Читать книгу Perlycross: A Tale of the Western Hills - Blackmore Richard Doddridge - Страница 7

"Oh, Mr. Sergeant, how you did alarm me!" cried a very pretty damsel one fine October evening, as she almost fell upon the breast of "High Jarks," from some narrow stone steps at the corner of a lane. She was coming by the nearest way to the upper village, from the side-entrance to Walderscourt, a picturesque way but a rough one. For the lane was overhung, and even overwhelmed, with every kind of hindrance to the proper course of trade. Out of the sides, and especially at corners, where the right of way should have been most sacred, jutted forth obstacles most inconsiderate, or even of set purpose, malicious. If a great stool of fern could be treated as nothing, even with its jagged saws quivering, or a flexible ash could be shoved aside lightly, with the cowardly knowledge that it had no thorns; yet in ambush with their spears couched, would be the files of furze, the barbed brigade of holly, or the stiff picket of blackthorn. And any man, engaged with these deliveries of the moment, might thank his stars (when visible through the tangle overhead) if by any chance he missed a blinding thump in both his eyes.

Alas, it would have been indeed a blessing, as well as a just correction, for the well-seasoned master of the youth of Perlycross, if a benevolent switch from the hedgerow had taken him sharply in the eyes, that had so long descried nothing but motes in more tender orbs. As the young maid drew back from the warlike arm, which had been quite obliged to encircle her, one flash of her eyes entered those of Mr. Jakes; and he never saw again as he had seen before.

But his usual composure was not gone yet. A true schoolmaster is well assured, whatever the circumstance may be, that he is in the right, and all others in the wrong.

"I beg you will offer no apologies, Miss," he began with a very gracious smile, as he rubbed up the nap of his old velvet coat where a wicked boy had tallow-candled it: "I take it that you are a stranger here, and not quite familiar with our kind of road. The roads about here have a manner of showing that they know not in what direction they are going?"

"But, Mr. Sergeant, don't you know me? Not so very long ago, I ran up this very lane, over the plank-bridge, and up to this heling, because of the temper you were in. It was my brother Watty you wanted to catch: but you flourished your cane so, that the girls ran too. But you would not have beaten poor me, Mr. Sergeant?"

She skipped back a step or two, as if still afraid, and curtsied to show her pretty figure, and managed to let her bright hair fall down over the blush of her soft round cheeks. Then she lifted her eyes with the sweetest appeal; for the fair Tamar Haddon was a born coquette.

"Why, Tamar, my dear, can it possibly be you? I could never have supposed that you would come to this. You were always the prettiest child among the girls. But, as you know, I had nothing to do with them. My business has always been with the boys."

"And quite right, Mr. Sergeant – they are so much better, so much quicker to learn, as well as better-looking, and more interesting!"

"That depends upon who it may be," said Mr. Jakes judicially; "some girls are much better at round-hand, as well as arithmetic. But why have I lost sight of you all these years? And why have you grown such a – well, such a size?"

"Oh, you are rude! I am not a size at all. I thought that you always learned politeness in the wars. I am only seventeen round the waist – but you shan't see. No, no, stick you to the boys, Mr. Sergeant. I must be off. I didn't come out for pleasure. Good evening, sir; good evening to you!"

"Don't be in such a hurry, Miss Haddon. Don't you know when I used to give you sugar-plums out of this horn box? And if I may say it without offence, you are much too pretty to be in this dark place, without somebody to take care of you."

"Ah, now you are more like the Army again. There is nothing like a warrior, in my opinion. Oh, what a plague these brambles are! Would you mind just holding my hat for a moment? I mustn't go into the village, such a fright, or everybody will stare at me. My hair is such a trouble, I have half a mind sometimes to cut off every snip of it. No, no, you can't help me; men are much too clumsy."

Mr. Jakes was lost in deep admiration, and Tamar Haddon knew it well, and turned away to smile, as she sat upon a bank of moss, drawing her long tresses through the supple play of fingers and the rosy curve of palms; while her cherry lips were pouting and her brown eyes sparkling, in and out the golden shower from her saucy forehead. The schoolmaster held her little hat, and watched every movement of her hands and eyes, and wondered; for the gaiety of girlhood, and the blushes and the glances were as the opening of a new world to him.

"I know what you are thinking now, it's no good to deny it," she cried as she jumped up, and snatched her hat away; "you are saying to yourself – 'What a poor vain creature! Servants' hats are not allowed in well-conducted households.' But you must understand that I am not a common servant. I am a private lady's-maid to her ladyship, the Countess; and she has none of your old-fashioned English ways about her. She likes to see me look – well, perhaps you would not call it 'pretty,' for that depends upon the wearer, and I have no pretension to it – but tidy, and decent, and tolerably nice – "

"Wonderfully nice, and as lovely as a rose."

"Oh, Mr. Sergeant, you who must know so much better! But I have no time for such compliments, and they would turn my little head, from such a learned man as you are. How can I think of myself for a moment, when things are so dreadful? Poor Sir Thomas – you know how ill he is; he is longing for something, and I am sent to fetch it on the sly, so that Dr. Fox should have no idea, but her ladyship says that it can do no harm, now."

"What, the poor Colonel waiting, Miss, and I have kept you all this time? I was just on my way to enquire for him, when – when I happened to meet you. I can scarcely believe in any doctor conquering him."

"They are though – they are doing it. He is very low to-day. They seem to have brought him down to a flat knock-under, just as you do with the schoolboys. I can't hardly think of it, without crying."

The fair Tamar dropped her eyes, and hung her head a little, and then looked softly at the veteran, to plead for his warmest sympathy.

"There, I declare to you, I have cried so much that I can't cry no more," she continued with a sigh; "but it is a calf's sweetbread that I be bound to get; and where from, I'd like to know, unless it is to Mr. Robert's."

A pang shot through the heart of Mr. Jakes, and if his cane had been at hand he would have grasped it. For Mr. Robert was his own brother, the only butcher in the village, a man of festive nature (as a butcher ought to be), of no habitual dignity – and therefore known as "Low Jarks" – a favourite with the fair sex, and worst of all, some twenty years the junior of "High Jarks."

"What, young Bobby!" cried the Sergeant, striking out, "there is nothing that he knows worth speaking of. And what is more to the purpose, he never will know nothing. I mean to say 'anything.' Sometimes I go back from all my instructions all over the world, to the way – to the way you talk, in this part of the world."

"But, Mr. Sergeant, that is only natural; considering that you belong to this part of the world. Now, you do – don't you? However learned you may be."

"Well, I will not deny that it comes up sometimes. A man of my years – I mean, a young man by age, and yet one who has partaken in great motions, feels himself so very much above butchers' shops, and the like of them. And all the women – or as they call themselves now – all the ladies of the neighbourhood, have now been so well educated, that they think a great deal of the difference."

"To be sure," said Tamar Haddon, "I can quite see that. But how could they get their meat, without the butchers' shops? Some people are too learned, Mr. Sergeant."

"I know it, Miss. But I am very particular, not to let any one say it of me. I could quote Latin, if I chose: but who would put a spill to my pipe afterwards? One must never indulge in all one knows."

"Well, it does seem a pity, after spending years about it. But here we are, come to the river-side at last. You mustn't think of coming across the plank with me. It would never do to have you drownded; and you know what Betty Cork is. Why, all the boys to Perlycross would be making mouths to-morrow? And I shall go home along the turnpike-road."

The schoolmaster saw the discretion of this. Charmed as he was with this gay young maid, he must never forget what was thought of him.

For she was the daughter of Walter Haddon, the landlord of the Ivy-bush, a highly respectable place, and therefore jealous of the parish reputation. Moreover the handrail of the footbridge was now on the side of his empty sleeve; and the plank being very light and tremulous, he feared to recross it without stepping backward, which was better done without spectators. So he stayed where he was, while she tripped across, without even touching the handrail; and the dark gleam of the limpid Perle, in the twilight of gray branches, fluttered with her passing shadow.

Just as she turned on the opposite bank, where cart-ruts ridged the water's brink, and was kissing her hand to the ancient soldier, with a gay "Good evening!" – the deep boom of a big bell rang, and quivered throughout the valley. Cattle in the meadows ceased from browsing, and looked up as if they were called, birds made wing for the distant wood, and sere leaves in the stillness rustled, as the solemn thrill trembled in the darkening air.

"For God's sake, count," the old soldier cried, raising the hat from his grizzled head, and mounting a hillock clear of bushes; "it is the big bell tolling!"

But the frolicsome maiden had disappeared, and he was left to count alone.

At intervals of a minute, while the fall of night grew heavier, the burden of the passing-bell was laid on mortal ears and hearts.

"Time is over for one more,"

was graven on the front of it, and was borne along the valley; while the echo of the hills brought home the lesson of the reverse —

"Soon shall thy own life be o'er."

Keeping throbbing count, the listener spread the fingers of his one hand upon his threadbare waistcoat; and they trembled more and more, as the number grew towards the fatal forty-nine. When the forty-ninth stroke ceased to ring, and the last pulsation died away, he stood as if his own life depended on the number fifty. But the knell was finished; the years it told of were but forty-nine – gone by, like the minutes between the strokes.

"Old Channing perhaps is looking at the tower-clock. Hark! In a moment, he will strike another stroke." But old Channing knew his arithmetic too well.

"Now God forgive me for a sinful man – or worse than a man, an ungrateful beast!" cried the Sergeant, falling upon his knees, with sorrow embittered by the shameful thought, that while his old chief was at the latest gasp, himself had been flirting merrily with a handmaid of the house, and sniggering like a raw recruit. He wiped his eyes with the back of his hand, and the lesson of the bell fell on him.

It had fallen at the same time upon ears more heedful, and less needful of it. Mr. Penniloe, on his homeward road, received the mournful message, and met the groom who had ridden so hard to save the angelical hour. And truly, if there be any value in the ancient saying —

"Happy is the soul

That hath a speedy toll,"

the flight of Sir Thomas Waldron's spirit was in the right direction.

The clergyman turned from his homeward path, and hastened to the house of mourning. He scarcely expected that any one as yet would care to come down, or speak to him; but the least he could do was to offer his help. In the hush of the dusk, he was shown through the hall, and into a little sitting-room favoured by the ladies. Believing that he was quite alone, for no one moved, and the light was nearly spent, he took a seat by the curtained window, and sank into a train of sombre thoughts. But presently a lapping sound aroused him, and going to the sofa, there he found his favourite Nicie overcome with sorrow, her head drooping back, like a wind-tossed flower; while Pixie, with a piteous gaze, was nestling to her side, and offering every now and then the silent comfort of his tongue.

"What is it, my dear?" The Parson asked, as if he did not know too well. But who knows what to say sometimes? Then, shocked at himself, he said – "Don't, my dear." But she went on sobbing, as if he had not spoken; and he thought of his little Fay, when she lost her mother.

He was too kind to try any consolations, or press the sense of duty yet; but he put on his glasses, and took little Pixie, and began to stroke his wrinkled brow.

"This dear little thing is crying too," he whispered; and certainly there were tears, his own or another's, on the velvet nose. Then Nicie rose slowly, and put back her hair, and tried to look bravely at both of them.

"If mother could only cry," she said; "but she has not moved once, and she will not come away. There is one thing she ought to do, but she cannot; and I am afraid that I should never do it right. Oh, will you do it, Uncle Penniloe? It would be an excuse to get her out of the room; and then we might make her lie down, and be better. My father is gone; and will mother go too?"

Speaking as steadily as she could, but breaking down every now and then, she told him, that there was a certain old ring, of no great value, but very curious, which her father had said many years ago he would like to have buried with him. He seemed to have forgotten it, throughout his long illness; but his wife had remembered it suddenly, and had told them where to find it. It was found by a trusty servant now; and she was present, while Mr. Penniloe placed it on the icy finger, and dropped a tear on the forehead of his friend, holy now in the last repose.

On his homeward path that night, the Curate saw through the gloom of lonely sorrow many a storm impending. Who was there now to hold the parish in the bonds of amity, to reconcile the farmers' feuds, to help the struggling tradesman, to bury the aged cripple, to do any of those countless deeds of good-will and humanity, which are less than the discount of the interest of the debt, due from the wealthy to the poor?

And who would cheer him now with bold decision, and kind deference, in all those difficulties which beset the country clergyman, who hates to strain his duty, yet is fearful of relaxing it? Such difficulties must arise; and though there certainly was in those days, a great deal more fair give-and-take than can be now expected, there was less of settled rule and guidance for a peaceful parson. Moreover, he felt the important charge which he had undertaken, as co-trustee of large estates, as well as a nervous dread of being involved in heavy outlay, with no rich friend to back him now, concerning the repairs, and in some measure the rebuilding, of the large and noble parish church.

But all these personal troubles vanished, in the memories of true friendship, and in holy confidence, when he performed that last sad duty in the dismantled church, and then in the eastern nook of the long graveyard. He had dreaded this trial not a little, but knew what his dear friend would have wished; and the needful strength was given him.

It has been said, and is true too often (through our present usages) that one funeral makes many. A strong east wind of unwonted bitterness at this time of year – it was now the last day of October – whistled through the crowd of mourners, fluttered scarf, and crape, and veil, and set old Channing's last tooth raging, and tossed the minister's whitening locks, and the leaves of the Office for the Dead. So cold was the air, that people of real pity and good feeling, if they had no friends in the village, hied to the Ivy-bush, when all was over, and called for hot brandy and water.

But among them was not Mr. Jakes, though he needed a stimulus as much as any. He lingered in the churchyard, till the banking up was done, and every one else had quitted it. When all alone, he scooped a hole at the head of the grave, and filled it with a bunch of white chrysanthemums, imbedded firmly to defy the wind. Then he returned to the sombre school-room, at the west end of the churchyard, and with one window looking into it. There, although he had flint and tinder, he did not even light a dip, but sat for hours in his chair of office, with his head laid on the old oak desk. Rough, and sad, and tumbled memories passed before his gray-thatched eyes, and stirred the recesses of his rugged heart.

Suddenly a shadow fell across his desk. He rose from his dream of the past, and turning saw the half-moon quivering aslant, through the diamond panes of the lattice. For a minute he listened, but there was nothing to be heard, except a long low melancholy wail. Then he buttoned his coat, his best Sunday black, and was ashamed to find the empty cuff wet, as the bib of an infant, but with the tears of motherless old age.

After his manner – when no boys were nigh – he condemned himself for an ancient fool, and was about to strike a light, when the sad low sound fell again upon his ears. Determined to know what the meaning of it was, he groped for his hat, and stout oak staff, and entered the churchyard by the little iron gate, the private way from the school premises.

The silence was as deep as the stillness of the dead; but, by the light of the westering moon, he made his way among the white tombstones, and the rubbish of the builders, to the eastern corner where Sir Thomas Waldron lay. His old chief's grave was fair and smooth, and the crisp earth glistened in the moonlight, for the wind had fallen, and a frost was setting in; but a small black figure lay on the crown, close to the bunch of flowers. A low growl met him; and then a dismal wail of anguish, beyond any power of words or tears, trembled along the wan alleys of the dead, and lingered in the shadowy recesses of the church.

"Good little Jess, thou art truer than mankind," said the Sergeant, and marched away to his lonely bed.