares for nothing but his Roman candles, and his +transcripts and gargles."<a name="FNanchor_1_1" id="FNanchor_1_1"></a><a href="#Footnote_1_1" class="fnanchor">[1]</a></p> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_1_1" id="Footnote_1_1"></a><a href="#FNanchor_1_1"><span class="label">[1]</span></a> Transepts and gargoyles.</p></div> + +<p>"Come," said the schoolmaster, "you wouldn't have the parson break down +in church, would you? I'm sorry I mentioned him. I was thinking of +Jasper Musk. He just stands as though Mr. Carlton had carved him out of +stone."</p> + +<p>"The wonder is that he can stand there at all," retorted the fellow with +the flower, "to hear what he don't believe read by a man he don't +believe in. A funeral, is it? It's as well we know—he'd take a weddun +in the same voice."</p> + +<p>The schoolmaster turned away with an ambiguous shrug. It was not his +business to defend Mr. Carlton against the disaffected and the undevout. +He considered his duty done when he informed the rector who his enemies +were, and (if permitted to proceed) what they were saying behind his +back. The schoolmaster made a mental mark against the name of one +Cubitt, ex-choirman, and, forthwith transferring his attention to the +audience on the wall, put a stop to their untimely entertainment before +returning softly to the porch.</p> + +<p>In Long Stow churchyard there was shade all day, but in the church it +was dusk from that moment in the forenoon when the east window lost the +sun. This peculiarity was partly temporary. The church was in a +transition stage; it was putting forth transepts north and south; +meanwhile there was much boarding with<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_5" id="Page_5">[Pg 5]</a></span>in, and a window in eclipse on +either side. The surrounding foliage added its own shade; and each time +the schoolmaster stole out of the sunlight into the porch, to peer up +the nave, it was several moments before he could see anything at all. +And then it was but a few high lights in a sea of gloom: first the east +window, as yet unstained, its three quatrefoils filled with summer sky, +the rest with waving branches; next, the brass lectern, the surplice +behind it, the high white forehead above. Then in the chancel something +gleamed: that was the coffin, resting on trestles. Then in the choir +seats, otherwise deserted, a figure grew out of the shadows, a solitary +and a massive figure, that stood even now when everybody else was +seated, finely regardless of the fact. It was a man, elderly, but very +powerfully built. The hair stood white and thick upon the large strong +head, less white and shorter on the broad deep jowl. The head was +carried with a certain dignity, rude, savage, indomitable. The eyes +gazed fixedly at the opposite wall; not once did they condescend to the +thing that gleamed upon the trestles. One great hand was knotted over +the knob of a mighty stick, on which the old man leant stiffly. He was +dressed in black, not quite as a gentleman, yet as befitted the most +substantial man but one in the parish. And that was Jasper Musk.</p> + +<p>The parson finished the lesson, and his white brow bent over the closed +book; the face beneath was bearded and much tanned, and in it there +burnt an eye that came as a surprise after that formal voice; and the +hand that closed the book was sensitive but strong. Stepping from the +lectern, the clergyman de<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_6" id="Page_6">[Pg 6]</a></span>clared his calibre in an obeisance towards the +altar, then led the way slowly down the aisle. Bearers rose from the +shades and followed with the coffin; they were almost at the porch +before Jasper Musk took notice enough to limp after them with much noise +from his stick. The congregation waited for him, swarming into the aisle +in the big man's wake. So they came to the grave.</p> + +<p>And there broad daylight revealed a circumstance that came as a shock to +most of those who had followed the body from the church, but as an +outrage to the officiating clergyman: the coffin bore no plate. Mr. +Carlton coloured to the hair, and his deep eye flashed upon the chief +mourner; the latter leant upon his stick and replied with a grim glare +across the open grave. For a moment the wind washed through the trees, +and every sparrow made itself heard; then the rector's eyes dropped to +his book, but his voice rang colder than before. And presently the earth +received its own.</p> + +<p>Mr. Carlton had pronounced the benediction, and a solemn hush still held +all assembled, when a bicycle bell jarred staccato in the road; a moment +later, with a sharp word for some children who had tired of the funeral +and strayed across his path, the rider dismounted outside the saddler's +workshop, a tiny cabin next his house and opposite the church. The +cyclist was a lad in his teens, dark, handsome, dapper, but small for +his age, which was that of high collars and fancy ties; and he rode a +fancy bicycle, the high machine of the day, but extravagantly nickelled +in all its parts.</p> + +<p>"Well, Fuller," said he, "who are they burying?"</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_7" id="Page_7">[Pg 7]</a></span>Fuller, the saddler, who enjoyed a local monopoly in the exercise of his +craft, but whose trade was the mere relaxation of a life spent in +reading and disseminating the news of the day, was spelling through the +<i>Standard</i> at his bench behind the open window. He dropped his paper and +whipped the spectacles from a big dogmatic nose.</p> + +<p>"Gord love yer, Mr. Sidney, do you stand there and tell me you haven't +heard?"</p> + +<p>"How could I hear when I'm only home from Saturdays to Mondays? I'm on +my way home now. Old Sally Webb—is it—or one of the old Wilsons?"</p> + +<p>"No, sir," said the saddler; "that's no old person. Gord love yer," he +cried again, "I wish that was!"</p> + +<p>"Who is it, Mr. Fuller?"</p> + +<p>"That's Molly Musk," said Fuller, slowly; "that's who that is, Mr. +Sidney."</p> + +<p>The boy had not the average capacity for astonishment; he was not, in +fact, the average boy; but at the name his eyebrows shot up and his +mouth grew round.</p> + +<p>"Molly Musk! I thought nobody knew where she was? When did she turn up?"</p> + +<p>"Tuesday night, and died the next."</p> + +<p>"But I say, Fuller, this is interesting!" Perhaps the average boy would +have been no more shocked; he might not even have found it interesting. +This one leant his bicycle against the wall, and his elbows on the bench +within the open window. "Where's she been all this time?" he queried, +confidentially. "What did she die of? What's it all mean?" And there was +a knowing curl about the corners of his mouth.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_8" id="Page_8">[Pg 8]</a></span>"Mean?" said the saddler; "there's more than you want to know that, Mr. +Sidney, but want must be their master. That old Jasper, <i>he</i> know, so +they say; but I'm not so sure. It was he fetched her home, poor old +feller; got the letter Monday morning, had her home by Tuesday night. +That's a man I never liked, Mr. Sidney. I've said it to his face, and +I'll say it as long as I live; but, Gord love yer, I'm sorry for him +now! That's given <i>him</i> a rare doing and no mistake, and less wonder. A +trim little thing like poor Molly Musk! Not that I'm so surprised as +some; a man of my experience don't make no mistake, and I never did care +for the breed. But there, even my heart bleed when that don't boil; as +for the reverend here, he feel it as much as anybody else, and that <i>I</i> +know. That young Jim Cubitt, he come by just now, and says he, 'He's +taking the service as if it was a wedding.' 'You've been kicked out of +the choir,' I says; 'that's what's the matter with you still, or you +wouldn't want a man to be a woman. Thank goodness there's one live man +in the parish,' I says, 'though I don't fare to hold with him.' And no +more I do, Mr. Sidney; but, Gord love yer, that make no difference to +men of our experience. I like the reverend's Popery as little as the +squire like it, and I tell him so, yet he go on bringing me the +<i>Standard</i> every day when he've done with it. Is there another clergyman +that'd do the like to a man that went against him in the parish? Would +the Reverend Preston at Linkworth? Would the Reverend Scrope at Burton +Mills? Or Canon Wilders, or any other man Jack of 'em? No, sir, not +one!"</p> + +<p>"But if he doesn't read them himself," said the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_9" id="Page_9">[Pg 9]</a></span> boy, "it doesn't amount +to so very much." And he laid his hand on three more <i>Standards</i>, +unopened, with the parson's name in print upon the wrapper.</p> + +<p>"What I was coming to," cried the saddler; "only when I get on the +reverend my tongue will wag. They say he don't feel. I say he do, and I +know: all this week I've had no <i>Standard</i>, so this morning I was so +bold as to up and mention it, and there was all six unopened. +'Reverend,' I says, 'you must be ill—with that there Egyptian Question +to argue about'—for we're rare 'uns to argue, the reverend and me—'and +no trace yet o' them Phœnix Park varmin!' But he shake his head. 'Not +ill, Fuller,' he says; 'but there's tragedy enough in this parish +without going to the papers for more. And I haven't the heart to argue +even with you,' he says. So that's my answer to them as says our +reverend don't feel."</p> + +<p>The boy had been patiently pricking the bench with a saddler's punch; +now he raised his deliberate dark eyes and looked at the other +point-blank.</p> + +<p>"You talk about a tragedy," he said, "but you won't say where the +tragedy comes in. What has killed the girl?"</p> + +<p>"I hardly like to tell a young gentleman like you," said the saddler; +"though, to be sure, you'll hear of nothing else in the village."</p> + +<p>"Perhaps," said the boy, with a rather sinister smile, "I'm not quite so +innocent as I ought to be. Come on, out with it!"</p> + +<p>"Well, then, the poor young thing was brought home in trouble," sighed +the saddler. "And in her trouble she died next night."</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_10" id="Page_10">[Pg 10]</a></span>The boy looked at the man through narrow eyes with a knowing light in +them, and the curves cut deep at the corners of his mouth.</p> + +<p>"In trouble, eh? So that's why she disappeared?" he said at length. +"Molly—Musk!"</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_11" id="Page_11">[Pg 11]</a></span></p> + +<h2 class="newchapter"><a name="CHAPTER_II" id="CHAPTER_II"></a>II<br /> +<span class="smalltext">THE CHIEF MOURNER</span></h2> + + +<p>Jasper Musk remained some minutes at the grave, alone, and more than +ever a mark for curious eyes; his own were raised, and his lips moved +with a significance difficult to mistake, but in him yet more difficult +to accept. The infidelity of the man was notorious, and, indeed, the +raised face was not the face of prayer. It was flint bathed in gall, too +bitter for faith, too savage for sorrow; it was a frozen sea of wrinkles +without a single ripple of agitation. Yet the lips moved, and were still +moving when Jasper Musk passed through the crowd now assembled about the +gate, erect though halt, a glitter in his eyes, but that was all.</p> + +<p>As the folk had waited and made way for him in the church, so they +waited and made way outside. Thus, as he limped down into the road, Musk +had the village almost to himself. He turned to the right, and the west +wind blew in his face, strong and warm, with cloud upon cloud of yellow +dust; overhead the other clouds flew high and white and broken, a +flotilla of small sail upon the blue. But Musk was done gazing at the +sky, neither did he look right or left as he trudged in the middle of +the road. So the saddler's place, and then the woody opening of the road +to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_12" id="Page_12">[Pg 12]</a></span> Linkworth, with the white bridge gleaming through the trees, and the +ripe leaves purling in the wind like summer surf, all fell behind on the +left; as, on the right, did the rectory gate, terminating that same +flint wall which had been the children's grand stand. Rectory, church, +and glebe stood all together, an indivisible trinity, with open uplands +east and north. Westward began the cottages, buff-coloured, thatched; +and it was cottages for half a mile, but healthy cottages, with plenty +of space between, here a wheatfield, there a meadow; for every +householder of Long Stow has also his holding of land, and there is no +more independent parish in East Anglia. Of private houses that are not +cottages, however, the village has only three: the rectory at one end, +the hall near the other, and the Flint House between the two.</p> + +<p>The Flint House now belonged to Jasper Musk. Report said that he had +bought it outright for nine hundred pounds, with the meadow he was now +passing on his left, and the wild garden reaching to the river. +Originally part and parcel of the Long Stow estate, the place had been +let for years, with a good slice of land, to London sportsmen who spent +just two months of the twelve there. Musk had been the lessee's bailiff, +and had feathered his nest so well that when the whole estate changed +hands, and the part went with the whole, the ex-bailiff was in a +position to buy a house and grounds for which the new squire had no use. +None knew how he could have come honestly by so much profit; yet he was +a man of tried integrity, but a hard man, and the last to get fair +treatment behind his back. A more genuine marvel was the way in which he +had<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_13" id="Page_13">[Pg 13]</a></span> spent his money, on a house that could scarcely fail to be a white +elephant to such a man, and a hideous house into the bargain. It abutted +directly on the road, grim and rambling, with false windows like +wall-eyes, and facets of flint so sharp that to brush against the wall +was to rip a sleeve to ribbons. There were many rooms, musty and +mice-ridden, and now only two old people to inhabit them. Musk had +driven all his sons from home, thus doing his country an unwitting +service, for there was the stuff that knits an empire in the blood. But +only one daughter had been born to him, and now he had left her in the +ground, and would wash his mind of her for ever.</p> + +<p>The resolution was easier than its accomplishment: on his very threshold +a shrill small cry assailed and insulted Jasper Musk. And in the parlour +walked his wife, meek-spirited, flat-chested, leaden-eyed; too weary for +much grief, as he was too bitter; in her thin arms an infant not four +days old.</p> + +<p>Musk put himself in her path.</p> + +<p>"Stop walking!"</p> + +<p>"That'll set him off again," sighed Mrs. Musk, though not before she had +obeyed.</p> + +<p>"I don't care," said Jasper. "That can cry till that die," he added +brutally, as the fit returned; "and the sooner the better. Hold it up a +bit. There, now! I want to have a look at the brat. I want to see who +that's like!"</p> + +<p>"It's like poor Molly," whimpered the grandmother, shedding tears that +she could neither check nor hide.</p> + +<p>Musk thumped his stick on the floor.</p> + +<p>"Molly? Molly? You let me hear that name again!<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_14" id="Page_14">[Pg 14]</a></span> Haven't I told you once +and for all never to lay your tongue to that name, in my hearing or +behind my back, as long as you live? Then don't you forget it; and none +o' your lies. That's no more like her than that's like you. But a look +of somebody it have, though I can't for the life of me think who. Wait a +bit. Give me time. That'll come—that'll come!"</p> + +<p>But the thin shrill screaming continued till the little red face grew +livid and wrinkled almost beyond resemblance to its kind; then Musk +relinquished his futile scrutiny, and signed to his wife to resume the +walking, but himself remained in the room. And he leant on his stick as +he had leant on it at the funeral; but here in his house he wore his +hat; and from under its broad brim he followed them, backward and +forward, to and fro, with smouldering eyes.</p> + +<p>"Do you know what I've vowed?" he presently went on. "Do you know the +oath I took, there at that open grave, when all the tomfoolery was over, +and that Jesuit jerry-builder had taken his hook?"</p> + +<p>"I'm sure I don't," sighed Mrs. Musk, as the child lay once more still +against her withered bosom.</p> + +<p>"I stood there," said Jasper, "and I swore I'd find the man. And I swore +I'd tear his heart out when I've found him. And I'll do both!"</p> + +<p>His voice rose so swiftly to so fierce a pitch that the woman started +violently, and the infant wailed again. Instantly the room shook, and +with one stride, paid for by a spasm of pain, the husband towered above +the wife; and this time it was a heavy hand upon her shrunk and +shrinking shoulder that put a stop to the walk.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_15" id="Page_15">[Pg 15]</a></span>"Do <i>you</i> know who it is?" he cried. "My God, I believe you do!"</p> + +<p>"I don't, indeed!"</p> + +<p>"She never told you?"</p> + +<p>"God knows she did not."</p> + +<p>"Or anybody else?"</p> + +<p>"I don't know."</p> + +<p>"But you think—you think! I see it in your face. Who is it you think +she may have told? I'll soon find out from him or her; trust me to wring +that out!"</p> + +<p>For answer, the woman subsided in sobs upon the horsehair sofa, rocking +herself and the baby in her grief and terror. "You'll be that angry with +me," she moaned; "you'll be right mad!"</p> + +<p>"Oh, no, I sha'n't," said Musk, in a kindlier voice. "I'm not so bad as +all that, though this do fare to make a man crazy. Tell away, old woman, +and don't you be afraid."</p> + +<p>"Oh, Jasper, it was when you were gone to Lakenhall for the doctor—that +last time!"</p> + +<p>"Well?"</p> + +<p>"She knew the end was near. Poor thing! Poor thing!"</p> + +<p>"What did she say?"</p> + +<p>"That she'd die more happier if only she could speak—if only I would +send——"</p> + +<p>"Not for Carlton?"</p> + +<p>The wife could only nod in her fear and desperation.</p> + +<p>"You sent for that man the moment my back was turned?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, I knew that'd make you right wild—I knew—I knew!"</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_16" id="Page_16">[Pg 16]</a></span>Musk controlled himself by an effort.</p> + +<p>"That don't. That sha'n't. I'll have it out of him, that's all; he's not +the Church o' Rome yet! Go on. Go on."</p> + +<p>"I went myself. No one knew. I left her alone time I was gone."</p> + +<p>"And you brought him back with you?"</p> + +<p>"Well, he got here first. He ran all the way."</p> + +<p>"He knew better than to let me catch him. Jesuit! How long was he with +her?"</p> + +<p>"Not long, Jasper, not long indeed!"</p> + +<p>"And you heard nothing?"</p> + +<p>"Not a word. I stayed downstairs. I had to promise her that before I +went. She had something to say to Mr. Carlton that nobody else must +know."</p> + +<p>"But somebody else shall!" said Jasper grimly. "That was it, you may +depend; you should have listened at the door. But that make no matter. +Somebody else is going to know before he's many minutes older!"</p> + +<p>And an ugly smile broadened on the thick-set face; but the woman gasped. +Quick as thought the child was on the sofa, the grandmother on her feet. +Trembling and terrified, she stood in her husband's path.</p> + +<p>"Jasper! You're never going up to the rectory?"</p> + +<p>"I am, though—this minute!"</p> + +<p>"Oh, Jasper!"</p> + +<p>"Do you let me by."</p> + +<p>"But I promised you should never know! You've made me break my solemn +word! He'll know I've broken it!"</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_17" id="Page_17">[Pg 17]</a></span>"Yes, I'm going to learn him a thing or two. Will you let me by?"</p> + +<p>"<i>She'll</i> know—too—wherever she has gone to!"</p> + +<p>"You'd better not keep me no more."</p> + +<p>"Jasper! Jasper! On her death-bed I promised her——"</p> + +<p>"Out of my light!"</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_18" id="Page_18">[Pg 18]</a></span></p> + +<h2 class="newchapter"><a name="CHAPTER_III" id="CHAPTER_III"></a>III<br /> +<span class="smalltext">A CONFESSION</span></h2> + + +<p>The rector's study was on the ground floor, facing south. It was a long +room, but narrow, and so low that the present incumbent, who stood +six-feet-two, had contracted a stoop out of continual and instinctive +dread of the ancient beams that scored his study ceiling, combined with +a besetting habit of pacing the floor. There were two doors; one led +into the garden, providing parishioners with immediate access to the +rector when he was not to be found at the church; the other terminated +an inner passage. Both were of immemorial oak, and, like the lattice +casement over the writing table, both rattled in the least wind. Such +was the room which the Reverend Robert Carlton haunted when driven or +detained indoors: rickety, ill-lighted, and draughty when it was not +close, it was still a habitable hole enough, and picturesque in spite of +its occupant.</p> + +<p>Optional surroundings afford a fair clue to the superficial man, but no +real key to character; thus Mr. Carlton's furniture suggested a soul +devoid of the æsthetic sense. He had the sense in all its fineness, but +it found expression in another place. Like many ritualists, Carlton was +a religious æsthete; none more fastidious in the service of the +sanctuary; on the other<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_19" id="Page_19">[Pg 19]</a></span> hand, after the fashion of his peers in two +Churches, the trappings of his own life were severely simple. They had +nearly all been purchased second-hand, those wire-covered shelves and +the books they bore, that oak settle, and the huge arm-chair filled with +miscellaneous lumber. Two baize-covered forms were there for the +accommodation of various classes which the rector held; a prayer desk +faced east in the one orderly corner of the room. Only three pictures +hung on the walls; a Holy Family and Guido Reni's St. Sebastian, +ordinary silver prints in Oxford frames, mementoes of a pilgrimage to +Rome; and an ancient cricket eleven, faded from age, and fly-blown for +long want of a glass. There were also a couple of tin shields, bearing +the heraldic devices of Robert Carlton's public school and of his Oxford +college, while a crucifix hung over the prayer desk. Among the books two +volumes on <i>Building Construction</i> might have been remarked upon the +settle, together with a tattered copy of Parker's <i>Introduction to +Gothic Architecture</i>; among the lumber, a mason's trowel and a +cold-chisel. Lastly, the study smelt, but did not reek, of common +birdseye.</p> + +<p>Jasper Musk, passing the open lattice, caught the parson hastily rising +from his knees, not at the prayer desk, but beside his writing table, +upon which a large book lay open. A newspaper lay on top of the book +when Musk was admitted some moments after he had knocked.</p> + +<p>He entered with his heavy, uneven steps, but took up a position barely +within the threshold, and began by declining a seat with equal emphasis +and stiffness.</p> + +<p>"No, I thank you, Mr. Carlton. I've never been<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_20" id="Page_20">[Pg 20]</a></span> here before in your +time, and I'm never likely to come again. I'm only here now to ask a +question—and return a compliment!"</p> + +<p>And the visitor's eye gleamed as Mr. Carlton creased the forehead that +was so white in comparison with his face: at the moment this contrast +was not conspicuous.</p> + +<p>"From what I hear," explained Musk, "you've done me the kindness of +coming to my house when my back was turned."</p> + +<p>"And you have only heard of it now?"</p> + +<p>"Within the last ten minutes; and I come here right straight. You may +think I wouldn't come for nothing, me that's never darkened your door +before to-day. I don't hold with you, Mr. Carlton, and I'm not the only +one. That's true—I'm not a religious man, and never was; but, if I ever +was to be, it wouldn't be your religion. No, sir, when I fare to want +Christmas-trees in church I'll go to Rome and be done with it; and +that's where you ought to be, Mr. Carlton, before you get a parcel of +women to confess their sins to you as though you was God Almighty!"</p> + +<p>Mr. Carlton sat quite still under this uncalled-for criticism; he even +looked relieved, and one sensitive finger brushed the brown moustache to +either side of his mouth.</p> + +<p>"I have never advocated auricular confession," said he, "whatever I may +think. I have merely said, to those in doubt, in difficulty, or in +trouble, I will help them with God's help if I can."</p> + +<p>"In trouble!" cried Musk scornfully. "I know one that never might have +got herself into trouble if she'd never listened to you! And that's what +brings<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_21" id="Page_21">[Pg 21]</a></span> me here; I'll beat about the bush no more. My wife said she +fetched you the other night. I don't blame you for going, I won't go so +far as that. What I want to know, and what I mean to know, is this: did +my—that young woman lying there—confess to you or did she not?" It was +a fist that he had flung in the direction of the churchyard.</p> + +<p>"Confess what?"</p> + +<p>And the parson's voice was cold and constrained, as it had been beside +the grave; but that white forehead glistened like a dead man's.</p> + +<p>"The name of the father of her child!"</p> + +<p>Carlton took an ivory paper-knife from his desk, and the thin blade +snapped in two between his fingers. A pause followed. Musk stood like +granite, stick and hat in hand, frowning down on the clergyman seated at +his writing table. At length the latter looked up.</p> + +<p>"I might say that is a question you have no right to ask, Mr. Musk; +what is certain, had there been any question of confession, I should +have no right to answer you. There was none. Your daughter sent for +me, to speak to me; and speak we did; but she did not tell me +that—scoundrel's—name."</p> + +<p>"But you know!"</p> + +<p>"How dare you say that?" cried Carlton; and a flash of anger played for +an instant on his pallor.</p> + +<p>"I see it in your face; but I'll have it out of you! I'll have it out of +you," roared Musk, in a sudden frenzy, striking his stick to the floor, +"if I have to tear your smooth tongue out along with it! So smooth you +could read over that murdered girl, and know all the time who'd murdered +her, and think to keep that<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_22" id="Page_22">[Pg 22]</a></span> to yourself! But you sha'n't; no, that you +sha'n't; not if I have to stand here till midnight. You know! You know! +Deny it if you can!"</p> + +<p>"I shall deny nothing," retorted the other. "No, I shall deny nothing!" +he reiterated as if to himself. "But think for a minute, Mr. Musk—I +entreat you to think calmly for one minute! Suppose I could tell you +what you ask, could it serve any good end for you to know?"</p> + +<p>"Good end!" cried Musk. "Why, you know it could. I could kill the man +who's killed my daughter—and kill him I will—and swing for him if they +like. That'll be a wonderful good end all round!"</p> + +<p>"Then is it for me to throw temptation in your way? Is it for me to +spoil a life, if not to end it? For all you know, Mr. Musk, it may be a +life otherwise honest, useful, and of good report. Nay!" exclaimed Mr. +Carlton, as if suddenly impatient of his own reticence, "I'll go so far +as to say that it once was all three. And the man would do such +duty—make such amends——"</p> + +<p>A groan admitted that there were none to make, and finished a sentence +to which Musk had not listened; the one before was sufficient for him; +and his broad face shone with the satisfaction of a point gained.</p> + +<p>"Come," said he, "that's fairer! So you do know him, and you say so like +a man. I always took you for a man, sir, though there's been no love +lost between us; and I'll say I'm sorry I spoke so harsh just now, Mr. +Carlton; for I had a hold of the wrong end o' the stick—I see that now. +It was the man that confessed—it was the man. Sir, if you're the +Christian gentleman that I take you for, and this here Christian<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_23" id="Page_23">[Pg 23]</a></span>ity o' +yours ain't all cant an' humbug, you'll tell me that man's name; for I +can't call to mind a single one she so much as looked at—unless it was +that young Mellis."</p> + +<p>"No, no; poor George is innocent enough, God knows!"</p> + +<p>"He's like to be, for all I hear. They say he carries a cross for you o' +Sundays—but I won't say no more about that. If he's your right hand in +the parish, as they tell me he is, at least I should hope he'd be +straight."</p> + +<p>A puff of wind came through the open window. It lifted the newspaper +from the open book, but the rector's hand fell quickly upon both. And +there it rested. And his wretched eyes rested upon his hand.</p> + +<p>"So I've never thought twice about George Mellis. I'd as soon think o' +you, sir. Then who can it be?"</p> + +<p>Mr. Carlton bounded to his feet, white as his collar, and quivering to +his nostrils.</p> + +<p>"You want to know?"</p> + +<p>"I mean to know, sir."</p> + +<p>"And to kill him—eh?"</p> + +<p>"I reckon I'll go pretty near it."</p> + +<p>"Ah, don't do it by halves!" cried Carlton in a strange high voice. +"Kill him now!" His hands fell open at his side; his head fell forward +on his breast; and he who had sinned grossly against God and man, yet +was not born to be a hypocrite, stood defenceless, abject, +self-destroyed.</p> + +<p>Moments passed; became minutes; and all the sound in the rectory study +came from the rattling of its inner door, or through the outer one from +the garden.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_24" id="Page_24">[Pg 24]</a></span> Then by degrees a hard breathing broke on Robert Carlton's +ears; but he himself was the next to speak, flinging back his head in +sudden misery.</p> + +<p>"Why don't you strike?" he cried out. "You've got your stick; strike, +man, strike!"</p> + +<p>It seemed an hour before the answer came, in a voice scarcely +recognizable as that of Jasper Musk, it was so low and calm; yet there +was an intensity in the deep, slow tones that matched the fearful +intensity of the fixed light eyes; and the massive face was still and +livid from the short steel beard to the virile silver hair.</p> + +<p>"Oh, yes, I'll strike!" hissed Musk. "I'll strike! I'll strike!" And he +struck with his eyes until the other's fell once more; until the guilty +man collapsed headlong in his chair, his arms upon the table, and his +face upon his arms. "But I'll strike in my own way, thank you," Musk +went on, "and in my own good time. You shall smart a bit first—learn +what it's like to suffer—taste hell upon earth in case there's no hell +for bloody murderers beyond! How I wish you could see yourself! How I +wish your precious flock could see you—and they shall. Whited sepulchre +. . . filthy hypocrite . . . living lie!"</p> + +<p>Deliberately chosen, with long pauses between, with many a rejection of +the word that came uppermost—the worse word that was too strong to +sting—these measured epithets carved round the heart that unbridled +abuse would have stabbed and stunned. Carlton could hide his face, but +he quivered where he sprawled, and the other nodded in savage +self-esteem.</p> + +<p>"Not that I had ought to be surprised," continued Musk; "it's what might +have been expected of a Jesuit<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_25" id="Page_25">[Pg 25]</a></span> in disguise; the only wonder is I didn't +suspect you from the first. I never set up for being a charitable man; +but that seems I was a damned sight too charitable towards you. I +thought no wrong, whatever else I may have thought of you and your ways. +No; I may have jeered, I may have been vexed, but my mind wasn't nasty +enough for that. God! that I can keep my stick off you, when I remember +the choir practices, and the organ practices, and the Bible classes, and +the Young Women's Christian Association. Sounds well, don't it? Young +Women's Christian Association! Now we know what it meant; now we know +what it all means, church and parsons, religion and all; a sink of +iniquity and a set of snivelling, whining, licentious——"</p> + +<p>"Stop!" cried Carlton, manned at last, and on his feet to enforce the +word. "Say what you please of me, do what you will to me. Nothing is too +bad for me—I deserve the very worst. But abuse my Church you shall not, +in my hearing."</p> + +<p>"His Church!" sneered Musk. "A lot you've done to make me respect it, +haven't you? My God, can you stand there looking at me as if I were in +the wrong instead o' you? Do you know what you've done, and confessed to +doing? You've murdered my girl, just as much as though you'd taken and +cut her throat, you have: more, you've murdered her body and soul, you +that snivel about the soul! And you can stand there and whine about your +Church! Is that all you've got to say for yourself—to the father of the +woman you've ruined to her grave?"</p> + +<p>"That is all I have to say to you, Mr. Musk. I will<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_26" id="Page_26">[Pg 26]</a></span> not insult you by +asking your forgiveness, much less by attempting to make the shadow of +an excuse; there could be none; nor can there be any forgiveness for me +from you or your wife; nor do I look for any mercy in this parish, or +this world. Go, spread the news, and ruin me in my turn; it's what I +deserve, and mean to bear."</p> + +<p>"Not so fast," said Musk—"not so fast, if you please. So I'm to spread +the news, am I? And do you think I'm so proud that's the reverend? By +your leave, Mr. Carlton, I'll keep that same news to myself till I've +had all I want from it."</p> + +<p>"Any refinement you like," said Carlton. "It will not be too bad for +me—or too much—please God!"</p> + +<p>Jasper Musk put on his hat, but came close up to the clergyman before +taking his leave.</p> + +<p>"I wish I knew you better!" he ground out through his teeth. "I wish I'd +made up to you like the women, instead of giving you the wide berth I +have. Do you know why? Because I'd have known how to hit you hardest," +said Musk, hissing like a snake; "because I'd have known where to hurt +you most!"</p> + +<p>Carlton stood a trifle more upright: his enemy's malice ministered +subtly to his remnant of self-respect.</p> + +<p>"I wish I'd been a church-goer," continued Musk; "but it's never too +late to mend! I may be there to-morrow to hear you preach; maybe I'll +have a word to say myself; maybe I shall not. You'll know when the time +comes, and not before."</p> + +<p>Carlton quailed, for the first time at a threat, and his visible terror +seemed to intoxicate the other. Seizing him by the shoulder as he had +seized his wife, clutch<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_27" id="Page_27">[Pg 27]</a></span>ing him like a wild beast, and thrusting his +great face to within an inch of that of the unhappy clergyman, Jasper +Musk spat lewd names, and foul insult, and wanton blasphemy, until +breath failed him. All the vileness he had heard in sixty years, and +could recall in half as many seconds, poured from him in a very +transport of insensate ribaldry; words that had never left his lips +before, crowded to them now; and were still ringing in a swimming head +when Robert Carlton woke to the fact that he was once more alone.</p> + +<p>His first sensation was one of overwhelming nausea. His very vitals +writhed; and he reeled heavily against an open bookcase, casting an arm +along one of the upper shelves, and resting his face upon the sleeve. +For a few moments all his weight was upon that arm; then he opened his +eyes, and the titles of the books engaged his dazed attention. None was +apt, but all were familiar, and the familiarity maddened the stricken +man. He stood glaring from one low wall to another, filled with those +doubts which are the cruel satellites of transcendent anguish. Had it +really happened after all? The room was so unchanged, from the few +things on the walls to the many in the chair! All was so homely, so +intimate, so reassuring; and no visible trace of Musk! Had he ever been +there at all?</p> + +<p>Ah, yes, for he had gone! In the distance a gate had squealed, and shut +with a rattle; the sound had lain in his ear; now it sank to the brain. +Now, too, another sound, intermittent all this time, but meaningless +hitherto, assumed a like significance. This was the continued rustling +of a newspaper, as the wind whisked in at the open door and out by the +open win<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_28" id="Page_28">[Pg 28]</a></span>dow in invisible harlequinade. The man's mind fled back a +little lifetime of minutes. And he recalled the last puff and rustle, +and the quick falling of his own hand upon the paper, which lay on his +desk, as the last event of a past era of his existence—the last act of +Robert Carlton, hypocrite!</p> + +<p>And what was the peril that had made the final demand upon his caution +and his cunning? It was a new irony to perceive at once that it had +existed chiefly in guilty imagination; to remove the paper, and to +reveal nothing more incriminating than the parish register of deaths, +with an unfinished entry in his own hand, a spatter of ink in place of a +name, and some round white blisters lower down the leaf. Yet this it was +that had brought Carlton to his knees an hour ago; and it brought him to +his knees again, not at the desk of formal prayer, but here at his table +as before.</p> + +<p>"Father have mercy on me," he prayed, "for I neither deserve nor desire +any mercy from man!"</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_29" id="Page_29">[Pg 29]</a></span></p> + +<h2 class="newchapter"><a name="CHAPTER_IV" id="CHAPTER_IV"></a>IV<br /> +<span class="smalltext">MIDSUMMER NIGHT</span></h2> + + +<p>And while he knelt the situation was developing, with unforeseen and +truly merciful rapidity, in an utterly unsuspected quarter; thus an +aggressive knock at the inner door came in a sense as an answer to the +prayer it interrupted.</p> + +<p>The rectory servants consisted at this time of a small but entire family +employed wholesale out of pure philanthropy. And this was the mother, +red-hot in her cheap crape, to say that she had heard everything—could +not help hearing—and that house was no longer any place for respectable +women and an honest lad—no, not if they had to sleep in the fields. So +the lad had got their boxes on a barrow, but he would bring it back. And +they would go, all of them, to Lakenhall Union, sooner than stay another +hour in that house of shame.</p> + +<p>Mr. Carlton produced his cash-box without a word, and counted out a +month's wages for each in addition to arrears. The poor woman made a +gallant stand against the favour, but, submitting, returned to her +kitchen of her own accord, and to her master's study in a quarter of an +hour, to tell him she had laid the table, and there was a wire cover +over the meat.</p> + +<p>"And may God forgive you, sir!" cried she at part<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_30" id="Page_30">[Pg 30]</a></span>ing. "I couldn't have +believed it if I hadn't heard it from your own lips with my own ears!"</p> + +<p>There was much that Carlton himself could not believe. He sat half +stupefied in his deserted rectory, like a man marooned, his one acute +sensation that of his sudden solitude. What was so hard to realize was +that the people knew! that the whole parish would know that night, and +his own family next week, and the whole world before many days. He was +well aware of the certain consequences of this scandal and its +disclosure; he had faced them only too often during the nightmare of the +past week, imagining some, ascertaining others. What seemed so +incredible was that he had made the disclosure himself, that the very +father had not suspected him to the end!</p> + +<p>The last reflection convulsed him with self-contempt. What a hypocrite +he must be! What an unconscious hypocrite, the worst kind of all!</p> + +<p>Here he was eating his supper; he had no recollection of coming to the +table; yet, now that he had caught himself, the food did not choke him, +he was not sick with shame; he only despised himself—and went on.</p> + +<p>It was dusk. He must have lit the lamp himself; as he lifted it from the +table, having risen, he caught sight of its reflection and his own in +the overmantel, and set the lamp upon the chimneypiece, and by its light +had a better look at himself than he could remember having taken in his +life before. There was no vanity in the man; he was studying his face +out of sheer curiosity, from a new and quite impersonal point of view, +as that of an enormous hypocrite and voluptuary.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_31" id="Page_31">[Pg 31]</a></span>Human nature was very strange: he himself would never have suspected +such a face. The forehead was so broad and high, the deep-set eyes so +steadfast, and yet so fervid! They were the eyes of a zealot, but no +visionary: wisdom and understanding were in that bulge of the brow over +each. But the evil writing is lower down, unless you look for positive +crime or madness; yet these nostrils were sensitive, not sensual; and +the mouth, yes, the mouth showed between the short brown beard and the +heavy brown moustache; but what it showed was its strength. No; neither +weakness nor wickedness were there; even Robert Carlton admitted that. +But to be strong, and yet to fall; to mean well, and do evil; to look +one thing, and to be another: all that was to embody a type for which he +himself had ever entertained an unbridled loathing and contempt.</p> + +<p>He carried the lamp to his study, and as he entered from within there +was a knock at the outer door. One was waiting to see the rector, one +who had waited and knocked there oftener than any other in the parish.</p> + +<p>Carlton drew back, and the impulse of flight was strong upon him for the +first time. It needed all his will to shut the inner door behind him, +and to cry with any firmness, "Is that George Mellis?"</p> + +<p>In response there burst into the room a lad in knickerbockers, +broad-shouldered, muscular, yet smooth-faced, and mild-eyed all his +nineteen years; but this was the supreme moment of them all; and his +woman's eyes were on fire as he planted himself before the rector and +his lamp, pale as ashes in its rays.</p> + +<p>"Is it true?" he gasped. "Is it true?"</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_32" id="Page_32">[Pg 32]</a></span>This lad was Carlton's chief disciple, his admirer, his imitator, his +enthusiastic champion and defender; his right hand in all good works; +nay more, his acolyte, his lieutenant of the sanctuary; and, before a +broad chest so agitated, and innocent eyes so wild, the culprit's +courage failed him at last, so that the truth clove to his tongue.</p> + +<p>"It's all over the village," the lad continued in gasps. "You know what +I mean. They're all saying it. They say you've admitted it; for God's +sake say you haven't! Only deny it, and I'll go back and cram their lies +down their throats!"</p> + +<p>But by this Mr. Carlton had recovered himself, and was looking his last +upon the anxious eager face of the lad who had loved and honoured him: +his final pang was to see the eagerness growing, the anxiety lessening, +his look misunderstood. And this time the admission was halt and hoarse.</p> + +<p>What followed was also different; for, with scarcely a moment's +interval, young Mellis burst into tears like the overgrown child that he +was, and, flinging himself into the rector's chair, sobbed there +unrestrainedly with his smooth face in his strong red hands. Carlton +watched him by a prolonged effort of the will; he would shirk no part of +his punishment; and no part to come could hurt much more than this. His +fixed eyes were waiting for the boy's swimming ones when at length the +latter could look up.</p> + +<p>"You, of all men!" whispered Mellis. "You who have kept us all +straight—me for one. Why, the very thought of you has helped me to +resist things! You, with your religion: no more religion for me!"</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_33" id="Page_33">[Pg 33]</a></span>At that the other broke out; his religion he could still defend; or +thought he could, until he came to try, and his own unworthiness slowly +strangled the words in his throat.</p> + +<p>"Say what you like," said Mellis; "it was you brought me to church; it's +you who turn me away; and I'll go to no other after yours. Only to +think——"</p> + +<p>And he plunged into puerile reminiscences of their religious life in +common, quoting extreme points in the rich ritual in which he had been +privileged to assist, as though they aggravated the case, and made it +more incredible than it was already.</p> + +<p>"If our Lord Himself——"</p> + +<p>It did not need the rector's finger to check that blasphemy; but the +thing was said; the thought was there.</p> + +<p>"Yes; better go," said Carlton, as the lad leapt up. "Go; and let no one +else come near me who ever believed in me; for I can better face my +bitterest enemies. Yet you—you must be one of them! After her own +father, no man should hate me more!"</p> + +<p>And there was a new pain in his voice, a new agony of remorse, as memory +stabbed him in a fresh place. But the boy shook his head, and hung it +with a blush.</p> + +<p>"You think I cared for her," he said. "I thought so, too, until she went +away. I should have cared more then! It troubled me for a time; but I +got over it; and then I knew I was too young for all that. Besides, she +never looked at me after you came; that's another thing I see now; and I +know I ran less after her. Yes, I was too young to love a woman," cried +this village lad, "but I wasn't too old to love you, and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_34" id="Page_34">[Pg 34]</a></span> look up to +you, and follow you in all you did. I tell you the honest truth, Mr. +Carlton," and his great eyes flashed their last reproach: "I'd have died +for you, sir, I would! And I'd die now—thankfully—if it could make you +the man I thought you were!"</p> + +<p>This interview left Carlton's mind more a blank than ever. It might have +been an hour later, or it might have been in ten minutes, that the +thought occurred to him—if his dearest disciple felt thus, what must +the enemy feel? And he was a man with enemies enough in the parish, +having followed the old order of country parson, and that with more +vigour than diplomacy. In eighteen months his reforms had been manifold +and drastic beyond discretion. It is true that his preaching had won him +more followers than his priestcraft had turned away. Yet a more acute +ecclesiastic would have tapped the wedge instead of hammering it; the +consummate priest would have condescended further in the direction of a +more immediate and a wider popularity. Carlton had gone his own way, +consulting none, attracting many, offending not a few. And he expected +the speedy settlement of many a score.</p> + +<p>Nor had he long to wait. Lamp in hand, he was locking up the house as +mechanically as he had fed his body; but one thing had pricked him in +the performance, and he tingled still between gratitude and fresh grief. +He had a Scotch collie, Glen by name, a noble dog, that was for ever at +its master's heels. So, during any service, the chain was a necessary +evil; but straight from his vestry, in cassock and biretta, the rector +would march to his backyard to release the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_35" id="Page_35">[Pg 35]</a></span> dog. To-day he had +forgotten; nor was it till the master's round brought him to the back +premises that the poor beast barked itself into notice. Then, indeed, +the dazed man realized that his outer ear had been calmly listening to +the barking for some time; and, with a small thing to be sorry for +again, and one friend behind him, he continued his round, a sentient +being once more.</p> + +<p>It was upstairs that the dog barked afresh, causing Carlton to snatch +his head from the basin of cold water in which he had sought to assuage +its fever, and to go over to his open window, towel in hand. No sooner +had he reached it than he started back, and stood very still with the +water dripping from his beard. When he did dry his face it was as though +he wiped all colour from it too. And it was six feet of quivering clay +that returned on tip-toe to that open window.</p> + +<p>The new moon was setting behind the trees towards Linkworth; there was +no need of its meagre light. Lanterns, bright lanterns, were closing in +upon the rectory: at first the unhappy man had seen lanterns only, +swinging close to the ground, swilling the lawn with light. Stealthy +legs, knee-deep in this light, he remembered after his recoil. But not +till he had driven himself back to the window did he see the set faces, +or realize the fury of his people, kindled against him by his own +confession of his own guilt.</p> + +<p>When he saw this his nerve went, and he stood with clasped hands, the +perspiration bursting from his skin. And the lanterns shook out into a +chain along the edge of the lawn, and were held up to search the face of +the house, all as yet without a word.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_36" id="Page_36">[Pg 36]</a></span>"That's his room," whispered one at last; "that—where the light is!"</p> + +<p>It was the voice of the schoolmaster, himself a churchwarden, and withal +an honest creature who was merely as many things as possible to as many +men. His part had been a little difficult lately. "This has simplified +it," thought the rector; and the twinge of bitterness did him good.</p> + +<p>He was a man again for one moment; the next, "He's in his room," cried +another, aloud; "that's him standing at the window!"</p> + +<p>And there burst forth a howl of execration, that rose to a yell as the +delinquent disappeared and in his panic put out the light.</p> + +<p>"You coward!"</p> + +<p>"Ah, you skunk!"</p> + +<p>"Bloody Papist!"</p> + +<p>"Hypocrite!"</p> + +<p>They were the better names; each shot his own, and capped the last; the +schoolmaster, mad with excitement, blaspheming with the best.</p> + +<p>"Come down out of that, ye devil!"</p> + +<p>"Do you show yourself, you cur!"</p> + +<p>And this command Robert Carlton obeyed, his manhood rising yet again. +But no sooner was he at the window than both panes crashed to powder +over his head, and the surrounding bricks rang with the volley. The +clergyman had a scratch from the falling glass, and a stone stung him on +the hand. The blood bubbled in his veins.</p> + +<p>"Cowards and curs yourselves!" he shouted down, shaking his fists at the +crowd; and in ten seconds he<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_37" id="Page_37">[Pg 37]</a></span> was at the front door, with a couple of +walking-sticks snatched from the stand. But he himself had turned the +key and shot the bolt within the last few minutes, and this gave him +time to think.</p> + +<p>"Quiet, sir—quiet!" he cried to the dog at his heels. "They've right on +their side," he groaned, "after all! Quiet, old doggie; come back; it's +all deserved. And it's only the beginning of what we've got to bear!"</p> + +<p>So he bore it, sitting on the stairs, where no window overlooked him, +and soothing Glen with one hand, restraining him with the other; and +yet, for his sin, despising his forbearance, even while he continued +telling himself it was his duty to forbear.</p> + +<p>And now breaking glass and barking dog made night a nightmare in the +dark and empty house: the infuriated villagers were smashing the rectory +windows one by one. Where the blind was up, the glass spread, and the +stone flew far into the room; where the blind was down, stone and glass +rattled against it, and fell in one heap with one clatter. So +dining-room and drawing-room were wrecked in turn, at short range, with +the heaviest available metal, and much interior damage. And still the +master of the house sat immovable within, nodding grimly at each crash; +wincing more at the curses; and once releasing the dog to stop his ears +altogether.</p> + +<p>It was no use; curiosity compelled him to listen; he was forbidden to +shirk one stripe. And that was a communicant, that cursing demon; this +was the schoolmaster, yelling like one of his own boys; the other +Palmer, of the Plough and Harrow, a very old<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_38" id="Page_38">[Pg 38]</a></span> enemy, hoarse as a crow +with drink and triumph. Young Cubitt, again, who cheered each crash, was +one of the disaffected; but till to-night most of this howling mob had +been his flock. Now all the good work was undone, was stultified, the +good seed poisoned in the ground; and not for the first, and not for the +fiftieth time that week, the confessed rake asked himself whether more +harm than good would not come of his confession.</p> + +<p>Meanwhile, of all the voices that he heard and could distinguish, only +one diverted his self-contempt for an instant. This was the soft, +passionless voice of a young gentleman, evidently not himself engaged in +the stone-throwing, pointing out panes still to break to those who were. +This was the voice of Sidney Gleed.</p> + +<p>The thing had gone on for ten minutes or more when the outcry altered in +character: an interruption had occurred: was it the police? No, the +rector of the parish was too well acquainted with the character of its +solitary constable. He would come up when all was over. Then who could +this be?</p> + +<p>The shower of stones had ceased as suddenly as it had begun. New oaths +were flying in a new direction, and a voice hitherto unheard was heaping +abuse on the abusers; with a strange thrill, the clergyman recognised it +as the voice of Tom Ivey, the young contractor who was building the +transepts; and he could remain no longer on the stairs. Stealing into +the drawing-room, he stumbled across a crackling drift of glass, and, +unnoticed now, stood in the wrecked bow-window, with the fresh air upon +his face once more.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_39" id="Page_39">[Pg 39]</a></span>Lanterns were skipping right and left, their erratic rays giving +momentary glimpses of a stalwart figure in pursuit, a stick whirling +about his ears, and resounding on the backs and shoulders of the +retreating rabble. Some stayed to stone the new foe before they ran; and +one, Palmer the publican, set his lantern on the gravel and squared up +in style. Robert Carlton never saw what followed; for at this moment his +maddened dog, which had been tearing about the house in search of an +outlet, bounded past him through the shattered window; and, when the +rout was complete, the inn-keeper's lantern was a solitary star in the +nether darkness. Then the gate clattered, a swinging step approached, +and Tom Ivey caught up the lantern in his stride.</p> + +<p>Carlton sprang through the window to meet him, every other emotion sunk +for the moment in one of overflowing gratitude.</p> + +<p>"Tom," he cried, "how can I thank you——"</p> + +<p>"Keep your thanks to yourself."</p> + +<p>"But—Tom——"</p> + +<p>"Don't 'Tom' me! Keep your distance too. Do you think I haven't heard +about it? Do you think I'd lift a finger for <i>you</i>—let alone a stick? +No, sir, I'd liefer take that to your own back; but I fare to mind when +the Rector of Long Stow was a good man, who didn't preach too tall, but +acted up to what he did preach; and I won't see the house he lived in +wrecked and ruined because a blackguard's followed him."</p> + +<p>"I am all that," said Mr. Carlton. "Go on!"</p> + +<p>The other stared, not so much disarmed as confounded.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_40" id="Page_40">[Pg 40]</a></span>"I'm sorry to open so wide, and you know I'm sorry," he at length burst +out. "'Tain't for me to call you over, sir, and I won't tell you no more +lies. I couldn't bear to see them snarling curs setting on you the +moment you was down, and that's the truth! But it wasn't what I come +back to say," continued Ivey doggedly. "I come back to say you can get +another party to go on with that there building, for I won't work no +more for you. The plant's yours; you found that for the job; you can +find more men. I throw up the contract: take the law of me if you like."</p> + +<p>Robert Carlton was back in his study. It was the one front room which +had escaped inviolate; the open lattice had saved it; not a pebble added +to the old disorder. The rector sighed relief as he held up the lamp on +entering; then he shot the rubbish out of the big arm-chair, and himself +lay back in it like the dead. A bloody smear, where the glass had grazed +his cheek, enhanced his pallor; his eyes were closed; no muscle moved. +And yet his wits clung to him like wolves, till presently the white brow +wrinkled, the heavy eyelids twitched.</p> + +<p>"May I come in, reverend?" said the saddler's voice.</p> + +<p>Carlton assented with a sigh, but did not raise himself to greet the +visitor, who came in mopping his forehead, reversed the chair at the +writing table, and seated himself with ominous deliberation. Then he +mopped again, and was slow to speak; but his scornful expression +prepared the clergyman for more of that which he was resolved to bear.</p> + +<p>"Pharisees!" cried Fuller at last. "Humbugs and hypocrites!"</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_41" id="Page_41">[Pg 41]</a></span>The words were precisely those which Robert Carlton expected and must +endure, but against the plural number he felt bound to protest. "We are +not all alike, Mr. Fuller," he said; "thank God, I am but one out of +many thousands."</p> + +<p>"You?" cried the saddler. "Gord love yer, reverend, did you think I +meant <i>you</i>? No, sir, it's the stupid fools and canting cowards <i>I</i> +mean, that take and hit a man as soon as ever he's down; not the man +they hit."</p> + +<p>Mr. Carlton sat silent, astounded, and tingling between pain and +pleasure. He fancied he had run through the gamut of the emotions, but +here was a new one that he feared to dissect.</p> + +<p>"Not the man," proceeded the saddler in raised tones—"not the man who +is worth the rest of the parish put together—saint or sinner—guilty or +innocent!"</p> + +<p>Yes, it was pleasure! It was pleasure, acute and lawless, wicked, +ungovernable, and yet to be governed. To have one man's sympathy, how +sweet it was, but how shameful in a guilty heart that would be contrite +too! It had brought a colour to his face, a light to his eyes; ere the +one had faded, and the other failed, Robert Carlton's will had frozen +that tiny rill of comfort at its fount.</p> + +<p>"You mustn't say that," was his belated reply; but it came curt and cold +enough to please himself.</p> + +<p>"But I do say it," cried old Fuller, "and I will say it, and I won't say +a word more than I mean. Let there be no mistake between us, reverend: I +don't deny I felt what <i>is</i> felt when first I heard; but when I<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_42" id="Page_42">[Pg 42]</a></span> come to +think of it, that fared to break my heart more'n to make that boil; and +when I thought a bit deeper, I see how easy that is to make bad worse. +Not as it ain't right bad; but that wasn't for us to make it worse. So +it was me fetched Tom Ivey. And now he tells me what he ups and says +himself when all was over. 'Gord love yer, Tom,' says I, 'you'll be +ashamed of that when you're a man of my experience! You forget the good +our reverend's been doing amongst us all this time, and you think only +o' this here evil. I'll go up,' says I, 'and I'll show him there's one +fair-minded, level-headed man o' the world in this here hotbed o' fools +and Pharisees.'"</p> + +<p>"But Tom was right, and you were wrong."</p> + +<p>"Don't tell me, reverend," said the saddler, edging his chair nearer to +the long limp figure under the lamp. "You can't undo the good you've +once done, not if you try. Leave religion out of it, and look at all +you've done for the poor: look at the coal club, and the book club, and +the dispensary, and the Young Man's——"</p> + +<p>"Unhappily, Fuller, all this is beside the question."</p> + +<p>And the cold tone was no longer put on; neither did it cover an emotion +which called for conscientious suppression; for these officious sallies +only fretted the spirit they were intended to soothe.</p> + +<p>"Well, then," rejoined Fuller, "if you prefer it, and for the sake of +argument, look at a poor old feller like me. What should <i>I</i> ha' done +without you, reverend? I don't come to church, yet you take no offence +when I tell you why, but you argue the point like a rare 'un, and you +lend me the paper just the same. The Rever<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_43" id="Page_43">[Pg 43]</a></span>end Jackson wouldn't ha' done +it, though I durs'n't stay away in his day; he'd have stopped my +livelihood in a week. So don't you fare to make yourself out worse than +you are, reverend; you've done wrong, I allow, but so did Solomon, and +so did David; and weren't so quick to own up to it, either! Like them, +you've done good, too, and plenty of it, and that sha'n't be forgotten +if I can help it. As for the poor young thing that's gone——"</p> + +<p>"Don't name her, I beg!"</p> + +<p>"Very well, sir, I won't. I'm as sorry as the rest o' the parish; but we +shouldn't be unfair because we're sorry. They may say what they like, +but a man of my experience knows that nine times out of ten the woman's +more to blame——"</p> + +<p>"Out of my house!"</p> + +<p>Carlton had leapt to his feet, was standing at his full height for the +first time that night, and pointing sternly to the door. His face was +white with passion. The saddler's jaw dropped.</p> + +<p>"What, sir?" he gasped.</p> + +<p>"Out of my sight—this instant!"</p> + +<p>"For sayun——"</p> + +<p>"For daring to say one half of what you have said! It's my own fault. +I've spoilt you; but out you go."</p> + +<p>Fuller rose slowly, amazed, bewildered, and mortified to the quick. He +was a kind-hearted man, but he had all the superior peasant's obstinacy +and self-conceit: the one had helped to bring him to the clergyman's +side, the other to wag his tongue. Yet his sympathy was genuine enough; +and the theory, of which the bare hint had spilled vials of wrath upon +his head,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_44" id="Page_44">[Pg 44]</a></span> was in fact his profound conviction. Smarting vanity, +however, was the absorbing sensation of the moment. And for the next +hour the saddler could have returned every few minutes with some fresh +retort; but in the moment of humiliation he could not rise above a +grumble:</p> + +<p>"I might as well have thrown stones with the rest!"</p> + +<p>"Better," the clergyman cried after him. "You had a right to punish me; +to pity and excuse me you had none. Least of all——"</p> + +<p>He broke off, and stood at his door till the quick steps stopped, and +the gate clattered, and the steps died away. The night was dark, and +this end of the village already very still: the Plough and Harrow was +nearer the other. The wind had not fallen; a murmur of very distant +thunder came with it from the west. Nearer home a peewit called, and +Robert Carlton caught himself wondering whether there would be rain +before morning.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_45" id="Page_45">[Pg 45]</a></span></p> + +<h2 class="newchapter"><a name="CHAPTER_V" id="CHAPTER_V"></a>V<br /> +<span class="smalltext">THE MAN ALONE</span></h2> + + +<p>At midnight he was still alone, and the slow torture of his own thoughts +was still a relief. As the dining-room clock struck—he noted its +preservation—and the thin strokes floated through those broken windows +and in at that of the study, he gave up listening for the next step. His +privacy seemed secure at last. He could abandon his spirit to its proper +torments; he could enter upon another night in hell. Yet, even now, the +worst was over, and there would be no more nights of secret grief, +secret remorse, secret shame. He had confessed his sin, and thereby +earned his right to suffer. No more to hide! No more deceit! He could +not realize it yet; he only knew that his heart was lighter already. He +felt ashamed of the relief.</p> + +<p>Yet another night came back to him as he paced his floor: a last year's +night when the full moon shone through ragged trees. It also had been +worse than this: it was the inner life that lay in ruins then. He +remembered pacing till sunrise as he was pacing now: such a still night +but for that; one had but to stand and listen to hear the very fall of +the leaf. He remembered thus standing, there at the door, in the +moonlight, and a line that had buzzed in his head as he listened.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0q">"And yet God has not said a word!"<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_46" id="Page_46">[Pg 46]</a></span>God had spoken now!</p> + +<p>And the man was glad.</p> + +<p>Glad! He almost revelled in his disgrace; it produced in him unexpected +sensations—the sensations of the debtor who begins to pay. Here was an +extreme instance of the things that are worse to dream of than to +endure. He felt less ignominious in the hour of his public ignominy than +in all these months of secret shame. He was living a single life once +more. The wind roamed at will through the damaged house as through the +ribs of a wreck; and its ruined master drew himself up, and his stride +quickened with his blood. He was no longer lording it in his pulpit, the +popular preacher of the countryside, drawing the devout from half a +dozen parishes, a revelation to the rustic mind, a conscious libertine +all the while, with a tongue of gold and a heart of lead. More than all, +he was no longer the one to sit secure, in loathsome immunity, in +sickening esteem: he, the man! The woman had suffered; it was his turn +now. Woman? The poor child . . . the poor, dead, murdered child . . . +Well! the wages of his sin would be worse than death; they were worse +already. And again the man was glad; but his momentary and strange +exultation had ended in an agony.</p> + +<p>The poor, poor girl . . .</p> + +<p>No; nothing was too bad for him—not even the one thing that he would +feel more than all the rest in bulk. He put his mind on that one thing. +He dwelt upon it, wilfully, not in conscious self-pity, but as one eager +to meet his punishment half-way, to shirk none of it. The attitude was +characteristic. The sacrificial spirit<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_47" id="Page_47">[Pg 47]</a></span> informed the man. In another age +and another Church he had done barbaric violence to his own flesh in the +name of mortification. Living in the latter half of the nineteenth +century, a mere Anglican, he was content to play tricks with a fine +constitution in Lent.</p> + +<p>"I will look my last upon it," he said aloud: "it would be insulting God +and man to attempt to take another service after this; I have held my +last, and laid my last stone. Let me see what I have sown for others to +reap."</p> + +<p>And he picked his way through the darkness to the church.</p> + +<p>The path intersected a narrow meadow with the hay newly cut, and lying +in tussocks under the stars; a light fence divided this reef of glebe +from the churchyard; and, just within the latter, a lean-to shed faced +the scaffolding of the north transept, its back against the fence. The +shed was flimsy and small, but it had come out of the rector's pocket; +the transepts themselves were to be his gift, because the living was too +good for a celibate priest, and it was his sermons that had made the +church too small. So he had paid for everything, even to the mason's +tools inside the shed, because Tom Ivey had never had a contract before +and lacked capital. And the out-door interest of the building had formed +a healthy complement to the engrossing affairs of the sanctuary; and, +indeed, they had developed side by side. Perhaps the material changes +had proved the more absorbing to one who threw himself headlong into +whatsoever he undertook. Of late, especially, it had been remarked that +the rev<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_48" id="Page_48">[Pg 48]</a></span>erend was taking quite an extraordinary part in these +proceedings: cultivating a knack he had of carving in stone; neglecting +cottages for his mason's shed; and tiring himself out by day like a man +who dreads the night. How he had dreaded it none had known, but now all +might guess.</p> + +<p>Yet he had loved his work for its own sake, not merely as a distraction +from gnawing thoughts; there was in him something of the elemental +artist: the making of anything was his passionate delight. And now the +scene of his industry inflicted a pang so keen that he forgot to +appreciate it as part of his deserts; and, for the moment, priest and +sinner disappeared in the grieving artist, bidding good-bye not only to +his studio, but to art itself. It was very dark; the place was strewn +with uncut boulders, poles, barrows, heaps of rubble; but he knew his +way through the litter, and, in the double darkness of the shed, could +lay his hand on anything he chose. He took something down from a shelf. +It was a gargoyle of his own making, meant for the vestry door in the +south transept. He stood with it in both hands, and his thumbs felt the +eyes and his palms the cheeks, at first as gently as though the stone +were flesh, then suddenly with all his strength, as if to crush the +grotesque head to powder. It was not a useful thing: no water could +spout from the sham mouth which he had wrought with loving pains. It was +only his idea for finishing off the label moulding of the vestry door; +it was only something he had made himself—for others to throw away, or +to keep and show as the handiwork of the immoral rector of Long Stow. He +restored it to his place; and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_49" id="Page_49">[Pg 49]</a></span> retraced his sure steps through the +rubbish, artist no more. Good-bye to that!</p> + +<p>He crossed over to the church, went round to the porch, and entered by +the only door in use during the alterations. Eighteen months ago he +would have found it locked. It was he who had opened the House of God to +all comers at all hours, and made every sitting free. He stole up the +aisle as one seeing in the dark. His feet fell softly on the matting, +where in early days they had clattered on bare flags, and yet more +softly when they had mounted a step without stumbling. The matting in +the aisle was his addition, the rich carpet in the chancel was his gift. +All his innovations had not provoked dissension. Presently he lit a +lamp, a Syrian treasure, highly wrought, that hung over the lectern: he +had bought it at Damascus, years before, for his church when he should +have one. Yes; he had given freely to God's House, to make it also the +House Beautiful, though he took no trouble to adorn his own.</p> + +<p>And this was to be the end! For events could take but one course now: a +complaint to the bishop (all the parish would sign it), a summons to the +palace, a trial at the consistory court; suspension certainly; +deprivation, perhaps; he had been at some pains to inform himself on the +subject. The bishop would be sore. He had taken such an interest in +everything at the confirmation, his sympathy had been so full and +unexpected, his approval so stimulating, so hearty and frank! Carlton +was ashamed of thinking of his bishop instead of praying to God upon his +knees. He longed to kneel and pray, for the last time, there at the +table<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_50" id="Page_50">[Pg 50]</a></span> which he chose to call the altar, but which he had found ugly and +bare, and was leaving richly laden and richly hung. In the small and +distant light of the lectern lamp he stood gazing at the damask +hangings, the green frontal, the silver candlesticks, the flowers from +his own garden—the flowers he grew for this. He longed to kneel, but +could not. He could not pray. He could not weep. His heart was a grave, +and the grave filled in and the weight of the earth upon his spirit. He +had been quite wrong an hour ago. <i>This</i> was the blackest hour of all. +To have done and given so much, and to lose it all! To have set his +whole soul for years towards the light, to have striven so to turn the +souls of others; and to be thrust into outer darkness for one sin!</p> + +<p>This wave of bitterness, of blind rebellion and human egotism, bore him +out of his church, for the last time, in a passion of defiance and +self-defence: a sudden and deplorable change in such a man at such an +hour. Happily, it was short-lived. His angry stride brought him tripping +into fresh earth, and he started back, aghast at his egotism, stunned +afresh by his sin, and overwhelmed by such a flood of penitence and +remorse as even he had not endured before. Under his eyes the new grave +was growing clearer in the starlight, and not less cruel, and not less +cold. An hour later he was still kneeling over it, and his tears had not +ceased to flow.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_51" id="Page_51">[Pg 51]</a></span></p> + +<h2 class="newchapter"><a name="CHAPTER_VI" id="CHAPTER_VI"></a>VI<br /> +<span class="smalltext">FIRE</span></h2> + + +<p>Witnesses have differed as to the exact hour at which the inhabitants of +Long Stow, sound asleep after excitement enough for one night, were +frightened from their beds by a sudden and violent ringing of the church +bells. The midsummer night was as dark as ever, and so it remained or +seemed to remain for a considerable time. It cannot have been more than +two o'clock.</p> + +<p>A few minutes before the alarm, Robert Carlton had forced himself to his +feet, to be struck with fresh shame at two apparent evidences of the +mood in which he had quitted the church. He had left the door wide open +and the church lit up. Every stone showed on the path, in the stream of +light poured upon it from the porch, into which, however, it was +impossible to see from where the rector stood. The porch projected from +the south side, while the new grave was directly opposite the west +window, every square of which stood out against the glare within. An +instant's reflection showed Carlton that this could not be the light +which he had left; he went to see what it was. A sudden heat upon his +face broke the truth to him in the porch, and in a stride he knew the +worst. A little fire was raging in the church: two or three pews were in +flames.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_52" id="Page_52">[Pg 52]</a></span>Robert Carlton stood inactive for a score of seconds. It looked the kind +of fire that a vigorous man might have beaten out with his coat. Yet one +in the full vigour of his manhood stood thinking a score of thoughts +while the flames bit through the varnish into the wood. Nor was this the +fascination of horror: the fire looked such a little fire at the first +glance. It was rather the obsession of an astounding puzzle: what in the +world could have caused a fire at all?</p> + +<p>A guilty feeling came in answer: he must have dropped the match with +which he lit that lamp. The feeling escaped in the simultaneous +discovery that the lamp in question had been extinguished, but that it +and others were slightly awry, and one or two still swaying on their +chains, as though all the lamps had been rudely meddled with. And now +horror came. The flames were spreading with curious facility, shooting +their blue tongues over the woodwork before the yellow fangs took hold, +but all so quickly that the burning area seemed to have doubled itself +in these few seconds, while from the heart of it there came the crisp +crackle of quicker fuel, culminating in a blaze as though a rick had +caught; and, sure enough, as these flames leapt high, their source was +revealed in a pile of the rector's new straw hassocks.</p> + +<p>The puzzle was one no more: plainer work of incendiary was never seen. +Through the smoke now swinging in black coils to the roof, the east +window showed in holes made within the last hour, obviously to promote +the draught that blew in Carlton's face as he rushed back to the open +door and laid hold of all the bell-ropes at once.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_53" id="Page_53">[Pg 53]</a></span>The bells were small and jangling; a new peal, and a tower to hang them +in, were among the things which the rector had said that he would have +some day. But as the old bells clanged for the last time, in the dead of +that summer night, they were heard at Linkworth, a mile and a half +across the wind, but down the wind they rang up half Bedingfield, which +is three good miles from Long Stow.</p> + +<p>The first inhabitant to reach the scene was the fleet and sturdy Tom +Ivey, whose mother kept the post-office in the middle of the village; as +he ran the ringing stopped, and the first glass smashed with the heat, +flame and smoke making a mouthpiece of the mullioned window in the north +wall as Tom dashed up by the short cut through the rectory garden. He +was greatly alarmed at finding no one in the churchyard, and rushed into +the church with the full expectation of discovering the ringer senseless +at his post. What he did find was the rector, standing within the +church, to windward of the conflagration, his back to the door, +absorbed, as it seemed, in a perfectly passive contemplation of the +fire.</p> + +<p>"Mr. Carlton!" shouted Tom.</p> + +<p>Before replying, the clergyman spun something into the heart of the +flames; in the thickening smoke it was impossible to see what; but the +same second he was round upon his heel, coughing and choking, his face +black, his eyes fires themselves, purpose and determination in every +limb.</p> + +<p>"Tom? Thank God it's you! We must get this under. Out of it before we +suffocate!" And with his own rush he carried the builder into the open +air.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_54" id="Page_54">[Pg 54]</a></span>"What's done it, sir?"</p> + +<p>"Done it? Wait till we've undone it! We can if we work together. Ah! +here are more of you. Buckets, men—buckets!" cried Carlton, rushing to +meet a half-dressed medley at the gate, and commanding them as though +there had been no other meeting earlier in the night. "You who live +near, run for your own; the rest into my kitchen and find what you can; +buckets are the thing! One of you pump; the rest form line from my well +to the church, and keep passing along. You see to it, Mr. Jones!"</p> + +<p>And for a while the schoolmaster and churchwarden, carried away as usual +by his feelings and self-importance, was as busy enforcing the rector's +orders as he had made himself in breaking his windows an hour or two +before.</p> + +<p>"Let one man ride or run for the Lakenhall engine; not you, Tom!" +exclaimed the clergyman, seizing Ivey by the arm. "They'll be all night +coming, and I can't spare you."</p> + +<p>"I'll stay, sir."</p> + +<p>"Water's no use to windward of a fire; it's spreading straight up the +church. We want to be on the other side to stop it."</p> + +<p>"The aisle's not afire!"</p> + +<p>"But they couldn't get the water to us, even if we got through alive. +No; where the walls are down for the transepts—that's the place. Which +side's boarded strongest?"</p> + +<p>"Both the same, sir."</p> + +<p>"Then we'll hack through the nearest! A saw and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_55" id="Page_55">[Pg 55]</a></span> an axe, and we'll be +through by the time the first bucketful's ready for us."</p> + +<p>And, friends again, but both unconscious of the change, they rushed +together to the shed of which Robert Carlton had so lately taken leave: +in the fever of the moment even that leave-taking was forgotten.</p> + +<p>It was the north transept which faced the shed. Already the walls were a +dozen feet high, but a doorway had been left. The greater gap between +transept and nave was vertically boarded over within the church, and on +these boards fell the rector with his axe, to make an opening for Tom's +saw. They had light enough for their work. The interstices between the +boards were as the red-hot strings of a colossal harp; quickly a couple +were cut, and the boards beaten in; and it was as though the wind had +come down a smoking chimney. The pair fell back on either side of the +black stream that gushed out like water. Then cried Carlton in his voice +of command:</p> + +<p>"Look here! you stay where you are, Tom."</p> + +<p>"With you, sir?"</p> + +<p>"No, I must have a look; but one's enough."</p> + +<p>"Not for me, Mr. Carlton. I follow you."</p> + +<p>"Then you keep me where I am," said Carlton, sternly.</p> + +<p>"All right, sir! You follow me!"</p> + +<p>Next instant they were both through the breach, the builder first by the +depth of his chest. And they stood up within, but were glad to crouch +again out of the smoke. Already a dense reek hid the roof, and every +moment added to the depth of that inverted sea. It was a sea of +ineffectual currents, setting towards the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_56" id="Page_56">[Pg 56]</a></span> smashed windows, the new +breach, the open door, but caught and diverted and sucked into the inky +whirlpool that the wind made under the roof, and escaping only by chance +fits and sudden starts. On the other hand, there was still air enough to +breathe within a few feet of the ground, and with water it seemed as if +something might yet be done. But it was no longer a very little fire: at +best the nave must be gutted now; to save roof and chancel was the +utmost hope. Yet here and there the worst seemed over. The blazing +hassocks were now only a glowing heap, and still the roof had not +caught. As the two men crouched and watched, the flames felt the front +pews with their splay blue tentacles, and the woodwork which was still +untouched glistened like a human body in pain.</p> + +<p>"You see that?" said Mr. Carlton, pointing to this moisture.</p> + +<p>"What is it?"</p> + +<p>"Paraffin! Look at the lamps; he's simply emptied them——"</p> + +<p>"Who, sir—who?"</p> + +<p>"God knows, and may God forgive him! I have enemies enough this morning, +though not more than I deserve. If only they will be my friends for one +hour, for the sake of the church! Are they never coming with that water? +Run and tell them a bucketful would make a difference now, but cartloads +will make none in ten more minutes! And tell them what I said just now: +bid them for God's sake think of nothing but the fire till we get it +under."</p> + +<p>He was thinking of nothing else himself, confident still of some measure +of success, only fretting for his<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_57" id="Page_57">[Pg 57]</a></span> water. In Ivey's absence he stripped +to the waist, and with his long coat essayed to beat the little flames +out as they spread and leapt, the blue and yellow surf of the +encroaching tide; but for one he extinguished he fanned a hundred, so he +retreated before he was flayed alive. And they found him stooping near +the opening, half-naked, scorched, begrimed, but not disheartened; a +strange figure in the place that knew him best in vestments, if any of +them thought of that.</p> + +<p>The first man had a bucket in each hand, but had spilt freely from both +in his haste. Carlton would not let him in, but received the buckets +through the hole, dashed their contents over the burning pews, and +returned them empty without waiting to see results. When he had time to +look, a little steam was rising, but the fire raged with undiminished +fury. The next comer was a boy with a brimming watering-can; but it is +difficult to fling water with effect from such a vessel, and pouring was +impossible in the increasing heat. Then came Tom Ivey with two more +buckets.</p> + +<p>"Keep outside," cried Carlton, taking them. "There's only work for one +in here. Can't they form line as I said, and pass along instead of +carrying?"</p> + +<p>"No, sir—not enough of us for the distance."</p> + +<p>"Not enough of you who'll put the church before the parson! That's what +you mean. The parson may deserve burning alive, but the poor church has +done no wrong!"</p> + +<p>And he continued his exertions in a bitter spirit not warranted by the +real circumstances, for his masterful monopoly of all danger had won +some sympathy outside, and many a one who had flung a stone was run<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_58" id="Page_58">[Pg 58]</a></span>ning +with a bucket now. More, however, stood with their hands in their +pockets; for East Anglia is constitutionally phlegmatic, and not all the +village had joined in the indignant excesses of the evening.</p> + +<p>The saddler came no farther than the fence in front of his house and +workshop. He was that implacable creature, the offended countryman.</p> + +<p>George Mellis did not even see the fire; already he had shaken the dust +of Long Stow from his feet for good.</p> + +<p>Thus, of the three types, as far removed from one another as the points +of an equilateral triangle, who had put in their individual word of +reproach, of denunciation, and of sympathy more insufferable than +either, only one was present on this lurid scene; but that one was doing +the work of ten.</p> + +<p>"That there Tom Ivey," said one of a group on the safe side of the +rectory fence, "he fares all of a wash. Yet I do hear as how he come up +to the rectory when he'd cleared the garden and called Carlton over +somethun wonderful."</p> + +<p>"I lay it was nothun to the calling over he had from Jasper."</p> + +<p>"Where is Jasper?"</p> + +<p>"Been indoors ever since: a touch of the old trouble, the missus told +Jones when he called."</p> + +<p>"That's a pity. This would've soothed his sore."</p> + +<p>One or two observed that that fared to soothe theirs; for there was no +reaction on the safe side of the fence. But the worst said in the +Suffolk tongue was invariably capped by a different order of voice, +which chimed in now.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_59" id="Page_59">[Pg 59]</a></span>"The best thing Carlton can do is to cockle up with his church. The +governor'll build you a new church and find a new man to fill it. +There's nobody keener on a change as it is. I should like to be there +when he hears . . ."</p> + +<p>The speaker was smoking a cigarette on a barrow wheeled from the shed. +He might have been watching a display of fireworks, and one which was +beginning to bore him. His unmoved eye sought change. It found the +sexton hobbling in the glare.</p> + +<p>"Hi, Busby! Come here, I want you. What the dickens do you mean by +setting fire to the church?"</p> + +<p>"Me set fire to it, Master Sidney? Me set a church afire? He! he! you +allus fare to have yer laugh."</p> + +<p>"It will be no laughing matter for you when you're run in for it, +Busby."</p> + +<p>"Go on, Master Sidney; you know better than that."</p> + +<p>"I wish I did. They hang for arson, you know! But I say, Busby, how's +the frog?"</p> + +<p>The wizened face grew grave, but only as the screen darkens between the +pictures; next instant it was alight with the ineffable joy of gratified +monomania. The sexton hobbled nearer, clawing his vest.</p> + +<p>"Oh, that croap away; that's at that now! Would 'ee like to listen, +Master Sidney?"</p> + +<p>"No, thanks, Busby; don't you undo a button," said the young gentleman, +hastily. "I can hear it from where I am."</p> + +<p>The sexton went into senile raptures.</p> + +<p>"You can hear it? You can hear it? Do you all listen to that: he can +hear it, he can hear it from where<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_60" id="Page_60">[Pg 60]</a></span> he sit. The little varmin, to croap +so loud! That must be the fire. That fare to make him blink! An' Master +Sidney, he can hear him from where he sit!"</p> + +<p>The sexton hurried off to spread his triumph; but he boasted to deaf +ears. There was a sudden light below the sharp horizon between black +roof and slaty sky, yet no flame rose above the roof. It was as though +the southern eaves had caught. Ivey rushed out of the north transept. +Mr. Carlton followed, axe in hand. His chest and arms were smudged and +inflamed, his blinking eyelids were burnt bare, and the sweat stood all +over him in the red light leaping from the shivered windows.</p> + +<p>"It's no use, lads!" he called to those still running with the buckets; +"the boards have caught on the other side. Come and help me smash them +in, and we may save the chancel yet! Every man who is a man," he shouted +to the group across the fence, "come—lend a hand to save God's +sanctuary!"</p> + +<p>And he led the way with his axe, stinging to the waist in the open air, +but drunk with battle and the battle's joy. And there was no more +talking behind the rectory fence; not a man was left there to talk; even +Sidney Gleed had dropped his cigarette to follow the inspired madman +with the axe.</p> + +<p>The south transept was a stage less advanced than the north. Carlton got +upon one low wall, ran along it to that of the nave, and swung his axe +into the burning wood to his right. A rent was quickly made; he leapt +into the transept and improved it, his axe ringing the seconds, the +muscles of his back bulging and bubbling beneath the scorched skin. Men +watched<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_61" id="Page_61">[Pg 61]</a></span> him open-mouthed. It seemed incredible that such nerve, such +sinew, such indomitable virility, should have hidden from their +vengeance that very night.</p> + +<p>"A ladder!" he cried. "There's one behind the shed."</p> + +<p>The wood screen was rent, but not to the top. Below, the fire was +checked, but above it still crawled east. Waiting for the ladder, +Carlton employed himself in widening the gap that he had made; when it +came, he had it held vertically against the eaves, left intact above the +boarding, and ran up to finish his own work with the axe held short in +his left hand. A couple of planks were smashed in unburnt. He stayed on +the ladder to see whether the flames would leap the completed chasm, +stayed until the rungs smoked under his nose. When the burning boards +fell in on his left, and those on his right did not even smoulder, he +returned quickly to the ground.</p> + +<p>Throats which had groaned that night were parching for a cheer. The time +was not ripe. A shrill cry came instead: the boarding upon the other +side had ignited in its turn.</p> + +<p>"Round with the ladder," cried the rector; "we'll soon have it out. We +know more about it now. We'll save the chancel yet! Find another axe; +we'll begin top and bottom at once."</p> + +<p>And now the scene was changing every minute. A sky of slate had become a +sky of lead. The tens who had witnessed the first stages of the fire had +multiplied into hundreds. Frightened birds were twittering in the trees; +frightened horses neighed in the road; every kind of vehicle but a +fire-engine had been driven<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_62" id="Page_62">[Pg 62]</a></span> to the scene. Among the graves stood a tall +and aged gentleman, with the top-hat of his youth crammed down to his +snowy eyebrows, and an equally obsolete top-coat buttoned up to his +silver whiskers, in conversation with Sidney Gleed.</p> + +<p>"The damned rascal!" said the old gentleman. "But how the devil did it +come out?"</p> + +<p>"Musk seems to have smelt a rat, and went to him after the funeral. And +he owned up as bold as brass; the servants heard him. There he goes, up +the ladder again on this side. Keeps the fun to himself, don't he? Who's +going to win the Leger, doctor? Shotover again?"</p> + +<p>"Damn the Leger," said Dr. Marigold, whose sporting propensities, bad +language, and good heart were further constituents in the most +picturesque personality within a day's ride. "To think I should have +stood at her death-bed," he said, "and would have given ten pounds to +know who it was; and it's your High Church parson of all men on God's +earth! The infernal blackguard deserves to have his church burnt down; +but he's got some pluck, confound him."</p> + +<p>"Sucking up," said Master Sidney: "playing to the gallery while he's got +the chance."</p> + +<p>"H'm," said the doctor; "looks to me pretty badly burnt about the back +and arms. If he wasn't such a damned rascal I'd order him down."</p> + +<p>"He's doing no good," rejoined the young cynic, "and he knows it. He's +only there for effect. Look! There's the roof catching, as any fool knew +it must; and here's the Lakenhall engine, in time for 'God save the +Queen.'"</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_63" id="Page_63">[Pg 63]</a></span>Dr. Marigold swore again: his good heart contained no niche for the heir +to the Long Stow property. He turned his back on Sidney, his face to the +sexton, who had been at his elbow for some time.</p> + +<p>"Well, Busby, what are you bothering about?"</p> + +<p>"The frog, doctor. That croap louder than ever."</p> + +<p>"You infernal old humbug! Get out!"</p> + +<p>"But that's true, doctor—that's Gospel truth. Do you stoop down and +you'll hear it for yourself. Master Sidney, <i>he</i> heard it where he sit."</p> + +<p>"Did he, indeed! Then he's worse than you."</p> + +<p>"But that steal every bit I eat; that do, that do," whined the sexton. +"I've tried salts, I've tried a 'metic, an' what else can I try? That +fare to know such a wunnerful lot. Salts an' 'metics, not him! He look +t'other way, an' hang on like grim death for the next bit o' meat. +That's killin' me, doctor. That's worse nor slow poison. That steal +every bite I eat."</p> + +<p>"Well, it won't steal this," said the doctor, dispensing half-a-crown. +"Now get away to bed, you old fool, and don't bother me."</p> + +<p>And neither thanks nor entreaties would divert his eyes from the burning +church again.</p> + +<p>The antiquated doctor was one of Nature's sportsmen: his inveterate +sympathies were with the losers of up-hill games and games against time; +and this blackguard parson had played his like a man, only to lose it +with the thunder of the fire-engine in his ears. The roof had caught at +last; in a little it would be blazing from end to end; and half-a-dozen +country fire-engines, and half a hundred Robert Carltons, could do no +good now. Carlton came slowly enough down his<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_64" id="Page_64">[Pg 64]</a></span> ladder this time, and +stood apart with his beard on his chest.</p> + +<p>"Hard lines, hard lines!" muttered Dr. Marigold in his top-coat collar; +and "Those slow fools! Those sleepy old women!" with his favourite +participle in each ejaculation.</p> + +<p>A sky of lead had turned to one of silver. Across the open uplands, +beyond the conflagration, a kindlier glow was in the east. And in the +broad daylight the fire reached its height with as small effect as the +firemen plied their water. Nothing could check the roof. Ceiling, +joists, and slates burnt up like good fuel in a good grate. Now it was a +watershed of living fire; now an avalanche of red-hot ruin; now a column +of smoke and sparks, rising out of blackened walls; a column unbroken by +the wind, which had fallen at dawn with a little rain, the edge of a +shower that had shunned Long Stow.</p> + +<p>When the roof fell in there were few of the hundreds present who had not +retreated out of harm's way. Only the helmed firemen held their ground, +and two others with bare heads. Of the pair, one was standing dazed, +with his beard on the rough coat thrown about him, and an ear deaf to +his companion's entreaties, when the crash came and the sparks flew high +and wide through rent walls and gaping windows. The sparks blackened as +they fell. The first smoke lifted. And the dazed man lay upon his face, +the other kneeling over him.</p> + +<p>Dr. Marigold came running, for all his years and his long top-coat.</p> + +<p>"Did anything hit him, Ivey?"</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_65" id="Page_65">[Pg 65]</a></span>"Not that I saw, sir; but he fared as if he'd fainted on his feet, and +when the roof went, why, so did he."</p> + +<p>Marigold knelt also, and a thickening ring enclosed the three.</p> + +<p>"He's rather nastily burnt, poor devil."</p> + +<p>And the old doctor lifted a leaden wrist, felt it in a sudden hush, +examined a burn upon the same arm, and looked up through eyebrows like +white moustaches.</p> + +<p>"But not dangerously, damn him!"</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_66" id="Page_66">[Pg 66]</a></span></p> + +<h2 class="newchapter"><a name="CHAPTER_VII" id="CHAPTER_VII"></a>VII<br /> +<span class="smalltext">THE SINNER'S PRAYER</span></h2> + + +<p>The bishop of the diocese sat at the larger of the two desks in the +palace library. It was the thirteenth of the following month, and a wet +forenoon. At eleven o'clock his lordship was intent upon a sheet of +unlined foolscap, with sundry notes dotted down the edge, and the rest +of the leaf left blank. The bishop's sight was failing, but against +glasses he had set his face. So his whiskers curled upon the paper; and +the wide mouth between the whiskers was firmly compressed; and this +compression lengthened a clean-shaven upper lip already unduly long. But +the pose displayed a noble head covered with thin white hair, and the +broad brow that was the casket of a broad mind. Seen at his desk, the +massive head and shoulders suggested both strength and stature above the +normal. Yet the bishop on his legs was a little man who limped. And the +surprise of this discovery was not the last for an observer: for the +little lame man had a dignity independent of his inches, and a majesty +of mind which lost nothing, but gained in prominence, by the constant +contrast of a bodily imperfection.</p> + +<p>The bishop stood up when his visitor was announced, a minute after +eleven, and supported himself with one hand while he stretched the other +across his<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_67" id="Page_67">[Pg 67]</a></span> desk. Carlton took it in confusion. He had expected that +shut mouth and piercing glance, but not this kindly grasp. He was +invited to sit down. The man who complied was the ghost of the Rector of +Long Stow, as his spiritual overseer remembered him. His whole face was +as white as his forehead had been on the day of the fire. It carried +more than one still whiter scar. Yet in the eyes there burnt, brighter +than ever, those fires of zeal and of enthusiasm which had warmed the +bishop's heart in the past, but which somewhat puzzled him now.</p> + +<p>"I am sorry," said his lordship, "that you should have such weather for +what, I am sure, must have been an undertaking for you, Mr. Carlton. You +still look far from strong. Before we begin, is there nothing——"</p> + +<p>Carlton could hear no more. There was nothing at all. He was quite +himself again. And he spoke with some coolness; for the other's manner, +despite his mouth and his eyes, was almost cruel in its unexpected and +undue consideration. It was less than ever this man's intention to play +upon the pity of high or low. He had an appeal to make before he went, +but it was not an appeal for pity. Meanwhile his back stiffened and his +chest filled in the intensity of his desire not to look the invalid.</p> + +<p>"In that case," resumed the bishop, "I am glad that you have seen your +way to keeping the appointment I suggested. In cases of complaint—more +especially a complaint of the grave character indicated in my letter—I +make it a rule to see the person complained of before taking further +steps. That is to say, if he will<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_68" id="Page_68">[Pg 68]</a></span> see me; and I don't think you will +regret having done so, Mr. Carlton. It may give you pain——"</p> + +<p>Carlton jerked his hands.</p> + +<p>"But you shall have fair play!"</p> + +<p>And his lordship looked point-blank at the bearded man, as he had looked +in his day on many a younger culprit; and his voice was the peculiar +voice that generations of schoolboys had set themselves to imitate, with +less success than they supposed.</p> + +<p>Carlton bowed acknowledgment of this promise.</p> + +<p>"In the questions which I feel compelled to put"—and the bishop glanced +at his sheet of foolscap—"you will perhaps give me credit for studying +your feelings as far as is possible in the painful circumstances. I +shall try not to leave them more painful than I find them, Mr. Carlton. +But the complaint received is a very serious one, and it is not made by +one person; it has very many signatures; and it necessitates plain +speaking. It is a fact, then, that you are the father of an illegitimate +child born on the twentieth of last month in your own parish?"</p> + +<p>"It is a fact, my lord."</p> + +<p>"And the woman is dead?"</p> + +<p>"The young girl—is dead."</p> + +<p>The bishop's pen had begun the descent of the clean part of his page of +foolscap; when the last answer was inscribed, the writer looked up, +neither in astonishment nor in horror, but with the clear eye and the +serene brow of the ideal judge.</p> + +<p>"Of course," said he, "I am informed that you have already made the +admission. Let there be no affectation or misunderstanding between us, +on that or any<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_69" id="Page_69">[Pg 69]</a></span> other point. But as your bishop, and at least hitherto +your friend, I desire to have refutation or confirmation from your own +lips. You are at perfect liberty to deny me either. It will make no +difference to the ultimate result. That, as you know, will be out of my +hands."</p> + +<p>"I desire to withhold nothing, my lord," said Robert Carlton in a firm +voice.</p> + +<p>"Very well. I think we understand each other. This poor young woman, I +gather, was the daughter of a prominent parishioner?"</p> + +<p>"Of a prominent resident in my parish—yes."</p> + +<p>"But she herself was conspicuous in parochial work? Is it a fact that +she played the organ in church?"</p> + +<p>"It is."</p> + +<p>The fact was noted, the pen laid down; and the little old man, who +looked only great across his desk, leant back in his chair.</p> + +<p>"I am exceedingly anxious that you should have fair play. Let me say +plainly that these are not my first inquiries into the matter. I am +informed—I wish to know with what truth—that the young woman +disappeared for several months before her death?"</p> + +<p>"It is quite true."</p> + +<p>"And returned to give birth to her child?"</p> + +<p>"And to die!" said Carlton, in his grim determination neither to shield +nor to spare himself in any of his answers. But his hands were clenched, +and his white face glistened with his pain.</p> + +<p>The bishop watched him with an eye grown mild with understanding, and a +heart hot with mercy for the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_70" id="Page_70">[Pg 70]</a></span> man who had no mercy on himself. But the +tight mouth never relaxed, and the peculiar voice was unaltered when it +broke the silence. It was the voice of justice, neither kind nor unkind, +severe nor lenient, only grave, deliberate, matter-of-fact.</p> + +<p>"My next question is dictated by information received, or let me say by +suspicions communicated. It is a vital question; do not answer unless +you like. It is, however, a question that will infallibly arise +elsewhere. Were you, or were you not, privy to this poor young woman's +disappearance?"</p> + +<p>"Before God, my lord, I was not!"</p> + +<p>"I understand that her parents had no idea where she was until the very +end. Had you none either?"</p> + +<p>"No more than they had. We were equally in the dark. We believed that +she had gone to stay with a friend from the village—a young woman who +had married from service, and was settled near London. It was several +weeks before we discovered that her friend had never seen her."</p> + +<p>"And all this time you did not suspect her condition?"</p> + +<p>"Yes; then I did; but not before."</p> + +<p>"She made no communication before she went away?"</p> + +<p>"None whatever to me—none whatever, to my knowledge."</p> + +<p>"And this was early in the year?"</p> + +<p>"She left Long Stow in January, and we had no news of her till the +middle of June, when strangers communicated with her father."</p> + +<p>Again the bishop leant over his foolscap.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_71" id="Page_71">[Pg 71]</a></span>"Did you ever offer her marriage?" he asked abruptly.</p> + +<p>"Repeatedly!"</p> + +<p>The clear eyes looked up.</p> + +<p>"Did you not tell her father this?"</p> + +<p>"No; I couldn't condescend to tell him," said Carlton, flushing for the +first time. "My lord, I have made no excuses. There are none to make. +That was none at all."</p> + +<p>His lordship regarded the changed face with no further change in his +own.</p> + +<p>"So you loved her," he said softly, after a pause.</p> + +<p>"Ah! if only I had loved her more!"</p> + +<p>"If excuse there could be . . . love . . . is some."</p> + +<p>It was the old man murmuring, as old men will, all unknown to the bishop +and the judge.</p> + +<p>"But I want no excuses!" cried Carlton, wildly. "And let me be honest +now, whatever I have been in the past; if I deceived myself and others, +let me undeceive myself and you! Oh, my lord, that wasn't love! It's the +bitterest thought of all, the most shameful confession of all. But love +must be something better; that can't be love! It was passion, if you +like; it was a passion that swept me away in the pride of my strength; +but, God forgive me, it was not love!"</p> + +<p>He hid his face in his writhing hands; and, with those wild eyes off +him, the bishop could no longer swallow his compassion. The lines of his +mouth relaxed, and lo, the mouth was beautiful. A tender light suffused +the aged face, and behold, the face was gentle beyond belief.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_72" id="Page_72">[Pg 72]</a></span>"Love is everything," the old man said; "but even passion is something, +in these cold days of little lives and little sins. And honesty like +yours is a great deal, Robert Carlton, though your sin be as scarlet, +and the Blood of our Blessed Lord alone can make you clean."</p> + +<p>Carlton looked up swiftly, a new solicitude in his eyes.</p> + +<p>"In me it was scarlet: not in her. She loved . . . she loved. Oh, to +have loved as well—to have that to remember! . . . She thought it would +spoil my life; and I never guessed it was that! But now I know, I know! +It was for my sake she went away . . . poor child . . . poor mistaken +heroine! She died for me, and I cannot die for her. Isn't that hard? I +can't even die for her!"</p> + +<p>His bodily weakness betrayed itself in his swimming eyes; in the night +of his agony no tear had dimmed them before men. But his will was not +all gone. With clenched fists, and locked jaw, and beaded brow, he +fought his weakness, while the good bishop sat with his head on his +hand, and closed eyes, praying for a brother in the valley of despair. +When he opened his eyes, it was as though his prayer was heard; for +Robert Carlton was bearing himself with a new bravery; and the +incongruous unquenched fires, which had caused surprise at the outset of +the interview, burnt brightly as before in the younger eyes. The old man +met them with a sad, grave scrutiny. But the lines of his mouth remained +relaxed. And, when he spoke again, his voice was very gentle.</p> + +<p>"You may think that I have put you to unnecessary<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_73" id="Page_73">[Pg 73]</a></span> pain," he said, "when +I give you fair warning that your case must form the subject of further +proceedings in another place. But I had heard that your conduct was +indefensible, root and branch, from beginning to end. Of that I am now +able to form my own opinion. Yet my individual opinion can make no +difference in the result, since absolute deprivation I had never +contemplated in your case, and it is only the extreme penalty which +rests with me. On the other hand, it will be my duty to set the +ecclesiastical law in motion; and the ecclesiastical law must take its +course. I take it that you do not propose to defend your case?"</p> + +<p>A grim light flickered for an instant in Robert Carlton's eyes. "Have I +defended it hitherto, my lord?"</p> + +<p>"Then there can only be one result; and you must make up your mind, as +you have doubtless already done, to suspension for a term of years. If +word of mine can lessen that term, it shall be spoken in your favour, +both out of consideration of the great work that you were doing, and +have done, and in view of certain circumstances which our conversation +has brought to light."</p> + +<p>"But can you want me back in the Church?" cried Carlton; and his heart +beat high with the question; but turned heavier than before in the +interval of prudent deliberation which preceded any answer.</p> + +<p>"I would punish no man beyond the letter of the law," declared the +bishop at length, "even if it were in my power to do so. The Act debars +suspended clergymen from all exercise of their divine calling and from +all pecuniary enjoyment of their benefice until<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_74" id="Page_74">[Pg 74]</a></span> the term of such +suspension is up. I would not, if I could, prolong the period of +disability by throwing further let or hindrance in the way of an erring +brother who repents him truly of his sin. I would rather say, 'Come back +to your work, live down the past, and, by your example in the years that +may be left you, pluck up the tares that your bad example has surely +sown. Retrieve all but the irretrievable. Undo what you can.'"</p> + +<p>Carlton's eyes melted in gratitude too great for speech, but plain as +the benediction which his trembling lips left eloquently unsaid.</p> + +<p>"That," continued the bishop, "is what I should say to you—because I +think we understood each other. You have not sought to palliate your +offence; nor are you the man to misconstrue the little I may have said +concerning the offence itself. What is there to be said? You know well +enough that I lament it as I lament its mournful result, and deplore it +as I deplore the blot on the whole body of Christ's Church militant here +on earth. You have committed a great sin, against humanity, against God, +and against your Church; yet he would commit a greater who sought on +that account to hound you from that Church for ever. Courage, brother! +Pray without ceasing. Look forward, not back; and do not despair. +Despair is the devil's best friend; better give way to deadly sin than +to deadlier despair! Remember that you have done good work for God in +days gone by; and live for that brighter day when you have purged your +sin, and may be worthy to work for Him again."</p> + +<p>"And meanwhile?" whispered Carlton, for fear of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_75" id="Page_75">[Pg 75]</a></span> shouting it in his +passionate anxiety. "Is there nothing I may do meanwhile—among my own +poor people—before the tares come up?"</p> + +<p>"If you are suspended you will be unable to hold any service; and I +hardly think you will care to go among your parishioners while that is +so."</p> + +<p>"But I shall not be forbidden my own parish?"</p> + +<p>"Not forbidden."</p> + +<p>"Nor my rectory?"</p> + +<p>"No; so far as I am aware, at least, you retain your right to reside +there; but I can hardly think that it would be expedient."</p> + +<p>"And the church! They must have their church back again. Who is going to +rebuild it for them?"</p> + +<p>Carlton was on his feet in the last excitement. The bishop regarded him +with puzzled eyebrows.</p> + +<p>"I have heard nothing on that subject as yet; it is a little early, is +it not? But I have no doubt that it will be a matter for subscription +among themselves."</p> + +<p>"Among my poor people?"</p> + +<p>"With substantial aid, I should hope, from men of substance in the +neighbourhood."</p> + +<p>"But why should they pay?" cried Carlton, impetuously. "The church was +not burnt down for my neighbours' sins, nor for the sins of the parish, +but for mine alone . . . Oh, my lord, if I could but go back among my +people, and be their servant, I who was too much their master before! I +was not quite dependent—thank God, I had a little of my own—but every +penny should be theirs!"</p> + +<p>And the profligate priest stood upright before his bishop—his white +hands clasped, his white face shin<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_76" id="Page_76">[Pg 76]</a></span>ing, his burning eyes moist—zealot +and suppliant in one.</p> + +<p>"You desire to spend your income——"</p> + +<p>"No, no, my capital!"</p> + +<p>"On the poor of your parish? I—I fail to understand."</p> + +<p>"And I scarcely dare make you!" confessed Carlton, his full voice +failing him. "I so fear your disapproval; and I could set my face +against all the world, but against you never, much less after this +morning . . . Oh, my lord, I have set my poor people a dastardly +example, and brought cruel shame upon my cloth; for its sake and for +theirs, if not for my own, let me at least leave among them a tangible +sign and symbol of my true repentance. I have the chance! I have such a +chance as God alone in His infinite mercy could vouchsafe to a miserable +sinner. My church at Long Stow has been burnt down through me—through +my sin—to punish me——"</p> + +<p>"Are you sure of that, Mr. Carlton?"</p> + +<p>"I know it, my lord. And I want to do what only seems to me my bounden +and my obvious duty, and to do it soon."</p> + +<p>The bishop looked enlightened but amazed.</p> + +<p>"You would rebuild the church out of your own pocket? Is that really +your wish?"</p> + +<p>"It is my prayer!"</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_77" id="Page_77">[Pg 77]</a></span></p> + +<h2 class="newchapter"><a name="CHAPTER_VIII" id="CHAPTER_VIII"></a>VIII<br /> +<span class="smalltext">THE LORD OF THE MANOR.</span></h2> + + +<p>Wilton Gleed owed his success in life to a natural bent for the politic +virtues, and to the quality of energy unalloyed by enterprise. He was a +man of much shrewdness and extraordinary tenacity, but absolutely no +initiative; so he had taken his opportunities and held his ground +without running a risk that he could remember. Not a self-made man, he +was, however, the son of one who had made himself by dint of that very +enterprise which was lacking in Wilton Gleed. The father had seen a +certain want and filled it to the satisfaction of the wide world; the +son had extended the business without meddling with the product of the +firm. Monopolies die hard. Gleed & Son did nothing to deserve a swift +demise. They just stalked behind the times, and appeared to thrive on a +sublime contempt of competition. And those who knew him best were the +most surprised when Wilton Gleed turned the great concern into a limited +liability company, and made a fortune out of the transaction alone; it +was the most daring thing that he had ever done.</p> + +<p>The reason for the step may be related as characteristic of the man. Age +had given the firm a certain aristocracy of degree—not of kind—even +age could not soften the fact that Gleed & Son sold things in tins.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_78" id="Page_78">[Pg 78]</a></span> And +the tins it was that turned plain Gleed & Son into Gleed & Son, Limited. +Some innovator was making tins with cunning openers attached; the lesser +firms jumped at the improvement. The lesser firms were already doing +Gleeds' some slight damage in their go-ahead little way; but the worst +they could all do together was as nothing compared with the extra +expenditure of an appreciable fraction of a farthing per tin on an +output of millions in the year. Wilton Gleed could not face the +immediate hole in his profits. He had never taken a risk in his life, +and was not going to begin. He had increased his expenses by going into +Parliament, and he was not such a fool as to play tricks with his +income. He faced the situation as though it were ruin staring him in the +face, and lost a discernible measure of flesh before his big resolve. It +was all he did lose over the ultimate operation. He retired into private +and public life with more money than he knew how to spend.</p> + +<p>The average man is at his best as host, and in that capacity Wilton +Gleed was popular among his friends. He was an excellent sportsman of +the selfish sort; cherished a contempt for the various games which +involve playing for one's side; but was a first-rate shot, a fine +fisherman, and a good rider spoilt by his great principle of refusing +the risks. To shoot and dine with him was to see Gleed at his very best. +He was a bald little man, with silver-sandy moustache and close-cropped +whiskers; but his full-blooded face was still pink with health, his +fixed eye unerring as ever, his step elastic as the heather he loved to +tread. Gun in hand, in his tweeds and gaiters, and with his cap<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_79" id="Page_79">[Pg 79]</a></span> pulled +well over his head, Wilton Gleed never passed the prime of life; it was +late in the evening before he collected the years blown away on the +moor; and in its way the evening was as delectable as the day. The +dinner was a good one, and the host abandoned himself to its joys with a +schoolboy's ardour. Irreproachable champagne flowed like water, more +especially at the head of the table. Gleed carried it like a gentleman, +also the port that followed, though a little inclined to be garrulous +about the latter. As he sipped and gossiped, and settled the Eastern +Question in two words, and Mr. Gladstone's hash in one, the skin would +shine as it tightened on the bald head, and the always intent eye would +fix the listener beyond the needs of the conversation. It was very +seldom, however, that a syllable slid out of place, or that Wilton Gleed +went to bed looking quite his age.</p> + +<p>For some years he had leased various shootings in the autumn, spending +the other seasons at a lordly but suburban retreat inherited from his +father, with an occasional swoop abroad—the correct place at the +correct time—less for enjoyment than for other reasons. Gun, rod, and +cellar were what he did enjoy, and of these delights he vowed to have +his fill after getting out of Gleeds with unexpected spoils. A sporting +estate was in the market within two hours and a half of town; and for +forty thousand pounds Wilton Gleed became squire of Long Stow, patron of +an excellent living, and a large landowner in a country where he had a +nucleus of friends and soon made more. As Member of Parliament for that +division of London in which Gleeds had employed hundreds of hands for +half<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_80" id="Page_80">[Pg 80]</a></span> a hundred years, he at the same time bought a house in town, and +let the place outside. Subtler investments followed. The man was +becoming a gambler in his old age; but he played his own game with +ineradicable care and foresight, and rose Sir Wilton Gleed when his side +lost in the General Election of 1880. It was only a knighthood, and Sir +Wilton might have entertained justifiable hopes of his baronetcy; but +one or the other had been a moral certainty for some time.</p> + +<p>It was in Hyde Park Place that Sir Wilton first heard of the Long Stow +scandal and its immediate sequel. The news came in a few dry lines from +Sidney, by the first post on the Monday morning, June 26, 1882. It fell +like a firebrand in a keg of gunpowder. Sir Wilton, however, had even +better reasons than were obvious for his paroxysm of rage and +indignation; personal mortification was not the least of his emotions. +He would have gone down by the next train to "horsewhip the hound within +an inch of his life," but the cur had taken refuge in Lakenhall +Infirmary, "with very little the matter with him," in Sidney's words. +And just then the House was an Aceldama which no good soldier could +desert for a night, with the Government satisfactorily on the spit +between Phœnix Park and Alexandria, and the Opposition creeping up vote +by vote. Sir Wilton decided to run down on the Wednesday for twenty-four +hours, and talked of having the rectory furniture thrown into the street +if the rector was not there to take it and himself away for good. Sir +Wilton had his own impression as to his powers as patron of the living, +and he very naturally swore that he would "have that blackguard<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_81" id="Page_81">[Pg 81]</a></span> out of +it" within the week. A friend at the Carlton put him right on the point.</p> + +<p>"You can't do that, Gleed. A living's like nothing else. My lord gives, +but my lord can't take away."</p> + +<p>"Then what on earth am I to do?"</p> + +<p>"Get him inhibited and make him resign. It will come to the same thing."</p> + +<p>The fire was in all the newspapers, with the hint of a scandal at the +end of the paragraph. Among those who spoke to Sir Wilton on the subject +was a jaunty politician who had never yet recognised him at the club.</p> + +<p>"Sir Wilton Gleed, I think? I fancy we have met before?"</p> + +<p>"Indeed, my lord?"</p> + +<p>It was the noble who had chosen to forget the circumstance hitherto; +to-day he was all courtesy and confidential concern. What was this about +the church that had been burnt down? He had heard it was on the other's +estate. Sir Wilton professed to know no more as yet than the papers told +him.</p> + +<p>"I ask because it reads to me——don't you know? Some scandal——what? +And I'm sorry to say—fellow Carlton—sort of connection of mine."</p> + +<p>"To be sure," said Sir Wilton. "I remember hearing it."</p> + +<p>"Odd fish, I'm afraid. Here in town for years, at that ritualistic shop +across the park—forget my own name next. Might have had a good time if +he'd liked. Never went out. Preferred the mews. Made a specialty of +footmen and fellows. Had a night club somewhere, where he taught 'em to +box, and brought<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_82" id="Page_82">[Pg 82]</a></span> my own man home himself one night with an eye like +your boot. It was about the only time we met. Remember hearing he could +preach, though; only hope he hasn't been making a fool of himself down +there!"</p> + +<p>"I hope not also," said the discreet knight; "but I am going down +to-morrow, so I shall hear."</p> + +<p>He went down very grim: for Robert Carlton had not only been a thorn in +his side that twelve-month past; he actually stood for the one false +move, of importance, which Sir Wilton Gleed was conscious of having made +in all his life. Yet he had taken no step with more complete confidence +and self-approval. A gentleman and man of brain, reported by Lady Gleed +and their daughter, and duly admitted by himself, to be the best +preacher they had ever heard; a man of family into the bargain, and not +such a distant cadet as the head of that family implied; could any +combination have promised a more suitable successor to the venerable +sportsman who had scorned white ties and caught his death coursing in +mid-winter with Dr. Marigold? And yet the fellow had proved a perfect +pest from the beginning. He had gone his own gait with a quiet +independence only less exasperating than his personal courtesy and +deference in every quarrel. In fact there had been no regular quarrel: +the squire had only been rather rude to the rector's face, and very +abusive behind his back. Nor was Sir Wilton's annoyance in the least +surprising. Devoid himself of a single religious conviction, but the +natural enemy of change, he viewed the inevitable, but too immediate, +innovations in the light of a personal affront; but when his own +expostulations were met with polite argument<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_83" id="Page_83">[Pg 83]</a></span> on a subject which he had +never studied, and he found himself at issue with a cleverer and a +stronger man, who put him in the illogical position of objecting in the +country to what his family approved in town, then there was no +alternative for the squire but to withdraw from the unequal field and +wait upon revenge. Too politic to break with one who after all had more +followers than foes, and who speedily made himself the first person in +the parish, Sir Wilton very naturally hated his man the more for those +very considerations which induced him to curb his tongue. But his +disappointment was manifold. It was not as if the fellow had proved +personally congenial to himself. He preferred teaching the lads cricket +to shooting with the squire, and he was a poor diner-out. His +predecessor had shot almost (but not quite) as well as Sir Wilton +himself, and had the harder head of the two for port. Carlton was not +even in touch with his own people. There was no advantage in the man at +all.</p> + +<p>But now the end was in sight—the incredibly premature and disgraceful +end. Sir Wilton went down grim enough, but much less angry and indignant +than he supposed. Most of his wrath was the accumulation of months, free +for expression at last. He was, however, a good and clean citizen +according to his lights, and he did undoubtedly feel the rightful +indignation with which the story from Long Stow was calculated to +inspire many a worse man. Arrived at Lakenhall, where the stanhope was +waiting for him, he asked but one question on the way to Long Stow, and +then drove straight past the hall to the church. Here he got<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_84" id="Page_84">[Pg 84]</a></span> down, and +examined the black ruins with his hands in his pockets and his shoulders +very square and a fixed glare of mingled rage and exultation. Then he +walked past the broken windows, and the stanhope met him at the rectory +gate. He drove home without a word. His one question had elicited the +fact that the rector was still in the infirmary.</p> + +<p>The village street cut clean through the high-walled hall garden, and +the brown-brick hall itself stood as near the road as the mansion in +Hyde Park Place, and was the uglier building of the two, from the dormer +windows in the steep slates to the portico with the painted pillars. +Within was the depressing atmosphere of a great house all but empty. Sir +Wilton hurried through a twilit drawing-room in deadly order, and forth +by a French window into a pleasaunce of elms and plane-trees whose +shadows lay sharp as themselves upon the shaven sward. A girl was coming +across the grass to meet him, a girl at the awkward age, with her dark +hair in a plait and her black dress neither long nor short. Sir Wilton +brushed her cheek with his bleached moustache.</p> + +<p>"Where's Fraulein?" he said.</p> + +<p>"In the schoolroom, I think, uncle."</p> + +<p>"I want to speak to her. I'm only down for the night and shall be busy. +I'll be looking round the garden, tell her."</p> + +<p>And he walked away from the house, treading vigorously on the cropped +grass; and presently a little middle-aged lady, with a plain, shrewd +face, flitted over it in her turn. She found Sir Wilton between the four +yew hedges and the mathematical parterres of the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_85" id="Page_85">[Pg 85]</a></span> Italian garden at the +further end of the lawn. He shook hands with her, but gave free rein, +for the second time in five minutes, to his idiosyncrasy of hard +staring.</p> + +<p>Fraulein Hentig had been many years in the family, and had taken many +parts; at present she was permanent housekeeper in the country, but had +lately also recommenced old schoolroom duties on the adoption by Sir +Wilton of his only brother's only child. There was no nonsense about +Fraulein Hentig. She told Sir William all that she had heard and all +that she believed was true, without mincing facts or wincing at the +expletives which more than once interrupted her tale. As it proceeded +the fixed eyes lightened with a vindictive glitter; but the end found +Sir Wilton scowling.</p> + +<p>"I wish I'd been here! I wouldn't have let them break his windows; no, I +should have claimed the privilege of horsewhipping him with my own +hands. I'd do it still if he were here; but he'll never show his nose in +Long Stow again. I suppose there's no doubt the church was wilfully set +fire to?"</p> + +<p>"None at all from what I hear, Sir Wilton."</p> + +<p>"Is nobody suspected?"</p> + +<p>"George Mellis was. They say he was in love with the girl, and he +disappeared on Saturday night. However, it turns out that he was already +in Lakenhall hours before the fire, and he never came back. It appears +he went straight to the rectory when he heard the scandal, and almost as +straight out of Long Stow when Mr. Carlton admitted everything. Already +I hear that he has enlisted in London."</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_86" id="Page_86">[Pg 86]</a></span>"You don't mean it! That's another thing at that blackguard's door; it's +a nice list! But it's enough to send the whole parish to the dogs. By +the way, you would get Lady Gleed's letter?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, Sir Wilton. I wrote last night to tell her ladyship that she might +make her mind easy about her niece. She is very innocent, and when I +told her the windows had been broken because Mr. Carlton had done +something dishonourable, she was amazed of course, but she asked no more +questions. I spoke at once to the servants, and I made Gwynneth promise +not to go among the people at present; they have already typhoid fever +in one of the cottages, and that was my excuse."</p> + +<p>"Excellent!" said Sir Wilton. "I won't have her in and out of the +cottages in any case, and I shall tell her so before I go. She's much +too young for that kind of nonsense. And she mustn't read just exactly +what she likes. She had a book in her hand just now—I couldn't see +what—but she seems inclined to fill her head with any folly. We must +find a school for her, and meanwhile bring her up as we've brought up +our own child."</p> + +<p>Fraulein Hentig smiled judiciously.</p> + +<p>"They are already rather different characters," she said. "But I will do +my best, Sir Wilton."</p> + +<p>When the pair quitted the Italian garden, the gentleman hurrying to make +other inquiries before dinner, while the German gentlewoman dropped +behind, two brown eyes saw them from an upper window, whither the girl +had carried her book in vain. Her attention had been intermittent +before, but now she<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_87" id="Page_87">[Pg 87]</a></span> could not even try to read. The air was full of +mystery, and the mystery was more absorbing than that in any book. It +was also absolute and unfathomable in the girl's mind. Yet her brain +teemed with questions and surmises. She had come upstairs because she +felt that they wanted her out of the way, her uncle and the good, slow, +serious Fraulein. Yet that was not enough for them: they also must +retire as far as possible for their talk. Of course Gwynneth knew what +they had to talk about; but what was the dishonourable action that a +clergyman could commit and that could not be so much as mentioned in her +hearing? She was not thinking of "a clergyman" in the abstract. She was +thinking of the man with the beautiful, sad face; of the passionate +preacher with the voice that thrilled the senses and the words that +filled the mind. She had heard him preach of sin and suffering with +equal sympathy. Phrases came back to her. Now she understood. But what +could he have done, that he should suffer so, and that a perfectly kind +person like Fraulein Hentig should exult in his suffering?</p> + +<p>Gwynneth was splendidly and terribly innocent, but all the more +inquisitive on that account. She was unacquainted with the facts, yet +not with the tragedy of life. In a tragic atmosphere she had been born +and bred. Quentin Gleed had been fatally lacking in the politic virtues +cultivated by his brother. He had deserted his wife and drunk himself to +death within the memory of Gwynneth. The young girl recalled dim years +of bitter scenes in a luxurious home, and vivid years of peace and +poverty in a tiny cottage. And now her mother was gone also; the dear, +independent,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_88" id="Page_88">[Pg 88]</a></span> wilful little mother, who had taught her child all but the +wickedness that was in the world! And that child sat at her bedroom +window in the new home that never could be home to her; and the drooping +sun could find no bottom to her dark and limpid eyes, no flaw upon her +pure warm skin; and neither the cuckoo in the poplar, nor the thrush in +the elm, nor the sparrows in the eaves just overhead, could tell her +anything of the wickedness that was in even her small world.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_89" id="Page_89">[Pg 89]</a></span></p> + +<h2 class="newchapter"><a name="CHAPTER_IX" id="CHAPTER_IX"></a>IX<br /> +<span class="smalltext">A DUEL BEGINS</span></h2> + + +<p>Late in the afternoon of July 13, a Lakenhall fly rattled through Long +Stow, and waited in the rain outside the rectory gate while one of the +occupants ran up to the house. He was such a short time gone, and so few +people were about in the wet, that the fly was on its way back to +Lakenhall before the Long Stow folk realised that it was the rector who +had upset prophecy by showing his nose among them in broad daylight. He +had done no more, however, nor was anything further seen or heard of him +during the month of July. It appeared that he had returned for some +private papers only. The rectory was locked up by the squire's orders, +but the rector had forced his own study door, and his muddy footmarks +were confined to that room. The same evening he went up to town—and +disappeared. But his address was known in an official quarter. And all +day and every day he might have been discovered in the reading room of +the British Museum: a memorable figure, stooping amid mountains of +architectural tomes, and drawing or copying plans in the few inches of +table-land they left him, all with a nervous eagerness of face and hand +not daily to be seen beneath that dispiriting dome.</p> + +<p>Then the call came, and he was tried in the con<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_90" id="Page_90">[Pg 90]</a></span>sistorial court of his +own diocese, before the chancellor thereof, at the beginning of August. +No need to record more than the fact. The proceedings were brief because +the accused pleaded guilty and his own word was the only evidence +against him. The sentence was that of suspension foreshadowed by the +bishop. The Reverend Robert Carlton was formally suspended <i>ab officio +et beneficio</i> for the period of five years.</p> + +<p>The result was reported in the London papers; there was only matter for +a few lines. "Mr. Carlton was suspended for five years" was the +concluding sentence in <i>The Times</i> report; and that was good enough for +Sir Wilton Gleed. It was a happy omen for the holidays, which began for +him that very day. The family were already in the country. Sir Wilton +took the last train to Lakenhall and drove himself home for good in the +highest spirits. Four miles of the five were over his own acres, and +every one of them was crumbling with rabbits in the rosy dusk. Later, +the larkspur and peonies on the dinner-table were as the very breath and +blush of the gorgeous English country; and a thrush sang its welcome +through the open window, and a nightingale trilled the tired Londoner to +sleep; but he dreamt of a pheasant that he had heard calling between +Lakenhall and Long Stow.</p> + +<p>In the country Sir Wilton was an early riser, and he was abroad next +morning while the shadows of the elms still stretched to the house and +quivered up its bare brick walls. The great lawn was dusted with a milky +dew in which Sir Wilton positively<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_91" id="Page_91">[Pg 91]</a></span> wallowed in his water-tight boots; +it was not his least delight to be in shooting-boots and knickerbockers +and soft raiment once more. The first few minutes of the more excellent +life produced an unseasonable geniality in the breast of Wilton Gleed. +The man was a human being, and he longed for companionship in his joy. +But Sidney never rose before he must, nor the gardeners either, it +appeared. In the stable-yard a groom was encountered, but Sir Wilton had +seen his face every day in town. He went out into the village, and +naturally turned to the left. The cottage doors were open, and they were +filled with homely figures that touched a cap or courtesied as he passed +with a pleasant word for all. It was good to be back, to be a little +king again. Sir Wilton pulled the cap over his eyes because the sun was +in them, and admired the ripe wheat in the field beyond the post-office, +the barley in the field beyond that. So he passed the Flint House on the +other side with unruffled mind, and was passing the Flint House meadow +before his thoughts took the inevitable turn which led to profane +mutterings through shut teeth. But this morning it did not lead quite so +far; this morning, with the scented air of England in his nostrils, and +a twitter in the ears from every thatch, even Sir Wilton Gleed could +find it in his heart to pity the sinner fallen from his high estate in +what was paradise enough for the squire.</p> + +<p>"Poor devil!" he said as he came to the rectory gate and saw the long +grass within. It was sufficiently in key with the old quaint rectory, in +its rags of ivy and its shawl of disreputable tiles. The<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_92" id="Page_92">[Pg 92]</a></span> windows were +still broken and the shutters shut. Otherwise the picture was as +alluring as its fellows to the lord of the manor. The trees that hid the +church at midsummer would screen its ruins for many a day.</p> + +<p>Sir Wilton entered to refresh his memory as to the minor damages, and +they changed his mood. Who was to pay for twenty-nine panes of +glass—no, he had missed a window—for thirty-three? He was a man who +did not care to spend a penny without obtaining his pennyworth; but he +was not clear as to his legal obligations; and he bristled at the idea +of paying for the immorality of the parson and the excesses of his +flock. He had paid enough in other ways. And there was the church. Who +was to rebuild the church? They might expect him to do that once he +began doing things; and the man fell into premature fuming between his +love of the lavish and his detestation of expense. Meanwhile he had +found a whole window, that of the study, and the door beside it stood +ajar. This he pushed open as though the place belonged to him (his view +in so many words), and stood still upon the threshold.</p> + +<p>"Well, I'm damned!" he cried at last.</p> + +<p>Robert Carlton sat asleep in his chair, his hands in his overcoat +pockets, the collar turned up about his ears. His boots and trousers +were brown and yellow with the dust of the district. In an instant he +was on his feet, scared, startled, and abashed.</p> + +<p>"So you've come back, have you?"</p> + +<p>"An hour or two ago. I walked from Cambridge. I don't know how you +heard!"</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_93" id="Page_93">[Pg 93]</a></span>"Heard? You must think me in a hurry for your society! No, this is an +unexpected pleasure, and I use the words advisedly. It's something to +find you don't come twice in broad daylight."</p> + +<p>"I have come on business, as before, but this time the business will +occupy more than a few minutes. I wished to get it in train with as +little fuss as possible. Then I was coming to see you, Sir Wilton."</p> + +<p>It was quietly spoken, without bitterness or defiance, but also without +the abject humility which had trembled in the clergyman's first words. +The other made some attempt to modify his manner: nothing could put him +in the wrong, but he realised that it might be as well to abstain from +mere brutality. And what he had just heard implied a certain +reassurance.</p> + +<p>"I see," said Gleed. "You have come to make arrangements about your +furniture and effects. I am glad to hear it."</p> + +<p>"My furniture and effects?" queried Carlton. "What arrangements do you +mean?"</p> + +<p>"Well, you can't leave them here, can you?"</p> + +<p>"Why not, Sir Wilton?"</p> + +<p>"Why not!" echoed the squire, turning from pink to purple with the two +words. "Because you've been disgraced and degraded as you deserve; +because you're the hound you are; because you've been suspended for five +years, and I won't have you or your belongings cumber my ground for a +single day of them! So now you know," continued Gleed in lower tones, +his venom spent. "I didn't think it<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_94" id="Page_94">[Pg 94]</a></span> would be necessary to tell you my +opinion of you; but you've brought it on yourself."</p> + +<p>Carlton bowed to that, but respectfully pointed out the difference +between suspension and deprivation, his tone one of apology rather than +of triumph.</p> + +<p>"I don't say which I deserved," he added, "but I do thank God for the +mercy He has shown me. This gives me another chance—in five years' +time. Meanwhile I am not only entitled to keep my furniture in the +rectory. I believe I may live in it if I like."</p> + +<p>Gleed stood convulsed with wrath redoubled. He had been too busy in town +to prime himself upon a point which could not arise before he went down +to the country; and here it was, awaiting him. His disadvantage alone +was enough to put him in a passion; but the last statement was monstrous +in itself.</p> + +<p>"I don't believe it! I don't believe a word you say! A man who can live +a lie will tell nothing else!"</p> + +<p>Carlton drew himself up, his nostrils curling.</p> + +<p>"Better go and ask your solicitor," he said. "I have forfeited the +right—as you so well know—to the only possible reply."</p> + +<p>"Rights apart," rejoined Gleed, his colour heightening by a shade, "do +you mean to tell me you would seriously think of remaining on the very +scene of your shame?"</p> + +<p>"I didn't say I would do anything. I said I believed I could."</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_95" id="Page_95">[Pg 95]</a></span>"You have done enough harm in the place; surely you wouldn't come back +to do more?"</p> + +<p>"No; if I came at all, it would be to undo a little of the harm—to live +it down, Sir Wilton, by God's help!" said Carlton, and his voice shook. +"But I do not mean to live here. I have spoken to the bishop, and his +advice is against it, though he leaves me free to follow my own +judgment. This afternoon I hoped to speak to you. There is another +matter which is really a duty, so that I can be in no doubt as to what +to do there. It will not involve my remaining on the spot, or obtruding +myself in any way. But the church has been burnt down on my account, and +I intend to rebuild it before the winter."</p> + +<p>"The church is mine!" said Gleed, savagely.</p> + +<p>"I don't want to contradict you, Sir Wilton; but you should really see +your lawyer on all these points."</p> + +<p>"The land is mine!"</p> + +<p>"Not the church land, Sir Wilton; and the rector is not only entitled, +but he may be compelled, to restore and rebuild within certain limits. +Your solicitor will turn up the Act and show it you in black and white. +And after that I think you will hardly stand between me and my bounden +duty."</p> + +<p>"I don't recognise it as your duty. Your first duty is to resign the +living lock-stock-and-barrel—if you've any sense of decency left; but +you haven't—not you, you infernal blackguard, you!"</p> + +<p>Gleed was standing on the drive, his arms akimbo and his fists clenched, +his flushed face thrust forward and his stockinged legs planted firmly +apart. It was<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_96" id="Page_96">[Pg 96]</a></span> Carlton's lithe figure which had been filling the doorway +for some minutes; but at this he strode upon his adversary, and towered +over him with a hand that itched.</p> + +<p>"Why must you insult me?" he cried. "Do you think that's the way to get +me to do anything? Or are you bent upon having me up for assault? For +heaven's sake remember your own manhood, Sir Wilton, and respect mine; +don't trade too far upon my readiness to admit that I am all men choose +to call me. Have a little pride! I am ready to take my punishment, and +more. I will keep away from the place as much as possible. If I can let +the rectory, that will be so much more money for the church. Don't +oppose me; if you can't help me by your countenance (and I grant you +it's more than I have a right to expect), at least be neutral, and let +me work out my own salvation in my own way. It will make no difference +to the past. It may make all the difference in the future. God knows I +can't reinstate myself in His sight and in the hearts of men by building +a church! But I can leave behind me a sign of my sorrow and my true +penitence. I can leave behind me a name and an example, bad enough in +all conscience, but yet not wholly vile to the very last. And think what +even that would be to me! And think what it would be if I could but pave +the way, not to forgiveness, but to some reconciliation with those whom +I have loved but led amiss . . . Well, that may be too much to hope +. . . no, I have no right to dream of that . . . but at least let me +make the one material reparation<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_97" id="Page_97">[Pg 97]</a></span> in my power; let me do my duty! When +it is done, if you and they will have no more of me, then you shall all +be rid of me for good."</p> + +<p>Gleed wavered, partly because in mere personality he was no match for +the other, partly because the prospect of a new church for nothing made +its own appeal to the man who had counted the cost of the broken +windows. His mind ran over the pecuniary scheme and detected a flaw.</p> + +<p>"And what's to become of the parish for the next five years?" he asked. +"Who's to pay a man to do your work?"</p> + +<p>"There's the stipend I cannot touch and would not if I could; a part of +that will doubtless be set aside. Until the church is habitable, +however, the case will probably be met by one of the curates coming over +from Lakenhall and taking a service in the schoolroom."</p> + +<p>"And how do <i>you</i> know?" cried Sir Wilton, not unjustifiably.</p> + +<p>"The bishop sent for me," said Carlton—and his eyes fell. "I ventured +to speak to him on the subject before I left. Do you think I don't care +what happens here in my absence? I hope the services will begin next +Sunday—the building next week. I have worked the whole thing out. I +could show you the figures and the plans. The new ones are ready, if you +can call them new. I shall be my own architect as before for the +transepts, but the rest shall be exactly as it was."</p> + +<p>"We'll see about that," said Sir Wilton grimly. He knew those melting +eyes, that enthusiastic voice.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_98" id="Page_98">[Pg 98]</a></span> They had brought their hundreds to this +man's feet before. They might do so again. Even the squire felt their +power in his own despite.</p> + +<p>"It is my one chance!" the voice went on in softer accents. "Do not ask +me to forego it altogether; but I will keep in the background as much as +you like; all I want to know is that the work is going on. Suppose I did +resign, and you appointed another man. Why should he give towards the +church? Why should he come where there is none? Let me build the new one +first!"</p> + +<p>"Has it come to letting? I understood I couldn't prevent you?"</p> + +<p>"No more you can; although——"</p> + +<p>"We'll see!" cried Gleed. "That's quite enough for me. We'll see!"</p> + +<p>"But, Sir Wilton——"</p> + +<p>"Damn your 'buts,' sir!" shouted the other, shaking with rage. "You +disgrace the parish, and you won't leave it. You come back, and set +yourself against me, and think you can do what you like after doing what +you've done. By God, it's monstrous! There's not a man in the country +who won't agree with me; you'll find that out to your cost. Build the +church, would you? I'll see you further! Law or no law, I'll have you +out of this! I'll hound you out of it! I'll have you torn in pieces if +you stay!"</p> + +<p>"I have already told you I don't intend to stay," said Carlton quietly. +"I only intend to rebuild the church."</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_99" id="Page_99">[Pg 99]</a></span>"All right! You try! You try!"</p> + +<p>And with his fixed eyes flashing, and his fresh face aged with anger, +but scored with implacable resolve, Sir Wilton Gleed swung on his heel, +and so down the drive with every step a stamp.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_100" id="Page_100">[Pg 100]</a></span></p> + +<h2 class="newchapter"><a name="CHAPTER_X" id="CHAPTER_X"></a>X<br /> +<span class="smalltext">THE LETTER OF THE LAW</span></h2> + + +<p>In the village he met Tom Ivey, but passed him with a savage nod, and +was some yards further on when a thought smote him so that he spun round +in his stride.</p> + +<p>"That you, Ivey?" he called. "I wasn't thinking; you're the very man I +wanted to see. How are you, eh?"</p> + +<p>"Nicely, thank you, Sir Wilton," said Tom, coming up.</p> + +<p>"Plenty of work, I hope?"</p> + +<p>"Well, not just lately, Sir Wilton."</p> + +<p>"Good! I may have some for you. I'll see you about it this evening or +to-morrow; meanwhile keep yourself free. By the way, how's your mother?"</p> + +<p>"Very sadly, Sir Wilton. I sometimes fare to think she's not long for +this world."</p> + +<p>"Nonsense, man! What's the matter with her?"</p> + +<p>Tom hardly knew. That was old age, <i>he</i> thought. Then the house was that +old and small; sometimes she fared to stifle for want of air. And this +Tom said doggedly, for a reason.</p> + +<p>"Ah!" cried Sir Wilton, his fixed eye brightening. "Wasn't there a +question of repairs some time since?"</p> + +<p>"There was, Sir Wilton."</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_101" id="Page_101">[Pg 101]</a></span>"Well, I'll reconsider it. We must do what we can to make the old lady +comfortable for the winter. I'll come and see her, and I'll see you +again about the other matter. Keep yourself free meanwhile. Don't you +let any of those Lakenhall fellows snap you up!"</p> + +<p>And Sir Wilton went on chuckling, but again turned quickly and called +the other back.</p> + +<p>"By the way, Tom, who <i>were</i> those fellows you used to work for in +Lakenhall?"</p> + +<p>"Tait & Taplin, Sir Wilton."</p> + +<p>A note was taken of the names.</p> + +<p>"The only builders in the town, eh?"</p> + +<p>"Well, Sir Wilton, there's old Isaac Hoole, the stonemason."</p> + +<p>"A stonemason, by Jove!" and down went his name. "What other builders +and stonemasons have we in the district—near enough to undertake some +work here? I'm not thinking of the job I've got for you, Tom."</p> + +<p>Ivey thought of three within fifteen miles, and several at greater +distances, but doubted whether any of the latter would accept a contract +so far afield. Their names were taken, nevertheless, and Sir Wilton +stared his hardest as he put his pocket-book away.</p> + +<p>"I shall want you all the same," he said, "and I shall expect to get you +when I want you. Understand? If anybody else offers you a job, remember +you've got one. And I'll see your mother this morning."</p> + +<p>Tom went his way with his honest wits in a knot. He could not conceive +what was coming. Ten min<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_102" id="Page_102">[Pg 102]</a></span>utes ago he had found a note slipped under the +door in the night, and he was going straight to the rectory without his +breakfast. Had Sir Wilton been there before him, and was he going to +rebuild the church? Then what had the reverend to say to it, now that he +was suspended for five years? And what in the world could he have to say +to Tom Ivey?</p> + +<p>He said nothing at all until they had shaken hands, and nothing then +about the fire; it is with the hand alone that men pay their big debts +to men, and Robert Carlton did not weaken his thanks with words.</p> + +<p>"Have you got a job, Tom?" were his first.</p> + +<p>"I have and I haven't, sir," said Ivey.</p> + +<p>"You're not free to take one from me?"</p> + +<p>"I wish I was, sir!" cried Tom, impulsively (he was not so sure about it +on reflection); and in his simplicity he explained why he was not free. +"But perhaps that's the same job, sir?" he added, hopefully.</p> + +<p>Carlton shook his head, and looked wistfully on the friendly face; a few +words (he knew his power) and the very man he wanted would be on his +side against all odds. But he must not begin by dividing the village +into factions; he must fight his own battle, with mercenaries from +neutral ground, or none at all.</p> + +<p>"Where was it you served your time, Tom?" he asked at length.</p> + +<p>"Tait & Taplin's, sir, in Lakenhall."</p> + +<p>"Thanks. I won't keep you, Tom. It will do you no good to be seen up +here."</p> + +<p>He held out his hand with a dismal smile. It was the other's turn to +wring hard. "I care nothing<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_103" id="Page_103">[Pg 103]</a></span> about that, sir! We've been shoulder to +shoulder once already; my mind don't go no further back than that; and +we'll be shoulder to shoulder again!"</p> + +<p>Carlton found flour and tea in the store-room, and in the fowl-house two +new-laid eggs. He cooked his first breakfast with the sun pouring +through the open kitchen window upon six weeks' dirt and dust. He was +not a man of very hearty habit, but he had learnt of old the evil of +exercise upon too light a diet. His pony was fattening in the glebe; but +a fastidious sense of fitness forbade him to drive, and between nine and +ten he set out for Lakenhall on foot.</p> + +<p>It was an ordeal for the first half-mile: the sunlight flooding the +village felt like limelight turned on him alone. Some children +courtesied as though nothing was changed; their elders stared at him +without further sign; only one shouted after him, he knew not who or +what. He reached the open country with a raging pulse, thinking only +upon circuitous ways back; but three solitary miles restored his nerve. +And in Lakenhall it was only every other passer who stopped and turned +and stared. Entering the town he was nearly run over by a dogcart. It +was Sir Wilton driving, and Carlton caught the gleam of his eye even as +he leapt to one side for his life, but mistook its significance until he +was within sight of Tait & Taplin's. Then it occurred to him, and he +entered fully prepared.</p> + +<p>"No, thank you, sir—not for us! We've heard of you, and we don't deal +with your sort. Do you hear, or do you want to hear more?"</p> + +<p>Carlton searched in vain for another builder, and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_104" id="Page_104">[Pg 104]</a></span> only got the name of +a stonemason by going into the cemetery and looking at the newer +gravestones. He had then to discover where the man lived, and he was +ashamed to ask questions in shops. He was still scouring the town, and +it was afternoon, when a gig was pulled up in the middle of the road.</p> + +<p>"So you're back? Well, you look better than you did."</p> + +<p>"I am," said Carlton, "thanks to you."</p> + +<p>"Who are you looking for?"</p> + +<p>"Hoole, the stonemason."</p> + +<p>"Jump up and I'll drive you there."</p> + +<p>The tone was too humane for Carlton.</p> + +<p>"Thank you, doctor, but I like walking."</p> + +<p>"Then find him for yourself, and be damned to you!"</p> + +<p>And Marigold drove on, red to the hoar of his eighty years; but, as +Carlton stood watching him out of sight with vain compunction, the old +doctor turned in his seat and pointed up an alley with his whip in +passing.</p> + +<p>Hoole, the stonemason, was not rude, but he was as firm as Tait & Taplin +in his refusal. He was an elderly man, of few words, but he admitted +that Sir Wilton Gleed had been there that morning. That was enough for +Carlton, who was turning away when something in his visible fatigue and +dejection moved the mason to give him a hint.</p> + +<p>"You won't get anybody in the district to work for you against Sir +Wilton," he said. "That stands to reason."</p> + +<p>"Then I must go out of the district," said Carlton.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_105" id="Page_105">[Pg 105]</a></span> And he bought a +county directory at a shop where he had been a regular customer; but +they insisted on the settlement of his current bill first; and even then +he had to help himself to the new book, and leave the money on the +counter, because they scorned to serve him. The directory contained the +names and addresses of the very few builders and master-masons within a +day's journey of Long Stow. And it was all there was to show for the +long day's round of retribution and rebuff when, late in the afternoon, +Carlton returned as he had come, too tired and too dispirited to walk an +inch out of his way; and the school-children who had courtesied in the +morning knew better now, and cried after the bent figure slinking home +at dusk.</p> + +<p>The next day was Sunday, and the school-bell tinkled towards eleven +o'clock, and stopped precisely at the hour. Then Carlton knew that his +own idea had been adopted, and that somebody was saying matins in the +parish school-room: he read the service to himself in his study, and +evensong when evening came, with a sermon of Charles Kingsley's after +each: for doctrine could not help him now, but brave humanity could and +did.</p> + +<p>The Monday was Bank Holiday; but Carlton only knew it when he had +trudged ten miles to have speech with a builder whose premises were +closed; and so another day was lost. On the Tuesday he tried again, but +with as little avail. Sir Wilton Gleed had been there before him (as +long ago as the Saturday afternoon), and it was the same elsewhere. The +week went in fruitless visits to small contractors and working masons in +this large village or in that little town; the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_106" id="Page_106">[Pg 106]</a></span> enemy had been first in +every field, with a cunning formula which Carlton reconstructed from the +various answers he received.</p> + +<p>"Of course, the church will have to be rebuilt," Sir Wilton had been +saying; "but not by him. He hasn't the money, for one thing; it had +better be an iron church, if he is to pay you for it. Help me to get rid +of him, and you shall hear from me again. We will have a decent church +when we are about it, and a local man shall get the job."</p> + +<p>Meanwhile the boycott was nowhere more operative than in Long Stow +itself, and no human being came near the rectory, where the rector +subsisted on a providential store of bacon and the daily deposit of +eggs, and on strange bread of his own baking, for he would risk no more +insults in the shops. But one night a forgotten friend came back into +his life: his collie, Glen, came bounding down the drive to meet him, +and the mad uproar of that welcome was heard through half the village, +and duly became the talk. The dog had been a vagabond and a rogue for +six wild weeks, and it came back gaunt and hard, its brush clotted and +raw underneath with the spray from a farmer's gun. Carlton washed the +wound with warm water, and the two pariahs supped together, and lay that +night upon the same bed, and went abroad together next morning, to try +the last man left.</p> + +<p>The day after that they stayed at home, and word reached the hall that +the rector had been seen among the ruins of his church; he was, indeed, +exploring them for the first time, and that both with method and +deliberation. When seen, however (from the lane that runs<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_107" id="Page_107">[Pg 107]</a></span> under the +fine east window of to-day, past the lawn-tennis court which was then a +fowl run, and the glebe that is still the glebe), he was seated on a +sandstone block in front of the little lean-to shed; and, as a matter of +fact, his back was to the ruins. He was contemplating similar blocks and +slabs of the undressed stone that lay where they had been lying on +Midsummer Day: some were still smutty from the fire, all were slightly +stained by the weather, otherwise there was no change that Carlton could +see as he sat thus. At one end of the shed rose a great yellow cairn of +material raw from the quarry—a stack of stones about as much of one +size and shape as so many lumps of sugar; enough to finish the +transepts, as matters had stood; a mere fraction of the amount required +now. Carlton looked on what he had got, and his eyes closed in a +calculation beyond his powers in mental arithmetic; he had to take a +pencil to it, and then a foot-rule to the blackened courses, and +presently a pair of compasses to the plans in the study.</p> + +<p>In the afternoon he tidied the shed. Every tool was intact; a little +rust had been the worst intruder; and the feel of the cool sleek handles +quickened Carlton's pulse. Nay, the hammer rang a few strokes on the +cold-chisel, for he could not help it, and the music reminded him of his +poor bells, now cumbering the porch; it was almost as good to hear; and +the way the soft stone peeled, in creamy flakes, thrilled the hand as it +charmed the eye. But a very few minutes served to make the enthusiast +ashamed of his enthusiasm; and though he spent more time in the ruins, +now testing a standing wall, now scraping a charred stone, ardour<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_108" id="Page_108">[Pg 108]</a></span> and +determination had died down in an eye that was looking within; a wistful +irresolution flickered in their place. And that night the lonely man +walked his room once more, from twilight to twilight, with long +intervals spent upon his knees, in agonies of doubt and self-distrust, +in passionate entreaty for a right judgment, and for the strength to +abide by it. Yet his duty had not dawned upon him with the day.</p> + +<p>Towards eleven the school-bell tinkled. It was Sunday once more; and +once more he read the prayers upon his knees and the psalms and lessons +standing; but no sermon to-day. No man could help him in his struggle +with himself; he must trust to the strength of his own soul, to the +singleness of his own heart, and to the guidance of the God who was +drawing nearer and nearer to him in these days—with each prayer that +rose from his heart—with each bead that stood upon his brow. And so at +last, when the burden of doubt and darkness became more than the man +could bear, it was as though the heavens had opened, and a beam of +celestial light flooded the narrow room with the low ceiling and the +cross-beams; for the peace of a mind made up had descended upon the +solitary therein. And that night his sleep was sound, so that in the +morning he had to ask himself why; the answer made him catch his breath; +it did not shake his resolve.</p> + +<p>"He shall have his chance," said Carlton; "he shall have it fairly to +his face. And he will take it—and that will be the end!"</p> + +<p>He hung about the ruins till it was ten o'clock by his watch, and then +went straight to the hall. Sir Wilton was at home; but the footman +hesitated to admit this<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_109" id="Page_109">[Pg 109]</a></span> visitor. Carlton's own hesitation was, however, +at an end, and his eye forbade rebuff. He was shown into the +drawing-room, where a very young girl was at the piano, evidently +practising, and yet playing in a way that made Carlton sorry when she +stopped. The cool room smelling of flowers; the glimpse of garden +through an open window, with the court marked out and chairs under the +trees; the momentary sound of a fine instrument finely touched: it was +all the very breath and essence of the pleasant every-day world from +which he had rightly and richly earned dismissal, and it all was branded +in his brain. Then the young girl rose, and stood in doubt with the sun +upon her plaited hair, and eyes great with innocent distress; but +Carlton barely bowed, and the child hardly knew how she got across the +room.</p> + +<p>Sir Wilton entered with jaunty step. His whiskered jaw was set like a +vice, but the light of conscious triumph danced in his fixed eyeballs. +Carlton had come prepared to have his intrusion treated as his latest +crime; a glance convinced him that the other was too sure of victory to +object to an interview with the virtually vanquished.</p> + +<p>"So you are quite determined that I shall not rebuild the church?"</p> + +<p>It was a point-blank beginning. Sir Wilton shrugged and smiled. "I have +told you to build it if you can," said he.</p> + +<p>"But you mean to make that an impossibility?"</p> + +<p>"Naturally I don't intend to make it easy."</p> + +<p>"Admit that by foul means, since none are fair, you are deliberately +preventing me from doing my duty!"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_110" id="Page_110">[Pg 110]</a></span> Carlton pressed his point with a +heat he regretted, but could not help.</p> + +<p>"I admit nothing," said the other, doggedly—"least of all what you are +pleased to consider your 'duty.' Your real duty I've already told you. +Resign the living. Let us see the last of you."</p> + +<p>Carlton met the rigid stare with one as unwavering and more acute. It +was as though he would have seen to the back of the other's brain.</p> + +<p>"Very well," he said at length. "You shall!"</p> + +<p>"Ah!" cried Sir Wilton, when he had recovered from his surprise. But it +was not the cry of victory; there was an uncharacteristic lack of +finality in the clergyman's tone.</p> + +<p>"You shall see the last of me this very morning," he continued swiftly, +nervously, "if you like! But it will rest with you. I am not going +unconditionally. Will you listen to what I have to say?"</p> + +<p>Gleed shrugged again, but this time there was no accompanying smile. The +other threw up his head with a sudden decisiveness—a pulpit trick of +his when about to make a primary point—and his right fist fell into his +left palm without his knowing it.</p> + +<p>"Very well," said Carlton; "now I'll tell you exactly on what conditions +you shall have your heart's desire, and I will renounce mine. In spite +of what I hear you've been saying, I have a little money of my own—not +much, indeed—but enough for me to have subsisted upon for these next +years. I am not going to touch a penny of it—I shall pick up a living +for myself elsewhere. Meanwhile I have turned my income into capital +which is now lying in the bank at Laken<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_111" id="Page_111">[Pg 111]</a></span>hall. It is a trifle under two +thousand pounds, and I want the whole of it to go into the new church. +Wherever I am I ought to be able to earn a little more, either as a +coach or with my pen; so let the offer stand at a church to cost two +thousand pounds. I long to have the building of it. I make no secret of +that. But I have been trying to read my own heart, and I see the +selfishness of such longings; and I have been trying to read your heart, +Sir Wilton, and I see the naturalness of your opposition. So I come to +you and I say, build the church yourself, and I withdraw. Build a better +church out of your abundance, and I will resign as you wish. Give me +your written undertaking, here and now, and you shall have my written +resignation in exchange."</p> + +<p>The words clung to his lips; he alone knew what it cost him to utter +them; he alone, in his absolute freedom from the mercenary instinct, +would have felt certain of the result. But the rich man was touched upon +his tender spot. What return was he offered for his money? Who would +thank him for building a church in the heart of the country? The church +could be built by subscription; bad enough to have to head the list. +Besides, he was flushed with triumph; he saw but a beaten man in the +nervous wretch before him. Fancy bribing a beaten man to fly!</p> + +<p>"I like your impudence," said Wilton Gleed. "Upon my word! <i>My</i> written +undertaking—to <i>you</i>!"</p> + +<p>"Do you refuse to give it?" asked Carlton quickly.</p> + +<p>"Certainly—to you."</p> + +<p>"Undertakings apart, do you entertain my suggestion, or do you not?"</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_112" id="Page_112">[Pg 112]</a></span>"That's my business."</p> + +<p>Carlton felt his patience slipping.</p> + +<p>"Do you mean to say that you don't even yet recognise that it's mine +too, as rector of the parish? Are you still so ignorant of the legal +bearings of the situation? God knows, Sir Wilton, it is not for me to +speak of right and wrong; but I do assure you that you're putting +yourself wilfully in the wrong in this matter. You hinder me from doing +my legal duty, and you refuse to assume any responsibility! Suspended or +not, I am bound to keep my chancel, at all events, 'in good and +substantial repair, restoring <i>and rebuilding when necessary</i>.'"</p> + +<p>Sir Wilton's eyes, fixed as usual, caught fire suddenly.</p> + +<p>"Oh, you're bound, are you?"</p> + +<p>"Legally bound."</p> + +<p>"You're sure that's the law?"</p> + +<p>"The very letter of the law, Sir Wilton."</p> + +<p>"Then see that you keep it! You come here blustering about your legal +rights; but you forget that I've got mine. Where there's a law there's a +penalty, and by God I'll enforce it! 'The very letter of the law,' eh? +I'll take you at your word; you shall keep it to the letter. Build away! +Build away! The sooner you begin the better—for you!"</p> + +<p>This was probably the boldest move that Sir Wilton Gleed ever made in +his life; it was certainly the least considered. But what satisfaction +sweeter than hoisting the enemy with his own petard? It is the +quintessence of poetic justice, the acme of personal triumph; and the +sudden opportunity of achieving his end by<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_113" id="Page_113">[Pg 113]</a></span> means so neat was more than +even Wilton Gleed could resist. Every builder and mason within reach was +already on his side; not a man of them who would work for dissolute +hypocrisy in defiance of might and right. No need to say another word to +the masons and the builders. They could be trusted on the whole, and the +untrustworthy could be bribed. Gleed had not the smallest scruple in the +matter, and he was characteristically forearmed with a public defence of +his private conduct. He believed that every right-thinking man would +applaud his sharp practice in the cause of religion and of morality; and +his confidence was not to be shaken by the way in which his challenge +was received.</p> + +<p>"Are you in earnest?" asked Carlton. "Do you seriously propose to hinder +me with one hand and to compel me with the other?"</p> + +<p>"I mean to take you at your word," Gleed repeated. "You are fond of +talking about your duty. Let's see you do it."</p> + +<p>"You set the builders against me, and then you tell me to build. May I +ask if you are prepared to defend such clumsy trickery?"</p> + +<p>"Any day you like, and glad of the opportunity!" cried Sir Wilton, +cheerfully. "All I have done is to give you your proper character where +it deserves to be known; you have it to thank if you can't get men to +work for you; and it's your look-out. I've heard about enough of you and +your church. Go and build it. Go and build it."</p> + +<p>"I will," said Carlton. "You have had your chance." And he bowed and +withdrew with strange serenity.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_114" id="Page_114">[Pg 114]</a></span>A parting shot followed him through the hall.</p> + +<p>"You will have to do it with your own two hands!"</p> + +<p>Carlton made no reply. But in the village he committed a fresh enormity.</p> + +<p>He was seen to smile.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_115" id="Page_115">[Pg 115]</a></span></p> + +<h2 class="newchapter"><a name="CHAPTER_XI" id="CHAPTER_XI"></a>XI<br /> +<span class="smalltext">LABOUR OF HERCULES</span></h2> + + +<p>All the church had not been burnt to the ground. West of the porch +(itself not hopelessly destroyed) stood thirteen feet of sound south +wall, blackened on the inside, calcined in the upper courses, but plumb +and firm as far as it went. A corresponding portion of the north wall, +the sixteen-foot strip west of the window almost opposite the porch, +stood equally rigid and erect. And, thus supported on either hand, the +entire west end rose practically intact, without a missing or a ruined +stone; the window was still truly bisected by its single mullion; +neither head nor tracery had given the fraction of an inch; only the +mangled leads, with here and there a fragment of smoked glass adhering, +would have told of a fire to one led blindfold under the west window, +and there given his first view of the church.</p> + +<p>But that was the one good wall and real exception to a rule of utter +ruin. The rest of the original building was either razed already or else +unfit to stand. The embryonic transepts were not quite demolished, but +they had never been many feet above ground. Sections of wall still stood +where there were no windows to weaken them, but east of the porch +nothing stood firm. Worst of all was the east end, from which the +chancel walls had been burnt away on either side. It<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_116" id="Page_116">[Pg 116]</a></span> stood as though +balanced, with an alarming outward list. One mullion of the great window +had gone by the sill; the other was cracked and crooked, as if +supporting the entire weight of the gable overhead; and it looked as +though a push would send the tottering fabric flat.</p> + +<p>Black ruin lay thick and deep within. To peep in was to see an ashpit +through a microscope. The remnants of the slate and timber roof lay +uppermost. Tie-beams, corbels, king-posts, ridge, struts, wall-plates, +pole-plates, rafters principal and common, joists, battens, laths and +fillets, half-burnt and black as the pit, save where some spilled +sheet-lead shone in the sun, spread a common pall over nave and chancel, +aisle and pews. It was as a midnight sea frozen in mid-storm, the +twisted lectern alone rising salient like a mast. Slates lay in shallow +heaps as though dealt from a pack; and certain pages, brown and brittle +at the edges, which the wind had torn from the burnt Bible before +Carlton rescued the remains, still fluttered in the crannies when the +wind went its rounds. And the hum of bees was in the air; but there had +been great distress among the sparrows, and one heard more of the +rectory cocks and hens.</p> + +<p>Upon this desolate and dead spot, in the heart of the warm, live +country, Robert Carlton stood looking within a few minutes of his exit +from the hall. But he did not stand looking long. He had changed into +flannels at top speed, and there was still more change in the man. His +eye glowed with a grim decision which lightened without dispelling the +settled sadness of the face. Passionate aspiration had cooled and +hardened<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_117" id="Page_117">[Pg 117]</a></span> into dogged and defiant resolve; and there was an end to all +compunction and self-questioning suspense. Carlton knew exactly what he +was going to do; he had known where to begin since the day before +yesterday. He wore neither coat nor waistcoat, his sleeves were rolled +up, he had a crowbar in one hand, and a heavy hammer in the other. He +began immediately on the thirteen feet of good wall to the left of the +porch.</p> + +<p>He had tested this wall on Saturday. The upper courses were loose and +crumbling; the sooner they went the better. Carlton climbed upon the +wall, and, sitting astride where it was firmest, began working off the +loose stones one by one with the crowbar. Iron would ring on iron twice +or thrice, and then a twist of the bar send the charred stone tumbling. +It was easy work, but the position was awkward, and Carlton soon went +for a ladder; on the way he was surprised to find that he was already +drenched with perspiration, and rather hungry.</p> + +<p>But the next hour tired him more, or rather the time that seemed an hour +to him, for it afterwards turned out to be three hours by the watch that +he had left indoors. Only the topmost course, or the stones on which the +red-hot eaves had rested, lent themselves to off-hand treatment; they +had been burnt to cinders—the mortar binding them, to powder; it needed +but a wrench to dislodge each one. But the next few courses were a +different matter. Half the stones were too loose to leave, too good to +chip in the removal. Carlton worked upon them with the cold-chisel +first, the crowbar next, and finally with his naked fingers, removing +the stones with immense care, and very delib<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_118" id="Page_118">[Pg 118]</a></span>erately dropping each into +its own bed in the long grass outside. At last the little strip of wall +was left without an unsound member from serrated crest to plinth: not a +stone that shook or shifted at a conscientious push; and the workman +took his eyes from his work. But he did not peer through the trees in +search of other eyes, for he was not thinking of himself or of his work +from a spectacular point of view. He merely saw that the sun had +travelled the church from end to end while he had been busy. And +suddenly he found himself sinking for want of food, and unable to stand +upright without intolerable pain. But he was back within half-an-hour, +and remained at work upon the sixteen-foot strip opposite till after +sunset.</p> + +<p>"But it hasn't been anything like a full day, old dog," said Carlton, as +they crept up to bed between eight and nine. And he set his +seven-and-six-penny alarum at four o'clock.</p> + +<p>Next forenoon the sixteen-foot strip was done with in its turn; no +infirm stone left standing upon another. Scraped and repointed, with the +uninjured pieces replaced in fresh mortar, and an entirely new top +course, these two short walls would be worthy of the gallant west end to +which they acted as buttresses. Its wounds were not skin-deep, thanks to +the west wind which had driven the flames the other way. It looked as +though a sponge would cleanse it, and Carlton sighed as he turned his +back upon the one good wall.</p> + +<p>Elsewhere, as has been said, there were fragments fit to use again, but +not to remain as they were. It cost Carlton a couple of days to take +these to pieces, laying the good stones carefully in the grass, as his<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_119" id="Page_119">[Pg 119]</a></span> +practice had been hitherto. The fourth day, however, he tried a change +of labour to ease his aching limbs, and went round and round with a +barrow, picking the sound stones from the grass, and stacking them near +the shed. Next morning he fought his way into the chancel, and stood +chin-deep in the wreckage, contemplating the leaning east end. And all +this time no soul had come near him; through the trees he had indeed +heard whispers that were not of the trees, but he had never thrown more +than a glance in their direction, and the green screen was still +charitably thick.</p> + +<p>The east end must come down sooner or later—therefore sooner. Carlton +was no engineer, but he was a man with a distinct turn for mechanics; +had used a lathe as a lad, and taught his Boys' Friendly how to use it +in their turn; had picked up much from Tom Ivey, and was himself blessed +with sound instincts concerning application and control of power. Here +was a tottering wall to come down altogether. It was too insecure to +pull to pieces. The problem was to get it down with as little damage and +as little danger as possible. One man could do it, Carlton thought, but +not without considerable risk of a broken head at least. If he could but +make sure of the whole wall falling in the one outward direction! He +revolved about it, mentally and on his feet, till he became angry with +himself for the loss of time, ceased to speculate, and went to work in +desperation. He would trust to luck; he despised himself for having +studied a risk so small. He had done so out of no absurd consideration +for his own skin, but entirely from the depth and strength of his +artistic impulse to do a thing properly or not at all. Even now<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_120" id="Page_120">[Pg 120]</a></span> he had +to prepare the ground: he had to clear the chancel enough to give +himself free play.</p> + +<p>Then he found a scaffolding-pole which had not been used, and tilted at +a tree for practice. The pole was unmanageable from its length. He sawed +it shorter. It was still too unwieldy to use amid the <i>débris</i>. He +shortened it until he had a battering-ram some eighteen feet long. But +all these preliminaries had taken unimagined hours, and again Carlton +felt sick with hunger before he thought of food, and unequal to further +effort until he had some. So he turned a breaking but reluctant back +upon the church, and went indoors; remembering everything on the way, +and loathing himself afresh: at his work he was beginning to forget!</p> + +<p>Thus far this outcast had subsisted chiefly on eggs; he beat up a couple +now, and tossed the stuff off with a little wine and water. Then he fell +upon a box of biscuits, but threw the dog as many as he munched himself, +striding up and down the while, and for all his fatigue. The room was +the one in which he had studied his own physiognomy. It might have been +any other. He had no eyes for himself to-day, and not many thoughts, +for, in the midst of his contrition for forgetting, he had forgotten +again. His mind had escaped to the chancel; the flesh followed in a few +minutes, having eaten and rested on its legs.</p> + +<p>The dog bounded ahead, and presently announced an intruder at the top of +its voice. Carlton quickened his pace, frowning at the thought of +interruption; he was on the spot before curiosity had tem<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_121" id="Page_121">[Pg 121]</a></span>pered his +annoyance; and there among the ruins stood Sir Wilton Gleed, not +frowning at all, but forcing a smile behind his cigar.</p> + +<p>"How long is this tomfoolery to go on?" said he.</p> + +<p>Carlton stood looking at him for some seconds; then he picked up his +pole without replying. "You'd better stand to one side," was all he +said. "Kennel up, Glen!"</p> + +<p>"Going to do something desperate?"</p> + +<p>"The further you get away from me the safer you'll be."</p> + +<p>But he did not look round as he spoke, and Sir Wilton gripped his stick +without occasion. Carlton's blood was boiling none the less. The enemy +had surprised him at his worst. He was, for the first time, attempting +single-handed the work of several men; and he might be going about it in +a very ridiculous way. He could not tell till he tried; and it was one +thing to experiment in private, but quite another thing to court open +discomfiture of the very nature which would most delight the looker-on. +And the man was worn out with hard and unaccustomed labour, dyspeptic +from evil feeding, nervous and irritable from both causes combined. Sir +Wilton Gleed could hardly have chosen a worse moment for renewing the +duel.</p> + +<p>In Carlton the longing to do something violent suddenly outweighed his +desire to raze the east end of the church. He poised his pole and fixed +both eyes on the one remaining mullion of the east window. If the +mullion went, he still thought that the whole fabric should collapse, +forgetting the inherent<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_122" id="Page_122">[Pg 122]</a></span> independence of arches; and his mind dwelt +wistfully on the effect of the crash upon Sir Wilton Gleed. But his aim +was not the less accurate, nor did his anxiety hinder him from utilising +every muscle in his body at the ideal moment. The end of the ram smote +the mullion fairly and powerfully, where it was already cracked. The +mullion flew asunder; a quatrefoil shifted a little, robbed of its +support. The whole wall seemed to shudder; but that was all.</p> + +<p>"You remind me of Don Quixote," said Sir Wilton's voice.</p> + +<p>Carlton spun round. The pole trailed behind him from his right hand. He +took fresh hold of it, lower down, and there was no mistaking his look.</p> + +<p>"You go about your business," said he, fiercely.</p> + +<p>"I've come about it," was the bland reply. "I'm not trespassing either; +don't put yourself in the wrong. Remember your own advice; and let's +have a civil answer to a civil question. My good friend, what do you +think you're trying to do?"</p> + +<p>The artificial geniality of address, the settled malice underneath, the +tone that people take with a wilful child, all galled and goaded the +tired man beyond endurance.</p> + +<p>"You had better go," he said.</p> + +<p>"Do you really propose to rebuild the church with your own ten fingers?" +inquired Sir Wilton, not to be daunted by a threat.</p> + +<p>"You proposed it. I mean to do it."</p> + +<p>Sir Wilton shook his head with a venomous smile. "Oh, no, you don't! You +mean to pretend to try. You mean to pose."</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_123" id="Page_123">[Pg 123]</a></span>Carlton flung the pole from him, and strode forward, swinging open +hands.</p> + +<p>"I'm not going to talk to you," he said, "and you sha'n't make me strike +you; but if you don't go out you'll be put out, Sir Wilton."</p> + +<p>Gleed smiled again. His collar was seized. He smiled no more, but lashed +out with his stick. The stick was wrenched away from him. It whistled in +the air. And Robert Carlton had his enemy at his mercy, still held by +the collar, in the place where he had preached goodwill to men. For he +was much the taller of the two and an old athlete, whereas the other was +only an elderly sportsman. Carlton could have whipped him like a little +dog. He did almost worse: released him without a cut, and handed him his +stick without a word.</p> + +<p>And at that moment there came the crash that would have saved this +collision a few seconds before. Both men turned, rubbing their eyes; a +cloud of yellow dust had filled them as it filled the chancel. The cloud +dispersed, and wall and window were gone from sill to gable; what +remained was nowhere higher than a man could reach.</p> + +<p>"Now leave me in peace," said Carlton, "for I shall have my hands full; +and don't trouble to come again, because I sha'n't listen to you. You've +had two chances. I promised to live away and only find the money and the +men; you wouldn't have it. I invited you to build the church yourself; +you wouldn't hear of that. No; you would force me to do my duty, having +tied my hands! You would take me at my word. I am taking you at yours. +I<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_124" id="Page_124">[Pg 124]</a></span> should try fresh ground, if I were you; meanwhile you could sue me +for assault."</p> + +<p>Gleed had fully intended doing so, but the scornful suggestion killed +the thought, and for once he had no last word. But his last look made +amends.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_125" id="Page_125">[Pg 125]</a></span></p> + +<h2 class="newchapter"><a name="CHAPTER_XII" id="CHAPTER_XII"></a>XII<br /> +<span class="smalltext">A FRESH DISCOVERY</span></h2> + + +<p>His son was waiting for him at the gate.</p> + +<p>"The man's mad!" cried Sir Wilton with a harsh laugh.</p> + +<p>"What's he been doing? What was that row?"</p> + +<p>Sidney's manner with his father was subtly disrespectful; he seldom +addressed him by that name, enjoyed arguing with him (having the clearer +head), and argued in slang. Yet his tongue was as dexterous and +plausible as it was always smooth, and he was a difficult boy to convict +of a specific rudeness.</p> + +<p>"There's some method in his madness," was his comment on the father's +account of the work accomplished under his eyes.</p> + +<p>"But he says he's going to build it up again!"</p> + +<p>"I wonder if he will," speculated Sidney.</p> + +<p>"What—by himself?"</p> + +<p>"Yes."</p> + +<p>"Of course he won't. No man could. He's a lunatic."</p> + +<p>They were walking home. Sidney said nothing for some paces. Then he +asked an innocent question. It was a little way of his.</p> + +<p>"I suppose one man could finish one stone, though, father?"</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_126" id="Page_126">[Pg 126]</a></span>Sir Wilton conceded this.</p> + +<p>"And fix it in its place, shouldn't you say?"</p> + +<p>A gruffer concession.</p> + +<p>"Then I'm not sure that he couldn't do more than you think," said +Sidney. "The windows might stump him, and the roof would; but he could +do the rest."</p> + +<p>"Nonsense!" cried Sir Wilton. "You don't know what you're talking +about."</p> + +<p>"Of course I don't," admitted Sidney readily. "That was why I asked +about the one man and the one stone."</p> + +<p>Sir Wilton had not half his boy's brain. The cold-blooded little wretch +would boast that he could "score off the governor without his knowing +it." Sir Wilton's merit was his tenacity of purpose.</p> + +<p>"I tell you the man's mad," he reiterated; "and if he doesn't take care +I'll have him shut up."</p> + +<p>"A great idea!" cried Sidney. "But, I say, if that's so we oughtn't to +be too rough on him!"</p> + +<p>"In any case I'll have him out of this," quoth Sir Wilton through his +teeth; but his mind dwelt on the shutting-up notion: it really was "a +great idea." And Carlton himself had given him another: he just would +"take fresh ground."</p> + +<p>He sought it that evening by a painful path. Jasper Musk and Sir Wilton +Gleed were not friends; they had not spoken for years. Sir Wilton had +not been long in the parish before he discovered that Musk had "cheated" +him over the Flint House. The word was much too strong; but some little +advantage had no doubt been taken. The quarrel had<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_127" id="Page_127">[Pg 127]</a></span> lasted to the +present time; but Sir Wilton had often felt that Musk must hate the +common scourge even more bitterly than he did himself, and that he would +be a very valuable ally. He was a strong man and solid, the one powerful +peasant in the neighbourhood. Unfortunately, sciatica had bound him to +his chair from the very day of his daughter's funeral. It would have +been comparatively easy to accost the old fellow in the open, and to +disarm him with instantaneous expressions of sympathy and of +indignation. It was more difficult for the lord of the manor to knock at +the door of an enemy who was not a tenant—a door opening on the very +street, and a door that might be slammed in his face for all Long Stow +to see or hear. So Sir Wilton went after dinner, on a dark night; was +admitted without demur; and stayed till after eleven.</p> + +<p>Next day he went again; he was also seen at the village constable's; and +the village constable was seen at the Flint House; and Sir Wilton +happened to call once more while he was there. The afternoon was rich in +developments, and duly murmurous with theory, prophecy, speculation. The +schoolmaster was summoned from the school, the saddler from his bench: +it was the latter who fetched Tom Ivey from the room that he was adding +to his mother's cottage at Sir Wilton's expense. Meanwhile the village +whisper became loud talk; but its arrows, shot at a venture, flew wide +of any mark. For through all his dark disgrace, as now when the odium +attaching to him was gathering like snow on a rolling snowball; from the +night of the fire to this<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_128" id="Page_128">[Pg 128]</a></span> eighteenth day of August; there was one thing +of which Robert Carlton had never been suspected by those who had loved +or feared him for a year and a half.</p> + +<p>Naturally the excitement penetrated to the hall, where Sir Wilton kept +dinner waiting, but, very properly, did not refer to the unsavoury +subject at that meal. He was, however, in singularly high spirits, and +drank a vast amount of excellent champagne; yet his own wife left the +table in ignorance of what had happened. Now Lady Gleed was a very +particular person, a great stickler for restraint, her own being +something strenuous and exotic. She seldom spoke of ordinary things +above a whisper, and would have dealt with the village scandal in dumb +show if she could. To her daughter she had genuinely preferred never to +mention it at all.</p> + +<p>But Lydia Gleed—it should have been Languish—was a more modern type. +She was frankly interested in the affair. It had given quite a zest to +what would otherwise have been an insufferably dull month for Lydia. The +girl had the makings of a perfect woman of society, and yet the end of +her second season found her still an unknown distance from the first +step to the realisation of that ideal. Proposals she had received, but +none such as an heiress of her calibre was entitled to expect. She had +actually been engaged to an adventurer; but that had only retarded +matters.</p> + +<p>There may have been purer causes. Feeble and inanimate in her every-day +life, and constitutionally bored by the familiar, Miss Gleed kept her +best side<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_129" id="Page_129">[Pg 129]</a></span> for those whom she knew least; could chatter to +acquaintances, the newer the better; was in her element at parties, and +out of it at home. Even in her element, however, Lydia never forgot to +conceal as much of her appreciation as possible, and would dance +angelically with the corners of her mouth turned down, and take like +medicine the wine which really did make glad her heart. This August she +was feeling particularly <i>blasée</i> and dissatisfied; and the romantic +downfall of the rector—whose sermons had kept her awake—was a French +novel without the trouble of reading it or the risk of confiscation. +To-night, therefore, it was Lydia who invited Gwynneth to play, and +pressed the invitation with a compliment; it was her commoner practice +to snub the much younger girl. And it was Lydia who drew her chair close +to that of Lady Gleed, and began the whispering, to which Gwynneth was +made to shut her ears with all ten fingers. Yet for once Lady Gleed was +frankly interested herself.</p> + +<p>"But what <i>has</i> he done?"</p> + +<p>The music had stopped. They had not noticed it. The ungrown girl was +standing in the middle of the room. She was dressed in white, and her +face looked as white in the candle-light, but her eyes and hair the +darker and more brilliant by contrast. And the eyes were great with a +pity and a pain which were at least not less than the natural curiosity +of a healthy child.</p> + +<p>"Mind your own business," said Lydia, bluntly.</p> + +<p>But even as she spoke the door opened.</p> + +<p>"What's this? What's this?" cried Sir Wilton,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_130" id="Page_130">[Pg 130]</a></span> who was beaming, and +good-naturedly concerned to see the tears starting to his brother's +child's eyes. "Whose business have you been minding, little woman?"</p> + +<p>"It was about Mr. Carlton," the child said with a sob. "I hear everybody +saying nothing's bad enough for him—nothing—and I thought he was so +good! I only asked what he had done. I won't again. Please—please let +me go!"</p> + +<p>"In an instant," said Sir Wilton, detaining her with familiarity. "You +mustn't be a little goose."</p> + +<p>"Let her go, Wilton," whispered his wife.</p> + +<p>"Not till I've told her what Mr. Carlton has done!"</p> + +<p>And Sir Wilton Gleed beamed more than ever upon the consternation of his +ladies.</p> + +<p>"But, Wilton——"</p> + +<p>Lady Gleed had risen, and was even forgetting to whisper. Lydia merely +looked unusually wide-awake, and prettier for once than the child under +the chandelier, who was terribly disfigured by her embarrassment and +distress.</p> + +<p>"If you want to know what Mr. Carlton has done," said Sir Wilton to his +niece, "it was he who set fire to the church!"</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_131" id="Page_131">[Pg 131]</a></span></p> + +<h2 class="newchapter"><a name="CHAPTER_XIII" id="CHAPTER_XIII"></a>XIII<br /> +<span class="smalltext">DEVICES OF A CASTAWAY</span></h2> + + +<p>Left in peace, Carlton threw himself into his task with redoubled +spirit, and presently forgot the existence of Sir Wilton Gleed. He had +just three hours before dark. In this time he succeeded in pulling the +rest of the east wall to pieces, even to the loosened plinth, and was +adding the good stones to his stack when night fell. It was a night not +to be forgotten in the history of Robert Carlton's case. Nothing +happened. But he had no proper food in the house, and he began to feel +really ill for the want of it. Eggs and bacon he had, but the lighting +of the fire fatigued him more than anything he had done all day, and he +fell asleep in the kitchen, and the bacon went brittle, and his attempt +at bread was become an unmasticable fossil. A very little whisky, from a +bottle that had been open for months, did him more good, and enabled him +to face the food problem in earnest before he went to bed. It was a very +serious problem indeed. Health and strength, success or failure, +continued vigour or a swift collapse, all hinged upon the inglorious +question, which engrossed till near midnight one of the plainest livers +on earth, as his labours had absorbed him since dawn. He had to reckon +with his enemies in the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_132" id="Page_132">[Pg 132]</a></span> matter. He had not the slightest hope of +obtaining supplies in the village. But at daylight he walked some miles +to see a farmer who had sometimes trudged as many to hear him preach; +and the farmer gave him breakfast with a surly pity, which Carlton +suffered, as he accepted the meal, for his hard work's sake.</p> + +<p>He had explained that he came on business, and after breakfast the +farmer asked him, not without suspicion, what his business was.</p> + +<p>"Do you kill your own sheep?" inquired Mr. Carlton.</p> + +<p>"Only for ourselves."</p> + +<p>"When do you kill?"</p> + +<p>"Let's see. Friday, is it? Then we kill this mornin'."</p> + +<p>"May I wait and watch?"</p> + +<p>The other stared.</p> + +<p>"I want some mutton," Carlton explained.</p> + +<p>"But I don't keep a butcher's shop," growled the farmer. "Well, we'll +see what we can do; we may be able to let you have a bit of the +neck-end."</p> + +<p>"I should be very grateful for it. But I'm afraid I want more."</p> + +<p>"What more?"</p> + +<p>"A flock of sheep."</p> + +<p>He was willing to pay outside prices. So a bargain was struck; and the +sheep were in the glebe that night. Meanwhile he had seen one killed and +dressed, and was not the less thankful that he had neck-end chops enough +to last him that week.</p> + +<p>The stacking of the stones was finished early on<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_133" id="Page_133">[Pg 133]</a></span> the Friday afternoon, +and Carlton determined to take the rest of that day easily. So he set +himself to retrieve the lectern from the ruins, and did finally wheel it +to the rectory, on two barrows; the first broke under its weight. +Moreover, this had consumed the entire afternoon, as another would have +foreseen at a glance, and Carlton emerged as from a pool of ink. Since +he had made himself rather hot and black, however, he thought it a pity +not to clear a little more of the interior while the light lasted. It +must be done some day; but again the task was more formidable than it +appeared to dauntless eyes still aflame with vast endeavour. The firemen +had not spared the water when all was over, so the big bones of the roof +were not burnt through. Tie-beams and principal rafters, in particular, +lay whole and heavy, and immovable less from their weight than from the +inextricable tangle in which they had fallen. There was nothing but the +saw for these, and Carlton had already sawn the lectern from its grave. +He learnt to saw with his left hand that evening; and after all had very +little but his own personal condition to show for his labour: only the +nucleus of a wood-heap near the stack of stones, and a crooked, +blackened, brass thing in the dining-room. But then he had not intended +to do much that afternoon; he went indoors, and drew the water for his +bath with that consolation.</p> + +<p>Meat for the second time that day! Carlton began to feel a man. He paced +his study with the old rapid step; and he determined to order and +arrange his day's work so that the muscles should relieve each other in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_134" id="Page_134">[Pg 134]</a></span> +gangs: varied exertions; that was the principle of all continuous +labour. You cannot sit down to rest when you are working hard; but you +can do something else. Carlton never rested till he went to bed. But +this evening he sat down at his desk.</p> + +<p>A sheet of sermon paper was ruled in six columns and a margin; the +columns were headed by the days of the week; down the margin the days +were divided into three periods, a short and two long; it was the +class-room chart of his school-days over again. In future he would rise +at five; four was too early. The short period before breakfast should be +daily devoted to work in the house. The place must be made and kept +habitably clean; that could be left partly to the wet days. Then there +was the kitchen work, the preparation of food for the day, baking two +days a week, the occasional slaughter of a sheep; and here Carlton +paused to grapple with the appalling problem presented by the hungriest +of living men and the smallest of slain sheep . . . Salt seemed the +solution . . . Salt mutton? . . . At any rate all carnal cares and +menial duties should be disposed of for the day as early as possible in +the early morning; not till then would he break his fast; and the real +day's work should begin as near eight o'clock as might be, but as often +as possible on the right side of the hour. Moreover, it should begin +with the lighter labour: scraping and repointing the uncondemned walls, +for example; that would take one man weeks or months; but it would not +tire him out at the beginning of the day. Then there was the preparation +of the stones; the careful scraping of those preserved; classification +as to size for the various courses;<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_135" id="Page_135">[Pg 135]</a></span> cutting and fitting of fresh +stones; the actual building with trowel and plummet. All this went under +one head, and was for the body of the day; a long spell broken by a good +meal and a determined rest. The day should finish, for many a day to +come, with a savage attack upon the chaos within the walls. A hand too +tired for skilled labour would still be fit for that.</p> + +<p>And as Robert Carlton reached this stage in the laying of his ingenious +plans, he leaned back in his chair, and stared at his dull reflection in +the diamond panes above his writing table, in a sudden horror of himself +and all his ways and works. He was actually happy—he! The reaction was +the same in kind as that which had come to him at the shed, in the joy +of touching hammer and chisel again, and which had driven him to the +hall next morning. But it was greater in degree: for then he had seen +how happy he might be; to-night he knew how happy he was.</p> + +<p>"But only in my work! Only in my work!" he cried, and fell upon his +knees to crave forgiveness from the Almighty for daring to enjoy the +consolation which He had ordained for him.</p> + +<p>The artist was dead in Carlton for that night. He rose a very miserable +sinner, every thought a whip for his poor spirit that had dared to come +to life without leave. He had committed deadly sin with deadliest +result; let him never forget it! He, God's servant——the morbid +rehearsal may be spared. But he did not spare himself. All the +aggravating circumstances were recalled, none that extenuated; all that +he had suffered he must needs suffer anew, slowly, deliberately, and in +due order; that he might not forget, that<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_136" id="Page_136">[Pg 136]</a></span> he might never forget again! +Now he was confessing to Musk, now to George Mellis; poor George, where +was he? Now they were breaking his windows, and now Tom Ivey was +refusing his hand. But at last he was before the bishop; that strong, +queer voice was croaking across the desk; and all at once the croak +ended, and the voice rang like a sovereign with words of refined gold.</p> + +<p>"Courage, brother! Pray without ceasing. Look forward, not back; do not +despair. Despair is the devil's best friend; better give way to deadly +sin than to deadlier despair!"</p> + +<p>And he prayed again; but not in the house.</p> + +<p>"For I will look forward," he said as he went. "But let me never again +forget!"</p> + +<p>There was neither wind nor moon. The sparrows were still, but not the +shrill little swifts. And somewhere a thrush was singing, clear and +mellow and certain as a bell; and once a bat's wing brushed the bowed +bare head of him who prayed not for forgiveness but for the peace of a +soul; for neither was it in the ruins that Robert Carlton knelt once +more.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_137" id="Page_137">[Pg 137]</a></span></p> + +<h2 class="newchapter"><a name="CHAPTER_XIV" id="CHAPTER_XIV"></a>XIV<br /> +<span class="smalltext">THE LAST RESORT</span></h2> + + +<p>Carlton chose a fresh stone from the heap; he was going to begin all +over again. He got it in his arms, and he managed to stagger with it to +the front of the shed. The stone was at least two feet long, and its +other dimensions were about half that of the length; as Carlton set it +down, himself all but on the top of it, he trusted it was the largest +size in the heap. It was of a rich reddish yellow, roughly rectangular, +but lumpy as ill-made porridge, exactly as it had come from the quarry. +Carlton tilted it up against a smaller stone, smooth enough in parts, +but palpably untrue in its planes and angles. This was the stone that he +had been all day spoiling; it had been as big as the new one that +morning, when he had begun upon it with a view to the lower eleven-inch +courses; and now he had failed to make even a six-inch job of it. The +stone was so soft. It cut like cheese. But he was not going to spoil +another.</p> + +<p>So he rested a minute before beginning again, and he marshalled his +tools upon a barrow within reach of his hand. It was rather late on the +Saturday afternoon. In the morning he had felt disinclined for violent +exertion, but just equal to trying his hand at that stone-dressing which +would presently become his chief<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_138" id="Page_138">[Pg 138]</a></span> labour; and his hand had disappointed +him. It had the wrong kind of cunning: as amateurs will, Carlton had +picked up his fancy craft at the fancy end: gargoyles were his +specialty, and an even surface beyond him.</p> + +<p>"But I can learn," he had been saying all day; and most times the dog +had wagged his tail.</p> + +<p>Ten minutes ago his tone had changed.</p> + +<p>"I'll start afresh! I'll do one to-night! I won't be beaten!"</p> + +<p>And that time Glen had leapt up with his master, and lashed his shins +with his tail, as much as to say, "Beaten? Not you!" and had accompanied +him to the heap, and was pretending to rest with him now. But Carlton +was constitutionally impatient of conscious rest; and this afternoon +certain sounds, louder though less incessant than those of his constant +comrades, the bees and birds, informed him that the Boys' Friendly were +not too proud to use the far strip of glebe land which the rector had +levelled for them last year. The discovery made him glad. But it also +brought him to his feet within the minute that he had promised himself; +and the hammer rang swift blows on the cold-chisel as much to drown the +music of bat and ball as to clear the grosser irregularities from one +surface of the stone.</p> + +<p>This done (and this much he had done successfully enough before), hammer +and cold-chisel were thrown aside, and the marbling-hammer taken up, +because Tom Ivey had always used it to make the rough sufficiently +smooth. But it is a mongrel implement at best, being hammer and chisel +in one, with changeable bits<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_139" id="Page_139">[Pg 139]</a></span> like a brace, and yet with less of these +than of the pickaxe in its cross-bred composition. Like a pick you wield +it, yet lightly and with the one and only curve, or at a stroke you go +too deep.</p> + +<p>Chip, chip, chip went the sharp seven-eighths-of-an-inch bit; and off +curved the soft yellow flakes, to turn to powder as they fell.</p> + +<p>Chip, chip, chip along the top; and the keen bit left its mark each +time; and the finished row of these was like the key-board of a toy +piano.</p> + +<p>Chip, chip, chip, always from left to right, a tier below, and then the +tier below that. The toy piano is becoming a toy organ of many manuals; +and the hue of the keys is not that of the rough outer surface: as they +first see the light they are nearer the colour of cigar-ash.</p> + +<p>Chip, chip, chip—chip, chip, chip; but <i>swish</i>, <i>swish</i>, <i>swish</i> is a +thought nearer the sound. So soft that stone, so sharp that bit, so +timorous and tentative the unpractised strokes of Robert Carlton!</p> + +<p>Every now and then he would stop, and anxiously apply a straight lath to +the spreading smoothness; but he was improving, and in the end the plane +was at least as true as it was smooth. The key-marks of the +marbling-hammer were not always parallel or of even length, and the rows +declined from left to right like the hand of a weak writer: "bad +batting," Tom Ivey would have called it, a "bat" being the mark in +question, and long, even bats, "straight along the stone," the mason's +ideal, as the inquisitive amateur had discovered the first day Ivey +worked for him. But knowledge and skill lie a gulf apart, and on the +whole<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_140" id="Page_140">[Pg 140]</a></span> Carlton felt encouraged. He had done but one side of four, but +the one was smooth enough to face the world as coursed rubble; let him +but get and keep his angles, and the other three would matter less. So +now he took the straight-edge, as the lath was called, and the bit of +black slate which Tom had also left behind him; and with these and the +mason's square a rectangular parallelogram with eleven-inch ends was +duly ruled on the satisfactory surface. Hammer and cold-chisel again. +Much use of the square, but no more play with the marbling-hammer. No +need to perfect the parts doomed to mortar and eternal night; rough +criss-cross work with a mason's axe is the thing for them; as Carlton +knew when he rather reluctantly applied himself to the mastery of that +implement, just as he was beginning to acquire some proficiency with the +other. The mason's axe was the most treacherous of them all. It was a +hand pickaxe with a point like a stiletto; a touch, and the steel lay +buried. But it was the right tool to use, and Carlton used it to the +best of his ability, stooping more and more over his work as the light +began to fail him.</p> + +<p>He was going to succeed at last! If only he had not lost so much time! +Then he might have mixed some mortar and laid the first stone of his own +cutting—the first stone of the new church! That would have been +something like a day's work; yet he was not dissatisfied with his +progress. Swish, swish, swish; he might have done much worse. He had +pulled down the bad walls—swish—and what was good of them—swish—he +had saved and there they were. He looked up, the perspiration standing +thick upon his white fore<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_141" id="Page_141">[Pg 141]</a></span>head, his eyes all eagerness and +determination. He stood upright to rest a moment in the mellow +light—happy again! Happy because he had not time to think of himself, +but only of what he was doing, and of what he felt certain he could do: +happy in his aching limbs and soaking flannels, and all that with a +happiness he was for once not destined to realise and to check. For, +even as he stood, Glen barked, and Carlton turned in time to see the +village constable tuck his cane under his arm while he stood still to +feel in his pockets. The man was in full uniform—a strange circumstance +in itself.</p> + +<p>"Good evening, Frost," said Mr. Carlton.</p> + +<p>"Evenin', sir."</p> + +<p>The constable was an imposing figure of a man, with a handsome stupid +face, and a stolid deliberation of word and deed which gave an +impression of artless but indefatigable vigilance. In reality the fellow +had few inferiors in the parish.</p> + +<p>"For me?" and Carlton held out his hand as the other produced a paper.</p> + +<p>"For you an' me," said the constable, winking as he kept the paper to +himself. And in an impressive voice he read out a warrant for the +apprehension of the Reverend Robert Carlton, Clerk in Holy Orders, on a +charge of unlawfully and maliciously setting fire to the parish church +of Long Stow, in the County of Suffolk, on the night of the 24th or the +morning of the 25th June, in the year of grace 1882; the warrant was +signed by two justices—Sir Wilton Gleed of Long Stow Hall, and Canon +Wilders of Lakenhall.</p> + +<p>"Like to see it for yourself?" inquired Frost.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_142" id="Page_142">[Pg 142]</a></span>"No, thank you; that's quite enough for me. Well, upon my word!"</p> + +<p>And Carlton stood staring into space, a glitter in his eyes, a smile +upon his lips, incapable of unmixed indignation: really, Sir Wilton was +a better fighter than he had supposed.</p> + +<p>"You will have to come with me to Lakenhall," said the constable's +voice.</p> + +<p>Carlton realised the situation.</p> + +<p>"To-night?"</p> + +<p>"At once, sir, if <i>you</i> please. They've sent a trap for us from +Lakenhall. That's waiting at the gate."</p> + +<p>The mason's axe was still in his hand, the unfinished stone at his feet. +Carlton looked wistfully from one to the other, and thence in appeal to +the officer of the law.</p> + +<p>"I say, Frost, is there any hurry for a quarter of an hour? I'd—I'd +give a sovereign to finish this stone!"</p> + +<p>Virtue blazed in the constable's face.</p> + +<p>"You don't bribe <i>me</i>, sir!" he cried. "I'm ashamed of you, I am, for +tryin' that on! No, Mr. Carlton, you've got to come straight away."</p> + +<p>"But surely I may change first?"</p> + +<p>"You'll have to be quick, and I'll have to come with you."</p> + +<p>"Is that necessary?" asked Carlton with some heat, as he flung his tools +under cover.</p> + +<p>"That's left to me, sir, and I don't trust no gentleman in his +dressing-room. My orders are to take you alive, Mr. Carlton."</p> + +<p>Carlton was upon him in two strides.</p> + +<p>"Very well," said he, "you shall; and you shall<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_143" id="Page_143">[Pg 143]</a></span> come upstairs and see +me change. But address another word to me at your peril!"</p> + +<p>A small crowd had collected at the gate; a Lakenhall policeman was +waiting in the trap. Carlton came down the drive with his long coat +flying and his head thrown back. Somehow he was allowed to depart +without a groan.</p> + +<p>On the way he never spoke, and something kept the constables from +speaking before him. They had a slow horse; it was nearly an hour before +Carlton saw the inside of a police-station for the first time in his +life. Here he was formally charged by a portly inspector with whom he +had some slight acquaintance; the charge concluded with the usual +warning that anything he said might be given in evidence against him.</p> + +<p>"I hear," said Carlton. "And now?"</p> + +<p>The inspector shrugged his personal regret.</p> + +<p>"I'm afraid there's only one thing for it now, sir."</p> + +<p>"The cells, eh?"</p> + +<p>"That's it, Mr. Carlton."</p> + +<p>"Till when?"</p> + +<p>"Monday morning, sir, the magistrates sit."</p> + +<p>"Lead the way, then," said Carlton. "I can spend my Sunday in gaol as +well as in my own rectory."</p> + +<p>His eye was stern but steady; he was filled with contempt, but without a +fear. He knew who was at the bottom of this charge, and had begun by +quite admiring the man's resource; but his admiration did not survive a +second thought. What a fool the fellow must be! No fool like an old +fool, said the proverb; and none so insanely reckless as your prudent +people, once they lose their head, thought Robert Carlton in his cell.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_144" id="Page_144">[Pg 144]</a></span> +Of the charge itself he scarcely condescended to think at all; for to +his mind, the more innocent on that score for his guilt upon another, +the thing seemed more preposterous than it really was. He burn the +church! With what object, pray? And what did they suppose he had risked +his life for at the fire? Remorse, or show? He could have laughed; he +was unable to imagine a shred of evidence against himself.</p> + +<p>There was a Testament on the table, but he had brought his Bible in his +pocket; and by the gas-jet in its wire guard, that striped the walls +with lean shadows like the bars of some wild beast's cage, Robert +Carlton forgot his own sins, persecution and imprisonment, in those of +his hero St. Paul; and was in another world when the rattle of a key +brought him back to this. It was the fat inspector himself, with good +news on his face, and in his hand the card of Canon Wilders, Rector of +Lakenhall and chairman of the local bench.</p> + +<p>"He doesn't want to see me, does he?" said Carlton, in plain alarm.</p> + +<p>"If you've no objection to seeing him, sir."</p> + +<p>"But he was one of those who signed the warrant! Tell him I can't see +anybody. Thank him very much. Say that I appreciate his kindness, but +would prefer to be alone."</p> + +<p>In a few minutes the man returned.</p> + +<p>"That's a pity you won't see the canon, sir; he don't half like it. He +couldn't help signing the warrant, not in his position; that seem to me +to be the very reason why he come the minute he heard we had you here; +and it's my opinion he'd like to see you out of custody."</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_145" id="Page_145">[Pg 145]</a></span>"You mean on bail?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, sir."</p> + +<p>"Because I'm a clergyman, and it's a disgrace to the cloth!"</p> + +<p>This explanation was a sudden idea impulsively expressed; but the +inspector's face was its tacit confirmation.</p> + +<p>"Is he here still?" demanded the prisoner.</p> + +<p>"Yes, sir, he is."</p> + +<p>"You can say I've been taken on a false and abominable charge," cried +Carlton, "and I don't want my liberty till the falsehood's proved! But I +am equally obliged to Canon Wilders," he added with less scorn, "and you +will kindly tell him so with my compliments."</p> + +<p>But he paced his cell in a curious twitter for one who had entered it +without a qualm. In all his trouble this was the first word from a +clerical neighbour: to a man they had stood aloof from him in his shame. +His own movements were in part responsible: he had disappeared from +view. Nor had he expected or coveted their sympathy; yet, now that one +of them had come forward, Carlton was conscious of a wound he had not +felt before. There was Preston of Linkworth—but his wife would account +for him. There was Bosanquet of Bedingfield, and there were others. They +might have inquired at the infirmary (Preston had), but he had never +heard of it. As for Wilders, he was a worthy man of local mark, for whom +Carlton had preached upon occasion; one prosperous alike in worldly +welfare and in spiritual satisfaction; the last person to go into +disgrace; and yet, by reason of a certain<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_146" id="Page_146">[Pg 146]</a></span> officiousness of character, +the first to come forward as he had done. Carlton had no wish to be +ungracious or ungrateful, or to make a personal matter of the signing of +the warrant; but he could not face his fellows with this new charge +hanging over him, nor was he going free by the favour of living man. On +the other hand, he pondered more upon his brother clergymen that +Saturday night in gaol than in all these eight weeks past. And the sense +of mere social downfall, the dullest of his aches hitherto, became +suddenly acute, so that for that alone he wished they had not put him in +prison. But for all the rest he cared as little as before, and showed as +little interest in the pending event.</p> + +<p>His indifference quite troubled the inspector, who evinced a desire to +show the prisoner every possible consideration, and was an early visitor +next morning.</p> + +<p>"That ain't no business of mine, sir; but you'll be wanting to see a +solicitor during the day?"</p> + +<p>"Why so?" asked Carlton.</p> + +<p>"Well, sir, your case will come up to-morrow morning."</p> + +<p>"But what do I want with a solicitor?"</p> + +<p>"Why, sir, every pris—that is, accused——"</p> + +<p>The inspector boggled at the word, and stood confounded by the other's +density.</p> + +<p>"Oh, I see!" cried Carlton. "So you're thinking of my defence, are you? +Thanks very much, but I don't want a lawyer to defend me. I make your +side a present of the lawyers, Mr. Inspector; they'll want them all. +It's for them to prove me guilty, not for me to prove my innocence."</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_147" id="Page_147">[Pg 147]</a></span>"And do you really think we have no case against you?" inquired the +inspector, with a change of tone, for he happened to have charge of the +case himself.</p> + +<p>"I don't think about it," returned Carlton, with unaffected +indifference. "The thing's too preposterous to be worth a thought."</p> + +<p>"I'm glad you find it so," said the other, nettled; "let's hope you +won't change your mind. I only spoke for your own good; there's plenty +would blame me for speaking at all. I won't trouble you no more, sir. I +might have known I'd get no thanks, after the way you served Canon +Wilders last night. Defend yourself, and let's see you do it!"</p> + +<p>The door shut with a clang, and Carlton watched the vibrations in some +distress. He was sorry to hurt the feelings of his would-be friends, but +he needed no man's friendship in the present crisis. God would be his +friend; his faith in Him was as profound as his contempt of the false +charge hanging over himself. The latter, he felt convinced, must break +down as it deserved; but if not, then the meaning would be clear. It +would mean that he had not been punished sufficiently for what he had +done, and must accordingly be prepared to suffer something for that +which he had not done, but of which his sin had indubitably caused the +doing. And Robert Carlton was so prepared in his heart of hearts. Yet he +was unable to carry his pious fatalism to its logical conclusion, and to +abate his bitterness against the human instruments of a vengeance he was +willing to think Divine.</p> + +<p>On the contrary, he condescended at intervals of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_148" id="Page_148">[Pg 148]</a></span> the day to give his +mind to the proceedings of the next; and he did recall one or two +circumstances which prejudice and malice might twist against him. To +consider these was to be instantly inspired with a conclusive reply on +every point; but Carlton was not sure whether the law would permit him +to reply at all. So in the afternoon he begged for newspapers, and his +request, though acceded to, was all over Lakenhall by nightfall. A +suspended clergyman who thought so little of his notorious sins that he +could ask for newspapers on a Sunday afternoon! The inference drawn by a +small community, greatly excited about the case, and unconsciously +anxious to believe the worst of one who was bad enough at best, will be +readily imagined. The whole town shook its head.</p> + +<p>Meanwhile the object of popular detestation was comparatively happy in +the exercise of his receptive powers. By good luck his bundle of +provincial newspapers contained that which can only be met with in a +local press: a verbatim report of the police-court proceedings in a +painful case of infinitesimal interest to the world at large. The +interest, however, was all-absorbing to Robert Carlton. The accused had +been represented by a solicitor. The solicitor had fought his case +tooth-and-nail. There had been certain "scenes in court"; all were +reported in the local paper, and no point involved was lost upon the +alert brain of the imprisoned clergyman. It was with difficulty that he +dismissed the subject from his mind when the church-bells rang once more +through the quiet country town. It happened, however, that the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_149" id="Page_149">[Pg 149]</a></span> parish +church was quite near the police-court; and in the morning Carlton had +been enabled to follow the whole service, partly through knowing it by +heart, partly from the strains of hymn or psalm that reached him at due +intervals through the grated window: and ever since then he had been +looking forward to evensong. So now when first the bells ceased, and +then the voluntary, the prisoner presently rehearsed the exhortation (in +silence) on his feet, the general confession (half aloud) upon his +knees; then followed the psalms, also from memory, his lips moving, his +hands folded; then knelt again to pray the prayers. And his eyes were as +earnest, his attitude as reverent, and even certain gestures as +punctilious, as though he were back in his church that had been burnt, +instead of lying in gaol for burning it.</p> + +<p>The August evening came early to its close; a little while the new moon +glimmered in the cell; then the organ pealed the people out of church, +and a few steps passed that way, and a few voices floated in through the +bars, before all was quiet in the little old town. And Robert Carlton +thought no more that night upon his enemies, and took no further heed +for the morrow.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_150" id="Page_150">[Pg 150]</a></span></p> + +<h2 class="newchapter"><a name="CHAPTER_XV" id="CHAPTER_XV"></a>XV<br /> +<span class="smalltext">HIS OWN LAWYER</span></h2> + + +<p>Canon Wilders was supported by Mr. Preston, of Linkworth, and by a +youthful justice whom Robert Carlton did not know by name, but who sat +like the graven image of Rhadamanthus, encased in the atrocious trousers +and the excruciating collar of the year 1882.</p> + +<p>Considering the romantic interest of the case, this was by no means "a +full bench"; there were, however, some conspicuous and deliberate +absentees, including Sir Wilton Gleed and Dr. Marigold. Carlton was less +surprised at his enemy's abstinence than at the position voluntarily +occupied by James Preston, an indolent cleric but genial gentleman, who +had been his friend. His surprise deepened when Preston nodded to him, +hastily enough, and with a change of colour, but yet in a way that +thrilled Carlton with a doubt as to whether he had altogether lost that +friend. He was in no such suspense concerning the stately chairman, who +very properly looked at the prisoner as though he had never seen him +before, and never addressed him without tuning his voice to the proper +pitch of distant disapproval. This was not a question of losing a +friend, but of having made an enemy of the most potent personage in the +court.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_151" id="Page_151">[Pg 151]</a></span>The latter was densely crowded when the stout inspector opened the case, +but the familiar faces stood out in quick succession, and they were not +a few. In a doorway apart stood a Long Stow trio—the saddler, the +sexton, and Tom Ivey; all three were in their Sunday clothes, and more +or less visibly ill at ease; but it was only Ivey who reddened and +looked away when the prisoner caught his eye. As for Carlton, he became +so lost in sudden and absorbing speculation that it was some minutes +before he realised that the inspector had finished a bald brief +statement of his case, and that a witness was already in the box and +giving evidence. The witness, however, was only Frost, the village +constable, and his evidence merely that of the arrest on the Saturday at +Long Stow. Carlton nevertheless whipped out his pocket-book, and the +witness waited before standing down.</p> + +<p>"May I ask him two or three questions?" said the prisoner, addressing +himself with courtesy to the bench.</p> + +<p>"As many as you please," replied the chairman, "provided they are +relevant."</p> + +<p>Carlton bowed before turning to the witness.</p> + +<p>"How far were you responsible for the warrant on which you arrested me?"</p> + +<p>"Re-spon-si-ble!" exclaimed the chairman in separate syllables. "What do +you mean?"</p> + +<p>"I wish to ascertain exactly in what measure the witness has been +concerned in trumping up this charge against me."</p> + +<p>"That is not the language in which to inquire!"</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_152" id="Page_152">[Pg 152]</a></span>"Your worships may discover that it is exceedingly mild language, before +the case is over."</p> + +<p>"I shall not allow you to cross-examine witnesses unless you do so with +due respect to the bench."</p> + +<p>The clerk to the justices, who had examined the witness, was the means +of averting an immediate scene.</p> + +<p>"I think, your worship, that he wishes to know whether the witness laid +the information against him."</p> + +<p>"I thank you," said Carlton, an incredible twinkle in his eye, as he +again turned to the witness. "I do desire to ask you, with due respect +to the bench, whether you 'laid this information' against me, or whether +you did not?"</p> + +<p>"I did," said Frost.</p> + +<p>"Before whom did you 'lay' it?"</p> + +<p>"The magistrate."</p> + +<p>"What magistrate?"</p> + +<p>"Sir Wilton Gleed."</p> + +<p>"And when?"</p> + +<p>"Last Friday."</p> + +<p>"The date, please!"</p> + +<p>"That would be the 18th."</p> + +<p>"The 18th of August! And the church was burnt on the morning of the 25th +of June! How is it that it took you eight weeks all but two days to 'lay +your information' against me?"</p> + +<p>The witness looked confused; but the chairman was quick to interpose; he +had been waiting his opportunity.</p> + +<p>"That may or may not transpire in the evidence,"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_153" id="Page_153">[Pg 153]</a></span> said he; "it is in +either event an absolutely inadmissible question, and I should strongly +recommend you to employ a solicitor. If you like I will adjourn the +court for half-an-hour while you instruct one; but I will not have the +time of the court wasted by irrelevant and inadmissible questions such +as you seem inclined to put. If you have nothing better to ask the +witness I shall order him to stand down."</p> + +<p>"Let him stand down," returned the prisoner, indifferently. "I have done +with him."</p> + +<p>Robert Carlton had surprised himself. He had come into court with the +most admirable intentions that it was possible to entertain: he was to +have kept cool but humble, to have curbed his contempt of proceedings +conducted (if not instituted) in the best of good faith, and never for +an instant to have forgotten his guilt of sin in his innocence of crime. +In this spirit he had risen from his knees that morning, and with this +resolve he had left his cell and been ushered into court; but the very +atmosphere of the place had made the blood sing in his veins; and it +needed but the chairman's voice to make it boil. He had sinned, and +chosen to suffer for his sin: so no crime was too dastardly to lay at +his door. He was down, and deservedly down, so friends and acquaintances +alike must gather and conspire to trample him. Carlton's point of view +went round like a weathercock in the wind; flesh and blood flew to the +front, in despite of spirit; and all the man in him rebelled at man's +injustice, in despite of his prayers.</p> + +<p>So when the next witness was being sworn (it<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_154" id="Page_154">[Pg 154]</a></span> was his own sexton), and +James Preston whispered to Canon Wilders, the man who had preached for +both of them looked on grimly.</p> + +<p>"As you seem bent upon conducting your own case," said Wilders, leaning +back, "you may possibly prefer a chair at the table; if so, there is one +at your disposal." And he pointed into the well of the court.</p> + +<p>Carlton thanked him in the voice that all his will could not purge of +all its scorn; he was perfectly comfortable where he was. Then he looked +pointedly at Preston, and his face and tone softened together. "But I +shall not forget the suggestion," he said; and again his friend changed +colour.</p> + +<p>The decrepit hero of the overweening hallucination had hobbled into the +witness-box meanwhile. Carlton had not come in contact with him since +the morning before the fire, and he little thought that his last +conversation with the sexton was about to come up in evidence against +him. Yet such was the case.</p> + +<p>Old Busby had been responsible for the lighting of the church. He had +kept the paraffin and filled the lamps. But in the month of June the +lamps were rarely needed. They had not been lighted on the Sunday before +the fire. There would have been even less occasion for them—by one +minute—the following Sunday. And yet, on the Saturday morning, the +prisoner had ordered the witness to see that the lamps were full!</p> + +<p>So Busby deposed; and the point seemed of sinister significance. It took +the prisoner plainly by surprise: the circumstance had escaped his +memory.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_155" id="Page_155">[Pg 155]</a></span> In a minute, however, he had recalled it in detail; and his +cross-examination, though provocative of some mirth, and curtailed in +consequence, was by no means ineffectual.</p> + +<p>"You remember when the lamps went out, through your neglect, in the +middle of even-song?"</p> + +<p>"I'm like to remember it. That was when I swallowed the frog."</p> + +<p>The court laughed, but not the prisoner, who was too much in earnest +even to smile.</p> + +<p>"I reminded you pretty often about the lamps after that?"</p> + +<p>"Ay, you were for ever at me about 'em."</p> + +<p>"Now, on the morning you mention, where was I when I told you to go and +fill the lamps?"</p> + +<p>The sexton thought.</p> + +<p>"In your study, sir."</p> + +<p>"And what were you doing there? Do you remember?"</p> + +<p>"I do that! I was telling you about the frog."</p> + +<p>This time the prisoner smiled himself.</p> + +<p>"And did I listen to you?" he demanded, a sudden change upon his face, +as though the act of smiling had put him in pain.</p> + +<p>"No, that you didn't," the old man grumbled; "you fared as though you +didn't hear."</p> + +<p>"So I told you to go away and fill your lamps," said Carlton, sadly, +"even though it was Midsummer Day! I have finished with the witness."</p> + +<p>He was as one who had brilliantly parried a deadly thrust, and yet +received a secret wound in the onset. He rested his head upon his hand +to hide his pain,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_156" id="Page_156">[Pg 156]</a></span> and only raised it at the sound of James Preston's +voice putting the first question from the bench:</p> + +<p>"As sexton, did you keep the key of the church?"</p> + +<p>"In the old days I did, sir; but that's been open church ever since Mr. +Carlton come."</p> + +<p>"You mean that the church was open day and night?"</p> + +<p>"To be sure it was."</p> + +<p>"Thank you," said Preston hastily, as though glad to relapse into +silence. Carlton did not add to his embarrassment by a glance, but his +heart throbbed with gratitude for the goodwill he could no longer +question.</p> + +<p>"<i>Did</i> you fill the lamps?" asked the chairman as the witness was +preparing to hobble from the box.</p> + +<p>"Yes, sir, I did."</p> + +<p>And, watching the chairman's face, Carlton was still more thankful to +have one friend upon the bench; for it seemed to him that the young +gentleman in the tall collar and the tight trousers was alone in +preserving a Rhadamanthine impartiality.</p> + +<p>What surprised him equally was the strength and the nature of the +evidence produced. In his complete innocence of the crime imputed to +him, he had been unable to conceive or to recall a single incriminating +circumstance not susceptible of an easy and immediate explanation. Yet +more than one arose during the afternoon, when first the saddler, and +afterwards Tom Ivey, went into the box to bear witness against him; and +more than once the explanation, so full and clear in his own mind, was +incapable of confirmation or admission in the form of evidence.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_157" id="Page_157">[Pg 157]</a></span> The +more striking instances were afforded by Fuller, whose testimony, though +convincing enough, and not the less so for its real or apparent +reluctance, came as a complete surprise to the prisoner. It appeared +that the saddler had returned to the rectory on the fatal night, more +than an hour after his first visit and summary dismissal, in order to +have his "say," and "not let the reverend have it all his own way." The +midnight visitor had found a light in the study, but the door shut, and +only the dog within. He had not entered, but had waited about the drive, +till, seeing a light in the church, he had made up his mind that "the +reverend" was there, and had decided not to interrupt him. So the +saddler had gone home and to bed, and was fast asleep when the +church-bells sounded the alarm.</p> + +<p>"And what made you so sure that it was Mr. Carlton in the church with +the light?" inquired Mr. Preston.</p> + +<p>"Because I couldn't find him in the rectory."</p> + +<p>"But you did not go in?"</p> + +<p>"I knocked and called, but I only made the dog bark."</p> + +<p>The chairman leaned forward in his turn.</p> + +<p>"Was the barking loud?" he asked. "Loud enough to be heard all over the +house?"</p> + +<p>Carlton sprang to his feet. He had been accommodated with a chair, of +which he had quietly availed himself during the examination of this +witness, and the suddenness of his movement brought all eyes to his +face. It was quick with impatience and sarcastic disregard.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_158" id="Page_158">[Pg 158]</a></span>"If you are labouring to prove that I was not at my house, but in the +church," he cried, "your worship may save himself the time and trouble. +I was in the church. I lit one of the lamps."</p> + +<p>This did not strike the prisoner as the sensational statement that it +was; he was therefore amazed at its effect upon the bench, where even +Rhadamanthus came to life, while James Preston opened eyes of horror, +and Wilders whispered to the clerk.</p> + +<p>"That," said the chairman, "is an extremely serious statement, and one +that you are surely ill-advised in making. It is not evidence, but it is +being taken down in writing, and may be given in evidence against you at +your trial. I should certainly advise you to refrain from further +statements of the kind."</p> + +<p>"I thought you wanted to get at the truth?"</p> + +<p>"So we do. But I have warned you. Have you any questions to ask the +witness?"</p> + +<p>"Not one; he is equally correct in his statements and his suppositions."</p> + +<p>Thomas Ivey was then sworn, amid the hush of deepening interest, and +gave his evidence in a manly, straightforward, level-headed fashion, +that added its own weight to what he said for good or ill; and his +testimony told both ways. He described the scene in the church on his +arrival; the character of the fire, and the attitude of Mr. Carlton; +both of which, he admitted (in answer to a question from the chairman), +had struck him as suspicious at the first glance.</p> + +<p>"But did you see him <i>do</i> anything that you thought suspicious?" asked +the well-meaning Mr. Preston.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_159" id="Page_159">[Pg 159]</a></span>"I did, sir."</p> + +<p>"What was that?" from the chairman.</p> + +<p>"He threw something into the flames. But I couldn't see what that was."</p> + +<p>"Did you afterwards find out?"</p> + +<p>"No, sir."</p> + +<p>Once more the prisoner attracted every eye. It was felt that he would +make another of his reckless and voluntary declarations. But this time +he was silent enough; and though the evidence now took a turn in his +favour, that silence left its mark.</p> + +<p>Everybody knew how the clergyman had risked his life, when it was too +late, to save the church. But the story had not yet been told as Mr. +Preston contrived to elicit it from the lips of Tom Ivey. The Rector of +Linkworth had been from home when the fire took place. There was nothing +unnatural in his desire for details, nor did he put an improper +question. The chairman, however, betrayed more than a little impatience, +while the junior justice, on the other hand, displayed excitement of +another kind, and actually put in his word at last.</p> + +<p>"Do you mean to say you let him throw the water single-handed," said he, +"while the rest of you stayed outside?"</p> + +<p>"There was no stopping him, sir," said Ivey. "He would have all the +danger to himself."</p> + +<p>"Then you could not see what use he made of the water?" suggested the +chairman, dryly.</p> + +<p>"No, sir," said Tom; "I could only see the steam." And his tone was +still more dry.</p> + +<p>Wilders looked at the clock as the examination<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_160" id="Page_160">[Pg 160]</a></span> concluded. The case had +not been taken till the afternoon; it was now nearly five. Wilders +beckoned and spoke to the inspector, subsequently addressing the +prisoner in his coldest tone.</p> + +<p>"I understand that this is the last witness to be called against you," +said he. "Do you propose to cross-examine him?"</p> + +<p>"I do."</p> + +<p>"And may I ask if you have any witnesses to call for your defence?"</p> + +<p>"I may have one."</p> + +<p>"Then it becomes my duty to adjourn the case." He whispered again to the +inspector, and at greater length with his colleagues, James Preston +appearing tenacious of some point upon which the chairman ultimately +gave way. "As the police have completed their case," continued Wilders, +"a remand of one day will be sufficient, and we shall simply adjourn +until to-morrow morning. But you may, if you like, apply for bail; +though the question, having due regard to the evidence which we have +heard, is one that would now require our grave consideration."</p> + +<p>"You may spare yourselves the trouble," said Carlton shortly. "I don't +want bail."</p> + +<p>And he went back to prison to lament his temper, but not to go through +the form of further prayer for patience and humility; for he felt that +these were beyond him in that public court, packed with prejudice from +door to door.</p> + +<p>"I told you what he'd say," grumbled Wilders in the retiring-room.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_161" id="Page_161">[Pg 161]</a></span>"I don't blame him," said Mr. Preston. "My dear sir, he's innocent of +this!"</p> + +<p>"I shall form <i>my</i> opinion to-morrow," returned the canon, with dignity. +"Meanwhile I confess to some curiosity as to whom he thinks of calling +as his witness."</p> + +<p>"The chappie shows us sport," quoth Rhadamanthus, "guilty or not guilty; +and I'm not giving odds either way."</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_162" id="Page_162">[Pg 162]</a></span></p> + +<h2 class="newchapter"><a name="CHAPTER_XVI" id="CHAPTER_XVI"></a>XVI<br /> +<span class="smalltext">END OF THE DUEL</span></h2> + + +<p>Rhadamanthus reappeared without a visible garment that he had worn the +day before. He came spurred and breeched from the saddle, with a +horseshoe pin in his snowy tie, a more human collar, and a keener front +for the proceedings withal. Carlton felt his eye upon him from the +first, and returned the compliment by taking a new interest in the +nameless youth; he had long read the minds of the other two; his fate +was in this young fellow's keeping. He had no time, however, for idle +speculation as to the result. Tom Ivey was back in the witness-box, and +the accused was invited to cross-examine without delay.</p> + +<p>Carlton soon showed that the interval had enabled him to profit by the +experience of the previous day. His questions were cunningly prepared. +He began with one not easy to put in an admissible form, yet he +succeeded in so putting it.</p> + +<p>"You have sworn," said he, "that your very first glimpse of me in the +burning church was sufficient to create a certain suspicion in your +mind. Did you mention this suspicion to anybody—that night?"</p> + +<p>"Not that night."</p> + +<p>"That month?"</p> + +<p>"Nor yet that month, sir."</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_163" id="Page_163">[Pg 163]</a></span>"And why?"</p> + +<p>"I didn't suspect you any more, sir."</p> + +<p>Carlton tried hard to suppress his satisfaction, as a sensation to which +he was no longer entitled. He had come back to this in the night; but it +was harder to abide by it during the day. He paused a little, in honest +effort to rid his mind and tone of any taint of triumph; but his +advantage had to be pursued.</p> + +<p>"May I ask when this suspicion perished?"</p> + +<p>"Before we had been five minutes together, trying to save the church!"</p> + +<p>"You are getting upon dangerous ground," said the chairman. "What the +witness thought, or when he ceased to think it, is not evidence."</p> + +<p>"Another point, then," said Carlton: "do you remember the appearance of +the lamps?"</p> + +<p>"Yes."</p> + +<p>"What was it?"</p> + +<p>"They were crooked."</p> + +<p>"Did you notice any paraffin spilt about?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, when my attention was called to it."</p> + +<p>"Where was this paraffin?"</p> + +<p>"On the pews that were catching fire."</p> + +<p>"And who called your attention to it?"</p> + +<p>"You did yourself, sir."</p> + +<p>"I did myself!" repeated Carlton, struggling with his tone. "That will +do for that. I am going back for a moment to those suspicions of yours. +Have you never mentioned them to a human being?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, sir, I have."</p> + +<p>"As things of the past?"</p> + +<p>"As things of the past."</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_164" id="Page_164">[Pg 164]</a></span>"When was it that you first spoke of them?"</p> + +<p>"Last Friday—the eighteenth, sir."</p> + +<p>"And did you then speak of your own accord, or were you questioned?"</p> + +<p>"I was questioned."</p> + +<p>"As the first man to reach the burning church?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, sir."</p> + +<p>"Take care!" cried Wilders. "That was a leading question."</p> + +<p>"It is the last," replied Carlton. "I have finished with the witness. I +would take this opportunity, however, of apologising to your worships +for the various errors and excesses which I have committed, and may +still commit, in my ignorance and inexperience of the law, and my +indignation at the charge. In this respect, and this alone, I crave the +indulgence of the bench, and beg leave to rectify one of my mistakes. I +spoke in haste when I said, yesterday, that I had no questions to ask +the witness Fuller. I desire, with your worships' permission, to have +that witness recalled."</p> + +<p>The chairman was rather sharp: subsequent evidence might make the recall +of witnesses a necessity, but the lost opportunities of counsel, or of +accused persons conducting their own defence, were an altogether +insufficient reason. However, the man was in court, and the application +would be allowed.</p> + +<p>"I appreciate the privilege," said Carlton, "and promise that it shall +not detain us many moments."</p> + +<p>He was becoming as fluent and adroit as a past practitioner; in the +pauses of the fight he felt ashamed of his facility, a haunting sense +that it was indecent<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_165" id="Page_165">[Pg 165]</a></span> in him to defend himself at all. Yet he was one +against many; and, in this matter, an innocent man. Fight he must, and +that with all the skill and spirit in his power. His liberty, his +self-respect; his one remaining chance, object, and desire in life; nay, +his very life itself was at stake with these. It was no time for +dwelling upon the past. The sin that he had committed was one thing; the +crime that he had not committed was another. It was his duty to be just +to himself. Yet this was how he treated himself, whenever he had time to +think! He resolved to give himself fairer play than he seemed likely to +receive at the hands of others; and his resolve declared itself in the +ringing voice that shocked not a few who heard it, having found him +guilty already in their hearts.</p> + +<p>"About that very story of the empty rectory and the light in the +church," he began, with Fuller—"about that perfectly true story," he +added, wilfully, "which you told us yesterday. Did you tell it to +anybody at the time?"</p> + +<p>"Only Tom Ivey."</p> + +<p>"Why only to him?"</p> + +<p>"He asked me to keep that to myself."</p> + +<p>"And did you?"</p> + +<p>"I did my best, sir, but that slipped out one day when I was talking +to——"</p> + +<p>"Never mind his or her name. You did your best to keep the matter to +yourself, but it slipped out one day in conversation. Now when did you +last tell that true story, not counting yesterday, as fully and +particularly as you told it here in court?<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_166" id="Page_166">[Pg 166]</a></span> Think. I want the exact date +of the very last occasion."</p> + +<p>"That was last Friday, sir—to-day's the 22nd—that would be the 18th of +August."</p> + +<p>"Last Friday, the 18th of August; a fatal day to me!" said Robert +Carlton. "Thank you. That is all I want from you."</p> + +<p>The justices put no question. The clerk did not re-examine. The witness +was ordered to stand down. Then followed a short but heavy silence, +pregnant with speculation as to the drift of all these questions and the +object of so much unexplained insistence upon a date. It meant +something. What could it mean? Carlton stood upright in the dock, calm, +confident, inscrutable; it seemed a great many moments before the +silence was broken by the formal tones of the clerk.</p> + +<p>"Do you call any witness for the defence?" he asked.</p> + +<p>Carlton dropped his eyes into the well of the court, and they fell upon +a pair that were fastened upon his face with the glitter of fixed +bayonets.</p> + +<p>"Yes," said he. "I wish you to call Sir Wilton Gleed."</p> + +<p>Quietly though distinctly spoken, the name clapped like thunder on the +court. Amazement fell on all alike, for the issue between these two had +been the common theme for days. Popular sympathy had rightly sided with +morality, and its champion had lost nothing by his tactful magnanimity +in refraining from sitting upon the bench; that he should be put in the +box instead, and by his shameless adversary,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_167" id="Page_167">[Pg 167]</a></span> was an audacity as hard to +credit as to understand. There was a moment's hush, then a minute's +buzz, to which the justices themselves contributed. Wilders muttered +that the man was mad; his colleague on the right confessed himself +nonplussed; his colleague on the left dropped his shaven chin upon his +gold horseshoe, and his shoulders shook with joy. Meanwhile Sir Wilton +had forced a grin and found his voice.</p> + +<p>"You want me in the box, do you?"</p> + +<p>"I do."</p> + +<p>"Very well; you shall have me."</p> + +<p>And he was sworn, still grinning, with an odd mixture of malevolence and +deprecation for those who ran to read. "I meant to keep out of this," +the florid face said; "but now I'm in it—well, you'll see! It's the +fellow's own fault; his blood" etc., etc. But this was not what Sir +Wilton was saying in his heart.</p> + +<p>Carlton began at the beginning.</p> + +<p>"You are the patron of the living of Long Stow, are you not?"</p> + +<p>"You know I am."</p> + +<p>"I want the bench to have it from you; kindly answer my question."</p> + +<p>"I am the patron of the living of Long Stow," said Sir Wilton, with mock +resignation.</p> + +<p>"In the year 1880 did you, of your own free will and accord, present +that living to me?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, and I've repented it ever since!"</p> + +<p>There was a sympathetic murmur at the back of the court. It was +immediately checked. Every face was thrust forward, every ear strained, +every eye<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_168" id="Page_168">[Pg 168]</a></span> absorbed between the prisoner in the dock and the witness in +the box. It was no longer the uphill fight of one against many; it was +single combat between man and man, and the electricity of single combat +charged the air.</p> + +<p>"You have repented it more than ever of late?" asked Carlton in steady +tones. The skin upon his forehead seemed stretched with pain; the veins +showed blue and swollen; but the many judged him from his voice alone.</p> + +<p>"Naturally," sneered Sir Wilton.</p> + +<p>"So much so that you were resolved I should resign?"</p> + +<p>"I hoped you would have the decency to do so."</p> + +<p>"Did you come to the rectory on the fifth of this month, and tell me it +was my first duty to resign the living?"</p> + +<p>"I don't remember the date."</p> + +<p>"Was it the Saturday before Bank Holiday?"</p> + +<p>"I daresay. Yes, it must have been. I didn't expect to find you there. I +went to see the wreck and ruin of your home and church, not you."</p> + +<p>"But you did come, and you did see me, and you did tell me it was my +first duty to resign my living?"</p> + +<p>"Certainly I did."</p> + +<p>"Do you remember your words?"</p> + +<p>"Some of them."</p> + +<p>Carlton looked at his pocket-book—at a note made overnight.</p> + +<p>"Do you remember making use of the following expressions: 'Law or no +law, I'll have you out of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_169" id="Page_169">[Pg 169]</a></span> this! I'll hound you out of it! I'll have you +torn in pieces if you stay'?"</p> + +<p>"I may have said something of the kind," said the witness, with assumed +indifference.</p> + +<p>"Did you, or did you not?" cried Carlton, slapping his hand on the rail +of the dock; the voice, the look, the gesture were familiar to many +present who had heard him preach; and thrilled them for all their new +knowledge of the preacher.</p> + +<p>"Really I can't recall my exact words. I rather fancied they were +stronger."</p> + +<p>Some one laughed at this, and the witness managed to recapture his grin; +but his demeanour was unconvincing.</p> + +<p>"I am not talking about their strength," said Carlton. "Will you swear +that you did <i>not</i> say, 'I'll have you out of this! I'll hound you out +of it'?"</p> + +<p>"No, I will not."</p> + +<p>"I thank you," said Carlton; and his ringing voice fell at a word to the +pitch of perfect courtesy. He ticked off the note in his pocket-book, +and the court breathed again; but its worthy president did more: he had +forgotten his position for several minutes, and he hastened to reassert +it with the first observation that entered his head.</p> + +<p>"I don't see the point of this examination," said Canon Wilders.</p> + +<p>"You will presently."</p> + +<p>"If I don't I shall put a stop to it!"</p> + +<p>Carlton raised his eyes from his notes, but not to the bench; they were +only for the witness now.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_170" id="Page_170">[Pg 170]</a></span>"Do you remember when and where we met again?"</p> + +<p>"You had the insolence to call at my house."</p> + +<p>"Was it on a Monday morning, the first after the Bank Holiday?"</p> + +<p>"I suppose it was."</p> + +<p>"I do not ask you to recall your exact words on that occasion. I simply +ask you to inform the bench whether I did, or did not, offer to resign +the living then and there—on a certain condition."</p> + +<p>"Yes; you did," said Sir Wilton, doggedly. He was very red in the face.</p> + +<p>Carlton could not resist a moment's enjoyment of his discomfiture: it +heightened the pleasure of letting him off.</p> + +<p>"And did you decline?" he said at length.</p> + +<p>"Stop a moment," said the chairman. "What was this condition, Sir +Wilton?"</p> + +<p>"Am I obliged to give it?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, if you think it inexpedient——"</p> + +<p>"I think it unnecessary," said the witness, emphatically. "I think it +has nothing whatever to do with the case."</p> + +<p>"In that case, Sir Wilton, we shall be only too happy not to press the +point."</p> + +<p>Carlton had a great mind to press it himself. He had invited his enemy +to build the church out of his own pocket. The invitation had been +declined. Would it also be denied? Carlton was curious to see; but he +overcame his curiosity. It would not strengthen his defence, and to mere +revenge he must not stoop. So one temptation was resisted, and one<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_171" id="Page_171">[Pg 171]</a></span> +advantage thrown away, even in the final phase of the long duel between +these good fighters. But the other saw the struggle, and felt as he had +done when Carlton had returned him his stick in the ruins of the church.</p> + +<p>"And did you decline?" repeated Carlton, in identically the same voice +as before.</p> + +<p>"I did."</p> + +<p>"Did I then point out to you that I was not only entitled, but might be +compelled, to keep my chancel, at any rate, 'in good and substantial +repair, restoring and rebuilding when necessary'? I quote the Act, your +worships, as I quoted it then. Do you remember, Sir Wilton?"</p> + +<p>"I do."</p> + +<p>"I made the point as plain as I have made it now?"</p> + +<p>"Yes."</p> + +<p>"And what did you say to that?"</p> + +<p>The sudden change in the style of the question was glossed over by the +single artifice which Robert Carlton permitted himself during the +conduct of his case: instead of ringing triumphant, his voice dropped as +though he feared the answer. Sir Wilton fell into the trap.</p> + +<p>"I said, 'If that's the law I'll see you keep it. Go and build your +church! Where there's a law there will be a penalty; go build your +church or I'll enforce it.'"</p> + +<p>"Which did you expect to enforce—the penalty or the law?"</p> + +<p>"I didn't mind which," declared the witness, after<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_172" id="Page_172">[Pg 172]</a></span> hesitation; and his +indifference was less successfully assumed than before.</p> + +<p>"Oh!" said Carlton; "so you didn't mind my building the church after +all?"</p> + +<p>Sir Wilton appealed wildly to the Bench.</p> + +<p>"Am I to be browbeaten and insulted, by a convicted libertine and evil +liver, without one word of protest or reproof?"</p> + +<p>The chairman coloured with confusion and indecision.</p> + +<p>"I am afraid that you must answer his question, Sir Wilton," said Mr. +Preston, mildly.</p> + +<p>"I share your opinion," said Rhadamanthus, in a tone that went further +than the words.</p> + +<p>The chairman threw up his chin with an air, and fixed the accused with +his sternest glance.</p> + +<p>"Pray what are you endeavouring to establish by this round-about and +impertinent examination?"</p> + +<p>"In plain language?" asked Robert Carlton.</p> + +<p>"The plainer the better."</p> + +<p>"Then I am endeavouring to establish—and I <i>will</i> establish, either +here or at the assizes—the fact that that man there"—pointing to Sir +Wilton Gleed—"has tried by fair means and by foul to rob me of a +benefice which is still mine in more than name. And I will further +establish, either here or at the higher court, if you like to send me +there, the patent and the blatant fact that this very charge is the last +and the foulest means by which that man has attempted to get rid of me!"</p> + +<p>His clear voice thundered through the little court;<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_173" id="Page_173">[Pg 173]</a></span> his fine eye +flashed with as fine a scorn. But it was neither look nor tone that made +the silence when he ceased. It was the first unrestrained expression of +a personality incomparably stronger than any other there present; it was +the first just and unanimous—if unconscious—appreciation of that +personality in that place. There was a round clock that ticked many +times and noisily before the presiding magistrate broke the spell.</p> + +<p>"A-bom-in-able language!" cried he in the separate syllables of his most +important moments. "You deserve to answer for your words alone in the +other court of which you speak!"</p> + +<p>"I intend to prove them in this one," retorted Carlton, "if you give me +fair play."</p> + +<p>"Oh, by all means let him have fair play!" exclaimed the witness, in +high tones that trembled. "I can take care of myself; don't study <i>me</i>. +Let him say what he likes, and let those who know his character and mine +judge between him and me."</p> + +<p>Carlton looked at the quivering lip between the cropped whiskers, and +his jaws snapped on a smile as he returned to his pocket-book. But the +whole of his examination of Sir Wilton Gleed does not call for elaborate +report: its weakness and its strength will be recognised with equal +readiness. With a stronger spirit on the bench, or a weaker spirit in +the dock, or even a capable solicitor to prosecute for the police, much +of it had never been; as the play was cast it was the accused clergyman +who presided over that country court for the longest hour in his enemy's +life; nor, when he had won his ascendancy, did he use his<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_174" id="Page_174">[Pg 174]</a></span> power as +unsparingly as in the winning of it. The witness was allowed to come out +of the corner into which he had been driven before his appeal to the +bench; he had contradicted himself, and the contradiction was left to +tell its own tale without being pressed home. On the other hand, some +startling admissions were obtained in regard to the responsibility with +which the witness had finally sought to saddle the accused; he had bade +him build the church because he believed Carlton would find it an +impossible task; he recklessly admitted it, with a pale bravado that +imposed upon few people in court, and on but one upon the bench.</p> + +<p>"You were still determined to get rid of me," said Carlton, "one way or +another?"</p> + +<p>"I was."</p> + +<p>"And this struck you as another way?"</p> + +<p>"It did—at the moment."</p> + +<p>"Ah," murmured the chairman, "we are all subject to the impulse of the +moment!"</p> + +<p>Carlton put this point aside.</p> + +<p>"And why did you think that I should find it an impossible task to +rebuild the church?"</p> + +<p>"I thought you would find a difficulty in getting local men to work for +you."</p> + +<p>"Your grounds for thinking that?"</p> + +<p>"I considered your reputation in the district."</p> + +<p>"Any other reason?"</p> + +<p>"One or two builders and masons had spoken to me on the subject."</p> + +<p>Carlton found a new place in his pocket-book, and read out a list of +nine names.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_175" id="Page_175">[Pg 175]</a></span>"Were any of these local men among the number?"</p> + +<p>"Yes."</p> + +<p>"All of them?"</p> + +<p>"Ye—es."</p> + +<p>"What! You admit having discussed me, during the present month, and +since I first spoke to you about rebuilding the church, with these nine +local builders or stonemasons?"</p> + +<p>"I don't deny it," said Sir Wilton, stoutly.</p> + +<p>"And do you know of any builder or stonemason in the neighbourhood with +whom you have <i>not</i> discussed me?"</p> + +<p>"Can't say I do."</p> + +<p>"That's quite enough," said Carlton. "I shall not ask you what you said. +I do not purpose calling these men, at this court; time enough for that +at the assizes." And without further comment he took the witness through +one or two details of their last interview in the ruins; by no means +all; indeed, the date was the point most insisted upon.</p> + +<p>"And so the very next day was last Friday, the 18th of August?" +concluded Carlton with apparent levity.</p> + +<p>The witness refused to answer, appealed to the bench, and secured +another reprimand for the accused.</p> + +<p>"I harp upon that date," said Carlton, "because, as I have already +remarked, it seems to have been a fatal date for me. It has arisen so +many times in the course of this case! This, however, is not the precise +moment for enumerating those occasions; let us first finish with each +other. Did you, Sir Wilton<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_176" id="Page_176">[Pg 176]</a></span> Gleed, on the eighteenth day of this present +month, have separate or collective conversation with the witnesses +Busby, Fuller, and Ivey?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, I did," said Gleed, hot, white, and glaring.</p> + +<p>"Separate or collective? Did you speak to them one at a time or all +together?"</p> + +<p>"Both, if you like!" cried the witness, wildly. "I can't remember. +Better say both!"</p> + +<p>"You interviewed these witnesses, separately and collectively, on the +very day that the other witness, Frost, laid an information against me +before yourself as Justice of the Peace?"</p> + +<p>"I said it was that day. You ask the same question again and again!"</p> + +<p>The man was fuming, trembling, near to tears or curses of mortification +and blind rage.</p> + +<p>"I have but two more questions to ask you, and I am done," rejoined +Carlton. "Did the witness Fuller tell you of the light in the church, +and the witness Ivey of what <i>he</i> saw later on, during these +conversations of the fatal eighteenth?"</p> + +<p>"They did."</p> + +<p>"And was this the first you had heard of those experiences?"</p> + +<p>"It was."</p> + +<p>"That is my last question, Sir Wilton Gleed."</p> + +<p>The justices put none. Gleed glared at them as he left the box.</p> + +<p>"I think," said he, "that this is the most scandalous incident—most +disgraceful thing I ever heard of in my life!"</p> + +<p>"I quite agree with you," whispered Wilders.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_177" id="Page_177">[Pg 177]</a></span>"And I also," said Mr. Preston, in a different tone.</p> + +<p>But no word fell from Rhadamanthus. His small eyes did not leave +Carlton's face for above one second in the sixty. But their expression +was inscrutable.</p> + +<p>"May I now claim the indulgence of the court for a very few minutes?" +asked the clergyman in the dock.</p> + +<p>The clergymen on the bench looked at the clock and at each other. It was +already past the hour for luncheon.</p> + +<p>"Better go on," urged Preston, "and get it over."</p> + +<p>"If you mean what you say," said Wilders to the accused, "we will hear +you now; if you proceed to treat us to a mere display of words, I shall +adjourn the court. Meanwhile it is my duty to remind you that whatever +you say will be taken down in writing, and may be given in evidence +against you upon your trial."</p> + +<p>"In the event of my committal," returned Robert Carlton, "I am prepared +to stand or fall by every word that I have uttered or may utter now; and +I shall not detain you long. I am well aware how I have trespassed +already upon the time of this court, but I will waste none upon vain or +insincere apology. I came here to answer to a very terrible charge; it +was and it is my duty to do so as fully and as emphatically as I +possibly can. Yet I have little to add to the evidence before you; a +comment or two, and I am done.</p> + +<p>"It seems to me that the witnesses called by the police have between +them produced but three points of any weight against me, or worthy of +the serious<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_178" id="Page_178">[Pg 178]</a></span> consideration of this or any other court of law. I will +take these three points in their proper order, and will give my answer +to each in the fewest possible words in which I can express my meaning +to your worships.</p> + +<p>"Arthur Busby has sworn that on the morning before the fire I ordered +him to fill the lamps with paraffin, though it was extremely unlikely +that any artificial light would be required in church next evening. But +on the man's own showing he was wearying and distressing me beyond +measure at the time—a more terrible time than this!" cried Carlton from +his heart; and was brought to pause, not for effect (though the effect +was marked) but by the very suddenness of his emotion. "And on the man's +own showing," he continued in a lower key, "he had once omitted this +important duty of filling the lamps, and I was 'for ever at him' on the +subject. What more natural than to tell him to go away and fill his +lamps, as one had told him a dozen times before, but this time without +thinking and simply to get rid of the man? On the other hand, if the +paraffin had been wanted for the felonious purpose suggested, could +anything be more incriminating and incredible than the suggested method +of obtaining it? I submit these two questions, with the highly important +point involved, to the consideration of the bench; and I do so with some +confidence.</p> + +<p>"The next point, I confess, is more difficult to dismiss. I shall not +attempt to dismiss it from any mind in court. I shall simply leave it to +the consideration of your worships as men of the world and students of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_179" id="Page_179">[Pg 179]</a></span> +the human heart. It is near midnight. I am not to be found at the +rectory, and a light is seen in the church. I admit that I was in the +church, and that I lighted one of the lamps.</p> + +<p>"Here I am forced to allude to another matter: a matter in which, God +knows, I have never denied my guilt, as I do deny my guilt of the crime +of arson: a matter in which I have never sought to defend myself, as I +have been compelled to do in this court for a very long day and a half.</p> + +<p>"Consider my case on the night of the fire. I will not dwell upon it; it +is surely within the knowledge or the imagination of most present. . . . +There was my church. I had held my last service there. I felt that I +could never hold another. And, whatever I had been, I loved my church! +You upon the bench . . . you Members of Christ's Church . . . I ask not +for your sympathy but for your insight. Can you think that I went into +the church I loved, wilfully and deliberately to burn it to the ground? +Can you not conceive my going there, in the dead of that dreadful night, +to look my last upon it—to bid my church good-bye?"</p> + +<p>His emotion was piteous, but never pitiful. It shook nothing but his +voice. It neither bowed his head nor dimmed the brilliance of an eye +turned full upon his fellows. And so he stood silent for a space, and +none other spoke; then through Tom Ivey's evidence with a lighter touch. +It was evidence in his favour: he scorned to enlarge upon it. The one +adverse point was lightly—perhaps too lightly—dismissed. He had been +seen to throw some<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_180" id="Page_180">[Pg 180]</a></span>thing into the flames. Did the prosecution suggest +that he had thrown fresh fuel? Other points, already made in +cross-examination, were left to take care of themselves: the paraffin on +the pews, to which he himself had called Ivey's attention, was one. +Indeed, in the whole course of the prisoner's speech, it was never +admitted that the church had been purposely set fire to at all; the +suggestion had been made in the heat of cross-examination, but it was +not made again. It even seemed as though Robert Carlton had grown either +certain, or careless, of the result of the inquiry—and the impression +was not removed by the close of his remarks.</p> + +<p>"And now," he said, "I have to deal with the evidence of Sir Wilton +Gleed. I shall endeavour to deal with that evidence as dispassionately +as I can, and as summarily as it deserves. Sir Wilton Gleed is a man +with a genuine grievance, which you all know and I have never denied. +But I do not propose to enter into the matter at issue between Sir +Wilton Gleed and myself, or to suggest for an instant that he was +anything but right in determining to rid his village of one who had +brought himself to bitter but merited sorrow and disgrace. I am not here +to defend my sins; nor have I defended them elsewhere; nor have I shrunk +from suffering from anything I have done. But here have I been brought +to book for something I never did—taken prisoner and brought to you on +a criminal charge and no other. And I tell you that this criminal charge +is as false as another was true, but for which this one would never have +been made. But enough of mere assertion; let<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_181" id="Page_181">[Pg 181]</a></span> me crystallise some of the +evidence that has come before you.</p> + +<p>"The witnesses swear to three or four suspicious circumstances between +them. Yet they seem scarcely to have opened their lips—nobody seems to +have heard of those circumstances—until Friday of last week. On Friday +last—my fatal date—these witnesses open their mouths with one accord. +And, curiously enough, it is in Sir Wilton Gleed that they are one and +all led to confide!</p> + +<p>"But there is a still more curious and informing coincidence. Sir Wilton +Gleed and I have several very stormy interviews, in which he tries, +first by one artifice, then by another—all frankly admitted in his +evidence—to drive me from a position which I have finally refused to +resign. My refusal may be just as obdurate and indefensible as you are +pleased to think it; that is not the point at all. The point is this +contest of tenacity on his part and on mine, culminating in a final +interview between us on the eve of the day upon which all these +witnesses break their more or less complete silence concerning my +movements on the night of the fire, and break it in the ear of Sir +Wilton Gleed!</p> + +<p>"I invite you to consider the obvious inference. My enemy has tried +every other means of dislodging me. He has threatened and insulted me. +He has set every builder and mason in the neighbourhood against me. He +has deprived me—as he thinks—of the means of building my church, and +then he turns round and tells me to build it or take the consequences! I +make a beginning in spite of him; he<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_182" id="Page_182">[Pg 182]</a></span> has to think of some new method of +expulsion; so, with infinite ingenuity, he trumps up this present charge +against me."</p> + +<p>Wilders opened his lips, but the prisoner's hand flew upward in +arresting gesture.</p> + +<p>"With infinite ingenuity, your worship, but not necessarily in bad +faith. I have never yet questioned the <i>bona fides</i> of Sir Wilton Gleed; +nor do I now. On the contrary, I am convinced that he honestly and +sincerely believes me capable of any crime in the calendar; but my +capability, again, is not the point; and belief and proof are very +different things. If your worships hold that this horrible charge has +been proved against me—proved sufficiently for this court—then send me +to a higher one as your duty dictates. But if you think that hatred and +prejudice, however deserved, have played the part of genuine and +spontaneous suspicion; that facts have been distorted to fit a +preconception, and the wish, however unconsciously, allowed to father +the thought; that, in short, an honest man has been quite honestly +blinded and misled by very loathing of me and all my doings; then I +implore your worships to dismiss this charge against me—and let me get +back to the work I left to meet it!"</p> + +<p>The last words came as an after-thought, but they came from the heart, +and as no anti-climax to those who knew the nature of the work named. In +absolute silence Carlton availed himself of the chair in the dock, +dropping all but out of sight, and bending double, his heart throbbing, +his head singing, his hot hands pressed across his eyes. It was the +sudden<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_183" id="Page_183">[Pg 183]</a></span> hum of talk which told him that the justices had retired; days +passed in his brain before a hush as sudden announced their return. +Meanwhile there were the scraps of conversation that found their way to +his ears. Hearing all, he could distinguish little; but now and then a +familiar phrase leapt home, as familiar faces declare themselves afar. +"The gift of the gab" was one, and "He'd argue black was white" another. +But some one said, "Give the devil his due"; and with that single crumb +of justice Robert Carlton had to crouch content until his present fate +was sealed.</p> + +<p>But the hush came at last, and sank to profound silence as the +magistrates took their seats—Rhadamanthus keen and grim—the clergymen +plainly angry with each other. Preston's honest face hid no more of his +feelings than heretofore, but the chairman cloaked annoyance with the +fraction of a smile, and only his voice betrayed him as he addressed the +prisoner.</p> + +<p>"After a long and patient hearing," said Wilders, "the bench find this a +case of ve-ry con-sid-er-able doubt in-deed. But, upon the whole, and +taking all the cir-cum-stances into care-ful con-sid-er-ation, they are +of o-pin-i-on that there is not enough ev-i-dence to justify them in +sending the case to the assizes. The charge is therefore dis-missed. I +should like, however, to add one word in respect to a witness, who +might, had he been a less chiv-al-rous opponent—a less mag-nan-i-mous +man—have sat here upon the bench instead of entering the witness-box to +suffer the remorseless cross-questioning of a personal enemy. I could +wish, indeed"—with covert<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_184" id="Page_184">[Pg 184]</a></span> meaning—"that Sir Wilton Gleed had seen fit +to take his proper place in this court! I need hardly say that he quits +it without stain or slur, of any sort or kind, upon his character; and +that he does so with the heartfelt sympathy of one, at all events, of +his colleagues upon the bench."</p> + +<p>Rhadamanthus turned his back to hide his face, but James Preston did not +rise till he had finished as he begun. He caught Carlton's eye, and +nodded once more to him, but this time unblushingly and with much +vigour. There was a little hissing as the prisoner vanished, a free man; +and some hooting in the street, in which he reappeared, contrary to +expectation, within a minute. It was like his brazen face, so they told +him as he strode through the little crowd as one who neither heard nor +saw a man of them. But no hand was lifted, no missile thrown, for the +deaf ear is no earnest of physical passivity, and it was notorious that +this man could take care of himself with his hands as well as with his +tongue. Such a very deaf ear did he turn, however, that a flyman had to +follow him to the outskirts of the town, and shout till he was hoarse, +before Robert Carlton paid more heed to him than to his revilers. And +all the time it was a decent man from Linkworth, only begging him to +jump in, as the clergyman at last discovered with instant suspicions of +the truth.</p> + +<p>"Who sent you after me?"</p> + +<p>"Mr. Preston, sir; leastways, he told me to be here all day, in case you +wanted me."</p> + +<p>"God bless Jim Preston!" muttered Carlton, and jumped into the fly +forthwith.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_185" id="Page_185">[Pg 185]</a></span>But presently they were at some cross-roads. And the driver drew rein +with a troubled face. He wanted to go a long way round, but his reasons +were wild and unintelligible. Carlton, however, divined the real reason, +and whose it was, and he himself pulled the other rein.</p> + +<p>"No, no," said he; "drive me through my own village! They drove me +through it on Saturday; take me back as they took me away. But it was +like Mr. Preston to think of it. Tell him I said so, and that I'll never +forget his kindness as long as I live!"</p> + +<p>It was the red-gold heart of the August afternoon, and the shrill little +choir of the ruined church sang a welcome to the friend who had never +sinned against them; and Glen came bounding and barking defiance at the +outside world; and the unfinished stone, the first stone that Robert +Carlton was to dress and to lay with his own hands, it was just as they +had made him leave it on the Saturday evening. But the story of his +return was still being bandied from door to door, when a new sound came +with the song of birds from the ruin in the trees, and a new ending was +given to the story.</p> + +<p>The sound was the swish, swish, swish of the mason's axe, with the +stiletto's point, through sandstone as soft as cheese.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_186" id="Page_186">[Pg 186]</a></span></p> + +<h2 class="newchapter"><a name="CHAPTER_XVII" id="CHAPTER_XVII"></a>XVII<br /> +<span class="smalltext">THREE WEEKS AND A NIGHT</span></h2> + + +<p>Carlton completed that historic stone within another hour, and actually +laid it that night. Jaded in body and brain, with every nerve exhausted, +he must needs do this or drop in the attempt. It was the first stone in +the new church. It was finished at last. He touched it here and there +with the straight-edge. He felt its angles with the square. This stone +would do. He whipped out his foot-rule and measured carefully. The stone +was eleven inches all ways but one. It was the exact depth for the lower +courses, but it was seventeen inches long. A seventeen-inch gap must +therefore be found or made for it. And Carlton went prowling round the +blackened walls, with his foot-rule and his dog, before resting from his +labours. The job should be finished this time, the first stone should be +laid that night.</p> + +<p>A place was found in the base of the east end, over a stable portion of +the plinth; the situation was of sacred omen, and Carlton cleared away +the old mortar with immense energy. Then his difficulties began. There +was new mortar to make; this was an altogether new undertaking. It had +been Tom Ivey's affair. Carlton had tried his hand at most branches of +the masonic art, but he had never at<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_187" id="Page_187">[Pg 187]</a></span>tempted to mix the mortar. He +barely knew how to begin. There was a heap of sand at one end of the +shed, and a load of lime under cover. These were the ingredients. That +he knew; but it was not enough.</p> + +<p>Suddenly, he remembered his <i>Building Construction</i> in two volumes; the +bulkier of the two treated of materials. In a minute the book was found, +deep in dust, and carried to the shed for consultation on the spot. And +there was only too much about mortar; the subject monopolised a column +of the index; its vastness oppressed Carlton, who nevertheless attacked +it then and there. A great disappointment was in store: so he was to +begin by "slaking" his lime. He had forgotten that step; now he had a +dim recollection of the process. According to the book it took two or +three hours at least; even this minimum presupposed that the lime was a +"fat lime," whatever that might be. Carlton, lacking all means of +deciding such a point, gave his inclination the benefit of the doubt, +and left his shovelful of quicklime under water and sand for exactly two +hours and a half.</p> + +<p>This check came in the nick of time. It reminded Robert Carlton of the +flesh, whose needs he had once more neglected, though now he would have +cooked and eaten if only to have killed an hour. He lit a fire. He put +on the kettle. He toasted some very stale bread; he boiled an egg warm +from the hen-house, then another; and having eaten he rested while he +must. The sun set; the new moon whitened in the sky, but as yet could +not light a man at his work when it was really dark. And that was why<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_188" id="Page_188">[Pg 188]</a></span> +the lantern stood so long upon the ground outside the shed, in a whirl +of tiny wings, while the mortar was being mixed at last.</p> + +<p>But the lantern stood longer still upon a salient fragment of the razed +east end, while the trowel rang, and the mortar flopped, until all lay +smooth and glistening in its light. Then Carlton knelt, and lifted his +handiwork with bursting muscles; and the mortar spattered his waistcoat +as the great stone dropped into place. A wrench, a push, a tap with the +trowel; a finishing touch with its point, a word of thanksgiving before +he rose; and Robert Carlton had laid the first stone of a new church, +and of his own new life.</p> + +<p>Next morning he began systematic work, rising at five, lighting his +fire, making his bed, sweeping, dusting, pumping, rinsing, all before +the day's work started after breakfast, with the gentler arts of +scraping and re-pointing, and all in strict obedience to the schedule +which Carlton had drawn up before his arrest. The working day ended, as +then arranged, with a violent assault upon that black disorder which had +been the nave; but this also acquired system as the days closed in; +while the influence of time was not less apparent in the gradual +disappearance of that tendency to morbid reaction which had been +inevitable in the first days of bodily and spiritual strain, of +incessant and excessive hardship, of a solitude consummate and profound. +But here time was assisted by the good sense and the strong will of +Carlton himself, who knew how little virtue there is in mere remorse, +and who struggled against it with<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_189" id="Page_189">[Pg 189]</a></span> all his might. It was a long time, +however, before even he was master of himself in this regard. One day, +in the exaltation of overwork, the high excitement of nervous and of +physical exhaustion, he was actually heard whistling at his walls, and +it was all over the village before he caught himself in the act; but +none seemed to hear how suddenly he stopped at last; none saw the raised +face, the clasped hands, the lips moving in meek apology for an +instant's joy. Nor did any man dream how this one would still mortify +himself, after such a lapse, with deliberate dwelling on the past. There +was but one link, indeed, in all the mournful chain of recent events, +upon which Robert Carlton would never permit his thoughts to +concentrate; that was his successful conduct of his own case before the +magistrates, culminating in his final triumph over Sir Wilton Gleed. He +had made the rule in the hour of his release, and he called in all his +strength of mind to its rigorous observance.</p> + +<p>It was now three weeks since he had spoken to a human being, none having +come near him to his knowledge; then one morning the air was full of +whispers, though the yellowing elms hung stagnant in an autumn mist; and +the outcast, looking over the wall which he was scraping, beheld a bevy +of school-children perched on that of the churchyard.</p> + +<p>He bent a little lower to his work. The wall was that thirteen-foot +strip, to the left of the porch, upon which he had spent the first +morning of all in getting rid of the unsound upper courses. It was still +his own height in most places; so the children could not<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_190" id="Page_190">[Pg 190]</a></span> watch him at +his work; but the sound of them was enough. Poor little children! To +grow up with such an example and such knowledge as would be theirs! His +heart had seldom smitten him so hard.</p> + +<p>"<i>Then said He unto the disciples, It is impossible but that offences +will come: but woe unto him through whom they come!</i></p> + +<p>"<i>It were better for him that a millstone were hanged about his neck, +and he cast into the sea, than that he should offend one of these little +ones.</i>"</p> + +<p>The text came unbidden; it cut the deeper for that. Woe unto him, +indeed! Of all men, woe unto him! Hammer and chisel slipped from his +hands; he hid his face. His thumbs went to his ears, but were drawn +back. The children's voices were more than he could bear, so he bore +them for his sin until another aspect of the case was driven home to his +intelligence. Next moment he appeared in the porch, and the children +were vanishing from the wall.</p> + +<p>"Don't run away," he called. "Come back, you bigger ones!"</p> + +<p>It was his old voice, come unbidden like the text; he might have been +using it all these weeks. The children had never disobeyed that quiet +but imperious summons. They did not begin to-day.</p> + +<p>"Why aren't you all at school?"</p> + +<p>There was silence, broken eventually by some bold but still respectful +spirit.</p> + +<p>"Please, sir, it's a holiday."</p> + +<p>"Not Saturday, is it?"</p> + +<p>He was beginning to lose count of the week-days;<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_191" id="Page_191">[Pg 191]</a></span> once already the +Sabbath school-bell had nipped a day's work in the bud.</p> + +<p>"No, sir, it's an extra holiday."</p> + +<p>"Then spend it better. Get away into the fields, or down the river. I +won't have you hanging about here. There's nothing for you to +see—nothing that will do you any good. Run away all, and forget who has +spoken to you. But don't let me have to speak again!"</p> + +<p>There was no need for another word. And the workman went back to his +wall; but his hands had lost their cunning; his heart was as heavy as +the stones themselves.</p> + +<p>Why had he never been harassed in this way before? He had not to think +very long. He was without that friend of friendless man, his dog. The +good Glen, his second shadow in these days, had chosen this one to +desert him; and Carlton was glad, for nothing else would have made him +appreciate the dog at his true worth. Now he thought of it, how often +the faithful brute had gone barking to wall or gate, and come back +wagging his tail! Preoccupied with his work, he had taken no thinking +heed at the time. But now he remembered and understood.</p> + +<p>Instead of working all the afternoon, he went in search of Glen. It +surprised him to find how much he missed a companion whose presence he +had often ignored for hours together; he felt as though he could do no +good without the animal now; its dumb sympathy seemed to have had no +small share in all that he had done as yet. That wag of the tail, how +well he knew it after all! It was like the grasp of a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_192" id="Page_192">[Pg 192]</a></span> good man's hand. +That wistful eye, watching over him at his work, was it a blasphemous +conceit to think of it as the mild eye of the All-seeing, shining +through the mask of one of His humblest creatures, upon another as +humble, and countenancing the work if not the man? If this was +blasphemy, then Robert Carlton blasphemed for once in his heart; and had +his deserts in an unsuccessful quest.</p> + +<p>He had searched the garden and the house; had stood whistling at the +gate, and in each of the far corners of the glebe. Night fell upon him +sawing a huge tie-beam through and through to shift it, and sawing with +all the irritable energy of the unwilling workman, very remarkable in +him. And for once he was glad to put on his coat.</p> + +<p>What could have happened to the dog? Its master could scarcely eat for +wondering. Now he sat frowning heavily. Anon his brow cleared, and a +fixed purpose glittered in his eyes. A little later he was in the +village street once more.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_193" id="Page_193">[Pg 193]</a></span></p> + +<h2 class="newchapter"><a name="CHAPTER_XVIII" id="CHAPTER_XVIII"></a>XVIII<br /> +<span class="smalltext">THE NIGHT'S WORK</span></h2> + + +<p>The night was as dark as it could possibly be. The day's mist still +lingered, impervious to stars, and there was no moon. Carlton was not +sorry, for he had no wish to be seen by more people than was absolutely +necessary; neither was he allowing for the shabby tweeds he had +unearthed to work in, for his cloth cap and untrimmed beard, which +obliterated the clergyman and changed the man.</p> + +<p>He had not gone far before he stopped in astonishment. He had met no +one, and the village was as dark as the firmament; in the first few +cottages there were no lights at all. Carlton groped his way up the path +of one, and knocked twice without receiving an answer or detecting any +sound within. It was as though his sin had driven his parishioners to +the four winds.</p> + +<p>He went on with increasing amazement, still without encountering a soul; +then swerved of a sudden from the middle of the road, and hugged the +wheatfield wall on the right-hand side while passing the Flint House on +the left. Here were lights, and more. The front door stood open, pouring +a broken beam of lamplight into the road. And on the single step,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_194" id="Page_194">[Pg 194]</a></span> +leaning upon his great stick, towered the silhouette of Jasper Musk, +only less colossal than his shadow in the lighted slice of road.</p> + +<p>Carlton half expected a challenge, and passed slowly and openly; instead +of slinking as his shame dictated. But there was neither word nor sign +of recognition from the gigantic figure on the step; and the lights +ended where they had begun. There were none beneath the gabled thatch +immediately beyond the wheatfield; and so for another hundred yards; not +a glimmer to right or left, with the single exception of a lattice +window over the post-office, where the bed-ridden Mrs. Ivey lay as she +had been lying for many months. Carlton saw the shadow of a flower-pot +on the widow's blind; no doubt it was the geranium he had taken her in +early summer; he remembered placing it on the sill. His pace quickened. +He was now at the long lane leading to the Plough and Harrow; and there +at last were the missing lights. The inn was lit up in every window, and +not only the unmistakable sound, but the very smell of feasting +travelled to the road, where Robert Carlton hesitated longer than his +wont. He might as well go home. It was quite bad enough to face his +people piece-meal. On the other hand, there was the dog; a +characteristic fixity of purpose in its owner; and a natural curiosity +to know more of the entertainment that could empty every home.</p> + +<p>The front of the inn revealed nothing after all. The brilliantly lighted +parlour was deserted by all but a single attendant behind the bar; the +scene of revelry was audibly the barn at the back. The inn itself had<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_195" id="Page_195">[Pg 195]</a></span> +once been a farm-house, and this barn came in for all the festivals.</p> + +<p>Carlton peered through the parlour window, and nodded to himself. The +face within was new to him, but that might well prove an advantage. It +was the florid face of a stout young man, passing the time with a +newspaper and a cigar, the first of which he threw aside to answer the +incomer's questions.</p> + +<p>No, he had seen nothing of any collie dog; but he was a stranger +himself, only come to lend a hand for the night. Black and tan collie, +but more black than tan? No; the only dogs he had seen all day were the +governor's tyke and a thoroughbred bitch belonging to the young +gentleman at the hall.</p> + +<p>"But have a drink," said the stout young man, reaching for a tankard.</p> + +<p>Carlton declined civilly, though not without betraying some +astonishment.</p> + +<p>"That's free beer to-night, old man," explained the other.</p> + +<p>"Indeed?"</p> + +<p>"I'm here to serve ut. Change your mind?"</p> + +<p>"No, thank you."</p> + +<p>"Then I will."</p> + +<p>And the young man drew a foaming pint, while a burst of revelry came +through the inner doors, but slightly deadened by its passage through +the open air.</p> + +<p>"May I ask what is going on?" inquired Carlton.</p> + +<p>"That's the biggest spread ever seen in Long Stow," said the stout +youth, drawing his sleeve along his lips and turning a shade more florid +than before.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_196" id="Page_196">[Pg 196]</a></span>"Not the harvest-home already?"</p> + +<p>"No; that's a dinner given by the squire to every sowl in the +parish—men, women, an' kids—all but one."</p> + +<p>The questioner stood absorbed.</p> + +<p>"All but one," repeated the temporary barman with knowing emphasis. And +he winked as he leant across the bar.</p> + +<p>"Ah!"</p> + +<p>"Their reverend ain't here—not much!"</p> + +<p>"I don't suppose he is. And why is the squire doing this sort of thing +on this scale?"</p> + +<p>"Why, in honour of the victory, to be sure."</p> + +<p>"What victory?"</p> + +<p>"Why, the one we've just had in Egypt. Tel-el——but here that is, in +the <i>Bury Post</i>, and a fair jaw-breaker, too."</p> + +<p>It was the first newspaper which Robert Carlton had seen for several +weeks. His <i>Standard</i> subscription had run out at mid-summer; he had +never renewed it. The world had renounced him utterly, and so must he +renounce the world. To live as he was living, and yet to have an ear for +the busy hum—he could not do it. For already he recognized the +startling truth: it was its very completeness which rendered his +isolation endurable.</p> + +<p>Yet his eyes glistened as he ran them down the stirring columns, and his +tanned face wore a coppery glow as he returned the paper across the bar.</p> + +<p>"Thanks very much," he said. "I am glad to have seen that."</p> + +<p>"Is it the first you've heard of it?"</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_197" id="Page_197">[Pg 197]</a></span>"Yes; I don't often see a paper."</p> + +<p>The young barman was eyeing him up and down, from the old tweed trousers +to the old cloth cap.</p> + +<p>"On the tramp, are you?"</p> + +<p>Carlton did not choose to reply.</p> + +<p>"Yet you seemed to know all about their reverend here!"</p> + +<p>"Who does not?" cried the man in tweeds, with involuntary bitterness.</p> + +<p>"Ah, you may well say that! And what do <i>you</i> think of him?"</p> + +<p>"I think the same as everybody else."</p> + +<p>"That he's the biggest blackguard unhung?"</p> + +<p>"Indeed, one of them!"</p> + +<p>"That's what the young gentleman from the hall say, when he was in here +this afternoon. But the governor, Master Palmer—O Lord! how he do hate +him! 'Unhung?' he say. 'Why, hangun's too good for him.' An' so it is, +come to think of it: to go and do what <i>he</i> done, an' to top all by +settun fire to his own church!"</p> + +<p>"Come," said Carlton, "that wasn't proved."</p> + +<p>"But everybody know it, bless you!"</p> + +<p>"Though the charge was dismissed in open court?"</p> + +<p>"Bah! 'Not guilty, but don't do that again!'"</p> + +<p>And the stout youth nodded sagely over his tankard's rim.</p> + +<p>"So that's the opinion of the neighbourhood, is it?"</p> + +<p>"That is, and that's not likely to change."</p> + +<p>Carlton was not astonished. He had foreseen this<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_198" id="Page_198">[Pg 198]</a></span> even from the +prisoner's dock, in that pause of the proceedings when he had felt +ashamed of his facility in self-defence, a haunting doubt of the +propriety of his defending himself at all. And yet the virile instinct +which had inspired him then was not yet dead in his breast; he could not +let all this pass; the conversation was none of his seeking, yet he must +say something more.</p> + +<p>"I have never stuck up for him," he began; "but give even him his due! +What possible object could a man have in burning down his own church?"</p> + +<p>"What I asked the governor," replied the barman. "'Dog in the manger,' +he say; 'didn't want the next man to reap where he've sowed. What's +more, that give him an excuse for stoppun in the place,' he say."</p> + +<p>Carlton was under no temptation to confute these arguments; his only +difficulty was to suppress a smile.</p> + +<p>"So his people don't think any the better of him for getting himself +off, eh?"</p> + +<p>"The better? That's made them right mad! The governor here, he say that +was the gift of the gab and nothun else; all parsons have their fair +share; but this here reverend, he do seem to be a holy terror, an' no +mistake. A gentleman like Sir Wilton Gleed haven't a chance agen him; so +they're all a-sayun, all but Sir Wilton himself. The young gent who was +in here this afternoon, he was a-sayun as how the squire wouldn't have +the reverend's name so much as spoken at the hall; and he's never been +heard to name it himself since the day of the trial, he's that mad. But +have you heard the latest?"</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_199" id="Page_199">[Pg 199]</a></span>Carlton had heard quite enough, and his hand was on the latch, nor did +he withdraw it as he turned his head.</p> + +<p>"Against the reverend?" inquired he.</p> + +<p>"That's it," said the young barman with renewed gusto. "And I nearly let +you go without tellun you!"</p> + +<p>"What has he been doing now?"</p> + +<p>Carlton was curious to hear.</p> + +<p>"That's not what he've been doün, but what keep comun o' what he've +done," his informant said ominously. "The latest is that some young chap +would go to the devil because the reverend had, so he 'listed, and he've +been in the very battle there's all this to-do about!"</p> + +<p>Of Mellis's enlistment Carlton had heard; the rest was news indeed; and +his hand tightened on the latch.</p> + +<p>"Has anything happened to him, then?" he faltered, sick at heart.</p> + +<p>"Not as we know on yet," said the stout youth, hopefully. "But the lists +ain't in, and, if this young chap's killed, everybody says it'll be +another death at the reverend's door."</p> + +<p>"So they want his blood!" exclaimed Carlton. "But what they say is +true."</p> + +<p>As he opened the door a burst of cheering came round from the barn.</p> + +<p>"That's for the squire," he left the barman saying. "He've been on his +legs these ten minutes."</p> + +<p>The outcast had shut the door behind him, and was groping his way in a +darkness no deeper than<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_200" id="Page_200">[Pg 200]</a></span> before, though perfectly opaque after the +strong light within.</p> + +<p>"And one cheer more!" screamed a voice from the barn.</p> + +<p>Carlton need scarcely have left his rectory to have heard the final +roar. Yet it was not the end.</p> + +<p>"And three groans . . ."</p> + +<p>This voice was hoarse; the name was lost in the night; but the outcast +well knew whose it was. And he stopped instinctively, standing firm upon +his feet while the groans were given—as though they lashed him like +wind and rain. Then he turned his face to the storm. He could not help +it. There was more clapping of the hands. Something further was to come; +he might as well hear what.</p> + +<p>The barn was a clash of violent lights and impenetrable shade. Its +outlines were inseparable from the sky; but its great doors had been +flung flush with their wall, which gaped twenty feet from jamb to jamb. +This space, illumined by slung lanterns and naked candle-light, and +streaked with tables, which ran the full length of the barn, stood out +like the lighted stage of a darkened theatre. Outside hovered the +unworthy element which the smallest community cannot escape, or the +largest charity embrace; these vagabonds were absolutely invisible to +those within; and were themselves too dazzled and disgusted to take note +of each addition to their number.</p> + +<p>Sir Wilton Gleed, on his legs once more, at the high table furthest from +the doors, was making that preliminary pause which is a little luxury of +the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_201" id="Page_201">[Pg 201]</a></span> habitual orator and an embarrassing necessity to the novice. He was +supported by the schoolmaster on one side and by his own son on the +other. The former wore the shiny flush which was the badge of every +reveller visible from without; but that was not many while all heads +were turned towards the squire.</p> + +<p>Sir Wilton began by observing, with sparkling eyes, that he was very +sorry to hear that name: he himself would have preferred such an +occasion to pass over without a reminder of the fact that they had a +leper in their midst. It was many moments before the speaker was +suffered to proceed; then he repeated the successful epithet at the top +of his voice, and drove it home with a synonym; recovering his own +composure during a second outburst, and continuing with conspicuous +self-restraint. Now that the matter had come up, he would not let it +drop, even upon that inappropriate occasion, without one word from +himself; but, he promised them, it should be his last public utterance +on the subject, in that parish at all events, as it was most certainly +his first. And another deliberate pause ended in a sudden gesture and a +new tone.</p> + +<p>"What's the use of talking?" exclaimed the squire. "The law of England +is against us; there's no more to be said while the law remains what it +is. I'm not thinking of my brother magistrates' decision the other day; +it would ill become me to pass one single syllable of comment upon that. +No, gentlemen, I confine my criticism to that law which empowers a +clergyman, convicted of the vilest villainy, to retain<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_202" id="Page_202">[Pg 202]</a></span> his living in +the teeth of every protest, and to continue poisoning the clean air of +this parish by wilfully remaining in our midst."</p> + +<p>"Shame! Shame!"</p> + +<p>"Shame or no shame," cried Sir Wilton, "I intend to bring the matter +before Parliament itself"—a further outburst of vociferous +approval—"intend to lay this very case before the House of Commons at +the earliest possible opportunity. And I think that I can promise you +some amendment of the law before another year is out. Meanwhile"—and +Sir Wilton raised his hand to quell renewed enthusiasm—"meanwhile let +us respect the law while it lasts. In signifying our detestation of this +monstrous wrong, let us be careful not to drift into the wrong +ourselves. There must be no more broken windows, mind!"</p> + +<p>And it was now a single finger that Sir Wilton Gleed held up.</p> + +<p>"But," he continued, "what we can do—what we are justified in +doing—what it is our bounden duty to do—is henceforth to ignore this +man's very existence in our midst."</p> + +<p>"Don't call him a man!"</p> + +<p>"That's a devil out of hell!"</p> + +<p>"Man or devil," cried Sir Wilton, "let us absolutely ignore his +existence among us. Don't go near him; don't even turn to look at him as +you pass. There he is—pretending to rebuild the church—posing as a +martyr—really laughing in his sleeve and crowing over all right-minded +men. We shall see who laughs last! Meanwhile, take no notice of him, one +way or the other; forbid your children the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_203" id="Page_203">[Pg 203]</a></span> churchyard, if not that end +of the village altogether; nothing that can feed the morbid appetite for +notoriety which makes me sometimes think the man's a lunatic after all. +But if he dares to show his nose among you, that's another thing; hunt +him out of it as you would hunt a mad dog! He won't show himself twice. +But for the present my advice to you is to leave the cur in his kennel, +and the lazar in the lazar-house!"</p> + +<p>The unseen listener left amid the musketry of prolonged clapping, +mingled with a banging of tables, and a dancing of glass and silver, +that followed him into the outer darkness as a sound of cymbals and big +drums. He was not sorry to have heard what he had heard: in his position +it was a distinct advantage to know the worst that was being said. +Certainly he would not go into the village again without necessity—as +certainly as he would do so the moment such necessity arose. It was as +well, however, to go prepared. The present experience might rank as a +narrow escape; but Robert Carlton would not have been without it if he +could.</p> + +<p>He began to think better of his opponent. So he was going to Parliament +as the final court! That was legitimate; that he could admire. There is +infinite stimulus in the man who does not know when he is beaten—to an +adversary resembling him in that respect. And this seemed to be the one +characteristic common to Mr. Carlton and Sir Wilton Gleed.</p> + +<p>Yet the outcast felt a little hardened. And his critical faculty, always +keen, though only of himself unsparing, went insensibly to work upon the +new<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_204" id="Page_204">[Pg 204]</a></span> material, even as he strode on through the deserted village, not to +give up his dog just yet.</p> + +<p>"I believe he had that speech by heart, for all its opening. It came too +pat."</p> + +<p>That was Carlton's first conclusion. The next made him stop dead.</p> + +<p>"I'll be shot if the whole function wasn't a peg to hang that speech +on!"</p> + +<p>And on he went with a short laugh of scornful conviction; there was no +doubt whatever in his mind; but the speech was not worth a second +thought. There was Glen to find, and there was George Mellis to think +about, since think he must. Poor lad! Yes, that was his fault again; the +people were right; he would be blood-guilty if the boy fell. One thing, +however, was quite certain: if the worst news came it could be trusted +to come to him; meanwhile he could pray for his friend, as his heart was +praying now, a clean sky above him, and the untrammelled air of an open +country all around.</p> + +<p>The village had been left behind; the Lakenhall road followed for half a +mile, then left at a tangent in its turn; and this open country, upon +which Carlton of all men had the audacity to trespass, was the vast +rabbit-warren of Sir Wilton Gleed. The dog might be caught in one of the +traps; that was at once its master's fear and hope; for a broken leg +would mend, and his one friend think twice before deserting him again. +Carlton could even enjoy the prospect of the cripple's complete +dependence upon himself: it would be something to be indispensable to +living creature now. But meanwhile he could neither see<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_205" id="Page_205">[Pg 205]</a></span> nor hear +anything of his dog, though he walked, and stopped, and whistled till he +was tired, and then called, "Glen! Glen! Glen!" No sound came back to +him in reply; not even the echo of his own voice; and at midnight he +gave up the search.</p> + +<p>At midnight also the Long Stow festivities culminated in the National +Anthem, its secular companion, and much hoarse roystering on the way +home; all this as Carlton approached the village; and for once he was +deterred. To march into the middle of a tipsy crowd, freshly inflamed +against himself, was to provoke a brawl at best. He would go round +instead by the river that flowed parallel with the village street. So he +crossed at the lock near the mill at this end of Long Stow, and +recrossed by the white wood bridge on the Linkworth road at the other +end. But this was an hour later; for three-quarters had been wasted +opposite the Flint House, with its river frontage of trim mead and wild +garden, and a very faint light in one back room.</p> + +<p>By this time all was so still that the returning rector became the +earlier aware of an erratic lantern and tell-tale voices in the road +ahead; and he was walking slowly to let these people pass the rectory +gate, when in the light went lurching before his eyes. He hurried +softly. The intruders were half-way up the drive, whispering thickly, +but leaving a continuous sound in their wake, from something or other +that they had in tow. Carlton followed on the grass, a horrible +suspicion already in his heart; but he recognised their voices first.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_206" id="Page_206">[Pg 206]</a></span>"Where shall we plant ut? Which is his winder?"</p> + +<p>"That there near the end. O Lord, what a lark!"</p> + +<p>"Yes—to think he come talkun to me while you was all in the barn. The +cheek! But here's his answer for him."</p> + +<p>The first and last speaker was the stout young barman from the Plough +and Harrow; the other was Jim Cubitt, an unworthy character who had been +turned out of the choir some months before. And Robert Carlton's +"answer" was his missing dog, lying dead in the lantern's light, with +particles of gravel glistening in his lacklustre coat.</p> + +<p>At this, the climax of his long night's search, with its ironic +interludes—all as honey matched with this—a very madness seized on +Carlton, so that he sprang out of the dark into the lighted area where +these two young ruffians stood, and fell upon them like a fiend. Not a +word was said; there was no time even for a cry. But Cubitt came first, +and had the muddled senses shaken out of him and new ones kicked in +before his comrade could so much as attempt a rescue. This, however, the +young barman did so gamely that the ex-chorister was flung in a heap and +his champion sent tripping over him with a boxing crack upon the jaw. +And Carlton towered breathless, his fists still doubled, waiting for the +fallen youths to rise and fall again.</p> + +<p>The one from the public-house merely sat upright, ruefully and sullenly +enough, but with a sound discretion which the Long Stow lout had the wit +to imitate.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_207" id="Page_207">[Pg 207]</a></span>"<i>We</i> never 'urt your dorg," the former vowed. "He was dead before I see +him, and I don't know now who done ut. I never knew anything about that +till after you was in to-night, when I heared who it must ha' been."</p> + +<p>"I don't care!" cried Carlton, in a fury still. "You helped to drag it +here—my poor dog! You would spite me like that, you whom I never saw +before to-night! You're worse than Jim Cubitt; he at least had an old +grievance against me; and you're both of you worse than the man who did +this foul thing, whoever he may be, and I don't want to know. Out of my +sight, both of you, and spread this as far as you please: what you got +from me, and what you did to get it. You'll find yourselves the martyrs +of the countryside!"</p> + +<p>"I'm sorry," said the young barman, getting up. "I'm sorry, and I can't +say no fairer, 'cept that I must ha' been an' got right tight. But I +ain't tight now. I'm not a Long Stow chap, sir, and I shall tell them, +where I come from, that you're a man, whatever else you are. But as to +spreadun, I don't think I shall do much o' that; what do you say, mate?"</p> + +<p>"I never killed his dog," said the former choirman.</p> + +<p>Nor did Carlton ever actually know, or seek finally to ascertain, the +author of a deed even more detestable than it had appeared at first +sight. For when the study lamp had been brought out into the still +night, the first thing it revealed was that the poor beast had been +neither shot nor poisoned; its<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_208" id="Page_208">[Pg 208]</a></span> brains had been beaten out. And Carlton +felt as though his own heart had been beaten out with them, as he +fetched a spade from the shed, and dug a grave by lamplight a few yards +from his study door.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_209" id="Page_209">[Pg 209]</a></span></p> + +<h2 class="newchapter"><a name="CHAPTER_XIX" id="CHAPTER_XIX"></a>XIX<br /> +<span class="smalltext">THE FIRST WINTER</span></h2> + + +<p>The last leaf had filtered from the elms; the horse chestnuts had long +been bare. And now there was no more cover for the blackened stump of +Long Stow church, in its ring of rotting leaves, and its meshes of trunk +and twig, than for the guilty genius of this mournful spot. All the +world could see him now, and gauge the crass pretence of his +preposterous task; there was no deceiving such a wise little world; but +it had been requested not to look, and was accordingly content with +passing glimpses of a drama in which its interest was indeed upon the +wane. There were some things, however, which even a docile and +phlegmatic community could not help noticing as winter set in. It might +not be honest work, but it was making a thin man thinner. And he was +always at it. Yet it no longer seemed to give him any pleasure. Indeed, +his face was changed. Its dominant expression was grim and dogged. There +were no more lights and shadows. It was the face of a workman who has +lost interest in his work. Nevertheless, the work went on.</p> + +<p>It went on in all weathers. At first Carlton had tried devoting the wet +days to indoor work. He had cleaned his house from top to bottom, +emptied most<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_210" id="Page_210">[Pg 210]</a></span> of the rooms, stored furniture in the others, and covered +with sheets like a careful housewife. Not that he cared greatly for his +things; but his hermitage should not grow foul. The two rooms which he +retained in use were the kitchen and his study (in which Carlton slept), +with the flagged scullery for his bath. The rest of the house he shut +up, after robbing his picture-frames to patch the broken windows, which +he treated so ingeniously that they looked quite wonderful from the +road; but on windy nights the constant rattle and the occasional crash +were one long outcry for putty and a glazier. There was no more to be +done indoors. And still it rained. So one day he marched through the +village (unmolested after all), and it was duly ascertained that he had +taken a return ticket to Felixstowe, of all places, apparently for +change of air. But through the very next day's rain he could be seen +(and heard) very busy at his walls: in a suit of oilskins and a +sou'wester. Thus the work went on once more.</p> + +<p>By Christmas every stone that was to stand had been scraped and pointed; +a few sound ones had been scraped and relaid; here and there an entirely +new stone had been cut to fit the place of one charred out of shape; but +in the lower courses such instances were rare, too rare to suit his own +creative taste, but Carlton was determined to deal with the lowest +courses first, and to raise all the walls to his own height before +finishing one. In the case of those which were to contain windows, it +might be well to pause at the sill; the windows alone might take him a +couple of years. Meanwhile these were the walls which had suffered<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_211" id="Page_211">[Pg 211]</a></span> +most, and first let him reach the sills: if he did that within the next +six months Carlton thought he would be lucky. For his progress was as +that of the insect which builds the reef; it was often imperceptible +even to himself; yet always the work was going on.</p> + +<p>The man was all muscle now; spare at his best, he had scarcely an ounce +of mere flesh left. Yet, for his work's sake, he made wonderfully +regular meals, often with a relish; and twice in the autumn killed a +sheep, having cold mutton for many days in the colder weather. But the +preliminary tragedy and the ultimate waste were equally disgusting, and +his normal needs seemed better met by predatory visits to the hen-yard. +Practice made him a fair baker and a moderate cook; but, as he had never +been particular about his food, and his only object was to maintain +bodily strength, he sometimes defeated his end, and added the dejection +of dyspepsia to all other ills. Otherwise the physical life suited +Carlton; he was out all day long; and the worst discomforts rarely +followed him into the open air. At his work, for instance, he was always +warm; indoors, only when he went to bed. He never had a fire, except to +cook by; thus he still had a few coals left, but he doubted whether +anybody would sell him any more. There was, however, all the half-burnt +woodwork of the church; most of this would burn again; and, with +economy, might keep him in firing throughout the term of his suspension. +Meanwhile, lamp, rug, and overcoat gave all the heat that Carlton would +allow himself in the study. Once, when his stock of par<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_212" id="Page_212">[Pg 212]</a></span>affin had run +out, he had to tramp for fresh supplies into a town where his face was +unknown; and that experience made him more than ever economical of such +fuel as he had.</p> + +<p>Unparalleled position for an endowed clergyman of the Church of England, +the incumbent of an enviable living, an Oxford man, a man of family, a +zealous High Churchman, an enlightened and alluring preacher, towards +the latter end of the nineteenth century! Scandalous priest though he +had also proved himself, his case was as pitiable as unique; a pariah in +his own parish; the outcast of his own people; an inland Crusoe, driven +to the traditional expedients of the castaway, and living the very life +of such within sight and hail of a silent and unseeing world. It was a +position which few men would have faced for an instant. This man +maintained it throughout the winter. And throughout the winter his work +went on. And the spring found him technically sane.</p> + +<p>But his brain bore it better than his heart. Some vital part of him was +certain to suffer. His brain escaped altogether, his body for a time; +but his heart was hard within him; all his prayers could not soften it; +and presently he lost the power even to pray.</p> + +<p>This was the meaning of the changed face seen from the road, in the days +and weeks succeeding the Long Stow celebration of the battle of +Tel-el-Kebir. Thereafter it was the face of one in the coils of +malignant despair. But the more gradual and substantial change, in such +a man, was terrible beyond deduction from its mere outward shadow.</p> + +<p>Here was no sudden and sweeping infidelity; no<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_213" id="Page_213">[Pg 213]</a></span> plucking of loose roots +from a shallow soil. Shallow this man was not, nor easily shaken in the +least of his convictions. His general tenets stood intact. He still +believed in the efficacy, under God, of earnest and worthy prayer. But +he could no longer believe in the efficacy of his own prayers. They were +not worthy: that was the whole truth. They were earnest enough, but +utterly unworthy, and it was better not to pray at all.</p> + +<p>His most passionate prayers had been for his own forgiveness, for the +restoration of his own peace of mind, for the blessing of God upon his +own little labours; selfish prayers, one and all; and he saw the +selfishness at last. It shocked him. He tried to stamp it out, this new +and obtrusive egoism; but he failed. Denied all contact with his +fellow-creatures, with only his own wishes to consult, his own work to +do, his own heart to probe, his own life to discipline, the man was an +egoist before he knew it; and it was only through his prayers that he +ever discovered it at all. They were not only unanswered; they no longer +brought their own momentary comfort, as heretofore. Of old it had been +much more than momentary; now it was no comfort at all. There must be +some reason for this; he asked himself what reason; and the answer was +this revelation of the true character of his prayers. They were poisoned +at the fount. He tried to purify them, but all in vain. Self would creep +in. So then he prayed only for a renewal of the faculty of pure and +unselfish prayer. And this was the most passionate of all his prayers. +But it also was unanswered. So he prayed no more.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_214" id="Page_214">[Pg 214]</a></span>He was unforgiven: so Carlton explained it to himself. And a little +brooding convinced him of his idea. If God had forgiven him, He would +have shown some sign of His clemency through men. But what had men done? +They had broken his windows; they had burnt his church; they had closed +up every avenue to such poor atonement as was in his power; they had +forced him into a position which he had never sought, though for a +little it had consoled him; then tried, by false accusation, to force +him out of it; and now they had cut him off from themselves, had set him +apart as a thing eternally unclean, had even stooped to destroy the one +dumb being that clung to him in his exile!</p> + +<p>The murder of the dog was no little thing in itself; coming at the foot +of such a list, at the bitter end of a night of bitterness, it was the +last drop that petrified a truly humble and a strenuously contrite +heart.</p> + +<p>But it did not petrify his hand; and the work of that hand went on +without ceasing, save on that day which was now the Day of Rest +indeed—and nothing more. The other six, his energies were redoubled. If +he was now more than ever a traitor to his Master, well, there was still +this one thing that he could do for the Master's sake. And he did it +with all his might.</p> + +<p>No day was too wet for him; no day was too cold. His fingers might turn +blue, his moustache might freeze; it is beside the point that the winter +chanced to be too mild for the latter contingency. While five fingers +could control the chisel, and the other hand<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_215" id="Page_215">[Pg 215]</a></span> strike true, no weather +could have deterred him. And no weather did.</p> + +<p>So the New Year came, and the work went on through January and February +without a break. But the month of March, as it often will, made late +amends for the insipidity of its predecessors. A spell of colourless +humidity was broken by bright skies and a keen wind; the latter grew +bitter with the day; the former darkened before it was time. And when +Robert Carlton opened his study doors next morning, to air the room +while he took his bath, a little snowdrift came tumbling in through the +outer one.</p> + +<p>Carlton looked forth upon a white world in dazzling contrast to the +clear dark grey of a starless sky; at first there was no third tint. But +every moment seemed lighter than the last, and presently the trees +showed brittle and black as ever against the sky; for the drifted snow +lay everywhere but on their waving branches; and the wind blew hard and +bitter as before.</p> + +<p>Carlton bathed grimly in broken ice; he was not going to be baffled by a +little snow. He was very gradually rebuilding the east end, using the +old stones where he could, but cutting more new ones than he had +bargained for. He could not help it. This wall was going up. It was too +near the lane. It should hide the builder's head before he left it for +another wall. It was up to his thighs already.</p> + +<p>So all that day he laboured with his feet in the snow, and only his legs +entrenched against the cutting wind. The stones were ready; he now +prepared them by the course. They had only to be carried<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_216" id="Page_216">[Pg 216]</a></span> from the shed +with mortar mixed expressly overnight; but to avoid dropping them in the +slush and snow, each stone was laid out of hand; and a considerable +muscular exertion thus followed by a prolonged niggling with trowel and +plummet and transverse string, and this in the fangs of the wind, as +often as twice or thrice an hour. It was the hardest day yet. But it was +also the most successful. The entire course was laid by half-past three +in the afternoon.</p> + +<p>In earlier days Carlton would undoubtedly have given way to that +spontaneous elation for which he had been wont to pay so dearly; now a +tired man crept back to his bed, without a thought beyond the next +hour's rest (he had seldom been so tired), and the meal that he must +then prepare as mere munition of war. Yet on his study threshold he +paused and turned, as doomed men may at the door of the dreadful shed.</p> + +<p>There was little in the scene itself to stamp it on the mind. Already +the snow was beginning to disappear; but the sky was still hard and +clean; and the east wind cut to the bone. The ridge of firs, cresting +the ploughed uplands beyond the lane, notched the bleak sky with dark +cockades on russet stems; white clouds floated above, a white moon hung +higher. A robin hopped in the snow at Carlton's feet; he was a good +friend to the birds, and had not forgotten them that morning. Somewhere +a blackbird sung him indoors; somewhere a starling smacked its beak. And +this was all; but Robert Carlton carried the impression to his grave.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_217" id="Page_217">[Pg 217]</a></span>Instead of sleeping for an hour, he slept far into the night; and spent +the rest of it in misery between bouts of shivering and of intolerable +heat. His throat was on fire, to quench it he coughed, and already his +cough hurt queerly. In the morning the man was ill enough to know that +he was going to be worse. He took characteristic measures while he +could.</p> + +<p>It was a fine instinct which had inspired him to economise his coal; now +was the time when that little hoard might save his life. But he had only +one scuttle, and for the moment felt baffled; then he dried his bath, +and put the coals in that, thus eventually getting them to the study in +one load. These exertions hurt Carlton like his cough. In both cases it +was as though his body had been transfixed. His head swam with the pain. +Yet next moment he was reeling back for wood; and not less than ten +infernal minutes did he spend on such errands, a furious fever alone +sustaining him. It was constructive suicide, yet not to have these +things was certain death. Now it was all the alcohol in the house, in a +bottle that had lasted nearly a year; now a basin of eggs, of which he +had always a fair store indoors; now pail upon pail of water for his +kettle. Carlton had been a great visitor of the sick, and seen many a +death from the disease he was preparing to resist. He had therefore a +rough idea of what to do for himself; he was only doubtful as to how +long he might be able to do anything at all. The lightest breath had now +become a pang. Already he was alarmingly ill, and must inevitably grow<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_218" id="Page_218">[Pg 218]</a></span> +much worse. But he did not intend to die. He trusted the constitution of +a lean and hardy race, and he trusted his own nerve.</p> + +<p>At last the fire was alight, a full kettle mounted, and the spout +trained upon the pillow, the bed itself being drawn up close to the +fire. Under the bed was the bath full of coals, and within as easy reach +the eggs, the whisky, a breakfast-cup, and the pails of water. But even +now the sick man was not in his bed; he was lying in a heap upon the +floor, where he had fallen the moment he could afford to faint.</p> + +<p>On recovering he shook off half his clothes, crawled between the +blankets, and beat up an egg with whisky. This was all he took that day. +And there he lay, breathing needles and coughing daggers until he slept.</p> + +<p>"I'm not going to die. They shan't get rid of me like that. I don't die +like a rat in his hole!"</p> + +<p>That seemed to be the burden of his thoughts for many days; in reality +the time was forty-eight hours. And whenever the determination rose +afresh in his heart, and the dry lips moved with its expression, the +whole man would rouse himself to an effort beside which the building of +the church was pastime. He would sit up and put on more coals with a +hand black from the constant operation. Then he would lean as close as +possible to the singing kettle, and inhale the steam until the gaunt arm +supporting his weight could do so no more. Even then he would make a +still longer arm before lying down, and replenish the kettle from one of +the pails, using the breakfast-cup for a dipper. So the kettle would +cease<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_219" id="Page_219">[Pg 219]</a></span> singing for a time, and, each occasion entirely exhausting the +spent man, the chances were that he would fall into a sleep that was +half a swoon. But he never slept very long. He would dream that the fire +was black, and start up to mend it—often before the kettle had +recovered its voice. So far from the fire going out, for sixty hours it +never went down. Carlton would mend it almost in his sleep. Even on the +third day, when a kind delirium destroyed sensation for some hours, he +never forgot his fire; the lean black hand would still feel its way to +the bath beneath the bed, and there grope weakly for the smaller coals. +All lucid thought and all delirious whispers were gradually monopolised +by the fire. It became the sick man's life. He would not let it out +while he lived. And live he would. When the fire died out, then so would +he. But he was not going to die this time.</p> + +<p>"Their latest dodge to get rid of me, is it? Trust to Général +Février—no, March! Never mind; he shan't lay his bony finger on me +. . . You'll burn 'em if you try! . . . I tell you the law's on my +side."</p> + +<p>Delirium grew from the exception into the rule. The kettle sang no +longer; the bottom was out and the whole thing red-hot; for the fire had +never been so good. The fender was inches deep in ashes. With or without +his reason Carlton knew enough to thrust the poker through and through +the lower glow. It was a clear fire all the time.</p> + +<p>And the heat of it at such a range! It singed the sheets; it flayed the +face; but it also helped in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_220" id="Page_220">[Pg 220]</a></span>calculably to keep this stricken body and +this strenuous soul together.</p> + +<p>The crisis came before its time. Carlton grew too weak to hold the poker +or to lift a coal, but cruelly clear in his mind. Thus far he had never +prayed. He had abandoned prayer with all deliberation and in all his +vigour. It needed more than the fear of death to make him pray again, +least of all for mere life. Now that the fire was going out, and +recovery no longer possible, the case was changed; and this erring +servant broke his long silence with God, to pray both for forgiveness +and for a speedy issue out of his afflictions. And in the same hour came +the seeming answer, as if to assure him that even his prayers had still +some value in the eyes of the Most High. For delirium had dwindled into +coma, with these few lucid minutes between, and the fever and the pain +had passed away.</p> + +<p>Yet it was in this world that Robert Carlton awoke yet again, to find +his precious fire alight after all, and a dilapidated figure nodding +over it to the song of a fresh kettle. It was old Busby, the sexton. The +sick man could not speak; his little finger seemed to weigh a stone; it +was some minutes before he achieved movement enough to attract the +sexton's attention. But all this time the live coals had been warming +his soul. And already he lay convinced that he also was going to live.</p> + +<p>The sexton turned his face at last. It was a startling face for sick +eyes at such a range. The toothless mouth, which never closed, had often +reminded Mr. Carlton of one of his own gargoyles. It<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_221" id="Page_221">[Pg 221]</a></span> did so now. And a +continual trickle of saliva added a disgusting realism to the image, +which was, however, immediately dispelled by a human grin of profound +slyness.</p> + +<p>"And have you been bad?" inquired the sexton.</p> + +<p>"Beat—up—an egg. I—can't—speak."</p> + +<p>Evidently he could not, for Busby was bending a horrid ear.</p> + +<p>"Eh? eh?"</p> + +<p>Carlton made a fresh effort with shut eyes.</p> + +<p>"No food . . . faint for want . . . there no eggs?"</p> + +<p>"Eggs? Why, yes, here's one."</p> + +<p>"Beat up for me . . . too bad to speak."</p> + +<p>The sexton looked more sententious than ever.</p> + +<p>"Ah, I thought as how you'd been bad," said he, with all the nods of the +successful seer. "I thought as how you'd been bad!"</p> + +<p>"It's only been a cold," whispered Carlton, in sudden terror of the +public pity.</p> + +<p>"Only a cold?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, yes—that's all."</p> + +<p>"Then you've not been as bad as me!" cried Busby, triumphantly. "Do you +mind what I had inside me last year? That's there still! I can hear +that——"</p> + +<p>"Will you do what I ask?"</p> + +<p>It was a peremptory whisper now.</p> + +<p>"I would, sir, but I don't fare to know the road."</p> + +<p>"Then give me the egg, for heaven's sake, and you hold the cup."</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_222" id="Page_222">[Pg 222]</a></span>Carlton managed to rise a few inches in his impatience; but his fingers +had less power than those of the babe new-born, and the egg slipped +through them. With fortuitous dexterity, the sexton caught it in the +cup; there was a crack; and accident had accomplished the design.</p> + +<p>"Look what you've gone and done," said Busby, reproachfully, displaying +the yolk in the cup. Thereupon he received instructions which even he +could follow; and at length the mess was down, stinging with the +sexton's notion of a teaspoonful of whisky. This second accident was +even happier than the first; there was instant agitation in every vein. +And now Busby could hear without stooping.</p> + +<p>"When did you find me?"</p> + +<p>"That fare to be an hour ago, I suppose. Ah, but I thought as how you +looked bad! Soon as ever I see you, I say to myself, 'The reverend's +found what beat him at last,' I say; 'he do look wunnerful bad,' I say. +And you see, I was right."</p> + +<p>There was the tiniest gleam in the great bright eyes.</p> + +<p>"You were partly right," said Carlton, "and partly wrong. I'm not done +with yet, Busby. So then you lit the fire for me?"</p> + +<p>"That wasn't wholly out."</p> + +<p>"Ah!"</p> + +<p>"That soon burnt up. Then I went and got another kettle."</p> + +<p>The great eyes flashed suspicion.</p> + +<p>"And told everybody you saw, I suppose!"</p> + +<p>"I should be very sorry," said the sexton, sig<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_223" id="Page_223">[Pg 223]</a></span>nificantly. "No, I come +an' went by the lane, an' took wunnerful care that nobody set eyes on I. +I thought as how you might fare to like a cup o' tea, an' that was a +rare mess you'd made o' <i>your</i> kettle."</p> + +<p>"You've done well," whispered Carlton. "You've saved my—saved my cold +from getting worse. You shall never regret it, Busby; only don't you +tell anybody I've had one—do you hear? Don't you tell a single soul +that you found me in bed!"</p> + +<p>"No fear," chuckled the sexton. "I should be very sorry to tell anybody +I'd found you at all. They might hear o' that somewhere else!"</p> + +<p>Carlton lay still with thought and purpose; and death itself could not +have given the lower part of his face a harsher cast; but the hot eyes +were fixed upon the fading diamonds of the window over the table. At +last he spoke—and it was a pity there was but the sexton to hear the +firm tones of so faint a voice.</p> + +<p>"Find my keys, Busby. I'm going to give you a sovereign——"</p> + +<p>"A what?"</p> + +<p>"The first of several if you do what I want!"</p> + +<p>Not much later the sexton was hobbling towards Lakenhall, for the first +time in many years; and the sick man lay greatly doubting whether he +should ever see him again. His weakness was terrible now. The excitement +of conversation had provoked a relapse as grave as it was inevitable in +one so weak. The flickering lamp was only fed by the stimulus of +suspense, the glow of the fire, and the man's own in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_224" id="Page_224">[Pg 224]</a></span>domitable will. The +latter, however, never failed him for a moment.</p> + +<p>"I <i>will</i> pull through," he would mutter at his worst. "I will—I will +. . . Oh, is he never, never . . ."</p> + +<p>He came at last—with corn-flour, meat-extract, a bottle of port, and +such other requisites as had entered the sick man's head under the spur +of his overdose of ardent spirits. And, simple and inadequate as they +were, these things spelt the first syllable of recovery.</p> + +<p>The sexton came night after night; he also was a lonely man; and he +dearly loved a pound. In a week he was richer than he had ever been +before. It became difficult for him to take a disinterested view of the +determined progress which the patient made towards complete recovery and +consequent independence. The situation, however, had its little +compensations: at all events it enabled the imaginary sufferer to crow +over the real one to his heart's content.</p> + +<p>"Ah, sir, you don't fare to know what that is to be right ill, like I. +<i>You</i> never had a fine fat frog settun in your middle an' keepun all the +good out o' your stummick. That get every bite I eat, an' then that cry +for more. Croap, croap, croap!"</p> + +<p>One day brought forth an unsuspected fact. The sexton was no longer +sexton at all. There had been no more burials. The school-bell was rung +on Sundays, as all the week, by the schoolmaster's son. Busby had been +dismissed with a present, as long ago as the month of August; but that +was not all.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_225" id="Page_225">[Pg 225]</a></span> He had thereupon left the Church in justifiable dudgeon, +and thrown in his spiritual lot with the Particular Baptists in the +little flint chapel between the Linkworth turning and the Flint House. +He now exhorted Mr. Carlton to do the same.</p> + +<p>"If you do, sir," said Busby, "you'll never fall no more."</p> + +<p>Carlton winced. But the man had saved his life. Nothing should annoy him +from the kind old imbecile who had come to his succour while the sound +world stood aloof.</p> + +<p>"You don't know that," he said quietly.</p> + +<p>"But I do," declared the other. "I'm like to know. God's children can't +sin, and I'm one on 'em."</p> + +<p>Carlton opened his eyes.</p> + +<p>"Do you mean to tell me you never sin?"</p> + +<p>"I mean to tell you, sir," said the solemn sexton, "that, since God laid +his hand on me, now seven month ago, I've never once committed the +shadder of a sin."</p> + +<p>"Then, if I were you, I should remember what St. Paul says—'Let him +that thinketh he standeth take heed—lest—he—fall.'"</p> + +<p>The text faltered; it was terribly two-edged; but Carlton had not +perceived the pitfall until he was over the brink. He had forgotten +himself in his scorn, and spoken impulsively as the man that he had been +the year before. But the inveterate egotist was conveniently full of +himself, and his pat retort quite free from offence.</p> + +<p>"Fall?" said he, with his foolish eyes wide open.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_226" id="Page_226">[Pg 226]</a></span> "Why, I couldn't do +that if I tried; and I have tried, just to see; but I fare to have +forgotten how to sin. Do you believe me, sir, I can't even raise a swear +at this little varmin what's killun me inch by inch. Why, I'm grateful +to it! But I do sometimes fare to cry to think I have to stay another +day in this world o' sin, when I know there's a place prepared for me in +heaven above."</p> + +<p>This stupendous speech was too much for even Mr. Carlton's self-control. +Its snivelling tone, its evident conviction (confirmed by a gargoyle's +grin of infinite self-esteem), were aggravated by the complete surprise +of this spiritual revelation; and between them they awoke a dormant +nerve. Robert Carlton did not exhibit that annoyance which he had +determined to conceal; he did much worse. He burst out laughing in the +sexton's face. And his laughter was long, loud, high-pitched and +hysterical, alike from weakness and from long disuse.</p> + +<p>The sexton on his legs, in a perfect palsy of horror and offence, alone +put a stop to it.</p> + +<p>"I beg your pardon," gasped Carlton, his eyes full of tears; "oh, I +beg——"</p> + +<p>And again that hysterical, high-pitched laughter got the better of him, +ringing weirdly enough through the empty house.</p> + +<p>"Ah!" said the dotard, when it had stopped at last; and the monosyllable +contented him for some moments. "Well," he at length continued, with a +brisker manner and a brighter face; "well, thank God I pulled you +through; thank God I didn't let you die in your sins and go to +everlasting hell without an<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_227" id="Page_227">[Pg 227]</a></span>other chance of immortal life. You wicked +man! You wicked man! I'll go and I'll pray for you; but I'll never come +near you no more."</p> + +<p>So the solitary regained his solitude; when he spoke again, it was to +himself.</p> + +<p>"Well, he has his money," he reflected aloud: he had paid the sexton +some seven pounds in all. "And my gratitude!" he cried later. "I must +never forget that I owe my life to that egregious old man."</p> + +<p>Yet the greater gratitude was beginning to stir within him, as the sap +was even then stirring in the trees. It was a mild, bright day, one of +the last in March. The invalid had not yet been out; he would go out +now. In an instant he was wrapping up.</p> + +<p>Oh, but it was wonderful! the feel and noise of the moist gravel under +the soles of his boots; the green, damp grass; the watery sun; the +beloved birds; the mild, beneficent air.</p> + +<p>His steps took the old direction of their own accord. In a minute he was +there, at the church, and seated on the very wall which he had been +building a fortnight before, surveying his work.</p> + +<p>Had some one been carrying it on in his absence? Or was it only that one +noticed no difference from day to day, but all the difference in the +world after an unaccustomed absence? Yes, this was it; and he drew the +deep breath which his first idea had checked.</p> + +<p>Still it was wonderful: one wall seemed so much higher, another so much +cleaner than before; and yet there was no stone either laid or scraped +which Carlton did not recognize at a glance, with sudden<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_228" id="Page_228">[Pg 228]</a></span> memories of +special travail; and the string was still where he had stretched it to +keep the line. He had under-estimated his progress at the time; that was +all; but again it was as though the sap was rising in his heart.</p> + +<p>The very tangle of blackened timber, which still cumbered nine-tenths of +the inner area, no longer struck Carlton as the unconquerable chaos it +had appeared on that bitter day which seemed so many days ago; yet, when +he laid white hands upon such a beam as he had easily shouldered then, +he could not lift it an inch. Ah, that day! It would take him weeks to +undo its evil work. The wet feet and the cutting wind, he could feel +them both again, with the sweat freezing on his body, and every pore an +open door to death. There was the ridge of red-stemmed firs, too far +east to blunt the cold steel of that deadly wind; and here beneath him +the barrier he had been building last, and must finish now before he did +another thing. How firm and true was this top course, that he had laid +that day with the bony fingers at his throat! Well, he would have died +with a good day's work behind him . . . It must have been a very near +thing . . . he wondered how near when the sexton came, and why the +sexton had come at all. The man had never given a good reason. He had +only just fared to think there might be something wrong.</p> + +<p>On the way indoors, the invalid stopped at a tree. It was one of the +horse-chestnuts; and already every delicate extremity was swollen and +sticky to the touch; and the birds sang of summer in the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_229" id="Page_229">[Pg 229]</a></span> branches. +Carlton passed on with the short, quick steps of a feeble person in a +hurry. Rivers were running in his heart; he wanted to be where he could +kneel.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_230" id="Page_230">[Pg 230]</a></span></p> + +<h2 class="newchapter"><a name="CHAPTER_XX" id="CHAPTER_XX"></a>XX<br /> +<span class="smalltext">THE WAY OF PEACE</span></h2> + + +<p>Three years later the man was still alone, and the church still growing +under his unaided but untiring hand. Indeed, from one end, it looked +almost ready for the roof, the west gable rising salient through the +trees, with the original window intact underneath. But this window was +the exception, the sole survivor from the fire, and for the past year +the rest had been one long impediment. Even now, only the three single +lights, in either transept and to the right of the porch respectively, +had been wrought to a finish from sill to arch; a mullioned window was +just begun; the remainder all yawned to the sky in ragged gaps of +varying width. But the village looked daily on the one good end, flanked +by the west walls of either transept, which happened not to have a +window between them, and were consequently finished. And the village was +softening a little towards its outcast, though no man said so above his +breath; nor was a living soul known to have been near him all these +years, unless it was the new sexton to dig a grave, or a Lakenhall +curate to make an entry in the parish register.</p> + +<p>There had, however, been one or two others; the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_231" id="Page_231">[Pg 231]</a></span> first knocking at the +study door on the evening of the first funeral, some months after +Carlton's illness.</p> + +<p>Carlton was reading at the time. His heart stopped at the sound. It was +repeated before he could bring himself to open the door.</p> + +<p>"Tom Ivey!"</p> + +<p>"That's me, sir; may I come in?"</p> + +<p>"Surely, Tom."</p> + +<p>The hulking mason entered awkwardly, and refused a chair. His large +frame bulked abnormally in a ready-made suit of stiff black cloth. He +seemed to take up half the room, as he stood and glowered, a full-length +figure of surly embarrassment and dark resolve.</p> + +<p>"There was a funeral to-day," he began at last.</p> + +<p>"I know."</p> + +<p>"That was my poor mother, Mr. Carlton."</p> + +<p>"Yes, I heard. Tom, I'm so sorry for you!"</p> + +<p>Their hands flew together, and were one till Carlton winced.</p> + +<p>"There's nothun to be sorry for," said Tom, with husky philosophy. "Her +troubles are over, poor thing. So's one o' mine! You can start me +to-morrow."</p> + +<p>"Start you, Tom?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, sir, I mean to work for you now. I'd like to see the man who'll +stop me! You've shown 'em all the man you are; now that's <i>my</i> turn."</p> + +<p>And the broad face beamed and darkened with alternate enthusiasm and +defiance. Carlton beheld it with parted lips and startled eye; and so +they stood through a long silence, till Carlton sat down<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_232" id="Page_232">[Pg 232]</a></span> with a smile. +It was a singularly gentle smile, as he leant back in his worn old +chair, and the lamplight fell upon his face.</p> + +<p>"After all these months," he murmured; "after all these months!"</p> + +<p>"I fare to hide my face when I count 'em up," admitted Ivey, bitterly. +"But what was the good of comun when I couldn't come for good? And how +could I in poor mother's time? It'd have meant—there's no sayun what +that wouldn't have meant."</p> + +<p>"You mean as regards Sir Wilton?"</p> + +<p>"I do, Mr. Carlton."</p> + +<p>"He will have been a good friend to you?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, yes."</p> + +<p>"Did those repairs, did he?"</p> + +<p>"Yes," sighed Ivey, "he was better than his word about them; you would +hardly know the place now. It made a lot of difference to mother. And I +had the job."</p> + +<p>"Oh!"</p> + +<p>"He's kept me busy, I must say. I've never wanted work."</p> + +<p>"Until now, I suppose?"</p> + +<p>"To tell you the truth, sir, I'm at work for him still."</p> + +<p>"For Sir Wilton Gleed?"</p> + +<p>"Yes—odd jobs about the estate."</p> + +<p>"Then my good fellow, what do you mean by offering yourself to me?"</p> + +<p>"Mean?" exclaimed Ivey, his black determination leaping into flame. "I +mean as I've made up my mind to give him the go-by for you. I'd have +done<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_233" id="Page_233">[Pg 233]</a></span> that long ago if it hadn't been for mother; but better late than +never. You've shown 'em the man you are, and now that's my turn. Look at +what you've done with your own two hands—there'll be other two from +to-morrow! You shan't work yourself right to death before my eyes. Why, +your hair's white with it already!"</p> + +<p>Carlton wheeled further from the lamp.</p> + +<p>"Not white," he murmured.</p> + +<p>"But that is, sir. When did you look in a glass?"</p> + +<p>"I don't know."</p> + +<p>"Then do you look to-morrow. That's white as snow. And your beard's +grey."</p> + +<p>"It's certainly too long," said Carlton, covering half with his hand.</p> + +<p>"And your hand—your hand!"</p> + +<p>It was scarred and horny as the mason's own. Carlton removed it from the +light, but said nothing.</p> + +<p>"That's done its last day's work alone," cried Tom. "I start with you +to-morrow, whether you want me or not. I'll show 'em! I'll show 'em!"</p> + +<p>And he stood nodding savagely to himself.</p> + +<p>"My dear fellow, you can't behave like that."</p> + +<p>The words fell softly after a long silence.</p> + +<p>"Why can't I?"</p> + +<p>Carlton gave innumerable reasons.</p> + +<p>"It would put us both in the wrong," was the last. "Go on working for +Sir Wilton—at any rate for another year. You owe it to him, Tom. And +don't you fret about me; I am a happier man than I ever deserved to be +again. Last winter it was different; but God has shown me infinite mercy +and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_234" id="Page_234">[Pg 234]</a></span> compassion. And now He has sent you to me, as a sign that even man +may forgive me in the end! That is enough for me, Tom. You cannot do +more for me than you have done to-night. But your duty you must do, by +God's help, as long as it is as clear as it is now. Don't bother your +head about me! I am getting into the knack. Perhaps by the time I come +to the roof—if I ever do—the want of a church may induce others to +help me finish mine. Then, if you like, you shall come back; but I won't +have you made an outcast on my account; one is enough."</p> + +<p>There were no more visits from Tom Ivey. This one came to the ears of +Sir Wilton; and that diplomatist instead of playing into the enemy's +hands by discharging his man, capped all his kindness to the mason by +getting him the offer of an irresistible berth in that London district +for which he himself sat. Thus Sir Wilton removed a wavering ally, and +at the same time renewed the lease of his allegiance.</p> + +<p>Carlton heard of it some months later, when there was another funeral, +and the Lakenhall curate came in again to make the entry. This curate +was a gentleman. He had a good heart and better tact. He not only +conversed with Carlton as with the perfectly normal clergyman, in +perfectly normal circumstances, but he would prolong these conversations +as far as he deemed possible without exciting a suspicion of the +profound pity which inspired him. He would bring bits of local gossip, +or the latest national event; once he let fall that Sidney Gleed was up +at Cambridge, and said to stand a chance of "coxing the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_235" id="Page_235">[Pg 235]</a></span> eight," while +Lydia was now a Mrs. Goldstein, the mistress of a splendid mansion in +Holland Park, and another up the Thames. It was from the same source +that Carlton obtained belated news of George Mellis, who had come +through two campaigns without a scratch, yet never been back to play the +hero on his native heath. In a word this curate, who was a very young +and rather commonplace fellow, came soon to stand for the outside world, +the world of newspapers and talk, to Robert Carlton, who liked him none +the less because his older eye saw through the artless arts with which +the lad sought to mask his charity.</p> + +<p>The visitations of this curate, who also conducted the one weekly +service in the village school, was a little arrangement between those +fast friends, Sir Wilton Gleed and Canon Wilders, who would have been +interested to learn the way in which their delegate improved the rare +occasion of a funeral. For marriages and baptisms the Long Stow folk had +taken to walking across the heath to Linkworth.</p> + +<p>Early in the second year there came a visitor whom Robert Carlton knew +at a glance, though he had never before seen him in the flesh. This was +a person with the appearance of a rather dissipated sporting man, who +tooled tandem through the village, and pulled up at the ruins in broad +daylight. The thing was thus a scandal from the first moment of its +occurrence, and the cockaded groom was beset by horrified rustics before +his master's red neck had disappeared among the low and ragged walls.</p> + +<p>Carlton had withdrawn into the invisible seclusion<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_236" id="Page_236">[Pg 236]</a></span> of the west end, +where he was nervously scraping at the nearest stone when the visitor +appeared, only to stop short with a whistle.</p> + +<p>"I thought this was the church the parson was building with his own +hands?"</p> + +<p>"So it is, my lord."</p> + +<p>"And you are what he calls his own hands!"</p> + +<p>"No, I am he."</p> + +<p>The visitor stared.</p> + +<p>"You the parson?"</p> + +<p>"I know I don't look like one," admitted Carlton, glancing from his +ruined hands to the shabby clothes in which he worked; "nor can I fairly +consider myself one at present. Yet I am still the only rector of this +parish, and it was I who wrote to your lordship about the stone. Yours +are the only quarries in this part of the country. The stone I am now +using came from them. But it is just finished, and unless you will let +me have some more I may have to stop; otherwise I believe that I could +build up to the roof, in time, without assistance."</p> + +<p>"And why should you?"</p> + +<p>"My church was burnt down through my own—fault."</p> + +<p>"I know all about that," said his lordship. "What I ask is, why should +you insist upon building it up single-handed?"</p> + +<p>"I didn't insist originally," sighed Carlton. "It is a very long story."</p> + +<p>The earl regarded him with a pair of very penetrating little eyes; he +was an ugly man with an ugly reputation, but one of those who take as +little trouble<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_237" id="Page_237">[Pg 237]</a></span> to conceal their worst characteristics as to display +their best.</p> + +<p>"To be quite frank with you," said he, "I happen to know something of +your story; and I consider it a jolly sight more discreditable to others +than to you. That's <i>my</i> opinion, and I don't care who knows it. So you +are really and literally doing this thing with your own two hands?"</p> + +<p>"Literally—as yet."</p> + +<p>"And who looks after you?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, no one comes near me; but I am bound to say that I have learnt to +look pretty well after myself. I have found it absolutely necessary for +my work."</p> + +<p>"Cookin' for yourself, and all that sort of thing?"</p> + +<p>"Cooking and even killing when necessary."</p> + +<p>"Is the boycott as wide and as bad as all that?"</p> + +<p>"It is no worse than I deserve."</p> + +<p>The visitor, looking sharply to see whether this was cant, was convinced +of its sincerity at a glance, though he loudly disagreed with the +opinion.</p> + +<p>"I call it a jolly shame," said he; "but I'm not going to hurt your +feelings by expressing mine. I'm the last man to rake up the past. But +it would be a different thing if you had really fired the church; that +was the last iniquity, charging you with that! How do I know you didn't? +There was a young friend of mine on the bench, and I had it from him as +a fact, with a jolly lot more besides. Now show me what you've done +before I go."</p> + +<p>This did not take a minute; there was so little to show for the first +long year and more of scraping, re-pointing, or rebuilding from the +ground. Save at<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_238" id="Page_238">[Pg 238]</a></span> the end where they had stood talking, there was +scarcely a wall that reached to their shoulders, and their tour of +inspection was closely followed from the road. It was conducted with few +words on either side, though the noble Earl muttered several which would +not have been muttered in other company. In the end he made a startling +undertaking. He would not only send as much more stone as was required, +but neither the stuff nor its delivery should cost Mr. Carlton a penny.</p> + +<p>Carlton turned a deeper bronze, but begged as a favour to be allowed to +pay. The new church was his debt to the parish. It was the one debt that +he would pay. The uttermost farthing and the least last stone were to +have come out of his own pocket. That had been his undertaking; it was +still his heart's ambition; but as such he saw its unworthy side; and +would place himself in his lordship's hands, sooner than be swayed by +false pride in such a matter.</p> + +<p>"Then you shall pay through the nose!" the other promised him; "and I'm +damned if I don't think all the more of you. I beg your pardon. I was +trying not to swear. But I never could stand parsons, and I suppose +it'll shock you when I tell you straight that you're the best I've +struck! You're a man, you are, and I take off my hat to you."</p> + +<p>He did so openly before the wide eyes and wider mouths of those watching +from the road; and so ended an incident which Sir Wilton Gleed described +as one of the most scandalous in all his experience. "Birds of a +feather," was, however, his ready and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_239" id="Page_239">[Pg 239]</a></span> untiring comment; and the saying +went from door to door, as "not guilty but don't do it again," had gone +before it; for there is nothing like a timeworn saying to crystallise a +widespread sentiment.</p> + +<p>This one did not come to Robert Carlton's ears, but he was perhaps the +first to whom the obvious comment had occurred, and its easy +justification did a little damp the glow in which his latest champion +had left him. It were better to have won the allegiance of a better man. +Yet who was he to judge his fellows? He had forfeited the right to +criticise another. Let him then be truly and duly thankful; for with +each waning year he had more and more occasion. Surely the heart of man +was beginning at last to soften towards an erring brother, who repented +very bitterly of his sin, and who was doing faithfully the little that +he could to undo the least of his sin's results. Ah, that he could have +done more! Ah, that by dying he could bring the dead to life!</p> + +<p>He was only a man; he could only suffer in his turn. That he had done, +was doing, and was still to do. And he thanked God for it again; so much +of the old spirit still endured. Yet was he none the less thankful for +every token of pardon or of pity from mere men. He knew that many would +justly execrate his name until the end. He knew of one at least who +would never forgive him in this life.</p> + +<p>This one came on a moonlight night in the spring of this fourth year; +came limping into the churchyard, leaning on his great stick, and +growling savagely to himself; little suspecting that he had Carlton +caught in the ruins, listening, watching, fascinated,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_240" id="Page_240">[Pg 240]</a></span> from one of those +ragged interstices with which even his perseverance and even his +ingenuity could scarcely cope. To be exact, it was, or was to be, the +mullioned window in the south transept; and as Musk advanced past this +angle of the building, the clergyman first leant, then crept, over the +sill to watch him.</p> + +<p>He stole into the open. Musk had his back turned; his shoulders were +very round. Carlton knew well at what grave the other stood staring, and +his heart stirred heavily within him. Oh, his wickedness! Oh, his sin! +How could there be any forgiveness, in heaven or on earth, for him a +clergyman? The poor old man, so old, so bent! He must speak to him; he +must throw himself at his feet; so bent, so lame! Oh, that that stick +might strike the life out of him then and there!</p> + +<p>He was creeping forward; suddenly he stopped. Musk was stooping, moving +his stick to and fro across the grave, with a sweeping movement, as of a +scythe. What was he doing? Carlton remembered—divined—and his blood +ran cold. The snowdrops were out; he had put some on the grave. It had +no stone, no name. It was only the tidiest and the greenest mound in all +the churchyard. He saw to that. And yet his flowers desecrated it; must +be swept to the winds . . .</p> + +<p>Musk had come away. He was looking at the south wall where it had +obviously been rebuilt. Carlton was skulking in the porch. The high moon +fell heavily on the upturned face, covering it with white patches and +black wrinkles; and these were working like a seething mass; but for a +long time the great<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_241" id="Page_241">[Pg 241]</a></span> frame stood motionless. Then, in a flash, a huge +fist flew from the huge shoulder, struck the sandstone a sickening blow, +swung round and was shaken at the rectory through the trees until the +blood dripped from the mangled knuckles. Carlton was so near that he +could both see and hear the heavy drops. He drew further within the +porch: he had also seen his enemy's face.</p> + +<p>Carlton had the fair mind and the true eye of the exceptional man. He +saw most things immediately as they really were, not as he wished to see +them, still less as they affected himself. He saw the moonlit face of +Jasper Musk for many a day. It did not haunt him. He could have +dismissed the vision from his mind at will; he preferred to consider it +calmly in a white light. There was hate undying and invincible. There +was something to respect. Carlton compared the petty though persistent +enmity of Sir Wilton Gleed with the great dumb hatred of Jasper Musk; +the last was inexorable as it was just; the first not wholly one or the +other, or Carlton was mistaken in the smaller man. Sir Wilton might be +the last man on earth to forgive him, yet in the very end he would +follow the world, supposing for a moment that the world ever led. But +Jasper Musk would hate the harder as the hate of others dwindled and +died.</p> + +<p>This conviction cast no new shadow across Carlton's life, but it brought +a new name into his prayers, and put the fine edge on an old anxiety. He +had always been anxious about his child, though in the beginning that +sense had been overborne by others. Now, however, it was acute enough. +What was<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_242" id="Page_242">[Pg 242]</a></span> becoming of the boy? Did he live? Was Musk bringing him up? +Was he kindly treated? Yes, yes, they would be kind enough! Carlton +trusted his enemy there; but his own position was none the less grieving +as he came to realise what it was. He had no position at all towards the +child—no rights, no control, no voice, no <i>locus standi</i> whatsoever. +Was it better so, or worse? What were they teaching the child? Would he +also grow up to deny God, and to execrate the name of his unworthy +minister?</p> + +<p>Yes, it was a shadow; but no new one; it only fell heavier and stretched +further than before. And gradually Carlton became obsessed with the idea +that he must do something, take some step, give some earnest of +voluntary responsibility, no matter what new humiliation awaited him. +But what to do, what step to take, for the best! As life grew a very +little easier in other ways that have been shown, this problem came upon +Carlton as a fresh complication, and as a poignant reminder of his +original wickedness. It was not, however, a problem to be solved out of +hand. It required infinite thought, and ceaseless prayer for that right +judgment for which Robert Carlton now again looked upward as well as +within. But while he thought, and even while he prayed, the walls were +still growing under his hands.</p> + +<p>And in his work he was strangely and serenely happy; there were no more +spasmodic joys and qualms. Enormous difficulties lay between him and the +impossible roof. He was at once artist and man enough to be stimulated +by these. He drew in chalk, upon the bare floors of his disused rooms, +full-<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_243" id="Page_243">[Pg 243]</a></span>size diagrams of all his arches, divided into as many parts as +there were to be stones, according to the easy rule set forth in his +precious book. Then he collected all the boxes, tin, wood, and +cardboard, that he could find upon the premises, and cut these up into +numbered patterns coinciding exactly with the diagrams on the floor, +thus providing himself with evening occupation for a whole winter, and +having all in readiness by the spring. Summer, however, found him still +in travail with the mullioned window in the north transept; and the +mullion and the tracery he was omitting altogether; the bare arch beat +him long enough.</p> + +<p>Prolonged solitude may debase a man to the savage or exalt him to the +saint; it never leaves him the mere man he was. Robert Carlton was still +too human to merit for a moment the hyperbole of saint; nevertheless he +developed in his loneliness several of those traits which are less of +this world than of a better. His mind dwelt continuously upon holy +things; it had ceased altogether to feed upon itself. He had suffered no +more sickness, either of body or of soul, such as that which had +threatened to destroy both in the first awful winter. The whole man was +chastened, purified, simplified and refined, by the consuming fires +through which he had passed. His faith had never been stronger than it +was now; it had never, never been so near in sheer simplicity to the +faith of a little child. In a word, and little as he knew it, this great +sinner, proven libertine, suspected incendiary, was now living in the +very sight and smile of God; and even His humblest creatures loved and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_244" id="Page_244">[Pg 244]</a></span> +trusted him as never in the days of prosperity and good report; for now +he loved them first. Nature, indeed, had not endowed him with that +sympathetic insight into inferior life—that genius for herself—which +is born in most people who are to have it at all. To Robert Carlton the +talent only came in his lonely and dishonoured prime, as the solace of +his exile, as a new interest and occupation for his mind, and surely +also as a sign of grace returning. There grew upon him in these years +the knowledge and love of very little things, trodden under foot or +brushed aside until now; a larger passion for nature in all her moods, +and all their manifestations; and, above all, the equal peace and +independence of him to whom the grasses whisper and the elements sing.</p> + +<p>So one wind braced him to titanic effort, and another confirmed him in +patient toil, and another relaxed both mind and members in merited ease; +so he came to know the birds about him, almost as a shepherd knows his +sheep, and even to discover some individuality beneath the feathers. +There was one huge sparrow, a perfect demon for the crumbs which Carlton +strewed every morning near the scene of his day's work, so that he might +not be quite alone. The lowest human qualities came out in this small +bird until finally, and with infinite ingenuity, it was trapped, +rationed, and compelled to watch a feast of the smaller fry through the +wires of a cage. Then there was a robin which in time came to perch upon +the solitary's hat while he worked; only in the beginning were there +crumbs in the brim. And again there was a starling that entertained him +by the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_245" id="Page_245">[Pg 245]</a></span> hour together, and all for love, from an elder-bush close to the +shed.</p> + +<p>But each of these years brought riper knowledge, until God's leafy acre, +with its canopy of changing sky, both teeming with life to his quickened +vision, became not only the outcast's second Bible, but all the almanac +he needed or possessed. With no newspaper to distract his mind, and +perhaps not a letter or a human voice for months, it was on bird and +leaf that he came to rely for the time of year; while the field of his +research was greatly extended by nocturnal exercise upon the +pine-serrated plateau beyond the church. Now the tips of the chestnut +twigs might bulge and bud, but spring was not spring until the plover +paraded his new black breast, or a peewit rose screaming at the midnight +intruder. All summer the small bird was king; hedgerows twittered; +crumbs were scorned; man was jilted for slug and worm. But the end came +in sight with the homebred mallard, flying feebly in his summer +feathers; and the flight of the wild duck was the end of all. The third +year found Carlton watching for the mallard as his bird of ill-omen, and +redoubling his efforts while his ear prepared for the shrill music of +the full-grown quills in final flight. Harsh experience had taught him +how little he could do, with any certainty or any continuity, in the +season when the little birds and he were best friends.</p> + +<p>It was late in May, and the church would soon be hidden for another +summer; meanwhile Carlton was still at work upon his transept window, in +a corner which a great stack of undressed sandstone made in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_246" id="Page_246">[Pg 246]</a></span>visible from +the lane, as it already was from the road. The folk from other villages +were beginning to stop and watch him longer than he liked, and he did +not care to be a cynosure at all. He only asked to build his church in +peace, and with it an example which should do at least a little to +counteract the one he had already set; and he meant both for his own +people, not for the outlying world. He really feared a reaction in his +favour on the part of the sentimental outsider. It would do him fresh +injury in the eyes of many of whom he honestly longed to win back in the +end. Moreover, his head was very level in these days. He saw nothing +heroic in his own conduct. With all his wish to undo a little of the +harm that he had done to others, there was a very human eagerness to +redeem his own past, so far as that was possible upon earth. Carlton was +never unaware of this incentive. He entertained no illusions about +himself, nor did he wish to create any in others. For example, there was +his work. It was never easy, sometimes hopeless, always fascinating. But +the man himself desired no credit for devotion to labour which he loved +for its own sake, and in which he was still capable (but no longer +ashamed) of forgetting the past.</p> + +<p>The transept window engrossed him to the last degree; mullion or no +mullion, it involved the largest arch that Carlton had yet attempted; +and already it alone had occupied many weeks. The patterns had been the +easy recreation of his winter evenings, but it had taken him all the +spring to reproduce a score of these in solid stone; for though the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_247" id="Page_247">[Pg 247]</a></span> +walls were coursed rubble, the windows must have ashlar facings, to be +as they had been before; and ashlar is to coursed rubble what broadcloth +is to Harris tweed. What with indefatigable labour, however, and the +general proficiency which he had now attained in his self-taught craft, +Carlton had his jambs up by the end of May, and his arched framework +fixed between them, all ready to support the arch itself. He was now +engaged upon the nine wedge-shaped stones to form the latter, working +each to the fine ashlar finish, as also to the exact dimensions of its +fellow in tin, wood, or cardboard, and laying them in couples on +alternate sides of the wooden centre, so as to weight it evenly as the +book ordained.</p> + +<p>It was the middle of the afternoon, and the quiet corner was already in +shadow; beyond, the wet grass glistened, for the day was a duel between +sun and rain. Carlton was taking the busier advantage of a brilliant +interval, and roughing out a new voussoir with the bold precision of the +expert mason. Ting, ting, ting, fell the hammer on the cold-chisel; the +soft, wet sandstone peeled off in curling flakes; the quick strokes rang +like a bell through the cool and cleanly air. It had been honest rain, +and it was honest sunshine. The green world broke freshly upon all the +senses. Every colour was more vivid than its wont, from the reddish +yellow of the rain-soaked stone to lilac and laburnum in the rectory +garden; from the creamy castles of the full-blown chestnuts to the +emerald sprays which were all that the slower elms had as yet to show +against an uncertain sky. Every inch of earth, every blade and petal, +was contributing<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_248" id="Page_248">[Pg 248]</a></span> its quota to the sweet summer smell. The birds sang; +the bees hummed; the hammer rang. And Carlton was so intent upon his +task, so bent upon making up for time lost that day, that it might have +been mid-winter for the little he looked and listened; yet he heard and +saw none the less; and his face was filled with quiet peace.</p> + +<p>In appearance he was many years older; at a distance he might have +passed for the father of the man who had drawn a larger congregation +than the old church would hold. His hair was grey; his beard was +grizzled. Incessant manual toil had aged him even more by giving his +body a constant stoop. And the hands were the hands of a labouring man. +But the brown eye, once inflammable, was now all gentleness and +humility; the whole face was sweetened and exalted by solitude and +suffering; in expression more patient, less austere; though the +untrained beard and moustache, hiding mouth and jaw, had something to do +with this.</p> + +<p>To his gentleness, however, there was striking testimony even now, as +his hammer rained ringing blows upon the cold-chisel; for within easy +reach of it perched the tame robin on another stone, quizzically +watching the performance. Then, in the same moment, three things +happened. The robin flew away, Carlton turned his head, and the ringing +blows broke off.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_249" id="Page_249">[Pg 249]</a></span></p> + +<h2 class="newchapter"><a name="CHAPTER_XXI" id="CHAPTER_XXI"></a>XXI<br /> +<span class="smalltext">AT THE FLINT HOUSE</span></h2> + + +<p>"The child must have a name, Jasper."</p> + +<p>"All right, you give it one. That's nothun to me."</p> + +<p>"But he must be christened properly."</p> + +<p>"Why must he?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, Jasper, if you don't fare to believe, his mother did, poor thing!"</p> + +<p>"And a lot of good that did her . . . but do you have your way. Make a +canting little Christian of him if you like. Do you think I care what +you do with the brat? I know what I'd do with it, if that wasn't for the +law!"</p> + +<p>So, in the early days, while Robert Carlton was still learning to live +alone, his son was trundled across the heath to Linkworth, and there +christened George after no one in particular. Followed the remaining +period of extreme infancy, during which Jasper Musk seldom set eyes upon +the child, and was more or less oblivious to its concrete existence. +Then one afternoon, the second summer, as Jasper sat smoking at a back +window, in the big chair to which his sciatica would bind him from +morning till night, there was a shuffling and a grunting in the passage, +and in came the child on all fours, with the lamp of adventure<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_250" id="Page_250">[Pg 250]</a></span> alight +and shining in grimy cheeks and great grey eyes.</p> + +<p>Musk took the pipe from his mouth, and met the small intruder with an +expressionless stare. Had his wife been by, no doubt he would have +bidden her take the little devil out of his sight; he had done so +before, using a harsher and more literal epithet for choice. But this +afternoon he was alone, and very weary of his solitary confinement. So +for the moment Musk sat stolidly intent; and the child, after a halt +induced by the creaking of the open door and the austere apparition +within, advanced once more, with the infantile equivalent for a cheer.</p> + +<p>"Well, you've got a cheek!" said Jasper, grimly.</p> + +<p>The boy had reached his legs, and was pulling himself up by the +particularly lame one, chattering the while in the foreign tongue of one +year old. Musk winced and muttered, then suddenly encircled the small +body with his mighty hands, and set the child high and dry upon his +knee.</p> + +<p>"And now what?" said he. "And now what?"</p> + +<p>For answer a chubby hand flew straight at his whiskers, grabbed them +unerringly, and pulled without mercy, but with yells of delight that +brought Musk's wife in hot haste from a far corner of the rambling +house. In the doorway she threw up her arms.</p> + +<p>"Oh, Georgie!" she cried aghast. "You naughty boy—you naughty boy!"</p> + +<p>Jasper had already created a diversion in favour of his whiskers, and +was in the act of blowing open an enormous watch when his wife +appeared.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_251" id="Page_251">[Pg 251]</a></span>"Now you take and mind your own business," snapped he, "and we'll mind +ours . . . Blow—can't you blow? Like this, then—p-f-f-f—and there you +are! Now you try; blow, and that'll open again."</p> + +<p>Georgie walked before the summer was over; and this was the year in +which Jasper scarcely set foot to the ground, so he made use of the +child from the first. Now it was his pipe, now his spectacles, now the +newspaper; these were the first familiar objects which the child came to +know by name before he could speak; and he never saw any one of the +three without taking it as straight as he could toddle to the great grey +man in the chair.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Musk suddenly found half her work with Georgie taken entirely off +her hands. She was even quicker over another discovery. Jasper would not +own that he had taken to the child; in her presence, on the contrary, he +ignored its very existence as utterly as heretofore. Yet now every day +she could have found them together at most hours; only she knew better.</p> + +<p>Cheerless environment for this new life—a gloomy old house—a grim old +couple. Nevertheless, and in very spite of all the circumstances of his +birth, Georgie from the first evinced that temperament which is a sun +unto itself. An expansive gaiety was his normal mood, and for years the +only variant was a terrible and overwhelming indignation with all his +world. He was, in fact, an entirely healthy little savage, with all the +wild spirits and facile affections of his age, and no exemption from its +traditional ills.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_252" id="Page_252">[Pg 252]</a></span> Once he had croup so severely that two doctors came +in the middle of the night, and Georgie never forgot their grave faces +and his grandfather's grim one at the foot of the bed. Indeed, the scene +formed his first permanent impression, though the sequel was more +memorable in itself. Georgie seemed to go to sleep for days and days, +and to awake in another world, though the bed was the same, and the +medicine-bottles, and the singing kettle; for it was day-time, and the +room full of sun, and the doctors gone; but in the sunlight there stood +instead the loveliest lady whom Georgie had beheld in his three or four +years of earthly experience. Thereupon he lay with his firm little mouth +pursed up, his grey eyes greater than even their wont, and his mind at +work upon some surreptitious teaching of his grandmother. It was a very +simple question that he asked in the end, but it made the lady kiss him +and cry over him in a way he never could understand.</p> + +<p>"Are you a angel?" Georgie had said.</p> + +<p>Gwynneth happened to be somewhat morbidly aware of her own poverty in +angelic qualities, though it was not this that made her cry. She was +alone at the hall for the winter, which Sir Wilton and Lady Gleed were +spending upon a well-beaten track abroad, while Sidney was still at +Cambridge. Gwynneth also might have drifted from Cannes to Nice, and +from Nice to Mentone, for she had been taken from school on Lydia's +marriage, and assigned a permanent position at the side of Lady Gleed. +In this capacity the girl had not shone, though her peculiar character +had lost nothing by the duty and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_253" id="Page_253">[Pg 253]</a></span> faithful practice of consistent +self-suppression. On the other hand, there was the demoralising sense of +personal superiority, which was thrust upon Gwynneth at every turn of +this companionship, causing her to take an unhealthy interest in her own +faults, in order to preserve any humility at all; for she was full of +mental and of bodily vigour, and her aunt was signally devoid of both. +Consequently when Lydia petitioned to go instead (having become a mother +to her great disgust, and demanding an immediate separation from her +infant), the proposal was adopted to the equal satisfaction of all +concerned. Gwynneth, for her part, was very sorry not to travel and see +the world; but she knew, from a tantalising experience, that hotel life +was all that one could count upon seeing with Lady Gleed; and from every +other point of view it was infinite relief to be alone. Literally alone +she was not, since the little German housekeeper never left the hall. +But Fraulein Hentig was a self-contained and entirely tactful companion, +with whom it was possible to enjoy the delights of solitude while +escaping the disadvantages. The two were very good friends.</p> + +<p>Gwynneth was now in her twentieth year, a tall and graceful girl, albeit +with the slight stoop of the natural student that she was. At her school +she had won all available honours, but it was not a modern school, and +in those days such as Gwynneth had no definite knowledge of any wider +arena. So she left her school without great regret. She had learnt all +that they could teach her there. And she taught herself twice as much in +stolen hours spent in the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_254" id="Page_254">[Pg 254]</a></span> hall library, which had been bought with the +place, and hitherto only used by Sidney on wet days. But now there was +no need to steal an hour; the girl's time was all her own, and she held +high revel among the books. Moreover, it was the dawn of the University +Extension system, and Gwynneth heard of a course of lectures upon +English literature, only eight miles from Long Stow, just in time to +attend. To do so she had to fight a weekly battle with the coachman, but +Fraulein Hentig took her side, and the opposition did not endure. +Gwynneth took voluminous notes and wrote elaborate essays, bringing to +the whole interest that energy, thoroughness and enthusiasm, to which, +though each was an essential characteristic, she was only now enabled to +give free play. Yet the young girl was no mere bookworm, though at this +stage of her career she seemed little else. It was a phase of +intellectual absorption, but all the while it needed but a touch of +human interest in her life to awake the deeper nature of the eternal +woman. Such awakening had come with the most alarming period of +Georgie's illness. Gwynneth was starting for her lecture, primed with +sharp pencils and her new essay, when she heard in the village that two +doctors had been at the Flint House in the night. She did not go to that +lecture at all, but for two days and nights was scarcely an hour absent +from the bedside of a little boy whom she had barely known by sight +before. And his first comprehensible words formed the question which +Gwynneth, worn out by watching, had answered in the fashion he could +never understand.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_255" id="Page_255">[Pg 255]</a></span>Well, she was destined to be the boy's good angel, though he never +mistook her for one again; and sometimes she looked the part. The dark +eyes, so ardent in the pursuit of knowledge, or of any other of her +heart's desires, could yet sparkle with childish glee, or soften with +the tenderness of the ideal Madonna. The self-willed mouth and nose were +only sweet as Georgie saw them; and none but he knew the warmth of the +pale brown cheek or the crisp electric touch of the dark brown hair. +Little knowing it before, and never dreaming of it now, Gwynneth had +long been hankering for all that the little child gave her out of the +fulness and purity of his tiny heart. She supposed that she was happy +because at last she was being of some trifling use to somebody; it made +her think more of herself. Looking deeper (as she thought), through the +deceptive lenses of her inner consciousness, Gwynneth took a still less +favourable view of her latest interest in life. It was that and not much +more to the imperfect introspection of her morbid mood.</p> + +<p>Nevertheless, this was the happiest time that she had ever known. +Georgie and she became inseparable, even when the boy was well again; +and on him Gwynneth was really lavishing all the love and tenderness +which had been gathering in her heart since the hour when she had kissed +a dead forehead for the last time. The fact was that the girl had an +inborn capacity for passionate devotion, and was now once more enabled +to indulge this sweet instinct to the full. She still went to her weekly +lecture, read every book in the syllabus, and wrote her essay with<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_256" id="Page_256">[Pg 256]</a></span> as +much care for detail as her innate energy would permit. Nor was her work +the worse for the counter-attraction which now filled her young life to +the brim. Georgie spoke of Gwynneth as his "lady," with a sufficient +emphasis upon the possessive pronoun, and to her by a succession of pet +names of their joint invention.</p> + +<p>Croup is an enemy that lives to fight another day, as Dr. Marigold said +when he paid his last visit; and that word was sufficient for the Musks. +Thenceforward Georgie had only to sneeze to be put to bed, where he +wasted many days before the winter was over. But Georgie was not to be +depressed, and as Gwynneth would come and play with him for hours it was +perhaps no wonder. They both had some imagination; one showed it by +extemporary flights of downright romance, and the other by following +these with immense eyes and not a syllable of his own from beginning to +end. Then and there they would dramatise the story, for it was usually +one of adventure, and Georgie had a clockwork paddle-steamer called the +<i>Dover</i>, which sailed the bed manned by cardboard sailors of Gwynneth's +making. In these seas the roughest weather was experienced in crossing +Georgie's legs, but the best fun was in the polar regions, where the +vessel lay wedged for months between two pillows, while the crew hunted +bear and walrus over Georgie's person, and dug winter quarters under the +clothes.</p> + +<p>One day, when he really had a cold, and had fallen asleep upon the +icebergs, Gwynneth took upon herself to search the cupboard for some +picture-book<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_257" id="Page_257">[Pg 257]</a></span> which he might not have seen before; and in so doing she +came across the photograph of a comely young woman, not much older than +herself, which compelled her attention rather than her curiosity, for +she guessed at once who it was. Moreover, the face was striking and +interesting in itself. The eyes had a strange look, half reckless, half +defiant, but, even in a faded and inartistic photograph, of a subtle +fascination. There was some slight coarseness of eyelid and nostril; but +for all that it was a fine expression, full of courage and full of will. +The will was obvious in the mouth. It had the strength of Musk himself. +Yet there was something about the mouth—so firm—so full—that Gwynneth +did not like. She could not have said what it was, but she preferred +looking into the eyes. They fascinated her, and she did not lift her own +eyes from them till Mrs. Musk entered and caught her thus engaged.</p> + +<p>"Oh, where did you find that? Give it to me—give it to me!" and the +poor soul held out hands that trembled with her voice. "That's Georgie's +poor mother," she sobbed, "and I didn't know there was another left. I +thought he'd taken and burnt them every one!"</p> + +<p>And she slipped the photograph inside her bodice, and pressed her lean +hands upon it, as though it were the babe itself at her breast once +more. Next instant Gwynneth's arms were about the old woman's neck, and +her fresh lips had touched the wet and shrivelled cheek of Georgie's +grandmother.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_258" id="Page_258">[Pg 258]</a></span>"Ah! but you are good to us," said Mrs. Musk. "I never would have +believed a young lady could be so sweet and kind as you!"</p> + +<p>Not that Gwynneth was in the habit of going among the people; that was a +practice which Lady Gleed would not permit in a young lady over whom she +exercised any sort of control. Consequently there was some talk in the +village at this time, and a little scene at the hall soon after Sir +Wilton and his wife arrived for the Easter recess. But Gwynneth argued +that in no sense could the Musks be accounted ordinary villagers; and +the squire himself took her side very firmly in the matter.</p> + +<p>"I won't have you rate Musk among the yokels," said Sir Wilton +afterwards. "He is the one substantial man in the place, and a very good +friend of mine."</p> + +<p>"Well, I don't consider it nice for Gwynneth to be always with that +child."</p> + +<p>"She doesn't know the child's history; you have only to hear her talk +about him to see that."</p> + +<p>"I don't think it nice, all the same," Lady Gleed repeated.</p> + +<p>"Then take her back to town with you."</p> + +<p>"No, she is out now, and I can't be bothered with her this season. She +is not like other girls. I've a good mind to send her abroad for a +year."</p> + +<p>"You can do as you like about that. It might be a very good thing. +Meanwhile I'm not going to have Musk's feelings hurt; only yesterday, +when I went to see him, he was telling me all Gwynneth has done for them +during the winter. I'm not going<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_259" id="Page_259">[Pg 259]</a></span> to break with a man like that by +suddenly forbidding her to do any more."</p> + +<p>So it was decided that Gwynneth should go for a year to a relation of +Fraulein Hentig's at Leipzig, for the sake of her music, which the girl +had neglected rather disgracefully since leaving school, but of which +she was none the less fond, given the proper stimulus. Gwynneth herself +acclaimed the plan, and indeed had a voice in it; there was only one +reason why she was not entirely glad to go; and her devotion to Georgie +was more constant than ever during the few weeks which were left to her.</p> + +<p>Summer was beginning, and the boy was well and strong, with chubby +cheeks and sturdy bare legs. Often Gwynneth had him to play in the hall +garden—this on Sir Wilton's own suggestion—but more often she took him +for a walk. There were beautiful walks all round Long Stow. There was +the windy walk across the heather towards Linkworth; there were cool +walks by the tiny river that ran parallel with the village street, +bounding the hall meadow and both meadow and garden of the Flint House; +there was a fascinating expedition, with spade and pail, to the +sand-hills off the road to Lakenhall. Yet it was on none of these +excursions that Gwynneth lost Georgie, but while leaving some papers at +the saddler's workshop, in Long Stow itself.</p> + +<p>Fuller would keep her to talk politics, or rather to listen to his own: +it was the year of the first Home Rule Bill, and even Mr. Gladstone had +never stirred the saddler's anger, hatred and contempt to such a pitch +as they reached in this connection. Gwynneth,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_260" id="Page_260">[Pg 260]</a></span> on her side, had an +insufficient grasp of the measure, but an instinctive veneration for the +man; and she was young enough to grow heated in argument, even with the +saddler. When at length she turned away, more flushed than victorious, +there was no vestige of the child.</p> + +<p>"Georgie! Georgie!"</p> + +<p>Neither was there any answer. Gwynneth turned upon the politician.</p> + +<p>"Didn't you see him, Mr. Fuller?"</p> + +<p>"Gord love you, miss, I thought you come alone!"</p> + +<p>And the saddler leant across his bench until his spectacles were flush +with the open window at which Gwynneth stood.</p> + +<p>"Alone? Georgie Musk was with me; and I've lost him through arguing with +you."</p> + +<p>She inquired at the next cottage. Yes, they had seen him pass "with you, +miss," but that was all. There were no cottages further on; the +saddler's was the last on that side and at that end of the village. +Opposite was the rectory gate, with the low flint wall running far to +the right, overhung at present by the great leaves and heavy blossoms of +the chestnuts. And all at once Gwynneth noticed that the chestnut leaves +were very dark, the sky overcast, and another shower even then +beginning.</p> + +<p>"He will get wet—it may kill him!"</p> + +<p>And the girl ran wildly on along the road; but it was a straight road, +and she could see further than Georgie could possibly have travelled. So +now there was only the lane running up by the church.</p> + +<p>Gwynneth took it at top speed; an instant brought<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_261" id="Page_261">[Pg 261]</a></span> her abreast of the +east end, gaping wide and deep for the east window, yet built like a +rock on either side to the height of the eaves. Another step, and +Gwynneth was standing still.</p> + +<p>Already her sub-consciousness had remarked the silence of hammer and +chisel, which had tinkled in her ears as she brought Georgie up the +village, ringing more distinctly at every step, and quite loud when +first they had stopped at the saddler's window. Then it must have ceased +altogether. But now Gwynneth heard another sound instead.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_262" id="Page_262">[Pg 262]</a></span></p> + +<h2 class="newchapter"><a name="CHAPTER_XXII" id="CHAPTER_XXII"></a>XXII<br /> +<span class="smalltext">A LITTLE CHILD</span></h2> + + +<p>Georgie stood beyond the mason's litter, his firm legs planted in the +wet grass, his holland pinafore less brown than his knees. A sailor hat, +with the brim turned down, threw the roguish face into shadow; but the +flush of successful flight was not extinguished; and the great eyes +fixed on Carlton were nowise abashed. Shyness had never been a feature +of Georgie's character.</p> + +<p>"Hallo!" said he.</p> + +<p>Carlton stood like his own walls.</p> + +<p>So this was the child.</p> + +<p>A new instinct was awake in the man's breast; he had never an instant's +doubt.</p> + +<p>And it struck him dumb.</p> + +<p>"I say," said Georgie, "are you angry?"</p> + +<p>But he showed no anxiety on the point, merely beaming while the grown +man fought for words.</p> + +<p>"Angry? No—no——"</p> + +<p>And now he was fighting for the power of speech—fighting hot eyes and +twitching lips for his own manhood—and for the little impudent face +that would fill with fear if he lost. But he won.</p> + +<p>"Of course I'm not angry; but"—for he must know for certain—"what's +your name?"</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_263" id="Page_263">[Pg 263]</a></span>"Georgie."</p> + +<p>"That's not all."</p> + +<p>"Georgie Musk."</p> + +<p>Carlton filled his lungs.</p> + +<p>"And who sent you here, Georgie?"</p> + +<p>"Nobody di'n't."</p> + +<p>"Then how have you come?"</p> + +<p>"By my own self, course."</p> + +<p>"What! all the way from the Flint House? That's where you live, isn't +it?"</p> + +<p>Carlton put the second question with sudden misgiving. The name was not +unique in that country; he might be mistaken after all. And already—in +these few moments—he could not bear the idea of being thus mistaken in +this sturdy, friendly, independent boy.</p> + +<p>"Yes, that's where," said Georgie, nodding.</p> + +<p>"Then what can have brought him here!"</p> + +<p>"Well, you see," said Georgie, confidentially, "my lady taked me for a +walk——"</p> + +<p>"Your lady?"</p> + +<p>"And I wunned away."</p> + +<p>"But who do you mean by your lady?"</p> + +<p>"My lady," said Georgie, turning dense.</p> + +<p>"Your governess?" guessed Carlton.</p> + +<p>"Oh, my governess, my governess!" cried Georgie, roaring with laughter +because the word was new to him, but made a splendid expletive: "oh, my +governess, gwacious me!"</p> + +<p>"Well, whoever it is," muttered Carlton, "she oughtn't to have lost you; +and you stay with me until she finds you."</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_264" id="Page_264">[Pg 264]</a></span>"That's good," said Georgie, with conviction. "I liker stay wif you."</p> + +<p>Carlton caught the child up suddenly, and swung him shoulder-high. What +a laugh he had! And what a firm boy, so heavy and straight and strong! +Carlton sat down in his barrow, taking the little fellow on his knee, +yet holding him at arm's length for self-control.</p> + +<p>"How can you like being with a person you've never seen before?" asked +Carlton, tremulous again, for all his strength.</p> + +<p>"'Cos I heard you makin' somekin," said Georgie, who was looking about +him. "What are you makin', I say?"</p> + +<p>It was here that, without any particular provocation, Robert Carlton's +resolution suddenly failed him, so that he hugged and kissed the child, +in a sudden access of uncontrollable emotion. This, however, was as +suddenly suppressed. Georgie had wriggled from his knee; but instead of +running away (as the other feared for one breathless moment), he +continued looking about him as before, bored a little, but nothing more.</p> + +<p>"What are you buildin', I say?" he now inquired.</p> + +<p>"A church."</p> + +<p>"What's a church?"</p> + +<p>Carlton came straight to his feet.</p> + +<p>"Do you never go to one?" he asked; but his tone was nearly all remorse.</p> + +<p>"No, I never."</p> + +<p>"Then have you never heard of God?"</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_265" id="Page_265">[Pg 265]</a></span>And now the tone was his most determined one.</p> + +<p>"Yes," said Georgie, subdued but not frightened.</p> + +<p>"You are sure that you have been told about God?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, sure."</p> + +<p>"Who has taught you?"</p> + +<p>"My lady and granny—not grand-daddy."</p> + +<p>"You say your prayers to Him?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, I always."</p> + +<p>"Sure?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, sure."</p> + +<p>Carlton stood with heaving chest. He was spared something at last; his +cup was not to overflow after all. And, as he stood, the grass +whispered, and the rain came down.</p> + +<p>Again Georgie was caught up, to be set down next instant in the shed; +but this time he was really offended.</p> + +<p>"I don't want to come in," he whimpered. "I want to build wif your +bwicks. They're much, much bigger'n mine!"</p> + +<p>"But it's raining, don't you see? It would never do for Georgie to get +wet."</p> + +<p>"Oh, I wish I would play wif your bwicks!"</p> + +<p>"Why, Georgie, you couldn't lift them; you're not strong enough."</p> + +<p>"But I are, I tell you. I really are!"</p> + +<p>"Here's one, then," said Carlton, who kept his misfits in the shed. "You +try."</p> + +<p>Georgie did try. He rolled the stone over, though it was no small one; +lift it he could not.</p> + +<p>"You see, it was heavier than you thought."</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_266" id="Page_266">[Pg 266]</a></span>"'Cos never mind," coaxed Georgie, in another formula of his own; "you +carry it for me!"</p> + +<p>"But it's raining, and we should both be wet through."</p> + +<p>"'Cos <i>never</i> mind!"</p> + +<p>"But I do mind; and, what's more, everybody else would mind as well."</p> + +<p>"Then what <i>shall</i> we do?" cried Georgie, from his depths.</p> + +<p>Carlton had no idea. But the boy was weary, and must be amused; that was +the first necessity; and he who had never laid himself out to conciliate +men must strain every nerve to please this little child. His eyes flew +round the shed. And there upon the shelf stood his gargoyles deep in +dust.</p> + +<p>"Oh, what a funny old man!" cried Georgie. "Oh, ho, ho!"</p> + +<p>But Carlton, in his ignorance of children, had over-estimated a strong +child's strength; the stone head slipped through the tiny hands, +narrowly missing the tiny toes; and when Georgie stooped and rolled it +over, it was seen that a terrible accident had really occurred.</p> + +<p>"Oh, oh, oh!" cried an alarming little voice, "Oh, he's broken his nose, +he's broken it to bits; oh, oh!"</p> + +<p>Carlton made a dive for the other gargoyle; but this was a peculiarly +sinister face; and Georgie's tears only ran the faster.</p> + +<p>"Oh, I don't like that one. It's a ho'ble face. I don't like it."</p> + +<p>Carlton cast the thing from him, and at the same moment became and +looked inspired.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_267" id="Page_267">[Pg 267]</a></span>"Shall I make you a new face, Georgie? A better one than either of the +others?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, do, I say! A new face! A new face!"</p> + +<p>And shouts of delight came from the tear-stained one: such was the sound +that Gwynneth heard in the lane.</p> + +<p>A very inspiration it proved. All unpractised in their earliest +accomplishment, the hard-worked hands had never been so deft before; nor +ever stone softer or chisel sharper than the first of each that could be +found. They were trembling, those tanned and twisted fingers, but that +only seemed to impart a nervous vigour to their touch. When the thing +had taken rough shape, and a deep curve or two suggested a whole head of +hair; when eyes and nose had come from the same sure delving, and the +mouth almost at a touch; then the mouth of Georgie, long open in mere +fascination, recovered its primary function, and yelled approval in +surprising terms.</p> + +<p>"Oh, my Jove, my Jove!" he roared. "What a lovely, lovely, <i>lovely</i> +face! Oh, my Jove, I must show it to my lady!"</p> + +<p>Carlton looked upon a baby face on fire with rapture; and for once no +dissimilar light shone upon his own.</p> + +<p>"Will you—give me a kiss for it, Georgie?"</p> + +<p>Without a word the little arms flew round a weatherbeaten neck that bent +to meet them, and the glowing cheeks buried themselves, voluntarily, in +the beard that had only hurt before; and not one kiss, but countless +kisses, were Georgie's thanks for the lump of sandstone that had grown +into a face<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_268" id="Page_268">[Pg 268]</a></span> before his eyes. And such was the scene whereon Gwynneth +Gleed arrived.</p> + +<p>At first she drew back, hesitating in the rain, because neither of them +saw her, and she could not, could not understand! But her hesitation was +short-lived, or, rather, it had to be conquered and it was. So with +flaming cheeks—because they would not see her—and dark hair limp from +the rain—eyes sparkling, lips parted, teeth peeping—came Gwynneth to +the shed at last.</p> + +<p>And the child ran to her, while the man's eyes followed him hungrily, +climbing no higher than Georgie's height.</p> + +<p>"Oh, look what a lovely, lovely face the workman made me; do look, I +say! Is it wery kind of him to make me such a lovely thing?"</p> + +<p>Gwynneth had been dragged to where the new head stood mounted upon a +misfit; and Carlton had been obliged to rise. But his eyes had not risen +from the child.</p> + +<p>"Is it kind of him, I tell you?" persisted Georgie.</p> + +<p>"Very kind," said Gwynneth, "indeed."</p> + +<p>And civility compelled Carlton to look up at last.</p> + +<p>"It was only to pass the time," he said. "I was obliged to bring him in +out of the rain."</p> + +<p>"It was so good of you," murmured Gwynneth. "But it was not good of +Georgie to run away as soon as my back was turned!"</p> + +<p>Georgie paid no heed to this reproach; he was busy playing with the +uncouth head.</p> + +<p>"Oh, don't say that," said Carlton, quickly; "I don't get so many +visitors! Are you the little chap's<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_269" id="Page_269">[Pg 269]</a></span> governess?" he added, yet more +quickly, to undo the visible effects of his words.</p> + +<p>"No, I'm—from the hall, you know."</p> + +<p>He could not but start at this. But now he was guarding his tongue. And, +as he reflected, there came back to him the vague memory of a face in +church, followed by the sharper picture of a very young girl at the +piano in a pleasant room—the last that he had ever been in.</p> + +<p>Gwynneth had recalled the same scene, and could see him as he had been, +while she gazed upon him as he was.</p> + +<p>"I remember," he said, gravely. "So you take an interest in this little +chap, Miss Gleed?"</p> + +<p>"Rather more than that," replied Gwynneth, taken out of herself in an +instant, and declaring her innocence by her sudden and unconscious +enthusiasm. "I love him dearly," she said from her heart: and together +their eyes returned to the round sailor hat, the brown pinafore and the +browner legs which were all that was now to be seen of Georgie the +engrossed.</p> + +<p>"He is indeed a dear little fellow," said Carlton, smothering his sighs.</p> + +<p>"And so affectionate!" added Gwynneth, thinking of the strange pair +together as she had found them.</p> + +<p>"Marvellously independent, too, for his age."</p> + +<p>"He is not quite four. You would think him older."</p> + +<p>"Indeed I would . . . And so you are his 'lady'!"</p> + +<p>"So he insists on calling me."</p> + +<p>"You seem to be very much to him," said Robert<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_270" id="Page_270">[Pg 270]</a></span> Carlton, jealously +enough at heart, as he looked for once into the fine, kind, enthusiastic +eyes of Gwynneth; but they fell embarrassed, and his own were quick +enough to wander back to the boy.</p> + +<p>"I have been more or less alone since last autumn," said Gwynneth. +"Georgie has been as much to me as I can possibly have been to him."</p> + +<p>"But he lives at the Flint House, does he not? I—I gathered he was a +grandchild of the Musks."</p> + +<p>"So he is."</p> + +<p>"Are they bringing him up?"</p> + +<p>"Yes."</p> + +<p>"Kindly?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, yes—kindly. But——"</p> + +<p>"Are they fond of him?"</p> + +<p>"Touchingly so; but, of course, they are two old people."</p> + +<p>"And so you stepped in to lighten and brighten a little child's life!"</p> + +<p>Gwynneth blushed unseen; for all this time he was looking at Georgie and +not at her.</p> + +<p>"You mustn't put it like that," she said, "for it isn't the case. It was +quite a selfish pleasure. I was all alone. And it began by his being +dreadfully ill."</p> + +<p>"What—Georgie?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, and I was able to nurse him a little. And after that we couldn't +do without each other. But now we shall have to try."</p> + +<p>He had looked at her with the last quick question, and was looking +still, a new anxiety in his eyes.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_271" id="Page_271">[Pg 271]</a></span>"Do you mean that you are going away?" he said; and his tone did not +conceal his disappointment.</p> + +<p>"I am sorry to say I am," replied Gwynneth, feeling all she said.</p> + +<p>"Soon?"</p> + +<p>"To-morrow."</p> + +<p>"Far?"</p> + +<p>"Abroad."</p> + +<p>"But not for long!"</p> + +<p>"A year."</p> + +<p>Her eyes fell at last before the frank trouble in his; and he ended the +pause with a sigh. "I am very sorry," he said. "I was hoping that you +would often bring him here to see me." Nor was any compliment taken or +intended in a speech which rang with the primitive sincerity of one who +had spoken very little for a very long time.</p> + +<p>Gwynneth took the short step that brought her to the opening of the +shed. She had suddenly discovered that the rain had never ceased +pattering on the corrugated roof, and was wondering when the shower +would stop. She wished it was fair, for more reasons than one. It was +high time she took Georgie away; and she did not know what Musk would +say when he heard where they had been. She only knew his opinion of +parsons generally, and of all that they professed, though she had once +heard him allow that they were not all as bad as this one. Besides, even +Gwynneth felt natural qualms in the society of an outcast whom no one +else went near, quite apart from the popular conviction that he had<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_272" id="Page_272">[Pg 272]</a></span> +burnt his own church to the ground. That she had never believed. And +now, when she found him all but at his work; when she saw him at close +quarters, aged and bent, with tattered clothes and battered hands, yet +handsome as ever, and now picturesque; and when she looked upon the +gigantic work that had aged him, the finished wall here, the deliberate +preparations there; then that old calumny was blown to final shreds for +Gwynneth. He might have done worse, as she had sometimes heard said, but +he had not done that. And the woman went to work within her: was there +nothing she could do for him? Was there no little luxury she could get +and send him? His clothes were torn—if only she could mend them! Alas! +that she was going abroad next day.</p> + +<p>Another moment and she was glad: how could she do anything, a young +girl, when all the rest of the world held aloof? Anything that she did, +or tried to do, would inevitably, if not rightly and properly, be +misconstrued. Yet, after this, it would be too painful to live so near +and to go on doing nothing. She had felt that long ago; and the memory +of their last encounter reoccupied her thoughts. No, she could do no +more now than she had been able to do then. Therefore she was glad to be +going away. And all this passed through her mind in the mere minute that +elapsed before the rain stopped as suddenly as it had begun.</p> + +<p>Yet in that minute Robert Carlton had got Georgie back upon his knee, +and Gwynneth caught him trying to extract a promise from the child; in +another he had risen, a duskier bronze than before, and was<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_273" id="Page_273">[Pg 273]</a></span> telling her +honestly what the promise was to have been.</p> + +<p>"I wanted him to come again to see me finish that head, but not to tell +his grandparents where he was going, or they would not let him. You see, +I am ashamed of it already! Make allowances for one who has not spoken +to either woman or child for very nearly four years."</p> + +<p>Gwynneth was deeply moved.</p> + +<p>"Allowances," she could but repeat; "allowances!"</p> + +<p>"Allow'nces, allow'nces!" chimed Georgie, to whom a new word was +necessarily humorous.</p> + +<p>Carlton picked him up, and kissed him lightly for the last time. To +Gwynneth he only bowed. And she was longing to take his hand.</p> + +<p>"Good-bye, Miss Gleed; a good journey and a happy time to you."</p> + +<p>Gwynneth had to say something, since she could do nothing, to show her +sympathy. "I think it's all wonderful—wonderful!" was all she did say, +with a little wave towards the sandstone walls. And yet her small speech +haunted her for weeks, seeming in turns so many things that she had +never meant it to be.</p> + +<p>Georgie also waved with energy. "Good-bye, good-bye, I'll see you in the +mornin'!" was his irresponsible farewell.</p> + +<p>And so they disappeared together, as the sun shone again through the +trees with the emerald tips, now dripping diamonds too; but to Robert +Carlton that little scene of his endless labours, the shed, the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_274" id="Page_274">[Pg 274]</a></span> strewed +stones, the barrow, the rising walls, the blossoming chestnuts, the +jewelled elms, had never looked so drab and desolate before.</p> + +<p>Yet, long after it was really dark, the lonely man still hovered about +the spot, now standing where the child had stood with his brown pinafore +and his browner legs; now sitting empty-kneed in the empty barrow; now +handling the rough stone head that he had hewn in a few minutes for +little Georgie.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_275" id="Page_275">[Pg 275]</a></span></p> + +<h2 class="newchapter"><a name="CHAPTER_XXIII" id="CHAPTER_XXIII"></a>XXIII<br /> +<span class="smalltext">DESIGN AND ACCIDENT</span></h2> + + +<p>Next morning he was early at his arch, and had soon finished the +voussoir which he had been roughing out when this vital interruption +occurred. But he was not satisfied with the stone, and wasted much time +in turning it over and over and wondering whether it would do or not. +Now this was a point upon which Carlton usually knew his mind in a +twinkling. Indecision of any sort was, indeed, among the last of his +failings; but that man is not himself who has not closed an eye all +night; and Robert Carlton had only closed his in prayer.</p> + +<p>Later in the morning his case was worse. He would think of the boy until +the chisel went too deep and spoilt another stone. Or, just when he was +beginning to get on, he would drop his tools and wheel round suddenly, +half hoping to see a second little apparition in a sailor hat with the +brim turned down. But these things do not happen twice, much less when +looked and longed for, as Carlton knew very well. And yet his knowledge +did not help him in the matter; on the other hand, it drove him again +and again to his gate, to gaze wistfully up and down the road he never +traversed; and this was the most disastrous habit of all.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_276" id="Page_276">[Pg 276]</a></span>Once more the work stood still; for the first time in three whole years, +it stood practically still for days.</p> + +<p>Meanwhile, at the Flint House, there had never been any secret as to +what had happened between showers at the church. Gwynneth had told Mrs. +Musk, and Mrs. Musk had deemed it better to tell Jasper himself than to +let him gather the truth from Georgie's prattle. And in the event Musk +took it better than his wife had dared to hope, merely vilifying quick +and dead with renewed rancour, and grimly undertaking that the incident +should not occur again.</p> + +<p>So Georgie saw more of his grandfather than he had ever seen before, and +rather more than he cared to see after his close association with +Gwynneth, whose wonderful letter from Leipzig was small comfort to so +small a soul, though Mrs. Musk had to read it to Georgie many times a +day.</p> + +<p>"Oh! I wish I would go and see workman," the boy would exclaim without +fear. "I wish I would! I wish I would!"</p> + +<p>"I daresay you do," Jasper would growl from his chair.</p> + +<p>"Then can I; can I, I say, grand-daddy?"</p> + +<p>"No, you can't."</p> + +<p>"Oh! why can't I?"</p> + +<p>"Because I tell you."</p> + +<p>"But, you see, grand-daddy, he was making me such a lovely, lovely face. +I must go back for it. Really I must. He did say he finish fen I go +back. So of course I must go. See? See? See?"</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_277" id="Page_277">[Pg 277]</a></span>Thus pestered, Jasper once thundered:</p> + +<p>"Oh, yes, I see! I know him—I know him. I see hard enough! But if ever +you do go I'll—I'll—I'll give ye what ye never had afore and'll never +want again!"</p> + +<p>"Oh, don't be angry wif me," Georgie whimpered. "Oh, I wish my lady +would come back!"</p> + +<p>"I daresay you do," said Jasper, calming. "And I don't."</p> + +<p>But a child forgets; at all events Georgie did; and so surely as his +<i>ennui</i> in the garden, within strict sight of the terrible old man in +the chair, reached a certain pitch, so surely did the treasonable +aspiration rise to his innocent lips.</p> + +<p>"I wish I would go and see workman. I <i>wish</i> I would!"</p> + +<p>But at last one day the old man rose, stick and all; and at this even +Georgie trembled; for it was long since he had seen his grandfather on +his feet. Over the grass he came hobbling, ungainly, abnormal, frowning +down upon the buttercups. Georgie crept aside. But Musk passed him +without a word. Three times he limped the length of the overgrown lawn, +muttering, frowning; and the third time his lameness was palpably less.</p> + +<p>"Why, Jasper," cried Mrs. Musk, running out, "you're getting better!"</p> + +<p>"No, I ain't," he roared. "You mind your own business and get away +indoors."</p> + +<p>Mrs. Musk was meekly obeying, and Georgie escaping at her skirt, when a +second roar recalled the child. Jasper was leaning with both hands on<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_278" id="Page_278">[Pg 278]</a></span> +the stick before him, his frown gone, but in its place a surely devilish +smile, since the child mistook it for the real thing.</p> + +<p>"So you're still longun to go back and see the workman, as you call him, +at the church?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, yes, I are!"</p> + +<p>And round eyes kindled at the thought.</p> + +<p>"Very well. You may."</p> + +<p>Georgie could scarcely believe his ears.</p> + +<p>"Fen may I? Now? Now, I say?"</p> + +<p>"When you like, so long as you don't bother me."</p> + +<p>Georgie jumped and shouted in his joy.</p> + +<p>"Goin' to see workman, goin' to see workman! Oh, my Jove, my Jove! Goin' +to see workman makin' lovely, lovely faces all for me—every bit!"</p> + +<p>"Hold your noise," said Jasper, roughly; "and go, if you're going."</p> + +<p>Carlton had given up expecting him, divining at last that Musk knew of +their one interview, and would never let them have another. So once more +Georgie surprised him at his work; but this time he had to hail his +friend; for now Carlton was making up for lost time, and at the moment, +up on a scaffolding, was all absorbed in the exciting task of fitting +the finished voussoirs over the wooden centre which supported the arch +until the keystone should complete it. And the keystone was actually in +one hand, a trowel full of mortar in the other, when the first sound of +Georgie's voice drove all else from his mind.</p> + +<p>"I say, I say, I say!" he ran up shouting. "Workman, workman!"</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_279" id="Page_279">[Pg 279]</a></span>But now the workman was only collecting himself, and thanking God with +quivering lips, before he could trust himself upon his ladder.</p> + +<p>"So here you are at last," he said, swinging the child off his legs +without endearment. Yet all his being yearned towards the merry +independent little boy. The straight strong legs seemed browner and +rounder already. It might have been the same holland pinafore; it was +the same sailor hat.</p> + +<p>"Yes, here I are," said Georgie, "and I wish you would make lovely, +lovely faces out of bwick."</p> + +<p>"Not run away again, I hope?"</p> + +<p>"No, 'cos I came by my own self."</p> + +<p>Carlton asked no more questions. Any minute the child might be missed +and sent for; every moment was precious meanwhile. It was a heavenly day +in early June, the elms in full leaf at last against the blue, the +churchyard dappled with light and shade, the fresh sandstone yellow as +gold where the sun caught it fairly. And in the sunlight stood its own +incarnation—sturdy champion of the golden age—laughing child of June.</p> + +<p>Carlton could see nothing else.</p> + +<p>"Come on, I say," urged Georgie; "come an' make faces, quick, sharp!"</p> + +<p>And he dragged the sculptor to his rude studio.</p> + +<p>"There it is, there it is," shouted Georgie, spying the unfinished head +high up on the shelf. "You did say you finish fen I come back. +Finish—finish—quick, sharp!"</p> + +<p>Carlton brought the thing outside, for the shed was close, and went to +work at the foot of his lad<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_280" id="Page_280">[Pg 280]</a></span>der, with Georgie sitting on the lowest +rung. And any merit which the rough attempt had possessed was speedily +removed by an over-elaboration on which Georgie insisted, and which +certainly served its purpose by earning his vociferous applause.</p> + +<p>"Oh, his eyes! What funny eyes! Make them open and shut, I say—can +you?"</p> + +<p>A doll, which Gwynneth had unearthed, before she knew her Georgie very +well, had retained this accomplishment even when the head was off its +body.</p> + +<p>"I'm afraid I can't do that," said Carlton.</p> + +<p>"Try—try."</p> + +<p>So Carlton gouged in the soft stone till the holes for the eyeballs had +disappeared.</p> + +<p>"Now open them again!"</p> + +<p>And fresh holes were made: they were the most sunken eyes ever seen +before Georgie was tired of the game. Next he must have ears, which were +supposed to be concealed by the very heavy head of hair; and when the +ears arrived, they were not worth having without ear-rings; but there +the sculptor was nonplussed, and struck.</p> + +<p>"All right," said Georgie, cheerfully; "then I'll carry it home +without."</p> + +<p>"What, run away directly it's done?"</p> + +<p>The cold-blooded ingratitude of infancy was new to Carlton, as his hurt +face was to Georgie, who eyed it with some compassion.</p> + +<p>"All right," said he; "I'll stay a little bit if you like."</p> + +<p>"And sit on my knee, Georgie."</p> + +<p>"All right."</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_281" id="Page_281">[Pg 281]</a></span>But there was no sentiment about Georgie to-day; it was mere +magnanimity, and he showed it.</p> + +<p>"Quite comfy, Georgie?"</p> + +<p>"No," sighed the boy, screwing about on the one thin thigh; "I think +it's only a little comfy."</p> + +<p>"That better?"</p> + +<p>And, the other leg being slipped under his small person, Georgie said it +was.</p> + +<p>"Are you sure, Georgie, that you want to take that head home at all?"</p> + +<p>"Course I are," said Georgie, decidedly. "I must take it, you see; +course I must."</p> + +<p>Carlton was again tormented by the ignoble inclination which he had +overcome by impulse rather than by will at the last interview. Was a +child of four too young to keep a secret? If only this one could be +induced to go and come back, and back, and back, without ever saying a +word to anybody! The proposition had shamed him before; and did now; but +the new love within him was stronger than his shame.</p> + +<p>"You wouldn't show it," suggested Carlton, "to your grandfather, would +you?"</p> + +<p>"Course I'll show it to him," said Georgie, for whom the stipulation was +too oblique.</p> + +<p>"But he'll be angry!"</p> + +<p>"Course he won't," said Georgie, more superior than ever, and with the +air of one who does not care to argue any more.</p> + +<p>"But you know he was before," said Carlton, drawing his bow.</p> + +<p>"Oh, bovver!" exclaimed Georgie, losing patience.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_282" id="Page_282">[Pg 282]</a></span> "Well, then, he won't +be angry to-day, I know he won't."</p> + +<p>"How do you know, Georgie?"</p> + +<p>"'Cos he did tell me I could come."</p> + +<p>"Not here?"</p> + +<p>Georgie nodded solemnly.</p> + +<p>"Yes, he did. I know he did."</p> + +<p>What could it mean? The child was strangely dependable for his years; +indeed, it was impossible to look in those great and candid eyes and to +doubt the testimony of the equally candid little tongue. Then what could +it mean? Had Musk relented? Was he relenting? Carlton's heart leapt at +the thought, and with his heart his eyes; and in the same second he had +his answer.</p> + +<p>Close at hand in the sunlight, where Georgie had stood last, brimming +over with delight, there now stood Jasper Musk himself, huge with hate, +livid with rage, vindictive, remorseless—but not surprised. Carlton saw +this at the first glance, in the triumphant lightning flashing from the +fixed eyes, and playing over the heavy, grim, inexorable face. And that +was his answer; furthermore it prepared him for all, and more than all, +that was to come.</p> + +<p>"Put the boy down," said Jasper Musk, with sinister self-control.</p> + +<p>Instinctively the child slipped to the ground; but there his courage +failed him, so that he turned his back upon the terrible old man, and +hid his face in the lap that he had left.</p> + +<p>"Come here, George!"</p> + +<p>But Carlton held him firmly with both hands.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_283" id="Page_283">[Pg 283]</a></span>Musk bore down on them in a series of little shuffling steps, his great +face wincing with the pain of each. His voice had already risen; now it +was so terrible to hear, so hoarse and high with passion, that in an +instant Carlton had his thumbs in the small boy's ears.</p> + +<p>"Snivelling hypocrite! Whited sepulchre! Do you hand the child over to +me, or I'll break this stick across your back. So I've caught ye, +temptun him here to make up to him behind my back! But you don't—no, +you don't—not while I'm alive to stop that. He's nothun to you and +you're nothun to him, and do you meddle with him again at your peril. +I've taken the trouble to learn the law of it, so I know. God damn ye! +will you take your hands off him, or am I to break your blasted head?"</p> + +<p>"You can do what you like," said Carlton; "but the boy shall not hear +you using that language to me. So you will never get a better +opportunity than you have." And his nostrils curled as he bent his +defenceless head over that of the boy, and pressed a little harder with +his thumbs.</p> + +<p>The other gnashed his teeth, and his great hand tightened on his stick. +But he could not strike like that. And his enemy knew it; trust him to +know when he was safe!</p> + +<p>"I'm not going to prison for ye," said Musk, "if that's what you want. I +daresay you'd think that worth a crack on the head to get me locked up +for a bit; well, then, you shan't. Do you leave go o' the kid, and I +won't swear no more."</p> + +<p>The effort at self-control was plain enough,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_284" id="Page_284">[Pg 284]</a></span> as Carlton looked up, +without complying all at once.</p> + +<p>"One moment," he said. "You sent him here yourself, I think?"</p> + +<p>"What, the child?"</p> + +<p>"Yes."</p> + +<p>"I didn't send him. He was pestering me to come. So at last I gave him +leave to do as he liked."</p> + +<p>"In order that you might follow and abuse me in front of him!"</p> + +<p>"I'll tell no lies," said Musk, sturdily. "I meant to let him hear what +I thought of you, and I won't deny it."</p> + +<p>Carlton looked a little longer upon the broad face between the steely +bristles and the silvery hair; it had aged nothing in these years which +had been as twenty to himself; and for the moment there was all the old +rugged dignity in its independent purpose and honest unrelenting hate. A +bargain had been in Carlton's mind, but at the last he decided to trust +his enemy instead.</p> + +<p>"It's all right, Georgie," he whispered: "we are not really angry with +each other. Run away and play."</p> + +<p>"But I don't want to!"</p> + +<p>"You must," said Carlton, and rose without taking further notice of the +child. "Mr. Musk," he said, in a low voice but firm, "is it to be like +this between us to the bitter end?"</p> + +<p>"That is."</p> + +<p>"I do not ask your forgiveness——"</p> + +<p>"Glad to hear it."</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_285" id="Page_285">[Pg 285]</a></span>"I only ask—in pity's name—to be allowed to do something for the boy!"</p> + +<p>Musk moved a muscle at last, and his eyes came close together with a +gleam. "I daresay you do," said he.</p> + +<p>"But will you not listen——"</p> + +<p>"I'm listening now, ain't I?"</p> + +<p>"Ah, but not to my prayer! I see it in your face; you have no pity. God +knows how little I deserve! Yet it's little enough that I ask: only to +see him sometimes, and not even to see him if you set your face against +it. I would be content—at least I would try to be—if I knew he was +going to good schools, if—if I might have hand or voice in his life. +You say I have no rights. That is my punishment; a new one, that I never +felt until I saw the boy for the first time the other day; but if you +knew how I have felt it since! If you knew what it would be to me to do +anything—give anything——"</p> + +<p>"I knew that were comun," said Musk, nodding to himself . . . "So you'd +like to do the handsome, would you?" His whole face became suddenly +suffused, as with walnut-juice; the very whites of his eyes seemed white +no longer, while the pupils shrank to steel points in their midst. "I +know you!" he cried, beside himself again; "but don't you try them games +with me. That's your line, that is—buy your way back! You'd buy it with +the parish, by making them a church; and you'd buy it with the boy, by +making things for him; but that's what you never shall do, not while I +live to prevent it . . . What you got there, George? You give that +here!"</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_286" id="Page_286">[Pg 286]</a></span>It was the sandstone head with the sunken eyes, and Georgie was clinging +to it in his trouble underneath the scaffolding; in an instant Musk had +seized it from him, and dashed it with all his might against the wall, +so that the soft stone flew into a dozen pieces. It was like blood to a +wild beast: the demon of destruction broke loose in Jasper Musk.</p> + +<p>"And that's how I'd treat the rest of your damned handiwork," he roared, +"if I was the village! I'd have no church of your building; I'd bring +that down about your ears right quick!" His wild eye lit upon the wooden +centre of the unfinished arch, and "This is what I'd do," he shouted, +lunging at the woodwork with his heavy stick. "Hypocrite! Pharisee! +Disgrace to God and man! Leper as——"</p> + +<p>But the centre had been dealt a heavy thrust, as from a battering ram, +with each expression; with each it had bulged a little; but the last +lunge drove the whole framework from under the unfinished arch, which +came crashing down amid a yellow cloud. Musk shuffled backward in time +to save his toes; for an instant then both he and Carlton stood aghast.</p> + +<p>Robbed of his latest treasure, and moreover having seen it smashed to +atoms before his eyes, Georgie had been howling lustily when the crash +came: when the yellow cloud lifted he lay silent enough, in a little +brown heap below the scaffolding, and already the blood was through his +hair.</p> + +<p>Carlton had him in his arms that instant.</p> + +<p>"He's insensible," he said quietly. "A nasty scalp wound, and may be +more. What day is this?"</p> + +<p>"Wednesday."</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_287" id="Page_287">[Pg 287]</a></span>Musk did not know what he was saying, but the cool question had elicited +a correct though unconscious reply.</p> + +<p>"Wednesday used to be the doctor's day at the dispensary——"</p> + +<p>"And is still," cried Musk, coming to his senses.</p> + +<p>"Then one of us must run for him."</p> + +<p>"I can't run!"</p> + +<p>"Then you must hold him while I do. Stop! I'll take him to the house; +you must bathe his head while I'm gone."</p> + +<p>Another minute and the boy lay in the rectory study, upon the little bed +in which Carlton had fought death and won three years before; yet +another, and up limped Jasper, crooked with pain, out of breath, but +gasping for news of Georgie as though he had been a week on the way.</p> + +<p>"Has he come to yet?"</p> + +<p>"No, and there's a lot of blood. We must stop it if we can. Wait till I +get a sponge and some water."</p> + +<p>Jasper Musk was bending over the boy, looking huger than ever upon his +knees, when Carlton returned to the room.</p> + +<p>"What have I done?" he was muttering. "What have I done? What have I +done?"</p> + +<p>"Nothing that you could help," replied Carlton, briskly. "Now you keep +squeezing this sponge out over his head—never mind the bed—till I get +back."</p> + +<p>Georgie lay insensible for hours. It was not the loss of blood, which +looked much worse than it was, and ceased altogether with the dressing +of the wound.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_288" id="Page_288">[Pg 288]</a></span> There was, however, somewhat serious concussion +underneath; and Dr. Marigold bluntly refused to guarantee the event.</p> + +<p>"The pity is to move him," he grumbled towards night. "But is there +anybody here who could nurse the boy?"</p> + +<p>"Only myself," said Carlton, who had been quiet and quick to help all +the afternoon.</p> + +<p>The doctor shot an upward glance through his shaggy white eyebrows.</p> + +<p>"Well, you're handy enough, I must say; and, as we know, the very devil +to do things single-handed; but this you couldn't do. No, I'd like to +take him straight to the infirmary, only I'm on horseback."</p> + +<p>"There are traps in the village."</p> + +<p>"They would jolt too much."</p> + +<p>"Then let me carry him."</p> + +<p>"It's five miles."</p> + +<p>"Never mind. I could do it. And he shouldn't jolt—he shouldn't jolt!"</p> + +<p>The mellow voice that had charmed the countryside in bygone years, it +fell and quivered with infinite tenderness and love, and it sped to the +heart of the gaunt old doctor. So this time Marigold raised his whole +head, and his look was open, prolonged, and penetrating.</p> + +<p>"No, no, Mr. Carlton," he said at length, and in the tone of old times. +"It might do no good, after all. But I'll tell you what you shall do: +you shall carry him to the Flint House, and I'll spend the night there +if I must."</p> + +<p>All this while Jasper Musk was sitting stunned and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_289" id="Page_289">[Pg 289]</a></span> staring in the +rector's chair. He had not moved for an hour, nor did he now until +Carlton touched him on the shoulder.</p> + +<p>"We are going, Mr. Musk. I am carrying Georgie to your house."</p> + +<p>Musk raised a ghastly face.</p> + +<p>"He isn't dead?"</p> + +<p>"No."</p> + +<p>"Nor going to die?"</p> + +<p>"God forbid! But the danger is great. The doctor is going to stay with +him all night."</p> + +<p>And there was a touch of jealousy in his tone, lost upon Jasper Musk, +but not on him who inspired it. Silently they left the house, and stole +down the drive in the blue twilight. Carlton led, treading almost on +tip-toe, as if not to wake a child that only slept in his arms. And so +they came to the Flint House, its master limping on the doctor's arm.</p> + +<p>"Go in, Mr. Carlton," said Marigold. "There's no one else to carry him +upstairs."</p> + +<p>And he detained Jasper below.</p> + +<p>"You must let that man stay till he is out of danger," the doctor said.</p> + +<p>"Why must I?"</p> + +<p>"Because I am not justified in staying all night; and he will look after +the boy as you and your wife cannot, and as no one else will, now that +Miss Gleed is away."</p> + +<p>Jasper bowed sullenly to his fate. But the doctor was not done.</p> + +<p>"Besides," said he, his kind hand on the other's arm; "besides, he feels +this as much as you do, and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_290" id="Page_290">[Pg 290]</a></span> God knows he's gone through enough! To-day, +I tell you candidly, but for him your little lad would be in a worse way +than he is. Now don't you think after this that all of us—even +you—might begin to be just a little less hard—even on him?"</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_291" id="Page_291">[Pg 291]</a></span></p> + +<h2 class="newchapter"><a name="CHAPTER_XXIV" id="CHAPTER_XXIV"></a>XXIV<br /> +<span class="smalltext">GLAMOUR AND RUE</span></h2> + + +<p>Georgie's lady was meanwhile enjoying her life in Leipzig, and the more +keenly since she had gone abroad without any thought of pleasure, but +only to work. This was characteristic of Gwynneth Gleed. She was not +light-hearted enough for a young girl; there had been too much sorrow in +her early years, too little sympathy in those that came after; natural +joy she had never known. A born delight in books, a blind appreciation +of the country, a passion for music, and the love of one little child; +these were the pleasures of Gwynneth in her twentieth year; nor as yet +did they include that zest in the present, that joy of merely living, +that healthy appetite for admiration, that proper pride in one's own +person, that catholicity of liking for one's fellow-creatures, which are +of the very spirit and essence of youth. And to youth Gwynneth added +something at least akin to beauty; but never knew it until she came to +live among strangers in a strange land.</p> + +<p>These strangers, who were mostly English, and many of them young +students like herself at the Conservatoire, were singularly kind to +Gwynneth from the first. In some ways they were the best friends the +girl ever had. They taught her the duty of gaiety at her time of life, +and the absolute necessity of a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_292" id="Page_292">[Pg 292]</a></span> certain amount of vanity in every human +being. Gwynneth was given to understand that she had more to be vain +about than most. Attracted themselves by the uncommon girl with the fine +eyes and the shy manner, her new friends did much to mitigate the latter +by making the very most of her looks and accomplishments, and seeing to +it that Gwynneth did the same. She was not allowed to dress as she liked +in Leipzig, nor to spend the whole of a fine afternoon at her piano, nor +to be out of anything that was going on. The gaieties of the English +colony were of a simple character in themselves, but they were +Gwynneth's high-water-mark in dissipation, and ere long she was throwing +herself into them with that enthusiasm which she brought to every +pursuit. She had learnt to waltz remarkably well, and to talk brightly +about nothing in particular to the acquaintance of a minute's standing. +She was none the less assiduous at her practising and her harmony, and +was still capable of immediate and immense excitement over this poet or +that composer; but these were no longer her only topics. Nor was a +holland pinafore and the small urchin it contained entirely forgotten in +these days. Gwynneth wrote to Georgie oftener than to anybody else in +England. And yet it was to the theatres and a real ball or so that she +first looked forward upon her return.</p> + +<p>Lady Gleed was much more than agreeably disappointed in the new +Gwynneth; herself incapable of seeing beneath the thinnest surface, she +could scarcely believe it was the same girl. Gwynneth was better-looking +and had more to say for herself than had<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_293" id="Page_293">[Pg 293]</a></span> ever appeared possible to Lady +Gleed, who decided to keep her niece in town for the rest of the season, +if not to present so creditable a <i>débutante</i> at the next drawing-room. +And a much more critical person, her son Sidney, coming up from +Cambridge for a night, was not less favourably impressed.</p> + +<p>Gleed of Trinity, a third-year man, was in his turn a vast improvement +upon the private scholar who had seldom addressed a syllable to Gwynneth +in his holidays, but had gone past whistling with his dogs. He was now a +really handsome little man, with a clear brown skin and a moustache as +mature as his manner; looked and spoke like a man of thirty; and could +be amusing enough with his sly satire and his ready repartee. Cynical +this youth must always be, but the cynicism was more good-humoured and +less ill-natured than formerly, and not abhorrent in the man as it had +been in the boy. At all events it amused Gwynneth, who was furthermore +surprised and excited to find that Sidney had read quite a number of +great books, and rather entertained than otherwise by his blasphemous +opinions of many of them. So they had something in common after all; and +Sidney was certainly very attentive and gay and nice-looking.</p> + +<p>It was in the drawing-room in Hyde Park Place, during an hour which went +very quickly, that Gwynneth made these discoveries; she was still too +simple to remark, much less read, the calculating droop of Sidney's +eyelids or the veiled preoccupation of the hereditary stare.</p> + +<p>"I wonder if you'd care to have a look at Cam<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_294" id="Page_294">[Pg 294]</a></span>bridge," at last said +Sidney, in the purely speculative tone.</p> + +<p>"Like to? I'd love it!" cried Gwynneth at once.</p> + +<p>Sidney paused, without relaxing his stare. She was certainly very +animated. Sidney was not sure that he cared for quite so much animation +with so little cause.</p> + +<p>"I shouldn't wonder if you did rather like it," he proceeded, "in +May-week—which never is in May, you know."</p> + +<p>"Oh? When is it?"</p> + +<p>"The week after next. There'll be heaps going on. Races every +afternoon——"</p> + +<p>"And don't you steer your boat?" interrupted Gwynneth, a partisan on the +spot.</p> + +<p>Sidney smiled.</p> + +<p>"I cox it, Gwynneth; and if we aren't head of the river we shall not be +very far off. But it isn't only the races; there are all sorts of other +things, a good match, garden-parties galore, and a dance every night."</p> + +<p>"You dance there!"</p> + +<p>"Yes," said Sidney; "do you?"</p> + +<p>"Rather!"</p> + +<p>"Get some in Leipzig?"</p> + +<p>"All that there was to get."</p> + +<p>"They dance well out there?"</p> + +<p>"I don't know."</p> + +<p>"But you do, of course?"</p> + +<p>Gwynneth saw the drift of this examination, and showed that she saw it, +but Sidney liked her the better for her dry reply:</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_295" id="Page_295">[Pg 295]</a></span>"You'd better try me."</p> + +<p>"You'd better try <i>me</i>," he rejoined adroitly.</p> + +<p>"Very well," said Gwynneth. "Here?"</p> + +<p>"Come on," said Sidney, his eyes sparkling, his brown skin a warmer hue; +and in an instant they were threading their way between the cumbrous +chairs and tiny tables of the big room, ploughing through its heavy +pile, he in patent leather boots, she in her walking shoes, and not so +much as a piano-organ in the street to set the time. Yet, even under +these conditions, a turn was enough for Sidney, though he did not want +to stop, and was very quick in asking whether he would do.</p> + +<p>"You know you will," said Gwynneth, forgetting everything in the +prospect of so excellent a partner.</p> + +<p>"And you dance rippingly," declared her cousin; "by Jove, I wish we +could have you at the First Trinity ball!"</p> + +<p>So did Gwynneth; but, instead of betraying further eagerness, sat down +at the piano, and, saying it was nothing without the music, forthwith +treated Sidney to snatch after snatch of the waltzes of the hour, +rendering each with a brilliance of touch and a delicacy of execution +alike worthy of a better cause. A year ago Gwynneth would not have done +this.</p> + +<p>Sidney, his hands in his pockets, but a sparkle still in his eyes, stood +watching her without a word until the end.</p> + +<p>"Look here," he then announced, "you've simply got to come, and that's +all about it. Of course the mater couldn't get away, but Lydia isn't so +full up, and I should think she'd jump at it. I'll write to her<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_296" id="Page_296">[Pg 296]</a></span> and fix +it up. There's a piano in our rooms, and we'll have it tuned for you; +no, we'll get a grand in for the week; and the whole court will be full +of men listening."</p> + +<p>"Who are 'we'?" inquired Gwynneth.</p> + +<p>"Oh, I share rooms with another fellow; an Eton man; you'll like him."</p> + +<p>And once more Sidney looked a little critically at his cousin, as though +he wanted to be quite sure that the Eton man would like her. But at this +moment the dressing-gong threw him into consternation. It appeared that +he was dining out at some club, had come up for this dinner, was only +sleeping in the house, and would be gone first thing in the morning. So +he had better say good-bye; and did so with rather unnecessary warmth, +Gwynneth thought; nevertheless, it was the dullest evening she had yet +spent in Hyde Park Place, though there was a little dinner-party there +also, after which the inevitable performance by Gwynneth was received +with the customary acclamation.</p> + +<p>It may be supposed that the girl was not enchanted with the prospect of +Lydia for chaperone; but she determined thus early to allow nothing to +interfere with her enjoyment of the Cambridge festivities. So when Mrs. +Goldstein came in her carriage on the next day but one, to say that she +supposed they must go, not that she was keen upon it herself, but to +please Sidney, and also because she thought it only right for young +girls like Gwynneth to have a good time while they could, the latter +tried to seem as grateful as though every word of Lydia's did not +ir<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_297" id="Page_297">[Pg 297]</a></span>ritate or repel her. She there and then received dictatorial +instructions as to dresses requisite for the week, and undertook to +follow them to the letter. It was not a congenial attitude for Gwynneth +to assume, but she also was at present bent upon that "good time" which +her cousin recommended. Lydia, on the other hand, cultivated the air of +one who is personally past all that. She seldom smiled, but yet had a +certain secret fondness for excitement. Gwynneth feared that she was far +from happy; she seemed dissatisfied with her position in society, and +spoke disrespectfully (when she did speak) of the dark, dapper, capable +man of business, her indulgent husband.</p> + +<p>There came a time when Gwynneth Gleed would have given much to forget +the merriest week of her life, but the memory of the next few days was +not to be destroyed. The girl never forgot the narrow streets teeming +with exuberant youth, the narrow river in similar case, the crush and +rush and uproar on the banks, the procession of boats flashing past, +each with an eight in which Gwynneth took no interest, but a ninth who +had always the same calm, brown, clean-cut face in her mind's eye. How +well he looked, swinging with his crew, he in his blazer, cool and +malicious, doing his part with splendid precision if only they did +theirs! One night they made their bump right opposite the boat in which +Gwynneth stood on tiptoe; and Sidney's smile at the supreme moment was +one of her vivid recollections; and her little scene with Lydia another, +which she brought upon herself by cheering as loud as any of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_298" id="Page_298">[Pg 298]</a></span> the men. +Sidney seemed very popular. Gwynneth was so proud to be seen with him, +especially when he wore his battered mortar-board and blue gown, which +appealed in some foolish way to her own vague intellectual aspirations. +And she looked down upon all the gowns that were not blue.</p> + +<p>But everything in Cambridge did appeal to Gwynneth, from the anthem and +the chancel-roof in King's Chapel to luncheon with Sidney and the Eton +man in Old Court. Lydia was for ever reproving her cousin's enthusiasm; +but Gwynneth was enjoying herself too much to resent anything that Mrs. +Goldstein could say. At the outset, however, a close observer might have +caught even Sidney with a cocked eyebrow, and the eye beneath upon the +Eton man; the girl was so frank and unsophisticated in the display of +her delight; but the Eton man seemed to admire it in her, and Sidney +gave up looking like that. The Eton man was twice his height, could +sing, and swore that nobody had ever played his accompaniments as +Gwynneth did; but he was not in any boat, and he could not compare with +Sidney as a partner. Nevertheless, his attentions and attractions had +more to answer for than anybody knew.</p> + +<p>Gwynneth had thought Sidney very nice in town, but at Cambridge he was +perfect. He was a thorough little man of the world, unconscious, +unconcerned, whereas many of the men whom Gwynneth met were scarcely +worthy of the name. Sidney did things like a prince, having an enviable +allowance, and a very good idea of the way in which things should be +done. And his arrangements were masterly; no day like the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_299" id="Page_299">[Pg 299]</a></span> last, or +next; and the whole a whirl of gaiety and excitement literally +intoxicating to one whose experience of this kind was so limited as poor +Gwynneth's. It all ended with the First Trinity ball. There is no need +to dilate on the astonishing magnificence of this revel; it was the most +memorable and splendid of them all; and the Backs by night, with a moon +in the heaven above and another in the water below, and grey old gables +salient in its light, and the Guards' Band in the faint distance, that +ought to have been so loud and near; all this was even more entrancing +than the ball itself, and Gwynneth moved as in a dream. She had had the +audacity to divide her dances between Sidney and the Eton man; but one +of them was given cause to complain towards the end, and the more so +since the girl had never looked so radiant in her life. The next day +Gwynneth and Lydia (who would not speak to her) were to return to town. +It had never been arranged that Sidney was to accompany them; yet he +did; and before evening there was trouble in Hyde Park Place.</p> + +<p>Sir Wilton would not hear of it at first; he was soon obliged to do +that. But he stood firm in refusing his consent to a formal engagement +between Sidney and his first cousin, and found an unexpected ally in +Gwynneth herself. The girl was paying for her week's delirium by a +deeper depression than her face betrayed or her heart admitted. Already +she was beginning to disappoint her cousin. But this was too much.</p> + +<p>"You agree with him?" gasped Sidney. "You'd<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_300" id="Page_300">[Pg 300]</a></span> rather <i>not</i> be engaged? +Then why, my darling, did you ever say 'yes'?"</p> + +<p>"It wasn't to that question, dear," said Gwynneth, colouring.</p> + +<p>"It amounted to the same thing."</p> + +<p>"It will amount to the same thing," Gwynneth said earnestly; "at least I +hope and pray that it may. But, of course, it's quite true that we're +both very young; and at least it's within the bounds of possibility +that—one or other of us might—some day—change."</p> + +<p>"Speak for yourself," said Sidney, with a taunting bitterness.</p> + +<p>"Dear, if you'll believe me, I'm thinking quite as much of you. At +twenty-two you would tie yourself for life!"</p> + +<p>"That's my look-out," said Sidney, grandly. "Age isn't everything, and +I'm not a boy; anyhow I know my own mind, if you don't know yours."</p> + +<p>Gwynneth's eyes filled with tears.</p> + +<p>"Oh, why did you tell me you cared for me?" she exclaimed. "Why did you +make me say I cared for you? It was true—it was true—but we seem to +have spoilt it by putting it into words. Oh, I was so happy before you +spoke! I never was so happy as all last week. I could have gone on like +that—I was so happy. And now it's all different already; you are, and I +am . . ."</p> + +<p>Sidney was watching her tears unmoved, for she had made him reflect. All +at once he saw his heartlessness, and next moment he was kissing her +tears away; vowing there was no difference in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_301" id="Page_301">[Pg 301]</a></span> him; but, if it was +otherwise with her, well, then, let them consider everything unsaid, and +start afresh.</p> + +<p>Gwynneth shook her head. Her eyes were dry again and full of thought.</p> + +<p>"No, dear, we can't do that; and you mustn't think I am not happy in +your love, because I am. Only, there seemed to be such a spell between +us before we were sure of each other. But perhaps it's always like +that."</p> + +<p>In the end they were engaged, but it was not to be a public engagement +for six months. Meanwhile Sidney returned to Cambridge for the Long, +having taken only a part of his degree; and Gwynneth quickly recovered +her reputation as a reformed character in the eyes of Lady Gleed, who +was less against the match than her husband, and who took the girl to +innumerable parties, each of which Gwynneth made a determined effort to +enjoy as thoroughly as the first half of the First Trinity ball.</p> + +<p>She seemed always in the highest spirits; and there was no one about her +who knew her well enough to know also that this perpetual brightness was +hard and unnatural in Gwynneth. Closer observers than Sir Wilton and his +wife might indeed have suspected as much; but there was only one +occasion upon which Gwynneth betrayed the livelier symptoms of a +troubled spirit. This was on her birthday at the beginning of July; upon +the breakfast table was a registered packet with the Cambridge +post-mark, and in its morocco case Gwynneth presently beheld a richer +necklace than she had ever dreamt of possessing as<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_302" id="Page_302">[Pg 302]</a></span> her own. Yet the +look in her face was so strange that Lady Gleed was obliged to speak.</p> + +<p>"Don't you like pearls, my dear?"</p> + +<p>"Oh! yes, oh! yes."</p> + +<p>"But you don't look pleased."</p> + +<p>"No more I am!"</p> + +<p>And she rushed from the room in unaccountable tears, and upstairs to her +own, where she was presently discovered writing a letter at top speed, +and crying bitterly as she wrote; it was Lady Gleed herself who +discovered her.</p> + +<p>"What <i>is</i> the matter, Gwynneth?"</p> + +<p>"I am writing to Sidney. I cannot take such presents from him. I am +writing to tell him why."</p> + +<p>"I think you are very silly," said Lady Gleed. "But your uncle wants to +see you in his study; that is really why I came up; and I don't think +you'll be so silly when you have heard what he has to tell you."</p> + +<p>There was an air of mystery about Lady Gleed, who furthermore kissed +Gwynneth before they separated on the landing. The girl went downstairs +with chill forebodings. Sir Wilton was seated at his massive desk, but +rose fussily as she entered, and wheeled up a chair with almost +excessive courtesy. Gwynneth had seldom seen him looking so benign.</p> + +<p>"I sent for you," said Sir Wilton, resuming his own seat, "because I +have some news for you, Gwynneth, which I am sure you will be as glad to +hear as I am to communicate it. It is against the law to dwell upon a +lady's age, but at yours I think you can afford<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_303" id="Page_303">[Pg 303]</a></span> to forgive me. I +believe that you are twenty-one to-day?"</p> + +<p>Gwynneth had not thought of that before, and at the present moment she +could scarcely believe she was no more. She made her admission with a +sigh.</p> + +<p>"Then for twenty-one years," pursued Sir Wilton, beaming, "or let us say +for as many of them as you can remember, you have, I presume, looked +upon yourself as an entirely penniless young lady? That has not been the +case; at least it is the case no longer. I—I hope I am not giving you +bad news?"</p> + +<p>Gwynneth was trembling all over. She had lost every vestige of colour.</p> + +<p>"My mother!" she gasped. "Why did she never know?"</p> + +<p>"Because, under the terms of your grandfather's will, nobody but myself +was to know anything at all about it until to-day."</p> + +<p>"It was cruel," cried the girl, in a breaking voice; "it might have kept +her here! It makes me not want to hear anything now . . . but of course +I must . . . forgive me, please."</p> + +<p>"My dear child," said Sir Wilton, kindly, "it is natural enough that you +should feel that. I can only ask you to believe that I at least had no +choice in the matter. And there were reasons; it is too painful to go +into them; your father was my brother, and I had rather say no more. I, +for my part, was obliged to fulfil the conditions. I have tried to do my +duty. I would gladly have done more, but your dear mother was the most +independent woman I ever met. I honoured her for it. But what could I +do?<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_304" id="Page_304">[Pg 304]</a></span> I must beg of you, my dear, to look upon the bright side; and, +believe me, this business has the very brightest side it is possible to +imagine."</p> + +<p>Gwynneth did her best. It was fine to be independent in her turn. But +the thought of her mother made her ashamed to touch a penny. And it was +a matter of several thousand pounds, invested all these years at +compound interest, yet with that absolute safety which distinguished the +financial operations of Sir Wilton Gleed.</p> + +<p>Sir Wilton could not say off-hand what the present capital would yield +if left where it was at simple interest, but he fancied it would work +out at seven or eight hundred a year at the very least. And these +figures, which sounded fabulous to poor Gwynneth, were obviously in +themselves the bright side upon which her uncle had harped. Yet he +continued to beam as though there was something more to come, and looked +so knowing that Gwynneth was obliged to ask him what it was.</p> + +<p>"Can't you see?" he said. "Can't you see?"</p> + +<p>"It is an immense amount of money. I can't see beyond that."</p> + +<p>"You heard me say that nobody knew anything at all about it except +myself, and, of course, my solicitors?"</p> + +<p>"Yes."</p> + +<p>"Even your aunt did not know until I told her just now."</p> + +<p>"Indeed."</p> + +<p>"And Sidney won't know until you tell him!"</p> + +<p>Then Gwynneth saw. Sir Wilton took care that<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_305" id="Page_305">[Pg 305]</a></span> she should. He did not on +principle approve of marriages between cousins; he said so frankly; he +might be wrong. But there was one thing which made him very proud of his +son's choice. And this was that thing; there were others also upon which +Sir Wilton touched with much playful gallantry.</p> + +<p>"But perhaps," said he, "you won't have anything more to say to the poor +lad now!"</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_306" id="Page_306">[Pg 306]</a></span></p> + +<h2 class="newchapter"><a name="CHAPTER_XXV" id="CHAPTER_XXV"></a>XXV<br /> +<span class="smalltext">SIGNS OF CHANGE</span></h2> + + +<p>Georgie was a short head taller, and no pinafore concealed the glories +of his sailor suit; but it was still the same baby face, round as the +eyes that greeted all comers with the same friendly gaze. His sentences +were longer and more ambitiously constructed; but he still said +"somekin" and "I wish I would," and, when excited, "my Jove!" And his +lady once more danced attendance by the hour and day together; for Sir +Wilton and Lady Gleed were paying visits until September; and Sidney was +still understood to be making up for lost time at Cambridge.</p> + +<p>Gwynneth had enjoyed the child's society the year before; now she seemed +dependent upon it. She would have him with her daily on one pretext or +another, sometimes upon none at all. She said she liked to hear him +talk, and that was well, for Georgie's tongue only rested in his sleep. +But now there was often an intrinsic interest in his conversation. He +gave Gwynneth many an item of village news which was real news to her. +Thus it was from his own lips that she first heard of his accident, on +seeing the scar through his hair.</p> + +<p>"Course I was in bed," swaggered Georgie; "I<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_307" id="Page_307">[Pg 307]</a></span> was in bed for years an' +years an' years—in bed and sensible."</p> + +<p>"Oh, Georgie, do you mean insensible?"</p> + +<p>"No, sensible, I tell you."</p> + +<p>"Did you know what was going on?"</p> + +<p>"Course I di'n't, not a bit. How could I fen I was sensible?"</p> + +<p>"My poor darling, it might have killed you! How ever did you do it?"</p> + +<p>But, as so often happens in such cases, that was what Georgie had never +been able to remember. So Gwynneth turned to Jasper Musk, who sat within +earshot; it was in the Flint House garden, on the very afternoon of her +return.</p> + +<p>"That was my fault," said Jasper, gruffly enough, yet with such a glance +at Georgie that Gwynneth was sorry she had broached the subject, and +changed it at once.</p> + +<p>But she reverted to it as soon as she had Georgie to herself. Who had +looked after him when he was ill? She was feeling very jealous of +somebody.</p> + +<p>"Granny did."</p> + +<p>"No one else?"</p> + +<p>"An' grand-daddy."</p> + +<p>"Was that all, Georgie?"</p> + +<p>Gwynneth was very sorry she had ever gone abroad.</p> + +<p>"Course it wasn't all," said Georgie, remembering. "There was the funny +old man from the church."</p> + +<p>"Mr. Carlton?"</p> + +<p>"Yes."</p> + +<p>"So <i>he</i> came to see you?"</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_308" id="Page_308">[Pg 308]</a></span>"Yes, he often. I love him," Georgie announced with emphasis; "he makes +lovely, lovely, <i>lovely</i> faces!"</p> + +<p>"And does he ever come now?"</p> + +<p>"No, not now, course he doesn't; he's too busy buildin' his church."</p> + +<p>"So he's building still!"</p> + +<p>"Yes, 'cos he builds wery nicely," Georgie was pleased to say; "better'n +me, he builds, far better'n me."</p> + +<p>"And is he still alone?"</p> + +<p>"All alone," said Georgie; "all alonypony by his own little self!"</p> + +<p>And the inconsequent nonsense sent him off into untimely laughter, +louder and more uproarious than ever, quite a virile guffaw. But +Gwynneth could not even smile. And now when neither listening to Georgie +nor haunted by her engagement, Gwynneth began to think of the lonely +outcast behind those trees, as she had begun indeed to think of him the +spring before last, while her mind and life were yet unfilled by the +motley interests which this last year had brought into both.</p> + +<p>The thought afflicted her with a sense of personal hardness and cruelty; +there was this lonely man, doing the work of ten, not spasmodically, but +day after day, and year after year, still unaided and unforgiven by the +very people in whose midst and for whose benefit those prodigies of +labour were being performed. Gwynneth knew now that there had been some +mysterious wickedness before the burning of the church. It was all she +cared to know. What<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_309" id="Page_309">[Pg 309]</a></span> crime could warrant such hardness of heart in the +face of such devotion, skill, patience, consummate endurance, and +invincible determination? These were heroic qualities, no matter what +vileness lay beneath or behind them; and the generous capacity for +hero-worship was very strong in Gwynneth. She would have honoured this +man for his splendid pertinacity, and have wiped all else from the +slate. That his own parishioners continued to dishonour him, and that +she perforce had to do as they did, made her indignant with them and +dissatisfied with herself. So far as Gwynneth was honestly aware, this +feeling was a purely impersonal one. It would have been excited by any +other being who had achieved the like and been thus rewarded. It is +noteworthy, however, that Gwynneth found it necessary to explain the +position to herself.</p> + +<p>It was strange, too, how her life had impinged upon his, strange because +the points of contact had in each case left a disproportionate +impression upon her mind. She often thought of them. There was once in +the very beginning, when she had actually stopped him in the village to +ask the name of the poem from which he had quoted on Sunday. Gwynneth +had never told a soul about this, she was so ashamed of her unmaidenly +impulse; but she still remembered the look of pleasure that had flashed +through his pain, and the kind sad voice which both answered her +question and thanked her for asking it. That must have been only a day +or two before the fire; the same summer there was the silent scene +between them in the drawing-room, when she longed<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_310" id="Page_310">[Pg 310]</a></span> to shake hands with +him, to show him her sympathy, but did not dare. Then came the finding +of Georgie in the stonemason's shed, only the spring before last; but +Gwynneth found that she had been gauche as usual even then, that she had +never risen to any of these occasions, but that her one small attempt to +express her sympathy had been nothing less than a piece of tactless +presumption on her part. And yet she felt so much!</p> + +<p>Well, it was something that Musk had opened his doors to him, if only +under pressure of a harrowing occasion; even then it was much, very +much, in the prime infidel of the parish. It was a beginning, an +example; it might show others the way. Gwynneth presently discovered +that it had.</p> + +<p>She had not brought Georgie to see the saddler this time, and she was +trying to follow that thinker's harangue as though she had really come +to him for political instruction; but all the while the sound from among +the trees distracted her attention and mystified her mind. It was +neither the ringing impact of iron upon iron, nor the swish of a sharp +steel point through the soft sandstone. It was the drone of a saw, as +Gwynneth knew well enough when she asked what the sound was in the first +opportunity afforded her.</p> + +<p>"That's the reverend," said the saddler, dryly.</p> + +<p>"It sounds like sawing," said disingenuous Gwynneth. "Has he reached the +roof?"</p> + +<p>"Gord love yer, miss, not he!"</p> + +<p>Gwynneth was consumed with an interest that she feared to show, +especially with the saddler looking at<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_311" id="Page_311">[Pg 311]</a></span> her through his spectacles as +others had done when Mr. Carlton supplied the topic of conversation. It +was a look that seemed to ask her how much she knew, and it always +offended her. She did not want to know what he had done; all her +interest was in what he was doing, alone there behind the trees. Yet now +she felt that speak she must, if it was only to soften a single heart, +in the very slightest degree, towards that unhappy man; and she had come +to the saddler with no other purpose.</p> + +<p>"Does no one go near him yet?" she asked point-blank.</p> + +<p>The saddler leant across his bench; the girl had refused the only chair +in the little workshop, and was standing outside at the open window, as +all his visitors did.</p> + +<p>"You won't tell Sir Wilton, miss?"</p> + +<p>"I shan't go out of my way to make mischief, Mr. Fuller, if that's what +you mean. But you had better not tell me any secrets," said Gwynneth, +with a coldness that cost her an effort; however, the saddler's skin was +in keeping with his calling.</p> + +<p>"Then you can keep that or not," said he, "as you think fit; but <i>I</i> go +and see him now and then, and, what's more, I'm not ashamed of it."</p> + +<p>"I should think not!" the girl broke out; and Fuller sunned himself in +the warmth of fine eyes on fire. "I mean," stammered Gwynneth, "after +all this time, and all he has done!"</p> + +<p>"What I said to myself last Christmas, miss; and I'm the only man that +say it to-day, in this here village full of old women and hypocrites; if +you'll<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_312" id="Page_312">[Pg 312]</a></span> excuse my blunt way o' speaking to a young lady like you. 'This +here's gone on long enough,' thinks I; 'an' it's the season of peace an' +good-will,' I says to myself; 'darned if I don't step across the road to +cheer up the poor old reverend, an' Sir Wilton can turn me out of house +an' home if he find out an' think proper.' Don't you mistake me, miss; I +wasn't thinking of Sir Wilton in what I said just now, and ought not to +have said to a young lady like you. No, miss, Sir Wilton has his own +quarrel with the reverend; and <i>I</i> had <i>my</i> quarrel, as far as that go; +but, Gord love yer, a man of my experience can afford to forgive an' +forget, an' be generous as well as just. There isn't a juster man alive +than me, Miss Gwynneth; and not a soul in this parish, or out of it, +that can say I'm not generous too."</p> + +<p>"I'm sure of it, Mr. Fuller. But did you go over to the rectory?"</p> + +<p>"There and then," cried Fuller; "there—and—then. And I told him +straight that I for one—but that's no use to go over what I said and he +said," observed the saddler, hastily. "I can only tell you that in ten +minutes we were chattun away as though nothun had ever come between us. +And what do you suppose, miss? What do you suppose?"</p> + +<p>Gwynneth shook her head, unable to imagine what was coming, and anxious +to hear.</p> + +<p>"He hadn't seen a newspaper in all these years! Hadn't so much as heard +of that there Home Rule Bill of old Gladstone's, and didn't even know +there'd been a war in the Sowd'n!" Gwynneth looked equally ignorant of +this. "You know, miss? The<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_313" id="Page_313">[Pg 313]</a></span> Sowd'n, where General Gordon was betrayed +and deserted by them varmin you'd stick up for. But we won't quarrel no +more about that: only to think of the poor old reverend knowun no more +about it than the man in the moon until I told him! Why, I had to tell +him one of the Royal Family was dead an' buried; it would have been just +the same if it had been the Queen herself, God bless her!"</p> + +<p>"So he has been absolutely shut off from the world," Gwynneth murmured.</p> + +<p>"There you've hit it, miss! 'Shut off from the world,' there you've put +it into better language than I did," said the saddler, with his most +complimentary air. "Gord love yer, miss, it used to be the reverend that +passed his <i>Standard</i> on to me; but ever since last Christmas it's been +me that's taken my <i>East Anglian</i> over to him; so the boot's been on the +other leg properly; and right glad I've been to do anything for him, and +to take my pipe across now and then as though nothun had ever happened. +Not that he fare to care much for that, neither; he've been so long +alone, I do believe he've got to like his own society as well as any. +Yes, miss, shut off from the world he have been and he is; but he won't +be shut off from the world much longer!"</p> + +<p>"Oh?"</p> + +<p>Gwynneth's interest was re-awakened.</p> + +<p>"No," said Fuller, with the air of mystery in which his class delights; +"no, miss, he's not one to be shut off longer than he can help. Hear +that sound?"</p> + +<p>"I do indeed."</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_314" id="Page_314">[Pg 314]</a></span>Latterly she had been listening to nothing else.</p> + +<p>"That's a saw!"</p> + +<p>"Well?"</p> + +<p>"Do you know what he's sawun?"</p> + +<p>"No."</p> + +<p>"Planks for benches!"</p> + +<p>Gwynneth repeated the last word in a puzzled whisper; and so stood +staring until the obvious explanation had become obvious to her. It +remained inexplicable.</p> + +<p>"I don't see the good of benches before the church is finished, Mr. +Fuller."</p> + +<p>"He mean to hold his services whether that's finished or not. And I mean +to attend 'em," the saddler said with an air.</p> + +<p>"But—I thought——"</p> + +<p>"He was suspended for five year, and the bishop has given him leave to +get to work directly the five year is up. That I happen to know."</p> + +<p>"It must be nearly up now!"</p> + +<p>"That's up next Sunday as ever is, and you'll know it when you hear the +bell ring. He's got one of the old uns slung to a tree, for I helped him +to sling it, and it's the first help he's had all this time. I wouldn't +mention it, miss, for the reverend doesn't want a crowd; there'll be +quite enough come when they hear the bell, if it's only to see what +happens; but the whole neighbourhood 'll be there if that get about."</p> + +<p>"And there's really going to be service in the church—just as it +is—without a roof—this very next Sunday!"</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_315" id="Page_315">[Pg 315]</a></span>It sounded incredible to Gwynneth, and yet it thrilled her as the +incredible does not. The very drone of the saw was thrilling now.</p> + +<p>"There is, miss, and I mean to be there," said the village Hampden, with +inflated chest. "I can't help it if that cost me Sir Wilton's custom, +the reverend and me are good friends again, and I mean to be there."</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_316" id="Page_316">[Pg 316]</a></span></p> + +<h2 class="newchapter"><a name="CHAPTER_XXVI" id="CHAPTER_XXVI"></a>XXVI<br /> +<span class="smalltext">A VERY FEW WORDS</span></h2> + + +<p>It had been in the air all Saturday, but few believed the rumour until +ten minutes to eleven next morning. At that hour and at that minute Long +Stow was electrified by the measured ringing of a single bell—a bell +hoarse with five years' rest and rust—a bell no ear had heard since the +night of the fire.</p> + +<p>Gwynneth was afield upon the upland, far beyond the church, a pitiful +waverer between desire and indecision. Now she must go; and now she must +not think of it. It was unnecessary, gratuitous, provocative, +ostentatious, unmaidenly, immodest—and yet—both her duty and her +desire. So the string of adjectives might be applied to her; they were +no deterrent to a nature which hesitated often, but seldom was afraid. +Gwynneth treated more respectfully the poignant query of her own +consciousness: was she absolutely certain that she did not at all desire +to show off like the saddler? She was not.</p> + +<p>She did desire to show off, if it was showing off to honour openly the +man whom she admired and wished others to admire. She gloried in the +man's achievement, and possibly also in her own appreciation of it and +him. That was her real point of con<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_317" id="Page_317">[Pg 317]</a></span>tact with the saddler. But for +Fuller there was the excuse of unconsciousness, and for Gwynneth there +was not. So she read herself that Sunday morning, under an August sky +without a fleck and a sun that drew the resin from those very pine-trees +upon which the outcast had so often gazed. It was thereabouts that +Gwynneth lingered, of self-analysis all compact. Then the hoarse bell +began—came calling up to her from the clump of chestnuts and of +elms—calling like a friend in pain . . .</p> + +<p>Gwynneth reached church by way of the strip of glebe behind it and the +gate into this from the lane, thus escaping the throng already gathered +at the other gate. She saw nothing but the rude benches as she entered +in; the last of these was too near for her; she shrank to the far end of +it, close against the wall, and the bell stopped as she sank upon her +knees. The beating of her heart seemed to take its place. Then there +came a light yet measured step. It passed very near, with a subdued and +subtle rustle, that might yet have meant one other woman. But Gwynneth +knew better, though she never looked.</p> + +<p>"<i>I will arise, and go to my father, and will say unto him, Father, I +have sinned against heaven, and before thee, and am no more worthy to be +called thy son.</i>"</p> + +<p>Already the girl could not see; all her being was involved in an effort +to suppress a sob. It was suppressed. There were no tears in the voice +that so moved Gwynneth. How serene it was, though sad! It began to +soothe her, as she remembered that it had done when she was quite a +little girl. She was a little girl again: these five years fled . . . +But oh,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_318" id="Page_318">[Pg 318]</a></span> why had he chosen <i>that</i> sentence of the scriptures? Gwynneth +looked at her book (for now she could see) and found that some of the +others would have been worse.</p> + +<p>At last she could raise her eyes; and there was Fuller in the very +front; and not another soul.</p> + +<p>But Gwynneth cared for nothing any more except the gentle voice that it +was her pride to follow in the general confession, kneeling indeed, yet +kneeling bolt upright in her proud allegiance.</p> + +<p>A strange picture, the rude benches, the ragged walls; the east window +still a chasm, the hot sun streaming through it down the aisle; and over +all the blue cruciform of sky, broken only by the nodding plumes of the +taller elms. And a congregation yet more strange—only Gwynneth and the +saddler. But this did not continue. Gwynneth heard movements in the +porch behind her, and presently a stumble on the part of one driven in +by the press; but no voices; not a whisper; and ere-long he who had been +forced in, tired of standing, came on tiptoe and occupied the end of +Gwynneth's bench.</p> + +<p>Now it was the second lesson. The rector was reading it in the same +sweet voice, with all his old precision and knowledge of his mother +tongue, and never a trip or an undue emphasis. No one would have +believed that that voice had been all but silent for five whole years. +And yet some change there was, something different in the reading, +something even in the voice; the clerical monotone was abandoned, the +reading was more human, natural, and sympathetic. The change was in +keeping with<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_319" id="Page_319">[Pg 319]</a></span> others. The rector wore no vestments in the naked eye of +heaven, but only his cassock, his surplice, and his Oxford hood. There +were flowers upon the simple table behind him, such roses as still grew +wild in his tangled garden, but no candle to melt double in the sun. The +lectern he had done his best to burnish; but it was still a cripple from +the fire. Above, the rector's hair shone like silver, for the sun swept +over it, but the lean dark face was all in shadow. Gwynneth only saw the +fresh trim cut of the grizzled beard, and the walnut colour of the +gnarled hand drooping over the book. That speaking hand!</p> + +<p>Now it was the first hymn—actually! So he dared to have hymns, and to +sing them if necessary by himself! But it was not necessary, and not +only Gwynneth joined in with all the little voice she possessed, but +presently there were false notes from the other end of the bench, and +the saddler was not silent. But Robert Carlton's voice rang sweet and +clear above the rest:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0q">"Jesu, Lover of my soul,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Let me to Thy Bosom fly,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While the gathering waters roll,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">While the tempest still is high:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Hide me, O my Saviour, hide,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Till the storm of life is past:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Safe into the haven guide,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O receive my soul at last . . ."<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>The hymn haunted Gwynneth upon her knees, taking her mind from the +remaining prayers. It was a hymn that she had loved as a little child, +and now it seemed so simple and so whole-hearted to one who<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_320" id="Page_320">[Pg 320]</a></span> longed +always to be both. But it was the passionate humility of it that touched +and filled the heart; and yet there had been neither tremor nor appeal +in the voice that led; and the humility was only in accord with one of +the simplest services ever held.</p> + +<p>The second hymn was another of Gwynneth's favourites; she could not +afterwards have said which, for in the middle Mr. Carlton knelt, and +then came forward to the twisted lectern at the head of the aisle.</p> + +<p>It was not a sermon; it was only a very few words. Yet in Long Stow +nothing else was talked of that day, nor for many a day to follow.</p> + +<p>The few words were these:—</p> + +<div class="blockquot"><p>"The first verse of the nineteenth psalm:</p> + +<p>"<i>The heavens declare the glory of God; and the +firmament sheweth his handywork.</i></p> + +<p>"Though I have given you a text, my brethren, I do not +intend this morning to preach any sermon. If you care +to hear me again—if you choose to give me another +trial—if you are willing to help me to start +afresh—then come again next Sunday, only come in +properly, and make the best of the poor benches which +are all I have to offer you as yet. There will only be +one weekly service at present. I believe that you +could nearly all come to that—if you would! But I am +afraid that many would have to stand.</p> + +<p>"I cannot tell you how grieved I am that your church +is not ready for you; but I hope and believe, as I +stand before you here, that it will be ready soon,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_321" id="Page_321">[Pg 321]</a></span> +much sooner than you suppose. Then one great wrong +will be righted, though only one.</p> + +<p>"Meanwhile, so long as we are blessed with days like +these—and I pray that many may be in store for +us—meanwhile, could there be a fitter or a lovelier +roof to the House of God than His own sky as we see it +above us to-day? Though at present we can have no +music worthy the name, have you not noticed, during +all this our service, the constant song and twitter of +those friends of man, as I know them to be, of whom +Jesus said, 'Not one of them is forgotten before God'? +And for incense, what fragrance have we not, in our +unfinished church, that is the House of God all the +more because it is also His open air.</p> + +<p>"My brethren, <i>you</i> need be no farther from heaven, +here in this place, unfinished as it is, than when the +roof is up, and the windows are in, and proper seats, +and when a new organ peals . . . and one whom you can +respect stands where I am standing now . . .</p> + +<p>"My brethren—once my friends—will you never, never +be my friends again?</p> + +<p>"<i>Oh spare me a little that I may recover my strength: +before I go hence, and be no more seen . . .</i></p> + +<p>"Dear friends, I have said far more than I ever meant +to say. But it is your own fault; you have been so +good to me; so many of you have come in; and you are +listening to me—to me! If you never listen to me +again, if you never come near me any more, I shall +still thank you—thank you—to my dying hour!</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_322" id="Page_322">[Pg 322]</a></span>"But let no eye be dim for me. I do not deserve it. I +do not want it. If you ever cared for me—any of +you—be strong now and help me . . .</p> + +<p>"And remember—never, never forget—that a just God +sits in yonder blue heaven above us—that He is not +hard—that I told you . . . He is merciful . . . +merciful . . . merciful . . .</p> + +<p>"O look above once more before we part, and see again +how '<i>The heavens declare the glory of God; and the +firmament sheweth his handywork</i>.'</p> + +<hr class="thin" /> + +<p>"And now to God the Father, God the Son, and God the +Holy Ghost, be ascribed all honour, power, dominion, +might, henceforth and for ever. Amen."</p></div> + +<p>He had controlled himself by a superb effort. The end was as calm as the +beginning; but the rather hard, almost defiant note, that might have +marred the latter in ears less eager than Gwynneth's and more sensitive +than those of the people in the porch, that note had passed out of +Robert Carlton's voice for ever.</p> + +<p>And there no longer were any people in the porch; one by one they had +all crept in to listen, some stealing to the rude seats, more standing +behind, none remaining outside. Thus had they melted the heart they +could not daunt, until all at once it was speaking to their hearts out +of its own exceeding fulness, in a way undreamed of when the preacher +delivered his text.</p> + +<p>And this was to be seen as he came down the aisle, white head erect, +pale face averted, and so through the midst of his people—his once +more—without catching the eye of one.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_323" id="Page_323">[Pg 323]</a></span></p> + +<h2 class="newchapter"><a name="CHAPTER_XXVII" id="CHAPTER_XXVII"></a>XXVII<br /> +<span class="smalltext">AN ESCAPE</span></h2> + + +<p>Mr. Fuller had made a hasty exit; but he waylaid Gwynneth on the road. +"Excuse me, miss," he cried, and the girl felt bound to do so. Next +moment she was trying to sort the mixed emotions in the saddler's face, +for a few steps had brought them to his house, and he had halted at the +workshop window.</p> + +<p>"Well, miss, and what do <i>you</i> think of it?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, Mr. Fuller, please don't ask me."</p> + +<p>"I don't mean the sermon, miss; I mean the flock of sheep that come and +listened to the sermon," said the saddler, with a bitterness that +astonished Gwynneth.</p> + +<p>"But, surely, Mr. Fuller, you were glad they did come? I was so +thankful!" declared the girl.</p> + +<p>"So was I, miss; so was I," said the saddler, grimly; "but, Gord love +yer, do you suppose they ever would have shown their noses if you an' me +hadn't given 'em the lead?"</p> + +<p>"Then we ought to be very proud, Mr. Fuller; at least you ought, since +but for you I never should have known in time."</p> + +<p>"But do you think a man of 'em 'll admit it?" continued Fuller fiercely. +"Not they—I know 'em.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_324" id="Page_324">[Pg 324]</a></span> They'll take the credit, the moment there's any +credit to take—them that hasn't given him a word or a look in all these +years. But the reverend, <i>he</i> know—<i>he</i> know!"</p> + +<p>"I'm sure he does," said Gwynneth, kindly; and left the forerunner to +his ignoble jealousy, only hoping there was some foundation for it, and +that a real reaction was already in the air.</p> + +<p>Even on her way home there were further signs. Jones the schoolmaster, +an implacable enemy these five years, but an emotional man all his life, +was still dabbing his eyes as he held unguarded converse with the +phlegmatic owner of the mill on the lock, who had been his fellow +churchwarden in the days before the fire.</p> + +<p>"I'll be his churchwarden again," declared the schoolmaster, "and Sir +Wilton can say what he likes. We know who ruled the roast before, and we +know——"</p> + +<p>Gwynneth caught no more as she hurried on, her first desire a quiet hour +without a whisper from the world. She wished to recall every word of the +sermon, while every syllable remained in her mind, and then to write it +all down and to possess it for ever. Such was her first feverish +resolve; nor, analytical as she was, did she stop to analyse this. The +stable gates were open; it never occurred to Gwynneth to wonder why. +There was a good way through the stable-yard to the garden, whose +uttermost end she might thus reach without being seen from the house. +And Fraulein Hentig had known where she was thinking of going, had +shaken Gwynneth not a little<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_325" id="Page_325">[Pg 325]</a></span> with her remonstrances, but would be none +the less certain to ask questions when next they met.</p> + +<p>Near the Italian garden was a certain walk, with stark yew hedges on +either hand, and fine grass stretched like a drugget from end to end. +Across this strip the old English flowers, poppies and peonies, +hollyhocks and larkspur, faced each other in serried lines as in a +country dance; and the vista ended in a thatched summer-house where it +was always cool. The spot was a favourite haunt of Gwynneth, who would +catch herself humming the old English songs there, and thinking of +patches and powder and the minuet. It had not that effect this morning; +she neither saw nor smelt the flowers, nor heard the thrush which was +singing to her with persistent sweetness from the stately trees upon the +lawn beyond. Gwynneth was in that other world which had existed all +these years within half-a-mile of this one. What she heard was the +virile cadence of the voice which had always thrilled her; strong and +masterful in the beginning; softening all at once, as the people pressed +in to hear; then for a little high-pitched and hoarse, spasmodic, +tremulous, too touching even to remember with dry eyes; then that last +pause, and the silver clarion of his proper voice once more and to the +end. And what Gwynneth saw, through her tears, was the sunlight resting +on that stricken head, as though God had stretched out His hand in final +mercy and forgiveness.</p> + +<p>But what she was to see, before many minutes were past, or the sermon +over in her mind, was a dapper figure approaching between the old +flowers<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_326" id="Page_326">[Pg 326]</a></span> and the spruce hedges, a figure in riding breeches, swinging a +cutaway coat in his walk.</p> + +<p>It was Sidney, ridden over from Cambridge on a hired horse. Gwynneth had +time to come out of the summer-house to meet him, but none to think. So +he had given her a kiss before she realised what that meant—and knew in +her heart that it must be the last. And the next moment she saw that he +was displeased.</p> + +<p>"So here you are!" was his verbal greeting: "I've been looking for you +all over the shop."</p> + +<p>"I'm so sorry," said poor Gwynneth. "If you had only let us know——"</p> + +<p>"Oh, that's all right; I took my risk, of course."</p> + +<p>He looked her up and down, as she stood in the sunlight, tall and +comely, her state of mind instinctively and successfully concealed; and +the brown tinge came upon his handsome face as the annoyance vanished. +Endearments fell from his lips, but now she made him keep his distance, +though so tactfully that he obviously did not realise his repulse. +Gwynneth looked at him for an instant with great compassion; then she +led the way into the summer-house, her mind made up.</p> + +<p>"You haven't been here all the morning, have you?" he went on. "No, I +see you haven't; there are your gloves."</p> + +<p>"Yes."</p> + +<p>"Been for a walk?"</p> + +<p>"Well, I did go for one."</p> + +<p>"What do you mean?" demanded Sidney, struck at last by her manner.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_327" id="Page_327">[Pg 327]</a></span>"I've been to church!"</p> + +<p>"What! Over to Linkworth and back?"</p> + +<p>"No."</p> + +<p>Her tone trembled; he was not helping her at all.</p> + +<p>"Then what church did you go to, and what on earth's up with you, +darling?"</p> + +<p>"I went to our own church."</p> + +<p>"But I thought that Lakenhall chap only came in the afternoon?"</p> + +<p>"He doesn't go to the church."</p> + +<p>Sidney stared an instant, and was on his feet the next. "You don't mean +to say you've been up to the church talking to—to Carlton?" he cried.</p> + +<p>"No, not talking to him."</p> + +<p>"Then do you mind telling me what you do mean?"</p> + +<p>Gwynneth did her best to explain the occasion and to describe the +service, but found herself unable to do the subject justice in a few +words, and drifted into a nervous enthusiasm as she went. Sidney's eyes +seemed smaller than when she began; she had never known he had so sharp +a chin. But he heard her out, standing in the doorway, and not always +looking her way; it was when averted that his face looked so hard. When +she had finished he gave her his whole attention, and was some time +regarding her, his hands in his pockets, without a word.</p> + +<p>"So you deliberately went to hear that blackguard!"</p> + +<p>"You needn't call him that," said Gwynneth, hotly.</p> + +<p>"But I do."</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_328" id="Page_328">[Pg 328]</a></span>"I should be ashamed to abuse him after all he has done!"</p> + +<p>"That doesn't alter what—what you apparently and very properly know +nothing about, Gwynneth."</p> + +<p>"And I don't want to know!" cried the girl, indignant at his tone. "I +only say, whatever he has done, he has paid very bitterly for it, and +made such amends as were never made by anybody I ever heard of. He may +have been all you say. He is more than all that I can say now!"</p> + +<p>"And what do you say?" inquired Sidney, with polite contempt.</p> + +<p>"That we shall honour ourselves in future by honouring him, and +dishonour ourselves by continuing to dishonour him. He has had his +punishment, and look how he has borne it! Why, he has done what was +never done in the world before by one solitary man."</p> + +<p>Gwynneth stopped breathless. Sidney eyed her coolly, his nostrils +curling. "So that's your opinion," he sneered.</p> + +<p>"It's a good deal more than that," cried Gwynneth. "It's my fixed +conviction and personal resolve."</p> + +<p>"To honour that fellow, eh?"</p> + +<p>Gwynneth coloured.</p> + +<p>"To the extent of attending his services when I happen to be here," she +said. And Sidney gave her a pregnant look—a more honest look—angry and +determined as her own.</p> + +<p>"And what about me?" he said. "What if I object?"</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_329" id="Page_329">[Pg 329]</a></span>Gwynneth was slow to answer, to tell him the sharp truth outright.</p> + +<p>"Do you mean to go your own way in spite of me, in spite of the +governor, in spite of all of us?"</p> + +<p>Gwynneth saw that she could not remain at the hall and follow such a +course. So this question went unanswered like the last, though for a +different reason. Meanwhile Sidney was accounting for her silence to his +own satisfaction, and he now conceived that the moment had arrived for +him to play the strong man.</p> + +<p>"Look here, Gwynneth," said he, "this is all rot and bosh, and worse—if +you'll take my word for it. And you must take my word, and take it on +trust in a thing like this, or you never will in anything. I tell you +this fellow Carlton is the most unspeakable skunk. But it isn't a thing +we can discuss together. Isn't that enough for you? Isn't my wish +enough, in a thing like this, which I know all about and you don't? Have +I got to enforce it while we're still engaged? If so——"</p> + +<p>Gwynneth had raised her head slowly, and at last she spoke.</p> + +<p>"We are not engaged, Sidney," she said quietly.</p> + +<p>"Not—engaged?"</p> + +<p>"It has never been a proper engagement."</p> + +<p>"A proper engagement!" Sidney gasped. "Not a public one, if you like! +What difference does that make?"</p> + +<p>"No difference. It only makes it—easier——"</p> + +<p>"What does it make easier?" he demanded fiercely.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_330" id="Page_330">[Pg 330]</a></span>Gwynneth was choking with humiliation. It was some moments before she +could command her voice. Her distress was pitiful; but the young man was +already busy pitying himself. A sudden change had come over Sidney. It +was not in all respects a change for the worse. His cynical aplomb had +already disappeared, leaving a tremulous, an angry, but a human being +behind. So Gwynneth felt a leaning to him even at the last; but this +time she knew her mind.</p> + +<p>And she spoke it with equal candour and humility: it was all her fault: +she could never forgive herself; but he would forgive her, when he saw +for himself what the woman will always see quicker than the man. She +liked him better than anybody she knew; that week at Cambridge had been +the happiest week in her life; one day they would, they must, be good +friends again. Meanwhile they had both made a miserable mistake. This +was not love.</p> + +<p>"Speak for yourself," cried Sidney, all bitterness and mortification. +"And I never believed in a woman before," he groaned; "my God, I never +shall again!"</p> + +<p>And he strode out savagely into the sun; but a different Sidney was back +next moment, one that reminded Gwynneth of the very old days, when he +would pass her whistling with his dog. A sneer was on his lips, and his +dry eyes glittered.</p> + +<p>"I beg your pardon for making a scene, Gwynneth; it isn't in my line, as +you know, and I apologise. But do you mind telling me when you +discovered that you had—changed?"</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_331" id="Page_331">[Pg 331]</a></span>"I have not changed, Sidney. That is my shame."</p> + +<p>"Do you mean that you never did care about me?"</p> + +<p>"Never in that way. I am ashamed to say it—more humiliated and ashamed +than you can ever know. But it's the truth."</p> + +<p>"Yet at the First Trinity ball, I remember, if you don't——"</p> + +<p>His tone was more than Gwynneth could endure.</p> + +<p>"Yes, I remember," she cried; "and I can explain it, though explanations +are no excuse. Sidney, you know what my life was until the last few +months? Happy enough in heaps of ways, but not the least gaiety in it; +and suddenly I felt the want of it. I felt it first abroad, and you met +that want in your May-week in a way beyond my dreams. You may sneer at +me now, but you were awfully nice to me then, and I shall never, never +forget it. You were so nice that I honestly did think for a little that +you met every other want as well! Yet I tell you now, what I tried to +tell you once before, that when once you had spoken nothing was the +same. It was like touching a bubble. The bubble had burst."</p> + +<p>"You felt like that from the first?"</p> + +<p>Gwynneth turned away, for now they were both upon their feet, restlessly +hovering between the summer-house and the sunlight.</p> + +<p>"And yet it has taken you two months to tell me," pursued Sidney without +remorse.</p> + +<p>"I know; it was dreadful of me; yet I could not<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_332" id="Page_332">[Pg 332]</a></span> tell you till I was +absolutely certain, and it is not so easy to be certain of oneself in +such things. If you find no difficulty, Sidney, then you might pity +those who do. Nevertheless, I did write, on my birthday, when you sent +me those beautiful pearls. Sidney, you must take them back—for my sake. +I meant to send them back at once, but you know what I heard that very +morning! It may have been cowardly and weak, but how could I tell you I +did not love you the moment I knew I was to have a little money of my +own? It's hard enough as it is; but I had not the pluck for that. Yet it +is hard enough now," repeated Gwynneth, with great feeling; "and you +haven't made it easier, Sidney. No, I don't mean anything you may have +said; you have not said more than I deserve. But you tempted me—you +little know how you have tempted me—to be dishonest with you to the +end. It would have been so easy to make poor Mr. Carlton the whole +cause, and not to have told you the truth at all!"</p> + +<p>"Then I wish to God you had done so!" Sidney cried out, revealing the +character of his wound unawares, yet once more human, young, and vain. +Moreover there was passion enough in his eyes and voice, as there had +been in his wooing. "Besides," he continued, "poor Mr. Carlton, as you +call him, <i>is</i> the cause, I don't care what you say. Curse him! Curse +him, body and soul!"</p> + +<p>Gwynneth was outside in the sun, doubly adorable now that he had lost +her, and for other reasons too. Her sweet skin was flushed, and even her +tears inflamed the unhappy young man. He looked at her<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_333" id="Page_333">[Pg 333]</a></span> long and +passionately, then muttered venom through his teeth.</p> + +<p>"What did you say?"</p> + +<p>"I said it was like him, too, the blackguard!"</p> + +<p>"I don't know what you mean, and I don't want to."</p> + +<p>"It's as well," jeered Sidney, with exceeding malice; but already she +was turning away. She was turning away without one word. In an instant +he had her by both wrists, as the devil possessed himself.</p> + +<p>"Let me go," cried Gwynneth. "You're hurting me!"</p> + +<p>"I'm not. I'm not. I'm only going to let you know the kind of beast +that's come between us."</p> + +<p>Gwynneth stood with unresisting wrists. Her scorn was splendid.</p> + +<p>"I am not sorry to have seen you in your true colours, Sidney."</p> + +<p>"You are going to see some one else in his."</p> + +<p>Her scorn had destroyed his last scruple. His eyes were devilish now.</p> + +<p>"Let me go, you brute!"</p> + +<p>"There are worse, Gwynneth, there are worse. It isn't a thing we can +discuss, as I told you. But did you never notice the likeness?"</p> + +<p>Her blank face put the involuntary question he desired.</p> + +<p>"Only between the one big villain in this parish—and the one rather +jolly little boy!"</p> + +<p>At last her wrists were released. But Gwynneth remained standing in the +sun. She was not looking<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_334" id="Page_334">[Pg 334]</a></span> at Sidney; on the contrary, her face declared +her oblivious to his continued presence. It was white with several kinds +of horror; it was pinched with many separate pangs. So she stood a few +moments, then went her way slowly, only turning with a shudder. As for +him, his fever subsided as he watched; and, before the diminishing +figure had passed out of the vista of cropped hedges and crude flowers, +even Sidney Gleed knew himself, for once in his life, for what he was +and would be to its end.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_335" id="Page_335">[Pg 335]</a></span></p> + +<h2 class="newchapter"><a name="CHAPTER_XXVIII" id="CHAPTER_XXVIII"></a>XXVIII<br /> +<span class="smalltext">THE TURNING TIDE</span></h2> + + +<p>Next Sunday there was a real congregation. Yet the benches were almost +as empty as before, the people herding near the porch until entreated +either to occupy such seats as there were, or to leave the church. +"Curiosity may have brought some of you here," said Mr. Carlton; "but I +earnestly hope that none will remain in that spirit." The benches were +full in a minute, and many had still to stand. All the next week Robert +Carlton spent in sawing more planks to one length, and more props to one +height for their support. And on the third Sunday his church was packed.</p> + +<p>The summer of 1887 was, however, a remarkable one. And the month of +August was an ideal month for the inauguration of open-air services, +where there were trees.</p> + +<p>In those hot still days came visitors of every type, and in greater +numbers than Robert Carlton desired. The tide had turned; he was early +aware of his danger now. Again and again it became his own sore duty to +remind this one or the other, distantly perhaps, yet none the less +unmistakably, of that which they might forget, but he never. Their open +admiration tried him acutely. He did like it a little<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_336" id="Page_336">[Pg 336]</a></span> for its own sake, +after five years' ostracism; more for the fresh purchase it gave him +over simple hearts; but he was very hard on himself for liking it at +all. On the other hand, he knew that it must put many a mind, the +subtler minds, more than ever against him. It also renewed his own +shame. So it was not admiration that he wanted at all; it was +confidence, forgiveness, love; and these if possible by degrees. It was +not possible, and Robert Carlton had to suffer in turn from the saddler, +the schoolmaster, and the rest. The first would come to hedge and hedge +with a view to Sir Wilton's imminent return; the next would intercept +him as he came away, learn what he had been saying, and forthwith step +across to the church to let the reverend know how the schoolmaster's +character impressed itself upon a man of his experience. It was an +unattractive trait in Fuller that he questioned everybody's sincerity +but his own, albeit his strictures were not seldom justifiable. He +talked, however, as though for years he had been the one and only +philanthropist to hold any dealings with the rector; at last it became +necessary to set him right on the point, which Mr. Carlton did with a +mild account of his illness and the sexton's aid.</p> + +<p>"I do wish I'd ha' known," said Fuller, with perfect truth; "I do wish +I'd ha' known an' had the nursun of yer, reverend, instead o' him. And +he never come near you no more; so I should expect."</p> + +<p>"But you tell me he's very ailing, Fuller."</p> + +<p>"He haven't been ailun all these years."</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_337" id="Page_337">[Pg 337]</a></span>"We—we had a little tiff in the end. It was my fault. I wonder if he'd +see me now?"</p> + +<p>"I'll make him, reverend, I'll tell him he's got to."</p> + +<p>"No, Fuller, I can't allow that. Besides, he has not got to do anything +of the sort; he has turned dissenter, and may prefer me to stop away. +Nevertheless I shall call, if only to ask how he is."</p> + +<p>There was no need to ask, in the event. The old sexton was failing fast, +and "not long for this world," as his daughter announced in front of +him. The poor man was in bed, and very dirty, but as sensible as he ever +had been; and he welcomed the rector with cadaverous grins.</p> + +<p>"They tell me," he whispered, "you fare to finish the church with your +own two hands. You're a wonderful man, sir—and I'm another."</p> + +<p>"You are, indeed. Why, you must be nearly ninety, Busby?"</p> + +<p>"Eighty-eight, sir, come next September. But I wasn't thinkun o' my age, +sir. Do you remember that little varmin I swallered out 'f a pond?"</p> + +<p>"I remember."</p> + +<p>"I've killed that, sir!"</p> + +<p>And the sunken eyes shone like lamps.</p> + +<p>"I congratulate you, Busby."</p> + +<p>"I killed that two year ago; and you'll never guess how!" The ex-sexton +proceeded to rehearse the various remedies he had tried in vain. "I +killed that with bacca-smoke," he concluded in sepulchral triumph. "It +was the minister's idea. I had to swaller the bacca-smoke instead o' +puffun that out, an' that choked that in three pipes!"</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_338" id="Page_338">[Pg 338]</a></span>The rector said it must be a great relief to be rid of such an incubus. +Busby, however, with a sick man's reluctance to admit any alleviating +circumstance in his case, was not so sure about that. He sometimes fared +to wish he had the little varmin back. Croap, croap, croap! That had +been wonderful good company after all. The ex-sexton was not too ill to +wax eloquent upon his favourite topic. And the tenor of his talk was +that mankind had been building churches since the world began, but what +other man had lived for years with a live frog on his chest?</p> + +<p>Their religious dispute was evidently forgotten, and Mr. Carlton did not +feel it incumbent upon him to risk another in the circumstances of the +case. On the way home the other egotist waylaid him, with his opinion of +old Busby's hallucination and general sanity since the saddler could +remember him.</p> + +<p>"But half the village and half the county is the same, reverend. Silly +Suffolk!"</p> + +<p>"Yet you're a Suffolk man yourself, Fuller," observed Mr. Carlton, +mildly.</p> + +<p>"Yes, reverend, but there was corn in Egypt, if you recollect."</p> + +<p>Meanwhile the building still went on, and was rapidly nearing a point +beyond which Carlton himself could not proceed unaided. That point was +the last window; the others were all finished. He had left out the +single mullions and all the tracery. They might be added afterwards by +an expert hand. They were not essential to the windows, which were ready +for glazing as they were. But the east window was<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_339" id="Page_339">[Pg 339]</a></span> another affair. It +must have its two mullions as before, with the quatrefoil tracery which +had remained undamaged in the west window opposite. All this was beyond +the self-taught hewer of coursed rubble and of gargoyles; the arch +itself must be two feet wider than any he had yet attempted; but on a +worthy east window he had set his heart.</p> + +<p>Such was the dilemma in which Robert Carlton found himself at the end of +August, and there seemed only one thing to be done. He must call for aid +at last, and now he knew that aid would come, for he had received +various offers of assistance since the beginning of the month. Some of +these were from local firms which had refused his work in the beginning; +Carlton had promised that if he called for tenders he would consider +theirs; and now call he must. Yet he could not bring himself to do so +all at once.</p> + +<p>To call in the world after all! To open his leafy solitude to the +British workmen in gangs, to hear their chaff, to smell their tobacco, +where he had laboured in quiet and alone through so many, many seasons!</p> + +<p>But it had to come. A tinge of autumn was on the trees. Any Sunday now +the open-air service might prove a discomfort and a peril to all; in a +few weeks at most it would become impossible. But the people must have +their church. They had waited long enough. Therefore any further +reluctance in him was little and unworthy, as Carlton saw at once for +himself. Yet there was now so much else to do, so many poor folks to +see, so many old threads to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_340" id="Page_340">[Pg 340]</a></span> take up, that for once he temporised. And +even as he temporised, his mind made up, and a competition pending +between the masons of the neighbourhood, Sir Wilton Gleed arrived in +Long Stow for the shooting.</p> + +<p>Sir Wilton arrived with a frown. It deepened but little at what he +heard. He was prepared for everything; and about Gwynneth he knew. She +had left his house, she had gone her own way, he washed his hands of +her, and only congratulated Sidney on his escape. That chapter was +closed. It was the older matter that harassed Sir Wilton Gleed.</p> + +<p>So that devil had reinstated himself after all! The fact might not be +finally accomplished; it was none the less inevitable, imminent. And Sir +Wilton had long been prepared for it; for the last two years he had been +unable to move without hearing the name he abhorred; it dogged him in +town, it followed him to Scotland, it awaited him in every hole and +corner of the Continent. Once he had been fond of speaking of his +property; but in two senses it was hard to do this without giving the +place a name. Sir Wilton was learning to deny himself the boast +altogether.</p> + +<p>Long Stow? Could there be two Long Stows? Then that must be the place +where the parson was building up his church. What a romance! And what a +man! Oh, no doubt he was a very dreadful person also; but there, in any +case, was a Man.</p> + +<p>Sir Wilton could not deny it; and by degrees he wearied of insisting +upon the deplorable side of the man's character. The task was +ungrateful; it put<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_341" id="Page_341">[Pg 341]</a></span> himself in an ungenerous light, which was the harder +upon one who was by no means ill-natured in grain. Gradually he took to +admitting his adversary's good points; even admitted them to himself; +but that did not remove the chronic irritation of infallible defeat. And +defeated Sir Wilton already was, with the people flocking to that man +again, and doubtless willing to help him finish his church. His own +parishioners had forgiven him—and well they might, said Sir Wilton's +friends in every country-house. Besides, the suspended parson was a +figure of the past; the law was done with him; he was absolutely free to +begin afresh. Henceforth the vindictiveness of the individual must +recoil deservedly upon the individual's head.</p> + +<p>Sir Wilton saw all this before his actual return; and he realised the +madness of either urging or attempting to coerce his tenantry to harden +their hearts, a second time, against one who had committed no second +sin. If he failed it would destroy his influence in the neighbourhood; +even if he succeeded it would damage his popularity elsewhere. And a +chat with the schoolmaster, a call upon one or two of the neighbouring +clergy, a word with old Marigold in his gig, all served but to convince +him finally of these facts.</p> + +<p>Sir Wilton's mind was made up. He had come back primed with a desperate +measure for the last of all. Once it was resolved upon, his spirits +rose.</p> + +<p>He told his wife and took her breath away; but a very little reasoning +brought the lady round the compass to his view. This was after breakfast +on<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_342" id="Page_342">[Pg 342]</a></span> the second day. The same forenoon Sir Wilton went up the village, +brisk and rosy, a flower in his coat, and a word for all. Past the Flint +House he began to walk slowly, took no notice of a courtesy, swung round +suddenly himself, and was knocking at Jasper Musk's door that minute, +still a thought less confident than he had been.</p> + +<p>Musk was in his garden, fast as usual to his chair. Mrs. Musk brought +out another chair for Sir Wilton, and drove Georgie indoors on her way +back. Sir Wilton watched the child out of sight, and then favoured +Jasper with his peculiarly fixed stare. There was unusual meaning in it +this morning.</p> + +<p>"So the world has forgiven him," said Sir Wilton Gleed.</p> + +<p>Musk stared in his turn, his great face glowing with contempt. "Have +you?" said he at last.</p> + +<p>"Not yet," replied Sir Wilton, a shade more pink in the face. He had +meant to lead up to his intention. He was taken aback.</p> + +<p>"But you mean to, do you?" pursued Musk, pressing his point in no +respectful tone: in all their relations this one had never pandered to +the other.</p> + +<p>"I don't say that, either," replied Sir Wilton, in studied tones.</p> + +<p>"Then what do you say?"</p> + +<p>"Less than anybody else, a good deal less," declared the squire. "I—I +don't quite understand your tone, Musk, I must say; but I can well +understand your position in this matter. It is unique, of course. So is +mine, in a sense. But I must beg of you not to jump to conclusions. I am +the last per<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_343" id="Page_343">[Pg 343]</a></span>son to make a hero of the man I did my best to kick out of +the parish five years ago; next to yourself, no one has reason to love +the fellow less. I thought it a public scandal that he should be +empowered to stay here against all our wills. My opinion of that whole +black matter is absolutely and totally unchanged. But I do confess to +you, Musk, that this last year or two have somewhat modified my opinion +of the man himself."</p> + +<p>Musk's eyes had never dropped or lifted from his visitor's face. Their +expression was inscrutable. The iron cast of that massive countenance +was the only key to the workings of the mind within: the lines seemed +subtly emphasised, as in the faces of the dead. And his gigantic body +was the same; only the eyes seemed alive; and they were as still as the +rest of him.</p> + +<p>"What if I've modified mine?"</p> + +<p>Sir Wilton looked up quickly; for the habitual starer had been for once +outstared. "Do you mean that you have?" cried he.</p> + +<p>"I don't say as I have or I haven't. But that's a man, Sir Wilton, and I +won't deny it."</p> + +<p>"Exactly what everybody is saying. I say no more myself."</p> + +<p>"And I won't say no less . . . Suppose you was to patch it up with him, +Sir Wilton?"</p> + +<p>"I should help him finish his church."</p> + +<p>Musk sat silent for some time. His eyes seemed smaller. But they had not +moved.</p> + +<p>"That would be a wonderful good action on your part, Sir Wilton," he +said at last.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_344" id="Page_344">[Pg 344]</a></span>"Not at all, Musk. I should be doing it for the people, not for Mr. +Carlton."</p> + +<p>Another pause.</p> + +<p>"And yet, Sir Wilton, in a manner o' speaking, you might say as he +deserved it, too?"</p> + +<p>Sir Wilton was quite himself again—a gentleman in keeping with the +flower in his coat.</p> + +<p>"I certainly never expected to hear you say so, Musk," said he frankly; +"though it's what I've sometimes thought myself."</p> + +<p>"I haven't said as <i>I</i> forgave him, have I?"</p> + +<p>"No, no, Musk, you haven't; it is not in human nature that you could."</p> + +<p>It was a strange tongue that had spoken in the massive head; there was +no forgiveness in that voice. Yet in the next breath the note of hate +was hushed as suddenly as it had been struck.</p> + +<p>"That may be in human natur'," said Musk, "but that ain't in mine. I'm +not a religious man, Sir Wilton. That may be the reason. But I do have +enough respect for religion to wish to see that church up again before I +die."</p> + +<p>"I consider it very generous of you to say so, Musk," declared the +other, with enthusiasm.</p> + +<p>"But I do say it, Sir Wilton, and I never said a truer word."</p> + +<p>"So I hear; and that decides me!" cried Sir Wilton, jumping up. "I +really had decided—for the sake of the parish—and was actually on my +way to the church to take the whole job over. A gang of competent +workmen could polish it off in a couple of months; and it ought to be +pol<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_345" id="Page_345">[Pg 345]</a></span>ished off. But it's really wonderful what he has done!"</p> + +<p>"I don't deny it," said Musk; and waited for the squire to recover his +point, his own set face unchanged.</p> + +<p>"Yes," resumed Sir Wilton, suddenly, "I was on my way up to make him +that proposal just now; but as I passed your door I could not resist +coming in. I thought I would like to tell you what I intended to do, and +to give you my reasons for doing it."</p> + +<p>"There was no need to do that," said Musk, with an upward movement of +the lips, hardly to be called a smile; for once also his great head +moved slowly from side to side.</p> + +<p>"And now I shall be going on," announced Sir Wilton, who did not like +this look, and was now less inclined to suffer disrespect.</p> + +<p>"Hold on a bit, Sir Wilton. I'm glued tight to this here chair by my old +enemy; that seem to get worse and worse, and I'm jealous I shall soon +set foot to the ground for the last time. That take me ten minutes to +mount upstairs to bed. I haven't been further'n this here lawn these +twelve months. So I can't come and see you, Sir Wilton; and I should +like another word or two now we're on the subject. You see, he was here +a good bit when the boy was bad, and even I don't feel all I did about +him, though forgive him I never shall on earth. At the same time I'd +like to see him have his church. That'd want consecrating again, sir, I +suppose?"</p> + +<p>"I suppose it would."</p> + +<p>"Would the bishop do it, think you?"</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_346" id="Page_346">[Pg 346]</a></span>"Like a shot," said Sir Wilton, a touch of pique in his tone. "I had +some correspondence with him years ago about this matter, and I was +surprised at the view the bishop took. He will come, if he is alive."</p> + +<p>Jasper had taken his eyes from Sir Wilton's face at last; they were +resting on the level sunlit land beyond the river. "That'll be a great +day for Long Stow," he murmured almost to himself; and suddenly his lips +came tight together at the corners.</p> + +<p>"It should be a very interesting ceremony," said Sir Wilton, foreseeing +his part in it. He had forgiven his enemy, the scandalous clergyman who +had lived down a scandal and a tragedy; it was Sir Wilton who had helped +him to live them down. Not at first; then he had been adamant; but his +justice in the beginning was only equalled by his generosity in the end, +when the man had proved his manhood, and the sinner had atoned for his +sin, so far as atonement was possible in this world. That poor +pertinacious devil had been five years running up the walls. Sir Wilton +Gleed had thrown his money and his influence into the scale, and +finished the whole thing in less than five months. They were saying all +this at the opening ceremony; everybody was there. His magnanimity was +being talked of in the same breath with the parson's pluck. The bishop +was his guest.</p> + +<p>"A very interesting ceremony," repeated Sir Wilton. "We could have it at +Christmas, if not before."</p> + +<p>"That won't see me," said Jasper Musk. "I couldn't get, even if I wanted +to. But sciatica that<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_347" id="Page_347">[Pg 347]</a></span> don't kill, and I hope to live to see the day." +And again the corners of his mouth were much compressed.</p> + +<p>"Yet you think you can never forgive him?"</p> + +<p>Sir Wilton felt that he could not be the bearer of too much good-will, +now that he was about it; but Musk turned his eyes full upon him, and +there was a queer hard light in them.</p> + +<p>"I don't think," said he. "I know."</p> + +<p>And so it fell out that in an hour of unusual depression, and of natural +hesitation which was yet not natural in Robert Carlton, he looked up +suddenly and once more saw his enemy in the sanctuary which would soon +be his very own leafy sanctuary no longer. Carlton had come there to +meditate and to pray, but not to work. That sort of work was not for him +any more. Others must take it up; the time was ripe; only the beginning +was hard. And here was Sir Wilton Gleed advancing towards him.</p> + +<p>And Sir Wilton was holding out his hand.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_348" id="Page_348">[Pg 348]</a></span></p> + +<h2 class="newchapter"><a name="CHAPTER_XXIX" id="CHAPTER_XXIX"></a>XXIX<br /> +<span class="smalltext">A HAVEN OF HEARTS</span></h2> + + +<p>Slower to decide than most young persons of her independent character, +Gwynneth was one of those who are none the less capable of decisive +conduct in a definite emergency. She behaved with spirit in the +predicament in which her weakness and her strength had combined to place +her. She had jilted Sidney; outsiders might not know it; but she had +treated him in a way which he and his were never likely to forgive. +After that, and that alone, his home could not have been her home any +more; but Gwynneth had other and even stronger reasons for determining +to leave Long Stow; and there were none why she should not. She had her +money. She was of age. She would be a good riddance now. It was her +first thought in the garden. The thought hardened to resolve while +Sidney, full of bitterness and champagne, was still galling his hired +horse back to Cambridge. Gwynneth also was gone within the week.</p> + +<p>It was a chance acquaintance to whom the girl had written in her need. +She had met in Leipzig a strangely interesting woman: commanding, +mysterious, self-contained. This lady, a Mrs. Molyneux by name, had +taken notice of Gwynneth, and, at the close of their short acquaintance, +had given her a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_349" id="Page_349">[Pg 349]</a></span> card inscribed in pencil with the name of St. Hilda's +Hospital, Campden Hill.</p> + +<p>"You have never heard of it," Mrs. Molyneux had said with a smile; "but +I shall be very glad if you will come and see me and my hospital some +day when you are in town."</p> + +<p>Gwynneth had felt honoured, she could scarcely have said why, for she +knew no more of this lady than she had seen for herself, which was +really very little. But there is a kind of distinction which appeals to +the instinct rather than to the conscious perceptions, and Gwynneth had +felt both awed and flattered by an invitation which was obviously +sincere. She had said that she should love to see the hospital—and had +never been near it yet.</p> + +<p>"I don't know whether you have ever thought of being a nurse," Mrs. +Molyneux had added with Gwynneth's hand in hers; "but if you ever +should—or if ever you want to do something, and don't know what else to +do—I wish you would write to me, and let me be your friend."</p> + +<p>The second invitation had been given with a wonderfully understanding +look—a look which seemed to sift the secrets of Gwynneth's heart—a +look she would not have cared to meet during the late season. She had +promised again, however, very gratefully indeed; and it was her second +promise that Gwynneth eventually kept.</p> + +<p>"I had such a strong feeling about you," Mrs. Molyneux wrote by return. +"I knew that I should hear from you sooner or later . . . I like your +frankness in saying that it is no fine impulse, or love<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_350" id="Page_350">[Pg 350]</a></span> of nursing for +its own sake, that makes you wish to come. I do not seek to know what it +is. Even if you are no nurse you can play the organ in our little chapel +as it has not been played yet; and that would be very much to me. So +come any day and make your home with us at least for a time." The writer +contrived to refer to herself as "Reverend Mother," in emphatic +capitals, and her letter was signed "Constance Molyneux, Mother in God."</p> + +<p>It happened that Gwynneth had spoken of Mrs. Molyneux to her aunt, who +knew a good name when she heard it, and had often asked Gwynneth if she +was not going to pay that call on Campden Hill; thus her recklessness in +casting herself among strangers was more apparent than real, and little +likely to aggravate her prime offence against kith and kin. Nor did it; +nevertheless it was a plunge into all but unknown waters. The hospital +was a private one, and Mrs. Molyneux both spoke and wrote of it as her +own. It was a cancer hospital for women, evidently run upon religious +lines, and those not easy to define, since Gwynneth happened to know +that the Reverend Mother was not a Roman Catholic. And these things were +all she did know when her hansom drew up before a red-brick building +with ecclesiastical windows, and a cross over the door, in a leafy road +not five minutes' climb from Kensington High Street.</p> + +<p>Gwynneth pulled the wrought-iron bell-handle, and next moment caught her +breath. The door had been opened by a portress in austere but becoming +garb, a young girl like herself, and the pretty face<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_351" id="Page_351">[Pg 351]</a></span> between the quaint +cap and collar was smiling a sweet greeting to the newcomer. A few worn +steps of snowy stone, and a Gothic doorway, with the oak door standing +open, showed more girls within against the wainscot; all were pretty; +and all wore blue serge, with white aprons and long cambric cuffs, +square bib-collars trimmed with lace, and Normandy caps with streamers +of fine lawn. Gwynneth blushed for her own conventional attire, as she +was ushered through this hall, past a dispensary where another of the +uniformed girls was busy among the bottles, and so into the presence of +the Reverend Mother.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Molyneux, the well-dressed woman of the world whom Gwynneth had +known in Leipzig, was a lost identity in a habit which marked her sway +only by its supreme severity; an order of St. John of Jerusalem hung +upon her bosom, and a crucifix dangled at her side. Her hands were +hidden beneath some short and shapeless garment reaching to the waist, +but one emerged for a moment to greet Gwynneth warmly. "Do you feel as +if you had come into a convent?" the Reverend Mother asked, a gentle +humour in her lowered voice. It was exactly what Gwynneth did feel, and +the sensation was by no means displeasing to her. The Mother herself +then showed Gwynneth over the establishment, which was indeed a singular +amalgam of the hospital and the nunnery. The dining-room was termed the +"refectory"; a cross hung over every bed in the wards upstairs, and in +the nurses' cubicles below the wards. Cap and apron, bib-collar and +cuffs, were laid out on Gwynneth's bed, and these she found her<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_352" id="Page_352">[Pg 352]</a></span>self +expected to don then and there. The Mother returned when she was ready, +and showed her the chapel last of all. It was a tiny chapel, but as +beautiful as antique carving, rich embroidery, much stained glass, and +hanging lights could make it. In her innocence Gwynneth wondered why +these lights were burning while the summer sun, shining through the +stained glass, filled the chapel with vivid beams of purple and red. She +was even puzzled by the unmistakable odour of recent incense; but she +said, with truth, that the chapel delighted her.</p> + +<p>"I knew it would," the Mother whispered with her penetrating smile.</p> + +<p>"How could you know?" Gwynneth asked, smiling also, because she had +never touched on religion with Mrs. Molyneux.</p> + +<p>"I saw you once in the English church," the Mother said. "It was before +I knew you; and yet, you see, I did know you, even then!"</p> + +<p>In this chapel there were daily matins, vespers, nones; and at each of +the three services attendance was compulsory on the part of all nurses +not required at an actual deathbed, and of all patients who were still +up and about. French-capped, pink-frocked maid-servants and ward-maids +filled the front rows of chairs; the patients sat behind; and on either +hand, in the carved oak stalls, were the pretty nurses, the Reverend +Mother near the entrance in their midst. The services, conducted by an +attendant Anglican of small account, were punctuated by genuflexions and +the sacred sign; and it was impossible to follow them in the Book of +Common Prayer.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_353" id="Page_353">[Pg 353]</a></span>Gwynneth tried hard to lift up her heart in this strange sanctuary. She +longed for real religion as she had longed for little in her life +before. At the first blush, it seemed as though Providence alone could +have led her into so unique a haven of equal sanctity and usefulness; +and yet, also from the first, the girl was repelled a little if +attracted more. She liked her work; she was a natural nurse, and soon +grew used, but never hardened, to hopeless suffering and slow death. +There were patients who loved Gwynneth, and not a nurse who was not fond +of her, before she had been at St. Hilda's a month. Already she was +playing the organ at all three services, and her own music, and the +voices floating up to her, at these set times, filled her heart with +peace; but she wondered if it was the right kind of peace; she wondered +whether this was religion at all. Sometimes the sweet little chapel—for +it was all that to Gwynneth's mind—struck her also as a stage of +studied effects. The nurses were so pretty, their garb so becoming, and +the blue of it had such a perfect foil in the maid-servants' pink. But +then the Reverend Mother, in her sombre supremacy, gradually revealed +herself as the superb mistress of deliberate effect; and a strange study +Gwynneth found her; of foibles and fascination all compact; at once +subtle, simple, vain, and noble. It appeared that Mrs. Molyneux was an +extremely wealthy widow, whose one consoling hobby was this anomalous +retreat upon Campden Hill.</p> + +<p>The patients paid nothing; the nurses received nothing; it was a retreat +for both, and Gwynneth<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_354" id="Page_354">[Pg 354]</a></span> was not the only one who had sought it +primarily, and frankly, for peace of mind and salvation from self. Her +hands at least were not the less tender and untiring on that account. +Some of her capped and cuffed comrades were no older than herself; many +were refreshingly frivolous, and properly free from care. Gwynneth's +chief crony was Nurse Ella, a bright young widow, who wore spectacles, +and declared herself unable to understand what the Reverend Mother had +ever seen in her, as she was neither pretty nor religious, nor as young +as the rest.</p> + +<p>Nurse Ella had, however, a shrewd wit and a sharp tongue; made wicked +fun of the Mother's sacerdotal pretensions when alone with Gwynneth; and +thus stimulated the latter to think for herself, if only to refute her +friend's arguments. Nurse Ella was above all things an extraordinarily +decided character, aggressively so in immaterial issues, but good for +Gwynneth by that very fact.</p> + +<p>These opposites became fast friends. Often they would talk over the +refectory fire—a wood fire in an ancient grate, which cast the right +mediæval glow over the polished floor and the dark wainscotting—long +after the others were in their cubicles. Nurse Ella had the greatest +scorn for the conventual side of St. Hilda's, which Gwynneth would +defend warmly, while her heart admitted more than her lips; the +discussion would ramify, and become animated on both sides; then all at +once Nurse Ella would look at her watch, and no persuasion would induce +her to stay another minute. Gwynneth could have sat up half<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_355" id="Page_355">[Pg 355]</a></span> the night, +and would plead in vain for ten minutes more; it seldom took Nurse Ella +as many seconds to suit her action to her word. She said she would do a +thing, and did it; that was Nurse Ella's principle in life.</p> + +<p>So there was no exchange of confidences between these two, both reticent +natures, and neither unduly inquisitive about the other's affairs. +Gwynneth only knew that her friend's married life had been a very short +one; for her own part, she had said nothing to let Nurse Ella suppose +that she had herself been even asked in marriage. But one night they +were speaking of another nurse, who had left St. Hilda's that day, in +floods of tears, to be married the following week.</p> + +<p>"If I felt like that," Gwynneth had declared, "I wouldn't be married at +all."</p> + +<p>Nurse Ella looked up quickly, her glasses flaming in the firelight. +"What, not after you had given your word?" said she.</p> + +<p>"Certainly not, if I felt I had made a mistake." Gwynneth was staring +into the fire.</p> + +<p>"You would break your solemn promise in a thing like that?" the other +persisted.</p> + +<p>"Better one promise than two lives," replied Gwynneth, with oracular +brevity. Nurse Ella watched her in sidelong astonishment.</p> + +<p>"It's easy to talk, my dear! I believe you are the last person who would +do anything so dishonourable."</p> + +<p>"I don't call it dishonourable."</p> + +<p>"But it is, to break your word."</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_356" id="Page_356">[Pg 356]</a></span>"Suppose you have changed?"</p> + +<p>"You have no business to change. Say you'll do a thing, and do it."</p> + +<p>The spectacled face had assumed a rigid cast which Gwynneth knew well, +and for which Nurse Ella had just the chin.</p> + +<p>"But supposing you never really loved——"</p> + +<p>"Love is an inexact term; it's not always easy to tell when it applies +to your feelings, and when it does not. But when you say you'll marry +anybody, that's a definite promise, and nothing in the world should make +you break it, unless it's been extracted under false pretences. We are +both very positive, aren't we?" and Nurse Ella smiled. "I wonder why you +are, Gwynneth?"</p> + +<p>"Because," said the girl, impelled to frankness, yet hanging her head, +"as a matter of fact, I've been more or less engaged myself."</p> + +<p>"And you got out of it?"</p> + +<p>"I broke it off."</p> + +<p>"Simply because you had changed?"</p> + +<p>"No—it was a mistake from the beginning. I had never really cared. That +was my shame."</p> + +<p>"And you broke your word—you had the courage!"</p> + +<p>The tone was a low one of mere surprise. There was more in the look +which accompanied the tone. But Gwynneth had her eyes turned inward, and +her wonder was not yet.</p> + +<p>"It had to be done," she said simply. "It was humiliating enough, but it +was not so bad as going on . . . Can anything be so bad as marrying a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_357" id="Page_357">[Pg 357]</a></span> +man you do not love, just because you have made a mistake, and are too +proud to admit it?"</p> + +<p>"No . . . you are right . . . that is the worst of all."</p> + +<p>It might have been a studied picture that the two young women made, in +the old oak room, with the firelight falling on their quaint sweet garb, +and reddening their pensive faces, only conscious of the inner self. +Nurse Ella was standing up, gazing down into the fire, her back turned +to Gwynneth; but now her tone was enough. It was neither wistful nor +bitter, but only heavy with conviction; and in another moment Nurse Ella +was gone, not more abruptly than usual, but without letting Gwynneth see +her face again. Then Gwynneth recalled the look with which the other had +exclaimed upon her courage, and either she flattered herself, or that +look had been one of envy pure and simple. Could it be that her friend's +decided character was all self-conscious and acquired? Was her +intolerance of the slightest hesitation, in matters of no account, a +life's reaction from a fatal irresolution in some crisis of her own +career?</p> + +<p>Gwynneth never knew; for a fine mutual reserve distinguished the +intimacy of this pair, and even drew them together, opposite as they +were in so many other respects, more than impulsive confidences on +either side. One had suffered; the other was suffering now; each was a +little mystery to her friend. And there was one more reason for this: +neither was sure of the other's sympathy: at every point of contact they +diverged.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_358" id="Page_358">[Pg 358]</a></span>So Gwynneth used to wonder whether Nurse Ella was in reality a widow at +all, and Nurse Ella was quite sure that Gwynneth was still in love, +probably with the man she had jilted, according to the wise way of +women; she was so ready to speak of love in the abstract; and once she +spoke so passionately. This was in Kensington Gardens, one foggy Sunday, +when the two nurses were on their way to church; for they were allowed +to worship where they listed after matins at St. Hilda's. Nurse Ella +rented a sitting under a fashionable preacher who discoursed with much +wisdom and some acidity on topics of the hour; but Gwynneth was still +seeking her spiritual ideal. They would walk together as far as the +Bayswater Road, where their ways diverged, unless Nurse Ella could +induce Gwynneth to go with her; on this particular morning they were +arguing about a novel when the houses loomed upon them through the bare +trees and the fog.</p> + +<p>"She never would have forgiven him," Nurse Ella had declared, in crisp +settlement of the point at issue. "No young wife would forgive a young +husband who behaved like that. So it may be the cleverest novel in the +language, but it isn't true to life." Whereupon Gwynneth, who had been +defending a masterpiece with laudable spirit, walked some yards in +silence. "Are you sure that it matters how people behave," she then +inquired, "if you really love them?"</p> + +<p>"How they behave?" echoed her friend. "Why, Gwynneth, of course! Nothing +does matter except behaviour."</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_359" id="Page_359">[Pg 359]</a></span>"It wouldn't to me," Gwynneth exclaimed, almost through her teeth.</p> + +<p>"But surely what one does is everything!"</p> + +<p>"Not in love," averred Gwynneth, whose convictions were few but firm; +"and those two are more in love than any other couple I know in fiction +or real life. No; you love people for what they are, not for what they +do."</p> + +<p>Nurse Ella laughed outright.</p> + +<p>"That may be good metaphysics," said she, "but it's shocking +common-sense! Our actions are the only possible test of our character, +as its fruit is the only test of a tree."</p> + +<p>In Gwynneth's eyes burnt wondrous fires, and on her cheeks; and her +breath was coming very quickly. But most persons look straight ahead as +they walk and talk, and between these two fell the kindly fog besides.</p> + +<p>"Suppose you loved somebody," the young girl cried at last; "and +suppose you suddenly discovered he had once done something +dreadful—unspeakable. Would that alter your feeling towards him?"</p> + +<p>"It could never fail to do so, Gwynneth."</p> + +<p>"It would not alter mine!"</p> + +<p>Nurse Ella turned her head. But in the road the fog seemed thicker than +in the gardens. And, apart from its vigour, Gwynneth's tone had sounded +impersonal enough.</p> + +<p>"I believe it would," her friend persisted, "when the time came."</p> + +<p>"And I know that it would not," said Gwynneth, half under her breath and +half through her teeth.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_360" id="Page_360">[Pg 360]</a></span>"Well, Gwynneth," said Nurse Ella, with a laugh, "we were evidently born +to differ. In my view that would be the one sort of excuse for changing +one's mind about a man—whereas you see others!"</p> + +<p>"But I am not talking about one's mind," cried Gwynneth; "the feeling I +mean, the feeling those two have in the book, lies infinitely deeper +than the mind."</p> + +<p>"And no crime could alter it?"</p> + +<p>"Not if he atoned—not if the rest of his life were one long atonement."</p> + +<p>"But, Gwynneth, that would make all the difference."</p> + +<p>Gwynneth walked on in silence. She was reconsidering her own last words.</p> + +<p>"Atonement or no atonement," she exclaimed at length, "it would make no +difference—if I loved the man. Atonement or no atonement!" repeated +Gwynneth defiantly.</p> + +<p>Nurse Ella had a passion for the last word, but they were come to her +corner, and there was Gwynneth glowing through the fog, her eyes alight, +her cheeks flaming, a new being in the puzzled eyes of her friend.</p> + +<p>"Come with me, Gwynneth," begged Nurse Ella, at length; "don't go off by +yourself. Come, dear, and hear a shrewd, hard-headed sermon, without +sentiment or superstition!"</p> + +<p>Gwynneth smiled. That was the last thing to meet her mood.</p> + +<p>"Then where shall you go?"</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_361" id="Page_361">[Pg 361]</a></span>"Either St. Simeon's or All Souls'," said Gwynneth. "I haven't made up +my mind."</p> + +<p>Nurse Ella shook her head over an admission as characteristic as her +disapproval. This was the Gwynneth that she knew.</p> + +<p>"When do you make it up!" exclaimed Nurse Ella without inquiry.</p> + +<p>"When it's a matter of the least importance," said Gwynneth, choosing to +reply. "What can it signify which church I go to, what difference can it +possibly make? As a matter of fact I rather think of going to All +Souls'."</p> + +<p>"I thought you didn't care about music and nothing else?"</p> + +<p>"I don't know that there is nothing else. I think of going to see. I +have often thought of it before, but St. Simeon's is rather nearer, and +I generally end by going there. I shall decide on the way."</p> + +<p>"What a girl you are, Gwynneth!" exclaimed Nurse Ella, with frank +impatience. "You never seem to know your own mind—never!"</p> + +<p>Gwynneth made no reply; but she kindled afresh, and this time very +tenderly, as she went her own way through the fog.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_362" id="Page_362">[Pg 362]</a></span></p> + +<h2 class="newchapter"><a name="CHAPTER_XXX" id="CHAPTER_XXX"></a>XXX<br /> +<span class="smalltext">THE WOMAN'S HOUR</span></h2> + + +<p>All Souls' was dark and hazy with its share of the ubiquitous fog, here +a little aggravated by the subtle fumes of incense newly burnt. In the +haze hung quivering constellations of sallow gaslight, and through it +gleamed an embroidered frontal, and the silken backs of praying priests, +lit by candles four. Delicate strains came from an invisible organ; a +light patter and a rich rustling from the feet and garments of some +departing after matins, some taking their places for choral eucharist, +women to the left, men to the right. Men and women, goers and comers +alike, with few exceptions, bowed the knee with Romish humility at the +first or the last glimpse of that shimmering frontal with the four +candles above and the motionless vestments below.</p> + +<p>The congregation was one of well-dressed women and well-to-do men; their +quiet devotion was not the less noteworthy on that account. A fine +reverence animated every face: the stray observer would have missed the +passive countenance of the merely pious, as Gwynneth did, and discovered +in its stead the happy ardour of those whose religion was a delight +rather than a duty. Yet the congregation took scarcely any part in the +actual service. Few<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_363" id="Page_363">[Pg 363]</a></span> untrained voices joined in the exquisite singing; +few, in the body of the church, left their places to take part in the +sacred climax. The congregation might have been only an audience; yet +somehow it was not. Somehow also there was nothing spectacular in an +office of equal dignity, distinction, and fervour.</p> + +<p>Yet the yellow lights in a yellow fog, the perfect organ, trained +voices, rich embroideries, incense, genuflexions, all these seemed at +one religious pole; and Long Stow church on a summer's day, with the sky +above and the birds singing, and Mr. Carlton in his surplice in the sun, +surely that was at the other! It was Gwynneth's fate, at all events, to +carry that single service in her heart and mind for ever, and to put +every other one against it. She did so now, involuntarily at first, and +then unwillingly, as she knelt or stood at the end of her row—her +cambric cuffs and fine lawn streamers in high relief against the rich +furs and the sombre feathers of those about her.</p> + +<p>On the other side of the nave, far back and close to the wall, a +grizzled gentleman stood and knelt by turns, in much obscurity; and his +attention never flagged. No detail of the elaborate ritual appeared +unfamiliar to this worshipper, and yet for a time his expression was +rather that of the alien critic. Gradually, however, the lines +disappeared from his forehead, his eyes opened wider, and brightened +with the peaceful ardour which he himself had already remarked in the +eyes of others. He was a tall thin man, very weather-beaten and rather +bent, wearing<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_364" id="Page_364">[Pg 364]</a></span> a new overcoat and a soft muffler; there was nothing in +his appearance to declare him of the cloth himself. His grey beard was +close trimmed. He wore gloves and carried a tall hat shoulder high in +the press going out. He was no more readily recognisable as the lonely +builder of Long Stow church, than Gwynneth in her nurse's garb as the +niece of Sir Wilton Gleed. But their separate fates brought them face to +face in the porch, and recognition was immediate on both sides.</p> + +<p>"Miss Gleed?" said Robert Carlton, raising his hat before it covered his +grey hairs.</p> + +<p>"Mr. Carlton!" she exclaimed in turn. There had been no time to think, +and her voice told only of her surprise; her own ear noticed it, and she +had time to marvel at herself.</p> + +<p>"I thought I could not be mistaken," Carlton was saying. And they were +shaking hands.</p> + +<p>"I never expected to see you here," said Gwynneth, with a strange +emphasis, as though the declaration were due to herself.</p> + +<p>"I never thought of coming until an hour or two ago."</p> + +<p>No more had Gwynneth: then the miracle was twofold. Her heart gave +thanks. It was not afraid.</p> + +<p>Meanwhile the crowd was carrying them gently, insensibly, but side by +side, across the flagged yard to the gate.</p> + +<p>"It's the first Sunday I've spent in town for years," observed Carlton; +"you are here altogether, I believe?"</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_365" id="Page_365">[Pg 365]</a></span>"Well, for some years, at least. I am learning to be a nurse."</p> + +<p>And Gwynneth blushed for her conspicuous attire, just as Carlton gave a +downward glance at the quaint cap on a level with his shoulder.</p> + +<p>"So I heard," he said. "May I ask which hospital you are at?" He could +recall none where the uniform was so picturesque.</p> + +<p>"You would not know it, Mr. Carlton; it is a private hospital on Campden +Hill."</p> + +<p>They had passed through the gate, and they paused with one consent.</p> + +<p>"Are you returning there now, Miss Gleed?"</p> + +<p>"Yes—through the gardens."</p> + +<p>"Then so far our way is the same." He did not ask whether he might +accompany her, but took the outer edge of the pavement as a matter of +course. "I am staying at Charing Cross," he explained as they walked; +"early this morning I went to the abbey. I did mean to go back there; +then I suddenly thought I should like to come here instead. I was once +one of the assistant clergy at this church."</p> + +<p>"I know," said Gwynneth. She would not deny it. That was why she had so +often thought of coming to All Souls'—only to resist the temptation +time and time again. Why, to-day of all days, had she been unable to +resist? Why had she thought of him this morning, and why had the thought +been so strong? These were questions for a lifetime's consideration. Now +she was walking at his side.</p> + +<p>"It was strange to go back there after so many<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_366" id="Page_366">[Pg 366]</a></span> years," pursued Carlton, +with the fine unguarded candour which he had brought back with him into +the world; "that service, in particular, was very strange to me. I did +not care for it at first. It seemed so artificial after our simple +service in the country. Then I looked at the faces of the men near me, +and I saw how narrow one can get. It was not artificial to them; it was +only beautiful; and there lies the root of the whole matter. Simple +services for simple folk—that is my watchword now—but beauty, +brightness, elaboration by all means for those who need it and can +appreciate it. It is the right thing for these rich congregations of +hard-worked professional men and busy society women; the trappings of +their religious life must not compare meanly with those of their daily +lives; let us order God's house as we would our own. But the opposite is +the case—though the principle is the same—with a primitive country +parish like ours at Long Stow . . . And yet I had not the wit to see +that when I went there first."</p> + +<p>He was musing aloud as men seldom do unless very sure of their audience. +How came he to be so sure of Gwynneth? They had seen nothing of each +other; this was the first time they had been alone together long enough +to exchange ideas; yet in a moment he was revealing his as few men do to +more than one woman in the world. And the one woman's heart was singing +at his side.</p> + +<p>She was with him; that was enough. Already it was the sweetest hour of +all her life; for the thought of him had haunted her for months, and was +full of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_367" id="Page_367">[Pg 367]</a></span> pain; but in his presence all pain passed away. That was so +wonderful to Gwynneth! So wonderful was it that she herself was aware of +it at the time; it was her one great discovery and surprise. To be with +him was to forget all that he had ever done, all that she had never +before forgotten—the good with the evil. It was to sweep aside the +earthly and the palpable, to feel the divine domination of spirit over +spirit, and the peace which comes with even the secret surrender of soul +to soul. Hers was a conscious surrender, and Gwynneth made it without +shame. Since it was her secret, why should she be ashamed? She was +exalted, exultant, and yet serene. She might carry her secret to the +grave; her life would be the richer for it, for these few minutes, for +every word he spoke. So she caught each one as it fell, and laid the +treasure in her heart, even while she listened for the next.</p> + +<p>But in a minute they were come as far as he intended to escort her; +there were the palings and the stark trees close upon them in the fog; +and an omnibus passing, huge as a house. Gwynneth had been treading thin +air; now she was back in the sticky streets, inhaling the raw mist, to +exhale it in clouds under a microscopic magenta sun. They had stopped at +the corner; he was hesitating: her breath disappeared.</p> + +<p>"I have to get over to that side sooner or later," he said. "I may just +as well walk across with you, if you don't mind."</p> + +<p>"I shall be delighted," said Gwynneth, frankly, brightly; but her breath +came like a puff of smoke,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_368" id="Page_368">[Pg 368]</a></span> and she felt her colour come with it as they +crossed the road.</p> + +<p>"I want to tell you about the church," he said, as they entered upon the +broad walk. "This is the first Sunday that I haven't taken service there +since the beginning of August."</p> + +<p>"The first!" exclaimed Gwynneth. "Have you actually gone on up to now +without a roof?"</p> + +<p>Carlton turned in his stride.</p> + +<p>"But we have a roof, Miss Gleed!"</p> + +<p>"You have one?"</p> + +<p>"It has been on some weeks."</p> + +<p>Gwynneth was standing quite still. "Do you mean to say that the church +is finished?" she cried, incredulous.</p> + +<p>"Yes," said Carlton; "thank God, I can say that at last."</p> + +<p>"But it seems such a short time! I don't understand. It seemed +impossible to me—by yourself?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, but I have not been by myself. I have had help."</p> + +<p>"At last!"</p> + +<p>"I wonder you have not heard. Everybody has helped me—everybody!"</p> + +<p>"Do you mean—my people—among others?"</p> + +<p>And Gwynneth preferred walking on to facing him here.</p> + +<p>"Is it possible you haven't heard?" exclaimed Carlton, incredulous in +turn.</p> + +<p>"Not a word," replied Gwynneth, bitterly. "They never write."</p> + +<p>But her bitterness was new-born of her indigna<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_369" id="Page_369">[Pg 369]</a></span>tion, not that they never +wrote, but that they had not written to tell her this. He told her +himself with much feeling and more embarrassment.</p> + +<p>"Why, Miss Gleed, I owe everything to Sir Wilton! It is the last thing I +ever—I can hardly realise it yet—or trust myself to speak of it to +you. My heart is so full! But it is Sir Wilton who has finished the +church; he came to me, and he took it over. He called for tenders; he +poured in workmen; the place has been like a hive. So the roof was on in +a month; and we never missed a Sunday, we had one service all the time; +but now we have three and four—thanks entirely to Sir Wilton Gleed!"</p> + +<p>He paused. But Gwynneth had nothing to say, and his embarrassment +increased. It was so hard to speak of Sir Wilton's magnanimity without +alluding to his previous attitude, and thus indirectly to its notorious +cause; and Carlton could not see that his companion was entirely taken +up with his news, could not realise the surprise it was to her, or +apprehend for a moment what impression it had made. He might, however, +have had some inkling of her view from the manner in which Gwynneth +eventually said that she was glad to hear her uncle had done something.</p> + +<p>"Something?" echoed Carlton. "He has done everything, and it is like his +generosity that you should hear it first from me!"</p> + +<p>Gwynneth shook her head unseen, though now he was looking at her, his +eyebrows raised; but she seemed intent upon picking her steps through +the thin mud of the broad walk.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_370" id="Page_370">[Pg 370]</a></span>"And what that is like," continued Carlton, "from my point of view, you +will see when I tell you why I am in town to-day. It is the first Sunday +I have missed; but Mr. Preston of Linkworth and other friends are kindly +dividing my duty between them. Sir Wilton has arranged that, by the way. +He telegraphed yesterday to save me the journey; for I was going down +for the day, and returning to-morrow. Yet I came up last Monday, and am +still hard at work—buying for the new church."</p> + +<p>Gwynneth asked what it was that he had to buy; but her tone was so +mechanical that Robert Carlton did not at once reply. He was beginning +to feel strangely disappointed, to wish that he had gone his own gait to +Charing Cross, or at least held his peace about the church. But there +was one point upon which he felt constrained to convince his companion +before they parted; he might do more than justice to an absent man; but +she should not do less. And the spire of St. Mary Abbot's was already +dimly discernible through the yellow haze.</p> + +<p>"There is nothing we have not to buy, for the interior," he said at +length. "The lectern is the one exception, and I have had it +straightened and lacquered into a new thing. Sir Wilton wanted me to +keep it as it was; but that would never have done. However, he would +have an inscription to the effect that it is the same lectern which was +in the fire, which is quite a sufficient advertisement of the fact. I +was in favour of restoring the communion plate also, but Sir Wilton +insisted on presenting us with a new set, which I have been choosing +among other things this<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_371" id="Page_371">[Pg 371]</a></span> week. The other things are too numerous to +mention—carpets, curtains, collecting-boxes, alms-bags, a Litany desk, +and the hundred and one things you take for granted as part of the +church itself. But each has to be chosen and bought, and I only wish +that I had had your help. I have found the best things most difficult to +choose—the plate and a very handsome cross and candlesticks of polished +brass—all of which are my choice, but Sir Wilton's gift. So is the +organ which is being built for us. Can you wonder, then, that his +generosity has moved me more than I can possibly tell you?"</p> + +<p>"Indeed, no!" cried Gwynneth, in her own kind voice; but her honour was +all for the man who claimed it for another; and, until she opened them +now, her lips had been pursed in mute rebellion. She could fancy so much +that the true generosity would never even see! Gwynneth had not that +sort herself; she did not profess to have it. On the other hand, she was +anxious to be fair, even in her own mind; so she asked a question or two +concerning the hired and skilled labour which had been thrown into the +scale with such effect; and, after all, it appeared that Sir Wilton +Gleed had not paid for this.</p> + +<p>"But he wanted to," said Carlton, quickly. "It was not his fault that I +would not hear of his doing so; it was my obstinacy, because I had set +my heart on rebuilding the church myself, in one sense or the other."</p> + +<p>"Yet you said he took it over from you!"</p> + +<p>"So he did, Miss Gleed. He lent me his influ<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_372" id="Page_372">[Pg 372]</a></span>ence and support; that was +much more to me than the money, which I had and didn't want. Besides, he +is a business man, which I am not, and he did take the whole business +off my hands. That is what I meant."</p> + +<p>Gwynneth wondered whether it was what the countryside understood; but +said no more about the matter. She had other things to think of during +their last moments together; for she had stopped at the corner near the +palace; nor did she mean to let him accompany her any further. She was +still so decided and serene. She was still exalted and strengthened out +of all self-knowledge in the quiet presence of the man she loved, and +must love for ever, even though her love were to remain her heart's +prisoner for this life. This life was not all.</p> + +<p>So it was that she could look her last upon him, perhaps for ever, with +her own face transfigured and beautified by a joy not of earth alone: so +it was that she could speak to him, and hear him speak, without a tremor +to the end.</p> + +<p>His church was to be consecrated that day week—Advent Sunday. The +bishop was coming to perform the ceremony; his voice softened as he +spoke of the bishop, who was to be his own guest at the rectory. His +face shone as he added that. It was going to be a very simple ceremony. +And here something set him twisting at one of his gloves; then suddenly +he looked Gwynneth in the eyes.</p> + +<p>"You don't happen to be coming down, Miss Gleed?"</p> + +<p>"I don't think it very likely."</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_373" id="Page_373">[Pg 373]</a></span>"It—it wouldn't of course be worth your while——"</p> + +<p>"It would! It would! It would be more than worth it; but, to be quite +frank, I don't know that I shall ever come down again, Mr. Carlton."</p> + +<p>Was he sorry? He did not even show surprise; and not a word more: for he +had heard stray words in Long Stow concerning Gwynneth's departure and +its reason as alleged. "I should have liked you to see the church," was +all he said.</p> + +<p>"And do you know," rejoined Gwynneth, speaking out her mind at last, +"that I am in no great hurry to see it? I know it is foolish of me—for +no one man could have finished such a work—no other man living would +have got as far as you did without a soul to help you! Yet somehow I +don't so much want to see the church that they came in and finished; it +would spoil the picture that I can see so plainly now, and always +shall—of the stones you cut and the walls you built with your own two +hands—and every other hand against you!"</p> + +<p>She was holding out her own. Carlton looked from it to her face, a +strange surprise in his eyes. He had wriggled out of one of his gloves, +and was twisting it round the iron paling at the corner where they +stood.</p> + +<p>"May I come no further?" he said.</p> + +<p>"No, I could not think of taking you another yard out of your way. And +it is really not so very many yards from where we stand!"</p> + +<p>Gwynneth smiled brightly; but her voice was the very firm one of this +half-hour of her existence.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_374" id="Page_374">[Pg 374]</a></span> And ever afterwards she was to marvel why +neither smile nor words were an effort to her at the time: so his +presence supported her to the end, when the clasp of that indomitable +hand, now bare, and horny even through her glove, left Gwynneth +outwardly unmoved. She returned his pressure with honest warmth; her +smile was kind and bright; then the cold mist fell between them in a +widening yellow gulf, with a diminishing patter of firm footsteps, that +Carlton could hear when the nurse's streamers had quite disappeared in +the fog.</p> + +<p>And he stood where he was to hear the last of her; and still he stood, +wishing he had disregarded tact, and persisted in his escort, whether it +embarrassed her or not, if only to find out where her hospital was. He +felt inclined to call before leaving town; already there was something +that he wished he had said; he kept saying it to himself as he wandered +back through dark gardens and a desert park.</p> + +<p>"So you prefer to think of it before the roof was on, as I managed to +make it by myself! You are the first to say that or to feel it—except +me! And I have put the feeling down; thank God, I have got it under; yet +it is a help to know that one other felt the same. Perhaps it was a +human feeling; but in me at least it was unworthy. God help me! But in +you it is sweet, and to me very wonderful . . . that you should +understand and sympathise . . . a young girl like you!"</p> + +<p>This whole fatality left the man sadly unsettled; tired and yet restless +in body and soul; humbly thankful for a woman's sympathy after so long, +and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_375" id="Page_375">[Pg 375]</a></span> so much, yet the prey of a new depression. A woman's sympathy! Or +was it only a woman's pity? No, she understood; but it mattered little +to Robert Carlton; there could be no second woman in his life. That he +had always felt; but he was not sure that he had ever before defined the +feeling. It was a part of his eternal punishment; but he was quite sure +that he had not previously regarded it in that light.</p> + +<p>A coxcomb Carlton had never been; he had no suspicion of the kind of +impression he had made upon Gwynneth; his sole concern was the +impression which she had made on him. Like the rest of the world, she +was flying to extremes; only in her case, if she especially magnified +the good, it was because she was still ignorant of the original evil. It +could be nothing else; but his feeling about himself was more complex. +He alone knew how much or how little of the highest and the best in him +had redeemed that passion born of passion which had blighted his life. +It was of further significance that for years Carlton had not looked +upon his life as blighted. The blight fell upon the shining vision of +the woman he could have loved. And all had been so sudden that the man +was dazed.</p> + +<p>He could not eat, though he was hungry; nor rest, though tired to the +bone. He would go out again. It was good to be out, even in a London +fog, which was nothing to the fogs he remembered, for there was no +question of groping one's way; one could see it for fifty yards, often +for more. But now there was not even a small magenta sun; it was the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_376" id="Page_376">[Pg 376]</a></span> +middle of the brief December afternoon when Robert Carlton left his +hotel; and near its close before he found himself in Kensington Gardens +once more. He hardly knew what brought him there. It was partly, but not +altogether, a sentimental impulse. Carlton had also some idea of finding +the hospital if he could, some hope of seeing Gwynneth again, if only to +assure himself that his imaginings of the last few hours had made her +other than what she was. And then he could rectify those omissions of +the morning; but neither was this all; a strong inexplicable attraction +drew him straight to the spot where he had stood so long after Gwynneth +was gone.</p> + +<p>And Gwynneth herself was standing there again!</p> + +<p>He was almost upon her before he saw her in the dusk, then those long +lawn streamers leapt like lightning to his eyes; and now he was creeping +backwards across the path. But she had not heard him, or she did not +heed: her back was turned, and bent, for she was leaning over the iron +paling which he had grasped before. And she shook with tears.</p> + +<p>Carlton was shaking, too; passion had taken him by the shoulders, and +was shaking the strength out of his heart. Horror had driven him back, +passion was spurring him on again. If she loved him—if she loved +him—then the hand of God was in all this.</p> + +<p>He was back upon the spot where recognition had come. Oh, yes, it was +she! She had given a little cry; she was stooping lower over the paling; +her voice was unmistakable. Then she rose, half turning, and he saw her +profile plain. She was raising<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_377" id="Page_377">[Pg 377]</a></span> something to her eyes; in another moment +it was at her lips, and she was kissing it, and sobbing over it, +whatever it might be.</p> + +<p>Carlton thought he knew what it was, and conceived a new horror of +himself in his involuntary capacity of spy. Yet instinctively he was +feeling in both overcoat pockets at once; in one there was a single +glove; in the other nothing at all. Cold with shame, but shivering with +excitement, the man stood torn between the newborn desire of his eyes, +and the fixed resolve of his soul. But he could not tear himself from +the spot—nor was it any longer necessary. Gwynneth was gone herself; +gone without seeing him; out of sight this time in an instant. And +Robert Carlton, white, trembling, but himself—the man with a will at +least—was listening a second time to the failing music of her feet, his +own planted firmly on the walk.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_378" id="Page_378">[Pg 378]</a></span></p> + +<h2 class="newchapter"><a name="CHAPTER_XXXI" id="CHAPTER_XXXI"></a>XXXI<br /> +<span class="smalltext">ADVENT EVE</span></h2> + + +<p>The bishop arrived on the Saturday afternoon. He was still the same +little old man, with the side-whiskers and the long mouth, the queer +voice and the ungainly limp; and Robert Carlton found him neither more +nor less cordial than at their last dread interview; but he asked to see +the church before it was too dark.</p> + +<p>All was in readiness at last. But the cocoanut matting in the aisle and +transepts, and the maroon axminster in the chancel, had only been laid +that day. As yet there was no stained glass, and only the east window +and the west were mullioned as of old; but through the latter a wintry +sun poured thick red beams, already too much aslant to touch the floor, +but just falling upon the altar with its glimmering candlesticks, its +rich green cover, its violet frontal, all three gifts from the hall. The +bishop heard this without remark, his mouth a mere seam. But he approved +of the rows of rush-seated chairs in place of pews, and he admired the +simple pulpit of pitch pine. There was a pleasant smell of pitch pine in +the church. All the woodwork was of this wood, including the ceiling and +all panelling; and the pores of the fragrant timber were not stopped up +with varnish. The new red<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_379" id="Page_379">[Pg 379]</a></span> hassocks looked very bright under each chair, +and the new black prayer-books shone like polished jet on the book-rests +behind them. In the south transept, a space was boarded off for the new +organ; and here chaos had still a corner to itself; nor was either the +lighting or the heating apparatus quite complete. Oil-stoves were +already burning, however, at various points, and their odour compared +unfavourably with that of the pitch pine.</p> + +<p>"I do not want you to catch cold to-morrow," said Carlton, as he locked +the door behind them when they left.</p> + +<p>"Tut!" said the bishop, "I am not such an old man that you need coddle +me."</p> + +<p>Nor did he look a day older for all these years, as they went out +together into the raw red sunset. But Robert Carlton seemed almost to +have caught him up: he had come back from London so haggard and +hollow-eyed.</p> + +<p>They talked very little until the evening. Carlton had servants now, +that very widow who had been the first to desert him being head and +chief once more; and she signalised the occasion by serving one of the +soundest meals of her career. But it was in the long low study, now a +study pure and simple, and an infinitely tidier one than aforetime, that +the bishop smoked his after-dinner pipe like any deacon, while Carlton +also tasted his first tobacco for five years and a half. And still they +were strangely silent, until the occurrence of an incident, little in +itself, but great with suggestion.</p> + +<p>There was a tiny patter on the worn carpet, and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_380" id="Page_380">[Pg 380]</a></span> all at once the bishop +beheld a big brown mouse seated upright within a few inches of his +companion's boot. The bishop exclaimed, and the mouse fled with a +scuttle and a squeak.</p> + +<p>"I tamed him," Carlton explained with a slight access of colour. "The +house is overrun with them, but this fellow lets none of the others in +here."</p> + +<p>The bishop was slow to follow up his exclamation. He certainly was a man +of fewer words than formerly.</p> + +<p>"You ought not to have made yourself such an anchorite," he said at +last. "You might have smoked your pipe—you say that's your first—and +written to me sooner!"</p> + +<p>So that still rankled. Carlton was not altogether surprised.</p> + +<p>"My lord," said he, "how could I? You had advised me to live anywhere +else, and yet here I was!"</p> + +<p>"The circumstances justified you, Mr. Carlton. I could not foresee such +circumstances, I assure you. I heard of them, however, at the time."</p> + +<p>Carlton had never written till the five years were nearly up, when it +became a necessary preliminary to the resumption of those offices from +which he had been debarred; but, when he did write, he had done so to +such effect that certain other preliminaries had been foregone.</p> + +<p>"Though you did not write," continued the bishop, "Sir Wilton Gleed did. +We had some correspondence about you, and we disagreed; that is one +reason why I declined his invitation and accepted yours. I<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_381" id="Page_381">[Pg 381]</a></span> would not +mention it, only you are now such excellent friends. And I understand +that he himself makes no secret of his former attitude towards you."</p> + +<p>"On the contrary, he has expressed the most generous regret for the line +he took."</p> + +<p>"He may well regret it," said the bishop.</p> + +<p>But Carlton had accepted his old enemy's aid, and would not hear ill of +him, whatever he might think. "It was natural enough," he murmured.</p> + +<p>"What! To prevent you from making the one reparation in your power? To +have you boycotted right and left? To trump up a criminal charge? To +force you, a clergyman, to remain in your own parish, labouring like a +convict by the year together? To trample the cloth underfoot in the eyes +of all the world?"</p> + +<p>"Oh," groaned Carlton, "it was I who did that! I alone am to blame for +that—I alone!"</p> + +<p>He leant his elbows on the chimney-piece, his face in his hands; for +stand he must if he was only to hear harsh words—that night of all +nights! Carlton was unprepared for such severity at this stage; and +infinitely hurt; for at his worst, when he deserved no sympathy at all, +the bishop had shown much more. But behind his back the blazing eyes +were quenched, and the long mouth relaxed.</p> + +<p>"No, no," a softer voice said; "you have done just the opposite—just +the opposite. You have been hard enough upon yourself; but the world was +harder on you—once."</p> + +<p>There was kindness in the rasping voice, but no enthusiasm. None other +had made so little of the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_382" id="Page_382">[Pg 382]</a></span> mere physical feat of this man; and to him +the tone was unmistakable.</p> + +<p>"I know what you mean," said Carlton, turning round, his own eye alight. +"You think the world is going to the other extreme!"</p> + +<p>"It generally does," replied the bishop. "I do not mean to be unkind."</p> + +<p>"You are not, my lord—unless you think I haven't seen this for myself!"</p> + +<p>The bishop nodded gravely to himself.</p> + +<p>"You would see the danger. I am sure of that. You must want to hear the +last of what you have done; superhuman and heroic in itself—I am the +first to admit it—it is nevertheless the last chapter of a book which +you must want to close once and for all. The last chapter recalls the +first. Close the book; put it behind you; start afresh."</p> + +<p>Robert Carlton stood looking down with a curious smile upon his haggard +face.</p> + +<p>"That is exactly what I am going to do," said he.</p> + +<p>"But the parish must do the same; they must help you. Let them also +think no more of the past, either remote or immediate."</p> + +<p>"They must think of what they will," rejoined Carlton, queerly. "They +cannot help me much longer, nor I them. I am resigning the living, my +lord."</p> + +<p>"Resigning it?" cried the bishop.</p> + +<p>"I intend to do so to-morrow night. It always has been my intention. But +you are the first whom I have told."</p> + +<p>"I'm glad to hear that!" the bishop exclaimed, as<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_383" id="Page_383">[Pg 383]</a></span> he scrambled to his +feet another being. "You have taken my breath away! My dear fellow, let +me dissuade you from any such course."</p> + +<p>Carlton shook his head.</p> + +<p>"My work here is done."</p> + +<p>"It is just beginning!"</p> + +<p>"No, it is done. I have given my parishioners the church I owed them, +since they lost their last church through me. I set them once an example +for which I shall pray to be forgiven till my life's end; but now, +please God, I have at least shown them that because a man falls it need +not be utterly and for ever. He can rise; or, at any rate, he can try. +God knows I have tried; and they know it; and it may help them in their +own day of bitter trouble. But it was you, my lord, who first helped me, +by bidding me never despair. I have tried to teach your lesson; that is +all."</p> + +<p>"But you have not finished," the bishop urged, gently. "Go on teaching +it—go on."</p> + +<p>"No. It is no sudden thought. I undertook in the beginning, when Sir +Wilton Gleed wanted to turn me out forcibly, to go of my own accord when +I had built the church. He may forget it, but I do not."</p> + +<p>"Then I devoutly hope he will not accept your resignation!"</p> + +<p>"He must. I have made my arrangements. There is need of clergy in the +far corners of our empire, greater need than here. There was an +Australian at the hotel I have been staying at in London, and he has +shown me my field. I am going out to offer my services to the Bishop of +Riverina, and I am relying<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_384" id="Page_384">[Pg 384]</a></span> upon a word from you for their acceptance. I +hope to sail at the beginning of next month; my passage is already +taken."</p> + +<p>"I suppose you took it when you were in town?" the bishop grumbled. +Carlton coloured in an instant.</p> + +<p>"I did—but I had long been thinking of it," he said, hastily. "Oh, my +lord, in my place you would do the same! How could I continue here to be +smiled on by these poor people? It was easier when they looked the other +way, when I lived in this room alone, doing everything for myself, and +not a soul came near me. How can I settle down again to a prosperous +life—here of all places—with my child in the parish, and his poor +mother . . . That is what they all forget in the generous warmth of +their reaction; but the more they forget, the more keenly I remember. +Ah! do you think I ever have forgotten—for an hour—for a moment—since +I left off working with my hands?"</p> + +<p>One of these was stretched in the direction of the churchyard; and the +bishop read its touching testimony for the first time.</p> + +<p>"There," whispered Carlton, in strange excitement, "there lies one . . . +whose ruin and whose death are at my door. I don't forget—I never have +forgotten. I have paid, and I will pay till the end. And there shall be +no other woman . . ."</p> + +<p>His tongue failed him; his face was grief-stricken; the whole man was +changed. So then the human being, his bishop, knew that there was +another woman in his heart already; recalled the most terrible part<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_385" id="Page_385">[Pg 385]</a></span> of +this man's confession to him, years before; and presently plucked him by +the sleeve. And the voice that Robert Carlton heard, as he leaned once +more with his elbow on the chimney-piece, and his face between his +hands, was the voice of their last interview, at the bishop's palace, in +the blank forenoon of a wet summer's day.</p> + +<p>"Forgive me," it said, "for I also have misjudged you in my turn. But +now I see—but now I see, and am ashamed . . . Your life has been hard, +my brother, but it has been brave! You have been through the depths, but +you have also touched the heights, and I think that God must be very +near you to-night. I see now that you are right to go; you are both +nobler and wiser than I thought; may happiness, and peace, and love +itself go with you first or last. Let us kneel together before I leave +you, and humbly pray that it may still be so!"</p> + +<p>When the bishop retired, Robert Carlton returned to his study, and +prayed by himself until a knock at the outer door brought him to his +feet, much startled; for it was eleven at night.</p> + +<p>He was still more startled when he reached the door, for there stood a +soldier straight and tall, sunburnt and jaunty; a medal with clasps and +the Egyptian star upon his scarlet breast; a smile behind the trim +moustache; right hand at the salute. It was only after a prolonged stare +that Carlton recognised the smart young man.</p> + +<p>"George Mellis?" he cried. "Come in—come in!"</p> + +<p>"That's me, sir," said George, entering like a machine. "But—can it be +you, Mr. Carlton?"</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_386" id="Page_386">[Pg 386]</a></span>And his smile vanished as the lamplight fell upon the grey hairs and the +deep furrows which made the clergyman look nearly twice his years.</p> + +<p>"Yes, George. I have aged a little. But so have you."</p> + +<p>"Oh, I'm all right," said the young soldier with his fine eyes on the +other's face; "but I want to kill somebody, that's all!"</p> + +<p>"I should have thought you'd done enough of that at the wars," rejoined +Carlton, smiling. "Come, George, it's you I want to hear about. Of +course I have heard of you. So you enlisted in the Grenadiers, and you +got straight to Tel-el-Kebir; and that's the clasp, and not the only +one! And now you're a colour-sergeant, and certain of your stripes, they +tell me; you're a great hero in the village, George; and yet I have +heard them complain that you never even came back to show yourself after +the war."</p> + +<p>"I haven't come back to show myself now, Mr. Carlton."</p> + +<p>And the young fellow looked rather grim above his brass and scarlet.</p> + +<p>"I didn't mean to hurt your feelings."</p> + +<p>"Nor have you, sir. But can't you guess why I've come back for the first +time to-night?"</p> + +<p>Carlton considered, and suddenly his hollow eyes lit up; but those of +the grenadier had lighted first.</p> + +<p>"Was it—was it really to—to be here to-morrow, George?"</p> + +<p>"That was it, sir—and nothing else! I'd heard how you were building it +up with your own——"</p> + +<p>"Never mind that, George."</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_387" id="Page_387">[Pg 387]</a></span>"I heard it from Tom Ivey, who found me out in barracks not long since, +and gave me all the Long Stow news. That's how I came to hear of the +consecration to-morrow. He said he was coming down for it, and I said I +would too if I could get leave; and I did; and we've come down together +to-night."</p> + +<p>Neither of them had dreamt of intruding at that hour; but Mellis had +seen the old light in the old window, and felt he must just come up to +shake hands. Yes, he would come in gladly after church to-morrow. No, he +had seen no one else to speak to as yet, except Mrs. Musk; and the +grenadier stood confused.</p> + +<p>"Where did you see her?"</p> + +<p>"Driving away from the Flint House."</p> + +<p>"That old woman at this time of night?"</p> + +<p>"Musk is bad, and she was going for the doctor herself. I offered to go +instead, but she had the girl with her, and there was no stopping them."</p> + +<p>"Bad!" echoed Carlton. "He has been bad for weeks; he may be dying—and +all alone!" He dashed from the room, but was back next moment in his +wideawake. "I must go to him, George! He will hate it, but I must go. +Open the door, and I'll put out the light; if he's dying I shall stay."</p> + +<p>It was a clear keen night with a worn moon curling in the west; and the +hard road rang like a drum as red-coat and black ran elbow to elbow down +the village, jerking a word here and there as they went.</p> + +<p>"Been bad long, sir?"</p> + +<p>"Sciatica for years; only just taken to his bed."</p> + +<p>"Sciatica shouldn't kill."</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_388" id="Page_388">[Pg 388]</a></span>"This must be something else. The man is old—and the one enemy I have +left!"</p> + +<p>They ran on. Before the Flint House came first its meadow and then its +garden wall, with the gate left open, and a rude drive twisting through +trees to the side of the house. "This way," said Carlton; and in half a +minute they were at the side door. This also had been left open. Carlton +lowered his voice, his hand upon the latch.</p> + +<p>"You wait here, like a good fellow. If he will not let me say one +word—if he orders me out—then you must come up instead. If he is so +ill that his wife goes herself at midnight for the doctor, then he is +too ill to be left with no one in the house but a child of five!"</p> + +<p>Carlton's concern was not a little for the child. Suppose he had +awakened to call and call in vain—perhaps to run for succour to a +corpse! The thought made Carlton shudder as he found his way through +passages with which he had been permitted to become familiar after +Georgie's accident. At the head of the stairs there was Georgie's room; +the father had to pass it; and could not, without peeping in.</p> + +<p>For this door was ajar, and a night-light burning on the chest of +drawers. Georgie was breathing gently in his cot. Carlton approached on +tip-toe, and stood gazing downward with clasped hands. Boisterous and +robust upon his feet, the boy looked still a baby in his sleep; his face +was so round and innocent; his hands seemed such toys; and the light +hair, too seldom cut, was lightest at the roots, and still curly at the +ends, as it lay upon the pillow where<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_389" id="Page_389">[Pg 389]</a></span> his last movement had tossed it. +It was a sweet face, even with the great eyes closed; the eyelashes +looked so much longer and darker against the pure skin; they were many +shades darker than the hair; and the eyebrows were assuming a very +delicate definition of their own. The mouth was beautiful. That brown +little hand was perfectly shaped. Carlton bent over, and kissed the warm +smooth cheek with infinite tenderness; then went upon his knees, and +prayed over the child, and for him, and for his future, out of the +fulness of a brimming heart. He forgot that Musk's death would make a +difference to the child and to himself; for the moment he forgot that +Musk was in any danger of dying, and that this was his house. He and his +child were alone together once more, it might be for the last time, one +never knew.</p> + +<p>"God keep you, my own poor boy, and lead you not into temptation, but +deliver you from evil, for ever and ever, Amen."</p> + +<p>He stooped once more over the cot, pushed the long hair back, running +his fingers through it gently, and kissed the pure forehead again and +again. And it seemed to Robert Carlton—but the night-light was very +dim—that at the last his son had smiled upon him in his sleep.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_390" id="Page_390">[Pg 390]</a></span></p> + +<h2 class="newchapter"><a name="CHAPTER_XXXII" id="CHAPTER_XXXII"></a>XXXII<br /> +<span class="smalltext">THE SECOND TIME</span></h2> + + +<p>In Musk's room there was more light. It lay under the closed door like a +yellow rod. Carlton knocked gently. There was no answer. He knocked +louder. Not a sound from within. Then the chill fell on him, and he +entered ready for any discovery but the one he was to make.</p> + +<p>Neither the quick nor the dead lay within.</p> + +<p>A fire was burning as well as the lamp; the very bed looked warm, but +was not; the sick man must have left it some minutes at least.</p> + +<p>The lame man, the man who could not walk, had left his bed if not the +house! Carlton caught up the lamp to go in search. And even on the +landing a voice came hailing him from the region below.</p> + +<p>"Mr. Carlton! Mr. Carlton! Quick, sir, quick!"</p> + +<p>George Mellis was still at the side door, and in the lamplight the other +could not see an inch beyond.</p> + +<p>"Have you found him, George? He's not in bed!"</p> + +<p>"Who—Musk? No, sir, no!"</p> + +<p>"Then what have you seen?"</p> + +<p>The grenadier had a wet skin, a quivering lip, a starting eye.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_391" id="Page_391">[Pg 391]</a></span>"Oh, I can't tell you, sir! I may be wrong. God grant it! But give me +the lamp, and go outside and look for yourself!"</p> + +<p>In sheer perplexity Carlton complied; and for an instant imagined some +outrageous freak of nature; for the trees of the Flint House drive, +black as night a few minutes before, now stood etched against the +reddest dawn that he had ever seen—at midnight in December! Then a +flame shot upwards, and another, and another; and Mellis was left +standing, lamp in hand, a brilliant patch of light and colour, yet less +brilliant every instant in the face of that unearthly glare in the east. +Swift feet were pattering down the drive; and had such a start, before +the soldier found his senses, that it was only in the churchyard he +caught them up.</p> + +<p>Long Stow church was on fire for the second time, and burning faster +than it had burnt between five and six years before. The crackle of the +pitch pine was loud as musketry already. The roof was already burning; +its destruction had been the climax of the former fire.</p> + +<p>Robert Carlton stood with folded arms heaving on his chest. The bishop +was there already, in his overcoat and rug, with the whiter and the +sterner face. The servants had called him: they also were there, in +pitiful case, but no more had arrived as yet.</p> + +<p>"It is no use their coming. The roof's on fire in three or four +different places. He has done his work better this time; more oil for +him, with those stoves!"</p> + +<p>The voice was Carlton's, because his lips moved,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_392" id="Page_392">[Pg 392]</a></span> and those of the +bishop were compressed out of sight. Otherwise Mellis, for one, would +never have recognised so sad a discord of heartbreak and devil-may-care.</p> + +<p>"Some things might be saved," said the bishop.</p> + +<p>"They might and shall! George, run to my study for the key; it's on a +nail beside the fireplace. And to think I locked up myself lest +something might happen at the last!" cried Carlton, with a single note +of high hollow laughter, as the soldier vanished. "But I never thought +of you! No, you have cheated me very cleverly this time. You almost +deserve your triumph—over me!"</p> + +<p>"Do you mean to say you know who has done it?" cried the bishop.</p> + +<p>"Yes—the man who did it before."</p> + +<p>"But was that ever known?"</p> + +<p>"No; but I knew. I found his hat in the church."</p> + +<p>"And you never told?"</p> + +<p>"Nor shall I now. But I do wonder where he got in! And he was well +enough to climb a ladder—my dying man!"</p> + +<p>Carlton said no more; he was sorry he had said so much. Yet this time it +was sure to come out. There was the empty bed. Mellis would speak of it, +though he had not seen it with his own eyes. Was the malingerer back in +it already? What hellish artifice! And the house emptied for the nonce! +The man's own wife would never have suspected him.</p> + +<p>Carlton was quite calm. There was nothing to be done. The roof was +flaring at either end and in the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_393" id="Page_393">[Pg 393]</a></span> middle. Only a fire-engine could have +put it out, and there was still none nearer than Lakenhall. The mind +will often puzzle over an immaterial question in the face of facts too +terrible to be realised at once: the known is blinding, but the unknown +is the dark, and it is a relief to grope there even for that which is +useless when discovered. So Robert Carlton was still wondering how the +incendiary had got in, and out, and exactly what he had done inside, +when Mellis came running with the key. In a few moments they were in the +church.</p> + +<p>Nothing could have been less like the corresponding impression of the +former fire. Then the pews had been discovered burning; but now +rush-seated chairs and pitch pine stalls stood equally intact; and a +first glance did not reveal the source of the dull red light which +filled the church. On the other hand, a badly-broken window in the north +transept satisfied Carlton's curiosity on the immaterial point; and +supplied another, pregnant with irony; for it was the window whose arch +he had been building when Georgie first swam into his ken.</p> + +<p>But now Mellis was looking straight above him, and calling to Mr. +Carlton to do the same. In three places the ceiling was on fire, and +burning planks beginning to drop; in another a spreading patch of brown +burnt through even as they watched. Almost simultaneously came a shriek +from the women and a roar from the men now gathering outside; it was Tom +Ivey who came rushing in.</p> + +<p>"There's some one overhead! He's smashing the skylight over the north +transept! That's the man<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_394" id="Page_394">[Pg 394]</a></span> that done it—that's the man that done +it—fairly caught!"</p> + +<p>The saddler came on Tom's heels.</p> + +<p>"Gord love us all, that's Jasper Musk!"</p> + +<p>Carlton darted into the south transept without waste of words, and in an +instant had disappeared in the part that was boarded off until the new +organ should be established in its place there; meanwhile the very +ceiling had not been carried to the end of the transept, and a ladder +led to the natural loft that it formed. Up this ladder the incendiary +must have climbed, and up this ladder the rector was running when Mellis +and Ivey, with the rest at their heels, reached its foot.</p> + +<p>"Come down, sir, come down, for God's sake!"</p> + +<p>"I am not coming down alone."</p> + +<p>"Then I'll fetch you," roared Ivey; "you are not going to risk your life +for him!"</p> + +<p>But the red-coat was first upon the ladder, and in a few seconds both +young men were in the triangular tunnel between the ceiling and the +roof; a space so confined that under the apex alone was it possible to +walk upright; and that only for the few feet dividing them from the +nearest flames.</p> + +<p>"Look out!" cried Tom Ivey from the top rung. "It wasn't made for a +floor; get on your hands and knees, and the weight won't be all in one +place." So they crept into the centre of the cross; and there they knelt +upright to see over a fringe of fire that burnt their eyelids bare as +they gazed.</p> + +<p>Roof and ceiling of chancel and of nave, both were in roaring flames to +right and to left of them;<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_395" id="Page_395">[Pg 395]</a></span> through the flaming barrier in their faces, +and the hole already burnt, they could see the pulpit and the chairs in +the north transept thirty feet below; and across the gulf, Jasper Musk +and Robert Carlton face to face. Carlton had made the leap; they could +not; already the flames were driving them back and back.</p> + +<p>In the steady roar and crackle they could hear no words. Musk was +crouching under a skylight all too narrow for his gigantic shoulders, a +tell-tale oil-tin overturned at his feet. His face was livid, but +fearless, and his light eyes gleamed with hate. Carlton's back was +turned to the watchers, and for a second motionless; then he looked +round, saw them through smoke and flame, and clapped a hand to his +mouth.</p> + +<p>"Down, both of you," he shouted, "and round with the ladder to the +outside here, and one of you fetch up an axe. The skylight's too +small—we must make it bigger!"</p> + +<p>Musk's lips moved, and his eyes flashed their own fire; the others could +almost see the words.</p> + +<p>"Well?" said Mellis.</p> + +<p>"Come on; it's our only chance."</p> + +<p>In an instant they were down the ladder, and had it horizontal in a +minute. Then Ivey began to fume.</p> + +<p>"It'll take some time getting through the porch!"</p> + +<p>"Shove it through the broken window."</p> + +<p>"Good man! Stand by, out there, to haul out this ladder!"</p> + +<p>The red-coat ran round, his medal twinkling in the glare, while Ivey +rushed for the axe.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_396" id="Page_396">[Pg 396]</a></span>"Up with her, comrades! That's it—altogether—<i>now</i>!"</p> + +<p>The ladder was up outside. Ivey, axe in hand, had leapt upon the fourth +rung at a bound, and was taking the rest two at a time. Below it was +light as day; the naked trees stood brown and brittle in the glare; the +upturned faces white as the curled moon. A whiter face peered through +the skylight.</p> + +<p>"Look alive with that axe, Tom; he can't breathe, and he's being +roasted!"</p> + +<p>"He deserve ut! Do you come through first, sir. There's room for you as +'tis. He can bide his turn."</p> + +<p>The white face flushed indignant dominion.</p> + +<p>"Unless you obey me, you are my murderer too!"</p> + +<p>A stifled curse came from under the tiles.</p> + +<p>"There, then! Would you save him after that? Leave him the axe and +through you come, you that can, or else I'll pull you through!"</p> + +<p>And his great arm thickened as he thrust it out, and grabbed at the +straight white collar, before relinquishing the axe from his other hand; +but at that moment there was a crackling groan, and a sudden unbearable +weight on Ivey's hand and arm, as the frail inner roof gave way; then a +blinding flame in his face, a crash below, and a cry of anguish from a +hundred hearts rent as one.</p> + +<p>The axe tumbled as Tom Ivey flung both arms round the ladder, and so +descended like a drunken man, a crumpled collar still warm and tight +between the clenched fingers of his right hand.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_397" id="Page_397">[Pg 397]</a></span></p> + +<h2 class="newchapter"><a name="CHAPTER_XXXIII" id="CHAPTER_XXXIII"></a>XXXIII<br /> +<span class="smalltext">SANCTUARY</span></h2> + + +<p>Long Stow church rose salient from its knoll at the eastern extremity of +the village, still in its wintry network of a million twigs. It was not +the ruin it had been before; but the new roof had vanished; and the +chancel was in the condition to which the first fire had reduced the +whole edifice. The other walls still stand as their builder built them, +and as they stood on that December day when he was laid to rest in their +shadow. The grave is in the angle of the north transept and the nave, +not a dozen paces from the site of the shed. The stone was not up when +Gwynneth visited it, but the grave was as easily identified as it is +to-day. It lay beneath a cairn of dead flowers, picked out with many +fresh ones. The cards still fluttered upon some of the wreaths, and +Gwynneth could not help seeing the surprising names upon some; but the +humble little home-made offerings, the bunches of snow-drops and the +early crocuses, touched her more. Yet she showed no feeling as she stood +and gazed. She had brought no flowers herself. There was no pretence of +mourning in her dress. She shed no tears.</p> + +<p>From his own observatory the saddler had seen<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_398" id="Page_398">[Pg 398]</a></span> who was in the covered +fly, when Gwynneth got out. He was at his usual work upon the latest +newspaper, and he took it up again for a minute. But Gwynneth was more +than a minute, and more than five; the saddler lost patience, and +wandered across the road.</p> + +<p>"Where did you bring that young lady from? Lakenhall?"</p> + +<p>"Yes."</p> + +<p>"And are you going to take her back again?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, in time for the 5.40 train; and she only got down by the 2.10."</p> + +<p>Gwynneth, who had not stirred a feature or a limb, started indignantly +at the sound of a profaning step; but had forgiven Fuller before he +reached her hand with his own outstretched. There had seemed so much +that she might never know, could never ask; it would not be necessary +with the saddler.</p> + +<p>"Why, Miss Gwynneth, is that you?" he cried, when he had crushed her +hand; and his eyes widened with concern.</p> + +<p>"Am I so much changed?" asked Gwynneth, smiling gallantly.</p> + +<p>"Changed! Gord love yer, miss, you're the shadder of what you was."</p> + +<p>"There is plenty of substance still, Mr. Fuller."</p> + +<p>"And where's your colour, miss?"</p> + +<p>"In London, I suppose."</p> + +<p>"That's it," cried Fuller; "that London! I wouldn't live there, not if +you paid me: nasty, beastly, smoky, overcrowded sink of iniquity and +disease! If I was the Government I'd pull that down<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_399" id="Page_399">[Pg 399]</a></span> and build it up +again on twice the space. That isn't good manners to run down the place +where you live, miss, I know; but I never could abide that London, and +now I shall hate it more than ever."</p> + +<p>"But I thought you were never there, Mr. Fuller?"</p> + +<p>"And never mean to be, miss, and never mean to be! I've too much sense. +Look at me: sixty-eight I am, and a bit over, and not an ache or a pain +from top to toe. That's because I live in the pure air and know what I +eat; now in London, if you'll excuse my saying so, you never do. Where +should I be if I'd been swallerun London fogs and adulterated milk and +butter all my life? In my grave these thirty years! Do you take the +advice of a man of my experience, miss: shake the soot of London off +your feet, and come you back to good living and good air, and you won't +know yourself in a week."</p> + +<p>Gwynneth let the saddler run on; a more sensitive man would have seen +that she was not hearkening to a word. Her eyes were very hard and +bright; they rested once more upon the faded flowers and the fluttering +cards.</p> + +<p>"So this is Mr. Carlton's grave!"</p> + +<p>The belated words told nothing at all. Fuller removed his cap.</p> + +<p>"Yes, miss, there lie the biggest and the bravest heart that ever beat +in this here parish or anywhere near it. And I have a right to say so. +Many has come back to him this last twelvemonth or so. But I was the +first."</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_400" id="Page_400">[Pg 400]</a></span>"Were you at the fire, Mr. Fuller?"</p> + +<p>"Was I at the fire! Why, it was me that saw that first, Miss Gwynneth. +Young George Mellis, with his red-coat and his bamboo cane, he would +have it that it was him; but there are some folks that fare to be first +in everything, and General George'll be getting too big for his uniform +if he don't take care. You see, I hadn't closed an eye when I saw the +first flicker on the ceiling; but an old man like me have to get on some +clothes before he can run outside in the depths o' winter. Meanwhile, +Master George, who haven't been near his old friend all these years, he +can come down fast enough when the reverend's got the ball at his feet +again; and there were the two of them at the Flint House, inquiring +after Jasper Musk, said to be at death's door at the very moment he was +setting fire to the church."</p> + +<p>"Fiend!"</p> + +<p>"You may well say that, miss, for it was the second time he'd done it; +and the reverend had known, all these years, and that must've been +Jasper's hat he flung into the first fire when Tom Ivey come, puttun two +an' two together. What make that worse, it seem old Jasper used to say +he hoped to live to see the new church consecrated; and some say he'd +smile as he said it; but now we know what he meant. And he used to limp +up and down his room, for practice, when even the doctor thought he +couldn't set foot to the ground; for the servant girl heard him at it. +Yes, Miss Gwynneth, he was deep and strong and cruel, like the sea, was<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_401" id="Page_401">[Pg 401]</a></span> +Jasper; that's what the bishop said himself, for I heard him; but I will +say this for him, he asked no more quarter than he gave. Tom Ivey heard +his last words through the skylight, and they aren't fit for a young +lady like you to hear, but they were a man's words whatever else they +were. The worst is that the dear old reverend could've squeezed through +himself if only he'd have let Jasper slip; but that he wouldn't; so they +both went through with the ceiling and were killed."</p> + +<p>"For his enemy!" whispered Gwynneth, an unearthly radiance in her poor +hard eyes.</p> + +<p>"Yes, for the man that burnt the church down twice, and deserved to burn +himself; that was the worst of it."</p> + +<p>The listener's lips were consistently compressed, but at this they +parted again.</p> + +<p>"Oh, no, it was the best. It was the best. A great death, a glorious +death!" And the pale thin face was white-hot with a pride which consumed +all else.</p> + +<p>"The bishop said his life was greater still. You should ha' heard his +sermon, out here, at the open grave, when it was all over. There never +was such a funeral in the countryside before, and there never will be +another like it. The place was packed. I stood where you are standing +now, miss. I was one o' the bearers; and Ivey, Mellis, and Jones the +schoolmaster, they were the other three. Then you should have seen the +clergy; there was a rare procession of the clergy from all round; the +Reverend Scrope from Burton Mills, the Reverend Preston from Linkworth,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_402" id="Page_402">[Pg 402]</a></span> +and Canon Wilders, and a lot more. But the bishop was in all his +toggery, and I never see a man look so fine; he's little and he's lame, +but the face he preached with, across this here open grave, you'd have +said that belonged to some old giant. And what a sermon! That didn't +make us cry; that dried our tears, an' made us want to build churches +and be killed ourselves. You might guess the text: 'Greater love hath no +man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friend.' I kept +waitun for him to point out that Musk was not the reverend's friend, but +his worst enemy; but he never did. I would have done; otherwise, he said +just what I would like to have said myself, let alone the one thing that +took the whole lot of us by surprise. And I tell you, Miss Gwynneth, the +place was right black with people; not only in the churchyard, but +across the fence in the medder as well; there was hardly a blade o' +grass to be seen."</p> + +<p>"What was the surprise, Mr. Fuller?"</p> + +<p>"He'd made up his mind to resign the living! He had told his lordship. +He meant to resign next night—I can't for the life of me think why!"</p> + +<p>But Gwynneth could; and, with the second sight begotten of her love, +read the dead man even in his grave, divining immediately some of the +very reasons which he had given to the bishop in his last hours. She was +never to divine them all.</p> + +<p>Meanwhile the saddler, having imparted a satisfactory amount of +information, was beginning to look for some return in kind, and supposed +Miss Gwynneth would be going to the hall. No, they were all<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_403" id="Page_403">[Pg 403]</a></span> from home; +indeed, Gwynneth had waited for that. Yet she made her answer with a +candid look, the prelude to a gratuitous admission.</p> + +<p>"I am going on to the Flint House," said she.</p> + +<p>"Well, there!" cried Fuller, "if I hadn't forgot to tell you where Musk +lie! He don't lie here, miss; he left it that he would go to Lakenhall +cemetery, in onconsecrated ground, some say. And Mrs. Musk—you won't +have heard it—but she's fair lost her know, poor thing!"</p> + +<p>"Yes, I had heard. Poor thing, indeed! Yet in her case it seems almost +merciful. But I am not going to see Mrs. Musk."</p> + +<p>"Then haven't you heard about little Georgie? That's a grand thing, +that! There's a lady in London (that's the only part I don't like), some +young widder with none of her own, that's going to adopt him instead."</p> + +<p>"I know that, too," said Gwynneth, flushing slightly as she smiled. "The +lady is a friend of mine; she heard of Georgie through me. We were in a +hospital together, but now we have taken a flat—for I am going to live +with her too. And it is for Georgie I am come to-day."</p> + +<p>Her companion had served her purpose; but would not go; and a hint might +betray that which had obviously never entered the saddler's head. So +Gwynneth looked her last upon her own heart's grave with the same pale +face and the same unbending carriage; but the bright eyes were softer +now, though radiant still with a heavenly pride. So his<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_404" id="Page_404">[Pg 404]</a></span> ashes exalted +her as his living presence; so his undying soul still strengthened hers.</p> + +<p>It was a pale February day, the grass very green, a subtle gloss of life +upon the bough; but it was man's handiwork that appealed to Gwynneth; +and all at once an astounding fact forced itself upon her vision and +understanding. The church was almost exactly as she had seen it last. +The east end was the worst; the roof was not begun. It was just as it +had been six months before; and only the work of the hireling had +perished after all; that of the self-taught mason, the pariah, the +penitent, still endured as an oblation and a sacrifice for his sins, and +as a monument to the man for all time. Gwynneth could have gone down on +her knees in thanksgiving for this miracle; as it was she saw his +resting-place but dimly for the last time. At that moment the starling +which had entertained him in life began a gossip in the elderbush at his +head; a jealous sparrow poured abuse from every tree; and so she left +him, at rest where he never rested, on the field where that rest had +been won.</p> + +<p>A married Musk with many children, one of the sons who had quarrelled +with their father, had already established himself and family in the +Flint House. He had thankfully accepted Gwynneth's proposal, made, +however, in Nurse Ella's name; and Georgie was ready when Gwynneth +called for the second time on her way back from the church. He was also +in tremendous spirits, leaping upon his lady like a wild beast, and, +later, roaring his farewells through the fly-window, as they drove away +towards a watery<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_405" id="Page_405">[Pg 405]</a></span> sunset, Gwynneth sitting far back on the deeper seat +She let him shout till he was tired; by that time she was mistress of +herself once more, and the dusk was such as to destroy all present +evidence of another character. So at last she could take him on her +knee.</p> + +<p>"And are you glad to come away with Gwynneth, darling?"</p> + +<p>"I should think I are; jolly glad; but I thought there was anunner lady +too?"</p> + +<p>"We shall find her where we are going. Do you know where we are going, +Georgie?"</p> + +<p>"Course I do. We're goin' to London to see the Queen. I wish we would +soon be there!"</p> + +<p>"So we shall, Georgie."</p> + +<p>"In a minute?"</p> + +<p>"No, not in a minute; we have to go in the train first. Have you ever +seen a real train, Georgie?"</p> + +<p>"No, never. I know I haven't," Georgie averred. "You are kind to take me +in one! I do love you, I say!"</p> + +<p>"Do you, darling?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, really. I love you bestest in the world. I know I do!"</p> + +<p>They were entering Lakenhall, and it was quite dark in the fly; but now +Georgie knew that Gwynneth was crying, for she was kissing him at the +same time, and as he never had been kissed before.</p> + +<p>"And you always will, Georgie—you always will?"</p> + +<p>"Course I will," said Georgie, gaily.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_406" id="Page_406">[Pg 406]</a></span>"And go to school when Gwynneth sends you, and turn into a great strong +man, and be good to poor Gwynneth then?"</p> + +<p>"Gooder'n all the world," said Georgie.</p> + + +<p class="center newchapter">THE END</p> + + + +<hr class="wide" /> + +<p class="blockquot">"Mr. Hornung's books are stories pure and simple, excellently +constructed, well written, cleanly, humorous, kindly. The plot is always +well managed, the telling is lively, with no waste of irrelevant +episode, and the untying is sure to be left to the last."—<i>New York Evening Post</i>.</p> + +<hr class="thin" /> + +<p class="center bigtext">OTHER BOOKS BY E. W. HORNUNG</p> + + +<p class="title">Dead Men Tell No Tales</p> + +<p class="price">A Novel. 12mo, $1.25</p> + +<p class="blockquot">"In this novel, as in the previous ones from Mr. Hornung's pen, there is +a wealth of well-handled incidents. It is story-telling of the most +direct kind and holds the attention from the first page to the last Mr. +Hornung seems to us in each succeeding book from his pen to gain in +confidence and authority, and we do not hesitate to place him among the +first of the comparatively new writers who must be reckoned +with."—<i>Literature</i>.</p> + +<p class="title">The Amateur Cracksman</p> + +<p class="price">12mo, $1.25</p> + +<div class="blockquot"> +<p>"There is not a dull page from beginning to end. . . . He is the most +interesting rogue we have met for a long time."—<i>New York Evening Sun</i>.</p> + +<p>"Raffles is amazing; his resource is perfect; he talks like a gentlemen +and acts like one, except when occupied with pressing business in +another man's house, at midnight, and naturally he has a 'cool nerve,' a +nerve positively arctic. They all have nerves like that, these +Raffleses."—<i>New York Tribune</i>.</p> +</div> + +<hr class="thin" /> + +<p class="center bigtext"><i>BOOKS BY MR. HORNUNG</i></p> + +<p class="blockquot">"Mr. Hornung has certainly earned the right to be called the Bret Harte +of Australia."—<i>Boston Herald</i>.</p> + +<p class="title">Some Persons Unknown</p> + +<p class="price">12mo, $1.25</p> + +<p class="center">CONTENTS</p> + +<ul class="advert"> +<li>Kenyon's Innings</li> +<li>A Literary Coincidence</li> +<li>"Author! Author!"</li> +<li>The Widow of Piper's Point</li> +<li>After the Fact</li> +<li>The Voice of Gunbar</li> +<li>The Magic Cigar</li> +<li>The Governess at Greenbush</li> +<li>A Farewell Performance</li> +<li>A Spin of the Coin</li> +<li>The Star of the "Grasmere"</li> +</ul> + +<p class="blockquot">"<i>In about half-a-dozen cases the scene is laid in Australia, and the +dramatic and tragic aspects of Colonial life are treated by Mr. Hornung +with that happy union of vigor and sympathy which has stood him in such +good stead in his earlier novels.</i>"—London Spectator.</p> + + +<p class="title">The Rogue's March</p> + +<p class="price">A ROMANCE</p> + +<p class="price">12mo, $1.50</p> + +<div class="blockquot"> +<p>"Mr. Hornung has succeeded admirably in his object: his Australian +scenes are a veritable nightmare; they sear the imagination, and it +will be some time before we get Hookey Simpson, the clank of the +chains, and the hero's degradation off our mind."—<i>London Saturday +Review</i>.</p> + +<p>"Vividly and vigorously told."—<i>London Academy</i>.</p> +</div> + +<p class="title">My Lord Duke</p> + +<p class="price">12mo, $1.25</p> + +<div class="blockquot"> +<p>"Mr. Hornung is a natural humorist, and has the art of telling a +story."—<i>Philadelphia Evening Telegraph</i>.</p> + +<p>"<i>It is pleasant to turn to a real story by a real story-writer. Such is +'My Lord Duke.' . . . Its story is its own, both in plot and in +characterization. It is a capital little novel.</i>"—The Nation.</p> +</div> + +<p class="title">Young Blood</p> + +<p class="price">12mo, $1.25</p> + +<p class="blockquot">"<i>Whether Lowndes be entirely realized or not does not much matter; the +conception of him is already a distinction. He is an adventurer of +genius, but not built on the usual lines. . . . And his vitality is +inexhaustible. We leave him, not without a stain upon his character, but +with considerable regret in our minds.</i>"—The Bookman.</p> + +<hr class="thin" /> + +<p class="center bigtext"><i>IN THE IVORY SERIES</i></p> + + +<p class="title">The Boss of Taroomba</p> + +<p class="price">16mo, 75 cents</p> + +<p class="blockquot">"There are passages in E. W. Hornung's latest story, 'The Boss of +Taroomba,' which remind us by their vividness and fantastic quality of +Stevenson in some of his South Sea Island tales. . . . The hero is an +uncommon creation even for fiction."—<i>Chicago Times-Herald</i>.</p> + + +<p class="title">A Bride from the Bush</p> + +<p class="price">16mo, 75 cents</p> + +<p class="blockquot">"Mr. E. W. Hornung is one of the most successful delineators of Bush +life."—<i>Chicago Tribune</i>.</p> + + +<p class="title">Irralie's Bushranger</p> + +<p class="price">16mo, 75 cents</p> + +<p class="blockquot">"A capital little story of Australian love and adventure. There is no +flagging in the press and stir of the story."—<i>The Nation</i>.</p> + +<hr class="thin" /> + +<p class="center">CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS, Publishers<br /> +153-157 Fifth Avenue, New York</p> + +<hr class="wide" /> + +<div class="blockquot"><p>Transcriber's Note: Numerous words were hyphenated inconsistently in the +original text (for instance, "evensong" and "even-song"). These +inconsistencies have been retained. End-of-line hyphens have been +retained or removed based on the predominant usage elsewhere in the +text.</p> + +<p>In Chapter II, "The resolution was easier than its accomplshment" was +changed to "The resolution was easier than its accomplishment".</p> + +<p>In Chapter XIX, a missing quotation mark was added before "I will—I +will", and "it's last day's work" was changed to "its last day's work".</p></div> + + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Peccavi, by E. W. Hornung + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK PECCAVI *** + +***** This file should be named 36115-h.htm or 36115-h.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/3/6/1/1/36115/ + +Produced by Steven desJardins and the Online Distributed +Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This book was +produced from scanned images of public domain material +from the Google Print project.) + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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Hornung + +Release Date: May 15, 2011 [EBook #36115] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK PECCAVI *** + + + + +Produced by Steven desJardins and the Online Distributed +Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This book was +produced from scanned images of public domain material +from the Google Print project.) + + + + + + +PECCAVI + +BY E. W. HORNUNG + +AUTHOR OF "THE AMATEUR CRACKSMAN," "MY LORD +DUKE," "YOUNG BLOOD," ETC. + +CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS +NEW YORK 1901 + +COPYRIGHT, 1900, BY +CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS + +All rights reserved + +THE CAXTON PRESS +NEW YORK. + + + + + CONTENTS + + Chapter Page + I. Dust to Dust 1 + II. The Chief Mourner 11 + III. A Confession 18 + IV. Midsummer Night 29 + V. The Man Alone 45 + VI. Fire 51 + VII. The Sinner's Prayer 66 + VIII. The Lord of the Manor 77 + IX. A Duel Begins 89 + X. The Letter of the Law 100 + XI. Labour of Hercules 115 + XII. A Fresh Discovery 125 + XIII. Devices of a Castaway 131 + XIV. The Last Resort 137 + XV. His Own Lawyer 150 + XVI. End of the Duel 162 + XVII. Three Weeks and a Night 186 + XVIII. The Night's Work 193 + XIX. The First Winter 209 + XX. The Way of Peace 230 + XXI. At the Flint House 249 + XXII. A Little Child 262 + XXIII. Design and Accident 275 + XXIV. Glamour and Rue 291 + XXV. Signs of Change 306 + XXVI. A Very Few Words 316 + XXVII. An Escape 323 + XXVIII. The Turning Tide 335 + XXIX. A Haven of Hearts 348 + XXX. The Woman's Hour 362 + XXXI. Advent Eve 378 + XXXII. The Second Time 390 + XXXIII. Sanctuary 397 + + + + +PECCAVI + +I + +DUST TO DUST + + +Long Stow church lay hidden for the summer amid a million leaves. It had +neither tower nor steeple to show above the trees; nor was the +scaffolding between nave and chancel an earnest of one or the other to +come. It was a simple little church, of no antiquity and few exterior +pretensions, and the alterations it was undergoing were of a very +practical character. A sandstone upstart in a countryside of flint, it +stood aloof from the road, on a green knoll now yellow with buttercups, +and shaded all day long by horse-chestnuts and elms. The church formed +the eastern extremity of the village of Long Stow. + +It was Midsummer Day, and a Saturday, and the middle of the Saturday +afternoon. So all the village was there, though from the road one saw +only the idle group about the gate, and on the old flint wall a row of +children commanded by the schoolmaster to "keep outside." Pinafores +pressed against the coping, stockinged legs dangling, fidgety hob-nails +kicking stray sparks from the flint; anticipation at the gate, +fascination on the wall, law and order on the path in the +schoolmaster's person; and in the cool green shade hard by, a couple of +planks, a crumbling hillock, an open grave. + +Near his handiwork hovered the sexton, a wizened being, twisted with +rheumatism, leaning on his spade, and grinning as usual over the +stupendous hallucination of his latter years. He had swallowed a +rudimentary frog with some impure water. This frog had reached maturity +in the sexton's body. Many believed it. The man himself could hear it +croaking in his breast, where it commanded the pass to his stomach, and +intercepted every morsel that he swallowed. Certainly the sexton was +very lean, if not starving to death quite as fast as he declared; for he +had become a tiresome egotist on the point, who, even now, must hobble +to the schoolmaster with the last report of his unique ailment. + +"That croap wuss than ever. Would 'ee like to listen, Mr. Jones?" + +And the bent man almost straightened for the nonce, protruding his chest +with a toothless grin of huge enjoyment. + +"Thank you," said the schoolmaster. "I've something else to do." + +"Croap, croap, croap!" chuckled the sexton. "That take every mortal +thing I eat. An' doctor can't do nothun for me--not he!" + +"I should think he couldn't." + +"Why, I do declare he be croapun now! That fare to bring me to my own +grave afore long. Do you listen, Mr. Jones; that croap like billy-oh +this very minute!" + +It took a rough word to get rid of him. + +"You be off, Busby. Can't you see I'm trying to listen to something +else?" + +In the church the rector was reciting the first of the appointed psalms. +Every syllable could be heard upon the path. His reading was Mr. +Carlton's least disputed gift, thanks to a fine voice, an unerring sense +of the values of words, and a delivery without let or blemish. Yet there +was no evidence that the reader felt a word of what he read, for one and +all were pitched in the deliberate monotone rarely to be heard outside a +church. And just where some voices would have failed, that of the Rector +of Long Stow rang clearest and most precise: + +_"When thou with rebukes dost chasten man for sin, thou makest his +beauty to consume away, like as it were a moth fretting a garment: every +man therefore is but vanity._ + +_"Hear my prayer, O Lord, and with thine ears consider my calling: hold +not thy peace at my tears._ + +_"For I am a stranger with thee: and a sojourner, as all my fathers +were._ + +_"O spare me a little, that I may recover my strength: before I go +hence, and be no more seen . . ."_ + +The sexton was regaling the children on the wall with the ever-popular +details of his notorious malady. The schoolmaster still strutted on the +path, now peeping in at the porch, now reporting particulars to the +curious at the gate: a quaint incarnation of conscious melancholy and +unconscious enjoyment. + +"Hardly a dry eye in the church!" he announced after the psalm. "Mr. +Carlton and Musk himself are about the only two that fare to hide what +they feel." + +"And what does Mr. Carlton feel?" asked a lout with a rose in his coat. +"About as much as my little finger!" + +"Ay," said another, "he cares for nothing but his Roman candles, and his +transcripts and gargles."[1] + +[Footnote 1: Transepts and gargoyles.] + +"Come," said the schoolmaster, "you wouldn't have the parson break down +in church, would you? I'm sorry I mentioned him. I was thinking of +Jasper Musk. He just stands as though Mr. Carlton had carved him out of +stone." + +"The wonder is that he can stand there at all," retorted the fellow with +the flower, "to hear what he don't believe read by a man he don't +believe in. A funeral, is it? It's as well we know--he'd take a weddun +in the same voice." + +The schoolmaster turned away with an ambiguous shrug. It was not his +business to defend Mr. Carlton against the disaffected and the undevout. +He considered his duty done when he informed the rector who his enemies +were, and (if permitted to proceed) what they were saying behind his +back. The schoolmaster made a mental mark against the name of one +Cubitt, ex-choirman, and, forthwith transferring his attention to the +audience on the wall, put a stop to their untimely entertainment before +returning softly to the porch. + +In Long Stow churchyard there was shade all day, but in the church it +was dusk from that moment in the forenoon when the east window lost the +sun. This peculiarity was partly temporary. The church was in a +transition stage; it was putting forth transepts north and south; +meanwhile there was much boarding within, and a window in eclipse on +either side. The surrounding foliage added its own shade; and each time +the schoolmaster stole out of the sunlight into the porch, to peer up +the nave, it was several moments before he could see anything at all. +And then it was but a few high lights in a sea of gloom: first the east +window, as yet unstained, its three quatrefoils filled with summer sky, +the rest with waving branches; next, the brass lectern, the surplice +behind it, the high white forehead above. Then in the chancel something +gleamed: that was the coffin, resting on trestles. Then in the choir +seats, otherwise deserted, a figure grew out of the shadows, a solitary +and a massive figure, that stood even now when everybody else was +seated, finely regardless of the fact. It was a man, elderly, but very +powerfully built. The hair stood white and thick upon the large strong +head, less white and shorter on the broad deep jowl. The head was +carried with a certain dignity, rude, savage, indomitable. The eyes +gazed fixedly at the opposite wall; not once did they condescend to the +thing that gleamed upon the trestles. One great hand was knotted over +the knob of a mighty stick, on which the old man leant stiffly. He was +dressed in black, not quite as a gentleman, yet as befitted the most +substantial man but one in the parish. And that was Jasper Musk. + +The parson finished the lesson, and his white brow bent over the closed +book; the face beneath was bearded and much tanned, and in it there +burnt an eye that came as a surprise after that formal voice; and the +hand that closed the book was sensitive but strong. Stepping from the +lectern, the clergyman declared his calibre in an obeisance towards the +altar, then led the way slowly down the aisle. Bearers rose from the +shades and followed with the coffin; they were almost at the porch +before Jasper Musk took notice enough to limp after them with much noise +from his stick. The congregation waited for him, swarming into the aisle +in the big man's wake. So they came to the grave. + +And there broad daylight revealed a circumstance that came as a shock to +most of those who had followed the body from the church, but as an +outrage to the officiating clergyman: the coffin bore no plate. Mr. +Carlton coloured to the hair, and his deep eye flashed upon the chief +mourner; the latter leant upon his stick and replied with a grim glare +across the open grave. For a moment the wind washed through the trees, +and every sparrow made itself heard; then the rector's eyes dropped to +his book, but his voice rang colder than before. And presently the earth +received its own. + +Mr. Carlton had pronounced the benediction, and a solemn hush still held +all assembled, when a bicycle bell jarred staccato in the road; a moment +later, with a sharp word for some children who had tired of the funeral +and strayed across his path, the rider dismounted outside the saddler's +workshop, a tiny cabin next his house and opposite the church. The +cyclist was a lad in his teens, dark, handsome, dapper, but small for +his age, which was that of high collars and fancy ties; and he rode a +fancy bicycle, the high machine of the day, but extravagantly nickelled +in all its parts. + +"Well, Fuller," said he, "who are they burying?" + +Fuller, the saddler, who enjoyed a local monopoly in the exercise of his +craft, but whose trade was the mere relaxation of a life spent in +reading and disseminating the news of the day, was spelling through the +_Standard_ at his bench behind the open window. He dropped his paper and +whipped the spectacles from a big dogmatic nose. + +"Gord love yer, Mr. Sidney, do you stand there and tell me you haven't +heard?" + +"How could I hear when I'm only home from Saturdays to Mondays? I'm on +my way home now. Old Sally Webb--is it--or one of the old Wilsons?" + +"No, sir," said the saddler; "that's no old person. Gord love yer," he +cried again, "I wish that was!" + +"Who is it, Mr. Fuller?" + +"That's Molly Musk," said Fuller, slowly; "that's who that is, Mr. +Sidney." + +The boy had not the average capacity for astonishment; he was not, in +fact, the average boy; but at the name his eyebrows shot up and his +mouth grew round. + +"Molly Musk! I thought nobody knew where she was? When did she turn up?" + +"Tuesday night, and died the next." + +"But I say, Fuller, this is interesting!" Perhaps the average boy would +have been no more shocked; he might not even have found it interesting. +This one leant his bicycle against the wall, and his elbows on the bench +within the open window. "Where's she been all this time?" he queried, +confidentially. "What did she die of? What's it all mean?" And there was +a knowing curl about the corners of his mouth. + +"Mean?" said the saddler; "there's more than you want to know that, Mr. +Sidney, but want must be their master. That old Jasper, _he_ know, so +they say; but I'm not so sure. It was he fetched her home, poor old +feller; got the letter Monday morning, had her home by Tuesday night. +That's a man I never liked, Mr. Sidney. I've said it to his face, and +I'll say it as long as I live; but, Gord love yer, I'm sorry for him +now! That's given _him_ a rare doing and no mistake, and less wonder. A +trim little thing like poor Molly Musk! Not that I'm so surprised as +some; a man of my experience don't make no mistake, and I never did care +for the breed. But there, even my heart bleed when that don't boil; as +for the reverend here, he feel it as much as anybody else, and that _I_ +know. That young Jim Cubitt, he come by just now, and says he, 'He's +taking the service as if it was a wedding.' 'You've been kicked out of +the choir,' I says; 'that's what's the matter with you still, or you +wouldn't want a man to be a woman. Thank goodness there's one live man +in the parish,' I says, 'though I don't fare to hold with him.' And no +more I do, Mr. Sidney; but, Gord love yer, that make no difference to +men of our experience. I like the reverend's Popery as little as the +squire like it, and I tell him so, yet he go on bringing me the +_Standard_ every day when he've done with it. Is there another clergyman +that'd do the like to a man that went against him in the parish? Would +the Reverend Preston at Linkworth? Would the Reverend Scrope at Burton +Mills? Or Canon Wilders, or any other man Jack of 'em? No, sir, not +one!" + +"But if he doesn't read them himself," said the boy, "it doesn't amount +to so very much." And he laid his hand on three more _Standards_, +unopened, with the parson's name in print upon the wrapper. + +"What I was coming to," cried the saddler; "only when I get on the +reverend my tongue will wag. They say he don't feel. I say he do, and I +know: all this week I've had no _Standard_, so this morning I was so +bold as to up and mention it, and there was all six unopened. +'Reverend,' I says, 'you must be ill--with that there Egyptian Question +to argue about'--for we're rare 'uns to argue, the reverend and me--'and +no trace yet o' them Phoenix Park varmin!' But he shake his head. 'Not +ill, Fuller,' he says; 'but there's tragedy enough in this parish +without going to the papers for more. And I haven't the heart to argue +even with you,' he says. So that's my answer to them as says our +reverend don't feel." + +The boy had been patiently pricking the bench with a saddler's punch; +now he raised his deliberate dark eyes and looked at the other +point-blank. + +"You talk about a tragedy," he said, "but you won't say where the +tragedy comes in. What has killed the girl?" + +"I hardly like to tell a young gentleman like you," said the saddler; +"though, to be sure, you'll hear of nothing else in the village." + +"Perhaps," said the boy, with a rather sinister smile, "I'm not quite so +innocent as I ought to be. Come on, out with it!" + +"Well, then, the poor young thing was brought home in trouble," sighed +the saddler. "And in her trouble she died next night." + +The boy looked at the man through narrow eyes with a knowing light in +them, and the curves cut deep at the corners of his mouth. + +"In trouble, eh? So that's why she disappeared?" he said at length. +"Molly--Musk!" + + + + +II + +THE CHIEF MOURNER + + +Jasper Musk remained some minutes at the grave, alone, and more than +ever a mark for curious eyes; his own were raised, and his lips moved +with a significance difficult to mistake, but in him yet more difficult +to accept. The infidelity of the man was notorious, and, indeed, the +raised face was not the face of prayer. It was flint bathed in gall, too +bitter for faith, too savage for sorrow; it was a frozen sea of wrinkles +without a single ripple of agitation. Yet the lips moved, and were still +moving when Jasper Musk passed through the crowd now assembled about the +gate, erect though halt, a glitter in his eyes, but that was all. + +As the folk had waited and made way for him in the church, so they +waited and made way outside. Thus, as he limped down into the road, Musk +had the village almost to himself. He turned to the right, and the west +wind blew in his face, strong and warm, with cloud upon cloud of yellow +dust; overhead the other clouds flew high and white and broken, a +flotilla of small sail upon the blue. But Musk was done gazing at the +sky, neither did he look right or left as he trudged in the middle of +the road. So the saddler's place, and then the woody opening of the road +to Linkworth, with the white bridge gleaming through the trees, and the +ripe leaves purling in the wind like summer surf, all fell behind on the +left; as, on the right, did the rectory gate, terminating that same +flint wall which had been the children's grand stand. Rectory, church, +and glebe stood all together, an indivisible trinity, with open uplands +east and north. Westward began the cottages, buff-coloured, thatched; +and it was cottages for half a mile, but healthy cottages, with plenty +of space between, here a wheatfield, there a meadow; for every +householder of Long Stow has also his holding of land, and there is no +more independent parish in East Anglia. Of private houses that are not +cottages, however, the village has only three: the rectory at one end, +the hall near the other, and the Flint House between the two. + +The Flint House now belonged to Jasper Musk. Report said that he had +bought it outright for nine hundred pounds, with the meadow he was now +passing on his left, and the wild garden reaching to the river. +Originally part and parcel of the Long Stow estate, the place had been +let for years, with a good slice of land, to London sportsmen who spent +just two months of the twelve there. Musk had been the lessee's bailiff, +and had feathered his nest so well that when the whole estate changed +hands, and the part went with the whole, the ex-bailiff was in a +position to buy a house and grounds for which the new squire had no use. +None knew how he could have come honestly by so much profit; yet he was +a man of tried integrity, but a hard man, and the last to get fair +treatment behind his back. A more genuine marvel was the way in which he +had spent his money, on a house that could scarcely fail to be a white +elephant to such a man, and a hideous house into the bargain. It abutted +directly on the road, grim and rambling, with false windows like +wall-eyes, and facets of flint so sharp that to brush against the wall +was to rip a sleeve to ribbons. There were many rooms, musty and +mice-ridden, and now only two old people to inhabit them. Musk had +driven all his sons from home, thus doing his country an unwitting +service, for there was the stuff that knits an empire in the blood. But +only one daughter had been born to him, and now he had left her in the +ground, and would wash his mind of her for ever. + +The resolution was easier than its accomplishment: on his very threshold +a shrill small cry assailed and insulted Jasper Musk. And in the parlour +walked his wife, meek-spirited, flat-chested, leaden-eyed; too weary for +much grief, as he was too bitter; in her thin arms an infant not four +days old. + +Musk put himself in her path. + +"Stop walking!" + +"That'll set him off again," sighed Mrs. Musk, though not before she had +obeyed. + +"I don't care," said Jasper. "That can cry till that die," he added +brutally, as the fit returned; "and the sooner the better. Hold it up a +bit. There, now! I want to have a look at the brat. I want to see who +that's like!" + +"It's like poor Molly," whimpered the grandmother, shedding tears that +she could neither check nor hide. + +Musk thumped his stick on the floor. + +"Molly? Molly? You let me hear that name again! Haven't I told you once +and for all never to lay your tongue to that name, in my hearing or +behind my back, as long as you live? Then don't you forget it; and none +o' your lies. That's no more like her than that's like you. But a look +of somebody it have, though I can't for the life of me think who. Wait a +bit. Give me time. That'll come--that'll come!" + +But the thin shrill screaming continued till the little red face grew +livid and wrinkled almost beyond resemblance to its kind; then Musk +relinquished his futile scrutiny, and signed to his wife to resume the +walking, but himself remained in the room. And he leant on his stick as +he had leant on it at the funeral; but here in his house he wore his +hat; and from under its broad brim he followed them, backward and +forward, to and fro, with smouldering eyes. + +"Do you know what I've vowed?" he presently went on. "Do you know the +oath I took, there at that open grave, when all the tomfoolery was over, +and that Jesuit jerry-builder had taken his hook?" + +"I'm sure I don't," sighed Mrs. Musk, as the child lay once more still +against her withered bosom. + +"I stood there," said Jasper, "and I swore I'd find the man. And I swore +I'd tear his heart out when I've found him. And I'll do both!" + +His voice rose so swiftly to so fierce a pitch that the woman started +violently, and the infant wailed again. Instantly the room shook, and +with one stride, paid for by a spasm of pain, the husband towered above +the wife; and this time it was a heavy hand upon her shrunk and +shrinking shoulder that put a stop to the walk. + +"Do _you_ know who it is?" he cried. "My God, I believe you do!" + +"I don't, indeed!" + +"She never told you?" + +"God knows she did not." + +"Or anybody else?" + +"I don't know." + +"But you think--you think! I see it in your face. Who is it you think +she may have told? I'll soon find out from him or her; trust me to wring +that out!" + +For answer, the woman subsided in sobs upon the horsehair sofa, rocking +herself and the baby in her grief and terror. "You'll be that angry with +me," she moaned; "you'll be right mad!" + +"Oh, no, I sha'n't," said Musk, in a kindlier voice. "I'm not so bad as +all that, though this do fare to make a man crazy. Tell away, old woman, +and don't you be afraid." + +"Oh, Jasper, it was when you were gone to Lakenhall for the doctor--that +last time!" + +"Well?" + +"She knew the end was near. Poor thing! Poor thing!" + +"What did she say?" + +"That she'd die more happier if only she could speak--if only I would +send----" + +"Not for Carlton?" + +The wife could only nod in her fear and desperation. + +"You sent for that man the moment my back was turned?" + +"Oh, I knew that'd make you right wild--I knew--I knew!" + +Musk controlled himself by an effort. + +"That don't. That sha'n't. I'll have it out of him, that's all; he's not +the Church o' Rome yet! Go on. Go on." + +"I went myself. No one knew. I left her alone time I was gone." + +"And you brought him back with you?" + +"Well, he got here first. He ran all the way." + +"He knew better than to let me catch him. Jesuit! How long was he with +her?" + +"Not long, Jasper, not long indeed!" + +"And you heard nothing?" + +"Not a word. I stayed downstairs. I had to promise her that before I +went. She had something to say to Mr. Carlton that nobody else must +know." + +"But somebody else shall!" said Jasper grimly. "That was it, you may +depend; you should have listened at the door. But that make no matter. +Somebody else is going to know before he's many minutes older!" + +And an ugly smile broadened on the thick-set face; but the woman gasped. +Quick as thought the child was on the sofa, the grandmother on her feet. +Trembling and terrified, she stood in her husband's path. + +"Jasper! You're never going up to the rectory?" + +"I am, though--this minute!" + +"Oh, Jasper!" + +"Do you let me by." + +"But I promised you should never know! You've made me break my solemn +word! He'll know I've broken it!" + +"Yes, I'm going to learn him a thing or two. Will you let me by?" + +"_She'll_ know--too--wherever she has gone to!" + +"You'd better not keep me no more." + +"Jasper! Jasper! On her death-bed I promised her----" + +"Out of my light!" + + + + +III + +A CONFESSION + + +The rector's study was on the ground floor, facing south. It was a long +room, but narrow, and so low that the present incumbent, who stood +six-feet-two, had contracted a stoop out of continual and instinctive +dread of the ancient beams that scored his study ceiling, combined with +a besetting habit of pacing the floor. There were two doors; one led +into the garden, providing parishioners with immediate access to the +rector when he was not to be found at the church; the other terminated +an inner passage. Both were of immemorial oak, and, like the lattice +casement over the writing table, both rattled in the least wind. Such +was the room which the Reverend Robert Carlton haunted when driven or +detained indoors: rickety, ill-lighted, and draughty when it was not +close, it was still a habitable hole enough, and picturesque in spite of +its occupant. + +Optional surroundings afford a fair clue to the superficial man, but no +real key to character; thus Mr. Carlton's furniture suggested a soul +devoid of the aesthetic sense. He had the sense in all its fineness, but +it found expression in another place. Like many ritualists, Carlton was +a religious aesthete; none more fastidious in the service of the +sanctuary; on the other hand, after the fashion of his peers in two +Churches, the trappings of his own life were severely simple. They had +nearly all been purchased second-hand, those wire-covered shelves and +the books they bore, that oak settle, and the huge arm-chair filled with +miscellaneous lumber. Two baize-covered forms were there for the +accommodation of various classes which the rector held; a prayer desk +faced east in the one orderly corner of the room. Only three pictures +hung on the walls; a Holy Family and Guido Reni's St. Sebastian, +ordinary silver prints in Oxford frames, mementoes of a pilgrimage to +Rome; and an ancient cricket eleven, faded from age, and fly-blown for +long want of a glass. There were also a couple of tin shields, bearing +the heraldic devices of Robert Carlton's public school and of his Oxford +college, while a crucifix hung over the prayer desk. Among the books two +volumes on _Building Construction_ might have been remarked upon the +settle, together with a tattered copy of Parker's _Introduction to +Gothic Architecture_; among the lumber, a mason's trowel and a +cold-chisel. Lastly, the study smelt, but did not reek, of common +birdseye. + +Jasper Musk, passing the open lattice, caught the parson hastily rising +from his knees, not at the prayer desk, but beside his writing table, +upon which a large book lay open. A newspaper lay on top of the book +when Musk was admitted some moments after he had knocked. + +He entered with his heavy, uneven steps, but took up a position barely +within the threshold, and began by declining a seat with equal emphasis +and stiffness. + +"No, I thank you, Mr. Carlton. I've never been here before in your +time, and I'm never likely to come again. I'm only here now to ask a +question--and return a compliment!" + +And the visitor's eye gleamed as Mr. Carlton creased the forehead that +was so white in comparison with his face: at the moment this contrast +was not conspicuous. + +"From what I hear," explained Musk, "you've done me the kindness of +coming to my house when my back was turned." + +"And you have only heard of it now?" + +"Within the last ten minutes; and I come here right straight. You may +think I wouldn't come for nothing, me that's never darkened your door +before to-day. I don't hold with you, Mr. Carlton, and I'm not the only +one. That's true--I'm not a religious man, and never was; but, if I ever +was to be, it wouldn't be your religion. No, sir, when I fare to want +Christmas-trees in church I'll go to Rome and be done with it; and +that's where you ought to be, Mr. Carlton, before you get a parcel of +women to confess their sins to you as though you was God Almighty!" + +Mr. Carlton sat quite still under this uncalled-for criticism; he even +looked relieved, and one sensitive finger brushed the brown moustache to +either side of his mouth. + +"I have never advocated auricular confession," said he, "whatever I may +think. I have merely said, to those in doubt, in difficulty, or in +trouble, I will help them with God's help if I can." + +"In trouble!" cried Musk scornfully. "I know one that never might have +got herself into trouble if she'd never listened to you! And that's what +brings me here; I'll beat about the bush no more. My wife said she +fetched you the other night. I don't blame you for going, I won't go so +far as that. What I want to know, and what I mean to know, is this: did +my--that young woman lying there--confess to you or did she not?" It was +a fist that he had flung in the direction of the churchyard. + +"Confess what?" + +And the parson's voice was cold and constrained, as it had been beside +the grave; but that white forehead glistened like a dead man's. + +"The name of the father of her child!" + +Carlton took an ivory paper-knife from his desk, and the thin blade +snapped in two between his fingers. A pause followed. Musk stood like +granite, stick and hat in hand, frowning down on the clergyman seated at +his writing table. At length the latter looked up. + +"I might say that is a question you have no right to ask, Mr. Musk; +what is certain, had there been any question of confession, I should +have no right to answer you. There was none. Your daughter sent for +me, to speak to me; and speak we did; but she did not tell me +that--scoundrel's--name." + +"But you know!" + +"How dare you say that?" cried Carlton; and a flash of anger played for +an instant on his pallor. + +"I see it in your face; but I'll have it out of you! I'll have it out of +you," roared Musk, in a sudden frenzy, striking his stick to the floor, +"if I have to tear your smooth tongue out along with it! So smooth you +could read over that murdered girl, and know all the time who'd murdered +her, and think to keep that to yourself! But you sha'n't; no, that you +sha'n't; not if I have to stand here till midnight. You know! You know! +Deny it if you can!" + +"I shall deny nothing," retorted the other. "No, I shall deny nothing!" +he reiterated as if to himself. "But think for a minute, Mr. Musk--I +entreat you to think calmly for one minute! Suppose I could tell you +what you ask, could it serve any good end for you to know?" + +"Good end!" cried Musk. "Why, you know it could. I could kill the man +who's killed my daughter--and kill him I will--and swing for him if they +like. That'll be a wonderful good end all round!" + +"Then is it for me to throw temptation in your way? Is it for me to +spoil a life, if not to end it? For all you know, Mr. Musk, it may be a +life otherwise honest, useful, and of good report. Nay!" exclaimed Mr. +Carlton, as if suddenly impatient of his own reticence, "I'll go so far +as to say that it once was all three. And the man would do such +duty--make such amends----" + +A groan admitted that there were none to make, and finished a sentence +to which Musk had not listened; the one before was sufficient for him; +and his broad face shone with the satisfaction of a point gained. + +"Come," said he, "that's fairer! So you do know him, and you say so like +a man. I always took you for a man, sir, though there's been no love +lost between us; and I'll say I'm sorry I spoke so harsh just now, Mr. +Carlton; for I had a hold of the wrong end o' the stick--I see that now. +It was the man that confessed--it was the man. Sir, if you're the +Christian gentleman that I take you for, and this here Christianity o' +yours ain't all cant an' humbug, you'll tell me that man's name; for I +can't call to mind a single one she so much as looked at--unless it was +that young Mellis." + +"No, no; poor George is innocent enough, God knows!" + +"He's like to be, for all I hear. They say he carries a cross for you o' +Sundays--but I won't say no more about that. If he's your right hand in +the parish, as they tell me he is, at least I should hope he'd be +straight." + +A puff of wind came through the open window. It lifted the newspaper +from the open book, but the rector's hand fell quickly upon both. And +there it rested. And his wretched eyes rested upon his hand. + +"So I've never thought twice about George Mellis. I'd as soon think o' +you, sir. Then who can it be?" + +Mr. Carlton bounded to his feet, white as his collar, and quivering to +his nostrils. + +"You want to know?" + +"I mean to know, sir." + +"And to kill him--eh?" + +"I reckon I'll go pretty near it." + +"Ah, don't do it by halves!" cried Carlton in a strange high voice. +"Kill him now!" His hands fell open at his side; his head fell forward +on his breast; and he who had sinned grossly against God and man, yet +was not born to be a hypocrite, stood defenceless, abject, +self-destroyed. + +Moments passed; became minutes; and all the sound in the rectory study +came from the rattling of its inner door, or through the outer one from +the garden. Then by degrees a hard breathing broke on Robert Carlton's +ears; but he himself was the next to speak, flinging back his head in +sudden misery. + +"Why don't you strike?" he cried out. "You've got your stick; strike, +man, strike!" + +It seemed an hour before the answer came, in a voice scarcely +recognizable as that of Jasper Musk, it was so low and calm; yet there +was an intensity in the deep, slow tones that matched the fearful +intensity of the fixed light eyes; and the massive face was still and +livid from the short steel beard to the virile silver hair. + +"Oh, yes, I'll strike!" hissed Musk. "I'll strike! I'll strike!" And he +struck with his eyes until the other's fell once more; until the guilty +man collapsed headlong in his chair, his arms upon the table, and his +face upon his arms. "But I'll strike in my own way, thank you," Musk +went on, "and in my own good time. You shall smart a bit first--learn +what it's like to suffer--taste hell upon earth in case there's no hell +for bloody murderers beyond! How I wish you could see yourself! How I +wish your precious flock could see you--and they shall. Whited sepulchre +. . . filthy hypocrite . . . living lie!" + +Deliberately chosen, with long pauses between, with many a rejection of +the word that came uppermost--the worse word that was too strong to +sting--these measured epithets carved round the heart that unbridled +abuse would have stabbed and stunned. Carlton could hide his face, but +he quivered where he sprawled, and the other nodded in savage +self-esteem. + +"Not that I had ought to be surprised," continued Musk; "it's what might +have been expected of a Jesuit in disguise; the only wonder is I didn't +suspect you from the first. I never set up for being a charitable man; +but that seems I was a damned sight too charitable towards you. I +thought no wrong, whatever else I may have thought of you and your ways. +No; I may have jeered, I may have been vexed, but my mind wasn't nasty +enough for that. God! that I can keep my stick off you, when I remember +the choir practices, and the organ practices, and the Bible classes, and +the Young Women's Christian Association. Sounds well, don't it? Young +Women's Christian Association! Now we know what it meant; now we know +what it all means, church and parsons, religion and all; a sink of +iniquity and a set of snivelling, whining, licentious----" + +"Stop!" cried Carlton, manned at last, and on his feet to enforce the +word. "Say what you please of me, do what you will to me. Nothing is too +bad for me--I deserve the very worst. But abuse my Church you shall not, +in my hearing." + +"His Church!" sneered Musk. "A lot you've done to make me respect it, +haven't you? My God, can you stand there looking at me as if I were in +the wrong instead o' you? Do you know what you've done, and confessed to +doing? You've murdered my girl, just as much as though you'd taken and +cut her throat, you have: more, you've murdered her body and soul, you +that snivel about the soul! And you can stand there and whine about your +Church! Is that all you've got to say for yourself--to the father of the +woman you've ruined to her grave?" + +"That is all I have to say to you, Mr. Musk. I will not insult you by +asking your forgiveness, much less by attempting to make the shadow of +an excuse; there could be none; nor can there be any forgiveness for me +from you or your wife; nor do I look for any mercy in this parish, or +this world. Go, spread the news, and ruin me in my turn; it's what I +deserve, and mean to bear." + +"Not so fast," said Musk--"not so fast, if you please. So I'm to spread +the news, am I? And do you think I'm so proud that's the reverend? By +your leave, Mr. Carlton, I'll keep that same news to myself till I've +had all I want from it." + +"Any refinement you like," said Carlton. "It will not be too bad for +me--or too much--please God!" + +Jasper Musk put on his hat, but came close up to the clergyman before +taking his leave. + +"I wish I knew you better!" he ground out through his teeth. "I wish I'd +made up to you like the women, instead of giving you the wide berth I +have. Do you know why? Because I'd have known how to hit you hardest," +said Musk, hissing like a snake; "because I'd have known where to hurt +you most!" + +Carlton stood a trifle more upright: his enemy's malice ministered +subtly to his remnant of self-respect. + +"I wish I'd been a church-goer," continued Musk; "but it's never too +late to mend! I may be there to-morrow to hear you preach; maybe I'll +have a word to say myself; maybe I shall not. You'll know when the time +comes, and not before." + +Carlton quailed, for the first time at a threat, and his visible terror +seemed to intoxicate the other. Seizing him by the shoulder as he had +seized his wife, clutching him like a wild beast, and thrusting his +great face to within an inch of that of the unhappy clergyman, Jasper +Musk spat lewd names, and foul insult, and wanton blasphemy, until +breath failed him. All the vileness he had heard in sixty years, and +could recall in half as many seconds, poured from him in a very +transport of insensate ribaldry; words that had never left his lips +before, crowded to them now; and were still ringing in a swimming head +when Robert Carlton woke to the fact that he was once more alone. + +His first sensation was one of overwhelming nausea. His very vitals +writhed; and he reeled heavily against an open bookcase, casting an arm +along one of the upper shelves, and resting his face upon the sleeve. +For a few moments all his weight was upon that arm; then he opened his +eyes, and the titles of the books engaged his dazed attention. None was +apt, but all were familiar, and the familiarity maddened the stricken +man. He stood glaring from one low wall to another, filled with those +doubts which are the cruel satellites of transcendent anguish. Had it +really happened after all? The room was so unchanged, from the few +things on the walls to the many in the chair! All was so homely, so +intimate, so reassuring; and no visible trace of Musk! Had he ever been +there at all? + +Ah, yes, for he had gone! In the distance a gate had squealed, and shut +with a rattle; the sound had lain in his ear; now it sank to the brain. +Now, too, another sound, intermittent all this time, but meaningless +hitherto, assumed a like significance. This was the continued rustling +of a newspaper, as the wind whisked in at the open door and out by the +open window in invisible harlequinade. The man's mind fled back a +little lifetime of minutes. And he recalled the last puff and rustle, +and the quick falling of his own hand upon the paper, which lay on his +desk, as the last event of a past era of his existence--the last act of +Robert Carlton, hypocrite! + +And what was the peril that had made the final demand upon his caution +and his cunning? It was a new irony to perceive at once that it had +existed chiefly in guilty imagination; to remove the paper, and to +reveal nothing more incriminating than the parish register of deaths, +with an unfinished entry in his own hand, a spatter of ink in place of a +name, and some round white blisters lower down the leaf. Yet this it was +that had brought Carlton to his knees an hour ago; and it brought him to +his knees again, not at the desk of formal prayer, but here at his table +as before. + +"Father have mercy on me," he prayed, "for I neither deserve nor desire +any mercy from man!" + + + + +IV + +MIDSUMMER NIGHT + + +And while he knelt the situation was developing, with unforeseen and +truly merciful rapidity, in an utterly unsuspected quarter; thus an +aggressive knock at the inner door came in a sense as an answer to the +prayer it interrupted. + +The rectory servants consisted at this time of a small but entire family +employed wholesale out of pure philanthropy. And this was the mother, +red-hot in her cheap crape, to say that she had heard everything--could +not help hearing--and that house was no longer any place for respectable +women and an honest lad--no, not if they had to sleep in the fields. So +the lad had got their boxes on a barrow, but he would bring it back. And +they would go, all of them, to Lakenhall Union, sooner than stay another +hour in that house of shame. + +Mr. Carlton produced his cash-box without a word, and counted out a +month's wages for each in addition to arrears. The poor woman made a +gallant stand against the favour, but, submitting, returned to her +kitchen of her own accord, and to her master's study in a quarter of an +hour, to tell him she had laid the table, and there was a wire cover +over the meat. + +"And may God forgive you, sir!" cried she at parting. "I couldn't have +believed it if I hadn't heard it from your own lips with my own ears!" + +There was much that Carlton himself could not believe. He sat half +stupefied in his deserted rectory, like a man marooned, his one acute +sensation that of his sudden solitude. What was so hard to realize was +that the people knew! that the whole parish would know that night, and +his own family next week, and the whole world before many days. He was +well aware of the certain consequences of this scandal and its +disclosure; he had faced them only too often during the nightmare of the +past week, imagining some, ascertaining others. What seemed so +incredible was that he had made the disclosure himself, that the very +father had not suspected him to the end! + +The last reflection convulsed him with self-contempt. What a hypocrite +he must be! What an unconscious hypocrite, the worst kind of all! + +Here he was eating his supper; he had no recollection of coming to the +table; yet, now that he had caught himself, the food did not choke him, +he was not sick with shame; he only despised himself--and went on. + +It was dusk. He must have lit the lamp himself; as he lifted it from the +table, having risen, he caught sight of its reflection and his own in +the overmantel, and set the lamp upon the chimneypiece, and by its light +had a better look at himself than he could remember having taken in his +life before. There was no vanity in the man; he was studying his face +out of sheer curiosity, from a new and quite impersonal point of view, +as that of an enormous hypocrite and voluptuary. + +Human nature was very strange: he himself would never have suspected +such a face. The forehead was so broad and high, the deep-set eyes so +steadfast, and yet so fervid! They were the eyes of a zealot, but no +visionary: wisdom and understanding were in that bulge of the brow over +each. But the evil writing is lower down, unless you look for positive +crime or madness; yet these nostrils were sensitive, not sensual; and +the mouth, yes, the mouth showed between the short brown beard and the +heavy brown moustache; but what it showed was its strength. No; neither +weakness nor wickedness were there; even Robert Carlton admitted that. +But to be strong, and yet to fall; to mean well, and do evil; to look +one thing, and to be another: all that was to embody a type for which he +himself had ever entertained an unbridled loathing and contempt. + +He carried the lamp to his study, and as he entered from within there +was a knock at the outer door. One was waiting to see the rector, one +who had waited and knocked there oftener than any other in the parish. + +Carlton drew back, and the impulse of flight was strong upon him for the +first time. It needed all his will to shut the inner door behind him, +and to cry with any firmness, "Is that George Mellis?" + +In response there burst into the room a lad in knickerbockers, +broad-shouldered, muscular, yet smooth-faced, and mild-eyed all his +nineteen years; but this was the supreme moment of them all; and his +woman's eyes were on fire as he planted himself before the rector and +his lamp, pale as ashes in its rays. + +"Is it true?" he gasped. "Is it true?" + +This lad was Carlton's chief disciple, his admirer, his imitator, his +enthusiastic champion and defender; his right hand in all good works; +nay more, his acolyte, his lieutenant of the sanctuary; and, before a +broad chest so agitated, and innocent eyes so wild, the culprit's +courage failed him at last, so that the truth clove to his tongue. + +"It's all over the village," the lad continued in gasps. "You know what +I mean. They're all saying it. They say you've admitted it; for God's +sake say you haven't! Only deny it, and I'll go back and cram their lies +down their throats!" + +But by this Mr. Carlton had recovered himself, and was looking his last +upon the anxious eager face of the lad who had loved and honoured him: +his final pang was to see the eagerness growing, the anxiety lessening, +his look misunderstood. And this time the admission was halt and hoarse. + +What followed was also different; for, with scarcely a moment's +interval, young Mellis burst into tears like the overgrown child that he +was, and, flinging himself into the rector's chair, sobbed there +unrestrainedly with his smooth face in his strong red hands. Carlton +watched him by a prolonged effort of the will; he would shirk no part of +his punishment; and no part to come could hurt much more than this. His +fixed eyes were waiting for the boy's swimming ones when at length the +latter could look up. + +"You, of all men!" whispered Mellis. "You who have kept us all +straight--me for one. Why, the very thought of you has helped me to +resist things! You, with your religion: no more religion for me!" + +At that the other broke out; his religion he could still defend; or +thought he could, until he came to try, and his own unworthiness slowly +strangled the words in his throat. + +"Say what you like," said Mellis; "it was you brought me to church; it's +you who turn me away; and I'll go to no other after yours. Only to +think----" + +And he plunged into puerile reminiscences of their religious life in +common, quoting extreme points in the rich ritual in which he had been +privileged to assist, as though they aggravated the case, and made it +more incredible than it was already. + +"If our Lord Himself----" + +It did not need the rector's finger to check that blasphemy; but the +thing was said; the thought was there. + +"Yes; better go," said Carlton, as the lad leapt up. "Go; and let no one +else come near me who ever believed in me; for I can better face my +bitterest enemies. Yet you--you must be one of them! After her own +father, no man should hate me more!" + +And there was a new pain in his voice, a new agony of remorse, as memory +stabbed him in a fresh place. But the boy shook his head, and hung it +with a blush. + +"You think I cared for her," he said. "I thought so, too, until she went +away. I should have cared more then! It troubled me for a time; but I +got over it; and then I knew I was too young for all that. Besides, she +never looked at me after you came; that's another thing I see now; and I +know I ran less after her. Yes, I was too young to love a woman," cried +this village lad, "but I wasn't too old to love you, and look up to +you, and follow you in all you did. I tell you the honest truth, Mr. +Carlton," and his great eyes flashed their last reproach: "I'd have died +for you, sir, I would! And I'd die now--thankfully--if it could make you +the man I thought you were!" + +This interview left Carlton's mind more a blank than ever. It might have +been an hour later, or it might have been in ten minutes, that the +thought occurred to him--if his dearest disciple felt thus, what must +the enemy feel? And he was a man with enemies enough in the parish, +having followed the old order of country parson, and that with more +vigour than diplomacy. In eighteen months his reforms had been manifold +and drastic beyond discretion. It is true that his preaching had won him +more followers than his priestcraft had turned away. Yet a more acute +ecclesiastic would have tapped the wedge instead of hammering it; the +consummate priest would have condescended further in the direction of a +more immediate and a wider popularity. Carlton had gone his own way, +consulting none, attracting many, offending not a few. And he expected +the speedy settlement of many a score. + +Nor had he long to wait. Lamp in hand, he was locking up the house as +mechanically as he had fed his body; but one thing had pricked him in +the performance, and he tingled still between gratitude and fresh grief. +He had a Scotch collie, Glen by name, a noble dog, that was for ever at +its master's heels. So, during any service, the chain was a necessary +evil; but straight from his vestry, in cassock and biretta, the rector +would march to his backyard to release the dog. To-day he had +forgotten; nor was it till the master's round brought him to the back +premises that the poor beast barked itself into notice. Then, indeed, +the dazed man realized that his outer ear had been calmly listening to +the barking for some time; and, with a small thing to be sorry for +again, and one friend behind him, he continued his round, a sentient +being once more. + +It was upstairs that the dog barked afresh, causing Carlton to snatch +his head from the basin of cold water in which he had sought to assuage +its fever, and to go over to his open window, towel in hand. No sooner +had he reached it than he started back, and stood very still with the +water dripping from his beard. When he did dry his face it was as though +he wiped all colour from it too. And it was six feet of quivering clay +that returned on tip-toe to that open window. + +The new moon was setting behind the trees towards Linkworth; there was +no need of its meagre light. Lanterns, bright lanterns, were closing in +upon the rectory: at first the unhappy man had seen lanterns only, +swinging close to the ground, swilling the lawn with light. Stealthy +legs, knee-deep in this light, he remembered after his recoil. But not +till he had driven himself back to the window did he see the set faces, +or realize the fury of his people, kindled against him by his own +confession of his own guilt. + +When he saw this his nerve went, and he stood with clasped hands, the +perspiration bursting from his skin. And the lanterns shook out into a +chain along the edge of the lawn, and were held up to search the face of +the house, all as yet without a word. + +"That's his room," whispered one at last; "that--where the light is!" + +It was the voice of the schoolmaster, himself a churchwarden, and withal +an honest creature who was merely as many things as possible to as many +men. His part had been a little difficult lately. "This has simplified +it," thought the rector; and the twinge of bitterness did him good. + +He was a man again for one moment; the next, "He's in his room," cried +another, aloud; "that's him standing at the window!" + +And there burst forth a howl of execration, that rose to a yell as the +delinquent disappeared and in his panic put out the light. + +"You coward!" + +"Ah, you skunk!" + +"Bloody Papist!" + +"Hypocrite!" + +They were the better names; each shot his own, and capped the last; the +schoolmaster, mad with excitement, blaspheming with the best. + +"Come down out of that, ye devil!" + +"Do you show yourself, you cur!" + +And this command Robert Carlton obeyed, his manhood rising yet again. +But no sooner was he at the window than both panes crashed to powder +over his head, and the surrounding bricks rang with the volley. The +clergyman had a scratch from the falling glass, and a stone stung him on +the hand. The blood bubbled in his veins. + +"Cowards and curs yourselves!" he shouted down, shaking his fists at the +crowd; and in ten seconds he was at the front door, with a couple of +walking-sticks snatched from the stand. But he himself had turned the +key and shot the bolt within the last few minutes, and this gave him +time to think. + +"Quiet, sir--quiet!" he cried to the dog at his heels. "They've right on +their side," he groaned, "after all! Quiet, old doggie; come back; it's +all deserved. And it's only the beginning of what we've got to bear!" + +So he bore it, sitting on the stairs, where no window overlooked him, +and soothing Glen with one hand, restraining him with the other; and +yet, for his sin, despising his forbearance, even while he continued +telling himself it was his duty to forbear. + +And now breaking glass and barking dog made night a nightmare in the +dark and empty house: the infuriated villagers were smashing the rectory +windows one by one. Where the blind was up, the glass spread, and the +stone flew far into the room; where the blind was down, stone and glass +rattled against it, and fell in one heap with one clatter. So +dining-room and drawing-room were wrecked in turn, at short range, with +the heaviest available metal, and much interior damage. And still the +master of the house sat immovable within, nodding grimly at each crash; +wincing more at the curses; and once releasing the dog to stop his ears +altogether. + +It was no use; curiosity compelled him to listen; he was forbidden to +shirk one stripe. And that was a communicant, that cursing demon; this +was the schoolmaster, yelling like one of his own boys; the other +Palmer, of the Plough and Harrow, a very old enemy, hoarse as a crow +with drink and triumph. Young Cubitt, again, who cheered each crash, was +one of the disaffected; but till to-night most of this howling mob had +been his flock. Now all the good work was undone, was stultified, the +good seed poisoned in the ground; and not for the first, and not for the +fiftieth time that week, the confessed rake asked himself whether more +harm than good would not come of his confession. + +Meanwhile, of all the voices that he heard and could distinguish, only +one diverted his self-contempt for an instant. This was the soft, +passionless voice of a young gentleman, evidently not himself engaged in +the stone-throwing, pointing out panes still to break to those who were. +This was the voice of Sidney Gleed. + +The thing had gone on for ten minutes or more when the outcry altered in +character: an interruption had occurred: was it the police? No, the +rector of the parish was too well acquainted with the character of its +solitary constable. He would come up when all was over. Then who could +this be? + +The shower of stones had ceased as suddenly as it had begun. New oaths +were flying in a new direction, and a voice hitherto unheard was heaping +abuse on the abusers; with a strange thrill, the clergyman recognised it +as the voice of Tom Ivey, the young contractor who was building the +transepts; and he could remain no longer on the stairs. Stealing into +the drawing-room, he stumbled across a crackling drift of glass, and, +unnoticed now, stood in the wrecked bow-window, with the fresh air upon +his face once more. + +Lanterns were skipping right and left, their erratic rays giving +momentary glimpses of a stalwart figure in pursuit, a stick whirling +about his ears, and resounding on the backs and shoulders of the +retreating rabble. Some stayed to stone the new foe before they ran; and +one, Palmer the publican, set his lantern on the gravel and squared up +in style. Robert Carlton never saw what followed; for at this moment his +maddened dog, which had been tearing about the house in search of an +outlet, bounded past him through the shattered window; and, when the +rout was complete, the inn-keeper's lantern was a solitary star in the +nether darkness. Then the gate clattered, a swinging step approached, +and Tom Ivey caught up the lantern in his stride. + +Carlton sprang through the window to meet him, every other emotion sunk +for the moment in one of overflowing gratitude. + +"Tom," he cried, "how can I thank you----" + +"Keep your thanks to yourself." + +"But--Tom----" + +"Don't 'Tom' me! Keep your distance too. Do you think I haven't heard +about it? Do you think I'd lift a finger for _you_--let alone a stick? +No, sir, I'd liefer take that to your own back; but I fare to mind when +the Rector of Long Stow was a good man, who didn't preach too tall, but +acted up to what he did preach; and I won't see the house he lived in +wrecked and ruined because a blackguard's followed him." + +"I am all that," said Mr. Carlton. "Go on!" + +The other stared, not so much disarmed as confounded. + +"I'm sorry to open so wide, and you know I'm sorry," he at length burst +out. "'Tain't for me to call you over, sir, and I won't tell you no more +lies. I couldn't bear to see them snarling curs setting on you the +moment you was down, and that's the truth! But it wasn't what I come +back to say," continued Ivey doggedly. "I come back to say you can get +another party to go on with that there building, for I won't work no +more for you. The plant's yours; you found that for the job; you can +find more men. I throw up the contract: take the law of me if you like." + +Robert Carlton was back in his study. It was the one front room which +had escaped inviolate; the open lattice had saved it; not a pebble added +to the old disorder. The rector sighed relief as he held up the lamp on +entering; then he shot the rubbish out of the big arm-chair, and himself +lay back in it like the dead. A bloody smear, where the glass had grazed +his cheek, enhanced his pallor; his eyes were closed; no muscle moved. +And yet his wits clung to him like wolves, till presently the white brow +wrinkled, the heavy eyelids twitched. + +"May I come in, reverend?" said the saddler's voice. + +Carlton assented with a sigh, but did not raise himself to greet the +visitor, who came in mopping his forehead, reversed the chair at the +writing table, and seated himself with ominous deliberation. Then he +mopped again, and was slow to speak; but his scornful expression +prepared the clergyman for more of that which he was resolved to bear. + +"Pharisees!" cried Fuller at last. "Humbugs and hypocrites!" + +The words were precisely those which Robert Carlton expected and must +endure, but against the plural number he felt bound to protest. "We are +not all alike, Mr. Fuller," he said; "thank God, I am but one out of +many thousands." + +"You?" cried the saddler. "Gord love yer, reverend, did you think I +meant _you_? No, sir, it's the stupid fools and canting cowards _I_ +mean, that take and hit a man as soon as ever he's down; not the man +they hit." + +Mr. Carlton sat silent, astounded, and tingling between pain and +pleasure. He fancied he had run through the gamut of the emotions, but +here was a new one that he feared to dissect. + +"Not the man," proceeded the saddler in raised tones--"not the man who +is worth the rest of the parish put together--saint or sinner--guilty or +innocent!" + +Yes, it was pleasure! It was pleasure, acute and lawless, wicked, +ungovernable, and yet to be governed. To have one man's sympathy, how +sweet it was, but how shameful in a guilty heart that would be contrite +too! It had brought a colour to his face, a light to his eyes; ere the +one had faded, and the other failed, Robert Carlton's will had frozen +that tiny rill of comfort at its fount. + +"You mustn't say that," was his belated reply; but it came curt and cold +enough to please himself. + +"But I do say it," cried old Fuller, "and I will say it, and I won't say +a word more than I mean. Let there be no mistake between us, reverend: I +don't deny I felt what _is_ felt when first I heard; but when I come to +think of it, that fared to break my heart more'n to make that boil; and +when I thought a bit deeper, I see how easy that is to make bad worse. +Not as it ain't right bad; but that wasn't for us to make it worse. So +it was me fetched Tom Ivey. And now he tells me what he ups and says +himself when all was over. 'Gord love yer, Tom,' says I, 'you'll be +ashamed of that when you're a man of my experience! You forget the good +our reverend's been doing amongst us all this time, and you think only +o' this here evil. I'll go up,' says I, 'and I'll show him there's one +fair-minded, level-headed man o' the world in this here hotbed o' fools +and Pharisees.'" + +"But Tom was right, and you were wrong." + +"Don't tell me, reverend," said the saddler, edging his chair nearer to +the long limp figure under the lamp. "You can't undo the good you've +once done, not if you try. Leave religion out of it, and look at all +you've done for the poor: look at the coal club, and the book club, and +the dispensary, and the Young Man's----" + +"Unhappily, Fuller, all this is beside the question." + +And the cold tone was no longer put on; neither did it cover an emotion +which called for conscientious suppression; for these officious sallies +only fretted the spirit they were intended to soothe. + +"Well, then," rejoined Fuller, "if you prefer it, and for the sake of +argument, look at a poor old feller like me. What should _I_ ha' done +without you, reverend? I don't come to church, yet you take no offence +when I tell you why, but you argue the point like a rare 'un, and you +lend me the paper just the same. The Reverend Jackson wouldn't ha' done +it, though I durs'n't stay away in his day; he'd have stopped my +livelihood in a week. So don't you fare to make yourself out worse than +you are, reverend; you've done wrong, I allow, but so did Solomon, and +so did David; and weren't so quick to own up to it, either! Like them, +you've done good, too, and plenty of it, and that sha'n't be forgotten +if I can help it. As for the poor young thing that's gone----" + +"Don't name her, I beg!" + +"Very well, sir, I won't. I'm as sorry as the rest o' the parish; but we +shouldn't be unfair because we're sorry. They may say what they like, +but a man of my experience knows that nine times out of ten the woman's +more to blame----" + +"Out of my house!" + +Carlton had leapt to his feet, was standing at his full height for the +first time that night, and pointing sternly to the door. His face was +white with passion. The saddler's jaw dropped. + +"What, sir?" he gasped. + +"Out of my sight--this instant!" + +"For sayun----" + +"For daring to say one half of what you have said! It's my own fault. +I've spoilt you; but out you go." + +Fuller rose slowly, amazed, bewildered, and mortified to the quick. He +was a kind-hearted man, but he had all the superior peasant's obstinacy +and self-conceit: the one had helped to bring him to the clergyman's +side, the other to wag his tongue. Yet his sympathy was genuine enough; +and the theory, of which the bare hint had spilled vials of wrath upon +his head, was in fact his profound conviction. Smarting vanity, +however, was the absorbing sensation of the moment. And for the next +hour the saddler could have returned every few minutes with some fresh +retort; but in the moment of humiliation he could not rise above a +grumble: + +"I might as well have thrown stones with the rest!" + +"Better," the clergyman cried after him. "You had a right to punish me; +to pity and excuse me you had none. Least of all----" + +He broke off, and stood at his door till the quick steps stopped, and +the gate clattered, and the steps died away. The night was dark, and +this end of the village already very still: the Plough and Harrow was +nearer the other. The wind had not fallen; a murmur of very distant +thunder came with it from the west. Nearer home a peewit called, and +Robert Carlton caught himself wondering whether there would be rain +before morning. + + + + +V + +THE MAN ALONE + + +At midnight he was still alone, and the slow torture of his own thoughts +was still a relief. As the dining-room clock struck--he noted its +preservation--and the thin strokes floated through those broken windows +and in at that of the study, he gave up listening for the next step. His +privacy seemed secure at last. He could abandon his spirit to its proper +torments; he could enter upon another night in hell. Yet, even now, the +worst was over, and there would be no more nights of secret grief, +secret remorse, secret shame. He had confessed his sin, and thereby +earned his right to suffer. No more to hide! No more deceit! He could +not realize it yet; he only knew that his heart was lighter already. He +felt ashamed of the relief. + +Yet another night came back to him as he paced his floor: a last year's +night when the full moon shone through ragged trees. It also had been +worse than this: it was the inner life that lay in ruins then. He +remembered pacing till sunrise as he was pacing now: such a still night +but for that; one had but to stand and listen to hear the very fall of +the leaf. He remembered thus standing, there at the door, in the +moonlight, and a line that had buzzed in his head as he listened. + + "And yet God has not said a word!" + +God had spoken now! + +And the man was glad. + +Glad! He almost revelled in his disgrace; it produced in him unexpected +sensations--the sensations of the debtor who begins to pay. Here was an +extreme instance of the things that are worse to dream of than to +endure. He felt less ignominious in the hour of his public ignominy than +in all these months of secret shame. He was living a single life once +more. The wind roamed at will through the damaged house as through the +ribs of a wreck; and its ruined master drew himself up, and his stride +quickened with his blood. He was no longer lording it in his pulpit, the +popular preacher of the countryside, drawing the devout from half a +dozen parishes, a revelation to the rustic mind, a conscious libertine +all the while, with a tongue of gold and a heart of lead. More than all, +he was no longer the one to sit secure, in loathsome immunity, in +sickening esteem: he, the man! The woman had suffered; it was his turn +now. Woman? The poor child . . . the poor, dead, murdered child . . . +Well! the wages of his sin would be worse than death; they were worse +already. And again the man was glad; but his momentary and strange +exultation had ended in an agony. + +The poor, poor girl . . . + +No; nothing was too bad for him--not even the one thing that he would +feel more than all the rest in bulk. He put his mind on that one thing. +He dwelt upon it, wilfully, not in conscious self-pity, but as one eager +to meet his punishment half-way, to shirk none of it. The attitude was +characteristic. The sacrificial spirit informed the man. In another age +and another Church he had done barbaric violence to his own flesh in the +name of mortification. Living in the latter half of the nineteenth +century, a mere Anglican, he was content to play tricks with a fine +constitution in Lent. + +"I will look my last upon it," he said aloud: "it would be insulting God +and man to attempt to take another service after this; I have held my +last, and laid my last stone. Let me see what I have sown for others to +reap." + +And he picked his way through the darkness to the church. + +The path intersected a narrow meadow with the hay newly cut, and lying +in tussocks under the stars; a light fence divided this reef of glebe +from the churchyard; and, just within the latter, a lean-to shed faced +the scaffolding of the north transept, its back against the fence. The +shed was flimsy and small, but it had come out of the rector's pocket; +the transepts themselves were to be his gift, because the living was too +good for a celibate priest, and it was his sermons that had made the +church too small. So he had paid for everything, even to the mason's +tools inside the shed, because Tom Ivey had never had a contract before +and lacked capital. And the out-door interest of the building had formed +a healthy complement to the engrossing affairs of the sanctuary; and, +indeed, they had developed side by side. Perhaps the material changes +had proved the more absorbing to one who threw himself headlong into +whatsoever he undertook. Of late, especially, it had been remarked that +the reverend was taking quite an extraordinary part in these +proceedings: cultivating a knack he had of carving in stone; neglecting +cottages for his mason's shed; and tiring himself out by day like a man +who dreads the night. How he had dreaded it none had known, but now all +might guess. + +Yet he had loved his work for its own sake, not merely as a distraction +from gnawing thoughts; there was in him something of the elemental +artist: the making of anything was his passionate delight. And now the +scene of his industry inflicted a pang so keen that he forgot to +appreciate it as part of his deserts; and, for the moment, priest and +sinner disappeared in the grieving artist, bidding good-bye not only to +his studio, but to art itself. It was very dark; the place was strewn +with uncut boulders, poles, barrows, heaps of rubble; but he knew his +way through the litter, and, in the double darkness of the shed, could +lay his hand on anything he chose. He took something down from a shelf. +It was a gargoyle of his own making, meant for the vestry door in the +south transept. He stood with it in both hands, and his thumbs felt the +eyes and his palms the cheeks, at first as gently as though the stone +were flesh, then suddenly with all his strength, as if to crush the +grotesque head to powder. It was not a useful thing: no water could +spout from the sham mouth which he had wrought with loving pains. It was +only his idea for finishing off the label moulding of the vestry door; +it was only something he had made himself--for others to throw away, or +to keep and show as the handiwork of the immoral rector of Long Stow. He +restored it to his place; and retraced his sure steps through the +rubbish, artist no more. Good-bye to that! + +He crossed over to the church, went round to the porch, and entered by +the only door in use during the alterations. Eighteen months ago he +would have found it locked. It was he who had opened the House of God to +all comers at all hours, and made every sitting free. He stole up the +aisle as one seeing in the dark. His feet fell softly on the matting, +where in early days they had clattered on bare flags, and yet more +softly when they had mounted a step without stumbling. The matting in +the aisle was his addition, the rich carpet in the chancel was his gift. +All his innovations had not provoked dissension. Presently he lit a +lamp, a Syrian treasure, highly wrought, that hung over the lectern: he +had bought it at Damascus, years before, for his church when he should +have one. Yes; he had given freely to God's House, to make it also the +House Beautiful, though he took no trouble to adorn his own. + +And this was to be the end! For events could take but one course now: a +complaint to the bishop (all the parish would sign it), a summons to the +palace, a trial at the consistory court; suspension certainly; +deprivation, perhaps; he had been at some pains to inform himself on the +subject. The bishop would be sore. He had taken such an interest in +everything at the confirmation, his sympathy had been so full and +unexpected, his approval so stimulating, so hearty and frank! Carlton +was ashamed of thinking of his bishop instead of praying to God upon his +knees. He longed to kneel and pray, for the last time, there at the +table which he chose to call the altar, but which he had found ugly and +bare, and was leaving richly laden and richly hung. In the small and +distant light of the lectern lamp he stood gazing at the damask +hangings, the green frontal, the silver candlesticks, the flowers from +his own garden--the flowers he grew for this. He longed to kneel, but +could not. He could not pray. He could not weep. His heart was a grave, +and the grave filled in and the weight of the earth upon his spirit. He +had been quite wrong an hour ago. _This_ was the blackest hour of all. +To have done and given so much, and to lose it all! To have set his +whole soul for years towards the light, to have striven so to turn the +souls of others; and to be thrust into outer darkness for one sin! + +This wave of bitterness, of blind rebellion and human egotism, bore him +out of his church, for the last time, in a passion of defiance and +self-defence: a sudden and deplorable change in such a man at such an +hour. Happily, it was short-lived. His angry stride brought him tripping +into fresh earth, and he started back, aghast at his egotism, stunned +afresh by his sin, and overwhelmed by such a flood of penitence and +remorse as even he had not endured before. Under his eyes the new grave +was growing clearer in the starlight, and not less cruel, and not less +cold. An hour later he was still kneeling over it, and his tears had not +ceased to flow. + + + + +VI + +FIRE + + +Witnesses have differed as to the exact hour at which the inhabitants of +Long Stow, sound asleep after excitement enough for one night, were +frightened from their beds by a sudden and violent ringing of the church +bells. The midsummer night was as dark as ever, and so it remained or +seemed to remain for a considerable time. It cannot have been more than +two o'clock. + +A few minutes before the alarm, Robert Carlton had forced himself to his +feet, to be struck with fresh shame at two apparent evidences of the +mood in which he had quitted the church. He had left the door wide open +and the church lit up. Every stone showed on the path, in the stream of +light poured upon it from the porch, into which, however, it was +impossible to see from where the rector stood. The porch projected from +the south side, while the new grave was directly opposite the west +window, every square of which stood out against the glare within. An +instant's reflection showed Carlton that this could not be the light +which he had left; he went to see what it was. A sudden heat upon his +face broke the truth to him in the porch, and in a stride he knew the +worst. A little fire was raging in the church: two or three pews were in +flames. + +Robert Carlton stood inactive for a score of seconds. It looked the kind +of fire that a vigorous man might have beaten out with his coat. Yet one +in the full vigour of his manhood stood thinking a score of thoughts +while the flames bit through the varnish into the wood. Nor was this the +fascination of horror: the fire looked such a little fire at the first +glance. It was rather the obsession of an astounding puzzle: what in the +world could have caused a fire at all? + +A guilty feeling came in answer: he must have dropped the match with +which he lit that lamp. The feeling escaped in the simultaneous +discovery that the lamp in question had been extinguished, but that it +and others were slightly awry, and one or two still swaying on their +chains, as though all the lamps had been rudely meddled with. And now +horror came. The flames were spreading with curious facility, shooting +their blue tongues over the woodwork before the yellow fangs took hold, +but all so quickly that the burning area seemed to have doubled itself +in these few seconds, while from the heart of it there came the crisp +crackle of quicker fuel, culminating in a blaze as though a rick had +caught; and, sure enough, as these flames leapt high, their source was +revealed in a pile of the rector's new straw hassocks. + +The puzzle was one no more: plainer work of incendiary was never seen. +Through the smoke now swinging in black coils to the roof, the east +window showed in holes made within the last hour, obviously to promote +the draught that blew in Carlton's face as he rushed back to the open +door and laid hold of all the bell-ropes at once. + +The bells were small and jangling; a new peal, and a tower to hang them +in, were among the things which the rector had said that he would have +some day. But as the old bells clanged for the last time, in the dead of +that summer night, they were heard at Linkworth, a mile and a half +across the wind, but down the wind they rang up half Bedingfield, which +is three good miles from Long Stow. + +The first inhabitant to reach the scene was the fleet and sturdy Tom +Ivey, whose mother kept the post-office in the middle of the village; as +he ran the ringing stopped, and the first glass smashed with the heat, +flame and smoke making a mouthpiece of the mullioned window in the north +wall as Tom dashed up by the short cut through the rectory garden. He +was greatly alarmed at finding no one in the churchyard, and rushed into +the church with the full expectation of discovering the ringer senseless +at his post. What he did find was the rector, standing within the +church, to windward of the conflagration, his back to the door, +absorbed, as it seemed, in a perfectly passive contemplation of the +fire. + +"Mr. Carlton!" shouted Tom. + +Before replying, the clergyman spun something into the heart of the +flames; in the thickening smoke it was impossible to see what; but the +same second he was round upon his heel, coughing and choking, his face +black, his eyes fires themselves, purpose and determination in every +limb. + +"Tom? Thank God it's you! We must get this under. Out of it before we +suffocate!" And with his own rush he carried the builder into the open +air. + +"What's done it, sir?" + +"Done it? Wait till we've undone it! We can if we work together. Ah! +here are more of you. Buckets, men--buckets!" cried Carlton, rushing to +meet a half-dressed medley at the gate, and commanding them as though +there had been no other meeting earlier in the night. "You who live +near, run for your own; the rest into my kitchen and find what you can; +buckets are the thing! One of you pump; the rest form line from my well +to the church, and keep passing along. You see to it, Mr. Jones!" + +And for a while the schoolmaster and churchwarden, carried away as usual +by his feelings and self-importance, was as busy enforcing the rector's +orders as he had made himself in breaking his windows an hour or two +before. + +"Let one man ride or run for the Lakenhall engine; not you, Tom!" +exclaimed the clergyman, seizing Ivey by the arm. "They'll be all night +coming, and I can't spare you." + +"I'll stay, sir." + +"Water's no use to windward of a fire; it's spreading straight up the +church. We want to be on the other side to stop it." + +"The aisle's not afire!" + +"But they couldn't get the water to us, even if we got through alive. +No; where the walls are down for the transepts--that's the place. Which +side's boarded strongest?" + +"Both the same, sir." + +"Then we'll hack through the nearest! A saw and an axe, and we'll be +through by the time the first bucketful's ready for us." + +And, friends again, but both unconscious of the change, they rushed +together to the shed of which Robert Carlton had so lately taken leave: +in the fever of the moment even that leave-taking was forgotten. + +It was the north transept which faced the shed. Already the walls were a +dozen feet high, but a doorway had been left. The greater gap between +transept and nave was vertically boarded over within the church, and on +these boards fell the rector with his axe, to make an opening for Tom's +saw. They had light enough for their work. The interstices between the +boards were as the red-hot strings of a colossal harp; quickly a couple +were cut, and the boards beaten in; and it was as though the wind had +come down a smoking chimney. The pair fell back on either side of the +black stream that gushed out like water. Then cried Carlton in his voice +of command: + +"Look here! you stay where you are, Tom." + +"With you, sir?" + +"No, I must have a look; but one's enough." + +"Not for me, Mr. Carlton. I follow you." + +"Then you keep me where I am," said Carlton, sternly. + +"All right, sir! You follow me!" + +Next instant they were both through the breach, the builder first by the +depth of his chest. And they stood up within, but were glad to crouch +again out of the smoke. Already a dense reek hid the roof, and every +moment added to the depth of that inverted sea. It was a sea of +ineffectual currents, setting towards the smashed windows, the new +breach, the open door, but caught and diverted and sucked into the inky +whirlpool that the wind made under the roof, and escaping only by chance +fits and sudden starts. On the other hand, there was still air enough to +breathe within a few feet of the ground, and with water it seemed as if +something might yet be done. But it was no longer a very little fire: at +best the nave must be gutted now; to save roof and chancel was the +utmost hope. Yet here and there the worst seemed over. The blazing +hassocks were now only a glowing heap, and still the roof had not +caught. As the two men crouched and watched, the flames felt the front +pews with their splay blue tentacles, and the woodwork which was still +untouched glistened like a human body in pain. + +"You see that?" said Mr. Carlton, pointing to this moisture. + +"What is it?" + +"Paraffin! Look at the lamps; he's simply emptied them----" + +"Who, sir--who?" + +"God knows, and may God forgive him! I have enemies enough this morning, +though not more than I deserve. If only they will be my friends for one +hour, for the sake of the church! Are they never coming with that water? +Run and tell them a bucketful would make a difference now, but cartloads +will make none in ten more minutes! And tell them what I said just now: +bid them for God's sake think of nothing but the fire till we get it +under." + +He was thinking of nothing else himself, confident still of some measure +of success, only fretting for his water. In Ivey's absence he stripped +to the waist, and with his long coat essayed to beat the little flames +out as they spread and leapt, the blue and yellow surf of the +encroaching tide; but for one he extinguished he fanned a hundred, so he +retreated before he was flayed alive. And they found him stooping near +the opening, half-naked, scorched, begrimed, but not disheartened; a +strange figure in the place that knew him best in vestments, if any of +them thought of that. + +The first man had a bucket in each hand, but had spilt freely from both +in his haste. Carlton would not let him in, but received the buckets +through the hole, dashed their contents over the burning pews, and +returned them empty without waiting to see results. When he had time to +look, a little steam was rising, but the fire raged with undiminished +fury. The next comer was a boy with a brimming watering-can; but it is +difficult to fling water with effect from such a vessel, and pouring was +impossible in the increasing heat. Then came Tom Ivey with two more +buckets. + +"Keep outside," cried Carlton, taking them. "There's only work for one +in here. Can't they form line as I said, and pass along instead of +carrying?" + +"No, sir--not enough of us for the distance." + +"Not enough of you who'll put the church before the parson! That's what +you mean. The parson may deserve burning alive, but the poor church has +done no wrong!" + +And he continued his exertions in a bitter spirit not warranted by the +real circumstances, for his masterful monopoly of all danger had won +some sympathy outside, and many a one who had flung a stone was running +with a bucket now. More, however, stood with their hands in their +pockets; for East Anglia is constitutionally phlegmatic, and not all the +village had joined in the indignant excesses of the evening. + +The saddler came no farther than the fence in front of his house and +workshop. He was that implacable creature, the offended countryman. + +George Mellis did not even see the fire; already he had shaken the dust +of Long Stow from his feet for good. + +Thus, of the three types, as far removed from one another as the points +of an equilateral triangle, who had put in their individual word of +reproach, of denunciation, and of sympathy more insufferable than +either, only one was present on this lurid scene; but that one was doing +the work of ten. + +"That there Tom Ivey," said one of a group on the safe side of the +rectory fence, "he fares all of a wash. Yet I do hear as how he come up +to the rectory when he'd cleared the garden and called Carlton over +somethun wonderful." + +"I lay it was nothun to the calling over he had from Jasper." + +"Where is Jasper?" + +"Been indoors ever since: a touch of the old trouble, the missus told +Jones when he called." + +"That's a pity. This would've soothed his sore." + +One or two observed that that fared to soothe theirs; for there was no +reaction on the safe side of the fence. But the worst said in the +Suffolk tongue was invariably capped by a different order of voice, +which chimed in now. + +"The best thing Carlton can do is to cockle up with his church. The +governor'll build you a new church and find a new man to fill it. +There's nobody keener on a change as it is. I should like to be there +when he hears . . ." + +The speaker was smoking a cigarette on a barrow wheeled from the shed. +He might have been watching a display of fireworks, and one which was +beginning to bore him. His unmoved eye sought change. It found the +sexton hobbling in the glare. + +"Hi, Busby! Come here, I want you. What the dickens do you mean by +setting fire to the church?" + +"Me set fire to it, Master Sidney? Me set a church afire? He! he! you +allus fare to have yer laugh." + +"It will be no laughing matter for you when you're run in for it, +Busby." + +"Go on, Master Sidney; you know better than that." + +"I wish I did. They hang for arson, you know! But I say, Busby, how's +the frog?" + +The wizened face grew grave, but only as the screen darkens between the +pictures; next instant it was alight with the ineffable joy of gratified +monomania. The sexton hobbled nearer, clawing his vest. + +"Oh, that croap away; that's at that now! Would 'ee like to listen, +Master Sidney?" + +"No, thanks, Busby; don't you undo a button," said the young gentleman, +hastily. "I can hear it from where I am." + +The sexton went into senile raptures. + +"You can hear it? You can hear it? Do you all listen to that: he can +hear it, he can hear it from where he sit. The little varmin, to croap +so loud! That must be the fire. That fare to make him blink! An' Master +Sidney, he can hear him from where he sit!" + +The sexton hurried off to spread his triumph; but he boasted to deaf +ears. There was a sudden light below the sharp horizon between black +roof and slaty sky, yet no flame rose above the roof. It was as though +the southern eaves had caught. Ivey rushed out of the north transept. +Mr. Carlton followed, axe in hand. His chest and arms were smudged and +inflamed, his blinking eyelids were burnt bare, and the sweat stood all +over him in the red light leaping from the shivered windows. + +"It's no use, lads!" he called to those still running with the buckets; +"the boards have caught on the other side. Come and help me smash them +in, and we may save the chancel yet! Every man who is a man," he shouted +to the group across the fence, "come--lend a hand to save God's +sanctuary!" + +And he led the way with his axe, stinging to the waist in the open air, +but drunk with battle and the battle's joy. And there was no more +talking behind the rectory fence; not a man was left there to talk; even +Sidney Gleed had dropped his cigarette to follow the inspired madman +with the axe. + +The south transept was a stage less advanced than the north. Carlton got +upon one low wall, ran along it to that of the nave, and swung his axe +into the burning wood to his right. A rent was quickly made; he leapt +into the transept and improved it, his axe ringing the seconds, the +muscles of his back bulging and bubbling beneath the scorched skin. Men +watched him open-mouthed. It seemed incredible that such nerve, such +sinew, such indomitable virility, should have hidden from their +vengeance that very night. + +"A ladder!" he cried. "There's one behind the shed." + +The wood screen was rent, but not to the top. Below, the fire was +checked, but above it still crawled east. Waiting for the ladder, +Carlton employed himself in widening the gap that he had made; when it +came, he had it held vertically against the eaves, left intact above the +boarding, and ran up to finish his own work with the axe held short in +his left hand. A couple of planks were smashed in unburnt. He stayed on +the ladder to see whether the flames would leap the completed chasm, +stayed until the rungs smoked under his nose. When the burning boards +fell in on his left, and those on his right did not even smoulder, he +returned quickly to the ground. + +Throats which had groaned that night were parching for a cheer. The time +was not ripe. A shrill cry came instead: the boarding upon the other +side had ignited in its turn. + +"Round with the ladder," cried the rector; "we'll soon have it out. We +know more about it now. We'll save the chancel yet! Find another axe; +we'll begin top and bottom at once." + +And now the scene was changing every minute. A sky of slate had become a +sky of lead. The tens who had witnessed the first stages of the fire had +multiplied into hundreds. Frightened birds were twittering in the trees; +frightened horses neighed in the road; every kind of vehicle but a +fire-engine had been driven to the scene. Among the graves stood a tall +and aged gentleman, with the top-hat of his youth crammed down to his +snowy eyebrows, and an equally obsolete top-coat buttoned up to his +silver whiskers, in conversation with Sidney Gleed. + +"The damned rascal!" said the old gentleman. "But how the devil did it +come out?" + +"Musk seems to have smelt a rat, and went to him after the funeral. And +he owned up as bold as brass; the servants heard him. There he goes, up +the ladder again on this side. Keeps the fun to himself, don't he? Who's +going to win the Leger, doctor? Shotover again?" + +"Damn the Leger," said Dr. Marigold, whose sporting propensities, bad +language, and good heart were further constituents in the most +picturesque personality within a day's ride. "To think I should have +stood at her death-bed," he said, "and would have given ten pounds to +know who it was; and it's your High Church parson of all men on God's +earth! The infernal blackguard deserves to have his church burnt down; +but he's got some pluck, confound him." + +"Sucking up," said Master Sidney: "playing to the gallery while he's got +the chance." + +"H'm," said the doctor; "looks to me pretty badly burnt about the back +and arms. If he wasn't such a damned rascal I'd order him down." + +"He's doing no good," rejoined the young cynic, "and he knows it. He's +only there for effect. Look! There's the roof catching, as any fool knew +it must; and here's the Lakenhall engine, in time for 'God save the +Queen.'" + +Dr. Marigold swore again: his good heart contained no niche for the heir +to the Long Stow property. He turned his back on Sidney, his face to the +sexton, who had been at his elbow for some time. + +"Well, Busby, what are you bothering about?" + +"The frog, doctor. That croap louder than ever." + +"You infernal old humbug! Get out!" + +"But that's true, doctor--that's Gospel truth. Do you stoop down and +you'll hear it for yourself. Master Sidney, _he_ heard it where he sit." + +"Did he, indeed! Then he's worse than you." + +"But that steal every bit I eat; that do, that do," whined the sexton. +"I've tried salts, I've tried a 'metic, an' what else can I try? That +fare to know such a wunnerful lot. Salts an' 'metics, not him! He look +t'other way, an' hang on like grim death for the next bit o' meat. +That's killin' me, doctor. That's worse nor slow poison. That steal +every bite I eat." + +"Well, it won't steal this," said the doctor, dispensing half-a-crown. +"Now get away to bed, you old fool, and don't bother me." + +And neither thanks nor entreaties would divert his eyes from the burning +church again. + +The antiquated doctor was one of Nature's sportsmen: his inveterate +sympathies were with the losers of up-hill games and games against time; +and this blackguard parson had played his like a man, only to lose it +with the thunder of the fire-engine in his ears. The roof had caught at +last; in a little it would be blazing from end to end; and half-a-dozen +country fire-engines, and half a hundred Robert Carltons, could do no +good now. Carlton came slowly enough down his ladder this time, and +stood apart with his beard on his chest. + +"Hard lines, hard lines!" muttered Dr. Marigold in his top-coat collar; +and "Those slow fools! Those sleepy old women!" with his favourite +participle in each ejaculation. + +A sky of lead had turned to one of silver. Across the open uplands, +beyond the conflagration, a kindlier glow was in the east. And in the +broad daylight the fire reached its height with as small effect as the +firemen plied their water. Nothing could check the roof. Ceiling, +joists, and slates burnt up like good fuel in a good grate. Now it was a +watershed of living fire; now an avalanche of red-hot ruin; now a column +of smoke and sparks, rising out of blackened walls; a column unbroken by +the wind, which had fallen at dawn with a little rain, the edge of a +shower that had shunned Long Stow. + +When the roof fell in there were few of the hundreds present who had not +retreated out of harm's way. Only the helmed firemen held their ground, +and two others with bare heads. Of the pair, one was standing dazed, +with his beard on the rough coat thrown about him, and an ear deaf to +his companion's entreaties, when the crash came and the sparks flew high +and wide through rent walls and gaping windows. The sparks blackened as +they fell. The first smoke lifted. And the dazed man lay upon his face, +the other kneeling over him. + +Dr. Marigold came running, for all his years and his long top-coat. + +"Did anything hit him, Ivey?" + +"Not that I saw, sir; but he fared as if he'd fainted on his feet, and +when the roof went, why, so did he." + +Marigold knelt also, and a thickening ring enclosed the three. + +"He's rather nastily burnt, poor devil." + +And the old doctor lifted a leaden wrist, felt it in a sudden hush, +examined a burn upon the same arm, and looked up through eyebrows like +white moustaches. + +"But not dangerously, damn him!" + + + + +VII + +THE SINNER'S PRAYER + + +The bishop of the diocese sat at the larger of the two desks in the +palace library. It was the thirteenth of the following month, and a wet +forenoon. At eleven o'clock his lordship was intent upon a sheet of +unlined foolscap, with sundry notes dotted down the edge, and the rest +of the leaf left blank. The bishop's sight was failing, but against +glasses he had set his face. So his whiskers curled upon the paper; and +the wide mouth between the whiskers was firmly compressed; and this +compression lengthened a clean-shaven upper lip already unduly long. But +the pose displayed a noble head covered with thin white hair, and the +broad brow that was the casket of a broad mind. Seen at his desk, the +massive head and shoulders suggested both strength and stature above the +normal. Yet the bishop on his legs was a little man who limped. And the +surprise of this discovery was not the last for an observer: for the +little lame man had a dignity independent of his inches, and a majesty +of mind which lost nothing, but gained in prominence, by the constant +contrast of a bodily imperfection. + +The bishop stood up when his visitor was announced, a minute after +eleven, and supported himself with one hand while he stretched the other +across his desk. Carlton took it in confusion. He had expected that +shut mouth and piercing glance, but not this kindly grasp. He was +invited to sit down. The man who complied was the ghost of the Rector of +Long Stow, as his spiritual overseer remembered him. His whole face was +as white as his forehead had been on the day of the fire. It carried +more than one still whiter scar. Yet in the eyes there burnt, brighter +than ever, those fires of zeal and of enthusiasm which had warmed the +bishop's heart in the past, but which somewhat puzzled him now. + +"I am sorry," said his lordship, "that you should have such weather for +what, I am sure, must have been an undertaking for you, Mr. Carlton. You +still look far from strong. Before we begin, is there nothing----" + +Carlton could hear no more. There was nothing at all. He was quite +himself again. And he spoke with some coolness; for the other's manner, +despite his mouth and his eyes, was almost cruel in its unexpected and +undue consideration. It was less than ever this man's intention to play +upon the pity of high or low. He had an appeal to make before he went, +but it was not an appeal for pity. Meanwhile his back stiffened and his +chest filled in the intensity of his desire not to look the invalid. + +"In that case," resumed the bishop, "I am glad that you have seen your +way to keeping the appointment I suggested. In cases of complaint--more +especially a complaint of the grave character indicated in my letter--I +make it a rule to see the person complained of before taking further +steps. That is to say, if he will see me; and I don't think you will +regret having done so, Mr. Carlton. It may give you pain----" + +Carlton jerked his hands. + +"But you shall have fair play!" + +And his lordship looked point-blank at the bearded man, as he had looked +in his day on many a younger culprit; and his voice was the peculiar +voice that generations of schoolboys had set themselves to imitate, with +less success than they supposed. + +Carlton bowed acknowledgment of this promise. + +"In the questions which I feel compelled to put"--and the bishop glanced +at his sheet of foolscap--"you will perhaps give me credit for studying +your feelings as far as is possible in the painful circumstances. I +shall try not to leave them more painful than I find them, Mr. Carlton. +But the complaint received is a very serious one, and it is not made by +one person; it has very many signatures; and it necessitates plain +speaking. It is a fact, then, that you are the father of an illegitimate +child born on the twentieth of last month in your own parish?" + +"It is a fact, my lord." + +"And the woman is dead?" + +"The young girl--is dead." + +The bishop's pen had begun the descent of the clean part of his page of +foolscap; when the last answer was inscribed, the writer looked up, +neither in astonishment nor in horror, but with the clear eye and the +serene brow of the ideal judge. + +"Of course," said he, "I am informed that you have already made the +admission. Let there be no affectation or misunderstanding between us, +on that or any other point. But as your bishop, and at least hitherto +your friend, I desire to have refutation or confirmation from your own +lips. You are at perfect liberty to deny me either. It will make no +difference to the ultimate result. That, as you know, will be out of my +hands." + +"I desire to withhold nothing, my lord," said Robert Carlton in a firm +voice. + +"Very well. I think we understand each other. This poor young woman, I +gather, was the daughter of a prominent parishioner?" + +"Of a prominent resident in my parish--yes." + +"But she herself was conspicuous in parochial work? Is it a fact that +she played the organ in church?" + +"It is." + +The fact was noted, the pen laid down; and the little old man, who +looked only great across his desk, leant back in his chair. + +"I am exceedingly anxious that you should have fair play. Let me say +plainly that these are not my first inquiries into the matter. I am +informed--I wish to know with what truth--that the young woman +disappeared for several months before her death?" + +"It is quite true." + +"And returned to give birth to her child?" + +"And to die!" said Carlton, in his grim determination neither to shield +nor to spare himself in any of his answers. But his hands were clenched, +and his white face glistened with his pain. + +The bishop watched him with an eye grown mild with understanding, and a +heart hot with mercy for the man who had no mercy on himself. But the +tight mouth never relaxed, and the peculiar voice was unaltered when it +broke the silence. It was the voice of justice, neither kind nor unkind, +severe nor lenient, only grave, deliberate, matter-of-fact. + +"My next question is dictated by information received, or let me say by +suspicions communicated. It is a vital question; do not answer unless +you like. It is, however, a question that will infallibly arise +elsewhere. Were you, or were you not, privy to this poor young woman's +disappearance?" + +"Before God, my lord, I was not!" + +"I understand that her parents had no idea where she was until the very +end. Had you none either?" + +"No more than they had. We were equally in the dark. We believed that +she had gone to stay with a friend from the village--a young woman who +had married from service, and was settled near London. It was several +weeks before we discovered that her friend had never seen her." + +"And all this time you did not suspect her condition?" + +"Yes; then I did; but not before." + +"She made no communication before she went away?" + +"None whatever to me--none whatever, to my knowledge." + +"And this was early in the year?" + +"She left Long Stow in January, and we had no news of her till the +middle of June, when strangers communicated with her father." + +Again the bishop leant over his foolscap. + +"Did you ever offer her marriage?" he asked abruptly. + +"Repeatedly!" + +The clear eyes looked up. + +"Did you not tell her father this?" + +"No; I couldn't condescend to tell him," said Carlton, flushing for the +first time. "My lord, I have made no excuses. There are none to make. +That was none at all." + +His lordship regarded the changed face with no further change in his +own. + +"So you loved her," he said softly, after a pause. + +"Ah! if only I had loved her more!" + +"If excuse there could be . . . love . . . is some." + +It was the old man murmuring, as old men will, all unknown to the bishop +and the judge. + +"But I want no excuses!" cried Carlton, wildly. "And let me be honest +now, whatever I have been in the past; if I deceived myself and others, +let me undeceive myself and you! Oh, my lord, that wasn't love! It's the +bitterest thought of all, the most shameful confession of all. But love +must be something better; that can't be love! It was passion, if you +like; it was a passion that swept me away in the pride of my strength; +but, God forgive me, it was not love!" + +He hid his face in his writhing hands; and, with those wild eyes off +him, the bishop could no longer swallow his compassion. The lines of his +mouth relaxed, and lo, the mouth was beautiful. A tender light suffused +the aged face, and behold, the face was gentle beyond belief. + +"Love is everything," the old man said; "but even passion is something, +in these cold days of little lives and little sins. And honesty like +yours is a great deal, Robert Carlton, though your sin be as scarlet, +and the Blood of our Blessed Lord alone can make you clean." + +Carlton looked up swiftly, a new solicitude in his eyes. + +"In me it was scarlet: not in her. She loved . . . she loved. Oh, to +have loved as well--to have that to remember! . . . She thought it would +spoil my life; and I never guessed it was that! But now I know, I know! +It was for my sake she went away . . . poor child . . . poor mistaken +heroine! She died for me, and I cannot die for her. Isn't that hard? I +can't even die for her!" + +His bodily weakness betrayed itself in his swimming eyes; in the night +of his agony no tear had dimmed them before men. But his will was not +all gone. With clenched fists, and locked jaw, and beaded brow, he +fought his weakness, while the good bishop sat with his head on his +hand, and closed eyes, praying for a brother in the valley of despair. +When he opened his eyes, it was as though his prayer was heard; for +Robert Carlton was bearing himself with a new bravery; and the +incongruous unquenched fires, which had caused surprise at the outset of +the interview, burnt brightly as before in the younger eyes. The old man +met them with a sad, grave scrutiny. But the lines of his mouth remained +relaxed. And, when he spoke again, his voice was very gentle. + +"You may think that I have put you to unnecessary pain," he said, "when +I give you fair warning that your case must form the subject of further +proceedings in another place. But I had heard that your conduct was +indefensible, root and branch, from beginning to end. Of that I am now +able to form my own opinion. Yet my individual opinion can make no +difference in the result, since absolute deprivation I had never +contemplated in your case, and it is only the extreme penalty which +rests with me. On the other hand, it will be my duty to set the +ecclesiastical law in motion; and the ecclesiastical law must take its +course. I take it that you do not propose to defend your case?" + +A grim light flickered for an instant in Robert Carlton's eyes. "Have I +defended it hitherto, my lord?" + +"Then there can only be one result; and you must make up your mind, as +you have doubtless already done, to suspension for a term of years. If +word of mine can lessen that term, it shall be spoken in your favour, +both out of consideration of the great work that you were doing, and +have done, and in view of certain circumstances which our conversation +has brought to light." + +"But can you want me back in the Church?" cried Carlton; and his heart +beat high with the question; but turned heavier than before in the +interval of prudent deliberation which preceded any answer. + +"I would punish no man beyond the letter of the law," declared the +bishop at length, "even if it were in my power to do so. The Act debars +suspended clergymen from all exercise of their divine calling and from +all pecuniary enjoyment of their benefice until the term of such +suspension is up. I would not, if I could, prolong the period of +disability by throwing further let or hindrance in the way of an erring +brother who repents him truly of his sin. I would rather say, 'Come back +to your work, live down the past, and, by your example in the years that +may be left you, pluck up the tares that your bad example has surely +sown. Retrieve all but the irretrievable. Undo what you can.'" + +Carlton's eyes melted in gratitude too great for speech, but plain as +the benediction which his trembling lips left eloquently unsaid. + +"That," continued the bishop, "is what I should say to you--because I +think we understood each other. You have not sought to palliate your +offence; nor are you the man to misconstrue the little I may have said +concerning the offence itself. What is there to be said? You know well +enough that I lament it as I lament its mournful result, and deplore it +as I deplore the blot on the whole body of Christ's Church militant here +on earth. You have committed a great sin, against humanity, against God, +and against your Church; yet he would commit a greater who sought on +that account to hound you from that Church for ever. Courage, brother! +Pray without ceasing. Look forward, not back; and do not despair. +Despair is the devil's best friend; better give way to deadly sin than +to deadlier despair! Remember that you have done good work for God in +days gone by; and live for that brighter day when you have purged your +sin, and may be worthy to work for Him again." + +"And meanwhile?" whispered Carlton, for fear of shouting it in his +passionate anxiety. "Is there nothing I may do meanwhile--among my own +poor people--before the tares come up?" + +"If you are suspended you will be unable to hold any service; and I +hardly think you will care to go among your parishioners while that is +so." + +"But I shall not be forbidden my own parish?" + +"Not forbidden." + +"Nor my rectory?" + +"No; so far as I am aware, at least, you retain your right to reside +there; but I can hardly think that it would be expedient." + +"And the church! They must have their church back again. Who is going to +rebuild it for them?" + +Carlton was on his feet in the last excitement. The bishop regarded him +with puzzled eyebrows. + +"I have heard nothing on that subject as yet; it is a little early, is +it not? But I have no doubt that it will be a matter for subscription +among themselves." + +"Among my poor people?" + +"With substantial aid, I should hope, from men of substance in the +neighbourhood." + +"But why should they pay?" cried Carlton, impetuously. "The church was +not burnt down for my neighbours' sins, nor for the sins of the parish, +but for mine alone . . . Oh, my lord, if I could but go back among my +people, and be their servant, I who was too much their master before! I +was not quite dependent--thank God, I had a little of my own--but every +penny should be theirs!" + +And the profligate priest stood upright before his bishop--his white +hands clasped, his white face shining, his burning eyes moist--zealot +and suppliant in one. + +"You desire to spend your income----" + +"No, no, my capital!" + +"On the poor of your parish? I--I fail to understand." + +"And I scarcely dare make you!" confessed Carlton, his full voice +failing him. "I so fear your disapproval; and I could set my face +against all the world, but against you never, much less after this +morning . . . Oh, my lord, I have set my poor people a dastardly +example, and brought cruel shame upon my cloth; for its sake and for +theirs, if not for my own, let me at least leave among them a tangible +sign and symbol of my true repentance. I have the chance! I have such a +chance as God alone in His infinite mercy could vouchsafe to a miserable +sinner. My church at Long Stow has been burnt down through me--through +my sin--to punish me----" + +"Are you sure of that, Mr. Carlton?" + +"I know it, my lord. And I want to do what only seems to me my bounden +and my obvious duty, and to do it soon." + +The bishop looked enlightened but amazed. + +"You would rebuild the church out of your own pocket? Is that really +your wish?" + +"It is my prayer!" + + + + +VIII + +THE LORD OF THE MANOR. + + +Wilton Gleed owed his success in life to a natural bent for the politic +virtues, and to the quality of energy unalloyed by enterprise. He was a +man of much shrewdness and extraordinary tenacity, but absolutely no +initiative; so he had taken his opportunities and held his ground +without running a risk that he could remember. Not a self-made man, he +was, however, the son of one who had made himself by dint of that very +enterprise which was lacking in Wilton Gleed. The father had seen a +certain want and filled it to the satisfaction of the wide world; the +son had extended the business without meddling with the product of the +firm. Monopolies die hard. Gleed & Son did nothing to deserve a swift +demise. They just stalked behind the times, and appeared to thrive on a +sublime contempt of competition. And those who knew him best were the +most surprised when Wilton Gleed turned the great concern into a limited +liability company, and made a fortune out of the transaction alone; it +was the most daring thing that he had ever done. + +The reason for the step may be related as characteristic of the man. Age +had given the firm a certain aristocracy of degree--not of kind--even +age could not soften the fact that Gleed & Son sold things in tins. And +the tins it was that turned plain Gleed & Son into Gleed & Son, Limited. +Some innovator was making tins with cunning openers attached; the lesser +firms jumped at the improvement. The lesser firms were already doing +Gleeds' some slight damage in their go-ahead little way; but the worst +they could all do together was as nothing compared with the extra +expenditure of an appreciable fraction of a farthing per tin on an +output of millions in the year. Wilton Gleed could not face the +immediate hole in his profits. He had never taken a risk in his life, +and was not going to begin. He had increased his expenses by going into +Parliament, and he was not such a fool as to play tricks with his +income. He faced the situation as though it were ruin staring him in the +face, and lost a discernible measure of flesh before his big resolve. It +was all he did lose over the ultimate operation. He retired into private +and public life with more money than he knew how to spend. + +The average man is at his best as host, and in that capacity Wilton +Gleed was popular among his friends. He was an excellent sportsman of +the selfish sort; cherished a contempt for the various games which +involve playing for one's side; but was a first-rate shot, a fine +fisherman, and a good rider spoilt by his great principle of refusing +the risks. To shoot and dine with him was to see Gleed at his very best. +He was a bald little man, with silver-sandy moustache and close-cropped +whiskers; but his full-blooded face was still pink with health, his +fixed eye unerring as ever, his step elastic as the heather he loved to +tread. Gun in hand, in his tweeds and gaiters, and with his cap pulled +well over his head, Wilton Gleed never passed the prime of life; it was +late in the evening before he collected the years blown away on the +moor; and in its way the evening was as delectable as the day. The +dinner was a good one, and the host abandoned himself to its joys with a +schoolboy's ardour. Irreproachable champagne flowed like water, more +especially at the head of the table. Gleed carried it like a gentleman, +also the port that followed, though a little inclined to be garrulous +about the latter. As he sipped and gossiped, and settled the Eastern +Question in two words, and Mr. Gladstone's hash in one, the skin would +shine as it tightened on the bald head, and the always intent eye would +fix the listener beyond the needs of the conversation. It was very +seldom, however, that a syllable slid out of place, or that Wilton Gleed +went to bed looking quite his age. + +For some years he had leased various shootings in the autumn, spending +the other seasons at a lordly but suburban retreat inherited from his +father, with an occasional swoop abroad--the correct place at the +correct time--less for enjoyment than for other reasons. Gun, rod, and +cellar were what he did enjoy, and of these delights he vowed to have +his fill after getting out of Gleeds with unexpected spoils. A sporting +estate was in the market within two hours and a half of town; and for +forty thousand pounds Wilton Gleed became squire of Long Stow, patron of +an excellent living, and a large landowner in a country where he had a +nucleus of friends and soon made more. As Member of Parliament for that +division of London in which Gleeds had employed hundreds of hands for +half a hundred years, he at the same time bought a house in town, and +let the place outside. Subtler investments followed. The man was +becoming a gambler in his old age; but he played his own game with +ineradicable care and foresight, and rose Sir Wilton Gleed when his side +lost in the General Election of 1880. It was only a knighthood, and Sir +Wilton might have entertained justifiable hopes of his baronetcy; but +one or the other had been a moral certainty for some time. + +It was in Hyde Park Place that Sir Wilton first heard of the Long Stow +scandal and its immediate sequel. The news came in a few dry lines from +Sidney, by the first post on the Monday morning, June 26, 1882. It fell +like a firebrand in a keg of gunpowder. Sir Wilton, however, had even +better reasons than were obvious for his paroxysm of rage and +indignation; personal mortification was not the least of his emotions. +He would have gone down by the next train to "horsewhip the hound within +an inch of his life," but the cur had taken refuge in Lakenhall +Infirmary, "with very little the matter with him," in Sidney's words. +And just then the House was an Aceldama which no good soldier could +desert for a night, with the Government satisfactorily on the spit +between Phoenix Park and Alexandria, and the Opposition creeping up vote +by vote. Sir Wilton decided to run down on the Wednesday for twenty-four +hours, and talked of having the rectory furniture thrown into the street +if the rector was not there to take it and himself away for good. Sir +Wilton had his own impression as to his powers as patron of the living, +and he very naturally swore that he would "have that blackguard out of +it" within the week. A friend at the Carlton put him right on the point. + +"You can't do that, Gleed. A living's like nothing else. My lord gives, +but my lord can't take away." + +"Then what on earth am I to do?" + +"Get him inhibited and make him resign. It will come to the same thing." + +The fire was in all the newspapers, with the hint of a scandal at the +end of the paragraph. Among those who spoke to Sir Wilton on the subject +was a jaunty politician who had never yet recognised him at the club. + +"Sir Wilton Gleed, I think? I fancy we have met before?" + +"Indeed, my lord?" + +It was the noble who had chosen to forget the circumstance hitherto; +to-day he was all courtesy and confidential concern. What was this about +the church that had been burnt down? He had heard it was on the other's +estate. Sir Wilton professed to know no more as yet than the papers told +him. + +"I ask because it reads to me----don't you know? Some scandal----what? +And I'm sorry to say--fellow Carlton--sort of connection of mine." + +"To be sure," said Sir Wilton. "I remember hearing it." + +"Odd fish, I'm afraid. Here in town for years, at that ritualistic shop +across the park--forget my own name next. Might have had a good time if +he'd liked. Never went out. Preferred the mews. Made a specialty of +footmen and fellows. Had a night club somewhere, where he taught 'em to +box, and brought my own man home himself one night with an eye like +your boot. It was about the only time we met. Remember hearing he could +preach, though; only hope he hasn't been making a fool of himself down +there!" + +"I hope not also," said the discreet knight; "but I am going down +to-morrow, so I shall hear." + +He went down very grim: for Robert Carlton had not only been a thorn in +his side that twelve-month past; he actually stood for the one false +move, of importance, which Sir Wilton Gleed was conscious of having made +in all his life. Yet he had taken no step with more complete confidence +and self-approval. A gentleman and man of brain, reported by Lady Gleed +and their daughter, and duly admitted by himself, to be the best +preacher they had ever heard; a man of family into the bargain, and not +such a distant cadet as the head of that family implied; could any +combination have promised a more suitable successor to the venerable +sportsman who had scorned white ties and caught his death coursing in +mid-winter with Dr. Marigold? And yet the fellow had proved a perfect +pest from the beginning. He had gone his own gait with a quiet +independence only less exasperating than his personal courtesy and +deference in every quarrel. In fact there had been no regular quarrel: +the squire had only been rather rude to the rector's face, and very +abusive behind his back. Nor was Sir Wilton's annoyance in the least +surprising. Devoid himself of a single religious conviction, but the +natural enemy of change, he viewed the inevitable, but too immediate, +innovations in the light of a personal affront; but when his own +expostulations were met with polite argument on a subject which he had +never studied, and he found himself at issue with a cleverer and a +stronger man, who put him in the illogical position of objecting in the +country to what his family approved in town, then there was no +alternative for the squire but to withdraw from the unequal field and +wait upon revenge. Too politic to break with one who after all had more +followers than foes, and who speedily made himself the first person in +the parish, Sir Wilton very naturally hated his man the more for those +very considerations which induced him to curb his tongue. But his +disappointment was manifold. It was not as if the fellow had proved +personally congenial to himself. He preferred teaching the lads cricket +to shooting with the squire, and he was a poor diner-out. His +predecessor had shot almost (but not quite) as well as Sir Wilton +himself, and had the harder head of the two for port. Carlton was not +even in touch with his own people. There was no advantage in the man at +all. + +But now the end was in sight--the incredibly premature and disgraceful +end. Sir Wilton went down grim enough, but much less angry and indignant +than he supposed. Most of his wrath was the accumulation of months, free +for expression at last. He was, however, a good and clean citizen +according to his lights, and he did undoubtedly feel the rightful +indignation with which the story from Long Stow was calculated to +inspire many a worse man. Arrived at Lakenhall, where the stanhope was +waiting for him, he asked but one question on the way to Long Stow, and +then drove straight past the hall to the church. Here he got down, and +examined the black ruins with his hands in his pockets and his shoulders +very square and a fixed glare of mingled rage and exultation. Then he +walked past the broken windows, and the stanhope met him at the rectory +gate. He drove home without a word. His one question had elicited the +fact that the rector was still in the infirmary. + +The village street cut clean through the high-walled hall garden, and +the brown-brick hall itself stood as near the road as the mansion in +Hyde Park Place, and was the uglier building of the two, from the dormer +windows in the steep slates to the portico with the painted pillars. +Within was the depressing atmosphere of a great house all but empty. Sir +Wilton hurried through a twilit drawing-room in deadly order, and forth +by a French window into a pleasaunce of elms and plane-trees whose +shadows lay sharp as themselves upon the shaven sward. A girl was coming +across the grass to meet him, a girl at the awkward age, with her dark +hair in a plait and her black dress neither long nor short. Sir Wilton +brushed her cheek with his bleached moustache. + +"Where's Fraulein?" he said. + +"In the schoolroom, I think, uncle." + +"I want to speak to her. I'm only down for the night and shall be busy. +I'll be looking round the garden, tell her." + +And he walked away from the house, treading vigorously on the cropped +grass; and presently a little middle-aged lady, with a plain, shrewd +face, flitted over it in her turn. She found Sir Wilton between the four +yew hedges and the mathematical parterres of the Italian garden at the +further end of the lawn. He shook hands with her, but gave free rein, +for the second time in five minutes, to his idiosyncrasy of hard +staring. + +Fraulein Hentig had been many years in the family, and had taken many +parts; at present she was permanent housekeeper in the country, but had +lately also recommenced old schoolroom duties on the adoption by Sir +Wilton of his only brother's only child. There was no nonsense about +Fraulein Hentig. She told Sir William all that she had heard and all +that she believed was true, without mincing facts or wincing at the +expletives which more than once interrupted her tale. As it proceeded +the fixed eyes lightened with a vindictive glitter; but the end found +Sir Wilton scowling. + +"I wish I'd been here! I wouldn't have let them break his windows; no, I +should have claimed the privilege of horsewhipping him with my own +hands. I'd do it still if he were here; but he'll never show his nose in +Long Stow again. I suppose there's no doubt the church was wilfully set +fire to?" + +"None at all from what I hear, Sir Wilton." + +"Is nobody suspected?" + +"George Mellis was. They say he was in love with the girl, and he +disappeared on Saturday night. However, it turns out that he was already +in Lakenhall hours before the fire, and he never came back. It appears +he went straight to the rectory when he heard the scandal, and almost as +straight out of Long Stow when Mr. Carlton admitted everything. Already +I hear that he has enlisted in London." + +"You don't mean it! That's another thing at that blackguard's door; it's +a nice list! But it's enough to send the whole parish to the dogs. By +the way, you would get Lady Gleed's letter?" + +"Yes, Sir Wilton. I wrote last night to tell her ladyship that she might +make her mind easy about her niece. She is very innocent, and when I +told her the windows had been broken because Mr. Carlton had done +something dishonourable, she was amazed of course, but she asked no more +questions. I spoke at once to the servants, and I made Gwynneth promise +not to go among the people at present; they have already typhoid fever +in one of the cottages, and that was my excuse." + +"Excellent!" said Sir Wilton. "I won't have her in and out of the +cottages in any case, and I shall tell her so before I go. She's much +too young for that kind of nonsense. And she mustn't read just exactly +what she likes. She had a book in her hand just now--I couldn't see +what--but she seems inclined to fill her head with any folly. We must +find a school for her, and meanwhile bring her up as we've brought up +our own child." + +Fraulein Hentig smiled judiciously. + +"They are already rather different characters," she said. "But I will do +my best, Sir Wilton." + +When the pair quitted the Italian garden, the gentleman hurrying to make +other inquiries before dinner, while the German gentlewoman dropped +behind, two brown eyes saw them from an upper window, whither the girl +had carried her book in vain. Her attention had been intermittent +before, but now she could not even try to read. The air was full of +mystery, and the mystery was more absorbing than that in any book. It +was also absolute and unfathomable in the girl's mind. Yet her brain +teemed with questions and surmises. She had come upstairs because she +felt that they wanted her out of the way, her uncle and the good, slow, +serious Fraulein. Yet that was not enough for them: they also must +retire as far as possible for their talk. Of course Gwynneth knew what +they had to talk about; but what was the dishonourable action that a +clergyman could commit and that could not be so much as mentioned in her +hearing? She was not thinking of "a clergyman" in the abstract. She was +thinking of the man with the beautiful, sad face; of the passionate +preacher with the voice that thrilled the senses and the words that +filled the mind. She had heard him preach of sin and suffering with +equal sympathy. Phrases came back to her. Now she understood. But what +could he have done, that he should suffer so, and that a perfectly kind +person like Fraulein Hentig should exult in his suffering? + +Gwynneth was splendidly and terribly innocent, but all the more +inquisitive on that account. She was unacquainted with the facts, yet +not with the tragedy of life. In a tragic atmosphere she had been born +and bred. Quentin Gleed had been fatally lacking in the politic virtues +cultivated by his brother. He had deserted his wife and drunk himself to +death within the memory of Gwynneth. The young girl recalled dim years +of bitter scenes in a luxurious home, and vivid years of peace and +poverty in a tiny cottage. And now her mother was gone also; the dear, +independent, wilful little mother, who had taught her child all but the +wickedness that was in the world! And that child sat at her bedroom +window in the new home that never could be home to her; and the drooping +sun could find no bottom to her dark and limpid eyes, no flaw upon her +pure warm skin; and neither the cuckoo in the poplar, nor the thrush in +the elm, nor the sparrows in the eaves just overhead, could tell her +anything of the wickedness that was in even her small world. + + + + +IX + +A DUEL BEGINS + + +Late in the afternoon of July 13, a Lakenhall fly rattled through Long +Stow, and waited in the rain outside the rectory gate while one of the +occupants ran up to the house. He was such a short time gone, and so few +people were about in the wet, that the fly was on its way back to +Lakenhall before the Long Stow folk realised that it was the rector who +had upset prophecy by showing his nose among them in broad daylight. He +had done no more, however, nor was anything further seen or heard of him +during the month of July. It appeared that he had returned for some +private papers only. The rectory was locked up by the squire's orders, +but the rector had forced his own study door, and his muddy footmarks +were confined to that room. The same evening he went up to town--and +disappeared. But his address was known in an official quarter. And all +day and every day he might have been discovered in the reading room of +the British Museum: a memorable figure, stooping amid mountains of +architectural tomes, and drawing or copying plans in the few inches of +table-land they left him, all with a nervous eagerness of face and hand +not daily to be seen beneath that dispiriting dome. + +Then the call came, and he was tried in the consistorial court of his +own diocese, before the chancellor thereof, at the beginning of August. +No need to record more than the fact. The proceedings were brief because +the accused pleaded guilty and his own word was the only evidence +against him. The sentence was that of suspension foreshadowed by the +bishop. The Reverend Robert Carlton was formally suspended _ab officio +et beneficio_ for the period of five years. + +The result was reported in the London papers; there was only matter for +a few lines. "Mr. Carlton was suspended for five years" was the +concluding sentence in _The Times_ report; and that was good enough for +Sir Wilton Gleed. It was a happy omen for the holidays, which began for +him that very day. The family were already in the country. Sir Wilton +took the last train to Lakenhall and drove himself home for good in the +highest spirits. Four miles of the five were over his own acres, and +every one of them was crumbling with rabbits in the rosy dusk. Later, +the larkspur and peonies on the dinner-table were as the very breath and +blush of the gorgeous English country; and a thrush sang its welcome +through the open window, and a nightingale trilled the tired Londoner to +sleep; but he dreamt of a pheasant that he had heard calling between +Lakenhall and Long Stow. + +In the country Sir Wilton was an early riser, and he was abroad next +morning while the shadows of the elms still stretched to the house and +quivered up its bare brick walls. The great lawn was dusted with a milky +dew in which Sir Wilton positively wallowed in his water-tight boots; +it was not his least delight to be in shooting-boots and knickerbockers +and soft raiment once more. The first few minutes of the more excellent +life produced an unseasonable geniality in the breast of Wilton Gleed. +The man was a human being, and he longed for companionship in his joy. +But Sidney never rose before he must, nor the gardeners either, it +appeared. In the stable-yard a groom was encountered, but Sir Wilton had +seen his face every day in town. He went out into the village, and +naturally turned to the left. The cottage doors were open, and they were +filled with homely figures that touched a cap or courtesied as he passed +with a pleasant word for all. It was good to be back, to be a little +king again. Sir Wilton pulled the cap over his eyes because the sun was +in them, and admired the ripe wheat in the field beyond the post-office, +the barley in the field beyond that. So he passed the Flint House on the +other side with unruffled mind, and was passing the Flint House meadow +before his thoughts took the inevitable turn which led to profane +mutterings through shut teeth. But this morning it did not lead quite so +far; this morning, with the scented air of England in his nostrils, and +a twitter in the ears from every thatch, even Sir Wilton Gleed could +find it in his heart to pity the sinner fallen from his high estate in +what was paradise enough for the squire. + +"Poor devil!" he said as he came to the rectory gate and saw the long +grass within. It was sufficiently in key with the old quaint rectory, in +its rags of ivy and its shawl of disreputable tiles. The windows were +still broken and the shutters shut. Otherwise the picture was as +alluring as its fellows to the lord of the manor. The trees that hid the +church at midsummer would screen its ruins for many a day. + +Sir Wilton entered to refresh his memory as to the minor damages, and +they changed his mood. Who was to pay for twenty-nine panes of +glass--no, he had missed a window--for thirty-three? He was a man who +did not care to spend a penny without obtaining his pennyworth; but he +was not clear as to his legal obligations; and he bristled at the idea +of paying for the immorality of the parson and the excesses of his +flock. He had paid enough in other ways. And there was the church. Who +was to rebuild the church? They might expect him to do that once he +began doing things; and the man fell into premature fuming between his +love of the lavish and his detestation of expense. Meanwhile he had +found a whole window, that of the study, and the door beside it stood +ajar. This he pushed open as though the place belonged to him (his view +in so many words), and stood still upon the threshold. + +"Well, I'm damned!" he cried at last. + +Robert Carlton sat asleep in his chair, his hands in his overcoat +pockets, the collar turned up about his ears. His boots and trousers +were brown and yellow with the dust of the district. In an instant he +was on his feet, scared, startled, and abashed. + +"So you've come back, have you?" + +"An hour or two ago. I walked from Cambridge. I don't know how you +heard!" + +"Heard? You must think me in a hurry for your society! No, this is an +unexpected pleasure, and I use the words advisedly. It's something to +find you don't come twice in broad daylight." + +"I have come on business, as before, but this time the business will +occupy more than a few minutes. I wished to get it in train with as +little fuss as possible. Then I was coming to see you, Sir Wilton." + +It was quietly spoken, without bitterness or defiance, but also without +the abject humility which had trembled in the clergyman's first words. +The other made some attempt to modify his manner: nothing could put him +in the wrong, but he realised that it might be as well to abstain from +mere brutality. And what he had just heard implied a certain +reassurance. + +"I see," said Gleed. "You have come to make arrangements about your +furniture and effects. I am glad to hear it." + +"My furniture and effects?" queried Carlton. "What arrangements do you +mean?" + +"Well, you can't leave them here, can you?" + +"Why not, Sir Wilton?" + +"Why not!" echoed the squire, turning from pink to purple with the two +words. "Because you've been disgraced and degraded as you deserve; +because you're the hound you are; because you've been suspended for five +years, and I won't have you or your belongings cumber my ground for a +single day of them! So now you know," continued Gleed in lower tones, +his venom spent. "I didn't think it would be necessary to tell you my +opinion of you; but you've brought it on yourself." + +Carlton bowed to that, but respectfully pointed out the difference +between suspension and deprivation, his tone one of apology rather than +of triumph. + +"I don't say which I deserved," he added, "but I do thank God for the +mercy He has shown me. This gives me another chance--in five years' +time. Meanwhile I am not only entitled to keep my furniture in the +rectory. I believe I may live in it if I like." + +Gleed stood convulsed with wrath redoubled. He had been too busy in town +to prime himself upon a point which could not arise before he went down +to the country; and here it was, awaiting him. His disadvantage alone +was enough to put him in a passion; but the last statement was monstrous +in itself. + +"I don't believe it! I don't believe a word you say! A man who can live +a lie will tell nothing else!" + +Carlton drew himself up, his nostrils curling. + +"Better go and ask your solicitor," he said. "I have forfeited the +right--as you so well know--to the only possible reply." + +"Rights apart," rejoined Gleed, his colour heightening by a shade, "do +you mean to tell me you would seriously think of remaining on the very +scene of your shame?" + +"I didn't say I would do anything. I said I believed I could." + +"You have done enough harm in the place; surely you wouldn't come back +to do more?" + +"No; if I came at all, it would be to undo a little of the harm--to live +it down, Sir Wilton, by God's help!" said Carlton, and his voice shook. +"But I do not mean to live here. I have spoken to the bishop, and his +advice is against it, though he leaves me free to follow my own +judgment. This afternoon I hoped to speak to you. There is another +matter which is really a duty, so that I can be in no doubt as to what +to do there. It will not involve my remaining on the spot, or obtruding +myself in any way. But the church has been burnt down on my account, and +I intend to rebuild it before the winter." + +"The church is mine!" said Gleed, savagely. + +"I don't want to contradict you, Sir Wilton; but you should really see +your lawyer on all these points." + +"The land is mine!" + +"Not the church land, Sir Wilton; and the rector is not only entitled, +but he may be compelled, to restore and rebuild within certain limits. +Your solicitor will turn up the Act and show it you in black and white. +And after that I think you will hardly stand between me and my bounden +duty." + +"I don't recognise it as your duty. Your first duty is to resign the +living lock-stock-and-barrel--if you've any sense of decency left; but +you haven't--not you, you infernal blackguard, you!" + +Gleed was standing on the drive, his arms akimbo and his fists clenched, +his flushed face thrust forward and his stockinged legs planted firmly +apart. It was Carlton's lithe figure which had been filling the doorway +for some minutes; but at this he strode upon his adversary, and towered +over him with a hand that itched. + +"Why must you insult me?" he cried. "Do you think that's the way to get +me to do anything? Or are you bent upon having me up for assault? For +heaven's sake remember your own manhood, Sir Wilton, and respect mine; +don't trade too far upon my readiness to admit that I am all men choose +to call me. Have a little pride! I am ready to take my punishment, and +more. I will keep away from the place as much as possible. If I can let +the rectory, that will be so much more money for the church. Don't +oppose me; if you can't help me by your countenance (and I grant you +it's more than I have a right to expect), at least be neutral, and let +me work out my own salvation in my own way. It will make no difference +to the past. It may make all the difference in the future. God knows I +can't reinstate myself in His sight and in the hearts of men by building +a church! But I can leave behind me a sign of my sorrow and my true +penitence. I can leave behind me a name and an example, bad enough in +all conscience, but yet not wholly vile to the very last. And think what +even that would be to me! And think what it would be if I could but pave +the way, not to forgiveness, but to some reconciliation with those whom +I have loved but led amiss . . . Well, that may be too much to hope +. . . no, I have no right to dream of that . . . but at least let me +make the one material reparation in my power; let me do my duty! When +it is done, if you and they will have no more of me, then you shall all +be rid of me for good." + +Gleed wavered, partly because in mere personality he was no match for +the other, partly because the prospect of a new church for nothing made +its own appeal to the man who had counted the cost of the broken +windows. His mind ran over the pecuniary scheme and detected a flaw. + +"And what's to become of the parish for the next five years?" he asked. +"Who's to pay a man to do your work?" + +"There's the stipend I cannot touch and would not if I could; a part of +that will doubtless be set aside. Until the church is habitable, +however, the case will probably be met by one of the curates coming over +from Lakenhall and taking a service in the schoolroom." + +"And how do _you_ know?" cried Sir Wilton, not unjustifiably. + +"The bishop sent for me," said Carlton--and his eyes fell. "I ventured +to speak to him on the subject before I left. Do you think I don't care +what happens here in my absence? I hope the services will begin next +Sunday--the building next week. I have worked the whole thing out. I +could show you the figures and the plans. The new ones are ready, if you +can call them new. I shall be my own architect as before for the +transepts, but the rest shall be exactly as it was." + +"We'll see about that," said Sir Wilton grimly. He knew those melting +eyes, that enthusiastic voice. They had brought their hundreds to this +man's feet before. They might do so again. Even the squire felt their +power in his own despite. + +"It is my one chance!" the voice went on in softer accents. "Do not ask +me to forego it altogether; but I will keep in the background as much as +you like; all I want to know is that the work is going on. Suppose I did +resign, and you appointed another man. Why should he give towards the +church? Why should he come where there is none? Let me build the new one +first!" + +"Has it come to letting? I understood I couldn't prevent you?" + +"No more you can; although----" + +"We'll see!" cried Gleed. "That's quite enough for me. We'll see!" + +"But, Sir Wilton----" + +"Damn your 'buts,' sir!" shouted the other, shaking with rage. "You +disgrace the parish, and you won't leave it. You come back, and set +yourself against me, and think you can do what you like after doing what +you've done. By God, it's monstrous! There's not a man in the country +who won't agree with me; you'll find that out to your cost. Build the +church, would you? I'll see you further! Law or no law, I'll have you +out of this! I'll hound you out of it! I'll have you torn in pieces if +you stay!" + +"I have already told you I don't intend to stay," said Carlton quietly. +"I only intend to rebuild the church." + +"All right! You try! You try!" + +And with his fixed eyes flashing, and his fresh face aged with anger, +but scored with implacable resolve, Sir Wilton Gleed swung on his heel, +and so down the drive with every step a stamp. + + + + +X + +THE LETTER OF THE LAW + + +In the village he met Tom Ivey, but passed him with a savage nod, and +was some yards further on when a thought smote him so that he spun round +in his stride. + +"That you, Ivey?" he called. "I wasn't thinking; you're the very man I +wanted to see. How are you, eh?" + +"Nicely, thank you, Sir Wilton," said Tom, coming up. + +"Plenty of work, I hope?" + +"Well, not just lately, Sir Wilton." + +"Good! I may have some for you. I'll see you about it this evening or +to-morrow; meanwhile keep yourself free. By the way, how's your mother?" + +"Very sadly, Sir Wilton. I sometimes fare to think she's not long for +this world." + +"Nonsense, man! What's the matter with her?" + +Tom hardly knew. That was old age, _he_ thought. Then the house was that +old and small; sometimes she fared to stifle for want of air. And this +Tom said doggedly, for a reason. + +"Ah!" cried Sir Wilton, his fixed eye brightening. "Wasn't there a +question of repairs some time since?" + +"There was, Sir Wilton." + +"Well, I'll reconsider it. We must do what we can to make the old lady +comfortable for the winter. I'll come and see her, and I'll see you +again about the other matter. Keep yourself free meanwhile. Don't you +let any of those Lakenhall fellows snap you up!" + +And Sir Wilton went on chuckling, but again turned quickly and called +the other back. + +"By the way, Tom, who _were_ those fellows you used to work for in +Lakenhall?" + +"Tait & Taplin, Sir Wilton." + +A note was taken of the names. + +"The only builders in the town, eh?" + +"Well, Sir Wilton, there's old Isaac Hoole, the stonemason." + +"A stonemason, by Jove!" and down went his name. "What other builders +and stonemasons have we in the district--near enough to undertake some +work here? I'm not thinking of the job I've got for you, Tom." + +Ivey thought of three within fifteen miles, and several at greater +distances, but doubted whether any of the latter would accept a contract +so far afield. Their names were taken, nevertheless, and Sir Wilton +stared his hardest as he put his pocket-book away. + +"I shall want you all the same," he said, "and I shall expect to get you +when I want you. Understand? If anybody else offers you a job, remember +you've got one. And I'll see your mother this morning." + +Tom went his way with his honest wits in a knot. He could not conceive +what was coming. Ten minutes ago he had found a note slipped under the +door in the night, and he was going straight to the rectory without his +breakfast. Had Sir Wilton been there before him, and was he going to +rebuild the church? Then what had the reverend to say to it, now that he +was suspended for five years? And what in the world could he have to say +to Tom Ivey? + +He said nothing at all until they had shaken hands, and nothing then +about the fire; it is with the hand alone that men pay their big debts +to men, and Robert Carlton did not weaken his thanks with words. + +"Have you got a job, Tom?" were his first. + +"I have and I haven't, sir," said Ivey. + +"You're not free to take one from me?" + +"I wish I was, sir!" cried Tom, impulsively (he was not so sure about it +on reflection); and in his simplicity he explained why he was not free. +"But perhaps that's the same job, sir?" he added, hopefully. + +Carlton shook his head, and looked wistfully on the friendly face; a few +words (he knew his power) and the very man he wanted would be on his +side against all odds. But he must not begin by dividing the village +into factions; he must fight his own battle, with mercenaries from +neutral ground, or none at all. + +"Where was it you served your time, Tom?" he asked at length. + +"Tait & Taplin's, sir, in Lakenhall." + +"Thanks. I won't keep you, Tom. It will do you no good to be seen up +here." + +He held out his hand with a dismal smile. It was the other's turn to +wring hard. "I care nothing about that, sir! We've been shoulder to +shoulder once already; my mind don't go no further back than that; and +we'll be shoulder to shoulder again!" + +Carlton found flour and tea in the store-room, and in the fowl-house two +new-laid eggs. He cooked his first breakfast with the sun pouring +through the open kitchen window upon six weeks' dirt and dust. He was +not a man of very hearty habit, but he had learnt of old the evil of +exercise upon too light a diet. His pony was fattening in the glebe; but +a fastidious sense of fitness forbade him to drive, and between nine and +ten he set out for Lakenhall on foot. + +It was an ordeal for the first half-mile: the sunlight flooding the +village felt like limelight turned on him alone. Some children +courtesied as though nothing was changed; their elders stared at him +without further sign; only one shouted after him, he knew not who or +what. He reached the open country with a raging pulse, thinking only +upon circuitous ways back; but three solitary miles restored his nerve. +And in Lakenhall it was only every other passer who stopped and turned +and stared. Entering the town he was nearly run over by a dogcart. It +was Sir Wilton driving, and Carlton caught the gleam of his eye even as +he leapt to one side for his life, but mistook its significance until he +was within sight of Tait & Taplin's. Then it occurred to him, and he +entered fully prepared. + +"No, thank you, sir--not for us! We've heard of you, and we don't deal +with your sort. Do you hear, or do you want to hear more?" + +Carlton searched in vain for another builder, and only got the name of +a stonemason by going into the cemetery and looking at the newer +gravestones. He had then to discover where the man lived, and he was +ashamed to ask questions in shops. He was still scouring the town, and +it was afternoon, when a gig was pulled up in the middle of the road. + +"So you're back? Well, you look better than you did." + +"I am," said Carlton, "thanks to you." + +"Who are you looking for?" + +"Hoole, the stonemason." + +"Jump up and I'll drive you there." + +The tone was too humane for Carlton. + +"Thank you, doctor, but I like walking." + +"Then find him for yourself, and be damned to you!" + +And Marigold drove on, red to the hoar of his eighty years; but, as +Carlton stood watching him out of sight with vain compunction, the old +doctor turned in his seat and pointed up an alley with his whip in +passing. + +Hoole, the stonemason, was not rude, but he was as firm as Tait & Taplin +in his refusal. He was an elderly man, of few words, but he admitted +that Sir Wilton Gleed had been there that morning. That was enough for +Carlton, who was turning away when something in his visible fatigue and +dejection moved the mason to give him a hint. + +"You won't get anybody in the district to work for you against Sir +Wilton," he said. "That stands to reason." + +"Then I must go out of the district," said Carlton. And he bought a +county directory at a shop where he had been a regular customer; but +they insisted on the settlement of his current bill first; and even then +he had to help himself to the new book, and leave the money on the +counter, because they scorned to serve him. The directory contained the +names and addresses of the very few builders and master-masons within a +day's journey of Long Stow. And it was all there was to show for the +long day's round of retribution and rebuff when, late in the afternoon, +Carlton returned as he had come, too tired and too dispirited to walk an +inch out of his way; and the school-children who had courtesied in the +morning knew better now, and cried after the bent figure slinking home +at dusk. + +The next day was Sunday, and the school-bell tinkled towards eleven +o'clock, and stopped precisely at the hour. Then Carlton knew that his +own idea had been adopted, and that somebody was saying matins in the +parish school-room: he read the service to himself in his study, and +evensong when evening came, with a sermon of Charles Kingsley's after +each: for doctrine could not help him now, but brave humanity could and +did. + +The Monday was Bank Holiday; but Carlton only knew it when he had +trudged ten miles to have speech with a builder whose premises were +closed; and so another day was lost. On the Tuesday he tried again, but +with as little avail. Sir Wilton Gleed had been there before him (as +long ago as the Saturday afternoon), and it was the same elsewhere. The +week went in fruitless visits to small contractors and working masons in +this large village or in that little town; the enemy had been first in +every field, with a cunning formula which Carlton reconstructed from the +various answers he received. + +"Of course, the church will have to be rebuilt," Sir Wilton had been +saying; "but not by him. He hasn't the money, for one thing; it had +better be an iron church, if he is to pay you for it. Help me to get rid +of him, and you shall hear from me again. We will have a decent church +when we are about it, and a local man shall get the job." + +Meanwhile the boycott was nowhere more operative than in Long Stow +itself, and no human being came near the rectory, where the rector +subsisted on a providential store of bacon and the daily deposit of +eggs, and on strange bread of his own baking, for he would risk no more +insults in the shops. But one night a forgotten friend came back into +his life: his collie, Glen, came bounding down the drive to meet him, +and the mad uproar of that welcome was heard through half the village, +and duly became the talk. The dog had been a vagabond and a rogue for +six wild weeks, and it came back gaunt and hard, its brush clotted and +raw underneath with the spray from a farmer's gun. Carlton washed the +wound with warm water, and the two pariahs supped together, and lay that +night upon the same bed, and went abroad together next morning, to try +the last man left. + +The day after that they stayed at home, and word reached the hall that +the rector had been seen among the ruins of his church; he was, indeed, +exploring them for the first time, and that both with method and +deliberation. When seen, however (from the lane that runs under the +fine east window of to-day, past the lawn-tennis court which was then a +fowl run, and the glebe that is still the glebe), he was seated on a +sandstone block in front of the little lean-to shed; and, as a matter of +fact, his back was to the ruins. He was contemplating similar blocks and +slabs of the undressed stone that lay where they had been lying on +Midsummer Day: some were still smutty from the fire, all were slightly +stained by the weather, otherwise there was no change that Carlton could +see as he sat thus. At one end of the shed rose a great yellow cairn of +material raw from the quarry--a stack of stones about as much of one +size and shape as so many lumps of sugar; enough to finish the +transepts, as matters had stood; a mere fraction of the amount required +now. Carlton looked on what he had got, and his eyes closed in a +calculation beyond his powers in mental arithmetic; he had to take a +pencil to it, and then a foot-rule to the blackened courses, and +presently a pair of compasses to the plans in the study. + +In the afternoon he tidied the shed. Every tool was intact; a little +rust had been the worst intruder; and the feel of the cool sleek handles +quickened Carlton's pulse. Nay, the hammer rang a few strokes on the +cold-chisel, for he could not help it, and the music reminded him of his +poor bells, now cumbering the porch; it was almost as good to hear; and +the way the soft stone peeled, in creamy flakes, thrilled the hand as it +charmed the eye. But a very few minutes served to make the enthusiast +ashamed of his enthusiasm; and though he spent more time in the ruins, +now testing a standing wall, now scraping a charred stone, ardour and +determination had died down in an eye that was looking within; a wistful +irresolution flickered in their place. And that night the lonely man +walked his room once more, from twilight to twilight, with long +intervals spent upon his knees, in agonies of doubt and self-distrust, +in passionate entreaty for a right judgment, and for the strength to +abide by it. Yet his duty had not dawned upon him with the day. + +Towards eleven the school-bell tinkled. It was Sunday once more; and +once more he read the prayers upon his knees and the psalms and lessons +standing; but no sermon to-day. No man could help him in his struggle +with himself; he must trust to the strength of his own soul, to the +singleness of his own heart, and to the guidance of the God who was +drawing nearer and nearer to him in these days--with each prayer that +rose from his heart--with each bead that stood upon his brow. And so at +last, when the burden of doubt and darkness became more than the man +could bear, it was as though the heavens had opened, and a beam of +celestial light flooded the narrow room with the low ceiling and the +cross-beams; for the peace of a mind made up had descended upon the +solitary therein. And that night his sleep was sound, so that in the +morning he had to ask himself why; the answer made him catch his breath; +it did not shake his resolve. + +"He shall have his chance," said Carlton; "he shall have it fairly to +his face. And he will take it--and that will be the end!" + +He hung about the ruins till it was ten o'clock by his watch, and then +went straight to the hall. Sir Wilton was at home; but the footman +hesitated to admit this visitor. Carlton's own hesitation was, however, +at an end, and his eye forbade rebuff. He was shown into the +drawing-room, where a very young girl was at the piano, evidently +practising, and yet playing in a way that made Carlton sorry when she +stopped. The cool room smelling of flowers; the glimpse of garden +through an open window, with the court marked out and chairs under the +trees; the momentary sound of a fine instrument finely touched: it was +all the very breath and essence of the pleasant every-day world from +which he had rightly and richly earned dismissal, and it all was branded +in his brain. Then the young girl rose, and stood in doubt with the sun +upon her plaited hair, and eyes great with innocent distress; but +Carlton barely bowed, and the child hardly knew how she got across the +room. + +Sir Wilton entered with jaunty step. His whiskered jaw was set like a +vice, but the light of conscious triumph danced in his fixed eyeballs. +Carlton had come prepared to have his intrusion treated as his latest +crime; a glance convinced him that the other was too sure of victory to +object to an interview with the virtually vanquished. + +"So you are quite determined that I shall not rebuild the church?" + +It was a point-blank beginning. Sir Wilton shrugged and smiled. "I have +told you to build it if you can," said he. + +"But you mean to make that an impossibility?" + +"Naturally I don't intend to make it easy." + +"Admit that by foul means, since none are fair, you are deliberately +preventing me from doing my duty!" Carlton pressed his point with a +heat he regretted, but could not help. + +"I admit nothing," said the other, doggedly--"least of all what you are +pleased to consider your 'duty.' Your real duty I've already told you. +Resign the living. Let us see the last of you." + +Carlton met the rigid stare with one as unwavering and more acute. It +was as though he would have seen to the back of the other's brain. + +"Very well," he said at length. "You shall!" + +"Ah!" cried Sir Wilton, when he had recovered from his surprise. But it +was not the cry of victory; there was an uncharacteristic lack of +finality in the clergyman's tone. + +"You shall see the last of me this very morning," he continued swiftly, +nervously, "if you like! But it will rest with you. I am not going +unconditionally. Will you listen to what I have to say?" + +Gleed shrugged again, but this time there was no accompanying smile. The +other threw up his head with a sudden decisiveness--a pulpit trick of +his when about to make a primary point--and his right fist fell into his +left palm without his knowing it. + +"Very well," said Carlton; "now I'll tell you exactly on what conditions +you shall have your heart's desire, and I will renounce mine. In spite +of what I hear you've been saying, I have a little money of my own--not +much, indeed--but enough for me to have subsisted upon for these next +years. I am not going to touch a penny of it--I shall pick up a living +for myself elsewhere. Meanwhile I have turned my income into capital +which is now lying in the bank at Lakenhall. It is a trifle under two +thousand pounds, and I want the whole of it to go into the new church. +Wherever I am I ought to be able to earn a little more, either as a +coach or with my pen; so let the offer stand at a church to cost two +thousand pounds. I long to have the building of it. I make no secret of +that. But I have been trying to read my own heart, and I see the +selfishness of such longings; and I have been trying to read your heart, +Sir Wilton, and I see the naturalness of your opposition. So I come to +you and I say, build the church yourself, and I withdraw. Build a better +church out of your abundance, and I will resign as you wish. Give me +your written undertaking, here and now, and you shall have my written +resignation in exchange." + +The words clung to his lips; he alone knew what it cost him to utter +them; he alone, in his absolute freedom from the mercenary instinct, +would have felt certain of the result. But the rich man was touched upon +his tender spot. What return was he offered for his money? Who would +thank him for building a church in the heart of the country? The church +could be built by subscription; bad enough to have to head the list. +Besides, he was flushed with triumph; he saw but a beaten man in the +nervous wretch before him. Fancy bribing a beaten man to fly! + +"I like your impudence," said Wilton Gleed. "Upon my word! _My_ written +undertaking--to _you_!" + +"Do you refuse to give it?" asked Carlton quickly. + +"Certainly--to you." + +"Undertakings apart, do you entertain my suggestion, or do you not?" + +"That's my business." + +Carlton felt his patience slipping. + +"Do you mean to say that you don't even yet recognise that it's mine +too, as rector of the parish? Are you still so ignorant of the legal +bearings of the situation? God knows, Sir Wilton, it is not for me to +speak of right and wrong; but I do assure you that you're putting +yourself wilfully in the wrong in this matter. You hinder me from doing +my legal duty, and you refuse to assume any responsibility! Suspended or +not, I am bound to keep my chancel, at all events, 'in good and +substantial repair, restoring _and rebuilding when necessary_.'" + +Sir Wilton's eyes, fixed as usual, caught fire suddenly. + +"Oh, you're bound, are you?" + +"Legally bound." + +"You're sure that's the law?" + +"The very letter of the law, Sir Wilton." + +"Then see that you keep it! You come here blustering about your legal +rights; but you forget that I've got mine. Where there's a law there's a +penalty, and by God I'll enforce it! 'The very letter of the law,' eh? +I'll take you at your word; you shall keep it to the letter. Build away! +Build away! The sooner you begin the better--for you!" + +This was probably the boldest move that Sir Wilton Gleed ever made in +his life; it was certainly the least considered. But what satisfaction +sweeter than hoisting the enemy with his own petard? It is the +quintessence of poetic justice, the acme of personal triumph; and the +sudden opportunity of achieving his end by means so neat was more than +even Wilton Gleed could resist. Every builder and mason within reach was +already on his side; not a man of them who would work for dissolute +hypocrisy in defiance of might and right. No need to say another word to +the masons and the builders. They could be trusted on the whole, and the +untrustworthy could be bribed. Gleed had not the smallest scruple in the +matter, and he was characteristically forearmed with a public defence of +his private conduct. He believed that every right-thinking man would +applaud his sharp practice in the cause of religion and of morality; and +his confidence was not to be shaken by the way in which his challenge +was received. + +"Are you in earnest?" asked Carlton. "Do you seriously propose to hinder +me with one hand and to compel me with the other?" + +"I mean to take you at your word," Gleed repeated. "You are fond of +talking about your duty. Let's see you do it." + +"You set the builders against me, and then you tell me to build. May I +ask if you are prepared to defend such clumsy trickery?" + +"Any day you like, and glad of the opportunity!" cried Sir Wilton, +cheerfully. "All I have done is to give you your proper character where +it deserves to be known; you have it to thank if you can't get men to +work for you; and it's your look-out. I've heard about enough of you and +your church. Go and build it. Go and build it." + +"I will," said Carlton. "You have had your chance." And he bowed and +withdrew with strange serenity. + +A parting shot followed him through the hall. + +"You will have to do it with your own two hands!" + +Carlton made no reply. But in the village he committed a fresh enormity. + +He was seen to smile. + + + + +XI + +LABOUR OF HERCULES + + +All the church had not been burnt to the ground. West of the porch +(itself not hopelessly destroyed) stood thirteen feet of sound south +wall, blackened on the inside, calcined in the upper courses, but plumb +and firm as far as it went. A corresponding portion of the north wall, +the sixteen-foot strip west of the window almost opposite the porch, +stood equally rigid and erect. And, thus supported on either hand, the +entire west end rose practically intact, without a missing or a ruined +stone; the window was still truly bisected by its single mullion; +neither head nor tracery had given the fraction of an inch; only the +mangled leads, with here and there a fragment of smoked glass adhering, +would have told of a fire to one led blindfold under the west window, +and there given his first view of the church. + +But that was the one good wall and real exception to a rule of utter +ruin. The rest of the original building was either razed already or else +unfit to stand. The embryonic transepts were not quite demolished, but +they had never been many feet above ground. Sections of wall still stood +where there were no windows to weaken them, but east of the porch +nothing stood firm. Worst of all was the east end, from which the +chancel walls had been burnt away on either side. It stood as though +balanced, with an alarming outward list. One mullion of the great window +had gone by the sill; the other was cracked and crooked, as if +supporting the entire weight of the gable overhead; and it looked as +though a push would send the tottering fabric flat. + +Black ruin lay thick and deep within. To peep in was to see an ashpit +through a microscope. The remnants of the slate and timber roof lay +uppermost. Tie-beams, corbels, king-posts, ridge, struts, wall-plates, +pole-plates, rafters principal and common, joists, battens, laths and +fillets, half-burnt and black as the pit, save where some spilled +sheet-lead shone in the sun, spread a common pall over nave and chancel, +aisle and pews. It was as a midnight sea frozen in mid-storm, the +twisted lectern alone rising salient like a mast. Slates lay in shallow +heaps as though dealt from a pack; and certain pages, brown and brittle +at the edges, which the wind had torn from the burnt Bible before +Carlton rescued the remains, still fluttered in the crannies when the +wind went its rounds. And the hum of bees was in the air; but there had +been great distress among the sparrows, and one heard more of the +rectory cocks and hens. + +Upon this desolate and dead spot, in the heart of the warm, live +country, Robert Carlton stood looking within a few minutes of his exit +from the hall. But he did not stand looking long. He had changed into +flannels at top speed, and there was still more change in the man. His +eye glowed with a grim decision which lightened without dispelling the +settled sadness of the face. Passionate aspiration had cooled and +hardened into dogged and defiant resolve; and there was an end to all +compunction and self-questioning suspense. Carlton knew exactly what he +was going to do; he had known where to begin since the day before +yesterday. He wore neither coat nor waistcoat, his sleeves were rolled +up, he had a crowbar in one hand, and a heavy hammer in the other. He +began immediately on the thirteen feet of good wall to the left of the +porch. + +He had tested this wall on Saturday. The upper courses were loose and +crumbling; the sooner they went the better. Carlton climbed upon the +wall, and, sitting astride where it was firmest, began working off the +loose stones one by one with the crowbar. Iron would ring on iron twice +or thrice, and then a twist of the bar send the charred stone tumbling. +It was easy work, but the position was awkward, and Carlton soon went +for a ladder; on the way he was surprised to find that he was already +drenched with perspiration, and rather hungry. + +But the next hour tired him more, or rather the time that seemed an hour +to him, for it afterwards turned out to be three hours by the watch that +he had left indoors. Only the topmost course, or the stones on which the +red-hot eaves had rested, lent themselves to off-hand treatment; they +had been burnt to cinders--the mortar binding them, to powder; it needed +but a wrench to dislodge each one. But the next few courses were a +different matter. Half the stones were too loose to leave, too good to +chip in the removal. Carlton worked upon them with the cold-chisel +first, the crowbar next, and finally with his naked fingers, removing +the stones with immense care, and very deliberately dropping each into +its own bed in the long grass outside. At last the little strip of wall +was left without an unsound member from serrated crest to plinth: not a +stone that shook or shifted at a conscientious push; and the workman +took his eyes from his work. But he did not peer through the trees in +search of other eyes, for he was not thinking of himself or of his work +from a spectacular point of view. He merely saw that the sun had +travelled the church from end to end while he had been busy. And +suddenly he found himself sinking for want of food, and unable to stand +upright without intolerable pain. But he was back within half-an-hour, +and remained at work upon the sixteen-foot strip opposite till after +sunset. + +"But it hasn't been anything like a full day, old dog," said Carlton, as +they crept up to bed between eight and nine. And he set his +seven-and-six-penny alarum at four o'clock. + +Next forenoon the sixteen-foot strip was done with in its turn; no +infirm stone left standing upon another. Scraped and repointed, with the +uninjured pieces replaced in fresh mortar, and an entirely new top +course, these two short walls would be worthy of the gallant west end to +which they acted as buttresses. Its wounds were not skin-deep, thanks to +the west wind which had driven the flames the other way. It looked as +though a sponge would cleanse it, and Carlton sighed as he turned his +back upon the one good wall. + +Elsewhere, as has been said, there were fragments fit to use again, but +not to remain as they were. It cost Carlton a couple of days to take +these to pieces, laying the good stones carefully in the grass, as his +practice had been hitherto. The fourth day, however, he tried a change +of labour to ease his aching limbs, and went round and round with a +barrow, picking the sound stones from the grass, and stacking them near +the shed. Next morning he fought his way into the chancel, and stood +chin-deep in the wreckage, contemplating the leaning east end. And all +this time no soul had come near him; through the trees he had indeed +heard whispers that were not of the trees, but he had never thrown more +than a glance in their direction, and the green screen was still +charitably thick. + +The east end must come down sooner or later--therefore sooner. Carlton +was no engineer, but he was a man with a distinct turn for mechanics; +had used a lathe as a lad, and taught his Boys' Friendly how to use it +in their turn; had picked up much from Tom Ivey, and was himself blessed +with sound instincts concerning application and control of power. Here +was a tottering wall to come down altogether. It was too insecure to +pull to pieces. The problem was to get it down with as little damage and +as little danger as possible. One man could do it, Carlton thought, but +not without considerable risk of a broken head at least. If he could but +make sure of the whole wall falling in the one outward direction! He +revolved about it, mentally and on his feet, till he became angry with +himself for the loss of time, ceased to speculate, and went to work in +desperation. He would trust to luck; he despised himself for having +studied a risk so small. He had done so out of no absurd consideration +for his own skin, but entirely from the depth and strength of his +artistic impulse to do a thing properly or not at all. Even now he had +to prepare the ground: he had to clear the chancel enough to give +himself free play. + +Then he found a scaffolding-pole which had not been used, and tilted at +a tree for practice. The pole was unmanageable from its length. He sawed +it shorter. It was still too unwieldy to use amid the _debris_. He +shortened it until he had a battering-ram some eighteen feet long. But +all these preliminaries had taken unimagined hours, and again Carlton +felt sick with hunger before he thought of food, and unequal to further +effort until he had some. So he turned a breaking but reluctant back +upon the church, and went indoors; remembering everything on the way, +and loathing himself afresh: at his work he was beginning to forget! + +Thus far this outcast had subsisted chiefly on eggs; he beat up a couple +now, and tossed the stuff off with a little wine and water. Then he fell +upon a box of biscuits, but threw the dog as many as he munched himself, +striding up and down the while, and for all his fatigue. The room was +the one in which he had studied his own physiognomy. It might have been +any other. He had no eyes for himself to-day, and not many thoughts, +for, in the midst of his contrition for forgetting, he had forgotten +again. His mind had escaped to the chancel; the flesh followed in a few +minutes, having eaten and rested on its legs. + +The dog bounded ahead, and presently announced an intruder at the top of +its voice. Carlton quickened his pace, frowning at the thought of +interruption; he was on the spot before curiosity had tempered his +annoyance; and there among the ruins stood Sir Wilton Gleed, not +frowning at all, but forcing a smile behind his cigar. + +"How long is this tomfoolery to go on?" said he. + +Carlton stood looking at him for some seconds; then he picked up his +pole without replying. "You'd better stand to one side," was all he +said. "Kennel up, Glen!" + +"Going to do something desperate?" + +"The further you get away from me the safer you'll be." + +But he did not look round as he spoke, and Sir Wilton gripped his stick +without occasion. Carlton's blood was boiling none the less. The enemy +had surprised him at his worst. He was, for the first time, attempting +single-handed the work of several men; and he might be going about it in +a very ridiculous way. He could not tell till he tried; and it was one +thing to experiment in private, but quite another thing to court open +discomfiture of the very nature which would most delight the looker-on. +And the man was worn out with hard and unaccustomed labour, dyspeptic +from evil feeding, nervous and irritable from both causes combined. Sir +Wilton Gleed could hardly have chosen a worse moment for renewing the +duel. + +In Carlton the longing to do something violent suddenly outweighed his +desire to raze the east end of the church. He poised his pole and fixed +both eyes on the one remaining mullion of the east window. If the +mullion went, he still thought that the whole fabric should collapse, +forgetting the inherent independence of arches; and his mind dwelt +wistfully on the effect of the crash upon Sir Wilton Gleed. But his aim +was not the less accurate, nor did his anxiety hinder him from utilising +every muscle in his body at the ideal moment. The end of the ram smote +the mullion fairly and powerfully, where it was already cracked. The +mullion flew asunder; a quatrefoil shifted a little, robbed of its +support. The whole wall seemed to shudder; but that was all. + +"You remind me of Don Quixote," said Sir Wilton's voice. + +Carlton spun round. The pole trailed behind him from his right hand. He +took fresh hold of it, lower down, and there was no mistaking his look. + +"You go about your business," said he, fiercely. + +"I've come about it," was the bland reply. "I'm not trespassing either; +don't put yourself in the wrong. Remember your own advice; and let's +have a civil answer to a civil question. My good friend, what do you +think you're trying to do?" + +The artificial geniality of address, the settled malice underneath, the +tone that people take with a wilful child, all galled and goaded the +tired man beyond endurance. + +"You had better go," he said. + +"Do you really propose to rebuild the church with your own ten fingers?" +inquired Sir Wilton, not to be daunted by a threat. + +"You proposed it. I mean to do it." + +Sir Wilton shook his head with a venomous smile. "Oh, no, you don't! You +mean to pretend to try. You mean to pose." + +Carlton flung the pole from him, and strode forward, swinging open +hands. + +"I'm not going to talk to you," he said, "and you sha'n't make me strike +you; but if you don't go out you'll be put out, Sir Wilton." + +Gleed smiled again. His collar was seized. He smiled no more, but lashed +out with his stick. The stick was wrenched away from him. It whistled in +the air. And Robert Carlton had his enemy at his mercy, still held by +the collar, in the place where he had preached goodwill to men. For he +was much the taller of the two and an old athlete, whereas the other was +only an elderly sportsman. Carlton could have whipped him like a little +dog. He did almost worse: released him without a cut, and handed him his +stick without a word. + +And at that moment there came the crash that would have saved this +collision a few seconds before. Both men turned, rubbing their eyes; a +cloud of yellow dust had filled them as it filled the chancel. The cloud +dispersed, and wall and window were gone from sill to gable; what +remained was nowhere higher than a man could reach. + +"Now leave me in peace," said Carlton, "for I shall have my hands full; +and don't trouble to come again, because I sha'n't listen to you. You've +had two chances. I promised to live away and only find the money and the +men; you wouldn't have it. I invited you to build the church yourself; +you wouldn't hear of that. No; you would force me to do my duty, having +tied my hands! You would take me at my word. I am taking you at yours. +I should try fresh ground, if I were you; meanwhile you could sue me +for assault." + +Gleed had fully intended doing so, but the scornful suggestion killed +the thought, and for once he had no last word. But his last look made +amends. + + + + +XII + +A FRESH DISCOVERY + + +His son was waiting for him at the gate. + +"The man's mad!" cried Sir Wilton with a harsh laugh. + +"What's he been doing? What was that row?" + +Sidney's manner with his father was subtly disrespectful; he seldom +addressed him by that name, enjoyed arguing with him (having the clearer +head), and argued in slang. Yet his tongue was as dexterous and +plausible as it was always smooth, and he was a difficult boy to convict +of a specific rudeness. + +"There's some method in his madness," was his comment on the father's +account of the work accomplished under his eyes. + +"But he says he's going to build it up again!" + +"I wonder if he will," speculated Sidney. + +"What--by himself?" + +"Yes." + +"Of course he won't. No man could. He's a lunatic." + +They were walking home. Sidney said nothing for some paces. Then he +asked an innocent question. It was a little way of his. + +"I suppose one man could finish one stone, though, father?" + +Sir Wilton conceded this. + +"And fix it in its place, shouldn't you say?" + +A gruffer concession. + +"Then I'm not sure that he couldn't do more than you think," said +Sidney. "The windows might stump him, and the roof would; but he could +do the rest." + +"Nonsense!" cried Sir Wilton. "You don't know what you're talking +about." + +"Of course I don't," admitted Sidney readily. "That was why I asked +about the one man and the one stone." + +Sir Wilton had not half his boy's brain. The cold-blooded little wretch +would boast that he could "score off the governor without his knowing +it." Sir Wilton's merit was his tenacity of purpose. + +"I tell you the man's mad," he reiterated; "and if he doesn't take care +I'll have him shut up." + +"A great idea!" cried Sidney. "But, I say, if that's so we oughtn't to +be too rough on him!" + +"In any case I'll have him out of this," quoth Sir Wilton through his +teeth; but his mind dwelt on the shutting-up notion: it really was "a +great idea." And Carlton himself had given him another: he just would +"take fresh ground." + +He sought it that evening by a painful path. Jasper Musk and Sir Wilton +Gleed were not friends; they had not spoken for years. Sir Wilton had +not been long in the parish before he discovered that Musk had "cheated" +him over the Flint House. The word was much too strong; but some little +advantage had no doubt been taken. The quarrel had lasted to the +present time; but Sir Wilton had often felt that Musk must hate the +common scourge even more bitterly than he did himself, and that he would +be a very valuable ally. He was a strong man and solid, the one powerful +peasant in the neighbourhood. Unfortunately, sciatica had bound him to +his chair from the very day of his daughter's funeral. It would have +been comparatively easy to accost the old fellow in the open, and to +disarm him with instantaneous expressions of sympathy and of +indignation. It was more difficult for the lord of the manor to knock at +the door of an enemy who was not a tenant--a door opening on the very +street, and a door that might be slammed in his face for all Long Stow +to see or hear. So Sir Wilton went after dinner, on a dark night; was +admitted without demur; and stayed till after eleven. + +Next day he went again; he was also seen at the village constable's; and +the village constable was seen at the Flint House; and Sir Wilton +happened to call once more while he was there. The afternoon was rich in +developments, and duly murmurous with theory, prophecy, speculation. The +schoolmaster was summoned from the school, the saddler from his bench: +it was the latter who fetched Tom Ivey from the room that he was adding +to his mother's cottage at Sir Wilton's expense. Meanwhile the village +whisper became loud talk; but its arrows, shot at a venture, flew wide +of any mark. For through all his dark disgrace, as now when the odium +attaching to him was gathering like snow on a rolling snowball; from the +night of the fire to this eighteenth day of August; there was one thing +of which Robert Carlton had never been suspected by those who had loved +or feared him for a year and a half. + +Naturally the excitement penetrated to the hall, where Sir Wilton kept +dinner waiting, but, very properly, did not refer to the unsavoury +subject at that meal. He was, however, in singularly high spirits, and +drank a vast amount of excellent champagne; yet his own wife left the +table in ignorance of what had happened. Now Lady Gleed was a very +particular person, a great stickler for restraint, her own being +something strenuous and exotic. She seldom spoke of ordinary things +above a whisper, and would have dealt with the village scandal in dumb +show if she could. To her daughter she had genuinely preferred never to +mention it at all. + +But Lydia Gleed--it should have been Languish--was a more modern type. +She was frankly interested in the affair. It had given quite a zest to +what would otherwise have been an insufferably dull month for Lydia. The +girl had the makings of a perfect woman of society, and yet the end of +her second season found her still an unknown distance from the first +step to the realisation of that ideal. Proposals she had received, but +none such as an heiress of her calibre was entitled to expect. She had +actually been engaged to an adventurer; but that had only retarded +matters. + +There may have been purer causes. Feeble and inanimate in her every-day +life, and constitutionally bored by the familiar, Miss Gleed kept her +best side for those whom she knew least; could chatter to +acquaintances, the newer the better; was in her element at parties, and +out of it at home. Even in her element, however, Lydia never forgot to +conceal as much of her appreciation as possible, and would dance +angelically with the corners of her mouth turned down, and take like +medicine the wine which really did make glad her heart. This August she +was feeling particularly _blasee_ and dissatisfied; and the romantic +downfall of the rector--whose sermons had kept her awake--was a French +novel without the trouble of reading it or the risk of confiscation. +To-night, therefore, it was Lydia who invited Gwynneth to play, and +pressed the invitation with a compliment; it was her commoner practice +to snub the much younger girl. And it was Lydia who drew her chair close +to that of Lady Gleed, and began the whispering, to which Gwynneth was +made to shut her ears with all ten fingers. Yet for once Lady Gleed was +frankly interested herself. + +"But what _has_ he done?" + +The music had stopped. They had not noticed it. The ungrown girl was +standing in the middle of the room. She was dressed in white, and her +face looked as white in the candle-light, but her eyes and hair the +darker and more brilliant by contrast. And the eyes were great with a +pity and a pain which were at least not less than the natural curiosity +of a healthy child. + +"Mind your own business," said Lydia, bluntly. + +But even as she spoke the door opened. + +"What's this? What's this?" cried Sir Wilton, who was beaming, and +good-naturedly concerned to see the tears starting to his brother's +child's eyes. "Whose business have you been minding, little woman?" + +"It was about Mr. Carlton," the child said with a sob. "I hear everybody +saying nothing's bad enough for him--nothing--and I thought he was so +good! I only asked what he had done. I won't again. Please--please let +me go!" + +"In an instant," said Sir Wilton, detaining her with familiarity. "You +mustn't be a little goose." + +"Let her go, Wilton," whispered his wife. + +"Not till I've told her what Mr. Carlton has done!" + +And Sir Wilton Gleed beamed more than ever upon the consternation of his +ladies. + +"But, Wilton----" + +Lady Gleed had risen, and was even forgetting to whisper. Lydia merely +looked unusually wide-awake, and prettier for once than the child under +the chandelier, who was terribly disfigured by her embarrassment and +distress. + +"If you want to know what Mr. Carlton has done," said Sir Wilton to his +niece, "it was he who set fire to the church!" + + + + +XIII + +DEVICES OF A CASTAWAY + + +Left in peace, Carlton threw himself into his task with redoubled +spirit, and presently forgot the existence of Sir Wilton Gleed. He had +just three hours before dark. In this time he succeeded in pulling the +rest of the east wall to pieces, even to the loosened plinth, and was +adding the good stones to his stack when night fell. It was a night not +to be forgotten in the history of Robert Carlton's case. Nothing +happened. But he had no proper food in the house, and he began to feel +really ill for the want of it. Eggs and bacon he had, but the lighting +of the fire fatigued him more than anything he had done all day, and he +fell asleep in the kitchen, and the bacon went brittle, and his attempt +at bread was become an unmasticable fossil. A very little whisky, from a +bottle that had been open for months, did him more good, and enabled him +to face the food problem in earnest before he went to bed. It was a very +serious problem indeed. Health and strength, success or failure, +continued vigour or a swift collapse, all hinged upon the inglorious +question, which engrossed till near midnight one of the plainest livers +on earth, as his labours had absorbed him since dawn. He had to reckon +with his enemies in the matter. He had not the slightest hope of +obtaining supplies in the village. But at daylight he walked some miles +to see a farmer who had sometimes trudged as many to hear him preach; +and the farmer gave him breakfast with a surly pity, which Carlton +suffered, as he accepted the meal, for his hard work's sake. + +He had explained that he came on business, and after breakfast the +farmer asked him, not without suspicion, what his business was. + +"Do you kill your own sheep?" inquired Mr. Carlton. + +"Only for ourselves." + +"When do you kill?" + +"Let's see. Friday, is it? Then we kill this mornin'." + +"May I wait and watch?" + +The other stared. + +"I want some mutton," Carlton explained. + +"But I don't keep a butcher's shop," growled the farmer. "Well, we'll +see what we can do; we may be able to let you have a bit of the +neck-end." + +"I should be very grateful for it. But I'm afraid I want more." + +"What more?" + +"A flock of sheep." + +He was willing to pay outside prices. So a bargain was struck; and the +sheep were in the glebe that night. Meanwhile he had seen one killed and +dressed, and was not the less thankful that he had neck-end chops enough +to last him that week. + +The stacking of the stones was finished early on the Friday afternoon, +and Carlton determined to take the rest of that day easily. So he set +himself to retrieve the lectern from the ruins, and did finally wheel it +to the rectory, on two barrows; the first broke under its weight. +Moreover, this had consumed the entire afternoon, as another would have +foreseen at a glance, and Carlton emerged as from a pool of ink. Since +he had made himself rather hot and black, however, he thought it a pity +not to clear a little more of the interior while the light lasted. It +must be done some day; but again the task was more formidable than it +appeared to dauntless eyes still aflame with vast endeavour. The firemen +had not spared the water when all was over, so the big bones of the roof +were not burnt through. Tie-beams and principal rafters, in particular, +lay whole and heavy, and immovable less from their weight than from the +inextricable tangle in which they had fallen. There was nothing but the +saw for these, and Carlton had already sawn the lectern from its grave. +He learnt to saw with his left hand that evening; and after all had very +little but his own personal condition to show for his labour: only the +nucleus of a wood-heap near the stack of stones, and a crooked, +blackened, brass thing in the dining-room. But then he had not intended +to do much that afternoon; he went indoors, and drew the water for his +bath with that consolation. + +Meat for the second time that day! Carlton began to feel a man. He paced +his study with the old rapid step; and he determined to order and +arrange his day's work so that the muscles should relieve each other in +gangs: varied exertions; that was the principle of all continuous +labour. You cannot sit down to rest when you are working hard; but you +can do something else. Carlton never rested till he went to bed. But +this evening he sat down at his desk. + +A sheet of sermon paper was ruled in six columns and a margin; the +columns were headed by the days of the week; down the margin the days +were divided into three periods, a short and two long; it was the +class-room chart of his school-days over again. In future he would rise +at five; four was too early. The short period before breakfast should be +daily devoted to work in the house. The place must be made and kept +habitably clean; that could be left partly to the wet days. Then there +was the kitchen work, the preparation of food for the day, baking two +days a week, the occasional slaughter of a sheep; and here Carlton +paused to grapple with the appalling problem presented by the hungriest +of living men and the smallest of slain sheep . . . Salt seemed the +solution . . . Salt mutton? . . . At any rate all carnal cares and +menial duties should be disposed of for the day as early as possible in +the early morning; not till then would he break his fast; and the real +day's work should begin as near eight o'clock as might be, but as often +as possible on the right side of the hour. Moreover, it should begin +with the lighter labour: scraping and repointing the uncondemned walls, +for example; that would take one man weeks or months; but it would not +tire him out at the beginning of the day. Then there was the preparation +of the stones; the careful scraping of those preserved; classification +as to size for the various courses; cutting and fitting of fresh +stones; the actual building with trowel and plummet. All this went under +one head, and was for the body of the day; a long spell broken by a good +meal and a determined rest. The day should finish, for many a day to +come, with a savage attack upon the chaos within the walls. A hand too +tired for skilled labour would still be fit for that. + +And as Robert Carlton reached this stage in the laying of his ingenious +plans, he leaned back in his chair, and stared at his dull reflection in +the diamond panes above his writing table, in a sudden horror of himself +and all his ways and works. He was actually happy--he! The reaction was +the same in kind as that which had come to him at the shed, in the joy +of touching hammer and chisel again, and which had driven him to the +hall next morning. But it was greater in degree: for then he had seen +how happy he might be; to-night he knew how happy he was. + +"But only in my work! Only in my work!" he cried, and fell upon his +knees to crave forgiveness from the Almighty for daring to enjoy the +consolation which He had ordained for him. + +The artist was dead in Carlton for that night. He rose a very miserable +sinner, every thought a whip for his poor spirit that had dared to come +to life without leave. He had committed deadly sin with deadliest +result; let him never forget it! He, God's servant----the morbid +rehearsal may be spared. But he did not spare himself. All the +aggravating circumstances were recalled, none that extenuated; all that +he had suffered he must needs suffer anew, slowly, deliberately, and in +due order; that he might not forget, that he might never forget again! +Now he was confessing to Musk, now to George Mellis; poor George, where +was he? Now they were breaking his windows, and now Tom Ivey was +refusing his hand. But at last he was before the bishop; that strong, +queer voice was croaking across the desk; and all at once the croak +ended, and the voice rang like a sovereign with words of refined gold. + +"Courage, brother! Pray without ceasing. Look forward, not back; do not +despair. Despair is the devil's best friend; better give way to deadly +sin than to deadlier despair!" + +And he prayed again; but not in the house. + +"For I will look forward," he said as he went. "But let me never again +forget!" + +There was neither wind nor moon. The sparrows were still, but not the +shrill little swifts. And somewhere a thrush was singing, clear and +mellow and certain as a bell; and once a bat's wing brushed the bowed +bare head of him who prayed not for forgiveness but for the peace of a +soul; for neither was it in the ruins that Robert Carlton knelt once +more. + + + + +XIV + +THE LAST RESORT + + +Carlton chose a fresh stone from the heap; he was going to begin all +over again. He got it in his arms, and he managed to stagger with it to +the front of the shed. The stone was at least two feet long, and its +other dimensions were about half that of the length; as Carlton set it +down, himself all but on the top of it, he trusted it was the largest +size in the heap. It was of a rich reddish yellow, roughly rectangular, +but lumpy as ill-made porridge, exactly as it had come from the quarry. +Carlton tilted it up against a smaller stone, smooth enough in parts, +but palpably untrue in its planes and angles. This was the stone that he +had been all day spoiling; it had been as big as the new one that +morning, when he had begun upon it with a view to the lower eleven-inch +courses; and now he had failed to make even a six-inch job of it. The +stone was so soft. It cut like cheese. But he was not going to spoil +another. + +So he rested a minute before beginning again, and he marshalled his +tools upon a barrow within reach of his hand. It was rather late on the +Saturday afternoon. In the morning he had felt disinclined for violent +exertion, but just equal to trying his hand at that stone-dressing which +would presently become his chief labour; and his hand had disappointed +him. It had the wrong kind of cunning: as amateurs will, Carlton had +picked up his fancy craft at the fancy end: gargoyles were his +specialty, and an even surface beyond him. + +"But I can learn," he had been saying all day; and most times the dog +had wagged his tail. + +Ten minutes ago his tone had changed. + +"I'll start afresh! I'll do one to-night! I won't be beaten!" + +And that time Glen had leapt up with his master, and lashed his shins +with his tail, as much as to say, "Beaten? Not you!" and had accompanied +him to the heap, and was pretending to rest with him now. But Carlton +was constitutionally impatient of conscious rest; and this afternoon +certain sounds, louder though less incessant than those of his constant +comrades, the bees and birds, informed him that the Boys' Friendly were +not too proud to use the far strip of glebe land which the rector had +levelled for them last year. The discovery made him glad. But it also +brought him to his feet within the minute that he had promised himself; +and the hammer rang swift blows on the cold-chisel as much to drown the +music of bat and ball as to clear the grosser irregularities from one +surface of the stone. + +This done (and this much he had done successfully enough before), hammer +and cold-chisel were thrown aside, and the marbling-hammer taken up, +because Tom Ivey had always used it to make the rough sufficiently +smooth. But it is a mongrel implement at best, being hammer and chisel +in one, with changeable bits like a brace, and yet with less of these +than of the pickaxe in its cross-bred composition. Like a pick you wield +it, yet lightly and with the one and only curve, or at a stroke you go +too deep. + +Chip, chip, chip went the sharp seven-eighths-of-an-inch bit; and off +curved the soft yellow flakes, to turn to powder as they fell. + +Chip, chip, chip along the top; and the keen bit left its mark each +time; and the finished row of these was like the key-board of a toy +piano. + +Chip, chip, chip, always from left to right, a tier below, and then the +tier below that. The toy piano is becoming a toy organ of many manuals; +and the hue of the keys is not that of the rough outer surface: as they +first see the light they are nearer the colour of cigar-ash. + +Chip, chip, chip--chip, chip, chip; but _swish_, _swish_, _swish_ is a +thought nearer the sound. So soft that stone, so sharp that bit, so +timorous and tentative the unpractised strokes of Robert Carlton! + +Every now and then he would stop, and anxiously apply a straight lath to +the spreading smoothness; but he was improving, and in the end the plane +was at least as true as it was smooth. The key-marks of the +marbling-hammer were not always parallel or of even length, and the rows +declined from left to right like the hand of a weak writer: "bad +batting," Tom Ivey would have called it, a "bat" being the mark in +question, and long, even bats, "straight along the stone," the mason's +ideal, as the inquisitive amateur had discovered the first day Ivey +worked for him. But knowledge and skill lie a gulf apart, and on the +whole Carlton felt encouraged. He had done but one side of four, but +the one was smooth enough to face the world as coursed rubble; let him +but get and keep his angles, and the other three would matter less. So +now he took the straight-edge, as the lath was called, and the bit of +black slate which Tom had also left behind him; and with these and the +mason's square a rectangular parallelogram with eleven-inch ends was +duly ruled on the satisfactory surface. Hammer and cold-chisel again. +Much use of the square, but no more play with the marbling-hammer. No +need to perfect the parts doomed to mortar and eternal night; rough +criss-cross work with a mason's axe is the thing for them; as Carlton +knew when he rather reluctantly applied himself to the mastery of that +implement, just as he was beginning to acquire some proficiency with the +other. The mason's axe was the most treacherous of them all. It was a +hand pickaxe with a point like a stiletto; a touch, and the steel lay +buried. But it was the right tool to use, and Carlton used it to the +best of his ability, stooping more and more over his work as the light +began to fail him. + +He was going to succeed at last! If only he had not lost so much time! +Then he might have mixed some mortar and laid the first stone of his own +cutting--the first stone of the new church! That would have been +something like a day's work; yet he was not dissatisfied with his +progress. Swish, swish, swish; he might have done much worse. He had +pulled down the bad walls--swish--and what was good of them--swish--he +had saved and there they were. He looked up, the perspiration standing +thick upon his white forehead, his eyes all eagerness and +determination. He stood upright to rest a moment in the mellow +light--happy again! Happy because he had not time to think of himself, +but only of what he was doing, and of what he felt certain he could do: +happy in his aching limbs and soaking flannels, and all that with a +happiness he was for once not destined to realise and to check. For, +even as he stood, Glen barked, and Carlton turned in time to see the +village constable tuck his cane under his arm while he stood still to +feel in his pockets. The man was in full uniform--a strange circumstance +in itself. + +"Good evening, Frost," said Mr. Carlton. + +"Evenin', sir." + +The constable was an imposing figure of a man, with a handsome stupid +face, and a stolid deliberation of word and deed which gave an +impression of artless but indefatigable vigilance. In reality the fellow +had few inferiors in the parish. + +"For me?" and Carlton held out his hand as the other produced a paper. + +"For you an' me," said the constable, winking as he kept the paper to +himself. And in an impressive voice he read out a warrant for the +apprehension of the Reverend Robert Carlton, Clerk in Holy Orders, on a +charge of unlawfully and maliciously setting fire to the parish church +of Long Stow, in the County of Suffolk, on the night of the 24th or the +morning of the 25th June, in the year of grace 1882; the warrant was +signed by two justices--Sir Wilton Gleed of Long Stow Hall, and Canon +Wilders of Lakenhall. + +"Like to see it for yourself?" inquired Frost. + +"No, thank you; that's quite enough for me. Well, upon my word!" + +And Carlton stood staring into space, a glitter in his eyes, a smile +upon his lips, incapable of unmixed indignation: really, Sir Wilton was +a better fighter than he had supposed. + +"You will have to come with me to Lakenhall," said the constable's +voice. + +Carlton realised the situation. + +"To-night?" + +"At once, sir, if _you_ please. They've sent a trap for us from +Lakenhall. That's waiting at the gate." + +The mason's axe was still in his hand, the unfinished stone at his feet. +Carlton looked wistfully from one to the other, and thence in appeal to +the officer of the law. + +"I say, Frost, is there any hurry for a quarter of an hour? I'd--I'd +give a sovereign to finish this stone!" + +Virtue blazed in the constable's face. + +"You don't bribe _me_, sir!" he cried. "I'm ashamed of you, I am, for +tryin' that on! No, Mr. Carlton, you've got to come straight away." + +"But surely I may change first?" + +"You'll have to be quick, and I'll have to come with you." + +"Is that necessary?" asked Carlton with some heat, as he flung his tools +under cover. + +"That's left to me, sir, and I don't trust no gentleman in his +dressing-room. My orders are to take you alive, Mr. Carlton." + +Carlton was upon him in two strides. + +"Very well," said he, "you shall; and you shall come upstairs and see +me change. But address another word to me at your peril!" + +A small crowd had collected at the gate; a Lakenhall policeman was +waiting in the trap. Carlton came down the drive with his long coat +flying and his head thrown back. Somehow he was allowed to depart +without a groan. + +On the way he never spoke, and something kept the constables from +speaking before him. They had a slow horse; it was nearly an hour before +Carlton saw the inside of a police-station for the first time in his +life. Here he was formally charged by a portly inspector with whom he +had some slight acquaintance; the charge concluded with the usual +warning that anything he said might be given in evidence against him. + +"I hear," said Carlton. "And now?" + +The inspector shrugged his personal regret. + +"I'm afraid there's only one thing for it now, sir." + +"The cells, eh?" + +"That's it, Mr. Carlton." + +"Till when?" + +"Monday morning, sir, the magistrates sit." + +"Lead the way, then," said Carlton. "I can spend my Sunday in gaol as +well as in my own rectory." + +His eye was stern but steady; he was filled with contempt, but without a +fear. He knew who was at the bottom of this charge, and had begun by +quite admiring the man's resource; but his admiration did not survive a +second thought. What a fool the fellow must be! No fool like an old +fool, said the proverb; and none so insanely reckless as your prudent +people, once they lose their head, thought Robert Carlton in his cell. +Of the charge itself he scarcely condescended to think at all; for to +his mind, the more innocent on that score for his guilt upon another, +the thing seemed more preposterous than it really was. He burn the +church! With what object, pray? And what did they suppose he had risked +his life for at the fire? Remorse, or show? He could have laughed; he +was unable to imagine a shred of evidence against himself. + +There was a Testament on the table, but he had brought his Bible in his +pocket; and by the gas-jet in its wire guard, that striped the walls +with lean shadows like the bars of some wild beast's cage, Robert +Carlton forgot his own sins, persecution and imprisonment, in those of +his hero St. Paul; and was in another world when the rattle of a key +brought him back to this. It was the fat inspector himself, with good +news on his face, and in his hand the card of Canon Wilders, Rector of +Lakenhall and chairman of the local bench. + +"He doesn't want to see me, does he?" said Carlton, in plain alarm. + +"If you've no objection to seeing him, sir." + +"But he was one of those who signed the warrant! Tell him I can't see +anybody. Thank him very much. Say that I appreciate his kindness, but +would prefer to be alone." + +In a few minutes the man returned. + +"That's a pity you won't see the canon, sir; he don't half like it. He +couldn't help signing the warrant, not in his position; that seem to me +to be the very reason why he come the minute he heard we had you here; +and it's my opinion he'd like to see you out of custody." + +"You mean on bail?" + +"Yes, sir." + +"Because I'm a clergyman, and it's a disgrace to the cloth!" + +This explanation was a sudden idea impulsively expressed; but the +inspector's face was its tacit confirmation. + +"Is he here still?" demanded the prisoner. + +"Yes, sir, he is." + +"You can say I've been taken on a false and abominable charge," cried +Carlton, "and I don't want my liberty till the falsehood's proved! But I +am equally obliged to Canon Wilders," he added with less scorn, "and you +will kindly tell him so with my compliments." + +But he paced his cell in a curious twitter for one who had entered it +without a qualm. In all his trouble this was the first word from a +clerical neighbour: to a man they had stood aloof from him in his shame. +His own movements were in part responsible: he had disappeared from +view. Nor had he expected or coveted their sympathy; yet, now that one +of them had come forward, Carlton was conscious of a wound he had not +felt before. There was Preston of Linkworth--but his wife would account +for him. There was Bosanquet of Bedingfield, and there were others. They +might have inquired at the infirmary (Preston had), but he had never +heard of it. As for Wilders, he was a worthy man of local mark, for whom +Carlton had preached upon occasion; one prosperous alike in worldly +welfare and in spiritual satisfaction; the last person to go into +disgrace; and yet, by reason of a certain officiousness of character, +the first to come forward as he had done. Carlton had no wish to be +ungracious or ungrateful, or to make a personal matter of the signing of +the warrant; but he could not face his fellows with this new charge +hanging over him, nor was he going free by the favour of living man. On +the other hand, he pondered more upon his brother clergymen that +Saturday night in gaol than in all these eight weeks past. And the sense +of mere social downfall, the dullest of his aches hitherto, became +suddenly acute, so that for that alone he wished they had not put him in +prison. But for all the rest he cared as little as before, and showed as +little interest in the pending event. + +His indifference quite troubled the inspector, who evinced a desire to +show the prisoner every possible consideration, and was an early visitor +next morning. + +"That ain't no business of mine, sir; but you'll be wanting to see a +solicitor during the day?" + +"Why so?" asked Carlton. + +"Well, sir, your case will come up to-morrow morning." + +"But what do I want with a solicitor?" + +"Why, sir, every pris--that is, accused----" + +The inspector boggled at the word, and stood confounded by the other's +density. + +"Oh, I see!" cried Carlton. "So you're thinking of my defence, are you? +Thanks very much, but I don't want a lawyer to defend me. I make your +side a present of the lawyers, Mr. Inspector; they'll want them all. +It's for them to prove me guilty, not for me to prove my innocence." + +"And do you really think we have no case against you?" inquired the +inspector, with a change of tone, for he happened to have charge of the +case himself. + +"I don't think about it," returned Carlton, with unaffected +indifference. "The thing's too preposterous to be worth a thought." + +"I'm glad you find it so," said the other, nettled; "let's hope you +won't change your mind. I only spoke for your own good; there's plenty +would blame me for speaking at all. I won't trouble you no more, sir. I +might have known I'd get no thanks, after the way you served Canon +Wilders last night. Defend yourself, and let's see you do it!" + +The door shut with a clang, and Carlton watched the vibrations in some +distress. He was sorry to hurt the feelings of his would-be friends, but +he needed no man's friendship in the present crisis. God would be his +friend; his faith in Him was as profound as his contempt of the false +charge hanging over himself. The latter, he felt convinced, must break +down as it deserved; but if not, then the meaning would be clear. It +would mean that he had not been punished sufficiently for what he had +done, and must accordingly be prepared to suffer something for that +which he had not done, but of which his sin had indubitably caused the +doing. And Robert Carlton was so prepared in his heart of hearts. Yet he +was unable to carry his pious fatalism to its logical conclusion, and to +abate his bitterness against the human instruments of a vengeance he was +willing to think Divine. + +On the contrary, he condescended at intervals of the day to give his +mind to the proceedings of the next; and he did recall one or two +circumstances which prejudice and malice might twist against him. To +consider these was to be instantly inspired with a conclusive reply on +every point; but Carlton was not sure whether the law would permit him +to reply at all. So in the afternoon he begged for newspapers, and his +request, though acceded to, was all over Lakenhall by nightfall. A +suspended clergyman who thought so little of his notorious sins that he +could ask for newspapers on a Sunday afternoon! The inference drawn by a +small community, greatly excited about the case, and unconsciously +anxious to believe the worst of one who was bad enough at best, will be +readily imagined. The whole town shook its head. + +Meanwhile the object of popular detestation was comparatively happy in +the exercise of his receptive powers. By good luck his bundle of +provincial newspapers contained that which can only be met with in a +local press: a verbatim report of the police-court proceedings in a +painful case of infinitesimal interest to the world at large. The +interest, however, was all-absorbing to Robert Carlton. The accused had +been represented by a solicitor. The solicitor had fought his case +tooth-and-nail. There had been certain "scenes in court"; all were +reported in the local paper, and no point involved was lost upon the +alert brain of the imprisoned clergyman. It was with difficulty that he +dismissed the subject from his mind when the church-bells rang once more +through the quiet country town. It happened, however, that the parish +church was quite near the police-court; and in the morning Carlton had +been enabled to follow the whole service, partly through knowing it by +heart, partly from the strains of hymn or psalm that reached him at due +intervals through the grated window: and ever since then he had been +looking forward to evensong. So now when first the bells ceased, and +then the voluntary, the prisoner presently rehearsed the exhortation (in +silence) on his feet, the general confession (half aloud) upon his +knees; then followed the psalms, also from memory, his lips moving, his +hands folded; then knelt again to pray the prayers. And his eyes were as +earnest, his attitude as reverent, and even certain gestures as +punctilious, as though he were back in his church that had been burnt, +instead of lying in gaol for burning it. + +The August evening came early to its close; a little while the new moon +glimmered in the cell; then the organ pealed the people out of church, +and a few steps passed that way, and a few voices floated in through the +bars, before all was quiet in the little old town. And Robert Carlton +thought no more that night upon his enemies, and took no further heed +for the morrow. + + + + +XV + +HIS OWN LAWYER + + +Canon Wilders was supported by Mr. Preston, of Linkworth, and by a +youthful justice whom Robert Carlton did not know by name, but who sat +like the graven image of Rhadamanthus, encased in the atrocious trousers +and the excruciating collar of the year 1882. + +Considering the romantic interest of the case, this was by no means "a +full bench"; there were, however, some conspicuous and deliberate +absentees, including Sir Wilton Gleed and Dr. Marigold. Carlton was less +surprised at his enemy's abstinence than at the position voluntarily +occupied by James Preston, an indolent cleric but genial gentleman, who +had been his friend. His surprise deepened when Preston nodded to him, +hastily enough, and with a change of colour, but yet in a way that +thrilled Carlton with a doubt as to whether he had altogether lost that +friend. He was in no such suspense concerning the stately chairman, who +very properly looked at the prisoner as though he had never seen him +before, and never addressed him without tuning his voice to the proper +pitch of distant disapproval. This was not a question of losing a +friend, but of having made an enemy of the most potent personage in the +court. + +The latter was densely crowded when the stout inspector opened the case, +but the familiar faces stood out in quick succession, and they were not +a few. In a doorway apart stood a Long Stow trio--the saddler, the +sexton, and Tom Ivey; all three were in their Sunday clothes, and more +or less visibly ill at ease; but it was only Ivey who reddened and +looked away when the prisoner caught his eye. As for Carlton, he became +so lost in sudden and absorbing speculation that it was some minutes +before he realised that the inspector had finished a bald brief +statement of his case, and that a witness was already in the box and +giving evidence. The witness, however, was only Frost, the village +constable, and his evidence merely that of the arrest on the Saturday at +Long Stow. Carlton nevertheless whipped out his pocket-book, and the +witness waited before standing down. + +"May I ask him two or three questions?" said the prisoner, addressing +himself with courtesy to the bench. + +"As many as you please," replied the chairman, "provided they are +relevant." + +Carlton bowed before turning to the witness. + +"How far were you responsible for the warrant on which you arrested me?" + +"Re-spon-si-ble!" exclaimed the chairman in separate syllables. "What do +you mean?" + +"I wish to ascertain exactly in what measure the witness has been +concerned in trumping up this charge against me." + +"That is not the language in which to inquire!" + +"Your worships may discover that it is exceedingly mild language, before +the case is over." + +"I shall not allow you to cross-examine witnesses unless you do so with +due respect to the bench." + +The clerk to the justices, who had examined the witness, was the means +of averting an immediate scene. + +"I think, your worship, that he wishes to know whether the witness laid +the information against him." + +"I thank you," said Carlton, an incredible twinkle in his eye, as he +again turned to the witness. "I do desire to ask you, with due respect +to the bench, whether you 'laid this information' against me, or whether +you did not?" + +"I did," said Frost. + +"Before whom did you 'lay' it?" + +"The magistrate." + +"What magistrate?" + +"Sir Wilton Gleed." + +"And when?" + +"Last Friday." + +"The date, please!" + +"That would be the 18th." + +"The 18th of August! And the church was burnt on the morning of the 25th +of June! How is it that it took you eight weeks all but two days to 'lay +your information' against me?" + +The witness looked confused; but the chairman was quick to interpose; he +had been waiting his opportunity. + +"That may or may not transpire in the evidence," said he; "it is in +either event an absolutely inadmissible question, and I should strongly +recommend you to employ a solicitor. If you like I will adjourn the +court for half-an-hour while you instruct one; but I will not have the +time of the court wasted by irrelevant and inadmissible questions such +as you seem inclined to put. If you have nothing better to ask the +witness I shall order him to stand down." + +"Let him stand down," returned the prisoner, indifferently. "I have done +with him." + +Robert Carlton had surprised himself. He had come into court with the +most admirable intentions that it was possible to entertain: he was to +have kept cool but humble, to have curbed his contempt of proceedings +conducted (if not instituted) in the best of good faith, and never for +an instant to have forgotten his guilt of sin in his innocence of crime. +In this spirit he had risen from his knees that morning, and with this +resolve he had left his cell and been ushered into court; but the very +atmosphere of the place had made the blood sing in his veins; and it +needed but the chairman's voice to make it boil. He had sinned, and +chosen to suffer for his sin: so no crime was too dastardly to lay at +his door. He was down, and deservedly down, so friends and acquaintances +alike must gather and conspire to trample him. Carlton's point of view +went round like a weathercock in the wind; flesh and blood flew to the +front, in despite of spirit; and all the man in him rebelled at man's +injustice, in despite of his prayers. + +So when the next witness was being sworn (it was his own sexton), and +James Preston whispered to Canon Wilders, the man who had preached for +both of them looked on grimly. + +"As you seem bent upon conducting your own case," said Wilders, leaning +back, "you may possibly prefer a chair at the table; if so, there is one +at your disposal." And he pointed into the well of the court. + +Carlton thanked him in the voice that all his will could not purge of +all its scorn; he was perfectly comfortable where he was. Then he looked +pointedly at Preston, and his face and tone softened together. "But I +shall not forget the suggestion," he said; and again his friend changed +colour. + +The decrepit hero of the overweening hallucination had hobbled into the +witness-box meanwhile. Carlton had not come in contact with him since +the morning before the fire, and he little thought that his last +conversation with the sexton was about to come up in evidence against +him. Yet such was the case. + +Old Busby had been responsible for the lighting of the church. He had +kept the paraffin and filled the lamps. But in the month of June the +lamps were rarely needed. They had not been lighted on the Sunday before +the fire. There would have been even less occasion for them--by one +minute--the following Sunday. And yet, on the Saturday morning, the +prisoner had ordered the witness to see that the lamps were full! + +So Busby deposed; and the point seemed of sinister significance. It took +the prisoner plainly by surprise: the circumstance had escaped his +memory. In a minute, however, he had recalled it in detail; and his +cross-examination, though provocative of some mirth, and curtailed in +consequence, was by no means ineffectual. + +"You remember when the lamps went out, through your neglect, in the +middle of even-song?" + +"I'm like to remember it. That was when I swallowed the frog." + +The court laughed, but not the prisoner, who was too much in earnest +even to smile. + +"I reminded you pretty often about the lamps after that?" + +"Ay, you were for ever at me about 'em." + +"Now, on the morning you mention, where was I when I told you to go and +fill the lamps?" + +The sexton thought. + +"In your study, sir." + +"And what were you doing there? Do you remember?" + +"I do that! I was telling you about the frog." + +This time the prisoner smiled himself. + +"And did I listen to you?" he demanded, a sudden change upon his face, +as though the act of smiling had put him in pain. + +"No, that you didn't," the old man grumbled; "you fared as though you +didn't hear." + +"So I told you to go away and fill your lamps," said Carlton, sadly, +"even though it was Midsummer Day! I have finished with the witness." + +He was as one who had brilliantly parried a deadly thrust, and yet +received a secret wound in the onset. He rested his head upon his hand +to hide his pain, and only raised it at the sound of James Preston's +voice putting the first question from the bench: + +"As sexton, did you keep the key of the church?" + +"In the old days I did, sir; but that's been open church ever since Mr. +Carlton come." + +"You mean that the church was open day and night?" + +"To be sure it was." + +"Thank you," said Preston hastily, as though glad to relapse into +silence. Carlton did not add to his embarrassment by a glance, but his +heart throbbed with gratitude for the goodwill he could no longer +question. + +"_Did_ you fill the lamps?" asked the chairman as the witness was +preparing to hobble from the box. + +"Yes, sir, I did." + +And, watching the chairman's face, Carlton was still more thankful to +have one friend upon the bench; for it seemed to him that the young +gentleman in the tall collar and the tight trousers was alone in +preserving a Rhadamanthine impartiality. + +What surprised him equally was the strength and the nature of the +evidence produced. In his complete innocence of the crime imputed to +him, he had been unable to conceive or to recall a single incriminating +circumstance not susceptible of an easy and immediate explanation. Yet +more than one arose during the afternoon, when first the saddler, and +afterwards Tom Ivey, went into the box to bear witness against him; and +more than once the explanation, so full and clear in his own mind, was +incapable of confirmation or admission in the form of evidence. The +more striking instances were afforded by Fuller, whose testimony, though +convincing enough, and not the less so for its real or apparent +reluctance, came as a complete surprise to the prisoner. It appeared +that the saddler had returned to the rectory on the fatal night, more +than an hour after his first visit and summary dismissal, in order to +have his "say," and "not let the reverend have it all his own way." The +midnight visitor had found a light in the study, but the door shut, and +only the dog within. He had not entered, but had waited about the drive, +till, seeing a light in the church, he had made up his mind that "the +reverend" was there, and had decided not to interrupt him. So the +saddler had gone home and to bed, and was fast asleep when the +church-bells sounded the alarm. + +"And what made you so sure that it was Mr. Carlton in the church with +the light?" inquired Mr. Preston. + +"Because I couldn't find him in the rectory." + +"But you did not go in?" + +"I knocked and called, but I only made the dog bark." + +The chairman leaned forward in his turn. + +"Was the barking loud?" he asked. "Loud enough to be heard all over the +house?" + +Carlton sprang to his feet. He had been accommodated with a chair, of +which he had quietly availed himself during the examination of this +witness, and the suddenness of his movement brought all eyes to his +face. It was quick with impatience and sarcastic disregard. + +"If you are labouring to prove that I was not at my house, but in the +church," he cried, "your worship may save himself the time and trouble. +I was in the church. I lit one of the lamps." + +This did not strike the prisoner as the sensational statement that it +was; he was therefore amazed at its effect upon the bench, where even +Rhadamanthus came to life, while James Preston opened eyes of horror, +and Wilders whispered to the clerk. + +"That," said the chairman, "is an extremely serious statement, and one +that you are surely ill-advised in making. It is not evidence, but it is +being taken down in writing, and may be given in evidence against you at +your trial. I should certainly advise you to refrain from further +statements of the kind." + +"I thought you wanted to get at the truth?" + +"So we do. But I have warned you. Have you any questions to ask the +witness?" + +"Not one; he is equally correct in his statements and his suppositions." + +Thomas Ivey was then sworn, amid the hush of deepening interest, and +gave his evidence in a manly, straightforward, level-headed fashion, +that added its own weight to what he said for good or ill; and his +testimony told both ways. He described the scene in the church on his +arrival; the character of the fire, and the attitude of Mr. Carlton; +both of which, he admitted (in answer to a question from the chairman), +had struck him as suspicious at the first glance. + +"But did you see him _do_ anything that you thought suspicious?" asked +the well-meaning Mr. Preston. + +"I did, sir." + +"What was that?" from the chairman. + +"He threw something into the flames. But I couldn't see what that was." + +"Did you afterwards find out?" + +"No, sir." + +Once more the prisoner attracted every eye. It was felt that he would +make another of his reckless and voluntary declarations. But this time +he was silent enough; and though the evidence now took a turn in his +favour, that silence left its mark. + +Everybody knew how the clergyman had risked his life, when it was too +late, to save the church. But the story had not yet been told as Mr. +Preston contrived to elicit it from the lips of Tom Ivey. The Rector of +Linkworth had been from home when the fire took place. There was nothing +unnatural in his desire for details, nor did he put an improper +question. The chairman, however, betrayed more than a little impatience, +while the junior justice, on the other hand, displayed excitement of +another kind, and actually put in his word at last. + +"Do you mean to say you let him throw the water single-handed," said he, +"while the rest of you stayed outside?" + +"There was no stopping him, sir," said Ivey. "He would have all the +danger to himself." + +"Then you could not see what use he made of the water?" suggested the +chairman, dryly. + +"No, sir," said Tom; "I could only see the steam." And his tone was +still more dry. + +Wilders looked at the clock as the examination concluded. The case had +not been taken till the afternoon; it was now nearly five. Wilders +beckoned and spoke to the inspector, subsequently addressing the +prisoner in his coldest tone. + +"I understand that this is the last witness to be called against you," +said he. "Do you propose to cross-examine him?" + +"I do." + +"And may I ask if you have any witnesses to call for your defence?" + +"I may have one." + +"Then it becomes my duty to adjourn the case." He whispered again to the +inspector, and at greater length with his colleagues, James Preston +appearing tenacious of some point upon which the chairman ultimately +gave way. "As the police have completed their case," continued Wilders, +"a remand of one day will be sufficient, and we shall simply adjourn +until to-morrow morning. But you may, if you like, apply for bail; +though the question, having due regard to the evidence which we have +heard, is one that would now require our grave consideration." + +"You may spare yourselves the trouble," said Carlton shortly. "I don't +want bail." + +And he went back to prison to lament his temper, but not to go through +the form of further prayer for patience and humility; for he felt that +these were beyond him in that public court, packed with prejudice from +door to door. + +"I told you what he'd say," grumbled Wilders in the retiring-room. + +"I don't blame him," said Mr. Preston. "My dear sir, he's innocent of +this!" + +"I shall form _my_ opinion to-morrow," returned the canon, with dignity. +"Meanwhile I confess to some curiosity as to whom he thinks of calling +as his witness." + +"The chappie shows us sport," quoth Rhadamanthus, "guilty or not guilty; +and I'm not giving odds either way." + + + + +XVI + +END OF THE DUEL + + +Rhadamanthus reappeared without a visible garment that he had worn the +day before. He came spurred and breeched from the saddle, with a +horseshoe pin in his snowy tie, a more human collar, and a keener front +for the proceedings withal. Carlton felt his eye upon him from the +first, and returned the compliment by taking a new interest in the +nameless youth; he had long read the minds of the other two; his fate +was in this young fellow's keeping. He had no time, however, for idle +speculation as to the result. Tom Ivey was back in the witness-box, and +the accused was invited to cross-examine without delay. + +Carlton soon showed that the interval had enabled him to profit by the +experience of the previous day. His questions were cunningly prepared. +He began with one not easy to put in an admissible form, yet he +succeeded in so putting it. + +"You have sworn," said he, "that your very first glimpse of me in the +burning church was sufficient to create a certain suspicion in your +mind. Did you mention this suspicion to anybody--that night?" + +"Not that night." + +"That month?" + +"Nor yet that month, sir." + +"And why?" + +"I didn't suspect you any more, sir." + +Carlton tried hard to suppress his satisfaction, as a sensation to which +he was no longer entitled. He had come back to this in the night; but it +was harder to abide by it during the day. He paused a little, in honest +effort to rid his mind and tone of any taint of triumph; but his +advantage had to be pursued. + +"May I ask when this suspicion perished?" + +"Before we had been five minutes together, trying to save the church!" + +"You are getting upon dangerous ground," said the chairman. "What the +witness thought, or when he ceased to think it, is not evidence." + +"Another point, then," said Carlton: "do you remember the appearance of +the lamps?" + +"Yes." + +"What was it?" + +"They were crooked." + +"Did you notice any paraffin spilt about?" + +"Yes, when my attention was called to it." + +"Where was this paraffin?" + +"On the pews that were catching fire." + +"And who called your attention to it?" + +"You did yourself, sir." + +"I did myself!" repeated Carlton, struggling with his tone. "That will +do for that. I am going back for a moment to those suspicions of yours. +Have you never mentioned them to a human being?" + +"Yes, sir, I have." + +"As things of the past?" + +"As things of the past." + +"When was it that you first spoke of them?" + +"Last Friday--the eighteenth, sir." + +"And did you then speak of your own accord, or were you questioned?" + +"I was questioned." + +"As the first man to reach the burning church?" + +"Yes, sir." + +"Take care!" cried Wilders. "That was a leading question." + +"It is the last," replied Carlton. "I have finished with the witness. I +would take this opportunity, however, of apologising to your worships +for the various errors and excesses which I have committed, and may +still commit, in my ignorance and inexperience of the law, and my +indignation at the charge. In this respect, and this alone, I crave the +indulgence of the bench, and beg leave to rectify one of my mistakes. I +spoke in haste when I said, yesterday, that I had no questions to ask +the witness Fuller. I desire, with your worships' permission, to have +that witness recalled." + +The chairman was rather sharp: subsequent evidence might make the recall +of witnesses a necessity, but the lost opportunities of counsel, or of +accused persons conducting their own defence, were an altogether +insufficient reason. However, the man was in court, and the application +would be allowed. + +"I appreciate the privilege," said Carlton, "and promise that it shall +not detain us many moments." + +He was becoming as fluent and adroit as a past practitioner; in the +pauses of the fight he felt ashamed of his facility, a haunting sense +that it was indecent in him to defend himself at all. Yet he was one +against many; and, in this matter, an innocent man. Fight he must, and +that with all the skill and spirit in his power. His liberty, his +self-respect; his one remaining chance, object, and desire in life; nay, +his very life itself was at stake with these. It was no time for +dwelling upon the past. The sin that he had committed was one thing; the +crime that he had not committed was another. It was his duty to be just +to himself. Yet this was how he treated himself, whenever he had time to +think! He resolved to give himself fairer play than he seemed likely to +receive at the hands of others; and his resolve declared itself in the +ringing voice that shocked not a few who heard it, having found him +guilty already in their hearts. + +"About that very story of the empty rectory and the light in the +church," he began, with Fuller--"about that perfectly true story," he +added, wilfully, "which you told us yesterday. Did you tell it to +anybody at the time?" + +"Only Tom Ivey." + +"Why only to him?" + +"He asked me to keep that to myself." + +"And did you?" + +"I did my best, sir, but that slipped out one day when I was talking +to----" + +"Never mind his or her name. You did your best to keep the matter to +yourself, but it slipped out one day in conversation. Now when did you +last tell that true story, not counting yesterday, as fully and +particularly as you told it here in court? Think. I want the exact date +of the very last occasion." + +"That was last Friday, sir--to-day's the 22nd--that would be the 18th of +August." + +"Last Friday, the 18th of August; a fatal day to me!" said Robert +Carlton. "Thank you. That is all I want from you." + +The justices put no question. The clerk did not re-examine. The witness +was ordered to stand down. Then followed a short but heavy silence, +pregnant with speculation as to the drift of all these questions and the +object of so much unexplained insistence upon a date. It meant +something. What could it mean? Carlton stood upright in the dock, calm, +confident, inscrutable; it seemed a great many moments before the +silence was broken by the formal tones of the clerk. + +"Do you call any witness for the defence?" he asked. + +Carlton dropped his eyes into the well of the court, and they fell upon +a pair that were fastened upon his face with the glitter of fixed +bayonets. + +"Yes," said he. "I wish you to call Sir Wilton Gleed." + +Quietly though distinctly spoken, the name clapped like thunder on the +court. Amazement fell on all alike, for the issue between these two had +been the common theme for days. Popular sympathy had rightly sided with +morality, and its champion had lost nothing by his tactful magnanimity +in refraining from sitting upon the bench; that he should be put in the +box instead, and by his shameless adversary, was an audacity as hard to +credit as to understand. There was a moment's hush, then a minute's +buzz, to which the justices themselves contributed. Wilders muttered +that the man was mad; his colleague on the right confessed himself +nonplussed; his colleague on the left dropped his shaven chin upon his +gold horseshoe, and his shoulders shook with joy. Meanwhile Sir Wilton +had forced a grin and found his voice. + +"You want me in the box, do you?" + +"I do." + +"Very well; you shall have me." + +And he was sworn, still grinning, with an odd mixture of malevolence and +deprecation for those who ran to read. "I meant to keep out of this," +the florid face said; "but now I'm in it--well, you'll see! It's the +fellow's own fault; his blood" etc., etc. But this was not what Sir +Wilton was saying in his heart. + +Carlton began at the beginning. + +"You are the patron of the living of Long Stow, are you not?" + +"You know I am." + +"I want the bench to have it from you; kindly answer my question." + +"I am the patron of the living of Long Stow," said Sir Wilton, with mock +resignation. + +"In the year 1880 did you, of your own free will and accord, present +that living to me?" + +"Yes, and I've repented it ever since!" + +There was a sympathetic murmur at the back of the court. It was +immediately checked. Every face was thrust forward, every ear strained, +every eye absorbed between the prisoner in the dock and the witness in +the box. It was no longer the uphill fight of one against many; it was +single combat between man and man, and the electricity of single combat +charged the air. + +"You have repented it more than ever of late?" asked Carlton in steady +tones. The skin upon his forehead seemed stretched with pain; the veins +showed blue and swollen; but the many judged him from his voice alone. + +"Naturally," sneered Sir Wilton. + +"So much so that you were resolved I should resign?" + +"I hoped you would have the decency to do so." + +"Did you come to the rectory on the fifth of this month, and tell me it +was my first duty to resign the living?" + +"I don't remember the date." + +"Was it the Saturday before Bank Holiday?" + +"I daresay. Yes, it must have been. I didn't expect to find you there. I +went to see the wreck and ruin of your home and church, not you." + +"But you did come, and you did see me, and you did tell me it was my +first duty to resign my living?" + +"Certainly I did." + +"Do you remember your words?" + +"Some of them." + +Carlton looked at his pocket-book--at a note made overnight. + +"Do you remember making use of the following expressions: 'Law or no +law, I'll have you out of this! I'll hound you out of it! I'll have you +torn in pieces if you stay'?" + +"I may have said something of the kind," said the witness, with assumed +indifference. + +"Did you, or did you not?" cried Carlton, slapping his hand on the rail +of the dock; the voice, the look, the gesture were familiar to many +present who had heard him preach; and thrilled them for all their new +knowledge of the preacher. + +"Really I can't recall my exact words. I rather fancied they were +stronger." + +Some one laughed at this, and the witness managed to recapture his grin; +but his demeanour was unconvincing. + +"I am not talking about their strength," said Carlton. "Will you swear +that you did _not_ say, 'I'll have you out of this! I'll hound you out +of it'?" + +"No, I will not." + +"I thank you," said Carlton; and his ringing voice fell at a word to the +pitch of perfect courtesy. He ticked off the note in his pocket-book, +and the court breathed again; but its worthy president did more: he had +forgotten his position for several minutes, and he hastened to reassert +it with the first observation that entered his head. + +"I don't see the point of this examination," said Canon Wilders. + +"You will presently." + +"If I don't I shall put a stop to it!" + +Carlton raised his eyes from his notes, but not to the bench; they were +only for the witness now. + +"Do you remember when and where we met again?" + +"You had the insolence to call at my house." + +"Was it on a Monday morning, the first after the Bank Holiday?" + +"I suppose it was." + +"I do not ask you to recall your exact words on that occasion. I simply +ask you to inform the bench whether I did, or did not, offer to resign +the living then and there--on a certain condition." + +"Yes; you did," said Sir Wilton, doggedly. He was very red in the face. + +Carlton could not resist a moment's enjoyment of his discomfiture: it +heightened the pleasure of letting him off. + +"And did you decline?" he said at length. + +"Stop a moment," said the chairman. "What was this condition, Sir +Wilton?" + +"Am I obliged to give it?" + +"Oh, if you think it inexpedient----" + +"I think it unnecessary," said the witness, emphatically. "I think it +has nothing whatever to do with the case." + +"In that case, Sir Wilton, we shall be only too happy not to press the +point." + +Carlton had a great mind to press it himself. He had invited his enemy +to build the church out of his own pocket. The invitation had been +declined. Would it also be denied? Carlton was curious to see; but he +overcame his curiosity. It would not strengthen his defence, and to mere +revenge he must not stoop. So one temptation was resisted, and one +advantage thrown away, even in the final phase of the long duel between +these good fighters. But the other saw the struggle, and felt as he had +done when Carlton had returned him his stick in the ruins of the church. + +"And did you decline?" repeated Carlton, in identically the same voice +as before. + +"I did." + +"Did I then point out to you that I was not only entitled, but might be +compelled, to keep my chancel, at any rate, 'in good and substantial +repair, restoring and rebuilding when necessary'? I quote the Act, your +worships, as I quoted it then. Do you remember, Sir Wilton?" + +"I do." + +"I made the point as plain as I have made it now?" + +"Yes." + +"And what did you say to that?" + +The sudden change in the style of the question was glossed over by the +single artifice which Robert Carlton permitted himself during the +conduct of his case: instead of ringing triumphant, his voice dropped as +though he feared the answer. Sir Wilton fell into the trap. + +"I said, 'If that's the law I'll see you keep it. Go and build your +church! Where there's a law there will be a penalty; go build your +church or I'll enforce it.'" + +"Which did you expect to enforce--the penalty or the law?" + +"I didn't mind which," declared the witness, after hesitation; and his +indifference was less successfully assumed than before. + +"Oh!" said Carlton; "so you didn't mind my building the church after +all?" + +Sir Wilton appealed wildly to the Bench. + +"Am I to be browbeaten and insulted, by a convicted libertine and evil +liver, without one word of protest or reproof?" + +The chairman coloured with confusion and indecision. + +"I am afraid that you must answer his question, Sir Wilton," said Mr. +Preston, mildly. + +"I share your opinion," said Rhadamanthus, in a tone that went further +than the words. + +The chairman threw up his chin with an air, and fixed the accused with +his sternest glance. + +"Pray what are you endeavouring to establish by this round-about and +impertinent examination?" + +"In plain language?" asked Robert Carlton. + +"The plainer the better." + +"Then I am endeavouring to establish--and I _will_ establish, either +here or at the assizes--the fact that that man there"--pointing to Sir +Wilton Gleed--"has tried by fair means and by foul to rob me of a +benefice which is still mine in more than name. And I will further +establish, either here or at the higher court, if you like to send me +there, the patent and the blatant fact that this very charge is the last +and the foulest means by which that man has attempted to get rid of me!" + +His clear voice thundered through the little court; his fine eye +flashed with as fine a scorn. But it was neither look nor tone that made +the silence when he ceased. It was the first unrestrained expression of +a personality incomparably stronger than any other there present; it was +the first just and unanimous--if unconscious--appreciation of that +personality in that place. There was a round clock that ticked many +times and noisily before the presiding magistrate broke the spell. + +"A-bom-in-able language!" cried he in the separate syllables of his most +important moments. "You deserve to answer for your words alone in the +other court of which you speak!" + +"I intend to prove them in this one," retorted Carlton, "if you give me +fair play." + +"Oh, by all means let him have fair play!" exclaimed the witness, in +high tones that trembled. "I can take care of myself; don't study _me_. +Let him say what he likes, and let those who know his character and mine +judge between him and me." + +Carlton looked at the quivering lip between the cropped whiskers, and +his jaws snapped on a smile as he returned to his pocket-book. But the +whole of his examination of Sir Wilton Gleed does not call for elaborate +report: its weakness and its strength will be recognised with equal +readiness. With a stronger spirit on the bench, or a weaker spirit in +the dock, or even a capable solicitor to prosecute for the police, much +of it had never been; as the play was cast it was the accused clergyman +who presided over that country court for the longest hour in his enemy's +life; nor, when he had won his ascendancy, did he use his power as +unsparingly as in the winning of it. The witness was allowed to come out +of the corner into which he had been driven before his appeal to the +bench; he had contradicted himself, and the contradiction was left to +tell its own tale without being pressed home. On the other hand, some +startling admissions were obtained in regard to the responsibility with +which the witness had finally sought to saddle the accused; he had bade +him build the church because he believed Carlton would find it an +impossible task; he recklessly admitted it, with a pale bravado that +imposed upon few people in court, and on but one upon the bench. + +"You were still determined to get rid of me," said Carlton, "one way or +another?" + +"I was." + +"And this struck you as another way?" + +"It did--at the moment." + +"Ah," murmured the chairman, "we are all subject to the impulse of the +moment!" + +Carlton put this point aside. + +"And why did you think that I should find it an impossible task to +rebuild the church?" + +"I thought you would find a difficulty in getting local men to work for +you." + +"Your grounds for thinking that?" + +"I considered your reputation in the district." + +"Any other reason?" + +"One or two builders and masons had spoken to me on the subject." + +Carlton found a new place in his pocket-book, and read out a list of +nine names. + +"Were any of these local men among the number?" + +"Yes." + +"All of them?" + +"Ye--es." + +"What! You admit having discussed me, during the present month, and +since I first spoke to you about rebuilding the church, with these nine +local builders or stonemasons?" + +"I don't deny it," said Sir Wilton, stoutly. + +"And do you know of any builder or stonemason in the neighbourhood with +whom you have _not_ discussed me?" + +"Can't say I do." + +"That's quite enough," said Carlton. "I shall not ask you what you said. +I do not purpose calling these men, at this court; time enough for that +at the assizes." And without further comment he took the witness through +one or two details of their last interview in the ruins; by no means +all; indeed, the date was the point most insisted upon. + +"And so the very next day was last Friday, the 18th of August?" +concluded Carlton with apparent levity. + +The witness refused to answer, appealed to the bench, and secured +another reprimand for the accused. + +"I harp upon that date," said Carlton, "because, as I have already +remarked, it seems to have been a fatal date for me. It has arisen so +many times in the course of this case! This, however, is not the precise +moment for enumerating those occasions; let us first finish with each +other. Did you, Sir Wilton Gleed, on the eighteenth day of this present +month, have separate or collective conversation with the witnesses +Busby, Fuller, and Ivey?" + +"Yes, I did," said Gleed, hot, white, and glaring. + +"Separate or collective? Did you speak to them one at a time or all +together?" + +"Both, if you like!" cried the witness, wildly. "I can't remember. +Better say both!" + +"You interviewed these witnesses, separately and collectively, on the +very day that the other witness, Frost, laid an information against me +before yourself as Justice of the Peace?" + +"I said it was that day. You ask the same question again and again!" + +The man was fuming, trembling, near to tears or curses of mortification +and blind rage. + +"I have but two more questions to ask you, and I am done," rejoined +Carlton. "Did the witness Fuller tell you of the light in the church, +and the witness Ivey of what _he_ saw later on, during these +conversations of the fatal eighteenth?" + +"They did." + +"And was this the first you had heard of those experiences?" + +"It was." + +"That is my last question, Sir Wilton Gleed." + +The justices put none. Gleed glared at them as he left the box. + +"I think," said he, "that this is the most scandalous incident--most +disgraceful thing I ever heard of in my life!" + +"I quite agree with you," whispered Wilders. + +"And I also," said Mr. Preston, in a different tone. + +But no word fell from Rhadamanthus. His small eyes did not leave +Carlton's face for above one second in the sixty. But their expression +was inscrutable. + +"May I now claim the indulgence of the court for a very few minutes?" +asked the clergyman in the dock. + +The clergymen on the bench looked at the clock and at each other. It was +already past the hour for luncheon. + +"Better go on," urged Preston, "and get it over." + +"If you mean what you say," said Wilders to the accused, "we will hear +you now; if you proceed to treat us to a mere display of words, I shall +adjourn the court. Meanwhile it is my duty to remind you that whatever +you say will be taken down in writing, and may be given in evidence +against you upon your trial." + +"In the event of my committal," returned Robert Carlton, "I am prepared +to stand or fall by every word that I have uttered or may utter now; and +I shall not detain you long. I am well aware how I have trespassed +already upon the time of this court, but I will waste none upon vain or +insincere apology. I came here to answer to a very terrible charge; it +was and it is my duty to do so as fully and as emphatically as I +possibly can. Yet I have little to add to the evidence before you; a +comment or two, and I am done. + +"It seems to me that the witnesses called by the police have between +them produced but three points of any weight against me, or worthy of +the serious consideration of this or any other court of law. I will +take these three points in their proper order, and will give my answer +to each in the fewest possible words in which I can express my meaning +to your worships. + +"Arthur Busby has sworn that on the morning before the fire I ordered +him to fill the lamps with paraffin, though it was extremely unlikely +that any artificial light would be required in church next evening. But +on the man's own showing he was wearying and distressing me beyond +measure at the time--a more terrible time than this!" cried Carlton from +his heart; and was brought to pause, not for effect (though the effect +was marked) but by the very suddenness of his emotion. "And on the man's +own showing," he continued in a lower key, "he had once omitted this +important duty of filling the lamps, and I was 'for ever at him' on the +subject. What more natural than to tell him to go away and fill his +lamps, as one had told him a dozen times before, but this time without +thinking and simply to get rid of the man? On the other hand, if the +paraffin had been wanted for the felonious purpose suggested, could +anything be more incriminating and incredible than the suggested method +of obtaining it? I submit these two questions, with the highly important +point involved, to the consideration of the bench; and I do so with some +confidence. + +"The next point, I confess, is more difficult to dismiss. I shall not +attempt to dismiss it from any mind in court. I shall simply leave it to +the consideration of your worships as men of the world and students of +the human heart. It is near midnight. I am not to be found at the +rectory, and a light is seen in the church. I admit that I was in the +church, and that I lighted one of the lamps. + +"Here I am forced to allude to another matter: a matter in which, God +knows, I have never denied my guilt, as I do deny my guilt of the crime +of arson: a matter in which I have never sought to defend myself, as I +have been compelled to do in this court for a very long day and a half. + +"Consider my case on the night of the fire. I will not dwell upon it; it +is surely within the knowledge or the imagination of most present. . . . +There was my church. I had held my last service there. I felt that I +could never hold another. And, whatever I had been, I loved my church! +You upon the bench . . . you Members of Christ's Church . . . I ask not +for your sympathy but for your insight. Can you think that I went into +the church I loved, wilfully and deliberately to burn it to the ground? +Can you not conceive my going there, in the dead of that dreadful night, +to look my last upon it--to bid my church good-bye?" + +His emotion was piteous, but never pitiful. It shook nothing but his +voice. It neither bowed his head nor dimmed the brilliance of an eye +turned full upon his fellows. And so he stood silent for a space, and +none other spoke; then through Tom Ivey's evidence with a lighter touch. +It was evidence in his favour: he scorned to enlarge upon it. The one +adverse point was lightly--perhaps too lightly--dismissed. He had been +seen to throw something into the flames. Did the prosecution suggest +that he had thrown fresh fuel? Other points, already made in +cross-examination, were left to take care of themselves: the paraffin on +the pews, to which he himself had called Ivey's attention, was one. +Indeed, in the whole course of the prisoner's speech, it was never +admitted that the church had been purposely set fire to at all; the +suggestion had been made in the heat of cross-examination, but it was +not made again. It even seemed as though Robert Carlton had grown either +certain, or careless, of the result of the inquiry--and the impression +was not removed by the close of his remarks. + +"And now," he said, "I have to deal with the evidence of Sir Wilton +Gleed. I shall endeavour to deal with that evidence as dispassionately +as I can, and as summarily as it deserves. Sir Wilton Gleed is a man +with a genuine grievance, which you all know and I have never denied. +But I do not propose to enter into the matter at issue between Sir +Wilton Gleed and myself, or to suggest for an instant that he was +anything but right in determining to rid his village of one who had +brought himself to bitter but merited sorrow and disgrace. I am not here +to defend my sins; nor have I defended them elsewhere; nor have I shrunk +from suffering from anything I have done. But here have I been brought +to book for something I never did--taken prisoner and brought to you on +a criminal charge and no other. And I tell you that this criminal charge +is as false as another was true, but for which this one would never have +been made. But enough of mere assertion; let me crystallise some of the +evidence that has come before you. + +"The witnesses swear to three or four suspicious circumstances between +them. Yet they seem scarcely to have opened their lips--nobody seems to +have heard of those circumstances--until Friday of last week. On Friday +last--my fatal date--these witnesses open their mouths with one accord. +And, curiously enough, it is in Sir Wilton Gleed that they are one and +all led to confide! + +"But there is a still more curious and informing coincidence. Sir Wilton +Gleed and I have several very stormy interviews, in which he tries, +first by one artifice, then by another--all frankly admitted in his +evidence--to drive me from a position which I have finally refused to +resign. My refusal may be just as obdurate and indefensible as you are +pleased to think it; that is not the point at all. The point is this +contest of tenacity on his part and on mine, culminating in a final +interview between us on the eve of the day upon which all these +witnesses break their more or less complete silence concerning my +movements on the night of the fire, and break it in the ear of Sir +Wilton Gleed! + +"I invite you to consider the obvious inference. My enemy has tried +every other means of dislodging me. He has threatened and insulted me. +He has set every builder and mason in the neighbourhood against me. He +has deprived me--as he thinks--of the means of building my church, and +then he turns round and tells me to build it or take the consequences! I +make a beginning in spite of him; he has to think of some new method of +expulsion; so, with infinite ingenuity, he trumps up this present charge +against me." + +Wilders opened his lips, but the prisoner's hand flew upward in +arresting gesture. + +"With infinite ingenuity, your worship, but not necessarily in bad +faith. I have never yet questioned the _bona fides_ of Sir Wilton Gleed; +nor do I now. On the contrary, I am convinced that he honestly and +sincerely believes me capable of any crime in the calendar; but my +capability, again, is not the point; and belief and proof are very +different things. If your worships hold that this horrible charge has +been proved against me--proved sufficiently for this court--then send me +to a higher one as your duty dictates. But if you think that hatred and +prejudice, however deserved, have played the part of genuine and +spontaneous suspicion; that facts have been distorted to fit a +preconception, and the wish, however unconsciously, allowed to father +the thought; that, in short, an honest man has been quite honestly +blinded and misled by very loathing of me and all my doings; then I +implore your worships to dismiss this charge against me--and let me get +back to the work I left to meet it!" + +The last words came as an after-thought, but they came from the heart, +and as no anti-climax to those who knew the nature of the work named. In +absolute silence Carlton availed himself of the chair in the dock, +dropping all but out of sight, and bending double, his heart throbbing, +his head singing, his hot hands pressed across his eyes. It was the +sudden hum of talk which told him that the justices had retired; days +passed in his brain before a hush as sudden announced their return. +Meanwhile there were the scraps of conversation that found their way to +his ears. Hearing all, he could distinguish little; but now and then a +familiar phrase leapt home, as familiar faces declare themselves afar. +"The gift of the gab" was one, and "He'd argue black was white" another. +But some one said, "Give the devil his due"; and with that single crumb +of justice Robert Carlton had to crouch content until his present fate +was sealed. + +But the hush came at last, and sank to profound silence as the +magistrates took their seats--Rhadamanthus keen and grim--the clergymen +plainly angry with each other. Preston's honest face hid no more of his +feelings than heretofore, but the chairman cloaked annoyance with the +fraction of a smile, and only his voice betrayed him as he addressed the +prisoner. + +"After a long and patient hearing," said Wilders, "the bench find this a +case of ve-ry con-sid-er-able doubt in-deed. But, upon the whole, and +taking all the cir-cum-stances into care-ful con-sid-er-ation, they are +of o-pin-i-on that there is not enough ev-i-dence to justify them in +sending the case to the assizes. The charge is therefore dis-missed. I +should like, however, to add one word in respect to a witness, who +might, had he been a less chiv-al-rous opponent--a less mag-nan-i-mous +man--have sat here upon the bench instead of entering the witness-box to +suffer the remorseless cross-questioning of a personal enemy. I could +wish, indeed"--with covert meaning--"that Sir Wilton Gleed had seen fit +to take his proper place in this court! I need hardly say that he quits +it without stain or slur, of any sort or kind, upon his character; and +that he does so with the heartfelt sympathy of one, at all events, of +his colleagues upon the bench." + +Rhadamanthus turned his back to hide his face, but James Preston did not +rise till he had finished as he begun. He caught Carlton's eye, and +nodded once more to him, but this time unblushingly and with much +vigour. There was a little hissing as the prisoner vanished, a free man; +and some hooting in the street, in which he reappeared, contrary to +expectation, within a minute. It was like his brazen face, so they told +him as he strode through the little crowd as one who neither heard nor +saw a man of them. But no hand was lifted, no missile thrown, for the +deaf ear is no earnest of physical passivity, and it was notorious that +this man could take care of himself with his hands as well as with his +tongue. Such a very deaf ear did he turn, however, that a flyman had to +follow him to the outskirts of the town, and shout till he was hoarse, +before Robert Carlton paid more heed to him than to his revilers. And +all the time it was a decent man from Linkworth, only begging him to +jump in, as the clergyman at last discovered with instant suspicions of +the truth. + +"Who sent you after me?" + +"Mr. Preston, sir; leastways, he told me to be here all day, in case you +wanted me." + +"God bless Jim Preston!" muttered Carlton, and jumped into the fly +forthwith. + +But presently they were at some cross-roads. And the driver drew rein +with a troubled face. He wanted to go a long way round, but his reasons +were wild and unintelligible. Carlton, however, divined the real reason, +and whose it was, and he himself pulled the other rein. + +"No, no," said he; "drive me through my own village! They drove me +through it on Saturday; take me back as they took me away. But it was +like Mr. Preston to think of it. Tell him I said so, and that I'll never +forget his kindness as long as I live!" + +It was the red-gold heart of the August afternoon, and the shrill little +choir of the ruined church sang a welcome to the friend who had never +sinned against them; and Glen came bounding and barking defiance at the +outside world; and the unfinished stone, the first stone that Robert +Carlton was to dress and to lay with his own hands, it was just as they +had made him leave it on the Saturday evening. But the story of his +return was still being bandied from door to door, when a new sound came +with the song of birds from the ruin in the trees, and a new ending was +given to the story. + +The sound was the swish, swish, swish of the mason's axe, with the +stiletto's point, through sandstone as soft as cheese. + + + + +XVII + +THREE WEEKS AND A NIGHT + + +Carlton completed that historic stone within another hour, and actually +laid it that night. Jaded in body and brain, with every nerve exhausted, +he must needs do this or drop in the attempt. It was the first stone in +the new church. It was finished at last. He touched it here and there +with the straight-edge. He felt its angles with the square. This stone +would do. He whipped out his foot-rule and measured carefully. The stone +was eleven inches all ways but one. It was the exact depth for the lower +courses, but it was seventeen inches long. A seventeen-inch gap must +therefore be found or made for it. And Carlton went prowling round the +blackened walls, with his foot-rule and his dog, before resting from his +labours. The job should be finished this time, the first stone should be +laid that night. + +A place was found in the base of the east end, over a stable portion of +the plinth; the situation was of sacred omen, and Carlton cleared away +the old mortar with immense energy. Then his difficulties began. There +was new mortar to make; this was an altogether new undertaking. It had +been Tom Ivey's affair. Carlton had tried his hand at most branches of +the masonic art, but he had never attempted to mix the mortar. He +barely knew how to begin. There was a heap of sand at one end of the +shed, and a load of lime under cover. These were the ingredients. That +he knew; but it was not enough. + +Suddenly, he remembered his _Building Construction_ in two volumes; the +bulkier of the two treated of materials. In a minute the book was found, +deep in dust, and carried to the shed for consultation on the spot. And +there was only too much about mortar; the subject monopolised a column +of the index; its vastness oppressed Carlton, who nevertheless attacked +it then and there. A great disappointment was in store: so he was to +begin by "slaking" his lime. He had forgotten that step; now he had a +dim recollection of the process. According to the book it took two or +three hours at least; even this minimum presupposed that the lime was a +"fat lime," whatever that might be. Carlton, lacking all means of +deciding such a point, gave his inclination the benefit of the doubt, +and left his shovelful of quicklime under water and sand for exactly two +hours and a half. + +This check came in the nick of time. It reminded Robert Carlton of the +flesh, whose needs he had once more neglected, though now he would have +cooked and eaten if only to have killed an hour. He lit a fire. He put +on the kettle. He toasted some very stale bread; he boiled an egg warm +from the hen-house, then another; and having eaten he rested while he +must. The sun set; the new moon whitened in the sky, but as yet could +not light a man at his work when it was really dark. And that was why +the lantern stood so long upon the ground outside the shed, in a whirl +of tiny wings, while the mortar was being mixed at last. + +But the lantern stood longer still upon a salient fragment of the razed +east end, while the trowel rang, and the mortar flopped, until all lay +smooth and glistening in its light. Then Carlton knelt, and lifted his +handiwork with bursting muscles; and the mortar spattered his waistcoat +as the great stone dropped into place. A wrench, a push, a tap with the +trowel; a finishing touch with its point, a word of thanksgiving before +he rose; and Robert Carlton had laid the first stone of a new church, +and of his own new life. + +Next morning he began systematic work, rising at five, lighting his +fire, making his bed, sweeping, dusting, pumping, rinsing, all before +the day's work started after breakfast, with the gentler arts of +scraping and re-pointing, and all in strict obedience to the schedule +which Carlton had drawn up before his arrest. The working day ended, as +then arranged, with a violent assault upon that black disorder which had +been the nave; but this also acquired system as the days closed in; +while the influence of time was not less apparent in the gradual +disappearance of that tendency to morbid reaction which had been +inevitable in the first days of bodily and spiritual strain, of +incessant and excessive hardship, of a solitude consummate and profound. +But here time was assisted by the good sense and the strong will of +Carlton himself, who knew how little virtue there is in mere remorse, +and who struggled against it with all his might. It was a long time, +however, before even he was master of himself in this regard. One day, +in the exaltation of overwork, the high excitement of nervous and of +physical exhaustion, he was actually heard whistling at his walls, and +it was all over the village before he caught himself in the act; but +none seemed to hear how suddenly he stopped at last; none saw the raised +face, the clasped hands, the lips moving in meek apology for an +instant's joy. Nor did any man dream how this one would still mortify +himself, after such a lapse, with deliberate dwelling on the past. There +was but one link, indeed, in all the mournful chain of recent events, +upon which Robert Carlton would never permit his thoughts to +concentrate; that was his successful conduct of his own case before the +magistrates, culminating in his final triumph over Sir Wilton Gleed. He +had made the rule in the hour of his release, and he called in all his +strength of mind to its rigorous observance. + +It was now three weeks since he had spoken to a human being, none having +come near him to his knowledge; then one morning the air was full of +whispers, though the yellowing elms hung stagnant in an autumn mist; and +the outcast, looking over the wall which he was scraping, beheld a bevy +of school-children perched on that of the churchyard. + +He bent a little lower to his work. The wall was that thirteen-foot +strip, to the left of the porch, upon which he had spent the first +morning of all in getting rid of the unsound upper courses. It was still +his own height in most places; so the children could not watch him at +his work; but the sound of them was enough. Poor little children! To +grow up with such an example and such knowledge as would be theirs! His +heart had seldom smitten him so hard. + +"_Then said He unto the disciples, It is impossible but that offences +will come: but woe unto him through whom they come!_ + +"_It were better for him that a millstone were hanged about his neck, +and he cast into the sea, than that he should offend one of these little +ones._" + +The text came unbidden; it cut the deeper for that. Woe unto him, +indeed! Of all men, woe unto him! Hammer and chisel slipped from his +hands; he hid his face. His thumbs went to his ears, but were drawn +back. The children's voices were more than he could bear, so he bore +them for his sin until another aspect of the case was driven home to his +intelligence. Next moment he appeared in the porch, and the children +were vanishing from the wall. + +"Don't run away," he called. "Come back, you bigger ones!" + +It was his old voice, come unbidden like the text; he might have been +using it all these weeks. The children had never disobeyed that quiet +but imperious summons. They did not begin to-day. + +"Why aren't you all at school?" + +There was silence, broken eventually by some bold but still respectful +spirit. + +"Please, sir, it's a holiday." + +"Not Saturday, is it?" + +He was beginning to lose count of the week-days; once already the +Sabbath school-bell had nipped a day's work in the bud. + +"No, sir, it's an extra holiday." + +"Then spend it better. Get away into the fields, or down the river. I +won't have you hanging about here. There's nothing for you to +see--nothing that will do you any good. Run away all, and forget who has +spoken to you. But don't let me have to speak again!" + +There was no need for another word. And the workman went back to his +wall; but his hands had lost their cunning; his heart was as heavy as +the stones themselves. + +Why had he never been harassed in this way before? He had not to think +very long. He was without that friend of friendless man, his dog. The +good Glen, his second shadow in these days, had chosen this one to +desert him; and Carlton was glad, for nothing else would have made him +appreciate the dog at his true worth. Now he thought of it, how often +the faithful brute had gone barking to wall or gate, and come back +wagging his tail! Preoccupied with his work, he had taken no thinking +heed at the time. But now he remembered and understood. + +Instead of working all the afternoon, he went in search of Glen. It +surprised him to find how much he missed a companion whose presence he +had often ignored for hours together; he felt as though he could do no +good without the animal now; its dumb sympathy seemed to have had no +small share in all that he had done as yet. That wag of the tail, how +well he knew it after all! It was like the grasp of a good man's hand. +That wistful eye, watching over him at his work, was it a blasphemous +conceit to think of it as the mild eye of the All-seeing, shining +through the mask of one of His humblest creatures, upon another as +humble, and countenancing the work if not the man? If this was +blasphemy, then Robert Carlton blasphemed for once in his heart; and had +his deserts in an unsuccessful quest. + +He had searched the garden and the house; had stood whistling at the +gate, and in each of the far corners of the glebe. Night fell upon him +sawing a huge tie-beam through and through to shift it, and sawing with +all the irritable energy of the unwilling workman, very remarkable in +him. And for once he was glad to put on his coat. + +What could have happened to the dog? Its master could scarcely eat for +wondering. Now he sat frowning heavily. Anon his brow cleared, and a +fixed purpose glittered in his eyes. A little later he was in the +village street once more. + + + + +XVIII + +THE NIGHT'S WORK + + +The night was as dark as it could possibly be. The day's mist still +lingered, impervious to stars, and there was no moon. Carlton was not +sorry, for he had no wish to be seen by more people than was absolutely +necessary; neither was he allowing for the shabby tweeds he had +unearthed to work in, for his cloth cap and untrimmed beard, which +obliterated the clergyman and changed the man. + +He had not gone far before he stopped in astonishment. He had met no +one, and the village was as dark as the firmament; in the first few +cottages there were no lights at all. Carlton groped his way up the path +of one, and knocked twice without receiving an answer or detecting any +sound within. It was as though his sin had driven his parishioners to +the four winds. + +He went on with increasing amazement, still without encountering a soul; +then swerved of a sudden from the middle of the road, and hugged the +wheatfield wall on the right-hand side while passing the Flint House on +the left. Here were lights, and more. The front door stood open, pouring +a broken beam of lamplight into the road. And on the single step, +leaning upon his great stick, towered the silhouette of Jasper Musk, +only less colossal than his shadow in the lighted slice of road. + +Carlton half expected a challenge, and passed slowly and openly; instead +of slinking as his shame dictated. But there was neither word nor sign +of recognition from the gigantic figure on the step; and the lights +ended where they had begun. There were none beneath the gabled thatch +immediately beyond the wheatfield; and so for another hundred yards; not +a glimmer to right or left, with the single exception of a lattice +window over the post-office, where the bed-ridden Mrs. Ivey lay as she +had been lying for many months. Carlton saw the shadow of a flower-pot +on the widow's blind; no doubt it was the geranium he had taken her in +early summer; he remembered placing it on the sill. His pace quickened. +He was now at the long lane leading to the Plough and Harrow; and there +at last were the missing lights. The inn was lit up in every window, and +not only the unmistakable sound, but the very smell of feasting +travelled to the road, where Robert Carlton hesitated longer than his +wont. He might as well go home. It was quite bad enough to face his +people piece-meal. On the other hand, there was the dog; a +characteristic fixity of purpose in its owner; and a natural curiosity +to know more of the entertainment that could empty every home. + +The front of the inn revealed nothing after all. The brilliantly lighted +parlour was deserted by all but a single attendant behind the bar; the +scene of revelry was audibly the barn at the back. The inn itself had +once been a farm-house, and this barn came in for all the festivals. + +Carlton peered through the parlour window, and nodded to himself. The +face within was new to him, but that might well prove an advantage. It +was the florid face of a stout young man, passing the time with a +newspaper and a cigar, the first of which he threw aside to answer the +incomer's questions. + +No, he had seen nothing of any collie dog; but he was a stranger +himself, only come to lend a hand for the night. Black and tan collie, +but more black than tan? No; the only dogs he had seen all day were the +governor's tyke and a thoroughbred bitch belonging to the young +gentleman at the hall. + +"But have a drink," said the stout young man, reaching for a tankard. + +Carlton declined civilly, though not without betraying some +astonishment. + +"That's free beer to-night, old man," explained the other. + +"Indeed?" + +"I'm here to serve ut. Change your mind?" + +"No, thank you." + +"Then I will." + +And the young man drew a foaming pint, while a burst of revelry came +through the inner doors, but slightly deadened by its passage through +the open air. + +"May I ask what is going on?" inquired Carlton. + +"That's the biggest spread ever seen in Long Stow," said the stout +youth, drawing his sleeve along his lips and turning a shade more florid +than before. + +"Not the harvest-home already?" + +"No; that's a dinner given by the squire to every sowl in the +parish--men, women, an' kids--all but one." + +The questioner stood absorbed. + +"All but one," repeated the temporary barman with knowing emphasis. And +he winked as he leant across the bar. + +"Ah!" + +"Their reverend ain't here--not much!" + +"I don't suppose he is. And why is the squire doing this sort of thing +on this scale?" + +"Why, in honour of the victory, to be sure." + +"What victory?" + +"Why, the one we've just had in Egypt. Tel-el----but here that is, in +the _Bury Post_, and a fair jaw-breaker, too." + +It was the first newspaper which Robert Carlton had seen for several +weeks. His _Standard_ subscription had run out at mid-summer; he had +never renewed it. The world had renounced him utterly, and so must he +renounce the world. To live as he was living, and yet to have an ear for +the busy hum--he could not do it. For already he recognized the +startling truth: it was its very completeness which rendered his +isolation endurable. + +Yet his eyes glistened as he ran them down the stirring columns, and his +tanned face wore a coppery glow as he returned the paper across the bar. + +"Thanks very much," he said. "I am glad to have seen that." + +"Is it the first you've heard of it?" + +"Yes; I don't often see a paper." + +The young barman was eyeing him up and down, from the old tweed trousers +to the old cloth cap. + +"On the tramp, are you?" + +Carlton did not choose to reply. + +"Yet you seemed to know all about their reverend here!" + +"Who does not?" cried the man in tweeds, with involuntary bitterness. + +"Ah, you may well say that! And what do _you_ think of him?" + +"I think the same as everybody else." + +"That he's the biggest blackguard unhung?" + +"Indeed, one of them!" + +"That's what the young gentleman from the hall say, when he was in here +this afternoon. But the governor, Master Palmer--O Lord! how he do hate +him! 'Unhung?' he say. 'Why, hangun's too good for him.' An' so it is, +come to think of it: to go and do what _he_ done, an' to top all by +settun fire to his own church!" + +"Come," said Carlton, "that wasn't proved." + +"But everybody know it, bless you!" + +"Though the charge was dismissed in open court?" + +"Bah! 'Not guilty, but don't do that again!'" + +And the stout youth nodded sagely over his tankard's rim. + +"So that's the opinion of the neighbourhood, is it?" + +"That is, and that's not likely to change." + +Carlton was not astonished. He had foreseen this even from the +prisoner's dock, in that pause of the proceedings when he had felt +ashamed of his facility in self-defence, a haunting doubt of the +propriety of his defending himself at all. And yet the virile instinct +which had inspired him then was not yet dead in his breast; he could not +let all this pass; the conversation was none of his seeking, yet he must +say something more. + +"I have never stuck up for him," he began; "but give even him his due! +What possible object could a man have in burning down his own church?" + +"What I asked the governor," replied the barman. "'Dog in the manger,' +he say; 'didn't want the next man to reap where he've sowed. What's +more, that give him an excuse for stoppun in the place,' he say." + +Carlton was under no temptation to confute these arguments; his only +difficulty was to suppress a smile. + +"So his people don't think any the better of him for getting himself +off, eh?" + +"The better? That's made them right mad! The governor here, he say that +was the gift of the gab and nothun else; all parsons have their fair +share; but this here reverend, he do seem to be a holy terror, an' no +mistake. A gentleman like Sir Wilton Gleed haven't a chance agen him; so +they're all a-sayun, all but Sir Wilton himself. The young gent who was +in here this afternoon, he was a-sayun as how the squire wouldn't have +the reverend's name so much as spoken at the hall; and he's never been +heard to name it himself since the day of the trial, he's that mad. But +have you heard the latest?" + +Carlton had heard quite enough, and his hand was on the latch, nor did +he withdraw it as he turned his head. + +"Against the reverend?" inquired he. + +"That's it," said the young barman with renewed gusto. "And I nearly let +you go without tellun you!" + +"What has he been doing now?" + +Carlton was curious to hear. + +"That's not what he've been douen, but what keep comun o' what he've +done," his informant said ominously. "The latest is that some young chap +would go to the devil because the reverend had, so he 'listed, and he've +been in the very battle there's all this to-do about!" + +Of Mellis's enlistment Carlton had heard; the rest was news indeed; and +his hand tightened on the latch. + +"Has anything happened to him, then?" he faltered, sick at heart. + +"Not as we know on yet," said the stout youth, hopefully. "But the lists +ain't in, and, if this young chap's killed, everybody says it'll be +another death at the reverend's door." + +"So they want his blood!" exclaimed Carlton. "But what they say is +true." + +As he opened the door a burst of cheering came round from the barn. + +"That's for the squire," he left the barman saying. "He've been on his +legs these ten minutes." + +The outcast had shut the door behind him, and was groping his way in a +darkness no deeper than before, though perfectly opaque after the +strong light within. + +"And one cheer more!" screamed a voice from the barn. + +Carlton need scarcely have left his rectory to have heard the final +roar. Yet it was not the end. + +"And three groans . . ." + +This voice was hoarse; the name was lost in the night; but the outcast +well knew whose it was. And he stopped instinctively, standing firm upon +his feet while the groans were given--as though they lashed him like +wind and rain. Then he turned his face to the storm. He could not help +it. There was more clapping of the hands. Something further was to come; +he might as well hear what. + +The barn was a clash of violent lights and impenetrable shade. Its +outlines were inseparable from the sky; but its great doors had been +flung flush with their wall, which gaped twenty feet from jamb to jamb. +This space, illumined by slung lanterns and naked candle-light, and +streaked with tables, which ran the full length of the barn, stood out +like the lighted stage of a darkened theatre. Outside hovered the +unworthy element which the smallest community cannot escape, or the +largest charity embrace; these vagabonds were absolutely invisible to +those within; and were themselves too dazzled and disgusted to take note +of each addition to their number. + +Sir Wilton Gleed, on his legs once more, at the high table furthest from +the doors, was making that preliminary pause which is a little luxury of +the habitual orator and an embarrassing necessity to the novice. He was +supported by the schoolmaster on one side and by his own son on the +other. The former wore the shiny flush which was the badge of every +reveller visible from without; but that was not many while all heads +were turned towards the squire. + +Sir Wilton began by observing, with sparkling eyes, that he was very +sorry to hear that name: he himself would have preferred such an +occasion to pass over without a reminder of the fact that they had a +leper in their midst. It was many moments before the speaker was +suffered to proceed; then he repeated the successful epithet at the top +of his voice, and drove it home with a synonym; recovering his own +composure during a second outburst, and continuing with conspicuous +self-restraint. Now that the matter had come up, he would not let it +drop, even upon that inappropriate occasion, without one word from +himself; but, he promised them, it should be his last public utterance +on the subject, in that parish at all events, as it was most certainly +his first. And another deliberate pause ended in a sudden gesture and a +new tone. + +"What's the use of talking?" exclaimed the squire. "The law of England +is against us; there's no more to be said while the law remains what it +is. I'm not thinking of my brother magistrates' decision the other day; +it would ill become me to pass one single syllable of comment upon that. +No, gentlemen, I confine my criticism to that law which empowers a +clergyman, convicted of the vilest villainy, to retain his living in +the teeth of every protest, and to continue poisoning the clean air of +this parish by wilfully remaining in our midst." + +"Shame! Shame!" + +"Shame or no shame," cried Sir Wilton, "I intend to bring the matter +before Parliament itself"--a further outburst of vociferous +approval--"intend to lay this very case before the House of Commons at +the earliest possible opportunity. And I think that I can promise you +some amendment of the law before another year is out. Meanwhile"--and +Sir Wilton raised his hand to quell renewed enthusiasm--"meanwhile let +us respect the law while it lasts. In signifying our detestation of this +monstrous wrong, let us be careful not to drift into the wrong +ourselves. There must be no more broken windows, mind!" + +And it was now a single finger that Sir Wilton Gleed held up. + +"But," he continued, "what we can do--what we are justified in +doing--what it is our bounden duty to do--is henceforth to ignore this +man's very existence in our midst." + +"Don't call him a man!" + +"That's a devil out of hell!" + +"Man or devil," cried Sir Wilton, "let us absolutely ignore his +existence among us. Don't go near him; don't even turn to look at him as +you pass. There he is--pretending to rebuild the church--posing as a +martyr--really laughing in his sleeve and crowing over all right-minded +men. We shall see who laughs last! Meanwhile, take no notice of him, one +way or the other; forbid your children the churchyard, if not that end +of the village altogether; nothing that can feed the morbid appetite for +notoriety which makes me sometimes think the man's a lunatic after all. +But if he dares to show his nose among you, that's another thing; hunt +him out of it as you would hunt a mad dog! He won't show himself twice. +But for the present my advice to you is to leave the cur in his kennel, +and the lazar in the lazar-house!" + +The unseen listener left amid the musketry of prolonged clapping, +mingled with a banging of tables, and a dancing of glass and silver, +that followed him into the outer darkness as a sound of cymbals and big +drums. He was not sorry to have heard what he had heard: in his position +it was a distinct advantage to know the worst that was being said. +Certainly he would not go into the village again without necessity--as +certainly as he would do so the moment such necessity arose. It was as +well, however, to go prepared. The present experience might rank as a +narrow escape; but Robert Carlton would not have been without it if he +could. + +He began to think better of his opponent. So he was going to Parliament +as the final court! That was legitimate; that he could admire. There is +infinite stimulus in the man who does not know when he is beaten--to an +adversary resembling him in that respect. And this seemed to be the one +characteristic common to Mr. Carlton and Sir Wilton Gleed. + +Yet the outcast felt a little hardened. And his critical faculty, always +keen, though only of himself unsparing, went insensibly to work upon the +new material, even as he strode on through the deserted village, not to +give up his dog just yet. + +"I believe he had that speech by heart, for all its opening. It came too +pat." + +That was Carlton's first conclusion. The next made him stop dead. + +"I'll be shot if the whole function wasn't a peg to hang that speech +on!" + +And on he went with a short laugh of scornful conviction; there was no +doubt whatever in his mind; but the speech was not worth a second +thought. There was Glen to find, and there was George Mellis to think +about, since think he must. Poor lad! Yes, that was his fault again; the +people were right; he would be blood-guilty if the boy fell. One thing, +however, was quite certain: if the worst news came it could be trusted +to come to him; meanwhile he could pray for his friend, as his heart was +praying now, a clean sky above him, and the untrammelled air of an open +country all around. + +The village had been left behind; the Lakenhall road followed for half a +mile, then left at a tangent in its turn; and this open country, upon +which Carlton of all men had the audacity to trespass, was the vast +rabbit-warren of Sir Wilton Gleed. The dog might be caught in one of the +traps; that was at once its master's fear and hope; for a broken leg +would mend, and his one friend think twice before deserting him again. +Carlton could even enjoy the prospect of the cripple's complete +dependence upon himself: it would be something to be indispensable to +living creature now. But meanwhile he could neither see nor hear +anything of his dog, though he walked, and stopped, and whistled till he +was tired, and then called, "Glen! Glen! Glen!" No sound came back to +him in reply; not even the echo of his own voice; and at midnight he +gave up the search. + +At midnight also the Long Stow festivities culminated in the National +Anthem, its secular companion, and much hoarse roystering on the way +home; all this as Carlton approached the village; and for once he was +deterred. To march into the middle of a tipsy crowd, freshly inflamed +against himself, was to provoke a brawl at best. He would go round +instead by the river that flowed parallel with the village street. So he +crossed at the lock near the mill at this end of Long Stow, and +recrossed by the white wood bridge on the Linkworth road at the other +end. But this was an hour later; for three-quarters had been wasted +opposite the Flint House, with its river frontage of trim mead and wild +garden, and a very faint light in one back room. + +By this time all was so still that the returning rector became the +earlier aware of an erratic lantern and tell-tale voices in the road +ahead; and he was walking slowly to let these people pass the rectory +gate, when in the light went lurching before his eyes. He hurried +softly. The intruders were half-way up the drive, whispering thickly, +but leaving a continuous sound in their wake, from something or other +that they had in tow. Carlton followed on the grass, a horrible +suspicion already in his heart; but he recognised their voices first. + +"Where shall we plant ut? Which is his winder?" + +"That there near the end. O Lord, what a lark!" + +"Yes--to think he come talkun to me while you was all in the barn. The +cheek! But here's his answer for him." + +The first and last speaker was the stout young barman from the Plough +and Harrow; the other was Jim Cubitt, an unworthy character who had been +turned out of the choir some months before. And Robert Carlton's +"answer" was his missing dog, lying dead in the lantern's light, with +particles of gravel glistening in his lacklustre coat. + +At this, the climax of his long night's search, with its ironic +interludes--all as honey matched with this--a very madness seized on +Carlton, so that he sprang out of the dark into the lighted area where +these two young ruffians stood, and fell upon them like a fiend. Not a +word was said; there was no time even for a cry. But Cubitt came first, +and had the muddled senses shaken out of him and new ones kicked in +before his comrade could so much as attempt a rescue. This, however, the +young barman did so gamely that the ex-chorister was flung in a heap and +his champion sent tripping over him with a boxing crack upon the jaw. +And Carlton towered breathless, his fists still doubled, waiting for the +fallen youths to rise and fall again. + +The one from the public-house merely sat upright, ruefully and sullenly +enough, but with a sound discretion which the Long Stow lout had the wit +to imitate. + +"_We_ never 'urt your dorg," the former vowed. "He was dead before I see +him, and I don't know now who done ut. I never knew anything about that +till after you was in to-night, when I heared who it must ha' been." + +"I don't care!" cried Carlton, in a fury still. "You helped to drag it +here--my poor dog! You would spite me like that, you whom I never saw +before to-night! You're worse than Jim Cubitt; he at least had an old +grievance against me; and you're both of you worse than the man who did +this foul thing, whoever he may be, and I don't want to know. Out of my +sight, both of you, and spread this as far as you please: what you got +from me, and what you did to get it. You'll find yourselves the martyrs +of the countryside!" + +"I'm sorry," said the young barman, getting up. "I'm sorry, and I can't +say no fairer, 'cept that I must ha' been an' got right tight. But I +ain't tight now. I'm not a Long Stow chap, sir, and I shall tell them, +where I come from, that you're a man, whatever else you are. But as to +spreadun, I don't think I shall do much o' that; what do you say, mate?" + +"I never killed his dog," said the former choirman. + +Nor did Carlton ever actually know, or seek finally to ascertain, the +author of a deed even more detestable than it had appeared at first +sight. For when the study lamp had been brought out into the still +night, the first thing it revealed was that the poor beast had been +neither shot nor poisoned; its brains had been beaten out. And Carlton +felt as though his own heart had been beaten out with them, as he +fetched a spade from the shed, and dug a grave by lamplight a few yards +from his study door. + + + + +XIX + +THE FIRST WINTER + + +The last leaf had filtered from the elms; the horse chestnuts had long +been bare. And now there was no more cover for the blackened stump of +Long Stow church, in its ring of rotting leaves, and its meshes of trunk +and twig, than for the guilty genius of this mournful spot. All the +world could see him now, and gauge the crass pretence of his +preposterous task; there was no deceiving such a wise little world; but +it had been requested not to look, and was accordingly content with +passing glimpses of a drama in which its interest was indeed upon the +wane. There were some things, however, which even a docile and +phlegmatic community could not help noticing as winter set in. It might +not be honest work, but it was making a thin man thinner. And he was +always at it. Yet it no longer seemed to give him any pleasure. Indeed, +his face was changed. Its dominant expression was grim and dogged. There +were no more lights and shadows. It was the face of a workman who has +lost interest in his work. Nevertheless, the work went on. + +It went on in all weathers. At first Carlton had tried devoting the wet +days to indoor work. He had cleaned his house from top to bottom, +emptied most of the rooms, stored furniture in the others, and covered +with sheets like a careful housewife. Not that he cared greatly for his +things; but his hermitage should not grow foul. The two rooms which he +retained in use were the kitchen and his study (in which Carlton slept), +with the flagged scullery for his bath. The rest of the house he shut +up, after robbing his picture-frames to patch the broken windows, which +he treated so ingeniously that they looked quite wonderful from the +road; but on windy nights the constant rattle and the occasional crash +were one long outcry for putty and a glazier. There was no more to be +done indoors. And still it rained. So one day he marched through the +village (unmolested after all), and it was duly ascertained that he had +taken a return ticket to Felixstowe, of all places, apparently for +change of air. But through the very next day's rain he could be seen +(and heard) very busy at his walls: in a suit of oilskins and a +sou'wester. Thus the work went on once more. + +By Christmas every stone that was to stand had been scraped and pointed; +a few sound ones had been scraped and relaid; here and there an entirely +new stone had been cut to fit the place of one charred out of shape; but +in the lower courses such instances were rare, too rare to suit his own +creative taste, but Carlton was determined to deal with the lowest +courses first, and to raise all the walls to his own height before +finishing one. In the case of those which were to contain windows, it +might be well to pause at the sill; the windows alone might take him a +couple of years. Meanwhile these were the walls which had suffered +most, and first let him reach the sills: if he did that within the next +six months Carlton thought he would be lucky. For his progress was as +that of the insect which builds the reef; it was often imperceptible +even to himself; yet always the work was going on. + +The man was all muscle now; spare at his best, he had scarcely an ounce +of mere flesh left. Yet, for his work's sake, he made wonderfully +regular meals, often with a relish; and twice in the autumn killed a +sheep, having cold mutton for many days in the colder weather. But the +preliminary tragedy and the ultimate waste were equally disgusting, and +his normal needs seemed better met by predatory visits to the hen-yard. +Practice made him a fair baker and a moderate cook; but, as he had never +been particular about his food, and his only object was to maintain +bodily strength, he sometimes defeated his end, and added the dejection +of dyspepsia to all other ills. Otherwise the physical life suited +Carlton; he was out all day long; and the worst discomforts rarely +followed him into the open air. At his work, for instance, he was always +warm; indoors, only when he went to bed. He never had a fire, except to +cook by; thus he still had a few coals left, but he doubted whether +anybody would sell him any more. There was, however, all the half-burnt +woodwork of the church; most of this would burn again; and, with +economy, might keep him in firing throughout the term of his suspension. +Meanwhile, lamp, rug, and overcoat gave all the heat that Carlton would +allow himself in the study. Once, when his stock of paraffin had run +out, he had to tramp for fresh supplies into a town where his face was +unknown; and that experience made him more than ever economical of such +fuel as he had. + +Unparalleled position for an endowed clergyman of the Church of England, +the incumbent of an enviable living, an Oxford man, a man of family, a +zealous High Churchman, an enlightened and alluring preacher, towards +the latter end of the nineteenth century! Scandalous priest though he +had also proved himself, his case was as pitiable as unique; a pariah in +his own parish; the outcast of his own people; an inland Crusoe, driven +to the traditional expedients of the castaway, and living the very life +of such within sight and hail of a silent and unseeing world. It was a +position which few men would have faced for an instant. This man +maintained it throughout the winter. And throughout the winter his work +went on. And the spring found him technically sane. + +But his brain bore it better than his heart. Some vital part of him was +certain to suffer. His brain escaped altogether, his body for a time; +but his heart was hard within him; all his prayers could not soften it; +and presently he lost the power even to pray. + +This was the meaning of the changed face seen from the road, in the days +and weeks succeeding the Long Stow celebration of the battle of +Tel-el-Kebir. Thereafter it was the face of one in the coils of +malignant despair. But the more gradual and substantial change, in such +a man, was terrible beyond deduction from its mere outward shadow. + +Here was no sudden and sweeping infidelity; no plucking of loose roots +from a shallow soil. Shallow this man was not, nor easily shaken in the +least of his convictions. His general tenets stood intact. He still +believed in the efficacy, under God, of earnest and worthy prayer. But +he could no longer believe in the efficacy of his own prayers. They were +not worthy: that was the whole truth. They were earnest enough, but +utterly unworthy, and it was better not to pray at all. + +His most passionate prayers had been for his own forgiveness, for the +restoration of his own peace of mind, for the blessing of God upon his +own little labours; selfish prayers, one and all; and he saw the +selfishness at last. It shocked him. He tried to stamp it out, this new +and obtrusive egoism; but he failed. Denied all contact with his +fellow-creatures, with only his own wishes to consult, his own work to +do, his own heart to probe, his own life to discipline, the man was an +egoist before he knew it; and it was only through his prayers that he +ever discovered it at all. They were not only unanswered; they no longer +brought their own momentary comfort, as heretofore. Of old it had been +much more than momentary; now it was no comfort at all. There must be +some reason for this; he asked himself what reason; and the answer was +this revelation of the true character of his prayers. They were poisoned +at the fount. He tried to purify them, but all in vain. Self would creep +in. So then he prayed only for a renewal of the faculty of pure and +unselfish prayer. And this was the most passionate of all his prayers. +But it also was unanswered. So he prayed no more. + +He was unforgiven: so Carlton explained it to himself. And a little +brooding convinced him of his idea. If God had forgiven him, He would +have shown some sign of His clemency through men. But what had men done? +They had broken his windows; they had burnt his church; they had closed +up every avenue to such poor atonement as was in his power; they had +forced him into a position which he had never sought, though for a +little it had consoled him; then tried, by false accusation, to force +him out of it; and now they had cut him off from themselves, had set him +apart as a thing eternally unclean, had even stooped to destroy the one +dumb being that clung to him in his exile! + +The murder of the dog was no little thing in itself; coming at the foot +of such a list, at the bitter end of a night of bitterness, it was the +last drop that petrified a truly humble and a strenuously contrite +heart. + +But it did not petrify his hand; and the work of that hand went on +without ceasing, save on that day which was now the Day of Rest +indeed--and nothing more. The other six, his energies were redoubled. If +he was now more than ever a traitor to his Master, well, there was still +this one thing that he could do for the Master's sake. And he did it +with all his might. + +No day was too wet for him; no day was too cold. His fingers might turn +blue, his moustache might freeze; it is beside the point that the winter +chanced to be too mild for the latter contingency. While five fingers +could control the chisel, and the other hand strike true, no weather +could have deterred him. And no weather did. + +So the New Year came, and the work went on through January and February +without a break. But the month of March, as it often will, made late +amends for the insipidity of its predecessors. A spell of colourless +humidity was broken by bright skies and a keen wind; the latter grew +bitter with the day; the former darkened before it was time. And when +Robert Carlton opened his study doors next morning, to air the room +while he took his bath, a little snowdrift came tumbling in through the +outer one. + +Carlton looked forth upon a white world in dazzling contrast to the +clear dark grey of a starless sky; at first there was no third tint. But +every moment seemed lighter than the last, and presently the trees +showed brittle and black as ever against the sky; for the drifted snow +lay everywhere but on their waving branches; and the wind blew hard and +bitter as before. + +Carlton bathed grimly in broken ice; he was not going to be baffled by a +little snow. He was very gradually rebuilding the east end, using the +old stones where he could, but cutting more new ones than he had +bargained for. He could not help it. This wall was going up. It was too +near the lane. It should hide the builder's head before he left it for +another wall. It was up to his thighs already. + +So all that day he laboured with his feet in the snow, and only his legs +entrenched against the cutting wind. The stones were ready; he now +prepared them by the course. They had only to be carried from the shed +with mortar mixed expressly overnight; but to avoid dropping them in the +slush and snow, each stone was laid out of hand; and a considerable +muscular exertion thus followed by a prolonged niggling with trowel and +plummet and transverse string, and this in the fangs of the wind, as +often as twice or thrice an hour. It was the hardest day yet. But it was +also the most successful. The entire course was laid by half-past three +in the afternoon. + +In earlier days Carlton would undoubtedly have given way to that +spontaneous elation for which he had been wont to pay so dearly; now a +tired man crept back to his bed, without a thought beyond the next +hour's rest (he had seldom been so tired), and the meal that he must +then prepare as mere munition of war. Yet on his study threshold he +paused and turned, as doomed men may at the door of the dreadful shed. + +There was little in the scene itself to stamp it on the mind. Already +the snow was beginning to disappear; but the sky was still hard and +clean; and the east wind cut to the bone. The ridge of firs, cresting +the ploughed uplands beyond the lane, notched the bleak sky with dark +cockades on russet stems; white clouds floated above, a white moon hung +higher. A robin hopped in the snow at Carlton's feet; he was a good +friend to the birds, and had not forgotten them that morning. Somewhere +a blackbird sung him indoors; somewhere a starling smacked its beak. And +this was all; but Robert Carlton carried the impression to his grave. + +Instead of sleeping for an hour, he slept far into the night; and spent +the rest of it in misery between bouts of shivering and of intolerable +heat. His throat was on fire, to quench it he coughed, and already his +cough hurt queerly. In the morning the man was ill enough to know that +he was going to be worse. He took characteristic measures while he +could. + +It was a fine instinct which had inspired him to economise his coal; now +was the time when that little hoard might save his life. But he had only +one scuttle, and for the moment felt baffled; then he dried his bath, +and put the coals in that, thus eventually getting them to the study in +one load. These exertions hurt Carlton like his cough. In both cases it +was as though his body had been transfixed. His head swam with the pain. +Yet next moment he was reeling back for wood; and not less than ten +infernal minutes did he spend on such errands, a furious fever alone +sustaining him. It was constructive suicide, yet not to have these +things was certain death. Now it was all the alcohol in the house, in a +bottle that had lasted nearly a year; now a basin of eggs, of which he +had always a fair store indoors; now pail upon pail of water for his +kettle. Carlton had been a great visitor of the sick, and seen many a +death from the disease he was preparing to resist. He had therefore a +rough idea of what to do for himself; he was only doubtful as to how +long he might be able to do anything at all. The lightest breath had now +become a pang. Already he was alarmingly ill, and must inevitably grow +much worse. But he did not intend to die. He trusted the constitution of +a lean and hardy race, and he trusted his own nerve. + +At last the fire was alight, a full kettle mounted, and the spout +trained upon the pillow, the bed itself being drawn up close to the +fire. Under the bed was the bath full of coals, and within as easy reach +the eggs, the whisky, a breakfast-cup, and the pails of water. But even +now the sick man was not in his bed; he was lying in a heap upon the +floor, where he had fallen the moment he could afford to faint. + +On recovering he shook off half his clothes, crawled between the +blankets, and beat up an egg with whisky. This was all he took that day. +And there he lay, breathing needles and coughing daggers until he slept. + +"I'm not going to die. They shan't get rid of me like that. I don't die +like a rat in his hole!" + +That seemed to be the burden of his thoughts for many days; in reality +the time was forty-eight hours. And whenever the determination rose +afresh in his heart, and the dry lips moved with its expression, the +whole man would rouse himself to an effort beside which the building of +the church was pastime. He would sit up and put on more coals with a +hand black from the constant operation. Then he would lean as close as +possible to the singing kettle, and inhale the steam until the gaunt arm +supporting his weight could do so no more. Even then he would make a +still longer arm before lying down, and replenish the kettle from one of +the pails, using the breakfast-cup for a dipper. So the kettle would +cease singing for a time, and, each occasion entirely exhausting the +spent man, the chances were that he would fall into a sleep that was +half a swoon. But he never slept very long. He would dream that the fire +was black, and start up to mend it--often before the kettle had +recovered its voice. So far from the fire going out, for sixty hours it +never went down. Carlton would mend it almost in his sleep. Even on the +third day, when a kind delirium destroyed sensation for some hours, he +never forgot his fire; the lean black hand would still feel its way to +the bath beneath the bed, and there grope weakly for the smaller coals. +All lucid thought and all delirious whispers were gradually monopolised +by the fire. It became the sick man's life. He would not let it out +while he lived. And live he would. When the fire died out, then so would +he. But he was not going to die this time. + +"Their latest dodge to get rid of me, is it? Trust to General +Fevrier--no, March! Never mind; he shan't lay his bony finger on me +. . . You'll burn 'em if you try! . . . I tell you the law's on my +side." + +Delirium grew from the exception into the rule. The kettle sang no +longer; the bottom was out and the whole thing red-hot; for the fire had +never been so good. The fender was inches deep in ashes. With or without +his reason Carlton knew enough to thrust the poker through and through +the lower glow. It was a clear fire all the time. + +And the heat of it at such a range! It singed the sheets; it flayed the +face; but it also helped incalculably to keep this stricken body and +this strenuous soul together. + +The crisis came before its time. Carlton grew too weak to hold the poker +or to lift a coal, but cruelly clear in his mind. Thus far he had never +prayed. He had abandoned prayer with all deliberation and in all his +vigour. It needed more than the fear of death to make him pray again, +least of all for mere life. Now that the fire was going out, and +recovery no longer possible, the case was changed; and this erring +servant broke his long silence with God, to pray both for forgiveness +and for a speedy issue out of his afflictions. And in the same hour came +the seeming answer, as if to assure him that even his prayers had still +some value in the eyes of the Most High. For delirium had dwindled into +coma, with these few lucid minutes between, and the fever and the pain +had passed away. + +Yet it was in this world that Robert Carlton awoke yet again, to find +his precious fire alight after all, and a dilapidated figure nodding +over it to the song of a fresh kettle. It was old Busby, the sexton. The +sick man could not speak; his little finger seemed to weigh a stone; it +was some minutes before he achieved movement enough to attract the +sexton's attention. But all this time the live coals had been warming +his soul. And already he lay convinced that he also was going to live. + +The sexton turned his face at last. It was a startling face for sick +eyes at such a range. The toothless mouth, which never closed, had often +reminded Mr. Carlton of one of his own gargoyles. It did so now. And a +continual trickle of saliva added a disgusting realism to the image, +which was, however, immediately dispelled by a human grin of profound +slyness. + +"And have you been bad?" inquired the sexton. + +"Beat--up--an egg. I--can't--speak." + +Evidently he could not, for Busby was bending a horrid ear. + +"Eh? eh?" + +Carlton made a fresh effort with shut eyes. + +"No food . . . faint for want . . . there no eggs?" + +"Eggs? Why, yes, here's one." + +"Beat up for me . . . too bad to speak." + +The sexton looked more sententious than ever. + +"Ah, I thought as how you'd been bad," said he, with all the nods of the +successful seer. "I thought as how you'd been bad!" + +"It's only been a cold," whispered Carlton, in sudden terror of the +public pity. + +"Only a cold?" + +"Oh, yes--that's all." + +"Then you've not been as bad as me!" cried Busby, triumphantly. "Do you +mind what I had inside me last year? That's there still! I can hear +that----" + +"Will you do what I ask?" + +It was a peremptory whisper now. + +"I would, sir, but I don't fare to know the road." + +"Then give me the egg, for heaven's sake, and you hold the cup." + +Carlton managed to rise a few inches in his impatience; but his fingers +had less power than those of the babe new-born, and the egg slipped +through them. With fortuitous dexterity, the sexton caught it in the +cup; there was a crack; and accident had accomplished the design. + +"Look what you've gone and done," said Busby, reproachfully, displaying +the yolk in the cup. Thereupon he received instructions which even he +could follow; and at length the mess was down, stinging with the +sexton's notion of a teaspoonful of whisky. This second accident was +even happier than the first; there was instant agitation in every vein. +And now Busby could hear without stooping. + +"When did you find me?" + +"That fare to be an hour ago, I suppose. Ah, but I thought as how you +looked bad! Soon as ever I see you, I say to myself, 'The reverend's +found what beat him at last,' I say; 'he do look wunnerful bad,' I say. +And you see, I was right." + +There was the tiniest gleam in the great bright eyes. + +"You were partly right," said Carlton, "and partly wrong. I'm not done +with yet, Busby. So then you lit the fire for me?" + +"That wasn't wholly out." + +"Ah!" + +"That soon burnt up. Then I went and got another kettle." + +The great eyes flashed suspicion. + +"And told everybody you saw, I suppose!" + +"I should be very sorry," said the sexton, significantly. "No, I come +an' went by the lane, an' took wunnerful care that nobody set eyes on I. +I thought as how you might fare to like a cup o' tea, an' that was a +rare mess you'd made o' _your_ kettle." + +"You've done well," whispered Carlton. "You've saved my--saved my cold +from getting worse. You shall never regret it, Busby; only don't you +tell anybody I've had one--do you hear? Don't you tell a single soul +that you found me in bed!" + +"No fear," chuckled the sexton. "I should be very sorry to tell anybody +I'd found you at all. They might hear o' that somewhere else!" + +Carlton lay still with thought and purpose; and death itself could not +have given the lower part of his face a harsher cast; but the hot eyes +were fixed upon the fading diamonds of the window over the table. At +last he spoke--and it was a pity there was but the sexton to hear the +firm tones of so faint a voice. + +"Find my keys, Busby. I'm going to give you a sovereign----" + +"A what?" + +"The first of several if you do what I want!" + +Not much later the sexton was hobbling towards Lakenhall, for the first +time in many years; and the sick man lay greatly doubting whether he +should ever see him again. His weakness was terrible now. The excitement +of conversation had provoked a relapse as grave as it was inevitable in +one so weak. The flickering lamp was only fed by the stimulus of +suspense, the glow of the fire, and the man's own indomitable will. The +latter, however, never failed him for a moment. + +"I _will_ pull through," he would mutter at his worst. "I will--I will +. . . Oh, is he never, never . . ." + +He came at last--with corn-flour, meat-extract, a bottle of port, and +such other requisites as had entered the sick man's head under the spur +of his overdose of ardent spirits. And, simple and inadequate as they +were, these things spelt the first syllable of recovery. + +The sexton came night after night; he also was a lonely man; and he +dearly loved a pound. In a week he was richer than he had ever been +before. It became difficult for him to take a disinterested view of the +determined progress which the patient made towards complete recovery and +consequent independence. The situation, however, had its little +compensations: at all events it enabled the imaginary sufferer to crow +over the real one to his heart's content. + +"Ah, sir, you don't fare to know what that is to be right ill, like I. +_You_ never had a fine fat frog settun in your middle an' keepun all the +good out o' your stummick. That get every bite I eat, an' then that cry +for more. Croap, croap, croap!" + +One day brought forth an unsuspected fact. The sexton was no longer +sexton at all. There had been no more burials. The school-bell was rung +on Sundays, as all the week, by the schoolmaster's son. Busby had been +dismissed with a present, as long ago as the month of August; but that +was not all. He had thereupon left the Church in justifiable dudgeon, +and thrown in his spiritual lot with the Particular Baptists in the +little flint chapel between the Linkworth turning and the Flint House. +He now exhorted Mr. Carlton to do the same. + +"If you do, sir," said Busby, "you'll never fall no more." + +Carlton winced. But the man had saved his life. Nothing should annoy him +from the kind old imbecile who had come to his succour while the sound +world stood aloof. + +"You don't know that," he said quietly. + +"But I do," declared the other. "I'm like to know. God's children can't +sin, and I'm one on 'em." + +Carlton opened his eyes. + +"Do you mean to tell me you never sin?" + +"I mean to tell you, sir," said the solemn sexton, "that, since God laid +his hand on me, now seven month ago, I've never once committed the +shadder of a sin." + +"Then, if I were you, I should remember what St. Paul says--'Let him +that thinketh he standeth take heed--lest--he--fall.'" + +The text faltered; it was terribly two-edged; but Carlton had not +perceived the pitfall until he was over the brink. He had forgotten +himself in his scorn, and spoken impulsively as the man that he had been +the year before. But the inveterate egotist was conveniently full of +himself, and his pat retort quite free from offence. + +"Fall?" said he, with his foolish eyes wide open. "Why, I couldn't do +that if I tried; and I have tried, just to see; but I fare to have +forgotten how to sin. Do you believe me, sir, I can't even raise a swear +at this little varmin what's killun me inch by inch. Why, I'm grateful +to it! But I do sometimes fare to cry to think I have to stay another +day in this world o' sin, when I know there's a place prepared for me in +heaven above." + +This stupendous speech was too much for even Mr. Carlton's self-control. +Its snivelling tone, its evident conviction (confirmed by a gargoyle's +grin of infinite self-esteem), were aggravated by the complete surprise +of this spiritual revelation; and between them they awoke a dormant +nerve. Robert Carlton did not exhibit that annoyance which he had +determined to conceal; he did much worse. He burst out laughing in the +sexton's face. And his laughter was long, loud, high-pitched and +hysterical, alike from weakness and from long disuse. + +The sexton on his legs, in a perfect palsy of horror and offence, alone +put a stop to it. + +"I beg your pardon," gasped Carlton, his eyes full of tears; "oh, I +beg----" + +And again that hysterical, high-pitched laughter got the better of him, +ringing weirdly enough through the empty house. + +"Ah!" said the dotard, when it had stopped at last; and the monosyllable +contented him for some moments. "Well," he at length continued, with a +brisker manner and a brighter face; "well, thank God I pulled you +through; thank God I didn't let you die in your sins and go to +everlasting hell without another chance of immortal life. You wicked +man! You wicked man! I'll go and I'll pray for you; but I'll never come +near you no more." + +So the solitary regained his solitude; when he spoke again, it was to +himself. + +"Well, he has his money," he reflected aloud: he had paid the sexton +some seven pounds in all. "And my gratitude!" he cried later. "I must +never forget that I owe my life to that egregious old man." + +Yet the greater gratitude was beginning to stir within him, as the sap +was even then stirring in the trees. It was a mild, bright day, one of +the last in March. The invalid had not yet been out; he would go out +now. In an instant he was wrapping up. + +Oh, but it was wonderful! the feel and noise of the moist gravel under +the soles of his boots; the green, damp grass; the watery sun; the +beloved birds; the mild, beneficent air. + +His steps took the old direction of their own accord. In a minute he was +there, at the church, and seated on the very wall which he had been +building a fortnight before, surveying his work. + +Had some one been carrying it on in his absence? Or was it only that one +noticed no difference from day to day, but all the difference in the +world after an unaccustomed absence? Yes, this was it; and he drew the +deep breath which his first idea had checked. + +Still it was wonderful: one wall seemed so much higher, another so much +cleaner than before; and yet there was no stone either laid or scraped +which Carlton did not recognize at a glance, with sudden memories of +special travail; and the string was still where he had stretched it to +keep the line. He had under-estimated his progress at the time; that was +all; but again it was as though the sap was rising in his heart. + +The very tangle of blackened timber, which still cumbered nine-tenths of +the inner area, no longer struck Carlton as the unconquerable chaos it +had appeared on that bitter day which seemed so many days ago; yet, when +he laid white hands upon such a beam as he had easily shouldered then, +he could not lift it an inch. Ah, that day! It would take him weeks to +undo its evil work. The wet feet and the cutting wind, he could feel +them both again, with the sweat freezing on his body, and every pore an +open door to death. There was the ridge of red-stemmed firs, too far +east to blunt the cold steel of that deadly wind; and here beneath him +the barrier he had been building last, and must finish now before he did +another thing. How firm and true was this top course, that he had laid +that day with the bony fingers at his throat! Well, he would have died +with a good day's work behind him . . . It must have been a very near +thing . . . he wondered how near when the sexton came, and why the +sexton had come at all. The man had never given a good reason. He had +only just fared to think there might be something wrong. + +On the way indoors, the invalid stopped at a tree. It was one of the +horse-chestnuts; and already every delicate extremity was swollen and +sticky to the touch; and the birds sang of summer in the branches. +Carlton passed on with the short, quick steps of a feeble person in a +hurry. Rivers were running in his heart; he wanted to be where he could +kneel. + + + + +XX + +THE WAY OF PEACE + + +Three years later the man was still alone, and the church still growing +under his unaided but untiring hand. Indeed, from one end, it looked +almost ready for the roof, the west gable rising salient through the +trees, with the original window intact underneath. But this window was +the exception, the sole survivor from the fire, and for the past year +the rest had been one long impediment. Even now, only the three single +lights, in either transept and to the right of the porch respectively, +had been wrought to a finish from sill to arch; a mullioned window was +just begun; the remainder all yawned to the sky in ragged gaps of +varying width. But the village looked daily on the one good end, flanked +by the west walls of either transept, which happened not to have a +window between them, and were consequently finished. And the village was +softening a little towards its outcast, though no man said so above his +breath; nor was a living soul known to have been near him all these +years, unless it was the new sexton to dig a grave, or a Lakenhall +curate to make an entry in the parish register. + +There had, however, been one or two others; the first knocking at the +study door on the evening of the first funeral, some months after +Carlton's illness. + +Carlton was reading at the time. His heart stopped at the sound. It was +repeated before he could bring himself to open the door. + +"Tom Ivey!" + +"That's me, sir; may I come in?" + +"Surely, Tom." + +The hulking mason entered awkwardly, and refused a chair. His large +frame bulked abnormally in a ready-made suit of stiff black cloth. He +seemed to take up half the room, as he stood and glowered, a full-length +figure of surly embarrassment and dark resolve. + +"There was a funeral to-day," he began at last. + +"I know." + +"That was my poor mother, Mr. Carlton." + +"Yes, I heard. Tom, I'm so sorry for you!" + +Their hands flew together, and were one till Carlton winced. + +"There's nothun to be sorry for," said Tom, with husky philosophy. "Her +troubles are over, poor thing. So's one o' mine! You can start me +to-morrow." + +"Start you, Tom?" + +"Yes, sir, I mean to work for you now. I'd like to see the man who'll +stop me! You've shown 'em all the man you are; now that's _my_ turn." + +And the broad face beamed and darkened with alternate enthusiasm and +defiance. Carlton beheld it with parted lips and startled eye; and so +they stood through a long silence, till Carlton sat down with a smile. +It was a singularly gentle smile, as he leant back in his worn old +chair, and the lamplight fell upon his face. + +"After all these months," he murmured; "after all these months!" + +"I fare to hide my face when I count 'em up," admitted Ivey, bitterly. +"But what was the good of comun when I couldn't come for good? And how +could I in poor mother's time? It'd have meant--there's no sayun what +that wouldn't have meant." + +"You mean as regards Sir Wilton?" + +"I do, Mr. Carlton." + +"He will have been a good friend to you?" + +"Oh, yes." + +"Did those repairs, did he?" + +"Yes," sighed Ivey, "he was better than his word about them; you would +hardly know the place now. It made a lot of difference to mother. And I +had the job." + +"Oh!" + +"He's kept me busy, I must say. I've never wanted work." + +"Until now, I suppose?" + +"To tell you the truth, sir, I'm at work for him still." + +"For Sir Wilton Gleed?" + +"Yes--odd jobs about the estate." + +"Then my good fellow, what do you mean by offering yourself to me?" + +"Mean?" exclaimed Ivey, his black determination leaping into flame. "I +mean as I've made up my mind to give him the go-by for you. I'd have +done that long ago if it hadn't been for mother; but better late than +never. You've shown 'em the man you are, and now that's my turn. Look at +what you've done with your own two hands--there'll be other two from +to-morrow! You shan't work yourself right to death before my eyes. Why, +your hair's white with it already!" + +Carlton wheeled further from the lamp. + +"Not white," he murmured. + +"But that is, sir. When did you look in a glass?" + +"I don't know." + +"Then do you look to-morrow. That's white as snow. And your beard's +grey." + +"It's certainly too long," said Carlton, covering half with his hand. + +"And your hand--your hand!" + +It was scarred and horny as the mason's own. Carlton removed it from the +light, but said nothing. + +"That's done its last day's work alone," cried Tom. "I start with you +to-morrow, whether you want me or not. I'll show 'em! I'll show 'em!" + +And he stood nodding savagely to himself. + +"My dear fellow, you can't behave like that." + +The words fell softly after a long silence. + +"Why can't I?" + +Carlton gave innumerable reasons. + +"It would put us both in the wrong," was the last. "Go on working for +Sir Wilton--at any rate for another year. You owe it to him, Tom. And +don't you fret about me; I am a happier man than I ever deserved to be +again. Last winter it was different; but God has shown me infinite mercy +and compassion. And now He has sent you to me, as a sign that even man +may forgive me in the end! That is enough for me, Tom. You cannot do +more for me than you have done to-night. But your duty you must do, by +God's help, as long as it is as clear as it is now. Don't bother your +head about me! I am getting into the knack. Perhaps by the time I come +to the roof--if I ever do--the want of a church may induce others to +help me finish mine. Then, if you like, you shall come back; but I won't +have you made an outcast on my account; one is enough." + +There were no more visits from Tom Ivey. This one came to the ears of +Sir Wilton; and that diplomatist instead of playing into the enemy's +hands by discharging his man, capped all his kindness to the mason by +getting him the offer of an irresistible berth in that London district +for which he himself sat. Thus Sir Wilton removed a wavering ally, and +at the same time renewed the lease of his allegiance. + +Carlton heard of it some months later, when there was another funeral, +and the Lakenhall curate came in again to make the entry. This curate +was a gentleman. He had a good heart and better tact. He not only +conversed with Carlton as with the perfectly normal clergyman, in +perfectly normal circumstances, but he would prolong these conversations +as far as he deemed possible without exciting a suspicion of the +profound pity which inspired him. He would bring bits of local gossip, +or the latest national event; once he let fall that Sidney Gleed was up +at Cambridge, and said to stand a chance of "coxing the eight," while +Lydia was now a Mrs. Goldstein, the mistress of a splendid mansion in +Holland Park, and another up the Thames. It was from the same source +that Carlton obtained belated news of George Mellis, who had come +through two campaigns without a scratch, yet never been back to play the +hero on his native heath. In a word this curate, who was a very young +and rather commonplace fellow, came soon to stand for the outside world, +the world of newspapers and talk, to Robert Carlton, who liked him none +the less because his older eye saw through the artless arts with which +the lad sought to mask his charity. + +The visitations of this curate, who also conducted the one weekly +service in the village school, was a little arrangement between those +fast friends, Sir Wilton Gleed and Canon Wilders, who would have been +interested to learn the way in which their delegate improved the rare +occasion of a funeral. For marriages and baptisms the Long Stow folk had +taken to walking across the heath to Linkworth. + +Early in the second year there came a visitor whom Robert Carlton knew +at a glance, though he had never before seen him in the flesh. This was +a person with the appearance of a rather dissipated sporting man, who +tooled tandem through the village, and pulled up at the ruins in broad +daylight. The thing was thus a scandal from the first moment of its +occurrence, and the cockaded groom was beset by horrified rustics before +his master's red neck had disappeared among the low and ragged walls. + +Carlton had withdrawn into the invisible seclusion of the west end, +where he was nervously scraping at the nearest stone when the visitor +appeared, only to stop short with a whistle. + +"I thought this was the church the parson was building with his own +hands?" + +"So it is, my lord." + +"And you are what he calls his own hands!" + +"No, I am he." + +The visitor stared. + +"You the parson?" + +"I know I don't look like one," admitted Carlton, glancing from his +ruined hands to the shabby clothes in which he worked; "nor can I fairly +consider myself one at present. Yet I am still the only rector of this +parish, and it was I who wrote to your lordship about the stone. Yours +are the only quarries in this part of the country. The stone I am now +using came from them. But it is just finished, and unless you will let +me have some more I may have to stop; otherwise I believe that I could +build up to the roof, in time, without assistance." + +"And why should you?" + +"My church was burnt down through my own--fault." + +"I know all about that," said his lordship. "What I ask is, why should +you insist upon building it up single-handed?" + +"I didn't insist originally," sighed Carlton. "It is a very long story." + +The earl regarded him with a pair of very penetrating little eyes; he +was an ugly man with an ugly reputation, but one of those who take as +little trouble to conceal their worst characteristics as to display +their best. + +"To be quite frank with you," said he, "I happen to know something of +your story; and I consider it a jolly sight more discreditable to others +than to you. That's _my_ opinion, and I don't care who knows it. So you +are really and literally doing this thing with your own two hands?" + +"Literally--as yet." + +"And who looks after you?" + +"Oh, no one comes near me; but I am bound to say that I have learnt to +look pretty well after myself. I have found it absolutely necessary for +my work." + +"Cookin' for yourself, and all that sort of thing?" + +"Cooking and even killing when necessary." + +"Is the boycott as wide and as bad as all that?" + +"It is no worse than I deserve." + +The visitor, looking sharply to see whether this was cant, was convinced +of its sincerity at a glance, though he loudly disagreed with the +opinion. + +"I call it a jolly shame," said he; "but I'm not going to hurt your +feelings by expressing mine. I'm the last man to rake up the past. But +it would be a different thing if you had really fired the church; that +was the last iniquity, charging you with that! How do I know you didn't? +There was a young friend of mine on the bench, and I had it from him as +a fact, with a jolly lot more besides. Now show me what you've done +before I go." + +This did not take a minute; there was so little to show for the first +long year and more of scraping, re-pointing, or rebuilding from the +ground. Save at the end where they had stood talking, there was +scarcely a wall that reached to their shoulders, and their tour of +inspection was closely followed from the road. It was conducted with few +words on either side, though the noble Earl muttered several which would +not have been muttered in other company. In the end he made a startling +undertaking. He would not only send as much more stone as was required, +but neither the stuff nor its delivery should cost Mr. Carlton a penny. + +Carlton turned a deeper bronze, but begged as a favour to be allowed to +pay. The new church was his debt to the parish. It was the one debt that +he would pay. The uttermost farthing and the least last stone were to +have come out of his own pocket. That had been his undertaking; it was +still his heart's ambition; but as such he saw its unworthy side; and +would place himself in his lordship's hands, sooner than be swayed by +false pride in such a matter. + +"Then you shall pay through the nose!" the other promised him; "and I'm +damned if I don't think all the more of you. I beg your pardon. I was +trying not to swear. But I never could stand parsons, and I suppose +it'll shock you when I tell you straight that you're the best I've +struck! You're a man, you are, and I take off my hat to you." + +He did so openly before the wide eyes and wider mouths of those watching +from the road; and so ended an incident which Sir Wilton Gleed described +as one of the most scandalous in all his experience. "Birds of a +feather," was, however, his ready and untiring comment; and the saying +went from door to door, as "not guilty but don't do it again," had gone +before it; for there is nothing like a timeworn saying to crystallise a +widespread sentiment. + +This one did not come to Robert Carlton's ears, but he was perhaps the +first to whom the obvious comment had occurred, and its easy +justification did a little damp the glow in which his latest champion +had left him. It were better to have won the allegiance of a better man. +Yet who was he to judge his fellows? He had forfeited the right to +criticise another. Let him then be truly and duly thankful; for with +each waning year he had more and more occasion. Surely the heart of man +was beginning at last to soften towards an erring brother, who repented +very bitterly of his sin, and who was doing faithfully the little that +he could to undo the least of his sin's results. Ah, that he could have +done more! Ah, that by dying he could bring the dead to life! + +He was only a man; he could only suffer in his turn. That he had done, +was doing, and was still to do. And he thanked God for it again; so much +of the old spirit still endured. Yet was he none the less thankful for +every token of pardon or of pity from mere men. He knew that many would +justly execrate his name until the end. He knew of one at least who +would never forgive him in this life. + +This one came on a moonlight night in the spring of this fourth year; +came limping into the churchyard, leaning on his great stick, and +growling savagely to himself; little suspecting that he had Carlton +caught in the ruins, listening, watching, fascinated, from one of those +ragged interstices with which even his perseverance and even his +ingenuity could scarcely cope. To be exact, it was, or was to be, the +mullioned window in the south transept; and as Musk advanced past this +angle of the building, the clergyman first leant, then crept, over the +sill to watch him. + +He stole into the open. Musk had his back turned; his shoulders were +very round. Carlton knew well at what grave the other stood staring, and +his heart stirred heavily within him. Oh, his wickedness! Oh, his sin! +How could there be any forgiveness, in heaven or on earth, for him a +clergyman? The poor old man, so old, so bent! He must speak to him; he +must throw himself at his feet; so bent, so lame! Oh, that that stick +might strike the life out of him then and there! + +He was creeping forward; suddenly he stopped. Musk was stooping, moving +his stick to and fro across the grave, with a sweeping movement, as of a +scythe. What was he doing? Carlton remembered--divined--and his blood +ran cold. The snowdrops were out; he had put some on the grave. It had +no stone, no name. It was only the tidiest and the greenest mound in all +the churchyard. He saw to that. And yet his flowers desecrated it; must +be swept to the winds . . . + +Musk had come away. He was looking at the south wall where it had +obviously been rebuilt. Carlton was skulking in the porch. The high moon +fell heavily on the upturned face, covering it with white patches and +black wrinkles; and these were working like a seething mass; but for a +long time the great frame stood motionless. Then, in a flash, a huge +fist flew from the huge shoulder, struck the sandstone a sickening blow, +swung round and was shaken at the rectory through the trees until the +blood dripped from the mangled knuckles. Carlton was so near that he +could both see and hear the heavy drops. He drew further within the +porch: he had also seen his enemy's face. + +Carlton had the fair mind and the true eye of the exceptional man. He +saw most things immediately as they really were, not as he wished to see +them, still less as they affected himself. He saw the moonlit face of +Jasper Musk for many a day. It did not haunt him. He could have +dismissed the vision from his mind at will; he preferred to consider it +calmly in a white light. There was hate undying and invincible. There +was something to respect. Carlton compared the petty though persistent +enmity of Sir Wilton Gleed with the great dumb hatred of Jasper Musk; +the last was inexorable as it was just; the first not wholly one or the +other, or Carlton was mistaken in the smaller man. Sir Wilton might be +the last man on earth to forgive him, yet in the very end he would +follow the world, supposing for a moment that the world ever led. But +Jasper Musk would hate the harder as the hate of others dwindled and +died. + +This conviction cast no new shadow across Carlton's life, but it brought +a new name into his prayers, and put the fine edge on an old anxiety. He +had always been anxious about his child, though in the beginning that +sense had been overborne by others. Now, however, it was acute enough. +What was becoming of the boy? Did he live? Was Musk bringing him up? +Was he kindly treated? Yes, yes, they would be kind enough! Carlton +trusted his enemy there; but his own position was none the less grieving +as he came to realise what it was. He had no position at all towards the +child--no rights, no control, no voice, no _locus standi_ whatsoever. +Was it better so, or worse? What were they teaching the child? Would he +also grow up to deny God, and to execrate the name of his unworthy +minister? + +Yes, it was a shadow; but no new one; it only fell heavier and stretched +further than before. And gradually Carlton became obsessed with the idea +that he must do something, take some step, give some earnest of +voluntary responsibility, no matter what new humiliation awaited him. +But what to do, what step to take, for the best! As life grew a very +little easier in other ways that have been shown, this problem came upon +Carlton as a fresh complication, and as a poignant reminder of his +original wickedness. It was not, however, a problem to be solved out of +hand. It required infinite thought, and ceaseless prayer for that right +judgment for which Robert Carlton now again looked upward as well as +within. But while he thought, and even while he prayed, the walls were +still growing under his hands. + +And in his work he was strangely and serenely happy; there were no more +spasmodic joys and qualms. Enormous difficulties lay between him and the +impossible roof. He was at once artist and man enough to be stimulated +by these. He drew in chalk, upon the bare floors of his disused rooms, +full-size diagrams of all his arches, divided into as many parts as +there were to be stones, according to the easy rule set forth in his +precious book. Then he collected all the boxes, tin, wood, and +cardboard, that he could find upon the premises, and cut these up into +numbered patterns coinciding exactly with the diagrams on the floor, +thus providing himself with evening occupation for a whole winter, and +having all in readiness by the spring. Summer, however, found him still +in travail with the mullioned window in the north transept; and the +mullion and the tracery he was omitting altogether; the bare arch beat +him long enough. + +Prolonged solitude may debase a man to the savage or exalt him to the +saint; it never leaves him the mere man he was. Robert Carlton was still +too human to merit for a moment the hyperbole of saint; nevertheless he +developed in his loneliness several of those traits which are less of +this world than of a better. His mind dwelt continuously upon holy +things; it had ceased altogether to feed upon itself. He had suffered no +more sickness, either of body or of soul, such as that which had +threatened to destroy both in the first awful winter. The whole man was +chastened, purified, simplified and refined, by the consuming fires +through which he had passed. His faith had never been stronger than it +was now; it had never, never been so near in sheer simplicity to the +faith of a little child. In a word, and little as he knew it, this great +sinner, proven libertine, suspected incendiary, was now living in the +very sight and smile of God; and even His humblest creatures loved and +trusted him as never in the days of prosperity and good report; for now +he loved them first. Nature, indeed, had not endowed him with that +sympathetic insight into inferior life--that genius for herself--which +is born in most people who are to have it at all. To Robert Carlton the +talent only came in his lonely and dishonoured prime, as the solace of +his exile, as a new interest and occupation for his mind, and surely +also as a sign of grace returning. There grew upon him in these years +the knowledge and love of very little things, trodden under foot or +brushed aside until now; a larger passion for nature in all her moods, +and all their manifestations; and, above all, the equal peace and +independence of him to whom the grasses whisper and the elements sing. + +So one wind braced him to titanic effort, and another confirmed him in +patient toil, and another relaxed both mind and members in merited ease; +so he came to know the birds about him, almost as a shepherd knows his +sheep, and even to discover some individuality beneath the feathers. +There was one huge sparrow, a perfect demon for the crumbs which Carlton +strewed every morning near the scene of his day's work, so that he might +not be quite alone. The lowest human qualities came out in this small +bird until finally, and with infinite ingenuity, it was trapped, +rationed, and compelled to watch a feast of the smaller fry through the +wires of a cage. Then there was a robin which in time came to perch upon +the solitary's hat while he worked; only in the beginning were there +crumbs in the brim. And again there was a starling that entertained him +by the hour together, and all for love, from an elder-bush close to the +shed. + +But each of these years brought riper knowledge, until God's leafy acre, +with its canopy of changing sky, both teeming with life to his quickened +vision, became not only the outcast's second Bible, but all the almanac +he needed or possessed. With no newspaper to distract his mind, and +perhaps not a letter or a human voice for months, it was on bird and +leaf that he came to rely for the time of year; while the field of his +research was greatly extended by nocturnal exercise upon the +pine-serrated plateau beyond the church. Now the tips of the chestnut +twigs might bulge and bud, but spring was not spring until the plover +paraded his new black breast, or a peewit rose screaming at the midnight +intruder. All summer the small bird was king; hedgerows twittered; +crumbs were scorned; man was jilted for slug and worm. But the end came +in sight with the homebred mallard, flying feebly in his summer +feathers; and the flight of the wild duck was the end of all. The third +year found Carlton watching for the mallard as his bird of ill-omen, and +redoubling his efforts while his ear prepared for the shrill music of +the full-grown quills in final flight. Harsh experience had taught him +how little he could do, with any certainty or any continuity, in the +season when the little birds and he were best friends. + +It was late in May, and the church would soon be hidden for another +summer; meanwhile Carlton was still at work upon his transept window, in +a corner which a great stack of undressed sandstone made invisible from +the lane, as it already was from the road. The folk from other villages +were beginning to stop and watch him longer than he liked, and he did +not care to be a cynosure at all. He only asked to build his church in +peace, and with it an example which should do at least a little to +counteract the one he had already set; and he meant both for his own +people, not for the outlying world. He really feared a reaction in his +favour on the part of the sentimental outsider. It would do him fresh +injury in the eyes of many of whom he honestly longed to win back in the +end. Moreover, his head was very level in these days. He saw nothing +heroic in his own conduct. With all his wish to undo a little of the +harm that he had done to others, there was a very human eagerness to +redeem his own past, so far as that was possible upon earth. Carlton was +never unaware of this incentive. He entertained no illusions about +himself, nor did he wish to create any in others. For example, there was +his work. It was never easy, sometimes hopeless, always fascinating. But +the man himself desired no credit for devotion to labour which he loved +for its own sake, and in which he was still capable (but no longer +ashamed) of forgetting the past. + +The transept window engrossed him to the last degree; mullion or no +mullion, it involved the largest arch that Carlton had yet attempted; +and already it alone had occupied many weeks. The patterns had been the +easy recreation of his winter evenings, but it had taken him all the +spring to reproduce a score of these in solid stone; for though the +walls were coursed rubble, the windows must have ashlar facings, to be +as they had been before; and ashlar is to coursed rubble what broadcloth +is to Harris tweed. What with indefatigable labour, however, and the +general proficiency which he had now attained in his self-taught craft, +Carlton had his jambs up by the end of May, and his arched framework +fixed between them, all ready to support the arch itself. He was now +engaged upon the nine wedge-shaped stones to form the latter, working +each to the fine ashlar finish, as also to the exact dimensions of its +fellow in tin, wood, or cardboard, and laying them in couples on +alternate sides of the wooden centre, so as to weight it evenly as the +book ordained. + +It was the middle of the afternoon, and the quiet corner was already in +shadow; beyond, the wet grass glistened, for the day was a duel between +sun and rain. Carlton was taking the busier advantage of a brilliant +interval, and roughing out a new voussoir with the bold precision of the +expert mason. Ting, ting, ting, fell the hammer on the cold-chisel; the +soft, wet sandstone peeled off in curling flakes; the quick strokes rang +like a bell through the cool and cleanly air. It had been honest rain, +and it was honest sunshine. The green world broke freshly upon all the +senses. Every colour was more vivid than its wont, from the reddish +yellow of the rain-soaked stone to lilac and laburnum in the rectory +garden; from the creamy castles of the full-blown chestnuts to the +emerald sprays which were all that the slower elms had as yet to show +against an uncertain sky. Every inch of earth, every blade and petal, +was contributing its quota to the sweet summer smell. The birds sang; +the bees hummed; the hammer rang. And Carlton was so intent upon his +task, so bent upon making up for time lost that day, that it might have +been mid-winter for the little he looked and listened; yet he heard and +saw none the less; and his face was filled with quiet peace. + +In appearance he was many years older; at a distance he might have +passed for the father of the man who had drawn a larger congregation +than the old church would hold. His hair was grey; his beard was +grizzled. Incessant manual toil had aged him even more by giving his +body a constant stoop. And the hands were the hands of a labouring man. +But the brown eye, once inflammable, was now all gentleness and +humility; the whole face was sweetened and exalted by solitude and +suffering; in expression more patient, less austere; though the +untrained beard and moustache, hiding mouth and jaw, had something to do +with this. + +To his gentleness, however, there was striking testimony even now, as +his hammer rained ringing blows upon the cold-chisel; for within easy +reach of it perched the tame robin on another stone, quizzically +watching the performance. Then, in the same moment, three things +happened. The robin flew away, Carlton turned his head, and the ringing +blows broke off. + + + + +XXI + +AT THE FLINT HOUSE + + +"The child must have a name, Jasper." + +"All right, you give it one. That's nothun to me." + +"But he must be christened properly." + +"Why must he?" + +"Oh, Jasper, if you don't fare to believe, his mother did, poor thing!" + +"And a lot of good that did her . . . but do you have your way. Make a +canting little Christian of him if you like. Do you think I care what +you do with the brat? I know what I'd do with it, if that wasn't for the +law!" + +So, in the early days, while Robert Carlton was still learning to live +alone, his son was trundled across the heath to Linkworth, and there +christened George after no one in particular. Followed the remaining +period of extreme infancy, during which Jasper Musk seldom set eyes upon +the child, and was more or less oblivious to its concrete existence. +Then one afternoon, the second summer, as Jasper sat smoking at a back +window, in the big chair to which his sciatica would bind him from +morning till night, there was a shuffling and a grunting in the passage, +and in came the child on all fours, with the lamp of adventure alight +and shining in grimy cheeks and great grey eyes. + +Musk took the pipe from his mouth, and met the small intruder with an +expressionless stare. Had his wife been by, no doubt he would have +bidden her take the little devil out of his sight; he had done so +before, using a harsher and more literal epithet for choice. But this +afternoon he was alone, and very weary of his solitary confinement. So +for the moment Musk sat stolidly intent; and the child, after a halt +induced by the creaking of the open door and the austere apparition +within, advanced once more, with the infantile equivalent for a cheer. + +"Well, you've got a cheek!" said Jasper, grimly. + +The boy had reached his legs, and was pulling himself up by the +particularly lame one, chattering the while in the foreign tongue of one +year old. Musk winced and muttered, then suddenly encircled the small +body with his mighty hands, and set the child high and dry upon his +knee. + +"And now what?" said he. "And now what?" + +For answer a chubby hand flew straight at his whiskers, grabbed them +unerringly, and pulled without mercy, but with yells of delight that +brought Musk's wife in hot haste from a far corner of the rambling +house. In the doorway she threw up her arms. + +"Oh, Georgie!" she cried aghast. "You naughty boy--you naughty boy!" + +Jasper had already created a diversion in favour of his whiskers, and +was in the act of blowing open an enormous watch when his wife +appeared. + +"Now you take and mind your own business," snapped he, "and we'll mind +ours . . . Blow--can't you blow? Like this, then--p-f-f-f--and there you +are! Now you try; blow, and that'll open again." + +Georgie walked before the summer was over; and this was the year in +which Jasper scarcely set foot to the ground, so he made use of the +child from the first. Now it was his pipe, now his spectacles, now the +newspaper; these were the first familiar objects which the child came to +know by name before he could speak; and he never saw any one of the +three without taking it as straight as he could toddle to the great grey +man in the chair. + +Mrs. Musk suddenly found half her work with Georgie taken entirely off +her hands. She was even quicker over another discovery. Jasper would not +own that he had taken to the child; in her presence, on the contrary, he +ignored its very existence as utterly as heretofore. Yet now every day +she could have found them together at most hours; only she knew better. + +Cheerless environment for this new life--a gloomy old house--a grim old +couple. Nevertheless, and in very spite of all the circumstances of his +birth, Georgie from the first evinced that temperament which is a sun +unto itself. An expansive gaiety was his normal mood, and for years the +only variant was a terrible and overwhelming indignation with all his +world. He was, in fact, an entirely healthy little savage, with all the +wild spirits and facile affections of his age, and no exemption from its +traditional ills. Once he had croup so severely that two doctors came +in the middle of the night, and Georgie never forgot their grave faces +and his grandfather's grim one at the foot of the bed. Indeed, the scene +formed his first permanent impression, though the sequel was more +memorable in itself. Georgie seemed to go to sleep for days and days, +and to awake in another world, though the bed was the same, and the +medicine-bottles, and the singing kettle; for it was day-time, and the +room full of sun, and the doctors gone; but in the sunlight there stood +instead the loveliest lady whom Georgie had beheld in his three or four +years of earthly experience. Thereupon he lay with his firm little mouth +pursed up, his grey eyes greater than even their wont, and his mind at +work upon some surreptitious teaching of his grandmother. It was a very +simple question that he asked in the end, but it made the lady kiss him +and cry over him in a way he never could understand. + +"Are you a angel?" Georgie had said. + +Gwynneth happened to be somewhat morbidly aware of her own poverty in +angelic qualities, though it was not this that made her cry. She was +alone at the hall for the winter, which Sir Wilton and Lady Gleed were +spending upon a well-beaten track abroad, while Sidney was still at +Cambridge. Gwynneth also might have drifted from Cannes to Nice, and +from Nice to Mentone, for she had been taken from school on Lydia's +marriage, and assigned a permanent position at the side of Lady Gleed. +In this capacity the girl had not shone, though her peculiar character +had lost nothing by the duty and faithful practice of consistent +self-suppression. On the other hand, there was the demoralising sense of +personal superiority, which was thrust upon Gwynneth at every turn of +this companionship, causing her to take an unhealthy interest in her own +faults, in order to preserve any humility at all; for she was full of +mental and of bodily vigour, and her aunt was signally devoid of both. +Consequently when Lydia petitioned to go instead (having become a mother +to her great disgust, and demanding an immediate separation from her +infant), the proposal was adopted to the equal satisfaction of all +concerned. Gwynneth, for her part, was very sorry not to travel and see +the world; but she knew, from a tantalising experience, that hotel life +was all that one could count upon seeing with Lady Gleed; and from every +other point of view it was infinite relief to be alone. Literally alone +she was not, since the little German housekeeper never left the hall. +But Fraulein Hentig was a self-contained and entirely tactful companion, +with whom it was possible to enjoy the delights of solitude while +escaping the disadvantages. The two were very good friends. + +Gwynneth was now in her twentieth year, a tall and graceful girl, albeit +with the slight stoop of the natural student that she was. At her school +she had won all available honours, but it was not a modern school, and +in those days such as Gwynneth had no definite knowledge of any wider +arena. So she left her school without great regret. She had learnt all +that they could teach her there. And she taught herself twice as much in +stolen hours spent in the hall library, which had been bought with the +place, and hitherto only used by Sidney on wet days. But now there was +no need to steal an hour; the girl's time was all her own, and she held +high revel among the books. Moreover, it was the dawn of the University +Extension system, and Gwynneth heard of a course of lectures upon +English literature, only eight miles from Long Stow, just in time to +attend. To do so she had to fight a weekly battle with the coachman, but +Fraulein Hentig took her side, and the opposition did not endure. +Gwynneth took voluminous notes and wrote elaborate essays, bringing to +the whole interest that energy, thoroughness and enthusiasm, to which, +though each was an essential characteristic, she was only now enabled to +give free play. Yet the young girl was no mere bookworm, though at this +stage of her career she seemed little else. It was a phase of +intellectual absorption, but all the while it needed but a touch of +human interest in her life to awake the deeper nature of the eternal +woman. Such awakening had come with the most alarming period of +Georgie's illness. Gwynneth was starting for her lecture, primed with +sharp pencils and her new essay, when she heard in the village that two +doctors had been at the Flint House in the night. She did not go to that +lecture at all, but for two days and nights was scarcely an hour absent +from the bedside of a little boy whom she had barely known by sight +before. And his first comprehensible words formed the question which +Gwynneth, worn out by watching, had answered in the fashion he could +never understand. + +Well, she was destined to be the boy's good angel, though he never +mistook her for one again; and sometimes she looked the part. The dark +eyes, so ardent in the pursuit of knowledge, or of any other of her +heart's desires, could yet sparkle with childish glee, or soften with +the tenderness of the ideal Madonna. The self-willed mouth and nose were +only sweet as Georgie saw them; and none but he knew the warmth of the +pale brown cheek or the crisp electric touch of the dark brown hair. +Little knowing it before, and never dreaming of it now, Gwynneth had +long been hankering for all that the little child gave her out of the +fulness and purity of his tiny heart. She supposed that she was happy +because at last she was being of some trifling use to somebody; it made +her think more of herself. Looking deeper (as she thought), through the +deceptive lenses of her inner consciousness, Gwynneth took a still less +favourable view of her latest interest in life. It was that and not much +more to the imperfect introspection of her morbid mood. + +Nevertheless, this was the happiest time that she had ever known. +Georgie and she became inseparable, even when the boy was well again; +and on him Gwynneth was really lavishing all the love and tenderness +which had been gathering in her heart since the hour when she had kissed +a dead forehead for the last time. The fact was that the girl had an +inborn capacity for passionate devotion, and was now once more enabled +to indulge this sweet instinct to the full. She still went to her weekly +lecture, read every book in the syllabus, and wrote her essay with as +much care for detail as her innate energy would permit. Nor was her work +the worse for the counter-attraction which now filled her young life to +the brim. Georgie spoke of Gwynneth as his "lady," with a sufficient +emphasis upon the possessive pronoun, and to her by a succession of pet +names of their joint invention. + +Croup is an enemy that lives to fight another day, as Dr. Marigold said +when he paid his last visit; and that word was sufficient for the Musks. +Thenceforward Georgie had only to sneeze to be put to bed, where he +wasted many days before the winter was over. But Georgie was not to be +depressed, and as Gwynneth would come and play with him for hours it was +perhaps no wonder. They both had some imagination; one showed it by +extemporary flights of downright romance, and the other by following +these with immense eyes and not a syllable of his own from beginning to +end. Then and there they would dramatise the story, for it was usually +one of adventure, and Georgie had a clockwork paddle-steamer called the +_Dover_, which sailed the bed manned by cardboard sailors of Gwynneth's +making. In these seas the roughest weather was experienced in crossing +Georgie's legs, but the best fun was in the polar regions, where the +vessel lay wedged for months between two pillows, while the crew hunted +bear and walrus over Georgie's person, and dug winter quarters under the +clothes. + +One day, when he really had a cold, and had fallen asleep upon the +icebergs, Gwynneth took upon herself to search the cupboard for some +picture-book which he might not have seen before; and in so doing she +came across the photograph of a comely young woman, not much older than +herself, which compelled her attention rather than her curiosity, for +she guessed at once who it was. Moreover, the face was striking and +interesting in itself. The eyes had a strange look, half reckless, half +defiant, but, even in a faded and inartistic photograph, of a subtle +fascination. There was some slight coarseness of eyelid and nostril; but +for all that it was a fine expression, full of courage and full of will. +The will was obvious in the mouth. It had the strength of Musk himself. +Yet there was something about the mouth--so firm--so full--that Gwynneth +did not like. She could not have said what it was, but she preferred +looking into the eyes. They fascinated her, and she did not lift her own +eyes from them till Mrs. Musk entered and caught her thus engaged. + +"Oh, where did you find that? Give it to me--give it to me!" and the +poor soul held out hands that trembled with her voice. "That's Georgie's +poor mother," she sobbed, "and I didn't know there was another left. I +thought he'd taken and burnt them every one!" + +And she slipped the photograph inside her bodice, and pressed her lean +hands upon it, as though it were the babe itself at her breast once +more. Next instant Gwynneth's arms were about the old woman's neck, and +her fresh lips had touched the wet and shrivelled cheek of Georgie's +grandmother. + +"Ah! but you are good to us," said Mrs. Musk. "I never would have +believed a young lady could be so sweet and kind as you!" + +Not that Gwynneth was in the habit of going among the people; that was a +practice which Lady Gleed would not permit in a young lady over whom she +exercised any sort of control. Consequently there was some talk in the +village at this time, and a little scene at the hall soon after Sir +Wilton and his wife arrived for the Easter recess. But Gwynneth argued +that in no sense could the Musks be accounted ordinary villagers; and +the squire himself took her side very firmly in the matter. + +"I won't have you rate Musk among the yokels," said Sir Wilton +afterwards. "He is the one substantial man in the place, and a very good +friend of mine." + +"Well, I don't consider it nice for Gwynneth to be always with that +child." + +"She doesn't know the child's history; you have only to hear her talk +about him to see that." + +"I don't think it nice, all the same," Lady Gleed repeated. + +"Then take her back to town with you." + +"No, she is out now, and I can't be bothered with her this season. She +is not like other girls. I've a good mind to send her abroad for a +year." + +"You can do as you like about that. It might be a very good thing. +Meanwhile I'm not going to have Musk's feelings hurt; only yesterday, +when I went to see him, he was telling me all Gwynneth has done for them +during the winter. I'm not going to break with a man like that by +suddenly forbidding her to do any more." + +So it was decided that Gwynneth should go for a year to a relation of +Fraulein Hentig's at Leipzig, for the sake of her music, which the girl +had neglected rather disgracefully since leaving school, but of which +she was none the less fond, given the proper stimulus. Gwynneth herself +acclaimed the plan, and indeed had a voice in it; there was only one +reason why she was not entirely glad to go; and her devotion to Georgie +was more constant than ever during the few weeks which were left to her. + +Summer was beginning, and the boy was well and strong, with chubby +cheeks and sturdy bare legs. Often Gwynneth had him to play in the hall +garden--this on Sir Wilton's own suggestion--but more often she took him +for a walk. There were beautiful walks all round Long Stow. There was +the windy walk across the heather towards Linkworth; there were cool +walks by the tiny river that ran parallel with the village street, +bounding the hall meadow and both meadow and garden of the Flint House; +there was a fascinating expedition, with spade and pail, to the +sand-hills off the road to Lakenhall. Yet it was on none of these +excursions that Gwynneth lost Georgie, but while leaving some papers at +the saddler's workshop, in Long Stow itself. + +Fuller would keep her to talk politics, or rather to listen to his own: +it was the year of the first Home Rule Bill, and even Mr. Gladstone had +never stirred the saddler's anger, hatred and contempt to such a pitch +as they reached in this connection. Gwynneth, on her side, had an +insufficient grasp of the measure, but an instinctive veneration for the +man; and she was young enough to grow heated in argument, even with the +saddler. When at length she turned away, more flushed than victorious, +there was no vestige of the child. + +"Georgie! Georgie!" + +Neither was there any answer. Gwynneth turned upon the politician. + +"Didn't you see him, Mr. Fuller?" + +"Gord love you, miss, I thought you come alone!" + +And the saddler leant across his bench until his spectacles were flush +with the open window at which Gwynneth stood. + +"Alone? Georgie Musk was with me; and I've lost him through arguing with +you." + +She inquired at the next cottage. Yes, they had seen him pass "with you, +miss," but that was all. There were no cottages further on; the +saddler's was the last on that side and at that end of the village. +Opposite was the rectory gate, with the low flint wall running far to +the right, overhung at present by the great leaves and heavy blossoms of +the chestnuts. And all at once Gwynneth noticed that the chestnut leaves +were very dark, the sky overcast, and another shower even then +beginning. + +"He will get wet--it may kill him!" + +And the girl ran wildly on along the road; but it was a straight road, +and she could see further than Georgie could possibly have travelled. So +now there was only the lane running up by the church. + +Gwynneth took it at top speed; an instant brought her abreast of the +east end, gaping wide and deep for the east window, yet built like a +rock on either side to the height of the eaves. Another step, and +Gwynneth was standing still. + +Already her sub-consciousness had remarked the silence of hammer and +chisel, which had tinkled in her ears as she brought Georgie up the +village, ringing more distinctly at every step, and quite loud when +first they had stopped at the saddler's window. Then it must have ceased +altogether. But now Gwynneth heard another sound instead. + + + + +XXII + +A LITTLE CHILD + + +Georgie stood beyond the mason's litter, his firm legs planted in the +wet grass, his holland pinafore less brown than his knees. A sailor hat, +with the brim turned down, threw the roguish face into shadow; but the +flush of successful flight was not extinguished; and the great eyes +fixed on Carlton were nowise abashed. Shyness had never been a feature +of Georgie's character. + +"Hallo!" said he. + +Carlton stood like his own walls. + +So this was the child. + +A new instinct was awake in the man's breast; he had never an instant's +doubt. + +And it struck him dumb. + +"I say," said Georgie, "are you angry?" + +But he showed no anxiety on the point, merely beaming while the grown +man fought for words. + +"Angry? No--no----" + +And now he was fighting for the power of speech--fighting hot eyes and +twitching lips for his own manhood--and for the little impudent face +that would fill with fear if he lost. But he won. + +"Of course I'm not angry; but"--for he must know for certain--"what's +your name?" + +"Georgie." + +"That's not all." + +"Georgie Musk." + +Carlton filled his lungs. + +"And who sent you here, Georgie?" + +"Nobody di'n't." + +"Then how have you come?" + +"By my own self, course." + +"What! all the way from the Flint House? That's where you live, isn't +it?" + +Carlton put the second question with sudden misgiving. The name was not +unique in that country; he might be mistaken after all. And already--in +these few moments--he could not bear the idea of being thus mistaken in +this sturdy, friendly, independent boy. + +"Yes, that's where," said Georgie, nodding. + +"Then what can have brought him here!" + +"Well, you see," said Georgie, confidentially, "my lady taked me for a +walk----" + +"Your lady?" + +"And I wunned away." + +"But who do you mean by your lady?" + +"My lady," said Georgie, turning dense. + +"Your governess?" guessed Carlton. + +"Oh, my governess, my governess!" cried Georgie, roaring with laughter +because the word was new to him, but made a splendid expletive: "oh, my +governess, gwacious me!" + +"Well, whoever it is," muttered Carlton, "she oughtn't to have lost you; +and you stay with me until she finds you." + +"That's good," said Georgie, with conviction. "I liker stay wif you." + +Carlton caught the child up suddenly, and swung him shoulder-high. What +a laugh he had! And what a firm boy, so heavy and straight and strong! +Carlton sat down in his barrow, taking the little fellow on his knee, +yet holding him at arm's length for self-control. + +"How can you like being with a person you've never seen before?" asked +Carlton, tremulous again, for all his strength. + +"'Cos I heard you makin' somekin," said Georgie, who was looking about +him. "What are you makin', I say?" + +It was here that, without any particular provocation, Robert Carlton's +resolution suddenly failed him, so that he hugged and kissed the child, +in a sudden access of uncontrollable emotion. This, however, was as +suddenly suppressed. Georgie had wriggled from his knee; but instead of +running away (as the other feared for one breathless moment), he +continued looking about him as before, bored a little, but nothing more. + +"What are you buildin', I say?" he now inquired. + +"A church." + +"What's a church?" + +Carlton came straight to his feet. + +"Do you never go to one?" he asked; but his tone was nearly all remorse. + +"No, I never." + +"Then have you never heard of God?" + +And now the tone was his most determined one. + +"Yes," said Georgie, subdued but not frightened. + +"You are sure that you have been told about God?" + +"Yes, sure." + +"Who has taught you?" + +"My lady and granny--not grand-daddy." + +"You say your prayers to Him?" + +"Yes, I always." + +"Sure?" + +"Yes, sure." + +Carlton stood with heaving chest. He was spared something at last; his +cup was not to overflow after all. And, as he stood, the grass +whispered, and the rain came down. + +Again Georgie was caught up, to be set down next instant in the shed; +but this time he was really offended. + +"I don't want to come in," he whimpered. "I want to build wif your +bwicks. They're much, much bigger'n mine!" + +"But it's raining, don't you see? It would never do for Georgie to get +wet." + +"Oh, I wish I would play wif your bwicks!" + +"Why, Georgie, you couldn't lift them; you're not strong enough." + +"But I are, I tell you. I really are!" + +"Here's one, then," said Carlton, who kept his misfits in the shed. "You +try." + +Georgie did try. He rolled the stone over, though it was no small one; +lift it he could not. + +"You see, it was heavier than you thought." + +"'Cos never mind," coaxed Georgie, in another formula of his own; "you +carry it for me!" + +"But it's raining, and we should both be wet through." + +"'Cos _never_ mind!" + +"But I do mind; and, what's more, everybody else would mind as well." + +"Then what _shall_ we do?" cried Georgie, from his depths. + +Carlton had no idea. But the boy was weary, and must be amused; that was +the first necessity; and he who had never laid himself out to conciliate +men must strain every nerve to please this little child. His eyes flew +round the shed. And there upon the shelf stood his gargoyles deep in +dust. + +"Oh, what a funny old man!" cried Georgie. "Oh, ho, ho!" + +But Carlton, in his ignorance of children, had over-estimated a strong +child's strength; the stone head slipped through the tiny hands, +narrowly missing the tiny toes; and when Georgie stooped and rolled it +over, it was seen that a terrible accident had really occurred. + +"Oh, oh, oh!" cried an alarming little voice, "Oh, he's broken his nose, +he's broken it to bits; oh, oh!" + +Carlton made a dive for the other gargoyle; but this was a peculiarly +sinister face; and Georgie's tears only ran the faster. + +"Oh, I don't like that one. It's a ho'ble face. I don't like it." + +Carlton cast the thing from him, and at the same moment became and +looked inspired. + +"Shall I make you a new face, Georgie? A better one than either of the +others?" + +"Yes, do, I say! A new face! A new face!" + +And shouts of delight came from the tear-stained one: such was the sound +that Gwynneth heard in the lane. + +A very inspiration it proved. All unpractised in their earliest +accomplishment, the hard-worked hands had never been so deft before; nor +ever stone softer or chisel sharper than the first of each that could be +found. They were trembling, those tanned and twisted fingers, but that +only seemed to impart a nervous vigour to their touch. When the thing +had taken rough shape, and a deep curve or two suggested a whole head of +hair; when eyes and nose had come from the same sure delving, and the +mouth almost at a touch; then the mouth of Georgie, long open in mere +fascination, recovered its primary function, and yelled approval in +surprising terms. + +"Oh, my Jove, my Jove!" he roared. "What a lovely, lovely, _lovely_ +face! Oh, my Jove, I must show it to my lady!" + +Carlton looked upon a baby face on fire with rapture; and for once no +dissimilar light shone upon his own. + +"Will you--give me a kiss for it, Georgie?" + +Without a word the little arms flew round a weatherbeaten neck that bent +to meet them, and the glowing cheeks buried themselves, voluntarily, in +the beard that had only hurt before; and not one kiss, but countless +kisses, were Georgie's thanks for the lump of sandstone that had grown +into a face before his eyes. And such was the scene whereon Gwynneth +Gleed arrived. + +At first she drew back, hesitating in the rain, because neither of them +saw her, and she could not, could not understand! But her hesitation was +short-lived, or, rather, it had to be conquered and it was. So with +flaming cheeks--because they would not see her--and dark hair limp from +the rain--eyes sparkling, lips parted, teeth peeping--came Gwynneth to +the shed at last. + +And the child ran to her, while the man's eyes followed him hungrily, +climbing no higher than Georgie's height. + +"Oh, look what a lovely, lovely face the workman made me; do look, I +say! Is it wery kind of him to make me such a lovely thing?" + +Gwynneth had been dragged to where the new head stood mounted upon a +misfit; and Carlton had been obliged to rise. But his eyes had not risen +from the child. + +"Is it kind of him, I tell you?" persisted Georgie. + +"Very kind," said Gwynneth, "indeed." + +And civility compelled Carlton to look up at last. + +"It was only to pass the time," he said. "I was obliged to bring him in +out of the rain." + +"It was so good of you," murmured Gwynneth. "But it was not good of +Georgie to run away as soon as my back was turned!" + +Georgie paid no heed to this reproach; he was busy playing with the +uncouth head. + +"Oh, don't say that," said Carlton, quickly; "I don't get so many +visitors! Are you the little chap's governess?" he added, yet more +quickly, to undo the visible effects of his words. + +"No, I'm--from the hall, you know." + +He could not but start at this. But now he was guarding his tongue. And, +as he reflected, there came back to him the vague memory of a face in +church, followed by the sharper picture of a very young girl at the +piano in a pleasant room--the last that he had ever been in. + +Gwynneth had recalled the same scene, and could see him as he had been, +while she gazed upon him as he was. + +"I remember," he said, gravely. "So you take an interest in this little +chap, Miss Gleed?" + +"Rather more than that," replied Gwynneth, taken out of herself in an +instant, and declaring her innocence by her sudden and unconscious +enthusiasm. "I love him dearly," she said from her heart: and together +their eyes returned to the round sailor hat, the brown pinafore and the +browner legs which were all that was now to be seen of Georgie the +engrossed. + +"He is indeed a dear little fellow," said Carlton, smothering his sighs. + +"And so affectionate!" added Gwynneth, thinking of the strange pair +together as she had found them. + +"Marvellously independent, too, for his age." + +"He is not quite four. You would think him older." + +"Indeed I would . . . And so you are his 'lady'!" + +"So he insists on calling me." + +"You seem to be very much to him," said Robert Carlton, jealously +enough at heart, as he looked for once into the fine, kind, enthusiastic +eyes of Gwynneth; but they fell embarrassed, and his own were quick +enough to wander back to the boy. + +"I have been more or less alone since last autumn," said Gwynneth. +"Georgie has been as much to me as I can possibly have been to him." + +"But he lives at the Flint House, does he not? I--I gathered he was a +grandchild of the Musks." + +"So he is." + +"Are they bringing him up?" + +"Yes." + +"Kindly?" + +"Oh, yes--kindly. But----" + +"Are they fond of him?" + +"Touchingly so; but, of course, they are two old people." + +"And so you stepped in to lighten and brighten a little child's life!" + +Gwynneth blushed unseen; for all this time he was looking at Georgie and +not at her. + +"You mustn't put it like that," she said, "for it isn't the case. It was +quite a selfish pleasure. I was all alone. And it began by his being +dreadfully ill." + +"What--Georgie?" + +"Yes, and I was able to nurse him a little. And after that we couldn't +do without each other. But now we shall have to try." + +He had looked at her with the last quick question, and was looking +still, a new anxiety in his eyes. + +"Do you mean that you are going away?" he said; and his tone did not +conceal his disappointment. + +"I am sorry to say I am," replied Gwynneth, feeling all she said. + +"Soon?" + +"To-morrow." + +"Far?" + +"Abroad." + +"But not for long!" + +"A year." + +Her eyes fell at last before the frank trouble in his; and he ended the +pause with a sigh. "I am very sorry," he said. "I was hoping that you +would often bring him here to see me." Nor was any compliment taken or +intended in a speech which rang with the primitive sincerity of one who +had spoken very little for a very long time. + +Gwynneth took the short step that brought her to the opening of the +shed. She had suddenly discovered that the rain had never ceased +pattering on the corrugated roof, and was wondering when the shower +would stop. She wished it was fair, for more reasons than one. It was +high time she took Georgie away; and she did not know what Musk would +say when he heard where they had been. She only knew his opinion of +parsons generally, and of all that they professed, though she had once +heard him allow that they were not all as bad as this one. Besides, even +Gwynneth felt natural qualms in the society of an outcast whom no one +else went near, quite apart from the popular conviction that he had +burnt his own church to the ground. That she had never believed. And +now, when she found him all but at his work; when she saw him at close +quarters, aged and bent, with tattered clothes and battered hands, yet +handsome as ever, and now picturesque; and when she looked upon the +gigantic work that had aged him, the finished wall here, the deliberate +preparations there; then that old calumny was blown to final shreds for +Gwynneth. He might have done worse, as she had sometimes heard said, but +he had not done that. And the woman went to work within her: was there +nothing she could do for him? Was there no little luxury she could get +and send him? His clothes were torn--if only she could mend them! Alas! +that she was going abroad next day. + +Another moment and she was glad: how could she do anything, a young +girl, when all the rest of the world held aloof? Anything that she did, +or tried to do, would inevitably, if not rightly and properly, be +misconstrued. Yet, after this, it would be too painful to live so near +and to go on doing nothing. She had felt that long ago; and the memory +of their last encounter reoccupied her thoughts. No, she could do no +more now than she had been able to do then. Therefore she was glad to be +going away. And all this passed through her mind in the mere minute that +elapsed before the rain stopped as suddenly as it had begun. + +Yet in that minute Robert Carlton had got Georgie back upon his knee, +and Gwynneth caught him trying to extract a promise from the child; in +another he had risen, a duskier bronze than before, and was telling her +honestly what the promise was to have been. + +"I wanted him to come again to see me finish that head, but not to tell +his grandparents where he was going, or they would not let him. You see, +I am ashamed of it already! Make allowances for one who has not spoken +to either woman or child for very nearly four years." + +Gwynneth was deeply moved. + +"Allowances," she could but repeat; "allowances!" + +"Allow'nces, allow'nces!" chimed Georgie, to whom a new word was +necessarily humorous. + +Carlton picked him up, and kissed him lightly for the last time. To +Gwynneth he only bowed. And she was longing to take his hand. + +"Good-bye, Miss Gleed; a good journey and a happy time to you." + +Gwynneth had to say something, since she could do nothing, to show her +sympathy. "I think it's all wonderful--wonderful!" was all she did say, +with a little wave towards the sandstone walls. And yet her small speech +haunted her for weeks, seeming in turns so many things that she had +never meant it to be. + +Georgie also waved with energy. "Good-bye, good-bye, I'll see you in the +mornin'!" was his irresponsible farewell. + +And so they disappeared together, as the sun shone again through the +trees with the emerald tips, now dripping diamonds too; but to Robert +Carlton that little scene of his endless labours, the shed, the strewed +stones, the barrow, the rising walls, the blossoming chestnuts, the +jewelled elms, had never looked so drab and desolate before. + +Yet, long after it was really dark, the lonely man still hovered about +the spot, now standing where the child had stood with his brown pinafore +and his browner legs; now sitting empty-kneed in the empty barrow; now +handling the rough stone head that he had hewn in a few minutes for +little Georgie. + + + + +XXIII + +DESIGN AND ACCIDENT + + +Next morning he was early at his arch, and had soon finished the +voussoir which he had been roughing out when this vital interruption +occurred. But he was not satisfied with the stone, and wasted much time +in turning it over and over and wondering whether it would do or not. +Now this was a point upon which Carlton usually knew his mind in a +twinkling. Indecision of any sort was, indeed, among the last of his +failings; but that man is not himself who has not closed an eye all +night; and Robert Carlton had only closed his in prayer. + +Later in the morning his case was worse. He would think of the boy until +the chisel went too deep and spoilt another stone. Or, just when he was +beginning to get on, he would drop his tools and wheel round suddenly, +half hoping to see a second little apparition in a sailor hat with the +brim turned down. But these things do not happen twice, much less when +looked and longed for, as Carlton knew very well. And yet his knowledge +did not help him in the matter; on the other hand, it drove him again +and again to his gate, to gaze wistfully up and down the road he never +traversed; and this was the most disastrous habit of all. + +Once more the work stood still; for the first time in three whole years, +it stood practically still for days. + +Meanwhile, at the Flint House, there had never been any secret as to +what had happened between showers at the church. Gwynneth had told Mrs. +Musk, and Mrs. Musk had deemed it better to tell Jasper himself than to +let him gather the truth from Georgie's prattle. And in the event Musk +took it better than his wife had dared to hope, merely vilifying quick +and dead with renewed rancour, and grimly undertaking that the incident +should not occur again. + +So Georgie saw more of his grandfather than he had ever seen before, and +rather more than he cared to see after his close association with +Gwynneth, whose wonderful letter from Leipzig was small comfort to so +small a soul, though Mrs. Musk had to read it to Georgie many times a +day. + +"Oh! I wish I would go and see workman," the boy would exclaim without +fear. "I wish I would! I wish I would!" + +"I daresay you do," Jasper would growl from his chair. + +"Then can I; can I, I say, grand-daddy?" + +"No, you can't." + +"Oh! why can't I?" + +"Because I tell you." + +"But, you see, grand-daddy, he was making me such a lovely, lovely face. +I must go back for it. Really I must. He did say he finish fen I go +back. So of course I must go. See? See? See?" + +Thus pestered, Jasper once thundered: + +"Oh, yes, I see! I know him--I know him. I see hard enough! But if ever +you do go I'll--I'll--I'll give ye what ye never had afore and'll never +want again!" + +"Oh, don't be angry wif me," Georgie whimpered. "Oh, I wish my lady +would come back!" + +"I daresay you do," said Jasper, calming. "And I don't." + +But a child forgets; at all events Georgie did; and so surely as his +_ennui_ in the garden, within strict sight of the terrible old man in +the chair, reached a certain pitch, so surely did the treasonable +aspiration rise to his innocent lips. + +"I wish I would go and see workman. I _wish_ I would!" + +But at last one day the old man rose, stick and all; and at this even +Georgie trembled; for it was long since he had seen his grandfather on +his feet. Over the grass he came hobbling, ungainly, abnormal, frowning +down upon the buttercups. Georgie crept aside. But Musk passed him +without a word. Three times he limped the length of the overgrown lawn, +muttering, frowning; and the third time his lameness was palpably less. + +"Why, Jasper," cried Mrs. Musk, running out, "you're getting better!" + +"No, I ain't," he roared. "You mind your own business and get away +indoors." + +Mrs. Musk was meekly obeying, and Georgie escaping at her skirt, when a +second roar recalled the child. Jasper was leaning with both hands on +the stick before him, his frown gone, but in its place a surely devilish +smile, since the child mistook it for the real thing. + +"So you're still longun to go back and see the workman, as you call him, +at the church?" + +"Oh, yes, I are!" + +And round eyes kindled at the thought. + +"Very well. You may." + +Georgie could scarcely believe his ears. + +"Fen may I? Now? Now, I say?" + +"When you like, so long as you don't bother me." + +Georgie jumped and shouted in his joy. + +"Goin' to see workman, goin' to see workman! Oh, my Jove, my Jove! Goin' +to see workman makin' lovely, lovely faces all for me--every bit!" + +"Hold your noise," said Jasper, roughly; "and go, if you're going." + +Carlton had given up expecting him, divining at last that Musk knew of +their one interview, and would never let them have another. So once more +Georgie surprised him at his work; but this time he had to hail his +friend; for now Carlton was making up for lost time, and at the moment, +up on a scaffolding, was all absorbed in the exciting task of fitting +the finished voussoirs over the wooden centre which supported the arch +until the keystone should complete it. And the keystone was actually in +one hand, a trowel full of mortar in the other, when the first sound of +Georgie's voice drove all else from his mind. + +"I say, I say, I say!" he ran up shouting. "Workman, workman!" + +But now the workman was only collecting himself, and thanking God with +quivering lips, before he could trust himself upon his ladder. + +"So here you are at last," he said, swinging the child off his legs +without endearment. Yet all his being yearned towards the merry +independent little boy. The straight strong legs seemed browner and +rounder already. It might have been the same holland pinafore; it was +the same sailor hat. + +"Yes, here I are," said Georgie, "and I wish you would make lovely, +lovely faces out of bwick." + +"Not run away again, I hope?" + +"No, 'cos I came by my own self." + +Carlton asked no more questions. Any minute the child might be missed +and sent for; every moment was precious meanwhile. It was a heavenly day +in early June, the elms in full leaf at last against the blue, the +churchyard dappled with light and shade, the fresh sandstone yellow as +gold where the sun caught it fairly. And in the sunlight stood its own +incarnation--sturdy champion of the golden age--laughing child of June. + +Carlton could see nothing else. + +"Come on, I say," urged Georgie; "come an' make faces, quick, sharp!" + +And he dragged the sculptor to his rude studio. + +"There it is, there it is," shouted Georgie, spying the unfinished head +high up on the shelf. "You did say you finish fen I come back. +Finish--finish--quick, sharp!" + +Carlton brought the thing outside, for the shed was close, and went to +work at the foot of his ladder, with Georgie sitting on the lowest +rung. And any merit which the rough attempt had possessed was speedily +removed by an over-elaboration on which Georgie insisted, and which +certainly served its purpose by earning his vociferous applause. + +"Oh, his eyes! What funny eyes! Make them open and shut, I say--can +you?" + +A doll, which Gwynneth had unearthed, before she knew her Georgie very +well, had retained this accomplishment even when the head was off its +body. + +"I'm afraid I can't do that," said Carlton. + +"Try--try." + +So Carlton gouged in the soft stone till the holes for the eyeballs had +disappeared. + +"Now open them again!" + +And fresh holes were made: they were the most sunken eyes ever seen +before Georgie was tired of the game. Next he must have ears, which were +supposed to be concealed by the very heavy head of hair; and when the +ears arrived, they were not worth having without ear-rings; but there +the sculptor was nonplussed, and struck. + +"All right," said Georgie, cheerfully; "then I'll carry it home +without." + +"What, run away directly it's done?" + +The cold-blooded ingratitude of infancy was new to Carlton, as his hurt +face was to Georgie, who eyed it with some compassion. + +"All right," said he; "I'll stay a little bit if you like." + +"And sit on my knee, Georgie." + +"All right." + +But there was no sentiment about Georgie to-day; it was mere +magnanimity, and he showed it. + +"Quite comfy, Georgie?" + +"No," sighed the boy, screwing about on the one thin thigh; "I think +it's only a little comfy." + +"That better?" + +And, the other leg being slipped under his small person, Georgie said it +was. + +"Are you sure, Georgie, that you want to take that head home at all?" + +"Course I are," said Georgie, decidedly. "I must take it, you see; +course I must." + +Carlton was again tormented by the ignoble inclination which he had +overcome by impulse rather than by will at the last interview. Was a +child of four too young to keep a secret? If only this one could be +induced to go and come back, and back, and back, without ever saying a +word to anybody! The proposition had shamed him before; and did now; but +the new love within him was stronger than his shame. + +"You wouldn't show it," suggested Carlton, "to your grandfather, would +you?" + +"Course I'll show it to him," said Georgie, for whom the stipulation was +too oblique. + +"But he'll be angry!" + +"Course he won't," said Georgie, more superior than ever, and with the +air of one who does not care to argue any more. + +"But you know he was before," said Carlton, drawing his bow. + +"Oh, bovver!" exclaimed Georgie, losing patience. "Well, then, he won't +be angry to-day, I know he won't." + +"How do you know, Georgie?" + +"'Cos he did tell me I could come." + +"Not here?" + +Georgie nodded solemnly. + +"Yes, he did. I know he did." + +What could it mean? The child was strangely dependable for his years; +indeed, it was impossible to look in those great and candid eyes and to +doubt the testimony of the equally candid little tongue. Then what could +it mean? Had Musk relented? Was he relenting? Carlton's heart leapt at +the thought, and with his heart his eyes; and in the same second he had +his answer. + +Close at hand in the sunlight, where Georgie had stood last, brimming +over with delight, there now stood Jasper Musk himself, huge with hate, +livid with rage, vindictive, remorseless--but not surprised. Carlton saw +this at the first glance, in the triumphant lightning flashing from the +fixed eyes, and playing over the heavy, grim, inexorable face. And that +was his answer; furthermore it prepared him for all, and more than all, +that was to come. + +"Put the boy down," said Jasper Musk, with sinister self-control. + +Instinctively the child slipped to the ground; but there his courage +failed him, so that he turned his back upon the terrible old man, and +hid his face in the lap that he had left. + +"Come here, George!" + +But Carlton held him firmly with both hands. + +Musk bore down on them in a series of little shuffling steps, his great +face wincing with the pain of each. His voice had already risen; now it +was so terrible to hear, so hoarse and high with passion, that in an +instant Carlton had his thumbs in the small boy's ears. + +"Snivelling hypocrite! Whited sepulchre! Do you hand the child over to +me, or I'll break this stick across your back. So I've caught ye, +temptun him here to make up to him behind my back! But you don't--no, +you don't--not while I'm alive to stop that. He's nothun to you and +you're nothun to him, and do you meddle with him again at your peril. +I've taken the trouble to learn the law of it, so I know. God damn ye! +will you take your hands off him, or am I to break your blasted head?" + +"You can do what you like," said Carlton; "but the boy shall not hear +you using that language to me. So you will never get a better +opportunity than you have." And his nostrils curled as he bent his +defenceless head over that of the boy, and pressed a little harder with +his thumbs. + +The other gnashed his teeth, and his great hand tightened on his stick. +But he could not strike like that. And his enemy knew it; trust him to +know when he was safe! + +"I'm not going to prison for ye," said Musk, "if that's what you want. I +daresay you'd think that worth a crack on the head to get me locked up +for a bit; well, then, you shan't. Do you leave go o' the kid, and I +won't swear no more." + +The effort at self-control was plain enough, as Carlton looked up, +without complying all at once. + +"One moment," he said. "You sent him here yourself, I think?" + +"What, the child?" + +"Yes." + +"I didn't send him. He was pestering me to come. So at last I gave him +leave to do as he liked." + +"In order that you might follow and abuse me in front of him!" + +"I'll tell no lies," said Musk, sturdily. "I meant to let him hear what +I thought of you, and I won't deny it." + +Carlton looked a little longer upon the broad face between the steely +bristles and the silvery hair; it had aged nothing in these years which +had been as twenty to himself; and for the moment there was all the old +rugged dignity in its independent purpose and honest unrelenting hate. A +bargain had been in Carlton's mind, but at the last he decided to trust +his enemy instead. + +"It's all right, Georgie," he whispered: "we are not really angry with +each other. Run away and play." + +"But I don't want to!" + +"You must," said Carlton, and rose without taking further notice of the +child. "Mr. Musk," he said, in a low voice but firm, "is it to be like +this between us to the bitter end?" + +"That is." + +"I do not ask your forgiveness----" + +"Glad to hear it." + +"I only ask--in pity's name--to be allowed to do something for the boy!" + +Musk moved a muscle at last, and his eyes came close together with a +gleam. "I daresay you do," said he. + +"But will you not listen----" + +"I'm listening now, ain't I?" + +"Ah, but not to my prayer! I see it in your face; you have no pity. God +knows how little I deserve! Yet it's little enough that I ask: only to +see him sometimes, and not even to see him if you set your face against +it. I would be content--at least I would try to be--if I knew he was +going to good schools, if--if I might have hand or voice in his life. +You say I have no rights. That is my punishment; a new one, that I never +felt until I saw the boy for the first time the other day; but if you +knew how I have felt it since! If you knew what it would be to me to do +anything--give anything----" + +"I knew that were comun," said Musk, nodding to himself . . . "So you'd +like to do the handsome, would you?" His whole face became suddenly +suffused, as with walnut-juice; the very whites of his eyes seemed white +no longer, while the pupils shrank to steel points in their midst. "I +know you!" he cried, beside himself again; "but don't you try them games +with me. That's your line, that is--buy your way back! You'd buy it with +the parish, by making them a church; and you'd buy it with the boy, by +making things for him; but that's what you never shall do, not while I +live to prevent it . . . What you got there, George? You give that +here!" + +It was the sandstone head with the sunken eyes, and Georgie was clinging +to it in his trouble underneath the scaffolding; in an instant Musk had +seized it from him, and dashed it with all his might against the wall, +so that the soft stone flew into a dozen pieces. It was like blood to a +wild beast: the demon of destruction broke loose in Jasper Musk. + +"And that's how I'd treat the rest of your damned handiwork," he roared, +"if I was the village! I'd have no church of your building; I'd bring +that down about your ears right quick!" His wild eye lit upon the wooden +centre of the unfinished arch, and "This is what I'd do," he shouted, +lunging at the woodwork with his heavy stick. "Hypocrite! Pharisee! +Disgrace to God and man! Leper as----" + +But the centre had been dealt a heavy thrust, as from a battering ram, +with each expression; with each it had bulged a little; but the last +lunge drove the whole framework from under the unfinished arch, which +came crashing down amid a yellow cloud. Musk shuffled backward in time +to save his toes; for an instant then both he and Carlton stood aghast. + +Robbed of his latest treasure, and moreover having seen it smashed to +atoms before his eyes, Georgie had been howling lustily when the crash +came: when the yellow cloud lifted he lay silent enough, in a little +brown heap below the scaffolding, and already the blood was through his +hair. + +Carlton had him in his arms that instant. + +"He's insensible," he said quietly. "A nasty scalp wound, and may be +more. What day is this?" + +"Wednesday." + +Musk did not know what he was saying, but the cool question had elicited +a correct though unconscious reply. + +"Wednesday used to be the doctor's day at the dispensary----" + +"And is still," cried Musk, coming to his senses. + +"Then one of us must run for him." + +"I can't run!" + +"Then you must hold him while I do. Stop! I'll take him to the house; +you must bathe his head while I'm gone." + +Another minute and the boy lay in the rectory study, upon the little bed +in which Carlton had fought death and won three years before; yet +another, and up limped Jasper, crooked with pain, out of breath, but +gasping for news of Georgie as though he had been a week on the way. + +"Has he come to yet?" + +"No, and there's a lot of blood. We must stop it if we can. Wait till I +get a sponge and some water." + +Jasper Musk was bending over the boy, looking huger than ever upon his +knees, when Carlton returned to the room. + +"What have I done?" he was muttering. "What have I done? What have I +done?" + +"Nothing that you could help," replied Carlton, briskly. "Now you keep +squeezing this sponge out over his head--never mind the bed--till I get +back." + +Georgie lay insensible for hours. It was not the loss of blood, which +looked much worse than it was, and ceased altogether with the dressing +of the wound. There was, however, somewhat serious concussion +underneath; and Dr. Marigold bluntly refused to guarantee the event. + +"The pity is to move him," he grumbled towards night. "But is there +anybody here who could nurse the boy?" + +"Only myself," said Carlton, who had been quiet and quick to help all +the afternoon. + +The doctor shot an upward glance through his shaggy white eyebrows. + +"Well, you're handy enough, I must say; and, as we know, the very devil +to do things single-handed; but this you couldn't do. No, I'd like to +take him straight to the infirmary, only I'm on horseback." + +"There are traps in the village." + +"They would jolt too much." + +"Then let me carry him." + +"It's five miles." + +"Never mind. I could do it. And he shouldn't jolt--he shouldn't jolt!" + +The mellow voice that had charmed the countryside in bygone years, it +fell and quivered with infinite tenderness and love, and it sped to the +heart of the gaunt old doctor. So this time Marigold raised his whole +head, and his look was open, prolonged, and penetrating. + +"No, no, Mr. Carlton," he said at length, and in the tone of old times. +"It might do no good, after all. But I'll tell you what you shall do: +you shall carry him to the Flint House, and I'll spend the night there +if I must." + +All this while Jasper Musk was sitting stunned and staring in the +rector's chair. He had not moved for an hour, nor did he now until +Carlton touched him on the shoulder. + +"We are going, Mr. Musk. I am carrying Georgie to your house." + +Musk raised a ghastly face. + +"He isn't dead?" + +"No." + +"Nor going to die?" + +"God forbid! But the danger is great. The doctor is going to stay with +him all night." + +And there was a touch of jealousy in his tone, lost upon Jasper Musk, +but not on him who inspired it. Silently they left the house, and stole +down the drive in the blue twilight. Carlton led, treading almost on +tip-toe, as if not to wake a child that only slept in his arms. And so +they came to the Flint House, its master limping on the doctor's arm. + +"Go in, Mr. Carlton," said Marigold. "There's no one else to carry him +upstairs." + +And he detained Jasper below. + +"You must let that man stay till he is out of danger," the doctor said. + +"Why must I?" + +"Because I am not justified in staying all night; and he will look after +the boy as you and your wife cannot, and as no one else will, now that +Miss Gleed is away." + +Jasper bowed sullenly to his fate. But the doctor was not done. + +"Besides," said he, his kind hand on the other's arm; "besides, he feels +this as much as you do, and God knows he's gone through enough! To-day, +I tell you candidly, but for him your little lad would be in a worse way +than he is. Now don't you think after this that all of us--even +you--might begin to be just a little less hard--even on him?" + + + + +XXIV + +GLAMOUR AND RUE + + +Georgie's lady was meanwhile enjoying her life in Leipzig, and the more +keenly since she had gone abroad without any thought of pleasure, but +only to work. This was characteristic of Gwynneth Gleed. She was not +light-hearted enough for a young girl; there had been too much sorrow in +her early years, too little sympathy in those that came after; natural +joy she had never known. A born delight in books, a blind appreciation +of the country, a passion for music, and the love of one little child; +these were the pleasures of Gwynneth in her twentieth year; nor as yet +did they include that zest in the present, that joy of merely living, +that healthy appetite for admiration, that proper pride in one's own +person, that catholicity of liking for one's fellow-creatures, which are +of the very spirit and essence of youth. And to youth Gwynneth added +something at least akin to beauty; but never knew it until she came to +live among strangers in a strange land. + +These strangers, who were mostly English, and many of them young +students like herself at the Conservatoire, were singularly kind to +Gwynneth from the first. In some ways they were the best friends the +girl ever had. They taught her the duty of gaiety at her time of life, +and the absolute necessity of a certain amount of vanity in every human +being. Gwynneth was given to understand that she had more to be vain +about than most. Attracted themselves by the uncommon girl with the fine +eyes and the shy manner, her new friends did much to mitigate the latter +by making the very most of her looks and accomplishments, and seeing to +it that Gwynneth did the same. She was not allowed to dress as she liked +in Leipzig, nor to spend the whole of a fine afternoon at her piano, nor +to be out of anything that was going on. The gaieties of the English +colony were of a simple character in themselves, but they were +Gwynneth's high-water-mark in dissipation, and ere long she was throwing +herself into them with that enthusiasm which she brought to every +pursuit. She had learnt to waltz remarkably well, and to talk brightly +about nothing in particular to the acquaintance of a minute's standing. +She was none the less assiduous at her practising and her harmony, and +was still capable of immediate and immense excitement over this poet or +that composer; but these were no longer her only topics. Nor was a +holland pinafore and the small urchin it contained entirely forgotten in +these days. Gwynneth wrote to Georgie oftener than to anybody else in +England. And yet it was to the theatres and a real ball or so that she +first looked forward upon her return. + +Lady Gleed was much more than agreeably disappointed in the new +Gwynneth; herself incapable of seeing beneath the thinnest surface, she +could scarcely believe it was the same girl. Gwynneth was better-looking +and had more to say for herself than had ever appeared possible to Lady +Gleed, who decided to keep her niece in town for the rest of the season, +if not to present so creditable a _debutante_ at the next drawing-room. +And a much more critical person, her son Sidney, coming up from +Cambridge for a night, was not less favourably impressed. + +Gleed of Trinity, a third-year man, was in his turn a vast improvement +upon the private scholar who had seldom addressed a syllable to Gwynneth +in his holidays, but had gone past whistling with his dogs. He was now a +really handsome little man, with a clear brown skin and a moustache as +mature as his manner; looked and spoke like a man of thirty; and could +be amusing enough with his sly satire and his ready repartee. Cynical +this youth must always be, but the cynicism was more good-humoured and +less ill-natured than formerly, and not abhorrent in the man as it had +been in the boy. At all events it amused Gwynneth, who was furthermore +surprised and excited to find that Sidney had read quite a number of +great books, and rather entertained than otherwise by his blasphemous +opinions of many of them. So they had something in common after all; and +Sidney was certainly very attentive and gay and nice-looking. + +It was in the drawing-room in Hyde Park Place, during an hour which went +very quickly, that Gwynneth made these discoveries; she was still too +simple to remark, much less read, the calculating droop of Sidney's +eyelids or the veiled preoccupation of the hereditary stare. + +"I wonder if you'd care to have a look at Cambridge," at last said +Sidney, in the purely speculative tone. + +"Like to? I'd love it!" cried Gwynneth at once. + +Sidney paused, without relaxing his stare. She was certainly very +animated. Sidney was not sure that he cared for quite so much animation +with so little cause. + +"I shouldn't wonder if you did rather like it," he proceeded, "in +May-week--which never is in May, you know." + +"Oh? When is it?" + +"The week after next. There'll be heaps going on. Races every +afternoon----" + +"And don't you steer your boat?" interrupted Gwynneth, a partisan on the +spot. + +Sidney smiled. + +"I cox it, Gwynneth; and if we aren't head of the river we shall not be +very far off. But it isn't only the races; there are all sorts of other +things, a good match, garden-parties galore, and a dance every night." + +"You dance there!" + +"Yes," said Sidney; "do you?" + +"Rather!" + +"Get some in Leipzig?" + +"All that there was to get." + +"They dance well out there?" + +"I don't know." + +"But you do, of course?" + +Gwynneth saw the drift of this examination, and showed that she saw it, +but Sidney liked her the better for her dry reply: + +"You'd better try me." + +"You'd better try _me_," he rejoined adroitly. + +"Very well," said Gwynneth. "Here?" + +"Come on," said Sidney, his eyes sparkling, his brown skin a warmer hue; +and in an instant they were threading their way between the cumbrous +chairs and tiny tables of the big room, ploughing through its heavy +pile, he in patent leather boots, she in her walking shoes, and not so +much as a piano-organ in the street to set the time. Yet, even under +these conditions, a turn was enough for Sidney, though he did not want +to stop, and was very quick in asking whether he would do. + +"You know you will," said Gwynneth, forgetting everything in the +prospect of so excellent a partner. + +"And you dance rippingly," declared her cousin; "by Jove, I wish we +could have you at the First Trinity ball!" + +So did Gwynneth; but, instead of betraying further eagerness, sat down +at the piano, and, saying it was nothing without the music, forthwith +treated Sidney to snatch after snatch of the waltzes of the hour, +rendering each with a brilliance of touch and a delicacy of execution +alike worthy of a better cause. A year ago Gwynneth would not have done +this. + +Sidney, his hands in his pockets, but a sparkle still in his eyes, stood +watching her without a word until the end. + +"Look here," he then announced, "you've simply got to come, and that's +all about it. Of course the mater couldn't get away, but Lydia isn't so +full up, and I should think she'd jump at it. I'll write to her and fix +it up. There's a piano in our rooms, and we'll have it tuned for you; +no, we'll get a grand in for the week; and the whole court will be full +of men listening." + +"Who are 'we'?" inquired Gwynneth. + +"Oh, I share rooms with another fellow; an Eton man; you'll like him." + +And once more Sidney looked a little critically at his cousin, as though +he wanted to be quite sure that the Eton man would like her. But at this +moment the dressing-gong threw him into consternation. It appeared that +he was dining out at some club, had come up for this dinner, was only +sleeping in the house, and would be gone first thing in the morning. So +he had better say good-bye; and did so with rather unnecessary warmth, +Gwynneth thought; nevertheless, it was the dullest evening she had yet +spent in Hyde Park Place, though there was a little dinner-party there +also, after which the inevitable performance by Gwynneth was received +with the customary acclamation. + +It may be supposed that the girl was not enchanted with the prospect of +Lydia for chaperone; but she determined thus early to allow nothing to +interfere with her enjoyment of the Cambridge festivities. So when Mrs. +Goldstein came in her carriage on the next day but one, to say that she +supposed they must go, not that she was keen upon it herself, but to +please Sidney, and also because she thought it only right for young +girls like Gwynneth to have a good time while they could, the latter +tried to seem as grateful as though every word of Lydia's did not +irritate or repel her. She there and then received dictatorial +instructions as to dresses requisite for the week, and undertook to +follow them to the letter. It was not a congenial attitude for Gwynneth +to assume, but she also was at present bent upon that "good time" which +her cousin recommended. Lydia, on the other hand, cultivated the air of +one who is personally past all that. She seldom smiled, but yet had a +certain secret fondness for excitement. Gwynneth feared that she was far +from happy; she seemed dissatisfied with her position in society, and +spoke disrespectfully (when she did speak) of the dark, dapper, capable +man of business, her indulgent husband. + +There came a time when Gwynneth Gleed would have given much to forget +the merriest week of her life, but the memory of the next few days was +not to be destroyed. The girl never forgot the narrow streets teeming +with exuberant youth, the narrow river in similar case, the crush and +rush and uproar on the banks, the procession of boats flashing past, +each with an eight in which Gwynneth took no interest, but a ninth who +had always the same calm, brown, clean-cut face in her mind's eye. How +well he looked, swinging with his crew, he in his blazer, cool and +malicious, doing his part with splendid precision if only they did +theirs! One night they made their bump right opposite the boat in which +Gwynneth stood on tiptoe; and Sidney's smile at the supreme moment was +one of her vivid recollections; and her little scene with Lydia another, +which she brought upon herself by cheering as loud as any of the men. +Sidney seemed very popular. Gwynneth was so proud to be seen with him, +especially when he wore his battered mortar-board and blue gown, which +appealed in some foolish way to her own vague intellectual aspirations. +And she looked down upon all the gowns that were not blue. + +But everything in Cambridge did appeal to Gwynneth, from the anthem and +the chancel-roof in King's Chapel to luncheon with Sidney and the Eton +man in Old Court. Lydia was for ever reproving her cousin's enthusiasm; +but Gwynneth was enjoying herself too much to resent anything that Mrs. +Goldstein could say. At the outset, however, a close observer might have +caught even Sidney with a cocked eyebrow, and the eye beneath upon the +Eton man; the girl was so frank and unsophisticated in the display of +her delight; but the Eton man seemed to admire it in her, and Sidney +gave up looking like that. The Eton man was twice his height, could +sing, and swore that nobody had ever played his accompaniments as +Gwynneth did; but he was not in any boat, and he could not compare with +Sidney as a partner. Nevertheless, his attentions and attractions had +more to answer for than anybody knew. + +Gwynneth had thought Sidney very nice in town, but at Cambridge he was +perfect. He was a thorough little man of the world, unconscious, +unconcerned, whereas many of the men whom Gwynneth met were scarcely +worthy of the name. Sidney did things like a prince, having an enviable +allowance, and a very good idea of the way in which things should be +done. And his arrangements were masterly; no day like the last, or +next; and the whole a whirl of gaiety and excitement literally +intoxicating to one whose experience of this kind was so limited as poor +Gwynneth's. It all ended with the First Trinity ball. There is no need +to dilate on the astonishing magnificence of this revel; it was the most +memorable and splendid of them all; and the Backs by night, with a moon +in the heaven above and another in the water below, and grey old gables +salient in its light, and the Guards' Band in the faint distance, that +ought to have been so loud and near; all this was even more entrancing +than the ball itself, and Gwynneth moved as in a dream. She had had the +audacity to divide her dances between Sidney and the Eton man; but one +of them was given cause to complain towards the end, and the more so +since the girl had never looked so radiant in her life. The next day +Gwynneth and Lydia (who would not speak to her) were to return to town. +It had never been arranged that Sidney was to accompany them; yet he +did; and before evening there was trouble in Hyde Park Place. + +Sir Wilton would not hear of it at first; he was soon obliged to do +that. But he stood firm in refusing his consent to a formal engagement +between Sidney and his first cousin, and found an unexpected ally in +Gwynneth herself. The girl was paying for her week's delirium by a +deeper depression than her face betrayed or her heart admitted. Already +she was beginning to disappoint her cousin. But this was too much. + +"You agree with him?" gasped Sidney. "You'd rather _not_ be engaged? +Then why, my darling, did you ever say 'yes'?" + +"It wasn't to that question, dear," said Gwynneth, colouring. + +"It amounted to the same thing." + +"It will amount to the same thing," Gwynneth said earnestly; "at least I +hope and pray that it may. But, of course, it's quite true that we're +both very young; and at least it's within the bounds of possibility +that--one or other of us might--some day--change." + +"Speak for yourself," said Sidney, with a taunting bitterness. + +"Dear, if you'll believe me, I'm thinking quite as much of you. At +twenty-two you would tie yourself for life!" + +"That's my look-out," said Sidney, grandly. "Age isn't everything, and +I'm not a boy; anyhow I know my own mind, if you don't know yours." + +Gwynneth's eyes filled with tears. + +"Oh, why did you tell me you cared for me?" she exclaimed. "Why did you +make me say I cared for you? It was true--it was true--but we seem to +have spoilt it by putting it into words. Oh, I was so happy before you +spoke! I never was so happy as all last week. I could have gone on like +that--I was so happy. And now it's all different already; you are, and I +am . . ." + +Sidney was watching her tears unmoved, for she had made him reflect. All +at once he saw his heartlessness, and next moment he was kissing her +tears away; vowing there was no difference in him; but, if it was +otherwise with her, well, then, let them consider everything unsaid, and +start afresh. + +Gwynneth shook her head. Her eyes were dry again and full of thought. + +"No, dear, we can't do that; and you mustn't think I am not happy in +your love, because I am. Only, there seemed to be such a spell between +us before we were sure of each other. But perhaps it's always like +that." + +In the end they were engaged, but it was not to be a public engagement +for six months. Meanwhile Sidney returned to Cambridge for the Long, +having taken only a part of his degree; and Gwynneth quickly recovered +her reputation as a reformed character in the eyes of Lady Gleed, who +was less against the match than her husband, and who took the girl to +innumerable parties, each of which Gwynneth made a determined effort to +enjoy as thoroughly as the first half of the First Trinity ball. + +She seemed always in the highest spirits; and there was no one about her +who knew her well enough to know also that this perpetual brightness was +hard and unnatural in Gwynneth. Closer observers than Sir Wilton and his +wife might indeed have suspected as much; but there was only one +occasion upon which Gwynneth betrayed the livelier symptoms of a +troubled spirit. This was on her birthday at the beginning of July; upon +the breakfast table was a registered packet with the Cambridge +post-mark, and in its morocco case Gwynneth presently beheld a richer +necklace than she had ever dreamt of possessing as her own. Yet the +look in her face was so strange that Lady Gleed was obliged to speak. + +"Don't you like pearls, my dear?" + +"Oh! yes, oh! yes." + +"But you don't look pleased." + +"No more I am!" + +And she rushed from the room in unaccountable tears, and upstairs to her +own, where she was presently discovered writing a letter at top speed, +and crying bitterly as she wrote; it was Lady Gleed herself who +discovered her. + +"What _is_ the matter, Gwynneth?" + +"I am writing to Sidney. I cannot take such presents from him. I am +writing to tell him why." + +"I think you are very silly," said Lady Gleed. "But your uncle wants to +see you in his study; that is really why I came up; and I don't think +you'll be so silly when you have heard what he has to tell you." + +There was an air of mystery about Lady Gleed, who furthermore kissed +Gwynneth before they separated on the landing. The girl went downstairs +with chill forebodings. Sir Wilton was seated at his massive desk, but +rose fussily as she entered, and wheeled up a chair with almost +excessive courtesy. Gwynneth had seldom seen him looking so benign. + +"I sent for you," said Sir Wilton, resuming his own seat, "because I +have some news for you, Gwynneth, which I am sure you will be as glad to +hear as I am to communicate it. It is against the law to dwell upon a +lady's age, but at yours I think you can afford to forgive me. I +believe that you are twenty-one to-day?" + +Gwynneth had not thought of that before, and at the present moment she +could scarcely believe she was no more. She made her admission with a +sigh. + +"Then for twenty-one years," pursued Sir Wilton, beaming, "or let us say +for as many of them as you can remember, you have, I presume, looked +upon yourself as an entirely penniless young lady? That has not been the +case; at least it is the case no longer. I--I hope I am not giving you +bad news?" + +Gwynneth was trembling all over. She had lost every vestige of colour. + +"My mother!" she gasped. "Why did she never know?" + +"Because, under the terms of your grandfather's will, nobody but myself +was to know anything at all about it until to-day." + +"It was cruel," cried the girl, in a breaking voice; "it might have kept +her here! It makes me not want to hear anything now . . . but of course +I must . . . forgive me, please." + +"My dear child," said Sir Wilton, kindly, "it is natural enough that you +should feel that. I can only ask you to believe that I at least had no +choice in the matter. And there were reasons; it is too painful to go +into them; your father was my brother, and I had rather say no more. I, +for my part, was obliged to fulfil the conditions. I have tried to do my +duty. I would gladly have done more, but your dear mother was the most +independent woman I ever met. I honoured her for it. But what could I +do? I must beg of you, my dear, to look upon the bright side; and, +believe me, this business has the very brightest side it is possible to +imagine." + +Gwynneth did her best. It was fine to be independent in her turn. But +the thought of her mother made her ashamed to touch a penny. And it was +a matter of several thousand pounds, invested all these years at +compound interest, yet with that absolute safety which distinguished the +financial operations of Sir Wilton Gleed. + +Sir Wilton could not say off-hand what the present capital would yield +if left where it was at simple interest, but he fancied it would work +out at seven or eight hundred a year at the very least. And these +figures, which sounded fabulous to poor Gwynneth, were obviously in +themselves the bright side upon which her uncle had harped. Yet he +continued to beam as though there was something more to come, and looked +so knowing that Gwynneth was obliged to ask him what it was. + +"Can't you see?" he said. "Can't you see?" + +"It is an immense amount of money. I can't see beyond that." + +"You heard me say that nobody knew anything at all about it except +myself, and, of course, my solicitors?" + +"Yes." + +"Even your aunt did not know until I told her just now." + +"Indeed." + +"And Sidney won't know until you tell him!" + +Then Gwynneth saw. Sir Wilton took care that she should. He did not on +principle approve of marriages between cousins; he said so frankly; he +might be wrong. But there was one thing which made him very proud of his +son's choice. And this was that thing; there were others also upon which +Sir Wilton touched with much playful gallantry. + +"But perhaps," said he, "you won't have anything more to say to the poor +lad now!" + + + + +XXV + +SIGNS OF CHANGE + + +Georgie was a short head taller, and no pinafore concealed the glories +of his sailor suit; but it was still the same baby face, round as the +eyes that greeted all comers with the same friendly gaze. His sentences +were longer and more ambitiously constructed; but he still said +"somekin" and "I wish I would," and, when excited, "my Jove!" And his +lady once more danced attendance by the hour and day together; for Sir +Wilton and Lady Gleed were paying visits until September; and Sidney was +still understood to be making up for lost time at Cambridge. + +Gwynneth had enjoyed the child's society the year before; now she seemed +dependent upon it. She would have him with her daily on one pretext or +another, sometimes upon none at all. She said she liked to hear him +talk, and that was well, for Georgie's tongue only rested in his sleep. +But now there was often an intrinsic interest in his conversation. He +gave Gwynneth many an item of village news which was real news to her. +Thus it was from his own lips that she first heard of his accident, on +seeing the scar through his hair. + +"Course I was in bed," swaggered Georgie; "I was in bed for years an' +years an' years--in bed and sensible." + +"Oh, Georgie, do you mean insensible?" + +"No, sensible, I tell you." + +"Did you know what was going on?" + +"Course I di'n't, not a bit. How could I fen I was sensible?" + +"My poor darling, it might have killed you! How ever did you do it?" + +But, as so often happens in such cases, that was what Georgie had never +been able to remember. So Gwynneth turned to Jasper Musk, who sat within +earshot; it was in the Flint House garden, on the very afternoon of her +return. + +"That was my fault," said Jasper, gruffly enough, yet with such a glance +at Georgie that Gwynneth was sorry she had broached the subject, and +changed it at once. + +But she reverted to it as soon as she had Georgie to herself. Who had +looked after him when he was ill? She was feeling very jealous of +somebody. + +"Granny did." + +"No one else?" + +"An' grand-daddy." + +"Was that all, Georgie?" + +Gwynneth was very sorry she had ever gone abroad. + +"Course it wasn't all," said Georgie, remembering. "There was the funny +old man from the church." + +"Mr. Carlton?" + +"Yes." + +"So _he_ came to see you?" + +"Yes, he often. I love him," Georgie announced with emphasis; "he makes +lovely, lovely, _lovely_ faces!" + +"And does he ever come now?" + +"No, not now, course he doesn't; he's too busy buildin' his church." + +"So he's building still!" + +"Yes, 'cos he builds wery nicely," Georgie was pleased to say; "better'n +me, he builds, far better'n me." + +"And is he still alone?" + +"All alone," said Georgie; "all alonypony by his own little self!" + +And the inconsequent nonsense sent him off into untimely laughter, +louder and more uproarious than ever, quite a virile guffaw. But +Gwynneth could not even smile. And now when neither listening to Georgie +nor haunted by her engagement, Gwynneth began to think of the lonely +outcast behind those trees, as she had begun indeed to think of him the +spring before last, while her mind and life were yet unfilled by the +motley interests which this last year had brought into both. + +The thought afflicted her with a sense of personal hardness and cruelty; +there was this lonely man, doing the work of ten, not spasmodically, but +day after day, and year after year, still unaided and unforgiven by the +very people in whose midst and for whose benefit those prodigies of +labour were being performed. Gwynneth knew now that there had been some +mysterious wickedness before the burning of the church. It was all she +cared to know. What crime could warrant such hardness of heart in the +face of such devotion, skill, patience, consummate endurance, and +invincible determination? These were heroic qualities, no matter what +vileness lay beneath or behind them; and the generous capacity for +hero-worship was very strong in Gwynneth. She would have honoured this +man for his splendid pertinacity, and have wiped all else from the +slate. That his own parishioners continued to dishonour him, and that +she perforce had to do as they did, made her indignant with them and +dissatisfied with herself. So far as Gwynneth was honestly aware, this +feeling was a purely impersonal one. It would have been excited by any +other being who had achieved the like and been thus rewarded. It is +noteworthy, however, that Gwynneth found it necessary to explain the +position to herself. + +It was strange, too, how her life had impinged upon his, strange because +the points of contact had in each case left a disproportionate +impression upon her mind. She often thought of them. There was once in +the very beginning, when she had actually stopped him in the village to +ask the name of the poem from which he had quoted on Sunday. Gwynneth +had never told a soul about this, she was so ashamed of her unmaidenly +impulse; but she still remembered the look of pleasure that had flashed +through his pain, and the kind sad voice which both answered her +question and thanked her for asking it. That must have been only a day +or two before the fire; the same summer there was the silent scene +between them in the drawing-room, when she longed to shake hands with +him, to show him her sympathy, but did not dare. Then came the finding +of Georgie in the stonemason's shed, only the spring before last; but +Gwynneth found that she had been gauche as usual even then, that she had +never risen to any of these occasions, but that her one small attempt to +express her sympathy had been nothing less than a piece of tactless +presumption on her part. And yet she felt so much! + +Well, it was something that Musk had opened his doors to him, if only +under pressure of a harrowing occasion; even then it was much, very +much, in the prime infidel of the parish. It was a beginning, an +example; it might show others the way. Gwynneth presently discovered +that it had. + +She had not brought Georgie to see the saddler this time, and she was +trying to follow that thinker's harangue as though she had really come +to him for political instruction; but all the while the sound from among +the trees distracted her attention and mystified her mind. It was +neither the ringing impact of iron upon iron, nor the swish of a sharp +steel point through the soft sandstone. It was the drone of a saw, as +Gwynneth knew well enough when she asked what the sound was in the first +opportunity afforded her. + +"That's the reverend," said the saddler, dryly. + +"It sounds like sawing," said disingenuous Gwynneth. "Has he reached the +roof?" + +"Gord love yer, miss, not he!" + +Gwynneth was consumed with an interest that she feared to show, +especially with the saddler looking at her through his spectacles as +others had done when Mr. Carlton supplied the topic of conversation. It +was a look that seemed to ask her how much she knew, and it always +offended her. She did not want to know what he had done; all her +interest was in what he was doing, alone there behind the trees. Yet now +she felt that speak she must, if it was only to soften a single heart, +in the very slightest degree, towards that unhappy man; and she had come +to the saddler with no other purpose. + +"Does no one go near him yet?" she asked point-blank. + +The saddler leant across his bench; the girl had refused the only chair +in the little workshop, and was standing outside at the open window, as +all his visitors did. + +"You won't tell Sir Wilton, miss?" + +"I shan't go out of my way to make mischief, Mr. Fuller, if that's what +you mean. But you had better not tell me any secrets," said Gwynneth, +with a coldness that cost her an effort; however, the saddler's skin was +in keeping with his calling. + +"Then you can keep that or not," said he, "as you think fit; but _I_ go +and see him now and then, and, what's more, I'm not ashamed of it." + +"I should think not!" the girl broke out; and Fuller sunned himself in +the warmth of fine eyes on fire. "I mean," stammered Gwynneth, "after +all this time, and all he has done!" + +"What I said to myself last Christmas, miss; and I'm the only man that +say it to-day, in this here village full of old women and hypocrites; if +you'll excuse my blunt way o' speaking to a young lady like you. 'This +here's gone on long enough,' thinks I; 'an' it's the season of peace an' +good-will,' I says to myself; 'darned if I don't step across the road to +cheer up the poor old reverend, an' Sir Wilton can turn me out of house +an' home if he find out an' think proper.' Don't you mistake me, miss; I +wasn't thinking of Sir Wilton in what I said just now, and ought not to +have said to a young lady like you. No, miss, Sir Wilton has his own +quarrel with the reverend; and _I_ had _my_ quarrel, as far as that go; +but, Gord love yer, a man of my experience can afford to forgive an' +forget, an' be generous as well as just. There isn't a juster man alive +than me, Miss Gwynneth; and not a soul in this parish, or out of it, +that can say I'm not generous too." + +"I'm sure of it, Mr. Fuller. But did you go over to the rectory?" + +"There and then," cried Fuller; "there--and--then. And I told him +straight that I for one--but that's no use to go over what I said and he +said," observed the saddler, hastily. "I can only tell you that in ten +minutes we were chattun away as though nothun had ever come between us. +And what do you suppose, miss? What do you suppose?" + +Gwynneth shook her head, unable to imagine what was coming, and anxious +to hear. + +"He hadn't seen a newspaper in all these years! Hadn't so much as heard +of that there Home Rule Bill of old Gladstone's, and didn't even know +there'd been a war in the Sowd'n!" Gwynneth looked equally ignorant of +this. "You know, miss? The Sowd'n, where General Gordon was betrayed +and deserted by them varmin you'd stick up for. But we won't quarrel no +more about that: only to think of the poor old reverend knowun no more +about it than the man in the moon until I told him! Why, I had to tell +him one of the Royal Family was dead an' buried; it would have been just +the same if it had been the Queen herself, God bless her!" + +"So he has been absolutely shut off from the world," Gwynneth murmured. + +"There you've hit it, miss! 'Shut off from the world,' there you've put +it into better language than I did," said the saddler, with his most +complimentary air. "Gord love yer, miss, it used to be the reverend that +passed his _Standard_ on to me; but ever since last Christmas it's been +me that's taken my _East Anglian_ over to him; so the boot's been on the +other leg properly; and right glad I've been to do anything for him, and +to take my pipe across now and then as though nothun had ever happened. +Not that he fare to care much for that, neither; he've been so long +alone, I do believe he've got to like his own society as well as any. +Yes, miss, shut off from the world he have been and he is; but he won't +be shut off from the world much longer!" + +"Oh?" + +Gwynneth's interest was re-awakened. + +"No," said Fuller, with the air of mystery in which his class delights; +"no, miss, he's not one to be shut off longer than he can help. Hear +that sound?" + +"I do indeed." + +Latterly she had been listening to nothing else. + +"That's a saw!" + +"Well?" + +"Do you know what he's sawun?" + +"No." + +"Planks for benches!" + +Gwynneth repeated the last word in a puzzled whisper; and so stood +staring until the obvious explanation had become obvious to her. It +remained inexplicable. + +"I don't see the good of benches before the church is finished, Mr. +Fuller." + +"He mean to hold his services whether that's finished or not. And I mean +to attend 'em," the saddler said with an air. + +"But--I thought----" + +"He was suspended for five year, and the bishop has given him leave to +get to work directly the five year is up. That I happen to know." + +"It must be nearly up now!" + +"That's up next Sunday as ever is, and you'll know it when you hear the +bell ring. He's got one of the old uns slung to a tree, for I helped him +to sling it, and it's the first help he's had all this time. I wouldn't +mention it, miss, for the reverend doesn't want a crowd; there'll be +quite enough come when they hear the bell, if it's only to see what +happens; but the whole neighbourhood 'll be there if that get about." + +"And there's really going to be service in the church--just as it +is--without a roof--this very next Sunday!" + +It sounded incredible to Gwynneth, and yet it thrilled her as the +incredible does not. The very drone of the saw was thrilling now. + +"There is, miss, and I mean to be there," said the village Hampden, with +inflated chest. "I can't help it if that cost me Sir Wilton's custom, +the reverend and me are good friends again, and I mean to be there." + + + + +XXVI + +A VERY FEW WORDS + + +It had been in the air all Saturday, but few believed the rumour until +ten minutes to eleven next morning. At that hour and at that minute Long +Stow was electrified by the measured ringing of a single bell--a bell +hoarse with five years' rest and rust--a bell no ear had heard since the +night of the fire. + +Gwynneth was afield upon the upland, far beyond the church, a pitiful +waverer between desire and indecision. Now she must go; and now she must +not think of it. It was unnecessary, gratuitous, provocative, +ostentatious, unmaidenly, immodest--and yet--both her duty and her +desire. So the string of adjectives might be applied to her; they were +no deterrent to a nature which hesitated often, but seldom was afraid. +Gwynneth treated more respectfully the poignant query of her own +consciousness: was she absolutely certain that she did not at all desire +to show off like the saddler? She was not. + +She did desire to show off, if it was showing off to honour openly the +man whom she admired and wished others to admire. She gloried in the +man's achievement, and possibly also in her own appreciation of it and +him. That was her real point of contact with the saddler. But for +Fuller there was the excuse of unconsciousness, and for Gwynneth there +was not. So she read herself that Sunday morning, under an August sky +without a fleck and a sun that drew the resin from those very pine-trees +upon which the outcast had so often gazed. It was thereabouts that +Gwynneth lingered, of self-analysis all compact. Then the hoarse bell +began--came calling up to her from the clump of chestnuts and of +elms--calling like a friend in pain . . . + +Gwynneth reached church by way of the strip of glebe behind it and the +gate into this from the lane, thus escaping the throng already gathered +at the other gate. She saw nothing but the rude benches as she entered +in; the last of these was too near for her; she shrank to the far end of +it, close against the wall, and the bell stopped as she sank upon her +knees. The beating of her heart seemed to take its place. Then there +came a light yet measured step. It passed very near, with a subdued and +subtle rustle, that might yet have meant one other woman. But Gwynneth +knew better, though she never looked. + +"_I will arise, and go to my father, and will say unto him, Father, I +have sinned against heaven, and before thee, and am no more worthy to be +called thy son._" + +Already the girl could not see; all her being was involved in an effort +to suppress a sob. It was suppressed. There were no tears in the voice +that so moved Gwynneth. How serene it was, though sad! It began to +soothe her, as she remembered that it had done when she was quite a +little girl. She was a little girl again: these five years fled . . . +But oh, why had he chosen _that_ sentence of the scriptures? Gwynneth +looked at her book (for now she could see) and found that some of the +others would have been worse. + +At last she could raise her eyes; and there was Fuller in the very +front; and not another soul. + +But Gwynneth cared for nothing any more except the gentle voice that it +was her pride to follow in the general confession, kneeling indeed, yet +kneeling bolt upright in her proud allegiance. + +A strange picture, the rude benches, the ragged walls; the east window +still a chasm, the hot sun streaming through it down the aisle; and over +all the blue cruciform of sky, broken only by the nodding plumes of the +taller elms. And a congregation yet more strange--only Gwynneth and the +saddler. But this did not continue. Gwynneth heard movements in the +porch behind her, and presently a stumble on the part of one driven in +by the press; but no voices; not a whisper; and ere-long he who had been +forced in, tired of standing, came on tiptoe and occupied the end of +Gwynneth's bench. + +Now it was the second lesson. The rector was reading it in the same +sweet voice, with all his old precision and knowledge of his mother +tongue, and never a trip or an undue emphasis. No one would have +believed that that voice had been all but silent for five whole years. +And yet some change there was, something different in the reading, +something even in the voice; the clerical monotone was abandoned, the +reading was more human, natural, and sympathetic. The change was in +keeping with others. The rector wore no vestments in the naked eye of +heaven, but only his cassock, his surplice, and his Oxford hood. There +were flowers upon the simple table behind him, such roses as still grew +wild in his tangled garden, but no candle to melt double in the sun. The +lectern he had done his best to burnish; but it was still a cripple from +the fire. Above, the rector's hair shone like silver, for the sun swept +over it, but the lean dark face was all in shadow. Gwynneth only saw the +fresh trim cut of the grizzled beard, and the walnut colour of the +gnarled hand drooping over the book. That speaking hand! + +Now it was the first hymn--actually! So he dared to have hymns, and to +sing them if necessary by himself! But it was not necessary, and not +only Gwynneth joined in with all the little voice she possessed, but +presently there were false notes from the other end of the bench, and +the saddler was not silent. But Robert Carlton's voice rang sweet and +clear above the rest:-- + + "Jesu, Lover of my soul, + Let me to Thy Bosom fly, + While the gathering waters roll, + While the tempest still is high: + Hide me, O my Saviour, hide, + Till the storm of life is past: + Safe into the haven guide, + O receive my soul at last . . ." + +The hymn haunted Gwynneth upon her knees, taking her mind from the +remaining prayers. It was a hymn that she had loved as a little child, +and now it seemed so simple and so whole-hearted to one who longed +always to be both. But it was the passionate humility of it that touched +and filled the heart; and yet there had been neither tremor nor appeal +in the voice that led; and the humility was only in accord with one of +the simplest services ever held. + +The second hymn was another of Gwynneth's favourites; she could not +afterwards have said which, for in the middle Mr. Carlton knelt, and +then came forward to the twisted lectern at the head of the aisle. + +It was not a sermon; it was only a very few words. Yet in Long Stow +nothing else was talked of that day, nor for many a day to follow. + +The few words were these:-- + + "The first verse of the nineteenth psalm: + + "_The heavens declare the glory of God; and the + firmament sheweth his handywork._ + + "Though I have given you a text, my brethren, I do not + intend this morning to preach any sermon. If you care + to hear me again--if you choose to give me another + trial--if you are willing to help me to start + afresh--then come again next Sunday, only come in + properly, and make the best of the poor benches which + are all I have to offer you as yet. There will only be + one weekly service at present. I believe that you + could nearly all come to that--if you would! But I am + afraid that many would have to stand. + + "I cannot tell you how grieved I am that your church + is not ready for you; but I hope and believe, as I + stand before you here, that it will be ready soon, + much sooner than you suppose. Then one great wrong + will be righted, though only one. + + "Meanwhile, so long as we are blessed with days like + these--and I pray that many may be in store for + us--meanwhile, could there be a fitter or a lovelier + roof to the House of God than His own sky as we see it + above us to-day? Though at present we can have no + music worthy the name, have you not noticed, during + all this our service, the constant song and twitter of + those friends of man, as I know them to be, of whom + Jesus said, 'Not one of them is forgotten before God'? + And for incense, what fragrance have we not, in our + unfinished church, that is the House of God all the + more because it is also His open air. + + "My brethren, _you_ need be no farther from heaven, + here in this place, unfinished as it is, than when the + roof is up, and the windows are in, and proper seats, + and when a new organ peals . . . and one whom you can + respect stands where I am standing now . . . + + "My brethren--once my friends--will you never, never + be my friends again? + + "_Oh spare me a little that I may recover my strength: + before I go hence, and be no more seen . . ._ + + "Dear friends, I have said far more than I ever meant + to say. But it is your own fault; you have been so + good to me; so many of you have come in; and you are + listening to me--to me! If you never listen to me + again, if you never come near me any more, I shall + still thank you--thank you--to my dying hour! + + "But let no eye be dim for me. I do not deserve it. I + do not want it. If you ever cared for me--any of + you--be strong now and help me . . . + + "And remember--never, never forget--that a just God + sits in yonder blue heaven above us--that He is not + hard--that I told you . . . He is merciful . . . + merciful . . . merciful . . . + + "O look above once more before we part, and see again + how '_The heavens declare the glory of God; and the + firmament sheweth his handywork_.' + + * * * * * + + "And now to God the Father, God the Son, and God the + Holy Ghost, be ascribed all honour, power, dominion, + might, henceforth and for ever. Amen." + +He had controlled himself by a superb effort. The end was as calm as the +beginning; but the rather hard, almost defiant note, that might have +marred the latter in ears less eager than Gwynneth's and more sensitive +than those of the people in the porch, that note had passed out of +Robert Carlton's voice for ever. + +And there no longer were any people in the porch; one by one they had +all crept in to listen, some stealing to the rude seats, more standing +behind, none remaining outside. Thus had they melted the heart they +could not daunt, until all at once it was speaking to their hearts out +of its own exceeding fulness, in a way undreamed of when the preacher +delivered his text. + +And this was to be seen as he came down the aisle, white head erect, +pale face averted, and so through the midst of his people--his once +more--without catching the eye of one. + + + + +XXVII + +AN ESCAPE + + +Mr. Fuller had made a hasty exit; but he waylaid Gwynneth on the road. +"Excuse me, miss," he cried, and the girl felt bound to do so. Next +moment she was trying to sort the mixed emotions in the saddler's face, +for a few steps had brought them to his house, and he had halted at the +workshop window. + +"Well, miss, and what do _you_ think of it?" + +"Oh, Mr. Fuller, please don't ask me." + +"I don't mean the sermon, miss; I mean the flock of sheep that come and +listened to the sermon," said the saddler, with a bitterness that +astonished Gwynneth. + +"But, surely, Mr. Fuller, you were glad they did come? I was so +thankful!" declared the girl. + +"So was I, miss; so was I," said the saddler, grimly; "but, Gord love +yer, do you suppose they ever would have shown their noses if you an' me +hadn't given 'em the lead?" + +"Then we ought to be very proud, Mr. Fuller; at least you ought, since +but for you I never should have known in time." + +"But do you think a man of 'em 'll admit it?" continued Fuller fiercely. +"Not they--I know 'em. They'll take the credit, the moment there's any +credit to take--them that hasn't given him a word or a look in all these +years. But the reverend, _he_ know--_he_ know!" + +"I'm sure he does," said Gwynneth, kindly; and left the forerunner to +his ignoble jealousy, only hoping there was some foundation for it, and +that a real reaction was already in the air. + +Even on her way home there were further signs. Jones the schoolmaster, +an implacable enemy these five years, but an emotional man all his life, +was still dabbing his eyes as he held unguarded converse with the +phlegmatic owner of the mill on the lock, who had been his fellow +churchwarden in the days before the fire. + +"I'll be his churchwarden again," declared the schoolmaster, "and Sir +Wilton can say what he likes. We know who ruled the roast before, and we +know----" + +Gwynneth caught no more as she hurried on, her first desire a quiet hour +without a whisper from the world. She wished to recall every word of the +sermon, while every syllable remained in her mind, and then to write it +all down and to possess it for ever. Such was her first feverish +resolve; nor, analytical as she was, did she stop to analyse this. The +stable gates were open; it never occurred to Gwynneth to wonder why. +There was a good way through the stable-yard to the garden, whose +uttermost end she might thus reach without being seen from the house. +And Fraulein Hentig had known where she was thinking of going, had +shaken Gwynneth not a little with her remonstrances, but would be none +the less certain to ask questions when next they met. + +Near the Italian garden was a certain walk, with stark yew hedges on +either hand, and fine grass stretched like a drugget from end to end. +Across this strip the old English flowers, poppies and peonies, +hollyhocks and larkspur, faced each other in serried lines as in a +country dance; and the vista ended in a thatched summer-house where it +was always cool. The spot was a favourite haunt of Gwynneth, who would +catch herself humming the old English songs there, and thinking of +patches and powder and the minuet. It had not that effect this morning; +she neither saw nor smelt the flowers, nor heard the thrush which was +singing to her with persistent sweetness from the stately trees upon the +lawn beyond. Gwynneth was in that other world which had existed all +these years within half-a-mile of this one. What she heard was the +virile cadence of the voice which had always thrilled her; strong and +masterful in the beginning; softening all at once, as the people pressed +in to hear; then for a little high-pitched and hoarse, spasmodic, +tremulous, too touching even to remember with dry eyes; then that last +pause, and the silver clarion of his proper voice once more and to the +end. And what Gwynneth saw, through her tears, was the sunlight resting +on that stricken head, as though God had stretched out His hand in final +mercy and forgiveness. + +But what she was to see, before many minutes were past, or the sermon +over in her mind, was a dapper figure approaching between the old +flowers and the spruce hedges, a figure in riding breeches, swinging a +cutaway coat in his walk. + +It was Sidney, ridden over from Cambridge on a hired horse. Gwynneth had +time to come out of the summer-house to meet him, but none to think. So +he had given her a kiss before she realised what that meant--and knew in +her heart that it must be the last. And the next moment she saw that he +was displeased. + +"So here you are!" was his verbal greeting: "I've been looking for you +all over the shop." + +"I'm so sorry," said poor Gwynneth. "If you had only let us know----" + +"Oh, that's all right; I took my risk, of course." + +He looked her up and down, as she stood in the sunlight, tall and +comely, her state of mind instinctively and successfully concealed; and +the brown tinge came upon his handsome face as the annoyance vanished. +Endearments fell from his lips, but now she made him keep his distance, +though so tactfully that he obviously did not realise his repulse. +Gwynneth looked at him for an instant with great compassion; then she +led the way into the summer-house, her mind made up. + +"You haven't been here all the morning, have you?" he went on. "No, I +see you haven't; there are your gloves." + +"Yes." + +"Been for a walk?" + +"Well, I did go for one." + +"What do you mean?" demanded Sidney, struck at last by her manner. + +"I've been to church!" + +"What! Over to Linkworth and back?" + +"No." + +Her tone trembled; he was not helping her at all. + +"Then what church did you go to, and what on earth's up with you, +darling?" + +"I went to our own church." + +"But I thought that Lakenhall chap only came in the afternoon?" + +"He doesn't go to the church." + +Sidney stared an instant, and was on his feet the next. "You don't mean +to say you've been up to the church talking to--to Carlton?" he cried. + +"No, not talking to him." + +"Then do you mind telling me what you do mean?" + +Gwynneth did her best to explain the occasion and to describe the +service, but found herself unable to do the subject justice in a few +words, and drifted into a nervous enthusiasm as she went. Sidney's eyes +seemed smaller than when she began; she had never known he had so sharp +a chin. But he heard her out, standing in the doorway, and not always +looking her way; it was when averted that his face looked so hard. When +she had finished he gave her his whole attention, and was some time +regarding her, his hands in his pockets, without a word. + +"So you deliberately went to hear that blackguard!" + +"You needn't call him that," said Gwynneth, hotly. + +"But I do." + +"I should be ashamed to abuse him after all he has done!" + +"That doesn't alter what--what you apparently and very properly know +nothing about, Gwynneth." + +"And I don't want to know!" cried the girl, indignant at his tone. "I +only say, whatever he has done, he has paid very bitterly for it, and +made such amends as were never made by anybody I ever heard of. He may +have been all you say. He is more than all that I can say now!" + +"And what do you say?" inquired Sidney, with polite contempt. + +"That we shall honour ourselves in future by honouring him, and +dishonour ourselves by continuing to dishonour him. He has had his +punishment, and look how he has borne it! Why, he has done what was +never done in the world before by one solitary man." + +Gwynneth stopped breathless. Sidney eyed her coolly, his nostrils +curling. "So that's your opinion," he sneered. + +"It's a good deal more than that," cried Gwynneth. "It's my fixed +conviction and personal resolve." + +"To honour that fellow, eh?" + +Gwynneth coloured. + +"To the extent of attending his services when I happen to be here," she +said. And Sidney gave her a pregnant look--a more honest look--angry and +determined as her own. + +"And what about me?" he said. "What if I object?" + +Gwynneth was slow to answer, to tell him the sharp truth outright. + +"Do you mean to go your own way in spite of me, in spite of the +governor, in spite of all of us?" + +Gwynneth saw that she could not remain at the hall and follow such a +course. So this question went unanswered like the last, though for a +different reason. Meanwhile Sidney was accounting for her silence to his +own satisfaction, and he now conceived that the moment had arrived for +him to play the strong man. + +"Look here, Gwynneth," said he, "this is all rot and bosh, and worse--if +you'll take my word for it. And you must take my word, and take it on +trust in a thing like this, or you never will in anything. I tell you +this fellow Carlton is the most unspeakable skunk. But it isn't a thing +we can discuss together. Isn't that enough for you? Isn't my wish +enough, in a thing like this, which I know all about and you don't? Have +I got to enforce it while we're still engaged? If so----" + +Gwynneth had raised her head slowly, and at last she spoke. + +"We are not engaged, Sidney," she said quietly. + +"Not--engaged?" + +"It has never been a proper engagement." + +"A proper engagement!" Sidney gasped. "Not a public one, if you like! +What difference does that make?" + +"No difference. It only makes it--easier----" + +"What does it make easier?" he demanded fiercely. + +Gwynneth was choking with humiliation. It was some moments before she +could command her voice. Her distress was pitiful; but the young man was +already busy pitying himself. A sudden change had come over Sidney. It +was not in all respects a change for the worse. His cynical aplomb had +already disappeared, leaving a tremulous, an angry, but a human being +behind. So Gwynneth felt a leaning to him even at the last; but this +time she knew her mind. + +And she spoke it with equal candour and humility: it was all her fault: +she could never forgive herself; but he would forgive her, when he saw +for himself what the woman will always see quicker than the man. She +liked him better than anybody she knew; that week at Cambridge had been +the happiest week in her life; one day they would, they must, be good +friends again. Meanwhile they had both made a miserable mistake. This +was not love. + +"Speak for yourself," cried Sidney, all bitterness and mortification. +"And I never believed in a woman before," he groaned; "my God, I never +shall again!" + +And he strode out savagely into the sun; but a different Sidney was back +next moment, one that reminded Gwynneth of the very old days, when he +would pass her whistling with his dog. A sneer was on his lips, and his +dry eyes glittered. + +"I beg your pardon for making a scene, Gwynneth; it isn't in my line, as +you know, and I apologise. But do you mind telling me when you +discovered that you had--changed?" + +"I have not changed, Sidney. That is my shame." + +"Do you mean that you never did care about me?" + +"Never in that way. I am ashamed to say it--more humiliated and ashamed +than you can ever know. But it's the truth." + +"Yet at the First Trinity ball, I remember, if you don't----" + +His tone was more than Gwynneth could endure. + +"Yes, I remember," she cried; "and I can explain it, though explanations +are no excuse. Sidney, you know what my life was until the last few +months? Happy enough in heaps of ways, but not the least gaiety in it; +and suddenly I felt the want of it. I felt it first abroad, and you met +that want in your May-week in a way beyond my dreams. You may sneer at +me now, but you were awfully nice to me then, and I shall never, never +forget it. You were so nice that I honestly did think for a little that +you met every other want as well! Yet I tell you now, what I tried to +tell you once before, that when once you had spoken nothing was the +same. It was like touching a bubble. The bubble had burst." + +"You felt like that from the first?" + +Gwynneth turned away, for now they were both upon their feet, restlessly +hovering between the summer-house and the sunlight. + +"And yet it has taken you two months to tell me," pursued Sidney without +remorse. + +"I know; it was dreadful of me; yet I could not tell you till I was +absolutely certain, and it is not so easy to be certain of oneself in +such things. If you find no difficulty, Sidney, then you might pity +those who do. Nevertheless, I did write, on my birthday, when you sent +me those beautiful pearls. Sidney, you must take them back--for my sake. +I meant to send them back at once, but you know what I heard that very +morning! It may have been cowardly and weak, but how could I tell you I +did not love you the moment I knew I was to have a little money of my +own? It's hard enough as it is; but I had not the pluck for that. Yet it +is hard enough now," repeated Gwynneth, with great feeling; "and you +haven't made it easier, Sidney. No, I don't mean anything you may have +said; you have not said more than I deserve. But you tempted me--you +little know how you have tempted me--to be dishonest with you to the +end. It would have been so easy to make poor Mr. Carlton the whole +cause, and not to have told you the truth at all!" + +"Then I wish to God you had done so!" Sidney cried out, revealing the +character of his wound unawares, yet once more human, young, and vain. +Moreover there was passion enough in his eyes and voice, as there had +been in his wooing. "Besides," he continued, "poor Mr. Carlton, as you +call him, _is_ the cause, I don't care what you say. Curse him! Curse +him, body and soul!" + +Gwynneth was outside in the sun, doubly adorable now that he had lost +her, and for other reasons too. Her sweet skin was flushed, and even her +tears inflamed the unhappy young man. He looked at her long and +passionately, then muttered venom through his teeth. + +"What did you say?" + +"I said it was like him, too, the blackguard!" + +"I don't know what you mean, and I don't want to." + +"It's as well," jeered Sidney, with exceeding malice; but already she +was turning away. She was turning away without one word. In an instant +he had her by both wrists, as the devil possessed himself. + +"Let me go," cried Gwynneth. "You're hurting me!" + +"I'm not. I'm not. I'm only going to let you know the kind of beast +that's come between us." + +Gwynneth stood with unresisting wrists. Her scorn was splendid. + +"I am not sorry to have seen you in your true colours, Sidney." + +"You are going to see some one else in his." + +Her scorn had destroyed his last scruple. His eyes were devilish now. + +"Let me go, you brute!" + +"There are worse, Gwynneth, there are worse. It isn't a thing we can +discuss, as I told you. But did you never notice the likeness?" + +Her blank face put the involuntary question he desired. + +"Only between the one big villain in this parish--and the one rather +jolly little boy!" + +At last her wrists were released. But Gwynneth remained standing in the +sun. She was not looking at Sidney; on the contrary, her face declared +her oblivious to his continued presence. It was white with several kinds +of horror; it was pinched with many separate pangs. So she stood a few +moments, then went her way slowly, only turning with a shudder. As for +him, his fever subsided as he watched; and, before the diminishing +figure had passed out of the vista of cropped hedges and crude flowers, +even Sidney Gleed knew himself, for once in his life, for what he was +and would be to its end. + + + + +XXVIII + +THE TURNING TIDE + + +Next Sunday there was a real congregation. Yet the benches were almost +as empty as before, the people herding near the porch until entreated +either to occupy such seats as there were, or to leave the church. +"Curiosity may have brought some of you here," said Mr. Carlton; "but I +earnestly hope that none will remain in that spirit." The benches were +full in a minute, and many had still to stand. All the next week Robert +Carlton spent in sawing more planks to one length, and more props to one +height for their support. And on the third Sunday his church was packed. + +The summer of 1887 was, however, a remarkable one. And the month of +August was an ideal month for the inauguration of open-air services, +where there were trees. + +In those hot still days came visitors of every type, and in greater +numbers than Robert Carlton desired. The tide had turned; he was early +aware of his danger now. Again and again it became his own sore duty to +remind this one or the other, distantly perhaps, yet none the less +unmistakably, of that which they might forget, but he never. Their open +admiration tried him acutely. He did like it a little for its own sake, +after five years' ostracism; more for the fresh purchase it gave him +over simple hearts; but he was very hard on himself for liking it at +all. On the other hand, he knew that it must put many a mind, the +subtler minds, more than ever against him. It also renewed his own +shame. So it was not admiration that he wanted at all; it was +confidence, forgiveness, love; and these if possible by degrees. It was +not possible, and Robert Carlton had to suffer in turn from the saddler, +the schoolmaster, and the rest. The first would come to hedge and hedge +with a view to Sir Wilton's imminent return; the next would intercept +him as he came away, learn what he had been saying, and forthwith step +across to the church to let the reverend know how the schoolmaster's +character impressed itself upon a man of his experience. It was an +unattractive trait in Fuller that he questioned everybody's sincerity +but his own, albeit his strictures were not seldom justifiable. He +talked, however, as though for years he had been the one and only +philanthropist to hold any dealings with the rector; at last it became +necessary to set him right on the point, which Mr. Carlton did with a +mild account of his illness and the sexton's aid. + +"I do wish I'd ha' known," said Fuller, with perfect truth; "I do wish +I'd ha' known an' had the nursun of yer, reverend, instead o' him. And +he never come near you no more; so I should expect." + +"But you tell me he's very ailing, Fuller." + +"He haven't been ailun all these years." + +"We--we had a little tiff in the end. It was my fault. I wonder if he'd +see me now?" + +"I'll make him, reverend, I'll tell him he's got to." + +"No, Fuller, I can't allow that. Besides, he has not got to do anything +of the sort; he has turned dissenter, and may prefer me to stop away. +Nevertheless I shall call, if only to ask how he is." + +There was no need to ask, in the event. The old sexton was failing fast, +and "not long for this world," as his daughter announced in front of +him. The poor man was in bed, and very dirty, but as sensible as he ever +had been; and he welcomed the rector with cadaverous grins. + +"They tell me," he whispered, "you fare to finish the church with your +own two hands. You're a wonderful man, sir--and I'm another." + +"You are, indeed. Why, you must be nearly ninety, Busby?" + +"Eighty-eight, sir, come next September. But I wasn't thinkun o' my age, +sir. Do you remember that little varmin I swallered out 'f a pond?" + +"I remember." + +"I've killed that, sir!" + +And the sunken eyes shone like lamps. + +"I congratulate you, Busby." + +"I killed that two year ago; and you'll never guess how!" The ex-sexton +proceeded to rehearse the various remedies he had tried in vain. "I +killed that with bacca-smoke," he concluded in sepulchral triumph. "It +was the minister's idea. I had to swaller the bacca-smoke instead o' +puffun that out, an' that choked that in three pipes!" + +The rector said it must be a great relief to be rid of such an incubus. +Busby, however, with a sick man's reluctance to admit any alleviating +circumstance in his case, was not so sure about that. He sometimes fared +to wish he had the little varmin back. Croap, croap, croap! That had +been wonderful good company after all. The ex-sexton was not too ill to +wax eloquent upon his favourite topic. And the tenor of his talk was +that mankind had been building churches since the world began, but what +other man had lived for years with a live frog on his chest? + +Their religious dispute was evidently forgotten, and Mr. Carlton did not +feel it incumbent upon him to risk another in the circumstances of the +case. On the way home the other egotist waylaid him, with his opinion of +old Busby's hallucination and general sanity since the saddler could +remember him. + +"But half the village and half the county is the same, reverend. Silly +Suffolk!" + +"Yet you're a Suffolk man yourself, Fuller," observed Mr. Carlton, +mildly. + +"Yes, reverend, but there was corn in Egypt, if you recollect." + +Meanwhile the building still went on, and was rapidly nearing a point +beyond which Carlton himself could not proceed unaided. That point was +the last window; the others were all finished. He had left out the +single mullions and all the tracery. They might be added afterwards by +an expert hand. They were not essential to the windows, which were ready +for glazing as they were. But the east window was another affair. It +must have its two mullions as before, with the quatrefoil tracery which +had remained undamaged in the west window opposite. All this was beyond +the self-taught hewer of coursed rubble and of gargoyles; the arch +itself must be two feet wider than any he had yet attempted; but on a +worthy east window he had set his heart. + +Such was the dilemma in which Robert Carlton found himself at the end of +August, and there seemed only one thing to be done. He must call for aid +at last, and now he knew that aid would come, for he had received +various offers of assistance since the beginning of the month. Some of +these were from local firms which had refused his work in the beginning; +Carlton had promised that if he called for tenders he would consider +theirs; and now call he must. Yet he could not bring himself to do so +all at once. + +To call in the world after all! To open his leafy solitude to the +British workmen in gangs, to hear their chaff, to smell their tobacco, +where he had laboured in quiet and alone through so many, many seasons! + +But it had to come. A tinge of autumn was on the trees. Any Sunday now +the open-air service might prove a discomfort and a peril to all; in a +few weeks at most it would become impossible. But the people must have +their church. They had waited long enough. Therefore any further +reluctance in him was little and unworthy, as Carlton saw at once for +himself. Yet there was now so much else to do, so many poor folks to +see, so many old threads to take up, that for once he temporised. And +even as he temporised, his mind made up, and a competition pending +between the masons of the neighbourhood, Sir Wilton Gleed arrived in +Long Stow for the shooting. + +Sir Wilton arrived with a frown. It deepened but little at what he +heard. He was prepared for everything; and about Gwynneth he knew. She +had left his house, she had gone her own way, he washed his hands of +her, and only congratulated Sidney on his escape. That chapter was +closed. It was the older matter that harassed Sir Wilton Gleed. + +So that devil had reinstated himself after all! The fact might not be +finally accomplished; it was none the less inevitable, imminent. And Sir +Wilton had long been prepared for it; for the last two years he had been +unable to move without hearing the name he abhorred; it dogged him in +town, it followed him to Scotland, it awaited him in every hole and +corner of the Continent. Once he had been fond of speaking of his +property; but in two senses it was hard to do this without giving the +place a name. Sir Wilton was learning to deny himself the boast +altogether. + +Long Stow? Could there be two Long Stows? Then that must be the place +where the parson was building up his church. What a romance! And what a +man! Oh, no doubt he was a very dreadful person also; but there, in any +case, was a Man. + +Sir Wilton could not deny it; and by degrees he wearied of insisting +upon the deplorable side of the man's character. The task was +ungrateful; it put himself in an ungenerous light, which was the harder +upon one who was by no means ill-natured in grain. Gradually he took to +admitting his adversary's good points; even admitted them to himself; +but that did not remove the chronic irritation of infallible defeat. And +defeated Sir Wilton already was, with the people flocking to that man +again, and doubtless willing to help him finish his church. His own +parishioners had forgiven him--and well they might, said Sir Wilton's +friends in every country-house. Besides, the suspended parson was a +figure of the past; the law was done with him; he was absolutely free to +begin afresh. Henceforth the vindictiveness of the individual must +recoil deservedly upon the individual's head. + +Sir Wilton saw all this before his actual return; and he realised the +madness of either urging or attempting to coerce his tenantry to harden +their hearts, a second time, against one who had committed no second +sin. If he failed it would destroy his influence in the neighbourhood; +even if he succeeded it would damage his popularity elsewhere. And a +chat with the schoolmaster, a call upon one or two of the neighbouring +clergy, a word with old Marigold in his gig, all served but to convince +him finally of these facts. + +Sir Wilton's mind was made up. He had come back primed with a desperate +measure for the last of all. Once it was resolved upon, his spirits +rose. + +He told his wife and took her breath away; but a very little reasoning +brought the lady round the compass to his view. This was after breakfast +on the second day. The same forenoon Sir Wilton went up the village, +brisk and rosy, a flower in his coat, and a word for all. Past the Flint +House he began to walk slowly, took no notice of a courtesy, swung round +suddenly himself, and was knocking at Jasper Musk's door that minute, +still a thought less confident than he had been. + +Musk was in his garden, fast as usual to his chair. Mrs. Musk brought +out another chair for Sir Wilton, and drove Georgie indoors on her way +back. Sir Wilton watched the child out of sight, and then favoured +Jasper with his peculiarly fixed stare. There was unusual meaning in it +this morning. + +"So the world has forgiven him," said Sir Wilton Gleed. + +Musk stared in his turn, his great face glowing with contempt. "Have +you?" said he at last. + +"Not yet," replied Sir Wilton, a shade more pink in the face. He had +meant to lead up to his intention. He was taken aback. + +"But you mean to, do you?" pursued Musk, pressing his point in no +respectful tone: in all their relations this one had never pandered to +the other. + +"I don't say that, either," replied Sir Wilton, in studied tones. + +"Then what do you say?" + +"Less than anybody else, a good deal less," declared the squire. "I--I +don't quite understand your tone, Musk, I must say; but I can well +understand your position in this matter. It is unique, of course. So is +mine, in a sense. But I must beg of you not to jump to conclusions. I am +the last person to make a hero of the man I did my best to kick out of +the parish five years ago; next to yourself, no one has reason to love +the fellow less. I thought it a public scandal that he should be +empowered to stay here against all our wills. My opinion of that whole +black matter is absolutely and totally unchanged. But I do confess to +you, Musk, that this last year or two have somewhat modified my opinion +of the man himself." + +Musk's eyes had never dropped or lifted from his visitor's face. Their +expression was inscrutable. The iron cast of that massive countenance +was the only key to the workings of the mind within: the lines seemed +subtly emphasised, as in the faces of the dead. And his gigantic body +was the same; only the eyes seemed alive; and they were as still as the +rest of him. + +"What if I've modified mine?" + +Sir Wilton looked up quickly; for the habitual starer had been for once +outstared. "Do you mean that you have?" cried he. + +"I don't say as I have or I haven't. But that's a man, Sir Wilton, and I +won't deny it." + +"Exactly what everybody is saying. I say no more myself." + +"And I won't say no less . . . Suppose you was to patch it up with him, +Sir Wilton?" + +"I should help him finish his church." + +Musk sat silent for some time. His eyes seemed smaller. But they had not +moved. + +"That would be a wonderful good action on your part, Sir Wilton," he +said at last. + +"Not at all, Musk. I should be doing it for the people, not for Mr. +Carlton." + +Another pause. + +"And yet, Sir Wilton, in a manner o' speaking, you might say as he +deserved it, too?" + +Sir Wilton was quite himself again--a gentleman in keeping with the +flower in his coat. + +"I certainly never expected to hear you say so, Musk," said he frankly; +"though it's what I've sometimes thought myself." + +"I haven't said as _I_ forgave him, have I?" + +"No, no, Musk, you haven't; it is not in human nature that you could." + +It was a strange tongue that had spoken in the massive head; there was +no forgiveness in that voice. Yet in the next breath the note of hate +was hushed as suddenly as it had been struck. + +"That may be in human natur'," said Musk, "but that ain't in mine. I'm +not a religious man, Sir Wilton. That may be the reason. But I do have +enough respect for religion to wish to see that church up again before I +die." + +"I consider it very generous of you to say so, Musk," declared the +other, with enthusiasm. + +"But I do say it, Sir Wilton, and I never said a truer word." + +"So I hear; and that decides me!" cried Sir Wilton, jumping up. "I +really had decided--for the sake of the parish--and was actually on my +way to the church to take the whole job over. A gang of competent +workmen could polish it off in a couple of months; and it ought to be +polished off. But it's really wonderful what he has done!" + +"I don't deny it," said Musk; and waited for the squire to recover his +point, his own set face unchanged. + +"Yes," resumed Sir Wilton, suddenly, "I was on my way up to make him +that proposal just now; but as I passed your door I could not resist +coming in. I thought I would like to tell you what I intended to do, and +to give you my reasons for doing it." + +"There was no need to do that," said Musk, with an upward movement of +the lips, hardly to be called a smile; for once also his great head +moved slowly from side to side. + +"And now I shall be going on," announced Sir Wilton, who did not like +this look, and was now less inclined to suffer disrespect. + +"Hold on a bit, Sir Wilton. I'm glued tight to this here chair by my old +enemy; that seem to get worse and worse, and I'm jealous I shall soon +set foot to the ground for the last time. That take me ten minutes to +mount upstairs to bed. I haven't been further'n this here lawn these +twelve months. So I can't come and see you, Sir Wilton; and I should +like another word or two now we're on the subject. You see, he was here +a good bit when the boy was bad, and even I don't feel all I did about +him, though forgive him I never shall on earth. At the same time I'd +like to see him have his church. That'd want consecrating again, sir, I +suppose?" + +"I suppose it would." + +"Would the bishop do it, think you?" + +"Like a shot," said Sir Wilton, a touch of pique in his tone. "I had +some correspondence with him years ago about this matter, and I was +surprised at the view the bishop took. He will come, if he is alive." + +Jasper had taken his eyes from Sir Wilton's face at last; they were +resting on the level sunlit land beyond the river. "That'll be a great +day for Long Stow," he murmured almost to himself; and suddenly his lips +came tight together at the corners. + +"It should be a very interesting ceremony," said Sir Wilton, foreseeing +his part in it. He had forgiven his enemy, the scandalous clergyman who +had lived down a scandal and a tragedy; it was Sir Wilton who had helped +him to live them down. Not at first; then he had been adamant; but his +justice in the beginning was only equalled by his generosity in the end, +when the man had proved his manhood, and the sinner had atoned for his +sin, so far as atonement was possible in this world. That poor +pertinacious devil had been five years running up the walls. Sir Wilton +Gleed had thrown his money and his influence into the scale, and +finished the whole thing in less than five months. They were saying all +this at the opening ceremony; everybody was there. His magnanimity was +being talked of in the same breath with the parson's pluck. The bishop +was his guest. + +"A very interesting ceremony," repeated Sir Wilton. "We could have it at +Christmas, if not before." + +"That won't see me," said Jasper Musk. "I couldn't get, even if I wanted +to. But sciatica that don't kill, and I hope to live to see the day." +And again the corners of his mouth were much compressed. + +"Yet you think you can never forgive him?" + +Sir Wilton felt that he could not be the bearer of too much good-will, +now that he was about it; but Musk turned his eyes full upon him, and +there was a queer hard light in them. + +"I don't think," said he. "I know." + +And so it fell out that in an hour of unusual depression, and of natural +hesitation which was yet not natural in Robert Carlton, he looked up +suddenly and once more saw his enemy in the sanctuary which would soon +be his very own leafy sanctuary no longer. Carlton had come there to +meditate and to pray, but not to work. That sort of work was not for him +any more. Others must take it up; the time was ripe; only the beginning +was hard. And here was Sir Wilton Gleed advancing towards him. + +And Sir Wilton was holding out his hand. + + + + +XXIX + +A HAVEN OF HEARTS + + +Slower to decide than most young persons of her independent character, +Gwynneth was one of those who are none the less capable of decisive +conduct in a definite emergency. She behaved with spirit in the +predicament in which her weakness and her strength had combined to place +her. She had jilted Sidney; outsiders might not know it; but she had +treated him in a way which he and his were never likely to forgive. +After that, and that alone, his home could not have been her home any +more; but Gwynneth had other and even stronger reasons for determining +to leave Long Stow; and there were none why she should not. She had her +money. She was of age. She would be a good riddance now. It was her +first thought in the garden. The thought hardened to resolve while +Sidney, full of bitterness and champagne, was still galling his hired +horse back to Cambridge. Gwynneth also was gone within the week. + +It was a chance acquaintance to whom the girl had written in her need. +She had met in Leipzig a strangely interesting woman: commanding, +mysterious, self-contained. This lady, a Mrs. Molyneux by name, had +taken notice of Gwynneth, and, at the close of their short acquaintance, +had given her a card inscribed in pencil with the name of St. Hilda's +Hospital, Campden Hill. + +"You have never heard of it," Mrs. Molyneux had said with a smile; "but +I shall be very glad if you will come and see me and my hospital some +day when you are in town." + +Gwynneth had felt honoured, she could scarcely have said why, for she +knew no more of this lady than she had seen for herself, which was +really very little. But there is a kind of distinction which appeals to +the instinct rather than to the conscious perceptions, and Gwynneth had +felt both awed and flattered by an invitation which was obviously +sincere. She had said that she should love to see the hospital--and had +never been near it yet. + +"I don't know whether you have ever thought of being a nurse," Mrs. +Molyneux had added with Gwynneth's hand in hers; "but if you ever +should--or if ever you want to do something, and don't know what else to +do--I wish you would write to me, and let me be your friend." + +The second invitation had been given with a wonderfully understanding +look--a look which seemed to sift the secrets of Gwynneth's heart--a +look she would not have cared to meet during the late season. She had +promised again, however, very gratefully indeed; and it was her second +promise that Gwynneth eventually kept. + +"I had such a strong feeling about you," Mrs. Molyneux wrote by return. +"I knew that I should hear from you sooner or later . . . I like your +frankness in saying that it is no fine impulse, or love of nursing for +its own sake, that makes you wish to come. I do not seek to know what it +is. Even if you are no nurse you can play the organ in our little chapel +as it has not been played yet; and that would be very much to me. So +come any day and make your home with us at least for a time." The writer +contrived to refer to herself as "Reverend Mother," in emphatic +capitals, and her letter was signed "Constance Molyneux, Mother in God." + +It happened that Gwynneth had spoken of Mrs. Molyneux to her aunt, who +knew a good name when she heard it, and had often asked Gwynneth if she +was not going to pay that call on Campden Hill; thus her recklessness in +casting herself among strangers was more apparent than real, and little +likely to aggravate her prime offence against kith and kin. Nor did it; +nevertheless it was a plunge into all but unknown waters. The hospital +was a private one, and Mrs. Molyneux both spoke and wrote of it as her +own. It was a cancer hospital for women, evidently run upon religious +lines, and those not easy to define, since Gwynneth happened to know +that the Reverend Mother was not a Roman Catholic. And these things were +all she did know when her hansom drew up before a red-brick building +with ecclesiastical windows, and a cross over the door, in a leafy road +not five minutes' climb from Kensington High Street. + +Gwynneth pulled the wrought-iron bell-handle, and next moment caught her +breath. The door had been opened by a portress in austere but becoming +garb, a young girl like herself, and the pretty face between the quaint +cap and collar was smiling a sweet greeting to the newcomer. A few worn +steps of snowy stone, and a Gothic doorway, with the oak door standing +open, showed more girls within against the wainscot; all were pretty; +and all wore blue serge, with white aprons and long cambric cuffs, +square bib-collars trimmed with lace, and Normandy caps with streamers +of fine lawn. Gwynneth blushed for her own conventional attire, as she +was ushered through this hall, past a dispensary where another of the +uniformed girls was busy among the bottles, and so into the presence of +the Reverend Mother. + +Mrs. Molyneux, the well-dressed woman of the world whom Gwynneth had +known in Leipzig, was a lost identity in a habit which marked her sway +only by its supreme severity; an order of St. John of Jerusalem hung +upon her bosom, and a crucifix dangled at her side. Her hands were +hidden beneath some short and shapeless garment reaching to the waist, +but one emerged for a moment to greet Gwynneth warmly. "Do you feel as +if you had come into a convent?" the Reverend Mother asked, a gentle +humour in her lowered voice. It was exactly what Gwynneth did feel, and +the sensation was by no means displeasing to her. The Mother herself +then showed Gwynneth over the establishment, which was indeed a singular +amalgam of the hospital and the nunnery. The dining-room was termed the +"refectory"; a cross hung over every bed in the wards upstairs, and in +the nurses' cubicles below the wards. Cap and apron, bib-collar and +cuffs, were laid out on Gwynneth's bed, and these she found herself +expected to don then and there. The Mother returned when she was ready, +and showed her the chapel last of all. It was a tiny chapel, but as +beautiful as antique carving, rich embroidery, much stained glass, and +hanging lights could make it. In her innocence Gwynneth wondered why +these lights were burning while the summer sun, shining through the +stained glass, filled the chapel with vivid beams of purple and red. She +was even puzzled by the unmistakable odour of recent incense; but she +said, with truth, that the chapel delighted her. + +"I knew it would," the Mother whispered with her penetrating smile. + +"How could you know?" Gwynneth asked, smiling also, because she had +never touched on religion with Mrs. Molyneux. + +"I saw you once in the English church," the Mother said. "It was before +I knew you; and yet, you see, I did know you, even then!" + +In this chapel there were daily matins, vespers, nones; and at each of +the three services attendance was compulsory on the part of all nurses +not required at an actual deathbed, and of all patients who were still +up and about. French-capped, pink-frocked maid-servants and ward-maids +filled the front rows of chairs; the patients sat behind; and on either +hand, in the carved oak stalls, were the pretty nurses, the Reverend +Mother near the entrance in their midst. The services, conducted by an +attendant Anglican of small account, were punctuated by genuflexions and +the sacred sign; and it was impossible to follow them in the Book of +Common Prayer. + +Gwynneth tried hard to lift up her heart in this strange sanctuary. She +longed for real religion as she had longed for little in her life +before. At the first blush, it seemed as though Providence alone could +have led her into so unique a haven of equal sanctity and usefulness; +and yet, also from the first, the girl was repelled a little if +attracted more. She liked her work; she was a natural nurse, and soon +grew used, but never hardened, to hopeless suffering and slow death. +There were patients who loved Gwynneth, and not a nurse who was not fond +of her, before she had been at St. Hilda's a month. Already she was +playing the organ at all three services, and her own music, and the +voices floating up to her, at these set times, filled her heart with +peace; but she wondered if it was the right kind of peace; she wondered +whether this was religion at all. Sometimes the sweet little chapel--for +it was all that to Gwynneth's mind--struck her also as a stage of +studied effects. The nurses were so pretty, their garb so becoming, and +the blue of it had such a perfect foil in the maid-servants' pink. But +then the Reverend Mother, in her sombre supremacy, gradually revealed +herself as the superb mistress of deliberate effect; and a strange study +Gwynneth found her; of foibles and fascination all compact; at once +subtle, simple, vain, and noble. It appeared that Mrs. Molyneux was an +extremely wealthy widow, whose one consoling hobby was this anomalous +retreat upon Campden Hill. + +The patients paid nothing; the nurses received nothing; it was a retreat +for both, and Gwynneth was not the only one who had sought it +primarily, and frankly, for peace of mind and salvation from self. Her +hands at least were not the less tender and untiring on that account. +Some of her capped and cuffed comrades were no older than herself; many +were refreshingly frivolous, and properly free from care. Gwynneth's +chief crony was Nurse Ella, a bright young widow, who wore spectacles, +and declared herself unable to understand what the Reverend Mother had +ever seen in her, as she was neither pretty nor religious, nor as young +as the rest. + +Nurse Ella had, however, a shrewd wit and a sharp tongue; made wicked +fun of the Mother's sacerdotal pretensions when alone with Gwynneth; and +thus stimulated the latter to think for herself, if only to refute her +friend's arguments. Nurse Ella was above all things an extraordinarily +decided character, aggressively so in immaterial issues, but good for +Gwynneth by that very fact. + +These opposites became fast friends. Often they would talk over the +refectory fire--a wood fire in an ancient grate, which cast the right +mediaeval glow over the polished floor and the dark wainscotting--long +after the others were in their cubicles. Nurse Ella had the greatest +scorn for the conventual side of St. Hilda's, which Gwynneth would +defend warmly, while her heart admitted more than her lips; the +discussion would ramify, and become animated on both sides; then all at +once Nurse Ella would look at her watch, and no persuasion would induce +her to stay another minute. Gwynneth could have sat up half the night, +and would plead in vain for ten minutes more; it seldom took Nurse Ella +as many seconds to suit her action to her word. She said she would do a +thing, and did it; that was Nurse Ella's principle in life. + +So there was no exchange of confidences between these two, both reticent +natures, and neither unduly inquisitive about the other's affairs. +Gwynneth only knew that her friend's married life had been a very short +one; for her own part, she had said nothing to let Nurse Ella suppose +that she had herself been even asked in marriage. But one night they +were speaking of another nurse, who had left St. Hilda's that day, in +floods of tears, to be married the following week. + +"If I felt like that," Gwynneth had declared, "I wouldn't be married at +all." + +Nurse Ella looked up quickly, her glasses flaming in the firelight. +"What, not after you had given your word?" said she. + +"Certainly not, if I felt I had made a mistake." Gwynneth was staring +into the fire. + +"You would break your solemn promise in a thing like that?" the other +persisted. + +"Better one promise than two lives," replied Gwynneth, with oracular +brevity. Nurse Ella watched her in sidelong astonishment. + +"It's easy to talk, my dear! I believe you are the last person who would +do anything so dishonourable." + +"I don't call it dishonourable." + +"But it is, to break your word." + +"Suppose you have changed?" + +"You have no business to change. Say you'll do a thing, and do it." + +The spectacled face had assumed a rigid cast which Gwynneth knew well, +and for which Nurse Ella had just the chin. + +"But supposing you never really loved----" + +"Love is an inexact term; it's not always easy to tell when it applies +to your feelings, and when it does not. But when you say you'll marry +anybody, that's a definite promise, and nothing in the world should make +you break it, unless it's been extracted under false pretences. We are +both very positive, aren't we?" and Nurse Ella smiled. "I wonder why you +are, Gwynneth?" + +"Because," said the girl, impelled to frankness, yet hanging her head, +"as a matter of fact, I've been more or less engaged myself." + +"And you got out of it?" + +"I broke it off." + +"Simply because you had changed?" + +"No--it was a mistake from the beginning. I had never really cared. That +was my shame." + +"And you broke your word--you had the courage!" + +The tone was a low one of mere surprise. There was more in the look +which accompanied the tone. But Gwynneth had her eyes turned inward, and +her wonder was not yet. + +"It had to be done," she said simply. "It was humiliating enough, but it +was not so bad as going on . . . Can anything be so bad as marrying a +man you do not love, just because you have made a mistake, and are too +proud to admit it?" + +"No . . . you are right . . . that is the worst of all." + +It might have been a studied picture that the two young women made, in +the old oak room, with the firelight falling on their quaint sweet garb, +and reddening their pensive faces, only conscious of the inner self. +Nurse Ella was standing up, gazing down into the fire, her back turned +to Gwynneth; but now her tone was enough. It was neither wistful nor +bitter, but only heavy with conviction; and in another moment Nurse Ella +was gone, not more abruptly than usual, but without letting Gwynneth see +her face again. Then Gwynneth recalled the look with which the other had +exclaimed upon her courage, and either she flattered herself, or that +look had been one of envy pure and simple. Could it be that her friend's +decided character was all self-conscious and acquired? Was her +intolerance of the slightest hesitation, in matters of no account, a +life's reaction from a fatal irresolution in some crisis of her own +career? + +Gwynneth never knew; for a fine mutual reserve distinguished the +intimacy of this pair, and even drew them together, opposite as they +were in so many other respects, more than impulsive confidences on +either side. One had suffered; the other was suffering now; each was a +little mystery to her friend. And there was one more reason for this: +neither was sure of the other's sympathy: at every point of contact they +diverged. + +So Gwynneth used to wonder whether Nurse Ella was in reality a widow at +all, and Nurse Ella was quite sure that Gwynneth was still in love, +probably with the man she had jilted, according to the wise way of +women; she was so ready to speak of love in the abstract; and once she +spoke so passionately. This was in Kensington Gardens, one foggy Sunday, +when the two nurses were on their way to church; for they were allowed +to worship where they listed after matins at St. Hilda's. Nurse Ella +rented a sitting under a fashionable preacher who discoursed with much +wisdom and some acidity on topics of the hour; but Gwynneth was still +seeking her spiritual ideal. They would walk together as far as the +Bayswater Road, where their ways diverged, unless Nurse Ella could +induce Gwynneth to go with her; on this particular morning they were +arguing about a novel when the houses loomed upon them through the bare +trees and the fog. + +"She never would have forgiven him," Nurse Ella had declared, in crisp +settlement of the point at issue. "No young wife would forgive a young +husband who behaved like that. So it may be the cleverest novel in the +language, but it isn't true to life." Whereupon Gwynneth, who had been +defending a masterpiece with laudable spirit, walked some yards in +silence. "Are you sure that it matters how people behave," she then +inquired, "if you really love them?" + +"How they behave?" echoed her friend. "Why, Gwynneth, of course! Nothing +does matter except behaviour." + +"It wouldn't to me," Gwynneth exclaimed, almost through her teeth. + +"But surely what one does is everything!" + +"Not in love," averred Gwynneth, whose convictions were few but firm; +"and those two are more in love than any other couple I know in fiction +or real life. No; you love people for what they are, not for what they +do." + +Nurse Ella laughed outright. + +"That may be good metaphysics," said she, "but it's shocking +common-sense! Our actions are the only possible test of our character, +as its fruit is the only test of a tree." + +In Gwynneth's eyes burnt wondrous fires, and on her cheeks; and her +breath was coming very quickly. But most persons look straight ahead as +they walk and talk, and between these two fell the kindly fog besides. + +"Suppose you loved somebody," the young girl cried at last; "and +suppose you suddenly discovered he had once done something +dreadful--unspeakable. Would that alter your feeling towards him?" + +"It could never fail to do so, Gwynneth." + +"It would not alter mine!" + +Nurse Ella turned her head. But in the road the fog seemed thicker than +in the gardens. And, apart from its vigour, Gwynneth's tone had sounded +impersonal enough. + +"I believe it would," her friend persisted, "when the time came." + +"And I know that it would not," said Gwynneth, half under her breath and +half through her teeth. + +"Well, Gwynneth," said Nurse Ella, with a laugh, "we were evidently born +to differ. In my view that would be the one sort of excuse for changing +one's mind about a man--whereas you see others!" + +"But I am not talking about one's mind," cried Gwynneth; "the feeling I +mean, the feeling those two have in the book, lies infinitely deeper +than the mind." + +"And no crime could alter it?" + +"Not if he atoned--not if the rest of his life were one long atonement." + +"But, Gwynneth, that would make all the difference." + +Gwynneth walked on in silence. She was reconsidering her own last words. + +"Atonement or no atonement," she exclaimed at length, "it would make no +difference--if I loved the man. Atonement or no atonement!" repeated +Gwynneth defiantly. + +Nurse Ella had a passion for the last word, but they were come to her +corner, and there was Gwynneth glowing through the fog, her eyes alight, +her cheeks flaming, a new being in the puzzled eyes of her friend. + +"Come with me, Gwynneth," begged Nurse Ella, at length; "don't go off by +yourself. Come, dear, and hear a shrewd, hard-headed sermon, without +sentiment or superstition!" + +Gwynneth smiled. That was the last thing to meet her mood. + +"Then where shall you go?" + +"Either St. Simeon's or All Souls'," said Gwynneth. "I haven't made up +my mind." + +Nurse Ella shook her head over an admission as characteristic as her +disapproval. This was the Gwynneth that she knew. + +"When do you make it up!" exclaimed Nurse Ella without inquiry. + +"When it's a matter of the least importance," said Gwynneth, choosing to +reply. "What can it signify which church I go to, what difference can it +possibly make? As a matter of fact I rather think of going to All +Souls'." + +"I thought you didn't care about music and nothing else?" + +"I don't know that there is nothing else. I think of going to see. I +have often thought of it before, but St. Simeon's is rather nearer, and +I generally end by going there. I shall decide on the way." + +"What a girl you are, Gwynneth!" exclaimed Nurse Ella, with frank +impatience. "You never seem to know your own mind--never!" + +Gwynneth made no reply; but she kindled afresh, and this time very +tenderly, as she went her own way through the fog. + + + + +XXX + +THE WOMAN'S HOUR + + +All Souls' was dark and hazy with its share of the ubiquitous fog, here +a little aggravated by the subtle fumes of incense newly burnt. In the +haze hung quivering constellations of sallow gaslight, and through it +gleamed an embroidered frontal, and the silken backs of praying priests, +lit by candles four. Delicate strains came from an invisible organ; a +light patter and a rich rustling from the feet and garments of some +departing after matins, some taking their places for choral eucharist, +women to the left, men to the right. Men and women, goers and comers +alike, with few exceptions, bowed the knee with Romish humility at the +first or the last glimpse of that shimmering frontal with the four +candles above and the motionless vestments below. + +The congregation was one of well-dressed women and well-to-do men; their +quiet devotion was not the less noteworthy on that account. A fine +reverence animated every face: the stray observer would have missed the +passive countenance of the merely pious, as Gwynneth did, and discovered +in its stead the happy ardour of those whose religion was a delight +rather than a duty. Yet the congregation took scarcely any part in the +actual service. Few untrained voices joined in the exquisite singing; +few, in the body of the church, left their places to take part in the +sacred climax. The congregation might have been only an audience; yet +somehow it was not. Somehow also there was nothing spectacular in an +office of equal dignity, distinction, and fervour. + +Yet the yellow lights in a yellow fog, the perfect organ, trained +voices, rich embroideries, incense, genuflexions, all these seemed at +one religious pole; and Long Stow church on a summer's day, with the sky +above and the birds singing, and Mr. Carlton in his surplice in the sun, +surely that was at the other! It was Gwynneth's fate, at all events, to +carry that single service in her heart and mind for ever, and to put +every other one against it. She did so now, involuntarily at first, and +then unwillingly, as she knelt or stood at the end of her row--her +cambric cuffs and fine lawn streamers in high relief against the rich +furs and the sombre feathers of those about her. + +On the other side of the nave, far back and close to the wall, a +grizzled gentleman stood and knelt by turns, in much obscurity; and his +attention never flagged. No detail of the elaborate ritual appeared +unfamiliar to this worshipper, and yet for a time his expression was +rather that of the alien critic. Gradually, however, the lines +disappeared from his forehead, his eyes opened wider, and brightened +with the peaceful ardour which he himself had already remarked in the +eyes of others. He was a tall thin man, very weather-beaten and rather +bent, wearing a new overcoat and a soft muffler; there was nothing in +his appearance to declare him of the cloth himself. His grey beard was +close trimmed. He wore gloves and carried a tall hat shoulder high in +the press going out. He was no more readily recognisable as the lonely +builder of Long Stow church, than Gwynneth in her nurse's garb as the +niece of Sir Wilton Gleed. But their separate fates brought them face to +face in the porch, and recognition was immediate on both sides. + +"Miss Gleed?" said Robert Carlton, raising his hat before it covered his +grey hairs. + +"Mr. Carlton!" she exclaimed in turn. There had been no time to think, +and her voice told only of her surprise; her own ear noticed it, and she +had time to marvel at herself. + +"I thought I could not be mistaken," Carlton was saying. And they were +shaking hands. + +"I never expected to see you here," said Gwynneth, with a strange +emphasis, as though the declaration were due to herself. + +"I never thought of coming until an hour or two ago." + +No more had Gwynneth: then the miracle was twofold. Her heart gave +thanks. It was not afraid. + +Meanwhile the crowd was carrying them gently, insensibly, but side by +side, across the flagged yard to the gate. + +"It's the first Sunday I've spent in town for years," observed Carlton; +"you are here altogether, I believe?" + +"Well, for some years, at least. I am learning to be a nurse." + +And Gwynneth blushed for her conspicuous attire, just as Carlton gave a +downward glance at the quaint cap on a level with his shoulder. + +"So I heard," he said. "May I ask which hospital you are at?" He could +recall none where the uniform was so picturesque. + +"You would not know it, Mr. Carlton; it is a private hospital on Campden +Hill." + +They had passed through the gate, and they paused with one consent. + +"Are you returning there now, Miss Gleed?" + +"Yes--through the gardens." + +"Then so far our way is the same." He did not ask whether he might +accompany her, but took the outer edge of the pavement as a matter of +course. "I am staying at Charing Cross," he explained as they walked; +"early this morning I went to the abbey. I did mean to go back there; +then I suddenly thought I should like to come here instead. I was once +one of the assistant clergy at this church." + +"I know," said Gwynneth. She would not deny it. That was why she had so +often thought of coming to All Souls'--only to resist the temptation +time and time again. Why, to-day of all days, had she been unable to +resist? Why had she thought of him this morning, and why had the thought +been so strong? These were questions for a lifetime's consideration. Now +she was walking at his side. + +"It was strange to go back there after so many years," pursued Carlton, +with the fine unguarded candour which he had brought back with him into +the world; "that service, in particular, was very strange to me. I did +not care for it at first. It seemed so artificial after our simple +service in the country. Then I looked at the faces of the men near me, +and I saw how narrow one can get. It was not artificial to them; it was +only beautiful; and there lies the root of the whole matter. Simple +services for simple folk--that is my watchword now--but beauty, +brightness, elaboration by all means for those who need it and can +appreciate it. It is the right thing for these rich congregations of +hard-worked professional men and busy society women; the trappings of +their religious life must not compare meanly with those of their daily +lives; let us order God's house as we would our own. But the opposite is +the case--though the principle is the same--with a primitive country +parish like ours at Long Stow . . . And yet I had not the wit to see +that when I went there first." + +He was musing aloud as men seldom do unless very sure of their audience. +How came he to be so sure of Gwynneth? They had seen nothing of each +other; this was the first time they had been alone together long enough +to exchange ideas; yet in a moment he was revealing his as few men do to +more than one woman in the world. And the one woman's heart was singing +at his side. + +She was with him; that was enough. Already it was the sweetest hour of +all her life; for the thought of him had haunted her for months, and was +full of pain; but in his presence all pain passed away. That was so +wonderful to Gwynneth! So wonderful was it that she herself was aware of +it at the time; it was her one great discovery and surprise. To be with +him was to forget all that he had ever done, all that she had never +before forgotten--the good with the evil. It was to sweep aside the +earthly and the palpable, to feel the divine domination of spirit over +spirit, and the peace which comes with even the secret surrender of soul +to soul. Hers was a conscious surrender, and Gwynneth made it without +shame. Since it was her secret, why should she be ashamed? She was +exalted, exultant, and yet serene. She might carry her secret to the +grave; her life would be the richer for it, for these few minutes, for +every word he spoke. So she caught each one as it fell, and laid the +treasure in her heart, even while she listened for the next. + +But in a minute they were come as far as he intended to escort her; +there were the palings and the stark trees close upon them in the fog; +and an omnibus passing, huge as a house. Gwynneth had been treading thin +air; now she was back in the sticky streets, inhaling the raw mist, to +exhale it in clouds under a microscopic magenta sun. They had stopped at +the corner; he was hesitating: her breath disappeared. + +"I have to get over to that side sooner or later," he said. "I may just +as well walk across with you, if you don't mind." + +"I shall be delighted," said Gwynneth, frankly, brightly; but her breath +came like a puff of smoke, and she felt her colour come with it as they +crossed the road. + +"I want to tell you about the church," he said, as they entered upon the +broad walk. "This is the first Sunday that I haven't taken service there +since the beginning of August." + +"The first!" exclaimed Gwynneth. "Have you actually gone on up to now +without a roof?" + +Carlton turned in his stride. + +"But we have a roof, Miss Gleed!" + +"You have one?" + +"It has been on some weeks." + +Gwynneth was standing quite still. "Do you mean to say that the church +is finished?" she cried, incredulous. + +"Yes," said Carlton; "thank God, I can say that at last." + +"But it seems such a short time! I don't understand. It seemed +impossible to me--by yourself?" + +"Oh, but I have not been by myself. I have had help." + +"At last!" + +"I wonder you have not heard. Everybody has helped me--everybody!" + +"Do you mean--my people--among others?" + +And Gwynneth preferred walking on to facing him here. + +"Is it possible you haven't heard?" exclaimed Carlton, incredulous in +turn. + +"Not a word," replied Gwynneth, bitterly. "They never write." + +But her bitterness was new-born of her indignation, not that they never +wrote, but that they had not written to tell her this. He told her +himself with much feeling and more embarrassment. + +"Why, Miss Gleed, I owe everything to Sir Wilton! It is the last thing I +ever--I can hardly realise it yet--or trust myself to speak of it to +you. My heart is so full! But it is Sir Wilton who has finished the +church; he came to me, and he took it over. He called for tenders; he +poured in workmen; the place has been like a hive. So the roof was on in +a month; and we never missed a Sunday, we had one service all the time; +but now we have three and four--thanks entirely to Sir Wilton Gleed!" + +He paused. But Gwynneth had nothing to say, and his embarrassment +increased. It was so hard to speak of Sir Wilton's magnanimity without +alluding to his previous attitude, and thus indirectly to its notorious +cause; and Carlton could not see that his companion was entirely taken +up with his news, could not realise the surprise it was to her, or +apprehend for a moment what impression it had made. He might, however, +have had some inkling of her view from the manner in which Gwynneth +eventually said that she was glad to hear her uncle had done something. + +"Something?" echoed Carlton. "He has done everything, and it is like his +generosity that you should hear it first from me!" + +Gwynneth shook her head unseen, though now he was looking at her, his +eyebrows raised; but she seemed intent upon picking her steps through +the thin mud of the broad walk. + +"And what that is like," continued Carlton, "from my point of view, you +will see when I tell you why I am in town to-day. It is the first Sunday +I have missed; but Mr. Preston of Linkworth and other friends are kindly +dividing my duty between them. Sir Wilton has arranged that, by the way. +He telegraphed yesterday to save me the journey; for I was going down +for the day, and returning to-morrow. Yet I came up last Monday, and am +still hard at work--buying for the new church." + +Gwynneth asked what it was that he had to buy; but her tone was so +mechanical that Robert Carlton did not at once reply. He was beginning +to feel strangely disappointed, to wish that he had gone his own gait to +Charing Cross, or at least held his peace about the church. But there +was one point upon which he felt constrained to convince his companion +before they parted; he might do more than justice to an absent man; but +she should not do less. And the spire of St. Mary Abbot's was already +dimly discernible through the yellow haze. + +"There is nothing we have not to buy, for the interior," he said at +length. "The lectern is the one exception, and I have had it +straightened and lacquered into a new thing. Sir Wilton wanted me to +keep it as it was; but that would never have done. However, he would +have an inscription to the effect that it is the same lectern which was +in the fire, which is quite a sufficient advertisement of the fact. I +was in favour of restoring the communion plate also, but Sir Wilton +insisted on presenting us with a new set, which I have been choosing +among other things this week. The other things are too numerous to +mention--carpets, curtains, collecting-boxes, alms-bags, a Litany desk, +and the hundred and one things you take for granted as part of the +church itself. But each has to be chosen and bought, and I only wish +that I had had your help. I have found the best things most difficult to +choose--the plate and a very handsome cross and candlesticks of polished +brass--all of which are my choice, but Sir Wilton's gift. So is the +organ which is being built for us. Can you wonder, then, that his +generosity has moved me more than I can possibly tell you?" + +"Indeed, no!" cried Gwynneth, in her own kind voice; but her honour was +all for the man who claimed it for another; and, until she opened them +now, her lips had been pursed in mute rebellion. She could fancy so much +that the true generosity would never even see! Gwynneth had not that +sort herself; she did not profess to have it. On the other hand, she was +anxious to be fair, even in her own mind; so she asked a question or two +concerning the hired and skilled labour which had been thrown into the +scale with such effect; and, after all, it appeared that Sir Wilton +Gleed had not paid for this. + +"But he wanted to," said Carlton, quickly. "It was not his fault that I +would not hear of his doing so; it was my obstinacy, because I had set +my heart on rebuilding the church myself, in one sense or the other." + +"Yet you said he took it over from you!" + +"So he did, Miss Gleed. He lent me his influence and support; that was +much more to me than the money, which I had and didn't want. Besides, he +is a business man, which I am not, and he did take the whole business +off my hands. That is what I meant." + +Gwynneth wondered whether it was what the countryside understood; but +said no more about the matter. She had other things to think of during +their last moments together; for she had stopped at the corner near the +palace; nor did she mean to let him accompany her any further. She was +still so decided and serene. She was still exalted and strengthened out +of all self-knowledge in the quiet presence of the man she loved, and +must love for ever, even though her love were to remain her heart's +prisoner for this life. This life was not all. + +So it was that she could look her last upon him, perhaps for ever, with +her own face transfigured and beautified by a joy not of earth alone: so +it was that she could speak to him, and hear him speak, without a tremor +to the end. + +His church was to be consecrated that day week--Advent Sunday. The +bishop was coming to perform the ceremony; his voice softened as he +spoke of the bishop, who was to be his own guest at the rectory. His +face shone as he added that. It was going to be a very simple ceremony. +And here something set him twisting at one of his gloves; then suddenly +he looked Gwynneth in the eyes. + +"You don't happen to be coming down, Miss Gleed?" + +"I don't think it very likely." + +"It--it wouldn't of course be worth your while----" + +"It would! It would! It would be more than worth it; but, to be quite +frank, I don't know that I shall ever come down again, Mr. Carlton." + +Was he sorry? He did not even show surprise; and not a word more: for he +had heard stray words in Long Stow concerning Gwynneth's departure and +its reason as alleged. "I should have liked you to see the church," was +all he said. + +"And do you know," rejoined Gwynneth, speaking out her mind at last, +"that I am in no great hurry to see it? I know it is foolish of me--for +no one man could have finished such a work--no other man living would +have got as far as you did without a soul to help you! Yet somehow I +don't so much want to see the church that they came in and finished; it +would spoil the picture that I can see so plainly now, and always +shall--of the stones you cut and the walls you built with your own two +hands--and every other hand against you!" + +She was holding out her own. Carlton looked from it to her face, a +strange surprise in his eyes. He had wriggled out of one of his gloves, +and was twisting it round the iron paling at the corner where they +stood. + +"May I come no further?" he said. + +"No, I could not think of taking you another yard out of your way. And +it is really not so very many yards from where we stand!" + +Gwynneth smiled brightly; but her voice was the very firm one of this +half-hour of her existence. And ever afterwards she was to marvel why +neither smile nor words were an effort to her at the time: so his +presence supported her to the end, when the clasp of that indomitable +hand, now bare, and horny even through her glove, left Gwynneth +outwardly unmoved. She returned his pressure with honest warmth; her +smile was kind and bright; then the cold mist fell between them in a +widening yellow gulf, with a diminishing patter of firm footsteps, that +Carlton could hear when the nurse's streamers had quite disappeared in +the fog. + +And he stood where he was to hear the last of her; and still he stood, +wishing he had disregarded tact, and persisted in his escort, whether it +embarrassed her or not, if only to find out where her hospital was. He +felt inclined to call before leaving town; already there was something +that he wished he had said; he kept saying it to himself as he wandered +back through dark gardens and a desert park. + +"So you prefer to think of it before the roof was on, as I managed to +make it by myself! You are the first to say that or to feel it--except +me! And I have put the feeling down; thank God, I have got it under; yet +it is a help to know that one other felt the same. Perhaps it was a +human feeling; but in me at least it was unworthy. God help me! But in +you it is sweet, and to me very wonderful . . . that you should +understand and sympathise . . . a young girl like you!" + +This whole fatality left the man sadly unsettled; tired and yet restless +in body and soul; humbly thankful for a woman's sympathy after so long, +and so much, yet the prey of a new depression. A woman's sympathy! Or +was it only a woman's pity? No, she understood; but it mattered little +to Robert Carlton; there could be no second woman in his life. That he +had always felt; but he was not sure that he had ever before defined the +feeling. It was a part of his eternal punishment; but he was quite sure +that he had not previously regarded it in that light. + +A coxcomb Carlton had never been; he had no suspicion of the kind of +impression he had made upon Gwynneth; his sole concern was the +impression which she had made on him. Like the rest of the world, she +was flying to extremes; only in her case, if she especially magnified +the good, it was because she was still ignorant of the original evil. It +could be nothing else; but his feeling about himself was more complex. +He alone knew how much or how little of the highest and the best in him +had redeemed that passion born of passion which had blighted his life. +It was of further significance that for years Carlton had not looked +upon his life as blighted. The blight fell upon the shining vision of +the woman he could have loved. And all had been so sudden that the man +was dazed. + +He could not eat, though he was hungry; nor rest, though tired to the +bone. He would go out again. It was good to be out, even in a London +fog, which was nothing to the fogs he remembered, for there was no +question of groping one's way; one could see it for fifty yards, often +for more. But now there was not even a small magenta sun; it was the +middle of the brief December afternoon when Robert Carlton left his +hotel; and near its close before he found himself in Kensington Gardens +once more. He hardly knew what brought him there. It was partly, but not +altogether, a sentimental impulse. Carlton had also some idea of finding +the hospital if he could, some hope of seeing Gwynneth again, if only to +assure himself that his imaginings of the last few hours had made her +other than what she was. And then he could rectify those omissions of +the morning; but neither was this all; a strong inexplicable attraction +drew him straight to the spot where he had stood so long after Gwynneth +was gone. + +And Gwynneth herself was standing there again! + +He was almost upon her before he saw her in the dusk, then those long +lawn streamers leapt like lightning to his eyes; and now he was creeping +backwards across the path. But she had not heard him, or she did not +heed: her back was turned, and bent, for she was leaning over the iron +paling which he had grasped before. And she shook with tears. + +Carlton was shaking, too; passion had taken him by the shoulders, and +was shaking the strength out of his heart. Horror had driven him back, +passion was spurring him on again. If she loved him--if she loved +him--then the hand of God was in all this. + +He was back upon the spot where recognition had come. Oh, yes, it was +she! She had given a little cry; she was stooping lower over the paling; +her voice was unmistakable. Then she rose, half turning, and he saw her +profile plain. She was raising something to her eyes; in another moment +it was at her lips, and she was kissing it, and sobbing over it, +whatever it might be. + +Carlton thought he knew what it was, and conceived a new horror of +himself in his involuntary capacity of spy. Yet instinctively he was +feeling in both overcoat pockets at once; in one there was a single +glove; in the other nothing at all. Cold with shame, but shivering with +excitement, the man stood torn between the newborn desire of his eyes, +and the fixed resolve of his soul. But he could not tear himself from +the spot--nor was it any longer necessary. Gwynneth was gone herself; +gone without seeing him; out of sight this time in an instant. And +Robert Carlton, white, trembling, but himself--the man with a will at +least--was listening a second time to the failing music of her feet, his +own planted firmly on the walk. + + + + +XXXI + +ADVENT EVE + + +The bishop arrived on the Saturday afternoon. He was still the same +little old man, with the side-whiskers and the long mouth, the queer +voice and the ungainly limp; and Robert Carlton found him neither more +nor less cordial than at their last dread interview; but he asked to see +the church before it was too dark. + +All was in readiness at last. But the cocoanut matting in the aisle and +transepts, and the maroon axminster in the chancel, had only been laid +that day. As yet there was no stained glass, and only the east window +and the west were mullioned as of old; but through the latter a wintry +sun poured thick red beams, already too much aslant to touch the floor, +but just falling upon the altar with its glimmering candlesticks, its +rich green cover, its violet frontal, all three gifts from the hall. The +bishop heard this without remark, his mouth a mere seam. But he approved +of the rows of rush-seated chairs in place of pews, and he admired the +simple pulpit of pitch pine. There was a pleasant smell of pitch pine in +the church. All the woodwork was of this wood, including the ceiling and +all panelling; and the pores of the fragrant timber were not stopped up +with varnish. The new red hassocks looked very bright under each chair, +and the new black prayer-books shone like polished jet on the book-rests +behind them. In the south transept, a space was boarded off for the new +organ; and here chaos had still a corner to itself; nor was either the +lighting or the heating apparatus quite complete. Oil-stoves were +already burning, however, at various points, and their odour compared +unfavourably with that of the pitch pine. + +"I do not want you to catch cold to-morrow," said Carlton, as he locked +the door behind them when they left. + +"Tut!" said the bishop, "I am not such an old man that you need coddle +me." + +Nor did he look a day older for all these years, as they went out +together into the raw red sunset. But Robert Carlton seemed almost to +have caught him up: he had come back from London so haggard and +hollow-eyed. + +They talked very little until the evening. Carlton had servants now, +that very widow who had been the first to desert him being head and +chief once more; and she signalised the occasion by serving one of the +soundest meals of her career. But it was in the long low study, now a +study pure and simple, and an infinitely tidier one than aforetime, that +the bishop smoked his after-dinner pipe like any deacon, while Carlton +also tasted his first tobacco for five years and a half. And still they +were strangely silent, until the occurrence of an incident, little in +itself, but great with suggestion. + +There was a tiny patter on the worn carpet, and all at once the bishop +beheld a big brown mouse seated upright within a few inches of his +companion's boot. The bishop exclaimed, and the mouse fled with a +scuttle and a squeak. + +"I tamed him," Carlton explained with a slight access of colour. "The +house is overrun with them, but this fellow lets none of the others in +here." + +The bishop was slow to follow up his exclamation. He certainly was a man +of fewer words than formerly. + +"You ought not to have made yourself such an anchorite," he said at +last. "You might have smoked your pipe--you say that's your first--and +written to me sooner!" + +So that still rankled. Carlton was not altogether surprised. + +"My lord," said he, "how could I? You had advised me to live anywhere +else, and yet here I was!" + +"The circumstances justified you, Mr. Carlton. I could not foresee such +circumstances, I assure you. I heard of them, however, at the time." + +Carlton had never written till the five years were nearly up, when it +became a necessary preliminary to the resumption of those offices from +which he had been debarred; but, when he did write, he had done so to +such effect that certain other preliminaries had been foregone. + +"Though you did not write," continued the bishop, "Sir Wilton Gleed did. +We had some correspondence about you, and we disagreed; that is one +reason why I declined his invitation and accepted yours. I would not +mention it, only you are now such excellent friends. And I understand +that he himself makes no secret of his former attitude towards you." + +"On the contrary, he has expressed the most generous regret for the line +he took." + +"He may well regret it," said the bishop. + +But Carlton had accepted his old enemy's aid, and would not hear ill of +him, whatever he might think. "It was natural enough," he murmured. + +"What! To prevent you from making the one reparation in your power? To +have you boycotted right and left? To trump up a criminal charge? To +force you, a clergyman, to remain in your own parish, labouring like a +convict by the year together? To trample the cloth underfoot in the eyes +of all the world?" + +"Oh," groaned Carlton, "it was I who did that! I alone am to blame for +that--I alone!" + +He leant his elbows on the chimney-piece, his face in his hands; for +stand he must if he was only to hear harsh words--that night of all +nights! Carlton was unprepared for such severity at this stage; and +infinitely hurt; for at his worst, when he deserved no sympathy at all, +the bishop had shown much more. But behind his back the blazing eyes +were quenched, and the long mouth relaxed. + +"No, no," a softer voice said; "you have done just the opposite--just +the opposite. You have been hard enough upon yourself; but the world was +harder on you--once." + +There was kindness in the rasping voice, but no enthusiasm. None other +had made so little of the mere physical feat of this man; and to him +the tone was unmistakable. + +"I know what you mean," said Carlton, turning round, his own eye alight. +"You think the world is going to the other extreme!" + +"It generally does," replied the bishop. "I do not mean to be unkind." + +"You are not, my lord--unless you think I haven't seen this for myself!" + +The bishop nodded gravely to himself. + +"You would see the danger. I am sure of that. You must want to hear the +last of what you have done; superhuman and heroic in itself--I am the +first to admit it--it is nevertheless the last chapter of a book which +you must want to close once and for all. The last chapter recalls the +first. Close the book; put it behind you; start afresh." + +Robert Carlton stood looking down with a curious smile upon his haggard +face. + +"That is exactly what I am going to do," said he. + +"But the parish must do the same; they must help you. Let them also +think no more of the past, either remote or immediate." + +"They must think of what they will," rejoined Carlton, queerly. "They +cannot help me much longer, nor I them. I am resigning the living, my +lord." + +"Resigning it?" cried the bishop. + +"I intend to do so to-morrow night. It always has been my intention. But +you are the first whom I have told." + +"I'm glad to hear that!" the bishop exclaimed, as he scrambled to his +feet another being. "You have taken my breath away! My dear fellow, let +me dissuade you from any such course." + +Carlton shook his head. + +"My work here is done." + +"It is just beginning!" + +"No, it is done. I have given my parishioners the church I owed them, +since they lost their last church through me. I set them once an example +for which I shall pray to be forgiven till my life's end; but now, +please God, I have at least shown them that because a man falls it need +not be utterly and for ever. He can rise; or, at any rate, he can try. +God knows I have tried; and they know it; and it may help them in their +own day of bitter trouble. But it was you, my lord, who first helped me, +by bidding me never despair. I have tried to teach your lesson; that is +all." + +"But you have not finished," the bishop urged, gently. "Go on teaching +it--go on." + +"No. It is no sudden thought. I undertook in the beginning, when Sir +Wilton Gleed wanted to turn me out forcibly, to go of my own accord when +I had built the church. He may forget it, but I do not." + +"Then I devoutly hope he will not accept your resignation!" + +"He must. I have made my arrangements. There is need of clergy in the +far corners of our empire, greater need than here. There was an +Australian at the hotel I have been staying at in London, and he has +shown me my field. I am going out to offer my services to the Bishop of +Riverina, and I am relying upon a word from you for their acceptance. I +hope to sail at the beginning of next month; my passage is already +taken." + +"I suppose you took it when you were in town?" the bishop grumbled. +Carlton coloured in an instant. + +"I did--but I had long been thinking of it," he said, hastily. "Oh, my +lord, in my place you would do the same! How could I continue here to be +smiled on by these poor people? It was easier when they looked the other +way, when I lived in this room alone, doing everything for myself, and +not a soul came near me. How can I settle down again to a prosperous +life--here of all places--with my child in the parish, and his poor +mother . . . That is what they all forget in the generous warmth of +their reaction; but the more they forget, the more keenly I remember. +Ah! do you think I ever have forgotten--for an hour--for a moment--since +I left off working with my hands?" + +One of these was stretched in the direction of the churchyard; and the +bishop read its touching testimony for the first time. + +"There," whispered Carlton, in strange excitement, "there lies one . . . +whose ruin and whose death are at my door. I don't forget--I never have +forgotten. I have paid, and I will pay till the end. And there shall be +no other woman . . ." + +His tongue failed him; his face was grief-stricken; the whole man was +changed. So then the human being, his bishop, knew that there was +another woman in his heart already; recalled the most terrible part of +this man's confession to him, years before; and presently plucked him by +the sleeve. And the voice that Robert Carlton heard, as he leaned once +more with his elbow on the chimney-piece, and his face between his +hands, was the voice of their last interview, at the bishop's palace, in +the blank forenoon of a wet summer's day. + +"Forgive me," it said, "for I also have misjudged you in my turn. But +now I see--but now I see, and am ashamed . . . Your life has been hard, +my brother, but it has been brave! You have been through the depths, but +you have also touched the heights, and I think that God must be very +near you to-night. I see now that you are right to go; you are both +nobler and wiser than I thought; may happiness, and peace, and love +itself go with you first or last. Let us kneel together before I leave +you, and humbly pray that it may still be so!" + +When the bishop retired, Robert Carlton returned to his study, and +prayed by himself until a knock at the outer door brought him to his +feet, much startled; for it was eleven at night. + +He was still more startled when he reached the door, for there stood a +soldier straight and tall, sunburnt and jaunty; a medal with clasps and +the Egyptian star upon his scarlet breast; a smile behind the trim +moustache; right hand at the salute. It was only after a prolonged stare +that Carlton recognised the smart young man. + +"George Mellis?" he cried. "Come in--come in!" + +"That's me, sir," said George, entering like a machine. "But--can it be +you, Mr. Carlton?" + +And his smile vanished as the lamplight fell upon the grey hairs and the +deep furrows which made the clergyman look nearly twice his years. + +"Yes, George. I have aged a little. But so have you." + +"Oh, I'm all right," said the young soldier with his fine eyes on the +other's face; "but I want to kill somebody, that's all!" + +"I should have thought you'd done enough of that at the wars," rejoined +Carlton, smiling. "Come, George, it's you I want to hear about. Of +course I have heard of you. So you enlisted in the Grenadiers, and you +got straight to Tel-el-Kebir; and that's the clasp, and not the only +one! And now you're a colour-sergeant, and certain of your stripes, they +tell me; you're a great hero in the village, George; and yet I have +heard them complain that you never even came back to show yourself after +the war." + +"I haven't come back to show myself now, Mr. Carlton." + +And the young fellow looked rather grim above his brass and scarlet. + +"I didn't mean to hurt your feelings." + +"Nor have you, sir. But can't you guess why I've come back for the first +time to-night?" + +Carlton considered, and suddenly his hollow eyes lit up; but those of +the grenadier had lighted first. + +"Was it--was it really to--to be here to-morrow, George?" + +"That was it, sir--and nothing else! I'd heard how you were building it +up with your own----" + +"Never mind that, George." + +"I heard it from Tom Ivey, who found me out in barracks not long since, +and gave me all the Long Stow news. That's how I came to hear of the +consecration to-morrow. He said he was coming down for it, and I said I +would too if I could get leave; and I did; and we've come down together +to-night." + +Neither of them had dreamt of intruding at that hour; but Mellis had +seen the old light in the old window, and felt he must just come up to +shake hands. Yes, he would come in gladly after church to-morrow. No, he +had seen no one else to speak to as yet, except Mrs. Musk; and the +grenadier stood confused. + +"Where did you see her?" + +"Driving away from the Flint House." + +"That old woman at this time of night?" + +"Musk is bad, and she was going for the doctor herself. I offered to go +instead, but she had the girl with her, and there was no stopping them." + +"Bad!" echoed Carlton. "He has been bad for weeks; he may be dying--and +all alone!" He dashed from the room, but was back next moment in his +wideawake. "I must go to him, George! He will hate it, but I must go. +Open the door, and I'll put out the light; if he's dying I shall stay." + +It was a clear keen night with a worn moon curling in the west; and the +hard road rang like a drum as red-coat and black ran elbow to elbow down +the village, jerking a word here and there as they went. + +"Been bad long, sir?" + +"Sciatica for years; only just taken to his bed." + +"Sciatica shouldn't kill." + +"This must be something else. The man is old--and the one enemy I have +left!" + +They ran on. Before the Flint House came first its meadow and then its +garden wall, with the gate left open, and a rude drive twisting through +trees to the side of the house. "This way," said Carlton; and in half a +minute they were at the side door. This also had been left open. Carlton +lowered his voice, his hand upon the latch. + +"You wait here, like a good fellow. If he will not let me say one +word--if he orders me out--then you must come up instead. If he is so +ill that his wife goes herself at midnight for the doctor, then he is +too ill to be left with no one in the house but a child of five!" + +Carlton's concern was not a little for the child. Suppose he had +awakened to call and call in vain--perhaps to run for succour to a +corpse! The thought made Carlton shudder as he found his way through +passages with which he had been permitted to become familiar after +Georgie's accident. At the head of the stairs there was Georgie's room; +the father had to pass it; and could not, without peeping in. + +For this door was ajar, and a night-light burning on the chest of +drawers. Georgie was breathing gently in his cot. Carlton approached on +tip-toe, and stood gazing downward with clasped hands. Boisterous and +robust upon his feet, the boy looked still a baby in his sleep; his face +was so round and innocent; his hands seemed such toys; and the light +hair, too seldom cut, was lightest at the roots, and still curly at the +ends, as it lay upon the pillow where his last movement had tossed it. +It was a sweet face, even with the great eyes closed; the eyelashes +looked so much longer and darker against the pure skin; they were many +shades darker than the hair; and the eyebrows were assuming a very +delicate definition of their own. The mouth was beautiful. That brown +little hand was perfectly shaped. Carlton bent over, and kissed the warm +smooth cheek with infinite tenderness; then went upon his knees, and +prayed over the child, and for him, and for his future, out of the +fulness of a brimming heart. He forgot that Musk's death would make a +difference to the child and to himself; for the moment he forgot that +Musk was in any danger of dying, and that this was his house. He and his +child were alone together once more, it might be for the last time, one +never knew. + +"God keep you, my own poor boy, and lead you not into temptation, but +deliver you from evil, for ever and ever, Amen." + +He stooped once more over the cot, pushed the long hair back, running +his fingers through it gently, and kissed the pure forehead again and +again. And it seemed to Robert Carlton--but the night-light was very +dim--that at the last his son had smiled upon him in his sleep. + + + + +XXXII + +THE SECOND TIME + + +In Musk's room there was more light. It lay under the closed door like a +yellow rod. Carlton knocked gently. There was no answer. He knocked +louder. Not a sound from within. Then the chill fell on him, and he +entered ready for any discovery but the one he was to make. + +Neither the quick nor the dead lay within. + +A fire was burning as well as the lamp; the very bed looked warm, but +was not; the sick man must have left it some minutes at least. + +The lame man, the man who could not walk, had left his bed if not the +house! Carlton caught up the lamp to go in search. And even on the +landing a voice came hailing him from the region below. + +"Mr. Carlton! Mr. Carlton! Quick, sir, quick!" + +George Mellis was still at the side door, and in the lamplight the other +could not see an inch beyond. + +"Have you found him, George? He's not in bed!" + +"Who--Musk? No, sir, no!" + +"Then what have you seen?" + +The grenadier had a wet skin, a quivering lip, a starting eye. + +"Oh, I can't tell you, sir! I may be wrong. God grant it! But give me +the lamp, and go outside and look for yourself!" + +In sheer perplexity Carlton complied; and for an instant imagined some +outrageous freak of nature; for the trees of the Flint House drive, +black as night a few minutes before, now stood etched against the +reddest dawn that he had ever seen--at midnight in December! Then a +flame shot upwards, and another, and another; and Mellis was left +standing, lamp in hand, a brilliant patch of light and colour, yet less +brilliant every instant in the face of that unearthly glare in the east. +Swift feet were pattering down the drive; and had such a start, before +the soldier found his senses, that it was only in the churchyard he +caught them up. + +Long Stow church was on fire for the second time, and burning faster +than it had burnt between five and six years before. The crackle of the +pitch pine was loud as musketry already. The roof was already burning; +its destruction had been the climax of the former fire. + +Robert Carlton stood with folded arms heaving on his chest. The bishop +was there already, in his overcoat and rug, with the whiter and the +sterner face. The servants had called him: they also were there, in +pitiful case, but no more had arrived as yet. + +"It is no use their coming. The roof's on fire in three or four +different places. He has done his work better this time; more oil for +him, with those stoves!" + +The voice was Carlton's, because his lips moved, and those of the +bishop were compressed out of sight. Otherwise Mellis, for one, would +never have recognised so sad a discord of heartbreak and devil-may-care. + +"Some things might be saved," said the bishop. + +"They might and shall! George, run to my study for the key; it's on a +nail beside the fireplace. And to think I locked up myself lest +something might happen at the last!" cried Carlton, with a single note +of high hollow laughter, as the soldier vanished. "But I never thought +of you! No, you have cheated me very cleverly this time. You almost +deserve your triumph--over me!" + +"Do you mean to say you know who has done it?" cried the bishop. + +"Yes--the man who did it before." + +"But was that ever known?" + +"No; but I knew. I found his hat in the church." + +"And you never told?" + +"Nor shall I now. But I do wonder where he got in! And he was well +enough to climb a ladder--my dying man!" + +Carlton said no more; he was sorry he had said so much. Yet this time it +was sure to come out. There was the empty bed. Mellis would speak of it, +though he had not seen it with his own eyes. Was the malingerer back in +it already? What hellish artifice! And the house emptied for the nonce! +The man's own wife would never have suspected him. + +Carlton was quite calm. There was nothing to be done. The roof was +flaring at either end and in the middle. Only a fire-engine could have +put it out, and there was still none nearer than Lakenhall. The mind +will often puzzle over an immaterial question in the face of facts too +terrible to be realised at once: the known is blinding, but the unknown +is the dark, and it is a relief to grope there even for that which is +useless when discovered. So Robert Carlton was still wondering how the +incendiary had got in, and out, and exactly what he had done inside, +when Mellis came running with the key. In a few moments they were in the +church. + +Nothing could have been less like the corresponding impression of the +former fire. Then the pews had been discovered burning; but now +rush-seated chairs and pitch pine stalls stood equally intact; and a +first glance did not reveal the source of the dull red light which +filled the church. On the other hand, a badly-broken window in the north +transept satisfied Carlton's curiosity on the immaterial point; and +supplied another, pregnant with irony; for it was the window whose arch +he had been building when Georgie first swam into his ken. + +But now Mellis was looking straight above him, and calling to Mr. +Carlton to do the same. In three places the ceiling was on fire, and +burning planks beginning to drop; in another a spreading patch of brown +burnt through even as they watched. Almost simultaneously came a shriek +from the women and a roar from the men now gathering outside; it was Tom +Ivey who came rushing in. + +"There's some one overhead! He's smashing the skylight over the north +transept! That's the man that done it--that's the man that done +it--fairly caught!" + +The saddler came on Tom's heels. + +"Gord love us all, that's Jasper Musk!" + +Carlton darted into the south transept without waste of words, and in an +instant had disappeared in the part that was boarded off until the new +organ should be established in its place there; meanwhile the very +ceiling had not been carried to the end of the transept, and a ladder +led to the natural loft that it formed. Up this ladder the incendiary +must have climbed, and up this ladder the rector was running when Mellis +and Ivey, with the rest at their heels, reached its foot. + +"Come down, sir, come down, for God's sake!" + +"I am not coming down alone." + +"Then I'll fetch you," roared Ivey; "you are not going to risk your life +for him!" + +But the red-coat was first upon the ladder, and in a few seconds both +young men were in the triangular tunnel between the ceiling and the +roof; a space so confined that under the apex alone was it possible to +walk upright; and that only for the few feet dividing them from the +nearest flames. + +"Look out!" cried Tom Ivey from the top rung. "It wasn't made for a +floor; get on your hands and knees, and the weight won't be all in one +place." So they crept into the centre of the cross; and there they knelt +upright to see over a fringe of fire that burnt their eyelids bare as +they gazed. + +Roof and ceiling of chancel and of nave, both were in roaring flames to +right and to left of them; through the flaming barrier in their faces, +and the hole already burnt, they could see the pulpit and the chairs in +the north transept thirty feet below; and across the gulf, Jasper Musk +and Robert Carlton face to face. Carlton had made the leap; they could +not; already the flames were driving them back and back. + +In the steady roar and crackle they could hear no words. Musk was +crouching under a skylight all too narrow for his gigantic shoulders, a +tell-tale oil-tin overturned at his feet. His face was livid, but +fearless, and his light eyes gleamed with hate. Carlton's back was +turned to the watchers, and for a second motionless; then he looked +round, saw them through smoke and flame, and clapped a hand to his +mouth. + +"Down, both of you," he shouted, "and round with the ladder to the +outside here, and one of you fetch up an axe. The skylight's too +small--we must make it bigger!" + +Musk's lips moved, and his eyes flashed their own fire; the others could +almost see the words. + +"Well?" said Mellis. + +"Come on; it's our only chance." + +In an instant they were down the ladder, and had it horizontal in a +minute. Then Ivey began to fume. + +"It'll take some time getting through the porch!" + +"Shove it through the broken window." + +"Good man! Stand by, out there, to haul out this ladder!" + +The red-coat ran round, his medal twinkling in the glare, while Ivey +rushed for the axe. + +"Up with her, comrades! That's it--altogether--_now_!" + +The ladder was up outside. Ivey, axe in hand, had leapt upon the fourth +rung at a bound, and was taking the rest two at a time. Below it was +light as day; the naked trees stood brown and brittle in the glare; the +upturned faces white as the curled moon. A whiter face peered through +the skylight. + +"Look alive with that axe, Tom; he can't breathe, and he's being +roasted!" + +"He deserve ut! Do you come through first, sir. There's room for you as +'tis. He can bide his turn." + +The white face flushed indignant dominion. + +"Unless you obey me, you are my murderer too!" + +A stifled curse came from under the tiles. + +"There, then! Would you save him after that? Leave him the axe and +through you come, you that can, or else I'll pull you through!" + +And his great arm thickened as he thrust it out, and grabbed at the +straight white collar, before relinquishing the axe from his other hand; +but at that moment there was a crackling groan, and a sudden unbearable +weight on Ivey's hand and arm, as the frail inner roof gave way; then a +blinding flame in his face, a crash below, and a cry of anguish from a +hundred hearts rent as one. + +The axe tumbled as Tom Ivey flung both arms round the ladder, and so +descended like a drunken man, a crumpled collar still warm and tight +between the clenched fingers of his right hand. + + + + +XXXIII + +SANCTUARY + + +Long Stow church rose salient from its knoll at the eastern extremity of +the village, still in its wintry network of a million twigs. It was not +the ruin it had been before; but the new roof had vanished; and the +chancel was in the condition to which the first fire had reduced the +whole edifice. The other walls still stand as their builder built them, +and as they stood on that December day when he was laid to rest in their +shadow. The grave is in the angle of the north transept and the nave, +not a dozen paces from the site of the shed. The stone was not up when +Gwynneth visited it, but the grave was as easily identified as it is +to-day. It lay beneath a cairn of dead flowers, picked out with many +fresh ones. The cards still fluttered upon some of the wreaths, and +Gwynneth could not help seeing the surprising names upon some; but the +humble little home-made offerings, the bunches of snow-drops and the +early crocuses, touched her more. Yet she showed no feeling as she stood +and gazed. She had brought no flowers herself. There was no pretence of +mourning in her dress. She shed no tears. + +From his own observatory the saddler had seen who was in the covered +fly, when Gwynneth got out. He was at his usual work upon the latest +newspaper, and he took it up again for a minute. But Gwynneth was more +than a minute, and more than five; the saddler lost patience, and +wandered across the road. + +"Where did you bring that young lady from? Lakenhall?" + +"Yes." + +"And are you going to take her back again?" + +"Yes, in time for the 5.40 train; and she only got down by the 2.10." + +Gwynneth, who had not stirred a feature or a limb, started indignantly +at the sound of a profaning step; but had forgiven Fuller before he +reached her hand with his own outstretched. There had seemed so much +that she might never know, could never ask; it would not be necessary +with the saddler. + +"Why, Miss Gwynneth, is that you?" he cried, when he had crushed her +hand; and his eyes widened with concern. + +"Am I so much changed?" asked Gwynneth, smiling gallantly. + +"Changed! Gord love yer, miss, you're the shadder of what you was." + +"There is plenty of substance still, Mr. Fuller." + +"And where's your colour, miss?" + +"In London, I suppose." + +"That's it," cried Fuller; "that London! I wouldn't live there, not if +you paid me: nasty, beastly, smoky, overcrowded sink of iniquity and +disease! If I was the Government I'd pull that down and build it up +again on twice the space. That isn't good manners to run down the place +where you live, miss, I know; but I never could abide that London, and +now I shall hate it more than ever." + +"But I thought you were never there, Mr. Fuller?" + +"And never mean to be, miss, and never mean to be! I've too much sense. +Look at me: sixty-eight I am, and a bit over, and not an ache or a pain +from top to toe. That's because I live in the pure air and know what I +eat; now in London, if you'll excuse my saying so, you never do. Where +should I be if I'd been swallerun London fogs and adulterated milk and +butter all my life? In my grave these thirty years! Do you take the +advice of a man of my experience, miss: shake the soot of London off +your feet, and come you back to good living and good air, and you won't +know yourself in a week." + +Gwynneth let the saddler run on; a more sensitive man would have seen +that she was not hearkening to a word. Her eyes were very hard and +bright; they rested once more upon the faded flowers and the fluttering +cards. + +"So this is Mr. Carlton's grave!" + +The belated words told nothing at all. Fuller removed his cap. + +"Yes, miss, there lie the biggest and the bravest heart that ever beat +in this here parish or anywhere near it. And I have a right to say so. +Many has come back to him this last twelvemonth or so. But I was the +first." + +"Were you at the fire, Mr. Fuller?" + +"Was I at the fire! Why, it was me that saw that first, Miss Gwynneth. +Young George Mellis, with his red-coat and his bamboo cane, he would +have it that it was him; but there are some folks that fare to be first +in everything, and General George'll be getting too big for his uniform +if he don't take care. You see, I hadn't closed an eye when I saw the +first flicker on the ceiling; but an old man like me have to get on some +clothes before he can run outside in the depths o' winter. Meanwhile, +Master George, who haven't been near his old friend all these years, he +can come down fast enough when the reverend's got the ball at his feet +again; and there were the two of them at the Flint House, inquiring +after Jasper Musk, said to be at death's door at the very moment he was +setting fire to the church." + +"Fiend!" + +"You may well say that, miss, for it was the second time he'd done it; +and the reverend had known, all these years, and that must've been +Jasper's hat he flung into the first fire when Tom Ivey come, puttun two +an' two together. What make that worse, it seem old Jasper used to say +he hoped to live to see the new church consecrated; and some say he'd +smile as he said it; but now we know what he meant. And he used to limp +up and down his room, for practice, when even the doctor thought he +couldn't set foot to the ground; for the servant girl heard him at it. +Yes, Miss Gwynneth, he was deep and strong and cruel, like the sea, was +Jasper; that's what the bishop said himself, for I heard him; but I will +say this for him, he asked no more quarter than he gave. Tom Ivey heard +his last words through the skylight, and they aren't fit for a young +lady like you to hear, but they were a man's words whatever else they +were. The worst is that the dear old reverend could've squeezed through +himself if only he'd have let Jasper slip; but that he wouldn't; so they +both went through with the ceiling and were killed." + +"For his enemy!" whispered Gwynneth, an unearthly radiance in her poor +hard eyes. + +"Yes, for the man that burnt the church down twice, and deserved to burn +himself; that was the worst of it." + +The listener's lips were consistently compressed, but at this they +parted again. + +"Oh, no, it was the best. It was the best. A great death, a glorious +death!" And the pale thin face was white-hot with a pride which consumed +all else. + +"The bishop said his life was greater still. You should ha' heard his +sermon, out here, at the open grave, when it was all over. There never +was such a funeral in the countryside before, and there never will be +another like it. The place was packed. I stood where you are standing +now, miss. I was one o' the bearers; and Ivey, Mellis, and Jones the +schoolmaster, they were the other three. Then you should have seen the +clergy; there was a rare procession of the clergy from all round; the +Reverend Scrope from Burton Mills, the Reverend Preston from Linkworth, +and Canon Wilders, and a lot more. But the bishop was in all his +toggery, and I never see a man look so fine; he's little and he's lame, +but the face he preached with, across this here open grave, you'd have +said that belonged to some old giant. And what a sermon! That didn't +make us cry; that dried our tears, an' made us want to build churches +and be killed ourselves. You might guess the text: 'Greater love hath no +man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friend.' I kept +waitun for him to point out that Musk was not the reverend's friend, but +his worst enemy; but he never did. I would have done; otherwise, he said +just what I would like to have said myself, let alone the one thing that +took the whole lot of us by surprise. And I tell you, Miss Gwynneth, the +place was right black with people; not only in the churchyard, but +across the fence in the medder as well; there was hardly a blade o' +grass to be seen." + +"What was the surprise, Mr. Fuller?" + +"He'd made up his mind to resign the living! He had told his lordship. +He meant to resign next night--I can't for the life of me think why!" + +But Gwynneth could; and, with the second sight begotten of her love, +read the dead man even in his grave, divining immediately some of the +very reasons which he had given to the bishop in his last hours. She was +never to divine them all. + +Meanwhile the saddler, having imparted a satisfactory amount of +information, was beginning to look for some return in kind, and supposed +Miss Gwynneth would be going to the hall. No, they were all from home; +indeed, Gwynneth had waited for that. Yet she made her answer with a +candid look, the prelude to a gratuitous admission. + +"I am going on to the Flint House," said she. + +"Well, there!" cried Fuller, "if I hadn't forgot to tell you where Musk +lie! He don't lie here, miss; he left it that he would go to Lakenhall +cemetery, in onconsecrated ground, some say. And Mrs. Musk--you won't +have heard it--but she's fair lost her know, poor thing!" + +"Yes, I had heard. Poor thing, indeed! Yet in her case it seems almost +merciful. But I am not going to see Mrs. Musk." + +"Then haven't you heard about little Georgie? That's a grand thing, +that! There's a lady in London (that's the only part I don't like), some +young widder with none of her own, that's going to adopt him instead." + +"I know that, too," said Gwynneth, flushing slightly as she smiled. "The +lady is a friend of mine; she heard of Georgie through me. We were in a +hospital together, but now we have taken a flat--for I am going to live +with her too. And it is for Georgie I am come to-day." + +Her companion had served her purpose; but would not go; and a hint might +betray that which had obviously never entered the saddler's head. So +Gwynneth looked her last upon her own heart's grave with the same pale +face and the same unbending carriage; but the bright eyes were softer +now, though radiant still with a heavenly pride. So his ashes exalted +her as his living presence; so his undying soul still strengthened hers. + +It was a pale February day, the grass very green, a subtle gloss of life +upon the bough; but it was man's handiwork that appealed to Gwynneth; +and all at once an astounding fact forced itself upon her vision and +understanding. The church was almost exactly as she had seen it last. +The east end was the worst; the roof was not begun. It was just as it +had been six months before; and only the work of the hireling had +perished after all; that of the self-taught mason, the pariah, the +penitent, still endured as an oblation and a sacrifice for his sins, and +as a monument to the man for all time. Gwynneth could have gone down on +her knees in thanksgiving for this miracle; as it was she saw his +resting-place but dimly for the last time. At that moment the starling +which had entertained him in life began a gossip in the elderbush at his +head; a jealous sparrow poured abuse from every tree; and so she left +him, at rest where he never rested, on the field where that rest had +been won. + +A married Musk with many children, one of the sons who had quarrelled +with their father, had already established himself and family in the +Flint House. He had thankfully accepted Gwynneth's proposal, made, +however, in Nurse Ella's name; and Georgie was ready when Gwynneth +called for the second time on her way back from the church. He was also +in tremendous spirits, leaping upon his lady like a wild beast, and, +later, roaring his farewells through the fly-window, as they drove away +towards a watery sunset, Gwynneth sitting far back on the deeper seat +She let him shout till he was tired; by that time she was mistress of +herself once more, and the dusk was such as to destroy all present +evidence of another character. So at last she could take him on her +knee. + +"And are you glad to come away with Gwynneth, darling?" + +"I should think I are; jolly glad; but I thought there was anunner lady +too?" + +"We shall find her where we are going. Do you know where we are going, +Georgie?" + +"Course I do. We're goin' to London to see the Queen. I wish we would +soon be there!" + +"So we shall, Georgie." + +"In a minute?" + +"No, not in a minute; we have to go in the train first. Have you ever +seen a real train, Georgie?" + +"No, never. I know I haven't," Georgie averred. "You are kind to take me +in one! I do love you, I say!" + +"Do you, darling?" + +"Yes, really. I love you bestest in the world. I know I do!" + +They were entering Lakenhall, and it was quite dark in the fly; but now +Georgie knew that Gwynneth was crying, for she was kissing him at the +same time, and as he never had been kissed before. + +"And you always will, Georgie--you always will?" + +"Course I will," said Georgie, gaily. + +"And go to school when Gwynneth sends you, and turn into a great strong +man, and be good to poor Gwynneth then?" + +"Gooder'n all the world," said Georgie. + + +THE END + + + + +"Mr. Hornung's books are stories pure and simple, excellently +constructed, well written, cleanly, humorous, kindly. The plot is always +well managed, the telling is lively, with no waste of irrelevant +episode, and the untying is sure to be left to the last."--_New York +Evening Post_. + + +OTHER BOOKS BY E. W. HORNUNG + + +Dead Men Tell No Tales + +A Novel. 12mo, $1.25 + +"In this novel, as in the previous ones from Mr. Hornung's pen, there is +a wealth of well-handled incidents. It is story-telling of the most +direct kind and holds the attention from the first page to the last Mr. +Hornung seems to us in each succeeding book from his pen to gain in +confidence and authority, and we do not hesitate to place him among the +first of the comparatively new writers who must be reckoned +with."--_Literature_. + + +The Amateur Cracksman + +12mo, $1.25 + +"There is not a dull page from beginning to end. . . . He is the most +interesting rogue we have met for a long time."--_New York Evening Sun_. + +"Raffles is amazing; his resource is perfect; he talks like a gentlemen +and acts like one, except when occupied with pressing business in +another man's house, at midnight, and naturally he has a 'cool nerve,' a +nerve positively arctic. They all have nerves like that, these +Raffleses."--_New York Tribune_. + + + + +BOOKS BY MR. HORNUNG + + +"Mr. Hornung has certainly earned the right to be called the Bret Harte +of Australia."--_Boston Herald_. + + +Some Persons Unknown + +12mo, $1.25 + + CONTENTS + + Kenyon's Innings + A Literary Coincidence + "Author! Author!" + The Widow of Piper's Point + After the Fact + The Voice of Gunbar + The Magic Cigar + The Governess at Greenbush + A Farewell Performance + A Spin of the Coin + The Star of the "Grasmere" + +"_In about half-a-dozen cases the scene is laid in Australia, and the +dramatic and tragic aspects of Colonial life are treated by Mr. Hornung +with that happy union of vigor and sympathy which has stood him in such +good stead in his earlier novels._"--London Spectator. + + +The Rogue's March + +A ROMANCE + +12mo, $1.50 + +"Mr. Hornung has succeeded admirably in his object: his Australian +scenes are a veritable nightmare; they sear the imagination, and it +will be some time before we get Hookey Simpson, the clank of the +chains, and the hero's degradation off our mind."--_London Saturday +Review_. + +"Vividly and vigorously told."--_London Academy_. + + +My Lord Duke + +12mo, $1.25 + +"Mr. Hornung is a natural humorist, and has the art of telling a +story."--_Philadelphia Evening Telegraph_. + +"_It is pleasant to turn to a real story by a real story-writer. Such is +'My Lord Duke.' . . . Its story is its own, both in plot and in +characterization. It is a capital little novel._"--The Nation. + + +Young Blood + +12mo, $1.25 + +"_Whether Lowndes be entirely realized or not does not much matter; the +conception of him is already a distinction. He is an adventurer of +genius, but not built on the usual lines. . . . And his vitality is +inexhaustible. We leave him, not without a stain upon his character, but +with considerable regret in our minds._"--The Bookman. + + + + +IN THE IVORY SERIES + + +The Boss of Taroomba + +16mo, 75 cents + +"There are passages in E. W. Hornung's latest story, 'The Boss of +Taroomba,' which remind us by their vividness and fantastic quality of +Stevenson in some of his South Sea Island tales. . . . The hero is an +uncommon creation even for fiction."--_Chicago Times-Herald_. + + +A Bride from the Bush + +16mo, 75 cents + +"Mr. E. W. Hornung is one of the most successful delineators of Bush +life."--_Chicago Tribune_. + + +Irralie's Bushranger + +16mo, 75 cents + +"A capital little story of Australian love and adventure. There is no +flagging in the press and stir of the story."--_The Nation_. + + + CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS, Publishers + 153-157 Fifth Avenue, New York + + + + +Transcriber's Note: Numerous words were hyphenated inconsistently in the +original text (for instance, "evensong" and "even-song"). These +inconsistencies have been retained. End-of-line hyphens have been +retained or removed based on the predominant usage elsewhere in the +text. + +In Chapter II, "The resolution was easier than its accomplshment" was +changed to "The resolution was easier than its accomplishment". + +In Chapter XIX, a missing quotation mark was added before "I will--I +will", and "it's last day's work" was changed to "its last day's work". + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Peccavi, by E. W. 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