Читать книгу Henry Smeaton - G. P. R. James - Страница 12

The animal which now trotted up to the door of this very rural inn was certainly what the worthy landlord might denominate a "hoss;" but it looked much more like a barrel on four legs, and those not very long ones. It was, in fact, a little short pursy galloway, as fat as it could be, and this fat must have been of a very perdurable kind, for though the dust with which it was covered, and some splashes of mud upon its legs, seemed to indicate that it had come a long way, yet it had certainly lost none of its bulk by the process of perspiration. It was sleek and well to do, in short, and when its master stopped at the little public-house, it stretched out its nose, as if prepared to ask the first person who appeared, if it could have the dinner and bed which the inscription promised. The rider was a short fattish man, somewhat resembling his beast, but rather more gaudily attired; for the pony contented himself with a coat of grey, while he who bestrid him was dressed, like Joseph, in a garment of many colours.

The old man upon the ladder heard the horse's feet on the road, and turned round to gaze, resting from his work the while. The sight of a stranger in the place seemed to give him no pleasure. He was callous to all such things, and he only set his jaws tight together, and mumbled something to himself. A boy, and then an old woman, came out from the house. The stranger dismounted, took his saddle-bags from the pony's back, and entered the little dwelling. The boy led the pony round to the rear of the house, and the old man assailed the yew-tree again.

If, however, he thought he was to go on uninterruptedly that morning, he was mistaken; for, in about five minutes more, the stranger walked up to the gate of the churchyard, advanced to the foot of the ladder, and looked up. The other took no notice of him whatever, except by stretching forth his arm, and, with greater strength than one might have believed him to possess, striking off a somewhat thicker branch of yew than usual, which fell upon the visitor's head and knocked his hat off.

"Ay! ashes to ashes, dust to dust!" muttered the old man, with a slight smile curling the corner of his mouth.

The other picked up his hat, brushed off the dust with his coat-sleeve, and then, without any observation on the accident, raised his voice, saying,

"I wish you would come down, sexton, and let me into the church."

"What makes you think I am sexton?" asked the old man, gruffly. "I never buried you or any of your kin."

"No, but you look like old father Time," answered the other, laughing; "and he buries all men."

"Then you should take me by the forelock," answered the sexton, whom the joke seemed to mollify a little; "and I have no forelock to take. So you are out, master. I am the sexton, however. But what do you want in the church?"

"I hear you have some fine statues there," replied the other; "and I want to see them."

But the old man was not yet satisfied.

"Why, what do you know about statues?" he asked, running his eye over the round, fat, unstatue-like figure of the other, with a somewhat contemptuous look.

"More than you do, old boy," replied the visitor, "though perhaps you have lived amongst them all your life; for I have made them all my life; and, depend upon it, there is no such way of knowing a thing as making it."

"That depends upon the workman," answered the sexton, beginning to descend the ladder. "I have made graves all my days, and yet don't know them as well as many who are lying underneath there. But I'll let you in," he added, in a more placable tone; "for they are fine monuments, finer than any for a hundred miles round; and, if you do know anything about such things, you'll say so."

When he reached the ground, he picked up his coat, fumbled in his pocket till he got hold of a large bunch of keys, and then, walking round to the door, opened it. The stranger entered, and his guide followed, with his back bowed and his gait somewhat halting. He had the same sort of cynical expression on his countenance as before; but the visitor's first exclamation seemed to please him; for all the pride of his nature--and every man has some pride--centred in his church and its contents.

"Ay, this is something like!" exclaimed our good friend, Van Noost; "I have not seen anything like this in a ride of a hundred and fifty miles."

"Dare say not," observed the sexton. "Did you come all that way to see it?"

"No," replied Van Noost, who was somewhat skilful at evasions; "but I am very glad I have seen it." And, walking on, he began to scan the various monuments with critical eyes.

"Why, the barbarians have been knocking the noses off!" he exclaimed, after a momentary glance at one of the tombs. "Why did you let them do that?"

"Because I could not help it," answered the sexton, with a growling laugh; "seeing I was a baby and they strong men when that was done, and yet I am three score and ten, come Martinmas."

"Ay, Cromwell, that devil, Cromwell, and his sacrilegious fools!" cried Van Noost. "They had no more taste or judgment than pigs in Smithfield."

"That's true--that's true," cried the old sexton, chuckling. "I remember them well enough; for I was a school-boy when old Noll died, and heard him preach once. Those might understand him who could. To me, he seemed to be talking nothing but nonsense; so I grinned, and one of his soldiers gave me a thump in the side with his fire-lock which nearly broke my ribs."

"Then you have cause to remember him," answered Van Noost, "and not to like him either. These are better times, master sexton."

"I don't know that," replied the man, gruffly. "We have got a foreigner for our king, and that's as bad as a Protector--at least, I think so. But I don't know much of such matters," he added, with a look of shrewd caution, coming upon his face. "King George may be a very good man, and Hanover rats as good as any other vermin, for aught I know."

Van Noost laughed aloud, and replied with a significant nod of the head--

"They may have a rat-catcher amongst them some day soon, master sexton; but that is not my business either. Gracious goodness, how dirty these monuments are! And half the brasses are gone out of the marble!"

"Ay, they took the brass to make farthings of," said the sexton; "and, as to the dirt, how can an old man like me keep such things clean? Besides, I don't know how to clean them properly, and I am afraid of spoiling them."

"I'll tell you what, old boy," replied Van Noost; "I am going to stay here for a day or two, and help you. I know all about it; and, if I have time and can get a little clay, I'll cast you a leaden head and put it on that cherub at the corner. A cherub is nothing without a head you know, master sexton, because it has got no body."

"Going to stay here for two or three days!" ejaculated the sexton. "Well, that's funny! I never knew any one stay here a minute after he could help it. Perhaps you have come down to these parts to make inquiries?"

"No," answered Van Noost, "no; I don't like inquiries, and always get out of their way."

The sexton put his finger to his bald forehead, and rubbed it slowly for a moment, repeating the word. "Ha!" more than once, and then Van Noost added in his usual poco-curante tone--

"That is the very reason I came down here, master sexton. People were making important inquiries, which offended me, and I left London in a fit of indignation."

Ha! said the sexton again. "I understand. You'll be safe enough here, master. You'll see plenty of curlews, and a sea-mew from time to time. I've known a roe deer too, in my day, down about the woody places; but men and women are the rarest birds of all in this country:" and, laying his old hand familiarly on Van Noost's shoulder, he added, with a laugh, "No bailiff has been seen in these parts for forty years. That I can certify."

"I fear not bailiffs!" exclaimed Van Noost, in a mock tragical tone. "Sexton, I am well to do in the world. I pay scot and lot, and owe no man any thing--though many owe me, by the way, who will never pay me. No, no, sexton, 'tis not for debt of vile and sordid gold that men, perhaps, may seek me, but for those thin ethereal essences called opinions, which suit not with the tyranny of the times."

The sexton chuckled, for he had a strong sense of the ludicrous, and Van Noost's bombast amused him.

"Ay, ay," he said, laughing and coughing; "how many a man there is who is obliged to make his heels save his head for the indiscretion of his tongue! Now, I'll warrant you've been swaggering about London in praise of King James, till you got frightened to death for fear King George should get hold of you. But you're safe enough here, man, you're safe enough here. Sergeants and pursuivants are as rare here as bailiffs, and it is not likely they'll be able to track you across the hills, even if a price should be set upon your head."

"There is no price upon my head," cried Van Noost, with a strong feeling of nervous apprehension at the very idea. "They could not hurt me even if they took me; but I love my liberty, master sexton, and should pine to death if I were cribbed up in a prison-cell."

"It would take a long time to pine you down even to a moderate size," replied the sexton, in a thoughtful sort of tone. "I've dug many a grave in my day, and there's only one I recollect that would have held you. You are so fat here behind."

"I have committed no crime," continued Van Noost, anxious to disabuse his companion's mind of the idea that he might be harbouring a traitor. "I have committed no crime, I say; and the blessed English law admits that men may talk treason, though they may not do it."

"Ay, the tongue, the tongue!" exclaimed the sexton. "That's what has brought you into danger, I can see well enough. It is an unruly member, as the Bible says; but here you will be quite safe. If I have to bury you, I ought to have a crown more for the width of the grave. I had when the fat parson died, this time thirty years ago, though his heirs said they did not like to pay for his fat. But hark more people on horseback all in one day! Master, I've a notion they've tracked you close."

Poor Van Noost lost his rosy, colour in a moment; for no man liked less the idea of martyrdom than he did.

"For Heaven's sake, my good friend," he cried, as the old sexton peeped through a chink of the church door, which had been left ajar, "for Heaven's sake, cannot you put me somewhere where they will not find me? Let me go into the vestry!"

The sexton eyed him, with his quiet old cynical smile. "How fond fat men are of life!" he said. "The vestry! They'd find you there in a minute. Here, you fool, go in there down into the vaults. They'll not look there, I'll warrant."

As he spoke, he unlocked a small door which lay in a shady nook between two pilasters; and, under the impulse of fear, Van Noost hurried in, without a word, taking his chance of the old man recollecting to let him out again. He saw the head of a flight of steps before him, and was rushing down, when the sound of the key turning in the lock raised up new fears in his mind, and he paused for a moment to listen. The only sound he could hear at first was produced by the slow irregular step of the old sexton upon the pavement of the church, as he again walked towards the great door, and then a loud manly voice from without was heard, as if saying to some one at a distance--"Walk them about till we come back. The air is keen upon these hills, even at midsummer."

The next instant, another voice answered, "I like that free fresh air. It feels like liberty."

"Liberty!" said the other voice. "Have you ever felt the want of liberty?"

"They are marvellous sweet-tongued officers," thought Van Noost, listening. But no reply was made to the question, or, if any, it was drowned by the cough of the old sexton; and, when that had a little subsided, the second voice which had spoken was heard, saying--

"We want to go all over the church, good Master Mattocks."

Van Noost trembled for the security of his hiding-place; but he was relieved in an instant; for the same voice went on saying--

"So you must show us all the monuments and tell us all about them; for this gentleman will not be satisfied with half information, I can assure you."

"That I will, my lady," answered the old man, "that is to say, all I know; for I never like to say things I only guess."

"My lady!" said Van Noost, to himself. "Ho, ho! It is a party come to visit the church; and I am shut up here like a rat in a rat-trap, when I could have given them much more information than that old mummy, who has dealt so long with corpses that he has caught the look of them. I have a great mind to knock to get out. They'll be in sad want of a better cicerone."

Caution, however, got the better of vanity; and, after a little consideration, he began to feel his way down the steps, resolved to see what the vaults contained. At first, the place seemed dark enough; but, as he descended, he found that he had been admitted, not to funeral vaults in the usual acceptation of the word, but to a crypt or underground church, of a much earlier style of architecture than the structure above. Low arched windows, earthed up for at least two-thirds of their height, admitted sufficient light to render every object round dimly visible. Monuments and carvings were seen in various different directions; and, with true antiquarian enthusiasm, Van Noost soon forgot what was passing above in the examination of all that surrounded him.