Читать книгу The Sun Cure - Alfred Noyes - Страница 4

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Away on the downs, in a remote spot where the cultivated land spread its last fields, Double Dick sat on a bank and turned over the collection of rags that Thorn, the shepherd, had brought up with him.

Thorn drove the central stake into the ground, and lashed on to it the crosspiece which was to extend the arms of a scarecrow.

"Them arms look to you too long?" said Thorn to that other scarecrow—the ragged man on the bank.

"A bit of jut-out at the end of the sleeves won't do no harm," said Double Dick. "If you has no objections, Muster Thorn, this here's a better hat nor mine, and a better coat nor mine."

"So I'd reckoned," said Thorn, "but felt a delicacy in putting it forward. It's not the hat that it was before it got into the chaff-cutter three years back, but they used good stuff in the days when that were made." He picked up the coat and surveyed it critically. "There you are again," he said, "Muster Bloxham had that coat twenty year, for so he told me when he give it me for this job. Ah, it took things easy at first, did that coat—same as we humans when we're young."

"Sundays?" suggested Double Dick.

"Aye, and market days. And then it got past it, and he worked it cruel hard every day and all weathers for eight years. Lately it's been sort of resting. That setter-bitch of his had it to lay on and her pups worried it a deal, but that were good stuff too. Well, there it is. Pitch me over your own coat and hat and put them on instead; and you'll look a better man and I'll build a better scarecrow."

Double Dick made the exchange with alacrity.

"Mind you," said Thorn, as he placed the scarecrow's trousers in situ and stuffed them out with bracken, "mind you, Double Dick, it's Farmer Bloxham's interests as I'm acting in. Wouldn't be honest otherwise. But worst clothes make best scarecrows. There's a smell of beer on this coat of yours as would ... Well, well, find us a niceish bit of chalk. I shall want that by'n'by."

Double Dick heard all disquisitions on morality without interest and undertook all work with reluctance. But a lump of chalk was lying against his foot and this is a give-and-take world. He picked it up wearily, threw it across to the old shepherd and reclined on the bank again.

As Thorn went on with his work he glanced from time to time at Double Dick, as an artist glances at his model. He trimmed a big swede with his knife and fixed it securely on the central pole. He whitened the front half with chalk except for two circles for the eyes, a triangle for the nose, and a crescent for the mouth. Fronds of withered fern represented the hair, and were held in place by the hat. He turned up the coat collar to make the neck more realistic. He fastened to the back of the figure the windmill arrangement that gave a continuous clack and croak in a light breeze. And then Thorn stood back a few yards to survey the finished work. Double Dick sat up and also looked at it with interest.

There was a moment's silence and then Double Dick said with simple conviction:

"Gord! It's me."

"It ain't unlike," the artist admitted. "Only that's got to work, that has. Ain't often we sees you three miles away from The Deliverance."

"When there ain't no job for me in Chalkdene, I've got to come and look for one." He jerked a thumb over his shoulder. "Picnic party up there—ten or a dozen of 'em. One of 'em came into Reed's for sugar what they'd forgot, and so I heard. Likely they'll be sick of carrying them tea-baskets, and if I gives a hand with them back to Helmstone that ought to be worth a shilling."

"I see," said the shepherd, which in this case did not necessarily mean, "I believe." Double Dick may have been so called because his real name was Richard Richardson. There may have been an allusion to the shuffling trot with which he would sometimes perform an accelerated errand. There was most certainly a reference to the fact that Richard Richardson was not a man of single purpose.

He was not a tramp. If he walked, and still more, if he trotted, it was with a view to remuneration. He preferred to remain in Chalkdene where he was well known and universally disrespected. Permanent residents employed him occasionally for work that did not demand intelligence, honesty or personal cleanliness. Visitors gave him coppers because he was, they alleged, "a character." In the winter by arrangement he slept in the corner of a barn or stable, and in return chopped as little wood as he thought the farmer would stand. In the present glorious weather, he slept frequently and slept anywhere.

We all have our special gift and Double Dick's gift was that he could drink a certain small quantity of paraffin with mustard in it without being ill. The exhibition of this gift—of which he probably had the monopoly—had earned him many a pot of beer at The Deliverance. He had one relative, a crippled brother who held an ecclesiastical appointment with a regular salary—he was organ-blower at St. Margaret's, made and mended nets for the fishermen, and lived decently at Helmstone. At one time this brother had responded not ungenerously to Double Dick's assertion—he would walk over from Chalkdene to make it—that brothers should help one another, by which he meant that John Richardson should finance Richard Richardson's insobriety.

"And then," Double Dick would recount, "that damn curate came interfering between blood-relations." In other words, Basil Strode had advised the organ-blower not to waste any more money on a worthless reprobate, and the advice had been strictly followed. "Setting brother again' brother," said Double Dick. "That's nice work for a man o' Gord, I don't think. Ah, and he'll answer for it at the last day too! And he won't have to wait till then if I get a half a quarter of a chance."

And Destiny had freakishly decided that the required eighth of a chance was to be forthcoming.

It was perfectly true that it was the picnic party that had brought Double Dick up onto the downs, but since his interest in it was not precisely as he had described, he waited until the shepherd had gone off to his work.

Double Dick then made his way upward to that little hollow where he had seen the picnic baskets deposited under the charge of Major Bongline, while the rest of the party went shoreward. And here Double Dick found what he had expected to find. Major Bongline had grown weary of inaction, had decided that there was not a soul in sight and that the picnic baskets were as safe as a church without him, and had strolled off to meet the others on their return. But there was no time to lose.

Double Dick was desperately hungry. For the last two days he had had nothing but beer, and not much beer. He opened the first basket, and started on the first edible that presented itself. It caused him to appeal loudly to the Deity. Paraffin and mustard he might tolerate, but he was sorry he had tried a caviar sandwich. Bath buns now—Helmstone has a shop which is famous for them—Bath buns were safer. He devoured a Bath bun with frantic haste, and at the same time dropped the silver cigarette box into one of the pockets of Farmer Bloxham's old coat and a few teaspoons into another. He kept his eye fixed on the ridge over which the picnic party would shortly be returning.

But, while he watched for danger in one direction, it came upon him from another. He heard its approach, but too late. He found his skinny arm held in a muscular grip, and the rest of the Bath bun dropped from his hand. And the more vibrant tones of Basil Strode's voice—the tones used for complaints about toast or dissenters—were heard:

"What is this, Richardson? You are a thief? I've always suspected it."

Thought (even in Double Dick) is more rapid than light. In less than a second, Double Dick thought of telling a tale, and of what the tale should be, and decided that the simple faith requisite in the audience was wanting in this case. It seemed equally useless to be very penitential and respectful, for this was a hard man who set brother against brother; and on the whole it would be better to say something on a different subject, gain time for consideration, and then see which way the cat jumped.

"You're 'urting my arm," said Double Dick.

"If you try to bolt, you'll be hurt more," said Basil, as he released him. "Come on, now. Turn out your pockets."

When Double Dick had turned them out, Basil Strode went over them and found in them one teaspoon, which he was asked to believe had been over-looked. The curate did not believe it and said so. And then Double Dick lost his temper.

"Think yourself ruddy clever, don't you? What would you do if you was me? You'd do the ruddy same as I've done. Yes, you ruddy well would. You've got your clothes and your money and your full belly and you don't want nothing. If you was nigh starved as I am, you'd snatch a bit of food where you could. There's no ruddy credit in not taking what you don't want."

"Under no circumstances should I steal," said Basil, firmly. "And cigarette boxes and teaspoons are not food."

"Ho!" said Double Dick, bitterly. "Tell us some more ruddy novelties."

Basil Strode caught him by the arm again, and this time he really did hurt him. He asked Double Dick to keep a civil tongue in his head. And there were tears in the squealing sufferer's eyes as the owners of the stolen property came over the ridge. Salutations and explanations followed.

"Case for the police," said Major Bongline at once, with military precision.

"If you had remained here, as you promised to do," said Mrs. Camp, the founder of the picnic, with severity, "this would never have happened, Major Bongline. As it is, we are very much indebted to you, Mr. Strode. I think it should be for you to decide. We can safely be guided by you."

"That is quite what I think," said Miss Bird.

"And I," said Miss Todmarsh.

"We all do," said a chorus of young ladies, led by Miss Adela Bird.

"Hear, hear!" said Mr. Pepper, a high-spirited young gentleman with symphonic shirt and necktie.

Major Bongline subsided and polished a silver cigarette box on which there were finger-marks.

"Well," said Basil, "I've already given him a bit of punishment for using bad language. You've lost nothing except a bun or so. If he goes to prison, his brother, our organ-blower, and a most respectable man, will feel it far more than he will. He's a worthless brute but—well, shall we give him a warning and one more chance?"

"As a matter of fact—" Major Bongline began, looking up from the cigarette box. But nobody took any notice of him, and he never finished the sentence. Unanimous agreement was given to Mr. Strode's suggestion.

Basil Strode addressed the sinner with manly severity. The ladies looked on approvingly. The Major deliberately—and somewhat rudely—turned his back and went on with his polishing. Mr. Pepper and another young man exchanged the glance of humor.

Double Dick's manner was now subdued. However much he resented the lecture, he was physically afraid of the lecturer. He was quite silent. His head was downcast. His unclean hands held the hat that had been in the chaff-cutter. But his furtive eyes were busy.

When Strode had finished, Double Dick thanked him and thanked the ladies. It would be a lesson to him for the future—and—well, he was sorry that there had been any misunderstanding. They were poor, confused and inadequate words, and as he was speaking them he dropped his hat and picked it up again. And then he slunk away.

But the dropping of the hat was neither confused nor inadequate. He had dropped it exactly where he meant it to go. The way in which he had picked it up did more credit to his dexterity than to the sincerity of his penitence. But nobody noticed it.

He knew of a safe retired spot not far away, where he could sleep and eat in peace. Thither he bent his steps. On reaching it he would remove his hat once more, and take out from it the large Bath bun which he had so skilfully picked up. It was something, as it were, saved from the wreck. But that "half of a quarter of a chance" of getting even with the Rev. Basil Strode seemed to have receded further into the distance. Yet it had never been nearer. It was very near indeed now.